before we get to this week’s case study
there’s something that’s very important
that goes beyond case studies and it
directly affects you and me and that’s
what’s happened with hurricane Harvey in
the south coast from Houston to Corpus
Christi it’s just devastating it breaks
your heart to see what’s going on down
there and part of a company that Pat and
I are also a part of people helping
people this week it’s people helping
Houston so go find people helping
Houston on GoFundMe and give what you
can we will direct that money directly
to a relief organization that has the
ability to get supplies down to those
that need it most
remember the need keeps going even after
the waters recede kids need backpacks
and clothing to get back to school and
they’re living out of a hotel because
their apartments been devastated young
people need an a refrigerator at their
new apartment wherever they’re going
there are so many needs it will keep on
going long after the airports are open
and Houston seems to be back to normal
there’s a lot of people that will be
there so please go to people helping
Houston and GoFundMe and give what you
can a hundred percent of the proceeds
accept the fee for GoFundMe and the
credit card fee but a hundred percent
goes down there to those agencies it’ll
help thank you for watching here at
value tainment and PHP agency’
we care welcome back to case studies
with the biz doc and you know
everybody’s been asking about examples
of companies that didn’t make it and why
so we’re gonna go speed round this week
with three of them that are unrelated to
each other in terms of product or
category but they are all related to
each other in that it didn’t go well and
there’s a lesson that you and I can
learn so let’s rip through them and I
hope you learn something and I leave you
better than I found you number one a
pretty good idea
BP it was like sort of a a brokered site
for used cars where they would take your
used car on consignment spruce it up a
little bit now they wouldn’t change the
brakes of the tires but they would make
it look as good as it can in its current
condition and they would broker the sale
for you and then you got the money for
it – a fee it was a pretty good idea and
I think it helps people who are busy
sell their car I think if you could see
venture capitalists and other people
getting involved which they did in 2014
2014 they raised 1.25 seed money and
look at this 2014 was spent raising
money they had then five million part of
the year six million then twelve
seven holy moly and then in the middle
of 2015 another 70 million
they raised 149 and then it all came to
a screeching halt
screeching halts good for used cars
isn’t it in 2016 where they have what I
called the oxygen round give me just
enough so I can take the assets of this
thing in the software and sell it to
something else and then God rest there
saw huerta in 2017 they’re gone after
having a valuation of 560 million
dollars so that’s the dollars of it but
what happened along the way why didn’t
it work
busy people I could see them saying hey
take my car spruce it up detail it I’ll
pay it for that whatever it is and then
you come back with a check to me my car
is sold seems like it would work except
like uber and other things you got to
keep expanding city to city so that’s an
operation in every city you can’t just
ship your car to floor enough to do that
when they’re actually touching the
physical car they got to do it neat
cities so they had to expand and part of
what happened they had kind of a rough
growth plan and along the way as happens
with entrepreneurs here’s that word
again one of the biz Doc’s favorite
words hubris you’ve got all this money
and it’s other people’s money sometimes
you don’t think of it as if it’s your
own such as you’re selling a Volkswagen
Beetle for $3500 at 26 miles a gallon
but you bought a $10,000 couch for the
office that gets a zero miles per gallon
and the only thing in common is that you
can screw in the back of beeble and you
screw on a couch that’s all they have in
common
meanwhile this is just mismanagement of
money and it’s other people’s money and
your growth plan going city to city and
so the growth plan fell over they were
full of hubris and mismanaged a really
good amount of money they had look at
this they could have gotten up to 20 or
30 cities with a good operation with
that kind of money but it didn’t happen
so a good and interesting idea that
maybe could have had some legs or head
wheels doesn’t quite make it onward
number two number two we go to Jusuru
and this is actually one of my favorites
because it falls into the great what are
you thinking file and I have a special
file that I love and it’s all these
things of live what were you thinking
what were you thinking you and I both
know what that’s all about
jusuru
for tons of pressure generated by a
little juicer to squeeze fruit and they
would sell you the little bag of fruit
that we get shipped to you so you get
these little bags of fruit for five to
eight dollars put it in a what four
hundred let’s see first of all was a
$700
Andrew help me out here with seven
hundred dollars for model one wasn’t it
yes seven hundred dollars to put five to
seven dollars with a fruit in it but
wait wait wait wait wait let’s go back a
second seven hundred dollars for the
model one that’s what she said wasn’t
Andrew yes it wasn’t what you said so
seven hundred dollars for model one and
oh by the way it had to be connected to
the internet so that it could understand
that the juice product you just bought
was within its expiration date window
that what you were putting in the number
that was on the bag of juice was
actually you know was was still fresh
but still seven hundred dollars for this
thing that allegedly generated four tons
there’s only one word for that as damn
that is just overkill
and it said it generated four tons of
pressure that’s good marketing better
get a question when my daughter was
small she could squeeze a grape like
this and she could turn a banana into
gelatinous goo in six seconds and I’m
pretty sure she wasn’t generating four
tons of pressure in her little
one-year-old hand so I think the
advertisement generates four tons of
pressure I think was out there also
there’s a very funny thing happened I
think was a Bloomberg reporter is am i
right Bloomberg Bloomberg reporter
orders a bag of it gets it in the mail
holds it over a glass takes all the
fruit squeeze squeeze squeeze squeeze
and the glass and goes hey that’s really
tasty and then said to himself why do I
need the $700 thing well they hired
Believe It or Not the ex-president of
coke because I think we can make it if
we just get a little bit more money I
think we can make it and get going and
the only thing this had in common with
coke is at the end of day you had both
had liquid because coke is a beverage
manufacturing company not a hard good or
appliance manufacturing company and they
are completely different in how you do
it
nonetheless president Koch puts his name
on this thing and comes and joins let’s
take a look well in 2013 they raised
four million bucks then sixteen and a
half and then they skipped a year and
they raised seventy and sixteen so it
raised about a hundred and eighteen
million dollars
on a mechanical product it’s really hard
to be in the mechanical appliance
product business they managed to drop it
down to $400 for like the model 2 or
whatever they called it and they’re
still kicking right now but sorta I mean
that they’re selling it for $400
so I got to say you know man a $400
juicer when you juice is available
everywhere and now thanks to delivery
through many many different things
including
you know uber you can get meals and
stuff delivered right to you so you can
get a whole tray full of juice delivered
from your local juice bar by uber and so
you don’t need a juicer Roo to do that
so I think this was just um I don’t know
I think it was you know well-managed
because they live so long but they were
in denial about what people actually pay
money for this that I don’t think it was
tested well which leaves us speaking of
testing leads us to the last one yak yak
yak yak was anonymous fully anonymous
messaging but was primarily aimed at
teens and college students so you
basically enabled bullying UA enabled
harassment after relationships breakup
you enabled people to make bomb threats
and death threats against professors in
schools and so this group of people
adolescents and young people growing up
wondering what they’re gonna do getting
angry about something
Yik yak was the perfect tool to go send
an anonymous message to somebody when
you’re completely pissed off whatever
result there’s a lot of negative bad
things that happen about this bomb
threats were taken seriously people were
really worried about stalking
ex-boyfriends and ex-girlfriends and it
didn’t last long
2014 they raised 1.5 million then 10
then 62 so 2014 there was a bunch of
people that said a messaging app that
does so well this is really great and
it’s anonymous Wow how cool could that
be but the byproduct was horrifying
anyway they got up to a four hundred
million dollar valuation but then 2017
Yik yak Mirta death out of the game
what’s interesting is Yik yak to do
anonymous messaging I don’t know why
they did it but the logo they saw
acted was a yak that’s right a yak now
you would figure if you’re dealing with
high school and college students that
your logo would be something horny but I
can’t figure out why you thought that
this was ultimately gonna be good so
let’s do a fast recap now let’s look at
what you and I can both learn from this
first of all BP I think on the product
concept side what hurt them was their
growth plan and mismanagement of funds
was the human side the product concept
side on Jusuru its I think it was boils
down to that $700 from model 1 $400 from
model 2 for a juicer and you may owe me
5 to 7 dollars with the stuff that I
could go down and get 4 to $5 you know
nice smoothie at my favorite juice bar I
saw but it had to be well-managed
because they they actually advertised it
there are 400 ultra custom parts that go
into this machine TechCrunch and God
love you TechCrunch I love what you said
here they said they should get some sort
of award for having 400 custom parts put
into an overpriced appliance that nobody
would buy there’s got to be some sort of
award for that and I call that like the
denial award you get an absolute denial
award because if you had sat back and
talk to people about what what they
would pay for this I think you would
have got some good data and may have
gone the other way with this Yik yak I
think it’s just wrong and somebody
should have sat there and said wait a
minute the unintended consequences and
everything could happen here is just
staggering so but I think to build
messaging apps that are scalable that
don’t fall over I think you have to be
clever so on the human side I just say
hey it was clever and Mis misdirected
genius
because if you can build something like
that that kind of scale those are
complicated systems and you know hats
off to the engineering team but putting
it to work this way 9nn I know so
there’s three examples this week of
failed because I guess you guys like
watching fails I could see you all in
YouTube probably watching all those like
diving board fails because everybody’s I
can’t want to see more fails I want to
hear about how they failed and why they
failed so there’s three for this week
and speaking of fails I need the pillow
that never fails value tainment the
channel that never fails to deliver
fantastic entrepreneurial content for
everyone on the internet it’s the number
one channel for exactly that until next
time I’m Tommy Lasorda I hope I left you
better than I found you [Music]
there’s something that’s very important
that goes beyond case studies and it
directly affects you and me and that’s
what’s happened with hurricane Harvey in
the south coast from Houston to Corpus
Christi it’s just devastating it breaks
your heart to see what’s going on down
there and part of a company that Pat and
I are also a part of people helping
people this week it’s people helping
Houston so go find people helping
Houston on GoFundMe and give what you
can we will direct that money directly
to a relief organization that has the
ability to get supplies down to those
that need it most
remember the need keeps going even after
the waters recede kids need backpacks
and clothing to get back to school and
they’re living out of a hotel because
their apartments been devastated young
people need an a refrigerator at their
new apartment wherever they’re going
there are so many needs it will keep on
going long after the airports are open
and Houston seems to be back to normal
there’s a lot of people that will be
there so please go to people helping
Houston and GoFundMe and give what you
can a hundred percent of the proceeds
accept the fee for GoFundMe and the
credit card fee but a hundred percent
goes down there to those agencies it’ll
help thank you for watching here at
value tainment and PHP agency’
we care welcome back to case studies
with the biz doc and you know
everybody’s been asking about examples
of companies that didn’t make it and why
so we’re gonna go speed round this week
with three of them that are unrelated to
each other in terms of product or
category but they are all related to
each other in that it didn’t go well and
there’s a lesson that you and I can
learn so let’s rip through them and I
hope you learn something and I leave you
better than I found you number one a
pretty good idea
BP it was like sort of a a brokered site
for used cars where they would take your
used car on consignment spruce it up a
little bit now they wouldn’t change the
brakes of the tires but they would make
it look as good as it can in its current
condition and they would broker the sale
for you and then you got the money for
it – a fee it was a pretty good idea and
I think it helps people who are busy
sell their car I think if you could see
venture capitalists and other people
getting involved which they did in 2014
2014 they raised 1.25 seed money and
look at this 2014 was spent raising
money they had then five million part of
the year six million then twelve
seven holy moly and then in the middle
of 2015 another 70 million
they raised 149 and then it all came to
a screeching halt
screeching halts good for used cars
isn’t it in 2016 where they have what I
called the oxygen round give me just
enough so I can take the assets of this
thing in the software and sell it to
something else and then God rest there
saw huerta in 2017 they’re gone after
having a valuation of 560 million
dollars so that’s the dollars of it but
what happened along the way why didn’t
it work
busy people I could see them saying hey
take my car spruce it up detail it I’ll
pay it for that whatever it is and then
you come back with a check to me my car
is sold seems like it would work except
like uber and other things you got to
keep expanding city to city so that’s an
operation in every city you can’t just
ship your car to floor enough to do that
when they’re actually touching the
physical car they got to do it neat
cities so they had to expand and part of
what happened they had kind of a rough
growth plan and along the way as happens
with entrepreneurs here’s that word
again one of the biz Doc’s favorite
words hubris you’ve got all this money
and it’s other people’s money sometimes
you don’t think of it as if it’s your
own such as you’re selling a Volkswagen
Beetle for $3500 at 26 miles a gallon
but you bought a $10,000 couch for the
office that gets a zero miles per gallon
and the only thing in common is that you
can screw in the back of beeble and you
screw on a couch that’s all they have in
common
meanwhile this is just mismanagement of
money and it’s other people’s money and
your growth plan going city to city and
so the growth plan fell over they were
full of hubris and mismanaged a really
good amount of money they had look at
this they could have gotten up to 20 or
30 cities with a good operation with
that kind of money but it didn’t happen
so a good and interesting idea that
maybe could have had some legs or head
wheels doesn’t quite make it onward
number two number two we go to Jusuru
and this is actually one of my favorites
because it falls into the great what are
you thinking file and I have a special
file that I love and it’s all these
things of live what were you thinking
what were you thinking you and I both
know what that’s all about
jusuru
for tons of pressure generated by a
little juicer to squeeze fruit and they
would sell you the little bag of fruit
that we get shipped to you so you get
these little bags of fruit for five to
eight dollars put it in a what four
hundred let’s see first of all was a
$700
Andrew help me out here with seven
hundred dollars for model one wasn’t it
yes seven hundred dollars to put five to
seven dollars with a fruit in it but
wait wait wait wait wait let’s go back a
second seven hundred dollars for the
model one that’s what she said wasn’t
Andrew yes it wasn’t what you said so
seven hundred dollars for model one and
oh by the way it had to be connected to
the internet so that it could understand
that the juice product you just bought
was within its expiration date window
that what you were putting in the number
that was on the bag of juice was
actually you know was was still fresh
but still seven hundred dollars for this
thing that allegedly generated four tons
there’s only one word for that as damn
that is just overkill
and it said it generated four tons of
pressure that’s good marketing better
get a question when my daughter was
small she could squeeze a grape like
this and she could turn a banana into
gelatinous goo in six seconds and I’m
pretty sure she wasn’t generating four
tons of pressure in her little
one-year-old hand so I think the
advertisement generates four tons of
pressure I think was out there also
there’s a very funny thing happened I
think was a Bloomberg reporter is am i
right Bloomberg Bloomberg reporter
orders a bag of it gets it in the mail
holds it over a glass takes all the
fruit squeeze squeeze squeeze squeeze
and the glass and goes hey that’s really
tasty and then said to himself why do I
need the $700 thing well they hired
Believe It or Not the ex-president of
coke because I think we can make it if
we just get a little bit more money I
think we can make it and get going and
the only thing this had in common with
coke is at the end of day you had both
had liquid because coke is a beverage
manufacturing company not a hard good or
appliance manufacturing company and they
are completely different in how you do
it
nonetheless president Koch puts his name
on this thing and comes and joins let’s
take a look well in 2013 they raised
four million bucks then sixteen and a
half and then they skipped a year and
they raised seventy and sixteen so it
raised about a hundred and eighteen
million dollars
on a mechanical product it’s really hard
to be in the mechanical appliance
product business they managed to drop it
down to $400 for like the model 2 or
whatever they called it and they’re
still kicking right now but sorta I mean
that they’re selling it for $400
so I got to say you know man a $400
juicer when you juice is available
everywhere and now thanks to delivery
through many many different things
including
you know uber you can get meals and
stuff delivered right to you so you can
get a whole tray full of juice delivered
from your local juice bar by uber and so
you don’t need a juicer Roo to do that
so I think this was just um I don’t know
I think it was you know well-managed
because they live so long but they were
in denial about what people actually pay
money for this that I don’t think it was
tested well which leaves us speaking of
testing leads us to the last one yak yak
yak yak was anonymous fully anonymous
messaging but was primarily aimed at
teens and college students so you
basically enabled bullying UA enabled
harassment after relationships breakup
you enabled people to make bomb threats
and death threats against professors in
schools and so this group of people
adolescents and young people growing up
wondering what they’re gonna do getting
angry about something
Yik yak was the perfect tool to go send
an anonymous message to somebody when
you’re completely pissed off whatever
result there’s a lot of negative bad
things that happen about this bomb
threats were taken seriously people were
really worried about stalking
ex-boyfriends and ex-girlfriends and it
didn’t last long
2014 they raised 1.5 million then 10
then 62 so 2014 there was a bunch of
people that said a messaging app that
does so well this is really great and
it’s anonymous Wow how cool could that
be but the byproduct was horrifying
anyway they got up to a four hundred
million dollar valuation but then 2017
Yik yak Mirta death out of the game
what’s interesting is Yik yak to do
anonymous messaging I don’t know why
they did it but the logo they saw
acted was a yak that’s right a yak now
you would figure if you’re dealing with
high school and college students that
your logo would be something horny but I
can’t figure out why you thought that
this was ultimately gonna be good so
let’s do a fast recap now let’s look at
what you and I can both learn from this
first of all BP I think on the product
concept side what hurt them was their
growth plan and mismanagement of funds
was the human side the product concept
side on Jusuru its I think it was boils
down to that $700 from model 1 $400 from
model 2 for a juicer and you may owe me
5 to 7 dollars with the stuff that I
could go down and get 4 to $5 you know
nice smoothie at my favorite juice bar I
saw but it had to be well-managed
because they they actually advertised it
there are 400 ultra custom parts that go
into this machine TechCrunch and God
love you TechCrunch I love what you said
here they said they should get some sort
of award for having 400 custom parts put
into an overpriced appliance that nobody
would buy there’s got to be some sort of
award for that and I call that like the
denial award you get an absolute denial
award because if you had sat back and
talk to people about what what they
would pay for this I think you would
have got some good data and may have
gone the other way with this Yik yak I
think it’s just wrong and somebody
should have sat there and said wait a
minute the unintended consequences and
everything could happen here is just
staggering so but I think to build
messaging apps that are scalable that
don’t fall over I think you have to be
clever so on the human side I just say
hey it was clever and Mis misdirected
genius
because if you can build something like
that that kind of scale those are
complicated systems and you know hats
off to the engineering team but putting
it to work this way 9nn I know so
there’s three examples this week of
failed because I guess you guys like
watching fails I could see you all in
YouTube probably watching all those like
diving board fails because everybody’s I
can’t want to see more fails I want to
hear about how they failed and why they
failed so there’s three for this week
and speaking of fails I need the pillow
that never fails value tainment the
channel that never fails to deliver
fantastic entrepreneurial content for
everyone on the internet it’s the number
one channel for exactly that until next
time I’m Tommy Lasorda I hope I left you
better than I found you [Music]
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