Getting a great deal gives him a literal rush
Khal turned the art of travel hacking into a lifestyle - challenging everything you thought you knew about booking fights, choosing credit cards and staying in hotels. Learn to stretch your dollars without compromising experiences.
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About the show:
Sam Laliberte - entrepreneur, digital nomad and freedom seeker, hosts the Freedom Lifestyle Podcast to expose people to the many ways you can design your dream life and unlock your own version of the freedom lifestyle. Her guests have empowered themselves through flexible work as a way to “have it all” - financial, location AND schedule freedom.
Getting a great deal gives him a literal rush
Khal turned the art of travel hacking into a lifestyle - challenging everything you thought you knew about booking fights, choosing credit cards and staying in hotels. Learn to stretch your dollars without compromising experiences.
Key Takeaways:
Resources:
Support the show:
☕️buymeacoffee.com/whatsyourfree
About the show:
Sam Laliberte - entrepreneur, digital nomad and freedom seeker, hosts the Freedom Lifestyle Podcast to expose people to the many ways you can design your dream life and unlock your own version of the freedom lifestyle. Her guests have empowered themselves through flexible work as a way to “have it all” - financial, location AND schedule freedom.
Today you're going to meet Cal, a new entrepreneur who also specializes in travel hacking, finding great deals and financial freedom For Cal, getting a great deal gives him a literal rush, and so we talked a lot about what he learned in his journey of being someone who just personally interested in saving money while traveling on hotels and flights and accommodations, but also someone who started to build a career in this industry. We unpacked a lot of the common myths around the best day of the week to buy flights, what type of credit card is the best credit card for you, how you should think about investing, especially if you want to start getting into alternative asset classes, and so this episode is all about how you can save money but also make money. Cal just also has a really cool journey of connecting so many of his passions and his personal interests into an entrepreneurial venture and why he feels like now is the best time in his life to take a risk with this new business. He also opens up about some personal things, including his dating life and how traveling all around the world, doing this entrepreneurial, remote lifestyle, has impacted things like having a secure relationship, and how he's thinking about blending those worlds while still pursuing his dreams.
Speaker 1:This week's episode is brought to you by Fiverr, the world's largest marketplace for freelance services, and you know from listening to the show that I've been really changing things up this year. I have a dream of booking more speaking opportunities at conferences all around the world so I can empower more freedom seekers, just like you listening today. The problem, though, is there are so many events and it's hard to know where to start, so I found an amazing freelancer on Fiverrcom. Each week, he sends me a list of about 50 conferences and events that are looking for speakers, along with the proper contact of who I should message. This has saved me hours, and instead I'm now spending more time doing what I do best building relationships with event organizers and spending less time over analyzing which events I should try to speak at and how to find them.
Speaker 1:I challenge you head to Fiverrcom next time you have a project but you don't have the time to execute it. I have been so pleased with how much space this frees up for me, and if you're new to Fiverr, you can use the link in the show notes for 10% off your very first order. So, with no further delay, meet Cal Cal. Welcome to the Freedom Lifestyle podcast. How's your day going so far?
Speaker 2:Good. Thank you for having me, sam, truly pumped to be here.
Speaker 1:I'm pumped to have you here. You put in the form that getting a great deal gives you a literal rush, which I love that line. So have you always been that way? What early memories come to mind for you when I ask you about your history of trying to get a good deal?
Speaker 2:I think part of it is family right.
Speaker 2:So both sides of my family, for multiple generations, have kind of been entrepreneurs and from that at a very fundamental level, you buy low and you sell high If you scrape away a lot of other things in business.
Speaker 2:So I was just always raised on entrepreneurial environments and then for myself I found that in the past it's an indicator for other things. So oftentimes when I'd interview people for an account manager or things like that in our teams, one thing that I would ask them is tell me about a time you got a great deal. And when I see their eyes light up, I know that they have like an innate trait, or hunger, or it matters to them, and the answer can be I got a two for one on Uber Eats. It can be hey, I negotiated my car lease from X to Y. It's that energy, because if that gives you, like I said, a little spark, I think that it's going to help in a lot of other facets of your life, and life is getting increasingly expensive. So if we can find a way to save some money along the way, that's always nice.
Speaker 1:As your wealth and your salaries have inevitably increased over the years. Has this changed your attitude towards getting a great deal and spending time to save money? Because that's something you also often hear in the entrepreneurial world is what are you worth Like? What is your hourly rate? If you're going to spend six hours to try to save $20, is that worth it? Has that changed Like? Has that logic kicked in, or are you still driven kind of by that emotional thrill of getting a good deal a lot of the time?
Speaker 2:No, that's a really good question. I think for me you're right. You have to figure out time is valuable. It's our most valuable trait that we can't get back. So the answer for me might not be I'll take the flight with the layover. The answer might be when I get to where I'm going, I might know that between Google or Travago or Kayak or mobile or desktop, there's all these little ways to save money along the way.
Speaker 2:And so things like that, if I'm booking on one booking site versus the other, that sometimes in itself is enough to make it worthwhile versus, like you said, putting my time at risk, where I think that is something that we know we can't get back. So I'll value that one a bit more.
Speaker 1:Okay, you mentioned a number of websites and resources already. Some of them I've heard of, some of them I haven't, so maybe we can start to unpack some of these tips that you have and what we can learn from you on getting a great deal. And so, as someone who's maybe lightly into travel hacking, what can our listeners learn from you, maybe if they wanted to get started in it? What are some like foundational tips and best practices for saving money on travel, whether it's flying around somewhere or staying in hotels, which I know you have a background in that space too?
Speaker 2:I think the best way I like to start this off is figure out what's important to you. For some people, that might be the most efficient route. So when you think about what a great vacation entails, it might not be risk of anything going sideways and like that's okay to value too. If you are somebody who is Delta Airlines loyal, it might make sense for you to either one lean into that or two build your plans around that.
Speaker 2:I do like to think about accommodation as somewhere where the early savings start, and the reason why is if you think about airlines and I'll use the US as an example in Canada, we've got probably three airlines in the US United, delta and American that take up the majority of flights, and so there's things like Spirit and Frontier in Southwest, and they exist, but ultimately most people are going to fly those kind of big three groups. But when you get into a market and you're booking a hotel, for example, you heard me mention a few of those websites. So one thing I like to always focus on is how are you actually booking? Most folks tend to always think about rumors, like Tuesday at 7pm that is the time I am booking this flight I saw on Reddit. There's no way Reddit's wrong, so I am going to follow that to a tee.
Speaker 1:I really hope you're going to either debunk that or verify that right now, because I've also heard that.
Speaker 2:So first things first is Reddit is good for some things. Always have a grain of salt, people. I would advise that. The second is time actually matters less than you would think. What actually really matters is environment, and what I mean by that is oftentimes folks might book on their laptop that might be thought of as desktop mode. Some folks might book on their mobile phone that might be viewed as mobile mode, but the mobile app on your phone might be viewed as the mobile app mode and a company might have three separate prices for three different audiences across three different segments, so oftentimes each of those might have a different rate. My advice is always to think about mobile versus desktop. Whether it's the app or you're on your phone, companies do oftentimes have better pricing on mobile. So that's kind of the first environment that I always think about and advise people to shop on.
Speaker 1:And mobile app or mobile browser.
Speaker 2:Very good question. I think if you're really wanting to save the bucks, you can do both and check them out and actually see if there is a difference. If you're already on the phone, big picture is probably not too much of a waste of your time, so to speak, but I think most of the time, as long as you're doing one of those, it's going to be better in some scenarios than desktop. The other thing and this one is a bit of you know there's different people at different viewpoints on this is incognito mode Right. Everybody is like the cookies are tracking and what am I going to do to avoid these darn cookies? And incognito mode is a good way to think about this. If you go to a site 10, 15 times and don't convert, that will eventually be data that they will use to try to make more on you because they see you really looking, they can guess your intent over time, all these kinds of things.
Speaker 1:Will they eventually give us a good deal. Like is that an option? Just keep going back and back. And then they're like maybe if I just drop it.
Speaker 2:I wish I could tell you that was the case. I think the answer, unfortunately, is the opposite Is they know that you've shopped this so many times that it's probably moved away from aspirational into like you need to get to Denver on Thursday, and so it's actually reversed. So the advice I was going to give is you know you might use incognito mode at a certain point, but when you want to eventually book be signed in, meaning you know sign in with Google and things like that and use mobile. Those are two of my favorite tricks to get the best in class pricing that we all know and love.
Speaker 1:Okay, those are great tips. What are some other misconceptions or myths about travel hacking that you've encountered that might surprise us or even just push back. You get from other people.
Speaker 2:So I like to think about folks in two buckets, and it's really important to recognize both of these buckets. There are people that want to save money. That's probably people like me, right, where I enjoy the aspect why would I spend more than I had to? But it's not the end of the world for me. If you know, I paid a few cents more or a few bucks more on something. There are also people that need to save money and that's a different demographic.
Speaker 2:At my last company, super, one thing I did at that company was I led the hotel buying portion of the firm. So I would buy a lot of hotel rooms every month, every year, and we'd provide those to our users and we'd spend some time looking at who our users were. And you might take a step back and say you know who is supercom? I've never heard of this company. Is this one of these travel firms that you know seems like some kind of odd company? You know, are they sketchy? Are they good? Things like that? Right, and Super is a startup that was founded in Toronto, is now based in San Francisco. There's been over $100 million raised. They've sold over $2 billion in hotel rooms and saved users, you know, over $30 million in savings, but people don't necessarily trust it because they might not have a brand like an Expedia or a bookingcom and that trust factor that you know oftentimes brands have with cash.
Speaker 2:So our customers were people that fell in the second bucket, that needed to save money, and so it became really interesting servicing these people because you would hear their stories, right, is, hey, like I am moving into a new apartment at the end of the month, I have five days to go and I'm with my two kids, right. So like they need to save money to book that room and it hopefully has two doubles for their family, right. So we think about things in a very like leisurely sense and we're blessed in many senses to be able to do that. But the people that need to save money were a big part of our effort and those people oftentimes would use the other websites that sometimes you might see on Google that are further down the fold.
Speaker 2:So not all of those are trustworthy. Of course, dyor, or do your own research, as they say. You know what are the reviews on Better Business Bureau or things like that where you can do a quick second to, you know, have a sanity check, but if a company has prices that seem too good to be true. In some cases they are, but in other cases there's a whole subsection of what are known as B2B rates, and those are business rates only for other businesses that users like yourself can now start to book thanks to being mobile and online and signed in and things like this. And these B2B rates, or closed user group rates, are the ones that you might see that seem too good to be true, but oftentimes are actually two thumbs up.
Speaker 1:Okay, so supercom, I did go on the website. I know they acquired SnapTravel, which is what the brand was previously.
Speaker 2:Right, yeah, so they rebranded to supercom from SnapTravel after some previous fund raises, and they're now focused on this broader fintech journey and helping folks, like I said, in that need to save market, be able to, you know, actually build a credit record or get better rates on hotels or things of that nature. And so hotels were a big part of that business and are, and so, you know, I would always advise folks that are looking to save some money when you see again a rate that's too good to be true, just go to True. Just give that company a sanity check and if they have, you know, an, A rating from some of the sites that you might trust, there's probably a reason why, right? So sometimes give those things a shot and they can save you a ton of money.
Speaker 1:Because are there horror stories Like is it that a thing where people are trusting these sites, thinking that they're booking a hotel for $40 and they get there and they have no reservations? Is that happening?
Speaker 2:Yeah, it's funny because there are websites that do do things like that, right, and that's why people pay a premium for brands in many scenarios. But I think there are also startups that many people are not aware of, right, like you know, one of my favorites is a company called Hopper that was founded in Montreal, right, they now are one of the biggest travel companies on the planet I think number three in North America. To you know bookingcom and Expedia, and people had no idea what Hopper was even a few years ago. Right, and they've managed to build a brand for themselves. So, you know, for the couple that might be a bit shady and are always worth a secondary Google, I like to joke that, you know, somewhere under that view, other rates button is probably the next billion dollar startup that's just getting started, and you know we just got to find them, mm-hmm.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I've been using Hopper for years. I'm glad you just brought that up because it's a reminder that that's a great resource for me. But for those who are just hearing about Hopper, my way to explain it would be you can kind of forecast when in the month or in the week or yeah, basically day that week it would be the best time to fly. So it will tell you a color coded. You know on a Wednesday you might get the cheapest rate. Saturday is going to be the most expensive. Is that what the business still is today?
Speaker 2:Yeah, and I think they've done a good job of building out solutions for other companies that want to power their corporate travel and things like that as they look to expand their business and grow from the leisure or leisure customers that are now increasingly a larger and larger segment of the population. But I think you hit something on the head, which was they made it simple and they made it easy. You saw a really cute little mascot. You saw a branding aesthetic that you trusted and had sort of just an innate feel that, oh, this is modern and sleek but also trustworthy, and that's a testament to the people on their design team that really built that out over, I'm sure, many iterations. But they also showed you how easy it was to save money. Green is good Good day to travel, click, like. You know what I mean, and in a couple of taps you were there.
Speaker 2:There was a company back in the day called Hotel Tonight for those of you that might have used this, and I think this is even worth thinking about is. We talked earlier about airlines and hotels, right, and how to think about them as saving money on airfare and saving money on hotels and we'll leave aside Airbnb for now, but the same kind of principle applies On an airline. Very few people are willing to chance it, which means booking it one day out or same day in many scenarios, because what goes on when you head to a market is you need to have your hotel organized or your transport or your dinner, and unless you have a very free lifestyle, you're probably not doing same day travel for a plane. But a hotel is just the opposite, right. If it's the day of my check-in and a hotel is 60% full, they probably slacked rates today, because any room that is not full is revenue that's been lost, right. So it becomes a really interesting and fun game of chicken.
Speaker 2:When you think about airlines again, I'm not one to play that game. I've booked one day of flight in my life and I was anxious the whole time. It was not for me. But I'll book day of hotels all the time because I'm not a bonvoy lover, right? If I don't have my specific, you know, hilton honors. That, like, means everything to me. I care about convenience, I care about being somewhere safe with a little bit of style, and I care about saving some money along the way for my journey. So in that sense, you know, being able to be brand agnostic is another way that I like to recommend folks. Save money where you might think you know I should double down on Marriott and it makes sense for some, but for others it definitely doesn't, and I think I'm just one of those people.
Speaker 1:Hmm, I want to get into that, because I was just at a Marriott last week and I went to go get my free breakfast that you'd expect at every hotel and they were like, oh, it's only for our platinum members. I was like, oh well, how do I know if I'm a platinum member? They're kind of like you'd know.
Speaker 1:So I didn't have breakfast, which was fine, because I typically intermittent fast. So I want to come back to that. But I'm so curious. I can't just leave you off the hook without sharing the story of your same day flight. Was this an experiment to save money? What was going on here? What are the learnings? You've dropped the flight price before and after. I'm so curious.
Speaker 2:So good question. I was heading to a friend's 30th in Cabo and I had forgotten to handle my things in advance. We can say I wasn't sure if I was going to go. It was very much a last minute thing. And then I found to the point earlier. You know, what do you value at that time? I wanted to like be there for my friend. I found like a really decent flight down there, so that was great. I didn't have a flight back so I was like, okay, like this flight there was relatively affordable. I want to be there for her and our friends, you know, on her 30th, right Time and relationships and memories or what we have at the end of the day that we go in the dirt with. So you know, that was the most important thing for me and I figured I would cross the bridge of how I get back later.
Speaker 2:You know, fast forward three wonderful days and we're all planning our exit out and we are the last two left. And Anna is her name. She kept telling me you know, hey, like last minute air works because they don't necessarily expect you to do this, because nobody can do this normally, and I took me a second to realize that she was probably right and in some scenarios, you know, think about flying home for Christmas on, you know, December 23rd. Or, like you know, you go to school in Ontario and you're flying back to BC after exams.
Speaker 2:Airlines know how to do what is known as yield, manage or revenue manage those opportunities to make more money for them. But in this example, I think Anna and I were the perfect sort of group of people that could do this, because we're two folks with no kids and flexible jobs and we could take the chance on a same day flight which paid off. So Anna was right, we got a direct flight home on a major airline and, you know, saved some money along the way versus even waiting two or three days out. So if you have a very strong fortitude and want to, you know, take a chance, it's there for you guys to potentially Do you have any idea of how much you think you saved?
Speaker 2:I would say about $400.
Speaker 2:Nice, which is, yeah, not a small amount.
Speaker 2:And that's why I think sometimes airlines know, like certain routes, like if you're flying to Mexico, you probably could afford to get to Mexico, you know, and especially to somewhere like a Cancun or a Cabo where they know tourists will be right, they know all these little weird things about us and I think that's always been an interesting lesson for saving money on travel.
Speaker 2:Right Is you have to kind of think like the man to beat the man or think like the person to beat the person. If you're flying from Dallas to Miami, most folks would think, okay, just like Texas to Florida, okay, like sure, savvy flyers would know that that's American Airlines number one biggest hub and number two biggest hub. So if you're flying into airline alliance, from hub to hub, you're going to get incredible prices because they have to keep those airports staffed and they need to fly planes between those two areas. So you know, knowing small things like that, am I flying Star Alliance hub to Star Alliance hub or specific airline hub to airline hub? Those are also really great ways to get somewhere a little thriftier than you might have otherwise.
Speaker 1:Nice. Okay, this is a good shift into airlines, because yesterday I interviewed Angel from Pennywise Travel and she's a full time travel hacker, content creator, who has built offers and products and this is her business. She's an influence on their space, she speaks at conferences, but she definitely had a US perspective in terms of the credit cards that she was recommending were credit cards associated with Chase Bank and things that my Canadian audience, which is about half, I would say, like 55%, of my audiences from the US just next, is Canada, and so I think you could give a really good perspective for our Canadian listeners on how they could also take advantage of things like credit card points, and I think I have you to thank for the reason why I now have a TD visa infinite privilege credit card. Are you the one who?
Speaker 2:told Jared about that. I hope you're liking it. Are we liking it?
Speaker 1:I mean, I walk into the lounge every time. Now, yeah where I belong.
Speaker 2:I love to hear that. I love to hear that. Yes, that's a very good card. Happy to dive in for the Canadian audience. So I'm Canadian myself. I've lived here. Most of my life I've lived abroad.
Speaker 2:Most of my banking is done here and with that means that you're choosing what credit card to sign up with. Many folks don't care about that and, for the record, that's OK too. My biggest advice for people that are not sure where to start with travel, or if it's even important to them, is make sure your credit card does something for you. So if you're going to get travel points, invest in that. There's no point getting one of the not junior cards, because they have a purpose too. But maybe a cashback card would actually be more valuable for most people than kind of a travel rewards card that isn't really optimizing and compounding rewards in the way that it makes a difference. Cashback is also good because you can spend that on anything you would like. It's more applicable for the vast majority of people. So that's always my preface is nothing wrong with a cashback card? I think if you're going to lean in on travel, a couple of things are important to decide. The first is are you loyal to an alliance or are you loyal to a bank? So we'll use the example that you just had, which was the Visa Infinite privilege, so that credit card is sold or, I guess, provided by two major Canadian banks which are CIBC, ntd.
Speaker 2:I come from a CIBC family. We had those growing up. There was something called Imperial Service that I think was for businesses, and my dad had a black debit card and that's how I knew my dad was cool. You know, it was nothing to do with anything else. I've never seen him wear jeans. He dresses amazingly every day, but it was the first black debit credit card I ever saw. So I was indoctrinated for a young age. But when I went to apply for this card, I noticed that CIBC had a $75,000 Aero Plan bonus, which is pretty good, and TD had $105,000. So you know we're talking over 30% more points for the exact same card, right? So big picture, when I took a step back is like, yeah, I like CIBC. It's like easier for me, I suppose. But big picture, it was also helpful for me to get more points for my lifestyle.
Speaker 2:And when you're choosing a card, the sign-up bonus cannot be understated as to the value it brings to you, the user Many times. That is the best way to make the selection of the card you take and if it's not a part of your selection process, it either one should be or two. Maybe a travel card isn't the right choice for you because, again, like I said, there's no point in my eyes going halfway. You might as well get the money back or decide to have some fun with the travel. So the Visa Infinite Privilege I like a lot because you know it is about three times more expensive than the entry-level Privilege Visa.
Speaker 2:But if you really are going to travel a lot and you are going to put spend on your credit cards at that point, the rewards that you'll get are worth the upfront cost, right. And I think that's always a lesson that people have to take is often everybody likes to find a way to get a deal, as we know, and people will pay for things upfront or they'll pay for things kind of in chunks. But a credit card bonus is a really good example of something where there is an upfront bitter pill to swallow, but the rewards you get the other 364 days make it worth it, right? So that's the choice I give a lot of folks when they think about travel and how to approach cards is really think about what is important to you and if you can swallow the first bitter pill, which is probably going to be a sign-up, that is like semi-uncomfortable.
Speaker 2:You're going to get you know Uber Eats for a year and DoorDash for a year. You're going to get free lounge access. You're going to get your free baggage. You're going to have to. You're going to get you know zone two boarding so you're not, like, you know, hassling with. You know, will my carry-on fit? And you know, if it didn't fit, that's okay because they'll take your bag for free because you're, you know that premium member right. So there is these upfront costs sometimes that are associated with travel and travel credit cards. But really double down would be my advice. Otherwise, take some cash back.
Speaker 1:Yeah, as someone who's flying monthly, that really adds to my experience to always know. Okay, I don't have to worry about food and rushing, I can just get to the airport, get to the lounge, grab some food. They now have vegan sausage pasta, which.
Speaker 2:I was.
Speaker 1:I was shocked to see that in the lounge, but so excited and totally. I always overpack, so knowing that I'm just going to be able to get on the plane early, get my seat settled. You know I'm still flying economy a lot of the time, working on that premium economy more often. But sometimes I get stressed like what if I'm the last one there and everyone's already settled? I want to have all of my things. So it has really added to my experience. I think that card is like $600.
Speaker 2:I think it was $499.
Speaker 1:Okay, 499. Is that your only credit card? How do you think about the number of credit cards you have at once, and what else is in your stack If it's not just that?
Speaker 2:Good question. So I have a cash back credit card as well. Most of the time, I do put my expenses on the travel card. Just by the nature of my lifestyle and what's important to me, that tends to work out. I think the other thing I have and this is just, you know, lifestyle planning for some folks as well is, when you have a relationship with a financial institute, that's worth something.
Speaker 2:It's known typically as our credit scores, and that's how these banks might decide. You know what we get and how we get it, and is it unfair and opaque and all of these things? Yes, does it change the fact that, like, we're not going to reinvent the banking system overnight? Even as, talking to somebody who runs a digital assets fund, the answer is also yes, right. So I have a third credit card that I don't really touch, but it's from a bank that I've had, you know, a relationship with for a long time and that has the highest credit limit I have, and I don't ever actually use that card and if I do, it's like for something on, like my Apple pay, and then I'll pay it off and that's just credit building hacks over time. But that credit building hack has allowed me to know that I have access to a decent chunk of change if things ever go sideways.
Speaker 2:Right, and I think everybody should take it upon themselves to try to do some financial planning. For some it's easier than others. I think having access to credit is something that is important. So if you're able to, you know work with a card and able to even put controls on yourself and how you might spend those things, and obviously you know your own personal ways you go about spending are important to things like this. I think just having access to credit is important because you never know when things might go sideways or an opportunities in front of you and you know you need that to help you build on your path forward, love that and I hate when you listen to podcast episodes or interviews and they say disclaimer.
Speaker 1:You know we can't give out financial advice. We're not giving out financial advice, but I don't like to fall the rules. I would love to give out some financial advice and I feel like, because you have your own fund now and this is your space, there's lots that we can learn from you.
Speaker 1:I know that when I was first starting, my very first business in my early 20s wasn't making that much money at all. I was maxing out my credit cards. I had like the $5,000 max. I was paying the 29% interest on it and I was so appreciative when I had to call my bank and they're like we're going to prove you for a line of credit. You're going to pay off your credit card and you're going to have a line of credit for like 1% interest and even just stuff like that. Like I didn't even know and that's something I tell so many people now because, like, unless you have a relationship with your bank or you're spending the time to educate yourself on this, you're just going to do what you think you're supposed to do. I have this credit limit on my credit card. No one's talking about line of credit. So that was definitely a financial saving tip that I share to people. Often Is there a piece of financial advice you feel like you're often sharing with your network that you'd be comfortable sharing on record.
Speaker 2:So I will say my disclaimer is not anything to do with finance, it's that I've known your husband for many years and, as somebody who I know is very specific about financial planning, I'm glad that you guys are starting to rub off on each other in this way and have each other to plan as you continue to grow in your lives and careers, because to you, somebody that even helped teach me some of this stuff back in the day, so that's really nice. And then, as far as advice that I would give overall, it's funny there's two sides to a coin. So the first piece of advice I'll give is have a balanced portfolio. And that can mean you know, even if, let's say, it's all stocks right, because you have, you know, a BMO investor line or something like that, right. Or you know some kind of TD Ameritrade or Robinhood, wherever you are, even if it's all stocks right, diversify in terms of sectors, like, don't just own Amazon. You know Amazon is a great company. It will probably go more up than down, but having all your eggs in one basket sometimes is not the move.
Speaker 2:So you know, be selective, try to figure out oh, this is in tech, okay, cool. This is in bio, this is in energy, right, have a chance to kind of split them up. If you want to get even crazier, we can talk about things like bonds, but we'll leave that aside for now. The other piece of advice I want to give is for a very specific portion of your audience, and those are people that go deep on a certain subject. So oftentimes you'll have people that have generalist skillsets or they have vertical skillsets, and you know there's pros and cons for both of those things. But if you have a vertical skillset, I would encourage you to let that have an overweight aspect in your portfolio.
Speaker 1:What does that mean?
Speaker 2:vertical versus. So for somebody like me, I might have more travel stocks than a typical person in my portfolio, because I understand that specific sector more than another person who probably could have bought a mutual fund or an ETF that just had a bunch of those, right. So, where you know, if somebody is an expert on distribution of cosmetics, right, maybe they have a specific point of view on whoever owns L'Oreal, or I think Koti bought Kylie for $600 million I saw a few years ago, right. So you know, if they know about that kind of world, then feel free to kind of dig in a bit more, because your intellectual curiosity, combined with the fact that it's your money, will make you more invested. So, if you know something, go deep and don't be shy. If not, play it balanced and play the long game over time. It would be the two ways I think about this.
Speaker 1:Okay, yeah, that's great tips. I would say a lot of people. I mean myself. I'm like I don't know if I have any perspective, you know, other than being interested in tech and interested in startups and have money that I can put towards my future and wanting to have a little bit of risk, because I'm in my early 30s now and I have some time, and so I know that alternative asset classes is something that you are specializing in. So tell us a little bit about your latest venture, poppy Seed Capital. Who is the clientele for this? How are you helping them?
Speaker 2:Yeah, sure. So I started Poppy Seed Capital about a year and a half ago and we are a fund focused on helping investors go from zero to one in digital assets. So for a lot of people, they might have heard about, you know, bitcoin or Ethereum, and they might even be believers or think that, hey, this is something I should start to have some kind of ownership of, but they're not sure where to start. And, generally speaking, there's two groups of people there's retail investors and there's institutional investors. Our goal is eventually to try to help everybody that we can with investment strategies. Right now you know this is where the disclosure parts come in is rules and regulations, especially around digital assets and crypto, mean that we can't serve everybody that we'd like to. So most of the time, the people that we end up helping are folks that have started to plan for their families, and you know they want to figure out for their businesses or for their family planning ways to start to hold crypto. So we aim to make it seamless and painless.
Speaker 2:We found there was a trust factor gap in this asset class.
Speaker 2:You know and you don't have to go very far to look at some of the shady characters that have been in this industry that I love, and it's always a reminder that you don't want to trust blindly, right?
Speaker 2:You want to trust but you want to verify, and so for our investors, they can trust us, but they can verify that we've done the right regulatory work to be able to safeguard their assets, that we work with the best companies in the world to help them provide, you know, earnings on these assets and oftentimes, as a result, you know, we get a chance to work with them more and more and deeper and deeper.
Speaker 2:So right now, we're mostly helping families in the US, particularly in Arizona, has been kind of a big hotspot for us, where there are people that know that they want to start to own crypto and, unlike kind of a year or two ago, where it was in the hype cycle everywhere and all over the news, when you want to invest in something is when it's boring and nobody's talking about it and it's out of the limelight, because when interest comes back, then you're positioned in a way to really benefit from that. So we've ended up using this last year or two period to really kind of position ourselves for what we think will ultimately be a pretty sizable run in the years to come.
Speaker 1:What experiences did you have that prepared you to now take on this type of business?
Speaker 2:Yeah, I think for me I said this earlier, but scratching your intellectual curiosity is really, really important, and for me, it's something where, after the 2016 election actually, or just before that in the lead up, I was traveling and I read a book called Blockchain Revolution and it just kind of smacked me across the face Because I think one thing that we all kind of saw from you know, this point it feels like so long ago, is almost a decade ago, right, but if you think about it, that was kind of the end of the era of social media as an innocent thing, right. We then began realizing like, oh, we can get cohorted and targeted and our data is for sale and all these kinds of things, and so this book really helped paint a picture of what could be a better way forward, because I thought that the advertising model like this had to be the end. It literally affected, like governmental elections at the biggest country in the world. You know, fast forward a decade. Maybe I'm not fully right on that, but I was thinking about, you know, what was next, and this seemed like a really interesting way how the next version of the internet could be built, because the way I describe, you know, crypto, very simply, is the internet. Is the internet of information? Right, I can send you an email, we can connect, like this, and it, you know, information can flow. What happens when we can make value flow as easy as information? Right, that is a crazy thing to think about. But right now, value flows between banks, between money transmitters, between governmental agencies, between FinTechs that we know about and legacy companies we do not. Anybody can hold it up along the way, right, like, your money isn't yours per se. And so when I thought about again what was next, you know, digital assets seemed to be a good way to place my time, my money and resources as a bet, kind of, so to speak. So I started for just myself in 2015,.
Speaker 2:Fast forward a couple of years. I was doing some family and friends, and then, at super, at the end of my three years there, I realized that I wanted to build something. I wanted to get back in that kind of entrepreneurial opportunity, and this was an asset class where I had a ton of knowledge and I had gone deep and I had done the work and I had lived. You know what felt like 10 lifetimes of information and cycles. My grades were coming into my chin and you know I knew it was time. So you know that's when I started Poppy Seed over the last, you know, kind of 18 months or so, and it's been a really fascinating journey because there's lots of cool stuff getting built and there's lots of weird stuff that we got to work around as well in a way that you know is good for everybody.
Speaker 1:I love it. Well, hopefully a time comes soon where you can serve more investors and more types of people who want to get into these asset classes. It sounds like it's for a restricted group of people for now, but-.
Speaker 2:Correct yes, that is the focus For now. And big vision yes. Obviously it'd be amazing to add value to Canadians and everybody around the world as they start to kind of learn about this new asset class.
Speaker 1:Amazing. You touched a little bit there on your personal life and why this was a good time in your life to start a business in the form. You talked a little bit about no mortgage yet, no kids, all of that so it felt like a really great time to build. I want to close off this interview with something else personal, that you put in the form, which is about your dating life, because I think it's so important.
Speaker 1:You had said that it's hard to find a partner who really understands your lifestyle and you are traveling around so often and I feel like so many freedom seekers. They either make one of two decisions they either sacrifice some of their freedom in order to compromise in the relationship to keep the relationship going. I interview people like that all the time. They're like oh well, I'm maximizing the freedom I have In this relationship. They can't travel, they can't do this, we're making it work. Or I mean people who are just delaying that life phase in order to really build their dreams and build their freedom now. So let's talk a little bit about how you came to the decision number two, I believe and what's changed now.
Speaker 2:Yeah, well, I think finding the right partner is helpful and I've been blessed to spend some time with somebody where I feel that way about them I think also for me and her when we had our discussions. You want to learn with the other person right and their dreams, their ambitions, their backgrounds, their goals, their family, what's important to them. And if I asked my partner how she'd want to spend her time, she would move to a villa in Thailand and work remote indefinitely, and so I knew that she understood. One, she had a love of travel, which is important for me to find in my partner. And two, she loved our home and where we met.
Speaker 2:But also with somebody that had been around whether it was personal or professional opportunities to see new things and knew the value of other cultures. And with somebody that I knew could be by my side is somebody that helped support me in my journey, just like I hopefully helped support her and hers, but also could hop on a weird spontaneous flight sometime and not be too non-plussed about it and have fun with me along the way. So being able to find a partner that could have both sides of that coin has been awesome. It's been something that I'm really happy about.
Speaker 1:Well, I'm so excited to meet this new infamous partner that's an in-calf wife.
Speaker 2:She's vegan so you guys can send some time. Yeah, yeah, and loves to cook, so I have no doubt some good stuff is coming your way.
Speaker 1:All right, well, maybe which? Whatever wedding we're going to together next year.
Speaker 2:That seems to be our main time.
Speaker 1:So thanks for coming on the show. I could have asked you like 10 more questions. You're such a great speaker. You had so much great value to offer us. So, yeah, thanks for making time.
Speaker 2:Awesome, talk to you later.
Speaker 1:Make sure you hit subscribe or follow in your podcast app so that you never miss an episode. And, hey, maybe take an extra minute to leave a short little review in your podcast app. It really helps me find other freedom seekers who can get inspired and empowered by these stories.