The argument in one line.
A brand becomes acquisition-worthy when its community loyalty is so strong that corporate infrastructure cannot manufacture it — the only path is to buy it from someone who built it human by human.
Read if. Skip if.
READ IF YOU ARE…
- A founder building a community-first brand who wants to understand what makes it attractive to acquirers or enterprise partners.
- An event or retreat organizer looking to understand what separates a forgettable gathering from a life-changing one with word-of-mouth compounding.
- A fitness, hospitality, or lifestyle entrepreneur thinking about how personal brand and business brand can amplify each other without collapsing when the founder steps back.
- A creator or brand marketer who wants to understand how UGC content flywheel deals actually form in the fitness and wellness space.
SKIP IF…
- You need digital-only brand strategy — the core playbook here is physical, experiential, and relationship-driven.
- You are looking for a repeatable B2B go-to-market system — this approach is heavily founder-personality-dependent and requires pre-existing credibility to replicate.
The full version, fast.
HPLT's acquisition by Life Time was not the goal — it was the outcome of a brand that built something corporate infrastructure could not replicate. Mazza's approach: make community the product, not the marketing. He used extreme shared experiences — Navy SEAL cold-water activations — to create instant trust bonds between strangers, kept the brand bigger than himself so it could survive beyond him, and grew through referral by making attendees feel like superheroes. The same principle runs through his personal brand origin story, the Kane Footwear launch, and his hospitality prescriptions: people need a reason to feel something, not just consume something.
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Create a free account →Who's talking.
00:07guestBrian Mazza
00:00hostAlex Garcia
00:00cohostBrian Blum
Where the time goes.
00:00 – 00:56
01 · Cold open + intro
Pull-quote hook before guest intro, promise of what the episode covers.
00:56 – 05:30
02 · Selling HPLT to Life Time
How a VP attending the 10,000-person summit kicked off a 4-5 month acquisition conversation. The Boca trip that became an interview. The deal close.
05:30 – 08:50
03 · Post-acquisition: scaling with Life Time
What changed (finance, marketing, club access) and what Lifetime is positioned to do in fitness innovation with content and events.
08:50 – 11:05
04 · Fitness landscape: CrossFit, Hyrox, the gap
CrossFit declining, Hyrox growing but lacking spectator appeal, the untapped middle ground combining strength-power with endurance.
11:05 – 16:03
05 · LT Games and making fitness mainstream
What the LT Games do right, the Jordan shoe analogy for how major brands making gear legitimizes a sport, what is needed to get fitness on TV.
16:03 – 18:40
06 · The problem with fitness culture
Extremism as algorithmic demand vs. societal toxicity, performative suffering, sub-3 marathon gate-keeping, being authentic vs. chasing novelty.
18:40 – 25:06
07 · Personal brand origin story
Building from Men's Health covers to Instagram 2012, the Nike Tone House shoot, posting before consensus formed, how brand deals compound.
25:06 – 27:04
08 · Mazza's advice and the Kane Footwear launch
Confidence despite judgment, faking the deck to get David Goggins, how Kane Footwear launched through HPLT network in 2021.
27:04 – 30:03
09 · Content effectiveness: 2021 vs. 2026
Whether the brand-seeding playbook still works, why trust in the people behind the brand is the durable variable.
30:03 – 32:17
10 · Making experiences memorable
Why the brand cannot be about the founder, how the network becomes the brand, why community loyalty creates a referral engine that barely needs marketing.
32:17 – 36:05
11 · The Navy SEAL activation as opening hook
Why the first experience at a summit is the most important design decision. Cold-water trauma bonding at midnight in Antigua. People leave feeling like superheroes.
36:05 – 39:12
12 · The right environment as leadership
Water bottle analogy — same product, different price, different context. LeBron to Miami, Harry Kane to Bayern Munich. Put people in the right room.
39:12 – 42:40
13 · What's next for the hospitality industry
The bar industry crisis: wellness culture, reduced drinking, high rents. Pop-ups, roving experiences, and social-viral food challenges as the prescription.
42:40 – 45:55
14 · Members-only clubs and experiential boom
The exclusivity paradox — VIP cards destroy the illusion. High-end members clubs work in wealth-dense cities only.
45:55 – 48:58
15 · The cheat code: content turnaround
Getting branded content back to attendees within hours of an activation so they post immediately while the emotion is highest.
48:58 – 53:00
16 · Balancing personal life and business
Starting with the homies, wives joining, women being tougher than men during Navy SEAL activations, growing to co-ed summits.
53:00 – 55:45
17 · Fatherhood as a performance standard
Sobriety as a parenting decision not a wellness trend, never wanting kids to see him tired, coach hat vs. dad hat, accountability calendars, TST soccer tournament.
Lines worth screenshotting.
- When a corporate buyer cannot replicate what you built organically, acquisition becomes the only move they have.
- The first two hours of an event are not setup time — they are the hook, and if attendees are not bought in immediately, the rest of the weekend is harder to save.
- Making an event too founder-centric gives it a shelf life tied to one person; community-first brands outlast their builders.
- Word-of-mouth referral scales faster when you make someone feel like a superhero — they tell the person struggling because they want credit for the transformation.
- Turning around polished UGC content within hours of an activation is a cheat code most event organizers leave on the table.
- Personal brand and company brand dance best when each can leverage the other without one consuming the other.
- The same person in a different environment becomes a different performer — the room you put someone in does more than the advice you give them.
- Instagram in 2012 rewarded the person willing to look slightly ridiculous before it was cool; the early mover who posts before consensus forms captures the category.
- Hyrox modernized the branding of fitness competition without solving the spectator problem — the category that combines strength, power, and endurance watchability is still open.
- A referral-driven business does not need to convince cold strangers; it needs to give existing members a person they already want to help.
- Sobriety made ten years ago as a quiet parenting decision and a wellness-trend identity adopted years later are not the same thing — one comes from conviction, the other from aesthetics.
- The VIP card destroys exclusivity; the velvet rope preserves it — scarcity only works when it is maintained, not handed to every regular.
- Brands going into experiential make the same mistake: they allocate resources but not a change agent who can execute the novelty.
The room is the product, not the content inside it.
WHAT TO LEARN
Every lesson in this conversation traces back to one principle: the environment you design determines the person someone becomes inside it — and that applies to events, brands, leadership, and parenting.
02Selling HPLT to Life Time
- A corporate buyer coming to you through your community — not a cold pitch deck — changes your leverage position entirely; the 10,000-person summit was the demo that started the deal.
- Saying yes to a trip you were not sure about is the move — showing up without agenda in a relationship-building context is the interview, whether or not it is framed as one.
04Fitness landscape
- Hyrox modernized the visual identity of fitness competition but has not solved the spectator problem — any format that wants mainstream reach needs athletes who transcend the sport.
- The gap between strength-power and endurance formats is a real category opening — the first format to combine both with watchable athletes and major brand footwear will own it.
07Personal brand origin story
- Moving early on a platform before consensus forms gives you content that stands out simply because no one else is doing it yet — the aesthetic advantage of posting before the category gets crowded.
- Each brand deal is a ratchet: Nike content leads to Men's Health cover, which leads to Volvo partnership, which leads to HPLT brand credibility — none of the later steps happen without doing the earlier ones for free first.
08Advice and the Kane Footwear launch
- Fabricating the deck and making the ask before the infrastructure exists is not fraud — it is the only way to close before competition finds the same opportunity.
- Your existing community is the launch platform for brands that cannot reach your audience any other way — you are not just an endorser, you are distribution.
10Making experiences memorable
- When a brand is designed so the founder is barely visible at the event, the community becomes the product and word-of-mouth referral fires without prompting.
- A referral that comes from one member to a struggling friend is worth more than any ad — the member wants credit for changing the friend's life, which is a more powerful motivation than loyalty.
11Navy SEAL activation as hook
- The first two hours of an event are the hook — if you do not manufacture buy-in and camaraderie immediately, the rest of the programming is harder to deliver.
- Shared physical discomfort between strangers collapses months of relationship-building into hours — the architecture of trust is suffering together, not networking together.
12Environment as leadership
- A water bottle is $2 at CVS and $12 at a stadium — same object, different context creates different perceived value. Every brand, job, and team benefits from the same principle applied deliberately.
- The leaders most responsible for someone's peak performance are the ones who changed the room, not the ones who gave the best speech inside the old room.
17Fatherhood as performance standard
- Children adopt the standard they observe daily, not the standard they are told about — parents who visibly suffer and recover give children a reference point for resilience that abstract encouragement cannot.
- Separating coach voice from dad voice in the same conversation is a skill that transfers directly to managing employees or clients — the honest assessment and the unconditional support can coexist if they are labeled clearly.
Terms worth knowing.
- HPLT
- Human Performance Lab Training — the fitness summit and community brand Brian Mazza founded, centered on military-style physical activations and high-caliber speaker curation, acquired by Life Time Fitness.
- Navy SEAL activation
- A cold-water physical challenge led by a Navy SEAL used to open HPLT summits — participants swim in cold ocean water together as their first group experience, engineering rapid trust bonds between strangers.
- Trauma bonding (event context)
- A designed first experience of shared discomfort that accelerates trust between participants who have just met — used deliberately as the opening activation at HPLT summits.
- Hyrox
- A global fitness competition format combining running and functional exercises, known for broad participation, strong modern branding, and rapid growth — lower barrier to entry than CrossFit, endurance-focused.
- LT Games
- Life Time Fitness Games — an in-house athletic competition run by Life Time that combines strength, power, and conditioning in a format considered more technically demanding and spectator-friendly than Hyrox.
- UGC (User Generated Content)
- Content created by customers, attendees, or community members and distributed through their own social channels — used as the primary marketing vehicle rather than paid media.
- TST
- Tournament of Soccer Teams — a million-dollar soccer tournament for retired or semi-professional players, structured similarly to TBT in basketball.
Things they pointed at.
00:56productHPLT (Human Performance Lab Training)
00:56productLife Time Fitness
06:05productBPN Ultra
14:03productLT Games
18:40productTone House NYC
23:57channelDavid Goggins
26:13productKane Footwear
27:05productAthletic Brewing
53:55productTST (Tournament of Soccer Teams)
Lines you could clip.
00:03
“People are going to judge you no matter what, and 99% of the people want you to fail. But I love that shit.”
29:11
“I never wanted it to be about me when they go to the events. I want the brand and the network to speak for itself.”
37:37
“A water bottle at CVS is $2. A water bottle at the airport is $7. A water bottle at the Met game is $12. Same water bottle, just different environment.”
50:57
“I need them to see me intentionally suffering every single day.”
23:57
“I didn't have a company really. I made it up. I was like, I have a company. I wanna do an event in May.”
Where the conversation goes.
00:56 – 08:50denseHPLT acquisition by Life Time
08:50 – 16:03steadyFitness industry landscape and competition
18:40 – 27:04densePersonal brand building and UGC strategy
30:03 – 36:05denseEvent experience design and community
36:05 – 39:12steadyLeadership and environment
39:12 – 45:55steadyHospitality and bar industry future
48:58 – 55:45denseFatherhood and performance identity
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00:00People are going to judge you no matter what, and 99% of the people want you to fail. But I love that shit.
00:07Brian Mazza is a lifestyle entrepreneur who recently sold his company, HPLT, to Lifetime Fitness last year. He's a master of building hospitality companies and world class experiences,
00:16not to mention being a creator with over 800,000 followers on social media. I have had people leave the summits and within an hour be like, I just quit my job for fifteen years. Thank you.
00:25Alright, dude. I don't know you, but I have to hold your arm right now and we're gonna get smacked in a 40 degree wave together. I can let you go.
00:31You just immediately make them trauma bond. You're immediately hooked.
00:34We talked to him about what it takes to build a world class experience, Lifetime's goal of becoming the go to third space in communities across America, and something I think y'all will love is how he'd save the struggling bar industry. You're gonna learn a ton in this one about the future of experiential marketing. But first, we gotta get into the story that he told at the beginning episode.
00:51We'll see y'all there.
00:56Alright. So we're on the one year anniversary Yes.
00:58Of you selling HPLT to Lifetime. I'd love to just kinda hear how that deal came together. Talk a little bit about the background of the business as well.
01:05You know, Lifetime came to the table, all that stuff. Yeah. So
01:09well thanks for having me here. Yeah. Of course.
01:11See you guys. Thanks for having us in the facility. Yeah.
01:13Know. Great great facility here. Yeah.
01:14So, I I really had no intention of ever selling HVLT. The business wasn't built to really do that. It was more of a incubator accelerator for me personally, as well as building a community and just chasing something that I've missed my whole life as being an athlete.
01:30Right? So I created this brand so I can continue to grow my network, continue to be around people that are gonna sharpen my tool throughout all the summits, and kind of play both sides.
01:40Right? So I can do my personal branding stuff, but leverage HPLT, and HPLT can leverage my personal branding stuff as well.
01:46Right? So we can all dance in the same pot. But we had a summit for 10,000 in September the previous year, and they had a a VP from Lifetime attended.
01:58I didn't know them. I didn't really know much about Lifetime prior to that. I was an Equinox guy.
02:04And then when I moved to the suburbs, I didn't go to Lifetime. I had my gym, so I just trained out of my own facility there Yeah. Which we still have, which is great.
02:10And then this guy, Jason Love, who's been at Lifetime, a wonderful guy. We hit it off all weekend, and he was like, man, this could be something really cool for attention tool internally at Lifetime.
02:23So maybe you could throw some summits for us internally and we can bring our top talent, top instructors or personal, you know, training employees in.
02:33And it could be just a really cool reset weekend or offer tools to to get them to to perform a little bit better. And we were into it.
02:42And it's it was so turnkey for us at this point that we could have done this. I I mean, I could do one tomorrow if I need to. And then he was like, hey, I want you to speak to this other my boss, this this awesome guy, Yufanda.
02:54And we hit it off on a on a call, and we were very aligned. And he was like, hey, actually, can you come to Boca? I wanna just spend some time with you.
03:01I wanna show you the Boca clubs. And I was like, no problem. I'll fly out tomorrow.
03:05So I went out there. And this again was just Always get on the jet. I've always been that my that way my whole life.
03:10Right? I've always been a yes man in that sense of if there's any opportunity that I feel like I can just meet new people and continue to grow, I'll travel where I need to go.
03:20Yeah. It goes back to when I was in the hospitality days as a bottle runner. You know, I was that 22 year old kid when all these mega nightlife people needed iced coffees in the morning.
03:29Even though I was hungover as hell, I would still go get the iced coffees and the bagels for everyone. Yes, they had nice cars for me to drive in the Hamptons, but I was like, if I go do all this stuff, pick up their laundry, do all these things, they'll they'll know that I'm reliable, and they'll always keep me around until there's opportunities.
03:44Right? So I got on that plane, went to Boca for twenty four hours. And I I felt like it was kind of an interview for me.
03:50And I spent about three hours in the car with this man I've never met before. And we talked everything but Lifetime and HVLT. We talked about family.
03:56We talked about, you know, just how we wanna continue through life and what means a lot to me. And and then after that he was like, hey, you know, you kinda passed the test.
04:06And I was like, what are you talking about? He's like, you know, we're really interested in your business. I need you to speak to this woman, Jesse, who I think you've met.
04:14And she, you know, runs New York at the time. And I met her and we hit it off right away, and and she was like, dude, I think we really need to have this internally. But I think we could do a lot more with it where we can help you reach more people.
04:27We can bring this summit to the masses and utilize our clubs and shoot content and all of that. And the conversation continued for about four or five months. And then I finally met the big man, BA, who who was the boss and runs everything.
04:40And, you know, we hit it off and it just came to, hey, we wanna acquire your business. Let's see how it goes for the year, and we're rocking and rolling.
04:48So that kind of accelerated really quickly, and then we sold it a year ago. Yeah. Is this the same Boca trip where you got recognized?
04:55No. It's a different Boca trip. But so funny, right?
04:57I I need to move to Boca. It's a different trip. I was like, you gotta attribute that.
05:00That's like good social proof that this is the Boca thinking about it. Wow. Good things happen in Boca, so I need to like move.
05:06You might actually have to move down there. Wow. Didn't I think about that.
05:08That's that's fascinating. So, they they wanted to almost use it as a professional development internally tool. Yeah.
05:14That's what I was told, and I was like, oh, that's really neat. Yeah. And then, I was speaking to Melissa who runs the business, and I said, hey, this could be, you know, maybe five, six, seven, eight events per year that we can just add as revenue.
05:25Yeah. So let's let's do it. Why not?
05:27It'll be very easy for us to And so have they have they kind of amplified the scale of the business thus far? Like So, yeah. I mean, it's great that we get to utilize all of their resources internally that I didn't have previously.
05:38Right? It was just me and Melissa running the business.
05:41But now, you know, I get the finance side of the things, I get help there, the marketing as well, and just the resources within all the clubs. And Yeah. The members get to have access to come.
05:51So that's been great. Right. But we still have such a big network of our own Mhmm.
05:55That we utilize a lot of our members still. But it's a great amenity for the lifetime member. Yeah.
06:01And I just look at I look at overall what what does the future of fitness
06:05look like? And if you look at Nike and what they're doing with, like, Training After Dark, you look at Bandit running in their run clubs, you look at the different lifting programs that all these facilities are having in this idea of creating a space where people can interact with each other and truly build a community where it's more of a horizontal relationship than vertical and top down.
06:24It's an interesting play from Lifetime to see that, know that come to you because you've already built it and be like, okay, how do we integrate this into what we have, the infrastructure that we have, the the the audience that we have, and then be able to take it, make it even bigger. What does that look like in the future for them on like Yeah.
06:42Mean, I don't even think we scratched the surface yet with them. I think there's so much more that we can contribute to what Lifetime wants to do on the innovation side of things. Mhmm.
06:50You know, Lifetime is is the best of what they do. Right? It's these athletic country clubs and no one can really touch them in that space.
06:57I like that positioning too. I mean, my kid we we go to a country club in my town.
07:02Right? My kids don't even wanna go to the one that I pay for. They're like, can we just go to Lifetime in Westchester?
07:07There's slides, there's rock climbing, there's basketball, there's pickleball, there's tennis. I mean, there's everything that you could do for a kid. And as a parent, you have childcare too.
07:16Not that my kids would go to that, but you have you have built in childcare. I mean, who does that? Yeah.
07:21Everyone wins there. Right? You can but when we go to Lifetime in Westchester, it's the pools are awesome, the amenities are sick, I get to relax, my kids run around, they know so many people there.
07:31But in terms of back to your question, you know, I think I would love to be tasked with more opportunity to innovate for them on these special projects. Right? Because content is king, and just look what BPN just did with their Ultra.
07:42Right? I mean, I can't even imagine how many eyeballs. Lifetime could do five different series like that.
07:47Without it? And Without a problem. They could do a pickleball niche, they could do like Biggest.
07:50A swimming niche, they could do anything. Right? It's just a matter of allocating resources having a change agent in the organization.
07:57Yeah. Exactly. So I think we're like, you know, kind of that
08:01that stallion group that can do it. You know Your acquisition to me is the signal that they know what they're doing. They do.
08:07Right? Oh, 100%. Between the Lifetime Awesome build out which for context for people is like this entire, you know, childcare with a wet suite like which is sauna cold plunge all in one.
08:17It's this massive gym. They got a they have a bar in there, you know? Like that's even counterintuitive.
08:22Yeah. You can you can turn up. You can turn up and I'll tell you it's so crazy.
08:25We were just
08:26No. I haven't been I haven't. He hasn't.
08:28Maybe he will. But we were just at Coral Gables. We did our our micro summit, is our one day summit.
08:33And the pool was I thought it was a it was a nightclub. Yeah. I was people are like, dude, what are we doing?
08:38I'm like, I have no clue. It was crazy. No.
08:40Sometimes it gets going. It gets going. Yeah.
08:43But, yeah, I think, you know, they they definitely know what they're doing. Right? They're on top of the game.
08:46I just think there's more opportunity for us to really do something really incredible. I think there's a huge opportunity just because I think about
08:53if we look at the fitness landscape and we look at, like, the competition, quote unquote, landscape. You have CrossFit here, which is slowly dying or losing its reach, sucks because I enjoy watching it, but overall as a sport, kinda dying.
09:09Then you have High Rocks, which is built for more so the endurance athlete. Right? Like And it's democratized.
09:14Like, anyone can really do that. Anybody can do it. And to me, there's no, like I'm not saying the guys that aren't winning aren't specimens, but you look at CrossFit or, like, football players or basketball players, and there's, like, elements that make them freak athletes that are the thing that you wanna watch.
09:29Like, you can't be one of them. Yeah. Like, no one here is One of the best guys.
09:32Jumping 40 inches. No one here is benching probably Oh. Three fifteen.
09:35I mean, you've been on camera saying you have 40 inch work. No. 36.
09:38I just got I've seen you training lately, bro. Good stuff. Thank you.
09:40Thank you. 36. See?
09:41Goddamn, Brian. I've seen the sprints. I've seen the sprints.
09:44I haven't seen the jumping. I've seen the sprints. Yeah.
09:45It's it's all he's he's got it on video. Don't feed the ego. You've got Hyrox over here that's very very endurance based, but there's nothing and I know you guys are are working on something, but, like, there's nothing in the middle that has the strength and power while maybe still adding some of the elements of endurance, but it's not the sole focus.
10:02Because I think this is, like, fun to do one time, and unless you're competing, it doesn't have, like, the addictive factor that something that's like, hey, I I go from benching to twenty five ten times to, you know, 20 times, or I go from a 30 inch vert to a 36 inch vert, or whatever the case may be.
10:19But like, the more the power
10:21explosive factors, and I think there's nothing that gets a crowd like more pumped up than seeing, you know, like a three fifteen clean. Yeah. Well, mean, I think the LT games is has been a great way to kind of blend everything there, you know.
10:32With the high rock stuff, listen, I think just fitness in general, if you're getting after it, awesome. Right? And that's the whole MO there.
10:38Don't think you're gonna me personally, I've never done High Rocks. I've really no desire to do it. And I know a lot of brands are like, we need you to get into High Rocks.
10:45I'm just like, it's not my thing. It's just really not don't I have no desire to do it. I'll go and like celebrate the homies and stuff.
10:51Alright. But with High Rocks, think it's like maybe four or five times max. How much better are you really gonna get?
10:57Unless you're dedicating your whole life to that.
11:00Few minutes. Right? So if you're doing your thing sick.
11:03The LT games, it's it's really technical. You have to be super strong. Talk about the LT Games a little bit.
11:08Yeah. The LT Games is sick. Mean, you have like think Noah Olsen won the first one who was a CrossFit legend Uh-huh.
11:13You know, competing there. And he was like, it was pretty tough. So, I know they also do high rocks and stuff.
11:18But when you see them do high rocks, it's really, in my opinion, I think they're just going through the motions of it. They're still crushing times.
11:25Yeah. But the LT games is very difficult. And I think when you watch that, you see real athletes, you see real strength and power, and what, you know, games should be.
11:35It's like when you used to watch I was talking about it with my trainer Tommy today. I don't know if you guys remember during the CrossFit Games when they had to race through all of those like dummies, and that was real athleticism.
11:44And Matt Frazier showed that he could do Cooked them. Cooked them.
11:48He like did it. It was like you training, right? Yeah.
11:50He could beat anybody, right? Quick feet. I like to see when people have to be real Yes.
11:56Deal athletes. Same. Totally.
11:58Now, I'm not taking away from High Rocks. It's great the community is is pretty wild. Their growth is insane from when it first came here.
12:04I would be down to get canceled by the High Rocks community on this podcast though. Like, if we started saying some controversial shit, they could come for us. You know?
12:10Yeah. It's fine.
12:12But I don't have any desire to, like, really watch like, if they if it was on TV I think it's just I would never watch it. It's done such a good job with modern branding and social That's
12:22the thing where it just seems like the CrossFit games and even like the Lifetime games to an extent. Like I think
12:28the model from High Rocks is there. Right? It is.
12:31Incredible photos of everybody. You look sick when you And we all look the same too. That's another reason why I don't wanna go is because we all we all have the same leg sleeve.
12:39We're all the same lines. Everyone's like black on black on yeah. All the same people and it's like, I don't wanna go and be my like, be with everyone like myself.
12:47I wanna do other stuff. Yeah. But we always joke about it.
12:50It's like, you'd just be like looking in the mirror for for three hours. Yeah. Yeah.
12:54But the homies that do it, I have a lot of friends that do it and they do do it really well. Yeah. And I applaud them and I think that's great.
12:59It's a it's a mission, know. It's like a good thing to go pursue. I do think the opportunities in that in that middle ground of like what CrossFit couldn't be with like what with what High Rocks did.
13:10Because like you guys said, they they modernized the branding of sport and of fitness. Yes. Because you still look at CrossFit
13:17branding overall like it's very 2001.
13:21You know what mean? But also impossible for the normal Joe to do. Yes.
13:24Right. Like if you can't Olympic lift
13:27Yeah. You're done. You're you're compete.
13:29Yeah. And I think that middle ground is is such an opportunity.
13:33And the other thing I think about too is, like, what do you think is needed to almost, like, transcend these these games or these competitions.
13:43Right? And what I'll reference is Michael Jordan transcended basketball.
13:48OBJ, in many ways, like, transcended football. Noah Lyles is trying to transcend track. Right?
13:54With like being bigger personalities outside of the sport, where do you think you have to go to be able to like transcend and make something like this mainstream?
14:02Well, think now with High Rocks, it's pretty incredible that these major brands are finally I'm talking about like major major brands, Adidas, Puma, the Nikes, they're finally buying into it with creating a shoe.
14:14I think it starts there. Right? Like, when Michael Jordan created his his Jordan Ones, right, they like they created that for him for basketball.
14:24I don't think they knew how big that was gonna eventually get. I think they knew he was gonna be wonderful, but I think he's the highest paid athlete still.
14:31On residuals. It's crazy. So I think now, you know, especially with Adidas when they're coming out with this new shoe that looks great.
14:38Right? You know, when Reebok was doing CrossFit, they never made a good looking shoe. No.
14:43Right. It was never a good looking shoe. You tell me you didn't have 10 pairs of the Nano?
14:46No one made a really cool CrossFit shoe. Yeah. Now, Puma is making a cool High Rock shoe.
14:54Adidas now is finally jumping on board and making a cool High Rocks or hybrid shoe. Right? They're not gonna say High Rocks, hybrid shoe.
15:01So I think that's the first start. And then once you have those big brands and big money behind it, they could start really getting the right athletes in there.
15:09Now, if High Rocks really wants to go to the next level, they're gonna have to get it on TV. They're gonna have to get real deal partnerships and athletes in there to have a league. Mhmm.
15:19Now, don't know. Is anyone gonna really watch High Rocks on a Sunday? Probably not.
15:22I don't know. But
15:24listen, the Premier League was able to do it and look at them now and they did that big monster deal with Peacock and NBC. No one I'm a big soccer guy. No one watched the Premier League back in the day.
15:33Right. It was like, we watched Italian league. Alright.
15:36So over the last two years of building Nibble, shipping nearly 8,000 UGC ads and getting performance data on every single one of them, it became super clear. There are two types of brands, those that understand creative volume and those that don't. The core difference was what they focused on.
15:48Brands that focused on volume plus hit rate were never complaining that Meta changed the algorithm. Their stuff just worked. And anytime we did work with one of those savvy brands, it was always on the same platform, Motion.
15:58Motion is by far the best tool to optimize your creative pipeline. Provides structure, visibility, and insights that your creative team needs to make better decisions. I like to think of it as like what Meta would actually show you if they cared about your success.
16:09All the key metrics like three second stop rate, winning angles, formats, competitor research, it's all built into their platform so you can make quicker and better decisions. They even just launched their new AI agent Runneth which functions as a twenty four seven creative strategist providing recommendations to your ad account.
16:23Y'all make sure to go check them out at motionapp.com. Alright. Let's get back to the episode.
16:27I think the challenge will I always be mean, it's just not really like that much of a spectator sport. And it's kind of cringe. Yeah.
16:33Right? Watching the same person who looks the same continue to do Right. Right.
16:38Yeah. It's hard to like really stand out.
16:40There's a there's a world where if you kinda did it like the BPN Ultra, people would tap in a little bit. If you like x y z
16:49thing works because it is extreme. Right? And I think like with content in particular, you have to have some sort of extreme or maximalist concept.
16:57You have to have some reason where you're like, alright, is someone gonna die at this ultra marathon? Like like the last I think that's the problem with fitness too a little bit. Yeah.
17:04And it like everything has to be extreme. Everything has to be extreme to stick. The challenge is that's just sort of like what the algorithms I get it.
17:12Desire. But I I think that is unfortunate sometimes extremely it's societally toxic.
17:18It's it kinda is. Right? It's like It's terrible.
17:21I hear people in certain gyms if your high rocks time isn't good enough that they don't talk to you. Yeah. That's actually like the entire city of Austin, Texas.
17:28Yeah. It's like, what are you doing? And it's like that it was I think running went through that too.
17:31Right? It was like if you didn't run a sub three, you're not cool.
17:35Totally. Like, I'm not gonna change my whole life to run a sub three. No.
17:38It's a lot I of care enough to do that. I'm Yeah.
17:42I've made more money not going sub three. Right. Exactly.
17:46Exactly. If I go sub three, it's not like I'm gonna make another million dollars.
17:50Like, it's just not gonna happen. Right? So, listen.
17:52I think people getting after it's great. Do your hard feats. It's amazing.
17:56Right. But also, people have to stop training for the craziest stuff just to be seen.
18:01Right. Like, be authentic in yourself. Be cool.
18:05Have some style. Yeah. And you should be okay.
18:08Yeah. I think everyone's fallen into the trap of
18:11trying to do the most extreme novel thing. Yeah. And you see it where it's like I'm the first man to run it'd like the crazy like the first man to run from here to Florida taking this route.
18:22And it's like what are we doing?
18:24No. Listen, if you have a charity component to it, awesome. Right?
18:27But I think I would like to see people get back to,
18:30I'm training to be like a really healthy fit dad. Right. Right.
18:35Yeah. Like being a good role model. Yeah.
18:36Being I mean, I'm not saying these people are bad role models, but let's tone it down a bit. Mhmm. It's become very performative.
18:42Let's talk a little bit about like content strategy and positioning because you've actually done a really good job building your personal brand and then now you've worked with Ro, you're launching your own brand, Cacio e Pepe. Yeah. Cacio Pepe.
18:53Yeah. And I just wanna hear about like, a, how you kinda went about positioning your personal brand. Right?
18:58Because it clearly resonated with hundreds of thousands of people. And b, was there a goal to make that fit with certain brands or did the brands come after? So when I first started dabbling in this world,
19:10I don't know how old you guys are but 30. 30? Yeah.
19:13Wow. Okay. I'm 41.
19:14So when I was doing Kinda mocking us right now. Yeah. You guys are young.
19:17But when I was doing this in, you know, in 2011 when we had the Ainsworth and the club in the Hamptons and all that.
19:24Mhmm. You know, this is when it was Page Six was super important to get into in in the New Yorkers. Yeah.
19:29Like PR was still a thing. So important. Right?
19:31Getting into GQ, getting into Esquire. I got on the cover of Men's Health twice. So that was kind of the game, and that's how I was always known like, oh, that's the restaurant guy who was on Men's Health, right, cover.
19:43And I always had this belief that I could do more than I was doing in the restaurant space. Even though we were the premier spot, I just felt, you know, as an athlete I had a lot more to give and I wanted to be challenged. And when you start getting those PR opportunities in New York City at the time, that was the Instagram.
20:00Right? That was the content play. Read the magazine and then whatever.
20:04You put it on Facebook. Right? Yeah.
20:07And then once Instagram came out, I said, okay, wow. Let me see if I can position myself as the fit restaurateur.
20:13I didn't wanna just be the restaurateur. I wanted to I was getting really fit, and I was training at Tone House. I don't know if you guys ever heard of that place.
20:19It's probably the hardest workout spot in New York. It's insane.
20:23It's wild. And if you trained at Tone House and you wore the hat in the street in New York during that time, people would be like, oh, word?
20:32Yeah, yeah. Totally. This guy gets it.
20:34This guy trains. Yeah. And that's when we were talking about before we started filming, there was no real fitness in New York then.
20:40I mean, people, you went to a big box gym and that's it. You didn't have all these boutique studios. Yeah, yeah, had Crunch Fitness probably and And stuff like Toenails sparked that, and Barry's came into play.
20:49So I went to a Nike event where they were super smart when we started doing this in 2012, maybe '11. They would bring a bunch of people together at Pier 40 on the rooftop, and they would shoot a whole turf workout with Tone House.
21:03But they'd have drones and photographers on-site. And they would get you that those pictures. You couldn't post videos, and there was no stories at the time.
21:10Alright? This is crazy. This is crazy.
21:11This is OG stuff. Like terrible filter stuff. This is like really bare bones Bare bones IG.
21:15No carousels either. No carousel. One photo, and that's it.
21:19Grainy with a filter. Yeah. Grainy and you hoped your hashtag worked.
21:22Yeah. I don't even know if they did work. Yeah.
21:23But whatever. So they would give you the content that night with hopes that people would post. Now, don't know if people did, but I was like, fuck, I'm in incredible shape right now.
21:31And I was like the OG guy to wear tights with no shorts back in the day, no shirt, and people were like, who is this guy? And I was just always very comfortable and confident that I was like, fuck it. I'm gonna roll like this cause more people that are gonna hate are gonna be following and whatever.
21:45Smart. So we went to this shoot or this this workout and I did a like a a jump in the air and I was higher than everyone and they snapped it perfectly. I And was like, fuck, this is a dope photo.
21:57I'm gonna post it on Instagram in the morning and I'm gonna put some cheesy caption and say, rule number one, don't be number two. And I got like maybe 300 likes. And I was like, oh, shit.
22:07300 people like this? This is really cool. So I called up my best friend Chris Carrow, who's a photographer.
22:12I was like, meet me on the East Side. I have all these tights, bro. We're gonna do a corny workout shoot on the turf, running the track, playing soccer.
22:20I love that. Right? And he was like, really, bro?
22:22And I was like, don't make fun of Yeah. Just fucking meet me there Just support it. At the sunrise Uh-huh.
22:27And you're gonna shoot me running around. Yeah. And he's like, okay.
22:30Told him no questions. Yeah. You just have to meet me.
22:32Telling your boy like meet me, I got seven pairs of tights is crazy. Yeah, know. Right?
22:35So he was like, I'm down, bro. Let's do it. Yeah.
22:38Yeah. The group chat, everyone's making fun of me. But we did it, and then I started posting more of those quotes on top of these photos, like, you couldn't even do any of that, like, in the captions, and it started picking up, started picking up.
22:49Nike started liking it. All these things. Next you know, I'm getting invited to a Nike event, an Adidas event.
22:54All these different pop ups. And then next thing you know, men's health hits me up from someone who saw this and was like, hey, can you be on a cover?
23:02Come to this shoot. And once that happened, I was like, oh, this is for real. Right.
23:07And then that men's health cover turned into meeting the CEO of MX who then did a hospitality Christmas event at my bar.
23:16Then I was like, oh my god, dude. I can get all these fitness people to come to the bar and do their parties. And then I was getting more press and more press and more press.
23:24And then Instagram slowly developed. Right?
23:27And then everyone was getting involved Yeah. In And then it was like, okay, I have a five year Volvo deal. That's And when like the new XC 90 came out, when the new body style.
23:35And they let me wrap it in green, and then I did that. And all these things started popping up.
23:41And then that's when I, you know, I ended up leaving in 2018, the restaurant business. But we did events better than anybody, and I was on the forefront of doing that.
23:49So then I was like, dude, can create a fitness company and learn I learned so much on that five year journey of Instagram that I could just replicate it now with HBOT. Right.
23:59And we got David Goggins to our first summit, and then I was like, I could just crush so much content UGC wise Mhmm. And all these brands are gonna wanna dance with us because we were the first people to do it. And that's peak David Goggins era too.
24:11Yeah. That was the first, like, you could DM him and he would DM you back. Yeah.
24:14That was like Oh. First Rogan episode. Yeah.
24:16So I DM'd him. He got back to me and he was like, hey, speak to my manager who was his fiancee.
24:22And funny story, like, we got on a call and I didn't have a company really.
24:28I made it up. I was like, I have a company. I wanna do an event in May.
24:30And she was like, alright, send me your deck. So I immediately when I left the restaurant Go make the deck.
24:35I called my girl. I was like, yo, please make me a deck. She made me a deck.
24:38I sent it over. She's like, he'll do it. It's gonna be $50 for him to speak for an hour, which is like insane now.
24:46I would do that all day now. He's probably like, what, 500? Think $1.50 or $1.75 for an hour.
24:50And she's like, yeah, he'll do it. Hop on a call with you and talk through it with him.
24:54I was like, what the fuck is going on? Yeah. And then I wired the money and my wife didn't know I started a new business and that's a whole another story, but Yeah.
25:01Yeah. We did it. So I I think It's for me gone.
25:04You know, any advice I could give people is like, you know, you have to be as confident as you possibly can and people are going to judge you no matter what. And 99 of the people want you to fail rather than you win.
25:15Yeah. But I love that shit. So I'd rather have everyone thinks they want me to fail and not do well.
25:19People almost never punch down. Right? No.
25:22They always are punching up. So, I mean, it just really fuck it.
25:25And then I think with the the user generated stuff, was just brands started to see what we were able to do on the HPLT side and the reach side, and
25:35kinda just took off from there. Yeah. Because I mean, that's actually one of the first times that I saw your stuff was when you did the the collab with Kane.
25:42Yeah. And so
25:43So we launched Kane. Right. Like, my we launched Kane at HPLT in 2021.
25:48Oh, wow. Rob Pinnell, the best lacrosse player ever, who's my best friend, was like, hey, you gotta meet this guy, John Gags. Yeah.
25:55He's a legend. Meet him at The OG. We met at a diner in Westchester.
25:59Oh. And he was like, dude, I have this shoe. What do you think about it?
26:02Was like, it reminds me of Crocs. And he's like, yeah, exactly. But we're better than Crocs.
26:06And I was like, I can help you do this. He's like, really? I'm like, yeah, dude.
26:09Have a summit coming up in May in Miami. Uh-huh. And I'll have all the right people there.
26:14I have Eric Hinman there, all these right people. Give everyone pairs of shoes. You're gonna speak with your designer, and I'm gonna blow this up for you.
26:22Yeah. He's like, really? I'm like, yep.
26:24So, he came. We blew it up for him. So, pretty much every athlete I brought to the table for them.
26:29Matt Choi, Nick Baer, Eric Hinman Yeah.
26:33The list goes on. That all came through HPLT and our network, and these are all friends. And John's a very good friend of mine, and Yeah.
26:39I was like, dude, if you trust me, I will funnel you the right people, then you take it from here and I don't need to, like Yeah. Do anything from there. Do you think
26:45I'm curious if you think that playbook is like as effective in 2026 as it was in 2021.
26:51I think it will always be effective. Yeah. Because people need to trust the people behind the brand.
26:57If you can build that brand loyalty, you'll always do well. Yeah. And that's why I think HPLT has been so successful over the past eight years is the amount of speakers we bring in, the brands that we bring in, people know that we really believe in them and we trust them.
27:08Yeah. I do agree. And they come and like, look what we we did the same thing with athletic brewing, you know, in 2018 when we we launched in LA with Seal Team Six and stuff, like, they were the logo on the shorts.
27:21Right. And then, I'm not saying we helped them take off, but they believed in us to get that content out right away. Yeah.
27:26Looking at where the space is going from from the event side,
27:31what have you learned over the last, what has it been, eight years roughly? Putting on events, putting on experiences, putting on things that that have, like, these die hard followings. Because looking at where the landscape's going, all the brands are are starting to try to put in, like, these these in person experiences.
27:46Yeah. Especially everybody's talking about like this analog era and and we wanna like use digital to bring people together. Especially in the luxury side too.
27:52Brands
27:53now are doing experiential. They're getting away from strategic PR that they used to do. And you have like Moncler going on a ski trip.
27:59Yeah. Right? Like, does that all the time.
28:01Right? They they work with those brands and they do really cool stuff, which is brilliant. But what are some of the mistakes that you make that you can tell people now so that they don't make the same mistakes as they're trying to lean into this?
28:11Yeah. Because those mistakes probably could cost $50,100,000 dollars. It costs so much money, and and you can ask my partner Melissa on this shit.
28:17I'm the cheapest guy ever with this stuff, so I'm very strategic with it. But I think no matter what, our brains now are so wired to consume consume consume consume. Right?
28:26It could be good, it could be bad, and people's attention span is is shot. I mean, mine's shot. I can even, like, what did I just look at?
28:33I forget. Right? For sure.
28:34So brands have to understand that people are gonna consume the info no matter what, but that just that just means that they're digesting it. They're just taking it in, what are they gonna do with that?
28:44What we've done a very good job that I had to learn along the way is people need to really be impacted by the surrounding network and people that are part of the event. I never wanted it to be about me when they go to the events.
28:58If you ask anyone, I'm actually kind of standoffish at the events because I want the brand and the network to speak for itself. When you make it too much about the founder, it's only gonna have a I believe it's gonna have a shorter shelf life because what happens if something goes wrong with the founder?
29:15Doesn't interact. Doesn't interact, or there's gonna be something or whatever. So if the brand has that loyalty and the network of the people are really the brand, I think it will go super far.
29:27Now, we just spoke about Moncler. They're gonna be fine. They have so much more money than I have in this stuff.
29:32Right? But when they do their events, it's not about the founder of Moncler.
29:37It's about the experience and what they're doing and the people that are going to the summit. So we're very intentional with who comes to the summit because we want people to have no ego. We want people to really interact with each other.
29:49And there's so many people that have become best friends, have invested in each other's businesses together by coming to our summits. And I think that is where they're consuming the information, but they're also have an action plan to do something with it after.
30:03What what are some of those ways you go about making an experience more memorable for your guests? Well, no matter what we always do, whenever we're by a body of water, we bring in Navy SEALs. And I think no matter what, I always have to do that, a, because I love doing it.
30:17I love to suffer in the cold water with everyone. Okay. But there is nothing like that in these summits or experiences that are people doing.
30:24Right. Right? So it's two hours.
30:26You're getting waterboarded. You're doing everything as a group. You are with Navy SEALs that have been in the craziest situations.
30:32Willingly getting waterboarded. Willingly getting waterboarded. And it's really uncomfortable for two hours.
30:37But I think it gives you a huge reality check when you're done. You're like, oh my god.
30:43Yeah. There's so much more I can give. Life isn't that bad.
30:45Exactly. And that really sets the tone for the weekend because the camaraderie between everyone is just so on fire. And then we take them through, you know, a mind body soul journey throughout the whole weekend, but that sets off the tone.
30:56So you do that at the beginning of the event? We do it right away. So people don't know each other yet.
31:01They're still a little standoffish, but then it's like, alright dude, I don't know you, but I have to hold your arm right now and we're gonna get smacked in a 40 degree wave together. I can let you go. Yeah.
31:10And by the end of that session, I'm like, dude, when am I coming to visit you in Austin? You just saved your life.
31:16Yeah. Basically. It's so crazy.
31:18You're like, dude, you're my man. You're my man now. Right?
31:20So, I think it's super unique and You just immediately make them trauma bond? Yeah. It's like, you're immediately hooked.
31:26That sounds brilliant. Right? And then you go throughout the next couple hours, and then you do breath work, and you're tapping into your inner child issues Yeah.
31:34And you're crying together. Do y'all do Hof?
31:37We don't do Wim Hof. We do hypno breath work with Francesca. This this woman out in LA who's wonderful, who's been to all of our summits.
31:44So we try try to make every experience inside of the summits where you have to second guess your life at some point, where you're like, maybe I should do that, maybe I shouldn't do that.
31:56I mean, I've I've had people leave the summits and within an hour be like, I just quit my job for fifteen years. Thank you. And I'm like or guys like, I'm not getting married now.
32:07I just bought a I just rented a new home and I literally just texted my fiance that it's over. And now, I'm not saying that's what we try to do, but it's so impactful for people that they're like It's a mindset shift. It's a it's totally They see life through completely different lines yeah.
32:22You're getting the dopest gear as well. Right? Like, you're getting the new Solomon Run shoes, you're getting all this stuff, you're you're feeling fly, you're doing all these different activations.
32:30Come out that motherfucker a new man. Yeah. You're like never looked so good.
32:33You gotta start giving haircuts while they're I know. I can't. Give them a pair of tights.
32:37So
32:38I think that's what we really try to do. It's worked really well, and the brands that come in, the founders that speak really We always tell the founders, we we want you to kinda be here for the whole summit so you can really get close to the people because then they'll be lifers. Now, you already know we are super skeptical on this show about most AI tools promising the world.
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33:33and tell them we sent you. I've never thought about that where the very interesting point to think about the first thing that you do almost as like a hook. Something that gets everybody very connected because like I don't know if you guys listened to the Rogan and it was Ben Affleck, Matt Damon episode Yes.
33:48Where he's talking about like it's Hollywood has shifted, how they film has shifted, how they come up with movies. Because they know people's attention speeds are cut. So they have to make Yeah.
33:55They were talking about the movie, the new movie that they just put out, don't know why I can't remember the name. On J. K.
34:00Merriman? The first five seconds, right, somebody gets popped right in the first five seconds. Every show right now, someone just gets shot in the head immediately.
34:06And then it goes into like storyline, and then they break it down on the Rogan episode where it's like, well, Netflix has to do that now because if not, they they got the data that people are gonna be scrolling, they're trying to find something else to watch. Not that that could happen at an event, but if you think about the first event where not the Shoot them in the fucking face immediately.
34:25Yeah. But you think about the first event as, okay, we need to get them to buy in and be Yes. Completely submerged and immersed into this experience.
34:35Through the first event, the first thing that we do, that's a very interesting Yeah. And we
34:40did yeah. And we did that in Antigua, so we did a summit overseas. And Kaj Larsen, who's an incredible Navy SEAL, I was like, dude, I honestly wanna do the Navy SEAL activation after dinner the first night.
34:53He's like, really? In the dark? I'm like, yeah.
34:56He's like, okay. Say no more. So he he ate quickly and went out in the ocean and was like floating by the boats.
35:05And we had everyone eat and we're like, okay. First activation starts now. Go to your room, change.
35:08We're down here in five minutes. And I saw grown men extremely extremely nervous to get into the ocean in the middle of the night.
35:16I mean, I I was hurt actually, so I didn't have to do it, thank God. And I do all the activations with everyone, so I still love this. That's why I really do it, because I get to just fucking train with awesome people.
35:25And he was at the boats floating, and people are on the beach lined up, and he comes out of the water. He swims in his Speedo, comes out in flippers.
35:35He's like, I'm Lieutenant Kaj Larson, blah blah blah blah. And people are like, oh my God.
35:40He's like, get in the water, swim around those boats, and come back. And people are like but again, after that moment Yeah.
35:47People feel like superheroes. And then the weekend flows so perfectly because people are bought in. People see that the leaders are bought in, and they're like, I can't let you down.
35:56I can't let you down. I have to train hard this week, and I have to be dialed in throughout all the seminars. Yeah.
36:01And it's really incredible that the it's you become a team. I was just saying, you made me think of a complete other side of it where
36:09there's probably so much affinity built into HPLT because of how you make them feel at the end of, you know, how however many days you guys put them through through the ringer where if they come in feeling like, oh, I'm anxious or I deal with, you know, I don't have confidence in the work area.
36:24But then, like you said, they leave that experience feeling like a superhero. That changes their whole life, but it also is they're gonna know the friend that's dealing with something and go right to like, Yo, Brian. Yeah.
36:35You can do it. You should definitely do this. And like, you have this word-of-mouth engine referral
36:39is huge us. Like, we don't even market really that much. Yeah.
36:43I put almost kinda has to come in through a referral. Yeah. Because, you know, if if you're new to this and I post the Navy SEAL workout and you see Ray Cash screaming at you to get in the water, you're gonna be like, I don't I don't know if I'm gonna do that.
36:55Yeah. Then I have to convince you to do it, right, on a call Which is which I don't want. So I'm like, hey, dude.
37:00Reach out to your homie. I know you you told me he's going through some stuff. I'll even discount him $500 till he comes.
37:05Yeah. Right? And he's like, really?
37:07And they come and like, you saved my life. I've I've heard that so many times and I'm like, I didn't do anything, dude. The Navy SEALs did that.
37:13I just put you in that room. And I think that's the key of real leadership, especially for coaches and and anyone in this world is if you want anything to be successful that you are part of with a bunch of different people, you have as a leader, you have to put them in the right room.
37:28Yeah. Totally. I wrote about this in the newsletter the other day.
37:31It's like a water bottle. Right? A water bottle at CVS is $2.
37:34A water bottle at the airport is $7. A water bottle at the Met game is $12. Same water bottle, just different prices, but different environments.
37:42Right? Look at I don't know if you guys watch soccer or Champions League, Elise and Harry Kane and Diaz right now at Bayern Munich.
37:50Harry Kane didn't win anything at Tottenham, nothing. Left, now he just won back to back and he might probably win Ballon d'Or. Wow.
37:58Michael Elyse, Crystal Palace, didn't really value him. Man City cut him as a kid. Now he's on Bayern Munich and arguably the best player or winger in the world.
38:06Yeah. I like him better than Yamal. I mean, Sam You could fight fight me on that.
38:10Sam Darnold. Sam Darnold just won a Super Bowl after being And look at Diaz, who's on Liverpool, left and went to Bayern Munich. Now, these guys are gonna probably win Champions League.
38:17They're all gonna crush in the World Cup. Same players. Same exact style of players, different environment, different coach.
38:25Right? So as a leader, you have to put people in the right room for them to be successful. Yeah.
38:30So I would actually like all the CEOs that of their their employees that come to my summit, send me a nice thank you because I make them so much sharper. Right? Because they're around steak knives all day for those three weekends.
38:40They're not around butter knives. They're around steak knives. They're getting sharp, and they're learning how to be weapons, and they go back and apply those tools with confidence.
38:47And confidence is the best tool in order to be successful in my opinion. You can even say the same thing about LeBron. Right?
38:52Like LeBron going from
38:54Cleveland to Miami, getting in the right room with Wade and Pat Riley Of course. Completely shifts who he was as a player then comes right back to Cleveland, wins it. Right?
39:02It's a complete shift. And the way he did it might have not been For sure. Awesome.
39:07Questionable rollout. Questionable rollout. Well, he wasn't in the room yet.
39:09But he was in the room, man. He got real sharp.
39:12They got sharp.
39:13You were a hospitality entrepreneur. Yeah. You got your start in the bar space.
39:16That's obviously struggling quite a bit. And then now you're a fitness kinda experiential entrepreneur. Like, what do you think happens next in this bar industry?
39:27Like, how does a bar or a member's club or some sort of hospitality experience replicate what you just said, which is like that first interaction is so strong that they build massive affinity
39:39for your establishment. Like, how does someone do that? Well, first and foremost, back in the day when we were doing the restaurant world, like, you could drink and do drugs and it was fine.
39:49Yeah. Yeah. Right?
39:50Like, there was Societally. Societally. It was like totally fine.
39:53Now, I think in the in the space of all all of these podcasts and information that people are getting Yeah. The wellness industrial complex.
40:01It's kind of like forcing it down your throat now in a way of saying like, wow, I shouldn't have a glass of wine or I shouldn't be drinking. Look at look what it's doing to my life.
40:10Huberman told me it'll kill me. Exactly. So we were at a we were at a over in Little Italy yesterday, we were having dinner
40:16and the guy's just like the wait the waiter's just like playing with my daughter the whole night and like being really sweet with her. At the end of the night, brings shots and He was like, hey, you guys drink?
40:24Was like, yeah, I'll take like a shot.
40:26Well, the first thing Tommy said is like, I can't take a shot. It'll ruin my sleep score. I was like, no, dude.
40:31Right? So now, in a way it's like, in a way that's good, but then in a way it's also not good, right, because you kinda have to live a little and you're over optimizing So I I understand that. But I think people are more hyper aware now of everything that they're doing Yeah.
40:44And how it can affect your sleep score and your longevity and how you look and how you act. And again, people wanna be cultish and be a certain way, right, so they follow the wave. Of course.
40:52Now, restaurants, you know, when we did Ainsworth, we created experiences. Right?
40:57We were the Sunday fun day kings. We were the first people to really have a DJ during Sunday football.
41:03Right. We had bottle service at noon on Sunday.
41:06Electric. On it was crazy. So we we created that experience for people.
41:09We had celebrities and athletes and all of that stuff all around. So, again, restaurants now are still they're gonna have to get creative and they're gonna have to create experiences within the restaurants.
41:20Now, New York City is crazy because rents are so high, and especially the new mayor and everything is kind of wild. It's the Wild Wild West now.
41:28I don't know if restaurants are gonna be able to get that creative on their their budget and their cash flow. Yeah. Because you have rainy days, you have bad days, it crushes you Yeah.
41:36As a restaurateur. Yeah. But then you look at it like I think Vegas is even getting affected by all of this.
41:42Right? Vegas is the poster child. Yeah.
41:44Now now look what they're doing. You're to Aspen, you're going to ski resorts, and you have a not Avicii, I just saw him.
41:49He just passed away. The anniversary. You get David Guetta Right.
41:54Coming to Aspen Yeah. To perform on a ski weekend.
41:58Gamble on your never happened. So people are seeking different locations for experiences.
42:03Right? But that's where the restaurants need to get really creative and follow to these different locations and do pop ups and do all these things to stay relevant.
42:12Because they're not gonna be able to hang along in these environments anymore because people aren't drinking as much. People are training more and people are buying into their health.
42:21So especially with like seed oils and all of these things, like, does this have seed oils on it? Like, dude, you you did cocaine like Yeah. Weeks a week You worry about seed oils.
42:30Right? It's nuts. So I think people need to kind of slow down with that.
42:34But restaurants, I feel like, definitely have to change their environment and their landscape people aren't eating out the way they used to be and they're not drinking the way they used to be. Do you think members clubs, like there's this massive bubble here.
42:46Yeah. You know, and and you're in New York City, right? So the amount of wealth is Yeah.
42:50Unmatched. Right. So you can do that here.
42:53But in other cities, maybe one or two max. Right. Maybe one.
42:56Yeah. But people wanna be exclusive. People wanna show again their experiences on their phone and I'm cooler than you.
43:02I could go to this I could do that. I got access to this. I got access, you don't.
43:06Right? And that's just the that's the world we live in. Dave Grumman was on a podcast recently and he said He's on Mark was he on Mark Brazil's podcast?
43:14Yeah.
43:15And he he came out and said, the quickest way to make sure someone never comes back to your bar is to give them a VIP card because then they don't have like the illusion that I might not be able to get Right? The Yeah.
43:27Like if if I don't know if I can get the place then like I probably
43:31wanna go more rather than, oh, that's my like default. That's my go to. And he said he keeps that exact mentality through all of his different restaurants.
43:40Yeah. And then, you know, you have these run clubs that are super popular. Right?
43:42Especially in Austin and New York and here. And it's like, I can't drink tonight because I have to super fly for my run club tomorrow.
43:49Yeah. I get it. But I think restaurants are in for a rude awakening.
43:54Yeah. I mean, they they barely survived COVID. Right?
43:56That landscape changed everything now. People drank a lot during COVID and they were like, oh my god, I have a drinking problem now. And they got out of it.
44:03But restaurants are it's gonna be tough. I think a restaurant could solve its problems by just reverse engineering what works on social media. Right?
44:10So, like, if you have we talked about extremism earlier. Like, if you have an extreme steak. I used to do the mac and cheeseburger challenge.
44:16Don't even know if you guys know Like, dude, this is crazy. So I created a burger called the mac and cheeseburger. So it's a burger, panko mac and cheese that was frozen, then got fried, so then you had that mac and cheese on top.
44:27Yeah. And then mac and cheese on top of that.
44:30I But was like, oh, this is dope. It's going viral on like infatuation and all these things. But was like, fuck.
44:35It's not enough. So let's do three burgers on top of each other. And whoever can eat this burger in forty five minutes without throwing up gets like $750.
44:42Yeah. It's like man versus yeah. Yeah.
44:44Kobayashi came and did three of them Oh my in a row and didn't throw up. So was that nine total burgers? That was nine total burgers.
44:51It was Eight pounds of mac and cheese. Eight pounds of mac and cheese. Was this big.
44:54What does it call? He ate all of it, so he was dipping it in water and eating it, but it was a huge social moment. Then, the food god who I've known forever through the hospitality industry, Jonathan Chebbin, I saw him out when my my son was like one.
45:06He was passing my bar and he was like, yo dude, let's do something together. Yeah. So we created 24 karat gold wings.
45:11Do you guys remember that? So I created that with him, and then that went viral. I think we won like the PR awards during that time because we had 24 karat gold wings that were a thousand dollars and you got a bottle of Ace of Spades with it.
45:24Right? So we partnered with that and we and people were like, dude. So we were doing this stuff.
45:28It's I remember it's so crazy. Casey Nystat Yeah. Right?
45:31The OG YouTuber, calls my phone one day. I'm like, hello?
45:36He's like, it's Casey. I'm like, Casey who? And he's like, he tells me, and I'm like, oh, what's up?
45:39He's like, dude, heard you got those wings. He's like, I got a drone flying out of your bar on 3rd On 3rd Avenue right now. Can I come in?
45:46I'm like, yeah. Cops come because there's a drone. You can't have drones in New York City.
45:48And then he shot this whole thing on YouTube for us for free. Yeah. And it went nuts.
45:54Was this when he was blogging everything everything. And he's in there eating the the 24 cow gold wings, wants to know how that's made, and all that stuff. I mean, were terrible, but it was a they were brutal.
46:06Yeah. But it was a huge PR. So, yeah, you have to do things that are wild Yeah.
46:11Right, to get people indoors. Just like when you're creating a clothing brand, right? You need to
46:15is short lived, but your other products and your foundation have to be gnarly. Right. They gotta work.
46:20But it's like now the low is higher. Yeah. Right?
46:22Like you go to an extreme high, the low is here, you're now like right in here. Yeah. You can like Right?
46:28We're we're a t shirt brand. That's our, you know, simple pleasures. All of our t shirts are made in The US.
46:33That's our bread and butter. We sell the most of But we're we're doing like really cool novelty pieces which get traffic into the site.
46:40Totally. You gotta do the we're doing a cool jean jacket. Like, we would never really make that.
46:44But people are like, dude, that's I we did these shorts for the World Cup. I posted it the other day on social. I mean, was the most I've ever received from people regarding the clothing brand.
46:54But,
46:55now our t shirts are selling more because people are going to the site. Yeah. You gotta bring the traffic up.
46:58So It's like if you're gonna buy the denim, you're gonna look for the thing that matches, and you might as well look for where you're already searching.
47:04Yep. Like, clubs are cool. Right?
47:06If you wanna be a runner, it's awesome. You get good fitness because there's hot chicks at it, the guys are gonna go. Yeah.
47:11It definitely helps. Definitely. But I think, like, everything you've kinda touched on so far is you you truly understand how to, like, make whether it's macro experiences or micro experiences like the 24 carat wings,
47:21to get people to talk about it and to get buzz about it and to almost like understand the infrastructure that people wanna pull out their phones and and and put that out there, show that they can do that. Whether it's a status symbol of like, hey, I completed the mac and cheeseburger challenge, or b, you know, 24 carat wings, or even like down to the Navy Seals, like I was water bordered by a Navy Seal at night.
47:40Yeah. And like, you know, the most wild part is like the mothers and the women that come and do the Navy Seal stuff are they love it. I feel like they get more out of it because their kids
47:50see, wow, mom just did this. Mhmm. And that's what they talk about.
47:53Yeah. Like my kids think I'm cool now. My kids know I'm strong.
47:56My my kids know I can do this. So for me, that's a huge win. Right?
47:59So anyone who does an AV seal activation is immediately on social right after. And we turn around content within hours.
48:06That's our other thing. I've and I've always done that for brands. We shoot and we get it to you.
48:10Yeah. And that's cheat code. Right?
48:12If anyone's listening out there. If you could do that with good people mean, he knows a lot of the people that we worked with back in the day. Boom boom boom, content out.
48:18So if you can get people to go to content right away that's edited and easy for them to post Yeah. They feel so cool and they say they just did the names. Of course.
48:24Yeah. Wasn't that a big transition for you on the growth of HBOT? Because it started just as mostly males.
48:29Right? Yeah. And then you added in females and them being able to do it as well.
48:34Was that like a big growth spurt for you? Yeah. Was hard because my wife's like, women are not gonna wanna do the Navy SEAL stuff.
48:39And I'm like, I don't know if that's necessarily true. Women are actually tougher than men with this stuff. They don't complain.
48:44The men complain the most during the Navy SEAL. Women just deal with it. We have to introduce it to them.
48:50Right? So that was you know, in the beginning when you start a business, you rely on the homies. Right.
48:54I told all my friends, you have to come buy a ticket. Yeah. Like, support my business.
48:57And they did that, and then it turned into, oh my god, this is real. This is really impactful. And then it's like, hey, can I bring my wife?
49:02My wife wants to join in. And then that's how it really started with with people bringing their spouses,
49:07and then their spouses bringing their friends. Yeah. Something you've talked about a lot is like being a dad and just like you're very family oriented.
49:15Yeah. Like, has that kind of been a superpower for you in growing your business? Yeah.
49:19I think so because
49:20first and foremost, like, stopped drinking ten years ago because I'd never wanted my kids to see me have a drink. And I was like, I don't I always wanna be in control and not that drinking is terrible, but I just don't want them to know that's how I I roll.
49:32And I always never want them to see me tired and I never want them to outwork me. Right? I like, I will will die on the track when my son beats me in a in a mile.
49:42Like, it's just not gonna happen. Like Okay. Right?
49:43And we and my son's eight years old, and he runs a six twenty, and I'm like, alright, bro. Like, we're gonna That's disgusting. We're gonna cook.
49:48That's great. And he's not in a run club. Yeah.
49:50And he doesn't do high rocks. Don't need one.
49:52Don't need any one of those. Yeah. Me and him are the run club.
49:54Yeah. But fatherhood for me allows me to check myself in saying, okay, how good can I really get as a human being?
50:03And how what what line can I ride there of being as strong as I could be, as fit as I could be, as emotionally supportive for them, be their dad and best friend? How can I juggle all of that?
50:13So I think for me it's it's been a really fun ride in that sense of, okay, you know, you want your kids to be good athletes. I have two boys, and I want them to fall in love with sport because not that they're gonna go pro with it, but sports are so important for their professional life.
50:28Mhmm. Right? If I want them to learn how to fail, learn how to win, learn what grit really means.
50:32Working with people. Work with people. Be a good teammate, because when you go get your job, I need you to be liked here.
50:38Like, likability is huge. And I find what I do is super important for them to see me do it. So I'm going for a run.
50:47It's gonna be 10 miles, I'll be back. Wow, you ran 10 miles, you're dripping wet. I'm going for a lift, I'll be back.
50:53Daddy, your muscles, your arms. Yeah, guys, you can look like this if you do this. I need them to see me intentionally suffering every single day.
51:01That has transcended them into understanding. They're six and eight, and we have accountability calendars.
51:07They're doing their push ups. They're making their bed. They're doing all these things which are structure for them so when they get when they don't need daddy anymore, they could thrive.
51:16And I think for me that's my greatest it's always gonna be my greatest work. When I see them performing in sport and doing really well, I'm just like, dude, it's it's incredible.
51:26You know, when my we we test our mile four times a year in our soccer club, and my son went from an eight sixteen to a six twenty one in like seven months.
51:36And we film it, I film it, and yeah, it's cool content, but it's the internal dialogue with him of him believing in himself is so crazy.
51:44Yeah. It's pretty cool to see too. It's so cool.
51:46Like, dude, you can do look what you just did. Yeah. It hurts.
51:49It's gonna hurt. Right? I always talk about it, like, I need you to taste a little blood today.
51:53Like, you're gonna taste the blood. You taste the blood, dude, it's gonna be fine. Taste too much blood, it's not gonna be good.
51:58Yeah. So I I have them taste the blood a little bit often
52:02Yeah. So they can continue to go. I'm curious to to hear your POV from this because like when I was younger and I was playing football, like, the NFL was my singular goal.
52:10I'm guessing you had very similar, like you had a goal playing professionally, etcetera, and you didn't probably think you could be more driven than that scenario.
52:20And then you have kids and you're like, wow, I'm doing everything times 10. Like, I'm more driven because of Yeah. This little human being that I Like you said, I never want them to see me tired.
52:29I always gonna do things like they're watching me as I I do. Has your mindset or even like intensity
52:38has shifted because of your kids? Yeah. I I just feel like I never wanna turn off for them.
52:44I'll never say no to them when they wanna do anything outside, ever. My dad never said no to me.
52:49Dad, I wanna run routes. Okay. Let's go.
52:51I wanna take ground balls. Okay. I wanna do pop ups.
52:53Okay. Okay. Okay.
52:54Yo, let's go. I take them everywhere I go. You wanna go to Europe?
52:57Let's go to Europe for a game. You wanna go to the grocery store? Let's go to the grocery store.
52:59And we always roll like that because I feel like it's so important to have this type of relationship with your kids, boy or girl. Because they need to know that they're in a safe space, but they also and and my kids are really great at this and I don't know why. But I talked to them with coach hat and dad hat.
53:14So when we ran that six twenty one mile, I said, you could do better. I'm not happy with your time as a coach.
53:23Hold on a second. Let me put my dad hat. I am so proud of you, bro.
53:25That was great. You crushed it. But as a coach, you could do better.
53:28Know you He's like, I know I could do better. And then he understood us down, dude, I'm so proud of you. Like, you crushed that.
53:33And if I can live in those both worlds with them, I feel like the sky is the limit for them. And they understand it with schoolwork, they understand it with work ethic, but doing well on things.
53:45So, yeah. I I can't turn off. I don't wanna turn off.
53:47I wanna You know, I'm playing in TST, soccer tournament, the million dollar tournament on May 25. Oh. Is that like TBT?
53:54TST. Yeah. Same guys.
53:55Own it. Yeah. So, that tournament is is really wild.
53:59Yeah. I'm broken in batter, like, my body should not be going out there. Yeah.
54:02But I have they have to see me play. Like, I will Yeah. It's like Take any injury after I'm gonna do it, like Yeah.
54:08I have they have to see me touch a ball Yeah. In real setting. Yeah.
54:12Sign up for Arena Football after this. Right.
54:14I know. Have to see Run through a brick wall. You 35 or whatever Yeah.
54:19They be saying. You know, they have to see you It's do hard so important.
54:22And I think it translates back to why Lifetime wanted to buy HVLT and why HVLT works when parents come so they can look little Johnny, look what I did with these Navy SEALs. You know who the Navy SEALs are? Yeah.
54:32And mommy, you did that? Oh, look, I did a 10 mile run or do it did a trail run. Like, wow.
54:39Yeah. So I think it's way more than the content for the personal person. It's it's it's such a it's such an evolution of what why these people wanna come.
54:49They they just open up and they become so much sharper as human beings. So as long as I can continue to give that to people, I think this brand can go on forever. And I hope Lifetime wants to continue to keep it going as we're doing it.
55:02Yeah. Well, dude, Brian, that was awesome, bro. Thank you.
55:05And I'm a huge fan of you guys. You know, this is first time we met, but I've, you know, we've Yeah, of course. We've kicked it before.
55:10But you guys are doing awesome. Your content is great. Love how you highlight people.
55:13It's very, very cool. Yeah. Well, tell them where to find you, where to support our Yeah.
55:17You guys could just find me on Instagram at brianmaza. Thank you so much for all the support. Come to HPLT if you wanna get water boarded.
55:24It's really not that bad. It's super fun. You're in New York now, you have no excuse.
55:27If you're around here May 14 I need that footage. You might be drowning. I need that video.
55:31I'm gonna be bobbing, dude. I'm so cooked. But keep doing what you guys are doing.
55:34It's super cool, and I know you guys have a ton of fans. Man. Thanks.
55:37Thank you.
The Hook
The bait, then the rug-pull.
Most brands chase acquirers. Brian Mazza built something a corporate giant could not manufacture — so they had to buy it instead. On the one-year anniversary of selling HPLT to Life Time Fitness, he walks through exactly how that happened, and why the brand was impossible to replicate from the inside.
How they asked for the click.
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