#AskGaryVee Episode 49: High-End Wine, Bucket Lists, & Self-Confidence

– [Voiceover] Jelle asks, “what
came first at VaynerMedia: clients or employees? And did you ever do
stuff without employees?” – So let’s get into this question. First, I actually don’t
know how to pronounce this, so let’s go to India, who I
thought helped us with that, DRock, how – ? – I don’t – “yell”? “Yelle”? I don’t know. – [Gary] Got it, alright. Steve? What’s your shot here? – “Yella?” I don’t know. – You know.
– [India] It’s very pretty. – It’s gorgeous. Yeah, don’t worry, you’re not hurting feelings anyway. India’s going to be very
sensitive on this show. (laughter)
Alright, you know, we started Vaynermedia, two
things happened in parallel. We got out, I got ahead of
it, AJ was graduating college and we were gonna start a company in May. In March or April I got ahead of it and got us a big project
with a big client. So I guess customer came first. I kinda used, I did something clever. I made that person pay the
entire project up front and then used those dollars
to pay the first 3-4 employees who were all of AJ’s homies, who are all still here,
hence the foundation. So I guess client, right? I got an upfront campaign
that I used those dollars, and then the official first day we had those five or six employees, so but we never did anything without them, though actually me and AJ
did some of the early stuff for that project by ourselves, so that’s the answer. I don’t know how you wanna look at it. I will say this: any time you can sell
ahead of your expenses, you do it. One of the biggest reasons so many people go out of business, and many of you who watch this
show will go out of business, is you do not know how
to manage cash flow. You think in terms of, you know, accrual versus cash basis,
if we wanna go hardcore, you know, CPA-style here, oh, we’re gonna make 80k so
I can have 70k in expenses, but if you don’t get paid
properly or if there’s a hiccup, or, you know, no buffers, no practical knowledge
of that vulnerability, and then a bunch of you
who are tech-driven, you raise too much money, you
don’t keep your burn in check, you assume you’re gonna raise more money, it doesn’t go as easy
or as well as you think, because once you actually become a company people are looking at what you’re doing versus what you promise you’re gonna do, and those are the vulnerabilities of how you go out of business. – [Voiceover] Gabii asks, “Do
you have any bucket list items

that you want to complete before 40?” – Gabii, this is a good question, one that I was excited to answer mainly because the truth is, I only have one bucket list
item in my life professionally, and that is to buy the New York Jets, and thus I don’t have any bucket
list items professionally. Personally, I don’t want to
climb any goddamn mountains, or jump out of anything.
I’m not that dude, so I don’t care about that, the bucket list item, you
know, on my personal life is quite basic as well, which is, I just wanna love my family, and I’m executing on that
and accomplishing that, and so the answer is no, not before 40 or 50 or
60 or 70 or 80 or 90, and the truth is, and this may actually lead to why I’m so happy, the two bucket list items in my life is to love and cherish and
make my family proud, and to live the process of
buying the New York Jets more than buying the New York Jets. And I’ve actually accomplished both. Which puts me in a good mood.

– Gary, is the high-end wine
business just a complete hoax? (laughter) Does anyone actually ever taste the oak? What does oak taste like? – That’s a great question, Steph. Is it a hoax? It’s as much of a hoax
as the art world is, it’s as much of a hoax
as a high-end restaurant that charges, you know, $10,000 a head for a once-in-a-lifetime meal. It is the classic example of
supply and demand, my dear. And coming from a, you know,
business-oriented TV show and living in the world that you’re in, is a stock price a hoax? The answer is, yes and no. To me, it’s not a hoax, because
I live a very basic life of supply and demand. I think when I get paid to
speak onstage is a hoax, and I did for awhile until I
realized, well, not really, because I’m compensated for
what I do for that event. And so, you know, does an actor who gets
paid $8 million for a movie but never gets brought
up, like an athlete, for being overpaid, is that a hoax? Yes and no. When you start understanding that actor brings people into the theater, or makes people watch, and then they sell advertising against it. It’s all an arbitrage. And so the wine world,
back to the basic question, can you taste differences in wine? Absolutely. I live it. I mean, I can taste the difference between an $80 wine and a
$10 wine pretty consistently. Can I taste the difference
between the $1000 wine and a $500 wine, or a $1000 wine and a $100 wine? A lot of times, no. The beauty of wine is,
everybody’s got their own palette, back to art or music, right? Is it a hoax that an EDM DJ gets a ton of people
into a place in Sweden? For me, well, actually,
I’ve gotten more into EDM, but, like, theoretically it is. But, you know, and that’s it. It’s brand, it’s supply and demand, it’s how the game works, and so the answer is, I
don’t think it’s a hoax, but if you’re watching this show right now and you don’t appreciate the game, so here’s a good piece of advice, let’s get into real good advice. Don’t drink good wine. Let me say that one more time. Don’t put yourself in a position to understand why it’s not a hoax. Don’t sit first class, because then you realize it’s not a hoax, because you like it better
than the middle seat in coach. Don’t get front-row seats to a ballgame, then you understand that it’s not a hoax compared to sitting in the upper deck. It’s context, baby. And so the bottom line
– that made me happy. (laughter) The bottom line is, it’s all perspective, it’s all supply and demand, but that’s what it comes down to, you start understanding why these things fetch the
dollar amounts they fetch when you actually taste it, versus you theoretically
complain about it. – [Voiceover] Cédric asks, “How do you not procrastinate that well?”

“How do you not procrastinate that well?” – Cédric. It’s unbelievable how well Cedric the Entertainer branded himself, because I literally was about to call Cédric here the Entertainer. Cédric, I’m calling you the Entertainer. As a matter of fact, I want to make a little piece of content for Cédric and I’ll tweet it out. Cédric, you won. I need a little “Cédric
is the Entertainer,” take his Twitter profile,
and we’re gonna make him. This is a new thing we can
do on the #AskGaryVee Show. We could make things for
fans, one-off t-shirts, pieces of content, I’m
seeing something here. This is gonna make a lot more people ask a lot more questions. Cédric, here’s a curveball, I actually think I’m an
obnoxious procrastinator, while equally not being. Meaning I stay in constant audit mode. Can I get a constant
audit mode alert here? By the way, I have to
watch yesterday’s episode to see what you did with the alerts. Yesterday had a lot of editing.
I gotta watch it outright. I don’t watch my stuff, by the way. It’s a little fun fact for all of you. Sorry, DRock, Staphon,
get to see the great work. There’s a ton of stuff
that I procrastinate, and I think I’m a procrastinator, but what I think I also am is always leveling up
whatever’s most important and prioritizing it in real time. Team can tell you here, I bet you Steve’s favorite inside joke is DeMayo. Can somebody get me the, literally, get me DeMayo? Watch this. This will answer your question
perfectly, VaynerNation, because the truth is, I do procrastinate, but I’m adjusting to
the reality of my life at the moment I’m living it, so if something is
super-important yesterday, I can literally decide that
it’s less important in an hour, predicated on what comes into my inbox, or the meeting that I’m about
to have right after this. And so the reason I think
it feels like I’m not, and so much is getting accomplished, is my pants are on fire for the thing that I deem most important at this exact moment. And that is how it works over and over, where’s DeMayo? And over. I’m trying to stall here. And over, and over, and over again. Let’s go to the next question,
we’ll get back to DeMayo. – [Man offscreen] Oh, here he is. – Oh, here we go. Don’t go, DRock. Leave all that. Don’t
edit that, I’ll be pissed. Now, tell the VaynerNation how– – What’s up, world. – Tell the VaynerNation
how often I’ll send an email that will say “now, this is top priority” versus the next day, this is top priority, and then you get crippled
by the notion of, hold on.
(laughter) If, like, literally, when I’m like, no no, this is the #1 priority in my life. – No, tippy-top priority
is the way you always say. – Tippy-top? Tippy-top. – TIppy-top priority. Yeah, probably every
time you’re on a flight, there’s probably about 15 emails
that come after the flight. – And then you struggle
with, like, what’s tippy-top versus number one. – Yeah, unless you say tippy-top priority. – Is that the new context? (laughter) – If that’s what you’ve
been using for the month. – Alright. – So maybe it’ll change for the new year. – Thanks, man. And that’s what happens, right? Matt, my admin, you know, he has to struggle through what is tippy-top priority of the moment, because it might change tomorrow, so as long as you’re executing
something every day, as a tippy-top priority item, then you’re moving the needle. And sure, something might have moved from second most important
to fourth most important to ninth most important, Alex, you’re dealing with this right now. A lot of things that you
would have dealt with, like BizDev was like the most important, you can’t get a minute from me because something has caused it to become the eighth most important thing versus the number one important thing, and, like, there’s a lot of serendipity, Steve’s been waiting
for this top six things at WineLibrary for four days, I found a minute, I decided it was tippy-top
priority of that minute, and it just works that way at all times. – [Voiceover] Pressian asks,
“How exactly did your mother

– [Voiceover] Pressian asks,
“How exactly did your mother instill that self-confidence in you?” – And finally, Pressian, thank you so much for
asking this question, ’cause I always love
to brag about my mama. She she instilled so much self-confidence in me because of a couple things. One, I probably had some
level of it in my own DNA, but she brainwashed me. My mom made me think that
the things that I was doing that many parents, on the negative side, put down their kids for, what the far majority of
parents would consider mundane, like getting a good haircut or, like, running quickly to pick up the ball, like it was so athletic, stuff that none of you would ever think is the kind of thing that you
would compliment your child for, the kind of things I compliment Misha for, which is the greatest
twirl I’ve ever seen ever, is what she did for me, and you know what? You start believing it. I can tell you this, and I’m positive of this, I know that the peeps in this room think more highly of themselves today than before they started jamming with me. The reason this company is so special, one of the funniest things
that happens in this company, is when somebody comes
in new that’s senior and they are completely flabbergasted by the confidence of the
youngsters in this room. And I bet you, as they’re all
thinking about it right now, and obviously Staphon and India
are here a little bit less, and DRock a little bit in the middle, and Alex a little less,
and Steve a lot more, I know that that’s what I do, maybe not to the extreme
level that my mom did for me, obviously it was very focused, one child. We have many children in the house, but I would even say that many of you have started to feel that way, because the truth is, my friends, positive energy is a good thing. I don’t know what else to tell you. And when it comes from a pure place, it’s double good. And so she just focused on it. It’s in her and the way that
it’s in me, we’re similar, and she just kept pounding
me and making me feel like the ordinary was something
that was extraordinary, until I finally believed it so much that that’s what I feel
about myself all the time. And if you don’t have good
empathy and self-awareness, it can go into a very dangerous place, but if you know how to balance it, and my mom balanced it by
punching me in my mouth with her raw hand, not kidding, when I
would do something wrong, so she’s got a little old-school
Eastern European in her, and that’s how she did it, with an enormous balance of just good stuff, man,
really good parenting. Really, really, really good parenting.