Bull Case For Taking 1 Month off Every Year, Recession Proof Companies

Good morning, let's get right to it:

Newsletter goal: You get one "aha" moment to make more $$$ or have a better life. 

👆 If I don't accomplish this, the unsubscribe link is at the bottom. 

Today's Outline:

• The Bull Case For Taking 1 Month off Every Year 🌎

• Infant Sleep Consulting 👶

• Recession Proof Companies 🛠

• What Is Tai Lopez Doing? 📚

📚 1 Business Lessons:

To the 2% of readers that know me personally, you know I just spent the last 24 months traveling lease-free.

That's right, living the digital nomad dream.

But candidly, I was also working pretty much 40 hours/week the entire time.

Except for August 2022 when I jumped around 10 cities from Porto, Lisbon, Madeira, Sorrento, Capri, Mallorca, Ericeira, Rosenheim, Valencia, Buñol, and to be honest... I didn't work more than 10 hours the entire month.

It was one of the best things I've ever done.

And I plan to continue "workless" Augusts every year forward.

Three reasons why you should consider a 1-month sabbatical if you're a business owner today:

1. You learn what breaks:

The #1 problem small business owners face:

They don't outsource what they need to in order to grow.

This typically leads to small business owners having a really high paying job instead of truly owning their own business.

And here's the truth: You can fake bad systems during a 1-2 week vacation.

But you can't fake them on a 1 month trip.

Things start to break.

And you'll return realizing what areas you were too involved in.

When you get back you have 2 options:

• Jump back in the battle and put all of the responsibility back on your plate

• Build systems & hire so that you aren't running your entire business and you can focus on growing your business.

2. You return with fresh eyes

Do you remember your first day at a new job?

Everything is new. So instead of accepting the "that's the way we've always done it" attitude, you begin to ask questions like "Why are we using Microsoft teams?"

Well if you're in your business every single day, you probably don't realize all of the unnecessary tasks, softwares and meetings you're putting up with on a weekly basis.

Returning from a 30 day sabbatical gives you the fresh perspective to change things.

3. Your life becomes exponentially more epic:

Let’s say you’re 30.

And we'll be realistic and say you'll live to be ~76. 

That's 46 EPIC adventures/stories you can add in your lifetime by following this rule.

• Hike Mt. Kilimanjaro

• Backpack around South America

• Spend 30 days learning to cook/gardening/jiu jitsu

• Go camping in Yosemite

• Take your parents on a trip they won't stop talking about for the next 365 days

You get the picture.

For me, this does 3 things:

• Future Event – I'm convinced people can fall in a rut when they don't have an end goal or an event to look forward to. I don't think you should defer happiness today for a future moment in time, but I do believe

• Memory Dividends – I recently finished Bill Perkins Die with Zero book and he talks a lot about how often experiences we do compound like money in the stock market. How many stories do you have that you've told 12+ times but the story itself was only a 6 hour night out?

• Redefines Self Worth – I'll be honest, for a long time a lot of my "self worth" came from this idea of superficial accolades or money in the bank. Spending time doing truly epic shit re-centers your life and makes you remember what's important (how you treat others, experiences with friends & family, etc.)

💰 2 Business Ideas

1. Infant Sleep Consulting –

Truthfully I'm 25, single, and extremely kidless (I hope). So I'll leave my bias out of this and let the numbers speak for themselves.

• 3.6M newborns annually

• 40% have reoccurring sleep issues

• In a poll by Parenting Magazine, sleep issues (both theirs & their child's) were the #1 issue with newborns

So this is... a big problem.

And what's great is that there are science-based solutions around it.

This company Restfully builds personalized sleep pattern plans and offers 24/7 support from trained physicians to answer questions from parents looking to get their 8 hours. According to their website they have a 92% success rate.

Their pricing models are a $399 one-time fee and a $30/month subscription afterwards.

What's great about businesses like these is they can be profitable on their own, or they can be huge funnels/services to offer for product based business (if you sell baby swaddles or cribs for example).

And I think you can offer similar productized service businesses in other categories if you have a backend product to sell

• 90 Day Dog Training Course that upsells training products & accessories

• Exterior Design Consulting (a company called Zenyard does this today and crushes by selling the supplies afterwards)

• Photography/Videography Course that can upsell premium digital filters and luts afterwards

2. Recession Proof Companies

I've heard a bit of skepticism from people around if now is a good time to start a business.

Candidly, everyone I know who's successful in business and is a serial entrepreneur/indie hacker is still starting new companies today.

This question often gets posed by individuals not in the game yet.

But the alleviate

DIY – When spending cuts back, people start tackling more home projects instead of buying everything. One of my favorite ways to capitalize on this is by selling DIY digital products.  

Like this person who made $300k+ selling an $18 chicken coop building plan PDF on Etsy

Babies – Like we discussed earlier, people are still having kids. Even if the market is down. Parents will find other areas to cut back on before they spend less on their kids.

Vices – Alcohol consumption is highest on both ends of the economy.

Times are good? Let's drink to celebrate. Times are tough? Let's drink to forget.

Snacks, Candy, & Alcohol sales always historically grow during recessions.

😎 3 Cool Internet Things:

1. Tai Lopez Buys BodyBuilding.com – I hate internet gurus and Tai Lopez is the clingiest of all of them in my opinion. But... he's doing some really cool stuff with his company Retail E-commerce Ventures buying distressed retail brand assets (they've bought Dressbarn, Linens & Things, Pier 1 Imports, Modells...etc.) Here's a video explaining what he's doing with these brands.

2. Perils of Audience Capture – How influencers become brainwashed by their audiences. Everyone talks about the benefits of building an audience but what's rarely discussed is how the creator can become captive to their audiences.

3. Lifestyles by Morgan Housel – Great short story (5 minute read) around how the quality of your life is shaped by whom you want to impress.

✌️ 

-Connor

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