Warren Buffett Lessons, VR Headset Accessories, Generational Wealth, Fire House Furniture

Welcome to Biz Brainstorms –

My name's Connor. This weekly email contains business ideas & lessons.

You get a lot of emails already. So… just find 1 cool thing and enjoy (and btw, if these suck just unsubscribe! I do this for fun. Not money.)

Today's Outline:

• 5 Lessons From Buffett

• VR Cases

• Generational Wealth

• Firehouse Furniture

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🤓 5 Lessons From Warren Buffett

This is stolen pretty much directly from a new newsletter I recently signed up for, Business Academy by Sieva.

But, I’m adding my own commentary on each:

1. Your greatest asset is you.

One of my all time favorite Munger (Buffetts business partner) quotes is:

We have access to the best knowledge on the planet.

The reality is, a kid in Tulsa Oklahoma has the same access to knowledge as a Harvard Graduate (books, podcasts, youtube, etc.)

So start investing in yourself. Even 1% daily improvements compound like crazy.

In Buffetts 2002 Shareholder letter he said:

☝️ the irony because I’m pretty sure 90% of this mans diet is Diet Coke & Peanut Brittle but I digress…

2. Learn Accounting

“Buffett told shareholders in 2003 to learn accounting by reading as many annual reports as possible. If you understand accounting, you’ll understand how to invest.” (Source)

3. How to Hedge Inflation.

Today a lot of younger people will argue it is Bitcoin.

And historically, the answer has been Gold.

But Buffett argues that it can be quite literally anything physical. And bonus points for when those physical assets product cashflow.

That’s why Real Estate is a fantastic hedge. You can adjust rates annually, while your debt payments stay fixed.

4. The Root of Evil.

“Greed is not the root of all evil. Envy is.”

There’s nothing wrong with wanting to make $1M.

The problem becomes when you earn $1M & suddenly it means nothing to you because the person next to you made $1.2M.

5. On Leverage.

“You can have 10 great years, but if you get wiped out in the 11th year, your overall return is -100%”

Similar to the Envy comment above, today you can open Youtube and find a video of someone who made $500,000 by taking out huge amounts of leverage in their brokerage account and making high-risk options.

What you don’t see are the thousands of people who it wiped out.

I’m not saying to act like David Ramsey & curb all debt.

Debt is a powerful tool that can help you accelerate returns.

However, too much of anything can become a bad thing.

🤿 VR Cases

I made this tweet ~ 2 years ago during the launch of the AirTags:

TL;DR – Apple accessories print money. That’s because:

1. Apple spends billions of dollars marketing their products

2. They suck at providing good accessories (seriously, how many of you are using an Apple phone case today?)

While Apple launching their Vision Pro product has Zuckerberg scared, it should actually make you incredibly excited.

That’s because the Apple accessory market is a HUGE space.

In fact, even this Airtag FOB design below sells an estimated $500,000/year according to looking at the Best Seller Rank on Jungle Scout.

You launching a complementary accessory will let you ride the wave of Apples hard spent marketing dollars & reputation.

3 product ideas you can start working on today for their 2024 launch:

1) Lens Cleaning Product – This one likely won’t lead to the most sales but requires zero product dimensions & specs to launch and it’s just about positioning it properly.

2) Carrying Case – Imagine being the top selling Laptop Case on Amazon? Apple is building this product to replace the laptop. Building a portable carrying case will let you get started without knowing the exact dimensions.

3) Upgraded Head Strap – Likely the hardest one since you’ll need exact product specs to launch this successfully by Q1 of next year, but this is the most popular Meta Oculus accessory today.

🤑 Generational Wealth

I read this tweet last week & it had me thinking:

Is this true?

On one hand – there’s a pretty obvious argument for Tylers side.

Look at most trust fund kids…they suck.

Often stupid (high degrees with low IQs), low ambition, zero perspective on how things actually work.

And once given the keys to the castle, they usually f*ck it up pretty fast.

70% of families lose their generational wealth by the 2nd generation

So at first glance it’s easy to say “Tyler is right, generational wealth sucks”.

But OK think about the flip side for a minute.

My friend Stephen has an amazing point here (summary below):

Stephens 2 points are essentially:

1. OK – what’s the alternative to generational wealth? You give your money to the government when you die? What an absolute waste as nearly every government has proven to be horrible stewards of capital

2. This will demotivate the individuals who contribute the most to society.

The reality is, the U.S. government provides a ton of tax-breaks to their business owners & real estate investors because they recognize how valuable having organizations that employ people and well-kept buildings are towards a functioning society. Demotivate people by not letting them provide for their kids when they’re gone & watch as unemployment sky rockets & the best talent in the country find a different home base.

Overall, I think this is a parenting question.

People hate generational wealth because, admittedly, it feels unfair.

And the product is often lazy individuals.

But I think that’s more a result of parenting than the instrument of inheritances.

What do you think? Reply to this email – I would love to know.

📈 Firehouse Furniture

My friend Nick sent me this company last week:

I’ll be honest, I don’t think it’s a huge business.

But I do think between the 27,187 fire stations in the US & their high Average Order Value, they can make a fantastic lifestyle business with the right product mix & SEO work.

3 other models to copy that would be similar:

1. Locker Room Furniture

2. Country Club Furniture

3. Airbnb Depot (a website that sells primarily Airbnb accessory products like Cameras, Log Books, etc.)

✌️ See you next week

-Connor

PS – I’m working on a digital product called “How to Quit Your Job & Not Run Out Of Money”. It’s everything I know & have learned about going from W-2 to self employed.

It’s going to be released at the end of the month. I want to survey as many people as possible to hear their story. If you want to be featured, just reply here & I’ll send you over a quick 5 minute survey. 🙏