Mastering the Couch Market: AI, Entrepreneurship, and the Quest for the Perfect Sofa with Alex Back

0:00

okay welcome ladies and gentlemen to the AI training podcast I have a very special guest today Alex back welcome

0:07

back what oh welcome back we're gonna have a blast together let's have some fun so Alex you are the CEO of couch.com

0:16

a fel.com with meaning amazing and

0:22

welcome to the show thank you so much I am very excited to be here I love your

0:28

podcast and to chat cool let's start from the top how did couch.com come to

The Origin Story of Couch.com

0:37

be great question I started thinking I left my company my

0:43

former company apartment 2B which is an online furniture retail brand and I left

0:50

my company after about 13 years a year ago and I set off on a worldwide journey

0:56

to find myself and I traveled the world and and read every Business book I could

1:02

get my hands on my goal was simple to get out of the furniture

1:07

business but somebody told me about the fact that couch.com the URL was available and so that idea was like

1:14

percolating in my mind it was very expensive mind you like life savings type expensive but I started thinking

1:23

what I might be able to do with it and I had an aha moment when I was traveling

1:29

the streets of Oslo Norway where I realized that this could be something

1:35

much bigger and something that can scale a lot better than I had originally

1:40

thought and so I started pursuing it and ended up acquiring the domain and yeah

1:46

we're just building it up right now it's very exciting I have not been to Oslo I imagine the couches there are

1:53

beautiful and that's super cool yeah that's what I went there for the beautiful couches of

2:00

course the beautiful Scandinavian couches that's what they talk about so true this this business couch.com I know

2:08

you've you've had a chance you've been doing a bit of a podcast tour lately showing up on all the popular podcasts

2:15

so nice to have you here feel like I'm talking to a little bit of a a podcast celebrity so what is couch.com what are

Understanding the Concept of Couch.com

2:23

you doing there yeah so couch.com is a place to find a couch it seems simple

2:30

enough but it sets out to it's a platform that sets out to answer the the

2:36

toughest question that consumers have when buying a new couch which is quite simply where the heck do I buy a new

2:43

couch nobody really knows even people in the industry friends of mine colleagues

2:50

we all joke about the fact that we ourselves don't really know where to buy great furniture and the reason is that

2:58

it's as much as it's saturated in some ways with direct consumer Brands these days that have popped up over the last

3:05

10 to 15 years it's very it's still very underrepresented in the online space the

3:10

furniture industry and the couch retail world the other thing that's really difficult is that people just generally

3:17

don't feel very comfortable buying a couch that's not a pun comfortable couch

3:23

they're not comfortable finding a comfortable couch and the reason is it's just something that no one really knows

3:30

very much about as a consumer it's very much like the car buying industry where

3:35

you know certain things and you've bought them before you use one every day but you don't really know about how the

3:41

business works so the goal of couch.com is to educate consumers to remove that

3:47

sort of veil of mystery if you will to make people feel comfortable and then

3:53

gather some information from them to point them in the right direction because there's a lot of information or

3:59

there's there are a lot of variables that go into a couch buying experience that people don't really expect when

4:05

they first set out sounds it's filled with all sorts of challenges and things

4:11

that an educated consumer can learn about couches at couch.com Great Name

4:16

love it you're an interesting Guy what's been one of your biggest Lessons Learned in entrepreneurship over the years for

Entrepreneurship Lessons and Challenges

4:24

me whenever I get asked a question like that the first thing that comes to mind

4:29

is is that it's something you hear often it's it's don't listen to other people

4:35

too much and how that applied to my personal history is that with uh my

4:43

former company apartment tub we were very successful but it took a long time to achieve that very

4:49

scalable success that we did in the end and our trick was really taking the slow

4:55

and steady approach that's not smart strategy for every single business or

5:02

organization but for us it worked and as much as people tempted us and Industry

5:09

tempted us to supercharge it at certain points we really found a lot of comfort

5:17

and ultimately success in taking this slow and steady route so we saw others pop up around us that raised a ton of

5:24

money and came and went and there's so many difficulties and challenges in the furniture industry that really behooves

5:31

one to take their time and figure it out so take your time and don't necessarily listen to anybody else is advice that I

5:38

would give to some people in certain cases mine was one of them slow and steady wins the race don't listen to

5:46

everyone I like it yeah what would you say your biggest challenge is as a

5:52

leader well personally my biggest challenge as a leader is that I need everybody to like me and that's a very

5:59

difficult we're getting a little deep here Mark early this morning but but that but it

6:06

truly is my greatest sort of crutch it's an advantage because it really allows me

6:11

to find ways to empathize with people and connect with them because I inherently want or need them to connect

6:18

back with me so it could be great for communication but if someone's not doing

6:23

their job very well you can imagine that wanting to be their friend and wanting to wanting to like you is not exactly

6:31

the easiest hurdle to overcome because sometimes as a leader you have to give it to people straight and be the bad guy

6:38

so that is that's been my personal challenge the most and I think a lot of

6:44

people struggle with that too just the balance between being the sort of

6:50

amicable leader I just said like 19 times being this amicable or benevolent

6:56

leader or dictator as a CE and also just getting the job done so

7:02

that's always been the biggest challenge for me as a leader I think I can relate to that it's it's hard sometimes when

7:08

you want everyone to like you and your role or the the nature of what you do

7:15

you can always be a good gu I appreciate you sharing that when it comes to prioritizing there's probably no

7:22

shortage of things that you have to get done what helps you prioritize what's most important that's a tough one and

7:28

it's that is that's a challenge I think that every startup founder struggles

7:36

with as well prioritization is very difficult and to bring It full circle to

7:42

a comment I made a few minutes ago everybody's telling you to do certain things there's always there's a lot that

7:49

attracts you in different directions I listen to podcasts and read articles every single day and I get excited by

7:56

things or interested and I get nervous that I'm not doing something that I should be doing and at the end of the day sticking

8:05

to one's goals and priorities and what's the most important thing is really sort

8:11

of Paramount to one's success do I achieve it all the time not necessarily but my practice at not

8:19

listening to other people and just that sort of Mantra rolling through my brain

8:24

at all times helps me focus on what is most important even though the new and

8:29

shiny may be attracted me and I think that it relates a lot to just this concept and term AI it's something that

8:38

really has gotten in everybody's Minds it's like the thing that everybody feels

8:44

like they need to master they need to incorporate it into their everyday life and sometimes it makes sense and

8:50

sometimes it doesn't focusing on the most important thing to your business or to your personal life is still I think

8:55

the most important thing AI it's a tool right but it can only help to so such

9:02

degree that your priorities are your priorities and there is a definite case

9:07

of shiny object syndrome with so many new tools coming out let's talk a bit about AI how have you been able to

The Role of AI in Couch.com

9:14

leverage it in your business there's a great question there's a frontend meaning user facing uh way to answer

9:22

that question and then there's backend but I'll start with the backend so our entire site thus far our strategy

9:29

couch.com was to get start with a Content first approach meaning before we

9:34

build the ultimate platform which is going to sort of be an advertising

9:40

platform for the furniture industry on a national scale where there's going to be local listings for furniture businesses

9:47

Mom and Pops and Regional chains alike brick and mortar and online the first thing we did was to

9:53

start with content making tons of Articles and videos and images to answer

9:58

some of the toughest questions that people have when buying a couch so that's what we've been focusing on in

10:03

the last six months and AI has assisted a lot in that we used AI to write a lot

10:10

of our articles or assist us in writing a lot of our articles I know it's taboo

10:16

to say that AI wrote everything it didn't we edited it heavily but we used AI a lot to gather information into one

10:22

place as far as our images in the furniture industry and interior design

10:28

it's just a sea of pretty images so much so that they almost don't resonate

10:34

anymore I think with consumers like a beautifully styled room and I would say

10:40

only a certain percentage of people are like whoa that's really nice I'd like all the products that are in that room most people just chalk it off oh that's

10:46

a pretty room that I'll never have or something to that effect so we used AI to create images that really told

10:54

stories that we would never be able to capture in a photographic sense there so Hy hyper real not hyper abstract images

11:01

like someone getting lost in a sea of couch cushions because they were having

11:07

trouble making a decision right that's not something you could be like all right let me hire a photographer and get a sea of couch cushions here no we

11:13

literally use mid journey to have a sea of couch cushions overcoming somebody is an example of how we used it to our

11:22

advantage from a visual perspective and then just tons of backend organ data

11:27

organization and things of that nature ai's been really helpful on the front end we intend to use AI in heavily with

11:35

couch.com to augment the users's experience of finding and ultimately

11:40

buying a couch the main thing is making

11:45

people feel comfortable and educating them in the process but first we have to

11:51

get information from them so the entry point to couch.com eventually will be a an AI powered quiz where

11:59

consumers will come and we will ask them quite literally what are you looking for what are the most important things to

12:05

you timing Comfort Design budget these

12:11

things don't always work in Tandem and they are four factors for instance out of the 50,000 that you need to consider

12:18

when you're buying a new couch needling in a what's most important to people using AI to funnel that information into

12:25

a personalization strategy to help the consumer find the couch of their dreams

12:30

is really important a really important part of our strategy and the user experience at couch.com

12:37

amazing the the thing you said earlier about you know not listening to people

The Importance of Mentorship and Inspiration

12:44

because there's this intuitive part of being an entrepreneur how do you balance that with mentorship and finding mentors

12:52

yeah that's a great question not to be a broken record but for me it applies I have a lot of people in my network I

13:00

started really young in e-commerce and business and so I built up a lot of

13:07

great contacts along the way what I found is every time I talk to someone

13:12

who is smarter than me and I know say that in a derogatory sense they literally are smarter than me but in a

13:18

specific area so I think it's important to remember what type of advice you're seeking from a mentor or a wise elder or

13:28

whomever you're seeking advice from because they often have a specific Focus if you talk to an accountant they're

13:34

going to give you they're going to have a a financial take about how you do certain things but they also may have an

13:41

opinion about how your website font looks like I don't know that's the person you should be listening to okay

13:46

that but that seems obvious ultimately I think it's about something I said before just not listening to everything

13:54

trusting that you or me in this case have the best sort of most well-rounded

14:00

vision for this company and when people give you advice or opinions even if you really trust

14:06

them I think it's to be taken with a grain of salt and I think good mentors understand that you're not going to just

14:13

be like yes whatever you say and do literally what they say I think it's

14:19

everybody has opinions especially people who have done stuff and has have succeeded so when they give them to you

14:26

I think it's about filtering them in a way that's going to be Val valubles you versus detrimental that's great

14:32

advice tell me Alex what are you most excited about I so like the furniture

14:38

whatever it's an open question you can take it anywhere you want I love making

14:43

so when you and your listeners check out couch.com now and in the future you see

14:49

a lot of Alex there me making silly videos and just having fun with all of

14:55

these Concepts that have that that we're educating customers on or that people

15:00

have questions about like negotiating in a furniture store and things of that nature like I love talking about things

15:07

and presenting them in an entertaining way so that's really on the streets of Oslo Norway what drove me towards this

15:16

type of Direction was like oh I can make a couch

15:21

content site that is actually helpful and entertaining so I'm excited to

15:26

really continue doing entertaining and funny content surrounding this but in a

15:33

larger sense I really know that this industry being a Furniture marketer for

15:38

so long is missing something like couch.com which is a platform that's

15:44

literally exists to help people bind and buy couches and I know that a lot of

15:49

furniture companies are struggling to find advertising that works for them

15:54

these days they're going to be really happy and excited by this especially when it works so ultimately that's what

16:01

I'm excited for but I like to make silly stuff too that's great there are I know

16:07

with your content you're you've got some stuff about like celebrity couches how do you figure out who's what celebrity

16:14

has a wet couch and where does that all come from that's funny because this is

16:20

something that's an example of something that where AI was extremely helpful to help scour the internet for information

16:26

that was already out there that an example like we'll have I think yeah we have a an article or two about yes like

16:32

as you said like celebrity couches who has what couch or like what what's been written about couches in people's homes

16:38

ultimately I think that's people like to know this it's architectural digest has sold a lot of copies based on their

16:45

celebrity sort of Partnerships or editorial exposes so yeah using AI to to

16:51

find what's been written about like Mark Wahlberg's big sectional and then aggregating that data in one place was

16:58

helpful but also I live in Hollywood baby I live in LA so we we're a very

17:03

celebrity driven Community here and I think that that offers us a little bit

17:09

of a unique perspective on on that subject and I intend to build upon that too I have definitely have some c-list

17:15

and Bist friends out there not really A-list but I hope to intend to bring

17:20

them to couch.com to have some fun with me at some point that's cool tell me a bit about

Personal Furniture Shopping Experience

17:26

your experience buying your last couch how'd that work yeah so the last couch I

17:32

got was it looks horrible right now but they deserve to see so I just moved into my

17:40

own new place a number of weeks ago so I'm still getting it ready but I bought a couch recently from one of the

17:48

factories where I'm basically partnered with so for me I do know where I want to

17:54

buy a couch but that was ultimately a decision that was driven by cost and

17:59

other factors and ease and convenience I think the more relevant story is where I

18:04

bought the rest of my furniture which is funny because I was talking with my former business partner from apartment

18:09

2B the other day and reminding him that neither of us even know where to go to buy furniture I ended up at Living

18:17

Spaces which is a regional big regional chain here on the West Coast big

18:24

furniture store you're in Florida so similar to room to go type of

18:30

environment something for everybody just a big furniture store not where you would expect like a cool direct to

18:35

Consumer brand founder to go bu furniture and you know where I went right to the back of their clearance

18:41

section and I was picking and popping all the little clearance items and things that I felt were like a great

18:48

value so I almost went bargain hunting in a huge furniture store because I thought that's where I would get the

18:54

best deal and where I'd get the quickest results to tie that in into the concept

18:59

behind couch.com that's what was most important to me it wasn't the design it wasn't the Comfort it wasn't really much

19:07

of anything except the two factors were I needed to furnish an entire house so budget was important not the big biggest

19:13

thing and timing I have I had no furniture I like instant results and I

19:18

think there are a lot of people out there like me I don't think that I'm like the anomaly some people want to say

19:25

yes I need it tomorrow and that's going to weed out a whole bunch of retailers

19:31

that sell or Market to customers online so for me to go to a place like couch.com and say I need it tomorrow and

19:38

have filtered results by all these different retailers in my area and online where I can get it tomorrow would

19:44

have been a very useful tool instead I just took my friend's pickup truck and went to the local Furniture chain store

19:50

and started bargain hunting for a few hours so in your mind will there be like a

19:56

clearance section on the site that gets

20:01

people who have that similar I just need to fill a house with a couple couches

20:06

and uh give me the best price uh help me

20:12

absolutely and uh in fact right now there's we have a great post that was from the last few weeks it's very

20:18

relevant um about the top 10 online clearance centers to shop one one little

20:24

Furniture industry tip I can give everybody it may not be a shock but every Furniture retailer is

20:31

overloaded with inventory why because 2023 was one of the worst years for the

20:36

furniture industry in a long time and everybody has to buy and make inventory choices well ahead of time so you find a

20:43

lot of furniture retailers these days looking to get rid of inventory as

20:49

cheaply as possible this is a great time to bargain hunt in the furniture industry especially like surrounding the

20:56

end and the beginning of the year that's a big product turnover time so if you

21:01

walk into a clearance section of a furniture store right now and it's not completely full of good stuff send me an

21:09

email I would like to know about that one place because they must be selling and doing something amazing most retailers have like tons of inventory in

21:17

in their clearance section and things like that good point I'm excited to see the site progress and see where the

21:23

content Sor we're going to have to edit this out I have a knock at the door let me just go answer it and I'll be right yeah no problem so sorry we cut it no

21:29

worries and we're back so I wanted to ask you about what you are inspired by

Content Creation and Inspiration

21:38

like you're doing all this content there's certainly people that maybe you have as watching what people are up to

21:45

what inspires you to create original content question I think the inspiration

21:52

for me comes from well okay hold on let me say specifically regarding creating

21:59

content what I think I enjoy most is that I know that it's very valuable

22:04

because whenever I talk to a friend or colleague like they they have the same

22:10

questions and they feel so happy when I give them advice the furniture industry is like the car industry and that if you

22:17

have a friend that tells you how to get the best deal on a new car or lease you're like thank you my goodness thank

22:23

you so much like I had no idea generally so I get inspired knowing that like I'm

22:29

giving information that's actually helpful and I'm not just making stuff for the purposes of making stuff because

22:36

I have to I I think that everything we're talking about at couch.com is actually valuable and helpful but

22:44

there's a lot of great interesting funny content on the internet on the social

22:51

platforms on YouTube and I get inspired by a lot of that stuff just to make

22:57

other wise for lack of a better term boring or not that interesting content

23:03

and make it fun and interesting I think it's a skill and it's something when I see other people's doing it well like

23:10

explaining some difficult Financial concept on a great YouTube video you're like oh this is great or an awesome

23:17

podcast wow I didn't understand that before so that those things inspire me as I'm sure they inspire

23:23

you yeah having a balance between some entertainment to little utility a lot of

23:29

utility and uh something that ideally people revisit so it's cool I'm uh I'm excited to see how the the content

23:36

evolves is the tools that make content easier evolve as well as an entrepreneur

Utilizing AI Tools in Business

23:42

what are some of your tools that you've started to use that have become daily Staples specifically around maybe AI

23:50

yeah absolutely so I will use GPT to organize dat data like

23:59

most people do but we're aggregating a lot of lists and taking just taking

24:05

things like transcripts and turning them into something else I think like data transformation and and light analysis

24:14

we're not asking AI to solve all of the couch industry's problems but we are

24:19

asking it to take a list of links of all these websites and give us just a list

24:25

of websites that we can give to our our readers and things like that one thing

24:30

for images because in the furniture industry the I don't know that there's

24:35

been a lot enough AI training out there for the visuals like on a platform like

24:41

mid Journey for instance you get a lot of weird stuff with prompts for

24:47

furniture think about what hap what may happen when you put in the term show me an armless sofa for whatever reason

24:54

it'll interpret it like arm should be coming out of it or something like that because there haven't been as many

25:00

prompts for armless sofa as there have been for attractive female superhero

25:07

with wielding daggers there there's been plenty of that and a lot of refinement um so that's interesting so

Harnessing AI for Visuals and Information Gathering

25:13

one of the programs that I've Ed that that does a great job with visuals

25:19

is. a that's something that's that has been really helpful to me and just found it's like for whatever reason filters

25:26

through some of that like AI noise when it comes to Furniture images it seems to

25:32

intuitively understand a little bit better what I'm looking for and yeah

25:38

tons of one thing I use just to gather information for myself I'm a big skimmer

25:44

when it comes to reading but if I'm listening to something I really connect with it so I turn almost all of my text

25:51

anything that's longer than an email I'll I'll use AI voice assisted audio to

25:56

give it to me while I'm working or exercising and I I find that I absorb information a lot better and it's so

26:02

engaging these days like tools are so good over the last few months even they've gotten so much better when it

26:08

comes to understanding and interpreting and ultimately putting a voice behind a lot

26:14

of text on some of these AI platforms like speechify something I use all the time yeah I was just I was just thinking

26:21

let's dig into that a little bit because I've I recently got back to iPhone which no idea how I went so long with without

26:27

it and the the ease of use with some of the text of speech is just amazing tell

Leveraging AI for Text-to-Speech: A Deep Dive into Speechify

26:34

us a little bit how you're using speech by yeah so essentially I'll go I have get a ton of emails every day with like

26:41

article roundups yeah they're probably leveraging AI to find those articles or

26:48

have some kind of alerts about what their readers will find interesting they'll and then they'll aggregate those

26:55

and put them in like an email Roundup we all get them in some form in every industry so then I will spend 15 or 20

27:03

minutes every morning or afternoon when I get to it opening those emails and

27:09

skimming through to find the articles that I think are most relevant to me and

27:15

what I'm thinking about right now and I'll open them in a like in separate

27:20

tabs then I'll go to them and just literally copy the URLs and paste them into speechify and each time I do that

27:27

it just it takes all of that information and puts puts it in the library there

27:34

and then when I'm ready to listen to it my my favorite lovely English woman will

27:39

read it to me in a wonderfully a powered AI powered voice that's great do you do

27:45

something s is this a me thing I I haven't it I think that is a you thing

27:50

but we're all unique and have our own little uh quirks but I do like that I think that's uh something that I'm going

27:56

to try so thank you for the suggestion so all you need is a a link to the URL and throw it in speechify and then you

28:02

can pick it up on your mobile phone when you're going for run or what have you and you can process it is that right

28:09

that's literally what I do and I just have my speechify libraries what I if I'm playing basketball or exercising

28:15

that's just have my earbuds in and I'm on speechify and that's when I get my

28:22

articles it's it's great I love it I have no complaints that's a great Pro tip one

28:28

thing that has been quite useful is not on the audio side but taking if there's

28:34

any training video or Long YouTube video that you don't want to spend an hour if you can copy that transcript and turn it

28:41

into a custom gep now you can dig into the details that's been like you talked

28:46

about that the way you manipulate data and taking some input and transforming

28:52

it into something else is U always interesting to hear about how other people are using technology because uh

29:00

it is so personal to us right I've often said that no two people are using chat

29:05

GPT the exact same way we all have our own little things that we've discovered that it can do and I love having these

29:12

conversations to hear how people are using these tools how do you prioritize

The Art of Staying Productive and Healthy

29:17

your your health I understand you you're using this is there anything else you do for productivity to reset after a long

29:24

day or are you a morning exercise or what's your how do you how do you stay in such great shape yeah I staying in

29:31

shape is important and I interview and people as

29:36

well and on for couch.com and somebody a very

29:41

successful CEO said recently even if it's 20 minutes a day you got to move your body around and so even though I've

29:49

been a sort of a lifelong exerciser myself I don't even think about it very

29:55

much and on the days where I'm like like oh this I'll skip today I'm like no

30:00

chanu said he said 20 minutes a day and that's the key to success and I'm like I can do 20 minutes so I really believe in

30:08

that and you hear it all the time you see a lot of at least I do a lot of advice and content surrounding how

30:14

important exercises to cognitive function I wish I felt the same way about sleep I don't get enough sleep

30:20

personally but when it comes to exercise like that's been one of my big things

30:25

for and yeah yes the morning sometime in the morning I'm not like a 5:00 a.m. exerciser but generally I'll take a

30:32

break in the morning my morning hours even though it's difficult to turn off the noise from you know 9 to 10 or

30:38

whatever that's the time I feel like I'm most needing of exercise and then it

30:44

pays dividends for the rest of the day so I think that's really important the timing of your exercise when can you get

30:50

yourself to to perform at a high level exercise wise and when will you get the

30:55

most benefit of focus that and mushroom coffee those have been my big things to

31:01

stay focused it's so funny it's like that and mushroom coffee of course can't forget it that's cool I I'm not drinking

31:09

mushroom coffee what's the why should I be drinking mushroom coffee what's I have no idea Mark no I'm

The Magic of Mushroom Coffee

31:15

just kidding mushroom coffee it it just really helps with focus it helps me with

31:20

Focus it's yeah it's caffeinated so that helps

31:27

yeah but it also just really yeah I don't know how else to say it like sometimes I feel extremely focused on

31:35

something almost to a degree that I'm have to check myself and I'm like whoa what's going on here I'm very dialed in

31:42

mushroom coffee I had it 30 minutes ago it really I don't know exactly I'm not like a big mushroom science person yet

31:49

but I started trying it about a month or two ago and it's been very helpful for my focus very cool you got a good

31:57

mushroom guy who's your go-to supplier now it's not legal in all the states yet

32:02

no not those kind of mushrooms but I think there's some similar principles but anyway the brand I got courted by

32:11

online after I told the Instagram or Tik Tok gods that I was interested in

32:16

learning more about this what is called rise R YZ they have a monthly

32:21

subscription thing it's super easy I guarantee there are plenty of them this one has been good for me and it's worked

32:28

so use promo code Alex at rise.com just yeah hit the link below no that's

32:34

that's cool mushroom coffee love that great is it I'm a big coffee drinker

32:41

myself ever made the switch over to mushroom The Taste is it is it you typically take a a Black Mushroom coffee

32:48

or you add a little something to that all right well here's what I do please I like okay so I like very

32:55

sweet coffee I'm not like a coffee connoisseur I have my I know what I like like very strong coffee with very sweet

33:03

sweetener there was a funny one of the seasons of the show True Detective on HBO these two cops were getting together

33:10

after not seeing each other for 25 years and he's one says to the other can I get you a cup of coffee he said yeah I'd

33:16

love one he you still like it the same way he goes yep make it like dessert and that's what I like but I digress so I

33:24

make my mushroom coffee like dessert don't love the tastes and I really like

33:30

my experience of tasting my morning coffee so I'll actually like down it I'll just put something in put some

33:36

coffee and and mix it with water and the mushroom coffee put some creamer in it like a bunch and I'll just down it I

33:44

don't know that's the best way but that's how I do it I don't try to savor it I'm just like this is serves a utilitarian purpose and then I go to my

33:51

like espresso coffee mate mixture to get the full effect recently yesterday

33:58

actually I went to McDonald's and I'll take a little milk in my coffee I'm from Toronto so that's totally normal but

34:05

they don't even have the option for milk at McDonald's anymore it's only cream

34:11

there is at least in Florida and I know McDonald's are supposed to be the same everywhere the only way that they were

34:17

going to give me milk was to sell me like a child's milk to go along with it

34:23

I don't know what's changing but milk I did because I misunderstood their what

34:28

they were saying and then I immediately refunded it because and I just had the coffee black but yeah Strange World

34:35

we're living in where McDonald's is not allowing you to have milk they're just not even an option it's cream that's

34:44

very very interesting yeah and for those good Canadians like you this is a New

34:51

Concept perhaps there's still a lot of milk in Canada I bet there's uh there's plenty of milk in

34:56

Canada so you're helping people get on the couch are you going to be talking about

The Couch Conundrum: Getting On and Off

35:02

ways for people to get off the couch because when they get these couches and they're so comfortable I feel like you

35:07

have a responsibility to help them do both I'm glad you mentioned that Mark because there is a health and wellness

35:13

category at couch.com a little bit underrepresented at this moment but we do have a few great posts on things like

35:21

I don't know if you're familiar with couch to 5K couch to 5K is just it's a race it's more of an internal race it's

35:28

like a individual challenge get off the proverbial couch and start running and

35:35

start slow start with a walk then it's build up to a 5k I don't think there's an organization that's behind that but

35:42

if there were that would be an example of a great partner for us at couch.com as I said something I believe in

35:48

personally a lot just physical fitness and balance in one's life with exercise

35:54

yeah I think there's going to be a lot of content like that but first we have to make sure people like buy the couches and and are

36:01

very comfortable on them that's the main focus of couch.com but I'll get them off of them too I

36:07

will yeah that full circle responsibility to help people get on the coach off the coach back on the couch we

36:14

have to get him back we get him outside we gotta get him out you're tired you got put your feet up it's gonna heal your your feet after uh a long run after

36:22

that 5K coaches it's I never thought I'd be talk so much

36:27

about couches I know maybe when you were you've been in the furniture industry a long time so there's probably so many

36:34

things that you've learned about couches what surprised you about couches that you did

36:42

not know yeah I think a a good thing to mention there is they're so much

36:50

simpler in construction than people think they are

36:55

and you get sold the bill of goods from a brand like Restoration Hardware which is extremely

37:02

premium expensive and you think that there's a

37:08

real big difference in between the construction of one couch and another but after spending time in factories and

37:14

talking to many Furniture manufacturers and makers over the years I wouldn't say

37:20

a couch is a couch because there absolutely are different materials and you want to make sure that you choose

37:26

the material that most that you enjoy most that most fit your lifestyle or sitting style to

37:32

be more literal but ultimately there really shouldn't be thousands of dollars

37:38

in difference between couches unless there's something extremely ornate a lot of it is you're

37:46

paying more for the brand or Cache or the Restoration Hardware behind something so I think the biggest thing

37:53

that I've learned over the years is that you can find a really great couch for a

37:59

lot less than you think Cliffhanger good advice the I think a little bit about

38:06

the car industry and that you never want to be taken and get a bad deal how can

The Quest for the Best Deal in Furniture Shopping

38:13

people avoid that experience of feeling

38:18

like they got hat and they're sitting on a couch that they may be paid too much for just what's the best way for people

38:25

to make educated decisions and get a good deal because we all want a good deal right that's an an amazing question

38:33

I was talking to somebody the other day and they were they equated what I'm doing in couch.com

38:39

to like a Travelocity or Expedia you go to these websites as a

38:45

user and what's the number one variable you want to find the best deal now you

38:51

have other criteria in place like I only want non-stop flights I don't want to lay over or I'm looking for this first

38:58

class business class only economy whatever there are variables to be sifted through but ultimately your

39:04

purpose is getting a good deal which is to say that it is a it is

39:11

a main criteria point it doesn't necessarily mean that you need to have find the

39:19

cheapest couch people want to feel like they got a good deal I think the operative term that we've always used in

39:25

my former business was value we didn't have the cheapest couches at apartment TV but we always believed that we had

39:31

pound-for-pound the best value in the online DC Furniture space because we combined extremely great designer

39:40

quality with a relatively affordable so

39:45

getting a good deal is very important to people and I think we're going to have a lot of content about finding the best

39:52

deal even if it's not at the the least expensive retailer so I think going for

39:57

consumers just really recognizing that getting a good deal is important to you

40:02

is extremely important and is actually a variable in your search because there are places where you'll never feel like

40:08

you you got a great deal if you go into a very high-end furniture store you're going to be wondering did I get taken

40:15

here did I get hosed on the price here is this really worth it and you're never

40:21

really going to find out the answer to that yeah makes a lot of sense yeah

Productivity Hacks and Inspirational Reads

40:27

when it comes to books you're an entrepreneur Avid

40:32

Reader what's on your desk or your audible right now what are you listening

40:37

to you're obviously an audio guy what do you like her one of my favorite questions this could be books you go

40:43

back to your revisits or your just things that

40:49

you're digging into now my revisits are very simple they're all about okay

40:57

productivity there's not much that I like to do over again like I'm not the type of guy who will watch a movie

41:03

multiple times to me that seems agonizing I don't know why so I don't go

41:08

back to things very often unless I really find a utilitarian purpose in doing so and for me think reminders

41:15

about productivity tips very those are very helpful because we've talked has

41:21

been a theme in our discussion today it's very easy to get distracted by the new and the shiny especially as an

41:27

entrepreneur you're always juggling 30 different things at one time focusing on

41:33

the most important thing for having tools to help you do that is very valuable another thing I go back to is

41:39

inspiring entrepreneurial stories if I'm ever feeling like lost or just needing

41:45

of a little bit of a push there's plenty of content around like the how I built this podcast is

41:52

unbelievable if it's the this Guyz I think I think it's very popular he even

41:57

wrote a book called How I built this where he Aggregates some of his top top

42:03

10 list of sorts of his guests and and ideas expressed so that's it's a pretty

42:09

broad one there but if you heard of how I built this podcast I have not it's

42:16

always great to be introduced to a new valuable source of information so I

42:21

appreciate that the productivity one is there a book or uh something that you

42:28

like you said you revisit the productivity category is there a specific author or someone that uh

42:34

really enjoyed I wish I was a super Smarty And could give you like the best answer on this one however I have um a

42:42

little bit of an abstract answer so no I don't have anything specific here's it's similar to how I feel about parenting so

42:49

I have two two young kids they're wonderful love you guys but very

42:56

challenging and all kids are right they'll push your buttons you'll they'll do whatever they can to just present

43:03

challenges and test boundaries and for me parenting advice is a very Dynamic

43:08

thing euro is changing the kids are growing your issues are changing the challenges are for me it's more about

43:16

getting new ideas or being reminded of old ones New Perspectives on the same

43:22

subject matter can be really valuable you don't necessarily have to follow them but for instance I'll listen to a

43:28

parenting podcasts that'll be like say this to your kids instead of that I'm

43:33

like oh my God yes that's great oh and it reminds me I used to do this and it really worked I'm going to bring that

43:38

back there's no parenting strategy that works for more than two weeks that's my thing right okay guys we're doing a

43:44

point system for your fortnite time and it's going to work like this it only works for so long until everybody falls

43:51

out of favor and the same thing goes for my productivity it's just I just I need to listen to 30 minutes of productivity

43:56

stuff right now so I'll go on blinkist blinkist is a great service that takes

44:03

very popular books and sizes them down to 12 to 15 minutes like an an audible

44:11

version of cliffs notes was and there I'll just listen to I'll rifle through

44:16

three or four books that give you a few tips and tricks and I'll jot down a few notes and I find out perfect appreciate

44:22

that and one more for fun if you were give advice to your younger self say mid

Advice to My Younger Self

44:29

20s that guy what advice would you have I'm going through a divorce so there's

44:35

certain things that come to mind with that no just kidding yeah that's a good

44:40

one I don't know I think it what what comes to mind most my my my business

44:46

partner um he's uh about 10 years older than me and we came up together in the

44:52

e-commerce space and figured it out as we went and I've always been the type of guy I think

44:58

I'm just I think I know everything and I just I have a lot of confidence and things that I know and can be very

45:04

Resolute about them but he would always say to me he's like when you get older

45:10

you get wiser and he would use that in a defensive way at certain times or I I

45:16

don't know exactly why but he mentioned always about being wiser now I understand that so my advice to myself

45:22

would be don't think that you know everything I wish I sought out more

45:27

information along the way and to tie it full circle with AI and all the tools that

45:33

are available to us now versus 15 20 years ago when I was getting started like that information is so much more

45:40

readily available so I would encourage myself as a young entrepreneur to really spend time to absorb a lot of

45:46

information and stories of other people versus just go and you think you know what you're doing but really there's

45:52

usually a better path for almost anything you do great advice Alex this has been a lot of fun I

Wrapping Up: The Journey with Couch.com

45:58

appreciate your time and let's let's do this again all the best with couch.com

46:04

it's a a wonderful journey and I can't wait to follow the story thank you Mark and when you need a

46:11

new couch you know where to go amazing thanks so much

English (auto-generated)

AllFrom OpenAi TrainingRelated