Mauro Fiore (00:00):
I've never been convicted of anything. I never said I wasn't charged but I've never been convicted. No convictions.
Bob Simon (00:07):
Yet.
Mauro Fiore (00:08):
Yet. Knock on wood.
Bob Simon (00:10):
You did a video game?
Raymond Mieszaniec (00:11):
Yeah, so in Hong Kong, shortly after PricewaterhouseCoopers, that was just a short stint, actually started my first company with a friend and where basically it was a game. So we built this game for college students to learn finance and essentially if they were good at the game, we got them hired at investment banks.
Bob Simon (00:52):
Welcome to this episode of Bourbon of Proof, where we like to tell stories over fine spirits with those who've succeeded at law and life. And today we're very honored to have Ray Mieszaniec. He is the founder of EvenUp and been the founder of a few other companies before that, which we'll talk about it, but I like to do a little TLDR at the beginning so people understand what we're getting ourselves into.
Mauro Fiore (01:13):
But what does TLDR stand for?
Bob Simon (01:15):
It's like we're going to skid you up to speed real quick.
Raymond Mieszaniec (01:16):
Too long didn't read.
Bob Simon (01:17):
Yeah, too long didn't read. So they're a big long read. Oh, yeah. We have Mauro. Ladies and gentlemen, Mauro's here, our co-host, once again. Mauro Fiore in LA, blah, blah, blah.
Mauro Fiore (01:27):
My pleasure.
Bob Simon (01:27):
His pleasure is all yours.
Mauro Fiore (01:29):
The pleasure is yours, Bob.
Bob Simon (01:30):
Thank you. But Ray is the founder of EvenUp, who recently had a $350 million valuation with 50 million into the company, and a long journey to get there. I know you founded your company in 2020 and you had a lot of things going up before then, but Ray's only 31 years old and he has actually been crushing the game. But we're going to hear Ray's story about how he did this in such a short amount of time. And I actually wore my white Jordan's, which these are the taxi editions. The taxi, because you are always on the road.
Raymond Mieszaniec (01:59):
Yeah.
Bob Simon (02:00):
He's the greatest show on road. So Ray is always on a plane. He came to us. He was in Mexico.
Mauro Fiore (02:06):
He's fucking manage your business.
Bob Simon (02:06):
He was in Mexico City this morning. He's always here. So we're going to get started for Ray. I got some George Dickel. This is a barrel select one. This is a hundred proof. So it's bourbon, it's a barrel proof or bottled and bond. But this is a three chamber. So Ray has two other founders. There's three founders of you. And this is the three chamber from the Leopold Brothers, but this is also in Tennessee, which Ray and I will be in Tennessee twice in the next 60 to 90 days at least.
Raymond Mieszaniec (02:38):
That's where we met too.
Bob Simon (02:39):
And we met in Tennessee. That's right.
Raymond Mieszaniec (02:41):
Yeah.
Bob Simon (02:43):
We met in Nashville at a party where somebody kept telling me, you need to meet this person named Ray. And I said, I'll find Ray. And I was with my sister and we found Ray and we ended up talking all night and then found out he lived in Marina del Rey. And the next Monday or Tuesday we got together, we flew back and we spent the whole day together just brainstorming the world.
Mauro Fiore (03:05):
Interesting. Well, let's have a taste of this George Dickel.
Bob Simon (03:08):
This is some George Dickel, some Tennessee Brew.
Mauro Fiore (03:10):
Beautiful. Oh, that's good.
Bob Simon (03:17):
It's good. I never had this one.
Mauro Fiore (03:21):
They have one that they've age in Tabasco barrels. Have you tried that one?
Bob Simon (03:24):
No.
Mauro Fiore (03:25):
It's like a spicy bourbon.
Bob Simon (03:26):
It's spicy?
Mauro Fiore (03:27):
Yeah, they age it in Tabasco. With the same barrels age Tabasco sauce.
Bob Simon (03:31):
Yeah.
Mauro Fiore (03:32):
I got to give it a whirl.
Bob Simon (03:33):
Yeah, so you know Ray's a G when he has the old school calculator.
Mauro Fiore (03:37):
Let me see.
Bob Simon (03:37):
Look at that.
Mauro Fiore (03:38):
Wow.
Raymond Mieszaniec (03:38):
Yeah, the data bank.
Mauro Fiore (03:40):
That's a calculator watch?
Raymond Mieszaniec (03:41):
Yeah.
Mauro Fiore (03:42):
Does it also get text messages and stuff like that?
Raymond Mieszaniec (03:45):
Not at all. It just does simple math.
Mauro Fiore (03:47):
Oh, that's [inaudible 00:03:48].
Bob Simon (03:47):
It can do anti cosine pretty quickly though.
Mauro Fiore (03:50):
Wow.
Bob Simon (03:50):
It's like TI-87. So no, we have a lot of Polish. I grew up in the Pittsburgh, so that's why I... Do you eat pierogies? You guys have your pierogies?
Raymond Mieszaniec (03:56):
Yes. Grew up on pierogies.
Bob Simon (03:59):
Love it.
Mauro Fiore (04:00):
Your last name is, are you Persian? Are you...
Bob Simon (04:03):
It's Polish.
Raymond Mieszaniec (04:04):
It's half-Polish, half-Chinese.
Mauro Fiore (04:06):
Half-Polish, half-Chinese. No Persian at all?
Bob Simon (04:10):
No, With that great head of hair too. Look at that.
Mauro Fiore (04:11):
Half-Polish, half-Chinese. Wow.
Bob Simon (04:13):
So Ray, tell everybody. Tell us your story. Where were you growing up? Where were you conceived? Do you know?
Raymond Mieszaniec (04:20):
Yeah. I was born in Burnaby, British Columbia. So Vancouver, BC, Canada. That's where I'm from. Basically grew up in the suburbs. So Port Coquitlam is specifically where I was raised. But yeah, I just spent my life there pretty much up until college is when I really...
Bob Simon (04:48):
Started traveling?
Raymond Mieszaniec (04:49):
Yeah. No, I mean it's an interesting story 'cause I grew up in Vancouver. So I'll just say Vancouver generally 'cause that's what people will know. But I remember just growing up always feeling like, "Hey, I want to explore the world." And my friends would always tell me, "Why would you want to explore the world? Vancouver's one of the best cities to live in the world. Why would you have to leave?"
Bob Simon (05:12):
It is nice though. [inaudible 00:05:13].
Mauro Fiore (05:13):
It is beautiful.
Raymond Mieszaniec (05:14):
And I would always ask them, I'm just like, "Where have you visited? Where have you traveled to?" And they would say, "Oh, I've never been out of BC." And so I'd be like, but you want to go see so that you have a comparison point. You can actually come back and say, Hey, Vancouver is the best place to live in the world. I've seen it all. And so that was one of my dreams just growing up. I was always thinking, I can't wait to just go and explore. But yeah.
Bob Simon (05:40):
Was your dad a guy of the sea? Vancouver is a sea town. I would assume he had something.
Raymond Mieszaniec (05:44):
Yeah. My dad was a fisherman, so he sailed around the world 300 days of the year. He did that for 10 years. He went everywhere.
Bob Simon (05:56):
Wow. So what are some places your dad had traveled to as a fisherman?
Raymond Mieszaniec (06:02):
Yeah. My dad would tell me stories of basically traveling all around Africa, Antarctica, Alaska. He has photos of him everywhere. He has these photos where, man, I don't even know what it's called, but basically when you cross the... Essentially you cross the equator, you get some sort of diploma. It's like this high school diploma, like the certificate. They award to you for being a person that's sailed around the world, across the equator and they have this whole ceremony where King Neptune awards you this. So it's like.
Mauro Fiore (06:39):
Was there a certain fish he would specialize in? That's why he was chasing that fish around, or what was it?
Raymond Mieszaniec (06:44):
My dad, I mean, I'm sure they fish.
Bob Simon (06:46):
Mauro loves octopus, by the way, so.
Raymond Mieszaniec (06:47):
Really?
Mauro Fiore (06:48):
Octopus is my favorite.
Bob Simon (06:49):
Oh yeah.
Raymond Mieszaniec (06:50):
I'm sure they caught a wide variety of fish, but my dad would always be a huge fan of catching salmon. So growing up, it's crazy 'cause my dad was known for having the best salmon, the best smoked salmon in all of Vancouver. People would just come to our house and literally buy it from my dad.
Bob Simon (07:09):
Wow.
Raymond Mieszaniec (07:10):
We would make smokers, like smoke houses out of random things. My dad would come home and he would just be like, "Ray, get in the car." And I would be like, "Where are we going?" And he'd be like, "I saw a fridge that somebody put on... They're throwing it away. We're going to take that in turn into a smoker." And I'm like, "Oh my god, dad."
Mauro Fiore (07:28):
That sounds like fun.
Bob Simon (07:29):
Are you an only child?
Raymond Mieszaniec (07:30):
No, I'm the youngest of three.
Bob Simon (07:33):
Wow. What are your brothers or sisters doing?
Raymond Mieszaniec (07:36):
So my brother, he's the oldest. He's in Hong Kong. Basically, he's a production manager for, I believe, it's New Era or Nike. My sister, she's back in Vancouver, and so she got two. Basically, I have two nephews. So she's got two kids. Super, super cute. But she's spending all of her time taking care of them.
Bob Simon (08:02):
Yeah. So tell us was... I mean obviously, you're an entrepreneur. What was your first business and what inspired you that?
Raymond Mieszaniec (08:13):
Yeah. Well, I think the catalyst of just entrepreneurship actually comes from the main reason why I really love what I do today. So like starting EvenUp. So of course, maybe giving some background information and you know the story but maybe Mauro, you haven't heard this before.
Bob Simon (08:37):
Mauro knows a lot of a little. A little.
Raymond Mieszaniec (08:39):
So my dad, when I was younger, he was involved in a catastrophic motor vehicle accident. And so that was a really crazy case where this guy, he was trying to kill his girlfriend, so he shot his girlfriend and basically went on this high speed police chase where 11 cars were chasing him, two helicopters. And then my dad was going to work in the morning and then the guy just split my dad's car in half because he was going superfast. And so ultimately that just flipped our family's life upside down.
Bob Simon (09:09):
How old were you at that time?
Raymond Mieszaniec (09:11):
Oh my gosh. I was just around 13, 14.
Bob Simon (09:14):
Wow.
Raymond Mieszaniec (09:15):
So yeah, basically we, of course, took several years to settle that case. Ultimately, my family walked away with pennies on the dollar, so $200,000, which at the time my parents were two immigrant parents. They're just like, "Wow, this is more money than we've ever seen in our life. So let's take this money so that my mom wouldn't have to work multiple jobs." But that said, after taking that money, it wasn't enough money to live off of for a family of five. Right? And so that's the moment where it wasn't where EvenUp was born or anything at all. That was just the moment where my parents were like, "Hey, you got to go start making money."
(09:58):
And so that's where I started doing everything my parents told me. They're just like, I took as many paper routes as I was allowed to. Now, I...
Bob Simon (10:07):
You're a paperboy. I feel like you'd be a paperboy.
Mauro Fiore (10:08):
No, no. I used to drive the thing on the driving range where you pick up the golf balls. That was my thing.
Bob Simon (10:13):
No, shit.
Mauro Fiore (10:14):
And people will shoot the balls at you on purpose.
Bob Simon (10:16):
Oh, mean.
Raymond Mieszaniec (10:16):
Yes.
Bob Simon (10:17):
I was your guy.
Mauro Fiore (10:18):
Yeah. And it's like, I don't get that. What's so fun about trying to hit the guy?
Bob Simon (10:18):
Are you kidding me? I would try to knock that.
Mauro Fiore (10:21):
Yeah. Sometimes I'd get stuck in the mud or something and I'd have to get out and I always like I'd hold my breath. As soon as I get out, I know I'm going to get golf balls raining on me.
Bob Simon (10:30):
I feel it.
Mauro Fiore (10:30):
So I'd get out for 10 seconds and then everyone's hitting their balls at me. Like I'm a target man. I'm trying to make a fucking living. I was making four bucks an hour.
Bob Simon (10:38):
He also dressed like Waldo, which made it a lot more interesting.
Mauro Fiore (10:41):
So that was my job.
Raymond Mieszaniec (10:42):
I love that. I'm hearing the other side of the story. I'm the guy shooting the ball.
Mauro Fiore (10:46):
It seems like funny until you're the guy out there.
Raymond Mieszaniec (10:48):
Yeah.
Bob Simon (10:48):
Have you ever been a mascot? I feel like this is your...
Mauro Fiore (10:52):
No, I've never been a mascot.
Bob Simon (10:53):
Oh, wow.
Mauro Fiore (10:54):
No, there's a court order against me doing that.
Bob Simon (10:57):
Oh, it was... He's a furry.
Raymond Mieszaniec (11:01):
Oh, gotcha.
Mauro Fiore (11:01):
Court order. I can't dress up in costumes. Can't dress up in costumes.
Raymond Mieszaniec (11:05):
You're actually not allowed in this hotel?
Mauro Fiore (11:06):
Yeah.
Bob Simon (11:09):
We're not really in the hotel though, are we?
Raymond Mieszaniec (11:10):
Yeah.
Bob Simon (11:12):
Yeah. So paper routes, I mean, what are some things you're doing? This is teenage years, right?
Raymond Mieszaniec (11:16):
Yeah, those are teenage years. And then as I got into high school, it was interesting 'cause we saw... My parents saw all these tents where people were selling flowers and you see them when you're driving around in the summer. So seasonal kind of thing. People are selling hanging baskets, potted planters, really nice arrangements and stuff and bedding plants to spruce up your garden. My mom was a green thumb. She was a genius when it comes to... She could revive plants. Just like resurrect them from the dead. And so essentially I teamed up with my mom and I was like, "Let's sell flowers in the summertime."
Bob Simon (11:57):
Wow.
Raymond Mieszaniec (11:58):
And the way this idea came about is my mom, one of the things that she was doing to make more money was she was working for someone selling those flowers. And that's where I was just like, my mom wasn't... She's working so hard. And she was basically the reason why people came back. I was like, "Well, why don't we just do this?"
(12:16):
And so teamed up with my mom, we were working together on that and essentially trying to figure out how do we differentiate ourselves from all these people selling bedding plants and hanging baskets and stuff. And it was really cool 'cause it was like, I mean, we did nothing different from other folks in terms of going out to the farms three hours out, come back and sell it in the city. Of course, have some markup there. But that said, we would teach people how to plant their gardens. So I was literally teaching nice old ladies in terms of like, "Hey, what kind of sun exposure do you have? Do you have full sun, full shade, half sun, half shade?" Stuff like that. Then I would start picking out the right flowers for them and they love that. That's what essentially kept people coming back every year. They're like, "You guys actually educate us on how to take care of these plants."
(13:14):
Ultimately, there's even some flowers that people didn't know. If you changed the acidity in the soil, you could change the color of the actual flower.
Bob Simon (13:20):
Mauro had a similar story where he had this racket where he was just trying to get to all the older women in the neighborhood's homes. Completely different business model.
Mauro Fiore (13:29):
I was offering services. Handy man services or handsy man services.
Bob Simon (13:36):
Handsy man.
Raymond Mieszaniec (13:36):
Yeah.
Bob Simon (13:36):
I think that was the name of handsy man.
Mauro Fiore (13:40):
Handsy man, I like that.
Bob Simon (13:40):
Handsy man. It's probably not taken. So then how did you get into, I mean, you're big into tech and AI, before we even knew what AI was. How did that start for you?
Raymond Mieszaniec (13:53):
Honestly, it's crazy. If I could summarize it. The draw towards tech basically was... So if I'm thinking about trying to make as much money from my...
Bob Simon (14:05):
Did you say about?
Raymond Mieszaniec (14:06):
Yes.
Bob Simon (14:07):
Mauro next pour. Next pour.
Mauro Fiore (14:14):
Oh, yeah.
Bob Simon (14:15):
So this is Three Fingers at 12 years tomorrow.
Mauro Fiore (14:17):
12 year Canadian whiskey, Canadian right blend, and I think it's pretty good.
Bob Simon (14:22):
I think this is fun.
Mauro Fiore (14:23):
Very smooth, very complex. 12 year aged.
Bob Simon (14:27):
How do they say nostrovia, right? Is that or something like this.
Raymond Mieszaniec (14:31):
Nostrovia. Yeah.
Bob Simon (14:31):
Nostrovia.
Mauro Fiore (14:32):
That's Polish?
Raymond Mieszaniec (14:33):
Yeah.
Bob Simon (14:35):
One of my best friend. His wife's a Polish, so.
Mauro Fiore (14:38):
I grew up here in Los Angeles, so not people from... Not a lot of Polish here in LA.
Bob Simon (14:44):
Really? I guess not.
Mauro Fiore (14:45):
Really isn't.
Raymond Mieszaniec (14:46):
There is a Polish restaurant though. Solidarity.
Mauro Fiore (14:48):
I think it's down there in Santa Monica, right?
Raymond Mieszaniec (14:51):
Yeah, yeah, yeah. That's really good.
Mauro Fiore (14:51):
Yeah, I've seen this sign driven by I've seen the Polish flag.
Bob Simon (14:54):
Especially they have sauerkraut.
Raymond Mieszaniec (14:55):
Yes.
Mauro Fiore (14:55):
But I have a friend of mine who went to University of Chicago. He got an MBA there, David [inaudible 00:15:02]. He runs a tech company. He got an MBA at the University of Chicago. I went to visit him one time. I'm a big soccer fan. And he said, "Come down, we'll go to the US versus Poland soccer game was like a World Cup qualifying game at Soldier Field. Right? And I don't know this, that Chicago is like 95% Polish or something, right?
Bob Simon (15:24):
Oh, yeah.
Mauro Fiore (15:25):
I mean, I'm from LA. What do I know?
Bob Simon (15:26):
Jen Aniston and Vince Vaughn, where he's like, "I know three Polaks with no future." One of the best lines. "It's fucking Chicago."
Mauro Fiore (15:32):
So we go to Soldier Field, right? Soldier Field is a gigantic stadium. It's a US men's national team. We go in the stadium and me and David were like the only two guys out of a hundred thousand wearing the US jersey. I was like, "Where'd all these Polaks come from?" He's like, "Oh, you didn't know that Chicago is like all Polish?" I was like, "Well, now I know. Shit. They had their..." The whole country was in the stadium.
Bob Simon (15:52):
Pittsburgh's like that too. We have the Pittsburgh Polka, they play for the Steelers and stuff. Yeah.
Raymond Mieszaniec (15:55):
That's great.
Bob Simon (15:56):
But you didn't know them Mauro.
Mauro Fiore (15:57):
Did not know.
Raymond Mieszaniec (15:58):
It was crazy growing up. My dad every year would get me a new size of the Polish, team Poland jersey and the shorts and everything. It was...
Bob Simon (16:08):
Yeah. So I never pegged you for a soccer guy. I mean, what kind of sports or stuff were you into?
Raymond Mieszaniec (16:13):
Yeah, so growing up I was competitive in Chinese Kung Fu.
Bob Simon (16:19):
Really?
Raymond Mieszaniec (16:20):
So yeah. It's really like I had like a...
Bob Simon (16:24):
This is very good, by the way.
Mauro Fiore (16:25):
Have you ever heard of the Quart of Blood Technique?
Raymond Mieszaniec (16:28):
No.
Mauro Fiore (16:29):
Oh, you got to see Trading Places with Eddie Murphy.
Raymond Mieszaniec (16:32):
There's all these movies that I...
Mauro Fiore (16:33):
He talks about the Quart of Blood Technique. Did you remember that when he was in jail? I'll show it to you after the show. I'll show you.
Raymond Mieszaniec (16:41):
Okay. All right. Sounds very violent, but okay.
Bob Simon (16:45):
He knows the half Nelson, the full Nelson and the Father Nelson.
Raymond Mieszaniec (16:47):
Yeah, the Father Nelson.
Bob Simon (16:49):
Those are the three moves.
Mauro Fiore (16:50):
So tell us about your kung fu career.
Raymond Mieszaniec (16:51):
I really liked Hong Kong cinema growing up. I liked seeing Bruce Lee. I liked seeing Jackie Chan all sorts of different...
Bob Simon (17:03):
Bruce Lee versus Jackie Chan in a fight. Who wins?
Raymond Mieszaniec (17:05):
Oh, man. I feel like, oh gosh, that's going to...
Bob Simon (17:09):
I want to know the answer. Is there an answer? I don't know.
Raymond Mieszaniec (17:11):
I think Bruce Lee is.
Bob Simon (17:12):
Oh, yeah?
Raymond Mieszaniec (17:13):
Yeah.
Mauro Fiore (17:13):
I don't know. I saw a Kareem Abdul-Jabbar kick Bruce Lee's ass. Have you ever seen that one?
Raymond Mieszaniec (17:22):
Yeah.
Mauro Fiore (17:22):
Kareem jumps off the roof and he comes down with the nunchakus. It's amazing. I used to watch Kung Fu theater every Sunday when I was a kid, but Kareem was in a lot of those movies. Remember that?
Raymond Mieszaniec (17:31):
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Bob Simon (17:33):
He was in Conan too.
Mauro Fiore (17:33):
Yeah, he was amazing in the Enter the Dragon.
Raymond Mieszaniec (17:35):
Enter the Dragon, exactly.
Mauro Fiore (17:36):
He was in Enter the Dragon. Yeah, it was a great scene with Kareem and Jackie Chan. Kareem and Bruce Lee.
Raymond Mieszaniec (17:43):
Yeah. So I mean, grew up watching that. And so I literally went... I started out every Saturday and it kind of grew from this, but I used to do kung fu every Saturday in Chinatown. And that was as a kid, and it's interesting 'cause my brother always really wanted to learn kung fu, but he wasn't ever allowed to because we didn't have money for him to do it. And so my mom was making it up with me, making it up to him through me. And I didn't actually originally want to actually learn. I just liked watching. But then I started learning and I really fell in love with it, so I practiced from basically the age of 12 all the way until I was 21. Competed. So like if...
Bob Simon (18:35):
What's the highest level you got to?
Raymond Mieszaniec (18:36):
So I was actually awarded a seventh degree black belt by the International Federation of Wushu. But...
Bob Simon (18:45):
Could you kill Mauro with your bare hands?
Raymond Mieszaniec (18:47):
I would not at all.
Bob Simon (18:49):
Oh, wow.
Mauro Fiore (18:50):
I have a black belt too right now I'm wearing it. I think this says it's Timberland.
Bob Simon (18:57):
Marshalls gave that to him. Awarded.
Raymond Mieszaniec (19:00):
But yeah, so it was really cool growing up. There was so many opportunities where it's crazy because this always comes back to the love from my mom where I'm just like, wow. Even though my mom didn't really... We didn't have money for us to basically get the things that we wanted, but if my mom knew that we really wanted something or desired something, she would make it happen. That's kind of where I feel like I get my, make it happen kind of.
Mauro Fiore (19:26):
There's nothing like mom. You know? Nothing like mom.
Raymond Mieszaniec (19:31):
My mom, so eventually she ended up... She's talking to people through Chinatown and there's a book about this. It's called-
Bob Simon (19:40):
Chinatown with Jack Nicholson?
Raymond Mieszaniec (19:41):
No. No, no, no.
Bob Simon (19:43):
Jack Nicholson movie. You saw Chinatown?
Raymond Mieszaniec (19:45):
Yeah.
Bob Simon (19:46):
We saw it.
Raymond Mieszaniec (19:47):
I think it's a book called The Tipping Point. But it's basically where they ran this experiment and they're like, if you want to meet anybody, how many degrees of separation do you think you are from say sending a letter, taking a letter and addressing it to Warren Buffett, giving it to one person that you think that will get it closer to him? How many passes do you think it will take on average to get to Warren Buffett? And the answer is something ridiculous. It takes like four passes.
Bob Simon (20:13):
Wow.
Raymond Mieszaniec (20:13):
Yeah. So you're only like...
Mauro Fiore (20:15):
It's like Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon. It's like you're only six degrees from Kevin Bacon, always.
Bob Simon (20:21):
At anytime. Actually less. Apparently, it's four or three with Kevin.
Mauro Fiore (20:24):
Well, I actually know someone who's very good friends with Kevin Bacon, so I'm like one.
Bob Simon (20:27):
Oh, wow.
Raymond Mieszaniec (20:28):
See.
Bob Simon (20:28):
Is it Judd Nelson?
Mauro Fiore (20:30):
No, it's Red Miller from the old '97.
Bob Simon (20:32):
Oh, there you go.
Mauro Fiore (20:32):
Yeah, he was in the Guardians of the Galaxy.
Bob Simon (20:35):
Anything with entertainment I would pass tomorrow and he can get it there.
Raymond Mieszaniec (20:38):
Oh, awesome.
Mauro Fiore (20:39):
Yes.
Raymond Mieszaniec (20:39):
But see, then that's, I mean the average.
Bob Simon (20:42):
Traci Lords. They give it tomorrow, he finds a way.
Mauro Fiore (20:45):
Well, that's a very taboo subject.
Bob Simon (20:49):
Before his time.
Mauro Fiore (20:50):
Before his time. You don't want to know about that.
Bob Simon (20:52):
So now that you've... I mean, your company took on 50 million to help your company grow, what do you do with that kind?
Mauro Fiore (21:01):
Have you got any of that in here? Where's that 50 million?
Bob Simon (21:04):
Ray's a very modest guy. You never seen him like...?
Mauro Fiore (21:06):
Where's the 50 million?
Raymond Mieszaniec (21:07):
It's not out here.
Mauro Fiore (21:10):
The guy's wearing the Casio calculator watch.
Raymond Mieszaniec (21:12):
Yeah.
Mauro Fiore (21:13):
Where's the 50 million?
Raymond Mieszaniec (21:14):
This is the last guy you would expect walking around with 50 million in his jacket.
Bob Simon (21:17):
Or the first. I don't know.
Raymond Mieszaniec (21:19):
Oh, that's true, that's true. It's all to throw you off, but...
Bob Simon (21:22):
If you ever need anything from artists, look in the cereal boxes on his pantry level. The second floor. He's laughing, he's blushing.
Raymond Mieszaniec (21:31):
Okay. Yeah, I'll see what I find in the Lucky Charms.
Mauro Fiore (21:36):
We're more of a Froot Loop's family.
Raymond Mieszaniec (21:37):
Oh, gotcha.
Mauro Fiore (21:38):
As a matter of fact, look at that.
Raymond Mieszaniec (21:40):
Oh, wow.
Mauro Fiore (21:41):
I'm wearing my Froot Loop sock.
Bob Simon (21:42):
Not even scripted, just right on.
Mauro Fiore (21:43):
I'm wearing my Froot Loop socks.
Raymond Mieszaniec (21:44):
Literally Froot Loops. Wow.
Mauro Fiore (21:46):
And my son, when I wear these and my son says, "Why do you have two canned Sam on your socks, dad?" I said, "This is my favorite cereal like you?"
Bob Simon (21:56):
I said, what kind of socks do I got on today? I got Pittsburgh Pirate socks on from Stance. Look at that giant P, sure enough. There you go. So comfortable.
Raymond Mieszaniec (22:06):
I've got Nike socks on under here.
Bob Simon (22:09):
Here's this guy. 50 million don't even have Stance socks over here or Froot Loops.
Mauro Fiore (22:12):
Not even Froot Loop socks. You have to give me your address. I'll send you some socks.
Raymond Mieszaniec (22:16):
Yeah.
Mauro Fiore (22:16):
What does the seven stand for? I'm fascinated by this.
Bob Simon (22:19):
There you go.
Raymond Mieszaniec (22:19):
The seven is the Seventh Amendment.
Mauro Fiore (22:23):
Which one is that?
Bob Simon (22:24):
Oh my God, the right to jury.
Mauro Fiore (22:25):
Oh, jury trial.
Raymond Mieszaniec (22:25):
Jury trial. Right.
Bob Simon (22:27):
He only knows the Fifth Amendment.
Mauro Fiore (22:30):
I only knows Fifth Amendment, the right to remain silent. I want to say for the record was Bob, I makes it seem like I'm a common criminal. I've never been convicted of anything. I never said I wasn't charged. But I've never been convicted. No convictions.
Bob Simon (22:47):
Yet.
Mauro Fiore (22:47):
Yet. Knock on wood.
Bob Simon (22:51):
So Ray, why do you believe in the Seventh Amendment? I mean, you're Canadian. You guys even have amendments? How does that go?
Raymond Mieszaniec (22:59):
Honestly, I couldn't tell you. I'm the worst Canadian.
Mauro Fiore (23:02):
Canada is into free love. Everything's great in Canada. You go to Canada, everybody's great.
Bob Simon (23:07):
Everybody's happy there.
Mauro Fiore (23:08):
Everything is great. Yeah, it's great.
Raymond Mieszaniec (23:10):
It's true. It's true. Everyone's flocking up there.
Mauro Fiore (23:12):
It's good. It's cold, but it's good.
Raymond Mieszaniec (23:14):
But I'll admit, number one, I think it's a beautiful pin. And number two, I just love the meaning behind it. And so that's obviously for what we do in terms of evening up the playing field EvenUp, that's what we stand for. And so that's why it's actually a pin that we distribute across the team. We want everybody to have it.
Bob Simon (23:33):
Wow. Well, I'm going to pour one of our last ones here. We have such good conversation over whiskey. So I'm going to give you... So we've been around the world. We've gone to Nashville, United States, we've gone to Canada. So now I'm going to give you some Irish into it. You're not Irish. This is an Irish whiskey.
Mauro Fiore (23:51):
Is this our third one from this episode?
Bob Simon (23:53):
Yeah, it's our third.
Mauro Fiore (23:55):
What was the first one?
Bob Simon (23:56):
Don't worry about it.
Mauro Fiore (23:56):
I don't remember.
Bob Simon (23:57):
You just do you.
Mauro Fiore (23:58):
Okay.
Bob Simon (23:58):
This is a Redbreast. This is a single pot still. So it's Irish whiskey to Sage 15 years. So a lot of people that drink Irish whiskey, this is like their staple. They have one or two over this maybe for Redbreast, but this is a very good one. So Ray, now that you take on 50 million, your company's worth almost half a billion. You can now afford to have a little Redbreast in your life.
Raymond Mieszaniec (24:19):
Oh, thank you.
Mauro Fiore (24:22):
I don't know, I'm going to have to turn this guy upside down before he leaves. I'm going to get 50 bucks out of him.
Bob Simon (24:26):
50 bucks.
Raymond Mieszaniec (24:26):
50 bucks.
Mauro Fiore (24:29):
To shake him down.
Raymond Mieszaniec (24:30):
Yeah. Cheers.
Bob Simon (24:31):
We're going to talk about the journey to get to Redbreast, Ray, 'cause I know it wasn't easy. I know this wasn't your first company.
Mauro Fiore (24:37):
That's a very good point there, Bob.
Bob Simon (24:39):
You're a professional.
Mauro Fiore (24:44):
Now, this is good. Now you can tell this is Irish.
Bob Simon (24:46):
Yeah.
Mauro Fiore (24:47):
It's totally different than American whiskeys and bourbons, for sure. But it's good.
Raymond Mieszaniec (24:52):
Yeah, I've never really actually compared all the different whiskeys.
Bob Simon (24:56):
It's definitely different.
Mauro Fiore (24:57):
You can tell. Once you've drank enough...
Raymond Mieszaniec (24:59):
Well, I can tell now. Yeah.
Mauro Fiore (24:59):
Once you've drank enough, you can tell the difference between whiskey, bourbon and scotch. It's pretty easy actually, once you've drank enough. At first it might not be.
Bob Simon (25:10):
Yeah.
Raymond Mieszaniec (25:10):
Yeah.
Bob Simon (25:10):
So I mean, that take you before EvenUp. First of all, you didn't stay in Vancouver.
Raymond Mieszaniec (25:15):
Nope.
Bob Simon (25:16):
Tell us the journey after that. I want to hear your story of how you got to EvenUp.
Raymond Mieszaniec (25:20):
Yeah. So ended up moving to Hong Kong. One of the reasons why I was in Hong Kong was kind of that original idea, inspiration to go elsewhere, live somewhere else in the world. There's this philosophy of travel that I believe in. It's like where if you immerse yourself into different geographies, different cultures, et cetera, it unlocks different parts within you, like in your mind as well. This is something I heard from a video from this Princeton professor going crazy in a math class, but essentially unlock something with you at a genetic level. And so I thought that that was a super cool concept. So I was like, I want to travel and learn stuff. So moved to Hong Kong.
Bob Simon (26:01):
You should see what Mauro unlocks when he goes to Sicily, the motherland in Italy. It unlocks very powerful spirits for Mauro.
Raymond Mieszaniec (26:08):
Oh, really, yeah.
Mauro Fiore (26:08):
Well, you know my dad's a Sicilian old school, Sicilian gangster. So I go to Sicily and I go up into the mountains and see my cousins. All old Mafioso guys. It's pretty... They'd scare you. If you saw my family up in the mountains in Sicily, it'd blow your mind.
Raymond Mieszaniec (26:22):
Interesting.
Mauro Fiore (26:24):
Now Sicily's popular, because I don't really watch too much of these Netflix shows, but there's some Netflix show where that was in Sicily. It's called White Lotus.
Bob Simon (26:32):
White Lotus. Yeah.
Raymond Mieszaniec (26:32):
Yeah.
Mauro Fiore (26:33):
Yeah. I never saw it. Everybody I know watched it.
Bob Simon (26:36):
Oh Mauro, you should watch it.
Mauro Fiore (26:36):
I heard. It's good.
Raymond Mieszaniec (26:37):
It's good, it's good.
Mauro Fiore (26:38):
I haven't watched it, but it's in Sicily. So now this, I already know a bunch of people this summer have already gone to Sicily, my friends, but I go there Sicily almost every year. I have family there, but I'm sure they don't go to my dad's town up in the mountains. They're probably in Messina or something on the water in the ocean.
Bob Simon (26:54):
So what did Hong Kong unlock in you, Ray?
Raymond Mieszaniec (26:56):
Well, actually when I was in Hong Kong, and this is random, but I actually once ran into the Triad and met the Triad, which is like the Mafia in Hong Kong. And that was a pretty crazy experience. They're actually the nicest people ever.
Bob Simon (27:08):
So they make you think.
Raymond Mieszaniec (27:09):
Yeah, exactly. As long as you're on the right side. But came to Hong Kong, I was working at PricewaterhouseCoopers as a cybersecurity and anti-money laundering consultant.
Bob Simon (27:19):
How old are you at this point?
Raymond Mieszaniec (27:22):
Like 24 ish.
Bob Simon (27:24):
Ish.
Raymond Mieszaniec (27:24):
24, 25.
Mauro Fiore (27:24):
Have you ever heard of the Triad guy from San Francisco, Shrimp Boy?
Raymond Mieszaniec (27:29):
No.
Mauro Fiore (27:30):
It was like Johnny Shrimp Boy who would kill everybody. He was like the Triad executioner in San Francisco.
Bob Simon (27:37):
I think this was Grant Theft Auto III.
Mauro Fiore (27:39):
Other guy, Shrimp Boy. And I thought maybe you knew about him.
Bob Simon (27:42):
Shrimp Boy.
Raymond Mieszaniec (27:43):
Yeah, yeah. This is like a mission, Mauro.
Bob Simon (27:44):
Exactly. It's not real life. Wait, didn't do a video game? You did a video game.
Raymond Mieszaniec (27:49):
Yeah. So in Hong Kong, shortly after PricewaterhouseCoopers, that was just a short stint. Actually started my first company with a friend and where basically it was a game. So we built this game for college students to learn finance and essentially if they were good at the game, we got them hired at investment banks. So it was this merit-driven approach of getting you hired into these super prestigious firms, prestigious roles that you otherwise...
Mauro Fiore (28:18):
Merit. Merit-driven.
Raymond Mieszaniec (28:19):
That's right. It doesn't matter about what school you went to, what GPA you had.
Mauro Fiore (28:24):
Well, that's interesting a merit-driven.
Raymond Mieszaniec (28:25):
And so that came from a little bit of a chip on my shoulder 'cause during college, I was studying mathematics and economics and my friends would tease me, they'd be like, "Oh, what are you going to do? Are you going to become a math teacher?" And I was like, "I can do what you guys are doing." They were doing finance. And I was like, "I could..." "Literally, what do you think created finance, like math?"
Bob Simon (28:45):
That's numbers.
Raymond Mieszaniec (28:45):
I really do believe it. It came from that.
Mauro Fiore (28:49):
There's no bigger deuce bags than the finance guys. Total deuce bags.
Raymond Mieszaniec (28:53):
Yeah.
Mauro Fiore (28:54):
They really are. They need to be all with each other.
Raymond Mieszaniec (28:58):
I'll admit a lot of those folks actually moved into tech. So now it's like, it's...
Bob Simon (29:03):
Who's laughing now, Ray? It's what happening now.
Raymond Mieszaniec (29:07):
Yeah. So you cannot escape. But yeah, that's actually the company. We grew that in Hong Kong. So we started actually from east to west. So we worked with all of the investment banks in Hong Kong because we were basically helping those investment banks stationed in Hong Kong, Singapore, all of Asia-Pacific, compete with the recruiting.
Bob Simon (29:31):
You were mid-20s at this point, right?
Raymond Mieszaniec (29:32):
Yeah. So basically, yeah, exactly. I mean, I'm never kind of really, what is it? Put tabs on all these events with age, but yeah. And so we were helping the banks in Asia-Pacific compete with Wall Street because every student, if you go to a really good school, you're typically going straight to Wall Street or that's what you're gunning for. And so all these banks in Asia-Pacific were trying to find great talent, but they couldn't find great talent by looking in the same pools as Wall Street for example. So it was really cool helping them tap into diamonds in the rough where essentially we believe this idea where talent is distributed equally, but opportunity is not. And so the more we can distribute our game within different colleges, universities, et cetera, put this in the hands of students that otherwise wouldn't have had a shot because they didn't go to a target school. This is where these firms could recruit-
Bob Simon (30:31):
Opportunity. Yeah.
Raymond Mieszaniec (30:32):
Super smart.
Bob Simon (30:35):
What was the name of this company?
Raymond Mieszaniec (30:36):
This was EquitySim.
Bob Simon (30:37):
EquitySim. Cool me.
Raymond Mieszaniec (30:39):
So Equity Simulation. So I mean that was really cool. We won a bunch of awards in Hong Kong at Pitch competitions and that got us noticed by VCs in Silicon Valley. And so...
Bob Simon (30:53):
You're in your mid-20s, you got EquitySim rolling in Hong Kong. What's next for Ray?
Raymond Mieszaniec (31:00):
Yeah. We're running EquitySim. Doing cold calls at night. So it was a dual-sided market. We were selling to colleges and universities on one side. So integrating that into the classroom, replacing the textbook 'cause like simulation, practical learning was the idea there.
Bob Simon (31:19):
They're essentially competing on your game to then get hired.
Raymond Mieszaniec (31:22):
But they were learning their concepts of how to trade stocks and bonds and how do options work and all of that stuff on our platform.
Bob Simon (31:28):
I mean that sounds like so practical that we should be doing that now.
Raymond Mieszaniec (31:31):
Yeah. I mean, I feel like if you can teach anything through a game, why wouldn't you? Right?
Bob Simon (31:36):
They should actually do bar prep as a game. Hey, I had an idea for you, Ray.
Mauro Fiore (31:42):
I took the bar so long ago, but even back when I took the bar in the '90s, they had a game you could buy on a floppy disc and it was like an evidence game where they would ask you evidence questions and then you would click yes or no. I think it was called Objection, the game. You've never seen it?
Bob Simon (31:58):
No.
Mauro Fiore (31:58):
It was to learn evidence. But it was old school, like floppy disc stuff.
Raymond Mieszaniec (32:03):
Interesting. Interesting.
Mauro Fiore (32:05):
But I had that when I studied for the bar.
Bob Simon (32:07):
You said floppy disc.
Mauro Fiore (32:08):
Floppy disc.
Bob Simon (32:09):
Okay. I just make sure. I thought I heard something different. That's it.
Mauro Fiore (32:12):
Anything floppy around here. It's you, not me.
Bob Simon (32:14):
Oh, here we go. All right. So now you're here. You're not a floppy disc. We got the real gamified education system. EquitySim.
Raymond Mieszaniec (32:22):
Yeah. So we're rocking out cold calls that night and now there was this one time, so how we got into San Francisco is we received an investment from 500 startups, which was... Well, now it's called 500 Global, but it's like a competitor too.
Bob Simon (32:35):
[inaudible 00:32:36] 500 Global. Yeah.
Raymond Mieszaniec (32:37):
Yeah. So a competitor to YC. So of course, it's all these investors, like former entrepreneurs who really made it big with their businesses. They're basically helping new entrepreneurs basically get from zero to one and then one to 100 really quickly. Like Justice HQ.
Bob Simon (32:54):
Yeah.
Raymond Mieszaniec (32:54):
Oh my gosh. It's with tech.
Bob Simon (32:58):
It's funny, I never got introduced to these type of... Actually, you introduced me a lot of this when we met even a year ago. How does this space work? The Zero to One, right? The Peter Thiel book. What are some for viewers and listeners, because you obviously a student outside of the game, right? You're doing, listening to podcasts, getting educated probably to this day. I would bet. So what are the ones, the core books or people that are doing these startups or these videos to watch? What are some stuff that you recommend?
Raymond Mieszaniec (33:26):
Oh, books for startups for just building your business. So Peter Thiel's Zero to One is really good. Hard Thing About Hard Things by Ben Horowitz. That's really, really good. So Andreessen Horowitz, that's an amazing one. I definitely, I mean all of me and my co-founders, we all were like, we have to read this. And so we all read it together.
Bob Simon (33:49):
Wow.
Raymond Mieszaniec (33:50):
That's just like, you'll just learn how crazy the stories are in terms of the whole Silicon Valley building a business. At the end of the day, what you learn in these accelerator programs, and I feel like we can all feel this a little bit ourselves today.
Bob Simon (34:04):
Taking a victory pour, that's our fourth one. I need a little bit more 'cause I'm really enjoying this.
Raymond Mieszaniec (34:08):
Go for it. The thing that we feel like after we've achieved certain things or different milestones within our life, we don't really feel any different as people. We're just like, "Oh yeah, we did that." And people will be like, "Oh my gosh, how did you achieve that?" And you're just like, I literally was just trying my best. I had no idea how I was doing, like what to do at the time, but I asked people questions. I got the information I needed and I just made the best decisions I could based on that information. And what was cool is through the 500 startups program, I got to learn from a lot of these folks who there was just like, yeah, just honestly, nobody knows how to do it. Nobody knows the playbook in terms of how to build a great business, but you're just going to have to go there, go out there and throw things at the wall and see what sticks.
(34:59):
So how we got into 500 startups, it was really interesting 'cause the investors flew from San Francisco to Hong Kong and we're doing cold calls at night. And so we're like...
Bob Simon (35:09):
Are you still at Pricewaterhouse at this point and doing this [inaudible 00:35:12]?
Raymond Mieszaniec (35:12):
No.
Mauro Fiore (35:12):
Bob, I guess you're the only one who likes a victory pour. Is that it?
Bob Simon (35:15):
Hey man, take it so wrong.
Mauro Fiore (35:17):
'Cause my glass is empty. My glass is empty.
Bob Simon (35:17):
Victory is a pass sometimes best by oneself.
Raymond Mieszaniec (35:21):
Here we go.
Bob Simon (35:22):
He's getting Three Fingers again. That was a good one.
Raymond Mieszaniec (35:25):
What is this?
Bob Simon (35:26):
Oh, Three Fingers, one mouth. That was actually his number one search term in 2019.
Mauro Fiore (35:34):
Yes, yes, yes.
Raymond Mieszaniec (35:34):
Number one, three fingers, one mouth.
Mauro Fiore (35:37):
Have you ever read the book by the guy from Zappos? It's called Delivering Happiness. I read that book. That was pretty amazing interest.
Bob Simon (35:46):
He could hide.
Mauro Fiore (35:47):
Yeah, he was a crazy dude. His name was like Tony Hsieh or something.
Bob Simon (35:49):
Yeah.
Raymond Mieszaniec (35:50):
Yeah, yeah.
Mauro Fiore (35:51):
His book was amazing on customer service and how to deal with your employees. I read that book because my management style is more like his. I let my employees kind of not run wild, but I just don't really micromanage them as long as they get results.
Bob Simon (36:08):
Dude, if you ever heard... So...
Raymond Mieszaniec (36:08):
Oh, I have a good book for that.
Mauro Fiore (36:08):
As long as they get results.
Raymond Mieszaniec (36:08):
I have a good book for that.
Bob Simon (36:09):
So Ray, he teaches me about hiring. How they hire is fucking fascinating. They hire people based off of how they answer questions and grade them. It's crazy. The scale that they're at with this is fucking insane.
Raymond Mieszaniec (36:21):
But it is all from the simulation learning thing. So from EquitySim, it's the same idea. It's just like if you're going to hire people for certain roles, it's like what are the skills do you think that are going to make them successful in that role? And then evaluate for those things. So to create exercises or simulations of that exact task and see how people do. Obviously, there's some things that people won't get right at the beginning, but that's where you have to see how do they learn something quickly in a short amount of time. If you gave them this task that anybody would've been confused at first, it's just see how resourceful they are. See where they go out and grab information and try to learn about how to do this. And then just see how they go about actually solving the problem. And that's where you see a lot about people [inaudible 00:37:10] boat, again.
Bob Simon (37:12):
A boat?
Raymond Mieszaniec (37:14):
Yeah.
Bob Simon (37:15):
You went straight from EquitySim to EvenUp?
Raymond Mieszaniec (37:18):
Yeah, so I mean 500 startups got me to San Francisco. It was really funny because I never would've even thought we got an investment from 500 startups because I literally hated the partners when they came to Hong Kong. So when they came to Hong Kong, we were cold calling all night and then we went to this 8:00 AM seminar where they were teaching us about how to grow our business and all that stuff. And I sat in the front because I'm like a keener, I wanted to learn as much as possible.
Bob Simon (37:46):
We call those gunners in law school. You sit the front, the gunners.
Raymond Mieszaniec (37:49):
Gunners.
Bob Simon (37:49):
I was sitting in the back and just playing poker online and stuff.
Raymond Mieszaniec (37:54):
Too cool. Too cool.
Bob Simon (37:54):
Because I had to make money in law school, pay for the shit. Fuck out of here.
Mauro Fiore (37:58):
Yeah, I was always the back of the class kind of guy.
Raymond Mieszaniec (38:00):
I was the front. And so I went to the front, but this day was really bad to sit at the front. Sat at the front, and then I was falling asleep the entire time. And literally this...
Bob Simon (38:10):
You guys are kindred spirits then.
Mauro Fiore (38:11):
Yeah. I've fallen asleep in the front row in the back row and anywhere. I once fell asleep standing up in line. I was with my wife. She never forgets it. She says, I've seen everything in line at Universal Studios to go on a roller coaster. I fell asleep while standing up and I collapsed. I collapsed. I collapsed on the guy in front of me. I went on top of him, but I don't know, my body just has to... I have to shut my rig down sometimes.
Bob Simon (38:37):
So on my Instagram, a whole story section for Mauro falling asleep, 'cause I catch up falling asleep. So people started sending me pictures of where Mauro falls asleep. He was presenting at a TBI seminar and he was on a panel and he had finished and another person had gone, another person's up, he's on stage. The lights are like this on his face and he's just sleeping. On stage. Outside of court one time, he just went and took a court appear as he's sleeping on the bench. People do send me pictures.
Mauro Fiore (39:03):
But the best is when I tried a case with Conal Doyle, who's a really good trial lawyer in LA and we tried a case together in December and he will never let me live it down, but I mean I fell asleep during that three week trial. I must've fallen asleep at counsel table during the trial five times.
Bob Simon (39:21):
Yeah.
Mauro Fiore (39:21):
Five times. But just for short, cat naps.
Raymond Mieszaniec (39:25):
Yeah, we need to make a meme of Mauro like-
Mauro Fiore (39:28):
It's just short naps.
Raymond Mieszaniec (39:29):
... the windows powered down or shut down style. Like that, "ta-na-na-na."
Mauro Fiore (39:35):
So Conal kept waking me up during that trial. I was like, "Just let me sleep for five minutes and I won't keep nodding off."
Raymond Mieszaniec (39:42):
Yeah. Yeah.
Bob Simon (39:44):
So your front row in Hong Kong for the 500.
Raymond Mieszaniec (39:48):
So this venture partner just starts kicking me and he is like, "If you're going to sleep in my class, get out." And I was like, "No, no, no, I'm so sorry." And then this happened three times before. He was like, "Get the fuck out of here." And I was just like, "Okay, chill, man. I was up all night doing cold calls and I was growing my business. I'm actually here 'cause I want to learn, but I just can't stay awake 'cause I was just grinding. So just give me a break." And when I expressed myself in that way, after he was like, "Wow, I like that guy."
Bob Simon (40:18):
Yeah, standing up.
Raymond Mieszaniec (40:20):
And that's what, but I hated him. I hated him so much. And I was like, I don't even care about these guys. I don't care about how important they are. I'm just going to focus on building the business. Long story short, they offered us to come to San Francisco and went to San Francisco, stayed there for four months, got to... Basically, the accelerator program thing is interesting 'cause they treat you, they put you in this cohort where you're like a family. You're treated like a family and you're all growing your business together, but at the same time, you're competing for the same resources and you're competing for investment at the end of the day. So it's like at the end of the day, the goal is you all go on stage for demo day and then you start pitching to investors with hundreds of investors in the room. And you're no longer friends at that point. I mean, you're kind of friends, but technically you want the investors.
Mauro Fiore (41:10):
It's like the girls on the Bachelorette. I mean they want the same dude. You know?
Raymond Mieszaniec (41:13):
Yes, that's exactly.
Bob Simon (41:15):
They're all not making out with the same sit.
Mauro Fiore (41:18):
They're teasing each other's hair in the background and telling her how cute the dress looks. But at the end of the day, they want the filthy guy that's making out with all of them. They all want the same one.
Bob Simon (41:28):
He just broke it down.
Raymond Mieszaniec (41:29):
There's the rose. And so we all wanted that rose. We're competing for that rose and so ended up living in San Francisco ever since then. So from 2017, all the way till now, been here ever since.
Mauro Fiore (41:43):
By the way, let me regress. Since Chris Hardwick left.
Bob Simon (41:50):
Digress. Regress. You can regress. You do regress.
Mauro Fiore (41:51):
Since Chris Hardwick left the Bachelor, they've jumped the shark. It's not the show it was. He was the best host. He can really keep all those wackos going. You know what I mean?
Bob Simon (42:03):
I'm more of an Andy Cohen guy, on The Real Housewives.
Mauro Fiore (42:05):
I like Andy Cohen.
Bob Simon (42:06):
Do you ever see the reunions?
Mauro Fiore (42:07):
Yeah, his reunion shows are good. Yeah.
Bob Simon (42:10):
Don't watch the whole season. Just watch the reunion. Those are the best ones.
Raymond Mieszaniec (42:12):
Okay.
Bob Simon (42:14):
You had to, Ray. I got to tell we're going to get you into some reality shows.
Raymond Mieszaniec (42:16):
Yeah, I wish. It seems like I'm missing out.
Mauro Fiore (42:20):
So when do you start EvenUp? What's the moment that you realize it's going to fly? Tell us that.
Raymond Mieszaniec (42:28):
In summer of 2019, I'm at Dolores Park, which is this park in San Francisco where everybody goes to on the weekend. It's just packed with...
Bob Simon (42:38):
Sure it wasn't a Mulva Park. It's a Seinfeld joke. I'll tell you later.
Mauro Fiore (42:43):
That's where the guy from Twitter always hangs out.
Raymond Mieszaniec (42:45):
Yeah, yeah.
Mauro Fiore (42:46):
I follow him on Twitter. The Twitter guy. And he's always at that park.
Raymond Mieszaniec (42:50):
Yeah. So Dolores Park is a big thing.
Mauro Fiore (42:51):
What's the name of the Twitter guy? John Jack.
Raymond Mieszaniec (42:53):
Jack Dorsey.
Mauro Fiore (42:54):
Jack Dorsey. Jack Dorsey is always at that park 'cause I follow him.
Raymond Mieszaniec (42:58):
Because you follow him. He's that at that park. Because you follow him.
Mauro Fiore (43:01):
Maybe you're right. You're right.
Raymond Mieszaniec (43:03):
Yeah, yeah. So we're there. I'm with my current co-founder, Rami, and he's telling me about litigation finance, and he's like, "Have you heard about this?" And I was like, "I've never heard about this." And he's like, "Oh well, I have my friend, Sam. He's teaching me about commercial litigation finance, like Burford Capital and all this stuff." At this time there was this company called Legalist, and they were basically funding these small mom and pop shops.
Mauro Fiore (43:29):
They used to send me emails all the day.
Raymond Mieszaniec (43:31):
Really?
Mauro Fiore (43:31):
Mm-hmm. Got million emails for me.
Raymond Mieszaniec (43:34):
So you're familiar. So they were basically tackling this market where there's Burford Capital and stuff like they're injecting crazy amounts of money into these huge commercial lawsuits. But then for the smaller lawsuits, there was no capital for them. And so basically Legalist was going after those cases, helping the smaller businesses go up against the bigger kind of Goliath defendants. And so we were like, "Whoa, that's really cool." How do you know what a case is worth? How do you underwrite these cases? And that's where Sam, our third co-founder. So he was just like, "Oh yeah, commercial case is pretty difficult to underwrite. This is like you need a bunch of attorneys and all that stuff." And when we started asking questions about what was more predictable, he was like, "Well, I do personal injury defense." And he's like, "If you know the injury, the treatment, the jurisdiction, who you're going up against, the policy limits, this data can really help you get closer and closer to figuring out what the case is worth."
(44:34):
Now, that's where he was just like, "Yeah, on the defense side, there's all this data that exists. They have both the money and they have the data in terms of how they're sharing it together in Colossus and Claims IQ and all of these other kind of softwares." But when we started talking about it was like, "Okay. Well, does that exist on the plaintiff's side?" And he was like, "No, it's fragmented. All of the law firms are sitting on their own data primarily. And the main way that you share that information with each other is maybe through some court reporting services or Listervs."
Mauro Fiore (45:09):
Or your friends.
Raymond Mieszaniec (45:10):
Or you call your friend and you're like, Hey, what does a torn rotator cuff?
Mauro Fiore (45:13):
I mean, we were just talking before we started today, we were just talking outside about that. One of my attorneys in my office called me and asked me what I thought a certain case was worth, which it's kind of the old-fashioned way people did it, right?
Raymond Mieszaniec (45:28):
Yeah.
Mauro Fiore (45:29):
And still do it.
Bob Simon (45:31):
We used to have those book, those O'Brien's evaluators. Remember that?
Mauro Fiore (45:33):
Remember that. Yeah.
Bob Simon (45:34):
Literally have to go to a freaking book and just like, just so stupid.
Mauro Fiore (45:37):
Now I get, you know how that you were mentioned Legalist. Now the company that sends me emails like they're relentless. It's called LexShares.
Bob Simon (45:44):
Oh, yeah.
Mauro Fiore (45:46):
Whoever they're marketing, whatever, they're relentless.
Bob Simon (45:50):
He knows.
Raymond Mieszaniec (45:50):
I think it's Max Volsky.
Mauro Fiore (45:52):
I get an email from them on every case I file. I get an email, "Oh, we were wondering if you needed any fine..." I usually deal with mostly premises slip and fall, trip and fall cases. So I'm always suing big companies. I'm always suing bonds or whatever, Trader Joe's, whatever. So I think they focus in on the defendant. They're looking for commercial defendants.
Raymond Mieszaniec (46:17):
A pecunious defendant.
Mauro Fiore (46:19):
Yes, they're looking for that. Whatever that means. That's what they're looking for.
Raymond Mieszaniec (46:22):
That's the same.
Mauro Fiore (46:23):
And they send emails, "Hey, do you have any need for funding on Jones versus Trader Joe's?" Because they probably figure maybe it's a class action or something crazy and it's like, yeah, my God fell in the frozen shrimp aisle. But it's like, I don't think you really lectures, does that interested in this one?
Bob Simon (46:42):
Like spraying a pinky on some grapes.
Mauro Fiore (46:44):
He broke a metatarsal. You know? But yeah, it's funny how they do bombard you. That LexShares is relentless.
Raymond Mieszaniec (46:53):
Yeah. I think what they do is they'll scrape any public court filings kind of see that if you...
Bob Simon (47:01):
So Ray we're at the tail end here, we know that or EvenUp has grown to in such a very short period of time. So you guys have embraced real AI, real predictive analysis and real thought learning into what you've done from trying to predict the value of these cases quickly, underwrite them to now solving a need for lawyers to help them write their demand letters quicker. But not only just write them but analyze their data, weaponize it, those types of things. Why do you think you were able to create this whole new...? It's a new industry almost for this and now everyone's trying to replicate, which as soon as you guys came out with that even announced when somebody leaked it, there were five other companies that popped up the next day.
Raymond Mieszaniec (47:45):
Absolutely.
Bob Simon (47:46):
Crazy. I was going to email some them like lectures. I was like, "Holy shit, how did they find out? Which, whatever." But that little solve, but now where are you going to grow it?
Raymond Mieszaniec (47:54):
Yeah, no. Obviously, it's pretty crazy 'cause nobody thought it was a good idea or nobody wanted to put any time into building this business up until they heard us announce. But yeah, we spent the past three years really figuring out this problem and despite anybody telling us that this was a bad idea or there was no money in the PI space or anything like that, we just stuck to what we knew and the unique kind of research that we were relying on and we're like, "Okay, we got something here and so let's make it happen." And honestly, it does come from us really actually wanting to even up the playing field. We were just like, "Technology like this has to exist." So I get that in 2020 when people were talking about this data and being able to use this data to maximize the value of claims. Maybe it sounds farfetched because nothing existed at that time, but...
Mauro Fiore (48:47):
So what data do you track? What cases or what a broken collarbone is worth in Southern California?
Raymond Mieszaniec (48:54):
Correct.
Mauro Fiore (48:54):
That kind of stuff.
Raymond Mieszaniec (48:55):
Yeah.
Mauro Fiore (48:55):
I mean, you...
Bob Simon (48:56):
Making as granular as who's the adjuster, who's the defense lawyer, and...
Mauro Fiore (49:00):
And that kind of information is really valuable. That kind of stuff, like me, I'm using myself as an example, but I've practiced in Southern California in this bubble for a long time, decades, 25 years. So I know how much I can get out of this defense lawyer on this case in this jurisdiction.
Bob Simon (49:22):
And imagine being verified to show you can prove that that's accurate and then put in a demand letter.
Mauro Fiore (49:27):
But that's just because I've been doing it so long.
Bob Simon (49:30):
Correct.
Mauro Fiore (49:31):
But it's like to me, what you're doing is the online poker thing. People can play online poker and play 20,000 hands in six months. Whereas in the old days, Doyle Brunson took 20 years to play 20,000 hands to learn how to play.
Bob Simon (49:48):
God rest his soul. God rest his soul.
Mauro Fiore (49:49):
Yeah. He just died. But Doyle Brunson took 20 years to play 20,000 hands to learn how intuitively to play no limit hold him. And then guys could play online and play 20,000 hands in three months and learn everything that Doyle Brunson knows for 20 years.
Bob Simon (50:04):
Right.
Mauro Fiore (50:04):
Now, you can do your data and understand everything I might know from 25 years on the street just from your data, which is amazing.
Bob Simon (50:14):
You can now get access Because you're on a cloud-based CRM and you could just give his company your data and he could tell you what your case is worth as it comes in the door now.
Mauro Fiore (50:21):
It's just amazing.
Raymond Mieszaniec (50:22):
It can help you basically within your firm, weaponize your data. So allowing everyone with your firm to basically settle for more consistent amounts rather than go at each case from scratch alone. So if we had the two, if we both had similar cases, but you've already settled yours in the past and stuff, I could just pick up all the notes very quickly just by searching or basically filtering for injury, treatment, all of that stuff, and find the exact cases to compare apples to apples. And then if I have anything that's up against the same adjuster or defense counsel, that's even better because the strongest thing that I could do from working within your firm is reference our own settlements, our own results. And so that's a really cool thing.
Bob Simon (51:09):
And at the end of the day, you'll show that better lawyers get better results and hopefully that'll drive the consumer to the better lawyer, even if they already have a lawyer to partner with that lawyer to make sure that the client wins.
Raymond Mieszaniec (51:20):
Yeah.
Bob Simon (51:21):
Well Ray, thanks for coming on this episode of Bourbon of Proof. This has been a fucking awesome show. I like the startup journey 'cause everybody is different. But always the last critical question for you, what is your Bourbon of Proof? These three beautiful bottles up here? What was the one that spoke to you and why?
Raymond Mieszaniec (51:37):
I think it's got to be the Canadian whiskey.
Bob Simon (51:39):
Wow.
Raymond Mieszaniec (51:40):
That was actually a really amazing for. I think that was really good. Honestly, I don't know any shit about whiskey at all, but that tasted really good. That's [inaudible 00:51:54] about that.
Bob Simon (51:53):
That's all you need to know. If it tastes good, that's what you know.
Mauro Fiore (51:56):
I have a friend of mine who's a wine guy, he's got 10,000 bottles of wine. You know what he says? You know what the best wine is? The one that you like.
Bob Simon (52:02):
One that you like.
Raymond Mieszaniec (52:02):
That's right.
Mauro Fiore (52:03):
That's it.
Raymond Mieszaniec (52:03):
That's right.
Mauro Fiore (52:04):
So yeah, if you like that one, then that's the best one.
Bob Simon (52:06):
That's the handy man's firm. Oh, no. Three Fingers.
Mauro Fiore (52:09):
Handsy.
Raymond Mieszaniec (52:09):
Handsy.
Bob Simon (52:11):
The handsy man's thing. Well Ray, thanks for coming on, man. Appreciate you and thanks for the genius in the industry, brother.
Raymond Mieszaniec (52:15):
Thank you for having me. Thank you.
