The Best One Yet
š” āIdeas = Currencyā ā TED Talksā CEO audition. Costcoās girl math. āMuskingā the US Govāt.
Mon, 10 Feb 2025
TED Talks needs a new CEOā¦ but TED is actually the deepest media biz weāve ever seen.Elonās mission to disrupt the government hit a new level, that requires a new termā¦ āMusking.āCostco is now paying workers 2x the averageā¦ itās the cost that pays for itself.Plus, a record 22M Americans called in sick today (got a case of the Super Bowl Mondays).$COST $WMT $SPYWant more business storytelling from us? Check out the latest episode of our new weekly deepdive show: The untold origin story ofā¦ Monopoly š©. Subscribe to The Best Idea Yet: Wondery.fm/TheBestIdeaYetLinks to listen.āThe Best Idea Yetā: The untold origin stories of the products youāre obsessed with ā From the McDonaldās Happy Meal to Birkenstockās sandal to Nintendoās Super Mario Brothers to Sriracha. New 45-minute episodes drop weekly.ā-----------------------------------------------------Subscribe to our new (2nd) showā¦ The Best Idea Yet: Wondery.fm/TheBestIdeaYetLinksEpisodes drop weekly. Itās The Best Idea Yet.GET ON THE POD: Submit a shoutout or fact: https://tboypod.com/shoutouts FOR MORE NICK & JACK: Newsletter: https://tboypod.com/newsletter Connect with Nick: https://www.linkedin.com/in/nicolas-martell/ Connect with Jack: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jack-crivici-kramer/ SOCIALS:Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/tboypod TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@tboypodYouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@tboypod Anything else: https://tboypod.com/ Subscribe to our new (2nd) showā¦ The Best Idea Yet: Wondery.fm/TheBestIdeaYetLinksEpisodes drop weekly. Itās The Best Idea Yet.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.
Chapter 1: What is TED Talks looking for in a new CEO?
Basically, access to Trump and the Treasury means that Elon has influence on government money and regulation. We're seeing this phenomenon with Oracle right now, too. The software company stock is at an all-time high, not just because of the AI boom. No, it's at an all-time high because CEO Larry Ellison is close to Trump. In fact, he's one of Trump's top picks to buy TikTok through Oracle.
So the difference between the state of a business and its actual stock price, it could be the power premium. The power premium.
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For our third and final story, Costco just gave its workers an epic pay raise. They are now the highest paying retailer in America. Why does Costco pay double the industry average? Why are they doing it, Jack? It's the price of loyalty. Yetis, Jack and I discovered this story last week, and then a bunch of yetis also DM'd us and told us about it too, and we jumped in T-boy style.
Most Costco stories we cover are on the consumer side, like the $1.50 hot dog and soda combo or the $5 rotisserie chicken. Or how the Costco magazine has 15 million readers. But yetis, this story is about Costco's workers. Because Jack just spent $300 over the weekend on chicken bakes, and we wanted to show some love.
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Chapter 3: How is Costco changing the retail industry?
Girl math themselves to employee loyalty. I love that, Jack.
But yet is this pod's not over yet. Here's what else you need to know today. Oh, how do we not think of that earlier? That's so good, man.
All right, first, the jobs report for the month of January came out. Only 143,000 new jobs were added. It was less than expected. But the unemployment rate somehow still fell to 4%. But we should point out the economic report people really care about these days, it's the inflation report, which drops this week on Wednesday. Second, e.l.f. Beauty stock is down 70% in just over six months.
The stock is not beautiful anymore. No, and they blamed a lot of strange things. In January, it was one of the weirdest months they'd ever seen in cosmetics. First, the L.A. wildfire stopped cosmetics posts from happening on fear of appearing tone deaf. And because TikTok was almost sort of banned, influencers weren't posting their Get Ready With Me videos.
As a result, Elf Beauty didn't get as many sales. And finally, Starbucks' new policy of hand-scribbling names on cups with Sharpies is resulting in lovely doodles and some awkward typos. Meanwhile, coffee prices hit an all-time high as Brazil is having a really bad crop. So your Starbucks is going to be more expensive, but charmingly, your name will be misspelled as... Is that a J?
It's a G. I find that charming. Nick, it's Wick. It's Jack? I mean, Jack rarely gets misspelled. Jack Latte! Yak! Yak! It's a Yak Latte, Jack. Yak Latte. Now, time for the best fact yet. This one sent in by Courtney Diamond over in Seattle, Washington. Get this. The term artificial intelligence was actually coined way back in 1955. 1955, which means it's 70 years ago.
It was coined by John McCarthy, a man who won the Turing Award, which is, I think, like a computer science award, basically deeming you like nerd of the year. Well, Jack- Can you sprinkle on some context to how long ago 1955 was? The Cold War was still in full swing. Rosa Parks had just refused to give up her seat on the bus. Disneyland opened that year, and McDonald's was founded in 1955.
That's when we got the term artificial intelligence. It's wild how our minds can be 70 years ahead. Of our artificial minds.
That's a confusing sentence, but I think it works. I think you had a win with the girl math one, Jack. We should have left it at that.
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