The Best One Yet
🚀 “The Hacks Pod” — Our 3 Best Stories on Innovation Hacks
Thu, 27 Feb 2025
Our 2nd Bonus Pod during our Paternity Week is on 3 of our best pop-biz stories on growth hacks from the last year:#1. SharkNinja’s stock has climbed 140% this year… Here’s how it’s taken over your kitchen.#2. Gin in a motor oil can? Tampons in an ice cream pint?... The new packaging trend is chaos.#3. The fastest-growing candy right is Nerds Clusters… It shows there’s a business case in gut instinct.Share this episode with your buddy who’s building something (or your buddy who should be).We’ll be back with our usual daily show next week, after Jack’s spent some time getting to know his new baby. But look out for more paternity pods from us dropping this week.And if you crave more business storytelling from us? Check out our weekly deepdive show: “The Best Idea Yet” — The untold origin stories of the products you’re obsessed with: Wondery.fm/TheBestIdeaYetLinks—-----------------------------------------------------Subscribe to our new (2nd) show… The Best Idea Yet: Wondery.fm/TheBestIdeaYetLinksEpisodes drop weekly. It’s 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) show… The Best Idea Yet: Wondery.fm/TheBestIdeaYetLinksEpisodes drop weekly. It’s 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 are the top innovation hacks discussed?
This is Nick. This is Jack. And today's innovation pod is the best one yet. Our top three growth hack stories of the last year. Yeti's Nick and Jack here. And if you're here in this episode, then Jack's baby just arrived and he's actually on paternity leave. Chances are I'm waiting for the perfect light to take the perfect picture to reveal this baby on Instagram.
So all week long, we're dropping our best ones yet of the best one yet bonus pods. Today's show is on innovation hacks. We've got too many to fit in one episode, but these are three fantastic ones. So send this episode to your buddy who's building something. huge. Jack, three stories. What do we got for today?
For our first story, we're going back to August 30th, 2024, when shares of Shark Ninja, the appliance company, had surged 140%. We'll tell you how Shark Ninja took over your home from air fryers to hair dryers. For our second story, we're going back to October 23rd. Sunscreen sold in a whipped cream can. Interesting. Tampons sold in an ice cream pint. What? The new packaging trend is chaos.
Chaos packaging is trending because consumers decide in three seconds. And our third and final story is from October 31st. There is one candy you saw on Halloween. Totally. Nerd Clusters. It's the fastest growing candy in America. Nerd Clusters are a case study in going with your yut. But yetis, before we hit that wonderful mix of stories. Fantastic mix of stories, Jack. Hockey, stick, growth.
Going Gretzky, baby. How can you surge your company's sales from zero to 60 faster than a Ferrari when your business feels more like a Subaru? Okay, first of all, this sounds like an infomercial or like some kind of motivational speech. But I like the momentum, Jack. Because to do those things, you need a hack. A hack, a tip, a trick, or a sneaky idea to go further, cheaper.
Hacks, rapid growth for minimal cost. Hacks, huge engagement for tiny involvement. Hacks, big returns for small investment. Besties, if you drop the term growth hack in your next pitch deck, then Mark Andreessen will take your meeting and kiss your left cheek. Because from startups to stocks, there's nothing hotter than a hack. No, there isn't.
In fact, one reason Jack and I asked you to send us the best fact yet on our daily show. Why is it, Jack? It's a growth hack. It is. Because when you hear your voice on the show, you share the episode on Instagram, which of course we love. We love it. It's a growth hack. So, besties, we've actually covered hundreds of these innovation and growth hacks on our show. We love covering them.
We whipped up three of our favorite ones to inspire your next hack you need. Three creative business ideas for innovation hacks. Let's hit them.
Let's hack them. 15 years before this song, two boys from the Northeast met in the dawn. They had an idea that caused a cultural storm. It's the best one yet, but the best is the norm. Jack Nick.
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Chapter 2: How did Shark Ninja achieve 140% stock growth?
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For our third and final story, we're going back to October 31st, 2024, Halloween. In the meantime, Nerds actually did a Super Bowl commercial this year with Shaboosie, but we want to talk about their Halloween growth hack. The number one candy you're going to see this Halloween, it's Nerds Clusters. Nerds Clusters are the fastest growing candy in America thanks to one gutsy decision.
Yetis, get this, something Jack and I have never seen before. But the nerds' candy just got front page pieces in both the New York Times and the Wall Street Journal. I bet you both reporters were really angry when they learned that their coverage was going to be split between the two. I mean, forget election coverage. It's all about candy coverage these days.
The reason both of the papers of record are covering nerds is because nerd sales have been growing like software recently. In six years, nerds' revenues have gone from $40 million a year to 700 million bucks a year, Jack. Can you sprinkle on some financial context? That's almost 20x growth in just six years. Nerds is the new NVIDIA. Nerds had a Super Bowl ad last year.
They're getting another one this year, and they're Kylie Jenner's favorite candy. And they're not even paying her to say that. They just happen to be your favorite candy. But we should clarify, this is not the box of nerds you remember from growing up, where the box is divided in two flavors, remember? No. No, no, no, no, no, no.
What we are talking about is the new version of nerds known as the nerds clusters. A nerds cluster is a dime-sized gummy covered in the tiny, tangy nerds that you know. It basically is like eating a cavity. That's what it's like. Imagine like an almost melted Swedish fish that gets tossed into a bowl of Nerds and you spin it around a little bit and then you pull it out.
And then get spray painted in 42 different colors. Yetis, get this. That spinoff version of Nerds was introduced just six years ago, but it's now 90% of Nerd sales. Nerds is basically gone. Nerds clusters are all you see now. The student has become the teacher. So, Yetis, we got to ask, how have Nerds clusters become the fastest growing candy in America?
Well, we read the New York Times and the Wall Street Journal articles, which were, by the way, the longest articles we have ever seen either of those papers produce. And according to that reporting, Nerds ignored the data. Back in 2018, Nerds was uncool. They had fallen behind Starburst, Skittles, Sour Patch Kids.
So the company was bought by Ferrara, the Italian candy company, for just a tiny bit of money. And then Ferrara scientists pulled off an engineering feat. They managed to stick hard candies on a gummy and maintain the integrity of the shape. It was a candy innovation. And ultimately, they found the ideal ratio of crunchy to smushy. That's just really satisfying.
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