Episode 483: Mark Cuban's Cold Email Empire: How $750K Investments Turn Into Billion-Dollar Returns

Hi, guys, it's Tony Robbins.

You're listening to Habits and Hustle, Greg.

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How many people actually work for you and your organization?

Just in dealing with the shark tank and other deals,

probably

12.

That's all.

Oh, that's it.

Yeah.

You have one.

This is like a side note.

Alyssa's cookies or Alyssa's Healthy Cookies.

Oh my God.

I'm obsessed with those.

So am I.

I am every morning for breakfast.

No exceptions.

They are delicious.

You can't get them on the West Coast.

Yeah, you can.

You can get them at

Ralph's, I think.

No.

No?

Trust me.

I've checked because I found them in Florida at the Super Bowl two years ago and I became obsessed with them.

And you can only get them at like public safe way.

And I, on the website, it was a whole schmade race.

So I never ended up ordering them, but I called them a bunch.

I was wondering when they're going to be here because they are so delicious.

Because, no, because I know, because one of my deal parts with Shark Tank is they got to have Alyssas there during the day for me to munch on.

Well, they're here.

I'll find out for you.

But you got to hear the story about this guy.

Doug.

sent me an email saying basically he was living out of his car and broke.

And he sent me samples of these cookies.

And the first thing I always do when anybody sends me any food is I look at the nutritional information.

Yeah.

You know, because if it's all fat, sugar, whatever, I'm not going to be interested.

Right.

So this is huge cookie.

And I turn it over.

It's 190 calories for enormous cooking.

That's not bad.

Then I look, it's like, no added sugar.

I'm like, that's good.

All this fiber, you know, huge amount of fiber, like a whole day's worth of fiber.

And then protein.

Yep.

I'm like, okay, let's see how this thing tastes.

So I break off a little piece.

I'm like, this is good.

I'm like, what's wrong with it?

What's, you know, so then I go to pull the cookie out of the wrapper and it falls apart.

And I'm like, ah, that's the problem.

Because when people go to buy a cookie, they want to eat a cookie.

Right.

So I made them change it to healthy bites because the way their whole manufacturing process works, it's really easy to combine it with a little bit of moisture and put it together so it tastes moist.

Right.

And they're just these little bites and they stay together.

Put eight into a package.

And with eight of them, it's only 360 calories, right?

So I eat, yeah, so 45 each.

So I eat like all eight of them for breakfast.

Oh, that's what I did too.

You had to eat four or two.

No, no, and it's only 360 calories for breakfast.

And I'm getting my fiber.

I'm getting, you know, it's like eating a healthy cereal, only it tastes better.

It's delicious.

And you don't, and you feel like you're actually giving, like, you're, you don't feel like you're depriving yourself with it.

Yeah.

That's what I felt like.

I feel like, but I could, but this is like two years ago or three years with COVID.

I can't remember.

Everything like blends, but I haven't looked for the last probably a year, but I did, I was like obsessive over them.

We got to find you where they are up here because I know they are.

And I order them either from Amazon or from

right from the website, Alyssa's Healthy Cookies website.

I should just do that too.

Are they doing well?

Oh, Russian.

So this guy, this guy went from living out of his car and

helping him get started.

I mean, I went to Central Market in Dallas and did one tasting thing.

Yeah.

And then it just blew up from there.

Really?

And that was more than 10 years ago.

Now

they'll do just under $20 million in revenue, but that's not even the good part.

We spend no money on advertising, not a nip.

Right.

Not a penny.

Yeah.

Nobody knew what they were when I was telling them.

Yeah.

And but people go in there and buy them, but people who buy them keep on buying them over and over and over again.

And we'll make $10 million in profits.

That is amazing.

So this guy went from living out of his car to like being Mr.

Badass down in Florida, making millions of dollars a year.

That's incredible.

You know, it's funny that you say that because for the super, it was for like Maxim Super Bowl parking and the whole stat, like everybody who was doing it, everyone became obsessed with these things.

And we would buy, we would,

we would like clean the shelf of every single.

Yeah.

I mean, I go in there and I buy like six at a time, eight at a time, wherever I'm traveling.

Easily.

For sure.

For sure.

I mean, Alyssa's Healthy Cookies.

And now we have a vegan version and we've got a chocolate version.

Yeah.

They're all really, really, really good.

And like, if you got a little bit of time, you throw them in the microwave and they get really like smushy yes off um they're great they're great and they've got a little travel pack so you can i take them in the row with me in my little computer bag i'm backpacked yeah so i can travel with them and i always have something healthy okay we got to find out about this west coast thing because that doesn't yeah because that doesn't make sense you must love what's with you and oats though with mush mush yeah yeah mush i'm comedian mush yeah and do you just love oats is that no it's not bad at all i like things that are tasty and healthy yeah it's true you know and you know ashie the female entrepreneur behind it is just insane i mean she's just amazing yeah she's a force of nature so when you get companies like that and um the entrepreneurs are amazing and the product's amazing and it's healthy yeah why not totally what's the one thing you look for when you do an investment with a startup is it the people or is it the product product first because you can have great people but if it's not going to sell it's not going to work um but You know, I look to see, is this something where I say to myself, why didn't I think of that?

Yeah.

That's the first thing.

And then even if it's not quite that, I'm like, okay, you know, if I'm looking to buy it or a typical consumer or company is looking to buy, is this something that's going to be compelling, differentiated, easy to buy?

And if it passed those tests, then I look at the entrepreneur and say, okay, can these people do it?

Yeah.

Well, you know what?

I find it interesting.

I always stare at you when I watch this show because I feel like you're very decisive.

That's not the answer I wanted after you said that.

Well, maybe I stare at you for other reasons too, but this is like an ad, you know, a family show.

But

what would, why is it that like, I feel like it's my, maybe it's just my opinion, but like you're like so decisive that you like could, either you like someone, I feel, or you don't like them.

Like, you know pretty quickly.

Well, remember, there's a lot of editing that goes on.

I know.

That's what I'm saying.

Is it just because of the editing?

It's because of the editing.

Because how long is each pitch, really, in real life?

Stupid ones?

20 to 30 minutes.

Oh, wow.

Intense ones, 90 minutes to two hours.

Medium ones, an hour.

Oh, so they're, so that's why, because

there's so much longer ones.

It's our money, and we know nothing about them when they walk into the room.

So they're not vetted at all.

They're vetted by producers, but not by us.

So we know nothing about them.

Here comes Jen.

They'll say, this is Jen, and that's it.

So you really, so it really is a surprise when people walk in.

Yeah, no idea whatsoever.

So then what happens, like, well, then you guys do due diligence, right?

After we say yes to a deal, we can do due diligence.

So what's the, what's the ratio or how much percentage of things that go through?

So early on for me, it was about 75%.

But now we get more and more people who just come on for the commercial.

Yeah.

And so they'll say, oh, Gray, we got a deal.

And then they'll ghost it.

They do.

They do.

Yeah.

Because I've had a few people come on here or I've met in like real life, whatever.

And like they said that they went on, and it was not you, actually.

Other people, other sharks.

Wouldn't close the deal.

Wouldn't close the deal.

And it just like

it dragged on and dragged on.

No, that's not me.

Yeah.

Some of the other ones will do that where they'll like try to change the deal terms and this and that.

And that's up to them, right?

However they want to do it.

But if I agree to it, I'll agree to it.

But if you drag me out, then you're playing with fire.

Yeah.

Because either you want to do a deal and you agree to what you agree to or not.

Yeah.

Now, who's your favorite shark besides, you know?

I like Barbara to work with the best.

Yeah, I like her too.

Because we compliment each other because she's really, she looks at people first and I look at deal first or product service first.

And so we compliment each other really well.

Right.

So do you do most of the deals you do, you do with her, though?

If I can, yeah, if I can.

Yeah.

How about those other two?

We'll move off of this, but like I'm so fascinated by this show.

Like, how about the Mr.

Wonderful?

Yeah, he's okay, but Kevin doesn't do a lot of deals.

And he also wastes people's time.

Yeah, that's just shtick, right?

And so, but he's a great guy.

So, yeah, he's a really good guy.

He's not like he is on TV.

Oh, he's not?

No, he's a really good guy.

The other one seems very nice.

Robert's too nice, you know.

Yeah.

But he's a good guy, too.

Lori does a good job.

You know, Lori is all about her wheelhouse, things that she can just plug in and sell, QVC or whatever, she's going to be great at.

Right.

So then I want to ask you back because when you were a kid, obviously you were selling the baseball cards and the garbage bags and like stamps, everything for those basketball shoes that your dad didn't want to get you.

Like you were like a bore, you were like a born hustler.

Like you just were.

Without question.

Without question.

So were you like the guy?

Like if I went to school with you, would I be like, oh, that guy's for sure going to be a billionaire?

That guy's for sure going to be successful.

No, no, you probably didn't even know who I was.

You'd be cute and I'd be the little fat guy.

I don't know.

I don't know if I'd be the cute one back then either.

Yeah, like when I was 16, no, when I was 15 14 uh 14 um freshman in in high school i was playing baseball and i ran into a bicycle and my parents like my dad did upholstery and cars didn't have a whole lot and like rather than getting me caps because i broke two teeth running into a bicycle and rather than getting me caps that matched all my other teeth they got me stainless steel caps so that because they would last longer they were cheaper no way and so every time i smiled even like in my high school graduation picture like you see there would be these two teeth at the bottom that were steel colored.

Really?

Yeah.

I mean, and like, if I showed you my 16-year-old picture, I was like five, eight, five, nine,

um,

weigh 30 pounds more than I do now.

Really?

Can I see a picture?

Do you have one?

Let me see.

That is so, I would never have guessed it because you seem super

yeah, things change.

No kidding.

Things definitely, you know, yes, $4.7 billion later, things definitely change.

But like, you seemed very all-I mean, I don't know.

That's a picture of me at 16.

My God, no, it isn't.

Yep.

This does not even look like you.

That's me at 16.

Wow.

Wow.

I don't even know what to say.

The teeth are gone.

Like, you got them fixed.

No, no, no, no.

You just can't see it there.

No, I'm saying that right now.

No, yeah, like you got them fixed after you kind of like got out of this whole face.

That's insane.

So like you

showing everybody, it's pretty amazing, actually.

I would never, but also.

That's one handsome motherfucker, right?

I was going to say the truth is, like, at the time, if you saw some pictures of me when I was 15, 16, it's mortifying.

You know, exactly.

Thank you.

You're going to be so, you know, dramatic there.

But like, the point is that still, like, you are not known.

Like, you seem to have like a confidence, though, a self-confidence.

Where did it come from to even do all these deals and wheeling and dealing?

I mean, there's two different things, right?

Like being confident about girls when you're 16.

Yeah.

And then being in business.

Like in business, you can just do the work.

Right.

You know, I got to do that.

That's your thing.

Yeah.

You do the work.

So you pick whatever topic.

And if I need to learn it for business for whatever reason, I can just spend the time.

Yeah.

And it's just up to me.

You know, it's like the saying, you know, the one thing in life you can control is your effort.

Absolutely.

And so that's just my style.

I mean, you know, I learned early, early, early on that most people didn't.

Yep.

You know, and whether it's learning how to code, whether it's learning about business, whether reading this book or watching that video, you can figure shit out.

Yeah.

Most people don't do it.

And so that's what gave me confidence because I knew I do the work.

I'm prepared.

And that set me apart always.

So you're just like, you, you love, I read this a bazillion times.

And I know if you've said this, like you just love to learn.

You read a ton, like four hours a day.

Curiosity is one of the greatest business skills anybody can have.

And once you're curious and you find something that's interesting to you, particularly if it fits what you're trying to accomplish, then it's just a matter of taking the time to learn it.

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Were you always just very interested in like computers and

my software?

What do you call it?

Yeah, all the above, right?

Technology.

And

it wasn't until when I got to Dallas, I got a job working for a software store.

And I had to learn it all right there and then on my own.

And that's really what got me into it.

I found out that because, you know, I didn't mind reading software manuals, hardware manuals, whatever,

that that gave me an edge and I could sell.

So you combine the two together and I taught myself how to program.

And, you know, I did really well as a salesperson selling software until I got fired, you know, and then I started my own company and the rest is history.

Well, also, like, you're very self-reliant.

Like, you don't like mentors.

You never had a mentor, right?

No, never.

No.

What's your reason for, like, do you like, because when people have asked you that before, you're like, no, I don't believe in them.

It's not that I don't believe in them to each their own, but it's just like you just going through the process of figuring things out is a skill.

Yeah.

Learning how to understand a market or a company or

a product or service is a skill.

Right.

And, you know, there really aren't shortcuts.

And I get, you know, having a mentor to introduce you to people and all that kind of stuff.

But, you know,

those same people will introduce you just as a referral if you have a great product or service and you're good at what you do.

Right.

And that's the way I always looked at it.

And like, so, like, what do you do?

Because you're in the situation now where everybody wants you to be their mentor or something from you.

They do that all the time.

All the time.

Right.

You just say, fuck off.

Did you say that?

Does it work?

Does it work?

Yeah, especially the 16-year-old kids, you know?

Yeah.

Exactly, right?

No, I mean, it just depends on the circumstances.

Like, typically what I'll do is

just say, okay, you know, send me an email.

Yeah.

And if it's a question I can answer, I will.

And as long as they don't ask me 50 questions, you know, as long as they don't ask me things that are easily answered just by searching online,

you know, then I'll try to help them.

Because sometimes, I mean, it's crazy.

Even like probably what I would have done, like 12, 13 year old kids that'll email me with business questions, you know, they'll they'll it's very you can tell it's very self-serving you know or you i'll get parents parents emailing me for their kids and so they do what they say yeah it's just like oh my son or daughter is really interested in abc can you answer these questions

i'm like no i'm not gonna answer them for you now if your son or daughter took the initiative right what's insane not to go too far

like now i'll get emails from parents of adults you know 22 24 28 years old

you know asking for job advice for their kids or will i revisit i'm like hell no you know so crazy the coddle

culture we have now.

I don't know if it's culture per se or just like these parents that are just like a lot of them.

Yeah, helicopter parents to the nine thousandth degree.

Absolutely.

And I'm like, no, you know, I just want to.

You're so accessible, though.

Yeah, my email is public.

Like, so I was going to say, like, every, how do you not have, like, aren't you just inundated all day?

I know you have two phones you carry around.

Well, no, I got two.

Yeah.

Well, three I have, yeah.

Um, just in case I need bed or service or I can be working on one and whatever, talking about them.

But in any event,

like, you know how you can just set up preview mode on your email?

So I just read the preview.

And if it's interesting, I read it.

And if it's not, I hit the delete key.

It takes me two seconds.

Wow.

You must be doing that all day, though.

Yeah.

You know, it doesn't matter if I'm eating lunch or doing whatever, you know, and it's, you know, me time where I can just bang through them and there's always something interesting there.

And I've literally gotten emails where I've invested probably over $100 million from people I don't know.

And a lot of them, there's one company that I invested, I don't know how many millions now, and they're out here in LA and they're begging me to come visit because I've never

met the guy, Relativity Space.

That's what it's called?

Yeah, Relativity Space.

They do 3D printing for space rockets, for rockets.

Oh my gosh.

Yeah.

And it's enormous.

And, you know, I think their last valuation was $4 billion,

which made my stuff worth like a whole lot of money.

No kidding.

Because it was just these guys from Dallas who were talking to me about, you know, they want to use 3D printing to build rockets.

I'm like, that's really cool.

I asked some questions, did some homework.

They answered all the questions great and everything.

And so I gave them like 75, 750 grand for 20% or 25% of the company.

Now, I've been diluted significantly since then because they've raised a bunch, but and you know, even as I've put in more.

Um, but yeah, that's worth you know, enough to cover all my bad investments.

That is

you never met them.

Yeah, the with the cost plus drugs, um, Dr.

Osh Mayansko, that was a cold email.

I was going to say tell the story.

That is crazy.

The guy just called, like, just email.

Yeah, just emailed me.

Um, guy named Dr.

Osh Rosh Mayansky, who is a radiologist, practicing radiologist, also has a PhD in math and statistics.

Also, did one year of law school just for the fun of it.

I mean, just insanely smart.

Everything comes easy to him intellectually.

And he sends me an email.

What was the subject line?

I don't even remember.

But it was basically saying that he wanted to create a compounding pharmacy to

make generic drugs that are often out of supply.

And because they're out of supply, the people who make them can charge anything they want.

Because if you happen to have that disease that needs it, you're going to do all you can to get it.

And I'm like, well, that's pretty cool, but that's too short-sighted.

We got to do it for all generics.

And so this was going up four years ago.

We started what turned out to be a company called CostplustDrugs.com.

And I kind of massaged the whole business plan and invested.

And basically, we have built this company.

If you go to costplustdrugs.com, we tell you exactly what our cost is for any drug we sell.

We just added 113 more today.

So now we're closing in on a thousand different SKUs.

Today, alone?

Because yesterday you added a few.

No, we reduced prices yesterday.

Oh, those are the

added a bunch today.

And so.

You know, just the fact you're reducing prices on drugs at all is insane, right?

People are, that's a real problem.

No, it's a huge problem, right?

That's why we did this.

And so now if you go to costplustdrugs.com and you put in a monotelub, which is for people with leukemia, as I found out,

and you can see that our cost is $45 and we sell it for, or $48 and we sell it for $54, right?

You'll see our cost, we add 15%.

That's it.

It's $3 for the pharmacy handling fee and $5 for shipping.

That's like a game changer.

That is a disruptor.

It's changing a lot of things.

You know, it's crazy, some things that we didn't even expect to see.

Somebody, because they see our costs, let alone our pricing, now they're able to back into a lot of the the bidding that goes on for different insurance companies and and somebody did um some research that said if for just 77 of our of our drugs buying in basic quantities if Medicare bought from us instead of where they buy now, it would say $3.6 billion a year.

And that's just 77 drugs.

And, you know, that's crazy.

Yeah.

And now we've got more than 900.

So you can see where it's going.

But, you know, in this country in 2022, we should never be in a position where you have to choose between your rent, your food, and your medication.

Yeah.

And we've been able to change that.

And, you know, we were thought we were going to primarily deal with people without insurance.

But as it turns out, not only were people without insurance really benefiting and saving a ton of money, but people with insurance were more often than not cheaper than people's copays.

Yeah.

That's what I was going to say to you.

Because if copays alone are so high.

Yeah.

So, I mean, you might have a $25 copay.

Yeah.

You know, and if any of our, you're buying a drug that costs less than $25, you're saving money.

That is, well, actually, the other thing is like, you have to hit a minimum.

So for me, I don't even bother.

I have to just pay out of pocket until I hit a place where it's so expensive that like this, even like, it doesn't even matter where you are socioeconomically.

It's so helpful.

Yep.

So check us out, costplustdrugs.com.

Just go in there, look for the medication, or your parents, or your aunts, your uncles, your grandparents, whatever.

And if we have it, we will save you money guaranteed.

That's amazing.

So even like something like a GodRX, right?

That was that, you know, that crushed and all these other ones are coming in.

GodRX is great, but any of the coupon companies, what they do is they work within the system.

Right.

And so you'll see like the Walmart's two, you know, two miles away is a different price than the Walmart's one mile away.

Right.

And CVS

can save you a moment.

Different price.

And then if you go, yeah.

And if you go back two weeks later, it's a completely different price.

And so with ours, it's just the same price.

Right.

No matter what.

Now, you can't just go pick it up because we mail it to you, right?

But it'll show up in three to seven days, and you can order as you know, whatever quantity you want.

And the more, the bigger the quantity, as long as your doctor prescribes it, the lower the price you'll pay.

So, guys out there that want

generic sialis, I mean, it's like 18 cents a tablet where it was, you know, who knows how much otherwise.

So, how do you,

like, how are you guys, like, what's your projection?

Like, by next year, are you going to have how many drugs?

And, like, what's available?

You have to have over, you know, close to 2,000 by year end.

And, you know, and there's other things like

methoroxane, methoroxane, I forget which drug it is, that, you know, is really

an issue right now because of Roe versus Wade being overturned.

Yes.

You know, birth control.

So our pricing, you know, both are generic.

And so our pricing is so much lower.

So people can buy birth control far less expensively than they could before.

Right.

This drug that has a lot of different uses, but because one of them is for

could potentially cause a medical abortion, there's a lot of pharmacists who won't sell it now, particularly in southern states.

Oh, right.

So we'll sell all that stuff.

You know, as long as it's prescribable and we can carry it, we'll sell it.

That is incredible.

And I went last night and I looked around.

Like, it's so, it's also very simple.

Yeah.

Like user-friendly to.

Yeah, you just put it in.

Yeah.

So, you know, if you're buying birth control, you just put in whatever brand you use and we'll show you the generic version.

And you can, you know, buy it.

You know, what did I just say?

I was talking to somebody.

Three count, 48, you know, for $25 or whatever.

It's like just insanely low versus.

and also I saw there's a button there where it's like well if you don't have a drug I can say okay I'm looking for

sign up and tell us what drug you're looking for yeah and then what's the problem like can you guys like if you get enough requests are you gonna we try to yeah we try to we're trying to add everything but it's just good to know if we you know if we get a ton of people asking for one specific drug then we'll prioritize that first now is that your major thing right now that you're super excited for yeah that's like that super exciting part of the type thing that is more than game changing like i mean when i heard when i initially heard about it I was like, I was, I didn't even believe it because I thought it was too good to be true.

That's what a lot of people say.

What's the catch?

Yeah.

You know, we don't sell your information.

You don't have to pay a monthly fee.

None of that stuff.

You don't need a card.

It's just straight up.

You know, we take our cost plus 15%,

and then we just hope we sell enough to cover all our costs.

And did I, is it true that you guys now have already surpassed what you thought you were going to have?

Yeah, I mean, we're way past what we thought we'd be two years in.

That's amazing.

Yeah, it's incredible.

So, no wonder you're like all in on that one.