The Cheese #80 🧀 - A Helicopter to the Hamptons, Ten Contestants, and Leo's Lobotomy

Last week I told you I was headed to the Hamptons. What I did not know was that it would turn into a 42-hour trip I will be talking about for a while.

Got in Thursday afternoon and went straight to Brooklyn. Richard, Richard's nephew Luke, and I met up with Nathan from Pipsticks and Jordan from Salvit Advisors for dinner. Great group, great night.

That same afternoon I got a call from Shoplift asking how I was getting out to the Hamptons. I told them I was taking the bus like everybody else. They asked if I wanted to take a helicopter instead. I told them I was with Richard, so we would need two seats. There was only one.

Richard told me to take it and enjoy the opportunity, which is a pretty classy move on his part. Forty-minute helicopter ride out of Manhattan. Super cool experience and one I absolutely did not see coming when I woke up that morning.

Monday had its own challenges. Johnny had a rash and a slight fever, so I took him in to the pediatrician because Colleen had her own appointment that day and I was not letting her reschedule it again. The rash turned out to be viral, low risk, likely not even contagious to adults.

The surprise was his first ear infection. We caught it in the super, super early stages, which is why he had not complained or even seemed to notice it. First round of antibiotics for the little guy.

On the BattlGames front, we announced the official ten contestants for Season 3. Brandon went live on YouTube to make the announcement. We are basically a month out from Game Time.

Season 3 sponsorships are also officially closed.

The press started picking it up too. Several articles showed up this week, and then Fox 5 Good Day Atlanta talked about it live on the air. That one was a total surprise that we did not see coming at all.

We also dropped our first BattlBox exclusive knife this week with a partner knife brand. A QSP BattlBox black and gold serialized. Active members got first crack at it, then we opened it up to the public the following day. This is the first of several we have been working on.

Whatnot is trending great. We are at $178k for the month with a forecast of $437k, which would destroy last month's record of $402k. I think that forecast is a bit inflated. We already had a mystery box drop and the QSP drop this month, so holding that same top line through the back half is going to be tough.

We have completed 35 shows this month with 51 left. Even if we fall short of the forecast, and we likely will, we do have a shot at a new record. It is going to be a challenge for sure. Cameron is hiring an additional showrunner and starting the search for new hosts as he scales this channel further.

Speaking of Whatnot, Cameron and I spoke on their all-hands call Wednesday morning. I did not realize it while we were chatting, but Cam showed me afterward that there were about a thousand people on that call. Really cool to get to talk to their whole team. Whatnot also just raised $545 million at a $20 billion valuation, and I wrote up what that number actually tells us about live commerce. Scroll down for that one.

Amazon is slow and steady, up and to the right. We are behind last month by about 15%, though we are definitely positioned for another stellar month.

Membership is still working through the post box churn window. We started seeing drops more than desired, so we launched another intro offer to try and curb it. Still in a good spot overall. Renewal is tomorrow.

Leo needed a bit of a brain upgrade this week, and honestly it pulled my focus off other parts of the business. We found an issue with how he was building listings for BattlVault. Completely our fault, something we missed and did not think about with the initial build.

The other issue was that he had become a real chatty kathy during the day while the team was going back and forth with him. Both are addressed and fixed. Another set of rules and a slight social lobotomy later, Leo seems to be his best version yet.

On eBay, we have a decision to make. To do this right we need to partner with Praella and build some tech. We either build it for eBay so we can scale there, or we build it for Whatnot and expand into an additional channel. Doing both at the same time does not make sense.

Two weeks of no travel ahead, which is much appreciated. After that it gets pretty crazy. Five of the following six weeks will have either me or Colleen out of town. Calm before the storm.

Let's get into the rest!

How Vicky Tsai Turned a Personal Crisis Into Tatcha's Global Beauty Brand

Lhea's latest. Vicky Tsai hit a personal crisis, went looking for answers, and came back with the foundation of a global beauty brand. Good operator read.

Whatnot Just Raised $545 Million: What a $20 Billion Valuation Tells Us About Live Commerce

Here is the one I teased up top. Whatnot raised $545 million at a $20 billion valuation. I broke down what that number actually signals about where live commerce is headed, and what it means if you are selling on the platform.

Meta Just Released a Free AI Assistant That Runs on Your Own Computer

Meta put out a free AI assistant that runs locally on your own machine instead of in the cloud. I wrote up what it actually is and where it fits if you are running an ecommerce business.

In-Car Advertising: BMW's Spider-Man Ad Is Just the Start

BMW ran a Spider-Man ad on the screen inside people's cars. I have some thoughts on where this goes next, and none of them are great for the person who actually bought the car.

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