
SquiggleDAO Podcast
SquiggleDAO is elevating the Chromie Squiggle to its rightful place in culture, as a beloved and seminal art project.
Squiggles have one of the most influential collector base in all of NFTs. We want to bring more interest to Squiggles by giving a platform to these collectors, visionaries, and creators.
The podcast is hosted by Nifty Fifty & Jared Poz. Both of these gentlemen are early and prominent collectors of Squiggles in their own right. You would be pressed to find 2 collective minds that are so passionate about Squiggles and so knowledgeable about their history, depth, and impact.
SquiggleDAO Podcast
S2E10 - Luca Netz Owner and CEO of Pudgy Penguins
S2E10 features Luca Netz.
Luca is the Owner and CEO of Pudgy Penguins, not only a cultural phenomenon but also the mascot of Crypto. He’s one of the best operators in the space and has a fascinating story, going from homeless to self-made millionaire at the age of 18.
In this episode Nifty talks with Luca about Luca's background, selling his company for $8M at 18 years old, going from flipping sneakers to making $5M flipping NFTs, leading Igloo - a 105 employee company - and more.
Prefer video? Watch this episode on our YouTube channel: https://www.youtube.com/@squiggledao
The sponsor of this episode is NFTfi. NFTfi is the most battle-tested and secure lending and liquidity protocol for NFTs. Since launching in 2020, NFTfi has had over 60,000 loans with zero security incidents. Try lending today: https://nftfi.com/
Guest
Luca Netz: https://twitter.com/LucaNetz
Host
Nifty Fifty: https://twitter.com/NiftyFiftyETH
SquiggleDAO
Website: https://www.squiggledao.com/
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Nifty (00:00)
Welcome to the Squiggle DAO podcast. This is Nifty and our guest today is Luca Nets. Luca is the owner and CEO of Pudgy Penguins. Not only a cultural phenomenon, but also the mascot of crypto. He's one of the best operators in the space and has a fascinating story going from homeless to self-made millionaire at the age of 18. It's an honor to have him with us today. Luca, welcome to the pod.
Luca Netz (00:23)
Thanks for having me.
Nifty (00:25)
So a YouTube video changed your life when you were 15. Can you tell us about that moment?
Luca Netz (00:33)
I changed my life at 18 and I think my perspective was I ultimately...
and ultimately started my first business. And I found product market fit really early on. And it changed my life. That's the simple version.
Nifty (00:58)
And you mentioned that you dropped out of high school in other interviews and you were self-educating. Can you explain a little bit how did you do it?
Luca Netz (01:11)
I dropped out of school. I realized I needed to get an education based on that education. I got that via podcasts and content. And, and that's how I self-educated as simple as it sounds.
Nifty (01:26)
And how do you learn now?
Luca Netz (01:29)
I learn off of experience and off of listening to other people. I think now I'm in a different bucket, but very much early on I spent a lot of my early days just listening. And I think today I spend my days learning and listening. So it's dual faceted.
Nifty (01:51)
I love that. And I also try to learn a lot and try to have those virtual mentors trying to learn from those podcasts and from those people have written books that can inspire you. So similar. You sold your e-commerce company. It was a jewelry e-commerce company for $8 million at 18 years old. That's a crazy story. I want to take a moment so you can tell us how did you get there?
so young and so fast.
Luca Netz (02:23)
I just found product market fit. just, uh, I can't tell you perseverance, not giving up things like that. Uh, but I don't have much for you other than that. I, uh, I got lucky and, you know, based on that luck, uh, well, I had tenacity, so it was luck. It was a couple things, luck being some of it. Uh, and yeah, I just dug deep and, know, persevered and
did something different and here we are today.
Nifty (02:55)
Yeah, I think luck has to be an ingredient, but I believe that it's only an ingredient of the recipe. It's always a lot more things to make that result. And I loved about your background that you started super young, flipping sneakers, then using that money to organize events. Then you went into tech startup. So you were lucky on that, but you were trying to find that luck.
So I think that's a little bit of a lesson for people listening that sometimes you keep trying and you end up finding the luck.
And it was really fast. I've listened to other interviews that you explained that it was really fast product market feed and you sell it at 18 years old. So you went basically from zero to millions in a very short period of time. How did it impact your life?
Luca Netz (03:56)
think it, you know, all the things that come with getting rich quick, you know, you just, you lose it, you make it back again. You know, I think life got a little bit easier in terms of, you know, better food, better places to live, but it also came with its own set of problems. So, it's not too atypical to anybody who gets, you know, who makes money.
Nifty (04:23)
you might consider it common, but not that common to make it that fast, that young. So I really respect that story. And a lot of people might go crazy like with that amount of money, so young. I think it could be part of the...
Luca Netz (04:34)
Thank you.
I definitely went crazy.
Nifty (04:47)
fun and nice memories, making some mistakes and some good memories, some good lessons.
Luca Netz (04:54)
Yep, it's sometimes in life you know what the right thing to do is but until you feel it, until you experience it, that's what's necessary to get you where you need to be.
Nifty (05:03)
Anything that you can share about the crazy part of the Afterworld story?
Luca Netz (05:11)
Yeah, I was such a schmuck. I don't know, just bought cars, bought watches, bought things that don't matter. Just like a young, immature boy. But, I knew it was stupid, but it's not until the money starts to get, starts to run a little dry where you're like, this was really stupid. You've got to feel pain. You've got to experience the pain to learn the lesson.
Nifty (05:32)
Yup.
Luca Netz (05:37)
You can't just know something. Very few people have the discipline to know what is right and what is wrong and to implement it before having to feel the pain. Usually you have to feel the pain to understand what is right, what is wrong.
Nifty (05:51)
And what is more painful? The before you have nothing and you are working hard feeling the pain or then having achieved something losing or almost going back to square one and feeling the pain again. What is worse in your opinion?
Luca Netz (06:13)
Knowing something, feeling the pain and feeling it again is definitely the worst. Because then it's really on you. The first time around you can't do much. The second time around you gotta look yourself in the mirror and be like, hey, you're stupid. Fix this. Fix this now before things get bad.
Nifty (06:27)
No, no.
Take ownership, yeah, agree. So, and related to this, you've mentioned that the purpose of money, and I totally agree, is to find freedom, freedom to work with people you like, freedom to pursue the projects you are passionate about. But in an interview, you mentioned a story about feeling insecure at a Kardashian's house and the things that happen afterwards.
Can you tell us that story?
Luca Netz (06:58)
Yeah, the story was, is that I go to Ben Simmons' house. Ben Simmons is dating Kendall Jenner at the time. And so a couple of the Kardashians are there. I remember going in and I had become like a millionaire, but I hadn't adjusted my lifestyle. I hadn't bought any cars. I hadn't done anything. I remember being in that room and feeling like a wallflower. And so that night I ended up spending, you know, tens of thousands of dollars on my clothes and I bought a new car and things like that.
I went back to the house a week later and then all of a sudden, you know, I wasn't so much of a wallflower, right? Like I was a centerpiece in the conversation. And that was a really interesting case study for me. was like, hmm, this is very strange that some clothes in the car can make the difference in terms of how people.
Approach you or talk to you or engage with you So that's that story. It's an interesting lens, but you know, I walked in with some dickies and a thrash or hoodie with some holes no one gave a shit I walked back in with a Brand new designer outfit and a nice car and then everyone was talking to me fascinating
Nifty (08:13)
It's really silly, doesn't have any sense, but it's real that people treat you differently. You arrive in a different car and you can feel it, different clothes, different attire. How did that experience shape your perspective on that role of material things in business, confidence life?
Luca Netz (08:34)
perception into reality is probably the thing I learned from that. And that people do judge you on appearances and how you carry yourself, whether you like it or not.
Nifty (08:48)
So true. It's like I was saying, it makes no sense or it's stupid, but it's a real game and probably don't try to change the game, which will be impossible. Try to play the game and depending on what you want to do, the attire, the car and everything matters depending on the business. So We've talked that you started with sneakers, then you went to different businesses, events.
You were one of the first employees on Ring, an e-commerce company. And then you discovered crypto. How was that discovering crypto moment?
Luca Netz (09:26)
I think the crypto discovery moment was interesting. My brother was a computer nerd, was into Ethereum, some of these other tokens, was where it coined for quite some time.
I just got into it. It made sense to me. So I bought my first bitcoins in 2016 and had a mining rig of I think 30 1080 Ti's from AMD that was mining Digibyte and mining the wrong token unfortunately and here we are today. But that was my first start was 2016 and right when that Bitcoin run started to happen.
Nifty (10:03)
That's super cool and what initially made you interested in the NFT space?
Luca Netz (10:11)
think I was a huge collector of things and if you go to my house you'll see that I had very few shelf space and wall space available. And so my love for connecting, collecting was handicapped by my storage within my home and the placement within my home. And so when I saw NFTs I was like, this is insane. And I just fell in love. It's really easy to fall in love with NFTs.
Nifty (10:36)
Makes sense.
Agreed. And you turned 50k into 5 million, if I'm not wrong, trading NFTs. Can you walk us through that experience?
Luca Netz (10:52)
I think I made a little bit more than that, but well, depends what was realized or not. And a huge part of that experience was because of pudgy NFTs. I bought a ton of pudgies when they were like a hundred bucks right before they ran out big. That allowed me to then, you know, participate in born apes and the rest of the ecosystems.
think it's like anything in life when you do something and you win that much successfully financially, you just like become like enthralled. And so I think that was the beginning for me to just basically be like, yeah, like how do I, how do I get my, my tentacles here to the best of my ability? and, yeah, I kicked off that kicked off my, my love and passion for NFTs.
Nifty (11:48)
And that's what led you to ultimately buying patches for 2.5 million in late 2022.
Luca Netz (11:55)
Yeah, probably after I started trading well, I started to think about what I could do to be a, like what role that I played in the greater NFT space. was really interested in it. Subsequently, a friend of mine had reached out to me and he had told me that he wanted to do an NFT project. He didn't know how to market it. If I could help him market it. And so I had helped him on Instagram.
via people don't know this, but I own tens of millions of followers on Instagram through some of the accounts that I own. And I had helped him push through that. And then that really gave me a deep understanding as to what was going on. And I was a little bit in the service side for maybe a couple of months. And then that just seemed like a path to just like, that just seemed like a non-sustainable path. And then I ultimately.
as a pudgy holder who thought that pudgy had all the ingredients to succeed, felt like I should just buy this and ultimately put my hand, my hat in the ring as an owner operator and hopefully show people how it was done or should be done.
Nifty (13:06)
Yeah, I feel that the space is fortunate to that you did that, that you took that leap and are part of the NFT leadership now. So, Pudgey Penguins under your leadership went into the physical realm, selling at Walmart at Target, something impressive. A figure that I saw was that you did $10 million in retail sales in the first six months. Can you tell us about the strategy?
behind launching physical products.
Luca Netz (13:36)
I think the physical product strategy was how do you remain omnipresent in an industry that is predicated on the phone and computer being on? So I was like, okay, how can we be competitive here? Well, I closed my eyes and I envisioned the future of Pudgy Peguins. I always envisioned a billion dollar consumer product brand, right? But on the other side of it, like I don't want to go build a billion dollar consumer product brand, right? And then not have the NFT win to succeed.
And so the physical products to me was like, okay, how can I compete in an industry that is super fast moving, super fast pace and has a low attention span?
Well, when they close their computer and they turn off their phone, how can I still be in their life? How can I still be top of mind when those things happen? And so, you know, from my perspective, that was really the bulk behind the strategy. People thought for the longest time we were in the toy business. The toys are marketing vehicles to the IP business. I'm not in the business of selling toys. Toys is a part of the business. It is a line item in the business.
But if I made no money on toys, I wouldn't care because I love what the toys do from a marketing perspective.
Nifty (14:46)
free marketing if you were keeping on the toys.
And I wanted to mention because launching at Walmart was huge for, for patches, but also for the whole, for the whole space. And very few people might know that you did it with only a hundred days notice. So again, respect to that. That's pretty, that's pretty crazy. I want to talk about collaborations because you've been doing, waves with collaborations with PES, the candy dispenser, the Lux Luxury Cookie brand, the Last Crumb.
Luca Netz (15:05)
Appreciate it.
Nifty (15:18)
trading card game, even...
Luca Netz (15:19)
Lying
Friends, we just announced Lying Friends earlier. That's a good one.
Nifty (15:23)
24 karat gold igloos. Yeah. So how did you decide which collaborations align with the brand and make sense?
Luca Netz (15:33)
think just comes down to cultural relevancy. Like what do I want Punchy Penguins and Pengu to be? I want it to be a beacon of culture. Right? I want it to be a cultural phenomenon. And so like to be a cultural phenomenon is to be embedded in culture. Right? When you do a PEZ collab, you are embedded in culture. When you are doing a collaboration with Line Friends, you're embedded in Korean culture. Right? And so the more I embed ourselves in culture and make ourselves familiar within culture and with the people,
the more likelihood we have of winning and succeeding.
Nifty (16:07)
And you've mentioned Pengo. I wanted to mention that it was probably one of the best executed airdrops I've seen. And there were 8 million eligible wallets. again, feat. I'm guessing already the answer, but what made you decide to launch a meme token?
Luca Netz (16:29)
think it's this idea that if you understand where Pudgy Penguins is positioned today, Pudgy Penguins has the most viewership. It gets more views and impressions than any other thing in crypto with the exception of Bitcoin and Ethereum and Solana. And from a memetic standpoint, is the most memetic character icon and most relevant character icon today. And that's not my take. That is just what the impressions tell me. That's what the data tells me.
And so if we have millions of followers across all of our socials, if we have products in millions of homes, if we are getting hundreds of millions of impressions every single day, then ultimately the next logical conclusion is simple. You need to go and open up an area in which everyone can participate and align with this. And you won't really see the full magnitude or get to the full potential of what this is without some sort of icon like that for everyone to participate in.
Right. And so this idea that everyone should be willing to participate in something that is, you know, for everyone it's for the people by the people, but then, you know, the only way you can actually be ingrained in it is via a hundred thousand dollar NFT or $50,000 NFT. It seems really counterintuitive to the mission and the spirit of Pudgy Penguins, which is ultimately to become the mascot of crypto, the face of crypto.
and the brand that everyone can align themselves with and be a part of. I want it to be this next generation social currency that, you know, invades the hearts and minds of everyday people. And you're not going to do that by having 8,888 NFTs that are too priced out for anyone other than the rich person.
Nifty (18:15)
Agreed. We haven't mentioned yet, but congrats on the recent launch of Abstract Chain. By the way, I've already breached some funds and done some transactions over there. What's your goal for Abstract?
Luca Netz (18:29)
Onboard consumers. Look, when everyone goes left, we want to go right. I want to onboard everyone. And I think abstract is going to be the place to do it. So I think the goal is like, look, we have the top of the funnel and the IP. How do you bring people in from the top of the funnel and to the bottom of the funnel and that bottom of the funnel being the chain and the ecosystem. And so, you know, if you want to build in the same spirit for consumer and viability that we're building for them, this is the chain of the ecosystem for you.
Nifty (18:58)
And after trying it, have to say that probably is one, or not probably, is the best attempt I've seen to making it easy for onboarding out of crypto people. I don't want to say enormous, just more people to the space. And we've mentioned abstract, we've mentioned, but you penguins all that world you are managing if I'm not wrong.
more than 100 people, 105 last time I checked, 60 at PatG, 40 at Abstract, five at Igloo, holding company. What's your leadership philosophy at running multiple businesses at that scale?
Luca Netz (19:39)
We're a team and our success is predicated on our performance and we're here to win and we're here to compete. And we all have a job to do. I want people to work here. want people to feel comfortable, but it's also important people here understand that we have a responsibility and that we're not just working for ourselves. We're working for hundreds of thousands of people who are placing their bets on us. And so we're...
you little more ruthless than I think people think or a little bit more of a sports team internally than I think people think. But ultimately I think that is the cadence that has got us here and it's the cadence that's going to continue to take us to where we need to be. So everyone holds each other accountable. If somebody's not playing defense, you got to report that and we'll either get you to convince you to play defense or we'll find somebody who will.
It's a lot of people actually. I actually, yeah, it's a lot of people. It's a lot of people. I kind of want to fix it. I kind of want to have a little less people. think we have maybe too many people. So we'll see. We'll see. We're doing a little bit of a review today, actually, ironically enough.
Nifty (20:53)
Can you expand on the ruthless and reporting, holding each other accountable? Have you implemented processes to make sure that happens and it's in a positive, still keeps a positive environment?
Luca Netz (21:09)
think we're very generous with our comp packages, specifically the alignment with the success of the company. And so I did this intentionally because if I win and the company wins and the community wins, the people in the company win bigly, right? Like, like really bigly. And so from our perspective, because I was so, because I'm so generous and I'm so keen on aligning the people who make this company great, I also expect.
Right. Then they take this with the same seriousness that I do, which is if this succeeds, our life has changed forever. Right. And that's not just me saying that every single person in this organization can say that. Right. All hundred and five, all, know, maybe, maybe you have the hundred and five, 95 of them can say that the other 10, you got to work up to that, right? You to have some, you got to, you got to earn some stripes and put some months. Yeah. You got, you can't just get that working here day one. Right. But.
I think that's kind how I hold it accountable. It's less of a, you need to go harder on behalf of the company. It's, hey, you need to go harder on behalf of yourself. And if you align everyone really well, it's kind of a cheat code. Most people don't want to do it because they kind of think zero sum. But if I'm in the creative department,
Nifty (22:14)
and yourself and everyone.
Luca Netz (22:26)
and my, my career, my financial future, there's so much upside for me to succeed. And the guy right to me has some sort of similar financial upside, but I'm carrying his weight. I'm just going to throw him under the bus. that. So it's the self accountability system. If you align everybody and incentivize everybody enough, just like, yeah, I don't even need to tell you, you just hold them accountable.
Nifty (22:51)
it takes care of it by itself, yeah, I agree. So at the beginning of each year, we at Squiggle DAO reverse engineer and ask ourselves what would be a successful year if we go to December 2025, what would make this year a success? And there are lots of ideas, but normally there are two or three things that stand out and are the real big wins. For example, last year,
It was producing and donating an 800 pound Squiggle marble sculpture and making Squiggles the on-chain art into the most museums. what would make 2025 a successful year for Igloo.inc
Luca Netz (23:33)
Number one game on the App Store across all categories, viral desktop game. I think we need to be getting north of 100 billion impressions a year. I think we will accomplish that this year and really dominate Asia. think this is once and for all we have to dominate there.
Nifty (23:51)
You are on track to get those views on least on Giphy antenna, right? Already. And the video games are almost...
Luca Netz (24:01)
They're almost here. One we've been working on in-house and the other one we partner with mythical on. So between the two partners, we have some really great products going.
Nifty (24:10)
I saw some demos in one of your videos, in one of the events on one of those video games and it looked really, cool.
So we have some time left, but this is one of my favorite sections or my favorite section. And it's getting a little bit bigger every episode and it's the rapid fire. I always like to say questions are rapid fire. Answers don't need to be. And you bought patches for $2.5 million, which was your first offer. You were ready to pay up to 7.5. What's your negotiation approach?
Luca Netz (24:48)
My negotiation approach, low anchor, high anchor. You always negotiate. If you're giving an offer, you put your high anchor. If you're making an offer, you give your low anchor. yes, for my side, always the first offer. Usually you meet in the middle and everyone's happy.
Nifty (24:59)
So you have your best scenario for your site.
and you are the first one to speak.
Luca Netz (25:10)
Yes.
Nifty (25:11)
That's interesting because I see other people when they're sitting in FTES, for example, that they don't want to say a number. And it's interesting that you want to put the anchor price so everything.
Luca Netz (25:24)
Yeah, I'm gonna give you the number. It's gonna be such a low number. It's gonna be a number that if you take, I feel like I robbed you. I might have committed a crime. You might have thrown me in jail.
Nifty (25:28)
And right.
Which happened with patches, right? So it works.
Luca Netz (25:35)
Yeah,
I think it was, you know, but at no fault. I also bailed them out. Right. So, you I don't want to make those guys feel bad. Like I think they got bailed out a little bit and us being successful only makes their sale higher integrity. Right. So.
Nifty (25:38)
Ha
Yeah, to be fair, yeah. 100%.
You mentioned...
And also handsight is 20-20. If the project failed, 2.5 probably was too much. yeah. And sometimes it's like in your hands, probably the project has 7.5 million of value, but in other people's hands, probably it might be zero. So you've mentioned that one of your keys is being decisive. How do you train it and improve it?
Luca Netz (26:12)
Exactly.
Things like going to the menu at the restaurant and just picking quickly and just being conscious of making a decisive action, little things. And then you also ultimately start to sharpen the tool with this decisiveness.
Nifty (26:33)
So true, so true. The restaurant example is so true. We've mentioned before, Pudgee Gifts have already 70 billion views in Giphy and Tenor. Last time I checked, already more than half a billion per day. So you are on track with a lot of margin for the 100 billion views, which is insane. An insane level of organic rich. you have a team building that, what's the strategy of having a team in-house creating?
gifts.
Luca Netz (27:03)
It's just the best way to proliferate IP. It got 10 people on it. It got its own CRM that we custom built. It's a machine. The 10 person machine that is all predicated around more stickers, more content around the Penguin. More content, the more the Penguin gets out there. It's not if we will succeed, it's when.
Nifty (27:22)
You have 10 people in the GIF team or... That's crazy, that's crazy. It's incredible job. Like, I see them more and more on non-related crypto things. So it's working.
Luca Netz (27:24)
Maybe feed a farm in the air.
Thank you.
Nifty (27:38)
Being the underdog, you've mentioned that motivates you. How do you approach that underdog mentality to business?
Luca Netz (27:45)
Just it's the, you know, it's the fuel that makes you dig deep. Like it's the difference between winning and losing. It's as simple as that. I can't give you a bigger answer than like, I'm a winner. I want to win. And if I'm the underdog, it means people, you know, don't want to see me win and I got to prove them wrong.
Nifty (28:05)
Yeah. And sometimes I have the feeling or you get the feeling, one gets the feeling that the world is a little bit run on envy. So it's not only that I want, I don't want to see you win. I want you to do, or I want to win is I want you to do a little bit worse than me, which is, yeah. So related to this, it's surprising that you that use your personal money to take over patches that
Are one of the best operators in the space? Are still sometimes criticized? How do you deal with critics and haters?
Luca Netz (28:44)
I succeed. Success is the greatest revenge.
Nifty (28:47)
is the best revenge, no?
100%.
you have more opportunities and inbound requests I can imagine that you can fulfill. How do you filter?
Luca Netz (29:02)
I gotta know them, you know what mean? I had 300 submissions to the little form. You filled it out. I know Squiggle's down. So I gotta go where I know there's some sort of familiarity.
Nifty (29:19)
And you mentioned that before you were accepting lots of meetings, getting no value, which it sounds familiar. And you are ruthless now in saying no and don't care about if you are looking like a bit rude, but you took over your calendar and your time. And I think that's a big lesson I took from your interviews.
Luca Netz (29:45)
Yeah, it's an important one.
Nifty (29:47)
How do you say now? Any tips and tricks?
Luca Netz (29:50)
No, I just say, sorry to be rude, dude, but I can't do it. Just sorry to be, you know, I don't want people to think I'm rude. Sorry I'm jump. It's pretty rude when you say no. You know, it's just like, not me even be rude, man. I just like, I got a job and if I'm doing it, I'm helping everyone. I'm not helping myself, you know?
Nifty (29:58)
Yeah.
And sometimes it's worse than just saying no, like putting an excuse that is half-baked sounds even worse, I think. So I'm not giving excuses, not lies.
Luca Netz (30:21)
Yeah.
Nifty (30:21)
Yeah.
So let's change gears for a sec. We've talked about your impressive success, but what are some of your mistakes and what have you learned from them?
Luca Netz (30:36)
I think...
Some of my mistakes has been like my emotions, my temperament. I've learned how to adjust it, fix it. For example, if I feel some type of way, I feel like I'm gonna lash out, just wait 24 hours. My response and my engagement to that person 24 hours later will be completely different than the heat of the moment. Little things like that.
Nifty (31:01)
So true. One video that I wanted to recommend that you cover that 24-hour rule and lots of other tips or mistakes to avoid is the 10 mistakes to avoid as a new entrepreneur in your YouTube channel. I totally recommend it. And that's so true. Sometimes, to be fair, I think it should be 48-hour rule. 24 might be too short sometimes.
Luca Netz (31:21)
you
Nifty (31:26)
but that video is really good. And I have the 10 here, like high, slow, fire, fast. Don't let your emotions take the best of you. Number three is don't do business with friends. I'm not gonna read them, but yeah, so you know, it's really good and everyone should go to the YouTube channel because there are some gems in there.
Luca Netz (31:49)
on that.
Nifty (31:49)
So
you mentioned in other interviews that you started flipping sneakers and that you were using that money to throw parties. Can you share some tips for those young entrepreneurs trying to start today?
Luca Netz (32:05)
Yeah, think flipping flipping products is probably the easiest buy and sell. Right. Like it's a probably the first step in business. So, you know, I can go to Costco and buy something on sale and sell it on, Amazon or eBay for double the price. Right. I go find good deals. This is, this is, this is where I think everyone needs to get their feet wet first. Right. Go buy something and go sell it for more. Right.
You don't need to make the brand. You don't need to do anything. Go buy some Supreme or some Nike. Go buy it for 200 bucks and sell it for 250. Right? Figure that out. Figure out what that feels like. Feels good, dude. Feels really good. People underestimate it. It's a really, really good feeling. So that's my first advice. If you're a young entrepreneur, go buy and sell something.
Nifty (32:53)
And I think those first $50 in profit can really change your life. The earlier you do it, probably the better because those 50 might not mean anything when you are 30, but if you are 14, it might give you, as you were saying, that initial intro to the space.
Luca Netz (33:13)
I can totally agree.
Nifty (33:16)
And last one is how would you, you started when you were 15, 16 years old, how would you start today?
Luca Netz (33:25)
start the same
way I start buying and selling, figure out a very straightforward hustle and then expand, right? Spam, but start buying and selling. That's the first place. I wouldn't know how to start any other way.
Nifty (33:40)
Yeah, you get the revenues, expenses, risk, you lose some, the shipping expense, everything. So totally agree. Luca, trying to be respectful of your time. It's been a, I think it's been a short one, but a really good one, full of gems. Anything else you'd like to share?
Luca Netz (34:03)
I just appreciate you taking the time and excited for the people listening to come join the ecosystem whether it's with our Pudgy NFTs or Pengu and I hope you guys are excited for the ride to come.
Nifty (34:16)
Thank you so much for joining us. Your story is truly inspiring. Really appreciate you taking the time. In our audience, people can follow Luca on X at LucaNets. Luca, thank you so much.
Luca Netz (34:29)
Thank you brother.