Andrew Wilkinson's $20,000 to $260,000,000 story
About This Episode
Andrew Wilkinson joins the podcast to discuss his journey building Tiny into a public company and the specific, often 'boring' business levers that drove his success. The conversation covers a range of topics including his 'profit first' financial management style, the advantages of being a 'barnacle on a whale' platform, and how he strategically built a network of billionaires and industry leaders.
Episode Description
Show Notes
- 0:00Intro
- 2:00Business on hard mode vs. easy mode
- 12:00Cliffs Notes for “Profit First”
- 19:30Leveraging incentives
- 24:00Breakdown: Holdco acquisition funnels
- 28:00Andrew sends Sam a private jet
- 32:30Shooting your shot with your heroes
- 38:00Crashing the Oscars afterparty
- 43:00Buying vs earning your way into the room
- 47:00POV: Peter Attia is your doctor
- 50:00Barnacle on the Whale Strategy
- 57:00People always suffer in silence
- 1:00:00Hitting rock bottom
Check Out Sam's Stuff
Check Out Shaan's Stuff
Key Takeaways
Implement a 'Profit First' strategy by sweeping profits into a separate account and leaving only 2 to 4 weeks of operating capital in the business bank account to force extreme fiscal discipline and leaner operations.
Utilize the 'Barnacle on a Whale' strategy to minimize marketing costs by building products or services inside existing, high-growth ecosystems like Shopify or Discord to leverage their built-in traffic and momentum.
Prioritize low-effort, high-impact business levers—such as raising prices, switching payment processors, or optimizing SEO—over complex product innovation, which often requires more effort for lower relative returns.