#81 with Mike Cessario - The Genius Way Liquid Death Sells Canned Water

**Sam Parr** (0:00)
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**Shaan Puri** (1:33)
Peace.
What's up, Sam? And we have a guest, Mike Cessario. Welcome, welcome to the podcast.

**Mike Cessario** (1:47)
Thanks, guys.

**Sam Parr** (1:49)
We'll have this hour to be a little bit of an escape. We talked about everything going on. Last podcast, I think, let's, we'll try to make this like, just say at least a 45 minute, 50 minute escape for people. And we can kind of talk about some interesting stuff.

**Shaan Puri** (2:05)
Exactly, it does kind of feel silly to be like, oh, here's some business ideas when like, you know, the whole world is, it's really, you know, in a tilt, whether it's through coronavirus or the different protests that are going on.
But like you said, I think, you know, for me, I'm like glued to Twitter and the news and all this stuff all day. Then, you know, by seven, eight PM, I just need a break. I go walk my dog and I go listen to some mindless stuff about sports or whatever else, just to, you know, just to calm my mind. And so hopefully we could be that for some people where a bit of a diversion or a bit of an escape from the heaviness that's going on. So, you know, Mike, I'm glad you're here.
You have a product that we've talked about on the podcast before, which is Liquid Death. So, okay, if somebody doesn't know what Liquid Death is, give them the what is Liquid Death, and then we're gonna talk about how you started that, and then we're gonna brainstorm some cool ideas and spaces around what you do.

**Mike Cessario** (2:53)
Sure, so, I mean, I guess at the heart of what Liquid Death really is, we're really just completely trying to change the way healthy food and beverages are marketed.
At the end of the day, most of the most hilarious, memorable ad campaigns that you asked most people about of the last 10 years, they'll tell you, Bud Light, Dos Equis, Snickers, Doritos, Skittles, like all junk food and alcohol. That's the funniest, most memorable kind of youth culture, owning, and energy drinks like Red Bull. That's like the most youth.

**Shaan Puri** (3:26)
And Old Spice, let's not leave Old Spice out.

**Mike Cessario** (3:28)
Well, it's not really a food or beverage, but yes. But yeah, it's all junk food and alcohol that does all the funniest, coolest youth culture marketing, whereas healthy food is traditionally marketed to mom, and it's quiet, and it's responsible, or it's like look better, show fitness models, drinking bottles of water.
It's a very different, they don't use fun to market, whereas unhealthy beverages, stuff like that, they wanna own fun. So we're basically doing that with water. So we wanna be able to take the healthiest thing you can drink, that most people don't drink enough of, and brand it and build a cool thing around it where it's something that you feel totally comfortable drinking a Liquid Death in a bar, or at a house party, or at a music festival, or at work, or in the gym, and just making it more fun to walk around and have a water.