John Fio - Creating Magic for Consumers

**Patrick O'Shaughnessy** (0:00)
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Hello and welcome everyone. I'm Patrick O'Shaughnessy and this is Invest Like the Best. This show is an open-ended exploration of markets, ideas, stories and strategies that will help you better invest both your time and your money. Invest Like the Best is part of the Colossus family of podcasts and you can access all our podcasts, including edited transcripts, show notes and other resources to keep learning at joincolossus.com.

**SPEAKER_2** (1:17)
Patrick O'Shaughnessy is the CEO and founding partner of Positive Sum and the CEO of O'Shaughnessy Asset Management. All opinions expressed by Patrick and podcast guests are solely their own opinions and do not reflect the opinion of Positive Sum or O'Shaughnessy Asset Management. This podcast is for informational purposes only and should not be relied upon as a basis for investment decisions.
Clients of Positive Sum or O'Shaughnessy Asset Management may maintain positions in the securities discussed in this podcast.

**Patrick O'Shaughnessy** (1:47)
My guest today is John Fiorentino. John is a product inventor and entrepreneur who in the space of a few years has bootstrapped four products, Gravity Blanket, Moon Pod, Moon Pals and Birthday Candles, which have collectively sold hundreds of millions of dollars of revenue. Our conversation is quite different than normal. Alongside his successful brands, John has had a range of life experiences, from starting as a jazz musician to working for Justin Bieber, that give him an original worldview. I was especially interested in his points around product positioning, creating magic for consumers, not letting yourself become the product and how to build enduring brands. Please enjoy this great conversation with John Fiorentino.
Where to begin this conversation?
Long before I met you, I think I had a Gravity Blanket. It was one of those funny things that came out of nowhere.
It seemed to be one of those things that if someone had one, they like told other people about it. It had that word of mouth thing to it. So what was the backstory behind it? And does that remain the most wild product experience that you've had?

**John Fiorentino** (2:46)
That one was totally wild because I really went from truly zero to having success literally overnight.
And I created a brand new category of products that's like a billion dollar category now. There was literally nothing out there that was selling this idea of weighted products to help you calm down and fall asleep better. Don't get me wrong, that came from a crazy me jumping off of the cliff type of I have no fucking clue what's going on, what's going to happen here. And I stumbled into that in a very funny way.
That was a really funny at my wits end, we're just going to try this because I love it. I love it. I put the thing on my chest, I passed out and I loved it. And I was like, you know what? I'm just going to see if other people like this. And the few people that I had try it freaked out. They laughed at me about, what do you mean? You're going to put a 25 pound blanket on me. And then they put it on. They were like, oh my God. Again, that same sort of moment. This is something I like. And they were very, very vocal about it. So I put it on Kickstarter and then literally boom, every press ever wrote about it. We did a million bucks in 24 hours.
I was running around on Good Morning America, flying all over the place to do these interviews. I had to jump on a plane to China. It was like the craziest whirlwind of all time.
And yeah, it was because a new idea was discovered and positioned in a way that delivered an incredibly exciting promise to people at a time where they felt incredibly stressed. And here was this new invention, a 25 pound blanket that was going to help you sleep better, be less stressed and feel good.