The Culture War - Tim Pool - Tim Pool Vs. Liquid Death CEO DEBATE w⧸ Mike Cessario (Liquid Death)

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00:00:43.200 Hello there, friends.

00:00:45.100 If you're watching on Rumble, you saw me do a quick frame check already,

00:00:48.740 because, you know, we're chilling.

00:00:50.780 I'm going to be having a discussion with the CEO of Liquid Death,

00:00:54.420 a canned water and beverage company, over issues I take with their company.

00:00:59.800 And I will start by saying I respect that he's willing to have this conversation,

00:01:03.360 because I think it's a bad company.

00:01:08.460 I certainly think that there's worse companies, for sure.

00:01:12.480 But I take issue with the misleading claim, Death to Plastic, while all of their products,

00:01:17.800 or I shouldn't say all, because I don't know everything they sell,

00:01:20.100 but their cans are all lined with plastic.

00:01:21.460 Not only that, they sell packets of drink mixes, which are also lined with plastic.

00:01:26.340 There are alternatives to plastic that are readily available and low cost,

00:01:29.200 which is glass and stainless steel.

00:01:30.440 And so, for that reason, we will have this discussion.

00:01:34.680 And let me start by pulling in the CEO himself of Liquid Death.

00:01:39.160 And again, I am honored that he is willing to have this conversation.

00:01:43.480 Let's make sure we have the audio is working.

00:01:46.220 Checking seems to be good.

00:01:48.680 Let's kick it up.

00:01:51.440 Make sure everything's here.

00:01:52.580 Mike, can you hear me?

00:01:54.640 Gotcha.

00:01:55.780 Thanks for joining me.

00:01:56.640 I do appreciate that you're willing to have this conversation.

00:01:59.080 Of course, no.

00:02:00.800 I'm glad that you're willing to have it.

00:02:02.500 Absolutely.

00:02:03.120 Let me put my headphones on.

00:02:04.800 Make sure the audio is good, but I'll put my headphones on.

00:02:07.540 So, let's just start from the beginning of how this kicked off,

00:02:11.020 and I'll start with my tweet.

00:02:12.900 And I'll be as crass as I need to be, and then you can address it.

00:02:15.980 I said that, I'll refrain from swearing, but I said your company was ish, you know, S-word,

00:02:22.020 and that you mislead the public into thinking you have plastic-free products

00:02:25.400 when you actually sell plastic-lined products and other plastic products.

00:02:29.400 And I'm not okay with that.

00:02:31.220 I'm not a fan of that.

00:02:32.880 So, I'll make the claim.

00:02:34.460 I believe the intention of your company with this death to plastic slogan is to trick people

00:02:40.540 into thinking that they're buying something that's more environmentally friendly

00:02:43.380 when, in fact, they're buying plastic, fully aware that plastic bottles are worse.

00:02:48.700 And the reason I say this is because a few years ago, as we've entertained the Maha argument,

00:02:55.600 and we've seen it rise up and the conversation become more notable, I was seeking out plastic

00:03:00.680 alternatives for my studio.

00:03:02.160 We have about 40 employees.

00:03:03.320 We have a dozen or so contractors.

00:03:05.180 Plus, we have three or four guests coming in every single day.

00:03:08.080 So, we like to stock up on various beverages and snacks.

00:03:11.600 Now, we would order pallets of plastic water bottles because some people just don't care.

00:03:16.020 We would also order glass bottles, and it was usually Saratoga Springs glass water bottles.

00:03:20.380 I'm fully aware that the plastic caps have—I'm sorry, the caps, they're metal, but they have

00:03:23.880 plastic sealers.

00:03:24.980 And a friend of ours, Richie Jackson, told us how he rode for liquid death and that we

00:03:29.440 should consider aluminum as an alternative to the plastic, the purpose being because we

00:03:34.120 wanted non-plastic contaminated goods.

00:03:37.560 So, we don't want our food products for those that are serious about it.

00:03:40.680 So, I ordered thousands of dollars of liquid death over the next couple of months for our

00:03:44.920 staff, and then my brother informed me, in fact, all of these cans are lined with plastic,

00:03:48.860 and we're not actually getting away from it.

00:03:51.460 We're still using it.

00:03:52.980 I was incredulous.

00:03:53.900 I said, what do you mean?

00:03:54.440 It says death to plastic.

00:03:55.420 They're aluminum cans.

00:03:56.820 And, silly me, I guess, I just didn't realize that aluminum can meant aluminum and plastic

00:04:01.180 can.

00:04:01.800 So, my brother, using caustic soda, dissolved the can and then showed us the plastic bag,

00:04:06.180 which we were drinking out of.

00:04:07.360 And I was a bit perturbed by this, not because I don't recognize that plastic lines everything.

00:04:14.660 We buy bacon.

00:04:15.680 It's in plastic.

00:04:16.180 But, the can says death to plastic, and I'd bought plastic, assuming I was buying something

00:04:20.840 that wasn't.

00:04:21.740 So, in fact, what ended up happening was, instead of me purchasing a glass bottle product, which

00:04:26.240 would be substantially less plastic, I ended up buying more plastic and increasing my plastic

00:04:29.920 consumption and the direct contact we make with our food goods.

00:04:34.560 So, I'll just throw it to you to respond and then give us an intro or how you see it

00:04:39.100 and what you want to say about all that.

00:04:40.700 Sure, yeah.

00:04:42.540 And, you know, and you bring up a good point.

00:04:44.440 And I think to kind of walk back, like, how Liquid Death started and what the idea was

00:04:49.540 from the inception was.

00:04:51.000 So, Liquid Death, we started the company basically in 2018.

00:04:55.300 And at that time, plastic pollution was a big thing.

00:05:01.220 You were seeing that, like, Marriott and all these huge hotel chains were getting rid of

00:05:05.480 plastic straws.

00:05:06.540 At that time, there was news that was out there around the whole China plastic bottle

00:05:13.160 recycling thing.

00:05:14.400 So, this idea that people were discovering plastic bottles are not actually recyclable.

00:05:19.620 Yes, technically they are recyclable, but they're not actually getting recycled.

00:05:23.700 What's happening is you're sending your plastic bottles in your blue container to a recycling

00:05:29.600 facility.

00:05:30.160 That facility, in the past, for decades, was then putting it on a ship to China and marking

00:05:38.040 it as recycled.

00:05:39.640 What happened once it got to China?

00:05:41.340 No one knows.

00:05:41.940 No one cared.

00:05:42.420 They could have just dumped it in the ocean.

00:05:44.180 They could downcycle it into carpets or whatever.

00:05:48.400 Then, I think it was, yeah, right around 2018, China said, we're not accepting any more plastic

00:05:54.380 trash from the U.S. 0.99

00:05:55.360 We don't want your plastic trash anymore. 1.00

00:05:56.960 It's useless. 0.90

00:05:57.400 Then, that was a problem for all these recycling plants.

00:06:01.360 Now, they have nowhere to market as recycled.

00:06:04.420 They just have to send it to the landfill because the costs, trying to process plastic

00:06:08.860 bottles, grind them up, then resell that at a profit to the facility so that they can actually

00:06:16.180 be a business that generates income, they would lose money.

00:06:20.560 They would go out of business if they actually processed all the plastic bottles.

00:06:24.380 So, what we did learn was aluminum is the only thing that actually gets recycled.

00:06:31.520 And aluminum is subsidizing any of the small amount of recycle that's happening for plastic

00:06:36.760 and also glass because metal is a valuable material.

00:06:40.020 You melt it down.

00:06:41.100 They can put it in bricks.

00:06:42.480 You can sell those bricks.

00:06:43.720 I forget what the price of aluminum is now.

00:06:45.340 It's like $1,500 a ton or something like that.

00:06:49.840 So, cans, from a recycling standpoint, if you're talking about environmentally friendly,

00:06:55.340 that's a big word.

00:06:56.260 What does that mean?

00:06:57.180 It can mean a lot of things.

00:06:58.420 If you're talking about sustainability, meaning, hey, I can drink a can.

00:07:03.820 It's going to get melted down and made into a new can over and over and over again.

00:07:09.520 There is no material, including glass, that comes close to aluminum when it comes to sustainability,

00:07:15.240 and especially plastic bottles.

00:07:17.040 So, in the original days of liquid death with death to plastic, everywhere it said death

00:07:22.060 to plastic on our bottle or on our pack, it said we donate a portion of proceeds to help

00:07:27.600 kill plastic pollution.

00:07:28.820 And we work with companies that we put on our site, like Five Gyres, that fight plastic 0.81

00:07:34.300 pollution, and a couple others.

00:07:36.640 So, for us, plastic was just shorthand as a beverage company for plastic bottles.

00:07:42.500 And a lot of people understood that.

00:07:44.700 Even now, I think we surveyed some liquid death drinkers, and it was like 80% assumed that

00:07:50.100 the reason they're buying the can is for recycling reasons, not because, oh, I believe that it's

00:07:55.580 so much healthier to drink out of an aluminum can, because pollution is a big thing to people,

00:08:01.420 and plastic bottles, being in the ocean, all of that.

00:08:04.600 That was how we built it.

00:08:06.240 Now, over the last couple years, this idea of microplastics is a very new thing that people

00:08:12.680 are discovering and that people are getting more aware of.

00:08:15.360 Like, liquid that touches plastic can potentially leak particles, and you're actually drinking

00:08:22.220 plastic particles.

00:08:24.620 And there's not been a ton of research on exactly what it is.

00:08:28.760 Some of it is so, so nano-small, like an atom-like level, that you need special stuff to even detect

00:08:35.500 it and figure it out.

00:08:37.020 So, if you're looking at, okay, well, people are concerned about liquid-touching plastic.

00:08:41.900 And to your point, hey, doesn't a plastic bottle mean that there's less plastic?

00:08:48.620 Well, it's not true, because in that plastic cap, there was a French study that was done.

00:08:54.040 They found more microplastics in glass water than even plastic.

00:08:58.920 Because with that cap, it's put on with so much pressure, and there's paint on the cap,

00:09:04.680 there's plastic seals on it, that just that act of turning it off is releasing so many

00:09:11.640 particles into the water itself that it could even be more than a plastic bottle.

00:09:16.860 And then, last thing, if you're even just talking about the amount of plastic used,

00:09:22.820 in a plastic cap, the amount of plastic, and then a lot of plastic bottles are actually using

00:09:28.080 plastic labels that they use to put, like, the branding and whatnot on there.

00:09:32.360 That amount of plastic used in a plastic bottle versus this basically microscopic coating that

00:09:39.880 they put on a can, even a glass bottle is using 10x the amount of plastic that a can is using.

00:09:47.040 So, again, it's a gray area, which is why I wanted to talk about it.

00:09:51.040 There is no kind of perfect material or perfect solution.

00:09:54.820 Everything kind of has, you know, pros and cons to it.

00:09:58.460 Like, glass and cans are far better than plastic on most levels.

00:10:04.280 But that's kind of a quick overview of it.

00:10:07.460 There's a lot to break down.

00:10:08.700 You mentioned donating proceeds.

00:10:10.720 You mentioned recyclability.

00:10:12.180 You mentioned the study about plastics, microplastics, all those things.

00:10:15.500 So, we'll try and go through these.

00:10:17.200 The first thing is the obvious one.

00:10:19.040 Why don't you disclose on the packaging, the cans, the boxes, or otherwise,

00:10:24.020 this product does contain plastic inside?

00:10:28.620 And it's a good point.

00:10:30.440 And we are, actually, as a—because I think, to your point, the need to talk about plastic being in there,

00:10:39.100 even though the plastic has absolutely no effect on the recyclability, which is really what our message was.

00:10:44.820 That's also not correct, but we'll stick to the first point.

00:10:47.540 No, it is correct.

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00:11:46.840 Plastic in the cans, where do they go?

00:11:49.640 That layer inside the can is microns thick.

00:11:53.580 When those cans are smelted down in the process, that is completely burned off.

00:11:58.900 Where do the particulates go?

00:11:59.840 And it has no impact.

00:12:00.680 What's that?

00:12:01.080 Where do the particulates go?

00:12:02.960 In whatever facility that they're burning that in.

00:12:05.980 So there's pollution made from it, correct?

00:12:08.060 What's that?

00:12:08.920 Plastic burned creates pollution.

00:12:11.260 Where does that pollution go?

00:12:13.400 Does the facility have certain filtration that they're capturing?

00:12:17.420 So where do the filters go?

00:12:19.040 What's that? 1.00

00:12:19.580 The argument that there's no pollution made from the plastic you're using is a stupid argument. 1.00

00:12:23.440 Okay? 0.99

00:12:23.760 When you burn off aluminum cans, the plastic is fried,

00:12:27.440 and it breaks down into plastic particulates, carbon dioxide, and water vapor, which is captured by filters in these facilities,

00:12:33.340 and those filters create massive landfill waste. 0.83

00:12:35.900 So this idea that—this is another issue I take with what you're saying.

00:12:38.880 You've done numerous interviews where you say infinitely recyclable, which is not correct, okay?

00:12:43.680 About 2% of your cans are still plastic.

00:12:46.020 I fully accept and recognize it's still better than a plastic PET water bottle, substantially cheaper.

00:12:52.640 You can get it for a fraction of a cent per ounce in a plastic water bottle.

00:12:56.980 But again, my point is you are using these—this is called assumptive reasoning in marketing and manipulation—to convince people that you are doing something—that you are not doing something you are, in fact, actually doing.

00:13:07.400 You burn the cans down to melt—I think it's 700 Celsius or higher—and the plastic fries off into pollutants, which are captured by filters, and those filters are waste product, and the filters have to exist because you're burning plastic.

00:13:21.680 But Tim, you are absolutely wrong.

00:13:24.280 They are infinitely recyclable.

00:13:26.580 The plastic's not recyclable.

00:13:28.320 They're not burning down the filters to make more epoxy resin lining.

00:13:32.620 Infinitely recyclable means these cans can be used, melted down.

00:13:39.920 That metal material can be used to make new cans without having to go mine more additional metal to make new cans.

00:13:48.180 Plastic cannot be.

00:13:49.220 You cannot—it is not happening where plastic bottles are being melted down.

00:13:52.880 Let me ask you—

00:13:53.420 So it is infinitely recyclable.

00:13:55.100 That's wrong to say.

00:13:55.520 Okay, so let's—what percent of your cans is plastic?

00:13:58.520 What percent of your cans are made of plastic?

00:14:01.420 Less than 1%.

00:14:02.600 So the industry estimate is that it's about 0.5 grams to a gram of plastic in all aluminum cans.

00:14:08.860 You guys—I don't know if you're still doing tall boys or the 12 ounces.

00:14:11.320 It's 0.3 to 0.6, but yeah, go ahead.

00:14:13.400 Okay, so the standard estimate is around 1% to 2% of a can.

00:14:18.080 I do the low end because I want to be—I want to steal them as much as possible.

00:14:22.000 So when you say the can is infinitely recyclable, are you saying that minus the plastic, which is a percentage of the can?

00:14:27.600 Infinitely recyclable, are you saying—there's a difference between saying infinite and 100% of this can is being reused.

00:14:37.520 There's a difference.

00:14:37.980 Oh, marketing.

00:14:39.820 It's not marketing.

00:14:40.780 It's the English language, Tim.

00:14:43.140 Infinitely recyclable.

00:14:43.920 Aluminum cans.

00:14:44.880 The can can be recycled over that metal material.

00:14:48.300 No, that's still not correct.

00:14:49.680 The aluminum can be, but the can itself can't because it contains chemicals you have to burn off.

00:14:53.320 The can can be infinitely turned from a used can into a new can over and over and over and over.

00:15:02.920 You cannot take a liquid death can, burn off the plastic and melt it down, and convert that into another liquid death can because you will need new plastic to line the inside.

00:15:18.640 Absolutely.

00:15:19.480 You are right.

00:15:19.940 So the can itself is not infinitely recyclable.

00:15:21.820 The aluminum of the can is.

00:15:23.320 Not to mention, my understanding is that—

00:15:25.320 Okay, so 99% of the can is infinitely recyclable.

00:15:28.640 You are correct.

00:15:29.320 99% of the can is infinitely recyclable.

00:15:32.060 0% of a plastic bottle is infinitely recyclable.

00:15:36.200 0% of a glass bottle is basically infinitely recyclable.

00:15:39.920 I also disagree with that because I have glass bottles that we reuse all the time and have arguably recycled.

00:15:45.500 I understand the point you're making about sending a glass bottle to a facility to melt it down.

00:15:49.420 But I look at—let's address the comparison that you've brought up over and over again because, once again, we're pitting this as if it's, you know, cans versus bottles.

00:15:59.160 But as far as I can tell, there is no metric showing that canned water has displaced plastic PET water bottles in any significant way.

00:16:07.760 In fact, plastic water bottle consumption is higher than it's ever been and growing exponentially, especially in the third world.

00:16:13.400 So when the argument is made that we are better than plastic, but when you look at the net product of liquid death still produces more plastic on top of existing plastic, I don't see how this actually is an argument.

00:16:25.440 So if you look at the top 10 plastic bottled water brands right now, since liquid death has been around over the last six years—and look, liquid death is still a small brand.

00:16:38.040 Like, we're not Coke.

00:16:39.080 We're not Pepsi.

00:16:40.220 But we're on the start to at least have people think about alternatives to plastic bottles.

00:16:44.500 Like, yes, we're—you know, if you look at the publicly available scan sales data of all our categories, in which, by the way, still water is less than 15% of our revenue now.

00:16:55.440 Mostly what we have are healthy soda, healthy low-calorie iced tea, and then we're launching sort of healthy, better-for-you energy drinks going into next year.

00:17:05.020 So if you just look at still water, it's becoming a smaller, smaller part of our revenue.

00:17:09.720 But if you look at the top 10 plastic bottled water companies over the last six years, all of them are declining in sales except for smart water.

00:17:19.360 Smart water is the one brand that is up in sales.

00:17:21.380 However, smart water has moved a lot of their bottles to aluminum.

00:17:26.020 If you go in an airport right now, almost all the smart water that they're doing, they're putting in aluminum cans.

00:17:31.180 Let's clarify that real quick.

00:17:33.620 You're saying specific companies' sales of plastic water bottles are going down.

00:17:38.380 Right.

00:17:38.860 That's fantastic for those 10 specific companies.

00:17:41.100 But in general, PET water bottles and the sale of water in plastic bottles has increased exponentially year over year.

00:17:47.100 So are you saying just don't do anything?

00:17:50.340 Are you going to answer my argument or are you going to shift and divert?

00:17:54.380 No, but I just told you of the top 10 brands that are doing all the volume.

00:18:00.320 Yeah, but I don't care about top 10 brands.

00:18:01.520 I care about total plastic consumption.

00:18:03.460 Of which Liquid Death says death to plastic but contributes significantly.

00:18:07.460 To be fair, small company, I understand you're a big company, but relative to the big players, you're not the biggest.

00:18:13.160 I want to say something real quick, too.

00:18:14.900 Actually, I love your drinks, and I think this is great.

00:18:19.460 Liquid Death, I've always been a fan.

00:18:21.360 I just don't like how you market this as though you're not plastic when you're contributing to plastic.

00:18:25.760 And there's a lot more to add to this.

00:18:26.800 I mean, you have single-use plastic-lined packets.

00:18:29.880 You don't need to do that.

00:18:30.720 You could do stainless steel.

00:18:31.800 You could also do glass.

00:18:33.500 My argument is you are using this marketing scheme to try and sell a product.

00:18:38.880 Well, one, we did get out of the packets.

00:18:42.640 No more Death Dust.

00:18:43.660 No more Death Dust.

00:18:45.500 All right.

00:18:45.680 There's another company that wants to license our name so that they can create Death Dust.

00:18:52.220 And now what we're trying to look at is what packages are available that are a better option than what's currently there.

00:19:02.020 With that stuff, there's not a lot of great options right now.

00:19:04.720 So the original thing for Death Dust, the thinking, just so you see how we're thinking, was that what we did find was because most of those packets are used by people who are like pouring them into reusable water bottles and going to the gym and using these things.

00:19:19.640 So you can make the argument that by using a packet, it's like 98% less plastic material than a plastic bottle if you're buying a Gatorade, that people kind of making their own sort of sports drinks.

00:19:32.120 You're kind of eliminating the need for someone to buy a plastic bottle so that if someone's not buying a Gatorade and they're making their own Gatorade, you can argue that it's less plastic consumption that's happening.

00:19:42.860 And then hopefully as technology moves along and packaging moves along, that there are better formats that can be used for these things, given that there's such a new category that out of the gate, it's not the most ideal solution.

00:19:55.660 But the minute there was something better that you could migrate over to it.

00:19:58.860 And that was kind of the thinking that we had going into it.

00:20:01.120 So why not glass?

00:20:04.100 Glass bottles for liquid death.

00:20:05.740 Yeah.

00:20:06.960 A couple of reasons.

00:20:08.440 One, the recyclability factor.

00:20:10.080 They're not actually being recycled.

00:20:11.780 So the idea that you have a plastic bottle, you put it in your blue bin, it goes to a recycling facility.

00:20:17.920 They don't wash it out.

00:20:19.500 Like, think about it.

00:20:20.320 You have a Coke bottle.

00:20:21.780 They own that exact shape and modeling of the bottle.

00:20:25.520 You're not going to wash that out in a facility and then it goes and then all of a sudden your Sprite is in somebody's old used Coke bottle.

00:20:32.200 That's not what's happening.

00:20:33.380 Europe actually has a better recycling system for glass.

00:20:37.700 And the reason that is, is because they don't have a mixed recycling plan.

00:20:41.440 They have very specific glass containers, metal containers, plastic containers.

00:20:46.000 But, but, but why does recycling of glass matter?

00:20:47.840 Because if you're talking about sustainability of something that, a material that doesn't have to be created from new always, that you can have material that's created new, gets reused over and over and over again.

00:21:04.400 You're not constantly having to create new.

00:21:06.640 And that's part of what sustainability can be.

00:21:09.100 But I look at it like, you know, calories per bottle, right?

00:21:12.760 So if the argument is that recycling is good because it requires less energy to recycle a glass bottle versus produce a new one, I suppose there's an argument there.

00:21:21.780 But the reason why they don't recycle glass is because it's actually not correct.

00:21:25.320 It costs more to recycle the bottle than to produce a new one from scratch.

00:21:28.160 Considering that glass bottles are rocks, and when they sit in landfills, it's a landfill full of rocks, I don't really have a great concern about that.

00:21:34.600 Plastic bottles, you and I agree on.

00:21:36.540 But I would actually make the argument that, you know, from my personal experience, we stopped buying the Saratoga Springs glass water bottles.

00:21:46.300 I'm familiar with the study that perhaps, according to this one study, there may be a couple, there's more microplastics in the bottle because of the cap.

00:21:54.880 There are alternatives.

00:21:55.720 There's cork, there's silicone, things like that.

00:21:58.260 But in my experience and what I've encountered, the argument that people are going to not buy a plastic water bottle because liquid death is an alternative, I think also presupposes that people will choose not to buy a glass product with less plastic because they see liquid death as a cheaper alternative, which in fact just increases total plastic consumption worldwide.

00:22:17.780 Yeah, but you're really going out on a limb to assume that millions and millions of people are making the same exact assumption that you are.

00:22:29.500 No, I'm making a balanced assumption that there's no data to suggest a person has foregone buying a plastic bottle in favor of liquid death when the inverse could equally be true, that they chose not to buy a glass bottle in favor of liquid death, which has more plastic.

00:22:42.040 I would actually argue this.

00:22:43.780 But liquid death doesn't have more plastic.

00:22:45.580 Than glass?

00:22:46.220 There's more plastic in a glass bottle than in a liquid death can.

00:22:50.140 In every single glass bottle, even with a cork cap and with a paper sticker?

00:22:54.900 Show me one bottle that exists in a retailer anywhere in this country that is not alcohol that you're charging $15 a bottle for that has a cork in it.

00:23:05.780 The cork.

00:23:06.860 So we've, it is funny because you sent me this big long post on X about, you know, our pool water gag product.

00:23:13.820 And we're talking to a variety of distributors that have offered cork, sealers, as well as silicone, which is a bit more expensive.

00:23:20.980 So it certainly exists.

00:23:22.500 Like my point ultimately is.

00:23:24.240 No, it exists, but it's expensive.

00:23:26.380 That's why alcohol brands use it.

00:23:27.920 And so liquid death is, is what, eight, eight times the cost of a plastic water bottle per ounce?

00:23:33.840 No, false, false.

00:23:35.640 So I can go, I can go to Walmart right now.

00:23:37.440 And for 0.8 of a cents, a point, there's like not even a single cent per ounce, I can get water from a plastic bottle.

00:23:45.440 Liquid death, I found at the lowest, eight cents per ounce and the highest 17 cents per ounce.

00:23:51.360 So let's talk about the beverage business then.

00:23:53.640 So you can talk about how we get the pricing.

00:23:55.400 Because I think people are really confused about how pricing ends up on the shelf where it is.

00:23:59.920 And that was part of my post to you to understand that.

00:24:02.520 Because even in the early days of liquid death, when I had the idea, I want to make this beverage company, there are so many costs that I never even realized existed until you actually get into it.

00:24:12.840 So there's two ways you can sell a beverage to somebody.

00:24:16.040 You can ship it direct to them from your warehouse and sell it on your website, which is kind of what it seemed like you were doing with the gag product, right?

00:24:24.780 Then there is selling in a retailer.

00:24:26.860 And there's only one way you can basically sell in a retailer.

00:24:29.220 You have to sell to a distributor who then sells into the retailer.

00:24:35.060 If you're a non-alc beverage product, the only distribution system, for the most part, that you can use is the beer distribution network.

00:24:44.880 Because the other two non-alc distribution networks are Coca-Cola's network, Pepsi's network, Keurig Dr. Pepper's network.

00:24:52.500 You cannot be distributed in their network unless they own your brand.

00:24:56.520 It's locked off.

00:24:57.280 Beer distributors, because of the alcohol laws in the U.S., alcohol manufacturers are only allowed to own 20% of their distribution network.

00:25:07.820 You can't produce the booze and also sell the booze to retail.

00:25:11.400 So there's about 400 independent Anheuser-Busch distributors.

00:25:15.900 Anheuser-Busch corporate only owns 20 of them.

00:25:17.960 So for those other 300-plus distributors, they're all individual family-owned distributors around the country.

00:25:24.520 You can go to them one by one and say, hey, will you distribute my product?

00:25:30.620 And most of them say, unless you have massive chain authorizations in Walmart or 7-Eleven or Albertsons, we don't want to deal with your product.

00:25:39.460 We've got 100 other brands.

00:25:41.160 So it took Liquid Death a lot of time to do that.

00:25:43.500 So once you build out that network, we've got about 300 Anheuser-Busch and some Miller Core, some non-alc distributors around.

00:25:50.780 They want a 30% profit margin to sell your product to the store.

00:25:56.740 So me, let's say I can make a 12-pack of Liquid Death water for, call it, $5 is my cost.

00:26:06.240 By the time you have the can, the filling, the carton, shipping from the bottler to your own warehouse, then also the cost of shipping from your warehouse to the distributor.

00:26:18.480 That all adds up to be a lot.

00:26:20.780 As a beverage company, on the low end of what you can sustain yourself as a company is a 30% gross margin.

00:26:27.880 At scale, you want to be north of a 40% gross margin.

00:26:31.680 Companies like, I mentioned, Monster Energy are at 54.

00:26:34.920 Coca-Cola is at 60.

00:26:36.300 You start adding that on, $5 plus shipping, give a 40% just mid-range beverage company margin on there.

00:26:44.000 Then it goes to the distributor.

00:26:45.600 They need a 30% profit margin on that to the retailer.

00:26:48.960 And then the retailer, if it's a grocery store, they want a minimum of 35% profit margin when they sell it to the customer.

00:26:58.400 In a convenience store, when you're selling singles, they want a 50% gross margin.

00:27:03.480 So you start adding that up.

00:27:05.000 That's how you get to these prices that are, yes, higher than what Coca-Cola can sell it for when they own the entire supply chain.

00:27:13.640 They own the cans.

00:27:14.640 They own everything.

00:27:16.060 So the beverage game in general is very capital intensive because as a small company, you will never get anywhere close to the cost benefit of a Coca-Cola who own most of the products on the shelves that you see.

00:27:29.620 Are you allowed to disclose the profit margins for liquid death?

00:27:34.220 I can't give an exact number, but I can say we're around 40% gross margin right now.

00:27:38.480 The public estimate is $333 million in sales last year.

00:27:43.440 Is that public number correct?

00:27:45.440 That's retail scan sales.

00:27:47.220 That means when there's certain data centers that track big retailers like Walmart or Albertsons, what goes through the register.

00:27:54.760 That's not our revenue.

00:27:56.400 That's how much liquid death was sold through the registers in retailers.

00:28:00.120 We're not allowed to disclose our actual revenue.

00:28:02.280 So are you allowed to say how many cans or how many units you sold in the last year?

00:28:09.480 I don't have an exact number, but you could kind of back out probably something close to like around a buck a can through the register.

00:28:18.160 So probably like close to 300 million cans.

00:28:20.560 Wow, that's a lot.

00:28:21.220 So is the argument, I suppose, that you don't want to disclose your products contain plastic or that as it pertains to using glass bottles, you could not find a way to reduce the label or maybe even use no label?

00:28:36.920 So since the post the other day, and this is something we've been talking about for a little while.

00:28:43.600 It's not like we're like, hey, this is something that we're in a room.

00:28:48.000 How do we manipulate the public and get them to buy?

00:28:51.660 That's not happening.

00:28:53.840 Death to plastic is a marketing tagline, right?

00:28:56.620 Like, marketing taglines at the high level like that, they're not claims.

00:29:03.720 We're not saying our product contains 0% plastic.

00:29:08.120 Death to plastic is like, just do it or gives you wings.

00:29:11.540 It's a short form to get people to then look deeper into the brand of like, oh, what is this?

00:29:17.680 And then if you actually go to our website or you read on the can or you look into it, there's more info of what it is.

00:29:23.560 And now I agree, at this point, because of all the other concerns about plastic, we should absolutely update our line to death to plastic bottles.

00:29:33.580 And we should have on our site, and we actually, if you go to our site now, I had my team update, hey, let's just change the logo now, death to plastic bottles.

00:29:43.120 Let's actually talk through everything that we talked through.

00:29:45.980 Hey, yes, they do contain a plastic liner.

00:29:48.260 And here's what it's all about.

00:29:49.360 And here's what's happened.

00:29:50.180 And reality is about microplastics and plastic bottles and let people make their decision.

00:29:55.900 Again, nothing's perfect.

00:29:57.520 And we're not trying to do this to deceive people.

00:30:00.680 Again, it's always hard for companies in a lot of areas where companies are so close to their own products, where it's like we live and breathe every day all the details of liquid death.

00:30:11.940 And what we might assume is something that is easily assumed might not be the case, and then we learn and we adapt.

00:30:19.740 And I think that's what you have to do.

00:30:21.420 I did notice this, too, because I pulled up your website and saw that you do have this section now, which talks about plastic liners, which I believe you put up yesterday.

00:30:30.360 And it wasn't yesterday.

00:30:31.500 It was yesterday.

00:30:31.780 As soon as we had this conversation and I saw some of the traction on there, again, this is something we've been talking about.

00:30:38.860 I'm like, guys, we've been talking about this for a while.

00:30:42.060 One, it should have been updated earlier.

00:30:44.140 I was like, guys, why isn't this updated?

00:30:45.660 Why didn't you do it years ago when all these articles came out and the videos of the plastic bag and the liquid death bottle were going viral back then?

00:30:53.400 It didn't matter or, you know, I look at it like here comes a guy with millions of followers posting on X.

00:31:00.100 I have this issue and you see all it's like over a thousand comments are made, hundreds of retweets, and then you update it.

00:31:05.980 But all the information I'm talking about, I've actually discussed privately or not even privately.

00:31:10.300 I've gone without naming liquid death out of respect for mutual and, you know, individuals, mutual colleagues that we have.

00:31:17.060 So I've actually done shows where I've talked about the issue of can liners without naming liquid death.

00:31:24.080 But there's articles from three years ago talking about how you guys line your product with plastic and don't disclose that.

00:31:28.640 And only now you change it.

00:31:31.320 Well, yeah, I mean.

00:31:32.480 I'm glad you did.

00:31:33.240 Don't get me wrong.

00:31:34.280 Yeah, and that's what I mean.

00:31:35.160 It's like, well, one, we didn't believe that based on because, look, we don't just make decisions in a vacuum of three people sitting in a boardroom.

00:31:43.680 Like we look at shitloads of survey data.

00:31:46.340 Like we have people, we're surveying liquid death drinkers to find out what is it?

00:31:50.140 Why are they buying?

00:31:50.980 Is this a problem?

00:31:52.020 And what we identified was the fraction of people, of all the liquid death customers, the fraction of people that would be in this camp of, oh, I thought I was buying something that had no plastic in it and how dare you deceive me was so small.

00:32:07.220 And even now, it's a very small number of people.

00:32:10.720 But, hey, sometimes you do have to cater to.

00:32:14.380 Hey, let's make it ultra clear.

00:32:16.340 So there's nobody that can do it.

00:32:18.860 I appreciate you coming on.

00:32:19.940 But did you talk with your lawyer before doing this show?

00:32:22.940 Absolutely.

00:32:23.880 And you brought up Red Bull gives you wings, which, you know, the FTC fined Red Bull for as a misleading statement.

00:32:29.720 And then you just stated that you. 0.95

00:32:31.840 But that's a ridiculous thing.

00:32:33.740 How many people actually are buying? 0.82

00:32:35.340 How many people are buying a liquid death or how many people do you think are buying a Red Bull saying, I believe this product is going to give me wings?

00:32:43.600 Fascinating, because that wasn't the FTC's argument.

00:32:45.800 The argument was that Red Bull's statement misled the public into thinking that it provided more of an enhancement than any caffeinated beverage.

00:32:51.720 The statement Red Bull gives you wings did not trick people into thinking they would grow wings.

00:32:55.940 People believed Red Bull was an energy drink.

00:32:57.720 And then they found out it was a standard caffeinated soda.

00:33:00.340 That's why they got fined.

00:33:01.180 I think it was $13 million.

00:33:02.080 So when you say to me, we knew death to plastic was a marketing slogan and our products contained plastic, and there was a portion of people who genuinely believed it was plastic free, sounds like you've just admitted to an FTC violation.

00:33:16.860 You're completely wrong, because death to plastic is not a claim.

00:33:20.440 Death to plastic is a point of view.

00:33:22.080 Neither is Red Bull gives you wings.

00:33:23.780 We are a company that is trying to do something about plastic.

00:33:27.460 Not all plastic.

00:33:28.300 We don't say, death to all plastic, our product contains 0% plastic.

00:33:32.940 That's not what we're saying.

00:33:34.420 And we have, if you look at any ad that Liquid Death has made, Recycled Plastic Surgery Center, the most recent thing we did with Whitney Cummings, the whole thing is about recyclability.

00:33:43.700 It's about putting plastic in your body, which microplastics do when they leach into your food product.

00:33:50.480 I thought that was pretty funny, because I like Whitney Cummings, and you did this commercial where they're jamming plastic in their body.

00:33:55.240 And I was like, kind of like when you consume plastic-lined food products with microplastics leaching into them, right?

00:34:01.080 Look, look, I'm going to say it again.

00:34:02.380 Tim, no, no, no, Tim, no, no, no, no.

00:34:03.720 You're trying to spin something here.

00:34:06.460 And look, that's what you do, too.

00:34:08.000 You spin.

00:34:08.480 Spin?

00:34:08.780 And you're trying to spin it.

00:34:09.840 Yeah, you're spinning.

00:34:10.840 Yeah, I'll tell you exactly what I'm doing.

00:34:12.760 I bought a product that had death to plastic, because I didn't know aluminum cans had plastic in it.

00:34:16.020 And you told me you knew people, there's a portion of people who didn't know that, and you kept selling the product without disclosing it.

00:34:22.100 That pisses me off.

00:34:23.540 I would not have bought liquid death as a plastic alternative had I known my food product was aligned with plastic, because it defeated the purpose of purchasing it.

00:34:30.160 And I stopped buying my Saratoga Springs, thinking this didn't have plastic in it.

00:34:33.460 That's my whole argument.

00:34:35.040 You said you knew that was the case for a portion of your customers.

00:34:38.380 I'm pissed.

00:34:39.760 I was one of those customers.

00:34:40.860 And not just that.

00:34:41.760 I'm buying thousands of dollars.

00:34:43.580 I'm buying, I think, dozens of cases, maybe even 100 cases, because we have 40 employees, and we were drinking a lot.

00:34:48.980 And our guests were drinking a lot.

00:34:50.200 And we've done special events where we've had people put liquid death on our table.

00:34:54.080 I don't care if Coca-Cola, liquid death, or Celsius or whoever has plastic-lined cans, because we get that.

00:35:01.720 I was unaware of that.

00:35:03.000 I learned something.

00:35:03.780 I care that this can says death to plastic on it.

00:35:07.020 And I thought aluminum cans didn't have plastic.

00:35:09.460 And you knew this was the case for some of your customers.

00:35:11.860 And I was buying a product through misleading advertising.

00:35:14.540 So what you're saying was, if it specifically said death to plastic bottles, there's no issue?

00:35:19.960 No, not at all.

00:35:21.460 How?

00:35:22.260 You said no issue at all.

00:35:24.280 It's not an absolute.

00:35:25.240 I take issue with the marketing campaign, which insinuates you don't use plastic and you're actively working against it,

00:35:31.480 when, in fact, you are contributing to the production and consumption of plastic.

00:35:36.020 It may, it's absolutely better than plastic bottles, but there's no data showing a comparison between liquid death consumption and a decline in PET bottle use.

00:35:44.320 In fact, exponential increase across the board.

00:35:46.300 So when I look at your cans, can for can, liquid death produces the same amount of plastic as every other canned soft drink manufacturer, and you're growing.

00:35:54.980 And now you're getting away from water and you're going into standard soft drinks, which typically are in aluminum cans because of pressurization.

00:36:00.820 They're not going to work in these thin PET bottles.

00:36:02.560 You are the same as every other company, but you have this thin veneer of we're environmentally friendly for some reason or better, despite the fact, if you put on these cans, these cans do contain plastic.

00:36:13.000 I would not have bought them.

00:36:14.260 I would have kept buying glass.

00:36:16.420 And so that's what I'm bothered by.

00:36:18.460 So I'll say this.

00:36:19.800 Put on all of your products.

00:36:20.720 But glass has more plastic.

00:36:21.540 Tim, glass has more plastic.

00:36:22.720 No, you're arguing that that's not correct.

00:36:24.940 We don't know that that's a something.

00:36:26.000 It's correct.

00:36:26.540 No, it isn't.

00:36:27.360 You're absolutely wrong.

00:36:28.460 Where is, how does glass have more plastic?

00:36:30.260 It's in the glass?

00:36:32.540 Plastic inside the cap of a plastic bottle, it weighs about three grams worth of plastic.

00:36:38.760 And can I get one without it?

00:36:39.880 The liner inside a can is 0.5 grams.

00:36:43.500 That's all the plastic.

00:36:44.220 On the high end, it's one.

00:36:45.040 So just the cap alone is six times the amount of plastic material as what is in a can.

00:36:50.500 And then if you have any plastic on the label of the plastic bottle, which a lot of them have, that's another couple grams.

00:36:58.040 So you're talking on average, and you go ahead, chat, GPT, AI, whatever the fuck, a plastic bottle, they estimate, has five to six grams of plastic used in a plastic, in a glass bottle, which is 10 times that of an aluminum can.

00:37:15.640 2.22.

00:37:16.280 So you could make the argument that that's what I'm getting at is, yes, there is no perfect thing.

00:37:24.880 And when it comes to plastic, that's the bigger thing.

00:37:27.440 Let's just say you made a glass bottle that somehow uses no plastic whatsoever.

00:37:32.360 If you're talking about microplastics, water in the bottling facility is touching plastic all over it.

00:37:41.420 There is no way to get away from plastic in the modern industrial society, unfortunately.

00:37:46.640 Water is passing through plastic tubes.

00:37:48.840 There's plastic nozzles on the bottle fillers that the water goes through in the facility.

00:37:53.640 So we live in a world dominated by plastic, so there is no way to get away from any risk of microplastics, regardless of what the container is.

00:38:02.560 I agree.

00:38:03.240 Yeah.

00:38:03.740 Yeah.

00:38:03.880 I agree with that, and that's why we have liquid death, and my issue is not that Coke lines their cans with plastics.

00:38:11.660 My issue is that your marketing misleads into people thinking that it's not the case.

00:38:19.020 But the point was made, so we can move on from there.

00:38:23.820 I do have a question, though, because you sent me that big, long Twitter thread about the cost of shipping glass.

00:38:28.740 I certainly think glass is still a point made about beer caps.

00:38:34.200 I did a quick search, and I'm not getting—for pop caps, which are not resealable, which I would consider to be more comparable.

00:38:44.700 Let's try and get a hard number.

00:38:47.240 So one of the concerns with, like, what is the demand for a plastic bottle, and resealability is a big deal.

00:38:54.600 So it looks like even in pop caps—oh, I'm sorry.

00:38:59.020 It's 0.03 to 0.08 grams in a pop cap.

00:39:05.880 A typical beer cap contains about 0.05 grams of plastic.

00:39:09.420 Okay.

00:39:09.860 So it looks like there is an alternative with less plastic in it than your can, because I figured that'd be the case.

00:39:14.740 It's kind of silly to think that a beer bottle would somehow have more plastic in it than a plastic-lined can, right?

00:39:19.580 So glass bottle cap structure is mostly steel and aluminum, 95% to 98% capped by mass.

00:39:27.160 With a total standard weight of 2.2 grams, the plastic liner is usually 0.03 to 0.08 grams, roughly 1% to 4% of the cap's total weight.

00:39:37.000 So, again, let me say, I respect fighting against plastic.

00:39:43.760 I think it's good that you offer alternatives to plastic PET bottles.

00:39:48.580 I don't, however, see a real market displacement.

00:39:51.840 PET is on the rise.

00:39:53.280 I think you're more likely to pull people from glass bottles, like Topo Chico, for instance, is going to have substantially less—or Mineragua, for instance—less plastic than yours, based on what I just looked up.

00:40:04.600 And not to mention, comparable price.

00:40:07.400 I've got 8.4 cents per ounce at my local Walmart for glass bottle Mineragua with a single-use pop cap.

00:40:13.700 So I can get—it's funny, Mineragua's not even marketing that they're anti-plastic, and there's less plastic in it.

00:40:19.820 Now, to be fair, maybe the label has a certain degree of plastic, but we could mitigate that.

00:40:23.480 We could do a paper label or something else.

00:40:24.880 So, ultimately, what it comes down to is I'm willing to accept that you didn't really think about it all that much.

00:40:32.120 You didn't—the microplastic thing is only new in the past several years.

00:40:35.100 But there's still a few factors that I think matter.

00:40:37.420 One is you could have always gone with glass and single-use pop caps, which has less plastic than the can.

00:40:42.960 You could have disclosed on your site, on the can, this product still does contain plastic, which I think is important.

00:40:49.140 And on top of that, I genuinely just think that liquid death is overall a contributor to the market, not a displacer for the market.

00:40:59.180 So consumption of single-use plastic is only going up.

00:41:02.420 I take issue with the phrase infinite recyclability because that misleads people into thinking this can is pure aluminum, and the whole thing can be reused as it can.

00:41:09.540 It can't.

00:41:10.340 You've got to get new plastics.

00:41:11.960 Yeah.

00:41:12.960 Yeah, I mean, again, you saying that they're not infinitely recyclable, like, you're really stretching on that one.

00:41:21.580 Okay, let me ask you a question.

00:41:22.960 If I took this can of liquid death after it was done, melted it down into aluminum, could that aluminum, just in and of itself, be reformed into another can of any size?

00:41:34.040 Yes.

00:41:35.640 It could.

00:41:38.160 Yeah, and then to your point—

00:41:39.300 So then why do you put plastic in your cans?

00:41:41.240 Yes.

00:41:42.960 All beverage cans are required to have a liner because the liquid would interact with the metal.

00:41:48.220 Okay, so let's try this again.

00:41:49.380 If I took this liquid death can, finished it, melted it down to aluminum, reshaped it into a can, it would not be capable of holding your beverage because it would react with it.

00:41:58.600 Yes, but you're talking about the word infinite.

00:42:03.700 Infinite. What do you mean by the word infinite? Let's get—let's start there.

00:42:06.800 Okay. A liquid death can—I'm not saying aluminum.

00:42:10.480 A liquid death can is not infinitely recyclable because of the portion of it which is plastic, ink, or otherwise.

00:42:17.220 The ink, by all means, whatever, however it's colored.

00:42:20.900 We can throw that out the window because it is what it is.

00:42:23.180 But the plastic has to be reproduced, not to mention when it's burned off, the plastic will emit carbon, water vapor, and plastic particulates, which are soaked into a filter.

00:42:32.120 That filter becomes waste.

00:42:33.600 It is tons better than plastic bottles, certainly not better than Topo Chico or any other single-use pop cap on a glass bottle.

00:42:39.980 So it is not infinitely recyclable. That is a marketing term.

00:42:44.080 And when you actually look into it, every confirmation is infinitely recyclable as a marketing term used to make it seem like it is.

00:42:50.540 Now, if you said the aluminum in our cans can be recycled infinitely because it's a metal, that would be a fair statement.

00:42:57.100 And by all means, make that distinction, I suppose.

00:43:00.580 Once again, my point is all of these factors line up and show us an avalanche, which says to me, I don't believe that you guys were unaware of the impact.

00:43:08.600 In fact, you said to me just a moment ago, you knew a portion of your consumer base thought this was plastic-free, and you did not put on the can that it was, in fact, containing plastic.

00:43:18.080 Even if that percentage is 2% or 1%, it shows that you are willing to say that portion of our consumer base is okay to lie to or mislead.

00:43:26.880 It's not lying, Tim.

00:43:28.620 It's lying by omission. It's misleading them into thinking death to plastic doesn't actually mean us because we're producing more single-use plastic.

00:43:35.220 We have tons of info on our site that is always talking about recyclability of plastic versus aluminum.

00:43:43.720 We're never claiming that these are healthier to drink from in any way.

00:43:47.960 We're never claiming anywhere actual claims of like 0% plastic.

00:43:53.840 Death to plastic is a rallying cry. It is not a claim.

00:43:57.160 Let me ask you. I get it. I get it. And I don't mean to cut you off, but just because I hear your point and I duly noted.

00:44:05.320 So one other question I have, it says on this can, we donate a portion of the profits from every can sold to help kill plastic pollution.

00:44:12.600 I checked your site. Do you want to explain?

00:44:15.580 I don't know if you're allowed to tell us what portion of the profits actually goes towards fighting plastic pollution.

00:44:20.260 Well, in the early days of liquid death, it was, we had a specific number.

00:44:25.780 We had, uh, it was like five cents a can was what we, what we donated in the very early days as the business.

00:44:33.060 Well, actually it was the original thing was 5% of the profits we were donating.

00:44:38.820 Your, your, your site in 2021 says 10%.

00:44:41.260 No, no, no. Not 10%.

00:44:43.260 The website liquid death archived 2021 says 10% of all sales per can goes to, uh, fighting plastic pollution.

00:44:50.180 That was never on our site.

00:44:51.580 It's how much you want to bet.

00:44:52.620 He wants to say 10%.

00:44:54.260 How much you want to bet?

00:44:56.180 Gentleman's bet. Cause I have the archive pulled up.

00:44:58.900 Million dollars.

00:44:59.900 Are you, are you sure?

00:45:02.120 I'm ready. I know we never put that on there.

00:45:05.440 Uh, everyone watching right now can see archive.org.

00:45:09.200 10% of the profits from every can is donated to help kill plastic pollution.

00:45:13.840 I don't know if you're able to see, uh, actually, you know what I, yeah, I can't, I can't put it on my screen.

00:45:18.580 Um, if you, if you, uh, everybody watching can see that it says 10%, buddy, you owe me a million bucks.

00:45:25.640 Hey, hey, hey, hey, you said it.

00:45:28.540 Tell me where to make the check out.

00:45:31.540 I don't know.

00:45:32.020 To a plastic fighting charity.

00:45:33.980 Yeah.

00:45:34.480 Um.

00:45:35.500 I'm not mad that you're saying 10%.

00:45:36.760 I don't think it's good.

00:45:38.100 That, that I could, I could show you detailed legal stuff within there.

00:45:42.780 That is someone who needs to be fired running our website because that is never, it's never been on a can.

00:45:49.600 It's never been anywhere else.

00:45:50.840 Like that is not at all what we've ever, what we've ever claimed.

00:45:54.460 Like that's somebody who copied and pasted something that, that, that's a typo and it's not on there now.

00:46:00.060 And it's not ever going to be on there.

00:46:01.460 That's not true.

00:46:02.300 August 1st, 2021, uh, liquid death website.

00:46:06.240 Uh, it's not.

00:46:07.480 Yeah.

00:46:07.620 Yeah.

00:46:08.040 And then lists, uh, and it's been updated.

00:46:10.060 And if you look on every can we have now, every packaging thing we have now, it's, it does not say that.

00:46:16.360 Yeah.

00:46:16.460 Currently it just says we don't need a portion.

00:46:18.520 So here, here's, here's another issue in my argument that I think this is a marketing ploy for you guys.

00:46:23.560 Uh, I looked into these non-profits and I was shocked to find that, uh, relative to the size of your company and your sales, these are microscopic non-profits.

00:46:35.160 They look fantastic.

00:46:36.380 Um, uh, you know, I don't want to just, uh, disparage them in any meaningful way, but I'm just surprised to find, I mean, is, is, is liquid death the principal contributor to these non-profits?

00:46:46.340 Or do you give them like a check for a hundred grand every year?

00:46:50.700 Well, five gyres is the biggest non-profit we could find that is solely dedicated to helping with plastic pollution and plastic.

00:47:00.500 So, so, so, yeah, I mean, how much, how much money do you give them?

00:47:05.640 I mean, we can't disclose exactly what it is, but we are probably their biggest, if, if not their biggest, one of their biggest contributors.

00:47:13.980 So according to their 990, uh, for the year of 2023, they brought in $1.2 million.

00:47:20.760 To be fair, I know that you guys have, uh, seen exponential growth over the past couple of years, but, and I, and I'm not trying to immediately just go totally dark and negative.

00:47:29.540 Cause I think it's good that you guys are doing this, but it seemed, it seemed low to be honest, um, that their total, uh, contributions for the year is 1.2.

00:47:39.420 The prior year before that was 1.1.

00:47:41.500 This is the latest 990 that I could find.

00:47:43.560 And the current assets for, uh, thirst was about 500,000 though.

00:47:47.380 I didn't pull up their direct 990.

00:47:48.740 It just seems small for, you know, the, the latest reporting period.

00:47:52.780 Again, I'm not trying to disparage the fact that you actually do this, but I look at it and like, to be, if it's,

00:47:59.280 I looked at what they do, they do like cleanups and things like this.

00:48:02.580 They advocate, they say that principally they're, what they do is science.

00:48:06.080 And so it seems like most of the financing is going to, uh, paying individuals who probably aren't getting a full salary to be completely honest.

00:48:11.560 I think it's respectable because most nonprofits I think are scams, but they have a big team.

00:48:15.240 And at the rate of revenue that they bring in, these people are really, they seem to be really doing the work, but it does seem to be relatively low, especially considering the size of the company.

00:48:24.380 Uh, I will photo, I will totally give, I think the estimates for total sales for liquid death in the ending fiscal year, 2023 was like less than half of where it is now.

00:48:33.500 So, uh, factoring in retail sales, don't, uh, account for your total sales.

00:48:38.380 You guys are making the drink.

00:48:39.620 You're then selling them to distributors.

00:48:41.160 It's probably substantially less.

00:48:43.400 If you're doing a buck a can and, uh, 330 million cans, that's, that's out the retail store, right?

00:48:50.440 The buck a can was like retail price.

00:48:51.860 I think you were, you were pointing out.

00:48:53.120 Retail price.

00:48:53.680 Yeah.

00:48:54.060 By us, single, uh, tall boys are $3.030 at our, at our sheets and our 7-Eleven.

00:48:59.840 And then the, the, the, the regular cans at Walmart are like $1.08 per can.

00:49:05.900 So are you guys still doing tall boys or is it now just all the small ones?

00:49:10.520 No, we still have the tall boys.

00:49:12.080 We, we got rid of, uh, cases of tall boys this year for most of what we have.

00:49:18.140 And then, cause basically if you look at the beer industry, all single cans are big tall boys that you buy, like cold.

00:49:24.480 All cases of beer is 12 ounce.

00:49:26.640 So we kind of moved to that.

00:49:27.760 But now we realize there's enough people who do want to buy full cases of big cans for a couple hero skews and flavors next year.

00:49:35.060 We're going to re-release some of the big cans.

00:49:36.800 So just, um, because I'm, I'm, I'm not trying to be so dark on this one because I think it's good that you're doing this.

00:49:42.180 But am I wrong about my interpretation that the nonprofit only brought in 1.2 in total contributions and you guys are generating, you know, I don't know, I don't know, tens of millions of dollars.

00:49:52.920 Is it, it, it comes off immediately again, I'm trying to be careful because I don't want to be too mean.

00:49:57.640 I actually respect this, but it does come off like you're contributing very little.

00:50:01.420 It's a lot relative to the nonprofit, but 1.2 million for a nonprofit is actually on one of the, is one of the smallest nonprofits, you know, in the industry.

00:50:10.540 Sure. And, and the reality is there's not a lot of nonprofits dedicated to plastic pollution.

00:50:16.400 They're the biggest one that there is.

00:50:18.260 Second, the other thing you have to keep in mind is yes, liquid death sold 300 million cans.

00:50:23.820 We are still not yet a profitable company because as much as it caught, like we're still operating, like we said, on a 40, 40 margin that took us forever to get there.

00:50:34.280 Big reason for that was during COVID ocean shipping costs went up five X.

00:50:38.520 We used to produce our product in Austria because there literally was not a single co-packer in the United States who could put spring water in aluminum cans did not exist in 2018.

00:50:49.980 So we, you know, in 2022, we moved our whole supply chain to the U S you know, it ate our margins.

00:50:55.840 But what that shows is like most beverage companies, the game is stacked against you with Coke and Pepsi to start a new brand.

00:51:02.980 And the most, most new beverage companies, what you have to do is you start a company, you have to price your product where Coke and Pepsi prices it.

00:51:12.640 Even though you don't have the economies of scale, you can't just say, oh, we're going to be an $8 can of water next to $1.79 smart water, because that's what we need to make a profit.

00:51:23.300 No, you have to price for Coke prices, lose money for years, raise capital, and then eventually you get to enough scale where your costs come down enough where, hey, you're actually maybe able to generate a profit.

00:51:37.520 And for example, the company, uh, body armor, they're like the Gatorade type product that got bought by Coke for 5 billion.

00:51:45.400 I think two years ago, they had to get to almost 600 million in revenue before they were actually generating profit.

00:51:53.580 So even though we're a company that's not even making money, we are still donating.

00:51:58.800 So yes, that's why we're not donating these massive amounts.

00:52:01.860 Now, as we get bigger and we have more profit and become a bigger company, we could continue to donate more.

00:52:07.300 Are you planning to sell liquid death?

00:52:11.580 Our excitement is as a company, because we're a multi-category brand and because the kind of marketing we do could never survive in the Coca-Cola corporate structure or Pepsi corporate structure.

00:52:24.780 Any of the stuff we do would die in a focus group or would get killed by, you know, somebody in that system.

00:52:31.300 That's not the kind of marketing they make.

00:52:33.000 So yes, maybe one day someone could come to us and say, hey, liquid death taken enough of our market share.

00:52:38.780 We're just going to buy them.

00:52:39.860 But for us, we're more excited about the potential of one day becoming a public company like Celsius or Monster or Vitacoco, where we still kind of control our own destiny.

00:52:49.000 No one can tell us how to market and we can, uh, you know, continue to drive company value.

00:52:53.700 And entertaining, uh, the possibility that a sale could come at some point.

00:52:58.760 Have you guys taken any actions which could benefit you in a sale of the company and, uh, specifically for the reason of maybe this will make us more, uh, appetizing to someone to buy us out?

00:53:09.400 I mean, I mean, yes, I mean, we work with a ton of smart people.

00:53:15.780 We have a board of people that understand M&A and people who have been a part of other brands, sold brands, been a part of the Coke and Pepsis who have bought other brands.

00:53:24.080 So we have a pretty good hold on what it needs to look like if you are going to get acquired by someone.

00:53:29.620 But again, most beverage companies are built to sell as they call it.

00:53:34.060 They're like, Hey, we're going to start this thing.

00:53:35.740 We're going to burn cash.

00:53:36.820 And the whole plan, the whole time is we're going to flip it to Coke or Pepsi.

00:53:40.440 That was never our thing.

00:53:42.000 Like we, we built this to kind of be a long term company.

00:53:45.920 Now to your point, if Coke or Pepsi comes to us and says, Hey, liquid debt, two and a half billion.

00:53:50.780 We got to think about that, right? 0.98

00:53:52.240 Cause there's a lot of people that have busted their ass with this company. 0.97

00:53:54.900 Every employee of liquid death owned shares in the company. 0.97

00:53:57.640 Um, Jason Ellis, as you know, owned shares in the company, like Dane Berman.

00:54:03.080 Yeah.

00:54:03.840 One of my favorite people on the planet and skaters who put together the liquid death skate team.

00:54:07.500 Just unfortunately, after six years, uh, you know, we just realized like, Hey, we, it just doesn't fit in like into our strategy.

00:54:14.020 And, you know, we, we just can't do it anymore.

00:54:16.140 And I, as much as I love Richie, I know that there wasn't many other sponsors.

00:54:19.840 He hadn't hit him really hard that, Hey, we can't keep paying you that couple of hundred bucks a month anymore.

00:54:24.940 Yeah. I don't think that was the issue for Richie.

00:54:26.420 I think it felt more like you stabbed him in the back.

00:54:29.300 And, uh, my understanding is that the entire skate team is now gone.

00:54:33.980 And, uh, you know, when, when, when Richie first told me to buy this stuff and I did, and then shortly after found out there was plastic in it and got pissed.

00:54:42.440 Cause I thought, you know, the marketing was misleading.

00:54:44.400 I said for Richie's sake, to be polite, I'm not going to start a public spat, uh, with liquid death.

00:54:50.980 But then you went and asked the whole skate team.

00:54:53.240 And I said, I don't got to hold my tongue on this anymore for Richie, not to, you know, I don't want to speak to his business, but I mean, the, the, the, the, the things this guy did for you was really, it was really amazing.

00:55:04.200 Um, he would always make sure he had a can of a liquid death in every video we're, we're producing to make sure it was on camera and everything else.

00:55:10.620 And for 500 bucks a month, you cut him off.

00:55:13.000 And he's been with you since the beginning.

00:55:15.020 You really couldn't afford 500 bucks a month.

00:55:17.180 I mean, Corey Duffel and the rest of the team, is it, you're, you're doing really that bad.

00:55:22.980 So let's talk about that.

00:55:23.960 I get it.

00:55:24.700 No, no, let's talk about this.

00:55:25.840 Cause I think it's important.

00:55:26.580 Cause I mean, you're a skater.

00:55:27.520 I'm a skater.

00:55:28.040 Let's talk about skateboarding and liquid death for a second.

00:55:30.840 So the skate team started when in 2019, we had like no sales.

00:55:37.340 Like we were a small, small company.

00:55:39.080 I went to, uh, it was a skate event where, uh, it was one of the concerts.

00:55:44.700 It wasn't warp tour, but it was like some kind of skate in concert thing.

00:55:47.840 I met, uh, Dane Berman there and Adam, uh, a run ski.

00:55:53.500 And I, we had liquid death at this event and they were videoing themselves, like doing stuff

00:56:00.440 like over a can.

00:56:01.640 And I, I got to, I'm like, Hey, this, I started this company.

00:56:04.540 He's like, Oh, this is cool.

00:56:05.740 And I got to be friends with Dane.

00:56:07.360 And Dane said, Hey, maybe I could put together like a little skate team for liquid death.

00:56:11.580 And I was like, Hey, look, like we don't have big budgets for this right now.

00:56:16.980 Also from the beginning, our strategy as a company was never to try to go into skate in

00:56:23.020 extreme sports.

00:56:23.740 We did it because I personally skateboard and love skateboarding.

00:56:27.480 But the reality is monster and Red Bull and energy drinks, they write massive checks into

00:56:33.760 that world that we could never compete with.

00:56:36.080 So it would be really dumb for us to go try to buy our way in to skateboarding against all

00:56:41.920 these other big energy drinks that throw so much money around.

00:56:44.560 But it's like, Hey, if we could do this thing really cheaply and you know, these are cool

00:56:49.060 guys.

00:56:49.420 And Dane's like, yeah, I'll get some cool guys together.

00:56:51.160 We did this for six years now in no way does it actually fit into what the marketing strategy

00:56:58.480 was.

00:56:58.920 So in the early days, me as the CEO, my personal likes, I can kind of keep around.

00:57:05.000 But now as we get bigger, when we have a team of people and marketing strategy and they're

00:57:09.160 like, Hey Mike, like, you know, we've been paying these guys for six years.

00:57:13.540 We don't really track.

00:57:14.940 Is it doing anything for the brand?

00:57:16.820 Is it selling any more water?

00:57:18.220 Like we're just kind of doing it because you like these guys, like we might have to

00:57:22.820 kind of start phasing this out.

00:57:24.720 So we, we had to do that.

00:57:26.940 I don't like the way you had to do it as part of my team.

00:57:31.380 I have to respect my team to a level and say, Hey Mike, this doesn't fit into the strategy

00:57:35.100 anymore.

00:57:35.760 We have to do it.

00:57:36.660 What was your budget per month for the skate team?

00:57:40.460 I think all in, like they're probably to pay all these guys every year.

00:57:44.600 I think it's like 40 grand a year that all in we're spending on the skate team.

00:57:49.640 Yeah.

00:57:50.280 I hear you on the, uh, Hey, we don't know if there's real value in these guys kind of statement,

00:57:55.520 I guess.

00:57:56.240 But it's, it's kind of crazy for a company recently evaluated at $1.4 billion to be like,

00:58:01.860 you know, these guys that have been here since the beginning, it costs us 40 grand per year.

00:58:05.760 Let's fire them. 1.00

00:58:07.300 And so, you know, my, my thing, uh, uh, I know people have already tried to making the

00:58:13.100 argument.

00:58:13.340 The only reason I'm arguing is because I'm friends with Richie and, and, and Jason and

00:58:17.300 some other people.

00:58:18.180 Uh, I just think, you know, look, I want to stress this.

00:58:23.320 I actually think liquid has a great company.

00:58:25.600 I just don't like the marketing that you do.

00:58:27.760 And I think you should fix it.

00:58:28.900 And really I have very little to say after the fact, if you do fix the marketing and say,

00:58:32.940 like, we get it, cans use plastic.

00:58:35.140 We're going to try and be better than everybody else.

00:58:36.560 Then there's not.

00:58:37.180 That's like, okay, all right, we'll make that the play outside of all of that.

00:58:40.900 As we have like the last few minutes here, bro, there's, I don't see an argument to be

00:58:46.280 like, I'm a skateboarder.

00:58:48.480 It costs me 40 grand a year to keep a skate team on.

00:58:52.000 And we just brought in a bunch of investments.

00:58:53.940 Like what's for, so it's like 3,600 bucks a month to keep the guys from the beginning on

00:59:01.080 who have, who have never missed a beat for you and you cut them off.

00:59:04.220 That's, that's, that's shady.

00:59:06.160 It's not shady, Tim.

00:59:07.620 Like you're, you're basically saying, okay, if you become a liquid death skater, you should

00:59:13.700 be paid forever.

00:59:14.940 It doesn't matter if you, if you're measuring what you're doing, what you're posting.

00:59:18.340 Also, I have, I can show you a text message when we brought Richie on about, I think it

00:59:25.440 was a year into it.

00:59:26.420 He came to me and said, Mike, I want to produce my own YouTube show.

00:59:31.100 That's kind of funny about skateboarding.

00:59:33.840 Will liquid death, give me the money to do it.

00:59:36.500 I said, how much is it going to cost?

00:59:37.980 He said, $50,000 for 10 episodes.

00:59:40.960 I said, Richie, there's, there's no way we can do that.

00:59:43.780 Maybe we can swing 20 grand.

00:59:45.800 And he's like, okay.

00:59:47.100 So we gave Rick, we wired $20,000 to Richie.

00:59:51.280 He made three episodes of this show.

00:59:54.320 It got no views and he got really bummed out.

00:59:57.900 He's like, I don't know why there's no views.

01:00:00.020 And he gave up.

01:00:00.860 He didn't even make the whole 10 episodes.

01:00:02.820 We didn't even get pissed at him.

01:00:04.720 Yeah.

01:00:04.840 Even though we wired in the money, we said, Hey, look, Richie, you tried.

01:00:07.960 It just didn't work out.

01:00:09.620 It's all good, whatever.

01:00:11.000 And we still kept paying him for years.

01:00:13.360 So it's not like we've done a lot.

01:00:15.880 And of all the skaters, I have a text from Corey Duffel, from Dane.

01:00:21.580 They all were like, Mike, I just want to say, thank you so much for the last six years.

01:00:27.380 Like you paid us, literally Corey Duffel said, you basically paid us to do nothing for six

01:00:32.880 years.

01:00:33.460 And I really appreciate that.

01:00:35.420 There's, it wasn't easy for us to go find sponsors that are various stages of career,

01:00:39.940 you know, where that is.

01:00:41.260 Thank you so much.

01:00:42.240 Like I appreciate everything I have.

01:00:44.360 Richie was the only one who went and, you know, posted something out of anger.

01:00:48.320 And I will say, I don't like the way that Richie was let go.

01:00:51.420 I wasn't even, I knew that we were moving on.

01:00:53.600 I had no idea when it was going to happen.

01:00:56.060 And then I found out after the fact, oh, someone just called them and said, this is

01:01:00.320 it.

01:01:00.540 I wanted to more personally do this.

01:01:02.880 And yes, I was not happy about that.

01:01:04.880 But if you look at the rationale of it, that's a whole difference.

01:01:07.460 I have no logical argument for your business rationale.

01:01:10.340 And I think it is largely correct.

01:01:12.240 Uh, and so I'll make sure that, you know, everybody who's listening understands this.

01:01:16.660 I run a business as well.

01:01:18.140 There comes a time when you're like, listen, man, we've done this for a long period of time.

01:01:23.040 We've got to wrap things up.

01:01:24.460 My understanding is, my understanding is you offered to keep paying everybody for, you

01:01:28.160 know, several months after the fact, even though the team, I don't know if it was you,

01:01:30.880 but whoever was in charge said, we're going to, we're actually letting you know what's

01:01:33.620 happening now, but we're going to give you several months lead time, which is respectable.

01:01:35.860 So I, I, I, I just think it's kind of like the personal and, uh, professionally, you make

01:01:44.880 a good point.

01:01:45.280 You're correct.

01:01:46.080 Personally, right now, skateboarding is at its worst moment ever.

01:01:49.360 And so to see a company as successful as yours, be like, it's 40 grand to keep these guys

01:01:55.540 in skateboarding in some capacity.

01:01:57.680 Nah, let's not do it.

01:01:59.160 It feels like no love of the game.

01:02:00.900 And there's no real logical argument that I have against you for doing so.

01:02:04.680 It's just like, it sucks that skateboarding is burning down.

01:02:08.640 And this is just another log on the fire.

01:02:10.720 I, and I totally get that.

01:02:12.940 And I hope that in the future as liquid death, actually, because so much of our focus right

01:02:17.440 now, it's like, Hey, look, we've grown, we've raised a lot of capital.

01:02:21.480 We're at the point now where it's like, you need to become a big boy company.

01:02:25.620 That's actually making profit and making money, or it's just going to go away.

01:02:29.900 Right.

01:02:30.380 So when it starts getting to like profitability, that's where all of a sudden little amounts

01:02:37.040 of money here and there all start adding up.

01:02:39.560 And that's really what you have to do to really drive, how do you, how do you become

01:02:42.880 a profitable company?

01:02:43.780 And if we get bigger in the future and, and, and we have more marketing budget to spend on

01:02:49.380 things, I would love to maybe get back into skateboarding in a much bigger way where we

01:02:53.440 can actually write the kind of checks that we have to compete against with Monster or Red

01:02:59.400 Bull or any of these other companies that can just throw money at guys.

01:03:02.720 Like how are we actually going to go make, make a big debt unless we're, we just have so

01:03:06.700 much money to spend on.

01:03:07.720 So just two, two last quick questions.

01:03:10.540 This one, you may, may require a longer answer, but when I talk to a lot of people about the

01:03:16.000 brand and when people, I got a bunch of messages from people when I was tweeting, a lot of people

01:03:21.360 say that they, there's two reasons they won't drink it.

01:03:23.880 One, there's like this hippie dippy, it's not really political, but there are these people

01:03:28.040 who believe that water contains emotional energy.

01:03:30.320 I'm sure you're aware of this.

01:03:32.320 Yeah.

01:03:32.760 We made a commercial making fun of that very recently.

01:03:35.040 Yeah.

01:03:35.340 They're like water molecules.

01:03:36.580 They're like, I won't drink anything called death because it's bad for the spirit.

01:03:39.720 But there are people who have said you're either mock or legitimate cursing and satanic

01:03:44.760 worship or prayer of the water means they'll never touch it.

01:03:48.420 And I'm not, I'm not, you know, that deeply theistic.

01:03:52.240 So I'm like, I don't know, I drank it, whatever I can't right here.

01:03:55.740 But do you think that's going to impact your growth?

01:03:58.280 This, this, there, there are a lot of people who are rather pious, I suppose, who won't

01:04:02.440 go near the brand and that's going to inhibit your, your, your growth capability.

01:04:06.240 Yeah.

01:04:06.760 Well, two things.

01:04:07.820 One, it's not a lot of people.

01:04:09.100 Um, I think most people always forget about social media.

01:04:12.820 What you may or may not know is like the 90, 10, one rule.

01:04:17.300 Yep.

01:04:17.500 Yeah.

01:04:18.460 90% of people who are viewing social media do not interact with it.

01:04:23.400 They treat it more like a television.

01:04:24.920 They're just watching kind of the circus.

01:04:27.360 10% of the people watching social media will do a light action.

01:04:32.380 Like maybe I'll click the like button.

01:04:34.680 Maybe that's 10%.

01:04:36.020 Only 1% of the people consuming social will actually take the time to write and comment

01:04:42.960 on something.

01:04:43.600 And then of that 1%, how many are the people who are like the angry people?

01:04:48.660 So I tell people all the time, people try to make business decisions based on angry things

01:04:54.520 they see on social media.

01:04:55.760 But the reality of what's happening is like, imagine being in a football stadium sold out.

01:05:00.180 There's one group of 10 people at the top screaming that this team should sell.

01:05:07.140 And they're the worst team ever.

01:05:08.180 However, how much does the actual ownership of that team going to put stock in those 10

01:05:13.280 people when you've got literally a full stadium of other people who are all bought in?

01:05:17.520 But because of the way social media works, you only see the negative stuff really easy.

01:05:22.880 So it could feel like it's a lot more than it is.

01:05:25.620 But you really have to look at, no, no, no.

01:05:27.280 What's actually happening?

01:05:28.640 I tell my team all the time, hey, if we have 20,000 likes and two angry comments, I'll take

01:05:35.300 20,000 to two all day.

01:05:36.820 You're never going to have 100% of people who love you.

01:05:39.920 Same is true for Yelp and Google reviews.

01:05:42.380 So I guess just last question.

01:05:43.540 First, I do appreciate you having the conversation.

01:05:46.220 It's very, very respectable.

01:05:48.280 Will you change the, in some meaningful way, the branding or whatever on these cans to make

01:05:55.580 it very apparent that there's plastic in them?

01:05:59.740 Yeah, so we are starting to make the updates of having our tagline be more specific to

01:06:06.200 say, debt to plastic bottles.

01:06:07.800 So we're going to have that on cans packaging.

01:06:10.560 Now, the way the cans and packaging works, it's going to probably have to happen in cycles

01:06:14.700 over time because there's inventory.

01:06:16.480 And we're not obviously going to like burn inventory.

01:06:18.200 And again, what we feel like is that the number of people that it's actually, you know, that

01:06:22.320 this is actually an issue for is small.

01:06:24.400 So we're going to continue to update it.

01:06:26.640 We already have it updated on our website.

01:06:29.320 And we'll continue to, you know, where we can make things very clear on the packaging.

01:06:34.000 But also, again, be very clear about what that means.

01:06:37.420 It's like just saying it contains plastic, but being clear about, okay, well, so what?

01:06:43.740 What does that mean?

01:06:44.420 Is it worse for me?

01:06:45.680 Is there more microplastic?

01:06:46.860 Is it less than a bottle?

01:06:48.380 Because you don't just want to give a blanket statement that people could then misinterpret

01:06:51.980 three other ways.

01:06:52.980 It's like every time you try to fix one problem, you could make three more, right?

01:06:55.640 Here's what I would appreciate.

01:06:57.300 And it's very difficult.

01:06:59.160 I don't think you can write out this huge paragraph like you've done in your site explaining

01:07:02.960 that cans contain substantially less plastic, though there is still going to be some

01:07:06.360 in there.

01:07:06.580 How do you let people know that you are doing better than a PET bottle, but the can is line

01:07:12.940 with plastic, you're still substantially better off.

01:07:15.920 It's very difficult to convey, which is why I took issue with just hashtag death to plastic.

01:07:19.720 I don't feel that death to plastic bottles rectifies any of the past or anything like

01:07:25.860 that.

01:07:26.140 Not that I know how you would do that other than update the site.

01:07:29.120 But as far as changing the marketing so that people know you're not saying outright all

01:07:33.900 plastic or the can doesn't contain plastic.

01:07:35.880 It's probably a step in the right direction.

01:07:38.720 You know, I got one more question for you, actually, because I'm looking at this can.

01:07:43.760 The iced tea says manufactured for liquid death in Los Angeles, California, and the ingredient

01:07:48.400 just says water.

01:07:49.340 What's the water source for this?

01:07:50.640 So for almost all soda, iced tea, anything that's not bottled water, they're using what's called

01:07:58.620 usually RO, reverse osmosis water.

01:08:02.360 Is that what you guys are doing?

01:08:04.180 For our flavored beverages, we use reverse osmosis water, which is basically, it's municipal

01:08:12.100 water, tap water that gets filtered of literally everything that's possibly in the water is filtered

01:08:17.220 out of it.

01:08:17.940 It's how basically all soda, all drinks are made.

01:08:20.840 That's the other thing about bottled water that most people don't realize.

01:08:23.820 Most of the big bottled water companies, Essentia, Aquafina, Dasani, that's all just purified

01:08:31.380 municipal tap water.

01:08:32.620 It's not actual premium source spring water.

01:08:35.560 So this is actually really funny.

01:08:37.600 Dasani's water source is municipal public water supplies.

01:08:40.380 Yes.

01:08:41.200 And they sell, they do a billion dollars in revenue.

01:08:44.800 They put tap water in plastic bottles and they sell, they're the number two bottled water

01:08:50.540 brand.

01:08:50.880 It's crazy.

01:08:51.340 So just to clarify, the rest in peach that I'm holding, you guys take, it's municipal

01:08:57.120 water that's reverse osmosis filtered and then used to brew your drinks.

01:09:01.180 Exactly.

01:09:01.800 Yeah.

01:09:01.860 Okay.

01:09:02.180 Right on.

01:09:02.400 Well, um, I think I've, I've, I've made my claim.

01:09:05.080 I think if you guys are honest in your commitment to, you know, I, I will add what a silly debate

01:09:11.740 for me to be having, you know, no respect to you, just like getting me getting angry over

01:09:16.000 the plastic branding on a liquid death thing.

01:09:18.160 I tweet about it.

01:09:18.740 And then here we're having a conversation.

01:09:20.040 Um, I respect that you're having a conversation.

01:09:21.720 And if you, if you, uh, our guys are committed to updating that so that people are aware, then,

01:09:26.840 uh, I don't know, I guess I'm content, you know, that's all, that's all I'm mad about.

01:09:32.400 All right.

01:09:32.720 And if you need a show sponsor, you know who to call.

01:09:34.920 Oh, here it goes.

01:09:35.640 Huh?

01:09:36.240 Uh, yeah.

01:09:37.700 Uh, well, anyway, man, is there anything else you want to add before we wrap up?

01:09:41.420 No, like I said, thank, I appreciate you having the call.

01:09:43.420 And again, like I'm big on a big reason.

01:09:46.380 I I'm, I'm a fan of you, even though we might not totally align on certain political things

01:09:51.140 and things like that.

01:09:51.980 What I do like is that I do believe the problem right now is most of us here in the world,

01:09:56.860 we live in the middle and there's so much extreme on either side that is somehow steering

01:10:02.900 the conversation and that.

01:10:04.720 And I feel like we need more people getting in the middle where it's like, people just

01:10:08.620 need to talk to each other and not have it be, well, I'm left. 0.74

01:10:11.820 So I'm never going to fucking talk to someone on the right or, you know, everything about 1.00

01:10:16.960 Trump is just, he's a fucking villain and a Nazi and everything else. 0.99

01:10:19.960 Like, yeah, I don't love Trump, but is there some stuff I think he does is good? 1.00

01:10:24.320 Sure.

01:10:24.740 Yeah. 0.98

01:10:25.020 Is there a lot of shitty things he does? 0.98

01:10:26.820 Yeah. 0.95

01:10:27.500 But it's like, I feel like we need more conversation and make, try to somehow get 0.62

01:10:32.640 back to like, just having dialogues and not having it be just pure fucking vitriol on the 0.96

01:10:37.700 other side. 0.83

01:10:38.480 I unfortunately don't know if we're trending in a positive direction in that regard, but

01:10:42.600 I do appreciate you having conversations.

01:10:44.480 So you got like social media or anything you want to shout out before we wrap?

01:10:47.860 No, no, no.

01:10:48.300 I think we're good.

01:10:49.300 Right on, man.

01:10:49.780 Well, again, I do appreciate it.

01:10:51.420 Thanks for the call.

01:10:51.960 Thanks for the conversation.

01:10:53.660 I saw that you updated your website the other day.

01:10:55.680 Thought that was a good thing.

01:10:57.300 And I appreciate you being as candid as you have.

01:10:59.400 I look forward to seeing the new labels on Liquid Death.

01:11:01.440 And I will add, I am impressed.

01:11:03.600 And you're doing substantially better than literally any other beverage CEO in addressing

01:11:07.380 concerns consumers have.

01:11:08.720 I can't believe you gave me the time of day to actually yell at you on the internet about

01:11:11.540 why I'm pissed about the marketing, but you did it.

01:11:13.540 So I have to respect it.

01:11:14.840 So brother, thanks for hanging out.

01:11:16.280 And I guess I'll just, I'll see you on X.

01:11:18.320 All right.

01:11:18.620 Thanks brother.

01:11:19.180 Have a go and take care.

01:11:21.340 Well, I got to give it to him at least as far as it goes with that.

01:11:23.360 Uh, he had the conversation.

01:11:26.340 He addressed the concerns.

01:11:27.600 We'll see what it means moving forward.

01:11:29.540 And, uh, I will stress, it is kind of funny and silly that it's like the least, uh, important

01:11:36.520 thing, I guess.

01:11:38.400 Um, there's some good stuff he clarified.

01:11:42.200 Uh, I will reiterate my position just as I wrap this up.

01:11:45.340 Death to plastic leads people to believe they don't use plastic.

01:11:48.720 The can itself says it contains 70% recycled materials saying infinitely recyclable implies

01:11:56.040 that they are actually recycling 100%.

01:11:58.840 They're not.

01:11:59.260 There's plastic in it.

01:12:00.620 And, uh, again, it says literally in the can, 70% recycled material.

01:12:03.620 So they are still a portion being reused.

01:12:05.880 The aluminum is.

01:12:07.200 And I'll also stress when I looked at their nonprofits, I try to be light on this one.

01:12:10.860 I'm not here to just rag on someone and be insulting or mean, but for a small nonprofit

01:12:15.460 to bring in only 1.2 million and this company to make as much as they do, I'm curious what

01:12:20.020 their actual profits are and if it really is that much.

01:12:22.700 He says they're actually not.

01:12:24.360 Uh, I also think it's absolutely hilarious because I'll, I'm going to pull this one back

01:12:27.960 up.

01:12:29.160 Uh, he owes me a million dollars because, uh, he made the bet 10% of the profits from every

01:12:35.620 can is donated to help kill plastic pollution.

01:12:37.420 And he says, that's not correct.

01:12:38.480 That's wrong.

01:12:38.980 Well, that's what you're marketing.

01:12:40.760 And I will stress this.

01:12:42.500 Well, I'm not going to be petty.

01:12:44.200 I respect, I got to put in perspective, ain't no other drink CEO is going to come on here

01:12:49.420 and have this conversation with me, but I'm going to stress my friend, someone, someone

01:12:52.820 commented 30% disappears.

01:12:54.220 Fair point.

01:12:55.140 It oxidizes.

01:12:56.380 I'm going to stress.

01:12:57.340 He did say to me, he knew a portion of their consumer base, believe their products did not

01:13:02.640 contain plastic, didn't update the packaging.

01:13:06.200 So that, that still irks me.

01:13:07.880 I mean, that's still kind of shady, right?

01:13:09.860 But not everybody is going to be perfect.

01:13:13.080 And if he's, if he's going to address it and he's going to take action now, because

01:13:16.720 there's some weight behind it, he's doing better than everybody else, I guess.

01:13:20.300 So I'll take, I'll take it.

01:13:21.360 Hey, this is a special live stream.

01:13:22.920 I had fun.

01:13:23.900 Uh, Mike, I appreciate it.

01:13:25.440 Thank you guys for watching this, uh, weird stream and conversation.

01:13:28.440 I think even outside of what my argument or disagreement may be with Mike, the conversation

01:13:34.400 may have been very informative for many of you to understand packaging, pressing, drink

01:13:38.520 monopolies.

01:13:39.980 A dude's got a great point about how you can't get into the space because Pepsi and Coke own

01:13:43.560 everything.

01:13:44.240 People have asked us why we don't do cold brew cans.

01:13:46.460 We wanted to because the expense, the cost is, is just absolutely insane.

01:13:50.300 As for our gag product, pool water, we can sell this locally at low cost.

01:13:55.880 If we want to have this be available in other regions, I don't know.

01:13:58.140 That's where it gets crazy because we can actually, the, the, the, the supplier and producer

01:14:01.220 is actually within 10 minutes driving from us.

01:14:03.100 That's why we could do this.

01:14:04.220 But if you do order it, we are going to put it up.

01:14:06.500 Shipping is going to be expensive depending on where you are.

01:14:08.260 If you're local, it'll be dirt cheap.

01:14:09.860 So the other thing I'm going to stress too, um, they could do glass, right?

01:14:14.520 I'm, I'm not going to attack liquid death because they're not a glass bottle company.

01:14:19.940 I'm angry over their marketing because if they want to say death to plastic, even death

01:14:23.720 to plastic bottles, like he's saying is going to do, I still think it's fair for me to say

01:14:27.160 Topo Chico, Mineragua, other glass bottles with single use pop top caps have substantially,

01:14:33.680 they have 10% of the plastic that's in this can.

01:14:36.600 You could do better, but you know, don't let the perfect be the end and be the good guys.

01:14:41.460 Thanks for hanging out.

01:14:42.120 This has been fun.

01:14:42.620 I'm going to go eat food because normally I'd be eating food by now.

01:14:45.260 I really enjoyed this and I, I really do appreciate Mike having this conversation.

01:14:50.160 Uh, I wish liquid death the best and I don't want anybody to fail.

01:14:54.560 And, uh, it, it, it hurts my heart that he fired his skate team, but he's not wrong

01:14:57.860 mathematically.

01:14:58.680 He's just wrong spiritually.

01:15:00.600 Not that it matters for a business.

01:15:02.080 Thanks for hanging out guys.

01:15:03.300 We'll see you tonight for Timcast IRL.

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The Culture War - Tim Pool - October 18, 2025

Tim Pool Vs. Liquid Death CEO DEBATE w⧸ Mike Cessario (Liquid Death)

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Summary

Transcript