Outliers with Daniel Scrivner: Explore the Greatest Innovators, Founders, and Investors

We explore healthcare as a product rather than a service. We’re joined by Adrian Aoun, Forward’s CEO and Founder, and we cover why healthcare should be a product, not a service, being problem-oriented as a founder, and why the health insurance industry is destined to fall. 

“Solutions don't really matter. Problems matter.” – Adrian Aoun

EPISODE GUIDE (LINKS, QUOTES, NOTES, AND BOOKS MENTIONED)

https://www.danielscrivner.com/notes/forward-adrian-aoun  

FULL TEXT TRANSCRIPT

https://www.danielscrivner.com/notes/forward-adrian-aoun-transcript 

CHAPTERS

This episode is our definitive guide to healthcare as a product rather than a service. In it we cover:

(00:00:00) – Introduction

(00:02:37) – From Google to Forward

(00:09:01) – Why founders should be problem-oriented

(00:12:31) – Advising the President on the future of technology

(00:17:22) – The root problem of the healthcare industry

(00:25:24) – Why healthcare should be a product, not a service

(00:30:01) – The imminent fall of health insurance

(00:35:06) – Does the healthcare system really matter?

(00:45:47) – Why medical specialties don’t make sense

(00:55:02) – How Forward is a mission that happens to have a company attached to it

ABOUT FORWARD

Adrian Aoun is founder and CEO of Forward, which is building an insurance-free healthcare system focused on preventative healthcare from the ground up. Forward was founded in 2017 to invert the typical model of healthcare, which follows the service model where one patient sees a single doctor whenever they need care. Forward is building healthcare focused on health and preventative care that's 1) productized so you can use it anytime, anywhere, 2) scalable so it's affordable to everyone, and 3) always on with help available through the Forward app and a network of offices around the US. This might sound like, well, how healthcare should have been all along, which is the goal.

This episode is a special one. In it we cover why Adrian is fanatical about being problem-focused rather than solution-focused, what he learned leading special projects for Sergey Brin at Google, and why Forward is focused on productizing healthcare to bring down the cost of treatments, make healthcare available 24/7, help customers manage all aspects of their health, and increase the pace of innovation and iteration.

Adrian shares his perspective on what happens as the percentage of GDP dedicated to healthcare reaches 30% and even 40%, and he talks through how he uses extreme perspectives to pick apart complex issues and come to ground truths.

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Overcast: https://overcast.fm/itunes1523851182

ABOUT OUTLIER ACADEMY

Learn timeless lessons on work and life from iconic founders, world-renown investors, and bestselling authors. Outlier Academy is the forever school for those chasing greatness. Past guests include Gokul Rajaram of DoorDash, Scott Belsky of Benchmark and Adobe, Joey Krug of Pantera Capital, Mark Sisson of Primal Kitchen, Luke Gromen of The Forest for the Trees, and Brian Scudamore of 1-800-GOT-JUNK.

Website: https://www.outlieracademy.com

Twitter: https://www.twitter.com/outlieracademy

ABOUT DANIEL SCRIVNER

Outlier Academy is hosted by Daniel Scrivner. Over the last 15 years, Daniel has led design teams at Square and Apple, turned around a $3M+ ARR SaaS business, and invested in more than 100 companies. He launched Outlier Academy in 2020 to learn from the world’s best founders, investors, authors, and peak performance experts.

Website: https://www.danielscrivner.com

Twitter: https://www.twitter.com/danielscrivner

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Listen to one of our favorite moments from tomorrow’s Spotlight episode featuring Forward with Adrian Aoun, where we explore healthcare as a product rather than a service. We’re joined by Adrian Aoun, Forward’s CEO and Founder, and we cover why healthcare should be a product, not a service, being problem-oriented as a founder, and why the health insurance industry is destined to fall.

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We deconstruct Adrian Aoun's peak performance playbook—from his favorite book to the tiny habit that's had the biggest impact on his life. Adrian Aoun is the CEO and Founder of Forward. We cover why medical wearables don’t work, focusing on impact, and creating companies that can change the world.

“Care deeply about the problem, not about your idea.” – Adrian Aoun

EPISODE GUIDE (LINKS, QUOTES, NOTES, AND BOOKS MENTIONED)

https://www.danielscrivner.com/notes/adrian-aoun-playbook/ 

FULL TEXT TRANSCRIPT

https://www.danielscrivner.com/notes/adrian-aoun-playbook-transcript/ 

CHAPTERS

In this episode, we deconstruct Adrian Aoun’s peak performance playbook—from their favorite book to the tiny habit that's had the biggest impact on their life. In it we cover:

(00:00:00) – Introduction

(00:02:21) – Creating companies that change the world

(00:06:07) – On being stubborn and persistent

(00:09:51) – Why medical wearables aren’t working

(00:14:03) – It’s just as easy to work on something big as something that’s small

(00:16:19) – Everything should relate to the problem

(00:17:39) – On fiction and factfulness

(00:19:20) – Cycling as meditation

(00:20:23) – The only thing that matters is impact

ABOUT ADRIAN AOUN

Adrian Aoun is the founder and CEO of Forward, which is building an insurance-free healthcare system focused on preventative healthcare from the ground up. Forward was founded in 2017 to invert the typical model of healthcare. Where most healthcare follows the service model, where one patient sees a single doctor only when they need care, Forward is building healthcare focused on health and preventative care. It's productized so you can use it anytime, anywhere. It's scalable so it's affordable for everyone and always on with help available through Forward's app, as well as a network of doctors' offices around the United States, which might sound like, well, how healthcare should have been all along, which is the goal.

In this episode, Adrian shares why he's so fanatical about being problem-focused rather than solution-focused and how he runs problem-centric brainstorms at Forward, where the goal is to beat up on other people's ideas in the name of getting to the best ideas. What he learned working with Sergey Brin and Eric Schmidt at Google, as well as the other advisors on the President's Council of Advisors on Science and Technology, why modern fitness wearables are broken, and why Adrian thinks we need to build tools to tell people what to do with that data, not just share the data with them.

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🎙 LISTEN ON

iTunes: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/outlier-academy/id1523851182

Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/58edVNgqaPNaCSGSxM6pef?si=88f37a5d20434775

Overcast: https://overcast.fm/itunes1523851182

ABOUT OUTLIER ACADEMY

Learn timeless lessons on work and life from iconic founders, world-renown investors, and bestselling authors. Outlier Academy is the forever school for those chasing greatness. Past guests include Gokul Rajaram of DoorDash, Scott Belsky of Benchmark and Adobe, Joey Krug of Pantera Capital, Mark Sisson of Primal Kitchen, Luke Gromen of The Forest for the Trees, and Brian Scudamore of 1-800-GOT-JUNK.

Website: https://www.outlieracademy.com

Twitter: https://www.twitter.com/outlieracademy

ABOUT DANIEL SCRIVNER

Outlier Academy is hosted by Daniel Scrivner. Over the last 15 years, Daniel has led design teams at Square and Apple, turned around a $3M+ ARR SaaS business, and invested in more than 100 companies. He launched Outlier Academy in 2020 to learn from the world’s best founders, investors, authors, and peak performance experts.

Website: https://www.danielscrivner.com

Twitter: https://www.twitter.com/danielscrivner

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Listen to one of our favorite moments from tomorrow’s 20 Minute Playbook episode featuring Adrian Aoun of Forward. In it, we deconstruct Adrian's peak performance playbook—from his favorite book to the tiny habit that's had the biggest impact on his life. Adrian Aoun is the CEO and Founder of Forward. We cover why medical wearables don’t work, focusing on impact, and creating companies that can change the world.

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This week we’re profiling Justin Mares, who has built 3 direct-to-consumer brands in Kettle & Fire, Perfect Keto, and Surely Wine that have all reached tens of millions in revenue. All by finding and owning emerging health and wellness trends.

Read the newsletter companion to this episode:

https://www.cheatsheetnewsletter.com/p/spotting-and-owning-trends

Here are the 3 big ideas in this week's Cheat Sheet:

How to spot trends and build businesses to own them.

Concept: Wedge versus ramp shaped businesses.

Reminder: Why it pays to bring on a Head of Finance early.

Listen, watch, or explore more of this week’s episodes:

#143 Kettle & Fire's Justin Mares | Identifying Trends, 5-Minute Mini Workouts, 6 To Dos Per Day, Favorite Books, and More

Listen Now | Watch Now | Episode Guide | Transcript

#144 Kettle & Fire, Perfect Keto, and Surely Wine: Spotting Trends and Building D2C Brands to Own Them | Justin Mares, Serial Entrepreneur

Listen Now | Watch Now | Episode Guide | Transcript

Sign up for the Cheat Sheet newsletter:

https://www.cheatsheetnewsletter.com

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This week we’re profiling Justin Mares, who has built 3 direct-to-consumer brands in Kettle & Fire, Perfect Keto, and Surely Wine that have all reached tens of millions in revenue. All by finding and owning emerging health and wellness trends.

Here are the 3 big ideas in this week's Cheat Sheet:

How to spot trends and build businesses to own them.

Concept: Wedge versus ramp shaped businesses.

Reminder: Why it pays to bring on a Head of Finance early.

Sign up for the Cheat Sheet newsletter:

https://www.cheatsheetnewsletter.com

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Learn how Justin Mares identifies trends and builds direct-to-consumer businesses (and brands) to own them. Including all of the hard lessons that Justin has learned along the way, from why he’s learned to bring on a head of finance early, why consumer business are “cashflow businesses”, to how he competes with generic brands. And so much more.

“The Iron Law of Ecommerce across everything I’ve ever started is that I start out thinking I’m selling to people like me and it always turns out that it’s 45-year old women that are buying the product.” — Justin Mares

EPISODE GUIDE (LINKS, QUOTES, NOTES, AND BOOKS MENTIONED)

https://www.danielscrivner.com/notes/kettle-and-fire-perfect-keto-surely-wines-justin-mares 

FULL TEXT TRANSCRIPT

https://www.danielscrivner.com/notes/kettle-and-fire-perfect-keto-surely-wines-justin-mares-transcript/   

CHAPTERS

(00:00:00) - Introduction

(00:01:19) - Getting Fired from 13 Jobs and Discovering Entrepreneurship

(00:08:34) - The Origin Story of Kettle & Fire

(00:15:39) - Evolution of Kettle & Fire’s Branding and Packaging

(00:19:10) - Distribution: Direct-to-Consumer vs Wholesale & Retail

(00:22:10) - How to Compete with Generic Store Brands

(00:24:27) - The Challenges of Building a Sustainably Profitable Business

(00:27:13) - Raising Venture Capital for Consumer Brands

(00:33:01) - Painful Lessons: $800k in Unpaid Invoices and Why Finance is Strategic

(00:39:24) - Launching Perfect Keto and Surely Non-Alcoholic Wine

(00:41:48) - Justin’s Annual Review and Goal Setting Process

(00:45:44) - Why Extreme People Have Extreme Outcomes

(00:49:32) - How to Become an Extreme Person

ABOUT THE COMPANIES

Kettle & Fire, Perfect Keto, and Surely Wine all have something in common. They were founded by Justin Mares and built to own an emerging health and wellness trend—from drinking more bone broth, to making the move to a keto diet, or deciding to drink only non-alcoholic wine.

Listeners can save 15% off any non-subscription Kettle & Fire order by using promo code Outlier15 when checking out on KettleAndFire.com.

💌 FREE NEWSLETTER

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🎙 LISTEN ON

iTunes: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/outlier-academy/id1523851182

Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/58edVNgqaPNaCSGSxM6pef?si=88f37a5d20434775

Overcast: https://overcast.fm/itunes1523851182

ABOUT OUTLIER ACADEMY

Learn timeless lessons on work and life from iconic founders, world-renown investors, and bestselling authors. Outlier Academy is the forever school for those chasing greatness. Past guests include Gokul Rajaram of DoorDash, Scott Belsky of Benchmark and Adobe, Joey Krug of Pantera Capital, Mark Sisson of Primal Kitchen, Luke Gromen of The Forest for the Trees, and Brian Scudamore of 1-800-GOT-JUNK.

Website: https://www.outlieracademy.com

Twitter: https://www.twitter.com/outlieracademy

ABOUT DANIEL SCRIVNER

Outlier Academy is hosted by Daniel Scrivner. Over the last 15 years, Daniel has led design teams at Square and Apple, turned around a $3M+ ARR SaaS business, and invested in more than 100 companies. He launched Outlier Academy in 2020 to learn from the world’s best founders, investors, authors, and peak performance experts.

Website: https://www.danielscrivner.com

Twitter: https://www.twitter.com/danielscrivner

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Listen to one of our favorite moments from tomorrow’s Spotlight episode Justin Mares, Serial Entrepreneur and Founder of Kettle & Fire, Perfect Keto, and Surely Wine.

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Justin Mares has a knack for identifying trends and building D2C businesses to own them—including Kettle & Fire, Perfect Keto, and Surely Wine. Learn how he identifies trends, why he focuses on just 6 tasks each day, how he gets in 25+ minutes of exercise with tiny 5-minute mini workouts during the day, and more.

“I’ve learned to appreciate that people systematically undervalue and write off things that are super weird or that they just don’t understand. So I look for areas where most people think that X has a probability of 10% and I think it’s really closer to 40-50%.” — Justin Mares

EPISODE GUIDE (LINKS, QUOTES, NOTES, AND BOOKS MENTIONED)

https://www.danielscrivner.com/notes/justin-mares-20-minute-playbook   

FULL TEXT TRANSCRIPT

https://www.danielscrivner.com/notes/justin-mares-20-minute-playbook-transcript   

CHAPTERS

(00:00:00) - Introduction

(00:01:06) - Recent Fascination: Environmental Chemicals and Crime

(00:04:43) - Justin Mares’ Daily Routine: Focusing on Six To Dos Per Day

(00:09:12) - Reflection: Enjoy the Ride & Trust the Process

(00:11:45) - Biggest Lessons Learned as an Investor

(00:16:59) - Exercise Routine: Three Lifts Per Week, Mobility, Swimming, and Pickleball

(00:21:06) - Justin Mares’ Superpower: Identifying Trends

(00:23:19) - Tiny Habit: Fitting in 5 Minute Workouts Throughout the Day

(00:24:55) - Favorite Books: The Three-Body Problem & The Company

(00:27:45) - Advice to Younger Self: Spend More Time Learning From Others

ABOUT THE GUEST

Justin Mares is a serial entrepreneur and angel investor. He’s the Founder of Kettle & Fire, Perfect Keto, and Surely Wine and a Venture Partner at Long Journey Ventures. His products are sold in more than 10,000 retail stores, and each of his companies does tens of millions of dollars in annual sales each year. He strives to make a dent in the problems with our food system and improve the trajectory of health in the United States.

💌 FREE NEWSLETTER

https://www.outlieracademy.com/newsletter

🎙 LISTEN ON

iTunes: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/outlier-academy/id1523851182

Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/58edVNgqaPNaCSGSxM6pef?si=88f37a5d20434775

Overcast: https://overcast.fm/itunes1523851182

ABOUT OUTLIER ACADEMY

Learn timeless lessons on work and life from iconic founders, world-renown investors, and bestselling authors. Outlier Academy is the forever school for those chasing greatness. Past guests include Gokul Rajaram of DoorDash, Scott Belsky of Benchmark and Adobe, Joey Krug of Pantera Capital, Mark Sisson of Primal Kitchen, Luke Gromen of The Forest for the Trees, and Brian Scudamore of 1-800-GOT-JUNK.

Website: https://www.outlieracademy.com

Twitter: https://www.twitter.com/outlieracademy

ABOUT DANIEL SCRIVNER

Outlier Academy is hosted by Daniel Scrivner. Over the last 15 years, Daniel has led design teams at Square and Apple, turned around a $3M+ ARR SaaS business, and invested in more than 100 companies. He launched Outlier Academy in 2020 to learn from the world’s best founders, investors, authors, and peak performance experts.

Website: https://www.danielscrivner.com

Twitter: https://www.twitter.com/danielscrivner

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Listen to one of our favorite moments from tomorrow’s 20 Minute Playbook episode featuring Justin Mares, Founder of Kettle & Fire, Perfect Keto, and Surely Wine.

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices