Cocktail Party Hacks for Your Next Get Together

00:00:00.000 | What kind of comes out of this whole experience?

00:00:01.900 | A successful cocktail party has the energy in the room, very high.

00:00:05.860 | And somebody leaves your party saying, wow, that was like the best party.

00:00:10.620 | That was awesome.

00:00:12.060 | And it's so simple.

00:00:13.380 | I got a message from a woman who just read my book and she hosted a party

00:00:16.440 | with name tags and ice breakers.

00:00:18.020 | And she said that night, she and her husband got multiple text messages

00:00:22.180 | from friends saying that it was the best party that they'd ever thrown.

00:00:25.500 | Why?

00:00:26.100 | Because they just added a little structure to it.

00:00:29.360 | So what's the feeling?

00:00:30.480 | It's that feeling that when you're done hosting, you say that

00:00:34.340 | was awesome, and that was also easy.

00:00:36.380 | Like I could do that again, because I think we've all hosted parties where

00:00:40.440 | we're absolutely drained afterwards.

00:00:42.540 | And while it may have been a success, we never want to do it again.

00:00:45.540 | Hello and welcome to another episode of all the hacks show about

00:00:49.240 | upgrading your life, money, and travel.

00:00:51.200 | If you're new here, I'm your host, Chris Hutchins, and I'm a diehard

00:00:54.200 | optimizer who loves doing all the research to get the best experience

00:00:57.720 | in life without an expensive price tag.

00:00:59.800 | So to make this happen, I sit down with the best experts each week and

00:01:03.800 | I learned all their strategies, tactics, and frameworks that shape their success.

00:01:07.440 | So you hear the phrase cocktail party.

00:01:10.640 | You might think like me, 1960s, dressed up couples, sipping

00:01:14.520 | martinis on a Mad Men set.

00:01:16.200 | But that's not exactly what my guest, Nick Gray means when he says that almost

00:01:20.280 | everyone should be hosting cocktail parties.

00:01:22.080 | Nick's the author of a new book called the two hour cocktail party, how to

00:01:26.040 | build big relationships with small gatherings, and he's on a mission to

00:01:29.720 | get people to have more parties, to make connections, build friendships,

00:01:32.960 | and live a richer life now between kids and COVID I haven't hosted many

00:01:37.360 | gatherings in a while, but when Nick told me he wrote his book for people

00:01:40.840 | like me and not for people who already host events all the time, I was really

00:01:45.080 | excited, so we're going to get tactical in this conversation, I want to hear

00:01:48.960 | why a cocktail party is a better way to get to know people than just having

00:01:52.240 | dinner, why Nick thinks name tags and icebreakers are non-negotiable for

00:01:56.320 | parties, and I want to get a complete run through of everything you need

00:02:00.280 | to do to make an event easy and effortless from invites to food and

00:02:03.880 | drink to getting to leave on time.

00:02:05.920 | But that's not all because Nick also founded a company called Museum Hacks

00:02:11.280 | to lead these renegade tours of museums like the Met in New York

00:02:14.940 | and others around the country.

00:02:16.320 | It's been featured in all kinds of media from the Wall Street

00:02:19.040 | Journal to the New York Times.

00:02:20.600 | And after a little research, I'm hoping I can take one of these tours soon.

00:02:23.640 | But in the meantime, I will make sure we also get all his Museum Hacks today too.

00:02:28.040 | And on top of that, Nick is an avid traveler and a fellow optimizer, so

00:02:32.760 | I'm certain we'll uncover some other hidden gems in this conversation.

00:02:35.840 | So let's get started.

00:02:37.160 | Nick, welcome to the show.

00:02:44.400 | I'm happy to be here.

00:02:45.880 | We're going to get real tactical today.

00:02:47.600 | That's fantastic.

00:02:48.960 | So I'm going to jump right in and just ask, why cocktail parties?

00:02:52.840 | You can get 80% of the benefits of hosting a dinner party with 20% of

00:02:59.560 | the work by hosting a cocktail party.

00:03:01.840 | Now, like anybody can write a book to teach you how to host one dinner

00:03:05.880 | party, but the reality is, is that most people will never do it again.

00:03:10.240 | And dinner parties are too hard.

00:03:12.720 | They're too complicated.

00:03:13.840 | A lot of people give entrepreneurs this advice, like host a dinner

00:03:17.080 | party or host a mastermind, and I think that's actually terrible

00:03:20.480 | advice for most people, you get most of the benefits from hosting when you

00:03:25.080 | can actually make it a habit and something where you always have

00:03:28.840 | your next party on the calendar.

00:03:31.000 | To do that, I built the easiest possible framework and

00:03:34.240 | formula for hosting events.

00:03:35.760 | So I've looked at that formula and I know you have all these things,

00:03:38.840 | name tags, icebreakers, firm stopping times, what's important?

00:03:43.240 | Why are they important?

00:03:44.360 | And how do you actually get people to kind of play along and agree to them?

00:03:47.520 | Well, one of the first things is that the best day to host an event

00:03:52.240 | might not be the one that you think.

00:03:53.800 | For example, I highly suggest that everybody hosts their parties

00:03:57.680 | on Monday, Tuesday, or Wednesday nights.

00:04:01.120 | Why those?

00:04:02.040 | We can go into that if you want, basically because they're

00:04:04.520 | non-competitive social nights.

00:04:07.480 | Most people don't have things going on.

00:04:09.520 | Second of all is I always give a stop time to my parties, two hours.

00:04:14.200 | There's a start time, there's an end time, and there's hidden

00:04:16.960 | benefits in having a stop time.

00:04:18.760 | One of which is that it gets all your guests to show up on time, right?

00:04:22.480 | When you're a host, you know, that beginning hour when

00:04:25.760 | nobody really shows up, it's slow.

00:04:27.600 | When you have a tight two hour thing, then folks show up on time and you end

00:04:33.360 | the party when things are going well, so that your friends, guests, your

00:04:36.600 | colleagues, they want to come back the next time that you host.

00:04:39.760 | And when you host regularly, is it always the same people or do

00:04:43.000 | people feel left out or how does that work?

00:04:44.640 | Great question.

00:04:45.400 | I usually mix it up.

00:04:46.360 | I'll do half repeat guests, half new guests.

00:04:49.080 | Um, you really get the best benefits when you're going through life.

00:04:53.920 | Let's say that you're hosting a cocktail party once every six weeks.

00:04:57.120 | Between those parties, you're meeting all these random people.

00:05:01.160 | And here's why, here's why I did this, why I can change your listener's life.

00:05:05.040 | We meet all these interesting people that we never do anything with.

00:05:10.240 | Like you meet them, they're cool.

00:05:12.400 | And you're like, oh, that person was interesting, but I'm not going to go out

00:05:15.520 | of my way to schedule a dinner with them.

00:05:17.280 | I'm not going to go out of my way to, you know, schedule a one-on-one meeting

00:05:22.120 | or a hangout with them because life's busy and things happen.

00:05:25.400 | When you have a cocktail party, you get to kind of collect all of those

00:05:29.760 | interesting people that you meet through life and bring them back in.

00:05:34.480 | And then sort of almost audition them to see if you want to be friends with them

00:05:39.080 | or build a relationship, almost something like that.

00:05:41.400 | I hope that doesn't sound bad.

00:05:43.040 | No, no, it's funny.

00:05:44.600 | I, we went to a birthday party, uh, for a kid named Jackson.

00:05:48.800 | Uh, I'd never met Jackson my whole life.

00:05:51.520 | My daughter, uh, has met him at the park with our au pair.

00:05:55.280 | And we got this kind of invite through the nanny group to us.

00:05:59.840 | And so we go to this party.

00:06:00.520 | We don't know a single person.

00:06:02.000 | And now we just met, I don't know, 10 couples with kids, our kids age.

00:06:06.280 | And I will share this is because we didn't know what to do with them.

00:06:09.760 | We're like, you seem cool.

00:06:10.760 | We've got kids the same age, but do we really want to orchestrate

00:06:13.680 | 10 play dates or group play?

00:06:15.440 | Like, it just seemed like we met these interesting parents

00:06:18.080 | and we didn't know what to do.

00:06:18.840 | So you've sold me on the fact that like dinner is not going to happen.

00:06:22.160 | I'm not going to schedule 10 dinners because that's going to take me the next,

00:06:25.680 | I don't know, 10, it feels like 10 months of, of dinners straight.

00:06:29.600 | So that's the, like, I get it.

00:06:32.200 | I get why I should do it, but it seems like a lot of work.

00:06:35.120 | So I'd love to just dial in, like, how do you make this?

00:06:39.120 | You said 20% of the work of a dinner party.

00:06:41.240 | How is that possible?

00:06:42.360 | Okay.

00:06:43.040 | I found when I was scheduling dinners that first of all, you have

00:06:45.920 | to stress about all the food, by the way, it's not about the food.

00:06:48.960 | The hack is that if you are insistent on hosting a dinner party, just order out.

00:06:53.440 | Don't try to cook the food yourself.

00:06:55.320 | Nobody cares about the food.

00:06:56.600 | They're coming for the people and for the conversation.

00:06:59.760 | When you order out, it allows you to be a little, a little less stressed about that.

00:07:04.200 | But how is it more efficient?

00:07:06.160 | How can you get 80% of the benefits with 20% of the work?

00:07:09.160 | Well, 80% of the benefits at a dinner party.

00:07:12.080 | Um, have you read the book, um, the art of gathering by Priya Parker?

00:07:19.160 | I have not absolutely fantastic book.

00:07:22.440 | And in there, she says one thing that when you have a dinner party with more

00:07:26.520 | than six people, the conversation will naturally split into two smaller groups.

00:07:31.720 | So if you have a dinner party with eight or dinner party with 10,

00:07:34.080 | the conversation will split.

00:07:35.800 | Unless you're doing Jeffersonian single track with a very skilled facilitator,

00:07:40.160 | moderator, the conversation naturally will split into smaller groups.

00:07:44.080 | And so I generally would have a dinner party with about

00:07:46.320 | six because that's easy to host.

00:07:48.240 | Uh, I find that by hosting a cocktail party and by the way, the sweet spot,

00:07:52.760 | the number of people that you want to have attend is 15 to 20.

00:07:56.840 | Why is that?

00:07:58.120 | Because less than 15, there's not enough energy.

00:08:01.680 | There's not enough dynamic, new connections and possibilities.

00:08:05.480 | If you have a group of 10 people over two hours, you can survey the room

00:08:10.320 | visually and generally you'll talk to pretty much everybody with 15 people.

00:08:14.920 | With 20 people, you probably won't get a chance to talk to everybody.

00:08:19.320 | And it leaves this excitement and energy for all of your guests,

00:08:22.680 | especially in the room as well.

00:08:24.200 | That is a little known fact that the more people you have, the

00:08:29.080 | easier it is for you as a host.

00:08:31.000 | If you are hosting seven people, six people, there's a lot of work.

00:08:35.120 | You're kind of always on, you are the host at all the time.

00:08:39.320 | When you're 15 to 20 people, you get to step back into the role

00:08:43.040 | of facilitator a little bit more.

00:08:44.880 | And my book speaks a lot about that.

00:08:46.440 | I can share those facilitation tips and tricks for you, but that's why for

00:08:51.200 | me, it's so much less work and I can connect with so many more people in the

00:08:55.760 | time it takes to watch a Netflix movie.

00:08:57.520 | So I've got the number of people I've got the day of the week.

00:09:00.720 | Well, you know, is this send a, an e-vite or how do you kind of get

00:09:05.640 | the people to the place and kind of, where do you do it just at your home?

00:09:09.360 | Do you rent a venue?

00:09:10.440 | I'm just going to go through all the questions I have.

00:09:13.000 | Cause in my mind, I'm already starting to plan the next one.

00:09:15.920 | Well, if you're open to it, can we just plan yours?

00:09:19.320 | Can we just do that?

00:09:20.720 | And then I'll tell you step by step.

00:09:22.520 | Okay.

00:09:22.840 | So first step is you need to pick a day and you need to give yourself

00:09:25.960 | three to four weeks minimum in advance.

00:09:29.320 | That's what I call the party runway.

00:09:31.640 | It's so that you can fill up your guest list, have plenty

00:09:34.200 | of time to plan and prepare.

00:09:35.520 | And so to do that, then you need to pick a date, a Monday or Tuesday, Wednesday.

00:09:40.120 | That's minimum three weeks in advance.

00:09:42.160 | Do you have a date that would work for you?

00:09:44.240 | First time here.

00:09:45.520 | Should I go like on the short end, four weeks, I got a date for you that

00:09:49.040 | works in, uh, in August about a month out.

00:09:52.320 | Yeah, probably.

00:09:53.240 | I probably have a date that works in September, like two months out.

00:09:56.120 | August is it let's do it sooner rather than later, because what a lot of

00:10:00.840 | people will say when they host this price, Oh yeah, that makes sense.

00:10:03.680 | I'll do it.

00:10:04.520 | And so I want to do it when it's perfect.

00:10:06.160 | No, like this is something hosting is something that we're going to

00:10:10.280 | do naturally and regularly.

00:10:12.440 | We're not going to wait for it to be perfect.

00:10:14.440 | And so I would even rather you do this first one sooner, just so you

00:10:18.040 | can see how easy it's going to be.

00:10:19.600 | And then you can do one that'll be even better later in September.

00:10:22.640 | So if you have that date, what day of the week is it?

00:10:25.400 | Is it a Monday and Tuesday?

00:10:26.480 | I went Wednesday.

00:10:27.120 | Great.

00:10:27.480 | Now you need to pick a two hour time block.

00:10:30.600 | What two hours for me when I was in New York city, I would choose

00:10:35.000 | seven to 9:00 PM, eight to 10 PM.

00:10:37.680 | Even because I'm single because in New York, people stay up later.

00:10:41.920 | Now I'm in Austin, Texas and people do things earlier.

00:10:44.440 | So here it's more like five to 7:00 PM, six to eight.

00:10:46.960 | What two hour time block would be good for you?

00:10:49.320 | Yeah.

00:10:49.960 | I mean, we have kids and so, you know, I would, I mean, there's a whole

00:10:54.520 | question I have about how does this whole scenario change with children?

00:10:57.640 | Because, you know, our kids eat dinner and go to bed.

00:11:01.160 | Like, do you invite them?

00:11:02.280 | So let me talk about that right now.

00:11:05.040 | Let's talk about that right now.

00:11:06.240 | So what time do your kids go to sleep?

00:11:08.080 | We, well, one is only a month.

00:11:10.800 | So it's just kind of on demand whenever, but, but the two year old, we

00:11:14.080 | usually do dinner around six, six 30.

00:11:16.200 | Do bedtime routine, seven, seven 30, and kind of from seven 30 on, she

00:11:21.320 | might not be asleep, but she's kind of in her room doing her own

00:11:23.720 | thing, hopefully falling asleep.

00:11:25.080 | Uh, so you have a one month old and you have a two month old, right.

00:11:27.760 | Or sorry, a one year old.

00:11:29.360 | Yeah.

00:11:30.000 | One month old and a two year old.

00:11:31.080 | So five to seven could work.

00:11:32.840 | Uh, you know, we would just maybe need someone to help get her some food

00:11:36.640 | so that when the party wraps at seven, we'll go put her down.

00:11:39.760 | So I love that idea for five to 7:00 PM.

00:11:42.040 | And you're speaking a lot about what do you do?

00:11:44.440 | How do you have a party with kids?

00:11:45.800 | And the advice that I've gotten and I've worked and I've trained a lot of people

00:11:49.560 | to host their first party is they say that you have to have the childcare

00:11:54.080 | handled, not just for your kids, but for any of the other people who you

00:11:57.920 | might invite to make it easy for them to say yes, and to swing by.

00:12:01.720 | And so to that extent, can you have childcare that's available, whether

00:12:06.560 | it's your au pair or hiring another babysitter as well, even if you

00:12:11.000 | have to spend an extra, I don't know how much babysitters cost 50, a hundred

00:12:14.800 | dollars, even if you had to spend a little bit extra to have one extra.

00:12:18.520 | Person that was on hand, the concept of the idea would be to have like a

00:12:23.960 | simultaneous children's party in your home, in another room, separate from the

00:12:29.020 | adults, how does that sound?

00:12:30.760 | Or how does that hit for you?

00:12:32.240 | I mean, I think that can work.

00:12:33.640 | Like we could, we could ask around it's in the summer.

00:12:36.040 | There's a lot of kids in our neighborhood that are home from college.

00:12:38.960 | We could probably find a couple of people to help entertain kids or, you

00:12:42.680 | know, I'm, I'm less worried about that and more worried, you know, are, are

00:12:45.240 | the parents going to want to let their kids go hang out with a random person?

00:12:48.160 | Are they going to want them to like hang out in the back, a second half of the

00:12:51.040 | backyard so you can maybe have the kids in the backyard where they're kind of

00:12:54.400 | in eyeshot, but kind of doing their own thing, both of those things, but just

00:12:58.320 | having the extra set of hands available during the party will let you figure

00:13:03.280 | out and feel the vibe.

00:13:04.560 | Do you feel that your, um, questions or concerns of managing the kids during

00:13:09.320 | the party are now handled doing it on a Wednesday night from five to 7:00 PM?

00:13:13.680 | Yeah, I think, I think that, I mean, we'll find out, uh, you know, if anyone

00:13:17.520 | shows up or they're all like, no, I've got kids, I can't do five to seven.

00:13:20.720 | I think the biggest question is if everybody feeds their kids five to six

00:13:24.320 | o'clock, how are the kids going to get fed?

00:13:26.440 | So you might not need parent food, but you know, kids might need food.

00:13:30.800 | Well, I'm so glad that you mentioned that.

00:13:32.440 | Cause if, if one of your listeners is saying, why are they talking

00:13:34.520 | about kids so much?

00:13:35.200 | I don't have kids.

00:13:36.000 | Well, the next step is going to apply both to you and to somebody without kids.

00:13:40.080 | Now that you've picked your proposed date and time Wednesday from what

00:13:45.800 | time was it again from five to seven.

00:13:47.440 | Okay.

00:13:48.140 | You're now going to think about what I call your core group.

00:13:51.800 | Your core group will be your closest friends, neighbors, or colleagues

00:13:56.080 | who you would invite to this party.

00:13:58.440 | And you need a minimum of five of them who would say yes.

00:14:02.880 | So to get to five, you may need to invite eight to 10, even.

00:14:06.840 | So can you think, or can you write down right now, the names of, you know, five

00:14:12.960 | to 10 of those people that you would invite first, that would be part

00:14:17.000 | of what's called your core group.

00:14:18.480 | Yes.

00:14:19.340 | I don't think I'd have to write it down.

00:14:20.680 | Cause you know, I think when we, you know, we've done our, everything

00:14:24.800 | from baby showers to stuff like that.

00:14:26.920 | It's like, I think I have that list prepared somewhere, but we don't

00:14:29.400 | have to go through it all right here.

00:14:30.440 | Good.

00:14:31.460 | Well, you know who that is and you know how to message them.

00:14:34.600 | Your next step is going to be to send them a text message, a DM, however

00:14:39.560 | you communicate most casually saying, Hey, my wife and I are thinking

00:14:43.840 | about hosting a casual cocktail party on Wednesday night from six

00:14:50.080 | to 8:00 PM or from five to 7:00 PM.

00:14:52.160 | Would that work for you?

00:14:54.160 | And if we do it, would you come?

00:14:56.960 | By getting those five first people to say, yes, that's what

00:15:00.720 | you're looking for is five yeses.

00:15:02.400 | You've done a little bit of a survey to know that more or less this will work

00:15:06.560 | for them and now your party is going to happen.

00:15:08.560 | You're not going to make an event page.

00:15:10.160 | You're not going to share it with anybody else until you get those five yeses.

00:15:13.720 | And so since you've set your date out about four weeks, you're going to give

00:15:18.320 | yourself the next one, two, three days to try to collect those five yeses.

00:15:24.080 | If you cannot get the five yeses, because people are saying, uh, no way we can do

00:15:28.120 | that, the kids are going to go down.

00:15:30.320 | I can't work that with our schedule.

00:15:32.240 | Then you're going to modify based on your environmental situation.

00:15:36.400 | You'll say, you know what?

00:15:37.200 | It's actually impossible for us to do this during the weeknight because

00:15:40.600 | the kids were going to rejigger this.

00:15:42.440 | I know that Nick said on a Monday or a Tuesday or Wednesday, let's actually

00:15:46.000 | try this on a Sunday afternoon.

00:15:47.600 | Okay.

00:15:48.480 | You can do that once you've done the first sample, but once you get those

00:15:53.320 | five yeses, now your party is happening and it's off to the races.

00:15:56.720 | Do you think that you would be able to get those five yeses?

00:16:00.360 | Just, I think we can get five yeses though.

00:16:03.280 | When you said Sunday afternoon, my gears went, oh man, Sunday afternoon

00:16:06.680 | feels like the, such a family friendly time after the nap, before dinner,

00:16:10.920 | you could do like four to six, but for the sake of this conversation, let's,

00:16:14.760 | I assume everything else will apply the same.

00:16:17.320 | Okay, good.

00:16:18.120 | So now you've gotten those five yeses.

00:16:20.640 | Your next immediate step is to create an RSVP page to collect

00:16:26.640 | the confirmations from people.

00:16:28.640 | What do we do by collecting the RSVPs?

00:16:30.680 | Have you used any of these like social platforms, paperless post,

00:16:34.240 | Evite, Eventbrite, which ones do you guys use?

00:16:36.960 | Or what have you used recently?

00:16:38.080 | I think, I mean, I think we did paperless post for baby shower, but I'm very

00:16:42.120 | curious to know like, what's, what's your go-to?

00:16:44.720 | Cause paperless post, you can get lost in like, oh, which design do I want?

00:16:49.560 | And they charge you, somebody just told me that in order for you to download

00:16:54.760 | a CSV of the emails or something, they charge you, which is sneaky.

00:16:58.680 | I understand.

00:16:59.640 | But sometimes for my friends, I don't, they're like, I'm not signing

00:17:04.280 | up for a subscription service.

00:17:05.760 | Um, the platform that I like the best, most that I recommend is a service

00:17:09.720 | called Mixily, M-I-X-I-L-Y.

00:17:14.240 | The youth love a service called a Partyful, P-A-R-T-I-F-U-L.

00:17:21.280 | I like Mixily and that is what I use.

00:17:24.120 | I'm hosting a party tonight.

00:17:25.360 | It's the service that I use.

00:17:26.720 | There's no charge.

00:17:27.880 | There is no fees.

00:17:29.360 | They don't spam your guests.

00:17:31.080 | There's no ads.

00:17:32.400 | You don't need to download special software.

00:17:34.520 | We're looking for the easiest way for someone to simply RSVP to your party.

00:17:40.440 | And why do we do that?

00:17:41.720 | Because they make a social contract and they say, I'm going to show up.

00:17:46.240 | And a lot of the work that I'm going to give you advice is just going to be

00:17:49.760 | making sure that people will attend.

00:17:51.640 | And one of the ways we do that is by getting them to RSVP, not just saying,

00:17:55.480 | yes, they'll come on text, but to further their commitment by RSVP.

00:17:59.440 | And so all those five have said, yes, you're now going to text them back.

00:18:02.320 | Perfect.

00:18:03.080 | Let me make an event page.

00:18:04.320 | I'll follow up in a day or two.

00:18:05.520 | You make the event page, you send them the link and you say, will you please

00:18:09.000 | RSVP here just so we can get a head count.

00:18:12.200 | You will now have a landing page for your party that lists five or more people who

00:18:19.920 | are coming showing social proof to everybody else you invite that people are

00:18:25.200 | actually going to come to this party.

00:18:27.640 | Have you ever been invited to an event?

00:18:30.240 | And like, you've clearly been spam the invitation.

00:18:33.520 | It's like 93 invited and two attending.

00:18:36.600 | Um, that's bad.

00:18:38.840 | And we're never going to do that because we're always going to ask people, can you

00:18:41.760 | come before you send the invitation?

00:18:43.520 | So you get your five yeses.

00:18:46.120 | You make the event page, you get them all to sign up on RSVP.

00:18:48.960 | Now you can invite a wider group that I call your great guests.

00:18:53.520 | These are your acquaintances.

00:18:55.520 | These are where you're going to fill up the rest of the guest list to get from 15

00:18:59.680 | to 20 attendees, not including the kids.

00:19:02.080 | I'll take a pause to see what type of questions you have or thoughts or feedback.

00:19:05.720 | No, that makes sense.

00:19:07.080 | I assume a guest, if you're inviting, you know, mostly couples is each couple is two

00:19:12.720 | people.

00:19:13.200 | So it's, you know, you probably are, if you're having 15 to 20, you're having,

00:19:17.240 | you know, eight to eight to 10 couples.

00:19:20.080 | If that's mostly the demographic.

00:19:21.880 | Yes.

00:19:22.840 | Yes.

00:19:23.200 | Yes.

00:19:23.400 | That makes sense.

00:19:23.960 | It's so funny because I, when I would host my dinner parties, I would finally

00:19:29.040 | curate the guest list and I would try to invite all these entrepreneurs and other

00:19:33.320 | people, and they'd ask, oh, can I bring my girlfriend?

00:19:35.440 | Can I bring so-and-so?

00:19:37.360 | And I would say no, because, um, I'm curating a specific group of people there.

00:19:43.120 | And that is blasphemy.

00:19:45.400 | If you tell somebody that they cannot bring their partner, unless it's a very

00:19:49.880 | strictly business event, if it's a social event, you're like, no, you can't bring

00:19:52.920 | your partner.

00:19:53.360 | It's very sketchy.

00:19:54.280 | So I now no longer suggest that people limit their guest list.

00:19:59.320 | And oftentimes for people hosting their first party, you just want warm bodies.

00:20:04.680 | You just want as many people to say yes.

00:20:07.800 | And so for your first party, I really need to encourage you, Chris, do

00:20:12.800 | not try to finally curate it.

00:20:14.600 | Do not try to invite VIPs to this.

00:20:17.720 | Simply invite people that you feel comfortable with to run through the

00:20:23.520 | pieces of this party formula that I'm going to share.

00:20:26.520 | Okay.

00:20:27.160 | So I've got this page set up.

00:20:28.720 | What do I put on it?

00:20:29.720 | So the important thing about the page is you have to set the expectations of

00:20:34.560 | what is going to happen at this party.

00:20:36.000 | And there's two unique things at one of my parties.

00:20:39.480 | Number one, is there are name tags and number two, there's icebreakers.

00:20:45.360 | I can talk about why those are important, but I can tell you that by listing them

00:20:50.120 | in the invitation, it will remove 95% of concerns that people that have on the

00:20:56.960 | event that they're going to sign up to an RSVP, by the way, you're also going to

00:21:00.520 | list not only the start time, but the end time.

00:21:04.360 | Many people are like, how do I get people to leave my party?

00:21:07.360 | And by letting them know that there is an end time by clearly listing that, then it

00:21:13.960 | helps people to know, and it also encourages them to show up on time.

00:21:17.560 | Like we talked about.

00:21:18.400 | So letting them know that there will be name tags and icebreakers.

00:21:22.920 | I usually say something simple like, Hey, I'm getting some friends together, uh,

00:21:29.480 | to have cocktails and a round of icebreakers.

00:21:33.480 | There will be name tags because I'm bad with names, LOL.

00:21:36.600 | Um, this is super casual.

00:21:39.280 | Uh, you don't have to dress up.

00:21:41.800 | You don't have to bring anything.

00:21:43.760 | We'll have mixers, drinks, alcohol, and seltzer, and maybe

00:21:48.920 | you'll meet some new friends.

00:21:50.160 | That's the general gist of what the invitation page will say.

00:21:53.840 | And by giving people knowing what to expect, it not only helps them have a

00:21:59.600 | successful event, but it also encourages people that are kind of shy or like

00:22:03.440 | introverted many times, we don't think about those types of people.

00:22:06.800 | You're a podcast host, so you're probably pretty outgoing.

00:22:09.520 | I probably sound pretty extroverted and outgoing, but a lot of my work in my

00:22:14.200 | book works to help people make their parties feel safe and comfortable for

00:22:18.320 | those that might not, or might be a little socially awkward, even after COVID too.

00:22:22.200 | You didn't mention anything about food.

00:22:24.280 | Is that because there's no food at this party?

00:22:25.920 | There's no food.

00:22:26.880 | There's only the most basic snacks.

00:22:28.320 | If you had to think of a simple way to think about my parties, you would

00:22:33.080 | think about the NIC party formula.

00:22:35.680 | N-I-C-K.

00:22:37.040 | N stands for name tags.

00:22:39.440 | I stands for icebreakers.

00:22:42.080 | C stands for cocktails only, no food.

00:22:45.440 | And K stands for kick them out at the end.

00:22:48.880 | The party's only two hours.

00:22:50.640 | Now, why is there no food?

00:22:52.240 | I have a pretty hard rule that there's no food because in the event that you say,

00:22:57.680 | well, maybe we'll just do some past appetizers, it completely changes

00:23:02.560 | the level of stress that's involved.

00:23:04.320 | You can add food later on.

00:23:06.600 | And in fact, my book goes through and I can just tell you what to have now.

00:23:09.840 | You can have baby carrots.

00:23:10.920 | You can have salted nuts.

00:23:12.040 | You can have prepared kind of easy food, like snacks, chips,

00:23:16.360 | dip, people love guacamole.

00:23:17.920 | Those things are simple that take minimal preparation.

00:23:21.280 | But the whole purpose of this is to show you how easy hosting an event can be.

00:23:27.280 | And that it's not about the food.

00:23:28.600 | It's about the people.

00:23:29.560 | Name tags make sense.

00:23:31.000 | Kick them out.

00:23:31.400 | Makes sense though.

00:23:32.040 | I do want to know what's the, what's the way to kick the people out?

00:23:34.920 | Like, let's say it's, it's five to seven.

00:23:37.040 | It's sevens rolls around.

00:23:38.360 | I I'm guessing most people there aren't like, Oh, looking at the time.

00:23:42.000 | Uh, what do you say to people?

00:23:44.160 | So you, as the host, we'll make a last call about 15 minutes before

00:23:49.640 | the party's scheduled to end.

00:23:51.400 | You would turn down the music and make a little announcement.

00:23:54.520 | And so I'll say something like, all right, everybody.

00:23:56.600 | Thank you so much for coming.

00:23:58.000 | It's seven 45.

00:23:59.240 | I said, this party would go till eight.

00:24:00.760 | I know it's a school night, so I'm going to let you home.

00:24:02.960 | Uh, grab a last drink.

00:24:05.400 | Say hello to somebody new.

00:24:06.520 | If you hadn't had a chance yet, and we'll start to wrap up in about 15 minutes.

00:24:10.280 | And then I'll turn the music back up at the time.

00:24:13.120 | The party is scheduled to end.

00:24:14.600 | I will turn all the lights up.

00:24:16.320 | I'll turn the music down.

00:24:17.760 | I'll thank everybody for coming.

00:24:20.080 | Maybe I'll do a group photo.

00:24:22.520 | I do something else that I hesitate to say because it'll

00:24:26.040 | make the party sound very weird.

00:24:27.440 | But at my parties, I do a little cheer.

00:24:29.520 | I've had people have very success with doing this, but it does

00:24:33.040 | feel like a kid's summer camp.

00:24:34.480 | But it adds a finality or sort of an end to it.

00:24:38.440 | And as silly and ridiculous as my formula sounds, I promise

00:24:42.240 | you that it really does work.

00:24:43.920 | I love it.

00:24:44.760 | Okay.

00:24:45.080 | Okay.

00:24:45.440 | I have a couple of fobs.

00:24:46.520 | You said music.

00:24:47.560 | Yeah, they're like a go-to playlist.

00:24:49.760 | I feel like that could be a stressful thing for a lot of people

00:24:52.400 | trying to curate what's playing.

00:24:53.640 | Oh my gosh.

00:24:54.360 | Never, never try to pre-program a playlist.

00:24:58.520 | You want easy, happy music that is not too loud.

00:25:02.080 | I will play the Beach Boys channel on a streaming service.

00:25:06.200 | It's easy.

00:25:07.080 | It's non-controversial.

00:25:08.160 | It's upbeat.

00:25:09.080 | It's generally positive.

00:25:10.320 | I'm looking for stuff like that.

00:25:12.120 | I have collected a list of playlists, www.party.pro/playlists

00:25:18.720 | of party playlists that my friends and readers and other hosts have used.

00:25:23.040 | But generally you just want something very easy.

00:25:25.840 | That's background music.

00:25:26.920 | That's upbeat and happy.

00:25:28.560 | Cocktails.

00:25:29.560 | You brushed over quickly.

00:25:30.960 | It can be a lot of work to make a mixed drink.

00:25:33.720 | Is this really just like only cocktails or is this beer, wine?

00:25:38.960 | And if you want a cocktail, you can make it.

00:25:40.840 | What's the drink situation?

00:25:42.280 | First controversial thing.

00:25:43.600 | There's no beer and I'll tell you why there's no beer.

00:25:45.800 | Second thing I wrote a book called the two hour cocktail party

00:25:49.000 | and I don't even drink alcohol.

00:25:50.440 | So that's ironic.

00:25:51.880 | There's not a single mixed drink recipe that's in the book, but we use that

00:25:55.840 | phrase cocktail party because it encapsulates a social construct of as an

00:26:01.240 | easy event that is lightweight and acceptable to pop into when I say the

00:26:07.960 | phrase cocktail party, what do you think of what sort of comes to mind to you?

00:26:12.400 | Chris.

00:26:12.880 | Yeah.

00:26:13.480 | I mean, like I said in the intro, it feels very like, you know, walk

00:26:17.160 | in, grab a martini kind of thing.

00:26:18.880 | But, uh, when I, when it comes out of your mouth, it obviously

00:26:21.520 | doesn't feel that way.

00:26:22.480 | It feels a bit more casual.

00:26:23.680 | Well, the reality is, is what drinks are you going to have at your party?

00:26:27.160 | You're going to have a do it yourself, serve yourself bar.

00:26:29.920 | And so that can be a couple bottles of alcohol.

00:26:32.400 | You can have vodka or tequila or whiskey or bourbon or whatever.

00:26:36.520 | You're going to have some basic mixers.

00:26:38.480 | You'll have a bowl filled with ice.

00:26:40.840 | You'll have maybe some juice and plenty of non-alcoholic options like

00:26:43.920 | seltzer, seltzer, water, or hard seltzer.

00:26:46.360 | Now I do not include beer for my list.

00:26:49.240 | Are you a beer drinker?

00:26:50.200 | I'm a casual beer drinker.

00:26:51.800 | Like I enjoy beer, but I wouldn't say it's always my go-to.

00:26:55.080 | Do you have friends that are beer drinkers that are beer drinkers?

00:26:58.920 | Yeah.

00:26:59.520 | I mean, I would be shocked if anyone ever says no to that.

00:27:01.880 | So generally what I find with beer drinkers is that they are highly brand loyal.

00:27:08.680 | Beer drinkers are very specific in their beer preferences.

00:27:12.360 | They're highly brand loyal and beer just creates a lot of party shrapnel.

00:27:17.560 | What do I mean by that?

00:27:18.680 | I mean, like there's extra beer bottles, there's beer cans.

00:27:21.720 | It's just like all this extra stuff.

00:27:23.760 | What type of beer?

00:27:24.640 | Well, if I'm going to buy this beer, then you need another

00:27:26.440 | type of beer for somebody else.

00:27:27.600 | If you want to serve beer at your party, you absolutely can.

00:27:31.320 | But I want to tell all your listeners, I've hosted hundreds

00:27:34.400 | of parties, never serving beer.

00:27:36.440 | And it's just another thing to remove the stress for me.

00:27:39.280 | And I've never had a complaint.

00:27:40.480 | So there's all these little hacks that I'm doing, which is just trying

00:27:43.840 | to make it as easy as possible to teach you that you can host and you

00:27:48.960 | can make hosting easy and that it can absolutely change your life.

00:27:52.360 | If you become someone who hosts.

00:27:54.280 | Okay.

00:27:55.040 | So I've got the drinks that want, you didn't mention wine.

00:27:57.640 | Is there wine there?

00:27:58.400 | Wine, some white wine, some red wine in the summertime, a

00:28:01.160 | rosé, just get two bottles of each.

00:28:03.480 | That hit everything except this whole, this kind of looming topic of icebreakers.

00:28:08.040 | And I think anyone listening right now is kind of wondering, Oh gosh.

00:28:10.640 | Like what, what does Nick mean when he says icebreaker?

00:28:13.680 | Yeah.

00:28:14.320 | And why do icebreakers?

00:28:15.320 | Aren't those, aren't those silly?

00:28:16.800 | Aren't those childish?

00:28:17.560 | Well, we do icebreakers because it's a short survey of the room.

00:28:22.680 | And icebreakers also not only give your guests excuses to go meet new people,

00:28:28.200 | which by the way, that's why your party is going to be very successful.

00:28:32.360 | And that's why your friends will love you for hosting this because you are

00:28:36.280 | going to help them meet new people.

00:28:38.200 | Most adults haven't made a new friend in the last three years.

00:28:41.640 | And yet, as we get older, we need friends more than ever, right?

00:28:45.280 | Friends become like a game of attrition.

00:28:47.120 | They have kids, they move, things happen.

00:28:49.480 | We don't see people as often.

00:28:51.000 | Your party will be successful because all of your guests are

00:28:54.520 | going to talk to a lot of new people.

00:28:56.480 | How do we encourage that by using these icebreakers?

00:28:59.840 | Icebreakers are a short survey of the room.

00:29:02.920 | Generally you'll go around the circle.

00:29:04.720 | You say your name, you'll say what you do for work.

00:29:06.840 | If you don't want to say for work, you say something you're excited about.

00:29:09.640 | And then the third one, which is the icebreaker question.

00:29:12.360 | Okay.

00:29:12.720 | So each icebreaker has three parts, name, what you do for work, and

00:29:16.440 | then the icebreaker question, right?

00:29:18.560 | You'll do three rounds of icebreakers.

00:29:20.360 | I think of icebreakers as a green, yellow, red, uh, scaffolding where you

00:29:26.560 | would want to start your party with a green level icebreaker.

00:29:30.160 | A green level icebreaker.

00:29:31.480 | The one that I use that I suggest everybody use for the first one is what

00:29:35.960 | is one of your favorite things to eat for breakfast?

00:29:39.160 | So first, how does that hit with you?

00:29:43.040 | What are your thoughts?

00:29:43.760 | I'm ready for it.

00:29:44.400 | If you hate it, then tell me and I'll tell you why it's great, but

00:29:47.160 | I just want to hear your thoughts.

00:29:48.120 | I mean, I don't actually eat breakfast that often.

00:29:50.720 | So I, because, because why not?

00:29:53.160 | Why don't you choose to eat breakfast?

00:29:54.440 | Uh, I.

00:29:57.240 | I don't know.

00:29:57.800 | I just, you just skip it's not for health reasons.

00:30:01.240 | You know, I didn't run fast and you just, I'm just lazy.

00:30:03.680 | Sometimes, sometimes, sometimes it's been, uh, intermittent fasting.

00:30:08.040 | Sometimes it's just been like, I don't want to, it's just one more

00:30:10.360 | thing to think about during the day.

00:30:11.720 | Yes.

00:30:12.240 | Um, yeah, when you do eat breakfast, what's one of your favorite

00:30:14.960 | things to eat for breakfast?

00:30:15.920 | When you do, I mean, when I do eat breakfast, it's usually like some

00:30:19.520 | ridiculous, like make an amazing breakfast for the weekend kind of thing.

00:30:23.040 | Like lemon ricotta pancakes.

00:30:24.560 | Are you lemon ricotta pancakes?

00:30:26.600 | Are you kidding me?

00:30:27.440 | That's like a go-to, uh, you know, once a month kind of thing in our house.

00:30:31.840 | I've asked this icebreaker hundreds of times.

00:30:35.000 | I've never heard somebody say lemon ricotta pancakes.

00:30:39.560 | That's incredible.

00:30:40.520 | Yeah.

00:30:41.600 | Cause I think it's like, I don't make a lot of breakfast.

00:30:43.360 | So if I do make breakfast, I'm going to step it up.

00:30:46.160 | And I have this recipe.

00:30:47.560 | I, now I feel like I should put it in the show notes that I think is just like

00:30:50.520 | every time I make these lemon ricotta pancakes, I'm like, I'm going to make

00:30:53.120 | like every time I make these lemon ricotta pancakes and they're not that

00:30:55.640 | hard, it just wins every time.

00:30:57.520 | Wait, now I got to know what, like, how long does it take you to make that?

00:31:01.200 | Okay.

00:31:01.480 | Look, if we're doing this at my party, I just want to show you right

00:31:04.800 | there, what just happened.

00:31:05.920 | You expressed a piece of your personality that you share and you make your secret

00:31:11.080 | thing, lemon ricotta pancakes.

00:31:14.280 | Now you might not always eat breakfast, but you did get to share when you do

00:31:18.320 | make breakfast, what you make.

00:31:19.680 | Okay.

00:31:20.920 | Everybody chooses or not chooses to eat breakfast every single day.

00:31:25.600 | And it is generally a positive, happy feeling that we have a good green level

00:31:31.640 | icebreaker is an icebreaker.

00:31:33.600 | That's quick to answer it's fast and it doesn't incur judgment from others.

00:31:39.400 | A bad green icebreaker, which I would never do would be something like say

00:31:44.880 | your name, so what you do for work and say your favorite book ever.

00:31:48.600 | Okay.

00:31:50.560 | Because that's subjective.

00:31:51.800 | That's definitive.

00:31:53.280 | That's very hard to pick it.

00:31:55.840 | It's going to maybe elicit a little bit of judgment.

00:31:58.200 | People are going to try to show off.

00:31:59.360 | They don't know.

00:32:00.160 | Now, how do we modify that?

00:32:01.800 | Right.

00:32:02.000 | It's what I said.

00:32:02.520 | What's one of your favorite things to eat for breakfast?

00:32:04.880 | I still wouldn't ask what's one of your favorite books.

00:32:07.520 | I would ask that later because a book is an intellectual thing, right?

00:32:11.880 | Breakfast is a human delicious thing.

00:32:15.360 | It's a fun thing.

00:32:16.560 | It's an easy thing.

00:32:18.320 | So we ask that as just a way for everybody at your party to sort of sound off and

00:32:24.080 | express a piece of their personality.

00:32:26.120 | You do it very quick.

00:32:27.640 | A good icebreaker is a quick icebreaker.

00:32:29.520 | So you're not going to allow for follow-up questions.

00:32:31.800 | Like I was drilling you on, right?

00:32:33.320 | You're just going to have everybody go around and then you just say, all right.

00:32:37.680 | Thanks everybody.

00:32:38.360 | I do those icebreakers so we can all meet somebody new.

00:32:40.920 | Maybe I hope you'll say hello.

00:32:42.560 | And then you as a host, shut up and you just let the party go, which is so

00:32:47.920 | awkward as a new host, if you've never done this, you're like, this is terrifying.

00:32:52.480 | But then you do it and the room explodes.

00:32:55.560 | It comes alive.

00:32:56.240 | People go up and they talk to new people.

00:32:58.040 | You turn the music back up and everybody's making these conversations.

00:33:01.720 | So we do that because most parties you go to, you just, what?

00:33:05.640 | Like you went to your kid's birthday party recently.

00:33:07.760 | They didn't do icebreakers.

00:33:08.960 | You just, maybe you bumped into somebody and started the conversation.

00:33:12.520 | I'm guessing, right?

00:33:13.600 | It's just physical proximity.

00:33:15.480 | Don't let your kid drink that juice box.

00:33:17.080 | Cause my daughter just threw it on the ground.

00:33:18.560 | Like that was our icebreakers.

00:33:20.720 | Yes.

00:33:21.720 | Yes.

00:33:22.240 | And there's nothing wrong with those.

00:33:23.400 | Those are, those are fine gatherings, but for listeners of your show, they're

00:33:26.960 | interested in how to get more out of life.

00:33:29.240 | They're interested in optimizing things.

00:33:31.320 | And as cliche and as ridiculous as it sounds to optimize your social

00:33:35.920 | situations, it does help if the goal is to help your friends, make more friends.

00:33:40.440 | To do a survey of the room, do a couple of them during your party to give

00:33:45.040 | people excuses to go start a new conversation because by the way, the

00:33:49.320 | other reason we do icebreakers is it gives people an easy excuse

00:33:53.440 | to end their conversations.

00:33:55.640 | So are you doing these, like every 30 minutes, you kind of pop in, do

00:33:59.520 | an icebreaker and then turn it off.

00:34:01.800 | That's exactly right.

00:34:02.960 | You do them every 30 minutes.

00:34:04.080 | You're going to do them three times.

00:34:05.240 | So your part two or three times, and they should only take five or so minutes.

00:34:09.960 | By the way, a hack that everybody needs to know the icebreakers.

00:34:13.200 | You have to be standing.

00:34:14.920 | You cannot let people sit down.

00:34:16.840 | It is the kryptonite to a successful.

00:34:19.480 | You can't do icebreakers sitting down.

00:34:22.600 | People will ask follow-up questions.

00:34:23.960 | They'll drone on a good icebreaker is a fast one.

00:34:26.960 | You said you go from green to yellow to red.

00:34:29.240 | What are the more advanced ones?

00:34:30.680 | And do you have people because people are coming, going, do you, do you

00:34:34.040 | redo the names and the works each time?

00:34:36.800 | Yes, you redo the names.

00:34:38.480 | You do that for all of them.

00:34:39.760 | So your first icebreaker, I'll get into the details with you.

00:34:42.680 | Your first icebreaker you're going to do when there's only five

00:34:45.280 | or six people who've shown up.

00:34:46.680 | And that is what I call lovingly the awkward zone at a party.

00:34:51.760 | It's the first 10 or 20 minutes when not many people are there.

00:34:55.640 | It's a little bit awkward.

00:34:57.360 | There's not enough energy in the room.

00:34:59.640 | You do the icebreaker to bust out of the awkward zone.

00:35:03.160 | You're going to do that same icebreaker about 20 minutes later

00:35:06.080 | when now everybody has arrived.

00:35:07.720 | And then 30 minutes later, you'll do your last and final icebreaker.

00:35:12.120 | And what I like to ask is say your name, say what you do for work.

00:35:15.760 | And then say one of the favorite pieces of media that you've consumed

00:35:21.280 | over the last couple months, that could be a show on Netflix.

00:35:24.640 | It could be a podcast like this.

00:35:26.400 | It could be a great book that you read, a long form article, a

00:35:29.600 | funny meme that you saw, a Tik Tok video, just a cool piece of

00:35:33.480 | media that you consumed and enjoyed.

00:35:36.000 | And Chris, this one works so well because everybody's sharing great

00:35:40.440 | recommendations for a book, a movie, something, and people are

00:35:43.760 | wanting to write down stuff.

00:35:45.000 | They're feeling smarter because everybody's sharing these great ideas.

00:35:49.120 | So I love that one.

00:35:49.960 | What about that middle break?

00:35:51.320 | Any other tips for icebreakers beyond the two you shared?

00:35:54.720 | One more that you could do.

00:35:56.760 | And this is, you've probably seen this online use for engagement bait is

00:36:00.080 | one of what is one of your favorite purchases of the last year?

00:36:03.520 | It could be a service or an activity, or it could be a physical

00:36:06.560 | object that you've purchased.

00:36:08.040 | Maybe it's a new car.

00:36:08.920 | Maybe it's a kitchen appliance, but what's one of your favorite purchases

00:36:12.680 | that's made your life better during the last year and people love to show.

00:36:16.480 | I love this one.

00:36:17.880 | Yeah, that's good.

00:36:18.640 | I don't know.

00:36:19.640 | I don't think I have any other questions.

00:36:20.800 | Are you using a, oh, there's one more thing.

00:36:23.400 | Can I tell you about this?

00:36:24.240 | Okay.

00:36:25.120 | Reminder messages.

00:36:27.040 | You need to do three reminder messages leading up to your

00:36:30.480 | party to keep it top of mind.

00:36:32.560 | And you'll send those reminder messages.

00:36:36.000 | One of them, one week before the party, simple message.

00:36:39.000 | Hey everybody.

00:36:39.520 | What's up?

00:36:39.880 | Excited to have you guys over.

00:36:41.080 | We'll see you next week on Wednesday night at 5:00 PM.

00:36:44.000 | More details to come.

00:36:45.400 | Okay.

00:36:45.920 | The next one you'll send is three days before your party.

00:36:50.520 | And for that one, you're going to use something I call guest bios and guest

00:36:55.480 | bios you're going to do for half or more of your attendees.

00:36:58.280 | It's a brief blurb about your guests.

00:37:02.680 | So for me, it could be Nick gray recently moved to Austin, Texas.

00:37:06.160 | He lived in New York for 13 years.

00:37:07.920 | Ask him about green tea.

00:37:09.600 | Right.

00:37:10.680 | It's, it's a quick little blurb or summary that you could pull from their

00:37:15.760 | LinkedIn or their Instagram or something like that, and it doesn't have to be a

00:37:20.680 | hundred percent, right?

00:37:21.440 | You're not asking for permission from other people to get this right.

00:37:25.040 | You're just writing some stuff to give these conversational access

00:37:28.400 | points and also to get them locked into attending and to give those sort

00:37:33.600 | of introverts or shy people an idea of who's going to be there and an idea of

00:37:39.320 | who they might want to talk to and to raise the excitement of all the other

00:37:42.840 | people as well, but not everyone, just a few people, you don't have to do it.

00:37:46.520 | Everyone.

00:37:46.920 | What I suggest is half or more.

00:37:49.440 | I'm more focused on the minimum.

00:37:50.760 | Don't don't do any less than half.

00:37:52.160 | So if you have 16 people coming, you need to do the minimum of eight, but

00:37:56.240 | don't feel that you have to do every single person I generally feel more is

00:38:00.440 | better, but don't feel like it has to be work.

00:38:03.240 | You know, you're not going to spend an hour writing this thing.

00:38:06.120 | It's just a quick little blurb.

00:38:07.840 | I think I got it handled.

00:38:09.440 | I think I'm ready to go.

00:38:10.800 | Any follow-up after do you try to get feedback on how it went?

00:38:14.240 | Yes.

00:38:14.880 | So right before you do your third round of icebreakers, you are

00:38:18.840 | going to do a group photo, right?

00:38:20.640 | A quick selfie.

00:38:21.520 | What's up, everybody.

00:38:22.200 | Turn around and take a selfie real quick.

00:38:23.640 | Okay.

00:38:24.120 | Group photo the next morning.

00:38:26.680 | You will send them a thank you message.

00:38:28.680 | Thanks everybody for coming.

00:38:29.880 | You include everybody on BCC.

00:38:32.000 | Thank you guys all for coming.

00:38:33.320 | Um, can I invite you next time?

00:38:35.280 | Right?

00:38:35.600 | Simple question.

00:38:36.320 | That's easy for them to say yes to, and you attach the group photo.

00:38:39.440 | That's it.

00:38:40.000 | That's all that you do.

00:38:41.400 | Yes, you can do surveys.

00:38:43.200 | That's an advanced level move.

00:38:45.000 | I don't recommend it yet.

00:38:46.880 | Um, but yes, surveys are helpful as you start to host more.

00:38:51.120 | Any other advanced moves for people who are hearing this and they're

00:38:54.080 | like, no, no, I'm ready for them.

00:38:55.120 | Now.

00:38:55.480 | Oh gosh.

00:38:56.800 | I hesitate to say this, but yes, I will tell your listeners, but

00:39:00.120 | please don't do this first.

00:39:01.440 | Please do not do this first.

00:39:03.040 | Okay.

00:39:03.760 | A popular theme theme that you can do.

00:39:07.400 | I'm trying to teach.

00:39:09.000 | And I wrote this book and all this stuff that I'm sharing, because this

00:39:12.280 | is an operating system to run events.

00:39:14.800 | You can use it at kids' birthday parties.

00:39:17.280 | You can use it at a lot of different type of events.

00:39:20.280 | For your first one, just do a cocktail party.

00:39:22.760 | Don't try to get fancy.

00:39:23.960 | One that is an absolute banger.

00:39:27.120 | Huge success is for your neighbors and friends to do a book swap.

00:39:32.200 | Everybody likes books.

00:39:34.760 | Everybody has extra books they want to get rid of.

00:39:38.040 | Everybody likes to get new books.

00:39:40.720 | A book swap is so easy.

00:39:43.000 | You use the same exact formula name, what you do for work, but maybe

00:39:46.960 | instead of something else you'd say, and tell us about one of

00:39:49.920 | the books that you brought, right?

00:39:51.920 | Why is it a great book?

00:39:53.280 | This book swap thing, I'm telling you, I've had people do it and it's

00:39:57.280 | their most well-attended event.

00:39:58.800 | So that's a good one.

00:39:59.800 | Um, you can host a clothing swap.

00:40:02.480 | I have a formula for hosting a clothing swap.

00:40:05.520 | All of these things that you can do, you can do more thematic ones if you want,

00:40:10.400 | but those are sort of advanced level.

00:40:12.800 | Get the formula first.

00:40:15.000 | Most people have never run an icebreaker before.

00:40:17.280 | And so one key thing, can I tell you about how to run a good icebreaker?

00:40:22.600 | Yeah.

00:40:23.080 | So here's a key thing.

00:40:25.680 | A lot of people don't like icebreakers because the hosts will be like, all

00:40:28.400 | right, we're going to do an icebreaker.

00:40:29.560 | Say your name and what you do.

00:40:31.320 | And the worst first date you ever went on Chris, you go first, right?

00:40:34.880 | It's like terrible.

00:40:36.680 | It's so bad.

00:40:37.280 | I hate the worst first date is a red.

00:40:40.280 | That's a good example of a red level question where there's not enough

00:40:42.880 | rapport built up among people yet.

00:40:45.000 | So we wouldn't do that one, but a good icebreaker always has the host go first.

00:40:51.640 | Ask permission for who can go next and then indicate to the group, which

00:40:57.200 | way the round of icebreakers would go.

00:40:59.120 | So as an example, if I was setting up the icebreaker, I would say, all right, so

00:41:04.120 | now we're going to do this round of icebreakers, you're going to say your

00:41:06.480 | name, what you do for work, and one of your favorite things for breakfast.

00:41:09.280 | I will go first and then looking to my left, Chris, uh, can we go to you next?

00:41:15.600 | And hopefully you'll say yes.

00:41:17.600 | I'll say great.

00:41:18.520 | So I will go first.

00:41:19.680 | We'll go to Chris next, and then we're going to go around the circle this way.

00:41:23.440 | Um, it sounds childish.

00:41:26.400 | It sounds like I'm a clown telling multiple times the instructions

00:41:31.560 | and which way to go around, but it just makes the instructions crystal clear.

00:41:36.120 | It makes it run fast and it gives power to those, I don't know,

00:41:40.400 | those people with social anxiety.

00:41:41.960 | I dated a woman who had a lot of social anxiety and she said, the more

00:41:44.760 | that I could know which way it was going, the less surprises, the better.

00:41:48.240 | Unfortunately, you are coming to San Francisco soon, but not later.

00:41:52.400 | So you won't, you won't get to see me do this in action, but I

00:41:55.400 | will let you know how it goes.

00:41:56.560 | And, uh, you know, we'll, we'll maybe save some of those

00:42:00.160 | advanced tactics for later.

00:42:01.400 | Um, one more, I'm going to give one, um, one last thing.

00:42:05.000 | Uh, when you do your round of icebreakers, I want your wife to stand next to you.

00:42:08.920 | And I want her to, to talk too much so that you can actually kind of cut her off.

00:42:15.840 | And why do you want to do that?

00:42:18.760 | Because then you can signal to everybody else that we're not going to use these

00:42:22.040 | icebreakers to drone on and on and talk too long.

00:42:24.760 | You can cut her off first.

00:42:26.360 | People will laugh a little bit.

00:42:27.800 | And I think, or she can go first and cut me off.

00:42:31.640 | She could go first, but then she needs to facilitate it.

00:42:34.880 | And she needs to be the one who is the facilitator.

00:42:37.080 | So, yes, absolutely.

00:42:38.200 | Yeah.

00:42:38.920 | There's nothing worse than doing icebreakers and one person talks forever.

00:42:42.160 | So I'm, I'm a big fan of finding a way to politely show people that this is

00:42:46.720 | not a time to give a presentation.

00:42:48.800 | Yes.

00:42:49.640 | Yes.

00:42:49.960 | And sometimes we have to do that.

00:42:51.320 | We have to be, we have to lead a party with generous authority.

00:42:55.360 | And that means that what is best for the whole group is not always

00:42:59.640 | being ultra polite to one person.

00:43:01.880 | So with a successful cocktail party, what do you think?

00:43:04.760 | What do you hope people feel after it?

00:43:06.760 | And what, what, what kind of comes out of this whole experience?

00:43:09.160 | A successful cocktail party has the energy in the room, very high.

00:43:13.120 | And somebody leaves your party saying, wow, that was like the best party.

00:43:17.880 | That was awesome.

00:43:19.320 | And it's so simple.

00:43:20.640 | I got a message from a woman who just read my book and she hosted a

00:43:23.320 | party with name tags and icebreakers.

00:43:25.280 | And she said that night, she and her husband got multiple text

00:43:28.960 | messages from friends saying that it was the best party that they'd ever thrown.

00:43:32.760 | Why?

00:43:33.360 | Because they just added a little structure to it.

00:43:36.240 | So what's the feeling?

00:43:37.720 | It's that feeling that when you're done hosting, you say that

00:43:41.600 | was awesome and that was also easy.

00:43:43.640 | Like I could do that again, because I think we've all hosted parties where

00:43:47.680 | we're absolutely drained afterwards.

00:43:49.800 | And while it may have been a success, we never want to do it again.

00:43:52.880 | What's the energy that your guests have?

00:43:55.360 | It's that they, they met so many people.

00:43:57.560 | They, they had a really great time.

00:43:59.880 | You let them go early, right?

00:44:02.280 | They didn't feel like they had to, Oh, I'm so sorry.

00:44:04.480 | We have to sleep at no you're telling them.

00:44:06.400 | They got to go get out of here.

00:44:08.040 | You're ending it while it's going great.

00:44:10.360 | Uh, yeah, it's just, I can talk about this all day.

00:44:13.920 | I want to turn to talk about this business.

00:44:15.720 | You started museum hack and my understanding is you started a little

00:44:19.160 | accidentally and you became a lover of museums, not intentionally.

00:44:24.000 | And you probably started on the other end of the spectrum.

00:44:25.960 | How did this all come about?

00:44:27.120 | Yeah, I hate most museums.

00:44:29.320 | I think they're really boring and they just don't have anything to do with me.

00:44:33.160 | I'm not, I didn't grow up going to museums.

00:44:35.040 | I think they're stupid.

00:44:35.760 | Um, however, I, I lived in New York city where they had the

00:44:39.600 | metropolitan museum of art and it's a big museum.

00:44:42.240 | Have you been to the Met?

00:44:43.080 | I haven't.

00:44:43.760 | Okay.

00:44:44.680 | It's enormous.

00:44:45.240 | It's the most popular museum in America.

00:44:46.960 | It's 2.3 million square feet.

00:44:49.200 | It takes up 11 acres of central park.

00:44:51.520 | It's enormous and it's overwhelming.

00:44:53.440 | And for many New Yorkers, it's just a tourist attraction.

00:44:56.400 | It's not a place they have a relationship with.

00:44:58.680 | Uh, this woman brought me there on a romantic date and she showed me

00:45:02.760 | things and she talked to me at my level, which I have like a third grade reading

00:45:07.440 | level, and so she just sort of talked to me like, wow, look at these Egyptian

00:45:11.960 | artifacts, sculpture, furniture, paintings.

00:45:14.600 | And so I started to go back to the museum because I was like, I think I moved in

00:45:19.000 | New York to hang out at places like this.

00:45:21.240 | And so I'd go to the museum and just explore.

00:45:23.640 | I'd look things up on Wikipedia.

00:45:25.040 | I'd watch YouTube videos and I started to do these tours for my friends, just

00:45:29.360 | showing them around when they'd come visit.

00:45:31.080 | And they became like a, a, a famous thing because my tours were basically

00:45:36.320 | 10 cool things I found and three things I wanted to steal.

00:45:39.800 | Uh, not like a narrative arc of, of art history, just cool stuff I found.

00:45:45.440 | And then it became very famous and celebrities started to come and I hired

00:45:50.720 | some tour guides to lead the tours.

00:45:52.840 | And what was special was Museum Hack would hire Broadway actors and

00:45:57.400 | standup comedians to be the tour guides instead of the museum volunteers.

00:46:01.920 | And they would work for me, not for the museum.

00:46:04.840 | And so they would tell the juicy backstories about the art, about how

00:46:09.480 | much the art cost, about stories of the donors, things like that,

00:46:14.240 | that people wanted to hear.

00:46:15.720 | And so that was our whole thing was attracting new audiences

00:46:18.840 | into these storied museums.

00:46:22.040 | And what did you learn about how to see a museum?

00:46:25.000 | Like, you know, I'm obviously people can go take a museum hack tour, which

00:46:30.000 | is still running as a business, but, uh, I'm so fascinated as someone who.

00:46:35.080 | I don't know if I, I, I could tell if someone asked me the

00:46:39.160 | question, how do you do a museum?

00:46:41.040 | I don't feel like I would have the answer you would.

00:46:43.200 | And I feel like you have a better answer.

00:46:44.640 | Yeah.

00:46:45.240 | I'll tell your listeners exactly how to visit a museum.

00:46:47.480 | And they're in San Francisco.

00:46:48.520 | Have you been to the Legion of Honor?

00:46:49.880 | I have.

00:46:50.520 | Yeah.

00:46:50.960 | It's a nice museum, right?

00:46:51.960 | That one in the D young are two really nice museums there.

00:46:54.840 | Um, so here's how to visit.

00:46:57.200 | Here's exactly from all my time.

00:46:59.000 | And I've been to the metropolitan museum of art more than a thousand

00:47:01.280 | times, and I've been to many other museums.

00:47:03.880 | Here is how you should go about experiencing a museum for the first time.

00:47:09.360 | So you're going to a new museum, any museum, or is it, you know, specific

00:47:13.440 | categories work better than others for this, uh, this applies to any museum.

00:47:17.960 | Museum hack, in my opinion, works best for art museums, but the thing, the

00:47:24.320 | hack, the special sauce I'm about to tell you the way to approach works for any

00:47:28.720 | museum, and here's what you're going to do.

00:47:30.760 | As soon as you get there, you're going to go in right where you buy your ticket.

00:47:35.040 | You'll get a map and you are going to walk the entire floor

00:47:39.040 | plan and you're not going to stop.

00:47:41.440 | You're not going to stop and look at it.

00:47:44.480 | I don't care if you love it.

00:47:45.680 | You're not going to stop.

00:47:46.520 | You can circle it on the map and you'll come back later, but

00:47:49.280 | you're not going to stop.

00:47:50.520 | You're going to walk the entire floor plan to build a mental map of the

00:47:55.680 | space and to know where you want to go back to later.

00:47:59.440 | So first you'll walk the entire floor plan.

00:48:02.400 | It could take you between five and 45 minutes, depending on how big it is.

00:48:06.520 | You will then go to the museum cafe.

00:48:09.840 | Almost all museums have a cafe.

00:48:12.360 | If they don't have a cafe, you can just sit down and you're

00:48:14.840 | going to take a little break.

00:48:16.360 | I like to go there and I like to get a cup of coffee.

00:48:19.120 | You can get a glass of wine if you want, and you get a little snack.

00:48:22.320 | You're going to rip replenish your glycogen or your glucose or whatever.

00:48:27.240 | You're just going to have some carbs, maybe some sugar to build up your energy

00:48:31.640 | store, to go back now that you've seen everything briefly, you will now go back

00:48:37.600 | and look closer at the things that captured your mind and interest.

00:48:40.760 | What happens to many people?

00:48:42.080 | Why we do this is have you ever done this?

00:48:44.200 | You go to a new museum and you spend like the first hour looking at the

00:48:49.720 | stuff that you happen to just walk like.

00:48:52.640 | You waste all of your cognitive load and, and, and looking energy on things

00:48:59.840 | that you don't even want to look at because the best stuff sometimes

00:49:02.400 | is at the very end, the stuff that you're most excited about.

00:49:05.440 | And by the time you get to that stuff, you're tired and you're exhausted.

00:49:08.400 | So the way to do it is to walk through the entire floor plan.

00:49:11.400 | Do not stop at anything.

00:49:12.760 | Circle things on the map, go to the cafe, take a break, and then go back

00:49:17.080 | and look closer and deeper at the things you're curious about.

00:49:20.240 | And how long does that usually take?

00:49:22.720 | Would you say for, I know there are museums of different sizes, but how

00:49:25.800 | long would you tell someone to budget for a trip to a museum?

00:49:28.360 | I personally can't spend more than two hours.

00:49:30.880 | I think that this was one of the biggest things that I changed a lot of my

00:49:34.600 | friends thinking about is that you don't have to go try to get every single

00:49:39.360 | dollars worth and stay there as long as possible.

00:49:42.640 | I can spend about two hours at a museum before I get tired.

00:49:45.480 | This is a real thing, getting tired at a museum.

00:49:48.320 | It's called gallery fatigue.

00:49:50.520 | It happens because we're not in an activated space.

00:49:54.440 | We're quiet.

00:49:55.200 | We're thinking, we don't know how we're supposed to act.

00:49:57.880 | It can be stressful sometimes.

00:49:59.400 | So I spent, I spent about two hours total.

00:50:02.280 | So about half that time is a run through and a cafe.

00:50:06.600 | And then the other half is actually kind of spending time in

00:50:09.600 | the things you're interested in.

00:50:10.680 | Yes.

00:50:11.200 | Yes.

00:50:11.480 | Sometimes if I go to a museum for two hours, I'll spend an hour in the cafe.

00:50:15.560 | Because I just want to go approach it with a strip, with a strategy.

00:50:20.400 | And many times we don't have a strategy.

00:50:22.240 | When we go into a new physical space, like a museum, we're just walking where

00:50:26.160 | our body takes us and we're looking.

00:50:28.200 | And before we know it, we've wasted an hour and we're tired.

00:50:31.480 | And we didn't even get to go see the really cool stuff that's on the

00:50:34.640 | second floor back in the modern way.

00:50:36.280 | And could you do that from the map at home or do you need to be there?

00:50:40.800 | I think you need to be there because you need to walk it.

00:50:43.440 | You need to physically get in your body and see the stuff firsthand.

00:50:47.720 | And also there's not going to be, the museum's not going to feature like

00:50:51.720 | all, like you may be interested.

00:50:53.520 | Like, for example, I love at the Metropolitan Museum of Art.

00:50:56.200 | There's this sofa, it's like a green, beautiful green sofa.

00:51:01.240 | It's not going to be on any of the museum website or featured top galleries.

00:51:05.920 | I don't know why I like it, but it was owned by the King of Spain or something.

00:51:09.840 | And I love that thing.

00:51:10.880 | And you're not going to find that when you do the museum's

00:51:12.960 | website tour of the galleries.

00:51:14.560 | Do you have some favorite museums from just, you know, you probably, if you've

00:51:17.880 | been to the Met a thousand times, I imagine you've been to, you know, when

00:51:21.120 | you're in a new city, I feel like you're probably like, how could you help

00:51:24.840 | yourself from going to check out a new museum?

00:51:26.560 | Yeah, I love to go to new museums.

00:51:28.480 | So the Metropolitan Museum of Art is my favorite in the whole world.

00:51:31.320 | And it's what's called an encyclopedic museum.

00:51:34.080 | That means there's many different galleries and curatorial departments.

00:51:38.600 | So I love encyclopedic museums, maybe similar to the Legion

00:51:42.280 | of Honor there in San Francisco.

00:51:43.880 | In Washington, DC, I like the National Gallery.

00:51:46.680 | I like the enormous big museums because they have a

00:51:50.800 | little something for everyone.

00:51:52.280 | And using my strategy, maybe will help your visitors approach these really big

00:51:57.960 | museums that can be so intimidating.

00:52:00.080 | To feel like you don't have to get it all in at once.

00:52:03.120 | You don't have to like, it's okay to leave and not see everything.

00:52:08.400 | What about deals on going to museums?

00:52:10.840 | I feel like, you know, running museum hack while the whole brand wasn't

00:52:14.760 | getting a deal on getting into museums.

00:52:16.520 | What have you found in that space?

00:52:17.960 | For deals, I could tell you how to beat the line.

00:52:21.200 | So I can tell people how to skip the line.

00:52:23.120 | Deals, it's really, Oh yes.

00:52:24.560 | Oh my God.

00:52:25.200 | Wait, I completely forgot.

00:52:27.280 | I have the best deal ever.

00:52:29.000 | I've won.

00:52:30.000 | Oh my God.

00:52:30.760 | I have the best.

00:52:31.480 | I hope I'm not blowing out my mic levels being too loud.

00:52:34.200 | I have the best hack ever.

00:52:36.920 | And don't put this in the show notes.

00:52:38.840 | There is a membership called the American Alliance of Museums.

00:52:44.440 | It's essentially an industry trade group for museums in America.

00:52:48.960 | You can join as a non-employee.

00:52:53.040 | It's called a friend of the association or something.

00:52:55.520 | It's called AAM American Alliance of Museums.

00:52:59.480 | You can join as a friend of the association for under a hundred dollars per year.

00:53:05.200 | It will grant you access, a free ticket to almost every single museum in America.

00:53:11.280 | Wow.

00:53:12.280 | Do not blow up my spot.

00:53:13.960 | Don't blow up my spot.

00:53:14.920 | American Alliance of Museums.

00:53:16.520 | It's like the friend membership or something.

00:53:18.800 | It should be a hundred dollars or less.

00:53:20.320 | And me and my friends have done this for many years.

00:53:23.040 | Now you should also support, if you're listening to museums, I'm not trying

00:53:26.680 | to scam people out of how to pay for these culture institutions

00:53:31.320 | that largely are underfunded.

00:53:33.200 | I want to tell you about this though, so that you feel like you can go to a museum

00:53:37.480 | for an hour and fall in love with it.

00:53:40.280 | And you can go multiple times.

00:53:41.560 | You can buy this and go to the Legion of Honor for 45 minutes.

00:53:44.280 | And hopefully you'll fall in love with it and buy a membership

00:53:47.120 | and support it in other ways.

00:53:48.480 | What about skipping the lines?

00:53:49.960 | You said there was another thing for skipping the lines.

00:53:51.760 | Some museums, so for skipping the lines, some museums have additional entrances.

00:53:57.640 | Major museums like the Metropolitan Museum of Art will have an education

00:54:01.920 | entrance that's for school groups and other things at the Metropolitan

00:54:06.160 | Museum in New York City, there is almost always an enormous line out the main

00:54:11.280 | entrance, but no line at the education entrance doesn't mean you have to be

00:54:16.360 | part of a school group to use that entrance.

00:54:18.400 | You can just go in and buy a ticket like normal.

00:54:20.960 | That's another hack.

00:54:22.840 | Love it.

00:54:23.880 | The one hack I want to share and it's, uh, it's not for everyone literally

00:54:29.280 | because it's, it's a Capital One related deal right now, but I mentioned

00:54:34.280 | this in the last episode, but since this is all about museums, if you

00:54:38.200 | have a Capital One card, I think for almost the next year, it's until June

00:54:43.360 | 2024, I think you can with any Capital One membership, get a six month

00:54:47.760 | membership to this site called the Cultivist, which gives you and three

00:54:52.640 | guests access to a hundred museums around the world, I know it includes

00:54:56.240 | the Louvre, the Guggenheim, the MoMA, um, and a lot more.

00:55:00.640 | So you, after that six months, you have to pay $40 a month.

00:55:04.120 | So, you know, if you like it and you want to keep going, great.

00:55:06.920 | But there is a six month free membership that I'd recommend anyone

00:55:10.400 | with a Capital One card, check out.

00:55:12.040 | Great one.

00:55:12.800 | And then the other one, I can't remember if I've talked about this

00:55:15.960 | before, but I didn't realize that joining museums as a member is in many

00:55:21.880 | cases, not much more expensive than just going.

00:55:25.600 | Um, and this is especially true if you have friends or family in town.

00:55:30.120 | Um, you know, we, the Academy of Sciences in San Francisco is a cool museum.

00:55:34.600 | We had a bunch of people in town and it was actually, well, two things.

00:55:39.120 | One, most museum memberships are all tax deductible donations.

00:55:42.440 | Yes.

00:55:43.120 | Most museum tickets are not.

00:55:44.840 | So, uh, so if you ever see that thing where it's like, buy your ticket, you

00:55:49.560 | can apply the cost of your ticket to your, uh, to your membership, technically

00:55:54.040 | the ticket price is not a deductible contribution, but the incremental cost is.

00:55:58.960 | So if you're going to join, join before you buy the tickets, but we looked

00:56:02.080 | into it and after you factor in the deduction you get for making a

00:56:06.440 | contribution, it was cheaper for us to buy a one-year membership to the Academy

00:56:10.120 | of Sciences, which allowed us a certain number of guests than it was to

00:56:14.320 | actually just buy the tickets the day of.

00:56:16.280 | Yeah.

00:56:16.800 | So, uh, in many cases that's true, which has now resulted in us being

00:56:21.080 | members of the Oakland zoo, the Academy of sciences, uh, a place called

00:56:26.000 | curiodicy, um, on the peninsula, which is kind of like half kids, science museum,

00:56:30.400 | half zoo.

00:56:31.200 | So I feel like we're collecting memberships because it turns out that

00:56:34.400 | factoring in the cost, it actually ends up being about the same cost as going

00:56:39.000 | sometimes once, sometimes twice, but almost never more than two times.

00:56:42.400 | It's really not that expensive.

00:56:44.280 | You're exactly right to join at the lowest level for many of these

00:56:47.320 | institutions with unlimited membership.

00:56:49.640 | I'll tell you something else for your listeners, a hack for many of these

00:56:53.080 | organizations, the biggest ones I'm talking about in major cities, New York,

00:56:58.000 | Chicago, DC, Seattle, Denver, big, big cities, their art museums, and sometimes

00:57:04.880 | science museums will have something called a young members program, young

00:57:11.000 | patrons program, something like that.

00:57:14.760 | That typically goes after members 45 or 40 and younger and gives you extremely

00:57:23.000 | VIP access at a disturbingly discount rate.

00:57:27.680 | I'll give you an example in New York city at the metropolitan museum of art.

00:57:31.000 | Uh, there was something called the Apollo circle group.

00:57:34.960 | That was a thousand dollars a year.

00:57:36.880 | Now you might think, wow, that is expensive.

00:57:38.600 | It is expensive for some people that gave you once a month after

00:57:43.920 | hours parties at the museum.

00:57:46.320 | With incredible past appetizers, open bar, private tours from the

00:57:51.240 | curators, insane level of access that for older members, they were

00:57:57.120 | charging five, 10, 15, $20,000 a year.

00:58:00.040 | But they subsidize this for young people, hoping that you will develop a long-term

00:58:04.800 | relationship and donate a lot more.

00:58:06.680 | So young patrons programs at these museums, the key word would be to ask

00:58:11.480 | if you're looking to, to buy a membership and you're curious about

00:58:14.840 | this, say, Oh, what type of young patrons memberships might you have?

00:58:18.520 | And then I forgot about bank of America.

00:58:20.800 | If you have a bank of America card, I think the first weekend of every month,

00:58:25.360 | you can go to a ton of museums around the country for free.

00:58:28.680 | I know in San Francisco, it includes the Legion of honor and

00:58:31.840 | the DeYoung museum and that, that, so, um, even like a free bank of America

00:58:36.440 | checking account would, would I think qualify if I remember correctly.

00:58:39.800 | So, uh, that's another one I'll link to that in the show notes with museum hack.

00:58:44.160 | You probably talked to lots of people and learned a lot about

00:58:46.560 | planning tours, booking tours.

00:58:48.280 | What do you do if you're in a new country and you want to find a tour?

00:58:52.120 | Do you have a way to do that?

00:58:54.240 | That that cuts through the noise and finds the best tours.

00:58:57.280 | I'll tell you right now, the people that are killing it are Airbnb experiences.

00:59:03.160 | Have you done an Airbnb experience?

00:59:05.240 | I we've done a bunch of virtual ones that were kind of like company

00:59:09.200 | organized events, COVID, uh, no way you got to do the real in-person

00:59:14.120 | Airbnb experience, and I would even challenge you to set up a date night

00:59:18.720 | with your wife and do one of them in San Francisco, uh, on the Airbnb experiences.

00:59:24.320 | The problem is now they're spamming them a lot with these photo things

00:59:28.280 | where they're just trying to juice for photos, skip all of those.

00:59:31.560 | I'm looking for food tours and walking tours that have an

00:59:35.040 | average rating above 4.9 with at least 25 reviews.

00:59:40.160 | Those are generally, you're going to get some really good tour guides.

00:59:44.680 | And what I like about that is they're empowered tour guides that

00:59:47.840 | have set up their own businesses that are going to be very passionate.

00:59:50.520 | So I like Airbnb experiences and I will generally schedule it.

00:59:54.200 | The first thing I do to a city, cause then I can ask the guide for advice.

00:59:57.720 | This show isn't usually a show about someone's kind of stories,

01:00:02.800 | their resume and that kind of stuff.

01:00:04.560 | And so normally I was going to skip over the career stuff in favor of all

01:00:08.440 | these tactical things we've talked about.

01:00:10.040 | Uh, but I looked at, I was like, Oh, you sold your company.

01:00:12.480 | Cool.

01:00:12.960 | You know, a lot of shows would be like, tell me about that.

01:00:15.640 | I wasn't that interested for the purpose of this show.

01:00:18.560 | And then I saw that it was actually a very interesting

01:00:20.840 | way you sold your company.

01:00:21.720 | Um, something that I think most people probably as business owners

01:00:25.920 | wouldn't think of, and most people as employees wouldn't think of.

01:00:28.760 | And so I would love to just hear the quick version of that and how it's gone.

01:00:34.000 | Because I thought it was something that at least one person listening

01:00:36.800 | might get a lot out of hearing.

01:00:38.040 | Yes.

01:00:38.920 | I sold my last company, museum hack to my then CEO and marketing director.

01:00:44.840 | They came to me with an offer to buy the business.

01:00:47.800 | I never thought that I would sell it.

01:00:49.200 | I just, I didn't, it didn't seem like a business you could really sell to

01:00:52.280 | somebody and I sold it to them using seller financing, which what that means

01:00:57.440 | is that they put zero money down.

01:00:59.560 | And they said, look, we're just going to run the business like we've been doing.

01:01:03.600 | And yet we will pay you off over five years from all the profits.

01:01:07.680 | So you get to lock in five years of profits of the business

01:01:11.280 | and have zero responsibility.

01:01:13.400 | And so that's how I sold the business.

01:01:15.720 | And they've, they've done so much better than I ever could have done.

01:01:19.040 | They've taken the business to new places and it was a big win for everybody.

01:01:22.800 | There's an episode.

01:01:23.920 | I think you've done on a podcast about it that I listened to briefly.

01:01:26.960 | I'll link to that in the show notes, but I just thought it was a cool story

01:01:29.760 | because most small business kind of sales, nobody really talks about how

01:01:33.960 | that works and this was a different one.

01:01:35.360 | Yeah.

01:01:36.200 | Uh, yeah, yeah, yeah.

01:01:38.040 | It was super, um, it was super unique and it now would give me the opportunity

01:01:43.360 | to do a lot of traveling myself, which I do have some questions for you about

01:01:47.760 | traveling myself whenever it's appropriate.

01:01:49.800 | Okay.

01:01:50.400 | Yeah, no, no.

01:01:50.840 | My, my, I had some travel stuff I wanted to jump into.

01:01:53.480 | Cause you know, you have this great website where you've

01:01:55.600 | blogged about all these adventures.

01:01:56.960 | So, but I'll let you jump in first and let's see where it goes.

01:02:00.040 | Fun fact, a friend of mine just flew back last night from, um, um, Istanbul.

01:02:05.440 | And have you gone through their new lounge there?

01:02:09.080 | Have you been through the new Istanbul airport?

01:02:11.360 | I'm going to assume.

01:02:12.560 | No, I think it was, it's been a long time.

01:02:14.800 | It is the biggest airport business lounge in the whole world.

01:02:19.720 | And it is absolutely incredible.

01:02:23.040 | And he and I were just sharing stories about that.

01:02:25.080 | Okay.

01:02:25.640 | Here's my questions.

01:02:26.560 | Okay.

01:02:26.880 | So I have a question for you.

01:02:28.160 | Is it ever cheaper to buy a round trip plane ticket?

01:02:32.320 | I love to book one way plane tickets.

01:02:35.000 | I think it's the greatest luxury in the world.

01:02:37.400 | I don't set myself a determined date to come back.

01:02:41.040 | I kind of love to go to places and I'll go back when I'm bored.

01:02:44.600 | Am I shooting myself in the foot and losing a lot of money?

01:02:48.440 | Or as I assume are one way is pretty much the same price as a round trip.

01:02:54.560 | I would say domestic for the most part that is correct.

01:02:58.840 | There are one, two, one ways is equal to a round trip.

01:03:01.720 | I was actually looking for flights to fly from San Francisco to steamboat

01:03:06.720 | Springs where my wife's family lives.

01:03:08.280 | And I actually noticed that booking a round trip was cheaper by about $75.

01:03:14.960 | You know, the total cost of the round trip was $75 less than two one ways.

01:03:18.720 | But I also know that in the winter steamboat Springs helps subsidize

01:03:24.040 | the cost of flights there.

01:03:25.480 | And I assume that part of that deal is we're going to help subsidize

01:03:28.720 | the flights for touristic purposes.

01:03:30.480 | Most people buying one way tickets aren't flying for, uh, you know, tourism.

01:03:35.240 | They're more flying for business or, or they live there.

01:03:37.280 | So I would say if there are places that are maybe small airports where they

01:03:41.200 | might be subsidized by the town for tourism reasons, you might actually

01:03:45.200 | still get a better deal buying round trip.

01:03:47.600 | When it comes to international, there are a lot of circumstances

01:03:52.200 | where one way is, is.

01:03:54.320 | Much more expensive than a round trip, or at least two one ways

01:03:58.040 | is more expensive than a round trip.

01:03:59.320 | Um, the, the catch there is there's a few things.

01:04:02.760 | So one, you could buy a round trip, set your return really far in the distant

01:04:07.360 | future, and you could actually look online and say, depending on the airline,

01:04:11.680 | what is their policy for cancellation and reusing the funds.

01:04:14.840 | And in those circumstances, I would say, let's say you wanted to fly on air

01:04:18.480 | France and you knew you, you weren't sure if you were going to come back.

01:04:21.600 | There might be a way and.

01:04:23.000 | Got to read a lot of the terms.

01:04:24.720 | You could book a round trip, uh, and change the return later.

01:04:28.680 | Uh, maybe book it on Delta instead of air France.

01:04:31.320 | So if you got credit, it would be on Delta, which you might use more

01:04:34.080 | frequently living in the States than you would use an air France credit.

01:04:37.600 | Um, or, and, and for anyone flying business class, it is often much

01:04:43.320 | cheaper to fly round trip business class than, uh, one, two one ways.

01:04:46.720 | But the fair is actually round trip.

01:04:49.680 | So I've helped a lot of people who are looking to fly one

01:04:52.080 | way business class to Europe.

01:04:53.320 | Maybe they want to go to another city and come back from there.

01:04:55.640 | You buy one way to Europe and business, and then you fly, but you buy a round

01:04:59.400 | trip and the return is in coach.

01:05:01.080 | And so, you know, I remember a circumstance where it was like the one

01:05:05.480 | way ticket was $4,000, but the round trip with the outbound in business.

01:05:11.440 | And the return in coach was like $2,300.

01:05:14.120 | So it was significantly cheaper if you bought a round trip, but you didn't

01:05:17.640 | have to buy the return in business.

01:05:19.800 | So that's another circumstance.

01:05:22.160 | If, if you're flying business that can help.

01:05:24.240 | Um, but I would say if you, it might be cheaper, let's say you're going in the

01:05:28.680 | summer, you want a one-way ticket to Europe.

01:05:30.800 | It might be cheaper to fly around trip, but summer is expensive, but you

01:05:34.120 | could always look to return, you know, maybe in January or some, some other

01:05:38.520 | month where it's a much cheaper time to travel, so I don't know if there's a

01:05:42.880 | hardened fast rule internationally on when, when it matters and when it doesn't.

01:05:46.560 | And, uh, but I have seen that be the case.

01:05:49.920 | There have been times where it's a case.

01:05:51.200 | So I would kind of give you the advice of check and see.

01:05:53.840 | Um, and if it's the same, then I would just book the one way.

01:05:57.440 | Of course, that's smart.

01:05:58.680 | I've, I've never thought about that idea.

01:06:00.200 | What resonated the most with me is business one way and then coach back

01:06:04.320 | and see how that would go to the one way.

01:06:06.360 | So similarly, the coach flight, because in Europe, any ticket you buy that you

01:06:10.440 | cancel, even if it's non-refundable, you get your taxes back.

01:06:13.680 | So the rule is, you know, you buy round trip business out coach back.

01:06:17.600 | As soon as you fly the business leg, you cancel the ticket and you get

01:06:20.280 | your taxes on the coach leg back.

01:06:21.720 | I like that, especially through airports like London Heathrow, where

01:06:25.320 | the taxes can be almost $200.

01:06:27.160 | Yeah, yeah, exactly.

01:06:28.000 | Okay.

01:06:28.960 | Next question.

01:06:29.680 | Um, I like having flight optionality, right.

01:06:33.000 | As my first question alluded.

01:06:34.280 | And so I love to book plane tickets where I can get a full refund very easily.

01:06:39.280 | For that reason, I tend to book Southwest a lot.

01:06:43.760 | Are there other airlines now post COVID?

01:06:47.000 | Does everybody give you full refunds on flights or let's just

01:06:51.680 | assume domestic only for now?

01:06:54.120 | Yeah.

01:06:54.840 | So Southwest, if you book with points, it's like full refund

01:06:58.080 | and points get redeposited.

01:06:59.240 | If you book with dollars, you get a Southwest travel credit.

01:07:02.440 | You don't get a full refund.

01:07:03.960 | Um, unless you, I believe there's a new fare.

01:07:07.600 | Uh, actually no, and that credit has to be used by you.

01:07:11.440 | Southwest just launched this, like want to get away plus fare.

01:07:14.560 | And the, the main selling perk is that that credit you get

01:07:17.320 | back can be used by anyone.

01:07:18.520 | Um, but most of the airlines have now moved to a similar model where if you

01:07:23.880 | cancel something, you'll get a credit back.

01:07:26.200 | Um, I don't have the list off the top of my head of which ones are doing that,

01:07:30.360 | which ones aren't, and when you book with miles, some of them still charge

01:07:33.760 | a fee to deposit those miles back if you cancel it, but many do not.

01:07:38.080 | Um, so I would say the most flexibility, you know, with Southwest, if I know

01:07:42.560 | I'm not gonna, I know I might need to make a change versus like, this

01:07:47.120 | is a trip I'm definitely taking.

01:07:48.440 | I try to book with points because they'll just refund the points

01:07:51.120 | instead of give you a credit.

01:07:52.120 | Um, so that's the move, but yeah, I think miles give you a lot of

01:07:56.680 | flexibility because let's say I'm booking an international trip.

01:08:00.160 | That's tons of miles for a family of four.

01:08:02.160 | They might charge you even a $50 a person redeposit fee, but I'd rather

01:08:07.080 | pay $50 times for people, you know, to get my miles back then have a $5,000

01:08:14.000 | credit on, you know, KLM or something, which is going to be really hard to use.

01:08:18.360 | Yeah.

01:08:18.960 | Super hard to use.

01:08:19.960 | Uh, so that leads me to my next question.

01:08:22.760 | I do book with Southwest and I do book with Southwest points because I just

01:08:27.760 | want it as easy as possible to cancel.

01:08:29.600 | I generally just transfer my chase points one to one to Southwest just

01:08:35.440 | cause it's easy and it's built in.

01:08:37.400 | I have a bunch of chase points.

01:08:39.960 | Is that stupid?

01:08:41.200 | Am I being stupid by just doing those one-to-one to Southwest or what?

01:08:45.000 | You're traveling and you're getting to go on trips.

01:08:48.720 | So I wouldn't say any of these choices are stupid, right?

01:08:51.120 | Like I always say, if you can use your points to go on a free trip, uh, you

01:08:54.760 | know, you're doing something right.

01:08:56.120 | However, I will say that, you know, the way Southwest airlines works is that

01:09:01.640 | their points are effectively worth like a dollar value, it fluctuates a little

01:09:06.960 | bit, but it's roughly around, I think it's like 1.37 cents per point.

01:09:11.760 | Um, so that's the bar, like you'll never get more.

01:09:16.880 | You'll never get less.

01:09:17.880 | It's kind of right hovers around there.

01:09:19.280 | If you use your chase points and you have a chase Sapphire reserve card and you

01:09:23.520 | just book in the chase portal, you can book any flight on any carrier, probably

01:09:28.240 | except Southwest, uh, because Southwest doesn't like to play with all these

01:09:31.880 | travel portals, but you can book any flight on any carrier and your

01:09:34.160 | points will be worth 1.5 cents.

01:09:35.840 | So your points are going to go further on any other carrier booking in the

01:09:39.960 | chase portal than they will on Southwest.

01:09:41.760 | Now that doesn't mean it's going to be as easy to cancel.

01:09:44.720 | If you do that, it might not be as convenient for you, but from a pure

01:09:48.880 | dollar value of the point, you know, my stack rank is transferred to Southwest

01:09:55.000 | near the bottom because the value trans book in the portal, and then, you know,

01:10:00.040 | I I'll refer you to a few episodes when we wrap up where we kind of go in more

01:10:03.520 | detail, but when you take those points and you transfer them to almost any other

01:10:07.560 | airline, Air France, uh, United, you know, you can get 1 cent, but you can also

01:10:14.600 | sometimes if you time it right, if you're booking last minute, if you're flying

01:10:17.920 | an international business class, you know, I've seen, I've gotten 5 cents, I've

01:10:21.680 | gotten 7 cents, so I would say you're getting free trips and I want you to

01:10:27.480 | take vacations.

01:10:28.400 | That's like, it makes me happy, but your points could be where it could probably

01:10:32.680 | be earning you more value, uh, than they are by transferring to Southwest.

01:10:36.760 | Speaking of international travel, what is your jet lag strategy?

01:10:41.640 | So I typically try to get on the time zone, like 24 hours in advance.

01:10:48.640 | I try to like, you know, you get on this plane and you're using your miles.

01:10:52.360 | You'd say you're flying in business and you're like, oh, they're going to give

01:10:54.240 | me this amazing meal and these free bottles of wine.

01:10:56.680 | And I'm like, but it's about 10 30 PM in Tokyo.

01:11:00.360 | So I'm going to bed.

01:11:01.280 | I'm not drinking.

01:11:02.560 | I'm not, you know, I'm trying to hydrate so that, um, you know, I can get good

01:11:06.080 | night's rest land.

01:11:07.880 | I try to power through as long as I can till the end of the day and go to sleep.

01:11:12.440 | And I'd say like 70% of the time it works.

01:11:15.440 | Every now and then I remember one night, one afternoon, my wife and I were in

01:11:18.840 | Budapest and we were like, let's just take a nap, like, you know, 2:00 PM.

01:11:23.280 | Just a quick one.

01:11:24.760 | And then, you know, you wake up at 4:00 AM and you're like, oh,

01:11:27.040 | we just, we're really screwed here.

01:11:28.560 | Oh God.

01:11:29.160 | Um, but for most part, I try to get on the time zone a day in advance and.

01:11:34.080 | You know, not worry about the plane ride and the experience as much as like

01:11:39.480 | trying to get on the right time zone.

01:11:41.840 | I have not yet done a trip like that, changing more than a

01:11:44.360 | time zone or two with children.

01:11:46.560 | And so anyone listening has tips there.

01:11:49.560 | I would absolutely love you to send me an email because we're talking about

01:11:53.800 | taking a trip where we'd go more than four or five time zones with two kids.

01:11:57.800 | And I have no idea what that will be like.

01:11:59.280 | I have used an app that is called time shifter.

01:12:03.640 | Have you heard of this app?

01:12:04.600 | No.

01:12:04.920 | Time shifter is a fascinating app.

01:12:07.640 | You can use it the first time for free.

01:12:09.640 | And then after that, I think it's $9 a trip.

01:12:12.160 | And they use the same science that NASA uses when they send astronauts up to

01:12:16.320 | the international space station by doing exactly what you said, but just a little

01:12:21.440 | more strategically of trying to get you on the new time zone, starting about two

01:12:26.080 | days in advance, what does that look like each day they'll have you wake up an hour

01:12:30.840 | sooner, each day they'll throttle back.

01:12:34.080 | The last time you're allowed to have caffeine, they're going to do certain

01:12:38.600 | things to modulate your behaviors in the two days leading up to your trip.

01:12:43.520 | And then on the flight itself, sometimes, like you said, they feed you all this.

01:12:48.840 | They try to get you drunk.

01:12:49.640 | They try to get you to go to sleep, but sometimes that's not what they're doing

01:12:53.400 | in the times when you're flying too.

01:12:54.960 | And they'll tell you advice, like open up your window shade, turn

01:12:59.000 | your phone brightness to a hundred percent, get light in your eyes.

01:13:03.240 | You need to get your body sync during the flight itself.

01:13:07.320 | I think that's an interesting app.

01:13:08.680 | I'll have to check it out.

01:13:10.160 | My next question is away from travel.

01:13:12.960 | You mentioned a couple of times during this interview that you have an au pair.

01:13:16.640 | Do you feel comfortable talking about the decision process that went

01:13:21.320 | into as a family, making that jump?

01:13:24.520 | I, I didn't grow up with people who had au pairs.

01:13:28.880 | I now know friends who have them, but for some, it could feel very inaccessible.

01:13:34.760 | And I was just curious what, how you came to that family choice.

01:13:38.840 | So I did grow up my parents.

01:13:40.880 | We had four au pairs from Norway when I was a kid.

01:13:43.240 | So, uh, you know, I just, we grew up in DC, uh, suburbs and I think, you

01:13:49.200 | know, DC is a very international place.

01:13:51.560 | I seemed so normal at the time.

01:13:54.040 | I can't actually say whether like my friends had au pairs,

01:13:57.200 | but I thought it was so cool.

01:13:58.200 | I brought my au pair to show and tell in school one year.

01:14:00.680 | That's incredible.

01:14:02.320 | And then my wife, Amy and I, we travel differently, I guess.

01:14:06.160 | So we took an eight month trip backpacking and we couch surf the whole time.

01:14:10.040 | And before we left, we wanted to like build up credibility on couch surfing the app.

01:14:15.240 | And so we hosted probably 50 people over the course of six months in our house.

01:14:20.840 | And so for us, the idea of having someone from another country around us, um, or

01:14:27.440 | staying in someone else's home, we don't know when we're traveling, uh, was just

01:14:31.720 | like something we've done, I don't know, hundreds of times.

01:14:34.480 | And so I love it.

01:14:36.120 | I think there's nothing more interesting than meeting people from different

01:14:39.880 | walks of life, different parts of the world, hearing their stories, having

01:14:43.640 | meals with them, cooking meals for them.

01:14:45.920 | I remember trying to find all the ingredients I needed to make eggplant

01:14:49.800 | Parmesan, uh, in rural Tanzania.

01:14:52.560 | Uh, in this house where all we had was like a pot and, you know, a little

01:14:57.960 | carrier, you know, uh, what did you propane stove and I remember I was so

01:15:02.640 | proud because I'd managed to find this international grocery store and Dara

01:15:05.880 | Salam and I found eggplant, I found mozzarella cheese and sauce and spaghetti.

01:15:10.520 | I made this whole meal and I served it.

01:15:13.640 | And the father of the house we were staying with was like, I'm so excited for

01:15:17.640 | dinner.

01:15:17.960 | And I was like, we just ate dinner.

01:15:19.400 | He's like, oh no, no, that wasn't dinner.

01:15:20.600 | There was no meat.

01:15:21.280 | And I was like, no, that was, that was Derek.

01:15:23.880 | We had eggplant Parmesan, we had spaghetti.

01:15:25.320 | We had some garlic bread.

01:15:26.720 | It was kind of garlic bread.

01:15:27.840 | And he was like, but there's no meat.

01:15:29.600 | So it couldn't have been dinner.

01:15:30.600 | And I was like, totally defeated.

01:15:32.440 | But that experience was like just cooking that meal.

01:15:35.640 | I might look at like a photo in the show notes.

01:15:38.040 | Cause it's kind of, it's like, it was not a normal kitchen to cook this meal in.

01:15:42.160 | Um, I should've gone with chicken Parmesan to be honest, but, uh, you know,

01:15:46.640 | that kind of stuff I love my wife loves, like we want our children to have

01:15:51.120 | experiences like that.

01:15:52.840 | So the idea of having someone from another country who has a totally set a

01:15:57.840 | different set of background, different set of experiences come in and, you know,

01:16:02.160 | share that with you for a year, um, and, and get to know your family and get to

01:16:06.120 | show them around, you know, I've like, we've taken, um, our au pairs to visit

01:16:10.440 | family, to visit other cities and friends and, um, showing them around museums.

01:16:15.400 | Uh, so for me, I think it, it just seemed like an obvious.

01:16:20.240 | Great solution, but about half the people I tell, tell about it, tell it to about

01:16:26.680 | half the people I talk about it with are like, you have a random person

01:16:30.480 | living in your house for a year.

01:16:31.680 | Like what for us, that just seems like it just totally reasonable and interesting.

01:16:37.600 | And whatever trade-off you lose, the space you lose for the room in your

01:16:41.640 | house, uh, the experience I I've, I've just found we've only had two au pairs

01:16:45.840 | so far, but, uh, to be totally worth it.

01:16:48.000 | And we're, we're already on track, uh, for, for another one next.

01:16:52.480 | So two experiences will lead to a third and we'll see what happens next.

01:16:56.040 | My guess is you wouldn't, you can't imagine your life not having it.

01:16:59.640 | And that's what I've heard from others.

01:17:01.160 | Yeah.

01:17:02.040 | I mean, I think that when kids are in school all the time and, you know, maybe

01:17:07.520 | they're going to camp in the summer or something like that, I could see a world

01:17:10.280 | where it's less beneficial to have full-time childcare when, you know,

01:17:15.960 | there's kids are out more, but right now when they're kids, you know, they're

01:17:20.120 | not out more, like, I, I feel like it would be impossible for me and Amy to

01:17:24.000 | both work and not have childcare.

01:17:26.200 | And, you know, the au pair experience for us is much more exciting than,

01:17:33.160 | you know, a nanny or daycare, but you know, they're like, I don't knock

01:17:37.560 | anyone for making any of those choices.

01:17:39.440 | It's just something that we love.

01:17:40.520 | Sure.

01:17:41.680 | Children, notwithstanding point redemption, regardless, if you could

01:17:47.880 | today's Tuesday, if I could say to you, Hey, look, there's no work on Friday.

01:17:51.960 | You and your wife can hop on, just go to San Francisco airport, take any

01:17:56.160 | flight anywhere in the world Thursday evening for a long, long weekend.

01:18:01.880 | Where would you like to go to just the two of us or just the two of us?

01:18:07.400 | Let's assume for the moment that it's just the two of you.

01:18:11.400 | Am I also assuming that for some reason, there's a, a flight, a

01:18:15.000 | nonstop flight anywhere in the world?

01:18:16.720 | That's a fantastic advanced level question.

01:18:19.880 | Let's assume no, we're going to play it on hard level.

01:18:24.880 | Not like, not like magical level.

01:18:27.600 | Let's, let's be realistic.

01:18:28.760 | That's a great question.

01:18:30.240 | The reason I ask is I've always wanted to go to the Canary islands and they seem

01:18:33.600 | quite difficult to get to, uh, from the West coast, um, I think, and how long are

01:18:40.200 | we going for you're going for the long weekend, so you fly out on Thursday

01:18:44.240 | night and you'll be back either Sunday or Monday, I'm gonna have to think about this.

01:18:49.440 | Well, I have my answer.

01:18:51.600 | Cause I prepared, can I tell you my answer?

01:18:53.200 | Yeah.

01:18:53.800 | Uh, so I've been dying to go to Buenos Aires and here's why there's a direct

01:18:59.680 | flight from many places, probably from San Francisco, from Houston, from New York.

01:19:04.920 | It's in the same time zone.

01:19:06.960 | And so you can take the flight at like 10 PM and you land, it's like a 10 hour

01:19:11.680 | flight and you land at 10 AM local time.

01:19:14.440 | You've not missed any time.

01:19:16.880 | There's no jet lag per se.

01:19:18.960 | To me, it seems like the most perfect, like whole new world environment

01:19:23.480 | and it's currency arbitrage because right now with not only the strong

01:19:29.160 | dollar, but just the Matt rampant inflation there and all the other stuff.

01:19:33.120 | It now does open up some interesting times for the dollar

01:19:37.760 | traveler to get exceptional value.

01:19:39.680 | Yeah, we did a trip to Buenos Aires.

01:19:42.520 | I don't know if this is still the case.

01:19:44.040 | I should be prepared, but I didn't know this was coming, but at the

01:19:47.160 | time there were two exchange rates.

01:19:48.880 | So there's, there's the, I think it was like the dollar blue, which is like

01:19:53.360 | the, the, the off market exchange rate.

01:19:55.640 | And then the one you get, so you never, at least at the time, please fact check

01:19:58.840 | all of this at the time, you never want to pay with a credit card because

01:20:01.720 | they're going at the bank rate, but the other rate was like half the price.

01:20:04.920 | So you would basically like walk down the street and someone be like, you

01:20:08.160 | need currency, you need exchange.

01:20:10.000 | And you'd walk into some random place.

01:20:12.160 | I remember at the time I was like watching YouTube videos on like how

01:20:14.920 | to test the currency, if it's real, because everyone's buying all their

01:20:18.480 | currency and like back alleys.

01:20:19.920 | And now there's WhatsApp groups and you'd message them and

01:20:21.880 | they'd come to your hotel.

01:20:23.000 | And, um, but I can only imagine that if inflation has gone rampant,

01:20:27.040 | the dollar has gone more valuable.

01:20:27.920 | It's even more valuable to do this.

01:20:30.080 | I second that.

01:20:31.120 | The only thing I'd say is we went to Argentina.

01:20:33.000 | Buenos Aires is awesome.

01:20:33.960 | It's incredible.

01:20:34.800 | It's one of the few places in the world.

01:20:36.280 | Maybe new Orleans is similar where people will say, Oh, you've

01:20:38.840 | got to check out the cemeteries.

01:20:40.360 | Um, which is a strange thing to recommend, but they're just so

01:20:44.840 | interesting and different than you've seen anywhere and beautiful and ornate.

01:20:48.840 | Um, but there's just so much cool stuff in Argentina that I wish that you would

01:20:54.440 | have more time than a weekend to go there, but I did do an episode for you

01:20:58.040 | to listen to with the basketball player, Manu Ginobili, who's from Argentina,

01:21:02.880 | where he talked about some of his favorite tips.

01:21:04.680 | So check that out before you go.

01:21:07.120 | Um, I also did a similar trip for a long weekend to Bogota, which was awesome.

01:21:13.080 | Even closer, same time zone.

01:21:15.040 | Um, really accessible.

01:21:17.080 | Gosh, I don't know where I would go for a long weekend.

01:21:20.600 | So let me throw some ideas out of there.

01:21:22.720 | Is that okay?

01:21:23.320 | Yeah, go for it.

01:21:24.160 | Would you guys go to Hawaii?

01:21:25.640 | We are going to Hawaii in a few months.

01:21:27.840 | So I feel like I would not go there this weekend if it was a surprise adventure.

01:21:32.080 | Okay.

01:21:32.720 | Would you go to Japan?

01:21:33.720 | A hundred percent, but Japan is not open right now.

01:21:36.800 | Oh, you're right.

01:21:37.680 | You're right.

01:21:38.320 | You're right.

01:21:38.680 | Okay.

01:21:39.040 | So Japan would always be the number one on the list.

01:21:41.120 | It's like, if you want to go on a trip, we're always like, is Japan possible?

01:21:44.360 | If not, we'll look at the rest of the world.

01:21:45.880 | Yes.

01:21:46.640 | Would you go to Bangkok?

01:21:47.800 | Would you do anything in Southeast Asia?

01:21:49.480 | Yeah.

01:21:50.120 | So we're actually talking, this is so funny, all the things you mentioned.

01:21:52.880 | So we're talking about taking a trip, maybe October, November for a couple

01:21:58.120 | weeks, um, with kids and au pair.

01:22:01.040 | And the plan was to go to Japan, but because it's closed now we're talking

01:22:04.040 | about Bali or Vietnam or Thailand, because we had so much fun there.

01:22:08.040 | The trip, if you hadn't constrained it to a weekend would

01:22:10.680 | be, let's go to New Zealand.

01:22:11.720 | I've heard incredible things about New Zealand, nonstop flight, crazy

01:22:15.680 | long, uh, way more manageable without children than with, and that would be

01:22:20.920 | the place, but I just couldn't imagine going all the way there and then turning

01:22:24.600 | around three days later and coming back.

01:22:26.640 | So that would have been my, my go-to had that not been the constraint.

01:22:32.040 | I love the New Zealand.

01:22:33.400 | Is there any place in South America or Central America that is interesting to you?

01:22:38.640 | You mentioned Bogota.

01:22:40.000 | I went to Medellin and I have to admit, I didn't feel safe there.

01:22:44.520 | Um, I felt, we heard a couple stories where there was one day, I just

01:22:49.080 | wanted to go take a nap in the park.

01:22:51.000 | And someone's like, you're not going to, you're not going to take a nap in the park.

01:22:54.360 | That's not a thing that we do here.

01:22:56.240 | And the idea to like not have your cell phone out and things like that, it became

01:23:00.280 | enough where I was just kind of spooked eventually and we bounced, but I heard

01:23:04.000 | so many great things about Medellin.

01:23:05.840 | I'm curious what your Bogota experience was, or if there's anywhere

01:23:08.640 | else in Central or South America.

01:23:10.160 | Yeah.

01:23:10.880 | I mean, if I were recommending to other people, uh, I could go on for

01:23:14.480 | like a, a great list of definitely Mexico city, awesome weekend trip from the U S.

01:23:19.880 | Uh, you just want to sit on the beach and relax.

01:23:21.800 | Cabo's a great trip, uh, from the U S Bogota was a great trip.

01:23:26.040 | Oh, what's up with Oaxaca.

01:23:27.120 | Have you been to Oaxaca?

01:23:28.120 | I have not, but I've heard cool things.

01:23:30.640 | Um, I haven't been, so I think one place I'd go for the long weekend.

01:23:34.080 | Uh, I'd go to Costa Rica.

01:23:36.040 | I went once, uh, before my wife and I, uh, like, I think we'd even met and it

01:23:42.280 | was awesome and she's never been, she's wanted to go and now it's been 10 plus

01:23:46.120 | years, a lot of what we'd want to do.

01:23:48.280 | We looked at doing with kids and we were like, gosh, it's just not, not

01:23:51.800 | the right place to go right now.

01:23:53.800 | Like I want to go surfing.

01:23:55.000 | We want to go like hiking in the rainforest and like, they're just not

01:23:58.160 | the most toddler friendly activities.

01:24:00.400 | So to finally answer your question, if we got thrown on a plane right now,

01:24:05.760 | uh, this weekend, I'd, I'd say let's go to Costa Rica.

01:24:08.560 | It's not the most inconvenient from the West coast, way easier from

01:24:12.360 | LA because there's direct flights.

01:24:14.080 | Um, that's probably where we'd go.

01:24:16.400 | All the hacks listener beat up in Costa Rica, get ready cocktail party

01:24:22.000 | with the cocktail party, with the name tags.

01:24:24.560 | Okay.

01:24:24.800 | Speaking of travel, this is my last and final question for you.

01:24:27.440 | Do you have any travel gadgets that you absolutely love?

01:24:32.680 | It could be as simple as, for example, I have a travel spork, this tiny little

01:24:37.120 | spork that I just throw in my backpack.

01:24:39.120 | And maybe I only use it like once every four months, but when I get to use it,

01:24:42.880 | I'm like, hell yeah, I got that sport.

01:24:45.320 | I don't have a, you know, some people have that long list of

01:24:47.640 | here's all my cool travel gear.

01:24:49.360 | I don't have the long travel gear list.

01:24:52.400 | The couple of things I'll share that I think are important.

01:24:55.160 | And one, we use those like stuff sacks to compress your, uh, travel,

01:25:01.400 | all your clothes and everything else.

01:25:03.000 | Those were a huge win.

01:25:04.480 | When my wife and I traveled for eight months, we were backpacking.

01:25:06.640 | So it was one carry on 30 liter backpack each.

01:25:09.560 | So space efficiency was important.

01:25:12.480 | The other one is I have this really small, like three outlets, uh, extension cord.

01:25:18.520 | It's not even, I wouldn't even call it extension cord, but I also

01:25:20.560 | wouldn't call it a surge protector because it doesn't actually

01:25:22.880 | have any surge protection.

01:25:24.320 | But it's basically like, instead of bringing, we all have like, okay,

01:25:28.000 | I got my iPhone charger.

01:25:29.120 | Maybe I've got my, you know, this charger, that charger, you

01:25:31.440 | got all these things to charge.

01:25:32.520 | Instead of bringing four ways to plug them into an outlet in

01:25:35.760 | Europe or an outlet in Japan, I just bring like a little tiny

01:25:38.960 | portable travel power strip.

01:25:40.720 | And one power converter.

01:25:43.160 | Cause usually if you're at a hotel, they'll have one, or you can buy one

01:25:47.000 | at any street side thing for a dollar or two, and then I have the power

01:25:51.000 | strip so I can plug everything in.

01:25:52.200 | That's probably like the one unique thing.

01:25:55.240 | Uh, I bring everything else.

01:25:56.760 | It's just kind of like, okay, you know, I bring my passport.

01:25:58.920 | I bring a backpack, you know, I don't have a, a crazy laundry

01:26:02.320 | list of cool, cool gadgets anymore.

01:26:04.520 | That's a great one.

01:26:05.520 | Cause I often find that I need three plugs and there's only two, or it's

01:26:10.040 | really hard, exactly like you said with the, with the power adapter.

01:26:13.360 | So I like the micro mini non-search search protector.

01:26:17.600 | That's a good one.

01:26:18.160 | On travel for you, there's two places you wrote about in your blog that I'd

01:26:23.040 | love you to, to kind of recommend or not.

01:26:26.040 | And it's Kyrgyzstan and the, the Azores.

01:26:28.680 | Is it Azores?

01:26:29.560 | I don't know.

01:26:30.040 | I think locals pronounce it, which is just very, um, so Kyrgyzstan.

01:26:35.440 | I went to Kyrgyzstan.

01:26:36.520 | I flew to Kyrgyzstan on business using United points from Istanbul.

01:26:42.760 | And that's where I got to experience the lounge in Istanbul.

01:26:46.000 | And it was amazing.

01:26:46.800 | Kyrgyzstan was fantastic.

01:26:50.000 | It did seem like the edge of the world.

01:26:52.760 | It felt like no man's land.

01:26:54.880 | Kyrgyzstan was good.

01:26:56.320 | Uzbekistan, I'm going to give a hard pass to.

01:27:00.720 | I found Uzbekistan to be very boring and very quiet.

01:27:07.080 | And maybe if you're a history nerd and you really geek out about the

01:27:11.880 | Silk Road and things like that.

01:27:13.560 | But for me, Uzbekistan was a pass.

01:27:16.960 | For the Azores, the Azores, the Azores, however you pronounce it.

01:27:22.600 | I went there on a cruise.

01:27:24.400 | I've done a bunch of cruises.

01:27:25.640 | Have you guys done any cruises?

01:27:27.680 | One like weekend cruise to the Bahamas and that's it.

01:27:31.080 | So let's, let's, let's jump to cruises that like, I'd love your, your take on cruises.

01:27:36.040 | I'd love to talk about cruises.

01:27:37.160 | Cause I do them in a really weird way.

01:27:38.640 | I do weird cruises.

01:27:40.280 | For example, I'm going on one tomorrow that goes Vancouver to Los Angeles.

01:27:44.840 | I've done a lot of transatlantic cruises where they reposition the cruise.

01:27:50.360 | That's when I went to the Azores or the Azores.

01:27:54.040 | Um, I went the longest cruise I ever went on was from Vancouver to Tokyo.

01:27:59.800 | I think it was 17 days.

01:28:02.000 | Now these cruises, you're not partying hard.

01:28:06.200 | This is not a party cruise.

01:28:07.960 | That's going, it's a really unique type of person who goes on this cruise.

01:28:11.840 | And I love it because I get to caught up on my reading.

01:28:14.680 | I'll read a book a day.

01:28:15.720 | Sometimes I get my diet dialed in.

01:28:18.640 | I get my gym routine.

01:28:20.840 | You're you have the opportunity to reinvent your life at sea.

01:28:24.720 | And it's a really special experience there.

01:28:27.640 | They're generally called repositioning cruises and they're very unique.

01:28:32.240 | And those are the cruises that I like, but even regular cruises with friends.

01:28:35.800 | Um, I love to do them and I think it's, it's unique cause I've

01:28:39.760 | been to a lot of weird places.

01:28:40.960 | And I think people might think like, oh, you're too good for cruises.

01:28:43.720 | Um, but environmental concerns aside, I do think that they are a neat

01:28:49.080 | opportunity for you to imagine how your life could be when there's no constraints.

01:28:54.240 | That's neat.

01:28:54.720 | That's cool.

01:28:55.200 | I think I got to give it another try.

01:28:56.840 | And I think cruises are, are, are more kid friendly than

01:28:59.640 | many other types of travel.

01:29:00.760 | So they are so kid friendly.

01:29:02.920 | They're incredible.

01:29:03.680 | People rave about Disney cruises.

01:29:05.480 | I want to try the new Virgin cruises that are really, really tailored to

01:29:09.560 | millennials and Gen X and things like that.

01:29:12.920 | All right.

01:29:14.120 | I got a couple of quick questions for you.

01:29:16.960 | You run a friend's newsletter and I think I've seen you

01:29:19.560 | write that everyone should.

01:29:20.760 | You talk about it.

01:29:21.600 | I think everyone should have a friend's newsletter when you were growing up.

01:29:25.360 | Did your family, did your parents send like an annual Christmas card or

01:29:30.440 | holiday card with family updates?

01:29:32.440 | Uh, my grandparents always did.

01:29:34.640 | Your grandparents always did.

01:29:36.520 | All right.

01:29:36.880 | And what would be in that card?

01:29:38.400 | It was just, here's everything we, and all of our kids and

01:29:42.320 | grandkids families did this year.

01:29:44.080 | Yes.

01:29:44.800 | Yes.

01:29:45.400 | My friend's newsletter came out of that tradition.

01:29:47.840 | My parents were in the military.

01:29:49.400 | And so that idea of giving this annual status update before social

01:29:53.960 | media, where we do daily status updates, that annual status update

01:29:58.040 | was something I wanted to do on a quarterly basis for my friends.

01:30:01.680 | But I tried to add value.

01:30:03.600 | So it wasn't just about me.

01:30:05.120 | I'd include a nice Netflix show.

01:30:07.280 | I'd seen a great movie or a book.

01:30:09.280 | I'm making recommendations for my friends about cool stuff.

01:30:12.360 | And I started it just every quarter.

01:30:15.360 | Sending to my friends, throwing them on BCC, adding a little note.

01:30:19.000 | Hey, if you don't want to get this, just write me back.

01:30:20.760 | We'll still be friends.

01:30:21.520 | I won't be offended.

01:30:22.360 | And it has been so powerful and helpful to me.

01:30:25.360 | I'd encourage everybody to think about starting a friend's newsletter.

01:30:28.520 | In many ways, the origin of the, all the hacks newsletter was

01:30:32.000 | that many, many years ago.

01:30:33.680 | Uh, how, how I started this newsletter called life updates.

01:30:38.200 | And it was like once a year, a life update of what I was up to.

01:30:41.240 | And then every time I started some new project, I kind of like somewhat

01:30:45.040 | folded them together and it kind of evolved and evolved and some

01:30:48.680 | people have been on it since then.

01:30:50.040 | Some people obviously just found out about it since relaunching the

01:30:52.960 | podcast or launching the podcast.

01:30:55.000 | What things, when you were sending that newsletter, think

01:30:57.960 | back to the earliest days.

01:30:59.520 | Think to the earliest days.

01:31:01.080 | For example, I, I can't talk about this now, but I added

01:31:07.480 | people who didn't ask to be added.

01:31:10.640 | I just sort of spammed my friends a little bit.

01:31:13.120 | Um, and that helped me get started to be honest, but I'll tell you what, if I did

01:31:18.440 | a hundred friends and if three of them, if five of them were mad that I spammed

01:31:22.600 | them, the other 95 were not mad.

01:31:26.160 | And some weren't even happy to receive my updates.

01:31:29.000 | So because everyone likes to travel, I love to ask every one of my guests to

01:31:32.480 | pick a place anywhere in the world that they know well, and tell someone who's

01:31:36.760 | there, what they should do, what they should eat, where they should have a

01:31:39.960 | drink and kind of give them a few ideas.

01:31:41.600 | All right.

01:31:42.640 | Because I spent 13 years there.

01:31:43.960 | I'm going to say New York city, but I'm going to give some new ideas that maybe

01:31:47.160 | people may not have heard elsewhere.

01:31:48.520 | Number one, the best park, the second best park in New York city, the first

01:31:53.200 | best, obviously being central park.

01:31:54.520 | The second best park in New York city is Washington square park.

01:31:59.000 | It is a locals only filled with characters.

01:32:02.640 | The vibes are immaculate.

01:32:04.720 | You can go almost any time for people watching and it's

01:32:08.040 | very centrally located there.

01:32:10.360 | Uh, at the metropolitan museum of art, I mentioned that there's two entrances.

01:32:15.200 | There's two entrances at the Met.

01:32:16.880 | You listeners can take the entrance at 81st street to skip the lines.

01:32:22.280 | Now, when else should you go to the Met?

01:32:24.120 | Well, on Friday and Saturday nights, cause the Met stays open late till nine o'clock.

01:32:28.240 | Most people do not know this.

01:32:29.760 | I would suggest arriving at seven and you can enjoy the

01:32:33.320 | museum almost all to yourself.

01:32:35.280 | So I would suggest that, uh, before the Met, why don't you go to central park?

01:32:39.560 | And go to my favorite place in central park called sheep meadow.

01:32:43.280 | Sheep meadow is a sprawling green area with skyscraper views.

01:32:48.240 | It's a great place to have a picnic.

01:32:50.280 | Really the best place in central park, in my opinion.

01:32:53.240 | And then the last thing that I'll suggest is if you want a

01:32:56.920 | fun activity in New York city.

01:32:58.640 | I'm not sponsored, but there's a thing called Scott's pizza tour.

01:33:02.120 | Scott is a classic tour guide in New York city.

01:33:06.000 | And he has a whole network of guides where they show you the behind the

01:33:09.120 | scenes of how the pizza is made and things like that.

01:33:11.440 | I love that place.

01:33:12.320 | Scott's pizza tour.

01:33:13.480 | You've written about a ton of things on your blog.

01:33:15.680 | Everything from Chrome extensions.

01:33:17.600 | You love using a virtual assistant, saving money, buying a car.

01:33:20.640 | I had this lofty dream of getting to all of these topics.

01:33:23.840 | We're not going to do that.

01:33:24.800 | Um, I definitely recommend people check out the book, check out the blog.

01:33:28.800 | Where else can people find you online?

01:33:31.080 | What do you want them to check out?

01:33:32.520 | Uh, before we wrap.

01:33:34.440 | Uh, so I wrote a book called the two hour cocktail party.

01:33:36.640 | That is if you like this show, it's incredibly tactical and practical

01:33:40.160 | with a lot of specific instructions.

01:33:42.080 | And the name of that book is called the two hour cocktail party.

01:33:45.280 | If you go to my book website, www.party, P A R T Y.pro www.party.pro, you can get

01:33:55.720 | a free two page party checklist that includes an executive summary of my

01:33:59.840 | book with all that you need to know.

01:34:01.720 | And you can download that there.

01:34:02.840 | It's like a PDF file.

01:34:04.440 | Um, and then I do have a friend's newsletter, which I think

01:34:07.160 | is like my favorite newsletter.

01:34:09.200 | Nobody likes to read my friend's newsletter more than I do.

01:34:11.840 | And it's great.

01:34:13.200 | Some people say it's one of their favorite newsletters after the, all

01:34:15.840 | the hacks newsletter, of course.

01:34:17.160 | Um, and you can find that on my website, which is www.nickgray.net and on social

01:34:27.840 | media, I'm @nickgraynews in the show notes will include how to host a clothing

01:34:32.480 | swap, how to host a happy hour, how to plan a networking event, other ideas that

01:34:36.840 | you can use to just bring people together.

01:34:38.520 | Oh, here's the last thing I'll say.

01:34:39.880 | All this stuff I've taught about is not rocket science.

01:34:43.440 | Hosting a party is something anyone can learn, but no one really teaches

01:34:48.000 | us how to throw a well-run event.

01:34:49.720 | This is something you can learn and you can become good at

01:34:52.680 | that just might change your life.

01:34:54.040 | I love it.

01:34:55.920 | Thank you so much for being here.

01:34:57.360 | Thanks for having me.

01:34:59.280 | [Music]

Cocktail Party Hacks for Your Next Get Together | All The Hacks with Nick Gray

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