Howdy Founders 🤠 

We’re exactly halfway through the working year and I hope it’s been a good one so far!

Here’s what we’re talking about today:

• Why I write this (and why you should too) 😎 

• Let’s figure out what to do together 🕺 

• How to build a big AI business while barely trying 💡 

I’m not consistent

You may have noticed that I don’t publish this newsletter on a tight schedule.

There are about eleven thousand you subscribed to this newsletter and I’d have to be a psycho to assume any of you are watching your inbox on Thursday mornings, waiting for it to come in.

My last publish date was April 11th. That means I’ve missed 4 weeks 😅 

No worries, this isn’t a business!

Many of you have probably already considered (at some point) creating a newsletter. The advice you’ve probably NEVER heard on the topic is “Don’t make it a business!”.

If you’re on the fence about creating a newsletter and you’re concerned about how many opens you’ll get and how much time you’ll have to spend a/b testing subject lines, my advice is to just DO IT and don’t think about how much money you could eventually earn on ad placements.

Here’s why I do it

I’ll be honest and tell you that I don’t particularly enjoy writing. I never have. The upside of publishing this newsletter (whenever I get around to it) is that I get to connect with a bunch of cool people. Isn’t that why we’re all doing anything?

Think about it, if you’re one of those “I’m building my startup to change the world” people, that’s probably because you look around and LIKE the people you aim to help. If you’re building a startup to get rich…why? So you can do cool stuff with people you like!!

So, writing this won’t make me rich but the outcome is essentially the same ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

One great example

In the last edition (on April 11th) I asked what would be the BEST way to facilitate connectedness among the 11k awesome startup founder subscribers.

I know you can’t read the tiny text on the screenshot above but just take my word for it, after a few hundred responses, “Bi-Annual Founders Retreats” was the BIG winner. I think it’s SO cool that you guys want to get together and I could not be more on board!

So, what should we do together?

Help me out by answering these two quick polls:

💡 Let’s build a big AI business (Business Idea of the Week)

Stop thinking of exciting ideas! I know, I know. It’s just how your brain works. Let’s turn that part off for now and think of some terribly boring ideas:

Did you know that there are 9,200 waste collection companies in the US alone? They do $77 BILLION in annual revenue and have 260,000+ employees 🤯 

These huge businesses run on razor-thin margins with the BEST performing company at 16% 🤮 .

One of the biggest challenges is LABOR costs. The median salary for a collector is $43,000 (More than a teacher in many states). So how can we help them cut down on labor costs?

Most companies are paid via public contracts which include rules like “You have to pick up ALL the trash that is properly positioned for pickup on your route by 5pm”. So what happens if 20% of the houses haven’t properly positioned their waste for pickup? Well, they have to stop and pick that up anyway because if enough residents contact their municipality to complain, that collection can lose that valuable contract.

How can we use AI to help them? VISION!

There’s currently no good, FAST way to properly document (and warn) cases of improper positioning of waste. Do you ever leave bags on the curb next to your can? You’re part of the problem!

What if there was an app that 1 guy on each truck had on his smartphone that could quickly snap a picture to document cases of improper positioning? It could use GPS data and a photo of the property to identify the owner so that they can be warned (Probably via snail mail). It would also live as a documented infraction so the waste collector has ammunition to protect their precious contract if there are complaints.

I don’t mean to be an advocate for laying people off but we have to be realistic here. If you could increase overall efficiency by only 10%, you’re talking about a labor savings of over a BILLION dollars across the industry, just in the US. All of a sudden, those margins aren’t so razor-thin.

I dunno. It’s late ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

The point here is to keep in mind that there are MASSIVE boring industries that are going to be left “In the dark” for some time while we’re all having fun with AI and stuff.

The End

That’s it for today.

Next week I want to tell you about how I’m helping a friend get hundreds of social media influencers to talk about his business, without spending his cash. We want to keep it a secret for at least one more week while we collect some sweet, sweet data.

Follow me on Twitter! I promise to almost never tweet.

Thanks for reading!

Love,

— John