Acquired

Ben Gilbert and David Rosenthal

Every company has a story. Learn the playbooks that built the world’s greatest companies — and how you can apply them.

#2 in the Top 100 investing Monthly chart

...more

43 Listeners

All episodes

Best episodes

Seasons

Top 10 Acquired Episodes

Goodpods has curated a list of the 10 best Acquired episodes, ranked by the number of listens and likes each episode have garnered from our listeners. If you are listening to Acquired for the first time, there's no better place to start than with one of these standout episodes. If you are a fan of the show, vote for your favorite Acquired episode by adding your comments to the episode page.

Starbucks (with Howard Schultz)

Acquired

06/04/24 • 192 min

Starbucks. You’d be hard pressed to name any brand that’s more ubiquitous in the world today. With nearly half a billion global customer purchases per week across its stores and 3rd party retail channels, a significant portion of the human population gets their daily fix in the green and white paper cup. (Including our own Ben Gilbert who famously enjoys his daily spinach feta wrap. :)

But it wasn’t always this way. Long before the frappuccinos and the PSLs and the cake pops, Starbucks was just a small-time Seattle roaster that only sold beans — and was started not by Howard Schultz but rather the guys who later ran Peet’s (!). Starting from six tiny stores when Howard took over in 1987, this quirky coffee company named after a character from Moby Dick has scaled to nearly 40,000 locations worldwide.

Today, in a first for Acquired, the protagonist himself joins us as a third cohost to tell the whole story of Starbucks. And Howard is in the perfect moment to do this — after three separate stints as CEO he’s now retired, off the board of directors, and in his own words “not coming back.” So place a mobile order (or not! as you’ll hear Howard speak about), sit back with your own favorite Starbucks items, and enjoy.

Sponsors:

Anthropic: https://bit.ly/acqclaude
Huntress: https://bit.ly/acqhuntress
Statsig: https://bit.ly/acquiredstatsig24

The Biggest Thing We’ve Ever Done:

San Francisco. September 10, 2024. Mark your calendars.

Links:

More Acquired!:

Get email updates with hints on next episode and follow-ups from recent episodes
Join the Slack
Subscribe to ACQ2
Merch Store!

‍Note: Acquired hosts and guests may hold assets discussed in this episode. This podcast is not investment advice, and is intended for informational and entertainment purposes only. You should do your own research and make your own independent decisions when considering any financial transactions.

10 Listeners

Costco

Acquired

08/21/23 • 179 min

Costco is not only Charlie Munger’s favorite company of all time (plus he’s on the board, natch), it’s an absolutely fascinating study in how seemingly opposite characteristics can combine to create incredible company value. For instance: Costco has the cheapest prices of any major retailer in America — and also the wealthiest customer base. They pay their hourly workers 30% above the industry norm (and give them excellent healthcare + 401k benefits) — and are almost 3x more profitable on labor than Walmart. Speaking of Walmart, Costco stocks 40x fewer SKUs than their Bentonville-based rivals — yet sells an average of 15x more volume of each. And oh yeah, practically all of Costco’s C-Suite started their careers as baggers and checkout clerks! Tune in for a mind-bending exploration of one of the world’s most iconic — and iconically unique — companies.

Links:

Carve Outs:

Sponsors:

Anthropic: https://bit.ly/acqclaude
Huntress: https://bit.ly/acqhuntress
Statsig: https://bit.ly/acquiredstatsig24

More Acquired!:

Get email updates with hints on next episode and follow-ups from recent episodes
Join the Slack
Subscribe to ACQ2
Merch Store!

10 Listeners

Season 3, Episode 1: Tesla

Acquired

07/17/18 • 123 min

Acquired kicks off Season 3 with a gangbuster two-hour extravaganza on America’s most successful automotive startup since The Ford Motor Company: Tesla. We cover everything, from founding to its 2010 IPO to all that’s happened since, including the question on the minds of superhero fans everywhere: who came first, Elon Musk or Tony Stark? (Spoiler: Elon)

Sponsors:

Anthropic: https://bit.ly/acqclaude
Huntress: https://bit.ly/acqhuntress
Statsig: https://bit.ly/acquiredstatsig24

More Acquired!:

Get email updates with hints on next episode and follow-ups from recent episodes
Join the Slack
Subscribe to ACQ2
Merch Store!

Carve Outs:

Ben: The Dissect podcast
David: Harry Potter and the Sacred Text podcast

4 Listeners

1 Comment

The Mark Zuckerberg Interview

Acquired

09/18/24 • 87 min

Mark is the iconic founder CEO of our time. At Chase Center on September 10, 2024, he did an unprecedented thing: a live conversation in front of 6,000 people on Meta’s company strategy, sharing stories from early Facebook history, and his thoughts on the future of AI, VR, and AR. Mark was remarkably candid in our discussion, and gave us a window into his real and intense daily demeanor leading Meta. (And his other life endeavors!)

We can't wait to release the complete video of the whole night, including our surprise conversations with Daniel Ek, Emily Chang, and cameo appearances from Jensen Huang and Mike Taylor (the incredible singer of “Who Got the Truth?”). That’s coming in a couple weeks, but for now: enjoy this conversation with Mark Zuckerberg.

Sponsors:

Many thanks to our fantastic Fall ‘24 Season partners:

Links:

Mike Amiri (who designed Mark’s shirt!)

More Acquired:

Get email updates with hints on next episode and follow-ups from recent episodes
Join the Slack
Subscribe to ACQ2
Check out the latest swag in the ACQ Merch Store!

Photo Credit: Mark Zuckerberg by Jeff Sainlar / Meta

4 Listeners

Charlie Munger

Acquired

10/30/23 • 66 min

We sit down with the legendary Charlie Munger in the only dedicated longform podcast interview that he has done in his 99 years on Earth. We’ve gotten to have some special conversations on Acquired over the years, but this one truly takes the cake. Over dinner at his Los Angeles home, Charlie reflected with us on his own career and his nearly 50-year partnership at Berkshire Hathaway with Warren Buffett. He offered lessons and advice for investors today, and of course he shared his speech on the virtues of Costco once again (among other favorite investments). We’re so glad that we got the opportunity to record and share this with you all — break out your notebooks, tune in, and enjoy the singular wit and wisdom of Charlie Munger.

A transcript is available here.

Sponsor:

Special thanks to Tiny for being the exclusive sponsor of this episode. You can get in touch with them here (just tell them Ben & David sent you), and order your very own bronze Charlie bust here.

More Acquired!:

Get email updates with hints on next episode and follow-ups from recent episodes
Join the Slack
Subscribe to ACQ2
ACQ Merch Store!

4 Listeners

1 Comment

Rolex

Acquired

02/24/25 • 300 min

Rolex is a series of paradoxes. They sell obsolete and objectively inferior mechanical devices for 10-1000x the price of their superior digital successors... and demand is stronger than ever in history! Their products are comparable to a Hermès Birkin bag in price, luxury status and waitlist times... yet they produce over 1m units / year (roughly 10x annual Birkin production). They make the most universally recognized and desired Swiss watches... yet their founder wasn’t Swiss and didn’t start the company in Switzerland! If Rolex were publicly traded, they’d almost certainly be among the top 50 market cap companies in the world... yet they’re 100% owned by a charitable foundation in Geneva that (among other things) literally just gives away money to local people in the city.

Tune in for one of the most fascinating and admirable companies we’ve ever covered on Acquired. We had an absolute blast making the episode, and hope you enjoy it as much as we did!

Sponsors:

Many thanks to our fantastic Spring ‘25 Season partners:

Links:

Carve Outs:

More Acquired:

Get email updates with hints on next episode and follow-ups from recent episodes
Join the Slack
Subscribe to ACQ2
Check out the latest swag in the ACQ Merch Store!

3 Listeners

IKEA

Acquired

11/18/24 • 202 min

IKEA may be the most singular company we’ve ever studied on Acquired. They’re a globally scaled, $50B annual revenue company with no direct competitors — yet have only ~5% market share. They’re one of the largest retailers in the world — yet sell only their own products. They generate a few billion in free cash flow every year — yet have no shareholders. And oh yeah, they also sell hot dogs cheaper than Costco! (Sort of.)

Tune in for an episode flat-packed with counterintuitive lessons about how this folksy mail order business from the Swedish countryside came into your living rooms (and bedrooms and dining rooms and kitchens and bathrooms and patios and garages and backyards) all over the globe!

Sponsors:

Many thanks to our fantastic Fall ‘24 Season partners:

Links:

Please take our 2024 Acquired Survey if you have a minute. It'd mean the world to us!
The Testament of a Furniture Dealer
Our past episodes on Costco, Walmart, Amazon, LVMH and Hermès
Worldly Partners Multi-Decade IKEA Study
Episode sources

Carve Outs:

More Acquired:

Get email updates with hints on next episode and follow-ups from recent episodes
Join the Slack
Subscribe to ACQ2
Check out the latest swag in the ACQ Merch Store!

3 Listeners

Hermès

Acquired

02/20/24 • 246 min

In luxury, there’s Hermès... and there’s everyone else. Stewarded by one French family over six generations, Hermès sells the absolute pinnacle of the French luxury dream. Loyal clients will wait years simply for the opportunity to buy one of the company’s flagship Birkin or Kelly bags. Unlike every other luxury brand, Hermès:

Doesn’t increase supply to meet demand (hence the waitlists)
Doesn’t loudly brand their products (IYKYK)
Doesn’t do celebrity endorsements (stars buy their bags just like everyone else)
Doesn’t even have a marketing department! (they barely advertise at all)

And yet everyone knows who they are and what they represent. But, despite all their iconoclasm, this is not a company that’s stood still for six generations. Unbeknownst to most, Hermès has completely reinvented itself at least three times in its 187-year history. Including most recently (and most dramatically) by the family’s current leaders, who responded to LVMH and Bernard Arnault’s 2010 takeover attempt by pursuing a radical strategy — scaling hand craftsmanship. And in the process they turned the company from a sleepy, ~$10B family enterprise into a $200B market cap European giant. Tune in for one incredible story!

Sponsors:

Anthropic: https://bit.ly/acqclaude
Huntress: https://bit.ly/acqhuntress
Statsig: https://bit.ly/acquiredstatsig24

More Acquired!:

Get email updates with hints on next episode and follow-ups from recent episodes
Join the Slack
Subscribe to ACQ2
Merch Store!

Links:

Carve Outs:

3 Listeners

Amazon.com

Acquired

08/16/22 • 263 min

Amazon. No company has impacted the internet — and all of modern life — more than this one. We’ve waited seven years to do this episode, and are so, so excited to finally dive into every nook and cranny of this legendary company. And of course because we’re Acquired and this is Amazon, we couldn’t contain it all to just one episode... even a 4+ hour one! So today we focus on Amazon.com the retail business, and we’ll have another full episode on AWS coming soon. And because all great series are trilogies, to fully understand Amazon we highly recommend starting first with our previous episode on Walmart, which truly is the giant’s shoulder that Jeff Bezos stood upon. Let’s go!!

**Big News** We've got merch! Check it out at https://www.acquired.fm/store !

If you want more Acquired, you can follow our newly public LP Show feed here in the podcast player of your choice (including Spotify!).

Sponsors:

Thank you to our presenting sponsor for all of Season 11, Fundrise! If you’re considering raising a growth round of capital in the next year, you should definitely explore raising some of it with the Fundrise Innovation Fund. Just email [email protected], and tell them Ben & David sent you. And if you’re an individual looking for exposure to private growth-stage technology companies, you can invest in the Innovation Fund here.
Thank you as well to Pilot and NZS Capital! You can register for the NZS Talkback here.

Links:

Carve Outs: