When I'm not hosting this podcast, I am writing books, but it is really hard for me to write when I'm at home, so I like to find remote cabins in the middle of nowhere to just hang out and write. But I hate the idea of my house just sitting empty, doing nothing but collecting dust and definitely not collecting checks. And that's why I'm an Airbnb host. It's one of my all-time favorite side hustles. Other popular side hustles are awesome, too, don't get me wrong, but they often involve big startup costs. By hosting your space, you're monetizing what you already have access to. It It doesn't get easier than that. And if you're new to the side hustle game and you're anxious about getting started, don't worry, because you're not in this alone. Airbnb makes it super easy to host. I mean, if I could do it, you could do it. And your home might be worth a lot more than you think. Find out how much at airbnb. Com/host. Hey, guys, are you ready for some money rehab?

Wall Street has been completely upended by an unlikely player.

Gamestop.

And should I have a 401k? Because then I said- You don't do it? No, I never- No. Do you think the whole world revolves around you and your money?

Well, it doesn't.

Charge for wasting our time.

I will take a check.

I got an old-school check.

You recognize her from anchoring on CNN, CNBC, and Bloomberg.

The only financial expert you don't need a dictionary to understand, Nicole Lappin. Money Rehabbers, are you ready to laugh? Today, we have Claudia and Ben Ostry, a. K. A. The minds and married couple behind the Internet personalities, Girl with no Job and Boy with No Job. But plot twist. They actually do have jobs. They have quite a few jobs, including one in particular that we're going to be talking about today. Claudia and Ben launched a sparkling cocktail brand Spritz Society. The beverage industry is a really difficult one, as you probably know, with big competition and low margins. But Claudia and Ben have tackled it like champs and now have some lessons to share. So let's get into it. Well, Claudia and Ben, I'm so excited to say, welcome to Money Rehab.

Thank you. I'm excited to be here.

Girl with no Job, boy with no Job. We've been calling you guys, Couple with no Job, just internally. And then I looked on Instagram and I was like, wait a minute, who is Mike and Victoria that have couple with no job.

Excuse me?

I mean, you guys- We need to sue them.

Ben and I like to role play at night.

He's Mike, and I'm Victoria. Amazing.

Well, for the couple with no job, you guys have a lot of jobs. I would love to talk about Spritz Society, your sparkling cocktail brand. How did you guys become interested in starting this brand? You're living together, sleeping together, I hope, and now working together.

Yeah.

Yeah. So yes, definitely living together, sleeping together, married for five years together for 11. So really- Mazel.

10. Yes.

Almost 11.

It's 10.

Isn't it 11 in September?

It's 10.

You're positive.

I'm a woman's woman. I'm with Claudia.

It's 10.

It feels like 11.

I love to lie, though, all the time. We've been together for 30 years, but it's 10.

10. Okay. Well, 10 is still a really solid amount of time. So origin story of Spritz Society. The decade before launching Spritz Society, I worked in traditional marketing roles, overseeing influencer and celebrity marketing agencies. But the goal of understanding product How it could fit, why brands succeed, why some fail, why some influence all products, where your influencers get paid to promote but don't end up driving any RI for the brand. And what we wanted to do was leverage our audiences. I built my own Instagram following, as you know, boy with no job, Claudia is girl with no job. Claudia is the Morning Toast, which is the number one female Millennial Morning Show. It's a podcast that goes live every morning, and they have a massive base. And Claudia is also a touring, comic, and New York Times bestselling author. So the accolades on her- It's all true.

So zero jobs.

What she's done is pretty amazing. And the core here is the audiences that we've built over the last decade are really authentic. The way that we relate to them is not from this celebrity perch on a hill looking down on their audience. It really is they're just like us. And as a result, we wanted to make a product that was in their image. So what we did was we put together a Google form asking our audience their opinions on logos, flavors, can designs, alcohol percentage, alcohol base. And we called that R&D group, the Spert Society. So the name of the brand Spert Society comes from the empathetic approach we took to building it through our communities two years ago. That's the full story. The side story is Claudia was a big hard seltzer drinker found out that she was allergic to malt, and the lack of transparency in the space pointed towards an opportunity to make wine-based sparkling cocktails that tasted better, were gluten-free, and didn't lie to the consumer.

Yeah, I think a lot of people will drink a hard seltzer and assume they're drinking something like a vodka soda. And that's what I was under the impression of. And it wasn't until a very dark day in a Utah airport where I had a really bad reaction, and I was so confused. And that actually caused me to look into what was in these hard seltzers, and it was malt. And I'm like, What the hell is malt? And I haven't been able to drink them ever since, but I love a drink. I love a cocktail. I love an evening out. And it was a huge loss for me. And I really felt like I wasn't able to find something that was just tailored to exactly what I needed. So we created the drink we wish to see in the world.

Can you tell us, not to get you graphic, but what happened to you?

Oh, I would love to tell you. It was overcast. I had just landed in Salt Lake City, and we landed. My stomach's not 100 %. And I'm thinking, I'll just wait till we get off the plane. We just landed. So I'm in a lot of pain. And And I get off the plane, we go to Bagage Claim. My whole family is waiting there. I'm like, you guys, I'm just going to run to the little girls room. I'll meet you outside by the car. And I'm fighting for my fucking... Can I curse? I am fighting for my fucking life in this... I was so dizzy, so nauseous. And then before, and I had just chugged Pepto-Bismal. Before I know it, I'm projectile vomiting all over this airport. It was so embarrassing. And it took me a minute to pinpoint what had recently changed or what I ate that was different. But the night before, I had a couple of hearts, and I was like, Oh, my God, that's it. And that's why I started looking into it. I'm like, What's... I mean, I drink seltzer all the time. I drink vodka all the time. Why wouldn't this be okay?

It's because there's actually not any vodka.

Correct.

Okay. I need a moment.

You asked.

I did. It's true. And it was a very good recap, very vivid. I felt like I was there in Utah with So maybe other people could have this allergy that they don't know about. This is a good point, though.

I think a lot of people have insensitivities to malt, and they don't realize that malt is the main liquor ingredient in those white claws truly hard seltzers. It's not vodka.

But you just want to check out.

Exactly.

Check yourself.

It's beer water. That's what malt is. It's beer water. So that's the reason why. And honestly, it's because of tax simplifications, And in some states, grocery or convenience, you can be sold in more places as a beer. And from a compliance perspective, malt is classified as beer. So that's why they do it. But they lied for a little too long.

Not anymore. Not anymore. So I'm assuming in addition to Claudia's story, what you found in your Google Doc Spritz, the O. G. Spritz Society, was that people wanted It sounds like more ingredient transparency. What else did you find in there from the testing, the original testing?

So one, they wanted a transparent base, so we chose wine. They picked our first core four flavors, grapefruit, blood, orange, pineapple, and lemon. They wanted something that was premium, so one, ingredient transparency. So if you look on the backs of other wine products, wine doesn't have nutritional fact panels. So we intentionally put it on the back, six ingredients or less. People asked for real sugar over artificial sugar. They didn't mind as long as it was low sugar. They say grams of aspartame was not something that-Toxic diet culture.

We're not here for it.

No, thanks. We're not. So we sit at 120 calories and 6 grams of sugar. That's where people said that they wanted the product at. They wanted it colorful so that if they wanted to pour it out over ice, it looked like a true cocktail. So it's something that you can really feel bougey when drinking or drink out of the can. And they wanted something that mixed well. So if you add a shot of tequila to our grapefruit Spritz Society is the perfect sparkling. So good.

So versatile. I love that you're really leaning into this R&D and testing and testing and testing because I think a lot of influencers or personalities who want to start products, think that they have this amazing idea in their mind or in a vacuum. But truly, whatever that idea is might not be amazing, might not land in that same amazing way as it did in your mind. So kudos for that.

And I think the way that I think about it, because everything I do is social media. I think part of the reason why TikTok is such a popular platform is because they lean in so hard to their users. If they see their users are doing a trend, they'll create a filter that makes that trend easier. Everyone's like, I wish TikTok did this. Boom, it's done in a week. It's like they're so generous in a sense that they just want to make the user experience easier for the users, where it's like, I feel like we've been begging Instagram for four years to do one small update to fix this one thing, and it never gets done. It's so frustrating to be a consumer of Instagram because you feel like you're never heard. And that's just a terrible feeling. And so the same applies to customer service. So you're like the TikTok of beverages? We're young and hot. Yeah.

Yeah, you are. What advice at this point would you give other couples who want to be business partners in addition to romantic partners?

I, and I'm just saying this, we don't do it, but we should, just a few boundaries. We are doing work stuff. I wish it was that once we got in bed for the night, it's over, but it's not. And it really invades every space, every conversation. And it's definitely not healthy. And it's definitely easier said than done to install those boundaries. But I do think they're really important. We haven't done it, but we should.

It's interesting that that was where you went. I was going to say to know your roles, which I think is very important because I don't feel as strongly that we overlap too much personal time into.

Because you're always the one bringing it up.

That's why you don't think about it. You bring up everything else.

No, I bring up life, Ben. I'm interesting. You're always like, So what about this meeting group?

Yeah, they're important. But really knowing roles, I think, is the key because we could be doing far worse, where if we were both trying to do the same thing and stepping on each other's toes and questioning what each other does, this business wouldn't be where it is, which is a successful so far business that consumers are buying and buying again, the big box is interested in and investors are funding. So I think that- And I also think trusting in your partner's abilities and not hovering is really important.

If there's a super important pitch, I don't even want to be on it. I have so much faith in Ben that it's exactly what he's good at. He's going to kill it. No one else needs to be there. And when it comes to doing meeting breads or creating any content for social or anything marketing-wise, Ben doesn't even look at me because he trusts me in my space, and I trust him implicitly in his space, and it makes for no weirdness.

So do you think it's made You're 30 years together stronger? Are you stronger as a couple?

I think it's just another piece of our journey. We hate each other more. No.

Totally.

I think it's just another part of our journey together. I mean, we We're different in the best ways, and we're similar in the ways that we need to be, where I just think that this is another example of that, where we're able to build things together from different sides, and that applies to everything and anything that we do here and going forward.

It's definitely been challenging for sure. But I think anything worth doing is going to be challenging. And I think challenges make a marriage easier because marriage is never going to be I would say.

Hot take. And marriage is a lot harder when you don't make something successful.

Yeah, right.

So I think that the financial- It's good now, but who knows? I was going to say it could be great or Or it could be terrible.

It's like either you and your partner can celebrate the success or you look next to him and you're like, Oh, my God, this business failed because of you.

Hold on to your wallets, boys and girls.

Money Rehab will be right back.

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Would you guys do another product together?

Would you do- Yeah.

What's been so great about this is that we've been able to solely focus on this 150 % of our time. But once we've really cracked the code on how to launch consumer products, there is absolutely no reason we wouldn't do it again. A hundred %. But I think the life cycle on this is to really understand how to build it. It's like a three to five year period. And then once we've learned to apply those learnings elsewhere, it would definitely be something that we should look into.

I love it.

Do you guys feel like you need money rehab?

I think Ben probably does. I'm extremely fiscally responsible. I don't want to say cheap. I want to say really frugal, yes, except when it comes to a few things, purses and vacations. But in life, I think I have a good barometer, and I think that on a personal level, Ben could do with a little money rehab.

I definitely will say that you are better at not spending when you don't have to spend and spending when you should spend. And I'm really good at spending when I don't have to spend and spending when I do spend.

Or what about just spending when it's other people's money?

I spend, period. I'm overly generous. I'll always pick up a bill when I don't have to. I'll always.

Now you're making me look like a terrible guest.

Well, maybe you are.

Bitch, I'm always being generous, always picking up the tab. I'm talking about personal finances. I'm not talking about like, wining and dining investors. Okay?

Interesting. Okay.

Here's a perfect example. Ready? Are you ready, Nicole?

Yes.

Every single day, Ben with the Trenta ice coffee from Starbucks always. And it's so stupid. It's like $8. On, was it Hanica or something? Ben's mom got us a lovely gift, a coffee machine. Nespresso, she got us the little pods. Ask me if Ben ever used it once.

Ask me if Claudia drank coffee, if she would use it. She doesn't even like coffee, and she had an entire trend around Starbucks.

Ready? Ready, Ben? Ready? I'm going to blow your mind. I have a coffee every single morning at the studio. It's Starbucks cold brew that I leave in the fridge and a little bit of coffee made creamer. What's the difference? That those two jugs cost me $13, and they last for two weeks. Point made. I win.

You're better at spending money on coffee. That's where we've landed. You're better at spending money on coffee. I wasn't talking about coffee, Ben.

It's a metaphor.

Yeah, it's a metaphor. How many boxes show up every day from a different clothing company online? Have I ever ordered anything online?

Such a good question. Do I pay for any of that? Some of it, not all of it.

Okay.

Oh, and let's get into it. This is going to turn into marriage rehab, not money rehab. Ready? Half those boxes that show up in, that's shit for the house. You all go to wash your hands. How do you know where the soap is? Oh, because I bought it. The sponges, the detergent, salt and pepper, duct tape.

Things you need, printer paper.

Who is that? Who is that? Not you.

I don't think that is in the box.

Always. It's something else. A screwdriver, a pair of scissors. I got us a new knife set on Prime day. I take care of the home. That's why I get more boxes than you. Interesting.

This is everything. We definitely need a spinoff I love marriage money rehab.

100 %.

For today's tip, you can take straight to the bank. When you're testing your project, make sure that you're reaching your specific target demographic when you're testing. Claudia and Ben made Spritz Society for their audience. So when it became time to test, they made sure that their audience, their target market, were the ones chiming in.

Money Rehab is a production of iHeartRadio.

I'm your host, Nicole Lappin.

Our producers are Morgan Lavoy and Mike Coscarelli. Executive producers are Nikki Etor and Will Pearson.

Our mascots are Penny and Mimsy.

Huge thanks to O.

G. Money Rehab team, Michelle Lans for her development work, Katherine Law for her production and writing, Magic, and Brandon Dickert for his editing, engineering, and sound design.

And as always, thanks to you for finally investing in yourself so that you can get it together and get it all. You spend my money, money, money. You spend.