The Freedom Company - Simple Businesses That Will Make You Millions

To get what you want, you have to deserve what you want. – Charlie Munger

Why I write about what I call Freedom Companies

It’s a beautiful afternoon on the island of Kauai on Shipwreck beach. My body burnt and sore from the back to back days of surfing, my wife and I sat and enjoyed our last bit of travel before we welcomed our baby girl into the world.

In between the chapters of our books, we reflected on how we got to where we were in life. The last 12 months had been a crazy roller coaster for us. Two of our businesses had been acquired, my wife got pregnant, we launched a holding company called Pono Ventures to keep building, buying, and investing in businesses, I snapped my collar bone in half in a biking accident. The list goes on.

In this calm after the storm moment with my feet in the sand, I had begun to notice a change in our lives. We were a little lighter. We had a little more flexibility in our day to day. I thought about it, and realized that the change could be distilled down to one simple word.

‍Freedom.

For the past ten years, I guess I had been pursuing exactly this. Freedom. I just couldn’t distill it down to that simple word. I realize now that I had been working long hours for what I call the three freedoms.

A life of financial freedom.

A life of time freedom.

A life of creative freedom.

All of a sudden, I’m sitting on a beach doing some life reflecting and realizing “h*ly shit, we did it”. We had the three freedoms I had been chasing. Financial, time, and creative freedom.

I began reflecting on what were the things that we did right to get here? It wasn’t time management. It wasn’t meditation (although this helps a lot). It wasn’t a lucky break. We achieved all three freedoms through one thing. A really good business.

What does having the three freedoms look like? It’s the ability to feel a sense of security for a potential rainy day. The realization that you don’t look at the prices as much on the dinner menu. To have a little more time to get that run in or read that chapter of the book you’ve been meaning to get to. To get one extra hour a day with your family. To spontaneously travel to a destination with little planning and budgeting. I know a number of people that feel all of these things. They had it. They had the freedom. And like my wife and I, they had all achieved it through one thing. A great business.

As I sat there looking out at the waves crashing on the beach, I thought about how it took me ten years to figure this out. What if we gave people a guide? What if we gave people a short cut to access this kind of freedom faster? What if I helped a handful of people access their definition of freedom faster? Challenge accepted.

There are hundreds of business books, all with their own twist on building passive income streams or large moon-shot businesses. They all have great frameworks and case studies. But I felt there was an opportunity to give people something a little more tactical. A true short cut.

And then it hit me like a freight train. There are a number of businesses that we’ve started or want to start at our holding company. The reason we fired these businesses up or have strongly considered them is because we know they are great businesses. Businesses that can make millions, require little startup capital, and can operate with a small team.

My favorite part about these businesses is that they take no special skills to get off the ground. I’m a testament to that. I have zero specialized skills. The businesses I share don’t take a law degree, a background in computer science, or 20 years of relative industry expertise. They just take a doer. Someone willing to put their head down and get the job done.

What if I wrote a short weekly newsletter (because lord knows I’m not a writer) that shared tactics for starting these businesses that generate millions in revenue that anyone can start? Beyond that, what if not only I shared the ideas but exactly how I would go about starting them? The actual steps I would take as well as updates on the businesses we're currently working on.

This is the website and newsletter I wish I had ten years ago. The guide that would have saved me the numerous failures. Saved me the hundreds of thousands of dollars to learn the hard lessons.

So I decided to go for it. Thank you for reading and following along. I sincerely hope it helps you on your journey!