00:00:00 · Charlie Gearside, Adam Miller, S2
[00:00:00] S0: I love this country, and I'm, like, worried about it. Young people aren't getting paid more and more. They can't afford houses. The era, what I define as, like, sort of, like, this property obsessed, minerals obsessed. We're not producing anything new. We're sort of just, like, writing this thing down and extracting things Yeah. And capturing capturing value. So we just ship rocks overseas, or we could turn lithium into batteries. Yeah. It's... Maybe it's up to our generation to pick it back up. [00:00:29] S1: After six years building a startup with three friends, in late twenty twenty four, Gearside exited telehealth giant, Eucalyptus, valued at $560,000,000. This debuted him on Australia's youngest rich list. Now he's taken his startup mindset to help Aussies fight the cost of living crisis. [00:00:47] S2: You kind of made the recent decision to leave Eucalyptus. How are feeling about that? [00:00:52] S0: I won't lie. It was one of the hardest decisions I've ever made. There's more to life necessarily than, this company. It's been six months since I've been out of the game. It's like one of your first, [00:01:04] S2: you know, videos was around how equity works in startups and how that can be a [00:01:08] S0: path to wealth. ESOP and just, like, how the actual... This idea of owning parts of companies works. Like Yeah. The average person just has no idea. Yeah. Artups are crying out for good people. We can, like, direct more young people into companies rather than boom away as of getting getting wealthier. That one is definitely...
00:01:08 · Charlie Gearside, S2, Adam Miller
[00:01:08] S0: path to wealth. ESOP and just, like, how the actual... This idea of owning parts of companies works. Like Yeah. The average person just has no idea. Yeah. Artups are crying out for good people. We can, like, direct more young people into companies rather than boom away as of getting getting wealthier. That one is definitely... [00:01:28] S2: Really quickly, before we get back into the show today, we just want to ask you, our audience, a quick favor. [00:01:34] S1: Only 7% of our returning weekly viewers are actually subscribed to the channel. However, as part of our mission to create the best tech media in Australia, we've got the lofty goal of hitting 15,000 subs by the end of this year. [00:01:45] S2: Truly, the best way to help this channel is subscribing. It helps more than you know, and we'd really appreciate it. [00:01:51] S1: Speaker So to thank you all who support us, we're planning a special surprise at the end of the year, and we can't wait to tell you all about it. For now, enjoy the show. [00:02:02] S0: Speaker Charlie, welcome to the studio. Awesome to be here, boys. [00:02:06] S2: So this has been a long time coming. I think the first time we met you, we did a sauna together over in the city, and we had a great chat about all things health care. And now you're kind of on a different journey, which is one that mirrors more closely to ours. And I think there's just a lot of interesting things to go into today.
00:02:06 · S2, Charlie Gearside, Adam Miller
[00:02:06] S2: So this has been a long time coming. I think the first time we met you, we did a sauna together over in the city, and we had a great chat about all things health care. And now you're kind of on a different journey, which is one that mirrors more closely to ours. And I think there's just a lot of interesting things to go into today. [00:02:22] S0: Yeah. I've just been consuming your content for the last two years and scheming how I can essentially be a light entrant copycat into the market. [00:02:30] S1: So thank you, boys. Yeah. We've been consuming yours recently as well and pretty pretty well. It's getting good results. First one absolutely blew up. And I remember that sauna we had together. This was the early days of us starting our company, and it was a fancy sauna ice bath place in the city. And I think it was, like, $70 entry, and me and Sachin, we were, like, shitting ourselves, like, $70 at the end. We're like, we don't have this money. But I think the conversation was well worth it. [00:02:52] S0: To be fair, like, get pretty, like, pissed off with that $70 entry, like, still. [00:02:57] S2: And [00:02:58] S0: and, yeah, I mean, Tyler just... Our mutual friend Tyler just like... You know, that's basically his office. So he's in moseys on in there all the time. But, yeah, mate, it was... It's it's a it's a stereotype, but we've had many good sauna at us once.
00:02:58 · Charlie Gearside, S2
[00:02:58] S0: and, yeah, I mean, Tyler just... Our mutual friend Tyler just like... You know, that's basically his office. So he's in moseys on in there all the time. But, yeah, mate, it was... It's it's a it's a stereotype, but we've had many good sauna at us once. [00:03:13] S2: And you kind of made the recent decision to leave Eucalyptus, which you're a cofounder of and is one of the fastest growing companies in Australia and is now kind of transitioning and, you know, going through its its own scaling journey. How are you feeling about that?
00:03:28 · Charlie Gearside
[00:03:28] S0: Yeah. I won't lie. It was one of the hardest decisions I've ever made. It's like when you frame it like that, it's like, oh, massive company growing awesomely. People are like, oh, why would you, like, leave that? And that's like, on the face of it, you tend to agree. And then I think it's just... It was... Yeah. It was tough. It was a painful journey of, like, a lot of introspection and sort of a lot of... Essentially a lot of therapy. You know, what... You know, I should be better at this. Why why am I not enjoying this as much? And then you sort of just, like, reach a point where you go... You get comfortable with who you are and what you're good at, what you're not good at. And I think that's where where I was, like, comfortable going, okay, there's more to life necessarily than this company, my identity being, like, intertwined with the company as well. And so there was it like that that part. And then there was the other part of why Eucalyptus is obviously just doing so well. And the the people and personalities there is... Are, like, very... Yeah. They're perfect for this stage of the business. So, like, the question was, like, does me being there actually help to make it an incrementally better company? And the answer that I got to was like, probably not. And so, yeah, it's been six months since I've been out of the game.
00:04:59 · Adam Miller, Charlie Gearside, S2
[00:04:59] S1: And was there... That sounds like quite a, like, a rational decision. Like, there was you, the company, and you felt over time there was less of a fit, almost like a very mutual and sort of happy breakup. But was there also any element to burnout after that? You were working there for six years. It was such a wild ride. The company's producing million... Hundreds of millions of dollars of revenue. There's a lot of stress on that. [00:05:20] S0: Yeah. I mean, you have to burn yourself, right, to, like... People talk about balance, but there's not really balance as a founder as you guys know. But you don't don't really wanna change that. It's like a... An awesome thing. I think the telling part about burnout was, like, once I was, like, four months out. And I think I went to, like, the first board meeting since I'd been out just like how mentally... How I felt so much sharper. So it's kinda like this, like, low grade flu that you carry. [00:05:57] S2: Burnout's like a Brain fog. [00:05:58] S0: Right? It's a brain fog. [00:05:59] S2: Right? Yeah. [00:06:00] S0: So, yeah, I think you're right, Adam. It was a factor. I just didn't really notice it.