The Best One Yet
🧊 “$17 per cube” — Glacial Ice startups. Bezos’ $20k electric car. California = 4th Biggest Economy.
Mon, 28 Apr 2025
Jeff Bezos’ secret electric car launched… It’s $20k, anti-Tesla, and inspired by the Amish.100,000 year old glacier ice is being used in Dubai nightclubs… selling for $60/cube.California passed Japan to be the 4th biggest economy in the world… we’ll tell ya how.Plus, the latest recession signal is the “Brown Bag Indicator”... Leftover lunch is an econ warning.$RIVN $AMZN $JBLUWant more business storytelling from us? Check out the latest episode of our new weekly deepdive show: The untold origin story of Subscribe to The Best Idea Yet: Wondery.fm/TheBestIdeaYetLinks to listen.“The Best Idea Yet”: The untold origin stories of the products you’re obsessed with — From the McDonald’s Happy Meal to Birkenstock’s sandal to Nintendo’s Susper Mario Brothers to Sriracha. New 45-minute episodes drop weekly.—-----------------------------------------------------Subscribe to our new (2nd) show… The Best Idea Yet: Wondery.fm/TheBestIdeaYetLinksEpisodes drop weekly. It’s The Best Idea Yet.GET ON THE POD: Submit a shoutout or fact: https://tboypod.com/shoutouts FOR MORE NICK & JACK: Newsletter: https://tboypod.com/newsletter Connect with Nick: https://www.linkedin.com/in/nicolas-martell/ Connect with Jack: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jack-crivici-kramer/ SOCIALS:Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/tboypod TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@tboypodYouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@tboypod Anything else: https://tboypod.com/ Subscribe to our new (2nd) show… The Best Idea Yet: Wondery.fm/TheBestIdeaYetLinksEpisodes drop weekly. It’s The Best Idea Yet.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.
Chapter 1: What electric car did Jeff Bezos launch and how is it different?
For our first story, a Jeff Bezos-backed electric car company just launched. And get this, it's priced under $20,000. But here's the twist. This electric car brand was inspired by the Amish. For our second story, California just passed Japan to become the fourth biggest economy in the world. Cali is about to pass Germany for number three.
But our story itself explains why California is so polarizing. And our third and final story. The newest startup trend is the oldest thing on earth. Glacial ice. 100,000-year-old ice cubes from glaciers are now a venture-backed business, baby. But yeah, it is before we hit that wonderful mix of stories. I can only afford one cube. Great mix of stories. Great mix of stories.
Couple weeks ago, we told you about recession brunette. Oh, the recession brunette when your usually blonde buddy starts looking more brunette. It's a bad sign for the economy. But there's another recession indicator that's already red flashing. And it's flashing in your salad. Introducing the bring your lunch to work index, aka the brown bag indicator.
The BYO lunch instead of buying at the office? Yeah, that's an early sign of an economic problem. We call it the brown bag recession indicator. And right now, it's flashing red like a half-eaten burrito. Here's the data. More people are working from the office, but fewer people are eating lunch out. Get this. Sales at fast, casual restaurants across America fell 7% nationwide in Q1.
Less Lenny's bagels, more leftover lasagna. Ceviche Wednesdays? Maybe every other Wednesday? Because the lunch math, it really adds up. Yes, it does, Jack. Your average sweet green salad plus a drink, that's 21 bucks, my friend. And over the course of the month, if you do it every day, that's $441 for your eating lunch out budget. Well, since making a meal at home saves about 75% of the cost.
300 bucks a month you could save if you bring your lunch to work. So besties, you're swapping out the sweet green for your homemade Cobb salad. The only drama is whether there's space in the office fridge. Jack, you better write your name on those noodles, man. It's the brown bag indicator. Let's hit our three stories.
15 years before this song, two boys from the Northeast met in a dorm. They had an idea to cause a cultural storm. It's the best one yet, but the best is the norm. Jack Nick. That's it. I don't even think they need to practice. 50%, that's a fat tip. T-Boy City on your at list. If you know, you know, cause we ready to go. We can't wait no more, so just start the show. Start the show.
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Chapter 2: How did California become the fourth largest economy?
It's never passed through a human before in the state of water. It's older than mankind. Plus, they carve the cubes, not into cubes, into spheres. So they're ice spheres. And that story selling of these virgin ice cubes is how they sell six cubes for 100 bucks a tray. That's $17 a cube. They turned a commodity into a luxury. Basically.
Like the restaurants, they're using these ice cubes to justify inflated cocktails. Like what do we see on the menu, Jack? There's a $218 glass of scotch on ice. Not just any ice. Yeah. Glacial ice. And there's a vodka company whose liquid content in the vodka is the melted glacial ice. The only one not happy about this. is Bobby Boucher, the water boy.
Well, we should point out, Jack, there is a huge carbon footprint when it comes to shipping glacial ice from Greenland. Yeah, there probably were polar bears harmed in the making of this ice. Yeah, this is more emissions emitted than your family over the course of an entire year. Shipping ice from the Arctic Circle made sense in the movie Frozen, doesn't make sense in 2025 modern economy.
And yet, despite the ethical issues and the abundance of water to turn into ice everywhere, the global ice market is expected to hit 7 billion bucks this year. Ice, it's hotter than ever. So Jack, what's the takeaway for our buddies? Sipping on global ice. Adam Smith wrote about this 249 years ago.
Yeti's philosopher Adam Smith is the father of capitalism, and his work is the basis of modern economics. In his famous 1776 book, The Wealth of Nations, Adam Smith wrote about the diamond-water paradox. Also known as the paradox of value. The thought is this. Water is more useful to us than a diamond is, and yet we value diamonds more than we value water. We need water now.
Every day, literally to survive. Literally. But we're willing to pay 10,000 times more for a diamond than we are for water. His conclusion? Value has two different meanings. The first is the value of utility. Which is the value we find from water. And the other is the value in what something conveys. Like a diamond. which conveys status and wealth.
So not only is that detail from Adam Smith an interesting observation, it also ironically relates to this story. Because $17 per cube glacial ice is a rare example of both of those types of values. Yeah, it's the diamond of water we're talking about. It is both a utility and a signal. $17 ice spheres from a glacier reminds us of Adam Smith.
Jack, could you whip up the takeaways for us to kick off the week? Slate's new electric car comes in at $17,500 after tax credits, but it's BYO screen and speakers. Amish style, baby. This car, it is Spirit Airlines in the business model, but the branding is JetBlue. For our second story, California just passed Japan to become the world's fourth biggest economy.
Cali represents American economic exceptionalism. both for good and for bad. And our third and final story. Startups are harvesting ice from Arctic glaciers and selling them for 17 bucks a cube in New York City nightclubs. Ah, it tastes like polar bear. Adam Smith foretold of this back in his 1776 economic classic, So Yetis, Tell Your Buddies, about the diamond water paradox.
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Chapter 3: What is the Brown Bag Indicator and what does it signify?
Celebrate the wins. And if you want to get a shout out or you have an audio fact for the pod, just click on one of the links in the description of today's episode. This is Jack. Nick and I both own ETFs at the S&P 500. If you like the best one yet, you can listen ad-free right now by joining Wondery Plus in the Wondery app or on Apple Podcasts. Prime members can listen ad-free on Amazon Music.
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