Learn, Make, Learn

Go “Pro” in Every Product Category or Just “Good Enough”?

• Ernest Kim & Joachim Groeger • Season 1 • Episode 32

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A question from a previous guest sparks this episode: Do we go “pro” in every product category or do we eschew the spec arms race & embrace “good enough”? We interrogate our own behaviors & share implications for people in the business of making products.

INTRO & FOLLOW-UPS – 02:51
Starbucks Follow-Up with Zoran Svetlicic
Generative AI x Product with Anmol Anubhai
What McDonald’s is REALLY Like in Italy
How to Try Int’l McDonald’s Menu Items in the US

JOACHIM’S PROFILE PREFS FOR CLAUDE – 07:40

J’s TAKE: A PORTFOLIO APPROACH – 16:40
Testing the Same Products from 1975 and 2025
SHEIN's plan to take over FASHION

E’s TAKE: SPECIALISTS OVER GENERALISTS – 27:03
Do Pharmacists Buy Bayer? Informed Shoppers and the Brand Premium
Why Doesn't Everybody Buy Cheap, Generic Headache Medicine?
The Secrets of Shopping
The Rise of Indie Running Brands

SPECIALIZATION vs HYPERGROWTH – 34:43
How I Built This: Tim Leatherman
Pelican’s Indestructible Cases
The Furniture Systems Of USM Haller

LESSONS FOR PRODUCT PEOPLE – 42:12
Military can’t repair its own equipment
Bad Dye Job

RECOMMENDATIONS – 48:33
The Enshittifinancial Crisis
Matthew Wilcock: 058 Motorway Cycle XI
FlowingData: Best Data Visualizations of 2025
Notion
Phantom Thread
Dior and I on Apple TV & YouTube
Sentimental Value

CLOSING – 01:00:02

****

Rant, rave or otherwise via email at LearnMakeLearn@gmail.com or on Threads @LearnMakeLearnShow.

CREDITS
Theme: Vendla / Today Is a Good Day / courtesy of www.epidemicsound.com
Drum hit: PREL / Musical Element 85 / courtesy of www.epidemicsound.com

Ernest:

Hello and welcome to Learn Make Learn where we share qualitative and quantitative perspectives on products to help you make better. My name is Ernest Kim, and I'm joined by my friend and co-host, Joachim Groeger. Hey Joachim, how's it going? I.

Joachim:

Very good. Thank you, Ernest. I am still processing fact that we didn't manage to get this the end of 2025. We're recording on 4th, so only four days. But what can you do? I, I will survive, but maybe this is. A start for really productive 2026. Lots of episodes, so we'll see. I'm gonna keep it positive. Yeah. How

Ernest:

Yeah, I, I feel pretty good about getting started, uh, in the, at least the first week of January.

Joachim:

Yeah,

Ernest:

Uh, yeah, and I think the, the holiday was definitely good. We had a, uh, you know, we were talking about this before, before we started recording, but, uh, my wife and I, we just stayed local, which was nice and relaxing.

Joachim:

Same. And we kept it local. No travel actually. but part of the reason we didn't travel as well, I, I, I dunno if I've told you this on this, but we have been in the process of getting our citizenship for

Ernest:

Oh.

Joachim:

we are now, we've gotten to all of the stages, but one, which is the final oath ceremony.

Ernest:

Oh, fantastic.

Joachim:

that's happening actually in five days time. We

Ernest:

Wow.

Joachim:

to, having our oath, we'll take our oaths and uh, pledge allegiance. Truly pledge allegiance to

Ernest:

Ah.

Joachim:

Um, so yeah, that's very exciting. And, uh, that means also that, you know, once we apply for passports, I think we were just a little bit concerned. We would like to make sure we had all of the tools in our arsenal to make sure that we could get back. So, um, these are good things.

Ernest:

Well, that's, that's great though. Congratulations.

Joachim:

Thank you. Yeah, it's, I, I'm, uh. I think it's gonna be a very momentous and emotional day, so,

Ernest:

Yeah. Yeah.

Joachim:

we'll have the kids with us as well, so it'll be very

Ernest:

Oh, that's fantastic. And so they will, will they just automatically become citizens?

Joachim:

Our kids were born in America,

Ernest:

right, right,

Joachim:

all, they're all citizens. It's just the parents who

Ernest:

right.

Joachim:

we had to, yeah, we've been on green cards for quite a lot of

Ernest:

Ah,

Joachim:

so, and yeah. Now, now we just felt

Ernest:

um,

Joachim:

to get moving. Yeah.

Ernest:

that's great. I'm actually, I'm a naturalized citizen as well. Uh, I think I became one when I was in my late, my teens, like 17, something like that, 17, 18.

Joachim:

know that. Honest.

Ernest:

And I still, I still remember it. It was a very, um, memorable experience and, um, in a very good way. I, I, I think everyone took it very seriously and I, I, it was, it was great. So, yeah. That's awesome that it's coming up so soon.

Joachim:

Yeah. Very exciting. I

Ernest:

All right, well this is episode 32 and our topic today was actually inspired by one of our recent guests, Zoran Svetlicic. We talked to Zoran in episode 30 titled Starbucks. Follow Up with Zoran Svetlicic, and I'll make sure to include a link to that episode in our show notes and um, in an email thread we've maintained since recording that episode. Zoran posed a really interesting question to Joachim and me, just to give you a bit of context. After hearing the episode, uh, we had recorded together. Zoran noted that, and I'm quoting him here. You guys sound so much better than my crap. AirPods. What's the secret? And, uh, that led to an extended exchange led by Joachim because he knows a lot more about audio gear than I do. And, uh, finally, after Zoran had decided on a new microphone, he followed up with this question, quote. This is getting kind of philosophical now, but do you go pro on every category you encounter or do you just collect a portfolio of S-curves that have hit good enough with maybe a few pro indulgences? Seems like most subcultures slash brands try to suck you into the spec arms race, but who has the time, even if you do have the cash? So this question of whether we go pro or just good enough in most of the product categories we engage with and what that might mean for folks in the business making products is what we'll grapple with in this episode. But before diving into Zoran's question, uh, we wanted to just share some followups to our previous episodes. Joachim, do you have any followups you'd like to share?

Joachim:

Yeah, I, um, want to little callback to episode 19 when we had unwell, as a guest. I guess she was our first guest, is that

Ernest:

Yeah, that's right.

Joachim:

Yeah. Our first guest, and she was discussing generative ai, large language models and, and how you work with them and how she thinks they can work together. you know, I think it's about a year or so almost that, that we'd had that conversation. I have been very resistant. and, and resisting the use of these tools a lot. I just like, out of principle, there's so many things wrong with them right now in terms of the quality of what they spit out, but also, um, the environmental costs, the ethical questions of what material is being consumed. I mean, it's a long, long list, so I do not want to that. But I am also saying that I'm complicit in it because the next thing I'm gonna say is that I have now leaned into heavily using a large language model. In particular, I've been using Claude,

Ernest:

Hmm.

Joachim:

uh, which is run by Anthropic. so that's been a incredibly helpful tool. A friend of mine showed me a language app that he had been working on. Um. You know, we both have kind of technical background. So I was, oh, I asked him, what did you do in the backend and how did you manage this? And he said, I have no idea. Like, don't you, what do you mean you don't know? He's like, I don't know, it's like Node and JavaScript. Who, who knows, who cares? And I was kind of, you know, horrified. And then I, you know, actually to a certain extent, that's true. Maybe I should invest a little bit of time to take advantage of these tools. There are so many things I want to test out and maybe this is the way to do it. So, uh, I took out a subscription for Claude, hooked it up to everything, uh, set up, got services running for like, serving, you know, a web service. I can run apps, web apps and prototype designs, different things, host things there, connected up to my GitHub, did all kinds of stuff, and just started churning out. prototypes and ideas.

Ernest:

Hmm.

Joachim:

and then that was very, very helpful. And then I started using it also for research and grabbing information, um, in kind of, you know, knowing, knowing exactly that something could be wrong in the output.

Ernest:

Hmm.

Joachim:

uh, it was quite interesting actually to treat it more like a very bad amateur, uh, that you're talking to and conversing with and extracting ask, getting it to ask you questions. misunderstandings. And its errors were very useful because they inspired other thoughts in me, which I've always held to be true, that innovation is so non-linear that even having a bad counterparty can be very, very productive to the process of trying to refine something on your own. that was, uh, surprising to me. So I've just been, yeah, taking advantage of these services, which I, I, I do suspect they will. Get way, way, way more expensive eventually. Anyway, so was interesting to find myself really using these resources so exhaustively, it's been pretty much a game changer for a lot of things that I've been doing. and the one thing I would say as a recommendation is to take advantage of all of the preferences that you can tweak, uh, inside of these. So, Claude, I haven't looked at Chat GPT, but I do know for a fact that Claude has an. Uh, preference settings. A text block where you can put in preferences. And so for me, I told it to stop telling me I'm amazing. In fact, I wrote something along the lines of like, do not always say that everything I write is great and brilliant. I need a somewhat critical voice and potentially provocative one that brings in new perspectives quickly; I want you to draw from new sources quickly; propose things that could be very far out; I want to always broaden my search and make larger connections; bring in academic work quickly as well. And that was, uh, so I had been running it without that prompt. For a while, and it was kind of addictive to have this thing tell me how brilliant I was. It is very, very when you then switch over to the mode that I got in and it was pushing back and saying, well, is that such a interesting idea that you have?'Cause here these other and I was very distraught, but then it turned out it was much, much more productive. So tweak the thing, make sure it doesn't try and flatter you because it does, that does lead to madness. And my goodness. The number of times that it's gone and done something wacky is, is, is countless times You get used to it, but you have to be aware. Uh, sorry, longer excursion into that but you know, interesting to come comeback after having been quite cynical about its use and now seeing, uh, it's actually kind of useful. I think they are. It is overblown, it's it's impact for sure. I, I don't think it's, um, I don't think that's such radical game changers, but being able to spin up a prototype of a pretty, you know, most of the work that I do is pencil and paper is complicated, but then the implementation in a web app or something is very standard. of crud, create, read, update, uh, delete database operations with some arithmetic. So it, I'm very standard once you enter that domain, um, I try to once to do something that's a little bit more complicated and it was falling apart. So again, very, very focused things if you have ideas and yeah, a surprising outcome for me. So. I, I, I'm not taking back everything I've said about LLMs and or in our private conversations, but definitely, uh, they're definitely powerful tools. So use them as that they are tools, not intelligent beings. Let's be clear,

Ernest:

I was just curious, um, if there was any particular reason you chose Claude over. You mentioned like chat, GPT or say Gemini Pro.

Joachim:

I, uh. First, I knew that Claude Code sits somewhere in the background of Cursor, so I had a sense that Cursor would be very good for, is very good for code, and Claude code is good, but I wanted to have another, like just a pure research tool as opposed to just a coding environment. And also, to be honest, I accidentally hit one year subscription on the Claude button. So I'm, I was committed from that point onwards. Uh, did, yeah, I didn't pay attention, so that's part of it as well. I, I, uh, um. But it's been, it's been pretty, I do think they're all like training off the same data,

Ernest:

Right.

Joachim:

I do think Claude Code is pretty good

Ernest:

Uh.

Joachim:

with everything that I've had is very fast. But my goodness, it blows through tokens when you do coding. Like it, it, you will hit your limits pretty fast. And, that's, that's the inefficiency of it. It's like a very inefficient system, but in some ways it's, what I found it to be very useful at is just seeing an idea come to fruition quickly and then. You can dispassionately assess, am I actually onto something here? Is this worth iterating on, or should I just kind of leave it as a quirk? So I've, I've done a couple of weird things that I've realized like, Hmm, this kind of fun, quirky idea. And once you see it's. It's not as important or consequential as you thought it was gonna be. So quite nice. I, I think that's, for me has been the best thing is like pruning ideas and, and getting rid of them, even with a crappy implementation has been very valuable. So I guess it's the same idea of, it's a thumbnail sketch, it's a bad prototype, it's a hack together thing, you know, it's the waffle shoe, whatever that like, getting it physical and or in pixels quickly so you can play around with it is. Probably the best, uh, stress tester, pressure tester for these things. So I would recommend it for that. But I do not think it is a creative engine you are bringing. You must, again, bring things to it

Ernest:

Right.

Joachim:

will feed, it

Ernest:

I

Joachim:

stuff back, just like any good search engine does, right? You can

Ernest:

right.

Joachim:

for nonsense and, uh, yeah. And it's disturbing what people use these things for in general. So that's why I put that as a warning. Give it good stuff, give it real meaningful things and ask it to be, um, critical.

Ernest:

I'm so glad you shared that because um, you know, obviously I think there's a lot of interest in LLMs, but, um, I just, out of personal interest, it's something that I'm also considering getting into even, you know, though I was also very much a skeptic, as we've discussed in the past, but, um, I, I can definitely see potential for utility as long as, as you mentioned, you view it, understanding the flaws going in.

Joachim:

a hundred percent. As with everything, it, it is exactly that. It's a tool, it's a hammer. It's a thing, let's not anthropomorphize it. Let's not think it's gonna invent something new. It really doesn't. And I've had that in many situations where I find it like regurgitating something I've seen before and getting locked into a very specific set of topics. Um, but it is responsive with a prompt back out. So, yeah. Yeah. As with everything used with caution, all tools.

Ernest:

Uh, well, I just have a quick follow up. and this is to our episode with, uh, our conversation with Zoran. And he had mentioned that when he was on holiday with his family in Italy. That the Starbucks were all quite empty, but the McDonald's were packed and kind of very active and very successful. so I thought I'd share a link to a video from one of my favorite, uh, food YouTubers named Mike Chen. He's been doing food YouTubing for, for quite a while now, but he recently published a video from Italy. It's titled what McDonald's is really like in Italy. Shocking menu items. Uh, and he goes over, he has this incredible capacity to eat. I don't know how he's able to eat as much as he eats, but he goes through quite a bit of the, McDonald's menu in Rome. and he comes to the same conclusion as Zoran did, which is that it's actually quite good there and quite a bit better than, um, anything he's had in the U.S. So this is a brief quote from the video video. He said, I've tried McDonald's in a lot of different countries. I don't know why the McDonald's in the US have the worst beef. And the croissant I had this morning at the McDonald's, there's no way you would ever find a decent tasting croissant in any McDonald's in America. So, he's definitely echoing some of the sentiments that, uh, Zoran had shared and that we had talked about. And, this is not, uh, a one-off thing. We actually, in the show notes to that episode with Zoran, I shared an, uh, a link to an article from the New York Times that was titled Fries with your Mc Baguette. For some travelers, McDonald's is a destination and uh, it's, it quoted a lot of Americans who've talked about how much they enjoy, uh, McDonald's overseas and how much better they are. And that article provided a link to, uh, another story in food and wine titled How to Try International McDonald's Menu Items in the U.S. So there is one McDonald's in the U.S. That does serve, uh, menu items from the various, overseas McDonald's locations and that's in Chicago. And so we'll provide a link to that article as well. So if you happen to be in the Chicago area, there is one McDonald's, uh, in Chicago where you can try menu items from the various global McDonald's, whether they'll be as good, uh, I think is a question mark, but uh, at least you can try some of the interesting different, uh, items that they have at McDonald's outside of the U.S.

Joachim:

Pretty cool. I mean, the place is called the McDonald's Global Menu Restaurant, which is a mouthful, pun intended, but also, yeah, probably worth a visit actually. Yeah,

Ernest:

All right, well, with our follow ups out of the way, let's jump back to our main topic for today. And as I mentioned earlier, we're going to address a question posed by Zoran Svetlicic, our guest for episode 30. He asked, do you go pro on every category you encounter or do you just collect a portfolio of S-curves that have hit good enough, with maybe a few pro indulgences? Seems like most subcultures slash brands try to suck you into the spec arms race. But who has the time, even if you do have the cash? So Joachim, what's your take on this? Do you always go pro or just good enough?

Joachim:

Uh, everything has to be mil-spec in my house. Uh, um, but yeah, I, so. We texted about discussing this, this question, uh, and then I replied with this video, um, from the YouTube channel Speed. Um, and they, they do fun activities and one of them was like, is older always better? And they go through various items. The highlight, you know, the, the click bey highlight is that they drink Coca-Cola from like the seventies or something, which is a terrible idea, but they do it, you

Ernest:

I was amazed they were able to find that I, that's incredible. And, and, and it still had some carbonation. It was incredible.

Joachim:

and worrying and incredible as well. Yeah. But, but, um, there are some more interesting things, I think products that they look at. And, and the, the first set is like craftsman tools. Um, uh. And I, it was, it was interesting because they did a very smart comparison. So one of these is like a wrench or something, um, an adjustable wrench in particular. So they got a craft on$25 and then they get the 1975 equivalent, which in today's money costs about$95., It's much more expensive. To get that 1975 version. So to make it a fair comparison, they go out and they buy a craftsman tool, adjustable wrench, foot$95, which they can get into, uh, in today's market. And, uh, the comparison is somewhat unsup unsurprising, which is you the, if you compare the$23 with one to the$95 19 75 1, yes. The new one that's at$23 is not as good as the one from 1975. But if you go to the$95 one, it's comparable. It seems I, the interesting conclusion from the video, which I think is clear now, is we have a lot more choice for low and lower quality items at lower price points. Uh, and we are used to buying those things if we just need to get a quick wrench and it doesn't really matter what the tolerances are. I think for a lot of people when they face that choice between$23 and$95, if it's just like doing some housework and you know, things repairing things in your home, you'd probably be okay with a$23 one. So I think in that sense, the modern globalized economy has given us these lower priced and lower tier things. Um, they do one more thing, which I found kind of interesting as well, um, which is the leatherman tool. Uh, they, they find one from the eighties and it costs.$50 at the time. If you adjusted for inflation, that's$300, which seemed really surprising to me. Um, and then a hundred dollars leatherman tool. So, you know, three, back in the day getting a leatherman tool was$300 and that leatherman tool today is a hundred dollars. And this is now flipped. So. The a hundred dollars one in today's thing is made to really, really high quality tolerances that were way more achieved. You know, much tighter tolerances, more tools, really solid. Of course the old one is still great, that original design of the Leatherman. Um, but here it's kind of flipped so you wouldn't have to blast through hundreds and hundreds of dollars to get a pretty good tool from Leatherman. And they've managed to somehow, I think they've been so focused on just the quality aspect of it, that they can get those different price points and achieve the, the pro they have, their very, their tiered versions. And you know, they have the military ones, the first responder ones, and then it goes more consumer direction. That tiering makes a lot of sense as well, but the consumer grade products are really, really good. We're not first responders, we're not in the military. We don't need these tools, but. That's where I can see Zoran's thing is like you just want that little epsilon of extra something. So when I think pro, I think quality. I think then the next step is of course, repairability. Sustainability and longevity. So for me, when I'm thinking about what the pro level looks like, it's something that will cost more, but it is something that I will be able to lean on for a longer period of time. Um, so I view these things more, like a dynamic problem. I don't want to just think about the static purchase of this one thing. So the tools example is. I don't do that much, you know, home improvement stuff. So the toolbox is ready. It has all the tools there, but it's not something that I have to constantly think about. Whereas there are other things in my home that are very much, Get used and will depreciate, and I do need them to last a little bit longer. And so I'm trying to create this portfolio almost of different longevity and different quality levels so that I can have the best of everything, right? So tools don't have to be pro, but anything else that's getting like a vacuum cleaner, not as sexy, not as exciting as tools, but is getting used every single bloody day in this home. That I would like to go higher up in the price points and go a little bit more pro because that one I know is gonna get bashed around, it's gonna get damaged and I would like it to be repairable or at least have good guarantees and warranties that I can get parts and replacements for it. So again, it's, it's about like the depreciation curves maybe are the way to think about it. I think one of the areas where it's very difficult to identify high quality, high price, that that correlation is not tight, is in clothing. Clothing is very, is really difficult, I think to identify quality product. Based on the price point, the high price point does not necessarily guarantee anything. There is an idea still there, even in fashion, despite the fact that it's not as obvious that higher price is higher quality. We expect that still. But we do know now from the luxury brands and the way they operate, that is not necessarily the case, but that culture still persists. And this made me think about, um, another video from. Uh, a YouTuber called Alice Capel. She's kind of a lefty philosophy person who talks about stuff, and so she was discussing, uh, sheen, the Chinese super budget clothing brand that we know has all kinds of issues with it, with the production technologies, environmental degradation, labor relations. I mean, just kind of the poster child of everything that's wrong with globalized capitalism and. In France, they opened up a oh a a pop-up store inside of a pretty prestigious old department store in Paris, and they were selling their brand as this idea that fashion shouldn't be a privilege. They're saying, you know, we're, we're trying to supply to the everyday person who can't afford nice fashion and you know, if you go against us, you're kind of going against the poorer people who can't afford fashion and you're depriving them of the opportunity to, to elevate their style. And it's a pretty twisted weaponization of fashion. And, and, and the classism inherent in that, right? Because I can understand that there's also from wealthier classes saying, don't buy that. Crap, it's gonna break and you should just buy high quality things. And you know, that's really the thing. And it just becomes this kind of crapping on poorer people who really have no way, no time, no no cash to access those things. And so all of that to say I, it does feel like we should be able to all access quality. And pro level things for certain tasks. And I do think it would be nice if we all could access a really good adjustable wrench, but we wouldn't have to spend a hundred dollars each individually to do those things. So, um, part of me is kind of wondering to what extent we should be thinking. More holistically about what it means to, to, to go pro. That it's actually something that could be done more communally. You know, tool libraries exist already. Give people access to good tools, they will treat them well, they will return them, well, you know, close libraries for all of those things. So that's kind of where my thinking started going is like, what are the solutions to the problem to give people access to more pro stuff? And that's, that's the next kind of. Things that have been on my mind about that, um, about the pro discussion. So I covered a lot of stuff. Sorry, I shouldn't, we have lots of, I mean, and I know you have another perspective, so I would really like to hear where you're coming from as well with these things and, and see where the conversation goes.

Ernest:

I mean, I think that's such a great point. Just the,'cause, one of the aspects of pro, like you talked about is the fact that they are made to last longer. And so it does seem a bit silly for this, you know, let's say a pro tool to be locked up in one person's garage where they barely use it when there could be so much more utility. You know, has the capacity for so much more utility if it could be shared or. If it could just be offered secondhand, right? So that someone can access that level of capability at a much lower price point. Um, and I think that's one thing that's exciting to see is culturally within the US it does seem like there's. Been a pretty big shift, uh, towards broader acceptance of secondhand product. You know, obviously there's been used cars forever, but now it's, it's broadening into people being much more comfortable buying secondhand clothes and, you know, et cetera. So, um, that feels like maybe one step towards an even better state, which would be, as you said, like, you know, two libraries which exist, but are still pretty rare, I think. Um, but yeah, it'd be fantastic to see that continue to evolve. Um, you know, one thing I thought it was funny in the video about leatherman was their surprise that it was actually, that it was named after a person. And, and I, I agree. Like it just doesn't sound like a person's name. It sounds like

Joachim:

Yeah. It was called the, weren't they gonna call it. the, like Mr. Crunch or something like terrible, terrible name, but yeah. No,

Ernest:

Uh, and that it is a Portland, Oregon based company, which is

Joachim:

Yeah. which I, I had completely forgotten as well until I watched the video. I was like, oh,

Ernest:

Yeah.

Joachim:

Local.

Ernest:

And I think most, if not all of their products are made in the US so, uh, it's amazing that they're able to do that at still, you know, accessible prices. yeah, so you mentioned that. Yeah, I, I have some thoughts on this as well. When I saw Zoran's question, the thing that came to mind for me was, the rise of challenger brands as they're called. Um, we've talked in the past, past episodes about Nike's recent struggles, you know, some of which have been self-inflicted, but some. A function of the rise of these more nimble brands like Hoka and on, uh, which, you know, I think fall under this rubric of challenger brands. And on the apparel side of things, you're seeing something very similar where Lululemon, which has been this sort of established player in the, um, athleisure world, has been, you know, experiencing struggles recently, again, partly due to, um, self-inflicted issues, but then also because of these. More nimble, focused challengers like in their case, aloe and vori. Uh, you know, also in other spaces like automotive, where really all of the established brands, uh, and even some recent challengers like Tesla, are confronting what I think is looking like an existential crisis in the form of challenger brands outta China. Um, so. There's definitely this, um, shift where, uh, kind of shift in power away from these big established brands into these smaller, more nimble challenger brands. And all of that kind of reminded me of this research paper outta the Uni University of Chicago that I can recall hearing about way back. I think the first time I was exposed to it was via a story on Planet Money, the NPR show. And I'll include a link to the full Planet money piece, but I just wanted to cite a brief snippet. Uh, so I'll quote the, the article where they brought it up here, so quote, along with a few colleagues, Matthew Gentzkow, An economist at the University of Chicago's Booth School-- and just a quick side note, Gentzkow is now at Stanford-- uh, but they set out to test a hypothesis: Maybe people buy the brand name pills because they just don't know that the generic version is basically the same thing we came up with. What is probably the simplest idea you've ever heard of Gentzkow, is we just look and see if people who are well informed about these things still pay extra to buy brands. In other words, do doctors, nurses and pharmacists pay extra for Tylenol instead of acetaminophen or by Advil instead of ibuprofen? Gentzkow and his colleagues looked at a huge data set of over 66 million shopping trips and found that, lo and behold, nurses, doctors, and pharmacists are much less likely to buy brands than average consumers. Gensco says. Pharmacists, for example, bought generics 90% of the time compared with about 70% of the time for the over overall population. In a world where everyone was as well-informed as pharmacists or nurses, the market share of the brands would be much, much smaller than it is today. Gens cow says unquote, uh, gens. Cow's team then extended this research into the food and drink space and found that much like medical professionals and over the counter medicines. Chefs are also more likely than the general public to buy generic food. Uh, a piece in the Chicago Booth, Um, Review highlighting this research. Noted that, again, I'm gonna quote that piece now. Quote, if everyone in the United States shops like a chef. The researchers estimate spending on branded pantry staples would drop by 24% leading to a fall of 20 million per year in the total amount spent on pantry staples. And this was in 2013, so be much more today. Overall, shopping with more knowledge could cause a$1.1 billion drop in annual spending as customers save money through buying private label goods, unquote. Um, so you know, what we're seeing today in the rise of challenger brands is distinct from the adoption of generics. But I think what they share is a diminished view of the value of established brands. and this is just a personal anecdote, but I do see that in my own shopping habits. And for me, I would say that it's less about this choice between pro or premium versus good enough and more about generalist brands, you know, where, to me Nike would be a generalist brand in the kind of sporting goods space versus specialist brands. Um, and you know, one example in terms of say running would be what we've talked in the previous episodes about the small brand out of France called, uh, satisfy, which only does running apparel. Uh, they just actually introduced their first trail running shoe, but you know, they only do running. And I think a lot of people get excited about that because you, you can see it in their own product that they just are of that world and that's really what they love and that's what, why they're making these products versus kind of a big multinational generalist brand that, you know, has a lot of other priorities outside of just making great products. Um, and you mentioned apparel too, and there. Uh, I think I, I've talked in the past about this small Japanese brand called Yama Tomichi that is, focuses on outdoor apparel and, you know, very similar work as compared to the more generalist brands, even like. San Arc Terex, which used to be very much a challenger brand and now is kind of more of that big multinational generalist. You can see there's a level of attention to detail in, at least for me, the Yama Dimitri product that, um, just speaks to me of, of a greater commitment, um, that, uh, I find very. Uh, special, you know, in a sea of products that just don't feel particularly special. Another example in more of the fashion space, I don't know if I've brought them up in the past, is again, another Japanese brand called Oslo. It's a men's wear brand. Uh, they specialize in pieces inspired by vintage workwear. And also in developing their own in-house textiles using heritage techniques and heritage machinery. Um, and the products are a little bit more expensive. But very high quality and you know, the sorts of thing that you can imagine handing down if, if one did those sorts of things anymore these days. But, um, you know, they feel like things that will last, uh, beyond just a single wearer's use. So, uh, you know, that's kind of where I went was more of this generalist versus specialist, and it feels like there's this. It's certainly something that I've seen in my own life, but it just seems like there is this app growing appetite for more specialized products because I think there is more utility in many cases from these more specialized. Brands, but also these intangibles. This, you know, sense that there is a greater commitment. And then also a sense that there's, um, they're engaged in the community to a, uh, a much deeper degree. Like, for example, Yama Amichi hosts events around Japan. They, they, um, you can buy their product online, uh, but they're based in Japan and so they host events across the country. To get more people into hiking, you know,'cause they love the activity so much. So it's just so clear that they genuinely have a love for this activity and they're making these products because they want more people to be able to enjoy this activity. So, um, that's where I went, you know, more versus the, uh, pro premium, uh, to just good enough, uh, in, in fact, I would say the specialist. Products are typically better than the just good enough or even the premium products. Um, I don't know if that, uh, aligns at all with things you've seen.

Joachim:

Yeah, I like that. I like that kind of partitioning because, uh, specialization or specialists, um, that, that, that kind of focus. Naturally puts a limit on the kind of business that can actually form around that specialization. And what I mean by that is that it does alter the type of like financial calculus that goes into a business that's specialized. Um, so I, I think, let's bring it back to leatherman, right? Le Leatherman tools is, has been going since the eighties. Um, they have about 400, 500 employees or something like that. So it's not a huge operation, it's a pretty sizable operation. They manufacture as much as possible in the United States. So they have manufacturing facilities here. Um, and you know, they just make a very, very focused set of things like it has been expanding, but originally it was just the small leather man, the larger leather man. And then now they've added more and more variety to it. But the ultimate. The core DNA is still a multi-tool, uh, that's usually built around the pliers, that if anyone, uh, doesn't know what the leatherman tool thing is, actually it is all about these pliers. Probably more useful than carrying a knife around, to be honest. But

Ernest:

Right.

Joachim:

I think that type of specialization and the fact that you're interested in just getting the craft of this item really, really good, that focuses everyone's minds, which is why I think they were able to get something that was. Better quality and a lower price point than for the old inflation adjusted version of the leatherman that they just every day woke up and said, this is what we do, and we will focus on that and we will eke out all of the efficiencies from that. And. It. This is not a hypergrowth business. This is not a business that's about being super financialized and trying to create like that. You're gonna make the entire globe your total addressable market. That is not the nature of what these guys are doing. Um, and so I think that specialization creates natural buffers on what growth can be expected and. I think that's healthy because the, the hyper growth thing is unsustainable and it leads to all kinds of bad behaviors. We're seeing it all the evidence around us Right. now, so yeah. I like that idea as well. I, and I think that rings true with the things that I've been, when I, I shop for things as well. I'm thinking about something like luggage. The companies that I tend to like to get luggage from are companies that only make luggage., I'm a big fan of Pelican cases, as is like everyone who use has to haul equipment of some kind. I have been using a Pelican cases, my suitcase most of the time because it's relatively light ur and not super, super expensive, but. Really, really can just handle the knocks and yeah, it's aging quite nicely. But again, what do they do? They make freaking cases. That's all they do. They don't do anything else, and They've expanded into other things, but it's still ultimately just a variation in the case, right. They've got coolers that's just a plastic box, you know, they've got cases for laptop. It's a plastic box. They've got little boxes, big boxes, so they've got all the sizes. I actually was looking at the website the other day. They have a pelican box just for your wine collection, so it's, it has foam cut out for wine and champagne. I'm like, this is exactly what you should be doing. Right, Just, it's ultimately just still the same fundamental product that they've been working hard on and creating. And, but you can do it for all kinds of silly things as well. And another brand that's even more limited in its focus is USM. That make bookshelves

Ernest:

Right.

Joachim:

whole thing is just this ball with threading and these rods and you screw them in. And it's this modular, uh, furniture system that they have been working on since the sixties. It's still family owned, it's based out of Switzerland, and they have been working for no reason other than their own motivation to make their product environmentally more friendly. Make it to tighter tolerances so that it can, you know, do more, hold more and get more flexible structures out of it. It's incredible, like they're just doing it because of the, the love of the product. And I think that is the difference. You're specialized, you're going into this thing, not expecting to conquer the world. You're expecting to be really, really good at this thing, and it focuses the mind on that. And I think. If your intent is to be the next Amazon, the next ex, you know, Walmart, whatever, it's very clear what your motivation is. It's very clear what your product is gonna look like. Um, and yeah, I wonder to what extent the worries and, and those guys are gonna go to the way of Lululemon. They'll just expand and have physical stores and they'll lose the kind of upstart maverick thing that got them the attention in the first place. So yeah, I do like your, your, uh. The spectrum, like specialization versus these general brands. And I think the appetite for specialist brands is growing because it's easier to find them right. than before. And, so yeah, that's,

Ernest:

And, and I, I do think it's, there's no better time in history to be a challenger, you know, specialist brand just because so much of the infrastructure that used to be, uh, such a huge barrier to entry is now. So accessible, just like getting a merchant account so you could process credit card transactions. Used to be this huge hassle and now you know, it's just within minutes you can get, uh, an account set up and up and running, and then logistics and warehousing, you know, Shopify can handle all that for you or, you know, whatever other brand. But so many of these. Just basic, um, uh, logistics based barriers, um, are are much lower than they were in the past. So, um, I think that has kind of been a quiet contributor to the rise of these challenger brands as well, just because those nuts and bolts things are just so much easier to deal with than they, than they ever have been. but I also love your point about hypergrowth being. Such a factor in this, you know, because if, if your goal and your mission is hypergrowth. You know, it's so obvious what gets pushed off to the side. You know, like service, longevity of the products. All those things get pushed off the table, right? Because those don't serve hypergrowth, it's just about new, new, new, um, you know, more about features you can talk about than features that actually deliver value. Uh, and you know, the, if the rise of challenger brands can help to, um, act as a. Bulwark against that, I think, man, I'm all for it.

Joachim:

Yeah, I think the theme is definitely like hypergrowth only becomes a necessity once you switch over to being, you know, a publicly traded company or want to be a publicly traded company. Leatherman's privately held. Um, you know, USM is a private company and, and you can kind of see when the shift happens is when they start becoming more, the product is not the endpoint, it's the way of generating financial gains as opposed to gains in the product. I think, we're kind of at the point where we're trying to draw lessons from this. So I feel like, you know, if you care about craft and you wanna make good products, then Yeah. be a specialist and find that thing. That is the, the thing that you can see yourself just honing in on, that you want to keep refining. You don't want to go public and you don't care about the hypergrowth cycle. What you care about is actually just making a really good product. But what's interesting as well, I can't remember now, minus maybe. You did mention this book that was about Apple and China's

Ernest:

Right.

Joachim:

feel like you did. Yeah. And that book highlights the fact that China was a, is able to do more now because they were involved in the manufacturing process that Apple had said no, we've just outsourced that. We make the design, you do the thing. And the hard work is, how do we go from the design to actually making this thing? How do you create the assembly lines? The tooling get the tolerances up. And in the process of doing that, they've learned how to make a phone themselves, you know? And at one point the Foxcom people present a phone that they've made. So in the making, I think there's a lot that has, is getting lost. So again, coming back to the Leatherman example, they're making everything, they're seeing it all there all day long. They're looking at their production line and they can be there when these things come together. And that's where you start eeking out those gains and can. Doing more with less. I mean, to me that's always been the ultimate way to make profit is you lower your costs and you're able to keep the price where it is, and you're just eking out margin because you're finding these efficiencies or new design features that allow you to do something, do more with less. And so, Yeah. it's aspirational. I guess, that we should move more into that space, but Yeah.

Ernest:

I love that you also, uh, mentioned that example of pelican expanding into doing those like

Joachim:

Yeah.

Ernest:

uh, cases. Just'cause I, I think most people, when they think about, a small company trying to grow it, typically the first impulse is, okay, we need to offer a lower price, lower cost option, and that often leads to a conversation about offshoring because that's the only way to get the margins we need is is if we make it overseas. I think that's a great example that you can actually grow your business through offerings into spaces that you haven't touched before. Like in the case of Pelican, I don't think a lot of people are using pelican cases to transport wine, but it makes a ton of sense, right? Uh, and that could be a really interesting growth opportunity for them. So it's doesn't always have to be race to the bottom, um, which is where I think people often just go to first.

Joachim:

Yeah. It's, it's about an interesting inversion or rotation of an existing idea, I think. Right. That's, that's, and that's why I wonder, like a lot of these specialist companies, what else could they be unlocking and, uh, who else could benefit from that unlock, you know.

Ernest:

Right.

Joachim:

Yeah.

Ernest:

Well, um, anything else you wanna highlight in

Joachim:

Well, I, I did wanna just say one more time, like I do, I do think that the, the quality, the pro that stuff, it, it, you know, it's not all on the manufacturers themselves to be doing these things. And it's also not on the consumer, Right. These are systemic problems, I don't wanna, uh. Hound people that need to shop at the lower end. I can't, it's, it doesn't make sense. But, um, like we were saying, that access to quality product, and I think part of it, we, I just said it in passing, repairability, um, being able to repair equipment yourself also is very valuable for a company that's not into hypergrowth, so, um, repairability and Right. To repair. Yes, manufacturers can do it, but I do think it is a much bigger systemic thing that has to be addressed and, uh, it's quite crazy to me to think that. I can't remember when this happened, but I think this year or 2025, Congress passed a bill that, um, prevented military personnel from fixing their own equipment. And I don't understand that. It's insane, you know, um, you're in the middle of a war zone and you're now gonna say, now ship this back to the manufacturer because. That lock-in is more valuable. So, sorry, side note. But the point is, I do think we as a populace should be very much like keeping paying attention to those types of battles that are being fought. The tractor maintainers who have to deal with John Deere, but also we should all be very cognizant that, you know, it's a, it's a very important fight that we have to fight because it will open up access for everyone else. Because if you can fix stuff and if you have a right to fix it, then we can. Refurbish equipment and then we can provide it at a lower price point and then recycle, reuse things and people will start actually being able to access high quality things in a mildly used state that's still repairable. So I do think that is still a critical piece of the whole puzzle, and that's not up to the individual product makers to figure that out. It, it does have to be like a global, a global thing. I mean, ISO standards, you know, all of those standards come from. Global coordination, uh, in a lot of things. But yeah, in the EU did stuff with USB-C and, and maintaining those things so that we could actually charge things. It's not perfect, but, um, it's, it's one of those things. So that was the li I just wanted to do like a little soapbox moment there. Sorry.

Ernest:

No, no, that's great. I, I agree. It's, it's so important and it's already, like you mentioned, the USB is just one example of Apple, you know, was forced kicking and screaming into allowing repair. And I think, uh, they've, to their credit, really embraced it. Um, and, uh, you know, it's just been a, a positive all around. So I do think that that's a, a really important path forward.

Joachim:

they had to do, all Apple had to do was fire. Joni, ive, I feel like he was the guy who just refused to make things like repairable and a little bit thicker, I dunno.

Ernest:

Oh gosh. Maybe we should actually have a whole episode about the, um. UI Design Guy Alan Dye leaving for, uh, meta,

Joachim:

yes. That could

Ernest:

which is, uh, something a lot of people within Apple were apparently very happy about. But, um, maybe that could be a conversation for another episode. Well, for this episode, I think, uh, now that you've heard our perspectives, we wanna hear from you. Please share your thoughts, questions or corrections with us at Learn Make learn@gmail.com. Or on threads at Learn, make, learn, show, all one word. We always love hearing your feedback. Now let's move on to our recommendations of the Week. Do you have any recommendations you'd like to share?

Joachim:

I have a couple, so I will try and keep it relatively brief and quick. Um, so the first one is a very, very long article. I think I have shared something from Ed Zitron in the past. Might've been the age of the business idiot. I can't remember if that was the thing I shared, but he's done a follow up called The End Financial Crisis, which is a mashup of the word unification and finance. So he goes line by line through all of the accounts of AI companies and the tech companies and just, you know, it's, it's good to read. So that one I leave for everyone to just read. It's 19,000 words. So I haven't finished it yet, but it's, it is worth it. And he's, it's not behind his paywall. So very much, you know, open to everyone. Uh, different vibe is, um, this Instagram account that I stumbled on, uh, a few weeks ago. Uh, it's just Matthew's Instagram is an account name, but that tells you nothing about what this guy does. Um, so he uses a combination of, um. Various software type for music creation, max MSP, um, pd, as well as touch designer. And what he does is he uses, he has video footage of something and you'll basically, his videos on his Instagram are, you see the video footage and then there's a. A solid line that he's superimposed on that. And then when an object passes through that line, it triggers notes and music from them. So the, the one that I saw was like a motorway, like merging of like a cycle. It looks like round roads that are being merging together and, um. It's very soothing. It's, it's quite incredible and a lot of craft and, and getting that to work and make something that's very nice. So I feel like it's a very interesting data sonification as well, and as, as an experiment, but aesthetically very pleasing as well. Um, so that was one and. It also gets an honorable mention on a blog that I used to follow when I was a PhD student of this other PhD student. It's called flowing data.com, and he has a whole host of like the best data visualizations for 2025. Really interesting. Nice to see stuff. There's some great things from the, the pudding I think I've mentioned in previous episodes, so worth checking out. So those two. And then the last one is also kind of a workflow product that I have also, I actually didn't. Take out the subscription by accident, but I did do it intentionally. Um, but I'm, I've been using Notion as well as part of my workflow and, um, I mean, it's, you know, what is it? It's, it's Google Docs, it's everything. It's like a, it's like everything else, but somehow the design of it is just really, really great. Um, the interface is pretty intuitive, the way you can organize. Pages and, and content. You can write text. It has AI support if you want to use some of the large language models to do things. It has excellent integration with various, um, other little languages like Late Tech for math, formulae, or like for mermaid diagrams. You can quickly write those all in the same text. Really fluid, all accessible through keyboard shortcuts. Um, so if you've ever tried to write equations and Google Docs pain in the butt,'cause you have to always go to the menu and then it pops up and it's not the full late tech experience. It's always very limited and weird mashup notion just said, we'll put late tech in there. Uh, and I keep saying late tech, it's LAT Kai X is is the math that the, the, um, the defacto standard for all scientific, uh, article writing is that you write it in latex. There, it's, it's been around since the seventies, eighties Tech has been, and Late Tech is the updated version. Beautiful for typesetting documents and papers, but great for writing equations. You can do all kinds of crazy stuff with it. And Notion has just, Hal also kind of plugged that into their ecosystem. So I've been really. Enjoying having that as part of my workflow, I have it on my phone and I have it on my laptop so I can quickly take notes and there's just little things that are nice, like you can add cover photos to the text that you're writing. You can quickly publish a page as a website, so it'll automatically generate a link and it becomes accessible. I'm, I've been very happy with it. I found it a really great alternative to Google Docs, especially since I spend. A lot of my time at work day job doing Google Docs. I wanted to also get into a different head space for, um, the other work that I do. And that's been really, uh, a very powerful ally in that. So, yeah. like I said, just give it a try. It's notion, um, it's, it just hit me at the right spot. I did try it a year ago and it really did not gel with me. And then this time round I've been working with another person that uses it for everything. I just thought, you know, I'll give it a try. This scene, he, he's been write, he writes tons of stuff. There's always new things coming through. I was like, I, let me see what this looks like. And Yeah. it, it's been a real, a really great product. So definitely worth giving it a check. I think there's a free version that you can test.

Ernest:

Ah, very cool. And we'll, uh, provide links to all of these in the show notes as well. Um, I wanted to share a couple things. Uh. This, this was inspired by, um, you know, many people sharing their best films of 2025. Lists at the end of the year. Uh, many of those lists featured, uh, film One Battle after another, directed by Paul Thomas Henderson. We've talked about this a little bit in the past. The film I actually wanted to highlight is, uh, an older film that Paul Thomas Anderson had directed back in, uh, 2017. Called Phantom Thread. I had, I finally saw it, uh, because it's on Netflix now. Um, and I just absolutely fell in love with it. It, um, it's directed by PT Anderson, stars Daniel Day Lewis, uh, Vicky Krieps and Lesley Manville, and, uh, has an absolutely gorgeous score by Johnny Greenwood, the, uh, lead guitarist and keyboardist for Radiohead. It's a, a classical score. It's just so beautiful. But, oh man, Daniel Day Lewis's performance, I think is just incredible. The writing is incredible and I, I'd have to say it's my favorite, Paul Thomas Anderson film, by a wide margin. It's, it's just incredible and I think it makes for a really good double feature with another older film not older, but somewhat older film, I guess; a documentary from 2015 titled"Dior and I," directed by Frédéric Tcheng. It chronicles the um, joining of Dior by Raf Simmons. He becomes their head of design and it follows him as he and his team develop his first couture collection for Christian Dior. And, I had seen it back when it first came out in 2015, and I remember I was captivated by it. And then after seeing Phantom Thread, I really felt like I wanted to see it again. And they're a great duo to watch together because, you see similar themes addressed. one fictionally and then one in a real world context. And, I have to say, when I was younger, I was very anti-fashion. You know, I think as a sort of typical heterosexual American male, I felt like I should not be into fashion. And this film,"Dior and I," was the first time that I came to, I wouldn't say I understand fashion at all. It still kind of mystifies me, but it was the first time I, I appreciated it. I think it's a beautiful film. It's a documentary,"Dior and I," it's beautifully shot. Um, the structure of it I think is very interesting. I won't get into any detail on it, but very interesting structure and it really, really, made me appreciate the, the artistry and the craft of fashion in a way that I just never had before. So I would highly recommend both of them. If you've already seen Phantom Thread, then you know, please do check out"Dior and I". I don't know, um, I, I'm not sure if it's on any streaming services, but, we'll provide a link to more information about it. Third Thing I wanted to highlight, this one's a little bit out of left field, but it is another film. My wife and I just watched it last night, it's, um, called Sentimental Value, a film by another Joachim, Joachim Trier. And it stars, Renate, I'm not sure if I'm pronouncing her name correctly, Renate Reinsve.

Joachim:

I dunno.

Ernest:

Um, and then her. The woman who plays her sister, I'm not even gonna try to pronounce her name. And, um, also Stellan Skarsgard and Elle Fanning. And, oh man, what a film. It, uh, it's, it's about so many interesting, important things, family place, the power of art. I think all what the, all of these three films have in common is that they all are about the power of art and the cost of art. Um, as well in interesting ways. In the case of sentimental value, I think it's such an incredible illustration of the fact that some people really struggle to connect with others, and the only way that they can is through art and how powerful that can be. Um, so it, it's available for rent now, digitally, and that's how we saw it. We rented it via, um, Apple TV. And man, it is just an absolutely incredible film with filled with incredible performances. So, Phantom Thread, uh, Dior and I and Sentimental Value are my recommendations for this episode.

Joachim:

Did you watch the worst person in the world,

Ernest:

I did, yeah.

Joachim:

What did you think of that?

Ernest:

I really liked it as well, but, uh, this hit me a lot harder, Sentimental Value, I mean. Um, I don't know if I had actually even mentioned this to you, but my, my mother passed recently.

Joachim:

I'm so sorry. No, No, Honest,

Ernest:

it, I mean it was, uh, she'd been struggling with, um, Alzheimer's for some years. So it was a very good thing and she, she went very peacefully. We were, our family was there in the room and she went very peacefully. So it was very much a good thing. But there's a part of Sentimental Value that that really highlights the importance of family and of a, a sibling relationship. And I think maybe that's what really struck me because this, experience of, I have two sisters and, us coming together through this experience. Um, it was very much echoed in the film. and, you know, that might be why it touched me in a, in a much deeper way. But yeah, I definitely enjoyed Worst Person in the World as well. I'd say that the thing that, they share, aside from having the same star, uh, is just, I think the films are just so beautiful. I love his visual, the director, um, Joachim Trier's, visual style. and he has these visual flourishes. Um, you know, there's one really kind of well known one in the worst person in the world, but in, uh, sentimental value as well. Have you seen it yet? Sentimental

Joachim:

but I think I will now. Based on your recommendation.

Ernest:

oh gosh, I just absolutely loved it.

Joachim:

Yeah, I'll have to do that.

Ernest:

All right, well, I think that does it for us. Thank you so much for joining us here at Learn Make Learn. And as I mentioned earlier, we wanna hear from you. Do you have any thoughts on anything we discussed or recommended this week? If so, what's your perspective? Or maybe there's a product or service you'd love to hear us focus on through the lens of of product marketing. Whether it's a request, a question, or an observation, please do share your thoughts with us at Learn Make learn@gmail.com or on threads at Learn Make Learn Show, all one word. Thanks for listening, and we hope you'll join us for the next Learn. Make, learn.

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Ernest Kim

Co-host
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Joachim Groeger

Co-host