Matt Bowles: Hey, everybody. It’s Matt Bowles. Welcome to The Maverick Show. My guest today is Eddie Rich. He is the founder and CEO of LoDo Massage, LLC, which provides onsite corporate wellness and mindfulness services ranging from in office chair massages and chair yoga to meditation and yoga classes for corporate workplaces, trade shows, and events. Founded in 2008 with just $30.00, LoDo Massage now generates over $4 million in annual revenue and operates in 45 cities around the US and has clients that include Airbnb, Microsoft, Goldman Sachs, Proctor & Gamble, Google, Amazon, and many others that you would surely know. LoDo Massage operates with only five full time corporate staff but over 800 licensed massage therapists and yoga instructors. Eddie has built his business with a location independent infrastructure so his entire corporate staff can work remotely and he can run his business from anywhere in the world. He has traveled to over 30 countries and recently completed the Remote Year Program. We are right now traveling together on the Trans-Siberian Railway from Moscow to Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia. And we are recording this podcast live on the train. Eddie, welcome to the show. 

Eddie Rich: Thank you, Matt.

Matt: So good to have you here, my man. We have got to set the scene because this is I feel like the most incredible environment where I have ever recorded a podcast. We are literally on the world famous Trans-Siberian Railway. We are on a 37 hour leg of this train going into Siberia. You and I are currently sitting in a dingly lit train car. It’s about 9:00 p.m. in the evening, totally dark outside, and we have just opened a bottle of – let’s take a look and see what this is because this is a local Russian wine. It is a white. I can tell you that. And I think it is probably –

Eddie: It’s Georgian grapes, isn’t it?

Matt: It’s some sort of Russian white. I can’t even read what the label is but this is what you can get on the Trans-Siberian Railway is you can get a white wine that is of some sort of Russian origin. And we can’t exactly read the label but it’s pretty good.

Eddie: Not bad. And it’s a little brighter in the car thanks to the full moon outside. 

Matt: We do have a full moon shining in our window. So, we’re going to be drinking through this bottle, sitting in our train car, and talking about some really, really incredible stuff tonight. Eddie, let’s start just sort of with your background and your journey. Can you talk a little bit about where you grew up and then, how you came to entrepreneurship?

Eddie: Yeah. I grew up in St. Louis, Missouri. We moved to Denver when I was in high school and then, back to St. Louis for my senior year in high school and went to the University of Missouri where I had my first stint with entrepreneurship. I started a poster company called Goofy Graphics. I made local posters ranging from anything to cartoons to official rules of a drinking game, which did not get good reviews from the school board. Nevertheless, it helped the sales of that pretty well. From there, I started an IT business shortly after a short stint in the financial business. And that’s how I ended up in the corporate wellness business. I took what I knew from the IT business and applied it. My IT business specialized in advising companies on how to remote network into their business. 

Matt: Can you talk a little bit more about that and also set kind of the context and the timeframe for that? Because you were really, I think, a pioneer that was really on the front end of that. Can you talk a little bit about that and sort of how that contributed to your mindset in terms of helping those companies move towards more remote-friendly operations?

Eddie: Absolutely. Well, I got to a point it was roughly right around the recession and I spent about close to a decade managing network onsite. I had a team of about five people. And it was just one problem after another running around the city. Five servers would go down at the same time. No way to get to them fast enough. No other support staff. And just the burn out kicked in. And I was seriously getting sick of it. And the recession didn’t help any matters. It was making revenue very low and that’s about when LoDo Massage was born to basically add a little bit of extra revenue during the off times or the slow times of LoDo Cloud or it was LoDo Lan at the time. We converted all of our clients to hosted Microsoft servers. So, we moved everything from a file server exchange server and I leased space on server racks up in Seattle. And it made life a lot easier. Clients were able to remote in. I had a backup staff that could fix their issues immediately. They were being monitored and backed up 24 hours a day. And the business became a lot more profitable right out of the gate when we switched to the cloud. And by the time 2015 rolled around, I had every single client running 100 percent off the cloud. The clients loved it because they were able to allow workers that work remote, work from home, cut away from sick time and snow days and so on and so forth. And it made a lot of my businesses more profitable as well.

Matt: And how did that affect sort of your mindset moving forward with respect to remote work as an entrepreneur yourself as you went on to then eventually start LoDo and develop that in the location independent infrastructure that exists today? Can you talk a little bit about I guess both the journey in terms of building LoDo and building it in what is today a location independent infrastructure but also sort of how that experience maybe influenced your mindset and the way you were thinking about it as a business owner?

Eddie: Absolutely. As the transition from LoDo Lan to LoDo Cloud occurred, I very rarely had to leave my home. So, technically, I was working remote. But I realized at that time I could work anywhere I want. The one thing that was stopping me was the sudden emergencies that could happen in a cloud business that even though I was able to work remote, I couldn’t engage into other activities during the day that would require my immediate attention because sometimes, an emergency could happen that if I was snowboarding or hiking or whatever, I wouldn’t have the ability to fix something. It wasn’t something I could get back to at a later time. When I decided to move forward with LoDo Massage, I realized, basically, I was making sales, working in SEO, marketing, so on and so forth making the company grow but I could do it on my own time when I wanted. It doesn’t matter if it was 2:00 in the morning or 2:00 in the afternoon. And I wasn’t hard pressed to deal with emergencies other than an occasional staffing issue, which gave me a lot more freedom and flexibility. So, then I was able to travel a lot more at that point. 

Matt: And how did you – when you were conceptualizing LoDo Massage, which is, again, not a business that people would probably initially off the top be like oh, yeah, that’s a remote business I could run from the other side of the world, how did you initially conceptualize the framework of that business? And can you talk a little bit about your journey in building LoDo Massage and building it to now an infrastructure where both you and your corporate staff are totally remote?

Eddie: Well, I, essentially, used the same infrastructure as LoDo Cloud. Instead of sending out IT people to fix broken networks, I was sending out massage therapists and yoga instructors to relieve stress. And instead of getting complaints from clients every time I sent somebody out to do a repair, I was getting compliments and basically high fives for destressing their workforce. So, there was a lot of positive reinforcement on that. And the margins were, essentially, the same so it was very interesting with a lot less residual stress on my end. So, I chose, at that point, to grow the onsite chair massage business. And I left LoDo Cloud relatively stagnant. I still was doing good. I was still monitoring it and eventually, I sold it off in 2016.

Matt: And then, from there as you were focusing on the massage business and continuing to grow that and build that, can you talk a little bit about just what the infrastructure of that looks like today and how the business functions, any of the systems and processes just to give people kind of an inside, behind the scenes look at that business?

Eddie: It started off as me handling everything from taking the calls, making the sales, responding to contact forms, scheduling the therapists, interviewing the therapists, interviewing the yoga instructors, making sure they showed up on time. I handled paying them collections if it was needed, so on and so forth. It was a one man operation run from my house. As the business grew, I could no longer do it by myself so I brought somebody in to assist me. I trained her in all aspects of the business but primarily, she was handling what we call the therapist coordination. So, I would make a sale, she would assist me in making sure we had somebody to cover the job. And she would follow up to make sure the person showed up and knew exactly who to contact once they were at the job. We grew further and we hired salespeople, a different therapist coordinator, and the business grew to about five people. And, initially, we moved it to an office location. We were going to go to a work share but we rented out the top floor of a massage studio that I own. And we moved it to that location. And it was working great for a while but it was on Remote Year that I realized that my staff could actually do a better job working remote. They weren’t going to be stuck in traffic. They’d be able to answer calls earlier in the morning. It’s one of these things where if we get a call for a sale, we don’t respond right away, we could lose the sale to our competitor immediately. So, my biggest concern was making sure we answered every call, answered every contact form immediately.

Matt: Can you talk a little bit about that? And let’s just contextualize Remote Year as well for people that may not know about that program. You and I, of course, have both done the Remote Year Program and we actually met through the alumni network of that program. And it’s basically a work/travel program for professionals that can generate location independent income. They could be business owners, freelancers, remote employees, whomever it is. And you travel the world together to have a four month version, a six month version, and a twelve month version of the program. And so, can you talk a little bit maybe about that, about your experience on that program and what your mindset was as a business owner when you started the program and then, what sort of lessons or insights or epiphanies or development happened on that program for you?

Eddie: I think, for me, my biggest concern was at the time I did Remote Year, I was 56 years old. I’ve always viewed it as something younger people do. I wasn’t sure if I was fit enough. I wasn’t sure if I could really step away in another city, even though I never really was at the corporate office very often. I just felt more connected being in the same city being closer to the people who were running my business. I was surprised to see that there were a lot more older people involved in this kind of networking. And there were some CEOs, ex-CEOs, people who were business owners that simply had their business running smoothly and were able to step away. And at the same time, there were people who were working sometimes 10, 12 hour days. They were just doing it in another foreign city, which made it a little bit more fun for them. So, age was not a factor. Other things that I was concerned about was health, things like that for being the age I was. Can I keep up with the young kids and so on and so forth. There seemed to be a good mix of people all over the board. There were quite a bit younger people, but there were a lot of people in their 40’s. And I met several people that were quite a bit older than me and my fears were actually subsided. The thing that I had the most difficult time with was letting go. Letting go of the business to the point where I knew that my immediate knee jerk reactions would be done from remote and sometimes, I would be sleeping when the email came in. It depends on where you are in the time zone changes and a fear of letting my staff make some of the key decisions without my input. And that was one of the things that on Remote Year that I was able to work through.

Matt: And can you talk about that process though? Because I feel like that’s the case for a lot of people, whether they’re planning to do a program like Remote Year or they just aspire to have more location independence and more freedom in their own lives but they have this fear barrier. I don’t know if in my business if that could really work. So, can you share anything more about what that sort of process was for you and any tips that you would have for people that are aspiring to move in that direction?

Eddie: Absolutely, yeah. My initial fears were more on the technical side. Who is going to collect my mail? I had an aging dog at the time and I only did the four month program. And I was very attached to my dog so that was a really tough thing for me to do. I had not spent – I did a lot of remote work at the time. I would pick a city, go there for a couple of weeks, fly home and everything was pretty much the same. You could let your mail sit for a couple of weeks. So, there are a lot of those technical factors. But the one thing that was vastly different was really letting somebody else make some emergency key decisions that could impact the profitability and the future of your business. And that was the toughest thing for me to work through as I left. And I think the ultimate answer to that was I felt being gone after the first couple of months, I realized that I had a staff that was probably more competent than myself. They were doing a phenomenal job. And without me breathing down their neck and micromanaging them, they were able to make decisions that were actually possibly even better than I would make on my own. So, there were some points on remote here that I found myself to be feeling a little bit retired, a little bit useless for my own company, which was a little concerning as well.

Matt: Well, and do you think that also relates to an evolution of your leadership style and/or of the company culture as you sort of moved into that direction and had those experiences and how the company subsequently operates today, any reflections that you have? Because I am curious, in general, about your leadership style as a CEO and an owner and how you create a company culture. So, I’d love for you to comment on that, in general. And then, any sort of evolution over time in terms of where that’s at today.

Eddie: I’ve been told my leadership style can be on a whim, I guess, is the best way to put it. I can make a decision quickly and then, I’m told I change my mind a lot. But I always tell my staff that that’s a good thing that I have the ability to change my mind. That’s not a bad thing. I realize I made a mistake and I have no problem saying this is not working out. Let’s back up and take a different direction. And it can drive employees crazy. But nevertheless, I think being able to realize that you made a bad decision is a good thing. As far as my initial style of this business, I was very hands on. I was always at the office. I was always present. I met my staff members for lunch, dinners, whatever, created events to go out and hang out and get to know each other. But we had more of a team camaraderie that I think disappeared a little bit when I started to step back. But I realized that they were trained with my mindset, my vision, my direction and they continued to keep the same energy in the business moving forward.

Matt: Awesome. I want to also drill down a little bit and talk about some of your areas of expertise in business and some of the things that you’ve done and the competitive advantages that you’ve cultivated. The first thing I want to ask you about is efficiency, systems and process, and how lean you’ve been able to keep your team and your operations and that sort of stuff. When you and I were talking earlier, you sort of identified that as one of your strengths and competitive advantages. And I’m wondering if you can share a little bit about that and also how you’re able to do that.

Eddie: I think I had a little bit of an edge there because my other business, the cloud server business, I created. Not only did I just maintain remote systems for people to work remotely, but I literally changed the entire process of 35 different companies in Denver for their mindset for being onsite that has to be under their roof to the ability to work remote and the simplicity of working remote. And I was able to create systems that helped other companies that made them a lot more efficient, a lot more productive, and were able to hire people in other cities without a hitch. And I, literally, got a little jealous. I thought I just need to do this myself. Why in the hell am I making no money teaching other people how to do this? And it kind of came about. I thought I’m going to apply this to my own company. And I’m going to pick a field that I know nothing about. And honestly, I’m not a massage therapist. I couldn’t massage a dog. And I’m not a yoga instructor. I’m probably the worst yogi you would ever meet. But I was able to create a set of efficient tools to allow people to work remote. And I was able to keep the staff down to a point where a lot of the stuff was automated through any type of onsite ASPs, basically, anything from a CRM to web based accounting. And I outsourced a lot of our stuff as well, too. I didn’t want to be bogged down doing my own books so I outsourced a firm that specializes in doing – and they’re out of India, actually. They have a call center here in the US but most of the work is done overseas. And I outsourced my website. And I outsource my marketing. Eventually, we did bring some marketers in house because we were doing so much marketing it was just less expensive at the time. It’s almost like that book, The Four Hour Work Week. Everything just became an idea in my mind and then, finding someone to outsource it to and applying it into my own company.

Matt: I also want to ask you about one of your other areas of expertise, search engine optimization, which I know has been a real staple of your business success. And I’m wondering if you can share a little bit about that and just a basic primer on SEO and the concept of it. And if you want to share how impactful SEO has been for your business. And then, I would love for you to share any tips or value that you can impart to aspiring entrepreneurs that may want to try to improve their SEO. 

Eddie: I think the key on the SEO, I was pretty much self-taught. I read a lot of books. I even read SEO for Dummies. It was the first SEO book I read. And I had a lot of experience doing it as a consultant in the IT world as well, too. The bottom line, you want to get more traffic to your website. In addition to more traffic to your website, you want to get more people to see you the minute they’re looking for your particular service. You don’t want to be on Page 2. You don’t want to have them scroll down 20 different competing businesses. You’ve got to somehow make your name on top. That’s the whole point of SEO. If you do that, you’re going to drive calls, you’re going to drive contact form submissions, and you’re going to save a butt load of money on hiring an outside sales force. Instead of hitting people one at a time, you’re hitting people thousands at a time because the minute somebody wants your product, they’re going to turn on the computer and they may not even use a search engine. They may just stick it in the address bar of their Windows computer and type chair massage or widget or whatever you sell. And if you want to make people call you, it’s best to be No. 1 organically and even in sometimes the paid advertisement area. 

Matt: Well, I remember when you and I were initially talking about this and you had listed off some of your mega, huge, high profile, Fortune 500 clients. And I was very impressed with that. And I said to you, “How did you land those clients?” I was like, “Did you do a big campaign where they were your dream clients and you were targeting them and you finally closed them?” And you were like, “No, they just found me on the internet. They Googled and they contacted us.” 

Eddie: In a nutshell, when we got called by Google, Google Googled us. 

Matt: That is unbelievable.

Eddie: Because we didn’t send anybody there. And the city that hired us from Google we didn’t have much of a presence. So, I highly doubt it was a referral. We had some smaller clients. And so, bottom line, we got Googled by Google. 

Matt: That’s unbelievable. Do you have any tips either specific tactical tips or conceptually the ways that entrepreneurs should be thinking about improving SEO in their business, maybe mistakes people are making or things they can be doing better?

Eddie: Yeah. It’s hard to give a direct tip because it changes hourly it seems like. There are all kinds of different formulas that Google web crawlers use. There are other areas. The bottom line, the most important thing is to drive as much traffic to your website and get as much engagement on your website as you possibly can. That’s going to give you an organic search. The other thing is the primary basis for a company much more important than Yelp, it’s about two years old now, but the Google My Business platform, which replaced most of the Google Plus for Business. And make sure that whether you’re auto repair or whether you’re a content writer or whatever it is you do, someone is going to Google the service that they want to look for. And it’s best to show up within the Google My Business because that’s going to be on top. If you’re in Google, that’s going to be on top above the organic search of the name of your company. So, we put a lot of emphasis on making sure we’re No. 1 in Google My Business. 

Matt: Awesome. And are there any tactics that you can share? I know you talked about when you went into this business and you went into this space, you really relied upon the SEO expertise that you had as a competitive advantage that you wanted to put into play to start and build your company on that. Are there any tactics that you’ve used along the way, either years ago or today, that you can share that were sort of creative or interesting or differentiated you in the SEO area

Eddie: I guess without giving a trade secret away because it seems to be working, I created a way that we appear to be very popular locally in every city we’re in. And I shoot for the local SEO. I had to make a decision on how I wanted to market our services. And I could either spend a ridiculous amount of money with advertisements, mailings, fliers, an onsite team that hits pavement like a lot of people do. I’m sure you get a lot of walk in sales reps for different office supply companies and so on and so forth. Or I could take that same investment and quite a bit less, actually, and dump every dime of it into the optimization of your website. A lot of people – I find it very interesting how many businesses completely disregard SEO in general. I don’t own an SEO business. I don’t vouch for any of them. Some of them are not as good as others. Some of them can be quite fraudulent. However, it is a huge factor in the success of your business. If you’re not present on the web, you’re not going to be found. And one of the key things I learned about how to get found in each city is the focus on the local searchability of the city that you’re in because you don’t want to waste time with phone calls coming in for a different product. You don’t want to waste time for phone calls coming in for a city that you have no presence in. So, you really have to pinpoint where you are and how to get the calls coming in that city specific. 

Matt: Awesome. I would love to hear, in terms of your journey, any entrepreneurial journey, there are always bumps along the way. There are always setbacks. There is this concept that all business owners know about called the entrepreneurial rollercoaster, which goes up and it goes down. And I’m wondering if you can share any challenges, setbacks that you’ve had along the way and what you learned from them and how you responded and overcame them.

Eddie: The first setback is I was looking for some investors to start this business because I thought it was a great idea. And everyone told me it was a stupid idea. So, that’s why the business was started with $30.00 because, during the recession, that’s about all I had left in my bank account. So, I didn’t have a choice. It, literally, was started with a Cricket phone. And this is absolutely the truth. I had a meeting with one of my massage therapists that was my personal massage therapist. Her name is Mary Hart. And I asked her some questions at a sushi restaurant. And I got a Cricket phone and I believe I signed up for Cricket and they gave me a free non-smart phone. You had to be smart to use the phone because the phone had no intelligence. And I got the 50 free business cards from Vista Print. And I needed 50 more so I think I created a second business account in a different email address and got another 50 free business cards. And then, I set up a one on one business website. I believe it was free or it might have been $9.00. So, we’re looking at about $25.00 to $29.00 start up costs. And I was in business. 

Matt: What were your first steps at that point? Because I think this is a really, really great example of truly bootstrapping something. And for entrepreneurs, wantrepreneurs, aspiring business owners that want to take that leap and they really don’t have a lot of resources and they don’t have that kind of stuff to start a business, I would love from that moment what then were your initial steps to go out there and start building. 

Eddie: I see a lot of entrepreneurs wanting to start and I’ve worked with a lot of them now after the success of this business and the one thing I see in common with so many is they want to get rich quick. They don’t want to work hard and make it grow. They don’t want to put 14 or 15 hours a day, which sucks. But if you read any of these business books, it seems to be the one thing in common by any successful entrepreneur is you put in your time and then, you can take the time later. And you’ve got to live it, breathe it, think it. I was answering sales calls while I was on the ski lift in between snowboarding to make sure this business worked. It was turned on 24/7. I guess there is another area. People are so desperate to get it going, they get stupid about getting investors into their business. They start giving away immediate two percent and five percent and eight percent ownership into the business, which sounds like a great way to get money quick. But then, when the business starts to do well, you realize you’re giving away a ridiculous amount of your margins to pay off the investors. And suddenly, you’re being told what to do and you have too many people breathing down your neck. I think that having an approach to understanding that it may take some time to grow the business and really trying to grow it internally before you go out and get investor happy. Sometimes you need it. You have an idea and it may require $5 million or $10 million. This business did not require that much start up capital to get going. And because of that, we didn’t have to have a lot of revenue in order to show a profit. But there are a lot of businesses that are inventions and so on and so forth. But the key is to understand that it does take time and it does take work and to not view it as a get rich quick scheme. 

Matt: I 100 percent agree with that. I’m also curious, Eddie, about how you structure your day and optimize your productivity. Any tips you have on that I’d love to hear if you have any morning routines or how your workday looks to be as productive as you are. And I suppose there are different phases of your business, obviously, when you’re kind of in the intense grind mode versus at different stages when you’re in less of that. So, feel free to caveat that if you like. But I’m curious about your day structure, morning routines, and how you optimize your productivity. 

Eddie: A lot of emails come in over the nighttime. And sometimes during the night, you have time to process some thoughts. So, when I wake up, it’s pretty much the same routine. I make a cup of coffee, make some breakfast, anything from a banana to usually something quick, a fried egg, and sit down and just run through my emails even from the prior afternoon. Sometimes, I quit checking my emails at a certain time because you need to step back and give yourself a little bit of a break. And I have learned that it’s not efficient to have your emails coming through 24/7. And it will destroy your mood. You feel like you have to answer the email immediately. There is no way of getting around that. And so, I think checking your emails in the morning is a great idea and then, maybe sometime in the afternoon. I know there are some other books that have said the same thing. But, basically, every morning I look at the financial markets. I look at the news, any breaking indicators of where we’re heading economy wise, which seems to change on a daily basis these days. And I check my emails. I look over our bank accounts, financials, and I check in with my staff usually every other day with either a phone call or an email. It could be a simple question on hey, how is it going. But at this point, my main role of the company right now is to maintain the financial structure of the business, create our growth pattern, and, basically, help out with any pressing or big issues.

Matt: And how do you personally deal with stress as you are going through the business journey when things get stressful or there are setbacks or catastrophes that happen or different things like that and you go through highly stressful moments or even in life? How do you manage stress? Do you have particular techniques for that? And then, how do you handle business challenges? How do you approach a business setback?

Eddie: Well, my initial gut reaction is to have a shot of whiskey but that’s not a healthy solution as much as I do love whiskey. I think my favorite way is some sort of outdoor activity. Some sort of an outdoor activity where you can be alone with your music and feel the surroundings of the outdoors. It could be anything from a hike to a solo day snowboarding, a simple walk in the park, or sometimes an urban hike. Throw on your hiking shoes and walk downtown about 2 miles and just people watch with very loud heavy metal music blasted through my ears is one of my favorite ways actually. I’m very happy that Tool came out with a  new album finally after eight years. But anyway, other than that, I try to do anything I can to get my mind off of the pressing issue that’s causing the stress and then, come back to it. And a lot of the times, and you can ask my staff this, I will make what they call a kneejerk reaction. And they somehow have been able to pretty much disregard those and they usually wait about two days for me to come back with a better solution to handle any kind of a pressing problem. So, it’s kind of funny how people get to know you after you’ve been working with them for a long time.

Matt: When you were starting LoDo Massage, how did you select that particular space? Did you do market research? How did you sort of assess a product market fit and test for a minimal viable product? Did you go through that whole kind of process? How did you select and know that that space would work and there would be demand and you’d be able to compete and scale it to this level?

Eddie: A very unorthodox way. I did zero research whatsoever. I got involved with indoor bouldering and I hurt my shoulder and I started getting massages all of the time. They included chair massage at Whole Foods and they included a subscription to Massage Envy where I went probably three times a week. One day while I was at Massage Envy, I was getting a massage and I thought I’ve got an idea. Instead of sending IT people out, I’m going to send massage therapists out to my companies because they can do no wrong. I’m going to get a positive response. I ran a handful of preliminary numbers based on what I could charge and what I would pay the therapist. And I realized that the business is identical to the onsite network repair business. However, instead of sending out IT staff, I was sending out massage therapists. And that’s pretty much what led to the big whopping $30.00 investment. And here we are today 11 years later.

Matt: That’s awesome. That’s amazing. What would be your biggest tip to entrepreneurs that are starting out or that are sort of maybe they’ve already started but they’re looking to really scale their businesses and try to take things to the next level? What would be your main tip for early stage business owners?

Eddie: The main thing is to feed off of the naysayers because everybody you meet, you tell them your business idea and they’re like I don’t know if that’s going to work. I don’t know if you should – you need to stick to your 9:00 to 5:00 job and show up to the office every day and make your salary and take your one hour lunches. And I really don’t think you should be creative and try to make your own business. Basically, I’m not sure what we’re supposed to say on this interview here but it’s like fuck you to all of those naysayers. So, as a matter of fact, I put out a big thank you to the naysayers recently on my Facebook post. Thank you all of the naysayers because every single person I had spoken with about the idea of starting a chair massage company said it was the stupidest idea they ever heard.

Matt: Wow. It sounds like what a lot of people say about this digital nomad lifestyle that we’re both engaged in.

Eddie: I’m dealing with that now, too. People think about playing on the road, which I am. But I’m also working quite a bit. And at the same time, I’m making better business decisions because I’m looking at the business from a distance and not being caught up in the day to day bullshit. And there you can make much better decisions.

Matt: I think that’s a really good point. And I think that’s also a really good transition point to start talking a little bit about travel and the digital nomad lifestyle. And I think that a lot of the location dependent business owners and entrepreneurs that I interview say similar things to what you just said there in terms of the value that they’ve brought to their business when they embark on the digital nomad lifestyle and start to exercise some of that location independence. But I would love to hear a little bit about your journey into that lifestyle and some of those things that you experienced in terms of naysayers or in terms of how did your – I know you have two kids that are grown adults now. How did they respond to it? How did friends and other people in your circles respond and what was sort of that transition like for you?

Eddie: I’m still going through a lot of it. My kids seem to be my biggest supporters, which is fantastic. I get messages from my daughters that I’m inspiring and they love seeing my photos. They love hearing my stories. And they love how nomadic I’ve become. And the biggest issue I’ve had is, and it can come from some of the staff as well as family, most of my staff is very supportive actually, and it’s the friends that really sometimes wonder what am I doing. Am I retired? They refer to nomading as vacationing. And I don’t think they understand the concept. I tend to feel that some of them have a little envy or jealousy. I hate to say that. But I don’t have an Instagram that I post every move I make. I’ll post funny photos of something I’m doing in a different city. And I try to keep from throwing it in people’s faces that I’m here, there, and everywhere and posting 90 different pictures of one city on Facebook and so on and so forth. But I do think that people think that I’m on this permanent vacation or I’ve become so successful that I no longer need to work. But I think in reality, what’s ironic about that whole situation is my business has literally tripled in revenue since I’ve been on the road. And it’s because I realize that I work better not being confined into a certain space that my staff, my five staff members that help me run LoDo Massage actually run it all themselves, work from home. I had two situations where two of my staff members had children recently and I was able to keep them on because sometimes the cost of living and the cost of daycare can be so overwhelming that it may not have worked out for them had I have been making them come to the office every day five days a week. And they were very appreciative that they were able to work straight from home. 

Matt: I think that’s so important. When I talk about location independence, one of the things that I say to people is that the specific lifestyle choices that I make in terms of how I structure my travel and structure all of this kind of stuff, that’s a very personal choice that may not be exactly the right fit for everyone. But I do believe that location independence and having more control over your own life and where you live and where you work from and just having the choice and the control is inherently a good thing. And then, how you choose to exercise that is totally up to you and is a very personal decision as you’re saying. If someone is a new parent and they have the flexibility not to have to go into the office and that they can work from home and that they can prioritize their kids as a new parent and all of that kind of stuff, that’s an amazing freedom and that’s an incredible way to exercise that freedom. Similarly, other people who choose to exercise it by being an itinerant nomad and seeing the world or people who choose to exercise that however they want, that’s a totally individualized decision. But man, being able to offer, especially as a business, because we do the same thing with 100 percent of our staff, the opportunity to live where you want, work from wherever you want, it also allows you to just recruit and retain the best talent because that’s an extraordinary benefit. 

Eddie: And here is one thing. Here is a shout out to all of the people who can’t work remote because they’re the people that are maintaining the servers in all of the different companies that very rarely get mentioned when I’m in a lot of these remote meetings and workshops and nomad groups. It’s a 50/50 split. There are people that are busting their ass maintaining the servers, maintaining the infrastructure so that the people who want to travel can do it. There is no way we can create a 100 percent nomadic society. There’s simply no way. But there are jobs you can do. I see on the road a lot of content writers, SEO people, business owners that have stepped away from their business such as myself and I’ve met quite a few on this train trip as well, the nomad train and that can literally  make really good decisions and do business. And one of the keys is to really be able to work when you know you need to work. And it’s to learn to say no to certain events or certain things that come up while you’re traveling. Sometimes, you have to work from 3:00 in the morning until 8:00 in the morning in order to get your work done because you have to match your time zones with your staff. It is an amazing lifestyle. And I really do feel that exposing myself to all of these different environments has helped me make really incredibly great decisions for my business itself. At the same time, working remote doesn’t always mean you’re traveling throughout the world in different countries. It could simply mean that you aren’t able to make it to the office and to give the people that can’t get to the office or have other pressing issues in their life work from home is a great opportunity as well, too. So, remote working just covers a vast amount of people. 

Matt: Totally, yeah. I’ve been location independent since 2007 when I founded Maverick Investor Group. But I chose to spend the first seven years of location independence living in Los Angeles, California. Not because I had a business purpose there, we weren’t doing any real estate in Los Angeles. I just liked the palm trees and the beaches and the city of LA. And I was in a relationship there and all of that. And so, I chose to be in LA. I could have been anywhere but I chose LA. But also, I chose and still do choose every year to go home and spend at least a month out of every year with my parents around the holidays spending quality time with them. Most people in the United States that work a regular job don’t have the opportunity to go if their parents live in a different state than they do to go spend a month with them every single year. But if you’re location independent, you can do that. And you can prioritize the places you want to be, the people with whom you want to spend time, and how you want to sort of structure that. So, that’s what I tell people. It’s simply striving for an increasing amount of location independence and increasing amount of freedom of mobility just simply means that you have control and you have choice. And then, you can exercise that however you want. But I think it’s awesome though, and you and I have had some great conversations about some of the similarities of the choices we’ve made including doing Remote Year. and I’m wondering if you can just share a little bit about how the overall program went for you in terms of everything, the lifestyle, the travel, the social aspect of it. What was that experience like for you?

Eddie: Remote Year, I liked it because it created a network of similar minded people that I could immediately relate to. That was No. 1. And No. 2, they were literally like a concierge that, basically, allowed me to travel without the extra hassle of planning this, planning airfare, planning where to live and so on and so forth. A lot of people say oh, I can do this cheaper than Remote Year or whatever. But really sit down and do it yourself and, unless you’re seasoned and have been doing it for a while, there are a lot of things you have to look for. What visas do I need? Where do I live? What’s the popular neighborhood? What are the cultures of the city? What are the key 10 words I need to know in this language to help get by just a little bit easier and so on and so forth? And Remote Year did all of that for you. But most importantly, it gave you a community and it gave you the option to be with this community or it gave you the option to just completely be on your own and reach out to the community when you need them. And it was an amazing experience. And some of the friends I made, whether they were working 9:00 to 5:00 remotely or whether they were business owners, there was some sort of connection with every single one of them. It didn’t matter how old. It didn’t matter where they were from. It didn’t matter what race they were. Nothing mattered in Remote Year. You had a family of people that were like minded and it was pretty special. 

Matt: That’s awesome. I agree. Super, super special experience and the community aspect of it were truly amazing. You and I have both, obviously, done a lot of international travel outside of Remote Year in a different context as well. And let me just ask you this, too, at this point in your travel journey broad sort of big picture macro question. Eddie, why do you travel? What do you get out of it, in general? What does travel mean to you?

Eddie: At this point, I’m wondering if it’s an addiction or if it’s just so much pleasure that I just want to continue doing it. There is something in my mind knowing I can fit everything I need into a duffle bag. It used to be a backpack but then, I hurt my shoulder. And you really realize I guess it’s the minimalist lifestyle. You think you need all of this stuff when you’re in a location. You’ve got to keep up with the neighbors. You’ve got to hit the hot restaurant all of your friends are going to. You need to live in a big place and have modern appliances. And traveling makes you realize that it’s fun to see different cultures. And it really hit me when I was in Vietnam why I like to travel so much. I was working on a project for my company and I broke away from Remote Year, which you’re allowed to do at any time and spent a couple of days just really on my own. And I wanted to see how can I get by in Hanoi, Vietnam knowing no Vietnamese and very few Americans or anybody for that matter who are foreign and roamed around with a laptop and a backpack. And I remember sitting down at a coffee shop and being treated better than I’ve ever been treated anywhere in the US or any type of work share or coffee shop and so on. And sitting there outside watching the chaos of the scooters, thousands of scooters going by every second. And I got more work done with all of that distraction than I’ve ever got in a quiet office in my home state. And I realized that wow, there is something about being on the road and working that was very appealing. 

Matt: That’s amazing. I love that. That’s so awesome. And now, you and I are participating in this is actually an organized event that we’re on called the Nomad Train, which Maverick Show listeners know Maria Sirotkina who I interviewed who is one of the co-founders of the Nomad Train, she herself is not on this particular journey with us but her staff are here. And this is a two week trip from Moscow all the way through Siberia and down into Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia where we’re then going to go on a trip and explore the Gobi Desert and see some of the insanely amazing landscapes of Mongolia. And so, and we’re here probably doing this with, I don’t know, 28 or so other nomads from around the world. People are from all over the place that are on this train, which is so amazing. 

Eddie: All over, yeah, everywhere.

Matt: But I would love to get your reflections on Russia, in general, because you and I before we got on the Nomad Train, we hung out in St. Petersburg and then, we hung out in Moscow. We hung out in Kazan and now, we’re making our way through Siberia. But I would love to get your reflections and thoughts on how Russia has been for you. 

Eddie: Russia has – actually, let me back up. I learned to pretty much ignore any stereotypes of any country anywhere in the world because our media seems to portray things extremely incorrect and especially TV shows in Hollywood, especially when you watch some of these ‘80s TV shows or the retro TV shows. You don’t think of Russia as being what it is now. And from the moment I stepped off of the plane until St. Petersburg and walking around downtown Moscow, I don’t think I’ve ever been treated better in my entire life. Everybody has been ridiculously friendly, incredible sense of humor. I can walk around with my camera on video and pull anybody, any Russian off the street and say, “Hey, say hi to my daughter,” and they’ll gladly say hello. And if they know how to speak any English, even if it’s just two words, they are extremely happy to do it. They welcome you with open arms no matter what business you walk into, no matter what restaurant you walk into. And they’re very proud to tell you about all of their different heritages. I’ve been to everything from a Soviet café, I’ve seen a lot of the museums. And walking around the art museum, the people who work there literally walked up to me, grabbed my map, and said you need to see this, this, and this. I’ve never seen anything like this before. The architecture has bene beautiful and the night life has been a little bit distracting but absolutely a blast. 

Matt: Incredible. And in St. Petersburg, first of all, what a gorgeous city. Like my goodness, just walking around St. Petersburg.

Eddie: It really is. It’s like the Amsterdam of Russia, I would imagine. The canals, the lighting, the food, cuisine, the style, the trendiness, it’s nothing like you would imagine.

Matt: And then, they have a speak easy scene there that blew me away. I probably went to six speak easies while I was in St. Petersburg and just incredible. And then, I just stumble upon these different scenes. What you were saying in terms of diversity of cultural appreciation and different things that they have in Russia, my background is I was a hip hop DJ in the ‘90s and so, for me, hip hop is a big love of mine. And I go into this one speak easy, it’s called The Secret Bar and it’s in the back of this restaurant through the secret door or whatever. And you go in and it’s this tiny place. And it can only fit like six or eight people. It’s like this tiny bar. And this guy that’s in there who speaks mostly Russian very little English but, basically, is talking to me about music. And this comes up, this hip hop stuff and he starts playing ‘90s hip hop in The Secret Bar. So, the whole Secret Bar is playing just ‘90s hip hop for me. And then, he’s like, actually, I can rap. I can freestyle for you but it’s in Russian. So, I literally pull out my video and he starts freestyling for me in Russian in this speak easy bar. But, again, it’s like that thing like where are you from, I’m from LA. So, he incorporates LA into his Russian language freestyle that he’s doing for me. I’ve known this guy for like five minutes. I literally just met him in this speak easy bar, this Russian guy. So, it was just amazing. And then, I went to this other hip hop event where Lord Finesse who is a very famous hip hop DJ from the Bronx from New York City is in St. Petersburg. He’s doing a beat making workshop and then, he’s performing as a DJ. And so, I go to the event. And it was so amazing to see all – and he’s playing all ‘90s hip hop. He’s mixing and scratching all of this ‘90s hip hop. And there are all of these Russian kids and when I say kids, I mean in their 20’s, early 20’s, mid 20’s. They come out wearing their New York jerseys. They know all of the words in English to all of the ‘90s hip hop songs, which were released before many of them were born. Do you know what I mean? And they’re so into it. They’re so passionate. It was just heartwarming for me. It was amazing. 

Eddie: Last night, I was at a bar called Lock, Stock, and Barrel. And the place was packed with many people younger than me. And there was a live band. And they played pretty much everything from the ‘60s, ‘80s, ‘90s, even recent stuff. A lot of poppy, heavy metal. Everything from Bon Jovi and they even did Lincoln Park and they damn a good job at Lincoln Park. Sometimes in Russian, many times in English. But when it was in English, the kids, again, the same age were just jumping up and down dancing. The energy was mindboggling. I even took quite a few videos of it and sent it to my friends and family. And they’re like what are you doing at a bar like that. And I go because it’s in Russia. That’s pretty damn cool.

Matt: That’s amazing. Yeah. It’s like anything that you would find in the states. If you want this kind of music or that kind of music and you want different sections of the population that are super passionate about it, you can find all of that in Russia just as you can find it anywhere else in the world.

Eddie: Absolutely. Outdoor cafes, healthy lifestyle, whatever you want. If you want vegan food, they have plenty of vegan restaurants. I don’t find anything really hard to find. If I need anything, the grocery store is well stocked. I got dry cleaning done very quickly. I’ve had no issue whatsoever and with a huge language barrier, too. But for some reason, it seems to work.

Matt: Yeah. Super, super, super impressed with both St. Petersburg and Moscow. I definitely want to come back for sure many more times.

Eddie: And Kazan.

Matt: Yeah, and Kazan for sure. Kazan I didn’t have, again, these expectations. St. Petersburg I kind of had expectations for but like Moscow that totally exceeded my expectations. Kazan I had no expectations for. I had no idea what to expect.

Eddie: And the bar I was talking about was in Kazan.

Matt: Yeah. Kazan I had no expectations for. That was super impressive and interesting. So, yeah, I can’t wait for our next stop on this train. I think it will just be increasingly interesting places as we cross Siberia and spend a few days at a handful of different places. I’m looking forward to that. Awesome. All right. Eddie, at this point, are you ready for the lightening round?

Eddie: Yeah. I believe I am. Let’s do it.

Matt: Let’s do it. All right. What is one book that has influenced you that you would most recommend to people?

Eddie: The Slight Edge by Jeff Olsen hands down. The Slight Edge is one of the most basic premises you could really think about. I guess it’s an easy read but it makes a lot of sense. And it’s like every tiny, little thing matters. It doesn’t matter whether you’re in business. Oh, I don’t want to work this hour because it doesn’t matter but it does hour because you add all of those little hours you don’t work together during that year because you think in your mind it doesn’t matter and it totals up to be an enormous amount of time. It works in your diet. Oh, well, I’m going to eat this triple patty burger worth 10,000 calories because it doesn’t matter. But you do that 100 times per year and you add it all up and it matters. And that’s really with The Slight Edge, it’s like every little decision matters. So, it’s one of my favorite reads. I’ve given it to a lot of my staff members to read. And some of my therapists have read it and they’ve all agreed it was one of their favorite books.

Matt: Awesome. Well, we’re going to link that up in the show notes for this episode along with everything else that we’ve mentioned and talked about. So, you can just go to one place at www.themaverickshow.com and get the links for all of that. Eddie, what is one app or productivity tool that you’re currently using that you’d most recommend?

Eddie: I just say it’s an app but it’s also a system but it’s a phone system. Ring Central has been epic as far as making our company work remote. We have been able to create a local phone number in every single city. And it points to one centralized number. And we can divert the calls coming in and break it up by sales territories. In addition, it’s a task monitor where you can share a task and assign tasks to different people. They call it Glip. It’s part of Ring Central. And the third thing is it’s an internal messaging system, which allows you to internally message your staff in real time or even make direct calls by just clicking on the staff member’s name. It runs on an app as your cell phone or you can buy the phone system that they have. But we don’t use the phone system. We’ve never bought a piece of hardware from them. We subscribe to the app alone. So, my entire staff runs off of cell phones and Microsoft surfaces. And we put the app on and it connects everybody as if they’re local. In addition to that, it has similar to Zoom and maybe they license Zoom, I’m not sure how they get the technology, but we can do our video meetings, conference calls, what have you within our staff. And it allows you to invite outside guests as well, too, which is impressive.

Matt: Awesome. Who is one person that’s currently alive today that you’ve never met that you would most love to have dinner with? 

Eddie: Currently alive today?

Matt: Currently alive today. It could be a celebrity, author, public figure, musician, movie star. It could be anybody but currently living today so this is an actual possibility that you could potentially have dinner with. And you can pick anybody and magically they appear. And it’s just you and this person for an extended three to four hour, one on one dinner conversation. Who would you pick?

Eddie: Well, I guess if it was today, it would be Barack Obama because I envy people and I admire people who have everything stacked against them. No handed wealth, no handed privileges and to be able to achieve what is supposed to be impossible. Whether it’s politics, whether it’s business. I guess someone who is not alive today would be Colonel Sanders because he, basically, was 65 years old. He had been through God knows how many jobs and a failed marriage and bankruptcies and hardships and at 65 years old started KFC. And I don’t know if you’ve noticed, Matt, about every block in Russia right now and in Vietnam and in Japan and in Malaysia, what do you see? What is the most popular chain of restaurants worldwide right now?

Matt: For sure, KFC is all over the place.

Eddie: Absolutely. And he was 65 when he started the business and he was 88 when he became a billionaire. But all of the cards were stacked against him because of his age. I didn’t start LoDo Massage until I was almost 50 and I had a lot of things stacked against me at the time. And so, never let your age be, never let anything in your life, be a deterrent from trying to do what you want to do. 

Matt: That is an awesome piece of advice. Eddie, what is one podcast that you listen to or blog that you read or information medium that you consume that you would most recommend people check out?

Eddie: I think at this point in my life, the ones that I read the most, and I don’t remember the author’s name, and it’s a series of them, I Google them when the subject matter remains relevant to me, is Simplicity. And really, it’s the minimalists. There are a lot of minimalist blogs out there. I subscribe to them anywhere from Linked In to on some of my podcasts. And reading ideas on how to really learn to live with less efficiently. And you and I have talked about this a few times. How do you pack everything you need into a duffle bag or a carry on suitcase? You want to look good when you go out. You want to be able to go to the gym. You want to be able to do yoga. You want to be able to hike. But how do you fit all of this into one suitcase? And it can be done. And the first premise is to be minimalistic. And these kinds of podcasts, books, and groups that I even talk with, basically, kind of help me justify. A lot of people when they start to make money, they want to spend it on crap they don’t need. So, they have garages full of motorcycles and bikes and cars and snowboards and all kinds of stuff. And granted, at my base unit at home, I have some stuff that I don’t need. But it’s definitely gotten a lot less than what I used to have. And the more I travel, the more I’m away from it, the more I realize I don’t need it. 

Matt: What is one item that you always travel with or one sort of centerpiece of the selection of things that you do bring with you when you travel? What is one item that you would recommend?

Eddie: That’s a great question. And a lot of the funny things I’ve seen a lot of the travelers that I travel with don’t put emphasis on this. They go I’m going to buy a cheap cell phone because if I lose it, I can just buy something cheap. But if you buy some of the higher end ones, the top of the line ones that can do a lot of the work for you, you tend to break your laptop out less. And there are points in time when I can literally travel with a powerful device in my pocket that can do most of the stuff that I need to do. A bigger screen cell phone that is powerful that has a great camera, that has a pen like the Galaxy Note 10 is my favorite. Believe me, I love Apple to death but they just don’t have anything that competes with Note 10. And Samsung sometimes aggravates me because they – actually, I shouldn’t say that because they’re one of my favorite clients. But there is simply a lot of software that gets downloaded on them that’s garbage so you have to wade your way through that. But that device itself, I’ve been on this Nomad Train now – I came early. I went to St. Petersburg and went to Moscow. And we’re deep into our second week. And I’ve opened up my laptop two times because everything that I need to do, spreadsheets, emails, Word documents and it actually runs Microsoft Word just beautifully well, all done on a very nice, easy to read screen. And I have a pen. I can quickly take notes.

Matt: That’s awesome. I think the minimalist packing thing for me has been enormous, really powerful. I spent the last six years since I’ve been full time nomading figuring out how to condense my life into carry on luggage only so I’m not checking a bag but also not compromising fashion and style and being able to do that. I do a whole workshop. I have a whole video on it, which I’ll link up in the show notes if people are interested. But I’m also continually learning from people as I go. That’s how I’m able to do it and continue to optimize is as I meet different nomads that are using different stuff or doing different stuff. And you actually told me about the pants.

Eddie: Oh, yeah.

Matt: And I want you to talk about those because I’m literally about to go track those down and get them. Can you share a little bit about those?

Eddie: They’re from Kuhl. They’re very lightweight yet warm when you need them to be warm and air breathing or whatever you call it. They wick away sweat. You can wash them in your sink and they dry in an hour. They’re stretchy. They’re like pajamas but they look like dress slacks. You throw on a black marina wool shirt and you throw on the pants and you look – honestly, people can spend thousands on an outfit and you’ll walk into the bar or the restaurant and you’re going to look good. You’re going to look damn good. Just gel your hair. 

Matt: You were telling me. You’re like, “Yeah, I’m wearing them out for a dressy night at the cocktail lounge and then, I’m also sleeping in them.”

Eddie: Exactly. And you’re doing yoga in them the next day. And, obviously, a dark color that doesn’t show sweat. Black is great. And the other hack that I have clothes wise is the All Bird shoes. I don’t have them on at the moment but they are a marina wool shoe. And you’ve heard of that, Matt, right?

Matt: Yeah, I have. 

Eddie: Yeah. I’m surprised how many people have All Birds on this trip. They’re literally like wearing socks but they’re shoes. The marina wool doesn’t smell. You can wear it about 10 times. Seriously, it doesn’t smell. If anything, it smells good when it gets dirty for some strange reason. And you can wash it in the sink and it will dry very, very quickly. It breathes beautifully. It’s cool on the hot climates and it keeps you very warm on the cold climates. It’s an amazing fabric. And there is a time where it will start to look ratty after a few years of use or it depends on how much you wear it. But you can literally pack a suitcase with one pair of these cool pants, two marina wool shirts, All Bird shoes, and a couple of pairs of socks and, literally, nobody would know. When you wear a printed shirt and you’re out, people remember oh, didn’t you wear that the other night. They don’t know. They see a slogan or they see a print. But you wear a black shirt, people are like oh, he’s got black on. I don’t think he wore black last time. I don’t remember. 

Matt: Totally. And probably 90 percent of my gear is marina wool, everything from collared dress shirts to my running socks to my running shirts. So, 90 percent of my gear for sure is definitely marina wool. And I do this whole video, which I’ll link up is exactly how to pack using mostly marina wool to be able to look good but then, also to have all of the functionality that you need. And as you said, versatility is one of the main pillars of that. Packing pieces that are versatile where you can create multiple outfits, which don’t necessarily look like the same outfit.

Eddie: And that’s the whole key is finding something that does everything. Back to the Note 10 or any top of the line iPhone. Unless you’re a professional photographer, you can get by without a massive camera carrying it around on your back. And that’s the last thing you want to do is walk around every one of these cities with a giant camera because it seems like today everybody is taking phenomenal photos. And I did bring a big camera once on a trip and I went home and I merged them all together on my Google Photo app and I honestly could not tell the difference between my phone pictures and my high-end camera. And these newer phones like the new iPhone 11 that are coming out and the Galaxy Note, the Galaxy Note 10 has four lenses on it. I have a fixed wide angle, a fixed regular lens, and a fixed telephoto lens. Not a digital telephone but an actual fixed telephoto lens built into this tiny phone. And I take pictures sometimes that accidently come out and it looks like somebody set up a tripod and did all kinds of crazy stuff. It’s got an amazing nighttime sensor that sometimes you can look through the phone and see better at night than with your very own eyes. This kind of technology has really helped between this and the cloud and the portability of notebooks has really generated a nomad community that really was impossible maybe as little as 10 years ago because you would have had to carry too much crap with you. And it’s worth paying up for the better stuff. On the contrary, yeah, you might lose it. You might drop your brand new $1,100.00 phone in the ocean and that does suck when that happens big time but it’s just nice to know that that device has about $20,000.00 of crap that you used to bring along with you all packed into one device.

Matt: For sure. And the iPhones are now waterproof, which is what I use because I drop my iPhone into a bucket of water or a reservoir of water every six months like clockwork. That’s just a given.

Eddie: Absolutely.

Matt: And now, it’s waterproof. I couldn’t have asked for anything more than a waterproof iPhone because I now have a lot more durability there. But totally agreed. Eddie, let’s move on to the final two questions, which are travel related questions. I want to ask you for your top three favorite travel destinations you’ve ever been to that you’d most recommend people check out.

Eddie: I was blown away with Japan, absolutely blown away. I felt like I was on another planet. They have an infrastructure there that is so high tech that it makes every other country look backwards, primitive. Their train system runs on a dime. And literally, they apologize over a loudspeaker if their high speed bullet train is one minute delayed because they don’t tolerate that. So, you know exactly to the second when you’re going to get to another city. What I loved about it is they gave tourists and business travelers a rail pass that they don’t even offer to their own residents, which I was surprised about. But they’re able to literally go from one end of the country to the other in luxury and I mean luxury. Beautiful, beautiful trains, clean as you can be. And the city, no matter where you are, the subways look like high end, upscale, Beverly Hills shopping malls every single one of them. I was blown away. I think my second favorite city as far as remoting was quite the opposite. Hanoi, Vietnam, the constant chaos, the constant noise but the entrepreneurial spirit in that city was something that I’ve never seen. I went to more start up workshops in Vietnam, in Hanoi particularly than anywhere I’ve ever been. And they were all held by Vietnamese. They were put on by the Vietnamese. And this is still under a communist regime. So, it was interesting to visit a country that was so into start ups but in a different style of government than we’re accustomed to. And thirdly, Russia has blown me away. Absolutely. I’m still in it but each time I go somewhere, my experience is like why are they talking about this country like it’s repressed? I even joked. I sent a picture of an upscale – I did a 360 video shot of a restaurant called White Rabbit, which is actually rated one of the best restaurants in the world. And I said you don’t find these kinds of restaurants. And the service there was second to none. I learned not about how wine tastes and what it should be paired with but the origin of the wine and what happened to the wine history from the wait staff. And this was in Moscow. I’m just absolutely blown away. And their metro system walking through is like walking into an art museum. They don’t have the shops and the stores like Japan had but it’s the opposite. Walking into a subway in New York is honestly like a sewer. It’s like you’ve stepped into a sewer to get from one end of the city to the other and most cities, Chicago, the same way. There has been no attention to detail and cleanliness and modernization. Russia and even here in Kazan, the artwork literally you would pay money in most cities to see this kind of artwork. And it’s just right there in the metro system.

Matt: Yeah. I went to White Rabbit as well. There are actually two restaurants in Moscow, White Rabbit and Twins Garden is the other one that in 2019, they were both ranked when they did the top 50 restaurants in the world, both White Rabbit and Twins Garden were ranked in the top 20 in the world. And so, I went to both of those in Moscow and the super impressive culinary scene there. I would agree with that. I have been really, really blown away by Russia. All right. Eddie, last question. What are your top three bucket list destinations and places that you’ve never been that are the highest on your list that you most want to see?

Eddie: Well, Matt, I haven’t been nomading as long as you so, obviously, I probably have 20 things on my bucket list. But I’ve not nomaded out of South America yet. So, pretty much every city there I want to do. I’m thinking I would literally like to spend about two months in Sweden. And, actually, there are some layovers I’ve done that I feel like wow, this is a cool looking city. I wouldn’t mind being here. Helsinki, Finland looked pretty interesting on its own. And I had a layover on my way to Russia. And I thought, wow, this would be a great place to work out of, too. And so, I can’t say that I have a top three on my bucket list other than South America is definitely No. 1 nomading out of there for probably six months. 

Matt: That’s a really good pick. We did six months on the Remote Year Program. We did one month in Mexico City, which is North America, of course. And then, we did five months in South America but you had six consecutive months of Spanish speaking countries. And it was a really, really, really nice flow to kind of get into the flow of the Spanish language and then, see similarities but also the diversity, of course, as you went from country to country down there. It was just really epic so I highly recommend it. I think it’s a good pick.

Eddie: I should say Turkey has definitely been on my bucket list. One thing I love about remoting is a lot of times, I have a one-way ticket somewhere but I have no clue where I’m going to go. And I don’t know if you do that, too. But when I came onto this Nomad Train, I had no return home flight. And I thought oh, maybe I’ll go to Seoul, maybe I’ll go to Croatia. I just didn’t know. Croatia is also on my bucket list. I’ve got a lot of bucket lists right now. Pretty much the more I travel, the more I realize how small the world is. And it’s amazing how you run into people all over the world, whether you knew them in real life. I recently ran into somebody in Denver just at a coffee shop that I met in Chang Mai out of the blue. He tapped on my shoulder, “Hey, Eddie, what are you doing here?” And so, these kinds of things happen. But Turkey and Istanbul have really been on my bucket list. And just yesterday I thought oh, I think I’ll hit that next. 

Matt: That’s awesome.

Eddie: That’s where I’m off to next. 

Matt: I highly recommend it. Istanbul is an amazing city. And yeah, I do sometimes do the same thing. So, I literally don’t have a flight booked yet out of Mongolia. So, I know I’m going to be on this train. It’s going to end up in Mongolia. I’m going to hang out with our crew and go explore the Gobi Desert for a couple of days. And then from there, I literally don’t have a flight out yet so I’ll figure that out in the next couple of weeks.

Eddie: I think most importantly that I’d like to add at the end of this here is that when you travel, whether it’s for pleasure, whether it’s for work, whether it’s for remoting, you see the world from a different perspective. Your friendships grow outside of your 3 foot circle. You’re no longer keeping up with the Joneses. You don’t really give a crap what your neighbor buys anymore and you try to outdo them. You don’t care what size house you live in. It doesn’t matter how much money you make or how little money you make. There are people on these trips that I meet that are barely getting by, that are sharing rooms with three or four nomads at a time. And there are CEO’s traveling together going out bar hopping together, eating dinner together, and learning from each other. And we’re learning the perspective of life from all different races, religions, nationalities, and cultures. And it makes you much more open minded. And it makes you see the world from a completely different set of eyes. And I would not trade this experience for any materialistic item ever. 

Matt: Amazing. That is an amazing way to end this podcast, Eddie. I could not agree more. It has been absolutely fantastic having you on the show, my friend. We have just come to the end of this wine bottle in our dimly lit, dingy train car on the Trans-Siberian –

Eddie: And the moon is still shining right on us.

Matt: We are literally on a 37-hour train length through Siberia. We are recording this podcast as the train is moving and we’re drinking this wine, which has been really, really a very special Maverick Show episode, my friend. So, I thank you for being a part of it. And I want you to let people know how they can, first of all, find out more about LoDo Massage if there are any businesses or event coordinators or folks that want to connect with LoDo Massage how they can do that. And then, also people that want to follow you on social media, follow your adventures, and find out what you’re up to, how can people contact and follow you?

Eddie: Yeah. Go to our website, www.lodochairmassage.com and choose which city you’re in and you can go from there. If you mention to the staff the word “nomad” that you heard it on this podcast, we will give you a 10 percent discount. We provide onsite chair massage, onsite chair yoga, onsite yoga classes, onsite meditation classes. Basically, our main purpose is to destress employees. We are business to business. We do not charge the employees. It’s a benefit the company does for their staff just like instead of ordering a pizza for everybody during a lunch meeting, have a hardcore meeting and then, destress everybody by massaging their back or create an in-room chair yoga event right after the meeting. And they all have the same effect. The point of this is to destress and make your employees happy. And that’s what we specialize in.

Matt: Awesome. Love that. So, what we’re going to do is link up that URL in the show notes. So, you can just go to www.themaverickshow.com. We’ll have the link. We’ll have the promo code to get the discount. You can check out LoDo Massage. And then, if anybody wants to connect with you personally and follow you on social media, are you on Instagram?

Eddie: Our Instagram is LoDo Massage. Our Facebook is LoDo Chair Massage. LoDo Chair Massage on Instagram, LoDo Chair Massage on Twitter. And that’s the best way to link up. You will get personalized service. We’re not an app. You will get a human being that will be glad to talk to you on the phone and customize what you need to be done for your business just for you.

Matt: Awesome. We will link all of that up, social media handles, website, and everything else in the show notes. You can go to one place at www.themaverickshow.com and just click on the show notes for this episode and you can get to all of that. Eddie, thank you so much for being here, man. This was a blast.

Eddie: It was fun. What a beautiful scene.

Matt: Good night, everybody. 

Announcer: Be sure to visit the show notes page at www.themaverickshow.com, for direct links to all of the books, people and resources mentioned in this episode. You’ll find all of that and much more at www.themaverickshow.com. 

Announcer: Do you want to learn how to travel the world for a year plus with carry on luggage only and look good while you’re doing it? Go to www.themaverickshow.com/packing to see a free recorded webinar and learn exactly how Matt does it. He shows you the luggage he uses, the specific items he packs, and the travel brands he likes most. Even if you’re just looking to go on shorter trips but pack more efficiently and eliminate your checked luggage, you won’t want to miss this. You can watch the free recorded webinar at www.themaverickshow.com/packing. 

Announcer: Would you like to get Maverick Investor Group’s white paper on real estate investing for digital nomads, how to buy US rental properties from anywhere in the world and finance an epic international lifestyle? Just go to www.themaverickshow.com/nomad. The report is totally free and available for you now, at www.themaverickshow.com/nomad. 

[End of Audio]

Duration: 86 minutes