BUSINESS IDEA | STARTUP

Public Domain Audiobook Platform 🖥️

Prose and cons

Available Domain: Bookbard.ai

1. Problem/Opportunity❓

The Problem/Opportunity: Pride and Prejudice. The Great Gatsby. Frankenstein. These are not just books I’ve pretended to read because I watched the movie (which is basically the same thing right?).

In fact these are some of the most famous books in the world that are in the public domain. Some of the greatest literary works of all time are sitting there, waiting to be read. But these days more and more of us are listening to books, not reading them. Audiobook consumption has exploded by 227% in the last decade, yet only a small portion of these public domain classics have high quality audio versions. Which is where we come in.

Market Size: The global audiobook market size was valued at $4.2 billion in 2024 and is expected to grow at a CAGR of 26.4% from 2025 to 2030.

2. Solution ✅

The Idea: An AI-powered audiobook platform for users to listen to public domain books

How it Works:

• You create a list of the most popular/best known books in the public domain and get digital copies of these books

• Use AI to create high quality audiobook productions of the novels including different voices for different characters, background music and so on

• You then create a website/app where users can listen to the books for free (ad-supported model)

• Over time you can build out additional features like book summaries, reviews, comments etc. to create an incredible audiobook platform

Go-to-market: Focus on a small number of incredibly popular books, share the platform on classic literature subreddits to gain early users and traction, then expand from there

Business Model: Freemium Model

• Free tier: Access to AI-narrated content with ads

• Premium tier ($4.99/month): Ad-free, human or AI narrations, offline access etc.

Startup Costs: The major cost here would be the cost to use the AI voice tools, the app development cost and the time needed to ensure it’s a high quality experience. But this shouldn’t run you more than a few thousand dollars to start if you have a technical co-founder

Competitors: Librivox offers something similar, but you could easily build a 10x better experience here (even just by having an app)

3. How You’ll Get Rich 💰

Exit Strategy: Get acquired by a major audiobook platform (like Audible) or a major book publisher looking to break into the audiobook market

Exit Multiple: Audio content platforms have seen exit multiples of 5-7x revenue recently

TOGETHER WITH AUTOMATIONLINKS

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DRUNK BUSINESS IDEA

Uroclub™

• Are you a big golfer? Ever find yourself caught short while on the course?

• Meet the UroClub™, the most discreet way to handle nature's calls on the golf course.

• This ingenious club comes with a built-in relief system that's more clutch than DeChambeau’s approach shot on 18 at Pinehurst. It looks like an ordinary golf club, but contains a reservoir built into the grip so you can relieve yourself.

• Oh and the built-in privacy shield ensures your private business stays private. Because the only thing your playing partners should be watching is your dodgy drive off the tee.

Real or not? Vote to find out:

• ✅ Yes this actually exists

• ❌ Nope you totally made this up

JUST THE TIP

Trend 📈: Celtic Sea Salt

• Recently salt has transformed from dietary villain to wellness darling, with products like electrolyte supplements and Himalayan pink salt leading its image makeover. And one salt that’s getting more and more popular these days is a variety called Celtic Sea Salt.

• Celtic Sea Salt (aka sel gris or gray salt) comes from Brittany's Celtic Sea coast in France and is a premium salt on the market today.

• This French salt packs less sodium than regular table salt, but contains a richer blend of minerals including magnesium, calcium, potassium, and iron, making it a premium product.

Business Ideas

• Celtic Sea Salt Electrolyte Supplement: Create an electrolyte supplement which uses Celtic Sea Salt as the primary ingredient

• Single Serving Celtic Salt Packs: Sell sachets of Celtic Sea Salt which equate to your RDA (recommended daily allowance) for salt intake in a given day

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THE MONEYSHOT

How a Scuba Diving Trip Led to a +$50m Business

Entrepreneurship is a vehicle to build a kickass life for yourself.

And these founders, in an effort to get most out of their lives, built a +$50m business in the process.

This is their story.

Ryan Chen (left) and Kent Yoshimura are impressive guys.

The pair met at UC San Diego where Ryan was studying chemistry and Kent was studying neuroscience. The pair were also student athletes, with Ryan training with the US Paralympic team after a tragic snowboarding accident at age 19 left him paraplegic and Kent training with the Japanese Olympic Judo team.

And as two guys trying to keep up with their hectic schedules, they turned to supplements like coffee, energy drinks, and caffeine pills to keep them going. But there was a problem…they hated all of these options.

In fact Kent hated them so much that in his sophomore year he started mixing supplements in his dorm room, which over time started to look more and more like Scarface’s den. Not an easy one to explain to the cops I bet…

But it was during a scuba diving certification trip in 2013 that the friends realized they could create an energy product that was different than anything else on the market. Which is when they had their lightbulb moment.

Gum. It’s portable, convenient and intrinsically shareable. Why not create an energy gum they thought?

After the trip Ryan and Kent started working with research facilities and chemists to create their flagship energy gum product, which contained a combination of natural caffeine, L-theanine and B vitamins.

They each invested $30,000 of their own money into the idea, since they had to meet the first minimum order of $50,000. They supplemented their own cash with crowdfunding, where in September 2015 they launched their product on Indiegogo, surpassing their $20,000 goal in just three days. How? The campaign gained traction on Reddit's r/nootropics community, where Kent was an active contributor.

Two years after their initial idea they were finally ready to go live.

They had founded Neuro.

Shortly after the Indiegogo campaign, Neuro was featured on several media outlets, including TIME, NBC, and a segment on the Dr. Oz show, which drove early sales to the business.

In 2017 they raised a small seed round to keep the business going but Neuro was hardly an instant success. By 2018 the business was turning over $1.5m per year, which jumped to $3.5m in 2019 after they started selling in retailers, the biggest of which was CVS.

But the biggest turning point for the business came in 2020 when they appeared on season 11 of Shark Tank, where they pitched incredibly well and ultimately turned down offers from two Sharks to invest. But while they didn’t walk away with investment, they did walk away with exposure.

From there the business kept scaling and as of 2023, Neuro had sold over 10 million units. They expanded beyond their core product to energy mints and other product around sleep and clarity.

While sales data is hard to come by the business looks to be clearing $10m in revenue per year and is valued in the $40m - $60m range (but that’s a bit of a guess from us). Regardless we think this will be a +$100m business in no time, partly because they’re fuelled by their own product.

And that’s the big takeaway here here. Ryan and Kent built their business to help them get the most out of their life, to keep them performing at the highest level. And for all of us building our own business is the best way to get what we want out of life. More time. More freedom. Financial security. Because otherwise what’s the point?

Will there be tough times? Of course, but ultimately entrepreneurship is a vehicle to help you build your best life and become your best self. It’s a personal growth pursuit masquerading as an economic endeavor.

So get out there and start building.

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