Acquired

Hosted by Ben Gilbert and David Rosenthal

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218

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Oct 2026

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Every company has a story. Learn the playbooks that built the world’s greatest companies — and how you can apply them.

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October 19, 2026Episode 33 hr 50 min

Seinfeld

Seinfeld, which ended three decades ago, has been watched by 72 million Americans so far THIS YEAR. Behind that incredible stat is an equally incredible business story: obsessive creators, perfect market timing, an ownership structure that aligned incentives for the long term…all of which created a sitcom that became number one by breaking all the rules. Sponsors: Many thanks to our fantastic Fall '26 Season partners: Sierra Anthropic Sentry WorkOS Links: Sign up for email updates , get our takeaways and research photos from each episode, and vote on future topics! The Acquired Seinfeld Companion PDF Top of the Rock: Inside the Rise and Fall of Must See TV by Warren Littlefield Comedian The Seinfeld Chronicles: An Unnecessary Data Exploration by Andy Kirk Worldly Partners' Seinfeld Study by Arvind Navaratnam Jerry Seinfeld's 2017 Harvard Business Review Interview All episode sources Carve Outs: Seinfeld - "The Marine Biologist" Seinfeld - "The Jacket" Seinfeld - "The Dinner Party" The Seinfeld Chronicles: An Unnecessary Data Exploration by Andy Kirk Buck's of Woodside Tin Can More Acquired: Get email updates and vote on future episodes! Join the Slack Check out the latest swag in the ACQ Merch Store ! 00:00:00 Start 00:00:55 Intro 00:04:52 Jerry Seinfeld's Stand-Up Origins (1954-1988) 00:16:16 NBC Pitches a Late-Night Special (1988) 00:21:35 Enter Larry David (1988) 00:35:04 Fin-Syn Rules & The Castle Rock Deal 00:52:45 Making the Pilot & Test Screening Disaster (1989) 01:04:24 Rick Ludwin Saves the Show (1989-1990) 01:10:17 Adding Elaine & "No Hugging, No Learning" 01:28:41 Season 2 & Defying Network Notes (1991) 01:35:56 The Structural Mechanics of Seinfeld 01:45:11 Season 4 & "The Contest" (1992) 01:57:09 Moving to Must See TV Thursdays (1993) 02:07:28 Anatomy of a Production Week & The Harvard Lampoon Writers 02:15:44 The Syndication Cash Cow (1995) 02:28:36 Larry Leaves, Cast Salaries & Season 9 (1996-1997) 02:42:13 Jack Welch's Brunch Offer & Jerry Walks (1997) 02:55:04 The Finale & Final TV Economics (1998) 03:11:21 The Modern Streaming Era & Netflix's Massive Deals 03:17:38 Analysis 03:30:00 7 Powers 03:34:00 Quintessence 03:41:49 Carve-Outs + Outro ‍Note: Acquired hosts and guests may hold assets discussed in this episode. This podcast is not investment advice, and is intended for informational and entertainment purposes only. You should do your own research and make your own independent decisions when considering any financial transactions.

September 14, 2026Episode 23 hr 35 min

The Home Depot

The Home Depot's founding story is like an Avengers movie… if the Avengers got fired, went broke, and stacked empty paint cans ten feet high to look legitimate. After being unceremoniously fired from their previous hardware chain at ages 48 and 35, Bernie Marcus and Arthur Blank took the words of their New York banker Ken Langone (who had also just accidentally caused their firings) to heart: they'd just been "kicked in the ass with a golden horseshoe.” They proceeded to author the greatest compounding story in American retail history, helped by some legendary cameos along the way from Sol Price, Jamie Dimon, and Ross Perot (to name a few). And the ending is as good as any superhero film: from its 1981 IPO to today, The Home Depot has been the single highest-returning equity in the entire US stock market — higher than Apple, Microsoft, Berkshire Hathaway, and everything else! Sponsors: Many thanks to our fantastic Fall '26 Season partners: Sierra WorkOS Anthropic Sentry Links: Sign up for email updates , get our takeaways and research photos from each episode, and vote on future topics! The Official Acquired Meetup on Sept 17th with our friends at Sentry. Join us! The Acquired Home Depot Companion PDF Our Visual Artifacts page for Home Depot Built from Scratch by Bernie Marcus and Arthur Blank Kick Up Some Dust by Bernie Marcus The Board Wore Chicken Suits by Joe Nocera, The New York Times Frank Blake on Invest Like the Best Ken Langone's interview with Arvind Navaratnam Worldly Partners' Multi-Decade Home Depot Study All episode sources Carve Outs: Silo Season 3 Tires Season 3 Ratio 8 Coffee Maker Trade Coffee Quarterback Comedian More Acquired: Get email updates and vote on future episodes! Join the Slack Check out the latest swag in the ACQ Merch Store ! 00:00:00 Start 00:00:43 Intro 00:05:32 Bernie Marcus's Early Career and meeting Arthur Blank (1972) 00:15:58 Ken Langone & Handy Dan (1970s) 00:33:08 Ken Buys Handy Dan, Bernie & Arthur Fired 00:43:55 Ross Perot Almost Buys Home Depot 00:51:20 Pat Farrah & The HomeCo Interlude 01:05:03 First Stores & Early Model (1979) 01:14:16 Home Depot Goes Public & Expands (1981) 01:24:35 Home Depot's Unique Operating System 01:46:01 Arthur Blank Takes CEO & Early Cracks (1997) 01:56:07 The Bob Nardelli Era (2000-2007) 02:12:09 Nardelli's Public Downfall & Firing (2006-2007) 02:24:24 Frank Blake's Turnaround: Crisis & Culture (2007) 02:42:30 E-commerce & Distribution Revolution 02:59:57 Home Depot Today: Pro & DIY (2024) 03:12:04 Analysis: The Paradox of Specialness 03:16:18 7 Powers: Home Depot's Competitive Advantages 03:19:17 Quintessence: Why It Got So Big 03:26:27 Carve-Outs + Outro ‍Note: Acquired hosts and guests may hold assets discussed in this episode. This podcast is not investment advice, and is intended for informational and entertainment purposes only. You should do your own research and make your own independent decisions when considering any financial transactions.

August 10, 2026Episode 14 hr 32 min

Disney: The Renaissance and the Empire

In 1984, the Walt Disney Company was worth more dead than alive. Disney Animation — the heart of Walt's famous flywheel — had stagnated for years, bleeding away talent while corporate raiders circled, salivating over offers to sell off the film library to MGM and offload the parks to hotel operators. But what followed instead was the greatest turnaround in media history under Michael Eisner and Frank Wells. Beauty and the Beast. The Lion King. Broadway. Bringing the Disney Vault home on VHS and DVD. And the greatest media acquisition of all time — ESPN. And then... it all almost fell apart. Again. Euro Disney turned into a money pit. Boardroom and executive infighting ran rampant. Animation descended into a dumpster fire. (Remember Chicken Little? Us neither.) Comcast — Comcast!! — tried to steal the company via a hostile takeover. Out of the chaos, a new generation of Disney management emerged under Bob Iger to stage yet another epic comeback with Pixar, Marvel and Lucasfilm, creating the defining media empire of the 21st century…until the tech companies came along. Tune in for the ultimate Acquired thrill ride: Disney, Part II. Sponsors: Many thanks to our fantastic Fall '26 Season partners: Sierra Sentry WorkOS Anthropic Links: Sign up for email updates , get our takeaways and research photos from each episode, and vote on future topics! The Official Acquired Meetup on Sept 17th with our friends at Sentry. Join us! The Acquired Disney Part II Companion PDF The Acquired Disney Part II Artifacts visual hub Our Disney Part II column in WSJ Worldly Partners' Multi-Decade Disney Study All episode sources Carve Outs: Warby Parker Transitions Extra Active Michael Arndt's Toy Story 3 Story Presentation The Golden State Valkyries More Acquired: Get email updates and vote on future episodes! Join the Slack Check out the latest swag in the ACQ Merch Store ! 00:00:00 Start 00:00:50 Intro 00:05:07 Disney in Chaos (1984) 00:11:33 Eisner, Wells, Katzenberg Arrive (1984) 00:24:30 Animation Renaissance & CAPS Tech (1989) 00:37:33 Flywheel Extensions: Home Video, Retail & Broadway 00:54:32 Challenges & ABC/ESPN Acquisition (1994-1995) 01:05:55 ESPN: Disney's Accidental Goldmine 01:21:26 Eisner's Decline & Save Disney Campaign (2001-2004) 01:34:53 Comcast Hostile Takeover Bid (2004) 01:41:58 Bob Iger's Vision & Pixar Acquisition (2005-2006) 01:52:17 Pixar: From Lucasfilm to Steve Jobs (1979-1995) 02:03:11 Toy Story, IPO & Eisner Conflict (1995) 02:34:30 Disney Acquires Pixar (2006) 02:46:37 Marvel & Lucasfilm Acquisitions (2009-2012) 02:58:01 Streaming Pivot: Cord Cutting & BAMTech (2015) 03:06:30 The Disney+ Strategy & FOX Acquisition (2017-2019) 03:19:01 The Disney+ Launch, COVID, & Chapek's Tenure (2019-2022) 03:42:15 Iger's Return, Challenges & Parks Revival (2022-2026) 03:50:54 The Business Today: Parks & Streaming Focus 03:59:22 Analysis: Disney+ Strategy & The New Media Landscape 04:10:01 Analysis: Bull/Bear Cases 04:21:20 Quintessence 04:24:39 Carve-Outs + Outro ‍Note: Acquired hosts and guests may hold assets discussed in this episode. This podcast is not investment advice, and is intended for informational and entertainment purposes only. You should do your own research and make your own independent decisions when considering any financial transactions.

June 22, 2026Episode 44 hr 31 min

The Walt Disney Company

The Walt Disney Company is the most successful enterprise ever created for monetizing human nostalgia. Today it’s the king of global entertainment, holding the intellectual property rights to the childhood memories of billions of people (including, likely, all of you) and is a reliable, predictable profitable business. But it didn’t start that way. During Walt’s era, Disney operated like an unhinged moonshot factory, blowing its finances on one seemingly crazy project after another, like the very first feature-length animated film or a theme park inspired by Walt's fascination with model trains (spoiler: Disneyland). Walt’s relentless ambition to bet the company over and over again not only created some of the most monumental artistic achievements of the 20th century (Snow White, Fantasia, Disney Imagineering), but also resulted in the accidental invention of the modern “flywheel” business model. In this episode, we tell the story of the ultimate marriage of art, commerce, and engineering — The Walt Disney Company: Walt's Era. Sponsors: Many thanks to our fantastic Spring '26 Season partners: J.P. Morgan WeAreDevelopers event Vercel ServiceNow Statsig Links: Sign up for email updates , get our takeaways and research photos from each episode, and vote on future topics! The Acquired Disney Companion PDF Our Disney column in WSJ The original 1958 WSJ “Flywheel” article Walt Disney: The Triumph of the American Imagination by Neal Gabler The Animated Man by Michael Barrier Walt Disney: An American Original by Bob Thomas Building a Company: Roy O. Disney and the Creation of an Entertainment Empires by Bob Thomas The Disney Version by Richard Schickel PBS American Experience: Walt Disney Disneyland Handcrafted Walt's 1966 EPCOT pitch video Worldly Partners' Multi-Decade Disney Study The Walt Disney Family Museum All episode sources Carve Outs: Brooks Vanguard sneakers Defunctland YouTube Channel Animagraffs YouTube Channel Volvo EX30 The San Francisco Symphony More Acquired: Get email updates and vote on future episodes! Join the Slack Check out the latest swag in the ACQ Merch Store ! 00:00 Start 01:10 Intro 06:03 Walt's Early Life & Artistic Calling (1901-1919) 12:22 From Commercial Art to Laugh-o-grams (1919-1923) 23:05 Hollywood, The Alice Comedies & Oswald's Loss (1923-1928) 43:27 Mickey Mouse & The Synchronized Sound Breakthrough (1928) 01:01:21 The IP Flywheel & Mickey Merch Explosion (1929-1933) 01:09:57 Flywheel Terminology Unpacked 01:18:53 Snow White: Walt's $1.5M Folly (1934-1937) 01:52:01 The Burbank Studio, Debt & Strike (1938-1941) 02:04:28 The Animators' Strike & Walt's Disillusionment (1941) 02:15:43 WWII, The Vault & Creative Slump (1941-1950) 02:24:27 Post-War Slump to Cinderella's Comeback (1945-1950) 02:33:48 Walt's Obsession: Model Trains to Disneyland (1950-1952) 02:38:44 Financing Disneyland: ABC, SRI & Davy Crockett (1953-1955) 03:17:05 Disneyland's Grand Opening & The Evolving Flywheel (1955-1958) 03:41:55 The Florida Project & Walt's Last Dream (1961-1966) 03:54:26 Walt's Untimely Death & Roy's Legacy (1966-1971) 03:57:57 Roy Finishes Walt Disney World (1966-1971) 04:01:09 The Post-Walt Slump & Corporate Raiders (1970s-1984) 04:09:44 Analysis: Why No Other Disney Flywheels? 04:17:15 7 Powers 04:20:45 Quintessence 04:23:50 Carve-Outs + Outro ‍Note: Acquired hosts and guests may hold assets discussed in this episode. This podcast is not investment advice, and is intended for informational and entertainment purposes only. You should do your own research and make your own independent decisions when considering any financial transactions.

May 18, 2026Episode 33 hr 48 min

Vanguard

Vanguard is the most effective vehicle ever created for participating in the fruits of American capitalism. Today it’s the single largest equity owner of the majority of corporations in the S&P 500, on behalf of 50 million clients (including, likely, many of you). And yet Vanguard itself is essentially a communist organization — it has no shareholders, makes no profits, and operates more like REI than Fidelity. If you own a Vanguard fund, you own a piece of the firm itself. Any excess margin instead gets returned to clients in the form of lower fees, which since 1975 have added up to roughly five hundred billion dollars transferred out of Wall Street managers’ pockets and into retail investors’ savings accounts. And oh yeah, it all started as a cockamamie revenge plot by a guy who’d just been fired by his partners. Today we tell the story of communist capitalism at its finest — Vanguard. Sponsors: Many thanks to our fantastic Spring '26 Season partners: J.P. Morgan WeAreDevelopers event ServiceNow Vercel Statsig Links: This episode's PDF companion Sign up for email updates , get our takeaways and research photos from each episode, and vote on future topics! Our Vanguard "episode preview" in WSJ Stay the Course: The Story of Vanguard and the Index Revolution by John C. Bogle The Bogle Effect by Eric Balchunas Worldly Partners' Multi-Decade Vanguard Study Worldly Partners' Article Generational Investing: The Discipline Behind 100+x Outcomes All episode sources Carve Outs: Our WSJ pieces on Ferrari and Vanguard MacBook Pro M5 Max Michael MacKelvie on YouTube The Super Mario Galaxy Movie Brooks Vanguard sneakers More Acquired: Get email updates and vote on future episodes! Join the Slack Check out the latest swag in the ACQ Merch Store ! 00:00:00 Start 00:00:41 Intro 00:05:30 Jack Bogle's Early Life & Family Ruin (1929) 00:12:34 Princeton Thesis & Mutual Funds Emerge (1949-1951) 00:27:20 Joining Wellington Management (1951) 00:30:38 The Go-Go Years & Fidelity's Ascent (1958-1965) 00:40:36 Jack Takes the Reins & The Ivest Merger (1965) 00:46:04 The Go-Go Bust & Jack's Crisis of Conscience (1970-1973) 00:53:28 Jack is Fired: The Genesis of Vanguard (1974) 01:13:03 The Journal Article That Inspired It All (1974-1976) 01:35:02 Building the Fund & Early Struggles (1976-1981) 01:44:32 The Rise of Indexing & Vanguard's Growth (1988-1992) 01:49:06 Jack's Health & The CEO Transition (1995-1996) 02:00:06 The ETF Debate & Jack's Second Firing (1999) 02:24:18 The 2008 Financial Crisis: Vanguard's Moment 02:30:46 The Warren Buffett Bet (2008-2019) 02:41:28 Fidelity & BlackRock's Resurgence (Post-2008) 02:52:04 Salim Ramji: Vanguard's First Outside CEO 03:04:43 Wellington's Comeback & Mutual Ownership 03:08:23 Analysis 03:30:58 Quintessence 03:39:35 Carve-Outs + Outro ‍Note: Acquired hosts and guests may hold assets discussed in this episode. This podcast is not investment advice, and is intended for informational and entertainment purposes only. You should do your own research and make your own independent decisions when considering any financial transactions.

May 3, 2026Episode 24 hr 51 min

Rolex

Rolex is a series of paradoxes. They sell obsolete and objectively inferior mechanical devices for 10-1000x the price of their superior digital successors… and demand is stronger than ever in history! Their products are comparable to a Hermès Birkin bag in price, luxury status and waitlist times… yet they produce over 1m units / year (roughly 10x annual Birkin production). They make the most universally recognized and desired Swiss watches… yet their founder wasn’t Swiss and didn’t start the company in Switzerland! If Rolex were publicly traded, they’d almost certainly be among the top 50 market cap companies in the world… yet they’re 100% owned by a charitable foundation in Geneva that (among other things) literally just gives away money to local people in the city. Tune in for one of the most fascinating and admirable companies we’ve ever covered on Acquired. We had an absolute blast making the episode, and hope you enjoy it as much as we did! This episode was released on February 23, 2025. Sponsors: Vanta: https://bit.ly/acquiredvanta ServiceNow: https://bit.ly/acquiredservicenow26 Legora: https://bit.ly/acquiredlegora Statsig: https://bit.ly/acquiredstatsig26 Links: The Renaissance of the Swiss Watch Industry - Marc Bridge HODINKEE - Inside All Four Rolex Manufacturing Facilities “If you were…” campaign Worldly Partners’ Multi-Decade Rolex Study Episode sources Carve Outs: Bluey Acquired on Armchair Expert Eleven Reader More Acquired! Get email updates with hints on next episode and follow-ups from recent episodes Join the Slack Subscribe to ACQ2 Merch Store ! © Copyright 2015-2026 ACQ, LLC ‍Note: Acquired hosts and guests may hold assets discussed in this episode. This podcast is not investment advice, and is intended for informational and entertainment purposes only. You should do your own research and make your own independent decisions when considering any financial transactions.

May 2, 2026Episode 22 hr 53 min

Costco

Costco is not only Charlie Munger’s favorite company of all time (plus he’s on the board, natch), it’s an absolutely fascinating study in how seemingly opposite characteristics can combine to create incredible company value. For instance: Costco has the cheapest prices of any major retailer in America — and also the wealthiest customer base. They pay their hourly workers 30% above the industry norm (and give them excellent healthcare + 401k benefits) — and are almost 3x more profitable on labor than Walmart. Speaking of Walmart, Costco stocks 40x fewer SKUs than their Bentonville-based rivals — yet sells an average of 15x more volume of each. And oh yeah, practically all of Costco’s C-Suite started their careers as baggers and checkout clerks! Tune in for a mind-bending exploration of one of the world’s most iconic — and iconically unique — companies. This episode was released on August 20, 2023. Links: The Science of Hitting Warren Buffett’s Costco joke Episode sources Carve Outs: Tifosi sunglasses Dwells “take off everything” Jeremy Giffon on Invest Like the Best Dogpatch David Lidsky’s great piece on Acquired in Fast Company Sponsors: Vanta: https://bit.ly/acquiredvanta ServiceNow: https://bit.ly/acquiredservicenow26 Legora: https://bit.ly/acquiredlegora Statsig: https://bit.ly/acquiredstatsig26 More Acquired! Get email updates with hints on next episode and follow-ups from recent episodes Join the Slack Subscribe to ACQ2 Merch Store ! © Copyright 2015-2026 ACQ, LLC ‍Note: Acquired hosts and guests may hold assets discussed in this episode. This podcast is not investment advice, and is intended for informational and entertainment purposes only. You should do your own research and make your own independent decisions when considering any financial transactions.

April 13, 2026Episode 23 hr 51 min

Ferrari

Ferrari is the pinnacle of luxury scarcity — across its entire 79-year history, the company has sold just 330,000 cars at an average price today of $500,000. For context, Hermès sells that many Birkins and Kellys roughly every 2 years, and Rolex moves that many watches every 3 months. And yet this ultimate luxury product also lives under the same roof with a widely beloved professional sports team… one with 400 million rabid fans from all walks of life who live and die by the Scuderia’s performance every F1 race weekend! How is it possible that these two seemingly contradictory customer bases can coexist within the same company? And far from destroying each other’s value, only reinforce it? The answer, it turns out, is a beautiful, bloody, tragic and romantic opera that spans two families and three generations — and just might be one of the best tales we’ve ever told on Acquired. Buckle up for the story of Ferrari. Sponsors: Vanta: https://bit.ly/acquiredvanta ServiceNow: https://bit.ly/acquiredservicenow26 Legora: https://bit.ly/acquiredlegora Statsig: https://bit.ly/acquiredstatsig26 Links: Sign up for email updates , get out takeaways and research photos from each episode, and vote on future topics! Our Ferrari "episode preview" in WSJ Enzo Ferrari by Luca Dal Monte Seeing Red on IMDb Go Like Hell by A.J. Baime Stephen Wilmot's great WSJ piece on Ferrari Ferrari factory tour Worldly Partners' Multi-Decade Ferrari Study All episode sources Carve Outs: Ford v Ferrari Maison Wheat sweaters Craighill scissors Amazon grocery service Travelpro Altitude backpack More Acquired! Get email updates with hints on next episode and follow-ups from recent episodes Join the Slack Subscribe to ACQ2 Merch Store ! © Copyright 2015-2026 ACQ, LLC 00:00:00 Start 00:01:07 Intro 00:05:57 Enzo Ferrari's Early Life & Tragedies (1898-1919) 00:12:25 Scuderia Ferrari: Enzo's Racing Dream (1920-1933) 00:22:58 The Prancing Horse & Ferrari's Branding 00:33:30 First Ferrari Road Cars & Le Mans Victory (1947-1949) 00:49:20 F1 & The Tragedies of Enzo's Life (1950s) 01:09:52 Ford vs. Ferrari: The Le Mans Rivalry (1963-1966) 01:17:13 Enzo Sells 50% to Fiat (1969) 01:23:32 Luca di Montezemolo's Return to F1 Glory (1971-1976) 01:47:02 Ferrari's "Pepsi Challenge" and how Luca rescued the company (1991) 02:20:26 Post-IPO Ferrari: New Models & Growth (2015-Present) 02:41:09 The FUV Purosangue & Model Range 03:00:01 Ferrari Luce: The EV Future with Jony Ive 03:05:22 Ferrari Today by the Numbers 03:22:24 Analysis 03:42:49 Carve-Outs + Thank Yous ‍Note: Acquired hosts and guests may hold assets discussed in this episode. This podcast is not investment advice, and is intended for informational and entertainment purposes only. You should do your own research and make your own independent decisions when considering any financial transactions.

March 2, 2026Episode 14 hr 18 min

Formula 1

Formula 1 is three competitions in one: a 200mph battle of the world's best race car drivers, the world cup of engineering where thousand-person teams spend hundreds of millions designing cars from scratch, and — as one of our listeners perfectly put it — the “Real Housewives of the Garage”, a soap opera of billionaire egos, team politics, and paddock drama that makes for incredible reality television. It's also the world's most popular annual sporting series with over 827 million fans globally — a fact that would shock most Americans, who until a recent viral Netflix series had barely heard of it. Today we tell the story of how a chaotic, deadly, and gloriously dysfunctional European racing series became one of the greatest business stories in sports. For decades, brilliant engineers and daredevil drivers dedicated their lives (and too often lost them) to a league controlled for 45 years by a single man: a former London car dealer named Bernie Ecclestone, who centralized power and extracted billions, while also undeniably single-handedly making the sport successful. Then, in a move no one saw coming, the American company Liberty Media bought the whole thing in 2017, installed a team of Fox Sports and ESPN veterans, and did what Bernie never would — professionalized it. All of a sudden famously money-losing F1 teams turned into real businesses, with the average team valuation today clocking in at an astounding $3.6 billion. Buckle up for one of our most-requested episodes: the wild story of Formula 1. Sponsors: Vanta: https://bit.ly/acquiredvanta ServiceNow: https://bit.ly/acquiredservicenow26 Legora: https://bit.ly/acquiredlegora Statsig: https://bit.ly/acquiredstatsig26 Links: Sign up for email updates and vote on future episodes! The Formula by Joshua Robinson and Jonathan Clegg Drive to Survive on Netflix F1 The Movie on Apple TV Adrian Newey, How to Build a Car Senna documentary Worldly Partners' Multi-Decade Formula One Study All episode sources Carve Outs: Cirque du Soleil Echo Super Bowl LX Mic'd Up Tonal Princess Peach: Showtime! on Nintendo Switch Daloopa for historical financial data More Acquired! Get email updates with hints on next episode and follow-ups from recent episodes Join the Slack Subscribe to ACQ2 Merch Store ! © Copyright 2015-2026 ACQ, LLC 00:00:00 Start 00:00:37 Intro 00:05:52 Origins of F1: Britain, Italy, and Monaco 00:30:43 Bernie's Entrance 00:37:42 Bernie Consolidates Power 00:50:33 F1 as a Global TV Sport (Except America) 01:08:08 F1's Incredible Engineering Achievements 01:19:34 Senna's Crash and a New Era for Safety 01:33:18 The Many Owners of F1, and Bernie's Liquidity Drama 01:57:48 FOTA: The attempted breakaway series 02:05:07 RedBull, Mercedes, and Reinventing the Sport 02:42:33 Liberty Media buys F1 and Brings it to the Modern Era 03:05:03 Drive to Survive 03:26:45 Apple, TV Rights, and Success in America 03:41:52 F1: The Business Today 03:56:23 Analysis: Why Did F1 Work… and Was Bernie Necessary? 04:05:40 7 Powers 04:08:23 Bear vs. Bull Cases 04:16:32 Quintessence 04:20:08 Carve-Outs + Outro ‍Note: Acquired hosts and guests may hold assets discussed in this episode. This podcast is not investment advice, and is intended for informational and entertainment purposes only. You should do your own research and make your own independent decisions when considering any financial transactions.

January 27, 20264 hr 8 min

The NFL

The NFL is nearly synonymous with America today. Practically nothing is more quintessentially and universally American than tuning in every Sunday (and Monday, and Thursday… and sometimes Saturdays and holidays too) to watch the world’s most beautiful ballet of violence. It generates the most revenue of any sports league globally and sets new records for team valuations each year. But it wasn’t always this way. The history of the NFL mirrors America’s own development: scrappy small-town teams rode the successive growth waves of the automobile, TV, the Internet and social media to grow larger than the even the founders’ wildest dreams. Whether you watch football or not, the NFL is one incredible business story, and one that we’ve taken more lessons from over the years for Acquired itself than perhaps any other episode we’ve made. Note: This is a remastered release of our original January 2023 episode, updated to today's Acquired production standards. It also features a full hour+ followup section at the end covering the seismic shifts in the NFL’s business since the original episode’s release. Much has happened in those three years: Taylor Swift entered the league (via merger 🙂), streaming went mainstream (and took over Thanksgiving and Christmas), sports gambling exploded from 46 million to 76 million bettors, and — in perhaps the most surprising development — private equity finally stormed the gates of the NFL. Oh, and average franchise valuations grew by 60% from $4.5 billion to over $7 billion. Communist capitalism is alive and well! Sponsors: Vanta: https://bit.ly/acquiredvanta ServiceNow: https://bit.ly/acquiredservicenow26 Legora: https://bit.ly/acquiredlegora Statsig: https://bit.ly/acquiredstatsig26 Links: Innovation Summit details and all Super Bowl LX Week events in San Francisco (note content from the Innovation Summit will be posted publicly the week after the Super Bowl — we’ll update this page with links when available) America’s Game Sports Illustrated’s oral history of the famous Joe Namath “pool photo” All episode sources Carve Outs: The Menu Peyton’s Places More Acquired! Get email updates with hints on next episode and follow-ups from recent episodes Join the Slack Subscribe to ACQ2 Merch Store ! © Copyright 2015-2026 ACQ, LLC 00:00:00 Start 00:00:37 Intro - Welcome to the Remastered NFL Episode 00:06:05 Origins of Football & the Forward Pass (1869-1905) 00:14:34 The Founding of the NFL (1920) 00:41:52 Bert Bell's "Any Given Sunday" Philosophy (1946) 01:03:28 Pete Rozelle Transforms the League (1960) 01:56:34 The Creation of the Super Bowl (1966) 02:09:47 Monday Night Football Invents Modern Sports TV (1970) 02:37:19 The NFL's Business Model Explained 02:39:28 CTE & the Kaepernick Controversy (2016) 02:48:36 Analysis: Playbook & 7 Powers Analysis 03:21:04 2026 UPDATE: Netflix, Youtube, Amazon Streaming, T-Swift, Gambling & New TV Deals 03:57:11 Private Equity Enters the NFL (2024) 04:14:08 Conclusion & Thank Yous ‍Note: Acquired hosts and guests may hold assets discussed in this episode. This podcast is not investment advice, and is intended for informational and entertainment purposes only. You should do your own research and make your own independent decisions when considering any financial transactions.

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