Acquired

Why has Acquired — seemingly against all odds — “worked”? It's a puzzling question: episodes are four hours long, they come out infrequently, and they usually don’t have guests or video. Hardly the standard-issue playbook for podcasting success! And yet well over a million smart, curious and exceedingly busy humans share their (your!) valuable time with us every month. Why? This is the exact paradox that has been rolling around in the head of Michael Lewis (yes, that Michael Lewis) since he found the show earlier this year.
So we asked Michael to be our guest "interlocutor" and share what he thinks is going on here, while we share ten lessons we've stolen (graciously) from companies we've studied and brought into Acquired itself. He takes us through the entire Acquired journey: how we started, why we've never hired anyone or raised money, how we pick episodes, what our business model actually is, why we focus on quality and enjoyment over maximizing enterprise value, and ultimately why we’re all — you, him, us — kindred spirits together. Oh, and just for fun, we recorded this episode where another special journey began — the garage where Google was founded.
Thank you for an incredible decade together… here's to the next one!

Sponsors:
Many thanks to our fantastic Fall ‘25 Season partners:
J.P. Morgan Payments (you can watch our full show with them at AWS re:Invent here!)
WorkOS
Sentry
Shopify
Thank-yous:
First, to Google for loaning us the garage. The sawhorse table desk, PC and CRT monitor on display in the background were all Google originals courtesy of the Google Founders Collection at the Computer History Museum. So cool!
Second, to our friends at Shep Films for helping us seriously up our game on production quality this episode!
Our Favorite Michael Lewis Books:
Home Game
Moneyball
Liar’s Poker
The Blind Side
The Undoing Project (as referenced by Michael in the beginning, about Daniel Kahneman and Amos Tversky)
Carve Outs:
Books: The Name of the Wind by Patrick Rothfuss
Science, the Endless Frontier by Vannevar Bush
Last Man Standing: The Ascent of Jamie Dimon and JPMorgan Chase by Duff McDonald
The Art of Spending Money by Morgan Housel
Emperors of Chocolate by Joel Glenn Brenner
Morris Chang's Autobiography

Podcasts: Against the Rules
Revisionist History
SmartLess
The Daily
The Bill Simmons Podcast
Graham Duncan on Invest Like the Best
Glue Guys

Video: Jay Kelly
The Rehearsal
Doug DeMuro
Tires
F1 The Movie
Andor
Fallout
Severance
Silo

Video Games: Sea of Stars
Kirby and the Forgotten Land

Products: ARTEZA Rollerball Pen 0.7mm Fine
Rotring 800 Mechanical Pencil
Fujifilm X100VI
Uniqlo Socks!
On Running Shoes
Rimowa Luggage

Parenting: Guided Access on iPad
Toy Story
SlumberPod
Bluey Experience in NYC

More Acquired:
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Check out the latest swag in the ACQ Merch Store!
‍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.

Coca-Cola is… sugar water. And somehow it’s also America, Christmas, summertime, friendship and happiness. Today we tell the story of how The Coca-Cola Company amazingly transmogrified a beverage into emotion in all of our collective psyches, and ALSO built one of the most incredible scale economy businesses of all-time. And oh yeah, there’s also cocaine, WW2, Mad Men, Warren Buffett, James Dean, Bill Cosby, Michael Jackson, Michael Ovitz, Steve Jobs, Bill Gates, McDonald’s and Monsanto. So cozy up to the fire with your favorite images of Santa Claus and Polar Bears and enjoy an ice-cold episode of Acquired — always delicious, always refreshing.
Sponsors:
Many thanks to our fantastic Fall ‘25 Season partners:
J.P. Morgan Payments
WorkOS
Shopify
Sentry — Link to ACQ Cassette Players, use code “audiophile”
Links:
Sign up for email updates and vote on future episodes!
The Hilltop ad / Mad Men finale
Pepsi Challenge commercials
Pepsi’s Michael Jackson commercials
Coke’s Bill Cosby commercials
Two liter bottles inflating
Worldly Partners’ Multi-Decade Coca-Cola Study
For God, Country, and Coca-Cola
Secret Formula
All episode sources
Carve Outs:
SkiErg
Super Smash Bros. Ultimate
Claude
Nike Vomero Plus
Hermanos Gutiérrez
More Acquired:
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Join the Slack
Subscribe to ACQ2
Check out the latest swag in the ACQ Merch Store!
‍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.

Trader Joe's breaks every rule of modern retail. They don't do e-commerce. They don't do delivery. No sales, coupons, or loyalty programs. They only stock 4,000 SKUs versus 50,000+ at normal supermarkets. Their parking lots are famously terrible and they're constantly out of your favorite items. Shoppers brave long lines and cramped aisles while overly-friendly employees in Hawaiian shirts try to chat them up. Everything about the Trader Joe's experience seems designed to drive modern consumers away. And yet they generate $2,000+ per square foot in sales — double their nearest competitor in Whole Foods and nearly 4x the industry average — and Americans are obsessed with them. How on earth did a company that so steadfastly refuses to participate in the 21st century build the most beloved grocery chain in America?
Today we tell the full story: how “Trader” Joe Coulombe started out cloning 7-Elevens in 1960s Los Angeles, pivoted to slinging hard liquor, discovered the enormous market opportunities for California wine and health food before anyone else, and ultimately built perhaps the most counter-positioned business we’ve ever studied on Acquired by doing almost everything differently than the supermarket-CPG industrial complex. Tune in for a wild voyage on the high seas of grocery retail!
Sponsors:
Many thanks to our fantastic Fall ‘25 Season partners:
J.P. Morgan Payments (And come see us at AWS re:Invent! Discount code: "ACQUIRED")
Sentry
WorkOS
Shopify
Links:
Sign up for email updates and vote on future episodes!
Worldly Partners’ Multi-Decade Trader Joe’s Study
Becoming Trader Joe
The Secret Life of Groceries
Build a Brand Like Trader Joe's
All episode sources
Carve Outs:
AirPods Pro 3
Mario Kart 8
More Acquired:
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Subscribe to ACQ2
Check out the latest swag in the ACQ Merch Store!
‍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.

Google faces the greatest innovator's dilemma in history. They invented the Transformer — the breakthrough technology powering every modern AI system from ChatGPT to Claude (and, of course, Gemini). They employed nearly all the top AI talent: Ilya Sutskever, Geoff Hinton, Demis Hassabis, Dario Amodei — more or less everyone who leads modern AI worked at Google circa 2014. They built the best dedicated AI infrastructure (TPUs!) and deployed AI at massive scale years before anyone else. And yet... the launch of ChatGPT in November 2022 caught them completely flat-footed. How on earth did the greatest business in history wind up playing catch-up to a nonprofit-turned-startup?
Today we tell the complete story of Google's 20+ year AI journey: from their first tiny language model in 2001 through the creation Google Brain, the birth of the transformer, the talent exodus to OpenAI (sparked by Elon Musk's fury over Google’s DeepMind acquisition), and their current all-hands-on-deck response with Gemini. And oh yeah — a little business called Waymo that went from crazy moonshot idea to doing more rides than Lyft in San Francisco, potentially building another Google-sized business within Google. This is the story of how the world's greatest business faces its greatest test: can they disrupt themselves without losing their $140B annual profit-generating machine in Search?
Sponsors:
Many thanks to our fantastic Fall ‘25 Season partners:
J.P. Morgan Payments
Sentry
WorkOS
Shopify
Links:
Sign up for email updates and vote on future episodes!
Geoff Hinton’s 2007 Tech Talk at Google
Our recent ACQ2 episode with Tobi Lutke
Worldly Partners’ Multi-Decade Alphabet Study
In the Plex
Supremecy
Genius Makers
All episode sources
Carve Outs:
We’re hosting the Super Bowl Innovation Summit!
F1: The Movie
Travelpro suitcases
Glue Guys Podcast
Sea of Stars
Stepchange Podcast
More Acquired:
Get email updates and vote on future episodes!
Join the Slack
Subscribe to ACQ2
Check out the latest swag in the ACQ Merch Store!
‍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.

It’s finally here! Today we are releasing Acquired’s first “concert film” — the full video recording of our Radio City live show from this summer with Jamie Dimon, Andrew Ross Sorkin, New York Times CEO Meredith Kopit Levien, Barry Diller, and cameos from around the Acquired Cinematic Universe including Christina Cacioppo, Ben Clymer, and Howard Schultz.
To watch the full production on any device, please head over to Spotify where you’ll find it available for free in the Acquired feed right alongside all our other episodes: https://open.spotify.com/episode/77Kl3BsiEQLpli2Q2ozZuf?si=4f4609e343504fd0
Sponsors:
Live Show Presented By: J.P. Morgan
Shopify
ServiceNow
More Acquired:
Get email updates and vote on future episodes!
Join the Slack
Subscribe to ACQ2
Check out the latest swag in the ACQ Merch Store!
‍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.