If you know anything about business podcasts, you’ve probably come across Shaan Puri’s name. That statement might also be true if you’re a Twitch type, or if you’ve heard of Blab, Bebo or Milk Road. He’s a busy guy, so let’s delve a little. How exactly did Puri learn so much about investing and business, and more importantly, how did he build a net worth of $15 million?
Early Life
Puri was born in 1988, and is currently based in San Francisco. He graduated from Duke in 2010 with a degree in Biology and Chemistry, but Puri decided to skip out on med school. Instead he started a sushi restaurant with two close friends.
Bad idea. The restaurant, which was supposed to be the “Chipotle of sushi,” went belly up, but at least Puri ate well during his struggles as a fledgling restaurateur.
The setback didn’t stick for long, though. Puri is one of those determined types who was hell bent to succeed at any cost, and he found his path to success when he discovered that he had a knack for starting and building companies.
The Business Build Up
The best way to track Puri’s business success is to look at some of the companies he’s founded. The first one that commonly gets mentioned is Blab, a social media IM app that was basically a video precursor of Zoom. It shut down in 2016, but that didn’t stop Puri in his quest for success.
Next up is Bebo. This social network was more successful, to the point where it was sold to Twitch for $850 million, then bought back by the original owner and Puri was hired as the CEO.
But Puri is about more than social media companies. He also runs a popular business podcast called My First Million with Sam Parr that is developing a cult-like following. In addition to a promising podcast, Shaan founded a crypto newsletter cleverly named Milk Road and is read by 250,000+ users. He recently sold Milk Road in a multi-million dollar deal.
Any search of Puri’s name will turn up dozens of other business-based offerings as well, including copywriting courses for effective advertising and other common offerings that are his online media empire.
Puri has suffered some setbacks, though. He’s a huge believer in the future of the metaverse, even though that imaginary VR playground has been slow to roll out viable products. Puri has also likely taken a hit with the crypto market selling off in 2022 as he owns Bitcoin and Ethereum.
He has committed to staying the course with crypto, but Puri hasn’t exactly been revealing when it comes to the percentage of his net worth that got pinched due to the crash.
Personal Life
As public as Shaan Puri has been about his endless quest for endless wealth, he’s just as private about his personal life. His wife, Divya, is referred to on most of his social media posts as “Shaan Puri’s wife,” although there are some entertaining posts about the ups and downs of their personal life and the extensive purchases she makes along the way.
They’ve recently started working on an ecommerce venture together, so look for her to be taking a more prominent role in his business affairs going forward.
