Brewing Success with Reed Hansen: Prioritizing Human Connection Over Software

With today’s marketers bogged down by overflowing tech stacks, where can they cut complexity to focus on what drives measurable growth? In this episode of Pipeline Brew, our CMO Matt Hummel sits down with Reed Hansen, Owner & Chief Growth Officer of MarketSurge, to explore what it means to lead with strategy over software. Reed shares his shift from SaaS sales to entrepreneurship, the decision to buy the agency MarketSurge, and how he transformed it from a CRM implementation shop into a growth engine powered by strategy and human connection. 

Reed also reveals how his podcast, Inside Marketing with MarketSurge, became an unexpected growth lever—fueling client acquisition, partnerships, and sharper thinking. He explains why showing up in public conversations builds more credibility than traditional sales outreach, and how authentic, human-first marketing can outperform any tech stack.

Whether you’re leading your own agency, navigating the chaos of MarTech overload, or looking for practical ways to drive results without losing authenticity, this episode delivers sharp perspective and actionable ideas for marketers who want to scale smarter.

Reed Hansen is a seasoned marketing leader and growth strategist recognized for his ability to scale businesses through visionary leadership and data-driven innovation. As Chief Growth Officer at MarketSurge, Reed leads with a clear mission: to help businesses transform marketing chaos into streamlined systems that drive predictable growth.

With a career spanning startups to Fortune 500 companies, Reed has held leadership roles at Northwestern University, Punchkick Interactive, and Solstice, where he built and guided teams that delivered high-impact digital products and record-breaking revenue growth. Prior to MarketSurge, he founded Million Dollar Studio, where his leadership extended beyond strategy into operations, mentoring, and building resilient teams.

Known for his ability to blend creative problem-solving with operational discipline, Reed has become a trusted authority in digital marketing and organizational growth. His leadership style emphasizes clarity, collaboration, and empowerment — guiding teams and clients alike to see marketing not just as a cost center, but as a powerful growth engine.

Beyond his executive role, Reed is the host of Inside Marketing with MarketSurge, where his leadership voice extends to the broader business community through conversations that challenge assumptions, explore innovation, and inspire action.

“There’s a tremendous opportunity to approach marketing like a white-glove business: results-focused rather than tool-focused. Clients don’t care about a line item list of platforms. They care about growth, leads, and pipeline. And marketing leaders today need to adapt to that mindset shift.”

“Podcasting is like the new city square or barbershop. It’s where people go to be heard, to connect, and to spark ideas in a space that feels casual but still meaningful. It’s helped me synthesize ideas, build partnerships, and even get clients. I didn’t expect that, but it’s been a tremendous growth lever.”

“I would spend much more time on creating great content and making sure to get myself out there and doing more networking conversations. The content that I can generate is a bigger determination of our business success and growth than any of the traditional sales efforts.”

00:00 Episode start

01:25 Icebreaker

03:00 Reed’s journey from sales to entrepreneurship

07:05 Diving into MarketSurge

11:55 How podcasting became a top tier growth lever

14:25 Marketing with purpose

16:20 From tools to service

19:15 Elevating the human side of marketing

24:30 What’s on Tap

[00:00:00] Matt: Hey everyone, and welcome to another episode of The Pipeline Brew, the podcast that meets at the intersection of people and pipeline. We’re bringing you fun yet insightful conversations where you’ll not only hear from marketing experts, but also get to know them as well.

[00:00:21] Matt: Hey, everyone. Today I’m super excited to be joined by Reed Hansen. Reed is the owner and chief growth officer of MarketSurge, a results-driven marketing agency just outside of Chicago. Reed started his career in SaaS sales, but acquired the business just last year, combining his entrepreneurial spirit with his passion for marketing.

[00:00:42] Matt: He also hosts his own podcast Inside Marketing with MarketSurge, which I’m also excited to talk more about. Today’s podcast, we’re gonna focus on the approach market Surge takes with its customers. Why more and more organizations are turning away from endless SaaS tools in favor of real results and how [00:01:00] moving slowly is actually better for acquiring customers in today’s world.

[00:01:03] Matt: With that, Reed, welcome to the show. How are you? I’m doing great. Thank you so much for having me. Really excited to be here. Oh, it’s my pleasure. I’ve loved getting to know you. I think you’re gonna bring a tremendous, you know, amount of information to the show today, so I’m excited to kick that off. But before we do, you know, I’d like to start each episode with a little icebreaker, which I think you know so Sure.

[00:01:24] Matt: What is your go-to beverage when you need a little pick me up? 

[00:01:27] Reed: Well, I wanted to bring one on the show, but just checked our fridge and we were out, so, oh, uh, I might be sipping, I’d love to try unusual sodas and I’ll go to the store and grab whatever is like the trending flavor. And so, you know, I love orange vanilla Coke.

[00:01:43] Reed: That is my go-to. But in this case, I have an A and W ice cream sundae, which. Tastes like chocolate soda, which, 

[00:01:53] Matt: how is it one to 10, 10 being amazing? Um, I’d say it’s an eight. It’s, it’s actually pretty good. Wow. 

[00:01:58] Reed: Yeah. I, I [00:02:00] thought I wouldn’t like it, but I think it works. I, I think they could rename it chocolate, chocolate soda, something like that.

[00:02:06] Matt: Reed. I thought I knew you and this takes it. I don’t even know what to say anymore. I’m speechless and that, that’s hard to, that’s hard to do, so. Alright, so I want to talk soda for a minute because Yeah. You know, orange Cream Coke, by the way. I didn’t even know that was a thing. Yeah. Now, were you the kid who was experimenting when you were at the soda fountain and you were mixing all the flavors together, so kind of before they started actually putting these flavors into a can?

[00:02:29] Matt: Absolutely. Absolutely. Are you a Coke guy more than Dr. Pepper or Pepsi? 

[00:02:34] Reed: You know what’s funny, when it just comes to the, the standard, if it’s just Pepsi or just Coke, I actually like Pepsi better, but that orange vanilla Coke is just like, there’s something magic about it. Like a, a new umami or something that just just works.

[00:02:48] Reed: Oh, well I might 

[00:02:50] Matt: have to try one. Yeah. Well, before we talk more about what you’re up to today, I’d love for you to tell the audience a little bit more about yourself, your passions and your background. 

[00:02:58] Reed: Yeah, absolutely. [00:03:00] Well, you know, I love to start things with mentioning that my dad was, uh, an entrepreneur and I always looked up to him.

[00:03:07] Reed: He brought me onto the work site. He was a landscape designer. And when I was eight years old, he started taking me after school. He would take me to pile rocks, do small projects, and, and you know, I kind of resented it at the time. Over the years, I really came to think that owning a business is like the coolest thing you could ever do.

[00:03:27] Reed: And so sure enough, I went to college and got a job right in an organization where I was like very bottom of the, to totem pole in sales. And so worked in tech sales for many years. Got an MBA at the University of Michigan. Go blue. Yeah, go blue. That’s right. So we went with the intent of branching outside of sales, maybe getting more into strategy and and marketing and each step of the way.

[00:03:51] Reed: Uh, you know, so I, I found myself kind of in a sales role, but with additional responsibilities, worked at a couple digital marketing [00:04:00] agencies, learned that space really well, largely in account development. And then worked with my wife’s startup briefly, who she had both a photography studio and a coaching business, and I helped her with the marketing there.

[00:04:14] Reed: Worked in higher ed for about five years at the nearby University of Northwestern. And an opportunity came up from a friend who had founded Market Surge, primarily just as a CRM service, and he gave us an opportunity to buy the business. He wanted to do something else, a, a product focused business. So we purchased a business, and in the last year, I have been adding services on top of the CRM.

[00:04:42] Reed: An automation offering that we had, and it’s been just so much fun. This is my favorite role. I’ve taken a piece of every job to help kind of make me a overall leader. Learned a ton, and I think just what I’m finding is that being a business leader today [00:05:00] just means being a consistent student of technology and business best practices like you just, I know I, my learning isn’t complete.

[00:05:08] Reed: I’ve got a lot to learn as the market changes. I love to hear that 

[00:05:12] Matt: and it’s, it’s clear and great background. I appreciate all you shared there. It’s, you know, even from your dad being an entrepreneur, it’s, it’s in your blood. Yeah. And so I could see that being a big driving force behind you, taking advantage of the opportunity to acquire market surge as I hear you opening your chocolate soda.

[00:05:29] Matt: That’s right. I was trying to be discreet. No, that’s awesome. So first time business owner. Yeah. Anything you would do different within your first year? 

[00:05:39] Reed: Yeah. You know, hindsight’s always 2020, but in a way, sometimes the best lessons are learned by, uh, making mistakes. Yeah. And I assumed that. So, you know, you learn a certain way of working when you’re in sales.

[00:05:52] Reed: You know, it’s, it’s a lot about persuasion. It’s consistency. It’s how many meetings you have, how many emails or calls you [00:06:00] make that really drive your success. And, and. And your effectiveness in those conversations? Well, I think over the last year what I’ve really learned is that, you know, I’m, I’m the leader and owner of the business.

[00:06:11] Reed: And then in marketing in particular, service-based business is custom. Uh, you know, each project is custom. That what is more important than the volume of outreach is the level of authority and value I can offer. And, and the content that I can generate the, and getting my face out there and my own writing out there in, in social media posts, that is a bigger determination of our business success and growth than any of the traditional sales efforts that I, uh, originally undertook.

[00:06:42] Reed: So the biggest lesson I’d say is, um, I would. Spend more, much more time on creating great content and making sure to get, get myself out there and doing more networking conversations. 

[00:06:54] Matt: I love it. I think that’s a great lesson for whether it’s founder-led businesses or just folks [00:07:00] making that transition from sales to marketing, which I think we’re gonna talk more about here in a little bit.

[00:07:04] Matt: But let’s talk more about market search today. So. You mentioned that you guys kind of started as this CRM focused organization. You’ve been focused on building out more services. What industries do you guys focus on? What services and where do you really provide the most value to the customers you serve?

[00:07:22] Reed: Yeah, so we have been working, uh, a lot with photography studios. A lot of it was with the relationships from my wife’s business that, uh, we were able to. Tie into that space really well. We built workflows that were accustomed to the photography industry, learned that practice. You know, again, it’s, it’s not only from a community standpoint do we have a lot of photographers, but we do have a lot of learnings along the way and just knowledge of the industry within the, within the organization.

[00:07:53] Reed: Oh, and I’ll also say too, we work with a lot of home services business, so strangely enough we have like these two cohorts, you know, they don’t [00:08:00] necessarily overlap, but we have a, a lot of home services businesses, including pest control, solar. Panel installation and Okay. Um, others like that. So they’re very different.

[00:08:11] Reed: But we do have learnings in each, and, you know, I, I would emphasize that it’s very valuable to build out a niche and expertise in, in that niche, both for potential referrals, word of mouth, but also just to get better at the job. You know, get, get really specific and. Today we offer a, a suite of services on top of the technology we offer.

[00:08:34] Reed: The CRM is a great hub, uh, as it is for any sales and marketing. Team for the data that you can collect and report on. So everybody should have a CRM, I think in almost any kind of business. 

[00:08:48] Matt: Yeah. 

[00:08:48] Reed: But beyond that, you know, we, I was observing when I first acquired the business that there were so many people that, uh, had other things connected.

[00:08:55] Reed: They were. Having ads leads flow in, they were having leads from [00:09:00] their website flow in and maybe having an SEO partner that was helping enable that. And they would also have other needs around designing websites. Landing pages for, for these things. And, and as I was observed, we also, our agency has benefited quite a bit from our efforts to, uh, generate content and the podcast itself.

[00:09:24] Reed: And so we’ve started offering services to our clients to. Help promote that, you know, it’s all in the name of getting more leads, higher quality leads, growing the business. Uh, the CRM continues to be the hub of everything we do, but the services are really like feeding a coin into a machine that spits out sales and leads.

[00:09:46] Reed: And, but as long as you have enough say, like opportunity, you, uh, you can continue to grow. 

[00:09:52] Matt: It’s funny, I, I find the industries you mentioned are likely very underserved in terms of. Marketing and just thinking [00:10:00] about true growth levers. Yeah. I, earlier in my career, I interviewed with two totally different but very similar small business CRM companies.

[00:10:10] Matt: One was focused on contractors like roofers or painters, and a business that you just don’t really associate. Modern marketing with, and then another was a CRM that served kind of just the B2B tech space in general. But it was so interesting as I learned more about these industries and opportunity, it aligns perfectly with what you’re saying.

[00:10:30] Matt: And they’re just truly underserved. And I think just good principles of marketing apply and they start to realize. Gosh, a little can go a long way because you, to me, it’s kind of like if you, you know, there’s a million Airbnbs out there, but the ones where they have really good photography and they know how to stage their homes are not only gonna probably get rented a lot more often, but a but at a much higher premium.

[00:10:53] Matt: And so, yeah, it’s not hard to do either one of those things, but just a lot of folks don’t take the time or understand what’s out there. So I [00:11:00] love that you guys have carved out your own niche and are. Doing that, so That’s awesome. 

[00:11:05] Reed: You know, I’ll just say just one coincidence between these two fields is they, you know, in their own way they’ve accrued a lot of technical skills and so say in the case of photography, it’s a lot of artistry and I would say it’s almost a mindset that’s a little antithetical to.

[00:11:20] Reed: Consistent sales and marketing and you know, so it’s really beneficial for a lot of them to outsource as much as they can just to keep a steady booking flow. Yeah. You know, because it’s like, you know, they’re creative. They have to think like big and, and, uh, unique. They don’t necessarily wanna do that context shift all the time.

[00:11:40] Reed: It’s like, okay, you know, I’ve gotta block off half the day to sell, sell and market. And then the, the other half, I’m an artist. You know, it, it’s, it’s tricky. 

[00:11:49] Matt: Yeah. Love it. You’ve mentioned a couple times the importance of podcasting within what you’re trying to do. Yeah. When did you realize that this was such a key growth [00:12:00] lever for your business?

[00:12:01] Reed: Yeah. You know, it’s funny, I am, I’ve always been a really big podcast consumer, um, even since like. 2008. And there’s some podcasts I have listened to almost every week since like I, and I really think oh 7, 0 8, and I, you know, I’ve, I’d heard ads and stuff and I kind of assumed that’s how you market, you know, if you were gonna get ads, placement and, and, um, and like, uh, you know, that’s just too expensive or not really for me, or, you know, it wouldn’t get the reach i, I wanted.

[00:12:29] Reed: But I just had kind of like an epiphany earlier this year. I was like, why don’t I seek out a. Podcast guest opportunity on a few industry podcasts and just see how that goes. And, uh, you know, I, I found some opportunities, found a service that helped, helped get me booked on some guest spots on some, uh, prominent podcasts.

[00:12:50] Reed: And the first ones, of course, I’m sweating bullets and just like, what am I gonna say? You know, I’ve got like pages and pages of notes so I can answer every possible question. [00:13:00] And it went fine. And then it got easier and easier to. Answer the questions. And I also found myself like synthesizing better ideas for my own business.

[00:13:09] Reed: I’m like, oh yeah, she asked about that. And I like, I don’t necessarily have. That part of the offering built out. And so it continues to spark ideas. I’ve partnered with people that I’ve, uh, met with on podcasts. It’s been like a tremendous networking activity. Like these are people that I could go back to and ask questions, ask advice, uh, ask for referrals, things like that.

[00:13:30] Reed: And. And then I, I just gave it a try to start my own. And the reciprocation has been great. You know, anytime I get a guest opportunity, I always invite the host to come on my podcast, which has been great. You know, we kind of double our connection and then frequently I’ll entertain a, a demo and, and in many cases, I’ve become a client, received a few referrals, made a lot of friends.

[00:13:53] Reed: I really think that the podcasting is like the new City Square or barbershop [00:14:00] where. You know, like people used to want to have conversations even with casual acquaintances because they felt like, you know, in a space where they felt like maybe they’d get heard and others might join in comment, but now it’s like hard to converse because we feel so like, isolated.

[00:14:18] Reed: You know, we don’t talk on the phone. The the, the one. Uh, you know, one-on-one calls, that doesn’t happen. But, you know, I definitely don’t stop strangers in public and, and talk to them. But, but the podcast seems to function like that and it does seem to, you know, it’s almost like for mental wellbeing ideation.

[00:14:37] Reed: Um, it feels like this can be a, a little consequence. ’cause I know a few people will tune, tune in, and it makes me want to elevate the comments I make on the podcast to, uh. You know, make it worthwhile. Make it interesting. Yeah. Make it 

[00:14:52] Matt: unique. So, no, I, that’s great. And I think you’ve clearly articulated. A path for successful podcasts.

[00:14:59] Matt: A [00:15:00] lot of companies, obviously, including our own, have a podcast and I think you’ve given some pretty interesting ideas of how to maximize the value. It’s funny, as you’ve been talking even about the industries you serve and now as we’ve been talking about the podcast more specifically, it’s almost just this idea of truly marketing with purpose and it’s, it’s, in a way, it’s getting back to basics, not marketing for the sake of marketing ’cause.

[00:15:22] Matt: We need to do marketing. Everybody’s doing marketing. We have to do it. But like, what are you really trying to do? What are you trying to achieve? And so even kind of building off what you just said about being really thoughtful around your comments, being really thoughtful with our marketing. With a certain purpose to achieve a certain thing, whether it’s an emotion or a sentiment, or drive a certain action or enable a buyer, whatever it is.

[00:15:44] Matt: Just being, again, being very purposeful. So not clinical, but, but purposeful, so. Right. That’s awesome. Yeah. Well, I want to jump back into market search. Yeah. It sounds like your team has been finding. Real success with results and expertise rather than [00:16:00] just offering another tool. Yeah, and you know, I’ve been meeting with tons of, of marketers and our market research supports it.

[00:16:06] Matt: Marketers are overwhelmed and tired of the MarTech madness as I call it. And CMOs and CFOs are frustrated because it’s hard to see ROI and it’s hard for marketers to even know what tools to select. We didn’t go to school. To have to sift through 15,000 or more technology. So are you guys experiencing this too, in terms of, you know, the, the customers you’re serving?

[00:16:31] Reed: Yeah, you know, personally, I love to tinker with new toys, and so I do love to hop on demos. Um, I, I’ll subscribe to a tool for a month, try it out, and, uh, switch to another one, you know, if it doesn’t totally fit my needs. But I love the experimentation process, but I recognize that that’s not for everybody.

[00:16:49] Reed: But I think it serves me well in. Um, when I’m talking to my clients, I can make some recommendations, some do’s and don’ts, but you’re, you’re right. It’s, I, we are just bombarded by all of these [00:17:00] tools. You know, in some cases they’re fantastic and unique and it’s been very easy for. A lot of companies to AI enable their tools to, uh, build tools from scratch.

[00:17:11] Reed: Uh, you know, we could talk at some point about Cursor and, you know, some of the good things you can do with AI enabled coding, but really for, you know, the people that I work with, they want results and they don’t want, uh, you know, 50 logins. They don’t necessarily wanna get in the, the weeds of. How it’s made, or you know, how the sausage is made for, you’re right, just to mix some metaphor, you know, sausage in the weeds.

[00:17:38] Reed: So, um, the, um, and that was a key problem that I, or a limitation I noticed of, of the business when we, we started though we did have the ability to do a lot of building campaigns, uh, email campaigns, text, and even DM campaigns. We were still functioning as kind of a tactical tool or tactical [00:18:00] partner rather than a, a strategic partner.

[00:18:01] Reed: Yeah, because we needed to wait for the leads to come in before we processed them. We didn’t dictate or optimize the way they, they did come in. So, like you said, solution really is the best way to, to partner as a marketing agency. You need to, you know, I think may maybe many marketers like myself are pretty excited about the, the new tools and the, um, you know, every release of chat GPT is just, you know, it’s very exciting.

[00:18:28] Reed: There’s so much you can do, but, but I don’t know that our clients care nearly as much as, as we do about some of the, the bells and whistles. They, 

[00:18:35] Matt: yeah, 

[00:18:36] Reed: they just need more leads. So they 

[00:18:37] Matt: want results. Right. And I think right. It’s interesting because we’ve talked on the show before about, you know, technology is not a strategy, it’s an enabler for your strategy, but I, I’m seeing a shift and it sounds like you are too, where.

[00:18:52] Matt: You know, yes, tools can be great, but again, what they really want are outcomes. And so it’s this, it’s kind of this transition we’re seeing from a SaaS [00:19:00] model, software as a service to services software where, you know, agencies like yourselves can use tools, but you’re coming over top with your expertise.

[00:19:10] Matt: Not, again, they don’t want to know how the sausage is made in the weeds, but they want, they want the results. They want the outcome. So it’s kind of this. New approach of, I almost call it like white glove, you know, support where, hey, we’ve got the ingredients, you need more leads, you need more pipeline.

[00:19:26] Matt: Whatever you need, we can do it. And then, you know, you guys can be the ones who have the expertise around the tools, the delivery, but ultimately on just delivering the results. Fair to say? 

[00:19:36] Reed: Yeah, that’s absolutely fair to say. And you know, like I, I think just a lot of professions require a lot more technical expertise than than ever.

[00:19:43] Reed: They’re getting deeper into their own niches and their own specializations. And don’t necessarily wanna go broader into other parts of the business. And so there’s tremendous opportunity to approach marketing, like you said, like a white glove business results focus rather than [00:20:00] here’s the line item for every piece of technology, you know, and, and the cost for each.

[00:20:03] Reed: You know, they, they want like a. Kind of like a, an overall cost and helps him understand the ROI a 

[00:20:10] Matt: hundred percent. Awesome. Well, you’ve snuck in a mention of chat pt, so I feel like we’ve waited long enough to talk about ai Yeah. And how it’s changing the way that we’re all working. Where are you seeing success with AI at MarketSurge and, you know, have there been any big surprises you’ve experienced?

[00:20:28] Reed: Yeah, so, you know, it’s been years since I’ve been using AI for content generation, uh, for social media posts and blogs and, you know, I think just the nature of it is it speeds things up. It, uh, enables you to write. Lengthier content draws on internet, uh, resources and there’s definitely some advantages to it.

[00:20:51] Reed: But on the downside though, it’s gotten a lot better. It still does sound artificial and it does sound similar to the other posts that people are [00:21:00] at, other businesses who are doing the same thing and, uh, makes it very hard to differentiate. And so even if you go to the extent of. Training a custom agent with your company’s background and your key styles.

[00:21:15] Reed: Tone of voice. Yeah, exactly. Yeah. Even if you do that, it’s still hard to make it completely unique. And so the way I’ve approached it now is, is a combination of the two. We love to encourage our clients to do a lot of short form video with their face on the screen. And you know, don’t use the AI avatars for now.

[00:21:34] Reed: Just talk to the screen, say, um, uh, you know, just talk like in your normal cadence and you become a relatable person that they either want to work with or, or don’t want to work with, but you need at least a significant chunk of your content formatted with your real voice and Uhhuh. So the algorithms do really prioritize, like whether it’s [00:22:00] on a LinkedIn, Google business page, or, um.

[00:22:03] Reed: You know, like your blogs that drive your organic ranking, they do prioritize frequent posting and it is hard to find the time to do that. So there is a place for ai, a generated content. It’s almost like you have have the robots talk to the robots, and then for content that you really wanna engage people.

[00:22:21] Reed: You’re the one on camera, you’re the one, uh, explaining. I think podcasts are a tremendous way to get those back links and to have content that you can make snippets out of that are real and genuine and, you know, it’s just a, just a great exercise. But, but also just those videos where you’re walking and talking on your phone, those are really valuable to.

[00:22:41] Reed: I kind of preach that we, we do a lot of newsletters. Some of it is AI generated, but there’s always an element of, you know, it was written out by the company leader or he was on video talking to his audience. 

[00:22:55] Matt: Yeah, I, it’s such a great perspective. It’s, you know, you kind of have to play the [00:23:00] game, right?

[00:23:00] Matt: Yeah. You, you described it. Robots talking to robots. We need to do that if, especially for answer engine optimization, but. You know, buyers still wanna buy from people. Yeah. People wanna buy from people. Uh, we always talk about account based marketing. It’s, it’s really like people, people based marketing.

[00:23:19] Matt: And so I think things like podcasts and video, you know, vlogging, if that’s even a term still are such great suggestions because it’s hard to, okay, I’m gonna look like a robot. And, you know, it’s like, no, we’re just, we’re humans. And I’m gonna say, um, and. You know, not because I’m, I want to, but because I can’t help it.

[00:23:39] Matt: Right. Right. So, ’cause I’m human. So I think that’s great. So great perspective. It’s, it’s this idea of using AI to scale, but also understanding that you still have to bring in the human element to differentiate. Yeah, absolutely. Well, good stuff. Well, I want to transition to our last segment, what’s on tap?

[00:23:58] Matt: So Reed, we’ll start with a [00:24:00] couple questions for you. So at the top of the show we talked about your obsession with interesting soda flavors, which you’re drinking chocolate soda right now. Although, what is it actually called? It’s a ice cream sundae. So, and it’s an A and w 

[00:24:17] Reed: drink. A and w drink. Yes. How many grams of sugar air in there?

[00:24:21] Reed: 37. Uh, a hundred. 150. 150. So I know, I, I don’t normally drink this. Um, I actually, you know, I’ll, I’ll say I usually drink the, the zero versions of the, of the drinks. Yeah. But where’s the fun 

[00:24:34] Matt: If you’re gonna go, if you’re gonna drink an ice cream sundae, it needs to have 150 grams of sugar. 

[00:24:40] Reed: I agree. I had, I had to, I’m sorry.

[00:24:42] Reed: You’re, oh, actually, I’m sorry. You, you were asking, I was looking at the big number calories. It’s 40 grams of sugar. 40 grams of sugar. Okay. So 

[00:24:49] Matt: it’s just above a normal root beer. Right. How do I know? Because my kids are obsessed with root beer and then we all face the pain when that sugar wears off. So, alright, so flip it around [00:25:00] end of day.

[00:25:01] Matt: What’s your go-to beverage when you need to wind down a little bit? 

[00:25:04] Reed: Yeah. You know, um, I’m Mormon and I’m a teetotaler and, and, um, never, I’ve never, I’ve never actually drank alcohol, but I love to. You know what’s weird is I don’t actually love water all that much. You can probably imagine by my, my taste in soda, but I usually like to grab.

[00:25:22] Reed: A tall glass of water and I will add a me an orange meo squirt in it. And uh, you know, usually it’s just, just like exactly what I need and I’m like, I actually, you’re making me articulate something that I’d like, I didn’t really realize about myself is that I. I just love, like sweetss, I guess. But, um, yeah, I’ll use the orange mayo and I just drink a whole glass.

[00:25:50] Reed: I, it’s like I’m taking my vitamins. I’m rehydrating. Yeah. And just feel, feel a lot better. It’s a cool, you know, I always do. Ice just cools me off. 

[00:25:59] Matt: I [00:26:00] have to look into this because I pretty much only drink water. Okay. I’ve, I’ve gone off, I don’t really drink much alcohol anymore. Yeah. I, I don’t drink caffeine and now I’ll do a decaf coffee here and there, but, mm-hmm.

[00:26:12] Matt: I just drink water and a mic. I don’t like bubbly water. Mm-hmm. Yeah. My kids and wife love it. So we have 48 flavors in our fridge and they always look good. And I try one, I’m like, I can’t do the bubbles. Right, right. So I need to try this. So a little bit of meo. Alright, so rumor has it, you’re into vibe coating.

[00:26:31] Matt: Yes. Which my kids would think is super cool. By the way. They’d already think you’re super cool because you drink chocolate soda. But now, now you do vibe coding. Yes. Talk to me about this. First of all, what is vibe coding and what have you been building? 

[00:26:45] Reed: Yeah. Well, so if you’re familiar with how chat GPT works, it’s you type in a question or some sort of request into a field and then the dialogue comes out, uh, it feeds out and vibe coding, actually [00:27:00] interface is very similar.

[00:27:01] Reed: It, uh, you have a, an open field where you type in your request and you could go as far. Like as early as saying like, give me code to make a webpage that describes how the dinosaurs died. And yeah, I mean it is powered by both, uh, chat, GPT and Claude and I maybe some others you can plug in, but it pulls from the same internet resources and, and we’ll give you a response and it can actually spit out the code, the, the real.

[00:27:33] Reed: Great thing though is it can actually implement the code because it’s not, you know, you can learn to code, but then there are a lot of little nuances about, well, where does the code go? What, what kinds of software do you need to install it on? What kinds of platforms? And, and well, if I wanna host it, where do I host it?

[00:27:51] Reed: And it is to the point where it does all of that for you. So if you develop an app, you’ve got an app idea. And I’ll give a couple [00:28:00] examples of things I developed. The first, first thing I was like, uh, for one of my jobs I was downloading these large CSV files, so, so large spreadsheets, like 10,000 plus names.

[00:28:11] Reed: And, um, I didn’t need all the information on the form. So, you know, it would be easy for a Python programmer to, uh, manipulate that data and remove it and make it smaller. Remove the data I didn’t need, like filter it and just allow me to download, send it in the smaller form. But as a non-developer myself, I had no idea.

[00:28:33] Reed: So I always had to open the whole file, select the column, delete the whole column that takes, it took forever and it was always crashing. So I built an app that. Basically did those Python steps for me and I hosted on my website. And you know, if anybody’s curious, you can go to, um, CSV filter, do csv filter.market surge.io and you can We’ll put the link in the show notes.

[00:28:55] Reed: Yeah, yeah, exactly. But you can upload these huge files and it will read the [00:29:00] file and it, it will say, tell me which columns you’d like me to remove from the file. That was like my first exercise. It does, it, it, uh, it was super fast. And like, it felt like I was like Superman, that I could now build an app.

[00:29:15] Reed: It’s on web, Amazon, Websters, I can access it on any computer. Wow. And, um, I mean, it took, it took a little bit of, of back and forth. I mean, it was several days on that, but to do the same. So that was like back in April. Now when I’m doing it. Today that that same task goes a lot faster. Like the, the engines are getting better and better.

[00:29:37] Reed: Now, lately what I’ve been working on is a fantasy football app that does Ooh. Uh, but where you’re actually, uh, making, so you, it’s while the game is happening that you make in-game predictions and, and mini, it’s kinda like prop bets, but it’s fantasy. And, uh, so you, you make predictions about. What will happen in the next play, et cetera.

[00:29:57] Reed: And I’m doing it again without the help [00:30:00] of a developer. I’ve, um, I’ve got the webpage up and it’s hosted on Amazon Web Services. The only challenge I’ve been faced with is I have to test it on live data, and so that means I’m spending all my Saturday working on it while the the games, the college games are happening.

[00:30:16] Reed: Yeah. So, but 

[00:30:18] Matt: it’s, it’s really fun that way you can just, you know, if anyone’s like. Re’s watching more football here. I I’m actually working here, so I’m working. 

[00:30:27] Reed: Yeah, exactly. Yeah, that’s, yeah, that’s, this is the story. I’ve been feeding my wife for the last few weeks and, uh, so far she’s, and you’re sticking with it.

[00:30:34] Matt: She’s 

[00:30:35] Reed: buying it. Yep. 

[00:30:36] Matt: Love it. Alright, well, last question for you. So you have lived. All over. Yeah. So I think you, you’re outside of Chicago. You’ve lived in Italy? Yeah. Have you also lived in Michigan? I have. I did. I went to grad school in Michigan. Yes. And uh, that’s right. That’s right. So let’s talk pizza.

[00:30:54] Matt: Oh yeah. Because you’ve lived in some famous pizza places. Yes. I have. [00:31:00] Just, I don’t even know how I wanna ask the question, just what. What’s your go-to? What’s your favorite, what’s your preferred style of pizza? 

[00:31:08] Reed: So, so first I’ll give my hot take. You know, I’m, I’m from Chicago. I’ve lived here the last 13 years and you’re probably expecting me to say like the best deep dish place, but I will say that.

[00:31:19] Reed: Deep dish Pizza is garbage. I can’t stand it. It is the worst. And I, I want no argument for me, by the way. I want nothing to do with it. So I will say the best, the two best pizzas I have, like I’d say genres or categories. The Detroit, the Square, puffy Pizza is just amazing. It is. There’s, there’s some places here that’ll make it, and I had some great versions of it when I lived in, uh, in Michigan.

[00:31:50] Reed: Just that fluffy crust. It’s, it’s, you can’t beat it. It’s almost like a focaccia plus, plus cheese and toppings. It’s just perfect. In [00:32:00] Italy, I had a lot of great brick oven style pizza, and never was it better than in the city of Naples. Uh, there’s. You know, they claim that there’s something in the water that the volcanic ash from Pompeii continues to nourish the local vegetables and even the livestock that are raised around there.

[00:32:20] Reed: And it is different. It is definitely different and it’s rundown as Naples is. It’s, you know, it’s got some great history, but it is kind of a, uh, decaying city and not a knock on it. It’s just things age. But it has the world’s best pizza. So good. Ah, 

[00:32:36] Matt: well I’ve been to Italy, but not to Naples. Yeah. And it’s one of those things where I’m sure it actually is better, but it’s also this, this sentiment of I’m in Italy.

[00:32:47] Matt: Yes. It had, you know, everything tastes better. You have a cup of coffee and you’re like, oh, this is the best cup of coffee I’ve ever had. Absolutely. Well, that’s awesome. And Detroit that I’ve had a couple Detroit style pizzas before, and it’s funny because they are a little [00:33:00] bit. Thicker than a, you know, a New York style or certainly Neapolitan style, but they’re not that thick.

[00:33:08] Matt: You know, excessively doey, excessively saucy. Right. But they do, they also put the sauce on last for Detroit style, is that right? Or am I, am I mixing that up, or, or something? I believe so. 

[00:33:17] Reed: Yeah, that’s right. So they’ll go, um, yeah, exactly the sauce. And it almost looks like it might come in after the baking process because it’s not That’s right.

[00:33:25] Reed: Dried up. So it’s, um, still quite, quite wet and you get that sweetness. Yeah. Yeah. And, uh, but the, but the, the cheese and the toppings themselves are quite crispy, and especially like the edges. It’s almost like the edges of a, a brownie. Yeah. You know, like, it’s, it’s just amazing. 

[00:33:44] Matt: I, I could keep talking to you, but I’m starving now, so we’re gonna have to wrap this up.

[00:33:49] Matt: No, that’s great. No, I appreciate it. I, thanks for, uh, that’s a great topic to end on. Oh it is. And that, and it’s funny ’cause you said topic and all I heard you say was topping and that’s how hungry [00:34:00] I am. So. Well, Reed, this has been an amazing conversation. I really appreciate you taking the time to be on the show today.

[00:34:06] Matt: I know our listeners are gonna get a ton out of this, so thank you so much. Thank you, Matt. It’s been a real pleasure. Awesome. Have a great rest of your day.

[00:34:17] Matt: Thanks again to Reed for joining us on today’s episode of The Pipeline Brew. I hope you’ll enjoyed the conversation as much as I did. Please leave me a comment with your thoughts and make sure you subscribe to the show so you’ll never miss an episode. Once again, I’m Matt Hummel and I’ll see you next time.