Jack Davis is a serial entrepreneur and investor with a knack for spotting early trends in media, sports, and food, and growing consumer-facing brands just before they go mainstream. His track record includes Crypt TV, which he launched with horror filmmaker Eli Roth; Pop-Up Bagels; Jomboy Media, now in partnership with MLB; Dave’s Hot Chicken, which was sold for $1 billion; and the experiential dining brand Chain, which he co-founded with actor/comedian B.J. Novak.
Not too shabby.
Davis joined the How Success Happens podcast and shared the methodology for picking winners, which he says really comes down to one metric: organic demand. “I try to be in spaces where I believe that there’s going to be natural growth in the space,” he told Entrepreneur. “You can’t buy demand.”
While he’s obviously done well in the investing game, Davis was very open about the businesses that didn’t work out, explaining what he (and you) can learn from those projects that looked great on paper but not so much in reality. “Once you start spending a certain amount of money and aren’t seeing proportionate results from the money, that’s probably a really bad sign,” he says. (On the subject of struggle, be sure to read his open and honest Entrepreneur article about the mental and financial anguish that came with a last-ditch effort to save one of his companies. Spoiler: it all works out in the end!)
Listen to the entire conversation here, and check out Jack’s three success tips below, including a technique for answering the age-old question: Is this idea actually going to make any money?
It’s All About Organic Demand
Davis emphasizes that truly successful businesses have one thing in common: they are built on “organic demand” rather than manufactured hype. He advises, “Everything I’ve ever succeeded with has come from people believing in something, putting an idea together, and then building off of what we see from authentic organic demand.” In Davis’s experience, organic demand means seeing people standing in line in parking lots to buy Dave’s Hot Chicken or to try Chain. “You can’t fabricate organic demand,” he says. “We are not in a boardroom world anymore, where people can sit there and decide what people want. In the social media age, demand has become democratized.” Seeing engagement that outperforms your marketing budget (or lack thereof) is the green light that you are onto something great. “Thinking you can throw money at something to create demand is dangerous,” he warns.
Takeaway: Focus on building a product or service people genuinely want—paid advertising should never be your main engine for growth.
Related: Celebrity Chef Andrew Zimmern Says Social Media Is Ruining Food
Learn from Failure
Davis candidly shares that he is not batting 1.000. “You probably never heard of Bakoshop because that investment went down very quickly—and it’s no fault of anyone.” The food was amazing, he says of the quick service concept, but it “just didn’t work.” Davis admits he was surprised by the restaurant’s failure, given the chef’s loyal following, but says the experience reinforced the importance of organic demand for a product and made him think about what he can bring to the table in an investment. “You have to be careful that you’re fitting your skill sets” to each new venture, he says.
Takeaway: Treat setbacks as valuable education—embracing failure sharpens your judgment and focus.
Scaling With Friends Is Fun
Reflecting on the Dave’s Hot Chicken deal, he jokes, “The second best thing in life is making money with your best friends…The best thing would’ve been if I had done it all myself!” Whether launching a new venture or investing in an existing business, he says it is vitally important to work with people who share a vision and the drive to continually grow. “The business world is a pie-eating contest where the first-place winner gets the reward of more pie,” he says. “If you win the pie-eating contest, you get to go eat more pie.”
Takeaway: Building businesses with people who align with your values is a recipe for lasting success.
Jack Davis is a serial entrepreneur and investor with a knack for spotting early trends in media, sports, and food, and growing consumer-facing brands just before they go mainstream. His track record includes Crypt TV, which he launched with horror filmmaker Eli Roth; Pop-Up Bagels; Jomboy Media, now in partnership with MLB; Dave’s Hot Chicken, which was sold for $1 billion; and the experiential dining brand Chain, which he co-founded with actor/comedian B.J. Novak.
Not too shabby.
Davis joined the How Success Happens podcast and shared the methodology for picking winners, which he says really comes down to one metric: organic demand. “I try to be in spaces where I believe that there’s going to be natural growth in the space,” he told Entrepreneur. “You can’t buy demand.”
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