AI Is Making Small Markets Worth Billions (Here's How to Build One) | Joel Moreau

So I'm, I'm curious, like if you-- Let's just do a thought exercise here because I'm, I've been really like stress testing like vertical defensibility, um, in the AI age really in the last few weeks, and it, and it stemmed from my own exercise, like building my own, um...

I built an industry-specific GPT over the last like two months.

Um, and it te- took a ton of time, but, um, I was able to do it as somebody who hasn't coded in a long, long time, right? [chuckles] And so it, it's really opened my perspective a, a, a little bit, and I'm curious.

So for the thought exercise, let's just say that ChatGPT, Claude, like let's fast-forward three years.

The tool has the, has the ability to where any person anywhere can talk to it and have it build exactly what they want, right? Just by typing or, or talking to it.

So if they're an outfitter, they can just say, "Hey, I need a booking system.

I need it to do XYZ." Now, obviously, that would, to build all of Mallard Bay by just talking to an AI would take probably, you know, days or weeks of time.

It's not an...

Even at the most optimal scenario, I'd assume.

But I'm just curious, like in that world, is your view like as long as we're the ones that, that they can talk to or we're the, we're the AI tool that's already doing all this stuff, or we're at a price point that's low enough where it doesn't even make sense for them to do all that, even if it's very easy, even if it's very little friction, then we're safe, then we can kind of win the market.

Like talk me through that stress test and how you think about it.

Yeah.

I think it's the, it's the question that a lot of other founders in our state or at this building right now are, are questioning or asking themselves, right? And it's what is...

A- as, as the barriers to entry from the tech perspective go down, what is the defensibility or what is the moat of my business, right? And so, you know, and, and just because our own customers aren't the ones out there vibe coding their own solution doesn't mean that there haven't been smaller upstart competitors that are just focused on a very specific part of the market like Hey, we're just building for fly fishing operators in Montana because they have their own unique, uh, unique needs.

And so, you know, for us, I, I would say it's, um, a lot of people are gonna come out with different point solutions to some extent, where someone might come out with something that's a better calendaring system or have feat- feature parity with us for what an outfitter needs to manage their resources, manage their rooms, manage their blinds, manage their team, et cetera.

Um, but it's gonna be really hard to fully match the all-in-one suite where you also have CRM and all the components of that with payments, with all of the kind of more bespoke reporting that's required of an outfitter.

So that's like one thing on, on the tech perspective.

But let's just say that they get to, like, true parity.

Our, our mode is really relationships that we have and, and have built over the last five years with a lot of the outfitter and guides associations, um, with brands in the space, spending all the times at, at, at these trade shows, to where we're beyond just a tac- a tech platform.

We are, you know, an outsourced team or the thought leader in this space to a lot of the outfitters.

I think that's one of it too.

And then three, you have to build in these, you know, network effects into the business that will keep someone beyond, you know, just the, the cost or utility of the software.

So for example, we allow any outfitter in the Mallard Bay network to refer business to other outfitters within the network.

So if I'm a fishing charter in South Louisiana that does tuna fishing, and then there's somebody that really wants to go, you know, tarpon fishing in Florida, you know, I can send that person a referral directly through the platform, 'cause a lot of them have the same customer.

So, you know, as you start to latch on these additional benefits beyond just saving them time or saving them money, uh, a better UI, you have to find other ways to, to latch on benefits like Stripe Capital or the ability to gain more money through referrals or different things like that.