Ryan Levesque: from Scrabble tile jewelry to $35 million, and the two deals that died at the last minute
His dad loaded boxes for the Post Office. He quit Wall Street the morning his company's bankruptcy hit the headlines. His first online business taught people to make jewelry from Scrabble tiles. Here is how he got to $35 million, the numbers, and what you can copy.
Overview
Ryan Levesque's dad loaded boxes onto trucks for the US Postal Service. His mom cut hair. Neither went to college. Ryan was the first in his family to go, studying neuroscience and East Asian studies at Brown.
At 10, his grandparents left his mom a little money, and she gave him $5,000 of it. He read every Peter Lynch book and invested it. By 18 it had grown to well over $100,000, and he cashed it out to pay for Brown, months before the dot-com crash.
After college he worked at Goldman Sachs, then AIG, which sent him to China because he spoke Mandarin. He quit the morning a Wall Street Journal headline said AIG was going bankrupt, in 2008, with $100,000 to $200,000 in the bank.
His first business sold tutorials on making jewelry from Scrabble tiles. His second, about orchid care, got to about $500,000 a year. The method behind them became The Ask Method Company.
How it really started
- The headline. 2008, Shanghai. He walked into his AIG office and the Wall Street Journal Asia edition read "AIG to file for bankruptcy." He had dreamed of his own business but was afraid to pull the trigger. That morning was "the kick in the pants" he needed.
- The jewelry idea. His wife spotted pendants selling like crazy on Etsy, made by gluing Scrabble tiles to origami paper. Living in Asia, they had all the origami paper they could want. But making and exporting jewelry from a factory in southern China was a life he did not want, so he said no.
- The twist. A few weeks later she showed him a woman, also named Ryan, who was not selling the jewelry. She was selling tutorials on how to make it. So that is what they did: they sold the know-how, not the product.
- The numbers. About $1,000 the first month, then $2,000, $4,000, $5,000, $9,000.
- The orchids. In Shanghai he filled the apartment with orchids before his wife visited. By the time she arrived, every one had died. "I can't be the only idiot out there who can't keep these things alive." That became Orchids Made Easy, a guide to orchid care, which grew to about $500,000 a year. He calls it his "practice business."
- 23 markets. He tried 23 niches in all, including a memory-training business, learning each time which kinds of markets work.
What did not work
- The Scrabble jewelry business. After climbing to $9,000 a month, "the market fell off a cliff and literally started making nothing at all." It was a fad. He compares it to fidget spinners.
- His own body. At 30, working 100-hour weeks across 23 businesses, a life insurance blood test came back so bad they refused to cover him. His organs were shutting down from undiagnosed Type 1 diabetes. Almost 10 days in the ICU, between a dialysis patient and a cancer patient, while his six-month-old could not visit.
- An expensive mastermind. A program capped at 40 members at $40,000 a year took 6 hours a week, and many members were not using the method. He shut it and replaced it with a bigger, cheaper coaching program.
- Two exits. A $42.5 million deal cut to $17 million at the last minute, and a $70 million offer that died when Russia invaded Ukraine in February 2022.
The move that made his name
Before the book, he used his ask-first method for other companies in exchange for a share of the sales. In golf, he and a partner built an audience of about 10 million golfers that did hundreds of millions of dollars in sales and was sold to NBC and the Golf Channel. It is now called GolfPass.
Timeline
| Year | What happened |
|---|---|
| Age 10 | Gets $5,000, teaches himself investing from Peter Lynch books |
| Age 18 | The $5,000 is now over $100,000. He cashes out to pay for Brown |
| After Brown | Goldman Sachs, then AIG in China |
| 2008 | Quits AIG the morning its bankruptcy hits the news, with $100,000 to $200,000 saved |
| Next | Scrabble tile jewelry tutorials, then an orchid care business at about $500,000 a year |
| Age 30 | Working 100-hour weeks across 23 businesses. Denied life insurance. Ends up in the ICU for 10 days with undiagnosed Type 1 diabetes |
| Since | Writes the book Ask. Builds The Ask Method Company: over $100 million in total sales, seven times on the Inc. 5000 |
| 2020 | A $42.5 million deal gets cut to $17 million at the last minute. He walks away |
| February 2022 | A $70 million offer dies when Russia invades Ukraine and markets freeze |
| Later | Sells to his closest competitor after sending him a WhatsApp voice memo |
| Today | About $35 million, living on a 150-acre farm in Vermont |
The numbers
| Figure | Number |
|---|---|
| Net worth | About $35 million, all liquid |
| His parents' jobs | Postal worker and hairdresser |
| Starting money at 10 | $5,000, grown to over $100,000 by 18 |
| Savings when he quit his job (2008) | $100,000 to $200,000 |
| Orchid care business | About $500,000 a year |
| The Ask Method Company | Over $100 million in total sales |
| Deal that got cut (2020) | From $42.5 million to $17 million |
| Offer that died (2022) | $70 million |
| Earlier exit he was part of | A golf business sold for over $100 million. His share: high six figures |
| The farm | 150 acres, just under $5 million, about $500,000 a year to run |
| Farm output | 48 beehives, over 1,000 maple taps, all the family's meat and sweetener |
How it makes money
The Ask Method Company sold Ryan's method for finding out what customers want by asking them the right questions, then selling them exactly that. It sold courses, software and services to online businesses, reaching over $100 million in total sales.
His early businesses worked the same way: he picked a hobby niche (Scrabble tile jewelry, orchid care), asked the people in it what they struggled with, and sold them the answer.
What they did right
1. He started in tiny niches
Scrabble tile jewelry. Orchid care. Small, specific hobbies where people already wanted help. The orchid one reached about $500,000 a year.
2. He asked before he built
His whole method, and later his book, is about asking customers what they want first. "Emulate before you innovate."
3. He walked away from a bad deal
When private equity cut a $42.5 million deal to $17 million at the last minute, he said no, even though it hurt.
4. He reached out to his competitor
After two deals died, the buyer turned out to be his closest competitor, Daniel Priestley in the UK. One WhatsApp voice memo started it. Three months later he flew to London to sign.
5. He decided what "enough" was
"If I doubled my net worth tomorrow, what would I do? I'd be spending more time with my kids. I'd be writing. I'd live in nature. I can do all of those things right now."
Do what they did: step by step
1. Pick a small niche you can reach.
Ryan started with Scrabble tile jewelry, not "fashion."
Do this: write down five hobbies or jobs where people spend money and ask a lot of questions online. Pick the smallest one you understand.
2. Ask before you build.
Do this: ask 20 people in that niche one question: "What is the hardest part of [the hobby] for you right now?" Write down their exact words.
3. Sell the answer to the most common problem.
Do this: make one simple guide, tutorial or product that solves the top answer, and offer it to the same people.
4. Talk to the people you think of as competitors.
Do this: message one person doing something similar to you. Ask how they got their first customers.
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Sources
- Mixergy, interview with Andrew Warner (2015) and follow-up
- Ryan Levesque, Ask (book)
- Hampton, Moneywise with Daniel Berk, "Ryan Levesque's Net Worth: $35M, Two Dead Exits, And A 150-Acre Farm" (interview and full transcript)
