- And y'all might remember my next guest
'cause not long ago, I featured him in one of our
"What I'm Liking" segments and I fell in love with him.
This wonderful man gave all of his employees raises.
Now they're each guaranteed to make at least $70,000 a year.
And that's not all.
He actually cut his own 1.1 million dollar salary
to match his employees' pay.
That, nobody does that.
- [Man] Nobody does that, right?
- Like, what?
Here he is the last time he was on our show, y'all.
- [Dan] And then I realized that a third of the people
at my company that I founded, that I owned
were making less than my friend, Valerie was making.
And that was just heartbreaking for me.
And I felt convicted about it, and I promised to her
on the hike, at the top of a mountain, that I would
find some way to have a 70,000 dollar minimum wage
for everyone at Gravity. (applause)
And a few weeks later, I announced that.
About a third of the people got their pay doubled...
- Okay, we have to have you come on this show and talk
more about this. This is like not long enough, Dan.
You've just made an impact on me and everyone here,
and everyone that's gonna see this show. Thank you so much.
Well, I told him I wanted to meet him in person
and today is the day, y'all.
Please welcome Gravity Payment CEO, Dan Price,
and the woman who inspired him, Rosita Barlow. (applause)
Oh my gosh! Okay, Rosita take us back to where you were
before the raise.
- I was, you know, working at Gravity and I loved it.
I loved the job, but I wasn't making ends meet.
I was barely to be able to cover my expenses.
So I started working at a fast food restaurant full-time,
in addition to working at Gravity,
and even then, I was still kind of struggling.
I was in survival mode at that point.
But I really didn't want Dan to know about it
because I was actually scared I was gonna get fired
for working two jobs.
But, you know, I got offered at the restaurant
to do some training and so I accidentally left the book out
at the office and he saw it,
and he called me into the office,
and I thought I was gonna get fired immediately.
- That's horrible.
- It was. And he came in and he just said,
"You know what is it gonna take
"to have a better work-life balance for yourself?"
"What is it gonna take to quit the other job?"
And he wanted me to think about it,
and so I came back and I gave him a number,
and then he said, "Let me...", you know,
"Give me some time to think about it"
And he came back and he's like, "All right, let's do it."
"We'll give you a raise,
"and...", you know,
"I wanna be able to have a sustainable life for yourself."
"So let's do that."
- That's so thoughtful.
- And he gave me the raise, and I quit the job, and
I mean, I've just been so thankful ever since. (applause)
- Oh my God! That's an unreal story. (applause)
Like this is the second time I'm hearing it
and my mind is still like (makes explosion sound)
that does not happen.
It should though. It's so beautiful.
So, Dan, how did Rosita's story affect you emotionally,
like to where you made that change?
- Well, she's such a hard worker, you know,
and she puts everything into what she does,
and there's so many people out there like that
as I'm learning.
But to see it first hand, to see somebody that is,
unquestionably deserving of a living wage,
deserving of being allowed to have health,
a balanced lifestyle, and enough resources to be able to
just live a good normal life.
You know, she's somebody who inspires me because I
saw she wasn't being provided that
when she, unquestionably deserves to have it.
- Wow. I'll work for you. (laughter)
I'm like, "No boss sounds like that." That's amazing.
- Well, it's a great business decision for us because...
- But you extended it to other, to all your employees.
- We do because we all know how health impacts
how well we do on our jobs and we know that intuitively,
and we bought into this lie, that like,
not having enough money is a character flaw.
It isn't. Actually when you solve those things,
when you make enough to pay your expenses,
to have a good healthy life, you perform better in your job
just like you perform better when you sleep better,
when you eat better, do the things to create
the life that you want
and to be able to make a difference through your work.
- Yeah, a stable, healthy life. (applause)
That is so cool.
And one of my questions was how has it affected,
one, your business, and two, the people at the workplace?
'Cause people that are happier
and sustaining a better lifestyle and something that's good,
especially with children, like, you know,
how has this all affected everything?
- So prior to our 70,000 dollar minimum wage,
people were, of course, a little bit stretched thin.
We had between zero and two babies born per year
at the company prior to that point.
- [Kelly] Wow.
- Since implementing it, we had over 40 babies born
in just over four years.
- People be like, (singing) "We got a raise!"
(laughter and applause)
They're like, "Yes. I can afford a child in diapers."
- Not only that, people are buying homes.
- [Kelly] Oh, I love it.
- We've seen almost a double of our voluntary savings rate
through our company 401K.
All of these programs, where everyone told me,
"Oh everyone's just gonna waste their money.",
that's not true. People have used the money
to make their lives better.
- It boosts the economy. They're spending...yeah, yeah.
- And the company has more than doubled in size.
We have 70% more employees. We're 250%... (applause)
- That's 'cause they've heard about you.
They were like, "Where the, what does he do?"
"I do that too. I wanna do that."
Not long ago, Dan decided to raise all of his employees'
salaries to a minimum of $70,000, cutting his own
1.1 million dollar annual pay in the process.
Crazy and awesome.
It's had a huge impact on all his employees,
including our next guest, Jose Garcia.
Y'all give it up for Jose right now. (applause)
Sporting this rock and roll hair, I love you.
So, how long have you been with Gravity
and how did the raise change your life?
- I've been, I like to round up, so I'll say, six years,
but it's about five and a half.
And the immediate impacts were great.
I got to move into an apartment that was way closer to work.
I went from a 30 to 40 minute commute with traffic,
to a six minute commute with traffic.
- Wow.
- Yeah, it was crazy. Like the immediate effects were great.
I bought trinkets, stuff,
Like, it's just the mental health part that was like,
Oh, I get to do these things that I've been wanting to do.
But the, um, unintended, it might have been unintended,
I don't know. You're smarter than I am, but, (laughter)
the unintended consequences were really
the important ones for me.
'Cause I got to do all sorts of stuff.
I got to take up Jiu Jitsu, I got to
take up kickboxing, rock climbing,
I got to break a finger. (laughter)
- I was gonna say I just noticed your hand.
I'm like, how are you doing?
- [Jose] Jiu Jitsu, yeah, yeah, yeah
- Oh okay.
- [Jose] I got in a fight...
- You're into it.
- I know. I love it. I love it.
- He's blaming the broken hand on me. (laughter)
- Yeah, pretty much. Yeah, it's Danny's fault
pretty much.(laughter)
Yeah, I got to get rid of a car that was 15 years old,
and worrying about is it gonna break down.
- [Kelly] Yeah.
- Going up a hill of snow. Snow was new to me.
I've never dealt with that. So, buying a car, peace of mind.
So the unintended consequences were really,
for me, like the more important ones where I was like,
oh, I didn't realize how much of my,
really like, day-to-day was like, okay cool,
am I going to eat? Or am I going to pay for gas?
- Dude, I remember you'd have to pick.
- [Jose] Yeah, yeah.
- Am I gonna pay this bill or do I want water?
And can I shower at my gym? (laughter)
- Well, thing was Jose was helping
all of our small business clients.
'Cause what we do is kind of boring.
We basically make software that helps small businesses
be able to keep up with Amazon and Starbucks 'cause we...
- That's not boring. That's awesome.
- [Dan] Yeah.
- Well we love little guy and gal small business owner.
That's like what drives us and Jose, during the day,
he's so passionate.
He's helping all these small business owners,
but in the back of his mind, he told me later,
there was this stress.
And so then all of a sudden, you remove that stress,
he can give 100% of our focus and attention
to these small business owners.
- [Kelly] Yeah.
- Since then, he's gotten promoted.
He's changed his jobs. Rosita as well.
So it really opens up that creativity
when you take away the stress.
- Yeah. Amen. I hate stress. Oh my God. (applause)
It's killing us. I just wanna point out once again.
It's like what Principal Christian who's up there said,
"It's opportunity." Opportunity is everything.
It gives you hope.
- The opportunities that Dan has provided me,
I've gotten to do crazy things
that I never would have imagined.
I've gotten to fly to Germany, like speak on behalf
of the company.
I've spoken at Harvard, which is insane.
I'm, uh, I was on a show once. Oh, we're here, right?
- [Kelly] Oh, (laughter) yes! Oh, you're funny.
You got jokes. (laughter) You got jokes.
- Those things of opportunities, you know,
I was this person. I wasn't really anybody.
I was just this kid and the opportunities that
Dan has provided, I feel like I've grown, and I've learned,
and I've gotten to do so many things, so
thank you. I appreciate everything. (applause)
- [Dan] That is so great. (applause)
- And like,
I don't know if y'all can zoom in on this brother, but
he has the cutest freckles in the whole world on his face.
(laughter) With that mohawk and the freckles,
I mean you're every momma's dream. (laughter)
- Jose also has posts on social media,
"What did I do to become like Batman today?"
'cause he's focused on his health. (Kelly laughs)
So every day he posts what he did to become like Batman
and he does the coolest workouts, meditation,
health practices.
- That's so cool. That's so good for you
- It's so inspirational to the whole team.
- Through this, I've been able to drop some weight
from the time that I started.
- [Kelly] And take time for yourself. Self care.
- Absolutely. It was like a hundred something pounds.
It was a little...
- [Kelly] What?
Oh my gosh!
- [Jose] Yeah.
- [Kelly] I love how casual you were about that. (laughter)
That's amazing.
- And those are, like I said, the unintended consequences.
People think of money, and yes it's helpful, but
really these things where it's like,
oh I can do, I could invest in myself, is what's happening.
- Yeah.
- [Jose] Yeah it's pretty great.
- That's amazing. So what is next for your company?
What's next for Gravity?
- Well, for me, I'm focused on being the best son,
brother, uncle that I can be and just like
really trying to connect from a relationship level
- Yeah
- 'Cause, to me, that's what matters.
And, you know, I'm working on myself 'cause like
what's most important to me is to be like a great
husband and father some day and so I'm working on myself...
- Are you saying you're single?
- [Dan] Uh, well.
- Ladies. (laughter) Let me talk to the world right now.
(laughter) You want to be in his presence. You want to
I can't believe that you're single.
- I have work to do on myself, so throughout my...
- Oh my God. You're such a good guy. (laughter)
Thinking inwardly? Like, what?
- Lionel and I wanna be in his presence. (laughter)
- Wait, wait, wait what are you talking about? (laughter)
- Like every woman and gay man out there is like, "Yes."
(laughter)
- Throughout my like teens and throughout my twenties,
I was working 16 hour, 17 hour days building this company.
And so I've had to take a little bit of time
and try to live out a healthy lifestyle myself.
And that's caused me to reflect inward and like
get to the right place.
- You're practicing what you preach.
- Yeah. I'm trying to and so...
- Yeah.
- It looks nice and people always say,
"Oh, best boss in the world" and all these kind of things,
but, you know, all of us have a lot of work to do.
And we all know that.
- Amen.
- We need to be better for each other. That's really
(applause)
- [Kelly] And better to ourselves. (applause) Yeah.
I mean if you need help, we will have you back. (applause)
We have a blind dating segment (laughter)
that you can use my voice chair, I'm just saying.
I will hook you up. (laughter)
- [Kelly] This is amazing.