What's on tap on this episode of The Chad & Cheese Podcast Does Europe? Munich-based company Personio has laid off 101 employees, constituting 5% of its workforce, to strengthen its market position and advance its product roadmap. The layoffs primarily affected the technology and product departments.
The move follows Personio's valuation at $8.5 billion, and the boys discuss the trend of venture capital and private equity focusing on headcount growth, emphasizing the importance of revenue. They predict more layoffs from other unicorns that have received substantial funding. The discussion also touches on the IPO plans for Personio and the challenges faced by companies expanding to the US, citing the example of VONQ.
The podcast later features a "Who'd You Rather" segment comparing two companies, HireAra and Poetry HR, and their recent funding rounds. The hosts share their preferences, highlighting the significance of the founders in their decision-making.
The episode concludes with a discussion on Amazon's French arm being fined over 27 million pounds for implementing an intrusive surveillance system to monitor staff performance. The hosts express varying opinions on the impact of the fine and the ongoing global conversation about workplace monitoring and employee privacy.
Looking to attend House of HR's E-recruitment Congress in March? Use CODE CP51000 and get 50% OFF when you register at https://www.erecruitment-congress.com
TRANSCRIPTION SPONSORED BY: Disability Solutions partners with our clients to build best-in-class inclusion programs and reach qualified, talented individuals with disabilities of every skill, education, and experience level.
[music]
Intro: Hide your kids. Lock the doors. You're listening to HR's Most Dangerous Podcast. Chad Sowash and Joel Cheesman are here to punch the recruiting industry right where it hurts. Complete with breaking news, brash opinion, and loads of snark. Buckle up, boys and girls. It's time for the Chad and Cheese Podcast.
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Joel: Ooohhhh, yeah. Three guys who feel totally violated by all the European privacy laws, and we kinda like it. You're listening to the Chad and Cheese Podcast Does Europe. I'm your co-host, Joel "Jamison" Cheesman.
Chad: I'm Chad "How many did they sell?" Sowash.
Lieven: And I'm Lieven "Stressed until the congress" Van Nieuwenhuyze.
[laughter]
Joel: And on this episode, Personio Gets Laid, Who'd You Rather, and Amazon's excessive intrusiveness. Let's do this.
Chad: Dude, that's laid off. That's, the laid. That's laid off.
Joel: Oh. I read that headline wrong. Oh. Oh, dammit.
Chad: It's okay.
Joel: 'Cause those Germans get nuts. Those Germans get out of control. I know it. I know.
Chad: That's what I've heard.
Joel: I've seen the Oktoberfest videos on TikTok.
[laughter]
Joel: Lieven, have you been to Oktoberfest?
Lieven: Not yet. But I'm definitely going to do it.
Joel: What? No.
Lieven: I'm definitely going someday. I've never been to the real one. In Munich, never.
Joel: That's it. We're recording an episode at some point in Oktoberfest, at Oktoberfest.
Chad: There's no reason not to.
[laughter]
Chad: There's no reason not to.
Lieven: We should.
Chad: We're manifesting it right now.
Joel: That's right.
Chad: We're gonna make it happen.
Joel: And sponsored by Personio at this point. They don't know it yet...
[laughter]
Joel: But they're gonna be sponsoring our trip to Oktoberfest.
Chad: They don't have to know it. They don't have to know.
Joel: They don't have to know. [laughter]
Chad: It's all good. It's all good. Yeah.
Joel: So Lieven's been busy. I'd say we get right to his shoutout 'cause he's got a tight schedule with this conference coming up. Lieven, what's going on?
Lieven: Do you know how much work it is to organize a congress?
Joel: No clue.
Chad: I do.
Joel: Chad does know. Chad knows.
Lieven: If you ever feel about maybe getting into organizing congresses, just forget about it and do something else.
[laughter]
Lieven: But I think everything now is more or less okay.
Joel: What's Rika gonna say when she hears that?
[laughter]
Lieven: Hi, Rika.
[laughter]
Lieven: Hi, Rika. How are you?
[laughter]
Lieven: I don't know. She'll say, "It's your job and get on it," or something.
Chad: "And get it done." Yes.
Lieven: "Get it done and don't complain, don't whine." Something like that.
[laughter]
Lieven: That's Rika.
Joel: That sounds like Rika.
Lieven: But we still love her. Oh, well, so the congress, it's still March 19th. Everything is okay by now. The registrations are coming in. I saw something about, was it UNLEASH who were boasting to have 900 people?
Chad: RecFest. Yeah. Yeah.
Lieven: RecFest. It was RecFest. I'm sorry. Registering even before the website was up or something. We have 300 already. It's almost the same thing. It's almost the same thing.
Joel: Intimacy...
Chad: 'Cause you've got 750 seats only, that's correct?
Lieven: Yeah, that's right. So they'll be filled. Yeah.
Chad: Okay. Yep. And they can be filled at half price if you go to chadcheese.com/events.
Joel: Oh yeah.
Lieven: That's right.
Chad: Up in the header, you're gonna see a beautiful E-recruitment Congress. It's gonna be nice. It's gonna be lovely, it's gonna be beautiful. There's gonna be a registration button. Just hit the registration button, use the discount code that'll be right there. And next thing you know, kids, half off.
Joel: So sexy.
Lieven: And I would prefer to sell all those seats for the full price. But...
[laughter]
Lieven: If you really, really insist, you can use the promo you'll find on the Chad and Cheese website.
[laughter]
Lieven: Anyway. Sorry, Rika. Sorry. They made me do it.
Chad: Yeah, we did.
Joel: Love some Rika. Love some Rika. What do you got, Chad, for shout-outs?
Chad: Oh, baby. You know what time it is.
Joel: Oh, no.
Chad: Shout-out time for Wrexham. Shout-out time for Wrexham. [laughter]
Joel: Gee, a Wrexham shout-out from Chad, shocker.
Chad: If you listen to the show, you know I love me some Wrexham, you know I love me some Welcome to Wrexham. Although, Wrexham sells more than Arsenal. That's right, kids. Arsenal, in the USA. And from my understanding, Arthur Okonkwo, who is the newest keeper for Wrexham, is one of the biggest selling jerseys. So, big shout-out to Wrexham. Europe, there's one thing that America can do better than anybody else in the world. That's...
Joel: Buy shit. [chuckle]
Chad: Productize and monetize. Productize and monetize, and that's exactly what we did. So shout-out to Wrexham and the Premier League.
Joel: And shout-out secondarily to China who sponsors Wrexham with TikTok, who clearly is probably amping the algorithm to sell more TikTok jerseys. I mean, Wrexham jerseys...
[laughter]
Joel: In the United States. That's a good one, Chad. Are you gonna make it to Wrexham this year? You have it in your schedule, right? You're gonna make it to Wrexham?
Chad: I am right now planning, after RecFest, to be able to shoot up to Wrexham and hopefully catch a match. If not catch a match, I'll have to take a look at schedules. At least just check out the place, for God's sakes. Have a beer around the stadium.
Joel: I have a sneaking suspicion that you won't be the only American walking around in Wrexham this time of year thanks to the...
Chad: Yeah. With a Wrexham jersey on. Yeah.
Joel: Yeah. Thanks to the success of the show. I feel like there'll be a few Americans there. Well, my shout-out goes out to no Americans whatsoever. The Six Nations rugby tournament is happening as we record this podcast.
Chad: What is this?
Joel: So this is great. This, to our American friends and anyone else that it's probably available to, Netflix now has a documentary on Six Nations. They look at last year's tournament, they highlight each team, they highlight the best players from those teams and the coaches. And it's a real nice introductory to rugby and the Six Nations, and the countries and the personalities around it. I, for one, kind of interested in this. Ireland is a juggernaut that is looking to be a back-to-back Grand Slam champion, which has never been done apparently. They just beat France 38-17, and France is arguably the second best team. Scotland had a big comeback win this past weekend. So there's good stuff here. It's not quite as accessible in America television-wise as I would like it to be. But it is a cool deal. These countries get really fired up, as they normally do. They don't go to war anymore. They play rugby and soccer. And this is a great way to, I don't know, experience the passion around beating each other up on a rugby field because they can't do it on a battlefield. So, shout-out from me to the Six Nations rugby tournament.
Chad: And then also Netflix 'cause Netflix is putting out some amazing global content. They just put out a limited series around the World Cup. Soccer, our... As you will know in Europe, is football, and focused on captains. It's entitled Captains. Following Messi, Ronaldo, all the big captains. They're doing some amazing, amazing work in being able to get that divide, across the divide for rugby, football/soccer, etcetera, etcetera.
Joel: And don't forget, they just signed the WWE contract to show that on. So between that, and there's also a NASCAR documentary, we're really, really exporting Americanism to the rest of the world, thanks to Netflix.
Chad: Thank God for Six Nations.
[laughter]
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Chad: Topics.
Joel: All right. Let's get right to the news, everybody. Munich-based Personio has laid off 101 employees constituting 5% of its workforce, primarily from its technology and product departments. They said the move is a strategic decision to strengthen its position in the market and advance its product roadmap. In case you missed it, Personio valued at $8.5 billion specializes in providing recruitment services to SMEs and they operate in multiple locations globally, serving over 10,000 clients across Europe with a workforce of 2100 employees. Chad, what are your thoughts on the Personio headcount reduction?
Chad: We've seen over the years that VC and PE really focus on headcount growth after they give out the money. They wanna see heads, they wanna see butts in seats to be able to demonstrate success. I know that, you're gonna need people to drive innovation and product. But when a lot of these unicorn companies get crazy amounts of cash, they are expected, they are expected, by VC and PE to just flush headcount growth. This is what the end result becomes in many cases. Then we look at the founder, we point our finger at the founder, say, "Why did you do this? This is ridiculous." It is, but they are at the whims, in many cases, of PE and VC. At the end of the day, this shouldn't be a surprise. And we're gonna see a lot more of this from other unicorns, which we have already, but we'll see more, that had to... They had to go down the same road. They had to, they were told to.
S?: Doesn't anyone notice this? I feel like I'm taking crazy pills.
Joel: Let me give you three letters on my commentary. I...
Chad: Oh, Jesus Christ.
Joel: P and O. These guys were talking about IPO a year ago in '23 of January. And it's now a year later and they've been, still been talking about IPO. We released a while back Coming to America. They've opened up an office in New York city. They continue to grow their headcount in Europe. And they need to cut some costs, if they're going to go IPO. They need to add a little bit to the bottomline. Like Chad mentioned, they are not yet profitable even after raising $724 million. Cutting headcount is a great way to boost the bottomline and look great on Wall Street. I think that's a big part of the move to lay off a fairly modest 5% of your workforce. I think the second thing to point out is that, most of the people laid off were in the technology and product departments.
Joel: I have to wonder, as Meta stock goes up 20% in Mark Zuckerberg's year of efficiency, if there's not a lot of pressure from investors to say, "Hey, do we really need that much in the way of technology and product?" And that pressure is coming down on everyone and Personio is part of that. They probably overhired in '22 and '23 in the tech and product department. They are now making a change to balance that out by laying off more tech and product people. And as a side note, I think we're gonna see a lot more companies laying off their tech and product people, thanks to Mark Zuckerberg and Facebook's/Meta's year of efficiency. Time will tell if '24 is the year that we see the Personio IPO. But I think this headcount reduction is a sign that they still are on track for a 2024 IPO.
Lieven: Could be, could be. But I think I read somewhere that they are planning on hiring 150 new profiles, so they're laying off 100 persons, but they are hiring more. I don't think it's budget cuts, could be. But I think when a company is growing, when they're evolving, at a certain point, they'll need different specialties and they'll need all skills than they used to need. Sometimes you can reskill people and you can have them grow with you, but sometimes those people just don't want to or they can't be reskilled. And sometimes it's just good to have new blood in the company. So I don't think it's that's weird to have 5% of your people laid off. Now, it's drastic because it's all at once. But there's a normal turnaround, 5% isn't that much. And it still sucks, of course, for the people getting laid off. It's always a blow. That didn't really strike me as something unexpected or anything. I do have a problem though, with valuation of eight billion for a company that still isn't profitable. It's absurd. There are so many companies making decent amounts of money that could use a bit of extra cash to grow even faster. But probably someone knows something I don't and they're happily investing and continue, continuously doing so. Is it known, by the way, what revenue they have? I couldn't find it immediately.
Joel: Yeah, AIM Group reported they're not a profitable company yet. So wherever they got it from, we don't know revenues.
Lieven: But they could have a lot of revenue, but maybe their costs are even higher. I don't know. But I'm not sure about the revenue. If the revenue was growing fast, then it would make sense to give them a real big valuation because maybe in two years they would become very profitable. Like Tesla did, for example. They've been burning money for years and suddenly they're making cash like water. But I don't think this is the case here, but I'm not sure. So for me, I don't know, whatever.
Joel: I think Chad and I talked on the weekly show about VONQ, successful European company coming to America, hiring top talent and getting a team around that is by all accounts a great team. Wheels come off, talent leaves, laid off, that did not work out for VONQ. So as Personio looks to come to America, I hope they listen to that episode and look at VONQ as an example of knowing how difficult it is for a European company to come to America. I don't know where those additional staff came from, but they're gonna have to hire people in America, and hopefully for them they do it right because it has gone very wrong for many companies in Europe that are trying to come to America.
Chad: Yeah. I wanna say your prediction in 2024 of no IPO, I don't see this happening in 2024. I think they're getting ready for 2025. I don't think as many people look at Zuckerberg as you'd like to think that they do, or Elon Musk. I think if they want to use them as an excuse to do something, maybe, but that's not why they're doing it. And at the end of the day, also, you're talking about the cycles, Lieven. And I agree 100%. You've got a cycle of the type of talent that you need in an organization. And we've gotta remember, these guys are still somewhat of a startup. They've got a shit ton of cash, they're a startup. And the cycle is, you build the product, and then you have that MVP and then you go to market. Well, a lot of these companies who got a shit ton of cash, after they did the MVP, they didn't turn on the revenue jets and focus on, "Okay, the product's built to an MVP level. Now let's go sell the shit out of it, get into a revenue generating cycle, and then start to build more features and whatnot later." I think a lot of these unicorns, unfortunately, they don't follow that normal cycle. And this is what we're seeing happens. PE forces headcount, headcount growth, and then also you see that they skip a few steps because they got so much fucking cash.
Joel: There are probably one or two Facebook shareholders that would disagree with your sentiment on Mark Zuckerberg.
[laughter]
Joel: Let's take a quick break and we'll play a little game of Who'd You Rather. All right, guys, it's that time again. We all know how to play a little, Who'd You Rather. In case you don't know, we talk about two companies that have recently raised money and each of us sounds off on who we'd rather.
S?: What are you doing, stepbro?
[chuckle]
Joel: All right. In one corner we have, London-based HireAra has raised €527,000 in seed funding for its AI-powered candidate presentation platform designed for recruitment agencies. The platform enables recruiters to showcase their brand and candidates effectively to hiring clients, thereby expediting the placement of candidates in new roles. The seed funding will support the expansion of HireAra's sales team, introduce two new content products in 2024, and advance its mission to modernize the recruitment industry. That is HireAra. And in the opposing corner, we have...
S?: Welcome to All Things Scottish. Our slogan is, "If it's not Scottish, it's crap!"
Joel: That's right. It's Glasgow-based Poetry HR. They've successfully concluded an early stage funding round to accelerate their mission of providing talent acquisition and recruitment process outsourcing solutions to the US and UK markets. The funding will be utilized to expand the product and technology team, as well as to promote the company's 30 generative AI-powered recruiter enablement solutions through marketing campaigns. The co-founder and director and friend of the show, Adam Gordon, has also founded Candidate.ID, which was acquired by iCIMS. The startup touts over 280 companies as users. Investors in the round include Recruiting Ventures, Doug Berg, and some asshole name Chad Sowash. So, guys, that is our two...
[laughter]
Joel: That is our two competing companies. Chad, you are commenting on why you're investing, but not exclusive... We're just gonna guess that you're gonna rather do Poetry.
Chad: Oh yeah. Duh. Yeah.
Joel: Please feel free to not because it'd make for a great show. But otherwise...
[laughter]
Joel: Let's go to you in terms of who'd you rather, and why'd you invest in Poetry HR?
Chad: Yeah. In advising founders over the years, one of the things that we've talked on the show, Firing Squad after Firing Squad is, always bet on the jockey. And there are two amazing jockeys at Poetry. You've got Adam Gordon and you've got Mike Hughes. And I was with them, an investor and also an advisor with Candidate.ID. And not only did they blow that one out of the water from an expectation standpoint, they were able to switch and go directly into something that we've been talking about for years. The recruiter desktop is a fucking mess. There are 27,000 tabs that they have open. They've got 30 different platforms they have to use, yada, yada, yada. And Joel and I, you and I have been talking about the platform to rule them all for, shit, about seven years now.
Chad: At this point, the platform to rule them all is not going to exist. What's going to exist is the recruiter desktop that allows the enablement of pretty much all these systems in one screen, or at least the connectivity between that, and then being able to use AI to create that efficiency. So, two things. We've got these amazing founders who I already have experience with. And it's 2:00 AM in the bar, you're definitely going to go to the hot blonde that you already know. And then secondarily, they've got a road of success in the space, they've got connections and they know exactly where they want to go to be able to look for an exit. Which is one of the reasons why I love these guys, I'm incredibly biased, but definitely Poetry all day.
S?: Ay, papi.
Joel: Just for the record, the girls that I knew I had a less chance of with than the girls I didn't know...
[laughter]
Joel: 'Cause they knew what a jerk I was. The best companies are ones that typically become time machines. In other words, they give you time back, they save you time 'cause time is money. So if I can save you time, then you're more willing or more able or more likely to use my product than if you have to actually invest more time in your day to use the product. And frankly, that's a big problem with a lot of products in our space, is they require more time and energy to figure them out than they do save you time. Both of these services make a really hard sell to how much time they're going to save you. And if you go to HireAra's site, there's literally a calculator where you can put in your recs and your employees and put in the numbers, and it'll spit out exactly how much time you'll be saving with the product. Which is kind of cool, I like the ROI calculator. Poetry on the other hand, exclusively, or not exclusively, but they highlight extensively that they will save recruiters 31 minutes per day by using their products. So they've actually, I don't know how Adam came up, it sounds like some Scottish math to me, but I don't know how they got so granular that they can say...
[laughter]
Joel: 31 minutes. I'm surprised he didn't throw in like 22 seconds or something to make it more exact. So both these companies are looking to save you time. To me, this comes down to the jockey. I'll echo Chad's sentiments. Adam has a great reputation, at least out of Scotland. Within Scotland, I don't know, he's a little sketchy and shady. But outside of Scotland, I think he's a solid dude. He's got a track record. He has done a fantastic job of branding himself, as well as his organizations within the industry. He'll talk about, like, "Hey, when I'm starting a company, I'm wearing a kilt, I'm going to these crazy Firing Squad things and being nutty," because he knows how to sell a product and that's going to translate into more than likely selling this product in six months to a year, maybe a little longer for a better price. But he's in the pole position to sell his thing. So jockey-wise, Poetry is head and shoulders, I think, above the founders of HireAra. In terms of the product, for me, there's just not much of a moat to say, "Here's a CV and we're gonna translate it into a cute branded, maybe highlighted or kind of a TL;DR version of the resume and then sell that as a staffing firm."
Joel: I don't see a ton of value there, and I don't see a ton of a moat where other people can't do that in a pretty quick and easy way. Particularly with AI the way that it is, to be able to take content and put it in a format that is more easily readable by your customers, I don't see a big moat there. In contrast, Poetry, more of a moat. They have competition. They're probably gonna see more. But I feel like there's more of an emotional connection because if I build my tools within Poetry, I have a connection there, it's personal. To me, it feels warm and fuzzy, it feels... The connection is there, and it's real. Both companies are priced pretty similarly. I don't feel like it's a... Both of these guys will probably be acquired at some point. The staffing space in the UK is really competitive and people are spending money there as well. But for me, as much as it pains me to give Adam Gordon more pub...
[laughter]
Joel: I'm gonna go with Poetry as my Who'd You Rather. Congratulations, Adam. Lieven?
Lieven: Cool. Did I get it right? Adam Gordon didn't only invest in Poetry, but also in HireAra.
S?: Say what?
Chad: That's great. So they both are looking for an exit. [laughter]
Lieven: I guess so. And Adam Gordon says about HireAra, "I've invested in HireAra because I can see that our technology is a logical adoption for every agency big and small, and that it can save thousands, blah, blah, blah." But... And they're quoting him, so it must be true. Anyways, when I was doing my homework, I said, "Okay, if Adam Gordon, my favorite Scotsman... "
S?: Welcome to All Things Scottish. Our slogan is, "If it's not Scottish, it's crap!"
Lieven: There's one even... Whatever. He's investing in HireAra, that must be doing something good. But then I heard about Poetry and he's even launching it. So, I think I'll go for both.
[laughter]
Lieven: Yeah. Just like Adam did.
[laughter]
[music]
Joel: That's right, he went for two, he went for the boats and the hoes. Everybody, that is another episode of, Who'd You Rather. Looks like Poetry is poetry in motion. All right. Let's go to a company that is not so much Chad's favorite company, Amazon. Well, France's data watchdog has fined Amazon's French arm over £27 million or €35 million, wherever you're listening from, for implementing "excessively intrusive surveillance system to monitor staff performance." The system included indicators tracking employees inactivity time and the speed of scanning items deemed illegal and excessive by investigators. Amazon disagrees with the fine and will probably appeal, asserting the necessity of industry-standard warehouse management systems for safety, quality, and efficiency. Critics say the broader context highlights the ongoing global conversation on the balance between workplace monitoring and employee privacy. Chad, what are your thoughts on Amazon getting pinched in France?
Chad: I get the safety concerns. If that was the case, maybe they would slow down the belt a little bit and not force some of their employees to piss in garbage cans when they're on the line. It's a little bit of a balance here. They're trying to tiptoe around the tulips. I don't see any employee wanting to be monitored, whether it's a monitoring system that's on their computer or in a warehouse. But at the end of the day, especially in Europe, this is not going to fly. If they want these practices to work, they're just gonna have to use them in the US because we'll allow that shit all day. So I think in Europe, they need to have a much different business model and being able to ensure that their "safety" is actually happening versus the US.
Joel: We talked recently about Google in South Korea, and Google behaving like an American company in Korea, which has led to people not leaving the office and just doing what Americans would not do.
Chad: They were requested to resign. They were requested to resign. [laughter]
Joel: Yes, requested to resign. Yeah. Go see the episode if you wanna hear about this. But my point is that, Americans coming to foreign countries, behaving like American companies and then thinking that people will behave in a similar way is now biting Amazon in the ass, just like it has Google and Facebook and others.
[laughter]
Joel: America, yeah, we're cool with peeing in trash cans. We're cool with monitor... We expect monitoring.
Chad: No, we're not.
Joel: Well...
[laughter]
Joel: We do it. And Amazon is still making a lot of money, and my wife is still ordering from Amazon. So, it does work from that perspective. You can't go to Europe and expect things to go the way that they do in America. The question for me is, is a 35 million euro fine a big deal to Amazon? No, it's not. But... They'll tweak their shit in France and try to get around as much as they can by still keeping. They'll appeal, like they said, they'll draw this thing out. Will other countries that Amazon is in in Europe also file suit? Probably. Is it built in to Amazon's budget? Probably. Are things really gonna change in any significant way? Not today, not tomorrow, maybe 10 years from now. But as far as I can see, this is Amazon playing the American game of, "Let's go to the courts and let's string this thing out. And if there is a fine, well, we'll just go to the couch cushions and find the money, write a check," and it's business as usual, full steam ahead for companies as big as Amazon.
Lieven: I've been following the company since 2015 and it's been a whole series of stories about wrongdoing to their own employees, and it's been that way for, I guess, even longer than I've been following them. They're called a low price and low wage giant, and I've got a problem with that. If their owner is the richest man in the world, then you should grant your own colleagues something as well. And I guess the board gets lots of money and the top management gets lots of money. But I was told, I'm not sure if it's still the case, but it was definitely a few years ago, in Germany, if you wanted to work at Amazon in the warehouses, so the lowest pay jobs, you had to do a tryout, which wasn't paid for weeks, and then you might be accepted, or maybe you weren't accepted and now you didn't get any pay at all. And this is called slavery, I feel.
[laughter]
Lieven: So, I've got a problem with it. But I'm not sure if it's still the case, and I'm not going to look into it, but...
Joel: You can still quit your job and work somewhere else in Europe, right?
Lieven: Of course. But the problem is with the people working in those warehouses, they don't have that many options. Those are mostly refugees, people fleeing from some situation which was even worse. They arrive in Germany and the only job they are easily accepted for a free tryout is at Amazon.
Chad: It sounds like internships here in the US. To Joel's point is, 35... The fine was nothing. But you've gotta remember, after Google was fined $2.4 billion in 2017, they started thinking twice. I think France is not a country you wanna fuck with. There are many European countries you do not wanna fuck with when it comes to fining. And I think what's gonna happen is, this is gonna be a slap on the wrist, it continues to happen, they're gonna go after a percentage of sales, and when that happens, then that will actually change the whole behavior of how Amazon starts treating this particular topic. They're still gonna screw people over in a million different ways, but in this topic, they will change, but they're gonna have to be forced to change. And I don't think playing chicken with France who is known to be the nation of rebellion, for God's sakes, that's the smart way to go.
Joel: Lieven, we're gonna let you get back to work, because you've got...
[laughter]
Joel: A congress to prepare for.
Lieven: Yeah. Yeah. Yes, Rika. Yes, Rika. I'm coming.
[laughter]
Joel: Boys, another one is in the can. We out.
Chad: We out.
Lieven: We out.
Outro: Wow. Look at you, you made it through an entire episode of the Chad and Cheese Podcast, or maybe you cheated and fast-forwarded to the end. Either way, there is no doubt you wish you had that time back. Valuable time you could have used to buy a nutritious meal at Taco Bell. Enjoy a pour of your favorite whiskey, or just watch big-booty Latinas and bug fights on TikTok. No, you hung out with these two chuckleheads instead. Now, go take a shower and wash off all the guilt. But save some soap because you'll be back. Like an awful trainwreck, you can't look away. And like Chad's favorite Western, you can't quit them either. We out.