Welcome to Half Baked, the newsletter serving up startup ideas as noteworthy as Brex getting acquired for $5B 🤯
In today’s edition:
💡 A timely fix for 70 million Americans
🛠 Using the decoy effect to price your SaaS product
🔋 From film festival frustration to a $470M AI video empire + more
🔍 OpenAI's $50B Middle East tour, ElevenLabs’ AI album + more
🍻 A product that’s answering the call
P.S: We’re looking for some contributors to work directly with us on the newsletter. More details here if you’re interested!
Let’s goooo 🚀
💻 MacBook Giveaway: We're teaming up with Wispr Flow (the incredible voice dictation product) this week to give away a MacBook to one of our readers.
In order to enter simply:
Download Wispr Flow for free (if you're already a user, let us know!)
Reply to this email with what you're building right now
Good luck this week!
😴 Sleep Pouches
Rest assured.
Available domain: lull.co
The Problem: We've all been there. Lying in bed at 1am, exhausted but wired, watching the ceiling while your brain replays every embarrassing thing you've ever said. You know you need sleep. You have a big day tomorrow. But your mind just won't switch off. So you reach for your sleep aid of choice - melatonin gummies, maybe some sketchy sleeping pill? Well if that’s you…you’re not alone. 70 million Americans struggle with chronic sleep issues and most sleep aids leave a lot to be desired, whether they’re too strong or take too long to kick in. People don't want to be knocked unconscious, they want to wind down naturally and wake up feeling human. It’s time to create a product that does exactly that. Here's what we're thinking.
The Solution:
💡 The Idea: A sublingual sleep pouch with melatonin and calming adaptogens that helps you wind down naturally.
🛠️ Product:
Pop a pouch between your lip and gum 20 minutes before bed - the sublingual delivery bypasses digestion and gets ingredients into your bloodstream in minutes, not an hour
Each pouch contains a science-backed stack: microdosed melatonin (0.3mg), L-Theanine, magnesium glycinate, and apigenin (the chamomile extract Andrew Huberman keeps talking about)
No sugar, no water needed, no grogginess - just a calming ritual that signals to your brain it's time to power down
🧑💻 Prototyping: Check out the landing page | Get the landing page prompt
💼 Business Model: DTC subscription at $39/month for a 30-pouch tin.
⭐ End Goal: Exit to a CPG giant like Nestlé Health Science or a sleep-tech company like Eight Sleep looking to expand into consumables. 4-6x revenue multiple.
Rate this idea
🗣️ Using ChatGPT 4x Faster with Wispr Flow
This is Darragh. Darragh never stops talking. But not to us, no...to ChatGPT. That's because Darragh uses Wispr Flow to supercharge his ChatGPT workflow.
How it works:
He presses and holds the spacebar to dictate his prompt to ChatGPT
Wispr Flow instantly converts his natural speech into text, auto-editing out filler words or mistakes
He hits enter
He also uses Wispr Flow across countless other apps, like Slack, Notion, Gmail. It works everywhere.
🎯 Using the Decoy Effect to Price Your SaaS Business
The Context: Ever wonder why pricing pages always have three tiers? It's not random - it's psychology. The decoy effect has been used by everyone from The Economist to Apple to nudge customers toward higher-priced plans. Dan Ariely found it can boost revenue by 30% from the same number of sales. Here’s how it works.
Step-by-step:
Identify your "target" plan - the tier you actually want most customers to choose, usually your mid or premium option.
Create a decoy priced close to your target but with significantly less value - if Pro is $49/month with 100 users, make the decoy $44/month with only 20 users.
Position the decoy right next to your target on the pricing page so customers naturally compare the two and see your target as the obvious win.
A/B test with and without the decoy to measure the lift.
Give it a try!
🧠 What if your browser actually thought ahead?
Neo summarizes pages instantly, organizes your tabs automatically, and helps you write anywhere - all with security built into its DNA. It's what Chrome would be if it were built today.
Smarter. Safer. Simpler.
🔋 Founder Fuel
🤑 The Money Shot: This duo turned film festival frustration into a $470M AI Video Empire. Here’s how.
📈 Trends with Benefits: The “Great SaaS Meltdown" appears to be upon us (if Chamath is to be believed). He could well be right…
💬 Prompt Drop: Here are 25 AI prompts to help SaaS founders to move faster.
🆓 Free Resource: The State of SaaS 2025 report from Avenir just dropped, and it’s packed with benchmarks on growth rates, churn, and what separates top SaaS businesses from the rest.
💵 Deal of the Day: Get up to $350,000 in cloud credits through the Google for Startups Cloud Program.
🔍 Founder Finds
💰 OpenAI is raising $50B at up to an $830B valuation from Middle Eastern sovereign wealth funds.
🎵 ElevenLabs just dropped The Eleven Album, an AI-generated album featuring Liza Minnelli and Art Garfunkel. Wild times.
🦸♂ Jensen Huang has an incredibly unique management style. This article breaks it down.
🔥 Tanay Kothari (Wispr founder) shared the 7 product principles he learned after 3 pivots and almost shutting down before raising $81M.
🎯 Paul Graham just went viral for advising startups to prioritize revenue over fundraising. As usual, he’s right.
🍺 Drunk Business Idea: Finger Phone
Tired of fumbling for your phone to answer a call? Wish you could answer calls like a secret agent?
Introducing Sgnl™, the smartwatch strap that transmits phone calls through your hands directly to your fingertip. Just stick your finger in your ear and start talking. Finally, a valid excuse to stick your fingers in your ear.
Sgnl™ - talk through the hand.
Vote
👋 That’s All Folks!
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See you soon,