👋 Good morning. Sorry to say the search for employee of the month has already concluded. But we think you’ll agree with our pick: Splash the otter. Two-year-old Splash is the country’s first search and recovery otter, trained by Michael Hadsell, president of Florida-based Peace River K9 Search and Rescue, to help find people underwater. The tiny hero can hold his breath for five minutes, making him perfectly suited for underwater missions. Plus, he's extremely cute.
NEWS FLASH
🏋️ Who could have seen this coming? The Enhanced Games — a Peter Thiel-backed Olympics-style competition in which athletes are allowed to use performance-enhancing substances — finally happened. Three winners were found not to have used any prohibited substances at all, while a swimmer who supposedly “broke” a world record wore a banned swimming suit, in addition to using drugs, meaning the record will not be recognized by any sporting organization. No other records were broken.
🐟 Faux fish: Vegan seafood startup Oshi raised $3m to expand its business after quadrupling US sales in 2025 and expecting to 4x sales again this year. The startup 3D prints soy protein and mycoprotein into whole cuts of salmon with 18g of protein. The company’s plug-and-play production model reduces costs by 80%, bringing its alt salmon — and soon whitefish — closer to the price of conventional fish, and its product is already available on 100+ restaurant menus and distributed in all 50 states by Sysco.
👚 Fashion sense: You may have heard Shein is acquiring Everlane in a deal worth $100m. The dissonance between the fast-fashion giant and a brand long associated with sustainability has spawned raised eyebrows and think pieces. Here’s an interesting one: Wired’s Louise Matsakis posits the move makes a lot of sense, as the “de minimis” loophole that allowed Chinese brands like Shein and Temu to avoid US tariffs and sell cheap goods is gone, meaning they need a new way to compete — like building or acquiring premium or lifestyle brands.
MORE NEWS TO KNOW
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Shopping spree: Eli Lilly announced it’s buying three companies for nearly $4B total to expand into infectious disease research and development with experimental vaccines for shingles, the Epstein-Barr Virus, and more.
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Ferrari, sans gas: The luxury carmaker unveiled its first electric vehicle, the Luce, a $640k glassy EV that can hit 60mph in under 2.5 seconds with a top speed surpassing 190mph.
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Fit to print: Wells Fargo will write mortgages on and incentivize startup Icon’s 3D-printed homes. Icon also works with Wells Fargo’s philanthropy arm to build communities for people in need.
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Life is sweet: K-pop sensation BTS is releasing a limited-edition Oreo filled with hotteok-flavored creme. Hotteok is a pancake filled with brown sugar, cinnamon, and nuts, popular in South Korea.
30+ CASH COWS
Discover your moneymaker
Some things are always in demand: Tree removal. Mold removal. Junk removal. Check, check, check.
But it’s not all hauling the unseemly. Seize 30+ unsexy business ideas to discover your unexpected calling. Your slow-and-steady cash cow. It’s somewhere on this list.
THE BIG IDEA
The art fair where everything costs $0
Forget free lunch, how about free art?
Zero Art Fair (ZAF) offers an unusual "store-to-own" concept where art lovers can take home artwork for free.
That's right: zip, zero, zilch. Goose egg, even.
The arrangement relieves artists of the costly burden of storage and gets art into households that couldn't otherwise afford it. It also aims to counterbalance the soaring prices created by artificial scarcity in the art world used to justify high prices for a few artists, per Bloomberg.
Like that free lunch, though, strings are attached.
How it works
Founded by artists Jennifer Dalton and William Powhida, ZAF aims to make collecting more accessible and takes inspiration from Mark Bittman's sliding scale restaurant, Community Kitchen.
Launched in 2024 in upstate New York, the fair moved to Manhattan in 2025 to increase accessibility. Free to attend, a three-day public preview is followed by two days when attendees are assigned time slots, with priority given to those who can't afford original art.
Attendees can take home a selected work for $0 — which might retail for anywhere between $400 and $40k — after signing a contract agreeing that:
- For a five-year vesting period, the borrower promises to care for the artwork.
- During that time, the artist can sell the work or borrow it for exhibition.
- If the artist receives an offer, the borrower has right of first refusal and can purchase the work at a prorated discount.
- After five years, ownership transfers to the borrower.
- If the artwork later sells, the artist receives 50% of the sale price and a 10% royalty on any subsequent sales.
Why it works
Most artists create more art than they can sell. Rather than paying for storage or crowding studio space, the artwork finds a loving home. The arrangement also ensures income for the artist if the work resells — money they'd never see from a typical sale.
Dalton and Powhida hope future ZAFs put pressure on the art market to evolve by getting more art into circulation and making fine art more accessible, while also allowing artists to retain a stake in the future value of their work.
Pretty laudable goals for a free lunch.
HIGHLY RECOMMENDED
Did you miss this one?: The little-known inventor of the home pregnancy test tells her story.
NEWSWORTHY NUMBER
How many points participants’ scores on an attention test dropped by for every 10% increase in ultraprocessed foods they ate, according to a new study that found a link between ultraprocessed foods and cognitive decline.
According to researchers, a 10% bump is equivalent to eating a bag of chips, and while that might not sound like much, an afternoon slump isn’t the worst-case outcome — that one guilty pleasure could also increase your long-term risk of dementia by 0.24 points, meaning it might be time to find a new midday snack.
HOW YOU HUSTLE
We don’t need to tell you — our readers are amazing. We wanted to dedicate some real estate to a Hustler building something big.
Who: L P
What: Houstory
The elevator pitch: “Houstory is the data platform that eliminates the Zero Data Decision. We aggregate verified property histories — including litigation, building violations, and real stories from past renters — so people can rent with confidence.”
The problem they’re solving: “We are closing the information void in the rental market. Right now, renting is the only major life decision people make with almost zero data. You see a glossy listing, but you have no access to the history of Class C hazards or a landlord’s litigation track record.”
Origin story: “I had a personal rental nightmare in Brooklyn that left me broke and searching for answers. I realized the housing market had a massive glitch: renters have no data while landlords have everything.”
One truly innovative thing they’re doing: “While other platforms stop at building-level reviews, Houstory drills down to the specific unit… We create a verified record of the actual living experience, not the marketing fluff.”
What are you working on? Tell us here.
AROUND THE WEB
📅 On this day: In 1937, San Francisco’s Golden Gate Bridge opened to ~200k pedestrians before opening the following day to vehicles.
✉️ Haha: A machine that just types, “I hope this email finds you well.”
🗞️ Newsletter: Girlboss Daily delivers career inspo, intel, and a dose of pop culture.
🥛 Useful: A handy guide to the shelf lives of various food and beverages.
🐟 Aww: Fish bridge.
SHOWER THOUGHT
Global screen addiction has probably sent four-leaf clover discoveries off a cliff. SOURCE
Today's email was brought to you by Juliet Bennett Rylah, Danny Jensen, and Singdhi Sokpo.
Editing by: Sara "Zeroing in" Friedman.
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