50 Cent stopped by The Katie Show this week and put his charm on Katie Couric while promoting his new book, “Formula 50″, which features fitness tips and nutritional meal plans for both men and women.
During the interview, he shared tidbits about himself like his love for painting his grandmother’s toes, while also dropping gems on why he decided to invest in Vitamin Water, how he became a successful businessman and why it is important for him to meditate every day. He also spoke a little on his relationship with Chelsea Handler and what he would require from his next serious girlfriend.
Catch a few tidbits we learned about 50 below:
His Vitamin Water deal was a result of curiosity and good timing
I was lucky I actually got the concept and idea of wanting to sell water from the supermarket. I just saw spring water that was $2.89 and then went further down the aisle and there was spring water that was .59 cents. And I know if you put both in the same glass, I don’t know which spring it came from. I brought it back to Chris Lighty at the time who was managing me, and we talked about it, and then we found Vitamin Water. It was a private owned company in Queens and they provided stock opportunities for employees for incentives and it was a small company at that point. Because I came in at the right time I was able to have equity in the actual company and when it sold to Coca-Cola for $4.1 billion, it was a big deal.
I had a non-disclosure agreement so I [can’t tell you how much I made], but I will show you all of my teeth. I did really good.
[Quicknote: In 2007 it was reported that 50 Cent made $400 million off of the Vitamin Water deal. It was later reported his earnings were somewhere between $100-150 mil. Still a lot of money.]
He first measured his success by the home he purchased
For me, That home [I bought in Connecticut] was confirmation of success. I grew up in a tiny space in my grandmother’s basement, like I spent a lot of my time sleeping there. When I walked around that house after performing 320 times that year with the ‘Get Rich Or Die Tryin’ Tour’ and they told me I can have this house…I had business managers around me saying that I actually needed that house for taxes and I said okay, I think I like it.
He knows a good team is critical to his success
[I continue to be successful by] not seeing limitations. I just set myself up, I find people that are knowledgeable and responsible people to delegate responsibility because I still have to go out and be 50 cent. You know, I have Harvard graduates working for me.
He meditates daily by asking himself “Who I Am”
I meditate every day and my mantra is I am. I ask myself who I am and it makes me conscious of me in a different way. I say who I am to keep me conscious, I go through my grandparents and I say their names out loud to reflect on how they actually feel about me. I go through their names, I am my mother’s child, my grandparents’ oldest grand child. I run through a list of what’s important to me and then if you run into someone who is negative you know, that that is theirs and it’s not necessarily yours.
He has a lot of respect for Chelsea Handler
Yes [we dated]. I need to be careful what I say about that because with Chelsea, she is a sweetheart. She is as crazy as I am. The conversation and things that she actually says, she has a really strong personality. You have to adapt and be really quick on your feet to respond, or you will just take a beating.
He’s single and the perfect girl would have the flexibility to be wherever he is
Yes. I travel so much on tour but a lot of my free time I spend in Los Angeles because I’m shooting two different television shows on two networks. If I had a girlfriend she would have to come with me.
