- Well as the father of three girls,

Erick Goss was faced with the challenge

of finding programming suitable for them.

So he decided to do something about it,

and here's the result.

- [Man] Erick Goss isthe co-founder and CEO

of Minno, a children'sbased digital media company.

As a former Amazon executive,

and now the father of three girls,

Erick understands how challenging it is

for Christian parents to find programming

that reflects their family values.

Minno was created to help fill that void.

Featuring shows like "Superbook,"

"Veggie Tales," "Owlegories,"

and more, Minno providessafe, value-based choices

for the entire family.

The blog Minno Life

provides resources andcommunity for parents,

while the publishing division Minno kids

features books like Phil Vishcher's

"The Laugh And Learn Bible for Kids."

- Well please welcome to "The 700 Club,"

Erick, it's great to have you.

Great what you're doing.

- Gordon, thank you.

- How does an Amazonexecutive turn to this?

What was the motivation?

- Well, I think,

so I left Amazon really 'cause I felt like

the Lord had put a desire on my heart

to really try to build an organization

that would reflect his kingdom.

I loved working at Amazon,

and the high standardsof excellence they had,

but I found

I wasn't able to do what I wanted to do

as a leaders, as a managerfrom a Christian point of view.

And so went to a small company

and had the opportunityto form a media company.

And in the middle of thatactually started working with

Phil Vischer who created "Veggie Tales,"

and in the process of working with him

on a series called "Buck DenverAsked What's in the Bible,"

just recognized that there was a huge need

for Christian parents to be able to

have access to programming,

and not just for parents tohave access to programming,

but for creatives who really

cared about Christian programming,

to have a platform tobe able to deliver that.

Because it was sodifficult when you look at

the history of children's media,

Christian retail played such a major role

in kind of launching products

and creating a modelthat allowed creatives

to be able to bring products to market.

With Christian retialno longer really vital,

there needed to be sort

of a new way to get thoseproperties to market.

But then really also for a place where

parents could discover programming

'cause there's a lot

of great programming that's produced,

but most parents don't know it exists.

- Right.

It's both an information problem,

as well as a funding problem.

So let's look at thefunding problem first,

'cause I think the demiseof Christian retail

has been the rise of the internet

and streaming and those things,

but that creates a business model problem.

How are you solving that problem?

- Yeah, so when we thoughtabout launching Minno

it was really thinking through

okay how could we create a financial model

and scale it because when you think

about digital models,

the best digital models arethe models that grow to scale.

And so we thought probably the best way

to move forward is probablya subscription model.

And so we've got a prescription model.

Today we charge $6.99 a moth

or $69 a year for a subscription.

But the idea is to grow that in such a way

that we can actually builda big enough audience

that there's enoughfinancial value created

that we can actuallyinvest in new programming,

and then ensure the producers

who created programming get paid

for their shows a fair wage.

Because I think so many people today

who care about developing programming

for Christian kids recognize that okay

if I go do that,

I don't know that it'll putmy kids through college,

I don't know if I'll beable to pay a mortgage.

And so we really wantedto create a situation

where we can create an economy

around Christian children's programming.

- Okay.

How are you dealing with awareness?

'Cause there's lots ofgood content available,

but most people seem tobe blissfully unaware

that it's there.

- Yeah, it's really challenging

'cause in one sense theInternet's been great

because we have access to more information

and more resources,

but the reality is there'sreally a couple platforms

that we spend most of our time on.

And those platforms aren't necessarily,

their number one priorityisn't necessarily

getting Christian programming out in front

of Christian parents.

And so it's a battle.

It takes heavy investmentfrom a marketing standpoint.

But things are going well.

So we're growing tripledigits year over year,

and we're seeing tensof thousand subscribers.

And so we're really optimistic.

We have subscribers in over 40 countries,

which we weren't expecting that.

- [Gordon] That's phenomenal.

- Yeah.

So, but there's a huge need.

The key issue is can wecontinue to lean into it

because it's just not easy.

But, we've got a great team,

very experienced,

and we're trying to leverage everything

I learned at Amazon,

and what does it mean to bring that

and deploy it on behalf of the church?

- Okay.

What's your break even point?

When do you declare it's successful,

we're making it, it's going to last?

- Yeah so I think, I think it's early days

so my former employer, Amazon, Jeff Bezos,

always told us it was day one.

And I felt like it was day one

for five to six to seven to 10 years.

- [Gordon] Well he says that today.

- He says that today.

- Still says day one.

- And I would say we're in day one.

I mean the one thing that,

well the name Minno comes from

the Greek word (foreign language),

which means to abide in Christ.

And I've had a lot of sort

of ups and downs since leaving Amazon,

and the one thing I've learned is success

is what the Lord calls success.

And so we want to be obedient.

We want to be faithful

and build the companythat he wants us to build.

Sustainability is a big part of that.

But it's also an issue

of what does the investmentin content look like?

And so there's one senseof can we be profitable?

Can be build a sustainable business?

I absolutely believe that we can.

The key question is howfast does that happen

based on the investment in content?

And so we just launched,

we're just now beginningto look at investments

in original programming

and what we can do tocome alongside producers

to help them bring theirproperties to market.

And so I think we justtake one day at a time.

But do I believe the model can work?

I absolutely believe the model can work.

Key issue is the timing of that

and when do we want it to play out?

- Okay for people thatwant it for their kids

or their grandkids, where do they go?

- So they can go to gominno.com,

that's g-o-m-i-n-n-o.com,

or they can go to the app stores

on Apple, Amazon or Google,

and look for Minno Kids.

We also set up gominno.com/cbn,

where you can type in CBN as a promo code

and get 15% off gift cards.

- [Gordon] All right.