Matty Benedetto is the creator behind Unnecessary Inventions who has amassed millions of followers across just about every social media network. These inventions are what Matty describes as unique solves to first world problems, and they range from a pair of glasses with built-in sponges that soak up tears to a funnel that catches falling ingredients from a burrito and neatly sorts it into a taco below. It’s these unique solves that have kept folks returning again and again to Matty’s video content for that last five years. In this first episode of my new video series, Full Frame: Creators, that profiles internet creators I spend a whole day with Matty to figure out how he makes his inventions and how he makes a living from posting about them.
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00:00Alright, welcome to the Verge's gear closet, which is in a perpetual state of ruin.
00:07Okay, so today I am packing my bag to go see Matty Benedetto.
00:11He is the inventor and creator behind Unnecessary Inventions.
00:15So the whole idea behind Matty's content is that he's an inventor who creates products to solve first-world problems.
00:20I invented the Burrito Bumper, the food funnel for sloppy burritos that catches your fallen fillings and carefully crafts a secondary taco for you
00:28And even though Matty's inventions aren't actually for sale, he's created a business just posting about them.
00:34And this has paved the way to a lot of brand deals, a Super Bowl commercial with Captain Morgan, and even TV appearances.
00:44I'm Becca, welcome to my creator focus series where I go spend a day with a creator that I really admire and figure out how
00:50they do what they do and why they do what they do.
00:52This is the Unnecessary Inventions story.
00:55And I think I packed too much gear.
00:58Oh my god!
01:02Matty's studio is in the heart of Burlington, Vermont.
01:05It was once a Gap store, but now 3D printers hum, churning out pieces for new inventions, and shelves sit full of collector's items.
01:13It feels like a museum filled with all of the coolest trinkets from the internet.
01:20I wanted to hang out with Matty because he's a rare creator whose content hasn't really changed since he started being a creator.
01:27Yet his business and his audience has continued to grow.
01:31So I started Unnecessary Inventions in March of 2019.
01:35It was probably like 10 inventions in that, like, I was only posting them on Reddit.
01:39I'm like, every single one I've posted has made it to the front page.
01:42Like, I've got something here.
01:44So that's when I sort of transitioned over to Instagram to just sort of try and create my own audience.
01:48His first inventions were presented on Instagram and Reddit as photos with written descriptions about what they did.
01:55I could make this thing and be like, it does this, this, this, this, this and this, you know, and I didn't have to actually film the video.
02:00So it was a little easier to have like a crazy cadence of getting them out.
02:04It was about September of 2019.
02:06So like seven-ish months later from first starting, I got my first brand deal.
02:11And the agency was like, so what's your rate?
02:13And I'm like, I have no idea what my rate is.
02:16And I gave them a number.
02:17They're like, you're worth more.
02:18We're going to double it.
02:19And I was like, OK, I've got a baseline now.
02:21There are many ways to make a living as a creator from crowdfunding to selling merch.
02:26But Matty makes a majority of his money via brand deals and AdSense revenue.
02:30AdSense is a program that puts ads before content and pays creators a small share of that ad revenue.
02:36And a brand deal is a partnership between a company and a creator that compensates the creator for promoting a product or a brand.
02:43So, for example, a few months ago, Apple reached out to Matty asking him to make a social video for his audience showing how he makes his inventions.
02:51The deal was that Matty would design the invention using a Mac, which he normally does anyway.
02:56And here's what that video looked like when it was finished.
02:58I invented the credit card roulette machine.
03:00And in collaboration with Apple, I'm going to show you how I built it on my Mac.
03:03To get started, you basically have regular rudimentary shapes.
03:06And then I'm able to tweak all of the little dimensions as we go along.
03:10Matty didn't feel comfortable sharing numbers, but for a creator of his scale and a company as large as Apple, a partnership like this can pay tens of thousands of dollars.
03:19And then the day that I was with him, Matty was making his other form of content, one of his classic I invented social videos using the credit card roulette machine.
03:27This video, it doesn't have a brand behind it, but it will hopefully generate AdSense revenue, gather more followers and maybe catch the attention of a brand that may want to partner.
03:36But this is the genius of Matty's business.
03:38Both his preparation of creating an unnecessary invention and the demoing of how the invention works make for content that generates revenue for his channel.
03:47And more importantly, both can easily be paired with a brand.
03:51But while I watched Matty work, I noticed that his creative process was much more chaotic than his business strategy.
04:02OK, shot one done.
04:04Matty edits his videos as he's shooting them.
04:07There's barely a script and absolutely no shot list.
04:10I'm a very big doer.
04:12I don't think, OK, what's step one I have to do?
04:14Step two, I have to do.
04:15I'm like, OK, let's go to step five and just like start doing it.
04:19And that's what works with Unnecessary is that like, I don't think like, OK, well, why wouldn't it work?
04:24You know, it's like I just think of idea in my brain.
04:28How do I make that a reality?
04:30Using a Sony ZV-E1 and an M3 Max MacBook Pro, Matty takes endless trips between his invention and his camera setup and his desk and his editing software.
04:40He would film a bit.
04:42Fully missed it.
04:45And then edit a bit.
04:47I invented the credit card machine, the easiest way.
04:51And then film a bit more.
04:52Which way?
04:53Oh, yeah, I did this one afterwards.
04:55And then edit a bit more.
04:56The entirety of the bill.
04:59Good luck and don't fuck it up.
05:03That could be gone.
05:04Well, we'll see.
05:07Watching Matty work was very comforting because this is how I work as well.
05:12It's certainly not the most streamlined process and there's a lot of trial and error involved.
05:17But I have found that as a creator, it allows me the most control over an edit.
05:21Every shot can be perfect.
05:26OK, that's enough to go back and start editing.
05:31From start to finish, this I invented social video took a little over an hour.
05:35Then Matty airdropped the video to his phone and we went to lunch where he began posting everything.
05:42Chips, dessert.
05:45Doing one last check, making sure something isn't wrong.
05:49Can't hear the audio, though, so we'll see how the audio is messed up.
05:53First comment.
05:54Audio sucks.
05:57That's a good gift for the cover.
05:58Oh, it's so perfect.
06:01On Instagram, I'll do like the exact video script and post it as the video script.
06:07TikTok, I'll do something else.
06:09Let's hope it was a payday.
06:10If you randomly get selected.
06:14Post.
06:16And we're uploading.
06:18Oh, my God, it's me.
06:25So now we get it up on Instagram and share.
06:31Now we got to keep going on to YouTube shorts and upload short.
06:37Three out of.
06:40We'll get Twitter, Snapchat and LinkedIn.
06:45Got to get LinkedIn 15 minutes in.
06:50We're just over 40,000 on Instagram.
06:52That's good.
06:53But then while reading comments on this short, I learned what was maybe the most interesting part about Matty's process.
06:59Engineering it for the comment section as well is like definitely a part of the way that I like to think about when I am
07:05inventing and designing the different products.
07:08Step one, get five friends.
07:11It's not necessarily the things I make, but it's like the way I make them that make people either mad in the comments or mess with people's brains and not necessarily like the thing itself.
07:22So it's like little Easter eggs I had in it.
07:24The most successful one was a Tic-Tac holster I made.
07:28So it was like to get rid of the rattle in a Tic-Tac canister.
07:32So you like put it in and had individual cells that you put all the Tic-Tacs in, had 16 on each side.
07:38And so I was like, oh, so if I do that right, that's 36 Tic-Tacs.
07:41And I think there's I think it's up to 20,000 comments on YouTube of people telling me it's 32 and not 36.
07:47No matter what, you got to give people their little moment to be right.
07:52Before I left for the day, there was one more thing Matty had to do.
07:55There's a very small storefront for rent just up the street from his studio that recently caught his eye.
08:00What's up?
08:01Good.
08:02Here it is.
08:04Just small enough that it feels like I should do something with it.
08:08For Matty, this little space could be the next step in Unnecessary Inventions' evolution.
08:13I want things to be more in real life that like I've done all of this stuff over the past five years on the Internet and having whether it's like some crazy in-person experience, but just like taking the essence of what I do and maybe applying it to different
08:31places and different things that aren't on the Internet.
08:34I was about to say some of the ideas, but I don't want to let them out just in case someone takes them.
08:39So that's the Unnecessary Inventions story.
08:42And I think what has stuck with me the most after spending a whole day with Matty and spending a whole lot of time in the edit is that for someone who has built such a rich presence online full of imaginary ideas, what Matty wants next is actually something that's far more rooted in reality.
08:59It's interesting.
08:59I'm Becca. This was the very first episode of my new Creator Focus series.
09:03I hope you liked it. Please let me know down below.
09:05And also let me know who you want me to profile next.
09:08Appreciate you so much. I'll see you in the next one.
09:10So we have a Arduino here hooked up to this button moves this motor in a randomized motion.
09:17And we've got this bumper here.
09:19So then as it spins around, it raises each card depending on which one is selected.