When Mark Zuckerberg isn’t leading a $1.5 trillion company, he’s finding other ways to keep busy, with no less ambition to create a superlative product.
The Meta CEO detailed his hobby of cattle farming in a recent episode of the “Idea Generation” podcast, explaining that he is working to engineer the perfect steak. The project of raising wagyu and angus cattle began in around 2024.
“On the ranch, one of my projects is, I’m trying to create the highest-quality beef in the world,” Zuckerberg said. “It’s like this is very low stakes, right. It’s like, I’m not selling it, but it’s like, I’m very into the genetics of the cattle.”
Zuckerberg began snapping up land on the Kauai island of Hawaii in 2014, now a $300 million property called Ko’olau Ranch. The complex, shrouded in mystery, is at least 2,3000 acres and has garnered controversy for being located on a native burial site, Wired reported last year. The ranch is home to two mansions with a gym and tennis court, as well as guest houses, and a tunnel leading to an underground shelter approximately the size of a basketball court, according to the outlet. Billionaires such as Marc Benioff and Peter Thiel have similarly purchased large compounds on the chain of islands.
A portion of the ranch land’s acreage is for growing macadamia trees for the cattle’s diet. A nutrient-dense food, the nuts are roasted and fed to the cows to add mass to their bodies quickly. To further stimulate the cows’ appetite, Zuckerberg said, he also feeds them beer that he brews and lets the animals choose between drinking room-temperature water and cold beer. Zuckerberg previously noted in 2024 that each cow eats between 5,000 and 10,000 pounds of food each year.
Zuckerberg has long had a fascination with cultivating his own food. Former Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey once recalled Zuckerberg serving him a goat he had killed. Dorsey said it was part of Zuckerberg’s yearlong effort to only eat food he killed himself.
“I’m never gonna stop, like it doesn’t matter how important or whatever the thing is,” Zuckerberg said. “It’s like, yeah, I’ll do some projects that don’t matter that much.”
High steaks, low stakes
For Zuckerberg, the esoteric hobby is part of his larger ethos around work.
“You need to find some balance of different things to work on, because I think when you work on one thing too hard, you can burn it, right? And you can burn the people,” he said.
The CEO admitted he struggles with becoming “obsessive” over his work, but engaging in collaborative projects can combat that feeling. Zuckerberg’s two older daughters have helped him plant trees and tend to the family’s animals. He said one of his daughters have the same propensity to look for creative activities as he does.
“There’s just stuff that you want to put into the world, and that’s how I’m wired,” he said. “So I think it’s important to get time to recharge and relax and make sure that you’re talking to different people, so you have good, varied perspectives, because if you go too deep on one thing for too long, you can kind of dry out the creative energy.”
While Zuckerberg has also counted windsurfing and bow hunting among his hobbies, he’s far from the only billionaire to find elaborate extracurriculars outside of the immediate confines of work. Oracle cofounder Larry Ellison is an avid yacht racer and formed the sailing league SailGP, which is expected to see its first team with a $100 million valuation by the end of this year, according to league CEO and cofounder Sir Russell Coutts. Google cofounder Sergei Brin has personally invested more than $250 million into LTA Research & Exploration, an aviation company with a goal to build airships not just to deliver humanitarian aid, but also serve as a luxury “intercontinental air yacht” for Brin and his loved ones.
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