Doug DeMuro: How A YouTube Car Reviewer Sold His Company For $40M

23:11I mean, at the end of the day, I make YouTube videos for a living. Like I shouldn't be involved in any sort of high eight figure private equity deal. Like that's not where I live, you know, I need people. So they came to us and... And by the way, we hear your fidget spinner or whatever you got there on the mic. There you go. Your G-Wagon. This is a Toyota Megacruiser. We, they came to us and, you know, we had gotten, as you can imagine, we had a lot of people reach out to us. because we had kind of grown and it became clear quickly. And then the car market started to blow up and all these PEVC type firms were like, we got to get in on this.

23:51We got to get on this today. And here's this business that's actually succeeding doing it. And Bring a Trailer had just sold to Hearst. And so all these other companies were like, are we missing something? We got to go. And then, you know, what's out there? We could start it ourselves or this exists. So we are getting a lot of reach outs. But we viewed it as like kind of BS. We were like, we're too small to make this make sense to anybody. and so we kind of ignored them all but the churning group was really persistent and finally they kind of got intro to us through a friend and I thought to myself well I can't say no to this call if it came through a friend I'll just take it and it'll be 10 minutes and I'll hang out and I took it in the car but they told me the most interesting thing I wasn't familiar with the churning group but they told me that they specifically work with creator-led businesses and that was a huge light bulb moment for me because my big fear of working with any PE or VC companies they're going to come in and they're going to say, we got to change this, this, and this on your YouTube channel.

24:42And it's going to look like this now. And this is how it's going to work. And even if it was a big payday for me, I feel like I didn't want to have to explain to someone how YouTube works. You know, like, I just want it. I felt like I could do it better myself. But these guys knew already how it worked. And they were going to be like, your audience, it's already working. This isn't how we don't want to screw with anything. And that was a big moment hearing that they like specialize in this. And so going forward, that just sort of began the conversation. And one thing led to another. They kind of went through, here's how we might do it.

25:12You know, we kind of gave them some basics. They gave us a term sheet and it came to fruition. Were you able to take money off the table or did it go to the business? Yeah, no, I took money off. I bought that career GT and so it was a nice situation for me to be able to do that, especially after a lot, a lot of hard work. And actually in the end, I feel like this is the best time because I got enough money that I can kind of chill a little bit. And I swear there's something nice about that in terms of running and operating a business like this. You make way more money when you have that, like when you could chill a little bit, you know, like the less you want it, the more you get it.

25:47I feel like that's true. Like, I feel like I'm more relaxed. I'm focusing on like myself a little bit more and then I'm in a better mental state to like make better decisions and do more things. And in the end, it's actually been beneficial, even though you would think it would be the opposite. If you're chasing money, you'd work harder. And maybe I did work harder, but I think I'm working better now. Have you ever heard the phrase, treat them mean, keep them keen? So like, I remember when I was like 16, I was like, I was telling someone, I was like, I want to meet, I was telling my friend, a girlfriend, who was like this really pretty girl.

26:19I was like, man, I want to meet more girls. And she goes, you got to treat them mean to keep them keen. You know, the less you want it, the more you're going to get it. And I was like, oh, thank you. Like, and so I tried way less hard and I got way more girls. The same is true with money. I treat them, I treat it mean and I keep it keen. the money comes to me the more that I don't want it that sounds like something an aunt would say no 14 year old is hitting you with that quote when you say I want to meet more girls she was like a neighbor she was in college at the time and I was like man I'm trying to meet these girls I read the book The Game I'm doing all this stuff I'm trying hard and she was like you gotta treat a mate to keep a team she's like you just gotta care less you don't do nothing we're still using that phrase all these years later it's still relevant it's how does this work though like if i'm this may be a question for for mike and those guys at turn in but like you buy a creator-led business creator wants to go chill on the beach now you give them give millions and millions of dollars but you need their face still it's tied to their face is there like a long transition plan where you you it's like blippy where they just changed out the guy a different guy came in and started wearing the stuff on youtube and everyone in the comments is like, hey, that's not Blippi.

27:35What's the plan here? I've done a few podcasts and interviews and all sorts of things after this deal is closed. I think about your question constantly. And you're the first person on one of these who's actually asked it to me. Because, yeah, I think they're nuts. I truly think they're crazy. Best answer. If you really think about it, it's a great idea when it works. And for them, it's worked wonderfully. And I suspect that relates to the diligence they do on the creator. Like they know that I'm not going to do that, right? Because they know me. They got to know me through this process. It took like six, eight months.

28:13And we really got to know each other. And they realized I wasn't about to just bail and go sit on the beach or do something insane, like start saying crazy stuff on Twitter and get canceled, whatever. They knew that. But like, I could. Like I still, if I were them, I'd be terrified. Like they're making massive investments into businesses that have dudes like me who could just go off the rails one day. And I think that is a crazy business model. But they would retort by saying, A, we do the diligence, but also like this is how businesses are going to be. Like creators have these audiences. This is where people want to get their stuff, whatever it is, kitchen products, cars, doesn't matter.

28:51They want to get it from people who they love and who they care about, Mr. Beast Burger, all that stuff. And so if you're going to do it, you got to take that risk. But the benefit is you don't have to spend a lot in paid marketing because the audience is there and they want to be there. And so there's a huge benefit to that, but also a very scary potential drug. We've had Mr. Beast on the pod. We recently did an episode with Danny Austin, who created a hair care brand, basically a scalp brand, also doing really, really well. what creator brands are awesome to you that you think have done a good job and is there any that stand out or you took inspiration from that's a good question you know when we when we launched this when we came up with the idea and launched this in the summer of 19 it wasn't as common like it's having a creator kind of pivot into a brand was like less of a thing a lot of guys were doing a lot of guys i say guys because it was car people but just generally people were doing merge That was a big thing.

29:50And some of them even had lines of products, whatever. But the pivoting of doing this has become more of a thing since then. And so I wouldn't say any of them were necessarily an inspiration. It was more that I was just terrified that I had this giant audience. And if I didn't do something with them, they were going to start to go away eventually. And I had to do something. And so it was more based out of fear and anxiety than being inspired by someone, which is great. But obviously, since then, a lot of others have come. And I give this advice to everybody I know, everybody in this space, all of my car creator friends.

30:23I tell them, like, start a business, start a business, start a business. You never know when your audience is going to go away. Please, like, take your audience right now and start a business. Do something. And they look at me like I'm nuts some of the time because they're like, what do you mean? I'm already traveling five days a week filming and doing all this stuff and editing late at night, doing, you know, writing scripts. How can I start a business on top of that and my answer is like i don't know but you gotta you gotta figure it out because that's the that's the next way to take what you're doing have you seen that i want to ask you about two ideas have you seen have you guys seen um what's it called uh exotic car hacks i think it's called no dude it's just the guy i i think that he's like playing a douche on tv i think he's like trying to be an asshole like his so his whole he's definitely this guy's like a total jerk but he he's got this course i think it's a course i don't know if it's a community or it's a course but you pay a little bit of money and he teaches you how to hack exotic cars which i have not taken it i think what it means is like you buy a car that's like four or five years old usually around the twenty thousand dollar uh or twenty thousand mile range and then you drive it for one year and you could sell it and you have hopefully only you know you you've mostly broke even i think he also has a thing where you can become a licensed dealer, which I don't understand how that works.

31:43But I heard a rumor that he sold the course to PE. Is that true or totally made up? I don't know. I haven't heard that. Have you seen that, Sean? Are you looking at this guy now? But his YouTube banner is like him as a Grand Theft Auto character. So that's solid to start. And then I think you're right. It's basically like learn how to buy, sell, and trade exotic cars for fun and profit. Honestly, it's a good niche. in fact my only criticism of this guy is he doesn't look douchey enough like once you go into the video he's just like a guy wearing like a v-neck he doesn't look like he's just kind of like no dude he's like I watched a video of his like 10 times more jewelry than he's wearing like this guy he needs to piss me off but also make me want him right like that's the trick he was driving a Land Rover Defender and he goes see the problem with the Land Rover defender is my watch is worth five times this defender.

32:42The audio. He's a verbal douche. He goes, even though it looks cool, I can't decide if I'm poor because five of these still wouldn't equal the price of my watch. Well, I think more people should do this. So, Doug, one of the companies I built, we got bought by Twitch. When I was at Twitch, you know, you spend a bunch of time on Twitch and you see what people are doing. And it was like, everybody's kind of doing a very similar thing. It's like, you know, there's two classes of people. There's really good at the game. Three classes, really good at the game. People watch them because they're so awesome at the game.

33:14They guys have no personality. People just like them because their aim is good. Then you have people that are super cute. Hot girls, they do well too. Then you have the third group, which is super likable. Kind of the group you're in, I would say. They're not the most technically good at the game, but they're likable. They're fun. They're called a variety streamer. They stream a bunch of different games to keep it interesting, good fan interaction. And there was one guy that just took it in a whole different direction, this guy Dr. Disrespect. Have you seen him? Yeah, I've heard of him. So he created a whole character.

33:48He comes on and he himself was like a college basketball player, so he's like 6 '8". So he's this huge guy, but he wears this mullet wig. He wears a bulletproof vest, like a red bulletproof vest. He looks like a character from the 80s, and he created his thing, Dr. Disrespect. And then he has his catchphrases, he was basically a wrestling character so he basically was like the rock where he would he had this persona and he had these catchphrases and then everybody in his life became a character his wife became a character like if she would come on the screen like you would never see her only her hand and she would feed him while he was playing like feeding him grapes basically and he would do everything ridiculous and then to add to that he would like go sit courtside at an NBA game but dressed fully as Dr.

34:30Disrespect and that investment of like that$5 ,000 courtside seat was actually really valuable to building this persona, this brand of like, and he always called himself the 1994, 1995, two-time blockbuster, NBA Jam, whatever, like champion. Like he's got these like phrases that he would always go to. Just purposely trying to be hateable. Yeah, just trying to be like, exactly. He created a whole character and he just stayed in character. Like when Floyd Mayweather became Money Mayweather. Exactly. You know, he's like, I'm going full heel. Exactly. But even more, like it was more like wrestling because he's got a costume also, like on top of the whole thing.

35:03and I actually think that for content creators it's surprising you don't see more of this like yeah that's such a good point there are these archetypes like in wrestling you have the faces the good guys you got the heels the guys that are intentionally bad guys that are going to get a big following because you'll love to hate him Floyd Mayweather did this in boxing he was not making any money and he became Floyd Money Mayweather this obnoxious arrogant you know money in your face guy then he started getting really really popular because people wanted to see him lose and there's a guy in the UFC that did the same thing he was basically about to get cut the UFC told him you're too boring we're going to cut you and so that night he went on and he just started saying all this offensive stuff on the microphone against Brazilians and this one fighter and whatever and they were like well now we got to keep him to fight that guy because he just created a feud and he's like this guy just took it to level 10 of being this heel I'm surprised there's not more of this on YouTube you know the best car guy who's doing that right now is this guy whistling diesel have you ever seen his i love whistling diesel i heard that he's a sweetheart by the way there is no car content creator who i like more than whistling diesel i've never met him tell sean tell sean what he does dude it's the it's like mr beast but like for cars and he and he just does things that make people hate him so he buys a ferrari to destroy it and he put it you know you you know you can buy those as an example you know you can buy those garage bubbles.

36:30Like boomers have, you know, they put their old Corvette and them inside their garage. It's like an inflatable bubble that makes sure nobody ever touches the car. He bought one of those for his Ferrari and just started throwing stuff at it. Ladders and shovels and anything. Sledgehammers and stuff. Sledgehammers, saw it to see if it worked. It would off-road the Ferrari. He put giant 20-foot tall wagon wheels on his Tesla. I mean, all sorts of just dumb stuff. And I just am obsessed with it. I'm like, this is the kind of content I wish I was making. how does he how does this guy afford it I assume I assume he's doing the same thing that Mr.

37:05Beast is doing where he's taking basically all of the money that he's pulling in from revenue and from you know placement ad placements and just putting it right back into doing more dumb crap like he dropped the G-Wagon into a house when he was in the G-Wagon I mean everything it's just incredible it's incredible content it's so cool what are some of the titles using$35 ,000 Nike Air Mags as work boots So he bought extremely rare, extremely expensive shoes. That's a great video. Just walking around in the mud with them doing work. There's extreme school bus off-roading. He takes a bus and he's just like flying around.

37:38But it's also number one. So I guess that's a series. I guess there's going to be a lot more of those to come. Driving a Tesla upside down. Pre-lossies 10-foot tall wheels. Okay, I don't even know what that is. That's amazing. But each of these has like 5 to 10 million views. So they're incredible. It's incredible content. and he's just this kid from like Indiana or like rural Pennsylvania. He just, if he wasn't doing this, he'd be like driving a truck, you know? But instead he like decided to become hateful on YouTube and he's killing it. And I love to see people hate him. There is nothing more fun than these people.

38:13That guy's so irresponsible. And it's like, yeah, that's big fun. It's YouTube. Yeah, you're supposed to be irresponsible. It's supposed to be a little bit different. He took like a$250 ,000 G-Wagon and which is like everyone says it's an off-road vehicle but like no one drives a g-wagon off-road and he like you know destroys it like to the point where it's smoking and he just annihilates this g-wagon how much revenue do you think that this guy's channel makes so i want to know if he is if he is putting all of it back into the videos i want to know how much that budget is he's getting 20 million views a month so i suspect he's probably pulling in you know, yeah, one to two million a month.

38:52And then he does ad placements and they must get tons of money because his views get so, his videos get so many views. Wait, at 20 million views a month, you think he's making up worth of two million? It's, I don't know. In his world, I don't know because his audience is, I suspect, very different from mine. My audience doing car reviews is really high dollar content because you're in-market car shoppers And that is a very desirable demographic for advertisers. Whistling Diesel, there's probably a lot of kids. There's probably more foreign audience than mine. So it probably doesn't make as much.

39:25But he's probably doing all right. And plus, he lives in the middle of nowhere in like rural Pennsylvania. So his cost of living is like, he's good. Except for the cararis, he's damaging. What would a good CPM be from AdSense for your YouTube video? That's a good question. I don't remember anymore. I actually calculated CPM in this completely different way because I never understood why it was views, like dollars per thousand views. It never really made sense to me. So I started calculating the number of views I had to get to earn a dollar. And so good for me was a video that broke 100 with the 100 mark.

39:55So less than 100 views to earn a dollar. And there were a lot of videos, especially in December when ad rates were strong, that were pulling in that. That's so funny. That's how you calculated. That actually makes a lot of sense. It makes more sense to me. Yeah, I feel like everything you've told me so far is like um just a guy like sort of using his intuition like like you're just like well like uh like i had a friend that was like i had a friend that would do this he'd be like um you know it like he would keep like his money like instead of like going to a bank setting a bank account and like oh you should invest it he's like no i have three shoe boxes and like shoebox one is spend money and shoebox two is save money and he like created his own bank account in my dorm room.

40:39And he was just like, yeah, like, you know, but you if you're going to move one to this box, you got to put two in the other box. And he's just like, I'm like, dude, I think you're actually just using the normal like personal finance rules, but you just are. But you backed into them. Yeah, you backed into them like a guy, like, you know, like a caveman, like just sort of discovering fire here. That's probably true for me. But I will say like in my view, that's kind of how YouTube was from like 13 to 19. Before like a lot of big businesses started showing up and really maximizing the hell out of everything.

41:09I think it was a lot of people just kind of randomly using intuition to like make decisions. And it was like, okay, that video did well. So I'm going to try this video instead of like really thinking through, okay, the thumbnail should say this at this pixel and all that, which is how a lot of creators do it now. It was a lot of just like, let's give this a shot. And for some people that worked out and those are the people that you end up talking to. And for some people that didn't, and those are the ones who fizzled out. Did you and do you now have a video team? I read somewhere that you were editing up, you were editing them up until Cars and Bids, and then now you just have an editor.

41:42But like, is that true? Or do you have like a booker? Because I know you're on the road, or at least you said one annual wrap up. You're like, I traveled like, you know, most weeks. Yeah, well, when I lived in Philly, I was traveling a ton because of the weather. But now I'm in California, it's gotten a lot easier. Yeah, so it was just me. So I launched the channel in 13. We went to two videos a week in 16. It was just me up until we launched Cars and Bids. The royal we. You're saying we. Yeah, we. I think of my wife as part of this because, boy, has that been a journey for her. But so I launched the channel in 13.

42:14And there have always been kind of people around, friends who helped shoot things, that kind of thing. So there's a we component to that, too. But mostly it was just me. And then in March of 20, when we all launched Cars and Bids, I realized like that week that I was never going to be able to edit another video again. And so I called a guy who had emailed me like a year before, like, hey, do you need an editor? And I was kind of ignore those emails. And I was like, are you still available? And can you start today? And his answer was, yeah. And he's still my editor. It's been now over three years.

42:44He just had a baby. And but now we have more people also because we're going to start doing more content. And so we hired like a video kind of content manager who's going to oversee. I think it's going to be multiple channels. mine, like Carson Bid's channel. And then new creators come in and stuff. And I just don't have the wherewithal of the bandwidth, especially because I want to continue doing what I'm doing. And I just don't really have the ability to also manage a whole thing in addition. Have you guys heard of More Plates, More Dates? Have you known who that is, Doug? No. Alright, so his name's Derek.

43:15He's probably maybe as famous as you, but in the fitness genre. He's like on Joe Rogan and stuff, whatever. And he has a great video. But his video, A, you don't know his last name. You just know it's Derek at More Plates, More Dates. and B, his videos, it's just him on a camera, kind of like you are right now, but it's just a plain white background. It looks like you're just at, like he's in a college dorm or he's just in his house, just goofing around. But his videos get millions and millions of views. And I heard a rumor that now his businesses are making many, many tens of millions a year in revenue.

43:52But the room that he originally started this YouTube video or this YouTube channel, it was just like a like a shitty old apartment when he didn't have a lot of money and they took the wall out of the apartment and he has since moved to a significantly larger very nice home but they try to transpose it so it looks exactly like the old one and that's kind of like what you have to do so like they don't want people to think like oh derek is like killing it now he's unrelatable and that's sort of like i imagine you've kind of lucked into this situation where it's like oh my whole shtick is that like i'm quirky and the videos aren't well edited therefore or I could keep getting bigger and bigger and bigger without doing anything that sophisticated.

44:30There is a component of that. Also, it's worked. So in a sense, I don't really want to change it that much because as much as that is kind of the shtick, it's also been successful. But yeah, one drawback of this, and I think about Jerry Seinfeld a lot when I think about this, Seinfeld's humor is all based on a normal guy doing stuff. He's no longer and hasn't been for decades a normal guy. And I bet it's gotten harder for him to make jokes like, Like, hey, you ever get to the FBO, the private plane, you know, and it's late and you're like, damn, like you can't. So how do you do that? And so for me, I'm like, it hasn't gotten harder, but I do feel sad that like I'm no longer like your neighbor who's like, here's how you should think of this car because here's how I think of this car.

45:12Now I'm a guy who's got, you know, a career GT or a Ford. And it's like, OK, well, maybe he's not quite as, you know, when he talks about supercars being slow, it's like, well, screw this guy, you know, because it's a little bit less relatable. But I still like to think that I'm, you know, in Chris Rock's most recent comedy special, he says I'm rich, but I identify as poor. And I kind of like feel that way to an extent because like this didn't I didn't start this way. Like I still I still wear these stupid clothes because like that's what I wear. It's not like I've like I'm not like wearing like high end stuff.

45:44And then when the camera turns off, like that's just who I am. And so I think to an extent, it's still it's still pretty genuine. By the way, Sean, a Carrera GT, it's like a one point something million dollar car. It's like the car enthusiasts love it. It's like a lot of people's dream car. Doug, but you're the type of guy who like I imagine shows up in a million and a half dollar car wearing cargo shorts, a white t-shirt that's dirty and old new balance. He's got like an average of over three and a half pockets per leg. That's exactly right. I drive it everywhere I go. I wear my stupid shorts and t-shirt.

46:19And like, you can think what you want. I'm driving a career GT song. And I don't know if you've seen this, Sean, but on his videos, the true fans, they'll put stuff at the top of video. Like Doug's the type of guy who licks his finger before he turns the page on his iPad. Like he's got these like - People think I'm like this geeky, like cautious person, which is probably accurate, to be honest. I just love, at the end of the day, people are like the quirks and features thing, what a great idea. Like this wasn't an idea. I really just love like seeing how buttons work in cars. Like that is genuinely, and you know what's funny?

46:54Like I shoot all these videos now for the site, you know, we're selling cars on the site and there are new cars that are gonna have big audiences. And like I show up to film and I like still have this feeling in me every single time shooting an Acura NSX right after this. And I still have this feeling like I'm really excited to see the quirks of this car. Like it's still in my mind after all these years. and so I feel like I'm probably doing the right job. How does it feel to be wealthy now? After grinding out of this for so long? It's better than before. It is definitely nice. Aside from that car, I didn't splurge on anything.

47:33I kind of live a certain life and that's sort of how it's going to be. But it is nice to have a little... I think I am a little bit more anxious about money than a lot of people and it's nice to not have any of that anxiety anymore. And I'll tell you, it came at the perfect time because I just had a boy and it's amazing to be able to detach and just be with him without having to worry about grinding for the next video. Every little dollar that I placed this thing perfectly in this video. It's an amazing sequence of events. Do you think, how big is this business going to get? By the way, Sean, have you seen Bring a Trailer?

48:09It's basically like a blog. I think it is actually, in fact, a WordPress blog. By the way, the whole time we've been doing this interview, I've also just been shopping cars and bids. So I'm like currently like my finger is hovering over this 1994 Toyota Hi-Ace Super Custom Wagon. I can just buy this van for$5 ,000 and I'm very, very tempted to do this. This is a pretty sweet looking van. I don't know why I want this, but I really, really want it. It's awesome. The site's awesome. I'm looking at you have this like three-wheeler of Vanderhall because I was looking at a Morgan three-wheeler. Do I need to close this tab?

48:44Buy or close the tab. Those are my two options. Right. Right. Exactly. That's kind of the fun of it. Well, Brigger Trailer, which was before you guys, it was basically just a blog. I don't know if you know this, Sean, but the guy who started it, his name was, one guy's name was Randy, but the other partner was Gentry Underwood, who started Mailbox. That's that company that sold, I think, for$100 million pre-launch to Dropbox. And I emailed him because he used to have Throttle Yard, which was that for motorcycles. It had all this stuff and I was like, tell me about this business. Bring a trailer.

49:15And he says, it's the hardest slog. It was the hardest thing ever to get going. It took years and years and years. And then I heard a rumor that it sold for many hundreds of millions of dollars. Do you know what it sold for, Doug? I have an idea, but I'm not going to speculate on Randy's business. Was it to private equity or who bought it? Hearst. Hearst Media bought like half of it, is our understanding. Am I often saying that it was probably worth... I think the valuation was in the hundreds of millions, but I don't I don't know exactly how much anybody ended up with or whatever, but they did well.

49:46Randy killed it. They're killing it now. The sale was, by the car business standards, the sale was relatively early in the sense that they sold kind of right before things went crazy in 21. And they and us, I mean, as a function of this market that's been so crazy, have ramped like crazy since then. And so I think the business is worth quite a lot more now, I suspect. What do you think is going to happen with you guys? I mean, do you think like, are you thinking, you know, this is a multi-billion dollar opportunity? I don't know. I honestly, I never thought I'd get here. Don't you have to make it that now?

50:21If you, if you, I think you sold, I don't know what you sold. You sold, it's just a majority, majority for 40 million, which I, you know, that puts the valuation in the 60 to 80 million range. I imagine, I mean, you need like a, I imagine they're looking for like a 500 million plus outcome. I think we'd all be happy at 500 million. And I think that there's a pathway to get there. And frankly, I think Bring a Trailer has shown that. And I think that also the reality of this space is that this is how it's going. The internet made it easier to buy and sell cars. Obviously, it used to be in the newspaper, and that was kind of a disaster with low information on both sides and everything.

50:59And now the internet shows up, Craigslist shows up, that's one thing. And now people are starting to realize that there is significant value in these auction sites because sellers can amplify. they can get you know to a much larger audience than they could on their own website or an auto trader and buyers can get a larger selection frankly than having to visit every single dealer's website and every single whatever or go to physical auctions like me come and those are you know what are you going to show up there you know like that's not realistic for a lot of people this is kind of becoming the new wave so i honestly don't know i think if you had asked randy eight years ago he never would have thought his business would have gotten this big and but this is the market is growing along with these businesses another interesting person in your space who i think that you have a feud with but i don't know why but when sean bought his car i think he d he watched your video and then he dm'd this guy named uh car dealer guy is that what it's called a car dealership guy car dealership guy so basically the story behind this is sean and i have been obsessed with so sean and i are both popular on twitter we've been obsessed with this idea of like, look, there's going to be a billionaire YouTuber.

52:04Mr. Beast at least is getting there. It might be around that. We've seen that happen on Facebook. We've seen billion-dollar companies start on Facebook. We've seen that on Instagram. No one's done it on Twitter, but it will happen. And in particular, we're interested in these guys called the guys. So there's the strip mall guy who talks about investing in strip malls. There's the watch guy who talks about old watches. And we're like, what's going to happen with these quote guys? What are they going to do? And then there's the anonymous car dealer guy. And I think Sean DM'd him asking which car should I buy.

52:38And he told him to get the Cadillac and then he watched your review and then he just wired some guy money and got the Cadillac. What do you think? First of all, I don't know why he needs... I said, I want to buy this car. I'm looking for this car. Can you find it for me and buy it for me and get it to my house? And I don't want to do any work. And he did exactly that. Okay. Here's the... I'll tell you the genesis of the feud and then I'll I'll tell you what I think of that. Here's the thing about success on Twitter. For one of those guys, and I love all those guy tweet Twitters. I think they're all really interesting, including car dealership guy.

53:14But the problem is, in order to be successful on Twitter, and I have a suspicion that this is even more true in the new age of Twitter, you got to be really controversial and you got to be pretty like, I wouldn't say blasphemous, but you got to be like out there with like your takes and your opinions because that amplifies more. And I think Facebook found out years ago that like they can do that, but that doesn't necessarily lead to a great community. And a lot of times there was all this election misinformation or all this fear mongering. And so they like dialed back some of that. And it sounds to me like Twitter right now is actually magnifying it.

53:45Like it seems every crazy take is at the top with all these engagements and that's what they're trying to maximize for. And the problem that I have with car dealership guy is that like his, if you read his posts, some of them are just like the most insane fear mongering stuff you'll ever read. Like the reason we got into the feud was I, he posted like Ford has done this crazy thing. They're going to go out of business. It's going to be the worst thing in the world. And I'm like, this is, this is so insane. And I went into the data of what he was talking about and Ford had to do some big write down on some investment this year.

54:15And so their profits were low and he didn't mention that. He only mentioned that the profits were off 80 % compared to last year. And it was like, maybe a little bit. Or he'll say like, he'll say like a lease, lease. I forget what it's called when you can't pay your lease, but lease delinquency is at this time, which is the highest it's ever been, which means in four months, something like this. Everything is going to blow up. I think the problem I have with all of those guy accounts is precisely that. So I called him out on this Ford thing, and we got into a little tiff, and unfortunately for him, everyone who was replying agreed with me once they saw the data, and so he blocked me.

54:49And then I realized though, I'm not the only person he has blocked. A lot of my card journalist friends who I suspect have also tried to add context at various times, he has blocked them also. And so what I suspect happens is he's like kind of tried to create a little bit of an echo chamber around himself because that's what makes you popular on Twitter now. If you go into somebody's tweets and you see that they have a lot of like, whoa, that's amazing types of replies, they're going to continue to get magnified and get blown out. And I think that people who have a lot of dissent, it starts to become a little bit cloudier.

55:17But if you see somebody as like a real icon where everybody's agreeing with him, then it continues to make him seem more and more like elevated and so I suspect he's blocking all the people who disagree. And so I like the idea of that Twitter account, but I think in order to be popular, I don't even dislike him. I dislike the concept of in order to be popular on Twitter, you kind of have to just keep going controversial and these crazy takes. And that's really the only way to like make it work. And I think that that's less true on the other platforms. Yeah, I think that's true. We have a friend named Nick who owns or part owns an agency that outsources a lot of like assistant, like executive assistant work to the Philippines.

56:01And he'll do these tweets where he brags about paying his workers$5 an hour and how that empowers them and everything like that, which like is or is not true. I imagine it is true, but he says it in such a way where he knows people are going to get angry and share it. And at the bottom of the tweet, he'd be like, by the way, if this actually interests you, you could like sign up here. and so he'll like tweet something that gets like it'll go it goes viral every time like he'll get like you know 50 ,000 likes and like you know three or four or five hundred quotes of like people saying this guy is such a douche can you believe how tone deaf he is whatever and then he'll like text us he goes made 50 grand today exactly that's the problem I have with Twitter at least right now I think it's definitely gone to more of a controversy sells kind of thing you can't just be like a nice dude and do well on Twitter right now you have to have like takes that are controversial and kind of ridiculous in order to get anywhere.

56:54And I'm just, I don't know. It's a shame. I want to ask you one, one last inside baseball question, which was, um, Sean, you probably don't, this probably doesn't entirely interest you, but maybe I think it would for you, Doug, have you noticed that a lot of car museums are nonprofits? So for example, there's like the barber museum in I think Alabama, where, so it's a nonprofit. You can go on and see their financials and everything. And I have a feeling, and this is an interesting tax hack, but I don't know if it's true. I have a feeling what they do is they sell a business, sort of like we've all done, and what you've recently done, Doug.

57:30And they put their money, I think, in some type of donor-advised fund, which is like you can give away a certain amount of money to certified nonprofits and then reduce your tax burden. And I have a feeling what they're doing is they're setting up their car museum as a nonprofit. And like the barber guy, I believe he set up the barber museum after he sold, I think, like a dairy company for like a billion dollars. He had like a milk and dairy business. I have a feeling what they do is they make a big sale, a big equity sale on their business, and they put a certain amount of proceeds into a donor advised fund of which they then put into a nonprofit that they own.

58:08And that's where they go and buy all their cars. And they let people come and see their cars and whatever. I have a feeling that's what's happening. I don't know. I've just been looking around this. I think that's what's happening. There's another guy who I think you had on. His YouTube channel is like, here's my$20 million car collection. He's a young guy that has a tire store. And he keeps saying in his YouTube videos, I buy these cars so everyone can enjoy it. And I have a feeling he's doing the same thing as well. You're talking about Hoovy, I think? Hoovy's Garage? I can't remember. He's in San Diego and he has a tire store.

58:39It's an interesting idea. It's an interesting idea. I think I need a larger exit before I can make that happen. But that is a great place to a great way to justify a vehicle collection. I think it's not that you donate the money. I think you have to donate the asset or your shares to the DAF first. But if you but if you control it and you work in the museum is yours, what do you care? I just asked. I asked Bard, the new Google AI, said, explain how rich people use nonprofit museums. to avoid paying taxes. Here's what it says. It says that a way that rich people use nonprofit museums to avoid paying taxes is to create a donor advised fund, DAF.

59:14A DAF is a charitable giving account. It allows the donors to make a one-time or recurring distribution of cash or appreciated assets and receive an immediate tax deduction. But, so basically, the donor donates art to, like for example, the donor donates art to a museum. They receive an immediate tax deduction for the full appraised value of the art. However, the museum does not have to sell the art and they can instead display it as their own collection. They can avoid paying capital gains on the appreciation of the art. And so I think I've seen this where people basically have a quote-unquote public museum in their backyard.

59:48It's like... And I wonder who dictates what the appraised price... Yeah, what is the monitoring of the price? But also, how many hours does the museum have to be open to justify that? No one's checking on that. Yeah, 45 minutes a year. you. Like, like, could you say that like, because this is Doug's Porsche, it is now worth an additional 20 % increase. You know what I mean? Like, I wonder, I wonder like what the appraised value is, but I had a feeling that's what's happening, which seems like a wonderful hack for Cardinals because you can now, I get, would that mean that your, your purchase price is effectively like 37 % or however, whatever your, your taxes, uh, 50%.

1:00:28I've been to that barber museum and it is quite an operation. And so if that's true, there's probably such a massive spend at the beginning to get, if you do it legally. 50 million, I believe. I went and looked up all his numbers. I think he seed funded it with 40 or something million and it makes around 50 million a year. Man, that's crazy. Nonprofits, you can go and look up all the information. I think there's the Peterson Museum in LA. There's a few other ones and you can actually go and look at all the, you can look at their financials and you could figure out because that was my dream. I was like, if I get a$500 million exit, it would be awesome to have this playground.

1:01:11But yeah, I've already done all the math and looked into all this. That's what we got to do. That's an interesting thing. Never considered it, but will in the future. Well, Doug, we appreciate you coming on. Hopefully you realize I'm legitimately a huge fan. Yeah, I appreciate that. To actually talk to you. and maybe Sean's not exactly a car guy, but maybe he will become one now. I hope you appreciate that I legitimately have only watched one of your videos, but it did lead me to buy a car. So, you know, good job. Enjoy that Escalade. It's going to be great. I will. It's only got a 66 on the Doug score.

1:01:44Now I'm thinking, oh, maybe I should have. No, that's good. The best car ever got like a 73. There's six cars higher than it. And so I'm like, am I the kind of guy who just buys the seventh best car? For like full-size luxury SUVs, I bet it's at the very... It is probably my favorite if you're going to go down that route. That's a bit of a risky car to drive around the Bay Area where everybody else is in electric cars. You're getting like 12 miles per gallon, you know? Oh, yeah, I love it. It's fantastic. I asked him, Doug, I go, so do you have like the self-driving stuff? And he's like, I don't know, do I?

1:02:16And I was like, that's like the whole point of that. That's the whole point. That's the whole point of that Escalade is that it has like... The car you drive for you. Isn't that in the Bay? that's what you want. The point of it is that it fits multiple car seats and has a huge amount of trunk space. That's the point, actually. Yeah, you didn't even know. I'm not trying to self-driving car my kids right now. No, it works well. Cadillac, the system you have in that car is the best system of all. It's better than Tesla self-driving? How is that possible? Absolutely. Unquestionable. It came from Cruise.

1:02:48The Cadillac system lets you be totally hands-off. Tesla's system is not even, and I would say in the top four anymore. But Cadillac system is especially good. It lets you be fully hands-off as long as you want, provided that you're looking ahead. You can be hands-off and you have to be on a mapped road, but that's like every highway. If you're on a mapped road, which is like the five, and you're looking ahead, you can just sit there and... Yeah, but like... I won't give you ideas about stuff you can do, but you don't have to be driving. I know you're the car guy, so let me just... But I am the tech guy and I just don't understand how Cadillac could possibly have better self-driving car software.

1:03:22Because they bought Cruze. they brought your buddy's company uh cruise you know remember remember them you see them in they they bought cruise gm bought cruise gm owns cadillac but cruise is not like cruise was not the top of the top right like that that wasn't they they are some of i mean you'll see cruises in san francisco now you can rent a cruise bro you've seen those cruises at the intersection they don't know what the hell to do at any intersection have you driven around san francisco i wouldn't trust it that's the thing about it the the cadillac supercruise system works best on and mostly only on freeways.

1:03:54I don't even use, because I have a pretty good system. I have a new Mercedes that has a great system too. And I don't use it. Once I get off the freeway, I'm driving myself. And that's true of the Teslas also. They say full self-driving, but we've seen all those, seen those videos where the car, I wouldn't trust it. Off freeway, we're still in a kind of a wild west situation. You didn't look at the Defender, Sean? You weren't a Defender guy? Is that a Marvel movie? I don't even know what you're talking about. The Defenders? What are we talking about here? that's the level right here with sean i dm'd a guy and told him to buy me a car that's the level of research i did i picked you didn't look at anything else you looked at rap videos dude like that was my research what about a minivan did you consider a minivan at all or did i wanted a minivan my preference was a minivan my wife vetoed it because she was like uh because i'm just like cars stress me out nice cars stress me out so i just wanted something i wouldn't be stressed about that was super functional.

1:04:51I was like, what if we just go the other way? What if we just zag here when everybody's zigging and we go get the most functional, most spacious, ugliest minivan that I'm not going to worry about anywhere. I can park it anywhere. I'm just not going to care what happens to this car. And it's just going to be this transport closet for me and my kids' mess. And that's what I was interested in. But my wife was like, cool, we're not doing that. I recommend minivans to everybody now. Everybody with multiple kids. I got a buddy who has three kids and I was just like, you need a van. He's like, what SUV can I get?

1:05:19I was like, you need a van. He was like, oh, I can get three car seats in my car. What's a good minivan for me? The Sienna is the one you want. That's the one everybody gets right now. That's the Toyota Sienna. That's the one you want. Dude, those are so lame. It is ugly and it is slow and it is lame. But if you have, especially three and up children, three numbers, three kids or more, you just have to. Getting car seats into an SUV, it's just... I just want the Crocs version of a car. That is exactly that. But Crocs are cool. Yeah, I'm betting that the minivan will make a Crocs-like comeback.

1:05:52No, you made the right choice with the Escalade, although that's like a$130 ,000 SUV, which kind of defeats the purpose of not worrying about it. Yeah, again, I got overrode. I got vetoed by my wife and had to buy a good car that I do have to worry about a little bit. And what do you own right now, Doug? I didn't know you owned another Mercedes. You have the Defender. My main normal car, I have an E-Class station wagon. So not an AMG. No, just an E450. Plebe. Dude, we had this exit. We had this giant exit. We got all this money. And I went out and bought a used non-AMG E-Class station wagon. That is who I am at heart.

1:06:33No, the real reason I did that is because I love the AMG wagon. But ultimately, I now have a Ford GT, a Carrera GT, and then two crazy convertible SUVs. And my view was, I don't need to be getting seven miles per gallon and doing zero to 60 in three seconds in my daily driver. It's just not, it's, I'm good. I've got cars that can do all that. And so I just bought a regular one. Also, the regular ones are just as fast now as the AMG ones were only a few years ago. So it's fine. It's comfortable. It's just, it's so nice. Do you still drive? I mean, I watched one of your things and you're like, I drove this car cross country six times in the last like two years.

1:07:06Why are you driving cross country versus flying? When the summer we live in Massachusetts. And so I drive all the way across the country every summer and all the way across at the beginning of the fall. Every single year, I've done this now three times. This will be my fourth. I'm leaving in 30 days from today. And it's a whole summer. So you need a car, you need your dog. We have a lot of stuff. And it's just the easiest way to get everything there unless I can afford to fly private, which I cannot. This is that. So by the way, I do the same thing. I spend my summers in New York and my wife flies and me and my dog drive.

1:07:42There you go. No, I found another person who does this. When will you be wealthy enough to fly private, you think? When are you going to feel comfortable? Do you know what it costs? Let me tell you a story. This is probably 30 grand from LA to SF. So this is the thing. We go to Nantucket. So I'm at the poles of the country. San Diego is the extreme Southwest. Nantucket is basically the extreme Northeast. So I generally fly first class now. That is one of the splurges that I do. And so a first class ticket across the country is a thousand bucks or whatever. And I'm like, thousand bucks, this is great.

1:08:15And I thought to myself, if I'm flying first class for a thousand bucks, I bet I can fly private for like, you know, three, four thousand. I bet that's what it costs. This was me of naive Doug thinking, hey, it's probably only a few grand more. You know what? How much more could it be? And the answer is, I looked it up,$55 ,000 direct from San Diego to Nantucket. And so the answer to your question, when will I be able to fly private? Never. my dog and I will always pile into the car and end up refueling at these sketchy gas stations in New Mexico and Oklahoma that will be our lives for years how often are people recognizing you on these road trips at gas stations all the time I imagine no it's rare on the trips and I'm like obsessive about getting there quickly like I just go I don't ever stop and like look at people or chat but in life like yeah all the time obviously and it's always nice.

1:09:07It's always good interactions with people. Well, dude, this is awesome. We appreciate you. Thanks for coming on, man. You want to shout anything out where people should find you or where to reach you or whatever? Cars and bids. No, we've talked about it. People will figure it out. Well, dude, thanks for doing this, man. Yeah. We'll pimp out your Twitter, YouTube channel, Cars and Bids, and you're the best, man. I've been a fan for years. It's awesome to finally talk. I appreciate it. Thank you for having me. And congrats on all the success, even though you've been at it for I've never seen Sam like this.

1:09:37He is just fawning. He can't stop. He's just like, listen, man, if you want to carpool cross country sometime, I'd love our dogs can sit in the back. We can sit in the front. It'll be amazing. Yeah, you need a friend? I got a friend. I'll be your friend if you need one. Glad to have you on the pod. Glad that we're friends now, right? Would that be fair to say? Would that be a reach or would that be okay? No. Sam, I'm legitimately, I'm thrilled to find someone else who does this drive and we should be in contact about that at the very least. I have become like a student of this guy. Oh, contact day.

1:10:08Yeah, yeah. We can start there.

1:10:13I'm happy to start there. We can do that. The funniest thing, by the way, Doug, we just did a live show in Austin and Sam is the opposite of this when someone's a big fan of Sam. They know everything about him. They've been a fan for years, been following him. They've kind of fallen over him. Huge turn off to Sam. But when it's somebody, he does the exact same thing to other people. this is hilarious to me. I had this happen to me. I met Jerry Seinfeld like a year ago. And Jerry tells me that he watches all my videos. And at this point, I've had people coming up to me on the street for a year.

1:10:48I've had some of the interactions go great, some of them don't. And I know exactly what to say, what I'm expecting someone to say to have it go great. And I meet Jerry and he's like, I watch all your videos. And I'm like, uh, uh, uh, do you like Porsches? I can't believe I've screwed this up after having so much

1:11:12Well, by the way, I know we keep like, we tried wrapping this up and then we kept going, so I just want to acknowledge that because I actually do kind of want to hear about this Jay Leno, I don't know if you know about this Sean, but Jay Leno's like the car guy doesn't he have like four or five airplane hangers? What was that like? Oh, I've been there now three or four times. It is incredible. Yeah, he's got like four. One of them might be an airplane hangar, but it's mostly just like buildings. It's like in an office park. It's next to an airport, but they're not. But anyway, they're giant buildings.

1:11:43Yeah, I would say maybe six of them. One is just like a machine shop. It's incredible. I mean, his collection is truly unbelievable. One of the coolest things I'll ever see. Oh, yeah. Hundreds of millions. You think so? Well, he's got a McLaren F1. That in itself is probably worth$40 ,000, maybe$50 ,000 at this point. A McLaren F1 is worth$40 or$50 million now? Wow. Yeah. That's pretty crazy. Yeah. His is like a one-owner car. He's out of 25 years. He told me he paid$800 for it. Or$700. That's insane to me. Yeah. Isn't that the car Elon had that he crashed? Have you seen a, Sean, do you know what weather tech is?

1:12:22It's like you buy a car and you get the mats, which is like one of those businesses like Yeti where you're like, there's no way a cooler company is going to be big. It turns out this thing is just massive. And the reason you know it's massive is I think it's privately owned, but they sponsor all this stuff, which you have to have a big budget for. But the owner bought a Ferrari 250, what's called a GTO for$80 million, which is like, I think the most expensive car sale ever. And that's how you know this company is killing it, that the owner of the privately held company has enough cash to spend on an$80 million car that's just going to sit, you know, it's ridiculous.

1:12:58I mean, it's like a crazy thing. And so Jay has one that's worth 40 or 50. That's got to be in the top 10 of like most valuable cars. Oh yeah, yeah, for sure. And by far the most valuable like modern car. And he told me the most unbelievable story about this car that he bought it, he paid 600 and he told me he's driving through LA. There's only 64 of them. He's driving through LA and he sees another one. Was he driving it? This was when he had bought it and he's driving through LA and he sees another one. So this is 97, 98. He sees another one just street parked in front of a house. And he's like, what?

1:13:29And so he goes up and rings the doorbell and meets the guy. And he says hi to the guy. They exchange info. We both got McLaren F1s in LA. And he told me that the guy calls him a year later and says, Jay, you'll never believe it. I sold mine. And I got$800 ,000. I made 200 grand. And Jay's like, I think I'm going to hang on to mine a little longer. And now it's worth 40. And that's a lesson in regret. who's going to buy a$40 million car? I mean, how many people in the world do you think would do that? Are there only like a thousand people? I reviewed Jay's and I asked him, and I had to cut this out of the video because it was quite an interesting segment.

1:14:03But like I asked him, I was like, what do you think of the other owners of this car? And he thought for a long time and gave a very measured response. And I thought to myself, like, reading between the lines, what he was trying to say is there are a bunch of jerks who have money. They're not car enthusiasts. Like that car has become the type of thing you buy if you just want like a trophy rather than if you actually care about cars. Whereas when it was 600, 800 grand, there were enough car people who could afford it that maybe they'd get into the mechanics and do the work themselves, which Jay values very heavily.

1:14:35But now it's just a bunch of rich guys who want to brag. And that's why he doesn't own Ferrari because in order to buy the fancy Ferrari, you have to buy an entry-level Ferrari and you get on a wait list and they like release them like a Rolex almost. And he's like, nah, fuck that. Even though I'm a rich guy, I'm a man of the people. I'm not getting on a wait list to buy a million dollar car. There's got to be 75 cars in that, maybe 100 cars in that collection and not one Ferrari. That's insane. How many people can afford a$40 million F1 or a McLaren? Nobody. And the ones who can, servicing it is a nightmare.

1:15:08It's done on some like MS-DOS based. I mean, the whole thing is like a total mess. But it's the coolest thing in the world, you know? And if you're a rich guy and you have all the rich guy cars like the Carrera GT and the F40, you're not a really rich guy unless you've got a McLaren F1. Then you don't even need the other cars. You're just like, yeah, I win. Where do you keep your... How much is your monthly insurance for a million dollar Porsche? Not as much as you'd think. I think it's only a thousand a month to insure that car. Do you even drive it? Do you drive it on a Friday night or once a month?

1:15:43I take it to Cars and Coffee once a week, basically. But other than that, my wife still hasn't even ridden in it. Like, it's just, it's not something I'm, I've driven it a thousand miles since I bought it four months ago, which is actually pretty good. But like, it's a terrifying thing to drive a car that's worth a million dollars. Like anybody could hit you and then it's like, okay, well, this is not going to be good for anybody. Like that person bankrupt now because their insurance limit is way below this. And my insurer is going to sue them. And like the whole thing is just, it's just a scary.

1:16:12I love driving it. I truly believe it's the greatest. Are you happy you own that car? It sounds like might be not so fun to own that car. No, no. When I take it out, which is very rare, but when I take it out on early mornings before people are up, when it's still cool and I can take it into the mountains and like really enjoy it, which I've done now three or four times, then it is so rewarding and so incredible. And I truly, truly believe that it is, and I've driven them all, the greatest driving car that has ever been made. And so like to that extent, it's worth it for sure. Okay. And that's insane.

1:16:42This is actually the end of the podcast now. All right. That's it, Sam. Sam, he's not going to be your bestie. He's not going to be your best friend. Yeah. Yeah. Give it time, bro. Give it time. It takes time. We'll build a relationship. I've already got this planned out. It's going to work out. Sam's going to happen to be in your town next week. Oh, hey, I'm just in town. I was hoping we could hang. I flew out here for this. Oh, you're not in LA? You're in San Diego? I'll be there tomorrow. I'm going to be there tomorrow, too.

1:17:15Thanks Doug we appreciate it Yeah thanks guys

1:17:37Alright this episode is brought to you by Mercury They are the finance platform of choice for over 200 ,000 companies. Shouldn't be surprised because I use it myself for not one, not two, but I have eight different Mercury accounts. I have seven for different companies that I'm a part of and then I have my own personal account because now they have personal banking, which is a really cool feature. I highly, highly recommend it. Like I said, I use it myself. And the reason why is because the way that Mercury works is beautiful. It's very intuitive and you could tell that it's actually made by a startup founder.

1:18:05It's an entrepreneur. You could tell it's made by somebody who used other banking products in the past and didn't like all the different rough edges and annoyances and decided to actually fix it himself. And really any type of entrepreneur you are, let's say you're an agency, well, one of the things every agency has to do is be able to send invoices, easily create them, send them to customers and stay current on your balances with all your customers. Well, you can do that inside Mercury. And so I think that Mercury is great. Highly recommend you check it out. And thank you for sponsoring the show.

1:18:30For more information, check out mercury.com. Mercury is a financial technology company, not a bank. Check show notes for details.