Anthony Kennedy Shriver & Best Buddies International: The World's Top Special Needs Support Network

24:23I think they do. Do they work harder? I think they do. And as a kind of consistent with the spirit of Coke and Coke sells happiness and joy. That's what they're trying to do with our organization. And they're hiring people with intellectual disabilities. So, you know, I think it's you just got to keep in mind, no matter whether it's one of the great brands, whether it's Rolex or Coke or whoever. I think, you know, best buddies has a role and helping them build their culture of caring, culture of inclusion, a culture of purpose. And I think when we are able to do that, everybody wins. Man, every time I want to say something like the word inclusivity, you take it from me, man.

25:03We're on the same wavelength. Yeah, there you go. Yeah. I mean, you know, it's part of it is because I understand. Right. And I'm not coming into it completely oblivious to what that type of partnership can bring to a culture shift of inclusiveness. So it's, you know, to me, when we touched on it, you mentioned it, but you didn't really go into it to the cycling, right? I love it because you have all these different, you know, like you said, revenue sources, but activities to bring inclusion and culture building for both brands, right? and to bring the gratitude and the experience for the buddies.

25:43But also, you're bringing a physical element to it as well. So you're promoting health at the same time. Can you talk about the cycling? Yeah. I mean, I think what we try to do is, as I quote it, and then we have a bunch of different assets, right? And we can sell these assets to whoever the customer is. And if our customer is a person with intellectual disabilities, we have employment opportunities for them. If they want to live and have a good, inclusive five-star housing, we can sell that to them. If you're an avid cyclist, we have all these cycling adventures all over the United States, cycling camps.

26:17We have walks. We do 78 walks we did in 2025. So if you want to come out free, if you don't want to raise any money or you don't want to get a T-shirt, you can show up, walk, participate, play, listen to music, the whole nine yards, and be involved in the walk. You want to play pickleball? You can come play pickleball at one of our pickleball events. You want to play tennis? You can come play tennis. You know, you want to have your kid involved and get paired up with a person with intellectual disabilities? They can start a program at their school if we don't have a mentoring program at their school.

26:49So, again, trying to have a menu of different opportunities for people in ways that they can participate and get engaged, despite what their level of interest is or what they want to do. So if you're a cyclist, you can come and you can hammer and ride 25, 28 miles an hour, have the best time with people that have won the Tour de France and, you know, rub shoulders with some of the greatest cyclists in the world or some of the greatest football players in the world or basketball players in the world. And you can get involved and you can raise money at the same time and have a great, healthy experience and eat good food and have camaraderie and learn about, you know, our mission.

27:31you may have come because you love to cycle and you want to participate in a best buddies challenge and ride a hundred miles from central park into the hudson valley or you want to ride a hundred miles in miami or northern california or in boston and that may have what got you there because you're passionate about cycling but then we have you there right so we get the horse to the well and then we got to sell them so when we get them there we got to turn them on they got to meet one of our participants they got to hear one of our participants you know give a speech they got to I hear one of them sing the national anthem, you know, play the piano.

28:03And then, you know, we have that chance to sell them on our mission. And then, yeah, maybe they came for cycling or maybe they came as they wanted to meet Tom Brady or Cindy Crawford. You know, but boom, we get them there. Then we've got our job to do. We've got to sell them on Best Buddies. We've got to sell them on our mission. And then we hope we keep them and turn them into a long-term supporter. So I think, you know, we have these Best Buddies challenges. The cycling component probably raises$15 million a year, which is great. But we have walks that are raising$7 million a year. We have galas, traditional galas.

28:37They're doing$15 million a year. So we have a lot of different ways that people can participate. So if you want to come to a party and drink and have great wine, you can do it. But if you want to ride 100 miles and crush it next to Chris Froome, who's won the Tour de France four times or Alberto Contador, Mark Cavendish or any of these great cyclists, you can do that as well. So again, I think you got to make sure you're, you got something for everybody and you're keeping it fresh and you're keeping it alive and, you know, pickleball is huge now. So we've started in the pickleball space. We have a pickleball tournament in Aspen, Colorado.

29:13And so, you know, we're getting the thing going and, you know, trying again to, you know, make sure that we're, we got our foot in the door and all these different areas and that we can be attractive to people. And then if something doesn't work, we shut it down and, you know, move on and, you know, reinvent ourselves in another city or another market and keep going. See that that's the difference though. Right. I mean, I'm listening to everything. And the, and the question was, you know, key strategies or strategic partnerships, and you're literally hitting on every single thing, right? Like you have the corporate sponsorships and the corporate relationships.

29:52You're going into sport and partnering with, you know, Tour de France champions. You mentioned Cindy Crawford, Tom Brady, and I believe there's Guy Fieri too. Yeah, Guy. Of all your celebrity ambassadors, you know, I mean, that to me is more than just having somebody represent the brand. Those are all individuals that have been reported to be really, really good people. And so that kind of thing right there is like, yes, those celebrity ambassadors not only bring awareness to the cause and to the foundation and maybe even a little bit of donation or revenue, but at the end of the day, you've really thought of everything, man.

30:40And to me, so when I look back at the growth, of the expansion, right? Internationally, to me, it's a no-brainer that this thing is going to hit the 500 million impact that you're going to hit. Yeah. Well, yeah, I'm hopeful. Yeah. I'm confident we'll do it for sure. And, you know, I think, you know, as we select these different things, I think, you know, the most important thing to remember, and I always tell our team is that, you know, we've only got one reputation and we build our reputation through experiences that people have. And people either come into the best buddy's family and they walk away with something really positive or they walk away with something negative.

31:18And that's our job is to give them that experience that's positive. And we don't hit it every single time. There's people probably that walk around and think we do a lousy job or have a terrible experience at an event. We got to figure out why and then correct it so we don't make the same mistake in the future. And as I always say, you know, our customer's always right. We got to make sure that we're super responsive to them. But, you know, we build, in my judgment, we build our brand through experiences. And people come in and they have an experience at Best Buddies. And then they go and they talk and they go and they build our reputation for ourselves.

31:51And, you know, we have to make sure that the global ambassadors that we pick, they've got to be quality people. Best Buddies isn't right for everybody. And there's companies that aren't right for us. And there's plenty of companies that they came and, you know, pitched me and wanted to give me$5 million. I wouldn't take them if they didn't fit our brand. I'm a long-term player, you know, and I know that we just keep chipping away. We'll get the right people. We can't go for a quick fix. You know, we got to build organically and just keep going, keep hammering. We lose somebody, we'll get another person.

32:22We keep our mission front and center. But it's really important. Who do we pick? Who do we allow into the Best Buddies family? What's their brand? And does it line up with our brand? And are we doing the same things? And in the end, you know, do we like each other? Does the head of Coca-Cola, you know, is he my vibe or she, it happens to be a woman. Is she my vibe and does she feel my energy and do I feel hers and do we share the same values? If not, you know, it's not the right fit, you know. Pepsi's not the right fit for us. Coke's the right fit for us for a whole variety of different reasons.

32:54Subway's not the right fit for us. Jersey Mike's is the right fit for us for a whole variety of reasons. So I think, you know, you got to make sure we have to make sure constantly that we're adjusting and picking. And sometimes, you know, a company will have a partnership with a new CEO will come in and their vibe is different. And, you know, we have a contract and our contract runs out. Sometimes I don't even want to renew with the company because it's just not the right that CEO is taking the company in a direction that doesn't fit for Best Buddies, not the right move. And it's hard to walk away from money.

33:24But, you know, sometimes you just got to do it for the long term benefit of the organization. So, you know, we got to be really careful and And, you know, we got to make sure whatever we launch, whatever new industry we go into, whether it's pickleball, tennis, whatever it is, we know what we're doing. We do it right. We start super small. We grow. We perfect it. We make the mistakes on a small level before we try to scale it on a national level or even an international level. I think it's critical to ensure that we continue to be successful. I love it. You know, the specific part about the partnerships that may or may not be a fit based on.

34:02you know, maybe the energy of the CEO or just overall company dynamic, right? It's very timely. You know, I put out a thought every single day on LinkedIn and on my socials in the story area. And today was about not selling your soul to get ahead, right? Basically outlining the fact that, you know, what is it even worth if you compromised who you are along the way? Is it really a win, right? And when I built my platform, it was Bootstrap, just like you did with Best Buddies. Bootstrap, you're starting small, you perfect something, you scale. Then you find something else, you do it small, perfect it, scale.

34:44So what I've done is I've walked away from a lot of different partnerships because the brand message, the brand feel wasn't in line with what I'm building. So there's certain things I would never take money from. There are certain things and types of industries that I would never even interview because of the fact that my audience, to me, is my family. That is – they are the people that are listening to this show and getting the value out of it. I want to make sure that I'm the gatekeeper for them and that I honor them. So I love that you said that, man. Yeah, you got to do it. I mean, yesterday, I'm not going to name the company because I don't want to hurt them at all.

35:24But it's a nicotine company that's doing really, really well in a nicotine dip. those tablets that you take and those things. You know, the guy pitched me and said, booming, fast, you know, you want to do a partnership with Best Buddies. They'd love to be involved. You know, do you like it? Do you do it yourself? You know, no. I mean, it's not the right place for us. You know what I mean? It just doesn't work. It's tempting. They've got to, you know, the brand's growing big time. They're all over the country. You know, we could be on the package. We could do, you know, five cents per can sold at Best Buddies.

35:55You know, they do advertising for us. you know, similar things that we do with some of the other brands, but it's just, it's not the right fit for us, right? It's not the right energy. And, you know, it's not the right dynamic for the organization, but, you know, I don't know what that deal would have looked like, whether it would have been a hundred thousand a year or 500, 250 ,000 a year. I have no idea because I didn't negotiate it at all, but it just doesn't fit. So you walk away, but you know, you got to do it, you know, you got to walk away and, you know, not everybody that rings your doorbell is the right person to let it in your house.

36:25And, you know, you've only got your one place. So, you know, they get in your family, they're in and, you know, they can be a cancer. So we, yeah, you just got to watch it. You know that. And it's, you know, it's the same principles about some of our biggest donors and these great, huge finance guys. And, you know, they say it all the time in the investment world. So many of the things that they articulate in the investment world are so similar to, you know, our world and the principles. I mean, so many of these principles that they're consistent with every business, right? Every company. It's the same thing.

36:56Everybody's got to pay attention to. And so many people don't pay attention. And, you know, they got caught up in so much of it, I think, you know, comes back to ego. And which is why I think, again, the humility part, faith, you know, having a calling, higher being, you know, for me, my faith, Catholicism is huge. Remind you constantly that you're nothing and we're nothing, you know, we're here for 60 years, 80 years, if we're lucky. And it can end in any moment. I could be out of my bike any day and then boom, it's over. So, you know, I think knowing that, you know, we really are nothing, seven billion people.

37:29I'm one guy, you know, I'm not even a speck. And my time on the earth is so tiny relative to the history of time. You know, it's, uh, you gotta want to do the right thing in my judgment. And it's, it's, it creates the best life. Well, that, that's, that's what I want the audience to hang on to right now. So for those of you listening and watching, that is what I really want you to hold on to, right? Because what you said there is it's not about us. We are nothing. We are here, right? And our job while we're here is to make an impact as much as we possibly can and to serve, right? And we have the same beliefs, okay?

38:06So it's like when we think of the ego and think of in terms of like, well, let me puff my chest out, man, it's just such a bad way. Maybe not a bad way, but for me, it's bad. It doesn't work for me, right? because I want to be focused every day on what can I give someone and, and, and how can I give it? Right. Because for me, this was my way of giving that, you know, this is my way. And of course, you know, in my circle of people and my friends, I, I reach out, I pour into them when I'm off camera and I'm the same guy, you know, on camera that you would be if you randomly showed up at my door, same, same dude, right?

38:45Because that's the energy I'm in. Right. And, and, but, But to serve the world is I really, truly feel that's what we're put here to do. And you're doing that daily. Oh, no, I appreciate it. And listen, I don't want to misrepresent. I mean, I think everybody's got their own journey, right? Everybody can serve in one way. And if there weren't people on Wall Street making billions of dollars a year, they wouldn't be giving that money back because they've got all that money or they wouldn't be letting me borrow their house for a Best Buddies event. You know, so everybody's got if everybody was doing my job, you know, I wouldn't have a job and I wouldn't have a business.

39:16So I need people, you know, selling Coca-Cola. I need people buying subs from Jersey Mike. So it's, you know, I need people at Citadel Securities making tons of money. So I think that, you know, it's everybody got to follow their passion and play the role and, you know, follow whatever God designed you to do. Not everybody is designed to do what I do. You know, there's people in my office, even the job I do, they go, I'd go crazy if I had to do your job. I look at my head of accounting or accounts payable. I go, I go crazy if I had to do your job. I'd hate it. I'd be terrible. So I think, again, trying to find, you know, your niche and your calling.

39:54And most of us know it in our gut, but sometimes we're too scared to admit it or too scared to go for it. Then we get ourselves stuck in the wrong job, the wrong profession. We do a lousy job. We get unhappy. We get depressed. We don't make money and everything starts unraveling because we don't have the courage to say, hey, I want to be an actor. Hey, I want to be the, I want to go into the, you know, finance and make tons of money. Hey, I want to run a charity, you know, whatever it is, you know, nothing, nothing bad there. You just got to go with what you know you're supposed to do. And then, you know, I think the whole system works really well when that happens and the system gets off when people are in the wrong jobs and doing the wrong things and starts to unravel.

40:34So anyways, it's good stuff. It takes all of us doing our thing. It sure does. And to your point, right? Not everybody needs to be in exactly the way you serve. The CEO of Coca-Cola is still in service. They're serving the best way that they know how. And they're providing a product that people enjoy. And so I just think it's also important for the audience to really key in on that. We're not suggesting that you go do exactly what Anthony's doing or what I'm doing, but find what that service is for you because that's the vertical you can own. Yeah, 100%. Yeah, you say it exactly right. Yeah, I know you know, obviously.

41:13So good for you and that you have the guts to do what you're doing. Oh, yeah. I mean, heck, man, I walked away from a successful medical sales career to do this. I mean, scary. It's scary. Yeah, right. It's scary, right? And I can remember the look on my wife's face. She went, you're going to do what? And I'm like, I think this is it. This is the purpose that I feel I have, right? And this is how I can thrive and give value and, you know, obviously, too, make money for the family. And it's working out. But, man, it wasn't pretty for a while, Anthony. Like, oof. It was scary. But, you know, a couple things as we wind down the show and, you know, give you your time back.

41:59And as I surely appreciate every moment you've given us in the audience. you know the show is called the determined society we're based on determination and discipline focus grit resilience everything you can think of right doing the things that we don't want to do at the time because it's going to exercise that part of our brain that's going to help us progress the most but in in your definition what does determination mean to you rinse takes your laundry and hand delivers it to your door expertly cleaned and folded so you could take the time once spent folding and sorting and waiting to finally pursue a whole new version of you.

42:32Like tea time you. Or this tea time you. Or even this tea time you. Or even tea time, tea time, tea time you. So update on Dave. It's up to you. We'll take the laundry. Rinse. It's time to be great. I mean, I think determination comes from within. I mean, I think it's an inner sort of push and calling that we all have. And I think some people have enormous amounts of it and some people really don't have a lot of it. I think there's, you know, a lot of people, and I think human nature in many ways is, you know, lazy. I mean, I hate to say it was, I think it's kind of negative, but I mean, I think people really want to always find the easiest way to do everything.

43:20And they want to take the easiest road to get to wherever they think they want to go. And as I say, like to my son, I think having determination to, you know, fall in love with the process, you know, when I set goals, you know, I set the goal, but, you know, when I actually achieve the goal, it's such a letdown, you know, because I immediately feel like, you know, I really like the process of getting to the goal. That's the fun. It's like, you know, if I'm setting a goal on the bike, you know, I like the process of waking up at four o 'clock in the morning. And I like the process of walking the dog.

43:52I like the process of making my shake and I'm filling my water bottles and setting up my bike and putting the lights on it and setting my garment and making sure everything's charged. And the night before getting out there and winning the day and coming back at 7am and feeling like I already won. I'm ahead of everybody else. And that process is amazing. But every time I go on the bike, I have goals. What do I want to do? What's my power? How long's my hold? What's my interval? You know, those things. And I have a yearly goal. I have a monthly goal. I have a daily goal, weekly goals. And, you know, when I get the bigger goals, you know, it feels kind of good, but as soon as you get it, you know, we got to, you got to want, I want to set another goal and I want to go through it because I love the journey to get to where I want to go.

44:36And to me, that requires determination. You're determined to get to the goal that you set out for yourself. And I don't know, not that I'm better than anybody else at all. I'm not. That's my path. That's my journey. I just don't know whether everybody wants to do that and loves the process. I think most people, a lot of people really love winning the lottery. You just get all the money, but you don't do the work to get the money. It feels so much better to me anyways to do the work and get the prize at the end. The prize isn't even the prize to me. It's the journey to get to the prize. It's really the prize for me, which I love.

45:16So, I mean, to me, that's determination and having determination to do all that. And I just don't know whether, you know, everybody loves that. And it doesn't mean that they're bad. I just don't think everybody really wants to, you know, grind like that and be determined. Yeah. I love that. Cause like, as you're speaking, you're firing me up because every goal, man, listen, every goal that my team and I have hit with this show, I get there. I'm like, Oh, it's a letdown almost. It's the first time we hit a million, you know, listens in a year. I was like, Oh my God, this is going to be amazing.

45:50We got there. I'm like, I miss the feeling of chasing it. I miss the feeling of the process. I miss the feeling of, of get this one. I miss the pain. Yeah. Right. And so then I take the dial and I crank it up one 80. I'm like, what makes me uncomfortable? What puts me in the most amount of pain daily in that journey because like you said that is the gift the journey that the the who you become in the in the pursuit of that success just like that old movie pursuit of happiness yeah like it was awesome the end of the movie was a letdown for me it was a success but what i really loved was who he was becoming yeah man power yeah you're right you're right You know, it's funny as I say to my kid, I've been getting him in the gym and he's always complaining.

46:41He's sore. He's sore. You know, his legs hurt. His chest hurts. He's whining about it. I say, you know, you're in the right game if it hurts. If you go to the gym and you're never sore, you're not hitting it hard enough. You got to put more weight on. You got to do more reps. You got to burn it. You got to get the blood in the chest more. So the next morning you wake up and your chest is tight or your arms hurt or you got to do lunges with more weight on the lunges because your hamstrings aren't tight. you're not working hard enough so you know you're doing it if it hurts and you know that's when the the gain comes you know so anyways we're on the same page dude we think the same you know we're we're on it so i appreciate it absolutely man it's that progressive overload in anything you do in life whether it's weights or business or spiritually you put that progressive overload to help you grow as an individual.

47:34So I love it, man. You know, and in closing, you know, I want you to let the audience know how they can best to do two things, right? Best support Best Buddies or and become involved with Best Buddies. Well, bestbuddies.org, go on there. We got all the info on there. You can make a donation. You can get involved. You can get a buddy yourself through our programs. You could hire someone with Best Buddies in your company or encourage the company you work for to hire a person with intellectual development disabilities. You know, we operate our jobs program all over the U.S. We're not in every single city in the entire United States, but, you know, maybe we are where you are and we can we can get that going.

48:14You can join one of our walks. We do 78 walks. You can join one of our challenges. We're launching our first one in New York City, October 4th. Go on there and sign up and join us, you know, and if you've never ridden 100 miles, You can train with one of our trainers and get fit to ride a hundred miles. If you're not up for it, ride 15. We have a 15 mile, 40 mile. So again, you know, there's so many ways to get involved. The website's the best place to start and shoot us emails. We'll follow up. And if we don't follow up, we got a problem. You need to send me an email and we'll fix it so that we don't ever drop the ball.

48:47But, you know, more the merrier. And, you know, it takes it takes thousands of people to make this stuff work. hundreds of thousands and make it stuck to work globally so uh i welcome everybody on the in the best place family i love it i'm looking forward to seeing what you guys have in florida i'd love to come to one of the galas support any way i can absolutely i will be there i'll go and take a look and um see what's coming our biggest one is november 15th down in miami do you want to come down and actually the guy that founded jersey mike's co-chairs it with me peter cancro and he He started Jersey Mike's as a high school kid, bought a little sub shop and sold it for eight billion dollars in January of this year.

49:29So, you know, it happens. Guy didn't go to college, you know, got a loan in high school. I mean, these stories are out there. These people are out there. You know, it can be you. Right. Yeah. You can be a billionaire if that's really what you want or you can start your own charity, your own business. I mean, everything's possible. You know, just for someone else is doing it doesn't mean you can't do it. Well, I will put November 15th on my calendar. You can mark that. You can mark that down. I will be there. But thanks again, man. Thank you. I appreciate it, man. Have a great day. I appreciate your time.

50:03Audience, you heard it. Best Buddies.org. Anthony Kennedy Shriver.

50:34Liberty Mutual Liberty, Liberty.