Latest / None of Your Business Podcast / Is Kosher Certification Big Business—or a Community Trust?

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Is Kosher Certification Big Business—or a Community Trust? · None of Your Business Podcast

• 0:00
  This extra business, it's, it's wild.
• 0:04
  It's it's it's. A real business.
• 0:05
  Like someone's got to write a book about this.
• 0:06
  I have so many questions now. Like you've opened my mind to so
• 0:09
  many things. None of your business, Oshi.
• 0:16
  None of your business, Michael. It's the None of Your Business
• 0:18
  podcast hosted by Michael Anoshi.
• 0:21
  Welcome back everybody to another amazing episode of the
• 0:25
  None of your Business podcast. Thank you again to the prime
• 0:27
  source production team for such wonderful output that we've been
• 0:32
  seeing and witnessing and all the growth that we've had and
• 0:34
  the comments and the likes and the the comments when people
• 0:37
  roll down their windows, the comments when people go to you
• 0:39
  at the gym, the comments when you know people are negative or
• 0:42
  positive. We're loving it all.
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  And today we have an amazing guest with us or she, I don't
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  think you know Rabbi Center, but Rabbi Ari Center is not only the
• 0:50
  leader of a nationally recognized kosher certified
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  organization, if that's the right way to put it, he's also
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  the leader and founder of a local shul.
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  I will always wondered, Rabbi, which one brings you more
• 1:00
  headaches? And, and today we can talk about
• 1:05
  a little bit about where, where this all came from, how it
• 1:08
  started. I know a little bit about Huff K
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  and I know that some restaurants have certifications of different
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  organizations throughout the world.
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  I don't know why. I don't understand why there is
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  a need of a Huff K if there's an OU and why there's an OU if
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  there's a Huff K. And I understand why there's a
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  need of shules in a neighborhood even though it's 5 within
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  walking distance of yours. But would love to learn more
• 1:28
  about who you are and where you're from.
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  And especially for Oshi because he doesn't really know you.
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  So that's. Zero.
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  I'm a little embarrassed, I'll be honest.
• 1:34
  I feel like I should know you a little bit better.
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  Maybe I even popped into your shul once or twice.
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  I think I attended A bris there, so at one point, but like your
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  face, I didn't recognize you when I walked in.
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  And I live in the neighborhood for so long and I heard your
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  name many times, so I definitely should know you a little bit
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  more. So when I heard you coming on
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  the podcast, I was excited, well, to learn about the Rabbi
• 1:56
  Center and I did not know that you're part of this Huff K
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  organization. I'm also excited to hear about
• 2:01
  how it all works in the background, like the mechanics
• 2:04
  of giving Heche Rim to stores because, you know, there's money
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  involved. I'm sure people are monetizing
• 2:10
  from this, but it's a very delicate topic.
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  You know, it's not to be taken lightly.
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  So I'd love to hear how all of that works.
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  So I'm excited to get started. So, OK, so let's get going.
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  What's your first question? I have a lot of questions that
• 2:23
  happens to be I'm. I'm.
• 2:24
  I'm curious about my first question to you.
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  What gives you more headaches? What gives me more headaches?
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  You could also throw in family that gives you headaches or
• 2:36
  friends. It doesn't have to be in any
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  what what gives you headaches. To give you an out, you could
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  say none of your business too to any one of our questions.
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  But yes, do you get one of your? Business, but only one time, so
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  use it carefully. I only get.
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  One. That's it.
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  You got one pass? Yeah, one pass.
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  And everything else you have to answer honestly.
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  OK, So what gives you more headaches?
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  You know, I think I would refrain the question.
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  Life has its challenges and life.
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  And in the end, I think most of us are looking for something to
• 3:04
  be relevant. And if everything was smooth and
• 3:07
  everything was easy, then that's not what we're here for.
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  And I'm going to answer your question, I think in the
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  following fashion. If you get to know me, I'm not
• 3:21
  your average Joe, I'm not your average rabbi.
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  And I think if I thought that everything was just
• 3:30
  run-of-the-mill, then in truth, I don't necessarily need it.
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  And I was, I have so many different things in my life that
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  are taking my time and my efforts.
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  I hope. And I'd like to believe if you
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  speak to my congruence and to the people involved, that
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  there's somehow I uniquely have a unique relationship with them.
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  And so it's challenging because yes, I feel their emotions, I
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  feel their life's, their life's challenges.
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  But at the same time, it's rewarding to know that hopefully
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  I've uniquely affected them. I have a unique relationship
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  with them. And I think you know that from
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  my pal about them that I really do look at them as an extended
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  members of my family. So well, you.
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  Started the whole thing, didn't you?
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  No, no, no, the background of the show was I was very happily
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  at 11th grade revenue and rubber didn't see to Shiva living on
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  Marine away and the show started in got real, I think.
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  No, it started in Jonah Rothman's.
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  Oh, it was a break off of a break off.
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  A break off. No, it was a brand new
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  community. It was a bunch of young guys,
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  brand new community, starting from scratch, got it.
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  And basically they formed the shul and they were having rabbis
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  coming in once a month of problems.
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  No, just initially it was just to speak and to.
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  Oh, I see. I see voluntary to be able to do
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  it. So I'd I'd done it a couple of
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  times and actually they initially asked me to come for
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  you. I'm the rhyme.
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  At that point in time, we were in the basement of a of Gabriel
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  Alexander's house. It was a very that was an
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  important lesson because it was an unfinished basement.
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  It was a concrete wall and remember one of the balabat and
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  came up to me. He said, Robert, get used to it.
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  You're getting you're going to be talking to a bunch of brick
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  walls. That was that was a very
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  interesting introduction to to rob on us.
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  And in truth, I said no. They offered me after the on the
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  run to become the rabbi and I said no.
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  And as you said, I think Ori Krishna is the one who put me in
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  the seat. Ori Krishna recommended me, Ori
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  asked me then to become Rabbi. And at that point in time, I had
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  enough things juggling in my. Life really love you.
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  Yes, I had enough things juggling in my life that I it
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  wasn't something that I necessarily needed.
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  And then a year later, a full year later, they went through a
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  whole year of probing and choosing and whatever so on and
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  so forth. A year later, they asked me
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  again to come for the Omdurum. Came for the omdurum.
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  And then the second time around over with input from Robert
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  Dancing and so on and so forth, actually convinced me to take
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  the job. How many years ago was this that
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  you started, you took? This is 20 some odd years.
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  Ago. Wow, long time.
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  Ago. Yeah, it's, yeah, I've so I've
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  been the only Rob for that of that tool.
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  And you never had a vision of becoming a Rob.
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  It wasn't in your life's plan. This all developed on its own
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  and it just one day. No, I thought so.
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  Let me let me answer that question.
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  So I I am somewhat following you after similar life paths of as
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  my father. My father was a rubber of a
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  shul. Now part of maybe my initial
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  apprehension, my father, my father was a rubber of a shul
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  for many years. And then eventually he left the
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  shul on the, you know, he voluntarily left the shul.
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  The shul had grown perhaps beyond what he can do because of
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  his other responsibilities in terms of cautious.
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  So to me, I was always a little bit apprehensive.
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  My father put a, put a huge amount into effort into the
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  shul. And then in the end, he, he was
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  no longer part of that shul. It's, they're great people that
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  are involved. There's no ill, ill will.
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  But the reality is, is he put in all that effort and then in the
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  end he had to walk away from it. So that to me put me on a little
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  bit of. The weary listing the.
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  Weary list before starting but yes.
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  Did I dream about it? It was not necessarily what I
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  dreamt about, but a lot of my life experiences were being the
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  child of a rabbi visual. You know, as I grew up, my
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  father was the rabbit visual. And did you like immediately
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  take to the job? Did you like it from the start?
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  Or did you very early on asked myself, why?
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  Why did I do this? What do I need this for?
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  I like people. I liked it from the beginning.
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  I like people, I enjoy people, I interact with people.
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  It's the people aspect of the shul was always a good part of
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  the shul. The challenges is, you know,
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  life has its challenges and being able to deal with people
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  and to actually deal with their challenges, which took takes and
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  took a tremendous emotional toll.
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  So that's the balance of it. The balance of it.
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  I'm not, I am not very good at having that degree of
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  separation. It's not one of my you're all
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  in. I try.
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  Yeah, I, I know for my shul Rydavan, I have a relationship
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  with my Rav, with the rabbi of the shul for 20 plus years,
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  since I'm a teenager, I had a relationship with him and I've
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  kept it ever since. And similarly to how your
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  neighborhood started the shul, we as well couple of guys moved
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  to a neighborhood. There were weren't a lot of Jews
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  living there at the time. And then slowly started
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  building. Yeah, we realized, you know, we
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  need a shul. And we solicited him to come and
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  to become the rabbi. And he was hesitant in the
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  beginning. You know, he wasn't, he wasn't
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  all into it. But with enough convincing, he
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  came and it was a great decision.
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  It turned out to be a booming neighborhood, still growing.
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  And I, I don't see the neighborhood without the rabbi.
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  I feel like he is at the helm. He's really directing and
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  steering the ship and he's very involved in every aspect.
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  I think rabbis today, Michael, are a little different than what
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  it used to be from what I remember growing up, you know,
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  and especially 50 years ago, like they're much more saturated
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  in what's going on in the shore. They're much more of a they're
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  not just to answer Shiloh's, to answer, you know, how lucky
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  questions. They're there to be involved in
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  your personal life, you know, to get advice, business advice
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  even. And they have a much bigger role
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  than they ever did. Would would you agree with that?
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  I agree with that. And that's part of the, the
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  challenge because as the show, as a show grows or as a
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  community grows, the relationship that one might have
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  with the 1st 203040 congregants is totally different,
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  potentially totally different. Because then you get stretched
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  out. And you know, in my
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  circumstance, since I'm wearing other hats, you know, it's the,
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  the, the rabbinics is voluntary and I'm not using that doing
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  that for pernostic purposes. So therefore I'm wearing another
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  bunch of other hats. So it it, it has its challenge
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  and. What do you mean you're not
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  doing this for pernostic purposes?
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  You mentioned that very casually.
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  So it's not a job for you financially.
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  So you have other things going on financially?
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  I have other things going on financially.
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  I've never, you know, I financially support the show,
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  not vice versa. You're kidding me.
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  So you don't take a salary from the shul and you support the
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  shul. Yes.
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  What does that mean? Why the people in the shul
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  aren't contributing? Like what?
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  Why is it set up the? People in the shul definitely
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  contribute, but predominantly, again, you have to be very
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  careful. Predominantly I I bought the
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  initial building and I've I'm probably one of the largest
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  donors to digital. OK, this is very interesting.
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  You're a whole different model than than.
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  You know most relationships between a rabbi and.
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  A congregation. So well, let's talk about this.
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  So what? By the way, I'm sorry, unless
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  it's a rabbit run tool. So this is more like a rabbit
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  run. But the rabbit?
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  The rabbit doesn't. Fund the shul, the rabbit
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  doesn't. The rabbit is not responsible
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  decision maker as the rabbit. I mean, the one advantage I
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  have, and to be honest, one of the advantages is I'm able to
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  speak my mind. There's no, I'm not.
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  I'm beholden to many people in the shore because they're great
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  to me and they really do great things to the community.
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  And there are many people that are are benevolent to the Shore.
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  But I'm not beholden to the shore because I take a salary.
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  There's a vote on my salary and of that sort.
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  You know, it's in the end, and I think it works both works well,
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  both ways. In the end, they know I'm here
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  because I care. You want to be.
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  I want to be. Yeah.
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  It's authentic. And at the same time, but I want
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  to be very clear this, it takes a village to raise a kid that's
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  I think this expression takes an entire community to create a
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  community. And it is not just rabbit
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  oriented. It is so many people that are
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  putting in efforts and being able to make acid work, be able
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  to make sure work. It requires so much more than
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  just question of a paid employee.
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  So we don't mind me asking, so where, where is this money
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  coming from? Do you have a side job like how
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  are you funding all of this? Well, that's.
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  The half K OK, I think let's talk about what are your hats,
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  Rabbi? Like you tell us real quick,
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  what are your hats that you're wearing?
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  What are the hats that I wear presently?
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  Please? I'm like kids parents.
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  Is that the first one? That's a good one.
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  I like. That, that's pretty big, yeah.
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  OK. No, the reality, I basically I'm
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  the executive director of whichever terminology you want
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  to use of the Kafke, which is the primary source of income.
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  I also have certain responsibility with any Shivasar
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  Ruvain and I am the roof of Kilosi Sharm of Wesley Hills.
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  So those are the predominant 3 hats.
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  And then obviously they're in life.
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  Things wind up if you're looking and open to helping people,
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  things wind up on your lap. So, but those are my primary 3,
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  the income, my financial income. The truth is my parents are
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  given my parents, my mother and my father have given me
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  everything that I have financially and that's the
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  reality. And Barack Hashem, they've
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  allowed and facilitated for each of their children.
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  My brothers are Russia. Shiva, my brother in Teaneck had
• 13:00
  started his own tool. All of our dreams have
• 13:04
  financially been facilitated by my parents.
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  Our spouses are all helpful and supportive and but on the
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  financial level, the reason why we don't need to be able to
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  access that we're able to do is not necessarily financially
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  based is simply because of the benevolence of our parents.
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  What a blessing. That's so beautiful.
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  And where did your parents come into having this these kind of
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  funds to support their children at this capacity?
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  How did they begin? OK, a partnership to be honest
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  with you in terms of the funds my mother invested.
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  My mother did all the finances in the family, everything from
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  A-Z. My father was a professor in
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  mathematics. He got a very nice buyout from
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  fairly Dickens University. My mother did all the investment
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  of it. My father ran the cuff K my
• 13:51
  mother. The the joke is my mother had a
• 13:54
  had a plaque, has a plaque on her desk that says my father
• 13:58
  says president, My mother says vice president in charge of the
• 14:01
  president. So the reality is is they were
• 14:04
  an absolute partnership and the Kufkay was obviously initially
• 14:09
  my father's brainchild, but he everything he did was an
• 14:11
  absolute. Partnership.
• 14:12
  Your father started the organization.
• 14:14
  Father started the organization, Yes.
• 14:16
  So what is Kufkay? Can you, can you walk us through
• 14:18
  that? Like what?
• 14:19
  What does? How did this organization start
• 14:20
  and what does it do? How did the organization start?
• 14:23
  Yeah, OK. My father had a PhD in
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  mathematics. He was a rub of a shul in North
• 14:29
  Bergen, NJ And back then many people were reading labels to be
• 14:36
  able to try to figure out things.
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  Kosher was not as regulated, not as formal as it exists
• 14:43
  presently. So at that point in time, there
• 14:46
  was Howard Johnson's along the highways.
• 14:50
  They had all the Howard Johnson's that were along the
• 14:52
  highways and he's a number of his congregants who asked him,
• 14:56
  you know, can we eat in the Howard Johnson's on on the
• 15:01
  highway? What is Howard Johnson?
• 15:02
  That's exactly you're on the. Whole television with that
• 15:05
  breakfast. Wow, that this is to tell you
• 15:07
  how things are going. Everything.
• 15:08
  Howard Johnson's used to be an ice cream parlor connected to
• 15:12
  the hotel. It was Howard Johnson's Ice
• 15:14
  Creams was the old, and it was by all.
• 15:17
  The rest, if you're a listener that knew that I want to know
• 15:19
  about that, but you knew that that's a demographic was.
• 15:22
  It a national company. It was a national organization
• 15:24
  and it was along all the rest stops.
• 15:26
  And instead then people would stop and get an ice cream and
• 15:30
  say Howard Johnson's ice cream. You can look it up.
• 15:32
  So basically at that point in time, my father, his background
• 15:37
  behind it was my father was involved in the Yeshiva student
• 15:43
  organization of Yeshiva NYU, which was put out at that point
• 15:47
  in time as opposed to the being formal ash caucus, they would
• 15:49
  put out recommended items in which they would call up the
• 15:52
  companies, get some affidavits and information.
• 15:55
  It was not as regulated, as formal as we have presently.
• 15:58
  It wasn't readily available. You had to go actively search
• 16:01
  this information. And information and a lot of the
• 16:04
  companies didn't have our Scala, so they in the end you had to do
• 16:06
  a very much closer to what exists in Europe.
• 16:10
  I was. Going to say in Europe, they
• 16:11
  have that Europe today. So my father was involved in
• 16:14
  this student organization of yeshiva and he got some
• 16:17
  involvement in the cautious end of that researching ingredients.
• 16:20
  My father, as I told him, was a mathematician by trade.
• 16:23
  He was a scientist. That was the way he was very
• 16:27
  exacting. And so when he in the rabbit, he
• 16:32
  was then asked to see if we can find out about this Howard
• 16:35
  Johnsons. So my father walked into the
• 16:39
  kept on calling them and eventually they they created a
• 16:41
  meeting and they met with my father and they said, OK, you
• 16:45
  know what Rabbi will let you come in to look at?
• 16:48
  There was a Howard Johnson to manufacturing facility was in
• 16:50
  Englewood, NJ. They said you'll come into
• 16:52
  Englewood, NJ. You look at it and this way you
• 16:55
  can tell your congregants as to that this item was kosher.
• 17:00
  So fine, my father comes, he comes to the meeting and he
• 17:03
  meets with them and then they say to him, Rabbi, we would like
• 17:08
  a letter on your, on your letterhead saying that the food
• 17:12
  is kosher. My father goes, what do you want
• 17:14
  it for? He goes, I'm here for my
• 17:16
  congregants. They go, Rabbi, do you think
• 17:19
  we're going to have 50 rabbis go through our plant and each one
• 17:23
  we would like 1 rabbi to go through the plant and tell him
• 17:27
  tell us that they can tell to the other rabbis that it's
• 17:31
  certified kosher. Father thinks about it.
• 17:34
  He goes, OK, I'll do that. I guess, I guess I can do it and
• 17:36
  I'll go through, I'll take care of the the thing.
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  So then there was another meeting again, this was over a
• 17:41
  course of weeks. They call him back for another
• 17:43
  meeting. They said, OK, we're going to
• 17:44
  meet. You're going to do this, you're
• 17:45
  going to set up. Then they look at him and they
• 17:48
  say, well, rapidly. So we have the plant in England,
• 17:52
  New Jersey, We have one in Baltimore, MD and we have one in
• 17:56
  Texas. If I was one second, I'm just
• 18:00
  interested in England, New Jersey.
• 18:03
  I'm a, I'm a local rabbi. I go, I have no interest in
• 18:07
  Maryland. And once again, rabbi, if you
• 18:10
  really think we're going to have rabbis go into all these places,
• 18:14
  we want you to do it. So fine.
• 18:16
  So the meeting continues and they look at the rabbit, my
• 18:20
  father, and say, OK, so this is what we want.
• 18:22
  We want a written proposal for an entire cost of this
• 18:25
  certification on your company's letterhead.
• 18:28
  Can you have that into us? You know, within a couple of
• 18:31
  days, my father's thinking for that letterhead company.
• 18:34
  My father has none of these things.
• 18:36
  So then they look at him and they look at my father and they
• 18:39
  say they saw my father was hesitant.
• 18:42
  He said you do have a company, don't you know, Because again,
• 18:45
  he dealt with so many different people, different conversations,
• 18:48
  you know, each person was different.
• 18:49
  He kept on moving up on the company for things.
• 18:51
  He goes, sure, sure. I have a company go oh, what's
• 18:53
  the name? Coach supervision service, KSS.
• 18:58
  That was what it was initially Kosher supervision service.
• 19:01
  He said OK, fine, so get us a proposal on your letterhead by
• 19:06
  the first thing in the beginning of the week, my father leaves
• 19:09
  the office. My grandfather was a had a
• 19:12
  printing company. I believe my grandfather passed
• 19:14
  already. So he went to my grandfather's
• 19:16
  partner Stabby. They drove, he strove
• 19:19
  immediately there. They went ahead.
• 19:21
  He says they printed, he made-up letterhead, sent it out and
• 19:24
  that's basically the way it started.
• 19:26
  Wow. So Howard Johnson.
• 19:27
  Howard Johnson. Put your father, the Huff K, in
• 19:31
  business. He was the first client.
• 19:34
  In reality, there were other clients afterwards.
• 19:35
  Once my father decided to do it before he actually put Howard
• 19:40
  Johnson certified Howard Johnson.
• 19:42
  There were actually two other companies that proceeded.
• 19:43
  I don't remember. I think.
• 19:44
  I think it was a bread company also in in the Englewood area.
• 19:48
  So OU wasn't around back. Then.
• 19:50
  So why couldn't Howard Johnson? Just call it OU and just the,
• 19:53
  the, the, the availability was a fraction.
• 19:57
  It just didn't exist. You talk to people in the late
• 20:00
  60s, kosher certification was just of it just wasn't as
• 20:06
  available. So is Huff KA competitor to OU
• 20:09
  and do you guys do this the same function?
• 20:12
  So, so I'll answer your question in the following fashion and
• 20:15
  it's it's in a very important question and I actually would
• 20:18
  like the opportunity to be able to debunk a misnomer.
• 20:23
  So basically Rabbi Ganach, who is the head of the OU has an
• 20:31
  expression. He says the OU was a little bit
• 20:33
  off center and that basically sent is my father's name.
• 20:37
  Many of the founders and many of the people have had significant
• 20:42
  positions within the OU actually worked for my father at one
• 20:44
  point in time. Rabbi Ganach had worked for my
• 20:46
  father at one time. Belsky, who was the paisik of
• 20:50
  the OU. He initially was the playstick
• 20:52
  by the cuff K. The idea of creating a playstick
• 20:54
  was something that my father chose.
• 20:56
  And so Robert Belsky and sometimes people come work for
• 20:59
  my father and then realize that there's a larger platform by
• 21:03
  going to the OU Rose Robert Ganache whether it was Robert
• 21:06
  Durable, there was a Robert Bernstein, there was Robert
• 21:09
  Belsky. Many of the people who were at
• 21:11
  the cornerstone positions within the OU.
• 21:13
  So to say that for years and decades, everything was hunky
• 21:18
  Dory and everything was always very, very smooth between the
• 21:22
  casual organizations, I'd be lying to you.
• 21:25
  There was at times stress and there were challenges.
• 21:29
  Politics, politics, whatever terminology you want.
• 21:32
  But I've been quoted, and this is a statement that I say
• 21:35
  proudly, my life's accomplishment is my father went
• 21:39
  into the Olympus for Macklecas with no one.
• 21:41
  My father had at the end. There were much like I said, and
• 21:44
  I'm not going to tell you that there weren't, but that might
• 21:47
  fit under none of your business. But my life's accomplishment is
• 21:52
  he went into the old members, but much like us, with nobody.
• 21:55
  For those listening to don't know what you Just said, that he
• 21:57
  went into the next World without anybody harboring any resentment
• 22:00
  on him. He had no political feuds with
• 22:03
  anybody. There were challenges over the
• 22:05
  years because as you it is a business and it is competitive
• 22:09
  and but I do believe, and that's what I'm saying debunk A
• 22:12
  misnomer. We are a business, but we work
• 22:16
  very, very, very well together. Robert Ganach, Robert Elephant
• 22:19
  from the OU are some of my well, they do do they do.
• 22:21
  Actually, the same things, right?
• 22:23
  They're they're both providing kosher supervision, providing.
• 22:27
  Kosher supervision, there are nuances, differences, meaning a
• 22:31
  certain volume have responsibilities to a specific
• 22:34
  constituents, which is whether it was the CRC in Chicago is to
• 22:37
  the is to Chicago. The Starcade does take a
• 22:40
  primarily responsibility. They're national organizations,
• 22:43
  but they have a a local, regional presence that they that
• 22:47
  they they are responsible. So there are some that are
• 22:50
  national, there some that are private and there are some that
• 22:53
  are. Who's the biggest is OU?
• 22:55
  OU is the biggest, right? And they work with, of course,
• 22:59
  the globe. They work with companies,
• 23:01
  Coca-Cola, you know, with post. So what's it we cuff K works
• 23:07
  with international companies that it's not a question of
• 23:10
  we're only doing regional and it was Unilever, Pepsi, you use
• 23:14
  Coke, Pepsi, Cola's under the cuff K.
• 23:16
  So there are Ben and Jerry's Unilever that there are very
• 23:19
  large industrial companies and the large.
• 23:22
  You're giving a certification for Ben and Jerry's.
• 23:24
  Yes, we do give a certification of Ben and.
• 23:26
  Jerry's let's talk about that one second.
• 23:28
  Oh, OK. I mean, isn't, isn't the owner
• 23:30
  of Ben and Jerry's a bullatin anti semite?
• 23:33
  No. Do you have that type?
• 23:36
  Of so no. So let me answer that question
• 23:38
  please, because the important Ben and Jerry's sold to
• 23:42
  Unilever, Ben and Jerry's is no longer owned by Ben or Jerry and
• 23:46
  Ben and Jerry's sold it and divested it long before that the
• 23:50
  the sanitary scandal happened. So it is 100% owned by Unilever.
• 23:57
  So he has nothing to even do with the company.
• 23:59
  They, they have an advisory role in a secondary, they, they
• 24:03
  maintain a social advocacy, which they always had and their
• 24:08
  social advocacy and it's a platform that they have, but
• 24:11
  Unilever. You have relationships with some
• 24:13
  of the more powerful companies, industries in the country.
• 24:18
  You guys hold a very important. Yeah.
• 24:20
  I mean, the Jewish market is is pretty substantial.
• 24:22
  Obviously, it's not the biggest market for them, but it's an
• 24:25
  important market. So much so that they change.
• 24:27
  I always wondered about this. Coca-Cola will actually have a
• 24:30
  different recipe or they'll change something just for
• 24:33
  Passover just so they can sell their products to Jewish people.
• 24:36
  Observing Jewish people in Passover, right?
• 24:38
  Is that right? How does that work?
• 24:40
  Like why didn't they even do that?
• 24:41
  But they're only changing. That's the thing.
• 24:43
  They're changing not across the entire market, meaning they're
• 24:47
  changing exclusively for the Passover run.
• 24:49
  They're not changing what they're marketing in, in North
• 24:52
  Dakota, right stuff in North just.
• 24:54
  In certain pockets where they have Jewish market.
• 24:56
  Specific run for. It but they do make a change in
• 24:58
  their product just for that, just for those eight day which
• 25:00
  always found interesting that they would do such a thing and
• 25:03
  my God, you can go 8 days without drinking Coca-Cola.
• 25:06
  It's OK, but I guess it's worth it for them.
• 25:08
  I believe that's predominantly a service.
• 25:11
  As a courtesy. That that I the the Passover I
• 25:14
  believe is more of a service. I can explain to you the
• 25:17
  difference why year round is not necessarily service as opposed
• 25:20
  to Passover. Passover is predominantly a
• 25:22
  service. Year round is an economic
• 25:24
  decision. It is it, it makes, it makes
• 25:26
  sense for them. I'm guessing they're making more
• 25:28
  money than it's cost to them for the So is there is this a a
• 25:31
  lucrative business that the OU and the Huff K and all these
• 25:34
  other are they are they really monetizing on this like they're
• 25:36
  charging big bucks to do this? Again, the, the, the cost is
• 25:40
  negligible to the company and I'll explain to why the
• 25:43
  company's doing it. Although one, one of the things
• 25:45
  growing up, one of these, you know, it was posted on the, the
• 25:50
  anti, the Jewish tax and so on and so forth.
• 25:52
  I remember our address growing up was posted on one of these.
• 25:57
  Again, I won't even say Internet.
• 25:58
  The Internet was in its beginning then, but it was being
• 26:01
  broadcast all across the country.
• 26:03
  A home address, because this is one of the people that are part
• 26:06
  of the kosher tax. There's no kosher tax.
• 26:08
  The cost that they incur is negligible in terms of that.
• 26:13
  So again, we're going back to why they do it.
• 26:15
  I think there's a very simple economics.
• 26:18
  You're the buyer now for ShopRite, right?
• 26:21
  And you have a choice of buying a potato chip that will sell to
• 26:25
  five percent, 95% of your customers will appeal to 100% of
• 26:29
  your company. Let's assume for a moment 5%
• 26:32
  here in the New York area, and 5% of those purchases are Jewish
• 26:36
  and that one kosher. Which one are you going to give
• 26:38
  the shelf space to? Are you going to give the shelf
• 26:41
  space to the 95? I imagine so. 95.
• 26:45
  No, you give it to the 100 if the cost makes sense if the.
• 26:47
  Cost makes sense and there's no cost difference.
• 26:49
  Yeah, of. Course you give it to the 100.
• 26:51
  You give it to the 100. So in the end, even if kosher
• 26:54
  just represents 5%. But it's worth it for the.
• 26:56
  Market, you're not getting the numbers, No, you're getting the
• 26:58
  shelf space. You're getting the 100%.
• 27:00
  You're knocking the other guy off the shelf space.
• 27:02
  I'm I'm I'm I'm sure. You're saying the company's
• 27:04
  willing to invest in that certification to get the shelf
• 27:07
  space? It's all about shelf space,
• 27:09
  that's what it is. And there the real estate on the
• 27:11
  on the ground real. Estate on the in the
• 27:13
  supermarket, yeah. And it's a.
• 27:15
  That's why you represent and that's.
• 27:16
  Interesting. What edge do you have?
• 27:18
  What edge you have and that's always whether and that's where
• 27:20
  it's gluten free, whether it's organic.
• 27:22
  And in the end the the shelf space is what's dictating it.
• 27:26
  And if you have that one little edge that gives you, so you're
• 27:29
  not getting that 2% to 3%, you're getting the shelf space
• 27:33
  which gets you everything that's the that that logic does not
• 27:37
  bear out on PESOC. You may not know the answer to
• 27:40
  this question, but because we're talking about Pesoc bazooka gum
• 27:43
  like, do you have any clue why it disappeared?
• 27:45
  I don't know. OK, Once a personal question.
• 27:47
  No. Once Upon a time, it wasn't my
• 27:49
  father. 'S bazooka How many employees
• 27:51
  work for the Huff Care Organization?
• 27:53
  I would say probably about about 100. 100 Now somebody within the
• 27:59
  organization has travelled to all of these manufacturing
• 28:03
  plants across the country, wherever they're making this
• 28:05
  stuff, and they're regularly checking in, they're coming in
• 28:08
  and is there a schedule? How does it work?
• 28:09
  How does that part work? It varies.
• 28:12
  Example and the growing the last 20 years, the greatest growth in
• 28:17
  terms of import and kosher certification happens to be from
• 28:20
  the Far East. So I happen to have 5 or 6
• 28:23
  employees that are constantly rotating in the Far East, going
• 28:27
  to different plants in the Far East.
• 28:29
  So. What's the more popular one?
• 28:30
  What area? It's all over me personally.
• 28:33
  It's China now. China, it happens to be we're
• 28:36
  seeing the effects of of the tariffs because there are
• 28:40
  companies popping up elsewhere to be able.
• 28:44
  Everybody wants to import and they all need to be importing to
• 28:47
  our manufacturers. So they're already popping up in
• 28:50
  the other countries, relabeling and so on and so forth.
• 28:53
  But, you know, do you mind if I go back and just tell the story
• 28:55
  about Ben and Jerry's? Do you mind it, please?
• 28:57
  Yeah, because, you know, there's a lot of misinformation and I
• 29:02
  think half. This page is about Ben and
• 29:03
  Jerry's OK. Sir, that's a really I didn't
• 29:06
  mean. Excited for you to talk about
• 29:07
  Ben and Jerry's. So OK, they literally just
• 29:09
  mentioned the the the genocide literally.
• 29:12
  And if they if they have their volume up for people, then I'm
• 29:15
  curious as to why the huff K wouldn't take a stance in it.
• 29:18
  Perhaps on the other side. I'm so curious.
• 29:20
  Yeah. Yeah, We would expect Huff K to
• 29:21
  stand. You know, we're stripping them
• 29:22
  of their certification. We don't want any part of this
• 29:25
  company. We don't want any part of this
• 29:27
  company. But again, if it's owned by, you
• 29:28
  know you're saying it's not even anything to do with it.
• 29:30
  Let. Me tell you.
• 29:31
  Let me tell you the story. I still have a challenge with it
• 29:33
  by the that's why. I'd like to hear the story so
• 29:35
  and you know what, I think there's some lessons that I
• 29:37
  think would work for both of us through the story.
• 29:40
  So basically, as we all know, at some point in time, Bet a
• 29:44
  Unilever, not Ben and Jerry's Unilever, because of pressure
• 29:48
  from Ben and Jerry's had given a ultimatum to their company in,
• 29:55
  in Israel that they are no longer going to, if you sell to
• 30:00
  you Huda Shamron, we are no longer going to allow you to
• 30:04
  maintain their, the, the, the marketing that they were going
• 30:11
  to stop. They had arranged an agreement
• 30:14
  at that point in time. It was being manufactured by a
• 30:17
  company in Israel. They, they, they just had
• 30:21
  licensing rights. It wasn't owned by Ben and
• 30:24
  Unilever. They were licensing the name to
• 30:27
  the company in Israel. They were going to take away
• 30:29
  that licensing, right, Because of the argument over Yehuda
• 30:32
  Shamran. Obviously that was, and yes, the
• 30:38
  question did turn and the lights turned towards us.
• 30:41
  Should we or should we continue certification?
• 30:45
  So first, the first thing is don't react immediately.
• 30:49
  Gather your information, find out what you're dealing with,
• 30:51
  and then make a educated decision or seek out people that
• 30:55
  will help you to make out an educated decision.
• 30:58
  So first of all, just a misnomer.
• 31:02
  Most companies are not interested in taking political
• 31:06
  stands, so want to see if maybe there's a little bit to the to
• 31:12
  the rest of the story. So Unilever happens to own 100%
• 31:18
  of Strauss. So now if they stopped Ben and
• 31:23
  Jerry's, so then they were 50% of the market. 50% of the mark
• 31:27
  was Ben and Jerry's, 50% of the mark was Strauss.
• 31:30
  By pulling it, they were because I'm going like how in the world
• 31:33
  are they walking away from multi, multi multi $1,000,000 of
• 31:36
  sales? They weren't, they were doing
• 31:39
  something that was in their economic express interest.
• 31:41
  They were closing down a competitor.
• 31:42
  They were using politics to be able to close down a competitor.
• 31:47
  Do you hear it? Very interesting strategy you're
• 31:48
  looking on online. Strauss was 100% owned by
• 31:51
  Unilever. So that so first statement is
• 31:55
  it's about dollars and cents. People think it's about
• 31:58
  politics, but it was about dollars and cents.
• 32:00
  Follow the money. That's where it usually ends.
• 32:02
  So then now what's our responsibility?
• 32:05
  So in life, and very often I apologize, podcasters or people
• 32:09
  that are speaking enjoy pontificating in their position
• 32:13
  in which it doesn't necessarily have real life repercussions or
• 32:17
  it does, meaning everybody's more than happy to tell me what
• 32:20
  to do under those circumstances. But in the end, who was going to
• 32:25
  be most affected by this decision?
• 32:27
  So we decided to contact the people by Yehuda and Shamron.
• 32:32
  So we actually became in contact with you got the money, you got
• 32:35
  the money was the CEO of the council of Yehuda and Shamron
• 32:40
  today in Samaria. And we said, OK, you go tell us
• 32:44
  what you want us to do, not what the power what what the talking
• 32:49
  heads want to do. What do you think is in your
• 32:52
  best interest? So you go said he wants to think
• 32:54
  about it. And at the same time in life, my
• 32:58
  family, a lot of our personal questions are directed to Rabbi
• 33:02
  Willig, Rabbi Mordechai Willig. So at one point in time we were
• 33:05
  we were balancing it, speaking to Rabbi Willig as to what on a
• 33:09
  religious perspective and at the same time getting the direction.
• 33:13
  So if you remember the history of it, they announced that they
• 33:17
  were going to stop taking away the licensing 18 months in
• 33:22
  advance. They didn't announce it
• 33:23
  immediately. They announced it 18 months from
• 33:25
  now. We're going to take it away from
• 33:27
  them because of this whole fight of you who didn't come wrong.
• 33:30
  So his response was stay the course, stay with them to try to
• 33:36
  influence them to change. He put us in contact with a
• 33:40
  professor Katarovic, I believe his name was, he was one who
• 33:42
  actually authored the law on VDS.
• 33:47
  He got helped us get in there during COVID.
• 33:49
  We went in, we met with them, we met, he brought us to a whole
• 33:52
  bunch of different councils. We met with Martin Kahana.
• 33:58
  He, he brought us within the government of the, the, the
• 34:02
  movers and shakers within the government of Aritis role.
• 34:04
  And they, they said stay the course, tell content, maintain
• 34:09
  your influence and tell them that OK.
• 34:12
  If so, if it comes to fruition, then we'll, we will be put into
• 34:16
  a difficult position, but don't don't draw the line in the sand
• 34:20
  when the line isn't sand isn't there yet.
• 34:22
  The line in the sand is 18 months out.
• 34:24
  So we, we maintain conversations, we maintain
• 34:28
  context and we kept on trying to influence it.
• 34:30
  In the end, the owner and we were very, we were in contact
• 34:35
  with the owner, Ben and Jerry's. If you know the end of the
• 34:38
  story, Ben and Jerry's sold the entire name to the Israeli
• 34:43
  companies. So the Israeli company no longer
• 34:45
  was just a licensee of it, it or actually owns the name Ben and
• 34:48
  Jerry's in Israel. It totally divested itself, no
• 34:51
  longer connected to the Unilever part.
• 34:54
  And in the end they were very, very happy and they're
• 34:57
  continuing to sell to Yehuda Shamran.
• 35:01
  All of course there is Israel. And I think the lesson is very
• 35:04
  often we like to react and we like to jump.
• 35:07
  And you know, and sometimes when we feel that we're attacked and
• 35:10
  we, as you know, were attacked at that circumstance.
• 35:13
  But the right thing to do is to seek out the people to seek out
• 35:18
  this year called the money is a very, very close friend of mine
• 35:20
  now and I spent and there are many different other projects
• 35:24
  that I'm involved with him now. Because in reality, when you
• 35:28
  think it through and you'll find proper people to give you
• 35:32
  advice. And that's the truth of in life.
• 35:35
  This is not a it's not a business lesson.
• 35:37
  So now in the end, is it nice that this separate and Unilever
• 35:42
  fully pulls fully basically then got sued by Ben and Jerry's
• 35:46
  because Unilever supported Ben and Jerry's Israel, the Ben and
• 35:50
  Jerry's social group, which is not Unilever, sued Ben and
• 35:54
  Jerry's in court to try to overturn it because in the end
• 35:57
  totally favored Israel. They lost, Unilever won in
• 36:02
  court. So our involvement, I'd like to
• 36:04
  believe our involvement somehow in some form of fashion help
• 36:07
  them and we dealt with the highest level of people to be
• 36:12
  moderators to guide us as to what is the most efficient and
• 36:16
  effective way. And they kept on saying Airbnb
• 36:19
  tried this also air I don't know if you knew that Airbnb also
• 36:23
  tried cutting out all of you who to shown Rome and they they
• 36:27
  fought against it BDS and we know what's going on in the
• 36:32
  college campuses. It's going to show its head
• 36:34
  again. And in reality, we have to be
• 36:38
  prudent and not necessarily be reactionary.
• 36:42
  We should be proactive, but at the same time follow the people
• 36:46
  who've got the most skin in the game.
• 36:50
  Yeah, that's. That's wow.
• 36:51
  That's crazy. I didn't realize, Michael, Now
• 36:54
  that I'm like being exposed to it, this extra business, it's
• 36:58
  it's wild. It's it's, it's a real business
• 37:01
  like. Someone's got to write a book
• 37:02
  about this. I have so many questions now,
• 37:04
  like you've opened my mind to so many things.
• 37:06
  There has been some sort of stigma, okay, And there's
• 37:10
  probably very little truth to it, but there's got to be some
• 37:13
  truth to it that the kashrus business has become somewhat of
• 37:19
  a mafia. And I'm just repeating what's
• 37:22
  been said out there and you could see why.
• 37:25
  I mean, it kind of makes sense is that your store and you're,
• 37:28
  you know, you're a restaurant and you're not going to get any
• 37:31
  business if you don't have proper supervision with, with
• 37:34
  certification from a reputable company like an OU, like a like
• 37:38
  1/2 K. And that gives them a lot of
• 37:39
  power that gives them the ability to squeeze people.
• 37:43
  You'll pay a price that I demand because the supply is very
• 37:47
  limited. It's not like you can go to any
• 37:49
  just, you know, local makeup type of car shows because no
• 37:52
  one's going to, no one's going to believe it, No one's going to
• 37:54
  buy into it. So you want to have the credible
• 37:55
  people, right? You want.
• 37:56
  And, and so you're going to have to pay whatever it is that they
• 37:58
  charge you. So that puts it in an
• 38:01
  uncomfortable position, you know, when you're paying for
• 38:04
  something that you have very little control over and there's
• 38:07
  something to be talked about as far as how, how fair is it when
• 38:12
  you're dealing with something that's related to Judaism, It's
• 38:15
  related to, you know, something that we're all dependent on.
• 38:17
  It's very necessary. It's almost like it should be
• 38:19
  regulated in a way. It should be something that, you
• 38:21
  know, we should talk about and make sure that there's a system
• 38:24
  in place that everybody's benefiting from, not some more
• 38:26
  than others. And turns out that this thing
• 38:29
  became a very, very, very big business.
• 38:31
  And and rightly, a lot of work goes into it.
• 38:33
  I believe very we've said this many times in the podcast.
• 38:35
  We're big capitalists. We believe that the only way
• 38:37
  things work effectively if somebody's turning a profit,
• 38:40
  otherwise what's the motivation? And then you get second class
• 38:43
  type of work. You know you want to get the
• 38:44
  best, you got to pay for it. So totally makes sense.
• 38:47
  But there has been a side to this business, let's call it
• 38:51
  that. There's a little bit of darkness
• 38:52
  to it. There's a little bit of dark
• 38:53
  clout on it that if you can shed some light, your perspective and
• 38:57
  all of that. So I'm going to tell you an
• 38:58
  answer that is going to be very unpopular.
• 39:01
  I believe in monopolies. Is that a big answer?
• 39:04
  Love it. You're not off to a good start.
• 39:07
  Let me. Explain.
• 39:08
  Let me explain. Obviously a little shock value,
• 39:11
  but I want to explain. My father and our organization
• 39:15
  afterwards has very limited restaurants and we try to avoid
• 39:19
  it like the plague. And I'll explain to you why.
• 39:23
  The reality is the highest risk kosher is your restaurants and
• 39:29
  unfortunately they're working on certain margins that makes at
• 39:34
  times finding the mashquia A qualified mashquia a difficult.
• 39:41
  And yes, even though yes, I am a card carrying Republican and I
• 39:45
  do believe in competition and so on and so forth, but you don't
• 39:48
  want competition to run to the to the least common denominator
• 39:52
  of kosher. I believe kosher really does
• 39:54
  remain in the domain of the local rabbis.
• 39:57
  That's why the coffee did not go into the different areas,
• 40:01
  because I do believe they should have the right to be able to.
• 40:06
  They bear the responsibility of the community as as we started
• 40:09
  off this conversation, I'm a rabbi also.
• 40:11
  So to me, they bear the responsibility of so many other
• 40:14
  religious aspects of the community that if there winds up
• 40:17
  being a competition and then in the end the person goes, you
• 40:20
  know, my rabbi didn't make me do that.
• 40:22
  My rabbi didn't make me do that. Well, that undermines them.
• 40:25
  So to me, I do believe in that the local rabbit, it should be a
• 40:30
  should be given the capability of, of establishing standards
• 40:36
  within the community and going back to the financials of it,
• 40:41
  the largest cost for them is the mosquito.
• 40:44
  And sadly, many of these people are living below the poverty
• 40:47
  level. And the worst thing in my mind
• 40:49
  is a competition on OK, well, you told me I only have to pay
• 40:52
  him $20.00 an hour. You're telling him I have to pay
• 40:54
  him $35.00 an hour. Well, I'm not going to you.
• 40:57
  So the many of these much people, unfortunately, are not
• 41:00
  living a, not receiving a living wage.
• 41:04
  And to me, the opening it up to the public at large and opening
• 41:10
  up to everybody has its risks. I understand in the theory in a
• 41:14
  capitalistic environment, but unfortunately it's an and it's
• 41:18
  now back to the consumers. What do I mean?
• 41:22
  When a scandal happens, wherever it is and all over, every time
• 41:26
  the chicken winds up here or there, whatever problem, then
• 41:28
  everybody's more than happy to point the fingers at the rabbit.
• 41:32
  How could you let this happen? But when the rabbit turns around
• 41:35
  and goes hold on one second, you know what I'm going to say
• 41:38
  proudly, because I give credit to the to the to the to the
• 41:43
  store in in Upper West Side. Upper West Side called me up and
• 41:47
  wanted to be able to have certification for a market
• 41:50
  there. I said I'm just I'm not
• 41:52
  interested. I have no interest.
• 41:53
  I got a call from the rush Kayla.
• 41:55
  The community wanted me to I we're not interested.
• 41:58
  I'm only doing it if you pay the musky $100,000.
• 42:01
  Now recognize that most of us can't make ends meet on that,
• 42:06
  but that's far more than than what the average mashiach is
• 42:11
  getting. How'd the story end?
• 42:12
  Yeah, they gave it. That's amazing.
• 42:14
  Yeah, they gave them, they gave it to and I, I would not have
• 42:16
  anything to do with it unless that was the case.
• 42:18
  But but Michael, that's the challenge.
• 42:21
  Yeah, as if you go into a free market.
• 42:24
  You're not. You're not predominantly in the
• 42:25
  restaurant. That's exactly that's OK you.
• 42:27
  Don't want to make it a price war to the bottom?
• 42:29
  That's what you don't want to do, a race to the bottom.
• 42:32
  We're slowly, I have to tell you, it's something my brother
• 42:35
  and I've worked on. You know, it's three years ago,
• 42:38
  Mashquikham were routinely being paid $20.00 an hour.
• 42:41
  Now we're gender in the 30 to $35.00 an hour, but that's still
• 42:44
  not a living wage. So to me, on some level it's an
• 42:48
  interesting balance. When things go wrong,
• 42:50
  everybody's more than happy to point the finger.
• 42:52
  But if they get together and if the cashier get together and
• 42:56
  want to actually enforce, and I think the most important thing
• 42:59
  to enforce is to be able to lift up the level of the pay to the
• 43:03
  Mashquikham, which is going to all sound like a mafia, right?
• 43:06
  But that's why unfortunately, I told you, I heard, I walk away.
• 43:09
  I walk away and allow. I believe the local rabbis
• 43:13
  should be able to do that in order.
• 43:16
  To but they do their local rabbis can create their own
• 43:18
  little thing for like the local stores and you know.
• 43:20
  They're like putting their name on and have it and you know,
• 43:22
  it's Bergen County. It exists.
• 43:25
  There is one RCBC rabbinical counts of Bergen County.
• 43:28
  So they're able to somewhat affect the we, we, my, my
• 43:33
  brother. Actually we were asked about 3
• 43:36
  or 4 years ago to come into, I grew up in Teaneck.
• 43:40
  So we were asked by the rabbis in Teaneck to go into Teaneck to
• 43:43
  help them reset. And part of the reset was asking
• 43:46
  some of the other certifying agencies to leave so that we can
• 43:50
  raise the mushrikum that were being paid 20 to be paid over
• 43:53
  $30.00 an hour. We were able to change you were
• 43:55
  able to affect the quality of the mushrikum and then then we
• 43:59
  left. Then afterwards we decided that
• 44:03
  that put back into the hands of the local rabbis.
• 44:06
  How many companies do you certify?
• 44:10
  Range 1500. Wow.
• 44:13
  And some of these companies out of the 1500 huge, huge.
• 44:16
  Companies, right? 10% not even. 10% are big
• 44:20
  companies. 700, I'm going to tell you 700 companies are
• 44:23
  coming from the Far East, which are chemical companies, the
• 44:26
  manufacturers, manufacturers. Yeah, I just want to clarify it
• 44:29
  for a second. So you're not in the restaurant
• 44:31
  world, right? You're not an alcohol world
• 44:33
  either. And just tell us real quick,
• 44:35
  what world are you living in the manufacturer space and.
• 44:37
  The we have a very large piece in the in the manufacturer
• 44:41
  space. OK, we do do again, yes.
• 44:44
  And it was like a example, you know, it's Pepsi Cola for those
• 44:50
  are the large. Large manufacturers or also
• 44:52
  distributors? But I feel like OU is much more
• 44:55
  visible. They have a lot more market
• 44:57
  share. I feel like like Lay's potato
• 44:59
  chips, like all the big big companies, the OU is the most
• 45:03
  known. Thing most definitely the most
• 45:04
  known. They have a big brand, the OU.
• 45:12
  How many like who runs the OU? Is there like a group of people
• 45:16
  or is there like one or two executives that OU like who who
• 45:18
  runs up? Because that's a big business.
• 45:20
  Right. So Rabbi Kanak, who I spoke to
• 45:22
  you mentioned before you work for my father and then there's a
• 45:24
  Rabbi Elephant. Those are the two people who are
• 45:28
  who are in charge. There is above it.
• 45:30
  There's a cautious Commission. It is part of a large Organism.
• 45:33
  OU is part of a larger non for profit Organism.
• 45:35
  So they're doing restaurants also.
• 45:36
  They do much they they don't do as many restaurants either.
• 45:39
  I see, but they do also manufacture.
• 45:40
  They're more product based. They do like like, you know.
• 45:42
  They do do some restaurants. How did you guys get Pepsi?
• 45:45
  I'm very curious. That's a big account.
• 45:47
  What was that like? 'Cause you want to be honest.
• 45:49
  Yeah, I understand. I think the OU gave it to us
• 45:52
  because they weren't able to do Kafka.
• 45:53
  They wow. That's so interesting.
• 45:55
  Why would OU give it to you? They couldn't.
• 45:57
  Monopoly. They couldn't do coke, would not
• 45:59
  allow them. Coke didn't want them to have.
• 46:02
  Coke did not allow them they. Didn't want them to be serving
• 46:04
  their competitors. I believe so again.
• 46:06
  Again, that's an. Interesting idea whether it's.
• 46:08
  Is Kafka the second biggest cashless company it.
• 46:12
  Depends on who you ask. But it's up there.
• 46:14
  It's up there top top three of those.
• 46:16
  Within the United States, the other two are going to be either
• 46:19
  ourselves with the OK. Oh, the OK, I forgot about that.
• 46:23
  So who's the OK who though? Like what's is there a level of
• 46:26
  cash versus as far as stringency?
• 46:27
  Like is OU the best K is the best or they're all the same
• 46:31
  Like it's the same masculine? Wrong person, no?
• 46:35
  He looked at the sign. He's saying it's none of your
• 46:38
  business. OK.
• 46:39
  None of my business. Honestly, I'm actually curious
• 46:42
  for the listeners and I'm curious myself.
• 46:44
  If I go to a product and I buy it, just can you just list me
• 46:47
  who are the ones that I need to trust on it as a symbol?
• 46:49
  What are the? What are the top?
• 46:50
  Yeah. What are some of the big ones?
• 46:51
  It's a great. Question, no.
• 46:52
  So again, it's interesting. I invoke my father a lot during
• 46:56
  these conversations. My father has for 30 years do
• 47:02
  not. And as I told you, my father
• 47:05
  went into the next World. Nobody.
• 47:09
  His strict policy was do not comment on other people's
• 47:12
  certification, OK? He says.
• 47:14
  It was very simple. You know what, in the end, if
• 47:17
  you say negative, everybody. Stefan, please research top 10
• 47:20
  cultural certifications. I'd like to see it on the wall.
• 47:22
  See them have their own little thing, but you can.
• 47:26
  Right. Didn't have their own thing.
• 47:27
  It's a whole. It's they.
• 47:28
  Don't they don't participate in the OU and the half cane any of
• 47:32
  this? That's a they do their own
• 47:33
  thing. That's a misnomer.
• 47:34
  That's a That's a very, very, very big misnomer.
• 47:36
  There's a lot of those coming out today.
• 47:37
  Yeah, let me explain. Honestly, there's no the flavour
• 47:42
  companies you asked where's a lot of what we have?
• 47:45
  So there's trickle down economics.
• 47:47
  What do I mean by that? The moment the manufacturer
• 47:50
  needs certification, then the ice cream company is going to
• 47:54
  need its certification on its cream.
• 47:55
  It's going to need certification on its sugar, it's going to need
• 47:57
  certification on each of the ingredients, not really, but
• 48:00
  primarily its flavors and so on and so forth.
• 48:02
  So all the people supplying to these companies now look for
• 48:05
  certification. So the vast majority of
• 48:07
  certification is not necessarily on that item on the market.
• 48:12
  But the 700 companies that I told you that are in China, we
• 48:17
  don't do. We don't do any of the consumer
• 48:21
  based product coming out of China.
• 48:22
  We're not doing any of those candies, any of those things.
• 48:25
  We're not involved in that at all.
• 48:26
  But we're involved in 700 companies that are supplying to
• 48:29
  other companies within the United States.
• 48:31
  So a lot of the certification is trickle down that's not coming
• 48:35
  from a consideration company that was considered.
• 48:37
  Many of those Hamishas goggles are contacting us.
• 48:40
  They're relying on you as the parent company to manage some of
• 48:43
  those. Ingredient based companies, the
• 48:46
  ingredients very interesting companies under our certificate.
• 48:48
  What do you do when you find out someone's treating the system
• 48:52
  like? Do you have ways how to order
• 48:53
  people like what? What are some what are some
• 48:55
  tricks that you go in that you do?
• 48:56
  Are you allowed to show up to any of the manufacturing plants
• 48:59
  without permission? You have the right, you have the
• 49:01
  keys to the building. You you do.
• 49:02
  Not have the keys to the building.
• 49:03
  So you have to be by invite only.
• 49:05
  It's not by invite only, it's basically by contract.
• 49:08
  They have to allow us in when we when we show up.
• 49:11
  Now there, there are various levels based on the intricacy of
• 49:14
  the product. Some, you know, is there a
• 49:16
  flavour companies that I have rabbits that are in there all
• 49:18
  the time. They have offices in the
• 49:19
  building, you know, other places, they're stationed there.
• 49:22
  They're stationed there. There are other places that the
• 49:23
  person might be there once a week.
• 49:25
  There are other it varies or once a month, it varies on the
• 49:28
  intricacy of the of the of the product.
• 49:30
  OK. So by the way, the rabbi, the
• 49:32
  the Stephanie, you just looked it up.
• 49:34
  Oh, she we could talk about it in the top three, top three, top
• 49:38
  three and so. What do you have?
• 49:40
  You have the MOU. And we have the CRC.
• 49:43
  No, the CRC is lower than the top three.
• 49:45
  Well, it's up there on the board.
• 49:46
  What are you looking on the board?
• 49:48
  Just scroll up. We have the star K we have the
• 49:50
  Huff K, the OU and the OK and the top four Huff K, Yeah.
• 49:53
  OK, where are you reading this from?
• 49:55
  Steve Rabbi Chachi PT Yeah. OK, remember that.
• 49:59
  Wow. Yeah, Earth.
• 50:01
  Kosher earth Kosher. Never heard of that.
• 50:02
  MK. That's Montreal.
• 50:04
  But that's you Heard of this? But that's probably.
• 50:07
  The RCC or just California? I just, I have a question on my
• 50:11
  mind that I have to ask it whether it's, you know, part of
• 50:13
  the someone just told me the story about the Muncie fiasco of
• 50:16
  the chickens and I'm so curious. You never knew that story.
• 50:19
  How it came out? Oh, how they were caught, yes.
• 50:22
  I don't even know that I just heard it.
• 50:23
  I don't know the answer to. That I'm going to tell you the
• 50:25
  story I heard. It's a cool story.
• 50:26
  You don't have to talk about your other things.
• 50:28
  I, I I respect. You and your OK you know.
• 50:30
  The the, the thing, it's just an interesting story.
• 50:33
  A guy's a distributor said, well, the guy was ordering, you
• 50:37
  know, tongue from me and I went to an event and I saw that there
• 50:39
  was tons of tongue at this event.
• 50:40
  And I'm like, I told all the distributors and I'm out of
• 50:43
  tongue. How did he get to, I'm the only
• 50:44
  guy in the industry with tongue right now?
• 50:46
  And then he did a little research and he found that it
• 50:48
  wasn't just the tongue, it was the chicken and everything else.
• 50:50
  But it's interesting because having the right mosquitum in
• 50:53
  place and having the right staff that actually don't just sit on
• 50:56
  the corner and take home lunch bags and you know, because they
• 50:59
  need to, because they're only getting paid like minimum
• 51:01
  poverty wage. Like you said.
• 51:03
  I love that. I love that concept.
• 51:05
  And I'm, I'm curious about how you guys decided what risks are
• 51:09
  in the industry, what aren't? And you're saying manufacturing
• 51:11
  is a big one, but you said 10% is national products as well,
• 51:15
  right? So I'll explain to you when you
• 51:17
  say risk take, you take any one of the large manufacturers,
• 51:24
  they're much less risk than the smaller manufacturers, right?
• 51:28
  They have development teams as long as, OK, I'll take it in the
• 51:33
  following fashion. It's very hard to be a
• 51:35
  policeman. It's much easier to be part of
• 51:38
  the facilitator. What do I mean by that?
• 51:40
  If you and a large company come involved with the purchasing
• 51:44
  company, with the developing development, so there's much
• 51:47
  less surprises. Your average, your small company
• 51:51
  might go and buy from a distributor and can't really
• 51:55
  even control who the the product they get there.
• 51:58
  The average restaurant is buying from a distributor.
• 52:01
  The distributor chooses what he provides them.
• 52:04
  When you were dealing with a company that's that's $100
• 52:07
  million worth of sales, it's a huge company.
• 52:10
  They're they're purchasing from the same people that have the
• 52:12
  quality control. It's a much consistency, the
• 52:14
  consistency, it's a much easier environment, right.
• 52:17
  So the smaller you get the smaller companies and that's the
• 52:21
  smaller companies and the the more.
• 52:23
  Volatile the smaller companies because there there's no real
• 52:27
  rhyme or reason for what they're getting that week, you know so.
• 52:29
  And and they're very much could be by price oriented and that
• 52:32
  was at that. Point whatever's cheaper for the
• 52:34
  day. What you know, there's like a
• 52:35
  they they like a shopping tool micro.
• 52:37
  Restaurant Depot and just fill up the cart and be able to do
• 52:41
  it. It's a totally SO.
• 52:42
  One of the good things that I that I learned from this already
• 52:44
  is that the idea of having a community based kosher, you
• 52:47
  know, I like that idea in the Muncie community.
• 52:50
  I came to shul the other day and that's what I wanted to ask you
• 52:53
  real quick. Sorry.
• 52:53
  I know you still have something on your mind.
• 52:55
  We'll get to it. Right.
• 52:56
  You remembering it? Sure.
• 52:58
  OK, good. The rabbi's got together of the
• 53:02
  community and they created a certification on top of all the
• 53:05
  certifications of all the restaurants in the community
• 53:06
  from all the other certifications that actually
• 53:08
  recognized in the community. I was so lost by it.
• 53:10
  I didn't understand it. I didn't get a good explanation.
• 53:12
  Can you just give me the the IT would make sense for me if the
• 53:15
  community got together and said the rabbi's, Hey, let's get rid
• 53:18
  of all the national organizations.
• 53:19
  Let's make a community based organization for Costros like
• 53:22
  California or whatever, Maryland and you know, and do something.
• 53:25
  But this is like, oh, no, no, no, the OU and all the other
• 53:28
  restaurants that are certified by nationally recognized.
• 53:30
  That's not good enough for you. We're going to make another
• 53:33
  layer. I'm just curious how that
• 53:33
  happened. You know what I'm talking about
• 53:35
  and. It was exactly talking about and
• 53:36
  I'm also curious how that happened as well.
• 53:38
  Is that's what that was my. Question Why do they feel like
• 53:39
  they had to? What's going on here?
• 53:41
  More resources to, you know, and also made people question like
• 53:45
  what's going on? Was there something?
• 53:46
  Wrong. OK, so can I?
• 53:46
  They put a lot of they debt by the way.
• 53:48
  That's what I meant by the power of these bigger organizations.
• 53:51
  Can say, by the way, that rabbinical organizations not
• 53:54
  good, they're no good, we don't approve them, and then they put
• 53:56
  them out of business. Sorry, Rabbi.
• 53:58
  Well, I'll let you answer. Good.
• 54:00
  OK, so I, I would like to explain it in the following
• 54:07
  fashion. You started off with the story
• 54:11
  beforehand about the challenge with the chicken.
• 54:14
  As I explained to you very often the coach certification you're
• 54:20
  going to have a proprietor and the proprietor a I'm a from
• 54:24
  person. I don't, I don't want to have to
• 54:26
  pay much yacht. And you understand where the
• 54:28
  proprietor is coming from, You know, very often and within our
• 54:32
  community. What do you mean?
• 54:34
  I'm from, I know it's and you don't trust me.
• 54:37
  So there's always a friction as to the more certification you
• 54:42
  want to establish versus the cost that's going to be incurred
• 54:47
  by the proprietor. It's a very, very difficult
• 54:49
  environment. And that's why you, you know,
• 54:54
  I'm going to say it out loud. There's standards that exist
• 54:57
  within our community in Muncie that are below the standards
• 55:01
  that may exist in Bergen County. In other words, both of your
• 55:06
  shoes, very often they're sending equipment without a
• 55:10
  Muscat, correct? They'll send you a hot box and
• 55:12
  that a hot box. They'll bring the food with the
• 55:14
  hot box, they'll drop it off and then they'll afterwards come
• 55:17
  back and take it back. They'll send a chomp pot.
• 55:20
  None of that exists in Bergen County.
• 55:22
  Why? Because the rules are the shuls
• 55:25
  have to have a have a mashkia for you to be able to bring
• 55:28
  anything that has a caterer's equipment in the shuls have to
• 55:31
  have a mashkia. So the reality is, is
• 55:34
  unfortunately, and I'm saying that I'm saying it out loud, the
• 55:38
  standards of cashews within our community is not as high as some
• 55:42
  other communities. And part of that is a pushback
• 55:45
  of pressure because of economics.
• 55:48
  You know what, nobody wants to have to pay for the mashkiah at
• 55:51
  their I'm synonymous sound terrible.
• 55:54
  Yes, I people, my shoulder might go ahead and might spend 20,
• 55:57
  five, $30,000 on a, on a bar mitzvah, kiddish or Shabbat.
• 56:02
  I don't want to pay the $500.00 for the mashkiah for the $1000
• 56:05
  for mashiah. They should.
• 56:07
  And the reality is, is our community as a whole could use
• 56:11
  an increase in standards as opposed to this perception.
• 56:15
  We have it with party planners. There are party planners that
• 56:18
  basically run entire events and there's no hush cock on it at
• 56:21
  all. So I believe part of what that
• 56:24
  that organization was, and I fully support it, is it was
• 56:28
  initially the brainchild of a Rabbi Alfred Cohn.
• 56:32
  He then some Blueberry Hill from Blueberry Hill.
• 56:35
  He, he spoke and he, he, he, he, he looked and, and asked for
• 56:39
  advice. I think a Robert Dervo was
• 56:41
  involved. Robert Crichton was involved
• 56:43
  through a lot of people who have tremendous cautious experience.
• 56:47
  And the point was that we understand that we're not
• 56:51
  looking to, they're not looking to put the certifying agencies
• 56:54
  out of business. But most of the certifying
• 56:57
  agencies embraced it because then they said, listen, what are
• 57:00
  you blaming me for? And I was there asking for this
• 57:04
  standardized standard across all of Muncie.
• 57:07
  So it allows that the the certifying, the present
• 57:12
  certifying agency to be able to enforce certain things without
• 57:15
  having to be concerned that oh, well, hold it.
• 57:18
  If I don't do it, it's going to go to another certification.
• 57:20
  By doing this, it is something I personally fully support it.
• 57:25
  Why my name was not on it, which is a good question, was is I
• 57:29
  didn't want it to to have any political overtones.
• 57:33
  Why is he involved? What in that this I, I, I It
• 57:36
  would be about conflicting conflict, but I I believe it is
• 57:40
  something that is a very. I don't I don't agree.
• 57:44
  That's because if they would have spoken about events and
• 57:46
  party planning it would have meant something.
• 57:48
  It said tell your restaurant to be part of our maybe mafia,
• 57:52
  otherwise we're you shouldn't eat there, not tell your bar
• 57:55
  mitzvah makers. What I what's that?
• 57:58
  What's that? I am to agree with you that
• 58:00
  there probably was a bigger fish to fry.
• 58:02
  I agree with you. I'll agree that I I I agree.
• 58:05
  It didn't have a very good look at the beginning.
• 58:07
  The ethics weren't great. It looked like a money grab to
• 58:10
  some people but it what but but. I know I can tell.
• 58:13
  You no, but and you. I think you're both pointing on
• 58:17
  to something which this side of the microphone has to do a
• 58:21
  better job or maybe for yours. I believe there are many things
• 58:26
  that we as rabbis, we as yeshivas, we as Castro's
• 58:29
  agencies are really trying to do the best the best we can.
• 58:36
  There isn't some sort of lack of trust and I think perhaps lack
• 58:42
  of dialogue, meaning every time Yeshiva comes out with some
• 58:45
  automatically assume that she was the with the there, there's
• 58:48
  a certain sarcasm, which is it's sad.
• 58:50
  It's sad because the community that I grew up in, my mother was
• 58:54
  in charge of the PTA and there was a much more communal based
• 58:58
  schools, communal based schools. And I think PR or 100% because
• 59:06
  not based on any knowledge. I'm going to flip it to you.
• 59:08
  You know, you had a negative adverse reaction, not because
• 59:12
  you had any information, but you made an assumption.
• 59:15
  And I think that's the problem. We as rabbis and as because very
• 59:21
  often it's, I want to give you an example and I believe in
• 59:25
  this, and this may be very, very, very unpopular.
• 59:28
  I wish the schools would go to 11 month school to what to 11
• 59:31
  month school. I'll explain in my personal
• 59:33
  opinion, there's a huge economic problem, camps, schools and
• 59:39
  things that if I told you that the achievers came to you and
• 59:43
  said, you know what, we're going to 10 1/2 months, for four
• 59:47
  weeks, they're going to be just Limoto Kodish and we're going to
• 59:50
  run a day camp in the afternoon because there's no question.
• 59:53
  I'm not naive. The kids are emotionally
• 59:55
  happier, they're more cooperative during, during
• 59:58
  during the summer. But the moment if because I do
• 1:00:02
  believe I want it immediately. Would there be negative reaction
• 1:00:05
  by most of the parent body if? The schools came out with saying
• 1:00:09
  we want 10 1/2. The answer's yes, but
• 1:00:12
  unfortunately I think there has to be more dialogue and our
• 1:00:16
  schools and the times are not good at bringing parents in.
• 1:00:19
  But I believe that. The problem I think that exists
• 1:00:24
  for a long time and this has always been sort of the two
• 1:00:27
  sides of the coin between, you know, the rabbinical crowd and
• 1:00:30
  then the the followers, you know, the people that are that
• 1:00:33
  are listening. I know what the relationship we
• 1:00:35
  call an employer, an employee, like what do we call?
• 1:00:37
  But bottom line is that a lot of the things became
• 1:00:39
  commercialized. A lot of things became about
• 1:00:42
  like we have matzo bakeries, right?
• 1:00:44
  Matzo bakeries. It's been known forever that if
• 1:00:47
  you owned the matzo bakery, you were probably very wealthy.
• 1:00:49
  You're probably well to do. I don't know if that's still the
• 1:00:51
  case. Certainly was for a very long
• 1:00:52
  time that it was a lucrative business to be in.
• 1:00:55
  They were printing money at a certain point.
• 1:00:57
  I mean, they start operating a matzo bakery, I heard like 6
• 1:01:00
  months in advance or whatever. It is a long time and they're
• 1:01:02
  working year round and they're making lots of money.
• 1:01:05
  And then you go to the grocery and you pick up a pound of matzo
• 1:01:09
  and you're paying like 40-50 bucks, whatever it costs these
• 1:01:11
  days, it's a lot, a lot of money.
• 1:01:12
  And people don't just wait a second, slow down a second.
• 1:01:15
  Who's actually taking advantage of the situation?
• 1:01:17
  We all need matzo, bottom line, and we understand that somebody
• 1:01:22
  else has to make it and somebody else to charge a fee for it and
• 1:01:24
  we get it. But at what point?
• 1:01:26
  So we all step in and say we got to draw a line in the sand here.
• 1:01:29
  You can't just charge whatever you want because we're forced to
• 1:01:31
  buy Maza because of our religion.
• 1:01:33
  And now some other people monopolize it, got ahold of, you
• 1:01:36
  know, and they they now control that segment and we have to have
• 1:01:39
  to conform to it. We're going to rebel.
• 1:01:41
  We're going to eventually put, and if this happens one too many
• 1:01:44
  times when things like this in our community comes up and they
• 1:01:47
  decided they need additional conscious to what we already
• 1:01:49
  have conscious, we need to do more.
• 1:01:51
  Why? What's going on?
• 1:01:52
  This is, it might be a little bit of a natural reflex for
• 1:01:55
  certain people because we have a history, unfortunately, of doing
• 1:01:59
  these kinds of things. So you're right, I think the
• 1:02:02
  rabbis, you do a better job of explaining things and not just
• 1:02:04
  forcing something down and saying this is what it is.
• 1:02:06
  But it's been going on for a while.
• 1:02:08
  It's unfortunate, but that's why we're sort of questioning it and
• 1:02:10
  we're trying to just get to the bottom.
• 1:02:12
  We're getting scammed. What's happening?
• 1:02:14
  We've been taking advantage. Of so I want to address both of
• 1:02:16
  yours because then. So first of all.
• 1:02:24
  OK, so I want to go. I want, I want to.
• 1:02:27
  So first of all, in that case, in that that organization does
• 1:02:30
  not have, there's no cost involved.
• 1:02:32
  They are not charging. It's no cost involved.
• 1:02:33
  They fundraise. Oh, that's.
• 1:02:36
  A big that's a yeah, you. They failed to mention that
• 1:02:38
  part. Most definitely there's no if
• 1:02:41
  you read through it's all of its pamphlets, it said clearly that
• 1:02:45
  this is they are not charging. They are not charging a nickel.
• 1:02:48
  The restaurant is a community. Not a nickel.
• 1:02:51
  It's a beautiful thing, exactly. Suddenly.
• 1:02:53
  OK, they are not charging. Safety net.
• 1:02:56
  They're in it for the right. Reason talk about the catering
• 1:02:58
  and the and the event because that means but.
• 1:03:00
  Now Eddie store that didn't join this.
• 1:03:01
  Thing. No, no, no, don't worry.
• 1:03:03
  So but any store that this should be shut down?
• 1:03:05
  No, but I want to go back to something.
• 1:03:06
  What's it? No, no.
• 1:03:07
  OK, You know what? People sometimes are averse to
• 1:03:11
  change, but the reality is they are not charging there.
• 1:03:14
  There is no charge. Now to go back to the other
• 1:03:17
  part, and I apologize if I'm throwing it back on people.
• 1:03:20
  You know what we all hear about the prices and so on.
• 1:03:23
  So I'm telling you, first of all, it's inconsequential.
• 1:03:26
  But you know what the responsibility in the end is?
• 1:03:31
  We have to balance our budgets. And that means if it means an
• 1:03:35
  extra stop to bingo or if it means an extra stop to Costco,
• 1:03:40
  it's something that we have to realize in the end.
• 1:03:43
  Very often we sit in a chair and we blame the schools, we blame
• 1:03:48
  the Schulz, we blame the rabbis, we blame the, we blame the
• 1:03:51
  system, we blame this. In the end, push comes to shove,
• 1:03:56
  it's our responsibility. And it is an imperfect system.
• 1:04:00
  You know, to me, I remember this, it was an amazing learning
• 1:04:04
  lesson for me and shy Cohen had come to my community.
• 1:04:08
  Do you know Rubbish, Cohen? Were priority one.
• 1:04:09
  Priority one, Yeah. So he was speaking was Friday
• 1:04:12
  night, and he was speaking and he was.
• 1:04:14
  Just tell everyone who rubbish Cohen is for, especially for
• 1:04:16
  oshi. I don't know.
• 1:04:18
  You rubbish, but you know I. Know he was a leader for for for
• 1:04:21
  teenage boys. He had a lot of programs and his
• 1:04:25
  priority was helping them grow through that age group.
• 1:04:29
  And he dealt with, he dealt with all aspects of teenage issues.
• 1:04:33
  A man, a heart as big as he, he accepted everybody.
• 1:04:36
  So we had a nice, beautiful Friday night and he's speaking
• 1:04:39
  and he was talking about the challenges that exist in the
• 1:04:43
  schools, in the schools, in the communities.
• 1:04:45
  And he was taught and I saw how it hit a nerve and a number of
• 1:04:50
  the people in my community kept on growing on on the statements
• 1:04:54
  and on the statements and, and it was, it was rejuvenating.
• 1:04:58
  But I saw in my mind it was going the wrong way.
• 1:05:01
  So I remember because everyone liked to hear all the
• 1:05:04
  negativity. So I raised my hand.
• 1:05:06
  I said to Shiva, that's how I referred to Rubbery Shaykhon.
• 1:05:10
  I said, you know what, very few people are in your position to
• 1:05:14
  actually make a difference. But what are we average guy like
• 1:05:18
  the guy sitting on this side? What do we do in this imperfect
• 1:05:22
  situation, 'cause he understood I was trying to reset the
• 1:05:27
  question. So he looked at, he looked at
• 1:05:30
  the, the, the crowd that was there.
• 1:05:32
  He said, I wanted to tell you something.
• 1:05:33
  He said the average principal or Russia, Shiva, he has, we're
• 1:05:39
  going to make it up. He has 200 people on a year that
• 1:05:42
  he's responsible for and each year changes.
• 1:05:45
  So the course of his career he has thousands of people that
• 1:05:49
  went through his door. The average teacher has 25 to 30
• 1:05:53
  kids in their class and over a 30 year career he'll have 1000
• 1:05:59
  and each year it changes, he says.
• 1:06:02
  In truth, we can talk about the responsibility of a Shiva, we
• 1:06:05
  can talk about the responsibility of the teacher,
• 1:06:08
  said. However, the average parent
• 1:06:10
  sitting in this room as somewhere between 467 kids and
• 1:06:14
  they're the same kids year after year, he goes, the primary
• 1:06:18
  responsibility sits on you. And even if it's an imperfect
• 1:06:22
  situation, we have to stop walking around and throwing and
• 1:06:27
  casting the responsibilities to the rabbis, to the teachers.
• 1:06:30
  It's just squarely on our shoulders.
• 1:06:32
  Now, of course, I don't want to, as the rabbi side abdicate.
• 1:06:36
  We have to wake up every morning and try to figure out how to
• 1:06:38
  make it better. But in the end, the solutions
• 1:06:42
  are going to come from the people.
• 1:06:44
  That's when the people, as you said, if you want to quote,
• 1:06:46
  rebel. Yeah.
• 1:06:47
  If if in the end you feel prices are too high somewhere, shop
• 1:06:49
  elsewhere. It's your responsibility.
• 1:06:52
  It is ours as individuals to responsibility.
• 1:06:55
  In the end, it's our end. And I'll get off, get on to my
• 1:06:59
  soapbox. If we think the weddings are too
• 1:07:02
  expensive, then change them and be the person who says, no, I'm
• 1:07:06
  not spending this amount, the money.
• 1:07:09
  I'm not spending this ridiculous amount of money to, to rent the
• 1:07:12
  dress. I'm not doing, you know, be be
• 1:07:15
  proud. You know, if somebody can
• 1:07:17
  really, if we can put the people on a pedestal that actually pay
• 1:07:22
  their credit card at the end of the month and put the people on
• 1:07:25
  the pedestal who really go ahead and do what's economically
• 1:07:28
  right, we would be able to change our community.
• 1:07:31
  It's as opposed to everything being about the the.
• 1:07:35
  One family at a time, Everybody take responsibility for your 100
• 1:07:38
  feet. That's around you.
• 1:07:40
  And we just had, we literally just had.
• 1:07:42
  Yeah, my dad, we. Spoke.
• 1:07:44
  About this and I recommend everybody to to spread the
• 1:07:49
  message within your community. I believe that if someone
• 1:07:52
  doesn't have a financial manager, 10 out of 10 people
• 1:07:54
  need it and it's helpful from a very young age.
• 1:07:58
  So someone that can help you manage your budget and your
• 1:08:00
  spending, because this is not something that comes easy,
• 1:08:01
  Rabbi. But this OK really I.
• 1:08:03
  Apologize my on my on my soapbox and I'll do it anyway.
• 1:08:07
  I love it. The reality is is how many of us
• 1:08:12
  and I'm calling us because you're all my friends.
• 1:08:15
  I appreciate it are going and spending 30 forty $50,000 on a
• 1:08:18
  Pesach and to be honest with you, I don't believe it's
• 1:08:21
  economically acceptable if you don't have two 3-4 years worth
• 1:08:26
  of assets. You know it's can you in an
• 1:08:29
  economic way explain why a person could spend 3040 thousand
• 1:08:32
  if he doesn't have a half $1,000,000 worth of savings
• 1:08:36
  because you know what market turns guy loses their job.
• 1:08:40
  The reality is we spend even if you're making ends meet, does
• 1:08:45
  God, you have to reach a certain point of time and go hold on one
• 1:08:47
  second. My predominant job right now is
• 1:08:51
  not to take my kids away for pay so but rather to put money away
• 1:08:54
  for their college, put money away for their debt.
• 1:08:59
  How old is your oldest? In his 20s.
• 1:09:01
  In his 20s. Do you know what it is to buy a
• 1:09:03
  house in Muncie now? If you're not putting money
• 1:09:06
  away, you're not putting money away for them.
• 1:09:08
  I. Hope you lose the Texas.
• 1:09:09
  OK, that may be certain. That may be their option.
• 1:09:11
  But the reality is, is you go back all the way at the
• 1:09:13
  beginning of the speech. All the way at the beginning.
• 1:09:16
  My parents never drove a new car.
• 1:09:19
  Our all the kids houses are bigger than theirs and they put
• 1:09:22
  money away for each and every kid and each and every
• 1:09:23
  grandchild because our parents understood what fiscal
• 1:09:27
  responsibility was. That's because that's because
• 1:09:29
  your parents were Yankees. There we go.
• 1:09:32
  There we go. No, no, no, no, Stefan.
• 1:09:34
  Actually, my parents are Russian and Polish.
• 1:09:36
  So my kids, they're the mix between Yankees and Russian,
• 1:09:39
  Polish. What's?
• 1:09:39
  The Yankees side of you, then. They come exactly half hour
• 1:09:42
  late. No, no, they are the action son
• 1:09:45
  of something. No, no, I married.
• 1:09:47
  I married in they. I'm married in.
• 1:09:48
  I'm not a blue blood. We got married into what?
• 1:09:50
  Which family? My wife is Rav Schwab's
• 1:09:53
  granddaughter. Got it.
• 1:09:54
  OK. Yeah, I know.
• 1:09:55
  It's, I knew there was a fun fact over there, Rabbi, one of
• 1:09:57
  the questions that we started asking our guests on the
• 1:09:59
  podcasts are unique to the to the people, but it's also we
• 1:10:02
  like to ask the same question. We came up with another question
• 1:10:05
  based on our listeners. And one of those questions are
• 1:10:08
  if you had a megaphone to scream out to the world, and it looks
• 1:10:10
  like you did already five times on this program with so many
• 1:10:14
  things that we can learn from you and grow with you.
• 1:10:17
  But what would that one message be on that mega?
• 1:10:19
  Everybody's listening to Rabbi Ari Center right now.
• 1:10:23
  Who has a message that's important for everyone?
• 1:10:25
  Is that the message what you were just saying, or is it?
• 1:10:26
  Can you solidify it? Is that something?
• 1:10:28
  Look in the camera, say it. What's that message?
• 1:10:31
  So by the way, I just wanted you to know it's interesting I asked
• 1:10:34
  rabbits and support a hell of the same question.
• 1:10:36
  So when I. Don't know what it is, sorry.
• 1:10:38
  Rabbits and support a Heller is a phenomenon in everything.
• 1:10:41
  So I was like at the host of first Shabbos beautiful.
• 1:10:44
  So I'm going to give her you her answer, but then I'm going to
• 1:10:47
  give you mine, please. Her answer was a fascinating her
• 1:10:49
  answer. I said rabbits and support the
• 1:10:51
  same story. If you were able to whisper into
• 1:10:53
  the ears of my Balabatan, what would you whisper into their
• 1:10:57
  ears? So she said, she told over the
• 1:10:59
  following story, she said that there was the the soldiers were
• 1:11:04
  evacuating in Gaza. They were evacuating at that
• 1:11:10
  point in time and Kushkatif, they were very echoing
• 1:11:15
  Kushkatif. And basically there, there was a
• 1:11:18
  father and son that were rebelling and fighting against
• 1:11:21
  it, and the soldier was crying because the soldier was
• 1:11:24
  following orders and had to. Remove this person from their
• 1:11:27
  home. He was please, you know, you
• 1:11:30
  know. I don't want to do this.
• 1:11:32
  You know, I don't want to do this, but you know, we're going
• 1:11:34
  to evacuate it. He goes, please, just just go.
• 1:11:37
  Why are you fighting? So the the father said to the
• 1:11:43
  soldier. He says I want my son to know
• 1:11:46
  two things, that there's things to fight for and when the times
• 1:11:49
  are tough, I'm going to be standing right next to him and
• 1:11:52
  no matter what the odds are, I'm going to be standing next to him
• 1:11:54
  fighting with him. So Reviton supporter Heller said
• 1:11:57
  somehow, someway, get that message to the kids that you
• 1:12:02
  will always be there for them. You will always stand besides
• 1:12:05
  them, no matter how desperate, no matter how difficult the
• 1:12:08
  situation is. And second message, there's
• 1:12:10
  something that's always worth fighting for.
• 1:12:13
  This was her message. A beautiful message, very nice.
• 1:12:14
  But I. Remember the moment, watching it
• 1:12:17
  unfold live, right? And watching it still giving me
• 1:12:21
  like. Right, but you had that question
• 1:12:23
  like, what are you doing? You know, come on, it's a waste
• 1:12:25
  of time. You thought it, but you know I.
• 1:12:27
  Actually agree with her. I, I, I understood what you want
• 1:12:29
  it. Yeah, It's you're not.
• 1:12:31
  You got to pull me out of here. Right.
• 1:12:33
  And that and and that memory will be etched in my mind.
• 1:12:36
  It's like a. Teachable moment.
• 1:12:37
  Forever. It's a teachable that that that
• 1:12:39
  was her. Did you repeat it to your
• 1:12:40
  congregation? I did.
• 1:12:41
  I did. You whisper.
• 1:12:43
  It's funny I ask you the question on a megaphone.
• 1:12:46
  What were you saying? Your version is, if you could
• 1:12:48
  whisper it. Okay, you know the difference.
• 1:12:51
  No, because maybe the difference.
• 1:12:53
  That's the right way to put the word in.
• 1:12:55
  Maybe the difference is OK, say it what?
• 1:12:59
  What is because you just want to speak.
• 1:13:00
  The other one is. You want it to be, you want.
• 1:13:02
  To listen, I want it to be heard.
• 1:13:03
  I want it to be heard, but OK what what what would?
• 1:13:07
  I yeah, I took it. No, I'm good.
• 1:13:08
  I'm good, I'm good. I'm in the Nazi.
• 1:13:10
  What would? Oh, you're a Nazi.
• 1:13:12
  You know, I like the socks though.
• 1:13:13
  They're very cool. Thank you.
• 1:13:15
  Bees fascinate me. Bees that.
• 1:13:17
  Then you should be interviewing my brother.
• 1:13:19
  My brother's a beekeeper. What?
• 1:13:20
  Sure you didn't know that? Which brother?
• 1:13:22
  Danny. Danny.
• 1:13:25
  That's what he does. No, Danny doesn't like 100
• 1:13:28
  things. Danny.
• 1:13:28
  Danny has a business card that has like 50 different things.
• 1:13:31
  One of his fifty is being. How many brothers are you?
• 1:13:34
  There there were 4 all together. My oldest brother passed away.
• 1:13:37
  I'm sorry. This is my brother Danny and my
• 1:13:39
  youngest brother Heinz. Who is the Rasha Shiva?
• 1:13:40
  In Israel, he's the Rasha Shiva. You heard of centers?
• 1:13:43
  Yes, Yes. OK, so going back to if I had a
• 1:13:45
  megaphone, what would what would be my message to the people or?
• 1:13:48
  If you could whisper in all of our listeners.
• 1:13:50
  OK, if I could whisper first, it would be is the following is
• 1:13:56
  Yiddishkite is enjoyable, tire is enjoyable.
• 1:14:01
  Life is good. Don't complicate it.
• 1:14:05
  Now there's an expression that we all cut accustomed to when we
• 1:14:09
  were growing up called Tartal Ishma Torah for its own
• 1:14:14
  purposes. I believe it's the Eglee Tao
• 1:14:17
  says it's a misnomer. People think that means I'm
• 1:14:20
  going to learn even though I don't enjoy it.
• 1:14:21
  He says no, life is about finding the part of Torah that
• 1:14:24
  you do enjoy in order that it should be that it could be
• 1:14:29
  Torah. It could be a guiding light.
• 1:14:30
  So first thing the megaphone is start with this perception that
• 1:14:34
  everything's difficult and everything's challenge.
• 1:14:36
  Life is good. And now here's the short
• 1:14:38
  message, the bumper sticker. Be the person you want your
• 1:14:42
  child to be. Because in the end, going back
• 1:14:46
  to Rabbi Shia Cone, 90% of what I could learn is what, by what
• 1:14:50
  we model, be the person you really want your kid to be.
• 1:14:56
  Wow, love that you know what I learned from this podcast?
• 1:14:59
  No, my take away was. I talk too much.
• 1:15:01
  No, no, you're awesome. You're awesome.
• 1:15:03
  By the way, I I can see why you can't grow.
• 1:15:05
  Your Cangans love you. You're very chilled.
• 1:15:07
  You're very down to earth. You're very easy to talk to you.
• 1:15:11
  Don't take a paycheck. You don't take a paycheck.
• 1:15:14
  To me, that's number one. I don't.
• 1:15:15
  Know any stress on anybody? You know, another mouth to feed.
• 1:15:19
  You're actually independent. I create stress.
• 1:15:20
  Don't worry. That's fantastic.
• 1:15:22
  But I took away this whole podcast.
• 1:15:24
  I had a I had a total I had an epiphany.
• 1:15:27
  I had like a maid. Like while you said you slipped
• 1:15:29
  in there, you didn't even notice, but you called it Costco
• 1:15:32
  instead of Costco. OK, I always know it as Costco.
• 1:15:35
  I always wonder what the heck is Costco where they come in that
• 1:15:37
  name. It's not Costco, it's Costco.
• 1:15:40
  That's what it is. There we go.
• 1:15:42
  That's what it came. Eventually became Costco.
• 1:15:45
  Poor guy, he's been thinking about this for 20 minutes.
• 1:15:48
  And Simply put, that's my dyslexia mispronouncing.
• 1:15:51
  It's Costco. I love it.
• 1:15:54
  I love it. Amazing.
• 1:15:55
  I learned something new today, that is.
• 1:15:57
  Great, Rabbi, we're going to have to wrap up.
• 1:16:00
  Although I I have to tell you, I can do this for hours.
• 1:16:02
  I haven't spoken about a lot of things that are on my list here,
• 1:16:05
  but one of those things were Ben and Jerry's.
• 1:16:06
  I'm happy. With So when am I getting
• 1:16:07
  invited back? You know what, that's a good
• 1:16:09
  question. I appreciate that.
• 1:16:10
  Round 2, before I ask you to come back, I want to ask you if
• 1:16:13
  you had to pick someone just like Ori picked you.
• 1:16:16
  And I'm so happy that we finally did this.
• 1:16:18
  By the way, Ori picked Rabbi Center and Rabbi Center is on
• 1:16:21
  the podcast. It happened within a few weeks.
• 1:16:22
  It's like amazing. So I'm I'm happy about that.
• 1:16:25
  Rabbi, let's keep that train going.
• 1:16:26
  Give me somebody who you think would add value to our growth
• 1:16:30
  oriented mission of our podcast. Someone that someone can learn
• 1:16:34
  from, you know, someone that can is meaningful, someone that's
• 1:16:37
  bringing growth to this world, someone that's helping make
• 1:16:39
  change to this world. That's really what this podcast
• 1:16:42
  has become. Thank God.
• 1:16:43
  So who would you recommend? So there are a number of people,
• 1:16:46
  but that was obviously I have my mentors, Robert Dinsky, Robert
• 1:16:50
  willing that you hear people, but I probably not maybe, but I
• 1:16:55
  think the person and I you all know him.
• 1:16:57
  Kivi Perlman. Kivi Perlman was a Talmud of
• 1:17:00
  mine and I actually love him like a son, Kivi Kivi.
• 1:17:04
  Any of the Pearlman's and you have the world's attention.
• 1:17:07
  By the way, right so but. So we all you know.
• 1:17:09
  This is specific to all the Pearlman's.
• 1:17:11
  Yeah, no, no, Yeah, it's. Specific.
• 1:17:13
  We had Sonny Pearlman, yes. No, somebody had specifically
• 1:17:16
  and you can tell Kivi that I told him because no.
• 1:17:18
  No, no, you're going to have to call him and ask him for.
• 1:17:20
  US Has Kivi ever been on Sonny's podcast?
• 1:17:22
  Kivi so he's. Not going to come on hours
• 1:17:24
  before he goes on, Sonny. No, he's already surpassed that
• 1:17:27
  in his life. He's been on Sonny's, I think.
• 1:17:28
  Yeah, yeah. But I have to tell you, I was.
• 1:17:31
  Don't let me see what happens. I'll give it a shot.
• 1:17:33
  I was roommates with Ellie Perlman in school.
• 1:17:35
  Sani Perlman has been a mentor of mine.
• 1:17:38
  Hi, Keevy, be be careful what you be careful what you say out
• 1:17:44
  loud. Keevy, I'm right now on a
• 1:17:46
  podcast and they asked me who is somebody that you would want
• 1:17:51
  that you think that would be beneficial for them to to, to,
• 1:17:55
  to interview. I said, you know what, there's
• 1:17:59
  there's a, there's a young man that I love as a son.
• 1:18:02
  And, and so that's so no, but Kivi, now, so they're not
• 1:18:07
  interviewing you, but can you just, you know what this is?
• 1:18:11
  This is very inappropriate for me, but I'm going to do it
• 1:18:13
  anyway. Kivi, why do we have a special
• 1:18:16
  relationship? Because I feel loved by you, I
• 1:18:20
  feel seen by you and I care deeply about you.
• 1:18:23
  I love the person you are and you, you've always been the most
• 1:18:26
  the kindest man to me. OK, so Kivi, you can take the
• 1:18:29
  check that I sent to you. I didn't take anything.
• 1:18:34
  He says this is. The honest truth.
• 1:18:36
  I'm teasing. I'm teasing.
• 1:18:37
  OK, Michael, take the phone schedule.
• 1:18:40
  So Kivi, hold on one second here.
• 1:18:42
  Kivi, it's Michael Greenfield. How are you?
• 1:18:44
  Hi, how are you? Amazing.
• 1:18:46
  The rabbi selected you. So I think you were already on
• 1:18:48
  Sonny's podcast, right, Oz? Yeah, a couple of times, Sonny.
• 1:18:53
  Yeah. OK, good.
• 1:18:54
  So you know what it's like. That's amazing.
• 1:18:55
  Oh. For sure.
• 1:18:57
  Yeah, Kivi, you'll do it once with them alone, then then we'll
• 1:18:59
  do it together because it would be to me that would be do it so
• 1:19:05
  we can do it together, OK. Kivi Oh, I like the path this is
• 1:19:07
  taking, by the way. Thank you, Kivi.
• 1:19:08
  I appreciate it. I'm going.
• 1:19:11
  To give you a call later. Kivi, I love you.
• 1:19:13
  I miss you. Talk to you later bro Bye bye.
• 1:19:16
  What a beautiful compliment to you, Rabbi and someone to say
• 1:19:20
  that right initially, like, you know.
• 1:19:21
  Also, what a nice relationship that was.
• 1:19:23
  Yeah, that's heartwarming. We should have more of that.
• 1:19:26
  I. Have to tell you, oh she, I've
• 1:19:27
  sat in Robert Centre's house past waste, past midnight and
• 1:19:31
  many times in my life dealing with community discussions and
• 1:19:35
  topics and it was such a pleasure to have you here.
• 1:19:37
  And our conversations are always so meaningful.
• 1:19:39
  They're always growth oriented. We always learn from each other.
• 1:19:42
  So educational. I knew so little about the whole
• 1:19:44
  Shavers world, but I have a little bit better perspective on
• 1:19:47
  it now. So it's an energy.
• 1:19:48
  In your house, your wife, the rabbits in an amazing human
• 1:19:51
  being, right? So I can't end without that.
• 1:19:54
  The reality is I have to come home tonight to realize that.
• 1:19:58
  Let's be real. No, the reality is is an all
• 1:20:01
  rapper sitting in this position in the end.
• 1:20:05
  It's almost an unfair because very often we get the fanfare
• 1:20:09
  and we get the appreciation and the reality of the people who do
• 1:20:12
  the mysterious nefesh when Kiwi would or Stephen and tell me
• 1:20:17
  then would show up at 2 minutes before Shabbos, by the way,
• 1:20:20
  you're coming in for the meal or they're taking us to the latest
• 1:20:24
  hours of the night. It's our wives.
• 1:20:25
  It's our wives that are doing it in reference to the clinic of
• 1:20:27
  the kids and there's a tremendous amount of
• 1:20:30
  appreciation. Shout out to her.
• 1:20:33
  Shout out to her that I'm going to end.
• 1:20:35
  I want to tell you the end with this story and then we can go
• 1:20:37
  from there. And this is partially why I
• 1:20:40
  appreciate this young man because reality, he's not a
• 1:20:43
  congregant and reality he's not and has nothing to do to you,
• 1:20:47
  Shiva. So I used to play ice hockey and
• 1:20:52
  I'm climbing. I'm coming out of the ice hockey
• 1:20:54
  rink, which I happened to play with my Bhala Bhatam.
• 1:20:57
  I play ice hockey with it when I was part of that initial,
• 1:20:59
  initial starting of that whole league.
• 1:21:02
  So we're coming out of the ice hockey rink and we're stepping
• 1:21:04
  over a bunch of people that are stoop sitting on the stoop.
• 1:21:07
  And I step out, I step over it and there's a guy sitting there.
• 1:21:11
  He's got a bunch of earrings and he's got a stud over here and so
• 1:21:15
  on and so forth. And I, I step over the night, I
• 1:21:19
  recognize him. I see him and I call him by his
• 1:21:23
  first name. We'll leave whatever the name is
• 1:21:24
  for a moment. He turns around and he goes
• 1:21:26
  Rabbi and give him a big hug and we continue walking and my son,
• 1:21:31
  he walks over and he goes, Daddy, you have no friends.
• 1:21:34
  You have zero friends in the world.
• 1:21:36
  I go, what do you mean I have no, everybody's my friend.
• 1:21:39
  They're all my friend. I love everybody because Daddy,
• 1:21:41
  you have no friends. I go, What do you mean?
• 1:21:43
  Here he goes, Daddy, even he calls you Rabbi.
• 1:21:46
  So. So then continue with the whole
• 1:21:48
  discussion then in the family. Does Daddy have any friends?
• 1:21:52
  Nobody. No friends.
• 1:21:53
  So I'm bike riding with my son-in-law up near Harriman
• 1:21:57
  State Park and I'm biking and I'm a little bit behind him
• 1:22:01
  because I've got a couple extra pounds, a couple actually years,
• 1:22:03
  a couple extra miles on me and a big SUV drives up next to me,
• 1:22:10
  passes me, then pulls back and then rolls down the window.
• 1:22:14
  And then my son was like, all worried.
• 1:22:17
  He looks at me. He goes, Rabbi, are you OK?
• 1:22:19
  There's an African American in the car.
• 1:22:20
  I don't remember where I knew him from.
• 1:22:22
  I have no idea. And he just continues hard.
• 1:22:24
  He goes, you really have no friends.
• 1:22:27
  So Steph knows me from the days when my name was, what was my
• 1:22:30
  name? Stephen Shushu.
• 1:22:32
  You remember that? So you know what, To me in life,
• 1:22:36
  the truth is, is it I, I, I enjoy the friendships and the
• 1:22:41
  friendships are what keeps us going.
• 1:22:44
  And even though I may be called rabbi at that point in time, I,
• 1:22:48
  I appreciate the reality is we, I'll end with this with Noah,
• 1:22:53
  Weinberg said. They have to know that you care
• 1:22:57
  before they care about what you know.
• 1:22:59
  In the end, that's the different role of a rabbi today.
• 1:23:02
  They have to really know that you care.
• 1:23:04
  And I hope that that's the message.
• 1:23:05
  I'm excited to have you back again, Rabbi.
• 1:23:07
  This has been an amazing, amazing podcast.
• 1:23:09
  Thank you to all our subscribers.
• 1:23:11
  Please don't forget to comment, like get involved.
• 1:23:13
  Thank you to the Prime Source production team and all our
• 1:23:15
  sponsors, and let's keep growing until next time.
• 1:23:20
  Amazing. Wow.
• 1:23:21
  Wow, that was enjoyable.