Latest / That Car Show / The Drive's Joel Feder.

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The Drive's Joel Feder. · That Car Show

• 0:00
  And we're really thrilled with what we've written and modifying
• 0:05
  certain pieces of the copy towards our new voice, towards
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  new to, to, towards the new angle and where we're going,
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  which again, it's day 2. Like if we're a 12 cylinder
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  engine, we're running on like 6 cylinders.
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  Yesterday it was like 4 like give me a second to ramp.
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  We're we're, we're warming up here, right?
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  It's like using the compact computer for the McLaren F1 to
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  start it up kind. Of there or do do make this?
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  You can hear the fan. You're like you.
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  Can hear it. It's warming.
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  It's that car show and once again our man Dan is away and
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  it's me and Lindsay. And this week we're joined by
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  our pal Joel Feder. Joel, of course, has been a long
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  time force in the world of automotive journalism and when
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  we recorded this, Joel was about a day and 1/2 into his new role
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  as Director of Content and Product at The Drive.
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  It's kind of a big deal, but he's also a hell of a nice guy
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  and is involved with so much more than cars.
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  From how the automotive space is changing quickly to what it
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  takes to put on a good cars and coffee, to the importance of
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  community and just getting off your ass and getting involved,
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  this one's for you. Stay tuned.
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  You're going to like this one and you're going to like Joel.
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  Might even learn something. It's that car show.
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  Well, hello and welcome back to that car show.
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  I'm Lindsay and I'm here with Ryan.
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  Hi, Ryan. Hey, how are you?
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  Good, good to see you. You too.
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  Been quite a week actually. Saw you in person.
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  I know. Thursday.
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  I know, I'm very happy we got to see each other actually in
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  person for once, right? Broke bread or pizza?
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  Yeah. We did delicious pizza and salad
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  and yeah, it's been a hell of a 10 days for me, but.
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  Can we talk about that just for two seconds?
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  Yeah, let's introduce our. Guest, we have.
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  Yeah, we have my friend Joel Federer with us, who is the new
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  Director of Content and Product at The Drive.
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  Hi, Joel. Thanks for having me guys.
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  Also it's exciting and busy as my week has been.
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  I feel like you are on the similar level for different.
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  Reasons, right? I think we can relate to like
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  the level of chaos and like, good chaos.
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  But yeah, it's exploding, right? Like drinking from a fire hose
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  in all the ways. Oh my Lord.
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  Like insanity, I mean. Does she not have a glow today
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  though? I mean to be fair, the last time
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  I saw her she had glow and she was not.
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  I don't even know if she's dating him so.
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  Like I was, not I. Think that's a natural state for
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  her? In some ways.
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  It's just slightly elevated the last six weeks, yeah.
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  Like it's just more more glowy. She is our podcast Sunshine so.
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  Well, I will take This is like the Hall of Gratuitous Praise.
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  I mean, we can go on all day. I never.
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  Text you anything other than. No, I know.
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  No, no, I mean, I'll take it. Listen like that's I'm here for
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  it. Joel, you are the new Director
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  of Content etcetera, etcetera, etcetera for the drive.
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  This is a big deal. Congratulations.
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  Thank you. It's befitting the skills that
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  you bring to the role and we're very happy for you.
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  It was. It was, it was a whirlwind 8
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  weeks of the last life and and yeah, I, I didn't even know this
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  was yeah, right. Sorry.
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  Is this a new role like maybe created for you or not, but is
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  this something they've had before or like can you talk
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  about? That's amazing.
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  So yeah, I mean, tell us I'll, I'll introduce you a little bit
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  and then you we'll hear all about the new role.
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  So. Anything you want to know
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  within? Right.
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  Right, whatever I can. Within the guideline, yeah.
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  Yeah. So you've been an automotive
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  journalist and member of the automotive media for decades.
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  And you have most recently, for 15 years, you were with the Car
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  Connection, Motor Authority and Green Car Reports.
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  But I know you've also freelanced for all the big
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  names, like if you, you know, if you think of it, Joel's written
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  for it or worked with them. You and I met at a Subaru dinner
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  after the LA Auto Show in the fall.
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  And just, it was a very hilarious group, as Dom and
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  Aaron and James are, are, you know, skilled at putting
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  together. Oh man, you should have seen
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  James Tate's e-mail after I got this job.
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  Definitely mentioned how he's definitely mentioned about a
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  dinner and and and guidelines at the drive and and how DoorDash
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  me mine next time, right? And there may have been, there
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  may have been a running theme about the size of the steak that
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  Joel ordered. But listen.
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  Like, go big or go home. Come on.
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  I've never been at one of these dinners.
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  No, wasn't. No, that was the cost.
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  OK, you were the one I've heard this story.
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  I've. Heard this story that's
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  different podcast. It's all lies, Yeah, No,
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  everyone was well within their limits, ordered exactly as they
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  were supposed. To we're all within Dom's
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  limits. Right, which is, you know,
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  that's, I mean, that's why we love Dom and like, we pretty
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  much laughed through the whole dinner.
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  But that was the first time that we had crossed paths.
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  It was a hilarious evening and we've stayed in touch since.
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  Joel has a boundless enthusiasm, as I think you can already tell,
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  and an infectious laugh and his razor sharp quick wit makes you
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  makes him somebody that you want to keep around and definitely
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  the master of the zinger. So I'm very happy to have you
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  join us today and hear about this next adventure.
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  So tell us everything. Yeah, the master of the zinger.
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  Bring it on. It look, it's been surreal for
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  the last 8. I mean, the last three days been
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  surreal, but but the last eight weeks have been surreal.
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  We did not have any heads up or, or or premonition or, or
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  knowledge that our outlet was going to get shipped down.
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  So I mean, we, we sat with it. I think I knew 48 hours for the
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  rest of the world knew, but it started leaking after about 24
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  hours. So there was about 24 hours that
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  that the world didn't know and then it started leaking and then
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  the rest of the world found out 24 hours later.
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  So, and it was only about a week and a half span from when the
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  world found out till it, it just, it all happened.
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  So it was fast and we didn't know it was coming.
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  So I mean, none of us had a plan.
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  You know, everyone, everyone's question was what are you going
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  to do next? It's like I didn't, I wasn't
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  looking for a job. I didn't have a resume.
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  I had given it literally zero thought up until that day.
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  And so it was kind of crazy. Yeah.
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  It was a lost process. And I mean, the world definitely
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  reached out this, you know, they say you're it matters when
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  things go sideways. That's when you find out who
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  your village is and who people are.
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  There's no question. I feel like a village showed up
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  and, and people were in my corner.
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  But I mean, the number one question was what do you want to
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  do? And, and I really, I didn't have
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  an answer. Very I, I knew all the things in
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  past I could do, but that's not what do you want to do?
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  And those are different things. And, and like I didn't have a
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  resume. It just, it just and we had
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  trips booked and, and, and stories like lined up that were
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  because because I mean, we you know, we book out yeah, I press
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  booked out six more weeks after that.
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  And I had trips that were lined up two or three under my name
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  that were for my outlet and all the like.
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  There was this whole ramification and fallout.
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  And so, you know, you each one of us handled the same way.
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  Like we call the automaker and say, I have all these cars
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  cancelled or, or scheduled and, and our outlets are closing and
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  whatever. And so I'm going to cancel these
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  cars to which every single automaker said, don't you?
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  It ranged from don't you dare, which that one was funny.
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  Like they're daring me to, to don't even think a thing about
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  it or, or should I send you some cars?
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  Because everyone just like we're betting on you, you're going to
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  stay in autos. It's going to be fine and, and
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  you'll figure it out. And I'm like, I'm not a
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  freeloader and, and I don't know that I can't promise you
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  coverage or content. And really all I have is like
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  the Joel Federer show, which I don't know if you know this, but
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  that's not real thing. So like I'm making that up.
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  I don't even know what that is. And, and, and, and they were all
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  just like, it's fine. It's going to work out.
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  Just, just, you know, and, and, and it did work out by the way,
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  like I ended up doing a lot of freelance in the last 8 weeks.
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  I would say 85 to 90% of the cars I drove ended up getting
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  written reviews. They're not all alive yet, but
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  they're all turned in of, of freelance.
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  So they all will get by lined. And seemingly automakers didn't
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  really care if they did or didn't.
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  Because this kind of those things where you know, you guys
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  know what it's like, you need to be up and aware on the content
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  of of vehicles and the landscape if you're going to continue,
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  right? It's pretty hard.
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  If you were out of car, it's only 52 weeks in a year.
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  If you were out of cars for 8 to 10 weeks or longer and then you
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  come back or you weren't paying attention to car news or any of
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  that stuff, it would be hard. It would be hard to just jump
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  back in and know what's if I didn't know that the Corvette
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  got refreshed and that the ZR1 launched and all these things
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  while I was out. Yeah, it would be difficult to
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  jump back in. You don't have a lot of context,
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  right? And you're trying.
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  To play catch up and still deliver good content.
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  And yeah, you've you've created an obstacle for yourself,
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  unfortunately. Well, and, and, you know, most
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  of my village was encouraging me to, you know, range from take
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  the summer because I'm big on lake life and I got kids and all
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  that stuff. They're like, take the summer,
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  go fishing, don't have the pressure.
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  I was kind of a workaholic and I was just like, I don't know how
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  to do that. Like if I go fishing, I'm going
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  to sit there and think I should be applying for a job, right?
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  Or, or, or September 1's going to come.
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  We're going to close the lake and I'll have a job.
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  And I wasted the whole summer. And also, everyone is interested
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  in what Joel Feder's doing now. And I was a hot topic because I
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  lost my job. But six months from now, is
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  anyone who care? Is anyone going to remember in
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  my history? Like it just didn't make sense
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  to me in my head. And so all of my friends and my
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  wife were like, you were a terrible unemployed person.
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  Like I still got up at 5:00 in the morning Monday through
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  Friday. Didn't change my schedule.
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  Actually, it's not true. 3 1/2 weeks.
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  Then I started giving myself grace.
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  I started hitting the snooze till 540I have a Gmail like what
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  3 minutes of grace I know. But I still got up in the
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  morning, had coffee, was reading the RSS and the news feeds and
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  all that stuff. Start drafting my freelance,
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  applying for jobs. And the issue was, is that I was
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  doing freelance while applying for jobs, while networking for
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  jobs, while looking for jobs. And So what was occurring is, is
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  I mean, I was literally working 24/7 because I was doing all of
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  these things at once. Usually you're either trying to
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  find a job or you're trying to freelance.
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  I was doing both. And it was difficult balancing
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  all of it, but I got everything. Of those, either one of those is
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  a full time job and you're doing both.
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  And you have a family. I was doing both.
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  I was doing both and still going to soccer practice and all those
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  things. I had the two trips I had
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  planned. I had three trips planned when
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  it all happened. I ended up doing two of them and
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  then ending up backing out of one of them because I didn't
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  have coverage sold and someone else me come and do some
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  consulting and so I end up going to South Korea.
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  The we actually I was in South Korea with Genesis when my
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  termination papers came in. I was on a bullet train doing
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  187 miles an hour in South Korea, ironically seated next to
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  my now Co worker Jerry Perez. Oh my gosh.
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  Reading my termination papers and like I stare I, I had a
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  picture of this I posted on Instagram.
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  I was staring out the window of this bullet train like I was
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  like, this is a surreal moment and I want to remember it.
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  And like I took a photo of my reflection in the in the window
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  and I was like, this is a moment where I'm going to someday from
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  now I will tell stories about this.
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  And then the next day, I was next to Jerry Perez at a Kia
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  press conference at South Korea Motor Show, signing termination
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  papers again, not even realizing he and I would end up working
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  together. And then the next night we were
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  doing Soju bombs, which is kind of like a South Korean sake and
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  I and I and we didn't have a lot.
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  I didn't have a lot to lose anymore.
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  I was now freelance. So like, you know, so they made.
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  Me. Sleep until Sunday, you know.
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  Oh dude, there's a video of me I have it and it's like 5 or 6
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  glasses of beer and then the the shot glasses and I knocked them
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  all in at one time with the with chopstick and I made it.
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  I thought I was going to get soaked.
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  I thought I was going to get just drenched and I made all of
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  them and that's how I became the Soji master of the trip.
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  But we were seeing they're brainstorming while drinking my
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  LLC names like as a collective table.
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  Jamie Butter is a lot of of news.
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  Jamie Perez, Jerry Perez from the drive.
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  He's not my Co worker. We're coming with my LLC names
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  and and so like surreal that I ended up working with Jared.
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  Yeah. And then I did the New York Auto
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  show and I did that with a Volkswagen still brought me.
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  I was supposed to go there originally and cover for the car
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  connection. I ended up going and covering
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  and just doing a bunch of freelance and then I did back
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  out of a different chip and do some consulting and and then I
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  did a bunch of freelance. I have a story in Automotive
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  News that'll be my first print story ever.
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  And online, but print. That's cool.
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  I asked if they sent me a copy. I was like, well, you.
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  Yeah, yeah, you got to frame it right.
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  Yeah, I was like just. Being cool.
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  Your mom wants one. Let's be honest.
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  Come. On and I was on the Autopian.
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  Ironically, I had two stories on the drive.
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  Freelance again, had no idea this was ever going to happen,
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  and then and now I'm here. So that's amazing.
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  It's been a crazy ride. Yeah, yeah.
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  Well, and I love like this has been happening for me a lot
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  lately too. When you look back and you see
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  these kind of threads and you're like, in a way it was there the
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  whole time. I just didn't know why.
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  Like, you know, to have Jerry with you every step of that and
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  then end up working with him. Like, I think that's just such a
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  cool little side thread. I I love Jerry Perez.
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  He used to be at Internet brands in a totally different capacity
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  and different vertical than me. So we never worked together but
• 13:30
  we knew each other. And then when he went to the
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  drive, I totally recommended him to everyone.
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  I was saying his praises. I love him as a guy and a worker
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  and his knowledge on cars and now to work with him, it is
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  just, it's awesome. It's just like a whole.
• 13:44
  Circle. Yeah, literally full circle.
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  I mean, and again, it's like a even longer thread than I
• 13:48
  realized when you were talking about these most recent moments.
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  Like, it's always been there. You just had to, like, see how
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  things were going to shake out and end up.
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  And 5%. This is so exciting.
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  So can you tell us what you'll be doing?
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  Like, what does this mean? What are you going to get to be
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  involved in? What are you creating?
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  Like, tell us. Tell us about your work.
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  Everything. Yeah.
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  So I'll that's. What we like to hear.
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  Everything I'm, I'm sucking on the masthead next to, to Kyle
• 14:19
  and there's a total it's, it's, it's surreal.
• 14:23
  The, the, the team, look, the team is amazing.
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  The team is, is full of ace players.
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  You know, Andrew Collins, Jerry Perez, Caleb, the Byron, the
• 14:33
  Adam, they're all, they're all great.
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  And everyone's got specialties and knowledge and background.
• 14:37
  They're all they're all great. Look, the the media landscape's
• 14:41
  changing, right? And it's under it's changing
• 14:43
  under everyone's feet at the at like literally in real time.
• 14:47
  And if things don't adapt, if things don't change or you, and
• 14:53
  by things, I mean outlets, right, with that to meet, I
• 14:56
  mean, at this point, it's meeting readers where they want
• 14:58
  to be and to make sure you're providing content that they,
• 15:00
  they, they feel is valuable, right?
• 15:02
  That's you're serving the reader.
• 15:03
  Otherwise, what's the point? And, and they got to have a good
• 15:07
  experience and they got to feel that they want to get that kind
• 15:10
  of content. And the Giant does a really good
• 15:13
  job at that for sure. But as the marketplace contracts
• 15:16
  and continues to contract, right, we'll see as we already
• 15:21
  seen, whether it's my previous outlets or, or automobile being
• 15:25
  wrapped into Motor Trend or, or auto blog.
• 15:28
  I mean, now it's being reborn, but like it died for like a
• 15:31
  second, right? You know, we need to provide
• 15:36
  content in all platforms of where people want to be.
• 15:41
  I, I, I read Kyle's post pretty closely yesterday and he didn't
• 15:44
  devolve into 100% what we're going to work on.
• 15:47
  But but it needs to be the days of just a destination website
• 15:51
  are going to die, right? Google search traffic and Google
• 15:54
  sending you direct traffic constantly, that's going to die.
• 15:56
  AI is going to suck in everything.
• 15:58
  That said, people don't only want things on Google.
• 16:02
  Google doesn't provide stories, by the way.
• 16:03
  They provide information, right? You want to know the wheelbase
• 16:06
  of a WKT Grand Cherokee? Google can give you that.
• 16:08
  You want to know how a car drives?
• 16:10
  Google can't give you that without us, by the way.
• 16:12
  And they certainly can't give you the narrative.
• 16:14
  And they can give you a summarization news, but they
• 16:16
  can't give you the context of it because it's not a human, right?
• 16:19
  So it can give you facts, but it can't give you the context and
• 16:23
  the narrative that a human can give.
• 16:25
  Using AI in your job to augment is useful in the right way for
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  sure. Like I used AI during my look.
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  I get paid to write partially. There's more to my job now than
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  writing. But but but part of my job is
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  writing and I used AI during my search to consolidate and use my
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  time efficiently. I didn't write things for me,
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  but maybe it helped augment certain things too as a
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  baseline. Again, not for like a new story,
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  but if you're asking it for advice on something or you're
• 16:56
  asking it to consolidate your words and get give you a
• 16:59
  backbone. Again, not for a news story, but
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  but resumes or or or cover letter.
• 17:04
  These are very different things in a news story.
• 17:06
  There's ways to use it in productivities to save you time
• 17:10
  or, or to take a bunch of presentations from an automaker
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  and have it being distilled down and take cut out all of the
• 17:16
  stuff in in in slides 90 through 99, right?
• 17:20
  There are ways that you can use it.
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  So then you can filter through what you need to get the
• 17:25
  information. Yeah, so there there's all.
• 17:28
  That and resource, if you use it correctly and like you said,
• 17:31
  like people still want the human element and the human critical
• 17:35
  storytelling and the subjectivity and the story.
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  And I think that's, you know, initially people went like, oh,
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  it can replace all the writers. And I mean, I'm sure the three
• 17:43
  of us have had somebody say to us.
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  Like certain kinds of writers for sure.
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  You know, can just do that for you.
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  And it's like, well, but we don't.
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  I don't want that as a writer. None of us want that, and our
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  audience doesn't want that. It's a certain kind of writing
• 17:55
  and information that can provide very useful, right?
• 17:57
  Yeah. Yeah.
• 17:58
  Is that what's hitting this? Is that what's resonating right
• 18:00
  now? The storytelling, the long form
• 18:02
  stuff, the narrative stuff, But what are people reading?
• 18:04
  What are? Where are the clicks these days?
• 18:07
  I got a Google Analytics access, yeah, three hours ago and I
• 18:10
  haven't clicked in. I'm still, I'm still getting the
• 18:12
  keys of things, you guys. But but Kyle and I spent like a
• 18:15
  collective, like, I don't know, 18 hours of some nonsense
• 18:18
  talking before I ever signed the paperwork.
• 18:22
  There is definitely product plans that I mean, look, they
• 18:25
  already have a newsletter. They already have a website,
• 18:27
  they already have YouTube, they already have social media.
• 18:30
  There are product plans and product for us is not cars.
• 18:33
  We don't we don't, we don't sell cars, right?
• 18:34
  We deliver content in the form of news or or social media, like
• 18:38
  all that stuff. A lot of their, their, their
• 18:41
  stuff, the drive, it can continue to be enhanced and
• 18:44
  refined, whether it's their experiences, my experiences,
• 18:47
  shared knowledge, collective knowledge is there's, I mean,
• 18:50
  the team was definitely excited based on the things that I
• 18:53
  already did at my old previous employer and the things they
• 18:55
  did. And then we can collectively
• 18:56
  merge a lot of our experiences together.
• 18:59
  So if you look at the drive last week and you look at the drive
• 19:03
  yesterday and today, Monday, a little bit like Monday was like
• 19:06
  really a lot. I didn't even get logged into
• 19:09
  CMS to like noon but but not because I wasn't online.
• 19:12
  I was online at 5:30. Don't you worry it was because I
• 19:14
  didn't get the keys to it. I was in my e-mail at 5:45 so.
• 19:19
  We know the schedule. You know the schedule but but if
• 19:23
  you look at yesterday's so yesterday we only run four ran 4
• 19:26
  posts. OK.
• 19:28
  Super, super proud of what we ran yesterday.
• 19:31
  Today I think we're going to run 6 and we're really thrilled with
• 19:35
  what we've written and modifying certain pieces of the copy
• 19:44
  towards our new voice, towards new, towards the new angle and
• 19:47
  where we're going, which again, it's date 2.
• 19:50
  Like if we're a 12 cylinder engine, we're running on like 6
• 19:52
  cylinders. Yesterday was like 4, like give
• 19:54
  me a second to ramp. We're warming up here, right?
• 19:56
  It's like using the compact computer for the McLaren F1 to
• 19:59
  start it up kind of there. You can.
• 20:02
  Hear the fan, You're like you. Can hear the thing.
• 20:04
  It's, it's warming, but I mean, give me a couple weeks.
• 20:09
  But I mean, we, we've barely had one meeting as a team and it, it
• 20:12
  was just general like Joel's here and here's kind of like the
• 20:15
  vision. We haven't even had a collective
• 20:17
  discussion fully on content as far as longer short form to, to
• 20:22
  Ryan's question and all of that stuff.
• 20:25
  There's no question that I was brought on for some of my
• 20:28
  relationships and, and the ability to for some access.
• 20:32
  And I think the competition will continue to shrink and we will
• 20:38
  continue to evolve. Kyle has not talked about all
• 20:42
  the future products. So.
• 20:43
  So there's that, right? But.
• 20:45
  Stay tuned. But they returned to YouTube
• 20:47
  last year, right? And they've been and the drive
• 20:49
  has been quite successful. They're not doing the same kind
• 20:52
  of videos as everybody else. The videos are not the same.
• 20:56
  You're going to find every other YouTube channel.
• 20:58
  I think that is something that I would point to towards when you
• 21:03
  see things that will come from the drive, it's you're not going
• 21:07
  to get it everywhere else because what's the point?
• 21:10
  Right. For those who don't know, how
• 21:11
  are they different? So do you if you go to the
• 21:15
  Drives YouTube channel, hang on, if you go to the old drives
• 21:17
  YouTube channel, the Dr. rebooted last year.
• 21:20
  So like only in the last year. I'll be clear and and I have
• 21:22
  nothing to do with it at least yet, but it's if you go to Motor
• 21:28
  Trend or car and driver or or if it be clear, they do great
• 21:31
  videos, Haggerty, great videos, amazing video quality.
• 21:35
  But the idea that you're going to come out the gate and just
• 21:36
  start competing with them. It's another video, right?
• 21:39
  We all go to the same launches. We're all going to drive the
• 21:41
  Corvette 01. We're all going to drive the
• 21:43
  Rivian. And so like you're competing on
• 21:45
  the same level with the same video.
• 21:47
  The stuff Kyle's putting out the series.
• 21:50
  There are multiple series. Don't ask me all the names yet.
• 21:51
  I'm not there. It it's, it's not the same.
• 21:55
  So like he just did a video. A lot of it's like investigative
• 21:58
  history. It's all automotive related.
• 22:00
  It's all really interesting. You're gonna learn.
• 22:02
  But there was just a video I saw that they posted about why are
• 22:06
  certain St. lights purple. Oh.
• 22:09
  Interesting. Yeah, I have no idea.
• 22:12
  Yeah. I'll have to go on that anywhere
• 22:14
  else. You're not gonna find that
• 22:14
  anywhere else. There's another video that I was
• 22:16
  watching while he and I were like interviewing.
• 22:21
  It never felt like an interview. It felt like a conversation.
• 22:23
  You were just talking about the history of a of the lost flying
• 22:27
  car. Oh, there you go.
• 22:29
  Yeah. And, and, and how it like got
• 22:30
  airborne and all this other stuff and then it crashed like,
• 22:33
  and again, real footage, super interesting.
• 22:36
  And it's not like a voice over thing like Kyle's on camera in a
• 22:39
  chair telling the story and it's coming over like it's it's
• 22:44
  unique content. Well.
• 22:45
  It's like, interesting. So there are multiple series.
• 22:49
  I know the ones I'm describing our documentary style.
• 22:52
  There are multiple series and I'm not super up on all of it
• 22:56
  yet. Or day three.
• 22:58
  I'm trying to get my hands around the the written content
• 23:00
  right now and then we'll move on to like everything else.
• 23:03
  But yeah, no, it's not stuff you're going to find everywhere
• 23:06
  else. It's kind of like old school car
• 23:08
  and driver, right? And they do a piece on the
• 23:10
  Popemobile or whatever, right? I mean, that's the stuff that I
• 23:12
  want to read and and hear about and, and, and what else is
• 23:15
  covering your points? So I love it.
• 23:17
  I love that direction. I think you're spot on.
• 23:19
  So. Well, and that and for the
• 23:21
  written direction too. So right, like so the stuff I'm
• 23:25
  just pointing up our homepage right now.
• 23:26
  So the stuff they're working on today.
• 23:27
  So we just, we just ran a story about Disney's new National Park
• 23:34
  that they're creating that is is based around cars.
• 23:37
  The movie for Piston, it's called Piston Peak.
• 23:41
  Exactly. No one's written about this.
• 23:43
  No, I've never heard. Of this exactly dude.
• 23:46
  Disney is creating a National Park called Piston Peak National
• 23:50
  Park. To be clear, using air quotes
• 23:52
  here for those listening. It's all based around.
• 23:54
  It's yeah. Right.
• 23:56
  They're not gonna get funding from the government, but it's
• 23:58
  all based around cars. The movie, yeah, Piston Peak, it
• 24:02
  launches in a couple of years. But I mean, they're really
• 24:05
  lenient and it's like an off road adventure and like, it's
• 24:07
  super cool. And there's the visuals.
• 24:10
  We ran this story. It went live like 5.
• 24:13
  Minutes ago I know what I'm immediately doing is.
• 24:15
  Saying we're done recording. I was just watching Cars One
• 24:19
  last night with my daughter and my fiance because we're all
• 24:22
  obsessed with it and we just learned about Cars Land at
• 24:25
  Disney and Anaheim, so that's on the list.
• 24:29
  So did they say where this is going to be, Joel?
• 24:33
  Gotta be honest, that was like 5:30 in the morning and I came
• 24:35
  up the headline in the story angle and gave all the things.
• 24:37
  And I moved fast this morning. Like today.
• 24:39
  You ever seen Cool Runnings? Yeah.
• 24:41
  And then, you know, the moment where you remember, you remember
• 24:43
  the moment where they're in the rhythm, in the rhymes all the
• 24:46
  time. So I sent my, I sent my friend
• 24:48
  this morning like that GIF. And I said day three, starting
• 24:51
  to feel like this, like I'm like, like I'm understanding
• 24:53
  their task management system. I'm understanding the daily
• 24:56
  rundown flow like I'm moving at. So my old Co worker duffer,
• 25:01
  Robert Duffer used to say, so you're moving at like the speed
• 25:04
  of Federer through this whole unemployment thing, aren't you?
• 25:05
  Like you're not resting. And I was like, whatever you
• 25:08
  think my speed is, It's that, but running on race fuel, like
• 25:10
  I'm moving at so fast to get a job.
• 25:14
  That's what it's felt like the last three days.
• 25:16
  I I I like. Yeah.
• 25:18
  Yeah, I so the, so that was an example.
• 25:21
  No one except for us ran the Cadillac F1 team securing a
• 25:25
  Tommy Hilfiger sponsorship for 2026 bid outside of Motorsports
• 25:29
  outlets. Ran it.
• 25:30
  Yeah, when we when, when I found it this morning, no one had
• 25:33
  really picked it up. And it's a huge deal because
• 25:36
  Tommy Hilfiger is like a very historical in my generation,
• 25:40
  Yeah, sponsor of F1. They, I mean, they've been with,
• 25:42
  they were just with Ben's and they let that go last year.
• 25:44
  Now Adidas with Ben's and they were hooked up with Lewis
• 25:46
  Hamilton and all that stuff. Like it it it kind of goes
• 25:49
  further to show how really serious Cadillac is about this
• 25:53
  bid for Formula One. And I was just like, I can't
• 25:56
  believe this isn't everywhere yet.
• 25:59
  And our story talks about that history and where else Tommy has
• 26:02
  been and all that stuff and and how that shows how Cadillac is
• 26:05
  serious. And then Andrew Collins did a
• 26:07
  great story this morning about something called from KCKC
• 26:11
  lighting, the highlights platform.
• 26:13
  It's the highlights platform 1. It's a roof rack with lighting
• 26:16
  involve integrated that also has power integration in the actual
• 26:19
  roof rack. That's going to be a game.
• 26:22
  Changer. Yeah, yeah, this is cool stuff.
• 26:24
  It is. So, so this is this is the kind
• 26:26
  of and then yesterday, you know, we ran a story about electric
• 26:30
  truck Berry demand increasing 70% last year year over year.
• 26:34
  And then the in current, current, current, all that and
• 26:37
  then get provided context about the where we're going currently
• 26:40
  this year. There was a story Jerry Perez
• 26:43
  did that was amazing about a fiery.
• 26:44
  There's a there was a rumor there's been a bunch of fiery
• 26:46
  crashes in the Hyundai and the Alondra Spec Cup in Korea, and
• 26:51
  people were blaming the brakes. And so they did.
• 26:54
  They talked from Hyundai, Jerry did an investigation, all this
• 26:57
  stuff. Turns out it's just the fact
• 26:59
  that they have novice drivers. They don't know how to drive.
• 27:02
  I'm flashing back to those Toyota like celebrity races in
• 27:05
  Long Beach from when we were kids, you know, and I I think
• 27:08
  that was the problem then too. So but turns.
• 27:11
  Out If you put a bunch of people that don't know how to drive a
• 27:13
  race car in a spec series, they might burn up their brakes and.
• 27:16
  Crash the car and it might not be the.
• 27:17
  Car's fault, right? So.
• 27:20
  Anyway this? Is this is this is?
• 27:22
  This is day two and three of like, this is where we're going.
• 27:26
  This is This is. It's going to be this type of
• 27:29
  coverage and you can expect this type of investigative and
• 27:33
  informative contract and even they'll.
• 27:35
  Be long form short for most of Look, we still have our reviews
• 27:37
  coming. I mean, I'm still in press cars
• 27:39
  every week. They'll still be press cars.
• 27:40
  Everybody seemingly is really excited about my voice on, on
• 27:45
  or, or pedantics, neuroticisms, whatever you want to call it
• 27:50
  about what federisms. That is actually what that is
• 27:53
  what some of my old team members just call the federisms and
• 27:55
  they'd like to strip them out. Some some of my coworkers like
• 27:57
  to strip them out and I was like, don't do that.
• 27:59
  Don't do. That, that's the magic right
• 28:01
  there. That's the magic.
• 28:02
  That's why you read my byline. So we'll, we'll still have all
• 28:06
  that and look, just because if there's a press release and a
• 28:09
  background, we're going to go to it if it makes sense and we're
• 28:12
  still going to cover it. But maybe not just the angle
• 28:15
  everyone covers like there might be another angle, right?
• 28:20
  And so you got stand out. Yeah, it sounds like it's going
• 28:23
  to be a good mix of like, obviously you're going to stay
• 28:25
  on top of current happenings, but then there's also going to
• 28:27
  be these sort of, it's not human interest, but like story
• 28:31
  stories, like you said with the stoplight or the Disney, you
• 28:33
  know, National Park. I'm so excited about that.
• 28:35
  I am too. OK, but because here we are.
• 28:38
  It's June of 2025. Your master of your domain king,
• 28:40
  Your castle holder of the keys. Assistant Master.
• 28:44
  Tile assistant. That's right.
• 28:45
  OK. Assistant Master.
• 28:47
  Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Where did this all start for
• 28:50
  you? Because I know you're a
• 28:50
  Minnesota boy. You go to the lake, you know,
• 28:53
  where did the car thing come in? I think kind of like me, your
• 28:57
  childhood was was an interesting one.
• 29:00
  What was your taproot like? There's actually a story I'm on
• 29:04
  Authority, which actually is still live currently.
• 29:06
  Currently live. I don't know how long.
• 29:09
  All the content I'm on authority, car connection, green
• 29:11
  car parts, Wheeler won't be live.
• 29:12
  I've no idea legitimately. Maybe by Christmas it's going to
• 29:16
  be gone, maybe it's not, who knows.
• 29:18
  But right now? I'm stuck in show notes.
• 29:20
  We'll have to get that. Yeah, so there there is a story
• 29:22
  that that actually just two stories that delve into the
• 29:25
  history of Joel Feder and they, they have photos with them.
• 29:31
  And so Yep, Yep. So, so I mean, look, my dad's
• 29:35
  car guy, my uncle's car guys, both my grandfathers are car
• 29:39
  guys. It's my grandmother.
• 29:42
  Well, not like a car chick enthusiasts definitely like had
• 29:47
  strong opinions about her cars. Very like right up to like 80
• 29:52
  some years old. She had opinions and thoughts.
• 29:55
  So he's definitely in my Federer DNA, if you will, which I think
• 29:58
  is a line from that story. There's a photo of my dad and I
• 30:02
  in my original bedroom on like this 80s gold or 70s gold
• 30:07
  carpet. And he think he's in a red
• 30:09
  shirt. And I was months old, nine
• 30:12
  months, six months. And I mean, he, he, he had 240
• 30:15
  or 280Z car in his hand and we were playing with it like it's
• 30:18
  and the two of us on the ground. So day one.
• 30:22
  Like you were as a Yeah. Yeah, no.
• 30:25
  And as a child I wanted to which the unit didn't exist back then.
• 30:29
  I had dreams of like I want to work a Motor Trend, a car and
• 30:31
  drive or I want to, I want to write about cars like that.
• 30:34
  Nobody paid to write about cars and drive cars.
• 30:37
  And even as a child, even as a kid, but even as a kid, it was
• 30:41
  never it was a dream, but never going to be reality.
• 30:43
  Like it was never going to happen because I was the kid
• 30:45
  that couldn't read or write in elementary school.
• 30:47
  And so just to get through elementary school, my mom paid a
• 30:51
  fortune. I'm sure not like we were rich,
• 30:54
  but like I'm sure like it felt like fortune to a tutor.
• 30:58
  Yeah, he just get me through school, like literally just get
• 31:01
  through a Joel to pass school and that tutor the writing never
• 31:06
  it got was fine, but the reading actually took hold and I became
• 31:09
  a speed reader and like reading became a passion.
• 31:11
  Like I would read really multiple books in a weekend kind
• 31:14
  of thing. So the the reading thing took
• 31:16
  hold. The writing thing wasn't really
• 31:19
  a passion. Well, you were probably
• 31:21
  diagramming sentences and all this kind of stuff, right?
• 31:24
  That, that just, you know, drove me nuts, right?
• 31:27
  If you just get to the writing. I just get to the.
• 31:29
  Stuff you're interested in. Oh, there you go.
• 31:31
  Yeah, yeah, yeah. Like, like how would I expect
• 31:33
  this car is when I was diagramming, my room was full of
• 31:36
  images of all the Mclarens and the countaches and the Audi A
• 31:39
  eights and the seven series and all of that stuff from all the
• 31:42
  magazines that we all read as a child and DuPont registry and
• 31:45
  and the ads and all that stuff. I went to college and originally
• 31:51
  I went to college as a bio major and I was going to be with an
• 31:53
  honest. Me too.
• 31:56
  I was going to be a doctor, but yeah, I was a bio major.
• 31:58
  Lasted weeks. Turns out I was going to, it
• 32:02
  turns out to get the orthodontia school, you got to go through
• 32:04
  bio, pre Med, dentistry, specialty orthodontia.
• 32:09
  I was going to fail through a lot of that to get to the thing
• 32:12
  that I really wanted to do. And I was like, this isn't going
• 32:13
  to work. So then I didn't know what I was
• 32:16
  going to do. And someone was like, you know,
• 32:17
  you could probably sell ice to Eskimos.
• 32:19
  You should just be in marketing. And I'm like, person's not
• 32:22
  wrong. So I went I, I, so I, they're
• 32:25
  not wrong. So then I I ended up with a
• 32:28
  business marketing degree and I sold Verizon during college and
• 32:34
  outsold all of my full time Co workers working part time in
• 32:37
  college because. Wow.
• 32:39
  Nice to sell ice to Eskimos. I I mean in Minnesota, No, that
• 32:43
  was in Iowa. I went to school in Drake at
• 32:45
  Drake University and. Oh, right on.
• 32:46
  OK, go drink. Yeah.
• 32:48
  Yep, and that's Bulldogs, and that's where I met my wife.
• 32:51
  That's. Amazing.
• 32:52
  The difference then that I realized when selling cell
• 32:55
  phones was that someone walked in and they had a problem and
• 32:59
  they needed a solution. Every one of my Co workers would
• 33:02
  ask me, you know Samsung, you're selling Motorola's, but Samsung
• 33:04
  has a spiff, we get an extra 20 bucks, you sell Samsung.
• 33:06
  I said, yeah, sure, but that guy's got three kids and a wife.
• 33:10
  And if I give that guy exactly what he needs and he's thrilled,
• 33:13
  he's going to come back in here and he ain't going to want to do
• 33:15
  with you. He's going to ask for me and
• 33:17
  he's going to buy four more phones and I'll make way more
• 33:19
  than $20.50 from Samsung. So I'm going to sell him what he
• 33:22
  needs, what fits his needs. He's going to come back.
• 33:25
  And time and time again, my coworkers would get really
• 33:28
  irritated when someone walk in and asked because we're in
• 33:31
  retail sales at Verizon and someone walk in and say, hey, is
• 33:33
  Joel working? That's like Joel.
• 33:36
  And they were just like, we're selling cell phones, doesn't
• 33:39
  matter who you talk to. And they're like, yes, it does.
• 33:43
  He helped me. I liked.
• 33:45
  And so that's how part time college Verizon sales, Joel
• 33:49
  Feder. It's like the number 2 sales guy
• 33:51
  at that that Verizon store. For like, it's amazing.
• 33:54
  Four years, three years or whatever it was, it was great.
• 33:57
  And then, and then I, I, I started social media and then
• 34:01
  there's like, I graduated in 2008.
• 34:02
  It's not a great time period to, to try and get a job.
• 34:06
  So I fell through whatever, whatever, whatever, blah, blah,
• 34:09
  blah, blah, blah. And then, and then I ended up
• 34:14
  she has never. So General Motors went through
• 34:16
  bankruptcy and General Motors had what was called.
• 34:20
  So I my mother introduced me to Twitter.
• 34:24
  What? My mother.
• 34:26
  God bless my mother. Seriously, your mom has been a
• 34:30
  significant thread through your story as as one would expect.
• 34:34
  Baby, as one would expect, she introduced me on Twitter and she
• 34:37
  said, I think that you really thrive on this.
• 34:39
  You should look into it. And so I got on there and it's
• 34:42
  like 2008, 2002, 1008. And I was like.
• 34:45
  That's early social. Talk to me about, oh, this is
• 34:48
  way before it hit Oprah. This was no, I mean Twitter, no.
• 34:52
  And, and I got on there and I was like, I can't talk about
• 34:55
  cars 24/7 with people around the world.
• 34:59
  What it was amazing. It was it was awesome and tweet
• 35:04
  deck and all of this greatness. And it was super fun.
• 35:08
  I it was super fun. And I made a lot of actual
• 35:11
  friends that turned into real life friends.
• 35:14
  And I created a following. General Motors went through
• 35:17
  bankruptcy. This is before influencers were
• 35:20
  even a thing. Influencers were not even of a
• 35:22
  thing. And General Motors?
• 35:24
  Was amazing. I know.
• 35:27
  Some of them. Are useful.
• 35:29
  Some of them are useful. It's all about personality and
• 35:32
  ethics. And like everything in the
• 35:34
  world, General Motors had a Prog technology showcase where they
• 35:39
  were going to show the IT would have been the ATSXTS.
• 35:48
  Trying to think of old car names now.
• 35:50
  When they were converting to those types of names.
• 35:53
  Yes, Equinox, the second Gen. Equinox, Colorado coming back,
• 35:56
  all that stuff. And what they did was they
• 35:59
  reached out to the agency, reached out to what wasn't what
• 36:03
  we would know as influencers, but they weren't influencers
• 36:06
  because that didn't exist. I was one of those people
• 36:08
  because I had a large following Twitter talking about cars and
• 36:10
  they invited us all to come out under embargo and look at the
• 36:13
  stuff the day before they did the media.
• 36:15
  Oh wow. So you were pre media?
• 36:18
  Dude, that would have pissed off me if I was in the media, that
• 36:20
  would have really irked me. That would have really irked me.
• 36:24
  Different times, but it was smart on their part.
• 36:27
  And what was interesting was we were allowed to tweet about
• 36:29
  everything, but everything was pic patched.
• 36:32
  No photos. So I accessed 24 hours before
• 36:36
  Autoblog and Jalopnik and Motor, all that stuff, but no photos.
• 36:41
  So I'm tweeting all of the stuff I'm seeing and all of a sudden
• 36:44
  Autoblog and Jalop and all these sites start running stories,
• 36:47
  sourcing my tweets without photos.
• 36:50
  Yeah, right. But I'm seeing it the day.
• 36:52
  Like this is news, right? This is totally different era
• 36:55
  guys. Well, and this was era, but but
• 36:58
  to sort of illustrate the point of like, because you didn't have
• 37:01
  pictures, you had to put it into writing, right?
• 37:03
  Correct. Like you've had to be able to
• 37:04
  describe it that way. Yeah.
• 37:06
  Correct. Correct.
• 37:07
  I was a horrible writer. Embarrassing.
• 37:09
  I don't know. Still, oh, still couldn't write
• 37:12
  a comment, save my life. Kidding me.
• 37:13
  String the letters, compound sentences, run on this.
• 37:16
  It was it was terrible, embarrassing.
• 37:17
  I hope it all has disappeared by now.
• 37:20
  So so, so but that. But then I came home from that
• 37:23
  and my mother. Again.
• 37:26
  Looks at me and says if you don't start a blog out of this,
• 37:29
  you've wasted your entire shot. This is your shot.
• 37:33
  Wow. So I started a blog overnight,
• 37:36
  Joel federer.com. It's very.
• 37:39
  Creative. Well what do I love when they
• 37:41
  go, how did you get your name? And you're like, cuz I was there
• 37:43
  when it was invented. I was the God created the earth
• 37:48
  and WordPress and Twitter and and I was.
• 37:51
  Right there. Yeah, but I named it Accelerate
• 37:55
  Minneapolis and PLS and I had a logo and everything overnight
• 38:00
  over like that life at. Fetter speed.
• 38:04
  There we go. Horrible.
• 38:06
  Embarrassingly bad. But I wrote about what I saw
• 38:10
  right then and there. I wrote what I saw that night it
• 38:13
  went alive. Horrible sharp cry.
• 38:16
  If I read it, I fire myself. And from there GM started giving
• 38:21
  me press cars. I started writing reviews
• 38:24
  horrible reviews on on my website.
• 38:27
  But you were doing it. And I was doing it at night and
• 38:30
  then, and then Ford invited me to the Fiesta backgrounder and
• 38:34
  started giving me press cars. And that that was the real
• 38:37
  background with media. Like now this is real with
• 38:39
  media. They invited me the Fiesta
• 38:41
  backgrounder, honey, they started giving me press cars.
• 38:44
  And like, like I started training rolling real fast.
• 38:47
  And then nine months later, a friend of mine who you all know,
• 38:52
  who became a definite guidance counselor, life coach, career
• 38:58
  coach, called me up and said, you've, you've got it.
• 39:03
  Like, do you know Marty Padgant? And I said, I mean, I know the
• 39:06
  name. I don't, I don't know the man.
• 39:08
  He said, what about Ben Toverson?
• 39:10
  I know the name, I don't know the man.
• 39:11
  Like, you know, the car connection, motor Authority and
• 39:13
  Green carports hire your media crew.
• 39:14
  I'm like, definitely know those sites, like those are real
• 39:17
  sites. And he's like hiring a social
• 39:18
  media manager. You need to apply like you, you,
• 39:21
  you, you're going to apply. And I think he called Marty and
• 39:26
  was like, there's this kid named Joel and he's going to apply and
• 39:29
  you need to hire this kid and. That's the kind of
• 39:32
  recommendation you like I. Don't remember, I don't remember
• 39:35
  exactly how I how we got connected.
• 39:37
  I think it was just via e-mail via this guy.
• 39:39
  I don't think there was a job listing at the time.
• 39:40
  I don't remember. It doesn't matter.
• 39:42
  They just got their second round of funding.
• 39:44
  They were so they just got their second round of funding.
• 39:46
  They took them to total 12 mil if I remember correctly.
• 39:48
  I don't remember. There's a press release about
• 39:49
  this somewhere through Excel and Greylock, all that venture
• 39:52
  capital. And that was how they were going
• 39:55
  to afford to hire John Walker. They hired me.
• 39:58
  But I remember I interviewed with the VP of product.
• 40:00
  I interviewed with Marty, the VP of Product, and a bunch of
• 40:02
  people on the phone and we really hit it off.
• 40:05
  It was amazing. And I said, well, why don't you
• 40:07
  send me the job, the job description for this thing.
• 40:09
  And they sent to me that night. It was 3 pages long, 2 pages
• 40:12
  long. And I remember reading I was
• 40:14
  like, no way. Like I have set up a failure.
• 40:17
  There's no way I can do this job.
• 40:20
  I don't, I'm going to get fired. I was like Nope.
• 40:22
  So I called the next day and I said, look, I really appreciate
• 40:24
  the conversation we had yesterday.
• 40:25
  It was amazing. Really like what you guys are
• 40:28
  doing. A lot of respect, don't think
• 40:30
  this is a fit. And the guy was just like, I
• 40:33
  don't understand. And I said I read the
• 40:35
  javascription last night, this is 3 people's jobs, not one.
• 40:39
  And you're going to set me up for failure and then I don't
• 40:42
  fail. So that's not a good fit.
• 40:44
  And he was like, no, no, no, no, no, no, you don't understand.
• 40:47
  We're a start up. We all sat down collectively and
• 40:50
  said what could this person do? We made a bullet point list and
• 40:54
  they said look, the job description in a bullet is dude
• 40:57
  with hair on fire. And I was like, they're.
• 41:02
  Like. I'm losing my hair and they're
• 41:03
  like he's like, I feel like you're a really strong flame.
• 41:07
  I feel like you're our guy. And I said, I mean, if that's
• 41:11
  the job description, I'm your guy, right?
• 41:13
  Page thing. I don't like that, but this I
• 41:16
  can do this and I still have the written job description on my
• 41:20
  computer with my handwritten scanned in notes about what
• 41:23
  their original traffic numbers was, what their original social
• 41:26
  media was, all that stuff. And and they they hired me, they
• 41:31
  gave me the keys to the Internet and they basically fed me a
• 41:33
  bunch of monster and low carb marks, the low carb and Red Bull
• 41:36
  and said as much as I want. They don't make sense.
• 41:37
  All the monster low carb and. Red Bull I wanted.
• 41:40
  What do you want? But they didn't care because I
• 41:43
  mean, they just, they just gave me the keys and they said just
• 41:46
  just Sprint. And I think we ended up going
• 41:49
  from motor authority I think had 50 fans on Facebook has like 2.3
• 41:53
  or 3,000,000 fans. And we were doing crazy organic
• 41:57
  traffic out of Facebook before Facebook became pay to play.
• 42:00
  I mean, 1,000,000 millions in traffic from Facebook.
• 42:02
  It was, it was, it was crazy. It was amazing.
• 42:06
  We were the JD Power Automotive media marking roundtable first
• 42:09
  we were there to as observers and I basically took over the
• 42:11
  entire Twitter feed with the hashtag with our accounts.
• 42:14
  And then the next year we came back or two years later we came
• 42:17
  back and I LED a panel of people and then I mean, I mean we
• 42:21
  really, it became a force. It was awesome.
• 42:23
  And we went from red to black in two years.
• 42:25
  So 2012 as company, it was awesome.
• 42:29
  We were full Sprint. So some lessons here, right?
• 42:31
  I mean, they picked up on your enthusiasm, your true
• 42:34
  enthusiasm, right? And they trusted you to do the
• 42:38
  job, right? Yeah, More of that, right?
• 42:41
  Yeah. You need more of that in this
• 42:43
  world, right? Because look, look what you did
• 42:44
  with it. Look where you are now, right?
• 42:46
  You were given that opportunity, right?
• 42:49
  To do your own thing and to follow your, your, your, your
• 42:52
  own drive, right? I mean, it's just doesn't.
• 42:54
  Happen. You say that because where I
• 42:57
  work, it is, it is funny. I mean, I'm on day three and,
• 43:01
  and I Kyle was around for like a little bit on Monday.
• 43:05
  It it because, because other things are going on.
• 43:07
  So like he did a first drive today, yesterday and and Monday
• 43:10
  afternoon he was dealing with YouTube stuff that he hot.
• 43:13
  You have to keep a schedule. And, and yesterday, I mean he
• 43:16
  was around for part of the day. We met and we met a little on
• 43:18
  Monday, but like, it's kind of like they gave me the keys and
• 43:21
  they just said Sprint like it just like it.
• 43:24
  There's not a lot of oversight going on And I, I, I think it's
• 43:29
  it, it, it feels a little similar of just like, alright,
• 43:31
  Joel, you can just go Sprint like do your.
• 43:33
  Thing, it's fine, yeah. Yeah, there's a little
• 43:35
  unhingedness going on. Don't burn it down, right.
• 43:42
  But it, I mean, there's also, there's a lot of faith and, and,
• 43:44
  and risk that goes into that, right?
• 43:46
  Like I mean with, with the, with the, the high gear stuff, to be
• 43:48
  fair, high gear didn't have a large social following when I
• 43:50
  started. I created all that through very
• 43:53
  targeted campaigns and all that stuff.
• 43:56
  I mean I had a cost of acquisition per fan of targeted
• 43:59
  fan of 20 point. I think it was $0.02 at one
• 44:01
  point. I mean we totally different era,
• 44:05
  but I mean we were, it was what we did was very calculated and
• 44:09
  it was good. We worked with zero budget.
• 44:12
  But there was definitely faith, right?
• 44:15
  Like just dumping someone, I mean, they dumped me in the CMS
• 44:18
  and I mean, there's a lot of trust that goes into that and
• 44:21
  and. You don't just hand that to
• 44:24
  anybody. I'm honored.
• 44:25
  Yeah, yeah. Well, I think I think it's a a
• 44:29
  good match both ways. I think they're lucky to have
• 44:31
  you and I think it's amazing. Like I think they're dead on and
• 44:34
  I can't wait to see what you do there.
• 44:36
  I mean, I think it's going to be great.
• 44:37
  But I think one thing I'm curious about too, and I was
• 44:40
  going to ask you about this and it's kind of good timing.
• 44:43
  You have seen social media from the beginning and how do you
• 44:48
  feel like it's impacted like the industry?
• 44:51
  Obviously we know how it directly has impacted your life,
• 44:55
  but one thing I always, you know, find so fascinating is
• 44:58
  like, we all have direct access to sort of our, you know,
• 45:03
  heroes, if you will, for lack of a better word, like the people
• 45:05
  that we grew up reading. We can reach them directly,
• 45:08
  which was not a thing when we were growing up.
• 45:11
  But you know, you saw their name on the masthead and it was like,
• 45:14
  cool. And then I'll I'll see what they
• 45:16
  wrote next month. But now we can communicate
• 45:18
  directly. Some of them are personal
• 45:19
  friends. Like talk a little bit about
• 45:21
  what you've seen and how it's how impacted the auto industry.
• 45:32
  It's funny, up until recently I told people the way that this
• 45:35
  all worked out for me. It wouldn't be replicatable
• 45:38
  today because because I was in the early days of Twitter and
• 45:42
  social media and influencing on a thing and all that stuff.
• 45:44
  But I actually, I don't think that's actually true.
• 45:48
  I think it's harder and different, but there's a woman
• 45:51
  named Olivia something off the top of my head and she she's a
• 45:56
  chef. She's personal chef, lives in
• 45:57
  New York, lived in New York. I don't remember.
• 45:59
  I think she went right. Just don't don't quote me any of
• 46:01
  this. I think her Instagram, but her
• 46:03
  Instagram is like oliviated or something and she fascinates me
• 46:08
  because she was a a chef, a private chef.
• 46:11
  She did the summer in the Hampton and she lived in
• 46:13
  Manhattan in the winter. She grew from nothing like
• 46:18
  nothing on Instagram to like 4 million in the span of like
• 46:22
  that. And I watched the whole thing
• 46:24
  happened. I watched it.
• 46:26
  She definitely needs a stick. Like she loves the F word.
• 46:29
  She loves flicking people off. It's a it's a thing.
• 46:33
  Brands definitely leaned in. A brand called maiden that makes
• 46:36
  high end cookware leaned in. She's been on this day show
• 46:40
  recently. She's making a cookbook now.
• 46:42
  I mean, I watched this woman. She's younger than me, but she's
• 46:47
  she's probably 27, 28, I don't remember.
• 46:50
  She went from literally just a random cook chef, a chef.
• 46:53
  She's definitely a chef, not a cook super famous.
• 46:58
  And I watched it happen. And so it's like it is sure,
• 47:00
  right? It, it can still happen, right,
• 47:02
  It can still happen. But she's authentic.
• 47:05
  She's authentic. She's authentic and what, but
• 47:07
  what what she did with it is interesting because what I did
• 47:11
  with it and what she's doing with it are different things.
• 47:12
  And I think it's because we're in different era, right?
• 47:15
  So what I did with is I turned into a career and I work for
• 47:17
  somebody else. It was before what I did would
• 47:21
  turn into you make a ton of money on YouTube or TikTok or
• 47:24
  any of that stuff, right? Like I would have had to do what
• 47:26
  I was doing on YouTube and move it to YouTube or all that stuff.
• 47:30
  But it would have grounded out for another seven years before
• 47:33
  all of a sudden I made crazy money, right?
• 47:36
  Because just before that era of time now what she did was she
• 47:42
  didn't go make a career of it and get a job.
• 47:44
  Like look what I'm doing. She's I mean, she probably done
• 47:48
  an LLC and she's, she's definitely, she's attending
• 47:50
  cooking things. She's got partnerships, she's
• 47:53
  sponsored, she's done this today show.
• 47:54
  She's making a cookbook like all those.
• 47:57
  So, so it's just turning into something different.
• 47:59
  She's turned into a career. It's a different career.
• 48:03
  She probably could turn into going to work at a high end
• 48:05
  place. But like what she's done, she's
• 48:07
  fine making more money doing it this way.
• 48:09
  I'm assuming. I don't know.
• 48:11
  I think you're right because nowadays like the people become
• 48:14
  the brands and like they're, they're the product and then
• 48:18
  it's the opportunities that come to them.
• 48:19
  But you're right, like people that maybe never thought they
• 48:21
  could work for themselves now are able to create this whole
• 48:25
  conglomerate. It is interesting to use the
• 48:27
  word brand because through this whole thing, I've had my eyes
• 48:32
  opened a little through the last 8 1/2 weeks.
• 48:35
  Yeah. So I came to High Gear Media
• 48:37
  when I was a nobody and we were a nobody.
• 48:39
  And, and my viewpoint, when we were a small fish in a big sea
• 48:43
  fighting for everything. And when we were in the red, we
• 48:46
  didn't have a lot of traffic. We were like, the lights could
• 48:48
  go out if we didn't make it work, right.
• 48:49
  And so the way I came in was we're the poor guys, we're the
• 48:54
  small fish, we're the newbies. We had to fight for everything,
• 48:56
  claw away for everything up the hill.
• 49:00
  The the the guys that came in to high gear or I guess Internet
• 49:04
  brands after we were acquired, they came into a job.
• 49:08
  But when I was there, it wasn't a job.
• 49:10
  Like we all had kind of stock options or some kind of options.
• 49:13
  And like we had we had like ownership and it's like if it
• 49:16
  was a job and I got paycheck, but if we didn't keep the lights
• 49:19
  on and make things move forward, we lost a job.
• 49:21
  Like it wasn't yourself fired like it all shut down, right.
• 49:24
  So there's ownership to that. And when Ivy bought it, that
• 49:27
  doesn't there's not like a light switch that changes for me and
• 49:30
  Marty and whatever because we were there, right?
• 49:33
  Yeah, my paycheck says Internet brand is not high gear media.
• 49:36
  Big deal, right? Is the threat of us shutting
• 49:39
  down the same? Probably not, which ironic now
• 49:42
  probably would have had more warning for your high gear media
• 49:46
  funny would have seen the signs coming.
• 49:50
  But that's not the point. The point is, is that over the
• 49:52
  last eight weeks, I've always viewed us as the smallest crappy
• 49:56
  guy. It didn't matter how large a
• 49:57
  traffic guy, it didn't matter how large I reached out on
• 49:59
  social media. It didn't all that stuff because
• 50:01
  my mindset didn't change. If I called someone, it was
• 50:04
  clawing and fighting for anything and everything we got
• 50:07
  right. And over the last eight weeks,
• 50:09
  we're through conversations and, and just because I've always
• 50:13
  viewed us as the start of small guy, it didn't even matter that
• 50:15
  we got acquired. We're the start of small guy.
• 50:17
  We're not motor trained. We don't have a car and driver
• 50:19
  historical name, right? We're not a household name,
• 50:21
  Kelley Blue Book, Edmonds, etcetera.
• 50:25
  When I got let go, it was interesting to watch the
• 50:28
  reactions in the industry and people reaching out and it
• 50:33
  became clear to me the certain personalities in the industry at
• 50:36
  outlets. I'm not just talking about me
• 50:38
  though. There are other people that I
• 50:41
  don't even start evenings, but like people at various outlets
• 50:43
  all across the board, right? Outlets we all know and love,
• 50:46
  historical outlets, small outlets, big outlets.
• 50:49
  There are certain personalities that are associated with certain
• 50:53
  outlets that they are their own brand, but they're associated
• 50:56
  with that brand, that outlet. They're a walking brand, but
• 51:00
  they're associated together. And it never dawned on me that
• 51:04
  whether me or Kirk or Marty, it didn't matter.
• 51:09
  Never dawned on me that we're our own brand too, and that
• 51:12
  people read our byline maybe on the site because they wanted to
• 51:15
  read our take, they thought our personality federisms or
• 51:18
  whatever. Yeah, it always like I'm Joel
• 51:20
  Federer, Internet brands. I'm on.
• 51:21
  I'm here for Motor Authority. I'm Joel Federer for the
• 51:23
  Internet brands. I'm here at the Car Connection.
• 51:24
  That's how I. Always viewed it, never mind I'm
• 51:26
  part of this. Part of this part of the crew.
• 51:29
  Yeah. I I am motor authority.
• 51:31
  Like I was walking, talking. I'm the visual representation of
• 51:34
  motor authority. That's how it never felt like
• 51:37
  I'm Joel Federer is the brand. And after all this happened, it
• 51:40
  became clear to me through certain people and comments that
• 51:44
  whether it's John Lieberman or Matt Farah, like nobody thinks
• 51:47
  of. I mean Matt Farah associated
• 51:49
  with smoking tyre. He's associated with rodent
• 51:51
  track. He's associated with all these
• 51:52
  different things. Johnny's associated with, you
• 51:54
  know, the car, the Motor Trend, the inevitable podcast.
• 51:59
  He's he just did a Rob report story.
• 52:01
  He he raised a Pike's peak. What's the big one?
• 52:04
  He doesn't have some. Radio.
• 52:07
  Spike, that's the one I was thinking of.
• 52:09
  He's been on Matt Farah's Smoking tire podcast, right?
• 52:11
  All these people like Matt Farah, Giant Lieberman, Steve
• 52:15
  Ewing, no matter where he goes, he has his own brand and own
• 52:18
  personality. He's at miss today, he's been at
• 52:20
  Winding Rd. he's been at auto blog, he's been at motor one.
• 52:23
  He's his own brand and never dawned on me the certain voices
• 52:27
  in the industry, certain by lines are their own brand until
• 52:30
  someone brought it up to me of like, I'm going to miss reading
• 52:33
  your byline, I'm going to miss reading your.
• 52:35
  They were referring to the federalisms that to put in
• 52:37
  Lindsay's words. And it.
• 52:38
  Didn't dawn on me that that was part of what made motor
• 52:42
  authority of the car connection in carports.
• 52:45
  That was drawing people in specifically for your flavor.
• 52:48
  Whether it's me or Marty or whatever, it just never dawned
• 52:51
  on me that like. But I suppose it makes sense
• 52:54
  that like I started reading certain things by Steven and
• 52:56
  Edmonds because now he's Edmonds, He's not at Motor One
• 52:59
  or at Autoblog or whatever, whatever, whatever, right?
• 53:01
  So it just didn't cross my mind that that 'cause these people
• 53:05
  are my friends. So to me, they're not brands,
• 53:06
  they're not personalities, but like normal people that are not
• 53:11
  in autos that are reading, whether it's their drive,
• 53:13
  Edmonds, whatever, these are personalities.
• 53:16
  Just like we all grew up with Chubb and all that stuff and,
• 53:18
  and Davis DE Adams and, and all that stuff.
• 53:20
  Davis, Davis, Adams, the their personalities, those are large
• 53:24
  and life figures. It was an interesting insight
• 53:31
  that I'd never thought true. Yeah, yeah.
• 53:33
  Well, and I think especially starting when you did, I mean I.
• 53:36
  Was a kid. Less of a thing to have, sort of
• 53:40
  like the personalities be as forward as the brand names even
• 53:45
  though and. Then you didn't know the
• 53:46
  personality as well because you know social media, right?
• 53:48
  You had you. All you would get is the copy in
• 53:51
  a story. So if Johnny has Johnny Isms or
• 53:53
  Joel had Fetter Isms or Trouble had chavisms or whatever, Yeah.
• 53:57
  In the story, that's the insight you got on the people.
• 53:59
  Yeah. But now you can follow Johnny
• 54:01
  Instagram. You can follow me on Instagram,
• 54:04
  you can follow Steven Instagram. And suddenly you learn about the
• 54:08
  person, you learn about who they are.
• 54:10
  You learn their personality. You learn the voice far outside
• 54:13
  the story. Yeah.
• 54:14
  And humanize is them. And suddenly it creates some
• 54:16
  kind of some kind of connection that never could have existed
• 54:21
  when we were all kids reading the magazines.
• 54:22
  Right, right. No, it's.
• 54:24
  That it's that it's that it's the connectedness that you were
• 54:26
  talking about earlier of like now you drawn.
• 54:29
  Right. And I, and I think what's been
• 54:31
  so interesting for me is you sort of you find the people that
• 54:35
  you connect with directly, you know, you start commenting on
• 54:38
  people's stories you follow. Obviously, I followed all the
• 54:40
  automotive personalities because that's what's interesting to me.
• 54:43
  But you find the people that you click with and you realize,
• 54:45
  like, oh, we have the same sense of humor or we had the same
• 54:48
  first car. And, you know, it's like with
• 54:50
  you, we're like, you love cars and you also love boats and
• 54:53
  fishing. And that's not something you
• 54:54
  would have learned unless you had mentioned it in a story when
• 54:57
  we were growing up reading the articles.
• 54:59
  Right. Some people find their future
• 55:01
  spouses this way. You got to be real careful so
• 55:04
  you meet on the Internet. You may find yourself engaged.
• 55:07
  Right. Can we bring this back to to
• 55:09
  cars? We can.
• 55:11
  Yeah. What is, I mean, this is all
• 55:12
  obviously a car adjacent, but at the heart of this is cars.
• 55:16
  What are you into? Like what's in your garage?
• 55:19
  What are you excited about that's coming out?
• 55:20
  Like what? Sure.
• 55:23
  What's your thing? So I mean, as Lindsay mentioned,
• 55:26
  so we have boats, right? Our family has boats so we need
• 55:32
  while I have press cars and automakers love seeing their
• 55:35
  press cars with the lake and the boats on stuff.
• 55:37
  What's your lake by by chance, by the way, in Minnesota, like
• 55:40
  what's your home lake? So we we're up in, we're up in
• 55:45
  Detroit, we're up near Detroit Lakes.
• 55:46
  Minnesota. Sure.
• 55:47
  OK. My kids are fifth generation.
• 55:49
  OK, fantastic. It is a cottage.
• 55:52
  It's not a house. It's not a cabin.
• 55:54
  It's not a it's not winterized. Yeah, but it but it would be
• 55:57
  considered what I would call a cottage Ryan.
• 56:00
  In. Wisconsin and, and so we have
• 56:05
  boats, which means whatever we own needs to be able to tow what
• 56:09
  we own. I'm a big believer on you.
• 56:10
  You need to be able to haul your own stuff.
• 56:12
  Sure, I use press cars all the time, but like what happens if a
• 56:14
  press car doesn't show up? What if I can't get there?
• 56:16
  Like need to be able to haul our own stuff?
• 56:18
  So my wife currently drives a 2015.
• 56:21
  It's going to be very specific. You're not going to be
• 56:23
  surprised. It's a 2015 WK 2 Grand Cherokee
• 56:28
  high altitude white on black blacked out with the Hemi V8 so
• 56:34
  it has the big front brakes and 7200 down till rating.
• 56:38
  And does it have any drunk on it?
• 56:41
  No be ridiculous. No it does not it but it does.
• 56:45
  I do run a downsize from the 20s that ride like crap that my wife
• 56:48
  loves to eighteens on hakas in the winter which is awesome.
• 56:53
  But the you can't go to seventeens on the V8 because the
• 56:57
  front brakes won't clear. You can only do seventeens on
• 56:59
  the V6. So that's what her daily driver
• 57:02
  is yeah car people problems. So that's her daily driver and
• 57:06
  then currently and then I have my uncle, so my uncle photos are
• 57:12
  there. Sorry you're.
• 57:14
  Gonna point to that Coon shot. Yeah.
• 57:17
  Right. No.
• 57:19
  So my uncle Unk, there's a whole story about this I'm gonna
• 57:22
  throw. Are you still alive, Unk?
• 57:24
  My uncle Robert had a name. He had all his ease.
• 57:27
  And when he died in 97 from cancer, he had a 1993 hundred ZX
• 57:32
  2 + 2 blue on blue he ordered. And I rode around the back as a
• 57:35
  kid and it went in storage elevenish years.
• 57:40
  My my interview a few times. But then she's just like taking
• 57:43
  care of it to the level that he would want to be taken care of
• 57:45
  is just too much. Yeah.
• 57:47
  And so it's basically sat in storage for 11 years and then my
• 57:49
  dad and I ended up getting it from her and it now lives in my
• 57:53
  garage and it's got 64,000 original miles on it.
• 57:58
  It's all stock except for, I mean, certainly is going to be
• 58:00
  replaced. So like we have, we replaced the
• 58:02
  brake lines because they were cracking and they put stainless
• 58:04
  steel ones on because it sits and I don't want to have a
• 58:06
  cracking again. And the shocks eventually need
• 58:09
  to replace. We put four way adjustable
• 58:10
  shocks on it so that can change them or whatever.
• 58:12
  But like it's stock it it visually is a stock car.
• 58:15
  It is a stock car. You never see them anymore,
• 58:18
  ever. And there's such a good looking
• 58:20
  pure design and they're just such.
• 58:22
  That was the first production car design CAD.
• 58:26
  Really. It tracks, right?
• 58:29
  It's yeah. OK, Yeah.
• 58:30
  Yep, yeah, yeah. So, so that, so that's in my
• 58:33
  garage. I but, but at this point it's a
• 58:35
  larger in life thing. He was a larger in life guy and
• 58:38
  my kids riding it and all this stuff.
• 58:39
  But maybe it hasn't even started this year.
• 58:42
  Been a little crazy the last 8 weeks.
• 58:44
  Yeah, so you have a good excuse. I'm hoping to start it on
• 58:46
  Monday. I hope I'm going out with my
• 58:48
  buddy on Monday. Monday night hopefully, but but
• 58:50
  I maybe 3-4 hundred miles a year maybe it it it driving it
• 58:56
  terrifies me going anywhere. When we first got it, it was it
• 59:00
  was a toy and we drove everywhere.
• 59:02
  But now at this point, we're 35 years old and.
• 59:06
  Which is crazy to think about. Finding blue parts is a
• 59:08
  nightmare and more importantly, I'm on 484 at 4:00 in the
• 59:14
  afternoon. I'm watching my review mirror
• 59:15
  more than I'm watching my friend.
• 59:16
  Are you going to stop? Are you going to rear at me if
• 59:19
  someone hits it? Can't replace it, right?
• 59:22
  Yeah. If I, if someone door Dings it,
• 59:24
  can I fix it? If someone breaks something, can
• 59:27
  I replace it? And so like, you know, I was out
• 59:29
  to dinner with my buddy one night And, and, and by the way,
• 59:32
  when I say out dinner, I mean, we sit on the patio and I can
• 59:36
  see the car to be clear, right? Like you have to have a line.
• 59:39
  Of sight to do. You know.
• 59:41
  Line of Sight Man 100. Percent.
• 59:44
  We get and or or my wife. We went out for a date night two
• 59:48
  years ago and and she said, do you want to take the Z?
• 59:50
  I'm like, yeah. And I was like, where are we
• 59:53
  going? And she said, and she said,
• 59:56
  we're going to this restaurant and at underground parking and
• 59:57
  stuff was like, wait a minute. Hold on, slow your roll.
• 1:00:01
  I'm. Not sure I like this.
• 1:00:03
  This is not a line of sight thing and and and and she's like
• 1:00:06
  no, no, no, no. I've already thought about it
• 1:00:08
  that you can tuck it in over this by the air conditioning you
• 1:00:10
  like, like we'll put it in the corner and whatever I was like
• 1:00:14
  you get right. Yeah, they check Google Maps,
• 1:00:17
  right? We all do this.
• 1:00:17
  We check parking on Google Maps before we go somewhere.
• 1:00:20
  Yeah. And.
• 1:00:21
  She cares? Yeah, she's.
• 1:00:22
  She's on about my well-being. She doesn't want me to have a
• 1:00:25
  heart attack, right. And so that kind of thing.
• 1:00:28
  So at this point, at this point, so this larger in life thing and
• 1:00:31
  you know, I was at dinner and she's like she's texting me.
• 1:00:33
  Can you stop targeting the way home?
• 1:00:34
  And I was like, I'm in the Z. She's like, Dang it, Joel.
• 1:00:38
  And I was like, are you kidding me right now with this nonsense?
• 1:00:42
  Like, I'm going to come home and I'm going to swap cars and then
• 1:00:44
  I'll go to target and she's like, target will close.
• 1:00:46
  And I'm like, hey, hey, you might have the target, targets
• 1:00:53
  over. Here anxiety I.
• 1:00:54
  Parked like at the end over here.
• 1:00:56
  And I. Fully expected to walk out and
• 1:00:58
  have nothing but one car next to mine.
• 1:01:01
  Right. Totally.
• 1:01:02
  You've never seen someone go through Target so fast.
• 1:01:06
  Oh man. I was like.
• 1:01:07
  What I was like, what do I need? Let's go, let's go.
• 1:01:10
  But it was fine. But yeah, so it so those are the
• 1:01:14
  two cars in my garage right now. I've gone through cars.
• 1:01:17
  So when I originally started, I had a 99 Grand Cherokee with a
• 1:01:21
  inline 4 liter inline 6. I'd slightly tweaked that a
• 1:01:25
  little, but not much. I sold that originally.
• 1:01:29
  I was planning to buy first. I was planning on buying AD 2 S
• 1:01:32
  8 and then I didn't. And then I, Yep, yeah, damn
• 1:01:38
  nice. So I originally planned to buy
• 1:01:39
  that and then, and when the train is blue, I was gonna swap
• 1:01:42
  in an S4 manual transmission. That was my plan, which is a
• 1:01:46
  common thing. It's just doable.
• 1:01:47
  Yeah, yeah, yeah. And then I backed out of that.
• 1:01:50
  And then at the time, I had a buddy who ran a custom Mopar
• 1:01:52
  shop. You know, I, I I started
• 1:01:55
  drafting up with him. A plan to make it was gonna be a
• 1:01:58
  Magnum wagon with a Challenger front end with Willwood brakes,
• 1:02:03
  fully adjustable shocks like it was gonna, it was gonna stop, it
• 1:02:06
  was gonna turn. It was gonna have a six, two
• 1:02:08
  naturally aspirated V8 because it was before the 6/4.
• 1:02:10
  It was it was gonna be awesome. I backed out of that, did not do
• 1:02:15
  that in the end. I don't know if I regrets about
• 1:02:19
  that, but but it would have been really cool.
• 1:02:20
  That would have. Been that would have been quite
• 1:02:22
  a thing. It would have been quite a
• 1:02:23
  thing. And then I did end up buying, I
• 1:02:28
  was going to buy an eighties 911.
• 1:02:30
  We moved to Portland, OR right after we got married.
• 1:02:32
  So, so all of this was right up in Minnesota still.
• 1:02:35
  We got married, we moved to Portland, OR 4 years for my
• 1:02:37
  wife's career. And so then that unlocked no
• 1:02:40
  snow mode. And suddenly it's like new
• 1:02:43
  options. I can get cars that are old that
• 1:02:45
  won't rust. Rain doesn't rust a car if you
• 1:02:48
  take care of it, right. So then I told Karen I was going
• 1:02:51
  to get an eighties 911 like an SC wide body.
• 1:02:54
  And she was like, absolutely not.
• 1:02:56
  And I was like, what? What?
• 1:02:59
  And she's like, we're going to have kids.
• 1:03:00
  You get press cars. We're still doing long term
• 1:03:02
  cars. At that time we have my car and
• 1:03:04
  I was like, I'll sell it. She's like, I knew you'd say
• 1:03:06
  that. And when you say that, I know
• 1:03:08
  you don't mean it. And we're going to end up
• 1:03:10
  keeping it and then buy another car.
• 1:03:12
  Absolutely not. She said 4 doors, automatic
• 1:03:16
  transmission, I don't care. I was like.
• 1:03:20
  And then I told her, well, I got to do this fast because I don't
• 1:03:23
  know how long it's taking me on the press fleet.
• 1:03:27
  So took two weeks to get into rotation.
• 1:03:30
  But in those two weeks, I moved fast to buy a car.
• 1:03:32
  I came out a window. Yeah, sure.
• 1:03:35
  That excuse. I need to get a car.
• 1:03:37
  You gotta keep up the urgency. Like, I don't know.
• 1:03:39
  Right. I found a guy in Seattle.
• 1:03:42
  It was only a three hour drive. Yeah, 4 hour drive who had a 91
• 1:03:46
  E, 34 M 5 and 4 doors, right? It's not the best mission
• 1:03:53
  though. I know it's totally the best in
• 1:03:55
  five. Fastest 4 door sedan in the
• 1:03:56
  world at the time. Last hand built M car.
• 1:04:00
  Yeah, that's right. So I told her on Friday night,
• 1:04:05
  Friday night at, I don't know, 10:00, We're going to Seattle
• 1:04:09
  tomorrow morning. We're leaving at 5:00 in the
• 1:04:10
  morning because this dude had a family affair.
• 1:04:12
  So we got to, like, be there. We're leaving at 5:00 in the
• 1:04:14
  morning. We're going by a car.
• 1:04:16
  Oh, we got to bring the dog because what happens if, like,
• 1:04:18
  shit goes sideways? Yeah, She's like, she said 4
• 1:04:21
  doors. She said absolutely.
• 1:04:23
  OK, Joel, that was the end of the conversation.
• 1:04:28
  That is the car that is only really five in the morning.
• 1:04:31
  Got he got up there, garage door open.
• 1:04:34
  She's still it's 4 doors, garage door open.
• 1:04:37
  She saw the badge. She's like, I mean, she
• 1:04:41
  instantly knew. Yeah, she's like guy starts the
• 1:04:45
  car instantly. She hates it.
• 1:04:47
  Like she instantly hates it. The car.
• 1:04:49
  The car is Stocker than dining stage 1.
• 1:04:51
  So I had like SLS and the rear had been removed.
• 1:04:53
  It sat like a millimeter lower, had new sway bars.
• 1:04:55
  That's it, but by stock. What color?
• 1:04:58
  Black on dove grey. Nice nice.
• 1:05:00
  And it had an E. 36 M. Three steering wheel.
• 1:05:02
  So the steering wheel was a little thick.
• 1:05:03
  Right on diameter. Yeah, Diane, same style,
• 1:05:06
  diameter had been shrunken in a smidge, that was that.
• 1:05:09
  But other than that stock yeah and Fusion ZR1 tires on it like.
• 1:05:17
  I used tires. Alright, and so terrible so so I
• 1:05:22
  looked at the car, it needed a headliner, it needed tires and
• 1:05:25
  which thank God and it needed AC recharge and it was still R12.
• 1:05:32
  And so I basically did the Creek math.
• 1:05:33
  I was like 3 grand car was priced great price.
• 1:05:36
  Car price was quarter accordingly.
• 1:05:38
  So I so I said looking for test drive and I was like, sure,
• 1:05:44
  answer the keys. Looks like Cameron, she's still
• 1:05:46
  sitting in our car and he said, are you going to go with him?
• 1:05:49
  She's. Like a quiet protest a little.
• 1:05:52
  Yeah, I'm just getting out of my car.
• 1:05:54
  Zero cares and and he says you're going to go with him.
• 1:05:57
  She's like, like, fine, I guess, gets into the car, make it half
• 1:06:02
  a block, she says. Turn around.
• 1:06:04
  I was like. No, it's over.
• 1:06:06
  Oh no, she said. I'm like, but I'm like, why?
• 1:06:10
  She's like, you just didn't buy the damn thing.
• 1:06:12
  Like just just turn around. You're going to buy it.
• 1:06:14
  Who cares? And I said we're absolutely
• 1:06:16
  going on the highway and I wait for because, I mean, I mean, I
• 1:06:20
  don't know if you guys ever driven that.
• 1:06:21
  It drives like shit under 3000 RPM.
• 1:06:23
  Yeah, it's terrible. It's a race car engine.
• 1:06:24
  It does not like life under 3000 RPM.
• 1:06:27
  Got to get it to get 32. So 32 is is the sweet spot. 34,
• 1:06:31
  the double plenum opens and then the sound changes.
• 1:06:34
  Then you're off to the races and 7200 RPM red line.
• 1:06:38
  You can go to 73. You have it on good authority.
• 1:06:42
  Yeah, I have another experience. So we drove on the highway,
• 1:06:45
  Absolutely bought the car. Yeah, so great.
• 1:06:48
  Love that car. Keep the crap out of the tires
• 1:06:51
  in the rain, just just total sideways.
• 1:06:53
  And then I threw super sports on it.
• 1:06:54
  Michelins loved them and did. I kept it R12, pay a fortune and
• 1:06:59
  kept it R12. Huge mistake.
• 1:07:02
  All leaked out a year later. I ended up going to R134A.
• 1:07:04
  Total waste of money. But I tried.
• 1:07:06
  I tried. Yeah, and then I put a new
• 1:07:09
  headliner in and fixed the door cards and then kept it for four.
• 1:07:12
  I drove it first year. I drove a lot, drove like 3600
• 1:07:16
  miles. And then I spent like 40-50
• 1:07:19
  hours detailing it. Made it way too perfect.
• 1:07:21
  And I drove it like, I don't know, 900 miles on the 16 months
• 1:07:24
  of my last ownership. I mean, like, I made it too
• 1:07:26
  perfect. I lived in Portland, OR, It was
• 1:07:27
  raining. If it rained, I wouldn't drive
• 1:07:28
  it. It was stupid, right?
• 1:07:30
  Well, you're not in the park. That's tough because I live in
• 1:07:34
  Seattle. It's the same thing where you're
• 1:07:35
  like, do I want to take that car out in the rain?
• 1:07:37
  Yeah, right. And then they make it clean.
• 1:07:38
  It up and it's like, yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
• 1:07:41
  But but I Co ran Portland cars and coffee there.
• 1:07:44
  I was going to ask you about that.
• 1:07:45
  I saw you had started that like so.
• 1:07:48
  I did not start it. Five dudes in a parking lot of
• 1:07:50
  Starbucks. You love it.
• 1:07:51
  Not 25 dudes in a parking lot of Starbucks.
• 1:07:54
  Well, so we were talking about like behind the scenes.
• 1:07:56
  Like what? Is it like to be part of running
• 1:07:59
  a cars and coffee because I think you know an immense amount
• 1:08:02
  of work Yeah like that's an immense right now he's.
• 1:08:04
  Muted my wife. Asked me why are you doing this?
• 1:08:07
  But there's. Cars and coffee in Portland.
• 1:08:09
  Rain and rain or shine. 365 every week, no breaks like it's
• 1:08:16
  a lot that's the Pacific Northwest it's a lot and so I
• 1:08:19
  Co. Ran it with a guy.
• 1:08:21
  Named Mark Schulz, who was one of the original founding people
• 1:08:24
  that went to it. It's moved locations over the
• 1:08:27
  years, but I mean, I, we create a Facebook group which is best
• 1:08:31
  for I mean, now it's got 3000. I don't remember that looking
• 1:08:34
  3004 thousand people in it. 2000 I don't remember thousands of
• 1:08:36
  people in it. We created a Facebook page.
• 1:08:40
  We're going out fast. We out through the parking lot
• 1:08:42
  instantly, very fast. I instituted volunteers, called
• 1:08:47
  them ground control, and then they called me Major Tom, right.
• 1:08:51
  It's the little things. It's the little things.
• 1:08:53
  There's a. There's a poster up in the top
• 1:08:55
  of my office. There's actually a small framed
• 1:08:58
  version that is the day we relaunched.
• 1:09:00
  So we, we outgrew it and we'd find a location.
• 1:09:03
  There was a museum, car museum. Lindsay probably knows this
• 1:09:05
  museum. It's called World of Speed.
• 1:09:08
  So they they then when they opened Mark and negotiate a deal
• 1:09:12
  that every Saturday morning we held cars and coffee in the
• 1:09:14
  parking lot. Genius.
• 1:09:16
  That was our new home. It was able to hold about. 400
• 1:09:19
  ish cars wow. And we'd have a turnover around
• 1:09:22
  9915 where I'd say 1/3 of the cars that originally came in
• 1:09:26
  left and another third or half would show back up.
• 1:09:28
  So we refilled a lot. So by the time I was leaving, we
• 1:09:30
  probably 1000 people in our cars showing up on a rotating basis
• 1:09:34
  in the morning, 25 dudes in the parking lot.
• 1:09:38
  It's incredible it it it became a thing at year round and on
• 1:09:42
  relaunch day we had all the way back to the highway cars waiting
• 1:09:46
  in line for relaunch. Wow when we moved and there's a
• 1:09:49
  photo of me. Hang on so and tell time this is
• 1:09:53
  my. Parting.
• 1:09:53
  I mean, I have a tart of parting gifts from all of.
• 1:09:56
  Them when I left, but this is a photo of me on relaunch day
• 1:09:59
  running literally both feet in the air to go solve some
• 1:10:03
  problem. Who knows?
• 1:10:06
  And then there's a There's a larger one in my office.
• 1:10:08
  Where everybody signed. It but there's a there's a ton
• 1:10:11
  of of I mean we created with world of speed.
• 1:10:14
  We created like, Oh, definitely. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
• 1:10:18
  And and. And and we had.
• 1:10:20
  I still have my. My Portland ground control badge
• 1:10:23
  sitting in my office and it was, it was quite a thing to leave.
• 1:10:26
  It was, it was sad so and they've since grown and they
• 1:10:30
  have a new location. Could worlds be closed?
• 1:10:33
  Sadly so they have a new location as well.
• 1:10:36
  But that was an experience to run.
• 1:10:39
  And I'm friends with the guys to run Minnesota Cars and Coffee,
• 1:10:41
  which is I believe the largest monthly cars and coffee in the
• 1:10:45
  US. At least it wasn't one point.
• 1:10:48
  And the guy that ran Founded in Renz is Tyler Kristofferson.
• 1:10:51
  He's a friend of mine. I've helped before I moved to
• 1:10:54
  Portland. Course, I was back from
• 1:10:56
  Portland. He was thrilled.
• 1:10:58
  And he's like, you're coming, right?
• 1:11:00
  And I'm like, God, 4 1/2 years of my life.
• 1:11:02
  Every weekend. I need a break.
• 1:11:04
  Carly, Poppy and I are in a fight.
• 1:11:06
  Yeah. I need to step back with my new
• 1:11:08
  children. I didn't have children back
• 1:11:10
  then, but I did show up. I did.
• 1:11:13
  Show up and I did help. Randomly and even last year I
• 1:11:17
  showed up in health. This year they were like, so now
• 1:11:19
  that you're unemployed, you have all the extra time.
• 1:11:21
  Like I don't think you understand what unemployed shows
• 1:11:23
  like right now. I got no time.
• 1:11:25
  So I've not been this year, but Tyler and I keep talking about
• 1:11:29
  going to lunch and, and I, I mean, I, I, I'm the biggest fan.
• 1:11:32
  I have a minister of cars and coffee T-shirt I was wearing
• 1:11:34
  yesterday. I got a couple of them.
• 1:11:35
  I got staff shirts. It's a great event.
• 1:11:37
  What's the secret to good cars and coffee?
• 1:11:39
  Because we've all been to bad ones.
• 1:11:41
  Right. What in a few words is, is what
• 1:11:44
  are the the good ones doing, right?
• 1:11:46
  I think the good ones, it's really, I mean Minnesota.
• 1:11:49
  And Portland are the two I know well.
• 1:11:51
  And, and obviously I took life lessons from Minnesota adapting
• 1:11:55
  to Portland in a different community, right?
• 1:11:57
  So you have to set it up differently.
• 1:12:01
  I think the, the, the, what I would have said, by the way, a
• 1:12:04
  year ago and what I was saying now are different things.
• 1:12:06
  Just, you know, interesting. So what I would have told you a
• 1:12:08
  year ago the the addition is addendum by the way, it's.
• 1:12:13
  In in addition to. So what I would have told you
• 1:12:15
  for my lessons of Portland Cars and Coffee is, is about building
• 1:12:17
  community, making sure everyone knows it's about community.
• 1:12:20
  Everyone is welcome, but everyone needs to be respectful.
• 1:12:23
  There are rules otherwise about rules.
• 1:12:25
  We have chaos. There are there needs to be
• 1:12:27
  safety. There's a time and place for
• 1:12:29
  everything and but everyone should be welcome.
• 1:12:32
  I don't really care what you drive.
• 1:12:34
  I can appreciate anything, literally anything.
• 1:12:38
  But we all need to be respectful and everyone does at different
• 1:12:40
  types. And so, but I, I think it
• 1:12:43
  literally goes to community right now.
• 1:12:44
  It goes back to that whole village mentality.
• 1:12:46
  We help out, right? There's ownership then, right?
• 1:12:48
  You're part of the community. Yeah, total.
• 1:12:51
  And it takes a village to make it work.
• 1:12:53
  Yeah. Yeah, the addendum, I would add
• 1:12:56
  that I feel like in the last 24 months of watching various cars
• 1:13:01
  and coffees thrive, fail, have issues, everything that with the
• 1:13:06
  rules and chaos and community and all that, but also adapt.
• 1:13:09
  It's gonna sound very familiar to a previous part of our
• 1:13:11
  conversation, adapting to the shifting landscape under our
• 1:13:16
  feet and making sure you're staying relevant and moving how
• 1:13:20
  you do things because how you did it four years ago might not
• 1:13:23
  be the best way how you do it today.
• 1:13:24
  Yeah. And so I know this sounds very
• 1:13:26
  familiar to a different part of this topic, but it applies to
• 1:13:29
  this as well well. And I think, I think more and
• 1:13:32
  more, I mean, I just had a. Meeting with someone and we were
• 1:13:34
  talking about that where it's like the only constant is
• 1:13:37
  change. Like you have to be able to roll
• 1:13:39
  with, I mean, you and I've talked about this in the last
• 1:13:41
  couple weeks, like life happens. You have to be able to roll with
• 1:13:43
  it. You have to be able to like look
• 1:13:45
  a few steps ahead, like you said, and see how things are
• 1:13:47
  changing and that suddenly you're married, suddenly you're
• 1:13:50
  not, suddenly you're engaged. Right.
• 1:13:53
  Suddenly you get engaged and buy a car in the same week stuff.
• 1:13:55
  Happens crazy, I know. You got it.
• 1:13:58
  Porsche buckets across the country.
• 1:14:01
  In three days, carbon buckets halfway across the USI.
• 1:14:06
  Will say I think I have disproven all the people that
• 1:14:10
  complain about the carbon buckets because I took a nap in
• 1:14:12
  them. So there you go.
• 1:14:16
  Straight piped, but it is. The vibration is super.
• 1:14:21
  Sleep right? That's right, it's a world's
• 1:14:25
  most. Expensive sound.
• 1:14:26
  Machine. Right, Right, Right.
• 1:14:28
  I love it. I love it.
• 1:14:30
  I know you have a. Hard stop here in 5 minutes,
• 1:14:32
  right? So I want can you want the last
• 1:14:35
  thing I wanted to have you share.
• 1:14:36
  Is can you talk a little bit about your work with move
• 1:14:39
  forward, like explain what they do absolutely your work with
• 1:14:42
  them and then we can then we can let you go now, but we'd like to
• 1:14:45
  have you come back. Absolutely.
• 1:14:46
  I would be happy to come back. Always schedule.
• 1:14:49
  Allowing. Hopefully things will be a
• 1:14:52
  little less chaotic next time. I mean, maybe depending when we
• 1:14:55
  do it and if they become more, if it becomes more than once, I
• 1:14:57
  could talk about some stuff we're going to do perfect.
• 1:15:00
  Beyond what I very lightly touched on.
• 1:15:03
  This is the teaser. So Move Forward is a nonprofit
• 1:15:07
  organization based here in the western suburbs.
• 1:15:10
  I've actually been involved with this high school at some level.
• 1:15:13
  It was formally known as Teens Alone.
• 1:15:15
  Now it's Move Forward. The rebrand happened a decade
• 1:15:18
  ago, changing time. Lindsay and Ryan under a better
• 1:15:23
  name. You gotta move, gotta adapt.
• 1:15:26
  It it. Helps at risk.
• 1:15:27
  Youth in the. West Metro and of course with
• 1:15:32
  different times we've had different demos.
• 1:15:34
  Our current demo would definitely be LBDBTQ and BIPOC
• 1:15:39
  Youth kids. I would say high schools like
• 1:15:41
  our main thing we go to like 20 to 24, but really like middle
• 1:15:45
  school to high school, which are those really hard transition
• 1:15:48
  years right now. The biggest differentiator
• 1:15:52
  between us like that makes us different than everyone else
• 1:15:54
  that no one in the western suburbs like a competitor to us
• 1:15:56
  and offer these services is that we're barrier free.
• 1:15:59
  So until like months ago, we didn't even take insurance
• 1:16:04
  because the biggest barrier to whether it's mental health,
• 1:16:07
  housing assistance, any, any service therapy, anything we
• 1:16:11
  offer, which we have licensed therapists and stuff.
• 1:16:13
  And, and we have a drop in center and we have hard goods
• 1:16:15
  you can pick up and we have housing assistance.
• 1:16:17
  All those things because no kids should couch surf, No kids
• 1:16:19
  should sleep in a car. All these things.
• 1:16:22
  Look, if you're if you're a kid. And you come out to your.
• 1:16:25
  Parents, lesbian, bi, trans. Gay any of this.
• 1:16:30
  Stuff and your parents like no, like that's not a thing and all
• 1:16:36
  of a sudden you're out of the house and you're in high school,
• 1:16:40
  you're in middle school and you don't know where to go figure
• 1:16:43
  that out as a child you're going to sleep in a.
• 1:16:44
  Car you're going to you're if you're if you're already have a
• 1:16:46
  license, you have a car. You're going to you're going to
• 1:16:48
  couch surf all these things or or or in a situation or or if
• 1:16:55
  you're a poor black kid again, using our current demo, this,
• 1:16:58
  this has changed over time. The biggest barrier is who holds
• 1:17:03
  the insurance. No kid has insurance.
• 1:17:06
  Your parent has an insurance. And you're on your.
• 1:17:08
  Parents insurance if you're lucky enough to have insurance
• 1:17:11
  right maybe you're you're under the power level and you don't
• 1:17:13
  even have insurance so you can't get help yeah we did just start
• 1:17:18
  taking insurance because there. Are kids that come to us to
• 1:17:20
  have. Insurance and they're like,
• 1:17:21
  well, I have insurance and it's like, OK, well now we're just
• 1:17:23
  not taking money. That's stupid.
• 1:17:25
  So right 'cause it like, so we're a kid, yeah, right.
• 1:17:29
  So we we. Are we are we do now take
• 1:17:31
  insurance but like. Literally did not take
• 1:17:33
  insurance, weren't even set up for it till months ago now and
• 1:17:37
  it's not required by any means. It's one of those things of
• 1:17:40
  you've got insurance, you want to run through insurance, your
• 1:17:41
  parents cool with it, great you don't have insurance, no
• 1:17:44
  problem. Like you walk in the drop in
• 1:17:46
  center, you need food, no problem.
• 1:17:48
  You need deodorant, you need tampons, you need we're in the
• 1:17:50
  Eisenhower Community Center, which it doesn't mean nothing to
• 1:17:52
  you. It's a it's like a school.
• 1:17:54
  And so that's where our actual drop in center is, is based in
• 1:17:57
  western suburbs and it's off a major highway, not a freeway,
• 1:18:01
  just a like A2 lane highway. And but they let you use,
• 1:18:04
  they're letting us letting us let other kids use shower
• 1:18:07
  facilities, ability to do laundry in their facilities,
• 1:18:12
  Right, right. So, so it's a really a full
• 1:18:16
  service set up. We're embedded in the school
• 1:18:18
  districts in the western suburbs.
• 1:18:20
  That's awesome with licensed counselors.
• 1:18:22
  We used to and over time we've adapted things, right.
• 1:18:24
  So we used to actually have drop in centers like ad hoc set up in
• 1:18:27
  libraries at one point. So like we'd have drop in center
• 1:18:31
  hours in libraries? Like different schools?
• 1:18:34
  No, like literally libraries. Public libraries.
• 1:18:37
  Public libraries like again. Adapting with times when I was.
• 1:18:40
  In high school, I was on what used to be called the Youth
• 1:18:43
  Advisory Board. Doesn't do this today and we're
• 1:18:44
  gonna probably bring it back, but totally different rendition.
• 1:18:47
  And we would throw a battle of bands to raise money in the
• 1:18:49
  schools and drive awareness with kids that didn't need our
• 1:18:51
  services but might know people that need their services.
• 1:18:55
  Yeah, it was awesome. It was awesome.
• 1:18:57
  That's huge. We're in the process.
• 1:18:59
  I think June 15th, I think we're relaunching a new website that
• 1:19:03
  is our executive director cried like it's gorgeous, it's
• 1:19:07
  amazing. Our current website's awful
• 1:19:09
  trash, don't even go. But June 15th, yeah, June 15th,
• 1:19:13
  we're going to have a new website that is really amazing
• 1:19:17
  and it's still resources information.
• 1:19:20
  It's going to look modern. It's going to be responsive.
• 1:19:23
  It's not going to be broken. It's going to be awesome.
• 1:19:28
  And yeah, so I'm the board chair of this organization.
• 1:19:31
  I'm the chair currently. I've been involved since high
• 1:19:34
  school until I took over his board chair last April, not
• 1:19:38
  2524, to be clear, just over a year ago.
• 1:19:41
  Before that, I was the chair of the communications committee.
• 1:19:44
  And now I'm the I stepped down from that a little busy.
• 1:19:48
  So, so we have someone else running communications, but I'm
• 1:19:50
  the chair of the board. And then I'm also the chair of
• 1:19:53
  the governance and nominating committee because we have so
• 1:19:55
  much going on that it's one of those things where it's like,
• 1:19:57
  I'm not going to stall someone to be a puppet and just tell
• 1:19:59
  them what to do. I need it because we we need, we
• 1:20:02
  have so many structural things to set us forward for the future
• 1:20:07
  with all the change we've gone through that I want to put the
• 1:20:09
  pieces in place to then hand the reins to be.
• 1:20:13
  A new person to run the government's nominee committee
• 1:20:16
  but the structure's all there for them that they can just
• 1:20:19
  manage it and, and, and grow it whereas I'm there's no structure
• 1:20:23
  to to run right now right you want to set them up to just
• 1:20:26
  start being being able to do the work and.
• 1:20:27
  Help. I'm super not busy.
• 1:20:28
  I've got a lot of free time. Yeah.
• 1:20:30
  I mean, what else are you going to?
• 1:20:31
  Do well and I I love. The work I.
• 1:20:33
  Mean we actually all have 12 year olds.
• 1:20:35
  I just realized and we know what that period and the next few
• 1:20:39
  years are. We've all looked through it
• 1:20:40
  ourselves, like, and I love the fact that you're helping.
• 1:20:44
  You know. We all agree nobody wants kids
• 1:20:46
  on the street. That's not right.
• 1:20:47
  So I love it's more important than ever right with all that's
• 1:20:50
  going on. So good on you with.
• 1:20:51
  Everything that's going on, I mean, we literally have a
• 1:20:54
  mental. Health crisis in this country,
• 1:20:56
  right? And and a lot of reasons.
• 1:20:58
  For a lot of reasons and and and the point is.
• 1:21:01
  That. You know, we're, we're not
• 1:21:04
  political. It was actually just a
• 1:21:05
  discussion recently. We're not political, but
• 1:21:08
  politics plays and has ramifications on us if that
• 1:21:12
  makes sense. Like as an org we are not
• 1:21:13
  political org. We're agnostic, but policy.
• 1:21:17
  And. Politics have a huge
• 1:21:19
  ramification because a large part of our funding is grant
• 1:21:23
  based, foundation based and donation based of course.
• 1:21:27
  But but because of what we do, grants and foundations are a
• 1:21:31
  huge portion and it's both federal and state level.
• 1:21:36
  Yeah. So it's it plays a huge role,
• 1:21:39
  impacts you guys even though you are very much so, yeah.
• 1:21:43
  It didn't used to as much. Because.
• 1:21:45
  This wasn't so. Political.
• 1:21:49
  Turns out we should just help people.
• 1:21:52
  That's very political. That's very political now.
• 1:21:54
  Yeah, it's. America and bring.
• 1:21:56
  Me you're. Tired.
• 1:21:57
  You're poor, you're needy. Something like that.
• 1:21:58
  I'm not real great with with history, but something like
• 1:22:00
  that. Yeah.
• 1:22:01
  Statue of Liberty was a gift. I don't know.
• 1:22:03
  Well, it's something that gets talked about in my house all the
• 1:22:05
  time. Is like when did basic.
• 1:22:07
  Human decency and honesty like that shouldn't be a big reach,
• 1:22:11
  but it transcend, right? It's didn't think that was in
• 1:22:14
  such short. Supply.
• 1:22:15
  So maybe we can all. Start to we can all start to
• 1:22:17
  bring that back, all of us. Well, this is my way of giving
• 1:22:19
  back, right? And also like it really.
• 1:22:22
  I feel it's a real good setting of example for my children,
• 1:22:26
  right, to teach my children. I'm also really involved with
• 1:22:31
  our with our synagogue and my wife and I and my family, my
• 1:22:34
  parents, we're all very involved in our synagogue.
• 1:22:35
  So teaching our children, I mean, religion is not the only
• 1:22:40
  thing, but but to be it's because because I mean, I don't
• 1:22:44
  know how much you guys know about you use and Judaism.
• 1:22:45
  It's it's loosely, it's really about the community.
• 1:22:48
  Like it's really kind of like cars and coffee, by the way, a
• 1:22:51
  religious thing for some people. You would have been drawn to all
• 1:22:56
  of these community. Based, but, but yeah, right.
• 1:22:58
  But but for at least at least in this.
• 1:23:00
  Household Judaism is much it is is really based around community
• 1:23:05
  heritage tradition. Like it's not it's not really
• 1:23:09
  about being in an action cultural.
• 1:23:11
  It's not really about. Being.
• 1:23:12
  In a synagogue, it's not about going to services, it's about
• 1:23:15
  your community doing good, your heritage, your culture.
• 1:23:20
  And, and I mean, as I mean, unlike Christians are majority
• 1:23:25
  and, and Jews and Muslims and all these other things,
• 1:23:27
  religions are, are definitely a minority, right?
• 1:23:30
  So if you don't teach your youth about your history and your your
• 1:23:33
  heritage, then it just dies. Like it's just, it's just, which
• 1:23:37
  is really ironic, by the way. As a child, I did not care.
• 1:23:40
  I wrote about this in the story. One of those stories includes
• 1:23:42
  this. I didn't, I didn't care about
• 1:23:44
  being Jewish. I did not.
• 1:23:45
  It was thought about going to religious school.
• 1:23:47
  I didn't want, actually, I did want a bar mitzvah.
• 1:23:49
  I wanted a party. My party had the DJ named Marty
• 1:23:52
  the party. Oh, that was how they got Marty
• 1:23:56
  the party. Was my DJ at.
• 1:23:58
  My Bar mitzvah. But but the point, the point is,
• 1:24:00
  is, is that it's it's about it's about teaching tradition and
• 1:24:04
  community and taking care of people and and heritage.
• 1:24:06
  That's it for for us, right? It's much more cultural than as
• 1:24:10
  much as as much as you need to be in a few and you need to be
• 1:24:12
  going to services. Right.
• 1:24:14
  It's not. It's not.
• 1:24:15
  Well, and I think like you touched on an interesting point
• 1:24:17
  like I think as you get. Older and you start to have the
• 1:24:19
  adult context and you understand more about life.
• 1:24:22
  You realize like there are a lot of people that go through and
• 1:24:25
  they check the boxes like you said.
• 1:24:26
  Well, I went every Saturday, I went every Sunday.
• 1:24:28
  I observed, you know, not entirely sure what that does
• 1:24:31
  well and personally, personally. For me so many like.
• 1:24:35
  I. I feel like the older you get,
• 1:24:36
  you realize. Like, you may have missed what
• 1:24:39
  the essence is supposed to be and like, the real thing of
• 1:24:43
  like, hopefully we all just treat each other with kindness
• 1:24:47
  and decency and, you know, and respect your heritage.
• 1:24:50
  I got a lot of friends. It's really important for their
• 1:24:52
  family that they go to church. But I think it, it, it's not
• 1:24:55
  building, right? Like it's because I'm, they're
• 1:24:58
  going to church and other people are going to church.
• 1:25:00
  So that's being together with your community, right?
• 1:25:02
  Like it's, it's, it's teaching your children to go and see
• 1:25:05
  that. Like, we definitely go to
• 1:25:06
  services, not every week, you know, and we, we, we definitely
• 1:25:09
  take part in major holidays And it's, it's we, you know, every
• 1:25:12
  Friday night, if we're at home, we got the candle, we say the
• 1:25:15
  Shabbat prayers and all that stuff.
• 1:25:17
  And it's teaching your children to be thankful, right?
• 1:25:19
  You know, be thankful for what you have, right?
• 1:25:22
  Well, it gives you a foundation. I mean, I remember at.
• 1:25:25
  One point like hearing a child say like, well, what is church?
• 1:25:29
  And I went, oh, that's a really interesting.
• 1:25:31
  That's a really interesting question, right?
• 1:25:33
  And it made me stop and think like you.
• 1:25:35
  Know what's interesting and. This is my perspective on like,
• 1:25:38
  our job as parents is to keep like expose our kids, inform
• 1:25:42
  them of the world. And I went, wow, that's
• 1:25:44
  interesting. I wouldn't have thought about it
• 1:25:46
  that way, especially if you weren't a religious family.
• 1:25:49
  You might have thought like, well, we don't need to talk
• 1:25:51
  about that. But if you've got like whether
• 1:25:54
  you're religious or not, they should know about it.
• 1:25:57
  They should know that it exists. And it's like, it kind of
• 1:25:59
  changed my perspective on parenting.
• 1:26:01
  Like, even if that's not something your family's
• 1:26:03
  participating in, you're only, you're only giving your children
• 1:26:07
  an enhanced experience to say like, well, this is what this is
• 1:26:10
  and expose them to different things.
• 1:26:11
  And you know, when I've explained, I've explained to my
• 1:26:14
  kids, you know, like what if I because, you know, there was a
• 1:26:16
  fight about going to religious. School or whatever, right, Which
• 1:26:17
  again, religious school is not like when I was a kid, religious
• 1:26:20
  school, they're making they're making Jewish recipes.
• 1:26:23
  They're like Jewish. I'm like, what is this like no
• 1:26:26
  spirit And I interest you in Marty the party.
• 1:26:29
  Let's be honest. But also like this is fun.
• 1:26:32
  What are you talking about? But but you know, I get that.
• 1:26:35
  Do I have to be Jewish? I'm like, no, right?
• 1:26:38
  When you're old, when you're, when you're, when you're older,
• 1:26:40
  I've done my job as a parent to teach you our history and our
• 1:26:42
  culture and, and, and literally our heritage.
• 1:26:45
  If you don't want to be Jewish, like that's your you, whatever
• 1:26:49
  you want to be. Believe whatever you want to
• 1:26:50
  believe. I'm not forcing you to believe
• 1:26:51
  what you. I mean like.
• 1:26:53
  I don't care. It's up to you.
• 1:26:54
  It's your life, right? It's that was kind of like, you
• 1:26:57
  know, someone's like, what if your kids turns out to be gay?
• 1:26:58
  And I'm like then I hope they end up marrying someone nice who
• 1:27:03
  loves and respects them well and I think makes sense you.
• 1:27:06
  Summed it up better than I was. I think it's easier.
• 1:27:09
  Like you give them the information and then as they
• 1:27:11
  grow up they get to make an informed choice.
• 1:27:13
  But our job is to make set them up so they're making informed
• 1:27:18
  choices. 100% like I love my kids and you do the best you
• 1:27:22
  can. At some point they become adults
• 1:27:24
  and they either turn it into Ryan or Lindsay or Joel and, and
• 1:27:27
  hope they they turned out all right.
• 1:27:29
  Right. Like, I mean, what are you going
• 1:27:30
  to do? Right?
• 1:27:31
  I think my parents are still hoping I'll turn out all right,
• 1:27:33
  but yeah, it's. This is we've covered a lot
• 1:27:36
  today. I know we have.
• 1:27:38
  I was on blind topics. This is great, I will admit
• 1:27:40
  that. I have a lot of slack.
• 1:27:43
  Things going on, I know we need to ignored SO.
• 1:27:48
  And and my e-mail. Is right.
• 1:27:51
  It's it's about time. It's that time for sure.
• 1:27:53
  So I will say. I would love to come back
• 1:27:55
  anytime. Let's do it.
• 1:27:56
  Thank you so much for joining. Us It was great to see you and
• 1:27:59
  hear. About this exciting new role and
• 1:28:01
  we're so excited for you and we can't wait till you can come
• 1:28:04
  back and tell us even more. And until then, I will say
• 1:28:08
  always be driving. We're that car show and we'll
• 1:28:10
  see you next time. Thanks so much, Joel.
• 1:28:13
  Thanks guys.