Ben Tells His Life Story
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Today's episode is brought to you by Angie. Angie has made it easier than ever to connect with skilled professionals to get all your jobs and projects done well. Let me tell you, there's the version of it where you try to do something at home and then there's a version of it where you have someone help you, you watch them do it the right way and you go, thank God I didn't try to do that myself.

I have fully done things around the home that I think look good and then a bang in the night and I wake up to a shelf collapsing, a painting falling off the wall. Like it, I've seen it all go south. I own a home and I can tell you, I know how much work it can take. Whether it's everyday maintenance and repairs or making dream projects a reality, it can be hard just to know where to start. But now all you need to do is Angie that and find a skilled local pro who will deliver the quality and expertise you need.

Whatever your home project, big or small, indoor or outdoor, you can Angie that and connect with skilled professionals to get the project done well. Right now, one of my wish lists is I want a bike for my condo in Milwaukee and I would love to rig it up on a pulley in the ceiling because I have one of those like lofted ceilings.

but I'm so scared to try that on my own. Angie has 20 years of home experience and they've combined it with new tools to simplify the whole process. Bring them your project online or with the Angie app. Answer a few questions and Angie can handle the rest from start to finish or help you compare quotes from multiple pros and connect instantly, which means you can take care of any home project in just a few taps.

Because when it comes to getting the most out of your home, you can do this when you Angie that. Download the free Angie mobile app today or visit Angie.com. That's A-N-G-I dot com.

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Feels good to be back. I'm so happy to be back, boys. I'm happy you guys are happy to be back. Ken, are you happy to be back? I'm great. I'm so happy to be back. So what do we got here? Cheddar in the hot seat? Yeah, Cheddar's in the hot seat. Are you sure you want to miss out on this episode, Ken? I've got about 400 sweatshirts to...

Fold and send out. All right. Ken, you got a valid point there. And I'm not going to hold you too long, but we did tear Ken away from his –

humble abode the merch area you bet your ass is not happy about it either you did turn it on when the camera went that's why it was good though ken you sparked up you sparked up so i am in the hot seat then yeah ben i if you didn't know no i knew i was just trying to mentally prepare myself for this it's hard to there's nothing really you can really do just come in with an open heart and an open mind that's the plan but i'm on a scale of one to ten how how much you guys gonna go in on me seven not really at all okay we don't really go

At most. Oh, really? Yeah. Oh, shit. Okay. That makes me feel a lot better, actually. Honestly, it's kind of tough to go in on you. Oh? I mean, without being just mean. I mean, I wouldn't say so. Ken's like, can I stick around, actually, for the rest of this podcast? I'm sure Ken has plenty of things to say. Before we let Ken go, we had a great weekend this weekend. We had a very successful meetup.

Thousands of people came. Thank you for coming out. Yeah, that was a movie, dude. Like, that was crazy. Dude, when I was crowd surfing and when we got Ken crowd surfing, that was one of those things where it's like,

You always see people doing it and you dream of that. Like, man, it'd be so cool to just get in a position to be able to have that opportunity and to be able to do it, bro. It felt as good as you would have thought. I was terrified. Yeah. Ken, I was going to say you, you really took advantage or maybe you didn't take advantage. You were more so forcefully thrown into it. But I, at that point, I don't think there was a choice. Yeah. The whole crowd there was, there was, I don't know how many. Thank you for inciting that. I don't know if I incited that. One of you,

One of you four incited it. It was solely on me. It was solely on me. The whole crowd was, big guy, big guy, big guy. How do you say no to that? It's literally impossible to say no to that. Yeah, what do you do? Why, did you not love it? No, I was terrified the entire time. So you're telling me, Ken, we could get you to do just about anything as long as we just have a crowd of like 500 people just behind us.

shouting, big cut, big cut. I mean, anything is a broad term at that point. But I was like, how do you say no at that point? We'll roll the clip over, but there was no way you were getting out of that. Absolutely. There's no chance I could get away without doing it. That's what you call peer pressure. But my favorite part was when

You know, crowd surfing, part of crowd surfing is jumping. It's like looking into the crowd going like, yes, I'm going. Honestly, that was the most terrifying part. But you had like a trust fall. Yeah, no, you almost like laid down like you're laying on a bed of roses. Because I didn't want to like just fall back and then just fall straight to the ground. I was down there to catch you, bud. Yeah, right. Hey, Ben, I'm going to call Cap on that one. Dude, I swear, Ken, you've got to stop saying Cap. He was.

I was there dude, I felt your juicy ass on my head. I was holding you up bro! I did have your back in that though Ken, because I was like "Do not drop him, do not drop him, make sure you get together!" And you did get dropped. I landed on my legs, so it was good. It was all good. You'll hear it in the clip, but Ryan just goes "Be careful, he's a hero!" Careful, he's a hero!

Oh, you said that? Yeah, it's true. Well, I tried, when I was editing it, I tried zooming in on Ryan's face in the background from a crowd view, because you could just see Ryan going, ah! What was that facial reaction, dude? Like, were you nervous, or were you excited? Like, I sat there and stared at it, and I was like, I can't tell what Ryan's vibe is on this. I was nervous, is that the reason?

Like, genuinely. I was too. I didn't want him to get hurt. Oh, okay. I was so pumped. Well, Ken. That was my favorite part about the whole weekend. Not gonna lie. So, big ups to you, Ken. Yeah, dude. You've crowd surfed and I haven't. Yeah. I don't know why I didn't do it.

I was slightly worried that they were going to drop. It was about the bare minimum amount of people that you could possibly have to crowd serve. And it was everyone in between the ages of 10 years old to 65. And like women...

Yeah. It wasn't a strong-looking crowd. It was a strange assortment of people to crowd surf on, that's for sure. It was interesting. It was a good time. I didn't go into the weekend expecting that would happen. It was crazy, dude. We stood in line for 10 hours straight and took pictures for all 10 hours. We probably took over like 1,000 pictures. It was more than 10 hours. It was like 11 or 12. 11 or 12. It was crazy. The merch booth was popping.

And I think we successfully had the most people in our booth out of anyone else at Hay Days. Probably, yeah.

Obviously. By two times, like I'd imagine. Second year in a row we've done that. And it was crazy. It's not like, oh, we're doing a signing, and then you get like a million people at your booth. No, it was just all day. Yeah. The whole day, morning till night. So that was pretty cool to see. We gave away, as everyone was crowding around the truck when they went crowd surfing, we gave away the pit bike. He unfortunately wasn't there, but he was close by.

Everyone was yelling for a redraw, which would have been pretty mean to him. But yeah, he ended up coming and that was pretty cool. Moments like that, when the booth is popping how it was, people in the industry, they can't help but just stand back and respect what is. And it's like, dude, we totally came in and just like disrupted the market. No brand like that in the industry, I think, has ever done what we did and what we're doing.

and it's starting to gain some traction and some respect which is cool to see especially when we're like out and about at like the after parties and people are like the big dogs are coming up to us and they're like hey that was that was crazy that was really cool that does feel good that feels really cool so thanks to everybody who came i understand everyone can't make it because it's in minnesota but it was lit so that was a good good time uh moving on ben

How's that seat feeling? Pretty hot? Feeling pretty hot. Ken, can I let you get back to your merch holder? You got the warmers going on that thing yet? Oh, you look comfortable. So that was all we had Ken here for. Well, I want to talk about his crowd service. Okay, so we weren't going to just completely roast and toast me and Ken was going to be like, oh, I've been waiting for this moment my entire life. Well, I'd like to. I kind of want to stick around a little bit now.

Do you want to? I'm down. I'll stick around for a couple minutes. Okay, yeah, I'm like, we just unorthodox. Okay, Ken, get all your roasts out right now since you got to get back. I got to get them thawed out now. I haven't had a chance to think about that yet. It's pretty tough. I mean, we were planning on probably going in. Ken, do you have anything you want to say about Ben's hot seat? Good luck. That's it? I thought you had some questions, bro. I've had two minutes to prepare for this. Aren't you guys like best friends?

I would consider us, but Ken wouldn't. I mean, depends on the day. Ben considers you guys best friends. Ken considers you guys enemies. Depends what he's done that day, I guess. Isn't it weird how, you know, just the duo, we got the oldest, largest Seaboy, and we got the youngest, smallest Seaboy ever.

You guys are like Tom and Jerry, kind of. See, the thing that really gets on me, it's like when you two get together and you just go full-blown troll mode. Well, everyone, no one's safe at that point, though, again. Like when you're calling me up on what day was that? Tuesday, Wednesday? Ben starts yelling on FaceTime. What does this have anything to do with me? I'm just throwing out an example. Okay.

You start, we're on FaceTime and then you just put it on mute and just start talking there. Oh, that was actually pretty funny. That was pretty funny. I was like, what the fuck? Ken FaceTimed me and I would just, I was talking and then I would just mute it but keep talking and Ken would just go, you're Mike. I think you muted me. You're on mute. I think you, hello. I think you muted me. Yeah, that was good times. Good luck, man. Get out of here, Ken. Get out of here. Thanks, bro. We'll be seeing you. Thanks, man.

Introducing Ben's right-hand man, Ryan. Hey, Ryan, why don't you take a seat, man? So, Benjamin, it's your hot seat episode. I suppose we might as well just get right into it, give the people what they want. You know, in all honesty, going into this podcast, I was actually pretty excited because usually before, you know, we sit down and we come up with conversation topics and, you know, this is the structure of it, this is how we want it to flow.

But this one, I get to just show up and talk about myself. It is kind of nice. You do love talking about yourself. All right. Anyways. So, yeah. This is your hot seat episode. Why don't you tell us a little bit about just like your early years growing up just to get us started? Like how early? I mean. Birth. Birth.

I want to hear your first memory and then just go from there. Some of my earliest memories was, you know how when you start doing stuff when you're like a little kid, but then it seems like nothing really seems like that crucial in the development of your childhood until you find that thing that's like, oh, shit.

I found something I actually really enjoy. I think back to my childhood being some of my fondest memories were when I first got into dirt biking, honestly. And so at the time, we lived in Fargo, which was like a city that's like 45, 50 minutes from here. And I had like a group of friends, but I always felt like...

You know, it's easy to like look back at it now and be like, oh yeah, it makes sense. But I always felt like I didn't belong in like a city like that. And I could never really put my finger on like why, but I always enjoyed coming out to the lake and doing things around the lake. And it was right around that time.

um that i got into dirt biking and that's when like my childhood started to go from like living in a city to the only things i cared about was like the small town living of like the dirt bikes on the weekends uh going out in the boat learning how to like surf and ski and and like all the things that now consist of like our life and everything that we do for like our jobs like i think back to growing up

like a passion in that at like a very young age and knowing like this is my thing. Yeah. The very first day I got a dirt bike, I literally hated it, dude. It's

It just sucks because I was way too small for it. It was a TTR 90. Can you hit us with the line? My name is Ben Roth, and I ride a TTR 90. So that was your first bike. So even that was too big for you? It was too big because I was always small growing up. But your dad took you to like Ely. Yeah, so we like got dirt bikes, and I always wanted to start riding a bike because my older cousin CJ, this douche canoe, and my brother...

had dirt bikes and they got to go out to our grandpa's farm and ride. And I was like, I was too young. So finally, my parents surprised me with a bike and we went up north in Minnesota and I learned how to ride it. Like the first day was like the worst day of my life. Like when I think back to like days that I remember, like, oh my God, I just want this day to be over with. That's probably top five. Wow.

Wow, you've had a pretty good life. I sound super privileged saying that. But yeah, I was just like way too small. I couldn't pick it up by myself. Yeah, you kept tipping over on yourself. You got kind of brought to a spot where it was a little bit more difficult riding for a kid that's on his first time riding a dirt bike. But then after that, it got a little bit easier. I started to enjoy it a little bit more. And then, you know, once you get the hang of it, then you...

start to enjoy things a little bit more. And then once I did get the hang of it, I was just, like, hooked. Like, the only thing I cared about for, like, the next five years of my life, probably actually the next, like,

15 to be realistic. But yeah, for like the next five years, dude. It was just dirt biking. Dirt biking and snowmobiling. Yeah. All I cared about. Yeah, you've always been into like the motor sports. Yeah. So before you were into dirt biking, you know, we really weren't that close until my parents bought the place down at the lake. And we lived right, you know, a few doors down from each other. Yeah. But I remember I wasn't like...

I didn't think much about you. I wasn't like... I like Ben. He's a cool guy. I remember you guys were into like taekwondo or something. Karate. I mean, I never was. I think you were, Ben. Maybe a short stint. Well, listen. So, I don't... I mean, my earliest memories of you is going over to your guys' house in Fargo. I'd be like, here we go. And then I show up. Because there's three of you and one of me. So, we show up and like...

For some reason, I'd always end up downstairs, and you had, like, a kicking bag or something. I don't fucking know. Yeah. You know? Yeah. And you guys would be in your taekwondo shit, and there I am, and you guys are, like, kicking the thing. You're like, come on, like, you kick it. And then I remember you. I remember this, bro. You kicked me in the fucking ribs. Like, I'm just a kid, but you're just like a little short asshole. Like, I'm not even ready for you. Just go. Like, come on.

Just like straight face. And I was like, all right. I don't know about that Ben guy. Yeah. So at that point, you were just cousins, not friends. Yeah, exactly. It was like, I'm going over to my cousin's house. But the turning point was when my parents, they drove us down here to look at houses and everything.

They were doing something with your parents, and it was just me and you. And on the way down, I was looking at all the ditches because they were mowed, and it was, like, at a downhill slope. And I was like, man, if I had my bike here, I would, like, totally, like, ride down that and, like, try to jump the approach. Yeah. Well, anyways, as soon as we pull up, I'm kind of standing around, and you're like, hey, you want to ride bike? And that's literally the first thing we did. Like, you just immediately went and did that with me without us even, like, communicating it. And I was like...

That was pretty fun. You know, this guy's all right. This guy's all right. And then we just kind of became friends ever since then. Yeah, I remember that day, dude. It was, like, raining out and shit. Yeah. We were just paddling, like, getting no air.

And we did that for a while, bro. We would just terrorize the neighborhood on our pedal bikes. And then it developed into dirt bikes. It was good times. And then cars. But you were always into like, you know, obviously we both were. We were just super into dirt bikes. Anything with a motor, really. We loved that. But also just bikes. We'd ride scooters. Yeah. Pretty much anything. Hi, I'm Angie Hicks, co-founder of Angie. And one thing I've learned is that you buy a house, but you make it a home.

because with every fix, update, and renovation, it becomes a little more your own. So you need all your jobs done well. For nearly 30 years, Angie has helped millions of homeowners hire skilled pros for the projects that matter. From

Today's episode is brought to you by Angie. Angie has made it easier than ever to connect with skilled professionals to get all your jobs and projects done well. Let me tell you, there's the version of it where you try to do something at home, and then there's a version of it where you have someone help you, you watch them do it the right way, and you go, thank God I didn't try to do that myself.

I have fully done things around the home that I think look good and then a bang in the night and I wake up to a shelf collapsing, a painting falling off the wall. Like it, I've seen it all go south. I own a home and I can tell you, I know how much work it can take. Whether it's everyday maintenance and repairs or making dream projects a reality, it can be hard just to know where to start. But now all you need to do is Angie that and find a skilled local pro who will deliver the quality and expertise you need.

Whatever your home project, big or small, indoor or outdoor, you can Angie that and connect with skilled professionals to get the project done well. Right now, one of my wish lists is I want a bike for my condo in Milwaukee and I would love to rig it up on a pulley in the ceiling because I have one of those like lofted ceilings.

but I'm so scared to try that on my own. Angie has 20 years of home experience and they've combined it with new tools to simplify the whole process. Bring them your project online or with the Angie app. Answer a few questions and Angie can handle the rest from start to finish or help you compare quotes from multiple pros and connect instantly, which means you can take care of any home project in just a few taps.

Because when it comes to getting the most out of your home, you can do this when you Angie that. Download the free Angie mobile app today or visit Angie.com. That's A-N-G-I dot com.

Um, but I remember, you know, the years went on and, uh, you always had to like kind of come up with the money to pay for it. If you want a new bike that was bigger, you had to, you had to pay for it yourself. Yeah. So you, you've had a job since, I mean, I'm pretty sure you had a job when it was illegal for you to be working. I was 13 years old. The, the, uh, the reason I got my first job was me and my friend Sam.

We're on his dad's four wheelers, like the big overland, um, can and four wheelers, heavy fuckers, right? I was turning around doing a shitty or something. I flipped it.

You could have died. I could have, dude. I'm a little kid. I luckily just got thrown off and the thing was like upside down and I was like, oh shit. You know, it always feels worse when you break somebody else's stuff, right? And we flip it back and the back was cracked. And I was like, Harvey,

I don't have any money. Like, I don't... I'm 13 years old. It was like 500 bucks or something. Yeah, it was like 500 bucks. Which seemed like a million back then. That takes a while to make. Exactly. Especially back then. Yep. Minimum wage was like seven bucks. Yep. So we figure out, you know, the plastics to fix it were 550 bucks or something like that. And I maybe had like $200 to my name. Well, I had to get a job. So I went to the Cormont store, the C store that we go to all the time. It was my very first job. And I have no idea...

Why they gave me a job. Like, I don't know who was running that at the time, but I think there was a couple of us, like 13-year-olds in there. It was cheap labor. Yeah, cheap labor. They didn't ask. And, yeah, that was the first job I had. That was my first time ever seeing you. I rolled into the Carmon store. I just started working down the road, and I, like, had to pick some stuff up. And I saw you, and you kind of were like, oh, what's up, man? Because you recognized me, and I don't know. Anyway, I'm like, man, that kid had to have been, like, 11.

And that's the thing is, is when I was 13, I looked probably 11. You were just, if not younger, like I was, I was small. I didn't hit puberty until I was 21. You know, you were really, really small though. Like, yeah, I was a small guy. Were you the littlest in your class or was there anyone smaller than you? Uh,

You'd remember this because I'm sure it really hit home for you. Guess who was the smallest person in our class and then it was probably me. Who? Jonas. Jonas. Our friend. You guys don't know Jonas but we know Jonas. You're just two small guys. Just two little guys. Now you're normal sized guys. I am but still but people still come up people still

Treat me like I'm like 5'1". Yeah, I don't know why. It's just like the weirdest times, too. Like we were doing like a photo shoot for Justin's wedding a couple weeks ago, and the photographer was like, hey, the little guy, get out of the back. We can't see you. And I'm like –

Bro, I'm 5'11". Are you talking about me? I'm like the same height as everyone else here. You were really small back then, though. I remember thinking you were just always going to be small for your whole life. Is 5'9 that big? That's average. I'd say I'm average at best. If you went to China, you'd definitely be one of the taller... I'd be a monster in China. Speaking of...

uh you being small and hitting puberty at 21 which i want to say you hit it a little before that i don't know if you if you've finished it yet yeah so it was just like hopefully i'm still going through it honestly you know everyone on the channel that's watched us for a while knows that ben has a squeaking problem and then six months ago it comes in waves yeah five months ago it was so bad dude i'm like honestly yeah i think he's gonna squeak like the rest of his life and then in the last two months i've heard you do it like three times maybe you're finishing i don't get it yeah i don't

We can hold. I don't know. I hope so. I hope my dick grows a little bit. Okay, now it's turned from the little guy to Ben's getting fat. Yeah. Which...

I mean, don't get me wrong. I've put on probably a couple extra pounds that I don't need. But the issue with it is the internet and the world has seen me grow up from being like that little kid. You were like malnourished. I wouldn't go that far. But I was like that little kid to now I'm like normal. And it's such a change. People are like, holy shit, you're really getting fat. Like, no, I've just matured. You know, like when we started filming, if you go and watch the very first videos, I was like 18 years old.

And a lot of people are, like, grown at that point. I just wasn't. My parents are both chiropractors, and they're, like, insanely healthy people. And that trickled down to my brother and my sister, and then there was me. But if you're a kid, you don't have an option. And there was me...

Yeah, exactly. I didn't have an option of that. So I would basically go over to my friend's house. Like, I would go over to Ryan's house, and I'd be like, holy shit, you have sugar cereal? I was like, what? Dude, that was the first thing you'd do. You'd walk in the door. You wouldn't even say hi eventually. You would just walk in, go to the pantry, grab the bag of Fruity Dino Bites, and sit down and eat. And then be like, what's up, bro? How's it going? And then you'd just talk for a while, and then you'd go grab a juice box. It was the same way at my house, too. I remember my parents, like...

cracking jokes to you when you were like it'd be like fall and they'd be leaving for the winter and and they'd be like it'd be like ben you getting ready for hibernation we better give an extra plate because you're just loading up yeah man i especially i mean it still is like that maybe that's why i've packed on some extra pounds finally because i can just go out and just buy the

food myself now yeah i can pick my own diet yeah it is interesting though how everyone in your family is uh still rather healthy but it never stuck with you you just weren't built that way no dude i'm like the black sheep of like mostly everything in the family though as i stated like both my parents are chiropractors and like everyone in my family has fallen down my grandparents are

on both sides, my aunt and uncles, I have, uh, my sister-in-law now, literally since earliest I can remember, I never wanted to do that. And like everyone else in my family did like my siblings, I dropped out of college, uh,

That was another thing. I was kind of the first to do that. You definitely don't have the same diet. I don't have the same diet. I don't really have... Well, me and my dad have a lot of the same interests. I was going to say that. That's why I like pretty much all the things that I do. Your dad, your grandpa, your uncle, they all love motorcycles, snowmobiling. Yeah, they're insanely adventurous. They will go all the way to Alaska by themselves and then drive...

Yeah. Motorcycle by themselves. Yeah. That's one thing that I don't really have is like, I like being with people. Right. Whereas is the rest of my family is okay with just being like alone and just being like a solo wolf where I love like the camaraderie of like the

boys. I would much rather go with the crew than by myself. You're very similar in the fact of you like cool cars. You like motorcycles. You like snowmobiles. You like boats. Everything that I guess I'd like, I guess you could attribute to someone in my family. Me and CJ's grandpa has had 27 Corvettes.

So it was only right that Ben got a Corvette. It was only right that I got a Corvette, which is fun. I don't know. Why is our family such Corvette people? I asked them that before, too, and they just said, I don't know. I don't know. We just like them. It's like things like that are just so weird. I think they said bang for your buck. Yeah. It is a lot of bang for your buck. For sure. Dude, my dad, grandpa, uncle, all of them have literally traveled like the entire world on a motorcycle. It's mind-blowing.

It really is mind-blowing. And I always thought that, oh, I mean, plenty of people have family members like that. But the older I get, it's like, no, that's pretty rare. Especially by yourself. True adventure like that is really rare. And what I still don't fully understand is the why aspect of it. Right.

which I'm still trying to figure out. It doesn't sound as good of a time by yourself. No, I don't fully get that. But, yeah, man. I mean, since I was like a little kid, dude, my dad would just put me in between his arms and we would just go bang like 500 miles of trail on a snowmobile. Wow. Yeah. Or I would hop on the motorcycle and we would go like out to Montana and I would just be like a little tight.

Just hanging on. One could say like that it's in your blood. Yeah. When you start that early.

And you're crushing just crazy adventures like that. Even the story about, like, when they got you your first snowmobile and you had that little pond in the back of your house and you could only keep it on the pond. So you do, like, a million laps in winter. They put me on a snowmobile when I was two years old. Wow. That's how it should be. That's how it should be. It really should be. Yeah. That's how I want to, like, raise my kid when I get one.

Yeah. When I get one, when I know, like if, you know, when I have kids one day, I definitely would want to raise them to be, uh, kind of like that adventurous soul. But I think there's so much to be said about teaching kids like motor skills when they're young too, because you know, when they get old enough to hop in a car, like they're aware of their surroundings and, uh, they're just like so much more prepared to,

than people that don't have that. It also helps, I think, with your coordination, like reaction skills. Yes, exactly. If you're on a bike and you're, say, riding a trail, you have to make a decision every split second. Which route do I take? Do I go around this rock or whatever? When we were in Akeley, if we wrote a lot more single track, you would have had a lot of that. Right. Which we kind of grew up doing. I'd imagine, though, if I were to get hurt doing something...

that like my dad taught me how to do like that'd be pretty hard on him you know and i and i think about that for me like would i want to put my kid on a motorcycle that could like endanger him or like get in an accident of some sort you know i will say though like one thing though is like there's like two different sides to like putting your kid on a motorcycle or a snowmobile it's like there's the guys that are like you're gonna race and like they they get them racing like

You're going to get hurt. It's inevitable. You're probably going to still get hurt riding a dirt bike in general. Yeah. Eventually, if you're going to ride it long enough. But it was like, you didn't have to hit jumps. They weren't telling you to hit jumps. They weren't telling you to do dangerous stuff. To go faster. You know? And, like, I definitely would, like what you were saying, I would never push my kid to do anything like that. You know? Because then you'll feel bad. But, like, if they want to go and try to hit a jump, like, go for it. I'm not going to be like, you should hit that jump. Like, no.

I would say I'm pretty moderate on the reckless scale. I don't just throw on a helmet. I'm like, I got a helmet on. This is protecting me for anything. It's not like that. But yeah, it is just being pretty aware of your surroundings and getting those basic life skills. Have you ever gotten hurt riding? What are some times? On the channel and off the channel. Just in general, your whole life. The first injury I ever had

that I can remember. Well, I fell off a piano bench and broke my arm when I was a little kid. Who knew piano could be dangerous? Yeah, exactly. You were better on a dirt bike. Yeah. And then, uh, I was riding with my brother, Sam one day and I came over this hill as Sam was coming down it and he hit me with his, with his bike, hit my top of my foot and I broke my foot and Sam, Sam was like, you can't tell mom and dad if

If they find out that I hit you, like, I'm going to be in so much trouble. So I took that. I probably should have taken it to the grave. But like a couple of years back, I was just like, hey, remember that time I broke my foot? And I just told them a while back. And what'd you do about it? What'd you tell her? It was broken. Oh, Sam was like, tell him that you tipped over and you crushed. Oh, OK. I was going to say, I was like, how the fuck you have a broken foot and you just wear it? No, I think I did wear it.

for like a couple days and then i was like i think my foot's like messed up it was a big old black and blue yeah damn so i guess i got hurt like that uh i flipped over backwards doing a wheelie at like 60 one time that's soft that was at the start of the channel dude i literally skid down the road and tore a hole in my shoulder

Threw a jacket, a sweatshirt, a t-shirt, and then into my skin. I probably still have a scar. And after that, I was like, dude, high-speed wheelies are not to be fucked with. But that really didn't slow us down, actually. Literally knock on wood. Actually have not gotten hurt doing too many things. I'm trying to think back. I don't know. Can you guys think of any? That was my genuine question. When we first started filming, you looped out really bad that one time. And then from then on...

You've been lucky. Yeah. My memory of you being injured, granted you didn't really have like an accident, you

You had to play, like you played soccer and you wouldn't do any physical activity all summer. And then come fall when you start soccer practice up, apparently they would run you really hard. And I remember you couldn't walk. Bro, you just limp around, you gimp around. You'd be like, no, I can't. So we started calling you polio boy. But like, I'm not kidding you. I would gimp around and I had a cough. I was like sick. I'd be like, I don't, like he'd be limping around. What the heck happened? CJ's like, polio.

Those are different times. You could say things like that. You could joke about polio. Yeah, but anyways. Well, I think nowadays it's okay. What do you mean? What happened? Like, how the hell do you... You just ran and apparently you couldn't walk? It's like shin splints, bro. It's like shin splints, but in your ankles. Bro, you had like... And it's just, I don't know. You were like crawling around.

Yeah, it was terrible. I think he even had crutches. It's like the equivalent of having two sprained ankles. Like, that shit sucked, dude. And he was just so little back then. And I would do it every single year. I wouldn't condition before soccer would start. Maybe it was because I was so malnourished, bro. Well, that's why you look like you had polio. You were so skinny. You were coughing. I was like, oh, a little polio, boy. You felt bad. Yeah. Yeah, that sucked. Speaking of soccer, Ben, what about...

I don't know how old you would have been. How old would you have been when you got your minor? That's right, dude. What a hell of a transition. Well, I was thinking about it because it'll make more sense as we get into it. I think I know where you're going with this. Okay, so I was 16 years old, and we had just started – we had just started –

I want to say like everyone. And I just so happened to be the youngest. Well, everyone else was 19 years older than you. Yeah, exactly. So I think we were all kind of just starting. Yeah. So when everyone else started boozing, it was just my time. And I just so happened to be 16 years old. Right. I crushed like eight beers.

Maybe even more. No, maybe. It was maybe like six. It was more than me, that's for sure. Let's go in the middle. Let's say seven. All right, so I crushed seven beers, and I was fucked up. It was probably my third time drinking ever, and I started throwing up.

My girlfriend at the time was the first day hanging out with her, wasn't my girlfriend. Yeah, I was like just starting to talk to her. She is your girlfriend. My girlfriend now. Yes, exactly. Yep. What a start. She gives me a ride home to my house and I start throwing. I was like dry heaving like in her car and her friends are in the back seat and they're like, so we pull over on the side of the road.

And I start throwing up outside the door. Actually, I might have done the courtesy of just getting out and throwing up, right? At the one streetlight. At the one streetlight in between Cormorant and my parents' house. There literally is no streetlights. No streetlights. Terrible spot to stop. And I come to. I look up, and I'm like...

Oh, shit. We're like kind of like in town, right? And they're like, Cormorant town. Underneath this streetlight. Like, we should go. Like, we should get going. I hop back in the car. And we start to like to pull out. Cop lights turn on behind us. And they're like, cops pulling us over. I'm like, oh, shit. I'm just tweaking in the front seat, right? Cop comes up. Anybody been drinking tonight? My girlfriend is just like, you know, innocent and just silent. Her friend's in the back seat.

Yeah, they just knocked me out. I'm like, oh, shit. You know, I, like, knew I was getting in trouble. Well, at that point, yeah, you're getting in trouble. So much stuff running through your head at that point. Oh, yeah. Next thing I know, you know, he's breathalyzing me and doing all this stuff. I get back in the car, and he comes back, and he goes, all right, here's the thing. You can either call your parents to come and pick you up, or we can bring you to jail for the night.

And I was contemplating it. I was like, call my dad or go to jail. And I was like, oh, yeah. Okay, I'll call my parents, right? Call my dad. Pissed. Probably partially because I woke him up. But comes and picks me up.

um, told the cop that he should have brought me to jail. It was like, it would be easier than, you know, bringing him home. And so we go home. I'm still throwing up. I'm still hammered, right? I'm throwing up. He's videotaping it. I'm sure he's still, he's sitting over here laughing right now. But, uh,

He's videotaping it. I hope those videos never surface. And I don't know. I get grounded and all this shit. They were like, well, you just fucked up your relationship with Greta. She's such a good girl. Like, she's never going to talk to you again. And I was like, I'm so screwed. Like, I was down in the dumps, right? I was like, ah, they're going to tell the school. I'm going to get, you know. Which is just what happens. That's what happens. That's what happens. When you get a minor. Yeah, yeah. It's like playing with fire.

I'm going to get suspended from my sports, which I didn't really care about, to be honest, because I was like, I just played sports just to do it. And what I was most worried about was all my friends finding out because I hung out with that friend group that was like anti-drinking. It's like the cool kids in the group that are like, no, the kids that drink in our grade are losers. We can have fun in any other way. Yeah. Now they're just friends.

Full-on boozers now. Look at them now. To clarify for the listener, you had two different groups. You had our group because we didn't go to school together. We just lived around this area. And then you had your friend group from school that you went to school with, and that's how they were. I was just super worried about people finding out, honestly. It was just that self-conscious...

uh, high schooler, you know? I mean, it's probably not the best thing for people to find out. No, definitely. Definitely. And, um, you know, I didn't, I didn't want my girlfriend's parents to find out. And it's just not a good look. You know, talk of the town, been talking to the town. It's a small town. I go to school on Monday.

No call. Tuesday, no call. Wednesday, no call. Next week, no call. Next week comes by, and after that second week, I was like, I think I'm actually good. But, dude, you didn't tell anybody. None of your friends. Greta's friends in the back seat didn't tell anybody. I have absolutely no idea.

nobody found out. And you kept playing soccer. And I kept playing soccer and golf and all that shit. And you kept boozing on the weekends too. Yeah, dude. Those of you that go to any small school or even medium-sized school, people just, they're going to know. You want to know why I think you got out of it? Why they didn't find out about it? It's because you live here in Cormorant and most people that live in this area would go to Lake Park, another small school, but you went to Detroit Lakes. And I

I guarantee the cop maybe told the Lake Park person or whatever. And he was like, hey, yeah. And then this guy's like, I don't fucking know who that is. And that was it. You know, I don't know, dude. I've played it over so many times as to what could have happened. And I still have no idea. Just haunts you, huh? No, it really, like, I don't know. It just doesn't make any sense.

It doesn't make any sense. Like, when have you ever heard of that happening? Most, most time people don't have the entire internet world to tell the story to afterwards, but I've never heard of that. Someone gets a minor, even though I literally could like not have ever even met them, let's say, but they go to my school. Like you're going to find out. Dude, you guys want to know the craziest part? Yeah, I'm down. Oh shit. Okay. So you, you have to, you know, you pay a fine, you have to do community service.

I don't know. I can't even remember what else you have to do. Oh, you have to write an essay about never drinking again and everything. Dude, I did my community service at the fucking high school.

High school on a Saturday. No one was like, what are you doing? Bro, it was the craziest. I was like, oh my God, we could do it anywhere else in the world and I would have been fine. But of course it has to be at the one place I don't want finding out about it. And they still never found out. What did said community service consist of? Just like had to clean everything. It's just like, I don't know, doing like the dirty work, like the janitor's assistant. Yeah, I had to do that just for being late.

Oh, really? So you had it pretty easy. Yeah, I was like, I had to help the janitors clean just for having tardies, and you have to serve community service. Well, Mike, when you're late that many times, they start punishing you to the highest degree. It's about the same equivalent. Yeah. Getting a minor is nothing...

That's not a big deal. Well, I shouldn't say that. You don't want to promote that. Yeah, it was absolutely discouraging. It really is. Yeah, I would not recommend it by any means. I got off pretty easy, but it's not a good look. I wouldn't suggest it. I wouldn't suggest it. It's not the end of the world if you get one, though. But yeah, maybe that's the thing. I want to say your life's not over. Sometimes in the middle of a kid getting that, you're thinking your life might be over in that small instance, but it's not. I think that's just one of the things that...

Kind of comes with being the youngest one of the group when we have such a vast range of ages. Yeah. Because Ken just turned, what, 21 or 22? Because I remember Ken supplied the alcohol. So if the cops are listening right now and they're trying to do something, put this guy in handcuffs. Ken wasn't. He would have been like 28. No, I'm kidding. Ken didn't supply the alcohol.

So then shortly after that, it would have been probably the following year. Your senior year is kind of when we started posting to YouTube. Yeah. What was that like? I mean, you were still in high school. Yeah. Did people say anything? No, no, honestly. Were we not getting enough traction? I think we're finding out Ben's just not a popular kid in high school. Yeah, that's what this is. People are watching this right now. He went to Detroit Lakes? Yeah.

No, dude. Honestly, when we started filming our videos, I remember my immediate friends thinking it was really cool. And they were supportive of it, and they thought it was cool. I had one teacher that said the classic, like, you can't make money on the internet, or that's not a job, or that's not cool, or some shit. I don't even remember. I mean, that shows how much it affected me. But...

Other than that, because you got to remember, we were pretty small that first year, dude. I'm trying to even think. What did we even have when I would have graduated? 50K? Yeah, something like that. 50, 60. We really didn't have many. Going into college, were we even at 100? We were probably just hitting 100 when we were going into college. That's such a small... It's not a lot to talk about.

But, yeah, I could definitely see where people would, in high school especially, get affected by trying to start something because of other people quote-unquote thinking it's, like, not cool. And it's always, like, the cool kids that love to just, like, make little jokes and then all, like, the kids that suck the cool kid's dick, you know, hopping on board. And then that's – it's just, like, a compound effect of, like –

bullying or like putting people down on it. But yeah, man, I was, I was pretty lucky as to where I was like at in my life. And, uh, you know, I've, I've, yeah, I've always been like pretty confident and I don't really look to other people for, you know, like their approval. So like that, I don't know. I like, I think back to those times and I was just like, so I was so sure of what we were doing that it was like, cool. Um,

It didn't affect me. Now that I look back at the videos, I'm like, oh shit, I would have probably fucking bullied me. But it's like, I don't know, it's just like the small snowball that goes into something more. And I was just like a really good

good stage of my life. Optimal timing. I feel like you were lucky being young because you're like, you got a jumpstart on your entire, or our career. You know, we were like 20, 20 years old, kind of kicking off where people are like, Oh, you're going to go get that internship. And then I'm like, nah, I'm going to do that. Yeah. But you were just graduating high school. So that's kind of cool for you that like you were able to like get such a good jump out of high school. And the thing about it is I, I,

I always wanted to do some kind of business or start my own business or... I don't know. I just knew I wanted to do something in business and...

Make a lot of money. You want to be an entrepreneur. I wanted to be an entrepreneur. I think I just saw this as such a good opportunity and so much potential. Like, from the get-go, you know, I was always, like, really about it. Like, I didn't have to be convinced to do it. I don't know. I just saw something in it, and I was willing to literally throw my life away for it because I didn't have a whole lot going for me outside of that, you know? You didn't have anything else to do. If it works, great. That's what I...

want to do if it doesn't i'm really not out anything right how long did you go to college for like year and a half barely though dude when i went to college i i knew from the moment i walked through the doors at college on the first day i was gonna drop out

I knew like, I was like, I don't know why I'm even here on the first day of school. Cause I'm going to drop out, whether it's in a semester or three fourths of the way through college. It was like, I'm going to drop out of college. I'm literally just here until the rest of my comrades agree with me with being like you guys. I was like, I just have to convince everyone that,

to also drop out or for for mike to just like quit his job and everything like that and like one by one by one like we did yeah you told me that many times you were like this is not even done with your first year you're like i'm gonna drop out i want to drop out at least but yeah it was the continual like adults around you shaming you kind of i mean not saying that affected you that much but it was one factor you're just like no i'm gonna do it i just trying to figure out the

Best time. Yeah, exactly. And I mean, it kind of goes back to like the small town thing. And like the only real connection I kind of have to like the outside world is like my girlfriend, you know, and I always go to her like, OK, so like if I do this, like what what what are people saying like on the outside? What do people think? Like what what would your parents think? And everything like that.

And that was kind of like the only thing that really deterred me from doing it just from the get go. And granted, she would have never cared or like told me not to. But it was just like that's like my connection to like the real world. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, I kind of just went with the status quo. If like people are watching this right now and they're like, I don't know if I should go to college or not.

Go to a cheap college. You don't have to go to an expensive college. Go to a cheap college if you're kind of in between until you find like that thing that you want to do. Don't get all suckered in. Don't get two years of generals and then kick, you know, two years of generals and you walk out. What do you have to show for that? Nothing but two years of a trade at a school. Or that. Yeah, exactly. But like the people that are like, I don't know if I want to go to college, but

I want to like start my own business. It's like either start your own business and like do it a hundred percent or just go to college and like dabble in it until you figure out what your thing is that you want to quit college for, you know? Like, I don't think, I think people overthink it. I overthought it for sure. I think the tides are changing though. Tides are changing. Cause like, I mean, our first ever hire, Justin, what are, he's sitting behind the cameras right now. What are you, you're not in school right now. You just graduated high school, right?

He's in online schooling, but you know, like he didn't jump into just going right to a big university. And I mean, same with my brother, same with a few of his friends. Like I feel like the tides are changing. People are starting to realize like, eh, you know, I understand the experience of college, but.

But once it's done, it's done. And you just drank the whole time and you're still a dumb idiot with a bunch of debt now. Yeah, college experience is only worth so much. Exactly. The experience is great for the memories. And I didn't mean like you're going to be a dumb idiot. Some people will. Most hopefully won't. When I was in college, I can probably count on one hand the amount of times that I went to like a college party. Like I feel like looking back at that part of our life,

It was such a grind time. And I didn't even know what the fuck we were doing. Yeah, you didn't even have time for that. We were, I just remember being like so focused on just working and I didn't really care what it was working on. It was just like doing something productive that like grew the brand in any kind of way. I didn't have a college experience. Literally.

Well, because you were in the dorm, right? And your roommate was rather odd. Strange guy. And he's fine. I stayed at my dorm room once. Okay, one time. That's insane, dude. You literally just didn't go there. One night. I stayed there one night. Either I would just stay at the lake and just drive in, or I'd stay at the Seaboy's house, the college house, or Greta's. What you were working on, though, if we backtrack a little bit, it was your idea to start...

The merch. I mean, it was very common for YouTubers to do merch, but you were like, we should do merch rather early. I mean, you took the initiative and you got it all set up. When I was a senior in high school, I interned for my girlfriend Greta's dad.

Uh, he, he owns a screen printing company and they're like crazy successful, like massive. Um, that's actually kind of like down to the root of, of why I wanted to always do something in business and why I wanted to own my own business. I saw that and I saw all the other really successful businessmen and I always like admired their, their, their schedule.

their income and just like being a boss. I, so I always knew I wanted to do that. But when I was interning for him, it was at around the same time that we were, we had started the YouTube channel and they had like these old screen printers and

They were like the manual screen printers, so you'd like burn off a screen, and then you would like manually press the ink through the screen onto the shirt, and then you put it on this oven, and it would bake the ink to the shirt. Boom, you have a T-shirt. I think we were at like 30,000 subs or something like that. 50,000. I don't even know if we were at that, honestly. Ryan and I did the math. Like if you started those shirts, I think it was like November or December. Yeah.

We had only been... We had just started posting in September. How the hell did we generate 50,000 subs from zero? Yeah. We had to have been at, like, if we're lucky, we had 20,000. Way too early in hindsight. But at the time, I was just, like, excited to do something and try something new. And it was, like, anything to make money. Just, like, doing something. Yeah. Like, I'm not, like, entirely money-driven. Like, I don't really care about that. But it's, like, feeling that sense of, like, oh, man, we...

we did something really successful. We just dropped a really good video. People are reacting to it. They love it. Like it's like little things like that, that make me so much happier. And at the time it was like, if we can create our own t-shirts and sell them to literally 25, 50 people and they, they love the t-shirts and we got like a sense of like, we built this with our hands. Like, that's all I want. I literally taught myself, uh,

How to burn screens in my parents' living room or in my parents' basement furnace room. All by yourself. With Micah. We taught ourselves how to burn these screens in...

print the t-shirts we had like the the shittiest supplies this is all we could afford we would use this oven thing that was meant to just like it's called flash the ink so it's like if you flash it then you can print another color on top of it well we would use the flash to cure the entire shirt we uh had our screen printer set up at ken's uncle's our neighbors over there at the time

And we took one of their old refrigerators and put it on its side. And that's what we would use for the base of the oven to flash over it. And we would carry it across. But moral of the story is, I don't know. I was just excited to do something and creating another source of revenue. And we were...

We were using that money just to, like, fund the channel and just, like, I don't know, just, like, grow. And it was, like, pennies at the time. Because, I mean, we'd make, like, yeah, let's say $1,500. We'd make that back. And that, you know, that was just enough. Oh, cool. Now we can buy another peanut. Yeah. Little things like that. Because YouTube didn't.

YouTube didn't pay us at all. We weren't getting many views. We weren't getting many views, exactly. It's hard to make money off of videos that aren't pulling views. I remember learning how to do that and it's such a process. Printing 50 shirts would take

I don't know, probably what? 20 hours? It was like once we got into printing them. From burning the screens to printing it to cleaning the screens. It's such a process, right? We became more of a screen printing company than a YouTube company. So as a side hustle, me and Micah would go out and

print shirts for other companies. You know, we were doing it for like a trucking company and just literally any way to put money in our pocket because at the time we were just like full-time YouTubers and not getting paid. Ben is easily the most entrepreneurial spirit I've ever met.

And so when we were filming videos, we weren't full time yet. We were keeping mine, you know? So that's why he had the idea to like, he's like, let's do merch. Cause should you do merch at 30, 40, 50 K subs? Probably not. No, you shouldn't. Nope. No, you shouldn't at all. Like not even a probably not. You just shouldn't. Yeah, you shouldn't. You should focus on the content. Yeah. But the reason we did was because when we would get together, we could only film,

One video a weekend, and it might not even be a full video because, again, we weren't full time. So when we had all this downtime. Yeah, like everyone else had kind of jobs. Yeah, we didn't have a great system. No, we didn't. It is the way it had to be. We didn't know we needed a system because how are we going to make a system for YouTube videos that don't make us any money? When I look back at the road of business that has brought me to here, I would consider myself delusionally optimistic. Yeah.

and delusionally entrepreneurial. And it's like doing more is not doing the most, though. Back then, though, you definitely thought that. You were pretty bullheaded. You were like, we're going to just outwork everyone. We're going to work all the time. If you're not here helping fold shirts, what are you doing? It was very bullheaded, I would say. I think there is something to be said about having that mentality, which is good, but almost...

moving that energy into into something that's more efficient i remember at one point you were coming out like i couldn't believe it you were coming up with so many good ideas bro you come up with a business idea every week it was like i couldn't keep up with them they were good too and so it's like we were like oh should we do that and then we would entertain the idea for a while and then we realized after a long time that if we put our eggs in the youtube basket it

and really cruise on, then it'd do good. But yeah, you ever, you had, we had like an, I, we had an idea to, uh, open an ice cream shop, ice cream shop. We had the idea to, uh, deliver, uh, firewood to people around the lake. Yeah. Uh,

Print t-shirts for people just lake-based. Yeah, all kinds of stuff. But it's like ideas are only so good without any execution. But also that motivated me. You came up with so many ideas, circles around me that I was like,

We'll make something work. Although that those years we definitely weren't working the most effectively. We really did. Like we literally pulled our YouTube channel by the bootstraps. We're like, all right, we, no matter, even if printing the t-shirts wasn't the smartest idea, we worked 17 hours a day. Every weekend we would get there Friday night. We'd work all day till 3am. I remember we would get a pizza. We'd get to order a pizza as payment. Yeah.

And we would just grind for those like, dude, like two years. That was what we did. And in that way, it gave us all something to do to keep us focused on the business. And in a roundabout way, I really think that is what got us through those beginning years when YouTube wasn't paying us and when making a video only was so much work. Granted, we probably could have gotten here way faster if we'd made four videos a weekend. Yeah.

But it was just what we did at the time. Yeah, it was part of the journey and I wouldn't change it for anything. Exactly. But it's like now that I've gone down that path, like I have a pretty good outlook on business just because of how much we've done and how much like I've tried to do. Like if somebody comes up to me, it's like, oh, I want to do this or I have this idea.

I have a pretty good idea whether it's going to work or not because of the amount of things that we've tried. Yeah, that's true. And you're able to guide them. You're able to give them, uh, you know, handful of sentences and be like, all right, go do it. I think that goes back to, you know, like you were pretty bullheaded back then. Now you, you think more, I would say, but you've obviously learned that from experience. Yeah. Now it's like, I don't really want to waste time. It's weird though. Uh,

Speaking of time, we would sit there and print shirts in a shop all night and all day on a Saturday and literally doing nothing. But we were hanging out. But honestly, I don't remember thinking, like, this sucks. We were just doing it. Also, we didn't really have much else to do. And we were still making more money than we would...

Not doing it. Yeah, I was just like, this is dope. We're printing our own shirts. We're making money. It was fun. It was fun, honestly. But yeah, realistically, it wasn't the right...

The right way to do things, but you never really know the right way to do things. Yeah, exactly. That's interesting times that like now we'll still work until 3 in the morning, right? Yeah, it's just happens all the time. None of us have a problem with that at all. Yeah, no problem. However, back then we would do it with literally without even thinking about it. It wasn't this like, ah, tonight's going to be a late night. It wasn't like that.

We literally would just work. I'd be like, oh, shoot, it's literally 4 in the morning. It's kind of nice when you don't have much other option. That's just kind of what you did, though. It was great. There wasn't a whole lot of other choices. The grind was fun. It was like going through a mirror house at the fair, but we just ran. We didn't stop and look at which way was the smartest way to make it through, and we ran into every glass and every so often.

we would get through a hole and it would just keep pushing us along down the road. Yeah, that's a good way to look at it. How many times have you had someone come up to you and they'll be talking? This happens to me all the time. I think it happens to you guys too, but it'll be someone who's trying to do...

a YouTube channel or be like an influencer of some sort. And they like come up and they're like, yeah. So like they start talking to you about like how they, they're going to start their merch and their, their merchandise is like their name. I'm like, okay, nice. And then, and then you've found you like, so what do you do? And they're like, well, I haven't started posting my videos. I'm like, well, how are you going to sell the shirts? You don't have it, you know? Yeah. They get too caught up in,

That's like step D, but you got to go ABC before that. Yeah. I mean, if anyone watching this right now wants to start a YouTube channel,

I wouldn't even consider merch until you have, I don't know, 100,000? Like, stickers at most. If you have, like, stickers. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I'd say if you have a good following. But, like, literally just double down on YouTube. Just make the content. Just make the content, and then everything else will follow. Yeah, I think you see that a lot of times with, like, the bigger creators now. They are mostly content-based because there is a lot of money to be made on YouTube. Yeah.

And if you realize that and you just double down on that, then the rest will follow. But we didn't have anyone telling us that. No, that's for sure. Yeah, I don't... I guess it is very subjective-based. I wouldn't say there's, like, a certain amount that you should start. Even if you do have 30,000, you might have 30,000 really loyal followers. But I'm just saying, like, just...

Keep that in mind. Content is the number one thing. Yeah, absolutely. Like if you want to make a clothing brand, it's a different story. But yeah, if you want to sell your shirts because you want to have a cool YouTube channel, have a cool YouTube channel first. Yeah. It kind of brings us up to today now. What would you say like your roles nowadays? Yeah, I wear a lot of hats for sure.

I'd say just like my main roles though, like off the top of my head would be editor, which I don't love. I'm actually pretty good at it. Pretty good at it. Yeah, pretty good at it. But like I don't really love it. I don't find a passion in it, neither does CJ, but we're pretty good at it. It needs to get done. Yeah, it needs to get done. So I don't really have a problem with that. I taught myself how to edit. Let's see, what would have been four years ago? It was just like a slow process of just getting a little bit better every video. Yeah.

Let's see. I do the accounting work, so I pay most of the bills. Which is funny. I don't know why this is funny, but it's funny because you're the youngest. It's normal now, but before... I think you just came into... For some reason, it was like we needed to set up the QuickBooks, and you were the one who did it. I was just like, all right, I'll do it. And your mom showed you how to do it, so you just became the guy. Yeah, so I paid all the taxes, all the checks to pay all of our...

um, wages and everything like that. Yeah. So believe it or not, he's a smart guy. Believe it or not. Well, despite what you see, I don't know. That's my next question though. You know, well, hold on, hold on my roles. We'll get to, we'll get to how stupid I am after. Let's see what else. Come up with a lot of the video ideas. Um, do a lot of filming, do a lot of the talking. Obviously, um,

I can help you out. When merch drops come around, most of the photos, I used to work with Mike pretty closely on the merch, but kind of handed that off.

To Ryan and Ken, but they still work with Mike. I still do. I try and sit in and give you ideas. Yeah, for example, the Stay Stoked, that whole idea, that was your idea. Yeah, I drew that on Snapchat. I just sent it to you. I said, make this into a logo. I bring it to life. So everyone helps with that. Helps with that. It is interesting. Ben and I were right-hand men as far as creating the merch, and now...

It's relatively hands-off because you have so many other hats to wear. Yeah, a lot of other stuff. What else is on there? I guess it's hard to think. I think you named them all, honestly. Do you feel like as the youngest guy in the group, you have anything to prove to, like, other people or to us? Like, do you feel like growing up that way that you were like, I have to make a name for myself or I have to do more? No, honestly, not at all, dude. I feel like I wish I did less. Like, I wish Ken being the oldest in the group was like, I'm the oldest in the group. I should do more. Like...

Honestly, I don't know. I would like to think I don't have much of an ego when it comes to that of like I need to prove myself. I feel like you definitely do more than enough to prove yourself. And I don't think you have an ego. I was going to say I feel like you don't think you're any younger than anyone else. Everyone feels the same. Also, I don't necessarily look at myself as like the youngest. Especially now.

Yeah. Once I hit like 21, before that, oh man. Things were different. Life kind of sucked before 21 because all of my friends would just leave me and I would just be back. I do remember that. We'd just hit you with like the, sorry, homie. Sorry. Yeah. It's like all good. I'd probably do the same. So no, I don't feel like I have to prove myself being like by age. I definitely try and like work as hard as possible and like inspire others to

To work really hard to like bring others up. You know what I'm saying?

You're a positive energy versus a negative energy. Yeah, I'd say you're definitely a natural leader. Like when you're in the room, people know you're in the room. I don't think you're ever in the room and people don't know that you were in there. But I mean, that comes down to like not wasting time. You're like, hey, let's get something rolling here. Let's not lollygag. Yeah. Okay, to answer your question though with age, I feel like it's like a little weird being –

so much younger but still coming off as like I don't want to be like bossy but I also want to get shit done and it's tough when you're the youngest one because it does come off more as bossy. Mm-hmm.

You know? But it's like, no, we're like, put age aside. We're trying to accomplish the same thing. I'm going to just be harder on you. And that's why I don't think we think about you as, we're not like, damn, like, Ben should not be telling us, you know. We don't ever think that for a second. Okay, good. Because we're on the same page. We're trying to achieve the same goal. Good. It would suck if we did think that, yeah. We're just like, dude, this fucking kid. This kid! Dude!

I was going to ask you, you know, obviously you did. You were smart at one point. I was. I used to be. That was nice. At one point. But I mean, us as a group, we were talking the other day when you were out of the room. Yeah. You know, we feel like you're getting dumber every day. But the real this is going to really solidify it. Are you seeing what we're seeing? I mean, that depends. What are you seeing? Do you feel like you're getting dumber as time goes on?

You know, when you say that, it does kind of get under my skin because I don't feel like I'm getting dumber every day. That's exactly what someone that's getting dumber every day would say. They would be unaware of it. Who originally said this? CJ!

Oh, yeah, when you ran over. Well, I ran over a box in the driveway because I was driving a monster truck. I drove over a tiny little cardboard box. No, it was just a breaking point. Oh, okay. I feel you. But guess what we ended up doing with that box? Throwing it away. Well, yeah, because Ben drove over it. No, I crushed everything. Okay, be honest with me. Do you think I'm getting dumber? No, I wasn't even a part of it. Not every day, but most days, yeah. Do you actually? Yeah.

I think maybe you're just so in your head thinking that you're unaware of what's going on. Which wouldn't even count as getting summer. As to what, like...

Give me a example. We'll be having a conversation. Like maybe it's just, you don't listen, but it makes you seem really dumb. It doesn't mean I'm dumb. I'm just not listening. Here's the video schedule. We're doing this, this, and this, and this on this day. And then literally right after that, you go, Hey, so what are we doing for Thursday? I just said it's written on the board right there. I just might have blanked out and wasn't listening. Yeah.

That's the only reason I'm ever sarcastic. If we have a legitimate plan and something is happening at this time and we go, hey, something's happening at this time and then someone goes, hey, when's that happening? That's the only reason you're sarcastic? No, you're a sarcastic asshole. Fine. You know what? Maybe we're biased. Maybe we're just, you know, we are quick to snap.

But what if, you know, you and your girlfriend have been together a really long time. Jesus, are we doing this? How long have you guys been together? Almost six years. Six years. So she knows you. And she probably would see if you're having an incline, a decline, staying the same. In mental capacity. Yeah. I'm actually intrigued to hear what she has to say. I'm going to call her right now. All right, so this is our first phone call guest on our Life Wide Open podcast. So this is kind of a big moment here. Hey, Greta. Hi, how's it going? Pretty good. How are you?

Why are you calling me? Ben's in the hot seat? Yes, he is. He is, he is. So we're kind of at a... Well, it's a pretty important question we have for you, actually. What is it? You know, you and Ben have been together a really long time. And obviously, you know him very well. And we're just curious if you're seeing exactly what we're seeing, you know, just being with him every day. How do I say this nicely? Yeah.

Do you feel like he is getting dumber? He's so nice. Okay. Well, then never mind. It might be us. It might be us. Double down on it. Oh, my gosh. No. Absolutely not. Holy shit. All right. Well, there we go. There we go. All right. I'm sorry. That's probably not the answer. That was it. I'm sorry. Hopefully. Do you actually think he's getting dumber?

Listen, Greta, we don't want to change your opinion on Ben. You guys live happy together delusionally. It's all good.

Thanks, babe. At least you got one person. All right. Thanks, Greta. Didn't mean to scare you. All right. See you. That is funny. Dude, she could genuinely think you're getting dumber and still lie. That's true. Yeah, she's great. She really is. Not saying she did that, but. Shit, now you're making me question it. Okay, fast forward to you hanging out with her tonight or something, and you're like, babe, so were you telling the truth? Get a lie to test your tech.

Oh shit. Bringing the lie to tester. Yeah, no, I don't. I honestly, I don't think I'm getting dumber. I'm just probably getting worse at listening. Yeah. I think that's ultimately what it is. A lot of distractions, not even bad distractions, just a lot of distractions. Yeah, probably like, yeah, I mean, I am thinking a lot.

Yeah, that is what it is. I am constantly like in my own world. You're in your own world. Yeah. So I could see that, but I mean, it is kind of frustrating when you, I think there is some genuine honesty in your guys' statement of that I'm getting dumber. Like it comes off as kind of like a joke, but I think you do, you do believe that. If we could find a way just to bring you to school. Yeah.

One day a week. No, it's not dumb like smarts dumb. I get what you're saying, though. The only way I could ever clown on you for that is if, like, you know, it's like I'd have to figure myself out before I can call you dumb, you know? I think that's actually where the term dumb every day got coined. Was when Ben was driving the Mustang and ran into a box. No, I think it had to be around you. I hadn't heard it up until that day, so...

You guys just call me dumb. All right, that's enough on the dumb talk. Back to the smart talk. Yeah, last podcast you said that you were going to have a new goal. Oh, shit. Like a non-monetary goal. Yeah, material-based. Like company-wise? I'll make it easier on you. So I'm not going to ask you, like, what's your five-year plan because I literally think that's the stupidest question. We don't know where we're going to be tomorrow. Yeah. Like, let alone...

you must have a really stable life if you have a five-year plan. Looking out a year, what would you like to accomplish within that year? Your personal life or just even the business, I'd say. What are some goals that you would like to do or even just things you'd like to do? I'd say one of my favorite things that we're doing really good at is we're getting a more defined schedule.

In a year, I'm going to know what I'm going to be doing in two weeks or next week because I think the more we are planned out and scheduled out, the more successful we'll be. Mostly because it does force us to sit down

Think of video topics, schedule them out, you know, the bigger ideas. If we want to do a big idea, well, we need a month to prepare this or that and that. And I think with that will come, you know, just more success overall, more views, more subscribers, you know,

You know, when you said, like, what's a goal of yours? Like, a goal of mine is to just get to every video, hit a million views. I really, that's going to be, like, a big moment for, like, I've been waiting ever since a million subscribers. It's in, all right, now how do we get the views to every single video, hit a million views? Like, a cult following of a million people. That's huge. That's huge. That was, like, really hard to do.

better than hitting a million subscribers. I want to go to our YouTube page and just scroll one mil, one mil, one mil. Something like that. I think that's going to be really good. A little bit more of a defined schedule personally wise. I'd like to buy a house. I don't really want to buy a starter home. I want to buy a nice

Like a nice lake home, you know? So I'm going to just keep saving until I can do that. I mean, you're only 22. Exactly. Yep. Holy shit. I love that we are almost, we're continuing to just work smarter as to like delegating jobs to people that are, or we can just hire it out to.

you know, I, I eventually don't really want to edit, you know, I want to hire that out. Basically every waking moment, not working in the business, just working on it, like working like bigger scale and just growing it as a whole, instead of doing like the, like the small minute tasks that need to get done. So I like in a year out, ideally just like, just,

constantly thinking of big video ideas and just filming video ideas and just filming like banger videos. Like that, when I think of like what makes me

uh like most fulfilled and happiest it's when we finish a video and we sit down on the couch and we watch it and we all get up and we're like yeah damn we made something out of nothing yeah like we we created a 20 minute video a piece of content that the entire world can consume that will be on the internet forever yeah yeah and uh everyone loves it and we feel really good about it because

As being the large part of the video ideas guy and the filmer and the personality and then the editor, it's like taking literally nothing...

And then creating something so refined and funny and enjoyable and creative. That feels so good. That's probably what, you know, one of the top things that makes me happy. And like most fulfilled. I don't know. Like I'm just like addicted to that. I agree. I'm so addicted. I'm so addicted to that. And it's not even like the money aspect of it at all. It's just...

something that's good that people enjoy. And obviously, I just want to do more of that. But at the end of the day, yeah, it's just like as long as people are responding well, a lot of people are responding well. And I think back, I think back to, you know, our YouTube journey and like the, my state of mind when we were here, here, here. And I'm like,

And I'm like, I feel so dialed in right now where I'm so confident in the next year. If I can get to the only thing that I think about is just making good videos and just growing the content side of things. Like if that's all I'm focusing on, how successful we'll be. Hiring people is obviously like,

bettering ourselves but it's also growing you know it's like literally growing our team and it will also grow our mindsets honestly i love the podcast because it shows us such a different side of us that you would never see on on the normal videos and i think it creates so much more depth over the next year i want to get to a place where i'm so much more than just a youtuber i'm

Where I have so many different opinions on things that matter. And I can, like, make a difference. Like, what I say, people will stop and listen to. Because they're like, oh, he has, like, knowledge on it. And is, like, respectable. And I don't... Like, I want to just become more diverse. And more than just, like, a crazy entertainer like that. You know, I think Logan Paul has done such a good job of that. Like, he's, like, one of my idols when it comes to just, like, taking...

something that was like he was strictly just entertainment based to where now he's like an educator and people like respect what he says and that's what I love about like this podcast is like it gives us a platform to show people that we're more than just what you see and like I want to continue to just

Be better at that. Even though I'm getting dumber every day, you know, but like I want people to listen to what I say and have a reason for them to listen to what I say. And as they continue to listen, we get better at saying those things. 100%. Just like, yeah, just like refining things.

like the the parts of me that i see need work and then just like doubling down on it you know and i think everyone's doing a really good job at that like you guys are seeing it real time like we're we're constantly evolving and i feel like in the last six months to a year we've really just like turned on the turbo boosters of that and now it's just like

rockets blazing. We're going forward. And it's either like hop on board or get fucking run over. Yeah. That's the, that's the good news is I don't think anyone's skeptical now, but you know, you're watching your favorite YouTuber and you're always like, I hope they keep going. That's what, you know, that's most people's goal with us or with anyone. It's just like, I just hope they keep uploading. And that is absolutely our goal. If I were to quit,

see boys tomorrow. I don't foresee a world of not being some sort of, of an entertainer either. You know, like I don't think I could just go and work like a normal job or like a normal startup company. Granted, I'm like very entrepreneurial where I know that I could go and start my own business tomorrow.

and be successful and honestly probably make more money than we are right now. That's an interesting point. You know, being if there's just one thing and you just like create a business, right? There's so many things. We talk about it all the time. There's so many ways to make a lot of money right now. It's a cash grab right now. It's a cash grab for sure. And like I don't doubt in my mind for a second if I wanted to do that, I could. But...

Like, I just see so much potential in YouTube as a whole. Like, it's only getting bigger. And you only see more and more people wanting to become YouTubers. You know, it's like the best job ever. Why would you not? So, like, I don't foresee anywhere in my near future...

wanting to stop doing that granted it's a lot of work it sucks sometimes sometimes yeah no i shouldn't say it sucks i should say it's like it's stressful it's a lot of work and it's stressful but like at the end of the day what job isn't you gotta choose your hard yeah you gotta choose your hard you gotta choose your challenges and like there's so much potential in just what we're doing and i'm like so confident in us honestly i'm like so confident that we're gonna be

some of the most successful people that we know. Yeah. Damn. I don't think any of us can articulate anything better than that. That was incredible. That was awesome. Thanks. That was awesome. What a great hot seat. That was fun. Thanks, Ben. That was amazing. Well, thanks for having me.

We got a meeting in 15 minutes speaking of expanding the crew. So as far as workers go. Shit, boys. Thanks for letting me chat about myself for a while. Absolutely. Love you, bro. Love you, too, boys.

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