Episode Transcription

00:00 Hey man, hey, what's up? I feel like you're the way your face is right now. You're planning something you have a play. It's so funny that you mentioned my face. but I needed to tell you this. I got I'm happy to be here. My face may not show up because I did get Botox yesterday for real. Are you lying to me? I'm not. I feel it. What do you think Botox is? No, not there on my forehead. So here's what happened. It does feel a little tight, so here's what I your eyebrows. 00:30 Are you serious? Yeah, is that for real? Yeah, I do a hard. Okay, yeah, I know I was trying to, but I feel like you're lying to me. I did give because my parents pressured me into it. Here's what happened. You got paired pressured. Here's what happened is that my parents, I think my parents are really concerned about my four headlines. Yeah, and I don't care, but they're like they, they really care. And so they did the thing where is the kind of like what they did to me when I was in middle school in fat. 01:00 was they don't want to address the problem. They wanted us offer a solution and hope that you can and hope that you figure out that it's like what mom took me to curves with her and she was like, she was like, you'll love this love because and so and so she was trying to get me to do yeah, you know, and so yeah, I did get Botox and it was, know, and you're like, oh, you like go to a place and yeah, I went to a place, this lady's house and her living room. She just 01:28 you know she just fully just it. It's not it is sketchy to me how big that market has become because now there are yeah people like that that are just like on the side doing botox. Yeah, like I don't feel like that should be league. It's like a couple hundred bucks. I mean it's legal. She's she got a certify. It's kind of like cutting hair like you can like my barber could cut. Can he cut hair? No, you're injecting. Are you allowed to you? That's different than cutting hair. Yeah, but it's like you got a you can't just cut hair and not know. I mean you can 01:58 Yeah, you know yeah, but like I feel like I feel like in here. What I do know different. Here's what I do know is that eight out of ten people who do botox injections at someone's house would not get a vaccine and that's crazy, but yeah, I was just in her living room. There's pictures of her family and are like six kids or whatever. They all talks and you know they all of our kids are like I I'm surprised 02:26 I'm surprised your parents are worried about the lines in your forehead. I my lines are kind of deep for time or worse. Now I don't think yours are worse than mine are way worse. You think so this whole hey, what if this whole comment below whose forehead looks worse and keep in mind that I have had worked on what if this whole thing is not that I graduated curves in his whole thing? 02:52 is it's the same thing where your parents wanted to address a problem, but they didn't want to address the problem. That's what I'm saying. So they are. The issue is not your four headlines. It's mine and so like if you book, they're like if we get all connected, I was like maybe I need Botox to all watch the hook, hooked on Botox and I'll be like, look how firm his forehead looks. He's got some for it. I was really trying to, but my eye, there is a problem. My eyebrows are too express like the video that I posted about what I was like. Oh, we didn't recognize my neighbor. 03:21 yeah. So many of the comments are like all I can see is how much this guy's eyebrows move. That's good. You're talking with your eyes. Yeah, sorry, I'm expressive. So now I'm really focused on not moving them. No move them. Don't listen to that advice. Move them and honestly, honestly, a crinkly forehead. It's like like if you're talking about wrinkles, no, you're on your face wrinkles on your eyes under the eyes. That sucks, but wrinkles on the forehead like when you're an older guy with like 03:48 with like gray hair, because the for yeah, where's this top right here, wrinkles on the forehead and a hairy arm talking about what makes a guy attractive to yeah. No, but I'm saying like that's a good guys too hot to be a forhead are distinguished man wrinkly eyes look like a forehead or the wrinkles in the forehead. Yeah crazy. It's supposed to take a couple weeks to like actually set in to like where it'll be like where I can't raise my eyebrows. Are you about to become like a botox addict? No, 04:18 and I literally did this yesterday and she was going through all the side effects that could happen. I've done it six times, I was like, oh, because there was a possibility that could like droop my eye, I'm yeah, was droopy. I yeah there was there's possible and possible side effects, but I had to let you know. I had to tell you I had to get it out of the way. Yeah, be like hey something's been eaten at me. Yeah, this is chemical in my forehand and I'm you know. 04:47 I'm going to get a facelift after this yeah and I'm going to get. I'm going to look freaking weird on purpose. I want to look like you know those celebrities that like that wet gecko he's got his head plastic surgery for sure. It's so crazy like I am optimal health, but it's also like yeah dude you've had your face faked it. You think that 05:15 I'm laughing about my boat talks. It doesn't look like I'm laughing, but my boat is nice holding it in and she's like smoking a cigar and bring a whiskey like she just freaking looks like it. She does it in a villain and she's just like actually yes, I can. 05:36 Things I learned last night. 05:45 anyway. Anyways, have you ever heard of Mackenzie Childs? A Mackenzie Childs. Okay, you're opening a picture that looks like Laura Ingraham Wilder in the Portland edition. This is very like I, if I can describe this picture to our listeners raggedy and what's that raggedy in? Is that what I'm thinking of? What's the, is that the doll? Yeah, raggedy and she does look 06:11 exactly like old raggedy and she hasn't had enough botox. Yeah, she's got more botox. She looks like she looks like a pretty chill lady. She this photo, this specific photo looks like if um in in two thousand thirteen a graduation announcement photo is what this photo looks like in the Midwest. Yeah, and she's graduating in two thousand thirteen. Yeah, she's graduating in nineteen thirteen, so her name and her 06:40 her name is Victoria Childs. Okay, this is her and she does look super chill. I'm not trying to make fun of her, but she is dressed like Raggedy and she's got like she's you know, she's an older woman with gray hair, but it's like she's got a lot of colors up there. Yeah, and so she does look like a stereotypical like you know barista. Yeah, yeah, she does. Yes, give off that vibe and she's just older and that's her name is Victoria Childs. She's hyphenated it to Mackenzie Childs Victoria Mackenzie Childs this because this is her husband Richard 07:10 Mackenzie. Oh, I've heard I know I recognize this couple. I know where we're going. They live on a boat. Yeah, now yeah, there's a lot of story between them now and they're super cool as well as I don't want to make fun of her. Yeah, they are very cool. She they're super chill. You got to see this. He's wearing a kilt and like they're in New York. Yeah, why you were to kill that great and he's got a the craziest purse hanging from his killed. I love it. I don't I guess it's a coin purse, but it's crazy. I can't 07:39 describe it. I've seen them. Yes, I was. I can't wait for their story. Great. So Victoria and I always want to call him Robert Richard Richard Childs, Victorian Richard, okay, Victoria and Richard McKenzie Childs. We'll start with Victoria. Victoria's kind of the main actor in the story. She grew up in in California. She was born in California shortly after 08:05 her and her family moved to Indiana okay, and she got involved with four H. You know what four H is yeah, so if you can you describe it for people who don't know because I isn't it like a it's like a farmer co op type thing for like for young kids. It's like it's like what F not FAA FFA future farmers of America. Four H Club would be like it was. It was an organization that you could join if you were like a farm kid. Yeah, I don't know much about it. It's got the clover 08:32 I know it yeah, it's got the clover. The four H is our head, heart, hands and health. Yeah, it's kind of boy scouts adjacent, but for like farmers okay, and so they do you try to tie knots but around cows legs kind of yeah, it's just like yeah. How do you how do you live a life in an agricultural society and so yeah you're doing out towards the stuff you're also doing in the home stuff baking and cooking and things like that like it's for the women so and uh 09:00 and she became like a competition person. It's it's hands heart. What is it? Let me pull back up hands, hands, heart, heart, health, health, homestead. that's what it is. A head head is the other one head, heart, hands, health, okay, homestead is the fifth one, the five. It's the four H community, 09:28 and for the four H community, we have to remember the five Hs. Yes, and they actually recently updated it out of six H its head, heart, hands, health, homestead and hell because you got to put some fear in those kids. I'm laughing about my botox. It doesn't look like I'm laughing, but my boat is nice holding it in. 09:53 Oh yeah, my boat dogs won't let me laugh at that. I boat. Yeah, I ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha 10:11 pretty good. Okay, that's the first I see. I see someone typing right now. It's not that funny. It's not that funny, so she she in the four is community. She became like a competition person in the four is community. She won a blue ribbon for ceramics and that's where she like learned this. Yeah, I know everything that they do in the four age. Okay, yeah, they do all sorts of just different things and so she 10:36 She got kind of obsessed with ceramics at that point. I went to Indiana University where she got a bachelor of fine arts and then she was the Hoosiers. Yes. And then she went on to, uh she took graduate courses at a couple of schools, Harvard, Radcliffe. And then eventually she went to the New York state college of ceramics at Alfred university. And Alfred, guess, is like a very esteemed ceramics school. Yeah. Some of them, but most like, you know, I love about anything. Yeah. 11:05 is that there is a prestige version of that somewhere. There is someone whose whole identity is that I know everything about ceramics and everyone in the super current ceramics community wants my approval and there's someone who like gets real power from that. You know there's somebody who like who is devil wears Prada e around in ceramics in ceramics. Yeah, it is interesting like it's just like breaking people stuff like get that out of here. 11:34 like like oh you made another ash tray. What's that? What's that cooking guy that had the show? The Hell's Kitchen show? What's his name? What's the guy who had the Hell's Kitchen show? The cook, the cooking show. I don't you know, I'm talking about no, you know exactly what I'm talking about. James Corden, no James Corden. Don't look up. Oh no, it's not Mason Ramsey, Mason Ramsey. 12:03 that's very close. Who's Mason Ramsey's the God, the the yodeling in Walmart? No, don't do this for me is Gordon Ramsey a a ceramics. The joke's dead now because you know yeah like ceramic show work, but it's quarter Ramsey style host yeah breaking everybody ceramics. That's really funny. Thanks. I can see your laughter. 12:35 I can't express. I can't express. So stupid. So she got a Master of Fine Arts at Alfred. And while she was at Alfred, she worked under a highly esteemed artist named Wayne Higbee, who taught him in this. That's what I'm saying. Freaking Wayne Higbee. Wayne Higbee is my name. And I'll tell you what, I didn't come all the way here to America to look at another ashtray. 13:03 All right. I came here to find art. Yes, exactly. That's exactly how he is. uh And he taught her this like Renaissance era technique called. Yeah. Magiolica. just know stuff from a hundreds of years ago. Yeah, you should. Here you go. Yeah. And it's this method that is very like intricate. You cannot mass produce this. This is something that's always handcrafted. Like it's a very. 13:31 uh labor intensive method of making pottery. Okay, and so she fell in love with this method. She loved the way like things came out here. She meets Richard who would become her husband and Richard and they're like college age this time during graduate school. So like early twenties, okay mid twenties and he uh on the kind of opposite end of the pottery spectrum. He wasn't really interested in making the pottery. He was really into like looking finishes. 14:01 I got a degree in looking at pottery. I got a PhD in pottery looking. Pottery peeping. Pottery peeping. What do do for a living? I peep at pottery. at pottery. 14:19 Let me take a peek. No, I don't like that. I'm not gonna say it. But he was like the Finnish guy. So like he was really good at like sealing it and like painting it and like all that. Like he was really meticulous about the finishes on it. She was really meticulous about crafting it. The making of it. Making of the pottery itself. Yeah. And so they were a really good match because they kind of like compliment each other skills. And yeah. Yeah. And so uh they end up, they graduate. 14:48 they get married. They move to Aurora, New York, which is a lake town in upstate New York. Okay, and while they're working there, they have a daughter and they're just kind of they're living there. They're working, making pottery, just kind of being like local artists, you know, uh selling their stuff at like vintage fairs and like different, like two people in town, kind of stereotypical struggling artist lifestyle. Sure, ah and then their daughter, this is what years this would be early eighties, late seventies. 15:17 Yeah, they and they were struggling with their four bedroom house. You know, peeping pots, you know, it is a door to door. Oh yeah, that's back in the eighties when I was peeping pots. Okay, I know ma'am. My name is Richard Mackenzie child. Is he reading that off a note card? Why'd you look that my name? Hey, my name is 15:43 I'm just one of kids. He just and I just was wondering if you're satisfied with your with your pots. I also wondering if I could just take a peep. I was wondering if you got any pottery I could look at. Yeah, it'll be seventy dollars. I'll look at all your potter. Yeah, I this guy's seventy dollars come looking at my pottery the other day. Oh yeah, he didn't do anything. You don't. I'll send you an invoice. Thank you. 16:09 freaking weird professional five stars on Google. I mean just to have his eyes on it. You know just to really on Facebook market place. Yeah, this rich people would pay for that rich people would pay for that. By the way they would they be like oh yeah, I paid an artist to come look at this in my house and you're like you okay. I like the phrase this piece was peeped by Richard McKenzie child. It's like certified got a stamp 16:37 ruins the art right on Mona Lisa's forehead. They're freaking really big ball. There's this piece was peaked. This piece was peeped by the line so he can sign. You know 16:52 yes and he is all frick mckinsey child. I forgot we hyphenated. You like put the little little lines of the she won't take my name because she's woke and then he walks out angry. I like that all of all of your jokes come to homestead. You made that joke earlier where you were like oh, it's head, hands, health and uh all your jokes are a little massage and is and I'll tell you what 17:21 I don't like the way you were like you made that joke earlier. You made that joke earlier. 17:30 I don't like it and then you're like oh she's too woke because you won't take his last name. You know women can do whatever they want him. Okay, so take a peek at that they were people feminism over feminism over here. Feminism. They were obviously not making a lot of money from their her their line of work and so their dot, but their daughter was really interested in ballet and one get into ballet and they couldn't afford it. 17:58 and so they said well, what can we do? L. A. Is rather expensive though yeah, you can do that at home yeah. What wait what do it at home? They like go to home you do it yeah, I'm a self I self taught on YouTube. Claude taught me how to ballet 18:22 Everything must go till it's going out of business and so our patron is now six ninety nine. People will freak out. They don't know we're joking till it is not going out of business. That was a joke, but we are reducing the price of patriot to six ninety nine for all tears you get. 18:35 every part you get access to discord, you get access to every episode of the ad for you. I bet that much it seems like gosh it is high. I know but when you talk like that it seems like we're really sell. I'm I was trying to do a word selling bit. You know it was like I don't say I'm a sleazy sales. I want to make it that I straight up think that we've been doing that bit too long that people are like it's a little. 18:58 This is the first time I've ever done the bit before I was a sleazy. we did the whole hey, Tuesday, Tuesday, We did those bits. Just leave it all in. Do this whole thing. Join us on Patreon. 19:14 So they were like, what can we do to fund this ballet dream for our daughter? And they decided to start a pottery business and so they found and they hadn't been doing that before. Well, they were kind of doing like on the side, like just selling stuff, being craft fairs kind of stuff. They were, they were being artists. This is like we're going to craft pottery and sell it, it as a business. Okay, business. Here you go. Sure. And so they'd rented a studio beneath a bar in Aurora eh and downtown Aurora. 19:42 and they started selling this pottery and what they did is they kind of images of their pottery at the time yeah. So what were they making? This is a little bit later of an image, but they would make pottery in this style ah and this became really famous. This is super fun. Yeah. This is known as the courtly check that they basically created which for audio listener. It's like a matching plate and a wine glass and you know 20:11 cutlery. Those are nuts, a knife right, salt and pepper shakers, a matching tea kettle and you know the whole set Matt candlesticks. The whole set is in this checkered pattern. Yes, like with a water on it and yeah, it's very whimsical. You got like butterflies that are like yeah not paint it on. They're like actual like on there like porcelain butterflies or something yeah and then real butterflies and then if you look at the checkered though, it's not like perfect like it's like yeah. You can tell it's hand painted. It's not straight. It's not 20:41 right in line. Some of the squares are smaller than others like it's just it's a very I whimsical is the word that they use. think it's a perfect yeah description of it very my white, my wife style. My wife style is this yeah. If we saw this somewhere, it this is one of those things where you either find this at Ross for twelve dollars or seventeen thousand dollars for real for real. You know while this very quickly blew up 21:10 um They started getting to the point where they could not keep up production in Aurora. And very quickly, down in Manhattan, it became like a trendy thing. People were like going up to Aurora to get this courtly check stuff. And so it became like a high-end status symbol item, and they could not keep up with demand. And so they began trying to scale the operation and getting larger facilities, larger facilities, larger facilities, until eventually they took out a loan. 21:39 to basically purchase a new home and manufacturing plan. Okay, and I've got pictures late in the process, but this was essentially a giant ranch outside of uh Aurora and they moved into the house here and this is post renovation. So this house looks beautiful right now, but it was completely dilapidated when they bought it. Oh wow. And they like restore. look very beautiful. And then on the property was this massive barn that they put and they turned into 22:07 the main you could get this from making pots in the eighties. You know I'm saying and then they had their own little shop inside of it. So this is like a full thing. This is like a little like this is like a little town. Yeah, they've got their yeah little studio shop. They became the precious moments of Aurora kind of okay and they they just exploded. They had shops 22:33 on the most prestigious streets, Fifth Avenue, New York, a day, drive, like a Angela's yeah sure they were the place and the best way I could describe their stores is over stimulating because this is just the way they laid them out. uh Here's another shot of one of their stores is a checkered pattern like their thing. Yeah, that this is what they're most known for is this this checkered pattern. Yeah, it's called the quiet check. Okay, what they're most known for, but they cause like there's a lot of stuff yeah 23:03 these chairs they designed. Is that part of they do furniture they do? Okay, they do they they jewelry. They got into everything as the business yeah, but scaling was because they kind of became like you know luxury 23:21 I don't want to say like Ikea, but like a luxury, know one imports yeah like it's like a bunch of home goods yeah yeah yeah yeah they wouldn't that they would make. I don't know what the luxury home good stores are yeah. I don't know what is where I win is the high they're out of business. That's highest I hear they didn't make it. They didn't make it way fair kill them yeah public and so they were very on 23:50 the maximalistic static like every day again. My wife, my wife's style, a lot like everything, you know. Yes. Yeah. They partnered with Neiman Marcus with Harrods in London, like all these big name, uh, here, that one, the one you're thinking of. Yeah. Um, and then at their height, uh, they employed 250 people that Duns, 24:17 dozens of artists inside that studio that were crafting these things at any time. uh But the problem was for them to reach the scale, the demand got so high and the way retail always works is you don't get paid until you fulfill your retail order. And so you have to find a way to fund that manufacturing. And as you're scaling, like that's difficult. And because they worked in this uh specific process, the Maggelica technique, everything was handcrafted. They needed artists to craft everything. It was a slow process. And so they had to 24:47 you be back ordered for like months exactly yeah, so they had to hire these highly skilled artists to write all these things very expensive and it got very expensive, very fast and so they had to take on debt and I think the thing that's interesting about this is I don't think that they intended this to get as big as it got like it. They just were just kind of riding the rave the wave because they were like oh, this is working. Let's just keep going for it and it was working so well banks were like look at the upward growth will give you money. It's a long story short. Yeah, yeah, 25:16 by the mid 90s, they had $21.4 million worth of debt uh from these expansion operations to grow this business. uh And they were doing well. They were able to keep that up. They were able to cover all of their expenses. They were able to pay everybody. Everything was going really, really good until in 95, there was this whole big farm was obviously like an old dilapidated farm that they were renovating as they went. 25:44 Right. And one portion of this farm that they hadn't got to to begin renovating yet, there was some exposed wire and it was old, like 30s wiring. Oh, no. And a rat chewed it, caused a short, which led to a fire, which damaged the entire production wing of this facility. And when the firefighters came through, they caused even more damage spraying these hoses, hitting this pottery, stepping on pottery. 26:10 their goal. They're to put the fire out. Yeah. Get the fire out. and also damage. by our hate art. Oh, they hate art. 26:23 all right. All right boys, here's our job. We're going to put out that fire. We're going to save the dogs and we're going to kill the art and then freaking kick through the paintings. You didn't got to do that. How did that help? How did that help with the fire? It didn't it did it lit a fire. 26:42 got to keep that fire going somehow. I got to keep that fire going somehow and if a lame looking paint and if die, if destroying someone else's hard work helps me get there, so be it okay, and here's the thing about Victor. Every day I gotta wake up and just smash a little thing of pottery. I'm just gonna. I have a subscription to cool, unique paintings dot com 27:09 and every day they said to a new cool unique painting in the mail for me to just crash which and okay. So hold on, hold on, on, hold on, so every day he gets he gets a cool unique painting, cool unique paties, I calm it's a one of one and then he smashes his head through it or like destroys it, but but he films himself doing right and he posts that on tick tock 27:37 thus creating a second layer of art. It's all ecosystem and so now he's got this internal conflict because he hates the art he's destroying, but he kind of likes the art. It kind of making is making and all the other firefighters are like that guy's got something. I want to be like him. Oh no, I should have him on my podcast. They all they hate 28:05 they hate him because they are. That's art. They're trying to kill them and so they are like out right. I can't sleep in the in the fire house. You know sleep with one eye open. He's like that guy makes art that guy makes art. Hey, what fire station happy for your first day. Watch out for that guy. He makes a heart. I'm an art kind guy a R T G U 28:38 I was just going to leave it on result a R T. I like G U I though all right. So anyway, fire fighters come through they are at crack the place. Yeah, here's the thing about Victoria. They put in the whole claim. They have insurance. They put in the whole claim insurance is going to repair everything, but Victoria refuses to claim all the damaged inventory because she's like it's still usable. We can restore this and make new pieces from all the damaged inventory and 29:05 and so she starts taking all that pottery to create new pottery because that's kind of her mindset. She's like I'm a reduce reuse recycle kind of person, so I'm a reduce reuse recycle. They're just going to throw that in a landfill. They're going to give me a check. I don't want that. I want to make this into something new, but they could have insurance that out yeah and this ended up being you need. You need a greed goblin on your side. Yeah, he's somebody to be like hey. We can say we threw it away yeah, you know 29:34 And so this put them behind just enough where they didn't have the inventory to meet the demand that they had. They couldn't meet their orders because she was in production. Then they couldn't make payroll. Then they couldn't make their bills. Then they couldn't pay the loans. And then the banks were like, well, we're going to invoke our rights as the loan holder. Right. So the bank stepped in and they installed an interim president. And let me get the name of this guy. The guy's name doesn't matter. He's some Wall Street interim president. guy. Yeah. And he says, OK, we're going to a man. 30:07 He says we're to get this an evil tie wearing man. This guy comes with his ties and his watch and his little Wall Street attitude and he comes in and he goes, listen here, you purple hair loser. All right, I would not be surprised. You the bank a lot of money and the rats, they, they, they set you up for failure. 30:35 all right, and my buddies down to the fire house said that they did their best to destroy this stuff. Okay, here's what we're gonna do. They did their best to this stuff is crazy. We tried our hardest. She really wants to use it. He really wants to keep it. This is him. uh It's a oh, you know what? Donald roll on a guy that seems like he he would come across as nice, but then he's like he looks like this, like this smile and stuff as he's like firing you yeah or he's just like yeah. 31:05 You got to go. He seems super nice, but he's really a shark. Yeah, his name is McDonald Rome Junior. oh He comes in. We hate juniors and he starts fixing the books. I should say fix the books. That sounds like well, he's not cooking. He's not cooking up. Yeah, he's like yeah, he's he's figuring out the accounting, realizing the problem that they're in. Yeah, so we try. There's a serve. We should. We should start a service called cooked books dot com. 31:35 It is just, I mean, 31:40 it's just a trap for people who think will cook their book. It's a sting operation sting yeah yeah and the website says this is a sting. Well, you got to legally disclose it yeah legally. This is a sting, but it's got a picture of sting yeah, so it's like so people are like it's a joke. They think that that's funny. They're funny guys. All my comedy shows by the way are sting operations crowd work portion. I just figure out what cry you're in. Where are you guilty of 32:10 Hey, what's been eating at your car? Hey, what's your name? Yeah. What do do for work? That's boring. So are you any crimes? Got any warrants out for your arrest? Actually, you do. I know for a fact to do because I'm a cop. There's a girl you knew a couple of years ago and she hasn't been seen for a while care to tell me a little bit. You know anything about her whereabouts? I do get told a lot that I have pretty cop energy, but oh 32:39 to to do crowd work and just just pick a random person and say yeah, there's a girl you used to know that hasn't been seen in a while. Just trap up and see how they respond to that. Oh, was a girl you knew that you didn't see in a while. Oh, there's a lot of girls. I know that I haven't seen a while. No, that no one's seen in a while. 33:01 what happened? There's a few of those. What happened to him? All right, so oh, he's deflecting. See, he doesn't like when the bits pointed at him. Don't want. wants me to make the point. The better he does sacrifice strangers, not me. All right, I'm not good under pressure. Hey, don't don't point a bit at anybody. I'm going to pull the trigger. So so he comes in and he's like he yeah, he's cleaning house. The situation's a little worse than I thought. 33:29 Yeah, so he starts shopping different business tycoons in Manhattan area to buy the business. He's like he's like we need an influx of cash. That's the only way we're gonna yeah we're gonna survive. We need you guys to solve significant portions of the company and so uh he's while shopping this around he talks to a woman by the name of let me get her name right. Pleasant Roland. This is her yeah she looks like Joe Bennett from the office. 33:59 Yeah, I can see that I can see that I thought Ursula, but that's a low also or it's meaner than what I said for sure, honestly kind of spot on skin and all she she's the founder of the American girl doll. Oh, there you go, and so he talked to her. She did that haircut her whole life. Yeah, she committed to that and 34:28 so she found out that the company was up for sale, learned a little bit about the situation that it was in and she decided I'm going to side step this, the whole purchase, the business thing. She's like, I know McDonald brought me the opportunity. I'm going to sidestep him. I'm going to go straight to the bank and I'm going to offer to buy the debt and so she bought the debt for half the value of the debt. I think it was about fifteen million. She paid for the debt and she immediately called the loan and so the which is 35:02 shocks man. That's a Joe Bennett move yeah, so she immediately calls alone and so they had no choice. They have to play her bankruptcy because they can't pay the loan back and so they declare bankruptcy. They have to war in all their assets who pull her back up. You pulled the young one. Oh shark crazy 35:27 crazy. I mean you can see it in this one though. Oh yeah, this one you're like yeah, this one has evidence of shark. She did that yeah. She's like she's like yeah. Oh yeah, we're gonna you're gonna buy it and be saddled with thirty million dollars of debt. I'll just buy the whole thing for fifteen. How about that yeah and so she wolf she calls alone and they have to liquidate. They declared chapter eleven. They're liquidating the assets. She goes to sale. She buys everything for five million, so now she's bought the company to twenty million yeah. 35:55 Yeah, yeah and so well, there's just inventory. I guess, but you know well, it's not just the inventory because it's the rights to everything about the company. I guess that's yeah and so in so they actually end up she uh she owns all the inventory, all the assets that the manufacturing facility, which is also their home. Yeah and that was a mistake and they she got to keep that separate and I was a mistake yeah a hundred percent. The other thing 36:25 she owns the brand, which is Mackenzie Childs, which is their name. And so they end up in this big legal battle because it's like you can't take our name from us. And she's like, I actually can't because it's your trademark. You trademark Mackenzie Childs and she's like smoking a cigar and drinking whiskey. Like she just freaking looks like she does a villain and she's just like, actually, yes, I can. She does look like that. Yeah, you see 36:53 She talks like, you see is what you did wrong. Yeah. Is it you thought you were going come in? What? Just cause I, cause I sell dolls. You thought I was going to be a doll? No, no, no, no, no. I sell dolls. All right. 37:10 So sees here's what his was gonna happen. I bought your name. I own you. She probably did say I own you, I'm sure which is sick. 37:25 Oh boy, am I sick? I sure do need Tim stones. Get well quick trick. And what is it? It's simply chug an entire gallon of orange juice. Wow. I forgot. And then this shirt reminded me, I'm so glad that I have this shirt as a public service announcement, a public health service to other people around me. Do your part. Get this shirt. 37:54 shop.tilland.com 38:01 And so she pressures them. You're welcome for my time. She says, Hey, I'll all I'll allow you guys. If you um sign an NDA and a non compete agreement, I'll let you just walk from here. We can just call it water under the bridge. You can go, but you can never make pottery again. And Victoria's like, we're never going do that. And she's like, she's like, well, what if, if we do the NDA and we do the non compete? And she's like, and I pay you $10 million and you just walk in this problem's gone. You never have to 38:31 about it again, you got $10 million, you can live the rest of life off that. And Victoria says, no, I want to make pottery. And she's like, okay, well, then I'm going to sue you for all your worth for the rest of the assets because you actually cosigned the loan for the business. And so I'm go try to get the rest of the debt that I'm owed that you couldn't pay, you only paid 5 million for the debt. Even though I was the one who bought the debt. And so she sued them personally. So then they personally had to declare bankruptcy. 39:01 and so they quite literally they went from having a seventy million dollar business right with lots of assets as a part of that to literally having nothing because she took the business from them and took all because of assets. What's her name? ah Pleasant Roland is her name. Her name is pleasant name is pleasant. That's how you know dude. 39:26 is that she came out of the womb and the mom was like. Maybe if we name her pleasant at all, that'll change, that'll change because she came out of the like the cigar, the glass, she was like hey, who's paying for this? Anybody got some dad I could buy? Oh, I was born of this guy. My dad's a loser couldn't be me. Geez man, well also she might be nice. 39:56 I doubt and behavior. Hey, it's not nice lady. Whatever your name is Roland pleasant Miss Roland. I assume let's find out. Is there a Mr Roland just on a leash next to her with that? You know he's just over there like she did marry a Jerome Frattushe in nineteen seventy seven who died in twenty twenty six. They never got divorced. Oh yeah. Oh shoot. I'm sorry for your loss ma'am. Yeah, 40:25 hey, if you'd like to cash and flux this podcast were over leveraged and we'll sign an in the a I'll sign anything you want. I won't compete. I'll stamp all your art and sign it. I promise you we won't start an American boy doll. We're not going to do that. Hold on, don't don't don't commit to that. Don't come into that start making point. Pretty cool. 40:54 American boy. I wish that we were in the of two thousand four commercial still. They were just American boy, no, no, no, no, no, anyway. So while they were in their personal bankruptcy case, while they were still in this lawsuit over the name, Mackenzie Childs, they were having to commute to Manhattan to do these courts. How far is that? It's a few hours because they were upstate New York, so it's I don't know exactly how long, but it's a few hours early and 41:24 they have lost their home and so they basically decided it makes more sense for us to try to find a place in Manhattan, but they are your poor, they're poor now, so the brokest of brokes yeah, so they're they're having a hard time finding a place that they could actually buy in Manhattan. Okay, but luckily and all of this was just because they wanted to do pottery. Here's the thing. If my wife, my wife's hobby takes off, we're making seventy million dollars and then you know something like that happens and then they're like okay, hey ten million dollars, but you can't 41:51 and it's not even like you can't make it. They're just like hey, you can't professionally sell it yeah, and she was like no yeah. I be like hey, we're going to take the ten million dollars. We're just not going to sell your pot or any more. Don't listen to her. We're going to make the ten million dollars a hundred percent. We're taking that deal. No deal, a deal deal actually. I'm sorry for that is I could not be more confident. She failed for each so 42:20 she's an art major like let's we can't are don't. I'm not trying to be and my wife knows this. I would shut that down so fast. I'd be like no yeah, not yeah. They are principal to the point that it's detrimental to the life yeah yeah so and I'm not to be clear to be clear. I'm not a principal this 42:48 like my talks tell you I'll take whatever I grab my eyebrows. It does look like we're both about to do something really racist, but it was my high brow, but it looks like we're about perfect for the thumbnail. We're about to be really problematic. No, but I mean like yeah, that's what I mean is like they offered you ten million dollars, but but that also does say that also does communicate from 43:18 unpleasant. Yeah, the you making pottery is a threat to me. Yeah, yeah, you know, I mean, I guess maybe that's like the yeah, she's threatened by us. Yeah, yeah, I don't know. Yeah, I don't know. I still take the ten million, but they moved. They moved to Manhattan and they're still in the core bow. So they haven't lost everything just yet sure, but they were like, well, we'll move to the one place we can and they bought the last remaining Ellis Island ferry for three hundred fifty thousand dollars is the Yankee 43:47 they bought it for how much Yankee Ferry three hundred fifty thousand. This is twenty twenty or two thousand three. How did it? So I guess I don't understand bankruptcy because my version of bankruptcy is I don't have three hundred fifty thousand dollars to buy a boat. You know what I mean? I don't understand bankruptcy a lot. I don't think I get bankruptcy because I do know bankruptcy. If that's the definition of bankrupt, I've got some problems. 44:14 I do know with bankruptcy, it does depend on how you set your finances up because if you set your finances up, well, there's parts of your finances that it can't touch. Right. And so like, I don't know how they were set up. I'm assuming they had some sort of share of wealth somewhere where they were able to afford to buy this. Okay. And I know that they live on this thing because they are, they obviously bought this. That's the only thing I know about them. They, moved in and they renovated this. This thing was just like the farm dilapidated when they got it. Yeah. And they turned it into their home. 44:44 Yeah and they like live here yeah, and it feels very much like their stores. This is oh wait. That is the star, ah but it is over. It is sick. It is very maximal. I love it. It's like their same style. They've got their it's so crazy and this is and for the just so the we're all clear. This is poor right. This is poor. Yeah, you're right. This is what poor looks like. 45:14 Yeah, and you'll see you can actually kind of see in this picture. They built this elaborate system of pulleys. You can kind of see this this rope going across the ceiling. Is that for the TV remote? No, they built it because some of their furniture wasn't heavy enough, so whenever the freighters would pass by it in the harbor in the New York Harbor, it would rock the boat so much that their their tables would tell and their pottery would fall out their tables. So they built this elaborate system of pulleys all throughout the house. 45:43 that whenever they tilt it keeps their surfaces flat. So that way the pottery wouldn't fall and this is this is for remember. This is what this is magical. I mean my wife and I would live in this tomorrow. This is great yeah and so and they and again she same thing she did when the there was the fire when Hurricane Sandy came through Hurricane Sandy obviously did a lot of damage and 46:09 she leaned over to the edge of the starboard bow and was just grabbing trash out of the out of the river and making furniture out of it. So a bunch of our furniture is just damage from the hurricane. We got that from we got that from river trash. The sea that was river trash. That was river trash. That was river trash. That was my and river trash was my high school band. 46:38 sell for river trash. Well, I'm from Mount Vernon. It be like Creek trash or Creek trash Creek. Hey, what's up? We're Creek trash. All right. One, two, three, four. I was seeing of your love for 47:06 their smash hits covers of for some songs. How great is our God Greek trash, but they honestly put it on a band T. That's sick. Last year they did an interview on board the boat. This is yeah, my favorite. about them. Yeah and they lived on the boat for twenty five years. Yeah, they also while they were living on this boat 47:32 They realized, hey, we didn't sign the non-compete. We also, we lost the name Mackenzie Childs, but we still have our first names. And so they opened up a new shop called V &R and Prize, which stands for Victoria and Robert. Yeah. Or Richard. And they started selling pottery and earrings and furniture, all this stuff again. It's now nowhere near as big and successful as Mackenzie Child. They have the brand loyalty. But for them, it doesn't really need to be like they just. Mackenzie Child is still a thing. 48:01 Mackenzie child is still a thing. She's still running the company. They've changed. They have corporatized it. They have uh it's mass assembly lined it as produced. Yeah, it's not handcrafted crafted, but it's still priced as if it were yeah. Like it's still upscale. Yeah, look at her freaking pleasant. Yeah, you think she's gonna be like hey sure it's made by smaller hands now. Wasn't what do you mean by that? 48:27 it's made by dolls, the dolls, the dolls make the pottery, the dolls make the pottery. Why do you think I invented the dolls? I wasn't going to just have a doll thing dude. She might be like crazy where she's just like yeah, the dolls and the dolls make the pottery, but she's like she's got enough aids around her people who are like yeah they do and then it's like to the pottery sweatshops dude and it's like but in her mind she's like all my dolls are workers. 48:57 like that's not how she does. She wheels to the fact. Oh, my are what cause she lives in New York. All my dolls are working. I made these dolls. They're working in her brain. She's wheeling through the factory. I don't know if she's in a wheelchair or not, but she's out in a wheelchair door and the dolls are singing these really like upbeat harmonic songs and she and like singing as she walks through and they're like dancing over there's fountains. 49:23 she does look like a boss and monsters ink doesn't she? He does actually look like the bus. She looks like most disney. She looks like all of it. She's got like the Karela Deville hair and the weird smile and like the fur other thing she's got Ursula was a really good call yeah, but like I could see her having eight legs like the like the pull up the boss from monsters in. You know who I'm talking about exactly you're talking about 49:53 while she's while we're hey, while we're pulling an old lady from New York, you should consider it when he's looking up images to continue pulling this older lady from New York. You should consider supporting us on Patreon. It's so worth it, which I like this shark. We have she would hate our Patreon model is just too cheap. It's too cheap. How you guys make it any money? We're not we're not. That's the point. We're losing money on this. uh 50:22 Yeah, you see what I'm saying. You see what I'm It's a I can see her having weird legs like that. I can see you're having weird legs and six eyes. Yeah, there you go. I forgot which one I was looking at for a second. That's how close I was similar. They are. That was mean to that lady. 50:44 It was. Yeah, you're right. I just got a notification that we got a Patreon subscriber. They heard me. They heard it. I literally just got an email on my watch. Tim. 50:57 Okay, here's the last name and you tell me how you want to say it. Okay, to E W S T O E W S, Tows, Tim Tows, Tows, Tows, Tows, Tows, Tows, Tows, Tows, Tows, Tows, Tows, Tows, Tows, 51:25 I'm in bully mode right now. I mean bully mode, so because the child is still at operation, she's breaking cash from yeah she's getting. It is much larger now than I mean it was large, but it's a hundred million dollar company now crazy. There are companies nowhere near as big. How big is their company though? Do you know? I don't know. There's not a number. They do it a million in revenue because that's a pretty big company. You know, here's what's kind of tough about them in that same interview where I showed you that picture 51:54 Yeah, on their thing. They asked her how much money she they were making and she said a lot and they're like, well, what's a lot? And she's like, I don't know. It was a lot. And then they're like, do you not know the actual number? She's like, no, I don't know the actual number. Then that means it's millions. That means that they're paid. have enough to pay somebody else to do the majority of the stuff. No, no, no, no, no, I not the current business, the business before the McKenzie and Childs. 52:17 yeah. So what I'm saying is like they were saying mckinsey and childs, but they didn't know how much mckinsey and childs was making when they were working there. Yeah, and so I don't get the vibe that they're the kind of people who care much about the numbers. That's what I'm saying. Understand, but they're making enough current. Yeah, they're probably making enough that it's like it's a they're actually making quite a bit of money. Still, she wasn't talking about the current. I know, but I'm saying that they probably are making a good. I for them to have yeah, probably you know, but I don't know. I don't do they still live on this boat, so 52:46 Yes ish. So in March 4th, 2026, Victoria passed away and her husband still lives on the boat. He is actively trying to sell it though and kind of go into the last. You got to find a specific person to buy that. Yeah, that's a hard sell and they've been having a hard time. They've been listed for customize. I'm not going to buy it. That was her. She's trying to She's like, I they're like, we're suing the bay. He's like, he's like, we hate you so much. 53:15 would you buy our boat? Would you buy our boat? You ruin the last years of our life? Yeah, would you buy our boat? uh But yeah, this is uh that's Mackenzie Childs. Wow, great business, really interesting couple. Yeah, cool pottery. They are the kind of couple that just like find each other. You know they are. They're both equally weird. 53:43 Yeah, in like a pleasant fun way. Yeah, it's like it's like they and it's one of those things where you look at this and you're like, yeah, of course you didn't run a good business. Yeah, you know, you should have. You should have made a friend found of shark. You should have found the husband of a friend you made. 54:01 you know, saying here's how that would happen. My wife would become friends with these people yeah and then and then she would come to me and be like. I don't think they know they understand what they're doing anything and so we would look at it and I'm like well, let's see what your revenue is and they would hand me a notebook and you're like really like that tie, con a pestle and it's like they wrote some numbers down two years ago and you're like you haven't written anything down since they're like we had no idea. We don't we don't like what's the this sheet literally says fourteen dollars 54:30 has last and they've just pull out like a a tub of money and here's like that's those that allers. Is that the money from the from the sales? That's the money that we so like whenever we buy stuff, we just take cash out of here and go buy it and then where we sell it, we put cash in cash back in yeah. That's a safe right. That's a call a million dollars in here. Let's figure this out. 54:55 You know, they seem like they wouldn't know business. Yeah, like a plow. Not in a make fun of a way, but it's just kind of like for real. I mean, yeah, from the what happened, like they clearly were aware of what they were. They were spreading themselves. You have a shark who comes along. Yeah. And who takes advantage of it. It's like, ah, and I mean, I think the sad thing, here's the thing. And here's the saddest thing. I think sharks don't die. Yeah. 55:24 They freaking live so long. Yeah. They are like, just go already. And they're like, no. And you're like, oh, okay. No. And what were you gonna say? Oh, just, the saddest thing about it is like they, uh, all of this stuff, they were, they were making it like they would have kept making it. Right. Honestly, how they took the insurance payout, they would have been fine. But again, I think this happened multiple times throughout their career. Like she's so principled and she's like, she's like, no, we're not going to throw this stuff away. 55:54 it costs for a lot. Yeah, I sure ten million later. I do hope that our set is maximalist like we I want to I want to add more stuff. It's not right now. Yeah, don't look up there. I would love to. I just want to cover it and stuff. I want to. I want you know, I like that we have a vacuum lamp. I like all this and then we have our fiddle for fiddling off. Hey, thanks for being here for this episode of things. I've learned last night. If you liked it and you want more of it, we did another episode about Nolan Bushnell, the guy who created Atari right Atari. 56:23 and also Chuck E cheese. So it's another episode about a you know kind of a wacky kind of you know business person or whatever. So speaking of business pay us and join us on a tree. Next week's episode is already available and you get ad free. We'd love to see over there and we do monthly hangouts, so we'll see you next week.