Episode 29: Innovating on the Go-To-Market Strategy for Food Courts

Episode Transcript

Garrett: Oh my gosh. So welcome, everybody. Brady now snaps at this microphone thing.

Brady: No one’s going to see that. It’s not like that’s on the-

Garrett: True.

Brady: … post-production.

Garrett: No, it just gets me every time. Before we start, what episode are we on?

Brady: I think 29.

Garrett: Episode 29. It’s the big 29.

Brady: Yep.

Garrett: Oh, man. 30’s always a tough one, you know.

Brady: Almost our golden episode.

Garrett: Almost. Yeah, right. Your-

Brady: Yeah. 31, right? We’re both 31?

Garrett: Yep. 29 was better than 30, though. I’m going to be honest.

Brady: Yeah, it was.

Garrett: I liked being in the 20s. It was nice. I still felt like I had-

Brady: Low 30s is still nice.

Garrett: It’s okay.

Brady: You still have the perspective of very young.

Garrett: I have three kids.

Brady: Yeah. You might have a different perspective than I do. I still have the perspective that I’m very young.

Garrett: I know. I feel like I’m I’m nearing the end. That’s how I feel. They’re beating me up, man.

Brady: Oh, man. They still got to go to college, then-

Garrett: Oh, I am excited.

Brady: They start giving back.

Garrett: Look, I have one that’s, like, pre- toddler, and I love that. The toddler phase is hard. I’m ready for post- toddler. I can deal with post- toddler. But what are you going to do?

Brady: I don’t know.

Garrett: No, you don’t know.

Brady: My nephews are toddler, so I can…

Garrett: Oh yeah. Toddlers are great to visit.

Brady: Yeah.

Garrett: They’re the best. They’re so much fun. It’s when they live with you that’s a little different.

Brady: Yeah. When they wake up from their naps just traumatized for some reason.

Garrett: Yeah. We’re getting better. We have fell through some tactics and stuff. Sometimes, maybe their blood sugar’s low, so you got to give them food. So give them food early and see if you can kind of cool them off. But it is fun. I mean, the highs are high, and the lows are low with toddlers, is what I would say. It’s very much a peaks- and- valleys age. They just will freak out because they can’t totally talk. They know, but they can’t express.

Brady: Yeah. Yeah.

Garrett: If that makes sense.

Brady: Yep.

Garrett: So it’s a whole learning journey. How was your weekend?

Brady: It was good. It was a lot of Disneyland. I went-

Garrett: Again?

Brady: So I went after work on Friday because-

Garrett: Dude.

Brady: …my sister took her-

Garrett: You’re obsessed.

Brady: …almost three- year- old son.

Garrett: Didn’t we talk about this last show?

Brady: Yeah, we did.

Garrett: Oh, my goodness.

Brady: So I went after work Friday. Rainy day, by the way. But my sister took her son for the first time with her husband and then got my parents tickets for their birthdays. So they were all there all day.

Garrett: Oh.

Brady: I didn’t even know if they would make it, but they were still there, so-

Garrett: Did you just go the whole day, or did you kind of just-

Brady: No, I went after work. And Lindsay didn’t have work that day, so we met up with them and just did some stuff with him, you know, Dumbo, Winnie the Pooh.

Garrett: What’s the go- to food? Okay, let’s say I’m visiting Disneyland. I only have the weekend. I want to get one thing. What’s the number-

Brady: So, right now, it’s the Food and Wine Festival, so I got some garlic mac and cheese with peppered bacon and a guava lychee cocktail. Highly recommend.

Garrett: What is this Disneyland?

Brady: Got a bulgogi burrito at one of the normal spots that wasn’t a part of the Food and Wine-

Garrett: I thought you were going to be like, ” Funnel cake.” Or, ” Turkey leg.”

Brady: No. Well, I mean, we went to Pizza Planet just because my dad and brother- in- law were on Space Mountain, and my mom and sister were shopping. We got there late, so we were like, ” We still need to eat. We’ll get pizza.” Lindsay got pasta. Then we met up with everyone.

Garrett: Is the pizza and pasta good there, or it’s just normal? It’s cafeteria food?

Brady: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. It’s whatever. But I mean, I got-

Garrett: The bulgogi burrito, though. Where’s that at? Is it popup?

Brady: That’s in California Adventure. So that has better food.

Garrett: Yeah, no doubt.

Brady: I mean, I’ve gotten a mac and cheese in a little bread cone. I’ve gotten a chili mac and cheese in a bread bowl.

Garrett: This new Disneyland, I might have to go to this place because I’m used to more Knott’s Berry Farm level food.

Brady: Yeah. I mean, the Food and Wine Festival’s cool. So that’s just during-

Garrett: Once a year or whatever.

Brady: … apart of March. And they have all these local vendors and…

Garrett: Nice.

Brady: Like a garlic truck, an avocado truck, which is all avocado base, artichoke. Good cocktails.

Garrett: Sounds great.

Brady: Yeah.

Garrett: Okay.

Brady: So I did that Friday, and then I went all day yesterday during the time change, got in the parking lot by 8: 00 AM. So we tapped out at 5: 00 PM, and I think I went to sleep from 6: 00 till 10:00 PM yesterday.

Garrett: And then you woke up and went back to bed or…

Brady: I woke up, and I did stuff till, like, 12:45, then went back to bed.

Garrett: I’m over here worrying about a banking crisis, and you’re just over here riding Dumbo. Just feeling like this is-

Brady: I didn’t do Dumbo yesterday. I did Dumbo Friday.

Garrett: “I did Dumbo on Friday.”

Brady: Before we knew the details of what went on with SVB, but…

Garrett: He’s just out there living his best life. Dude, I love it. So all day on Sunday, you weren’t Disneyed out?

Brady: No. I mean, we already had Sunday booked with people.

Garrett: Got it.

Brady: Because you have to reserve dates. And then, the whole Friday thing…

Garrett: Dude, your calendar, bro. I tried to fit in your calendar. I was not happy with you.

Brady: I’m sorry. I apologize.

Garrett: I tried to be, like-

Brady: I know. I know I was firing you up, but…

Garrett: I was, ” Brady…” So I’m trying to schedule this event, and I’m like, ” Okay.” So I’m over a month out, and I’m like, ” All right, guys, what of these weekends work?” Brady’s just like-

Brady: Barely over a month out.

Garrett: Over a month out.

Brady: Yes.

Garrett: Over a month out.

Brady: Over a month out. Yes.

Garrett: And I’m like, ” How does this work?” And you’re just like, ” Every weekend from now until your dead, Garrett, is planned.”

Brady: Just till May.

Garrett: And now I know what it’s planned with, Disneyland. I can’t compete with that.

Brady: No, none of that is Disneyland. None of that is Disneyland.

Garrett: I can’t compete with Disneyland.

Brady: No.

Garrett: It’s a magical place. I’m not magical. What am I going to do?

Brady: Yeah. March, I mean, is a crazy month for us.

Garrett: Yeah. But we figured it out.

Brady: Yeah.

Garrett: We’ll see each other in June.

Brady: June. That worked.

Garrett: Oh my God.

Brady: Just that weekend, though, that we chose. The rest of June is booked.

Garrett: I’m sure it is.

Brady: We’re good.

Garrett: We’re good. We got it. And I’m going to start planning the next one out because…

Brady: Yeah.

Garrett: I got to get on-

Brady: 2024’s right around the corner.

Garrett: Right around the corner. Got to get in there.

Brady: Yep.

Garrett: Oh, man.

Brady: How was your fishing trip? I saw you were prepped. I didn’t see any additional photos.

Garrett: They were on the story.

Brady: No.

Garrett: Yeah. Look, dude, they’re pretty good photos.

Brady: I was sleeping yesterday.

Garrett: No, I went to San Clemente Island. So I went all the way out, which was sweet. Didn’t catch any fish at San Clemente Island. Tons of bait, which was a little disappointing. The water was real cold, though, so like 56, 58 degrees. So I drove, like, two hours, went all the way out to San Clemente Island. I was looking… There’s supposed to be early bluefin potentially around. I didn’t see any. And there was tons of fog, so bad visibility. I was driving on the radar a lot. I don’t know how many miles out, but I was pinging it between the whole channel so I could see both islands. Because I was hoping maybe if I could find a commercial boat on the radar, I could, you know, ” Oh, hey, buddy-

Brady: Tag along a little bit, a little piggyback.

Garrett: Sometimes you can’t find fish. You can find boats. But there was nobody. And I saw some commercial lobster guys on San Clemente Island, so I talked to them. They were nice. They’re just doing the commercial guy thing, smoking cigarettes, pulling up pods. And they said essentially they weren’t seeing anything. I was like, ” Goodness. Great.”

Brady: Oh yeah, great.

Garrett: They’ve been living out here, so that’s good. So did that, and then we went back across the channel to Catalina and then fished the front side and got a ton of bonito.

Brady: Oh, cool.

Garrett: Got, like, 24 of them.

Brady: Nice.

Garrett: The guys loved that. And we were just hooking them up like crazy and so…

Brady: That’s fun.

Garrett: We had a good time. And we got back by 5:00. We left at 4: 00 in the morning, so everybody got to the dock by 4: 30. One guy showed up at 4: 45. So we left at, like, 4:45, got over there for sunset. And then-

Brady: To sunrise?

Garrett: Sunrise, yeah. I wish I could show you the photos. It was crazy how pretty San Clemente Island was. There’s waterfalls…

Brady: Oh yeah, I did see that-

Garrett: Going-

Brady: Yeah.

Garrett: That was the photos.

Brady: That was cool.

Garrett: Yeah. So that was-

Brady: No, I thought I was looking for a big bluefin photo, is what I was excited about.

Garrett: Oh, okay, Brady. Yeah. I went to-

Brady: That was my expectation.

Garrett: … Disneyland, butI didn’t ride any rides, unfortunately. You know what I mean? I don’t post the bonito because they’re kind of like a…

Brady: Yeah, it’s more the experience. You had to be there kind of thing.

Garrett: You had to be there, yeah. The bonito are less to brag about. But it was a great time, honestly. Anytime I get on the water, that’s great. We were going to spend the night, but one of the guys has a newborn, and it just wasn’t going to fly. So we came back that night. It was great, though.

Brady: Nice.

Garrett: But yeah, man. And then we got the banks collapsing. That was interesting. That was a nice little Sunday.

Brady: Yeah.

Garrett: Considering that we are one of the largest tech marketing agencies, if not the largest in the world, I thought we might have a little problem there, but it looks like the government stepped in Sunday afternoon, so that was quite nice of them.

Brady: Yeah, we’ll see what the aftermath of that is.

Garrett: Yeah, I’ve seen, like, four clients today be like, ” Our Silicon Valley Bank credit card wasn’t working.” For Google Ads or something. Not what they pay us on but how they’re paying Google or their ad channels. So they’ll have to figure that out. They said it should be a week, is what I’m being told. But it’s crazy, man. I mean, we are very exposed to tech, considering that’s all we service.

Brady: Yeah. I mean, this was an interesting one because it was so big that my awareness was through memes on all the finance Instagrams I follow. And then actual, ” This is what happened.”

Garrett: And I was doing comms, crisis comms in general Slack in the executive channels. I prepared all the responses for customers because we ended up having about 12% exposure to the bank. So 12% of our customers bank with Silicon Valley, or 12% revenue. So that was a pretty decent exposure. I thought it was… In my gut, unfortunately… So I’ve been monitoring it since Thursday. So Thursday, Friday, Saturday, I was like, ” We might have 25 plus percent exposure to this situation.” And I’m like, ” What do we do? Because, I mean, Monday morning, is this going to be a flood of people trying to cancel or get out of their contracts?” And we obviously can’t do that because we can’t lay our team members off because of the situation. And so just navigating how do we honor our customers, support them in this process, but not void contracts and juggling all that… I mean, it was a heck of a weekend in that regard of just prepping. And then, by Sunday night, the government had stepped in, and I guess everything’s good. But let’s not pretend. I think this just accelerated the recession, to be honest.

Brady: I think so too.

Garrett: Which I think is a good thing because I think the faster… If the recession is inevitable… I want to be clear. I don’t think a recession is a good thing, but if a recession is inevitable, the faster it gets done, the more we can get out of a fear- based state of planning and capital allocation. I mean, at the end of the day, we’re not… I’d like to assume… We’re not plumbers. You know how everybody poops?

Brady: Yep.

Garrett: They’re recession- proof. Doing advertising for tech is not recession- proof. Doing marketing for tech is not recession- proof. It’s close to recession- proof historically because tech has kind of always been on the way up. But as we’ve seen in this latest cycle, tech is the one getting crushed. And that’s made it definitely a lot harder for Directive and for us. I mean, in our day- to- day lives, a lot of clients want to take things in- house and see if Jimmy or Jill can do it. And, ” Hey Jimmy, didn’t you used to do Google Ads? Jill, weren’t you on SEO at one point?” Taking the-

Brady: Yeah, “Get on YouTube, figure it out.”

Garrett: Yeah. It’s a lot of that. I understand it. Everybody has to count their own chickens first before they count everybody else’s. And they’re trying to take care of their own team, right? They’re trying to do what they got to do, which I get. The industry we’re in, which is a third- party vendor that manages your marketing and advertising, is tough. I think the good news for us is twofold. One, positioning- wise, we work with larger, more established tech companies, so hence we have a lot less exposure because they’re less startups and more publicly traded or large tech companies, number one. And then, number two, we’re positioned into revenue. We’re not doing a feel- good marketing. We’re doing top- line revenue- generating marketing. And I think because of that… Historically, when COVID hit, we grew 3% that year. So I’ve been pretty proud that the organization at Directive is seen valuable enough in our customers’ eyes that when things get bad at the macro level, we’re able to get through it, and our customers rely on us to power their business. I can’t say that we’re essential, but I think we’re pretty darn close. You know what I mean?

Brady: Yeah. We can fit into the plan of do more with less, and that seems to be the environment. But with the diverse talent we have at Directive, we give people access to do more-

Garrett: With less.

Brady: …with less. And then I think a very common value prop within our tech clients for their value positioning is efficiency within organizations. So that’s another nice part of tech, in general, is tech often is replacing something far more expensive.

Garrett: Yeah. It’s a good point.

Brady: And so there is still a need even for our clients out there. So I think still pretty strong positioning.

Garrett: Tech’s still new enough that not everything is tech- enabled, to your point. And so when people are cutting costs, sometimes they’re cutting costs on headcount to bring on tech, but we’re pretty darn close to the end of that. And as a third- party vendor, you’re always at risk. You just are.

Brady: Yeah, of course.

Garrett: But I would say we’re doing as good as you can do to stay critical. I always want to make sure the service we offer, the positioning we have in the market, the way we tell our story, the way we establish ourselves with our customers is that we are mission- critical to their revenue forecast. And I’d say we are. I would say we are mission- critical to a company’s revenue forecast. The question is, are you okay lowering that forecast to cut our cost? Right?

Brady: Yeah.

Garrett: And I think as long as that narrative is true, we’re fairly recession… Not proof but recession… We can weather a recession. We’re going to still get our bumps and bruises. COVID had some bumps and bruises, but there were still people buying, and we got through it. But this one was a little different because it wasn’t like the whole economy was collapsing. It was the tech market was collapsing. And when COVID went bad, technically, during COVID, tech stocks skyrocketed.

Brady: Yeah. And the clients that had speed bumps, they were kind of oddballs where it really affected their business model.

Garrett: But if you remember, COVID went from fear to opportunity once COVID had occurred. Once we went through that whole wave, and we got the vaccinations, and everything became kind of like, ” This is the new normal,” that’s when our business took off. And so if you looked at that year of 2020, we lost a ton in the first three quarters of it, and we made it almost all back on the back half of the year. That’s kind of my point with this recession we’ve been in for what now? It’s got to be… They’ve been talking about it for about a year now hard, six months, nine months?

Brady: Yeah.

Garrett: It’s been pretty rough. I buy all tech stocks, so everything’s clobbered. I can go open up my Robinhood, and I’ll tell you, it ain’t great. And yeah, I mean, I ride or die with the industry, and so the stocks I buy too because it’s the companies that I’ve evaluated and done usually brought on in a competitive vendor analysis. They’re all down.

Brady: It’s all right.

Garrett: I’m all red right now.

Brady: That’s why you dollar cost average. I buy every Monday, so when it’s down, I feel good about it.

Garrett: Yeah. You’re like, “I’m up.”

Brady: Mostly, I’m buying it cheap.

Garrett: Yeah. Exactly. And I did that for a while, too. But I think my broader point is this one was a little different in the sense that it was the tech market explicitly, number one, and then number two, people have had tighter purse strings because the recession hasn’t happened. Until we get to the bottom, people aren’t worried about going back up. I need procurement and finance and the board and the executive team to have determined that the recession has already occurred or passed us, and that’ll then reopen the wallets to focus on growth. Right now, everyone’s doing cost- cutting, and it’s just a really hard time to be in business.

Brady: Yeah, the big moment hasn’t happened yet, so it’s all preparation and what- ifs.

Garrett: I know. It’d be nice if God could give me a little break here. You know what I mean? I mean, what did we go? It went COVID, potentially World War III, and then banking collapse and recession.

Brady: Yeah.

Garrett: It’d be nice if we could just-

Brady: Get some life.

Garrett: … getback to peace and prosperity.

Brady: Two, three years of that environment?

Garrett: Yeah.

Brady: It’s pretty crazy.

Garrett: Two and a half years.

Brady: It’s gone by fast.

Garrett: It’s gone by very fast. But it’s not like it didn’t happen.

Brady: No.

Garrett: It’s been very real and very rough. But we did grow from what, 60 people to 160 people in the last two years?

Brady: Yep.

Garrett: I think that’s a testament to the service we have and ability to get results. But it’s also… Gives me a little bit of, imagine what it could have been. You know what I mean? If we weren’t just punching uphill every day, just knocking down new obstacles. And I’m just so proud of our executive team and our management team and our team members and our employees and everyone globally just being so tough because it’s a really hard time to be in the performance industry where we’re paid by clients to do things they’ve never done before, that the last agency failed at, in a macro environment where our consumers are just… We do revenue- based marketing, and consumers just aren’t buying as much, nor are companies. And it’s hard to hit those numbers, but our team’s working their butt off, and I think they’re doing really good.

Brady: Yeah. I think in my even impact to recovery trajectory is companies like us who have developed a lot through these hard times. Just imagine the performance when things normalize.

Garrett: I know. When it gets back to normal-

Brady: I’m looking forward to that.

Brady: Whatever

Brady: happens, we’ll see. Probably an asteroid is going to hit once this recession’s over but…

Garrett: At least.

Brady: At least.

Garrett: Well, should we get to advertising jealousy?

Brady: Yeah, let’s dive in.

Garrett: Now that we’ve given all our deep banking insights, as bankers. All right. Let’s start with this one. He’s my favorite advertiser ever.

Brady: He’s pretty dang good at it.

Garrett: Mr. Ryan Reynolds. He’s my-

Brady: What does he own now? Aviation?

Garrett: He’s owned Aviation for a while. I wouldn’t say he’s like a role model to me so much as he’s an inspiration around just creativity and personality. He’s also a ridiculously good actor, so obviously, he has some character strengths there, being in character, and he’s just very good at being on camera.

Brady: Yeah. It’s interesting how he takes his personality from movies, and he brought it into advertisement and works very well.

Garrett: Yeah, it’s cool. Have you seen Wrexham AFC?

Brady: No.

Garrett: You have to watch it. It’s so good.

Brady: That’s the team he owns, where there’s a show about it?

Garrett: Yeah. It’s a club with Rob McElhenney or something like that, I think, from Always Sunny. Yeah, it’s awesome because you can see he has that ability to turn it on. He can a be normal dude, or he can be superstar movie star actor Ryan Reynolds. And he can go back and forth between the two. And it’s kind of crazy to watch, and you can see him doing it. He’s not really acting so much as being a superstar, like an athlete, for example, which I think is really interesting to see. He has that level of charisma and charm. And it’s funny how he brings it into the advertising space. I don’t know if, back in the day, they had people like this. I know I’ve showed the Ronald Reagan one, I think it was. There’s been actors who have done it but never been like… He owns his own ad agency. He’s the creative director. And he actually is technically in our industry, like a partner at an ad agency firm. And then he does the storyline and the scripts, too, and he’ll be the director on it, which to me is great because I’ve never been in Hollywood. I’ve never got to be on set with the top storytellers in the world when it comes to visual storytelling. He’s been surrounded by the top visual storytellers in the world his whole life, and then he decided to just come into our industry, my turf, and just make us all look bad. What the heck, Ryan? So let’s take a look. This is for his company, Aviation Gin. I love the fact that he can also have millions of followers into his own ads. Just like, all right, bro. Such a good value prop for why you should give Ryan Reynolds equity.

Brady: He has quite the reach.

Garrett: Yeah, he’ll do this. All right. Let’s hit it, Scarlett.

Ryan Reynolds: It’s Father’s Day, but if you don’t mind, we’re going to celebrate with the mother of all cocktails, The Vasectomy. Let me show you how to make it. First, fill a tall glass with ice-

Garrett: I just hate how good he is.

Ryan Reynolds: …the way children fill our lives with so much joy. Next, pour one ounce of cranberry juice. Sweet, just like their little smiles. Then, pour three ounces of tonic so bubbly… Then, pour three ounces of tonic. So bubbly, just like I feel every day I wake up after a long, full night’s sleep. Now, add a dash of lemon juice. Fresh, if you have a few minutes to squeeze one, or store- bought if the little ones have you running around a bit today, the little scamps. Finally, we’re going to add one and a half ounces of Aviation American Gin, the world’s highest- rated gin for the world’s highest- rated job, dad.

Speaker 1: Cut, please. Got to do that part again.

Ryan Reynolds: Finally, we’re going to add one and a half ounces of Aviation American Gin, stir, and then we’re going to garnish with a little slice of sunshine. Now that is as refreshing as fatherhood. A little something I call The Vasectomy for no( beep) reason at all. Happy Father’s Day, everyone.

Speaker 1: Cut.

Ryan Reynolds: When people see this, they’re going to be like, ” Has he ever been outside?”

Garrett: So the reason I like those is because you can make something as boring as a cocktail video all of a sudden engaging in a way that also plugs your product. But I don’t know if anyone else… Let’s see if Nick Cannon can do it. Can you click the Nick Cannon one? I want to see if Nick Cannon can do it. So he’s up three squares right from there. Yeah. I want to see this one.

Brady: If anyone’s going to relate to being a father, it’s got to be Nick Cannon, the most experienced in the world.

Nick Cannon: It’s almost Father’s Day. And the one and only Ryan Reynolds asked me to help us all celebrate with the mother of all cocktails, The Vasectomy. Lord knows I need one. Let me show you how to make it. First, fill a tall glass with ice, the way children fill our lives with so much joy. Next, pour in one ounce of cranberry juice. Sweet, just like their little smiles. Then, pour three ounces of tonic so bubbly, just… So bubbly, just like I feel every day I wake up after a long, full night’s sleep. Now, add a dash of lemon juice. Fresh, if you have a few minutes to squeeze one, or store- bought if the little ones have you running around a bit today. Little mother… Finally, add one and a half ounces of Aviation American Gin, the world’s highest- rated gin for the world’s highest- rated job, dad.

Speaker 1: Cut, please. Mark that.

Nick Cannon: Finally, we’re going to add one and a half ounces of Aviation American Gin, stir, and then we’re going to garnish with a little slice of sunshine. And that looks like a delicious Vasectomy.

Ryan Reynolds: I’ll take it from here, Nick. I have three kids.

Nick Cannon: I have eight.

Ryan Reynolds: Come on. Bring it in. Just hold each other. No wonder you have eight kids. You smell amazing.

Speaker 1: Cut.

Garrett: So I think one of the things that it shows that’s really cool is the copy on the script is really good because both actors actually crushed that commercial.

Brady: Yeah. I thought Ryan’s was better, even though I felt like Nick had better positioning, just given his…

Garrett: Maybe that’s because-

Brady: …reputation.

Garrett: …one of them is a world- famous actor, and the other one hosts Wild N’ Out. But no shade, Nick. You’re great too.

Brady: But I think the script was written for Ryan.

Garrett: Of course.

Brady: And his personality.

Garrett: He might have even wrote it. Who knows?

Brady: Yeah.

Garrett: But I thought it was terrific. I think it’s very relatable to me because I can’t tell you how many times I’m like, ” You’re my little favorite.” You can’t really say anything you’re actually thinking or feeling in that moment because they’re kids. And I think that commercial perfectly encapsulated fatherlyhood anger, when you’re mad, but you’re just like, ” Am I going to yell at a two- year- old right now?” That’s exactly the restraint you kind of feel all day. When you’re like, ” How’s your day going?” You’re like, ” It’s going great.” And I think they showed that really well. And I think it plugs the product well because it fits with what people do when they’ve had a terrible day, grab a drink.

Brady: Yeah. And it was a simple cocktail. It was realistic. It’s a go.

Garrett: I can make this.

Brady: Cranberry juice, club soda, and gin.

Garrett: Well, yeah, but I think it was a… Because there are… So if you’re not aware, that’s a thing that a lot of the alcohol brands do. Not that, but they’ll do the cocktails with because they’re trying to essentially encourage… Well, if you think about it, right… Let’s pause for a second, and I’ll show why it’s smart. Have you ever taken shots of gin?

Brady: No.

Garrett: Okay. So if you don’t drink gin like that, then you need to do it when you mix drinks, yet most people only know… What do they know about gin? What’s the mixed drink they do with gin?

Brady: Is martinis a big gin drink?

Garrett: Yeah, it is. But what’s the most popular mixed drink? Anyone here know it?

Scarlett: Gin and tonic.

Speaker 2: Gin and tonic.

Garrett: Gin and tonic.

Brady: There you go.

Garrett: So if you don’t like gin and tonic, you probably just don’t ever buy gin. So if you’re Aviation, what do you need people to do? Understand that they can make more and different types of drink with gin, and hopefully, you can show them one they like so they choose to buy your product. But if you do it in a non- Ryan Reynolds way, it’s less entertaining, less engaging. I don’t know if people will actually watch the ad. And so that’s why I thought it was so clever. It’s a very stereotypical ad placement. It’s a very well- used ad strategy in the liquor business. I just think when he executes, it’s better than everybody else. And that’s kind of why I like that.

Brady: And then he takes a sip at the end. So no way is that on TV.

Garrett: Great point, Brady.

Brady: Bringing it back.

Garrett: Yeah, you are. Any other thoughts, team? You guys like it?

Brady: I liked it. There was one moment… I think it’s a bit, but he dumps it in, and then he goes to add one and a half ounces. I don’t know, it didn’t connect as much as I thought. I was like, ” Wait, was that something else that he just dumped in?” Because then he says, ” Now, add 1. 5 ounces of Aviation-

Garrett: Well, he was showing that, as a dad, he wants to drink the whole bottle.

Brady: Yeah. And maybe it was a play. There was one cooking show meme where the lady’s like, ” Now just had two ounces of vodka.” And she’s just like… It’s like, “…”

Garrett: Oh, that. I’ve seen that one. Yeah.

Brady: Yeah, that’s a good… So I don’t know if it was a play on-

Garrett: No, I don’t think it was.

Garrett: I think it

Garrett: was a play on, ” You’re only supposed to have one and a half ounces, and I could drink six right now.”

Brady: But the bit just didn’t-

Garrett: Didn’t hit with you.

Brady: …connect as clean as… I was a bit confused, like, ” Wait, did he just put something else in, and now he’s adding it?” That’s my only-

Garrett: I like that. That’s pretty good.

Brady: …feedback as a consumer.

Garrett: No, I agree. It wasn’t perfect in that regard.

Brady: But I liked it.

Garrett: Yeah, it was different. I thought it was a very stereotypical ad that I think had a good product integration and served a purpose. And I do think one of the things we don’t do a lot of ourselves is timing in the sense that The Vasectomy around Father’s Day and then doing the ad. Putting it all into a campaign around a critical event in the sense of Father’s Day and then building a campaign around it, I thought that was pretty clever and smart.

Brady: And I really enjoyed that we watched the Nick Cannon one just because it had the same exact script-

Garrett: Same script, yeah.

Brady: …by two actors. And just how much I liked Ryan doing it better than Nick, even though I thought Nick would be funnier because of his-

Garrett: I think Nick’s hilarious.

Brady: …situation.

Garrett: I know. Oh, yeah.

Brady: And yeah, he’s a funny guy but-

Garrett: Oh, he’s so funny.

Brady: …just the subtleties of the way Ryan kind of looks up at the camera-

Garrett: Now, Nick and Ryan-

Brady: He’s so good at it.

Garrett: …please don’t get yourself in any legal trouble now that we mentioned you on our show. We have kind of a bad track record of this, so if you guys could avoid all problems, that’d be great.

Brady: Yeah. Don’t.

Garrett: Don’t be going off getting yourself in any mischief now that we talked about you. All right, Brady, who do you got?

Brady: So I have a golf brand that I’ve actually never heard of.

Garrett: I bought their shoes.

Brady: Really?

Garrett: Gave me blisters.

Brady: Oh, those are the blisters shoes?

Garrett: Those are the blisters shoes.

Brady: Okay.

Garrett: Because they look super classy and cool. I actually like the brand. And they do gloves too. They’re all leather- based products, I think.

Brady: Yeah. So I went to their site. I thought the bags were pretty cool.

Garrett: Yeah, they are.

Brady: I saw all the gloves. But yeah, the ad reminded me of that Oliver Peoples ad you liked.

Garrett: Okay, let’s see it. I mean, if that’s more story brand thematic, I love it.

Brady: So it was a pretty high production just golf… So I’d never heard of them. This ad was sent to me by a colleague, Michael. And it was interesting because he sent it to me, saying, ” Brady, I think you’ll really like this ad.” So I checked it out, and I definitely liked the cinematography, but then we kind of went back and forth. And he doesn’t golf. And so, for him, he was like, ” Oh, I thought this made golf seem really cool. It made it seem a bit edgier and accessible.” And it kind of disrupted everything he thought about golf.

Garrett: See, it did the opposite for me.

Brady: Exactly.

Garrett: That ad was everything I hate about golf and made me to never want to be around those people.

Brady: So that’s what I told him. I’m like, ” To me-

Garrett: But he’s British, right?

Brady: Yes. But he just doesn’t golf.

Garrett: No, I-

Brady: And so for me, I think he thought the rebellion and the tattoos, all that side of it was not what he thought golf was.

Garrett: But you should see how we golf at Costa Mesa Country Club.

Brady: But for me, as a golfer, I was concerned with, ” Great, I have to be a rich, chiseled- jaw, white dude to play golf.”

Garrett: Yeah, exactly.

Brady: Is what that ad, in my mind-

Garrett: Yeah, like when you go to play golf at the Beverly Hills Country Club.

Brady: …represented. And so I just thought it was so interesting for him not being a golfer that ad could introduce someone to golf and see it a different way. But me as a golfer, I-

Garrett: You reminded me of the Kingsman.

Brady: Yeah. I processed it that way. So I just thought it was fascinating why he thought I would like it. And I still like the ad. I thought the production was really cool. All the people in the pool… I went to their site to see, is this really weatherproof- type material? Was there a connection there?

Garrett: Was there?

Brady: I still couldn’t tell.

Garrett: Let’s go to the website real quick.

Brady: Yeah. Their whole site is very-

Garrett: G/ FORE?

Brady: …aquatic themed. And I like their stuff. So once I started seeing their brand and their clothes… It was very expensive, which I didn’t like.

Garrett: I love the branding. I’m not going to lie. I love the commercial. I love the production. Now…

Brady: They tie it to the site. So the ad is connected to the current brand.

Garrett: This looks like the polo brand without even more pretentious… Or if Lacoste had a pretentious child. Do you know what I mean? It’s like Equinox and Lacoste.

Brady: They got the pickleball gear.

Garrett: It’s literally Equinox and Lacoste had a baby, and out popped G/ FORE.

Brady: Yeah.

Garrett: Because that’s kind of what their branding is. Watch. Go to Equinox and then go to Lacoste. I’ll show you what I mean. Okay.

Brady: Whoa.

Garrett: See what I mean?

Brady: Yeah.

Garrett: So it’s like this super-

Brady: What?

Garrett: Yeah, this is what I’m talking about. I haven’t even seen it, but I just know they always do stuff like this. And I love their branding because it’s so-

Brady: That Euro section is wild.

Garrett: …avant- garde, I think would be the word. Is that right, Scarlett? Avant- garde?

Scarlett: Yeah.

Garrett: Okay, then let’s go to Lacoste, which is just like-

Brady: Thank you for not confirming that with me because I have no idea.

Garrett: Yeah, no, I know you.

Brady: Okay.

Garrett: And then Lacoste… There she goes again. Yeah. See what I mean? That wasn’t a bad take. I haven’t seen either of these websites. But my take was Lacoste meets Equinox, had a baby, and I think that’s pretty much G/ FORE. And I actually love it. Yeah. Literally. Do you know what I mean?

Brady: Yeah.

Garrett: Now if you go back to it, ” Disruptive luxury.” I love that. It is disruptive luxury. That is a great… Honestly, I freaking love it. Now, I hate it-

Brady: They own their positioning.

Garrett: Yeah. I hate it in the sense that this is the antithesis of me. And I did buy their shoes, and they did give me blisters, and they weren’t comfortable. But I didn’t do it because of their brand. I bought it because I liked they had the all- white leather shoes. I like the white leather shoes.

Brady: Is it those ones?

Garrett: Yeah, those ones. They’ve just been around forever. I thought those look classy and cool. Nah, I like that. Look, right there, “Own a golf shoe.”

Brady: And you’re probably hoping because it’s more of a new age brand, they’d have better comfort and technology-

Garrett: I thought it was going to be comfy but it-

Brady: … thanthe classic look.

Garrett: Yeah. It was like, I like the new age version of the classic golf shoe. I thought it looked really clean. I do love the shoes. Look at that. The tuxedo… That one right there. That’s a sexy- looking shoe. Horribly uncomfortable, though, because they’re so stiff. If you look in the insole… Go to that one right there. See that right there? That thing goes into your Achilles. That, yup. And it just dug into me. Compared to the soft heel of the Nikes… When I went back to my Nikes, I was like, ” Oh, this is game changer.” But you got to stand… We talked about this before on another show about being a clothing brand and, well, a shoe brand. If you’re going to be a shoe brand, I feel like you got to be this. If you want to stand out, you can’t just be another Nike. I think you have to be something different. I love the ad, Brady. I’m not going to lie to you. I mean, I hate everything about what it represented. I hate that part of society.

Brady: Yeah. And there’s definitely a market for it. And I think they’re close to… I like the disruptive part of golf. I like the bright colors and unique outfits. And I think a lot of youth golfers new to golf are getting into that, but they just kind of miss that connection.

Garrett: I want to say a lot of people like this. I’m very much more Coors Light and flip- flops.

Brady: I mean, if I was in Florida, and my dad was a country club member, and I saw that ad on TV, it’s probably what I’d be asking for for Christmas.

Garrett: Yeah. No, I agree. I think it is disruptive luxury. I think that’s a perfect brand positioning. It’s also kind of what I hate.

Brady: Yeah. It reminds me of Outer Banks. Have you watched it?

Garrett: I’ve watched a couple of episodes.

Brady: The scene where-

Garrett: Went back to Wicked Tuna.

Brady: …Topper and Rafe jump Pope when he’s delivering food on the golf course. It just reminds me of… Those are the people who would buy-

Garrett: Correct.

Brady: …these clothes.

Garrett: Yeah. No, they’re all the people that… I was never a part of their society. Never have been.

Brady: But the ad was close. Looks like cool stuff. I wouldn’t buy it. I’m all about Marshalls, the Callaway polos on clearance. That’s my game but-

Garrett: Well, after Vuori.

Brady: So when it comes to golf polos-

Garrett: You don’t wear Vuori golf polos?

Brady: I have a couple now from-

Garrett: Are you not loyal?

Brady: From the most recent sale, I did get a couple polos that aren’t too tight, and they’re long enough. But Callaway, Marshalls-

Garrett: It’s more your love language?

Brady: Delicious. It’s where it’s at.

Garrett: No, I totally feel you. It’s kind of like, I’m a member at Balboa Yacht Club while being the antithesis of someone who’s yachty. And I’ll walk in with my fishing boots, and I’ll smell like squid. And it was funny because I brought my other buddy the other day inside, and he’s all tatted up, and he’s wearing all his fishing stuff, and he looks at me, he’s like, ” Am I allowed to be in here?” And he’s literally freaking out. I’m like, ” Hell, yeah. This place needs way more of us and a heck of a lot less of that.”

Brady: Yeah. You don’t need a pastel sweater tied around your neck, wearing it like a cape.

Garrett: Because I feel that. I always feel so uncomfortable in those environments where everybody’s wearing the very preppy thing.

Brady: Hopefully, that’ll change. I think that’s going to change over time. Even golf clubs now, it’s like, you can wear your-

Garrett: There’s some brands that are trying to reinvent it.

Brady: Yeah. I guess. I’m just trying to wear my hat inside. Some of those rules…

Garrett: I like some of the rules. At the club, you’re not allowed to be on the phone, which I love.

Brady: Yeah, I think that’s-

Garrett: Because there’s nothing worse… It happened to me the other day. I was at a restaurant, and some guy just hops on his FaceTime and just starts talking on his FaceTime in front of everybody. Luckily, I was leaving. And then another thing happened, too, with a family, and they put their iPads out with the kids. I got no problem with iPads. But don’t you dare turn that volume up. I’m trying to have a conversation. You can hear it over the sound in the restaurant. And they’re blasting Blippi or Bluey up on 10 over here.

Brady: You’ve already seen that episode too and just…

Garrett: Oh my gosh. People are just so disrespectful. Y’all are getting me started on this stuff, man. The FaceTiming in the restaurant and the, ” What, buddy?” And they’re yelling at you on the table, and you can’t hear what you’re thinking.

Brady: There’s a place in our society for rules.

Garrett: There is.

Brady: I agree.

Garrett: For honoring others, appreciating others, being respectful for others. But I love this position. Can you go back to the website? I have a question. I want to make sure I formulate it correctly. I just want to make sure I understand this. They’re not obviously for golf. I want to pause there for a second.

Brady: Yeah. Even the ad…

Garrett: I know, that’s why I’m asking you.

Brady: There was a lot of golf-

Garrett: Ish. Golf-adjacent.

Brady: …related… The first scene ishim dropping his bag and the guy hitting him from the front lawn.

Garrett: Correct.

Brady: But then you get into water-

Garrett: Which I liked.

Brady: … acrobaticsor synchronized swimming.

Garrett: Correct. And I loved all that. And then, did you notice that the women who were doing the synchronized swimming did have on the shoes?

Brady: Yeah.

Garrett: So I thought that was great. What do you think about the women’s wear, Scarlett? Is that preppy enough for you or…

Scarlett: I like the colors.

Garrett: It’s popping, right? It’s modern.

Scarlett: Yeah.

Brady: It’s, like, all bright, but it’s not too much.

Scarlett: Yeah. It’s not flashy. Because I don’t like flashy things.

Garrett: It’s kind of cute, right?

Scarlett: Yeah.

Garrett: Different.

Scarlett: Yeah. And the name is cute.

Garrett: It’s edgy.

Scarlett: If I was a golfer, I’d buy that.

Garrett: Right? At 125? It’s not the worst price. Women’s clothes is, I feel like, usually cheaper than-

Scarlett: No, because then you’ll get good quality.

Brady: It’s on the verge of like…

Garrett: Yeah.

Brady: It’s not a high- end designer type price but-

Garrett: I like the models too, how they’re positioning the clothes, everything they’re doing. But notice she’s not on the-

Brady: Not on the course or anything, yeah.

Garrett: …course. Correct.

Brady: That guy is-

Garrett: Look at the shoots. So you go to the floral camo tech, the Jersey quarter zip pullover. She’s not golfing. Notice, never once is she golfing, nor is she wearing… Is she wearing golf… No. She’s kind of wearing… It’s like a lifestyle brand for golf. Let’s see if any of the women are golfing in any of the pictures. Because I think that’s actually interesting. What about the shoes? Let me see on the shoes.

Brady: I don’t know if they have lifestyle photos on the shoes.

Garrett: Because those are golf shoes. Let’s see on the golf shoes if they’re golfing. No.

Brady: No, there’s no lifestyle…

Scarlett: It’s just the product shots.

Brady: Yeah.

Garrett: That’s very interesting. Will you go to the Men’s real quick? I want to see that. So let’s go to a polo or something. Yeah, yeah. Oh my God.

Brady: Whoa.

Garrett: Let’s go to polos. Let’s click on one, see if he’s golfing.

Brady: No, it’s all the same. Just-

Garrett: Yeah. See?

Brady: …background.

Garrett: I think that’s smarter. I think if they were golfing, it wouldn’t come across the same. That is a good- looking polo, fits right.

Brady: Yeah.

Garrett: It’s different. I don’t think it would fit me.

Brady: Tiger Sunday red.

Garrett: It’s meant for long, skinny people. It’s pretty clever.

Brady: It’s a cool color.

Garrett: It is a cool color. Cerulean? No mediums. It’s interesting. Huh. Can you go down? I want to see their descriptions too. ” Clubhouse.” So you see how they use words like clubhouse slub?

Brady: Yeah. What I never understand, and this is very common, is, ” Matthew is 6’2″ and wearing a size medium.”

Garrett: “Pablo is 6’3″ and wearing a size medium in poppy.”

Brady: For me, it’s length, right? I’m 6’1″. Every medium I’ve tried on would be like a crop top.

Garrett: Let me see if it’s a crop top on him.

Brady: Well, he has it tucked in those but that… See the untucked version?

Scarlett: But this is so tight.

Brady: Yeah. So I guess it’s, if you’re skinny-

Garrett: That’s for your body type, bro.

Brady: … and that tall,maybe it does go a bit lower.

Garrett: On me, the sleeves would just look like… I’m way too stocky for these types of clothes.

Brady: Yeah, I don’t know.

Garrett: The designer stuff, it’s made for the Euro look. You know what I mean?

Brady: Yeah.

Garrett: Where you’re allergic to the weight room or something. It doesn’t fit-

Brady: I think it’s pretty bub. I just can’t believe that’s a medium. I just feel like if I got a medium shipped…

Garrett: It would just be a crop top on you?

Brady: Yeah.

Garrett: I’ve never seen the fit, though. I didn’t know they were doing that. That’s kind of cool.

Brady: A lot of sites do that. They’d say the…

Garrett: I don’t shop-

Garrett: … online,I

Garrett: guess. So that’s on me.

Brady: Yeah.

Garrett: I’m like a Neanderthal. But that’s awesome. I thought this was great, Brady. I thought this is a really cool call- out. But it is interesting to me that they’re a golf brand that wants nothing to do with golf. Can you go back to the homepage and scroll? I want to see if there’s any golf on the homepage.

Brady: Yeah, if you scroll down, it gets into the golf covers and bags, and-

Garrett: Okay. We got some golf-

Brady: … theygot up on that.

Garrett: …bags, pocket pants. Go up. Is that pickleball before golf, though?

Brady: Yeah.

Garrett: They did pickleball-

Brady: New positioning.

Garrett: … before golf.Yeah. And skiing. See that? Porsche, so driving. They have everything except… This is their co- op. It’s very… Yeah. See how she’s-

Brady: What is that?

Garrett: But the broken racket, I love it. It’s just a vibe. It’s disruptive. Move quick, break things, Brady. Tech. You know what I mean? It’s very much like… It is Equinox and Lacoste had a baby, avant- garde disruptive luxury.

Brady: Support breaking the equipment when most brands would be against it.

Garrett: “How could you? It’s against the rules.” They’re like, ” We’re going to be the trendiest rule- breakers of all time.” It’s working for them. Are they publicly traded? We go G/ FORE stock. Let’s see if there’s… Let’s see how they’re doing. I don’t think they’re traded, but let’s see. One funding. When did they get funding? Oh, they were acquired by Peter Millar.

Brady: Oh, there you go.

Garrett: In 2018. Okay, so they’re Peter Millar’s edgy… So go to Peter Millar. And Peter Millar is everything you think of when you think of golf.

Brady: Yeah.

Garrett: You want to know what your dad wears? Watch this.

Brady: But it’s funny how Peter Millar would never have this positioning.

Garrett: See?

Brady: So they just buy companies-

Garrett: Yeah. Exactly.

Brady: …so that they can…

Garrett: So that’s Peter Millar. This is what your dad wears. And I’ve had one of these. They’re so comfy. They’re going to sponsor the golfers. They’re going to go with the classic fit. See, this is more, frankly, what I’d be more comfortable wearing, something more like this. And then they have the retail store at Fashion Island or whatever. You know what I’m saying? And so it shows… The cool part is you’re Peter Millar, and you own G/ FORE, you don’t have to bet the house on rebranding Peter Millar hoping that-

Brady: You kind of have your alter ego going on.

Garrett: Yeah. You have your alter ego, G/ FORE. I love it. I think it’s brilliant from a strategy standpoint. Really, really cool ad, Brady. It was a cool conversation.

Brady: Yeah. Like I said, it was delivered to me, which was first. And I was like, ” Well, I don’t love it for these reasons. So do I show it?” But I thought it was fun. The fact that we both perceived it differently. I was curious how you would perceive it as well.

Garrett: I freaking love it. I love anything that’s creative and you swing for the fences on. But it’s very cool to… Shows how you become an edgy brand, and it’s do the opposite.

Brady: Yeah.

Garrett: “What are you,a golf brand? Perfect. Don’t show any golf. Oh, you want people to know what your product does? No, no, no. Make it completely vague. Abstract.” Right?

Brady: Yeah. It kind of called out golfers for faking it. I think that’s what that whole scene on the phone with the cop, it’s like, ” Yeah, we’re all on our phones when we drive. We’re a brand for normal people.”

Garrett: Yeah. Except there’s nothing normal about them.

Brady: Except for it was still very high- end and preppy.

Garrett: And$ 135 for a top.

Brady: Yeah. It still had, ” My dad’s a lawyer” vibes but-

Garrett: Yeah. Exactly. But like, ” My dad’s a cool lawyer,” which was like, ” Okay.” It works. There’s still plenty of money in that side of the market.

Brady: Yeah, definitely.

Garrett: And you can’t disrupt Lacoste by brand equity. You can disrupt them through disruption, though. And I think they’ve really leaned into that. And I thought that was pretty dope. But let’s talk Market This.

Brady: Cool.

Garrett: So Brady and I were at our spot.

Brady: Mitsuwa Mondays.

Garrett: We go to a Japanese market slash food court pretty much every Monday for a year now almost?

Brady: Well, it was even a spot prior-

Garrett: Before.

Garrett: Yeah, it was always-

Brady: Mitsuwa

Brady: Mondays was just-

Garrett: What it was.

Brady: …before we were remote.

Garrett: Have you ever actually gotten food anywhere else in that spot?

Brady: So I used to get the katsu curry.

Garrett: What I get?

Brady: No. It’s on the other side. It’s like katsu over rice with a bunch of curry.

Garrett: Can we try that next time? Because we… Okay. We only go to one spot. So we go to this food court, and we only go to the same spot every time.

Brady: Yeah. I just don’t eat heavy lunches anymore. So the beef udon, just some broth, some noodles, a little bit of beef is good. The katsu curry plate is a ton of food. So back in the day, lunch used to be my biggest meal the day, so I’d be more for a heavier lunch. But yeah, I guess we could try something new. They have a slushy beer. There’s a little frozen beer action if we want to get crazy on a Monday.

Garrett: Ooh. Little slushy beers?

Brady: I’ve never had one.

Garrett: Yeah. I have not had a slushy beer.

Brady: Yeah, I’m pretty sure there’s a station there.

Garrett: But we were there, which is our normal spot. And we were like, ” What should we talk about today?” And I said, ” Food court.”

Brady: Yeah.

Garrett: Because there’s some problems with food courts, Brady. And I’ve got some opinions on this.

Brady: Yeah. And some of them… I mean, you just see places die in food courts.

Garrett: I think I can fix food courts. I think I got some ideas.

Brady: I got some business model ideas myself.

Garrett: You do?

Brady: Yeah.

Garrett: Okay. Let’s start with the first biggest problem that is universal of every food court, parking.

Brady: Yeah. Like the HiroNori one?

Garrett: The HiroNori one? Exactly where I was thinking. Diamond Jamboree, which is not a food court, but it’s kind of like a food court. Mitsuwa, which is a legitimate… Inside a… When we’re saying food court, there’s two types. You got the new school outdoor food court, which is Orange County’s version of food trucks to a certain extent, which is a courtyard, and it has a bunch of 30×30 restaurants. So there’s no actual seating. And it’s all just walk up to the counter. And there’s, let’s say, 10 of them in a 1, 000 square foot radius or 4, 000 square feet radius. That’s what we’re referring to. They have those inside and outside. So Mitsuwa, it’s in a Japanese market, and then they have a bunch of Japanese food. But once again, they’re just vendors that you can walk up to, like a food court at the mall. Very much like a mall. The other one that we’re talking about, the HiroNori one, is more of an outdoor food court where it has a courtyard, but the same thing of just the walk- up stands, and it’s all shared seating in the middle. That’s what we’re referring to. They all have bad parking. Why is that? I think it crushes them, though, on… Because I don’t think people go to a lot of these places during peak hours because they can’t get parking.

Brady: Yeah. I guess I tend to only go during peak hours. Even I got my car up in Bellflower on Saturday, and we went to Rodeo in Garden Grove. I don’t know if you’ve ever been there.

Garrett: Rodeo?

Brady: I think it’s just-

Garrett: I’m just kidding.

Brady: I want to say it’s called… It could be Rodeo or Rodeo, but Rodeo’s too similar to Rodeo Drive. So I think it’s Rodeo. But anyway, it’s similar to HiroNori. It’s all indoors, just tons of spots. And the parking is crazy.

Garrett: It stinks.

Brady: I went to the restroom at the mechanic in preparation for knowing I’m not going to be able to park, and I already kind of had to go. And that was the case is I could not find a spot.

Garrett: Why is that?

Brady: I mean, I don’t know if they don’t expect the popularity that they get, and so that’s too risky to-

Garrett: I feel like they only have three spots.

Brady: … planthat much parking.

Garrett: I feel like it’s, like, three spots per stand or something like that. It doesn’t even make logical sense because if all the stands had a line, nobody could be there. It feels like the parking situation at a food court is predicated upon only half of the restaurants succeeding. Because if everybody actually went to… Think about Mitsuwa, where we just were. If we’re being honest, only two of them ever have a line. And we only go to one of them.

Brady: Yeah. But their-

Garrett: If they all had a line-

Garrett: …nobody

Garrett: could park there.

Brady: At least the time that we go, I always get parking.

Garrett: Correct. But if we went 30 minutes later, I don’t think-

Brady: Yeah. Then it’s tough.

Garrett: It’s tough.

Brady: And they have a full underground that we don’t even touch.

Garrett: There’s an underground?

Brady: Yeah. They have a parking garage there.

Garrett: Dude, you know how much the walls on there-

Brady: Your truck wouldn’t make it.

Garrett: No, I wouldn’t make it. There’s no way. Okay, so first thing’s parking. I want parking. I want to make sure every vendor who’s in our food court could be… If they were successful, would have parking available to their customers.

Brady: Are you going to try to make it just difficult enough to unlock some valet or not go that route?

Garrett: Well, let’s talk about that. The outdoor anti- malls, they also have parking issues, Brady. If you go to The LAB or you go to The Mix, you go to these places, it’s always hard to get parking. Parking, to me, is just, I think, from the development. It must be at the commercial level, at the developer. They try to maximize everything but parking. There has to be.

Brady: Yeah, enough spots to keep all the restaurant cycling and make the revenue, but they don’t want to overdo it.

Garrett: Well, in California’s different because we don’t have any public transit. So the only way you’re getting to one of these places is you’re driving.

Brady: Yeah. And maybe Uber, but I don’t know what’s happened with local Ubering since the pandemic. I don’t know if that’s-

Garrett: Do you Uber the food-

Garrett: …or you do DoorDash the food at this point? Youknow

Garrett: what I’m saying? In Southern California, you drive. And so these places just never have enough parking. So we got to fix parking. What else can we fix?

Brady: So Mitsuwa has a unique setup where they bus tables.

Garrett: I do like that.

Brady: Which is cool. It’s pretty unique.

Garrett: I feel so bad about it, though. You ever feel like… I’m used to it now, but first time I went there-

Brady: Yeah. I mean, I need to get better. I usually leave a dollar or two just under my tray.

Garrett: Ooh. Under the tray? A little surprise.

Brady: Even though if you go to Japan, it’s anti- tipping culture. So that’s always my excuse when I don’t do it.

Garrett: Yeah, yeah. ” They don’t want to be tipped. It’s authentic.”

Brady: You’re trying to honor the Japanese culture, yeah. No, we should tip them. But that, to me, is unique. So I was just thinking some type of reward system and…

Garrett: Loyalty to the food court.

Brady: Loyalty to the food court and loyalty to diversifying where you get-

Garrett: Kind of like when you go to a inaudible first.

Brady: … food, too, like, “Hey, we go here every time. What if there was a reward for us getting the katsu plate?”

Garrett: You know when you go to a conference, and they give you a map, and you got to get all the stickers, and the only way you get the stickers is by visiting all the booths?

Brady: Yeah.

Garrett: And that’s how they get foot traffic to the booths that are sponsoring the conference. We can do something like that.

Brady: So something like a system for the food court and even shared POS systems. I don’t know if there’s revenue goals for the food court in general, and that impacts your rent.

Garrett: So if you’re a loser, you pay more, like accelerated, decelerated rate?

Brady: Yeah, I don’t know. I was just thinking just the business model of food courts, like shared POS systems, a food court reward system that honors diversifying your choices and increases repetition. So those are more business models.

Garrett: So we own the food court and essentially… How are we going to promote these places too?

Brady: I don’t know about promotion, but I do think surveying and recommending the type of food that gets placed… Because what I see happens is a random spot goes in, and it either hits, or it tanks, and then it’s just out. But it’s like, was there any preparation, any surveying? Did the people want this type of spot here? I feel like we could layer that on.

Garrett: Well, a lot of them… Okay, so Diamond Jamboree, it’s intrinsically an Asian market, but I think if we were Diamond Jamboree, I think one of the value props to choosing Diamond Jamboree would be one, we have the audience that Asian people know that we have good Asian food here. And I do think some people just go to Diamond Jamboree and then see what they have, but they know it’s within a category of Asian food. So I think that’s clever, number one. Number two, I do think we can advertise and promote, and market the center. Each tenant can still advertise their own business, and I don’t think we should advertise any tenant individually but instead collectively promote the center to get foot traffic into the center. And we could do certain types of promotions. So I wanted to take something… It’s a little creative here, Brady, but I think you’ll like it. From Texas. So one of the cool parts about Austin, Texas, is every bar and every place you go always has two things, music and an outdoor area. What if we had a little bit of an outdoor area? Some tables, little picnic tables, a little space. I know it’s hard to get space around here.

Brady: Yeah.

Garrett: But if we could have a little bit of space, communal space. So I think if… You ever been to Brewery X?

Brady: Yes.

Garrett: So I’m thinking a micro version of that where 30- somethings that have families and kids could go and just kind of be in the chaos and get out of their house. And then live music. I think if we had some live music going on, and then we could promote what artists were going to be at the center, and if you added music plus a little community space to the area… Not so much that it took up the parking. We need parking. But if we could have parking plus space plus music, and we could promote that, I think people could start to like the center even more than they like the restaurants, and that could let us raise rents and just have a more compelling business.

Brady: Yeah. So I have a good example of this.

Garrett: Okay, let’s go. Let’s go.

Brady: I only know the coffee shop there. So if you look up Dark Horse Coffee. It’s a shipping crate center, but they had live blues music. So that’s the coffee place. And so I wonder what the center is.

Garrett: Can we see… Can you click on that photo? I want to see photos. They’ll probably show some. You’ll probably have some outside… See the outside photos?

Brady: Yeah. I just wonder what that whole center is called. SteelCraft. So SteelCraft is the place.

Garrett: Okay, so this is more what I’m talking about, yeah.

Brady: Yeah. So see if SteelCraft has a website now, please. I just had to find a route to find what the place was called.

Garrett: Yeah, yeah, yeah. So there’s a SteelCraft Garden Grove website.

Brady: Garden Grove.

Garrett: Yeah. Right there. Yes. Well, the food, the drinks, the people. ” There’s a place for you at the SteelCraft table.” Yes. So this is what I’m talking about.

Brady: They have a big- screen TV.

Garrett: Yeah. So this is like Packing House, too, in Anaheim.

Brady: Yeah, kind of like Packing House. But this is a good example where if we’re ever in that area, we’ll go to SteelCraft maybe because we know we want coffee-

Garrett: But you just know you’re going to get the vibe with this.

Brady: Yeah, we’re going to get something there. I don’t know what we’re going to eat-

Garrett: You can walk around, hold hands, take photos, put it on your story.

Brady: Oh, yeah.

Garrett: It’s a whole thing. It’s a date. That’s what the Packing House is. I don’t feel like people go to the Packing House just for the restaurant. I think they go for the Packing House.

Brady: I mean, the Indian food’s pretty good.

Garrett: It is good food there. But you can also, on your way out, grab a cookie or an ice cream or a coffee, and they kind of got it all there. They make going to the place a vibe. But once again, the parking sucks at the Packing House.

Brady: Yeah.

Garrett: Did the parking stink here?

Brady: So I have never had a hard time with parking.

Garrett: Do you just valet it, though?

Brady: No. I don’t think there’s a ton of parking, though. So I haven’t struggled with it yet. But I could imagine if-

Garrett: You could see.

Brady: …there was a big event there…

Garrett: Spring or summer weekend-

Brady: Yeah.

Garrett: …nice weather, going at-

Brady: I could definitely see us having an issue.

Garrett: …12:30 on a Saturday when it’s 75 degrees out, 80 degrees out may be a problem.

Brady: Yeah. So let’s make a place called The Structure. And it’s a parking structure, and it’s all built on top.

Garrett: Ooh. I like where your head’s at. We can use the top of the structure. I like that. Now, can we go to our vendors? I want to see how their marketing shop merge. I just want to see how they market it. Yeah, it’s this.

Brady: We can maybe check out their Instagram after.

Garrett: Okay. So they have all their different socials linked.

Brady: Yeah, they have the tags.

Garrett: With some photos. They got some workspaces too.

Brady: Oh, yeah, they have a whole workspace. One of the crates at the top is like an office for lease.

Garrett: That’s crazy. They got some vendors. Yep. Kind like the anti- mall style.

Brady: The Penalty Box, I think that’s… Who owns the steakhouse in Laguna Beach? Ex- Ducks player?

Garrett: No, that’s Selanne’s.

Brady: Yeah, I think-

Garrett: Oh, Selanne owns the inaudible.

Garrett: Oh,

Garrett: sorry. Okay. I’m like, ” That’s called Selanne’s.”

Brady: I know. Well, now I know. I didn’t know.

Garrett: But, dude, yeah, I like all this. So what can we do different, though? Is it open carry? Not gun, but alcohol?

Brady: I’m pretty sure. Yes.

Garrett: Okay. Because that part’s always, I think, nice. The Packing House is not.

Brady: Oh, I didn’t know that.

Garrett: You can’t take your alcohol outside of each restaurant because not everywhere… So you can’t walk around with it. So that was always harder at The Packing House. There’s a little bar area with no vibe, and all the vibe’s outside of you. But if you get a drink, you got to be away from the vibe because you can’t walk around with it.

Brady: So I had that this weekend in Rodeo is I asked the bartender because my wife was getting-

Garrett: That’s what I’m talking about.

Brady: I was getting a katsu sandwich. I was like, ” Can I take this beer-

Garrett: “To go.”

Brady: “…somewhere else?” And she said I could.

Garrett: That part’s nice.

Brady: But I think the common theme is as owners of this food court, we take ownership on the success of-

Garrett: The lot.

Brady: …each vendor.

Garrett: I would agree, yeah.

Brady: Because I know even SteelCraft, I think, they created a lot of cool things, but then maybe let it then run itself versus being the ones who promote, being the ones who survey the traffic and recommend and pitch the next thing to be in there.

Garrett: That’s hard to do, though, Brady. What happens when you’ve got an empty vendor, and you and I have got bills to pay? Because that’s what happened to the HiroNori one. HiroNori has a bunch of crap vendors. No offense.

Brady: Yeah, and there’s the timers. It’s a bunch of steel doors closed. It’s like, “Is it not open yet? Or are these spots just empty?”

Garrett: No, it’s always, like, 25% filled. And you could go every other month and see new popups dying there. And I do think that’s because of parking. I think that one’s so bad on the parking.

Brady: I think people go there for maybe only a couple spots.

Garrett: And no shade. Shade’s a big problem, too, because in the summer, a lot… Remember how hot that place would get? And there was no shade.

Brady: Yeah.

Garrett: Do they have shade at this one? Can I see-

Brady: Yeah, there’s a big coverage.

Garrett: Because the shade matters. Yeah, see, they got the marketing with the video and all that. So for us, we need shade. We need parking. Now, I think we would have to be really selective with the type of food we brought in. Because do you want two different Mexican joints, two different Japanese joints, two different Chinese joints? Or can you only have one of… No culinary competition. Because I think that would also help attract people. And then, maybe you have to have X amount of Yelp reviews with a certain score. So you have to have over a hundred Yelp reviews, all above four stars or something like that. I feel like you have to have some type of criteria.

Brady: Some standards, yeah.

Garrett: Because it’s always the case, the cream will rise to the top. Even, let’s say, a Brewery X. Have you noticed that everybody gets the pizza, but they don’t ever get the other cart?

Brady: Mm- hmm.

Garrett: All these places are like that. When you were here, were there some places that were just dead and then some that were slammed?

Brady: I haven’t been here in a while, but this weekend, yeah, that was the case for… I actually walked up to a spot where… The spot I wanted to go to moved locations. I was stoked there was no line, and I looked up, and I was like, ” Sorry man, this is the wrong place.” He was like, ” Yeah, they moved over here to the bigger spot.”

Garrett: What do we do about that? The no- line problem. Because what if we do have a great vendor who just doesn’t have a line?

Brady: Yeah. I think that’s where-

Garrett: But the food’s fire.

Brady: …the rewards and diversification, just having some type of program in place to influence, evening out the traffic.

Garrett: Because remember when we first started Directive, when we were at Executive Park, and they would do food truck Fridays? Three food trucks would show up. One would get a line, and two were dead.

Brady: Yeah.

Garrett: Every time. And it wasn’t always the same one. It was just, if you had a line… We’re all sheep. We’d go to the one with the line. How do you get lines for other people? I mean, I don’t know if stickers-

Brady: Paid actors.

Garrett: Paid actors? Okay. Do you get what I’m saying, though? The line is a powerful thing on these popups.

Brady: Yeah, definitely. No, I always joke with my wife, ” Is all about long lines.” That means it’s good.

Garrett: Yeah, I know. It’s just how we’re wired. In Texas… This is a funny little thing I learned about Texas when I lived there. They purposely understaff the register. You get your food instantly. The line is literally so that there’s a line. That’s their marketing. So they’ll have three registers, two are closed, only one person’s working. You order. By the time you find your table, they bring your food out. There is no actual capacity issue.

Brady: It’s like the barbecue place in San Juan. It does a good job at that.

Garrett: That’s what we’re talking about. Barbecue is pro at lines. They create the line to create the demand. It’s essentially manipulating supply and demand to create more demand. So how do we do that with ours? Maybe there’s a entrance to the food court, and you get a ticket. Nobody does that. I’m just thinking out loud here. Kind of more like the fair. You know how you have a line in the fair, but then you can buy food once you’re in the fair?

Brady: Mm- hmm.

Garrett: I’m trying to figure out how do we get a line for our food court so people are like, ” Oh snap. This place is…” Can we get everyone… I’m trying to make sure everybody has in line. If we could figure out how to get everybody a line, we’d be the best.

Brady: So-

Garrett: The line’s the trick.

Brady: Yeah. One way to do is have one place to order for everything. So no one knows what anyone’s in line for. They’re just all-

Garrett: So this is like a ghost kitchen to a certain extent? So you don’t order from each individual-

Brady: Yeah, you still have some type of storefront, but there’s like one place to order.

Garrett: That could work. I like that idea. It’s a little innovative.

Brady: You could better control the… Because you don’t want it to be a crazy line, but you could then control the line, essentially.

Garrett: You’d just have four POSs for-

Brady: There’s only one line. Yeah. Drop it to three if it’s too short of a line.

Garrett: And then we can see what percent of people are ordering your food. And if nobody’s ordering your food, we can have a hard conversation with you and say, ” Look…” Because if it’s not line- related, but instead product- related… Because essentially, I would argue, in the traditional food court, some places might have a good product, just none of us will trust them. Because we don’t really Yelp… Maybe we do. Do you Yelp the places when you’re at the food court, or are you just looking for lines, and you’re Yelping the food court?

Brady: I do not personally, but my partner-

Garrett: Do you know what I’m saying?

Brady: …in crime is definitely on Yelp.

Garrett: And she’s-

Brady: While we’re there.

Garrett: She’s checking them all?

Brady: Yeah. Yeah.

Garrett: Yeah, I check them all too.

Brady: More for the visuals of the food.

Garrett: Yeah, like, ” What’s been most ordered? What should I order here too?”

Brady: Yeah, just to look at actual photos of the food. I guess an opposite thing to lines would be mobile ordering. Take a little note from Disney.

Garrett: What do they do? I mean, you know what they do better than anyone.

Brady: So Disney, it’s all about mobile order.

Garrett: So you don’t order…

Brady: You don’t wait in line and then order. You just get on your app.

Garrett: How do they know where you are?

Brady: You put in your order, and then you say when you’re there.

Garrett: And they just bring it out?

Brady: And then they just say, ” Go to this window nine.” And you tell your code, and they give you your food.

Garrett: Really?

Brady: Yeah. It’s all mobile.

Garrett: What if we did it like a stock market and-

Brady: Like that bar in San Francisco?

Garrett: …you would discount the food that no one’s ordering or increase the price of food everybody is ordering from our centralized POS?

Brady: You see, that’s where… Yeah, I think the centralized POS-

Garrett: Give us some options?

Brady: Gives us a lot of…

Garrett: But the best restaurants aren’t going to want that because now they’re having to give away crap to the bad guys.

Brady: Yeah. But maybe that would just give them more control and visibility on the competition.

Garrett: Oh, I got an idea.

Brady: So they could have their own performance dashboard in comparison to their technically competitors.

Garrett: What if we only worked with already established brands? So what if it was a food court where it had Javier’s, it had JOEY, it had all the top restaurants, but they’re street food edition, and it was just exclusively in our food court? Because that would pre- baked- in demand for us. That’s actually a better idea.

Brady: I think that lowers the risk.

Garrett: That lowers the risk a lot.

Brady: Yeah. Because, obviously, there’s the hot new spot, and I still think that it would come with that vibe if it’s like a Javier spinoff-

Garrett: Correct.

Brady: …side project that’s not like a replica.

Garrett: That’s what I’m saying. So imagine we had Javier’s, Bear Flag, a different menu from In-N- Out, something like that where it was all of the top restaurants everybody knows.

Brady: The In-N- Out sliders.

Garrett: Exactly. In-N- Out sliders. Something like-

Brady: So like a slider shop.

Garrett: Yes. So if we just did the street food version of the top 20 restaurants in Orange County, that would slap. And then, they’d still have different lines, but we’d still have baked- in demand for all of them. And then, all of the fan favorites would still want to come visit to check out a different menu than they could get at the restaurant. And then, if things work there, maybe they bring it into the restaurant.

Brady: Yeah. It could be their test kitchen.

Garrett: Test kitchen. I actually like that plan of all the ideas we’ve had because you and I would have a lot less risk on that.

Brady: Or just the whole theme is test kitchen, where it’s an incubator for restaurants, but then consumers get to give feedback. If you go to Taco Bell headquarters, you can give feedback on their food.

Garrett: That’s true. Some people are better at test kitchens.

Brady: Is there a way to monetize that?

Garrett: Or standardize… Have you ever had someone when they try a dish for the first time, though, and they want you to be their… Some people’s test kitchens are pretty bad- tasting. Like, you know when you go to your buddy’s place, and he’s cooking something for the first time, he’s like, “Ooh, I wanted to try to smoke this type of meat for the first time”? I know I’m guilty of this.

Brady: It could be more of the story than the reality.

Garrett: Okay, good.

Brady: But it could have that baked in…

Garrett: Cucumber steak. And you’re like, ” I don’t know.”

Brady: Yeah.

Garrett: I think that could work, though. Or, you know, you could always do an all gluten- free type food court or something like that where at least if you chose your kind of tribe, and they were strong enough of a tribe, you could do well.

Brady: Yeah.

Garrett: Like, all- vegan food court.

Brady: Or require those options. But because I remember this place, I was actually impressed with the… Mexican spot with street tacos had, like, three vegan options.

Garrett: Really?

Brady: Yeah. So I hit up my buddy who I know they have a lot of dietary restrictions. Like, ” Oh, we should go here as a group because I think there’s great vegan food.”

Garrett: Yeah, ” You can find a spot. We don’t have to eat your crappy food.”

Brady: Big TV if there’s a game on.

Garrett: “Bradycan find his own food too.”

Brady: Yeah.

Garrett: Everybody wins.

Brady: So I think maybe having that as a requirement.

Garrett: Yeah. No, I agree. I agree. So, in closing, ample parking.

Brady: Yes.

Garrett: Strong marketing for the center itself.

Brady: Mm- hmm. Yeah, taking ownership of the success of everyone.

Garrett: High criteria for who’s able to get a lease at the food court, that it has X amount of reviews or quality of food-

Brady: Yeah, risk management.

Garrett: Some type there.

Brady: Because you lose a lot of money during that turnover.

Garrett: Yup. And then, ideally, lastly, in my opinion, if we could get the top 20 restaurants in the area to do a street food or test kitchen style set up there that had baked- in demand. In other words, it wasn’t a bunch of people no one’s heard of. No offense to these people, but I’ve never heard of their restaurants before. We go get some branding and some marketing that already exists. And then, what would we do for the advertising? We will run some geo- fencing on some Instagram and Facebook ads and YouTube and social media and Google and Yelp ads.

Brady: Invite the Yelper elites.

Garrett: Yeah, get the Yelp elites.

Brady: Do what we got to do.

Garrett: Get the Instagram foodie influencers there and just do good marketing. And then, live music, some type of communal area where you can hang out, good for young families.

Brady: Yeah. Like that brewery in Irvine in that business park.

Garrett: Yeah.

Brady: I think it’s Hangar 24th.

Garrett: Yep. Yep

Brady: Really good for family.

Garrett: Yep. If we do all of that, I think we’re going to be hard to beat, Brady. Hard to beat.

Brady: Yeah. SteelCraft, I think, is a good benchmark.

Garrett: Good benchmark. Good standard- bearer.

Brady: Yeah.

Garrett: Okay, well, we’re coming for you, SteelCraft.

Brady: CarbonFiberCraft. It could be that.

Garrett: Ooh, even better. I like that, Brady. Well, that’s Market This. Thanks for tuning in with us today.

Brady: And see you next week.

Garrett: See you next week. Bye to everybody.