George Kamel - Savannah Bananas: Millionaires In Cars Getting Coffee with Jesse Cole

Episode Date: November 7, 2025

In today’s installment of Millionaires in Cars Getting Coffee, I’m driving around with Jesse Cole, the mastermind behind America’s most entertaining baseball team: the Savannah Bananas. He’s sharing the money lessons he learned while climbing out of almost $2 million of debt and transforming a small-town team into a cultural phenomenon. Next Steps: • 🎥 Watch my video Millionaires in Cars Getting Coffee with Dave Ramsey. • 📈 Are you on track with the Baby Steps? Get a free personalized plan. • 💵 Start your free budget today. Download the EveryDollar app! Connect With Our Sponsors:  • Get up to 40% off Cozy Earth with code GEORGE. • Get 20% off when you join DeleteMe. Go to FAIRWINDS Credit Union for an exclusive account bundle!   Explore More From Ramsey Network: 🎙️ The Ramsey Show 🍸 Smart Money Happy Hour 💸 The Ramsey Show Highlights 🧠 The Dr. John Delony Show 💡 The Rachel Cruze Show 🪑 Front Row Seat with Ken Coleman 📈 EntreLeadership   Ramsey Solutions Privacy Policy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Is it true that the entire Banana Ball franchise is worth about a billion dollars now? Does that blow your mind? January 15, 2016, we got the call that we overdraft our account. We were out of money. We had to sell our house, empty our savings account, went into seven figures plus debt. Ideas are everything. We find a way to figure things out. And I'd rather find the way to figure it out, the way we've done it on who we are and what we stand for and say, here's an influx.

Let's just pay someone else to figure it out. There was no money. I mean, we ran out really quickly. There was no money. We had to sell merchandise to keep us going. We had to sell merchandise to keep us going. Things have just blown up. I mean, sold out stadiums, NFL stadiums getting sold out, millions of fans.

If MLB called and said, hey, we want to buy the whole thing, we're going to give you a billion dollars. You're saying no? You don't drink coffee. You've never had a sip of this stuff? I've never had a sip of coffee in my life. Some of our team said coffee wakes up and has a cup of me. All right, picture this. You're cruising down the road in a bright yellow Jeep, drinking your banana macho

protein drink, and in the passenger seat, a man in a full yellow tucks. Well, my friends, that's not a fever dream. That's just the day I had today. And you're going to love it, because I got to drive around with Jesse Cole, the mastermind behind America's favorite most entertaining baseball team, the Savannah Bananas. And in this video, he's going to share the money lessons he learned while climbing out of seven figures of debt and going from a small town team to a cultural phenomenon, now worth a billion dollars.

It's all coming up in today's installment of Millionaires and cars, getting caught. coffee. Jesse! Come on in, man. Here we go. How you doing? Fantastic. How are you? Thanks for taking a ride with us today. Let's do it. We got you a yellow Jeep that I understand is not the same shade. That's almost impossible. What would you call this shade? Highlighter? I wouldn't call it. This is banana yellow. Banana yellow. That's it. I love it. So here's a deal. You are the man in the yellow hat. I am George. Live action, Curious George movie. Thoughts. Oh, that's a good one. You know, every single day people ask me, you know, where's George?

So, you know, it would be nice to kind of separate them to actually have, you know, a live movie now. I'll travel with you if you want. No, no, I don't think, I can't be that person. I need to separate myself from that guy. That guy is legendary. Yeah, you're right. And who am I thinking I could play curious, George? That's some big hairy shoes to fill.

Yeah, I hear you. I hear you. I love it. So I saw this. I need confirmation. You guys sell tidy whitties in your merch store. Oh, we sell Dolce and Banana underwear, to be specific. Okay.

Yes, completely different things. Dolce and Banana. You have not been sued yet. No, because it's not Tolchian Banana. It's Dolce and Banana. Okay, perfect. So, yes, we have a banana. I didn't know if they took kindly to that.

We would know. We have a banana. I don't think they know. I don't think we're on their radar right now. Their lawyers aren't like, hey, we got to get the banana guy next. We're not selling hundreds of thousands of them. We may sell 1,000 or 2,000. You know what?

That's more tidy Whitey's than most merch stores sell. The most sports team. Yeah, well, whatever's normal. It's you and Spencer's gifts, holding the record for most tidy, witty-wit-sold. Whatever's normally the exact dog. We can't just sell, we can't just sell shirts and hats. You've got some things that are different. Well, I'm curious, that got the green light.

What merch didn't get the green light because it was too, too wild? It's for stuff that the team brought to you, or you thought and like, hey, we literally. I don't know. I mean, we have, you know, the party emols are our second team who's got over six million followers. Their mascot is Farty with a P. And he's the gaseous mascot in sports. and we actually sell a bubblehead of him that actually

passes gas. So that got the approval. So we've really started this with the underwear and the potty humor. This is an interesting start for us. Which is what adults want, and it's what kids want. So you've got something for literally everyone. Yeah, I guess that's what we're trying to do. Wow. Well, you guys have been countercultural for a long time.

That's kind of your M.O. is like, let's do the weird thing that nobody is doing. It's fun. It's fun to do things that are different. I think, you know, we try to create something that we would love that gives, that makes us excited. If you have the same games happening every single night, it's boring. You know, it's not been the only boring, but boring for you. And so we do hundreds of these all over the country. So that's why we do new things every single night. I think that's what it's all about.

Just to keep you excited. So you don't get bored. Well, I think it goes into, you know, the greatest creators. You think about, you know, George Lucas said this. He wanted to create a movie that he would love. Same thing with the Pixar guys. You know, they wanted to create things that they love. Steve Jobs, you know, he was the, as the, you know, as the, you know,

phones. He was looking at the phones and they were like they were clunky and he's like no I want to create a phone that I would love. I think the greatest creators often do that if you start with something on what would make you excited what make you passionate about it do that and there's probably a lot others that that will follow well I've watched a lot of you know interviews with you and I've gotten to interview on the entree leadership podcast years ago yeah on the Ramsey network and I remember leaving going this guy he really means it like you are obnoxiously positive and I mean that so lovingly A mid-state culture that is very cynical. Like, do you think part of banana ball and what you've created is beyond sport?

And it's just like, we're just out here being positive and having a good time and people are craving that. Yeah, I mean, I think the world is certainly hungry for it. I think even more so, not just on the, you know, the skepticism and negativity that's out there, but also the digital revolution as you see people on their phones and, you know, the isolation that's happened from that. And I think there's certainly a need. But for us, we surround ourselves with like-minded people that want to have fun. And we put on a show every night. We're not playing a game.

We're putting on a show. You know, when you have a dad-bodd cheerleading squad called the Mananas. I love that. The Banana-Nanas. And your players are dancing every game and lip-sinking and doing full performances. It's hard not to feel the joy. And so I think it's contagious. And I think that's what drives us is to spread that.

And so you can feel it when we do an NFL stadium with 60 or 70,000 people or a college football stadium with 80,000. It's like you can feel it. I think the world could use a little bit more of that. So we're going to double down on it and keep doing more of it. I love it. Well, I'm curious. I saw you guys on Jimmy Fallon.

Yes. Incredible performance. And I was thinking about the mananas that are out there cheerleading. And I went, did these guys when they were kids think, one day, I'm going to be on Jimmy Fallon cheerleading with my belly hanging out? How do you cast those guys? You know, it's funny. A few of them, we had our fans first talk. So after every weekend series, we were at Yankee Stadium that weekend.

and one of the man, Anna's, Mr. Kay, it looks like Mr. T. He said, our dreams came true. We got to be, I never thought I'd be doing this. I'd be on Jimmy Fallon. So exactly what you're saying. No, I think the goal was with everybody on our team, everybody on our staff, everyone on our cast, we want anybody when you're a kid or older to feel like that you could be a part of it. So to give you an example, it's very hard to think that you can be the next show Hey Otani or Mike Trout or, you know, any of these, Steph Curry. You know, they're just, they're, they're so good.

You know, there's only a handful in the world that can have the town. Once in a generation place. Exactly. But, you know, we have Princess Potasia and we have little girls that want to be Princess Potasia. You know, we have the Banana Nanas and we have senior citizens that want to join the Banana Nanas. We have the Dad bought cheerleading squad, the Mananas. And yes, dads reach out to us wanting to be a part of it. Even our umpire, our dancing umpire.

Oh, he's fantastic. You don't have to. A torquing umpire. A hundred percent. And I think that's what's really cool of what we're trying to and not only should have been us, but with all of our teams, anybody can resonate with someone on our cast, on our team, and our characters. I mean, stilts, our player on stilts, like, it's amazing what he does,

but he wasn't an unbelievable baseball player. He got on stilts and he showed that he could hit the ball. And now, you know, literally kids will dress up like him for Halloween and get small stilts and be out there. So I think that's really kind of a big part of what we try to do is make sure everyone feels like they belong or that they could aspire to be something in our our show. Yeah. Well, I've, I've loved watching the success and even last few years since I've interviewed you. Things have just blown up. I mean, sold out stadiums, NFL stadiums getting sold out, millions of fans. But I wanted you to take us back to 2016. You can correct me if I'm wrong. You just sold your house to make payroll. 1.8 million dollars in debt. You're

sleeping on an air mattress. And here you are less than a decade later. Walk us through what was happening then and how you climbed out of it. Well, we were a brand new team in a new in a market that had professional baseball for 90 years. So you think about this at that point, you know, before we built banana ball and built our own league, we were a college summer baseball team. That doesn't sound that exciting. It's like, oh, did you hear about the college summer baseball team coming to the city? Like, they had minor league baseball. They were in New York Mets affiliate. They had top prospects. They had some of the best players in the country play there. But they still weren't attracting fans. Like they were the lowest in the league in attendance. And so the

team wanted a brand new stadium. The city said no, and they left. And we were the next team that was expected to fail. Like, we were expected to fail. And so we came in. And so, of course, people aren't jumping up and down. They're here. They're here. They're finally here. So, yeah, we only sold a handful of tickets in our first few months. And January 15, 2016, we got the call to be overdraft in our account. We were out of money. And we had to sell our house. Empty our savings account. Went into seven figures plus debt. And I don't blame the community. They had no reason to support us. We hadn't done anything for them yet. We hadn't shown them anything. We were just talking about what we were going to do. And you can talk, talk, talk and talk.

What are you going to show it? You know, Steve Jobs said that said, no one knows what they want until you show it to them. We had to show them that our experience was different than what they saw the last 90 years or what they expected to be actually worse because it was a lower level of baseball. And so we had to get to that opening night. We had to convince fans that it was going to be different. And then we had to actually prove ourselves. So yeah, we had a banana baby that opening night We put a baby and we lifted up and everyone saying, nah, Savannah. You know, we had the first banana that we threw out. We had the banana band.

We had the players dancing. We had, you know, players delivering roses to little girls in the crowd. And we had all these moments that were different. And the whole stadium was all inclusive. So you couldn't get a ticket without including all your food and all these little things. And so after that, they started to feel it. They started to experience it. And that's how we started selling out games and playing traditional baseball until we had to disrupt ourselves again.

and say we're leaving traditional baseball what got us there and we're going to do something that's unproven and no one wants and that's when we created banana ball and we just had a feeling that this is what would be best for our fans even though no one wanted us to do that wow so how much were you paying attention to the money side as all this was transpiring was it a goal to like we got to make enough to get payroll get out of debt like there was no money thinking there was no money Survival. There was no money. I mean, we ran out really quickly. There was no money. We put the little that I had in our savings, I think it was $25,000 just to get us to the next, you know, payroll and to get us through the month. We had to sell tickets to keep us going. We had to sell merchandise to keep us going.

I probably paid attention more to where our accounts were there because I never wanted our people. I never wanted to miss payroll. I never wanted our people to suffer. And so, yeah, we paid attention to it, but it was more just how do you create a great experience. How do you sell out a game? How do you sell out two games? How do you get fans to want to come to the games? So that's where we put all of our focus on and then Fortunately because the experience was so different than anywhere else we start selling on games and that started going all right now we can start to pay off this debt and climb out of this Yeah, we were better place yeah we got out of debt you know relatively soon after my wife and I got off the airbed and about a year after and Probably good for your marriage. It was it was that was our first year married and so within a few months we had to sell our house after What did I sign up for?

Of course she was, but she was so supportive, so behind it. You know, she grew up with a humble, humble start as well. And, you know, she was making 19,000 at her first job right out of college. So, you know, we knew how to, you know, deal with challenges and adversity and not having everything handed to us. So, yeah, and so then we started selling on games. We won a championship of our first year. We won more championships. But we realized even with all the entertainment and all the selling out, fans were still leaving games early.

And that's when we realized there was a fundamental problem with the game of baseball. And that's when we started saying, if we could create our own game from scratch. and eliminate all the boring parts, the slow parts, the parts that aren't great for the fans, let's do it. And that's when we started, went to our idea book, it started writing down ideas. And that's where the origin of banana ball started. Yeah, I love the rule, like the no bunting, no mound visits.

Like, cut all the stuff where you just look away and want to look at your phone. And I heard you actually watched, like, footage of the stadium. What were people doing? When did they get bored? Yeah, well, we had to be, you know, again, you can, I never want to do surveys because, you know, people don't know what they want until you actually show it to them. Like, what sport would you want? Like, they don't know.

They don't know. You know, Henry Ford's have asked people what they want. They would have said faster horses. Like, no one's going to say, I want banana ball a game with a two-hour time where every inning counts for a point. You can't step out of the batters box. There's no bunting. There's battering. You can have a showdowns.

There's a golden batter rule. Like, no one would have said all that. Fans can challenge plays, like all these rules that we put into play. So we just started from scratch and said, all right, let's just try it. And that's where it starts. And so we did a one city world tour. And that one city world tour is kind of a big piece for us. We talk about it regularly in our organization.

One city world tour. Start small, dream big. And so that's how we do everything. So start small, dream big. So we got one city to agree to host this brand new game called Banana Ball. And we played there in Mobile, Alabama. And only 3,500 people sold out by small. The Bay Bears.

There you go. Well, well played. Well played. Well played. And sold it out and learned a ton and said, let's go to seven cities next year. And let's go to third. 30 or three cities. So you start small. And Dave, Dave says it this way from the Bible. Don't despise

humble beginnings. And you guys had that like, hey, it's fine. We don't need to go big tomorrow. Yeah. We should do the next right thing. Thousand percent. And the other core value that, you know, is speaking to me that we have a Ramsey is if you help enough people, you don't have to worry about money. We call that marketplace service. And in your, your world, it's if you entertain enough people, you don't have to worry about money. If you bring joy and, you know, the definition of entertain is to provide amusement or enjoyment. And again, I think the world is hungry for enjoyment, and we can all provide it. So I was like, how are we going to, you know, bring some more enjoyment, some more fun, some more joy?

And so that's what we started building. I love it. Well, hey, this is millionaires and cars getting coffee. So I thought, we got to get coffee. But I know, famously, you don't drink coffee. You've never had a sip of this stuff? I've never had a sip of coffee in my life. What if you love it?

Well, that's one way of thing. Yeah, some of our team who knows me very well, they said coffee wakes up and has a cup of me. because of from an energy standpoint. It's the most Chuck Norris crossover. Never heard the Chuck Norris, but I like that. But yeah, no, I just, I wake up, I never have an alarm. I wake up with energy. I'm very fortunate.

I do things that give me energy. So, yeah, I drink water. Does your wife drink coffee? No, she doesn't have coffee either. Is it allowed on that house? We don't have coffee in our house. We just don't do it. I mean, she's had some long road trips where she's actually dabbling in coffee.

So I open your fridge, nothing in there as far as liquids go. There's lots of fruits, lots of vegetables. Emily's obsessed with eating healthy for our kids. There is, and there's, yeah, it was water. Would you consider her a crunchy mom? So my wife's into the crunchy mom lifestyle. I've heard a little bit, you've got to explain to me a little more. It's a very clean ingredients.

You know, no processed food. But also, I'm obsessed with cookies. I've been on a quest to find the best cookie in America. So I've done cookie reviews all over the country. Are you the Dave Portnoy of cookies? I don't know if I'd call me that, but I'm obsessed with cookies. COVID, you know, had a lot of, you know, impact on a lot of people, a lot of different things. For me, is cookies. I just, I really indulged

in cookies and I haven't slowed down. What's, what's your like, if you could give me a top three? Oh, well, I have a spreadsheet. Can people go find the spreadsheet? Well, LeBain Bakery in New York City, that's my top one. Okay, now I know you're a real one for mentioning LeVane. Then, surprisingly, I don't know where at number two, treat cookies in Seattle. They reached out to us and I was blown away. A little seesol on top soft, very gooey, fantastic. And then bacon babes down in Florida. So those are my top three. But there's been, I've done a lot. I've done a lot. I've done a lot of cookies. What's on the last one on the list? If you can put them under the bus. No, I won't do that, but it's hard cookies. If you're a hard cookie, get out of your mess. It's got to be a soft cookie.

If it's just hard. If you have lots of crumbs, we've got issues. Get out of here. Before we get back to Banana Land, allow me to show you how you can peel your personal data off a bunch of shady data broker sites. See what I did there? Okay, I'll see myself out. But you can do that by using Delete Me, the sponsor of today's video. They'll comb through hundreds of these data broker sites that are out there selling your information, and they'll use it against you for spam, scam, and other nefarious activities. So if you want to help protect yourself

against these things, just use Delete Me. Their data privacy experts work all year long to remove your information off of these sites, and they even send you a report showing you what they did and how much time they've saved you. I'm currently sitting at over 100 hours saved, which is more time to watch Dancing with the Star Season 34, which is, it's heating up, guys.

You've got to check it out. You can also check out, Delete Me, and get 20% off their annual plans by going to join deleteme.com slash George or use the link in the description. All right, let's get back to the road. Hey, be right with you? Sure.

Do you have anything banana flavored? Banana matcha. Banana matcha. Is that like a banana coffee drink? Is that a coffee drink or no? No. Look at that. She put it on the screen for you.

It's a protein mat. That sounds very healthy. I think your wife would approve. That scares me in many ways, but with you, I'll try it. We're going to go for it. I can't believe that. I have a man who loves all things banana on this vehicle, so thank you. Yeah, and then let me actually double check.

You're looking for something. He doesn't want to be caffeine. Something refreshing, no coffee. Refreshing, but no coffee in it. I think that'll do it. I don't think that has caffeine. It does have caffeine, but it's going to have less than even, like, espresso shop. Oh, okay, like, it's a minimal amount because matcha has a natural.

You're making me do it. Let's go. All right, we're doing it, and then I will do. How about the iced brown sugar oat milk shaking espresso? I didn't want to have to say it all, but there it is. Can I do that but like half sweet? Half sweet. With blonde espresso with a restretto.

Yes, I got you. Can I do a smaller or not a grande? Yeah, can he do like a tall instead of a grande on that banana? Smallest amount. Yeah. I got you. Okay, perfect. What else?

That's it. I think we've overdone it today. Go on around. All right, thank you. All right. Can they see us? They have a little camera. Do they?

Yeah. Because she was getting very giggly. I think that might just be her personality. It could be. We'll find out at the window. If they, because they could know who you are. There's no way.

There's no way. Although it is fun when we have, you know, celebs in here like you. And I go, hey, you're a fan. And they go, no, I don't know who that is. They may be. I was with Mike Rowe. And I was like, you know,

he's like, I can't place him. They may be a fan of Curious George. That's my, what might be happening. I think that's what could be happening. We're going to a curious sports theme birthday party. You know, what do you make. making me drink. You're making me drink this thing. It sounds delicious. I'm shocked they had a banana flavor drink on the menu because who's asking for that? It's green. It's bright green because of the

macha. What is he's a match? If your wife is watching, she'll go, wow, I can't believe you made him drink matcha. Macha? It's a like a fine powder that's from the eastern origins that's known to have a lot of benefits. Macha. That was probably the worst definition of matcha. I apologize. If someone please explain what masha. It tastes like grass. That sounds terrible. You live on grass. What? No, what does that mean? I live on... You're always on the field. Yeah, some fields are turp, but I don't live on there. You love the smell of fresh-cut grass.

I can live somewhere. I'm not going to eat it. I don't get on the... It's like, hey, guys, before we start a show tonight, let's all eat some grass. And that's what you're making me do right now. I can't wait for this experiment. Here's like, if you hate it, you can... That's why I try to go small. But the tall from the grande was like 70-cent difference. It wasn't even...

That's how they get you. And that's called price anchoring in the biz. In the biz. I'm teaching your business lesson today. We're spending $6.25 on grass and banana. You know what? It's Dave Ramsey's money and we're paying cash. That's all that matters.

We're not taking out any debt on this. I started this segment so I could get free coffee at work. It makes sense. And I am using a debit card for everyone wondering. Yes. They go, well, how do we know that's not a, it's a, can you business debit? Business debit. I'm not going to show you the number.

So we're certainly not taking a loan out for this. No, we're not doing buy now, pay later on your banana matcha protein. Starbucks is, I think they're just. putting drinks on the menu just to see, just to mess with people. I guarantee I'm the only one that bought this today. Like, where's the focus group? They went, they want banana and macha together. And if you don't know on machas, just think grass from the eastern civilization as you

describe it. I don't know what influencer caused young women to love macha, but it just tastes like a root vegetable in your mouth. I am petrified of this drink. Like, I'm actually scared. I'm so nervous. My fear is at an all-time high. Like, there's not, you can put me in front of a 10,000 people, 100,000.

It seems like you get nervous. About this drink, I am petrified. What if you instantly vomited? You know, we have it on camera, though. That's a great story. A great moment. But do you have multiple tuxes? I got to give a speech tomorrow, and this tuck would be done.

Wait, you only have one? No, I brought, I got two. I had three on the weekend. One went home with Emily. I got two left. Okay, I opened her closet. How many tuxes are in there? There's nine yellow tuxes.

And how many normal person clothes? Zero normal clothes. No, I have another closet. On the weekends? There's two closets. Nights and weekends? There's a yellow tux closet, and then there's a dad closet. Okay, with normal dad gear, like cargo shorts.

I'm trying to picture what you even look like outside of the house. I have my running clothes in the morning. I run in the morning. So that's shorts and a shirt. I wear this, and then I don't wear this. Okay. And then, yes, or if I'm, I wear shorts. So 100 degrees, or you're still in the tux?

If I'm working. But if I'm a dad, I'm in bathing suit, maybe I'm swimming with the kids. Okay. Is it banana theme or you say? I have a yellow bean suit. Hello. Yeah, I understand the banana. I told him he's obsessed.

I can't get him away from bananas. Okay, I got you. Are you a straw guy? I was just going to chug it. Yeah, no, a straw. A straw is a sipper? A straw is fan. I will need a straw.

For safety. Just for safety. Oh my gosh. That looks like. This is called a tall. This is a tall. It looks like baby poop. Is this baby food?

Is this baby food? No, seriously. like, are you sure? I am so scared. Are you a fan of the Savannah Bananas? Oh, this is amazing. Thank you. We just made a new fan. Thank you so much.

Google it, thank me later. Yes, yes. Tell your coworkers say I ran into it, and they're going to be like, who? No, you didn't. Not the bananas guy? All right, I'll stop holding up the line. Have a good day.

This color, George. Hold it up to the camera so they can see. George, this color. Look, I have three kids under seven. I have seen so many things come out of kids. I have a newborn. I changed a diaper that look just like that. That literally is what I'm drinking.

Like, you chose this for me. Like I have seen. You chose it. You just yelled banana. Water. You said banana. Yeah, again, water's safe. Water's safe.

This is, I, like, there's stuff going on in here. That's the matcha. All right, take a sip. Let us know what you think. Thank goodness. I have an extra water here. I need like a. You're going to need to wash it.

I need a chaser. But what is. It's actually delicious, and you've been missing out on banana and a macha. All right. Do you already have a sip of yours? Yeah. Mine tastes like a normal drink. A normal drink.

Yeah. Oh, Jesus. Good. All right. Good luck. Here we go. Wait, I just don't. It's a very complex.

It's like you want to say there's a lot going on. There was a lot going on. And yet not a else. At first, at first, no. At first it felt like a treat. And then it was like, oh, machas like, I'm here. I'm here to sign. Is the banana coming forth?

No, like, I felt like, it felt like, it felt like, a banana dessert at first. It's like, oh, okay. And then macho's like, no, no, no, I'm here. Just let you know, hold it. I'm going to add something that's not going to be good to the ending taste. This is the worst marketing for Starbucks banana matcha protein drink. I probably shouldn't say that. It's fine. We'll make sure to clip this out text. No, Starbucks, it was a great start. No wrong. You just don't like macho. It was a great start. I just, I don't know if I'm a macha man. Macha, mach a man. I'm going to do sip number two. How many steps am I legally required to drink of this? At least four.

I feel bad for Dave the cost for this. I mean, I've... All right, I think we can go now. I was waiting for this guy. All right. Second sip was better. Macha was like, I'm not going to dominate as much. It's growing on you.

Or I think Macha was like, I'm going to chill for this one, because I want him to have more of me. Yeah. So I'm going to slow down my Macha, you know, integration here. This is getting better. Yes. This is getting better. I am not a full convert of the Macha ways.

Oh, my God. I can't wait for this like 20 milligrams of caffeine to hit you. You're going to be a whole new man. Yeah. I'm very nervous about that. I'll probably get a headache because I only drink water. So I should not have more of this. I apologize.

So speaking of money, you keep your prices for these tickets. It's $40 to $60. Yes, 35 in minor league parks. And you could charge way more. You choose not to. Yes. It's giving Arizona iced tea CEO vibes. Oh, yeah.

A lot of respect there. Yeah, we haven't raised the prices coming the same, keeping the same again next year, even though everyone tells us we need to. Are your costs going up? Oh, yeah, 100%. Well, we're paying more people when we're taking care of more people. 100%. Because you travel with like 200 people. You guys are rolling deep. 200 MLB tours and 150 in the minor league tours. And we're going to have three multiple tours going

next year. Wow. So there will be, and then we also hire two to 400 or 500 or 500 at NFL stadiums on the road. So next year, there will be about 500 people on the road for our three tours and we'll hire another 1,000 or so. That's amazing. So the expenses are significant. How do you keep it profitable? Like obviously ticket prices are there. Do you do partnerships? Like what other ways does the business bring in? Partnerships, partnerships and broadcasters less than 1% of our right now, less than 1% of our business model. So it's tickets plus merch? Yeah, merchandise is a very significant part of our business.

Very significant. And that's like the lion's share. It's just tickets in merch. And because you guys are selling out every single stadium you're in. Yeah. And you know exactly how much you're going to like. And most people are buying merch. So you guys have blown up.

You now have more social media followers than every MLB team. That's got to feel a little bit vindicating. Well, we're not competing against them, but I know people put that. Yeah. I mean, it's, I think, between our teams now, we have like 32, 33 million social media followers. Yeah, I mean, the party animals have more followers than every major league baseball team on TikTok. So they're like... That is amazing.

So, yeah, I mean, but again, focus on your customers, not your competitors. We don't spend, you know, the last time I checked, MLB never wrote us a check. So, you know, so I'm focused on our fans. Are they spooked by you guys? No, they're doing great. Their attendance went out for the third straight year. They got the pitch clock. Is it a rising tides lift all ship situation where you're bringing more attention?

to baseball in general? I think everyone's aware of what needs to happen to make baseball more exciting, more entertaining, and more fast. I think they have some very smart people in each one of their teams and them will be off. So I think what we're all doing is trying to build fans. It's just we have different ways.

They're going to build it with the most talented players in the world. We're trying to build the most entertaining players in the world. Wow. So it's just two different ways of looking at it. So I don't know, you know, you read articles and you hear rumors. Is it true that the entire Banana Ball franchise is worth about a billion dollars now? Does that blow your mind?

Yeah, I mean, again, it's that and I don't put any time thinking about it. Yeah, maybe on paper, and we've been valued that for a few different places. And it doesn't change anything for me or this organization. What we focus on is one fan at a time. And that's not cliche. It's like, again, I'm not interested in a billion dollars. It's not going to change the way we do things. We are investing heavily in our cast, our staff, our players,

and our broadcast and our merchandise and our ticketing in our organization. And we're just re-investing to try to create a better product and experience for our fans. Wow. So if MLB called and said, hey, we want to buy the whole thing, we're going to give you a billion dollars. You're saying no? They could offer $100 billion. I mean, it would be no in a second. It's just not for sale.

It's priceless. We love what we do. And we get to do what we do. And we're able to control the experience. And there's no thought at all on a return. There's no thought at all on trying. How do we bring in more revenue? The thought is on how do we create more fans?

Anytime you have someone else that buys something or an investor or a shareholder, the number one thing they want is a return. That's why they invest. That's why they buy something. R-O-I. Correct. And so for us, me and Emily, we were living on an airbed down to our last dollar, and we were loving what we got to do. And so we don't need a return.

We don't need R-O-I. We just need to create more fans. And that's what we focus on. And the stated goal is a billion fans. Yeah, we want to create a billion fans, and I believe we're going to do it. And again, people would say, well, you know, if you got a big influx of capital, You could do that faster. No, no.

We want to learn doing it the way that we've done things, and that's who are. We don't want to just pump money into something. You want to go through it and do it the way that fits our values. And our values is always bad. We've been scrappy. We've been relentlessly resourceful ideas or everything. We find a way to figure things out. And I'd rather find the way to figure it out the way we've done it on who we are

and what we stand for it and say, here's an influx. Let's just pay someone else to figure it out or pay someone else to do that. No, I want us to find. I want us to get our hands dirty. I want to get in the arena and figure it out. That's what fires me up. Yeah. So no investors.

No, zero investors. It's all just you guys figuring out ways to create better experiences, which then creates more revenue, which means you can reinvest. Our fans support us. You know, there's not many organizations that are as fortunate as we are to sell out every single stadium and have a wait list that's approaching four million. And the merchandise, you know, we have a giant warehouse now. We're shipping merchandise all over the world daily.

I mean, that... So we've gone international. Is there any aspirations to take this? We'll play international at some point, but not yet. And I think we get asked that question a lot. And we've got offers to go to a lot of different countries. The answer is not yet because the reality is there are towns in Montana and North Dakota and South Dakota and Oregon and Washington and New Hampshire, Delaware, that haven't seen us play yet.

And so I want to bring our game to all them. I want to create fans. There's still so many fans in the United States. So you think about Chick-fil-A or Southwest, you know, Southwest dominated Texas first. Chick-fil-A dominated the Southeast and starting with Georgia, become really good at one market. Expand Northstroke, Seattle, we're going to do Seattle really, really well before we start building with the malls of America. And so we still have a lot to learn. And we got to figure out how to go to these small little markets or, you know, continue to do football stadiums and even bigger

football stadiums. And so we got a lot to learn. And again, you're playing the long game. If you were to say five years ago, five years ago, we hadn't even played a banana ball game. And now we got a league with six teams playing all over the country. So, you know, Zoom out. Five years from now, yeah, there's probably a good chance we'll be playing international. Is there a spot for me on the team for someone who may not have the athletic ability? Well, like I was saying, you know, you don't have the man antibody. So the question would be, what can you do?

Yeah, I'm not dad bought enough. Yeah, you don't have that. So the question is, what can you do that? I'm scared of heights. I can't do the stilts. Yeah, we're not going to make that work. So then what can you do that's different or remarkable? I can skateboard.

I can play instruments and sing. Can you ride a skateboard while playing instruments and singing? Yes. Okay, so that's unique. Do I need to do it on the dirt? We'd have you on the dugout probably. You'd be on top of the dugout? All right, I'm in.

And so if that was like, all right, now please welcome George, the skateboard singer. I can fit small spaces. So if you need me to do like a Trojan horse situation, I can like pop out, you know, like Ace Ventura style out of the rhino. I think there's something there. Okay. You know, we had a contortion. We had a contortion. coach first a year or two ago.

That was one of the weirdest things I've ever seen because they were putting their arms and legs around their body. And I was trying to get them to call signs, but they were from a different country and didn't speak English. Oh, boy. And so they were just contortioning at first, which was really tough to watch and tough not to watch. Yeah.

Well, I mean, you've got to try things to know if they're going to work. Have there been any failed experiments where you're like, we thought this would land and it was atrocious? Every day. I mean, what's the latest one? You're like, this was a gamble and it did not pay off. Oh, geez. Where do you have to?

What about the bagpipes? How did that go? Oh, yeah, that was that was bad. That was the halftime show. I mean, we almost did. Our team really, we were so close to it. I'm glad we did. It was called Don't Drop the Baby. And so we had all these baby dolls. And they were practicing literally before the game slingshoting them from the upper deck. And dads had to catch them. I'm very glad we didn't pull the trigger on that because that was not a, yeah, that's not a good look.

There's not, there's no amount of context that could make that. Oh, that was fun. Yeah, I mean, it was. Swing fake babies across. Yeah, so I'm glad we said no to that. Instead, we did like a ZZ Top race in Houston with kids dressed up like ZZ Top. So that was, you know, that didn't fail. That's, but yeah, I mean, yeah, there's been, there's the pregnant women danceoffs, women in their third trimester dancing to something. Pepper's push it. That was interesting. Well, speaking of women, you guys have included women. Oh, yeah? You know, on the teams. Was that an intentional decision? Like, how do that come about? Banana ball is one of the most unique games that no matter what your background, we can find a place for you to be successful.

So like Stilts, for instance, you know, he didn't play high-level baseball, but he had one of the best ERAs of any pitcher last year because he's pitching on stilts. Same thing like with some, there's some unbelievably talented women out there that have played baseball and played softball at a high level. And, you know, in the right situations, I mean, Annaball, because every inning counts for a point. The worst thing that you can do is lose an inning, and it's only one point. So even if you'll have six runs, you're not going to get, it's not going to completely impact the game. And so, you know, we've, we've dabbled and had some amazing women, Jocelyn Allenow and Val Perez and Ashton Lansdale. And then having Kelsey Whitmore join us this past year. The bananas in pitch, you know, she's had some great success.

And so, yeah, that's going to be something that grows. My goal would be every single team in Banana Ball to have a women superstar that could really continue to inspire young girls to not just want to play softball or baseball, but to play Banana Ball. I love it. Well, hopefully my two-year-old girl one day, she'll audition for the team. If she has my athletic ability, we're screwed, but we'll see. She'll figure something out. So you built an amazing level of wealth over the last 10 years as a byproduct of entertaining a whole lot of people. What do you still feel like is a waste of money? Are there things that you're still like weirdly frugal about, even though you have the money to do it? You're just like, it feels weird paying for that thing or delegating that thing.

That's interesting. Between you and your wife, are you the safer, she's the spender? No, no, no, we don't buy clothes. I mean, we spend, meals are important part of our life. You know, we're feeding, you know, we got three kids and, you know, we indulge, we spend on meals. We invest a lot. I mean, we do healthy meals, we do, I do DoorDash, I probably spend a silly amount on that. We don't buy clothes, like, at all, like, literally we, we don't buy any new clothes for ourselves.

I don't know if Emily's bought something since, like, college. Wow. So we don't spend money on clothes. You're just like the stuff we have is fine. Yeah, we're just like, it's fine. We're not trying to impress anybody. This is who we are. You've been on trend for a long time.

I've been wearing this for years. And you have nine of them? You have nine of them. Are you looking to expand or you have it was nine? It's a good number because, you know, I usually have to put a few away at the end of the year. That's one for every day plus two laundry days. Yeah, but then they get beat up so off to probably replenish the soon. Yeah, any rips, tears?

Oh, every day. Because I can I ask where you get them from? Are these custom? Well, it started at bright color tuxedo.com. know and then I opo suits and you know they just they fit has anyone reached out oh yeah we've got a few people yeah I've had someone the staff had built like got someone to make a custom one for me you know many years ago they said we you know because the ones I had weren't fitting me and they they built a custom one might have made which was really nice surprise I think you should go like

Indochino and go hey can we do an unlined one for the summer keep it cool let's do a wool one for the winter let's look at I'm content like again I don't spend I don't spend money on that I never bought a first class ticket to fly I guess It upgraded a lot now because I fly all the time, but I've never bought a first-class ticket. I drive a 2018 Honda Accord. I've had that for years. I don't have any plans for a new car. We don't fly private.

You know, I fly commercial. It's just, we like everyone else. I think you don't need to splurge on that. How often do you get your haircuts? Every couple of hours. Okay. I go short. You got a barber for that?

No, again, I go to Great Clips Supercut. I spend $20. I spend so little on that stuff. We invest in our family. It seems like you're too busy. You're like, I mean they're at work, traveling where I'm with my family. We travel every weekend. We come home to the family.

So we invested. So we invested in our backyard. We built a pool, a pool house, a turf area to play in. We built a retreat. So that's where you're like, that's where I'm happy to spend my money here. That's where we spend our money in our home. And so we could really have a time where it's just us. That's important to us.

I love it. So we talked about spending. Let's talk about saving, investing. Like, do you have a person for that? Do you like to be involved? You know, do you have a goal? doesn't excite me. It's for saving.

So my dad taught me when I was a kid. My dad taught me when I was kidding, you know, about saving. And when I got to, I forgot my first job making $27,000 as a GM. So I was a general manager of a team making $27,000. My dad said, you gotta live where you save every other paycheck. So you save half of every paycheck. Wow. And so he's like, so what are you making?

I was like, it was like $897 or whatever, you know, every two weeks or I have to look back on it, something like that. And so I found a place I could rent for $300. I had my car paid off. I had a full scholarship, so I didn't have college debt because of baseball. And I made it so I could save every other paycheck. So half of every paycheck or every other paycheck. So I started doing that at 23 years old, making $27,000.

So I've stayed with that. So now half of everything that comes in. Now or a couple decades later. Half of everything comes in and just goes away. Do you still live like that? Or is that a good still principle you try to live by? Just let's put away. If we can put away half our money into a future.

I'm putting away a lot more now. But I mean, I pay myself very little. I'm probably, if you look at our full-time staff, my pay, if you count their bonuses, I'm probably the lowest paid on the entire staff. I take very little from the team. I'm fortunate. I get opportunities to speak all over the country in Fortune 50 companies. My speaking helps fund our lifestyle.

So I utilize that. That's incredible. Put aside a lot of that. And that is how intentional is that? Because a lot of people are going, that's my guy right there. Jesse, he's living it. Like he's the least paid on the team. Well, that's pretty wild.

And you pay your team really well. Do we take care of our team? Yes. I was shocked at seeing the salaries of just the players and how well you take care of your own people. And it's crazy. You know, I look at our bonus pool. It's on the millions that we give out to some. Like profit sharing.

Yes, correct. Correct. Some of the bonuses are low salaries would be like a low salary that you're adding on top of their salary. Like this is what I made when I was a G. Yeah. Oh, even more than that. So, I mean, yeah, even if someone starts at a very low level, Yeah, I mean, if they get a $20, $25,000 bonus, they're more than what I'm making.

So, but yeah, but it's not about that. I'm fortunate that I've been able to have the opportunity to speak. And, you know, I have books that do very well and continue to do well for our company. So, but yeah, it's money doesn't excite me. I don't like, my dad's always been big into finances. So my dad, like, overlooks my portfolio. But like, I don't even have access to my portfolio. I don't have access to the team's bank.

Just like, hey, how's it going over there? He's like, that's great. Well, yeah, he just says, he just said, he always, jazz, I want to tell you what you're doing. I'm like, great dad. He gets so much energy, so I let's know him, but I'm not really, it doesn't excite me. I need to interview your dad. I think I need to get on this channel. Well, again, if you live your life the same way, and whether you have a million saved,

10 million saved, 10,000 saved, like, to me, it's not going to change the way I live. And so, and I don't have plans with that money. I'm living off what we're doing, the speaking, the books, the team. So it's like, it's not going to change anything. So I don't see, I don't get a lot of excitement. Now, I'm so grateful that our kids and probably our kids' kids' kids and generation. I'm very grateful that they're going to be on a good spot, but also I want them to earn and understand what it's like to struggle, sleeping on an airbed and grinding and having, we spent

$30 a week on our food for, for, that's what we had for months. There's me and Emily's $30 for 42 meals. And so that's not real food. And we had to grind. We had to figure it out. And I had to say, how can we sell something today? How can we bring in some revenue? How can we create some fans?

That's how it kind of started. And so I think kids often, or if they don't have that, it's hard for them to have the work ethic and grind and understand when things go wrong, how do they get through it? And I'm grateful that I've had that opportunity. Resilience. It's the grit. Perseverance. A hundred percent. And we've had that and we still have that. It's hard to teach. It's hard to just, you know, go, hey, kids, you should have perseverance. You have to experience it. And that's why, like, we're also intentional. Like, a lot of our people start as interns. Most of our people, we struggle with bringing people from the outside and paying them a huge number because

they didn't go through the challenges with us in the university. So I love that, you know, Emily started at $19,000. And she was, you know, and not, this wasn't with us. It was another company. She knew what was like 19,000 as a full-time salary. Wow. I love that. That's poverty level in today's America.

100%. And again, no, we understand. we take care of people at a much higher level. But like, you know, I get nervous of when we get to the place where, you know, everybody's making, you know, X number. And, you know, do they understand? Or is it just, hey, they got a job with us and this is where they are. I love the fact that we have a multimillion dollar bonus structure for our full-time

staff that the company's, doing well and you're working hard and you're doing well. You should feel it. And you also get you get evaluated by your culture and how much do you add to the culture. And that's a part of the scale that we have. It's not just how long you've been here. It's also the culture. So that's awesome. So we talk spending, saving. Let's talk about giving now. I know you've got a big heart for that. You've got bananas foster, which is all about, you know, foster care. What other ways do you give that excite you? You give to your team. That's something I've got to be simple. Well, I think so many people today try to have so many different initiatives for us.

We keep it simple. Yeah, I mean, Emily share with me in our heart and her dream in the foster care world with 400,000 kids in the U.S. who don't have a permanent home, and we knew we had to do something. So instead of just talking about all the bad, we wanted to celebrate the good. And so every night at every single stadium, we honor a future foster family. That's maybe had 50 kids come through their home or adopted three or done this or had brought in sibling sets or been doing it for 30 years. And they get a standing ovation. It's such a special moment.

So we honor them. Obviously, we were foster parents. We adopted our two girls out of foster care. we believe in it. And so we constantly are giving a way to acknowledge and, you know, really recognize the foster heroes and then get more people to become. So that's important to us. And then we don't have tons of other nonprofits. We do one thing and try to do it very well. And then, you know, we focus on giving to our team and giving to our cast, our players, our staff, and, you know, give them joy. Even, you know, giving time off. You know, we don't play any games

on Monday, Tuesdays or Wednesdays. You know, most people would say, like, no, play as much as you can. Like Major League Baseball. I got six games a week. You can fill more stadiums. 100%. Oh, we could bring in millions more, but also if we charge ticket fees or convenience fees, or if we didn't pay our fans taxes, which is millions of dollars. Most CFOs are like crazy. I'll slow down.

You, 40, 50, 60 dollars tickets, no fees, no taxes. No taxes. And a $30 shirt, you buy a $30 shirt, it's $30. That is why. And you guys are covering that tax. We cover all that. So you have to pay taxes legally, but you're like, hey, we'll cover that. Millions of dollars.

Millions upon millions. And we don't have to do that. It wouldn't, like, if you look at that, it wouldn't take it. And free shipping. Free shipping on everything. So that's another millions of dollars. I feel like this is a great ad for your merch. Well, and custom, they're shipped custom yellow boxes.

We usually have a coozy decal. We try to add different things here and there. Sometimes we'll have a player sign something, put it in there. Like, it's just those little things. And so, yeah, it's you're building fans. And so you give, you give, you give. And then if things are tough like they were for COVID us, our fans gave. Like they kept trying to find buy merchandise.

Like, they kept us like. You attracted generous fans. We were profitable during COVID when we could only play in front of a thousand fans. I think our bottom line was $13,000 or whatever, but because our fans found a way to support us when it's hard. And that's what I believe in. It's to continue to give, give, give without wanting anything in return. I love it.

I heard a rumor that Dave Ramsey inspires something that you did for your team. Oh, yes. Is that right? Yes. Because that was a part of the Ramsey script. So this past few years, yeah, we surprised everybody. And we took our entire team, our players, our cast, our staff, everyone to the outlets and gave him a $500 gift card for everyone to go shopping before Christmas.

And so we've done that a few times. Now it's a lot more people than it used to be. I'll tell you that. That hurts a little bit more. Oh, it's every bit of high six figures, but it's worth it. And those touches really go a long way. Yeah, Dave feels the same way. Because of our team grew, we're like, we're at a thousand people.

I'm going to throw these crazy parties and do these shopping trips. Every day of the week. I love it. So what's next? What's on your mind? Probably no more macha. I'm done with the match. I'm done with the match.

You made it maybe three sips. I had five. We'll check the cameras, but I think it was close to five sips. I'm worried about the caffeine, to be honest with her. They wrote Yum on the... I'm sure that's good. Which I feel like was a lie. That's good.

I'll take it in. Maybe I'll have another one. I'll take it in with me. Oh, my goodness. No, what's next is how do you create more fans? How do you create more special moments? How do you do things that people have never experienced before? How do you do things that can really wow people and bring people together in a different way?

And so I look at all those ways of bringing people together to creating more fans, different fans, with six new teams in the banana ball championship league playing all over the country. That excites me of how. and we create fans with new brands and new experiences. I love it. Well, you know, very few people and organizations deserve all of the praise and all of the growth. So I'm wishing you guys the best as you continue to expand for the best purest reasons of just giving joy to people who desperately need it in an increasingly dark and chaotic world. Well, it's what you guys do.

You provide joy, you help people and just keep helping and trying to share. I think it's so valuable. So I love it. I don't think many people in the world get to do something. they truly love every day. And I hope that's what we get to do with our whole team. I want anybody who joins us to truly, I know there's hard things, there's challenges, their diversity, but if they can love where we're going, what we're doing, why we're doing

it, that fires me up because that's where you provide and it can spread. It can become contagious to their family, their friends, and they have a dipter and bounce to their step every day. That's awesome. That is fantastic. I truly thought when you said what's next, you're going to say, we're going to do a fantasy banana ball. Choose your fantasy league.

What manana is? All of that probably will happen. It's all on the table. There's no red tape for us, which is cool. Oh, well, I hope to get to see a game. It's almost impossible. And you guys don't do handouts of like, you know, even the employees can't just give out tickets to family.

You want the fans to be first. We take care of them. This is so fun. I had a great time. That's great. No, I appreciate you. Other than the macho. No, I'm taking the macho with me.

What are you going to do? Dump it in the toilet? I'm going to, I'm going to figure it out. Sip on it slowly. I'm going to slowly slip on it all day long. Well, Jesse, thank you so much. Hey, will you give a shout out, tell them to subscribe? Subscribe.

That's all it tough. They're going to get millions. Thank you, man. Good to see you. Thanks a lot. Huge thanks to Jesse for taking the time out of his busy schedule to ride around with us today and inspire us to greatness. If you want to learn more, I'll drop some links down to the Savannah Bananas and Bananas

Foster, their nonprofit organization that supports foster families. And if you enjoyed this episode, you're going to love the episode we did with my boss, Dave Ramsey, another CEO who's got a lot of smart things to say. You can check it out in the description or just click right over here. Thanks for watching. We'll see you next time.