The Best One Yet - 🐏 “I gave away $3B” — Patagonia’s ultimate donation. Amazon’s NFL play. Railroads’ road rage

Episode Date: September 15, 2022

After a $13B deal, NFL football begins on Amazon tonight, streaming exclusively for the 1st time ever - because football is the holy grail. The founder of Patagonia just gave away his $3B baby - the ultimate mission statement. And your weekend Amtrak right might get canceled because the Railroad strike reveals how much we rely on Railroads.$AMZN $CSXFollow The Best One Yet on Instagram, Twitter, and Tiktok: @tboypodAnd now watch us on YoutubeWant a Shoutout on the pod? Fill out this formGot the Best Fact Yet? We got a form for that tooLearn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

This is Nick. This is Jack. It's Thursday, September 15th, and today's pod is the best one yet, Jack. It really is, Nick. We should point out that Thursday is the new Friday. And this T-boy doesn't disappoint. We didn't forget yet. He's Jack, what's our first story for the T-B-O-I?

Amazon's $13 billion Thursday night football deal begins tonight. Bezos was wrong. Football is the one ring to rule them all. My precious. Right on cue. For our second story. If you've got a weekend Amtrak trip planned, heads up, it might get canceled. Uh, the railroad strike.

It just revealed how much we really depend on the train. The locomotive. The caboose. For our third and final story, the founder of Patagonia has given away the entire company. The whole company. All three billion dollars of puffer jackets, poof. Gone. Or as he put it, the earth is our only shareholder now.

But yeties, before we hit that fantastic mix of stories. Wild mix, including a last minute edition of the Patagonia story, did not see that coming. We pulled an audible, Nick, but Yeties, we have a warning to all those traveling northbound on Interstate 55. Besties, if you're commuting in the greater Memphis area, you're going to want to watch out on your starboard. Because there's a sauce situation that shut down the entire northbound left lane. Jack, I'm checking the traffic came here.

Looks like it's also shut down the entire right lane. Here's the news, Yeties. A tractor trailer that was transatlantic. supporting thousands of pounds of Alfredo sauce has tipped over. It spilled enough buttery cheese law to shut down the highway indefinitely. We repeat, a major thoroughfare was fully shut down. And it's because of a carboloaded cream sauce, Jack. I'm no surgeon general, Nick, but that's like a billion calories on the highway.

Give or take a billion and two calories, Jack. But we only see one delicious solution to this problem. And here's that solution. Concerned citizens got to show up with a few breadstores. sticks each. Get a high school football team to mop up that sauce in seconds. Jack, it's a double whammy. You fix the traffic situation and you alleviate hunger. Olive Garden, this is your moment. You can be here. You can be family. Jack, you've been training for this your entire life. But here's the strangest thing, Basties. Jack and I noticed that this is the second sauce situation

to hit interstates just this month. That's right. Two weeks ago, 50,000 pounds of tomato sauce spilled off a truck in California. We repeat, that's 50,000 pounds of Marinara shutting down Interstate 80, the Olay-80. This moment is the worst condiment crisis since the soy sauce shakeup of 1968. Or the Tartar travesty of 1982. Festies and Yetis, hold on to your pest out. Carbonara might just crush your commute. Let's hit our three stories.

Let's sauce them off. Fifteen years before this song, two boys from the northeast met in the dawn. They had an idea that caused a cultural 50%. That's a fat tip. Tea Boy City on your at list. If you know, you know, because we're ready to go. We can't wait no more, so just start the show. For our first story, Alexa, I said hot, hot.

Amazon just bought 11 years of Thursday night football from the NFL, and it all begins tonight. And it all could change how we watch TV from here on now. All right, Jack, we got a mid-coast-West Coast matchup, Kansas City Chiefs, first of Los Angeles Chargers. Who you got? Two of the best quarterbacks facing off in the biggest game of the week. This is basically like barbecue sauce versus beet juice.

Those are the two cultures battling it out tonight. True. But this is also the biggest NFL game for the history of media. We are not exaggerating that. Because this is the first time ever that an NFL game, which is top shelf television, won't be watchable on cable television. Your uncle's like going to throw his remote against the wall when he finds out his Xfinity package doesn't include this tonight.

You do not want to be in the room when your uncle searches every channel and can't find the game. He's going to be like, I don't hear that sound. Where's that sound? You know the sound. I paid $150 a month just to hear that sound on Thursday night. Now, yeties, we know what you're thinking. Hasn't the NFL streamed games before? Yeah, it has.

Amazon has streamed games before. But in the past, Amazon's Thursday night football was also simulful. simultaneously on a cable TV channel as well. So like Jack and I just said, this is unprecedented in media. 12 million people are expected to watch because this is the most popular TV show by far, and it's only on streaming. Now, here's what fascinated Jack and me, Amazon's strategy, because their strategy is basically to be like, you know, the new kid at your high school.

They want to strike a balance. The new kid strategy. They want to be similar enough not to annoy people completely. Right. but new enough to intrigue all of their new classmates. For example, when you watch this football game on TV tonight, you'll notice the tackling feels the same. Same helmets, same eye black, same grunting.

And the sound will sound the same. The voices of Kirk Herb Street and Al Michaels are doing the game, classic. And the commercials will look the same. Another Jeep attacking a rock, another blue tide pod attacking a lasagna stain. But here's where things get interesting. Because Amazon is whipping up enough new stuff. to make NBC jelly. For instance, you're not going to be stuck with Kirk Herb Street and Al Michaels, the old-school

play-by-play guys. They're offering you a second option. Amazon is also doing an alternative broadcast with a bunch of YouTubers commenting on the game. They're letting the kids watch the game commentated by the guys from Dude Perfect, a popular YouTube channel. Oh, and when a Tide to go saves a T-shirt from a chicken wingstain in a commercial, you should be able to buy that Tide Stick immediately. Because your uncle reluctantly had to set up an Amazon account to watch the game.

So they've got all the information to send the tide to his front door. And one more thing. You're not going to have to whip out your phone to Google the quarterback stats when you're having an argument with your buddy Timmy. Because Amazon's a tech company, they can overlay the stats on the screen and let you browse through them with your remote. So Alexa, what's the takeaway for our buddies over at Amazon? Amazon just confirmed that live sports. Sports are the holy grail of streaming video. Oh, uh, Yetis, you want to know how valuable live sports are to the streaming wars?

Get these numbers. We've told you a couple times already that Amazon spent half a billion dollars on the Lord of the Rings series. It got a lot of press, including in this pot. But get this, Amazon dropped $13 billion on this 11-year Thursday night football deal. That's not $13 billion for all of the NFL. it's $13 billion just for the rights to broadcast one game per week. Okay, we'll break that math down further. That means Amazon is spending $75 million on every single game.

That is double the cost of each episode of Lord of the Rings. Yeah. But just the $13 billion absolute budget is gigantic. Yeah, this isn't about e-commerce. Bezos isn't selling like $13 billion of tight stick pens, which, by the way, is worth two lifts. Amazon is paying a king's ransom. handsome for live sports because that's the holy grail of streaming.

For our second story, starting Friday night, we may get the first railroad strike in 30 years. It's a big threat because trains are shockingly big still for our economy. Okay, Jack, I used to do the Amtrak a lot like the Philadelphia, New York. Love it. Okay. Have you had the microwaved hot dog? No, but have you had the Wi-Fi? I think it's on the same level as the microwave hot dog, Jack. The craft beer list actually is not too bad.

I'm a huge fan of Amtrak. Full disclosure. A lot of Yetis though right now are listening to us in this moment on an Amtrak train. They're probably commuting from Providence to Boston asking the same question we used to ask, what the hell does a cella mean? Nobody knows. Well, funny timing because Amtrak just announced a whole bunch of cancellations. Union Station to Penn Station. From the northeast corridor to like the Pacific Surfliner.

All these cancellations are because of the impending railroad strike. Now, we should clarify, not a passenger train strike, but a freight train strike. Well, 97% of Amtrak trains, which are passenger trains, they run on train tracks that are owned and maintained by the freight companies. So if a freight train strike goes down, then those tracks are closed to Amtrak. Amtrak can't use them, so they're making the cancellations proactive. So we have a potential train travesty. We do.

Freight train stocks, which are publicly traded, are concerned about the impending strike. Now, this railroad strike, it could happen tomorrow night or it might reach a last second deal and be completely avoided. Whether the strike happens or not, this story highlights that we are still dependent on trains. And that's what Jack and I found so fascinating. Get these numbers. 30% of freight in America moves on a train. Yeah, like your mattress, mattress, mattress, all aboard on the mattress train. One out of the three things in your home spent part of their lives on a mile long train that was going eight miles an hour. Like a third of the stuff in our lives depends on a conductor and a caboose.

Oh, you want more? 15% of the oil that got to the gas station got there on Tommy the tank engine at some point. Oh, hey, Darlene, America doesn't run on Duncan. She runs on locomotives. That little engine that could? It could. It did. And trains, like publicly traded $67 billion CSX railways, they depend on railway workers.

Yeah, they need the workers. So the stock is down 6% this week because there might be a strike. So the core question here, what do railroad workers want right now? Why are they threatening to strike? Interestingly, it's not money. So Jack, what's the takeaway for our buddies over on the train tracks? The railroad workers, they don't want better pay. They want better lives.

All right, besties. We often hear about work-life balance in the context of like white-collar. service jobs out there. Mindfulness Mondays, no meeting Wednesdays, summer Fridays, kombucha on the house. Well, we can't forget that essential workers like rail workers, they have crazy expectations that are imbalanced. Train conductors and engineers, they actually get paid pretty well. They take home about $100 grand a year. But the issue is constantly being on call. It's the erratic schedules, the night shifts, the complete inability for them to plan any life events. There's been lots of stories of train workers who have to cancel doctors visits and cancel vacations because they got called in to work last second.

And they're on call for 14 straight days, but then they don't get called in, and then they don't get paid because they didn't get called in. Rail workers want certainty. We all do, but that requires more workers, and that's tough with this worker shortage. So these railroad workers, they're not striking for more pay. Interestingly, they're striking for better lives. Now a word about our sponsor, Robin Hood. A lot of Yetis don't realize how much prep work goes into this pot. We spend hours every morning jumping in T-boy style to earnings reports, CEO tweets, breaking news, heaven. Jack and I are toggling tabs like you toggled IM Convo's in 2004.

Having eight tabs open can be stressful. You don't need that, especially when invest. Robin Hood offers it all in one app. Whether you want to trade options, ETFs, or stocks through Robin Hood Financial, or you want to buy some Bitcoin on Robin Hood Crypto. You can do it all on the Robin Hood app. If you're not investing in Robin Hood yet, to get started, go to Robynet Financial. Robinhood.com slash T-Boy and choose your free stock.

That's robinood.com slash T-B-O-Y. Limitations apply. Robin Hood Financial LLC, member SIPC, all investments involved with us. By the way, this podcast is not owned or part of Robin Hood. We are not employees of Robin Hood. For our third and final story, Patagonia's founders just decided to, you know, give away the entire company that he entirely owns. To save the world.

It's a perfect capstone to the most purpose-driven company. of our generation. Okay, Jack, save space here. Have you ever eaten cat food? No. Okay, what about canned five cent fish and bits cat food? No. Then I had you with the fish and bits, maybe some slamming salmon. But you know who has Jack? Yvonne Schenard has eaten cat food. Yvonne Schenard was a climbing bum, living out of the back of his Subaru so that he could afford to climb Yosemite. Ultimately, he got tired of eating cat food in that Subaru and he founded a jacket company 49 years ago called Great Pacific Ironworks. Today, that company is called Patagonia because Yvonne Channard loves mountains.

Yeah. And he loves a nice quarter zip with the two color toned pocket, Jack. The puffy pullover with that bicep pocket. I think he trademarked the bicep pocket. Jack, if you don't have the nanoflease, are you even on the DevOps team? North Face, you're fired. And now Yvonne Chonard, that founder, is a billionaire ranked in Forbes magazine. And now his company, Patagonia, is ranked number three in the list of most respected companies in America, according to Harris.

But here's the problem. He's a climbing bum at heart. He doesn't drive Alexis and he doesn't like being on that Forbes billionaire list. He's not into the Forbes billionaire list at all. No, no, no, no. So as of yesterday, Ivan Chouinard is no longer a billionaire because he chose not to be a billionaire. He voluntarily unbillionaire in himself. Here's the news yet he's.

Shannard, his wife, and his two kids just transferred away 100% ownership of Patagonia. This family owned the entire company. Now they own none of the company. Yeah, they gave it to Holdfast Collective, which is a set of trusts and nonprofits with one particular mission. The new owners of Patagonia, the Holdfast Collective, have one order. Fight climate change with this company, Patagonia. Like not fight climate change, which is money. Fight climate change using the company Patagonia.

the weapon. Now let's sprinkle on a little context here about how you can weaponize Patagonia to save the world. Patagonia makes around $100 million in profits every year on those puffer jacket, snap, button jackets, according to the New York Times. Yeah, those Gortex shells, they're not charitably priced. No. So Patagonia has become an ATM machine churning out $100 million a year in profit, purpose-driven profits. And that consistent cash flow gives the company an estimated value of $3 billion. Okay, so just to repeat, Jack, Yvonne Schenard gave away $3 billion overnight. He voluntarily unbillionaireed himself.

Now, he could have IPOed the Patagonia company immediately becoming the darling stock of earth-loving investors. Or Schenard could have sold Patagonia, guaranteeing his descendants a life of comfort for generations. But he didn't, and it's shocking, and it's unprecedented. But it's also not shocking at all. he did this. So Jack, can you toss on that turtleneck and whip up the takeaways for our buddies over at Patagonia? There are mission statements. And then there are mission statements. Hold the Pataguchi.

Everything Patagonia does has one condition. And here it is. Use the business to protect nature. You must use the business to protect nature. Yeah. So Shinar didn't IPO or sell the company because going public would have given up control of the company. And if he gave up control of the company, he couldn't guarantee that sacred condition of Patagonia. But with non-profits in charge of Patagonia now, the mission to protect nature is legally secure. The Holdfast Collective must put the company's profits to work to try to save the planet. Specifically by fighting climate change and preserving the world's wildland. The most purpose-driven company of our generation just made its mission statement a mission statement.

Jack, can you whip up the takeaways for us for the new Friday? Amazon's Thursday night football deal begins tonight. And they're paying a king's ransom for it because the NFL is the holy grail of streaming. For a second story, railroads could go on strike, which could affect 30% of our collective stuff. Yeah, they don't want more pay. They want better lives. Our third and final story is Patagonia's founder, Yvonne Channard. He just gave away the company to a climate nonprofit. It's the perfect capstone to the most purpose-driven company of our generation.

Now time for the best fact yet, which was sent in as a voicemail from Lisa Clark in lovely Seattle, Washington. Push and play. Here we go. The minimum average salary for the NFL is $705,000 a year. The average is over $2 million. The current highest paid player is Aaron Rogers at $50 million. But it wasn't always like this. Players used to work second jobs in steel mills on rink. ranchers or salesmen to put food on the table.

And that doesn't even include the Affleck ads. Yeah, any NFL are taking a second job today. They're doing it for a passion project. It's a different kind of side hustle these days. Yeah, it is you look fantastic. And remember, if you want to help grow the T-Boy pot, all you got to do is turn to someone next to you today and say, hey, H-Y-H-T-O-I.

Have you had the best one yet? If you know, you know. Nick and I, we'll see you tomorrow. Can't wait. And before we go, happy birthday to Yeti Francisco Scanone in Alapada, Florida. And happy birthday to Patrice the engineer power in Chicago. And Daniel, over in Detroit, happy birthday. Happy 20 years of being friends to Jess and Daisy.

Yeah, they even have matching H-Y-TBOY shirts. Congrats to Carlos and Aaliyah, who got married in Vegas, but Carlos sprained his ankle dancing on the dance floor. And Pugia just got her dream job over at Amazon, joining her sister-in-law Anushka, who's been there for six years. And Brad and Emily Knoll, congrats on the 10-year anniversary in Villa Hills, Kentucky. And to anyone else celebrating something today, make it a T-boy. Celebrate the wins.

This is Jack. I own stock of Amazon, and Nick and I both own stock of Robin Hood. Now, a word about our sponsor, Robin Hood. A lot of you listen to our show while you're driving. Two hands on the wheel. Keep it 10 and 2. You might be cruising Chris, no rush. Stay in the right lane. Or you might be doll lane from Duncan, dotting from lane to lane. And there are different drivers on the road.

They're different investors too. Maybe you're cruising down the long-term lane with stock investing, or maybe you're a more advanced full-speed trader. Well, the Robin Hood app helps put you in the driver seat wherever you're at in your investing journey. If you're not investing on Robin Hood yet, to get started, go to robinode.com slash t-boy and choose your free stock. That's Robinhood.com slash T-B-O-Y.

Limitations apply. Robin and Financial LLC, member SIPC, all investments involve risk. By the way, this podcast is not owned by or part of Robin Hood, and we are not employees of Robinhood.