WEBVTT - Ben Baller 0:00:01.440 --> 0:00:04.960 Welcome back to another episode of Big Money Energy, where 0:00:04.960 --> 0:00:07.800 we talked to super successful people and self made people 0:00:07.800 --> 0:00:09.959 to find out exactly how they did it, how they 0:00:09.960 --> 0:00:13.400 went from nothing to something. Today, I'm joined by the 0:00:13.520 --> 0:00:16.560 ultimate jack of all trades. You know him by his 0:00:16.680 --> 0:00:19.119 name if you've ever listened to any rap song ever, 0:00:19.520 --> 0:00:22.560 Ben Baller, Ben Balling with the Chains. That is who 0:00:22.640 --> 0:00:24.919 is here today. The incredible story and if you're not 0:00:24.960 --> 0:00:28.200 familiar with him, he's also a music producer, he's a jeweler, 0:00:28.240 --> 0:00:31.640 he's a podcaster. I mean, let's just use the word mogul. Honestly, 0:00:31.720 --> 0:00:34.400 he is everything to everybody, and his story of success 0:00:34.520 --> 0:00:37.760 is really unconventional, which is why I needed him to 0:00:37.880 --> 0:00:39.839 tell it on the pot for all you guys. We 0:00:39.840 --> 0:00:42.560 discussed his origins and music coming up in l A, 0:00:42.760 --> 0:00:45.160 how he managed to piss off Dr Dre that story 0:00:45.200 --> 0:00:48.239 is ridiculous after blowing his first million dollar check, and 0:00:48.360 --> 0:00:52.400 how he managed to become hip hop's most sought after jeweler. 0:00:52.640 --> 0:00:54.440 This is one of my favorites. Let's get into it. 0:00:54.480 --> 0:01:07.960 Welcome to another episode. You have no idea how excited 0:01:08.000 --> 0:01:13.000 I am for today's guest. He is the entrepreneur businessman 0:01:13.120 --> 0:01:17.880 and he go to jewelry designer for a plus celebrities 0:01:17.920 --> 0:01:22.880 like Drake, Justin Bieber, Asap, Rocky and I think everybody else. Uh. 0:01:22.880 --> 0:01:27.679 He's established himself as an insanely creative entrepreneur, which is really, 0:01:27.720 --> 0:01:31.920 really really important to me, influencing fashion, style, sports and 0:01:32.000 --> 0:01:35.840 music industries effortlessly. He's a legend among some of the 0:01:35.840 --> 0:01:38.520 biggest artists in the world. And if you don't know, 0:01:39.000 --> 0:01:42.560 he co founded IF and Co. Jewelry in two thousand four, 0:01:42.640 --> 0:01:48.240 creating diamond encrusted jewelry for a ton of high profile clients. Listen, 0:01:48.480 --> 0:01:50.600 I don't have a nice out change as yet, but 0:01:51.120 --> 0:01:54.000 after today I might have to get like a serhant 0:01:54.320 --> 0:01:56.800 one and I think that would look insane. I just 0:01:56.880 --> 0:01:59.000 like Rocket over the suit. I would be the only 0:01:59.080 --> 0:02:01.120 real estate broker in New York City who had that. 0:02:01.280 --> 0:02:04.600 And that's how maybe I could stand out right People like, oh, 0:02:04.640 --> 0:02:07.440 that guy with the great that's Shane. Yeah, now we 0:02:07.480 --> 0:02:09.400 know who he is. Yeah he sold us that place. 0:02:09.520 --> 0:02:11.080 Yeah that was crazy. I don't know. I don't know. 0:02:11.120 --> 0:02:12.960 Maybe you guys can tell me what you think. Honestly, 0:02:13.000 --> 0:02:16.280 he is a taste maker. It's the first time I've 0:02:16.280 --> 0:02:19.240 ever used that that word on this podcast, so here 0:02:19.280 --> 0:02:21.840 to discuss how it all started and how he got 0:02:21.880 --> 0:02:25.280 to where he is and his upcoming projects. Please welcome 0:02:25.400 --> 0:02:28.280 Ben Baller. Appreciate you guys having me. That was a 0:02:28.520 --> 0:02:29.880 hell of an intro. I don't know if I can 0:02:29.919 --> 0:02:32.000 cuss them being careful because I had a potty mouth, 0:02:32.080 --> 0:02:33.880 but no, that that was. That was probably the best 0:02:33.919 --> 0:02:35.919 intro out of any show I've ever done in my life. 0:02:35.960 --> 0:02:39.560 Can you talk a bit about your decision to go 0:02:39.639 --> 0:02:41.800 Ben Baller where you said, you know what, I'm gonna 0:02:41.800 --> 0:02:43.600 put Humble in the backseat. That's not going to be 0:02:43.639 --> 0:02:45.359 my business, that's not going to be my m O. 0:02:45.600 --> 0:02:47.799 It was that something that you always felt like as 0:02:47.800 --> 0:02:49.720 a kid. Were you three years old and You're like 0:02:49.800 --> 0:02:51.639 this toy, I'm going hard? You know what? I think. 0:02:51.680 --> 0:02:53.560 I've just been a big mouth since joll And Tell Fridays, 0:02:53.600 --> 0:02:55.240 you know, since I was maybe five or six years old. 0:02:55.240 --> 0:02:58.520 I've just been I've always had a large personality. And um, 0:02:58.600 --> 0:03:00.520 where were you when you were five? So I was 0:03:00.520 --> 0:03:04.120 in Koreatown, Los Angeles. Uh become super gentrified now you know. 0:03:04.160 --> 0:03:06.760 There was definitely no high rises. Anthony Boordain was not 0:03:06.800 --> 0:03:08.400 trying to come through there then, by the way, I 0:03:08.400 --> 0:03:10.040 don't know, you know what I mean, people do know that, 0:03:10.080 --> 0:03:11.720 but I was one of the people that had brought 0:03:11.800 --> 0:03:13.440 him over there for when he did the Creatown special. 0:03:13.480 --> 0:03:15.000 But you know, Creatown was, you know, it's kind of 0:03:15.080 --> 0:03:16.840 close to the hood. It's it's the neighboring city to 0:03:16.880 --> 0:03:19.519 almost downtown LA. It was a decent part of town. 0:03:19.960 --> 0:03:22.760 But Creatown has just gotten so big. But if people 0:03:22.760 --> 0:03:25.079 don't realize, is like there's a lot of gang activity 0:03:25.120 --> 0:03:26.760 that was going on there. There was a lot of robberies. 0:03:26.800 --> 0:03:30.400 It was again it was not a Korean majority populated area. 0:03:30.520 --> 0:03:32.240 It was just a rough area. And you know, the 0:03:32.320 --> 0:03:34.280 night Stock had been through there with tremeres and just 0:03:34.360 --> 0:03:35.920 it was a lot of crazy ship that was going 0:03:35.960 --> 0:03:38.280 on then. And um, you know, I was going to 0:03:38.280 --> 0:03:41.320 public school, which is very strange, is uh. My parents 0:03:41.320 --> 0:03:43.800 came here as immigrants. I always told people like, no, 0:03:43.880 --> 0:03:45.680 Wan came here with two hundred dollars in blah blah, 0:03:45.680 --> 0:03:47.760 And people are like, wait, maybe in the sixties, that 0:03:47.760 --> 0:03:49.000 wasn't that much money. That was a kind of a 0:03:49.000 --> 0:03:50.880 lot of money, wasn't it. And my sister is like, no, 0:03:51.080 --> 0:03:53.840 your mom came here with like twenty dollars and um. 0:03:53.880 --> 0:03:55.680 You know, there's there's stories that I've heard we want 0:03:55.720 --> 0:03:58.200 when we were poor, that my dad got pulled over 0:03:58.240 --> 0:03:59.840 for whatever a ticket he had to do like two 0:03:59.880 --> 0:04:02.200 days in jail and um, because he couldn't afford to 0:04:02.200 --> 0:04:04.360 pay the citation and certain things, and they lived in 0:04:04.400 --> 0:04:07.640 a garage when I was born. I'm the youngest of three. Um, 0:04:07.760 --> 0:04:09.560 things started getting better my mother. And my mother was 0:04:09.600 --> 0:04:13.360 the original entrepreneur, but really from hard work. You know, 0:04:13.400 --> 0:04:15.640 now people work smarter. She was smart in the fact 0:04:15.720 --> 0:04:17.840 that she was able to get into the garment industry 0:04:18.120 --> 0:04:21.520 and be address contractor. Early. With that being said, I 0:04:21.600 --> 0:04:23.640 was the wild kid that was the latch key kid 0:04:23.680 --> 0:04:26.640 at home, you know whatever. My brother's nine years older 0:04:26.640 --> 0:04:29.360 than me. My sister is uh five six ye older 0:04:29.360 --> 0:04:31.880 than me, so they were kind of further in school. 0:04:31.880 --> 0:04:33.320 You know. I wasn't with them in high school and 0:04:33.320 --> 0:04:37.360 things like that. So my brother, which some people look 0:04:37.400 --> 0:04:39.400 at like damn, do you know, Like when people meet 0:04:39.400 --> 0:04:41.520 my brother and sister, they don't believe that we're related 0:04:41.680 --> 0:04:43.480 when they kind of look closely like oh, you know, 0:04:43.839 --> 0:04:47.000 and you know my sister being an enormous Hollywood stylists. 0:04:47.560 --> 0:04:49.440 She'll meet people that I worked with, whether it be 0:04:49.480 --> 0:04:51.640 Denzel or Justin Bieber, and I'm like, that's really your brother, 0:04:51.680 --> 0:04:53.120 Like I thought he was raised by wolves. You know. 0:04:54.480 --> 0:04:57.719 So growing up, I grew up in public schools and 0:04:57.760 --> 0:05:00.359 I got kicked out a lot of schools, whereas my 0:05:00.440 --> 0:05:03.839 brother went to and over he went to private schools, 0:05:03.880 --> 0:05:06.160 and my sister went to a school called Concord Academy. 0:05:06.360 --> 0:05:09.040 So they both went to boarding schools in the East Coast. 0:05:09.480 --> 0:05:11.400 And then you know, my brother and sister both went 0:05:11.400 --> 0:05:13.560 to prestigious colleges and everything else, and it just I 0:05:13.640 --> 0:05:15.120 just was a different guy. I got arrested for the 0:05:15.120 --> 0:05:20.920 first time at eight years old. So at eight man eight, 0:05:21.080 --> 0:05:22.799 what do you would you do? So I was stealing 0:05:22.960 --> 0:05:25.359 Colliko vision if you were Colligo Visions, you know, it 0:05:25.400 --> 0:05:28.000 was it was like Sega, right, stealing video games from 0:05:28.120 --> 0:05:30.480 Sears in a parking lot there. It was the outdoor 0:05:30.520 --> 0:05:33.919 parking lot. And we got away with it, me and 0:05:33.960 --> 0:05:37.440 my cousin. I decided to go back because I wanted 0:05:37.440 --> 0:05:40.960 to get an adapter, and it became grand theft larceny, 0:05:41.040 --> 0:05:42.880 and I just made up all kinds of stories, you know, 0:05:42.960 --> 0:05:45.080 and then finally they were like, hey, listen, you know 0:05:45.120 --> 0:05:46.680 your parents canna be worried about you. You You know, I'm 0:05:46.680 --> 0:05:48.440 sure they're worried. Boom, And I'm in a jail cell 0:05:48.480 --> 0:05:50.040 cracking jokes with all these adults. I'm like, you know, 0:05:50.040 --> 0:05:51.640 I'm a little kid, and like, what the hell do 0:05:51.680 --> 0:05:53.000 you doing here? You know, I see a bunch of people, 0:05:53.000 --> 0:05:54.279 and I wasn't scared, you know, because I grew up 0:05:54.279 --> 0:05:56.440 in such a seedy part of town. Yeah, you know. 0:05:56.520 --> 0:05:58.440 I mean that's that's where it started. I've always just 0:05:58.480 --> 0:06:00.640 been kind of like a just not humble, you know, 0:06:00.640 --> 0:06:02.359 if I if I had no money, whatever it may be, 0:06:02.400 --> 0:06:04.560 and just I just I like to talk ship. Do 0:06:04.600 --> 0:06:09.240 you think that that attitude, though, of not being humble 0:06:09.600 --> 0:06:12.720 and being incredibly confident even when you didn't have money, 0:06:12.720 --> 0:06:16.520 even when you were young, helped you propel yourself to 0:06:16.760 --> 0:06:20.400 where you wanted to get to because you were already 0:06:20.440 --> 0:06:22.920 being that guy. Like a big thing for me, and 0:06:23.040 --> 0:06:25.040 I tell people a lot is you know. When I 0:06:25.040 --> 0:06:28.679 came to the city, I also lived in Kreatown. Um 0:06:28.680 --> 0:06:31.039 not Korean, but I lived in Creatown on thirty first Street, 0:06:31.040 --> 0:06:33.760 and Broadway, and I was the only white guy in 0:06:33.760 --> 0:06:35.800 the building I lived in, right, lived with a bunch 0:06:35.839 --> 0:06:37.880 of other Koreans, and it was awesome. It's great. I 0:06:37.960 --> 0:06:40.080 knew that one day I was going to be successful, 0:06:40.240 --> 0:06:43.000 and I just projected that image and I acted like 0:06:43.080 --> 0:06:46.080 that guy and I knew that I will become that 0:06:46.080 --> 0:06:47.760 guy because I know what the future is. That I 0:06:47.760 --> 0:06:51.120 could tell the future. It kind of sounds like you 0:06:51.160 --> 0:06:53.440 were in the same headspace. No, for sure, you know, 0:06:53.520 --> 0:06:55.719 at a certain point, you know, like I definitely had. 0:06:55.960 --> 0:06:58.320 You know, people would say just the tire something, No, 0:06:58.520 --> 0:07:00.479 you're worth, know your valuable. But I mean I just 0:07:00.560 --> 0:07:02.400 I mean yeah, without saying so much, you know, I 0:07:02.680 --> 0:07:05.240 would talk my ship and people be like you' relax, man, 0:07:05.279 --> 0:07:06.600 you live in a one bit of apartment, you know 0:07:06.640 --> 0:07:08.039 what I mean with with four people in there. And 0:07:08.160 --> 0:07:09.640 my brother was already gone by the time I was 0:07:09.680 --> 0:07:11.720 kind of like, you know, before I was even a teenager. 0:07:11.720 --> 0:07:13.280 By the time I was ten, my brother was out 0:07:13.280 --> 0:07:14.800 of the house, right. I mean, he was in boarding 0:07:14.800 --> 0:07:16.320 school before that. But I didn't get to kind of 0:07:16.320 --> 0:07:18.160 grow up with my brother. Only during certain parts of time. 0:07:18.240 --> 0:07:20.280 But I always just touched it. Always felt like, look, man, 0:07:20.280 --> 0:07:21.920 I'm gonna make it. I don't care what you guys say, 0:07:21.960 --> 0:07:23.680 no matter what you know, when I was working at 0:07:23.680 --> 0:07:26.880 Burger King. It's hard to vision that later, but I 0:07:26.920 --> 0:07:28.840 was like, no, man, whatever it takes, it's it's just 0:07:28.880 --> 0:07:31.240 gonna happen. You know. That another term that I can't stand. 0:07:31.240 --> 0:07:32.760 But it's like, you know, closed mouths don't get fat. 0:07:32.800 --> 0:07:34.640 It's it's true to a certain point. Like I wasn't 0:07:34.640 --> 0:07:36.200 gonna let you know and be like, oh, let things 0:07:36.240 --> 0:07:38.200 happen naturally, let things come to you know that I'm 0:07:38.240 --> 0:07:40.320 going to them right you know. You know, no doors 0:07:40.360 --> 0:07:41.960 really opened up for me. And I had to build 0:07:41.960 --> 0:07:43.400 a door. I had to knock it down. You name 0:07:43.480 --> 0:07:45.720 what it is. I saw a crack, I'm busting it open. 0:07:45.800 --> 0:07:48.960 Do you credit a lot to your mom for giving 0:07:48.960 --> 0:07:51.640 you that entrepreneurial spirit and just seeing how hard she 0:07:51.640 --> 0:07:53.360 worked when you were a little kid. That just showed 0:07:53.400 --> 0:07:55.440 you that you could do absolutely anything if you put 0:07:55.480 --> 0:07:58.320 the work in. Definitely. One thing my mom would say 0:07:58.360 --> 0:08:00.880 is even though my brother was a gene is above mensa. 0:08:01.080 --> 0:08:02.680 That's how he got into school. There was a lot 0:08:02.680 --> 0:08:05.360 of financial aid with and over what's crazy is. My 0:08:05.440 --> 0:08:09.240 brother was always being told what to do, go on 0:08:09.280 --> 0:08:11.080 to boarding schools and before that, like sort of a 0:08:11.120 --> 0:08:13.040 military school and just the way to be a man 0:08:13.120 --> 0:08:15.560 and blah blah. Whenever he came back home, he'd wake 0:08:15.640 --> 0:08:17.680 up at ten am or whatever and go to sleep. 0:08:17.720 --> 0:08:19.440 My mom be like, I'm so sick of this ship. 0:08:19.480 --> 0:08:20.520 You know, my MoMA wake up at four in the 0:08:20.520 --> 0:08:22.920 morning every day and get to it. She's like, no, 0:08:23.040 --> 0:08:24.720 I can't. You know, if you know what life was 0:08:24.720 --> 0:08:26.640 like in Korea, you know we're so poor. I can 0:08:26.640 --> 0:08:28.440 never go back to that. And I saw my mom 0:08:28.520 --> 0:08:32.800 go from one sewing machine to like five to twenty 0:08:32.840 --> 0:08:35.320 to a hundred and be like, wow, people have have 0:08:35.440 --> 0:08:37.719 a philosophy. Were like, have no expectations and you know 0:08:37.760 --> 0:08:40.800 you'll never be disappointed. Fuck you on my happen. I 0:08:40.840 --> 0:08:43.000 have high expectations, you know what I mean. I'm aiming 0:08:43.040 --> 0:08:46.760 for seventeen galaxies passed, you know, Mars or whatever, and 0:08:46.880 --> 0:08:50.200 and I'll land on Jupiter if I fail, you know. 0:08:50.240 --> 0:08:52.280 And that's just where I always was with it. And 0:08:52.920 --> 0:08:55.080 you know, the whole thing. You get knocked down twenty times, 0:08:55.120 --> 0:08:56.959 coming up twenty one times. I came up like thirty 0:08:57.000 --> 0:08:59.120 five times. You know, like, yo, it's just and I 0:08:59.160 --> 0:09:01.920 think at a certain point, I really never looked back 0:09:01.920 --> 0:09:04.079 after like two thousand four. Is that when you started different? 0:09:04.600 --> 0:09:06.440 It was also the year I became a millionaire. Yeah, 0:09:06.640 --> 0:09:08.800 what were your jobs leading up to two thousand four? 0:09:08.880 --> 0:09:10.600 I mean as a kid, I worked at a martial 0:09:10.679 --> 0:09:13.160 arts store that sold weapons. I think I was obsessed 0:09:13.160 --> 0:09:15.360 with weapons at a young age. That's terrible, right, I'm 0:09:15.360 --> 0:09:19.080 sure there's a family family filled podcast. Um. But uh, 0:09:19.160 --> 0:09:21.680 I worked a paper route. Again. I always talked about 0:09:21.720 --> 0:09:23.840 worked at Burger King, you know, an only age three 0:09:23.840 --> 0:09:26.520 seventy five an hour. I worked at Subway. Um. I 0:09:26.559 --> 0:09:28.199 worked at my mom's shop, and I thought my mom 0:09:28.240 --> 0:09:31.200 would give me, you know, like like some sort of 0:09:31.200 --> 0:09:34.000 a break, you know, and uh, working at our factory suck. 0:09:34.080 --> 0:09:35.520 That was probably one of the jobs. I probably would 0:09:35.600 --> 0:09:45.959 rather work at Burger King ten times won't work, my mom? 0:09:46.000 --> 0:09:47.760 How did you know that jewelry was going to be 0:09:47.800 --> 0:09:49.600 in your future? We haven't talked about it at all 0:09:49.679 --> 0:09:51.559 so far. It's funny. It's like it wasn't like a thing. 0:09:51.600 --> 0:09:53.800 When you're a kid, you know, you like shiny things. 0:09:54.040 --> 0:09:56.080 I love shining things. You know, watching run DMC and 0:09:56.240 --> 0:09:58.280 Eric b Rock cam having big cold chains and stuff. 0:09:58.320 --> 0:10:00.600 It's just something, you know, you see. I talked about 0:10:00.600 --> 0:10:02.640 this moment quite a bit. When Dr Dre gave me 0:10:02.679 --> 0:10:05.280 a check, my first big check. He pulled me to 0:10:05.320 --> 0:10:07.200 the side and I was like, yeah, what's up. And 0:10:07.240 --> 0:10:10.400 he's like, hey, man, don't don't be stupid. And I 0:10:10.480 --> 0:10:12.760 was like, well, why why are you talking to me? 0:10:12.760 --> 0:10:14.000 Why don't you talk to all the other guys. Why 0:10:14.000 --> 0:10:15.400 don't you talk to Butter and stew and all of them, 0:10:15.400 --> 0:10:17.400 and you know, and and uh and mel and all 0:10:17.400 --> 0:10:19.520 the other guys. And he's like, I don't care about them. 0:10:19.559 --> 0:10:21.200 They from the ghetto, blah blah whatever. I'm like, I'm 0:10:21.440 --> 0:10:23.160 I'm from the ghetto, bro. He's like, you're not from 0:10:23.160 --> 0:10:25.920 the real ghetto. Man. Look man, you're my Asian. And 0:10:25.960 --> 0:10:27.480 he said this one thing, he said, hey, man, making 0:10:27.480 --> 0:10:30.040 a million dollars is easy. Keeping a million dollars is 0:10:30.080 --> 0:10:32.360 not easy. And he said, you know, I was like ship, 0:10:32.800 --> 0:10:35.320 making a million dollars easy, Keeping news in okay, all right, 0:10:35.520 --> 0:10:38.080 and one in one air out the other. That day, 0:10:38.320 --> 0:10:41.080 I remember I left at four o'clock, barely make it 0:10:41.120 --> 0:10:42.800 just to put the check in my account boom, and 0:10:42.840 --> 0:10:45.079 I remember by six pm I bought an M three 0:10:45.080 --> 0:10:48.000 BMW right, and I also was able to go get 0:10:48.040 --> 0:10:50.520 a Rolex come to the studio next day. There's a 0:10:50.559 --> 0:10:51.959 lot of nice cars of the studio, a lot of 0:10:52.040 --> 0:10:55.040 nice cars. For some reason, he gets so he always 0:10:55.040 --> 0:10:56.480 gets to the studio later in the day, like three 0:10:56.520 --> 0:10:58.520 or four, five o'clock. I'm there maybe at ten am twelve, 0:10:58.840 --> 0:11:00.160 but at prior to you know, you gotta get there 0:11:00.200 --> 0:11:02.480 early because of the East Coast time and everything. You know, 0:11:02.840 --> 0:11:04.600 I hear Dre like a man who's BMW Is that 0:11:04.640 --> 0:11:07.600 over there? I'm like this rangerovers and you know, trucks 0:11:07.600 --> 0:11:10.280 and everything with rims. It's like, who's who's BMW's that? 0:11:11.120 --> 0:11:13.000 Don't tell me that's Ben Yang's. He wouldn't call me 0:11:13.040 --> 0:11:15.280 Ben Baller. By the way, Andre's like, don't tell me 0:11:15.280 --> 0:11:18.840 that's Ben Yang's car. And so he cousin he goes goes, hey, 0:11:18.880 --> 0:11:21.040 mass a nice fine German otto bild there you know 0:11:21.040 --> 0:11:23.840 it was M three okay, okay, And then he sees 0:11:23.880 --> 0:11:27.400 the rolex on my wrist ship and he didn't talk 0:11:27.400 --> 0:11:29.040 to me for almost two three days, like really we 0:11:29.040 --> 0:11:31.280 had no communication. That was my first role X. I 0:11:31.320 --> 0:11:32.920 never I mean I never had money before. You know, 0:11:33.000 --> 0:11:35.440 even though I worked at Priority and had things, it's different, 0:11:35.440 --> 0:11:36.800 like I had corporate money and how you know, I 0:11:36.800 --> 0:11:38.760 had expense county cool places. I had no money in 0:11:38.760 --> 0:11:40.719 my real like I had no net worth. Really, you know, 0:11:40.720 --> 0:11:42.520 I had no assets. It was just a different thing. 0:11:42.640 --> 0:11:44.559 That was my first taste of being around jury like that. 0:11:45.000 --> 0:11:47.439 And my cousin was already you know, taking over his 0:11:47.679 --> 0:11:50.280 dad's business, uncle's business, and he's making jelry. He's telling me, 0:11:50.280 --> 0:11:52.040 hey man, why don't you bring some of these rappers 0:11:52.040 --> 0:11:53.800 over here and let's makes majority I'll break you off. 0:11:54.840 --> 0:11:56.080 And I was like, no, I don't know about all 0:11:56.120 --> 0:11:58.440 that whatever. And we talked about during family things. But 0:11:58.559 --> 0:12:01.440 my mom, I remember when I graduate high school, she 0:12:01.440 --> 0:12:03.760 she bought me a herring bone, and it meant everything 0:12:03.760 --> 0:12:05.319 to me. You know, it's it's like a four five 0:12:05.360 --> 0:12:07.800 millimeter herring bones, very big, it's very small, but you know, 0:12:07.840 --> 0:12:09.760 it was gold on my neck. It meant a lot 0:12:09.800 --> 0:12:12.040 to me. It was something I just never understood. In 0:12:12.120 --> 0:12:14.480 two thousand four, when I got my real money, won't 0:12:14.679 --> 0:12:16.240 when I became a millionaire, for the first time my 0:12:16.280 --> 0:12:18.400 life free and clear. My cousin had broke down to 0:12:18.480 --> 0:12:20.840 me that he was buying gold. This is many years 0:12:20.880 --> 0:12:22.679 before you start saying I'll buy goal, we buy gold, 0:12:22.720 --> 0:12:25.240 blah blah. And he was breaking down to me like, hey, man, um, 0:12:25.280 --> 0:12:26.440 you know, you can make a lot of money if 0:12:26.440 --> 0:12:28.080 you just you know, bring a couple of sales here 0:12:28.120 --> 0:12:31.960 and there and so like referral business because like bring 0:12:32.080 --> 0:12:36.640 us clients. Yeah. When we started the business, every Korean 0:12:37.200 --> 0:12:40.240 around my age or so understands their parents started business. 0:12:40.440 --> 0:12:43.080 Someone never even had LLC. I know that sounds crazy, right, 0:12:43.080 --> 0:12:45.319 but they're like, they just wouldn't be a liquor store, 0:12:45.679 --> 0:12:47.800 laundry business, whatever. They didn't understand how to write off 0:12:47.800 --> 0:12:51.000 things or whatever. I already knew when I did my 0:12:51.040 --> 0:12:52.800 taxes at you know, at Priority Records. I was like, oh, 0:12:52.840 --> 0:12:54.160 my whole life is a rite off. Wait. I could 0:12:54.200 --> 0:12:56.320 write this car off. Oh man, I could write this off, 0:12:56.440 --> 0:12:59.240 every meal, I could write off there's a meeting, okay boom. 0:12:59.280 --> 0:13:02.240 So I did that, and I understood having a corporation 0:13:02.240 --> 0:13:04.640 because I had a management company in music business. So 0:13:04.760 --> 0:13:06.040 I told my cousin. I was like, hey, man, we 0:13:06.040 --> 0:13:07.640 can't do this the cream way. We cannot do this 0:13:07.679 --> 0:13:10.240 on a handshake, Like I gotta have some kind of paperwork, 0:13:10.559 --> 0:13:13.720 and we gotta move locations, even if we're moving five booths. 0:13:13.800 --> 0:13:15.439 I just need to move locations. So we honest. And 0:13:15.480 --> 0:13:18.439 he's like, damn, this motherfucker bend like I'm family, you 0:13:18.440 --> 0:13:19.880 don't trust like And I was just like no, because 0:13:19.880 --> 0:13:21.080 there was a lot of weird things when with my 0:13:21.120 --> 0:13:23.719 mom and her brothers and sisters that there's money that 0:13:23.840 --> 0:13:25.880 being owed and stuff, and I didn't want to have 0:13:25.920 --> 0:13:28.319 that come between my family, right. So we started this business, 0:13:28.440 --> 0:13:31.560 and uh, I remember the first week, Um, I had 0:13:31.559 --> 0:13:33.200 a couple of just you don't bring some sales in. 0:13:33.520 --> 0:13:36.160 It was like you know, um, Travis Barker's homeboys and 0:13:36.320 --> 0:13:38.080 they will come through. And and I remember getting like 0:13:38.080 --> 0:13:40.640 fifteen hunt on my pocket. Now even though I had 0:13:40.640 --> 0:13:42.880 a couple of million in my bank account. It was 0:13:43.400 --> 0:13:46.680 a great thing to see cash, you know, so easily 0:13:46.679 --> 0:13:48.840 come in. It wasn't until I realized, all right, this 0:13:48.920 --> 0:13:53.120 is cool, but now I've changed the game. Every time 0:13:53.160 --> 0:13:56.240 I went somewhere, it's always taken me a year or 0:13:56.280 --> 0:13:59.360 two later than everyone else. So like, let's say, for instance, 0:13:59.520 --> 0:14:02.520 when I'm in high school, my junior year, I became 0:14:02.559 --> 0:14:04.840 an excellent wide receiver and a defensive back, and I 0:14:04.840 --> 0:14:06.959 started became you know, all city, All State, All League, 0:14:07.200 --> 0:14:09.680 and then my senior year. At that point, you know, 0:14:09.679 --> 0:14:11.280 you can have a great year, but you've already committed 0:14:11.280 --> 0:14:13.360 to a college. You're gonna go to buy January. So 0:14:13.360 --> 0:14:14.880 I always felt like I was like, yo, man, i 0:14:14.880 --> 0:14:17.000 feel like I'm a year behind when I get to college. 0:14:17.200 --> 0:14:18.760 I feel like, I mean, you're I mean, you're behind 0:14:18.840 --> 0:14:21.480 everything I love. And there's a clock. You know, by 0:14:21.480 --> 0:14:23.200 the time you're in Division two, you could be up. 0:14:23.720 --> 0:14:25.520 But I mean, I'm already finishing school, so I can't 0:14:25.520 --> 0:14:27.640 play anymore. I'm not gonna play pro. What do I do? 0:14:28.120 --> 0:14:29.640 So I'm like, all right, So now I'm in the streets. 0:14:30.160 --> 0:14:33.960 I'm in my technically second profession as an adult, and 0:14:34.000 --> 0:14:35.400 I'm like, all right, So I want to be a 0:14:35.400 --> 0:14:38.320 professional jeweler, and people like you're talking about the don't 0:14:38.320 --> 0:14:40.280 know there's you're your jeweler, You're not, you know, And 0:14:40.280 --> 0:14:41.840 I'm like, look, bro, I don't want to be a salesman. 0:14:41.960 --> 0:14:44.200 I'm already a salesman. You know that I could sell anything. 0:14:44.480 --> 0:14:47.200 You know, I'm not worried about that. How do I 0:14:47.200 --> 0:14:49.040 take it to the next level and create something. Let's 0:14:49.080 --> 0:14:51.360 create some let's let's let's change the game, let's do 0:14:51.640 --> 0:14:53.800 let's do something totally different. I want to be like 0:14:53.880 --> 0:14:55.360 Cardi and I don't want to buy Cardio anymore. I 0:14:55.400 --> 0:14:57.040 want to buy Ben Baller. I don't want to be 0:14:57.120 --> 0:14:58.920 the next Tiffany and Co. I want to be the 0:14:58.920 --> 0:15:00.840 first If and Co. And there we was just certain 0:15:00.840 --> 0:15:02.160 things that I was motioned. I was like, you know, 0:15:02.240 --> 0:15:04.640 I have no time limit. You know, I just gotta 0:15:04.680 --> 0:15:06.560 do this. And even though I feel like I became 0:15:06.600 --> 0:15:09.280 a millionaire late in life and I became a dad 0:15:09.320 --> 0:15:12.200 and husband late, you know, I stopped looking at time. 0:15:12.520 --> 0:15:15.360 You know, time is so important, and I just started saying, look, man, 0:15:16.160 --> 0:15:18.400 I gotta go back in my bag now, and now 0:15:18.400 --> 0:15:20.560 I gotta learn how to make jewelry. And then once 0:15:20.600 --> 0:15:23.640 I do that, I think because of my influence on 0:15:23.680 --> 0:15:26.200 the sneaker world and these things and how it affects 0:15:26.200 --> 0:15:28.800 pop culture. And when I left Nike, you know, left 0:15:28.880 --> 0:15:31.360 djaying and things, I still left the big impression on 0:15:31.480 --> 0:15:34.000 that that world. And I had guys at Nike telling me, 0:15:34.240 --> 0:15:36.560 you know, no, look at there's no money in lifestyle. 0:15:36.840 --> 0:15:39.960 The money is in basketball, in soccer, blah blah. I'm like, okay, 0:15:40.120 --> 0:15:41.800 is that why you guys did eight billion dollars after 0:15:41.840 --> 0:15:43.720 I left Hi dunks and Air Force ones and Jordan's 0:15:43.720 --> 0:15:46.840 and all the retro shoes. No one cares about your 0:15:46.840 --> 0:15:49.720 new technology. I'm sorry to tell you guys this, right, Yes, 0:15:49.760 --> 0:15:51.320 I've been up flowing on the Nike Jet and all 0:15:51.320 --> 0:15:53.520 this other stuff, but there was like no money there again, 0:15:53.560 --> 0:15:54.560 you know, it was like a thing. It was like 0:15:54.560 --> 0:15:56.880 a weird and I was like, no man, And people 0:15:57.080 --> 0:16:01.280 never understood why I accepted so many gifts like rare 0:16:01.320 --> 0:16:05.160 shoes and things like that. I wasn't taxed on that, 0:16:05.280 --> 0:16:07.960 you know. Again, sneakers like like, uh, their their currency 0:16:08.080 --> 0:16:10.040 for me. So you know, when I was able to 0:16:10.080 --> 0:16:13.400 flip everything, it was so much of a greater profit margins. 0:16:13.440 --> 0:16:17.600 So with jewelry. Once I understood that gold was the 0:16:17.680 --> 0:16:20.840 same price in Alaska, same price in New York, same 0:16:20.840 --> 0:16:26.840 price in Brazil, Australia, Korea, Russia, gold is universally the 0:16:26.880 --> 0:16:29.600 same price, and I started understanding about the euro and 0:16:29.640 --> 0:16:31.480 the dollar and the Canadian dollar was like, god damn, 0:16:31.480 --> 0:16:33.160 because I was already been. I've already been in Canada 0:16:33.160 --> 0:16:35.720 a few times, and I'm like, okay, this is where 0:16:35.720 --> 0:16:38.600 it's at. So, you know, I started investing in gold obviously, 0:16:38.600 --> 0:16:40.320 because I own a jewelry store. Why wouldn't I not 0:16:40.320 --> 0:16:42.200 I would have to buy, you know, at least a 0:16:42.240 --> 0:16:44.840 couple million dollars in gold chains to have an inventory. 0:16:45.160 --> 0:16:47.640