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Speaker 1: Pushkin.

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Speaker 2: I'm Carrie Batton, and I wrote is Doctor Bronner is

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Speaker 2: the last corporation with the soul for GQ magazine and

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Speaker 2: it is the story of the week.

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Speaker 1: Okay, tell everyone who you are.

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Speaker 3: I've heard that on MPR before. I'm your lovely wife.

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Speaker 3: Your name though, Cassandra Berry, and you are your lovely

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Speaker 3: wife the luckiest personalies. Yes, so you may remember this,

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Speaker 3: but I used to use a certain kind of soap

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Speaker 3: in the shower. Oh I remember, Yeah, but I've stopped. Yes,

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Speaker 3: you got medical advice. I did from a well respected physician.

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Speaker 1: What did she tell you?

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Speaker 3: So? I was having recurring uti and your doctor how

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Speaker 3: what I thought was a pretty weird request.

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Speaker 2: Pretty quickly she mentioned, is your husband washing himself with?

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Speaker 3: Doctor Bronner's preferment was And I was like, are you

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Speaker 3: sleeping with my husband?

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Speaker 2: How would you possibly know that my husband is addicted?

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Speaker 3: It was an addicted my soap of choice.

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Speaker 2: It was a staple of our shower. Yes, but apparently

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Speaker 2: it causes irritation.

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Speaker 1: Not for me.

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Speaker 4: So.

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Speaker 3: But the theory is that just by being on my

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Speaker 3: body hours earlier, it's so powerful the peppermint yeah, that

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Speaker 3: it could then irritate you indirectly hours later.

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Speaker 2: Look, it's the only soap she name checked.

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Speaker 1: Well, I haven't used it for like a year.

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Speaker 4: Now.

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Speaker 3: It's forbidden. It's forbidden in this house, although you are

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Speaker 3: actually free to use it on any part of your body,

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Speaker 3: just not your penis.

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Speaker 1: Oh really, writing is hard.

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Speaker 5: Who's got that kind of time when you're already busy

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Speaker 5: trying to be jon stanned?

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Speaker 1: So it turns on a mic?

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Speaker 5: Maybe twiddles Enop calls a journalist Frand has got in

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Speaker 5: that jewel John pies single story. Just listen to smart

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Speaker 5: people speak, conversation, film and information is the story of.

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Speaker 1: All. Too often I find out that some company I

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Speaker 1: like is run by people with evil agendas. This time, however,

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Speaker 1: I discovered that a product I love is run by

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Speaker 1: completely insane people and has been for generations. Carrie Batton

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Speaker 1: looked into the crazy history of Doctor Browner soap for

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Speaker 1: GQ magazine. Carrie, this might be a personal question, but

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Speaker 1: what soap do you use?

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Speaker 2: What soap do I use? I use Dove. I have

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Speaker 2: historically used Dove Bar soap.

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Speaker 1: The most popular soap by far in our country.

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Speaker 2: It is true, and yet I will say that since

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Speaker 2: I started reporting on the Bronner Family. I have switched

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Speaker 2: over to doctor Bronner's Peppermint.

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Speaker 1: Soap Wow, which is must be a shocker, right, that's

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Speaker 1: a real change in your morning.

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Speaker 2: Yes, I think I might want to switch to the

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Speaker 2: almond because the peppermint can be a little bit intense.

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Speaker 2: I don't know if you have have used it or not,

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Speaker 2: but I have.

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Speaker 1: And in personal areas it can really wake you up.

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Speaker 2: It certainly can.

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Speaker 1: Just in case our listeners don't have any hippi friends,

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Speaker 1: what is doctor Bronner's soap?

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Speaker 2: Well, I don't think you need to have hippie friends

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Speaker 2: in order to know what doctor Bronner's soap. In fact,

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Speaker 2: Gwyneth Paltrow and Megan Markle are loyal patrons of the brand.

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Speaker 2: But Doctor Bronner's is a sort of iconic soap brand

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Speaker 2: that dates way back to the nineteen forties, founded by

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Speaker 2: doctor Emmanuel Bronner, and the original product was this extremely minty, powerful,

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Speaker 2: all natural, all purpose soap that was working on and

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Speaker 2: not toxic et cetera.

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Speaker 1: So the soap was created by this guy, Immanuel Bronner,

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Speaker 1: who was he.

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Speaker 2: So Emanuel Bronner is a truly eccentric German American entrepreneur

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Speaker 2: who came from a long line of soap makers in Germany,

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Speaker 2: and he emigrated to the United States in the late

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Speaker 2: nineteen twenties from Nazi Germany.

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Speaker 1: It wasn't Nazi Germany yet, right in the nineteen twenties.

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Speaker 2: Well no, I mean no, it wasn't. But his parents

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Speaker 2: were later killed in concentration camps, and he was very

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Speaker 2: impacted by World War Two.

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Speaker 1: Wait, so why do you leave?

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Speaker 2: I don't think that the family has too much history

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Speaker 2: on exactly why he left. He decamped for the United States.

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Speaker 2: I think, you know, with the same immigrant dreams that

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Speaker 2: a lot of people have of just you know, the

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Speaker 2: American dream.

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Speaker 1: Does he have dreams of building like a soap empire?

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Speaker 5: No?

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Speaker 1: Not.

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Speaker 2: Initially he came to the United States and he was

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Speaker 2: actually institutionalized in Chicago.

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Speaker 1: Yes, what could you do in the nineteen thirties that

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Speaker 1: could get you institutionalized?

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Speaker 2: I don't think that sort of like loudly screaming about

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Speaker 2: how you want to unite the human race. Really, it

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Speaker 2: must not have gone over too well back then.

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Speaker 1: He's like a manic street preachers.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, exactly, Uh huh. I think there were there were

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Speaker 2: certainly some elements of mania there. And also you know

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Speaker 2: he adopted the honorific doctor. He wasn't a real doctor.

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Speaker 1: Well, he's the whole doctor. Bronis is built on a lie.

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Speaker 1: He does not have a medical degree.

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Speaker 2: He does not have a medical degree.

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Speaker 1: No, he was why would you call yourself doctor?

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Speaker 2: Uh, that that would be what you would have to agree,

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Speaker 2: drop acid and ask his ghost why that's real? Reporting, Yeah, exactly,

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Speaker 2: And then he escaped the mental institution. He'd literally literally escaped,

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Speaker 2: literally escaped.

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Speaker 1: Like broke out of a window somewhere.

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Speaker 2: And uh yeah, literally escaped.

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Speaker 1: And then went back to madic street preaching of Guessie.

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Speaker 2: He went to southern California, where his ideas seemingly were

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Speaker 2: a little bit better received. He didn't want to have

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Speaker 2: a soap brand so much as he wanted to kind

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Speaker 2: of profess this idea about uniting the human race. So

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Speaker 2: he was like, Okay, I'll start making soap and then

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Speaker 2: I will print a label with all of my ideas

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Speaker 2: that people will be forced to read.

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Speaker 1: We have a clip of Emmanuel later in his life.

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Speaker 1: It's from this documentary Doctor Browner's Magic Soapbox. So he's

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Speaker 1: sitting shirtless by the pool in Florida. He looks like

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Speaker 1: he weighs eighty pounds and has never left the sun

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Speaker 1: in his life. Do you want to listen to that

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Speaker 1: with me?

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Speaker 2: Yeah? Absolutely, I would love to hear that.

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Speaker 4: I'm so mega master Chemists, Doctor Emmanuel H. Pranam. What

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Speaker 4: causes all the trouble and deserves the past two thousand

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Speaker 4: years is a lack of rabbis, a fight year of

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Speaker 4: rabbis to teach every twelve year old boy on God, Spice, Ship, Earth, Moral, ABC,

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Speaker 4: the outage, none, so life free.

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Speaker 1: I'm not sold.

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Speaker 2: You're not sold on the ideas or that doesn't make

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Speaker 2: you want to buy soap.

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Speaker 1: I might buy soap maybe, but I'm definitely not. Like

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Speaker 1: he's not gonna be my guru. I'm not going to

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Speaker 1: join that religion.

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Speaker 2: Right. People were skeptical of it, so they wouldn't. He

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Speaker 2: was giving away bottles of soap for free if they

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Speaker 2: came and watched him lecture in various auditoriums, and a

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Speaker 2: lot of people were showing up and taking their free

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Speaker 2: soap and leaving because they liked the soap better than

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Speaker 2: they liked what he was saying.

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Speaker 1: Can you explain what his religion or beliefs are.

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Speaker 2: At the end of the day, it sounds really convoluted

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Speaker 2: and complex, but if you boil it all down, it's extremely,

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Speaker 2: almost childlike in its simplicity, which is just that we

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Speaker 2: are all one human race and we're better together than

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Speaker 2: a part et cetera, et cetera.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, so all this stuff is written in tiny print

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Speaker 1: on every soap. Everyone seems to ignore the insanity on

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Speaker 1: the label and just pretend it's some kind of graphic design.

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Speaker 1: But the label that I read always talks about the

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Speaker 1: moral abcs, and because the designs so insane, I can't

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Speaker 1: figuret what they are.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, you know, I'm actually going to grab my bottle.

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Speaker 2: I haven't actually read the moral abcs in a while.

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Speaker 2: Now I'm realizing the moral abcs are not actually ABC's,

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Speaker 2: that it is a numbered list. For example, number.

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Speaker 1: The moral ABC's are not a B and C.

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Speaker 2: No, it's you know, it's a numbered list.

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Speaker 1: Why wouldn't it be the moral one? Two threes?

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Speaker 2: These are the tough questions that I could not get

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Speaker 2: to and in my reporting. But no, but number one

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Speaker 2: is if I'm not for me, who am I nobody?

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Speaker 1: Oh?

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Speaker 2: Number two yet, if I'm only for me? What am

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Speaker 2: I nothing? If not now then when once more, unless

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Speaker 2: constructive selfish, I work hard, perfecting first me. Absolutely nothing

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Speaker 2: can help perfect me. So you can see how it's

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Speaker 2: a little bit difficult to parse.

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Speaker 1: God even in the shower where you've got free times.

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Speaker 1: That's a tough reed.

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Speaker 2: It is a bit of a tough reed.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, but it becomes this incredibly successful number one natural

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Speaker 1: soap in America. How does that happen?

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Speaker 2: Yeah, it took off in the sixties in southern California

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Speaker 2: and on the East Coast as well. But like you know,

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Speaker 2: something about doctor Barner's messaging really resonated in that kind

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Speaker 2: of countercultural moment. And that was a time when there were, like,

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Speaker 2: you know, Trader Joe's was becoming a thing, Doctor Bragg's

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Speaker 2: apple cider vinegar was becoming popular. It was like the

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Speaker 2: natural health food boom, and I think doctor Barner's kind

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Speaker 2: of got lumped into that wave. It didn't quite explode

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Speaker 2: until Minuel Broner's two sons, and a few years later

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Speaker 2: his grandsons took over the company.

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Speaker 1: I'm realizing what a bad business plan selling soap to

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Speaker 1: hippies is. It's like selling Beard trimmers to hippies.

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Speaker 2: I totally agree with you. In the short term, it's

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Speaker 2: a very stupid, but I think in the long term

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Speaker 2: it actually was really smart because the hippies eventually kind

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Speaker 2: of grew up and they sort of went back into

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Speaker 2: normy culture, and you know, doctor Bronner's was the relic

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Speaker 2: from their hippie time.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, so tell me a little more about this second

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Speaker 1: generation of Bronner's after Emmanuel. Who are they?

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Speaker 2: Yeah, the second generation of Bronner's are Jim Bronner and

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Speaker 2: Ralph Bronner. Ralph was sort of the kooky marketing mind.

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Speaker 2: He would go around and just hand out, you know,

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Speaker 2: bottles of soap to people in the same way that

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Speaker 2: his father did. And then Jim was kind of the

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Speaker 2: rigorous chemist, mad scientist.

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Speaker 1: And did they believe in the ABC religion.

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Speaker 2: I think Ralph probably did more than Jim. I think

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Speaker 2: they were both wrestling with a lot of the bitterness

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Speaker 2: they were feeling towards their own childhood, you know, in

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Speaker 2: sort of proselytizing and spreading this message around the country

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Speaker 2: and developing the soap company. He abandoned his children when

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Speaker 2: they were young. They were all in the foster system.

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Speaker 2: It seems like they had some some serious blocks against

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Speaker 2: the ABC's and the messages on the label.

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Speaker 1: Have they passed away or are they still around?

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Speaker 2: Those two brothers, Yeah, they've both passed away. Jim died

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Speaker 2: in the late nineties of cancer and then that's when

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Speaker 2: his sons came in and took over.

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Speaker 1: When we come back, we'll go into the headquarters of

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Speaker 1: Doctor Browner Soap and find out it's gotten even weirder

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Speaker 1: than it first started. But first, our sales team is

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Speaker 1: going to sell you some concentrated cranberry juice pills for

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Speaker 1: your UTF. So, who's running Doctor Bronner's now? It's in

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Speaker 1: its third generation.

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Speaker 2: Yes, it's in its third generation. So the CEO of

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Speaker 2: the company is David Browner, who is the eldest grandson

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Speaker 2: of Emmanuel Browner. And then his young brother Michael is

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Speaker 2: also at the executive level, and their mother, Trudy is

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Speaker 2: the CFO. It's a real family affair.

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Speaker 1: The CEO David Bronner.

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Speaker 2: What's he like, Yeah, so he's about fifty. I think

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Speaker 2: you'll understand a lot about him by learning that CEO

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Speaker 2: does not stand for in his case, chief executive officer.

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Speaker 2: It is cosmic Engagement officer.

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Speaker 1: Is that literally on his IRS filings, like he has

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Speaker 1: to yes, yes, yes, yes, they must love that.

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Speaker 2: Yeah. David Bronner is a mad genius. He is a

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Speaker 2: enthusiast when it comes to psychedelic drugs and psychedelic experiences.

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Speaker 2: I would classify him as a hippie. He had like

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Speaker 2: a psychedelic awakening while he was a student at Harvard,

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Speaker 2: you know, started to learn all about drug reform and

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Speaker 2: criminal justice.

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Speaker 1: So this is some guy you you definitely knew while

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Speaker 1: you were in college.

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Speaker 2: Oh yeah, totally, totally. I knew many of these guys,

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Speaker 2: and it's always like you do you do anything with them,

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Speaker 2: hang out with them, and then like eventually you're just

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Speaker 2: kind of waiting for the conversation to circle back to

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Speaker 2: psychedelics and to be like, well, should we trip now,

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Speaker 2: And you're like, no, I have class in five minutes.

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Speaker 2: That's a little bit what David Bronner's is. But to

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Speaker 2: give him a little bit of credit, he did transform

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Speaker 2: his own interest in taking psychedelics and tripping. He did

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Speaker 2: the work of researching them, doing a lot of work

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Speaker 2: with veterans groups and with psychiatric groups about like their

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Speaker 2: therapeutic benefits and lobbying for them politically, which is a

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Speaker 2: huge part of doctor Bronner's today.

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Speaker 1: I remembers like ten years ago, the New York Times

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Speaker 1: had a picture on the front page which was David

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Speaker 1: Bronner in a cage in front of the White House

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Speaker 1: and he was protesting. I think it was just legalization

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Speaker 1: in marijuana. But the cops were like cutting the bars

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Speaker 1: of the cage to take him out of the rest

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Speaker 1: of them.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, he still does that, still does what. He still

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Speaker 2: protests the DEA for various precedd injustices. You know, I

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Speaker 2: think he would even admit that it's a little bit

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Speaker 2: of stunt marketing for doctor Bronner's.

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Speaker 1: And you said they are a pretty ethical company. Does

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Speaker 1: that apply to like how much they pay their workers

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Speaker 1: as well?

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Speaker 2: Yeah. So one really important thing they do that almost

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Speaker 2: no American corporations do is they have an executive salary cap.

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Speaker 2: Each executive can only make, I believe, at maximum five

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Speaker 2: times the amount that the lowest paid employee makes, so

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Speaker 2: it's it's capped at three hundred thousand dollars, which means

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Speaker 2: that the minimum lowest paid salary is sixty thousand dollars annually.

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Speaker 2: Plus really really really good healthcare and I think maybe

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Speaker 2: even some childcare benefits, really really good paid sick leave,

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Speaker 2: paid time off, free access to various types of therapy,

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Speaker 2: including ketamine therapy. You know, there's just like it is

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Speaker 2: very like modern tech corporation benefits and but for very

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Speaker 2: physical manufacturing jobs.

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Speaker 1: And one thing that I loved in your story was

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Speaker 1: that they fund a hotline for people to call if

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Speaker 1: they're having a bad trip. I didn't know that existed.

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Speaker 1: That's tremendous.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, no, they do. And they also I believe they

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Speaker 2: have a you know how in burning Man. I guess

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Speaker 2: there's like all these tents and kind of spaces you

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Speaker 2: can go to if you're having a bad experience. I

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Speaker 2: think they're involved with a lot of those too. They're

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Speaker 2: really invested in making sure people have have good psychedelic experiences.

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Speaker 1: I'm confused on their politics because they're also or their

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Speaker 1: mom is like a Christian kind of conservative, Reaganite kind

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Speaker 1: of person.

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Speaker 2: Yeah. Not only is their mom a Christian Conservative, their

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Speaker 2: brother in law Michael Milam, who is CEO, he is

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Speaker 2: also a Christian Conservative. And their grandfather, doctor Emanuel Browner,

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Speaker 2: was a Zionist. He was Jewish. But I think in

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Speaker 2: their minds, all of these kind of disparate impulses make

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Speaker 2: them sort of stronger and more humanistic because they're able

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Speaker 2: to reconcile all of them in the name of, you know,

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Speaker 2: their various causes.

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Speaker 1: So you went to their headquarters, which are like near

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Speaker 1: San Diego, right, Yeah.

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Speaker 2: They're in a town called Vista, California, which is about

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Speaker 2: twenty five minutes from San Diego.

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Speaker 1: What's what's the place like?

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Speaker 2: I don't know if you've ever seen a suburban corporate

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Speaker 2: office park, it's just like literally the most generic possible

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Speaker 2: thing you can imagine. And I was like, man, this

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Speaker 2: is so disappointing, like this is where, this is where

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Speaker 2: doctor Brown's is. But then I kind of as I

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Speaker 2: got closer and closer, I was like, oh, like, here's

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Speaker 2: this solar paneled parking lot with a zillion electric car chargers.

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Speaker 2: And then I heard music blasting and it was like

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Speaker 2: disco and funk coming from this fire truck. And there

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Speaker 2: was a group of maybe twelve or fifteen people in

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Speaker 2: kind of like overalls and kooky hats and blowing bubble

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Speaker 2: and smiling and waving at anyone who came through the

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Speaker 2: front door, and I was like, okay, so here, I

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Speaker 2: think I'm at the right place. So Doctor Browners has

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Speaker 2: a division called the Magic Film Experience, and so this

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Speaker 2: team of people are kind of they ride this fire

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Speaker 2: truck which is equipped with foam. They foam people at

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Speaker 2: pride parades, and they go to burning.

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Speaker 1: Man Or did you get phoned?

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Speaker 4: Ah?

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Speaker 2: Yes, I did more than getting phoned. I did a

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Speaker 2: lot of foaming, and I would I think I'd prefer

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Speaker 2: to foam other people than to be foamed. It's a

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Speaker 2: very powerful feeling.

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Speaker 1: Wow, you should talk to your therapist about that.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, right, right, there's some Freudian dynamics there.

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Speaker 1: But were they out there to greet you or are

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Speaker 1: they just normally out there?

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Speaker 2: So that the day that I went was the day

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Speaker 2: of a new employee onboarding, so they were there to

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Speaker 2: greet all of the new employees.

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Speaker 1: What is it like to be a new employee at

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Speaker 1: Doctor Browner's.

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Speaker 2: Most of these new employees they were like packaging specialists

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Speaker 2: and shipping and sales, and they were coming in and

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Speaker 2: being kind of sold this lifestyle. I have to imagine

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Speaker 2: it's a little bit of a trip for them to

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Speaker 2: get into that.

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Speaker 1: Right, because They're not like burning man people. They're people

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Speaker 1: that work at a factory. What are the people who

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Speaker 1: work there?

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Speaker 2: Like, Yeah, I mean San Diego has a large Catholic

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Speaker 2: Mexican American population, of course, so that's who most of

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Speaker 2: the new employees were.

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Speaker 1: So you're there on employee orientation day and who greeted

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Speaker 1: the employees? Like, who's running orientation?

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Speaker 2: The foamy homies? Who are the employees who make up

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Speaker 2: the Magic Foam Experience?

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Speaker 1: That's their full time job.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, as their full time job. They are vibe creators.

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Speaker 1: Wow, So they're blasted with foam And do they then

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Speaker 1: have like a normal first day experience or what's the

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Speaker 1: rest of their day?

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Speaker 3: Like?

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Speaker 2: Well, so it's several hours of initiation where in this

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Speaker 2: conference room with quotes from Emmanuel Bronner painted on the walls,

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Speaker 2: they get told the entire family history by David and

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Speaker 2: Michael Bronner and Trudy Bronner, their mom, and then they

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Speaker 2: are prompted to, you know, tell the group about themselves.

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Speaker 2: They performed their favorite dance and they were like talking

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Speaker 2: about their favorite sports and their you know, just just

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Speaker 2: sort of like this Kumbaya sharing circle. I was certainly

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Speaker 2: like good God, I really hope they do not make

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Speaker 2: me participated in these games.

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Speaker 1: You didn't have to do your favorite dance?

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Speaker 2: No, I don't. I think I would have left if

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Speaker 2: they if they had asked me to do that.

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Speaker 1: Do you have a favorite dance?

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Speaker 2: No, no, they don't. I don't think so.

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Speaker 1: Mine is one hundred percent of the Running Man. I

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Speaker 1: would have definitely broke out Running Man.

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Speaker 2: Okay, there was some running Man going on. People were

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Speaker 2: doing like the lawnmower or the sprinkler, the macarena.

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Speaker 1: Like you know, if you have a cosmic engagement officer

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Speaker 1: who's caging himself in front of the White House and

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Speaker 1: working out legalizing ketamine, how is this business so successful?

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Speaker 2: I think, like a all of this stuff is great marketing.

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00:20:15,944 --> 00:20:18,864
Speaker 2: It has kept this level of kind of bemused attention

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Speaker 2: on Doctor Bronner's the company for a really long time.

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Speaker 2: And then everybody wants to seem like an ethical company

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Speaker 2: these days, and I think Doctor Bronner's was already so

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Speaker 2: far ahead in these ideas of what an ethical company

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Speaker 2: is that they were sort of there to catch that wave.

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Speaker 1: Did reporting the story give you hope for the future

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Speaker 1: of capitalism?

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Speaker 2: I mean it didn't give me hope for the future

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Speaker 2: of capitalism. But it did sort of open my eyes

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Speaker 2: to like, Okay, this is possible. You don't have to

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Speaker 2: have like corporate bonuses in excess of hundreds of millions

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Speaker 2: of dollars a year. Like people can like live really

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Speaker 2: well off of a fairly moderate income and actually free

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00:21:00,904 --> 00:21:03,984
Speaker 2: up so much money for their employees to be happy

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Speaker 2: and make a good product.

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Speaker 1: Until the price of ketamine skyrockets, at which point David

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00:21:08,104 --> 00:21:11,944
Speaker 1: rethinks this whole thing. Yeah right, Carrie Baton, you wrote

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00:21:12,304 --> 00:21:15,944
Speaker 1: is Doctor Bronner's the Last Corporation with the soul for GQ,

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Speaker 1: and it's the story of the week. Thanks for coming on.

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Speaker 2: Thank you, Joel. I appreciate you.

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Speaker 1: Oh my god, did you learn that from Doctor Bronner's.

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Speaker 1: That's so great.

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Speaker 2: I know.

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Speaker 1: I appreciate you too. I've read James Joyce's Ulysses, I've

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Speaker 1: read Emmanuel cons a prolegoma to any future metaphysics, But

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00:21:35,584 --> 00:21:39,424
Speaker 1: I've never read something as hard to understand as the

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00:21:39,504 --> 00:21:43,864
Speaker 1: label on Doctor Bronner's eighteen and one Hemp peppermint pure

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00:21:43,904 --> 00:21:47,304
Speaker 1: castile soap. First, let me inform you that the label

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00:21:47,424 --> 00:21:52,944
Speaker 1: clearly lists ten, not eighteen uses really ten. It name

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00:21:53,024 --> 00:22:01,144
Speaker 1: checks Jesus, Hallel, Mohammed, Confucius, spaceships, and many many times

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00:22:01,624 --> 00:22:06,304
Speaker 1: Thomas Paine. It also espouses a really unique form of

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00:22:06,344 --> 00:22:10,464
Speaker 1: birth control which apparently works like this, and I quote

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00:22:11,464 --> 00:22:17,544
Speaker 1: apply vasoline, oil, butter or cream, insert teaspoon, juicy lemon

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00:22:17,624 --> 00:22:21,864
Speaker 1: pulp pH two. God's Law prevents conception one hundred percent

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00:22:21,984 --> 00:22:27,144
Speaker 1: below pH three. Next day douche with court soapy water,

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00:22:27,904 --> 00:22:34,024
Speaker 1: pH eight restoring pH five balance God made we officially

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00:22:34,064 --> 00:22:37,464
Speaker 1: at the podcast recommend using a condom. Oh and one

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00:22:37,544 --> 00:22:41,064
Speaker 1: other part that seems crucially important is covered by large

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00:22:41,184 --> 00:22:45,744
Speaker 1: texts that says thirty two fluid ounces nine hundred and

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Speaker 1: forty six mili liters and yes, the whole time I've

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Speaker 1: been reading this, I've been completely naked.

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Speaker 5: At the end of the show, what's next for joel Stein?

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Speaker 5: Maybe you'll take a naper poker round online.

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Speaker 1: Our show Today was produced by Joey fish Ground, Kate

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00:23:05,504 --> 00:23:10,104
Speaker 1: McAuliffe and Nishavenkat. It was edited by Lydia g Our

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Speaker 1: engineer is a Manda ky Wang and our executive producer

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00:23:14,104 --> 00:23:17,784
Speaker 1: is Catherine Shira Dau And our theme song was written

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00:23:17,784 --> 00:23:21,104
Speaker 1: and performed by Jonathan Colton and a special thanks to

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00:23:21,144 --> 00:23:25,464
Speaker 1: my voice coach Vicky Merrick and my consulting producer Laurence Alasnik.

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Speaker 1: To find more Pushkin podcasts, listen on the iHeartRadio app,

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Speaker 1: Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your podcasts. I'm

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Speaker 1: Joel Stein and this is the story of the week.

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00:23:36,584 --> 00:23:39,424
Speaker 2: Doesn't that peppermint soap seem like it's killing germs?

437
00:23:40,784 --> 00:23:43,664
Speaker 1: It's killing more than germs. My wife's ob gyn told

438
00:23:43,664 --> 00:23:45,064
Speaker 1: me I had to stop using it because it could

439
00:23:45,104 --> 00:23:45,824
Speaker 1: cause you t eyes.

440
00:23:47,784 --> 00:23:49,184
Speaker 2: That's good to know. I didn't know that.

441
00:23:49,424 --> 00:23:51,504
Speaker 1: I don't know if that's true, but that's what she said.

442
00:23:51,824 --> 00:23:54,024
Speaker 2: Maybe your wife's ob gyn is in the pocket of

443
00:23:54,064 --> 00:23:54,584
Speaker 2: Big Dove.