Chumlee: How Chumlee Transformed His Brand Beyond Pawn Stars | DSH #1525

thing with crypto is i just i don't really know how to follow it yeah i probably should have just bought and held you know my friend actually that i grew up with bitcoin was like at like i don't know pennies he's like under way under a dollar he wanted me to buy something he was like just throw a thousand bucks in it i was like nah i don't think so yeah you would have been set for life i would have been yeah you know how much that is probably yeah hundreds of millions i know

Okay guys, Vegas Legend here today.

We got Chum Lee.

Let's go, man.

How you doing?

I'm good, man.

I can't wait to see what you're up to these days.

I'm up to everything, you know.

Despite what people think, I'm a workaholic.

Yeah.

That's pretty much all I do.

Yeah, I don't think that's the first assumption people have of you.

No, they think I'm pretty lazy.

And I mean, they have a right to.

They see me, you know, from Pawn Stars on TV where basically

I'm the butt of the joke or the comedic relief.

But to be fair, Chum Lee, the name comes from Tennessee Tuxedo.

i don't know you're probably a little young for that even i'm young for that but it's basically the dim-witted sidekick walrus to the smart penguin so it fits interesting how did you feel about the way you were portrayed on the show i guess so i actually

that was done by me by design so when we first started the show it was they were just kind of filming with the three uh the you know father grandfather um grandson

And they were, we had like 12 employees at the time and they were trying to figure out who else can we fit in the show.

And so I just went home and was like, I'm going to go watch reality TV.

So, of course, I chose to watch Jersey Shores.

I started watching a little bit of Other Without Reality TV and I just felt like, oh, they need someone that's like loose and fun.

So what I did was just took my natural character flaws and just like over-exaggerated them times 10 with the goal of...

You know, when you go to Thanksgiving dinner and everyone likes Uncle Billy, but Uncle Billy is just a little bit different.

So try to like get that vibe going, but I try to stay true to my character just by like over-exaggerating things.

Also,

you know, I'm 43, almost 43, and I was maybe 26 or 27 when we started.

So

I also did have the ability to like grow up in front of people and grow up, you know, as a man, as a person, as a businessman.

So, you know, I went through a lot of changes.

This year, I'll be 43.

That's the age Rick was when we started filming Pon Stars.

Holy crap.

Yeah.

Yeah.

It's been a long time.

Let's go.

Yeah.

I feel like you were underestimated, but you got some pretty good deals on that show.

Yeah.

Um, I have done a lot of good deals.

People always ask me too.

I hope you're not going to ask me, what's your best deal in this?

Because I don't know.

You know, I always tell people what you actually see on TV is probably less than 1% of the stuff we've ever looked at.

And I don't watch the show.

Occasionally, I'll, when we film a new season, I'll watch the first few cuts just to see if they've changed up the editing style.

Because

people always ask if it's scripted, it's not scripted.

It's basically improv.

And

if I know how they're editing it, it makes me be able to make my workflow better on camera.

So pretty much at the beginning of each season, I'll watch the first four or five edits and then just kind of see if they've changed up the editing style a little bit.

That makes sense.

And you're still flipping a lot of stuff right now, too.

Yeah,

I'm definitely flipping a lot of stuff.

Some people call me a scalper.

Some people call me a businessman.

But, you know,

I sell a lot, a a lot of Pokemon.

And I get it because I'm actually, you know, in Pokemon, there's a thing called the Game Piece Army.

There's like, there's basically two sides to Pokemon.

The Game Peace Army, aka the Timmies, they want everything to be worthless.

And then the collector, the investor, they want everything to be worth money.

So right now, Pokemon can't keep up with the massive print demand.

So

boxes, you know, MSRP is maybe around $160, but usually a box costs anywhere from $1 to $110.

Right now, the new boxes are coming out at about $260.

Damn.

And it's hard to get them.

So, you know, I have access to them.

We have some distribution.

Yeah.

I use secondhand distribution and, you know, I sell Pokemon cards.

I want Pokemon cards to be cheap too because I'm a player.

You know, I'm part of the Game Piece Army.

I actually play the card game,

but.

It's in my nature to sell things.

I've been at the pawn shop like 22 years at least.

So all I know is like selling collectibles.

I've been doing it over half my life.

I've worked at the pawn shop over half my life.

Crazy.

Were cards one of the biggest movers at the shop?

Like they sold off?

So we just started doing cards maybe about two or three years ago.

And Rick doesn't understand cards at all, but he loves money.

So, you know,

sports cards and Pokemon cards do really well.

Obviously, the margin is a lot different than jewelry and stuff.

So it's all about volume.

But collectibles in general are just,

it's massive.

You know,

a lot of people are worried about cards because of the, you know, the 90s junk wax era, right?

But I think companies have learned from their mistakes.

And not that that can't happen again.

I think companies do what they can to make sure that they're not overprinting and

burning their company to the ground, right?

Like Pokemon is the biggest IP.

It's...

I don't know exactly, but it's somewhere probably around $200, $250 billion.

It's massively bigger than even something like Disney, which is hard to even think of.

That's hard to fathom.

I remember there was a viral YouTube clip of you seeing a huge Pokemon collection with one stars like 10 years ago, right?

So we've done quite a few little Pokemon collections, but you're talking about the Charizards for sure.

Right.

And

that was actually filmed in 2016, and it didn't hit the air for 18 months.

So

the market changed a little bit in that 18 months, but that was the first time I met Gary, King Charizard.

He's the one who brought those in.

And he wanted like, I want to to say like

somewhere twenty to forty thousand dollars over value if i remember correctly so by the time it aired maybe the value had went up a little bit and then by the time most people saw it it was covet time and everyone was watching you know all these different clips on tick tock and instagram and of course the collection was worth millions of dollars at the time so yeah you know every day People always want to know, does Rick regret it?

And the truth is, like,

you know, if the deal's not right, you got to walk away.

100%.

Have you guys ever paid over for something?

Okay, so no, not to sell, but I think it's perfectly fine to pay over for something that you like, right?

Like an example, it's maybe not the best example because it's not a collectible, but you know, when I went to buy my most recent house, I'd been in it about eight years.

I came in, I just offered market for, I offered what they wanted for the house.

And my real estate agent was like, no, no, no.

I'm like, well, we want to get everyone else out of the picture.

So let's get their appraisal and deal with it later.

And then I still ended up paying about $22,000 over the

the tri-light from therisage is no joke medical grade red and near infrared light with three frequencies per light deep healing real results and totally portable it's legit photo biomodulation tech in a flexible on body panel this is the tri-light from therisage and it's next level red light therapy it's got 118 high-powered polychromatic lights each delivering three healing frequencies red and near infrared from 580 to 980 nanometers it's sleek portable and honestly i don't go anywhere without it appraisal value of the house.

My realtor was not happy with me.

I've known him my whole life, but I tried to explain to him, I'm like,

if you really want something, if you really love something, if you know you're paying over for it, it's okay.

Like, if you're doing this to make money, like if you're, if I'm buying this house to fix it up and flip it, you can't pay over.

You got to get the best deal.

But, you know, my house has doubled since then, and my realtor thinks I'm a genius.

So, you know, but when it comes to collectibles, like when I do card shows, I don't pay over a lot of people it's you're starting to have to get to pay more and more for stuff but i'm firm um this is what i can pay you know i have my you know i have three or four employees that i have to pay so i need to make my certain margins and i just don't pay over if i'm trying to make money on it now if i want something for my collection i'll pay full market or maybe even a little bit over if it's something that is you know, low population report or really hard to find, but that's a personal choice.

It's not a business choice.

Yeah.

You do those coin flip things.

I do not do the coin flips.

I'm totally against the coin flips.

And I think it's cool to watch,

you know, and do the content.

You know, it's possible, like if I was doing content for that, I would do it.

But for me, it's a business decision.

Say, you know,

we're doing like an 80 or 120 for a coin flip.

I'd rather just meet in the middle at 100 if it works for me.

Because if I, you know, pay 120, that means I'm outside of my margin.

So if it doesn't work, I just, you know, walk away.

I usually make people an offer and I always tell them, hey, if you get a bunch of offers and you're still not sure, come back to me.

Tell me what your highest offer is.

And if I can beat it, I'll beat it.

If not, you know, go to them.

I tell people all the time when I make them an offer, they'll be like, well, this person offered me this.

I'm like, you should take this back to them right now and sell it because

you might get a better offer, but that's like, probably

an insane offer.

Yeah.

Yeah.

That's a good negotiation tactic, right?

Yeah.

So I'm very honest when it comes to like buying stuff.

I'll tell people straight up, you know, this is the exact percentage I'm paying for it.

And if you want to go shopping around, go, I'll be here right here.

And my offer stands.

What's the percentage range you usually aim for?

I would love to do stuff for 70%, but it's a little hard right now.

So lower end stuff, I'll go 70 to 80%.

But I will pay, you know, 85%,

maybe even 90% on some higher end stuff.

Like

I do a lot of my, I do a lot of my sales online.

So I have built-in fees.

So I got to stay below 85%,

you know, closer to 80.

But if I, say, you brought me a card that, you know, was $5,000 and I knew I could sell it hand to hand without a transaction fee online, then I could probably go 90%, maybe even 95%.

If I had a buyer for it that I already knew would buy it, I don't making mind making 5% or 10% on a sale.

But since I sell most of my stuff online,

each different platform has different fee structures built into it.

If I'm buying something that I know is going to go online, it's a tight initiative.

Because eBay and StockX, they take a fat fee, right?

Yeah.

So I do ebay but uh the i do whatnot as well have you heard of that yeah but i just moved to tick tock about a month ago because uh at the beginning of covet i jumped on tick tock right away and amassed like two and a half million followers so the traffic is good so for example if i'm on whatnot because i do live streaming So I do passive selling on eBay.

I do live streaming on eBay too.

But if I'm on eBay or whatnot, it's more of a narrow market, right?

You're in the Pokemon category.

You're in the football category, right?

So in my TikTok shop, I go wide.

I'm selling, you know, people are buying football cards to chase the downtown, and then they're buying One Piece or Pokemon cards after it.

So like in my store, I have absolutely like football, One Piece, Pokemon, Disney Loricana, vintage Naruto.

Like I could put everything in there and it doesn't really get still.

You know, people are buying different stuff all day.

I've seen some shops pulling crazy numbers on TikTok.

Yeah, yeah.

It's definitely, it's definitely pretty good.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Like I'm talking tens of millions like you in cards.

it's nuts yeah so i actually just left la i got back last night um around midnight um

because i'm gonna move into the coin space and uh i think

people know me as a card collector but i think uh a lot of people trust me as a coin you know a coin bender or coin reseller so i think that uh the market is going to be huge and I've had relationships with coin dealers longer than I've had the relationships with the people I buy my

cards cards from.

So it makes sense.

But the thing with coins is, you know, you're working on, you know, 3 to 5% instead of

whatever, 10 to 25%.

So it's a volume game.

It's a volume game.

Yeah.

And you got to, it's,

it's much easier to supply, though.

You know,

no one's ever going to come in a coin stream and call me a scalper like they do in my Pokemon stream.

It's a different market.

Yeah.

What kind of coins are we talking, like the ancient coins or?

So I have access to everything.

I'm going to

just kind of

throw it at the wall and see what sticks.

So

I'm definitely going to have like ancient coins, but I'm going to have, you know, maybe you're a first time, maybe you want to buy a coin.

You've never bought a coin before, right?

Your budget is maybe $30 on a coin.

I'm going to have that.

But

I'm also going to have some, you know, mid-to-tier stuff, $300, maybe some $1,000 stuff.

But like, if you came up to me and were like, hey, I'm looking for this coin.

It's like $50,000.

I could probably make a phone call and get you that coin.

So

my goal is to just cater to the people that

want to buy stuff and not really exclude anybody because I'm in a weird position.

Most of the time, if you go into a TikTok shop, you're buying from someone who sells like Pokemon, right?

Most of the people on my TikTok are buying something from the guy they grew up watching on TV.

So they collect all this stuff, but it's a different, it has a different transaction value as to where like they're almost, you know, I always say like, you know, the Pokemon card the football card yeah it's the final product but it's not exactly what we're selling we're selling a memory an experience because these people most of them grew up watching me with their family or you know with their kids or their dads so this is they are buying something they want but they are also creating a memory that gives them an interaction to have a you know a moment with someone that they grew up watching in their living room.

Yeah, you're selling experience.

That's what card breaking is, basically.

Yeah.

That's why people pay more to open it on live.

Yeah.

And I always, and people do pay more to open online because it's a different type of community, right?

You're still like, some people go to the cigar lounge.

Some people go to the bar.

Some people go to watch concerts or EDC.

And that's their community, right?

Nerds like me, we don't want to leave the house.

So we're perfectly fine sitting on the couch, building a community with people online.

And that's the thing about whatnot.

It's more of a, it's more of a community, you know,

as to where TikTok is, for me personally i have so many people in my tick tock that it's it's just more of an experience as to where i'm building a community there but whatnot's a little more personal that makes sense yeah were you always pretty nerdy growing up no i didn't touch pokemon cards till i was 31 yeah i was uh

just a hustler and a grinder my whole life i was basically ran with the skaters okay yeah skater boy huh skater boy baby yeah but you were still fixing it like flipping back then too uh yeah just anything i could i mean even dumb stuff from candy when i is this i hope you guys are enjoying the show please don't forget to like and subscribe it helps the show a lot with the algorithm thank you it's hard to believe but this is a true story uh my mom's boyfriend when i was in like fourth and fifth grade was um he bet a lot of football and anything you can imagine so he would let me place bets so he would bring me home have you ever seen the booklet where he like has this point spreads for the whole week yeah So he would bring that home and I would take little bets, you know, in fifth grade.

Nothing crazy, $2, $5, whatever.

I would take bets from everyone all day, and we would shoot dice

under the playground.

And we had a little

tiny gambling ring.

It was so, you know, I'm talking maybe 50 to 100 bucks a week type thing, you know, nothing crazy at all.

Fifth grade.

Yeah, but you know, I was also selling candy cheaper than the snack shack and all that.

A lot of people start with candy, man.

That's how I started.

Yeah, a lot of people started with candy.

I started with sports betting.

Did you ever get addicted to gambling after that?

So So me and Corey from the show, we lived together.

And

I don't know if I was, I guess I probably, I don't know if I was addicted.

I do have an addictive personality.

Yeah.

But

we used to,

before the show, we used to bet a lot on sportsbook every Sunday.

And he would bet a lot, like all his money.

I would bet a lot too.

Luckily, this was a very good year for me sports betting.

I probably went like 60%.

So that's a good year if you go 60%, you know?

And

I don't bet parlays, I'll bet a parlay once in a while for fun, but you know, you just bet units, single games.

Corey would bet like all his rent money.

I would make sure I had enough money to cover my rent left if I lost everything, but he would bet everything, just keep flipping it every, and he would just go home and go to bed and wake up for the night game and see how he did.

He was just too nervous, straight degeneracy, yeah, yeah.

But yeah, we were pretty degenerate when we were younger.

Yeah, but I feel like that's hard to pull off in Vegas, too.

Yeah, I think that's probably why I don't really do it much anymore.

I don't really sports gamble anymore because I'll do a bet sometimes.

But for me,

if I was to win $1,000 right now, it feels okay.

But if I'm to lose $100, boy, am I TikTok?

It hurts more.

Yeah, it hurts.

You know, like, so the risk versus reward, I don't get the same dopamine kick.

But

although I haven't for the last year or so, because I've been so busy grinding, I do love to play poker.

Yeah.

Yeah.

You're nice at poker.

Yeah.

I mean, I play my own game.

You know, I just play the smaller games.

I don't really play big games, but it I just like going in there and these old guys, they don't know what I'm doing ever, you know.

I get caught a lot, but sometimes they I just think I like to go in there and mess with them.

And yeah, yeah, yeah, I was pretty good when I played.

Um, it's hard to make money in poker, though.

No matter how good you are, yeah, you always make a bad decision.

Yeah, do you use the solvers?

Like, are you really analytical?

No, I'm no analytics at all.

I'm just purely body language and um

try to make like, does my play make sense from the very beginning?

Like, yeah, I took some lessons from Jonathan Little at the very beginning.

I don't know if you know who I know.

Yeah.

Yeah.

So

yeah, I'm not a math guy at all.

I'll do like a quick basic kind of rundown, like think of it, but I'm not a numbers or a math guy.

That's why I don't play the big games because I'll get myself in trouble playing those kind of big games, you know.

If I'm in a three or a $500 or a $1,000 buy-in, like, it's not really too much trouble.

That's your sweet spot.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Like, you know, one, three or two, five or, you know, sometimes I'll I think two five is about the biggest I'll play yeah that makes sense though because you've talked to tens of thousands of people So you're probably really good at reading people.

Yeah, I you know, I'm pretty good at reading people and

I don't read a lot but I listen a lot I meant to bring a book for you I totally forgot it.

I read a lot No, no, no, but I have this one book that I give to everybody.

I bought so many copies of them.

I give them to everybody.

I'll give you one in the future here.

Please.

I read a lot of psychology.

I listen to a lot of psychology books, but this one's called

Surrounded by Idiots.

I don't know if you've heard that.

I haven't heard that one.

So basically it takes

the psychology of human personality and it just breaks them down into four colors and it helps you to identify what color or combination of colors people may be.

And it's

it helps you in negotiation with negotiating with certain types of characteristics.

Interesting.

I've read a lot of other books like this, but this one is so simple and easy to digest.

I always tell people, you know, this is a good book to read, especially like if you want to sell cars, if you want to sell timeshares, if you want to sell million dollar properties, you know, $100 million properties, this is a great book to start and get into it.

Did that book help you on pawn stars?

Negotiating?

So that was actually one of the most recent books I read.

Yeah.

I think negotiating and pawn stars, negotiating is just natural for me.

I've been in the pawn shop since I was probably 22, 23.

Yeah.

And I'm just being there, I've always learned how to negotiate.

you know, Rick and the old man, you know, they're just,

they're just natural negotiators.

So I think I've always been a natural salesman.

So the pawn shop really was like a kind of a great fit for me.

Yeah.

But

yeah, negotiation is, is a, is a skill that everybody should learn.

Absolutely.

Rick's number one rule is know when to walk away.

Like, you know, like I like Trump's statement about it.

Some of the best deals that you make are the ones you walk away from, right?

Like sometimes that's the best thing that can happen is you can walk away from a deal and wait for the next one to pop up.

Yeah.

Rick's one of the best I've seen, man.

Dude, he's good.

Yeah.

He's he's really, really good at it.

I've seen him do.

I'm sure you picked up a lot off him just seeing him over the years.

Yeah, I mean,

he's the best of the best when it comes to negotiating because

he's not afraid to walk away.

He just knows it's going to walk through the door later.

Yeah.

No, it's iconic.

He'll take a deep breath when he hears their offer.

It's the best I can do.

It's like a big meme, yeah.

No, he's phenomenal with it because the facial expressions mean a lot too, right?

Yeah, facial expressions do mean mean a lot in a person and you know

negotiating is a lot harder now than it was 10 years ago right because now you can look it up not even that now you can go on facebook group and sell it for 95 to 100 right you got

you know 10 20 years ago like if you're the you know you're a sports cards collector you told me like okay like yeah you can go to a card shop maybe you can search ebay but you're limited right now you can just go in a hundred different facebook groups post what you're looking looking for, and you're probably going to get 40 people hitting you up competing for your product.

Damn, I didn't know that.

Yeah.

So Facebook's kind of.

I mean, Facebook Marketplace, Offer Up.

You know, I don't really, I used to do Facebook Marketplace and the Pokemon groups, but

I like to use platforms that have built-in shipping.

I don't like to go write out my shipping label and pay for it at the thing.

I like to

pay for it, print it, and stick it on your shipping hundreds of stuff.

Yeah, yeah.

Probably, you know, minimum, you know, 500 packages a week.

Yeah.

And we only do about 20 hours, 20, 25 hours of streaming a week.

We're still scaling up right now.

That's insane.

Yeah, I didn't even think about that.

So that means pawn shops must be struggling then.

Yeah, I think I don't really know.

Like pawn shops do pretty good because gold, right?

Gold is at an all-time high.

I did really well on gold last year.

And I did really well on silver.

It's the first time I've ever done well on silver.

I've always lost money buying and selling silver.

But last year,

just the trajectory of gold and, you know, the value ratio for silver to gold, it's, you know,

gold's, I think, around $3,200, $3,300 an ounce today, and it goes up and down every second as to where just one year ago, it was around $1,900.

Holy crap, dude.

It almost doubled.

Yeah, you know, it's 50%.

And I mean, when I started the pawn shop, It was like $2.50 an ounce.

And now it's $2,300.

So I remember one time I bought a I bought a big Mr.

mr t rope chain from rick right this was back when gold was like maybe 250 300 an ounce and i put on layaway and one day one morning gold shot up to 450 an ounce so i went and bought the lane chain off layaway and sold it back to rick for a profit i never even wore it yeah i love it yeah you got to be quick in this space you know stuff fluctuates yeah collectibles fluctuate like every every every single day yeah that's nuts i saw on the show you guys bought a 3372 ounce silver collection um yeah I don't even remember that, but we buy that every day.

Like yesterday, you know, I was with our coin guy and, you know, he, you know, spent $30,000, $40,000 on silver coins.

And, you know, that's probably about,

he probably bought two weeks to a month's worth of stuff, depending on if it's a little slow or normal.

But, you know, we're rolling into summer, right?

And

tourism.

Even though they say tourism is down in Las Vegas, it's always going to be massive in the summer.

Even if it's down, it's still massive.

Maybe the casinos are losing out because of these big resort fees and maybe they'll change that but the people are still coming and you know if you can buy a 30 silver coin or i think silver is 32 an ounce now so it'd probably cost you about 40 bucks to buy it and you know people look at that as a solid investment right it's you know some people like bitcoin some people like to have a tangible piece of you know value that they can hold and put in their saves yeah are you big on crypto at all or no i do i have no crypto i had a bunch when bitcoin was around 15 and i just sold it like an idiot.

My thing with crypto is I just, I do, I don't really know how to follow it.

I just, I think it's great.

I do believe in it, but I don't know how to follow it.

Yeah.

A lot of anxiety if you're following it every day.

Yeah, I probably should have just bought and held.

You know, my friend actually that I grew up with, like probably Bitcoin was like at like, I don't know, pennies, whatever.

I don't know, like 10, 20 cents, was it ever like, it was like under, way under a dollar.

He wanted me to buy some.

He was like, just throw a thousand bucks in it.

And I was like, nah, I don't think so yeah you would have been set for life i would have been yeah does he still have it he lost his keys yeah dude you know how much that is probably yeah hundreds of millions i know i holy literally he was we were just

i was probably 21 yeah 21 22 yeah maybe 23 at the oldest so this was you know 17 18 years ago something like that back in the day that's how you bought fake ids yeah well we just used to go to the swap meet down there a fantastic uh this fantastic swap meet and buy them in the in the uh oh they had them there yeah yeah you can get them there damn i actually went there the other day yeah they don't have them anymore yeah you would just go in the parking lot and they would be walking around they would make them there yeah i was johnny zero damn what a name yeah did it work at the bars yeah but honestly i really never had to do it from the time i was 16 i could cash my own sports ticket um when me and corey were

he's about

About a year and a half younger than me.

So I was probably like 18

and maybe I was 17, 18.

And we used to go, we lived in Reno.

We went to Java Corps.

We lived instead.

And we'd go to Reno for the weekend because he had a truck out there.

And at about 18, I could go into this pizza joint and I would get us our pitchers of beer and a couple of pizzas and we'd sit there and drink beer.

So I always had facial hair and I could always,

I have a really baby face when I shave my face.

That's why I don't shave it off.

It's such a baby face, but you know, the beard goes a long way.

I love it.

Yeah.

Damn, the good old days, huh?

The good old days.

But I always say if you're not changing year by year, then you know, what are you doing?

Because you got to progress in life.

So change is a good thing.

I don't stray away from change, but change is needed.

I do love the good old days.

They made it what it is.

What's the main focus these days outside of coins?

I know you brought some stuff today that you wanted to show.

Yeah.

So Pokemon is my main focus.

Let me pull it out and then I'll talk.

All right.

So we'll start with something that's not a collectible.

I made this to sell at my candy shop.

We're running through the last bags and we're going to rebrand it because it looks like candy, but I have a beef jerky company.

Oh, nice so uh these are my flavors uh original western uh barbecue scorpion jalapeno garlic and western teriyaki so we have a great name chumley's awesome jerky we're gonna take the chumlee off of it and rebrand it to uh fit into the beef jerky aisle and take it like you know No added sugar.

Let's go.

I love jerky.

Yeah.

That's it.

Well, when I made this, I fell off a little, but I've gained like 30 pounds this year.

So I'm back on my, back on my grind, but I did no sugar, like just grass-feed, grass-fed meats and vegetables and eggs and cashews.

That's the way to do it.

Yeah.

So, so I got that.

That's going good in the candy shop.

We're going to, you know, sell these last thousand bags and then rebrand it.

Love it.

Into the jerky aisle.

Can I try one?

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

That one has sugar in it.

Oh, it does?

Yeah.

Only the brown one has no sugar because there's no flavor.

All the rest of them have sugar.

But that one's hot.

This is my favorite.

This is, that's a really good spicy.

Love me with barbecue.

Oh, this looks that's really spicy.

Do you like spicy?

Yeah, that's okay.

And I love the wet jerky, too.

Yeah.

Oh, that's fire.

Holy shit.

I'm going to eat the whole bag of them.

I'll leave those with you.

You can try and give them out or whatever.

Yeah.

So Pokemon, obviously, these are the hottest sets right now.

Is this brand new set?

So this 151, I think, is about two years old.

But it's...

It's the 151 original Pokemons rebranded into a modern set.

Got it.

So, you know, when this comes out, I think

um

this should be about

18 to 22 dollars but you know like they're 65 probably 65 bucks right now damn this is not the newest set but it's the second to newest set it's a small set prismatic evolution same price point as this but these are about probably 73

um they just They have a lot of very expensive cards in there you can chase.

So it's pretty crazy.

73 just for that long.

You're more than welcome to open any of those if you want.

But I do have something I want to open with you.

Are you cool with that?

Let's do it.

What is the hottest trend right now?

What do you think the hottest, newest, biggest trend is right now?

Is it Magic the Gathering?

No, but I do sell Magic as well.

I could play Magic too, but no.

We're talking K-pop, right?

What does everybody want right now?

Laboobus.

Have you ever heard of them?

Yeah, my fiancé collects these.

All right.

Well, let's pull her something good.

Dude, let's do it.

Do you care if we open something?

No, let's do it.

She'd be so happy with this.

So I just dove.

I got a few of these last week and at the card shop.

I saw saw how attached everyone are at the card show.

I saw how attached everyone was to them.

And I said, oh, this is going to have a nice run.

So, bro, we just waited an hour in line for these.

I just bought 1,200 units.

Holy crap.

An insane amount.

From a guy I've only done business with once, I spent $9,000 with him.

Damn.

And then I sold a few of them.

I called him back and was like,

these are flying right now.

Yeah, I spent 50, I spent.

$55,000 on these this week.

Oh, my God.

That's either going to break or make, is it going to make or break it?

So.

how did these take off you think lisa from big pink so they were created in 2015 i forget the lady's name but they're uh created after like uh nordic mythology so this is like a little monster in some kind of like little mythology maybe like in a you know maybe popularized in a book or something and so um

Let's do it.

Yeah, basically, those are your options.

And there's a secret one, one in 72.

If I really want the black one, but if we pull it today, then your girl is going to be super, super hyped.

Yeah.

Let's go.

So um, inside it will be in a blind bag because you know, blind bag is the you know, the big thing right now, right?

Blind bag, yeah.

So, don't look at the just pull it out and don't look in there because there's a card in there that it will give it away.

All right, got it out, then yeah, you just uh so you want the black one.

Is that the secret one?

Yeah, and it goes for 400.

What, maybe more?

I saw one actually sold.

I looked today, and there was one that sold for $589 on eBay.

That's insane, yeah.

So, it's super rare, then, yeah, and I didn't get the black one, but.

So that's pink.

This is the one I pulled.

I only opened.

Oh, so you got love and I got loyalty.

Yeah.

Love and loyalty.

Yeah.

So how much would these go?

Probably

I didn't, they're less, so less than if you bought it, you know, in a box already, right?

So it's like Funko's when you open it, it loses a little bit.

Yeah.

So, I mean, listen, you want to just open these real fast?

Yeah.

I want to, you know, we'll get.

Then you girl will be happy you came to the podcast today.

So this is the big energy.

These are like the new hottest, hottest ones so these just came out yeah these are like the newest series everyone wants these and uh they go for

you you they go for about 60 to 65 you can find them cheaper but you got to be careful because you might be at a lefufu yeah

so they're already faking these they're already faking these yeah they're already faking these if there's money to be made They're going to fake them.

Yeah, we just waited an hour in line to buy.

We spent like 21 each on honestly.

Yeah, yeah.

They're a lot cheaper if you wait in line.

but um

yeah i i pay i personally pay quite a bit more than uh 21.50 for them yeah so i make about 20 bucks per one so i think i pay you know about 40 45 depending on how one it is yeah so these ones i pay about 45 bucks for

oh so if you don't want to wait in line you know you could pay a little more and hit me up i got you yeah i'll give you i'll give you my price

we got four out of the seven all right we have two more chances to pull to pull a secret rare one here have you ever pulled a black one i've only opened one of these i just got these i haven't even the my first time opening one of these was sunday damn and then i just i saw how much people liked them and i was like oh this is there's going to be a good year-long run

probably around christmas black friday they're going to go crazy so i'm going to have to start collecting these then

yeah well you got a good collection here

All right, let's see.

Last chance.

Oh.

Well, I think we got them all, though.

Yeah, we did.

All right.

So now you just have to chase the secret one.

It's cheaper just to go buy it for $500.

Wow.

I've spent a lot chasing cards.

You know, if your girl does like to collect them, you might want to take this little card out of each one.

It just

tells you exactly what it is.

That was fun, man.

So, yeah, that's what I do.

You know, and Pokemon cards, obviously, you know, there's a card in here that...

It's probably worth about $1,500 like ungraded.

It's like a Charizard or something.

No, it's an Umbreon.

You know, Umbreon?

Yeah, though.

So Umbreon's the modern Charizard, basically.

It's the Moon Kitty, they call it.

Yeah.

Yeah, I remember that one.

That was the black one, right?

Yep, yep.

And a lot of people will use these Pokemon cards to actually play a game and build a deck, like what I do as well.

Yeah.

But

there's a huge people that just collect them.

What's your most prized collectible?

I know you collect everything.

Samurai Sword.

It's about 500 years old.

Yeah.

That's cool.

Yeah.

So actually, I collect a little bit of everything.

I don't collect a lot of bit of everything.

I'm actually a minimalist.

When it comes to my house, it's a little overflowing with product right now.

I have it all stacked up.

I'm looking for the perfect space because I'm very picky.

So I'm looking for a place right now.

But typically when you walk into my house, it looks like an Airbnb.

It's very, very minimal, a few little decorations.

And then my Pokemon is,

you know, I like collecting that because I can.

binder it or slab it and put it in a case and put it in the closet and it's not like out everywhere.

Yeah.

I didn't expect that answer.

I thought you'd be be like a hoarder with all the collectibles you surround yourself with.

Well, I work in the pawn shop.

It's like every day I'm inside of that giant collection, right?

Yeah.

I do have a weird collection of, do you know what Millifort is?

No.

So

it's been around thousands of years.

It's basically glass art.

And what they do is they, there's different ways to make it.

There's called stringers where they put a tube and they stack different color tiny little strings in there and make a picture.

And then other artists will paint the picture up right and it's a big tube like this Then they heat it up and they pull it out into little canes or coins.

Wow, that's cool And then they put those some people collect those but um have you ever seen like a

So they put them on like pipes and stuff too.

Have you ever seen like a pipe with that marble with the picture inside of it?

I think so.

So I collect those marbles.

So they have like I've actually sent someone on a plane to go pick one up before

because I didn't want to risk losing it in the mail, you know?

It wasn't crazy.

It was expensive, but 2500 bucks usually collectible like that you just send it in the mail right but it's so rare and I wanted it so bad I wasn't I was like I'm just gonna

send my assistant to San Francisco to pick it up and not worry about getting losing this thing in the mail well it's glass you don't want it to break right yeah I mean I bought so much glass I bought more expensive glass than that through the mail and stuff but this particular artist Mike Gong is just

It was my first Mike Gong marble and I just really, really, really wanted to make sure that it got to me safe.

Yeah.

I've been looking into art.

I might start collecting art, too.

Yeah.

Do you know what artists you like?

Basquiat.

Basquiat.

Yeah.

This is a Basquiat hat.

Oh, yeah.

I got this from the Basquiat Museum.

No way.

Yeah.

I love Basquiat.

Do you have

a living artist that you like?

Not yet, to be honest.

I just started researching it.

I love Mark Ryden.

Have you been seeing this stuff at all?

It's like...

kind of pops the realism, but it's like

he uses like little girls in like doll form kind of figures to create like an innocence to his painting but there's also like it's

it's just really really weird really really weird stuff and i i absolutely love it yeah yeah check it out it's either you're either for it or you're not but it's uh completely different than basque but he is like you know one of my top artists as well yeah so yeah he um you know like his story and everything no yeah so he kind of basically like apprentices with andy warhol and stuff yeah so he was all in the new york scene keith herring and all that yeah Yeah.

Art is fascinating because, first of all, it just looks cool.

And also, the appreciation is insane on some of them.

Yeah.

Well, we're going to have you at the pawn shop, I think, very soon.

So we have a lot of art at the pawn shop.

Can't wait to see it.

Yeah, we have a framing shop there.

We frame stuff up and everything.

Yeah.

What's the most expensive thing you got in there right now?

Well, it changes all the time, but we had on the show, we bought these

prints of where the wild things are.

Yeah, so we still have those.

Oh, you still have them?

I'm pretty sure they're like,

I'm pretty sure they're around like,

I don't know if they're like 50,000 or like 80, 90,000 each.

Yeah, I'll show them to you tomorrow.

I'll show them to you.

That's crazy.

Yeah.

Damn.

Yeah, those are probably worth over a million collectively, right?

I don't think they're that much, but

they are worth a lot of money, like at least over $100,000.

But they...

We don't really deal in the million-dollar art, right?

We can get all that stuff, but we deal in like, a lot of it is like several hundred hundred or a few thousand, a thousand, five thousand.

We do have some 10, 50,000.

We keep that in the back, but we deal in the stuff that your average person could come in on vacation and, you know, buy some prints.

Like we have tons of Picasso prints, salvo.

Oh, Dolly.

That's another one I like.

Yeah.

So Dolly has so many different art styles.

Have you ever been to the museum in Miami?

Not that one.

Okay.

If you go to Miami, go to the Dolly Museum.

It is insane.

It's so beautiful.

I got to check that out.

There's this one piece I definitely will buy of his.

It's like a watch, like a blue clock.

Yeah.

That's my favorite one.

Yeah, no, Dolly has a real interesting story.

He,

you know, he went to art school for fine art and then he was in all the like aristocrat circle and just kind of decided to go his own way and do his own thing and

really like

He's one of those artists that actually made something of themselves while they were alive.

You know, a lot of artists never get to see their their success but dolly actually like you know was able to make something out of himself while he was alive yeah that's such an interesting concept i wonder why that happens to artists yeah i think um a lot of time

you know art isn't appreciated until it's appreciated right i think the best artists are ahead of the curve

so a lot of art that gets sold while artists are living you know and this isn't a nocturnal artist but it's not an original style right although there was other people doing surrealism like Dolly, when you see a Dolly, you know it's a Dolly.

What he can do and

convey with the like how he uses shadows is really hard to do.

And there's other artists that are good at it, but no one uses shadows like Dolly.

And that's, I think, what makes his art so special and why it's just still so collectible today.

When you see, you know, something here and then the shadow of it is in the perfect position, exactly how it should be, like with the light facing it.

It's just, you know, that's crazy.

dolly's understanding of light is just beyond you know it

so so so high level yeah legend what was it like taking stuff on the road with pawn stars to america oh my god stressful

so yeah it was a whole it was a whole production i mean the stressful part was i'm a homebody i do not really leave my house very often so

we did three seasons but two of the seasons were done back to back on the road so the first season was crazy we were like you know and then this the second one was even crazier because it was basically seven months at a time we we would go on the road for 21 days

and the first season we'd only come home for like three or four days and then we go back on the road that's insane so the second and third season we did it back to back but we did do like 19 20 days on the road and then we get to spend a week or two at home but

it was super stressful for me because I was doing cart shows in between.

One month I did like 24, 25 plane rides or long drives.

We would, you know, get off on Friday.

I'd get on a plane, fly to another state, do a Pokemon convention, you know, work till Sunday, hop on a plane Sunday night, arrive back in the road show on a Monday, get in my car, maybe shower.

Sometimes I didn't even have time to shower, drive straight to work.

But it was really cool because

people, you know, in Vegas, people are bringing stuff to us.

So you go somewhere like, you know, Indianapolis, right?

People from Indianapolis are, they're bringing you their stuff there.

It's, you know, it's a lot of stuff that you won't get to see come into Vegas.

So a lot of cool stuff, a lot of good memories on the road, but I spent most of my time in the hotel room.

So I was so happy to, you know, Rick is a social butterfly.

Rick will, you know, Rick will just go out, sit at the bar and have a drink and just talk to who's ever right there.

Even if he's not having a drink, he'll go to the bar, get a diet of Coke or regular Coke and just, you know, have conversation with people.

So you're like the total opposite.

You're an introvert, it sounds like.

Yeah, I'm an introvert who does really well extroverted but i prefer not to be extroverted you know um i do i do really well in my circle or with someone i want to be around but if i don't want to be there i just don't want to be there yeah well people probably drain your energy you know yeah uh well and it's you know i appreciate my fans so much and i want to give them a good experience right but um

I can only do it for so many hours, right?

Because it's the same thing.

When I'm out, you know, we have a huge fan base and I want people to have a good experience when they meet me.

And, you know, it's, but the last thing I want to do after I worked all day, 19 days in a row, is go eat dinner and have a drink and talk about what I did all week.

You know, and, but I understand that's what I have to do when I'm out.

So if I'm not in that mindset, I just, I just don't go out.

But yeah, I do, I do really well when I am out, though.

Yeah.

And I feel like social media really revived the show, too, with all the clips, right?

Yeah.

So it's crazy you say that because for like the last three years, this and about six months ago, I got the realization.

Everyone kept saying, you're the guy from TikTok.

And I'm like, I had a TikTok, but I don't post anything on TikTok.

I haven't posted on TikTok for years.

You're the guy from TikTok.

I'm at the bank one day and someone goes, you're the guy from TikTok.

And it like a light bulb.

I'm the fucking guy from TikTok.

And I realize they're watching Ponstars episodes on TikTok and you don't ever hear our name on TikTok.

You just.

You see me and Rick or me and Corey or me, Rick and Corey, and we're the guys from TikTok.

They don't know it's Rick, Chum, and Corey.

So I was like, I'm i'm the guy from tick tock now so yeah um social media has like put a huge you know revive into the show and it's i feel like it's just so strong yeah that's how i consume content these days i don't really watch many shows or movies i just see highlights and clips on social media yeah i mostly watch yeah uh i mostly watch youtube or I'll watch some shows.

I'll usually watch an hour or two of TV at the end of the night, you know, just to relax and hang out and unwind.

But sometimes I'm not even watching it.

I'm maybe working on my spreadsheets just have it on the background but I wake up really early so I like to have like two hours of um

you know current events in the morning on YouTube because you could pick where you want right yeah um you don't have to listen to the legacy media uh push their

yeah push their agendas down your throat whether it's you know left or right it doesn't really matter but I listen to all of it but um you get a more authentic perspective from the YouTube channels and stuff stuff like that.

Yeah.

Yeah.

I love YouTube over media too.

A lot of good podcasts and shows on there.

Yeah.

And I feel like everyone's attention span is shot these days.

Like I used to be able to watch a whole season of like Naruto in like a day.

Yeah.

Oh, I wish I would have brought my 2004 Naruto cards.

Naruto cards?

Yeah.

I did a really good buy a while ago and I got some really, really, really hard to find stuff.

Yeah, sick.

Yeah, but no, attention span is shot.

You know, it's 15 second attention span.

So I can't even watch a show without checking my phone anymore.

It's crazy.

Yeah, like literally, that's so, I'm so good.

Like,

I don't, I'm just a post and ghost.

I'll like respond.

If I make a post on social media, I'll try to respond to it for the first 15 minutes.

Maybe I'll come back a couple of days later and try to respond a little bit or throw some hearts.

But

even if I am sitting down doing nothing, if I get on my phone for after two or three minutes, I'm like, oh, I got to put it down.

This is,

because I will have an addictive personality.

I will get sucked back into it.

And there's so many other things I'd rather do to waste my time because, you know, I like to waste my time.

I don't waste much of it.

But if I'm going to waste my time, I want to do it wasting it something else.

Productive, right?

Or even if it's not productive, there's other things I want to waste my time doing than like being glued to my phone, right?

Even if it's unproductive.

you know, I just, there's other things that I could be doing to waste my time.

You addicted to any video games right now?

I haven't played a video game in years.

Yeah.

Just, I play the card game Pokemon.

I mean, all day I'm working.

I'm, you know, different parts of the businesses.

I have a candy shop, you know, the collectibles online business, the beef jerky company.

You know, Rick and I do Pawn Stars or we do Pawn After Dark, the podcast.

So, you know, I'm either doing the podcast with Rick, working at my candy shop an hour or two a day,

doing the card stuff.

So I do the candy shop because it's right next to the pawn shop.

And we're not, we don't, we're not out on the floor a lot when we're at the pawn shop.

So it's just an opportunity for fans to come by and meet someone.

And really, I started it.

I have a brother.

He's 26.

The candy shop's been open since 2017.

And just didn't want my brother to have to work for anyone.

So I'm like, oh, let's just open a candy shop right here.

You could run it, make your own money.

And then, you know, I can come in here a few times a week and say hi to people for a couple hours, take pictures.

That's cool.

Damn, you're doing a lot.

You're working like 80 hours a week.

They say you work less when you work for yourself, but you work more, right?

Yeah.

No, way more.

Way more.

Not even close.

You don't have any time off.

Even in your time off, somehow it's relating back to work.

Oh, I'm still thinking about work in my time off.

I'm on the bed thinking about podcasting.

For sure.

Well, dude, it's been fun.

I can't wait to come on the show tomorrow.

Anything else you want to close off with here?

No, just I guess, yeah, check out Pawn After Dark.

Rick and I have a podcast.

Rick's.

Not the best interviewer, but, you know, people love listening to Rick.

He's super fun.

Sometimes we just do episodes where me and him talk about stuff.

Last time we were talking about solar flares and stuff like that.

Yeah.

So Rick's a well of knowledge.

He really is that smart.

And it's just fun to talk with him.

So yeah, check out Pawn After Dark and come by the pawn shop.

I'll be at the candy shop all summer from like 12 to 2, you know, Thursday through Sunday if anyone's out here.

Come say hi.

Yeah, we'll link it all below.

Thanks for coming on, man.

My pleasure.

Thanks for your little boo-boo, also.

I'm going to stop watching you.

See you guys.