Episode 481： Costco Kevin Cuts Membership Card & Responds to Mask Controversy
Episode Stats
Summary
On today's episode of ValueTaming, we have a guest on the show who was kicked out of Costco because he wasn't wearing a mask at the front of the store. The video of the incident went viral and has since been viewed millions of times on social media.
Transcript
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The video went viral and I said, let me just give him a platform to see what his argument
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is, why he's so upset that Costco kicked him out.
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Tell us what happened when you went into Costco that day.
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I was checked for my card at the door, but they did not ask me to put a mask on at the
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So I go about my business, load up my shopping cart.
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About 10 minutes later, a manager confronts me near the back of the store and says, hey,
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Next thing you know, there's a swarm of about six of these people starting to walk up on
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And the guy said, hey, we're not going to let you check out because you're not wearing
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That's where I pull out my camera to film this interaction.
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So he's this presentable, happy Costco employee on the video.
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Obviously, if you get put on video, though, you're going to change.
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And then he proceeds to take the cart from my hands.
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I'm holding on to it pretty firmly, but not going to try to start an actual fight over
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I wind up going back over to him saying, hey, I'm giving my girlfriend my cards, my debit card and my Costco card.
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And she's going to buy this stuff and I'm going to leave.
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So that's kind of how it ended off camera is he walked her up to a register, had her ring out, pretty much walked her to the door.
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Not when she walked in, but she has a mask from work.
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She put the mask on when she started feeling the heat because she's not as standoffish as I am, perhaps, you know?
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So she put her mask on and this employee takes her to the counter.
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Does she end up paying and being able to leave with everything or no?
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And then later that night, I'm still fuming, right?
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Like you're so angry because you're just driving home in your car and you're just so mad thinking about everything that happened.
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So I have a Reddit page that I wasn't thinking was linked up to my business.
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Never leave a political opinion if it's linked to your business.
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Boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom.
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So then if that wasn't smart enough, I decide to make a response video where I'm calling these people sheep in the video saying, look, it's not about the mask.
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The premise being is that we're being conditioned to accept collectivism where the group has rights over the individual.
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I feel that every single individual has rights.
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But under socialism, you would know that the individual loses the rights as the group gains them over that individual.
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So I make this video, duh, duh, duh, duh, duh, duh.
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I do not want this thing to affect my business.
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I'm starting to see one-star Yelp reviews, one-star Google reviews, people doxing my name and information.
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His name is da, da, da, this is where he lives.
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So I remove the videos because I don't need my livelihood being affected by some choice words that I said and opinion I had.
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So the media makes it sound like I took my video down because I'm somehow rescinding my statement or I didn't mean what I said.
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So I take the videos down, but they'd already been recorded.
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And then it disseminated and it went viral from there.
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But that original video just took off way more.
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How many views did your first original video get?
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I'm not sure because it was on Reddit and it was like upvotes.
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I don't know if there's a view counter on that, but...
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You went into a business like Costco and you refused to wear a mask, but did Costco have a sign outside saying that we require everybody to wear a mask when they come in or no?
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And, you know, I want to tell people that, like, you know, my personal rights and liberties don't end where Costco's, you know, private policies to begin.
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They can ask you to leave, et cetera, et cetera.
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I don't believe that Costco can tell me that, hey, you got to put a mask on your face.
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You don't think Costco can tell you to wear a mask when you go into their place of business?
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Because unlike a normal business, I signed a contract to be there, so I'm a paying member.
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So I have, like, a right to be there, not a privilege.
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So in my opinion, that's not in the terms and conditions of the contract that I signed.
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And by the way, you're talking to a guy who doesn't wear masks.
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I go to Capitol Grill right here, and I go to Del Frisco's, and I go to Toulouse.
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Today's my daughter's birthday, and I'm surprised when I'm taking her on a date night.
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So I got a nice little place I'm going to take her.
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I think it's disgusting to wear a mask and serve food for me because the entire time you've
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So I'm not a fan of the mask, but just like some YouTube channels went and sued YouTube
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to say you cannot take our videos down, and they have the right to do so.
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By the law, the First Amendment doesn't have anything to do with corporate's decisions on
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Costco doesn't have to have you as a member if you refuse to wear their mask.
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So that's the one part that you got to know that audience has to know that you went in
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knowing Costco said you have to wear a mask, and you knew that in advance.
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So to Costco's defense, they can say, we don't want you to wear a mask and refuse business.
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To your defense, you can go out there and not wear a mask if you don't want to in public.
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And if the government decides to do something to you, they're crossing the line, but not
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if a business decides to, because those are two different things.
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And I think at this point in the game, you kind of have an idea about those two differences.
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As a small business owner, as a libertarian, I completely understand all of the ramifications
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But I really want to get across the point that this wasn't an organic Costco policy.
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This was kind of like government mandate by proxy, which created that Costco policy.
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And one of the biggest reasons why small businesses aren't allowed to be open in the
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first place is because they're not sure if those small businesses are going to be able
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And so that's why these big box stores are open is because they know that they will follow
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And then I've got a big problem with small businesses not being open because it's crushing
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And people say, hey, why don't you go somewhere else then?
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And I say, hey, why don't they open somewhere else?
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Hey, these other businesses are private businesses.
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And look at the government interfering and saying that you can't open your business.
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I didn't just walk into a baker shop and say, hey, I'm not wearing your mask, John.
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I kind of took it to like the epicenter of the enforcement, if you will.
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And I'm always about like change starting from the grassroots.
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Like I can't write the CEO of Costco a letter and complain, it'll fall on deaf ears or the
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So sometimes you have to get in the face of the person that's already in your face, trying
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So in fairness, I would say I acknowledged his right to ask me to leave.
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I gave him a piece of what I thought, but then I left.
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I think the statement was made that some people are very frustrated with having to
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I got my employees out there and we're coming back from 25% to 50%.
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I'm in a little bit of a more business friendly state than you are.
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I moved here from California four years ago for that exact reason, because they're more
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But those are the choices that you have to make.
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Now that you're experiencing that in the state of Texas, in the state of Colorado, is that
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influencing you to consider leaving your state to another place?
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I see what the governors are doing in the blue states to drag down the economy, artificially
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That is an invite saying, hey, we're inviting you to leave.
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And man, there's a lot of business owners, both Democrat and Republican here.
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And there's still people going along with this.
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Like my favorite sushi place says, we don't think we're opening our doors until July.
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Like, I only see that Americans are fighting to reopen this thing, which is why we're opening
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it, not because of coronavirus infection rates.
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And, you know, they just now started to allow small businesses in Colorado to start reopening
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under extremely strict regulations, which are totally outside of law, only because 421
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restaurants said, come Monday, hell or high water, we're opening and we don't care what
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Because, you know, a story like you, I mean, it's inevitable.
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Maybe you recorded it and it got out there, I guarantee you, there are tens of thousands
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of stories like yours that went to a place, refused to wear a mask.
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But you are not the only person that's frustrated about wearing a mask to go to a place.
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Have you decided to stop your membership with Costco due to what just happened?
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You know, I have not decided to stop my membership at Costco because I understand that they can revoke
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my membership if they want to, but I'm going to continue giving them business because they've
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got the plug on a few different products I need.
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And I kind of need to go there for those products.
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I might try to find a way to replace those products.
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But, you know, quite frankly, at the end of the day, I handled myself poorly.
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We were bumping heads and nobody was a cupcake in this situation.
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So that being said, I'll walk in there when they stop having this mask policy and I'll
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Yeah, but they have to just drop this mask policy.
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Like, I'm not trying to create, like, a legal situation.
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You're going to send your girlfriend to go shopping instead of you?
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And actually, as a matter of fact, I want to start a whole F Costco, support small business
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sort of a thing because, man, all these big box stores are just raking it in, raking it
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And small business has been hurting for three months now.
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So I think when things start opening back up, we need to look at a situation like this
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and say, hey, we got to support small business.
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We got to stop supporting these big box stores as much because middle class America is going
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There were small business loans, which just puts business owners further in debt.
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But we didn't get golden parachutes and bailouts.
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So, you know, I think that, you know, this just needs to open up a discussion as to, like,
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whether we want to continue being patrons at a place like Costco.
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But if you're going to go back to them, you're saying that you're okay with what they're
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So if you're going to make a statement, you got to revoke your relationship with them
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and your membership for you to have some kind of credibility behind your voice.
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You can't say, I don't like the fact that you make me wear a mask, but can I please come
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If you're going to do it, you got to take a stand one of those two places.
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Costco is going to contact us and say, why did you make us lose a customer?
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Let's see what you're going to do here, Costco Kevin.
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I'm surprised I didn't throw it out the window on my way home.
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People were like, you need to shop at Sam's Club instead.
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And I advise everybody, if you don't like your rights being trampled,
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I don't believe that your rights end where a company's rights begin.
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And I want to say, you know, people are really trying to devalidate my statement
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It does not take away the validity of the statement that I made.
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And we're dealing with a company that in 2019 releases the modern transparency,
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the modern slavery transparency statement written by the CEO of Costco
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where they openly admit to working with people in their supply chain
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that still use companies that are involved with human rights violations,
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you know, like human trafficking, slavery, people that abuse employees in other ways.
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And we're over here talking about me flouting a policy.
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Let's talk about why does Costco, in this transparency letter,
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say that they openly tolerate the use of slavery?
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I think you've got a few different arguments going on here.
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One of your arguments is the fact that you don't want to be forced to wear a mask,
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which, fine, in a public, I get it, but when it comes down to a business,
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And the reason, like, for instance, my wife and I today were talking about
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My four-year-old daughter's friends to her house for a pool party.
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I said, babe, invite and let everybody know that we fully understand
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if they refuse to show up because they're uncomfortable with it
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But if they're not, we don't take it personally.
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We don't want it to be something where our daughter doesn't get invited to her friends
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because you know how the whole technical thing when you have kids is,
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oh, you didn't invite our daughter to your birthday?
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We're not going to invite her to our, I don't want my daughter to experience that,
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And we have the choice of telling them we want you to be here.
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So it's such a technical place because even at our workplace,
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I was at Yardhouse just literally 15 minutes before doing the interview with you.
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And I said, so is traffic back up at Yardhouse?
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A guy behind me says, oh my gosh, Patrick, David, I watch all your content.
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I said, I'm comfortable shaking hands if you are.
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So I think there's got to be an out for you to say, I refuse to go to Costco.
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My wife will tell you that there are certain businesses I will never go back to.
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My wife and my family were heavy duty Costco customers.
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We've been there for 30 years of being customers of Costco.
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But I'm also not a person that goes to businesses when they ask me to wear a mask.
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I like to go to places where I don't have to wear a mask.
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And when everything settles, then I'll go back to that business myself, but my wife's
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The other part about small businesses and then bailing out the bigger companies, that's
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a complete different conversation, which many people agree with you on these bigger companies
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Harvard getting an $8.55 million check when they got $40 billion in their endowment, but
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Now, were you an essential business or a non-essential business, the business that you run yourself?
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So yeah, it's automotive services, so it's considered essential.
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That being said, when the lockdown happened, March and April, I was getting hammered.
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Yeah, it's recovered a little bit, but then all of a sudden, once the haste started coming
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in, all my Google calls just stopped coming in.
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Yelp is actually working with me on removing those reviews, though.
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And right now, it's just recurring and supportive customers.
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I had about four cancellations, about $1,600 worth of work canceled like that, which I needed
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really bad because I got to recover from a winter where I don't have much business.
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Because these are supposed to be three of my busiest months of the year, supposed to live
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So I'm being punished financially for voicing an opinion that may or may not be popular,
00:19:07.020
It's like, you know these masks aren't stopping the virus.
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And they say, reserve those for medical workers.
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You need to wear a scarf or a t-shirt or a cloth mask, like non-FDA approved measures.
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And do you ever see people wash their cloth mask?
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Women put them back in their purse, spread the germs in their purse, put it back on their
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We're working with enhanced numbers of COVID infection and death rates.
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All of the science has been fraudulent, like many experts on your own show have pointed
00:19:51.500
And the one thing about America is if you take a position and you make a statement, you
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can get an audience like you just noticed you have.
00:20:00.260
But then when you also take a position, you create an opposition, which is also what's
00:20:04.700
So, you know, when you do that, you have to be able to capitalize on those who support
00:20:09.600
you, which means a lot of people will come to you and say, we're going to do business
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So you got to find a local libertarian community that wants to have you be their mechanic.
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But you also have to realize that you're going to lose some of the people that do not
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agree with you, who do agree with wearing masks.
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And that's a risk you take when you take a social position.
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Four years ago, Starbucks said they're not going to put Merry Christmas on their cups.
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And this guy named Josh Feuerstein goes and does a video, says Starbucks said we're not
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I went to Starbucks, bought a coffee, said my name is Merry Christmas.
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But he also had an opposition, which sounds like that's what happened to you.
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Well, Costco, Kevin, I'll give you final thoughts here before we wrap up.
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I appreciate you making the time to get on here.
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But what are your final thoughts here that you want to tell us with what's happened with
00:21:05.440
your business and what are you going to do moving forward?
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I've had to try to delete my Google business listing.
00:21:13.200
You know, I'm having to retract some of my online presence and just hammer harder on foot,
00:21:18.680
you know, just work on calling my dead leads, you know, just go back and call previous customers,
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Just check in with my old customers, call up dead leads, cold call people, and just footwork
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even harder, you know, because kind of like Google has the platform, YouTube has the platform,
00:21:42.660
you're building your independent platform, your business should also not be reliant on
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these platforms that could turn against you at any moment.
00:21:49.860
So it just reminds me just to strengthen my business by strengthening my personal relationships
00:21:58.180
Now, that being said, all of the mainstream news media is making me look like a fool.
00:22:04.560
And then I really kind of understood that the mainstream media, their biggest sponsor is
00:22:12.060
Big Pharma, and they're going to make so much money off this demand that they're generating
00:22:16.800
based off the fear that they're selling to people.
00:22:19.840
So if, for instance, I have to look like an idiot to everybody because they need people
00:22:27.560
to be scared to line up for the $1,000 a day remdesivir and to line up for the vaccines.
00:22:32.780
And if they start breaking that conditioning, people aren't going to be scared and they're
00:22:37.240
not going to lie in Big Pharma's pockets with big bucks.
00:22:40.580
So that's why I'm just going to look universally dumb, whether it's Fox News or MSNBC, I'm kind
00:22:47.920
And I think we just need to really work on destroying this narrative, destroying this
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fear and say, hey, I'm going to take off the mask.
00:22:55.680
I'm going to live in freedom and I'm not going to live in fear, which is a mindset you
00:23:04.020
But the best thing about America is you can take a position as long as you stay there,
00:23:09.180
And if there's areas that you made a mistake and you come back and say, I was kind of screwed
00:23:12.320
up in this area, but I still take a stand in this area, you'll gain even more credibility
00:23:16.080
with the audience to say, we understand that this guy's coming from a sincere place.
00:23:21.560
And by the way, I think it was 11 years ago, I got endorsed by a character I had no idea
00:23:27.340
When I got endorsed, two of my offices shut down immediately.
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This was a very big name nationwide when he got up and he endorsed me for the business
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and whatever I was doing on one radio station, I got a black eye.
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I had like three, four offices, two of them shut down.
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And this is when I couldn't afford to shut down two offices.
00:23:47.760
We started doing certain things right and everything changed.
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And I wish you nothing but the best as a small business owner.
00:23:54.000
And maybe you're going to hear from Costco and this guy who was the boss at Costco.
00:24:00.460
The next time you see him at a mall, you guys are going to see each other and hug it
00:24:03.480
Or you guys are going to put a nice fight together and we'll have it on pay-per-view fight and
00:24:07.440
we'll see who's going to be able to knock out the other guy.
00:24:09.580
Either way, I think you reached out to me on Instagram.
00:24:18.480
Because the other one was we reached out to him, but you reached out to me and I'm glad you
00:24:21.180
were able to kind of share some of your thoughts where you're at.
00:24:28.980
And by the way, if you haven't already subscribed to Valuetainment on iTunes, please do so.
00:24:36.480
And if you have any questions for me that you may have, you can always find me on Snapchat,
00:24:44.380
And I actually do respond back when you snap me or send me a message on Instagram.