M&A Trends, Fee Compression & Recordkeeper Pricing

[0:01] JD: A four day work week pilot was so successful, many firms say they won't go back to the way they were before. 15% of the employees who participated went so far as to say that there is no amount of money that would convince them to, to go back to working five days a week. This is actually an update from an earlier, smaller pilot published in November that we talked about on this show. And so think of this as us. We covered it before, now we're checking back in. It's been all the rage in the news these days. It's in tons of headlines. And even, even Mr. Bernie Sanders has been chiming in with his, his advocacy for the four day one. [0:53] Justin: I am once again asking for your financial support. [0:59] JD: I'm gonna go to Mark, I know you like to work less. [1:05] Mark: Yeah, I didn't realize a four day work week wasn't standard. Is that not what we do seven years straight, Mark? [1:14] Chad: We've been doing it. [1:15] Mark: Yeah, I don't, I, I've never worked five days my career here. [1:21] JD: Let's go to the master of the spreadsheet, the calculator, creating man himself, Chad Johansen. I mean, you're about efficiency, you're about numbers, you're about math. Surely, Chad, you must believe you would get more work from someone who works 40 hours a week versus someone who works 32. [1:41] Chad: So that's the discrepancy for me in all of this is that they, they required the same amount of pay but allowed everybody to work less. [1:49] Mark: My understanding, schedule where you're working 10, [1:52] Justin: 10 hours a week, 32 hours. [1:55] Chad: And, and so I, I took a little issue to that in my mind. No, not about less time. [2:04] Mark: Okay? [2:05] Justin: The average employee burns about two hours a day not working. It's conversing with their, you know, other friends and whatnot. [2:12] Chad: So, and that's going to change if you go to four eight hour days. [2:16] Justin: Great. [2:17] JD: Maybe, maybe not. Man. [2:19] Justin: I think people will be jacked. I think their head. [2:23] JD: Rob. [2:24] Justin: I think I. [2:27] JD: Are you in the, are you in the rope guy camp or in the Chad camp on this? Like, if you were running your own company, would you make people work 40 hours a week or 32? [2:37] Justin: I just feel so one is so. I went to school in Vermont, so, you know, you throw up, Bernie. It's like I have to back them, I guess. But, but, but I feel like I'm being trapped with this, you know, this four day workweek thing because I'm a, you know, because I'm a millennial and isn't that kind of the, that's kind of the M.O. right? We change jobs a lot and we, we don't like to work. So I feel like, I feel like you're setting me up for something here. But I quite honestly would, I prefer, I think there's a guy on TikTok and I saw it the other day and he was talking about going the other direction. He said something like, I can work three full days in one day and you will never catch me because I work three days in one day. So, you know, you may work one day and I'm working three times as hard and then by the end of that day I'm 200% ahead of you. And I like that guy's. [3:35] JD: This, this, this comes down to the, this important question I'll ask you, Chad on Based on what Rob just said, am I paying you as an employer to give me 40 hours or am I of hard work? Or am I paying you to accomplish certain tasks and to rob the questions? [3:57] Chad: Yeah, it depends on the work that you're doing. If you have a customer service agent, their job is to answer the phone for 40 hours a week and to be there and support clients and help. And, and if you made that 32, then you got to create overlap with other employees that end up equaling 40. [4:12] JD: Right. [4:13] Chad: If you look in our line of work, often we, we kind of justify a person's success in the admin slot by how many plans they're able to collectively get done over a period of time. And so I don't think that that's about them working 40 hours as much as it is handling their workload and what needs to get done. Now let me finish answering the first question and give you an example too. JD I'm down for the four day work week and I think the guys know now, when we moved to Missouri, my kids went to a four day school week. So they go longer each day, but they go Tuesday through Friday. It is the best damn thing imaginable. So two things that accomplished one, it got teachers that wanted to work four days rather than five days to come into the school district travel in really good teachers to travel in because they're one day less a week. Second thing it did for us as a family, it gives us even though I'm working every Monday, wife and kids feel like they have an extended weekend. The kids start school on Monday. They do some at home work, but it's not like they're getting up and going to school. The productivity from them, the lack of complaining, astronomically different than when it was A five day school week. [5:23] JD: Well, that's exactly what Justin was saying. Go ahead Justin. [5:26] Justin: What didn't the results that they found say productivity went up? I thought profitability went up. [5:34] JD: Yeah, this is like 8% or something that went up. But that's a great sign. But that you. Chad just explained Justin's theory of the two hours wasted on things. And so this is the real question is if you can get that break, that beautiful three day weekend every week, would you be re energized enough that you would be better than your old self that only had the two day week and therefore, and I'm going to stick with the whole 32 hours versus 40 because I feel like those aren't that far apart. Therefore you could be as effective, maybe more in the 32 hours than you would in the 40 because of that, that break, that balance in life. You feel better about your family, you feel better about your hobbies, you feel better about just the work life balance that you have. [6:23] Chad: I don't think there's some. [6:24] JD: You don't think so? [6:26] Justin: I think I probably agree with Chad. I mean especially like you know, putting it in the lens of the cert, you know, a service type industry, you know, and especially in the advisor world, like, you know what, what makes an advisor valuable? If you look at studies, you know, from clients, it's one, they're knowledgeable and they understand. Two, they're available, right. Whenever, whenever you call there for you. And three, they're able to help you in many areas. And you know, with, with number two being, and a very close number two being available, I think it's probably goes to, I think there's a couple comments in there, right? It's like are you providing the value for your clients and are you getting the work done and is the work done with quality? And if that takes 20 hours, you know, and the customers are happy and the business is growing, then that's probably great. So it probably all comes down to like what are you trying to do with the business and are the employees working to the point where they're helping you achieve that? Right. If you're trying to. [7:25] Chad: Before we move on. Be specific then Rob, in our line of work, could an advisor do a four day work week? Absolutely. Could a wholesaler do a four day work week? Absolutely. Could a third party administrator compliance office do a four day work week? Not if they're closed on the fifth day. They would need to be open and still answering calls and servicing. But could they do some employees on the first four. Some employees on the. Absolutely. I think in almost all walks it could work in our line of business as long as you're keeping the phone answering five days a week. [7:59] JD: I'm glad you brought that up because in the article they use example of like, well, you can't have a daycare company that goes down on the fifth day. [8:08] Chad: But. [8:08] JD: But that I thought exactly to Chad's point. Wait a sec, we're talking about people. And so even in the service business, it doesn't mean your service lines go down. It just means the team that you're working with is all working on a 32 hour workweek. And therefore maybe they handle people's inquiries better. Maybe they're more cheerful when they're talking to people. I'm being the optimist here, but I don't know. I'm usually more of a numbers guy and I want to shoot this down. I'm especially as being kind of the, the Lamborghini driving business owner that wants to crack whips on their employees and get as much as they can out of them, which I might slant towards that. Sometimes it makes me want to go the other way. But then I think like, but maybe there's some logic to this and if I could get more efficiency and more value out of 32 hours and everyone's happier, I'd consider it. [9:01] Mark: Dude, this, this is just a response to the fact that the world went remote and absolutely Nobody was working 40 hours. That just didn't exist anymore. And so people are now hopping around, they're doing things. Employers want to set themselves apart. So this could be a, a hiring tool to attract people to say we use a four day work week, but let's be honest, it's like unlimited pto. Oh, me, me, me, me. It's the same thing, right? It sounds great in theory, but really it only works for a certain subset of people in. Within. I don't care. It could be within a company. The type of person. By the way, people who work at Target are looking at this and going like you, man. [9:48] Justin: Like, you're right. [9:49] Mark: Oh cool. You want to work in an office for four days and get your free meals and like that. [9:55] JD: It's such a response. [9:56] Chad: Get a real job, Mark. [9:57] Mark: Yeah. Wow. Wow, you're so right. [10:04] JD: You're so right. Roby, catch me outside. How about that? [10:09] Mark: I had other points to make, but [10:11] Justin: I need to drink this drink. [10:12] JD: So that's a big argument is that this is actually more of a high paid, white collar, upper class kind of thing and that the blue collar workers really don't give a about this because they would prefer to get overtime. They're looking for more hours, more work to make more money. And what the article said is they actually are looking for more flexibility in their career. So it's not that they want to work less. They just like to be able to take a vacation when they want to take a vacation and, and have breaks between their 15 hour shifts that are adequate enough for them to get sleep and see the family and stuff. So it is, it's funny that Bernie. Not to get political here, but it's funny that Bernie is this big advocate for this. When I think this is more a pro white collar, rich person thing than it is a blue collar. [10:55] Justin: Bernie loves money. [10:56] Mark: Well, no. Can I ask a question? Who decided 40 hours was the appropriate work week? [11:04] JD: Let me tell you, Mark. Yeah, I'm glad you asked that. [11:07] Justin: The 40 hour revolution. [11:10] JD: Yeah, the 40 hour work week. [11:11] Justin: Right. Ford. Sorry. [11:13] JD: It's okay. The 40 hour work week was put into the United states law in 1938. It was post the Great Depression and before that it was common to work six days a week. So, yeah, so look at this. [11:26] Mark: We're, we're just trying to do less and less and less, you know, like, hey, let's just get all of our, our stuff produced overseas. Let's ship everything in. We don't need factories, we don't need to do. Yeah, wow. [11:40] JD: Chat GPT can take up some of this. [11:45] Mark: Eventually no one's gonna work anymore. It's gonna be a. We're just gonna go back to the caveman days. [11:51] Justin: We work, we work four days and Chat GPT works one day. [11:55] JD: Perfect. You gotta drink for that, Rob. [11:57] Justin: You know, I just like, I think to wrap it up, like if you're, if you're gonna go with kind of that flex or less than 40 hour work week, you just have to hire the right people, trust them. Right? I mean, we've all been in offices pre. [12:11] Mark: Hey, Brandon, my buttons aren't working, dude. [12:14] JD: You gotta drink from the hard stuff, Rob. [12:16] Chad: Same with even working remotely. You're right. It's, it's very similar. [12:19] Justin: You're right in there where it's, you know, working for the sake of working where you feel like you have to do it. And so you're there, you're in the office and you're chatting or, you know, on YouTube or something. I think if you hire the right people and they're productive and you can trust them, then, you know, if that's what keeps. If that's what keep Keeps people happy when it's so hard. Especially in the TPA world. [12:44] JD: Right? [12:44] Justin: You guys get to bring them up. So hard to. Ah, there it is. So it's so hard to. To keep going. [12:52] Mark: I don't think you took a sip. [12:53] Chad: I don't think you did either. [12:57] JD: I do that sometimes, Rob. Let it, just let it touch the lips a little bit. [13:02] Mark: Yeah, you talk way too soon after that, Rob. [13:05] JD: You also. It's not just hire the right people. You can also have a business model where if you can measure, like if there's metrics to measure their output, then that can also allow for that type of work environment so you can see if they're actually getting the job done. Let's move and let's do. Not a mid trow, not an intro, but you know, whatever it is in [13:26] Justin: the middle, we dubbed it something [13:31] JD: and you out there, you're gonna rate Justin on his core trow on a scale of 0 to 10 and see how he does. So take it away, Justin. Introduce our guest as a former pro [13:40] Justin: hockey player turned financial advisor. We may have a real life HBO ballers on our hands, folks. Sure, he may not be as massive as a rock, but his pants are just as tight. And having played goalie, you know he can throw down just as well because those boys are some wiry sons of bitches after hockey. He also spent some time as a managing director for WebMD. So yes, you have him to thank for that time you thought you had cancer. After searching if that bruise on your bum was something to be concerned over. Fresh into his new venture with Marsh Berry, Mr. Rob Midori. Sour Midori. [14:12] Mark: What? [14:13] Justin: Last name or not. How do you pronounce the last name? What's that? I said maduro works, but you know, like someone said, don't. Just don't call me. [14:26] JD: Right. Well, we can't promise that. [14:30] Mark: Yeah, the night is young. [14:32] Chad: Give us some time. [14:33] JD: Welcome to the show, Rob. We've known you a long time and we've been watching you from afar. So it's nice to bring you into our little inner circle here. And I will say I hadn't had, I had not anticipated this, but quite a lot of people were excited that you're going to be on the show tonight. Me personally, I was like, fuck, whatever. Let's try it out and see. But the rest of the world really wants you here. So hopefully get into some good stuff tonight. [14:59] Chad: Every. [14:59] Justin: Every now and again you toss a throwaway in there and then it actually works out right? [15:04] JD: Right now the boys get mad that's [15:06] Mark: how I got hired. [15:07] Chad: Dude. [15:09] Justin: It's like that. It's like that other. That thing you used to do in school, right? Like, where you do that. [15:14] JD: I know what you're doing. [15:15] Justin: You're like, well, I guess we're having Rob on tonight. [15:17] JD: I know what you're doing there. [15:19] Chad: Before we move on real quick, who. [15:20] Justin: Who is the most famous NHL player you ever played with? [15:25] Chad: Geez, Justin. [15:27] Justin: So I got actually a funny story from when I was in high school. So I'm from Pittsburgh, you know, and. [15:36] Mark: Hold on, hold on. [15:37] JD: No, no, no. Time out. [15:38] Mark: What does that mean? I'm from Pittsburgh, you know? Like, what was that supposed to mean something? [15:43] Justin: It just means I'm. I'm awesome. [15:46] Mark: Like, you're. [15:47] Chad: You're great. [15:48] Justin: It's great. You got. You know, we have kind of a fraternity if you're from Pittsburgh, you know, we all just hang out. It's kind of like we can sniff each other out wherever we are, but. So one of the best players of all time is a guy named Marilyn Mew. [16:00] Mark: If. [16:00] Justin: You know, if you know hockey at all. And when I was in high school, I got called down to a practice with the team when I was like, 15 or 16, and it was Mario's Mario Muse. Last practice, we were in the middle of, you know, running through practice, and all of a sudden he went off. He had heart issues. And, you know, it was great. What a. What an awesome experience. But then they fired the coach in the GM like, two days later. So I think. I think that was, like, emblematic of, you know, how my. The quote unquote career was going to go. But Maryland Mew, definitely most famous. Definitely. [16:38] Mark: Awesome. Yeah. Brandon hit the button. And also, my buttons aren't working, so, [16:44] JD: you know, sports over. [16:47] Chad: Gotta find them. Yeah, sports is over. [16:48] JD: Oh, cool. Thanks. Good, good, good. [16:51] Justin: The team. [16:52] JD: The team. [16:53] Mark: Go, team. [16:56] JD: Don't worry, everyone. Just like a soccer game. We'll add on time to the end of the show for the time they waste talking about. [17:01] Mark: Oh, that's a good reference. [17:05] JD: Get to headlines. Oh, we're in headlines. Brian Graff, Q. Butterbeer Video now. And the American Retirement association have a new podcast. Yummy. You got to use that every chance you can. The first episode of they use the acronym but Define contribution. Pension Geeks is available on your favorite podcast app. Now it's EP Number one podcast. [17:37] Justin: Yeah, it's kind of shitty. [17:39] JD: Okay. All right. [17:41] Chad: JD Created that name for him. Justin. [17:43] Mark: Yeah, right. [17:45] JD: We worked on that. [17:46] Chad: That was chat tv. [17:47] Mark: Took him hours. [17:48] JD: That would be funny. The Episode one guest is Department of Labor's Assistant secretary for the Employee Benefits and Security Administration, Lisa Gomez. We've had one of those types on our show before. Mr. Old. Preston Rutledge, if you remember, is. I believe that's the same gig, same job, chat bar. Tell me I'm right. I think I am. Is the guest honest review beyond Justin's critique of the name? I'm not gonna lie to y'. All, you know, it ain't Nevin and Fred, you know, but it's episode number one, so give them some time to kind of get their feet underneath them. A little advice, everyone. I'd skip to about a minute 18. Just skip through the first 18 minutes. It's kind of a pile of shit. [18:34] Chad: And probably the next seven years. [18:37] JD: And then. And then they finally start talking about some stuff. The definition of investment advice and. And the. What the future might hold. I. On a positive note, honestly, you can't rip on someone on their first episode. I mean, if you go to retail. Harlequin, episode one, it's a. It's a piece of dog. [18:54] Mark: Please don't do that. [18:55] JD: Yeah, so. So fair enough. But I think this concept of Brian Graff giving us a little insider's look into Washington and the going ons, there could be a really cool podcast in a niche that we don't have. And if he can succeed in giving us kind of the insider's look, hey, I could see a lot of value in that. I'd tune in. So we'll. I'll try episode number two and. And hope that he improves his game a little bit. Don't get mad at me, Brian. [19:29] Chad: Yeah, don't. Don't get mad. I would. Here's. Here's the way I would rate it. The last six minutes of content was what I expected all 26 minutes to be. I spent a great time doing an intro and talking about the industry as a whole. And I'm like, look, this is the nerd podcast. We don't need the fluff. We need the nerd shit. Bring us the nerd stuff. And it didn't come until, like, the last few minutes. [19:55] Mark: Well, like, I think to JD's point, right? Like, they're just getting their footing. Like, give them. Give them some time. How many years did we go on depth? The first half of our show was worthless [20:09] Chad: still. [20:10] JD: And then Brandon and he can liven it up. Yeah, no, no, I. First of all, not to kiss ass to Brian Graff now, but he's a smart guy. He's obviously very experienced. He's part of our industry, has been in our industry for decades. He's a great speaker. He knows his. So I think the opportunity. Is there something good? I just like Chad said, maybe you want to skip episode one and see what he comes out with next time. Sorry. Let's spin the Wheel of Ice, shall we? [20:41] Mark: It's a hundred percent landing on me. [20:43] Chad: I'm going to the John Deere room [20:45] Justin: at last week I did. [20:48] Chad: I did. Well, the week before. [20:49] JD: Oh, yeah. [20:52] Chad: Oh, and it's a Mallory, too. [20:54] JD: And I got. I got the. The big dog here. The big dog here. Before I start pounding this thing, not the entire bottle, let's jump right into the mergers and acquisitions market. Chad likes to call it the murders and acquisitions market. Rob, we're gonna ask you the question everyone wants to know. It's the typical one. This shit's been booming for several years. It's been in all the headlines. We can't. We turn around every week and see that some new firm's been acquired. They don't tend to give us the numbers all that time. Maybe we can dig into some of those numbers tonight. Kind of put you on the spot. But first question is, is, are things slowing down? Is 2023, 2024 gonna look like past years, or is this coming to a. To a much slower pace? Take it away. [21:47] Justin: I think it'll probably be. I mean, obviously this is where you insert the. There are no guarantees, but I think you'll probably see it be similar to the past few years. I don't want to say it's slowing down. That kind of implies that it's going away. And I think if you pull it and say, why. Why are people, you know, why are people selling their business? There's succession, and that's certainly not going anywhere. Right. I think it's like across the RIA world, like 62% of advisors. Are we got another one? Is this the hard stuff, or am [22:20] Chad: I going hard stuff? [22:22] JD: And Rob, I'm. The boys don't like this, but in our new format, we don't really explain the rules. Do you know why you're being penalized? [22:29] Justin: But I'm kind of okay with it. It's been a long day. [22:32] JD: But you know why you're using acronyms? [22:35] Justin: Yes. [22:36] JD: Okay, good, good. Yes, sorry, continue on. [22:39] Justin: No, no problem. So I was gonna say, you know, like, 62% of folks are looking to transition out of the business in a succession. So most of the acquisitions haven't been that. But that's certainly not going away. And then on the strategic side, I don't, I don't want to say it's slowing down. I would just say it's changing. You know, for, for the longest time, you know, if you had a good business and you were looking to potentially make a move, you were going to get a great deal, it was going to be at a good number and you're going to be able to kind of pick your spot. But I think as a lot of these folks are, you know, and when I say that, I mean a lot of the large acquirers of retirement business or wealth business kind of grow out and mature the, you know, mature their thesis and have kind of made acquisitions in a lot of the key geographies. They're just changing, they're looking for something different. [23:31] JD: But are we, are we crazy to think all the stuff we hear in the news that, and this goes way beyond my kind of wealth level. Like, I don't understand this stuff. But when interest rates are zero, that means free money. That means if I'm a big shot, I'm a, you know, I'm in the business of acquiring companies for millions, tens of millions, hundreds of millions of dollars, I flourish. I'm like a pig in slop, right. When interest rates are zero. And so with that combined with a strong economy, stock market doing well, I'm speaking of the last, you know, four or five years and now talk of recession, high inflation, interest rates going up and up and up, and the, and the Federal Reserve saying we're going to stick to this path. We're not. That doesn't with all this stuff. [24:21] Justin: And it definitely does. And that's why. [24:23] Chad: Absolutely, [24:25] Justin: you know, you, you kind of hit on two things, but to kind of go down that line, right. If when interest rates go up, it's going to increase the, you know, the cost of debt service on a lot of these acquisitions. Right. So it's not just the future acquisitions, it's the ones they've already made. Right, right. And so that can eat into margin. And then when you look on the other side, because most, most of the deals are about margin. Right. When you hear about multiples and you hear about people getting these, these kind of earth shattering numbers, you know, it's, it's EBITDA or free cash flow purchases. Right. They're looking for free. Is that. Oh yeah, definitely is. Okay. [25:02] JD: You should know, bro, it's your business. [25:05] Justin: I should have made a little like sticky note of what not to say. [25:08] JD: No, we like it when you drink. [25:10] Justin: Anyways, so point being, you've got kind of the, the, the shrinking of the margin on that side. And then when you're looking at businesses like, like ours, retirement consulting, wealth management, the, the market impacts the top line revenue as well. Right. Because a lot of it's tied to assets. So you're kind of losing it in two spots. [25:33] JD: Right, right. [25:34] Justin: And it changes the calculus, no question. But at the same time, just like insurance, like if you look back in the last 20 years in the insurance industry, because I think that's a good, it's not the same, but it's, it's kind of adjacent. They've been through these ups and downs. A lot of the big acquirers have been very successful. And you know, you could kind of make the argument that it's a, it's somewhat of a recession proof industry. Right. Everyone always needs insurance. Well, you could argue that even in a down market, folks still need their retirement plans, you know, managed. Right. You know, wealth management. So, so I don't think the demand is going to go down necessarily to continue acquiring. It's just going to change. [26:22] JD: I guess I would not knowing this the way you do what you're, I think what you're trying to say is in a normal business cycle people are going to want to need to sell their business regardless of what's happening in the economics around them. But I look back and I think, yeah, but is that true, Rob? Don't you think greed was a factor in a lot of. It wasn't all just circumstantial like succession. You said it yourself, I don't think we saw a lot of succession. Planning sales, at least they weren't a big part of the pie. And so it was more like a greed kind of moment thing of like holy shit, I didn't realize that my company would be worth this much at this moment in time. Time to look at this. And when that all goes away, it's, it's gonna slow things down. And maybe your answer is yeah, and you're just being really smooth about it and saying okay, that's fine, but there's still going to be deals to get done, which I don't think anyone could argue with. [27:21] Chad: Yeah, the volume has to slow down. I, I would think based upon all the metrics you just stated that are headwinds, we can't see what we've seen in the last two or three years. The question that was asked of me yesterday on this topic is when it's go, it's gonna slow down. But when will we see an 18 month kind of point where all of these relationships and conversations are already happening, and they're likely to go through. And then we start to see a little slowdown. Or will it happen nearly immediately as we've. And it seems like perhaps it already has just watching the press releases, but we don't get all of them. So I'm not sure. [27:59] Justin: Yeah, the, the tough thing to measure is it's the number of transactions is lagging. Right. Because a deal takes six to 12 months to get right. [28:10] JD: Right. [28:11] Justin: And so you really won't know until the end of the year if, if it's really been a slowdown. I mean, if you look, if you look at, at the fourth quarter of 2022 versus the fourth quarter of 2021, you know, the deals were down a little bit because I think some of them got pushed into the, into the first quarter of 2023. But when I say buyers are being selective. So we'll see, right? We'll see. Chad, on to that point. Like, it could, it could slow down [28:41] JD: a little bit from Rob, can I ask you on that point, if it's got that longer close cycle, which makes perfect sense to me, saying doesn't happen in a matter of weeks. You know, it takes months and months to get it all done. We've had such a abrupt change to interest rates like this. The whole economy didn't slowly change it. It happened very, very quickly. Did these deals get changed in the middle? Like, did they come. They must, right? You must come back and be like, oh, we haven't signed this yet, but so we got to tweak some of these numbers now. [29:18] Justin: There are deals that, you know, we're at kind of at the, at the table, if you will, that. That would walk away from because they had to start prioritizing their capital a little bit. Right? Where do we, if we have. If we have to get a JD or a Chad, right? Well, we really want Chad, so we're going to prioritize putting the money on. On him. Right? So it's. [29:38] Chad: Sorry, jd, we'll break it to you later. [29:40] Justin: Try. [29:41] JD: Ouch. Bad decision. [29:43] Justin: But, you know, so, yeah, it changed a little bit. And I think it changed, like, over the last, you know, if you look back 20 years, right. It's changing the deal structure. If you look back 20 years, you got, you know, maybe it was 25. [29:58] Mark: What were you doing 20 years ago? Six years old, dude, you talk like you're someone who's been around a long time, but you're young as shit, dude, [30:14] Justin: I read a lot. [30:16] JD: Yeah, you can still do Your research. I'm with you, Rob. You can still do your research, continue. Right. [30:21] Justin: But if you look at the deal structures now, they've changed. It's all like, it's a, it's a lot about managing risk. Right. If you think about it from an Acquirer's perspective. So 20 years ago, you're getting 25, 35% down at the front, and a lot of the shared risk is, can you grow within this business and earn that money? And then it's kind of shifted to where 10 years ago is maybe 50%. And then over the past couple years, it's been, you know, 80, 90, 100 of the deals up front because there's just so many firms with a lot of. [30:54] JD: They got the money. Free money. [30:56] Justin: Yeah, it's free money. Right. And they have to go out and they have a mandate to grow. You know, when you get, when you get institutional capital behind you, you can do great things, but at the same time, you're, you know, it's time to grow. So, you know, so there's a lot of competition for the, the same firms. And, and so it kind of changed the, the dynamic. You know, folks were more. Buyers were more willing to push cash forward and, and take on most of the risk and really de. Risk the owners of those businesses. [31:25] JD: So I, I feel like, Rob, we've, I feel like we've managed to brainwash you and convince you that, take you off your first statement, which is things are not going to be the same, that they're going to be different and they're going to slow down and, and maybe we'll see some that are in the pipeline right now, but eventually this stuff's going to kind of slow down a little bit. The numbers are going to go down. The, the, the buyers. I want to ask you this. I mean, did I. What I just said, was that accurate or you like. No, J.D. fudge you, it's going to keep rocking and rolling. That's what I was trying to say. [31:56] Justin: I just, I think I'll probably stand by my earlier statement, which is I think it will change and you'll see the type of acquisitions change and who's being acquired change. But I think the numbers will stay [32:07] JD: relatively similar in terms of, in terms of quantity, frequency. Okay, fair enough. Let me ask you this. I always found this really sexy and kind of super interesting to me. Can you help me speculate? I, I throw on my tinfoil hat all the time and I, and I jump in this world that I really know nothing about. But when I'm A disruptor, I'm a guideline to human interest. The list goes on and on. And I got hundreds of millions of dollars over the past few years in this free money time zone that we were in. Are not my investors now coming to me going like look, the fucking bolts are tightening on us and all of our investments and we need to see profitability out of this investment we made in you. And, and isn't it possible that those companies at that very same time are wanting to come back to them and go like, look, we're in stage three, we need some more money to grow people. And isn't that kind of a class that's going to fucking implode on itself or am I just tin foiling this shit? [33:15] Justin: I think you're totally right. And I think that kind of, you can draw a pretty distinct line. Like if you think acquisitions of retirement consulting businesses or wealth managers. Right. It's a different type of revenue than like one of those high growth tech firms. And I mean we're all seeing it. I mean jd, you're out west, right? You're more or less Silicon Valley, at least compared to me. And you know, there's a lot of layoffs, it's a lot harder capital. You know, it's changing the, the calculus for those firms as to like, what's our Runway, what kind of money do we want to spend? How do we grow really fast? And you're seeing like a lot of maybe bloated organizations from a people perspective. The Pete. Yeah, we can't go out and raise 100 million dollar round now. We might have to take 60 or you know, 50 or 40 at a, a different valuation. So yeah, it's definitely, it's definitely changing. And I, you'll probably see some firms, you know, have to sell just because they didn't anticipate they wouldn't be able to raise another round. [34:18] JD: Two things on that one. I agree with you. When you see the PE ratios of the like, biggest companies in the world dropping and, and everyone's saying they've been overvalued forever. I think I need a drink for that one. I do. That's gotta be a, a sign, you know, that's a canary in the coal mine kind of moment for you there. But then, oh, what that is Canary in the coal mine. [34:46] Justin: Never heard of. Wow, I like that chat bar. [34:49] JD: Let these guys. [34:51] Justin: Yeah, you know, I know what you're saying. [34:52] JD: Jd, I got you what he's saying. [34:56] Mark: I mean he's plucked it out of thin air from like the 60s. [35:01] JD: What. What else sounds fun for you is I hadn't thought about this. And maybe we talk about Marshberry a little bit, I don't know, or your new role, but. Okay, so acquisitions of advisor shops may start to slow or differ, or you say no, whatever. Whoever's right, doesn't matter. But when shit starts to blow up, it could create more opportunities on the downside. Right. Like, companies are struggling, they need to get the fuck out, and then they need someone like you to kind of marry partners to figure it out. [35:31] Justin: Yeah, I mean, there's. There's whether the. You know, whether the acquisitions kind of continue as they've been rolling or not. I mean, there's always value to scale, and so there's always going to be a lot of value to bringing people together and bringing different. And I saw Michael Kushner's organizations together. There's always value to bring organizations together and. And kind of leveraging that. And that could be a full acquisition. Like, everyone merges together and, you know, uses it to get better, you know, better funds or access to different managers. Or. [36:12] JD: I was being more like. I was trying to go more down. Like the ambulance chaser kind of vibe of like, if their house is on fire, they're going to need someone like you, too. But I'm just having fun. [36:22] Justin: Are you saying stress that there are distressed assets out there? Yeah. [36:25] JD: Right. There you go. [36:26] Justin: No, I'd say yeah. I mean, there's. I have talked to plenty of folks that were trying to time the market, and it's just like, you would probably counsel any client you don't want. You don't ever want to time the market. You don't want to try because you'll get burned. So, yeah, there probably are. There probably are some people that are thinking they maybe missed the boat, and maybe those would be kind of in that. The JD class of distressed assets. [36:52] JD: But come on, Rob, you can do the deal where you. You where. Plan design consultants, buys guideline. I'm joking. [36:59] Chad: Make it happen. [37:01] JD: I'm kidding. We're gonna. We're gonna have their. Their founder on this show, so I like to talk about him even more now. I know he's a. Just kidding. Kevin. We know. You know, I can't buy you. You're not a distressed asset. [37:14] Chad: But we could join forces for scale, Tony. [37:19] JD: Well, you gotta vote for me for stepping in for Samson while he's out. [37:22] Mark: Yeah. [37:23] JD: Good job. Well, we can come back to some of that, Rob, if you'd like to, but for now, I think people need help. With their finances. You know, the world's tough. The markets are on the ups and the downs. Robe guy's been away. You know, he. He goes to happening. Yeah. He goes to golf tournaments at pebble beach and he goes to Disneyland to hoop it up. And he leaves all of his followers just waiting for advice and in the dark. So this is another segment of Drunk Stock Tips with Ro. Remember, all of the stock Recommendations given by Mr. Mark Palmini are definitely the opinion of JD Chad, Justin, Plan design consultants or retireaholics. Everyone, we. We believe in this. And you should. [38:28] Justin: It's not true. [38:29] JD: And do all of that, okay? So don't be an idiot. Not pay attention to what he's doing. I'm not going to go through all of the success. We don't have time for that tonight. We'll try that later. I do it all the time. Not tonight. Let's go straight to it. Robey, I'm going to go close to home with you here. I'm going to have a little bit of conflict of interest here, I might say. Let me describe from Google here, this company without giving you its name. It's an American financial retirement investment and insurance company based in New York. And it began its name as. I'll drink for this. Ing. It's not called Voya. [39:11] Justin: Why? [39:12] Mark: No, no, no. [39:14] JD: You can't do. [39:15] Mark: Okay, whatever. [39:18] JD: The stock is currently at 73.81. It's, it's. It was at 59.65 back in December of last year. So it's been on a bit of a tear over the last. You know, what are we at two couple months here? I know you don't care about those things. I know you're not interested in that. But it's got just under 6,000 employees. The 7.5 billion plus in revenue. You're familiar with the company. I know you are. So what do we do, Robbie? Do we buy Voya? Do we sell it? Do we short it? I mean, what do we do? [39:59] Mark: I. I [40:02] JD: don't think about your local wholesaler. [40:04] Chad: Yeah, he's, he's. He's. He's mitigating his risk right now. I say this. My compensation goes down. [40:11] JD: Hey, Justin, I've learned one thing. People are watching. They'll eventually. [40:17] Mark: Yeah. No jd. [40:19] JD: So don't think about your local wholesaler. Think about all the people that are on the edge of their seats wanting to know what the to do with their E Trade account. [40:30] Mark: Okay. [40:32] Justin: This is the longest you've ever taken. [40:34] JD: I like the silence. [40:35] Mark: I'm really. I'M really nervous right now. Usually it's so, so easy. [40:40] JD: You ever see Elon Musk answer a question, you know, takes it? No. [40:45] Mark: Right, Exactly. [40:46] Justin: There's no responses. [40:48] Mark: You have to embrace the silence. Right. The silence is Chad's drinking ginger ale. [40:55] Justin: Everyone just saw that. [40:57] JD: Come on, Robbie, tell us this is a gut instinct thing for you. No. Cerebral thing. [41:02] Mark: I mean, it's. For me, it's, it's, it's fairly simple. [41:06] Justin: It's. [41:07] Mark: It's a buy. I say that with analysis, with little excitement. Right. Just because, like, hang on, I'm just [41:14] JD: opening up my E Trade. [41:16] Mark: Yeah, no, I, I, I believe that. I believe that it's a company that will continue to prosper. That's. That's all I can say. That's this. That's all. Mark, you cannot, you cannot name. No, from now on to here forward, we don't, we don't work where we eat. [41:38] JD: Whatever. [41:39] Mark: However you say that, eat where we shit. [41:42] JD: Yeah, you got it. Eat where you. Where you at. [41:47] Justin: You don't bite the fan hand that feeds you type. [41:49] Mark: Yeah. [41:50] JD: Wow. Okay, I apologize, everyone. We'll move on from this one. But. [41:54] Chad: Yeah, hey, can. Can I, Can I challenge Mark then? Yeah, I lost to him last time. [42:00] Justin: We do want an update for this one specifically. Next. Next time we do this. [42:04] Mark: Right? [42:05] JD: Of course, of course. [42:06] Mark: Go on, Chad. [42:07] Chad: What's the time horizon mark? [42:10] Mark: A month. [42:12] Chad: Oh, that's too short. Okay, I'm in bias as well, then. [42:16] JD: You're gonna. [42:17] Mark: Okay, okay. [42:19] Chad: Three months. [42:21] Mark: No, it's. It's February 23rd. [42:25] JD: Okay. [42:29] Justin: End of Q2. [42:31] Mark: And, yeah, July. Our first show in July. [42:35] Justin: Chad. [42:35] Chad: Okay, I'm, I'm saying it's not a buy. [42:37] Mark: Then I'm still a buy. [42:39] JD: Okay, Good for you. The chat bar wanted an apology, and they don't want apology because of the silence or this or that. They're with Justin. What they're missing out in on is Robey's, like, really cool color commentary on, you know, the customer service at Home Depot, the new episodes coming out at Netflix, and we got none of that with Voya. Just a little go ahead and buy. So we'll move on. We'll move on. Thank you. [43:08] Mark: So. I'm so glad I let you down. [43:09] Justin: Jd, we do need a ruling on this. I'm gonna do it regardless. I said quarter two, but I said the abbreviation of that. Does that count? [43:17] Mark: You're already drinking, so. [43:18] Justin: Yeah, Ed called me out, but I didn't know. For future. Okay, I think I'm with you there. [43:22] JD: Did you know this. Rob, did you know this? Everybody listening in out there. The publication that you all love, the one you tuck under your pillow at night, the 401k averages book has just been released. The 23rd edition. You know you guys love that shit. I buy it. I buy it. [43:44] Chad: You buy it? The wholesalers give it to us for free. [43:47] JD: Oh, fuck. Well, I don't have. I didn't say that I was. The last time you sold a plan, J.D. they don't give it to me. I got to go. [43:56] Chad: Well, so the truth is Hancock called and said, who should I send it to? And I said, me, of course. And then they said, can you get multiple copies? [44:04] JD: Everybody. That's the same answer Chad gives them when they ask them who's who to send the Aruba trip details to for selling whatever plans. Chad, send it my way. Shall I go through some of the. Let me go through some of the. The headlines. Not the headlines. The. The kind of bullet points from this article. First thing you got to do, Brandon, or Brandon, JD Is find it. And I'm struggling to do that here. Bear with me, people. Here we go. Got it. [44:33] Justin: Fantastic. [44:34] Mark: Okay. [44:36] JD: Smaller plans pay higher fees than large plans. No, duh. A small plan with 5 million in assets costs 1.09% while the plan with $50 million in assets costs.81% based on the averages. Chad, opinions on this? [45:03] Chad: Obviously. Obviously. Why don't we look at a per employee cost on those for that 5 million dollar plan versus the 50 million dollar plan? [45:12] JD: Well, that's good. I think they have one like that. So check this out. Here's the next one because that one's kind of silly, kind of stupid. No offense, 400 and K specialist magazine. But don't give me key findings that are stupid like that. So the next one is. Plans with smaller average account balances pay more than those with larger balances. Okay. A 20 million dollar plan with 2000 participants, everybody has an average total plan cost of 1.17%. While a 20 million dollar plan with 200. Remember the first one had 2000. This one's got 200 participants, has an average total plan cost of 0.91. You know, pretty big gap because there's less people there. So. Comments? Rob, I'll go straight to you. Does this shock you? [46:00] Justin: I got. I got minimal to say here at the. [46:04] JD: Oh, come on. Try to. [46:05] Justin: We're going through the obvious. [46:08] JD: Yeah, it's obvious. [46:09] Justin: Obvious nothing. Let me just throw out an acronym so I can drink on this one. [46:12] JD: Good for you. Yes. Nice. Like it Chad, do most record keepers have proposals in the micro, small, even mid market that takes into account headcount or average account balance or there's still lots of them that are just like it's about how many millions you got. [46:35] Chad: No, I mean all of them have their own metrics in terms of their scale and how they're pricing. Some of them are heavy on average account balance. You got folks like Standard that are just about peer number of participants. You have others like Transamerica that did for years, that was about number of positions in the underlying investments. So number of participants and number of investments in the core menu, they all have their different flavor of how they're pricing. When you stack them all side by side, you have a few that do a better job at allowing for billable fees to be as part of the structure for smaller plans, thus keeping the the operational expense down and allowing the plan to grow without the costs growing. But the vast majority in that micro space are still all asset based. And the asset base, unlike JD when you were selling plans where they used to have a lot of break points, very few of them have breakpoints now. [47:28] Mark: When was that exactly? [47:29] Chad: They're all pricing in to account plan growth and they're pricing a $1 million plan with no intent of repricing it at any point in the future. [47:38] JD: At first I was gonna say I kind of like that. Then I'm like that because there's a, [47:41] Justin: is that because there's a lot of almost like a sunk cost on the front end where they're doing a lot of work and well that and it's like a loss, you know, you lose money the first few years. [47:52] Chad: Yeah, most of them will say they need to retain a client for 18 months before they get see any profitability. But the second component of that, Rob, is is they're trying to be so skinny and competitive up front that they're baking in future price break points that they used to have. Their, their actuaries will tell you like, hey, our pricing right now is 20% lower than what it would have been three years ago. And that's why we can't lower our cost at the next pricing break point because we need to make up for that. And the market's gotten so aggressive to win business. [48:23] JD: There's nothing more frustrating for them when they take that approach. And then an advisor slash client advocate comes back to them in 18 months and asks them to sharpen their pencil because there's competition, which I get both sides of that story. But then the record keeper has to explain to them. Like, look, man, we kind of gave it away the last 18 months. We're really hoping to get to year three, four, five where we can actually make some money on this thing. And by the way, that is exasperated. Exacerbated. [48:53] Justin: Exacerbated, yeah. What? [48:56] JD: Don't use big words when you're drinking. Me too. In the micro market, that's where you see a lot of it, you know, then they win that $500,000 plan, the million dollar plan. Probably see less of it on $100 million plans and $200 million plans. Yes. [49:14] Chad: Chad, in, in my short career doing this, we went. Jd, you and I talked about this today. We went from the industry saying, hey, what can we afford to build in? Like an advisor, maybe even a third party administrator would say, oh, we're cutting the cost by 40 basis points so we can build in an extra 20, saving the client 20 basis points. [49:36] JD: You mean based on what the incumbent is? What you're looking. [49:39] Chad: What the incumbent is. So I'm going in a timeline here. It used to be what can be baked in and then it was what can we, what can we charge to still be competitive? Now we've seen tons of advisor practices come out and say, no, we're going fee based. Like we've got a 10 grand per client minimum or we've got a $5 million or a 5K minimum. And, and many, many advisors are stepping away from the asset based model where their revenue grows as assets grow. They're saying they're delivering a service regardless of the asset size. Are we ever going to see the record keeping space lean that way? I know we've seen a few of them that have no role in the investment world. Call it some of your more modern disruptors that have no tie to the assets themselves, but do you think the big dogs will ever lean that way? [50:30] JD: Why would they? [50:35] Chad: Because the industry's pushing it. Why have advisors? Why have third party administrators? Because it's, we've gone down this path of fee compression. You need to be profitable on every plan. They're not profitable on small ones. They're not profitable for three years. So maybe they start coming out saying, hey, we're going to be profitable from day one. So rather than being based on assets, we're $27,000 to do the record keeping on this plan. [51:00] JD: That just seems like a, although a very like transparent and honest approach, it seems like really ill timed given that a lot of the disruptors are trying the opposite approach. And you know me, I won't get on My soapbox tonight. But I, I hate the fact that our industry sells itself as cheap and that cheap is successful and low cost works all the time. [51:27] Mark: By the way. [51:28] Chad: I'm not saying cheap. [51:28] JD: No, I know and I'm not getting upset. We won't go down that path again. I just don't think the record keepers are going to react that way. And by the way, I could tell you that the reality is that I won't say guideline, but human interests and some of these others really aren't cheap. When you look at it like. And they're kind of almost taking Chad's approach. They have a very high profitable early with a higher profitable. But so here's my point is this is an age old question that we've always known in this industry, but we tend to kind of skip around it a little bit. [51:59] Mark: Chicken before the egg. [52:01] JD: Should, should, should a record keeper make more money on a ten million dollar plan with a thousand participants versus a five million dollar plan with a thousand participants? Is it okay to make your revenue based on assets, which is just another way of what Chad was kind of proposing there? And I just don't think that that's going away. I think we see a push for advisors to charge flat fees, but even that's a, what percentage of the market is that where advisors aren't actually a percent of the assets? It's tiny. And you don't see a lot of record keepers, especially south of 50 million. [52:48] Chad: I see where you're going. Let me flip the question and ask a little differently. If we as an industry are trying to find a way to help people save more, get more involved, keep more money in their accounts and we know that expense is the largest headwind. Once they're participants, we know that expense is the largest headwind. Could we see our government stepping in and saying, hey, we'll give tax credits not just to those new plans emerging for plan expenses, but to all plans and their plan expenses in a way of inflating employee account balances? [53:21] JD: I don't think so. I don't think that's anywhere near the radar. Rob, you look like you got something. [53:25] Justin: I was just, I was just thinking like, you know, the only way I could see that happening is if. Because no one wants to see their revenue go backwards. So the only way I could see it happening is one, they find a way to do it cheaper, right? And it's kind of keeping the margin. [53:42] Chad: Two, [53:44] Justin: I don't know, they find a way to make up for that revenue somewhere else. [53:48] JD: Oh, there you Go. There you go. They're definitely looking at ways to do that. [53:52] Justin: And I think that's, I mean, you know, when you're a hammer, everyone everything looks like a nail kind of saying. Right. Is that's. And I don't know if this is, this might be an acronym. You know, you look at participants and, and where. And I'm going to drink on it [54:06] Mark: anyways because I think that what, what were you said? Participants. That's not an acronym? [54:12] Justin: Well, I don't know. That's, I mean it's kind of, it's kind of niche. They're employees. Departure. Mark, let him, let them drink. [54:18] Mark: I'm, I'm confused. You sounded so, you sounded so smart until that one comment. [54:25] Justin: I'll just say ppts. [54:27] Mark: There you go. Now drink again. [54:31] JD: I don't want the chat bar to think where we're dodging a question here because we've talked about this many times on the show in the past. But anyone that's a new viewer here, like, yeah, and of course third party administrator revenue share is something Chad and I talk about all the time. We're caught up in this same thing of like, I could tell you guys think it's like free money. I look at it more as a business owner of like something I have to adjust my billables by. I would love a world, a nice flat competitive landscape where there was no such thing as revenue share. I think that would really simplify how, how business is done. And, and that's, I'm talking third party administrator revenue share. But then here's the bigger problem above me is advisors having their comp tied to size of assets, record keepers having their comp tied to site tied to the size of assets. I feel like it's got a change up of that record keeper space. And it's, what's funny is if we were to look in the mirror as an industry, it seems like the prudent thing to do. It seems like the thing that the clients would want us all to do. But to Rob's point, I think a lot of people are very worried about what, how that impacts their current revenue. Not saying like one has to be less than the other. It just, and here's the, here's the problem and I'll shut up. It's who, who, who steps first, who dives first. And so we're, it's not like we're all going to hold hands and jump off the cliff together because if we did, that would work. But instead one person does it, another company does it. Another company does it, and now we're all in this weird competitive market where we're all offering different things, and it's kind of reminiscent of what we're in right now, but it gets worse. And so that doesn't work. And that's a problem. [56:18] Justin: Prisoner's dilemma. [56:19] JD: Yep. [56:20] Justin: Yeah. Someone's got to move first and, and be able to do it with some scale and make it a competitive thing instead of just a, you know, a revenue thing. [56:30] JD: And that's a tough ask. You know, I, I mean, you could, you could maybe say that some of the disruptors are pushing the cost down competitively, even though I, I challenge you on that. But I don't think that's really happening. I don't think the record keepers are feeling like, oh, my God, guidelines so cheap we have to, like, lower our price if Voya is going to hit their numbers this year or empower. That's just not the case. And last thing I'm going to say on this is, you always say that, J.D. and it's never the last thing is, at least in the small micro market, I don't think people are ripping clients off. I've said that before. I think clients are ripping vendors off in the micro market. So I don't think it's really an issue down there. This is more an issue of stumbling upon a $75 million plan that you go, ooh, these fees look a little juicy on a couple of these. Are they really getting the services they, they deserve? [57:25] Justin: So I would, I would say on the, like, having taken apart, you know, financials of companies, like, one of the first things you do is you look at the clients and you say, what's your profitability per client? And I think, I don't know that anyone on here would disagree if you were. If you're going down a client roster, it's those micro plans that you're saying, hey, why are you doing that? [57:49] JD: Yeah, these are, these are, these are hurting your ebitda. [57:53] Justin: There it is. Yeah, there it is. That's it. [57:56] Chad: And, and I'll, I'll say this too, because JD and I had this conversation earlier today. In our world, you need those small clients to win the advisor relationship so that you get their 5, 7, 10, $20 million plan when it sniffs along. So you, you can't steer away from them as an industry. They, not only do they need help, but you need them if you're going to win the larger ones, too. [58:18] JD: I, I feel like the chauffinator has been dropping value in the Chat bar. [58:23] Chad: He didn't like anything I had to say. So yeah, he's. And then he came. He came back with a flash. [58:28] JD: We need to bring him back on the show again. Last time he's on the show he had Covid. We need to bring him on when he's healthy. Is that one cov id? We used to know that. [58:38] Chad: I think we decided that it wasn't. [58:40] JD: We are about to vote for a chat bar champion. Rob, you're gonna pick someone from the chat. [58:46] Justin: We gotta, we gotta bring up Steve Wilkinson, by the way. [58:49] JD: Oh, you want to talk about. [58:50] Justin: We gotta. Yeah, we didn't have the show. [58:52] JD: Maybe we'll do a little after show on that. Yeah, we'll get him on the show. He's well spoken. His ideas are full of. But he's well spoken. [59:01] Justin: I like, I like what he's doing. [59:03] JD: We all do. We like what he's doing. [59:04] Justin: Trying to control it. He's scaling and it's not easy. [59:07] JD: We just like to. With him. Not everything works great. [59:12] Justin: You're not giving me enough of a hard time. Like, would you forget to do the research? Like there's plenty of. There's plenty if you dig. [59:19] JD: Sorry we didn't do that. But you are about to vote for someone that you think in the chat bar has done a great job tonight. [59:27] Justin: I like, I like. I like Tony Davis. [59:29] JD: I mean, we'll let you. We'll let you have that one. You just missed my little setup line. But that's okay. I know I talk a lot. The setup line is. It's very important on who you choose because they're going to get a. A king's ransom of a gift next week. Last week's champion was Michael Soa. Right? Justin Soa? I don't know. I was hammered last week when we asked the second one. [59:56] Justin: So I think that was. Yep, that works. [59:58] JD: Check out his LinkedIn. He actually posted a picture of all the lucky recipients of his prize tonight. Sorry people. I was lazy. I had a lot on my plate today. I went back to the old food deal instead of Target or Walmart or something. And also because it was Michael's first win ever. So I wanted to get something cool besides like condoms and lubricant. And so I, I got him one Shake Shack burger, one Shake Shack cheeseburger, one hand spun chocolate milkshake, a Chicken Shack burger. Chicken burger from Shake Shack. I don't. I've never eaten at this place. [1:00:39] Chad: By the way, delicious. [1:00:42] JD: The vegetarian Shroom burger. One grilled cheese sandwich, one bacon cheese Fries. By the way, you know who got this stuff coincidentally at his house was a bunch of frickin eight year old kids. I mean we could have fed, we could have fed 50 of these fuckers with all the shit that I bought. One grilled cheese sandwich, some bacon cheese fries, a hot dog, an organic apple juice drink. I know some little kid was digging on that. A large lemonade, fries again, a white truffle burger and a double cheeseburger. All sent to last week's champ. So whatever. Check it out. [1:01:22] Mark: That all sounds fantastic. [1:01:24] JD: Yeah, it was good, right? It's like a good one. [1:01:27] Justin: Where are you buying that from? No one's getting laid off there. [1:01:30] JD: Sometimes you get lucky doordash bro. That they've been flourishing. That's who we should ask Mark about next week. Doordash. Oh yeah, unfortunately I'm gonna ask him about whatever record keeper he sold a lot last year. I'm gonna research that. No, I'm kidding. We'll go, we'll go, we'll go. Doordash. So Rob, you have voted for Tony Davis who by the way won like two weeks ago. But hey, you can win again and again and again. Justin, your vote for Chap, our champion is. [1:01:58] Justin: I'm going kush. He was pretty good tonight and he's got to redeem himself for last week. [1:02:01] JD: Okay, you're going kush. I'm gonna go in value because I'm not as drunk as I was last week. So I'm going shop because he's been bringing the value. You know, I'm into that. Chad, what does your quarter zip tell you? [1:02:15] Chad: I felt like tonight was weak. It was, it was a little lackluster in the chat bar. Although my, my vote goes for, for Greg, for Gigi, for dropping some dirty words and I, I won't repeat them, but that and the sausage fest comment. [1:02:34] Mark: So Robey, that was the sausage. Tony. [1:02:38] Chad: Tony had the original. Greg followed it up. [1:02:41] JD: Robey, this puts you in a very powerful position. I believe you have four different nominees, which would mean the, the winning vote could go to you. So their success hangs in the balance of your decision. What shall you decide? [1:02:58] Mark: Well, you're all in luck because my original vote that I wrote down on this piece of paper is no longer here. And I, I stick by that rule. You don't like that, you've got to be here. But I really wanted to know who Happy Time 420 was. I really wanted to know. [1:03:15] JD: Not your vote. [1:03:16] Mark: Are they still here? Oh no, no they're not, they're not here. They're not here. [1:03:22] Chad: No, no, it wasn't your dad. [1:03:25] Justin: No, it wasn't. There he is. I think food would be the perfect gift if happy time for. [1:03:31] Chad: Oh yeah, that's a good point. Food would be food. [1:03:34] Justin: Food. It's a perfect gift. [1:03:38] Mark: Okay, so anyways, I feel like I'm just going to break this tie, so can you remind me. I don't remember any of who you [1:03:45] JD: said I picked Shaft. I pick Kush. [1:03:49] Chad: I pick Greg and Rob and Tony. [1:03:52] Mark: Okay. All right. [1:03:57] JD: Do you want him to battle in the chat bar? That's up to you, man. Whatever. [1:04:01] Justin: Yeah. [1:04:01] Mark: No, no, no. [1:04:02] JD: I, I, I, I, I. [1:04:03] Mark: All of those names were on my radar. I'll say this, but I, I love somebody who can just give it to Chad. Not in that way, buddy. But Shaft shots. [1:04:14] Justin: My winner. [1:04:15] JD: Shop. Shop. Congratulations, Shaw. We will be sending prizes to your Florida crib next week. [1:04:27] Mark: Yeah, that's a guy. That's a guy who doesn't need a four day work week, I'll tell you that much. [1:04:32] JD: So yeah, I might go. I might go nuts with him. I don't know. We'll see. We'll see. Maybe I'll actually get you guys involved. How about that? Should we get. [1:04:39] Chad: Yeah, let's do it. [1:04:40] JD: We can all pick something. Schedule. Schedule a corporate meeting for Tuesday to decide what we should send to shop's address on Thursday. [1:04:48] Mark: No, hold on. Tuesday's the day I don't work. [1:04:51] JD: That's your, that's your fifth day. [1:04:53] Justin: That's a terrible off day, dude. [1:04:58] Chad: His Monday, Wednesday, Friday. [1:05:00] Justin: Oh yeah, he's already taken Mondays off. 45 day weekend. [1:05:04] JD: I liked our group text where I said, hey, we're, we're going to talk about the four day work week and because it's done better than the five day workweek and someone on there was like, it's just like six minute abs. If the four day work week does better than the five day work week, we should be looking at the three day work week because that could crush it. Congratulations. [1:05:24] Justin: Well, I generally come in at least 15 minutes late. I use the side door. That way lumber can't see me. And after that I just sort of space out for about an hour. [1:05:40] JD: My stapler, to Chad's point, I was [1:05:43] Chad: looking for my stapler. [1:05:44] JD: Rob, thank you so much for, for joining us, for being our guest. Congrats on your new gig. If you want, we could do a little after show. If not, you can take off and we'll talk about you. [1:05:59] Mark: Rob, did you have to, did you have to like run this by your new team, your new employer, to allow for you to be here. [1:06:08] JD: Yeah. [1:06:08] Justin: Oh, yeah. It had to go through compliance and, you know, we'll see what comes of it tomorrow. [1:06:14] Chad: Mark, hey, we got a spot for you when you get fired. [1:06:18] JD: Mark, their. Their corporate LinkedIn actually promoted the show today. And I always get a little chuckle when I see that when the corporation promotes it, I'm like, oh, if they only knew what kind of shit show he's going to get involved. No, Rob, we really do appreciate it, boys. It's a pleasure. It's great to be back and have the entire band back together. It feels good. Everybody out there in the audience. It's wonderful to see you again on another Thursday evening. I was going to call you some obscenity, but that'd be just me, like me playing up for the show. That's not true. I love you. So why can't you just be honest, jd and tell everyone that you love them? Because I do. Tony, I apologize. I haven't commented on that. That Chad AI drink for that artificial intelligence graphic there. And the old Beverly Hillbillies song, that was phenomenal. My intention is it was awesome. I just haven't yet. But we're not playing Beverly Hillbillies tonight. I saw a post today from Nevin Adams and John Sully Sullivan that was fantastic. And I looked at their little rock star shirts. Surely a like, corporate request for this retirement party. Wear your favorite rock band shirt. Dumb. But I love these two guys. And they did. And I saw this band, Nightwish, and I was like, I wonder what that is. I should google it. Well, guess what? My brother has the same blood running through his veins. The same I'll drink DNA. He thought the same thing. Unlike me, he looked it up and motivated him for our final song tonight to close out before the after show. Take it away, Brandon. What is this Nightwish band that Nevin Adams loves? [1:08:07] Mark: I wish I had an angel.