#115: Behind the Bima - Israel "Yummy" Schachter

we are with the great the one and only Israel Israel yummy thank you for letting us go behind the bema with you we're so excited to be together I want to start out by telling us how you got the name yummy when did that nickname begin oh my gosh did you not have my father on why didn't you ask him that question of all the things we could have asked him that wasn't that wasn't on the top of your list that didn't make the top of the list Mr Brewer versus you know we didn't get to the yummy um my Hebrew name is Israel mosha and I think good ma'am I don't know it started when I was born I had nothing to do with it there's no great story behind it I'm sorry to disappoint you start as far back as you remember and who was Israel was it was that after the country Israel or your father no my mother's grandfather was Israel my father's grandfather was Moshe um and that's it again great to kick off this behind the bema episode with no I'll tell you why I'll tell you why it is an exciting question to start with because you've built this extraordinary extraordinary business it's a business but really it's the business of helping others charity bids you've raised 200 million dollars according to your website I'm sure it's actually much more since then you need to update your website but you've raised hundreds of millions of dollars for worthy non-profits in the Jewish World the non-jewish world when you operate out there in the non-jewish world or the secular Jewish World do they wonder what yummy like is that your favorite food or you like to eat or where does yummy come from do you have to explain your name a lot I don't explain it because I don't go by that name in the outside world so it's like you know me since I'm a kid so you know but it's it's not a name that I lead with um and then the people who somehow find out they think it's cute they think it's funny uh but I will correct you and I will check my website also I'm gonna have people look at that but we raised uh 200 million during covet alone for charities sorry yeah it doesn't say coveted it says having raised we have to correct it but it's something I'm incredibly proud about that during covid that's what we did during covet alone so very proud of my team for that and we will update that accordingly it's incredible so yummy tell us how did you get into that you're in the business of helping other businesses do their business well which is to empower others is an amazing thing into the tune and the numbers that you have we went to the United Hotel event recently here in South Florida a magnificent incredible event we know that you were part of that you you helped launch that and ran that the amudim campaign and so many others the Jewish and non-jewish world how did you first get into this it's a good question I think um I I think I would attribute this to my parents um my parents are I've recently said this to somebody else so that's why it's fresh on my mind but you know my parents everybody knows my parents but people don't know my parents because they are wealthy my parents are not wealthy but I would still argue to say that my parents are amongst the most generous people I've ever met in my life so I learned from a very young age just from growing up in my house and seeing by osmosis that being charitable and being generous has no correlation to how much money you have in the bank and you could be incredibly generous with your time with your ideas with your contacts if you just put people and ideas together and that's what I saw my parents doing my entire life as a kid people were always coming over to the house whether it be personal issues or communal issues or whatever it is and all I saw is them helping and giving so I was already producing charity events when I was a kid uh you mentioned that solo United that's Allah Ellie Beer came to meet me aviard Goldberg introduced me to Ellie Beer when I was a freshman NYU wow and Emily beer was a partner in running hatsala Euro line at the time that's how he had an idea no that's how long I've been involved with I was involved with United that's all uh from the ground up before there was a United that's all but again that that wasn't from you know any training I had it was just what I saw at home this is something that has to be done how do we get there who do we connect who's you know who's got good ideas who's got the funding let's put everyone together and that's kind of where it started that is amazing and and everyone knows but for those who may not we're of course talking about rev and rabbits and shakter offers one of the godolam of our of our time and yeah as a talmud of shakter I know that he's gone out of his way he has no time but he'll make time to make a phone call to make an introduction for something he thinks worthy people show up here on behalf of Institutions or causes they show a letter that rashakter wrote and One More Story which yummy can maybe maybe even collaborate I heard it from your brother is a story of a Yeshiva that wanted ref shifter to make an introduction to a philanthropist who can make a nice donation and what if she said yeah you know I'll be in Brooklyn I give a share there once a week let me check out the Yeshiva when I see it firsthand I'll be in a better position to be more persuasive when I ask that person to help and he got a phone call back that said you know the Yeshiva is not really your hash kafa I don't know if it would be good if you come if you could just make the phone call with outcoming anyone else would have hung up on such a person Bradley he he uh he was prepared to make the phone call afterwards your mother the revitson was a little frustrated and objected and what I understand is when your brother spoke to ravasha Weiss about it his answer was that your father your mother is right and your father is righteous your mother was right and your father's righteous which is a good description of both of them in general but that's just how far his generosity goes to even work for a cause that doesn't fully accept him but he doesn't care it was learning Torah it was valuable it's an amazing story in its own right so that that's what inspires your work in charity bids but how did you actually get into it you graduate college you graduate why you finished with Yeshiva what's your career path that leads you to found a organization that's entirely about raising money for others I it was never a plan to be honest uh I was being called by a lot of organs you know there were organizations that I took on my own to help out and to do events for and as those became more successful uh I was getting calls from all sorts of other organizations and as much as I'd like to help everybody I just wasn't in a position to do everything for everybody um and I kind of figured that without you know setting up setting this up as somewhat of a business then I'm never going to be able to help as many people as I would like to um you know we didn't we didn't uh the business that we have today is not where it started this is this has evolved over the years and kind of addressing the needs of of the community and what things have been throwing thrown at us but that's that's basically how it started it was there was never a plan to be in this business ever um and I was on the other side of this business you know not on the business side for my whole life um until this accidentally turned into a business so it it's a very crowded space the world of the world of online marketing and fundraising how do you differentiate what what charity bids does versus all the other programs out there so first of all what charity bids in essence the main the the main company that we started uh we first started as an online auction platform for Charities kind of like an eBay for Charities um and that at the time was not a business so that was set up really just to help as many Charities as possible this was in 2008 when the economy started to tank and you know we were trying to educate Charities that if people aren't giving as much money they'd probably give gifts and kind you'll be surprised how much they make and things like that so we started there uh then what happened was because basically I built that platform with two partners we built that platform coming from the side of volunteer fundraisers for and people who have been involved in community and organizations for so many years not what what should we build that would make a successful business what could we build that would actually address the needs and concerns of the organizations using it so we spent a tremendous amount of time and money and effort and energy building something that we thought would be good for the organization's branding and data generation and uh navigation and things like that and essentially what happened was we put out this amazing platform but the average charity doesn't care they just need to make money they don't care about the branding and the data generation so essentially what happened was the the first the clients we had after we spent an entire year building this platform where our first clients were Michael Jordan and Denzel Washington and Morgan Freeman and Tom Hanks people who understood like how genius this platform was and how instead of them sending all their fans and all their followers which is their most valuable asset to third-party websites to do whatever campaigns they want to do we could do it all under their brand on their websites on their Facebook pages whatever it was um this was just to clarify Michael Jordan wasn't raising money for himself meaning there was a there was a charity he cared about yeah but the people who ended up using our platform were Hollywood Studios and radio stations like people who understood how Godless this platform was the issue is that's not who we built it for and I'm not here to do uh for people who could afford to do so um basically the Charities who we actually built this for were then coming to us and say Well we'd love to use your platform could you help us solicit product I'm not going to solicit product on behalf of everybody's organization so we started referring them to companies that offer Consignment so there's there's no risk Consignment business it's a very big business and there are Charities who run auctions and they can take without any risk they could do they could get art they could get jewelry they could get memorabilia they could get trips and experience so we started all the Charities who were using our platform we were referring them to other companies that did this and very quickly we realized that we shouldn't be referring people to companies where we can't vouch for the product I don't know how much the Hillary's worth I don't know what art is being sold I don't know the authenticity of the product let's just stick to trips and experiences so uh you know after two years or so of referring them to other companies that were doing it I kind of realized you know what I have the relationships and I have the experience and I've traveled a lot more than the people selling these things why don't I start my own business doing this and we ended up basically slowly wound down on the technology side of what we were offering um and I started what's now charity Biz became at least until covid um we offer unique trips and experiences on consignment to Charities running auctions so we service about 1500 Charities a year I'd say wow and then overnight by covid uh we were out of business and we had to recreate on our entire business and change uh Direction very quickly and we ended up using the relationships we have and the experience we have in fundraising and and community and production um to produce we produced uh over 100 virtual events for non-profits during covid and then I guess when covert was over our Consignment business came back but also a lot of the people who had seen our work during covet in the virtual event space assumed that the only reason we were in the virtual event production space was because they obviously were producing real events before covet so after covid we've been asked now we have a whole production company now that produces Live in-person Events so it kind of mushroomed over the years it was never the plan I never wanted to be in this industry but I'm very happy I stumbled on it because it's very very rewarding and and use a template that you follow and you basically recreate the same events or some creativity has to kick in each whether it's the yukonica event the United Hotel event or you know the next organization that's going to call you you have to think out of the box and get really creative and do something no one has done before because the truth is as the people invited and who attend these events you know everyone knows they're miserable nobody wants to go to the next dinner like how many times you're gonna hear that committee and that singer that MC start with the same corny jokes and again we we have to host one of those dinners shortly so I'm not knocking it we want people to come but how do you how do you think out of the box each time that someone's like that's something I want to go to not something I feel I have to go to so first of all you're saying something that's very very very true people are sick of going to dinners they don't have the patience they don't have the the attention span and certainly after covid people are being a lot more picky about what they attend and why they attend and how many they attend that's for sure um but I would never want to do the same event twice for two organizations right it doesn't work because each organization has completely different needs uh there's different things they want to accomplish there's different audiences there's different things they've done in the past there's different things they're trying to achieve it just doesn't work uh but B I'd be miserable if I was doing the same thing day in and day out so unless I'm constantly creating you know it just it just wouldn't work for me um you know I I recently did an event I produced a big event recently and there was a gentleman there who's very successful in the real estate space and he said to me uh someone once told me that I'm the best in class and they probably thought they were complimenting me but in fact they really ruined my day I said why he said because my whole life all I did was work to be the only one in my class and in one in one sentence this guy just put me along with everybody else so he said to me now that I've experienced your event I could tell you you're the only one in your class and make sure to stay there the only way to stay there is by constantly creating things that nobody else is creating or coming up with ideas that nobody else is coming up with um I'm not going to say it's easy but you can't do the same event for two organizations it doesn't work do you have to spend money to make money in the world of Charity and as we're having a dinner and we're going to spend let's say five thousand dollars on it on a comedian that comes in but if we would spend two hundred thousand dollars we would make a lot more money do you have to spend money to make money in the real world in the world of Charity no I mean you're asking me yes absolutely sorry I'm being so Jewish but but of course I mean it doesn't mean by the way that just because you're spending more money means you're going to raise more money it's also what you do with the talent you hire so a lot of I I think a lot of why we've been successful as a company specifically in this space is because in addition to you know hiring Talent we also are coming up with ideas of how to use the talent right these these comedians or singers or actors or whoever it is or MCS they're doing these events every day so unless you're using them in a way that nobody else is using them your event's not going to stand out because people have seen it before right um what's your proudest event what's a creative event that was so out of the box no one had done it before you're really proud it's a signature yummy schachter event his next one there's a lot of them uh I'm definitely proud of amudim because when everybody was stuck and nobody knew what to do and we were called seven weeks before to to come up with something um I think that the first year we had 700 I think it was 780 000 people tune in to a 36 hour live stream event that was just amazing but there there were so many I mean I I produced the when the Kennedy Honors had to go virtual I that was something that I'm very proud of um we basically the Kennedy Honors is a televised event but it's incredibly exclusive maybe there's only 200 people in the room every year and the Secretary of State comes and the president comes sometimes um and people look forward to this event the whole year because this is like the place to see to see and be seen um I think the people invited are people who give maybe 250 000 and up it's it's crazy and there are five honorees each year even the honorees themselves the people who are being honored by the county audit even them maybe get two or three seats to this event um and essentially when they came to me and asked if I had an idea to what to do virtually I said well why don't you give first of all you have to make sure to educate people on what the candidate Center is and what the Kennedy Honors are about and who's being recognized and why they're being recognized I said if you would stop the average person on the street they probably never heard of the Kennedy Center and if they have heard of the Kennedy Center they'll just assume yeah I heard of it it's a party for rich people that's what it really sounds like um and I basically said if you finally have the opportunity to do it virtually there's two things you have to accomplish number one don't bother doing a virtual event unless the people who are used to coming are going to have the same feeling that they have when they go so let's first identify what are those feelings that people have what do they look forward to what do they want to see what how does it make them feel walk me through the experience and the second thing is now that you're going virtual open this up to thousands of people who otherwise would never have the opportunity to have that feeling so essentially after hearing everything they did they you know were describing about the event I sent in a camera crew after hours to the Kennedy Center we shot the center in 300 with 360 degree cameras and we recreated this space in virtual reality so that the guests who are used to coming are walking in the same entrance on the same red carpet they're hearing us simply play the theme song and they were able to interact with friends of theirs we had different permissions so the people who actually would be invited and be there were able to see their friends who they usually see at this event on the red carpet and in the hallways and talk to them so like a video chat like we're doing now it was it was amazing that was that was awesome um there's there's a bunch I'm very proud of everything we did during covert really how important is it to you to vet the Charities to believe in them yourself is it a business that any charity comes to you and you'll just use your creative genius to do it or you have to believe in the cause that you have to be comfortable with the with the finances of it meaning that they're credible that they don't have too much overhead that enough is going to what they want it to be going to because the world of Charity there's a lot of you know corruption I was listening to a podcast recently and they were talking about this big Scandal because they're um you know there's Make A Wish Foundation and then there's like children with A Wish Foundation where like only 20 of the money goes to children and it turns out 80 are going to the people who started that and because they've used similar wording and they send out mailers and take out ads on TV they're just totally fraudulently taking money from people in the same way they're like there are organizations for veterans PTSD and then you know a little bit similar to that name you take out a lot of ads you're bringing a lot of money people are pocketing so there's a lot of Fraud and charity work probably in the Jewish world too we could talk about that also so how much do you vet or do you have have to believe in what you're going to be working on in terms of vetting I usually am working with the principal of the organization and usually it's the founder or someone who's like all the way at the top so you know and and the organizations we're working with are are known to be legit now it's not my job to start looking at people's books um but obviously if something doesn't feel right or small right we're not taking it on that's number one the second thing is and I would say this for anything in life if you don't have passion for what you're doing and you don't believe in what you're doing you're not going to be successful so we have unfortunately well fortunately for me unfortunately for them have had to turn away a lot of organizations if it just it just doesn't feel right we're not doing it I will not be able to create something I will not be able to put my heart into something I'm not going to be able to give you the best version of myself and my team and give you the best event I possibly can if I don't really care about what you're doing so um you know I'm sure there's a great Colo in Australia for orphaned kangaroos but it's not uh not something we're going to deal with understood understood you know you deal with a lot of celebrities do you ever go home and and tell your your family or your parents you know you won't believe who I just met do they care are they do they try to discouraging no one cares I think anybody cares no what percentage of what percent of the non-jewish celebrities have you met would your parents even know their name I don't know the answer probably close to zero close to zero uh except the pope you asked me before we started what the picture behind me is uh I remember meeting the pope soon after we got married that's actually a great story did I tell you the story no okay I once posted it I'm not sure if you saw it anyway I met the pope soon after we got married and um and we mentioned that we just got married so he was trying to be friendly he says the pope said so the one the pope who just passed away he said um I don't remember seeing an invitation to your wedding he's trying to be funny so I said you know it's funny you mentioned that because we actually were debating it for for weeks on end whether or not to invite you and we and we decided at the end that it was better not to invite you out of respect we didn't invite you he said why I said my father's a rabbi and I wanted my father to officiate our marriage and I assume that you don't go to weddings and not officiate so it would be better not to invite you than to invite you and have you be insulted that you're just you know not officiating the wedding so the pope said to me do you study talmud I said yes I do why he says because nobody else would answer me like that how have you connected with some of these I know that you have relationships with a lot of what the world calls celebrities how did you get in how do you have those relationships how do you know when you can leverage them and when not to um I don't know how I got into it um but I think um just from looking back and seeing it how these people interact uh with the people around them and how the people around them interact with them I think they're used to everybody around them jumping the second they want anything or the second they need anything and very few people challenging them and very few people being real and authentic and when you kind of come into someone's life and you don't care about what they do professionally or their movies or their albums or their this or that and you're more interested in their family life and in their values and their beliefs and you don't say yes to them every time they ask for something and you push back I think as much as maybe sometimes it doesn't feel good in the moment you're someone who stands out right if if under no circumstances am I ever going to put you before my family or my religion that's not something they're used to saying I don't think right they know that I will never be away from my family for Shabbos or yantiff I don't care what's going on they know that you could call me a million times on Shabbos I'm not going to answer they know that if I'm with my family I'm not taking time to speak to you and I think you know over time that's something I think they respect and then the conversation is also very different with all these people you know I've people who I send almost every Friday I send the devartora not not in the sense not not the type of devartora that you would necessarily give but I take a thought from every week's Torah portion I send it out to mostly people who are not Jewish in the entertainment space that might be the only real thing that anyone sends them the whole week that has nothing to do with them or their movie or their tour or their anything or making money yeah it's me sharing Jewish wisdom with you and and my family's beliefs and values and some thought from the Torah and something nice with you and that's it um and I don't know if there's many people who interact with them like that so I guess looking back that's that's probably how it's done I don't know anyone you haven't met yet who still want to meet you need an introduction to I don't want to meet anyone I I don't know they all find you they find you for through charity bits no it's not only through charity but I think once you you know that's it's it's like anything else right you're you are friends with someone and you introduce them to another friend of yours and then they become friends with those people it's it's it's kind of like a circle if you're in the circle you're in and you meet other people at events or at you know different functions and if you're legitimately friends with someone people's guards are down and there's a very different start to a conversation or a relationship either if they know you through someone who they know you know would have had the same I guess vetting process as they would or if they saw an event that you produced or or something that you pulled off that they recognize or respect then they they want a relationship because they want some of that too let me ask you a question you may not feel comfortable answering but you know many people even even within the Jewish world or the total World they look at some of these celebrities as like they've made it and I wish I could have their life if I had the money if I had the fame if I had the influence if I had the celebrity status if I had the lifestyle that's making it if I I wish having having an entree they're seeing that the way you see it um you think if people knew what that life was really like they'd want to trade for it do you think that life is what it's quite you know what people make it out to be or is there a lot going on there there's a lot of emptiness a lot of hollowness a lot of they've made it in all those other measures but you know like you were alluding to before and I've I've you know met a fraction of people you have like this who who live with the parano they don't know who in their life is real who has a real relationship with them who just wants to be friends with them for their name yeah I think that's the worst part of it forget about you know here's another thing you know to a lot of these people I'm a person who thank God has been married to the same woman for 18 years and I have children with her and I'm always with my family and my family values comes for like that's not normal in any of their worlds it's unheard of so like they're they're celebrating like I can't believe that's amazing that's not amazing that's normal right and and what's normal became abnormal especially in that world so um but but the answer is if you constantly have to live such a there's so so many of them are so paranoid and so empty and and searching for meaning and searching for for something more than they have that I don't I many of them I think if you if you would even offer many of them to trade the fame and the money for just a normal life where people leave them alone and where they could be who they are and live anonymously and just be happy and have a good family life and stuff like that I think many of them would trade it in um and I think that's part of going back to what I said before that's part of what inspired me to start sending out these like motivational messages every week to a lot of these people um because they they want it so badly so badly people are so thirsty for meaning and purpose and they're not really finding it anywhere else because everybody else is just Yes Men their job is to make them feel good and get them what they want and whether it's good for them or bad for them just do whatever they want and get the job done but there's nobody kind of giving them any perspective on anything and I have a lot of these people call me and they'll tell talk about their marriages and their relationships and their kids and their business decisions things like that I'm by no means an expert on any of these things but the fact is they probably and I'm a nobody right they they have people who they're friends with for 30 years they're not calling them why they calling me if they just met me this year because I I don't think they have a lot of people in their life who they could really trust who trust or respect and that's very sad very very lonely existence for a lot of these people interesting Well you certainly have a lot of people in your Rolodex you know that you can call at any moment you seem like the kind of guy that's not afraid to do that what do you say to people that also know people let's say that they're they're significant people not celebrities or but sometimes just afraid to pick up the phone to to ask them for for whatever the donation is or you're just afraid to ask them for for the favor how do you do it all the time um I think I think with the right approach you could get a yes from anybody and the right approach is people cannot ignore passion right when someone's passionate whether you're really into it or not when you feel someone's passionate about something and you feel someone really believes in something and their heart is really into something and they really want you to do something you want that right and uh I I think that's it if you I would never ever call someone and ask them to do anything that I wouldn't do myself or to do something that I don't personally believe in or then something I'm not involved in because then you're just like anybody else but I think if you've called someone and you really passionate about what you're calling them about and you have a good reason for calling them and a good you know reason why you're asking them whatever it is you're asking them then that can't be ignored it's very hard to ignore someone who's really into something so just don't be afraid just do it I don't know why you would be I mean maybe I'm maybe I'm maybe I'm I don't know like I never asked for anything personally so maybe that's also a difference I've never asked anyone for a personal favor I'm always asking on behalf of someone else so maybe that takes me on the barrier a little bit right because I'm a volunteer the same way you're a volunteer I'm asking you to do something that I'm doing as a volunteer too so maybe that's a little bit different but I I still think that if you really believe in something people are going to feel it they're going to hear it in your voice and they're going to want to be part of it can we can we let we you leverage some of these relationships both regarding anti-Semitism and Israel meaning we need prominent people right you got you got the Kyrie issue and you've got the the yay issue and and these people have enormous platforms right right Kanye had more followers what is it more followers on Twitter than there are like and there are Jews in the world right so you're talking about that platform that voice right LeBron historic previously had retweeted someone's lyrics that an anti-semitic Trope never held accountable happens to be near and dear to my heart right now because our good friend Myers Leonard was just featured on ESPN on SportsCenter on the podcast and he's been tried out for three teams and please God we'll be making a comeback in the NBA and it's amazing Myers said one word whatever you think about him nobody ever dug up any pattern of anti-Semitism he made a mistake he said one word a mistake and he was held to a different standard I think there are a lot of reasons for that that are unfair to him and he's a really special person he's done a he's done a great comeback and and by his connecting with the Jewish community and the relationship that we've kept he's become a big spokesperson right and he's using his platform of which he has a a fairly large one to represent to stand up so could we be doing more because the yummy schefters and there are more yummy sectors who have relationships with other athletes celebrities and what about Jewish celebrities I mean that's often a big disappointment to me it's like we're the Jewish celebrities using their voice their platform to talk about anti-Semitism to talk about Israel to stand up for the things that we care about that that people you know when you look at Kanye it's not a matter of what he said or tweeted you see that he tweets and then in a few minutes 30 000 people liked it but the truth is that if an equal celebrity in that world would tweet something positive about Jews 30 000 people would like that people just swayed by someone they look at and you know and that's the whole industry right like they pay whatever Kardashian to tweet about a pocketbook they pay her two million dollars because they know the return on that just for saying like in the pocketbook nobody cares but you know so can't we leverage that about I like the Jews okay now millions of people will like the Jews because the right person tweeted they liked the Jews there's a lot in here yeah of course I have thoughts on that so the the answer is that anybody who has any relationship should obviously leverage it to try to do good for the Jewish Community the first one of the first things I did you know in the beginning of covet specifically when I was starting to produce all these events is bring in uh talent that otherwise would never appear on Jewish events uh and and bring them in it wasn't only because of the creativity and originality of it which obviously I'm going for but it's also to introduce them to some of what we do so you know the fact that we had you know uh Michael Strahan and Jamie Foxx on an event that I did for Friendship Circle why right but but it worked that David Blaine I mean David Blaine's Jewish but David Blaine's not used to doing the high Lifeline dinner and Kenny G and Michael Bolton aren't used to doing the high Lifeline you know concert in Toronto and uh Wolfgang Puck and and Emeril Lagasse aren't used to making kosher dinners for Jewish organizations but this was you know some of what I've been doing great ideas bringing bringing people into our world and showing them what we do because at the end of the day they all have exposure to different non-profits and organizations whether they're involved themselves or friends have gotten them involved but none of them every single person I've ever brought into a Jewish organizational event has been blown away by the volunteers by the work by the creativity by what's being done even Andrea Bocelli when we were describing to him how United that's all it works with the motorcycles and he just he couldn't believe it his first reaction was of course leave it to the Jews to come up with an idea like this nobody else thinks like this right so that's that's number one number two is um you know and I've had conversations with Jewish celebrities who have huge followings who I feel are not vocal enough um one of them in fact said to me well you won't understand my position so first of all there was something interesting I heard from from one very famous Jewish person in Hollywood she said nobody in Hollywood is ever going to feel bad for Jews the Jews you know it's it's you know it's it's a saying that Jews run Hollywood but she said if you actually live here and work here most of the people in the industry are Jewish we're not going to go into how that started and why that is it doesn't make a difference but the point is she said you're not going to get if you're trying to play the victim and say that Jews are victims no one here feels bad for us and it's just not you're not going to get anywhere there was somebody else who has over 10 million followers and I had this conversation with her and she said you'll never understand the position I'm in until you have a following of 10 million people and you have a brand and if you say one thing your brand has done and I said respectfully Hitler didn't care what your brand was you're a Jew the same way I'm a Jew right and if you don't use the platform that you have wow to speak up and to defend the Jews and defend Israel then you don't deserve to have that platform you're probably going to lose it by doing something else um and then and then there's other things you know there are you know part of what you you mentioned before let's say LeBron James retweeting something I think a lot of these people see something first of all everybody is running through life now no one's reading a tweet and focusing it on really thinking on it thinking about it and and pondering and before they retweet you see something that kind of sounds right it makes sense you retweet it that's unfortunately the world we live in and why these things spread so quickly so I think you know I'm not going to speak for LeBron but I think there's there's a serious lack of Education both from our community to other communities and other communities towards us and I think there's there needs to be a lot of Education there was you know someone I could look it up now but in the tens of millions of followers who tweeted uh retweeted a video or shared a video from Louis farrakin and I called him up and it said I just saw your Tweet the video you shared what's the story he goes what do you mean what's the story I said do you know Farrakhan yeah I've had him in my house I said do you realize that he's one of the biggest like rabid anti-semits semites on the planet and he's such a bigot and like why why would you he said man you don't actually I'm not going to do his voice because then people will figure out who it is he said you don't understand you don't understand what he means to the black man what he symbolizes are there things he says that are extreme yeah of course but overall what he means to our community you'll never understand and I said to him so let me ask you a question if the head of the Ku Klux Klan put out a video and I shared it and I gave you the same speech and said you don't know you're not white you don't understand what he means to us does he say crazy things yeah but you know what he means to us is that you know would you give me a pass and he's not going to get a debate with debate with you right now but I hear what you're saying and I'm going to take it down and I think a lot of people are very afraid to make phone calls like that with people they know they're always afraid what am I going to lose he's not going to be my friend anymore he's not gonna maybe I'm lucky to be in a position where I don't ask I don't need these people I don't ask them for anything I think they all want me in their lives more I need them and more than I need them in my lives and I use that to my advantage I think if you're you're always in a position with people especially like that where you're not afraid to lose anything then what do you have to lose yeah you can't be you can't be Starstruck 100 yeah the last thing is I mean I assume I mean I know you know but I met a I met a tick tock star Montana Tucker I I spoke to you about her when we were sitting on the plane together um she's actually grew up in Boca Raton but the name Montana Tucker did not sound Jewish to me and from looking at her I never thought she was Jewish and the first conversation I ever had with her she's talking to me about her Bobby and zadie I said oh hold on a second you're Jewish she said yeah I'm 100 Jewish I said tell me more about your Bobby and zadie she says they're Holocaust Survivors they were in Auschwitz so I said have you ever gone back to Poland to see like where your family's from she said no my mom and I have talked about it many times so we never had the chance to go so I said I'm going to send you to Poland and I'm going to send you with a documentary film crew and we're gonna do a project she has I don't know 15 million followers on Tick Tock and Instagram or something like that and what we did was I sent her and her mother for I don't know six days to Poland they traced their whole family's history and we made a 10-part docu-series where each episode was only two minutes because you know I read a statistic that 60 of American teens have never heard of the Holocaust as a Jew and as someone living in this world even not as a Jew that's a frightening statistic this only happened 75 years ago um so um where are most of the teens hanging out today on social media what is the content they're consuming and how long is the content and how is it being produced whatever that is we have to follow that format and teach them Holocaust Education so that's what we did we did 10 days in a row she did a social media freeze um every day just a two minute episode because no one's able to watch for longer than that today and I think in the first month we had over 10 million views wow and just to just to show you kind of uh how that levels up to you know numbers wise the Holocaust museum in Washington DC which is probably looked at as the flagship Holocaust Museum outside of Yad vashem but okay how many visitors do you have that do you think they have in a year 1.6 million visitors a year come to the Holocaust museum in Washington DC and in one month we hit 10 million people so uh yes getting back to your loaded question I've been trying to do everything I possibly can there's actually something that came up this week I was speaking to Danielle agreement Davis this week I don't know if you know who she is but she was telling me that the world Jewish population is I'm I'm gonna get the statistics wrong but probably very close is 0.2 percent or point zero two percent of the point zero two percent of the world population are Jews 20 of kidney donors are Jewish and not only are they Jewish majority of the kidney donors are actually religious and she said imagine if we could get a celebrity who's not Jewish necessarily who's had some issues with their own kidneys or a family member something related to kidneys and off the top of my head I gave her three names of people that I know who would be great and have them just put out that statistic that alone like you're saying it's no one has to do I'm saying show by example show what the Jewish Community is doing for society that has nothing to do with Israel and has nothing to do with politics has nothing to do with anything that statistical alone is mind-boggling I love that idea I love that idea but let's pivot um you know you mentioned and I think this is a really really important point that you're making about your own life and how you have the confidence to have those conversations you said you know I'm not impressed I'm not blown away I don't need them and I wonder whether part of that is you've been exposed to real Godless and greatness right your parents and I I say your father and your mother are are real profiles in extraordinary people and great people who've accomplished great things and are great great people and I Wonder has growing up in their home being their son being exposed to them sort of said you're not going to impress me because you're an athlete or a celebrity or a Hollywood star I've seen the real deal right and that's not to say that there aren't great people outside of the Jewish world or the total world but I've seen truth I've seen Ms I've seen greatness I've seen immortality and Eternity in people who are the modern representative and symbol of Eternity and Torah I don't care how many followers yeah how much money your movies pretty I don't care that doesn't impress me you think there's a connection between the two growing up that way gave you some of that confidence 100 I mean I I you've been around my parents enough to know that my father's approached by all kinds of people all day and he interacts with all kinds of people uh he doesn't care who someone is or how much money they have or where they're from his answer is going to be his answer and the way he talks to you is going to be the way he talks to you and the respect that he gives you and the patience that he gives you it doesn't matter who you are he's giving the same thing to everybody and absolutely that comes from home my father we I think we're all like that I don't think any of us are enamored by anybody because everybody knows from growing up in the house we grew up in it doesn't make a difference we all put on our pants the same way in the morning and so what so you have a lot of flowers so you have a lot of money but what are you at topless what do you do with your life that's right I think that's that's what I care about that's what we should care about um you know I I my tagline for for years 20 years has been Integrity is currency nothing else matters show me who you are show me what you do for the world show me what's what do you contribute to society then then maybe I'll have some respects but just because you're famous just because you're rich who cares yeah and we're living in a world that so many people you know even this industry it nauseates me a little bit the notion of being an influencer and we could get into this now and have you know depending where we want to go but I think it's seeped into the total world where it's not people who say that torah's sacred or if sacred ideas and I've been blessed with an opportunity to communicate it in a way that resonates and I hope people will listen but people will say I want to be an influencer I measure my life by how many followers I have I measure my life by by the statistics of how many views this has or how many likes it has or I measure my life by the brand that I've watermarked on someone else's video and may go viral you know that that this world now is defined by this desire to be a brand and be an influencer and it's seeped into the total World in a ways I think really really dangerous so don't get me wrong there are men and women on social media media who have real content and real value and who are really humble and it's not about them it's about the message but they're also a lot of people that it's not about the message or the content it's about them and I don't know that the the audience The Spectators are being judicious enough or sophisticated enough to differentiate out the two and to weed out the two for ourselves who do we follow and listen to and watch for our children who do we follow and listen to and watch how do we make sure that we're distinguishing the real content the real people and the real values they're just good at getting it across I like listening or the people who might be entertaining but but their whole identity is just being an influencer and when you take that away there's nothing left right whatever you said you know we have I'm in a business you know with the charity Consignment business has brings us you know uh in front of a lot of people who will throw money at us to do the craziest things and a lot of times we get it done because like why not we can people are paying for it money's going to charity great there are other times where people call me and I just don't understand what the point of like why do you want to do what you want to do and many times I'll either say no even though I can make a quick buck and do something so easy it just doesn't feel like or a lot of times I'll give them a new idea within the same realm and say well why don't you bring your wife and why don't you bring your kids and why don't we do it this way in that way this way what you're walking away with is a memory and an experience and something that you did special with your family um and I think a lot of that is missing Unfortunately today uh and the more you give people that rush and that feeling that they're an influencer or you give them something that gives them a rush all they want is more and more and more and then the secondly don't have it they're miserable so it's shallow people are shallow and that's like a drug with an adrenaline release right and and you know again you know you're you're on social media we're on social media anyone would lie if they don't say that when something you know is prominent that you don't get oh maybe people saw that wow that's so rewarding that feels good but it's a dopamine release it's a it's not it's not it's not real right you know it's just because many people viewed it and you see how it's all manipulated because you can spend money and get a lot of views you could spend money in YouTube advertising Google advertising Facebook advertising and and people are confusing I think sort of what's manipulated and counterfeit with what's real and both as consumers of it and when you have the privilege of being a provider of it you have a big responsibility to not be shallow to not get confused in what's real to remember what matters I think you got a front row seat to some of that well I could tell you my life from here on in is downhill because once I've been on behind the bema ah exactly I don't want any more I've made it I've arrived this is well speaking of that there's so many popular platforms where you mentioned Facebook and Google and now Tick Tock is there something that in order to stay relevant in the Jewish world there's something new coming or there's something on the horizon that you've already seen is becoming popular no I have no idea I think the most popular thing you could do as a Jew is be honest and be authentic and be real and be good and do good that's it like none of the platforms are going to do anything for you when people have interactions with Jewish people that are positive that's that's gonna do more than face-to-face real right ultimately when whenever we post anything and I hate to burst your bubbles but I'm bursting mine at the same time you know sometimes we'll go on social media we'll have a thought we'll have an idea we think we're inspiring people we want to share it who do you think is reading it we're preaching to the choir it's not making any difference maybe it feels good maybe you're getting nice comments maybe you're getting compliments very nice at the end of the day that's not what's affecting the world around us and that's not what's going to combat anti-Semitism what's going to combat anti-Semitism is acting the way we're spokes act and behaving the way we're supposed to behave and being a light on to the Nations uh and unfortunately I think uh we're living in a time where we all have to double down on those efforts to make a condition Hashem and and show people why Jews are different than why we're you know why we are who we are wow for sure your father of your father your mother people know their greatness their greatness your father's greatness and Torah is extraordinary the greatness and character and midos what's something about your parents something about your father that you think is underappreciated that you wish people knew more knew better um I mean anyone who knows him knows how humble he is but I think the people who don't know him if they knew how humble he was they'd be blown away right I don't know I don't know if that's that's a good enough answer I don't know if that's what you were looking for but um it took me a long long long time to appreciate who my father is um you know I I could probably say that for the first 20 years of my life I probably felt that life was very unfair right I was always the son of I was always expected to do different things and act differently and be different and dress different than I couldn't do the things that a lot of my friends were doing and there was always something when making a comment or doing this and that and it was annoying felt very unfair and I guess from from probably 20 to 40 it was my mission to just become myself right people should know me for who I am not who my parents are and then I reached 40 and then I look back and say okay so now I've done everything that anyone has ever do and I've met anyone who I wanted to meet and I've done and accomplished and achieved whatever people dream of accomplishing and now what and I think from 40 was when I was like you know what I only am who I am because of my parents and most of what I learned and most of my ability to interact with people and build relationships and do things for Community comes from my parents so now that everyone knows who I am and now that I did everything but now who am I what am I doing with all this right so basically from 40 on was when I kind of decided let me take the first 20 years of my upbringing and everything I saw and learned at home and the next 20 years of all the relationship building and all the experiences I had in travel and all that and let me pull that together and see well how do I use all that and and do good things for the world and I I'm trying my best and I hope I'm doing an okay job you're doing you're doing great things you're doing great things but you know you you alluded to you said explicitly growing up in that home growing up with his parents growing up with that last name is a lot of pressure you know Barak Hashem you have many siblings you have a large family and distinguished brothers-in-law is there a lot of pressure on you like you know I've got to produce in Torah and learning in in farm and teaching and living up at some was was that a challenge how do you to grow up and and to measure yourself against your father who nobody could measure against it's so hard it's so hard what's what's that like so first of all this is another thing about my father that probably people should know he never uh uh you know I wasn't a strong learner when I was a kid I wasn't a good student I wasn't interested in learning mostly like most kids my father learned with me way too much when I was a kid right but but looking back like now I have a closer every day now I do that family like I would have never ever had the the wish and the want and the desire to do any of that now if I didn't have that when I was a kid so when I was a kid it was annoying but now it's like without that I probably wouldn't learn today but my father never as much as he you know encouraged learning with him whenever he was around whenever I had free time he never ever pushed any of his kids to be exactly the same way you know my siblings everybody's different everyone does their own thing and everybody contributes to their you know respective communities very differently in their own way um you know it's funny you mentioned I was in Miami a couple years ago on tishova and this goes back to this was like right before I turned 40. uh so this was before that uh so at that point it's I established myself as who I am and I had a name for myself and when people would hear who my parents are they were actually shocked and surprised right so the first 20 years was everybody knew who my parents were the second 20 years by the end of it was oh wait those are your parents I would have never thought anyway so some guy comes to me I'm waiting for the elevator right after we finished dominating on tissue of morning and someone said something and someone said oh you know who his father is and I said and he goes that's your father he said yeah he said is he disappointed in the way you came out and on and on Tish above no less right right I said I said disappointed why would he be disappointed he said oh because you're so different than than your brothers I said I'm actually you know when I think about it I'm probably more similar to my father than many of my siblings and he said how I said we both use our god-given talents to bring happiness and joy to the people around us so I said I think the base of megdish was destroyed because of comments like that and uh it was it was sad but uh good for you he said sorry that's the kind of guy who's setting back our mission you know if that's what he said to you imagine how he interacts with other people I don't think I got everything from my father uh comebacks like that come from my mother don't don't no question no question about that no question about that yeah we're grateful for your time this is a really fantastic conversation really spoke about so many different things and uh appreciate your friendship we've known each other for a really long time and I will never forget that you and your brother came to the event we did for Israel last year and uh you know who your friends are you know it's it's not it's not you don't learn who your friends are when everything's going well and right and everyone's cheering you on and what you're doing is simple and non-controversial you learn how your real friends are when you need them to show up and it's not so easy to show up and the fact that you and and shy and your brother came that night we will never ever forget uh what it meant to us that night and your friendship on a regular basis and your advice mean the world and the relationship with with your family regardless who your parents are with you independent of it is really really special and something that we cherish so thanks for going behind the bema with us we really enjoyed it yeah there's a lot more a lot more still to talk about a lot more to come thank you that you're making we want to see a frame of this on the wall behind you next time some stuff down I'll make some room