August 6, 2025 • 41 mins
Let's talk about the importance of resilience and reinvention to success.
Alex Greene aka Mr. GreeneStuff considers his life an example of ‘successful failures’, while he learns from life’s setbacks and achieves amazing goals.
He was a guitar player who had to pivot after a hand injury. He has been homeless. he has won Emmys and Tellys for children’s programming. He has raised millions in private investments, and negotiated global IP and licensing deals. His story is about resilience, adaptability, and reinvention. And he is a fabulous story teller!
Check him out further at his website Alex Greene a/k/a Mr. GreeneStuff: Executive Producer, Entrepreneur & Speaker | A Greene Group
Follow Marci Talks Money (and Life) wherever you get your podcasts to get the episodes as they post.
Visit MoneyMarci.com for other financial literacy resources.
Alex Greene aka Mr. GreeneStuff considers his life an example of ‘successful failures’, while he learns from life’s setbacks and achieves amazing goals.
He was a guitar player who had to pivot after a hand injury. He has been homeless. he has won Emmys and Tellys for children’s programming. He has raised millions in private investments, and negotiated global IP and licensing deals. His story is about resilience, adaptability, and reinvention. And he is a fabulous story teller!
Check him out further at his website Alex Greene a/k/a Mr. GreeneStuff: Executive Producer, Entrepreneur & Speaker | A Greene Group
Follow Marci Talks Money (and Life) wherever you get your podcasts to get the episodes as they post.
Visit MoneyMarci.com for other financial literacy resources.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:02):
Powered by Riverside FN.
Speaker 2 (00:05):
Welcome to Marci talks money in life. I am money, Marcy.
My guest today is Alex Green, also known as mister
green Stuff, and I don't know that my introduction can
do him justice, but I'm going to try. He considers
his life an example of successful failures while he learns
from life setbacks and achieves amazing goals. He was a
(00:28):
guitar player who had to pivot after a hand injury.
He has been homeless. He has won Emmys and Telly's
for children's programming. He has raised millions in private investments
and negotiated global ip and licensing deals. His story is
about resilience, adaptability, and reinvention, and he is a fabulous storyteller.
(00:51):
Welcome Alex, Well, thank you Marcy.
Speaker 1 (00:53):
You know what, this is a pleasure. It was great
meeting you a few days ago in the pre meeting.
It really is a pleasure to be here.
Speaker 2 (01:02):
I am thrilled to have you. When we were talking before,
I think we could have gone on for days talking.
So I'm so excited to share you with my audience
because you have gone through the whole range of financial
situations and your attitude. I'm going to pick myself up
and I'm gonna get moving again and finding success again,
(01:23):
and just the resilience and everything else. And now you're
pivoting to become a speaker and help people others to
learn these skills that you have that have helped you
achieve these things. And I just love sharing inspiring stories.
Speaker 1 (01:41):
Well, I appreciate that, Marcie. I started out and I
got to go back to Like when I was nine
years old, my mother was a very religious person. He
was Pentecostal, and she used to drag us to church
all the time. And they were having a contest see
who could bring in the most people in this church.
It was in Maubash, Indiana, and the prize was a
(02:04):
Bible with your name written in gold leaf at the bottom.
I was just compelled to win that bible. And I
mean I went to work, I took their little flyers,
and I talked to all the kids at school. I
even went to some of their homes and talked to
their parents. I ended up winning that Bible. I was determined,
and I think that set the standard of how I
(02:27):
look at things. And I just feel like, if you
want it, it's there for you to achieve it, and
there's no reason for you not to at least try.
And that's just been my motto, and that's the way
I go at things, you know. I when I was
eighteen years old, as you mentioned, I took a job
in a factory and I lost three fingers on my
(02:47):
left hand, which is my courting hand for playing guitar,
and it devastated me. I didn't know how I could
go through life without my guitar in my hand. I
mean that's I was fanatical about playing guitar. I wanted
to be a rock star, you know, as most teenage
boys do, you know. So anyway, shortly thereafter, within a
few weeks, I got married. I had met a young
(03:10):
woman that at the time I was in love with,
and she really was the person that encouraged me to
pick the guitar up and learn how to play left handed.
You know, you go through life and as you're trying
to do things, there's always someone there that's beside you.
You may not realize it, but they're there. And every
(03:30):
step of the way of everything that I've done, there's
always been somebody, whether it was the artist I was
working with, whether it was a manager, whether it was
a TV house that I had met somewhere. There's always
someone there to help encourage you. That's what I want
to do, is I want to be able to encourage
people to it doesn't matter what they trip over, pick
(03:50):
yourself up and continue moving forward. I don't believe in roadblocks.
I believe in detours.
Speaker 2 (03:56):
That's a great way to put it. I like that
a lot. I'm going to use.
Speaker 1 (03:59):
That to welcome to So where do you want me
to begin?
Speaker 2 (04:02):
Well, there are so many places you could begin. So
you lost the fingers on your left hand, so you
switched to playing guitar reverse? And where did it go
from there? Because you've had continuous ups and downs?
Speaker 1 (04:14):
Oh? Absolutely, you know. I joined different bands. I played
the Detroit club scene for a long time. I started
doing cover tunes and I didn't like being a human
shoot box. So I decided I really wanted to get
into my own music, and so forth. We put together
another group, went on TV, did some music videos, did
(04:36):
all the crazy stuff that most musicians do. And as always,
we're working day gigs because there's not enough money in
playing as a musician, and especially in Detroit, the clubs
pay a little bit, but they don't pay a lot.
I continued playing, and then I ended up getting custody
of my son when he was nine years old, and
(04:57):
I was working as an insulator doing today playing clubs
at night, and it was really bothering him that I
would go off and play because he'd have to have
a sitter and so forth, and I just thought, you
know what, it's time for me to settle down. It
hit thirty. I knew that the chances of succeeding after
that point were really off the charts and very difficult.
So I decided to lay the guitar down and continue working.
(05:20):
But I was working for small companies. I couldn't afford
my rent and just all the bills, and we ended
up homeless. He moved in with his aunt for about
three months while I hustled and tried to pull everything
that I could pull together to start my own business.
And as I mentioned, there's always someone there to support you.
When I was searching to try to do jobs, I
(05:43):
went to a guy that was building this brand new house,
and I told in my situation. He wrote a check
out to my company that I was just starting, so
that I could buy ladders and buy all the equipment,
insulation and things like that to translate his home. And
he did that because I was an underdog and he
felt that I needed the help. And while I was
(06:05):
doing his house, when I'm insulating it, I'm getting it off,
you know, ready for drywall and so forth. He went
out and got me five other homes in that neighborhood,
which is a very exclusive neighborhood. And you know, these
are at that time probably half a million, two a
million dollar homes, which was in nineteen eighty five eighty six.
(06:28):
What ended up happening was I started my own inslation company,
and I was able to get on my feet, get
my son and I our own home, and move forward.
And within a few years of that, I find myself
just going out of my mind because music was my
lifeblood and I wasn't doing that. I was working as
a contractor and not having any enjoyment other than the
(06:52):
fact that I'm providing a home and food for my son.
You know. So I called this guy that I knew
his name was. He had a television show called Stars
of Tomorrow. He was also a singer in the Four Tops.
He met with me and he lectured me for forty
five minutes. He just did not let up. He couldn't
(07:12):
understand why I was working in construction and not doing
something in entertainment because he knew who I was. And
so I ended up leaving that meeting. And at the
end of the day, I had sold my three used trucks,
I sold my equipment, I placed my employees. I had
three guys that were kind of part time and I
(07:33):
placed him with my competitors. And I had ten thousand
dollars at the end of the day after selling everything,
which was nothing, but this is, you know, nineteen eighty eight.
And I called another guy that I knew, Peter Toco.
He just passed a few months ago and just a
wonderful human being. And he was also a singer. Anyway,
(07:56):
I called him and I said, what do you know
about wine? And he laughed, he said, well, I am Italian.
And I said, okay, I want to buy a bunch
of wine. I've got a crazy idea, but I got
to move forward on it. So I gave him the money.
He purchased about fourteen bottles of wine, and the cheapest
wine that he bought was about four hundred and fifty
(08:17):
bucks and the most expensive I believe was eight hundred dollars.
So I got this wine. I shipped to New York.
I bought one of these industry trade books, and I
called all these record A and R guys and I said,
I'm coming to New York. I'll be there on such
a time. I'd like to have a meeting with you.
I went to all these meetings. I presented them a
(08:39):
bottle of wine as a token of appreciation, and it
gave me new contacts. When I left New York that week,
I'm sitting on the airplane and I'm smiling, and I'm thinking,
I'm a music promoter. So now I had to find
talent to start sending to these record companies. And the
reason why I did that, I got back up here
(09:00):
a little bit because when I was performing, I couldn't
find an agent. I couldn't find a manager that would
go to any lengths to try to make sure that
we were successful. So I always knew that that was
a serious element for everyone to have. Anyway, what I
did was I went home and I looked at a
Billboard magazine and I thought, I'm going to put an
(09:21):
ad in here, and either I'm going to get blackballed
or I'm going to make a lot of money. So
I've put this ad in the middle of the classifieds
and I specified where I wanted it to be, dead center,
you know, and said, if you're looking for a record deal,
called Alex J. Green and I put my phone number
in there, and my phone started bringing. I was getting
(09:41):
calls from across the country, Austria, Australia. It was amazing,
and I started representing artists. Then one day I get
this crazy phone call from an attorney and he told
me of this young artist that wanted to meet with me.
So I said, well, all right. Because I I was
in the middle of doing a deal at that time
(10:02):
with Arista Records. Things really started picking up. I really thought,
this is it. I'm going to make a lot of
money promoting these artists. I'm starting to produce a little bit.
Everything was going great, and then all of a sudden,
the industry just started shifting. It just wasn't happening like
I thought it was going to. So I there were
(10:22):
pitfalls and so forth like that. I managed this artist
for about seven years, really tried to get her going.
She was amazing. She played just about every instrument I
signed her to Warner Brothers. We ended up losing the
deal inside of eighteen months, and here I am almost
broke again. Now I have to reinvent myself one more time.
Speaker 2 (10:40):
I was Napster. At that point in time, that had.
Speaker 1 (10:42):
Been yes, Yes, Yes, Napster really changed the whole way
we do business. And everybody that I knew that was
in the record industry, they were finding different jobs. They
were all leaving all the record companies were consolidating the
and our departments, where no one was into development. Most
of the record labels just stop developing artists at that time.
(11:03):
And I'm sitting in my office and I'm doodling around
and I can't draw a straight line, but I'm sketching
out this idea that i had for a kids show,
because by this time, I'm remarried. I've got toddlers at home,
and I'm having an issue trying to get them to
go to bed. It was a nightmare. And so I
saw Barney on television. I thought, oh God, I could
(11:25):
never let that in my house, you know, never let
my kids watch it. And so one morning I started
to go to the offices all doing the downturn of
the industry. My son wouldn't let me out of the sight.
So it was hard for me to take a shower
and to be able to get to the office and
plus get them to daycare and so forth. But I
(11:45):
turned on Barney. I put him in front of it,
and it started waving my hand in front of his face,
and he'd move his head to see around my hand,
and I'm thinking, oh my god, Barney's a king. I
ran upstairs, I took a shower, came downstairs. He still
glued to Barney, and it started dawning on me. You
know what, there's something here. And then my kids, you know,
(12:08):
they wouldn't go to bed at night. So I came
up with this idea of a TV show that would
teach kids to go to bed. I put together a
business plan. I went crazy over this. I just thought
this has got to be it, you know. So I
wrote this business plan. It took me about six months
to do this. I had started another installation company because,
you know, like I said, the record industry had fallen
(12:31):
through the holes in the ground. And as I was
putting together this business plan, I'm really honing in on
the whole thought of teaching kids to go to bed
and all right, Now I got to figure out how
in the world am I going to raise this money.
I didn't know anybody with money. My family didn't have money,
my friends didn't have money, and I'm thinking I'm going
(12:53):
to need one point two million dollars to get this
show off the ground. In fact, I went to all
the major student udios in Detroit area, Grace and Wild,
Producer's Color, all these different companies, and found out that
I was a little bit off that it was the
quotes I was getting was like two point seven million
dollars to develop the characters, to do all the things
(13:14):
that I wanted to do, and to produce four shows.
My mind started thinking, in no way, I'm going to
stand on a curb with a DVD in my hand
after spending two point seven million dollars and say, now
what you know? So I started looking into it a
little bit more, and I thought, all right, I got
to get out there. I got to figure out how
(13:34):
to get out there.
Speaker 2 (13:36):
What year was this?
Speaker 1 (13:37):
I was in ninety seven was when I started working
on their show concept, when and ninety nine through the
whole Napster thing, and then this was probably this was
two thousand and two. Thousand and one, and so what
ended up happening was during the Napster days, I started
writing a pamphlet and it was called How and Where
(13:58):
to Find Investors, totally based on my assumptions, no facts
at all, just my assumptions. And it was a thirty
page pamphlet. And when I got through writing it, I thought,
no one's ever going to want to read this garbage,
and so I filed it away. Well, when I was
writing my business plan, when I was working on the
idea for the kids show, I completed the plan and
(14:20):
I was standing in my front door, or at my
front door, and I'm looking outside and I'm taking it.
I have nowhere to go with this, nowhere, and I
remembered that pamphlet. I went down in my basement. I
went through the file cabinet until I found it. I
brought it upstairs. I sat in my dinner and I
read it, and I read it again, and I realized
(14:41):
I had unknowingly written a roadmap and want to do
several years prior to needing to have it. I'm telling
you the truth. This is amazing that I looked at it,
I read it, and I followed it every step of
the way. I packed up all of my colorful drawings
and everything that I had, and I started going into
upscale neighborhoods. And I would go into a restaurant and
(15:03):
I'd sit in the middle of the restaurant spread everything
across the table. People would walk by, they'd look and
they go, oh, what's going on here? And I tell him.
They go, oh, that's cool, and they go on. Well,
one day, this elderly gentleman, he just came out of
the blue and says, oh, what are you doing, you know,
And he pulled the chair out and he sat down
and started looking at everything, and we talked, and he said,
(15:25):
I know somebody that would be interested in this. And
I said who is that? And he said his name
is Jimmy Giftus. He is the owner of the National
Coney Islands. And I said really. He says, give him
a call. He wrote his name down on a piece
of paper, and then he wrote his name and he says,
by the way, my name is Buck Buck Rogers. And
I'm going, oh my god, I got a wacko on
(15:47):
my hands. You know, I'm here in the twilight zone music,
you know. And I took the piece of paper and
I called the guy and his secretary answered and I said,
Buck Rogers told me to call him. She says hold on,
and he came to the phone and he goes, this
is Jimmy. Who's this? And I told him and he said,
how in the hell is Buck? And I just went, oh,
(16:09):
my god, he's real, you know. And so anyway, Jimmy
came on board later on. But I kept doing this
and go into all these different restaurants. I chased Jimmy
for a year and a half. After sending my business plan,
he wouldn't even talk to me. He had no interest.
I ran into a guy and he says, let's have
a meeting about this. I'll put a group together and
(16:29):
let's see what we can do. So I was prepared.
I went to the meeting and they were all excited.
They wanted to have a meeting a couple of weeks later,
and so I left there thinking I did it. I
did it. I know I've got this. Three days before
the meeting, the towers fell. It was over. I thought,
not now, and what I meant was not ever. But
(16:50):
you know, it was like I was just on the
cusp of being able to finally get something together and
this has to happen. And everything was all dark and gloomy.
No one wanted to do anything. Everybody's panicking, nobody is
even thinking about tomorrow. Everybody was lost. So I get
a phone call and it was one of the investors
(17:10):
and he said, we need something good. Beat me at
my house on Friday and pick up a chat. So
I went to his house. He gave me a twenty
thousand dollars chet and I thought, I don't know if
I can do this, but I have to. Now I
just took somebody's money, you know, I'm in this up
to my eyebrows. And so I just proceeded forward, and
over the next year, year and a half, I readed
(17:32):
about one hundred and fifty thousand dollars. I went to
my very first television conference. It was called NAPPEAT and ATPE,
which is the National Association of Television Program Executives. It
was just an average, you know, one boot after another,
and I felt like, as I'm sitting there and somebody's
walking by, I felt like saying, hey, can I make
(17:54):
you a key chain? You know, It's just one of
those things, you know. But one morning, it was a
day before the conference was over. I'm hearing congratulations, congratulations,
and thinking what the heck's going on. When I get
to my booth, there's a stack of newspapers. It was
a Las Vegas Sun, and my booth was on the
front page with my assistant and it was amazing. I
(18:16):
sent twenty twenty five new newspapers home. By the time
I got back from the conference, there was two hundred
thousand dollars in my bank account and we were on
our way. It was just a matter of reinventing and
reinventing and reinventing, and so we finally we got to
a point where I'm building these sound stages, having all
(18:38):
this work done. I've got eight employees. There was only
two hundred thousand dollars that went out for you know,
paying all the bills and things like this. This is
probably another period of another year or so. I got
down to where I didn't have very much money left.
And the unit next to the unit that I was
in the middle of the building and it was only
(18:59):
thirty two h square feet and there was four units
in this building, and the one next to me was vacating,
and I thought maybe I should get this and expand
So I was talking to the woman that did my
set design, and I said, what do you think I
should do? She says, well, I'd look at my checkbook
(19:19):
and if there was more than twenty thousand dollars in it,
I'd probably do it. I walked to my office, I
opened up the check book. There was twenty two thousand
dollars in the account. So I grabbed the unit. And
you know, coming from a construction background, I built the
recording studio and things like this, it was just being
framed out, and I thought, I got to do something.
(19:41):
I got to get money in the door, otherwise we're
closing the doors. I remembered Mitch Hots at the Macomb
Daily because he was a really big fan of the
artists that I had signed to Warner Brothers. I thought,
I'm going to give him a call and have him
come in. So he came over and he looked at it,
and I told him I was doing this children's show
and it was called bed Bugs, and he looked at
(20:01):
everything that was going on. He says, I am having
my photographer come here today. We're going to take some
pictures and I've definitely want to do a story on you.
I said, okay, great. The photographer came in a few
hours later. Two days later, I'm on the front page
of the macomb Daily. At this time, I'm down to
roughly about eight thousand dollars in the account, and I'm
(20:22):
thinking I'm not going to make it. You know, within
two and a half weeks there was eight hundred and
seventy five thousand dollars in my account. People started coming in,
the investors that were already in started telling their friends,
and friends started telling friends, and it was just it
was amazing. It just started really coming together. I thought, wow,
this is fantastic. This point, I've raised a million dollars.
(20:46):
One of the main guys that helped me out, he
was a retired banker. He's the one that, in fact,
he brought Jimmy giftis in at a later time, which
is a great story. Maybe I should tell you this now.
Joe Michael was an investment banker. He's reached tired. He
wanted to really be involved in it in the show.
When I met him, he came to the studio and
he just loved it. It was to him, it was
(21:07):
like going to Disneyland. It was very colorful and it
just kind of knocked your socks off when you walk
into the sound stage and everything's black and you flip
the lights on and this colorful stage bounces back at you.
So one day he called me up and he says, hey,
Sonny boy, what are you doing on Wednesday? I said,
I don't know. What do you got going? He says,
I want to bring a friend of mine in. I
(21:28):
said okay, and he says, I want you to do
something really special. I said, all right, I'll do that.
So he called me up that day and he said,
we're coming at seven point thirty. You've got everything ready
and I said, I'm all set for you. I said,
by the way, who are you bringing? And he says,
Jimmy giftis. I said, he's not going to do anything.
I chased him for a year and a half. He
(21:48):
loved the business plan, but then he told me to
call him back in two weeks, an hour or a
year and a half later, I'm still chasing him. He says,
you leave that to me. He says, you just take
care of what I asked you to do, and we'll
do it. I said, okay. So I thought I really
got to fix this sky. I got to make sure
I get his attention. So I have my art director
get into one of the costumes and sit in the
(22:08):
corner and I told him, whatever you do, don't move,
but if he goes to touch you, I want you
to grab his arm. So they got Haunted House.
Speaker 2 (22:19):
It's all the same thing, right.
Speaker 1 (22:20):
It was beautiful. It was so great. I had this
other guy, Randy, that worked for me. We walked into
the room and I yelled lights and Randy hit the lights.
This stage just lit up. Jimmy left my side. He
walked over to this bed. Now, this bed is ten
and a half feet white and fourteen and a half
feet long. It's the size of a bedroom. And you know,
(22:40):
the mattress was roughly almost five foot high, you know,
a huge bed. And so he's touching it. He goes
over to the fish tank. He's touching it. He touches
the arm wire and he's moving across the room and
he gets over to the character and he goes to
touch him and he grabs his arm. Joe was steady
there and he hits his chest with his hair and
he goes, what the hell you tried to do? Give
(23:01):
us a heart attack? And Jimmy gift is looked at
me and he goes, you got me. He shook his
head and as he walked out, he's grabbing these pamphlets
that I had. And they left. The next morning, Joe
Michael called me up, Saunny boy, where are you? And
I said, I'm on my way to the office. He says,
I'll meet you there in fifteen minutes. Okay. So he
(23:23):
comes in. He throws a fifty thousand dollars check on
my desk and he says he just bought himself a
seat on your board, and I said absolutely. So it
was just a great story. Jimmy was such a great guy.
God bless his soul. He passed away many years ago.
Speaker 2 (23:40):
You're lucky you're meeting all these people along the way
who help you and introduce you to other people. But
it also sounds like you were one of your helpers
as well, because you wrote a pamphlet that you thought
was nothing, and then when you found it later, it
was a blueprint that you needed to start moving forward.
Speaker 1 (23:57):
Absolutely, you know, it's amazing what happened in life. As
you go through challenges, you find yourself down and out
and not knowing what you're going to do, and a
light comes on. And I've had so many of those.
And that's why what I say about successful failures, it's
just unbelievable what can happen. And every successful failure leads
(24:18):
to another opportunity, and that has happened throughout my life.
Speaker 2 (24:23):
Now I have to say this for the audience, because listeners,
since I don't do a video podcast, don't know that
I am looking at a sizable wall of these statues
that you seem to have.
Speaker 1 (24:36):
Yeah, we were really fortunate. Let me adjust that for you.
There you go. The first year when we got onto television,
I mentioned Joe Michael and I got to bring him
up again. I had pitched my concept and we had
recorded our very first episode, so I sent it to
Detroit Public Television to a guy that I kind of
(24:57):
knew there. I sent it to him. He handed to
the head of programming, and then I get a phone
call from Joe Michael says, I have some materials that
you have me in my van. Why do you want
me to give to the CEO of Public Television, the
general manager. I go, when are you meeting him? He says,
I'm sitting with him right now. I'm going to go
to the van and get it. Tell me what I
(25:17):
got to give him. I said, give him everything you got.
He called me up a few hours later on in
the day and he said, Steve wants to come down
and see the studio. And he says, set something up
so we can come down. So they came through about
eight o'clock at night and they told me they had,
you know, fifteen twenty minutes to spend. Three hours later,
he's leaving and he gave me a show date when
(25:38):
we were going to start airing. We only have one episode.
We needed six, and we only had two months to
do it. So we had to write those episodes, we
had to get them shot. We turned them in on time,
and they gave us a trial and then they extended
it to thirteen episodes. Then they wanted the second season,
(26:00):
and this all happened very fast, and that was in
two thousand and four when we hit the airwaves. The
two thousand and five Emmy Awards happened in January or
the early part of two thousand and five, and it
was for two thousand and four. Well, we ended up
winning four m He's that very first year, and the
best thing about it was when I was looking for
(26:22):
camera guys. When I was looking for audio, all the professionals,
I went to everybody that I knew that was you know,
really had a name for themselves, and they gave me
outrageous numbers I couldn't afford. So I went to specs Howard.
I got four kids to run cameras and they all
four one Emmys that year, very first time out of school.
(26:44):
And it does make the.
Speaker 2 (26:45):
Rest of their career seem a little bit harder when
you start off like that.
Speaker 1 (26:49):
You know. It was funny because I was standing at
the bar getting grabbing a drink and this camera guy,
he says, I've been in his business for forty five
years and I've never won an Emmy. I've had every
opportunity to do so, and now I'm getting beat out
by four punks, and I'm smiled. You know, he didn't
know it was my show. It was nice to see
that these young kids. They won. We won in four
(27:11):
different categories, and my four camera guys all won one
for camera work. It was excellent. And then the following
year I won six, and then the first year we
also won four Tellies, and then the next year we
won eight Tellies. So in the two years of broadcast
where we were in heavy production, we were doing well.
We continued on. I had fifty two employees, I started
(27:33):
attending more conferences. We ended up licensing to thirty countries.
We did several national broadcast deals. And then two thousand
and eight hit, and it's time to reinvent again.
Speaker 2 (27:47):
Yeah, the economy tanked for pretty much everyone in two
thousand and eight, right, it really did.
Speaker 1 (27:51):
But I keep picking myself up, and now I find myself.
I want to reinvent myself again. I want to help
others because I know what it is it's like to
be down, and I know what it's like to get
kicked when you're down. I know what it's like to
have things in your hand and have them taken away.
I really, honestly believe that everybody has it within them
to make a step forward, to make a step upward.
(28:14):
I had a young lady come to me just a
couple of days ago, and she's from Columbia. She got married,
she came here and her and her husband are artists.
They are very cute couple, and she says, I want
to do some things. I would really like to have
you mentor me if you would, and I said, well, absolutely,
tell me what you want to do. And she couldn't
do it. She's trying to tell me. She started crying.
(28:36):
She's really very withdrawn and shy, and she just feels
that there's a thumb on her forehead and she can't
lift it off to get going. And I told her,
you know what, there is a thumb on your forehead,
and when you move it, you're going to find your fingerprint.
I got nothing's stopping you, and I will help you.
We will get you through this and you will get underway.
(28:58):
And within a few minutes you really started looking at
things a little bit differently. I just honestly believe everybody
can do it. If you want to do something, there's
nothing stopping you. No one's going to write a check,
tape it to a rock and throw it through your window.
It's not going to happen. Open the door. You can
go to the right, you can go to the left,
you can go forward, but you have to get out there.
(29:20):
You know, I told you I wrote a book called
The Investors Networking Guide, and that I think there's forty
five pages in that book. It's on Amazon. It's all
about networking. No one does this alone. You come into
this world, you're not alone when you go out, Hopefully
you're not. I always say, when it's time to leave,
that's your box. No one loves you enough to get
(29:41):
in it with you. You've got to do what you have
to do, what's going to make you happy, what's going
to satisfy your soul. And as long as it doesn't
hurt anyone and it helps people, go for it, get
up and do it.
Speaker 2 (29:55):
I think that's great advice, and really it's for anyone
in any field, whether it's a creative or working in
a shop or whatever it is. You want to reach
out and help people coming up behind you and see
how the people around you and above you can help you,
because we're here as a community, whether we realize it
(30:16):
or a lot.
Speaker 1 (30:18):
You know. I always say that it doesn't matter if
you're manufacturing two picks or TV shows. It comes down
to one thing, the end user. Somebody has to want it.
So if you have an idea that you believe people
will want, do everything you can to get out there
and get it done, and there's always someone that can
guide you. That's what I'm here for. I try to
(30:40):
help as many people as I possibly can. Like I said,
I know the pitfalls. I'll give you a I think
it's a great story. It actually happened to me. I
told you I had raised a million dollars at this point,
and we hired a management consulting firm to come in
and look at everything that we're doing. So the account
him in and he says to me. He says, Alex,
(31:03):
you've raised a million dollars and you've sold four percent
of your company. I didn't know. I said, is that
a good thing? He says, is that a good thing?
He leans in over the table and he says, you're
an f and genius. It was by accident. I just
had an idea how things should be structured. And I
figured if I looked at a pie, I would make
(31:25):
a peace sign and then I'd take off one of
the legs and the larger piece of the pie I
had to hold. That meant the other half of the
pie I could sell. And you divide those up into
power values. And I purchased a bunch of you know,
a lot of pars, a lot of stops, you know.
When I set my company up, and then I divided
it up, well, I divided it up so that I
(31:46):
could raise ten million dollars if I wanted to and
still maintain control. But anyway, shortly after that, one of
my board of directors, he was the president of a
Fortune five hundred company based out of Indiana, said, I
want you to go to South Bend, Indiana. I want
you to see this law firm and make sure that
everything's really good in the books. She says, I just
(32:08):
have a sneaky feeling that you have some problems. So
I said, okay. So I went to this meeting and
I gave her all of everything that she needed, all,
you know, all all the company books and registers everything.
I was probably about a month later. She called me
up and she says are you Are you standing up?
And I said yeah, she said sit down. So I
sat down and I says something wrong. She says, I believe.
(32:31):
So she says, you know who the Security and Exchange
Commission is? And I said yes. She says, You've broken
five rules and they're not good ones. You've exceeded your
number of non accredited investors. You brought in accredited investors
without issuing any regulation forums. You did not file your
regulation D forms. You went across state lines and there
(32:55):
was another one that I don't remember, and she says,
you've really got a serious problem. And I'm thinking, O, God,
I'm trying to do a children's show, you know, I'm
trying to do something good. And I said, so, what's
the next step? She says, you have to do what
is called a rescinding offer. I have to resend my
(33:15):
offer and give them six percent interest, so their money
back plus six percent. I've raised over a million dollars
and the money spent. What happens if I can't pay
them back? She goes, You're going to jail. So I
had to go to my board of directors. I had
to explain that situation to him, and one of them
(33:36):
a godsend, he was my angel investor. He said, don't
worry about it. I'll give you whatever you need. We'll
get through it, and we'll pay whatever fines that are necessary,
and so forth. The attorney had to fly in and
meet with the board. It was fifty thousand dollars in
legal fees just to take care of this issue, and
I had to offer everyone their money back. And it
(33:56):
was a nice little blinder, almost a half an inch thick,
and I had to disclose how much money they made,
and so forth, a lot of disclosures in this stack
of papers. Let me tell you, this is a process
of over three months. And I'm on the xantis at
this time because I'm thinking I'm going to go to jail.
I'm walking around, I'm having heart pelps and everything else,
(34:17):
and I'm just in panic for several months. The attorney
called me up and she said, are you sitting down?
And I said yes. She says, you can stand up,
and I called what's going on? And she said, this
is my first time in my law practice, in my
career that I've ever seen this. But no one resented.
(34:38):
All of your investors, all one hundred and two of them,
have decided to stay with you. She says, I've never
seen this. You've got a lot of people that like
you and like what you're doing. And it was all over.
And from that point I raised about eight and a
half million dollars, and like I said, we syndicated it ourselves.
I reached out to syndication companies and couldn't get the
(34:58):
results I wanted. Signed with one company, and within ninety
days I had to pretty much go back and renegotiate
a deal and get my rights back. We had seventeen
percent of the United States, and it wasn't enough. I
had to get this thing across the country and there
(35:19):
was just no other way about it. So in two
thousand and five, I remember reading an article and it
said that the FCC was changing the rules and regulations
for digital television because all these digital channels were starting
to happen. Now. I was using APT for my public
television distribution, American Public Television, and I was signed to
(35:40):
Detroit Public Television. And so after getting my distribution rights back,
I had seventeen percent of the United States. Within ninety
days we had seventy one percent. How I did that
was because when I read that article from the FCC,
I got all my materials ready to go out to
all the digital channels across the country. They sat there
(36:02):
for eighteen months, packaged up with addressed ready to go,
and one day I get a phone call from Public
Television w XON is interested in picking up the show,
and I said, well, but you have it in Detroit,
so that's up to you. Said, no, well, this is
for their digital channel. CC just released the rules and
(36:26):
all the digital channels are hammering for children's programming because
they have to have three and a half hours of
pro children's programming. I hung up, got them in the intercom,
and I told Randy to get to my office, load
that stuff up in the car and get it to
the post office. And we had I don't know, probably
about three thousand packages that were going on across the country,
(36:48):
and like I said, within ninety days, we had seventy
one percent. It was just amazing. We had a wonderful ride.
I had a great staff, fifty two people that just
loved working together and just building something. You know, it
was special to them, you know what I mean.
Speaker 2 (37:05):
Well, you created the culture that made it what it was.
I mean, let's let's call it that they saw EU
someone that was there. You had their backs. You've had
a crazy ride with the ups and downs. I mean,
if you were to look back at it now, would
you have done anything differently?
Speaker 1 (37:24):
Probably not. You know what I would I would I
wouldn't be so nice in negotiations. I wouldn't be so nice.
So my people, my people meant everything to me always,
which is a beautiful thing. But anyway, Yeah, I've met
a lot of people over the years, and a lot
of ups and downs, and you just got to find
a way to pick yourself back up. And I think
(37:46):
reinvention is key. I remember watching the Late Night Show
one time and Madonna was on, and I was never
a Madonna fan, but I became one that night. She
said say whatever you want about me, just say something,
and that stuck in my head. It just like, really,
that's the whole point, you know. I remember writing business
(38:07):
plans for people after the industry the fallout, and we
had the film incentive here. We started writing business plans
for people to help them get their projects off the ground.
And the one thing I told them, I said, treat
this book like you're an evangelist. Get out there and preach.
Don't take no for an answer. Keep preaching, and if
you're in a crowd and you're not loud enough, throw
(38:28):
that damn business plan on the ground and stand on
it to make yourself an inch taller and scream a
little louder. And I believe in that philosophy. If you
want to do it, go do it. The only thing
holding you back is your doortop.
Speaker 2 (38:43):
And your thumb yep, and both of them you are
able to access yourself. So you got to take the
responsibility rather than looking for blame.
Speaker 1 (38:51):
I mentioned it's a team all the way through in
that throughout my life, you'd always meet somebody, like I said,
when I lost my fingers, it was my first wife,
and God bless her. So she has since passed, but
she was the catalyst for me to, you know, learn
how to play and stick at it, because, believe me,
flipping your brain over and doing something in an opposite
(39:13):
way is not an easy task. And then there was
a confidence here issue. You know, my hand was just
you know, what's the word, I'm looking forward, just formed,
And so I had a confidence issue. But I was
damn determined not to put that hand in my pocket
and hide it. And I love driving windows because it's
all my left hand. I have to pay with my
(39:35):
left hand, I have to get the food with my
left hand. I will show it. I'm not afraid of it.
When I spoke one time at an event, and the
first thing I told my camera guy when he was
video taking it, I said, I'm gonna hold my hand up.
I want you to put it on screen. He goes, really,
and I go, yeah, put it on screen. So I
(39:56):
went out, I grabbed my mic I raised my hand
in the air and if put it on the big
screen behind me, and I said, this is the hand
of determination. And that's how I started my speaking platform
for the day. And I really honestly believe that you
just don't let anything hold you back. So I got
through that and as I mentioned people along the way,
(40:17):
as you go. When I decided to buy the wine
I had Peter when I was absolutely broke, a friend
of mine said, you're the insulation man, and I thought, hey,
that's not a bad title. So I called my company
the insulation Man. I started it, like I said, with
just a few ladders in a van, and then I
(40:38):
built it up. And when I went into television, I
called my two nephews and I said, I don't want
you guys starving for the rest of your life. Here's
the company. Take it and do well with it. And
now they're doing over a couple million dollars a year
in business and they've had it for twenty five years.
Speaker 2 (40:55):
I think it's awesome. I love your story. I love
your stories and the resilience you know getting back up,
and I love this next phase of your life. I
will be putting a link to your website so people
can find you. Alex, this has been truly my pleasure
to have you here, and I look forward to seeing
all the good you're gonna do in this next phase.
Speaker 1 (41:16):
I really appreciate your time, Artie. I love what you're
doing and it was a pleasure meeting you.
Speaker 2 (41:22):
I'll have you back, so figure out what news stories
to tell everyone. Thank you for listening. Thank you to
Alex for being a fabulous guest. Mister green stuff and
this is money, Marci, Thank you for listening to Marcie
talks money in life.
Powered by Riverside FN.
Speaker 2 (00:05):
Welcome to Marci talks money in life. I am money, Marcy.
My guest today is Alex Green, also known as mister
green Stuff, and I don't know that my introduction can
do him justice, but I'm going to try. He considers
his life an example of successful failures while he learns
from life setbacks and achieves amazing goals. He was a
(00:28):
guitar player who had to pivot after a hand injury.
He has been homeless. He has won Emmys and Telly's
for children's programming. He has raised millions in private investments
and negotiated global ip and licensing deals. His story is
about resilience, adaptability, and reinvention, and he is a fabulous storyteller.
(00:51):
Welcome Alex, Well, thank you Marcy.
Speaker 1 (00:53):
You know what, this is a pleasure. It was great
meeting you a few days ago in the pre meeting.
It really is a pleasure to be here.
Speaker 2 (01:02):
I am thrilled to have you. When we were talking before,
I think we could have gone on for days talking.
So I'm so excited to share you with my audience
because you have gone through the whole range of financial
situations and your attitude. I'm going to pick myself up
and I'm gonna get moving again and finding success again,
(01:23):
and just the resilience and everything else. And now you're
pivoting to become a speaker and help people others to
learn these skills that you have that have helped you
achieve these things. And I just love sharing inspiring stories.
Speaker 1 (01:41):
Well, I appreciate that, Marcie. I started out and I
got to go back to Like when I was nine
years old, my mother was a very religious person. He
was Pentecostal, and she used to drag us to church
all the time. And they were having a contest see
who could bring in the most people in this church.
It was in Maubash, Indiana, and the prize was a
(02:04):
Bible with your name written in gold leaf at the bottom.
I was just compelled to win that bible. And I
mean I went to work, I took their little flyers,
and I talked to all the kids at school. I
even went to some of their homes and talked to
their parents. I ended up winning that Bible. I was determined,
and I think that set the standard of how I
(02:27):
look at things. And I just feel like, if you
want it, it's there for you to achieve it, and
there's no reason for you not to at least try.
And that's just been my motto, and that's the way
I go at things, you know. I when I was
eighteen years old, as you mentioned, I took a job
in a factory and I lost three fingers on my
(02:47):
left hand, which is my courting hand for playing guitar,
and it devastated me. I didn't know how I could
go through life without my guitar in my hand. I
mean that's I was fanatical about playing guitar. I wanted
to be a rock star, you know, as most teenage
boys do, you know. So anyway, shortly thereafter, within a
few weeks, I got married. I had met a young
(03:10):
woman that at the time I was in love with,
and she really was the person that encouraged me to
pick the guitar up and learn how to play left handed.
You know, you go through life and as you're trying
to do things, there's always someone there that's beside you.
You may not realize it, but they're there. And every
(03:30):
step of the way of everything that I've done, there's
always been somebody, whether it was the artist I was
working with, whether it was a manager, whether it was
a TV house that I had met somewhere. There's always
someone there to help encourage you. That's what I want
to do, is I want to be able to encourage
people to it doesn't matter what they trip over, pick
(03:50):
yourself up and continue moving forward. I don't believe in roadblocks.
I believe in detours.
Speaker 2 (03:56):
That's a great way to put it. I like that
a lot. I'm going to use.
Speaker 1 (03:59):
That to welcome to So where do you want me
to begin?
Speaker 2 (04:02):
Well, there are so many places you could begin. So
you lost the fingers on your left hand, so you
switched to playing guitar reverse? And where did it go
from there? Because you've had continuous ups and downs?
Speaker 1 (04:14):
Oh? Absolutely, you know. I joined different bands. I played
the Detroit club scene for a long time. I started
doing cover tunes and I didn't like being a human
shoot box. So I decided I really wanted to get
into my own music, and so forth. We put together
another group, went on TV, did some music videos, did
(04:36):
all the crazy stuff that most musicians do. And as always,
we're working day gigs because there's not enough money in
playing as a musician, and especially in Detroit, the clubs
pay a little bit, but they don't pay a lot.
I continued playing, and then I ended up getting custody
of my son when he was nine years old, and
(04:57):
I was working as an insulator doing today playing clubs
at night, and it was really bothering him that I
would go off and play because he'd have to have
a sitter and so forth, and I just thought, you
know what, it's time for me to settle down. It
hit thirty. I knew that the chances of succeeding after
that point were really off the charts and very difficult.
So I decided to lay the guitar down and continue working.
(05:20):
But I was working for small companies. I couldn't afford
my rent and just all the bills, and we ended
up homeless. He moved in with his aunt for about
three months while I hustled and tried to pull everything
that I could pull together to start my own business.
And as I mentioned, there's always someone there to support you.
When I was searching to try to do jobs, I
(05:43):
went to a guy that was building this brand new house,
and I told in my situation. He wrote a check
out to my company that I was just starting, so
that I could buy ladders and buy all the equipment,
insulation and things like that to translate his home. And
he did that because I was an underdog and he
felt that I needed the help. And while I was
(06:05):
doing his house, when I'm insulating it, I'm getting it off,
you know, ready for drywall and so forth. He went
out and got me five other homes in that neighborhood,
which is a very exclusive neighborhood. And you know, these
are at that time probably half a million, two a
million dollar homes, which was in nineteen eighty five eighty six.
(06:28):
What ended up happening was I started my own inslation company,
and I was able to get on my feet, get
my son and I our own home, and move forward.
And within a few years of that, I find myself
just going out of my mind because music was my
lifeblood and I wasn't doing that. I was working as
a contractor and not having any enjoyment other than the
(06:52):
fact that I'm providing a home and food for my son.
You know. So I called this guy that I knew
his name was. He had a television show called Stars
of Tomorrow. He was also a singer in the Four Tops.
He met with me and he lectured me for forty
five minutes. He just did not let up. He couldn't
(07:12):
understand why I was working in construction and not doing
something in entertainment because he knew who I was. And
so I ended up leaving that meeting. And at the
end of the day, I had sold my three used trucks,
I sold my equipment, I placed my employees. I had
three guys that were kind of part time and I
(07:33):
placed him with my competitors. And I had ten thousand
dollars at the end of the day after selling everything,
which was nothing, but this is, you know, nineteen eighty eight.
And I called another guy that I knew, Peter Toco.
He just passed a few months ago and just a
wonderful human being. And he was also a singer. Anyway,
(07:56):
I called him and I said, what do you know
about wine? And he laughed, he said, well, I am Italian.
And I said, okay, I want to buy a bunch
of wine. I've got a crazy idea, but I got
to move forward on it. So I gave him the money.
He purchased about fourteen bottles of wine, and the cheapest
wine that he bought was about four hundred and fifty
(08:17):
bucks and the most expensive I believe was eight hundred dollars.
So I got this wine. I shipped to New York.
I bought one of these industry trade books, and I
called all these record A and R guys and I said,
I'm coming to New York. I'll be there on such
a time. I'd like to have a meeting with you.
I went to all these meetings. I presented them a
(08:39):
bottle of wine as a token of appreciation, and it
gave me new contacts. When I left New York that week,
I'm sitting on the airplane and I'm smiling, and I'm thinking,
I'm a music promoter. So now I had to find
talent to start sending to these record companies. And the
reason why I did that, I got back up here
(09:00):
a little bit because when I was performing, I couldn't
find an agent. I couldn't find a manager that would
go to any lengths to try to make sure that
we were successful. So I always knew that that was
a serious element for everyone to have. Anyway, what I
did was I went home and I looked at a
Billboard magazine and I thought, I'm going to put an
(09:21):
ad in here, and either I'm going to get blackballed
or I'm going to make a lot of money. So
I've put this ad in the middle of the classifieds
and I specified where I wanted it to be, dead center,
you know, and said, if you're looking for a record deal,
called Alex J. Green and I put my phone number
in there, and my phone started bringing. I was getting
(09:41):
calls from across the country, Austria, Australia. It was amazing,
and I started representing artists. Then one day I get
this crazy phone call from an attorney and he told
me of this young artist that wanted to meet with me.
So I said, well, all right. Because I I was
in the middle of doing a deal at that time
(10:02):
with Arista Records. Things really started picking up. I really thought,
this is it. I'm going to make a lot of
money promoting these artists. I'm starting to produce a little bit.
Everything was going great, and then all of a sudden,
the industry just started shifting. It just wasn't happening like
I thought it was going to. So I there were
(10:22):
pitfalls and so forth like that. I managed this artist
for about seven years, really tried to get her going.
She was amazing. She played just about every instrument I
signed her to Warner Brothers. We ended up losing the
deal inside of eighteen months, and here I am almost
broke again. Now I have to reinvent myself one more time.
Speaker 2 (10:40):
I was Napster. At that point in time, that had.
Speaker 1 (10:42):
Been yes, Yes, Yes, Napster really changed the whole way
we do business. And everybody that I knew that was
in the record industry, they were finding different jobs. They
were all leaving all the record companies were consolidating the
and our departments, where no one was into development. Most
of the record labels just stop developing artists at that time.
(11:03):
And I'm sitting in my office and I'm doodling around
and I can't draw a straight line, but I'm sketching
out this idea that i had for a kids show,
because by this time, I'm remarried. I've got toddlers at home,
and I'm having an issue trying to get them to
go to bed. It was a nightmare. And so I
saw Barney on television. I thought, oh God, I could
(11:25):
never let that in my house, you know, never let
my kids watch it. And so one morning I started
to go to the offices all doing the downturn of
the industry. My son wouldn't let me out of the sight.
So it was hard for me to take a shower
and to be able to get to the office and
plus get them to daycare and so forth. But I
(11:45):
turned on Barney. I put him in front of it,
and it started waving my hand in front of his face,
and he'd move his head to see around my hand,
and I'm thinking, oh my god, Barney's a king. I
ran upstairs, I took a shower, came downstairs. He still
glued to Barney, and it started dawning on me. You
know what, there's something here. And then my kids, you know,
(12:08):
they wouldn't go to bed at night. So I came
up with this idea of a TV show that would
teach kids to go to bed. I put together a
business plan. I went crazy over this. I just thought
this has got to be it, you know. So I
wrote this business plan. It took me about six months
to do this. I had started another installation company because,
you know, like I said, the record industry had fallen
(12:31):
through the holes in the ground. And as I was
putting together this business plan, I'm really honing in on
the whole thought of teaching kids to go to bed
and all right, Now I got to figure out how
in the world am I going to raise this money.
I didn't know anybody with money. My family didn't have money,
my friends didn't have money, and I'm thinking I'm going
(12:53):
to need one point two million dollars to get this
show off the ground. In fact, I went to all
the major student udios in Detroit area, Grace and Wild,
Producer's Color, all these different companies, and found out that
I was a little bit off that it was the
quotes I was getting was like two point seven million
dollars to develop the characters, to do all the things
(13:14):
that I wanted to do, and to produce four shows.
My mind started thinking, in no way, I'm going to
stand on a curb with a DVD in my hand
after spending two point seven million dollars and say, now
what you know? So I started looking into it a
little bit more, and I thought, all right, I got
to get out there. I got to figure out how
(13:34):
to get out there.
Speaker 2 (13:36):
What year was this?
Speaker 1 (13:37):
I was in ninety seven was when I started working
on their show concept, when and ninety nine through the
whole Napster thing, and then this was probably this was
two thousand and two. Thousand and one, and so what
ended up happening was during the Napster days, I started
writing a pamphlet and it was called How and Where
(13:58):
to Find Investors, totally based on my assumptions, no facts
at all, just my assumptions. And it was a thirty
page pamphlet. And when I got through writing it, I thought,
no one's ever going to want to read this garbage,
and so I filed it away. Well, when I was
writing my business plan, when I was working on the
idea for the kids show, I completed the plan and
(14:20):
I was standing in my front door, or at my
front door, and I'm looking outside and I'm taking it.
I have nowhere to go with this, nowhere, and I
remembered that pamphlet. I went down in my basement. I
went through the file cabinet until I found it. I
brought it upstairs. I sat in my dinner and I
read it, and I read it again, and I realized
(14:41):
I had unknowingly written a roadmap and want to do
several years prior to needing to have it. I'm telling
you the truth. This is amazing that I looked at it,
I read it, and I followed it every step of
the way. I packed up all of my colorful drawings
and everything that I had, and I started going into
upscale neighborhoods. And I would go into a restaurant and
(15:03):
I'd sit in the middle of the restaurant spread everything
across the table. People would walk by, they'd look and
they go, oh, what's going on here? And I tell him.
They go, oh, that's cool, and they go on. Well,
one day, this elderly gentleman, he just came out of
the blue and says, oh, what are you doing, you know,
And he pulled the chair out and he sat down
and started looking at everything, and we talked, and he said,
(15:25):
I know somebody that would be interested in this. And
I said who is that? And he said his name
is Jimmy Giftus. He is the owner of the National
Coney Islands. And I said really. He says, give him
a call. He wrote his name down on a piece
of paper, and then he wrote his name and he says,
by the way, my name is Buck Buck Rogers. And
I'm going, oh my god, I got a wacko on
(15:47):
my hands. You know, I'm here in the twilight zone music,
you know. And I took the piece of paper and
I called the guy and his secretary answered and I said,
Buck Rogers told me to call him. She says hold on,
and he came to the phone and he goes, this
is Jimmy. Who's this? And I told him and he said,
how in the hell is Buck? And I just went, oh,
(16:09):
my god, he's real, you know. And so anyway, Jimmy
came on board later on. But I kept doing this
and go into all these different restaurants. I chased Jimmy
for a year and a half. After sending my business plan,
he wouldn't even talk to me. He had no interest.
I ran into a guy and he says, let's have
a meeting about this. I'll put a group together and
(16:29):
let's see what we can do. So I was prepared.
I went to the meeting and they were all excited.
They wanted to have a meeting a couple of weeks later,
and so I left there thinking I did it. I
did it. I know I've got this. Three days before
the meeting, the towers fell. It was over. I thought,
not now, and what I meant was not ever. But
(16:50):
you know, it was like I was just on the
cusp of being able to finally get something together and
this has to happen. And everything was all dark and gloomy.
No one wanted to do anything. Everybody's panicking, nobody is
even thinking about tomorrow. Everybody was lost. So I get
a phone call and it was one of the investors
(17:10):
and he said, we need something good. Beat me at
my house on Friday and pick up a chat. So
I went to his house. He gave me a twenty
thousand dollars chet and I thought, I don't know if
I can do this, but I have to. Now I
just took somebody's money, you know, I'm in this up
to my eyebrows. And so I just proceeded forward, and
over the next year, year and a half, I readed
(17:32):
about one hundred and fifty thousand dollars. I went to
my very first television conference. It was called NAPPEAT and ATPE,
which is the National Association of Television Program Executives. It
was just an average, you know, one boot after another,
and I felt like, as I'm sitting there and somebody's
walking by, I felt like saying, hey, can I make
(17:54):
you a key chain? You know, It's just one of
those things, you know. But one morning, it was a
day before the conference was over. I'm hearing congratulations, congratulations,
and thinking what the heck's going on. When I get
to my booth, there's a stack of newspapers. It was
a Las Vegas Sun, and my booth was on the
front page with my assistant and it was amazing. I
(18:16):
sent twenty twenty five new newspapers home. By the time
I got back from the conference, there was two hundred
thousand dollars in my bank account and we were on
our way. It was just a matter of reinventing and
reinventing and reinventing, and so we finally we got to
a point where I'm building these sound stages, having all
(18:38):
this work done. I've got eight employees. There was only
two hundred thousand dollars that went out for you know,
paying all the bills and things like this. This is
probably another period of another year or so. I got
down to where I didn't have very much money left.
And the unit next to the unit that I was
in the middle of the building and it was only
(18:59):
thirty two h square feet and there was four units
in this building, and the one next to me was vacating,
and I thought maybe I should get this and expand
So I was talking to the woman that did my
set design, and I said, what do you think I
should do? She says, well, I'd look at my checkbook
(19:19):
and if there was more than twenty thousand dollars in it,
I'd probably do it. I walked to my office, I
opened up the check book. There was twenty two thousand
dollars in the account. So I grabbed the unit. And
you know, coming from a construction background, I built the
recording studio and things like this, it was just being
framed out, and I thought, I got to do something.
(19:41):
I got to get money in the door, otherwise we're
closing the doors. I remembered Mitch Hots at the Macomb
Daily because he was a really big fan of the
artists that I had signed to Warner Brothers. I thought,
I'm going to give him a call and have him
come in. So he came over and he looked at it,
and I told him I was doing this children's show
and it was called bed Bugs, and he looked at
(20:01):
everything that was going on. He says, I am having
my photographer come here today. We're going to take some
pictures and I've definitely want to do a story on you.
I said, okay, great. The photographer came in a few
hours later. Two days later, I'm on the front page
of the macomb Daily. At this time, I'm down to
roughly about eight thousand dollars in the account, and I'm
(20:22):
thinking I'm not going to make it. You know, within
two and a half weeks there was eight hundred and
seventy five thousand dollars in my account. People started coming in,
the investors that were already in started telling their friends,
and friends started telling friends, and it was just it
was amazing. It just started really coming together. I thought, wow,
this is fantastic. This point, I've raised a million dollars.
(20:46):
One of the main guys that helped me out, he
was a retired banker. He's the one that, in fact,
he brought Jimmy giftis in at a later time, which
is a great story. Maybe I should tell you this now.
Joe Michael was an investment banker. He's reached tired. He
wanted to really be involved in it in the show.
When I met him, he came to the studio and
he just loved it. It was to him, it was
(21:07):
like going to Disneyland. It was very colorful and it
just kind of knocked your socks off when you walk
into the sound stage and everything's black and you flip
the lights on and this colorful stage bounces back at you.
So one day he called me up and he says, hey,
Sonny boy, what are you doing on Wednesday? I said,
I don't know. What do you got going? He says,
I want to bring a friend of mine in. I
(21:28):
said okay, and he says, I want you to do
something really special. I said, all right, I'll do that.
So he called me up that day and he said,
we're coming at seven point thirty. You've got everything ready
and I said, I'm all set for you. I said,
by the way, who are you bringing? And he says,
Jimmy giftis. I said, he's not going to do anything.
I chased him for a year and a half. He
(21:48):
loved the business plan, but then he told me to
call him back in two weeks, an hour or a
year and a half later, I'm still chasing him. He says,
you leave that to me. He says, you just take
care of what I asked you to do, and we'll
do it. I said, okay. So I thought I really
got to fix this sky. I got to make sure
I get his attention. So I have my art director
get into one of the costumes and sit in the
(22:08):
corner and I told him, whatever you do, don't move,
but if he goes to touch you, I want you
to grab his arm. So they got Haunted House.
Speaker 2 (22:19):
It's all the same thing, right.
Speaker 1 (22:20):
It was beautiful. It was so great. I had this
other guy, Randy, that worked for me. We walked into
the room and I yelled lights and Randy hit the lights.
This stage just lit up. Jimmy left my side. He
walked over to this bed. Now, this bed is ten
and a half feet white and fourteen and a half
feet long. It's the size of a bedroom. And you know,
(22:40):
the mattress was roughly almost five foot high, you know,
a huge bed. And so he's touching it. He goes
over to the fish tank. He's touching it. He touches
the arm wire and he's moving across the room and
he gets over to the character and he goes to
touch him and he grabs his arm. Joe was steady
there and he hits his chest with his hair and
he goes, what the hell you tried to do? Give
(23:01):
us a heart attack? And Jimmy gift is looked at
me and he goes, you got me. He shook his
head and as he walked out, he's grabbing these pamphlets
that I had. And they left. The next morning, Joe
Michael called me up, Saunny boy, where are you? And
I said, I'm on my way to the office. He says,
I'll meet you there in fifteen minutes. Okay. So he
(23:23):
comes in. He throws a fifty thousand dollars check on
my desk and he says he just bought himself a
seat on your board, and I said absolutely. So it
was just a great story. Jimmy was such a great guy.
God bless his soul. He passed away many years ago.
Speaker 2 (23:40):
You're lucky you're meeting all these people along the way
who help you and introduce you to other people. But
it also sounds like you were one of your helpers
as well, because you wrote a pamphlet that you thought
was nothing, and then when you found it later, it
was a blueprint that you needed to start moving forward.
Speaker 1 (23:57):
Absolutely, you know, it's amazing what happened in life. As
you go through challenges, you find yourself down and out
and not knowing what you're going to do, and a
light comes on. And I've had so many of those.
And that's why what I say about successful failures, it's
just unbelievable what can happen. And every successful failure leads
(24:18):
to another opportunity, and that has happened throughout my life.
Speaker 2 (24:23):
Now I have to say this for the audience, because listeners,
since I don't do a video podcast, don't know that
I am looking at a sizable wall of these statues
that you seem to have.
Speaker 1 (24:36):
Yeah, we were really fortunate. Let me adjust that for you.
There you go. The first year when we got onto television,
I mentioned Joe Michael and I got to bring him
up again. I had pitched my concept and we had
recorded our very first episode, so I sent it to
Detroit Public Television to a guy that I kind of
(24:57):
knew there. I sent it to him. He handed to
the head of programming, and then I get a phone
call from Joe Michael says, I have some materials that
you have me in my van. Why do you want
me to give to the CEO of Public Television, the
general manager. I go, when are you meeting him? He says,
I'm sitting with him right now. I'm going to go
to the van and get it. Tell me what I
(25:17):
got to give him. I said, give him everything you got.
He called me up a few hours later on in
the day and he said, Steve wants to come down
and see the studio. And he says, set something up
so we can come down. So they came through about
eight o'clock at night and they told me they had,
you know, fifteen twenty minutes to spend. Three hours later,
he's leaving and he gave me a show date when
(25:38):
we were going to start airing. We only have one episode.
We needed six, and we only had two months to
do it. So we had to write those episodes, we
had to get them shot. We turned them in on time,
and they gave us a trial and then they extended
it to thirteen episodes. Then they wanted the second season,
(26:00):
and this all happened very fast, and that was in
two thousand and four when we hit the airwaves. The
two thousand and five Emmy Awards happened in January or
the early part of two thousand and five, and it
was for two thousand and four. Well, we ended up
winning four m He's that very first year, and the
best thing about it was when I was looking for
(26:22):
camera guys. When I was looking for audio, all the professionals,
I went to everybody that I knew that was you know,
really had a name for themselves, and they gave me
outrageous numbers I couldn't afford. So I went to specs Howard.
I got four kids to run cameras and they all
four one Emmys that year, very first time out of school.
(26:44):
And it does make the.
Speaker 2 (26:45):
Rest of their career seem a little bit harder when
you start off like that.
Speaker 1 (26:49):
You know. It was funny because I was standing at
the bar getting grabbing a drink and this camera guy,
he says, I've been in his business for forty five
years and I've never won an Emmy. I've had every
opportunity to do so, and now I'm getting beat out
by four punks, and I'm smiled. You know, he didn't
know it was my show. It was nice to see
that these young kids. They won. We won in four
(27:11):
different categories, and my four camera guys all won one
for camera work. It was excellent. And then the following
year I won six, and then the first year we
also won four Tellies, and then the next year we
won eight Tellies. So in the two years of broadcast
where we were in heavy production, we were doing well.
We continued on. I had fifty two employees, I started
(27:33):
attending more conferences. We ended up licensing to thirty countries.
We did several national broadcast deals. And then two thousand
and eight hit, and it's time to reinvent again.
Speaker 2 (27:47):
Yeah, the economy tanked for pretty much everyone in two
thousand and eight, right, it really did.
Speaker 1 (27:51):
But I keep picking myself up, and now I find myself.
I want to reinvent myself again. I want to help
others because I know what it is it's like to
be down, and I know what it's like to get
kicked when you're down. I know what it's like to
have things in your hand and have them taken away.
I really, honestly believe that everybody has it within them
to make a step forward, to make a step upward.
(28:14):
I had a young lady come to me just a
couple of days ago, and she's from Columbia. She got married,
she came here and her and her husband are artists.
They are very cute couple, and she says, I want
to do some things. I would really like to have
you mentor me if you would, and I said, well, absolutely,
tell me what you want to do. And she couldn't
do it. She's trying to tell me. She started crying.
(28:36):
She's really very withdrawn and shy, and she just feels
that there's a thumb on her forehead and she can't
lift it off to get going. And I told her,
you know what, there is a thumb on your forehead,
and when you move it, you're going to find your fingerprint.
I got nothing's stopping you, and I will help you.
We will get you through this and you will get underway.
(28:58):
And within a few minutes you really started looking at
things a little bit differently. I just honestly believe everybody
can do it. If you want to do something, there's
nothing stopping you. No one's going to write a check,
tape it to a rock and throw it through your window.
It's not going to happen. Open the door. You can
go to the right, you can go to the left,
you can go forward, but you have to get out there.
(29:20):
You know, I told you I wrote a book called
The Investors Networking Guide, and that I think there's forty
five pages in that book. It's on Amazon. It's all
about networking. No one does this alone. You come into
this world, you're not alone when you go out, Hopefully
you're not. I always say, when it's time to leave,
that's your box. No one loves you enough to get
(29:41):
in it with you. You've got to do what you have
to do, what's going to make you happy, what's going
to satisfy your soul. And as long as it doesn't
hurt anyone and it helps people, go for it, get
up and do it.
Speaker 2 (29:55):
I think that's great advice, and really it's for anyone
in any field, whether it's a creative or working in
a shop or whatever it is. You want to reach
out and help people coming up behind you and see
how the people around you and above you can help you,
because we're here as a community, whether we realize it
(30:16):
or a lot.
Speaker 1 (30:18):
You know. I always say that it doesn't matter if
you're manufacturing two picks or TV shows. It comes down
to one thing, the end user. Somebody has to want it.
So if you have an idea that you believe people
will want, do everything you can to get out there
and get it done, and there's always someone that can
guide you. That's what I'm here for. I try to
(30:40):
help as many people as I possibly can. Like I said,
I know the pitfalls. I'll give you a I think
it's a great story. It actually happened to me. I
told you I had raised a million dollars at this point,
and we hired a management consulting firm to come in
and look at everything that we're doing. So the account
him in and he says to me. He says, Alex,
(31:03):
you've raised a million dollars and you've sold four percent
of your company. I didn't know. I said, is that
a good thing? He says, is that a good thing?
He leans in over the table and he says, you're
an f and genius. It was by accident. I just
had an idea how things should be structured. And I
figured if I looked at a pie, I would make
(31:25):
a peace sign and then I'd take off one of
the legs and the larger piece of the pie I
had to hold. That meant the other half of the
pie I could sell. And you divide those up into
power values. And I purchased a bunch of you know,
a lot of pars, a lot of stops, you know.
When I set my company up, and then I divided
it up, well, I divided it up so that I
(31:46):
could raise ten million dollars if I wanted to and
still maintain control. But anyway, shortly after that, one of
my board of directors, he was the president of a
Fortune five hundred company based out of Indiana, said, I
want you to go to South Bend, Indiana. I want
you to see this law firm and make sure that
everything's really good in the books. She says, I just
(32:08):
have a sneaky feeling that you have some problems. So
I said, okay. So I went to this meeting and
I gave her all of everything that she needed, all,
you know, all all the company books and registers everything.
I was probably about a month later. She called me
up and she says are you Are you standing up?
And I said yeah, she said sit down. So I
sat down and I says something wrong. She says, I believe.
(32:31):
So she says, you know who the Security and Exchange
Commission is? And I said yes. She says, You've broken
five rules and they're not good ones. You've exceeded your
number of non accredited investors. You brought in accredited investors
without issuing any regulation forums. You did not file your
regulation D forms. You went across state lines and there
(32:55):
was another one that I don't remember, and she says,
you've really got a serious problem. And I'm thinking, O, God,
I'm trying to do a children's show, you know, I'm
trying to do something good. And I said, so, what's
the next step? She says, you have to do what
is called a rescinding offer. I have to resend my
(33:15):
offer and give them six percent interest, so their money
back plus six percent. I've raised over a million dollars
and the money spent. What happens if I can't pay
them back? She goes, You're going to jail. So I
had to go to my board of directors. I had
to explain that situation to him, and one of them
(33:36):
a godsend, he was my angel investor. He said, don't
worry about it. I'll give you whatever you need. We'll
get through it, and we'll pay whatever fines that are necessary,
and so forth. The attorney had to fly in and
meet with the board. It was fifty thousand dollars in
legal fees just to take care of this issue, and
I had to offer everyone their money back. And it
(33:56):
was a nice little blinder, almost a half an inch thick,
and I had to disclose how much money they made,
and so forth, a lot of disclosures in this stack
of papers. Let me tell you, this is a process
of over three months. And I'm on the xantis at
this time because I'm thinking I'm going to go to jail.
I'm walking around, I'm having heart pelps and everything else,
(34:17):
and I'm just in panic for several months. The attorney
called me up and she said, are you sitting down?
And I said yes. She says, you can stand up,
and I called what's going on? And she said, this
is my first time in my law practice, in my
career that I've ever seen this. But no one resented.
(34:38):
All of your investors, all one hundred and two of them,
have decided to stay with you. She says, I've never
seen this. You've got a lot of people that like
you and like what you're doing. And it was all over.
And from that point I raised about eight and a
half million dollars, and like I said, we syndicated it ourselves.
I reached out to syndication companies and couldn't get the
(34:58):
results I wanted. Signed with one company, and within ninety
days I had to pretty much go back and renegotiate
a deal and get my rights back. We had seventeen
percent of the United States, and it wasn't enough. I
had to get this thing across the country and there
(35:19):
was just no other way about it. So in two
thousand and five, I remember reading an article and it
said that the FCC was changing the rules and regulations
for digital television because all these digital channels were starting
to happen. Now. I was using APT for my public
television distribution, American Public Television, and I was signed to
(35:40):
Detroit Public Television. And so after getting my distribution rights back,
I had seventeen percent of the United States. Within ninety
days we had seventy one percent. How I did that
was because when I read that article from the FCC,
I got all my materials ready to go out to
all the digital channels across the country. They sat there
(36:02):
for eighteen months, packaged up with addressed ready to go,
and one day I get a phone call from Public
Television w XON is interested in picking up the show,
and I said, well, but you have it in Detroit,
so that's up to you. Said, no, well, this is
for their digital channel. CC just released the rules and
(36:26):
all the digital channels are hammering for children's programming because
they have to have three and a half hours of
pro children's programming. I hung up, got them in the intercom,
and I told Randy to get to my office, load
that stuff up in the car and get it to
the post office. And we had I don't know, probably
about three thousand packages that were going on across the country,
(36:48):
and like I said, within ninety days, we had seventy
one percent. It was just amazing. We had a wonderful ride.
I had a great staff, fifty two people that just
loved working together and just building something. You know, it
was special to them, you know what I mean.
Speaker 2 (37:05):
Well, you created the culture that made it what it was.
I mean, let's let's call it that they saw EU
someone that was there. You had their backs. You've had
a crazy ride with the ups and downs. I mean,
if you were to look back at it now, would
you have done anything differently?
Speaker 1 (37:24):
Probably not. You know what I would I would I
wouldn't be so nice in negotiations. I wouldn't be so nice.
So my people, my people meant everything to me always,
which is a beautiful thing. But anyway, Yeah, I've met
a lot of people over the years, and a lot
of ups and downs, and you just got to find
a way to pick yourself back up. And I think
(37:46):
reinvention is key. I remember watching the Late Night Show
one time and Madonna was on, and I was never
a Madonna fan, but I became one that night. She
said say whatever you want about me, just say something,
and that stuck in my head. It just like, really,
that's the whole point, you know. I remember writing business
(38:07):
plans for people after the industry the fallout, and we
had the film incentive here. We started writing business plans
for people to help them get their projects off the ground.
And the one thing I told them, I said, treat
this book like you're an evangelist. Get out there and preach.
Don't take no for an answer. Keep preaching, and if
you're in a crowd and you're not loud enough, throw
(38:28):
that damn business plan on the ground and stand on
it to make yourself an inch taller and scream a
little louder. And I believe in that philosophy. If you
want to do it, go do it. The only thing
holding you back is your doortop.
Speaker 2 (38:43):
And your thumb yep, and both of them you are
able to access yourself. So you got to take the
responsibility rather than looking for blame.
Speaker 1 (38:51):
I mentioned it's a team all the way through in
that throughout my life, you'd always meet somebody, like I said,
when I lost my fingers, it was my first wife,
and God bless her. So she has since passed, but
she was the catalyst for me to, you know, learn
how to play and stick at it, because, believe me,
flipping your brain over and doing something in an opposite
(39:13):
way is not an easy task. And then there was
a confidence here issue. You know, my hand was just
you know, what's the word, I'm looking forward, just formed,
And so I had a confidence issue. But I was
damn determined not to put that hand in my pocket
and hide it. And I love driving windows because it's
all my left hand. I have to pay with my
(39:35):
left hand, I have to get the food with my
left hand. I will show it. I'm not afraid of it.
When I spoke one time at an event, and the
first thing I told my camera guy when he was
video taking it, I said, I'm gonna hold my hand up.
I want you to put it on screen. He goes, really,
and I go, yeah, put it on screen. So I
(39:56):
went out, I grabbed my mic I raised my hand
in the air and if put it on the big
screen behind me, and I said, this is the hand
of determination. And that's how I started my speaking platform
for the day. And I really honestly believe that you
just don't let anything hold you back. So I got
through that and as I mentioned people along the way,
(40:17):
as you go. When I decided to buy the wine
I had Peter when I was absolutely broke, a friend
of mine said, you're the insulation man, and I thought, hey,
that's not a bad title. So I called my company
the insulation Man. I started it, like I said, with
just a few ladders in a van, and then I
(40:38):
built it up. And when I went into television, I
called my two nephews and I said, I don't want
you guys starving for the rest of your life. Here's
the company. Take it and do well with it. And
now they're doing over a couple million dollars a year
in business and they've had it for twenty five years.
Speaker 2 (40:55):
I think it's awesome. I love your story. I love
your stories and the resilience you know getting back up,
and I love this next phase of your life. I
will be putting a link to your website so people
can find you. Alex, this has been truly my pleasure
to have you here, and I look forward to seeing
all the good you're gonna do in this next phase.
Speaker 1 (41:16):
I really appreciate your time, Artie. I love what you're
doing and it was a pleasure meeting you.
Speaker 2 (41:22):
I'll have you back, so figure out what news stories
to tell everyone. Thank you for listening. Thank you to
Alex for being a fabulous guest. Mister green stuff and
this is money, Marci, Thank you for listening to Marcie
talks money in life.
Host
Marci Grossman
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