Fingerboard Pawn Shop? Grail Finds & Drop Culture | Run It Back FB | S4 E149

On this week's episode of the podcast, we welcome a very special guest, Nick from @run_it_back.fb! We dive into how Run It Back FB really works, we pull back the curtain and show the full process. We talk about pricing used gear fairly, quality control and inspection cards, massive 150 item drops, and what it takes to scale a one man operation without losing community trust. We also get into Nick’s origin story from skateboarding to discovering pro fingerboarding, plus the Upstate New York scene, future warehouse plans, potential team riders, and upcoming collabs and freebies. 

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Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00)
Welcome to USAFBL Fingerboard Podcast, the official voice of fingerboarding culture from league news to community stories with real insight, writer interviews and the heart of the scene. I'm your host, Levine Cunningham today. I'm joined by Nick Yoest.

Nick is also known as runit oner score it underscore back.fb. Runit back FB in the house. Nick, welcome to the pod. How you been?

Speaker 2 (00:35)
Good, good, thanks for having me man. This ⁓ is awesome. Good to see you.

Speaker 1 (00:39)
Man, so you've been on a war path to getting probably the biggest collection or marketplace I should say for used and new fingerboarding gear.

Speaker 2 (00:52)
Yeah, yeah, mean, it's been a journey. I'll say that. It's been a very fast-paced journey. And I'm just taking a break from packing orders right now so we can chat. It's just constant. Yeah.

Speaker 1 (01:06)
Man, all right, so the concept of run it back is at least from my view looking from the outside in is that you created a marketplace where sellers can sell new and used items on your platform and then buyers can also pick up those new and used items as well.

Speaker 2 (01:25)
So it's so that's actually I think when most people first hear about run it back. That's what they think it is. ⁓ The reality is I'm actually selling inventory that I've acquired, right? So I'm not doing yeah, I'm not doing

Speaker 1 (01:40)
We gotta talk about this. We gotta talk about it.

Speaker 2 (01:43)
Right, right. So I'm not doing I think I had heard from folks that that's like an idea that had been attempted in the past and things like that, right, like host a platform for folks to buy, sell and trade on. ⁓ And that, the problem is

You have to run a platform, have to charge commissions and things like that. And it sounded like, you know, it probably, I think it's inevitable that it drives the price up on all these transactions. And yeah, you maybe get that added, you know, sort of security factor of, we did it through this legit site and it's protected. ⁓ But I think as long as Instagram and Facebook are free and those, you know, pages and communities are thriving, you know, it's, you know, that's, it's still a good place to do it, you know, is on those, those platforms. So what I did.

a little differently is start noticing on those platforms, hey, there's a lot of people who, like say, hey, I'm retiring from the hobby. I'm selling my whole collection. I'll sell it at a wholesale price just to throw it in a box and get rid of it. And you know, there's a lot of people who are still in the hobby, but like, I have a chunk of my collection I want to offload. I don't feel like listing every single one and dealing with the DMs of like, okay, I think I'll take it. Nevermind. And then you go to the next DM, like who was first? It's like,

it's really time consuming to go and sell a large collection of stuff the way that we all do on Facebook or Instagram. And a lot of people are, if you have the patience to do that and you're not in a rush or anything like that, you have the, ⁓ I guess the social capacity to deal with the DMs and all the different people and the reference checks and all that stuff. That's the way to go. But there are a good amount of people who just don't want to deal with that stuff. And Runnaback kind of provided this outlet for, hey, if you're okay with

know, bulk pricing, selling me those chunks of your collection, I'll take them, right. And it's one thing I noticed that was popping up consistently enough on those platforms, like, hey, you know, I've got all these premium things, and I'll sell them to you for 900 bucks. And for the first few years, it was like, you who's got $900 lying around for fingerboard stuff? It's a great deal. If I did it, you know, I could, you know,

potentially keep some stuff for my collection. I could sell some stuff and make a little bit of profit, but that whole idea of I'm going to buy an entire collection was just not really feasible until I started noticing, hey, this happens consistently enough that you could potentially start a business off of just buying in bulk from...

from all these collectors and everything like that. So that's really where it is. Yeah. I try to take that aspect out of it, like the consignment or, you know, a list my thing for sale. I'm trying to acquire it so that I just kind of have control over, you know, when it drops, you know, when it gets shipped and, it's our inventory that we're shipping out of my basement.

Speaker 1 (04:31)
changes a lot of questions that I had for you. Okay. So in a sense, more of a buy flip buying and flipping kind of a business. You're just buying bulk and then you're basically reselling them, basically market value. So

Speaker 2 (04:35)
We schedule

Yeah, yeah, that's that's kind of the difference. I there's a lot of you know, I would I think maybe the term flipper is like associated with people who are upselling a lot of things, right? relative to their retail their sticker price, right? And that's kind of why I like this idea of just buying in bulk, right? Getting that volume to drive the price down, because now I can go and take, you know, the same deck that someone might list for a price gouged, you know, sort of rate ⁓ individually on, you know, online, but I can

give it to you closer to sticker price or something like that. And that's one of my hopes is like if this was really impactful that I start to sort of ⁓ drive those, what is the fair market value down to more reasonable levels for some things. And honestly bring it up for lesser known brands, ⁓ Things like that. So it's something I can do. can sort of balance it out if I have a large lot that has a lot of premium brands and a lot of maybe

lesser known brands and things like that. can sort of even out how much I charge for all of that. And I think that just gets it out to more people. ⁓ The whole idea is like, people ⁓ like, I really want to try this, like a beast pants, but I can't afford one on the secondhand market. But here's one that was kind of crashed and for 30 bucks, can try it, see if it's worth it for you. And so the idea is to get like,

new brands, brand discovery out to people who otherwise weren't going to do it.

Speaker 1 (06:20)
Right. You go through the, cause I, I run and I manage and I own like a lot of the Facebook groups and they are tons of people.

that have been like, I've been in the scene since, you know, in the 2010s or even earlier, I came back during COVID and then decided to leave because, you know, COVID went away and I don't really have like the heart to get back in the finger boarding or you got people that are like my kids kind of aged out and now they're interested in other things. Like I see those kind of posts like all the time and like are like the Facebook groups and stuff like that. And so like, are you like one of those ones that have just kind of look for those kind of situations where like, you know, people really don't have an

interested in and they're just willing to just kind of just get rid of it or whatever kind of monetary value that they're kind of looking for and taking off their hands and then basically repurposing old gems to new people.

Speaker 2 (07:11)
Yeah, yeah, exactly. think right, I kind of prowl the the Facebook group and you know, the Instagram sales pages and things like that. And now it's just like a habitual like, you know, let's just check scroll real quick. Is there a new posting type of thing? And yeah, yeah, it's you when those pop up, you know, that's when I reach out and, know, anyone who's selling a large lot, I might reach out and be like, Hey, would you consider selling this like a bundle deal, you know, packaged price just to get it all off your hands and

know, don't try to like pressure anybody or lowball anybody. ⁓ you know, that's, it's there's, there's an attractive, you know, feature there of like, hey, I just one fell swoop, one transaction, I got rid of all the stuff I was trying to sell. And there's been some stories to have people who are like, hey, I'm in real need of money, like right now. And, you know, yeah, it's also at a discount, if you can just, we can make this happen today, right. And, ⁓ you know, I feel like

Those have been good situations for both sides. ⁓ I've been able to help a few people out that way, too.

Speaker 1 (08:15)
It was a rough month of December and the groups I noticed, and I'm probably sure you noticed the same thing. There was a lot of people that were struggling with some Christmas money, like in some Christmas presents under the tree for sure. In December I saw so many like, need quick cash. Here's like five decks or a couple obstacles or whatever they had going on. Like neither gone today kind of stuff. And I was like, Hey, this is wild. It's sad and wild at the same time. And I'm just like, man, that sucks.

Speaker 2 (08:42)
Yeah,

people say like, that's what I never want to hit up the person who's like, I don't want to get rid of this. But I'm just like, find a way to get if you're if you're iPad sellers remorse. And, know, there's some setups that I've seen that like, I sold the got resold and resold. I'm just like, I wish I just kept that right, because that was such a sweet setup. Right. I don't try I always try to make sure like, you're sure right? Like, you're okay, you know, letting this go. Because yeah, I feel that I always get a little bummed when somebody's

sells with some regret or some remorse, right? Yeah.

Speaker 1 (09:15)
And it's crazy. I'm like, we need to. It's like you can't save everybody, but it's almost like, you know, I've seen a couple where like, you know, they were selling a lot of stuff and it was like, all I really need is like 20 bucks. And they're like, I don't want to sell it. I just need gas or whatever it was. And I'm just like, dude, like just like, I mean, just swing you 20 bucks and you just pay me back next week. Like, like, your, your stuff to you. Like just, just keep it.

Speaker 2 (09:38)
Yeah, yeah. that's what I think someone on Reddit at some point called run it back the fingerboard pawn shop. And I'm just thinking, maybe we should get it.

Speaker 1 (09:47)
Well,

that's originally what I thought. I was like, man, I had kinds of like questions lined up for you. More or less kind of like a pawn shop or just a platform where people there was just a marketplace, I guess. But this is actually an interesting take. So you're just.

onboarding all kinds of inventory. I don't even want to know what the treasure chest of goodies that you have that you just kind of take in and then eventually start listing. But I noticed that you did have a post like a week or two ago that said that you have like 150 new items being listed on the store.

Speaker 2 (10:20)
Yeah, yeah, the drops have been getting bigger and bigger. seems like I feel like 150 is about my limit at this point. I think that took a lot of time to get that prepped. yeah, that's, you know, that's, ⁓ it's maybe a significant chunk of what I've got lying around here. you know, I've got, I've got significant inventory is what I'll say, you know, it's, can do 100 plus pieces ⁓ every drop for a while to come without acquisitions and

But I'm continuing. That's kind of where any profit that I get has just been reinvested. And it's mostly going toward acquisitions, building up that inventory, making sure I have variety and the things that people really want every drop, just keeping it exciting. So yeah, it's kind of happening that way. think through this first year, it's going to just be totally reinvested or somehow going back into the fingerboard community. And then hopefully by like...

know, mid year, we're gonna finally start, you know, doing real accounting and do the books and see like, is this a viable business? We'll find out. And, and but yeah, that's the whole goal is to really just, you know, I just I had a big collection myself and ⁓ my my CFO or right back CFO, my wife was bugging me like, you spend a lot of money on this stuff. Like, is there a way to make money on this stuff? Like make this productive?

And so my old goal was like, it started a shop that basically funds my bad habits. ⁓ and really means, you know, like supporting makers and, know, buying new products and stuff from the fingerboard community. like, you know, I feel pretty good about that. And if it turns into a, you know, a legitimate side hustle for me, ⁓ you know, I had no plans to quit my day job and, ⁓ hike up the prices or anything like that. So I can make a living off this, but, I do want to grow it. I want it to scale. And I just know that.

to do that, I need help. need to do real growth and planning and things like that. I'm not trying to get ahead of myself here. we're probably that 150 piece drop is probably about the plateau that we're hitting at this capacity right now.

Speaker 1 (12:30)
So I guess walk me through the process of, like your product. Once this episode launches, you're probably gonna get a bunch of people like, Hey, I got this for sale now. I got that for sale now. And so like, if someone approaches you and they're like, Hey, I've got all these things for sale. What would you give for me? You guys negotiate a price. I'm assuming that you have, they're going to have to ship it to you and then you're going to end up paying them once you receive it. I'm assuming.

Speaker 2 (12:53)
So I've been mainly paying upfront with PayPal, GNS, the goods and services that kind of protects the whole thing. And the reality with that is that it does kind of put both parties at risk. It obviously protects the buyer, ⁓ but I didn't realize it puts the seller at risk too.

If I'm a real ⁓ scammer of a guy, can just get your box shows up with all your stuff. I dump it out and I take a picture. Hey, it showed up empty. It goes both ways. So I don't think this would work that way if I hadn't been active in that, like the Facebook group and the Instagram buy sell trade pages. I've been active in those for like over a year and kind of built up those refs and know,

I have plenty of people to reach out to who are legit in the scene to ⁓ know like, you can do this deal with me and know that you're not going to get scammed. That's a big part of what drove Run It Back was like, build up those credentials. Just have a centralized place where you don't have to worry about like, this person wants to sell me this or he wants to buy this for me. But they don't have a profile picture. They've only been on Instagram for a week or something. It seems sketchy. ⁓ Now you don't kind of really don't have to worry about that.

know, with run it back because, you know, all it takes is one bad deal and probably my, the reputation of my business is going to be, you know, down the hill, right? Nobody's going to want to do business if I, if I screw one person over, right? So no plans to do that.

Speaker 1 (14:27)
No, I feel you. It's the community is almost you got to run a very perfect tight ship within our community for sure. Cause one, one thing can almost ruin you. Like it's kind of weird how it's either all or nothing basically.

Speaker 2 (14:42)
Right, right. doesn't take much to ruffle feathers, it seems like. So I'm trying to have fun.

Speaker 1 (14:49)
So when we're talking about the onboarding process, so you get all everything in, I'm just, you're quality checking everything. You got to literally do the whole like picture listing description, put it on the website for every single one of these things. I'm assuming. Right.

Speaker 2 (15:06)
Yeah, it's really one piece at a time. Basically, I have these little inspection cards that I fill out now for every piece that I'm about to list. Basically, I get things in bulk and I get them sorted into inventory. Then as I'm prepping for a drop, I'm things out of them, trying to curate each drop to make sure I have a variety of different brands and an even amount of...

higher end stuff versus budget stuff and everything in between, you know, and I kind of get them all picked out and then, one at a time. I'm doing a, you know, a visual inspection, some stress testing and things like that. Just kind of checking things off on this little card that comes with every piece that you buy from me to show that, yeah, I checked this out. You know, it's not like you're going to get a deck that was cracked and I missed it or something like that, or you're not going to get something that's warped and soggy or you're not going to get trucks.

hopefully without stripped base plates or axles that are slipping all over the place. I wasn't doing the inspection cards at first when I first started it and there were some misses there. There's things that are easy to miss. So having that card where every single thing I have to go and check ⁓ is definitely minimize those. ⁓ it is used gear. ⁓ It's never perfect. Sometimes it might be, the next time you thread this is when it strips.

I've always been, know, when people reach out, if you bought something for me and it wasn't, didn't meet your expectations, just reach out, we'll figure something out. I got a ton of stuff here, right? So everybody's been pretty cool about like, hey, this axle did slip. And I was like, I don't know how I missed that, but sorry, let's swap out the hanger and all this stuff. You know, we can, we always figure it out. So.

Speaker 1 (16:50)
Yeah, that's gotta be, that's difficult, but at least you're trying to go through the checks, the process, the quality control as much as possible. know that's, there's no perfect system whenever you're talking about used gear, stuff like that. It's the same thing with buying a used car. Like someone can literally drive it, no problems. And then like literally like the next oil change, like everything just wants to crap out. And it's just like, there's no way to, no way to prevent any of that stuff. It's just, you know, sometimes luck in the draw.

Speaker 2 (17:16)
Yeah, yeah, exactly. I think everybody, all my customers have been pretty reasonable. Now I've thought like, I got to get disclaimers out. Like, yeah, I only guarantee you this will work for a week or whatever. But I'm like trying to avoid it being something really, know, stringent like that. And it seems like, you know, most people are just reasonable and work things out like that when it happens. for all it's going to take is like one, you know, one, you know, very upset person to change that on my end.

Haven't found them yet, so that's good.

Speaker 1 (17:47)
Luckily, mean, most people have been in the, you know, in the finger boarding for quite some time. They know how the process of finger boarding gear, the more you interchange, you know, trucks between decks and stuff like that, you're going to risk these.

Stripped base plates, things like that. And so yada, yada, yada. So like people realize like once you get into used stuff, like you have no idea what the person before them did. You don't know how many times these set of trucks have been interchanged in between different decks and things like that. And so like there's always just that unknown unknown. And I think a lot of people kind of understand that and they know that going in buying used gear, stuff like that. It's like, okay, this is thrashed, but I don't, or not thrashed. shouldn't say that, but like just it's used and it's like, you know, we don't know.

really what all went behind in their care and their keep and where they stored their stuff and stuff like that. it's, there's just a little bit of an unknown thing, but for the most part, everybody knows how to like, you know, the whole finger boarding thing for sure.

Speaker 2 (18:43)
Yeah, I was thinking that might be some of the content that comes out this year is like more like the field tips and tricks for hey, if you got a little bit of a loose axle, here's how to get your wheels on and look at the work just fine. Yeah, Things like that just to support people because yeah, at some point it's like, well, you've been riding it for a week and now there's a problem. I don't know if I can, you how much more I can help you other than to give you advice and make sure your setups working right.

Speaker 1 (19:09)
that's oil for the bearing for the wheels and all that stuff.

Speaker 2 (19:13)
Yeah,

because a lot of I can say a lot of the customers to our kind of newcomers to the hobby, you know, and I've been able to, you know, a lot of people do reach out and ask some of those more basic questions that like, you know, after you've been doing this for a few years, you kind of learn it, you know, it but so that's been that's been cool being able to help them out. And, you know, I do this sort of like ranking system of if it's thrashed, or if it's just skated, or if it's mildly used, or if it's like, it's fresh.

Right. And yeah, I always put the disclaimer if you're getting something that's worn out or thrashed, like I'm selling it, you know, super cheap. take, you know, roll the dice. No guarantees this is going to work. But then, you know, I also have like new out of package stuff where, you know, that shows up and then there's a problem. And of course, we're going to we're going to fix that. We're going to figure that out. Right. And everywhere sort of in between, you know, as long as everyone's reasonable, you know, I'll continue to be as generous as I can with that.

Speaker 1 (20:10)
on. All right, so let's backtrack a little bit. I'm assuming you're a skateboarder.

Speaker 2 (20:16)
Yeah, yeah, skateboarder at heart for sure. It's definitely part of the ⁓ Tony Hawk pro skater wave of, you know, generation of skateboarders that came into the came into the sport. ⁓ And yeah, you know, at the same time is when tech deck, you know, rose to what it is now. And so yeah, just basically always had tech decks on me, ⁓ skateboarded, you know, almost every day through my late teens to my mid 20s.

Kind of dropped off after that. Like my mid 20s, I'm going into full school work and career, just workaholic mode and things like that. So I wasn't really paying as much attention to skateboarding anymore. ⁓ But I always had tech decks on me. They were just like my fidget, right? Sitting at my desk, like, I don't have a tech deck in the drawer and just like, know, make sure I can still 360 flip and things like that. ⁓ know, so that was always kind of always been in the back pocket.

definitely, you know, started out in skateboarding. We're in the northeast here. So you can only like go outside and skateboard like 35 % of the year. So we did a lot of indoor sessions on the tech decks and fingerboards and things like that. But yeah, yeah, like my first two skate videos on VHS I ever owned were Transworld, Modus Operandi and Fingers of Fury. And those just got played constantly. They get to get a ⁓ a second copy of Fingers of Fury at some point.

So we just wore out the first one.

Speaker 1 (21:41)
When did fingerboarding, when did you take fingerboarding more seriously? Cause you mentioned that like, you know, you're doing the tech decks and they are doing the skateboarding, like, when did like fingerboarding really become more of a, a serious hobby for you?

Speaker 2 (21:54)
So much later than it should have. It's like, yeah, I don't believe in having regrets in life, but mine would be not getting plugged into the finger boarding scene much sooner. ⁓ Because, you know, I guess when I was younger, I swear I just had this like really warped attitude of like, because I watched Fingers of Fury and I said, okay, they make their boards out of wood and all this stuff, right? And to me, it was just like, well, I can just go to.

Walmart and get a tech deck for $3. Why would I spend all that time, money and effort to make my, you know, these poor people have to make their own fingerboards. I've got mine in the shop right here, you know, and never like dawned on me to really look into it further until yeah, it was, you know, maybe when I started picking up more of the tech deck stuff again, when I first, you know, when my kid, my oldest turned like two years old and I was like, looking through toys and stuff like that. Like, yeah, the finger boards and we dig up all my old fingerboard stuff, you know.

all my old tech deck stuff. that kind of sparked it. And you know, just taking those, like the target runs where you go through the toy aisle, like, of course, the Hot Wheels are right next to the tech decks that works out great for me and my kids. And it was like 2019 or something when I first saw tech deck performance series, like not even the pro but the performance that had like a wooden deck. And I just remember that that double take of like $14 for a fingerboard. This is crazy.

I to have it right. So I took I picked that up and I was like really digging it, you know, and then it was 2020 really, you know, during the lockdown or, you know, like Amazon was kind of one of the only things you could shop, you know, from right and at some point I stumbled on a teak complete on Amazon. And I was like, All right, let's check that out. Right. And that kind of got me taking it more seriously from

the standpoint of like getting my chops up and like getting some obstacles around so I can actually like, you know, the whole idea of like filming and trying to make skate videos again, that was my favorite thing to do when I was skateboarding is make skate videos and edit and things like that. And that was like a long lost creative outlet. And then I'm like, got really interested in doing that again. Because I can just do it all myself now. can self film and things like that. So I really tried to focus on self filming and kind of just getting my

my chops back up with like a teak complete, a few of those, you know, over the course of a couple of years. And it wasn't until like, you know, maybe 2023 or so when I really started to go down the rabbit hole and discover this whole world of pro fingerboarding. So, so I'm a relative newcomer, but like I should have been plugged in back in like 2000. It's something I've always, I know I would have loved being a part of that back then.

Like, I wish I focused on that more. But here I am now.

Speaker 1 (24:49)
Well, the interesting thing is I got a very similar story and stuff as well. you know, just being part of the whole tech deck for me, at least pre-tech deck, like era of finger boarding and then, you know, going through high school and just went the whole girls and sports route and.

Then went to college. so like, there was this huge period of time where like, wasn't even like there. And like, I kind of looked back and I was like, man, like if I was there, the entirety of like my childhood to like now, like it'd be kind of crazy. But I also don't know if I would be running USAFBL if I was like in it since day one, because I would have been more in it as probably more as a collector and like a enthusiast instead of like a event builder, media guy, stuff like

that. it's almost like coming in at different stages of your life. It gives you different perspectives of how you want fingerboarding to be part of your life.

Speaker 2 (25:44)
True, yeah, right. Coming into it with a sort of a professional eye rather than just having been lurking in the background the whole time. Yeah, it makes sense.

Speaker 1 (25:54)
Yeah,

I probably would have been like Levine the fingerboarders that are like Levine the podcast guy like Levine the Playa's guy like it probably a different version of me because fingerboarding would have meant something a little bit different than me for me like you know 10-15 years ago so yeah.

Speaker 2 (26:10)
true,

true. Yeah. And the only reason why I say like, I really regret it on my side is just because of where I am here in upstate New York. There's some there are some real like legends from this area, right? I didn't realize that, you know, like, growing up that, you know, Zach, who runs whoop was making history the next town over, literally, you know, a 15 minute drive from where we're, you know, all that was happening, all that was going down.

know, there's just a lot of kind of sort of OGs in this area that I'm starting to meet now and getting to know now but realizing that man that was that was like a special time in fingerboard history and you know, I was ⁓ too busy, you know, getting my dumb degree, you wasn't paying attention.

Speaker 1 (26:58)
Well,

the Northeast and I mean, I really shouldn't use the term like old money, but like, there's just a lot of like just OGs that have just been in the industry for a very, very long time. And I would basically contribute that to, you know, Mike with flat face, cause he, you know, started this 20 plus years ago out of his.

no driveway basically. And so he just built this community 20 years ago that has gotten to something absolutely wild and crazy at this point, as far as numbers and scale and stuff like that. so finger boarding for the United States, in my opinion, the Northeast, Boston, New York, that whole like New Jersey, all those Eastern States over there. it's like, it's just the, foundation has been there for so long that like it's

Speaker 2 (27:27)
Yeah.

Speaker 1 (27:42)
A lot of rising stars that have been there, people that are coming up, people have been there for literally decades, which is kind of crazy to say out loud, but.

Speaker 2 (27:49)
Yeah, yeah, exactly. It's it's a there's definitely a culture up here. And, you know, this sort of, ⁓ I guess, camaraderie of, you know, getting in the car and meeting up at, you know, at food or something like that. And just, you know, I can just see all the all the old friends and just the welcoming of new people. And, yeah, and also the people who come and go, I think this is one of those hobbies where you can kind of dip in and dip out.

you know, and people are happy to see you. And if you're not there this year, I wonder, I hope they're all good. Let me hit them up. You know, so it's, you know, it's exactly the level of intimacy, I think finger boarding should be. It's pretty cool.

Speaker 1 (28:31)
Well, actually it's interesting you say that because I have seen people come in like myself during COVID and then they, you know, COVID went away, then they kind of bounced out and then they'll kind of like, you know, crack the door open a little bit, see what's going on and then go back out. so like, I do see people kind of coming in and out of the industry as far as like, you know, posting content, being more involved, things of that nature. I've seen some companies like kind of start then stop and then come back and then restart back up and being in it, I guess for we're almost like, you know, six years now since COVID. like, it's interesting to kind

see the progression of like just the community as a whole. it's what that really means to people.

Speaker 2 (29:07)
Yeah, exactly. can say even, you know, my board sponsor right now, Rook, shout out Jake at Rook. He's going through, you know, a lot of stuff at work and family and stuff and just hasn't been, you know, able to get into his workshop and, you know, make boards and stuff for a while. But, you know, to me, it's like, I understand that, you know, at some point I get pulled into lots of crazy things at work and family and stuff. you know, I'm hanging tight and checking in, making sure, you know, everything's good with Jake, but, know,

ready to come back like not get out to ditch the team because I'm like you know I haven't gotten a board in a month you know so yeah yeah yeah for sure yeah

Speaker 1 (29:43)
Check.

one

of those guys too. He came in strong during COVID as well. I think he had like a new baby, maybe two new babies. He's been growing his family. His little family unit's definitely been growing. And I know he kind of bounced out and he just recently kind of got back into the scene again, which he's been on the podcast ⁓ two, three months ago talking about that and stuff as well. yeah, he's

Speaker 2 (30:06)
Got it.

Speaker 1 (30:08)
Coming back, looks like he's making a real good, strong return too. So he's sponsoring local events and helping the Michigan scene just kind of thrive and stuff like that. So he's doing his thing.

Speaker 2 (30:17)
They're a super, super cool dude and makes a mean deck for sure.

Speaker 1 (30:21)
Does

he does he does like some kind of weird water slide or water graphics or he does some kind of graphics that's different than everybody else's. don't know what the process is.

Speaker 2 (30:32)
I

tried to pry the trade secrets out of them. Yeah, yeah. I'd say to like in the New York area, you know, where we're at right now to we have a really good like core of sort of a local homies here, you know, that get together for session nights. you know, kind of, I've got this red done here. And we've got, you know, for a while there, we had these weekly meetups, you know, for

for fingerboard sessions and things like that. And one thing, you know, I'm lucky to have like gotten into the hobby. And this is the area that I'm in because I'm like, oh, this is awesome. This is like the regular, this is the norm for me. And then I realized, you know, talking to a lot of people like most, you know, especially like small cities like ours, like don't have something like that, right? So super grateful to for this area and you know, kind of what it brings to the, you know, to the hobby.

Speaker 1 (31:24)
Let people know where exactly are you out of.

Speaker 2 (31:28)
yeah. So I'm in the Albany area of New York, sort of, you know, upstate New York, Eastern side, right. So, you know, we're pretty equidistant to like, you know, rendezvous and all the New York City events and everything like that. But like right smack dab in the middle of all that, ⁓ you know, we've got a we've got a pretty dope crew out here who gets together here. ⁓ you know, I kind of built the shred then here for for session nights and just for clips and things like that. And just because.

I lost my mind and had a lot of fun down here. ⁓ Most people have a man cave or something with football paraphernalia, but mine's finger boards. ⁓ we got the homie Dave, shout out to Dave. Pineapple pizza. He was hosting session nights in his garage. He has several parks and things like that. And that was my first real introduction to session with like.

the pros and you know, people who are really good at this, you know, at this hobby and learn just a ton. ⁓ You know, going to the the garage 518. Unfortunately, our IP, you know, they've had to move out of that. And we're still looking for you know, where's the next place to go outside of just like my basement here. ⁓ But yeah, we're trying to get that sort of weekly, you know, session night and then more maybe like a bigger monthly event type of thing lined up here.

Speaker 1 (32:51)
I Dave Totei. Right on, right on. I was just connecting all the pieces. I'm like, who's Dave that lives up there that has a garage with parks? I would know someone had a garage parks. That's gotta be Dave. Okay. Yeah. Nice.

Speaker 2 (32:53)
Yeah, yeah, yeah, okay

Yeah, there's just a ton of, you know, clips and content being cranked out of that garage in 2024. And then, yeah, unfortunately, we lost the space in 2025. But, know, especially now as my business is outgrowing my basement, you know, basically, I have to cannibalize my table space and my parks and stuff. So I can't really sesh while I'm in the middle of doing all these things for my business, right. And so the more I look at it, it's like we need a warehouse, right? We need a centralized place where we can all kind of

have the key and put all this stuff in session, run the shop and all this stuff. So that's kind of in the works right now. Hopefully, you know, we get more of like an event hosting type of situation here in the Albany area in the next year or so.

Speaker 1 (33:50)
We got a lot of community ringleaders. think if you guys all figured out a way to just kind of pull together, you guys can make it happen. I know I didn't realize Dave lost a spot. We actually did a pod. He had a couch in that garage that we did a pot off and stuff. I don't know what number it is, but yeah, definitely to go back and go check that out. But he does a lot of community outreach. He'd raised a lot of money for, ⁓ think a children's hospital that we did.

some kind of events to raise funds and stuff like that for those causes and things like that. Like he's doing some crazy good stuff and there's not a lot of ringleaders out there that are making those kinds of moves happen. And so you got a few of them right here in your backyards. I think between you and like, you know, Dave and a few others, like you might hopefully can make something happen and make something work.

Speaker 2 (34:34)
Yeah, yeah, for sure. That's that's kind of the plan always been, you know, the plan in the works. And, you know, now, I think we've got kind of ahead of steam here with with the run it back shop. And, you know, I think as soon as we have the space to facilitate it, and yes, just a situation that makes sense to start running that we're gonna, you know, pretty go pretty hard into that.

Speaker 1 (34:56)
This inflation is like just just do do like that's 20 years ago. Like you could just rent an apartment and just like make it happen. And it used to be like so cheap. Like you rent like a one bedroom apartment for like three, 400 bucks. No problems. And like, like back in the day, like, yeah, he was renting an apartment. We'll put all our parks in there. There'll literally be nothing else in there. Just like maybe a TV on a stand over there in the corner and nothing but parks. We'll just make this thing like a spot. And like you can't even entertain those ideas anymore. It's so crazy.

Speaker 2 (35:00)
Yeah.

I agree.

Right, right, yeah, warehouse space, that's what's nice.

Speaker 1 (35:28)
You

gotta have warehouse space and all that stuff. And even back then, like it wasn't, it was still expensive, but I feel like it was nowhere near where it's at now.

Speaker 2 (35:36)
Yeah, it has to be at a ⁓ level that makes sense so I can sustain it with the revenue. And that's not a ton, right, relative to what they're charging for warehouse space these days. And there's some rundown ones. it's like, you really want to come and sesh here. So we're trying to find what's that perfect mix. Or you're really trying to find somebody who knows someone like, I have a garage. can run this out of or whatever. So ⁓ hopefully.

Hopefully sometime soon, you know, we figure that out. we got a couple leads, couple things I'm following up on here pretty soon. So fingers crossed.

Speaker 1 (36:13)
I'm

stoked for you. So when did run it back become like an idea that you're wanting to pursue? Kind of walk us through that time.

Speaker 2 (36:22)
So it was actually we were at an event in Utica, UC event out in Utica this summer. And, you know, I go to these events with like, I've got this kind of big collection that my buddies always make fun of me. It's like, it's way too, what are you doing with your life right now? You have so much stuff. And I bring, you know, put it all in a pack and bring it out to events to do sort of, you know, show and tell, buy, sell, trade and things like that. And as we're going through, you know,

some stuff at that event and, and just chatting with the folks there. My buddy JD, shout out Yang and my JD just looked at me he was like, dude, you should just start a use fingerboard shop at this point. And I was like, I kind of did like a free stake like the record scratch. Like, why wouldn't I do that? Why don't I do that? You know, and it kind of started there. And at the same time, I was getting kind of like the algorithm ads for

for Clued, the shop platform that I run run run it back off of now. And so they just make it like stupid easy to like set up a shop and I was like, all right, instead of like, I think I was complaining about the whole process of like, man, I want to sell all these things. And I posted them on Instagram. But you know, I got leads on one of them and they didn't sell and I got to update the picture and cross out things that have sold because I'm still getting DMS for that. It was like kind of just like, you know, bitching about that, you know, general process. And that's when I was like, why don't I just put them on the site?

you know, the stuff I'm trying to sell on the site and say, Hey, if you want it, here's the price, you know, reach out if you want, you want to negotiate or whatever. And that's how the shop started. And it was just like, under my Instagram handle, it was like the Yoast Mob shop or something like that. Right. And it wasn't until like, when we were really talking about like, using that, like after I did my first sale or something on that platform, I was like, yeah, maybe this could work. Then the name run it back kind of came to my mind. And for some reason,

It didn't, it wasn't something I was considering to do seriously until I thought of that name. I was like, no, run it back. That's it. Like, you're doing this, right? So, so that's when I started, you know, listing a lot of things on there and advertising it more. It's like a shop rather than just me trying to sell my personal stuff, right? And yeah, then it just kind of grew from there. It really just started with me selling my own personal collection pieces, right? And

And then starting to take seriously the idea of like, somebody has a huge lot that they want to sell for, you know, a good price. And let me, let me pick that up. Let's see how this goes. Right. And yeah, it just kind of went to kind of snowballed from there.

Speaker 1 (38:56)
This was, so this is still relatively new.

Speaker 2 (39:00)
Yeah, yeah, that was back in June. ⁓

Speaker 1 (39:02)
Man, so like I've been looking at ways to kind of do something similar, but more on like a platform level. That's why I got like super excited at beginning. I'm like, man, he'd like crack the code. He's got his own platform. He's got a marketplace. Like he's got buyers and sellers. And I'm like, dude, like that's wild. this idea is theoretically still out there, but I'm like,

Speaker 2 (39:23)
Right.

Speaker 1 (39:24)
I don't think people understand like the amount of work that goes into, probably have hundreds of hours just in the 150 listing. Like even if you're doing a listing every minute, which I mean, you're talking about just speed clicking and typing and all that. Like, I mean, that's a, that's just a ton of work. It's very tedious. You got the inspection process. Like there's a lot of stuff that you are doing behind the scenes that people don't even understand. Like

Speaker 2 (39:45)
Yeah, yeah.

Speaker 1 (39:51)
Just to see like that one listing, you've probably got 20, 30, 40, maybe an hour's worth of like actual work behind almost every listing.

Speaker 2 (39:59)
Right, right. And especially when you think of it from, you know, the acquisition, like I've got to, I've got to, you know, negotiate a ⁓ price that works for the business with somebody and, I to get it in, I got to get it sorted, I got to get it inventoried. And one thing that makes it manageable, you know, I think the reason why I'm able to do the number of listings I am now in the timeframe that I can is the the Clued app, you know, not to plug them too hard, but they, especially since I started filling out that

that inspection card, they have like an AI feature where like you you upload a post and it tries to just like write the description for you. And it wasn't really working until I introduced like a photo of that card with it. And it would just like, like verbatim, just put all that stuff down there. Like it would just so accurately describe everything that all I have to do now is kind of just my handwriting sucks. So there's a lot of like typos that I got to go back and correct like no, I didn't mean that.

And just make sure if there's additional info, like disclaimers on, this piece looks like maybe somebody glued the axles back on or something, right? Just make sure all the transparency is there. But otherwise, the bulk of the... After I've done all the hands-on work of sorting and the inspection and ⁓ the photography aspect of it, ⁓ then a lot of that work after that is just sort of...

automated on that platform, which has been super helpful. know, be much in this one of reasons why the volumes were much smaller, you know, to begin with, because I wasn't utilizing that. So that that's been super helpful. So shout out, Clued and ⁓ AI, I guess.

Speaker 1 (41:44)
Alright, so this might actually be a good time to do our Listen to Win. We haven't done one of those in a while. Shout out to Season 4. This is a brand new us, brand new year. First Listen to Win of the year. Want to tell them the challenge?

Speaker 2 (41:49)
Yeah, yes.

next time.

Yeah, let's do it. We're going to do a most thrashed setup challenge here. ⁓ Send us pics of your thrashed setup that is still in use. Again, it's not a setup that got ran over by a car yesterday and you're not using it anymore. More like, hey, I've been using this for a year or whatever. Here's my thrashed setup that I'm still using daily or regularly. Show us your most thrashed setup. And we're going to pick the top three.

most thrashed and send you a code for 20 bucks on the run it back site. So for your next order, you can get 20 bucks off.

Speaker 1 (42:42)
Yeah. So we're looking for a singular deck, your most singular, complete setup that you're currently using. That is the most thrashed send us a picture and tag. Sorry, don't send us post your picture on Instagram tag, run it up USA FBL and USA FBL FBP that's fingerboard podcast and

This episode will come out on Wednesday. Deadline is going to be Friday, 5 p.m. Eastern. post your picture, tag the three accounts. We're going to go through the photos. We're going to make a couple decisions and we're going to highlight some winners.

Speaker 2 (43:30)
Let's do it.

Speaker 1 (43:31)
Excited I'm excited. Yeah,

Speaker 2 (43:33)
People

are...

Speaker 1 (43:35)
People have been writing some thrash setups. I actually enjoy thrash setups more than new setups. Hot take.

Speaker 2 (43:41)
Yeah, honestly, there's just some that are just so dialed in, you know, that that's actually one of my favorite comments I've gotten from a customer early on was, you know, basically set up in the center of a bunch of you stuff enough to make a complete. And he was like, dude, how did you send me like an already dialed in setup? I feel like I've been using this for four months already. And it's like, yeah, that's that's perfect. Right.

Speaker 1 (44:04)
I didn't even think of it like that, but yeah, that's a, being able to actually just obtain an already dialed in setup is pretty fire. I'm a, some decks are literally too pretty to actually sesh. And I've seen a lot of setups with the colorways, the matching wheels, the truck base plates, everything just goes crazy. And I'm like, dude, this is more like art. Like I don't even want to like try to do a kickflip back tail and just grind off like some, just.

pieces of your your graphic or scratching up bass plates and stuff like that. And I'm just like, man, that stuff just kind of freaks me out because it's just too pretty. So like having a thrash set up or like, you know, those worries and just completely out the window and you just actually just finger board the way the finger board is supposed to be, you know.

Speaker 2 (44:45)
right.

Right, right, right. Exactly. So think there's a lot of people wondering, you know, if I did, you know, splurge and buy a brand new, you know, premium brand, like, what, what I feel like it's worth it, because I want to, I want to use it. Right. So like, here's, here's a cheap, fresh version. Do you like that? Like, if you do, then maybe, you know, maybe they have a new customer now. Yeah.

Speaker 1 (45:13)
Well, I a that had a knife deck and he wouldn't do any slides. So no board slides, no slides or tail slides, no nose blunts and stuff like that. Only like grinds, like you'll grind the trucks, but like he really wanted to keep that graphic like just so that, you know, if you wanted to resell it or whatever, like, you know, that value and stuff was there. And I'm just like, ⁓ that's tough, dude. That's tough. Cause I'm like, deck is meant to be shredded, not like protected. You can't baby that like.

And so like I get both sides, but I'm like, man, that's tough.

Speaker 2 (45:44)
Yeah, there's been a few that I've kept, you know, sort of like in pristine, but I guess I'm kind of a masochist or that, you know, all my setups, put board rails and screw some board rails into my knife. It takes courage to screw board rails into a knife deck, but I've done it. ⁓

Speaker 1 (46:03)
man. Alright, so you are sponsored by Rook Rook Fingerboards. Do have any other sponsors?

Speaker 2 (46:10)
⁓ that's, that's it for now. ⁓ I guess, you know, I kind of sponsored myself with the shop and, we're, kind of right now thinking about, you know, who the team is going to be. I need to make sure as somebody who's running the shop that I can set expectations for the team. Like I got to figure out, you know, how much, how much can I really help you out as, as your shop sponsor? Right. But we're working on that. ⁓ you know, getting some sponsored writers for the team.

But yeah, that's it for me at this point.

Speaker 1 (46:42)
man. All right. So you're pre team organizing. I like this. This is very, very rare. Like most people are like, you know, I've got two, three team writers or there'd been a thing for a while, but walk me through like, what are you thinking as far as like, I mean, you're trying to hook up like local homies, people that you know, are you looking for, you know, outsiders? Like if like, you know, what are you looking for when you get to this point?

Speaker 2 (47:08)
Yeah, it's almost like, I'd say the local homies, you they're already, you know, kind of here in the shop. And yeah, they're already pretty much, you know, sponsored by the shop. Right. So I kind of count them as like one head on the team, right? The, the, the upstate New York local homies. And ⁓ then there's just a handful of, we have a short list right now folks who've been super supportive of the business who are also, you know,

shredders who give their posting clips and, and things like that, that, you know, we would be honored if they'd, you know, rep the shop for us and things like that. ⁓ It's just more, yeah, I'm looking for, you know, folks who genuinely have been involved in the business. Like, I can't tell you how weird it is to get those like, DMS out of nowhere from people you've never talked to asking, will you sponsor me? Because I never thought I'd get to the

that side of things. I always thought I'd be the weirdo asking someone else to sponsor.

Speaker 1 (48:05)
That's you you made it.

Speaker 2 (48:08)
It is I just wonder what what is the success rate of that approach? Like, has that ever hit? I'm a pro now. Just a cold, cold DMDSA. But yeah, not that type of thing. More, you know, folks who have been here since early on kind of day one or just have been genuinely supportive of the business and people who have a genuine, you know, sort of need to fill, you know, like, there's a lot of people that deck sponsors and stuff. So I don't expect my shop to be giving you

a bunch of other decks, right? you know, from other brands and things. But you know, a lot of people don't have truck sponsors. And it's like, well, I have a lot of different trucks, you know, I can give you some, you know, here and there. But, you know, I just want to set those expectations kind of, I don't want to overdo it, you know, be super generous to my team, and then find out it's not sustainable. And I also don't want to like, be the the guy who sponsors someone and doesn't, you know, never send a sponsor pack either. Right. So it's really about like, making sure

you know, the writers can continue to shred, do their thing, make sure they've got everything they need to do it. And then, you know, maybe occasionally hooking them up with something they just kind of want. Yeah, so yeah, again, make sure you know, whoever it is, it just makes sense with respect to what, what I can, what I can do with, you know, my inventory and the shop, right? Like, I can't, yeah.

anyone wants to ride for the shop because they want SB trucks and knife decks like I'm sorry. Sorry, you know, but you know, I've got a lot of you know, a lot of inventory from different other brands and things like that. But yeah, I can definitely help you out with that. So when when the fit comes along, I think it'll make sense. So but yeah, yeah, we're working on that. That's on the on the horizon, hopefully early this year.

Speaker 1 (49:58)
Man. All right. So I'm going to ask you a couple of loaded questions. What is the just craziest gem high value? Like, I can't believe I actually got this like item, like out of a collection or out of an acquisition.

Speaker 2 (50:17)
⁓ that's a good question. ⁓ like the

Speaker 1 (50:23)
One item that you're just like, I have no idea why I'm holding this thing. It's so like just crazy.

Speaker 2 (50:29)
Well, yeah, one of the I guess one of the craziest stories so far was one of the drops I listed a deck that I guess I didn't look up the graphic because I assumed it was one that I had seen before I thought it was civil made makes this graphic with like a cartoon cat or something on it right. I don't know the brand civil made it's like one of their popular graphics. In my mind, I think, you know, because like this takes a lot of time is probably late at night, I was probably just like,

blurry eyed like, oh, that's a civil made and listed it on the site for like 30 bucks or something like that. And luckily, you know, just as I was like, you know, cool, the community is the drop went live and I just immediately got a DM like, dude, that's not a civil made. That's like a super rare catfish barbecue collab with what was it? Welcome skateboards or something like that. And so it's like this really sought after piece that had Garfield on it says I skate Mondays or something like that.

And it turns out it's like this highly sought after piece. And like, you know, this person who's like, this is this is my grail deck, dude, like, let's figure this out. Like, you could have just bought that for 30 bucks. Play dumb. But like, you're cool. And you reached out. And so I like took it down right away. And then, you know, we worked out a really, you know, good trade for the both of us. He got his grail. And you know, I got some some good stuff from it, too. So. But yeah, that was that was one of those were that since I'm kind of

relatively recent to the scene. think I'm constantly sort of fumbling, you know, like grail pieces, right? Like collector's pieces. ⁓ Like recently had a set of wheels that were like the unofficial, you know, Matt era Joy-Colt collab with Wubb, you know, Colorway. And I just listed them as like, these look like, you know, orange and yellow wheels. And so my homie, Paul, yeah, poke poke.

pointed it out and picked them up. You know what these are, right? You know what these are.

Speaker 1 (52:25)
Yeah, let's say Paul Dave, a couple of cats definitely run some of that stuff through them. They've been they've been around for a long time.

Speaker 2 (52:33)
Yeah, exactly. That's that's been kind of a focal point of session nights now is I've got like bins of stuff like I need to identify this. Can you help me with that? Yeah, they've been a wealth of knowledge to get me on that track. But but yeah, I did, you know, one of my favorite, you know, I guess lots I've picked up so far was genuinely somebody who was like, super involved in the scene way back in the day. And then like, you know, for a decade had a box in their attic with like these genuine, you know, ⁓

old mold, ⁓ Berlin woods and a Holywood and no comply and stuff like that. And it was funny because you could tell he like dug it out of the, the, the attic. And then he went on, I think on the Facebook page for the first time ever and said, Hey, have all these, does anybody want this? Right. And he's just got like flooded with DMS of like people like offering a ton of cash for it.

at that point, I'd been chatting with him about it and just kind of trying to be real with him about it. And was just like, dude, you know, this is overwhelming. I'll happily sell you this all this stuff is you want all of it, right? And said, it's just one piece at a time. And so I've just kept in touch with that dude, because he's given me a lot of perspective on where this stuff comes from and everything, too. So yeah, yeah, having those in my hand, especially since I kind of missed that era and just kind of seeing like

Man, if I put tech deck trucks on this that are reshaped and some Winkler wheels, will I travel back in time? I get to see what it was like? Yeah, so those have been cool acquisitions for sure. That and yeah, it's just being able to get my hands on a lot of these pieces that are like the high value pieces and things like that and start to understand, this is why people clamor for this stuff, right? This is super high quality and just being able to see it.

first hand and deal with it, right? And ⁓ yeah, there's been a lot on that list, getting back to your main question, but yeah, I'd say that catfish was at least the funniest one.

Speaker 1 (54:36)
I can see some of the struggles for the problems are is that people, especially here in the U S like, I mean, we collect stuff from all over the world and it's literally impossible to be versed on everything all over the world during a 30 year, like just time era. it's, it's, that's daunting.

Speaker 2 (54:58)
Right, right. Yeah, exactly. That's one of my goals too when I started collecting was to just try to try the brands from around the world, right? Like just try to get one of everything, right? So, you know, things like Planktoon, I've been chatting with them quite a bit, right? They make some really good stuff, right? So, you know, trying to figure out ways of, how do we bring, you know, like a shop or something like that.

you know, focuses on those hard to find things, the international things and stuff like that to get those out to people. That's kind of a, that's an idea that we're kicking around right now to just, it's hard to think about doing more than what I'm doing right now. But yeah, yeah, there's, there's a lot of those things like through these collections to run it back is, you know, used gear, but I do have a lot of new and packaged stuff that's come in too. So it's like, how do we deal with that? know, is there

Does that go into the shop, or is that a sister shop, or something like that? So yeah, there's a lot of stories I guess I could tell there. ⁓ But yeah, that's a good question.

Speaker 1 (56:05)
Well, the cool thing is that once you do this long enough, it could take a couple of years or however long, but you'll eventually become a finger boarding product historian.

Speaker 2 (56:15)
Right, right.

Speaker 1 (56:17)
Like we'll literally be like, we've got to reach out to Nick and we got to be like, Hey, what is this? Where did it come from? Tell me about it. And you'll have your own TV show at this point. can just see like, yeah, dude, this was produced in 1996. German made this guy did like, you know, two select series of just, you know, finger boarding decks. And then he just disappeared and he just like, yeah. Uh, current value is like, you know, it can go from like, you 200 bucks to $350. Just depends on the shape and.

You're gonna be like doing like mid grades and all kinds of stuff.

Speaker 2 (56:50)
Yeah,

yeah, man. That's a flash forward, you know, 10 years from now or something. yeah. Longer beard, totally gray. I just as long as it doesn't turn into the you know, the fingerboard pawn shop, I just read it cracked me up. ⁓

Speaker 1 (57:06)
That's literally what I'm envisioning. It's like just Pawn Stars. Where these guys just come in with these weird antiques and you're just like, yeah, like this is definitely like a very unique one-on-one piece kind of thing. They got a whole show behind it.

Speaker 2 (57:18)
Right. Someone shows up with one set up and like best I can do is 20 bucks. Try to avoid that image surrounding the shop. But yeah, yeah, ⁓ there's been a lot of cool things coming in and out of our hands here. And yeah, I try to try to get those grails onto the site, you know, somebody just read this, the art drops is like a fingerboard scavenger hunt because I hate to like, you know, list

like all the goodies up front and you know, all the cheaper stuff at the bottom, like I try to mix it up, right? I try to have sort of this curated, ⁓ like you got to scroll, you know, to really find, you know, some of these gems, right? And ⁓ I think that's, you know, kind of made it fun too for people, right? know, you have strategies for the drop now.

like, hey, dude, like you start at the top of the list, I'll go to the bottom, we'll meet in the middle, you know what I like, I know what you like, pick it up and you see it. It's just kind of crazy that that's the, those are the conversations being had around our shop drops right now.

Speaker 1 (58:18)
Well, the cool thing is that no one knows what you're dropping. So it's like Christmas every time you do these drops, because it could be something that they were looking for. It could be literally something that they weren't even thinking that they even needed until they saw it on your site. And you're like, I got to have this.

Speaker 2 (58:32)
Right, right. That's what I realized that's kind of unique to it is a lot of, you know, a lot of these like high drops that, you know, sell out in seconds, you kind of know what you're gunning for, right? Yeah, yeah. That, you know, not to like, lean too hard into impulse buying and things like that. But it's just, you know, kind of a, I think there's that aspect to it too, where it's like, you see it, you have that, you can always talk yourself out of it, you know, after seeing the

hey, next week, I'm dropping this, he can be like, do I really want that? You know, and, but you know, when you see it, and it's it's there, and, you know, I would feel bad if I was price gouging while I was doing that. But like, hey, you have the opportunity to get that gem at a, ⁓ you know, a good price. I shoot for fair or better. So if you can get, you know, something that really catches your eye for a fair price, I'd feel bad if I was price gouging it or something. But you know, it's, it's just a yeah, it's a new

It's kind of a different approach, I guess. So I realized it's kind of unique and maybe that's what's been so exciting about it for a lot of customers. ⁓ And yeah, I'm talking with Clued quite a bit on how we can ⁓ really make this ⁓ even better. ⁓ The drop culture is tough for a lot of people when the outcome is, hey, I had this in my cart. I went to check out and then the wheel spun.

And then it looked like a charge my card, but then I got an error. And I wait three days for a refund because I didn't get it right. Like that's not a good format for these drops, right? So how can we provide more visibility? And ⁓ like, if you could just know, like, hey, there's there's 200 people hitting the refresh button right now waiting for this drop, it's going to be more reasonable to when you like, I didn't get it right. Or if you there was a way for you to see that, somebody that's in someone's card already or something like

or gamify it, you know, type of thing. These are the ideas we're kicking around, where you can see the other subscribers or something like that and what they're gunning for, right? we're thinking about that. We want to make that because that is maybe the main complaints I've gotten from customers is like, hey, man, can you like do a cart lock? I had it in my cart. I want to check out with it and somebody else got it. And it's a really frustrating.

know, experience, you know, that I think a lot of us collectors go through pretty regularly. So especially like the newcomers to the scene weren't familiar with that, you know, it's it's a bummer. And it's confusing, right. So ⁓ we're trying to figure out a better way to deal with that, too. So.

Speaker 1 (1:01:06)
It's tough, man. I see it all the time, least two or three times a week in the groups, know, knife drops, pyro drops, all these like, just more sought after.

hype companies that just do part of the drop culture like will have 10, 20 items that you can basically grab. there's like a hundred people basically literally chopping out the bit, just hitting refresh, just trying to get everything before it's all just gone. And then you get a lot of people like, I scored. And a lot of people like, dude, this is bullshit. Like I'm never doing this again. And want to get involved and I'm just like, I'm

Speaker 2 (1:01:37)
People get pretty mad about it.

Speaker 1 (1:01:44)
I'm the kind of guy that just like wants to like look at it, like read the description. Like I like to get intimate with my purchases and like I can't, I can't be part of drop culture being that slow and just looking at the photos and just, you know, it's just, I take my time. And so like, I can't do drop culture.

Speaker 2 (1:02:00)
Yeah, it's definitely not for everyone. the hope is, I'm sure a lot of people have been turned off by it on our site because we we literally broke the servers and stuff on Clued. We've gone crazy with this, with our platform. So I know it's probably turned some people off and we're trying to figure out a way to sort of make it ⁓ less daunting and a more fun experience, I guess, for people that even if you do miss out at least.

⁓ at least you get a place in line for the next thing or whatever. ⁓

Speaker 1 (1:02:35)
Yeah,

we also have like a lot of items to work, you know, there's a lot to choose from. So it's not like you're dropping five things or 10 things and then, you know, bouncing out like, you you just did 150 item drops. It was like a lot of stuff to choose from a lot of deals, a lot of bargains, a lot of cool things that you can walk out with.

Speaker 2 (1:02:52)
Right, right. Yeah, that's, that's kind of one of the goals too, is that like, hey, you know, I didn't tune into the countdown timer on your Instagram story. So I missed the drop. Well, there's a lot of stuff on the site. So I always appreciated that's more how the business started was like the trickling end of orders throughout the week. And that was so fun to manage, like, oh, shit, next day, you know, five orders. Okay, great. Now it's like 90 % of the orders come in that first like 2448 hours after a drop. And I'm just

buried, right. So I do appreciate anyone who wants to just peruse the shop and you know, place an order on a random Wednesday. You're my favorite. I'll hook you up with some some goodies in your bag. But but now yeah, we're working on managing that that drop, you know, the drop volumes a bit better, you know, getting some help and coming up with systems where I can bring some of the homies in here to actually help me pack orders and get them out quicker and things like that, too. So

That's the thing too is, I'm aware of the version of like, ordered something, but it's going to take forever to ship out. I think that's, with makers, I think you kind of have to realize, hey, this is handmade stuff, right? Like this might take a while to get to your order, but I'm taking stuff off the shelf and putting it in a pack and sending it to you, right? So I feel like I'm holding myself to that expectation of like,

you if I haven't shipped your stuff in a week, I really feel bad because that's not what you were expecting. It's not how long it should take, but just know that it's because, you know, we get more and more orders every single drop and you know, there's only so many hours in the day. It's mostly a one man operation at this point. So, but we're, trying, we're trying to expand.

Speaker 1 (1:04:41)
All right, so do you have any any upcoming projects, anything you want to you want to leak on the podcast?

Speaker 2 (1:04:48)
yeah, I kind of mentioned, you know, the I kind of mentioned that we're looking at building a team. ⁓ We're kind of looking for, you know, maybe warehouse space and things like that. So hopefully there could be like a regular, you know, upstate New York, you know, event space and sesh space for people to, you know, begin, we're pretty centrally located. So, you know, it's not a huge travel for a lot of people, but ⁓

That would be cool. We're looking at, again, the possibility of like a sister shop. My vision there would be to a shop that features up and coming makers, ⁓ maybe on the weekly, right? And just to get visibility on, you there's a lot of, you know, new makers or, you know, people who haven't been seen for very long or making high quality stuff. And, you know, everybody's battling the Instagram, you know, algorithm.

to get eyes on their work, right. So as somebody who, you know, spent a good amount of time in my first couple years, just, you know, honing my algorithm to just fingerboard anything, you know, I can find a lot of these folks. And there's been several examples of like, these new makers who are like, man, I've never heard of this guy, it looks like pretty low sales volumes, but this, what they're making is really cool, right. So this whole idea. And the thing is, I think that I feel like there's no way that shop like makes

me any money and hopefully it just helps the seller. ⁓ really the main thing I got to do is like accounting and do my books and see how I can like subsidize good ideas like that with what Run It Back is actually bringing to the table. But yeah, other than that, we've got some little collabs in the works. One of the things we've done is partner up with folks who are supportive of this whole shop idea. Like with Pipsqueak, we did like

Hey, he gives us six wheels, right? And there's all these random extra wheels that everybody has. like, you know, even in his shop as he's making them, he's like, yeah, I onesie twosies of these color waves that just don't, you know, match up into a pack. so yeah, he was able to get me there's a ton of random wheels. And I've just acquired a bunch of ton of random pipsqueak for yellows, fifth and sixth wheels that don't make it onto the setup, right. And we just gave away a bunch of ⁓ random party packs of pipsqueaks, right? So things like that.

Yeah, yeah, we're working on some stuff right now too. ⁓ But yeah, things like that, I want to keep those going little collabs with, you know, with these other makers to get their stuff out to people, you know, got one coming up now, we're going to be giving out some really cool little board rails with every order coming up soon from ⁓ somebody who just started kind of doing that. ⁓ And yeah, we're gonna try and keep that going throughout the year.

little freebies and things like that ⁓ in conjunction with some other other makers on the scene trying to do more co-labs as we go throughout the year.

Speaker 1 (1:07:50)
Nice, nice. Man, I'm sure you got a nice little list of shout outs people you wanna recognize.

Speaker 2 (1:07:58)
Yeah, yeah, for sure. So yeah, shout out Dave. We all talked about Dave. Dan, FNS, ⁓ homie here, JD. He's kind of the co-founder. He's the guy who said, don't you start a use fingerboard shop? And now here we are. So shout out JD. Paul, little fingerboard. ⁓ Adam, Coast of Allen. ⁓ Connor, Blue Hour Decks. ⁓ Justin, Natty's, and ⁓ Tom, Upscale Rails.

⁓ you know, shout out to Zach and woob and Chuck at bonk. those are the homies too. And, ⁓ other New Yorker, the, the upstate New York, you kind of the central New York, Western New York guys, you know, ⁓ just some of my favorite people I've met, you know, we've got, we've got Zach, ⁓ van FB, we've got Tommy Siggs, Ryan at loft, ⁓ 99 fingers, Nick. ⁓ you guys are all awesome. Then the New York city guys, ⁓ Esco void.

Shout out to Squared and Queen's Fingerboarding for what they've done with the DIY part. just, that place ⁓ is like a holy land for us. yeah, just New Jersey folks have been super supportive. ⁓ We've got, know, like Flipmaze down there, Mad Science down there. ⁓ We've got... ⁓

people around the country and stuff. The New Mexico scene, my brother lives in Albuquerque, so I've been able to go and meet a lot of the folks in the New Mexico scene. I went to a Weasel Rat event, so shout out to Donnie, ⁓ Matt from Free Range, Fingerboards-ish, at G Sheets, RJ, Druzy Draws, he does all our logos and things like that. Really cool scene down in New Mexico too, so those are all the homies for sure.

Speaker 1 (1:09:45)
Man, I don't even know if I want to start up on the Albuquerque, New Mexico scene, but yeah, that's place to start. They're growing, they're growing fast.

Speaker 2 (1:09:55)
Yeah, yeah, there are a lot of really cool personalities down there for sure. I hope to make it down there again. Yeah, I visited my brother for his birthday and it just happened to coincide with a Weasel Rat event. I was like, yeah, I'm here to visit you, buddy.

Speaker 1 (1:10:09)
That's the universe talking to you right there.

Speaker 2 (1:10:11)
Yeah, exactly, exactly. we got to a conveniently visit him again on a weekend where there's another one of those events.

Speaker 1 (1:10:21)
Right on. Well, where can people find you on the internet?

Speaker 2 (1:10:24)
So yeah, Instagram, we're runitback.fb. It's run underscore it underscore back.fb. ⁓ My personal fingerboard is yosemob.fb. ⁓ And yeah, we're mostly on Instagram. I won't cross the boundary into TikTok. I just can't bring myself to do it. Instagram is the best place to find us. ⁓ And ⁓ yeah, we're on our website's on the Clued platform.

Clued.shop slash runitbackfb, all one word. ⁓ That's the shop site. And you can find the link in the bio and everything on Instagram. So check it out.

Speaker 1 (1:11:05)
And if you're on YouTube, I'll drop all those links in the description for you as well.

Speaker 2 (1:11:09)
Word, Yeah, I an old YouTube that has like all my old skate videos and stuff that I made, you know, decades ago, but I haven't been putting a lot of content on YouTube. think that's the next step that I need to take as a content maker. But it's a catch-22, man. I started a fingerboard shop and now I have no time to fingerboard. So not a lot of content breaking up.

Speaker 1 (1:11:33)
in its full circle, man, it is full circle. Hopefully you'll get that, that work fingerboard life balance.

Speaker 2 (1:11:40)
Yeah, yeah, for sure. We're figuring it out. For sure, man.

Speaker 1 (1:11:44)
One day at a time.

Right on. I'm Levine Cunningham. You can find me at USAFBL on all platforms. Nick, I appreciate you coming on the pod. It's been an absolute pleasure.

Speaker 2 (1:11:56)
Yeah, absolutely. Thanks for having me, dude. This is great. Same.

Speaker 1 (1:11:59)
Until next time.

Take tight, I'm soaring like a bird Every trick or story, every slotted word Grinding on the edge, I'm breaking the mold Fingerboardin' dreams worth their weight in gold Hear the wheels as they scream In this fingerboardin'

as they scream in this finger-boding dream. Finger-boding, I'm flying free.

With every flick I'll write my story On this board