Brand Trust Is Earned… And Easily Exploited. (Fake UPS Delivery)

They didn’t work for UPS... but the brand opened the door.

In this episode we dive into a chilling real-life story: individuals impersonating UPS workers to gain access to someone’s home. What started as a bold move exposes a bigger lesson about trust, reputation, and the power of a brand.

We unpack:

• Why people trust familiar brands before they verify individuals
• How impersonation can exploit even the strongest reputations
• The responsibility businesses carry to protect the trust they’ve built
• Lessons for entrepreneurs — whether you’re running a global company or just starting out

Trust isn’t just a marketing tool. It’s a responsibility. And if it’s not protected, it can become your biggest risk.

Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:00

Yo, yo, yo, what is up, everybody? And welcome to the Untraditional Entrepreneur Podcast. I'm your host, Jamene Delmans. And today we are going to be covering a very difficult topic. As you guys know, what's circling around social media is the UPS fake delivery. Um, father, mother, and a son was killed and left two infants in the home. Today we're going to talk about how brand loyalty can actually impact some of our decision-making skills and also allow us to put our guards down. In the meantime, we'll see you guys on the show. Let's get started. Okay, all right, all right, okay, ladies and gentlemen, welcome back. I'm your host, Jamee Delmas. Um, and yeah, today's gonna be a real touch one. I want to be very clear before you know we get started. Um, we are not here to, you know, uh sensationalize violence. We're not here to, you know, exploit a tragedy. A family lost their lives, you know, and what we're here to talk about is something much deeper and more uncomfortable. How trust in a brand uniforms and feeling familiar with a brand can override some of our own instincts because what happened here wasn't random, it was all intentional. And, you know, this is more of a psychological approach in this, you know, in this podcast. So, what I'm gonna do first, I'm gonna start off with playing a video for you guys. Um, you know, I do want to disclaim here that you know this video does show graphic pieces, and I want to know that I want you to know that there will be some pieces in the video that might be unpleasant. So viewer discretion is advised, and we're gonna go ahead and play the video.

SPEAKER_02 1:55

This exclusive video was first obtained by Midwest crime and has never been seen by the public before.

SPEAKER_01 4:05

They struck the dad in the face. That's the son who left the dad.

SPEAKER_00 4:26

Una pistola, big ho.

SPEAKER_04 4:37

What's anything, please?

SPEAKER_02 4:46

The mother managed to call nine one one, leaving the line open so dispatchers could hear what was happening as the chaos unfolded.

SPEAKER_03 5:01

Give me the f money. I know, hey Mario. Come on with the money, man.

SPEAKER_04 5:12

Okay. Give me the money. Okay. I'm gonna smack the out you. I will give you whatever you want. Go give me the money then. Okay, that's okay.

SPEAKER_00 5:23

Come on. You get the when you move too much. I'm getting up. I'm telling you, I'm gonna smack the out your song. Oh, okay. I'm going. Get come on in.

unknown 5:34

Okay.

SPEAKER_00 5:34

All right, where the money is, go get it.

SPEAKER_03 5:38

Go get it. It's right here. Yeah, get it. Open it. Open it. Where is that? This ain't all the money. You finna play with me, so I gotta see I gotta be highly like that's all the money we have.

SPEAKER_04 6:12

This ain't money.

SPEAKER_03 6:14

Okay.

SPEAKER_02 7:53

The intruders rushed to destroy evidence before fleeing the city unaware that nearly every moment of their crime had already been captured on camera. Meanwhile, inside the home, a heartbreaking act of bravery unfolds. The older child, despite being just a toddler himself, pulls his little sibling away. That's crazy.

SPEAKER_01 8:15

All right, man. Um yeah, man, that's that's next level shit right there. Um, look, I want to start off by saying, man, my condolences to the family. Um to you to be fair, most this videos, this this incident is not like yesterday, a couple days ago. This video is like I mean, this incident happened like February 2024. So we're going up on two years since this incident happened. And you know, UPS is a big ass brand. So, you know, you know, they had PRs keeping that shit a hush-hush out of the public, you know, but now shit leaking and you know, spreading like wildfire. Um, listen, you know, I want to go back just, you know, I'm gonna scroll just a little bit through this video, kind of like while you guys what the fuck we looking at here, because I want you guys to know that this they didn't trust strangers. Like these are strangers to this group of family, right? They didn't trust strangers, they trusted the badge, the uniform, the logo. That's what they trusted. They didn't trust that shit, they trusted the brand, and that's why these guys walked up because here's the deal looking at these niggas right here on some real shit, these two niggas right here. If these two niggas came up here with a regular t-shirt, some pants, some flip-flops, and walked up with a fucking box, these niggas would have these niggas here would have been a little bit more skeptical. I want like the kid, the guy who opens the door for him, right? In the scene, you can see he's extremely comfortable with these guys. He calls them back over. Yo, come here, yeah. Hey, you guys UPS back. He don't know these fucking dudes, he don't know him. Only thing he fucking knows is that brand. He knows that that UPS brand is what he's familiar with. Look, my man's back is turned to these guys, he's smiling, he's playing with his dog. Like, naturally, we as human beings have instincts and you know suspicion. So when you see two black males, you know, specifically coming up on you, you like you're not gonna fully open the door. You're gonna be like, Hey, what's up? What's up? How can I help you? You're gonna you might peek through the peephole, what you got going on. No, this man here trusted these niggas because they was wearing the badge. That's what that he didn't he don't know them, he he know the brand, he knows UPS, he knows the power of UPS, and he knows UPS is gonna hire quality people, is what he was thinking. So, my man's back is turned to complete strangers he knows nothing about back completely turned to these guys, and they're smiling and kicking it. You know, he's he's talking to him. You would think these are homeboys, the way they are circling, and you know, obviously, the dude with the mask is you you you see he's prepping here, but this man here, he is super, he is super comfortable, he's not worried about shit. This nigga even laughing in the video, you know, he he's got a very friendly smile, and then all of a sudden, bro getting ready to open the door to let these guys in. He's about to let niggas in that he don't even know their name, he don't know who they are. The only thing he knows is that UPS logo, and therefore he felt comfortable enough to say, Hey man, I'm gonna bring you guys in no problem. I'm like, Yeah, you drop the package off here, whatever the case is. Let me just do that. You know what I mean? So that's what he he trusts that he trusts the brand, not the niggas coming, but not knowing this was a setup. Authority doesn't always come from power, sometimes it comes from perception. This isn't about UPS as a company, this is about how powerful a logo is in the mind of the loyal customers because you don't think shit about UPS. You know, hey, they come in, they drop packages off, they come in, you go. The only red flag I see here is you know, like UPS do be having them big ass brown trucks, you know what I'm saying? Like, but you know, now there's so much shit going on with like deliveries. Sometimes motherfuckers be pulling up at my house in regular cars from Amazon, and I know it's because Amazon is like a partnered company, you know what I mean? Like Amazon partners with you know contractors and shit like that, so people are able to, you know, work on their own kind of time, so people pull up in their own car. So he he probably was thinking the same thing, you know. A person can wear an Amazon jacket and pull up in a motherfucking Honda Accord, and you won't think nothing of it. You think this is my package coming in, you know. So, but we trust that because of the brand, we trust the brand and the brand loyalty. But you know what's fucking crazy about that shit? That loyalty that we have as consumers is the same exact way that criminals use to manipulate the brand. Brands are powerful, brands are extremely powerful. Mark marketing brands are extremely powerful. Not only did you know UPS hit this very, very well. I'm gonna read some statistics to you guys real quick, so you kind of know, like you know, kind of like what I'm talking about here. So it says in the United States, tens of millions of packages are stolen every year from UPS, right? That tells us two fucking things. Two things. One, deliverers deliveries are constant. Two, criminals know people trust this process. Criminals know that people trust you coming in, they shit. Over 90% of consumers say they trust major delivery brands. That trust lowers people's guards, so they're not as skeptical. Again, I said earlier, if these two niggas came knocking on the door, he wouldn't have probably been so open to open the door. He would have said, How can I help you guys? What's going on? Whatever the case is. That's you know, that's what was happening, according to like data uh tracked by uh the Federal Trade Commission. Impersonation scams have increased more than fourfold since 2020. Motherfuckers are getting scammed on emails from shit that you think is a real person. That's why I have clients that be like, yo, is this real? Because these scammers and criminals will use like a Facebook logo, Facebook branding to try to try to win you over to do something or click some shit uh in the fucking fishing email by making it seem like they're these brands. And the reason these criminals do that is because they know you trust them, they play on your trust. And it's fucking crazy because the trust of brands have really altered the way we think, and it allowed us to lower our guard as human beings to not see what is what is happening in the world of branding, and now how criminals are getting smarter with this shit. It's fucked up, it's fucked up. This dude looking at this video had no clue what was about to happen. He just trusted the brown look, the UPS look. And I'm not gonna lie, I'm gonna be honest, and I can say this because I'm a nigga. That don't look good for black men at all. I'm gonna say this like niggas, we we are all not like that. We all don't get behind that. These some niggas that had nothing to lose, and this is what upsets me the most about the situation, about you know what happened here is that you know, these guys, this kid, his mother, his father, they hard work, and you know, you they you know they work, they put in the work for what they need and shit, like you know, they do what they need to do. These niggas gotta take from somebody who's we're out there going to get it without without them actually just going out there to fucking get it. Why the fuck you gotta take from another nigga because you don't have it? Get your ass up and go get it. Why the fuck do you feel like you gotta take from somebody else because you do too lazy to go get it? Like that's the reason you rob motherfuckers, you rob people because you don't have, and they have what you want, and you go and take that shit because you don't have it. That's lazy fucking mentality that's weak, and every black man ain't like that shit. We all ain't like that, and this is why people bleak people look at niggas the way they look at us, they scared of us, they don't know what to do with us because when you see shit like this, this is gonna make people skeptical of fucking running making doing business with you because these are allegedly and these aren't even real UPS workers. I don't know where the fuck they got these outfits from, but they utilize these outfits to to to to commit a crime, not only commit a crime, but as you guys see, they killed these motherfuckers and left two kids in the house by themselves with three dead bodies. That is so fucked up, that is so fucked up, and not only that, the little the little the oldest one, the little two-year-old. I mean, like there was panic, there was panic throughout the entire process. She he was panicking in diapers, panicking, running back to the room screaming, terrified. This shit blows my mind, and niggas, we are it's like we make this shit look so bad, utilizing brands that people trust to commit violence that we're too fucking lazy to go out and get. We gotta take from the next nigga because we don't want to go get it when this is the land of fucking opportunities where you can go out and do anything you want, you don't have to rob the next nigga because they all have the same opportunities as you got. I get passionate about this shit because like I was those little kids, being fair with you. I was those little kids. My mom, we we got we were fortunate. My this situation right here is how my dad died. What happened with the UPS delivery was exactly how my dad died, similar to it. It wasn't uh a brand awareness, it was just niggas came in his house and it was people that he trusted. My mom had left him at this point, it was a couple months after she left him. He had another woman. Man, these guys come in my dad's house, he trusts them, whatever the case is. They coming in, you know. She you my his girlfriend opens the door because she's familiar with the guys, they shoot her in the head right when she opens the door. She was pregnant, shot her in the stomach. You know what I'm saying? They didn't just shoot her in the stomach. My dad coming out the kitchen seeing what's going on, seeing his people that he knows, coming here to rob him, asking him for the money, whatever the case is, shoot my dad in the head and kill him in the kitchen. And then there was a two-year-old in the in the in the living room. They killed the two-year-old too. That's my story. I can relate to this shit because that's my story. My mom lucked up and got out of that because if we if my mom was still with my dad, we would have been in that situation. That would have happened to us. That would happen to me. But these kids, you know, these kids witnessed this and could do nothing about it. Nothing. Watching these men come in here and slaughter his their mother and fucking father. You know what I'm saying? This is a this is a true story for myself. And I can relate to this. And you know what? Niggas do it. We do it to ourselves. We do it. Look at this little kid trying to stop this nigga from from doing more damage and harm. I'm just thankful that he didn't kill the kids. While he didn't kill them physically, they killed him emotionally. And all because they manipulated a business to get what the fuck they wanted. That's how powerful a brand is. People let their fucking guards down to a brand. And it's it's really sad because you know, this isn't about one crime, right? It's about how often we move through life on autopilot, not thinking shit about it. And what's fucking crazy about this entire situation is do let these guys in the fucking crib thinking nothing of it, not knowing when you in a situation, look right now, grab them by the jacket. When you're in the situation and a gun is up on you, that's it. When you're in a situation, period, that's it. Sometimes we think to ourselves like this ain't gonna never happen to me, right? But in reality, once you in this situation, you in this situation, that's it. It don't matter what you got, don't matter how many guns, because the way I look at it is if a nigga rob you, if a nigga decides he wants to rob you, rob you, and you have a gun, that gun ain't gonna mean shit for you. That's why it kills me when dudes tell me, Yeah, bro, I keep my heat on me, I keep the heat. What the fuck does that mean, nigga? Just because you keep your heater on, you don't mean it's gonna protect you. To be fair, if we gonna be if we're gonna be fair, your gun that you have on your hip is primarily designed to protect somebody else next to you or somebody in the crowd, it's not technically there to protect you. Even when you think about celebrities, right? They don't carry guns typically, they have armed security because what the fuck is the gun gonna do for them? It's not gonna do anything for them. Why? Because if somebody comes up and rob you, you're not gonna have enough time to pull out your gun in enough time to protect yourself. But if somebody's robbing your homeboy right next to you, you have a little bit more time to pull out and see what's happening right now. You carrying your gun is not gonna protect you. You carrying your gun is gonna protect the next nigga or somebody else beside you. So even these guys, I'm certain they probably had a gun in their house. I'm certain they probably was prepared, I'm certain they're ready for burglars, but they use brand to let these this family guard down. Decided to jump in the fucking crib, take from these people, and they there's nothing they can do because they're in the situation. Once you're in the situation, you're in it. Not gonna lie, you know, it pisses me off because most of the time, most of the time, when I'm preparing for a burglar in my house, I know it's gonna be a nigga. Most of the time. I know for a fact that if I'm preparing for a burglary in my crib, it's primarily gonna be a nigga. And you know what's crazy? White people think the same thing too. But for the most part, if somebody's gonna break in my shit, it's probably gonna be somebody black. Not saying that white people don't do it, but for the most part, it's gonna be somebody black, somebody who has lesser opportunities, less fortunate, who decides I want to take from somebody that I already don't have. That's fucked up instead of going out and get your own. They they literally shot and killed these kids' family in their face, and it's scary, it's sad, and you know, I don't want to go on this rant, but like utilizing a brand, you utilizing a brand to slaughter a family to to create trauma for for a child is sad. This little kid in the blue, I was probably about his age when this happened to my dad. I don't even remember it. I just I was about two. I don't even remember it. I don't even remember him. But for this situation, we live with this, you know. Like I'm I'm those children in this video. That's me. I grew up without my dad because he was robbed and killed in his house. Him, his girlfriend, my sibling as well, killed in the house. And I'm not even being funny, you know. I don't, I'm not gonna pocket check people or whatever the case is, but these people don't look like they have all of this money. Like when the lady sat there and told that nigga, this is all I got, and he was like, You lying. I'm like, bro, like, come on, bro. There come on, come on. You I ain't judging on the house, but like you come on, the they don't look like wealthy people, they don't look like people who are just you balling out of control, they don't have uh heavy, expensive art on the walls. They they have you know, they have a Toyota. This looks like another, maybe Toyota, like it's not you, it's not this doesn't give me expensive vibes at all. And I'm not judging because people oftentimes got money and still live low-key, at least with their car. But in this situation, it just doesn't feel like this should have been a hit. This doesn't give me loud people who are trying to be flashy. This give me people, regular people who live in their life or doing the right just living their regular life. I most most people argue that this was a fucking setup or a hit. I don't know. I can't say what I can say is the situation pisses me off because black men, particularly, used the brand UPS to rob, kill, slaughter a family in front of infants. And guess what? Me as a black man, I have to also deal with that because other black niggas who do this shit fuck it up for us too. And this is why people feel a certain type of way about black people, and like, hey man, you know, better be careful. Like you get so skeptical about letting niggas in your crib because you don't know what a nigga motive is, you just don't know. You always on guard. Like, this will be the most terrifying situation for me. If I'm in the house with my wife and kids or whatever the case is, and this that there's niggas in here got a gun to like that that right there breaks a man when he is helpless as he is watching his family be handled anyway, and it's our job as a man to protect, you know what I'm saying? And to be fair, I do not think that these niggas' intentions was to come in and kill them. I think that when the other guy shot the dad, it was like, fuck, we gotta get rid of the witnesses now. Like he put it, he set this up for them, and when that gunshot happened, it was like we're in it now. We can't leave witnesses. My face is exposed. When the shot hit, they both ran to the room. You can see it here. He shoots them, bow, and then they hear it, they both run. Say, what the fuck? Now he's dead. This man's gone. They left the victims in the back here. Bruh dead. The dad is dead, and oftentimes when a burglary happens, the first thing you're gonna do is get rid of the fucking threat. The threat will always be the man. Get rid of the threat, and now bruh dead. Now we gotta kill these guys. Now everybody gotta die. You know what I'm saying? That's why you shot the lady, back turning everything. Just came in, shot her in the back of the head, she fall on the ground. Then they go run back into the. I mean, you're talking about less than two minutes later, after killing the dad, literally, less than almost a minute later after killing the dad, they kill the mom and the son. All wearing UPS branding. All wearing UPS branding. Anyhow, I say this to say, you know, tonight wasn't about fear, it's about awareness in this situation. A family literally lost their fucking lives because trust was exploited. Um, the way we honor that tragedy is panic, it's understanding. Familiar, being familiar with the brand doesn't always mean it's safe. And questioning doesn't make you disrespectful. If these motherfuckers come knocking at your door and say delivery, and you say, Hey, leave it on the porch, you good. Ain't nothing, that's not you being disrespectful to that. That's you protecting you and your household because you don't know who the fuck this is. Like you wearing the badge, but I don't know who the fuck you are. People do it in the police force all the time, too. Wearing badges, tricking people that you know, using the police badge to brand, the police branding to trick people to think that this is safe. Come to me, let your guard down. Because as long as your guard down, I can I can do what I need to do to you very easily. You know what I mean? And what does this mean for UPS, right? So because this wasn't UPS's crime, but their brand was used as the weapon. This wasn't UPS, their brand was used as the weapon. UPS did not commit the crime, but their brand authority was exploited. That means the trust they've built is now part of a conversation and a part of the killings. These people work hard for their fucking brand, and niggas, here we come. Come in here and fuck it up. Now people are gonna be skeptical to open a fucking door for the UPS people, FedEx people, because Amazon people, because that's what we do. When a brand carries authority, criminals will try to borrow it. Criminals will borrow the authority that a brand carries. This is not about blame, it's about responsibility that comes with trust. Real nigga shit. High visibility brands create a few things comfortability, people get comfortable with it, routine. So people are comfortable with the routine of UPS and how they operate, and automatic trust. It's it's it's while it's widely known. Criminals don't choose brands at random, they choose named brands. We're not a big brand. These I promise you, if these niggas came to these people's house wearing a UTE shirt, knocking on the door, what a fuck, talking about some, oh, you know, we got a package, they're probably not gonna be as friendly. UTE is not as big as UPS. So when I'm looking at shit like this, it's like these guys' guards was down because this was a widely known brand. It was it's ubiquitous, it's a ubiquitous brand, and these guys decided to come and utilize the trust of a brand to manipulate its own consumers and customers. That's fucked up, and I hate to see it. All niggas ain't like this, right? So, anyways, what what we do now, and I'm gonna wrap with with this, you know, you know, it's okay to not open that motherfucking door. It's okay to not, you know, to to to not engage. It's all right to be like, hey, you leave it there. And it's not just it's not just UPS, it's not just Amazon, it's not, it's Uber. Uber Eats. Don't you ain't gotta take the fucking food. Put my fucking food on the ground, take your picture and go go and get the fuck on while what you gotta do so I can get on with my life. I don't trust you, I don't know who the fuck you are. I don't know what you got on you. I don't know what you got going on. Don't you know leave my food at the motherfucking floor, or same thing with Uber. If I'm riding in the motherfucking Uber, you don't know the you getting in the car with a woman died that way too. Because you know, this what you know in this situation, though they these guys were the riders. You don't know the getting in your car, you don't know who you're getting in the car with. I think that if we as people start identifying the importance of brand, so even when people argue that marketing isn't X, Y, and Z, people are literally using marketing tactics to commit criminal activities, and that's fucked up. That's how important, that's how big, that's how major brands are, because brands is what is what builds trust, and that's what leads to sales, that's what leads to people um getting acclimated with a brand. And then motherfuckers like this use it, take advantage, kill this man, his wife, and his son, and leave his two infants in the fucking crib by themselves with three dead bodies. Be be safe, always stay skeptical about things. If it don't feel right, don't take it. And just remember, man, like you know, once you're in that situation, once you're in a situation, you're in it. Once your life is threatened, it's you're in it. The best way to, you know, the best thing that I could tell you is always pay attention to your surroundings, always pay attention to what's happening. I don't give a fuck what brand it is, I don't give a fuck if it's me. Always, always do that shit because you just never know. You never know what people's intentions are. Even if they did work at UPS, they might have been fired and just kept some of the uniforms. You know what I mean? So listen, man. I hope you guys enjoyed this live today, tonight, this evening. I you know, this was a this was a different level of entrepreneurship for our brand and our podcast. And I think that always, you know, I love you guys. I know I come on here and talk my shit to y'all because that's who we are. We all cool, that's what the fuck we do. We can do that shit. I just want you know, people to understand that not everything is good, you know, not everybody's intentions is good, and these niggas make us as black men look bad too. But I'm here to tell you guys that not all black men are like that, and I and and I know people like, yeah, we get that, we get that, but we still ain't gonna, you know, we still gonna watch y'all motherfuckers, which is fair. Ain't shit I can do about it because I got kids too that I have to raise them and have them understand that this is the world we live in because niggas fucked it up for us too. They fucking it up for businesses, they fucking it up for people's livelihood, and sometimes we do it to our own selves. I'm your host, Jameen Delbans. Thank you guys for joining me on this live tonight. And until then, we'll see you guys on the next episode. Welcome to the other side of motivation. Talk soon.