Hey, this is Julie. I just want to let you know
you're listening to the finale episode of our season 4.
So Jake and I are going to take a few weeks off.
We'll be back in May with new episodes.
So enjoy this episode and we'll see you in a few weeks.
Or. Listen to you or no?
You're going to listen to us. You know what I mean?
OK, Goodbye. Welcome to garage Sales
Unhinged. Where the characters are as
quirky as the vines. I'm Julie.
And I'm Jake. Join us as we dive into the wild
world of garage sales yard. Sales.
Estate sales. And anywhere second hand sales
are happening. From bizarre bargains to
hilarious haggles. You won't believe the stories
we've got lined up. Let's get unhinged.
Hi, Jacob. Hey, how are you?
How? What's up?
Wait, do you care how I am or you want to know what's up?
Is there a third choice? Nothing do.
You. Want to go with officer #3?
Let's do that. OK, let's remind people how this
podcast got started. I was quitting my corporate gig
and I wanted to fill my life with something that meant
absolutely nothing. And I was like, hey, Jake, my
brother Jacob, you want to do a podcast with me?
And you, do you remember what you asked?
No, what's it going to be about? And I was like, I think I'm
going to do the second hand sales market.
And you were like, why? Because you and I were both, we
both have like marketing type jobs and there are a lot of
marketing podcasts out there. And I was adamant I did not want
to create another marketing podcast, but we have all this
knowledge of how to best get people to buy things through our
careers as marketers. And I thought, you know what, we
could probably apply that to the group.
The second hand sales market, Garage sales, estate sales, yard
sales, thrift shops, Facebook marketplace, the real real Like
all of the things. All the stuff.
Yeah. And also whenever I was looking
around, I was like, there's not really a podcast that celebrates
the second hand sales market. So that's how we came about
creating this podcast. And do you remember one of the
first stories you pitched to me and you were so excited about
this? Do you remember it?
I think I do. Please tell me you're not going
to like jump the shark and and do it now, But I think I know
where you're you're you're going.
But for me it was the the price master.
Yes. Yeah.
So I was very excited about the prospect of really digging into
The Price Master, which was an early viral video of a what
turns out was a performance art piece put on by somebody in this
whole area here in Denton, TX. There was a kind of mock yard
sale and a lot of stuff, you know, typical study, nothing
unusual about the stuff in the yard sale, but the thing that
really made it viral was that it was being presided over by this
Mystic, this guy in a in a costume.
If you've seen it, you've seen it, you know it, but you do this
amazing job. You know, the other people
working the yard sale would interact with people shopping
and they're kind of like, it was just set up as a regular yard
sale. And they were actually going,
well, how much for this, how much for that?
And these other employees would go, I don't know what's ask the
price master. And this guy was on a stage,
which I guess is like the porch of the house, but they had a
backdrop and everything like that wild costume.
And they had a microphone and it was amplified in a huge way.
And then they go price master how much for the toothbrush
holder and he think about it for a moment ago, $2,000,000, some
absurd price. And they just kept that up the
entire time and people got really upset.
Yes. And some people were amused and
some people were very put out about it.
It was fantastic. So yes, I want to talk about the
Price Master today because it came out 25 years ago and the
the person who played the original Price Master, his name
is Nathan Austin. He passed away in 2022.
So there's there was a group of people that made the Price
Master come to life because, you know, yes, you had the quote UN
quote stage, which was the porch that had the backdrop.
He had a whole costume thing going on.
They also had someone in the crowd like with the camcorder so
that there's you can go on YouTube and watch it and the
YouTube video has millions of views on it.
And also it's like a late 90s like ham quarter esque.
Right. It's got that kind of quality to
it. Yeah.
It's very kind of a Blair Witch, just with, you know, room to
negotiate on price. Well, and also like they were
playing like Korean music behind him.
And to Jake's point, the the microphone, it had a reverb on
it. So it didn't sound like a normal
human. And the way that it, they
pitched us. And it's just a group of
friends. And for those that are not
familiar with Denton, it's home to the University of North
Texas. They have a great music program.
I know people that have gone through the music program,
fantastic music program. But this was people that were
part of like the arts scene at UNT didn't is a very cool town.
It's a very funky town. They have great live music.
They have a lot of art there. But this year, February 10th
that they actually acknowledged it and didn't as the price
master day. And I think they did a little
bit of a, a parade type thing to like celebrate that.
Really all cool. Yeah.
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But the way it all started is that they were going to Drake's
point, they were going to have this yard sale.
And one of the guys was like, and also the house that they had
it at was a like an art house, like it was an artist community.
And so inside the house, you may have had multiple people living
there and then each one had a studio that they were working
in. So the house itself was there to
support local artists and, and to let them be creative in this
environment. So they decided to have this
yard sale. And one of the guys is like,
man, I, you know, we can't sell that couch like it belongs to
the house. And the the guys were that were
organized, they're like, Oh no, we're not selling anything.
Nothing's actually for sale. Yeah, but they made all the
signs. They put out a classified ad
like, hey, we're having a yard sale that day.
And so the people that showed up are your die hard garage selling
folks. And they didn't know that it was
an art installation. No one knew it.
What? What?
It was, I love watching it and you, you see the, the, the
shoppers, the people in the crowd who they have no idea
what's going on. They're they're making eye
contact with the camera the whole time.
They're not in on this. It's great.
And to see it was like, yeah, like it's the people that are
hardcore yard sale people. A lot of them are nada and Pop
Pop and they are not happy with this art project.
They don't they're, they're generally not OK with the arts
period. So it was.
It was. Very good.
They mentioned someone picked up a a broken chainsaw and like,
hey, price master, how much do you want for this?
And the price master goes $9000 and they're like for the no like
seriously, how much you want for and and then he would like go up
or he would go down. But it was also like.
These he's always. $500 or $2,000,000.
And so it was just, and then people would get frustrated and
leave. And also it's funny thinking
like they brought stuff that belonged to their friends and
like, Oh no, we're not going to get rid of it.
It's just going to. It's like it's here for a prop.
As I recall, I think part of the part of the point was like to I
think there's probably a statement being made there about
consumer culture. Yes, these things are on sale.
They're just not accessible to you.
It's an absurd price. No, like, no one should charge,
you know, $60,000 for the spork. But like, like, what?
How do we arrive at what is reasonable?
Right, right. Well, and so the city of Denton,
they did price the price Master day, which was February 10th.
And what they were encouraging people to do was to bring items
to this event and ask the price master how much it should like,
what's the value of it? Oh.
Fantastic. And so they had various people
as the Price master and they were playing the the music and
they were doing all the weird stuff that Price Master did.
There was a way to celebrate this character, this cult, this
cult classic person. But also as I was, I was reading
this article, the articles from the Denton Record Chronicle, and
there's a person that created Price master action figures.
Oh heck yeah man, sign me up. So it looked like it was an
action figure that was actually created for like a diorama of
like some of the things in Denton.
Like I don't know if you can go out and buy additional of these
action figures, but it's pretty funny to to see this whole
thing. So the person who created the
Price master action figure is actually the owner of Thug
Emporium, which is in Denton, TX.
So yeah, I think it's still probably on display there.
But if you are ever in the Denton, TX area, go up, look at
Price, master action figure and all the stuff that they have
there. And I'm hoping that they're
going to make this an annual event where anyone can come up,
you can bring something random, ask for it to like.
And the other thing is like at this yard sale that where they
first started off, it was like make me your best offer.
It was like $2.00. I was like, no 4000, like come
on. What was great is that it's the
same bit over and over, but it never gets old.
And there every time he does the price announcement, there's
always this gigantic wind up, you know, before he says the
full price and it comes up, you know, booms out this huge
number. And there's always like two or
three breaths before he says dollars after that.
And it's the same bit over and over and it never gets old.
It might have gotten old for the people that didn't realize it
was good and like they were trying to buy something.
It really clearly did. There's like people that are
very, very upset and not here for this shit.
They, they wanted, they wanted to go to a yard sale.
But it is I, I take away like how how funny it is and how
bizarre it is. They was making some pretty cool
points too about how like the agreed upon value of things is
kind of a on shaky ground. It always has been.
And those things are pretty arbitrary.
And that's what to me is interesting about the topic of
second hand sales and everything like that is to me, it kind of
pulls back the curtain a little bit on the agreements we we make
or the agreements we're kind of subject to as to what what it
costs to live. Yeah.
And after that initial transaction, the rules kind of
lighten up a little bit or the rules are more open to
negotiation. And if it's if something's
considered a good trade, you know, a right value at this at,
you know, at a lower point, then what prevents that earlier on.
But so I don't know it for me, it's really interesting what I
love about Price Master on top of all that other stuff was like
it. It invites that kind of thought
as to the malleability of things that you you might think are
kind of set in stone. Yeah.
Well, and, and a couple of people that were part of the,
the Price Master coming to be, they're trying to get a, a
public art statue in Denton of the Price Master.
And they're, they're envisioning that the statue would have the
voice in full reverb of make me an offer.
And part of me is like, man, if I just see that on the square in
Denton, I might pee myself laughing because that would be
hilarious. I hope the thing would just like
like randomly blurt out a number at all hours of the night,
that'd be great. They're probably going to have
set hours would like do that, but but yeah, it's pretty funny.
And then also part of the lore of Denton and, and just the, the
students of the University of North Texas and how creative
they can be. So I thought it was really
interesting. I know that you had mentioned
like, Oh, I want to, I want to bring this to the podcast, but I
saw the news article about that's the 25th anniversary said
that we missed it in February. But also I have a feeling that
whenever it was supposed to happen, I also, I couldn't find
any information if it did happen because that's right around the
time that we were getting some pretty major weather through
North Texas. So I don't know if it actually
happened, but I'm going to put it on the calendar for next year
so that we can Mosey on over to Denton and check it out next
year. I.
Am absolutely doubt for that. That'd be great.
That would be fun. So anyway, Long live price
master. And if people don't know what
we're talking about, look it up on YouTube, probably crack open
a cold one and watch it because it's, it's interesting.
He's a price master, always. Well, that's what I got for this
week, Jake. All right.
Thanks for the the memory trip. Bye.