- I didn't want Machine Gun Kelly.
[imitates machine gun firing]
Line up, everybody's dead.
What I wanted to do was get your opinion
on what you thought about the business as a whole.
- Green Zebra is a money loser.
And we can talk about it on the phone with Lisa.
I'm ready to go if you wanna do it.
I'm available. I just--
We can it quickly, 10, 15--you know,
I just have a couple of questions for Lisa.
I do wanna meet her.
- It's just in first gear right now,
and you want to rev it up.
[jazzy music]
♪ ♪
- I'm just asking a question. That's all.
I would do-- I do the same thing
for everybody I work with.
- Father Emmanuel--
very, very smart, very knowledgeable.
I actually personally like him quite a bit.
- Anyways, look, we're not called to be nice, Mark.
Nice is not a virtue.
Doesn't say anywhere in the gospel.
It just says we have to be honest, courageous,
humble, modest.
I'm not saying I'm those things,
but nice is never a virtue.
- He's an interesting guy,
makes the Wolf of Wall Street
look like a teddy bear.
- Well, it's up to you guys if you wanna do it.
If not, we'll do it some other time.
- Let's take beat here, okay?
- All right, you guys, take care of yourselves,
all right? - Thank you, sir.
- I--I think that he's asking some really specific questions.
- No, he doesn't understand-- or he hasn't seen the stores,
he hasn't meet Lisa, he hasn't really been able to,
you know, have that personal touch, right?
The thing that I love about Green Zebra is Lisa
and her leadership, her attitude, her approach.
- I mean, it's almost like he approached it
from, "Let me make sure first that this isn't a scam," right?
Which is good. - Look, my only concern
is--and that continues to grow--
is just the climate of the world, you know?
Are we gonna be in a depression?
- Got it.
- Let me go get my kids situated with dinner.
- Okay, sounds good. Bye.
- All right.
[light music]
♪ ♪
- But again, everything, like, dirty, gritty,
and don't anticipate his movements.
- Okay.
- So today we're just gonna shoot
a 1 1/2 minute launch piece kind of showing
the MUNICIPAL story,
Sport Utility Gear.
- Let's go, baby, let's go. It's time.
[exhales heavily]
- So we're kind of capturing that
and gonna put it into the launch piece for us.
Hey, Mark, can you switch into this for the jump rope?
Do you not wanna wear it?
- I'll wear it. - Okay.
[laughter] - Put that on. Thanks.
- You're a MUNICIPAL man.
- Just another normal Thursday
in the life of Mark Wahlberg.
♪ ♪
- We wanna create an awareness
and tell the message behind the brand.
And we wanna inspire people that no matter you come from
or what obstacles you have to overcome
that anything is possible.
That's the goal.
- Mark--I don't what kind of energy he's on,
but he's on a super level.
[laughs]
[uplifting music]
♪ ♪
- Hey, Doctor. - Nice to see you again.
- [coughing]
- Give me a big "ah."
- Ah.
[gags] Oh, motherfucker.
- One more.
- [panting] I'm okay.
Ah.
- Good. - Damn, that took--
[laughter]
[dramatic music]
♪ ♪
I'm finally getting back to my day job.
I'm excited about that.
But not being able to wake up in my bed,
kiss my family, that's certainly
not the ideal situation.
So every day,
I wanna be the first face that my kids see.
So I wait to call Gracie. She's always up first.
Hi.
First face, first face?
Oh, my God. - Wow, what a handsome man.
- It's a shit stain. - [laughs]
- It's not you. Don't take it personal.
- Oh, no, no, I'm not. - Like, God.
- We have done a wonderful job, Alan.
- Do I look any different?
- Why?
- A really bad one?
- I kept calling to get that first face.
Me and my mustache wanted to meet you.
With technology, you get to call and FaceTime.
But it's not the same thing.
It's the little things that I'm missing out on that are,
you know, really the most difficult.
I love you.
- Making films and being an actor and a producer,
it's taken me everywhere else around the world,
which has been amazing.
But the difficult part
is being away from my family.
- Yeah. - Whoa!
Not being able to really spend quality time together,
that's really hard.
What the heck is going on here? What is this?
And these sort of things can either push you apart
or make you stronger and bring you closer together.
Like, it's tough.
What do you got? - Mickey Mantle.
- Mickey Mantle? - One of one.
- One of one? - Yeah.
- All right, bud, love you. - Love you.
[plaintive music]
- Wow, we're live. Nice!
Say hi--say hi to everybody. We're live.
- This is our first live thing, I think, we've done, right?
- Damn right.
We're gonna get Mark on this thing in just a moment.
[soft hopeful music]
♪ ♪
Let's see. Go live with...
- What's all this nervous talk, Harry?
[laughter]
- Today MUNICIPAL is live, municipal.com.
When you're young, you don't need much to make you happy:
a bat, a ball, a hoop,
a few friends in a public park.
As you get older, things get a little more complicated:
school, work, stress, responsibilities,
all that shit.
We should all try to recapture the original feeling,
go back to the beginning,
and apply that to our everyday adult lives.
[inspiring music]
Never forget where you come from.
Everyone has an origin story.
MUNICIPAL.
- It feels like it's been a long--a long haul, brother.
Probably nobody would have told you,
"Hey, you know what's cool, Mark?
"Why don't you guys try to launch a new brand
right in the middle of a pandemic?"
- Well, that wasn't--that wasn't originally the plan.
I mean, you know, when things got real
and the pandemic hit, then it was like,
"Okay, now you really gotta bet on yourself."
You know, you guys were always the perfect partner for us
because you had the same vision, the same belief,
and put the same emphasis on quality
and, you know, a real-- a real value proposition
for the customer.
- Thanks, Mark. Keep it up, man.
We're gonna--we're gonna keep slinging it here.
- Where we going? We just got started.
- We're just getting started.
You gotta start somewhere. - Yeah.
Hold on, wait-- hey, hey, thank you.
And for everybody-- everybody tuning in,
thank you guys. God bless you.
Stay positive, stay safe, and we'll see you soon.
♪ ♪
- The final day of shooting.
We made it.
[dramatic music]
♪ ♪
- It was a long, long shoot.
I'm happy to go home.
I miss my wife. I miss my kids.
And then I'm getting back to work.
- How you doing? - Good, you?
- I'm hanging in there.
- How do you feel about losing the Emmy?
- I'm okay with it.
- You're used to it. See, that's the problem.
Like the Jets. - Let me tell you something--
- [laughs]
Let me tell you something.
The first Emmy that you get,
I'm getting with you at the same time.
How about that? - Nice.
- So what do-- what do you wanna know?
- What have we sold,
and what do you think you're gonna sell?
- All right.
We have "RV There Yet?" - Okay.
- If you have a second to do a little video that says,
"Hey, I'm excited about this."
I'm gonna show you the sizzle right now.
- How did I know this would come to me,
performing something?
Want me to do it right now? - Sure.
- What's it called? - "RV There Yet?"
- Yeah, I love it. - It's got a--
- The title alone. - Wait a second, I just got it.
"RV There Yet?"
Hey, everyone, Mark Wahlberg here.
Sorry I couldn't be there personally
to pitch you "RV There Yet?"
But I am so excited about this show.
And it just so happens
I have my own Airstream and RV dealership in Columbus, Ohio.
So I'd be more than happy to provide
some of the sickest RVs out there.
- When we started the company,
there was a three-year business plan.
Because of the pandemic,
we've fallen dreadfully short of that.
It's made things ten times harder.
But I think Mark is as driven as ever,
and that really keeps me going too.
- Archie--we have a huge amount of respect
for each other and appreciation for each other.
And, you know, it's-- he's a special guy.
I really like him, and I know that he has my back.
And that's important.
- Mark, Lev, and myself, we are full believers
that there's a lot of great things to come.
- So then Jose came in...
- This is gonna be really interesting.
We've been working on a secret project, and I went--and then
it turns into Larry David meets "I Love Lucy."
- I mean, if I was to do anything
as an actor or as a personality,
it would be like a time capsule period, like, piece.
- That would be awesome in a documentary style.
- We've produced some pretty amazing content
out of the gate,
and once this pandemic is over,
we'll be doing some amazing things.
- What I learned from the pandemic
is that family, by far,
is the most important thing
and to be able to appreciate what's right in front of you
more than I have in the past.
- Whoa! - Whoa!
[dramatic music]
♪ ♪
- The country and the world, it's completely changed
because of COVID and all the restrictions
that have been put on.
So promoting F45,
that is very tricky.
We've been able to survive,
but it's been a rough year.
- So everyone should have a barbell in a setup place
at their station.
- This is crazy, bro. It's, like, depressing.
- It's so sad.
And we're considered lucky, you know?
That's the sad part. - We're fighting through.
- There was so much uncertainty, fear,
and I think you're used to a lot of that as an entrepreneur.
But the lack of ability to kind of control
any of the outcome,
that creates a lot of pressure for businesses.
- It's just, like-- it's so depressing.
- It is.
- The state of the business right now.
- We're--felt like we finally had turned the corner
that second year, and this was gonna be the year
where we had massive growth.
And to see all of it just kind of come
to a screeching halt so abruptly--
- All right, trust me. I get it.
- If we make it through the other side,
it's a big opportunity.
- Once this pandemic is over,
we'll be at an advantage in that we will have access
to better locations in the future.
But, you know, gotta figure out
where we're at when the dust settles, you know?
- Good news about these vaccines.
So hopefully, by Q1, right, of next year,
confidence changes.
That seems to be the best path.
- We'll see.
- Growing up in pretty difficult circumstances,
you know, financially, you learn that
you can be happy with very little.
And 2020 is definitely a reminder of that.
And I think with F45, hopefully,
you can kind of gain momentum again
as there's better clarity around COVID.
- All right, let's go-- let's go do this class.
- All right.
Let's rock and roll.
We're gonna start with bent-over rows.
We're gonna have a reverse...
- What business is easy?
Tell me what the easy ones are.
I'll take a crack at them.
What are the easy businesses?
- Here we go, jump squats.
Hands to the ground...
[inquisitive music]
- We launched during the pandemic,
and there was definitely a period
where I had to really temper my idealism
about what MUNICIPAL was gonna be.
How's your day been?
- Well, now seeing your cheery face, it's better.
- I'm here to cheer you up.
- Oh, well, thank you.
I mean, I always knew
what kind of guy Harry was, you know?
He's a man of integrity.
It's not what he had initially signed up for,
but he's taking it all on the chin
and keeps going and moving forward
and, more importantly, creating a great product.
- But I wanted to fill you in on a few things.
The business itself is-- is off to a great start.
Our average order value, too, is, like,
significantly higher than what we were expecting.
- So what were you estimating?
- We were thinking we would average around
90 bucks per order,
and right now, we're pushing 120 bucks per order...
- Wow.
- Which is, you know, crazy, crazy phenomenal.
The response has been overwhelmingly positive.
People love what we're doing. They get what we're doing.
And then we got that--
the underwear launch two months from now.
- When are we gonna see some samples?
- We should be getting that inside of the next week.
- Okay.
- I'll have the samples for you to try,
put it through the paces.
You don't have--you don't even have to send it back to us
when you're done; you hang on to those.
- Okay. We'll see.
- [laughs]
This period, it really has punctuated
the importance of those core relationships
and the keeping of people close to you
close to you.
My relationship with the team here
by and large are people that believe in me
and believe in MUNICIPAL.
- Harry was basically putting a shit ton
on the line financially.
I felt inspired that Harry would do that
and that his wife, Kim, would do that.
- You have to be vulnerable.
Let them see you be vulnerable.
And a lot of pride permeated into our team.
- Let's go!
- So we're really just getting started.
All right, buddy, thanks for jumping on.
Anything you need, let us know, okay?
- Yep, hang in there, brother.
- Thanks again, Mark. Love you guys.
- All right, buddy.
I can't tell you how long it's been since I've been up here.
Lookit, all this shit is blocking the greens.
Like, how am I gonna hit over there?
I can't even see. I can't even see that hole.
- Oh, my God.
Before the pandemic,
I was used to getting up 3:00 or 4:00 in the morning.
Now I'm sleeping till, like, 9:30.
[groans] Not enough yardage.
Get up, and I just, you know, pray
and work out... Shit!
And get on Zoom calls
and, you know, do calls all day.
But today I have golf.
No, too far.
[leisurely music]
Not hitting any of them. - Ugh.
♪ ♪
Where am I, at Augusta?
[tense music]
♪ ♪
- How was golf?
- [sighs] A lot less stressful than this will be.
[laughter]
Since the brand's infancy,
we've been dealing with trying to make sure
that we find the right people
in the right positions. - Yeah, yeah.
- I'm not convinced we have done
the best execution of the brand as originally designed.
I still think the original game plan
has not been executed at all to the level it needs to be.
- Right, one thing I'm anxious to see you guys develop is,
drive-through is a-- you know, what--what is--
- I hope drive-through is never the answer.
- Is not the answer? - No, because that's--
that's definitely going way the wrong way.
The speed of service would be all out of wack,
so that's definitely not a path we're gonna chase.
We're working on a new fry.
We're not fans of the fries. Or I'm not, at least.
- No, I've said that to Paul since day one.
- Yeah, so actually, that's happening tomorrow.
- Even just send me a video or something.
I just wanna see the shape and the cut.
- Okay, sure. - [clears throat]
I'm gonna get Matt on the phone if that's okay.
- Yeah.
- As I was talking to Mark
during the interview process,
it came apparent to me that
Mark's not only the franchisor
but he was also invested with some of the franchisees.
He's the brand but also the franchisee,
and they're having their own financial issues.
- Hey, Matt, how you doing?
- Good. - All right.
I am here with John, JJ, and Mark,
and we're about to go into the numbers analytics
that you prepared.
- So we got $2.4 million of cost as we stand now.
- You know, we're $2 1/2 million in the hole.
- Basically, what were intended to be
multimillion-dollar positive numbers
turned out to be almost across the board negative numbers.
[tense music]
♪ ♪
To put it in deal terms,
you know, we need to claw our way out.
- It's tricky when you're on the franchisee side
and the franchisor side.
And I definitely got myself in way too deep.
It's upsetting and disappointing,
I think, us not paying as close attention to detail
as we could have, should have.
- Mark is the classic entrepreneur.
He wants to get his hands in everything.
I'd strongly recommend that he stop doing that
because you can't be on both sides of this thing.
And those are the kind of things
that we just gotta get him out of going forward.
- All right, Mike, I'm taking this?
- That's yours. - Multiple copies.
- All right. Thanks, guys.
- The biggest fear right now I have
is the fear of the unknown.
There's no playbook you can look to
as to how to work your way through a pandemic.
And I know other brands aren't gonna make it through.
But we feel like we're gonna make it through.
- You know why this show's gonna be such a hit?
- Why?
- 'Cause it's a fucking shit show.
It's fucking disastrous.
I mean, holy shit.
People are gonna love watching me fucking implode.
[melancholy music]
♪ ♪
[line trills]
- Hey, Mark, how you doing?
- Hey, Lisa, how are you? - I'm great.
- So can we talk about Green Zebra for a minute?
- Yeah--yeah, let's do it.
- I had some concerns.
- Mm, mm-hmm.
- I asked Ryan again, I said, "Okay, send me, you know,
the people that are funding and how much."
And now all of a sudden, it's broken up into tranches,
which is saying-- which I was not aware of
and was very, very concerning to me.
- I'm familiar with working in tranches,
and I've done that before... - Mm-hmm.
- And I'd prefer not to do it either.
And because things were taking a long time
and I was just like, "Fuck, let's just bring in
some part of this right now."
- We started hearing that
it wasn't all going to be funded at once,
that there were kind of two tranches.
And I said, "Well, wait a second here.
That's not what we talked about."
You know, I wasn't going to be
the only one who is funding.
Yeah, we've been down this road before,
where we've gotten into businesses
that are, you know, expensive to grow and build
and, you know--never mind in the middle of a pandemic,
you know what I mean, where people are, like--
don't know what's gonna happen, don't know--
yeah, I mean, so...
let's just pause for a minute.
- Um...
I totally get what you're laying down.
- It's rare that you kind of find people, those kind of--
the talent, the skill, the leadership qualities
that she has and possesses.
But like Green Zebra, there are so many
other businesses that have fallen victim
to COVID-19 and this pandemic.
And if doesn't work out in Green Zebra,
I'd certainly want her to be in my camp
and figure out we're gonna do something else together
in the future, you know?
Those kind of people
that have that kind of talent and commitment
and dedication are invaluable.
The only thing that's really exciting about this
is what you've created and who you are.
- There's lots of other investments over the years
that I thought might happen and I didn't get
and I went on to a plan B.
So I better start thinking of a plan B.
You know, there's-- there's gonna be a big ugly cry
in this at some point of just, like...
[groans]
Great. Thanks a lot for calling.
- Bye.
[melancholy music]
- Mark has been phenomenal. But I'm feeling really sad.
You know, Green Zebra has to continue marching forward.
Without him, this interview that we're having right now
is the first time where I've really sat down
and thought about what a difficult path it's been.
♪ ♪
This whole thing has caught me by surprise.
And the sequence of events was also very hard.
And there's a lot of loss that's happening right now.
We're running out of money.
And then we have to close two stores
and lay 60 people off during a pandemic.
And, you know, the valuation of the company has gone down.
I'm hoping against hope right now
that can make it through this.
- So, Mark, we've actually documented over a year
in your business life.
What thoughts do you have looking back over the year?
- [clears throat]
Uh...
Well, if you like drama,
you couldn't have picked a better year.
This year, it really put an emphasis on the importance
of utilizing your time wisely.
And, you know,
I've been spreading myself pretty damn thin.
I'm about to be 50 years old.
Some days, I wake up and I feel like I'm 80,
and other days, I wake up and I feel like I'm 18.
And I'm like, "Where did the time go?"
- Listen, Mark, go back to your fundamentals
of what got you here:
investing in your partners,
putting in the work, the sweat.
More importantly, I think, just trust your gut, man.
You'll be a'ight.
- I have my hands in a lot of things,
and they're exciting and all that stuff.
But it's also been taking away
and been a distraction from the important things
and the little things and the time
that you don't get back.
- You have to keep your family priorities in order,
which will also keep
your business in order.
- But I think the misses, the mistakes,
those are the things that are kind of invaluable
because those are the lessons
that you need to learn and make sure you're avoiding
making those mistakes again in the future.
- You have to be kind of risk-averse.
You're certainly gonna fail.
You're probably gonna lose money.
It's just part of the process.
- You know, at the end of the day,
family's far more important
and, of course, being super disciplined
upon my faith and commitment to my family.
If I can give my kids that, that's far more valuable.
- Never compromise who you are personally
to become who you wish to be professionally.
- I'm learning every day, growing and learning
through trial and error, you know?
We got off to a rocky start,
but, you know, we're still plugging away.
We're still climbing.
I see things in terms of victory or death
and not just victory but total victory.
It's true. I always have.
It's either victory, or don't bother.
But you've already moved your little king slightly back row.
[sucks teeth] Don't move to back row, son.
You're running out of moves.
Oh, God, I didn't see that one coming.
I don't like this.
You moved another main man?
- Yeah. - Damn, son.
All right. So let me ask you a question.
Do you think I should just focus
on making movies and television
or F45
and my other business stuff, Wahlburgers?
- Movies. - Movies?
[dynamic music]
♪ ♪