The Grey NATO – 340 – Jason Hutton Of The Timepiece Shows & Zenea Watches

Published on Thu, 14 Aug 2025 06:00:00 -0400

Synopsis

In this episode of The Grey NATO, hosts Jason Heaton and James Stacey welcome Jason Hutton, founder of the Toronto and Vancouver Timepiece shows, Timepiece World Awards, and Zinnia Watches. The discussion covers Hutton's journey into watches, from his first digital watch in the 1970s to starting his own watch brand and eventually launching major watch shows in Canada. Hutton shares details about the upcoming Toronto Timepiece Show in September, which will feature 85-90 brands and expects over 4,000 attendees at its new, larger venue. He also discusses the inaugural Timepiece World Awards, a global competition celebrating excellence in horology that received around 185 entries from brands worldwide.

The hosts also share their regular segments, including wrist checks and final notes. James discusses his experience with an upgraded Olight flashlight, while Jason recommends a recent Blancpain documentary about photographing the rare coelacanth fish. The episode concludes with discussion of a Speed YouTube channel video about upgrading budget bicycles, highlighting how different hobbies can affect one's perception of value.

Transcript

Speaker
Jason Heaton Hello and welcome to another episode of The Grey NATO, a loose discussion of travel, adventure, diving, driving, gear, and most certainly watches. This is episode 340, and it's proudly brought to you by the always-growing TGN supporter crew. We thank you all so much for your continued support. And if you'd like to support the show and aren't already, please visit thegraynado.com for more details. My name is Jason Heaton, and I'm joined, as ever, by my friend and co-host, James Stacy. James, you can tell I emphasized my last name because we have a very confusing show today. We have another Jason H. on that sounds strangely like Jason Heaton, but this is Jason Hutton. Now that we have that out of the way, how are you doing?
James Stacey Yeah, I'm doing really well. You know, our kind of push to have a bunch of guests on, you know, cross them off the list. We've got another exciting one coming up for next week, I believe, that I'm pretty pumped over. But this week's going to be a good one. You know, we wanted to fill in some blanks for the Toronto Timepiece show and the Vancouver show and all these things. And we've had little snippets with Jason on in the past. And this time we got him for a full episode. So we just recorded that and it came out really well. We'll get to in just a few minutes time here. Let's see, show kind of housekeeping. Yes, it's just that, you know, send in your Q&A questions. We're going to kick off a whole run of Q&A episodes starting in September. So if you'd like to offer up a question for the Q&As, these are the fifth episode a month. It'll be a much more than that. through September, October, November as we catch up on the year's backlog. We have a ton of great questions, but if you have a question for the Q&A, please just put it into a voice memo on your phone and then send that file to thegraynado at gmail.com and we will add it to the queue. We've been getting a ton. Some of them are really good questions. I was just organizing a bunch of them the other evening and it's been great. So I am looking forward to kind of kicking off that as we get back into September and I get back into full-time sort of work mode. and that sort of thing. So I think that's all I've got as far as housekeeping. We don't have to talk about the Toronto Timepiece show because we've got a whole main topic about that.
Jason Heaton What have you been up to for the last week? Gosh, you know, it's a bit of a blur. It's been hot here. And so I've been trying to get in the water as much as I can. You know, just fortunately, I live in the land of 10,000 lakes, as it's called here in Minnesota. And so there's always a lake just down the street. So I've been doing a bit of that. And I guess speaking of swimming, I just actually just about an hour before we started recording, I signed up. There's this event in Lake Superior every year that I've wanted to do for many years. It's called the Point to La Pointe Swim. And it goes from Bayfield, Wisconsin, across a stretch of Lake Superior to Madeline Island. Oh, cool. and there's a limited number of entries available. So I had to hover over my computer right at noon today to sign up. And I was able to sign up early because I'd made a pledge to help raise $500 for this rec center up in Bayfield. But I'm excited. I've got a year to train. I think it's August 1st of 2026. It's a two-mile open water swim in Lake Superior. So I've kind of... been having the itch to, to do another big physical challenge. You know, I did the fan dance last year and this year I kind of have been taking it easy a bit other than just maintenance training. So it's good to have a goal and, uh, I'll just be swimming a lot between now and then. So that's absolutely. That's that. And then I guess in other news, kind of also swim related, if you recall my trip to the Outer Hebrides in Scotland back in May, that was for the kind of launch campaign for a new Pollen watch. Pollen, kind of the sister brand to Honor Dane out of Scotland. And we had that great trip back in May. And now the fruits of our labors are coming to pass in the form of an event at the Wind Up Showroom in Brooklyn on August 21st at 630. So I'll be out there doing a little Q&A and meeting with the folks from Pollen and whoever wants to come for that. Um, wind up has put up a, an RSVP link. So, you know, you have to kind of sign up to, to go to that. So if you'd be in New York on August 21st and want to come and say hello, um, we'll, we'll throw that link in the show notes as well. So I'm, I'm pretty excited. And I'll be in New York for a couple of days and, um, haven't been there in a few years. So it'll be. Kind of fun, and I've never really explored Brooklyn, so that'll be kind of a new thing for me as well. So that's kind of the news on my phone.
James Stacey Brooklyn's great. Used to spend a lot of Saturday kicking around Brooklyn. I miss it, especially on a sunny Saturday in August. There's nothing quite like Prospect Park and maybe... and maybe grabbing a revel up to, uh, either out to some barbecue spot or up to a great brewery on the North side, or there's, there's some great spots. So if I can get, put a list together for you, I will. But, uh, we also, I'm sure we have people on the Slack who actively in Brooklyn. Uh, I'm sure I would recommend somewhere that they'd be like, nah, that, you know, that place closed years ago. Uh, so that, that is what it is. But, uh, Yeah, that sounds awesome. I really wish I could be down there for that. And I'm sure it's going to be a good time. And if anybody from the crew does go, please snap a few photos and throw it up in the Slack. I think everybody would like to see what it looks like. And I thought the video was awesome. Just really, really fun. I watched it a few times, showed it to Sarah. You let me in on a little breadcrumb tidbit that I totally didn't catch, embarrassingly.
Jason Heaton I'm curious if anyone else picks up on that.
James Stacey My MI6 training is really fading at this point.
Jason Heaton Yeah, right, right. And how about you? You told me earlier that you're getting a little more sleep these days. That's always a good thing.
James Stacey Yeah, sleeping okay. Sun's doing well. Growing big, growing fast, eating, sleeping, all that kind of stuff. It's been, like you said, pretty warm here. So we were trying to get kind of the maximum time that we could at the cottage and in the lake. My brother and his fiance were up from or out from BC for a week. So that ended up just being like a ton of like driving around to see family, going up to the cottage, going out to where my folks live, back and forth and all that sort of thing. And then they... They went home late last week, and I just kind of felt wiped out. I had spent all of the sort of social bank that I had saved up. So we've been kind of laying low, and I started playing the first of the two Zelda Switch games, Breath of the Wild, with my daughters. They're now more into their can read fast enough to keep up with the story and the dialogue and all that. So we've been doing that in the evenings. Really just kind of being a little bit lazy here as summer starts to get into that second half. We're recording this a bit early because we have kind of a busy week and then we'll be back up at the cottage again. So yeah, just kind of making the most of it while we can. I'll be back full time with work first week of September. So just kind of making what I can out of every day. I've got a bunch of bird... bird houses and feeders in the backyard so we're doing a lot of kind of amateur bird watching and that sort of thing and then we'll get to the show notes but there's a another thing that i'm now considering like i need another hobby um but there's another one that i'm kind of considering so we'll get to that towards the end and if you're on the slack you already saw the big thread about this but it's a it's good stuff so yeah i can't say tons going on but that's kind of the point Uh, that's why we've got these great guest episodes and lots of good chats and, and look, uh, an, an incredible, uh, turnout for Neil last week, uh, on his episode. I thought it was a great episode and it really has kind of resounded with, uh, with the audience. So, uh, very encouraging on that front. Thanks again to Neil for being on.
Unknown Yeah.
James Stacey Yeah. But yeah, you want to, want to jump right. We're going to hold off on wrist checks so we can do it with, uh, the other Jason H. Our, uh, our soon to be guest, uh, for, this is probably his third time on tape, maybe fourth at this point. I don't actually remember.
Jason Heaton Yeah.
James Stacey But we'll put all that in the show notes. You want to jump into it with Jason Hutton? Yeah, let's get it rolling. Okay, today we have yet another special guest for the Summer Series. He's been on the show a few times in the past for smaller segments, but with some big moves on the horizon, we thought it would be fun to get a full chat on the books. He's the founder of everything from the Toronto and Vancouver Timepiece shows, the Timepiece World Awards, and Zinnia Watches. Please welcome back to the show, Jason Hutton. Jason, how are we doing?
Jason Hutton I'm doing great, enjoying the summer, and thank you so much for the opportunity to be a part of the podcast, and always been a fan of you folks, and appreciate your support for the show and everything we're doing.
James Stacey Well, of course, man. Yeah, we literally keep a list of people who we would like to have on. And obviously, we had you on for the potluck episode we did at Toronto last year. We did a few minutes with you at the Vancouver show this year. I did because I got the pleasure of being in town for that great show. And then I just figured, you know, we are, what, five weeks away, six weeks away from the main event here in Toronto. So I figured it was a good time. And I think you have a pretty interesting kind of background in watches that's not just a guy who decided to go into trade shows. as I've known you and as I kind of, I think, first met you, you were very interested in watches, went on to start your own brand, and then want to start these shows to really build enthusiasm for watches in Canada, fill a hole in the market, as I think we've talked about in previous chats. You know, we'll put in the show notes the last couple of times you were on if people wanted to go back there. But let's really start this kind of as a clean slate if it's good for you. Where did you, you know, it's that easy question we like to kick it off with. Where did you get into watches? What kind of started the fascination for you?
Jason Hutton You know, it's, uh, I really enjoyed watches really since I've been very young. Um, I'm 56 right now. So when I say starting young, it was like in the seventies, I would say. Uh, so my first watch is like a lot of young people back then was a digital watch. So, uh, my first ever one was, I don't own it anymore, but it was one of those old ancient, like black blocky digital watches with the red LEDs and you would press the button to show the time. That was really my first one that I had a number of different analog ones. Um, I've had various watches throughout the years. I would say I really got into it though, uh, probably when I was into my thirties at some point. And that's where I really kind of transitioned from, you know, just buying a new watch every five or six years to really getting into the enthusiasm and the hobby and. and everyone around certainly social media was a big part of that because it exposed you to so many things that you normally didn't see other than from you know retailers and your friends before that did you make a big leap at some point to kind of a quote-unquote luxury watch and how did that feel like i think we all have that story uh in our background yeah we It's absolutely true. There's kind of two. When I graduated from high school, I remember my mom said, you know, I'm going to get you a nice gift. So what is it that you'd want? If you could pick anything, what would you want? And my answer to her was, I want to get myself a really nice watch. At that time, I still have it. It's very small. It's like a little Gucci G-face. I mean, it's only a quartz. It's not like the type of timepieces that I like now. But to me, that was a very beautiful watch at the time. And I wore it for many, many years. I enjoyed it a lot. But I think the watch that really felt like kind of a step up was the first time I went out and I chose a watch. And I actually bought a TAG Formula One. And I absolutely, I actually love that watch. And I remember at the time, I think it was around... 350 or $400 US. It was on a trip to Portland and I bought it. And, uh, I just, I love that watch and I wore it for many, many years. I know it's around here somewhere, but I've lost it in my stuff. So I, someone was asking me last day, if I have it, I go, I know I do, but I just, I have no idea where it is, but it's got lots of battle scars. And I used to wear it hiking and playing sports and it's pretty beat up, but you know, it's, it was my first, what I would consider real kind of watch where I dropped a little bit of cash, uh, at that point for me into that. And, uh, so that that's where it started.
Jason Heaton Yeah, that's a noble first watch. I think a lot of people probably can claim a Formula One as their first kind of step up.
Jason Hutton If you were into watches in the 90s, it was a staple for sure. So, yeah.
James Stacey And I mean, now to see it come back in the last 12 months as kind of a more premium product. Although, I don't know, if we sat here and maybe did the kind of inflation index on a $400 watch in the 90s, we might actually be pretty close to what they're asking. Maybe not quite the same, but pretty close. And yeah, the history of that watch I found fascinating. You know, we were happily received a long kind of oral history of the watch up for Hodinkee. And I learned a ton, both about the way TAG was operating at the time and how they made these watches. And especially when you were shooting for that lower price point with the kind of plasticky case and that sort of thing. And you just see them now. And I think they've aged really nicely. Maybe it's just the, you know, impression of having the 2024, 25 models. now back on the radar, but they do look really cool when you see them. So I hope you find it in a drawer someday.
Jason Hutton I'm sure I will. I'll have to do a deep dive and really find it because it's buried somewhere deep. I haven't found it after years of keeping my eyes out for it. And, uh, but I would agree with you. I think the tag formula one really at the time, uh, it had some very unique and very stylish aesthetics, which was very, very unique. And I believe that has actually aged quite well. And a lot of brands since then have incorporated elements of that design of that time piece into their own. Right. And, uh, So it's arguably, I think, one of the more iconic dive watches, at least not from a deep, deep history standpoint, but certainly from a design standpoint, it's strong. Nice.
James Stacey Yeah. Well, look, while we're talking specifically about certain watches, why don't we jump into a quick wrist check? We held off on doing it earlier in the show, which is where we normally do it. When we have a guest, we like to have you included. So why don't you let us know what you've got on wrist today?
Jason Hutton Sure. I'm actually wearing my brand today. I have about 90 watches in my personal collection, so I rotate. A lot of the time I'm wearing my own brand, so I'm wearing a Zinnia meteorite dial Eula Diver. So that's probably one of the more popular models. I love this watch. It's a lot of fun. Every dial is very unique, so I'm enjoying that. This is just what I happened to grab today on the wrist. That's great.
James Stacey Yeah, I got to see that in person in Vancouver. You had it at the stall there, and the dial is fascinating. Yeah, it looks really good. Jason, how about you? What are you? Or other Jason? Hutton, Heaton? Yeah, this is going to be a confusing episode.
Jason Hutton Jason H., Hutton, Heaton. Yeah, we'll do our best to keep us separated. But anyways, we'll get through it.
Jason Heaton I pulled one out that I haven't worn in quite some time. Um, and it's a brand that was at Toronto time piece show last year. And I'm guessing they'll be there again, uh, in a month or so. Um, Elliot Brown.
Jason Hutton Yes.
Jason Heaton You know, one of my favorite small brands, I've got the Holton GMT automatic on my wrist. Um, it was kind of one of my favorite of their releases. And, uh, like i said i haven't worn it in quite some time and and i i it's a bit of a heavy watch i'll admit that but i today i had a bit of a revelation i put it on this uh you know the garmin um ultra fit which is their you know the garmin velcro and it i i wear this strap quite a bit i kind of move it from watch to watch and i've had it on the fxd and it because you can kind of infinitely adjust it to to the certain tightness of your wrist and it's so soft um it works really well for a big watch like this it holds it really well and it's proving to be super comfy so that's what i'm wearing amazing yeah and james how about you
James Stacey Yeah, I went with kind of a similar sort of inspiration of the Vancouver Timepiece show. So I'm wearing the Arkin Altarum Speakeasy Edition. So this is that darker. I spoke about it a bunch on the on the episode previously, and I'll be sure to include a photo. But it's a version of the Altarum that Ken made in a small batch as he was out for the Vancouver show. And, you know, you'll have to speak with Ken if you want to see what he's got possibly in store for the Toronto show. But I'm loving this one. It's that dark green case, the black rubber, a lot of black accents, and then you've got kind of like a sandy golden GMT hand. And I just, you know, if I'm just going to pick up a watch, I really love either the NATO or the rubber this time of year, depending on the watch, and I find it quite handy. So I've been wearing so much of the Aqualand 40, and I was wearing my Datejust the other day, and then this morning, for whatever reason, I wasn't even thinking necessarily of... of this episode, which I should have. But it's one of those, you know, I don't know about you guys, but I've got different places where my watches live, depending on how often I like to wear them. Like there's some that sit next to the bed. There's some that are down here on my desk. There's other that are, you know, away in the case. And this one's been on the on the bedside table, you know, since April when I was in Vancouver. And, you know, it's a city if you listen to the show much, it's a city that means a ton to me. It meant a ton to me to be able to be part of the Vancouver show. You know, if you speak to guys like Jason, yet another Jason Gallup from from Roldorf and the importance of watchmaking to that city is just it's there's so much still left on the table. And I think we got to see that in April. And I think of all those great memories and the good times we had and that kind of thing when I wear the watch. So I get a buzz from it.
Jason Heaton That's a good pick. Um, and, and, uh, you know, your, your mention of where you keep your different watches, um, makes me wonder kind of a good follow-up question. You know, Jason, you, Jason H, Jason Hutton, um, you mentioned you have 90 watches in your collection. That's, that's formidable. I've been, I've been in kind of this mode of, of paring down. I think I'm down to about 20 now, but that still seems like a lot to me, but 90s, a big number to keep track of. I'm curious, how do you Not store them. I mean, you don't have to give away details.
Unknown Like a barcode system.
Jason Heaton Yeah, right. Do you keep like a subset that's handy for kind of weekly wear? And how do you kind of manage that?
Jason Hutton I would say yes and no. I do inadvertently wind up with kind of piles of watches. They're not quite piled up, but they're in like a certain area. And then I'll wear those and rotate through them. And then I'll... feel motivated and I'll put those away and bring out some others. And it's, it's a bit of haphazard in terms of how I choose to wear them. Uh, the range of watches do, although it's 90 watches, I'm into vintage time pieces as well. So I've got a real range of pieces. I've got pieces that I purchased from an AD and I've got watches that I've purchased from thrift stores for 10 or $15. And I actually like wearing all of them for different reasons. So it kind of depends on my mood. This is actually the first time I've worn my brand in about two weeks. I've been on a bit of a vintage vibe for the last two weeks, just wearing vintage pieces that I had. So it tends to rotate around, but I keep most of them, I would say, within my office and kind of bedroom area. That's where they tend to reside.
James Stacey Yeah. Do you have like a specific avenue for vintage watches, like just chronographs, just dive watches, or really just kind of anything that kind of strikes the fancy?
Jason Hutton It's a mixture of both. I probably own more vintage dress watches for two reasons. One, they tend to be a little more accessible and there's many of them. I do love like vintage dive watches and chronographs. I don't own a lot of chronographs, vintage or new. I like them, but I just, for some reason, I don't own that many. And I do have a couple of vintage dive watches, but they tend to be, I find they're less common to find in the marketplace, unless you're really willing to step up and pay some top dollars for some of them.
James Stacey For sure. And also the level of acumen, of knowledge around some of them makes them more collective. Whereas I think we've talked in the past, I've gotten lucky at random garage sales for cool Bolivas. And then it takes like I had to speak with someone at Bulova who pulled like an ad from the late 40s and said, that's a Carlton. And you go, oh, cool, a Carlton. All right. And then you Google like Bulova Carlton and there's one website. It's like on an angel fire hosting platform from 2004. And, you know, and it has the serial number range for Carlton's and that sort of thing. So it's different than these things that have been popular because of that focus on sport watches from the 60s. It makes you think that all watches might be that popular, but they aren't necessarily all that well written about or covered. Absolutely true. Especially some of the more obscure stuff.
Jason Hutton Yeah, I love it because some of the pieces that I've picked up, you know, people have immigrated from different parts of the world. So it may have been a popular brand in Asia or another part of the world, but not really North America. So there's very little in terms of when you search the web. And you can sometimes find a reference, but there's very little information on it. But that's part of the fun. And you kind of dig around and you discover new things, right?
James Stacey Yeah, and it's funny how a $50 watch from a garage sale can kind of actually have the same emotional... interest to you as a watch that you bought at an ad and had to break out the the right credit card to cover it and all all that you know speaking from personal uh you know experiences here uh yeah it's it's just such a fun hobby because it can you can really get the same sort of buzz from entirely different things uh which i think is part of the fun the variety
Jason Hutton Yeah, absolutely true. And, you know, the part that I love about vintage timepieces is, especially ones that have been a little more weathered or you can tell they've been worn, that was probably somebody's, you know, such an integral part of them during that time period, whether it's 40s, 50s, 60s, 70s. And you're kind of carrying on the acquisition and carrying of that timepiece. And, you know, you probably will never know the story about who actually owned that watch. But you know it's been worn and probably enjoyed for decades. And it's fun to know that you're a part of that story.
James Stacey Absolutely. I'm curious. I want to push into kind of your background with Zanaya. What was the evolution of your interest in watches where you went, oh, I want to do this on my own. Like I want to bring something into the world with a name that I've decided and a design that I've decided on and that sort of thing. What kind of kicked that off?
Jason Hutton It wasn't something that was an epiphany that I just decided one day to do the brand, but certainly there was a starting point. I've always been into connecting people. I've always been into creating new things, developing something, doing something different. And there was a bit serendipitous in context of, again, social media. I remember watching a YouTube video and there was a gentleman on there talking about, you know, and he was doing a tour through. I think it was like a Hong Kong factory and talking about watches and basically what it takes to kind of start or start your own brand. And I never really had thought about it until then. And then when I saw this, I was like, oh, this could be very... The ability to do this is real if you chose to. So I started doing a little bit of research and kind of went down a rabbit hole for probably about six or seven months. And after that process of six or seven months of doing research and speaking with people, I shifted my focus in my mind to, I wanted to create and start my own brand for a number of different reasons. So that's, I think that's where that came from. But it came from a place of, again, wanting to create something and a way for what I'm creating to connect with other people in the community. I think that was the exciting part for me. What year was that? When did you? That would have been, it was before COVID. So when I first started looking at doing it, it probably would have been around, I'm guessing around mid 2018, possibly 2017. And then as I went through that process and started talking and talking to exhibitors, like not exhibitors, sorry, I'm used to talking about the shows here, talking to factories, you know, I kind of had my process and there was a couple of bumps along the way where I had to shift my focus and do different things. But by the time we actually did the design, started the prototyping and actually launched the brand, it was, we launched in basically December of 2019, which was about probably, you know, six to eight weeks before COVID really started and everything shut down. So it kind of threw a bit of a wrench into things and I think slowed the initial launch. But, you know, like anything, you adapt as best you can. And it's very exciting. But I... I'm glad that time has passed us and the ability to meet in person and dialogue is more commonplace now because that's the part certainly that was missing, I think, when I launched the brand back in 2020.
James Stacey And there's a question we've asked lots of other folks that have been on that have started their own brand is you start at a certain level of knowledge, whether it's a YouTube video that describes the relationship with suppliers and that sort of thing, or you could even start at a lower level, or maybe you come from the supply and logistics world and you understand all how these things. For you, if somebody comes up to you and go, hey, I saw that you started your own brand. I've seen the watches. How would I get into this? What's that like piece of...
Jason Hutton advice or like the surprising thing that you had no concept of before you started that now is just like I'm glad I got beyond that and I still have the brand there there are so many things the biggest thing that I tell people and I've had many people come and approach me and they're either in process with establishing their brand or they're toying with the idea I think one thing that a lot of I'm a watch enthusiast first and then kind of who became a brand owner and then I'm more deeply involved in the industry now with the shows and the awards etc and But for me, when people get into designing the watch, as a watch nerd, you kind of get into the actual product itself and you get deep down into it. And it's a lot of fun. But I tell people to certainly build your audience and engage with the community. and build that following so people know that you're building your brand and you're kind of so when you do actually launch you've already got an audience or people who are fans of you and what you're doing i think this is so important i didn't really do that myself i did it very much in a solitary way and that was probably the one thing that i would change now is really make more of an active effort to be involved directly in the community through different means and i think that's something that's incredibly valuable for a new brand owner when you're starting out
James Stacey Yeah, I mean, to that extent, you went from one sort of difficult task of launching a brand and maybe not harnessing all the various little groups and communities that exist to quite literally building a foundation for these groups in Canada. You know, I definitely encourage everybody to check out Zanaya's website. We'll put it in the show notes. But the next big thing on the horizon is, you know, another year, the second year of the Toronto Timepiece Show. You know, we're very excited. Jason's coming up for it. We've got some programming. coming together. And I know we've asked you this before, but what was the inflection point? What was the motivation to do something that so many people had probably thought of and then gone, this is going to be too hard, which is, you know, start a trade show, a brand new trade show.
Jason Hutton It wasn't an easy task. Really, the precipice of kind of where I shifted from starting to thinking about doing it was I would go to shows as a brand owner and exhibit. And I would see the things that they would do well. And I would also see the things that maybe could be a little more optimized or better executed. And, you know, there was nothing that existed like this in the Canadian market space. And Toronto in particular has a very, very strong watch community. And I just thought it would be something that would be incredible to do. I think it would really feed into the community. It's something that I could tap into my expertise of my career, but also as a brand owner, understanding some of the challenges that people face day to day. And I really wanted to put something together that was just an exceptional experience, both for attendees and the brands. And that's always been the focus, still a focus for all my shows. So that was really the precipice of it. But it was a big undertaking. And before I started it, I knew I needed to kind of commit to it 100%. So I always remember when I started touring venues and looking for just the right spot for the first show. And I actually put the deposit down, which was sizable. And I hadn't actually spoken to a single brand yet. So I had a year and two months to make it happen. And I knew how much work it would be. But it was a bit of a leap of faith doing it because the deposit was sizable. And... I was like, okay, it's real now. And I remember driving home. It was downtown and I live in Thornhill. So it's just about an hour North. And I remember driving home and kind of feeling this low grade panic rise in my belly a little bit like, Oh, what am I, what have I done? It's really real now. And, um, Yeah, but it's amazing. And I started working on it and just, you know, I was a bit relentless and connecting and networking and I would travel and go to other shows and talk with brands. And I had great people like yourselves helping to promote the show and give me feedback about how to make the show exceptional. And really it's a community effort. I did a lot of work, but it wouldn't have happened without the support of the local community and others around that made the show a success. So I'll always be grateful for everyone for doing that.
Jason Heaton You're a bit of a glutton for punishment, I'll say that. Starting your own brand and then embarking on not just one show but two different cities and now a second year. Is this a pattern with you? I'm curious about your...
Jason Hutton life before watches or or maybe your alter ego or your do you have a day job are you i mean what what's your background do you build a sailboat in your basement kind of guy or no no yeah it's a bit of a masochist i guess um but anyways i i'm enjoying it though my corporate career previously and i stopped doing that in june of 23 i worked in a number of different leadership positions primarily in sales and marketing mostly sales in the pharmaceutical and medical devices sector So I always enjoyed that, managed a lot of teams. I dealt with a lot of business development. So I had a good background, I felt, to kind of pursue that. And when my contract came up and ended in June of 23, I was about two months into the planning process for the first Toronto show. And I... I kind of had that choice in front of me at that point. I said I could either, you know, devote myself, look for another role, or maybe devote myself full-time to the show and kind of see if I can get some real momentum going. So I made the choice to give myself a few months of full-time work just dedicated to the show and some momentum really started happening. I felt it was you know worthy of kind of staying back and just pursuing that so this is what I do full-time now producing the shows now with the awards show and doing some other things as well but it's all timepiece related I'm absolutely loving it I think if you can get yourself into a position where you're making your full-time living in the timepiece industry you're already winning because it's not an easy thing to do to connect and do something that you absolutely love and something that, you know, provides you enough of sustenance that you can, you know, pay your mortgage, pay your bills, buy your food, which is getting incredibly expensive these days. But, you know, these are all wonderful things. So this is what I do full time now. And I absolutely love it.
Jason Heaton What was the hardest part of doing it that maybe you didn't even expect or didn't foresee when the first show came about that you kind of look back on now?
Jason Hutton I was fortunate as I had some good people helping me out. I knew I would need to bring in a number of other people to help me out in terms of the actual running of the show, just like extra help. And that was one thing where the first show, and I'm going to give a shout out to somebody here because they deserve a lot of credit. I had a number of people lined up to help out and assist with the show. And I think there was just so much on my plate. I left it a bit till the last minute. And I do have one employee on my team. Her name's Geraldine. She's absolutely spectacular. And I was in a bit of a crunch. She was always going to manage the theater aspect of the show. And I realized probably a few weeks out from the show that I was in need of some additional leadership and guidance in terms of managing the team. And she's like, I've got, I've got this, let me do it. And, uh, yeah, she brought in her team and that was a big part, I think, of the success of the first show as well. We had a great floor team helping out and keeping things running smoothly. So I'm going to give a shout out to Geraldine here because she's absolutely amazing and I heard nothing but great things. And she's involved with this year's show as well. And I'm actually going to be, uh, the plan is to hire her full-time come January, 2026. So be the first full-time employee for the timepiece show, uh, group, which is amazing. I'm a bit freaked out about it, but, uh, But it's amazing. It's amazing. That's awesome.
James Stacey I'm curious, people can go back and listen to episode 302, which we recorded at the Time Peace show in Toronto last September. Comparing the first year with the second year, how has the show sort of evolved? What can people expect if they came last year? If they haven't come to any, what should they expect right from the mind of the guy who's not only signing the checks and all that kind of thing, but really kind of dreamt this up from the hope of making a cool show in Toronto?
Jason Hutton Yeah, it's a great question. One of my goals in the original show is I wanted after the show, I wanted every attendee who came to the show to say that was like an absolutely incredible experience and I want to come back again. I also wanted the same for brands who participated. I wanted them to say that was an incredible first show. It was an incredible show. We want to come back again. So that's always been the focus. It's still the focus of all my shows. Um, the differences from last year versus this year, I was pretty happy with how last year went. I think the execution was fairly smooth. There's some things that went sideways a little bit behind the scenes, but I don't think most people kind of saw that and they were pretty minor. Unavoidable. Uh, yeah.
Unknown So.
Jason Hutton I think this year we've probably gotten a little bit better from a planning standpoint, but with the new venue, it's much, much larger. There's a lot of natural light. It's an absolutely stunning venue with the Meridian Arts Centre, which is just north of Yonge and Shepherd here in Toronto. It's more midtown. I believe people who come to this show who came last year will really be just a bit blown away because it's such an exceptional venue and it's so beautiful. It's just going to be a whole other level of experience. A lot of the same brands are back, but we've also got many, many more brands as well. And some pretty large brands as well that have stepped up and said, we want to participate. And, you know, I think it's an amazing mixture of high-end brands, like ones that would be an authorized dealer. And other ones, small independence. And there's a place for everything there. So I'm super excited about the venue itself. And I believe the number of people that are going to be there is going to be substantially larger. I'm estimating over 4,000 people this year. And for context, we had 2,000 people at Toronto timepiece show last year. Man, last year was busy. Yeah. This will be busy. It was great.
Jason Heaton How many brands did you have last year versus how many brands do you anticipate this year?
Jason Hutton Yeah, last year we had 55 brands who are participating at different levels with about 50 tables total. For this particular show, we're going to have about 77 or 78 tables and we'll probably have 85 to 90 brands participating. And it's incredible. People from all over the world. We've got some larger brands as well as some smaller ones as well participating. So it's going to be a real mixture, I think, for everybody. We're going to publish those hopefully in about the next week, week and a half. But I'm just super excited for the show. And we've got a tremendous theater as well because it's a live theater complex. I'm really looking forward to some of the things that we're going to host there over the weekend.
James Stacey Well, and I guess that takes us to the next evolution. Again, just if you're listening, this wasn't enough. The show, making the show quite a bit larger, doing a show in Vancouver, launching the brand, all these sorts of things. We also have the Timepiece World Awards. Just in case, because I've mentioned it several times on the show in the last few months, but why don't you give us the elevator pitch on the TWA's and what they sort of mean and how they're connected to the show and how they function.
Jason Hutton Sure. Well, the connection to the show is in the context of it's something that's happening concurrently, but independent from the show, meaning that you don't need to be an exhibitor at the show necessarily to participate in the awards. It's a full gala evening. It's being hosted by Colin Macri. It's happening on the Saturday evening in the same venue, but it's after the show closes. And it's really an awards ceremony meant to represent excellence and creativity in the global horology community. So it's been a very, very busy process. Our timing was when I decided I wanted to go ahead and create this juried awards program. It was probably like January, February, and I started building everything. We created a unique voting platform. A number of other things happening in the background. James, you're part of the jury, of course, this year. We have a jury and committee group of 36 experts from around the world. I really wanted to create a committee and jury group that was comprised primarily of more creators and journalists and people with heavy experience in the watch industry, but maybe not brand specific necessarily. I'm very happy with how everything turned out. Most people were very excited to take part. We've had a tremendous number of entries with about 185 entries coming in total from across the world. About 150 of those were approved. And we've got brands from very high-end, independent, prestigious brands, mainstream brands to independents. And I'm just very excited. It's really a celebration of time. It's going to be a lot of fun. Colin's going to be an amazing host. And we've set up the theater to really be something exceptional. We'll be broadcasting the ceremony live as well. So even if you can't come to the show itself, you'll have the opportunity to watch it online. So I'm super, super excited about that.
James Stacey That's great. And did you find the process of setting that up? Was it like starting a whole new thing or were you able to transfer some of the learnings and the relationships and stuff from the shows to the award platform?
Jason Hutton There was a little bit of transfer. It was very much a new effort, though. The biggest one probably is because this is a global competition, I was having to engage brands that I really had not dealt with in a direct way before. Certainly, the jury and committee was very helpful with helping to create introductions and spread the word on the awards. But again, it was a completely new process. And the timeframe from when we actually opened up registrations for submissions to the closure date was only 50 days, which is an incredibly compressed timeframe. So it was probably one of the more, I would say, stressful experiences I've had in my career. I've had some pretty heavy ones, so it wasn't the worst by far, but there was just so much work involved with it every day to keep things moving forward. And I just basically, you know, had a plan. I knew exactly where I need to be come closure date. And I kind of worked backwards to help create that. So I had like a daily tracker on an old school piece of paper and kept track. And I knew if I was behind or ahead of schedule and, you know, this helps because it helps keeps me focused. And it was an amazing process for sure. But I'm very happy with the response for our first year for this program. And I'm very, very excited what it's going to do, I think, for the city. And there'll be some spillover for the show, but the awards are really not designed to grow the show. They're designed as their own entity and to really create something amazing for the community as a whole. When I say community, I mean the global community.
James Stacey And so you've already outlined that the brands were able to hit a deadline and be part of the awards. if someone would like to attend the awards in person, if they're in Toronto, is that a possibility?
Jason Hutton It is a possibility. About half of the seats are reserved currently for jury committee members, brand representatives during the process. We will be putting up for sale about 260 tickets approximately. The venue has a master agreement with Ticketmaster, so they'll have to be issued through Ticketmaster. Those will hopefully be available within about the next week, and I'll be advertising those extensively when the time comes. So Should be a really amazing evening though. And we open up the show with a champagne reception before the actual awards ceremony. So it'll be a lot of fun and a good way for people to kind of kick back and relax a little bit and just enjoy the show and have that celebration of time and connect with other brand owners, people within the industry. I'm super, super excited about it.
James Stacey That's great. And then the broad show, the Toronto time piece show is September 19th, 20th and 21st. I believe the public days are 2021. Correct. That's correct. That's correct. And obviously we've been sharing the link for the last several weeks in the show notes. But if you're just listening, you can go to time piece show dot com and get your tickets now. You know, it looks like it's going to be an absolutely killer show. And I mean, Jason, I couldn't be more excited. It's kind of the main thing we're doing together. The option of doing a live show means the world to us. Uh, it, it's so much fun to be able to do that and to connect with people. I thought last year's show was an absolute blast. I, you know, I was, I had a buzz from that for, for a couple of months and, uh, we had a really good time. So I'm very much looking forward to this. Uh, if you're listening and you're going to make it, we'll definitely be there. And, uh, it's going to be a great time to hang out. There's a, obviously the award show on Saturday night, and then there is a great event with marathon Jason, uh, Hutton and Heaton. Heaton, you have to come. I hope you'll come. I hope I can come. On the Sunday night. If you can make it, we would love to see you there. We had a great time last year, and it became kind of a fun thing to be able to repeat. But is there anything else that you'd love the audience to know in advance? I think we've made it clear they can get tickets. If they want to come to the awards show, tickets will be available soon.
Jason Hutton Absolutely. Anything else to remember? I would just say that the show, the way I designed it is to be accessible for everyone. So tickets for the show itself on Saturday and Sunday are still free. You need to register through Eventbrite. That link is on the website that James mentioned, timepieshow.com. Welcome everyone. It's all levels of collectors and enthusiasts. We have people coming who just have a mild or passing interest in watches or they're curious. We have other lots of hardcore collectors coming and It's really a show that welcomes everybody. And we want it to be a fun, safe, amazing environment. And, you know, if you're curious, come. I imagine a lot of the listeners to the show are pretty heavy into watch enthusiast world. But, you know, come on by. And if you want to make a trip to Toronto. come on by too and enjoy the city. The city is a beautiful spot. Uh, we're getting more and more travelers coming up for the Toronto show. I know in Vancouver, we actually had probably about 30% of the attendees were from out of country.
Unknown It was awesome. It was incredible.
Jason Hutton And I loved it. You know, we had enthusiasts up from Seattle, from Portland. I had a, there was a pilot actually, um, who was, had a stopover and he came in and, uh, took in the show for a day while he was there and visited family. Like I love seeing stuff like this. It's absolutely incredible. So, uh, the Toronto show welcomes everyone.
James Stacey Oh, fabulous, Jason. Thank you so much for coming on the show and chatting about it. And we can't wait to see you in a few weeks at the Meridian Arts Centre for the Toronto Times.
Jason Hutton It's going to be absolutely amazing. Thank you so much for continuing to support the shows and everything that you folks do. You're amazing. I know the community loves you as well. And I fully anticipate we're going to have a pretty full theatre when you folks are doing your... podcast live. I hope so.
James Stacey We're already brainstorming some goofy ideas, but we always have a good time. I love it. That's the important part. So thank you so much. Absolutely. Yeah. Thank you. Thank you.
Jason Heaton All right. Well, great chat with Jason Hutton, another friend of the show. You know, always good to have a Jason on the show. Seem to have a glut of them in the TGN audience. We've got Jason Lim. We've got Jason Gallop. We've got Jason Hutton. It's just, yeah, it's crazy. I think there's a Jason Harrier on the Slack. I mean, it's just, it's crazy. But, you know.
James Stacey I mean, at this point, I fully, I've said this before, I entirely, James and Jason, I respond to either at this point. I will not correct you in email. I will not correct, if you call me that on a Zoom call, you will not get anything other than a natural response.
Unknown I'm just used to it at this point. We're merging. It's a lot of Jasons. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Jason Heaton All right. Well, that was a good chat. And, you know, as we've talked about quite a bit with him, the show seems really exciting. New venue, lots of brands, expecting a big crowd, plus the awards. I mean, it's going to be a big weekend there in Toronto, and I can't wait to get up there.
James Stacey Yep. And then the other thing I would add, which I did forget because we should have put this at the front. This is my mistake. The RSVP link for our event with Marathon is now live. You'll find it in the show notes. So if you're coming to Toronto for the show and you would like to come to our Marathon event on the Sunday evening, it's basically a repeat of last year's event. We're going to make a few tweaks to make it a little bit more special, a little bit more fun, that sort of thing. But we've got a great partner in Marathon for that event and just an unbelievably cool space to hold it. and host the event. The RSVP link is in the show notes for this episode. The Slack got it a few days ago and we're already getting a lot of RSVP. So I think it's going to be awesome. But hit that link in the show notes if you'd like to be there. Otherwise, I was interrupting. Time for final notes. Time for final notes.
Jason Heaton Yeah, you've got two. Why don't you jump into your first one?
James Stacey For sure. So a while ago, I'd have to look back in a search of previous episodes. I spoke about a little flashlight I got that was like a metal clip that you could just clip onto stuff. It's made by Olight.
Unknown Yeah, I bought one on your recommendation. Oh, yeah, you've got one.
James Stacey Okay, great. And it's become something that I would just almost constantly, whether I had a fanny pack or a backpack, it was clipped to the strap. It was clipped to something because it's just kind of borderline very useful. Small, held a good charge, all that kind of stuff. Well, we were at my cottage this past weekend, and I have a cousin that's four or five years old. And he was going under a cottage with some other people to do some, like, to see some plumbing. And I was showing him the flashlight, and he just took it and walked right under the cottage. You know, where a lot of adults would be like, oh, is that full of spiders? And he just... disappeared and I was like, well, it's his light now. I can't take it back. That would be very mean of me. So I left the light with him and that was the standard O-Lite O-Clip. I went down a rabbit hole of like, oh, should I buy that new Wubin G5, which people really like. I do enjoy flashlights. They're a nerdy kid kind of joy thing for me. And it turns out that O-Lite, since the clip, the O-Clip, the original has evolved it so you can get the Pro and the Ultra. And I just decided I would give the Ultra a try. It's a good bit larger, not harder to carry if you're putting it on a backpack or something, but maybe a little bit less useful on the inside of a pocket. I wouldn't say it's double the size, but it might be close. We're still talking about a very small light, all things considered. But it's bigger, brighter, better battery. It has a rotating switch on the side, so you don't have to remember the pattern. to turn it on, turn it off, switch to red, switch back to brighter, lesser. So this is just a rotating switch that allows you to go between like a flood mode, a spotlight mode, which is kind of insanely bright and gives you like a really tight beam. And then this one, the ultra has UV, which I really like for charging up a watch loom for photos, that sort of thing. I do find the red lights quite handy, but you couldn't get one with both. If you don't want the UV, go with the Pro. It's very similar to the Ultra, but has a red lamp. The Ultra also has their own material, their own version of aluminum, like scratch-resistant metal casing. So far, I'm just really totally blown away by it. I think... I didn't necessarily need more power, but this having the better battery life and considerably more lumens gives me a little bit more flexibility in genuinely dark spots like we have up at the cottage. But yeah, again, if you're ever in the market for kind of a step up from the most basic, you know, I think a normal O-clip is 30 bucks, maybe more like even 22, 25 bucks. And this was 50 for this one, which is kind of the premium level. And I think to go beyond that with o light you're into some much more intense sort of models this still really follows a form and function that i find quite useful yeah this looks great i'm checking it out on their site they've got a few different colorways i think it's a blue a green one and like a stars and stripes one yeah yeah
Jason Heaton Yeah. Super cool. Yeah. I've, I've gotten good use out of mine. Um, don't necessarily know I need to upgrade just yet, but if I, if I have a cousin that I pass mine on to, then I'll keep this.
James Stacey Yeah. Yeah. I don't think I would have, I wouldn't have replaced mine. I was super happy with it. Uh, but just, you know, the opportunity came to me to try and find, so I may still buy that Wubin G5. I'll include that in the show notes just for fun. Cause they're, they're starting to show up on the Slack as well. Cool. All right.
Jason Heaton All right. What, uh, what have you got for us this week? Yeah, this one was pretty exciting. This was released by our friends at Blancpain within the past week or two. It's a YouTube video about 12 minutes long called Face to Face with the Coelacanth, a story revealed by Laurent Balesta and Alexis Chapuis. And as the name suggests, it kind of revisits the 2013 Gombessa expedition that Laurent Ballesta did with his expedition team. And, you know, we've had Laurent a few times on the show. He's just such a hero of ours, TGN, incredible underwater photographer and marine biologist. And, you know, people might recall if you've listened to him or read up on him, he was the first to photograph this fossil fish, this kind of missing link creature in very deep water off the coast of Africa back in 2013 called the coelacanth. And it kind of he kind of made his name through that. And Blancpain underwrote it and has really it's just become the stuff of legend. And just this past year. This other marine biologist slash photographer named Alexis Chapui, also working with Blancpain, found that there's a different variant of the coelacanth fish that's found in Indonesia. And so this video kind of... Comparison contrasts or kind of piggybacks off of Laurent's expertise and his expedition back in 2013 with what Alexis has done in Indonesia and interviews both of them and some incredible footage. Alexis, this just blows my mind. They were diving to 150 meters to photograph this thing. I mean that. It's so deep. That's testing your dive watch water resistance in some cases. That's just incredibly deep and such a commitment and such a technical challenge and to get images and video and to hear these guys screaming into their... with their helium inflected voices through their rebreathers, you know, there's the coelacanth, the coelacanth. I mean, it's, it's, it's just wild. I got goosebumps watching it. So, um, great video. I just, I love these kind of short form documentaries that, that occasionally watch brands put out, um, not often enough for, for my taste, but, uh, it's a really, really good one. So check that out if you haven't already.
James Stacey Yeah, I don't have anything really critical to add here. The first is I would have taken 50 minutes. I'll take the 12. Thank you so much, Blancpain. I know how much work it is to make video. I would, you know, I would pay 10 bucks for the hour and a half version of this doc for sure. And then on top of that, it's only got... 8,500 views in five days. I feel like we can make that number something more meaningful. Yeah, right. Feel free to hit this. I think this is like core viewership. I've got it saved on my smart TV to show my daughters in the next couple of evenings. I think it's great. I think all of this stuff is just like... special and cool and this is like so so critical to the reason i grew up loving diving and dive watches were people willing to to take this under as far as a task and the brand's willing to keep it possible it's it's that custo thing you want it's totally this is what we get this is this is our our generation's version of uh yeah what people were getting buzzed about in the 70s with custo and
Jason Heaton Years ago, I saw there actually was a full-length film about the 2013 expedition that I suppose Blancpain underwrote it. I don't know, but I think it was a full... hour long, maybe a 45 minute to hour long movie. And looking back, I had it saved. I had a link with a password, um, from Blancpain and now it's, it's expired. I can't access it anymore. I would love, maybe I can reach out to Blancpain and see if they can make that available because I, they made a whole series of these videos for, for all of his Gombessa expeditions and they're great watching. And I think it would be worth them kind of pulling those up. I'll, I'll see if I can get some response from Blancpain on those. Cause I, I'd love to share that with our audience for sure stuff. Yeah, that's a great one.
James Stacey Solid pick for sure. My second and final for this week is actually just another YouTube video. I've spoken a ton in the past about these videos from Speed with three E's that I really love. And most of them are car focused or they're focused specifically on a brand. But these guys are really starting to nail a certain type of very accessible content. And this is a video where the guys from behind Speed, and that includes James Pumphrey, who we've talked a ton about in the past on the show and his role with Donut Media. The guys from Speed are getting into bikes. And they decided... Zach, one of the guys on the show, knows quite a bit about how to work on a bike and build a bike. So they decided to try and prove, like, could you go out and buy a... I think they said it's like a Walmart bike. I don't remember what they said it was cost, but it was like a Huffy Walmart and then put $1,000 worth of parts on it would come anywhere near one of their bikes that they spent. I think they spent up to three grand on the ones that they're riding around more commonly. And I found this fascinating. There's a bunch of things I had no idea you could upgrade on a bike. My father's quite into bikes and probably knows the majority of the stuff in this, but so much of this was very new to me and has me wondering like, hey, should I make three or four changes to my ride and find that I enjoy it quite a bit more? I have a bike that I'm fairly happy with, but I love the idea of kind of tinkering with this, especially as kind of more of a winter assignment. Then the snow goes away and you get back on the bike and you get to actually give it... give it a run and not having the pressure. Like if I take the bike apart now, that's going to be it for the season. And not that I've ridden a ton this year at all, but it is a nice thing to kind of consider. I thought this video was really fun, really interesting. There's a ton of things I didn't know. And then it was almost very quickly. kind of picked up by the Slack crew and a really fun thread kind of developed for people asking, like I was asking, where do I buy, where do I get my first toolkit for working on a bike and a stand? And people were saying, don't buy this, buy this. And I love this kind of stuff. It's just what I want from the Slack. The thread's awesome. So check that out if you're on the Slack and that's open to anybody who's on the subscriber side for TGN, which is as little as five bucks a month. But the speed videos, and they're up to like 1.6 million views. subscribers and i mean in in comparison to the cola can't video i have to assume one video being more expensive to produce than the other this is 434 000 views in four days uh so just they're just hitting the mark on this stuff this is a really fun video it's easy to watch and they walk you through a few things that i just didn't know it's basic so if you're really into building bikes you'll see that they're skipping they're not necessarily it's not an instructional like how-to of everything, but they're giving you the basics of understanding why you might pick this part over another or why this frame maybe isn't great for $1,000 worth of parts, all that kind of stuff. I really loved it.
Jason Heaton Yeah, that's great. I'll check that out. In a past life, I was really into building and rebuilding bikes. I mean, the fact of the matter is a great number of popular bike brands and far more expensive ones are built in the same factories in Taiwan or in Asia. And then It really comes down to the components you put on it. So it's, yeah, I'll be curious to watch this and see how they do. Good picks. Yeah, for sure.
James Stacey And I'm looking forward to, you know, kind of continuing the conversation on the TGN Slack as I maybe, you know, over the winter start pulling parts off the bike and see if it's a good candidate for some upgrades.
Jason Heaton I think I'm always struck too by how compact and how easy, how much easier it is to work on a bicycle than it is like a car. Obviously. Yeah. Stuff's not heavy. You can do it like in your, a corner of your garage or basement or whatever. And then just how much cheaper it is, you know, like, or, or. I was really into bikes for years and I used to think that was expensive. Then I got into watches and then we know what happens then. Watches are expensive and you get down the strap rabbit hole, etc. Coming back to bikes a little bit in the past couple of years, I'm struck by it's pretty cheap to get a new set of pedals or even rims or a saddle or whatever. It's like, man, I should have just stuck with this. I would have had a lot more money now than if I'd gotten into watches.
James Stacey Yeah, I mean, just underlining my own ignorance on the thing, like when they said $1,000 in parts, I thought that would be like three or four parts. Like they replaced almost everything that wasn't the frame on this bike. That's like the, you know, the gear set was $60. I was like, yeah, I would have guessed $400.
Unknown Right.
James Stacey Yeah.
Jason Heaton Yeah.
James Stacey It is weird how some hobbies really change your predictive price sensitivity, that sort of thing. But yeah, I mean, it's a fascinating thing and a fun video. So check it out if it sounds interesting. And I definitely recommend you check out the suggestion from Jason, which is the... face-to-face with the Colacanth doc from Blancpain. That's a solid one. I'd love to see them get their numbers to the point where they were willing to make more, because they must shoot so much, and they have to be very selective about what they take the time to edit. I understand that now that I help lead a team that makes video. You have to be selective to a certain extent, but if you start to get the response, then you in turn go, well, I'll make more, and that sort of thing. So maybe we can get those numbers up a bit. I think that'd be great. But hey, this was a fun episode. Yeah, it was. Yet another great chat and some good stuff. I'm excited for next week's as well. And yeah, RSVP for the marathon event. And as always, thank you so much for listening. If you'd like to subscribe to the show notes, get into the comments for each episode or consider supporting the show directly, maybe even grab yourself a new TGN signed NATO, please visit thegraynato.com. Music throughout is Siesta by Jazar via the Free Music Archive.
Jason Heaton And we leave you with this quote from David Letterman who said... There's no business like show business, but there are several businesses like accounting.