Riders Share CEO Talks Biz and Safety

Transcription is approximate. Please forgive any errors.

Hey everybody, welcome to the arrive alive podcast episode number 80. I'm Len Vallejo. You're a happy and humble host. We do have an entertaining show for you. I I'll tell you that but before we get started I want to remind you that this show is sponsored by the good folks over at the Heyman Law firm they specialize in motorcycle injuries,
and I hope you never need them But now that we're in the thick of of riding season. We've actually had a few people in our New York group that have had the need for services like that.
You could always call them at 1 -800 -HAMOND, H -A -Y -M -O -N -D, and on the show notes I will link to a small card that you can keep in your wallet just in case you need them.
Okay, let me tell you about our guest today. His name is Guillermo Cornejo, okay, And he is the founder and CEO of Ryder Share.
Now this is where you can either put your bikes up for rent and other people can rent them, or if you're traveling or in your own town or city, you can rent other people's bike by the day,
by the week, et cetera. So it's really good, let's say you go on vacation and you live in the East, but you go on the West Coast and you're not gonna take your bike 2 ,000 miles away unless you're like one of the BMW guys that will do that,
just kidding. But if you're on vacation, you're visiting your mother -in -law, you're visiting your grandmother, visiting your cousin, and you want something to do for a day or two and ride somebody else's bike, and they have a plethora of bikes to choose from,
and they're reasonably priced, and they can also provide helmets and the whole thing. And we were introduced to Gileagromo by our friend Ken, the founder of Eight Ball Tire.
So, if you are in Arizona, California, or Florida, and you need a new set of tires for your motorcycle, check them out, eightball .tires, and yes, it's .tires,
I didn't make a mistake on that. So, and now, let's talk to an entrepreneur who loves motorcycles and loves getting off at 110 miles an hour.
Actually, he didn't love it, but We learned a lesson that we'll hear about. (speaks in foreign language) Welcome to episode 80. >> Thank you. >> You're very welcome.
That was the right answer. So we're going to talk about your approach to safety, but you know, everybody knows that I run a couple of motorcycle groups here in New York City. We have hundreds of people every week.
And you know, one of the things that people talk about is where to rent. And in the old days, I think the only Solution was like Eagle Rider, right? And now your company is on the scene You know number one,
I don't think there's any billionaires that have made money in the motorcycle industry So tell me right like you're Bill Gates, right? You know, whatever So it's it must be a labor of love,
but just tell everybody why the heck you decided to do this Well, it was because I had a serious accident when I first started riding and I was not able to afford to buy another motorcycle after that.
So I looked into renting and renting a motorcycle would cost like $300 a day, which is absurd. And so when I lived in Dallas at the time and the closest rental location was like 20 miles away from my house,
so that was also not convenient. And, you and I figured that the Airbnb model could make this work. I had a background in risk management and data and so I figured I could mitigate the risks and make it viable.
- And I saw you worked for Nissan for a time, is that correct? - Yeah, I worked for Nissan, GM and Hyundai. - So out of those three, If you had to buy one car for reliability purposes,
which would you buy? - For reliability, I would buy Toyota, man. (laughing) - I'm glad you said that, right? Because I don't know, do you ever see the Scotty Kilmer channel on YouTube? - No.
- Oh, he's a mechanic, but he talks about how Nissan has ever since they got bought by that other company or no, or whatever company. - Yeah. - How the quality has gone down. GM, forget about it hopefully nobody works at GM but yeah I would say Toyota although I think the Hyundai's are getting a little bit better but okay so that's cool now how many so you've been in business for like seven eight years now right yes
and how many motorcycle owners today have a motorcycle on rider share to write so we have we - Yeah,
4 ,500 motorcycles currently actually listed. They belong to probably around 4 ,000 motorcyclists. - Okay. And are people,
and I read a little bit about your bio when you first were thinking of starting this, people were saying, the usual, hey, it can't be done, Guillermo. They said that to Anthony from RevZilla. I don't know if you know Anthony from RevZilla story,
but everybody said, Anthony, you'll never freaking do this right you'll never be any good. When people said that to you did that kind of motivate you to do it even more? I mean I think it's seriously like why not you know and and then I ran some tests because you know you everyone knows I mean they teach in school right like yeah you can run a survey you can ask for feedback but nothing like a real -world test And
so I created a shitty website that we have really rent, but I tested like I run some ads and if people gave me an email address and listed a bike, then okay,
I proceed with the business. So I did that and turns out, you know, it's always very few people that are willing to do it, but there are like almost 9 million registered motorcycles. Yeah. And so like I only need a very small percentage of those bikes to to build a big business.
And what would you say if you have this off the top of your head, if not great, what are the most popular motorcycles to rent? It's still Harley and Indian.
Is it really? Wow. Close second, well I mean it's not even close, but it's American tour baggers and cruisers are by far number one. Okay. The PML,
BMW, GS, and VentureRights are number two. - The Nohonda Groms. - No, very many, yeah. - We get a few of those, you know,
and we're actually, we're building up a Vespa crowd. But, you know, those Vespa owners are all very uptight about everything they use. I don't know if they would ever want to, you know, but the Vespa is a pie. And the nice thing about the Vespa is in most states,
you don't even need a motorcycle license, you know. God, cool. It's funny that you mentioned those types of bikes because I was thinking, if you ever do come to New York,
I was thinking of buying like maybe two or three. You're familiar with the Royal Enfield bikes? Yeah. Yeah. There's a lot of them in the city because for 6 ,500 out the door with a three -year warranty,
you get a really nice bike that you can do just about anything with. And popular, but, you know, we'll see hopefully. Oh, what is stopping? Like, why are you not in some states and not in some states and not in others?
We're in every state in Puerto Rico, except New York, because New York has really, really onerous peer -to -peer rental liability laws. Yeah,
it's just the insurance company would charge us an additional $70 per rent a day to just to correlate it in New York, just might as well not operate there, you know, we would need to charge absolutely high prices.
Well, we're going to have links on the show notes page to write or share and, you know, so more information about how you can sign up either as a host or a renter. I assume you need both.
So, and if you're not in New York, you can definitely try it. We have listeners all over. Anything going on for Canada or is it just to count it just the continental United States or the 50, the 49 states? - We're probably going to launch Canada next year.
Our insurance policy does work in Canada. The only thing stopping us is, you know, French. But outside of that,
we're like, we're like, almost ready to roll out in Canada, probably next summer. - All right, cool. All right, let's talk about fun stuff, motorcycle riding. So while we were talking earlier before we started recording Guillermo mentioned that he went down at 110 miles an hour on his first motorcycle.
What motorcycle was that Guillermo? It was a Ninja 250. Oh, a 250 went 110 miles an hour? It was redlined all the way. Like it was I bought it used.
It was it was not stock. It was it was going as fast as it could oh boy and so what what is going through your mind when you are down on the pavement at 110 miles an hour well the first thing is I'm going to die you know to the MSF class and they told me that if you crash at more than 60 miles per hour you're probably dead and the second thing was like I remembered that when you commit suicide,
often you survive because you jump from a building and you're so relaxed that your body, that you survive. So I relaxed like a doll and my arms bounce around,
I bounce around for like 20, 30 feet. And then I got up and I was fine. - Wow. - I was so fucking happy to be alive. I was like,
I can't believe I survived the next two weeks were the happiest two weeks of my life. But you did have some road rush, you said, right? I had some road rush and then my watch got stuck on the pavement on the when I was rolling on the way out and broke my hand and had a little piece on my hand.
But like, you know, I didn't break any arms or legs or I had a helmet and I had a layer jacket that helped. I would have bought a lot of tickets if I were you that day,
Guillermo. If you were very lucky. And then I went to the hospital. Oh God, keep down. And then they gave me, you know,
painkillers like Oxy, I don't know. Oxy cotton, yeah. That was the first time ever I had done a painkiller like that. And they gave it to me for two weeks.
and like no wonder people get addicted, man. It was, it did not help with the pain whatsoever, but it made me feel incredibly happy. It was, yeah, yeah.
Those things should not be, not being in hospitals. - Is there any reason why you were going 110 miles an hour? - I was 20 years old and I liked it.
(laughs) - Yeah, that's good. We have, Have you seen the movie why we ride? Not yet. Is it out? Well, it's from 2013 Guillermo. So yes.
Oh, yeah, I'm gonna send you a link on my Dropbox file And you're gonna watch it. It's gonna change your freaking life. But anyway, I'm sorry I saw on that for that movie like recently Yeah,
it's probably out again. I don't know if it's out on DVD or whatever. Nobody has DVDs, but documentary. It's amazing and I had this big guy Alonzo Bodin. He's a stand -up comedian.
He's got four Amazon specials. He's on he was in horror movie one two and three. Really nice guy and I asked him the same question and he's like I said what safety advice would you give to people?
He's like if you can make it out of your 20s you should be okay because it's a stupid shit in our 20s and and it's true but the nice thing is now um so what are you riding now Kawasaki something uh now right at Kawasaki Volcan 650 at a little cruiser um yeah after that experience sport bikes you know they sound so nice and you just want to go fast you know so i i start to be twins and and they well difference
not between but i start to cruisers and i just I don't feel compelled to go 100 miles per hour anymore. - Now, are you a tour? Do you have the side cases of bags that you'd like to go out away for the weekend or just kind of going around the city and Texas thing?
- Yeah, I have the bags and stuff and well it's, I like to, I don't like to go sleep somewhere else. I guess, you know, I like to leave the city and go in real areas and then come back. That's why I was telling you how I want that electric with over 200 miles of range.
I don't think, I think most people use motorcycles to leave the city, go find a twisty road, ride it and come back, right? - Yeah. - So like, no one's using their bikes just to commute to work, you know?
It's just, I'm sorry. - You know, it depends. - Some people do it. - Yeah, I think south of the Mason -Dixon line, a lot of people do. I have a lot of people in North Carolina,
I've had a bunch of people, guests from North Um, so, but, you know, you never know, but yeah, the, the weekend rides are great. I've been to, I think 35 States of the 50 on my motorcycle or not my motorcycle,
but on a motorcycle cause I, you know, went to Seattle once minute. Have you ever ridden in Seattle? No. And I'm sure you have bikes in Seattle, right? Oh yeah, but I've never even been to Seattle.
Yeah. So, so, so like 10 years ago I was working for a company in Seattle and I rented a Harley. I think it was for Eagle Rider, right? And it was the most sunny blue sky day you could ever see.
72 degrees perfect weather, finishing the credit card thing. And the guy comes over to me and he hands me a package. He says, "Just put this in the side case." I'm like, "What is it?" And he says, "It's a rain suit." And so I'm just renting it for the day.
I'm not going to need it. It's beautiful. You know, there's not a out in the sky. He said, "You're gonna need it." 'Cause in Seattle the weather changes like every 20 minutes and I got 20 minutes outside the road and it was like,
it was like gather the animals two by two rain that started coming down. That's how Seattle, yeah. It was, so luckily I put on the rain suit and I pulled over and went,
it's really hard. Have you ever, and let's talk about some safety. Now you're in Austin, I've been to Austin in a number of years, you get a lot of heat, okay? And I'm not sure if you got a lot of rain. You did have that one winter where you had a lot of freaking cold,
but what's it like riding? Like if nobody has ever ridden in Austin, Texas or around there, what would you say to them? What's it like to ride in there? - Yeah, I mean, it's greater in the winter because it only gets truly cold a couple of weeks out of the winter.
And so that means you can ride with all the safety gear and not drenched in sweat, right? But right now it's 90 degrees and it can be a little bit humid and yeah.
And it's always like, you're riding early in the morning to make it a little less hot. - Yeah. - And every time I go out, I am like, do I bring that layer jacket or do I risk it?
You know, because it's so hot. It's so hot. A lot of people here ride without a helmet because it's so hot, right? And that I cannot do.
I must use a helmet, but yeah, I get it. It's really freaking hot. Well, yeah. I mean, they have mesh jackets and I'm a big helmet fan too,
but we've had, I have some friends in Toronto, Canada, and they love coming down to Pennsylvania because it's a very short ride for them, and they could ride in Pennsylvania with that element. And you know, in the rowing mountains and hills,
I guess it's fine. But again, to each their own. Now, you were well protected. What is, you know, so you try to ride where all the gear, and you know, one of the most popular things,
I guess, the rowing part is inflatable vests, jackets, and pants. Have you studied those? Do you I think you're gonna get, do you have anything like that right now? - I thought I'll buy them.
I mean, they're still a little too expensive, but I mean, the ones I've seen are like full motorcycle racing suits, right? Like, it's just too much,
man. I put, you know, getting into one of those suits every time you ride, it's just-- - Well, they have the vest now in jackets. Clim or Klein, K -L -I -M, they have like,
you know, you can go as low as $450, you can find them on Amazon. Oh, I had not seen that. Yeah. And so, but like, does it help? I thought the biggest problem was getting hit in the head, right? Like,
do it really help that much? I think it helps with the neck, right? It stops your neck from going back, shoulders. And we, you know, our show is also sponsored by a law firm,
the Heyman Law Firm, and I had the CEO, He's a Harley rider on and he lives in Connecticut where there is no helmet law, too And he said, you know, he doesn't want want to get political about it and believe it or not He said most of motorcycle action.
It's below your waist that gets the most down your leg That's what he said because you know what like your natural instinct is to kind of like protect your head anyway and And just kind of crouch a little bit.
So that's what he sees. And on Instagram now I've seen ads for these inflatable pants, you know, that when you detach, you make it look like a Michelin man. So,
and they use a lot of AI, right? Because in the old days, you used to be a tether and that's when the inflatables would release. But now the more expensive ones, they know within like 10 milliseconds that you are crashing and they pop,
Pop open so that's cool. Yeah, I had to look into it For sure. Yeah, you're gonna be a millionaire tomorrow with your business. So you might have a fight Do you is there like you know,
we have our two -wheel Tuesdays here where everybody gathers on Tuesdays Do you have like a night like that in Austin where you guys go? Oh, yeah, there's plenty of bag nights Yeah, excellent and you're gonna tell them to listen to the Arrival Eye podcast.
I know it. - Arrival Eye podcast. - I'm thinking I was sending this to all of our members. You know, we have an email list of almost 400 ,000 people. - Oh my God.
- Yeah. - That's great. - And, you know, safety is paramount. Like, one thing I like about my business is that if we are able to increase the safety,
our profit margins go up. - For sure. - So like, anything that helps with safety, we need to push it out. - For sure. All right, so let's talk a little bit more about safety. So we've talked about the heat.
Here we have deer. Do you have a lot of deer in Texas or not? - In some areas, yeah. I've never really had a problem with deer in Texas. I did once in Wyoming near the Deaton Mountains.
I had a couple of really close calls, but I know they are there and they're really areas of Texas, but it's just the thing I had encountered them. Well,
yeah, and since you guys rent motorcycles all over the country, right? I mean, some of the things we talk about is, you know, you have to be watch out early morning and at dusk. That's when they kind of come out. Oh, really?
Yeah, that's when they're feeding or when they get like a little sexy feeling they look for like the male deer looks for the female deer and they're like let's get it on I think so that's when they get like very excited and so you know and when you see those deer crossing signs those are not for fun those are there because that they have seen deer around there and you want to be well lit so if you can have any
extra lighting number one and you definitely want to go flow in these areas. We have the Poconos, Pennsylvania, we have Route 80 that goes through the mountains, and man, every other mile is like a dead deer around this time of year.
So you really have to be careful. Hey, we'll be right back with the rest of the show, but first I want to tell you about VOOM Insurance. They are a new kind of insurance company that has a very transparent and fair and cost effective model from motorcycle insurance,
you pay by the mile, that's right. Most riders will save anywhere from 20 % to 40%, so give them a call at 1 -888 -871 -2421 or go to the link on the show notes at ArrivalLivePodcast .com.
It's the same coverage as the big guys, but you're gonna save a lot of money. They have great customer service and very highly rated. If you do call, please mention the Arrival Eye podcast. Thanks and back to the rest of the show.
- The other thing is, let's talk about, now you haven't, you don't have any advanced training on motorcycle yet, right? - No,
I don't. - And that's okay. And I would recommend that you do. And even though you don't have, and I'll put, we'll put a link to this on the show notes too. But if you join the BMW motorcycle owners of America,
and you say, "Len, I don't have a BMW. Well, here's the thing. You don't need a BMW. You join it, it's for free." And what they do is you get access to content and things like that. And then they have a scholarship fund,
where they will reimburse you up to $50 for any motorcycle safety course that you do. So if you take one that's $150, $200, they write you a check. All you have to do is show them the receipt and they write you a check and that's it.
You just copy your driver's license and it's great. BMW in South Carolina has very advanced motorcycle safety courses at some that last one or two days. And if you just go to the MSF,
yeah, go ahead. - You find these courses at the dealership, is that what you said? - No, no, you can do a Google search motorcycle safety foundation depending on what cities that you ride in.
and a lot of times they're given at local colleges and schools for a day. I've had a few motorcycle safety instructors on the show and they all, you know, it's really great.
I try to take one and plus you get a 15 % discount on your insurance. So every other year I'll take one. And because you know how life is, right? You forget stuff. And that's what one of the things that people tell me about this show is like,
Glenn, you talk about the same things a lot and I love it because I forget it and I need that reinforcement you know just like things like look where you want to go or keep yourself in a bubble right you know all that stuff so I had heard of California super bike school and rode once with that with that guy and He gave us all some really,
really solid tips. And I know that my MSF instructor gave me a lot of completely incorrect information, you know? - Oh, really? - Oh my God. It was like,
for years, I thought that you were supposed to break primarily with a back break. - And Yemma, we're gonna throw you off the show. You never say that. The front page is the most. - Hey,
dealing with customers on RadioShare, how many people when I, you know, we send, sometimes we send emails like, Hey, you should, you know, prioritize a front brake. That's where a lot of people email back,
no, the front, the back brake is, there's a lot of misinformation out there, man. There's a lot of misinformation out there. It's the front brake and most bikes have ABS now. And even if they don't, you can modulate the front brake.
So yeah, for those people, and maybe I'll write you like a 10 step, you know, safety checklists if you don't have one that you can include for your you know just use all the great safety tips that we have you know over here but we had you know this one gentleman oh gosh was named Brett he's gonna hate me but he was he was in an accident and he listened to the show and he was the reason why he was an accent
because he was involved with the wrong people and maybe some you know illegal substances or something like that but after you No, it's true. And after he listens to this show, he's like, listen, Len, after listening to your show,
I decided to change my life. I stopped hanging around with these people that were bad influences on me. And he moved to Arizona from Portland, Oregon. He enrolled in Motorcycle Mechanics School.
And now he's a mechanic in North Carolina. I had him and his boss on the show. And if you look at him, he's got a sleeve full of tattoos and these big piercings. But when you go to his Instagram page,
he's a total mama's boy. Half the pictures of our him and his mother and they look like adorable. And he's a great guy. I know he's, and I know he's listed too. And I'm sorry I'm spacing out your day,
but it's Friday. But a wonderful, wonderful person. And I hope to be riding with him sometime soon. So yeah, so definitely take an advanced riders course. And let's talk a little bit about,
so what kind of pipes do you have on your bike right now? Stock or anything other than stock? - What kind of pipes? - Yeah. - I have loud pipes. - Okay. And so I used to,
I bought a bike last year. It's a little bit more sedate. And that's one of the things we talk about here. There's a lot of people that say loud pipes don't save lives. And I don't think it's like shopping or moth saves lives,
but I think having a throaty sound that you can use as a horn, do you find that as well? - Look, like when, I mean, I used to live in California and I would split lanes in between traffic.
And if I didn't have to open, well, not an open exhaust, but like, you know, an aftermarket exhaust, people just wouldn't open like you they wouldn't hear you and you could you if you had the you know the Bassani or whatever the cars would just open up for you and you could just go not a big deal so all those studies that they say they can't hear you I'm sorry but in the real world they hear you I agree and
maybe they don't hear you at 60 miles per hour you know But like, you know, at 60 miles per hour, you're not doing, you should not be doing stupid shit at 60 miles per hour, right? No,
I agree. You should be length splitting at more than 30 miles per hour, I think is the guideline, right? Even 30 is really fast. No, you're absolutely right. You're absolutely right. Let's talk about,
you know, I'm Italian, you're Latin American, can we call you, or Peruvian? Yeah, Latin Yeah, okay, so we both have probably very emotional Passionate people and one of the reasons why I started this show Guillermo is because whenever somebody used to cut me off I would get roadway and that's gotten a lot better really.
Oh, man You know, I mean, I'm not a young kid anymore But you know and part of it I had Eric Anderson who's one of the founders of Scorpion helmets on and I Considered him like my mentor and guru.
And when he was on the show, he said, "Listen, Len, you've got to stop doing that." I said, "Eric, I'm not really doing it for me. I want them to not do it for the next guy." And he said, "Screw the next guy,
because you are more vulnerable when your emotions are that high. You are not as aware." And one of these days, it's going to be a freaking bite. So having all these people on the show,
I'm definitely more definitely more sedate. And part of my pre -ride approach, along with checking the tire pressure and oil and all that stuff, I kind of pretend that somebody's going to screw with me and I try to be very more calm.
Does it always work? No. And I've talked to guys that carry rolls of pennies in their jackets to throw at cars and screw them, right? That's bad. No, they do. This is New York,
right? I think I've seen so many videos of motorcycles getting their ass kicked because they're not in a cage. They're not protected. Now, I think that just honestly shows,
if you get road -rich on a car, I get it. But if you get road -rich on a motorcycle, that's just honestly low -emotional intelligence, man. It's like, you know, motorcycles are only 3 % of the vehicles in the road,
but they're only only 1 % of the miles driven. Most of those miles are happening in real areas where there are not many cars. So the average car driver, they're not looking for a motorcycle,
you know? It's 0 .5 % of the miles driven. They're just not. You shouldn't expect them to. The one thing that they taught me at the MSF that I really like is that you should drive, ride,
like everyone's out there trying to kill you. And I think that's the best advice ever. And that's, I assume they're not, they can't see me. I'm, you know, get in front of them. I try to avoid riding next to a car,
always in front of them or way behind them. Like, no, if you're gonna road, if you get mad at a car driver for not seeing you, that's just lack of empathy. You know, it's you can't,
you can't get mad, especially if you try to pick a fight with a car, you're also gonna lose. So why even bother? Yeah, no, here in Texas, a lot of people carry guns, You know and right but it works both ways if a motorcycle car is again It's even easier for a car driver to like pull the gun and aim,
you know There's no way you're not winning that one So don't even bother trying to fight and especially like don't even get angry in the first place It's just you gotta have some empathy,
right? Oh, what kind of cell phone do you have gillianmoe? I thought - iPhone. - iPhone, okay. Do you use it on a mount on your bike or do you keep it in your pocket? - Mount.
- Okay. One thing I will recommend, and even to people, especially to people that don't ride a lot if you're renting from rider's share, or especially if you're on a new bike,
like that's not familiar to you, one thing I will agree with like your show number 80, and some of our shows have had multiple guests, so I've had at least 87 to 90 guests. I would say like 86 out of the 90 recommend not having them out.
Now, number one, the iPhone's a little bit more prone, you know, with the vibration to damage, but it gives you, especially if you're in the city, right? If you're in the city, your reaction time has reduced so much more.
And you know, God gave us two ears and those funky ear pods that we have. And if you want turn -by -turn directions, just keep it in your pocket, I would say. And also the problem is that if you do get into an accident,
even like on a country road, and that phone is a mile away from you, you can't call for help, but if it's in your jacket, you can call for help, you know? - It's a good point. But the thing is,
I'm not constantly looking at my cell phone, right? It's just one or two roads that you uh because I have to ride the airport thing and when you're on the highway you can't hear it you know I it's I mean I'm kind of deaf in addition to riding motorcycles I like to play electric guitar so like I can't hear shit man oh man yeah who's your favorite band what was the first concert you ever saw um it was a metal
band in Peru called Ratavlanca they're from Argentina well 15th right of them, but you know classic rock nice. Yeah typical motorcycle rider even though I'm Peru. I'm more I did karaoke the other night we I did under the bridge by red hot chili peppers so that came out pretty good I got the deep voice for that one but I'm more like 80s I'm sorry I can play that in guitar really oh maybe we'll do a little karaoke.
Do you like Marcy? Do you know who Marcy is? Marcy? Marcy. I'm fairly named, but if you play me a tune, I'll probably know it.
Okay, he's got a bunch of good songs and he's very popular with Latin Americans, even though he's from England, but he's very good. He was in the Smiths and I kind of grew up with like U2 and Depeche Mode and you know Marvin Gaye and Chade and Chili Peppers and Madonna and Ina,
and all that fun stuff, but we'll save that for the next podcast about music. Name, so have you ever been caught, like since you're not doing overnight and long trips,
like is there a memorable time where you got caught in like some weather that was not really good and like what did you do? - Oh yeah, I mean, I have done long trips. I was going from Fort Worth and then near Dallas to California.
- Oh, wow. - I was changing jobs. And I accepted a job offer from Honda in California. And they would, they paid me to move there, right? - Okay. - And they didn't include it.
If I rode my motorcycle from Texas to California, they would pay me $700, right? Instead of, instead of then I had to pay to ship it and they would pay for that hotel stage and all that stuff and like fuck yeah and so I left and uh I think it was Saturday morning or Friday morning and the weather forecast did not say there was going to be like a cold front and you know 20 minutes into my ride and it starts
like snowing and the temperature is like 29 degrees and and I was completely unprepared, you know, so yeah it sucked and so as I keep going like,
you know, you really feel the pain of the cold in your hands and you know Texas and California I had zero experience with the cold and so I didn't I honestly didn't cover a lot of distance that that day because of the cold I and I spent the night of Desa,
Texas, not even outside of Texas. And I get into a shower, the warm, warm shower finally after a, and I start feeling pain in my fingertips,
you know, 'cause they were coming back to life after being frozen. (laughs) - Yeah, no, I hear you, and that reminds me, have you ever been to Maine? - Yes,
it's beautiful. - It's beautiful, it's beautiful in the So I was there in the late fall, about 20 years ago. And usually when I do my motorcycle trips, I make it so I never have to be anywhere at any time.
So if I do 100 miles in a day, or if I do 400 miles a day, no big FN deal, right? But one time I had to be in Boston and I was, it was like 38 degrees.
I was on a highway and it was raining. and my face shield was fogging up so much, I couldn't see 10 feet in front of me. Okay, so just open the face shield. But when I opened the face shield,
the raindrops were so cold that it felt like you were throwing a thousand frozen needles at my cheeks and eyes every 10 seconds. (laughing) - And then I pulled over to a gas station.
I didn't have my rain boots. So I went to the gas station and I said, I bought a pair of pantyhose and Vaseline. And I said, where's the men's room? And she's like,
what are you going to do with those in there? I'm like, don't worry, I'm just going to dry my freaking feet off, put Vaseline so I can kind of get my feet back to life and wear the pantyhose. 'Cause pantyhose is actually very warm.
'Cause I had no dry socks. And that was, I did the rest of the trip that way. And, you know, and in harsh conditions, and what I tell people all the time, don't be a freaking hero, man. If you've got to pull over,
if you've got to go into a hotel for a night, if you've got to find cover, go to somebody's house. I was in a house store one time that actually went to somebody's garage and knocked on their door. I said, "Listen,
Kai, just stand under your garage for an hour or so." And they were fine. They were fine with it. And that's the good thing about the BMW MOA, too, is that they have a roadside assistance program and the whole thing.
Yeah, a classic thing people do is they they put their hands on their hot exos Yeah, well, I mean with with the gloves with the gloves. Yeah What funny anecdote is that I stopped in El Paso at a dealership to to buy freaking,
you know Whether appropriate gear. Yeah, and I ran it to that influencer What's that guy that has a little dog and those two like every hardly leadership in the United States like every year.
Uh, not not bikes and beards. No. No, that guy's in Pennsylvania. Um, oh, shit. He's a hardly guy. Hardly. Okay. You know, I forget his name.
Yeah. I sponsored him. I feel terrible. But, uh, anyway, that was the first time I was like, I didn't know, but I was just celebrity. He gave me advice on what gloves to buy and I Got the right gloves and the rest of the trip was just fine.
I had to like make a really really Really fast time to be able to make it to California in time and then as I arrived in LA Going down the mountains beautiful view I get rained on it's never fucking rains in LA and you're right.
Yeah, and I And I was in Orange County sales like two more hours of driving and totally wet. It was quite an adventure, honestly.
And the fact that, you know, when you don't stop and succeed and keep going despite all this shitty weather, you know, you're like, you know, I have discipline,
I can do stuff. (laughs) - Yeah, for sure. Let's talk a little bit about safety here, because, you know, there's this thing going going around the country not sure if you heard about it Guillermo it's called inflation have you heard about this yeah right it's bad and you know Revzilla as much as we love them for their selection you know nothing good is cheap these days right especially when you're talking about
protective vests and then things like that and what I tell people I would even tell you know your renters right like if you say hey I'm gonna rent You know a rider share bike for a few days.
I don't want to spend a thousand bucks on gear right now What I would recommend number one Go to your local thrift store Because if you're a decent size you will find great boots great Well,
we know about jeans don't always work right but you can definitely find some good jeans And you'll find amazing leather jackets at thrift stores number one number two There's always places like eBay and there's a new site that a friend of mine owns and I'm forgetting,
I'll put it in the show notes, but he has a marketplace for used rider gear. And you look like you're probably like a 38 in a suit, maybe what I'm 36 maybe.
- I don't really know. - But you look like you're, I'm a little bit bigger than you, so I would have a little bit tougher time. But yeah, definitely, you can definitely find things on eBay, even Facebook marketplace,
although it's filled with the most terrible people in the world every once in a while. You'll find a good deal on Facebook marketplace and the good thing is that that is slow. You know,
Leonardo, one thing I have not heard you talk about is like being reckless. And I'm curious, so because we have data from, you know, 75 ,000 trips and rides and shirts,
like I can tell you that almost never the accident is caused by the bike, you know, like almost never, or by a third party event.
Like we've had a handful of accidents caused by third parties, like cages, because the stereotype is that, oh, you know, like it's 10 years for the order of people, yeah,
that's wrong. 99 % of the time accidents are caused by the rider You know, they, they're either going too fast and make a mistake. They don't break in time.
They, you, you name it. And so, and, and almost always, like we can see clearly that younger people crash more often. Right. And then people that display risky behaviors and,
you know, aspects of their life are the ones that crash more often as well. Right. So it's, you can talk about safety, get all you want, but like really, really, Like the primary thing that's driving people to crash is recklessness and spitting,
you know? And, you know, and we are right in the middle of cycles. We do it because we love spitting and recklessness, right? To an extent. But you just gotta, you know, you just gotta, you have to do it on your own mistakes.
- You make a great point. And, you know, I think the people that are reckless are probably less less likely to listen to this podcast. Most of our people are 35 to 65, but you know,
we, you know, I don't know if you're familiar with Revol Scooters, the company Revol, where they, yeah. So when you, yeah, not in New York, but there are other places,
and now they have Tesla cars, so they're like an Uber, but they made you take a photo of yourself with a helmet on before you got on the thing. - We do that too. - Oh, you do that too,
okay great. And they made you take a little test. I still saw three drunk girls on Rebels on Friday night, so didn't know who was freaking out. And a CBS news reporter who was 26 years old,
she was riding on the back and her friend was drunk and she died, unfortunately two years ago. You know, she died and I don't know what to say on that, on the Recklessness what I try to tell people is think of the like when I see people if I and I you know I'll see somebody at a light sometimes and who's doing reckless behavior and I'll say listen not for now I don't want to be an idiot But if you and I'll
ask them do you have anybody in your life that you love or that loves you? And they always say yes I say you may just want to rethink how you rock Because not just don't think of yourself,
think of your others. And I think about my daughter a lot, my parents are still alive and well, I'm so blessed for that. And that goes through my mind. And that, but you make a good point.
And with you, right? Because with Airbnb, you know, people treat Airbnb is different than their own home. And I'm wondering if the reckless accidents have a higher proportion on your service because it's not their bike.
What do you think about that? Oh, no, no. I think that happens probably with traditional rentals, you know, but like when you're renting from a person,
they usually like this like a relationship, like it's not a business, it's a person's bike, you know, there's more respect, but also like we, we now take the possibilities of at least $500.
So like if If they crash the bike, they're on the hook for at least $500 and so that really deters people, right? It deters a lot of people from renting altogether,
you know, but like, it's, yeah, unfortunately there's a lot of people that think, "Oh, I'm going to rent a bike to learn how to ride," you know, and that's not what it's for.
Guillermo, when you were a kid or even now, do you like magic? Magic like the game or magic in general magic like magicians. Oh Yeah,
okay. I love this. Yeah, you can can you name a famous magician that you know? What any Can you name a famous magician that's alive? I cannot okay?
I'm gonna tell you why David Copperfield have you heard of him? Of course. Okay, so he's like, yeah, he's - Yeah, he's still alive. He's like 75. But he looks good, he had a lot of Botox,
man. He's got a, he's got, he's like, he's like Barry Manilow. He look at Barry Manilow, Barry's like 80 and he looks like he's 14. It's crazy, but Copperfield's still around. I mean,
Copperfield made the Statue of Liberty just, that was like his claim to fame in front of a live audience. I mean, and that's like, he's done a lot of things. But anyway, The reason why I asked that is,
let's say David Copperfield was here and he could wave his magic wand and he could improve one aspect of your motorcycle riding skills.
What would that be? What would you ask for him to improve with his magic skills? My motorcycle riding skills, coronary. Okay.
Yeah. So you feel you could use more help. You know, I love to corner right. I can't corner left for whatever reason Do you have that issue or are you? Most people have one better side,
right? Yeah. Yeah, me too. Me too When you do it, right, it's great man when you're on a country road and you're like, how low can I freaking lead with this thing?
And oh, did you go to the MotoGP races in Austin, about last month? - Yeah, it's right here. At one time, I was riding on the track with a bunch of journalists and whatnot.
They invited me and so it was free for me. And they also invited a couple of professional racers. - Yeah. - 'Cause they were testing bikes to then ride about them on,
I think it was one of the motorcycle news, one of those right yeah and and I got on 400 KTM and I was going as fast as I could possibly go leaning so fucking hard it was my best lap and one of these racers passes me on a Honda Goldwing so I I would love to get a bit of an eye corner.
- Okay, all right, so we'll send the note to David Copperfield, we'll see if you can fit it on your schedule, and I appreciate your time. I know we have only a few more minutes left. Let's pretend that it's June 7th,
2025, so a year from now, and as far as your business goes, ridershare, what would you, what do you hope happens for ridershare in the next year,
or what New features or aspects or maybe two questions, okay? You know we um, I Would love to add ATVs and expanding to our countries and all that stuff but we still have a lot of room to grow in the US most people don't know that we exist and I'm most people that are on motorcycles even don't know that we exist right so I'm always trying to how do I How do we build brand awareness without spending money?
And unfortunately the only way to do it is to spend money and marketing has gotten so expensive that it's just really difficult to grow while remaining profitable. And so yeah,
it's a challenge, but you know. - Okay, so ATVs and growing while still remaining profitable. All right,
so I think we're just about done we will have your links to your website of course I'm sure you're on Instagram and we'll have and you know I'll make a little kind of cheat sheet of motorcycle say especially for a bike that's new to you right because we all know our own bike but it's so much different when you're on a bike that's not you know that you don't have if it's a similar bike or even a dissimilar bike
so I'll put it like a pdf that people can download And it's been really fun having you on the show. I would really appreciate it if you had a video with me.
I will immediately put it on the website. Thank you. You got it. Well, that wraps up episode 80 with Guilhermeaux from Riders Share.
And that's riderswithanest -share .com. And you don't meet too many people who get off a cycle at about 100 miles an hour and then not only do they want to get back on a motorcycle,
but they start an entrepreneurial venture like his right where you can you know rent other people's bike by the day by the week and probably more.
So you know it's summer right so if you're going to Aunt Emily's place for a week in Columbus Ohio or Uncle Tony in Reno, Nevada I'm sure that you probably want to get away from those people for a little while and maybe go for a ride for a day or two or three,
right? So check out ridershare .com. We'll have links in the notes, a special link. And also we're going to have a top 10 safety list checklist,
right? It'll be a little bit different because it's going to go a little bit more around top 10 safety points for riding somebody else's bike. Now, many of them are universal, but these will be more focused at riding someone else's bike because it's different,
right? Now, I also want to thank everybody that makes this show possible. Number one, I want to thank Mr. Rob McLaughlin, composer and songwriter of The West Coast Hearts.
He's on Apple and Spotify, West Coast Hearts, give him a search. Also, Liam Murray, he does our commercial music, And I want to thank you, people like you, please post links to the show.
What it could be your favorite show just could be arrivealivepodcast .com on your social media, Twitter, Instagram, Facebook, all that fun stuff. It helps us get the word out.
We're going to be coming out with arrive alive stickers. Look at the website pretty soon. Also want to thank the good folks over at the Heyman law firm. There's a link on the show for that. and you can connect with us at arrivealivepodcast @gmail .com and if you have any suggestions for the show,
maybe you want to be on the show, you want to support the show, that would be great. My name is Len Belello and I'm your happy and humble host and thank you very much for listening.
Stay safe and enjoy riding.