Ep. 39 - Brian Scotto (HOONIGAN)

When I first moved to LA I worked in marketing and PR for what was then a three-pronged business owned by Mike Ryan. Mike is a Hollywood Stunt Driver famous for doing stunts with semi trucks, but alongside his driving, he owned a business responsible for sourcing and placing cars in movies and television shows. At the time, Mike was also one of only two guys racing a semi at the esteemed Pike’s Peak International Hill Climb: the second oldest race in America behind the Indianapolis 500. It was 2007 when today’s guest Brian Scotto founded a magazine called 0-60. I was first in contact with Brian when he reached out about doing an article on Mike. 0-60 was based in New York City and I was going to be there the following week, so I suggested we meet for lunch and talk about it. The article went great and the magazine was awesome. 12 years later, Brian is now living in Long Beach, California and heads up [HOONIGAN], a multi-media company best known for its production of Gymkhana videos starring Ken Block acrobatically driving an arsenal of tire-shredding cars. Collectively the videos have amassed a viewership in excess of 550 million views. Given I’ve been a big fan of effectively everything he’s produced, I reached out to Brian about me now interviewing him, and he kindly obliged. His story is a fun one and we conduct some serious car talk as you can imagine. I thoroughly enjoy how he goes into what’s been easy for him as well as the challenges that opportunity can bring. We also get a back stage pass to what goes into making those incredibly viral videos. What I thoroughly enjoy, and frankly get inspired by, is other people’s passion. And it’s fair to say you can hear Brian’s passion in this conversation. He’s well on his way to building an empire, but at the end of the day, he’s as curious about what you have going on as he is about how he’ll attract millions of eyeballs on YouTube. I truly had a blast seeing him again, and I’m certainly excited to see what they have coming, so stay tuned to hear about it.