Four Money Bears - A Conversation with Mac Gardner

In this episode of The Money Script Podcast, host Yohance Harrison sits down with Mac Gardner, CFP, author of The Four Money Bears and Motivate Your Money. They discuss the importance of financial literacy, especially for children, and explore the gaps in financial education that disproportionately affect underserved communities. Mac shares his journey into financial planning, the inspiration behind his books, and his mission to bridge the gap between financial literacy and technology through innovative tools. Tune in for actionable insights, engaging stories, and plenty of "Mac Nuggets" that will inspire you to rethink how you teach and approach money.

Twitter: https://twitter.com/macgardner_cfp
Instagram:  https://www.instagram.com/fourmoneybears/ and https://www.instagram.com/finlittech/
websites: https://www.thefourmoneybears.com/ and https://finlittech.com/
Books: "Motivate Your Money" https://www.amazon.com/Motivate-Your-Money-Spend-Invest/dp/0615873251/ref=tmm_pap_swatch_0?_encoding=UTF8&qid=1666376426&sr=8-1
                 "The Four Money Bears" https://www.amazon.com/Four-Money-Bears-Mac-Gardner/dp/0692381406/ref=sr_1_1?crid=2KOJFP32POCAO&keywords=the+four+money+bears+mac+gardner&qid=1666376529&qu=eyJxc2MiOiIwLjY0IiwicXNhIjoiMC4wMCIsInFzcCI6IjAuMDAifQ%3D%3D&s=digital-text&sprefix=the+four+money+bears+mac+gardner%2Cdigital-text%2C147&sr=1-1

Transcript

Yohance Harrison 0:11

Welcome back to the Money Script podcast. It's your host, Yohance Harrison. So happy to be with each and every one of you today. Hey, to everybody that's out there on YouTube. It's so exciting to be on YouTube. Now we're. We're real. We're both real. We're here. I know it's been a little while. I, I thank you for all of your messages, all the shouts out on, on, on Twitter and the like. I, I was at a. And what else did I do? I did my taxes. There was a few things that I was doing and it just. I also had a couple reschedules. There were a few people where I think they were doing their taxes or, you know, something came up. So we're back and I'm excited today because I have the, the unique pleasure of meeting with someone else that's in the industry. You guys know I like to talk to other folks in the industry because we all have the same mission. As I said before, we don't look at each other's competition. No, we're not competition. The competition are all the things that you'd like to spend your money on. Our competition is inflation. Our competition is you not knowing how the match works on your 401k. That's our true competition. So we're here to actually help everyone become more financially literate. We're going to do it one podcast, one YouTube at a time. So I want to start where I usually do. Oh, I forgot if this is your first time, this is a financial literacy podcast. We're here to help you learn more about how to do better with your finances. And of course, shout out to all of the students that I met last week in San Francisco, all the medical students, thanks for jumping onto the podcast so that you can learn more about your finances as you're also learning how to save lives. So I'm a financial planner. I've been in financial planning for 22 years. That's fun to say, 22 years now I'm actually finally old enough that I got an exemption on one of my continuing educations. They're like, ah, you've had it long enough. You don't have to do that one anymore. I didn't know if I should be excited or feel old. I felt old, but I was excited. I was excited. So nonetheless, I want to just start off where we normally do. Let's talk just a little bit about what's going on just, just in the economy, in the markets today. Well, the first thing you've probably Heard it is. It is officially October. Whenever you're listening to this, maybe it's not October, but for us it is officially October. We're all getting ready for Halloween and we got spooked with some good news last month that we're going to have. Well, most of us that are under certain brackets are going to have some. Our income levels are going to have some of our debt paid off. That's right. The federal government is going to forgive some loans for a lot of Americans out there. There's, there's certain criteria that you have to meet. All the details are going to be on the financial aid. Financialaid.gov

Yohance Harrison 2:53

we'll put it in the show notes. There's so many websites in my head, I forget them. We'll put it in the show notes. But make sure you go and get the information you need to see if you qualify. Last I checked, the application's not out yet. Maybe by the time you're hearing this application is out. And the deadline for the application is December 31st of this year, unless they extend it. I did log onto the site day one and it crashed. Of course it did. It's a government website. Speaking of government, there is a government website that got a nice little refresh last week because of the billions of dollars, the highest amount that they've ever had that Americans have poured into Series I bonds. And that's that safer, safer investment that we talked about where you can loan your money to the federal government for one year and they're going to pay you if you do it by the end of October, they're going to pay you 9.62% for the first six months. Not too shabby. There's really nothing else out there like it right now that can produce that same amount of guaranteed return. Now, after the first six months, yes, the rate will change. We'll find out what that rate will be sometime later this month. More than likely it's going to be around the same amount, but I don't know. Let's just call that I don't know. But if I look at some of the data that's out there, it's like inflation's still pretty high. So it's probably going to be around the same amount. So if you haven't had the chance to research whether or not I bonds are a good place for some of your investments, for some of your money, or maybe you want to start a little account for a child or grandchild, we'll put the link to that in the show notes as well. And Then I have to just talk about the bombshell that came out the other day. You know, just walking around and all of a sudden I get the alert that apparently the federal government is starting to change their stance on marijuana finally. And Biden had a pretty interesting, has pretty interesting comments about it. So if you haven't seen that yet, I encourage you go check them out. But we're gonna have, I think the last count was around 60, 60, 300 or 6,500Americans that are going to have pardons for their possession, marijuana possession there. I think it's the lowest level of marijuana possession on the federal will have those, those pardons. So that's, that's good news for those individuals. Hopefully there's nothing else on their record and that means it's going to open them up to be able to re, enter into the workforce and remove some of the stigmatism. He also called on governors to do the same and for our government to look at reclassifying marijuana. So for those of you that I know it's a lot of you out there could have, I hear questions about it, you have some of those marijuana stocks and marijuana investments, maybe for once they might go in a different direction than they have for the last three years, but who knows? Now, just because the government makes it legal doesn't mean it's going to make money. So let's remember that. So. All right. So with that no further ado, I want to get to our guest today. We have in the studio with us Mac Gardner. He is a fellow cfp, certified financial planner. I can't wait to join you. Also, he is a minority cfp. There's not a lot of us out there. Actually one just started working for our firm. We just picked up. I shouldn't say picked up. We didn't pick him up, but he joined the firm. We had. We, we have a, a new member of the team. Will Gholston shout out to you. Thanks for joining us. He also is a brother and a CFP and a cfa. There's something.

Yohance Harrison 6:14

No, they're, they're, that's an even smaller combo right there, I think. Literally about a handful of those.

Yohance Harrison 6:17

Oh, yeah. Yeah. I, I told him he is probably in the 0.01%.

Yohance Harrison 6:24

Keith Beverly literally is the only other one that I know. He owns his own firm on the.

Yohance Harrison 6:29

East coast, so, so funny thing. So let's talk about this whole. Just, we're just going to dive in. Say hello to people. Let's dive in. But, but hey, folks, let's talk about the CFP thing first because. So I am, I'm in, I'm a college student now. Shout out to Morehouse. I'm in their, their online cohort of students that launched last year. Actually, as of last night, I'm a junior. Okay. Had some credits clear last night, so. Thank you, thank you. So hopefully I can get, I'm gonna try to do the next two years in one, so I'll sleep in 2024 after I cross the stage, like, oh, you just got your degree. What are you going to do? Take a nap.

Yohance Harrison 7:05

So one of the things that just grinds me a bit about the lack of minorities that have their CFP or that have advanced designations period, in the financial services field is that here in Dallas, I googled black cfp.

Mac Gardner 7:27

Did college football come up? Please don't tell me.

Yohance Harrison 7:29

No, no, worse. No worse. Worse. Worse than that. The first listing is a gentleman whose last name is Black. He is a cfp, but he is not black.

Mac Gardner 7:31

Oh, Lord.

Yohance Harrison 7:47

Yeah, yeah, I, I could, yeah, that's, that's problematic.

Yohance Harrison 7:51

So being that I'm in the Dallas area, it is my intention to change that. Yeah.

Mac Gardner 7:56

Yes.

Yohance Harrison 8:00

Since nobody else. Now, if there are other black CFPs out there and you're hearing this. Well, if you're actually hearing this, by all means, you may have the top ranking. Until I get mine. Because I have a special piggy bank I'm just saving up for to make sure that I, that goes at the top. And, and Mr. Black out there, you're cool. I, I, this is nothing against you. Yeah. And you are a black.

Mac Gardner 8:12

Until you get yours. Until you get.

Mac Gardner 8:28

You're just. But not the.

Yohance Harrison 8:32

No, you know, I think that's a great way to open up our conversation,

Yohance Harrison 8:38

Bill, Because

Yohance Harrison 8:41

I have been blessed to have been in this business for 20 plus years. I like to say I'm old enough to be respected, but young enough to be rele.

Yohance Harrison 8:49

So writing that one down, I got.

Mac Gardner 8:52

A bunch of what I call Mac nuggets that I like to share with people. But I, I, I have been Nuggets.

Yohance Harrison 8:57

Yeah, that one is good. I might even say I'm using a Mac nugget here.

Mac Gardner 9:01

By all means. You know, I started off my career in retail banking. Really blessed to have won a lot of hats in this business. You know, banking, investment management, commercial corporate lending, trust administration, advanced markets, high net worth, ultra high net worth. I, I been really blessed and what really triggered a lot of stuff for me to start writing and really start focusing on financial literacy. My first book is titled Motivate Your money. And I wrote that because I was working in a field with very, very wealthy people that had little to no financial planning or financial literacy education or knowledge. And it was just mind blowing. And so that's why I wrote the first book and then my second book, which is a children's book called the Four Money Bears. I wrote that one because one of my clients is on the board of an organization called Jack and Jill.

Yohance Harrison 9:52

I know Jack and Jill.

Mac Gardner 9:53

Yeah, yeah, she was on the board in Houston.

Yohance Harrison 9:55

They've been. They've been courting my daughter for a little while.

Mac Gardner 9:57

And, you know, it's a phenomenal organization. And she said, Mac, love what you love. Love the Mac Nuggets, Love what you wrote for adults. Would you be open to writing something for children? And so that's when we wrote the Four Money Bears book to really provide parents with young children of all backgrounds

Mac Gardner 10:15

a fun and entertaining way to start the conversation about money. Because if you never got it as a parent, how can you give it to your.

Mac Gardner 10:21

To your children? So that's how you talk about. This is. Yeah. No, you're right.

Mac Gardner 10:26

This is good stuff.

Yohance Harrison 10:31

A lot of our parents did not receive it from their parents and their parents not from their parents. Especially if you are a minority in the United States, because if you go back far enough, you hit that slavery wall where you did not have access. Okay. And even if you go right past that, you have one of the greatest bank failures in the United States history, when many newly free slaves were encouraged to put their money into a bank, and the bank raised millions of dollars in capital and lost it all. They were gone, and it was gone. Like the south park episode, my favorite one, when Kenny goes to investors. But not Kenny. What's the other name? Kyle. Whichever one researched South Park. And it's gone. One of the best. Anytime. Anytime the market is going down and it's, you know, it's just been one of those days. I just have to go watch, and it's gone. And I feel better because I'm like, at least it's not happening like that. But. But yeah, it was gone. One of the greatest bank failures. And that. It actually, that incident. My father was

Yohance Harrison 11:41

a. He was born in the 40s, and so his elders taught him to not trust the banks because they were the ones that actually lost their money in the banks. So that stayed with him until he was. Until I started working for a bank. And I was like, dad, come on. Let me. Let me. He's not like that anymore. Yeah, exactly. Yeah. I'm like, SIP Insurance.

Mac Gardner 11:52

Yeah. Yeah.

Mac Gardner 11:59

Let me. Sipc.

Yohance Harrison 12:06

And still, it was very hard to get him to have because it was deeply ingrained and instilled. It became part of his money script. That was his script. No, don't trust the banks.

Mac Gardner 12:16

Yeah. And the cultural aspect of all the things that build up a person culturally feeds into a lot of the behavioral aspects that pan out into how they deal with money. So, yeah, the space that I started a company called Finland Tech. Our mission is to build a bridge between financial literacy and financial technology because there's a bunch of financial literacy and knowledge out there, but there's not a lot of fintech that focuses on the knowledge aspect. Like, I can use my phone and get a loan. I can do some investing.

Yohance Harrison 12:55

Oh, I can throw away some money fast.

Mac Gardner 12:57

We can do lots of things, but, you know, there's nothing out there that deals with education. And I think at the core of what we're doing as financial literacy influencers, you know, advisors, whatever you want to call it, it's really education. I think education is important, and I think start the education process early.

Yohance Harrison 13:15

Absolutely. So let's talk about these bears. You. I know Goldilocks and the three bears, but that story doesn't have anything. Anything to do about with money.

Yohance Harrison 13:28

I guess it could. I guess you could make some money relations, but we'll do that another time. Let's talk about the four money bears. So. So can you tell us who the four money bears are? I think each have a role.

Mac Gardner 13:38

They do. And so in my first book, and motivate your money, I talk about these five steps to financial success. And these were steps that, as I worked in the wealth management, financial planning space over the years, there were the steps that people were taking. And then all of a sudden, at the, you know, when they got to retirement, they had money in the, in their accounts, they, they grew some. Well, they had assets to be able to pass on. And the first step is to plan accordingly. So you got to have a plan, some sort of financial.

Yohance Harrison 14:09

Okay, hold on, hold on. Okay, everybody go grab.

Yohance Harrison 14:14

Grab your, your financial journals. For those that have them, grab your journal and go ahead and write down these Mac nuggets. There we go.

Mac Gardner 14:22

Step one, plan accordingly. You have to have a plan, right? Step two, spend cautiously. If you overspend, guess what? You can't move on to step three, which is to save diligently.

Mac Gardner 14:37

Once you've spent cautiously, you save diligently. Guess what? You actually have assets where you can invest wisely.

Mac Gardner 14:44

Ah, I knew there was another ly Coming in there. Okay.

Mac Gardner 14:47

And then the last one is to give generously.

Mac Gardner 14:50

Oh, and you can. All lys.

Mac Gardner 14:52

You got to. And so now I like to say to folks, you can give at any point in time in. In your life, but what we find is that once you have your personal family, all those situations sort of taken care of, it's a lot easier to give generously. And that's. You often see philanthropists doing that. So those five steps of financial success. When we were looking at a platform to engage young people and engage children, I was like, okay, the book is literally the story of me and my wife teaching our kids about money. And in our house, I'm Papa Bear, my wife's mama bear, we have our three baby bears. So I said, okay, let's look at these four functions of money, and let's create characters where young people can understand that they actually have four options when it comes to their money, when they get it, and not just the two that most young people are familiar with, which is the spending and saving. So we created these four money bears. Spender Bear, Saver Bear, Investor Bear, and Giver Bear. And the whole idea is for these bears to teach kids the pros and cons of each function at the end to budget and work together. And when they all work together, they can have. They can. They can have happy, successful, healthy spending habits which become behaviors, which then become traits.

Mac Gardner 16:13

Shout out to your marketing department because I'm not going to be able to think about Build a Bear without thinking about Spend a Bear. Save a Bear. Saver Bear. Invest the Bear.

Mac Gardner 16:24

Spend, Save, invest, Give. Yeah, yeah, we're actually talking to them. We're in the talks with. With the Build a Bear company. Oh, we're doing. We're building an app right now called the four money bears Berryville. It's going to be ready by Q2, hopefully. Latest Q3 of next year that we. We. When I tell you, Johansson, that we are so fortunate. I wrote this book five, six years ago. We have global book sales. Germany, France, uk, South Africa, and it's only in English.

Mac Gardner 16:40

We're.

Mac Gardner 16:55

Hey, yeah, Money everywhere. And that's what I talk about this podcast. That's what I share with people. So, yeah, we may talk a lot about what's happening in America, but this is. This is a psychological. It's a global issue relationship that we have with our money. And it's everywhere because every. Unless you are an indigenous individual still living off the earth, cut off from electricity and all that other stuff, then other everybody else, you're you're affected by it. Because you're a part of this global village that we have in our relationship with money, the excesses and the lacks that all come with it. And we're all, I mean, whether we're dealing with hyperinflation or deflation or whatever and everything in between, we're all dealing with it.

Mac Gardner 16:58

But. But.

Mac Gardner 17:24

Yes.

Mac Gardner 17:42

Whether you have a scarcity perspective or an abundance perspective. It's, it's funny. I joke around, I tell people, I say, you know, people care what you look like. People can what you sound like. People care where you're from. Money doesn't. Money's just a tool. But, but if you know how to use that tool and you understand the functionality and the potential power that it has over time, those who understand are the ones going to be able to benefit from it.

Mac Gardner 17:55

Just a tool.

Mac Gardner 18:10

Absolutely. Yeah. Absolutely. Agreed. And. And it is. And that is again why this podcast is here. This is a brand new resource for you, everyone. Okay. Especially for those that have children's one. That's a question I get all the time. Hey, I'm trying to figure out how do I start talk to my kids about money? I was doing some research a few years ago about the tough conversations and I found out, I think it was Prudential had did this. They spent lots of money on asking all these pre Wright retirees and retirees about their fears when it comes to money. And one of the things that came up was talking about it with their kids and talking about money with their kids had a higher fear anxiety level than talking about death and sex.

Mac Gardner 18:58

I saw that study. Fascinating.

Mac Gardner 19:00

Absolutely fascinating. I was like, really? And, and I think it was because I'd been a financial advisor for about a decade by the time I came across it. And I was like, oh, people don't like talking. And had to start thinking about my own upbringing. I was like, oh, wait, we didn't talk about money. We talked about Bruno more than we talked about money because we all have Bruno's in our family. But we didn't talk about money. Money was. That's the real song. We don't talk about money. No, no, no, no, no, no, no.

Mac Gardner 19:25

Yeah, you know, we. When you look at the psychology of it, it's really fascinating.

Mac Gardner 19:32

I talk about the socialization of lots of things in life and how when you socialize things from an early age, language, religion, food. Right. Those things that get socialized from an early age become who you are, become your culture.

Mac Gardner 19:52

Finances is not one of them. But here's the crazy thing. There was a Cambridge study done a few years ago that shows that a child's connectivity with money starts as early as age 7.

Mac Gardner 20:07

Yep. Saw the same thing as early as age 5.

Mac Gardner 20:11

So think about it. Right now, if you, there are 15 states that require financial literacy for high school graduation by your senior year and.

Mac Gardner 20:24

You have the same Google search algorithms. Okay, keep going, Go ahead, go ahead.

Mac Gardner 20:28

So think about this. If you are fortunate to be in one of the 15 states that has it by when you're 17, 18, but studies show that your money habits start forming when you're age 7, that's a 10 year gap of 10 years of bad or misinformation or bad habits about what to do with money. And so that's why we are really, really big advocates of, we know there's a ton of education out there. We think there's a formula to this whole financial wellness that everyone's trying to get to. The formula is financial literacy. Gotta have it, gotta have the knowledge. Totally understand. But you must also have the financial capability. You've got to give people the tools in order to be able to get and implement all this knowledge. And so that's what our company, Finland Tech does. And we're starting it off by building a gamified solution based on the book.

Mac Gardner 21:21

So what age do you recommend the book for?

Mac Gardner 21:25

So it's a K through 5 engagement. So if you, some kids as young as age 5, all the way to, you know, 10, 11 years old, we find that fourth, fifth graders

Mac Gardner 21:38

are better with the math and are better with grasping some of the concepts of investing. I like, I do, I do a, a hundred dollar bill challenge. I started doing this when I'd go to schools and I start talking about finances. I'm like, okay, how am I gonna get these little kids to be quiet and sit down? So I'll pull out a hundred dollar bill. I'm like, if I give you this 100 bill, what would you do? And hands start flying up in the air like, oh, I'd buy this and I'd buy that. And what it became was an actual experiment to prove to people that children are conditioned to consume from a very early age. And, and a lot of times I talk about the three Rs of our connection with money. We realize what money is, you recognize what it does, then you start rationalizing how to use it. But if you get to that recognition stage and it's only bound by two options,

Mac Gardner 22:27

you don't realize you've got these other options. How can you rationalize it and do.

Mac Gardner 22:31

All these other great things, which is why I'm sure in your profession as mine, as we meet people, they say, where were you 10, 20, 30, 40, 50 years ago? Because they had no concept of some of the things that we bring to the table. So, speaking of young age, with all of our guests, there's some research that I'm doing because, like you, I intend to be an author one day. And so I'm gathering stories from individuals because I am a firm believer that we all are impressed by money at a very early age. Like you mentioned the Cambridge researcher saying as early as age 7. And I'm also in the questions I've been asking of people, I find out that sometimes it's even earlier for some people, especially if you have siblings and you see some of what they're going through, or if you come from a family that went through some struggles, sometimes those struggles started a lot. You became aware of the struggle a lot earlier. So the question I have for you, sir, is what is your first memory of money?

Mac Gardner 23:34

My first memory was a very formalized one, and I'll tell you why. My from Caribbean background. Dad was born in Antigua, my mom was born in Haiti. Dad went to Howard for his undergrad and then went to NYU for his MBA and was a bank executive for years. And I clear as day, remember my dad sitting down with me and, and literally taking a piece of paper and writing a T chart and writing assets on one side, liabilities on the other side, and then another T chart, and it was cash flow, income and expenses. And, and, and so it's, it's so funny when you look back on how you get to where you are. And you know, a lot of times it's not by accident, but I, my dad had a, had a formal background in finance and sat down with me at a really, really young age and.

Mac Gardner 24:35

Was like, you are one of the lucky ones.

Mac Gardner 24:38

See, all We Are, your house at the end of our day. And I tell people this and I truly believe it. And our Heart of Hearts is a collection of stories. Yeah, All We Are.

Mac Gardner 24:48

That's it. And money itself is a collection of stories.

Mac Gardner 24:52

How you manage it, what you do with it. So our kids, you say you have a daughter, right?

Mac Gardner 24:58

A daughter and a son. So I have a son, a senior in college and a kindergartner.

Mac Gardner 25:02

Okay. So your kids, our kids, they're going to be fortunate. They're going to hear stories about 401ks and IRAs and stocks and bonds and what to do with all blah, blah, blah, 95, if not higher. Children will not get any of those stories. And so that's why we created this four Money Beer book to start changing narratives in homes in underserved and overlooked communities, and then step it up even higher by developing this app that we can leverage technology to get to places so that narratives and stories and homes can change.

Mac Gardner 25:19

No.

Mac Gardner 25:43

Man, I love it. I am. Thank you for all of the work that you're doing. We can't wait to join the mission with you. I. I'm already thinking about. We just had parent teacher conferences today, so with the kindergartner, of course, and. And everything's great. It was, you know, it's a formality if nothing else. But in my mind as I'm sitting there and they're talking about the concepts they're learning, money wasn't on the sheet of paper. I didn't say anything out loud, but that's in my. I'm retching in my stomach like, y'all can't teach. You could at least. You could at least teach. Teach the coins. Why can't the coins be in there? You know, she. She's five. She knows what money is.

Mac Gardner 26:22

Believe me, you will appreciate this because you're in Texas. So when I wrote the book, we were living in Houston. I bought the book to my kids school. They were in elementary school at the time. And I gave it to the principal. She starts flipping through this. She's like, Mac, do you know what you have on your hands here? Like, book to start teaching elementary kids about money? She said, texas has these teaks, these, these, I guess, requirements. And the state of Texas is starting to, or may have started already to introduce financial literacy at some point in time in their curriculum earlier than high school. And she's like, Mac, there's nothing like this out there. Again, this is five, six years ago. And so we have some tailwinds behind us. More states are starting to realize that it's important and that the onus kind of falls upon the state, the education system to provide this. But there's still so much work to be done. So much work.

Mac Gardner 27:18

So speaking of work, you have an app that's coming next year. We have the. The four Money Bears. I. I'm sure they can get that wherever books are sold.

Mac Gardner 27:31

Amazon, like, you can buy pretty much everything nowadays.

Mac Gardner 27:33

All right, I'll make sure to create a QR code for that. So I get a little credit for pushing your book along. That'll be in the show notes. Let's see. And then you have your other. Your first book. Your first book, Motivate your money also wherever, also on Amazon. I look forward now. Have you, have you created a audiobook yet?

Mac Gardner 27:40

Thank you. Thank you.

Mac Gardner 27:55

We've created an audiobook for the four money beer. So you can actually go to YouTube and you can play that at your leisure. We're actually working on the next project at Finland Tech is to develop a multimedia financial education platform with a. A diverse, equitable and inclusive focus titled Motivate your money. And so we're in the process of interviewing

Mac Gardner 28:25

CFPs, financial advisors, so on and so forth because.

Mac Gardner 28:31

Was this my interview? See ah, see interviewing here.

Mac Gardner 28:36

You didn't realize.

Mac Gardner 28:39

No, but interestingly enough, some of the. Some of the input that we're getting from financial institutions is that the financial education, financial literacy contents out there is byzantine. It is old, it is boring, it is stale, and it is male pale and stale.

Mac Gardner 28:57

It is run by older for everyone. For all of my fin. Twit community out there. You all know I went through some continuing education at the beginning of the year that I had to do, and I was a little late on getting it done, so I was, I was cramming. And the vendor that I chose is the largest vendor of financial continuing education in the country. And out of the 15 or so modules that I did, it was very old and pale.

Mac Gardner 29:30

I started screenshot. I said, you've got to be kidding me. And then the one time, or not the one time, the few times that they would depict someone that was making poor money decisions, they were always female or ethnic.

Mac Gardner 29:48

This is just an ant. The drawings had to be from like 1972. I'm like, come on, you updated everything else.

Mac Gardner 29:56

Archaic.

Mac Gardner 29:57

I was like, you could have given me Bart Simpson characters at this point. I would have felt a little bit better. Yeah, yeah.

Mac Gardner 30:02

So. So you. You're living it, brother.

Mac Gardner 30:05

Oh, yeah, I'm living it. I'm living it. Yeah. No, I. I fired a marketing company. I had a marketing company that I started working with to do. To do my newsletters. And they said, here, you can customize this and we'll do the templates. And so I started with them because I was early on, I was like, all right, yeah, I need something, so I'll go with this. And so I want to call. I was like, hey, so I'm a black financial advisor and a lot of my clients look like me.

Mac Gardner 30:34

So I was wondering if there's a way that the marketing can look like me too.

Mac Gardner 30:39

Yeah.

Mac Gardner 30:42

I know, right? We'll get back to you that. About 90 days goes by, I get back to him, and I wind up getting the VP of marketing. And she started apologizing in ways you would never believe. And she said, you're right. We. This needs to be fixed. We've got to fix this. And she's like, we don't have a fix for you. Because I also asked, well, can you make it so I can change out the images? And, like, the technology doesn't allow that. I said, you're fired.

Mac Gardner 31:11

So just to let you know, there's a company here in Tampa that is creating diverse, equitable, inclusive stock, photographs and stock. Yeah.

Mac Gardner 31:24

So. So the decision I made. So I wind up going to another company. Decision I made. Is that I have a beautiful family and a beautiful team. So we do photo shoots sometimes a year. And we just. We have. We. We. I. I have a zero stock policy now for website. There's just still a few things in the marketing campaigns where. Like the landing page. I can't change that yet. But every other image, like, no, it's gonna be us. Yeah, it's gonna be us. Like, yeah.

Mac Gardner 31:27

Yeah.

Mac Gardner 31:32

There you go.

Mac Gardner 31:48

So. So we're working to make a big change where we want to have. We want the face of financial education to be representative. Representative of the actual society that we're in, which is this huge melting pot. People, different backgrounds, different cultures. So we're working lots of cool stuff.

Mac Gardner 32:07

So I'm excited. Well, I'm glad. I don't even know how we found you, how we found each other, but I'm glad we're here. You click the link, you schedule. You scheduled it. We. We found each other somewhere. But this is exciting. All right, so we've talked about your current projects. Oh, where do we find you? The Instagram or. Yeah, tell us about that.

Mac Gardner 32:24

So Twitter is Matt Gardner underscore CFP Instagram. You can find me either the Four Money Bears or FinLit Tech. And then you can also go to our website, www.the4moneybears.com.

Mac Gardner 32:40

It's spelled out T H E F O U M I E R B A R S. And you can learn about. You can actually download the demo of the app and kick the tires and play a little bit.

Mac Gardner 32:49

I will be kicking some tires.

Mac Gardner 32:51

Please do. And you can buy the book there as well. Yeah. So we're just. We're on this mission again to build a bridge between financial literacy and financial technology and anything that we can do to. To help more people.

Mac Gardner 33:04

I'm pumped. I. I'm excited. I'm excited. How did we Say it earlier. What was yours? I said, if that doesn't get your fire burning, your wood is wet. You had another one.

Mac Gardner 33:15

Oh, which is the one that I had. The, the.

Mac Gardner 33:18

The old enough use another one you had. I forgot it.

Mac Gardner 33:23

Oh. Oh, okay. I. If I remember before our time is up. But hey, usually when people ask what I'm doing, I say, I'm doing what I got to do. Do to get what I got to get.

Mac Gardner 33:24

If I.

Mac Gardner 33:31

I gotta get. I know that one. Stay ready. Ain't got to get ready. Let's get it. All right. So awesome. Thank you, Mac, for spending some time with us today. We can't wait to have you on the show again. Make sure you check out all the links in our show notes so you can get your hands on the four money bears so you can learn more about the motivate your money. Speaking of motivate your money. Hey, by the way, I have a huge announcement for future shows. You guys, listen. Okay, the most amazing thing happened. So I told y'all I'm in school, right? So I took this law class. When I took this law class, I learned about fair use. I learned some things about fair use that I did not know. So I've now created a whole show going back to motivating your money. I've talked before about my money motivation playlist. Okay. By the way, there's another company out there called Money motivation. They do graphic tees and sweatshirts. Good friend of mine. I'll connect the two of you because I think you guys can do some co elaboration. He's. He's. He's killing it right now. Like, he's also a black financial professional as well. We used to work together some time back. Anywho,

Mac Gardner 34:39

we are going to be breaking down the financial literacy and the lack thereof in hip hop music. Oh, I'm a huge hip hop fan. And I'll tell you what, if you tried to do a, a, a, a search, you know those little word things that tell you how often something is talked about and you were to go across all of hip hop, you're going to find that money is going to be pretty big one. It's gonna be a big one. That's in there pretty pervasive. But really, they just talk about making it, spending it, you ready for it, rarely saving it, rarely investing it. Go ahead, Mac. What you got for me?

Mac Gardner 35:05

Big.

Mac Gardner 35:18

I'm gonna hit you. I'm hit you with one. The issue that we see very often when it comes to personal finances is people focus on the fruits and not the roots.

Mac Gardner 35:33

Hip hop, very. Yep.

Mac Gardner 35:35

Hip hop focuses on the fruits and.

Mac Gardner 35:38

And not just the fruits. No, they focus on the. On. On the. On the fruits that spoil the quickest. So. So not like a nice firm apple is going to be for a while. No, they focus on some strawberries. Just, you know, but just have any.

Mac Gardner 35:48

Yeah, just.

Mac Gardner 35:51

Value depreciating assets when the focus could be on the roots. And that is the education, that is the knowledge of the solutions, knowledge of the process. And. And. And. And so funny you say that, man. I would love whenever that project takes.

Mac Gardner 36:06

Oh, we'll wait. So. So. Oh, we have a. So I. I've been curating it for a few weeks now, so I've. I've. I have now categorized into. We're gonna. We're gonna play some songs, some snippets of some songs that are just bad. We're gonna also pay some ones that are kind of middle of the road. But I found some gems. There are some gems out there. And the sad thing is about a lot of the gyms, they don't make it to the Billboard charts.

Mac Gardner 36:29

So it doesn't get past play.

Mac Gardner 36:31

They don't make it. So we want to make sure that we highlight some of those artists and not just Jay Z, because everybody. I mean, for those of you that hip hop fans, you're probably thinking, oh, you can just do the whole 444 album. I'm like, I can, but I can also go back to his first album, and he was not on that level. He was Money ain't a thing. Him and Jermaine Dupree, they said, money ain't a thing. They're throwing it all over the place. Okay. But he. He maturated over time because we. We also know. And just giving you, all of you, some tidbits of some of the things we'll explore. When he talks about on the 444. The. The. He could have bought a place in Dumbo when it was 2 million. Now it's 20 million. Whatever. I forgot the math problem. He says, now I'm looking at myself. Dumbo, we're gonna explore that. We're gonna explore him and Beyonce's album. When they did the Boss, he said, you ain't a boss. You got a boss.

Mac Gardner 37:18

Yeah, let me know, man. Let me know.

Mac Gardner 37:20

Yeah, I'll make sure that I curate an episode just for you. And we'll go and we'll. We'll take a look at five songs and look for the financial literacy in those songs. And make sure that people can, can look to something that they love, that that's something that's so careless and carefree and actually get something out of it. So with that, Mac, thank you so much for, for joining the show. Everyone, of course, of course, love us. I think YouTube, I'm learning my, my buttons here. Subscribe. There's a button, button. There's a button somewhere around here there's a button. Press it. It says subscribe so that you know, you'll get the other YouTubes. For those of us that are still listening, if you're especially my whole crew, my truckers that are out there on the road, my students that are out there studying so hard, keep listening, share it with a friend and, you know, pick up this book about the four bears. By the way, he said it's the four money bears. He said it's K through 5. If you've already achieved K through 5, it doesn't mean you can't learn from it.

Mac Gardner 38:16

And a lot of parents, yeah, a lot of parents have actually thanked us for not making it too, Kitty, because.

Mac Gardner 38:21

I'm confident and I'm confident, so, so I encourage all of us to have some fun with this. And Mac, thanks again for being a friend of the show. We look forward to having you back. And who knows, maybe I'll get to loan my voice to something you're working on in the new future.

Mac Gardner 38:34

Oh, that's going to happen, man. I like to say the financial life journey is a long one, right? Thankfully, you have amazing clients and amazing people that you, that you help to impact and what, what motivates you, motivates your money, man. Journey continues.

Mac Gardner 38:51

Journey continues with that. We'll see you next time right here on the Money Script podcast. Y'all take care.

Speaker 3 38:57

Thanks for joining us on the Money Script podcast. Be sure to check out our other episodes. Subscribe, follow and give us five stars. Continue to send your financial questions on Twitter or Instagram hemoneyscript. Go to moneyscriptwealth.com and schedule your complimentary consultation to discuss your specific goals and concerns. Financial advisory and investment management services are offered by MoneyScript Wealth Management, PLLC, a registered investment advisor advisory firm registered in the state of Texas and California and other states where exempt. The Money Script LLC and the MoneyScript Wealth Management PLLC and guests of the episode may have interest in the investments mentioned today. The opinions and views are expressed here or for informational purposes only. This material is educational in nature and should not be deemed as a solicitation for any specific product or service. All investments involve risk and a significant loss of principal. The Money Script and nor MoneyScript Wealth Management offer tax or legal advice. Please consult your tax advisor or attorney for specific advice about your situation. Until next time.