We begin with a discussion of the all-new, all-electric Ford F-150 Lightning pickup. Judging by the numbers, there's no doubt that the Lightning is already a hit–but is its success a phenomenon or was it inevitable? Then, we announce the new Gear Patrol Library of Pursuits, a series of newsletter-based courses that are all but guaranteed to improve your life thanks to a boatload of expert advice. It's a perfect pursuit for the new year. Lastly, the New Year and… you! We asked our Instagram followers to submit their 2022 product resolutions: the gear goals you hope to achieve this year, whether that means upgrading, checking something off your grail list, a new purchasing behavior… sky's the limit. Spoiler alert: we had a lot of great responses, so don't miss out on our reactions and advice for everyone who wrote in.
It's no surprise that Gear Patrol fans have great taste and lofty product resolutions for 2022. Also in this episode: F-150 Lightning popularity and the Library of Pursuits.
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Nick Caruso:
This is The Gear Patrol podcast for Friday, January 7th, 2022. Happy new year. I'm Nick Caruso and I hope 2022 finds you happy and healthy. I'm glad you're here because we are starting our chat in this brave new year by discussing the all-new, all-electric, Ford F-150 Lightning pickup truck. Judging by the numbers, there's no doubt that the lightning is already a huge hit. But is it success a phenomenon or was it inevitable? Then we're discussing all-new offering by yours truly, meaning Gear Patrol, called the Library of Pursuits. It's a series of newsletter-based courses that are all but guaranteed to improve your life. It's free, it's full of expert advice, and we're going to get the rundown on what to expect there.
Nick Caruso:
Lastly, we're so sort of doing a full circle kind of thing and turning to the new year and to you. If you follow us on Instagram, you likely saw us asking for your gear goals for the year in our story today. We're looking for product resolutions you plan to realize over the next 12 months. We got a ton of responses, which is awesome. We will share those and some of our own. Perhaps some suggestions or shall we say reactions to yours, in case you need a little affirmation or criticism to start the year. So with me, the we, in question, our platform's editor, JD DiGiovanni, and associate editor of production design, Henry Phillips. Hello, JD.
JD DiGiovanni:
Hey there. How's it going?
Nick Caruso:
I'm great. Hello, Henry.
Henry Phillips:
Hey there, happy new year.
Nick Caruso:
Thank you. Guys, what's your review of 2022 so far?
Henry Phillips:
So far, so good, man. Things are like cruising.
JD DiGiovanni:
Yeah, new year, same radiator, unfortunately. So I'm not sure how positive review I can give it. That's at least the biggest doc, is that I still have the same radiator. So apologies for any knocking and clanging. Yeah.
Nick Caruso:
Right. I don't think we ever had an issue on the podcast but if anybody's ever had a video conference with JD when it's cold out, there's like a soundtrack in the background. It's kind of like stump but in his apartment.
JD DiGiovanni:
Yeah. The Blue Man Group lives in our radiator room, so it's kind of a vibe.
Nick Caruso:
Exactly, perfect. Well, let's get right into this stuff because there's actually a fair amount to cover. We're laying the groundwork for a year of podcasts. Our first story is about the all-electric Ford Lightning pickup truck. So the truck isn't out yet but folks are absolutely clamoring for it. I was going to say it feels sort of like near Rivian-level hype but if you go by numbers, it's actually much greater. So Ford had to actually shut down the reservation system for the new truck because too many people to the tune of 200,000 reserved theirs. Ford has increased production numbers twice already.
Nick Caruso:
So just so we're on the same page, of course, this is an electric version of the best-selling vehicle in America, The F-150 pickup truck. The base model called Pro starts at just under $40,000. The platinum trim truck starts at over $90,000. Starts at that, which is crazy because you can also expect massive dealer markups when these hit the showroom floors. So my biggest question here is this level of fervor unexpected or was the F-150 by dent of being the F-150, this is the F-150 of the future? Is it inevitable that we were going to see a wild success here? I have my opinions but Henry, I'm coming to you first to ask because, well, you better believe I'm going to bring up some new economics in a little while. But what's your take overall first?
Henry Phillips:
I just can't wait. I've been reading my Adam Smith all break, it's going to be awesome.
Nick Caruso:
He had a lot to say about the F-150 as I recall.
Henry Phillips:
Yeah, he was a big fan of trucks generally. It seems super cool. To me, it can't be that surprising that this thing is so in-demand. Isn't the F-150 like consistently the best-selling vehicle on earth?
Nick Caruso:
Yes, it is, by a lot.
Henry Phillips:
So you would expect that the electric version of the best-selling vehicle on earth would sell reasonably well. But I also think it's such a... I personally really love it just because it's kind of normal in a lot of ways. It's an electric power train that ticks most of the boxes and kind of covers the baseline. Then doesn't really try and do all that much more than that. It's got a couple cool kind of gimmicky features but generally, it's an F-150, and I think maybe that's part of the appeal. One of our motoring guys, Tyler Duffy, threw in the Gear Patrol Slack, that Ford is currently making the best cars that you can't buy because of similar success and supply constraints with the Bronco.
Henry Phillips:
Yeah, I think they're making really appealing stuff that kind of taps into what people like about Ford products. While modernizing it in a really kind of nice way. So I like it, I don't think I would ever buy one just because I'm not hauling lumber. But were I to get into the lumber-hauling business, I'm in.
Nick Caruso:
Yeah. I think that's a great point about it being normal. That's such a... Since the dawn of hybrid cars, we'll call them for not much longer, I suppose, alt-fuel vehicles. It looks freaking weird. The Prius, in my opinion, is one of the ugliest things that's ever rolled down the road ever in history. Some people really like those aesthetics, sort of like the quirky. Even Teslas are kind of weird looking but this just looks like another F-150 with a very few styling changes. I'd love to see more of that in the space. Like a bunch of cars that I love the look of, just put electric motors in them. Do that everybody. JD, what do you think, is this surprising kind of hype around the F-150 Lightning or what?
JD DiGiovanni:
In some ways, actually what's kind of surprising to me is the relative lack of hype around the car. I think in the motoring world everyone's talking about it. Obviously, it's getting a lot of traction. Pretty much all the indicators you would look to see like is this going to be a success or not? Are kind of pointing towards yes. I think that's great for the planet and all this other stuff and just a general trajectory of how we move around. But I'll just be the guy to talk about Elon Musk first in this podcast because he's always kind of lurking around there when we ever talk about EVs. It's kind of surprising to me actually, how all of this news isn't translating to the same hype it's reflected in stock prices, which is it just interesting. I don't really know much about investing in individual companies but when you're using that as a barometer for excitement about something, that seems to be a pretty good one. I'm not really sure what to take of that, I don't know. What do you think, Nick?
Nick Caruso:
Yeah, it's an interesting point. The F-150 is just sort of like a foregone conclusion at this point. It is kind of... I'm thinking of the Avengers like this is inevitable. This is like, that was right, Thanos, was inevitable, is that right? I don't know.
JD DiGiovanni:
Yeah.
Nick Caruso:
Yeah.
Henry Phillips:
We're just going to go with it.
Nick Caruso:
It's like every year hundreds of thousands of F-150s will be purchased. I assume that means that every year a humongous number of people are retiring their old trucks and getting the new truck. That's just what they drive, the F-150. This year it happens that the new F-150 is electric and they're just like I'll also do that. That's the surprising part to me. I think I'm happy to be surprised by this but I've always assumed that most, certainly enthusiasts, like automotive enthusiasts. But a lot of customers, shoppers in the United States will be really put off by the idea of an electric car. There will be too many hurdles or this just like they're not sure and they'll avoid it. But as far as I can tell people are just kind of like accepting EV generally. Obviously, there are holdouts, obviously, there are naysayers. But that's why this is surprising to me. It's such a smooth transition into the electric world.
Henry Phillips:
Yeah, and for such a product that you would... Yeah, I'm totally in the same boat, where it's an electric truck. People were having small riots when they started making body panels out of aluminum or it was the frame out of aluminum. But that's the kind of culture that this entering into. This like truck dude environment. Yeah, and it's so surprising to see it so kind of seemingly well adopted. I can't believe, they haven't delivered too many yet.
JD DiGiovanni:
It's a lot of those same kind of stuff though that we've seen with other trucks. [inaudible 00:10:56] it's a lot of the same trends are kind of going along with this too, they're huge one. Then secondly, they're so expensive. The pro starts at $40,000 and, obviously, that's not factoring in the federal tax credit you get from buying an EV. But you go up the XLT, it's like 52.9 grand, platinum of 90 grand. That's so expensive, man, that's crazy.
Henry Phillips:
That's so insane.
JD DiGiovanni:
But the thing is that's not really news. I think we've even talked about it before on the pod. Where it's just big pickup trucks are kind of just like an American version of a luxury vehicle. They're not really... We were talking about hauling lumber earlier and it's like I don't need a haul lumber, so yada, yada. But how many people who are spending 100 grand on their pickup truck are using it for labor every day? I don't know, I could be wrong.
Henry Phillips:
No, and maybe that kind of explains the EV adoption in a way, where it's just the new kind of like luxury feature. Once you get the kind of basic constraints out of the way, like can it drive as far as I need it to drive and all of that? Then it's just a cool thing to brag to your buddies about. About how you can power your house with your car or your truck, rather.
Nick Caruso:
Yeah. Henry, you brought up a good point earlier. When the F-150 started utilizing aluminum in its frame, people lost their minds. The other... There was another inflection point. When Ford introduced the EcoBoost six-cylinder in the F-150. Is turbocharged, little thing, six-cylinder, four-cylinder?
Henry Phillips:
Yeah.
Nick Caruso:
Whatever. People were like my V-8 kind of reactions. That quickly subsided because the EcoBoost outperformed the other vehicles or the other engines. I expect that once these hit the streets and people get behind the wheel, they will realize that electricity outperforms fossil fuel when it's powering a car in many important metrics. So that wouldn't surprise me but yeah, this upfront acceptance does very pleasantly so.
Nick Caruso:
I shared... Well, I tried to share a clip, I couldn't, I shared the entire thing off a podcast with you guys. It's one of my new favorites actually and it's called Plain English with Derek Thompson. One of the recent episodes, he's an Atlantic writer, contributor, and among other things, a journalist. In this episode, he and his guests were discussing myths of economics and it hit me. It really struck me, this particular part of the conversation. Which basically, inflation is a huge news item right now because the economy. We're going through a period of inflation, sort of like noticeable. That's all measured by the CPI, the Consumer Price Index, which is basically the cost of goods, right, the change. They bust this myth that the CPI is really like a relevant statistic in a lot of ways because it's just like an average of American households and everyone spends money differently. So I'm not sure I'm asking a question here so much as I'm just tying bits together.
Nick Caruso:
I was gobsmacked by the price of the Lightning, the top end. We're going to expect many thousands of dollars of markups. I was like how can 200,000 people be committing to an expensive electric truck right now? Then I heard this podcast and it kind of like changed my perspective a bit. It makes sense like people just bought... This is people are buying trucks and that is the state of the truck economy is good. I guess, is my punchline there. Henry, you're the expert. Is that true up with what Adam Smith taught you?
Henry Phillips:
Absolutely. No, to touch briefly on the CPI. Yeah, I think it's generally, it's a really simplistic look at how inflation works. People refer to it as like a basket of products. So you go to the grocery store and you're buying whatever, milk, eggs, cheese, an iPod, whatever. It's the kind [inaudible 00:15:49].
Nick Caruso:
Dairy and an iPod.
Henry Phillips:
Yeah, they go together like peanut butter and milkshakes. Anyway, so the kind of classic critique is that it doesn't really measure progress very well. So things get better and that's not really accounted for, which maybe is the case with the Lightning. Certainly, it is a luxury truck by any measure, especially at the top end. So I think like stuff's getting more expensive. Inflation is certainly a real deal but you wonder yeah, how much of it is ascribed to that versus they're really making a high-end product and kind of accordingly. But a brief kind of thing is that I've been kind of interested about is the markups. You're placing these reservations but ultimately, not quite sure what you're going to pay for it, which is wild to me. It kind of made me think that for however much I might deride Tesla for a variety of reasons. The direct to consumer purchasing is one of the more impressive things that they've done by a pretty large margin.
Nick Caruso:
For sure.
Henry Phillips:
You buy this car and you're putting in a reservation years out and you're going to pay that much for that car. It's like buying something off Amazon. Whereas this is really wacky, the idea that you could reserve something and then be forced to pay like 30 grand more.
Nick Caruso:
Yeah, and that's a real number by the way. We discussed that in on Slack, I think several of us. 30 grand is not an unrealistic amount to expect some markups for these trucks to be. $30,000, which is a truck. You could buy a loaded Ford Maverick for that. JD, I cut you off, I'm sorry.
JD DiGiovanni:
No. Yeah, totally. I think it's a testament to like we can crack jokes about Elon Musk all day and probably would if given the opportunity. But Tesla made this business model. They're the ones who really brought it and they also just made it cool to drive an electric car. I think that's we're talking about why this is being adopted and why people are excited about it. I think you can't honestly assess the answer to that question or answer that question without giving credit to Tesla and Elon Musk. For making it like a cool thing to drive a Tesla and have a super-fast car that has a bunch of torque. Making that exciting and neat. I love to mention, is just people don't do things out of altruism, really. They do it, at least, not consistently or reliably. But they do things off of self-interest. It's a cool thing, if like a nice flex is to have an electric truck, that's great, that's fine. Let's lean into that. I think that anyone, whoever wants to make positive change in the world should take note, you should make it cool. You should make it something that people want to do based off of really shallow and narrow-minded reasons.
Nick Caruso:
Yeah, man, sex sells. That is really interesting. I'm sure that, obviously, the automotive industry has been expecting a comeback of electric propulsion for a long time. But I'm sure like CEOs of major car company, like Ford, whatever, GM were watching Tesla. Being like man when we uncork this, we're going to let him ride, make it cool. When we do this, people are going to be like, well, I would love to have a Tesla but I'll just go with my brand. Just clean up, which is exactly what they're doing.
Henry Phillips:
Yeah. Think about if you hold a reservation for a Cyber Truck right now, you're looking at at least a year still after waiting.
Nick Caruso:
Yeah. What just happened, they delayed it again?
Henry Phillips:
2022 delivery date off of their site. So safe to assume that it's not going to happen in 2022, which this car was announced 2019, I think.
Nick Caruso:
Yeah.
Henry Phillips:
Late 2019.
Nick Caruso:
'18. '19? '18, I think.
Henry Phillips:
A long time. People have put down these $100 deposits and I can't even remember what the base price of this truck is. But consider it like mostly irrelevant at this point. But yeah, you're 60, you're going up to 70, 80. If I could say you could have that now or an F-150 or that in whenever you get it or an F-150 [noonish 00:20:54], that's an easier sell.
Nick Caruso:
Right. You could just buy a cubist interpretation of a cast iron pan and put some wheels on it, and roll down the road, either one. Last question on this segment because I think it is nice to tie back to the hype. So F-150 is the truck. That is the perhaps safe to say, now the quintessential truck. Its Lightning seems to be doing really well but the other player in the game right now... Well, Chevy just debuted their Silverado EV, which is going to be go-gang busters too. But what kind of chance do you guys think Rivian has against these guys?
JD DiGiovanni:
I have no idea. They seem like cool cars, I don't know.
Henry Phillips:
They seem super cool. They're the cool like boutique guy and they've got a boatload of money. I believe if my terrible stock market knowledge is up to date, Rivian is worth-
Nick Caruso:
We do some real-time research right now.
Henry Phillips:
About 90% of what Ford is worth according to people with money, which is frankly insane. But yeah, they've got a boatload of money, they've got like a bunch of cache. They are producing trucks, however, one every few days. They're doing their thing and I think they're like... Maybe they kind of start to wonder if they're like become the Range Rover to Ford's F-150 or something. But yeah, it's hard to imagine on equal footing in terms of pure sales numbers. If a boutique place like... I say boutique but they're worth $80 billion. If a company like Rivian could compete with a company like Ford but it'll be fun to see. Speaking of like kind of econ 101 and a baseline knowledge of it. The more people there are competing for truck guys dollars, the better products you're going to get, and the cheaper they're going to be. So yeah, I'm all for it. Just give more EV wars, give me people who are producing cool stuff at reasonable prices.
Nick Caruso:
Amen. It's still kind of want to get in. A buddy of mine's picking up a Rivian R1S, the SUV when it comes out.
Henry Phillips:
That's so cool.
Nick Caruso:
It's bound for him, I cannot wait. Okay. He's, by the way, upgrading from a Mach-E, so it's like quite a life.
Henry Phillips:
Did those just like literally just come out?
Nick Caruso:
Yeah but when you're good, you're good. What can I say?
Henry Phillips:
He loves an EV.
Nick Caruso:
You got to hand it to him. Cool. Well, I think that was a very thorough rundown of that story, so thank you both. Let's move on to not a new story but something that our listeners will certainly be interested in because it comes from the geniuses at Gear Patrol. So this segment, so it's a little meta. JD has headed up an awesome new effort at Gear Patrol called the Library of Pursuits. Our slogan is for life's pursuits, so this is on the money. I don't know if that was a coincidence or not but it's email newsletter-based. So you can sign up specifically for a single topic or what we're calling courses. You'll get the multi-installment course delivered directly to your inbox. Each lesson is chock-full of expert interviews and advice, plus a hell of a lot of context and product recommendation. A lot of stuff going on. So, JD, can you give us a better description of the Library of Pursuits and chat with us a little bit about it?
JD DiGiovanni:
Yeah, sure. Look, I think the entire project was kind of born out of this idea that when you're trying to get into something, it's not enough to just to know what to buy. If you want to... I think the first installment we're doing is how to get and stay fit. I think this is a really tricky one and a very topical one for this time of year when people are setting new year's resolutions. When you come to sites like Gear Patrol, you often find a lot of different recommendations. Based off of what are the best shoes or what are the best shorts and things of the sort. We stand by all those recommendations. But if you really want to build a kind of lasting habit, there's a lot more you kind of could go through.
JD DiGiovanni:
I think in this case and in the case of fitness, in particular, it's a lot more actually about the frame of mind that you enter into. A kind of like a challenge like that or I can do a lifestyle shift. Than it is about any particular thing you're trying to accomplish. You want to get super-fast and you're running or if you want to like drop a bunch of weight or if you want to put on a bunch of weight. There are a lot of different things you can kind of set. But the intent of this course was to help people go through those steps of kind of laying out the framework in their own mind as to what are the goals they want to set. What are the things they should kind of try to make sure they avoid? What are the types of styles that they can train in? How do you think about diet in a way that doesn't make you want to totally lose your mind because you're counting calories and everything? Then, yeah how do you make sure you can accomplish the goals you want without getting burned out?
JD DiGiovanni:
I think that's a challenge all of us have faced whether it's in fitness, in particular or in kind of any other thing that we set for ourselves to accomplish. But yeah, that's the kind of gist of what this thing is and why we ended up producing it.
Nick Caruso:
Yeah, fitness, just to kind of go on a small tangent. The idea of getting your head in the right space has always been really like a striking principle to me. Specifically, in terms of diet, which you also mentioned. It's like diets are not... Sort of fad diets don't work, this is a lifestyle change. You need to change what you're up to and that starts inside your head or arguably inside your heart if you want to be metaphorical. So this, yeah and I've read through all this content. This is really thorough, sort of like step-wise very logical, very digestible way to sort of start training yourself to do that. So can you talk a little bit about like what people would expect if they sign up for a course?
JD DiGiovanni:
Yeah, totally. When you sign up for these courses, for this one, specifically, what you'll get is two emails a week. We deliver them on Tuesdays and Thursdays in the morning. Each email contains about, I don't know, we have a kind of main lesson, some kind of fun facts. Then we give you something to try yourself at the end of it. So it'll kind of occur over the course of three or four weeks. We got an intro email and an outro there too. But yeah, so it's about a month long. I think I speak for more than just myself in saying that it's really easy to get overwhelmed by info, in general, and especially so when you're trying to learn something new for the first time. So taking time to read something and then sleep on it and then come to something new and read that and sleep on it is definitely part of the approach here.
Nick Caruso:
Yeah, cool. Can we talk about other topics or are those mum for now? You want to tease any?
JD DiGiovanni:
Yeah, we have a couple more coming up next month and the month after that. We'll be kind of sharing announcements on-site when we're ready to share those. Yeah.
Nick Caruso:
Yeah. Henry, you're part of this too, though. I don't want to leave you entirely. Let you just kind of like lazy over there with your dog, Dart. Maybe not you directly but part of the presentation of these things is these awesome illustrations. I was talking to JD about this sort of extensively yesterday. Is just like sort of striking artwork and it's really fun and different than what you normally see on Gear Patrol. But they're custom stuff that was made for this purpose. Can you talk a little bit about how that process went?
Henry Phillips:
Yeah, totally. So the Library Pursuits can kind of has this kind of vintagey, really kind of abstract in a lot of ways style. It's to kind of match this messaging of here kind of things but maybe not super concrete products or items. As a result, got these great illustrations done by this illustrator named Kayla Ogawa. Who we've worked with in the past on a handful of projects, both in the magazine and on the website. They're really awesome. No amount of me describing them is ever going to do them justice. So would highly encourage everyone to subscribe. But yeah, they're really great and they're not overly complicated. They're kind of a really elegant pairing I think to a newsletter and a course that is only as deep as it needs to be, to be effective. I think JD had it just right, where we're not kind of trying to overwhelm or over saturate here. I think the visuals do a great job of that.
Nick Caruso:
Yeah, for sure. That's a great point about the content too. Is that like something I've always told writers. Is that you've got a lot of information to impart. You want to do it in a nice way that you really love and you want to make sure that it reads really well. But once you are done imparting the information, stop writing, you're done writing now. When you're editing, that's kind of the marker too. It is really succinct, it's really actionable stuff and relatable. I know we're doing a little naval-gazing here but we're excited about this because it's new and it's a little different than the stuff we normally do. We hope you, listeners will enjoy this stuff. If you do, you should tell JD because it's from his [muggin 00:32:43]. JD, any last-
JD DiGiovanni:
Yeah. Well, I had a... No, is it really bad? Is my mic terrible?
Henry Phillips:
It's perfect.
Nick Caruso:
No, your interjection was like such a shock.
JD DiGiovanni:
Sorry.
Henry Phillips:
That's okay.
JD DiGiovanni:
Yeah, I actually wanted to ask you guys. Do you guys have any resolutions, like fitness resolutions for the year?
Nick Caruso:
Yeah, I do. I'll start with this one because actually, this will be a good segue too. My resolution is to do more yoga regularly because I personally... It's not that I despise exercise, it's that I don't enjoy it. I don't like anything about it, like 0% of it. I don't like how I feel afterwards or during or whatever. I don't feel like thinking about it, I don't like this conversation very much. So anything that's going to get me there. My girlfriend's very good at yoga and she thinks I can just do the things she can. But I'm working up to it, so that's my year.
JD DiGiovanni:
Nice.
Henry Phillips:
I love that. I'm trying to kind of build more consistency and kind of shorter workouts into my routine. For a long time, for a useless backstory for everybody listening. I was a huge cycling nerd and rode bikes a lot, reasonably competitively. With that kind of stuff, it was if you don't have an hour and a half or two hours or more don't even bother.
Nick Caruso:
That's just to get the shorts on.
Henry Phillips:
Exactly. Once they're on, they're not coming off. I'm still trying to get around this idea that like good workouts can happen consistently and over the span of 30, 40 minutes. So that's a big one. Then a little tidbit was actually gleaned from a recent Gear Patrol email newsletter. In that trying to think of dieting less in a prescriptive, kind of calorie counting way. Breaking things up into buckets with here's something, you can have as much lean protein as you want. But starting to kind of like mildly restrict some things and then heavily restrict others. In a way that's less kind of analytical and more intuitive. So I hope that kind of sticks around. It's sustainable and it's delicious, so why not?
Nick Caruso:
Yeah. Two upsides. JD, do you have one?
JD DiGiovanni:
Yeah, first off, I was glad to hear you were into that takeaway. I love that bit from the course. Yeah, I'm not going to get it this year, I don't think. But I want to make progress towards dead-lifting two and a half times my body weight. So just trying to work my way there. I somehow have become really enamored with lifting up heavy things and putting them back down again. But it's just where I'm at in my life right now, I guess
Nick Caruso:
I like it. What was that commercial for, I pick things up and I put them down? Do you remember that?
Henry Phillips:
Absolutely no idea.
Nick Caruso:
No? It was like a commercial for something. It was like a muscle man and he was like I pick things up and I put them... It was like all he could say. I think you should work toward doing the Scottish stones.
JD DiGiovanni:
Yeah.
Nick Caruso:
Yeah, those are sick. Okay, we are going to drop a link to sign up for the library pursuits in the show notes. So everybody should check that out. You will benefit from this. To Henry's point, even actually to mine, I'm going to refer to myself. I don't even like fit us much. I found this first course because I've seen the whole thing. Very helpful and motivating. I've seen the other stuff too and it's good. It's all very relevant and you'll love it. So make a resolution to sign up for a newsletter and then read it.
Nick Caruso:
Speaking of resolutions guys, we're going to have a little fun, a little segment here. The third segment today is on new year's resolutions but not just any promise to go to the gym or read more books kind of promise to yourself. We're focusing on gear. Yeah, products. We love them, we know all about them. We asked our Instagram followers to share their gear goals for 2022. Whether that means upgrading something you've already got laying around or fixing up something or knocking something off your grail list. Trying something new or maybe it's a little more abstract. I want to make just a personal note here that we're not trying to encourage people to just like buy, buy, buy, spend, spend, spend. This is more like what do you personally desire for yourself for the year and how can you make it happen?
Nick Caruso:
So I'm just going to read a bunch. We got so many cool responses, they're great. I was really happy to read through these. So we'll call out a bunch and we'll try to get through as many as possible. JD and Henry, I'm going to need your candid reactions to these and you're going to have to interrupt me a little bit. But I'll try to ask some questions when I find them relevant. There's a great mix of stuff here. So let's dive in. So the first follower, I'm not going to be able to pronounce everyone's handle. Not all words but I believe we've got L Patterson4 here. Who says many, many pairs of high-quality Goodyear welt work and dress boots, which is more of a Goodyear resolution. But jokes aside, Henry you liked that one. I love this, I've got some Red Wing Iron Rangers over here. Guys, do you Goodyear yourselves?
JD DiGiovanni:
I wish I did.
Henry Phillips:
Yeah. No, JD-
JD DiGiovanni:
That's a good resolution. Yeah. My boots, their bottoms are just almost done. We had freezing rain in New York City yesterday and I definitely ate it on the sidewalk and it sucked. I was sure was wishing that I had a better pair of soles. But I bought a pair of boots that were not Goodyear welted. So it's a lot more difficult to actually to get the shoes resold. So that's a good invest, that's a very big brain thing from our reader. He's not only buying himself boots for now but effectively, for years down the line when the soles run out. Wise man.
Nick Caruso:
Yeah, for sure.
Henry Phillips:
That's a great call.
Nick Caruso:
Sounds like JD, you need to invest in some, what do they call them? Yak tracks, the little grippy, elastic things you can put on your shoes. I love those. Click it, click around. Yeah, click, click, click, I love that.
Henry Phillips:
Get some [inaudible 00:40:34].
Nick Caruso:
Yeah, just some tank treads, just replace my feet. Next one. William C-M-I-I very simple, succinct one here but I love it. It's build a 72-hour bug-out bag, which is something I've toyed with doing. Just like having a go-bag, not because I am hoping for an apocalypse but I expect one.
JD DiGiovanni:
Yeah. After living in the city for a while, it's like you watch disaster movies, and they're fun. Then you live here for a while and you're like God, what would I do?
Nick Caruso:
Yeah, the snowstorm that stranded so many people by D.C. on 95 got me thinking about it yet again. This is really TMI in a way and sort of sick of me. But sometimes I fall asleep, daydreaming apocalypse scenarios. It was like if New York City came to a standstill, we would've to walk out. If they froze, if a few highways were blocked, we'd be screwed. So make sure your bug-out bag is-
JD DiGiovanni:
It's very workable though.
Henry Phillips:
It's a walking city.
JD DiGiovanni:
It'd be probably pleasant.
Nick Caruso:
Okay, this is a great one from Brandon. It says buy less disposable and single-use gear and invest in quality that will last and save our planet, which is fantastic. We've discussed this a lot and it can be really hard to do this, so good luck. My advice there is to start slowly. Start sort of extricating yourself from that disposable stuff. I've been in this mindset lately. Have you guys thought more and more? Are you feeling that trend?
Henry Phillips:
Yeah, definitely. I found it actually much easier to do this with the kind of bigger items in my life. Furniture, especially or even things like some tech or even things like your headphones or whatever. You can justify spending the extra doe, knowing that it's going to last you a little bit longer. I'm much less good about it when it comes to things like straws or cups because I'm a terrible human being who values my own convenience over the world.
Nick Caruso:
Do you use straws? Do you have plastic straws?
Henry Phillips:
Yeah. I have like one of those diner straw dispensers.
Nick Caruso:
You're kidding.
Henry Phillips:
Yeah. My God, you're making me look bad in front of the world.
JD DiGiovanni:
Wait, hold on, Henry. You buy your own diner straw dispenser?
Henry Phillips:
Yeah, that's a rule. They're hugely awesome and I can justify it because I don't know, I'd buy nice headphones that I don't have to replace as much.
Nick Caruso:
Yeah, you can justify it. You can justify anything if you try hard enough. Hopefully, you're just making a lot of chocolate malted and not using illicits straw use.
Henry Phillips:
I don't where you're going with this.
Nick Caruso:
I make a cocaine joke, I don't know. I'm very old to be second-guessing my cocaine jokes. God, I hope Ben and Eric don't hear me talking about cocaine on the company podcast. I don't endorse it. Okay, next one. Speaking of... Actually, not speaking of anything, this one is just absolutely wild. This is nuts, I love it. Handle is Diesel Brute, which itself is like a bulk and very different from the last user. But this resolution is purchasing a 380 realm Boston Whaler yacht boat. For trips to The Bahamas and overnight sword-fishing expeditions.
Henry Phillips:
Hell yeah.
Nick Caruso:
That is amazing. Guys, I looked this thing up. These are like three-quarter million dollar boats with room for a ton of people. You can get up to 1500 horsepower in these. You can go 60 miles per hour on the water. That's amazing, I want to go to Bahamas in a boat.
Henry Phillips:
Yeah, that's super cool, I'm in.
JD DiGiovanni:
Boston Whalers are great.
Nick Caruso:
Diesel Brute, you got to do that, hook me out, buddy. Take me with you. Another user says buy smarter. This could have been tied into the other one. Buy smarter, more research, more comparisons. Not sticking to brands highlighted in media, which-
Henry Phillips:
Yeah, let's hold on there. Pump the brakes, bud.
Nick Caruso:
Yeah, let's pull this one apart a little bit, it's a real rollercoaster. Okay. A, do your own research is a big thing these days. But you're telling... I think this user's name is Zach. Zach, you're telling the guys at Gear Patrol, you're not going to read our stuff.
Henry Phillips:
[inaudible 00:45:53] he's going to spiral out of control here.
Nick Caruso:
I'm going to put Diesel Brute on this guy, he is going to kick his ass.
JD DiGiovanni:
No, I'm with Zach, I get it, man. Yeah, it's like I think when people talk about media, what they often mean is just like stuff that's very popular. It's become a kind of synonym for almost just like this is what everyone's talking about. So like Nike versus like 10,000, I don't know. But I get that, man, yeah. Yeah, being more intentional about what you're buying and trying to find cooler stuff. That's not just like the first thing that's on top of your mind because they've been spending millions of dollars in advertising for 30 years.
Nick Caruso:
Yeah.
Henry Phillips:
I do think it kind of comes naturally too, just about everybody I talk at Gear Patrol. This kind of like enhanced research purchasing. I think a lot of us will kind of actively refuse to buy something unless we're very confident that it's the best thing or the best thing for the money. I know I have that kind of paralysis constantly. But the truth of the matter is that it doesn't take very long to do that. So I highly encourage anybody who's buying anything, do a boatload research. It takes an hour and it's a fun hour. If you're the kind of person that I'm going to go ahead and say listens to a Gear podcast-
Nick Caruso:
Nerd.
Henry Phillips:
You probably already do this but dive in, man. It's awesome.
JD DiGiovanni:
Get a spreadsheet, figure it out. Yeah.
Nick Caruso:
Yeah.
Henry Phillips:
Yeah. Pro, cons, 10 different sources.
Nick Caruso:
Okay. So I want to, for the record, say that I was just giving our follower a hard time. I also agree, the second is that I do endorse Gear Patrol's methods because I know these people and I trust them. But third Henry, if it only takes you an hour to put together a color-coded spreadsheet with all your buying options, you are doing it wrong, my friend, doing it wrong. I have spent literally months researching things like the best engine mount for my damn Jeep. Brown Dog Offroad, by the way. But you got to obsess over it. Let yourself obsess.
Henry Phillips:
No, it's so fun. Like even you can take the simplest of purchases and think about like a wallet or yeah. We're kind of going big dog here but like a coffee-maker and those things will take forever. But when you finally do buy something, you'll be hugely confident that you have the best thing. You'll have a talking point that nobody but you will care about, so win-win.
JD DiGiovanni:
We should talk about this at some point in the pod, maybe. About the difference between satisfying and maximizing because I think we're all maximizers. But sometimes I think people who buy the stuff that just comes to them easily is they're happier people. So anyway, I'll shut up now.
Henry Phillips:
I like that.
Nick Caruso:
Yeah, that's smart. Essentially, when we talk about product lifestyle and being kind of obsessed with products, that's what we mean. It's not that we're like we just want everything in the world. It's like we relish in the idea of finding stuff that works super well or is really interesting or just stuff, Gear Patrol.
Henry Phillips:
Yeah. No, I'm looking at my desk right now and I could tell you like the research and purchasing rationale for everything on it.
Nick Caruso:
My God.
Henry Phillips:
Which is probably not healthy. I definitely could have spent that time developing myself or relationships. But instead, I have the perfect double rocks glass presently filled with Cheez-Its but whatever.
Nick Caruso:
There's too much to unpack in what you just said, we'd have to have a... I think we should do that though, that'd be a great conversation. To like just drop in on someone and tell them to tell me about their desk, boy.
Henry Phillips:
A lot of insight, man.
Nick Caruso:
Speaking of insight, J11 Murray, a man of few words and classic tastes simply replied to this prompt with Rolex Submariner.
Henry Phillips:
Show off.
Nick Caruso:
Love that.
JD DiGiovanni:
Hell yeah.
Nick Caruso:
Right, next. This is great. This is a solid sort of like more abstract thing but also, very specific at the same time. 2022 is all about sorting the hi-fi. Goodbye ugly receiver, hello tubes. Going old school.
Henry Phillips:
Someone has got it figured out, man.
Nick Caruso:
I love that, I hope that means Macintosh.
JD DiGiovanni:
Cool.
Nick Caruso:
This is good, both of you will be able to respond to this. This user says I'm looking for the right watch. Also, what a situation this is. Looking for the right watch for my fiance to get me for our wedding. Yeah, first of all, congrats, very exciting. Guys, first recommendation, top of your head, put you on the spot, wedding watch?
JD DiGiovanni:
I can get you a specific model if you give me a second longer but NOMOS.
Nick Caruso:
Yes.
Henry Phillips:
That was a great call, can't go wrong. My first one was going to be an Omega Speedmaster.
Nick Caruso:
Why is that, Henry?
Henry Phillips:
Well, my real answer is some variety of Rolex, whether it be Sub or Explorer. But frankly, the state of the world means that you're going to be paying way too much if you can get an older one. If you want to pay retail you can't. So go for the most iconic watch that is readily available and for me, that's the speedy.
Nick Caruso:
Before we get JD's model, a specific model, I'll jump ahead because Brett... No, that's not right. A follower with a very appropriate Instagram handle, Cynic Sam says I just want to get a Rolex at retail.
Henry Phillips:
Dude, me too.
Nick Caruso:
Right, Sam?
JD DiGiovanni:
Yeah.
Nick Caruso:
We hear you, Sam. JD, you find it, is it the Metro?
JD DiGiovanni:
I'm having a hard time, actually. It's been a while since I've been on the NOMOS site, just like looking at watches. I'm not going to allow myself to buy. Zurich, I think.
Nick Caruso:
Henry and I toured their... Zurich?
JD DiGiovanni:
Zurich is great.
Nick Caruso:
Henry and I toured the NOMOS factory together. We talked about this before on the pod but those watches are unbelievable and they're relatively affordable. A few thousand dollars.
Henry Phillips:
Yeah. If you need a watch in that of price range, you truly cannot go wrong with NOMOS.
Nick Caruso:
They're unlike anything else. Okay, speed through a few here. Brett Jackson 11 speaking right to JD here. Says building out a home gym in my garage.
JD DiGiovanni:
Yes, man that's my heart. Dude, reach out, we should talk.
Nick Caruso:
Yeah, you should. Brett, send us an email at podcastatgearpatrol.com and JD will send you a shopping list. I'm not promising that but something to that effect. Another user says this is great, to actually use my gear in the way it was intended. Rolex equals climb Everest.
JD DiGiovanni:
Awesome, that's so cool.
Nick Caruso:
I hope it's real, I hope this person is planning to climb Everest. That's amazing.
JD DiGiovanni:
Yeah, that's awesome.
Nick Caruso:
Can you imagine if we used all the cool shit in our apartments for their intended purposes?
JD DiGiovanni:
Yeah, I'd stop sleeping in my [inaudible 00:53:58].
Henry Phillips:
Using my desk chair exactly as intended.
Nick Caruso:
Yeah. Henry uses his straw caddy properly but not the rocks glass on his desks.
Henry Phillips:
No.
Nick Caruso:
It's a journey. We did this one already. Troy Matthews buying a Wusthof Amici 1814. So I looked this one up too. This is a knife, obviously, a chef's knife. It is a limited edition chef's knife. It's $1,500 because it's gorgeous. Olive wood handle, this really pretty blade, and only 1,814 produced. The year that Wusthof was founded.
JD DiGiovanni:
Cool.
Nick Caruso:
I like that.
Henry Phillips:
Not my gear resolution but if you are in need of a gear resolution and don't have a newish or well-made chef's knife, do that. Your life will be better, I promise.
Nick Caruso:
Yeah, that changes the kitchen a lot.
JD DiGiovanni:
If you spend any time in the kitchen, it's good having an effective, sharp well-made knife. Boy, what a nice... Yeah, it's amazing.
Nick Caruso:
Total. I just got a stone-sharpening set that I haven't broken in yet but I'm-
Henry Phillips:
I'm so intimidated by that.
Nick Caruso:
It's a knife-sharpening set, you know what I mean. Tony here says he wants to find the best white pocket T-shirt. Tony, I feel like we can hook you up with several ideas. I'm going to make a note. T-shirts.
Henry Phillips:
I wish I had snappy answer to this, there's so many great ones. Shirley has.
JD DiGiovanni:
I think Buck Mason has one.
Henry Phillips:
Yeah. If they do then that's the spot.
Nick Caruso:
No doubt. I picked up not with a pocket but a Buck Mason T-shirt with the heaviest cloth they have. It's so great.
Henry Phillips:
It's like wearing a towel with that one?
Nick Caruso:
Yeah, it was a towel. Interesting. All right, so I'm going to breeze the through these next ones because they are all good but they're also our colleagues. So you know these people are very in tune. But we don't want to give air time to people, though these attention hogs we work with. So Hailey who writes for our outdoors and fitness, on our outdoors and fitness team. Has two things here, the brand new Arc'teryx Alpha Parka, which is sick. I just saw this first yesterday, at 1000 bucks. But it's like a parka made for climbing, like belaying in the cold, in the wet. Yeah, which is amazing that Hailey would want something like that because it means she's going to use it. She says and considering splurging on the NuFACE Trinity facial toning kit, which I also looked up because I wasn't familiar. This is like a device with a gel that like tones and firms your skin. Put it on your skin and it makes your face firm, firm-face.
Nick Caruso:
There seems to be a theme here. Our colleague Caitlin says she's finally going to try [inaudible 00:57:20] to see if it upstages her Nespresso. But what's on point with the other resolutions is that she's upgrading her everyday watch to a Tudor Royal.
Henry Phillips:
Love it.
JD DiGiovanni:
Nice.
Nick Caruso:
Nice. Good job, Caitlin. Coffee experimentation and a fine watch will get us going every time. Ben, who hopefully will not be reprimanding me for making cocaine jokes on the podcast. Says he's looking to properly recycle a bunch of old tech and also, looking for an EV, which is a great combo.
Henry Phillips:
Cycle of life, man.
Nick Caruso:
Yeah, right, make room for the new. I can relate to this. So my girlfriend and I are moving in together and that means I have to go through all of the bounty of things in my apartment. I just bundled all the charging cables and like charging bricks I have yesterday. It was abhorrent. The numbers are shocking. So I don't want to just throw those things out, got to figure it out. I know you can take stuff into tech stores and there are recycling programs and such. But that's a good thing to look into if you've got a lot of tech. Where else are we here?
Nick Caruso:
Ryan is going to finally buy a new surfboard after 10 years surfing in New York City. I surfed twice, cut up my foot once. Drank champagne after and decided to never surf again. Matt is saying he wants to get proper dress shoes, which it sounds like he should talk to our Goodyear welt friend. Lastly, speaking of style, Evan, our style writer says he wants to break away from what he thinks his style is to embrace stuff I never considered wearing.
Henry Phillips:
That's great.
Nick Caruso:
Cool, very noble pursuit. It begs the question, who will style the style guys? No?
Henry Phillips:
I don't know but whatever he chooses I'm buying in. Evan's a very deeply stylish dude. Every time I look at his Instagram, I just kind of break down a little bit and wonder what I'm doing.
Nick Caruso:
That's okay, Henry.
Henry Phillips:
What I'm doing wrong?
Nick Caruso:
I bet Evan doesn't have a straw caddy.
Henry Phillips:
I'm going to get each of you a straw caddy for the next major holiday, gifting holiday, that's Easter.
JD DiGiovanni:
That would be so sweet of you, yeah.
Nick Caruso:
Yeah, truly.
Henry Phillips:
You can choose whether you get the push lever one, which is a superior, obviously, or the kind of pull-up diner one, where they all fan out.
Nick Caruso:
So if you're about the spectacle of mechanics, yeah.
Henry Phillips:
Yeah.
JD DiGiovanni:
My favorite type of cigarette holder is the pullout one. It's like a bouquet.
Henry Phillips:
Yeah, that's cool as hell.
Nick Caruso:
Yes. You could also do like the push button ashtray as well on top, which is sort of like the opposite. At the risk of running far too long, do you guys have any succinct product resolutions for yourself?
Henry Phillips:
Mine's kind of lame. Everybody had these really great specific ones and mine is kind of like embracing the fact that I've spent the last two years buying stuff that is really kind of practical in a way. Kind of serves a kind of predetermined purpose. As opposed to buying stuff that might be used on an experience or somewhere else or doing something. So after spending years buying like home office stuff, I'd love to get a pair of skis or something that'll get me out doing something, rather than sitting on my ass.
Nick Caruso:
Fair.
JD DiGiovanni:
Yeah, it's good.
Nick Caruso:
JD.
JD DiGiovanni:
Yeah, I'm just going to continue to try to make my apartment fancy. This is I moved out to New York from California with like two suitcases and I've slowly accumulated furniture. It's been a long process but kind of do a couple flourishes this year with like bookcases and plants. Stuff like that.
Henry Phillips:
Hell yeah.
JD DiGiovanni:
Yeah.
Nick Caruso:
Man, I've been on a kick yeah of doing the same, so I can very much relate. Mine is I have a couple but the main one is to finally sort out my soda stream situation. Don't shake your head at me, Henry.
Henry Phillips:
No. I noticed how you're going through.
Nick Caruso:
You agree, okay. I have to sort it out because like returning to things and doing all stuff. There's mail order-
Henry Phillips:
It's a thing, man.
Nick Caruso:
the problem is I spend an insane amount of money relatively on cases of La Croix. I just go through this stuff like it's-
Henry Phillips:
Don't say it.
Nick Caruso:
Fun water. It is, it's a tough situation, so soda stream.
Henry Phillips:
I think that's a great resolution because I gave up. We had the soda stream, loved it, used it. Returned to the canister maybe once and then just didn't.
Nick Caruso:
Boy. Well, hopefully, we can get ourselves figured out here. You probably have a lot of the Seltzer canisters though, like the clowns used in the 1910s to go along with your straw.
Henry Phillips:
Yeah, my apartment is basically a diner, got a griddle and everything.
Nick Caruso:
Well, speaking of things that we are planning to pick up, we are going to do our traditional last segment here. We can breeze through it, though. Well, actually I should circle back. Thank you everybody for submitting those resolutions. I got so excited about them, I just assumed they were part of everyone's life. So thank you, those are great. I wish you all the best of luck. If you want to keep us updated on your progress, please do. So we're going to end with our usual segment, which is highlighting our favorite new product launches announced over the past week. JD, can I go to you first?
JD DiGiovanni:
Yeah. There was some rumor about Tom Sachs first look at Tom Sachs and Nikki collab. It just doesn't seem to be a bunch of information about it. It's kind of one of these things that have like leaked maybe on Instagram but it was covered in [TIG 01:04:11] this week. Man, I'm just a fan of him and I love a kind of good, low-profile sneaker, with like some subtle flair to it. That is exactly what these sneakers are, they're very cool.
Nick Caruso:
Right on. Henry, straw man.
Henry Phillips:
I wish there was some straw con in this week's take but I'll have to settle for an $80,000 Rolex. Not Rolex, Omega Speedmaster made of something called Canopus Gold. Not cannabis or canola gold and it is super cool. I wish I had the quantity of disposable income to justify it but. What it is is basically an homage to the first Speedmaster ever made, which was in 1957. So it's celebrating a significant anniversary there, 65 if my bad math is correct. So it's so stealthy, it hurts. It's made of this Canopus Gold, which is a white gold that is kind of made to look even more like stainless steel. Then it's got a black dial, which is in fact, Onyx, the stone, not the color. The bezel is enameled. It's got all sorts of crazy stuff. Then to cap it all off the movement on the inside is not the kind of traditional Speedmaster movement that you see all over the place these days. But the 321, which is a wild and crazy reverse engineered movement that powered the original watch. That was kind of like lost to time for 30, 40 years, and then brought back fairly recently.
Henry Phillips:
They're all made by one dude in Switzerland. They're super beautiful. Yeah, the coolest part about this watch is to 99 and a half percent of the people ever see it, it'll look like a really cool Speedmaster. It may be if they go that far, that seems kind of cool. To the one guy who you probably don't want to talk to, it's going to be like the coolest thing ever. It is an awesome watch and it is so stealthy that it hurts. I hope everybody who buys one gets to have a beer with me.
Nick Caruso:
Yeah, you hear that everybody. You're not going to want to talk to Henry but he wants to talk to you. Also, yeah, you can either get this watch or a Ford Lightning Platinum, your choice. That's great, it is gorgeous, so pretty. I like that we have kept the watch theme going here. My favorite from the week is a suitcase. I love to travel, of course, used to be in my dating profile. It's pretty standard, so you know it's real. I really, really want an aluminum suitcase because I'm also just a classic gentleman. But Zero Halliburton, Rimowa. Very pretty, too expensive. You can't buy these used because they patina and they dent, which is part of the fun. So I'm looking at this essential aluminum carryon, which is the name of the product from Move. It's aviation-grade aluminum, it's got a hollow shell design. It's got this branch-resistant exterior rather, and it's $169 carryon-sized aluminum suitcase. The reason it's priced that way is that Move if you're not familiar as a membership-based sort of marketplace for staples, for standard stuff people need. I really want to staple myself to this suitcase. So there you go.
Nick Caruso:
Those are three of many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many product releases from the last week. Listeners, if you are into that kind of stuff, you've come to the right place. I'm telling you to go somewhere else, which is to the Gear Patrol website, and or you can sign up for the newsletter, the Gear Patrol dispatch. We publish a daily column called Today in Gear, it's full of releases just like this. All the news you need, none you don't, so don't miss out.
Nick Caruso:
Guys, that was it. That was the first pod of the new year. Goal. Yeah, we started out right. It is dark as hell outside because it is the middle of winter. That is all the time we have today. JD and Henry, thank you a ton for your time.
JD DiGiovanni:
Thank you.
Nick Caruso:
Yeah. Listeners, if you have any questions about anything we covered today, check the show notes for links because I'm dropping a bunch of info down there. You can find us on social media. Who knows if you respond to our story, you may be featured on a future episode of the Gear Patrol podcast. Our handle everywhere is @gearpatrol and that is one word. You can also email me @podcast @gearpatrol.com. I especially expect our friend, Brett building his home gym to do that. That's it.
Nick Caruso:
Aside from subscribing to the pod if you like what you hear and resolving to rate it five stars in 2022, I dare you. Well, we appreciate you being here, we appreciate you listening, and tuning in, and coming back after the new. A happy, healthy one to you all. For Gear Patrol, I'm Nick Caruso and until next time, take care.