An American Story With Ken Langone

Summary

Podcast Summary: "An American Story With Ken Langone"

Podcast Information:

• Title: Jill on Money with Jill Schlesinger
• Host/Author: Audacy
• Episode: An American Story With Ken Langone
• Release Date: July 4, 2025

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1. Introduction and Early Life

In this engaging episode, host Jill Schlesinger revisits a compelling interview conducted seven years prior with Ken Langone, the co-founder of Home Depot. Langone shares insights from his upbringing, highlighting the influence of his Italian-American parents and the environment on Long Island.

Notable Quote:

• “It was where the poor people lived. I think my parents paid $4,000 for the house they bought, which they couldn't buy. They were renting the house for a few years.”
  — Ken Langone (02:22)

2. Education and Overcoming Challenges

Langone discusses his parents’ emphasis on education despite their limited formal schooling. He reflects on his own academic struggles and the pivotal moment when a Bucknell University professor’s guidance changed his trajectory.

Notable Quote:

• “I am the furthest thing from a self-made man you'll ever know.”
  — Ken Langone (07:17)

Key Points:

• Despite not being academically inclined, Langone excelled in mathematics.
• His parents instilled the importance of education as a path to better opportunities.
• A transformative conversation with his economics professor at Bucknell motivated him to persevere academically.

3. Entering Wall Street and Career Beginnings

Langone narrates his entry into Wall Street during a tumultuous period marked by the 1962 market crash. His determination led him to secure a position despite the challenging economic climate.

Notable Quote:

• “I keep going. I really was getting discouraged, but I wasn't going to give up.”
  — Ken Langone (09:00)

Key Points:

• Langone leveraged connections and persistence to break into the financial sector.
• His early roles involved selling securities, where his people-centric approach set him apart.

4. Meeting Ross Perot and Early Deals

A significant moment in Langone’s career was his meeting with Ross Perot. Their initial skeptical interaction evolved into a long-lasting professional relationship, showcasing Langone's straightforward and honest demeanor.

Notable Quote:

• “I think it's bad faith not to offer this deal, which is supposed to be a slam dunk deal, to his people.”
  — Ken Langone (21:19)

Key Points:

• Langone confronted unethical practices directly, earning Perot’s respect.
• Their collaboration played a role in shaping Langone's future endeavors.

5. Founding and Building Home Depot

Langone details the genesis of Home Depot, emphasizing the collaboration with Bernie Marcus and Arthur Blank. He recounts the challenges of establishing a new retail concept and the strategic decisions that fueled the company's growth.

Notable Quote:

• “The roots started with a very good friend of mine in Philadelphia, Gary Orban, who had a chain of home centers experiencing difficulties.”
  — Ken Langone (15:14)

Key Points:

• Identifying and partnering with visionary leaders was crucial.
• Innovative strategies, such as stocking empty boxes to simulate inventory, helped attract customers.

6. Leadership and Growth of Home Depot

As Home Depot expanded, Langone discusses the importance of strong leadership and maintaining company culture. He reflects on hiring practices, the integration of key partners, and the scaling challenges encountered during rapid growth.

Notable Quote:

• “Great companies are run by great people. Home Depot is a success because we had people like Bernie and Arthur and Pat.”
  — Ken Langone (11:06)

Key Points:

• Building a team with complementary skills was essential for operational success.
• Langone underscores the significance of fostering a positive work environment to sustain growth.

7. Encounter with Bernie Madoff

Langone shares his experience meeting Bernie Madoff before the infamous Ponzi scheme was exposed. He highlights his intuition and ethical stance that ultimately led him to distance himself from Madoff’s dubious proposals.

Notable Quote:

• “If I was playing poker with this guy, he'd have all my clothes, he'd have all my houses, he'd have. This guy was Mr. Cool.”
  — Ken Langone (23:57)

Key Points:

• Langone's skepticism and ethical considerations prevented him from engaging in fraudulent dealings.
• His decision showcases the importance of integrity in financial dealings.

8. Views on Capitalism and Income Inequality

Towards the end of the interview, Langone delves into his philosophy on capitalism and the critical issue of income inequality. He advocates for inclusive economic opportunities to ensure that the American dream remains attainable for all.

Notable Quote:

• “We can't allow these people, all of us as citizens, we can't allow these people to not participate in this great dream called America.”
  — Ken Langone (25:19)

Key Points:

• Langone emphasizes the need for structures that support upward mobility.
• He highlights Home Depot’s initiatives, such as offering stock options to employees, as examples of fostering economic inclusion.

Conclusion

Ken Langone's journey from a working-class upbringing to co-founding one of the largest home improvement retailers provides invaluable lessons on perseverance, ethical leadership, and the importance of inclusive capitalism. His insights offer a roadmap for aspiring entrepreneurs and individuals striving to make meaningful contributions to society.

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Final Thoughts: This episode of "Jill on Money" with Ken Langone offers a deep dive into the life and career of a financial titan. From overcoming educational challenges to building a retail empire, Langone’s story is both inspiring and instructive for anyone interested in finance, entrepreneurship, and ethical business practices.

Transcript

[Kristen Bell]

Hi, I'm Kristen Bell and if you know my husband Dax, then you also know he loves shopping for a car. Selling a car, not so much.

[Ken Langone]

We're really doing this, huh?

[Kristen Bell]

Thankfully, Carvana makes it easy. Answer a few questions, put in your van or license and done. We sold ours in minutes this morning and they'll come pick it up and pay us this afternoon.

[Ken Langone]

Bye bye Truckee.

[Kristen Bell]

Of course, we kept the favorite.

[Ken Langone]

Hello other Truckee.

[Kristen Bell]

Sell your car with Carvana today. Terms and conditions apply.

[Ken Langone]

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[Jill Schlesinger]

Welcome to.

[Kristen Bell]

The Jill on Money Show.

[Jill Schlesinger]

It is Friday the 4th of July. Happy Independence Day to everyone. I know a lot of you are traveling or taking some time off.

[Kristen Bell]

Congratulations.

[Jill Schlesinger]

Well done. Today I want to present an interview that we conducted seven years ago. I know it's crazy. That's a long time. It is with Ken Langone who is the co founder of the Home Depot Now. Now at the time he had written a book called I Love Capitalism and it was really a fun way to kind of get into how somebody builds a company and a career and all the twists and turns along the way. I really hope you will enjoy it because he is a great storyteller. So give it a listen and of course let us know if you've got any questions by going to jillonmoney.com and clicking the Contact Us button here. Here is our interview with Ken Langone.

[Kristen Bell]

You were born to Italian American parents on the North Shore of Long Island?

[Ken Langone]

Yep.

[Kristen Bell]

They who's first generation? Your grandparents or your parents?

[Ken Langone]

My parents are first generation.

[Kristen Bell]

Your parents are first generation working class. Dad was a plumber.

[Ken Langone]

My father was a plumber. He went to the eighth grade. My mother worked in the school cafeteria. She went to the seventh grade.

[Kristen Bell]

And you lived on what you said sort of describe as like the bad side of the tracks in a nice town.

[Ken Langone]

It was where the poor people lived. I think my parents paid $4,000 for the house they bought, which they couldn't buy. They were renting the house for a few Years. It was right by the public school.

[Kristen Bell]

How is it that your parents, who were not educated, were so encouraging that you become educated? Because a lot of people who grew up as tradespeople, children of tradespeople, go into the trade.

[Ken Langone]

My father made me learn to be a plumber. On weekends in high school, I used to help him so I could do all the things a plumber does. Wipe a joint, hit a. Hit a joint for copper tubing with lead thread, a pipe, cut pipe, all this stuff.

[Kristen Bell]

This is great, because I need some work on my go to Home Depot.

[Ken Langone]

We got a lot of people that can really help you, and we got great prices and everything you need.

[Kristen Bell]

Okay, so you learn the trade boat. But what was it that they knew about being educated?

[Ken Langone]

My parents, God bless them, didn't blame themselves for where they were. They felt if they had the chance for an education, they'd have done better than they did. And we used to go to my grandparents in Port Washington for lunch every Sunday. They all got together. We would drive through a wealthy section of town called Roslyn Estates. And when we would drive through there, every time we drive through there, mom would say to me, I was sitting in the back of the. She was sitting in the front on a makeshift chair seat, and she said, would you like to live here someday? And I said, yes. She said, well, you're going to have to work hard and get an education. So she knew, okay, well, they understood because they knew they could capable of doing so much more, but they lacked the tickets.

[Kristen Bell]

And meanwhile, they're telling you, be educated. And you say you weren't such a great student.

[Ken Langone]

I didn't. I wanted to make money.

[Kristen Bell]

I hear you. You say it in, like, very plain English way right here on page six. I loved making money.

[Ken Langone]

Yeah, I was. Hell, I delivered newspapers. I was a caddy. I worked in a gas station. I worked in a butcher shop. I used to take the cardboard out from the liquor store. There was a supermarket in Roslyn called M and H had opened up at the same time. I was working for the butcher shop, which was a competitor at nights. I was helping them set up the store without the butcher shop knowing. I was working two jobs.

[Kristen Bell]

I mean, it's interesting. You say I was never academically curious and I didn't apply myself at all, so. But you did say math came easy to you, so that was good.

[Ken Langone]

Numbers were just like that.

[Kristen Bell]

Tell me about how you then headed to Bucknell University. How'd you get there?

[Ken Langone]

Understand that I did okay in high school. Numbers in Me got along very well, and I still do. I had pretty much convinced myself that I wasn't a student. And I wanted to go into the marine Corps in 1953 because the Korean War was still on. My brother was in the army, my older brother. I only had one brother. And I took the position that this is what I wanted to do. Well, Eisenhower had different plans than he ended the war. So I said, what am I going to do? And I went to see friends of mine from port Washington. Jim McNamara, J.R. davis, Stan Cutler. They were at Bucknell. I went there, and it was house party weekend. I said, geez, this is what you do in college.

[Kristen Bell]

I could do this really well.

[Ken Langone]

This fits me.

[Kristen Bell]

Yes, I can execute on this.

[Ken Langone]

So they had Saturday morning classes. And that morning. That Saturday morning, they said, look, we have to go to class. Why don't you go up and see the guy over in the building over there? He's the guy that lets people in who's called the registrar. His name was George. Faint. And I went over and he said, I'm sitting there and he's. What are you waiting for? I said, my friend said I should come see you. What about? I said, well, I'm in high school. You're a senior. I said, yeah. What are you going to do? I don't know. Come on in my office. So we talked for an hour. The following Thursday, I get a letter from him that if I want to come to Bucknell, he'd be happy to have me.

[Kristen Bell]

That may be the best decision that anyone from Bucknell ever made.

[Ken Langone]

Now, the best decision anybody from Bucknell ever made that's in the book was my economics professor who wanted to know if anybody ever told me I was stupid. And I said, yes, everybody. And he said to me, you know, the only sin you believed.

[Kristen Bell]

It's great advice.

[Ken Langone]

And he said to me, how are you doing in your other classes? I said, about as bad as I'm doing in your class. Well, you know, you're going to be out of here in January. I said, yeah, I know that. And he said to me, is that what you want to happen? I said, no, I don't. He said, okay. He said, I'll make a deal with you. I'll reach out to all your other professors. You promise me you'll give it everything you got, and we'll see if we can pull you out of this nosedive. And they did.

[Kristen Bell]

It's something interesting to me that many people will say the difference between someone making it and not making it. Whether and you're I know you're involved in the charter school movement. It can be anyone from a coach, a music teacher, an academic teacher who just says, hey, you, you ken what's going on here and they see something in you.

[Ken Langone]

Yeah. Look, every place I look, I see people that I know have helped me to do what I've done and in many cases have done more than I've done myself.

[Kristen Bell]

And that is why you say you are not a self made man.

[Ken Langone]

I am the furthest thing from a self made man you'll ever know. Okay. And my regret on that, not regret. I hope I didn't. I don't know how many hundreds of names there are in there, but I hope I didn't leave. But if I did, it was a bad memory. Not that they didn't participate.

[Kristen Bell]

Let's talk a little bit about how you left college. And you said you're gonna go. You know, it's like where the bank robber goes. He's gonna go to the bank. That's where the money is. You said the money's on Wall Street. So you graduate and you go talk to some folks. I do love this advice from Maurice Hart. And he says, quote, let me tell you the lay of the land. We have Jewish firms for Jewish kids. We have WASP firms for WASP kids. The Irish, we make the clerks, we put them on the floor of the stock exchange. Italian kids like you, we put in the back office. What'd you think when you heard that?

[Ken Langone]

I didn't appreciate the fact that he was discrimination. But I know one thing I made my mind up, that ain't gonna hold me back. You have no idea the price we're paying for our entitlement system in America. Not the money, but the number of people that don't get a chance to develop self respect by doing it for themselves. You got to respect yourself first before you're going to respect anybody else. Somebody who has no respect for themselves has a difficult time seeing good in somebody else. I view that more as an opportunity than as a setback.

[Kristen Bell]

So I want to talk a little bit about how you did get into Wall street selling securities and that was in the early 60s. And talk a little bit about what you did and how you then ultimately met Ross Perot.

[Ken Langone]

Okay. I was called back. I was in the army once in 58 for six months. And then I got called back when they built a wall around Berlin in 61. When I got out in June of 62, I made my Wall street had had the biggest crash it had had since 1929 in May. And everybody was leaving Wall Street. And I said, hey, this is my moment to strike. And my father in law, God bless him, he was in the business. And he set me up with a series of appointments and the fact that people were leaving and the firms were cutting back. I kept going. I really was getting discouraged, but I wasn't going to give up. I had a wife and one child and a second one due in September of that year. And I met a man, and he said to me, I'd like to hire. His name was Jack Cullen. He said, I'd like to hire you. But he said, we're cutting back and we just can't do it. And I said, but he said, I think you're going to be a big success. He said, I think you got certain talent. I said, what's that? He said, well, you strike me as a very sensitive guy, and that's a great, great talent to have if you're going to sell. So he thanked me and said he couldn't help me. And I got in the elevator and I went down to the floor, down to the lobby, and I thought to myself, I said, wait a minute. I went right back upstairs and I said, I'd like to see Mr. Cullen again. And I went in and he said, what's up? Did you forget something? I said, no. I said, let me ask you a question. What do you pay a secretary? So we pay him about 150 bucks a week. I said, can you pay me as a secretary? He said, what do you mean? I said, can you pay me 150 a week? He said, well, you can't make it on that. I said, that's my problem. I was teaching at NYU at night, by the way. Consider this. Barely 10 years from when I was told I was going to get thrown out of college, I'm now teaching it one of the great business programs in the country. And so I said, I'll make it. Don't worry about it. So then I said, but there's only one condition. You have to give me every account you're not doing business with. And, boy, then I went to work.

[Kristen Bell]

That's great.

[Ken Langone]

And so you were selling, selling like crazy.

[Kristen Bell]

And you are a salesman at heart.

[Ken Langone]

I love selling crazy.

[Kristen Bell]

Even if you love the numbers, the selling. You're a relationship guy. That's the sensitivity.

[Ken Langone]

That's all about the people.

[Kristen Bell]

Absolutely.

[Ken Langone]

And that includes companies. Great companies are run by great people. Home Depot is a success. It is because we had people like Bernie and Arthur and Pat. These were our Partners when we started the company. All right. And these men were unique and special in every respect.

[Kristen Bell]

All right, let's get back to Ross Perez. How'd you meet him?

[Ken Langone]

I went to a party in Washington and in 1968, and I met a man there who said he was Perot's partner and Washington representative. I didn't know who the hell Perot was. I didn't know what he did. And he started telling me. And I said, gee, that sounds like that's interesting. And he said to me, I said, gee, I said, is there a chance I can get in to meet this man? He says, well, call me on Monday. I'll see what I can do. His name was Jack Hite. I called Jack on Monday. He said, look, you got an appointment. He said two things. You got 30 minutes. And he said, don't use any bad words. So I said, and you're a little.

[Kristen Bell]

Rough on the bad words.

[Ken Langone]

I am what I am.

[Kristen Bell]

I know, me too. Okay, can't do it here, but here's what it is. I understand now.

[Ken Langone]

If you live in a trading room long enough, that becomes part of the territory. So anyway, I went down and I met Willem. And exactly at the point I was supposed to get in, I got into his office and we were 30 minutes. And for 29 and a half minutes, he told me everything he'd heard from Goldman Sachs, Whitewell, Merrill Lynch, Clark Dodge, gh, all these firms that were really trying to get his deal. And when he got all done, it was about 30 seconds left, and he said to me, what do you think of what I just said? And I think, well, I blew the 30 minute rule, right?

[Kristen Bell]

Right.

[Ken Langone]

So I said, Mr. Perot, I said, pardon me, that's the biggest pile of horseshit I've ever heard in my life.

[Kristen Bell]

That's awesome.

[Ken Langone]

And he looked back, he took back, and he said, what do you mean? And we talked for 13 hours. We talked till 1 o' clock the next morning.

[Kristen Bell]

Good God.

[Ken Langone]

I had not brought any clothes down. So he was driving us around Dallas looking for a drugstore where I could buy some toiletries and a T shirt.

[Kristen Bell]

Oh, my God.

[Ken Langone]

And we found out in that meeting we were married the same hour, the same day, the same year. His values and his integrity was so precious. And I said to him, I said, I'll never throw a curve at you. And he said, oh. He said, I was going to make a decision by Friday. This was Wednesday. He says, I. I'm gonna put it off. He said, let's get to know each other. Better. So over three months, he played with my head a couple of times. One time he called me and said, you know, he said, ken, the thing that bothers me about you is you don't show your enthusiasm very well. I said, what? I'll be down there in five minutes.

[Kristen Bell]

Right. You think that this thing, which is basically builds like the electronic infrastructure for big municipalities.

[Ken Langone]

No, what they did was they ran data processing operations. They were called out, weren't called outsourcing them, but that's what they were. They would send their highly trained, capable programmers and scientists into these companies and help them get the most they could get out of their computers.

[Kristen Bell]

It's amazing. So you then become the guy who runs the firm where the. Where they sit.

[Ken Langone]

Well, I. I got that deal. I'd been made a partner before that. I was made a partner in 66. I got that deal. And I felt pretty good about my. I was kind of full of myself, frankly. You know, I think today I might be less arrogant than I was then, but I was floating around. I got this deal from all these other firms, and I did it. And blah, blah, blah, by the way, I didn't do it alone. Again. We had a team of people at presbyterch that were fabulous. And when I gave this big number to pro, 100 times earnings was an unheard of multiple.

[Jill Schlesinger]

Yeah.

[Kristen Bell]

And you got more than that.

[Ken Langone]

He got 115, he thought. When he asked me driving through the tunnel to sign the papers in Jersey, he said, well, this is what you're going to tell me. I'm not getting 100. I said, you're right. And he got a little perplexed. And his wife Margot was in the car with me. And we're in the back seat of a limousine, two seats looking at each other, and I said, yeah, you're not going to get 100 times earnings. He said, see, Margot, they're all alike up here. Blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. I said, okay, look, if you want 100, that's okay with me. So then Margot said, well, what were you going to do it? I said, oh, I was going to do it at 115 times earnings. But if he only wants 100, yeah, that's fine. We did it at 115 times earnings, by the way.

[Kristen Bell]

So I want to just flash forward, and I would love for you to tell the story of Bernie Marcus, Arthur Blank, and the roots of the Home Depot.

[Ken Langone]

Okay. The roots started. A very good friend of mine in Philadelphia, Gary Orban, had a chain of home centers who I had brought Public called Panorama. And they were experiencing difficulties. 75, 76. And Gary had hired me as a consultant. And we were in his office one day and I said, look, I said, we ought to have a model if we're going to fix this, we got to look who's the best out there. Now, the home center industry then was regional. You had Rickel Pergam and Channel here. You had Hecking's in the Mid Atlantic, you had Scotty's in Florida, and you had Handy Dan and Angels out in the way. So Gary says, ken, there's a guy out there, Bernie Marcus, he's fabulous, does a great job. I said, okay, can you get me an appointment? Long story short, the next day I was in LA having lunch with Bernie Marcus. And I met him and then and now spectacular human being. And we bonded. And he was running a company that was 19% owned by the public and 81% owned by an industrial company called Dalen. I ended up buying almost all of the 19% in the market. I kept buying and buying for myself and for clients. And he persuaded me one day to sell my stock to the guy that owned owned 81%. I said, look, the guy doesn't like you and he's going to fire you. And he said, no, no, he needs me. He didn't know the business. I said, I'm telling you, I'm warning you. Nope. So this guy paid me a very significant premium to bias out all of myself and my investors. Four months after he bought us out, he fired Bernie. He fired Arthur, he fired Ron Brill. And Bernie calls me up. No health insurance, no stock, no income, three kids. I need a job. I said, forget about a job. When can you come to New York? And the next day he comes to New York. We sit in the Peacock Alley at the Waldorf Story with him, myself and a fellow by name, Jerry Grossman, a lawyer, a labor lawyer. And they'd committed a labor law violation. That's all it was. Civic means the union get certified. Bernie earlier had told me we owned the stock for two years. In that two year period, Bernie and I used to go walk store openings when they were opening in the store, I'd go with him and it was wonderful. And one walk in Houston, he says to me, don't get too excited because somebody's going to figure out the Achilles heel and it's going to change this industry. I didn't know he. Well, tell me. I said, tell me. No, no, I can't. I'm not going to tell you. So when he Got fired. I said, he comes to New York. I said, all right, you just got hit in the ass with a golden horseshoe. Let's do that thing you said is going to change the industries. What do you mean? I reminded him, and he said, the meet. Let's do it. And we initially went to Perot, and it wasn't going to work. So I went and lined up 40 people that all had done very well with Handy Dan. And we put together $2 million Arthur Bernie. And right after we incorporated, they found another guy, a merchandise and genius by the name of Pat Farah. And we brought him on board. And he was two months after we were founded, but he was effectively one of the founders of the company as well. And the rest is history.

[Kristen Bell]

So one thing that I found interesting was that started with. The aim was to open four stores in Atlanta. Two of them open, but it was not supposed to.

[Ken Langone]

No. Early on, Bernie was standing in front of the store offering people a dollar if they would walk in and look what was in the store.

[Kristen Bell]

And why do you think that was? Because the concept was so new.

[Ken Langone]

Yeah, it was brand new. When you had this huge. And, you know, we had challenges. We didn't have a lot of money. And so when they were negotiating with the vendors, we got the vendors because we didn't want to have empty shelves. They gave us empty boxes with their labels on them. So people thought we had all this merchandise and all the overheads was air.

[Kristen Bell]

So when did you have the sense that it was going to really be as big as it became? What was the beginning when you were sitting?

[Ken Langone]

Well, Bernie got fired.

[Kristen Bell]

Talk about that.

[Ken Langone]

Look, Bernie is fabulous. I knew Bernie was going to be a big success, and Bernie knew the business. Bernie had a great knack for having good people around him. That's critical. So I had a good start there, and Bernie had. And we still have a very close relationship. We had to persuade Arthur to come. He was not sure he wanted to do it. Pat Farrell was running his own store, which was doing very well in terms of physically, but financially, it was a disaster. And eventually he had to bankrupt it. It was then we got Pat to join up with us, and we did it. But I never thought we'd have 400,000 employees, but I thought we had a chance to have a great business.

[Kristen Bell]

So I want to talk a little bit about. I want to kind of finish the Home Depot section just by talking a little bit about how you have these founders. Obviously, it's getting big. There's different skill sets of starting something. And Being entrepreneurial, running a mature organization. So talk a little bit about finding Arthur's successor.

[Ken Langone]

Okay. Bernie, Arthur and I had agreed that we didn't have anybody in the company, that if something happened to Arthur. So we hired Heydrick and Struggles. And it turns out, at the time, coincidentally, I was on the board of General Electric. And this was when Jack Welch was going to make his decision about his successor. Unfortunately, he picked up the wrong guy. It turned out to be a disaster. Bob Nardelli was the only one, and Bob had done a great job. I was on the board of GE and I saw. As an operator.

[Kristen Bell]

Yep.

[Ken Langone]

And this is what we needed. We, you know, we were growing. We don't forget. We were opening 200 stores a year then. Staggering amount of stores, and it was getting away from us. And so we brought Bob in. In fairness, Bob did a great job for four years, and for whatever reason, he sort of lost whatever it was. What he had done in the first four years left a lot to be desired, and we had to make a change. We had a serious morale issue in the store.

[Kristen Bell]

So I want to end because Mark is obsessed with Bernie Madoff. We have had Diana Henriques, who wrote the wizard of Lies, on the program. He's a friend of mine. And you were featured in the movie version of that. Not exactly the right way to recount the story, so.

[Ken Langone]

But it didn't happen that way.

[Kristen Bell]

Yeah, exactly. That's what I wanted. I want to hear what happened when you met Bernie Madoff.

[Ken Langone]

2008, in the middle of the crash, the week Lehman Brothers went broke. We sold a company we had a big interest in called Choice Point to Reed Elsever for cash. And thank God for Marty Lipton and his firm. Ed Hurley and the gang, they wrote a contract with Reed Elsever that you couldn't get a drop of water through. Reid tried to claim force majeure. We said, uh, we're settling. And so we got. Friday night of the same week that.

[Kristen Bell]

Lehman went broke, you got a big wire in.

[Ken Langone]

We got $4.3 billion in cash. That wasn't all ours, but we had a good piece.

[Jill Schlesinger]

Yeah.

[Ken Langone]

A very dear friend of mine, a wonderful man, called me up and said, look, Bernie Madoff would like to meet you. This was a month and a half after that, in November. He wanted you to meet with him. And so I have a partner that lived out in Sun Valley then. And I called up Steve Holzman, and I said, steve, do me a favor. I said, I'm going to beat this guy Madoff. I don't know what the hell he's talking about. I said, but you probably might, because Steve understood all these different strategies and stuff. So Steve came in, and for the first 40, we're in his offices in the Lipstick Building on Third Avenue, showing me all this art, like I really care. And finally I said, bernie, I got to go to a dinner. And I said, can we sit down and talk? And he said, sure. So he sits down and he starts talking about this and that and the other thing and this put and that call and this straddle. And I'm sitting there, my eyes are glazing over. Steve is listening. And then he says to me, and look, he said, I can only take 500 million for this deal. He said, it's not big enough for me to give all of my existing clients, so I'm going to give it to you. My first reaction was, wait a minute, how would I feel if I was one of his clients? And I found out he's got this phenomenal bird's nest on the ground, but he's giving it to a guy he's never done business with before and keeping me out of it. I didn't say anything, Bernie, I gotta leave for dinner. And so we thanked him, we got in the elevator, we went downstairs, and I said, steve, I don't want to do business with this guy. I thanked him very much. I said, I don't want to do business with this guy. He's why. I said, look, if he's going to screw his existing customers, I might be the next one. He gets screwed. I don't want to do it. I said, I think it's bad faith not to offer this deal, which is supposed to be a slam dunk deal, to his people. He said, well, let me think about it. So the Friday after Thanksgiving of that week, Steve called me and said, you know, Ken, you're right. I don't want to do it. I said, well, do me a favor. Call him up and be polite and respectful. Just tell him we're going to pay us. And that's how it happened. Hollywood likes license. They need drama.

[Kristen Bell]

Exactly. Meeting this guy, he was teetering on the edge of.

[Ken Langone]

He was slick. I wouldn't want to play poker with this guy. He knew he was going down when he was talking to us.

[Kristen Bell]

That's what I think, timing wise.

[Ken Langone]

If I was playing poker with this guy, he'd have all my clothes, he'd have all my houses, he'd have. This guy was Mr. Cool.

[Kristen Bell]

I want to wrap up, and I know that Capitalism is sort of the theme of the book and why you love it. It's really the story of your life. I want to also point out a couple of the things that you say that you have. Curiosity. You are notorious for asking more questions than any other director on a board. I didn't give a blank if my question showed how stupid I was. You also, I guess was interesting is that you note that this is not a zero sum game. And you say in the book you were a lifelong Republican for some time, but you also have spoken publicly about how you're concerned about income inequality.

[Ken Langone]

Absolutely.

[Kristen Bell]

Could you explain that a little bit?

[Ken Langone]

Sure. If the gap between the well off and the not so well off gets big enough, you put the people that are not so well off to say, hey, you know what? Nothing's working for me. What happens? You get a Cuba, you get a Venezuela, you get a Russia. We've got to figure a way out to bring everybody to the party. The most exciting thing to me about Home Depot, a lot of things about it. We have 3,000 kids today who started in the parking lot fresh out of high school, pushing carts in. They're multi millionaires.

[Kristen Bell]

Is that because of the stock or.

[Ken Langone]

They work their way up? No, no, we give them options and stock savings. Look, I think of my mother and father, they were down at that end of the spectrum and I know how they struggle. We've got to do a better job. I don't have all the answers, but I know we can't allow these people, all of us as a citizen, as citizens, we can't allow these people to not participate in this great dream called America.

[Jill Schlesinger]

I hope you liked that. It was fun for me to revisit this interview because it has been a while. Now, if you've got a financial question about your own financial journey and what's going on in your life, don't hesitate to give us a Holler. Go to jillonmoney.com, click the contact Us button, it's always in the upper right hand corner. And, and drop us a note if you would like to join us live. Don't forget to check the box. Mark will do everything else. And of course, while you are on the website, don't forget to sign up for the free weekly newsletter, which is basically a substack now. So if you're on substack, just search for Jill on Money and there we will be. It is a Friday and so I will thank Mark Telercio, the best executive producer and king of all things web. I also would like to thank Joel Goodman who composed our music, and also the wonderful folks at Audacy who distribute this program. And by the way, if you want to subscribe to us, you can do so on the Audacy app or wherever you find your favorite podcast. Don't forget to do something nice for someone else today. Change your work, change your wealth, change your life. Thank you for listening. We'll talk to you on Monday.

[Kristen Bell]

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[Ken Langone]

Hey, what's up Flies? This is David Spade. Dana Carvey. Look at I know we never actually left, but I'll just say it. We are back with another season of Fly on the Wall. Every episode, including ones with guests, will now be on video. Every Thursday you'll hear us and see us chatting with big name celebrities. And every Monday, you're stuck with just me and Dana. We react to news, what's trending, viral clips follow and listen to Fly on the Wall everywhere you get your podcasts.