Buy in bulk and on credit

Summary

Marketplace: Buy in Bulk and on Credit Host: Kai Ryssdal | Release Date: January 23, 2025

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1. Consumer Spending Drives Economic Momentum

Kai Ryssdal opens the episode by highlighting the pivotal role of American consumer spending, which accounts for 70% of the U.S. economy. He underscores this by referencing Procter & Gamble's (P&G) recent performance, where the conglomerate reported a 3% year-over-year sales growth, primarily driven by increased sales volume rather than price hikes.

Notable Quote:

"Spending by or on behalf of American consumers drives 70% of everything that happens in this economy." — Kai Ryssdal [01:04]

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2. Shift from Price Increases to Volume Sales

Henry Epp from Marketplace investigates how consumer goods companies, like P&G, are adapting to current economic conditions. Arun Sundaram of CFRA Research explains that while companies previously relied on price increases to drive profits, this strategy is no longer sustainable. Instead, businesses are focusing on maintaining competitive prices to boost sales volume.

Notable Quote:

"Growth has been driven by, you know, higher prices, which is obviously not sustainable over the longer term." — Arun Sundaram [02:28]

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3. Bulk Buying as a Consumer Strategy

Sundaram further elaborates that consumers are increasingly purchasing larger pack sizes from retailers like Costco and Sam's Club, seeking better value. Brian McCarthy from Deloitte adds that value now encompasses not just lower prices but also quality and convenience, influencing purchasing decisions.

Notable Quotes:

"More consumers are shopping at places like Costco or Sam's Club, where you can get those larger pack sizes." — Arun Sundaram [03:01]

"Value is really what shoppers are looking for right now after years of high inflation." — Brian McCarthy [03:10]

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4. Current Health of Consumer Credit

Despite rising delinquencies on credit cards and auto loans, CEO Richard Fairbank of Capital One asserts that the overall credit metrics remain strong. This sentiment is supported by Gerard Cassidy from RBC Capital Markets and Ben Ayers of Nationwide, who note that ongoing government relief efforts and a robust labor market help sustain consumer financial health.

Notable Quotes:

"The consumer's in a great place." — Richard Fairbank [05:25]

"Workers are hard to find. Income growth is outpacing inflation." — Ben Ayers [05:58]

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5. Uneven Credit Stress Among Households

Economist Shannon Grine from Wells Fargo highlights that while wealthier consumers remain financially stable, lower-income households are increasingly struggling under high prices and interest rates. These vulnerable groups are the primary drivers behind the recent uptick in loan delinquencies.

Notable Quote:

"The top 20% of consumers account for about 40% of spending in the U.S. so I think you can have these vulnerabilities surface without it causing a meaningful deterioration in consumer spending." — Shannon Grine [06:42]

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6. Agricultural Labor and Immigration Policies

In an insightful interview, Patrick Smith of Loftus Ranches discusses the critical dependency of agriculture on the H2A visa program. Rising labor costs, now consuming 99% of revenue for Washington apple growers, are squeezing profit margins. Smith emphasizes the broader implications of restrictive immigration policies on food security and national interests.

Notable Quotes:

"Farm labor, and a secure source of farm labor is more than just important to employers like us, to farmers." — Patrick Smith [12:14]

"In 2023, Washington apple growers spent 99% of their revenue on labor." — Arun Sundaram [10:22]

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7. Impact of Executive Orders on Infrastructure Funding

Kimberly Adams reports on the confusion stirred by a recent executive order titled "Unleashing American Energy," which temporarily halted federal funds tied to the Inflation Reduction Act and Infrastructure Law. This pause has led to uncertainty among state policymakers and could potentially delay critical infrastructure projects.

Notable Quote:

"The whole thing is causing a ton of confusion." — Kimberly Adams [23:24]

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8. Effective Disaster Relief: What’s Needed

Jill Replogle highlights the challenges in disaster relief efforts, particularly the mismatch between donations and actual needs. Volunteers at the YMCA in Sierra Madre focus on distributing pet supplies, while experts like Drew Hanna from Team Rubicon stress the inefficiency of used clothing donations, which often end up in landfills. The recommendation is to donate money or specific needed items to ensure relief efforts are effective.

Notable Quotes:

"Clothing donations can be especially difficult to handle." — Drew Hanna [17:30]

"A better approach ... is to contact donation centers or check their social media to find out exactly what's needed." — Jill Replogle [17:45]

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9. Rebuilding Communities Post-Disaster

Hannah Berniske, owner of Cold Mountain Art Collective in Canton, North Carolina, shares her journey of rebuilding after Hurricane Helene. She emphasizes the importance of community involvement and flexible financial assistance, noting the overwhelming nature of reconstruction tasks and the necessity of support from local volunteers and resources.

Notable Quote:

"I love my building. I'm very attached to it and I just don't think I could lose, lose it or leave it." — Hannah Berniske [26:14]

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10. Market Movements and Financial Insights

The episode briefly touches upon the day's market movements, noting increases in major indices like the NASDAQ and S&P 500, influenced by consumer demand and corporate performances. However, a deeper dive into these figures is reserved for upcoming segments.

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11. The Valuation of College Football Teams

In a quirky final note, Ryssdal references Indiana University research valuing top college football teams at nearly $2 billion each. This segment reflects on the commercialization and financial dimensions of collegiate sports, though it remains more of an anecdotal commentary than a deep economic analysis.

Notable Quote:

"Could that team be bought and sold on the open market?" — Kai Ryssdal [26:50]

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Conclusion

In this episode of Marketplace, Kai Ryssdal and his guests delve into the dynamics of consumer spending, the shifting strategies of major corporations like Procter & Gamble, and the nuanced state of consumer credit. The discussion extends to the indispensable role of immigrant labor in agriculture, the complexities introduced by recent executive orders affecting infrastructure funding, and the best practices for disaster relief. Through interviews with industry experts and affected individuals, the episode paints a comprehensive picture of the current economic landscape, emphasizing the interconnectedness of consumer behavior, policy decisions, and community resilience.

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This summary is based on the transcript provided and excludes commercial breaks, introductions, and non-content segments to focus on the core discussions and insights presented in the episode.

Transcript

[Sponsor Announcer]

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[Kai Ryssdal]

In which once again, the hero of the economic story is you. From American Public Media, this is Marketplace in Los Angeles. I'm Kyle Rudolph. It is Wednesday today, the 22nd of January. Good as always to have you along, everybody. We'll begin midweek with a checkup of sorts on the American consumer. We do that, by the way, concentrate so much on consumers, because in case you're new here, spending by or on behalf of American consumers drives 70% of everything that happens in this economy. And the most proximate beneficiary of that spending today is the consumer products conglomerate Procter and Gamble, maker of everything from laundry detergent to tampons to toothpaste. P and G reported profits this morning, sales up 3% year over year sales growth mostly thanks to higher sales volume rather than higher prices. Marketplace's Henry Epp gets us going with what that tells us about how consumers are spending right now and how retailers are trying to get their piece of it.

[Henry Epp]

Companies that sell packaged goods to U.S. consumers, razors and toilet paper and cleaning products, they've had a pretty decent couple years, says Arun Sundaram at CFRA Research.

[Arun Sundaram]

But growth has been driven by, you know, higher prices, which is obviously not sustainable over the longer term.

[Henry Epp]

A company can only raise its prices so much before customers start to look for cheaper options. So now companies are trying to keep their prices in check and focus more on sales volume. He says. Procter and Gamble is having some success in that area, in part because, as their chief financial officer told Bloomberg, some consumers are consistently buying larger packs of things. Again, Arun Sundaram at cfra, that indirectly.

[Arun Sundaram]

Means that more consumers are shopping at places like Costco or Sam's Club, where you can get those larger pack sizes. And oftentimes that comes at a better value to the consumer.

[Henry Epp]

Value is really what shoppers are looking for right now after years of high inflation, says Brian McCarthy at Deloitte. And value doesn't just mean spending less. It can be a combination of things and not just about the product itself.

[Kai Ryssdal]

For some, it's going to be quality.

[Arun Sundaram]

For others, it's price Brother's experience, you know, some for its convenience.

[Henry Epp]

So if retailers can make it easy and maybe satisfying to buy, say a 36 roll pack of toilet paper, that approach can win over some customers. And overall economic conditions might make those customers open to spending a bit more in the months ahead, McCarthy says.

[Kai Ryssdal]

We're starting to see interest rates come down while the labor market remains strong and inflation is starting to wane as well.

[Henry Epp]

Those factors could give retailers a lift in many categories, including some that have struggled the last couple years, says Craig Rowley at Korn Ferry.

[Arun Sundaram]

We're seeing apparel doing better, we're seeing athletic wear doing better, we're seeing home goods doing better.

[Henry Epp]

All that stuff we bought a ton of early in the pandemic, he says. It's starting to wear out and needs to get replaced, and we've got a bit more spending power to do that right now. I'm Henry Epp for Marketplace P and.

[Kai Ryssdal]

G shares up about 1.9% today. That's a bit better than the three major indices. We will have the details when we do the numbers. Even though Procter and Gamble has been selling a lot of pretty much everything, there is still a handful of warning signs when it comes to American consumers. Right now, interest rates are still high, and there's a good chance they're going to stay that way for the foreseeable future. And according to data from the New York Fed, delinquencies on credit cards and auto loans have been rising for more than a year now. That does sound like a bad sign for an economy powered by consumer spending. But as Marketplaces Justin Ho reports, is it really?

[Justin Ho]

This is how Capital One CEO Richard Fairbank described the health of his customer base on an earnings call this week.

[Kai Ryssdal]

The credit metrics are looking great.

[Justin Ho]

The consumer's in a great place, fairbank said. Customers account balances are higher than before the pandemic. Gerard Cassidy, a bank analyst at RBC Capital Markets, says all of the government relief aid that went out early in the pandemic is still helping people pay off their bills.

[Kai Ryssdal]

And I think it's going to take at least another year or two before.

[Henry Epp]

It'S completely washed out of the system.

[Justin Ho]

The labor market is still strong, too. Workers are hard to find. Income growth is outpacing inflation. Ben Ayers is senior economist at Nationwide.

[Henry Epp]

For most people that have jobs, and.

[Arun Sundaram]

Particularly those that have investments, they have homes, and those values are going up, the credit situation for most households is.

[Justin Ho]

Pretty solid, but the emphasis there is on most. Ayres says plenty of households are struggling under the weight of high prices and high interest rates. In fact, he says, it's those households that are behind the recent increase in loan delinquencies.

[Arun Sundaram]

They're falling behind on payments. They're putting more of their day to day expenses on credit cards. And it's that segment that we're definitely concerned about.

[Justin Ho]

But those pockets of stress don't really pose much of a threat to the broader economy because wealthier consumers are still in good shape, says Shannon Grine, an economist with Wells Fargo.

[Sponsor Announcer]

So the top 20% of consumers account for about 40% of spending in the U.S. so I think you can have these vulnerabilities surface without it causing a meaningful deterioration in consumer spending.

[Justin Ho]

Grind says the risk here is that the strong economy will mask those vulnerabilities. She says that's something the Federal Reserve will have to keep in mind.

[Sponsor Announcer]

They need to see a little bit more sustained progress on inflation. But I do think they're also aware of the fact that higher rates are having an impact on certain areas of the economy, particularly these more vulnerable consumer groups.

[Justin Ho]

And Grind says cutting interest rates could help those groups stay afloat. I'm Justin Ho for Marketplace.

[Kai Ryssdal]

About eight years ago, I went apple picking for a series we were doing on the show back then, but it wasn't fun. What a lovely fall day. Apple picking. It was actual agricultural. This is a job. Apple picking. And it was hard.

[Arun Sundaram]

You should feel how heavy that bag is.

[Kai Ryssdal]

Give him the strap, too. Oh, yeah, the whole thing all filled up. Which it is. The thing weighs 42 pounds. Jesus.

[Arun Sundaram]

That's how handy that bag is.

[Kai Ryssdal]

He's going up a ladder, up a.

[Arun Sundaram]

Ladder, down a ladder.

[Kai Ryssdal]

And with some chiding. No, I don't want to try to climb. All right, fine, I'll try to climb. So am I. I get hurt. We're going to sue you. You know that, right? Slowly but surely, I inch my way up. Just a couple of steps, mind you. Wow. Wow. Yeah. Now, all right, I'm done. That was Patrick Smith with me there that day on his family farm, Loftus Ranches in the Yakima Valley up in Washington State apples and hops too, is what they grow. As you've heard me say more than once on this program. Immigration is a labor story, which I mention, of course, because of the Trump administration. So to get a sense of what that might mean in the very labor intensive agriculture sector, we've gotten Patrick Smith back on the phone. Patrick, it's really good to talk to you again.

[Arun Sundaram]

Yeah, good to talk to you, guy.

[Kai Ryssdal]

First things first, I suppose. How's business at Loftus Ranches?

[Arun Sundaram]

Yeah, business is good. You know, agriculture, of course, is very cyclical and both hops and apples are two primary crops are in a little bit of a down cycle right now. But you know, we've got a great team here and we're focused on the things that we can control. And yeah, we're making our way through it.

[Kai Ryssdal]

Fair enough. Let's talk about some stuff you maybe can't control. And the reason we wanted to talk to you was, you know, I played up in the introduction to this piece, I played a piece of tape from, you know, when I was up there with you guys in 2016, and I came to realize how hard apple farming is and what kind of labor you need. Here's, here's my question. First of all, what's your labor situation right now? Are you getting all the H2 visa people that you need? And secondarily, how much is it costing? It's got to be really expensive.

[Arun Sundaram]

Yeah, yeah. So we are fortunate that the H2A visa program does give us the availability of labor that we need to get the job done. As you allude to, the difficulty is that the cost continues to escalate even faster than inflation. That represents a significant real cost increase.

[Kai Ryssdal]

What I hear you saying is that your margins are getting really thin.

[Arun Sundaram]

Yeah. Correct. So the Northwest Horticultural Council trade group here commissioned a study recently about Washington apple growers labor costs over the past decade. And in 2023, Washington apple growers spent 99% of their revenue on labor. So that 1% doesn't leave much for fertilizer and taxes and water and, you know, fuel for your tractors, things like that. And so, yeah, margins are getting squeezed in comparison. In 2013, labor was about 37% of the like per bin revenue that apple growers received.

[Kai Ryssdal]

You don't need me to tell you this, but having 1% left over is, is not a way to run a business model.

[Arun Sundaram]

No, no. And like we've talked about before, farmers are price takers. We don't set the price of apples. And in an economic environment and political environment, where inflation is really the driving, you know, force in elections and, you know, household budgets. You know, it's really hard for us to manage and, you know, not pass on significant cost increases that consumers would see in the grocery store.

[Kai Ryssdal]

It's tricky to know what the new Trump administration is going to do on immigration before they actually do it. They've started some crackdowns, and obviously crackdowns will not happen to H2A workers because they're illegally unsponsored by you. But it's possible that this administration is going to decide that even legal immigration is not something that it's interested in.

[Arun Sundaram]

Yeah, absolutely. You know, farm labor, and a secure source of farm labor is more than just important to, to employers like us, to, to farmers. Food security is an important, you know, part of national security. It's also an important trade bargaining chip in that American agriculture is a net exporter. And if legal immigration is constrained through policies of the Trump administration, that has other implications beyond just how it affects farmers.

[Kai Ryssdal]

Yeah, you are what I know I ask you this pretty much every time, and I can never remember, you're the fourth generation, right. Of your family to be on this farm.

[Arun Sundaram]

Yeah. Correct.

[Kai Ryssdal]

All right. And you and your siblings and the rest of your family have expanded. You have a brewery now. You've got, I was looking at your website earlier. You've got Loftus Labs, which is sort of a analytics and data thing. So you're clearly expanding. Here's my question, though. Do you imagine how old are your kids now, Patrick?

[Arun Sundaram]

I have three kids. They are 14. 8 and 4.

[Kai Ryssdal]

14. So not too far from deciding what that kid is going to do. Do you imagine they're going to be generation number five?

[Arun Sundaram]

I certainly hope so. If we do our job well, the farm hopefully will be there for them to at least have the decision whether they want to come back to it or not. You know, I certainly hope that, you know, that we pursue smart immigration and trade policies that benefit farmers as well as, you know, the nation as a whole.

[Kai Ryssdal]

Patrick Smith, Loftus ranches up in the Yakima Valley in Washington State. Apples, hops, brewery data analytics, all that good stuff. Patrick, thanks a bunch. Good to talk to you again.

[Arun Sundaram]

Likewise, Kai, Good to talk to you.

[Kai Ryssdal]

There's been, as I'm sure there is, wherever natural disaster strikes, a massive outpouring of support for victims of the Palisades and Eaton fires, GoFundMes shelter and donations of all kinds. But what gets given isn't always what's most needed. From laist, Jill Replogle has More.

[Jill Replogle]

Just southeast of where the Eaton fire burned, the YMCA in Sierra Madre is a hive of activity. On this morning, a large group of volunteers forms a chain to unload boxes of donations from an Amazon truck.

[Sponsor Announcer]

I can see the front wall.

[Jill Replogle]

There are also a lot of just regular folks who wanted to help, like 11 year old Winnie Newberg.

[Kai Ryssdal]

We didn't lose our home, but a lot of our friends did, so we wanted to give something back.

[Jill Replogle]

And what's your job here?

[Kai Ryssdal]

Right now me and my friend are.

[Jill Replogle]

Basically just giving out pet supplies like.

[Arun Sundaram]

Toys, leashes, food for cats and dogs.

[Jill Replogle]

The back patio of the YMCA is dotted with piles of canned food, toys and bedding. AJ Plasencia wanders around looking to replace things that he, his wife and 2 year old son lost in the fire. Are there specific things that you're looking for for him?

[Kai Ryssdal]

Basically cars, toy cars, dinosaur toys and.

[Sponsor Announcer]

Things that he likes like that.

[Jill Replogle]

He's also looking for essentials he'll need when he can get out of the emergency shelter where he and his family have been staying.

[Kai Ryssdal]

Trying to find a mattress, but I can't. I don't seem to find one here.

[Jill Replogle]

Placencia and the other fire victims I speak with say they're grateful for all the help they're getting, including for little things like snacks and toothbrushes and eye cream. Many of them lost everything. State Senator Sasha Renee Perez is also here. She represents this area. She says what people need most right now is money.

[Sponsor Announcer]

Cash assistance really gives my constituents the flexibility to address whatever pressing needs that they may have at that moment. A lot of times that need might be housing, right?

[Jill Replogle]

Maybe it might be food for the children. What fire victims and donation centers don't seem to need more of is used clothing. After I leave the ymca, I drive down Sierra Madre Boulevard several miles west past scarred oak trees and hillsides scorched by the Eaton fire. I see five pop up donation sites within about a mile on the porches of businesses. Outside of the supermarket in front of a local funeral home, used clothing is piled high on folding tables. Some of it, including a poofy white wedding dress, is strewn across the sidewalk.

[Arun Sundaram]

I've seen, you know, pallets of clothing just left outside in a, in a.

[Henry Epp]

Parking lot for four months after some disasters because there's no place to put it.

[Arun Sundaram]

People don't have resources to sort it.

[Jill Replogle]

This is Drew Hanna. He's led relief efforts after disasters in California, Hawaii and elsewhere for the nonprofit Team Rubicon. He says clothing donations can be especially.

[Kai Ryssdal]

Difficult to handle, that is countless hours.

[Arun Sundaram]

Of work by, you know, volunteer agencies, by survivors themselves to navigate, you know, the piles and piles of donated clothing.

[Jill Replogle]

Hannah says a lot of donations after disasters unfortunately end up in the landfill. A better approach, he and others told me, is to contact donation centers or check their social media to find out exactly what's needed or give money to a trusted relief organization that knows how to put it to good use. In Los Angeles, I'm Jill Replogel for Marketplace.

[Sponsor Announcer]

Coming up, I could use all the help painting, trim, just spot cleaning, staging.

[Kai Ryssdal]

That kind of thing, reopening after a hurricane. But first, let's do the numbers down. Duster was up 130 points today, about 3/10%, finished at 44,156. The NASDAQ went up 252 points. That's 1.3%. 2020,009. The S&P 500 up 37 points about 6 10% 6086 we heard earlier from Henry Epp about the state of consumer demand. Kellanova, the parent company of Cheez, its Morningstar Farm meat substitutes and Rice Krispie treats, dipped less than a 10th percent today. Clorox Company might be and probably is best known for its cleaning products. Also, however, owns the Kingsford Charcoal brand and also Hidden Valley Ranch. Who knew down 8/10 of 1%. Bonds down yield on the 10 year T note up 4.61% on the 10 year today you are listening to Marketplace.

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[Kai Ryssdal]

This is marketplace. I'm Kai Rysdal. Executive orders and actions have been coming out of the White House fast and furious, as you have surely seen and heard. And while speed can get an agenda moving quickly, it can also muddy the waters. Take, for instance, Section 7 of the Executive order from the other day titled Unleashing American Energy. It orders, among other things, an immediate pause to the disbursement of federal funds tied to certain components of the Inflation Reduction act and the infrastructure law. Which components exactly, is a lot less clear, as Marketplace's Kimberly Adams explains.

[Kimberly Adams]

Early yesterday afternoon, Jeff Davis at the Eno center for Transportation started getting frantic.

[Arun Sundaram]

Phone calls saying that the executive order signed by President Trump the day before.

[Henry Epp]

Reporting to stop green New Deal spending.

[Arun Sundaram]

Was having the effect of suspending all Federal Highway Administration payments and new project approvals.

[Kimberly Adams]

Davis says the FHA started shutting down disbursements out of an abundance of caution, even for things like road and bridge work. The idea that promised funding could be on hold changes the calculus for state policymakers, says Adi Tomer at the Brookings Institution.

[Arun Sundaram]

They may be hesitant to continue projects where they might be liable for enormous sums of money. We're talking tens to potentially hundreds of.

[Kimberly Adams]

Millions of dollars after that panic, the White House issued guidance clarifying it was just talking about the Green New Deal stuff like EV charging infrastructure. Other funding can keep flowing if agencies check in first. The whole thing is causing a ton of confusion.

[Kai Ryssdal]

I will tell you that.

[Sponsor Announcer]

There is a lot of people reaching out that are wondering what is going on.

[Kimberly Adams]

Marcia Gildert Murphy is the president of the American Society of Civil Engineers and also works as an engineering consultant in five states.

[Arun Sundaram]

Everybody in those states are all equally.

[Sponsor Announcer]

Concerned about what is going to happen to this money that hasn't been received.

[Kimberly Adams]

Yet, but was promised because tens of billions of dollars have been promised for projects tied to the Inflation Reduction act and infrastructure law. Jody Freeman directs the Project on Environmental and Energy Law at Harvard Law School and says if the president tries to block that funding permanently, that's considered impoundment.

[Justin Ho]

That would be the president actually impounding.

[Kai Ryssdal]

Money that Congress has appropriated and that would lead to a legal battle.

[Kimberly Adams]

Plus, says Freeman, states that already spent that money with the expectation of reimbursement would likely sue to get it back. In Washington, I'm Kimberly Adams for Marketplace.

[Kai Ryssdal]

Plans to build back are just starting to take shape after the fires here in Los Angeles. Over on the other side of the country, a lot of homeowners and businesses are in the early stages of their own rebuilds after Hurricane Helene hit last fall. Hannah Berniske is the owner of Cold Mountain Art Collective in Canton, North Carolina.

[Sponsor Announcer]

So we still have a long way to go, but I was able to get a brand new window for the front gallery space. We've had some electrical work done. And I think really in the next two weeks, things should start picking up and moving pretty quickly, as is my hope. I really would like to be open no later than like late February. But each week that goes by, each day that goes by, it just, it, it's starting to feel like it's going to push into March. I hope not, but we'll see. Sometimes it feels really overwhelming to think about all of the small things like countertops and doors and mirrors and toilet seats. And it's like all the little things add up and they feel very overwhelming. But it looks like around $50,000 for the rebuild. Now, whether insurance matches that or not, I don't know yet. So kind of a wait and see game with that. But either way, it's got to get done. I think that for me the biggest question is why stay in this location knowing that it's flooded and that it'll likely flood again. But I bought this building with my small business loan for a really good deal. And even if I were to sell it and try to purchase another property, I would never be able to get something as affordable as this. I love my building. I'm very attached to it and I just don't think I could lose, lose it or leave it. I'm looking forward to, like, the final details. We're going to set up some volunteer days to have the community come in and do like, put together our IKEA furniture and we'll have pizza. And it just, it gives the community more of an investment in the space. They've really been wanting to offer physical labor. And so I'm going to, I'm going to accept that I could use all the help painting, trim, just spot cleaning, staging, that kind of thing. I think it's those moments leading up to the grand opening that I'm looking forward to the most. It's kind of like an opportunity to start fresh with new business ideas and just new new paths.

[Kai Ryssdal]

Hannah Berniski, owner of the hopefully soon to be up and running again, Cold Mountain Art Collective in Canton, North Carolina. This final note on the way out today in which I ask you once again to tell me how college football is intended, actually professional. The name, image, likeness deals we have talked about whereby players can benefit from the use of their personal brands, which good. Saw this in the Wall Street Journal today, though, that the Ohio State Buckeyes football team, newly minted national champions, would be valued at $1.96 billion. Could that team be bought and sold on the open market? That's research out of Indiana University. Columbus, Texas comes in at 1.9 billion, Michigan at 1.6, Georgia, Notre Dame, LSU, Penn State, Tennessee and Texas A and M, all breaking nine figures. I personally wanted Notre Dame to win, not that that's here nor there. Our media production team includes Brian Allison, Jake Cherry, Jesse Dueler, Drew Jostat, Gary O'Keefe, Charlton Thorpe, Juan Carlos Tirado and Becca Weinman. They are priceless. Jeff Peters is the manager of media production. I'm Kai Ryssdal. We will see you tomorrow. Everybody, this is APM.