Any Updates to Harvey Brody's 4th Gear?

I was just browsing my old Harvey Brody manual, but it's kind of hard to read because it has a lot of water damage (maybe I have Gordon's copy, since he lost his in a basement flood).

Anyways, I was reading the part about the "4th Gear" which is basically licensing. Harvey says that there are 4 gears you can operate your business on... and the 3rd and 4th would have created wealth faster for him... if he had discovered them earlier.

3rd gear is when you are a virtual manufacturer, and you outsource the manufacturing. 4th gear is licensing your idea or concept.

However, I was also reading an internet post recently that claimed Harvey has gone way beyond his earlier teachings.

I've always thought that licensing was the "holy grail" of business -- no business hassles and no financing problems -- but residual income from an entire industry.

Does anyone know if there was an update to the course... or if there is a "5th" gear? Does anyone know what Harvey is up to?

Someone should get the rights to re-publish his old courses.

Thanks.

[GordonJ]

Hi Pickle,

Actually he has some copies in his warehouse, but he considers that "yesterday's" news and is at this point in time, probably, not willing to "bother" with them. He thinks of that stuff as being "historical".

Consider the TOLL position...you and I may think it's the greatest concept ever in building a business...

BUT, Harvey considers this to be the first INCH in a mile of information about making money and keeping it.

As far as there being a 5th gear...YES. And Harvey might say that it is more like Ninth or Tenth gear today.

I paid almost 600 bux for his old course, worth 1000 times that...and he had a publishing concern and employees...and he woke up one day and didn't want to be "bogged down". So through attrition and by not marketing his information products he was able to shut down an area of his business (although it was profitable) that had the "bog down" factor.

Anyone with employees knows that feeling.

Consider his friend Ben Suarez, with a 175,000 square foot facility and HUNDREDS of employees...and even though SCI is a 100 million dollar a year company, there is a lot of overhead...

Now I don't know, so this is just an example...but in Ben's book, 7 Steps to Freedom II there is a formula for how many employees a company needs (a remote direct marketing company that is) as it grows.

Using that formula it would not be hard to imagine that Ben personally pulls 6 or 7 million dollars a year out of the company, and of course he builds the equity and value of the business he owns. So we might be able to guess that most owners of a 100 million dollar company are making 4 to 10 million a year after paying all those employees.

Now mileage varies, of course.

But SCI is a "corporate" model. With hundreds of employees, buildings, overhead you and I could retire on...

And Harvey maintains (today, after ridding himself of employees and other headaches) more of a family "Entrepreneur" type business.

Harvey, his wife and daughter are the business. He has upwards of 150 customers. SCI has millions of customers.

3 people, and although this is only as example, Harvey and family are able to generate a substantial income, more than most 100 million dollar company owners by doing things his way.

IS the 4th gear still a part of his operation...I would say yes, and I think he might say something like "that is so yesterday, I'm involved in something much better than that now"...

What exactly is his 5th, 6th, and 7th gears? When I find out (and with his permission of course) I'll be the first person to share that information.

I do know that patents, licensing and INTERNATIONAL TOLL positions still play a large part in his company.

Maybe I'll finally be able to persuade Harvey to do a little teleconference and give us Harvey Brody wannabes a peek into what he is doing now.

At 75 years he is in great health, LOVES what he does, fights off the gurus with a stick (they want to BOG him down) and he doesn't suffer fools.

IF there are others who would like to know what Harvey is up to these days...start banging the drum slowly...here's as good a place as any...and maybe to stop the din of noise we're sending in his direction...

he'll give us a little sample and help in pursuing our goals.

Thanks for asking pickle...I'll make sure Harvey knows that there are still people out here who remember him (I should clairfy that, many of us lesser knowns...since he does business with 150 of the biggest names in the world, you know, names like Sears, Wal-Mart, Home Depot, etc. who KNOW HB and have never lost track of what he is doing).

There have been a few imitators, but I truly believe the man is a ONE of a kind...and I still have hope I can persuade him to REappear on the "help us out" stage without getting 'BOGGED' DOWN.

Gordon Jay Alexander

PS. Pickle, what would you want/need to see about the 4th and 5th gears? Examples? Current uses? What would be the most helpful to you as a Harvey Brody "student".

Thanks so much, Gordon -

As to your question, what I would want to see about Harvey's 5th Gears, etc... is basically how Harvey is using his concepts today. A peek into his current-day operation, if you will... and maybe his advice on what young entrepreneurs should do today... what he would do differently, if he had to do it all over again.

My favorite parts of my Harvey Brody materials are:

(A) The numerous examples from his previous students... incuding the wonderful ads!

(B) The special insights he had, that no one else had... for example, his ingenious use of "slug lines."

For those who don't know what a "slug line" template is... it's basically a template where he could insert his master distributors' logos, and then provide those templates as labels, ads, press photos, etc. -- that's so pure genious, because he gets to own the rights to everything. He accomplishes 3 things by doing this: (1) he creates a "toll position" because his master distributors cannot "copycat" his formula (if it wasn't patented)... because if they did, they would have to change the label of the can -- thereby losing the goodwill of the product, and (2) he gets to provide his distributors with ready-to-go marketing material (3) he gets to build his own brand quickly (because the trademark for the product is included along with the private labeler's name on the can).

Anyways, what I'd like to learn from Harvey:

If there is a 5th gear, or a 6th gear, I'd really like to know about it! I'm looking for any material that shows how to avoid the bog-down.

I also have Ben Suarez's book.... which is great. But as soon as you look at the cartoon diagram in his book for "how to set up your office" ... and you loook at the areas for order processing, pick & pack, etc.... you realize that you're gonna need a lot... A LOT of employees.

Have you ever managed an employee before? All they care about is themselves... how much money they can earn per hour, by doing the least amount of work. The only exception is the commission-only salesperson... but in sales, turnover is so high, that you're constantly recruiting new salespeople... which bogs you down.

There is a certain genious to dealing with fewer customers...

Basically, to answer your question, Gordon I'd appreciate any info Harvey could give regarding avoiding the bog-down phenomenon.... basically, a "how-to" for operations.... what he has learned since he last taught his concepts... why he considers all of that "historical information."

Thanks so much.

Pickle,

Originally Posted by Pickle

Basically, to answer your question, Gordon I'd appreciate any info Harvey could give regarding avoiding the bog-down phenomenon.... basically, a "how-to" for operations.... what he has learned since he last taught his concepts... why he considers all of that "historical information."

Thanks so much.

One method I've read about, that seems to be making smaller businesses larger is employees being made part owners.

They experience and share in the ups and downs in business. When the business prospers, they prosper. When the business loses profits, they lose profits.

Publix, the largest employee owned supermarket chain, does this and the employees seem to be all hands on and very much interested in what happens through daily operations.

Here's some quick facts about them:
Publix Facts

Woody Quiñones
The Promotional Guy

[GordonJ]

time eating and time wasting part of life.

Let me share a little of what I do know...Harvey Brody HAS been approached by some well known, big name marketers who want to have him do seminars. They all say they can make him millions of dollars.

And he says, "so what"?

The TIME it would take for him to create an information product or be hassled with getting to a seminar or presentation can be time spent making bigger money for less effort.

SEE? That's a problem I've been having with Harvey for the last 3 years...as "creative" as I think I might be, I haven't YET been able to create a concept that beats anything Harvey has going.

So he just encourages me to keep trying. MAYBE, I'll (or someone else) will hit on just the right note.

A very small example...perhaps he has a few hundred of his old courses in his Warehouse...that could bring in thousands of dollars...but the time spent either doing it or even dealing with someone who would do it for him, and he has to do nothing...excpept sign an agreement...is still too much of a Time Waster for him.

The TW's of the world drive him crazy. We see it here and on all the forums. A person asks question after question about a subject she or he is going to do. They get all the answers, enough to write a book...and a week or two later, they are back with questions about some "greener pasture" type of thing.

Recently someone sent me a potential "deal" on an item we may have been able to make a few hundred dollars on as Finders. It could have been a couple of thousand dollars, not much, but the TIME spent would have been under an hour.

That is worth MY time, of course not for Harvey...but I'd be willing to drive up the street about 10 minutes and ASK if my contacts had interest.

The only thing I needed to do this was PICTURES of this expensive item, so we could see what condition it was in.

That is NOT an unusual request, wouldn't you want to at least see some pics before you considered buying Anything for thousands of dollars?

AND I've never heard anything back after a request to see some pics.

I have to regard that as a total waste of my time (and thank goodness I found it out with only a few minutes invested, now I know better than to get invovled).

Time Wasters. TW's.

I know that if there is a way to tap into Harvey Brody's 50 years of success and get gears one to four PLUS what has been added...without wasting his time...then we're all in for some 24k GOLD How To information.

Employees are BOG down points. Partnerships are BOG down areas. He operates a large part of his business on AGREEMENTS. Some on going and some time limited.

And when he enters into an agreement with Home Depot for example, it isn't for a few boxes of stuff...it is for hundreds of thousands, if not millions of units.

So the same amount of time that I spent farting around trying to someone who approached ME to give me some PICS, and ended up wasting my time...that same amount of TIME to Harvey Brody could be worth a million dollars or more. THAT is why he won't get BOGGED down.

He just knows more ways NOT to than even the most successful of business people know.

In the employee owned company, Harvey would know how to extract more money from something better, with less time and NO employees at all.

Gordon Jay Alexander

PS. Why does he consider his old ways to be "historical"? It would be like driving an old car when you have the new sitting right next to it. OR like flying on a plane from the 70's when you have a private jet waiting to take you anywhere you want to go.

From our conversations, I've taken away the idea that there are BETTER ways of doing it. Now I keep "hammering" on Harvey that the basics, the FOUNDATION of Freedom are still in that course, the gear 4 or so. But again, how do I get Harvey to come out of 9th gear and talk to me about 3rd and 4th gear operations...his mind just doesn't like to slow down or go "back"...he's a very progressive thinker.

I think the TOLL position coupled with his 4 gears information, with some examples of how he has done this...perhaps in an AUDIO interview (I'm pretty sure he isn't going to go for VIDEO) but MAYBE, I can use my powers of Remote Influence and get him to give up some OLD historical secrets that he has used and maybe aren't In Force at this time. YEA. I'll give that a try.

As for an example as a 9th gear...he gave me one, I'm not at liberty to share it...although I did in the archives through metaphor...and I think I can do that again...

IMAGINE if you found a golf pro that was making $750,000 a year...a teaching pro, not a tour player...and you found he had a "replicable" system, that other golf pros could use to get their income to that level...

Would you have any problems finding X number, say for example {and my poor math skills} 1000 of them to come to a seminar and PAY 25,000 to learn the system and 10% a year from their business increase...

I don't think you would. And that is ONE example of an advanced gear that Harvey Brody uses, and there are a lot of different ones too.

If Harvey thinks that even a series of audio interviews where he just answers questions is too much of a time waster, then I don't think there is much hope that his new business methods will ever be shared with anyone else before he eventually passes. That's totally his prerogative, but it would be disappointing.

Originally Posted by GordonJ

time eating and time wasting part of life.

Let me share a little of what I do know...Harvey Brody HAS been approached by some well known, big name marketers who want to have him do seminars. They all say they can make him millions of dollars.

And he says, "so what"?

The TIME it would take for him to create an information product or be hassled with getting to a seminar or presentation can be time spent making bigger money for less effort.

SEE? That's a problem I've been having with Harvey for the last 3 years...as "creative" as I think I might be, I haven't YET been able to create a concept that beats anything Harvey has going.

So he just encourages me to keep trying. MAYBE, I'll (or someone else) will hit on just the right note.

A very small example...perhaps he has a few hundred of his old courses in his Warehouse...that could bring in thousands of dollars...but the time spent either doing it or even dealing with someone who would do it for him, and he has to do nothing...excpept sign an agreement...is still too much of a Time Waster for him.

The TW's of the world drive him crazy. We see it here and on all the forums. A person asks question after question about a subject she or he is going to do. They get all the answers, enough to write a book...and a week or two later, they are back with questions about some "greener pasture" type of thing.

Recently someone sent me a potential "deal" on an item we may have been able to make a few hundred dollars on as Finders. It could have been a couple of thousand dollars, not much, but the TIME spent would have been under an hour.

That is worth MY time, of course not for Harvey...but I'd be willing to drive up the street about 10 minutes and ASK if my contacts had interest.

The only thing I needed to do this was PICTURES of this expensive item, so we could see what condition it was in.

That is NOT an unusual request, wouldn't you want to at least see some pics before you considered buying Anything for thousands of dollars?

AND I've never heard anything back after a request to see some pics.

I have to regard that as a total waste of my time (and thank goodness I found it out with only a few minutes invested, now I know better than to get invovled).

Time Wasters. TW's.

I know that if there is a way to tap into Harvey Brody's 50 years of success and get gears one to four PLUS what has been added...without wasting his time...then we're all in for some 24k GOLD How To information.

Employees are BOG down points. Partnerships are BOG down areas. He operates a large part of his business on AGREEMENTS. Some on going and some time limited.

And when he enters into an agreement with Home Depot for example, it isn't for a few boxes of stuff...it is for hundreds of thousands, if not millions of units.

So the same amount of time that I spent farting around trying to someone who approached ME to give me some PICS, and ended up wasting my time...that same amount of TIME to Harvey Brody could be worth a million dollars or more. THAT is why he won't get BOGGED down.

He just knows more ways NOT to than even the most successful of business people know.

In the employee owned company, Harvey would know how to extract more money from something better, with less time and NO employees at all.

Gordon Jay Alexander

PS. Why does he consider his old ways to be "historical"? It would be like driving an old car when you have the new sitting right next to it. OR like flying on a plane from the 70's when you have a private jet waiting to take you anywhere you want to go.

From our conversations, I've taken away the idea that there are BETTER ways of doing it. Now I keep "hammering" on Harvey that the basics, the FOUNDATION of Freedom are still in that course, the gear 4 or so. But again, how do I get Harvey to come out of 9th gear and talk to me about 3rd and 4th gear operations...his mind just doesn't like to slow down or go "back"...he's a very progressive thinker.

I think the TOLL position coupled with his 4 gears information, with some examples of how he has done this...perhaps in an AUDIO interview (I'm pretty sure he isn't going to go for VIDEO) but MAYBE, I can use my powers of Remote Influence and get him to give up some OLD historical secrets that he has used and maybe aren't In Force at this time. YEA. I'll give that a try.

As for an example as a 9th gear...he gave me one, I'm not at liberty to share it...although I did in the archives through metaphor...and I think I can do that again...

IMAGINE if you found a golf pro that was making $750,000 a year...a teaching pro, not a tour player...and you found he had a "replicable" system, that other golf pros could use to get their income to that level...

Would you have any problems finding X number, say for example {and my poor math skills} 1000 of them to come to a seminar and PAY 25,000 to learn the system and 10% a year from their business increase...

I don't think you would. And that is ONE example of an advanced gear that Harvey Brody uses, and there are a lot of different ones too.

Gondon,

As I read what you have written about your interactions with Harvey Brody, it seems to me that you have been successful in finding out what Harvey doesn't want. (Please don't take this the wrong way . . . it's just an observation.) It might be worth your while to take a look at that to see if you can make some adjustment in your approach that will enable you to find out what he does want that you might be able to provide.

As you know, people will gladly make an exchange, including giving money, to get something they want. And of course they won't pay for or get involved in something they don't want. Sometimes you can find out what someone wants even when they are telling you what they don't want. It's just a matter of turning it around.

For example, when Harvy tells you that he doesn't want TW's in his life, is telling you that he does want more non-TW's in his life? If that's the case, then if you could provide him with one or two non-TW's, he might respond positively.

I guess my suggestion, for what it's worth, is to just look at whatever he gives you as a "don't want" and turn it around to see if you can find what the underlying want is.

He must want SOMETHING, or he wouldn't still be active in business!

Another approach is to find out who or what he is trying to help. It's doubtful that he does what he does only for himself. Finding out who or what a person is trying to help is another way of finding out what they want.

My two cents . . . like I said, for what it's worth!

---- Hugh

[Ankesh]

If you can't convince Harvey to be interviewed - can you ask him if you could interview his daughter or wife? Maybe that'll work...

[GordonJ]

Bill,

You are right. NO one lives forever, and although Harvey is in great health at 75, you just never know, too many things happen quickly. HOPEFULLY, we'll be able to extract some of his secrets via audio/video or Vulcan Mind Meld...whatever is going to work.

Hugh,

Right on. Good conclusion. IF I'm not getting through to Harvey, it must be ME...and as someone who claims to be able to persuade people, then I must indeed, try another way. Thanks.

Ankesh,

Perhaps I just need to put my butt on a plane and go knock on his door. BUT, recently, I've learned some things I didn't know before, and most importantly, I'm applying what I'm learning.

Thanks to all.

Gordon Jay Alexander

PS. In today's Entrepreneur Hotsheet, Dien has posted a link to a discussion of the LIVING LEGENDS...WHO would you add to my list? I'm sure I forgot someone. Thanks. Here's the link:

http://clicks.aweber.com/z/ct/?uM7NlaES.YpSg3xKoRMb2w

Let remember the Riches man in the world. He did it with buying the product for $10,000 and making him the Riches man with the toll principles. He has so many employees but it does not matter. I am sure Gates does not work in the business rather on the business.

And the late E. Joseph Cossman had similar tools but never had a lot of employyees.

Somewhere in my stuff I have some of Harvey stuff. They are all good in the what they do. But you can't model them. It has to be you own way.

Model work but them have to be old ones the you revive. Kreskin the mental Magician took the act of Dunninger and it worked for Kreskin.