Nathan For You 2x4

1. My name is Nathan Fielder,

2. and I graduated from one of Canada's top business schools

3. with really good grades.

4. Now I'm using my knowledge

5. to help struggling small-business owners

6. make it in this competitive world.

7. This is Nathan for you.

8. Nabil Khalil is the owner of Bouquet Plaza Liquor

9. in Santa Clarita, California,

10. and every day, he deals with a problem

11. that has vexed liquor store owners for years.

12. We always have teenager

13. trying to come and buy alcohol.

14. We always refuse the sale.

15. As far as I'm concerned,

16. no business should ever have to turn away a paying customer,

17. so I paid Nabil a visit to help him out.

18. Every time you turn away a teenager

19. who's trying to buy alcohol, you're losing a sale.

20. Yes, because that's what the law is.

21. Mm-hmm. So, from now on, you allow them to purchase it,

22. but they just can't take it home until they're 21.

23. The main reason teenagers want booze

24. is to look cool to their friends,

25. so if Nabil let minors purchase alcohol,

26. but then held it in a storage locker

27. until their 21st birthday, Bouquet Plaza Liquor would gain

28. a ton of new underage customers, who could then

29. brag to their friends that they own booze.

30. The plan, increase business by selling alcohol to minors.

31. Could be possible, but when you get close to that age,

32. definitely, you don't want a voucher that says,

33. "Oh, yes, I own couple bottle of liquor,"

34. But where they are? So they want to have it.

35. Well, no offense, but, you know, I'm a bit closer

36. to my teenage years than you are,

37. so I think I know what youth these days want.

38. If they get the happiness of "Yes, I have it,"

39. that would be great.

40. With Nabil on board, I created some tags

41. that would work like a coat check system for alcohol.

42. So minors could reclaim their booze from storage

43. once they turn 21.

44. Next, I had to get the word out to young people,

45. so I arranged a meeting

46. with the chair of a local youth little league

47. in the hopes of landing a sponsorship deal.

48. You seriously are talking about putting a banner

49. that says, "We sell liquor to minors"?

50. These minors don't actually get to take home

51. the alcohol till they're 21.

52. Well, I do understand it, but I'm not sure that I agree

53. with tying that up to our little league.

54. Do you understand what I'm saying?

55. I don't know if this helps in any way,

56. but we'd also be willing to offer a free bottle of gin

57. to every kid in the league.

58. No, I'm sorry.

59. Thank you for your time, then.

60. Well, thank you for your offer.

61. - Yeah. - I'm sure it'll work out.

62. - Oh, no. - What?

63. - What is this for? - This—

64. - What is this for?

65. Oh, no, no, no.

66. No, no. Thank you very much, though.

67. - Are you— - Let me show you out.

68. - No, no, are you sure? - Yeah, yeah. We're done.

69. With sponsorship off the table,

70. I needed a different way to reach the youth market,

71. so I hired a teen actor to pose as a student

72. to get the word spreading at a local high school.

73. So right off the bat, you know, before you talk

74. about the liquor store or anything,

75. you got to establish a rapport

76. so the teens you're talking to think you're cool.

77. - Okay. - So maybe talk about

78. how school sucks, you know, or a bit

79. about how the Internet's awesome or something.

80. and throw in some swear words too.

81. So try that.

82. Hey, man, what's up?

83. Hey, dude, that Internet these days is so dope.

84. Man, school sucks, dude.

85. You can just go on the stinking Internet.

86. With Connor trained, I gave him a backwards hat

87. and sunglasses so he would look cooler.

88. Then I sent him onto school property

89. to begin spreading the word.

90. So how about that internet, man? What's up?

91. Oh, the teacher sucks, but the Internet rules, you know?

92. So, anyways, I got this cool tip.

93. There's this liquor store down the block.

94. It's called Bouquet Plaza liquor store,

95. and it sells alcohol to minors.

96. Okay, I got to go back to skipping class.

97. With Connor working the school,

98. I headed back to Bouquet Plaza,

99. ready to receive our underage customers,

100. and within minutes, they began to arrive.

101. Did you read the sign outside?

102. - That's— Did you— - That's real?

103. - Yeah. - Yeah, yeah. You can

104. - Go grab some if you want. - You want to go ahead

105. and grab yourself some alcohol or something?

106. I mean, I guess so.

107. - Look what you got, huh? - Look at that.

108. - 40 ounce. - Oh, that's huge, buddy.

109. - High life, awesome. - You're gonna start heavy,

110. - Don't you? - Yeah.

111. - So you own this now. - Yeah, it's tight.

112. Pretty sweet. Ah, ah, not so close.

113. You get a claim check, so you're allowed to come back

114. and claim it when you're 21.

115. Yeah, but—

116. I want it for right now. I don't want it two years later.

117. With no refunds allowed, the minors had no other option

118. but to fill out the claim check, allowing them to own alcohol

119. without the consequences of consuming it.

120. What you're doing is weak. That sucks.

121. It's cool and legal.

122. Breaking the law is never cool.

123. Seems like a waste of money to me.

124. My plan was working, and Nabil was now able

125. to sell to a whole new type of customer.

126. Why did I even just pay for this?

127. Because you're allowed to own the alcohol.

128. Okay, well, I don't want to own the alcohol.

129. I want the alcohol.

130. Knowing that some teens wouldn't be satisfied

131. leaving empty-handed, I had a corner of Nabil's store

132. converted to look like a cool basement

133. so minors could take photos with their alcohol,

134. before it goes into storage,

135. that would help them brag to their friends.

136. It felt great to make young people happy

137. while teaching them about responsible drinking.

138. So after closing up for the night,

139. it broke my heart that I had to give Nabil

140. some terrible news.

141. I looked into it, and it turns out

142. that what we were doing was extremely illegal,

143. and you know, I got to look out for myself.

144. I'm sorry.

145. Good evening, sir.

146. - Yes? - Are you the owner

147. - of this business? - Yes, sir. Hi.

148. I'm afraid I'm gonna have to place you under arrest.

149. Why? What's going on, sir? How am I—

150. For doing good business!

151. You're not in trouble at all, I was joking.

152. So really? It does work out?

153. Yeah, it's not illegal.

154. - Okay. - I mean, he's not a real cop,

155. - he's a stripper, yeah. - That's okay.

156. But to bring a stripper to a businessman,

157. it's not a really good idea, no.

158. - Oh, you don't like it?

159. Not at all. Like, okay—

160. Well, it was a joke, you know,

161. like, you thought he was a cop. You know?

162. That's what I'm saying, even if it's gonna be a joke,

163. Nathan, to bring a businessman, bring him, like, stripper—

164. a guy stripper, it's not really gonna be the cool thing to have.

165. All right.

166. Javier Arteaga is an exterminator

167. and the manager of Bugs "A" to "Z,"

168. a pest-control company

169. based out of Woodland Hills, California,

170. and he's desperate to expand his business

171. beyond the residential homes he normally services.

172. It'd be great if, I mean, we land any kind of hotel work.

173. Javier wanted a contract with a major hotel,

174. and I had the perfect method to win him that deal.

175. Rather than making it look like the hotel has

176. an exterminator visiting, why don't you instead

177. make it look like the hotel is winning an award?

178. Right.

179. Every hotel's greatest fear is having to hire an exterminator,

180. because their arrival is basically an announcement

181. that the hotel has pests,

182. so if Javier could disguise his purpose

183. to make it look like he's there to give the hotel an award,

184. he'd not only delight guests,

185. but surely win a contract with the hotel

186. that wants to keep their pest problem a secret.

187. Now, how—I mean, do I show up with—

188. I mean, I just— I-I—as far as, I mean—

189. If customers see you coming in,

190. they're actually gonna be like,

191. "Oh, this hotel is really good,"

192. you know, rather than seeing an exterminator

193. and being like, "Oh, this hotel is not so good."

194. You've done this before.

195. You know, you're a business major.

196. I mean, what's the worst that's gonna happen?

197. Javier was on board with the concept.

198. So, to sell this to a hotel, I needed to show them

199. exactly how the system would work,

200. so I had one of Javier's service vans rewrapped

201. to look like a delivery vehicle for the Hotel Excellence Awards,

202. a very prestigious organization that I made up.

203. Then Javier and I worked to develop a discreet method

204. for exterminating every room in a hotel.

205. - Like, some sort of secret... - A compartment

206. - or or an opening. - Compartment that opens up.

207. With the system now in place, I got permission

208. from the historic Mayfair Hotel to shoot a demonstration video

209. of our method that we could then present to their management.

210. It begins by arriving in our covert vehicle,

211. then removing what looks like a large trophy

212. that's being awarded to the hotel.

213. This serves a dual purpose of both getting

214. our equipment inside, and impressing guests,

215. as they see that they're currently residing in the hotel

216. with the least amount of bedbugs.

217. - With the least bedbugs? - Yeah.

218. So it's a possibility of some being there.

219. We're just delivering the award,

220. - we don't know. - Oh, okay.

221. Then, we make our way into the private back offices

222. where we can safely remove all our gear

223. without anyone seeing.

224. Once that's done, we convert our awards table

225. into a custom-designed maid cart,

226. and I change my outfit to look natural pushing it.

227. The hollowed-out interior then allows Javier to travel

228. from room to room without drawing any suspicion

229. from hotel guests.

230. You okay in there?

231. Yeah.

232. When we get to an infested room,

233. the cart blocks the doorway and Javier is able

234. to sneak out without anyone seeing.

235. A quick handoff of the vacuum then gets our equipment inside,

236. and Javier can get to work

237. spraying down the pest-ridden areas.

238. Although we didn't find any in this hotel,

239. Javier told me he often encounters mattresses

240. that get so infested with bedbugs

241. they have to be thrown out.

242. So I also wanted to show the hotel manager

243. that we had a method to secretly dispose of one

244. without guests thinking anything fishy was going on,

245. and since the Mayfair catered to a lot of Asian clientele,

246. the perfect cover was obvious.

247. In the guise of an impromptu celebration,

248. we were able to take a mattress

249. straight through the lobby, and once outside,

250. all it took was a quick identity changeover

251. to keep everything looking normal to onlookers.

252. Then, in the blink of an eye, we're gone,

253. without anyone ever knowing

254. the hotel had a problem with pests.

255. So later that week, I was hopeful our sales video

256. would be enough to win over the Mayfair manager,

257. Mike Schoeffin.

258. Underneath that dragon is our mattress

259. that was covered with bedbugs, infested with bedbugs.

260. And you can see we've been developing a new method

261. of spraying the public areas using a blind man's cane.

262. So to guests, it just looks like,

263. "Oh, there's a blind man stumbling around the lobby."

264. - Right. - So that's what we're about.

265. And once our sales video was done,

266. it was time to seal the deal.

267. Let's get your signature on that contract.

268. I'm not gonna make a decision right this minute.

269. Mike didn't seem to want to do business with Bugs "A" to "Z,"

270. so I excused Javier to speak with Mike one-on-one.

271. Hey, so it's clear you don't want to give

272. a deal to us today, right?

273. Not without comparing all the numbers, no.

274. You know, I have a TV show, and on the show,

275. we like to have happy endings,

276. so would you be able to sign this contract

277. just for the cameras?

278. Uh, if it's just for the cameras,

279. as long as it's not binding.

280. Great, here you go, just sign here and—

281. just for the cameras.

282. - There you go. - All right,

283. so we have a deal then.

284. We have a deal in the TV show—

285. Oh, no, but in the contract, it said that

286. "I understand that when Nathan asks,

287. "'Will you sign this contract for the camera?'

288. "I understand that that's code for 'Will you sign the contract

289. "'in real life.'" - Oh.

290. - You can see. - Mm-hmm.

291. - That clause right there. - Right.

292. The contract was presented to me under false pretenses.

293. Trust me, this is a good call,

294. so you shouldn't feel bad about this.

295. - No, you tricked me, and it's— - It's not a trick.

296. - No, it is a trick. - No, it's not a trick.

297. And I don't appreciate it.

298. Everything was in the contract.

299. I don't appreciate it.

300. I did it, and I couldn't wait to share

301. the good news with Javier.

302. Yeah. All right. Happy, right?

303. - Yeah. - Okay, good.

304. Rub-a-dub-dub, splish, splash,

305. suck, suck, and...

306. These are just some of the sounds you'd hear

307. if you paid a visit to Los Feliz car wash

308. in Atwater Village, California.

309. But one sound you won't hear that often is "Cha-ching."

310. Amir Lankarani is the owner here,

311. and he admits that lately, business has been tough.

312. Occasionally, can be very much so struggle.

313. But for a man whose business is cleaning,

314. I was surprised by how filthy his office was,

315. and it made me wonder if this was part

316. of a sophisticated strategy.

317. Do you keep your office this dirty to make a point

318. to your customers that you only care about cleaning cars?

319. Yes, rather than trying to clean my office,

320. I put my emphasis in cleaning their car.

321. So this is all intentional.

322. Yes.

323. I mean, I've seen clutter, but you go all out.

324. - Well, I do my best. - Yeah, I mean,

325. you have a full-size toilet bowl under your desk.

326. Well, the reason behind it is, we bought it for our—

327. What is it? One of the bathrooms,

328. haven't had the chance to replace it yet.

329. You don't use that toilet?

330. Not here, no.

331. - No? - No.

332. Amir clearly had a unique approach

333. for marketing his car wash, and that meant

334. I had an idea that he was gonna love.

335. Los Feliz car wash is uniquely situated

336. in a neighborhood with very few birds,

337. so if Amir could somehow attract more birds

338. to specific trees that overhang the streets nearby,

339. demand for his services would surely go up.

340. The plan, more birds equals more business.

341. Birds?

342. I mean, there's nothing wrong with putting a bird

343. - in a tree. - That's true.

344. What they do after that is their own choice.

345. That's right.

346. So, if they do that on a car, it benefits you,

347. - But— - More dirty cars,

348. more dollar signs coming inside the register.

349. You're right.

350. Amir was into the idea, so the first step

351. was finding the right tree to host the birds.

352. Directly across the street from the car wash

353. was the perfect branch that hung over traffic.

354. This is where I needed them to be.

355. Since I know birds love bird seed,

356. I sprinkled some along the branch

357. and all over the tree in the hopes of attracting them,

358. but surprisingly, after a day, no birds had come.

359. So I emptied out a couple of tuna cans

360. and packed them with earth worms and soil

361. then taped those to the branches,

362. thinking that this would be a more appealing treat.

363. I even put tiny scarecrows in other trees in the area

364. that I didn't want the birds to go in,

365. but again, no birds showed up,

366. and I wasn't about to spend the rest of my life

367. helping this car wash.

368. So I arranged for a bird wrangler to come

369. and physically put pigeons up on the branch,

370. but frustratingly, they weren't pooing enough

371. to make the impact I needed,

372. so I talked to the bird wrangler

373. to see if she had any other ideas.

374. Chickens or peacocks, they— they poop pretty good.

375. Don't you think chickens would maybe look

376. a bit strange in the tree though?

377. - Maybe? - No, chickens roost in trees.

378. So it wouldn't really stand out as being that weird?

379. - No, uh-uhh. - Okay.

380. - I trust your instincts, then. - Yeah.

381. Taking Carol's advice, we added some chickens

382. to the tree, which she said had to go more regularly,

383. and it helped, but the dropping size

384. just wasn't big enough to persuade people

385. into getting their cars washed,

386. so we arranged to have a peacock added to the mix

387. that can drop loads 50% larger than the chickens.

388. And with that, I felt like I had everything I needed

389. to get things started.

390. So I posted a sign at the car wash

391. advertising a new special.

392. Now I wanted to show Amir the birds in the tree.

393. Wow.

394. - That's great. - Yeah.

395. I mean, it just looks— Mother Nature, doesn't it?

396. So people are driving under, they're dropping all over cars,

397. and then where are they gonna go?

398. Right there across the street.

399. - Yeah. - Makes—you know, makes...

400. common sense, doesn't it?

401. Now I needed to figure out a way to get cars to stop

402. so the birds would have enough time to do their business.

403. Sir, sorry. Sorry, I dropped my contact lens over here,

404. so I'm just looking for it.

405. Yeah, I don't— I'm worried you might drive over it.

406. Yeah.

407. Um, I don't know where.

408. Oh. There's a lot of birds today.

409. Sorry, there's a car wash down the street,

410. they can do a really good job of taking it off.

411. If you want, there's a coupon.

412. My plan was finally paying off.

413. You got chickens up in that tree.

414. The droppings were actually encouraging drivers

415. to pay a visit to the car wash.

416. As the day progressed...

417. Do you know how to get to the Hollywood sign from here?

418. Nature was taking its course, and even though

419. I took a brutal splash in the mouth...

420. I'd do it again in an instant if it meant bringing in

421. one more customer to that car wash.

422. So at the end of the day, I met up with Amir

423. to see if he was happy with my results.a

424. So how do you feel about everything today?

425. Beautiful. Seems like the idea is working a little bit,

426. at least I saw a few cars with the bird poo-poo.

427. Poop, yeah. Now, just so you know,

428. I bought all of the pigeons and the chickens for you,

429. so you can go and put them up yourself if you choose.

430. Okay.

431. Now, I know this might be

432. a bit of an awkward subject to broach,

433. but I know you have an "employee of the month" program here.

434. - Yes, we do. - You know,

435. I obviously showed you today that I did a good job,

436. and so I was wondering

437. if you would consider me for that.

438. For the employee of the month?

439. Yeah.

440. Sure.

441. Okay, thanks.

442. You're quite welcome.

443. Now, do you normally do a ceremony or something?

444. We normally just present them with a $25 gift certificate.

445. Okay, it maybe is a bit low for what I did.

446. Is it possible to up it to $200?

447. Sure.

448. Great, thank you so much, that's...

449. - My pleasure. - such an honor, I mean—

450. Okay. You're quite welcome.

451. "Welcome to our employee-of-the-month

452. "meeting ceremony.

453. "This honor goes to the person who has shown

454. "the most commitment to the company this month,

455. "the person who has worked the hardest,

456. "and who is just the best person in general.

457. "This month— This month, it goes ot Nathan.

458. - Me? - Yes, you, Nathan.

459. - Oh, my God, really? - Yes.

460. Oh, my God. I'm so surprised.

461. - Thank you so much. - My pleasure.

462. - Thank you very much. - I'm so honored,

463. Uh...

464. Oh, thank you.

465. - "And there's your $200 cash prize..."

466. - Bonus. - Your $200 cash bonus.

467. Thank you so much. Oh, my God.

468. Oh, okay.

469. Thank you.

470. "Now, if you can all form a line,

471. "Then Nathan will walk past you,

472. "and you can pat him on the back."

473. Okay, it's a bit embarrassing,

474. - Right. - Okay.

475. Thank you. Thank you.

476. Oh, wow.

477. All right, see you, I guess, or see you later.

478. Okay.