Undercover Billionaire Glenn Stearns Is CRAZY…And I Love Him!
Last year one of the biggest hits on TV was Discovery’s new entrepreneur series, Undercover Billionaire. The show follows a guy, Glenn Stearns, alias Glenn Bryant, a man who started over in life in his mid-fifties to prove the American Dream is still a reality for anyone.
Glenn is dropped off in a city where he has no contacts, Erie, Pennsylvania, only $100 in his pocket, a cell phone, a new name and a piece of sh*t pickup truck.
The goal of the show is to see if super successful entrepreneur, Glenn Stearns, with the new identity of Glenn Bryant, can turn $100 cash into a million dollar business in just 90 days. And by the way, that is not the reason I say Glenn Stearns is crazy and I love him.
Before I get into why I love this guy here is a little background about the real life of Glenn Stearns, whose backstory is the stuff the American dream is made of. Stearns built a phenomenal business, Stearns Lending, a mortgage-banking company which generated hundreds of millions in revenue and employed nearly 2,000 people. In addition to providing jobs and helping tens of thousands of people with loans, the company Glenn built made him extremely wealthy, including all the symbols of wealth, private jet, and two things I enviously don’t own, a helicopter and a yacht.
So why would a guy with everything take on this insane challenge of going from super rich guy to a guy with nothing but a truck and $100 to his name???
…and then why challenge yourself with building a million dollar business on a timeline of only ninety days in a city most people have given up on?
Crazy right?
Well, like most successful people, Glenn wasn’t satisfied with what he had done but needed to challenge himself to see if he could do it again. I recently grabbed a few moments with Glenn on the phone and asked him, “Why did you do this” and he said, “I just needed to see if I could do again with nothing – no contacts, no money, and no name.”
If that is not enough of a challenge, Stearns took this on while he was also recovering from throat cancer. As I watched each of the eight segments, I didn’t actually care whether Glenn built the million-dollar business I just watched in admiration and respect of anyone crazy enough to take on this challenge. Every show I asked myself, “Could I do this?”
I was so inspired to see his courage, tenacity, persistence and the common sense he applied as he pushed through Erie to build a business. I was so moved by watching him prove the reality, “anyone can achieve anything in this great country with the right mindset, strategy, persistence and execution.”
I relate to Glenn on so many levels; we both experienced rough beginnings, no father available, trouble in schools, negatively affected by the pain caused by drugs and alcohol, surrounded by lot of negative people and luckily we both found mentors at crucial points in our lives who took the time to guide us to our success.
As I watched Glenn leave his beautiful wife Mindi, his kids, the yacht life, and fly into a city where he had never been, Erie, Pa. and then get stripped of all but $100 of his financial wealth, his identity and all his connections I was inspired and asked myself again, “Could I do that?”
I learned a lot watching Glenn navigate his way through this adventure, in a broken-down old pick-up and $100, managing how to get food and shelter. Keep in mind, the guy sleeping in his truck in the snow, throwing up his guts, eating noodles from a can could have bought the best hotel in the city.
If you haven’t seen Undercover Billionaire, you HAVE to watch it.
It’s on the Discovery Channel. Bring something to write with so you can grab the jewels of his common-sense application to take $100 and build it into a million dollar business.
Glenn is proof that with imagination, initiative, determination and hard work you can achieve any goal. He proved anyone can start with literally nothing and achieve incredible success in a very short period of time. Just imagine what he could do if he had a year in Erie.
As I watched all eight segments, I found myself asking myself at the start of, during and the end of each show, the same two questions;
“Could I pull this off?” and more importantly, “Would I do it?”
If you asked me right now and I would say, “NO!” That doesn’t mean I won’t change my mind, cuz you know I am crazy!
But I might give it a try someday but I tell you what, I can’t think of anything more terrifying. Glenn Stearns, if you read this I have 10X respect for you taking on this insane crazy challenge to validate the American Dream and dismiss any delusion people have about it. Fighting cancer, no money, no identity, no family, no contacts, and a piece of sh*t truck, the fact that you even completed the challenge is more inspiring to me than what you built.
Watch the show my friends, Undercover Billionaire on Discovery Channel.
