r/RecklessBen

In this video, I explain why I made a GiveSendGo for Reckless Ben

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Brick by Brick.

The BAM executives are rats. >!Watching the CEO squirm when coffeezilla pointed out their corporate email had access to bryans inventory since before the store takeover. And watching him meltdown that they can't know everything.!<

This whole thing is like watching a company walk directly into chapter 7 bankruptcy in slow motion. When coffeeezilla said Reguardless of what a franchisee does, the new one the old one, the company behind it must stand behind their product/service.

>!Unfortunately bricks and minifigs has chosen to defect and dodge responsibility at most opportunities, and created a really awful customer experience that has snowballed into this crazy series of events, but instead of taking accountability, that they have taken an aggressive legal strategy which I told them personally was a horrible idea. As of writing this Bryan Mansell is being sued for 1.3 Million !<

Edit: typo

• Ammon claims the Lego were never in the store the night of the takeover
  • Crystal claims Lego were temp offsite due to security concerns @ beginning of the consignment deal until they installed a safe(s)
• Brandon was sent undercover to scope out the store for days leading up to the takeover and recorded store condition
• Matt claims Brandon observed Crystal moving numerous covered carts to her car leading up to takeover, this is never brought up again in rest of video
• Ammon, acting fake shocked, claims they just recently found out that Crystal has retail theft in her past and that people online are saying this
  • Crystal says she was 19, pregnant, and manipulated by PD (in her mid-40s now for reference)
  • Crystal says she had disclosed at initial hiring that she had a record from when she was younger and BAM said they only care about who she is now
• Matt claims they've had Brandon's spy footage for awhile and haven't published the footage that would easily support their claims of no Bryan Lego on site at takeover b/c attorneys
  • Footage shows very empty shelves
  • Crystal counters that shelves were empty b/c it was end of day and @ end of day they removed Bryan's sets from the shelves and placed them in the safes overnight since their storefront is all glass windows and history of burglary
  • Matt claims everything recorded was all that was at the store -> However I'd counter this by pointing out that unless details were omitted, this footage was portrayed as being recorded during Brandon's undercover visits, so why would he have access to the back rooms then?
  • Matt provided spreadsheet of "all" the Lego Star Wars in-store at takeover, Coffee countered w/ Crystal's yellow tag photos, which do depict sets in what appears to be a safe.
    • Coffee has Matt search the spreadsheet for set numbers in Crystals photo and on what was depicted as search #2, already found one set not listed on spreadsheet.
    • 3 of 4 sets Matt searched were not on spreadsheet, Matt says safes must have been locked and Brandon wasn't able to photograph.
  • Gormans had over 200 counter photos of the store
• Crystal claims Brandon arrived @ takeover in U-Haul, Matt claims it was a rental car
• Employee of Eugene store said Brandon dropped off a U-Haul truck from Salem with a LOT of sets, including Star Wars, and that Brandon claimed Crystal stole Lego and left country
  • Employee states Brandon said they have to hold onto those sets @ Euguene until corporate directs where to redistribute them
  • Matt dodges directly responding to this, just reiterating that there was no U-Haul
• Coffee has photo with U-Haul parked outside of store on night of takeover, Matt claims he saw footage from that night and there was no U-Haul
  • Ammon claims this is a disgruntled ex-employee and weeks earlier Brandon had picked up inventory from a storage unit from former Salem franchisee to then transfer to Eugene (??????)
  • Ammon claims Brandon flew in redeye on Nov 14th, picked up rental truck to tow trailer with. Truck did not work, so rented U-Haul to tow trailer with. Executed takeover, drover to Euguene to return truck, went back to Salem at 2 AM so U-Haul image timeline couldn't possible have added up.
  • Brandon provided photos showing last timestamp @ Salem store of 9:44 PM 11/14, and returning U-Haul close to 1AM 11/15, leaving a 3-4 hour gap unaccounted for
• Real average estimate of Bryan's collection = approximately $107k
  • Root of $200k claim = That was the OG, non-itemized, BALLPARK estimate Crystal gave Bryan purely based on visually walking around the rooms his collection was in.
  • Press release making $200k claim was put out prior to itemized valuation
• Crystal's records show roughly $24k of collection sold, w/ Bryan being paid roughly $17k, which aligns with the consignment agreement %
  • BAM claims they only found $5k of Lego potentially belonging to Bryan and only $13k of Lego Star Wars total
• Based on analysis of Crystal's photos and videos, Coffee estimates roughly $21k of Lego that can be factually attributed to Bryan. This is 3-5x BAM's estimate even if you account for valuation differences.
• Bryan made side-deal w/ Lego Youtuber to buy some of his collection. Some parties (unnamed) insist these sets were never in Crystal's inventory, however 100% of sets the Youtuber purchased match sets in spreadsheet listed with "Storage" as location.
  • Side deal accounts for approximately $15k
• $15k-$25k worth of sets (98 qty) set aside for layaway that had not been paid for yet at time of takeover.
  • Josh claims they only found 2-3
  • Coffee ID's 98 qty as abnormal for layaway, Crystal agrees, says that this was due to the well-priced, new-in-box, nature of Bryan's collection
• About $10k estimated amount of Lego from spreadsheet unaccounted
  • Crystal floats possibility that she was behind on updating spreadsheet
  • This *is* corroborated by the ring cam footage of Crystal saying there are sales Bryan still needs to be paid out for. Whether that accounts for $10k unknown
• Coffee's concluding estimate is roughly $12k missing the can't be accounted for via all sources
  • Accounted for vs paid out for do not mean the same thing. Estimated $50-$83k unpaid to Bryan
• When presented w/ all evidence Matt appears on verge of tears saying he "just wishes people understood that yes, Crystal had mentioned something about consignment, but then some guy walks in demanding $60k w/ o proof, what are we supposed to do?"
• When presented w/ evidence Ammon gets very animated and defensive, holds line that they just wanted documentation. Says spreadsheet and contract is not enough, pivots to say corporate never received either of those.
  • Ammon says they only acquired the spreadsheet months later after it was shared online as he is visibly bouncing and shaking
  • Coffee calls out that the spreadsheet is owned by BAM Franchising Inc.
  • Ammon stumbling over himself claiming this is the first he's seen
  • Ammon says spreadsheet was created by Crystal so they don't know how accurate or up to date it is
  • Ammon fake appreciative (paraphrasing) "thank you so much for sharing this with us! We don't know what we don't know, we don't go looking in every nook and cranny"
• Little to no time spent on Ben
• Zero coverage of Josh + Ammon's insane claims to PD, the lawsuit, or PD's response
• Note: Coverage of Ben may have been removed due to the legal issues surrounding him, or because the primary focus of the video was ID'ing source(s) of missing Lego. I will say that while BAM's credibility was still portrayed as shaky, it feels like a disservice to leave out their craziness during the AFPD saga.

https://www.gofundme.com/f/support-reckless-bens-legal-battle - Now Fully Raised

https://preview.redd.it/ra81nxzv3d6h1.png?width=1519&format=png&auto=webp&s=6a42d38425767cf28786980576c2a2b0aab37599