Spencer: You know, I would maybe consider you one of the OG YouTubers. 

Rob: YouTube was in its infancy, infancy stage. So I got together, we called it the tool reviewer mafia. 

Spencer: Like it wasn’t as common to be a YouTuber. 

Rob: You know, if I look back 16 years, you know, which is the biggest regret doing all this stuff, it’s… Wow. 

Spencer: Hello and welcome back to another episode of Creators Uncut. Super excited for another episode today. We’ve got a special guest for you today. His name is Rob Robillard and he’s from the YouTube channel Concord Carpenter. Rob, thanks for being on the show. 

Rob: Hey, Spencer. Thanks for having me, man. This is kind of fun. Yeah, it is. We talked about this a while back, but, um, yeah, I’m glad we’re finally getting the chance to do it. So. 

Spencer: Yeah. So I actually help you a little bit with some of your videos, but for those listening or watching this episode, who may not know you, do you mind going ahead and just telling about yourself and your channel and kind of what it’s about? 

Rob: So, Concord Carpenter, we had two channels, kind of simultaneously. It was Concord Carpenter and Toolbox Buzz. And Concord Carpenter, can I tell you how it got started? Because it’s a bizarre story. Yeah, yeah, you can. I want to say… 2007, 2008, maybe earlier. Oh, wow. 

Yeah, it goes way back. And I had a drinking buddy, a Catholic priest friend of mine. We would go out on Thursday nights and we would get dinner and have a couple of drinks. And he had a blog and it was called… And this is back when there was Google Blogger before, like WordPress and all this other stuff. And YouTube was in its infancy, infancy stage. And it was called Concord Pastor Comments. 

And I used to follow it. And one night I was, after we were out, I was on his blog looking at it and he had put up a sidebar with like a bio and a photo and I clicked on it. And I clicked on his picture and it opened up his dashboard. It should have been password protected. He didn’t, he forgot. And in there he had his whole bio, but then there was a secondary blog and it said Concord Carpenter. 

And I was like, oh, that son of a gun, he’s going to try to, you know, pull a fast one on me. So I quickly, you know, googled, search the internet, how to enter a blog post, how to upload photos, what can I do? So I went into the blog because it was all unlocked and I uploaded like three carpentry posts, my photo, a bunch of things, a bio and it’s all real fast and hastily done. And I closed it all down and just waited. 

And he called me like three days later, he’s like, you son of a gun. I can’t believe you get in there. And I’m like, you should have password protected. So one of the things I did when I was in there is I put my name down in there, my contact information as a secondary owner, I guess, sir. Person after the cat was out of the bag and we had a good laugh about this, he deleted it. And when he deleted it, I immediately got an email and said, you know, Austin Fleming wants to delete this. 

Do you want to delete this? And I was like, oh, my God, what did I do now? I’m going to break something. I was like, no. So I clicked, no. The second I clicked, no, that blog became mine. I was now the only person on that. So and then once I realized that I started posting daily and it was called Concord Carpenter comments. 

And I’ve shortened it to Concord Carpenter. And I posted all over the place. I was political rants and carpentry and this and that. And then eventually I kind of focused in and. I started doing just two reviews and carpentry. 

Articles, how tos, DIY stuff, stuff like that. So that’s kind of how it started. And then one day, like I said, you two was so new. I was just bored one day and I was messing around. And one day I said, this YouTube thing’s kind of cool. 

And I was watching some videos that were on YouTube. And I was like, I wonder how hard it would be to. Open a channel. I’ll call it Concord Carpenter. And I’ll just do some fun videos just for play. So I my first video was a miles craft stencil thing that you use your router and you make like signs with. And I just did a video and it just took off from there. And people liked it and started subscribing to the channel. And before you know it, it kind of took on a little bit of life of its own. And that’s kind of how I got into it. That’s awesome. 

Spencer: That’s an interesting story. It’s weird, right? 

Rob: Spencer, if you had said to me, you’re going to be, you know, in a few years, you’re going to be a blogger. You’re going to probably write two or three articles a week. Your writing is going to improve. You’re going to be doing research and test. You might be going to dabble with some video cameras and do some videos. And and eventually you’re going to have this channel that like be an influencer. I would have laughed at you and said, yeah, I know I’m too busy for that stuff. Yeah. 

Spencer: Yeah. So that blog, is that what is your website now? OK, cool. 

Rob: Yes. So I eventually move, transferred it from Google blogger to like WordPress. I use WordPress and then and then the YouTube channel and that they interface depending if I’m writing and doing a video in the same that’s awesome. 

Spencer: That’s a great story and how you got started. I don’t think I’ve heard anyone else have quite the same story as you when starting their YouTube channel. 

Rob: I had zero intention of starting a blog, zero, you know. Yeah. Who knows if that never had happened. You know, what would I be doing? Say, probably just watching other people’s videos, right? 

Spencer: Yeah. You know, I would maybe consider you one of the OG YouTubers because you started back when YouTube was in its infancy, like you said. I actually looked at your channel and your oldest video was 16 years ago. Did you know that? 

Rob: This video. Yeah. Yeah. It’s funny. I’ve been to a lot of media events. Media event is typically when a tool company will host us influencers to come review and look at their new tools and then talk about it. 

They want to create a buzz. And I’ve been at so many different media events where the younger guys who have more followers than I have on Instagram or YouTube, whatever, they’re big now. And they’re like, I, I watch all your videos. 

You are the reason why I got into YouTube or you’re the reason why I started doing video reviews. And I’m like, wow, I got these, you know, now these guys are way bigger than I am. They’re full time. 

A lot of these guys, you know, the guys and gals that are doing it. I never did it full time. I’ve always stayed as a part time kind of hobby for me. 

Night’s weekends. And that was that’s probably my biggest regret. If I were to say, you know, what would I know if I look back 16 years, you know, what’s your biggest regret doing all this stuff? It’s that I didn’t jump in with both feet. You know what I mean? 

Yeah. I had three kids, you know, college was starting. I had four jobs at the time. You know, I was busy and it was hard for me to let go of those jobs to go for something that might happen. 

Yeah. And it probably would have because Instagram, YouTube was growing, but I just didn’t, you know, I was averaging a video every six weeks or something. And whereas a lot of these folks were doing one a week or two a month or something. And, and, and that’s how you grow your channel. That was my biggest, probably has been my biggest regret. Yeah. 

Spencer: And, you know, back then YouTube, like it wasn’t as common to be a YouTuber, like to do it full time. Like there was a few people that were really big that was maybe doing it full time back in its infancy. But, you know, I could see it being like scary trying to jump all in when it’s not a super new thing to do. 

Rob: Like Jimmy Jorester, I think, is that how you say it? He was huge. A lot of the woodworkers got huge. People love woodworking. That was the other thing. If I had transitioned more to woodworking, I think the channel would have grown more as well because it opens up a whole other channel to people who are, you know, white collar guys who do woodworking on the weekends, you know? Yeah. Whereas I’m kind of geared towards contractors and people who like tools and maybe a little DIY stuff. 

Spencer: That makes sense. So through all these years that you’ve been doing YouTube, has there been a video that you would say is like your best video or your favorite video that you made? And if so, what’s the reason why it’s your favorite or the best one? 

Rob: I’ve had a lot of good videos and a lot of fun. So I can think of two and for two very different reasons. So a lot of times, a lot of times I would, along the years, I would be doing something again, nights and weekends, I’m picking away a lot of this stuff. I’d be doing maintenance at my own house and I’d be like, you know, this is a good video. I bet people would like to know how to do this. So several years ago, I, I need to replace some screens on my house. So I did a video. I just set up the tripod and I just did a video on how to replace a screen. I did that in maybe 15, 20 minutes. 

As long as it took to do the screen, edit it, publish it. That thing is like two or three million views. People everywhere I go, people like, I was, hey, I’m at a cocktail party somewhere, a Christmas party somewhere. And someone was like, I was researching how to replace a screen the other day and your video came up. It was awesome, man. And it was funny. I looked at that and I was like, it was spontaneous. It was on a whim. I just whipped it out. And I’ve done that dozens of times. And a lot of times the ones that you whip out, they become the viral videos, you know, the other video that I think kind of brings me a chuckle was I was trying to reach 200,000 subscribers at the time. 

And I was like, how can I do something kind of funny, get some engagement? And I’d seen this video, this guy did, he was a cyclist. And I was like, that’s hilarious. I’m going to, I’m going to spin that on the carpentry side. And I did this video. 

It was called Tool Attic Anonymous. And it was like a video. And the whole video was me just goofing on myself. And at the end of the video, it was, you know, please subscribe and hit the bell. 

You know, it was the whole thing was to just get people to like the channel. And it’s a hilarious. I find the video super hilarious, super creative. 

I think you’d like it because of the creativity that was involved in it. Yeah. You know, I’m in the video, I’m saying, you know, I can’t help my I’m in a group of guys talking like I’m at kind of like an addiction meeting. And I’m like, I can’t help myself. I find myself thinking about tools, you know, when I shouldn’t be thinking of tools or whatever, and I’m showing myself walking, you know, in the lumber yard and there’s a board sticking out of the pile of wood. I walk into the board or I’ll be using a tool. And I’ll say, I find myself watching my own videos while I’m making my own video. 

And I’ll have like a phone strapped to a circle. So I was cutting with a video running. It was just it was fun, creative and stupid. And it just brings a chuckle when I think of it. 

Spencer: Those are those good videos. Yeah, I have to go watch that. That one, that one sounds really good. I’ll send you a link. It was it’s pretty funny. Yeah. Yeah. 

I’m glad that you mentioned that one. I feel like a lot of YouTubers today, they get too focused on making videos for the views, making sure they can, you know, make good content. When sometimes it’s just it’s just good to make a video that’s fun for yourself. So I’m glad that you mentioned that one. 

Rob: Well, you know, as you talk about fun for yourself, I wouldn’t still be doing this if I didn’t enjoy it. It’s I don’t look at it as a job. It’s it’s a little side hustle or a little side hobby. 

Again, weekends and nights. But I just really enjoy writing about carpentry. I like teaching. 

I’ve always liked teaching. I’ve had a little bit of background in that and I enjoy sharing that knowledge. And I. I love the tool reviews we do. So you do a lot of the tool testing videos. You do a lot of the editing for that. You do an amazing job. Oh, thank you. 

On with that. It’s almost like my wife goes to book group with all her girlfriends. And it’s like book group for men, except we play with tools. Yeah. We get to test all these tools. 

Spencer: So you mentioned with a story you were trying to pass 200,000 subscribers. Now you’re nearing 300,000 subscribers, which is awesome. So you’ve got a lot of followers. 

Rob: One thousand away. 

Spencer: It’s like, yeah, you’re almost there. So from all your followers and subscribers, has there been a comment or a moment that has like stuck out to you either good or bad? 

Rob: Oh, yeah. Oh, God, yeah. And, you know, so many. Well, you know, here and there, right? So some of them can be cutting and mean. And some of them are like, you saved my life. Thank you so much. This was you fix. You saved me 1000s of followers or that was really inspirational. And I just get I get a lot of people long time subscribers like this one guy, Ted, he’s been he’s been commenting for 15, 16 years. They’re just so supportive and so encouraging and thankful for your time and your effort. And then there’s other ones where, you know, they’re mean and cutting and insulting. And it’s like, dude, this is free content for you. 

And I just spent, you know, probably 40 hours between testing this or building that and filming it and publishing it. And you’re so quick to just be like, boom, you know, so yeah, it can go over the way with those comments. Sorry about the dog. Oh, that’s okay. Yeah, I think I think, you know, not one particular comment, but but there are lots of memorable ones, you know, 

Spencer: I think that’s the same with most YouTubers is there’s always those people who I don’t know how they have the time to come on and make these insulting comments. But there’s always one person it seems like that, like, is mean, but it’s always nice to have those good comments, like that Ted guy you mentioned, who’s stuck around and oh my goodness. Yeah, yeah, I feel like those people are really motivating for for continuing. 

Rob: I love the people I call them keyboard warriors or internet controls. Yeah, controls is a common one. But I like the people that say, that’s stupid. Why didn’t you do this, this, this, this and this? And sometimes I get frustrated. That’s probably my kryptonite, my biggest weakness. I got to bite my tongue and just not reply. 

Thank you for your comment. I’ll look, you know, I’ll consider it next time. Sometimes I just can’t help myself and I’ll be like, great idea. I can’t wait to see your video on this. You know, if you do it, if you do it, it’s gonna be so mean and tell me what to do. You do the video, I’ll watch your video and I’ll critique you. Yeah, nobody’s perfect. In fact, perfect is the enemy of good, you know. So yeah, a lot of fun still though. But I wouldn’t do it if it wasn’t a blast. 

Spencer: Yeah, yeah, definitely. So even though YouTube is fun, sometimes it’s nice to make some money from it. And I know that a lot of YouTubers work with sponsors to get, you know, some money from it, which is nice. 

And your tool, your channel specifically works with power tools. And I know you may have gotten some in sponsored deals. Have there been any deals where you’ve worked with a company that didn’t go quite as expected, either good or bad? And you don’t have to name specific names if you don’t want to, but I’ll share a little bit further. 

Rob: I’ll go OG on you here. Okay. All these Instagrammers and new tumors now that are getting lots of money, not all of them, because some of them were probably doing it back when I started, but tool companies wouldn’t even talk to us back then. So I got invited to my first media event, probably in 2007 or 2008, it was DeWalt. And at the time, it was four of us. 

Wow. Four website companies. And I did YouTube’s videos, nobody else did. 

So it was four websites. And the rest of the people in the room were magazine editors. And they were all in three piece suits and ties. 

I was in a polo and slacks and work shoes, which soon changed to like work pants and a polo and because we were using the tools. And I remember, I remember this perfectly. It was Jeff Beck. He was the product manager at the time for the SDS drills at DeWalt. He demonstrates the drill. He talks, he does his whole spiel on the drill. And then he says, anybody want to try it? 

And it was almost like all the editors took a step back. I’m standing there all by myself. I’m like, I’ll do it. Well, I ended up using all the tools that day. I was filthy. And they were taking photos of me using it and whatever. And I remember them looking at us with disdain, like, Oh, who are these YouTubers and website kids? You know, and then over the years, they, they went from this many people to this many people. And now it’s the other way around. So early on in those days, early on those days, the two companies wouldn’t talk to us. They were happy for us to come to an event and write and do videos and talk about them. 

They wouldn’t spend any money. So I got together, we called it the tool reviewer mafia. It was a great time. We got together eight or 10 different small website YouTube groups at the time. We got together and we said, look, together we’re stronger. 

And we put together kind of a media guide based on the tier tier one, two and three on price, based on how big your website was in your engagement. And I made that I made it a one cheater. And I went to all the tool companies and like I’m the walled Milwaukee, Bosch, Makita, all of them, Hilty, they were all so resistant. And I finally got Milwaukee to break down because they were so nervous to pay to play. They didn’t want, they didn’t want us to, you know, get an ad. It was, we were buying or selling ads at the time. So on our websites, there was so nervous that if they bought an ad, we’d write something good about their tool and not be honest. 

We had to be very strict about that. Like this is editorial, you know, independence and we want us to keep our, we want to keep our neutral independence and our ability to write what we feel. And the agreement was if your tool is horrible, we just won’t write about it. We’ll call you, we’ll tell you what’s wrong about it, whatever. So that never happened. They always let us publish because we did good and bad. But I broke, I broke open the mold with that tool. 

Three years later, we dissolved, we all went our individual ways and did our own individual advice. But that’s kind of how these website Instagram YouTubers started getting money from tool companies through advertisement. 

Spencer: Wow, that’s awesome. That definitely makes you an OG if that’s the case. That’s, that’s a great story. 

Rob: It’s an OG move. And they talk about it. I talked to the old leadership at Milwaukee and they still remember that they joke about it like, you were tough, man. You were, you were, you were telling, we’re not going to write about your tools anymore unless you consider us as advertised because they were spending huge money with the magazines, but they wouldn’t spend anything with online magazines, which is what we were trying to be. So we had a blast with that. 

And I think your question was, did it go different than expected? That when they finally opened the door to that, and it was almost like they were recognizing us as legitimate media that day when they finally said, okay, we’re going to do a deal with you guys. We’re going to, we’re going to buy an ad. We’re going to put it on your site, 300 by 250. 

And with this ad buy, you agree to do four reviews or whatever, right? So that was a big deal for us moving forward. And there was some money involved at the time too, which was great. Yeah, that’s huge. That’s gone by the wayside, by the way. Now the tool companies, they don’t care about ads anymore. They just want engagement and videos and they love video. 

Spencer: Yeah, definitely. Well, Rob, it’s been great to have you on the show. It’s been awesome to hear your experiences and your stories. I’ve got one final question for you. And this is more like advice type question. And you kind of mentioned this maybe earlier, but has there been a mistake that you’ve made while doing YouTube that you wish you knew beforehand or it’s something you’ve learned from that maybe our audience could benefit? 

Rob: Yeah, yeah, I kind of mentioned it already to you, Spencer. I kind of wish, I’m trying to get away from the sun here a little bit, I kind of wish I had jumped in with both feet and maybe more focus into it. I treated it for so long as just a little side hobby because I was very busy in life and it was very new. And then like I said, I meet these young kids now that aren’t just crushing it out there with views and all kinds of stuff. And they’re like, yeah, I started because of you. I watched all your stuff. You motivated me to start my own channel. 

It’s like, shoot, why didn’t I just jump in with more vigor and more emphasis? And I don’t, I guess I don’t regret where I am in life. I’m very happy, but I wish I had done a little bit more because again, I feel my channel deserves more than 300,000 subscribers. What I’ve the things that I’ve been parted to my readers, the things I’ve taught people and the money I’ve probably saved people along the way with showing them tips and tricks. And it’s like, it should be, it should be half a million. It should be a million. I don’t know what happened there, but I wish I had pushed more on that. That’s my biggest regret. 

Spencer: That makes sense. I think it’s hard because it’s the what if, you know, what would have happened? 

Rob: Yeah, publishing, you know, frequency and all that. The algorithm, right? You got to play those. Yeah. 

Spencer: So that makes sense. Well, Rob, thanks so much again for being on the show. It’s been, it’s been great having you on. 

Rob: I appreciate you having me. And I have, I’m glad to get a chance to say this publicly. Thank you for everything you’ve done for me recently. So what a lot of people don’t know is I recently engaged Spencer to edit and process and help us up our game in, in our video editing. And for years, it’s just been me on iMovie, which is very limited. And I got to say, people are stopping me. 

in Home Depot, Lowe’s. Sometimes I’m in a restaurant. People like, I love your videos, man. And whatever you’re doing now is amazing. I like what you’ve done. You’ve like ramped it up. So people are noticing, man, and it’s you. It’s, it’s all you. 

I mean, I give you the content, but it’s you that made it come up a level. So thank you for everything you’ve done for us and continue to work together. And I’m looking forward what the future brings for two of us partnering. 

Spencer: Yeah, thank you for sharing that. I appreciate that. It’s been, it’s been fun working on your videos. You know, it’s, it’s really nice to have content that is really good. And just being able to bring it like just to step up just with my video editing skills. 

Rob: You’re really good. I should have told you an email. I got an email a few days ago. The guy, the guy was asking me how to, in one of the videos, he’s like, how did the tool do this or how do you do that with the tool? And then he ended by saying, by the way, your new formatting and your videos is amazing. And you know, it’s just people are noticing. And it’s completely different from what I would have done when I first saw it. I was like, oh, oh, oh, he’s transitioning to videos. It’s like, oh, there’s no, oh, oh, and Jeff’s like, relax, let’s see where this goes. This is how people watch videos now, Rob, because I’m older, you know, older, OG, right? And yeah, people love it. I just had to let go of the reins a little bit and let, you know, let’s fence and take the wheel. 

Spencer: Yeah, it’s hard. Sometimes your videos are like your baby. And so it’s hard to let that go. But I appreciate that. Yeah, you’re amazing. Thank you. So thanks to our watchers and listeners for checking out this episode. Make sure to go to Concord Carpenter on YouTube and subscribe to his channel so he can reach 300,000 subscribers. And if you want help like Rob with your videos, make sure to check us out at http://www.creatorluxe.com. And we’ll see you in the next one. 

Rob: Bye, everybody.