Carlo Gonzalez is a businessman, an entrepreneur and brilliant marketer. He has traveled all over the world and met with celebrities far and wide, to bring them the world of exotic cars right to their doorsteps. He represents the YOLO (You Only Live Once) lifestyle perfectly, and makes him the perfect guest for the Yolo Podcast with Yolo Rum Founders “Uncle” Phil Guerin and Producer WIGNZ.
We asked Carlo to tell us a little about Mile High Drives and his business adventures. This is what he told us.
BUSINESSES
Drives At Mile High Exotic Car Rental
Offering ultra exotic and luxury car rental services in Denver, CO and Phoenix, AZ.
Exotic Cars Worldwide THE BEGINNING
ALISON COOPER
ODELL BECKHAM JR.
VIRAL VIDEO
Exotic vehicle buyer/seller services around the globe.
THE BEGINNING
I was tired of the regular job/work just like everyone else. So back in 2012, I basically did something that most people would consider completely irresponsible or just plain stupid. I drained my bank account to buy a Lamborghini to chase a dream. Yes, you heard it right. Drained my bank account. At the time, everyone thought I went crazy. Friends calling me all the time asking if “I was okay” and if I had literally gone bananas. Me being a huge supporter of Drake’s music….. I was just thinking”YOLO” the entire time! I told myself that NOW was the time to the risk. I had a plan and a passion. But most people doubted me at the time and straight-up laughed at my lucrative idea. But that didn’t stop me. I was 26 years when I made this life-changing decision, and here comes beautiful white Lamborghini I had just purchased that started a crazy and epic journey!
HIGHLIGHTS/PROMOTE
Drives At Mile High has now been operating in Denver for over 7 years. We offer daily exotic car rentals and group driving experiences. We’ve provided high-end car services for major events, athletes, musicians, such as:
Odell Beckham Jr
Jarvis Landry
21 Savage
Jeremy Hill
Drake
Tyga
LeBron James
Alice Cooper
WWF
….. and more.
With my other company, Exotic Cars Worldwide, I started global exotic car buyers service. So basically I would track down sellers with high-end/collector cars around the world and connect them with the right buyers. The major perks is being able to travel the world to meet clients and see come of the craziest cars around the globe.
Before the businesses really took off, I was just a regular guy who went to middle and high school in Wheat Ridge, Colorado. And now, I’m in cities like Tokyo, Paris, Hong Kong, and London seeing AND driving Lamborghins and Ferraris. Not to mention riding in private helicopters with some of the scariest/most powerful people on the planet! Talk about YOLO.
ALISON COOPER
The last celebrity that I had mentioned (Alice Cooper) definitely brings up a funny memory. I was one of the very first rental companies to have the brand new 2014 Corvette Stingray back in late 2013.
I received a random call from a person claiming he was Alice Cooper who REALLY needed the new Corvette Stingray for an upcoming event….. AND he wanted to deliver the car to his house. Of course, I didn’t believe him. I’m thinking this fool wants to steal the car!!
Slightly offended, he handed the phone over to his designated “car guy” where this person proceeded to pay for the rental. I still was extremely skeptical about the whole situation…… and thought there’s no way that was Alice Cooper. I’m thinking these guys have to be professional thieves.
I arrive to a huge beautiful house in Scottsdale….. and guess what??? There he is. The man himself. Alice Cooper. We chatted about cars for a bit and I got him going in the vehicle right away. As a huge thank you….. he opened his garage that was COMPLETELY PACKED with brand-new in-box electric guitars. He pulls one from the box, autographs the guitar, says thank you….. and then drives away in Corvette.
ODELL BECKHAM JR.
Odell contacted me for some vehicles when the Pro Bowl was in Arizona a while back. This was during the football season where he made his world-famous one-handed catch. I delivered a Ferrari to his house which he absolutely loved….. but, after a week or so he wanted something much faster with world-class performance. Of course, this meant the high powered McLaren sports car. But, his people made it very clear to NOT give him any ultra high-performance car for liability reasons.
So of course I secretly gave him an upgrade to the McLaren and made it clear to please keep it on the “down-low” so no one would know he had the ultra high-performance car. What happened next??? He broke the internet by showing up to a live ESPN event in the car. My phone blew up all day with non-stop text messages!! So much for keeping the upgraded car a secret.
VIRAL VIDEO
The time when I accidentally created the most watched video in the world for 7 straight days. The famous skateboard kid and McLaren video generated over 13million views in 7 days. One of our cars had a damaged windshield. Instead of responsibly parking the car (like a normal person) until the windshield was replaced…… it was another YOLO moment, so I decided to smash the glass!
We staged a fake accident involving a skateboard who smashed the windshield of our $250,000 McLaren after the car ran the stop sign and “hit” the skateboarder. We staged the accident by Littleman’s Ice Cream in the highlands in front of about 200 people. I did a TERRIBLE job of filming the whole accident with my phone. I wasn’t very optimistic about the video going viral at all. That night I uploaded the video on YouTube and went to bed. I woke up really late that morning. My phone was buzzing nonstop. I had missed calls from just about everyone in Denver. I finally called one of my buddies, who was an actor in video, and was screaming….. “DUDE!!! We’re all over the internet!!!”. He kept shouting that over and over again.
SnapChap, Instagram, Facebook, The Chive, Yahoo, CNN, Fox News, BBC…. the video is literally EVERYWHERE!!! News crews were on-site for an entire 2 days to investigate the “accident” in the highlands neighborhood in Denver.
Actor Nick Cannon loved the prank so much….. he sent his production team from New York to Denver to interview me in person. He wanted to feature the video on his show called Caught On Camera. The interview and video aired on the TV and created even more buzz. I had requests from TV shows in Japan, United Kingdom, China, Russia, Brazil, and more to feature the video on their network. The whole viral video experience was overwhelming and shocking at the same time.
STEALING MY OWN CARS
The winters months are generally slower in the exotic car business. So one year I decided to send 4 of our cars to a company in Vegas to try and create a little more revenue during these months. Long story short, they never paid me anything from all the rentals for 2+ months. I then had to fly to Vegas myself with the spare keys and had to basically steal my own cars back from customers who has my vehicles. The memorable one was stealing one of my exotic cars from the Cosmopolitan hotel in front of all the valets and watch them in horror as I took off with the car.
To get my cars back…… I had to stalk to valets, find out where they stored the keys, steal the original key from the valet box when they were distracted, and then essentially steal my own car back before the valet noticed. Have you ever stolen 4 exotic cars in one day?? Well, lets just say I had to.
FUNNY “YOLO” MOMENTS WITH THE CARS
McDonald’s Lamborghini
Recognized as the originator/content creator of taking a Lamborghini through the McDonald’s drive-through. Again, another YOLO moment. Who in their right mind would take their Lamborgini through McDonalds??? I would!!! I started this trend about 7 years ago. Today several social media influencers have followed the trend and done the same.
Make Monday’s Fun Again (Exotic Car Pastry Fights)
I would nonstop work all weekends. That’s the busiest time in the exotic car business. So when Monday’s would come around, the the shop would be relatively uneventful. All my friends would also at be work. So was tough for me to pass time just sitting around bored on Mondays. And of course, no one in the corporate world likes Monday’s either. The solution??? Monday pastry fights. I would buy boxes of pastries at the grocery store. All my friends with corporate job would get off work a bit early and get to my shop at about 3:00pm.
We would all jump into Lamborghinis and drive around the parking lot while throwing pastries at each other! Yes, we were grown men in our late 20’s / early 30’s throwing twinkies and cupcakes at each other. But we were having the time of our lives! You can call this immature. We called it living our best life. Or as you call it, YOLO! Afterwards, we would wash down all of the cars while laughing hysterically. The amount of fun we had made everyone feel alive again.