I should have known better than to plan a pilgrimage to Omaha for the Berkshire Hathaway shareholder meeting at the last minute. Last minute for most travelers means a few days before but Buffett cognoscenti know last minute means something short of a year in advance. The annual shareholder meeting has transformed the sleepy town of Omaha into a frenzy of price gouging and inconvenience when Warren Buffett and Charlie Munger hold court. Omaha hotels are all sold out even with rates tripled or more and all modes of transportation to Omaha become twice the normal rates if available at any price. Nearly 45,000 people flock there from all corners of the world to hear words of wisdom from Warren Buffett and his legally blind sidekick Charlie Munger.
For some reason I can only explain as the unpredictable but thoroughly natural rhythms of paternal nurturing, I decided that my two boys, one 16 and one 22 needed to go to Omaha and hear from the oracle directly. Cole, the 22 yr. old has become intensely entrepreneurial and Hunter, the 16 yr. old is taking financial literacy at this very moment in high school. I figured there were no better lessons in finance and just about everything else than the ones taught this weekend in Omaha. Having been on this pilgrimage twice before myself, one has to wonder just how much longer this show can go on with Buffet, 84, and Munger, 92 years of age. I don’t venture to guess how the long -term performance of Berkshire Hathaway stock will do without Warren Buffet and Charlie at the helm but I am certain that the show, the veritable Woodstock of Capitalism will end with their demise.
Booking the trip a month in advance left few options. We took Uncle Warren’s budget saving advice and flew into Kansas City and saved over a thousand dollars by doing this. Savings come at a steep price in time, though. A direct flight from Salt Lake to Omaha normally takes 2 hours fly time. Our particularly flight left Salt Lake at 6:00AM and did not arrive until late afternoon with a ghastly early morning plane connection in Las Vegas.
After arriving in Kansas City and making our way to the car rental lot, we then drove 2.5 hours to Omaha, stopping along the way for food and Wi-Fi hot spots so my son could upload large video files to work. This was a working vacation for him. We finally arrived at our hotel on the western edge of Omaha and bedded down for the evening. Door to door 15 hours travel time. According to Google maps drive time would have been only 12.8 hrs. Certainly could have flown to Hawaii for a lot less time and probably the same money.
Sometime before going to bed for the night, I called the front desk of the hotel and told them we did not want to spend two nights there. The hotel was disgusting, emitting some chemical odor that reminded me of inhalation warnings from organic chemistry class. My youngest asked me if I thought the hotel had bed bugs. I lied and said probably not. The Indian couple living in the hotel said they could not do anything about refunds since we used Booking.com to purchase our rooms. We told them we were not staying the next night and managed to get 50% off the exorbitant room rate after complaining to Booking.com but not before several minutes elapsed on the phone. Hotel management told them that all the carpets had just been replaced and the noxious odor was the smell of new carpets. I now recognize that smell, formaldehyde. It was biology not chemistry.
Going to a Berkshire Hathaway shareholder meeting and getting a good seat requires tenacity and endurance. My good friend Scott Tilson, and his brother, Todd had the good graces to save us a choice seat. They stood in the drizzling predawn chill outside the Century Link Center since 5:30AM to be near the front of the line when the doors opened at 7AM. Scott has been at least 13 times to the annual event and has actually bought two luncheon dates with Buffett, including the second one ever auctioned off. They now go for about $500,000. When I thanked Todd for his noble effort, he replied, “This is what we do.”
We spent a few minutes cruising the exhibition area of the Century Link center where many of the Berkshire Hathaway companies have their wares on display. If you want a discount on Justin Boots or Geico auto insurance, just step right up and you are likely to be waited on by senior management of those companies.
Buffett introduces themselves, by saying Charlie who is blind, “he hears and I see, “we make a good partnership.”
Everyone who attends or listens to Warren Buffet and Charlie Munger takes away some new gleanings of financial wisdom and lessons of life. Just a few of the ones I noted are below:
When asked how do you network when you don’t have an elite business school network Charlie answers, “do the best you can. Play the hand you have.”
There are usually questions about economic forecasting. Buffett is legend for not looking at the macro view. In fact Buffett says,” any company that employs an economist has one employee too many.” That’s noticeable to me, as he has just finished pointing out John Stumph in the audience, who is the CEO of Wells Fargo. Berkshire is the largest shareholder and I’m sure Wells Fargo has more than one economist on the payroll.
Buffett is keen on renewables but he has a holistic concept of going green. MidAmerican, a portfolio company, is the largest developer of renewable energy in the country due to the ability of the consolidated profitable Berkshire companies to take advantage of government tax credits more than other regulated utilities.
“You could buy stocks cheaper in 1973,74 than even in 2008,” Buffett notes.
His favorite economic reads:
Wealth of Nations by Adam Smith
Where are the Customers Yachts by Fred Shwed
Secret Millionaires Club: Warren Buffett’s 26 Secrets to Success in the Business of Life
Intelligent Investor by Benjamin Graham
When asked by the audience, “What’s most important to Buffett? Buffett thinks about this question rather seriously. He remarks about his concern for the nearly million Berkshire Hathaway shareholders before he elaborates,
“It’s most important that Berkshire does well.”
Charlie Munger quipped,” A good doctor doesn’t like it when the patient dies on the table either”
We left the arena to avoid the traffic gridlock while Buffett was getting the last question. We were all exhausted and I began to feel a tinge guilty about putting my kids through this traveling whirlwind marathon. They were exhausted and passed out in the seats. I loaded up on coffee, 5- Hour Energy, and Lorrilard Blue E-cigarette so I could stay awake. Somewhere on the drive back that afternoon to Kansas City, I realized that I was not being completely honest to myself or to my kids when I told them the only reason I was on this road trip from hell, was for them to see Warren Buffett while he was still sharp and in command of his empire. I realized I was doing this for myself as well. Even after countless hours of watching Buffett on TV and in person twice, he is still the most interesting person in the world to me.