Matt McNeff told his franchisees the plan is to get boring so people look away. Then he said the Tucson store “will be shut down” and that “we’ve been in communication with the landlord.” The landlord got one phone call. He also said BAM is filing on Monday.
On Saturday, Matt McNeff posted a video to every BAM franchisee. McNeff is BAM’s Chief Operations Officer and one of the plaintiffs suing Reckless Ben. He said the Southeast Tucson store “will be shut down” and stay closed for good; the store’s landlord had received one phone call. He said Reckless Ben’s lawyers were only “threatening” an anti-SLAPP motion that they had filed the day before. He said “there will be sanctions” from a court filing BAM had not yet made.
PRIMARY SOURCEMatthew McNeff’s remarks to BAM franchisees on September 19, 2026, reviewed and transcribed. McNeff is BAM’s Chief Operations Officer and a named plaintiff in No. 2:26-cv-00593 (D. Utah)CONFIRMEDwhen McNeff spoke, the landlord of the Southeast Tucson store had received one phone call about the store and nothing else, and no official proceeding was pendingUNRESOLVEDthe order to show cause McNeff said BAM will file on Monday, September 21. No such filing was on the docket on September 20
What McNeff told franchisees
A growing number of BAM franchisees are handing the company’s internal messages to The BAM Map. One is the video McNeff posted on Saturday in #announcements_general, the channel that reaches every store at once. On Tucson, he was blunt.
“We’ve been in communication with the landlord, and the location will be shut down and will be remaining permanently closed.”
McNeff is one of the plaintiffs suing Reckless Ben. What a plaintiff says about his own case can be used against him in it.
The landlord got one phone call
It is confirmed that when McNeff spoke, the landlord of the Southeast Tucson store had received one phone call about the store. Nothing else had reached the landlord, and no official proceeding was pending.
It matches what the landlord’s office told the store’s owner on September 18, as he relayed it to Collecting Weekly and as this site reported that night. No lease had been signed, no takeover had been started, and he was still the tenant. The notice on the store’s door, signed by the owner, says temporarily closed.
McNeff did not tell franchisees how the store “will be shut down.” He told them “we’ve been in communication with the landlord.” That communication was one phone call. BAM had not signed a lease for the space or bought one out, and it had no proceeding pending to take it.
McNeff said he was answering “speculation and rumors” and “uninformed opinions” about the store. One account franchisees had heard came from BAM itself. On September 18 this site reported that Julie Kuni, BAM’s franchise business coach for the West Coast, told an owner in her region that BAM had “bought out the lease” and closed the store. McNeff did not repeat that, and he did not correct it. Neither version matches what the landlord received.
McNeff began with Sarasota, where a second store opened on Saturday under a new name. He thanked “the franchisees who alerted us to that situation last night.” The store came off BAM’s own locator at about 1 a.m. Eastern on Saturday. He said BAM will act in Sarasota “similar to Southeast Tucson.”
The motion he said might not be filed
“They’ve been threatening to file this anti-SLAPP motion ... our legal team has looked at things and feel very confident and comfortable that we’ll be able to overcome that if they do file that.”
The motion was filed the day before McNeff spoke. It is ECF 37, filed September 18. Its certificate of service shows it went to BAM’s lawyers through the court’s filing system that day, and it has been hosted on this site since that night. September 18 was also the deadline BAM’s own lawyers agreed to, in a stipulation they signed (ECF 35). If the court dismisses any part of BAM’s complaint under the motion, Utah’s anti-SLAPP statute makes BAM pay Reckless Ben’s attorneys’ fees for it.
The filing he promised for Monday
“On Monday we will be filing an order to show cause ... for Ben and his team to go before the judge and to tell him why they’ve been violating the preliminary injunction. And there will be sanctions and other ... remedies that come from that order.”
The Monday McNeff meant is September 21. As of September 20, BAM had not filed it. A party can ask a court for an order to show cause. Whether one issues, and whether anyone is sanctioned, is for the court to decide. McNeff told franchisees “there will be sanctions” before BAM had asked for any.
The injunction he says was violated is one BAM asked for. BAM’s lawyers signed the joint motion for it (ECF 11), and the court entered it (ECF 21). Its first paragraph restrains conduct, such as coming within 100 yards of a BAM store. Its second says nothing in the order stops the defendants from “commenting on this litigation” or “engaging in investigative journalism.” This site has quoted that paragraph at length. To get sanctions, BAM would have to show conduct. It agreed in writing that the speech is allowed.
What the owners said to each other
In #forum_miscellaneous, a working channel for the whole system, owners spent Saturday on Reckless Ben’s livestream and on the case. The messages are reconstructed. The owners are not named.
YouTube · Reckless BenBricks and minifigs is trying to shut us downThe mediation the owners wrote off was real, and the offer in it was not BAM’s. On September 1 BAM’s lawyers signed a filing that said the plaintiffs were meeting a mediator that day to consider “an offer from the remaining defendants.” What BAM answered has never been made public. McNeff told franchisees the other side is “not interested in actually settling.”
The first owner asked whether this is not “defamation, slander, copyright infringement, something.” BAM has already sued Reckless Ben for defamation. Those claims are the ones the September 18 motion asks the court to dismiss. What the owners asked for, a creator “shut down” over his videos, is what Utah’s anti-SLAPP statute was written to stop.
The plan
“Our goal is just to not even play that game. Obviously, as we become more boring and less interesting, fewer people are going to pay attention. And so that’s kind of the strategy.”
McNeff told franchisees BAM will “hit both Reckless Ben and those that affiliate with him.” In public, he said, BAM will not respond. “We won’t be responding, we won’t be reacting, we won’t be giving them any more oxygen.”
The quiet is already on the record. BAM’s last public statement about the lawsuit was on August 19. On September 12 its marketing director told owners that Reckless Bricks might bring back attention “after much of the conversation had begun to quiet down.”
McNeff said all of this in the channel that reaches every store. A growing number of the franchisees in it are sharing what is posted there with The BAM Map.
The transcript
The fair counterpoint. McNeff was speaking to franchisees, not to a court, and a phone call is communication. BAM may still file on Monday and answer the motion. Neither had happened when this was published. The right of reply is open to BAM and to everyone named here.
Sources. This account is compiled from BAM’s own internal messages, which a growing number of franchisees have shared with The BAM Map: Matthew McNeff’s September 19 remarks to franchisees, transcribed above, and the owners’ thread in the #forum_miscellaneous channel the same day, reconstructed above with owner identities, store locations and exact times withheld. What the landlord received is confirmed. This site’s reporting of what BAM’s franchise business coach told an owner, what the landlord’s office told the tenant, and the notice on the door, the Sarasota store, BAM’s public silence since August 19 and its marketing director’s message to owners. The federal docket in BAM Franchising, Inc. v. Schneider, No. 2:26-cv-00593 (D. Utah), reviewed September 20, 2026: the anti-SLAPP motion (ECF 37, filed September 18, hosted here), the stipulation that set its deadline (ECF 35), the joint motion for the preliminary injunction (ECF 11) and the order entering it (ECF 21), and the September mediation. The right of reply is open to BAM and to everyone named here.