Kyle Forgeard has pulled off one of the most improbable business pivots in internet history. In 2010, he was a teenager from Mississauga, Ontario, filming pranks with his friends on a channel called NelkFilmz. Sixteen years later, he owns a business empire that sells close to $100 million worth of apparel a year, moves hundreds of millions of cans of hard seltzer, and runs one of the most-watched podcasts on the planet — all built on two words: “full send.”
He has interviewed a sitting president, partied with UFC royalty, and landed on the Forbes 30 Under 30 list. He has also been demonetized by YouTube, arrested during a botched retail prank, and linked in the tabloids to half of influencer Los Angeles — all while revealing almost nothing about his actual private life. The public Kyle Forgeard is loud, generous, and permanently mid-send. The private one is far harder to pin down.
So who is Kyle Forgeard, really? This is the verifiable story: the kid from the Toronto suburbs who dropped out of film school, the viral prank that changed everything, the business playbook that turned a YouTube ban into a fortune, the honest truth about his net worth, the relationship rumors, and what the internet keeps getting wrong about him.
Quick Bio
| Full Name | Kyle John Forgeard |
| Known For | Co-founder of NELK; creator of the Full Send brand; co-founder of Happy Dad Hard Seltzer; host of the Full Send Podcast |
| Birth Year | 1994 (July 12) |
| Age | 32 (as of 2026) |
| Birthplace | Mississauga, Ontario, Canada |
| Nationality | Canadian |
| Profession | YouTuber, entrepreneur, podcaster |
| Parents | Rick and Gayle Forgeard |
| Siblings | One sister, Chantal |
| Spouse | Never married; no confirmed long-term relationship |
| Children | None confirmed |
| Current Status | Active; NELK relocated to Miami, Florida |
Who Is Kyle Forgeard?
Kyle Forgeard is a Canadian YouTuber, entrepreneur, and podcaster best known as the co-founder and owner of NELK, the prank-and-lifestyle YouTube collective that grew into Full Send Entertainment. The NELK channel now counts roughly 8.4 million subscribers and nearly 2 billion total views, but the subscriber number undersells what Forgeard actually built: a direct-to-consumer merchandise machine, a hard seltzer brand, a chart-topping podcast, and a string of spin-off channels covering golf, MMA, and more.
His defining insight was that the audience was the asset, not the platform. When YouTube cut off NELK’s ad revenue entirely in 2020, most creators would have treated it as a catastrophe. Forgeard treated it as a nudge — and the businesses he owned outright ended up making him far more money than ads ever had.
In February 2022, Forbes named him to its 30 Under 30 list for social media, formalizing what his fans already knew: the kid filming pranks in parking lots had become one of the most successful creator-entrepreneurs in North America.
Early Life in Mississauga
Kyle John Forgeard was born on July 12, 1994, in Mississauga, a sprawling suburb just west of Toronto. He was raised there by his parents, Rick and Gayle Forgeard, alongside his sister Chantal, in what every account describes as a supportive, ordinary Canadian household.
His parents were not background characters in his story. Both appeared in NELK videos over the years — his mother was famously the target of the “Fake House Party Prank on Mom” video — and Forgeard has spoken about looking after them as his money grew. Multiple outlets report that he bought his mother a car in 2021 and gave his father enough money to retire, the kind of detail that explains why his audience reads him as loyal rather than merely rich.
From an early age, Forgeard was drawn to cameras and comedy. After high school he enrolled at Ryerson University in Toronto to study film, but he left before finishing his degree to go all in on YouTube. It was the classic dropout gamble, except that in his case the channel was already his real education: he had been making videos since 2010.
The Birth of NELK
The NELK story starts in 2010, when Forgeard created a YouTube channel called NelkFilmz with a group of Mississauga friends that included Lucas Gasparini and twins Niko and Marko Martinovic. The name itself was an acronym built from the original crew: Nick, Elliot, Lucas, and Kyle. Early uploads were scrappy comedy skits, including “McDonalds Job Interview PRANK” in 2013.
The channel’s direction changed decisively in August 2014, when Forgeard met Jesse Sebastiani at an MTV Canada conference. Their first video together, “YOU LIT ME ON FIRE!!!,” went up that same month, and Sebastiani became Forgeard’s key creative partner as NELK pivoted hard into pranks. A year later came the video that made them famous: “Coke Prank on Cops,” uploaded in January 2015, in which the crew told Los Angeles police officers they had “coke” in the car — then revealed they meant Coca-Cola. The LAPD was not amused and issued a public warning, but the video exploded, eventually passing 49 million views and becoming the most-watched upload in NELK history.
Growth was slow, then sudden. NELK crossed one million subscribers and collected YouTube’s Gold Creator Award in January 2018. By then the prank formula — brash, borderline-reckless stunts aimed squarely at young men — had made the group, in the words of one Canadian outlet, “two of the most recognizable personalities for young people in North America.” The partnership that powered it, though, would not last: Sebastiani gradually stepped back from videos around 2020, and in 2022 he formally bought out of the company and launched his own brand, Sunday.
“Full Send”: The Business Playbook
The phrase that became Forgeard’s empire started as a catchphrase. NELK popularized “full send” — which Forgeard has defined as giving any activity your absolute best — and in 2017 the group turned it into a clothing brand sold through one-time, Supreme-style “drops.” Each drop released limited quantities for a short window; when it sold out, it was gone until the next one. Single drops reportedly sold out in under half an hour, and the brand now moves close to $100 million in apparel a year.
The merch model was only half the playbook. The other half was owning everything the audience touched: spin-off YouTube channels (Full Send Podcast, Full Send Golf, Full Send MMA), a paid subscription arm, and eventually beverages and supplements. For more profiles of the personalities behind famous brands, browse our Celebrity section.
Then came the ban that made him. In September 2020, after NELK threw a roughly 200-person flash mob at Illinois State University in violation of COVID-19 rules, YouTube demonetized the channel completely — no ad revenue, on any video. Forgeard later told health entrepreneur Gary Brecka that losing monetization was, perversely, good for the business: it forced the operation to live entirely off brands it owned rather than rent collected from a platform. The audience stayed; the middleman left.
Happy Dad Hard Seltzer
In June 2021, Forgeard co-founded Happy Dad Hard Seltzer with brothers John and Sam Shahidi, the talent managers who had become NELK’s business partners. The connection ran through an unlikely chain: a chance dinner in Los Angeles where the Shahidis were dining with Justin Bieber, who was already a NELK fan. UFC president Dana White — a friend of the Shahidis — came aboard as an investor and partner, giving the brand instant credibility with exactly the demographic NELK already owned.
The seltzer is produced and packaged at Minhas Breweries in Monroe, Wisconsin, and its rise was startlingly fast. By 2023 it ranked as a top-five hard seltzer brand at Total Wine, according to IRI retail data, and distribution expanded across the United States through a partnership with Breakthru Beverage Group. Some outlets report the brand has sold more than 224 million cans since launch and value it in the hundreds of millions of dollars — figures that should be read as industry estimates rather than audited numbers, but which point to the same conclusion: Happy Dad, not YouTube, is the engine of Forgeard’s wealth.
The Full Send Podcast
On August 4, 2021, NELK uploaded the first episode of the Full Send Podcast, with Dana White as the inaugural guest. The format was disarmingly simple — long, loose conversations with famous people — and the guest list quickly became absurd: Elon Musk, Mike Tyson, Donald Trump, Shaquille O’Neal, O.J. Simpson, Andrew Tate, Ben Shapiro, and Tucker Carlson, among others. Musk’s episode is the most-watched at nearly 23 million views; Tyson’s sits around 13 million.
The podcast’s breakout moment came in March 2022, when Donald Trump appeared on the show. The episode pulled roughly 5 million views in its first 24 hours before YouTube removed it, and the controversy catapulted the Full Send Podcast to No. 2 on Spotify’s US charts — one of the highest positions a creator-led show had ever reached. Forgeard launched the show with comedian Bob Menery as co-host; in later years Aaron “Steiny” Steinberg became his regular foil.
The political lane widened from there. NELK met Trump on Air Force One in October 2020 and danced to “Y.M.C.A.” with him onstage after a rally; the group backed his 2024 presidential campaign, with Forgeard speaking at several rallies. In July 2025, Forgeard and Steinberg interviewed Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu on the podcast — then acknowledged they had been supplied with scripted questions by Netanyahu’s staff, drawing backlash from parts of their own audience. Steinberg later said he regretted not pressing his guest harder.
The Honest Truth About His Net Worth
Search Kyle Forgeard’s net worth and you will find numbers ranging from $1.5 million to $25 million, stated with equal confidence and almost never sourced. The $25 million figure, now the most widely repeated, comes from celebrity-finance aggregator sites and has not been independently verified — treat every number in this genre as an estimate, including that one.
What is verifiable is the shape of the money. Full Send apparel generates on the order of $100 million a year in revenue. Happy Dad is a top-five player in its category at a major national retailer. The podcast commands premium sponsorship rates on the strength of its guest list. And in January 2022, NELK’s Full Send Metacard NFT collection — 10,000 digital cards on Ethereum — reportedly sold out in minutes for roughly $23 million in total value. Forgeard is also reported to hold real estate in Los Angeles and Las Vegas. Whether his personal fortune is $15 million or $30 million, the direction of travel is not in doubt.
The Private Life He Keeps Private
For someone whose brand is total exposure, Forgeard guards his romantic life with unusual discipline. He has never confirmed a long-term relationship, has never been married, and has no confirmed children. Most biography sites simply list him as single — which is accurate as far as anything he has confirmed goes.
The one relationship saga attached to his name involves influencer Megan Eugenio, known as Overtime Megan. Outlets including EssentiallySports reported that the pair’s “situationship” began around October 2023, that they started dating in March 2024, and that they split in December 2024 after Eugenio said on TikTok that she had found Forgeard cheating during a trip to Australia. Forgeard himself has never publicly confirmed the relationship, and the whole episode remains a matter of her account and tabloid reporting rather than anything he has acknowledged.
What he does show the public is generosity toward his circle. The most famous example: for his 28th birthday in July 2022, Dana White handed him $250,000 in cash on camera — a gift that went viral and said as much about Forgeard’s proximity to power as about his bank balance. He is 5 feet 10 inches tall, athletic, dark-haired, and — by every account from people who know him — intensely loyal to the friends he started with.
Run-Ins With the Law
A prank career was never going to be controversy-free. The “Coke Prank on Cops” earned the group an LAPD warning in 2015. In May 2020, Forgeard, SteveWillDoIt, and Salim Sirur were arrested for disturbing the peace while filming a prank at a Target store in Mississippi; they were released on bond a few hours later. And the Illinois State University flash mob in September 2020 brought both a police investigation and the YouTube demonetization that reshaped the business.
None of it dented the trajectory. If anything, the pattern — stunt, backlash, bigger audience — became the operating system. NELK relocated from Orange County to Miami, Florida; Happy Dad set up headquarters in Newport Beach, California; and Forgeard, by his own account on the Brecka podcast, spent recent years overhauling his health after the party-heavy era caught up with him.
What the Internet Gets Wrong About Kyle Forgeard
Because Forgeard rarely corrects the record, the record is full of errors. A few worth clearing up:
The stale subscriber counts: older profiles still list NELK at 7 million subscribers. The channel sits around 8.4 million with nearly 2 billion views — always check the date on a stat.
The net worth certainty: no outlet publishing a Forgeard net worth has access to his accounts. The $25 million figure is an aggregator estimate, not a fact.
The Jesse Sebastiani confusion: many bios still describe Sebastiani as Forgeard’s partner. He bought out of NELK in 2022 and now runs his own brand.
The “Coke Prank” date: it was January 2015, not 2016 as some fan wikis claim.
The girlfriend claims: no woman has ever been confirmed as Forgeard’s girlfriend by Forgeard himself. The Overtime Megan story is reported, not confirmed.
Frequently Asked Questions
How old is Kyle Forgeard?
Kyle Forgeard was born on July 12, 1994, in Mississauga, Ontario, Canada. He is 32 years old as of 2026.
What is Kyle Forgeard’s net worth?
Estimates range from $1.5 million to $25 million, with $25 million the most commonly cited figure in 2026. None of these figures has been independently verified; they come from celebrity-finance aggregator sites. His wealth is built on Full Send merchandise, Happy Dad Hard Seltzer, and the Full Send Podcast rather than YouTube ad revenue.
Is Kyle Forgeard dating anyone?
He has never publicly confirmed a relationship. He was linked by media outlets to influencer Overtime Megan (Megan Eugenio) from late 2023 until their reported split in December 2024, but Forgeard himself has never confirmed it. As far as anything he has acknowledged, he is single.
How tall is Kyle Forgeard?
He is consistently reported as 5 feet 10 inches tall (1.78 meters).
Why was NELK demonetized on YouTube?
In September 2020, after NELK hosted a flash mob of about 200 people at Illinois State University in violation of COVID-19 regulations, YouTube demonetized the channel entirely. Forgeard later said the ban ultimately helped the business by forcing it to rely on brands it owned outright.
What companies does Kyle Forgeard own?
He is the owner of NELK and the Full Send brand (apparel, podcast, and spin-off channels), and a co-founder of Happy Dad Hard Seltzer, launched in June 2021 with John and Sam Shahidi.
Bottom Line
Kyle Forgeard’s real talent was never pranks. Plenty of people can film a prank; almost nobody can convert a prank audience into a nine-figure consumer business while a platform ban is raining down. He understood, earlier than almost any creator of his generation, that attention rented from YouTube could vanish overnight — and he built the kind of company that does not need YouTube at all.
That is the story the subscriber counts miss. A 16-year-old started a channel in Mississauga in 2010; a 26-year-old lost his ad revenue in 2020 and got richer; a 32-year-old now sits at the intersection of internet culture, beverage retail, and presidential politics. Whatever the exact net worth, the arc is the point: Kyle Forgeard didn’t just go full send on the stunts. He went full send on the business, and it worked.
