A man in Missouri was filming the cabin of a used Toyota when he zoomed in on the driver’s seat and saw what appeared to be a cattle brand pressed into the leather. Viewers set out to identify the animal’s owner, and one of them pointed to a ranch in the high desert of northern Nevada.
Josiah Simpson (@jo.simps) posts family videos and clips from his cleaning jobs around Springfield, Missouri on TikTok. The 11-second clip on 30 October, has so far drawn 1.8 million views. “This Corolla is in fact property of whoever owns the ‘YP’ ranch,” the caption says. “Just gotta find out who that may be.”
‘That is unreal’
The clip starts tight on the perforated middle of the black seat cushion, where a light-coloured mark is visible. “This is a factory Toyota seat with the brand of whatever cow it came off of,” Simpson says. “That is unreal.” Someone off-camera says, “It’s real.”
In the comments he described the mark as a “little bit larger than the average palm.” When viewers pointed out that the car was a Camry, he called one of them a “Corolla denier.” The door panels shown in the video correspond to Toyota’s press photos of the sixth-generation Camry. It was sold for the 2007–2011 model years, and not to the 2009–2013 Corolla.
Where is the ranch?
“YP Ranch in Tuscarora, Nevada,” wrote user6996781023510, in a comment that Simpson liked and that has nearly 1,200 likes. Celtgunn interpreted the mark as a “Lazy Y P.” They said that tracking down its owner would mean going through “each state brand book.”
Nevada’s book does carry a YP brand with a Tuscarora address. The state’s 2020 Official Livestock Brand Book lists a “Y P COMBINED” brand. It was registered to Petan Company of Nevada at Petan Ranch in Tuscarora. The 2008 edition counted it among “the oldest recorded brands in the state.”
“YP connected, recorded in 1885 and still in use today by Petan Co. of Tuscarora, Nv,” it said.
A 2025 profile in Ruralite, the magazine published by Raft River Rural Electric Co-op, traced the brand back to the ranch’s Basque founders, Juan and Grace Garat. They “brought it with them in 1874” from California. The Jackson family has held the ranch since 1939, and at spring branding its crew sets out “to brand 200 to 300 calves daily.”
The same 2020 book records a plain “Y P” brand held by an owner in Round Mountain, Nevada, and a “Quarter Circle Over Y P” in Carson City. So the letters on their own do not settle the question. Other states keep separate registers. Nevada’s brand law refers to cattle arriving with “a recorded or registered brand of that other state.”
How a brand gets on a seat cover
“Y’all actually think they use leather for seats?” asked takoda_westfall. In fact, both cars were offered with leather.
Toyota said the 2010 V6 Camry XLE had “standard leather-trimmed seats.” And its 2010 Corolla release said “a leather-trim interior is available on the S and XRS grades.” Several commenters argued the seat was SofTex, Toyota’s synthetic material, which the company described as “new for Toyota” in a 2011 release stating that it “does not include any animal-based material.”
The 2022 National Beef Quality Audit found that 70.5% of fed steers and heifers had no brand at all and 22.4% were branded on the butt. “Hides become less valuable when they are branded,” the authors wrote.
Hot brands “frequently do burn well into the hide structure,” Leather International reported in 2007, although “modern finishing techniques, particularly in the upholstery sector, are surprisingly good at disguising them.” On car seats, flaws are “marked to identify” and the cutting patterns are “positioned around these defects,” according to a Leather Working Group guide, which adds that “areas free from defects are required in the most visible parts of the seat.”
Commenters who said they worked in the trade were divided on whether a brand could make it through. “As someone who literally works in a plant that makes seats for Toyota and Mazda, that would never get sent out,” wrote spokenmemoirs97. Zephyr351c, who said they had worked with leather and in manufacturing, offered two explanations. “It’s entirely possible the brand wasn’t that visible when the seat cover was made and installed,” or “it’s entirely possible that it was visible, but no one wanted to do the non-conforming paperwork.”
‘Gotta track down the rancher’
“You know, if Ford did that with their King Ranches, that’d be pretty clever,” wrote sirthegsd Ford has in fact done something along those lines. the leather seats in the 2021 Explorer King Ranch came “with the legendary King Ranch Running W logo,” Ford said in a press release.
Danielhefner0 offered a different theory: “That’s from the bedazzled jeans of the dude that’s been driving it.” Simpson replied, “This actually did cross my mind, other than it being a 60–70-year-old owner.”
Others wanted to see the car reunited with the animal’s owner. “Gotta track down the rancher and sell it to them,” wrote dalton87143. When taco1765 concluded the brand had to be aftermarket, Simpson replied: “Aftermarket cow with aftermarket brand put on at the factory.”
Subplot News contacted Simpson by Instagram direct message, and Toyota and the YP Ranch, for comment. We will update this story if they respond.
@jo.simps This Corolla is in fact property of whoever owns the “YP” ranch just gotta find out who that may be.
♬ original sound – Josiahasimpson
