Episode 2: From Corporate to Freedom: Bob Spotz of All-Star Power Cleaning

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what's up guys?

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It is matt jackson and welcome to episode two of the brand up your business podcast.

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I got one of my good friends, bob.

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We've known each other for a few years in the fresh washing industry, met through mastermind groups and see each other here and there at conferences.

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So he has a fresh washing business based out of Cleveland Ohio area and we kind of have a similar story.

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So let me kick it off to Bob here and introduce him and let him tell you the story and we'll go from there.

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Well, yeah, first off, thanks for having me.

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You know you've been a great resource, somebody I've looked forward to or looked up to kind of, in the early years, in the pivotal years.

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But I guess I'll kind of kick things off and we'll take a deep dive.

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My background, I would say, and how I got into the pressure washing business, is pretty unconventional.

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It's a pretty unique story, came with its own challenges, but I guess I'll just dive right in.

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So I was born in 85, grew up in a affluent suburban community of Cleveland called Mentor, ohio, you know, grew up in a nice neighborhood on the cul-de-sac, went to the Catholic schools and kind of growing up in that environment.

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I think the one takeaway that really stands out looking back is just the conformity.

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You know everything has a label.

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You don't want to stand out too much, you want to fit in, you want to be accepted and you kind of want to just march along the path that society has you aligned with.

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So in many cases that path is you know, you go to a decent high school, maybe play a little sports, you go to university so you can get a better job and that's kind of what everybody's focused on.

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You know I was a unique kid.

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I had some really strong interests.

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I wasn't a sitting still type of guy.

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I really found fascination with the military, with adventure, with airplanes, with these types of things and ever since a very young age I wanted to do something like be on a SWAT team, fly a fighter jet, go join the Marines.

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I think if you took a time machine back to childhood, bob, and you said, hey, one day you're going to own a cleaning company, you probably won't want to be near that temper tantrum, yeah, so we could kind of go forward.

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You know, I went to high school, got into the University of Dayton.

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When I went to my university visits, really liked the community.

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The atmosphere just seemed like the right fit.

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So I went in undecided, new in the back of my mind, I wanted to be in the military and with a college degree it opened up opportunities to become a pilot.

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Therefore being an officer and sophomore year I kind of selected the major of engineering technology, specifically in manufacturing.

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I chose that while most of my friends were in the business school, just because when it came to the whole business idea, the images that stood out was like office space being in a cubicle.

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Nothing about that really seemed interesting, so I wanted something hands-on.

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So fast forward a little bit went to Marine officer training.

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For a variety of reasons it didn't go the way I liked.

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I was trying to reapply to that but didn't really cross paths.

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So when I graduated in 2008, we all know what happened back then Right, I tried really hard to fall back on my major and, after getting kicked in the face so many times, I found a job doing kind of valve product design, research and development.

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Did that for four years, ended up taking a job away in Tucson once I got bored, had a job working with aircraft cabins where I got to travel, and ultimately moved back home to Cleveland in 2015 where I wanted to buy a house kind of plant roots, be close to family.

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2015, where I wanted to buy a house kind of plant roots, be close to family.

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And upon getting into this house on an engineer's salary you know I'm in my early 30s I quickly found out that the money coming in and the money going out be it a home repair, a project and then being in your early 30s, everybody's getting married, so you have that.

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You have bachelor parties.

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30s, everybody's getting married, so you have that, you have bachelor parties, I constantly was playing tug of war with my um savings account, with my credit cards, and you know you'd hear the old school well, you should stop getting that starbucks and listen to dave ramsey and quit going to chipotle yeah, but none of

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that really worked.

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So one time what I'll consider a discovery moment I was at the gym on the treadmill and I was just giving it hell.

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I had my adrenaline going, my heart rate was up and it's almost like this divine voice came in my head where it said you could either whine like a bitch and be a victim or you could do something.

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So, immune to all the judgment and the social media comments and what people might think, I made a post on the community Iraqi River page that I was willing to do spring cleanouts and do flower bed mulching, pull weeds.

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Pulling weeds was my first job.

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I made 200 bucks, probably eight to 10 hours worth of work.

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I thought it was great, but that was the genesis.

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The other thing that people really seemed to bite on on these posts was pressure washing.

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Now, when I moved into this house, my parents were going through a divorce, so they were liquidating a lot of their furniture, a lot of their yard equipment, and one of the items I got was this red honda pressure washer and, um, I remember I even let that borrow.

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I let a friend borrow that even before I thought of using it as a business tool and I got it back broken.

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So one thing is, I looked up videos on how to repair it opening the thing, replacing the cam and I think, almost having that, aha, I fixed it.

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It gave me a sense of can do.

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So that summer, in 2017, when all this happened um power wash, jobs and a junk removal I made 5,200.

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So I thought at the time it was great money.

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I thought there was momentum with that and I just my main takeaway was I took action.

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So I was doing everything that people make fun of on those like facebook groups.

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I was up on a ladder just blasting away the um algae from siding.

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I thought that it was just a huge deal and a huge upgrade to buy the low 70 rotary disc.

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I remember having one of those too where you have to like quick connect it onto your uh wand and lance exactly and then, and then it it ends up blowing up after like two or three driveways and you're like man, this is not sustainable right, I remember like doing two days on a driveway with that, but um yeah you know that summer passed and winter came and I one thing I think that was pivotal was I took some time and I joined some communities and I had mentors.

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I talked to a guy, james, who runs a real successful business out of Texas, another guy, patrick, who now he's switched and is in manufacturing, and I even caught up with Michael Hinder later the owner of powerwashcom, and I learned a lot from these people and I ended up buying a four gallon a minute unit to use the next season.

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So I more than doubled how much I made and kind of learned and I kind of grew.

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And then 2019, I got talking to Mike Kilgore.

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He was really a big voice and an advocate for driveway sealing, paver sealing.

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I actually attended one of his workshops outside of Tampa that spring and apply the knowledge, not only with the processes, but I learned, you know kind of how to sell, how to engage with the customer, how to properly use a CRM, which saved me a lot of time, because before I was just using a Word document and editing all this stuff it was pretty time consuming.

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Oh yeah.

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That took me to 2019.

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And at the time I still just had an idea.

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I didn't think that this would be an actual replacement of income.

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I still was stuck in that conformity thinking.

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I thought being an engineer was a good, respectable job to have.

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That's what everybody was saying and some of the other contractors I met.

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You had some rougher guys, some people who weren't as focused on business, a lot of recovering addicts.

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So I kind of had this negative archetype in my brain that was preventing me from thinking of this as going all in.

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So 2019, I got laid off from the company I was at and, mind you, rewinding a little bit the time in corporate America, working as an engineer.

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I came in with these great intentions, working with aerospace companies, spacex, more of the involvement and what was gauged in these companies not even by what you're doing to drive bottom line or creativity.

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It was an atmosphere of perception.

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You know, the one company I was working with at the time had a guy who didn't seem to really have much going on, who was working, you know, 6 am till 10 pm, and then these younger guys would get out of college with the loans and they were coming in every Saturday and soon.

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That was kind of being pushed from the top down as the culture.

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So the controller of the company would send out an Excel sheet and he would list everybody by name in the department and it would show how many hours you work, that you had to log.

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So you were on salary but people were saying they were working 70 hours a week.

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So I feel like that was putting pressure.

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Oh, you're here 40 hours, you're doing the bare minimum.

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So all in all there was an internal conflict.

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I just felt like this is kind of bullshit.

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You know, giving more of your time away, you're not doing anything to the bottom line.

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I'm impressing people, or trying to impress people who, frankly, aren't paying my bills, don't give a shit about me, and this is stupid.

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So I kind of was a minimalist in some of those situations I found ways to escape by.

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So I lost that job as part of a big Boeing layoff because Boeing had problems with the 737 MAX and their major supplier.

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I took a slimy headhunter job from a smaller, you know manufacturing foundry outfit.

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I was let go without reason and then COVID happened and I kind of mentally had the rug pulled out for me during COVID.

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I wasn't about making big business moves.

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I thought we were more disaster preparedness.

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I made less money in 2020 than I did in 2019.

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And I kind of fell back on the safe routes a engineering company hour away from my house, working on circuit boards, decent job, but, um, I was scared.

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I accepted an offer with a lot less vacation than I would take, just one week.

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Um, and during this time period, something happened actually, where I met you.

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So I was kind of set out on a quest for knowledge to understand how somebody could take this business model from something that's just a job, just an owner-operator, to being what the E-Myth talks about, you know, a business with systems that works for you that you don't work for.

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So I came across a coach Hindsight, I don't necessarily align with said coach, but we don't need to talk about this.

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I met yourself.

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I met other guys in Kentucky, the fireman.

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I met people who like, look just like me, they like guys my age.

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We all hung out in that kind of rewrote the script of how I thought about this business and I decided, you know, exactly one year into that last job, I was going to go full-time into this.

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So april 14th, 2021, day I'll call personally judgment day.

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I gave my notice, nervous the butterflies meeting with my boss in the conference room and, believe it or not, you know what he said to me.

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He wasn't talking about, uh, moving away from great opportunity.

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I'll never forget this conversation.

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He said I'm 55 years old and you know part of me is kind of jealous that I never took an opportunity.

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I play softball with a guy doing this on the opposite side of town.

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He just bought a new Corvette.

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That's it.

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It's funny what we like, the lies we tell ourselves.

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And then when we listen to somebody else and you're brave enough to make that jump and they give you respect, as opposed to you think that, oh, he's my boss, he's going to tell me I'm going to fail and the only option is what I'm currently in.

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So it's.

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Yeah, I ended on good terms.

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I gave him three weeks notice.

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Um, you know, made sure that we ended well.

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But the funny thing about that here's the kicker.

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If I took what the boomer generation calls the safe, prestigious role, yeah, so picture this I go in Cinco de Mayo, go figure, my last day in corporate America, may 6, my first full time day.

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I remember just driving out to the opposite side of town working on on a paver patio, just like picture the perfect day 75, partly cloudy, getting coffee on my time.

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I'm thinking this is great.

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It's a week after my last day outside company and three people still at that company.

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They reach out to me via Facebook Messenger.

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That company had a huge layoff just due to the semiconductor industry.

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So the corporate had decided they had to have a reduction in headcount to make up for margins.

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And that layoff was calculated by corporate.

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So it had nothing to do with performance and, based upon some of the parameters that were shared with me, that was based on seniority.

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So it's with certainty that had I stayed at the safe road, I would have been canned.

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So that would have been three jobs in a two year period.

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Just imagine what that would do to my ego trying to stay into that field.

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Especially if you didn't have a backup plan.

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It seems like you had something built up where you could have just whether it was on your intention or the company laying off based upon, like, the economy constraints, like you were able to fall into something.

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That is how you're successful today.

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So, like, imagine not having that opportunity and then having to go back on LinkedIn and having a job search and having to take, maybe, an offer.

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That's not ideal, but it kind of floats your bills.

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I mean, yeah, I've been there.

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I don't wish that on anybody.

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It's very humbling and I think some of the things I owe besides just networking with you, besides just learning about business I got really intense in my personal habits, the gym, and what type of knowledge and what type of messages I would consume.

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I remember during those days, the months leading up to what we're going to call judgment day, I just spent um every lunch just eating in my truck looking out over the lake and I would listen to the same thing where you maybe you know about this Steve Harvey gives a famous speech about how you have to jump.

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You know what we're talking about, um, we can post it in the links.

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That really resonated with me and it kind of got me fired up.

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So, um 100, I kind of own that.

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And the very next day I was buying a 17 000 trailer and an equipment supplier in akron.

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So we were not just using that same old push power washer, we were making an investment.

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Yeah, at the time I had a buddy who was from one of my old jobs working for me and we were kind of splitting um the job.

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I was paying him a commission and um that year, starting um full time in may, we did 121 pretty cool coming from nothing like starting from scratch.

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You're able to to do that and like that revenue is like really solid in comparison to like yeah, you're making a comfortable salary as an engineer, but you're able to say, hey, I can actually like influence my income and make an impact, as opposed to just sign in, check, make sure that you're not getting fired, and then, uh, it's almost like maintaining mediocrity.

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That was my experience in corporate america right, I'm sure about that because we we have similar experiences here.

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I was in the sales side of things, but they in in corporate sales.

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They sell you on the dream of like oh, unlimited commissions.

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It's like you can be your own boss, when in reality you're just like a cog in the wheel and a huge corporation.

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So, like I had accounts but like, in order to get more accounts to make more money, there's a lot of politics involved.

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There was a lot of luck and chance involved too.

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Like hey, this guy over here is making 250 300 000 a year, but he's locked down these accounts for the last 20 years and there's a thousand people behind him in line to get it.

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So I was frustrated in the sense that like, oh, I will never be this guy because he's like one in a thousand at this company, with the account ownership and the politics in the company and all that stuff.

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So, yeah, dangling the carrot is definitely plays a huge role, and then nepotism is huge as well.

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I've heard stories from some friends just throughout the interview process about being derailed, yeah, where they're put through the whole dog and pony show and they do all that crap when they have, you know, a nephew or somebody from church already lined up.

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So I guess huge you can go in with the right intentions and all the messages you've been put from guidance counselors and schools, and I think you and I kind of came to very similar conclusions throughout our experience in that environment.

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Yes, and I think too, like seeing you and me and other people, it changes that narrative that was fed into our brains from like day one.

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It's like, hey, study hard in school so you don't end up like you and me today, because we were told by people who were in that professional white collar environment, who had the college degree, who worked up in an organization and they said this is gonna pay me and this is gonna be my retirement and my safety net, which is not even a reality in today's world.

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So it's almost like we were led to failure by people who are now in that boomer generation figuring out hey, that's not all that's cracked up to be.

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I got to work as a seven-year-old, I got to work double jobs to pay for my own retirement.

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Yet our adult children are starting off on this madness and there's a huge disconnect between people like you and me who are able to see what's real and break free from that matrix, as you want to call it.

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Yeah, absolutely.

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I can't speak more to that.

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I mean that boomer generation.

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They bought their homes at $50,000.

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They worked construction to put themselves through college.

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Tell that to a millennial.

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Tell that to a gym teacher and they have no debt or cost of living is affordable for them off of their salaries.

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It always seems like they're the first ones to give you their opinion or unsolicited advice.

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I mean, I remember in my early days of entrepreneurship, right till now, just being in certain situations Maybe it was at a friend's family party and the dad made some like backhanded comments that I'm an engineer and what am I doing?

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And this can't be enough money, and almost kind of like you know, know, when people are passive, aggressive and they say something, but it's not, it's ill intent, like oh, what are you doing?

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And another thing too is like everybody's like with that mentality, they seem to be obsessed with asking what I do during the winters, like I get.

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People don't understand that, but I feel like it's just this period and work ethic, hustle, culture that you always have to be busy running on the hamster wheel.

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Yes, for me winters are very impactful.

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I don't just use the time to do video games or whatever time waste.

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I get very intentional with my habits.

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I kind of very antisocial, very locked in with the gym, and I use this time to really review what we've done the previous year in business, what our KPIs have been, where the sales have been, how we've done it, and a lot of times I'll take that data and take those learnings and I'll build out a plan for the coming year, which is what I've been in the middle of doing and it's really an exciting time.

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And one thing I could speak to for a positive with the engineering background is I was trained by a university and these large companies to basically take a process.

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Take something that somebody on the shop floor is doing.

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You can be building a widget, a valve, an airplane part, whatever, and you have to learn how to streamline that process, eliminate defects, make it more efficient and free of waste.

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One thing that's really big is Lean Six Sigma.

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Give it a little history lesson.

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And, coming from the Rust Belt, after World War II, our manufacturing was a powerhouse.

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We were king of the hill and we got a little bit complacent.

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Meanwhile in Japan and Germany, those countries have been bombed to smithereens.

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So the economists, the industrialists, had to rebuild from scratch.

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So you had some revolutionary figures.

00:21:08.913 --> 00:21:17.436
You know Ono Shigeo, the Toyota production system kind of set the gold standard and a lot of times in the 50s, 60s, 70s we got our butts kicked.

00:21:17.436 --> 00:21:21.646
That and a lot of times in the 50s, 60s, 70s we got our butts kicked.

00:21:21.646 --> 00:21:26.122
That's a lot of the rust belt decay because they had in asia and europe.

00:21:26.122 --> 00:21:31.480
They were learning for constant pursuit of defects or elimination of defects.

00:21:31.559 --> 00:21:34.049
I'm sorry, but what does this have to do with pressure washing?

00:21:34.049 --> 00:21:39.375
Well, okay, so you're taking one thing, you're taking something from a state.

00:21:39.375 --> 00:21:46.623
I could take this Xbox controller, I'm making it and I learn how to insert the buttons.

00:21:46.623 --> 00:21:49.506
I learn how to, you know, injection, mold it.

00:21:49.506 --> 00:21:58.421
If I'm documenting a process, I'm taking something from state A to state B to basically do activities that a customer pays for.

00:21:58.421 --> 00:22:04.916
So whether you have a home service business and you're in plumbing, hvac, pressure washing, you name it you're doing that.

00:22:04.916 --> 00:22:07.875
You just don't have a factory, walls and ceiling over your head.

00:22:08.009 --> 00:22:39.074
So if you could kind of find how to implement those, I feel like that kind of gives me an edge and it's a unique, I guess, angle that All-Star Power power cleaning has over our competitions yes, yeah, it's like you're and again, this is kind of the value add of your background, your experience in the corporate world and your degree and your education and like how your mind was trained prior to this where, like you can see things that the normal pressure washer doesn't even understand or doesn't even know where to look.

00:22:39.074 --> 00:22:49.461
So, like us, like with both of the corporate, like I, I have similar corporate experience with, like understanding like how corporations and billion dollar publicly traded companies operate.

00:22:49.461 --> 00:23:01.016
So it's like our own, like we were essentially trained in business or operations through these larger corporations and now we're able to translate that in our entrepreneur, eventual entrepreneurial ventures like pressure washing.

00:23:01.016 --> 00:23:11.157
So that's kind of like a competitive edge that you and I have both have, especially since we've like kind of as the quote Elon we've broken away from the mind virus of like that conformity of the matrix.

00:23:12.259 --> 00:23:15.915
Absolutely, and I think that again, everybody's on their own path.

00:23:15.915 --> 00:23:25.079
I think that people, people from our backgrounds and there's a couple other people who we knew from our mastermind that are kind of on a similar trajectory.

00:23:25.079 --> 00:23:36.719
I feel like we kind of stand out and we don't embrace the and again, I'm just shooting from the hip here, not trying to mislabel anything but that blue collar I work 80 hours a week.

00:23:36.719 --> 00:23:49.684
I have no holidays off, must be nice and I feel like a lot of that mentality is just staying busy where we look at things and where our goal is to be effective and to use tools.

00:23:49.684 --> 00:24:03.178
Now, the great thing about business is, I feel like you don't have a $60,000, $70,000, $80,000 salary decent but okay income at that time.

00:24:03.178 --> 00:24:09.803
Today that's going to be a little tough with the cost of living, but I didn't see a lot of upside.

00:24:09.803 --> 00:24:21.952
Maybe one out of 20 people could be a department head, but there wasn't sales commissions, there wasn't incentivized KPIs commissions there wasn't incentivized KPIs.

00:24:21.972 --> 00:24:25.267
I feel like a lot of times the motivator was almost in the negative form that you know, we're going to keep you on your toes.

00:24:25.267 --> 00:24:30.659
I mean, some of these places I was at even had a little bit of a culture of toxicity.

00:24:30.659 --> 00:24:36.295
You know excessive meetings in the boss's office with HR the door is closed.

00:24:36.295 --> 00:24:45.330
You know little passive, aggressive digs here and there, and I feel like that's really what they were trying to do is they didn't want to get people too comfortable.

00:24:45.330 --> 00:24:51.635
They wanted people to have what's called a healthy fear of losing your job, and that's just not how I wanted to go through life.

00:24:51.635 --> 00:24:53.570
I don't want to be motivated by the negatives.

00:24:53.570 --> 00:25:06.637
I think somewhere along early on I went out to lunch with a group of guys, older guys, and one guy said something like oh, this is just how it is, this is what life is, and that stuck with me.

00:25:06.637 --> 00:25:09.819
You know, you have people, experiences, conversations that stick.

00:25:09.819 --> 00:25:16.623
I think that really kind of rattled me up in my 25, 26-year-old self at the time.

00:25:17.104 --> 00:25:42.797
Yeah, 25, 26 year old self at the time, yeah, kind of going back to the boy who wanted to um, have adventures, who didn't want to sit still, who didn't want to be confined in a box with labels oh yeah, and you think about it from like day one, because I have similar experiences with that and I remember like, hey, I'll go online and I'll learn stuff that interests me and I'll become like one of like, I'll be like autistically engaged in one of these passion projects.

00:25:43.089 --> 00:25:49.596
However like you sit me down in school and you say you need to read this, you need to write this report and you need to think this way and I'll be.

00:25:49.596 --> 00:25:51.455
Like I'll do the bare minimum and get by.

00:25:51.455 --> 00:25:53.798
And corporate America was the same vibe to me.

00:25:53.798 --> 00:25:59.769
And then they try to fear you and oh, like if you don't do a good job, you're going to, you're going to get fired or you're never going to get promoted.

00:25:59.769 --> 00:26:05.682
And I was like this is like the nonsense that I was battling in high school and college, just to barely get through.

00:26:05.682 --> 00:26:10.923
And then I look around and people are dealing with this for the next 40 years of their life to live a mediocre life.

00:26:11.349 --> 00:26:25.453
So it's like man your escapism is like running a credit card debt like some of these people do, credit card debt like some of these people do and they try to keep up with the joneses, or they're in alcohol or they're in these activities that are just like outlets of escape to them because they have no freedom.

00:26:25.453 --> 00:26:35.124
And I think, like the like, the light for me was finding like entrepreneurship, where it's like I don't have a fear of failure.

00:26:35.124 --> 00:26:39.041
I have a fear of being like conformed and put in a box and told what to do.

00:26:39.041 --> 00:26:45.551
So, like on even a bad day of entrepreneurship, or like a slower season where we don't have as much cash flow as we're used to.

00:26:45.551 --> 00:26:48.762
I, I don't have a fear of like oh, I'm not gonna make it.

00:26:48.762 --> 00:26:50.067
I have a like it's.

00:26:50.067 --> 00:26:58.337
I always related back to, like you're saying, those jobs in corporate america where there's like why was this uh meeting put on my calendar today with no notice?

00:26:58.337 --> 00:27:00.603
And it's with my boss in HR.

00:27:01.951 --> 00:27:07.638
And then they bully me into some bullshit where I'm like no, no, no, no, no, no.

00:27:07.638 --> 00:27:13.198
It's so funny A job is replaceable, but when you're in a job, corporate America thinks you're the one who's replaceable.

00:27:14.215 --> 00:27:15.069
They would do that shit.

00:27:15.069 --> 00:27:19.060
I mean they would have little charades, let's call it.

00:27:19.060 --> 00:27:27.098
I mean they would put a little sticky note on your desk to come see me, and it was about something dumb, something non-impactful.

00:27:27.098 --> 00:27:30.371
That, um could have just been an email like why did they have to do the sticky note?

00:27:30.371 --> 00:27:32.296
Is there some game or charade to this?

00:27:32.415 --> 00:27:41.624
and I, I feel like, like you said, if, if they know they can't, they have to like create scarcity in the employee to keep them around when they can't keep up with market demand.

00:27:41.624 --> 00:27:44.898
It's like I feel like that, yes, supply and demand.

00:27:44.898 --> 00:27:52.317
It's like, hey, in the real world, we can go out and hustle in our businesses and make more money and then therefore we see, hey, we're able to like gamify the system.

00:27:52.317 --> 00:28:02.823
In that world, where there's no game, there's no like direct reward system, they're having to create scarcity in us, so like we don't look around and say, oh man, like we just keep our blinders on and keep going forward.

00:28:04.104 --> 00:28:06.135
It's funny, yeah, and I mean it just it.

00:28:06.135 --> 00:28:11.858
I'm thankful that you know, in my early thirties I was able to kind of find my path and not get stuck into it.

00:28:11.858 --> 00:28:19.122
But I mean, in my twenties I would just living for the weekend, living for Friday, trying to keep your head down.

00:28:19.122 --> 00:28:22.053
I was partying a lot, probably more than I should.

00:28:22.053 --> 00:28:35.534
You know, I'm happily married right now, so those days are behind me, but uh, it's um, it's just that you know to your point about you know the mediocrity and um, the labels.

00:28:35.974 --> 00:28:40.844
I feel like a lot of um, a lot of society kind of funnels people on that path.

00:28:40.844 --> 00:28:49.619
What I might say might even be counterintuitive and I get I have this conversation all the time that you know, going to college, law of averages, you're probably going to be better.

00:28:49.619 --> 00:28:56.192
We need I'm not anti-college, you need people with college, you need the engineers, the doctors, like all those things.

00:28:56.192 --> 00:29:10.126
But I almost feel like when you grow up and you're on that path, if you're kind of there by accident, you may have a disadvantage with the golden handcuffs on you because you're on that treadmill and it's a lot harder to get off once that belt starts.

00:29:10.126 --> 00:29:19.625
I mean some of the big dogs, and the real ones I know are the ones that kind of came from nothing, from alcoholism, from abuse, from the projects in there.

00:29:19.625 --> 00:29:21.575
They got that fight in them.

00:29:22.598 --> 00:29:23.000
It's funny.

00:29:23.000 --> 00:29:42.624
I saw a Facebook group for pressure washing and one of the guys who comments a lot he said like hey, I've noticed, like the felon guys or the guys that were like born again people where they they started out in a bad position and then they found like, oh wow, I can directly control my destiny, whether they're on the technician side or whether they're on the business owner side.

00:29:42.624 --> 00:29:46.661
Those are the ones that achieve the most because they got that dog in them.

00:29:47.569 --> 00:29:48.213
Yeah, that's right.

00:29:48.213 --> 00:29:53.114
I always was drawn to the weird people, you know, the people who maybe marched to a little bit different beat.

00:29:53.515 --> 00:29:53.734
Yeah.

00:29:54.076 --> 00:30:10.383
I mean, I feel like when I was in those corporate companies, when I was around the engineers or other people, everything was very straight laced, like you had to be very politically correct and what you said it was the white collar humor, like we got all four seasons in a week.

00:30:10.383 --> 00:30:15.696
I'm living the dream and I was like that was like talking to a lot of the people.

00:30:15.930 --> 00:30:26.751
I would talk to a lot of the operators, a lot of the maintenance people, like recovered addicts.

00:30:26.751 --> 00:30:38.453
I would talk to real people and these people, like they weren't inferior to people that just had a degree, like some of these people were very smart, they were very um perceptive to how they saw the world yeah, I, I think too like you have a different lens so you're able to, like, see the world differently.

00:30:46.315 --> 00:30:48.559
One thing I'm going to grab, one thing that stood out.

00:30:48.559 --> 00:30:50.042
I didn't finish this whole book.

00:30:50.042 --> 00:30:52.950
This guy was an investor or he was into hedge funds Ray Dalio.

00:30:52.950 --> 00:31:01.053
He has a book called the Principles of.

00:31:01.053 --> 00:31:28.477
It's not even on the freaking page, but it's called his principles, and I read a few chapters and he said something along the lines of, like you know, having a excellent, spectacular life was the goal, but he'd rather face tragedy and catastrophe, the mediocrity, and that stood out, just kind of recalibrating your brain when you've had years and years of institutional um, being on the treadmill, being in the safe path, path, being afraid of what's on the other side, and kind of have that tipping point where, um, you're going to proceed to um to seek more, more opportunity.

00:31:28.958 --> 00:31:33.229
Like that really stood out yeah, I, I think that's cool.

00:31:33.229 --> 00:31:46.400
That's like the humanity and the spirit of us inside and it's almost like I feel like we look at our country and our country has been so used to that treadmill where we just conform to whatever we're told to doing.

00:31:46.400 --> 00:32:03.913
So like the mentality of like breaking free, doing our own thing, like sure, there's people that are like, oh, I want to be an entrepreneur because it's cool to do, because I don't want to work for anybody else, but in reality it's like, hey, how far and how fast do you want to run?

00:32:03.913 --> 00:32:04.596
Like the baton is in your hands.

00:32:04.596 --> 00:32:05.618
It's up to you to decide your own destiny.

00:32:05.618 --> 00:32:18.480
And like that spirit is is what's great about america and that's what, like, I resonate with you about, especially because we come from a place of like the success that we were told from day one it didn't align with our core values it.

00:32:18.500 --> 00:32:19.182
It's just funny.

00:32:19.182 --> 00:32:24.098
I mean, you know, we know, with like the election and everything, I think we're seeing a major culture shift.

00:32:24.098 --> 00:32:29.817
So, kind of to your point about America, we didn't start off as like a nation of conformity.

00:32:29.817 --> 00:32:30.760
We were rebels.

00:32:30.760 --> 00:32:34.461
We stood up against an empire with all odds against us.

00:32:34.461 --> 00:32:38.998
You know, we crawled Washington across the Delaware in the middle of a smallpox epidemic.

00:32:38.998 --> 00:32:41.196
So we have that.

00:32:41.196 --> 00:32:50.845
We have the manifest destiny, the Louisiana Purchase, basically going out with nothing but you could fit on a wagon and settling just as a virtuous pursuit.

00:32:50.845 --> 00:32:54.539
You know, fighting two world wars, putting people on the moon.

00:32:54.539 --> 00:32:57.919
I mean, now you know, are we just divided?

00:32:57.919 --> 00:32:59.122
Are we sedated?

00:32:59.122 --> 00:33:13.231
I mean, now you know, are we just divided?

00:33:13.231 --> 00:33:13.813
Are we sedated?

00:33:13.853 --> 00:33:20.387
I'm not trying to get completely off topic, but you look at all the conversation with like what's in our food and all the social media and all the crap that people are consuming, like people are kept down more in these like systems of mediocrity, opinion, another renaissance revolution, I do think.

00:33:20.387 --> 00:33:34.951
A couple takeaways, I do think the gen z, they are rebellious to this um, they see through the lens that um, this boomer driven eight to five, especially with what their cost of education and housing is getting out isn't going to work correct.

00:33:34.951 --> 00:33:36.592
Are they going to leave the next charge?

00:33:36.592 --> 00:33:38.432
And then you have to also decipher.

00:33:38.432 --> 00:33:46.680
You know, in the age of the Internet, there is so much bullshit, there is so much smut out there about what it means to be an entrepreneur.

00:33:46.680 --> 00:33:49.261
Yes, for every person who's actually doing it.

00:33:49.261 --> 00:34:00.971
You have some guy who's borrowing his neighbor's Lamborghini, talking about drop shipping for Amazon, or crypto or stupid or something.

00:34:00.990 --> 00:34:04.701
crypto or stupid, a 1200 toro rental for the day and then, uh, right standing in front of somebody's house, and then yeah, it's.

00:34:04.701 --> 00:34:11.818
It is a form of, like mental masturbation and escapism, I feel like, for a lot of people it is and then that's.

00:34:11.858 --> 00:34:41.661
That's no good, but again, like, I think that, like, we're in like a revolutionary time of, like breaking out of the like knowledge lapse because, like with the internet, like you said, like I figured out how to do all this based upon the internet, like nobody was there to hold my hand, and it's probably the similar situation to you where, like, we were able to go online, connect with people online, learn from youtube videos and, like, build these businesses, build these like six figure plus businesses off of what we're able to learn purely off of the internet.

00:34:42.581 --> 00:34:44.925
So and yeah, there's so much more to it.

00:34:44.925 --> 00:34:48.420
You know the internet, like obviously right, then you have to learn processes.

00:34:48.420 --> 00:34:56.275
You need to learn that you don't just blast, siding with a pressure washer you downstream or soft wash yeah all the things you have to worry about.

00:34:56.355 --> 00:35:05.731
New concrete connects, etch, but there that's the top layer of the onion, and a lot of times in pasting, people like, oh hire bob, he's just the best power washer.

00:35:05.731 --> 00:35:27.750
Well, that, that's like that is only the tip of the iceberg, because if you want to get bigger at this game, you know it's just taught me to be so much more effective, like learning about how ai is utilized in marketing and web presence and how, what you have to do with technology to put a platform online higher to Google and how that converts to more revenue.

00:35:27.750 --> 00:35:29.972
Learning the KPIs of a business.

00:35:29.972 --> 00:35:38.105
Learning leadership and culture, learning how to incentivize somebody, how to find good talent, how to build a team.

00:35:38.105 --> 00:35:43.039
I mean just these past four years have changed me a lot for the better.

00:35:43.481 --> 00:36:03.655
Starting out, I just didn't want to be scanning a badge, to have somebody watching over me and telling me when I could or couldn't travel, but now I feel like if you have the opportunity to build a culture and lead people and have somebody be able to give their kids presents for Christmas and their birthday, it makes you a better person.

00:36:03.655 --> 00:36:08.476
And learning all these things I feel like in the pursuit of skills and value.

00:36:08.476 --> 00:36:25.282
I feel like we have so much more value to give to the marketplace that if we're standing in a box and just following the systems and kissing up the management as a small business owner, it's sink or swim and you really have to find a way to be tip of the spear.

00:36:25.282 --> 00:36:34.510
And not that I'm saying this, but hypothetically, I feel like if we were to reapply or rewrite our resumes.

00:36:34.510 --> 00:36:42.284
I really feel like this experience, as defined, gives us a lot more value to make bigger leaps.

00:36:43.130 --> 00:36:43.793
I fully agree.

00:36:43.793 --> 00:36:54.936
I think if somebody like you said there was a gun to your head, something happened and you had to create that resume again, I think somebody in a leadership position would say, hey, this guy knows how to run a business.

00:36:54.936 --> 00:36:56.141
I want him on my team.

00:36:56.141 --> 00:36:59.139
It's like we can teach him the technical with ai.

00:36:59.139 --> 00:37:03.907
Nowadays I can use chat, gpt to like figure out technical information.

00:37:03.967 --> 00:37:05.152
It's like what are you going to do with that?

00:37:05.152 --> 00:37:12.992
That's going to differentiate yourself from the guy next to you in the cubicle, like your mindset and how you're going to go about a problem or how are you even going to think about a problem.

00:37:12.992 --> 00:37:19.365
Like they don't teach you any of that stuff in in corporate world because they want to keep all that knowledge and control down.

00:37:19.365 --> 00:37:24.034
Because that's almost like back in the day you look at like the catholic church, the roman catholic church, or like the pope.

00:37:24.034 --> 00:37:33.873
Those were the people that understood and read latin so they could keep the people in conformity and it's almost the same in corporate america today, where it's like hey look, that's above your pay grade.

00:37:34.114 --> 00:37:40.324
we're going to compartmentalize you, we're going to keep everybody teared away so they don't understand the big picture Us having a business.

00:37:40.324 --> 00:37:44.317
We're forced to work in that big picture and we're forced to be involved in everything.

00:37:44.317 --> 00:37:49.476
Then, whether we're delegating it to other people or we're doing it ourselves, we have our finger on the pulse.

00:37:49.476 --> 00:37:57.456
That's a skill that most people don't have, because they're all in a box and they're compartmentalized and they're not told to ask questions.

00:37:57.456 --> 00:38:01.393
Because if you ask questions, you're rocking the boat and in corporate America that's how you get fired.

00:38:02.818 --> 00:38:03.760
Exactly they want.

00:38:03.760 --> 00:38:07.360
Yes, men, and I think just you know what we're discussing is the core of this.

00:38:07.360 --> 00:38:09.016
It's something I'm really passionate about.

00:38:09.016 --> 00:38:46.744
I kind of see the problem statement and if I'm thinking about working towards something bigger than buying more trucks and having a better brand and the bragging rights and the vacations and buying more guns and toys and all that, I really want you know this journey of mine to be about a legacy, to be able to kind of share some with this, with somebody who else may be disenfranchised, that there is a way to kind of normalize some of these boomer set stigmas where they look down on blue collar, on labor and even people within my company.

00:38:46.929 --> 00:38:49.739
One thing that, uh, let me see, I have this right here.

00:38:49.739 --> 00:38:50.875
This is worth the mention.

00:38:50.875 --> 00:38:53.418
Um, I really want to dive in.

00:38:53.418 --> 00:38:55.581
You may be familiar with Tommy Mello.

00:38:55.581 --> 00:38:59.010
Oh yeah, this is a good dude right here.

00:38:59.010 --> 00:39:30.447
I listened to the Audible of that that you need to build your dreams so big that everybody else under you's dreams can fit in you, yeah, I agree with that In your dream.

00:39:30.811 --> 00:40:26.418
Well, and then one thing that I noticed in my business is like I have a guy who's like my lead, essential, like lead tech, and then I pick up some guys here and there in the busier seasons and I feed him in the slower seasons and then even in the busy season, like it's an incentive based pay from like hey, this is the number we're gonna hit together and he's like he's a great guy, college educated guy, similar mindset to you and me, and like this is his jump out of like the corporate america as well, and I'm able to pay him like more than he was making in another position because hey, we're both on that same, we're in the same boat together, we're rowing together Like you're more technical, you're in the field, but it's my job to hunt and try to grow this business, so I'm able to feed you and I think to like the Tommy Mello's point is like hey, you're going to give your employees the dream like a better job, a better culture that they didn't have before, and then it's going to force you to kind of level up and get more work so you can support that.

00:40:27.679 --> 00:40:31.402
And it's kind of funny where, like, there is the differential of balance.

00:40:31.402 --> 00:40:37.568
You know with, like, what we're talking about in small business, how we want our people to make more, we want our people to win.

00:40:37.568 --> 00:40:40.791
We're not trying to keep our people scarce.

00:40:40.791 --> 00:40:47.543
We're not trying to set up meetings with the HR director, yes, so to instill that these people could just have a job.

00:40:47.543 --> 00:40:50.153
I mean, it is competitive finding good people.

00:40:50.153 --> 00:41:08.829
Wages have gone up, inflation, so you can't just rely on somebody that you're going to send to a multimillion dollar house with a $60,000 capital asset and think that you're going to pay somebody fry turning wages and that they're going to, you know, give your company five-star reviews.

00:41:08.829 --> 00:41:12.940
That's something that I think professionalism is really big.

00:41:12.940 --> 00:41:14.222
You know a lot of our clients.

00:41:14.222 --> 00:41:16.798
They're women home during the daytime hours.

00:41:16.798 --> 00:41:25.634
So certain things, certain hygiene, certain language, people may say everything matters and any consequence of that.

00:41:25.653 --> 00:41:36.753
It's not felt by the employee, it's felt by the brand exactly and, too, I think this is because I I know like this podcast is like brand up your business, and this is what we really mean by branding.

00:41:36.753 --> 00:41:42.150
It's like our journey, our story, like how we treat our employees, like the vision we have for our company.

00:41:42.150 --> 00:41:43.675
So we've been talking for 40 minutes.

00:41:43.715 --> 00:42:03.190
We hadn't talked about our logo, we hadn't talked about our seo strategy we're talking about, like what truly is the brand, and that's that emotional connection, because it's like the authenticity of ourselves spread to our customers, into our marketplace, and so yeah it's like people mistake all the depth of what we've been speaking with as like oh, that's, that's nothing Like.

00:42:03.190 --> 00:42:04.193
What's the logo look like?

00:42:04.193 --> 00:42:05.257
What colors do I need?

00:42:05.257 --> 00:42:06.860
Like, what wrap should I put on my truck?

00:42:07.710 --> 00:42:10.139
And they miss the entire point of like what we've been talking about.

00:42:10.139 --> 00:42:13.800
It's like, hey, this is, this is like why we care, this is why we do what we do.

00:42:13.800 --> 00:42:15.615
This is like who we are as people.

00:42:17.710 --> 00:42:18.952
I love that stuff, you know.

00:42:18.952 --> 00:42:26.101
Going into it, I had the and I don't know if you're going to put images on when this gets up, but I had the logo designed by a guy on Upwork.

00:42:26.101 --> 00:42:30.646
It cost me not a lot, but I wanted to stand out.

00:42:30.646 --> 00:42:40.159
I didn't want to just get the generic logo of the two roof peaks with the window and the lawn we see every new company getting, but I kind of came up with the all-star.

00:42:40.159 --> 00:42:42.864
I couldn't think of another term for it.

00:42:42.864 --> 00:42:48.315
You know, you think of this old school adage like, oh, have an A, it's the front of the phone book.

00:42:48.315 --> 00:42:49.534
But I came with it.

00:42:49.534 --> 00:42:50.478
I like the logo.

00:42:50.478 --> 00:42:52.257
That was the logo for a while.

00:42:52.257 --> 00:43:02.483
Color scheme I like the true red, true blue, sky blue and we really took our brand to the whole nother level this past season.

00:43:02.503 --> 00:43:10.947
So, going into 2024, I was relying on my 2023 guy coming back and you know he was a great guy, great asset.

00:43:10.947 --> 00:43:18.771
We were gonna I bought a new F-150, we were gonna take my truck and wrap that and I worked with the company an hour away.

00:43:18.771 --> 00:43:22.036
They were just awesome, know, so enthusiastic and engaging.

00:43:22.036 --> 00:43:25.242
I got the text from my guy.

00:43:25.242 --> 00:43:29.913
He wasn't coming back and I remember it just felt like a breakup almost.

00:43:29.913 --> 00:43:32.902
But you know, luckily I was able to find Cody through Indeed.

00:43:32.902 --> 00:43:35.896
He came late February and I just knew talking to the guy.

00:43:35.896 --> 00:43:41.338
He was the all-star power cleaning material and he worked with me the entire season.

00:43:41.338 --> 00:43:42.494
Just awesome guy.

00:43:42.494 --> 00:43:46.715
I remember um late march, just seeing this wrap of this truck.

00:43:46.715 --> 00:43:49.842
We had ai help design a mascot this year.

00:43:49.842 --> 00:43:55.744
You know, a golden retriever, I have a golden, it's yeah, you know, and for anybody that doesn't know, bob.

00:43:55.784 --> 00:43:56.831
Like every time I see him.

00:43:56.831 --> 00:43:58.637
Even in the back of your video.

00:43:58.637 --> 00:44:04.458
Over here I see your little golden retriever walking around, so yeah, exactly, and that's just that mascot.

00:44:04.670 --> 00:44:07.739
I went through so many iterations, got the base thing of AI.

00:44:07.739 --> 00:44:14.063
The artist Michaela at the wrap place doctored him to look more authentic and I think it's awesome.

00:44:14.063 --> 00:44:17.056
So you know how our brand looks.

00:44:17.056 --> 00:44:20.543
The truck we have a whole skid unit in the back.

00:44:20.543 --> 00:44:26.853
The truck we have a whole skid unit in the back um 100 gallon buffer tank.

00:44:26.853 --> 00:44:40.942
I feel like with the um area of the you know we're in, we typically have sufficient water pressure, so I don't really need those like large, you know, dual axle 500 gallon tanks we got this yeah we got this lean fast F-150.

00:44:40.981 --> 00:44:44.505
It just looks kick-ass with the wrap and the soft wash.

00:44:44.630 --> 00:44:57.054
So we had that unit this year as well as my trailer Moving into the new year, something that may still be kind of tight to my chest, because it is a strategy.

00:44:57.054 --> 00:44:59.038
I think we are going to continue our brand.

00:44:59.038 --> 00:44:59.570
I'm not.

00:44:59.570 --> 00:45:14.326
I think our strategy is going to be better utilizing what we have, and we want to focus more on some of the recurring services the window cleaning, the holiday lighting, just the detailed stuff.

00:45:14.326 --> 00:45:19.677
Like people think of window cleaning as, oh, you just need wind dugs and paper towels.

00:45:19.677 --> 00:45:27.601
Well, well, if you're doing it on a professional level and you spend any time to learn how to maneuver a squeegee and all the different types of windows.

00:45:27.601 --> 00:45:28.791
There is so much.

00:45:28.791 --> 00:45:35.000
So I feel like we really want to um transform our brand.

00:45:35.000 --> 00:45:37.985
We're a very detailed company.

00:45:37.985 --> 00:45:42.398
We're the exclusive flat, the platinum club company.

00:45:42.398 --> 00:45:44.684
We work with very affluent customers.

00:45:44.684 --> 00:45:46.713
We're not the $99 guy.

00:45:47.094 --> 00:45:50.101
Yeah, I've noticed some of the pictures you posted.

00:45:50.101 --> 00:45:52.512
You do some mansions on the lake, don't you?

00:45:53.333 --> 00:45:53.793
Yeah, we do.

00:45:53.793 --> 00:46:12.918
Yeah, we have some very affluent people, some notable people in the community, some big time entrepreneurs, ceos, we've had the privilege of actually it was a small job but, believe it or not, we did a job for the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and if you've ever been to Cleveland it's a landmark.

00:46:12.918 --> 00:46:16.880
It's this pyramid looking building that was built in the 90s Super cool.

00:46:16.880 --> 00:46:19.934
We did work cleaning up after food trucks.

00:46:19.934 --> 00:46:26.184
So one of the cool things, especially this past season, is using the Mavic drone and the GoPro.

00:46:27.070 --> 00:46:43.422
I've just been getting a buttload of content and one thing about how I work and what's different is I wake up early in the morning and my brain is racing I'm just a caffeine addict and I'll go to town, kind of working with our SEO company adding content.

00:46:43.422 --> 00:46:48.519
We have a separate web page built out for every community we work in.

00:46:48.519 --> 00:47:01.916
You know, for those who are familiar with Cleveland, rocky River is a big one, westlake, avon Lake I want to say we have 30 community page and all the content on those pages is work that we have done in said city.

00:47:01.916 --> 00:47:04.318
So it's not, you know, just your typical.

00:47:04.318 --> 00:47:05.440
You know generic.

00:47:05.579 --> 00:47:25.998
I'm sure you've seen the guy with electric power washer with overhauls, blasting bricks we're not using any of that garbage, exactly and then making YouTube videos with the epic music in the background, kind of like showcasing the city and intro flying into the city.

00:47:25.998 --> 00:47:27.001
Here's the landmarks, here's what we do.

00:47:27.001 --> 00:47:33.820
So I really, I really take a lot of pride and storytelling in my business and it's you know we're constantly trying to get better.

00:47:33.820 --> 00:47:35.572
You know there's some activities.

00:47:35.572 --> 00:47:42.478
I can't speak to everything because you know it is a very competitive market and it's sink or swim exactly.

00:47:42.539 --> 00:47:56.871
And that's the thing too about like sales marketing, branding like, yeah, you can, you can tell people like what direction, but make sure to keep something for yourself because, like in this business, like if somebody hears you're doing this one thing, they're going to copy you and then it's going to like, dilute your brand and dilute their brand.

00:47:56.871 --> 00:48:01.717
So it's always like I'll tell people like, hey, this is what I've, I've done, but like what?

00:48:01.717 --> 00:48:08.445
Like I'm thinking about doing, I'm kind of like, hey, this may be the direction I'm going, but I'm not going to be like this is the exact secret to follow.

00:48:08.445 --> 00:48:12.742
And then, like you know, in the pressure washing scene, everybody's copy pasting each other.

00:48:12.742 --> 00:48:17.652
So it's almost good to like, hey, keep that creativity to yourself and then they can copy you once you hit the market.

00:48:17.652 --> 00:48:19.394
But don't be like telling all your secrets away.

00:48:20.556 --> 00:48:21.396
Yeah, absolutely.

00:48:21.396 --> 00:48:26.340
I mean, you know there is some top secret war room activities, especially this time of year.

00:48:26.340 --> 00:48:31.322
Oh yeah, um, some things I can share, some things just have to keep up my sleeve.

00:48:31.322 --> 00:48:37.128
You know I can't show all my aces right now, but uh, let's talk for a minute about customer avatar.

00:48:37.128 --> 00:48:45.518
I think your business you know Matt the driveway guy, I've seen your brand, your raps, your videos and I think we can kind of agree in unison to this.

00:48:45.518 --> 00:48:57.003
A lot of people getting into it are worried about racing to the bottom and this person undercutting this price, and I think you're going to agree with me that your value customers are often your worst customers.

00:48:57.610 --> 00:48:58.414
So 100 percent.

00:48:59.230 --> 00:49:00.615
Why don't you kind of lead the way?

00:49:00.615 --> 00:49:03.516
What do you do to kind of reach out?

00:49:03.516 --> 00:49:10.849
What is your customer avatar and how do you try to seek those people and align your brand with that avatar?

00:49:11.414 --> 00:49:13.592
I'd say probably similar to your avatar.

00:49:13.592 --> 00:49:27.371
My avatar is going to be somebody that can find me like, whether it's social media, whether it's Google, somebody who's like tech enough where it's not like hey, I'm going off of a yard sign, or oh, I hear that I hear through my, my, my mom's friend that you pressure wash Like.

00:49:27.371 --> 00:49:33.233
I want somebody who's already like landed upon my brand from social media or like word of mouth and then they've seen it from there.

00:49:33.233 --> 00:49:34.639
Something where there's value.

00:49:34.639 --> 00:49:42.023
It isn't like oh, you pressure wash like how much like the conversations I get where they're like how much is it to pressure wash my house?

00:49:42.023 --> 00:49:46.612
Usually that's not the best customer because, like you said, they're value driven, they're going off of price.

00:49:47.034 --> 00:49:49.342
I want somebody who's like hey, I follow you on social media.

00:49:49.844 --> 00:49:51.731
Like I see your wrap trucks in our neighborhood.

00:49:51.911 --> 00:49:53.436
Oh, my neighbor said she did a great job.

00:49:53.436 --> 00:50:51.101
Like I'd like to, I'd like to have you do my house and then, like it's one of those like you want somebody to look for you via like value first and say if we're going to go off of a demographic, I'd say our average job is seven hundred thousand dollar to like a million dollar plus like household and we keep the constraints of that through, like pricing, because like we're not gonna, we're gonna say, hey, we have a set minimum price of, say like 350 dollars and there's certain times where I'm like, hey, if I can tell in the first couple of texts or interactions with people, if it's not the best fit, I'll just refer somebody else uh be like hey look I don't really want to tarnish our brand and tarnish our like waste time with our employees and stuff like this by like chasing somebody I can already tell is going to be like a karen and like hyper picky and they're they're not going to leave that google review and all that stuff some of my best customers.

00:50:51.141 --> 00:50:51.449
They're like.

00:50:51.449 --> 00:50:54.557
I see you have all these google reviews yes they're.

00:50:54.557 --> 00:51:06.010
They're not a value driven person, because I think if they look at your website and they see you're professional and you got wrapped drugs with six figures worth of investment, they're going to know off the bat that you're not cheap.

00:51:07.152 --> 00:51:10.681
Right, and I think you know some of my best customers to your point.

00:51:10.681 --> 00:51:14.655
They've taken the time, they've found our website, they've read my bio.

00:51:14.655 --> 00:51:16.739
One lady stands out.

00:51:16.739 --> 00:51:22.300
She's like I read your review and I said please, please, please, come to my community.

00:51:22.300 --> 00:51:28.896
And you know she was great inviting my wife and I to her church and, like you know you deal it's.

00:51:29.135 --> 00:51:31.802
You get to meet all different types of people for better or worse.

00:51:31.802 --> 00:51:43.521
I mean, some of my clients I've even had friendships with Some of my clients have been advocates for us and you know you do have to learn some of that conflict management.

00:51:43.521 --> 00:51:51.614
No matter what you do, you're always going to have somebody who may ask a certain amount of questions or have some not so pleasant feedback.

00:51:51.614 --> 00:51:55.724
And, admittedly, this is probably an area where I need personal growth.

00:51:55.724 --> 00:52:04.190
I mean there were some times, you know, even last year, just some of the questions, some of the BS, like my patience was really spread then.

00:52:04.190 --> 00:52:17.521
So I'm really I think I want somebody who can, um, be an office manager and kind of be that point of contact yes, where that's their job to kind of build that out as a system.

00:52:17.581 --> 00:52:26.721
That's one of our um directives for the year yeah, I know I have a virtual assistant that helps me out and, yeah, there's certain things that need to be escalated ultimately to me.

00:52:26.721 --> 00:52:36.081
But if I know it's like, hey, this person is calling and we need to go back and there's a call back, I'll have him, I'll have him reach out and I'll keep that interaction between like him and them.

00:52:36.130 --> 00:52:43.802
That way it saves, like, my emotional margin for the day where it's not like we're going back and forth and somebody just needs to call them and say, hey look, I'm, I'm listening to you.

00:52:43.802 --> 00:52:51.731
You're right, we'll be out on this day and the like, the problem that we may have caused, like there's a solution for it and here's our action plan.

00:52:51.731 --> 00:52:57.262
Like we don't need to like be thinking about it all day long and being drained off of that.

00:52:57.262 --> 00:52:58.771
That is a.

00:52:58.771 --> 00:53:07.003
Let's see, that's something my internet just cut out.

00:53:07.003 --> 00:53:07.344
Are you good?

00:53:08.465 --> 00:53:09.711
I'm good, I could hear you.

00:53:09.711 --> 00:53:14.882
You're frozen, I was just moving around, okay, yeah, yeah, give me a second.

00:53:15.143 --> 00:53:23.824
We're all good, let's get things back up uh, but yeah, if you can hear me, I still talk, but yeah, that's, that's kind of the same boat as you.

00:53:25.873 --> 00:53:28.958
Yeah, I mean that's um stuff is gonna go wrong.

00:53:28.958 --> 00:53:37.731
I mean we have all of our sops and processes and all that engineering stuff, but it's law of averages and a lot of times I think it's a test how you handle it.

00:53:37.731 --> 00:53:40.918
Um, some stuff may not even be your fault.

00:53:40.918 --> 00:53:48.380
I mean, I've had um soft wash brick in the shutters turned red, the maroon shutters turned green and just so happens.

00:53:48.380 --> 00:54:00.496
Again, I don't want to I'm trying to say this because I'm not airing out other people's dirty laundry Um, we were able to get the customer fixed up.

00:54:00.496 --> 00:54:03.139
Um, it's just one of those things.

00:54:03.139 --> 00:54:16.476
People have to be on the lookout for some of the paints to market with the VOC rags, yeah, but they, they really appreciate that.

00:54:16.476 --> 00:54:21.447
But I mean you will deal with difficult people.

00:54:21.447 --> 00:54:32.791
I think sometimes people on the front end, sometimes people could be, you know, if they're really ravenous with the amount of like questions, it could go either way.

00:54:32.791 --> 00:54:39.132
We've had some of our clients that were burned by the big competitors that loved us yeah but I don't know.

00:54:39.172 --> 00:54:43.797
We've had other people that have just not been happy.

00:54:43.797 --> 00:54:47.956
No matter what you do, and you're gonna have that yeah, I hear you there.

00:54:48.838 --> 00:54:51.932
Yeah, my video's out, but I can still talk yeah, we'll still.

00:54:51.952 --> 00:54:52.735
We'll still go with that.

00:54:52.735 --> 00:54:56.181
I mean I don't see a reason to stop the uh yeah.

00:54:56.262 --> 00:55:17.782
So I guess I I found too, like you have a good, like your journey, like you have a good like your journey, like you have a good story behind your brand and then like, similar to me, it's like you found what, what is your like authentic self, and then, like you have, like your dog, your family, like you care about the community, like you're educated and like I think that resonates through your brand as it does ours.

00:55:17.782 --> 00:55:21.277
So you're going to get a certain clientele that's attracted to that Like you.

00:55:21.436 --> 00:55:33.371
You you won't get as many people as say, you're like the $99 guy but you'll get those right people that you really want to do business with Right and you'll get the sticking point.

00:55:33.371 --> 00:55:33.871
And I do things.

00:55:33.871 --> 00:55:34.914
I try to be the personal family run service.

00:55:34.914 --> 00:55:35.534
We're part of the community.

00:55:35.534 --> 00:55:37.998
We're not run by a private equity, we're not just sales driven.

00:55:37.998 --> 00:55:51.217
Without saying their names, we have several very large companies that, uh, I know one of which got brought by, bought by private equity, and now they're franchised and they're just like they have this gorilla size marketing budget.

00:55:51.297 --> 00:56:16.333
So, yeah, trying to come at an angle and compete with the you know, be the david to the goliath marketing budget, it really lends itself to having to, um, shift to that client who's looking for somebody that they know on a personal basis, where they can get in touch with leadership, where we could give them more solutions and solve more problems than a one-size-fits-all just siding, roof and driveway wash.

00:56:16.333 --> 00:56:18.797
We can clean your windows, we can seal your pavers.

00:56:18.797 --> 00:56:22.574
Um, we know a ton of other companies local.

00:56:22.574 --> 00:56:23.891
Oh, your basement's leaking.

00:56:23.891 --> 00:56:28.349
Well, you should talk to this guy, and I think that that's part of what sets us apart.

00:56:29.130 --> 00:56:35.710
Yeah, and to add to that, you know, every christmas I'll send all my clients handwritten christmas cards.

00:56:35.710 --> 00:56:42.724
It's a it's a big task, but I think, um, it really is part of the, you know, growing those seeds.

00:56:42.724 --> 00:56:46.077
You know one thing like looking at business success.

00:56:46.077 --> 00:56:51.590
I'll look at a map and it's almost like you're playing one of those like Monopoly or Command and Conquer games.

00:56:51.590 --> 00:56:53.092
And I look at neighborhoods.

00:56:53.092 --> 00:56:59.945
And what do we do in these neighborhoods where we got like let's call them a gold standard customer that got us in there.

00:56:59.945 --> 00:57:03.210
How do we do that in these communities and what's our strategy?

00:57:03.210 --> 00:57:07.240
And you start to really think about things on the higher level, right.

00:57:09.251 --> 00:57:12.130
Yeah, that's true, I mean.

00:57:12.130 --> 00:57:17.422
So I guess we could probably talk for hours about this stuff.

00:57:17.422 --> 00:57:27.371
What would you say was like some of the most important branding and marketing things that you've done, to like really separate your company and uh and and grow to the business you guys are today?

00:57:29.438 --> 00:57:36.822
I would say the um additional services being able to solve multiple problems with one phone call, like doing some of these services.

00:57:36.822 --> 00:58:13.074
I understand why the um larger companies don't take them on, just because it's more risk, there's more weather dependency, but kind of being more of that customizable, detail-oriented company has opened us up to some of the target neighborhoods we want to get into and just having that unique brand, having the mascot, the colors, the wrap, just having that what's the word brand congruence or brand continuity, that corporate talks about that, you know, between the facebook oh yeah, the google ads, everything just being able to be recognized.

00:58:13.155 --> 00:58:19.615
I mean, I just posted randomly a picture of our truck in a golden retriever meetup job and got a job out of that that's cool.

00:58:20.077 --> 00:58:22.440
Yeah, do you attract a lot of dog people?00:58:24.063 --> 00:58:24.804


yes and no.00:58:24.804 --> 00:58:30.463


I mean some people, um, some people really resonate with that.00:58:30.463 --> 00:58:32.610


A lot of people, most people, have dogs.00:58:32.610 --> 00:58:34.876


Some people are all about the golden retrievers.00:58:34.876 --> 00:58:39.721


If somebody has a personal interest and you ask them about that, it makes people feel good.00:58:39.721 --> 00:58:42.210


It's kind of like how to win friends and influence people.00:58:42.311 --> 00:58:46.293


You know, when you're talking to people and customers, get them talking about what they like, right.00:58:46.293 --> 00:58:52.038


You know we live in a culture where, myself included, your pets are your family, so people take a lot of pride in that.00:58:52.038 --> 00:58:56.291


You know, ask people about their cats and ask to hold them and have those like interactions.00:58:56.291 --> 00:58:59.376


That really builds a level of rapport.00:58:59.376 --> 00:59:05.226


But then again, I mean there's some people that just think it's cool and they're not as excited as you would hope.00:59:05.226 --> 00:59:15.903


Somebody is excited about the brand but you know, even one of my repeat customers lived on the street of a December job and she's like, oh my son, he's asking about your rap.00:59:15.903 --> 00:59:16.585


He sees it.00:59:16.585 --> 00:59:19.719


And you know little stuff like that where you put a smile on people's face.00:59:19.719 --> 00:59:25.101


Those are some of the small things that you take away from this yeah yeah, no doubt.00:59:26.103 --> 00:59:38.153


So I guess anything you would like to talk about when you're like to close this out I just think I mean for anybody listening um, surround yourself by good people, follow your moral compass.00:59:38.153 --> 00:59:39.356


You understand that.00:59:39.356 --> 00:59:44.565


You got to listen to that inner voice in you, even if it's like pushing outside that comfort zone.00:59:44.565 --> 00:59:51.461


And imperfect action always beats no action at all.00:59:51.461 --> 00:59:55.581


You know, in engineering you're taught to analyze everything, have the correct data.00:59:55.581 --> 00:59:58.056


I've had projects I was working on that never went to the next floodgate just because more data, more data, more data.00:59:58.056 --> 01:00:01.887


So I think don't be afraid to just go take action and this is not just for business on that never went to the next floodgate just because more data, more data, more data.01:00:01.887 --> 01:00:07.603


So I think don't be afraid to just go take action and this is not just for business, this is anybody, you know.01:00:07.603 --> 01:00:18.331


Whether you want to do sports or theater or you just want to live truly, be your authentic self, just don't give a fuck about anything anybody else is going to say just do you heck yeah that's awesome.01:00:19.273 --> 01:00:22.161


but yeah, I mean that's a good close.01:00:22.161 --> 01:00:25.896


I can flip that thing up Like don't give a fuck about whatever that says.01:00:27.030 --> 01:00:27.355


Awesome.01:00:27.355 --> 01:00:30.938


Are we going to chat for a couple minutes offline after we're done with that?01:00:30.989 --> 01:00:32.496


Yeah, I'll just what I'll do.01:00:32.496 --> 01:00:36.496


I'll just cut the recording and then I'll see if I can get my online.01:00:36.496 --> 01:00:40.317


I'll just zoom you back and see if I can just call you through my webcam.01:00:41.099 --> 01:00:41.699


All right, Good deal.01:00:41.699 --> 01:00:43.083


So you want me to click on a new link?01:00:43.083 --> 01:00:43.871


Then yeah.01:00:43.911 --> 01:00:44.855


I'll give you a new link in a second.01:00:44.855 --> 01:00:46.693


So thank you.01:00:46.693 --> 01:00:49.237


Yeah, no doubt I'll wrap this thing up All right.01:00:49.237 --> 01:00:50.201


Well, appreciate your time.01:00:50.201 --> 01:00:51.523


Yeah, appreciate you being on.