Brent Garrett – From a $5,000 Truck to a Better Business

I had a 5000 bucks and beat up Astro Van and I started from

scratch, moved to selling my company in five years to a

Fortune 300 company and I had to admit that I had really screwed

some things up and made $1,000,000 mistake.

I already sold the business, right?

Successful business. I'm learning a lesson that I

should have already know. You can never as an entrepreneur

let go of the financial ownership of your business.

The only way I'm going to quit doing this is get rid of those

tools. Then I didn't have the option

right? What's that was my form of

burning my own ship. So I gave all my tools away as I

made some real mistakes and I assumed that it's simple and

it's easy. Starting and running a business

is simple if you keep it to the basics, but it's not easy.

I had a. Hey there and welcome to From

the Ground Up Show, the show where we encourage and inspire

the next generation of free thinking leaders by telling the

stories of those that have been there, done that, and are still

getting it done. Building a life that they love

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So today I'm excited. I think this is going to be a

fun conversation. I am joined by Brent Garrett.

Brent is the President of Sirius Plumbing and Air Conditioning,

the creator of the Best Business Program and author of 30 Days to

a Better Business. Brent started his career with

$5000 in a beat up truck and has built that into a very

successful business. He spent a few years trying to

wrangle his business into shape with hectic effort before

getting serious about building systems, discipline and true

leadership. Now he shares those secrets with

others through his writing, speaking, and coaching.

So, Brent, thanks for joining us today.

Eric, thank you so much for having me.

I'm looking forward to this. Yeah, I think it's going to be

fun. I know you sent me a copy of

your book. I got to read through a little

bit and we've communicated a little bit in the run up to this

recording. You just have a wealth of

knowledge and experience and some great stories.

I think we're going to have a lot of fun.

I'm looking forward to it. I appreciate it, you make 61

sound and sound a lot better than than it probably should.

Well, you look good for 61 and, and you got a lot going on.

We'll dive into all your business ventures and everything

you're doing. But we like to start every show

just getting to know you a little bit and you know, what

kind of a upbringing, what kind of a history produces someone

that does the things that you've done.

So do you mind going back clear to the beginning and telling us

a little bit about your childhood and what things were

like growing up? Yeah, sure.

I I was born in the Midwest Illinois and better part of the

1st 14 years were spent there. My my dad was a Korean War

veteran and had had a scholarship, football

scholarship to go to the University of Missouri, but he

was also a reservist even in high senior in high school.

And so at 17, he, he went to Korea and came back and went to

work, started family and worked at the local hammer factory in

Bushnell, IL. And, and, you know, don't even

try to Google it, man. I show up on the map.

It's a small place. But he was an apprentice plumber

on the weekends to make extra money that our family, you know,

didn't come from. We came from humble beginnings

and and so, you know, it's three ways you get into the plumbing

and air machine business. You either marry into it, you're

born into it like I was, or you had a buddy who needed a strong

back and a weak mind and you never left the business.

So my dad was that latter part and he, you know, really worked

hard and, and kind of was one of those like about 80% of the

business's day, 2-3 trucks, right?

Never scaled his business, but man, put 4 kids through college

and my, my start in the plumbing business start on the end of a

shovel at 12. And, and I'm a Fast forward

through some more of this, but but he was so committed to us

going to college. I was first generation graduate,

got a degree in marketing and accounting and I broke my dad's

heart when I told him that I wanted to start my own plumbing

and air Cushing business. And he I made him the promise

that I would go to work for a life insurance company because

if I he told me if I was going to start a business, if if I

could learn how to sell first and any anybody out there that's

ever sold life insurance, let me tell you what that is some hard,

tough lessons and I really enjoyed it was the best advice

he ever gave me. I went to work for New York life

after that. I had I had a 50 by each a

business plan and 5000 bucks and you're right, a beat up Astro

van in Richardson, TX and I started that from scratch five

years later. I know you're a big reader,

Eric. I read the E myth by Michael

Gerber and seven habits a highly effective people by Stephen

Covey and and those those two books helped me move to selling

my company in five years to a fortune 300 company.

And man, I got so much experience at ServiceMaster on

how to get some corporate Polish and communicate a little better.

And I got hired away by a head hunting firm and became the CEO

and president of a regional company in Memphis, TN called

Letic Management group. They were a multi family fee

based manager. And from there I went right back

into private ownership, start another company here in Dallas

from scratch again. And we raised our kids.

I did a little keynote speaking workshop training.

And if you read my book, you'll, you'll, you'll learn quickly

that I, I got hit with some really tough life questions and

I chose family 1st and got off the road, quit teaching and

coaching and keynote speaking. And Jenny and I have worked

together, that's my wife for over 20 years.

And she and I are working on another book called 30 Days to a

Better Marriage that works. We have, we have worked

together. And I mean, she's, she is my

true partner in many, many different senses of the word.

But we, we work together and, and there's, there's a lot to

learn on that. And there are a lot of small

businesses out there that out of necessity work together.

And so we're, we're working on that.

But I said that if I ever got back into coaching and writing

and, and keynote speaking, I wouldn't do it just for the

money. So what what I am doing is I'm

coaching a small community of skilled trades owners who want

to grow and scale their business without compromising their

values. And so that's what I'm doing

now, just right on that other side of that wall.

Or 30 employees here in Dallas, TX in this hot weather, taking

care of people in their homes. And you know, my my son is over

there working and learning and growing and helping with the

business. It's just a blast to watch them

do well. I don't own a job.

I own a business and I coach the coaches.

So I hope that got the summary. I like to give a 42nd answer.

It's hard to go from when I was born to 61 in 40 seconds.

So. Man, good stuff and I like that

distinction. You own a business instead of a

job. I think especially in the

skilled trades, there's a lot of people that kind of get trapped

in the later. So when I was roofing and

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Show again that is athlete fresh dot shop slash from the ground

up show. Well, let's move into that a

little bit. You said your first business

that you started, you took it from a start up to selling out

to a Fortune 300 company in five years.

What did that look like? What what was the process?

How did you get started? Yeah.

Well, you know, I think after about six months, I was out of

the truck and I moved quickly into that.

I think there are 5 stages of scaling a business.

I moved quickly into that teaming phase is what I call it,

where you're bringing on team members and you're taking hats

off. And that's really that first

level for a business owner to think about who not do.

And, and so that's really tough for some folks.

What I, I wanted to get out of the truck, I had a vision for

where I was growing the business.

And, and so at that phase, you know, we, we clicked along for a

couple years. I, I told you, I, I read Michael

Gerber's book, the E Myth and he talks a lot about process and,

and we worked a lot on process. And here we are in the age of AI

and that was like in the mid 90s.

So a lot of my competitors or people that were in the

business, they didn't even have APC and you know, so we bought

our first computer. I remember like the first year,

I remember when we first started running calls.

Eric I I don't know how old your do you remember thermal fax

paper I. Do yes.

Wow, OK. We're a little behind the curve

here in Wyoming and we were still doing business by fax when

I got started in the industry, so.

You know, we were scheduling calls with thumbtacks on a cork

board and had Monday, Tuesday through Saturday and those

thermal pack fax papers where we would get calls from a home

warranty company is, is a big part of our, our growth

initiative. But we, we were, we were pencil

and paper for a long time and then so grew a relationship with

those folks from American Home Shield.

They were owned by a company called ServiceMaster and so they

came and approached me about buying the business and I joined

their executive team there and worked there for two or three

years. We did a roll up of the plumbing

and air conditioning industry, about a $500 million roll up.

And I did mergers and acquisitions, leaned a lot of my

finance and accounting background and it was just a

great experience. I learned a lot.

There was a gentleman named Bill Pollard at that time who was the

CEO of Service Master, and they were a a publicly traded company

with a heart, a purpose and a vision.

And it just really rang true with me.

And I learned a lot with my days at ServiceMaster.

Yeah. So I, I've got a couple

questions there just about that business startup.

But while we're on the topic, I mean five years is a pretty

short time to have built a business to get somebody's

attention like that and especially to be kind of on the

front end of a big roll up. What was special about what you

had built that got people's attention and and kind of put

you in that place to to help initiate that roll up and be

part of that process? I think number one was we.

I was always reading a lot, learning a lot and, and I was

very focused on the client experience.

I told you that I came from the Midwest and I grew up in a small

town and, and I just, I was in a, you know, the Dallas area,

Richardson's in Dallas. And I just brought a small town

client experience, customer service approach and we grew our

business not through a lot of marketing tactics, but through

referral. I got to tell you, I am a

reader, but the best business book I've ever read in my life

was The Tortoise and the Hare. Slow and steady wins the race

and I brought a small town approach.

We still do. We spend significantly less on

marketing than my competitors. On the average, we spend

somewhere between 4 and 7% of total revenue in marketing.

The industry average is about 15 to 30 per for growth companies.

And so, you know, there's a really good accounting lesson in

that too. And when I work with our

clients, you know, my value proposition to them is the fee

you pay me is about 20% of what I'll save you in marketing

dollars. And so it's a philosophy in the

Midwest, we say that you can share sheep about 3 * a year.

You can only skin it once. And, and our philosophy is

repeat customers and reoccurring revenue and slow and steady wins

the race. Well, you know what, when you're

in a major metropolitan area and you do that, it's a little

unique at times. I have no judgement about other

people's business models, but it did accelerate our our growth.

I was open to selling, not so much because of the money that I

got for the sale, but I needed some Polish.

I needed some experience and scaling and communicating and

managing and HR and, and, and ServiceMaster did that for me.

And, and so we probably could have just kept growing the

business, but I wouldn't have developed.

And you know, that's, that's one of the things I tell young

people that are in a job. And I had tell I, my, my kids

are 26 and 29. They're young adults doing

great. And when they got out of college

said never take a, never take a job for the money.

Take the job for what you can learn.

And then the second one is not mine.

Guy named Jim Rohn. He's not with us anymore.

He passed away, but he said work on yourself harder than you do

your job. And so if, if, if I there's my

first, there's those are my first two little Nuggets that I

would throw out to your listeners from a from a 61 year

old guy. Work on yourself harder than do

your job and and take take a job or or work for what you can

learn, especially in the 1st 10 years.

Yeah, good. Stuff.

Yeah, those are great little Nuggets.

You mentioned, you know, you started your business, you you

kind of had a vision for growing it.

You wanted to get out of the truck and you talked about that

process. I think that's something that's

difficult for a lot of business owners and especially those that

are moving from kind of a practitioner to a business

owner. How do you fill those roles when

you're in that teaming process? I I interview a lot of business

owners and some of them say that they hired too fast and had too

much burden on payroll and couldn't keep up, and others say

that they hung on too long and were unwilling to let go and

that limited their scale. How do you know when is the

right time to hire that next roll?

Bring on that next person? How do you find that balance?

Yeah, I think first of all the leader owner mindset has to be a

shift to who not do OK. Everything that makes you

successful in that solopreneur to first couple of team members

is that you're resilient, you're independent, you're hard

working, you're driven OK, and you're you're an individual and

you drive a lot of identity from what you do.

OK, well, what gets you passed into that next level?

Everything that got you there can keep you from moving to the

next level, right. So the first thing you have to

say is look, I've got I'm wearing a lot of different hats.

That's what I what I work with folks is which hat do you not

like the most? And then, and, and I think

that's a, a little bit of the, the E myth and, and all these

books I've read, but let's get that hat off that you don't even

like doing. OK.

And, and, and they're all ears. Well, here's the next phase.

I'm going to tell you a story that I what I had to do in that

to, to make that happen. And, and you do things and you

don't even realize it. And, and I want you, I want to

share with you, I've lived every one of these phases.

And I want to say to your listeners, I have been inches

from bankruptcy and I've had commas next to my net worth.

And thank goodness I haven't been close to bankruptcy in

quite a while. But I'm telling you, there are

these little lessons at each phase.

I found myself in the office with folks out, but every time

there was a problem, I still had a truck with tools and that man,

I would go out and fix it. And I started to realize, hey,

you know what? I have to take away the ability

to do that, to force me, this may not work for everybody, but

to force me to help get the team to take care of the problem.

Because let me tell you what, in business, we're all going to

have problems. I guarantee you I've got three

different problems right now in this business, and there's some

adversity around it. The one promise I can make is

we're all going to have problems, right?

So what you need to be as a business owner is a problem

solver. And don't worry about all of

them. Pick the right one, right?

Well, what it resulted in, Eric, was me looking and going, you

know what, the only way I'm going to quit doing this is to

put somebody else in that truck and get rid of those tools.

Then I didn't have the option, right?

I think you've heard maybe the stories about leaders and ships

meet at medieval wars where, you know, the leaders would land and

burn the ships, right? There's no option to go back.

Well, that's, that was my form of burning my own ship.

So I gave all my tools away And, and that, and that hopefully is

a metaphor for when you're at different phases #1 Let's

replace the hat that doesn't fit well and, and let's get rid of

the. Things that would cause us to

run to and fix the problem that forces us to work with a team

and say, OK, I'm not going to do that.

I'm going to work with who is going to do that?

And then that's a whole different little bullet list on

bullet point list on how do you effectively manage and lead.

And that's when I started to realize that, man, I needed some

training in that. And that's really what I learned

at Service Master was I was realizing that that I could

learn a lot more about how to lead and manage people.

So I took a job and got paid to get trained about how to, to

kind of round out these gaps. And so I hope I answered your

question, but sometimes you got to burn the ship.

Sometimes you got to get your give your tools away.

But, but it's real easy to get rid of the hats that you don't

enjoy. And that's really what scaling's

about. And you get to a certain point

you get really excited about you go, wait a minute.

I don't own a job anymore. I own a business and I'm doing

what I love and everybody else is doing the stuff I don't want,

I don't love to do. And here's the really cool

thing. There are people in the world.

If you can just grab that and understand, you know, the

creator of this world, none of us all have can do it.

All it the joy is is there's somebody else that loves to do

what you don't love doing and you build a good team.

It's a lot of fun when you come to the office.

Yeah. That's good stuff.

I can relate to a lot of that. I was the the guy that kept

tools in my truck for way too long.

And when when a fire started, I was the first one to grab the

fire extinguisher and jump in. And that that was probably a

detriment to our growth for a while.

And once I quit doing that, just like you said, that's when they

got to be a little more fun. I got to be exciting to to

manage an organization and own a business rather than a job.

Sometimes it'll save a marriage too, that's true.

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MacArthur code.com. I know you mentioned, you know,

starting your business when things were still run by fax

and, and buying your first computer there in your first

year of business. You've run service businesses

through the tech revolution. Oh, what is your stance on that

now? Are you an early adopter?

Do you kind of wait for proven systems?

Are you one of the guys that hangs on to legacy systems and

waits until you have to upgrade? What's your approach to tech in

a service business? I've always leaned in on that

and I think but, but the computer's never going to fix

the leak. So let's talk about how we use

technology and what problem are we solving with it.

And never misunderstand that the magic moment, at least in my

business, is when our technician is in front of the customer.

And that magic moment's taking place where they're solving

problems for our clients and customers.

So technology has always been something that is solving a

problem #1 not because it's really cool.

And I break down technology into there's bleeding edge technology

and there's leading edge technology.

And we try to stay right around maybe a year behind leading edge

technology. And that's that's for us in our

industry. If I'm a year, what I always

found and I've found through the last 30 years, if I'm a year

behind leading edge technology, I'm about 5 years ahead of my

industry. Now there are industry segments

where, gosh, if you're not right behind or on the wave of

bleeding edge technology, you may get wiped out.

I get that. I have the luxury of being ahead

of my industry by being just a little bit behind what I call

leading edge technology. So what's that look like?

About two or three years ago, we moved from a Microsoft

environment to a cloud based, well, cloud been with us for a

while, a while, but we moved to Google Suites and we kind of

stayed in that environment. That obviously LED us a year or

two ago to be a part of Gemini, which is, you know, pick your

flavor, ChatGPT or Gemini or whatever your and that's back

when we were probably a year behind the AI craze.

You know, a Google platforms going to be pretty up to date.

So, you know, two or three years ago we were we were getting

better at writing our emails, little better at process.

We looked a little smarter. We looked look like we made

better grades in English class and it we were, it was speeding

things up and our research got quicker, right.

And so here in the last six months, we're starting to use AI

agents and we're exploring codecs and creating our own

applications. But we're a little cautious.

There's quite a bit of talk, you know, we're AVOIP system on the

phones, quite a bit of talk right now about bots and how we

use them and how they learn from our voice phone calls that

learns how, what's our culture, that kind of thing.

And so I'm now the strategy guy in the company going, I have

just had a conversation about two hours ago and somebody said,

hey, we can have this up and running by tomorrow.

I said, hey, whoa, whoa, tap on the brakes there.

You know, let's, let's look at this.

Let's talk about what problem we're solving.

It's not an if, but when. So I feel like we've stayed

there with technology in our lane and maybe in roofing, You

know, there are a lot of things that are consolidating, a lot of

neat things going on with technology.

We shouldn't be spooked by it. A lot of my clients are a little

just spooked by it or hey, I, you know, is this really going

to put me out of a job and you know, those kinds of questions.

So my my philosophy stay just just about a year behind leading

edge technology I. Like it, I think What?

By the way, bleeding edge bleeding's not good.

No. Bleeding's expensive.

Yes, and it's still in what I would call a beta test.

Yeah, OK. You.

Spend 3 times as much for something to find out that you

bought the wrong one. Yeah.

Yeah, exactly. Good stuff.

Yeah. I can relate to a lot of that.

I love to focus on solving problems.

That was a big part of the the DNA that I tried to build into

our company. I made a kind of a personal rule

a couple years ago that I don't buy anything that solves a

problem I didn't know I had. Yeah.

Exactly if you. Call me selling something I'm

not buying. I when I have a problem I find a

solution instead of hearing about a solution to realize I

had a problem. So.

I gave you a couple Nuggets on the a few minutes ago.

Let me give you another. Let me give your listener

something we I'll give you a real practical use is we use

notebook LM OK, Because what I'm trying to do is get our coaches

to be better trainers. And so notebook LMI introduced

it to them and it'll take, let's say, a document that's either a

checklist or some process you want to teach your technicians

or office folks. And it will take that script or

that information that you might speak from and they'll, it'll

turn it into a deck for you that you can train and speak from.

So you're working maybe with a field leader who's a little

uncomfortable anyway about doing training.

It's a form of public speaking. There's an example of how to

make that a little more entertaining, a little more

attractive to the eye and, you know, maybe a little easier for

somebody to communicate things. That's that's that's one real

practical way that we're using AI and technology.

You can download it's free. That's.

The best kind? Yeah.

Well, I know you built a a successful company, scaled and

sold in five years and then you spent a portion of your career

in M and a kind of rolling up similar, similar companies.

What types of things make a company most appealing for

acquisition? Man, that's a great question.

And I, I will tell you there, there are two or three things

that I think, yeah, I can just speak in our industry.

OK. Let me give you a little some

data points here. The residential skilled trade,

plumbing and air conditioning market potential or annual

revenues somewhere around $120 billion a year, OK.

And so some pretty interesting facts, 15% of those contractors

are controlling about 60% of that 120 billion the other. 80

to 85. Percent are doing things that

the 15% are OK. And so and I'm, I'm getting to

your question and that is, is that there's a huge equity roll

up in my industry, but they're only interested in that 15%.

Interesting enough right now the equity gain and none of them

have 1% of the market share, right?

It's still crazy fragmented, but of that 15% that they own about

30% of it and and we could talk for another two hours about

equity and I know you don't want to do that.

So but to your point, let me just tell you what the things

are that the 80% aren't doing that the 15 are.

And I will tell you that the 15%, what they're doing are the

things that you need to do to get your company in a best

situation. Then I'll talk about what team I

would put around you and some of the mistakes I made when I sold

my company. So of that 80% are 1,000,000 1/2

or less, the average is about 400,000 a year in revenue.

So those contractors we're going to talk about roll pricing,

inventory, time, compensation and marketing, OK.

And this is what they're doing. We already talked about it.

They're doing, they're not whoing and I've I've heard say

it's not my take, but think think like an owl, OK, who who

not do OK. The on pricing they're they're

usually charging for time and material and their average gross

margin is 35 to 45%. And they're inventory, they're

making a lot of trips to supply house.

They're they're, they're billing about 20 to 25%.

I'm sorry, 20 to 25 hours of a 40 hour week.

We talked more about that and dive into it.

The other one is the time it's opening schedules instead of

instead of using what is Parkinson's law?

Talk about that more. But if I give you 2 jobs, Eric,

and your jobs to work 8 hours a day, I know I'm, I'm speaking to

a roofing guy here. How long do you think it's going

to take you to to do those two jobs 8.

Hours. Yeah, if I give you 5 and you've

got to make your daughter's dance recital by 5:30 and you

have 5 calls to do and you know it, how long is it going to take

you to do? Those I'm going to get it done

about four and a half. Yeah, or or at least 8, right.

We have to compress time. Those 80% contractors aren't

doing that and a lot of that's because they're still doing so

much they don't realize and they're not managing their team

as efficiently as they could compensation.

I think we already know that. I don't want to say the word

clock milking, but that's really what's going on there.

And and so marketing is word of mouth reliance.

So let's talk about what those 15% companies are doing that are

controlling 60% of the of the total market share.

They delegate leadership. They are on a flat rate platform

that's somewhere between 50 and 55%.

There are companies out there charging 60 and 70% that would

be the skin at once thing. I your share it 3 * a year.

You know, you can fool some of the people some of the time.

They're just not going to call you back.

I mean, I just, I just know that from experience.

They have a rolling warehouse on their trucks.

Their trucks are stocked. It's a one stop repair.

They they're time boxed, which means that Eric, glad to be

here, love to talk about all those repairs.

The problem I have here is, is that you have a stoppage in your

home and I'm here to take care of that.

Let me go diagnose that. I've got 5 calls today.

OK, we can certainly take care of some of those things that

aren't as pressing, but I want to get this taken care of now

that now the customer's working with you within the time frame

to fix the problem they asked you for.

It also mitigates their impression that you're there to

upsell them all day long and and camp out in their home.

That's a strategy for some companies.

That's not one for us. They're performance driven.

They are getting paid either by the job or they're being paid

and incentivized to be efficient on completed calls, maximizing

communicating surveys with the customer and then marketing.

They're consistently spending somewhere between 8 and 12%.

So two more things, 1 is they have a consistent and and a an

accurate ability to provide somebody with three years

financials. I'm going to put my accounting

data on now that's balance sheet P&L, not so much cash flow, but

you need to be able to show that potential purchaser of your

business #1 what's your growth rate?

How, how confident am I on the accuracy or financials?

Because that's how they're going to value your business.

Here's The X Factor. If you own the business and

don't run the business, they're going to pay you more money for

it because it runs without you have systems and processes in

place. So that those last five or six

things I just talked about. Now, the one thing that you

didn't ask me is, well, how do you build a team?

If you want to go sell a business, you will save the fee

that you pay a business broker to negotiate on your behalf.

Because guess what? The equity players do this every

day and they've done it all their life and they're the

sharpest people in the business environment.

You're going to do it once a business broker knows how to

communicate on your behalf and represents your interest.

Yeah. Does that make sense?

So, so that's the first one, a really good closing attorney, a

really good CPA. And then the third one is, is

this is the one I didn't have around the table that I should

have. I sold the business in 99.

And if anybody knows about that environment, I sold it for about

80% stock and 20% cash. Guess what happened to the

market in 99. Yeah, right.

I should have had a financial advisor around the table.

I would have collared that stock and protected my investment.

I didn't know what a collared stock was.

I do now and wished I had known that, Yeah.

Good. There's #3 that's so I hope I

answered your question, but those are the things I would do

if you're preparing that if you, if you don't, if you don't have

those in place, get with a business coach and start working

your business to a point and get it ready for sale.

There's. There's good stuff there and I

didn't necessarily do it with any foresight or any education

or knowledge, but you hit so many of kind of my core values

in the way I ran my business there.

I I gave talks to my crew about Parkinson's Law probably once a

week. I'm impressed that, you know

Parkinson's Law. I.

I was talking about Parkinson's law before I knew that was what

it was called. I had read the study, I think it

was Harvard did the study that resulted in Parkinson's law.

I'd read that study and would talk about it all the time, and

I've been talking about it for probably a decade before I

realized it had a name. Yeah.

I really shouldn't be surprised because I looked at your reading

list or your book list on your website.

You are a leader who reads and and you probably are going to

run into that, but it works, right?

Man, yeah, I. Did anybody out there listening,

if you run a company, just do this for a week.

If you give somebody a task, say, look, I need to hear back

from you in 15 minutes on this. And if they look at you like 15

minutes, OK, 30 minutes is 30 minutes.

OK, I'll be back to check with you.

Watch how fast it gets done. Yeah.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, I think it just didn't.

I've, I've only scaled and sold one business and I, I didn't

know what I was doing most of the time I was running it.

But those few tips you gave there just nailed everything

that I learned through that process.

And even the business broker, when we went to sell our

business, I heard it said a long time ago.

It's been something that I always listen to is I heard it

as an analogy to a poker game. You know, in every game there's

a sucker, and if you don't know who it is, it's probably you.

And I think it's true for negotiations as well.

So if you don't feel like you're in the power seat and in

negotiation, someone's probably taking advantage of you and you

need to build that team. You need to have advice.

You need experience around you to make sure that you're being

protected and taken care of. If you wondered how I had that

list in my head, I I was about ready to send out another

broadcast to. Podcast host and the topic is

what to do with your business or what to know before you sell it.

You know, and and so I'm not that good.

It's just was fresh on my brain. It's a great question.

Didn't know that one was coming, but it it's on everybody's mind

right now. Well, you mentioned that you

kind of disappointed your dad starting a a plumbing and air

conditioning business. What was it that attracted you

to that business? Why did you decide to go all in

as an entrepreneur to build your own business instead of using

your education and going into another field?

Yeah, I think number one, I already knew the business, so to

speak. I knew I wanted to start my own

business. Being an entrepreneur is a life

sentence. That's what Dan Sullivan says,

and I agree with him. Once you, once you.

I was a quarterback in college. Once.

Once you play the position quarterback, it's just not much,

much fun to go play wideout, right?

You'd rather be throwing the ball and catching it.

OK, well, it being an entrepreneur, if it's in your,

if it's in your bones, it's with you forever.

No matter. That's why people will fail five

times to succeed. They just it's in their blood.

OK, so I knew I wanted to start a business.

I already knew a little bit about the business, but I told

you I got a marketing and accounting degree.

Marketing, I had a great senior level instructors said, look,

one of the best things you can remember in marketing is if

everybody's doing this, do something that makes you look

different, right? Well, when I looked at the

plumbing and air conditioning business, there weren't a lot of

and I think I, I was kidding you before we, when we did the warm

up that on my notes at the time in the 90s, I was an

unconventional career transformer, but I wasn't a Gen.

ZI was a Gen. X, OK.

I just saw a space that had so much opportunity and, and it, it

had really favorable net income or profit margins in comparison

to other business models. I went, hey, wait a minute,

everybody's, everybody's being a computer program or they're

doing this or they're going to work for corporate.

I think I'm going to do this. And and as you know, what is it

the road not taken by Robert Frost?

I took the road less traveled and that made all the

difference. I just, I just took a path that

wasn't as travelled because I saw less competition in my

opinion. Yeah, good stuff.

I, I my dad. Did not see that.

I, I picked it up from a like tactical book, not a not a

business book, but again, a quote I love is when everybody

else is looking left and right, you better be looking up and

down. Well, as a quarterback, remember

there's somebody back behind you running after you, too.

You might, you might not want to stop.

You might get run over too, right?

We're both saying the same thing.

Good. Stuff so you've built 22

successful successful businesses from the ground up in Canada's

plumbing and HVAC sector what was the most difficult step in

building those businesses you know the.

First one was so new to me that and things happen so fast that I

think I want to focus in on the second one because I made some

real mistakes and I assumed that it's simple and it's easy.

OK starting and running a business is simple if you keep

it to the basics, but it's not easy.

And the second one I started, I made $1,000,000 mistake.

I was out on the road speaking, keynote speaking and workshop

training on Tuesday through Thursday.

And I said, oh, this is easy. I'm just going to hire team

people, fund it with money and let it run and I can do this.

And I kind of watched it on Monday and Friday.

I'll get to the two lessons I learned all this.

Two more Nuggets coming off to this one.

But it was six months to the day last time I had checked some

financials, I'd looked at bank accounts.

Wasn't like we weren't weren't watching the financials, but not

to the level of looking at it every day.

OK, I come home, Eric on a Friday and I write about this in

my book because I want your list to understand.

I have failed so many ways and so many different types of

mistakes, right? I'm I'm thinking life's great

and I'm on the road 120 days a year and, and there's some

trappings about speaking and and you start to believe your own

press clippings and it's it's I learned a lot of lessons there.

But the lights go out in the office and I'm in Texas.

It's summer. We have brownouts and blackouts.

You know, we have electrical flow issues.

I'm on I must be something going on.

I go next door and my neighbor's lights are just fine.

We were late on paying our electric bill.

I had an accountant person handling the accounting, not an

accountant that went past and it was a wake up call for me.

This is what I want to share with you though get this is the

toughest lesson I learned. I had already been going

through. My kids were four and six.

Then it was bothering me beyond the road.

Something was tugging at me that wasn't about business, that my

life was an imbalance. And I took a stack home and

like, we were $1,000,000 in debt.

This company was bankrupt. But emotionally and spiritually,

I think I was reaching A bankruptcy that I didn't know.

And so I looked through that. I had lunch with Jenny the next

day, my business partner. I said, look, I don't know how

to tell you this, but we're in a deep hole and I don't know that

we've been wiped out personally, but that business was on a final

thread and we had a real hard tart and I said I, I really,

this is a wake up call for me. I want to get off the road.

I was saying goodbye to a really nice income, but I said I got to

get my life in order this business.

I don't know if I can save it or not, but we're going to give it

a good try. And we did save it.

But I'm going to tell you, sometimes things happen in your

life. You know, we're talking a lot

about business and how we make our living and how we pay our

bills. But there's a much bigger game

being played in our lives, and that's the choices we make about

what matters. That business nearing bankruptcy

and those lights going off were a metaphor for me to turn a

different light on. And that was a light that I knew

was always in my life, that I had made a commitment 2 years

ago. And the what I would say about

that, it was my toughest lesson to learn in business, but it

saved my life. So you know, here I am at 61,

that was I was 41. But here was the other piece.

There's a lot of pride involved in the business and and I had to

admit that I had really screwed some things up.

The two lessons that I learned from that is number 1 and then

an interesting, I already sold the business, right, successful

business. I'm learning a lesson that I

should have already know. You can never as an entrepreneur

let go of the financial ownership of your business.

It's the failure for most. And most companies after five

years will be out of business. And a lot of is because it's

just poor cash management. And there I was at 41 looking at

going, how could you, an accountant, an accounting

background, successful business soul be in this position?

It was pride. It was pride and ignorance and

and what I call willful, willful ignorance because I knew what to

do. I just didn't do it.

The second one is, and I hope we get to talk about this a little

bit, you can never delegate the culture of your business.

You set the rules, you set the tone, you set how we're going to

go to market, you set how we're going to treat each other

because that's what ultimately allows you to scale and grow

your business. Because if people don't know how

they're supposed to do their job, and here's more

importantly, why. Our why in our business is to

make lives better. What we do is plumbing and air

conditioning, but our why is to make lives better for our team

first, our customers 2nd, and our vendors 3rd.

So I never delegate the responsibility financials and I

never delegate the culture. And that's why that company

almost went bankrupt. It's because I took my eye off

that. So that's the biggest lesson I

learned. That was a tough one.

And we, we, we saved it through sales because sales covers a

multitude of cents and man, I had about a million cents at

that point. Good stuff, man.

I think you and I would get along really well running a

business together. We're we're pretty aligned on a

lot of these things. I know that I interview a lot of

business owners and I hear again and again and again, know your

numbers, know your numbers, know your numbers, stay on top of

accounting. And that was the one thing I was

never willing to let go of in my own business.

You know, doing M&A, the quality, quality of earnings

report is a big deal. And I didn't know that you could

do that deep of a dive into someone's accounting until I

went through it. But when we were negotiating

with a couple different firms and and looking at the buyout,

what I estimated the result of our quality of earnings to be

was like 2% off of what the accounting firm came up with.

After spending three months and $300,000 investigating our

accounting, I had it down almost exactly what they came up with.

Did you? You got to know your numbers.

You got to know where you're at. Yeah, yeah, yeah, absolutely.

Yeah. Good.

Stuff. When were you most afraid you

you just talked about realizing you were $1,000,000 in debt.

Pretty. Afraid right there.

I will tell you, you know something that is with most

small business owners or entrepreneurs, they, they have

two problems that they may or may not be aware of.

But the 2 problems that are with them is liquidity.

How do you get your, how do you get your money out of your

business? And the second is exit strategy.

You know, you're going to sell it, you're going to pass it on,

you're going to sell it to your employees or you're just going

to close the doors up. They usually don't think and

plan for that. But there are other problems

that we're always going to have in business.

I, I tend to say this and I mean it.

I, I always, I'm a little, I'm a little scared somebody will

misunder, misinterpret me saying this, but because of my

accounting background, if I don't have cash problems, my

money's not working hard enough for me, OK?

And so one of the things that's with most small business owners

is that liquidity thing, OK, is managing cash, managing payroll,

those types of things. But I have solid financials and

I know when we I talked to my clients about this, you've got

to know what a quick ratio is on the balance sheet, got to know

what your current ratio is. And then there's an acid test

ratio and acid test is really telling you what what's going

on. And that's all about how much

cash do I have to meet my future obligations or payables.

Now I'll get out of the technical, but those are that's

something that's with my clients that I see is most of what

causes them pain. The the cure for that is to know

your financials. So those are the day-to-day

things. You know, what are we going to

do to move money here or there? If you get to owning a business,

then you're planning should be how do I have these emergency

account funds? Because problems are going to

happen. Unexpected things are going to

happen. That's going to bring Peace of

Mind and make you more strategic about your decisions.

But then there's that extra level of how am I going to build

a legacy? You know, what types of things

do we want to give back to? What are what are we going to do

with our resources? What can we do for our team to

strengthen them? How do we how do we take our key

team members and take the option away that they will ever leave

the company because somebody might entice them away for a

another couple box, Right. These are strategy things that

free up your brain, but they are things that can cause you a lot

of pain. You lose a key employee that's

been with you for 10 years, they know everything about your

business. Guess what, You're back doing

their job. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

What kind of best strength you're going?

So I think those are some of the common daily problems that are

that are always there, yeah. Do you have any silver bullet

advice there for taking care of that team and making sure that

you build a a culture and environment and incentive

package that causes them to stay?

You know what, I'm glad you brought that up because let me

tell you what AII used to be so intimidated by the interview

process when somebody would say, well, and I was like, man, I

want this guy on our team or this, this person in the office,

this is who I want. And they say, well, I was making

this over there and I want 20% over that.

And you know, OK, how do I come back with that?

Because I knew it was a kind of a, a car trading kind of

conversation. Here's here's my nugget.

AI is a great tool and one of the things I use, I put in, you

know, what's the average compensation in Dallas Fort

Worth for a residential licensed plumber and residential service?

Could you also please provide a standard or typical job

description for that boom? I mean it's 30 seconds, right?

And so now when somebody says, hey, I'm making 120 over here,

well, you know what? I'm fine with doing that.

You sound like you can do the job.

It doesn't scare me. But the average compensation for

a licensed plumber in Dallas, TX, doing what we do is $60,000

a year, $65,000 a year. They slump down in the chair a

little bit. And now you have a real

conversation. What I say is #1 pay bases that

are commensurate. That's an $8 word for comparable

to others. OK, pay a base there or maybe in

the 1st 30 days, you say, man, I really want to break you on our

standard environment. You already know we've got the

business, we can do this, we can provide these things.

Here's the benefits package, but it's just standard 1st 30 days.

We pay 10% less than the base and if you're there, we'll pay

you 20% off your starting. So we'll give you a 10% bump in

30 days. You can do the job.

And oh, by the way, we'll also put a monthly bonus if you do

these things. And that's when you talk to them

about your culture statement. I usually have one at my desk.

I'd hold it up. I don't have it right now, but

here's the culture statement. And guess what?

All you have to do are these four things for the 1st 30 days.

You have to show up on time, do what you say you're going to do,

follow through, say please and thank you.

And the reason that is, is that you need to build trust in US.

I promise you, we'll do those four things.

If you'll do those four things, we'll bump you up.

And then your bonus structure will be for the value you create

in the business. And when that's how we get to

that 120 number, here's what happens.

The person that knows they can do that, they already want to be

a part of your culture or not. And they go, yeah, I'll do that,

I'll take that. Or they'll counter and say, hey,

how about if I take that deal, but I've got to have this, OK,

that's great. Now we're at a 65 number.

We're not a 120 number. OK, don't get suckered into a

bad deal. But our philosophy is we're

going to pay a base or slightly higher than the base, but you

got to show us you can do what you all these things you said

you can on your resume. Sometimes it doesn't always work

out, Eric, you know that from your experience.

So we we put a win win compensation agreement and we

put it in writing, not as a contract because we're A at will

employee state, but but we put it in writing.

Most companies in our industry will never put a thing in

writing because they they they can't back up the word.

I love it. Many, not not all of them, but

that would be my advice. That would be my advice.

I. Feel like I'm interviewing

myself here a little bit. That's.

Well, I'll tell you one thing I want your listeners to know that

each one and go man, how did this guy figure all this out?

Because every one of them has been some painful, expensive

lesson, right? And you go, man, I'm not going

to do that again. You know, I told you we're all

going to have problems. Some of your solutions, your

problems just come from the pain of mistakes, right?

Yeah, good question that. That was one of our core values

was, you know, our job was roofing, but we're here to solve

problems. You got to solve problems and

think ahead, what are the coming problems?

How do we not experience these problems again?

How can we get in front of it? And I love that that was always

my pay structure is we're going to pay a, a base that's

comparable to the market. Make sure you got your bills

paid, you're comfortable at the base.

But then we put together a, a performance based incentive that

is the win, win. If you help us win, we're going

to share with you. And if, if you don't help us

win, life gets hard for all of us.

So it, it builds that incentive to, to win, to go out and kill

it. And yeah, good stuff.

Well, I know you talked a little bit there about culture.

You, you mentioned earlier we wanted to come back to it.

You said you never delegate culture.

What type of a culture do you try to cultivate and how do you

go about doing that? It's so.

I, my business, I've, I've never, ever come to work and I

mean that. I love what I do.

I've been very blessed to actually get to do and find what

I love to do. And what I do is I get groups of

people to work together to a common goal to where they can

thrive and be successful. And that started a long time

ago. I mean, when you're in a huddle

with 10 other guys, you're leading a group of people toward

a common goal. And my common goal is not to get

killed. And so and, and my faith and

trust were in those other 10 guys that they were going to

help be aligned with my goal. So I learned at early age that's

what I do and that's what I love to do from a personal belief

system. I believe that this there's

there. I believe that there's an order

to this world, OK. And it's all around us and we

can see it in the physical, just like gravity.

And if you don't believe in that natural law of gravity, Eric and

I want to see you jump off A2 story building and we if we

we're all for you, if you can fly, that's great.

But we have a lot of evidence that says probably not right.

And there's so many physical natural law examples in the

world. There's there's got to be an

order to this world. Or you believe that it just

somehow all fell into place and all fits together out of chaos.

And so I, you know, my, my simple little brain thinks that

hey, there's probably order to it.

They're all the also those things unseen.

And so in our organization, we start from an understanding that

people who tend to do good things, good things happen and

people who choose get rich quick, a win lose agreement.

If if you want to go really dark, people who who, who choose

dishonest or evil things. They just never seem to get

ahead OK. And it's not transactional,

right? It's it's it's overtime.

And so they might. Win the first period of time,

but it catches up to them. Exactly, exactly.

So and this is not new stuff. It goes back to Plato and

Aristotle 4000 BC. It's called natural law and it's

evolved and it's become different.

And, and you know, somewhere around 1000 BC, there was quite

a, an article written by a Pope from the Catholic Church about

natural law. And, and so there's something to

that and our choice here, you know, Covey says think when,

when right, choose the right thing, do the right thing.

Our culture starts here. Do your best, do the right

thing, and treat people fairly. From there, there's behavior.

Show up on time, do what you say you're going to do.

Follow through, say please and thank you.

Our why is to make lives better. We do it four different ways.

We do it one by serving each other, two by focusing on

progress, not perfection. We are not a yell and scream

environment. My dad taught me a lot of really

good things, but he brought back from the Army a drill Sergeant

mentality and a voice level that came with it.

We are not a yell and scream environment here.

We're going to the the third thing we're going to do is we're

going to help you develop. We're going to train.

We're going to break you down into two types of team members.

Are you a can't or won't? If you're a can't, we're going

to train you up. That's our job.

We're your leader. We have to make sure you can do

the job. If we know you know how to do

the job and you're a won't, I'm sorry, we're going to trade you

to the competition. We don't fire anybody.

They make a decision to play on another team.

And then the fourth thing we have to do, I mentioned this

about Bill Pollard at ServiceMaster.

One of their key components of ServiceMaster was to grow

profitably, not because profit was the goal of Wall Street, but

because it's the way that we reinvest in the company to live

our why. And our why is to make lives

better for our team members first, customers second, vendors

3rd. And that's our culture and it's

on, it's on a laminated sheet. They have to bring it to every

training meeting along with about something to write notes

on. And that's I have AI, have a 40

page employee manual, but everything you need to know

about being successful in our company is on one side of a

piece paper. That's it.

Love it. That's fantastic.

That is very similar to my company's values and what we did

internally training people that, that's fantastic.

So well, you, you mentioned there reinvesting in the

company. We talked a little bit earlier

with your accounting background and and knowing your numbers,

what was your approach to capital reinvestment?

How? How do you view that?

Or. What kind of a percentage did

you reinvest? What kind of things do you

reinvest in? Yeah, I think #1 we're always

asking the question, what can we do better for our team?

What portion can we reinvest in our team?

I think we're at the phase where we're making stronger

commitments to key leaders because we're on on a scaling

phase to go. We, we, we have about 17 trucks.

I think I mentioned to you 30 team members, we're on our way.

We, we do a little over 5 million in revenue.

And and I always say this about growth, we want to be best at

something before we're biggest, but we're on our way to 10

million over the next three to five years.

If we're not growing the company, then we're not creating

internal career paths and opportunities can't promote

within if you don't have something to promote them to,

right. And so we have a competitive

environment. We're trying to secure those

leadership positions that we know we need for that next

level. So the short answer is we save

our coins to reinvest in the future in our people.

And so, you know, we're paying it forward a little bit to that

position to help incentivize them to get to that.

Give them a reason to learn new things, right?

Give them a reason to stretch. And we're not always able to

promote from within. Scaling means we, we might need

a new capability at that next level.

We might, you know, because of my accounting background, I

probably need to the tool metaphor, I probably need to let

go of the computer at some point and have a controller.

But you know, technology leverages that.

We'll know when that happens, but that's probably something we

need to invest. So, so we reserve capital for

future investment and, and that could be assets too.

It could be trucks, it could be infrastructure.

It also we're, we're, we're vertically integrating the

business. So, and what I mean by that is

at what point do we own our building instead of rent it?

You know, if we get to a point where we can invest our capital

now we're starting to build a legacy, man, one of the greatest

strategies you brought up exit strategy.

I did do mergers and acquisitions.

It did a lot of due diligence like you talked about.

The best business models I saw were when people owned their

building and leased the building back to the company that bought

their company. I mean that is mailbox money

right there. That is brilliant.

Good stuff. That's where I'm sitting right

now, so. Good for you.

Good. Stuff.

Is there a lesson that you wish you would have learned earlier?

What would I tell my younger self?

First of all, I don't want to, I don't want to promote my book,

but I've gotten this question a number of times.

My book, the first three weeks is a narrative between an A sage

business owner and a solopreneur.

And they said, hey, are you, are you Evan or you Carl?

And I said I'm both. And so if you really want to, I

don't. I don't need to tease the book,

But if you want to know what I would save over three weeks to

myself, younger self, there it is.

Here's what I would tell you from a spiritual standpoint.

I was scared to death at 20. I didn't come from a lot of

money. I'm a little emotional about it.

It was very serious for me to move from where I was.

What I would say to that younger 20 year old is it's going to be

OK. There's a plan.

Just keep working hard, work on what you have control over and

it's going to work out. And and it did, Eric, you just

did it to me. Way to go.

Let me clear up a little bit. That's what I would tell people.

If you know you work hard and you have a belief system and you

choose to do the right thing, it may not monetarily work in the

moment. Don't think transactional, but

don't give up. Keep working, keep swinging.

And I think over time, if you choose the right thing, the good

thing, I think there's an order to the world where you'll be

rewarded. It may not be you'll be built

gates, but you're going to be OK.

Yeah, that's my answer. Oh man, there's some wisdom

there. There's good advice there.

So is there an opinion you once held strongly that you've

changed based on your experience?

Yeah, I think I was way too quickly dismissive of somebody's

work ethic or their culture or their belief system.

And I learned to be more patient and realize that sometimes the

problem's not the problem, the problem's the way somebody's

looking at the problem, and I should spend more time

introducing a new way to look at an old problem than than being

dismissive that it's a character flaw in somebody.

What I've learned over time is I've seen some really, really

talented, sharp people develop in our company and they don't

hold the same belief system that they did 10 years ago or five

years ago. I think early on I could have

done a better job of not being what I'm saying, dismissive, but

in my mind going, oh, that person's this or this person

doesn't have that ethic or or that that character piece that

is so necessary. Over time I realized I can't

change people, but I can model something that maybe they

haven't seen before and just to be a little more patient.

Slow and steady wins the race. Good stuff, The tortoise and the

hare every time. If you get start all over, go

back to coming out of college and do something different,

Would you or what would you do differently?

I. Almost died in 2014.

I was on an O2 bag for 45 minutes, didn't see any light,

but I had a piece and a column that came over me.

And it was one of those moments where, you know, afterwards

people, I'll just let you know that.

Fast forward through the story. I wake up in the ER room after

45 minutes and they're nine people and they're looking at me

like, and, and the look on their face was like, you are almost

dead. You were dead.

And you can just see it on their face.

And I would get a lot of questions from friends.

Hey, has that changed your life? Is that is that changed you in

any way? I was 40, 14.

That would have been, yeah, it's probably close to 50 somewhere

on there. I think may have got the math

wrong on that. So what would you do different?

And I said, you know what? It hasn't changed.

The thing I'm going to continue to live the life I have it, it,

it affirmed it. But one thing I don't do anymore

is I don't equivocate. Or if there's something to be

said that I believe somebody needs to hear an encouragement

and my support and my love for them both in family and

business. At times I probably was a little

more political and go, you know, and I, yeah, I'm probably not

going to do that. From that point on, I've never

held back. Now I've learned to be hold back

on some things that are rolling around in my head that probably

should stay there. But I don't equivocate.

So if I looked back, I would say to myself, man, if you have a

thought about somebody you have a connection with that you think

they need encouragement or you should take some time or you

should not leave anything to risk about somebody knowing how

you feel about them, how committed you are to them.

Do not let that sit in your head.

They need that. That feeling is there, that

emotion is there. That might be the one thing that

makes their life just a little bit easier and keeps them from

doing something that might be extreme.

And so I wish that I had learned that lesson sooner.

And I'm not proud that it took me almost dying to learn it.

So that was a really good question.

I don't think I would have come up with that in any other way.

So I really don't talk a lot about it because because people

are going, oh man, did you see a light or is sorry, I didn't get

any of that. But I will tell you this.

Everything slowed down. I had a piece and a calm that

came over me like I can't even explain my only regret and the

moment was and because I'm telling you, Eric, I went into

anaphylactic shock. I couldn't breathe and I knew it

was over in my mind. My only regret was I wasn't

going to be able to say goodbye to people I love and care about.

So those are the lessons. That's a big one.

There's a lot of wisdom there and man, you're you're full of

Nuggets of wisdom today. This is going to be a great

interview. I appreciate you're just a

great. Interview.

That's what you are. What mistake has cost you the

most money? Taking my eye, I mean come on

1,000,000 bucks. I we already covered that.

I'm sorry I I can't give you a better one than that.

That tops the list I. Just I took my eye off the.

Ball it's good stuff My when I took over the business, my dad

always told me, you know, dance with the girl that brought you

that. I think it's entrepreneurs.

We can get that squirrel ADD you know there's always something

better. I want to do this.

I want to do that. You talked about kind of

ignoring the business because you were speaking and coaching

and and doing all, all of that. And that business that provides

the foundation for your income, it deserves your full attention.

Yeah. I can, I can look back at that.

I really want to make the point. The $1,000,000 it, you know that

that was a lot of money, but what's the cost of losing a

marriage, your kids not turning out well because you just didn't

spend the right time, didn't make the right choices?

That's far more costly than a debt you had in the business.

Yeah, so. Absolutely and I have found in

my own life anyway, when you get your priorities in order, things

work. You know when you put when you

put your family first. My business tends to thrive when

I allow the business to come over my family.

I struggle. It was difficult the the

problems in the family arose that created problems at work.

And when I get my priorities in the right order, when when

marriage comes first and kids comes first and then the

business like life just went better.

That my business thrived when it was priority #3 or 4 rather than

when it was priority one or two. Is that been crazy how that

works though? Yeah, I.

I just think reflection I I personally like to do it early

in the morning at 61. How old are you, Eric?

I'm. Only 37, so yeah.

Eric, I've been 37. You never been 61.

I'm going to tell you I I've always gotten up early, but

there's a new definition of early now because I I will wake

up at 4:30 or five and I just like that quiet time in the

moment and in the morning. But having some kind of

consistent looking at what you're doing, not always doing,

and I call it quiet time. And there's a preparation there.

It just seems to set your brain and you know, when you're

starting to get to a point where you think there's no, there

isn't enough time for anything, that's when you really need to

sit down and look at what you're doing.

Because it's not that there isn't time to do, it's what are

we choosing to do? And when our brain is clear

about our priorities, I think we just make better decisions day

in and day out with our interaction with the people, our

business and everything. I mean, we're kind of drifting

off the business discussion, but there they're they're

intertwined for sure. Yeah.

Well, when you get the priorities right, I'm going to

go back to what you said. You know, I think it's pretty

evident there are there are natural laws that you know,

within this creation, within the world, there are things that

come together. And when I put some boundaries

around my business and put my family and my priorities first,

I was working less and finding more success.

You know, those 8090 hour weeks when everything was frantic and

everything was on fire and I had to do the business and family

had to suffer. I, I found less success there

than when I said this is what I had to give.

These are my boundaries. I will give 100% in this time or

at this time. And then I have to go take care

of what's important. My business thrived more with

those boundaries than when it was the number one priority.

Yeah. And I and I and I said I think

it, I want to add to that and I said I wouldn't talk much about

what I the coaching I do. But my position statement is I

work with a community of skilled trades owners that want to scale

and grow their business without compromising their values.

And I think the time we've spent together, reason I want to say

that is I said it's a small group of people.

That's a unique person, right? It's a small group that wants to

achieve that. And because we spent so much

time talking, it makes sense because it all starts with your

belief system and who you want to be.

And here's the thing about skilled trades.

I think most really good skilled trade technicians, their core is

they want to make lives better for their customers.

They want to do a good, honest job.

And there are there's plenty of white noise out there about get

rich quick about the path is you need heavy marketing, you need

to upsell, you need to close them seven times.

And I'm just telling you that's what we're hearing.

We go this way and it and it and it's exactly what you're talking

about. It's as simple as gravity.

Yeah. And and my clients sometimes go.

I had no idea how simple or how easy this was.

And you're saying the same thing.

Whatever get, I get, get the culture set, we get our

processes in place. I'm, I'm working less, I'm, I'm,

I'm achieving more. And I don't mean just

financially, I'm achieving, I'm growing an organization that's

thriving and, and living without me.

And I'm not the answer to every problem.

It's the most liberating thing in the world, but it is.

And I, I think the caveat, you know, when you're growing a

business, starting a business, there's going to be the 80 hour

weeks, the 90 hour weeks. Like there, there are times when

you have that problem that you have to solve, you put in the

work. But if the 80 hour work week is

the norm for you, if that's every week to the detriment of

everything around you, that's a problem and eventually the

cracks are going to show. You know, building a business,

you said it's hard work. It's a lot of hard work.

I heard a quote recently, you know, entrepreneurs are the only

people on earth that will work 80 hours to avoid working 40 it.

There's a lot of work that's involved there and it's hard

work. But if that's the norm, if

that's every week and if it's to the detriment of everything

around you, you're not serving your business well.

You have to take care of first priorities first and I I see

businesses thrive more when the owners take care of their

families and themselves 1st and then the business comes after

that. It changes who you are.

Yeah, I agree. Yeah.

What has been your biggest win as a leader?

My marriage and my kids doing so well.

I have my son both. Both son and daughter were

college athletes. My daughter was AD one academic,

all American. My son just amazed me.

And they're thriving right now. They're, they're working and

getting their MBAs. They, they have a great work

ethic. You know, a marriage of almost

28 years. It's just, it's just, that's it.

I, I, I, it's, it's not, it's not selling a company and stop

being ACEO of a corporation. And it I, I would, I would, I

hope that these next 20 years that I spend because I've got a

20 year plan and is helping other business owners achieve

that. The one thing about my coaching

is, is if you've been with me more than three years, let's say

we take you at that, you're in that 80% bucket.

If in three years we're not real close to owning a business, I

failed you and you need to fire me.

My, my goal is not for them to continue to need me, but to

learn what they need to do to stay there and move on.

And my goal is if, if, if there's something second to what

I just told you, biggest accomplishment would be a

fraternity of owners that that would buy in and, and, and have

some of the joy and satisfaction and hear about their kids doing

so well and that kind of thing. So.

Yeah, good. Stuff.

One of my regrets is that I never saw your business in

action because it sounds like it was a great company.

They're still going and still doing well.

But yeah, I think you and I would get along really well.

We seem to share a lot of values and strategy.

Even so, was there a turning point in your career?

I know you mentioned you came from pretty humble beginnings

and kind of that was a big adjustment to make.

Was there a point where you were able to kind of take a sigh of

relief and like, I've, I've made it.

I've got a level of comfort, a level of success.

I'm I I can see the light at the end of the tunnel.

There were certain stages where I would take stock and where I

was and, and certainly felt more at peace about some financial

things or things are heading the right direction.

But to be totally authentic with you, I have a plan and it's to

get to the next bend in the river and, and I've always been

motivated off of 90 day plans and goals and those types of

things. So there's something in me that

that continues to go, hey, you know, we can get a little

further down the road. And that's that's what I want to

share. You didn't ask this question,

but a guy named Dan Sullivan, the strategic coach, I went to

him in my 90s as well. And he has this illustration

called the gap. You could probably look it up on

YouTube and find it. But Dan says that there are

three different positions in your, in your, in your progress.

There's where you came from, there's where you are and

there's where you want to be. And he calls that where you want

to be, the horizon line. And so no matter how hard or how

fast we run to the horizon line, there's a new horizon, right?

So but there's a danger and only looking forward because that's

the negative area, right? It's always a critical parent in

your head saying, gosh, I'm not there, I'm not there yet, I'm at

it. And it's not like that for me.

And the best way to get out of that is go take stock five years

ago and where you were and where you are today.

And the positive comes from where you've come from and the

progress you've made. And however you want to measure

that, if that's financially or emotionally, spiritually,

whatever, but you also have to get reconciled that successful

people are always moving forward toward the horizon line.

But if they don't realize that that horizon line keeps moving,

that's when you become psychotic, you know?

And so, yeah, there were stages that I looked back and went,

man, I'm I'm not where I was and I'm glad I'm not there and and

I've made some progress, but don't lose your mind over not

being there. Yeah, yeah, I think, I think you

and I would say, hey, look, I I I have huge admiration, some

envy in our pre call that you live in Wyoming and could go fly

fishing anytime you want. You look out if you come to

Dallas, TX, Eric, it's not the same scenery.

It's pretty flat and a lot of buildings.

OK, great place to make a living, but it's not Wyoming,

right? You know, there are a lot of

things around us that we take for granted that are huge

blessings. Yeah.

So I love it. I know I didn't answer your

question. I think I just rambled on about

that. But there's something in there

that's. Great.

I think there's there's something to that though.

I knew when I chose to come started or continue a business

and live my life in Wyoming, there were some limitations

where we're a small community, there's some economic

limitations, but it was where I wanted to live.

And I go to places like Dallas and I look around and I'm like,

Oh my gosh, if somebody showed up here with a little bit of

capital that the opportunity is unlimited.

They're, they're just development happening.

There's new businesses, there's people, there's the, the

economic movement is massive. But I I I chose to live a great

fly fishing, you know. I got to tell you a story.

I, I know where the intersection was.

It was it's Hwy. 635 and Coit Road and I think I had been here

for six months. I grew up in a town of less than

1000 people. I was not a farm boy.

It was a small town boy in Illinois and the largest place

I've ever been was where I went to school and I think there was

2530 thousand people there. Not terribly large.

It was in Arkansas. I remember sitting in my truck

watching cars go like crazy around me and people waving

their hands and screaming each and and I had this very surreal

moment. It's like we all remember things

in our lives. I'm going, what have I done and

why am I here? I mean, it's just, they're just

those moments, right? What advice would you have for a

young person today that wants to do what you've done, that wants

to build the businesses in the OR build a business in the home

services sector that they want to be successful, that wants to

aspire to great leadership and and become what you've become?

Yes. Some of the advice I gave

throughout this this conversation don't take a job

for money. Take a job for what you can

learn. And I've, I have five people

that have come through our business that own their own

business and they call me all the time.

And I'm not running a prison here.

If somebody's ready to go start a business, I'll do everything I

can to help them. But make sure that you've got

the basic tools to to own and run a business.

Hey, you need technically to understand how to do the job.

You need some leadership experience.

You need some management experience.

If, if you can get some office experience and understand

systems and processes. Don't ever steal from somebody,

but tell them, hey, look, I want to learn this.

I want to grow. One of the things I always tell

folks is that if you interview for a job and don't get it, ask

them why. And why did they pick somebody

else? Or could you work for free for

30 days? And if you can prove that you

can do the job, can you have it? And will you pay me for the work

that I did if I did it? Well, I mean, and, and say,

look, I don't have a job right now.

And if I find one, I'll take it. But I'd like to show you that I

actually can do this for you. I work hard, I show up on time,

I do what I say. I'm going to do what I follow

through and I'm going to do my best and do the right thing and

treat you fairly. I bet you if they really have

that position, Eric, I know you as a business owner.

That turned your head, wouldn't it?

Yeah. Absolutely.

Maybe don't go 30 days. Give him a week.

See. Let let me let me interview by

helping you when I leave, I learned something.

You get free work. How can that not work, Eric?

That's hard to say no to. Yeah, I always say it's not over

until you say it's over. And that's not a hard close.

It's just what are you going to do for the next week while

you're interviewing for another job because you don't have this

one. Learn something from it, right.

So, you know, have a plan. You know, the squirrel analogy.

I love that. One of the reasons that small

business people fail and we talked about misappropriation or

or mismanagement of cash, lack of a sales plan.

Some just don't have the experience ready to do the job

and they don't have a plan. Awesome.

Well, I know in addition to running your successful

business, you also have your book.

We've talked about that a little bit, 30 Days to a Better

Business and you run the Better Business program.

Who are those products tailored towards and what can they expect

to get out of it? Sure that that book was written

pay it for what I was telling my younger self.

And it's done in a narrative

So it's it's 30 days to a Better Business and it's broken down

into 1200 word chapters and about, you know, 3031 chapters.

So each week is a theme. And the first one is sales

because sales covers a multitude of sins.

The second one is leadership because that's the next thing

you really need to have an understanding on to scale your

business and team the business. And then the third week is

planning. The 4th week, if I get you to

read that far, maybe they'll work through the accounting

piece. They'll probably put the book

down and then come back to it later and read week 4.

I don't know average book people don't read past the 3rd chapter

but the 4th. The 4th week is about

accounting. KP is finance.

It's the stuff that's real textbook.

Like the first three weeks are in a narrative.

It's a storyline between an old, older, established business

owner and a solopreneur. So those things are highlighted

at the end of each chapter. There's a challenge and some

bullet points and some things to think about.

What's the one thing you could do tomorrow in, in light of this

thing right here or what happened to this character?

And then the 5th week is about what successful or great

companies have in common. And they do, they have, they

have a great client experience, they have a great sales and

marketing process. They have a great HR or team

member process. They have a, they have great

numbers. I mean, these are things that

every great company has and, and it's almost like gravity.

It's a natural law. It's what you have to have to

get there. And then if you make it that

far, there's an epilogue in the back and I'll tell you exactly

where my heart is and why I'm doing this and, and what I

believe in. Awesome.

And. So I know you do some some

coaching as well and you have the Better Business program.

Who is going to be the best fit for your Better Business program

and your coaching? Who's your ideal client?

We're looking for folks that either are quickly moving to

what I call the messy middle. And the messy middle is the

third phase of scaling a business in my the numbers can

change. I don't know what it would be in

roofing, but but it's when the owner is hitting a ceiling of

complexity where things things are getting a little out of

control for them. They can't, they can't seem to

have their hands on everything. Here's the true tale of the

messy metal. It's when you are half the size

and you are making twice the amount of money than you are

right now. OK, And that's then those those

are different. That's a that's an area that's

where you might be close to bankruptcy.

You might be stuck. You may be contemplating going

back and making your business smaller back when you could

control it and understand it. We move those, those contractors

and owners, small business owners to a three day retreat

with us. And if you want to talk to me

about that, go to my website. You'll get a, a free 3040 minute

conversation. It'll be just like this.

Eric. He's just like, what what,

what's your pain point? What's, what's, what are you

working on? Right?

You'll know, I'll know if you want to work with me.

If not, I'm going to give you two or three things to go away

and implement in your business. You get that free.

I'll give you a, an E version of my book for that conversation.

What we do is we take it there. The the big back end is I work

with a mastermind group clients that we meet every week and they

talk about their business. But what's neat about that is

that group is a community of believers.

And I know you would understand this if you're a small business

owner, you can't talk to your buddy who works at the factory

about the struggles and challenges you have.

Mastermind thing is something that came out in the 1920s where

it's a process where we share our biggest problem in our

business and you get, you get the strength of 10 other people

or 20 other people in the room going, hey, and it's a control

process. I had that same problem.

This is what I did. So you Start learning from the

best practices from everybody. But here's the thing that that

mastermind also gets in the back end.

They get everything I do in my business.

I'm not hiding this under a bowl.

I give it to you. You will save what you pay to be

a part of that mastermind on your marketing expense alone

because a lot of the marketing products that we have and that

we do, we give it to you with your logo on it.

So the way we move to that in between is we have a three day

retreat. So basically you can call me,

we'll talk for 30-40 minutes and you can go off and do it by

yourself or in the three day retreat.

We do it together. We talked about sales,

leadership and business planning and you're ready to go and then

you can do it on your own or I give you and do it for you in

the back end. The mastermind.

So that's, that's that small group that we talked about.

Yeah, that's that's that's what we do.

It's not it's it's tortoise in the hare man.

It's not, it's not a get rich quick.

It's not, it's not me telling you, hey, you just need to go

close the customer more. You know, we're coming from that

natural law, but I will tell you upfront that's a program to move

you from working with me to not needing me anymore because

that's the goal. The goal is you shouldn't need

me or you shouldn't need my coaching.

You might give me a call, but I'm not going to charge you for

it. I'm going to look.

You've already done it and it can happen for you.

It really can't. Good.

Stuff. Sometimes these things.

Just need a little tweak. Yeah, you know, that's great

stuff. Tweaks can mean big things.

That's that's kind of the heart behind this show is yeah.

Like you said, if you own a business and run a business,

most people, especially if you're in a smaller area, your

peer group doesn't get it. It can be very lonely, you know,

whether you're really struggling and have some big problems or

even have some awesome success, you, you can't tell your bowling

buddy that they, they can't relate.

They don't get it. No, it seems like you're

complaining or bragging when you're just trying to share

life. And so getting around like

minded people and hearing from people that have been through

similar struggles and and had similar wins that that month

that you make more money than you've ever imagined you could

make before and you're excited about it.

You can't tell your buddy that works for your salary about

that. You know it.

No, it and and Eric, I, I maybe you're the one who's never had

that problem. I don't want to assume this, but

when I talk to you about the challenges of cash and making

payroll and paying out of a different pocket for somebody

because you had a team member that needed a new set of tires,

you know exactly what I'm talking about, right?

Yeah. You know, it's, it's it's a

fraternity of people. And so people think they join

for me to coach and give them the Nuggets.

And I do, and I help them and I talk through their business.

But what happens with this community is it's it's a group

of people that they don't ever want to leave.

You know, some of these folks travel and vacation together.

I mean, it's it's it's special. Yeah.

Yeah. Good stuff.

Well, if somebody wants to get a hold of your book or wants to

engage you for coaching or become part of one of your

mastermind groups, what's the best way to get a hold of you or

get a hold of those resources? Yeah.

So it's real simple. You go to brettgarrett.com or

the skilled trades coach.com, either 1 you can find me

connect. You'll hit a button that says

Connect, might ask a few questions to add a little bit

more to that conversation we have, and you'll book a 3040

minute conversation with me. I'm not going to sell you a

thing. I'm going to talk about what

your big problems are and I'll tell you what I do, but it's all

focused on helping you with a few good ideas about what that

next bend in the river is. And man, maybe we make make the

trade business a little easier to understand, a little more

successful. And I'll give you an E version

of the book. I'm not.

I'm a big believer that I read a little bit of scripture and

bread cast upon the water comes back tenfold.

I don't do what I do because I'm going to get something for for

it. I just know that there's this

natural order of the world that if you help enough people get

where they want to go, you do too.

So that's it. I say just go to the website,

book a conversation with me. You'll talk to a really nice

lady named Kate. She'll find a time on the

calendar for us to talk. And, you know, you get some free

stuff and some free advice and a couple things maybe help your

business. That's how you get in touch with

me. Good.

Stuff. Well, we'll include all of that

in the show notes so listeners can just click on the link there

and get right to your page, get right in touch with you quick.

This is my favorite question that I ask of every guest.

Are you a person of a particular faith tradition, and if so, how

has that affected your leadership and your career?

Yes, I am a person of faith. I am.

I am a Christian. I was raised in the Catholic

Church. I'm a Protestant now.

I go to a Methodist Church here in in Plano, TX.

I contemplated going into the ministry at when I was in

college. I realized that that wasn't my

calling, but the church needed strong laypeople.

I made a decision, you know, when I was in college to choose

a path that was not what I learned at home.

And that's made all the difference in the world.

And I will tell you that while I'm a Christian, I don't pretend

to understand how this world is put together, but I know there's

an order to it. I talked to you about natural

law. I think something or somebody

somewhere created this. And it's OK if we don't

completely understand it. And I don't know the path or all

the paths to understand that. But for me, the path that I

found led me to a deeper understanding of that.

And so that's my belief system. I'm a big believer in this

concept of grace. I don't believe that that

creator is connected with us because of what we do, but it's

out of a free gift given to us. And the way we repay that is not

because we owe it. It was freely given that insults

the giver. It is because we believe in that

that we share it. And that's my belief system.

Good stuff. Well, thank you.

I appreciate that. Yeah, so.

I know, good question. You mentioned you have a 20 year

plan. Can you give us a little insight

with what is next? You've built multiple

businesses, you've been ACEO and a corporate officer for large

public companies, You've bought and sold countless companies for

others. What's next?

Where do you go from here? You know, if, if you have

listeners that are in the 45 to 60 range, I want them to turn

the volume up. OK, Because COVID taught me some

stuff and, and, and I think I became aware of some things.

I started looking around me. I'm in a stage in my life where

my friends are retiring. And I told you, I love what I

do. And one of the things that I

found that keeps me young is working with younger people.

OK, It keeps me relevant. But what I'm seeing is in some

of my friends who might be retired.

Not all of them, just some observations that they were

really successful at the top level of their businesses in

their lives. And, and I when I'm talking

about that, I'm talking about I make up the bottom half that

makes their top half possible. OK, these are really successful

people, but some retire and some don't have a purpose.

And what I've realized, you talked about that horizon line.

I've got a 20 year plan. I got a lot of stuff I want to

do. My challenge to that 45 to 60

group is if you love what you do until you know what you want to

do next, don't quit doing it because it adds purpose to your

life. I think it keeps you young and

it keeps you in some habits that are probably a little healthier,

and I'll just leave it at that. OK, good stuff and good advice.

Is there somebody that you'd like to see on this show,

somebody with an interesting background and interesting

business that you'd like to learn more about?

That's a great question. I'm going through my Rolodex in

my head of folks. Yeah, I'll give you 1 gentleman

named Warren Lentz. He is in Austin, TX, one of the

sharpest and progressive business minds I've met in the

last 10 years. He runs a staffing company for

skilled trades and I I just think he has a very unique

background. I think he has a very

interesting life story and I respect him a lot.

And I think, I think I think it would be a great conversation

with Warren. I respect him a lot.

Awesome. And and he does, he does a lot

of our staffing for our company and has done a tremendous job.

That's How I Met him to that point.

You know, you, you meet other business owners and you strike

and, and we've shared business models and talked and I just

think he'd be a great guy for you to talk to.

Wonderful. Well, I might see if you can

make an introduction here in the next couple days and see if we

can get him off. Absolutely awesome.

Yeah. 100% well. Our our last question to either

fuel or settle the debate. As somebody that spent a a

career in the services industry, if you have a job to do that

requires A cordless tool, which brands do you prefer?

I'd have to say Milwaukee. I mean we, we, we, I think we

have two or three install trucks with Milwaukee pack outs and all

that stuff. I will say that 90% of the, the

things that we buy in terms of tools, equipment, supplies are

with the largest supplier for plumbing and air gas, Ferguson

supply, you probably heard of them.

And man, we get Milwaukee tool Flyers all the time.

And that's what if, if I the way I said as like, gosh, I don't

I'm not on the tools anymore. And S61 power tools probably

don't need to be in my hands, but all the guys have Milwaukee

tools. So I'm that's probably what I

would say all. Right, good stuff.

Well, Brent, thank you so much for joining me today.

You are a wealth of knowledge, a wealth of experience and I

really appreciate you taking time out of your day to share

that with us. So thank you.

I. Thoroughly enjoyed this, thanks

for having me on. You run a really well run

professional podcast and I can tell you put a lot of

preparation into it. Thank you so much, hope you'll

have me back. Sometime, yeah, that'd be great.

We might have to get an update on your 20 year plan here in a

year or so. Thanks a lot, Eric.

Yeah. And thank you guys for joining

us here on From the Ground Up Show.

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