Adam Fink – From Marine Corps to Building a Business From Scratch – Our most honest interview yet!

And the first year that I ran the company, I think I broke like $100,000.

And I was super proud of myself.

like, hey.

And I think maybe in six months or so I did that.

I was like, I'm really doing something here.

My aunt pulled me in, she was helping with the books, and she showed me a screen that said I had spent $200,000.

And I was like, oh man, this isn't going good.

Take a briefcase full of $20 bills.

don't know.

Any of it would have been better than what I did.

Hey guys,

as I edited

this episode

I realized I needed to include an apology.

This is probably the most raw, honest, and best interview we have had on From the Ground Up show.

And I dropped the ball as the host.

Adam brought some incredible content, was extremely vulnerable.

and gives an incredible view into the emotion and thoughts of a fresh entrepreneur and a human being who has pushed through some very difficult things.

There are so many questions I wish I would have asked and I missed it.

I sincerely hope that Adam will return for an update on his new business ventures and to further discuss the hard lessons he has learned throughout his unique life experiences.

So,

I apologize for my performance and I sincerely hope that you dive in and enjoy the most raw and honest interview I have ever done.

Thanks and enjoy.

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 with their hearts, their hands, and their hustle.

I'm your host, Erick Loden.

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Make sure you check that out and get the full video version

Today I am joined in the studio by Adam Fink.

Adam is the owner of Clear Creek Septic Service and Laird Sanitation founded in 2021.

He partners in that endeavor with his father-in-law.

They began in 2021 with Clear Creek Septic Service and just one truck and a commitment to reliable service.

Since then they have expanded into portable toilets and have steadily grown their fleet.

In January this year, they acquired layered sanitation, allowing them to serve customers better and providing comprehensive septic and portable toilet services to six counties in

northern Wyoming.

along with owning Clear Creek septic services, Adam is a former Marine, a search and rescue volunteer, dog handler, competitive shooter, and a father and a husband.

So Adam, thanks for joining me.

Yeah, thanks for having me.

Awesome.

We will dive right in.

The first thing we do every show is we just like to learn a little bit about you.

So can you tell us about your life growing up?

Yeah, I was uh born here in Buffalo, Wyoming, raised about two blocks from here.

And my parents owned uh Clear Creek Well Service, a water well contractor.

They started in 92, so I was kind of raised up with an entrepreneurial spirit.

I was homeschooled until the eighth grade where...

uh

my mom decided that maybe she was tired of having me around all the time.

Now that I have kids, I feel bad for what I put my mom through in those years.

I went to Three Peaks Christian School in Sheridan for one year and then they unfortunately shut down.

So I went to Buffalo High School and that's where I graduated from.

From there, I joined the Marine Corps.

spent four years in the Marine in Hawaii, which was great.

Did a couple of tours to Afghanistan, got out, and started my professional careers from there.

OK.

Can you tell us a little bit more about your service in the Marines?

I know you've had a few interesting things.

You worked with dogs quite a bit, didn't you?

Yeah.

Kind of, was, my MOS was 0311, uh rifleman.

And one of the things that they offered to infantrymen during that period of time, I don't know if they still do it, but the IED threat was so high.

And so they had a program where they utilized black labs that were trained as trial dogs.

So just your regular gun dog.

And then they just imprinted them with IED scents, all the different types of explosives that we would run into.

And we handled them just like you would any other trial dog.

um And one of the guys, we call them seniors, all the guys that are above us.

he went through the program and I thought it's pretty sweet.

so.

when it was my turn to volunteer, I did.

And I was lucky enough to get sent to that schooling.

It was a five week school in South Carolina.

And this was actually on my second deployment.

So my first deployment, was a rifleman.

uh And uh I carried a M249 SAW.

then on my second deployment is when when I did the dog handler thing, but it was super fun, super rewarding.

I love dogs.

So having a dog working with a dog, having another companion with you was cool.

That wasn't one of the guys was all grumpy and pissed off all the time like the rest of us.

And so yeah, her night we

We found a handful of IEDs.

um Could probably credit some lives being saved to the work that she was able to do while we were there.

um And then we split ways.

At the end of the deployment, you cut ties with them.

um Can be kind of hard.

My mom had signed up for.

The ability to adopt retired service dogs.

uh wouldn't allow active duty members to do it because we didn't know where it would be next month.

So she actually got an email right after I decided to get out of the Marine Corps that Riley was up for adoption.

wow.

Which was.

Super cool.

So we did all the paperwork.

I had to go down to Denver.

She flew in basically in a shipping crate and got her back.

everyone asked me, they were like, well, did she remember you?

I don't know.

She was excited.

But I think anybody would be, when they come out, get shipped across the country in a crate.

uh But what was super cool is I was part of Search and Rescue at the time.

And she didn't have a job to do anymore.

So I got her imprinted on cadaver, and we became a cadaver team.

And I think you got to meet her through that process.

that was super rewarding, um able to take those skills.

There's not a lot of transferable skills from being a grunt in the Marine Corps into the real world.

So it was cool to actually be able to use some of that.

for a short period of time.

um She ended up diabetes that was misdiagnosed or we just missed it.

And so she passed away pretty early.

that was very rewarding to be able to.

work with her in the service and come back and continue that service with her here at home.

That's pretty cool.

Do you know, is there a reason they kind of disconnect the handler from the dog after that deployment?

Yeah, the dog's going to get redeployed.

And that Marine that was assigned to her, who knows where he's going to end up.

aside other than in country the dog isn't really with you you go to you go to the schooling you

They introduce you to a handful of dogs, the ones that you connect with, you end up working with as long as that connection continues to thrive.

And then you deploy, the deployment's over.

And that's unfortunately it for that chapter of the story.

There are other occupations within the armistices where I think guys will get dogs and keep dogs because it's their primary job.

This was secondary for what I did.

So there was no guarantee on my next deployment where I would be going.

And that was actually my last deployment.

that's why I don't know if my dog had two or three or four handlers before me, but she had definitely been over there before.

Interesting.

Yeah, that's an interesting program.

Yeah.

Yeah, it was.

And it was all civilian ran.

I can't remember the town in South Carolina where they run it out of.

But all of the trainers that trained the dogs and the Marines are multi award winner gun trial guys.

You Google them up and they're pretty well known.

it was neat getting into that side of the dog world.

been around hunting dogs growing up a little bit here and there and always had a bird dog that was not well trained.

uh seeing that that side of what dogs can do is super cool.

I've never been able to train a dog up to that level.

I was lucky that they did all that for me.

getting out of the Marines.

You got your dog.

Yeah.

And so you had a few more years with Riley, serving in search and rescue.

You had no secondary education after high school, is that correct?

Nope, nope.

And I didn't for a long time.

uh So after I got out, I bounced around jobs a little bit, uh ran equipment for a dirt work outfit, and then uh went to work for my dad.

And at that time, he was

He wasn't really running the operations anymore.

His business partner was more the operations manager.

My dad was just more making sure that the wheels didn't fall off.

I think I started in July-ish of 2013.

I got on the Marine Corps in 2012.

And uh,

went to work for my parents.

um

kind of got pushed up a little faster than I would have liked.

I think you could probably relate to that.

I wasn't ready.

I knew I wasn't ready.

um went from, at that point in time, they had transitioned completely out of drilling water wells and were in oil and gas.

so I was just working the floor, perfectly happy, just working, not having to use my noggin at all.

And uh

They pushed me into a driller position and um I didn't really know what I was doing yet.

um And somebody got hurt bad m by me, by the actions that I took uh running the rig.

And uh I just was not confident.

um I wasn't comfortable.

And about two weeks later, somebody else got hurt.

And that one was a mixed.

uh

mixed effort.

There's a couple of things that went in.

But ultimately, I was the one on the controls.

It was my rig, my crew, and another guy got hurt.

And I hung it up.

that point, I wasn't getting the help that I needed to make sure that I was fully aware and understood what I was doing.

It was kind of a here's the keys, have fun.

And I just wasn't.

I wasn't going to continue down that road.

Somebody's going to get killed.

uh it wasn't something that I wanted to be part of anymore.

So I left the company.

um Went back to running equipment for a while.

then, actually, while I was still working for my parents, we found out that my mom had brain cancer.

That was in October, November-ish of 2013.

And it was later on that winter when I decided to be done with the company.

uh so my parents drafted up a contract and sold out to their business partner.

uh

My dad basically asked me at that time if I would come on payroll with them and just help out, know, wherever he knew that he wasn't going be able to do it all on his own.

um And so I did that.

I left the job that I was working, took a pretty decent pay cut and just helped out.

I remodeled their house for him.

um We knew that my mom, after her...

first brain surgery wasn't going to be super mobile.

So did some ADA stuff around the house and then.

um

Just kind of farted around, I helped out people, know, day worked and stuff like that where I could, but just made sure that I was available for whatever they would need.

In September 2014, my mom passed away.

And then my dad started.

Throughout all of this, he...

He abused alcohol and pain medications and essentially melted his brain.

He got early onset dementia.

And by the time he was 60, early 60s, he was pretty well, um had very little cognitive function.

um So my sisters and I,

were the primary caretakers for him along with my aunt, his sister.

ah And in that timeframe, when my dad sold the business to his partner, we kept one water well rig.

And so I fired that rig back up, hired a couple guys and was doing my best to make ends meet there and all of that.

And go out on my own and try to walk in my father's footsteps, if you will.

oh

and make a run of it.

that was probably 2015, 2016 time frame.

And it was pretty slow around here.

There just wasn't a lot going on.

And the first year that I ran the company, I think I broke like $100,000.

And I was super proud of myself.

like, hey.

And I think maybe in six months or so I did that.

I was like, I'm really doing something here.

My aunt pulled me in, she was helping with the books, and she showed me a screen that said I had spent $200,000.

And I was like, oh man, this isn't going good.

that was just, I had to make another decision right then.

Obviously, things weren't going great.

I had way too many people on payroll.

Because of the circumstances, I was.

When my mom got sick, they brought my aunt on to help run the books.

um We kept her because I needed her.

She would take care of my dad during the day while I could try to go work.

um And then...

It just came to a point where I had to just shut everything down.

I had to let her go.

I had to let the two hired guys that I had on, I let them go just to try to save enough money so that my dad could eat.

When they sold the business, they

I basically lost it all the first year because of my mom being sick.

It all went to medical costs.

And so I went from having to worry about providing for myself for then, you I did I did come up with some way to provide for everybody and we were just losing too much money.

So uh shut all that down, sold the rig to a guy here in town and went got a nine to five again.

My sisters and I.

uh

split time of taking care of our dad.

The unfortunate thing is he was a candidate for nursing home at that point in time.

because of this, when they sold the company, they carried their partner on a note.

they had a lot of assets on the books.

He defaulted.

within a year, but was able to make some payments here and there.

So we're kind of keeping alive.

that's the oil and gas is up and down.

It's boom and bust.

And so we knew that if we waited long enough, another boom, or at least enough of one would show up that we'd be able to get the rest of the money paid off the note, and we'd

be OK.

It never came.

um

unfortunately had to had to move on and do the same thing I was doing is uh fold and go get a job.

So because of that, that that contract still existed, and the state wouldn't kick in any funds.

So even though my in the bank account, there was not a lot of money, the state viewed it as as we did.

So I had to start the process of

repossessing that defaulted purchase agreement and that was ugly.

Unfortunately, the family friends that bought it are no longer family friends.

And that was tough.

At that point in time, was...

20, 25, 26, and have to make some pretty big boy decisions.

And it was hard.

That whole time period was hard.

And.

took a lot of humility.

There was no time to think that, uh no, this might work out.

I had to say, no, I failed.

um And it's time to move on.

Strap your boots on and keep going and just drive forward.

And we did.

My sisters and I made that arrangement work for another three or four years until.

My dad passed away.

And one of the hardest things I had to do through that time period was we knew that he probably only had three or four years left.

uh

I've struggled with this forever.

um

He had a life insurance policy, a term life insurance policy that was getting close.

Well, we were running out of money and couldn't pay it.

So I went down and I met with the insurance agent.

And I'm happy I did, but it's hard because...

uh

She said, your mom and dad have made this investment.

They paid a lot of money into it.

We know the end is near.

Don't stop, don't stop paying on this yet.

my uh for a moment in time my my dad's life his legacy

unfortunately turned into dollar signs, know, ones and it was hard and she wasn't wrong.

It was an investment that they made.

They paid on it for a long time.

um But to have it said that way, you know, and to have to think about it that way was tough.

But we decided

to, uh I don't remember how we ended up paying it, but we kept paying it up until the end.

um

So we were fortunate enough that, you know, when it was all when everything was finally when all the dust had settled, my parents were able to still leave us with something, even

though the company uh seemed to have not provided the the fruits of their labor the way that they wished it would have.

But there was still something left, at least when it was all said and done.

So that that was 2019.

um I was.

No, 2018 is when he passed away.

was working at Spring Creek coal mine as a mechanic at that point in time.

Still always wanted to go out on my own and uh but started having kids at that point in time and I wasn't willing to take the risk.

Some opportunities had come up and gone and I always sat around saying I wish I would have, wish I would have.

um

In 2021, I was working for the padlock ranch as a maintenance manager for them, which is a really fancy title for the handyman.

Padlock has anywhere from three to 500,000 acres, depending on the year, around 30 houses.

I was busy.

I would call the local septic company.

to get some service done and they would just tell me how busy they were and they didn't feel like it needed to be done and I kind of got tired of hearing that.

I had a little bit of money saved up and my father-in-law, he was a rancher his whole life and I was telling my wife, was like, just need somebody, I'll buy the truck if somebody

will just drive it.

And...

uh

somebody, whether it was her sister, I can't remember.

actually had this argument the other day, which one?

Had the conversation with them.

um But the bug in his ear, he called me right away and was like, you serious?

And I was like, not really.

But yeah, let's go.

And I think within a week, we had a truck here.

I didn't have a business set up yet.

I didn't have anything.

And he's dropping at the bit ready to go.

And uh the first year,

Think.

We started in July, come winter, we had money in the bank but not enough to carry him through the winter.

I was still working full time.

um In the evenings, I was doing invoicing and paying bills and doing whatever else came up and then he would go out and do the jobs.

um That first winter, I don't remember who, he worked for a couple different other people through the winters and just whatever it took to get it going.

and uh

I always had told him, said, I have no intention of ever doing this full time.

We'll see where it goes, but I don't really want to be on call.

I don't want to be the guy that's leaving birthday parties to go out on emergency call.

And so as long as you have enough to survive and do well, um that's all I'm worried about.

I didn't know my father-in-law as well as I thought I did.

um

He ran his entire life.

um So he doesn't know what a five day work week is.

And he doesn't know what an eight to five is.

If it's not 10 hours or more, it's not a full day's work.

um And he doesn't idle well.

So I could see pretty quick that this thing's going to grow a lot faster than I thought it was.

Um, and I think it was in 22, we, bought our first trailer full of portable toilets.

I found them on Facebook, drove out to gig Harbor, Washington to go get them.

Um, borrowed somebody's 40 foot Gooseneck trailer and it was 30 toilets and a portable toilet truck.

We show up.

The truck is not as represented at all.

uh foolishly wired this guy in full for everything.

So we show up and uh we got there, thank God, we got there early on a Friday and uh walk around the truck and I still remember the panicked look on my father-in-law's face when we

realized we cannot take this truck.

it won't make it back to Wyoming.

it's he basically is like, you got to go do something about this.

And I'm like, oh, no.

So I have to go tell this guy.

I'm like, hey, we'll take the toilets, but we cannot take the truck.

And he's like, oh, well, I already moved all the money around and and there's three people involved in this.

And I paid some guys off and I'm like, oh, man.

There goes.

And I don't remember how much it was.

I think that truck was $30,000 and the toilets were about the same.

uh

I mean, God had his hand in it, obviously, because the guy got on the phone with his bank and...

I talked to his banker.

She gave me all of her credentials.

She's like, we will pay you.

Don't worry about it.

those are the lessons that would be better learned in a classroom than in Gig Harbor, Washington.

But I'm happy you it.

And you asked if I had a formal education.

Yeah.

Lessons like that.

I think some of those are lessons that.

I don't know how you learn that in a classroom.

You don't.

I don't know that there's a way to learn that.

Don't wire money.

Take a couple cashier's checks.

Take a briefcase full of $20 bills.

don't know.

Any of it would have been better than what I did.

But it all worked out.

And yeah, we just continue to steadily grow since then.

That's awesome.

So I want to roll back a little bit.

You were just talking about education.

um What was the thought process or what was it that pushed you to dive into the Marines instead of diving into the workforce or pursuing an education after high school?

I just had a desire from a young age.

I don't know what it was.

um It was always there.

was never going to do anything other than that.

um

My GPA in high school reflects that.

I mean, I did just enough to get by.

I signed contract to go to the Marine Corps when I was 17.

um If they could have got me at 16, they would have had me.

There was nothing else I was going to do.

um I don't know when it was that I decided on the Marine Corps.

Somewhere in high school, found out that

obviously they're the best.

And I can attest to that.

uh

Found out they had the hardest boot camp.

It 13 weeks long.

I was like, sounds right.

I'll do that.

uh And that's kind how I, for whatever reason, that's how I do everything.

If it's going to be the hardest, most difficult way to get it done, sign me up.

And uh so yeah, never was going to do anything other than that.

I was going to be a career Marine.

uh

do 20 years or more.

And it was...

just circumstances back here that kept me from doing that.

OK.

So it wasn't anything, any part of your service or any issues with Marines that caused you to get out?

No.

mean, there was leadership issues.

There was all sorts of stuff like that going on.

But I loved the Marine Corps.

um I loved the camaraderie.

We were the tip of the spear.

And that was cool.

We had massive egos and chips on our shoulders and walked around with our chest puffed out and there wasn't anybody that was gonna tell us any different.

um Yeah, I loved every aspect of it.

um It was not in the cards for me to stay there.

Okay, have you ever thought about going back or serving in the reserves?

I have.

um

Back in 16, I actually reached out to a buddy that I served with that was a recruiter at the time.

And I was like, hey, I'm going to come back.

And he's like, don't forget all the reasons why you left.

I'm going to contradict everything I just said.

It's like anywhere else.

When you're in it, it sucks.

The grass is greener.

But you get a couple.

steps away from it and you look at it retrospectively and with hindsight everything obviously looks a lot better.

there uh is.

being a grunt, an infantryman.

When there's nothing to do, the only thing to do is screw with you and your time.

And when you're in between deployments and you're not in that workup schedule yet, there's a lot of downtime.

And so it's a lot of games.

just when you're uh even as a junior NCO, I got out as a corporal in E4.

um

It just, a lot of nonsense.

Days where you could have been done at three and set out early to go enjoy Hawaii.

They'd keep you till 10 at night just because the company first sergeant probably doesn't like his wife.

So he doesn't want to go home either.

So he just uh takes it out on all of the people below him.

There's stuff like that.

It's the truth.

That type of thing is what happens.

And ah it does cause for burnout.

It causes for a low retention rate.

And I don't know what the retention rate is anymore in Marine Corps, but it was pretty low when I was there.

OK.

And you said uh since you guys have started, you've been growing pretty rapidly in your new business.

ah Can you give us an idea?

What does that growth look like?

What have been kind of the big steps or?

ah

you know how much have you been increasing your sales every year?

Yeah.

um

It's gone from Lyle, my father-in-law, having to find work to do in the winter to um if he wants to.

The problem is, as we've grown, we've stayed busy through the winter season.

But um we can carry him through the whole winter, which is great.

um Which is what my goal was, setting out with this, was to have him.

ease into retirement a little bit, even if he refuses to take a day off.

least the office is there.

And I don't actually know sales percentage, all of that.

It's job by job.

we went from those 30 toilets, now we have 80.

And that's in three years.

I measure our success in the freedom that we've been able to get in our lives.

Later on, and as I continue to grow this other business, those type of metrics are going to be a lot more important.

But when it was just me and Lyle, was just kind of, hey, are we surviving?

Great.

And not even, we were thriving.

um and continued to thrive.

um But yeah, that's where that's where we're at today.

We're we're we're to the point where we're not worried where the if the next jobs coming in or when the next jobs coming in.

um We've.

I think it's safe to say that we're probably the number one call in Sheridan County now for for septics.

Porta Pogsie is still slow, but I'm at a point right now where.

ah that threshold of growth where

If we grow anymore, I'm going to have to bring somebody on.

If I bring somebody on, margins are going to get tight again.

And I haven't completely decided how we're going to handle that one yet.

I'm figuring this out as I go, more than anything, through hopefully less failure than before, but grit and determination and a willingness to go about it an unconventional way.

I just.

quit my full-time job a month ago.

that's because of the acquisition of Laird Sanitation.

just wasn't going be possible for me to work a full-time job anymore.

um But you have to be willing to sacrifice a lot to be a business owner and to start a business and to grassroot it.

m it was uh a common occurrence for me to

still be up working at 11 o'clock at night and waking up early and going to my next, you know, to my real job.

And then getting off and then going and hopping in our truck and helping Lyle out and then um going back to the office, getting the kids, put the bed in office, which is my house.

Getting the kids to bed and going back to work again, you know, it just.

uh

It's what I enjoy.

I don't know why I thought of this the other day, but uh it occurred to me that I don't care what I'm doing.

I just like working.

um Never in a million years did I ever think I was going to own a septic company.

It never crossed my mind.

But I don't care.

It just work.

if it's physical labor, great.

If it's sitting behind a desk, great.

I like working.

Is it a difficult decision to uh give up your day job and kind of go all in and have two families relying on this business now?

Yeah.

uh Yeah.

And there's actually more.

So I have three full-time employees with Laird.

yeah, there's in July this last year, my wife quit.

quit her job um to take a little bit off of my plate.

we knew that more likely than not, this uh purchase with Laird was going to go through.

And so was um get her trained up on Clear Creek to take my position because uh Laird is probably 3 to 4X what Clear Creek septic service is right now.

that will be the work that.

the work that-

I was just talking about.

I'll leave a full-time job to take a full-time plus one because Mike and his wife, the previous owners, they both were working the business side of it.

um And I'm very fresh into it.

That was uh January 29 that we signed papers and bought that.

So um just a little over a week into it.

Yeah.

What made you decide to go that route and acquire another business instead of focusing on growing yours or going a different route there?

It landed in my lap.

um I think earlier I alluded to watching opportunities come and go and saying, I wish I would have.

This one landed in my lap super hard.

um Mike treated us very well.

um It was extremely generous through the whole process of purchasing the company.

We kind of partnered up, got to know each other a little bit and built some rapport while kind of doing all the negotiations as well.

And I left it up to God.

I remember we were in the final stages of negotiating and uh it kind of looked like it was all going to fall apart.

And I said,

I just, I got down on my knees and I prayed to God and I said, if this is not supposed to happen, let me know.

it was later that day I was listening to a podcast and the host was talking about work and uh kind of that same thing I just said, like, doesn't matter what it is.

And he said, I don't care if you're the septic guy pumping shit, go out and get it done.

And I'm like,

holy cow, if that's not a sign, then I guess there won't be anything bigger than that.

And so we push forward and uh we'll find out.

But ultimately, it's all in God's hands.

um

I'm just a steward of what my parents left for me.

I grew up in the church.

My mom was extremely active in the church and in the community.

um this is a way to continue the legacy that they tried to build and leave for us.

I couldn't say no, you know?

it's all up to God from

now.

man.

That's a big leap, but it seems like things are going well so far.

So far, so good.

what, man, you've been through some hard things at a lot of different levels.

uh What has been uh the hardest part of Clear Creek sanitation so far?

Working with family is always difficult Lyle and I luckily have a great relationship um But it's always there's always the fear that you know one's gonna do something that's

gonna upset the other um and so just Being open and honest managing expectations both directions Learning how to communicate, know well

with each other, that's probably one of the hurdles that we had.

Like I saying, Lyle's a go, go, go, go, go, and I'm a whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, Which has been great, kind of that yin and yang where I might have drugged my feet until something

wasn't available anymore and if it were up to him, he would have bought it three times yesterday.

But yeah, know that.

Growth is hard, we structured it from the beginning the right way.

um were all cash, if it failed tomorrow, the bank wasn't knocking our door to take our homes.

um And we just started small and just planted a seed and let it grow.

um So there wasn't a lot of...

really difficult lessons learned yet.

I guess driving to Gig Harbor with hoping that money was going to come back to us.

um yeah, some embarrassing things like that throughout the last couple of years.

overall, it's just been we went about it the right way this time.

uh I say we, but a lot of that's me.

um

Just I learned from my past experiences.

didn't want to go through that again.

I'm sure you know you can't scale exponentially without having anything to land on when you're done.

So we're just building a foundation and still are.

um I'm not in any hurry to.

to meet any certain goals of growth or anything, as it comes, it'll come.

Yeah.

That seems like a wise approach.

That was always kind of my approach in business as well.

But I know it gets looked down on sometimes.

And man, there's a lot more stability there than trying to shoot the moon.

Five years out, I hope that we've continued just a steady up.

word trajectory and uh I'm not looking for a percentage attached to that as long as it's still going up.

I'm happy with that.

Yeah, that's great.

Are you going to keep the name with Laird Sanitation?

Yep.

Yeah.

So Mike, he had that for 20 years.

He uh did the same thing I did.

He bought out some local over there uh and then grew it into what it is today.

He's got

I mean, basically runs the entire Bighorn Basin.

I mapped it out the other day.

If you take his area and the area that we have on this side of the mountain, it's like 10,000 square miles of area to run.

that's, know, Porta Potty spread out through all of that.

he's a...

He's a very big personality over in the Bighorn Basin.

um And his name is very much recognized, so I'm keeping the name.

The branding's great.

um Everyone knows who he is.

His slogan's got poop.

Which, over the last year, we've been using one of his trucks on this side of the mountain.

And the amount of people that have stopped, taken a picture.

or just wanted to tell me how hilarious it was.

The only cross-branding that I am going to do is I'm going to adopt the Got Poop on Clear Creek.

then maybe later on down the road, maybe we'll look at doing some rebranding.

But right now, they're completely separate.

Yeah.

I think I saw that on one of the trucks.

I didn't realize it was yours, but I saw that recently and thought it was funny.

I know you've learned a lot of hard lessons through a lot of things.

ah Is there one in particular that you wish you would have learned earlier?

Hmm.

No.

They all came when I needed them.

I don't...

I don't think that I would have been ready to receive some of the lessons that I got, know, had they come in different times.

um And again, that kind of comes to the, it's all God's plan part of it.

um He's gonna, He's gonna give us our trials and tribulations when we're ready for them, um whether we know it or not.

Yeah.

Great.

Is there uh something?

that you've changed your mind about.

ah Maybe throughout, you've now run a few different businesses.

ah Is there something you once held as a pretty strong opinion or maybe a little bit judgmental about and through your experience you've changed your mind?

I think the big one that I've changed is a...

None of it's um I owe it, all of it to God.

um

I'm working right now for my kids um so that if they want, can continue on.

And if not, they can go explore whatever it is that turns their crank.

um

That, you know, I used to want it to be about me and what I've done.

But it's not what it is at the end of the day.

uh It's what God's afforded me and what I can do for those around me.

Yeah.

Man, that's great.

I can't argue with that at all.

Oh.

Well, I know you're still pretty fresh into this only a few years in but if you could go back and had the opportunity to Start Clear Creek again or do something else.

Would you do it again?

Yeah, I do it all again in a heartbeat.

I would have I would have said yes earlier And my dad always told me his biggest regret in business was that he didn't start earlier and I I sat by and I watched the clock tick and

You know, that's

I did start early and maybe too early.

um But again, not really because the lessons I learned from that failure is allowed me to be where I'm at today.

And yeah, I do it all over again.

OK.

I know you mentioned uh learning the lesson of communication, working with your father-in-law.

uh

For someone else looking at a partnership or especially maybe a family partnership, do you have any caution or advice of what has worked or what hasn't?

If you don't know each other at the beginning, you're going to know each other by the end of it.

Better to rip that bandaid off early.

There's going to be hard conversations.

going to be uncomfortable conversations that are going to have to be had.

Get it all out in the open.

Don't hide anything from each other.

Let each other know what your expectations are.

That's a big one.

through everything, whether it's your business partner, your spouse, or an employee.

Make sure that your expectations are known, and make sure that you understand theirs.

Good.

Has that changed the dynamics of family get togethers or family relationships at all?

Yeah.

For the better.

I always tell my wife.

Whenever she's, don't want to, complaining's not the right word.

But when we're having conversations about her dad, I say, don't talk about him like that.

That's my business partner.

OK.

That's good.

But no, no, not at all.

um It's strengthened me and Lyle's relationship.

um I consider him a friend more than a father-in-law now.

It's been great.

I've loved working with the guy.

I hope that.

When I'm his age, I work half as hard as he does, because it'll still be twice as much as anybody else.

Yeah.

That's great.

uh I read a quote the other day that said, um what was it?

I only work half days.

I just decide which 12 hours that's Yeah.

I know you've been through, yeah, a lot of really hard things.

um

taking over your parents' business and walking.

with them through the end of life, um shutting down a few businesses.

What is it that keeps you motivated and keeps you moving forward when things get hard?

There's no other option.

mean, we can sit and dwell on our self-pity or just keep moving forward.

in the worst of times when we didn't know how we were going to take care of our dad, I had no other option.

I had to figure it out.

um

And now that I have multiple families relying on me again, it's the same way.

When problems arise, you have to find a solution to them.

There's no options.

Yeah.

I think that's one of the uncomfortable things about leadership is quitting isn't an option.

No.

You don't get to just go find another job.

No.

But unfortunately, sometimes,

it is too, you know, and that's where

you have to be able to.

truly step back and look at the situation you're in and decide.

Is this recoverable?

do we pull the plug early while there's still something to be maybe saved a little bit?

But yeah, mean, right now failure is not an option to me.

I got a lot riding on it.

With the experiences you've had um with other businesses and your parents business, did that add any hesitation to starting a new business?

No.

It's what I always wanted.

um My mom, she stayed at home, raised us, me and my two sisters, homeschooled us.

She was able to be there.

for everything and same with my dad for the most part.

m That every ball game, he might not be sitting in the stands, but he'll show up and on the other side of the field and sit in his pickup, but was able to make it.

And that was a big turning point this summer.

I said that my wife quit her job and part of that was so that we could raise our kids.

um

you know, take their future into our hands, make sure that we're molding them into the future, maybe entrepreneurs or just.

Hopefully, there will be a value add to society.

uh

And it was important to us that that was left up to us only.

So did you plan to homeschool your kids then?

No.

I don't have the patience that my mom did, and neither does my wife.

um We're fortunate uh in Rochester with the school district that we have.

We're extremely pleased with it.

They have a four-day school week, which is great.

But again, um me and my wife being self-employed now.

that Friday is no longer a stress of how are we going to, how and what are we going to do with the kids on Fridays when they don't have school?

um Summertime's got easier.

know, all of that is just...

A lot of that stress is gone.

Yeah, that's cool.

That's great.

Has there been a major turning point building your business where you kind of got to take a sigh of relief and felt like you hit a level of stability?

Yeah, you know, I think the first time that...

We had a, you my goal with the business was, is always to, with Clear Creek Septic Service, because we grass rooted it, we started it with cash.

Everything we did was cash.

We never had a bank involved, period.

So once we built it up to the amount where, hey, if any of our trucks break down tomorrow, we can go buy a new one.

We're not out of business.

That was a huge sigh of relief.

all right.

We're in it for the long haul now.

can weather some storms.

And I think that's my approach to business now is just make sure that you're setting yourself up to weather that storm.

Because it's going to come.

It always does.

um And as long as you've positioned yourself that way, the stress level goes down a little bit.

yeah.

Yeah, I remember in 2008 when everything was tanking and my dad's business actually ended up growing a lot that year.

He grew like 50 percent.

But when things were uh looking pretty bleak and we didn't know how things were going to turn out, I asked like, what's going to happen?

What are you going to do?

He's like, well, if all the work dries up, I guess we'll park all the equipment in the garage and take a couple of months off.

Yep.

when you don't have payments to make, when you're not leasing someone else's equipment, um that stress kind of disappears and things go a lot smoother.

And I can't say that for the new business, but um that's our goal.

We'll get there.

Yeah.

Sounds like you're off to a good start.

Have there been any unique challenges uh taking over someone else's business that you've experienced in the last few weeks?

Not yet.

um

It's funny how God maps your life out.

Two years ago, I took possession at the VA in Sheridan as the ground supervisor and fleet manager there.

uh

There was, I'm trying to remember, there were six grounds guys.

I was one of them.

And then they opened this position.

I got it.

So I went overnight from peer to supervisor and inherited.

All the employees, good or bad, and had to figure out how to work around that.

And mean, that's essentially what I just did again.

um I'm extremely lucky.

The guys that Mike has hired on are rock stars.

They're rock solid.

um Couldn't ask for a better group of guys to do this huge transition of ownership with.

So extremely fortunate.

But it's not.

It's not unfamiliar water for me.

Great.

Well, this is uh my favorite question we ask of all the guests.

You've alluded to it a little bit already, but are you a person of a particular faith tradition?

And if so, how has that shaped your business journey?

Yeah.

um

grew up Southern Baptist and

walked away from God for a long time.

um It was difficult, know, when my mom was sick and my dad was sick and all of that, my mom gave her every free moment she had that she wasn't with her family.

She was doing something for the church and for God.

And I couldn't understand why she had to suffer the way she did for every, you know, after.

everything she did.

And I still don't understand, I've-

I've

because

Because of my kids asking my wife a bunch of questions about God that I wasn't willing to answer, we ended up going back to church this last year.

And I kind of reluctantly went, and it's been the best thing for me.

I never was, I kept God at arm's reach.

When I needed him, I would reach out to him.

And this, over the last six months, I've really rekindled my relationship with God.

And I'm looking back now, I can see he was always there.

He really was.

I wouldn't have anything that I have without him.

And it's changed my perspective on life and how I run my business.

I was telling you, it's not for me right now.

It's all God.

And whatever plan he has with what I'm doing, it's the direction we're going to go.

The thing I love about it is I don't have to stress about it.

um I have to work.

But he's going to provide.

He always has.

uh It's funny.

This morning, I have a daily Bible verse.

Today was Romans 5, 3 through 4.

Not only that, but we rejoice in our sufferings.

Knowing that suffering produces endurance and endurance produces character and character produces hope.

You know, I was thinking a lot about the conversation that we're going to have in what direction I wanted to go with it because I could hit all the high points.

But there's a lot of low points that I'd learned a lot of lessons in.

And that verse sums it all up.

Without all those hardships, you're not built into the person.

I wouldn't have been built into the person that I am today.

And uh I think.

lean into the hardships, see what God's trying to teach you and take everything you can out of it.

We're gonna land in those times.

Don't ask why, but ask what?

What are we gonna learn from this?

Yeah, that's a great lesson.

So it sounds like you kind of just gave the number one piece right there, but are there any particular resources that you've used to grow your knowledge, grow in leadership, grow

as a person that you would recommend to somebody else?

um

Observation is a huge thing for me.

I take in as much knowledge as I can.

I listen to lot of podcasts.

I try to read, but I end up falling asleep as soon as I open the book.

But I just try to surround myself with people that are lot smarter than me, which is easy because I'm not entirely intelligent.

um

I listen to people.

If I see someone that's doing something I want to do, I go and talk to them and figure it out and have them teach me.

That's great.

I think we've had quite a few guests that said something along those lines.

I think that was the best advice my dad ever gave me was to find people that are where you want to go and hang out with them, do what they're doing.

And don't be so prideful that you can't admit that you're

you're wrong or don't know something.

Some of the best leaders I knew were never the smartest guy in the room.

But they would just pay attention, read the room, just good people, good people, people.

ah One of the best pieces of advice I ever heard too is staff your deficiencies.

And that doesn't necessarily mean you have to hire it, but.

Um,

it might be.

you know, reaching out to someone to coach you along, you know, but you don't have to have all the answers.

You won't have all the answers, but somebody does and go find them.

man, that's gold.

That's good stuff right there.

huh.

I know you've talked a lot about your kids working for your kids, the legacy that you were left and the legacy you wish to leave for your kids.

ah

If there was some advice or piece of information or something that you would wish for your kids to have as they grow into adulthood, what would that be?

Kind of what I just said.

uh Don't stop learning.

Soak up every bit of information someone's trying to give to you.

mean, I'm sure we've all had that person that's trying to tell you what you need to go do.

And you're like, you're an idiot.

You know nothing.

I'm the smartest person right now.

Get rid of your ego, get rid of your pride, and it'll only get in your way.

Come in.

Yeah, that's good stuff.

think the best leaders and the most successful people are humble.

if you don't learn it yourself, life has a way of teaching you.

Yeah.

So what's next?

Where are you going from here?

I know the acquisition of Laird is pretty new.

I imagine that's still kind of on the horizon.

What is your vision or your goal?

The vision is to get, hopefully sooner than later, get out from underneath the mountain of debt that I just went under to purchase that.

And then.

You know, right now I'm just get stable again.

know, everything's all the dust is kicked up pretty thick right now.

So just let everything settle, get into the groove and then just see where see where it takes me.

Are there potential future acquisitions or expansion on the horizon?

I think there's some some options out there.

um Maybe they don't know it yet.

Yeah, mostly kidding.

But no, I don't know.

just, wherever it goes, I'm not.

I plan for the hardship and just wait to see where it's going to go on the good end.

Yeah.

Great.

Well, is there uh somebody else that you'd like to see on the show?

Somebody that has a really cool business industry story that you'd like to learn some more about?

You.

Oh, OK.

Well, we might have to do that someday.

Maybe a hundredth episode or something.

no, I'd love to hear.

Hear about.

Your uh successful taking over successfulness of taking over your father's business.

um Yeah, it'd be super interesting.

OK.

Well, we might have to consider that.

Maybe uh we'll make that happen someday.

our last question, we ask every guest to either uh fuel or settle the debate.

If you have a job to do and have to pick a cordless tool, which brand do you prefer?

Milwaukee.

Big red.

I think they're pulling ahead again.

DeWalt and Milwaukee are kind of, they've been, Milwaukee gets a little bit ahead and DeWalt catches up and they keep edging us out.

I think that's kind of how it is on the industry too.

Milwaukee releases a new better tool, then here comes the Walt with those, right?

Ouch.

That stings a little bit.

Well, thank you so much for joining me today.

This has been a pleasure.

I really appreciate the insight, the honesty, the lessons learned that you brought to the table.

And thank you guys all for joining us here on From the Ground Up Show.

Again, you can find us on social media at from the ground up show.

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