January 7, 2025 • 34 mins
Ep. 197 Will Lucas is the Brand Manager at AfroTech and Black Tech Green Money, sharing insights on how Black professionals and entrepreneurs can build lasting wealth through technology. But beyond the mic, he’s also a seasoned entrepreneur running multiple businesses, including Creadio, a marketing technology agency, and TolHouse, a private social club designed for the creative and entrepreneurial class in Toledo, Ohio.
On this solo episode, Will reflects on the lessons of 2024 and shares his strategic game plan for 2025. He discusses how to avoid burnout, the importance of building systems for sustainable growth, and why staying stagnant means falling behind. Plus, he highlights how his businesses are leveraging AI for efficiency, how he’s scaling his real estate ventures, and why creating space in your life is key to achieving your goals.
Follow Will Lucas on Instagram at @willlucas
Learn more at AfroTech.com https://instagram.com/afro.tech
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
So thankful that you guys rock with this podcast, that
you have subscribed to this podcast, or that you tell
somebody else about this podcast. Whatever you do and showing
your support for this podcast means so much to me.
And the biggest compliment is when you share with somebody else.
So thank you for you know, rocking with your boy
and Black Tech, Green Money. What we're trying to do
(00:21):
here is give you insights knowledge on wealth creation and
this is particularly for people who are either building or
leveraging technology for their wealth and legacy. And so this podcast,
this particular episode is going to be a little bit
more about what's been going on with me in twenty
(00:43):
twenty four and what I plan for twenty twenty five.
What we tend to do is expect unintentionally. Often I think,
I don't think it's you know, something that we do
just maliciously. But what we think, what we tend to
do is assume that because the year has changed, that
things are just different. And I had this post that
(01:05):
I put up on I think at my threads a
couple of days ago. So just because it's a new year,
if you don't change the operations the way your habits
work at et cetera. Then your twenty twenty five will
be actually worse than you're twenty twenty four, and that's
because the landscape around you is changing. So one of
the biggest lessons I learned in business was, like, there
(01:28):
is no stasis, Like there is no flat. What we
assume is flat is just because the numbers may be
the same as they were last year. You know, maybe
we didn't grow, we didn't grow as much as we
could ever should have, or maybe we're down just slightly.
All of those things mean you're down because the market
is continuing to progress, and you being flat means that
(01:50):
everything else is changing around you and going in a
positive direction while you're stuck where you were. So if
you have not taken the initiative and responsibility of changing
your habits and putting systems in place, changing your operations,
then things will be what they were last year, and
(02:12):
that means that you will be increasingly behind. And so
I've already started to feel and then it's a wee
a weekend. I've already started to feel the pressure of
twenty twenty five and the things that are in front
of me, the things that are on my plate, what
happened to me in twenty twenty four was by the
end of the year September October was on fumes, like
(02:35):
legit running on fumes, and it's my own fault. I
will talk more about that. Like I have a few businesses,
toll Houses. One toll Houses a private social club that
is designed for the city d well and creative and
entrepreneurial class. And so it's in my hometown of toled Ohio.
We're sitting right on the water. Water's right outside you
know where I am right now because my Creatio office.
(02:59):
Creatio is my market company. That office is right here
inside Toehouse in the front of the building. So toe
House is twenty five thousand square feet that we own. Here.
There's five bars, there's five lounges. There's a coffee house here.
There's a jazz club. Jazz and blues is what we're
doing there. There's a cigar lounge in there, there's a
(03:20):
pub in the back. There's a coworking space with two boardrooms,
two conference rooms, a work lounge, there's a private dining area.
All of these different amenities that we offer to our
members and somebody. These areas are open to the public,
like the coffee house and the jazz club, but everything
else is for members and their guests. So that's Toll House.
Then Creatio is a marketing, technology and production agency, so
(03:43):
we do everything from video production, website development, communication, strategy design,
and more out of Creatio. And that business is a
business I've been running since two thousand and seven, and
so Creatio and my team is actually next door in
the office next to me, and so that team is
a growing team, and we are really working to, particularly
(04:08):
for the region that we're in, is help companies and
organizations reach and engage multicultural and diverse audiences. So we
specifically work with not intentionally, but specifically. Our customers just
tend to be governments, nonprofits, school systems, et cetera. Because
they are trying to reach and engage multicultural and diverse audiences.
(04:29):
We do other things. Those just tend to be the
people who have us on retainer. Then beyond that, there's
four other four total real estate properties that we own
right on the same strip. So I have this building
that I'm in right now, which is the Toll House
and Creati operation. The next door is a building that
(04:50):
we bought earlier in twenty twenty four, So that's another
ten thousand square feet. Then about two blocks down on
this same street water there's two more buildings that I bought,
I want to say, in twenty twenty three, and in
twenty twenty two we bought two other buildings. In total,
there's sixty thousand square feet that we have right in
(05:11):
this same stretch, which is the historic Vistula District in Toledo.
And so I'm committed to this area number one because
I saw the most opportunity here and the most white
space for getting my ideas out into the world. Like
I'm not in a real estate holder from the perspective
(05:33):
of I'm trying to lease out space. I have enough
ideas of my own and I'm an operator, and so
I am interested in starting my own operations out of
these properties. Now that that doesn't mean like forever, I
won't lease out or rent out space, but I'm working
on getting my operations going for the business ideas that
(05:55):
are very very quickly coming into fruition. So toll House
being the first physical footprinted business that mattered, I guess
for square footage like Creatio, we didn't don't necessarily need
a place where customers could come but we do intend
to have more space for creatives to be able to produce.
(06:18):
And so obviously I do a podcast. I've been podcasting
for almost a decade, if not a decade, and there
are many people in our community who want to get
into podcasting, video and or audio, and what we're doing
is creating space for them to be able to have studios.
And so you'll see more of that kind of thing
(06:40):
come up if you're following along in my business journey.
But the point in telling you all these things, and
there's also other things, like there's boards I sit on.
I just actually recently turned off of the University of
Toledo Board of Trustees. I was the chair to board
up until a couple of months ago. And I'm currently
(07:01):
vice chair of the Casino Control Commission for the State
of Ohio, and I will turn off of that board
in very short order, just a couple of months. And
so what's important to me is that I'm doing things
that feed the mission. And so my life's mission is
(07:22):
to create content and opportunities that helps black people realize
entrepreneurial success beyond their wildness dreams. So everything I do
is intended to do that. What happens is because I'm
involved in so many things and I have a family.
Because I have so many things going on, I can
(07:42):
get bogged down with just a to do list. The
to do list drives my day. My calendar and my
to do list drive my day. And it's not a
great way to live. It is a way to live,
but the businesses end up unintentionally driving me, or at
least my intention is not for them to drive me,
(08:04):
but they end up driving me because I'm just doing
so many things. And mind you, I've been doing this
with like a virtual assistant, a remote assistant somebody who
used to live in Toledo no longer lives in Toledo,
but helps me now remotely. She mostly manages my calendar
and my schedule and projects for the Creatio team. But
(08:26):
I have not had an on site assistant in a
long time, or assistant that I'm seeing regularly on site
in a long time. And part of that's my fault
because I don't I have not found what I work
well with. And Sada, who's my assistant now, is fantastic,
and even though she's remote, there's so much comfort there.
(08:51):
She knows what I like, she knows what I don't like.
She knows how I like my schedule to be outlined,
she knows when I don't want to take meetings whatever.
So she's already aware of my proclivity. Is the things
that I like set up in specific ways. But what
happens is when you don't have somebody nearby or you know,
(09:16):
within arms reach, that things just end up coming to you.
And there's like no barrier between me and opportunities. There's
to vet these opportunities, because not every opportunity is a
good opportunity, and not every opportunity is for you. But
I am the the blessing and like the I don't
(09:37):
want to say curse, but like the good and bad
thing that I have in equal parts. I am equal
part business and creative. And so that's my superpower. And
so I am really good at operating and really good
at creativity. And so what happens is because I have ideas,
I can roll and rock out on those ideas very quickly.
(10:00):
And that's not always a great thing. It is good
to be able to move fast, but that doesn't mean
you always should move fast, because if you've heard the
old adage, you know, if you want to go fast,
go alone. If you want to go far, go together.
I am learning that and living that in real time
because I've put myself in positions that require me to
continue to go fast, and I'm paying for that in
(10:22):
many ways because I've not always brought people along, and
so I've had to learn as an entrepreneur and as
a CEO that you know, you can't just always you
can't always turn on a dime. It's great to be flexible,
and it's great to be agile, but you will burn
yourself out if you continue to turn on dimes at
(10:43):
one hundred miles an hour. And so at the end
of last year again, you know, September October somewhere around there,
which is gassed like even an afro Tech and even
I mean actually probably not Afrotech, because I like, I
was rested up for afro Tech, but globally just exhausted.
(11:04):
And I've learned how to operate exhausted. But it's not
good to operate exhausted. Like I'm not bragging. I'm not
saying that, yo, this is the way to live grind time.
I'm not saying that at all, cause it's not great
to live that way. But I'm coming out of the
season of living that way, and that means putting in
position and putting in place operations and systems that allow
(11:27):
me to have more space in my life. And so
if you don't have space, the things that would come
to you can't even find an opportunity to get to you, Like,
if you don't have space in your life, you will
miss out on other things. And so what I found
is as it's equally as important to build the operation
(11:51):
as it is to have great ideas. Everybody's got an idea.
Everybody's got, you know, things that they believe that they
will start as a business. Everybody's got great ideas, even
though I'm sure you I'm sure somebody you know has
ideas that will never come into being, because it's not
(12:12):
just about having the idea. It's about also putting in
together the systems and executing on those ideas inappropriate ways.
And I have not always I've always executed, but I
have not always executed in appropriate ways, and therefore it's
caused strain and stress in areas of my life. And
(12:33):
I'm just like, I can't continue to live like this,
and so I've been fixing those things, and I dug
myself so deep into so many of these respects that
it's like now it's an opportunity to come out and
coming out of that hole that I've dug so long,
for so long that you don't just jump out of
(12:55):
the hole. You have to climb out of the hole.
And I've been finding myself with opportunities to climb out
of the hole. And so it's been a process and
it is a process that I will continue to do
for the rest of my life, because as you get
one thing going, other things again coming to play. And
there are other businesses that will be launching this year
(13:16):
that will change the landscape once again. But the important
thing is to not make those same mistakes again. And
so I'm looking forward to sharing more about this particular journey,
but I want to talk about today how I'm using
the things that I've learned over last year, over this
(13:38):
past year for my twenty twenty five and so particularly
as it relates to me my professional journey and toe
housing creatio. So we've been leaning very heavily into AI,
as you should be. If you're not, what are you
doing well? Just in some very simple ways and some
(14:00):
very in depth ways, But the very simple stuff like
we have again a jazz club here at Toehouse and
Lucille's Jazz Lounge. So if you look it up onlines,
just Lucille's Jazz Lounges dot com. That's my jazz club.
And I was because I do podcasting and I do
voice stuff, I was doing all the intros for our performers,
(14:22):
and so what I would find is I would always
be left with a batch of intros to go record,
and that's just another thing to do. So like none
of the things that found their way onto my to
do list were like super complex things. It was just
another thing. And like big problems aren't made always of
(14:47):
big issues, like big problems are made of small issues.
It's like, you know, when I was growing up, I
had learned that, you know, you don't just go from
a well running vehicle to needing new rotors, like you
go from a well running vehicle to brake pads that
(15:08):
need to be changed. And if you don't fix the
brake pads, that becomes a different problem. And if you
don't fix that problem, that becomes a different problem, and
the problems compound, Like so what could have been a
thirty dollars forty dollars fifty dollars fix now is a
couple hundred dollars fix or thousands of dollars fixed, depending
on what kind of car you got, because you didn't
get the small thing resolved. So the point I'm making
(15:33):
in that is what I have found is on my
to do list, there's a lot of little things that
just need to get done. And that doesn't mean they
need to get done by me, though, And that's always
been our problem is I've known that other people could
probably do this thing, but I knew I could do
it faster, and I knew I need to pay somebody
(15:53):
else due to so I can just get it done
and be over and done with. And it's not a
great way to run a business that you play to grow.
And so what happens to too many businesses like ours
ours is that we end up having single, you know,
one person on the payroll. Some of us don't even
(16:16):
have real payroll. We just take money out the business.
But for general purposes, most of our businesses don't have
more than one employee, and so to house, there's twenty
two people here on staff. And so what I've had
to learn how to do is not continue to dig
myself in these holes that I had previously dug in
(16:39):
other businesses, where I had painted myself in the corners
because I was the only person doing things, which means
I was the only person who knew how and why
we did things certain ways, because all the institutional knowledge
was in my head. And so what's been important for
me is to allow other people, people and systems technologies
(17:02):
even to take over some of this stuff. So particularly
again back to Lucille's. I know that was a long
way back to Lucille's, but with Lucille's even I was
doing all these voiceovers. So now we're using AI and
I'm just typing in, Hey, here's the artists we have,
here's our typical intros. Create these voiceovers. So now I
use eleven Labs for this. So eleven Labs just creates
(17:27):
all of our voiceovers for all of these shows, and
so it doesn't need to be my voice that's introducing
people to these acts who perform at Lucille. So that's
one way that we're using these technologies to be able
to just relieve things from my play, and soon there
will be somebody else who just does it and I
don't even got to be involved in it anymore. But
(17:48):
today it's just me going to the website, inputting the
artists and spitting it out, and then I send the
MP three to my guy. Soon again there will be
somebody else who says, Okay, there's an act coming up,
make sure we have this voiceover for the intro, and
I won't even be involved anymore. But again it comes
as a process of working myself out of the whole
(18:10):
that I dug myself into. How else are we using
AI here at Tohouse? So another way we've been using
AI here at Toll House is just working on our
events calendar. And so because we have all this member
data and data for people who even just visit as guests,
we've built this database of interests in, database of profiles,
(18:34):
and database of demographics that we can then build programming around.
So our two words of the year for twenty twenty
five are partnership and program development here at Toll House.
So partnership was also our word of the year for
twenty twenty four. And what that means was it wasn't
necessarily that we built Toll House to be the sole
(18:58):
producers of all of our program I mean, we wanted
our members to take the front seat on the types
of programs they wanted to see us do. So members
became the faces the influencers of the programs that we
developed here. For twenty twenty five, we're keeping that same
sentiment alive, but we're also adding in professional development because
(19:20):
so many of our members, if not a third close
to it, are on corporate memberships. So that means that
they come here to work. They come here during the day,
they come here to have meetings, they come here to
you know as their hybrid or remote office, and so
they're getting work done here. And so how about we
lean into that and provide them professional development opportunities to
(19:43):
where they're hearing a talk, or they're listening to a
fireside chat, or they're engaging in a seminar to help
them be better at what it is that they're aiming at. So,
whether they're working somewhere or whether they're starting a business,
they're going to find the programming that they need here
to help them be better. As a matter of fact,
I'm doing a talk coming up on prompting for AI
(20:08):
that's specific for small businesses. How to prompt AI to
help get you the information that you need to grow
your small business. So that's one of the things. We
also have other talks on things that are not necessarily
just business related, but things about the kind of foods
you eat. So there's people in our membership database who
are very interested in more holistic foods. But the point
(20:31):
is we used AI. We just dumped all this information,
all the characteristic information about our members, and you know,
we use that to analyze what types of programming might
be of interest to people in this population. And so
I've been using a lot of chat sheept's muscle to
build out our programming calendar and come up with ideas
(20:55):
that otherwise we wouldn't have thought of if I've even
done it for Lucille. It's like, one of the interesting
things Seals is it's a jazz club. Jazz and blues
is what we're doing there. And it's constantly like booking
an act for a show. And we have a fickle market,
and so people don't always want to see the artists
(21:16):
that you think is fire or that may work in
other communities and other markets. Just because they working in
the market doesn't mean they're gonna work here in Toledo.
And so I've been using chat GPT just to provide
guidance on how I should think about our programming and
lou seals our talent roster, and it came up with
this idea going back and forth with it of alternative
(21:41):
types of shows, and so what we're doing actually is
the show coming up. I think it's in February where
we're doing an album show to where there will be
an mc R host who will be on stage and
members of the audience can bring an album with them,
actual vinyl twelve inch vinyl with them or forty five
(22:02):
with them of a song that means something to them.
They get an opportunity to tell the story of that
album or song, and the audience gets an opportunity to
enjoy that song alongside them. And so that's an idea
I would not have come up with otherwise. But we
were going through this analysis with chat GPT of how
(22:26):
to think about our location and that stage differently, like
what can we do other than just booking talent on
that stage, And through that process came up with this
really creative idea of having an album party an album show.
So I'm super excited about that one because I have
(22:49):
a very big record collection and I never really get
an opportunity anymore to share those songs with other people.
And so you might have people over to your house,
so you might have you know, maybe you're a DJ
who still spins with wax, but just to have these
old records that sit up in your grandmother's you know,
(23:10):
attic or wherever they are, you know, having an opportunity
to pull those out, dust them off, and bring them
to a jazz club and blues club and play them
for people, and then get an opportunity to tell the
story behind why it means so much to you. I
think it's super duper special. On the creatio side, how
we're using AI is you know, for number one, very
(23:34):
surface level action is to just help us with emails.
I want to respond to emails in specific ways. Just
train a particular GPT on this is how I respond
to emails, will just spit out a response. We use
(23:55):
AI a lot for writing scripts, and so we get
from clients this is the goal of this particular effort,
whether it's a commercial, whether it's a documentary or whatever.
It's often putting together that shot list, the script and
all of those things. The creative treatments we're doing a
(24:16):
lot of that stuff with chat gpt now writing blog
posts for just putting thought leadership, and so I may
have ideas on particular things that are happening in the marketplace,
things that are happening in our community, things that are
happening globally that would be good to distribute on creatios
(24:37):
platforms on social media. And I don't always need to
spend an hour or two hours or half an hour
writing a blog post when I can put the general
ideas down and just work through on Claude writing out
a blog post and tailoring it for our audience. And
(24:57):
one quick thing is like we use chat chip to
do a lot of analysis, and I use Claude to
do more writing. And there's a lot of people I've
heard that use it the same way. And I really
believe that it's more the user interface than it is
like the technical you know, offering. That's just this is
my own personal hot take. Because chat GPT you can
(25:19):
get really great content written content out of chat gpt also,
but the user interface on Claude is so much more
aesthetically pleasing to write on. So I think that is
you know, even claud I mean, take the alternative approach
like Claude you can do really deep analysis, but chatchipt
(25:40):
it looks like an analysis machine. It's kind of like
how you know Apple and Microsoft used to be back
in the day, Like Apple was for creatives and microsofte
for business people. It's like, that's kind of like that,
you know, way of a corporate business people, I should
say corporate business people like Microsoft and creatives like Apple.
But clawod tends to be more leaning because of the
(26:03):
user interface. It's a beautiful place to write chat ept
if I'm just doing analysis. Again, it's a great place
to provide analysis and insights. We also do voiceover work,
you know, so getting those documentaries who need voices using
eleven Labs. I use eleven Labs for that. So what
(26:26):
am I doing, you know with these businesses pecifically the
real estate? So I talked about we have these four
properties on the in the right here in the Pastrulia district,
and I've been very intentional about only acquiring properties that
are in this same area because I want to own
this area, and we're doing a pretty good job towards
(26:49):
that goal. We're sixty thousand square feet now and across
four buildings and there is a market that we're opening
this year. We're doing We're gonna move the cigar lounge
out of Toll House and put it in one of
the other buildings and make it publicly accessible. There will
be members only areas, but Vistula District, where my businesses
(27:14):
are located, is on the outside of downtown, and for
our purposes, we need more bodies in the area. And
so what's been important for us is to create concepts
that just bring more foot traffic, more drive traffic in
the area. That helps the whole ecosystem grow, the whole
area grow. And so we're moving the cigar lounge out
(27:36):
of Toll House into one of the buildings and it'll
be members only area, and then another part of it
will be open to the public, will have a bar
and air food concept. And then the market, which just
followed along on my personal stories. You'll see more about
the market to come. But the market. We live in
a community that has like a Fresh Time fresh market.
(27:58):
We don't have a whole food I think we're supposed
to be geting the Trader Joe's, but there's an opportunity
there for us to create more premium offerings, better options
for the community. This is not necessarily like a food
desert effort to help, you know, dissolve that. I believe
(28:19):
that that is a worthwhile effort. I believe that there's
people who should be tackling that effort. I am not
necessarily personally making that effort to solve a food desert issue.
I am building a business to compete at the highest
levels with the whole foods, the Trader Joe's, the fresh markets,
(28:41):
the arawines like that's where we are targeted. So I
want to build a premium market that is that emphasizes brand,
and you'll see more of that in my conversations here
on this podcast, my YouTube channel, and my social media,
so follow along for that. I'm in. There's some other concepts. Know,
we've been thinking about other wine concepts, bush and shops,
(29:03):
small businesses that feed the ecosystem, the local ecosystem where
there's gaps in the marketplace. But what's important to me
is that there are that I'm taking advantage of these
opportunities because these opportunities won't be available forever and there
are real market opportunities. And you'll hear me talk more
(29:24):
this year about how we're going to scale these things
because as you recognize or you might have thought that
these businesses don't necessarily scale, they could if I position
in certain ways. But I'm trying to specifically target local opportunities.
But there will be software plays that I will talk
more about on this podcast that provides scale globally. So
(29:51):
we're building the technology because I'm very adamant on not
subscribing to a whole bunch of other software to plug
in to help us run our business more efficiently. We're
building that software because I have an agency that builds technology.
So not only at Creative do we do video production,
website development, we build software. And so we'll see more
(30:13):
of that effort pointed in house to where will be
completely vertically integrated, where you'll have this private club, this
grocery store, this butcher shops and guard lounge, all premium
offerings vertically integrated and underpinned by a marketing company. And
(30:33):
that's super important to me because we can own the
whole stack and create more opportunities that way. So that's
what's happening in my twenty twenty five And what I
want to leave you with is kind of how we
started is just because it's a new year, and just
because we roll the calendar over, your year will not
(30:56):
necessarily stay the same. Your year will not necessarily change
or be better if you don't change your operations, your habits,
and your daily activities. If you do the same things
you did last year, your year will potentially be worse
than twenty twenty four because just as you are staying stasis,
(31:18):
just because you're not changing, and you know, you might
make the same amount of money you did in twenty
twenty four that you will make in twenty twenty five,
or you might be the same way in twenty twenty
five that you did in twenty twenty four. You might,
you know, have the same output in twenty twenty five
that you did in twenty twenty four. Well, the market
around you is actually growing and getting more efficient and
(31:40):
getting richer. So if you're staying flat, everything else is
changing around you, which means you are declining. And so
while it may look on its face as everything is
the same, nothing is the same because the system around
you is getting more efficient and richer, there's more wealth
being created, and all of these things. So I want
(32:02):
you to spend some time if you have not done
it yet mapping out your twenty twenty five Give the
first couple of weeks of the year to yourself and
really map out what you want this to look like.
If you're great, you would have started in the end
of twenty twenty four. But it's not too late to
really get a handle on what you want this year
(32:24):
to look like for yourself, because I've already noticed there's
certain things about the third things that I didn't like
about my daily life in twenty twenty four are already
starting to creep back into my days, and it's up
to me to make sure I extinguish that number one,
but get a hold and grasp of the things that
need to be operationalized and standardized so that by the
(32:47):
end of twenty twenty five, I'm not again completely gassed out.
And so just because it's a new day, just because
it's a new year, does not mean that everything is changed.
Change the things intentionally and be specific about what you
want this year to look like. So that's my word
for you. That is the first episode of Black Tech
(33:11):
gree Money for twenty twenty five. It's a new season
of the Black Tech gream Money podcast, and so I'm
glad you spent this first episode with me just to
set the landscape of what we're gonna do this year.
So if you enjoy this and you're looking forward to
this next season of Black Tech, Green Money, I know Masking,
just go ahead and share this episode with somebody, put
(33:34):
something into comments. I really appreciate that like this episode
because that just helps the algorithm give it to more people.
So if you like this, if you got some value
out of it, share with somebody, comment on it, just
hit like subscribe, And I appreciate everything you bring to
this podcast, every single one of you guys who've been
rocking with me for a five seasons so far we're
(33:56):
going into our sixth season. From the bottom of my heart,
I appreciate it. Let's get to it.
So thankful that you guys rock with this podcast, that
you have subscribed to this podcast, or that you tell
somebody else about this podcast. Whatever you do and showing
your support for this podcast means so much to me.
And the biggest compliment is when you share with somebody else.
So thank you for you know, rocking with your boy
and Black Tech, Green Money. What we're trying to do
(00:21):
here is give you insights knowledge on wealth creation and
this is particularly for people who are either building or
leveraging technology for their wealth and legacy. And so this podcast,
this particular episode is going to be a little bit
more about what's been going on with me in twenty
(00:43):
twenty four and what I plan for twenty twenty five.
What we tend to do is expect unintentionally. Often I think,
I don't think it's you know, something that we do
just maliciously. But what we think, what we tend to
do is assume that because the year has changed, that
things are just different. And I had this post that
(01:05):
I put up on I think at my threads a
couple of days ago. So just because it's a new year,
if you don't change the operations the way your habits
work at et cetera. Then your twenty twenty five will
be actually worse than you're twenty twenty four, and that's
because the landscape around you is changing. So one of
the biggest lessons I learned in business was, like, there
(01:28):
is no stasis, Like there is no flat. What we
assume is flat is just because the numbers may be
the same as they were last year. You know, maybe
we didn't grow, we didn't grow as much as we
could ever should have, or maybe we're down just slightly.
All of those things mean you're down because the market
is continuing to progress, and you being flat means that
(01:50):
everything else is changing around you and going in a
positive direction while you're stuck where you were. So if
you have not taken the initiative and responsibility of changing
your habits and putting systems in place, changing your operations,
then things will be what they were last year, and
(02:12):
that means that you will be increasingly behind. And so
I've already started to feel and then it's a wee
a weekend. I've already started to feel the pressure of
twenty twenty five and the things that are in front
of me, the things that are on my plate, what
happened to me in twenty twenty four was by the
end of the year September October was on fumes, like
(02:35):
legit running on fumes, and it's my own fault. I
will talk more about that. Like I have a few businesses,
toll Houses. One toll Houses a private social club that
is designed for the city d well and creative and
entrepreneurial class. And so it's in my hometown of toled Ohio.
We're sitting right on the water. Water's right outside you
know where I am right now because my Creatio office.
(02:59):
Creatio is my market company. That office is right here
inside Toehouse in the front of the building. So toe
House is twenty five thousand square feet that we own. Here.
There's five bars, there's five lounges. There's a coffee house here.
There's a jazz club. Jazz and blues is what we're
doing there. There's a cigar lounge in there, there's a
(03:20):
pub in the back. There's a coworking space with two boardrooms,
two conference rooms, a work lounge, there's a private dining area.
All of these different amenities that we offer to our
members and somebody. These areas are open to the public,
like the coffee house and the jazz club, but everything
else is for members and their guests. So that's Toll House.
Then Creatio is a marketing, technology and production agency, so
(03:43):
we do everything from video production, website development, communication, strategy design,
and more out of Creatio. And that business is a
business I've been running since two thousand and seven, and
so Creatio and my team is actually next door in
the office next to me, and so that team is
a growing team, and we are really working to, particularly
(04:08):
for the region that we're in, is help companies and
organizations reach and engage multicultural and diverse audiences. So we
specifically work with not intentionally, but specifically. Our customers just
tend to be governments, nonprofits, school systems, et cetera. Because
they are trying to reach and engage multicultural and diverse audiences.
(04:29):
We do other things. Those just tend to be the
people who have us on retainer. Then beyond that, there's
four other four total real estate properties that we own
right on the same strip. So I have this building
that I'm in right now, which is the Toll House
and Creati operation. The next door is a building that
(04:50):
we bought earlier in twenty twenty four, So that's another
ten thousand square feet. Then about two blocks down on
this same street water there's two more buildings that I bought,
I want to say, in twenty twenty three, and in
twenty twenty two we bought two other buildings. In total,
there's sixty thousand square feet that we have right in
(05:11):
this same stretch, which is the historic Vistula District in Toledo.
And so I'm committed to this area number one because
I saw the most opportunity here and the most white
space for getting my ideas out into the world. Like
I'm not in a real estate holder from the perspective
(05:33):
of I'm trying to lease out space. I have enough
ideas of my own and I'm an operator, and so
I am interested in starting my own operations out of
these properties. Now that that doesn't mean like forever, I
won't lease out or rent out space, but I'm working
on getting my operations going for the business ideas that
(05:55):
are very very quickly coming into fruition. So toll House
being the first physical footprinted business that mattered, I guess
for square footage like Creatio, we didn't don't necessarily need
a place where customers could come but we do intend
to have more space for creatives to be able to produce.
(06:18):
And so obviously I do a podcast. I've been podcasting
for almost a decade, if not a decade, and there
are many people in our community who want to get
into podcasting, video and or audio, and what we're doing
is creating space for them to be able to have studios.
And so you'll see more of that kind of thing
(06:40):
come up if you're following along in my business journey.
But the point in telling you all these things, and
there's also other things, like there's boards I sit on.
I just actually recently turned off of the University of
Toledo Board of Trustees. I was the chair to board
up until a couple of months ago. And I'm currently
(07:01):
vice chair of the Casino Control Commission for the State
of Ohio, and I will turn off of that board
in very short order, just a couple of months. And
so what's important to me is that I'm doing things
that feed the mission. And so my life's mission is
(07:22):
to create content and opportunities that helps black people realize
entrepreneurial success beyond their wildness dreams. So everything I do
is intended to do that. What happens is because I'm
involved in so many things and I have a family.
Because I have so many things going on, I can
(07:42):
get bogged down with just a to do list. The
to do list drives my day. My calendar and my
to do list drive my day. And it's not a
great way to live. It is a way to live,
but the businesses end up unintentionally driving me, or at
least my intention is not for them to drive me,
(08:04):
but they end up driving me because I'm just doing
so many things. And mind you, I've been doing this
with like a virtual assistant, a remote assistant somebody who
used to live in Toledo no longer lives in Toledo,
but helps me now remotely. She mostly manages my calendar
and my schedule and projects for the Creatio team. But
(08:26):
I have not had an on site assistant in a
long time, or assistant that I'm seeing regularly on site
in a long time. And part of that's my fault
because I don't I have not found what I work
well with. And Sada, who's my assistant now, is fantastic,
and even though she's remote, there's so much comfort there.
(08:51):
She knows what I like, she knows what I don't like.
She knows how I like my schedule to be outlined,
she knows when I don't want to take meetings whatever.
So she's already aware of my proclivity. Is the things
that I like set up in specific ways. But what
happens is when you don't have somebody nearby or you know,
(09:16):
within arms reach, that things just end up coming to you.
And there's like no barrier between me and opportunities. There's
to vet these opportunities, because not every opportunity is a
good opportunity, and not every opportunity is for you. But
I am the the blessing and like the I don't
(09:37):
want to say curse, but like the good and bad
thing that I have in equal parts. I am equal
part business and creative. And so that's my superpower. And
so I am really good at operating and really good
at creativity. And so what happens is because I have ideas,
I can roll and rock out on those ideas very quickly.
(10:00):
And that's not always a great thing. It is good
to be able to move fast, but that doesn't mean
you always should move fast, because if you've heard the
old adage, you know, if you want to go fast,
go alone. If you want to go far, go together.
I am learning that and living that in real time
because I've put myself in positions that require me to
continue to go fast, and I'm paying for that in
(10:22):
many ways because I've not always brought people along, and
so I've had to learn as an entrepreneur and as
a CEO that you know, you can't just always you
can't always turn on a dime. It's great to be flexible,
and it's great to be agile, but you will burn
yourself out if you continue to turn on dimes at
(10:43):
one hundred miles an hour. And so at the end
of last year again, you know, September October somewhere around there,
which is gassed like even an afro Tech and even
I mean actually probably not Afrotech, because I like, I
was rested up for afro Tech, but globally just exhausted.
(11:04):
And I've learned how to operate exhausted. But it's not
good to operate exhausted. Like I'm not bragging. I'm not
saying that, yo, this is the way to live grind time.
I'm not saying that at all, cause it's not great
to live that way. But I'm coming out of the
season of living that way, and that means putting in
position and putting in place operations and systems that allow
(11:27):
me to have more space in my life. And so
if you don't have space, the things that would come
to you can't even find an opportunity to get to you, Like,
if you don't have space in your life, you will
miss out on other things. And so what I found
is as it's equally as important to build the operation
(11:51):
as it is to have great ideas. Everybody's got an idea.
Everybody's got, you know, things that they believe that they
will start as a business. Everybody's got great ideas, even
though I'm sure you I'm sure somebody you know has
ideas that will never come into being, because it's not
(12:12):
just about having the idea. It's about also putting in
together the systems and executing on those ideas inappropriate ways.
And I have not always I've always executed, but I
have not always executed in appropriate ways, and therefore it's
caused strain and stress in areas of my life. And
(12:33):
I'm just like, I can't continue to live like this,
and so I've been fixing those things, and I dug
myself so deep into so many of these respects that
it's like now it's an opportunity to come out and
coming out of that hole that I've dug so long,
for so long that you don't just jump out of
(12:55):
the hole. You have to climb out of the hole.
And I've been finding myself with opportunities to climb out
of the hole. And so it's been a process and
it is a process that I will continue to do
for the rest of my life, because as you get
one thing going, other things again coming to play. And
there are other businesses that will be launching this year
(13:16):
that will change the landscape once again. But the important
thing is to not make those same mistakes again. And
so I'm looking forward to sharing more about this particular journey,
but I want to talk about today how I'm using
the things that I've learned over last year, over this
(13:38):
past year for my twenty twenty five and so particularly
as it relates to me my professional journey and toe
housing creatio. So we've been leaning very heavily into AI,
as you should be. If you're not, what are you
doing well? Just in some very simple ways and some
(14:00):
very in depth ways, But the very simple stuff like
we have again a jazz club here at Toehouse and
Lucille's Jazz Lounge. So if you look it up onlines,
just Lucille's Jazz Lounges dot com. That's my jazz club.
And I was because I do podcasting and I do
voice stuff, I was doing all the intros for our performers,
(14:22):
and so what I would find is I would always
be left with a batch of intros to go record,
and that's just another thing to do. So like none
of the things that found their way onto my to
do list were like super complex things. It was just
another thing. And like big problems aren't made always of
(14:47):
big issues, like big problems are made of small issues.
It's like, you know, when I was growing up, I
had learned that, you know, you don't just go from
a well running vehicle to needing new rotors, like you
go from a well running vehicle to brake pads that
(15:08):
need to be changed. And if you don't fix the
brake pads, that becomes a different problem. And if you
don't fix that problem, that becomes a different problem, and
the problems compound, Like so what could have been a
thirty dollars forty dollars fifty dollars fix now is a
couple hundred dollars fix or thousands of dollars fixed, depending
on what kind of car you got, because you didn't
get the small thing resolved. So the point I'm making
(15:33):
in that is what I have found is on my
to do list, there's a lot of little things that
just need to get done. And that doesn't mean they
need to get done by me, though, And that's always
been our problem is I've known that other people could
probably do this thing, but I knew I could do
it faster, and I knew I need to pay somebody
(15:53):
else due to so I can just get it done
and be over and done with. And it's not a
great way to run a business that you play to grow.
And so what happens to too many businesses like ours
ours is that we end up having single, you know,
one person on the payroll. Some of us don't even
(16:16):
have real payroll. We just take money out the business.
But for general purposes, most of our businesses don't have
more than one employee, and so to house, there's twenty
two people here on staff. And so what I've had
to learn how to do is not continue to dig
myself in these holes that I had previously dug in
(16:39):
other businesses, where I had painted myself in the corners
because I was the only person doing things, which means
I was the only person who knew how and why
we did things certain ways, because all the institutional knowledge
was in my head. And so what's been important for
me is to allow other people, people and systems technologies
(17:02):
even to take over some of this stuff. So particularly
again back to Lucille's. I know that was a long
way back to Lucille's, but with Lucille's even I was
doing all these voiceovers. So now we're using AI and
I'm just typing in, Hey, here's the artists we have,
here's our typical intros. Create these voiceovers. So now I
use eleven Labs for this. So eleven Labs just creates
(17:27):
all of our voiceovers for all of these shows, and
so it doesn't need to be my voice that's introducing
people to these acts who perform at Lucille. So that's
one way that we're using these technologies to be able
to just relieve things from my play, and soon there
will be somebody else who just does it and I
don't even got to be involved in it anymore. But
(17:48):
today it's just me going to the website, inputting the
artists and spitting it out, and then I send the
MP three to my guy. Soon again there will be
somebody else who says, Okay, there's an act coming up,
make sure we have this voiceover for the intro, and
I won't even be involved anymore. But again it comes
as a process of working myself out of the whole
(18:10):
that I dug myself into. How else are we using
AI here at Tohouse? So another way we've been using
AI here at Toll House is just working on our
events calendar. And so because we have all this member
data and data for people who even just visit as guests,
we've built this database of interests in, database of profiles,
(18:34):
and database of demographics that we can then build programming around.
So our two words of the year for twenty twenty
five are partnership and program development here at Toll House.
So partnership was also our word of the year for
twenty twenty four. And what that means was it wasn't
necessarily that we built Toll House to be the sole
(18:58):
producers of all of our program I mean, we wanted
our members to take the front seat on the types
of programs they wanted to see us do. So members
became the faces the influencers of the programs that we
developed here. For twenty twenty five, we're keeping that same
sentiment alive, but we're also adding in professional development because
(19:20):
so many of our members, if not a third close
to it, are on corporate memberships. So that means that
they come here to work. They come here during the day,
they come here to have meetings, they come here to
you know as their hybrid or remote office, and so
they're getting work done here. And so how about we
lean into that and provide them professional development opportunities to
(19:43):
where they're hearing a talk, or they're listening to a
fireside chat, or they're engaging in a seminar to help
them be better at what it is that they're aiming at. So,
whether they're working somewhere or whether they're starting a business,
they're going to find the programming that they need here
to help them be better. As a matter of fact,
I'm doing a talk coming up on prompting for AI
(20:08):
that's specific for small businesses. How to prompt AI to
help get you the information that you need to grow
your small business. So that's one of the things. We
also have other talks on things that are not necessarily
just business related, but things about the kind of foods
you eat. So there's people in our membership database who
are very interested in more holistic foods. But the point
(20:31):
is we used AI. We just dumped all this information,
all the characteristic information about our members, and you know,
we use that to analyze what types of programming might
be of interest to people in this population. And so
I've been using a lot of chat sheept's muscle to
build out our programming calendar and come up with ideas
(20:55):
that otherwise we wouldn't have thought of if I've even
done it for Lucille. It's like, one of the interesting
things Seals is it's a jazz club. Jazz and blues
is what we're doing there. And it's constantly like booking
an act for a show. And we have a fickle market,
and so people don't always want to see the artists
(21:16):
that you think is fire or that may work in
other communities and other markets. Just because they working in
the market doesn't mean they're gonna work here in Toledo.
And so I've been using chat GPT just to provide
guidance on how I should think about our programming and
lou seals our talent roster, and it came up with
this idea going back and forth with it of alternative
(21:41):
types of shows, and so what we're doing actually is
the show coming up. I think it's in February where
we're doing an album show to where there will be
an mc R host who will be on stage and
members of the audience can bring an album with them,
actual vinyl twelve inch vinyl with them or forty five
(22:02):
with them of a song that means something to them.
They get an opportunity to tell the story of that
album or song, and the audience gets an opportunity to
enjoy that song alongside them. And so that's an idea
I would not have come up with otherwise. But we
were going through this analysis with chat GPT of how
(22:26):
to think about our location and that stage differently, like
what can we do other than just booking talent on
that stage, And through that process came up with this
really creative idea of having an album party an album show.
So I'm super excited about that one because I have
(22:49):
a very big record collection and I never really get
an opportunity anymore to share those songs with other people.
And so you might have people over to your house,
so you might have you know, maybe you're a DJ
who still spins with wax, but just to have these
old records that sit up in your grandmother's you know,
(23:10):
attic or wherever they are, you know, having an opportunity
to pull those out, dust them off, and bring them
to a jazz club and blues club and play them
for people, and then get an opportunity to tell the
story behind why it means so much to you. I
think it's super duper special. On the creatio side, how
we're using AI is you know, for number one, very
(23:34):
surface level action is to just help us with emails.
I want to respond to emails in specific ways. Just
train a particular GPT on this is how I respond
to emails, will just spit out a response. We use
(23:55):
AI a lot for writing scripts, and so we get
from clients this is the goal of this particular effort,
whether it's a commercial, whether it's a documentary or whatever.
It's often putting together that shot list, the script and
all of those things. The creative treatments we're doing a
(24:16):
lot of that stuff with chat gpt now writing blog
posts for just putting thought leadership, and so I may
have ideas on particular things that are happening in the marketplace,
things that are happening in our community, things that are
happening globally that would be good to distribute on creatios
(24:37):
platforms on social media. And I don't always need to
spend an hour or two hours or half an hour
writing a blog post when I can put the general
ideas down and just work through on Claude writing out
a blog post and tailoring it for our audience. And
(24:57):
one quick thing is like we use chat chip to
do a lot of analysis, and I use Claude to
do more writing. And there's a lot of people I've
heard that use it the same way. And I really
believe that it's more the user interface than it is
like the technical you know, offering. That's just this is
my own personal hot take. Because chat GPT you can
(25:19):
get really great content written content out of chat gpt also,
but the user interface on Claude is so much more
aesthetically pleasing to write on. So I think that is
you know, even claud I mean, take the alternative approach
like Claude you can do really deep analysis, but chatchipt
(25:40):
it looks like an analysis machine. It's kind of like
how you know Apple and Microsoft used to be back
in the day, Like Apple was for creatives and microsofte
for business people. It's like, that's kind of like that,
you know, way of a corporate business people, I should
say corporate business people like Microsoft and creatives like Apple.
But clawod tends to be more leaning because of the
(26:03):
user interface. It's a beautiful place to write chat ept
if I'm just doing analysis. Again, it's a great place
to provide analysis and insights. We also do voiceover work,
you know, so getting those documentaries who need voices using
eleven Labs. I use eleven Labs for that. So what
(26:26):
am I doing, you know with these businesses pecifically the
real estate? So I talked about we have these four
properties on the in the right here in the Pastrulia district,
and I've been very intentional about only acquiring properties that
are in this same area because I want to own
this area, and we're doing a pretty good job towards
(26:49):
that goal. We're sixty thousand square feet now and across
four buildings and there is a market that we're opening
this year. We're doing We're gonna move the cigar lounge
out of Toll House and put it in one of
the other buildings and make it publicly accessible. There will
be members only areas, but Vistula District, where my businesses
(27:14):
are located, is on the outside of downtown, and for
our purposes, we need more bodies in the area. And
so what's been important for us is to create concepts
that just bring more foot traffic, more drive traffic in
the area. That helps the whole ecosystem grow, the whole
area grow. And so we're moving the cigar lounge out
(27:36):
of Toll House into one of the buildings and it'll
be members only area, and then another part of it
will be open to the public, will have a bar
and air food concept. And then the market, which just
followed along on my personal stories. You'll see more about
the market to come. But the market. We live in
a community that has like a Fresh Time fresh market.
(27:58):
We don't have a whole food I think we're supposed
to be geting the Trader Joe's, but there's an opportunity
there for us to create more premium offerings, better options
for the community. This is not necessarily like a food
desert effort to help, you know, dissolve that. I believe
(28:19):
that that is a worthwhile effort. I believe that there's
people who should be tackling that effort. I am not
necessarily personally making that effort to solve a food desert issue.
I am building a business to compete at the highest
levels with the whole foods, the Trader Joe's, the fresh markets,
(28:41):
the arawines like that's where we are targeted. So I
want to build a premium market that is that emphasizes brand,
and you'll see more of that in my conversations here
on this podcast, my YouTube channel, and my social media,
so follow along for that. I'm in. There's some other concepts. Know,
we've been thinking about other wine concepts, bush and shops,
(29:03):
small businesses that feed the ecosystem, the local ecosystem where
there's gaps in the marketplace. But what's important to me
is that there are that I'm taking advantage of these
opportunities because these opportunities won't be available forever and there
are real market opportunities. And you'll hear me talk more
(29:24):
this year about how we're going to scale these things
because as you recognize or you might have thought that
these businesses don't necessarily scale, they could if I position
in certain ways. But I'm trying to specifically target local opportunities.
But there will be software plays that I will talk
more about on this podcast that provides scale globally. So
(29:51):
we're building the technology because I'm very adamant on not
subscribing to a whole bunch of other software to plug
in to help us run our business more efficiently. We're
building that software because I have an agency that builds technology.
So not only at Creative do we do video production,
website development, we build software. And so we'll see more
(30:13):
of that effort pointed in house to where will be
completely vertically integrated, where you'll have this private club, this
grocery store, this butcher shops and guard lounge, all premium
offerings vertically integrated and underpinned by a marketing company. And
(30:33):
that's super important to me because we can own the
whole stack and create more opportunities that way. So that's
what's happening in my twenty twenty five And what I
want to leave you with is kind of how we
started is just because it's a new year, and just
because we roll the calendar over, your year will not
(30:56):
necessarily stay the same. Your year will not necessarily change
or be better if you don't change your operations, your habits,
and your daily activities. If you do the same things
you did last year, your year will potentially be worse
than twenty twenty four because just as you are staying stasis,
(31:18):
just because you're not changing, and you know, you might
make the same amount of money you did in twenty
twenty four that you will make in twenty twenty five,
or you might be the same way in twenty twenty
five that you did in twenty twenty four. You might,
you know, have the same output in twenty twenty five
that you did in twenty twenty four. Well, the market
around you is actually growing and getting more efficient and
(31:40):
getting richer. So if you're staying flat, everything else is
changing around you, which means you are declining. And so
while it may look on its face as everything is
the same, nothing is the same because the system around
you is getting more efficient and richer, there's more wealth
being created, and all of these things. So I want
(32:02):
you to spend some time if you have not done
it yet mapping out your twenty twenty five Give the
first couple of weeks of the year to yourself and
really map out what you want this to look like.
If you're great, you would have started in the end
of twenty twenty four. But it's not too late to
really get a handle on what you want this year
(32:24):
to look like for yourself, because I've already noticed there's
certain things about the third things that I didn't like
about my daily life in twenty twenty four are already
starting to creep back into my days, and it's up
to me to make sure I extinguish that number one,
but get a hold and grasp of the things that
need to be operationalized and standardized so that by the
(32:47):
end of twenty twenty five, I'm not again completely gassed out.
And so just because it's a new day, just because
it's a new year, does not mean that everything is changed.
Change the things intentionally and be specific about what you
want this year to look like. So that's my word
for you. That is the first episode of Black Tech
(33:11):
gree Money for twenty twenty five. It's a new season
of the Black Tech gream Money podcast, and so I'm
glad you spent this first episode with me just to
set the landscape of what we're gonna do this year.
So if you enjoy this and you're looking forward to
this next season of Black Tech, Green Money, I know Masking,
just go ahead and share this episode with somebody, put
(33:34):
something into comments. I really appreciate that like this episode
because that just helps the algorithm give it to more people.
So if you like this, if you got some value
out of it, share with somebody, comment on it, just
hit like subscribe, And I appreciate everything you bring to
this podcast, every single one of you guys who've been
rocking with me for a five seasons so far we're
(33:56):
going into our sixth season. From the bottom of my heart,
I appreciate it. Let's get to it.
Host
Will Lucas
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