Episode 224 | Conrad Baird of Affordable Imports - Corie Sheppard Podcast

Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:16):
I've been here for a while and we're talking to a lot
of different artists, a lot ofdifferent personalities around
the carnival and the cultureright and one of the things that
I keep hearing people sayingsome of the naysayers they say
carnival and the culture right.
And one of the things that Ikeep hearing people saying some
of the naysayers they saycarnival is not a business and
Calypso is not a business andSoka is not a business.
So part of my mission is to seesome people who are in the
business, who might be behindthe scenes, who you might never

(00:37):
have seen before, and this isone of them fellas, hey, conrad
Baird, how are you going?

Speaker 2 (00:41):
sir, I'm all right man, you good Glad to be here,
man.

Speaker 1 (00:43):
Good, good, good.
You're always here, you know.

Speaker 2 (00:44):
You're always here.

Speaker 1 (00:45):
Don't say glad to be here.
Like you're now show up night,you know.

Speaker 2 (00:47):
Well, you know what it is.

Speaker 1 (00:48):
I'm in front of the camera.

Speaker 2 (00:49):
Glad to be in front of the camera.

Speaker 1 (00:58):
That's wrong.
Glad to have you in.
I'm out my bedroom, out offocus, in the dark things
shining off the top of my headand so on, and how things
looking professional.
This is the guy, One of them.

Speaker 2 (01:09):
One of them.
He's a part of our team.
I thought.

Speaker 1 (01:11):
Who's your team again ?

Speaker 2 (01:12):
We have Kyle, we have Che.
Recently we added a guy namedAaron.
He's part-time, but it's anexcellent small team we have.
We hit hard considering thesize, but yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah
so there's a team behindaffordable import studios, right
pretty much, at least in theoperations.

Speaker 1 (01:28):
You still have people in the community and everybody
still that supports of course,of course, of course, and of
course we'll talk about some ofthe people who use this studio
as well.
But I want to get into yourjourney and how you got here and
all that.
But behind the scenes forCarnival, let me ask you about
your season.
When I have Calypso, you alwaysask them how their season went.
How was your Carnival season?

Speaker 2 (01:51):
Carnival was a unique experience.
I mean every year somethingslightly different, but this
year, I would say, because we dothe rentals especially, that
was very busy.
Carnival from, I'll say Fridaynight, friday night, and I have
to specify night.
Yeah, carnival, we've been justgoing, going, going.

(02:13):
Technically it hasn't endedbecause, now have Carnival for
up the islands.
People are shooting content andif you think about anytime you
see a costume online, whatyou're seeing is somebody in a
studio capturing that.
So everybody involved themodels, the photographer,
designer, the people who assistthe designers, the bar owners,

(02:33):
all that yeah, they are a huge.
I mean it's a huge effort andit's still ongoing.

Speaker 1 (02:43):
Carnival is good though, no complaints.
Now you say Carnival Fridaynight and you stopped it.
But if I remember, rememberright, you would say carnival
saturday, carnival sunday,carnival monday, monday tuesday,
and we haven't stopped heretechnically, yeah so you know
half days over the studio prettymuch open every day pretty much
, I would say, for contentcreators.

Speaker 2 (02:59):
There's no rest and sometimes 10 o'clock any night.
We get a message you know howdo I do this, or you're
available yeah so there's norest um carnival, especially,
like I said, because there areso many different carnivals.
They have nothing, nothing,yeah they are nothing hill.
Yeah, grenada supposed to besometime soon exactly and

(03:21):
content needs to be out well inadvance for for them to
advertise.
And you know, know, get thenumbers up Gotcha.
So it's almost a year-roundthing.
The only time you may get abreak is closer to say Christmas
.
But yeah, we've been just goingat it, but that's good.

Speaker 1 (03:36):
We were talking about the business model, right?
Because that is one of thethings it's very intriguing to
me personally, because I always,every time I come in, I notice
I always ask who only had thismorning who coming next.
You know what I mean, becauseit's very, very it's fascinating
for me to see.
But that we be talking aboutCarnival a little bit, but your
content people who might usethis studio for content is

(03:56):
really really wide ranging.

Speaker 2 (03:58):
Yeah, that's one of the unique things we've been
blessed with.
Our clients technically arecontent creators and because
content creation could be usedfor so many different um
industries.
You just sometimes we reallyare amazed at who is walking
through the door.
At times you just never know.
So we now speak about carnival.

(04:19):
It could be a soca artist, sowe're still in Canterbury, but
then we have so many local R&Bartists.
We have gospel and that's justmusic.
Yeah.
Then you have to consider youhave persons who are celebrating
their birthdays, sometimes afamily.
They want to have a nice familyphoto shoot.
It just ruins it.

Speaker 1 (04:38):
It's a wide range.
There's some maternity shootsgoing on too.

Speaker 2 (04:40):
Yeah, maternity, that just got me frightened.

Speaker 1 (04:42):
That's the ones that I want to get out quick, you
know what I mean.

Speaker 2 (04:45):
Make sure and get your maternity shoot done early.
Don't wait until the belly big,big, big to come and do your
shoot.
Serious what's the issue?
Okay, so I know a lot of themothers.
They want to look ripe, ofcourse, but then you're tired,
you're tired and you can't keepup.
No, it's not easy at 8.5, 8months to be moving with that
belly, you know.

(05:05):
I say the right time and I couldbe corrected because there are
some experience.
Like you wouldn't believe.
We have world-class maternityphotographers even in Trinidad,
right here I would say it'saround like five, six months.
The belly is showing, but it'snot huge.

Speaker 1 (05:20):
Gotcha.
Yeah Well, I can tell you howhard it is to walk around with a
belly for years, you know, Imean I, I'm an expert I don't
need a consultant to help themwith energy.
You just let me know yeah,we'll bring in a little master
class or something.

Speaker 2 (05:31):
Yeah, yeah, I need a little master class.

Speaker 1 (05:33):
I remember coming here the first time with um
salute to cassius.
Yeah, cassius rocheford came inand we did a photo shoot for
the podcast.

Speaker 2 (05:39):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah,
yeah.

Speaker 1 (05:40):
Rush photography and before, yeah, yeah, rush
photography.
And before then, right, I'mlooking from the outside at a
photo shoot and seeing reallythe final product and not
understanding what goes into it,right?
And I remember coming and westarted to take the first few
photos and Cassius was likeCorey, there's no normal energy
when you record it, and I'm notthinking of what it takes just

(06:01):
to.
You know it's an act, you knowyou had to be prepped.

Speaker 2 (06:05):
Well, it's weird enough.
You say it's an act.
So it depends on what you'retrying to bring out in a person.
Sometimes you actually don'twant them to act.
You want them to just feelcomfortable.
Yeah, just be natural.
Be natural if you will.
And the minute you tellsomebody, be natural now, they
get all stiff right, they climbup now.
So the girls stuff right.
Yeah, there's this other clamup, like I said, but when you

(06:26):
think about it you are notfamiliar with the studio space,
so I don't know if you realize.
Recently we tried to make it alittle bit more homey and
certain parts of the studio.
yeah, the idea is that personsare comfortable.
They feel as though I just homein my living rooms and then you
come in and you know you have adecent time.
But that is a huge thing.

(06:46):
We have studio sessions asshort as one hour and some
people be like, yeah, it's morethan enough.
But when you consider the factthat this person has to get
comfortable, they have to feellike you know, yeah, I can let
my guard down a little bit.
That's why and I'm going to letout some secrets Photographers
are like I just take anothershot.
I just take another shot.
There's no real shooters atthat time.

(07:07):
They're looking for, they'retrying to just get you in your
comfortable state Gotcha?
Yeah, because from the time yousay, hey, I take any shot,
they'll be like, yeah, I felt ittoday.

Speaker 1 (07:17):
I felt it today, but I will say that you and your
team amazing job getting peoplecomfortable from the car park,
from the gate.
I'm starting to see the littlesigns behind it a little more,
as I hear often.
I appreciate it.
One of the things I appreciatea lot is that you all will and
it was almost awkward the firsttime.
You all did it but the peoplewho live in or the people who

(07:38):
come in after me, you all alwaysintroduce everybody, I mean,
and make it kind of thenetworking and the homeliness of
it.
That helps a lot.

Speaker 2 (07:45):
You're in the space the last thing you want to do is
just pass somebody by.
You never know again.
You never know who you'repassing on.
We have had many instanceswhere we've had people I didn't
see you in years you know howlong I didn't see you and they
forget about the photo shoot orthe video.
Sometimes it's as simple as ahey, good day.
You know that, courtesy again,you're entering a space, you're

(08:08):
leaving a space.
You want to have a good energyif you will.
You know, sometimes we talkabout energy.
It's just a matter of youleaving behind.
If you're leaving, um, this,this perspective, that is, you
know, accommodating homely, yeahI would say that energy is felt
.

Speaker 1 (08:23):
I can tell you that as a customer is really, really
felt.
And before I get into yourorigins and how you got here,
let me talk about your revenuemodel a little bit now.
I like to.
When I'm doing business class,I like to get to the money fast
so that students understand whywe in this place.
Wow, so your revenue modelstructured around one rent and
all the studio space and yousaid there's a multi very

(08:45):
different things you would do inthe studio space you have
several podcasts.
You have different photo shoots,video shoots and so on.
Right, yeah, uh, from what Icould glean as well, your model,
your other revenue stream,would be renting equipment.
That's correct.
There's just those two models,or?

Speaker 2 (09:00):
well, initially, affordable imports started with
sales.
Yeah, a little bit ofconsulting, in a sense, because
what we discovered is a lot ofcustomers simply don't know what
they want.
You're talking about me now,but keep going.
They have an idea, you know,but at the end of the day,
without the expertise ofsomebody who's more familiar,

(09:23):
they're kind of of left floatingaround.
And then equipment, especiallyfor photo and video, is not
cheap.
So you're talking aboutsomebody saving for six months,
a year plus, and they just come,and you know it's tough to just
depart with that money and walkaway, at least for me.
I always try to put myself inthe position of the customer.
I mean, sometimes they overdoit, they want to get of the

(09:45):
customer.
I mean, sometimes they overdoit, they want to get all the
information.
Or, later, youtube, now Go onYouTube the thing before you
come and ask me.
But seriously, though, that'swhere we got our start really.
That's why we are stuck withthis name affordable imports
From the sales, yeah.
So it's kind of strange for somepeople when they say affordable
imports have a studio.
It's like why?
And that's kind of like aresult of, just over the years,

(10:10):
expanding, trying new things.
So now, yes, we have this name.
That's on like a car dealershipaffordable imports but we have
a studio.
So, as I mentioned, we have therenters, we have the sales side
, as I mentioned earlier.
We have the renters.
Uh, we have the sales side, asI mentioned earlier.
Uh, we have the studio.
We also, because of the renters, sometimes end up on film sets,

(10:31):
right, um, video sets.
We do a little bit of gaffering, um, not everybody will
understand what that is, butit's mostly to deal with the
lights on a film set, okay, andthen we would sometimes like
consult again.
Um, even so, for corporateclients Gotcha, I'm the average
guy on the ground.
Sometimes they reach out to us.
You know what you think about.

Speaker 1 (10:49):
That's a very common question Well, yeah, I would
imagine.

Speaker 2 (10:52):
So your third revenue stream looking at is really the
expertise I would say that,yeah, yeah, the expertise, and
because of the studio now andthat's the latest product
technically we have been exposedeven more so to creative, so
along the way we would pick upstuff.
You know, we don't just comeand say, yeah, we know

(11:14):
everything, no, no, no, weobserve and we implement as we
go along.

Speaker 1 (11:18):
Yeah, that's something I appreciate.
Here there's a lot of fixing Ialways talk in business about.
You had to fix the tire whileyou're driving.

Speaker 2 (11:26):
And I feel that way here a lot.

Speaker 1 (11:28):
You know what I mean.
We're trying to figure it outtogether, which is appreciated.
It feels supported becauseyou're right, like for me
personally.
I'll tell you how I met Conradinitially.
Right, one day must be mash upa memory stick or something.
I can't remember where thishappened and Cassie herself told
me call this person you couldget, because before then it was
Amazon.
But of course I recorded everyweek them times.

(11:51):
So I can't wait.
I need something today to putan episode next week and I call
and when I call, you spoke to meand you say, yeah, I know the
podcast and I saw it Right.
And you gently suggested he'slike how far are you from the
wall behind you?
Yeah, it's his way of sayingthe thing looking terrible.
You know what I mean.

Speaker 2 (12:10):
No, and there's something I've been trying to
implement in my life I try notto tell people stuff because I
have my own opinion.
So I like to ask questions.
Yeah, it goes a long way, right, it helps, because you may have
an idea, but you don't have thefull, you don't know the
circumstances.
So you're thinking, yeah, Iknow what you're talking about,

(12:31):
but you didn't ask the question.
Next thing, you want that wallin your shirt.
Of course you love that walland I tell you you move away
from that wall Immediately.

Speaker 1 (12:38):
I alienate you from what you want to do, of course.
Of course, when I did a courseone time on effective personal
productivity, a managementcourse designed to get people
from supervision and middlemanagement up to senior levels,
and there was a whole module onasking questions and how
powerful that is Because, as yourightly say, if you tell

(13:00):
somebody something they're morelikely to kind of clam up, they
might get defensive.
Yeah, because the thing aboutit is, like you rightly say, a
client here like myself, I kindof know what I want in the end
and it's a very vague version ofwhat I want.
So one of the things Iappreciate being here is that I
could come and say the outcome Iwant and not worry about the

(13:20):
technical side of it, because Idon't know the technical side.
When you start to tell me aboutice, get frightened.
One side, I don't understand itright.
So if you say I started offinitially doing sales, I want to
go back to your background,because one of my experiences in
booking guests which isdifficult to do you had a real
follow-up with people.
Get the times right, get youknow.
All the stars are aligned foryou to get a guess here right,

(13:41):
but one of the things that hasalways happened is I say they
say we're doing it, and I sendthem the location and they say
oh, that's by Conrad Right, youknow what I mean, and that makes
life easier.
I'll tell you that.
Okay, but your name is startingto get synonymous with this, so
I want to ask your background.

Speaker 2 (13:59):
So you mentioned audiovisual and to me as a young
person growing up, I wouldtinker with technical stuff.
You know, just a typical youngman coming up.
You just you like electronics,you're into it a little bit.
That was my extent of trainingbefore this.
Yeah.
Yeah, it's just because youjust have that natural inkling

(14:28):
for you know messing with stuffa little bit, how it works, why
this works this way what worksbest.

Speaker 1 (14:31):
So in what area you grew up in?
Um, I grew up in a place calledLacano in Santa Cruz, oh nice
you're a part of it, man.

Speaker 2 (14:36):
You know these are my heartbeats.
All right, yeah, the Larabrothers.
It's a place where it's lower.
Some people say it's Sanwa,it's not the.
I would say it's the lowermiddle class, even lower end of
society.
In terms of, like, what peoplecould do economically, sure, and

(14:57):
I was exposed to Sanwa throughschool.
I see, yeah, so Sanwa, itdepends.
I basically went to school inSanwa my whole life, from prep
school all the way up tosecondary.
Oh, okay, yeah, I'm not surehow far you want to go back with
it.
Well, what primary school andsecondary school you went to
Sanwa, sda, because I was bornand grown SDA, right, and then,

(15:32):
Sanwa government, I think nowit's now San Juan South.
Okay, yeah, and the reason why Imentioned school and so on is
because that's when I wasexposed to another type of
person, if you will, because yougrew up in one area, but then,
because of school, you know, youstarted to become familiar with
oh, they have that, that exists.
Yeah, so I was exposed to adifferent type of people from
probably Aranguas, sikoro andBarataria and I would say it
seriously impacted me because Icame from a home where my
father's a contractor, mymother's a nurse and daddy was

(15:55):
always a businessman of sorts,an entrepreneur, and he would
have always advocated for me tobecome an accountant.
Yeah, you know, yeah, so Iactually am an accountant in
training at a professional life.
Uh, didn't complete acc alsowent into acc and it's true that
I was exposed to differentindustries as well.

(16:18):
Just like creators, accountantstend to have a wide range of
clientele.

Speaker 1 (16:23):
Gotcha.
So you started to see differentbusinesses.

Speaker 2 (16:25):
the insights Started to see different businesses, but
it's so weird how life happens.
Sometimes you study for onething and you just end up
somewhere else because of howlife happens, and you're just
kind of like narrowing down yourpath in terms of what you want
to do.
So because of my job as anaccountant, I ended up working
with a shipping company andthrough that I understood

(16:46):
logistics, and that's where Iwas able to now marry that
knowledge with camera and videoequipment, which is a whole
other story.
I wouldn't want to get too deepinto it, because then we could
talk for hours but essentiallywhat it is is just me narrowing
down over time and picking upthose skills here, a little
knowledge there, and applying itto something that could

(17:08):
eventually earn money.
I mean, growing up I would sellCDs.
I remember we used to makephotocopies in Sauer 25 cents,
and then you're trying to sellback the Ninja Turtle drawing 75
cents little things like that,you know.
So that entrepreneurial spiritwas always there from you, yeah,
a little bit, a little bit and,as I would say, I'll give dad

(17:29):
the credit.
As much as he wanted to be anaccountant, he was also always
kind of like, advocating for meto understand how to make money,
because he used to saysomething I'll never forget.
He said at the hotel you see,you see walking, busing concrete
and taking and thing, but inhis role it's not just the labor

(17:50):
intensive part, you have to useyour brain, of course, and
that's what something daddy saw.
He said.
If anything, I would at leastuse your brain because you have
to use it and you know, once youget older, the other way out,
you're out there having to bustconcrete and things.
Yeah, you know.
So you say it's mashup yourbody.
That's what you used to alwayssay.
So you say work hard, work hardin school and try and get
education and through that.

(18:11):
Now, um, I live a kind of softlife, you know, and I've already
had much like physical umexcision and probably like gym
and other exercise and so on.
But to get back on topic,through my exposure to the again
shipping company, I was able tounderstand logistics, started

(18:34):
bringing in equipment and it'sso weird how everything comes
together.
You know, looking back now it'slike, was this meant to be?
And I honestly sometimes wonderif like entrepreneurship is
like 20, 20 percent luck, youthink.
So yeah, it's weird how thingshappen.
I would have never.
If you asked me about thisabout 15 years ago, I would have

(18:55):
never thought, no, no, I, Iwait, I own a studio it don't
make sense.

Speaker 1 (19:02):
Yeah, it's something I come I always intrigued by and
and that's why when we spokealmost one of the first times I
come here I say, connor, they'regonna come on the podcast and I
had to tell people about hisjourney because I think you're
fortunate, like myself, to havea father who plant that seed and
you're very young.
But the truth is, if we have asociety full of people who might
not fathers, who areentrepreneurs, how do they, how

(19:24):
are they exposed, how do theyknow who is there to tell the
average that you could do it?
I think plenty people don'tbelieve is something that you
could do and they also sometimessee, I always talk about this
one percent thing on the podcastwe don't see the top income
earners in the country or thetop entrepreneurs.
Yeah, we almost just see themas real people.
We see them as fantasies yeah,uh, figments of imagination,

(19:46):
boogie men even sometimes boogiemen even worse, because I mean
you can't be that or you can'tdo that, you don't want to be
some people, of course, becausethey figure, you know, money is
the root of all evil yeah, soyou stay away from it, yeah and
I have a big issue with thatbecause, in my opinion, you
can't tell me, tell me I'm boundto be poor.

Speaker 2 (20:05):
That is something that has always bothered me.
I thought about it recently andthat has been something that I
almost I hate that.
I fear that almost Becauseyou're saying, essentially
because I was born in a certainplace, or I look a certain way,
or I came from these people, I'mnot supposed to have any

(20:26):
progress in life, I'm supposedto be that, stay there, and to
me that's scary.

Speaker 1 (20:31):
Yeah, who invent that .
So thank God for fathers whowould tell us these things.
And you know it's funny.
You say they tell you, don't goand break your back in
construction.
You ever notice.
Like, talk to entrepreneurs,right, most of them will tell
you they do what they're tryingto do what they're doing Because
it's tough, it's hard, you seethat, but Okay.

Speaker 2 (20:50):
So being in the studio again it has allowed me
to get some unique experiences.
And I remember at one time, atone point in time, we had
another podcast, fair enough,and the guy came from abroad and
he was interviewing a 1%, joeyeah, and the 1% walked through
the door and I was like, butthis guy normal.

Speaker 1 (21:13):
That's what we need to show more of.

Speaker 2 (21:14):
This guy normal, just like me and you right.
Corey more normal than me, soI'm like okay.
And it's so weird because ofwhat I do um, at least my role
in the business I oftentimeshave to walk away, set up, get
you going, you're comfortable,and walk away and let my guys
deal with you.
But I found myself sitting inon the spot so I had like a

(21:38):
front row seat to understandwhat it takes, and I will never
forget one of the things he hewas talking about is how much
you mentioned fathers.
Again, he was speaking abouthow much his father basically
influenced his progress and whathe does right.
So just to give a quicksynopsis without giving away too
much, essentially his father isinto construction as well, so

(22:01):
so immediately I'm like whoaparallels.
And then he's like the needlerose where they would have to
have cleanups after they do ajob his father.
So he would find himself doingthat portion of the business.
They naturally already do it,but then it was a business now

(22:21):
that he realized he could offerto other parties rather than he
just have it under his father'sbusiness.
So he now goes and register thebusiness and he starts
implementing systems and hiringthe right people, and one of the
things he said that stuck withme was the most important things
in the hiring process aremanagers, because they are

(22:42):
essentially your representativeon the ground rather than you
trying to manage everybody.
You're just basically talkingabout the structure of his
business.
I won't go too much into itbecause that's not our podcast,
but what I really took from itis how much you have to look for
a need and essentiallycommoditize it.
It's as simple as that.

(23:03):
You know a lot of people.
They try to work with theirpassion and you hear people say
you know, as long as you lovewhat you do, you won't work a
day in your life.
But as much as that is true toan extent, it sometimes is
difficult to commoditizesomething.

Speaker 1 (23:17):
It might be hard to pay Exactly.
It's hard to figure outsometimes.

Speaker 2 (23:20):
Yeah, it's really tough and he was going on and on
about how the business ran andhis influence and when you
really look at it, or when Ilisten to him a bit, it wasn't
just his father, it started fromeven before his grandfather Of
course, yeah, and that is onething.
I give props to certaincommunities.
They understand successionplanning and they understand

(23:42):
that this is not just for me,it's for generations down the
road.
I think that's where a lot ofthe one percent have it um on us
, where you and you really thinkand I'm saying us because I
want to be a oneof course Ilike with you.

Speaker 1 (23:55):
I'm glad you say that so you can leave miles on an
island.

Speaker 2 (23:58):
I I don't understand.
I mean, I know it's notachievable for everybody,
because then it's not onepercent right, yeah, it'll be 99
.
But what I really admire aboutcertain cultures is they
understand that it's not just me.
So you mentioned that peoplewould say, or parents would say,

(24:18):
I don't really want my childrento do what I'm doing, which is
true, but when you really thinkabout it, if you are doing in
writing, why wouldn't you wantthem to do it?
Because it's true, but when youreally think about it, if you
are doing in writing, whywouldn't you want them to do it?

Speaker 1 (24:26):
because it's the next generation you have to consider
of course yeah, and sometimesyou see communities who build
their lives around getting thechildren they matriculate right
into the business exactly.

Speaker 2 (24:37):
Yeah, that's it would .
Yeah, and you, you would lookat somebody on the floor, a
child on the floor of thebusiness place, and I'm like why
is this child not back playing?
Or they're doing what they'resupposed to do?
Yeah, they're playing, in asense, exactly.
They're learning the business,they're understanding the
business.
Sometimes you go into arestaurant and you see the child
on the floor doing the homeworkyeah, something I'd always

(24:59):
admired about Chineserestaurants in St James.

Speaker 1 (25:01):
Yeah, where I used to see there was one little girl.
I knew she would be a littleyounger than me, right, and she
used to be a little child.
On the counter when you go tobuy food, Until she went convent
and then she would be cashed.
Right, and then as I started togo to business school, she was

(25:23):
running her place.
Imagine that.
So I always looked at lot and Iappreciated it.
I can't imagine what her fiveyears was like since she's five
years old Because she learned inlogistics, delivery, customer
service, accounting, finance, athousand hours.
Of course, by now, while I'mpaying a thousand, she's paying
ten, yeah, so running herbusiness is going to be, and you

(25:46):
know where.
You see it.
A lot, too.
You see the younger generationswith her.
For instance, that restaurant'sstill where it was on the main
road, but she went on to launchother businesses that shadow the
business that her parents hadat the time.
So it's something that I'malways intrigued by.
So I want to go back to whenyou said you went to school and
you were exposed to differentpeople who impacted you.

(26:07):
Who are some of those otherpeople?

Speaker 2 (26:08):
So, again, because of growing up in Lackanope, it's
predominantly Afro-Tunnelaudience, gotcha, and there's a
certain culture that goes alongwith that.
It's village life, rightVillage life, pretty much.
We still have roosters.

Speaker 1 (26:25):
Literally roosters, literally I have roosters in my
neighborhood up to this morningI would hear the roosters, so
it's proper country, gotcha.

Speaker 2 (26:28):
Yeah, um, that's actually one of the the things
I've been blessed with.
When you think about it, ofcourse, um, I still live in
lakano and it kind of forces youto understand that, as much as
you're meeting with amulti-millionaire today, you're
still grounded as in.
You know what's on the, what'sgoing on around you, and it
doesn't sound bad.
But one of my neighbours stillhas a latrine.

(26:48):
Yeah, one of my next doorneighbours country life, country
proper thing.

Speaker 1 (26:53):
You experienced it different when you went through
that.
Yeah, I have a different lifeexperience and it's weird.

Speaker 2 (26:58):
I didn't even know and I don't want to say I grew
up poor, because that would belike a disservice to my parents
and they tried to achieve but Ididn't realize how much more
wealth existed out there growingup.
Because I always find it sostrange that you know some
people in the neighborhood willlook at us and say I'm doing
good and you know they treat usa certain way, but when they

(27:19):
reach outside they realize, bro,and I think that's one of the
things that I really want tolike, I want to focus on in
traveling and realize andexperience what it's like to
live in this, where I realize Imean not necessarily living like
to go and live, but just to beexposed to a different type of
living, to try and expand whatis possible.

(27:41):
Because you're growing up inthis box.
As far as you're concerned,this was in this box.
Are the world, is the wholeworld, is your in this box?
As far as you're concerned, thewalls in this box are the world
, it's the whole world, it'syour whole world.
And it's only when you reallytravel outside and get to be
familiar with other things thenyou realize there's way more to
life than this box.
So I would have grown up, as Isaid, in a more Afrocentric,

(28:05):
afro for Trinbago community andbecause of school, our Anguas
and our Sikora are predominantlyEast Indians.
So then I was exposed to a lotmore kumus.
You know garden, just simplethings like sada Sure, you know,
we would say you know some sadabake or whatever.
Like no, it's sada roti andthere's this whole discourse

(28:25):
right there, takari, and thenyou know aloo.
I didn't know anything aboutaloo until I went to school?

Speaker 1 (28:32):
No, of course.

Speaker 2 (28:33):
Because I know, like potato, you know little things
like that.
And then because of that, nowthe exposure I'll never forget I
had a friend named Kenneth.
He was he is a serialentrepreneur in a sense, thanks,
and where he would have gone toschool with us in Salon Sec, um
, but his brothers and they didthese random, like real weird

(28:56):
things, and Kenneth, I wouldn'tsay he wasn't the brightest, he
still did well, still scoredwell, excellent actually, in
certain things, um, but before Iknow it, um, we left school and
we always had this thing westill always go by him for
diwali and again, of course, youdon't know about that at all
and then he would have been, um,enrolled with prisons and even

(29:18):
though this man in prisons, hehave a garden up in, I think,
the hawk at our side with theuncle, and so, out of school
he's already starting to dobusiness and he started talking
about buying land and things.
So, whereas a lot of peoplethat I'm close to or near my
community are speaking about,you know, getting their first
car, he's already talking aboutland in las lomas and how we had

(29:43):
to go and plant garden early inthe morning, before the sun
come up.
We had to go and deal with thegarden before we could go in
prisons, and so he's making adecent bank and he has his own
things as well.
He's still into cars andwhatever.
But I will never forget therewas one day while we went by
Kenneth and we were looking allover Aranguas and I was like,
look at land out there, wow,there's just so much of garden

(30:04):
land that is the back of ouranglers back then.
And I remember one of myfriends.
He was saying like you know,you can't really buy that land
because you don't have noapprovals and whatnot.
And I was like that's weirdapprovals.
I don't understand nothingabout that.
I was like, okay, that's whereit takes its own land.
And if you look at the back ofour Angles, no, it's a

(30:29):
commercial industry, it's justindustrial land.
You see warehouses and stuffspanning apartments and whatnot.
And what you got to understand,especially in Trinidad once you
have that entrepreneurial spirit, you find a way.
You know you find a way.
And it's not so much that youcan't do nothing.
You can't do this, you can't dothat is.

(30:50):
You now have to figure out howdo I get this to happen so I
could do that.
So it's kind of like you'rejust constantly fitting puzzle
pieces together and trying tofigure out how am I going to get
to where?
I really want to do this, I'mgoing to do that.
And's what stood out to me asone of the things like as much
as the official way of doingthings.
You can't do that.
It oftentimes just needs anentrepreneur to come through and

(31:12):
say you know, the back of ourhand doesn't make a hell of an
industrial zone and you know youhave NP and a whole lot of
business.

Speaker 1 (31:23):
Everybody is a whole commercial space now.

Speaker 2 (31:25):
A commercial space, as I say, and over the highway
and stuff.
That was Swamp man.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
It always stood out to me thatessentially you would think that
this is impossible, butsomebody out there sees an
opportunity.

Speaker 1 (31:37):
Well, where we are now.
If you go back far enough, thiswas a real, real residential
area as well.

Speaker 2 (31:42):
Yeah, so now this is a whole commercial precisely.

Speaker 1 (31:45):
And you know, I read somewhere whether you tell
yourself you can or you tellyourself you can't, you're right
, so it's the mentality and thething about it like something we
talk about a lot inentrepreneurial class, right is
there's this portion of theclass where you talk about the
entrepreneurial spirit.
I find it to be one of the moredifficult things to teach,

(32:08):
right, because you find that youhave people like yourself who
take the chance and do it.
It's like riding a bike, youknow they say tacit learning.
Yeah, you can't explain tosomebody how to ride a bike.
You had to go there, you had tofall, you had to get back up,
you had to experience.
So even when you talk aboutbecause you're talking about the
exposure you get from justgoing to school, yeah, but I put
somebody else in that sameenvironment and they meet the

(32:30):
same people and they hear thesame things and they still never
take some of the things.
You know, everybody'sperspective is so different.

Speaker 2 (32:35):
It's amazing.
It's amazing how yourexperience the exact same thing,
the same factors.
How much your prior experiencelike would you say circumstances
.
Yeah, the same factors.
How much your prior experiencelike, would you say
circumstances make you retire.
So it's amazing how somebodywould see you know a open door
as an invitation and the nextperson would see that as an
invitation to come in.

Speaker 1 (32:54):
And teeth when you're looking, yeah, or somebody see
it as a threat, yeah.
So it's the difference betweenseeing a problem or opportunity
or obstacle, and opportunitycircle and an opportunity.
So when you say you, younaturally, because even talking
about it you already trained tosay now you could figure it out,
this idea that you can't do it.
Because your first questionwhen somebody's telling you
can't is probably like why?

Speaker 2 (33:12):
why not?
Or why what we need to do?
Yeah, yeah, yeah to make that ayes of course, of course so you
went through that schoolheading for accounting.

Speaker 1 (33:21):
Yeah, get into accounting, yeah, right.
So I want to go to the edge.
Right, the edge is a scaryplace for most people.
I think people mightunderestimate how scary it is
for people who have their ownbusiness as well the logistics
company you were in.
Where did you start seeing theopportunity in this space?
So what?

Speaker 2 (33:39):
I noticed was sorry.
What I noticed was I tried toget a camera in trinidad and it
was difficult, it wasn'timpossible, but it was difficult
, but for what's why you waslooking for a camera, just
personal use, yeah just personaluse.
So I was.
I am into cars and I just soldoff my, my precious.
I had a sports car and I waslooking for another hobby and it

(34:01):
always struck me that you knowthere are so many and so weird.
My father was into photographyas well, growing up, than a
sports car and I was looking foranother hobby and it always
struck me that you know thereare so many and it's so weird.
My father was into photographyas well, growing up, when I was
trying to get a camera.
I just couldn't find one.
So me now trying to beresourceful, I remember after a
week or two and the people onthem computer, I'm trying to buy
a camera.

(34:22):
I'm buying it straight fromNikon and Canon.
I'm doing a little bit ofresearch, google, whatever and I
can't buy the thing BecauseTrinidad, credit cards.
In Trinidad, they are blockedfrom purchasing stuff through
those websites.
They are basically USA only.
That's back then.

Speaker 1 (34:41):
Oh the sites have Trinidad and Couches.

Speaker 2 (34:43):
They actually can't purchase certain things using a
train of credit card, okay, fromthose sites.
And then I realized there wereother sites, third-party sites,
and then I realized there wereused examples of it and I was
like this is so weird and itwell enough.
Back then facebook marketplacewasn't really a thing.
There were facebook groups andwhatever.
So, again trying to beresourceful, and people spend so

(35:06):
much time watching crap onTikTok, on Instagram, whatnot,
and they don't realize theyliterally have all the tools
they need right there,Especially now right, it's so
weird.
I mean, oh, you know what I also?
I'll say it my mother wasinstrumental and me reading.

(35:30):
I read a lot growing up, a lotof reading.
So um, I I know I don't readbooks as much, but I read a lot
of online stuff, a lot of forums, a lot of information I try and
capture.
But anyway, long story shortshort.
I found a facebook group oneday.
I had like 400 members orwhatever, and it was something
about selling, sell and useequipment to an extent as local
local.
Okay, all right.
And eventually what happenedbecause a long story short is I

(35:51):
brought in equipment for myselfbecause I wasn't finding what I
wanted locally and then I neededto upgrade.
So I said I remember yourFacebook group, I'll sell it on
there.
And it went quick.
Yeah, okay, I was like that'sweird.
I'm paying much attentionbecause I have my job, I'm doing
everything as I supposed to do,as I am.
You're walking, you havesomething to roll around in, are
you going home?

(36:11):
After you might hit a gym, yougo and watch a show, you sleep,
whatever.
I say all this to say thateventually, what happened is I
realized there was anopportunity for reselling
equipment in france.
So I, so I had my own equipment, but I was bringing stuff just
to sell.
It wasn't for me.

Speaker 1 (36:28):
So you were going to bring it in to sell in that same
Facebook group, that same.

Speaker 2 (36:31):
Facebook group and, before you know it, that group
started to expand rapidlybecause you're getting a lot of
content creators coming up.
So it's kind of like, again, Ifigured I was lucky, coming at
just the right time, becausethere are photographers before
me, there are people sellingequipment before me.
Again, there have been so manyof what I am before me, but it

(36:55):
was almost like the perfectstorm where a knowledge of
accounting, a knowledge oflogistics, a knowledge about the
equipment on Facebook, meetinga lot of people and still
offering a kind of friendlyservice and eventually, word of
mouth and it still is to thisday to be our best marketing

(37:17):
tool where the group has nowreached 12,000 plus members and
everybody in the group at apoint in time was, and still to
this day, was like ask Conrad,ask Conrad, ask Conrad.
So this is not new.
No, it's not, and you'retalking about like 10 years ago.
I see I was looking backrecently to see where I had some

(37:39):
earlier posts and I think I hadback to 2014.
And it was kind of like areminder of like you know, we
came from real far.
I didn't realize like the timeflies so quickly when you're
having fun, when you're doingtoo.
Yeah, and it was.
I wouldn't lie.
One of the most fun thing aboutme for business is meeting
different people and justabsorbing a little bit of them

(38:02):
every like along the way.
I meet some really excellent.
I don't like to use the wordfriend lightly, but I meet some
friends along the way, somepeople I'm like to this day.
I'm amazed that yo, I know thisman 10 years and I don't even
know Like I reach home andpeople live in room.

(38:29):
I remember, especially in Saudi,I have some people that
hospitality in saudi isdifferent.
Of course, I would never forgetum, kieran yip, now kyn
photography.
Um, I reached by him and it wasa job I can't remember if it
was paper memory card orsomething and he had a bottle of
water.
I would never forget pulling upin a yard and he has a bottle
of water there waiting and weend up in old talk and to this
day, kieran on the message andsay, hey, how you going, nice,
you know, and the relationshipshave been blessed to like

(38:51):
accumulate over the years.
It's really amazing when I thinkabout it, I really think I'm
blessed, I'm lucky.
Um, some people would cite thecustomer service that friendly
that hospitality has as beingone of the reasons why they
still work at affordable imports.
Um, but it has been amazing.
It's an amazing journey.
Um, it didn't feel like 10years.

(39:12):
No, it don't feel like 10 years.
And even going back, like I waslike I did that right, you sure
, like wow, I used to go southlike three times a week after
work, any night.

Speaker 1 (39:27):
Sometimes I'm coming back up the road like 10 o'clock
in the night after I went towork in the morning yeah, of
course, because when you firststart doing that, even though
the group expanding, you haveyour day job, you have to do it,
you have to do it outside.
It's weekend and nights, kindof thing weekend night sometime.

Speaker 2 (39:41):
I can't talk right now.
That's fine, got it, and it'sso weird.

Speaker 1 (39:45):
So so, when did you get to the point where you start
to accept that you had to leavethe job?

Speaker 2 (39:50):
so that is something I I never accepted.
Yeah, I always felt probablythe entrepreneur in me like I
could make this work while I Istill have good I see I see um,
and it wasn't.
And I'll be honest, I mean, ifsomebody from my last job is
watching it wasn't a comfortableprocess at all.
I still sometimes think back onit.
I see, I see, but I didconsider some people as real

(40:14):
friends, right, probably more sothan just professional.
You know um persons that youwork with.
But what happened was I wasalmost forced out to extent it's
kind of like um, becauseaffordable imports grew to where

(40:39):
it was.
I had no choice but to leave.
So at that point you haveregistered affordable imports
and everything yeah affordableimports was registered, so I was
riding dirty for a whiledepositing money, commingling
the funds.

Speaker 1 (40:50):
Yeah, commingling.
Put this in the front of theepisode and make it a clip.

Speaker 2 (40:55):
You're commingling funds, you're just riding dirty.
You're doing what you had to do.
I reached so fast.
I had a um.
I had an excel sheet with thecoordinates of the different
bank atms for me to depositmoney throughout the country,
because you can't deposit low.
Yeah, you can't go same placeevery time and you're making up
all these weird systems.

(41:16):
All right, this account, this,this atm, will be one thousand.

Speaker 1 (41:19):
That one will be 2 000, figuring it out when it hit
.

Speaker 2 (41:23):
So, at a weird point in time, I could tell you which
atm how long it takes for themto clear it, and so I started on
the sandbank yeah, of course,as you go and you're riding duty
, but then there's no studio andso it's just you selling and
selling equipment at that pointback just made me back of a cab
bro so you get sold, you drop itoff yeah, you're just riding

(41:45):
dirty.
I remember um I had a mymother's Nissan Laurel, she let
me use and it had a.
It had a mopstick holding up thetrunk because it folded so much
boxes it busts busted springholding up the trunk Nice nice
and sometimes it would just slamdown bam.
I meet real people like that.
I can imagine, you know.

(42:06):
Yeah, it's amazing, I ain'tgetting robbed.
You know it's amazing becauseKnock on wood.

Speaker 1 (42:11):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (42:13):
We're not speaking out of existence, but when you
think about it as anentrepreneur, you're just
studying, I just need to getthis done.
You just had to get it done.
You just had to get it done andbecause I enjoyed it so much,
it really didn't feel like atask.
When, I would use an example, Iremember we had a delivery.
I was supposed and this is whenthings are running fairly

(42:33):
proper Sure, proper the courieris supposed to deliver to is
this fireplace in South.
I, the courier, was supposed todeliver to this far place in
the south I can't remember thename right now.
We're talking two hours drive,yeah, two hours drive from where
we are based in Samoa.
And since the start of the week,the man said show this thing,
go on reach on Friday and needus for weekend.
He's like yeah, yeah, go reach,courier, go reach.

(42:55):
And the courier and I go reach.
So the Thursday I was like hey,you delivering this thing today
.
He's like what are you talkingabout?
There was some mix up.
I think it was on all part andI'll never forget.
I was like I talked to my guys.
I was like do you have this?
He said yeah.
He said alright, good, and Ileft the office here and so on.
I went and delivered personally, just the expression.

(43:16):
I remember the man come outfrom the side of, like his
farmland, where they had somegalvanized fencing.
I see the fence open, othergalvanized open.
He come out, pull in the chair.
He say boy, if you know howthankful and poor reason a
little bit, you know howgrateful I am for this.

Speaker 1 (43:32):
It's so amazing.

Speaker 2 (43:34):
I always try to make that affordable import where
we're not just selling yousomething, it's like we be
making it happen.
It's part of the experiencewhere you understand we
understand that it's not justyou departing money for a
product.

Speaker 1 (43:49):
You need this, yeah there's some purpose behind it,
right?

Speaker 2 (43:52):
yeah, there's purpose .
I like that, um, I think thatis what defines affordable
imports understanding thecustomers purpose, um, what they
need from us, our, our purposein their life, and just meeting
those targets, like there'snothing else to me in business
that matters.
Of course you have to pay bills, you want to upgrade, you want
to progress, you want to do newthings, but I think to me that

(44:15):
is the pinnacle ofentrepreneurship solving
somebody's problems so much sothat you are the only person
that could have done it, ofcourse, of course.
And I think that's where, likewhen I get older, probably when
I'm ready to retire, I send yousomething or eat something.
That is all I look for, wheresomebody will come back and say
you know, because of you, myfather was able, and if it

(44:36):
wasn't for your business, thiswould have never happened To me.
That's the ultimate.

Speaker 1 (44:39):
Well, you're living that.
I told you that Almost thefirst or second time I record
here, I say, conor, they'remaking dreams come true.
You don't understand how longthis has been a dream for me,
seriously, and yeah, yeah, yeah,yeah, yeah.
So sometimes I'm in this spaceand I don't remember to focus on
the forced out from your, fromyour business, for a job.
Was it because of the businessyou were running on his side?

Speaker 2 (45:01):
yes, because I couldn't concentrate as much,
and I would admit that I couldnot concentrate or give my, my
job, as much attention as itdeserved, right?
Yeah, it's just the whole wayit happened.
Again, I wish it didn't, but itis what it is, life.
And yeah, you can't really harpon that.
As much as I say it stillbothers me to an extent.
You can't really harp on thatas much as I say it still
bothers me to an extent.
You can't really harp on thatbecause in my mind I'm like what

(45:22):
could I have done different?
Could I have probably justhired out more people so I was
not as involved?
But everything happens for areason, you know.

Speaker 1 (45:31):
Well, I want to harp on it for a minute, you know,
because there's a book I readcalled Fired Up.
Right, when my father firststarted the business business,
we started site up in 2005.
That's the marketing business.
Yeah, right, trade marketing.
So what, what?
What?
When we first started off, wewere both working at tstt, all
right, and he had.
We were kind of back and forthas to who should leave because
we had got no contract with sonyericsson, very similar to what

(45:52):
you're describing now.
He's still working there, right,but we had to do the people
work as a client, of course, andI don't want to leave because I
know starting off and I don'thave nothing, and he don't want
to leave because he's like hehad mortgage and he had children
and benefits, so it's difficult, yeah, and when we, when he
eventually left, we had oneemployee and he brought me on
board, uh, first for 2000, firstof january 2006 is when I had

(46:15):
started second of january, anduh, I remember him giving me the
book, fired Up to Read, and Iwas like, wait, we're coming to
start a business.
I'm excited, I want to see that.
Will you give me a book for a?

Speaker 2 (46:24):
little book.

Speaker 1 (46:25):
And I read it and it was.
It was a good book.
It was about the emotionalrollercoaster that entrepreneurs
would go on, and I read it andit impacted me a lot then.
But it's something thatcontinues to impact me today
Because, no matter how muchyears pass, the emotion that
goes with business the ups anddowns, the highs and lows, the
excited things when things aregoing well and the low lows when

(46:47):
things aren't going so well.
They're difficult.
So and one of the first thingsI fired up spoke about is just
what you talk about, like makingthat jump.
So some of us sit in a job,like my father Golden shackles
is a good way to put it rightthe job, the benefits, the
guaranteed money.
I never thought about what yousaid.
Where you spoke about maybe theentrepreneurial spirit is the

(47:08):
reason why you hold on to thejob, because you just think you
could get it done.
You want to hold on to both soemotionally.
Now you're sort of forced outof your company.
There's relationships there andso on which you had to deal
with and process.
Now you're on your own.
You had to make your own bank.
When months end, what is theemotion like there?
Curious thing.

Speaker 2 (47:27):
So I remember there was a situation that arose and
because of that situation,that's when I realized, yo, we
have to leave.
You know as much as otherpeople wanted me to leave, I
just thought I didn't have to.
And then I was like, when thatsituation happened, I'm like,
yeah, this is it, you can't goback there.
And what was scary is the factthat, as much as the business

(47:50):
was doing well and a lot ofpeople speak about this you know
, the first thing you need to doas an entrepreneur when you
have a problem, you go on Googleso you say, yeah, save six
months, your salary must.
It must be making twice as muchas a salary and yeah, you have
no depend on.
So if you do, you haveeverything set out for them, the
usual stuff and, like you said,you, you could tell somebody

(48:12):
how to ride a bike, how muchtime, but as long as you never
touch that pedal, you don't knowwhat the hell you're talking
about.
So at that point in time, whenthe situation arose, I, I was
like yo and I, I just spoke tomy, my boss, at the time and I I
mean as much as I haven'treally spoken to her after.
I would say publicly I lovethat woman to death, because she

(48:33):
was a bit of a symbol of what Iwould have liked to be and she,
to this day, has affected how Ideal with my my guys.
Yeah, because she had a as muchas she's very much a
professional.
She had a personal touch.
Um, I'll give her all thecredit again, as much as I wish
things happened differently.

(48:54):
I really admired her, um, shewas a huge influence on my life.
But going back to that moment,I spoke to her and said I need
to leave Because I was full ofemotions.
Yeah, how scary was that meeting?
Yeah, yeah, that meeting had mein tears, texting, and I
admitted openly Because, again,it was something I just really

(49:15):
didn't want to do.
And I will never forget when Idid handle that resignation
letter, she was like like oneday you'll thank me and I would
never give her that credit.
I hope you'll watch the video,but I would never get that
credit.
I would never thank you, um,but this is the thanks.
Yeah, this is the time.
This is as much time as you get, because it honestly is because
of that.
This is where we are now.

(49:36):
I do as much as I try and thinkback like how this could have
been different and that it it'sweird how life plays out.
There is no other way thiscould happen.

Speaker 1 (49:45):
No, yeah there's no other way.
It's hard to you'll secondguess it, because that and
that's what fired up was so good.
It spoke about that.
Should I go?
Should I go in?
Should I you know?
It was a weird thing.

Speaker 2 (49:56):
As much as I was saying, the business was doing
well when I, literally as Iwalked out of work that day, I
got caught.
Hey, conrad, I have anemergency, I need you now and
now.
You could go yeah if I was inthat position.

Speaker 1 (50:12):
I was so if you're still in work.
You couldn't, you couldn't goand it was like it's like what
was that?

Speaker 2 (50:17):
like telling you like , hey, I'll, hey, I'll be back,
bro, I'll be back.
You know I'm not the mostreligious person, but spiritual
and I'll still give it.
God, I grew up as I said.
God was immediately like yo,you didn't do anything, don't
worry, you're good.
And I fought to it.
And I was like I remember wellthat situation occurred, went

(50:39):
back the very next day, hand himresignation letter, people,
just like what going on thing.
People, some people understoodwhat transpired, some people,
some people upset whatever,because I to an extent was a
people's person and work, sosome people were a little off by
it and I'll.
But immediately the businesswas like on another level again.
So it was our next gear, kickingto our next gear, and I

(51:02):
basically sold out of my van.
I had bought a Hilux not toolong after I was married and
that's what I was selling out ofoh, so you're married at this
time.

Speaker 1 (51:10):
You're leaving the work married.
What is it like going and tellyour wife now you're going and
do this on your own.
I have to give her full props.
She just took me.

Speaker 2 (51:17):
It was like yeah you make it happen yeah, because
it's kind of like it was alreadyhappening, but I was trying to
force it not to.
She said, yeah, you're good,you'll be all right, be good.
And she has a job.
So it's like, yeah, be good,and for the next again.
So now to the back of a vehicle.
You're talking about meetingpeople from England.

(51:40):
They come in and meet me behindout of a vehicle.

Speaker 1 (51:44):
At this time, it's only sales still.

Speaker 2 (51:46):
We're doing rentals too.

Speaker 1 (51:47):
Oh, you started doing rentals by that time.
Rentals yeah.

Speaker 2 (51:50):
Even now I'm amazed to check back and see some posts
where I was doing rentalsbefore I even know I was doing
rentals.
It's kind of weird it's like, Iknow I had equipment, so why not
rent it?
Um, I didn't know what I wasdoing.
I mean take some hits here andthere, but it kind of worked out
.
It's again.
It's a weird thing when I lookback.
Um, uh, for about, let me see,this was like around June and

(52:14):
for about 10 months I'm runningback and forth between home and
a grocery Uncle Beddo'ssupermarket if anybody knows
supermarkets, of course, inTibet.
Yeah, so I'm selling out toUncle Beddo's car park.

Speaker 1 (52:26):
Oh nice yeah.
So that was your meeting point,that was my meeting spot to
this day To some people.

Speaker 2 (52:31):
Hey, I remember you from my Beddo's Nice.

Speaker 1 (52:37):
It's weird when I look back and say, bro, you
really did that.
It feels surreal.
Right, it's surreal.

Speaker 2 (52:39):
I mean, it's a 6 in the morning.
I'm in Uncle Beto's car parkselling and renting equipment.
Again, it's amazing, I wasnever.

Speaker 1 (52:48):
Yeah, nobody's going to roll up on you.

Speaker 2 (52:49):
Different Trinidad, it's different, it's weird.
And then to the point where Iremember one of the sons of the
business owner.
He was like what do you guys do?
Because I was like afterwards,I was like yo, you're taking a
car spotting these people allday.

Speaker 1 (53:06):
no, you're running back and forth let me buy a
punch or something I don't needto you know, let me pitch and
support the business.

Speaker 2 (53:13):
Yeah, and he's like yo, what do you really do?
And it's seven days a week.
I'm back on foot.

Speaker 1 (53:20):
Just like now, because most people.
If you check the affordableimports website now you could
book pretty much seven days aweek to do anything.

Speaker 2 (53:28):
It's weird.
It's a weird grind and itdidn't feel like a grind because
it just felt like I needed todo this, like I needed to.
It was calling you kind of wayyeah, I need to give people what
they want.
I can't stay back and not do it.
If I don't do it, I'm notfulfilling my purpose?

Speaker 1 (53:44):
Of course yeah, and your purpose is in helping other
people fulfill their purpose.
It's almost always the case, eh.

Speaker 2 (53:49):
Yeah, where you get married, both goes To me.
It's like again it's a perfectstorm, sure.

Speaker 1 (53:54):
So I had to ask you you're formally trained in
accounting.
Were you ever formally trainedin all this other equipment, or
did you learn that as you goalong?
Like I said, no, Never went toschool for that.

Speaker 2 (54:03):
University of YouTube and hands-on experience I would
never forget.
Shout out to Michael Mulder.
He kind of exposed me to myfirst studio session.
Sure, I've been to studios,because how it worked out was
the name started to spreadconrad, ask conrad, ask conrad.
A little bit of affordableimports, and then what was

(54:27):
happening is, again people werereaching out to me, people I
never heard about.
You know, here, let's do this.
I hear I have that, I hear thisand I was finding myself.
I remember the I'm in work, weknow, talking about what
happened on ian allen.
I gave him with Laura, talkingabout what happened on Ian Allen
the evening before.
Who calls me Ian Allen?
Yeah, so I have, you could dothis deal.

(54:49):
I was like, wait, what Nice.
And things like that reallystruck me as amazing, because
what you got to realize is, asan entrepreneur, everybody needs
something.
You thinking that you need toprobably jump through these
hoops to reach to that person toget, and it put me in a unique

(55:10):
position where I'm now able tocall on my network to help other
people.
My phone has over 6,000 numbersin it and that's from years of
just accumulating.
It's like a roller that's justweighed like 6,000 plus.

Speaker 1 (55:25):
Yeah, and it's on the same phone every time, Every
time you message.

Speaker 2 (55:28):
Again back a message Every time you call again, it's
still Conrad behind your phone,you know, and that's something I
need to work on in terms ofactually delegating tasks and
hiring people to do stuff.
But there's this personal touchthat I fell in love with.
As much as I try to let my guysdo stuff, sometimes I just want

(55:48):
to come around people aroundthe door and say you're good.
You're good, yeah, because it'srelationships we've formed over
years and sometimes I knew whencertain people their girlfriend
leave them.
I knew when some people losttheir child them.
I knew when some people losttheir child.
Yeah, I knew when some peoplechild graduate and it's like
highs and lows, um, affordableand boss was able to, to be with

(56:10):
people on this journey yeah andand again.
It's a very unique opportunitylike somebody be like.
You know I need a switcher.

Speaker 1 (56:19):
I have a funeral to stream what I mean my father
passed, yeah yeah, these peoplewalk the road with all the time.

Speaker 2 (56:29):
It's crazy, it's crazy it's amazing, I think
about it, um, but I'm reallygrateful, first to god and then
especially to the community, ofcourse.
All Without the community as Ialways say that without the
community, affordable Importswouldn't exist, our community, I
realize now again, a lot ofthings will just happen,

(56:52):
happenstance.
But if you can build acommunity around your business
and you simply marry what youare trying to do with what they
need to do, it's amazing how farreaching your efforts are.
I think a lot of people takethat for granted.
They figure this sale is thisone sale, it's final.
But, um, for example,podcasting, it's true, you doing

(57:15):
a podcast here and I'm sharingback your content, and so on.
Somebody has reached out to melike, hey, I see, let's do
podcasts.
Yes, I know somebody that needsto do a podcast.
And well, somebody come in thestudio to a podcast and it's
like I see all your speakersrent in there and this is, this
is literally something thathappens, like it just happened
yesterday.

(57:35):
Um, we have somebody who comesto shoot carnival content in the
studio a couple times a yearand he went to book on the
website.
He called me yesterday.
He's like yeah, come, anita,and book a session and thing we
have a, uh, me to shoot.
I was like, okay, cool.
He said, but I don't even wantto call you about.
I see all your speakers againmarried.

(57:58):
On Saturday you need speakers.
I said, but I thought allthey're married already.
He's like no, we know, we knowtime we know official yeah.
With you and it's like littlethings like that and people
understanding that you know younow have a relationship with
this person and you becomesynonymous with a certain
product.

(58:18):
So as soon as somebody says,buy anything, I speak.

Speaker 1 (58:22):
I know how man, yeah, yeah, yeah.

Speaker 2 (58:24):
It's the product and the expertise, you know it's a
good marriage.

Speaker 1 (58:27):
Yeah, ask Conrad, that is valuable, yeah, yeah.

Speaker 2 (58:31):
That has been a huge blessing.
I mean, some people are I.
I would probably um rough upsomebody a little bit because I
find there are a lot of timing,but I can't imagine it.

Speaker 1 (58:53):
No, no, no, I'll be.
I'll be honest.

Speaker 2 (58:55):
It's happening in business, yeah, in business
sometimes you have to to pull upon a customer or even fire a
customer, because what they arebringing isn't necessarily
congruent with what you aretrying to achieve or, worse,
they are obstructing your otherclients from doing what they're
doing Well.

Speaker 1 (59:10):
It's especially important when you see it as
building community.
Yeah, Because when you buildcommunity, you have to protect
it too.
Exactly.

Speaker 2 (59:17):
Exactly protected too , exactly, exactly.
We had a.
I remember this one situationand I hope the lady sees it,
sees this and understands why Iwould have pulled up on her all
the time she would have beenasking me for.
So I want to come and test thething before I rent it and I'm
like, honestly, I could tell youall about the piece of
equipment and send you YouTubevideos and all that, but when
you come it's to collect and go.

(59:40):
Even if you want, you could bookthe studio and have some time
with the equipment, that's noproblem, you'll set aside so you
have the space, because as muchas we have a couple hundred
square feet 24, I think, or2,500 square feet we still,
because of what we do, we can'taccommodate everybody at the
same time.
And she comes to collect whenwe have a studio session going

(01:00:01):
on.
We said not just a studiosession, a studio session that's
involved in recording audiovery critically after all, the
right environment, and she's infront there.
Yeah, so because I'm inside thestudio, she's outside doing my
guy.
Yeah, I just want to go throughthe thing and then I'm like
picking up inside yeah it's like, hey, what's going on out here?
She's like man, I'm just goingthrough the equipment.

(01:00:23):
And then I said but we talkabout this, we talk about this,
I already and she didn't likehow I speak to her and she, she
fired herself pretty much as acustomer.
But what happens?
Yeah, looking back, you know,and in fact, I can recount it.

Speaker 1 (01:00:43):
It bothered me to extend, of course, of course,
your personality.
You see, you want to be um.
You might the what I get fromyou over the past few months.
You, you're genuine in the wayyou approach it.
It's not about the business orthe money.
A lot of times, like I'll tellyou one of my first experiences
here, it was um, unique for me.
The first time I came to recordhow you and the team I felt
like I was the only person whoexisted in here.

(01:01:04):
You were, yeah, exactly, andthen you get it done.
And then, when I was going toleave and you introduced me to
the next person, I saw yourfocus switch and I said, no, I
like this, I like it, it makesyou comfortable, right.
But you mentioned Miami andit's something I want to talk
about, especially when you talkabout customers and the issues
around customers.
Right, when you move to sales,you sell the equipment, you give

(01:01:25):
some kind of guarantee orwarranty.
I would imagine that have someservice along with it.

Speaker 2 (01:01:28):
So we do because of the limitations of being in
Trinidad, and then you havedealership and so on, because
there are limitations in termsof what we could guarantee.
In terms of what we couldguarantee, we try to tell people
we offer seven weeks.
How do you phrase it?
Sorry, I'm in podcast moderight now, but essentially it's
a manufacturing effect.

Speaker 1 (01:01:48):
Yeah, so if you have an immediate issue, if there's
an issue.

Speaker 2 (01:01:51):
We try and check it through.
We're going to check it aftersee if there's really an issue
or if it's a user error.

Speaker 1 (01:01:57):
It happens.

Speaker 2 (01:02:01):
It happens issue.
Or if it's a user error, ithappens.
It happens even with us.
Um, if there's an issue, we'regonna deal with it, don't worry
about you.
Deal with it.
And some people would take that.
I remember somebody broughtback.
They come back with a batteryyears later.
Hey, I buy this from earlier, Ihardly use the thing and it
don't use nickel tesla and it'sa battery.
If you don't use a battery,eventually, whatever you do, use
a battery, eventually it loses.

Speaker 1 (01:02:20):
Whatever you do with a battery, you lose capacity.
But your rental thing I want totalk about, because your rental
now is tell me what might beyour most expensive lens you
ever buy to stock your rental.

Speaker 2 (01:02:33):
I don't know if I've already put it out there.
Some people will be like oh,there's a opportunity.

Speaker 1 (01:02:37):
Well, you and I'll linger to him, maybe a crime or
not you could call it um what itit.

Speaker 2 (01:02:45):
How do you?

Speaker 1 (01:02:45):
figure 20 grand, you could pay that for you could pay
that for pct equipment or usall, right, so that answers that
question.
Yeah, when you rent somebody,that what happens?
Then you could sleep, becausewhen you run that for two days
it's unmoving.

Speaker 2 (01:02:59):
I know it's unmoving.
I mean, as much as you haveinsurance and stuff, people will
say, yeah, insurance thing.
Trust me, if you have a bentleyand you want to drive it around
as much as it have insurance,it's still gonna be a little
cautious, yeah, you know.
So I mean, we've grown to trustthe process and our clients.
Um, we've had people who, um,they would have had breakage and

(01:03:23):
we dealt with that based on thecontracts and so on that we
have.
Um, I would even go to go sofar to say that there have been
circumstances.
Um, because we believe incommunity and we believe in what
we're doing supporting creativeshort tnt and one of the
personal things that I wanted todo or at least I remember
talking about alkalis when I getolder, I saw the way there was

(01:03:45):
a need in trenton and tobago for, for our service and one of the
things I was like yo, I'm gonnamake a difference in the film
community in trenton and tobago.
I'm gonna be that differenceand and it came to pass and it's
still ongoing where, because ofus, people who do film at

(01:04:05):
commercials and whatnot, videoprojects are now able to put on
a production without having toinvolve specific persons in the
community.
And it's not so much that theywant to exclude the person, but
what that means is that theywant to exclude the person, but
what that means is that they nolonger have to rely.
Yeah, um, there was almost likelittle monopolies here and there

(01:04:27):
where individual would not havebeen able.
Let's say I wanted to shoot anad for a congressman.
Let's say I want to shoot an adfor kfc, true, um, they put out
the tender.
Uh, you immediately know that,as a creative coming up, a young
person coming up who don'tnecessarily have as much I care
to, that I at best I'll be luckyto get on the crew who is able

(01:04:51):
to do that at best.
And what affordable importsallowed or was able to enable
creatives to do is attach aprice to doing that because at
the end of the day, somebody hasto foot the course and that's
what they pay ad agencies and soon to do essentially to put on
a production.
And if you're doing business,well, even the people who

(01:05:14):
already were able to do thosekind of production, that that
level of production, they wouldput in a billion for the
equipment.
But what affordable imports do,and especially because of the
website you are now able to seelive, you could itemize your
cost.
A cost there's no, oh, oh, I'mjust saying this is what some

(01:05:36):
dollar people oh, you're doingsomething for KFC, my price went
up.
Oh, I see, of course.
Oh, you need to shoot an ad inmy studio for KFC.
That's now 15,000.

Speaker 1 (01:05:49):
Yeah, but you standardize.

Speaker 2 (01:05:50):
You can go on your website and check everything it
doesn't matter, and that was oneof the things that helped us a
lot.
A lot of people appreciatedthat.
I even advised some of ourclients.
You know, explain to yourcustomer when they come.
This costs so much.
Go and check affordable andportable website.
You want to see what it takesto do what you are asking me to

(01:06:11):
do.
Yeah, Even when you have yourown equipment, you have to
understand that there's a costto owning our equipment.

Speaker 1 (01:06:18):
I see what you say.
It could help cost out theirown equipment and how to price
it.

Speaker 2 (01:06:23):
And that has been a recurring issue in the creative
industry, especially worldwide,but especially in Trinidad,
where people underpricethemselves just to get a job.
They're not fully consideringwhat it takes to do that job.
So you have a lot of overheadsto do that job.
So, um, you have a lot ofoverheads, you have your, your
car that might break down youhave your taxes, insurance, your

(01:06:44):
child had to go to school Allthese things are built into the,
the final production course,and a lot of people take that
for granted.
When they they want to hire aphotographer, they figure it,
you're just pressing thatshutter button.
But what you're not realizingis and he asked me about um
expensive equipment um, I'lljust use the example of one of

(01:07:04):
our, I'll say primarilyphotography cameras and icons.
Eat, yeah, that camera, when itcame out, was a wrong us to the
900s.
That's before it touches down.
If you do a quick matter, seven, that's twenty thousand dollars
.
You still need to add a lens tothat and let me tell you
something?
lens is something cost more thanthe body.
I find that out the hard way,right, right, you would have

(01:07:26):
experienced that.
Yeah, so you had twenty eightthousand dollars before we ship
it into the country.
Titty twenty eight thousanddollars.
The lens might be anothertwenty thousand dollars, so that
is forty eight thousand dollars.
We still literally have a lenson our camera body and we still
can't do anything with it.
We need to get a memory card,we need to get a tripod, we need
to get lights.

Speaker 1 (01:07:46):
So when you rent, a man down, it fall and it break.
Oh god, this happen before.
Of course, serious, of course.

Speaker 2 (01:07:55):
I'll never forget one of our most expensive accidents
and most expensive accidents.

Speaker 1 (01:07:59):
And it's one of the most expensive accidents I like.

Speaker 2 (01:08:01):
Well, it's not even something to laugh at, because
it was a serious, like ahorrible moment.
Unfortunately, somebody died,yeah.
Yeah, car accident or what Toan extent.
So they were shooting out ofthe back of a car, covering a
marathon, and I don't know thecircumstances, definitely I

(01:08:23):
wasn't there.
But essentially what happenedwas he's shooting out of the
back of a car and the car washit yeah, oh man, and he pelt
from the back of the vehiclewith our equipment.
We're talking about the wholesetup where it's trapped to his
back.

Speaker 1 (01:08:39):
And I will tell you that camera was $6,000 US with
our equipment.

Speaker 2 (01:08:41):
We're talking about a whole setup where it's strapped
to his back and coming over,and I will tell you that camera
was 6,000 US, the lens was about2,800 US, 2,400 US the piece
that goes over his back andquite an easy rig.
That is about 1,100 US.
So if you do a quick math,they're talking about 7,000.

Speaker 1 (01:08:59):
Yeah, so if you do a quick math, they're talking
about 7,000, almost 8,000 in gay, yeah, and as you see, with
building relationships too, Imean, gay are replaceable when
somebody lost their life ExactlySomething else, right?
So?

Speaker 2 (01:09:08):
that that that was that guy and out of respect I
don't want to go too deep intoit, but I would say as much as
the community was hurt becauseof how small Trinidad is and how
creatives work I tell thecreatives there are so many most
passionate people.
It's a small group, eh, to anextent.

Speaker 1 (01:09:27):
Sometimes when.

Speaker 2 (01:09:27):
I see the same faces.
What happens is that group.
For months they can't function.
To this day, the lead on thatgroup, he is good, you could see
it.
Yeah, you could see it.
You could see it.
So when he came to me, I'llnever forget.
He came home in camera in peaceand he's crying and I watch

(01:09:51):
this.
Oh, I go and tell that man hehad to pay for that now.
He's like but what other thingI will write now?
I'm like you sold out, and thatis where sometimes you have to
take off the business hat andjust be another human.
Yeah, you can't.
At that point in time there'slike the businessman, you're
mashing my thing you owe me$80,000 you have $80,000 at that

(01:10:15):
point that don't matter, no,that's.

Speaker 1 (01:10:16):
It matters less we that's like months later.

Speaker 2 (01:10:19):
Months later, it doesn't matter.
No, that's the last thing.
Yeah, it matters less.
You know, we, as I put forward,yeah, yeah, yeah, months later,
months later, we cleared upwhat we had to clear up, but it
wasn't important and, in thegrand scheme of things, it just
had to be a human first.

Speaker 1 (01:10:29):
Of course.
Yeah, that's important, that'simportant.
So your rental business mostlyis it with, or people could just
come in and rent stuff.

Speaker 2 (01:10:37):
So we have systems in place that prevent somebody
from just walking off the streetRight.
That is for obvious reasons.
We have to consider that noteverybody has their own your
best interests at heart.
They have people who would.

Speaker 1 (01:10:50):
They have their best interests at heart, exactly.

Speaker 2 (01:10:52):
They would rent the equipment.

Speaker 1 (01:10:53):
You can get 20,000 lends rent and you bust.
Out of that, you bust out ofthat, right.

Speaker 2 (01:11:00):
So we've gone so far as to turn away people at the
door many times.
Who is in the industry knows oris familiar with our process,
so they would understand how wego about it.
And the community is very smallrelatively, I should say and
personable, and of course youhave the arm of the law to help
you with this, of course, right,yeah, if it reaches to that.
So we house the Stams End Placeand I don't want to go too much

(01:11:24):
into it because of course youknow, the more people are aware
of things yeah, the secret sauce.

Speaker 1 (01:11:28):
They could, yeah, they could bypass it.

Speaker 2 (01:11:30):
Come along it yeah, but we've been blessed.
We've had incidents and we'vebeen blessed to still be able to
walk away from it.

Speaker 1 (01:11:38):
Okay, good, good.
So when did you shift?
When did you move to the studio?

Speaker 2 (01:11:43):
So, as I mentioned, it was after I left my job, I
would say about 10 months later.
I was looking for a location.
Back then we were only doingrentals and sales for the most
part, and I was like I say we,but it's really me in the back
of my eyes.
I'm like I need to get a spacebecause meeting people here yeah

(01:12:03):
, uncle Bedouin's games, it'stoo much, you know yeah.
I'm floating boxes in the peoplein the car park.
And I did and I said and Iurged them, because I must buy
something from them now becauseI'm feeling bad, I'm taking up
two, and sometimes, because I'mfeeling bad, I'm taking up two
inches.

Speaker 1 (01:12:19):
Sometimes, my man just pull in Rah In the car park
and he's blocking the tree andsomebody's going to pass out and
it's not my place.

Speaker 2 (01:12:23):
Yeah, disrupting the business, oh my God, I was like
Sometimes I'm hustling fast andI think, I think and people.

Speaker 1 (01:12:31):
And you have a lot of cash Bop.

Speaker 2 (01:12:35):
And I, okay, so probably like about, I would say
, seven months, six months afterI left my job.
What year is this?
At this point, this is 22,.
I think 22, okay, well, 22 iswhen I got the place, 21 is when
I left the job and the heightsare COVID.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, as risky as itgets, yeah, so I'm like okay,
let me get a place, and I waslooking, I was looking, get a

(01:13:03):
place and I was looking, I waslooking.
But what I I learned inbusiness is, if you could have
something that has more than onepurpose, it immediately
mitigates some of the risk yeah.

Speaker 1 (01:13:08):
So instead of looking for a place that's just sales
and rental, okay with you.

Speaker 2 (01:13:11):
I was like okay, what , what is needed for a studio?
And I I wasn't even thinkingabout this size, I was just what
is needed for a studio.
I was like, probably that Iknow people can't see the camera
probably like that.
Yeah, just say 15 by 10something, that's all.
Because I'm thinking mycustomers are studios as well.
I don't want to compete withthem and and that has been a

(01:13:34):
thing I, I, I love therelationship and I appreciate
the relationship so much.
I don't really want to competeand have bad blood yeah.
Because, again, these are peoplethat I cared about over time.
So I'm looking for that and,when enough, I'm driving up a
secure night, late night, andI'm sitting everywhere, by the

(01:13:54):
way, before I'm not seeinganything that I really like.
I check a couple of places,even seen anything that I really
like.
I check a couple places.
Even customers reached out andsee what they could find in the
network.
I'm driving up a screw allnight, um with my family, and I
see a foreign sign, simple asthat, on this building, on this
building, and look on the doorso this big door, if you know,
affordable imports and there's alittle sign.

(01:14:14):
So I was like these peoplereally want to rent this out I.
I called people the next day inthe middle of the Onkebedo's car
park.
I called people.
I was like I see a place forrent.
He's like, yeah, you know, whensomebody is not really sure,
yeah.
And as soon as I get tounderstand why they were not
really pushing, it is becausethey had bad experiences.

Speaker 1 (01:14:36):
Okay, so the people who live upstairs are in the
space.

Speaker 2 (01:14:39):
Yeah, Okay, okay, so they would be particular about
sharing the space and everybody,and explain their circumstances
and what happened and what theywould like, of course and I
remember the lady she was like-you sure that's why the sign's
small.

Speaker 1 (01:14:54):
Yeah, that's why.

Speaker 2 (01:14:55):
I feel the husband just wanted to put her into a PC
.
Why?
I mean like I'm doing somethingyou know.

Speaker 1 (01:14:59):
finally, yeah, trying to rent it.
You can't say I ain't trying.

Speaker 2 (01:15:01):
You can't say I ain't trying and.
And then he, he, um, the lady,she was like, yeah, sure, cause
I imagine she just watching thisguy, this young guy, I wear the
same thing day in, day out,like me.
Yeah, it's easier I always talkabout.
I remember Joe Van is our titlenext.

Speaker 1 (01:15:24):
Yeah, it's our next New Balance blue jeans.
It makes it easier.

Speaker 2 (01:15:27):
I have so many other things to deal with and focus on
and eventually, well, yeah, wearrived at our price, we were
both comfortable with and we gotinto the space it was.

Speaker 1 (01:15:37):
It is literally a shell so it's a blank warehouse
type space at the point blankwarehouse and um through my
father.

Speaker 2 (01:15:44):
We kind of subdivided it all right.
Your father's a contractor yeah, so he helped me subdivide it
based on my vision right andwhat we needed the space to do.
And as I started bringing oh, Iwas storing equipment home.

Speaker 1 (01:15:59):
Right yeah, in a spare room At next risk, yeah.

Speaker 2 (01:16:01):
Yeah, and then as I brought in the equipment because
the lady I know she was, she'slike sure I want to bring in the
equipment I was like, oh yeah,I think this space is too small,
because I didn't realize howmuch I had packed into that
space.
I didn't, yeah, of course, ofcourse I didn't appreciate the
size of the operation.

Speaker 1 (01:16:19):
When it came into a bigger space and everything
spread out, I was like so whenyou say subdivide, because for
people who come to rent thisstudio you might see several
different spaces, spaces youcould do podcasts.
I remember coming here one dayand you say Corey, just look
around everywhere here and seewhere we're back from here, like
you could do anything anywhere,and we've been trying with a
few different iterations too.
Yeah, but when you saysubdivide, you also not just

(01:16:41):
have to subdivide the studio forrental or revenue spaces.

Speaker 2 (01:16:44):
You had to create your space to work from yeah, we
have an office to storage, gotit?
Yeah, it's a whole area that wehad to split up right and
immediately.
I was like shoot and.
And fortunately you have beenblessed to still be able to work
out all this space.
Sometimes you're like yo, whereare we going with this?

Speaker 1 (01:17:04):
Yeah, Well, I have a random question about that, you
know, because the first time Icame to work with Cassius,
cassius told me to bring aboutfive sets of things to change.
Now, as a man, that don't meannothing to me, because I just
work with five jerseys and Iwould take it off right where
Cassius shoot it, it would notmatter to me, but I understand
that that would be different fordifferent clients.
So when you have a firststartup, you had dressing room

(01:17:24):
space that people could havechanged.

Speaker 2 (01:17:26):
I could have seen from the toilet to the front
door and I'm like yo, and thatis how Affordable Imports
evolved, kind of like from againfrom inception.
Looking back, is it's thecommunity, is feedback, is
everything that's comingtogether and my personality

(01:17:47):
being a problem solver, yeah, wehad to figure some out.
So, because of again, I had aparticular idea and how I wanted
the space to look, and thenthat had to evolve because the
needs of the client are we, myown biases, of course.
I mean, you always takefeedback.
You don't just say, well,that's what they want, that's

(01:18:07):
what they get.
You have to, you know, you haveto filter it out in an
entrepreneur mind and and say,okay, this would, this would
work, this would get the jobdone, and that's kind of like
how everything has flown.
So now we have the change rooms.
So I, we had a pillar, or wehave a pillar in the middle of
the room, yeah, and when I sawthat pillar I was like fuck, but

(01:18:28):
the place good, if I didn'thave a pillar, I would have been
able to do this, that and that.
And because of that pillar, weare now, or we were at the time,
the only people who had twoshooting areas.
That wasn't by design, that wasworking around our problem.
Yeah, we were working around ourproblem.
So we had a shooting area onthis side of the pillar and

(01:18:49):
another shooting area on thatside of the pillar, and it's so
weird that turned into a thingwhere now people want to have
two shoots going onsimultaneously.
And who does that?
Hannibal?
Barnes, I got it, so they havethe white for their catalog on
their website.
And then they have the creative.

(01:19:11):
And then I not knowing.
I was like, okay, I would havethe change rooms and then we
would have storage.
It doesn't have to be changerooms, because we would need
storage.
Which studio had four changerooms?
Who needs four change rooms?
You know who needs four change?

Speaker 1 (01:19:23):
rooms, yeah, kind of like that, and you've got pants
In and out first.

Speaker 2 (01:19:26):
Yeah, so they have multiple models running through
the place and it's like aproduction line and, without
even realizing it, I was kind ofcreating a formula and then
other studios came about afterand they know what to do.
They follow the formula.

Speaker 1 (01:19:41):
That's business.
That's business.
If KFC put a recipe, are youlooking to go and fry that?

Speaker 2 (01:19:45):
I don't want to do it too.

Speaker 1 (01:19:46):
I can do it for cheaper or do it better, but the
thing is like you seem to bealways paying attention to where
that need lies, because a lotof the things that you describe,
another person might see it asan obstacle.
Or, let me say it differently,another person might see it as a
reason to not leave the job orgive up on the idea, or say care
, work, but you seem to alwaysbe trying to figure it out that,

(01:20:08):
to me, is exactly what.

Speaker 2 (01:20:10):
That's what you're supposed to be.
You can't just see a problemand sit on your laurels.
That always encouraged me, it'slike.
And looking back now, I didn'tat the time appreciate some of
his methods, like in normalthing, to what I say to rascal,
but you're watching what yourparents doing or seeing and you

(01:20:31):
figure them against me.
But there's you, trade, that'syou.
That's, that's naivety.
You're just not.
You don't know what really isgoing on around you.
And when he did certain thingswhere I essentially realized now
is that he was trying to makeme a problem solver.
So, so much to say, I rememberwe had a shoot here, a carnival

(01:20:54):
shoot, and somebody had not toolong open another studio, bigger
studio, um of the formula andso on.
So everybody was like, yeah,affordable, and buzzed them,
they in the ground, you know.
And the girl, one of the youngladies, asked me I'll never
forget she's like so it's kindof like an unspoken thing, cause

(01:21:17):
you didn't want to be out oftime.
And she's like so you hearabout this space, I hear about
it.
She of like an unspoken thingbecause you didn't want to be
out of time.
And she's like so you hearabout this space.
It's like, yeah, I hear aboutit.
She's like so what do you goand do?
I was like you hear what youwant me to do.
She's like so, so you know thatthis exists.
What, what does affordableimpostor?
I imagine she's trying to evokeout of me uh, problem solver,

(01:21:39):
like that is a problem.
This other studio exists.
I'm going to have a problemthat I need to fix.
I'm like and she's right, andshe's like what, what does all
this do that will make me wantto come here and I was like, but
we we're the problem solversand she's like, oh, okay, and,
and to be fair, some of ourcustomers have gone to the other

(01:22:02):
space and they stayed there,but some of them have come back
and we've had many, manyinstances where customers have
left us for whatever reason, andthat's fine.
You have to learn to you can'tfit everybody, of course, but
they are calling us to beproblem solvers, mm-hmm At the

(01:22:23):
end of the day, I like that, soit's like okay, as much as you
want to go elsewhere, you stillneed affordable imports and to
me that's just obvious.
That just shows how obviously wehave impacted a lot of the
industry and again we've hadpeople looking out for our best
interests, the community.
They still patronize and tangoit for that.

Speaker 1 (01:22:45):
Well, what was the podcast?
You said that the guy wastalking about the 1%.
What's the name of that podcast?

Speaker 2 (01:22:50):
I can't recall the name, but it was a one-off.
I think it was a guy it wasn'tconsistent yeah.
He came in just to check us out, to see what we could do, and
he realized his space could dowhat he needed to do, I see.
Okay, gotcha, he invited theguy to it.

Speaker 1 (01:23:04):
Well, the thing is, like the people who to the
highest levels in business, oneof the difficulties is that
growth is painful and there aretimes where I remember from my
business, for instance, you knowall the customers, you know
them by name.
Same thing you're saying thatstep of stepping back so that
you get to the point where,because you have a strong team
here, your team is executed at ahigh level.

(01:23:24):
How easy or difficult is it foryou to step back, step away?
Very difficult.
That delegates it.

Speaker 2 (01:23:35):
I'm going to ask them , and I'm going to ask Kyle
directly.
It's one of the most difficultthings, what I oftentimes are
reminded of.

Speaker 1 (01:23:46):
So we have an accountant and he gives me a lot
of homework to do, and you'rean accountant too.

Speaker 2 (01:23:49):
Yeah, so I understand too, and sometimes we play a
little bit of a cat and mousegame where he's like he's like,
you know, you have to do thisright, and I'm like, yeah, but
the business side of me is likeI don't want to do it.

Speaker 1 (01:24:03):
You want to be the customer, right I?

Speaker 2 (01:24:04):
focus on the customer and he's like no, you have to
do it.
And that has been a greatreminder as to yeah, as much as
you want to be in it with thecustomer, you want to be on the
ground.
Um, yeah, you have anotherpurpose.
Yeah, and you wouldn't achievethe overall growth that you
would like to achieve if you aredoing what you.

Speaker 1 (01:24:23):
Yeah, something to learn as you go along, because
sometimes we ask conrad is ablessing and a curse, for sure
they have people who probablywill only want to talk to con.

Speaker 2 (01:24:31):
They only want to talk to Conrad.
I mean, we even had a jokewhere Kyle and I I was like,
yeah, tell them he's Conrad.

Speaker 1 (01:24:37):
Yeah, because they don't know what.

Speaker 2 (01:24:38):
Conrad looks like right, they just figure it's
Conrad they're coming to.
It's like yeah, he's Conrad.

Speaker 1 (01:24:52):
So sometimes we play those jokes on person.
In is like oh, so you're conrad.

Speaker 2 (01:24:54):
I was like no, no, I'm kyle, yeah, I'm kyle.
I was like oh, oh.
So, conrad, you're gonna trustit now, right, yeah?
And I'll be like are we going?
We going with it?
And then I'll be like kyle andhe's like yes, I knew it, I knew
it, she was conrad all along, Iknew it.

Speaker 1 (01:25:02):
I'm like yes, how do you get people to trust the
brand and not the individualnames?
You know?
If you get to see kyle.
That is, some people lucky tosee kyle every week, but some
not so lucky.

Speaker 2 (01:25:11):
Yeah you know kyle is a vibe, 100% a vibe.
I mean I've had instances inthe studio where people is like
I prefer kyle you know I workkyle.
Yeah, yeah, go and come back.
Go and call kyle, I'm like youneed to see boss here.
Yeah, you need to see boss Kylecome and see how many people so

(01:25:33):
it's kind of like sometimes youreally have to just admire the
fact that you have enabledcertain people to do something.

Speaker 1 (01:25:41):
Oh yeah, it's critical.

Speaker 2 (01:25:42):
Yeah, and your purpose has been fulfilled.
Step back.
Yeah, you don't need to bethere anymore, because if you
are to fulfill a purpose, youreally have to let somebody, you
have to delegate, you have toallow somebody else to grow.
Recently we had, like I said,we had a part-time.
We have a part-time Aaron, andas much as you want to babysit

(01:26:06):
and show him everything and havethem do it how you want it, you
show them once and then you say, yeah, I got it.
And he's like, yeah, with howyou want it.
You, you show them once and thenyou say, yeah, I've gone and
and, yeah, you, you have this,you have this.
And and show them that you haveconfidence in their ability and
you have to from a distance.
You're not just going to leavethem in the in the water, to
swim away from a distance.
On here, you know you're doing,you see someone, hey, so why,

(01:26:29):
why you did it that way?
Oh, okay, okay, you, sometimesyou actually learn something
from from the people that you'retrying to mentor or teach or or
, um, delegate to our students.

Speaker 1 (01:26:39):
Like that makes sense yeah, that delegation is one of
the other than talking aboutthe first jump, like, however
you get there, like thatdelegation is one of the harder
points in business.
Yeah, because you have to.
I always tell her there's myteam in work.
I always tell them listen.
For you to get promoted, youreally had to get somebody else
who could do your job.
Yeah, if, if, if.

(01:27:00):
I can see what's going tohappen if you move from this
position, you probably willnever move.

Speaker 2 (01:27:12):
And you see that there's a dangerous thing about
doing a job too well.
If you do it too well and thisis just for people who are
employed it makes it difficultfor you now to be promoted,
because where am I going to findsomebody else to do what you do
?
Yeah, yeah, I probably had tohire two people just to do what
I can, just pay you yeah, nomatter where we are.

Speaker 1 (01:27:23):
We had to get comfortable with the idea of
coaching, developing people.
I always say you study answers.
You know if I put and it'suncomfortable feeling if I teach
you how to do something.
Yeah, and I experienced it, myson, you have kids.
Yeah, I do.
You tend to experience it withyour children a lot.
Yeah, you tell them dosomething.
Your expectation is that theydo it the way you told them.
Yeah, and when they're doing itdifferent you, you my instinct

(01:27:46):
is to step in and correctcorrect, I'm trying to learn now
.
Okay, let me see him do it, letme see him make the mistake,
because sometimes the way he doit, I say, boy, you know better,
I do it.

Speaker 2 (01:27:55):
So yeah, and it's almost like something that I
have tried to work on Ego, ego.

Speaker 1 (01:28:03):
Yeah, I don't know if it's a bad thing, but it's very
, very difficult when it comesto delegating.

Speaker 2 (01:28:12):
E when it comes to delegating ego and, weird enough
, somebody who no longer workswith us.
But ego is important because itgives you, it gives you almost
like purpose is like I know whatI am able, able to do.
I, this is me, um, this is mypurpose, this is what I stand
for.
But sometimes you really haveto just set it aside because, as
much as you have belief inyourself, there may be a better
way, or there is a better way,because same thing we used to do

(01:28:35):
now, or we used to do, sorry,10 years ago, more than that,
we're not doing the same wayright now, and it's because
somebody questioned somebody.

Speaker 1 (01:28:42):
Of course you had to break up the old way to get the
new way.

Speaker 2 (01:28:45):
Exactly, you had to bust it up.

Speaker 1 (01:28:46):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, and I never thought of it as ego.
I always saw it as okay.
I've done this a hundred timesand it work.
So I'm afraid for somebody todo it another way because I feel
it didn't go work, which is nottrue.
There's no evidence of that mymethod.

Speaker 2 (01:29:00):
Of course you say my method, not the best yeah, all,
I guess all the time I suppose Iexperienced that when I got one
of my jobs working at um aunion any jfw and I remember I
said but why are these peoplewho do this?
And then I asked because you'retrying to be polite?
I asked him he's like so whyare we doing this?
He's like what are you talkingabout?
We're doing this for years now.

(01:29:20):
I'm like why?
And that's when I realized Ineeded to leave doing something
the same way for years and it'snot working.

Speaker 1 (01:29:29):
and we need to keep doing it this way or we accept
that it can't get better.

Speaker 2 (01:29:33):
It can't get better to me that's the scariest thing
and I realized ego was thekiller of group.
You can't.
You can't achieve anything ifyou have an ego I mean we ain't
seeing anybody come around youimmediately disappear.
Of course you need to have someconfidence in yourself and your
abilities, but you should havethe ability to at least question
yourself Hannah, am I reallydoing it the best way?

(01:29:57):
Because if you are able toteach me a better way, it's only
better for me again.

Speaker 1 (01:30:02):
Of course, Better for everybody.
As you say, Better for thecommunity.

Speaker 2 (01:30:06):
And I have had to take that position Again.
I thought I was going to be theone to take film to an
international standard and Ithink, and and I would say this
much somebody else was givenpriority.
As much as I would like to belike, oh you would, I don't
think something that bothers me.
I'm like, honestly, at the endof the day, if they somehow

(01:30:29):
bring more business to turnaround to be a go yeah, I find
sometimes people feel like ifthe best way to have businesses
have no competition have nobodyelse in the industry.

Speaker 1 (01:30:40):
All this, yeah, quantity, yeah, it's query, it's
scary and I always remember.

Speaker 2 (01:30:46):
I don't know if it's a analogy or whatever, but
there's this thing where on onestreet there was a diamond
dealer, jewelry dealer, and hewas on the end of the street
there and everybody used to comeand buy.
That was the only place on thestreet to buy their jewelry.
And then, weird enough,somebody opened up on the same

(01:31:07):
street, down the road, and hewas like competition boy, you're
going to mash up, you're takinghalf my customers.
And and then somebody, theycome and open up in the middle
of the street.
The same you know you're someonelike oh come on, I turn on the
customers if I'm lucky, I don'tcompete with this and what

(01:31:28):
essentially was formed was adiamond district.
Of course, now the pool gotbigger.
The pool got bigger, so it wasno longer the people that walked
along the street.
That area now became renownedfor diamonds, of course, and now
everybody comes here, not justyour little box.
And it's a part of the scarcitymindset that I think we, being
on an island, we think there'slimited land, we're surrounded

(01:31:52):
by water, there's only so manyit's 1.3 million people here.
We do have all the, and thatforces a lot of people to kill
their dream because they figure,you know, it's only so much.
People go buy this.
You know, of course, I can't,really I can't do nothing with
this.
What do you mean?
You want to rent a?
company for equipment photo andvideo equipment.

(01:32:12):
Every other photographer hastheir own equipment and they are
correct to a point.
But what I've grown to realizeis that's the mindset that puts
you in a disadvantageousposition where immediately you
are thinking of all the problemsrather than the solution for

(01:32:32):
sure.

Speaker 1 (01:32:32):
Sometimes it causes us to talk our way out of the
idea, exactly you have abrilliant idea.

Speaker 2 (01:32:39):
You have a brilliant purpose.
Even I can't do that, boy fromlack of boy I, but I people
still in that thing.
You know, boy, you know peoplelike me don't really.
It's not 1%.
I don't have that kind of money, boy, and before you know it
you may have been the purposethat would have made everybody

(01:33:03):
around you elevate yeah.
You may have been the reasonwhy your neighborhood is now the
neighborhood for that.
Somebody beating on our parloryeah madness, madness, madness.

Speaker 1 (01:33:21):
And now it's our whole industry.

Speaker 2 (01:33:23):
Yeah, the national instrument of Toronto, bego, of
course.
So sometimes we really talkourselves out of solutions, out
of our purpose.
It's really unfortunate when wedo that, we put ourselves in
boxes and because of thescarcity mindset we don't
realize our purpose.
That may have changed it will.

Speaker 1 (01:33:42):
Well, like you say, you know, sometimes you could
find a million reasons why not,but if you find that you talk to
enough entrepreneurs, they willfind the one reason why, why,
truly, why not.
But you find out, you talk toenough entrepreneurs, they will
find the one reason why why.
And as we start off, I wassaying in the beginning that
somebody, always, somebodyspecial, always.
Next, so when?
I come in here always watchingto see who coming in next.
And again a wrap-up sign fromkyle, so I know that mean that
somebody coming next.

(01:34:03):
But I have one more question toask you before we wrap up.
Uh, a little offbeat from theentrepreneurial thing.
When you have to order this,order this equipment, and US
dollars is such an issue in thecountry, how are you dealing
with that now?

Speaker 2 (01:34:16):
So I don't want to give out too much of the secret.
But as an entrepreneur, youfind a way.

Speaker 1 (01:34:21):
So it's just another obstacle to you Just another
obstacle.

Speaker 2 (01:34:24):
And I would even go so far to say that because of
Forex is why we focus on rentalsa lot more than before.
So again, you find a way,Because I can't allow Forex to
be the reason why my businessdidn't work.

Speaker 1 (01:34:40):
What about the political situation?
Mini Heart of an electionseason Party in power?
Yeah, that's affecting you.

Speaker 2 (01:34:46):
There's an opportunity right there.
We had people from variousparties come through and shoot
stuff.

Speaker 1 (01:34:54):
So you didn't give me no yellow.
Is it code 40,000?
And you had the work going onhere.

Speaker 2 (01:34:58):
I didn't get the JZ wrap up with the money yet, I'll
share.
I'll share, all right, good.
It doesn't matter to me.
It doesn't matter who's inpower.
There's an opportunity.
You know I am apprehensive tobe aligned with any one party,
because to me, what you're thendoing is discarding all the
opportunities.
I mean, I may have my ownpersonal beliefs and I will have

(01:35:22):
my own personal preferences,which I wouldn't make known to
the general public as much aspossible, but I don't see the
point in limiting my potentialclientele because of my of
course, sometimes Conrad isConrad and affordable, exactly
exactly um it.
It doesn't matter red or yellowor green or purple.

(01:35:44):
You could have stopped at redand yellow.
Yeah, it doesn't matter who,who is in power or who has
authority, affordable importsstill has its purpose to fulfill
, you know.
So again, I wouldn't want toharm, but of course it's a
money-making thing.
If you could get money fromboth sides, if I could pull a
koos out of a bag or whatever.
Why not?

(01:36:05):
You have to learn from the 1%.
Again you figure, do this.
Again you figure it was 1% doyou understand?

Speaker 1 (01:36:10):
they went through the same thing.
We built a gun through, likehow you start off, how you
everybody challenges difficultfor everybody.

Speaker 2 (01:36:18):
Helen Bargoun sings father owned the hardware.
I think they started off inSealers if I'm not mistaken.

Speaker 1 (01:36:23):
Okay, that was I could be wrong.
I mean, I repeat to the Helenboss lady, but she took it to
the Helen Bush lady, but shetook it to the next level they
took it to the next level.

Speaker 2 (01:36:31):
You know her brother and they were Dan Steele and so
on, of course, and what I'vegrown to appreciate, especially
from you, corey, is those peoplebefore us.
I mean, I always had a love forhistory to an extent, but we
don't really give localsespecially the credit.
You asked me about a bunch ofinternational stuff, things low,

(01:36:58):
because, especially the credit.
You asked me about a bunch ofinternational stuff, things in
the usa and whatnot, and I'myeah, I know about that, I know
about the natchan coal and so on.
But what you have shown me isthere's a rich resource of of
knowledge locally that peoplecould rely on, even their
experiences, but we take it forgranted because it's right in
our backyard well, yeah.

Speaker 1 (01:37:09):
so that's why I wanted to do this, because this,
right in my backyard, I see youbehind these cameras for many,
many weeks helping my dreamscome true, but I feel like it's
very, very important for peoplelike you to tell your story.

Speaker 2 (01:37:21):
And I find it so boring you find so.
Yeah, I find my story boring.

Speaker 1 (01:37:25):
Wait for the feedback you go here you go, see, you'll
see.
You'll see.
Thanks, brother.
I appreciate you coming onbecause I feel like it's
critical to talk about some ofthese things.
I don't see you as 1%.
Already when I walk in here Isee 1%.
I say what the hell does thisman do, how he do this?
So I appreciate you sharingsome of this story and coming in
.
I want to tell people that wetypically start recording at

(01:37:48):
about 10 am on a daily basis andthis one we end up doing at 8
am and Conrad is always up tothe challenge.
I appreciate it, thank you.

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Episode 224 | Conrad Baird of Affordable Imports

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.css-14f5ked{margin:0;word-break:break-word;display:-webkit-box;-webkit-box-orient:vertical;box-orient:vertical;-webkit-line-clamp:2;overflow:hidden;}Episode 224 | Conrad Baird of Affordable Imports