July 23, 2024 • 47 mins
Buyers and sellers can be friends, right? Well, what about business partners that work together to scale HVAC businesses?
In this episode of the Before You Buy or Sell a Business podcast, I sit down with Marc Chard and Spencer Satorie of Apex Services dive into their journey of expanding HVAC companies, sharing insights on acquisitions, systems implementation, and management across multiple locations.
From their initial partnership to acquiring multiple companies, they reveal strategies for overcoming challenges, the importance of a solid system, and their growth plans, including adding plumbing services.
Discover how they effectively manage diverse operations and hear their advice for aspiring business owners.
If you're interested in the intricacies of business acquisitions and roll-ups, you won't want to miss this.
📢If you are interested in sponsoring the podcast, reach out to me at Jared@JaredWJohnson.com
CHAPTERS
0:00 | Introduction
5:05 | Business Acquisition and Transition Period Challenges
7:54 | Navigating Business Partnerships and Growth Strategies
11:47 | Challenges and Successes in Acquiring Underperforming Businesses
25:06 | Challenges and Strategies in Managing Multiple Acquisitions
31:19 | Empowering Managers with Trust and Control in Franchise Operations
38:45 | The Challenges and Rewards of Scaling a Business
______________________________________________________________________
If you have questions for Jared, visit JaredWJohnson.com
DISCLAIMER: The views and opinions expressed in this program are my own and/or those of my guests. They do not necessarily reflect the views or positions of my employer.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
If you don't have a system that you runlike I'm talking
(00:03):
traits like plumbing and infection,you don't have to be running.
You go to school by somebody.
You're trusting that
that company had a good systemand they weren't necessarily doing well.
You'reprobably not going to necessarily do so.
Welcome to the before you buyor Sell a business podcast
where we help buyers and sellerslearn more about the acquisition process,
discuss recent transactions, and stay upto date on the latest news in the market.
(00:28):
Here is your host, Jarrett Johnson.
Hey, everybody.
All right,before we get into the next episode,
I've had a lot of people reach out to merecently requesting to sponsor
the show and I have decidedto go ahead and open that up.
So if that's you and you're interested,please shoot me an email at Jared,
which is Jared at Jared W johnson.com.
(00:52):
And I'll get you some informationover on how you can do that.
All right.
Today I got Mark and Spencer Saturday
I know one of the majorthings was asking you
how to say your name properlybecause everybody says Satori.
Right.
So, I try to get that right, because,
a lot of people say Jerry or Gerald,and I'm like, no, it's Jared.
(01:15):
So, especially as a kid,my name was a little difficult to,
get people to say properly.
And then Mark, your last name is easy.
So we we don't have to worry too,too much about that.
Right. But,
so I think the biggest reasonI'm excited to have you on is
you're one of the first peoplewe've talked to
that are doing what a lot of peopleare trying to do, which is kind of roll up
(01:35):
Hvac and plumbing.
So I know we'll definitely dive into that.
Maybe we could start with Mark.
we could talk about your background,like where you grew up.
Did you go to college, all that fun stuff.First?
Yeah.
I've, grown up in around the Omaha,Nebraska area, town called Valley.
And then I'm just burnt out.
Foreign, which is part of a lot rightnext to Valley.
Now, I've been in theworld, since the late 80s.
(02:00):
I've been doing this a long time.
started first company at 20, for 20 yearsthis year.
So, Yeah, things.
I did go to college.
I was an industrial engineering major.
And then I got the opportunity.
My wife had the opportunityto take over a restaurant, and I'm
in my early 20s, and I thoughtthat was the greatest thing in the world.
But I learned two things from that one.
(02:22):
I never want a restaurant ever again.
But two,I really like being self-employed. So,
after that, then I got a new track,put in my time to get my license,
and then I went out on my own.
So cool.
Yeah, we get a lot of people,I want to buy a restaurant. Why?
Well, it sounds fun.
No, no, it'snot the right reason for it. Yeah.
So no, no. So.
(02:44):
All right, Spencer, what about you?
Yeah, I, I'm from the Omaha area as well.
graduated from North South High School andthen went to the University of Nebraska.
I got a business administration degree.
so I am a Husker.
and then
after that, I did a few different things.
(03:05):
I was selling real estate or selling
real estate and insuranceat the same time for a while.
box of real estate properties, residentialthat I was managing and renting out.
and then I started flipping houses,
up to the beginning of 2020,
when I sold my last flip project,
(03:27):
and got into the, the Hvac world.
So cool.
Well, yeah.
So it's always interesting to see kind ofhow people got into what they're doing.
And I know the, the way that youto kind of started
working together is very interesting.
So maybe you guys can talk about that.
Mark was actually lookingto buy another Hvac company
(03:48):
while running the Omaha, NebraskaApex Services.
And the biggest problem from the bank is,well, how are you going to manage that?
Whereverhe was looking, right in Florida or
on the other side of Nebraska or whatever,how are you going to manage that?
And your one in Omaha, Nebraska,if you just live in Omaha?
(04:09):
So his way to get overthat hurdle was listed
company in Omaha for saleand go buy a bigger company in Florida.
and sothat's where the opportunity came for me.
I was looking at a construction companyfrom the same broker,
that he used to list it.
I passed on that construction companyand they said, well, it's not construction
(04:32):
per se that you were looking for,but it's in the same realm.
financials are really strong.
They brought that opportunityin front of me.
yeah. Put the offer in.
I think Mark actuallyhad better offers on the table.
Unless he lied to me all these years.
But, my intention was to keepthe employees on,
(04:53):
and run the business as it wasin, as it was a family business
that was obviously really important,for Mark to,
make sure his family membersstill had jobs at the end of the sale.
So that being my attention, I bought it,
kept all the employees that were on staff.
and then Mark went down and bought, GrahamHeating and Air in the Tampa Bay area.
(05:16):
All right.
And then, Mark,how did you end up partnering together?
How did that happen?
So it was, part of the contract was
I was to to be there for him for a year.
So we set up monthly meetings.
And so we were, come in.
And so the first thing was, you know,you have that transition period.
So I remember we we did the closingand I, we walked into the office
(05:38):
and I told him, I'm like, dude,I only work like five hours a week.
And he goes, and no one ever believes mewhen I say that.
I'm like, I and I'm here longer foryou are our offer
person would be freaking outif I'm here more than that.
Last time, I said.
But anyway, we walked into the officeand and I hand him this manual.
I said, here's the manual to the business.
So I went through the manual with themand I don't know how long that was.
(05:59):
Yeah, I, I had planned for a whole day.
It was Sunday.
I mean, I was like
I told my wife, like, I don't knowif maybe I'll be back around five.
Could be later, I don't know.
I got here at nine.
I think he left at 930
and hands this book and he's like,you good.
We go through the book and he's like,you know, we got the manager in place.
(06:20):
He's going to follow this.
as long as you keep following this,you'll keep having the same success.
Okay.So I don't know what else to tell you.
what questions do you have?
I had, I don't know, like ten minutesworth of questions.
And at 930, he's out the door.
then he came back, I don't know,maybe an hour later to introduce me
to the manager that was runningthe operation at the time.
(06:42):
And then the manager was his brotherin law. So,
you know, he was contractually obligatedto not share that he was selling it.
So it was a big shock to his brotherin law that he was selling it.
after market walked out,he was like, man, I,
I really just needa little time to process.
I'm really.
(07:02):
Christ, I don't know what to think,but I can tell you, we're
gonna we're going to do better this yearthan we ever have.
I can't believe he did this to me.
And he was right, though.
I mean, we actually did break the fracturethat year, so,
Yeah, looking back on it,it was the most motivating thing for
the manager was getting back in.
It's like,
(07:25):
you know.
So then we had other works.
Yeah.
And the week of meetingfor we'd meet once a month and stuff.
And so, taken over Graham and stuff,and then we're talking and I'm like,
yeah, I want to buy more locationsbecause you see how the process is, too.
Spencerdidn't know anything about these things,
but he comes in and he just runs it andit's like, you have to plug and play, man.
You put this inand we run it and you'll do well.
(07:46):
So we,
we were talking and he's like, well,I want to grow and I want to grow.
Well, we were we realized his strengthsand my strengths are two different things.
They're two different things.But we fit well together.
And, as I told him, the best thing iswe were not lifelong friends,
so I'm not letting him get awaywith anything.
He's not letting me get awaywith anything.
And partnerships can be very difficult.
I've seen many, many fail.
(08:07):
And so I'm like,so what's the thing here, guys?
So the reason.
So I laid out the case. So we were like,well, let's grow together.
Like, okay, let's, let's do this.
And so we laid it out the pros and consand what we're worried about,
we ran it by our wivesbecause your wives have to agree. Right.
That's number one rule.
So, they were they were on board with it.
So then we just started.
(08:27):
All right,we got this plug and play system.
We just go in
and we know when we walked in,
we bought wewe know what we're looking for companies.
And then we buy them andand we'll double them in the first year.
And then we'll double them againthe second year. That's our history.
Like by year two
we're doing quadruple what they were doingthe first the year before we took over.
So see that's a great story.
I knew it would it would be great.
(08:48):
it's often times that it's funnybecause I feel like most of the time
when we're work on a deal,
by the time we're done,the buyer and seller, like,
want nothing to do with each other.
even if they've got some kindof consulting agreement, they're like,
yeah, we met twice.
And then, you know, they were madthat I changed, you know, X, Y, and Z.
And I was mad that, you know, theyI had to make the changes
(09:08):
because they didn't knowwhat they were doing.
And it's like this,you know, head butting.
And so I always thought it was funny
when the, the first timeSpencer called me and goes, yeah, so we,
we want to buy some more stuff and,but I'm partnering with this guy Mark. And
so let me explain to you.
He was the seller.
I was like, well,I hope you don't have a non-compete.
You guys are working together.
(09:28):
And, you said,no, no, no, he's awesome like this.
It's been perfect.
And I'm like, okay, well,I mean, it makes sense.
You got somebody with experience like,let's figure this out. So.
Yeah.
And thing I was told no. Right.
No, you can't do that cuzyou live in Oman.
You can't own property and businessesin other parts of the country doing this.
That's my process. Doesn't matter.
(09:49):
I don't have to be there.I didn't tell you.
I know how it works, but I'm here.
I bet they hear that
every single person they talk toand they don't know me, right?
And they so like, okay.
And then, yeah.
And then and the thing with the owners,like, we, we take over companies now,
we don't really want them in there.
We're like, just help us get everything
transferred overand then we'll see you later, man.
Like you were just their pain in the butt.
(10:11):
Yeah. It's like a five hour process.
We transfer all the utilitiesand all that stuff.
After closing and.
All right, well, four.
And a half hours longerthan your interaction was.
But you're right. You know.
That's right.
And I and I appreciate youbringing up the,
the thing about the partnership stuff,because I do feel like
that is one of the biggest challengesthat we see
when people do partner with each otherbecause it's a total gamble.
(10:33):
Right?
I mean, I've,I've said it many times, like,
would you have marriedsomebody that you met after, you know,
maybe 30, 60, 90 daysthat you really haven't spent time with?
If you did marry him, like,is it going to work out?
And so that's what I kind of cautionpeople on when they're deciding
to form a partnership.
Now, you brought up a very good pointthat you both
(10:55):
bring different skill sets to the table,and I think that's the key.
And I mean, obviously we see that'sthe key in a relationship, right too.
I mean, we've we've all see our friendsthat are exactly the same as their spouse.
And we can't understand whyevery time we go to dinner,
they leave yelling at each other. Right.
But then the ones that are differentand bring different things
to the table, it ends up working out,you know, and I I've heard it many times.
(11:17):
Somebody says, if you don't ever say no,there's to each other.
There'sno reason to have a partnership. Right.
You're just one in the same.It doesn't make sense.
So yeah. Seems to make sense though.
Cool.
And then okay,so then you decided to partner together.
And the first timethat you went out looking,
(11:38):
and you had found some, I think that'swhen when we met each other.
how many,
did you buy at that time?
Yeah, we partnered right at the beginningof 2020 to January 1st of 2022,
with the goal of we were going to buyone company a year for ten years.
That was our goal.
(11:59):
we failed in 2022 to close on anything.
but we had obviously met you,and I think it was June of 2022.
We put an offer in on.
We had put an offer on two companiesthat got accepted.
That was actually I thinkthat was the third and fourth company.
We put offers in on,
that were accepted,but the others went nowhere.
(12:23):
the sellers backed out of the deal,
and, you know,they're contractually obligated.
We could have forced the hand and said,no, we're moving forward with this with,
you don't want to take over a businessunder those circumstances.
So, yeah, when wewe went under contract with these two,
assuming something's going to happen,one of them is going to fall through,
(12:46):
one's in Kissimmee, one's in Port Richey.
And would be a really difficult thingto close on both of them at the same time.
of course we contacted you right aroundthat same time that we went under contract
with them, and it,we were supposed to close in 90 days.
There was,
a lot of slowdown from the sellers side.
(13:08):
so we look for businessesthat are underperforming,
and maybe not ran,at their optimal performance
so we can fix them and, and get that addedequity growth out of it.
but with that comeswith those struggles on
business ownersthat aren't on top of things.
so getting informationout of them is quite a struggle.
(13:30):
Sometimes.
deal.
Yeah. Thatthat really delayed us in getting close.
So it was January of 2023 when we actuallyI think it's the 13th of January,
you know, in three.
We actually closed on those two.
Yeah.
I mean, not all of them had do a manualand have a brother in law with
a chip on his shoulder. So
it's exactly right. The,
(13:52):
the, the funny part is that BrotherLaw moved from the small location
down to Tampa to run that one quite well,and he's never leaving it.
That's good for him. Yeah.
That's great.
So, when you bought those two,where they similar size
was one larger than the other,do you remember what you paid for them?
What you put down.
For Richie,I think, was doing about 1.2 million.
(14:16):
I think we paida little over a million for it.
and then the one in Kissimmee was doing
they had a track recordof doing 750 to 800.
But the most recent year, I think in 2022,they only did like 500.
Yeah. But they were going down.
but yeah, they,they were definitely on a downward
(14:36):
trajectory when we bought that was 300.
Yeah. that we paid for that one.
You got to love the SBA in there.
Hey, if you're going to buy a business
just like your business, we're going tofund the whole thing for you.
so with that, and then,
we worked in the, working capital.
(14:59):
So I think technically we financed 107%
of the purchase price,and got that 7% back.
I most deals don't work out that way, but,
it was nice.
yeah, I think it,
at the end of the day, like,not everybody fits that criteria, right.
(15:19):
Or that mold,
our our bank at first and I, we'reour credit manager is awesome.
He he understandskind of what you're doing
because he has a background in that.
And, you know, the
I think the, the big thingthat everybody tried to get into
in the last 4 or 5 years was like,I'm going to go roll up, you know, home
service businesses, you know, a guy in atruck is usually what, what they call a
(15:43):
we're happy to to make that happenif you have the right people.
So with both of you,with your skill set already having,
you know, an established locations and,
you know, being able to kind of provethat, that, you know, what you're doing
makes it a lot easierto make that decision.
So, yeah,so we close on that one and, and January.
And then how did that gowhen you took over those two.
(16:05):
What what was kind of thethe process I guess, and how it went with.
So the more we do this, the better offwe get.
Better we go.
So when what I went down to Graham,I went down to the to go over
Graham and I roll up my manual.
I'm like,this is the way things need to run.
I'm going to train you. I'mgoing to train you and train you.
But this is a 30 a companythat had employees that have been there
20, 30 years as technicians.
(16:26):
And so setting their mindwhere they're going to do things
and they would learnand we run with chose to exhaustion.
finally it was just a change up.
So we we figured we we found a way todetermine if someone was going to change.
So then we took these two overand we just had meetings with them,
you know,just like you do when you take over.
And we said, this is the here'swhat we here's how we do business.
And the problem with all these companiesis when we know when we're buying it,
(16:51):
the, the, the employees run the business,not the owner to the beat up there.
We're down there.
Everyone thinks that the trades are great,but the owner gets beat up
because he doesn't know how to runa business. He doesn't.
So he was a technicianat one time, doesn't know profit,
and he doesn't understand overhead.And they don't price accordingly.
And they don't understandthat vessels are going to happen.
So they get beat upand these employees lead the way.
(17:11):
Like I'm not coming into work today, okay.
That's okay with them.
With that, so we can work that way.
So we go in there,
we lay out exactly what's going to happenand remember the one place.
So if we're going to call it10:00 on a Saturday
and I don't want to run it,you're going to make run it.
And so we sureare are you don't have a job.
Well he didn't stick around.
But then he'scalling about two weeks later when he got
(17:34):
there.
We go in and we're okay with thatbecause we have a great process.
We put ads up,we get plenty of applicants.
We have a great training program.
We train our guys, our managers,we train them well.
And so we know going inwe're going to make some changes.
very I would say, the adminis the most important person to keep.
There's no doubt, because they knowall the information about the business.
(17:54):
Yeah.
We, we promoted from within.
So that made a huge difference.
When we bought both of them,the owner was managing the day to day.
so when the owner steps out,we had those positions fill,
so we promoted two guysthat were currently working,
from our Clearwater location,
(18:15):
to those management positions.
So having somebody that already knows yourprocess and your systems and, and you,
makes it a much easier transition
to implement your process at that.
You know, it's slow.
Yeah. That's that's great.
so looking back at the the first kind ofacquisition you did together of those two,
(18:39):
is there anything that, you felt likeyou could have done different?
if if somebody was saying,hey, what's the best piece of advice
that you could givethat you learned during that transaction?
Is there something therethat you could share with us.
If they don't have a good system already?
If you don't have a systemthat you run like I'm talking traits
(19:00):
like plumbing and electrical, you don'thave to be running you school by somebody.
You're trusting that
that company had a good systemand they weren't necessarily doing well.
You'reprobably not going to necessarily do so.
So it's hard for me to say that because Ialready had a learning have a system.
So we were talking thatthe biggest thing I just learned is don't
know, based on if you hear this,but don't count on your employees thing
(19:21):
because it's a different system,even though they make more money,
like we've laid it out like we.
Yeah, well, it's that one that would bemy advice is like,
you don't have a system to go buynew plumbing or something.
unless that company is thriving,
don't buy it because you're goingto have the same problems, either
because you don't have a systemor if you don't know how to get a system.
(19:43):
That's great advice.
And, you know, as, as banksand as us doing this for a very long time
and doing so many transactions, wewe kind of look at it very realistically
and what we want to hear or want tosee is not typically what does happen.
And we we understand that. And so,
that is why we lean heavily on, on youas the person borrowing the money
(20:07):
because your experience and,you know, your business acumen
really comes into playwhen you have issues like, and employees
leaving and,you know, I, I've seen it myself where
sometimes you have some turnoverand it's probably a good thing.
at the end of the day, those peopleprobably weren't the right fit.
if you've got somebodyelse that's willing to listen, that's
(20:29):
shape of all moldablethat you can kind of fit into your system,
which clearly works,then you're not too beat up about it.
So it ends upit ends up working out so well.
One of the biggest things I have learned,which was really eye
opening for me, was when I bought apex.
Everybody stayed, it was a great team.
(20:51):
So going in with that expectationfor the future,
you know,when we first closed on these two,
I assume we'd be able to win the
all the employees over.
I didn't, realize
it was foreign to methat some people are not willing,
even though we pay significantly betterthan what they were making, they weren't
(21:14):
willing to step up to the our expectationsof employees to make that better pay.
So they they were willing to sacrifice,not getting paid as well
for that responsibility,not having to take on.
That's interesting.
Yeah.
So I guess you can't, completely motivatepeople that aren't motivating themselves.
(21:38):
I guess. So, right?
Yeah. Makes sense.
all right, so then you got those onesunder your belt.
How long was itbefore you called me again?
well, in the middle of that.
So before we called you again laterthat year, 2023,
we bought one in Clearwater.
(22:01):
that, is, is a small transactionto a smaller deal.
we bought,
I don't know,we make that same purchase again.
Yeah, we'll answer that one.
I wouldn't
I wouldn't make that think we're justbecause you didn't have server software.
okay.
So the the costto get all of those customer
filesentered into the system was significant.
(22:24):
You know, we got five vehicles with that,probably around $100,000 value.
Yeah.
We still have his adminperson still, works for us.
he had
a long history of success,but he definitely gave up.
Completely gave up.
so getting a lot of benefit fromthat, has been difficult.
(22:49):
So I don't know if I'd make that exactsame purchasing
or we paid for that purchase if we paidfor that versus if it was so much work.
And just not having service softwareis a big one anymore going forward.
We know you don't serve software.
3.1 first and final.
If you're considering selling a businessand especially a service business
(23:11):
and you're not on servicesoftware, you highly consider
good. Get into it.
Get your stuff set up on it becauseit makes that transition so much easier.
and I wouldn't be interested in buying itif you're not offering software.
Yeah.
Yeah, that makes sense.
And then we went to,and we were saying that was evil.
(23:31):
Okay. Did we give you six monthsbefore we told you again?
I don't remember, and I think so.
I called you in June 2023 and, well.
To be fair, you tried to cheat on meand go with another lender first.
But, you're,
But that's okay, I get it.
I think it was funny because I thinkI heard from somebody else that that you
that you called me and you said, hey,I know it's it hasn't been very long.
(23:56):
can we talk it?
sure. Let's let's hear it.
and we do get those requests,
you know, fairly often and sometimes.
And every, every lender is going to have,like a kind of quote unquote rule
with it or,most of them will have a line in the sand.
You need to operate for 24 months beforewe'll give you an opportunity.
(24:17):
And it's it'skind of silly to act that way.
I feel, with us,we we've always tried to say,
let's look at every single transactionindividually
through its own lens and see,can we get this to make sense?
And it's to work.
And there's a lot of lenders
that are just like, nope,our rule is 24 months and call me then.
(24:38):
And sometimesit doesn't make sense to do that.
So I think once we we started talkingand you kind of said this is what
I'm looking to do.
I'm kind of like, oh, okay, let me,let me see what we could do
because I feel likewe just stop talking to each other.
Let's start again,you know? So. Yeah. Yeah.
So that was meafter we did that first one, we're like,
(24:58):
we're never buying two companiesat the same time again.
I'm never doing that.
And so what we did,we went about three of the same.
Yeah exactly.
What's better than two is three. You know.
It's yes.
Yes. We had three of those.
And then maybe just give us like
some quick context on where they werelocated, the size of them.
you know what you liked about them.
(25:20):
Now they're all in,the south west area of Florida.
so Fort Myers, they're office locations.
Where is Fort Myers?
Northport and Englewood?
so, they're all within
30 minutes or so of each other.
you know, it's all man.
(25:41):
It's our intention in the beginning
was maybe to have two offices,but currently they're all managed by one.
got into a very, very good job.
so the whole goal was to buy these
three group, groupit together a little bit,
and have a larger operation
(26:01):
out of the three different companies.
and so far, it has gone very well.
Yeah.
This crushing, I would say like, so
I think combined, they're around 2 millionand take out some of their stupid stuff.
They did, I call stupid stuff.
We can do refrigeration commercial workor do you do building stuff?
So they're probably probably combineddoing two manufacturing
(26:23):
of that stupid stuff.
And man,he's probably on pace to do 4 million.
So he waswe were just shy of 400,000 bucks. One.
Yeah. With those locations. So
yeah.
Group them together.
Just creatingone larger operation in that area.
And we lowered the overheadsignificantly between the three of them
(26:44):
by just not having as much office space,
not needing as many admin people.
just less Metal City doing that. So
yes, them and I would say the thingwe learned off
that one is thewhy the admin is so important.
Everyone thinks it's the ownersattacking the installers to us, the admin
(27:05):
is the most important person personin that company that we need to retain
because they know all their history,they know everything.
And when the customer when they call in,oh yeah, we dealt with them 18 months ago
or whatever or they know history of calls.
That route is very helpful.
So because we kept one of the admin,
two of the admin of the threecompanies, correct.
(27:27):
And you know, thatthird company has issues kind of really
we have to really dig to find the answers.
So that's some great advice.
I don't I don't think I've everhad someone tell me that.
And it it's probablya little bit industry specific, but
I think that's, that's some great piecesthat we can pull out of that.
definitely something I will start to,talk to buyers
(27:47):
about and kind of say, hey, you know,are you keeping that person around?
What's your plan for it?
You know, there's two guys out therethat are killing it.
They told me, this is what you have to do.
So I trust them, right.
And they usually have a very good feelfor the requirements.
Florida is crazy on how many jurisdictionsand where you pull permits.
Then,
(28:07):
they usually always knowall that information already.
So they are very keyin making sure you're set up
in all the tiny jurisdictionsand all the little areas,
they pulled all the permitsfor these places.
So they have a really good grasp onnot just the customer base,
but the local ordinancesrequired to, you know,
(28:31):
call.
So I think totalthen does that bring you to eight total
if you, if you take all of them.
If that's the, you know,
And now are you rebranding them all as onebrand, are you leaving them separate.
How are you handling that?
so our Omaha, Nebraska location we've left
as a service is not the original
(28:53):
one we bought in.
in the Tampa Bay area.
And Clearwater areais brand heating and air.
we have rebranded all of the ones
that we bought in 2023, to operateunder that brand heating and air.
Okay.
most of them,
(29:14):
a couple of the companieswere starting to have,
get a bad reputation online.
not that they had a bad reputation,but if you don't focus on, like,
your Google reviews, then all you end upwith is the negative Google reviews.
So then, you know, if you have 15 reviewsand you have four of them
that were the one started,
(29:36):
that's a tough thingto overcome in a short period of time.
So we found that it's just easier to group
it under our so when we're found online
rather than online marketing,
you have aha having a for hire is a lot different
than having something belowfor for your online presence.
(29:58):
Yeah, I would say myself that that'skind of some of the first things I do.
If I'm looking for some kind of service,
I'll go to the Google reviewsand read them.
I always switch itto like the latest ones,
because sometimes I feel like they'remaybe the first ones that pop up
may have been from 2 or 3 years ago,and you know, if the latest ones are a lot
better than maybe they had bad managementor maybe even got acquired or something.
(30:21):
But yeah, I think a lot of peopledon't necessarily focus on
that and realize that the day and agethat we're in, you can review
almost everything you buyor every service that you, you use.
And so it really makes senseto pay attention to that stuff.
So it's probablya little bit of a learning curve.
And it's probably difficultwhen you have so many different locations
trying to group them all togetherand see what's going on with it. So
(30:43):
all right, so you've got all those now.
So maybe just give us a little bitof context on how you manage all of those.
You kind of mentioned a little bitof having a manager helps with it.
But I know, being so popularof trying to kind of roll up
or take on a certain marketor demographic,
(31:03):
and then certain locations,
the biggest struggle that oftentimespeople have, or even the banks have,
and wrapping their mind around it is like,how are you going to manage that?
How are you going to be ableto kind of control all of that?
So maybe you could talk about thata little bit about that.
We are a franchise,but when we're recruiting managers,
(31:24):
we it's it's similarto opening a franchise.
So, we have the playbook.
This is what it takesto run this operation successfully.
we so we train that manager on our plate.
Every one of our manager bringstheir personality to their location.
(31:45):
but our goal is to get themto just follow the playbook.
and then they can put there.
As long as they are
following our main guidelines,they can put their flavor into it.
And they have a lot of control.
So we hire guys with managementexperience or,
or experience with usthat we've promoted to a manager spot.
(32:05):
so we give them the powerto control their team.
Our philosophy on itis I'm going to hold you to the standard.
It's up to you to choose the guysthat are going to help you achieve that.
so they have a lot of that,
that controlin how they achieve their goals.
obviously they start follow our processes.
(32:27):
but the people they put ontheir team is up to them
how long they keep coaching them.
If it's not working,we leave it up to them.
so that
can be atrust, I guess, is what I'm trying to say.
That is the best way to, put it.
you got to be able to trust your manager.
(32:47):
and with that comes being able to verify.
So making surethat we're getting our spreadsheets daily
that have our KPIsso we can make those adjustments
on the fly and not waiting,you know, until the 10th of the next month
when our PNL comes out and saying,oh, you lost money last month.
so we get those daily reports for you,those reports with the manager,
(33:10):
to get. Hey.
Okay, so you're a little bit offon your payroll percentages.
What's your goal? What happened?
How are you going to fix it?
and then we can give our input on.
Okay, well,you know, that plan should work.
We've seen people try that plan.
Maybe we shouldlook at these other options.
but empowering
them to lead their teammakes a huge difference, for sure.
(33:32):
And, Mark, is itthe kind of the same playbook
that you handed Spencer and said, bye,I'm going to go play golf?
Yeah. Is that.
And so as we're growing the thing rightnow, it's like,
how do we manage all these locations?
And so we're learningas we're throwing as we hit walls
and all these things,we learn about that stuff.
We want to keep growing
(33:52):
because this is a great journeythat we're on, like we always do.
So people were two guys with the dream.
We're not we don't havebillions of dollars behind us.
We just have the two guys, the dream,and we got a great process.
So, you know, likewe've had to add the HR person,
which, is newand we've added an accountant and then,
we just recently hiredan operations person
who will kind of takesome of that managing operations off,
(34:14):
so we can continue focusing on newprojects going forward. New,
growth,
like we're adding plumbingand adding those things.
So, yeah, as we're growing,we're adding the city in the pieces
so we canwe're not the reason we're slowing down.
That's maybe.
Yeah, thatthat's a great way to look at it.
So that would kind oflead me to my next question.
(34:35):
You kind of hinted at alreadya little bit.
But what what's next.
Well, we,
the only thing that's consistent
is change for us. So,
we just opened, a Lakeland office.
this last week, actually.
so technically,we hired guys about a month ago.
(34:55):
You know, we've been training.
Their first calls were Tuesday.
so two days ago were our first callsin the Lakeland, Florida area.
and then we also started plumbing.
so that started on the 5thor the 16th of May.
we started plumbing.
Teamed up with a local plumber in Omaha.
(35:17):
it's been he's been in plumbingfor a very long time.
but he was always focusedon the new construction commercial side.
He decided he wanted to get away from thatand go into the residential side.
so we were actually working with him.
It's, an old friend of Mark's,
and just
helping coach him through that transition.
(35:39):
and you know that,
going from the commercial new constructionto the residential
when you don't have any customers,on the residential side
or very few residential customershave was quite the struggle for him.
so and working with himand trying to get him over that hump,
(36:01):
we all kind of came to the realization,you know, we partner up here
on plumbing in Omaha, we can work together
to iron out our processes and systems.
Then once we have that done,we can implement
plumbing in our Florida market.
as we and we have over120,000 customers in Florida.
(36:23):
in our database.
So once we get the processes down,
it should be fairly easy,just like we do on the back side,
just a plug and playto our current operations in Florida.
We predict that within two years.
And even if we don't over on the backside, we'll probably close to double
total revenueby just adding plumbing to each location.
(36:45):
Yeah. That's great.
So then isis that kind of the ultimate plan is
to get all of thosekind of built up on the plumbing side.
So you've got it downand then continue to grow from there.
Are you wanting to sell at that point?
What what'skind of the next steps from there?
I don't know, enjoy the journey.
Like so recently Logan Lakeland didn'tfind really any good business to sell.
(37:09):
Right.
You know, there isn't that you know,let's just open it and scratch.
So we've done it and they've been booking4 or 5 calls a day like us for calls.
And we're like, our goal was to do6.7 a day in the first year.
Well, if we did that the first week,just imagine.
But anyway, so that's athat's kind of a tough thing.
but it's workingand we'll, we'll see how it goes.
(37:31):
And then, no, I don't know, selling.
I mean, you know, we've been approached,
we've talked to these privateequity groups and we get more.
We always pick their brainwhere they probably pick cars
because we want to know.
That's how we came upwith the operation. Correct.
And we're like, yeah, man, that's probablyhold us back.
Let's talk about an operations record.
So we we detailed out what it needs.
And then we thought about, okay,
(37:52):
what do we know that would fit this.
So we knew one of the someone we knewI say
we literally just hired him this morning.
So, just we just hired himthis morning, so,
he'll start in a month, and then he'sgoing to take care of these operations
where all those menwho call him instead of us.
So we're not dealingwith problems of today.
We still people who forward,but we don't have plans going now.
(38:13):
We do not have a plan of selling.
that said, we are of the mindset
that it is an asset.
so it's the right price, is there?
I mean, right, we would discuss it.
the hard part of that is,
I mean, in 2022,we did a combine was a 4.34 million,
(38:36):
I think it was.
Yeah. Somewhere around there. Yeah.
whatever.
and then in 2023,we did a, a some eight, seven.
And right nowwe're on pace to do 17 this year.
So to put a value on that,even if it's a difficult thing
because they're going to look at wellwhat did you do last year.
(38:57):
Oh well
I mean we've already done more.
Yeah we've you know we're in the 6or 6 million range right now.
Yeah. That's great.
So it's yeah it's a tough thingto put a value on it.
for a buyer for sure.
It's a tough thing, for us to try to say,
(39:18):
to devalue it, to say, well, okay,that's what we did last year, but
look what we're doing right now andwe know what we're going to do next year.
So I, I don't see the point selling.
Really. Yeah. Well, and if it's.
If it's working,I mean if you're in you're continually
just kind of refining it a little bit hereand there and it's not killing you.
(39:42):
why sell.
You know, I mean, I think it makes sense.
And people kind of, I feel likea lot of people, especially more lately.
We were talking about this,a couple of days ago.
A lot of peoplelook at it as, I'm going to roll up,
you know, seven, eight, nine,ten of these operators for one year,
then sell it, and then people get in thereand they do it
(40:02):
and they go, you know,this is actually kind of fun.
I kind of enjoy it.
Or they say, I'm doing really welland I'm not working 75 hours a week.
Like, why, why would I turn this off?
You know, and then they end up saying, I'mthrowing that out the window,
I'm going to actually run this.So I get it.
Makes sense.
So, seems like you're kind ofat that point, which is which is great.
(40:25):
yeah.
If you can get into the $30 million
revenue range just by adding the plumbing,I mean, that's that's big.
So that's real big money.
So that's awesome.
Yeah.
And it's good to see that it is doable.
I think a lot of people,
are, are a little intimidatedby trying to figure out how to do it.
(40:45):
I do think,
there's a lot of people that try to do it,but they don't have the same skill set.
and, you know, you figured out a processwhich is extremely important.
so if anybody can kind oftake something out of this, it's
create a process that clearly worksand then just continue to
to implement that at each locationand maybe refine it here
(41:07):
and there a little bit if you need to.
So yeah, glad it's working.
Of course you're. Happy with it. Yeah.
We can't stress like we're talking aboutlike I couldn't
individually go on this on my ownand he could do it on his own.
It's a board of us.
And I was like, yeah, we were bothin the same boat, in the same mud.
And we could have done.
We wouldn't be where we're at todaybecause there's a lot of a lot of pain
(41:28):
with it. Like, those walls are real.
People talk about walls.
They're real because you need capitalto get through that wall.
And yeah.
So yeah, and time and time again,it is a lot to try to
to bust through those,those business walls.
We definitely felt itat the beginning of this year
as we were really pushingthrough that 15 million.
(41:48):
And I mean, itit was a lot of time, a lot of stress.
but all three, it's lonely at the top.
Right?
So having that other person there with you
to push through those things is not a lot.
You know?
Well, it sounds like you'vejust been an overachiever all together.
You wanted to do ten or, sorry,one a year for ten years.
(42:10):
And you said,I will just hit fastball. So.
And then you've been you've donegreat. Yeah.
So you continue to be an overachiever.
Either that or you
just set really low goals for yourselfso you can just make yourself
feel really good jumping.
Off nice exercise, you know.
Yeah,I don't I. Don't think that's the case.
But yeah, you guys are doing great.
(42:32):
So, you know, there's a lot of knowledge,a lot of, information
really appreciate it.
so at the end, I was asked two questions.
so maybe Mark will start with you.
do you have a mentor,or have you ever had a mentor?
yeah, I see mentors on these guys.
I don't say will be on for,
He's really.
He reallychanged my mind to get on the field.
(42:54):
and then he's the same person.
Oh, I didn't know the second one yet.
Yeah. Okay, we'll get to that. What?
Right.
Spencer, what about you with a mentor?
well, not as much now as maybe
wasn't 2020 when he handed methis book and said, good luck.
but really, Mark, you was a great mentor.
(43:15):
like I say, my background in real estate.
So transitioning over to,
you know, I was only feeding myself to nowI have six employees,
and I'm running this companyin a H-back world.
I'm unfamiliar with.
Mark answered the phone pretty muchevery time I called or call me right back.
(43:36):
and that made.
Yeah, made a world of differencein the success that I experienced.
That especially that first year,running the business by myself.
So that's awesome. Yeah.
So and then second question,we'll we'll come back to you, Mark.
you know,you guys have obviously been successful.
what what motivates you?
I think just the journey,
(43:56):
like we said, we also
we have goals, but it's just getting it'sjust went through everything.
I just, I just enjoy the journey.
Like, it's like you always look back onthings and you're like, you remember that?
Just I don't eventhe manager are ruin the blown up.
You know your goal was to do this.
But man, look at what you've done.
And remember this kind of this happened
(44:18):
in the time that this happenedgood and bad.
I just enjoy the journey. That's great.
You know, he'snot just looking off into space.
Yeah. We here. Oh, no.
I figured you know, he's not just. No no
no no.
I need to get I need to get a, goal boardin my office.
Probably.
But, they're usually up in my headsomewhere, so.
(44:41):
And then what about you, Spencer?
That's the same thing.
I mean, I feel like we really madea huge difference
in every market that we go into.
It's funny, the like Mark said,it really is a journey.
when we first started any market, it is.
It's difficultto find guys with experience.
We have a great training program.
We hire a lot of guys without experience.
(45:04):
but then after we've been in the marketfor even just six months,
we get people that just walk in and apply,
they've heard about what we're doing,where they've heard about how we pay.
I mean, all these
all these bad guys talk to each otherevery time they're in a supply house.
And, you know, they're griping about thisand griping about that.
And I'm sure our employees have their fairshare of gripes like anybody else.
(45:28):
but I think that's a big part of it
is we're really we change the industryin every market that we go into.
And having people that seek us outto come work for us.
It's, it's a big deal to me. Yeah. So.
Yeah, that's athat's a great way to, kind of quantify
how you're doing isif people are starting to call you
(45:49):
because you hear a lot of peoplewhere they struggle to, to find good help.
So that's awesome. So.
Well, yeah, I mean, this was, jam packed,and we'll have to do it again sometime.
when you decide to buyfive more next week.
well, I did call you last week.
Yeah.
You did?
Yeah. It's, Hello. Right.
(46:10):
Right down a goal and then blow itout of the water like you usually do.
So that'll be great.But I really appreciate your time.
I know, I know,you've got a lot going on and stuff, and,
the listeners will definitely be happy to,
to hear about how this is going,because, this is a lot
of what people are trying to do.
So I really appreciate you guysjumping on here.
Absolutely. No.
(46:31):
Anything really, because youyou are a big part of that tyranny.
and getting these dealsfinanced is not a it's not an easy thing.
so we definitely appreciateeverything you've also done in helping us
achieve our goals.
Yep. Cool I appreciate that. Awesome.
Well, sure. We'll talk again soon.
All right. Thanks, guys.
(46:52):
Thank you for listening.
We hope you found this podcastinformative and helpful.
Please don't forget to subscribeon your favorite podcast player
for more information or if you'd liketo discuss the transaction, please go to
Jarrett johnson.com.
If you don't have a system that you runlike I'm talking
(00:03):
traits like plumbing and infection,you don't have to be running.
You go to school by somebody.
You're trusting that
that company had a good systemand they weren't necessarily doing well.
You'reprobably not going to necessarily do so.
Welcome to the before you buyor Sell a business podcast
where we help buyers and sellerslearn more about the acquisition process,
discuss recent transactions, and stay upto date on the latest news in the market.
(00:28):
Here is your host, Jarrett Johnson.
Hey, everybody.
All right,before we get into the next episode,
I've had a lot of people reach out to merecently requesting to sponsor
the show and I have decidedto go ahead and open that up.
So if that's you and you're interested,please shoot me an email at Jared,
which is Jared at Jared W johnson.com.
(00:52):
And I'll get you some informationover on how you can do that.
All right.
Today I got Mark and Spencer Saturday
I know one of the majorthings was asking you
how to say your name properlybecause everybody says Satori.
Right.
So, I try to get that right, because,
a lot of people say Jerry or Gerald,and I'm like, no, it's Jared.
(01:15):
So, especially as a kid,my name was a little difficult to,
get people to say properly.
And then Mark, your last name is easy.
So we we don't have to worry too,too much about that.
Right. But,
so I think the biggest reasonI'm excited to have you on is
you're one of the first peoplewe've talked to
that are doing what a lot of peopleare trying to do, which is kind of roll up
(01:35):
Hvac and plumbing.
So I know we'll definitely dive into that.
Maybe we could start with Mark.
we could talk about your background,like where you grew up.
Did you go to college, all that fun stuff.First?
Yeah.
I've, grown up in around the Omaha,Nebraska area, town called Valley.
And then I'm just burnt out.
Foreign, which is part of a lot rightnext to Valley.
Now, I've been in theworld, since the late 80s.
(02:00):
I've been doing this a long time.
started first company at 20, for 20 yearsthis year.
So, Yeah, things.
I did go to college.
I was an industrial engineering major.
And then I got the opportunity.
My wife had the opportunityto take over a restaurant, and I'm
in my early 20s, and I thoughtthat was the greatest thing in the world.
But I learned two things from that one.
(02:22):
I never want a restaurant ever again.
But two,I really like being self-employed. So,
after that, then I got a new track,put in my time to get my license,
and then I went out on my own.
So cool.
Yeah, we get a lot of people,I want to buy a restaurant. Why?
Well, it sounds fun.
No, no, it'snot the right reason for it. Yeah.
So no, no. So.
(02:44):
All right, Spencer, what about you?
Yeah, I, I'm from the Omaha area as well.
graduated from North South High School andthen went to the University of Nebraska.
I got a business administration degree.
so I am a Husker.
and then
after that, I did a few different things.
(03:05):
I was selling real estate or selling
real estate and insuranceat the same time for a while.
box of real estate properties, residentialthat I was managing and renting out.
and then I started flipping houses,
up to the beginning of 2020,
when I sold my last flip project,
(03:27):
and got into the, the Hvac world.
So cool.
Well, yeah.
So it's always interesting to see kind ofhow people got into what they're doing.
And I know the, the way that youto kind of started
working together is very interesting.
So maybe you guys can talk about that.
Mark was actually lookingto buy another Hvac company
(03:48):
while running the Omaha, NebraskaApex Services.
And the biggest problem from the bank is,well, how are you going to manage that?
Whereverhe was looking, right in Florida or
on the other side of Nebraska or whatever,how are you going to manage that?
And your one in Omaha, Nebraska,if you just live in Omaha?
(04:09):
So his way to get overthat hurdle was listed
company in Omaha for saleand go buy a bigger company in Florida.
and sothat's where the opportunity came for me.
I was looking at a construction companyfrom the same broker,
that he used to list it.
I passed on that construction companyand they said, well, it's not construction
(04:32):
per se that you were looking for,but it's in the same realm.
financials are really strong.
They brought that opportunityin front of me.
yeah. Put the offer in.
I think Mark actuallyhad better offers on the table.
Unless he lied to me all these years.
But, my intention was to keepthe employees on,
(04:53):
and run the business as it wasin, as it was a family business
that was obviously really important,for Mark to,
make sure his family membersstill had jobs at the end of the sale.
So that being my attention, I bought it,
kept all the employees that were on staff.
and then Mark went down and bought, GrahamHeating and Air in the Tampa Bay area.
(05:16):
All right.
And then, Mark,how did you end up partnering together?
How did that happen?
So it was, part of the contract was
I was to to be there for him for a year.
So we set up monthly meetings.
And so we were, come in.
And so the first thing was, you know,you have that transition period.
So I remember we we did the closingand I, we walked into the office
(05:38):
and I told him, I'm like, dude,I only work like five hours a week.
And he goes, and no one ever believes mewhen I say that.
I'm like, I and I'm here longer foryou are our offer
person would be freaking outif I'm here more than that.
Last time, I said.
But anyway, we walked into the officeand and I hand him this manual.
I said, here's the manual to the business.
So I went through the manual with themand I don't know how long that was.
(05:59):
Yeah, I, I had planned for a whole day.
It was Sunday.
I mean, I was like
I told my wife, like, I don't knowif maybe I'll be back around five.
Could be later, I don't know.
I got here at nine.
I think he left at 930
and hands this book and he's like,you good.
We go through the book and he's like,you know, we got the manager in place.
(06:20):
He's going to follow this.
as long as you keep following this,you'll keep having the same success.
Okay.So I don't know what else to tell you.
what questions do you have?
I had, I don't know, like ten minutesworth of questions.
And at 930, he's out the door.
then he came back, I don't know,maybe an hour later to introduce me
to the manager that was runningthe operation at the time.
(06:42):
And then the manager was his brotherin law. So,
you know, he was contractually obligatedto not share that he was selling it.
So it was a big shock to his brotherin law that he was selling it.
after market walked out,he was like, man, I,
I really just needa little time to process.
I'm really.
(07:02):
Christ, I don't know what to think,but I can tell you, we're
gonna we're going to do better this yearthan we ever have.
I can't believe he did this to me.
And he was right, though.
I mean, we actually did break the fracturethat year, so,
Yeah, looking back on it,it was the most motivating thing for
the manager was getting back in.
It's like,
(07:25):
you know.
So then we had other works.
Yeah.
And the week of meetingfor we'd meet once a month and stuff.
And so, taken over Graham and stuff,and then we're talking and I'm like,
yeah, I want to buy more locationsbecause you see how the process is, too.
Spencerdidn't know anything about these things,
but he comes in and he just runs it andit's like, you have to plug and play, man.
You put this inand we run it and you'll do well.
(07:46):
So we,
we were talking and he's like, well,I want to grow and I want to grow.
Well, we were we realized his strengthsand my strengths are two different things.
They're two different things.But we fit well together.
And, as I told him, the best thing iswe were not lifelong friends,
so I'm not letting him get awaywith anything.
He's not letting me get awaywith anything.
And partnerships can be very difficult.
I've seen many, many fail.
(08:07):
And so I'm like,so what's the thing here, guys?
So the reason.
So I laid out the case. So we were like,well, let's grow together.
Like, okay, let's, let's do this.
And so we laid it out the pros and consand what we're worried about,
we ran it by our wivesbecause your wives have to agree. Right.
That's number one rule.
So, they were they were on board with it.
So then we just started.
(08:27):
All right,we got this plug and play system.
We just go in
and we know when we walked in,
we bought wewe know what we're looking for companies.
And then we buy them andand we'll double them in the first year.
And then we'll double them againthe second year. That's our history.
Like by year two
we're doing quadruple what they were doingthe first the year before we took over.
So see that's a great story.
I knew it would it would be great.
(08:48):
it's often times that it's funnybecause I feel like most of the time
when we're work on a deal,
by the time we're done,the buyer and seller, like,
want nothing to do with each other.
even if they've got some kindof consulting agreement, they're like,
yeah, we met twice.
And then, you know, they were madthat I changed, you know, X, Y, and Z.
And I was mad that, you know, theyI had to make the changes
(09:08):
because they didn't knowwhat they were doing.
And it's like this,you know, head butting.
And so I always thought it was funny
when the, the first timeSpencer called me and goes, yeah, so we,
we want to buy some more stuff and,but I'm partnering with this guy Mark. And
so let me explain to you.
He was the seller.
I was like, well,I hope you don't have a non-compete.
You guys are working together.
(09:28):
And, you said,no, no, no, he's awesome like this.
It's been perfect.
And I'm like, okay, well,I mean, it makes sense.
You got somebody with experience like,let's figure this out. So.
Yeah.
And thing I was told no. Right.
No, you can't do that cuzyou live in Oman.
You can't own property and businessesin other parts of the country doing this.
That's my process. Doesn't matter.
(09:49):
I don't have to be there.I didn't tell you.
I know how it works, but I'm here.
I bet they hear that
every single person they talk toand they don't know me, right?
And they so like, okay.
And then, yeah.
And then and the thing with the owners,like, we, we take over companies now,
we don't really want them in there.
We're like, just help us get everything
transferred overand then we'll see you later, man.
Like you were just their pain in the butt.
(10:11):
Yeah. It's like a five hour process.
We transfer all the utilitiesand all that stuff.
After closing and.
All right, well, four.
And a half hours longerthan your interaction was.
But you're right. You know.
That's right.
And I and I appreciate youbringing up the,
the thing about the partnership stuff,because I do feel like
that is one of the biggest challengesthat we see
when people do partner with each otherbecause it's a total gamble.
(10:33):
Right?
I mean, I've,I've said it many times, like,
would you have marriedsomebody that you met after, you know,
maybe 30, 60, 90 daysthat you really haven't spent time with?
If you did marry him, like,is it going to work out?
And so that's what I kind of cautionpeople on when they're deciding
to form a partnership.
Now, you brought up a very good pointthat you both
(10:55):
bring different skill sets to the table,and I think that's the key.
And I mean, obviously we see that'sthe key in a relationship, right too.
I mean, we've we've all see our friendsthat are exactly the same as their spouse.
And we can't understand whyevery time we go to dinner,
they leave yelling at each other. Right.
But then the ones that are differentand bring different things
to the table, it ends up working out,you know, and I I've heard it many times.
(11:17):
Somebody says, if you don't ever say no,there's to each other.
There'sno reason to have a partnership. Right.
You're just one in the same.It doesn't make sense.
So yeah. Seems to make sense though.
Cool.
And then okay,so then you decided to partner together.
And the first timethat you went out looking,
(11:38):
and you had found some, I think that'swhen when we met each other.
how many,
did you buy at that time?
Yeah, we partnered right at the beginningof 2020 to January 1st of 2022,
with the goal of we were going to buyone company a year for ten years.
That was our goal.
(11:59):
we failed in 2022 to close on anything.
but we had obviously met you,and I think it was June of 2022.
We put an offer in on.
We had put an offer on two companiesthat got accepted.
That was actually I thinkthat was the third and fourth company.
We put offers in on,
that were accepted,but the others went nowhere.
(12:23):
the sellers backed out of the deal,
and, you know,they're contractually obligated.
We could have forced the hand and said,no, we're moving forward with this with,
you don't want to take over a businessunder those circumstances.
So, yeah, when wewe went under contract with these two,
assuming something's going to happen,one of them is going to fall through,
(12:46):
one's in Kissimmee, one's in Port Richey.
And would be a really difficult thingto close on both of them at the same time.
of course we contacted you right aroundthat same time that we went under contract
with them, and it,we were supposed to close in 90 days.
There was,
a lot of slowdown from the sellers side.
(13:08):
so we look for businessesthat are underperforming,
and maybe not ran,at their optimal performance
so we can fix them and, and get that addedequity growth out of it.
but with that comeswith those struggles on
business ownersthat aren't on top of things.
so getting informationout of them is quite a struggle.
(13:30):
Sometimes.
deal.
Yeah. Thatthat really delayed us in getting close.
So it was January of 2023 when we actuallyI think it's the 13th of January,
you know, in three.
We actually closed on those two.
Yeah.
I mean, not all of them had do a manualand have a brother in law with
a chip on his shoulder. So
it's exactly right. The,
(13:52):
the, the funny part is that BrotherLaw moved from the small location
down to Tampa to run that one quite well,and he's never leaving it.
That's good for him. Yeah.
That's great.
So, when you bought those two,where they similar size
was one larger than the other,do you remember what you paid for them?
What you put down.
For Richie,I think, was doing about 1.2 million.
(14:16):
I think we paida little over a million for it.
and then the one in Kissimmee was doing
they had a track recordof doing 750 to 800.
But the most recent year, I think in 2022,they only did like 500.
Yeah. But they were going down.
but yeah, they,they were definitely on a downward
(14:36):
trajectory when we bought that was 300.
Yeah. that we paid for that one.
You got to love the SBA in there.
Hey, if you're going to buy a business
just like your business, we're going tofund the whole thing for you.
so with that, and then,
we worked in the, working capital.
(14:59):
So I think technically we financed 107%
of the purchase price,and got that 7% back.
I most deals don't work out that way, but,
it was nice.
yeah, I think it,
at the end of the day, like,not everybody fits that criteria, right.
(15:19):
Or that mold,
our our bank at first and I, we'reour credit manager is awesome.
He he understandskind of what you're doing
because he has a background in that.
And, you know, the
I think the, the big thingthat everybody tried to get into
in the last 4 or 5 years was like,I'm going to go roll up, you know, home
service businesses, you know, a guy in atruck is usually what, what they call a
(15:43):
we're happy to to make that happenif you have the right people.
So with both of you,with your skill set already having,
you know, an established locations and,
you know, being able to kind of provethat, that, you know, what you're doing
makes it a lot easierto make that decision.
So, yeah,so we close on that one and, and January.
And then how did that gowhen you took over those two.
(16:05):
What what was kind of thethe process I guess, and how it went with.
So the more we do this, the better offwe get.
Better we go.
So when what I went down to Graham,I went down to the to go over
Graham and I roll up my manual.
I'm like,this is the way things need to run.
I'm going to train you. I'mgoing to train you and train you.
But this is a 30 a companythat had employees that have been there
20, 30 years as technicians.
(16:26):
And so setting their mindwhere they're going to do things
and they would learnand we run with chose to exhaustion.
finally it was just a change up.
So we we figured we we found a way todetermine if someone was going to change.
So then we took these two overand we just had meetings with them,
you know,just like you do when you take over.
And we said, this is the here'swhat we here's how we do business.
And the problem with all these companiesis when we know when we're buying it,
(16:51):
the, the, the employees run the business,not the owner to the beat up there.
We're down there.
Everyone thinks that the trades are great,but the owner gets beat up
because he doesn't know how to runa business. He doesn't.
So he was a technicianat one time, doesn't know profit,
and he doesn't understand overhead.And they don't price accordingly.
And they don't understandthat vessels are going to happen.
So they get beat upand these employees lead the way.
(17:11):
Like I'm not coming into work today, okay.
That's okay with them.
With that, so we can work that way.
So we go in there,
we lay out exactly what's going to happenand remember the one place.
So if we're going to call it10:00 on a Saturday
and I don't want to run it,you're going to make run it.
And so we sureare are you don't have a job.
Well he didn't stick around.
But then he'scalling about two weeks later when he got
(17:34):
there.
We go in and we're okay with thatbecause we have a great process.
We put ads up,we get plenty of applicants.
We have a great training program.
We train our guys, our managers,we train them well.
And so we know going inwe're going to make some changes.
very I would say, the adminis the most important person to keep.
There's no doubt, because they knowall the information about the business.
(17:54):
Yeah.
We, we promoted from within.
So that made a huge difference.
When we bought both of them,the owner was managing the day to day.
so when the owner steps out,we had those positions fill,
so we promoted two guysthat were currently working,
from our Clearwater location,
(18:15):
to those management positions.
So having somebody that already knows yourprocess and your systems and, and you,
makes it a much easier transition
to implement your process at that.
You know, it's slow.
Yeah. That's that's great.
so looking back at the the first kind ofacquisition you did together of those two,
(18:39):
is there anything that, you felt likeyou could have done different?
if if somebody was saying,hey, what's the best piece of advice
that you could givethat you learned during that transaction?
Is there something therethat you could share with us.
If they don't have a good system already?
If you don't have a systemthat you run like I'm talking traits
(19:00):
like plumbing and electrical, you don'thave to be running you school by somebody.
You're trusting that
that company had a good systemand they weren't necessarily doing well.
You'reprobably not going to necessarily do so.
So it's hard for me to say that because Ialready had a learning have a system.
So we were talking thatthe biggest thing I just learned is don't
know, based on if you hear this,but don't count on your employees thing
(19:21):
because it's a different system,even though they make more money,
like we've laid it out like we.
Yeah, well, it's that one that would bemy advice is like,
you don't have a system to go buynew plumbing or something.
unless that company is thriving,
don't buy it because you're goingto have the same problems, either
because you don't have a systemor if you don't know how to get a system.
(19:43):
That's great advice.
And, you know, as, as banksand as us doing this for a very long time
and doing so many transactions, wewe kind of look at it very realistically
and what we want to hear or want tosee is not typically what does happen.
And we we understand that. And so,
that is why we lean heavily on, on youas the person borrowing the money
(20:07):
because your experience and,you know, your business acumen
really comes into playwhen you have issues like, and employees
leaving and,you know, I, I've seen it myself where
sometimes you have some turnoverand it's probably a good thing.
at the end of the day, those peopleprobably weren't the right fit.
if you've got somebodyelse that's willing to listen, that's
(20:29):
shape of all moldablethat you can kind of fit into your system,
which clearly works,then you're not too beat up about it.
So it ends upit ends up working out so well.
One of the biggest things I have learned,which was really eye
opening for me, was when I bought apex.
Everybody stayed, it was a great team.
(20:51):
So going in with that expectationfor the future,
you know,when we first closed on these two,
I assume we'd be able to win the
all the employees over.
I didn't, realize
it was foreign to methat some people are not willing,
even though we pay significantly betterthan what they were making, they weren't
(21:14):
willing to step up to the our expectationsof employees to make that better pay.
So they they were willing to sacrifice,not getting paid as well
for that responsibility,not having to take on.
That's interesting.
Yeah.
So I guess you can't, completely motivatepeople that aren't motivating themselves.
(21:38):
I guess. So, right?
Yeah. Makes sense.
all right, so then you got those onesunder your belt.
How long was itbefore you called me again?
well, in the middle of that.
So before we called you again laterthat year, 2023,
we bought one in Clearwater.
(22:01):
that, is, is a small transactionto a smaller deal.
we bought,
I don't know,we make that same purchase again.
Yeah, we'll answer that one.
I wouldn't
I wouldn't make that think we're justbecause you didn't have server software.
okay.
So the the costto get all of those customer
filesentered into the system was significant.
(22:24):
You know, we got five vehicles with that,probably around $100,000 value.
Yeah.
We still have his adminperson still, works for us.
he had
a long history of success,but he definitely gave up.
Completely gave up.
so getting a lot of benefit fromthat, has been difficult.
(22:49):
So I don't know if I'd make that exactsame purchasing
or we paid for that purchase if we paidfor that versus if it was so much work.
And just not having service softwareis a big one anymore going forward.
We know you don't serve software.
3.1 first and final.
If you're considering selling a businessand especially a service business
(23:11):
and you're not on servicesoftware, you highly consider
good. Get into it.
Get your stuff set up on it becauseit makes that transition so much easier.
and I wouldn't be interested in buying itif you're not offering software.
Yeah.
Yeah, that makes sense.
And then we went to,and we were saying that was evil.
(23:31):
Okay. Did we give you six monthsbefore we told you again?
I don't remember, and I think so.
I called you in June 2023 and, well.
To be fair, you tried to cheat on meand go with another lender first.
But, you're,
But that's okay, I get it.
I think it was funny because I thinkI heard from somebody else that that you
that you called me and you said, hey,I know it's it hasn't been very long.
(23:56):
can we talk it?
sure. Let's let's hear it.
and we do get those requests,
you know, fairly often and sometimes.
And every, every lender is going to have,like a kind of quote unquote rule
with it or,most of them will have a line in the sand.
You need to operate for 24 months beforewe'll give you an opportunity.
(24:17):
And it's it'skind of silly to act that way.
I feel, with us,we we've always tried to say,
let's look at every single transactionindividually
through its own lens and see,can we get this to make sense?
And it's to work.
And there's a lot of lenders
that are just like, nope,our rule is 24 months and call me then.
(24:38):
And sometimesit doesn't make sense to do that.
So I think once we we started talkingand you kind of said this is what
I'm looking to do.
I'm kind of like, oh, okay, let me,let me see what we could do
because I feel likewe just stop talking to each other.
Let's start again,you know? So. Yeah. Yeah.
So that was meafter we did that first one, we're like,
(24:58):
we're never buying two companiesat the same time again.
I'm never doing that.
And so what we did,we went about three of the same.
Yeah exactly.
What's better than two is three. You know.
It's yes.
Yes. We had three of those.
And then maybe just give us like
some quick context on where they werelocated, the size of them.
you know what you liked about them.
(25:20):
Now they're all in,the south west area of Florida.
so Fort Myers, they're office locations.
Where is Fort Myers?
Northport and Englewood?
so, they're all within
30 minutes or so of each other.
you know, it's all man.
(25:41):
It's our intention in the beginning
was maybe to have two offices,but currently they're all managed by one.
got into a very, very good job.
so the whole goal was to buy these
three group, groupit together a little bit,
and have a larger operation
(26:01):
out of the three different companies.
and so far, it has gone very well.
Yeah.
This crushing, I would say like, so
I think combined, they're around 2 millionand take out some of their stupid stuff.
They did, I call stupid stuff.
We can do refrigeration commercial workor do you do building stuff?
So they're probably probably combineddoing two manufacturing
(26:23):
of that stupid stuff.
And man,he's probably on pace to do 4 million.
So he waswe were just shy of 400,000 bucks. One.
Yeah. With those locations. So
yeah.
Group them together.
Just creatingone larger operation in that area.
And we lowered the overheadsignificantly between the three of them
(26:44):
by just not having as much office space,
not needing as many admin people.
just less Metal City doing that. So
yes, them and I would say the thingwe learned off
that one is thewhy the admin is so important.
Everyone thinks it's the ownersattacking the installers to us, the admin
(27:05):
is the most important person personin that company that we need to retain
because they know all their history,they know everything.
And when the customer when they call in,oh yeah, we dealt with them 18 months ago
or whatever or they know history of calls.
That route is very helpful.
So because we kept one of the admin,
two of the admin of the threecompanies, correct.
(27:27):
And you know, thatthird company has issues kind of really
we have to really dig to find the answers.
So that's some great advice.
I don't I don't think I've everhad someone tell me that.
And it it's probablya little bit industry specific, but
I think that's, that's some great piecesthat we can pull out of that.
definitely something I will start to,talk to buyers
(27:47):
about and kind of say, hey, you know,are you keeping that person around?
What's your plan for it?
You know, there's two guys out therethat are killing it.
They told me, this is what you have to do.
So I trust them, right.
And they usually have a very good feelfor the requirements.
Florida is crazy on how many jurisdictionsand where you pull permits.
Then,
(28:07):
they usually always knowall that information already.
So they are very keyin making sure you're set up
in all the tiny jurisdictionsand all the little areas,
they pulled all the permitsfor these places.
So they have a really good grasp onnot just the customer base,
but the local ordinancesrequired to, you know,
(28:31):
call.
So I think totalthen does that bring you to eight total
if you, if you take all of them.
If that's the, you know,
And now are you rebranding them all as onebrand, are you leaving them separate.
How are you handling that?
so our Omaha, Nebraska location we've left
as a service is not the original
(28:53):
one we bought in.
in the Tampa Bay area.
And Clearwater areais brand heating and air.
we have rebranded all of the ones
that we bought in 2023, to operateunder that brand heating and air.
Okay.
most of them,
(29:14):
a couple of the companieswere starting to have,
get a bad reputation online.
not that they had a bad reputation,but if you don't focus on, like,
your Google reviews, then all you end upwith is the negative Google reviews.
So then, you know, if you have 15 reviewsand you have four of them
that were the one started,
(29:36):
that's a tough thingto overcome in a short period of time.
So we found that it's just easier to group
it under our so when we're found online
rather than online marketing,
you have aha having a for hire is a lot different
than having something belowfor for your online presence.
(29:58):
Yeah, I would say myself that that'skind of some of the first things I do.
If I'm looking for some kind of service,
I'll go to the Google reviewsand read them.
I always switch itto like the latest ones,
because sometimes I feel like they'remaybe the first ones that pop up
may have been from 2 or 3 years ago,and you know, if the latest ones are a lot
better than maybe they had bad managementor maybe even got acquired or something.
(30:21):
But yeah, I think a lot of peopledon't necessarily focus on
that and realize that the day and agethat we're in, you can review
almost everything you buyor every service that you, you use.
And so it really makes senseto pay attention to that stuff.
So it's probablya little bit of a learning curve.
And it's probably difficultwhen you have so many different locations
trying to group them all togetherand see what's going on with it. So
(30:43):
all right, so you've got all those now.
So maybe just give us a little bitof context on how you manage all of those.
You kind of mentioned a little bitof having a manager helps with it.
But I know, being so popularof trying to kind of roll up
or take on a certain marketor demographic,
(31:03):
and then certain locations,
the biggest struggle that oftentimespeople have, or even the banks have,
and wrapping their mind around it is like,how are you going to manage that?
How are you going to be ableto kind of control all of that?
So maybe you could talk about thata little bit about that.
We are a franchise,but when we're recruiting managers,
(31:24):
we it's it's similarto opening a franchise.
So, we have the playbook.
This is what it takesto run this operation successfully.
we so we train that manager on our plate.
Every one of our manager bringstheir personality to their location.
(31:45):
but our goal is to get themto just follow the playbook.
and then they can put there.
As long as they are
following our main guidelines,they can put their flavor into it.
And they have a lot of control.
So we hire guys with managementexperience or,
or experience with usthat we've promoted to a manager spot.
(32:05):
so we give them the powerto control their team.
Our philosophy on itis I'm going to hold you to the standard.
It's up to you to choose the guysthat are going to help you achieve that.
so they have a lot of that,
that controlin how they achieve their goals.
obviously they start follow our processes.
(32:27):
but the people they put ontheir team is up to them
how long they keep coaching them.
If it's not working,we leave it up to them.
so that
can be atrust, I guess, is what I'm trying to say.
That is the best way to, put it.
you got to be able to trust your manager.
(32:47):
and with that comes being able to verify.
So making surethat we're getting our spreadsheets daily
that have our KPIsso we can make those adjustments
on the fly and not waiting,you know, until the 10th of the next month
when our PNL comes out and saying,oh, you lost money last month.
so we get those daily reports for you,those reports with the manager,
(33:10):
to get. Hey.
Okay, so you're a little bit offon your payroll percentages.
What's your goal? What happened?
How are you going to fix it?
and then we can give our input on.
Okay, well,you know, that plan should work.
We've seen people try that plan.
Maybe we shouldlook at these other options.
but empowering
them to lead their teammakes a huge difference, for sure.
(33:32):
And, Mark, is itthe kind of the same playbook
that you handed Spencer and said, bye,I'm going to go play golf?
Yeah. Is that.
And so as we're growing the thing rightnow, it's like,
how do we manage all these locations?
And so we're learningas we're throwing as we hit walls
and all these things,we learn about that stuff.
We want to keep growing
(33:52):
because this is a great journeythat we're on, like we always do.
So people were two guys with the dream.
We're not we don't havebillions of dollars behind us.
We just have the two guys, the dream,and we got a great process.
So, you know, likewe've had to add the HR person,
which, is newand we've added an accountant and then,
we just recently hiredan operations person
who will kind of takesome of that managing operations off,
(34:14):
so we can continue focusing on newprojects going forward. New,
growth,
like we're adding plumbingand adding those things.
So, yeah, as we're growing,we're adding the city in the pieces
so we canwe're not the reason we're slowing down.
That's maybe.
Yeah, thatthat's a great way to look at it.
So that would kind oflead me to my next question.
(34:35):
You kind of hinted at alreadya little bit.
But what what's next.
Well, we,
the only thing that's consistent
is change for us. So,
we just opened, a Lakeland office.
this last week, actually.
so technically,we hired guys about a month ago.
(34:55):
You know, we've been training.
Their first calls were Tuesday.
so two days ago were our first callsin the Lakeland, Florida area.
and then we also started plumbing.
so that started on the 5thor the 16th of May.
we started plumbing.
Teamed up with a local plumber in Omaha.
(35:17):
it's been he's been in plumbingfor a very long time.
but he was always focusedon the new construction commercial side.
He decided he wanted to get away from thatand go into the residential side.
so we were actually working with him.
It's, an old friend of Mark's,
and just
helping coach him through that transition.
(35:39):
and you know that,
going from the commercial new constructionto the residential
when you don't have any customers,on the residential side
or very few residential customershave was quite the struggle for him.
so and working with himand trying to get him over that hump,
(36:01):
we all kind of came to the realization,you know, we partner up here
on plumbing in Omaha, we can work together
to iron out our processes and systems.
Then once we have that done,we can implement
plumbing in our Florida market.
as we and we have over120,000 customers in Florida.
(36:23):
in our database.
So once we get the processes down,
it should be fairly easy,just like we do on the back side,
just a plug and playto our current operations in Florida.
We predict that within two years.
And even if we don't over on the backside, we'll probably close to double
total revenueby just adding plumbing to each location.
(36:45):
Yeah. That's great.
So then isis that kind of the ultimate plan is
to get all of thosekind of built up on the plumbing side.
So you've got it downand then continue to grow from there.
Are you wanting to sell at that point?
What what'skind of the next steps from there?
I don't know, enjoy the journey.
Like so recently Logan Lakeland didn'tfind really any good business to sell.
(37:09):
Right.
You know, there isn't that you know,let's just open it and scratch.
So we've done it and they've been booking4 or 5 calls a day like us for calls.
And we're like, our goal was to do6.7 a day in the first year.
Well, if we did that the first week,just imagine.
But anyway, so that's athat's kind of a tough thing.
but it's workingand we'll, we'll see how it goes.
(37:31):
And then, no, I don't know, selling.
I mean, you know, we've been approached,
we've talked to these privateequity groups and we get more.
We always pick their brainwhere they probably pick cars
because we want to know.
That's how we came upwith the operation. Correct.
And we're like, yeah, man, that's probablyhold us back.
Let's talk about an operations record.
So we we detailed out what it needs.
And then we thought about, okay,
(37:52):
what do we know that would fit this.
So we knew one of the someone we knewI say
we literally just hired him this morning.
So, just we just hired himthis morning, so,
he'll start in a month, and then he'sgoing to take care of these operations
where all those menwho call him instead of us.
So we're not dealingwith problems of today.
We still people who forward,but we don't have plans going now.
(38:13):
We do not have a plan of selling.
that said, we are of the mindset
that it is an asset.
so it's the right price, is there?
I mean, right, we would discuss it.
the hard part of that is,
I mean, in 2022,we did a combine was a 4.34 million,
(38:36):
I think it was.
Yeah. Somewhere around there. Yeah.
whatever.
and then in 2023,we did a, a some eight, seven.
And right nowwe're on pace to do 17 this year.
So to put a value on that,even if it's a difficult thing
because they're going to look at wellwhat did you do last year.
(38:57):
Oh well
I mean we've already done more.
Yeah we've you know we're in the 6or 6 million range right now.
Yeah. That's great.
So it's yeah it's a tough thingto put a value on it.
for a buyer for sure.
It's a tough thing, for us to try to say,
(39:18):
to devalue it, to say, well, okay,that's what we did last year, but
look what we're doing right now andwe know what we're going to do next year.
So I, I don't see the point selling.
Really. Yeah. Well, and if it's.
If it's working,I mean if you're in you're continually
just kind of refining it a little bit hereand there and it's not killing you.
(39:42):
why sell.
You know, I mean, I think it makes sense.
And people kind of, I feel likea lot of people, especially more lately.
We were talking about this,a couple of days ago.
A lot of peoplelook at it as, I'm going to roll up,
you know, seven, eight, nine,ten of these operators for one year,
then sell it, and then people get in thereand they do it
(40:02):
and they go, you know,this is actually kind of fun.
I kind of enjoy it.
Or they say, I'm doing really welland I'm not working 75 hours a week.
Like, why, why would I turn this off?
You know, and then they end up saying, I'mthrowing that out the window,
I'm going to actually run this.So I get it.
Makes sense.
So, seems like you're kind ofat that point, which is which is great.
(40:25):
yeah.
If you can get into the $30 million
revenue range just by adding the plumbing,I mean, that's that's big.
So that's real big money.
So that's awesome.
Yeah.
And it's good to see that it is doable.
I think a lot of people,
are, are a little intimidatedby trying to figure out how to do it.
(40:45):
I do think,
there's a lot of people that try to do it,but they don't have the same skill set.
and, you know, you figured out a processwhich is extremely important.
so if anybody can kind oftake something out of this, it's
create a process that clearly worksand then just continue to
to implement that at each locationand maybe refine it here
(41:07):
and there a little bit if you need to.
So yeah, glad it's working.
Of course you're. Happy with it. Yeah.
We can't stress like we're talking aboutlike I couldn't
individually go on this on my ownand he could do it on his own.
It's a board of us.
And I was like, yeah, we were bothin the same boat, in the same mud.
And we could have done.
We wouldn't be where we're at todaybecause there's a lot of a lot of pain
(41:28):
with it. Like, those walls are real.
People talk about walls.
They're real because you need capitalto get through that wall.
And yeah.
So yeah, and time and time again,it is a lot to try to
to bust through those,those business walls.
We definitely felt itat the beginning of this year
as we were really pushingthrough that 15 million.
(41:48):
And I mean, itit was a lot of time, a lot of stress.
but all three, it's lonely at the top.
Right?
So having that other person there with you
to push through those things is not a lot.
You know?
Well, it sounds like you'vejust been an overachiever all together.
You wanted to do ten or, sorry,one a year for ten years.
(42:10):
And you said,I will just hit fastball. So.
And then you've been you've donegreat. Yeah.
So you continue to be an overachiever.
Either that or you
just set really low goals for yourselfso you can just make yourself
feel really good jumping.
Off nice exercise, you know.
Yeah,I don't I. Don't think that's the case.
But yeah, you guys are doing great.
(42:32):
So, you know, there's a lot of knowledge,a lot of, information
really appreciate it.
so at the end, I was asked two questions.
so maybe Mark will start with you.
do you have a mentor,or have you ever had a mentor?
yeah, I see mentors on these guys.
I don't say will be on for,
He's really.
He reallychanged my mind to get on the field.
(42:54):
and then he's the same person.
Oh, I didn't know the second one yet.
Yeah. Okay, we'll get to that. What?
Right.
Spencer, what about you with a mentor?
well, not as much now as maybe
wasn't 2020 when he handed methis book and said, good luck.
but really, Mark, you was a great mentor.
(43:15):
like I say, my background in real estate.
So transitioning over to,
you know, I was only feeding myself to nowI have six employees,
and I'm running this companyin a H-back world.
I'm unfamiliar with.
Mark answered the phone pretty muchevery time I called or call me right back.
(43:36):
and that made.
Yeah, made a world of differencein the success that I experienced.
That especially that first year,running the business by myself.
So that's awesome. Yeah.
So and then second question,we'll we'll come back to you, Mark.
you know,you guys have obviously been successful.
what what motivates you?
I think just the journey,
(43:56):
like we said, we also
we have goals, but it's just getting it'sjust went through everything.
I just, I just enjoy the journey.
Like, it's like you always look back onthings and you're like, you remember that?
Just I don't eventhe manager are ruin the blown up.
You know your goal was to do this.
But man, look at what you've done.
And remember this kind of this happened
(44:18):
in the time that this happenedgood and bad.
I just enjoy the journey. That's great.
You know, he'snot just looking off into space.
Yeah. We here. Oh, no.
I figured you know, he's not just. No no
no no.
I need to get I need to get a, goal boardin my office.
Probably.
But, they're usually up in my headsomewhere, so.
(44:41):
And then what about you, Spencer?
That's the same thing.
I mean, I feel like we really madea huge difference
in every market that we go into.
It's funny, the like Mark said,it really is a journey.
when we first started any market, it is.
It's difficultto find guys with experience.
We have a great training program.
We hire a lot of guys without experience.
(45:04):
but then after we've been in the marketfor even just six months,
we get people that just walk in and apply,
they've heard about what we're doing,where they've heard about how we pay.
I mean, all these
all these bad guys talk to each otherevery time they're in a supply house.
And, you know, they're griping about thisand griping about that.
And I'm sure our employees have their fairshare of gripes like anybody else.
(45:28):
but I think that's a big part of it
is we're really we change the industryin every market that we go into.
And having people that seek us outto come work for us.
It's, it's a big deal to me. Yeah. So.
Yeah, that's athat's a great way to, kind of quantify
how you're doing isif people are starting to call you
(45:49):
because you hear a lot of peoplewhere they struggle to, to find good help.
So that's awesome. So.
Well, yeah, I mean, this was, jam packed,and we'll have to do it again sometime.
when you decide to buyfive more next week.
well, I did call you last week.
Yeah.
You did?
Yeah. It's, Hello. Right.
(46:10):
Right down a goal and then blow itout of the water like you usually do.
So that'll be great.But I really appreciate your time.
I know, I know,you've got a lot going on and stuff, and,
the listeners will definitely be happy to,
to hear about how this is going,because, this is a lot
of what people are trying to do.
So I really appreciate you guysjumping on here.
Absolutely. No.
(46:31):
Anything really, because youyou are a big part of that tyranny.
and getting these dealsfinanced is not a it's not an easy thing.
so we definitely appreciateeverything you've also done in helping us
achieve our goals.
Yep. Cool I appreciate that. Awesome.
Well, sure. We'll talk again soon.
All right. Thanks, guys.
(46:52):
Thank you for listening.
We hope you found this podcastinformative and helpful.
Please don't forget to subscribeon your favorite podcast player
for more information or if you'd liketo discuss the transaction, please go to
Jarrett johnson.com.
Popular Podcasts
United States of Kennedy
United States of Kennedy is a podcast about our cultural fascination with the Kennedy dynasty. Every week, hosts Lyra Smith and George Civeris go into one aspect of the Kennedy story.
Dateline NBC
Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations. Follow now to get the latest episodes of Dateline NBC completely free, or subscribe to Dateline Premium for ad-free listening and exclusive bonus content: DatelinePremium.com
Bookmarked by Reese's Book Club
Welcome to Bookmarked by Reese’s Book Club — the podcast where great stories, bold women, and irresistible conversations collide! Hosted by award-winning journalist Danielle Robay, each week new episodes balance thoughtful literary insight with the fervor of buzzy book trends, pop culture and more. Bookmarked brings together celebrities, tastemakers, influencers and authors from Reese's Book Club and beyond to share stories that transcend the page. Pull up a chair. You’re not just listening — you’re part of the conversation.