July 2, 2025 • 50 mins
Ever finished a job perfectly, only to wait weeks or months to actually get paid for it? For blue collar businesses, cash flow isn't just an accounting concept—it's the lifeblood that keeps crews working, equipment running, and families fed.
In this revealing conversation, tech entrepreneur Joe Kaye shares how his journey from corporate boardrooms to blue collar solutions began when he nearly purchased a trades business himself. During due diligence, he discovered a universal pain point across the $657 billion trades industry: inefficient invoicing processes creating cash flow nightmares. This revelation sparked the creation of Procured, a veteran-built mobile invoicing platform specifically designed for smaller trades businesses.
What makes this discussion particularly valuable is Joe's recognition that existing software solutions have failed the trades. "The smaller businesses have been forgotten," he explains, as most platforms are prohibitively expensive and needlessly complex. Procured takes a different approach—simple mobile workflows that let field teams create professional invoices on-site, integrated with QuickBooks, without exposing sensitive financial information.
The episode also explores the demographic shifts transforming the trades, with retiring baby boomers creating both challenges and opportunities. We're witnessing private equity firms actively purchasing plumbing, HVAC, and other trades businesses, consolidating them into larger entities—a trend that underscores the long-term value and stability of these essential services. As Joe notes, "Robots aren't coming to replace plumbers or fix septic tanks anytime soon."
Whether you're an established contractor struggling with administrative bottlenecks or a growing trades business looking to scale operations efficiently, this conversation offers practical insights on using technology appropriately to solve real-world problems. As Joe reminds us, success ultimately comes down to personal initiative: "Make it a great day or don't. The choice is yours."
Ready to transform how your business handles payments? Reach out to Joseph at joseph@procured.us to learn how Procured can help your business invoice faster and get paid sooner.
Click the link above for a free marketing audit with insights to boost your blue collar business!
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:09):
Hey guys, welcome to the Blue Collar Business Podcast
, where we discuss the realest,rawest, most relevant stories
and strategies behind buildingevery corner of a blue collar
business.
I'm your host, cy Kirby, and Iwant to help you in what it took
me trial and error and a wholelot of money to learn the
information that no one in thisindustry is willing to share.
Whether you're under that shadetree or have your hard hat on,
(00:30):
let's expand your toolbox.
Welcome back, guys, to anotherepisode of the Blue Collar
Business Podcast, sponsored andbrought to you today by
PodcastVideoscom's team here inRogers, arkansas.
These guys, we have been withthem right out of year.
They have been displaying theshow to you guys.
They built the website.
(00:51):
You guys see all the ads adsthat come out and short form
content.
Those are built by the teamhere and I can't tell you they
have transformed the message andthe value of the show.
I could have kept it going frommy kitchen, but it would have
(01:11):
been definitely far and fewbetween and I dang sure don't
think we would be anywhere closeto 40 episodes in.
So, thanks to them and theirbeautiful solo pod room, here I
come at you guys with a remoteguest and today we're going to
be diving off into the weeds alittle bit.
(01:31):
We're going to be hangingaround the techie world guys.
Basically, the motto of the dayis going to be asking questions
about getting that invoice outas fast as we possibly can so we
can get our payment as fast aswe possibly can.
So we can get our payment asfast as we can.
And I have brought you guys aguest today that has been in
major boardrooms before, thatknows how to talk the talk and
(01:56):
walk the walk in the technologyworld and, as you guys know, the
blue collar work in space.
It's so hard to make thistransition into a handwritten
notepad of what I got done today, to putting it in an email
format or, for god's sakes, westart talking about another
(02:16):
software.
And so you guys have all foughtthe software battles and have
had struggles, but I ampassionate about what Joe is
trying to do.
Him and basically one othergentleman founding partner have
been working very diligently ona company called Procured,
(02:39):
essentially to help you and meget invoices for work that we've
done out the door and everybodyin between the time we take
contract to the time we get paid.
Job is easier is what we'retrying to effectively talk about
today.
So, furthermore, thank you somuch, joe Joe K, with Procured
(03:00):
Thanks, for being here buddy.
Speaker 2 (03:01):
Thank you, Cy, You're hired man.
That was an incredible openingspeech there for us.
Speaker 1 (03:07):
Thank you so much for having me on 40 episodes in,
probably getting a littleseasoned, I guess you would say
Shout out to a few of thepodcasts I have been guesting on
over the last couple of weeks.
I've been doing some travelingfor you guys in the audience and
I'm really excited for those tohit the market so you guys can
(03:28):
hear me as a guest.
So be looking out for that.
But furthermore, joe, thank youso much for joining us and
you're located nowhere nearwhere I'm at.
Go ahead and give us a littlebrief intro who you are on this
show, so we can understand.
Speaker 2 (03:50):
Yeah, no, thanks again.
So much for having me on.
I am uh located just around thecorner from sai here in
manhattan, new york.
Uh, we're gonna.
We're gonna figure out a way todo this in person, maybe next
time um I'll come up.
Speaker 1 (03:57):
Don't even threaten me with a good time, big dog
okay, yeah, let me know you'rewelcome.
Speaker 2 (04:01):
You're gonna have to probably share the couch, though
you know we're looking at 700square feet of an apartment here
.
Speaker 1 (04:07):
I've never been to central park but I'll.
I'll come up there and do apodcast in central park.
Speaker 2 (04:13):
All right, uh, it sounds good.
That sounds awesome, um, but,uh, it's, it's.
It's great to be on.
Obviously, my name is Joe uh,the co-founder of Procured.
We've been working on Procuredfor about a year, so I'm excited
to talk about it and explainyou know how we got from A to B
today, and a little bit moreabout what we do.
Speaker 1 (04:35):
Freaking love it, buddy.
You have a briefly off air.
Joe was sharing some of hisbackground and how he got to
here and it's so cool I guess isthe word how podcasting brings
two individuals like us from farends of the spectrum.
(04:58):
Our paths probably would nevercross, would never cross.
And here we are talking aboutthe massive problem of not just
getting work done, but gettingwork done that you can document
you've done and talk a littlebit about why you guys thought
this was such a need, and maybea few of the folks that you can
(05:22):
see drastically need this.
Speaker 2 (05:26):
Yeah, so I think, like to get to that I have to
start really where this allbegan, and so sorry.
Speaker 1 (05:34):
I'll start where this all began.
Speaker 2 (05:36):
So, yeah, I just hit my.
The desk here is shaky, I guess.
But so, rewinding, you know Iwas part of this startup company
.
I was very, very early on atthe company.
I was around employee 40, 50.
We grew to about I don't know600, 700-ish employees.
(05:57):
I was an equity holder and I waspart of the transition of a
private equity from privateequity and I received a payout
for payout for my equity and myshares.
And so I immediately called upmy mom and dad and I was like,
hey, look what I just did.
And then my second call was tomy accountant.
(06:18):
So I reached out to myaccountant and I said, hey, mark
, what the hell should I do withall this money?
Am I putting it into the stockmarket?
Am I putting it under my pillow?
Am I putting it under themattress?
You know, or you know, whatshould I be doing?
And so we we saw this trend ofof how big you know private
equity is in acquiring some ofthese smaller businesses in the
space.
You know buying up plumbers andHVACs and kind of.
(06:40):
You know, taking them andunifying them into one.
You know PEO pool if you will.
And I thought, okay, that couldbe.
You know I had some backgroundand I, throughout my life I
worked in construction, throughhigh school and in college, to
pay, you know, for the bar tabs,no-transcript, ready to acquire
(07:14):
businesses.
And this is, you know, thisprocess was about five, six,
seven months, um, and we're, youknow, getting ready to pull the
trigger on one specifically,and then we're really starting
to peel the layers back of theonion and I'm like, hold on a
second, something fishy is goingon here with the finances.
I need to do a little bit moredue diligence.
We asked those third, fourth,fifth layer questions and
(07:35):
something wasn't adding up.
So we pulled back and I said,all right, I'm going to pump the
brakes on this.
I don't want to buy thebusiness right now.
I'm just going to just sit andkind of think on what I want to
do.
And so I think, from all of theresearch and all the
conversations that I did andthat I had, one of the big
(07:57):
things that kept coming up wascashflow.
Cashflow was always aconsistent issue with all of
these businesses.
And then I started to reach outto other businesses after that
and think, just from aperspective of like, hey, I'm
just doing research, I don'twant to buy the business.
I'm not trying to do anythingelse other than just ask a
couple of questions.
And we started to do more andmore research and I was like
(08:18):
learning hey, all right, it'sabout 50% of these guys don't
know when they're going to getpaid.
You know, they've got, they'vegot lead invoices.
They don't know what the heck'sgoing on with their, with the
payments, et cetera.
So I kind of built this idea oflike hey, what about invoicing
software?
What if we could create asoftware that can make life
easier, you could invoice fasterand get paid sooner.
And I started doing someresearch and I thought, okay,
(08:39):
there's, there's somecompetition out here, and and
and I welcome the competition,right, if there's.
If there's other sharks in theocean, right, then you know that
there's probably some fishthere, because there wouldn't be
competition in an empty youknow an empty pool.
So that's right, you know.
So I'm starting to think, allright, this could be a
potentially a good idea.
And I'm starting, you should,you should see the first
PowerPoint like presentationthat I put together to kind of
(09:01):
pitch my co-founder, luke, onthis.
It looks ridiculous and weactually joke around.
We'll send it to each otherevery once in a while, but so I
called my buddy.
Speaker 1 (09:10):
Luke up, let's start somewhere.
Speaker 2 (09:11):
Yeah, you got to start somewhere for sure.
So I called Luke up and I saidhey, what do you think about
this idea?
He's like give me a couple ofdays, let me see if I can figure
out how I would do this and mapit out.
Luke is a much smarter than Iam type guy and he is a genius,
for lack of a better term.
He calls me back in a couplehours and he's like I can do
(09:31):
this no problem.
So that's sort of the birth ofProcured.
We came up with the idea fromreally just connecting with a
bunch of businesses.
I was thinking about acquiringa business or buying into
business Found this big problemin the market.
I talked to one of my buddiesand I said hey, do you think we
could build this?
(09:52):
And you know, it's been about ayear now.
Um, and so, yeah, that's what.
That's really where the theidea came from.
Speaker 1 (09:59):
You want to talk about an entrepreneurial spirit.
My guy, literally, it's so cool, number one.
Good on you.
Congratulations on number onejoining into a force, becoming a
force within the force andearning your fair share of what
you, you know, rightfully helpedbuild so and then turn around
(10:23):
and not just going and blowingit like, yeah, a large
percentage of folks that I knowprobably would, including myself
, but investment, of course, iswhere you're sitting here,
you're looking at and were youwhen you were talking about
buying these companies.
Are you talking about buyingskilled trades business or was
(10:45):
it just another tech business?
I wanted to start there.
Speaker 2 (10:48):
Yeah, so it was.
It was strictly a tradebusiness.
Um so yeah, I was looking into,you know, potentially being
like a part owner and like goingin and extending a, you know an
offer to an HVAC or a plumberand and being a part owner of
the business, cause there's alot of businesses that are
trying to sell.
Go ahead.
Speaker 1 (11:05):
It's so and it's so crazy because you've got a lot
of plumbers, a lot ofelectricians, a lot of concrete
guys, steel guys, pipe guys,dirt guys.
They're all listening to thisas the skilled tradesmen, the
blue collars of the world.
We're just out here trying tomake it to Friday, literally.
(11:26):
You know what I mean.
And so for you to sit there andsay that, as a guy sitting in
Manhattan worked his ass off toget where he's at, did it right,
made the money and is nowsitting on it and he's attracted
in buying a blue-collar tradesbusiness because why?
Speaker 2 (11:50):
I mean it's one of the fastest-growing markets in
the country.
You know it makes, I think anddon't quote me on these numbers
but I think it makes 4% of theworkforce in the US right now.
The TAM, the total addressablemarket of the industry, is $657
billion.
I mean this is one of thebiggest industries in the world
(12:11):
and surely in our country.
And what we're seeing right nowis when we really start to look
at the finite granular numbersand start to really do research
and think about let's look atthe macro and micro views of
this industry.
We're seeing a huge shift.
We're seeing those 50, 60, 70year old guys that are trying to
get out of the business andthey're retiring and their sons
(12:34):
and their daughters don't wantto get into the business that
mom and dad owned.
Speaker 1 (12:37):
They want to go to college.
Statistically, they're sellingthese businesses because there
is nobody there to take it over.
Speaker 2 (12:43):
Right, exactly, and so we're in a kind of a weird
spot right now.
This dichotomy of like, hey,who's going to be taking on the
businesses?
Like we still need plumbers, westill need roofers, we still
need HVAC, guys Still need thepavers, so you know, we still
(13:05):
need people that are gonna digup septic tanks and put new ones
in right, Like that doesn'tchange.
So there's a massive demandright now for them, and I think,
and I'm and, and procured, andLuke and I and our other uh, we
hired a part-time guy as wellShane, Um, we, we're, we're
taking on the gamble and the betthat this industry is going to
grow, that there's going to beyounger people that are going to
(13:27):
get into this and those youngerfolks are going to be into
software.
Speaker 1 (13:31):
Man, you are so far ahead of where you guys are at
because, number one, before wego any further, joe, I just
wanted to shine light to the guythat's down there in Alabama or
over in Utah or up there inOhio working his freaking balls
(13:53):
completely off every single day.
Every single Saturday he'smissing out on ball games and
he's just wondering if this isgoing to be worth it.
And there is a Joe sitting upthere looking to buy him.
If what guys?
Joe just told you what you needto have ready to go at all
times, and that's some freakingfinancials.
(14:15):
Man, inside accounting is hugein a business and I, joe, I'll,
I'll tell him, tell him myselfhere.
Man, I didn't have the bestinside accounting.
Just I mean surprise 90 of bluecollars, especially within the
first five to ten years.
Don't even know what a pnl andbalance sheet is.
So it takes some time, but it'sjust really just encouraging to
(14:38):
you guys, even you guys downthere that are doing a million
to $2 million worth of revenue.
If you're showing 10 to 20% onthat at the end of the year, a
guy like Joe can't smell anyfishiness coming from a CPA,
audited, ready to go, financialstatement at least once a
(15:00):
quarter.
And then look, you are strikingon an opportunity to literally
walk away or turn around and bean operations manager or
whatever the case may be, butyou built it from nothing.
So I just wanted to encourageyou guys and highlight that and
not skip over that A guy that'sup there in the boardrooms of
(15:22):
all the boardrooms living inManhattan wants to buy you guys.
And so just a little bit ofencouragement there.
And, joe, you're absolutelyright, dude, in the next 10 to
15 years, all the boomers aregoing to be gone.
That Gen I think it's Gen X, oris it Gen?
Speaker 2 (15:40):
yeah, gen X after that I can't keep up anymore
with the F.
Speaker 1 (15:43):
And then you've got millennials, which is me and you
, and so the service industry.
I mean, I don't know how it wasup there where you went to
school at, but junior high,through high school, there was
no shop class.
They took away even shop class,and down here in the South that
(16:03):
was a big deal, like there wasno zero involvement in.
Hey, what about a trade?
What's a trade?
Go to college, go to college.
Go to college, go to college.
And I'm like I'm not going tocollege.
Guys Like I didn't have trouble, dude, through school.
I didn't whatsoever.
(16:24):
I I should have made more of it, 100%, but I didn't.
I got some college courses donein my, in my, in my junior year
, my senior year, I did the workprogram.
I was gone.
But if I had somebody withinthe high school regimen be able
to go, hey, dude, this guy's gota little bit of a trade mind,
(16:46):
let's grab him and let's startposturing him and mentoring him
so that we can line him up witha local economy guy around here.
So I'm a part of that systemnow.
Now a couple episodes back hereon the show
bluecollarbusinesspodcastcom.
You can catch that with ChadBurkett and two 18-year-old
(17:08):
graduating seniors from theTyson School of Innovation down
here in Springdale and they havetheir CDLs my guy commercial
driver's license at 18 years old.
They have OSHA 30, so they'rehitting the market.
So just a little bit ofencouragement there.
I thought there wasn't manyprograms out there as well, but
there is.
They're starting to to toreally come on, because it's a
(17:30):
fricking problem.
The whole premise of this showand message of this show is to
highlight the blue collarworking man and woman in this
country and help them withresources that they need to
obtain to be better at what theydo so they don't give up and
quit.
So we do have that daggumplumber here.
We do have that electricianhere in the next five to 10
(17:53):
years.
So just wanted to shine alittle light on there.
But you're absolutely right,there needs to be more focus on
cash flow financials, justfinancials in general.
You use terms, joe, alreadythat I haven't hardly understood
within our brief intro, butit's because you're in that
(18:14):
world.
But I could make you completelyspin your head off your
shoulders our terms as well, butit's.
It's navigating the other whereI was going with this.
The other major message of thisshow is doing exactly what
we're doing here today is takinga white collared individual no
offense, brother, that's theroute you took in life and a
(18:34):
blue collar individual puttingus together in the same room and
speaking the same language sothat maybe, just maybe, we help
the guy or give somebodyencouragement to keep the fight
going.
So sorry, that's a little bitof a rant there, first part of
the show, but thank youseriously for shining light on
(18:54):
these tradespeople, man, becausethey need it or we're not going
to have anybody and you knowthere's not many.
Last thing, there's just notmany folks in their early 30s
with 10 or 15 years of businessin the skilled trades.
So we've really got to pour thegas and fire here in the next 5
to 10 years and bring awarenessto this subject and, for sure,
(19:19):
spotlight them, but trying tomake their job just a little
easier.
You are 100% on.
A major, major pain point iscashflow and you know you
electricians and plumbers, youstill have your cashflow
problems.
But from an excavation guy Idon't know how you guys have
(19:41):
cashflow problems because yougot S10s and or bands and
$20,000 worth of tool and thenbands, and I've got a truck full
of four guys with $20,000 worthof tools, a $300,000 dozer, you
know, and I'm going to just goon just to get their day done.
So I, when you have majoroverhead and indirect costs,
like an excavation contractorcompared to a plumber, how are
(20:04):
we still dealing with the sameissue?
Well, it's getting that paymentin the door quicker.
So I said all that to kind ofgive you some breezeway there
into how is Procured going tohelp us get our invoice out.
With the amount of work thatwe're already done, we don't
(20:27):
want to be waiting on thatpayment.
How's it?
How's it going to solve theproblem, my guy?
Speaker 2 (20:31):
yeah, yeah, and I think, just prefacing that, like
that, you, you mentioned acouple of things there and I
think you hit on a ton of reallycrucial points.
Speaker 1 (20:39):
if youpack him, if you want my guy, we got all the
time in the world.
Speaker 2 (20:44):
But I think, from a standpoint of it really comes
down to where the money is right, like as somebody that's in
high school.
They're thinking, oh, theplumber's not making as much
money as the guy that's tradingstocks on the stock market.
So I'm gonna go to school andI'm gonna go to finance, I'm
gonna get into finance right,but cool.
(21:07):
And I'm gonna go to finance,I'm gonna get into finance,
right.
But I think we're actually atan inflection point where the
pendulum's gonna swing back andthe plumbers are gonna start
making more when, you know, aitakes over and there's all this
other stuff going on becauserobots not coming to fix, you
know, the septic tank, robotsnot coming in to replace your
heater, their robots not comingin.
Or maybe there's going to berobots to pave driveways so
pavers watch out for that Maybe.
But all jokes aside, robotsaren't going to be replacing
(21:28):
these guys anytime soon.
So we're going to see, I think,a pendulum swing and I think
these folks are going to be inthe month.
So, to answer your question onhow we're helping, so everything
is mobile right.
So we've built this software soyou can do everything directly
in the field.
You can um, I actually wrotealong, uh, with quartz plumbing.
(21:49):
Shout out to quartz plumbing.
They were actually the firstpodcast that uh, that took me on
.
So shout out to those guys.
Thank you so much.
But they let me drive in theirum truck for for the day.
I went in and I was like, heyguys, is it cool if I just drive
around with you and weirdlyjust see and follow you around
while you work for a full day?
I need to see how your dayworks.
And it's just driving in.
(22:10):
They're looking, got theflashlight going behind the
tanks, they're like, oh, youneed X, y and Z stuff that I
don't.
It's way past.
You know my breadth ofknowledge.
And the most important thing iswhen you've got that client in
front of you to be able toexecute on the contract.
Right, if you've done the work,you're right there.
If you let something sit I meanI've been in sales If you don't
(22:30):
get something done right away,if you don't have what we call
next steps on the calendar Seeyou later You're not seeing that
money until they're ready topay you, you bet.
And so what we're able to dofrom a standpoint of our
application and our software isto create invoices on the fly.
You know, you can say, hey,this is what I think it's going
to cost.
Then you do the work.
(22:51):
They, once they've approved onhey, this is what it's going to
cost.
You do the work, you can sendthat invoice via text, via email
, and they can pay directly withtheir credit card right away.
Um, and so the whole processshould be pretty seamless.
And then all that stuff maps toQuickBooks.
We're looking at a couple ofother accounting softwares, but
as of right now, we're mapped toQuickBooks, so you can report
(23:12):
all of your taxes and youraccountants.
Lives will be a little biteasier.
Speaker 1 (23:16):
And so you know where I'm going with this, because
this is the question you guysface all the time.
It's well, I can do that fromQuickBooks, or I can do that
from whatever app you know like.
Literally, I can send an.
Our transactions normally don'tget paid by credit card, but at
(23:37):
the same time, if a guy is youknow doing those 400, when we
were starting out, dude, I can'ttell you how many 300 and $400
ditches guy, is you know doingthose 400 of the when we were
starting out?
dude, I can't tell you how many300 and $400 ditches I did you
know, 10 of them in a day and,yeah, they need to all have
separate addresses, they allneed to have separate invoice
numbers, and so, yeah, that canget pretty cumbersome and if you
don't do them right then you'renot getting the next 10 ditches
(23:59):
done tomorrow and soproduction's got to slow at some
point.
But literally what?
What makes it more unique?
Is it the reporting?
Is it the tracking?
Is it the seamless?
Is it because there's alreadyproducts out there doing that?
And I'm not trying to be anyway my guy, but I told you I'm
not.
I'm kind of a softwarechallenger, especially for my
audience, because theyunderstand where I'm at with
(24:23):
softwares over the years.
Speaker 2 (24:25):
So a couple of things about our software.
First and foremost, we are aveteran built company.
My co-founder is a veteran.
So we think that that'sabsolutely crucial.
We support veterans and webelieve that it's actually one
out of every three folks thatare in the service space are
veterans.
So we thank them for theirservice and we believe that that
is a really important thing tosupport and back veteran
(24:48):
businesses, and we think thatfolks that are in the service
industry will care about that.
So, not necessarily adifferentiator and product, but
for sure a differentiator and,like hey, who we are as a
company.
I think from another standpoint.
We've built this product to beincredibly simple.
My father does not know how touse a computer.
(25:08):
When he types, he types likethis.
He doesn't know a single thingabout products and he's able to
use this thing pretty muchwithout any problems.
And then the other thing iscost.
The biggest, obviously the mostimportant thing is cost.
We've leveraged our productwhere and not to, like you know,
(25:29):
share too much of the secretsauce here, but our kind of, our
goal here is more so a marketshare grab versus, like hey, we
want to grab the really bigclients that are out there and
charge them 20, 30, 40 grand,and that's how we're going to
drive our business.
We believe that the smallerbusinesses have sort of been
forgotten when it comes to, likethe service titans and
(25:50):
Housecall Pro and some of theseother guys that are out there.
I forget the name that you hadmentioned, but they're really
complicated.
There's so many bells andwhistles, there's so many things
going on.
They're so expensive.
It's $1,000 a month and if youwant to add another user sorry
that's going to be another $150.
And so we've designed this soit's not only pretty simple and
(26:12):
easy, but from a causeperspective, it's there for the
folks that are smaller.
It's there for the folks thatare building their business and
need products to get to thatnext level, and so our hope is
that we can evaluate and growour product with companies, but,
as of right now, we are reallygeared towards the smaller
(26:33):
businesses that are out there.
Speaker 1 (26:35):
So you're saying, if I wanted access for my
superintendents or anybody inthe field to be able to send
invoices, because QuickBooks ismainly managed by the admin team
in-house, like nobody gets intoQuickBooks.
Now, when you're first startingout, I mean I can't tell you
(26:55):
how many invoices I sent onQuickBooks online sitting on
that mini X on my phone on thebrowser, as I sent on QuickBooks
online sitting on that mini Xon my phone on the browser and
so.
But as you scale and you've gota few crews running around,
it's not as easy.
Yeah, well, and it'stransparency like we were
talking about.
Yeah, you want to betransparent, but there's some
(27:16):
things that they just don't needto see, so you don't want them
sending them from quick sorry,from quickbooks.
But if you were a hightransaction, high volume based
water heaters and um plumbers, aservice calls, etc.
You guys think about it.
How much easier it would bethat the superintendent is
(27:40):
sitting out there in the fieldand and I think you're hitting
the nail on the head is gearingit for those guys in the field,
because those guys don't doexcel.
Now I agree with you that thenew age guy like myself, you
know that late 20s, early 30s or, hell, even early 20s,
(28:00):
especially, he's going to have abetter chance.
But the guys that have been inthe game a little bit is what
I'm trying to say five, six toseven year company history and
they're sitting there reallyquestioning themselves after a
few years of maybe bad years ora really good year, and then two
, you know, a bad year, and theycan't figure things out.
And it's these small painpoints that, at the end of the
(28:22):
day, once problem is finding andresearching.
Before you just jump in bedBecause I have done that before
(28:48):
Procore and a couple othercompanies and thought that was
the magical solution to allthese problems I'm going to find
one product and fix 17 problems, and it's just not.
You need to have some strategy,you need to have some planning.
So if you, if procured, sitshere and go straight into into
(29:08):
QuickBooks, somebody um, it'salong the lines of the text
messages is so cool.
Number one and how?
Speaker 2 (29:17):
is it?
Speaker 1 (29:17):
displayed to the customers.
Is it in a professional format,I would assume?
Speaker 2 (29:22):
Yeah, so you can add your, your information on it,
right?
So, like, you've got your logo,your contents, on there.
It's it's a standard invoice,but, yeah, it's in a
professional tone for sure,right?
I think the other thing to note, too is you had mentioned, like
hey, we don't need everybodyinside of our QuickBooks, like,
we don't need people seeing thebottom dollars, right, we don't
want everybody to know how muchrevenue we made in 2022 and 2023
(29:43):
and so on.
We have the ability in oursoftware to create admin levels
and then users, so certain folkswon't have access to the admin
aspects of the business, which Ithink is another really
important feature, because youdon't want people to see all the
you know, especially if you'rejust like imagine you hire
somebody and they're they'reworking for you for two months.
(30:04):
You don't know them that well,um, even hell, even six months,
right.
And then, all of a sudden,you're like hey, here's all my
financials.
No, that's, that's not what youwant.
So, um, yeah, we, we've builtit.
So there's, there's layers andlevels to it for sure layers and
(30:24):
levels to it for sure.
Speaker 1 (30:25):
Talking just real quick.
Well, before I hop on on thatsubject train and that matter I
want to.
I want to shout out my guysblue collar performance
marketing.
They have been extremelyvaluable in what CyCon blue
collar business podcast.
Everything behind the sceneshow we're getting out in front
of you guys has been behind thescenes strategically planning,
as I'm sitting here talkingabout with Joe.
(30:46):
Literally he sits down onceevery other bi-weekly with my
content team and we see how theroadmap's going, where'd we fail
, what's doing good, what's notdoing good.
He's been working and tweakingon my website.
I'm telling you guys, if youwant a comprehensive free look
at your marketing campaign orprogram at your blue collar or
(31:08):
skilled trade service basedcompany, give them a shout at
bcperformancemarketingcombackslash blue collar podcast.
Shoot them an email.
They'll hop on a discovery callwith you and give you a full
broadband overview of where youmay be doing good, you may not
be doing anything and where youmay just be flat, missing the
(31:31):
mark.
So get with Ike and the teamand they'll get you hooked up.
All right, but from there, myguy Joe, I want to talk about
replacing it there's I literallywas talking to a member of our
YouTube channel and the membersbehind the scenes.
If they get a little bit morejuicy content, I guess you would
(31:52):
say more real, raw content, thethings that I can't put out
there just for everybodyinsurance bonding.
You know the customers,essentially, and clients and
everybody that's viewingeverything that you're putting
out there, and if you guys don'tthink they are, you're freaking
crazy because they are, firstthing they do is they're
googling your butt.
So spin around, talk to theseguys.
(32:15):
You know.
This certain individual think isgreat for this conversation.
He's 28 years old.
He's been with this gentlemansix years.
This gentleman's 61 years oldwho's the current owner of the
company, and they are workingout an agreement to basically
(32:38):
him take over the business andso he's sitting there as acting
owner with little to no power.
So, uh, he's reaching out to me.
Obviously hey man, he's got agiant, enormous job going.
Um, georgia is where this is at, cool.
And he's asking me and I juststart real simple about time
(33:01):
tracking and job costing and,hey man, what are we doing for
the guys' time?
Well, time sheets.
I'm like, oh, okay, okay, nojudgment there.
I was there myself.
First thing we got to do is wegot to get them on a time
tracking app.
You have to for the size job.
But where I'm going with thisis is that he expressed to me
(33:25):
that he has been researchingthis stuff as a new age donor,
knowing, obviously, with all theamount of content surrounding
these said issues.
Yeah, he knows for a fact thatit needs to be done, but.
But then you've got a working60-year-old owner who's not
really in it, kind of checkedout, done with it, burnout, but
(33:48):
won't let him necessarily makethese calls.
So replacing those clipboardsand spreadsheets with these
mobile-friendly workflows, justin general, talk about the
quartz plumbing and the some ofthe success that they've had,
etc.
How do we get from there towhere we're talking about now,
(34:11):
even with the non-techie folks?
Speaker 2 (34:15):
so I think you know you, you have to adopt it really
like it's.
It's at the end of the day,that's just.
It's as simple as that.
And I think that's the questionyou're asking me is like how do
you, how do you, get a littlebit bigger from being smaller?
Is that, is that?
Speaker 1 (34:31):
the question Great, great way of putting it.
Brother.
Speaker 2 (34:34):
Yeah, so so I mean, I think you know, first and
foremost, technology is is yourfriend on.
It's an unfortunate.
You know, first and foremost,technology is your friend.
It's an unfortunatecircumstance.
I actually don't have anysocial media myself, no personal
social media.
I'm not a big tech guy.
Speaker 1 (34:52):
I don't like to spend a lot of time in front of the
computer.
Speaker 2 (34:53):
As a matter of fact, like 930, 10 o'clock if I'm not
super busy with stuff, allscreens are shut off in this
house and so you know from mystandpoint.
I hear where people are comingfrom, I hear it.
It's just like pain in the ass.
You don't want to be in thephone.
You don't want to be doing that, sean.
Unfortunately, it's just theway you got to do it.
I had a.
So over the course of like thelast 12 months to maybe even 18
(35:16):
months, as I've been buildingthis and creating this company,
months as I've been buildingthis and creating this company,
I've done this rule with myselfwhere I have to meet with one
founder every single week.
I have to go out.
I write people on LinkedIn.
I will poke at friends to say,hey, can you introduce me to
this guy, can you introduce meto that gal?
And try to just get in front ofpeople and pick their brains.
And I've been doing that for areally, really long time and
(35:39):
I've gotten a ton of incredibleadvice.
And I've been doing that for areally, really long time and
I've gotten a ton of incredibleadvice.
And I've met with, like you know, private equity guys and CEOs
of $30 million companies, $150million companies, like sat in
rooms with guys, you know thatare billionaires.
And one thing that was prettycommon and pretty funny to me is
you don't really start yourbusiness until you get your
(35:59):
first lawsuit, and one of thefunny things that kind of comes
from that is that if you don'thave your ducks in a row, you're
going to lose that battle 10out of 10 times.
And so I think, from astandpoint of getting your ducks
in a row, it's about makingsure that you've built the
foundation to scale and buildthe house and make sure that
(36:23):
your ducks are in a row, fromnot only a standpoint of the
foundation but also all thestuff that you need to track
time, track invoicing, how muchmoney you've made this month,
this quarter, so you canactually figure out your
cashflow.
Can you hire additional people?
Is it a possibility?
Is there a possibility that youwon't be able to pay Joe out on
Monday because you don't havecash flow?
(36:44):
Those things are reallyimportant and if you don't
figure that out early on, thenyou're setting yourself up for
failure in the future.
Speaker 1 (36:51):
Dude, it's you, and here's the problem.
I'll let you in on a little bitabout the skilled trades and
the blue collar working world.
From my experiences, these guyswork so hard in the business
and they don't even know how tostart working on the business,
(37:13):
let alone enjoy it, let aloneknow where to start.
I mean, you may be completelytalking a foreign language to a
lot of these guys that arelistening today.
So you know, maybe, just likemy YouTube member I was speaking
about, where do these guysstart coming from, you know the
(37:33):
tech side of the world, andwhere do these guys start if
they have never had anyexperience with the tech world?
And you know, maybe it is thatold head, 55, 65 year old man,
that is trying his hardest toobtain some of this knowledge.
Where can he start?
(37:55):
Or maybe the entrepreneurthat's sitting there trying to
go oh man, I am too old at this,how do I go ahead and get into
this game?
Where do I?
Where does he start?
Speaker 2 (38:07):
Yeah, that's a good question.
I mean, I think we in in 2025,we've got the most information
out of our fingertips than everbefore.
Um, you go on YouTube, watch acouple of videos, do do some
research.
You can have a book on yourfront doorstep two days from now
if you go on Amazon.
I think it's all abouteducation and educating yourself
(38:30):
.
If, for example, before I wasdoing this and I had no idea
about the massive problem ofcash flow, of invoicing in this
blue collar space, I was doing aton of research, I was reading
books, I was going on and I wasfinding podcasts to listen to.
Podcasts like this one, right,like where you come on and you
(38:51):
hear about, hey, this is aproblem I'm having and this is
what we're talking about, andthen, all of a sudden, things
start to click.
It's all about educatingyourself and I know it can be
like very cumbersome at firstand you're like a little nervous
about kind of jumping into apool that you don't know how to
swim in.
Um, but it but it's absolutelycrucial that you figure out how
to educate yourself and it's so,it's so available, it's, it's
(39:12):
in youtubes, it's it's downloadif you're you're you're curious
about, hey, I don't know how, uhlike, some of these apps work.
Go and download it and try touse it.
I think, like you know, there'sno silver bullet to this.
It's just like you know, it'sabout educating yourself and
trying to do so through some ofthe different, you know, things
(39:32):
that we have available.
So books and YouTube, I think,were huge for me.
And then I also, I think a lotof people are afraid to reach
out and ask, and it's reallythat simple.
I mean, like I'm reaching outto people that I don't even know
.
I'm like, hey, this is what I'mdoing.
I would love to pick your brainfor 15 minutes.
Can we do that?
Yep, and it's crazy howreceptive people are.
(39:56):
And sure you're going to havesome people like I've had some
bad phone calls.
I've had some weird awkwardinteractions, for sure, you know
there's some.
There's there's people that areincredibly rude to me.
There's people that are like,hey, well, you're wasting my
time, you know, sure, but yougot to kind of just take that
and move on.
There's a saying, there's asaying that I, that I've got
(40:19):
actually stamped to my wall andit's make it a great day or
don't?
The choice is yours.
Gotta win the day.
Baby, gotta win the day.
Speaker 1 (40:28):
Beat the devil back, get up early and just keep
moving forward and he's waitingfor you as soon as you crest
over that threshold at sixo'clock in the morning, big dog
oh yeah, man, it took me a longtime because you know, as I can
(40:54):
go off on that subject forforever, but literally just some
encouragement.
Oh yeah, you got another set offolks going hey, I need this
right now or we're never goingto get this job done.
You have all these peopleasking you all these time
concept questions.
Just win the day, that's all youcan do sometimes and then guess
what Some of them stringtogether and you're like, hey,
(41:16):
what's going on here?
But again, like Jocko says,says nothing changes.
If nothing changes, man, andyou've got to, you've got to
start the change and educatingyourself is a great answer to
that.
I mean we, we can go off into awhole different scary two
letters of ai and what's goingto come of that.
But chat gpt will do half theexcel building for you now, like
(41:39):
literally.
I am not even an Excel, I knowbecause it's scary.
It's scary to those old guys.
You know what I mean.
Older, I shouldn't say old, butolder generation guys that
didn't grow up with thistechnology.
And you know our generation.
We can remember when computerswere getting integrated into
schools, you know, by the massesand like figuring it out.
(42:01):
And now these kids areliterally learning how to
embrace AI at the high schooleducation level.
It's insane, dude and but likethey're there, these kids are so
smart they're using just,they're just having chat GPT do
everything, and not just thatone specific AI, but that's the
one I utilize most.
Right, just that one specificAI, but that's the one I utilize
most.
(42:21):
Right, but I am so uneducatedin that world trying to slowly,
like literally trying to figureout how to utilize AI in smaller
tools, like I'm going to blowsomebody's mind today.
But you can put a set of PDFcivil documents into chat GPT if
(42:43):
you pay for plus, and it willliterally give you a approximate
quantification of water, sewergas, electric, whatever you're
trying to take off.
I hope I helped somebody withthat today, cause I just found
that out myself this week andjust playing around with it at
work.
I'm like running some excel,trying to build some sheets,
(43:03):
because I'm not an excel guy,but I the the the folks on my
team.
That's how they read and receptinformation, so I'm trying to
meet their you know requirementsof how their brain works and
ticks, and because they do thesame thing for me.
So, hey, chatgpt, here's myinformation.
Throw this in with thesecolumns and these categories and
(43:26):
this is how it needs to beshown.
Two minutes later, export it inPDF and shoot it to them.
And people are like what didyou just do?
And I'm like I literally justbought 15 minutes of my life.
Back is what I did.
Anytime as an entrepreneur, wecan buy time.
Anyways, going off on the AItrain, that's not what we're
talking about today, guys.
(43:47):
But, literally buddy.
I truly appreciate you comingon here and having focused and
founder is Luke, right Otherfounder is Luke.
Speaker 2 (43:57):
Yeah, co-founder is Luke Shout out to Luke.
Speaker 1 (43:59):
Thank you so much for your service.
My guy Truly need more mindsfocused on this issue.
The awareness of the bluecollars dwindling and we're not
making it any easier on them andwe need some help here.
So I encourage you guys forsure to keep this thing going.
(44:22):
Look forward to hearing moreabout it.
Um, but one last question herebefore we end the show.
My guy, I ask every single guestwhether you're white collar,
blue collar, I don't care.
Um, I need to know.
And you kind of hit it on thenail on the head.
I think I already know youranswer already.
But the blue collar worker whois just sitting there being
(44:46):
stuck in the mud, or even youknow what, the white collar,
let's step out there, becauseyou grew up in that, like you
came through that world, incorporate world, I could only
imagine.
Yes, we probably don't have asmany folks listening in that
world, but sitting in thatoffice chair trying to get eight
to five, or that blue collarguy who is just mentally,
(45:07):
emotionally, physically, they'rejust stuck in the mud and they
don't know how to get up and doit again.
Talk to them for just a minute,joe.
Speaker 2 (45:16):
Yeah, yeah.
So, first and foremost, I feelyou We've been there, man, trust
me you know there's there'sgood days and there's bad days,
but it's really like a choice, Ithink, like everything's a
learning experience.
And if you're not taking thatnegatives and flipping it and
saying, hey, I just learned areally, really great lesson here
, you know, then then you'remissing out.
(45:37):
I think, like you know, you gotto want it, you have to want it
, and that is like a big pieceof this there's.
I've, as I've gotten older, I'velearned that there are people
that just simply don't want itas much as as me or as others.
And like you'll see it and andif you want it more, you'll see
it too.
Like you'll, you'll be able tosee that there's a massive
difference, uh.
But I think like, if you canyou get up a little bit earlier,
(46:01):
you can figure out a way tokind of make the day a little
bit better.
Um, good things will come, andI I can't remember what the
actual term or the actual likephrases, but it's like hard work
and people are luckier right Isultimately the takeaway from it
, and it's you can create yourown luck by just busting your
butt a little bit harder, um,and there's light at the end of
(46:22):
the tunnel for sure, so justkeep going.
Speaker 1 (46:25):
You know what?
Just to add to that just alittle bit, nobody's coming to
save you guys.
Oh yeah, Literally just thenext day is the next day.
Yesterday is yesterday andwe're never going to talk about
it unless you want to talk aboutit.
So make today a different day,Make tomorrow a different day.
Get up just a little bit earlier.
(46:46):
You're right, Joe, that's a lotof it.
I used to try and sleep inright till the bell would ring
off, and now I'm up 30, 45minutes before my alarm, getting
things done, so I can have alittle bit of time to do this or
that, you know, just before Ihead out with the kids or
whatever the case may be.
But try and be very um, whatwould be the word intentional
(47:09):
with my time, and it has changeda lot in my life over the last
three, four years.
Um, you know, not wasting timeon people that don't need to
waste waste my time or theirsand but also to being more
intentional about the peoplethat do need my time to
hopefully help them out of thosemoments.
So Joe I really appreciate youfor coming on my guy with
(47:32):
Procured, so check them out.
Where can we find you guys?
Speaker 2 (47:35):
Yeah, so we're in the process actually of changing
the website over fromgetprocuredus to procuredus.
So soon you'll find us atprocured P-R-O-C-U-R-E-Dus, but
right now it is at getprocuredus.
You can reach me at josephJ-O-S-E-P-H at procuredus and,
(47:57):
yeah, reach out to me if you'vegot questions, comments,
concerns.
I'm more than happy to addressthem as they come through.
Speaker 1 (48:03):
It sounds like Joe would also take some research
from anybody that's willing togive it to him.
Speaker 2 (48:10):
Absolutely yeah, so feel free to reach out to me.
I would love an opportunity toconnect with you and learn a
little bit more about yourbusiness, see where Procured can
fit.
Speaker 1 (48:19):
I'm just saying Sorry to have you ahead.
No, go ahead.
Speaker 2 (48:24):
No, because when you're saying, you're saying
about the.
You know how can you get alittle bit bigger, stronger,
faster?
You know, tomorrow One of thebig things that I forgot to
mention and you kind of had saidit.
But, like, I write down mygoals every single morning.
Every single morning I get anew sheet paper, rip it off, new
set of goals.
It's time to you know, finishand complete those goals and
(48:44):
those tasks.
So I think that that's amassive thing that a lot of
folks don't do, and whensomething's written down, I
think it's 36% a higher chanceof it getting done.
So write down your goals andwake up at 5.30 instead of six.
Speaker 1 (48:58):
My problem is that just be a difference.
That's right, my guy that isright, no dude, I really
appreciate you shining light,shining light on vets,
veteran-owned businesses.
Shout out to them across theentire world or entire country,
and I really appreciate you guysshining light on a massive
(49:19):
problem within our industry andkeep after it, my guy, it's good
things coming.
Speaker 2 (49:25):
Yeah, for sure the light at the end of the tunnel
is coming for Procured and notthat we're in the tunnel.
I feel like we're kind of outin the pastures right now
enjoying the sun.
So feel free to reach out to meif you've got any questions,
comments, concerns, as Imentioned at josephiprocuredus,
because we'd be happy to startthose conversations.
Speaker 1 (49:43):
But thank you so much , zach.
Guys, until next time.
I really, really, reallyappreciate Joe coming on.
And until next time, guys.
You guys be safe, be kind, behumble.
If you've enjoyed this episode,be sure to give it a like.
Share it with the fellers.
Check out our website to sendus any questions and comments
about your experience in theblue collar business.
Who to send us any questionsand comments about your
(50:06):
experience in the blue collarbusiness?
Who do you want to hear from?
Send them our way and we'll doour best to answer any questions
you may have.
Till next time, guys.
Hey guys, welcome to the Blue Collar Business Podcast
, where we discuss the realest,rawest, most relevant stories
and strategies behind buildingevery corner of a blue collar
business.
I'm your host, cy Kirby, and Iwant to help you in what it took
me trial and error and a wholelot of money to learn the
information that no one in thisindustry is willing to share.
Whether you're under that shadetree or have your hard hat on,
(00:30):
let's expand your toolbox.
Welcome back, guys, to anotherepisode of the Blue Collar
Business Podcast, sponsored andbrought to you today by
PodcastVideoscom's team here inRogers, arkansas.
These guys, we have been withthem right out of year.
They have been displaying theshow to you guys.
They built the website.
(00:51):
You guys see all the ads adsthat come out and short form
content.
Those are built by the teamhere and I can't tell you they
have transformed the message andthe value of the show.
I could have kept it going frommy kitchen, but it would have
(01:11):
been definitely far and fewbetween and I dang sure don't
think we would be anywhere closeto 40 episodes in.
So, thanks to them and theirbeautiful solo pod room, here I
come at you guys with a remoteguest and today we're going to
be diving off into the weeds alittle bit.
(01:31):
We're going to be hangingaround the techie world guys.
Basically, the motto of the dayis going to be asking questions
about getting that invoice outas fast as we possibly can so we
can get our payment as fast aswe possibly can.
So we can get our payment asfast as we can.
And I have brought you guys aguest today that has been in
major boardrooms before, thatknows how to talk the talk and
(01:56):
walk the walk in the technologyworld and, as you guys know, the
blue collar work in space.
It's so hard to make thistransition into a handwritten
notepad of what I got done today, to putting it in an email
format or, for god's sakes, westart talking about another
(02:16):
software.
And so you guys have all foughtthe software battles and have
had struggles, but I ampassionate about what Joe is
trying to do.
Him and basically one othergentleman founding partner have
been working very diligently ona company called Procured,
(02:39):
essentially to help you and meget invoices for work that we've
done out the door and everybodyin between the time we take
contract to the time we get paid.
Job is easier is what we'retrying to effectively talk about
today.
So, furthermore, thank you somuch, joe Joe K, with Procured
(03:00):
Thanks, for being here buddy.
Speaker 2 (03:01):
Thank you, Cy, You're hired man.
That was an incredible openingspeech there for us.
Speaker 1 (03:07):
Thank you so much for having me on 40 episodes in,
probably getting a littleseasoned, I guess you would say
Shout out to a few of thepodcasts I have been guesting on
over the last couple of weeks.
I've been doing some travelingfor you guys in the audience and
I'm really excited for those tohit the market so you guys can
(03:28):
hear me as a guest.
So be looking out for that.
But furthermore, joe, thank youso much for joining us and
you're located nowhere nearwhere I'm at.
Go ahead and give us a littlebrief intro who you are on this
show, so we can understand.
Speaker 2 (03:50):
Yeah, no, thanks again.
So much for having me on.
I am uh located just around thecorner from sai here in
manhattan, new york.
Uh, we're gonna.
We're gonna figure out a way todo this in person, maybe next
time um I'll come up.
Speaker 1 (03:57):
Don't even threaten me with a good time, big dog
okay, yeah, let me know you'rewelcome.
Speaker 2 (04:01):
You're gonna have to probably share the couch, though
you know we're looking at 700square feet of an apartment here
.
Speaker 1 (04:07):
I've never been to central park but I'll.
I'll come up there and do apodcast in central park.
Speaker 2 (04:13):
All right, uh, it sounds good.
That sounds awesome, um, but,uh, it's, it's.
It's great to be on.
Obviously, my name is Joe uh,the co-founder of Procured.
We've been working on Procuredfor about a year, so I'm excited
to talk about it and explainyou know how we got from A to B
today, and a little bit moreabout what we do.
Speaker 1 (04:35):
Freaking love it, buddy.
You have a briefly off air.
Joe was sharing some of hisbackground and how he got to
here and it's so cool I guess isthe word how podcasting brings
two individuals like us from farends of the spectrum.
(04:58):
Our paths probably would nevercross, would never cross.
And here we are talking aboutthe massive problem of not just
getting work done, but gettingwork done that you can document
you've done and talk a littlebit about why you guys thought
this was such a need, and maybea few of the folks that you can
(05:22):
see drastically need this.
Speaker 2 (05:26):
Yeah, so I think, like to get to that I have to
start really where this allbegan, and so sorry.
Speaker 1 (05:34):
I'll start where this all began.
Speaker 2 (05:36):
So, yeah, I just hit my.
The desk here is shaky, I guess.
But so, rewinding, you know Iwas part of this startup company
.
I was very, very early on atthe company.
I was around employee 40, 50.
We grew to about I don't know600, 700-ish employees.
(05:57):
I was an equity holder and I waspart of the transition of a
private equity from privateequity and I received a payout
for payout for my equity and myshares.
And so I immediately called upmy mom and dad and I was like,
hey, look what I just did.
And then my second call was tomy accountant.
(06:18):
So I reached out to myaccountant and I said, hey, mark
, what the hell should I do withall this money?
Am I putting it into the stockmarket?
Am I putting it under my pillow?
Am I putting it under themattress?
You know, or you know, whatshould I be doing?
And so we we saw this trend ofof how big you know private
equity is in acquiring some ofthese smaller businesses in the
space.
You know buying up plumbers andHVACs and kind of.
(06:40):
You know, taking them andunifying them into one.
You know PEO pool if you will.
And I thought, okay, that couldbe.
You know I had some backgroundand I, throughout my life I
worked in construction, throughhigh school and in college, to
pay, you know, for the bar tabs,no-transcript, ready to acquire
(07:14):
businesses.
And this is, you know, thisprocess was about five, six,
seven months, um, and we're, youknow, getting ready to pull the
trigger on one specifically,and then we're really starting
to peel the layers back of theonion and I'm like, hold on a
second, something fishy is goingon here with the finances.
I need to do a little bit moredue diligence.
We asked those third, fourth,fifth layer questions and
(07:35):
something wasn't adding up.
So we pulled back and I said,all right, I'm going to pump the
brakes on this.
I don't want to buy thebusiness right now.
I'm just going to just sit andkind of think on what I want to
do.
And so I think, from all of theresearch and all the
conversations that I did andthat I had, one of the big
(07:57):
things that kept coming up wascashflow.
Cashflow was always aconsistent issue with all of
these businesses.
And then I started to reach outto other businesses after that
and think, just from aperspective of like, hey, I'm
just doing research, I don'twant to buy the business.
I'm not trying to do anythingelse other than just ask a
couple of questions.
And we started to do more andmore research and I was like
(08:18):
learning hey, all right, it'sabout 50% of these guys don't
know when they're going to getpaid.
You know, they've got, they'vegot lead invoices.
They don't know what the heck'sgoing on with their, with the
payments, et cetera.
So I kind of built this idea oflike hey, what about invoicing
software?
What if we could create asoftware that can make life
easier, you could invoice fasterand get paid sooner.
And I started doing someresearch and I thought, okay,
(08:39):
there's, there's somecompetition out here, and and
and I welcome the competition,right, if there's.
If there's other sharks in theocean, right, then you know that
there's probably some fishthere, because there wouldn't be
competition in an empty youknow an empty pool.
So that's right, you know.
So I'm starting to think, allright, this could be a
potentially a good idea.
And I'm starting, you should,you should see the first
PowerPoint like presentationthat I put together to kind of
(09:01):
pitch my co-founder, luke, onthis.
It looks ridiculous and weactually joke around.
We'll send it to each otherevery once in a while, but so I
called my buddy.
Speaker 1 (09:10):
Luke up, let's start somewhere.
Speaker 2 (09:11):
Yeah, you got to start somewhere for sure.
So I called Luke up and I saidhey, what do you think about
this idea?
He's like give me a couple ofdays, let me see if I can figure
out how I would do this and mapit out.
Luke is a much smarter than Iam type guy and he is a genius,
for lack of a better term.
He calls me back in a couplehours and he's like I can do
(09:31):
this no problem.
So that's sort of the birth ofProcured.
We came up with the idea fromreally just connecting with a
bunch of businesses.
I was thinking about acquiringa business or buying into
business Found this big problemin the market.
I talked to one of my buddiesand I said hey, do you think we
could build this?
(09:52):
And you know, it's been about ayear now.
Um, and so, yeah, that's what.
That's really where the theidea came from.
Speaker 1 (09:59):
You want to talk about an entrepreneurial spirit.
My guy, literally, it's so cool, number one.
Good on you.
Congratulations on number onejoining into a force, becoming a
force within the force andearning your fair share of what
you, you know, rightfully helpedbuild so and then turn around
(10:23):
and not just going and blowingit like, yeah, a large
percentage of folks that I knowprobably would, including myself
, but investment, of course, iswhere you're sitting here,
you're looking at and were youwhen you were talking about
buying these companies.
Are you talking about buyingskilled trades business or was
(10:45):
it just another tech business?
I wanted to start there.
Speaker 2 (10:48):
Yeah, so it was.
It was strictly a tradebusiness.
Um so yeah, I was looking into,you know, potentially being
like a part owner and like goingin and extending a, you know an
offer to an HVAC or a plumberand and being a part owner of
the business, cause there's alot of businesses that are
trying to sell.
Go ahead.
Speaker 1 (11:05):
It's so and it's so crazy because you've got a lot
of plumbers, a lot ofelectricians, a lot of concrete
guys, steel guys, pipe guys,dirt guys.
They're all listening to thisas the skilled tradesmen, the
blue collars of the world.
We're just out here trying tomake it to Friday, literally.
(11:26):
You know what I mean.
And so for you to sit there andsay that, as a guy sitting in
Manhattan worked his ass off toget where he's at, did it right,
made the money and is nowsitting on it and he's attracted
in buying a blue-collar tradesbusiness because why?
Speaker 2 (11:50):
I mean it's one of the fastest-growing markets in
the country.
You know it makes, I think anddon't quote me on these numbers
but I think it makes 4% of theworkforce in the US right now.
The TAM, the total addressablemarket of the industry, is $657
billion.
I mean this is one of thebiggest industries in the world
(12:11):
and surely in our country.
And what we're seeing right nowis when we really start to look
at the finite granular numbersand start to really do research
and think about let's look atthe macro and micro views of
this industry.
We're seeing a huge shift.
We're seeing those 50, 60, 70year old guys that are trying to
get out of the business andthey're retiring and their sons
(12:34):
and their daughters don't wantto get into the business that
mom and dad owned.
Speaker 1 (12:37):
They want to go to college.
Statistically, they're sellingthese businesses because there
is nobody there to take it over.
Speaker 2 (12:43):
Right, exactly, and so we're in a kind of a weird
spot right now.
This dichotomy of like, hey,who's going to be taking on the
businesses?
Like we still need plumbers, westill need roofers, we still
need HVAC, guys Still need thepavers, so you know, we still
(13:05):
need people that are gonna digup septic tanks and put new ones
in right, Like that doesn'tchange.
So there's a massive demandright now for them, and I think,
and I'm and, and procured, andLuke and I and our other uh, we
hired a part-time guy as wellShane, Um, we, we're, we're
taking on the gamble and the betthat this industry is going to
grow, that there's going to beyounger people that are going to
(13:27):
get into this and those youngerfolks are going to be into
software.
Speaker 1 (13:31):
Man, you are so far ahead of where you guys are at
because, number one, before wego any further, joe, I just
wanted to shine light to the guythat's down there in Alabama or
over in Utah or up there inOhio working his freaking balls
(13:53):
completely off every single day.
Every single Saturday he'smissing out on ball games and
he's just wondering if this isgoing to be worth it.
And there is a Joe sitting upthere looking to buy him.
If what guys?
Joe just told you what you needto have ready to go at all
times, and that's some freakingfinancials.
(14:15):
Man, inside accounting is hugein a business and I, joe, I'll,
I'll tell him, tell him myselfhere.
Man, I didn't have the bestinside accounting.
Just I mean surprise 90 of bluecollars, especially within the
first five to ten years.
Don't even know what a pnl andbalance sheet is.
So it takes some time, but it'sjust really just encouraging to
(14:38):
you guys, even you guys downthere that are doing a million
to $2 million worth of revenue.
If you're showing 10 to 20% onthat at the end of the year, a
guy like Joe can't smell anyfishiness coming from a CPA,
audited, ready to go, financialstatement at least once a
(15:00):
quarter.
And then look, you are strikingon an opportunity to literally
walk away or turn around and bean operations manager or
whatever the case may be, butyou built it from nothing.
So I just wanted to encourageyou guys and highlight that and
not skip over that A guy that'sup there in the boardrooms of
(15:22):
all the boardrooms living inManhattan wants to buy you guys.
And so just a little bit ofencouragement there.
And, joe, you're absolutelyright, dude, in the next 10 to
15 years, all the boomers aregoing to be gone.
That Gen I think it's Gen X, oris it Gen?
Speaker 2 (15:40):
yeah, gen X after that I can't keep up anymore
with the F.
Speaker 1 (15:43):
And then you've got millennials, which is me and you
, and so the service industry.
I mean, I don't know how it wasup there where you went to
school at, but junior high,through high school, there was
no shop class.
They took away even shop class,and down here in the South that
(16:03):
was a big deal, like there wasno zero involvement in.
Hey, what about a trade?
What's a trade?
Go to college, go to college.
Go to college, go to college.
And I'm like I'm not going tocollege.
Guys Like I didn't have trouble, dude, through school.
I didn't whatsoever.
(16:24):
I I should have made more of it, 100%, but I didn't.
I got some college courses donein my, in my, in my junior year
, my senior year, I did the workprogram.
I was gone.
But if I had somebody withinthe high school regimen be able
to go, hey, dude, this guy's gota little bit of a trade mind,
(16:46):
let's grab him and let's startposturing him and mentoring him
so that we can line him up witha local economy guy around here.
So I'm a part of that systemnow.
Now a couple episodes back hereon the show
bluecollarbusinesspodcastcom.
You can catch that with ChadBurkett and two 18-year-old
(17:08):
graduating seniors from theTyson School of Innovation down
here in Springdale and they havetheir CDLs my guy commercial
driver's license at 18 years old.
They have OSHA 30, so they'rehitting the market.
So just a little bit ofencouragement there.
I thought there wasn't manyprograms out there as well, but
there is.
They're starting to to toreally come on, because it's a
(17:30):
fricking problem.
The whole premise of this showand message of this show is to
highlight the blue collarworking man and woman in this
country and help them withresources that they need to
obtain to be better at what theydo so they don't give up and
quit.
So we do have that daggumplumber here.
We do have that electricianhere in the next five to 10
(17:53):
years.
So just wanted to shine alittle light on there.
But you're absolutely right,there needs to be more focus on
cash flow financials, justfinancials in general.
You use terms, joe, alreadythat I haven't hardly understood
within our brief intro, butit's because you're in that
(18:14):
world.
But I could make you completelyspin your head off your
shoulders our terms as well, butit's.
It's navigating the other whereI was going with this.
The other major message of thisshow is doing exactly what
we're doing here today is takinga white collared individual no
offense, brother, that's theroute you took in life and a
(18:34):
blue collar individual puttingus together in the same room and
speaking the same language sothat maybe, just maybe, we help
the guy or give somebodyencouragement to keep the fight
going.
So sorry, that's a little bitof a rant there, first part of
the show, but thank youseriously for shining light on
(18:54):
these tradespeople, man, becausethey need it or we're not going
to have anybody and you knowthere's not many.
Last thing, there's just notmany folks in their early 30s
with 10 or 15 years of businessin the skilled trades.
So we've really got to pour thegas and fire here in the next 5
to 10 years and bring awarenessto this subject and, for sure,
(19:19):
spotlight them, but trying tomake their job just a little
easier.
You are 100% on.
A major, major pain point iscashflow and you know you
electricians and plumbers, youstill have your cashflow
problems.
But from an excavation guy Idon't know how you guys have
(19:41):
cashflow problems because yougot S10s and or bands and
$20,000 worth of tool and thenbands, and I've got a truck full
of four guys with $20,000 worthof tools, a $300,000 dozer, you
know, and I'm going to just goon just to get their day done.
So I, when you have majoroverhead and indirect costs,
like an excavation contractorcompared to a plumber, how are
(20:04):
we still dealing with the sameissue?
Well, it's getting that paymentin the door quicker.
So I said all that to kind ofgive you some breezeway there
into how is Procured going tohelp us get our invoice out.
With the amount of work thatwe're already done, we don't
(20:27):
want to be waiting on thatpayment.
How's it?
How's it going to solve theproblem, my guy?
Speaker 2 (20:31):
yeah, yeah, and I think, just prefacing that, like
that, you, you mentioned acouple of things there and I
think you hit on a ton of reallycrucial points.
Speaker 1 (20:39):
if youpack him, if you want my guy, we got all the
time in the world.
Speaker 2 (20:44):
But I think, from a standpoint of it really comes
down to where the money is right, like as somebody that's in
high school.
They're thinking, oh, theplumber's not making as much
money as the guy that's tradingstocks on the stock market.
So I'm gonna go to school andI'm gonna go to finance, I'm
gonna get into finance right,but cool.
(21:07):
And I'm gonna go to finance,I'm gonna get into finance,
right.
But I think we're actually atan inflection point where the
pendulum's gonna swing back andthe plumbers are gonna start
making more when, you know, aitakes over and there's all this
other stuff going on becauserobots not coming to fix, you
know, the septic tank, robotsnot coming in to replace your
heater, their robots not comingin.
Or maybe there's going to berobots to pave driveways so
pavers watch out for that Maybe.
But all jokes aside, robotsaren't going to be replacing
(21:28):
these guys anytime soon.
So we're going to see, I think,a pendulum swing and I think
these folks are going to be inthe month.
So, to answer your question onhow we're helping, so everything
is mobile right.
So we've built this software soyou can do everything directly
in the field.
You can um, I actually wrotealong, uh, with quartz plumbing.
(21:49):
Shout out to quartz plumbing.
They were actually the firstpodcast that uh, that took me on
.
So shout out to those guys.
Thank you so much.
But they let me drive in theirum truck for for the day.
I went in and I was like, heyguys, is it cool if I just drive
around with you and weirdlyjust see and follow you around
while you work for a full day?
I need to see how your dayworks.
And it's just driving in.
(22:10):
They're looking, got theflashlight going behind the
tanks, they're like, oh, youneed X, y and Z stuff that I
don't.
It's way past.
You know my breadth ofknowledge.
And the most important thing iswhen you've got that client in
front of you to be able toexecute on the contract.
Right, if you've done the work,you're right there.
If you let something sit I meanI've been in sales If you don't
(22:30):
get something done right away,if you don't have what we call
next steps on the calendar Seeyou later You're not seeing that
money until they're ready topay you, you bet.
And so what we're able to dofrom a standpoint of our
application and our software isto create invoices on the fly.
You know, you can say, hey,this is what I think it's going
to cost.
Then you do the work.
(22:51):
They, once they've approved onhey, this is what it's going to
cost.
You do the work, you can sendthat invoice via text, via email
, and they can pay directly withtheir credit card right away.
Um, and so the whole processshould be pretty seamless.
And then all that stuff maps toQuickBooks.
We're looking at a couple ofother accounting softwares, but
as of right now, we're mapped toQuickBooks, so you can report
(23:12):
all of your taxes and youraccountants.
Lives will be a little biteasier.
Speaker 1 (23:16):
And so you know where I'm going with this, because
this is the question you guysface all the time.
It's well, I can do that fromQuickBooks, or I can do that
from whatever app you know like.
Literally, I can send an.
Our transactions normally don'tget paid by credit card, but at
(23:37):
the same time, if a guy is youknow doing those 400, when we
were starting out, dude, I can'ttell you how many 300 and $400
ditches guy, is you know doingthose 400 of the when we were
starting out?
dude, I can't tell you how many300 and $400 ditches I did you
know, 10 of them in a day and,yeah, they need to all have
separate addresses, they allneed to have separate invoice
numbers, and so, yeah, that canget pretty cumbersome and if you
don't do them right then you'renot getting the next 10 ditches
(23:59):
done tomorrow and soproduction's got to slow at some
point.
But literally what?
What makes it more unique?
Is it the reporting?
Is it the tracking?
Is it the seamless?
Is it because there's alreadyproducts out there doing that?
And I'm not trying to be anyway my guy, but I told you I'm
not.
I'm kind of a softwarechallenger, especially for my
audience, because theyunderstand where I'm at with
(24:23):
softwares over the years.
Speaker 2 (24:25):
So a couple of things about our software.
First and foremost, we are aveteran built company.
My co-founder is a veteran.
So we think that that'sabsolutely crucial.
We support veterans and webelieve that it's actually one
out of every three folks thatare in the service space are
veterans.
So we thank them for theirservice and we believe that that
is a really important thing tosupport and back veteran
(24:48):
businesses, and we think thatfolks that are in the service
industry will care about that.
So, not necessarily adifferentiator and product, but
for sure a differentiator and,like hey, who we are as a
company.
I think from another standpoint.
We've built this product to beincredibly simple.
My father does not know how touse a computer.
(25:08):
When he types, he types likethis.
He doesn't know a single thingabout products and he's able to
use this thing pretty muchwithout any problems.
And then the other thing iscost.
The biggest, obviously the mostimportant thing is cost.
We've leveraged our productwhere and not to, like you know,
(25:29):
share too much of the secretsauce here, but our kind of, our
goal here is more so a marketshare grab versus, like hey, we
want to grab the really bigclients that are out there and
charge them 20, 30, 40 grand,and that's how we're going to
drive our business.
We believe that the smallerbusinesses have sort of been
forgotten when it comes to, likethe service titans and
(25:50):
Housecall Pro and some of theseother guys that are out there.
I forget the name that you hadmentioned, but they're really
complicated.
There's so many bells andwhistles, there's so many things
going on.
They're so expensive.
It's $1,000 a month and if youwant to add another user sorry
that's going to be another $150.
And so we've designed this soit's not only pretty simple and
(26:12):
easy, but from a causeperspective, it's there for the
folks that are smaller.
It's there for the folks thatare building their business and
need products to get to thatnext level, and so our hope is
that we can evaluate and growour product with companies, but,
as of right now, we are reallygeared towards the smaller
(26:33):
businesses that are out there.
Speaker 1 (26:35):
So you're saying, if I wanted access for my
superintendents or anybody inthe field to be able to send
invoices, because QuickBooks ismainly managed by the admin team
in-house, like nobody gets intoQuickBooks.
Now, when you're first startingout, I mean I can't tell you
(26:55):
how many invoices I sent onQuickBooks online sitting on
that mini X on my phone on thebrowser, as I sent on QuickBooks
online sitting on that mini Xon my phone on the browser and
so.
But as you scale and you've gota few crews running around,
it's not as easy.
Yeah, well, and it'stransparency like we were
talking about.
Yeah, you want to betransparent, but there's some
(27:16):
things that they just don't needto see, so you don't want them
sending them from quick sorry,from quickbooks.
But if you were a hightransaction, high volume based
water heaters and um plumbers, aservice calls, etc.
You guys think about it.
How much easier it would bethat the superintendent is
(27:40):
sitting out there in the fieldand and I think you're hitting
the nail on the head is gearingit for those guys in the field,
because those guys don't doexcel.
Now I agree with you that thenew age guy like myself, you
know that late 20s, early 30s or, hell, even early 20s,
(28:00):
especially, he's going to have abetter chance.
But the guys that have been inthe game a little bit is what
I'm trying to say five, six toseven year company history and
they're sitting there reallyquestioning themselves after a
few years of maybe bad years ora really good year, and then two
, you know, a bad year, and theycan't figure things out.
And it's these small painpoints that, at the end of the
(28:22):
day, once problem is finding andresearching.
Before you just jump in bedBecause I have done that before
(28:48):
Procore and a couple othercompanies and thought that was
the magical solution to allthese problems I'm going to find
one product and fix 17 problems, and it's just not.
You need to have some strategy,you need to have some planning.
So if you, if procured, sitshere and go straight into into
(29:08):
QuickBooks, somebody um, it'salong the lines of the text
messages is so cool.
Number one and how?
Speaker 2 (29:17):
is it?
Speaker 1 (29:17):
displayed to the customers.
Is it in a professional format,I would assume?
Speaker 2 (29:22):
Yeah, so you can add your, your information on it,
right?
So, like, you've got your logo,your contents, on there.
It's it's a standard invoice,but, yeah, it's in a
professional tone for sure,right?
I think the other thing to note, too is you had mentioned, like
hey, we don't need everybodyinside of our QuickBooks, like,
we don't need people seeing thebottom dollars, right, we don't
want everybody to know how muchrevenue we made in 2022 and 2023
(29:43):
and so on.
We have the ability in oursoftware to create admin levels
and then users, so certain folkswon't have access to the admin
aspects of the business, which Ithink is another really
important feature, because youdon't want people to see all the
you know, especially if you'rejust like imagine you hire
somebody and they're they'reworking for you for two months.
(30:04):
You don't know them that well,um, even hell, even six months,
right.
And then, all of a sudden,you're like hey, here's all my
financials.
No, that's, that's not what youwant.
So, um, yeah, we, we've builtit.
So there's, there's layers andlevels to it for sure layers and
(30:24):
levels to it for sure.
Speaker 1 (30:25):
Talking just real quick.
Well, before I hop on on thatsubject train and that matter I
want to.
I want to shout out my guysblue collar performance
marketing.
They have been extremelyvaluable in what CyCon blue
collar business podcast.
Everything behind the sceneshow we're getting out in front
of you guys has been behind thescenes strategically planning,
as I'm sitting here talkingabout with Joe.
(30:46):
Literally he sits down onceevery other bi-weekly with my
content team and we see how theroadmap's going, where'd we fail
, what's doing good, what's notdoing good.
He's been working and tweakingon my website.
I'm telling you guys, if youwant a comprehensive free look
at your marketing campaign orprogram at your blue collar or
(31:08):
skilled trade service basedcompany, give them a shout at
bcperformancemarketingcombackslash blue collar podcast.
Shoot them an email.
They'll hop on a discovery callwith you and give you a full
broadband overview of where youmay be doing good, you may not
be doing anything and where youmay just be flat, missing the
(31:31):
mark.
So get with Ike and the teamand they'll get you hooked up.
All right, but from there, myguy Joe, I want to talk about
replacing it there's I literallywas talking to a member of our
YouTube channel and the membersbehind the scenes.
If they get a little bit morejuicy content, I guess you would
(31:52):
say more real, raw content, thethings that I can't put out
there just for everybodyinsurance bonding.
You know the customers,essentially, and clients and
everybody that's viewingeverything that you're putting
out there, and if you guys don'tthink they are, you're freaking
crazy because they are, firstthing they do is they're
googling your butt.
So spin around, talk to theseguys.
(32:15):
You know.
This certain individual think isgreat for this conversation.
He's 28 years old.
He's been with this gentlemansix years.
This gentleman's 61 years oldwho's the current owner of the
company, and they are workingout an agreement to basically
(32:38):
him take over the business andso he's sitting there as acting
owner with little to no power.
So, uh, he's reaching out to me.
Obviously hey man, he's got agiant, enormous job going.
Um, georgia is where this is at, cool.
And he's asking me and I juststart real simple about time
(33:01):
tracking and job costing and,hey man, what are we doing for
the guys' time?
Well, time sheets.
I'm like, oh, okay, okay, nojudgment there.
I was there myself.
First thing we got to do is wegot to get them on a time
tracking app.
You have to for the size job.
But where I'm going with thisis is that he expressed to me
(33:25):
that he has been researchingthis stuff as a new age donor,
knowing, obviously, with all theamount of content surrounding
these said issues.
Yeah, he knows for a fact thatit needs to be done, but.
But then you've got a working60-year-old owner who's not
really in it, kind of checkedout, done with it, burnout, but
(33:48):
won't let him necessarily makethese calls.
So replacing those clipboardsand spreadsheets with these
mobile-friendly workflows, justin general, talk about the
quartz plumbing and the some ofthe success that they've had,
etc.
How do we get from there towhere we're talking about now,
(34:11):
even with the non-techie folks?
Speaker 2 (34:15):
so I think you know you, you have to adopt it really
like it's.
It's at the end of the day,that's just.
It's as simple as that.
And I think that's the questionyou're asking me is like how do
you, how do you, get a littlebit bigger from being smaller?
Is that, is that?
Speaker 1 (34:31):
the question Great, great way of putting it.
Brother.
Speaker 2 (34:34):
Yeah, so so I mean, I think you know, first and
foremost, technology is is yourfriend on.
It's an unfortunate.
You know, first and foremost,technology is your friend.
It's an unfortunatecircumstance.
I actually don't have anysocial media myself, no personal
social media.
I'm not a big tech guy.
Speaker 1 (34:52):
I don't like to spend a lot of time in front of the
computer.
Speaker 2 (34:53):
As a matter of fact, like 930, 10 o'clock if I'm not
super busy with stuff, allscreens are shut off in this
house and so you know from mystandpoint.
I hear where people are comingfrom, I hear it.
It's just like pain in the ass.
You don't want to be in thephone.
You don't want to be doing that, sean.
Unfortunately, it's just theway you got to do it.
I had a.
So over the course of like thelast 12 months to maybe even 18
(35:16):
months, as I've been buildingthis and creating this company,
months as I've been buildingthis and creating this company,
I've done this rule with myselfwhere I have to meet with one
founder every single week.
I have to go out.
I write people on LinkedIn.
I will poke at friends to say,hey, can you introduce me to
this guy, can you introduce meto that gal?
And try to just get in front ofpeople and pick their brains.
And I've been doing that for areally, really long time and
(35:39):
I've gotten a ton of incredibleadvice.
And I've been doing that for areally, really long time and
I've gotten a ton of incredibleadvice.
And I've met with, like you know, private equity guys and CEOs
of $30 million companies, $150million companies, like sat in
rooms with guys, you know thatare billionaires.
And one thing that was prettycommon and pretty funny to me is
you don't really start yourbusiness until you get your
(35:59):
first lawsuit, and one of thefunny things that kind of comes
from that is that if you don'thave your ducks in a row, you're
going to lose that battle 10out of 10 times.
And so I think, from astandpoint of getting your ducks
in a row, it's about makingsure that you've built the
foundation to scale and buildthe house and make sure that
(36:23):
your ducks are in a row, fromnot only a standpoint of the
foundation but also all thestuff that you need to track
time, track invoicing, how muchmoney you've made this month,
this quarter, so you canactually figure out your
cashflow.
Can you hire additional people?
Is it a possibility?
Is there a possibility that youwon't be able to pay Joe out on
Monday because you don't havecash flow?
(36:44):
Those things are reallyimportant and if you don't
figure that out early on, thenyou're setting yourself up for
failure in the future.
Speaker 1 (36:51):
Dude, it's you, and here's the problem.
I'll let you in on a little bitabout the skilled trades and
the blue collar working world.
From my experiences, these guyswork so hard in the business
and they don't even know how tostart working on the business,
(37:13):
let alone enjoy it, let aloneknow where to start.
I mean, you may be completelytalking a foreign language to a
lot of these guys that arelistening today.
So you know, maybe, just likemy YouTube member I was speaking
about, where do these guysstart coming from, you know the
(37:33):
tech side of the world, andwhere do these guys start if
they have never had anyexperience with the tech world?
And you know, maybe it is thatold head, 55, 65 year old man,
that is trying his hardest toobtain some of this knowledge.
Where can he start?
(37:55):
Or maybe the entrepreneurthat's sitting there trying to
go oh man, I am too old at this,how do I go ahead and get into
this game?
Where do I?
Where does he start?
Speaker 2 (38:07):
Yeah, that's a good question.
I mean, I think we in in 2025,we've got the most information
out of our fingertips than everbefore.
Um, you go on YouTube, watch acouple of videos, do do some
research.
You can have a book on yourfront doorstep two days from now
if you go on Amazon.
I think it's all abouteducation and educating yourself
(38:30):
.
If, for example, before I wasdoing this and I had no idea
about the massive problem ofcash flow, of invoicing in this
blue collar space, I was doing aton of research, I was reading
books, I was going on and I wasfinding podcasts to listen to.
Podcasts like this one, right,like where you come on and you
(38:51):
hear about, hey, this is aproblem I'm having and this is
what we're talking about, andthen, all of a sudden, things
start to click.
It's all about educatingyourself and I know it can be
like very cumbersome at firstand you're like a little nervous
about kind of jumping into apool that you don't know how to
swim in.
Um, but it but it's absolutelycrucial that you figure out how
to educate yourself and it's so,it's so available, it's, it's
(39:12):
in youtubes, it's it's downloadif you're you're you're curious
about, hey, I don't know how, uhlike, some of these apps work.
Go and download it and try touse it.
I think, like you know, there'sno silver bullet to this.
It's just like you know, it'sabout educating yourself and
trying to do so through some ofthe different, you know, things
(39:32):
that we have available.
So books and YouTube, I think,were huge for me.
And then I also, I think a lotof people are afraid to reach
out and ask, and it's reallythat simple.
I mean, like I'm reaching outto people that I don't even know
.
I'm like, hey, this is what I'mdoing.
I would love to pick your brainfor 15 minutes.
Can we do that?
Yep, and it's crazy howreceptive people are.
(39:56):
And sure you're going to havesome people like I've had some
bad phone calls.
I've had some weird awkwardinteractions, for sure, you know
there's some.
There's there's people that areincredibly rude to me.
There's people that are like,hey, well, you're wasting my
time, you know, sure, but yougot to kind of just take that
and move on.
There's a saying, there's asaying that I, that I've got
(40:19):
actually stamped to my wall andit's make it a great day or
don't?
The choice is yours.
Gotta win the day.
Baby, gotta win the day.
Speaker 1 (40:28):
Beat the devil back, get up early and just keep
moving forward and he's waitingfor you as soon as you crest
over that threshold at sixo'clock in the morning, big dog
oh yeah, man, it took me a longtime because you know, as I can
(40:54):
go off on that subject forforever, but literally just some
encouragement.
Oh yeah, you got another set offolks going hey, I need this
right now or we're never goingto get this job done.
You have all these peopleasking you all these time
concept questions.
Just win the day, that's all youcan do sometimes and then guess
what Some of them stringtogether and you're like, hey,
(41:16):
what's going on here?
But again, like Jocko says,says nothing changes.
If nothing changes, man, andyou've got to, you've got to
start the change and educatingyourself is a great answer to
that.
I mean we, we can go off into awhole different scary two
letters of ai and what's goingto come of that.
But chat gpt will do half theexcel building for you now, like
(41:39):
literally.
I am not even an Excel, I knowbecause it's scary.
It's scary to those old guys.
You know what I mean.
Older, I shouldn't say old, butolder generation guys that
didn't grow up with thistechnology.
And you know our generation.
We can remember when computerswere getting integrated into
schools, you know, by the massesand like figuring it out.
(42:01):
And now these kids areliterally learning how to
embrace AI at the high schooleducation level.
It's insane, dude and but likethey're there, these kids are so
smart they're using just,they're just having chat GPT do
everything, and not just thatone specific AI, but that's the
one I utilize most.
Right, just that one specificAI, but that's the one I utilize
most.
(42:21):
Right, but I am so uneducatedin that world trying to slowly,
like literally trying to figureout how to utilize AI in smaller
tools, like I'm going to blowsomebody's mind today.
But you can put a set of PDFcivil documents into chat GPT if
(42:43):
you pay for plus, and it willliterally give you a approximate
quantification of water, sewergas, electric, whatever you're
trying to take off.
I hope I helped somebody withthat today, cause I just found
that out myself this week andjust playing around with it at
work.
I'm like running some excel,trying to build some sheets,
(43:03):
because I'm not an excel guy,but I the the the folks on my
team.
That's how they read and receptinformation, so I'm trying to
meet their you know requirementsof how their brain works and
ticks, and because they do thesame thing for me.
So, hey, chatgpt, here's myinformation.
Throw this in with thesecolumns and these categories and
(43:26):
this is how it needs to beshown.
Two minutes later, export it inPDF and shoot it to them.
And people are like what didyou just do?
And I'm like I literally justbought 15 minutes of my life.
Back is what I did.
Anytime as an entrepreneur, wecan buy time.
Anyways, going off on the AItrain, that's not what we're
talking about today, guys.
(43:47):
But, literally buddy.
I truly appreciate you comingon here and having focused and
founder is Luke, right Otherfounder is Luke.
Speaker 2 (43:57):
Yeah, co-founder is Luke Shout out to Luke.
Speaker 1 (43:59):
Thank you so much for your service.
My guy Truly need more mindsfocused on this issue.
The awareness of the bluecollars dwindling and we're not
making it any easier on them andwe need some help here.
So I encourage you guys forsure to keep this thing going.
(44:22):
Look forward to hearing moreabout it.
Um, but one last question herebefore we end the show.
My guy, I ask every single guestwhether you're white collar,
blue collar, I don't care.
Um, I need to know.
And you kind of hit it on thenail on the head.
I think I already know youranswer already.
But the blue collar worker whois just sitting there being
(44:46):
stuck in the mud, or even youknow what, the white collar,
let's step out there, becauseyou grew up in that, like you
came through that world, incorporate world, I could only
imagine.
Yes, we probably don't have asmany folks listening in that
world, but sitting in thatoffice chair trying to get eight
to five, or that blue collarguy who is just mentally,
(45:07):
emotionally, physically, they'rejust stuck in the mud and they
don't know how to get up and doit again.
Talk to them for just a minute,joe.
Speaker 2 (45:16):
Yeah, yeah.
So, first and foremost, I feelyou We've been there, man, trust
me you know there's there'sgood days and there's bad days,
but it's really like a choice, Ithink, like everything's a
learning experience.
And if you're not taking thatnegatives and flipping it and
saying, hey, I just learned areally, really great lesson here
, you know, then then you'remissing out.
(45:37):
I think, like you know, you gotto want it, you have to want it
, and that is like a big pieceof this there's.
I've, as I've gotten older, I'velearned that there are people
that just simply don't want itas much as as me or as others.
And like you'll see it and andif you want it more, you'll see
it too.
Like you'll, you'll be able tosee that there's a massive
difference, uh.
But I think like, if you canyou get up a little bit earlier,
(46:01):
you can figure out a way tokind of make the day a little
bit better.
Um, good things will come, andI I can't remember what the
actual term or the actual likephrases, but it's like hard work
and people are luckier right Isultimately the takeaway from it
, and it's you can create yourown luck by just busting your
butt a little bit harder, um,and there's light at the end of
(46:22):
the tunnel for sure, so justkeep going.
Speaker 1 (46:25):
You know what?
Just to add to that just alittle bit, nobody's coming to
save you guys.
Oh yeah, Literally just thenext day is the next day.
Yesterday is yesterday andwe're never going to talk about
it unless you want to talk aboutit.
So make today a different day,Make tomorrow a different day.
Get up just a little bit earlier.
(46:46):
You're right, Joe, that's a lotof it.
I used to try and sleep inright till the bell would ring
off, and now I'm up 30, 45minutes before my alarm, getting
things done, so I can have alittle bit of time to do this or
that, you know, just before Ihead out with the kids or
whatever the case may be.
But try and be very um, whatwould be the word intentional
(47:09):
with my time, and it has changeda lot in my life over the last
three, four years.
Um, you know, not wasting timeon people that don't need to
waste waste my time or theirsand but also to being more
intentional about the peoplethat do need my time to
hopefully help them out of thosemoments.
So Joe I really appreciate youfor coming on my guy with
(47:32):
Procured, so check them out.
Where can we find you guys?
Speaker 2 (47:35):
Yeah, so we're in the process actually of changing
the website over fromgetprocuredus to procuredus.
So soon you'll find us atprocured P-R-O-C-U-R-E-Dus, but
right now it is at getprocuredus.
You can reach me at josephJ-O-S-E-P-H at procuredus and,
(47:57):
yeah, reach out to me if you'vegot questions, comments,
concerns.
I'm more than happy to addressthem as they come through.
Speaker 1 (48:03):
It sounds like Joe would also take some research
from anybody that's willing togive it to him.
Speaker 2 (48:10):
Absolutely yeah, so feel free to reach out to me.
I would love an opportunity toconnect with you and learn a
little bit more about yourbusiness, see where Procured can
fit.
Speaker 1 (48:19):
I'm just saying Sorry to have you ahead.
No, go ahead.
Speaker 2 (48:24):
No, because when you're saying, you're saying
about the.
You know how can you get alittle bit bigger, stronger,
faster?
You know, tomorrow One of thebig things that I forgot to
mention and you kind of had saidit.
But, like, I write down mygoals every single morning.
Every single morning I get anew sheet paper, rip it off, new
set of goals.
It's time to you know, finishand complete those goals and
(48:44):
those tasks.
So I think that that's amassive thing that a lot of
folks don't do, and whensomething's written down, I
think it's 36% a higher chanceof it getting done.
So write down your goals andwake up at 5.30 instead of six.
Speaker 1 (48:58):
My problem is that just be a difference.
That's right, my guy that isright, no dude, I really
appreciate you shining light,shining light on vets,
veteran-owned businesses.
Shout out to them across theentire world or entire country,
and I really appreciate you guysshining light on a massive
(49:19):
problem within our industry andkeep after it, my guy, it's good
things coming.
Speaker 2 (49:25):
Yeah, for sure the light at the end of the tunnel
is coming for Procured and notthat we're in the tunnel.
I feel like we're kind of outin the pastures right now
enjoying the sun.
So feel free to reach out to meif you've got any questions,
comments, concerns, as Imentioned at josephiprocuredus,
because we'd be happy to startthose conversations.
Speaker 1 (49:43):
But thank you so much , zach.
Guys, until next time.
I really, really, reallyappreciate Joe coming on.
And until next time, guys.
You guys be safe, be kind, behumble.
If you've enjoyed this episode,be sure to give it a like.
Share it with the fellers.
Check out our website to sendus any questions and comments
about your experience in theblue collar business.
Who to send us any questionsand comments about your
(50:06):
experience in the blue collarbusiness?
Who do you want to hear from?
Send them our way and we'll doour best to answer any questions
you may have.
Till next time, guys.
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