October 1, 2025 • 59 mins
Sam Light, owner of Lighthouse Machinery and a 25-year veteran of the heavy equipment industry, takes us behind the scenes of a market in transformation. With experience running dealerships across multiple states, Sam brings unparalleled insight into why he left the corporate world to create something that genuinely serves customers rather than shareholders.
The conversation reveals how the construction equipment industry has fundamentally changed over the last two decades. Experienced professionals with deep parts and equipment knowledge are retiring, while dealership networks increasingly departmentalize, preventing essential cross-training. When COVID hit, these structural weaknesses were catastrophically exposed, creating an opportunity for Sam to build a business addressing these gaps.
What makes Lighthouse Machinery truly unique is its approach to the parts business, creating a comprehensive database of parts availability across the continental US and becoming a crucial resource for the very dealerships they might appear to compete with. Sam shares how 60-70% of their parts business comes from dealers themselves, who often lack the experience or resources to source aftermarket solutions.
The discussion takes a fascinating turn when Sam details how restrictive dealership territories and proprietary diagnostic software are effectively holding equipment owners hostage. With service rates hitting $200/hour for often untrained technicians, the industry is ripe for disruption. Sam explains how recent tariff increases, sometimes jumping from 35% to over 100% overnight, are adding another layer of complexity to equipment procurement.
Whether you're managing a construction fleet, working within the dealership network, or simply fascinated by the mechanics of a changing industry, this episode provides a masterclass in identifying systemic problems and creating innovative solutions. Sam's parting wisdom for blue-collar workers feeling stuck will leave you inspired to push beyond artificial limitations.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
SPEAKER_00 (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.
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Big shout out to ThumbTaq forjoining forces with us.
As you guys know, we have beenum looking for blue-collar
(01:15):
product and services, and onethat I am very uh learning more
and more about every day.
I I was just on the phone withthem yesterday.
I've been an avid customer sincethey've been in our area.
Well, since I've known aboutthem.
Uh the gentleman here has moreinsight and knowledge than I
think we're gonna have time toshare about the used equipment
(01:35):
market, the new equipmentmarket, the dealership network,
buckets, attachments, everythingyou guys want to know inside and
out about kind of where theindustry is.
Um, this gentleman has insighton, and uh he is a U.S.
Army veteran with nearly 10years of service.
Thank you for your service, sir.
Um, but this gentleman has 25plus years in heavy equipment,
(02:00):
construction industries as awhole, but mainly based around
the equipment side, salesservice, etc.
Uh, none other than Mr.
Sam Light, owner of LighthouseMachinery.
Thank you for joining me, sir.
Thank you for having me.
Yeah, this is freaking awesome.
Sam Sherity is definitelystepping out of its comfort
zone, and I really, reallyappreciate you because there is
(02:21):
so many guys that are gonnawatch this, and ladies, I
shouldn't discount you guys,maybe sharing it to their
husband.
Hey, look, here's some insighton a on a topic we were just
talking about going into thisnew machine, etc.
So um there's so much to betalked about in the equipment
side of things, but um, as justas our previous guest guys, if
(02:44):
you guys want to go watch that,www.blue
collarbusinesspodcast.com or anyof your streaming podcast
platforms, uh, Mr.
Alex Kraft, shout out there.
But uh this aligns right uh Ilove how it's back to back weeks
because we're gonna be on thesame topic as where I was going
with that.
And in the heavy equipmentspace, excavation space.
(03:05):
Literally, this gentleman hassome cranes, all different sorts
of types of stuff.
Um I follow him on LinkedIn anduh check them out at
lhmpartsusa.com and lighthousemachinery.
So, Sam.
Thank you, sir.
Give us there, give us a littlebackground where Lighthouse came
from.
I know with 25 plus years ofexperience, you have probably
(03:28):
seen it all, the mistakes, wherethe industry was heading, where
the industry worked before, butum I probably made most of the
mistakes.
Me and you both.
That's why I have this show, andthat's why I try to share with
the audience to hopefully notend up like me, you know.
SPEAKER_01 (03:43):
But talk about why lighthouses, who they are, and
where you're going with so togive a backstory to it, um ran
dealerships, uh a dealership andsales team in Arkansas for a
long time, uh, 14 plus years,and then went and uh ran some
dealerships uh in the Carolinasfor eight years.
(04:04):
Anyway, I just um working thedealership side and the changes
from 98 to 99 to now is insanedifferently.
So um my last company was acorporation, um was corporate
ran, corporate owned.
He was an investment companythat owned it, and um um just
(04:25):
not what I wanted to continuedoing morally that too it just
um I'm I don't work for the themarket um the shareholders
understood, sir?
I don't work for shareholders.
I work for the customers and formy employees.
And that and anyway, uh but no,I learned a lot, and then um um
(04:47):
I was we were looking for areason to come back home because
um and um so we've we decidedthat hey, we're gonna move back
to Arkansas.
We're gonna move when DollinPlace lived in Aristotle's in
the north of the world.
SPEAKER_00 (04:59):
That's right, that's right.
Hillbilly country.
SPEAKER_01 (05:02):
My wife's rewarded and I'm gonna like settling.
We didn't anyway.
So during the 25 years, uhnotice the transition of the
dealership and OEM network.
Um your old people, not say oldpeople, your experienced people
that knew the parts, knew theequipment are leaving.
And um the new guys are comingin, don't know nothing at all.
(05:23):
And so in the training side ofit, a lot of the dealerships are
departmentalizing, firstimparts, the imparts, friend
service.
There's no cross-training,there's no share of information
of why you need these seals forthe engine, why you need this
parts for this this part of theuh the equation of the machine.
None of that was being taught.
And so uh also um during COVID,there was a striction of the
(05:46):
supply chain.
And that showed, boy, was thereit showed where all the all the
uh shortcomings are through thewhole system, not not pointing
figures to anybody, but theentire system was screwed up.
The industry is all in ashithole.
(06:13):
So we started Lighthouse, um,one to uh sell equipment.
Uh if you deal with RichieBrothers or uh let's say anybody
in particular, um they havetheir their tooling, they they
they're good at some things, butuh the charges are expensive.
Yep, 10-15%.
And usually the guy doesn't knowwhat they're talking about,
(06:35):
usually.
Usually some of them are notsome are very not.
That's right.
And so um, and COVID hit and hadthese OEM guys said, Sam, come
help us liquidate assets.
Okay.
And so that's right when the uhoil fields went to crap.
And so uh went out there, oh, itwas awful, man.
It was it was excavator stackedup like hardwood across the
(06:58):
field of machines with no marketto go.
Also, due to contractualrestraints between dealerships,
it was hard for them to movethat stuff.
And so we went in there and cameup with a plan to move that
inventory.
That's what it startedlighthouse.
I had a contractor in in SouthCarolina, love that man to deaf,
Clary Hood.
My left lender, he said, What doyou want to do?
I'm gonna start something.
I don't know what it is.
He said, Well, how much youneed?
(07:19):
I said, I'm gonna need this.
He said, Go see her, she got acheckpoint.
Go like out of nowhere.
Why?
And then I said I got on theroad and I went and saw
customers that I had arelationship through the years.
One with Grant Garrett.
Yep.
Drove here.
So Grant didn't talk to you.
We'll start this business.
I don't know what it is, butit's gonna be something.
(07:40):
Can you help me?
Yes.
Ronnie George with GrantMountain, uh, with McGeorge
contracting.
I um I can go through the wholelist of people throughout the
country, Rogers Group, Marvinwalked in, said, guys, we're
gonna make something, and uhwe're hoping to be a resource.
So we started looking at assets,and that's where the cranes and
we sold some stuff from the appholts, uh, just stuff that no
(08:05):
one really knew about and didn'tspend time focused on it.
That's right.
Okay.
So eliminated the assets onequipment, and then during that
process, well, one of my oldproduct support guys, Marty,
says, Sam, you need to start theparts business.
Marty, no.
And Teddy's like, no.
He said, No, start the partbusiness.
(08:25):
And he came on board after aboutfour months of wearing me out,
and he sold$150,000 in parts inthe first month.
My just on his phone callingcustomers.
Well, what Marty had was aknowledge of 30, 40 years, and
people can call him and give itto him and walk away.
And he'll handle it.
(08:46):
He just walk away.
And I said, Marty, holy cow,Batman.
I said, uh we gotta replicatethis.
He said, I've been telling you,you gotta do it.
He still rose in my face.
And so then we brought on BradPruitt because he's somebody
that has the knowledge on partsI didn't have.
And so we brought on Brad, andBrad is welcome knowledge.
(09:06):
And then we started lookingaround for people.
And how do you take somebodythat's in our industry is less
than one percent of thepopulation?
Our our inner w less than onepercent.
It's insane.
How do you train them?
How do you bring them in and andteach them what we need them to
learn to be successful?
SPEAKER_00 (09:26):
Really quickly, I have in the last six months
started an internal trainingprogram uh with video and video
capturing everything.
But no, I'm with you.
It's very hard.
It's just it's strategy that youhave to find.
Like I try and get a guy thatknows what a grade stick is
anymore.
(09:46):
You know what I mean?
You have to be adaptable intraining.
But that's that's been kind ofour number one thing was hiring
the right people.
Sounds like you know exactlywhat you're looking for, but
training somebody new is oh,it's the most expensive thing we
go through as business owners.
SPEAKER_01 (10:04):
And we go through so many people to get to that one
person.
That's right.
And we have right now we havesome amazing people.
I mean, yeah, you do, man.
Devin, Jordan, Katie, um, Brad,Marty, uh, Dustin.
We got three people, we gotpeople up now in New York and
and North Carolina and Floridathat are coming on board.
Um I want to see more of that besuccessful.
(10:28):
Um, but anyway, so back to theyou're fine, back to the parts
side of the equation.
Uh when we started doing parts,uh the COVID hit, and some of
the OEMs came to us and said,Hey, we need parts.
We can't get GET.
I need we need you to figurethis out.
And so we started bringingcontainers and container loads
of of GET from all over theplace to fill in the short, the
(10:50):
sh the short uh supply here.
And uh, and we were the ourbiggest customer was dealers.
It's still today, our biggestcustomers for parts is dealers,
hands down.
60 to 70 percent of our partsbusiness is sold to dealers.
Wow.
That's staggering, actually.
SPEAKER_00 (11:12):
Wow, that's awesome for you.
SPEAKER_01 (11:14):
Well, you're gonna get you don't get better.
The easy button for you.
See when you walk into adealership for the most part,
you got phones ringing, somebodyin the shop needs something.
That's right.
And just all this stuff goingchaotic.
So um, are these your glasses?
Yes, sir.
I'm so sorry.
I thought that was remote.
(11:34):
No, sorry to take you offtraffic.
And then um, and so uh customercalls in and wants an
aftermarket solution or a usesolution, and the guys don't
have the experience.
So they just call us and wewe'll provide options for them.
Um sometimes we can make moneyoff of it, sometimes we can't.
We just we do what we can do forthat side of it, and and that's
where we're headed to.
(11:55):
So um every dealership is in myopinion, um have a struggle with
the parts, whether it beself-inflicted or OEM
inflicting.
And uh, and our job is to helpmitigate that risk and that that
that issue.
And so far it's been it's beenvery profitable for us.
SPEAKER_00 (12:15):
That's amazing because like you said, man,
you're concentrated on thecustomer.
I'm a customer.
I can tell you for a fact theyare 100% concentrated.
I haven't bought a machine, butum buckets and the inventory
that did you automaticallystart.
I mean, you guys have a massive.
(12:35):
So our inventory runs.
How did that start working?
SPEAKER_01 (12:38):
So the inventory, we started out with nothing.
Yeah, I mean, of course.
And our po bore we were workingin our pro board at my house.
Okay, and that was it was it wasit was definitely unique.
It worked.
Um, it worked.
We got out of there because wehad these containers coming and
we ended up buying thewarehouse, and and we're ex
we're we're busting that we needa bigger spot.
(13:00):
But right now, we're just youknow the growth.
Business, the businessstruggles, Bob.
So uh the thing is though, uh,how do we maximize inventory and
offering to our customerswithout the huge investment?
Okay.
So what we've done was uh oncewe prove ourselves to our
suppliers and to our neuralnetwork that we're actually
resource for you, not a neatcompetition.
(13:21):
That's right, we're here to helpyou and the end user to keep up
running, whether it be yourrental fleet, because we're a uh
equipment share certifiedsupplier.
Really?
They can call anywhere in thecountry, they'll call us one
stuff.
And so uh we're there's severalcompanies that we do that with.
(13:42):
Um anyway, so they'll um the westarted creating a database of
suppliers and what they're goodat.
Now, not all suppliers supplyall good parts.
No, I agreed.
There's joke, yeah, okay.
Yeah, yeah.
And we've we've had we'velearned the hard way uh we've
(14:02):
experienced you know, that wethought was from a credible
vendor and it wasn't, but youdid it because you took care of
your customer.
You had to.
And so during that process oflearning, um, we create a
database where people, endusers, the dealer can go into
our website and put an apartmentnumber that pulls up what's
(14:24):
available in the continental US.
Wow.
Okay.
Now we're trying to stay focusedin the US, but uh, we're coming
to find out we're having to shipa lot of stuff out of Europe
right now, especially on um onroad products, we're having to
bring stuff in.
Um but um but mainly being inthe United States.
And anytime that we see um anissue, like for instance, we'll
(14:46):
have a run of five or six uhsame parts being asked for from
different parts of the country,then we'll all automatically go
out there and start searchingwhere is that where's that
pocket inventory that can feedthe needs of everybody else?
And uh and what a model, man.
No, once that once we find outwhere the honey hose are, this
sells in two weeks.
Right.
(15:06):
Until the OEM can catch up.
SPEAKER_00 (15:08):
Well, on the That's insane.
The inventory side of things Iwanted to really highlight on,
guys, is that man, I just boughta bucket from you guys for our
Kamatsu 360.
We were kind of talking abouthow unique of a size I was
looking more for a 36-inchbucket.
I would have actually liked it alittle smaller, and you ended up
(15:29):
having on the yard a 30-inch uhinstruct bucket with some going
through some major rock in thatarea.
It's kind of shallowed up now.
But either way, man, same day,Jordan's standing out there
going, hey dude, I think thisbucket will work.
This one here, let me measurethis.
Let me and dude, just the way hecommunicates with his customer.
(15:51):
Um, you don't get that kind oflevel of service.
And he he cared.
He cared about the crew sittingthere waiting for the bucket,
you know.
But he had it on the yard.
Next day it's on the machinedigging.
Now, granted, we're right here.
That makes that that's a loteasier, but there's there's guys
all across the country, and Iknow you'll ship to them.
Well, yeah, we should we shippedtwo rippers to Hawaii last week.
SPEAKER_01 (16:13):
Did you the little rippers go?
It went on the uh John Deere470, and we shipped um, yeah, it
the freight was like four grandto get that ripper there, but
they bought the ripper and threesets of teeth in Alaska.
From now until the end of theyear, we'll ship tons of stuff
(16:33):
to Alaska.
Really?
You can chip in Portland, get ona boat, and go up.
Oh, we'll um getting ready forwinter, everything's getting
down timed.
Uh frost rippers, we sell a tonof frost rippers up in that area
and up and uh also all along theCanada Canadian border.
Hey, shout out to my Kanuckies.
But that um but we haven't instock, right?
(16:54):
Um we don't have everything instock, we never will have
everything in stock but uh andwe'll do as much as our capital
allow us to do.
But but the resource is isknowing where things are in the
country.
If you know that, the otherthing that that I'm trying to
teach my guys, and they're greatguys.
I'm the team is is slowly comingtogether, but they're great, is
(17:17):
ask the customer what the assetis.
If it's a$10,000 machine, do weneed a new part?
Do we need a reman part?
Come on.
Are you planning on using it fora season?
Are you planning on fixing itand send it to auction?
What is the game plan on over toassets so that we can search the
best product?
Right.
And most depending on the sizeof the company, your size
(17:40):
company, you know what you needand know what the options are.
Normally, normally, but a beercompany, they have a personal
agent, asset manager, and um,they're not thinking about all
that.
And also they're not thinking toask that from a dealership.
They're just going to use newparts.
SPEAKER_00 (17:56):
Well, that's literally where I'm going next
is let's talk about thedealerships.
And uh literally, you hit it onthe head when we were just
pre-talking here before the showand and the struggles that you
saw within the dealershipnetwork, not only for the
dealership, but mainly for thecustomer and what they were
(18:18):
dealing with from all levels,from sales to service.
And um the biggest thing Ipicked up from last week's show
with Alex was that there's noincentive for the dealers to get
any better because there's notgoing to be another cat dealer
moving in on Riggs territory orHolt's territory or Fabric's
(18:40):
territory.
There's just not.
They know they're the onlyperson.
And I know I'm opening it to meup, man.
I'm telling you.
I'm telling you, I figured Iwould I would catch a bone or
two.
But it is it's so true.
And thank God for companies likeyourself that go, hey, we have
got to fix this industry.
This is crap.
(19:00):
The customers are getting hosedon, and it and literally that
the software that it takescoming out and the mileage trips
and hey, uh, and the untrainedtechnicians that they're sending
out there$200 an hour to changea filter that you couldn't even
diag over the phone, and youtold me it was an injector and
it was all this crap, and youscared me, and now I got to pay
(19:22):
$2,800 for you coming out andchanging a filter or whatever
the case may be.
Yes.
But you there has to be otheroptions and not just to hear
that dealers are coming to youand going and your team and
going, hey man, this guy's got auh larger excavator with 9,000
hours on it, the new part.
Oh, it's gonna take like eightweeks to order.
(19:44):
Do you have anything?
Reman, is there anything that wecould, you know, at least offer
the gentleman outside of new?
Because I promise you, andnormally I run a newer fleet.
That's besides the point.
But if I'm going in an olderpaid-off excavator, say a pit
machine, I'm not gonna probablynecessarily slap a brand new
whatever it is.
If it's a uh critical part, ofcourse you're gonna go back new,
(20:07):
OEM, whatever to get thelongevity out of the machine,
but sprock it or et cetera, youknow what I mean?
SPEAKER_01 (20:12):
So it you and I'll tell you a quick story.
Please do.
We were talking about you know,used parts and stuff like this
and and older machines.
We were in Austin at aconference, um uh uh equipment
management conference, and I wassitting there at the table, and
the guy sitting beside me wastalking about how he couldn't
get parts to finish rebuilds oncat machines, and that cat could
(20:35):
not let him buy parts outsidethe dealer network or the supply
chain network.
So they're getting bombardedwith fines and fees because
they're they had to rebuildthese machines at the refills
sale to get them out.
And there is a in theircontract, they get they had to
pay for a real machine, pay forthis, pay for that.
And we were sitting theretalking, and in every part that
he uh we're discussing, I calledup Marty and called up Brad.
(20:57):
I said, What about these parts?
What about what about theseparts?
And they said, Sam, yeah, I knowwe got them right here.
They're Cat OEM.
We can get them.
So, but they wouldn't allow themto buy it through without their
contracts.
And that goes back to the dealnetwork.
Uh the deal networks uh isdifferent than a car dealership.
Oh, yeah.
They're restricted.
(21:17):
Okay.
They can only sell in theirtrade area.
If you sell outside trade area,then there's a penalty.
And then the gentleman'sagreement between dealerships.
I'm gonna poach on you or poachon me.
Right.
And I can tell you a lot ofdealership meetings, that was
the struggle and the fight.
It's like you sold this customerin my territory, now you gotta
pay me.
Well, that creates borders.
Yeah.
Also, they don't want to worktogether.
(21:40):
Some of them don't, some of themdo.
And that and so that sharingparts inventory to help each
other out.
They try to do it throughdifferent OEMs, had different
programs, and it didn't work tothe full effect it needs to
work.
And uh customer suffers becausewhere you're gonna go.
Are you gonna drive all the wayto Oklahoma City to get it, want
something from one cat whereriggs on that?
(22:00):
No.
SPEAKER_00 (22:01):
You're not gonna tell them to pick up the phone
and call Jordan and light out.
SPEAKER_01 (22:05):
Exactly.
Okay, and guess what?
We have access to a system thattells us where the cat part is
and reach out and get it.
Wow.
And that and that's what that'swhat kills me.
Take care of the customer.
Will you make less money if youwere outside your outside your
dealership?
Yeah, you're probably gonna letmake less money.
Okay.
Uh, but do it and get thecustomer up and going.
(22:26):
And then uh, and some of theprograms penalizes the dealers
from doing that.
Anyway, that has createdopportunity for Lighthouse to
create something that doesn'texist.
Yeah.
And that is, and you think aboutit, the old school guys, um,
like from Heavy Quip or from theother, they're closing up.
Yeah, their knowledge is gone.
(22:47):
Or they're getting bought out byinvestment companies.
And here we go again.
It's about the dollar versus thecustomer.
Going back to that corporateledge, I mean, I'm not
interested in that.
So the the part side of theequation is for us one, to to
breach break barriers and supplythe customer with option the
(23:09):
best option we can do.
And that's what we want toaccomplish.
SPEAKER_00 (23:13):
Literally.
And um the dealerships, man, thesoftware.
I know you have I know I figuredthat would be a next uh pretty
good proprietary software topic.
Oh my god.
SPEAKER_01 (23:26):
If you require me to pay you to come out to my
machine to diagnose it, you arenot gonna charge me.
That is captured audience, thatis called trade restriction,
that is holding me hostage.
And I wish that we, as anindustry, I'm talking about
contractors, go to ourlegislative and and tell them
(23:47):
create a law to where I'm notheld hostage to this.
Uh-huh.
And that's a great idea.
They can do that.
We can do that.
And there's been discussionsabout it.
And the OEMs, I'm not saying allof them, but they're having
discussions on how to combatthat or how to help that.
I've had I've been inconversations with in with OEMs,
and they're like, okay, we needto start facilitating this.
(24:10):
And then the dealers go, well,that means we lose revenue.
And we can't charge you$2,000for a service call every time to
go look at something and tellyou that it was a filter.
Yep.
Well, if I had access to monitormy own machine and to dynox with
my own machine, let's do that.
There was a company that we metum last no, it was the beginning
(24:31):
of this year, and they have anAI, all they're going to AI all
of the service manuals where youcan talk to the phone and put in
what your symptoms are, and itscans the service manuals and
put out which they check.
That's like if that's completed,how much money would that save a
contractor on service costs?
(24:52):
Yep.
On BS service costs.
Now, if it's something major,yes.
And I want my dealers to makemoney.
I want them successful.
I want to them to make money andbe able to take care of me when
I need them.
That's right.
But not hold me hostage.
SPEAKER_00 (25:07):
And that's killing us.
I can only imagine, man.
I mean, contractors as a whole,I am a little bit different.
Um, I basically pay them toservice my machine through the
entire warranty.
And I already know that I'mgonna have to do one hose.
You go out there, hey, I needthis hose.
Well, it's a it's a sealedsystem.
(25:27):
You're gonna have to have uscome out and reprogram that
sensor to read this line, thatline.
Like, what?
So I should have just had youguys to come out to begin with.
And, you know, earlier in theyears of Sycon, I didn't know
what I was doing when I wasbuying equipment, just buying
equipment.
Oh, the cheapest price possible.
I didn't know you could putservice packages in.
I didn't know you could putmileage in it, that you didn't
(25:49):
see a bill on your incrementalhours, and that they're
servicing the machine.
So when you go to resell it, Ididn't know any of this existed.
And so thank God I did beforeall this software.
It seems like in the last five,seven years for sure, the
software has become a completeissue, especially for farms,
farmers, them guys.
(26:10):
I feel so bad for those guysthat have shops.
They have learnt the knowledgewe were talking about.
Those guys are fading out, youknow, but they know the
knowledge how to work on thesetractors, and uh, but they can't
because they need something togo beep, beep.
Right.
Click okay, yes, sir, recharge,regen, whatever it may be.
But it's just so epic.
SPEAKER_01 (26:29):
The komatsu service program, they it's a really
great program.
Dude, I love it.
Yeah, as a matter of fact, um,I'm building a rental fleet now.
Um, and and I'm gonna do thebest I can to have power as my
serving service and do komatsumachines because of the komatsu
care.
Um I'm not plugging in at all.
(26:49):
Oh, it's fine.
No, I'm just Kamatsu where youat.
But uh, but uh Komatsu care andall that look, I've got a long
frontal reach on I got a longreach on on Red right now.
In South Carolina, I'm launtinghere and Lender uh is is doing
doing the service work for megoing out there.
So there that model's doinggood.
Now, is all dealers great?
(27:11):
No.
No.
But um, but if I had my choicefor the market area I'm in,
agreed.
Power is my company.
Uh South Carolina Lender is mycompany.
Yeah.
So um that's how we use forthat.
SPEAKER_00 (27:22):
But that gives a little reassurance and
affirmation that I'm not crazy,that I did pick the right dealer
back then, you know.
But back to pop back to power,though.
SPEAKER_01 (27:30):
Scott got a good team.
Yeah, he does.
Scott's a good team, solid.
Yeah.
Uh there's I was telling tellingum oh, what's his name?
The president of power, Tim DMoon.
Oh, okay.
Yeah, yeah.
That's talking to Andy, I waslike, Andy, you have a great
team.
It was in springtime.
I'm really happy to be part ofthat.
But anyway, back to service.
(27:51):
If if one,$200 an hour isridiculous for what we're
getting.
Untrained, untrained, yeah,multiple trips, yeah, because
the guy couldn't figure it out,downtime, and there's no one to
hold him accountable.
We're held hostage.
And so I'm starting to see moreand more technicians leave the
dealer network and start theirown companies.
(28:13):
And I'm starting to see a trendline on our revenue to those
independent uh contractors,service guys.
There's a company in uhCharleston that have six
technicians, that's all they dois independent.
I know a ton of service guys inthe Atlanta market that went out
and bought their own servicetruck and they're doing their
(28:34):
own deal.
And they're charging 120 to 140bucks an hour version with a
dealer charging 200.
SPEAKER_02 (28:40):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_01 (28:40):
Now, sometimes I question, well, their knowledge,
so when you start working for adealer, your knowledge hits a
wall to where you're not gettingthat training.
So eventually those machineswill fade out.
And whether where's the theknowledge side of it where they
can gain knowledge on the newerproducts?
So eventually, there has beenOEMs that have discussed using a
(29:02):
Tesla model as a celldistribution and setting up
service facilities to servicemachines through certified
technicians that are not part ofthe dealer network.
That has been discussed by a lotof people.
Well, yeah.
And the OEM will allow to keepthe margins of the retail for
themselves.
It's it's there's we can go downthat rabbit hole.
(29:25):
But there has to be discusseddiscussion looking at it, and
and to the point to where theyhave looked at what would cost
about contracts of dealerships,what would it cost versus what
they would gain, how longeverything else.
If that happens, then they wouldhave to create a um training
program for the independenttechnician to work on that
product, be skamatsu certifiedor deer certified or cat
(29:47):
certified, Sandy certified, orwhatever the case may be.
Um so I'm looking one, if we canlimit what we get in charge in
the field for BS service callsor Restricted uh access and have
some way to for them to trainour people.
SPEAKER_00 (30:06):
That's right.
SPEAKER_01 (30:08):
Okay.
And that person could be anindependent service contractor.
That's only 1099 with us.
Okay.
Train those guys until that wecan be more profitable.
And and that has to come aheadsometime or another.
It has to.
SPEAKER_00 (30:21):
The grid.
I think the you know, sittinghere on this side of the table,
I mess with Chat GPT and Grokand a couple other AIs, uh,
probably a little far too much,but I'm trying to obtain that
knowledge as quick as I canbecause I'm not a techie guy,
but you know, I never eventhought about taking a I'm gonna
try it now, is taking a usermanual uh from one of my
(30:43):
machines and spinning it in aChat GPT and ask the questions.
Yeah, I'm gonna ask somequestions and see if that works,
but because I I believe that'swhat they're they're doing as
well, whoever whatever dealerthat was, was basically dropping
it into an open AI languagelearning model and and basically
but think about the gentlemanthat is 70 years old who you
(31:06):
know is finally buying that lastpiece of equipment and he won't
and and can be able to just go,Hey, why is my you know exactly
it's gonna be impressive for youknow, or the young guys that
always have their phone in theirhand and can't get it out of
their hand and they're glued toit.
Hey, why why is this machinewrong?
So they can maybe, you know, notfix it, they're operators, but
(31:27):
at least when they pick up thephone and call boss, they can
go, hey boss, uh I changed fuelfilters out.
We had an extra pair there inthe trailer, but uh man, this
thing is acting funny.
I checked the code online andjust give me a little bit of
information so I can go out tothe dealer network or whatever
it may be and uh independentguy, and actually, I'm not if I
(31:48):
could fix it myself, I would.
If I'm calling somebody, most ofthe time I don't know what I'm
talking about.
So the more information I canget from them as fast as I can,
and the more information yougive the dealership, too.
SPEAKER_01 (31:56):
There you go.
You get because on the when Iwas working for the dealership
side, I had a customer callingme up and him complaining about
the service work.
And he comes in livid and umupset and and I understand.
I I feel you're paying five butthe heel.
But um, but then I go back to myservice department, and I'm and
(32:17):
I try to keep from doing it, butmy frustration, aggravation,
what I felt from him is startingto come out in my service
department, and I'm and I'm I'mtrying not to be that way.
But uh and say, Do you need totake care of my customer?
We come to find out thecommunication between him and
somebody else within the companyat his at their and um and all
the facts went there, so he waspiecing it together.
(32:38):
Uh but if we had a tool thatwould help our people in the
field uh get some kind of dataor get some chain of filters or
disc code popping up, somethingto help them uh the feed it back
to the dealership immediately bea lot faster and quicker.
SPEAKER_00 (32:54):
You know, there's a this may blow some of you guys'
minds that I own Kamadsuequipment, but uh a gentleman
shared there's one dealer out inSouth Carolina, actually, as
funny as that is, and I thinkit's North South Carolina or
North Carolina, but they have asearch bar that you can take
your code from your Komodsumachine and stick it in there
and at least give you some idea.
(33:15):
It it's um Carl sent it to meanyhow in an email, and I
checked it.
We had uh some codes thrown onour 360, and I got it halfway
dyaged where I could call myheavy guy and go, hey man, I
think this has something to dowith either this or this.
Oh, well, you probably ain'tchanged this out yet or done
(33:36):
this, have you?
And I'm like, oh no.
You want to come out and look atthat?
He's like, Yeah, yeah, I'll bethere and come out, you know.
But we do.
We have to have from the dealerside and from the customer side,
because I have been thatgentleman, I have 100% um gone
in hotheaded into situations notbeing trusted and verified in my
information before I movedforward.
(33:58):
Made an ass of myself sometimes,you know.
And but at the same time, thatdealer should be able to kind of
go, hey, I'm not gettingeverything I need for in order
for me to do my job.
Can I have this or somebody thathas that information, you know?
And it goes back to trainpeople.
Right.
And um, but my I can't tell youhow many times I get a I get a
(34:20):
call from a guy in the field,hey, this is so this is broke.
You want me to call over anddeal with that?
Well, my automatic answer isgonna be sure.
Yeah, I dude, I'm at it.
I'm dealing with this and this.
And by the time it comes backaround to me, hey, Sam called me
for this part, or my Sam, youknow, for this part and this
part, and it I think he reallyneeds this.
(34:43):
Can you like take some time andverify this?
But no, I agree.
I think you know, things likeback to Komatsu, my komatsu,
their their app, that's probablyhow you're watching your your
dredger.
Exactly.
And so, not to plug them anymore than they need, but I love
my komatsu app that I can seethe fuel burn rate.
(35:04):
How much idle time are thosemachines sitting out there?
Are we can we actually bill whenI go to send a bill?
Is the customer going to beupset because you know we we
didn't do eight hours worth of,we did three on a check is my
komatsu and go, oh yeah, mycustomer's right.
We only did three hours worth ofwork, you know, it hasn't
happened, but right that's theverification that I want as a
customer that's spendinghundreds, not millions, of
(35:27):
dollars on on these pieces ofequipment that I want to
hopefully last longer than thepayment.
SPEAKER_01 (35:35):
You know what I mean?
I know exactly what you mean.
Because this uh equipment is notgoing to get any cheaper.
And um we man uh this year Ithink we're up to$35 million in
equipment sales.
Let's go.
But in that same breath, I gotcustomers to buy them and and
(35:57):
they buy them, and I'm verygrateful for that.
And but I'm always scared.
Um not always scared, I try todo the research, but I try to uh
if the machine goes down, itbreaks down.
Yeah, and uh and back to what itcosts and stuff, every time we
do use machines, I do evaluationand try to get the programs that
that the OEM is offering.
So if if uh deer, cat, whoeveris offering 0% for 48, 36,
(36:21):
whatever, I I gotta take thatconsideration and then I look at
the use machine and say, doesthis machine has appreciated
enough to offset that?
Well, how can we expect thatcost expense uh expenditure?
And then also the warranty sideof the equation, does the
machine have a warranty on itthat offset the risk factor over
here?
And and then I look at the hourutilization of what the customer
(36:44):
is and pencil it out, okay, ifwe did finance this machine,
what would be the depreciationcost or be worth at the end of
the note?
Okay, we don't want to get tothe note and he paid off the
machine wore out, or everysingle business model different.
And so my main customers that Ideal with, I pretty much know
what their accounting structureis and how they will depreciate
(37:07):
out stuff.
So I'll put the asset togetherand propose these methods of
purchase, whether it be a rentalpurchase or uh financing or cash
or whatever.
And then uh then also theirbuying habits.
So a lot of my public tradingcompanies do not buy anything
until January.
So like there's some bigprojects that are coming up that
(37:28):
they don't have the capital tobuy the machine, it's not
approving the budget.
They get the money, it's not andit's just not something they
have the approval for fromcorporate level.
And we'll go out there and buythe asset and rent it to them.
And we then at any given timewe'll have five to six million
like that now out just fillingthat need because they need it
(37:48):
now.
They need it now, yep.
And the in that market may nothave it there, okay, because the
market's different all over thecountry.
And um and we'll get the assetand put it on rent to them um if
we have a plan in place.
SPEAKER_00 (38:02):
You bet, of course.
Yeah, no, but it's it soundstime and time and time again,
and I'm I'm very excited forthis story to be shared.
But I mean, seriously, you'vesat here for the past you know
45 minutes, hour, and talkedabout how you have found
problems, and here's thesolution.
Here's the problem, and here'sthe solution.
And the if you guys don't followLighthouse Machinery on
(38:25):
LinkedIn, I'll give you ashameless plug there because um
watching that ripper, it caughtmy eye.
I watched that thing over andover again.
And you talk about the the megaripper on the 470 and and and
give that little bit ofsolution, how your customer came
to you.
And oh, we didn't talk aboutthat, did we?
No.
Okay, all right, not all theway.
I could I stopped you off.
SPEAKER_01 (38:46):
Okay, okay.
So uh Terra Honk is a uh utilitycontractor, contract in Riley.
Um great Dale Wars, awesomedude.
Contractor, he also teachesschool.
Uh he's at uh North CarolinaState, I think.
Let's go ahead.
Yeah, he's a good dude.
Um he called me up and said,Sam, drilling blasting has cost
me a fortune.
We got some sensitive areas towhere we can't blast because
(39:08):
they got Dale Computer Umfactory and then Farmer Stata
Center.
Yeah, I said can't drill ablast.
And if we do drill and blast,the liability the liability
aspect of it is astronomical.
And he said, Did you ever seeone of those big rippers on
YouTube that they have in China?
I said, Yeah, I seen it.
And uh he says, Can you keep meone of those?
So I called guys over atInstruct in England and I said,
(39:32):
Look, shout out, yeah.
I said, guys, can you make thishappen?
Yeah, we do it all the time inAustralia.
I'm like, You're kidding me.
And he said, No.
I said, Well, put me pricetogether.
The first one we did was alittle PC 750.
And so uh huge, dude.
So, oh my God.
(39:53):
The see that baby work was wassomething.
Now, we've had some rippers wedemoed right here that didn't do
good on the 490.
SPEAKER_00 (40:00):
Okay.
SPEAKER_01 (40:00):
Um, we demoed to Grant.
Grant took it to four, GrettGarrett, yeah.
He took it, um, he was hadcustomers that had issues with
moving materials.
Like there's a place over herewhere they got um mines on the
ground, yeah, and they got thecore on top, and they couldn't
drill and blast.
And so they were wanting todevelop that in the subdivision,
but they couldn't move the rock.
(40:21):
Anyway, we tried it there, itdidn't work.
Anyway, but the mega ripper,it's on PC 750.
The arm itself, just the arm, is33,000 pounds.
Just on.
Because you have down pressure.
Yeah, the D11 ripper with acylinder that's this massive,
it's huge.
And anything it touches, if ithas a 15,000 uh or less uh PSI
(40:42):
rate, it just butter just ripsthrough it.
Now, the problem that we have,well, the problem, and also it's
a it's a guilty pleasure, is hehas to go he goes to uh tooth
every Tuesday.
I'm not talking about breaking.
I'm talking about you go upthere and you can pour water on
(41:03):
it and just you sizzle becauseit gets hot.
So that tooth.
So we had to import some teethum by the container load because
we get anywhere else or five,six hundred dollars things.
SPEAKER_00 (41:16):
Yeah.
They're stupid.
That is ridiculous.
SPEAKER_01 (41:17):
Yeah, and so we could I can import it for 200
bucks.
And I'm like, let's import themand then uh make sure this the
material spec is right, and uhand so that we don't kill our
profitless ding job.
So that job was great, and thenuh pay for the machine, loves
it.
I said, Sam, we got another jobthat's and they want to they
(41:39):
want these machines digginghere, and so we order another
one.
And that was that was excitingon that one, the 374.
The tough part of that equationwas, and this is something that
uh everybody that's listening tothis needs to pay attention to.
Uh the terror scenario.
Okay.
When we ordered that, that part,it was 35% terror.
(42:00):
When it came in, it was 100 andsomething.
SPEAKER_00 (42:03):
Oh my lord, no notification, no nothing.
Here's your bill.
No, we got notified.
Okay.
SPEAKER_01 (42:11):
Uh, but uh it was we got notified, but it already
shipped.
Okay.
Already shipped.
So he has a brand new cat 374still on the ground.
Okay, with no bonus stick.
Why?
Because he bought it because hewas and now I got this ripper
coming in.
I called him, I said, Daniel.
(42:32):
Oh I said, dude, I just got mybill to my tax bill from uh from
the feds uh from um on this onthis ripper, and we can't come
up with 780 grand more.
And he's like, no.
I said he did, he met uh notime, man.
Because the bill's here, it'shere.
Either I have to obey the at theport or pay the pay the tariff.
(42:54):
Well, what are you gonna do?
And so we either split it.
Good for you.
Yeah, well, no, it's not goodbecause no, but he made more not
even making money.
SPEAKER_00 (43:03):
I understand, but it's for the customer.
Yeah, yeah.
Point proven, man.
Oh, gosh.
SPEAKER_01 (43:08):
You're worried about the customer.
Oh then, and that's that's onething I'm finding right now is
that my customers or ourcustomers, or you, or whoever,
are based these projects andbeen these projects based upon
the cost factor they have atthat time.
That's correct.
And I am seeing where the theasset tool needed, customer
(43:31):
can't go up fast enough tooffset that cost.
No, I promise you.
You can't.
And and it and it's and it'sscaring the living shit out of
me.
Yeah, I bet it it is.
No, you're fine.
It's it's it's scaring mebecause uh I'm seeing it with if
what I have when I'm having topay for to replace my inventory,
it's like gas.
When gas goes up and you got andit's a dollar cost, now it's a
(43:52):
dollar twenty-five.
Well, you didn't make any money.
No.
Because you gotta buy 25% morefor the gas.
And politics aside, whateverthey're gonna do, understood,
but it is hurting our industryright now.
Uh once it once it settles andwe can catch up and we know what
the rules we play by.
Oh yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (44:13):
Pay pay it go on, but it's hurting us.
No, I could only imagine.
I mean, uh it it it I didn'teven honestly, of course it's
the parts game, uh tariffs,everything inbound.
So yeah, that's definitelyincreasing uh more and more.
But honestly, it's not justparts like that, it's also the
(44:34):
projects that we're building,man.
The tariffs, like when thisfirst hit the ground, to again,
politics aside, here guys, likewhen they first hit the ground,
we were bidding some work.
We thought, you know, after theelection year, here we go.
All this work's pouring out.
Here it is, March, and thencrickets, dude.
(44:56):
Hey man, did you see that bigold proposal we sent?
Yeah, man, uh busted out.
Hey man, oh yeah, we're gonnawait a year.
Hey, I mean, it was push, push,push.
We're still living the pushgame.
We're in the middle of it.
Now, don't get me wrong, youstill have projects going, etc.,
funding federally, but man, thecommercial world, the multi-flex
(45:17):
space, the multi-family space,anything, you know, cushions on
a dead gum fire sprinkler wentup like four dollars a piece at
one point.
There's hundreds of them.
You know what I mean?
Just the rings that cover thedead gum sprinkler heads, you
know.
It's things like that we don'tnormally think about.
No, but going into a buildingprice and you're sitting there
going, yeah, I've got this miland a half total site package
(45:38):
coming up, yeah, we're ready togo.
And then all of a sudden, heyman, uh, we're gonna wait till
next year.
Oh, okay.
Oh, yeah.
Oh, oh, okay, yeah.
I wasn't totally just planningfor this job over here.
You know what I mean?
Like, and you got a flip, and ifyou're not bidding any more
work, but the tariff game onjust the commercial, then you
start bringing in the interestrate game, as I know you don't
(45:59):
love.
And that was kind of killing,you know, land buying, land
development.
Nobody wants to purchase wheninterest's high.
Uh that's doing its purpose,right?
But we still have jobs to do,right?
SPEAKER_01 (46:11):
You know what I mean?
The interest rate is hurtingdeals too because it costs more
to for them to stock theinventory.
Yeah.
So it's anyway.
I just if if any contractor I'mtalking to now when we're
forecasting to achieve 2026, I'mtelling right now to have a 10
to 15% buffer for unexpectedwhatevers.
Whatever.
(46:31):
That's a big whatevers.
It is.
It is.
Now, at least you're talkingabout it.
At least you're talking aboutit.
Okay, forecast it.
Plan for it.
If you don't need it, great.
But don't get caught up in nextyear in like, holy cow, we blew
through our capital and we'renot enough machines to start
this job.
Yeah.
Or do this job.
Yeah.
Do a figure heavy on rental.
I'm starting to see now some ofthe rental companies, um and
(46:54):
this this happened hererecently.
I had fan rollers on the watercome from Europe.
Okay, home rollers.
Uh, and some of them from Bomactoo.
But the two in particular weresplit drum, vibratory, cab,
heat, and air, specific to a astate contract, and they had to
have it.
Yeah, okay.
Didn't have it in US.
Yeah, we're gonna give it forthree or four months if you deal
(47:15):
with it.
And so we brought it over, anduh they passed a steel tariff of
fish products that weekend, andit increased the the cost of
those machines by 15, 20percent, 15% overnight.
No, no, just it already shipped.
So my and and geez, so I calledhim up, and we we had to pay it
because that was specific, it'sjust like having the Cat 815
(47:38):
compactor for compaction uhtests.
You know, the engineer's notgonna sign off on anything
different.
He knows that's what it's gonnado, and he won't sign off on
nothing else.
That's right.
And so that's what that tool wasfor.
I just one for dealerships.
Um, I don't see how they canincrease the rental rate fast
enough to offset to get thereturn they need to have a
rental fleet, uh to have thatoffship for the contractor to
(48:01):
use.
Uh also uh contractors goinginto next year with a dollar
amount and then get there andwon't be able to write the
check.
Right.
Oh, my lord.
And there's some some companiesdon't have to worry about they
have enough, uh they're strongenough to to weather a storm.
That's countries now.
SPEAKER_00 (48:20):
No, it's already been a storm to this point, you
know what I mean?
Residual from things we justspoke about.
But yeah, I didn't even put twoand two together there, but on
on the whole tariff capacity,inbound, outbound, you guys need
to be absolutely payingattention to that because Wow
Factor.
Yeah, 50% on fashion goods.
(48:41):
God, well fish goods, dude.
$300,000 dozer.
SPEAKER_01 (48:45):
Well, so so they want you to break it down for
where the steel came from.
So, like on the rollers, the theengine is made in England.
Okay.
Okay.
The rollers made assembled inGermany.
Uh the shell, the the roundpart, that the actual is made in
Prague or somewhere.
So every, if it's not part ofthe EU, it uh it's a different
(49:08):
tariff.
If it comes in China, whichthey're not gonna tell me it
comes from China or not to fillin the paperwork.
So we've had to uh basicallyfollow the big boys on how they
report so we can report the sameway.
And that's becoming challenging.
SPEAKER_00 (49:21):
That's insane.
It is.
That is truly insane.
I told you guys we were gonnaget some and we're running out
of inventory.
SPEAKER_01 (49:28):
I am running out, I am running to inventory.
I am running out of inventorybecause people are buying up
stuff.
Everybody's had a 78% priceincrease in the last 30 days.
Yeah.
So and I'm sitting there tomyself, I've already quoted this
guy 100k for this machine or200, whatever it is.
I know for a fact that if you goto dealership, he's gonna pay
(49:50):
50, 30 more.
And I'm trying to fight the urgefor the greed urge of going up.
Yeah, because but um for themost part we're not because it
it'll come back to bite you.
I'll pay you the price, but it'she he's gonna remember that.
Yeah, or she.
And it'll come back to get youlater.
But anyway.
Hate to go off that part, butthat's something they we all had
(50:13):
to pay attention to.
SPEAKER_00 (50:14):
No, I am so glad you did.
I mean, yeah, it's subjectmatter.
We that's the that was the wholepurpose of the show, is the
subject matter.
You know, you, sir, yes, you'reyou're in the blue-collar world.
There's no doubt about it, butyou're definitely most smarter
than most blue-collar ranbusinesses, you know what I
mean?
And you've had the experience.
There was a question on this goahead that that hit me.
(50:36):
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If you're looking to work with amarketing team who does what
they say, does it well, and isalways looking for ways to help
your company grow, book adiscovery call with Ike by going
(51:20):
to bcperformance marketing.combackslash BCB podcast, or click
the link in the show notes slashdescription below.
Thanks, guys.
What takeaways were ablue-collar worker who is sick
of being stuck in the mud?
SPEAKER_01 (51:35):
Well, hit me so hard.
Okay.
Okay, and the reason why isbecause I've been in the
boardrooms where the people uptop were not the smartest.
No at all.
They were there because ofpolitics or for whatever
reasons.
Uh I've been there where mytechnician knew more about the
(51:55):
PL than the people that wereresponsible for it.
The inputs and outputs.
And all I can tell you is thatblue collar doesn't mean nothing
other than what you labelyourself.
And I tell guys all the time,especially on my on the park
side of the equation, you'resmarter than most of the guys
out there because you know howto make it happen.
(52:17):
Doing and thinking of it are twodifferent things.
If you know how to do it, don'tlet anything hold you back.
Because you can do it.
Don't let some manager or somewhoever uh restrict your
possibilities.
And and back to the militaryscenario we used to talk about
that.
As long as you're willing tofight, you can there's no reason
(52:38):
why you cannot get there ablue-collar guy that can
accomplish whatever youaccomplish.
Because um they had the skillset to do it, they just need to
do it.
Man, that's that's because I'm Italk to technicians all the time
uh uh at dealerships.
I talk to parts counter people,I talk to uh the guys in the
field running machines, and allof them are capable of doing
(53:02):
each other responsibility.
You just take the time to trainthem, teach them.
Um, but when I saw that, I'mlike, yes.
unknown (53:09):
Funny.
SPEAKER_01 (53:10):
They need to pull themselves up, let's go.
SPEAKER_00 (53:12):
Dude, I so you stole you stole a final question from
no, don't be.
I I'm glad you're excited.
I have asked that on all 50 plusepisodes to every single person.
And you should, I can't waittill we put a collage.
We put a small collage together,but I I think I ought to put an
episode of just people's answersto that because I've had people
(53:33):
from concrete guys on here tomega finance guys to you know,
gentlemen on a fleet ofequipment, whatever it may be.
And the answers are simpler thanmost, but at the same time,
you're absolutely right.
You just need to do it, you justneed to start.
You just whatever, don't letanybody I can't tell you how
(53:53):
many people told me not to dothis podcast.
I can't tell you how many peopletold me to you're gonna put your
utility work and earth work onYouTube.
I can't tell you how many timesI got told that, but all I knew
was what I knew.
And so I stepped out, starteddoing something a little bit
different, and there's alwaysreward in the value of helping
(54:15):
the guys that I was telling youvery shortly about, you know,
the the the folks that havereached out.
I can't thank enough to youguys, man, that have reached out
about the marriage podcast thatme and Sarah did.
And we we didn't talk abouthardly anything business.
It was more just our personallevel.
(54:35):
But the direct messages andemails that I received from you
guys, I can't thank you enough.
But that's the reason I'm doingthe show.
That's the reason I keep showingup every week and getting to
meet wonderful, you know, folkslike yourself.
They get to learn a little bitmore insight.
But there needs to be moreresources for that blue-collar
(54:56):
guy that wants to achieve, wantsto get out of the mud, wants to
go do something else.
He needs to be able to go find aresource that he can use, plug
in, let's get better as he'ssitting there doing his work for
the day.
But no, I ask every singleperson on the show, so I'm glad
you're excited about that.
SPEAKER_01 (55:12):
Because that was the one that stuck me the most.
Because I get um when I startedLighthouse, they said you you
know you're crazy.
Why are you bucking the system?
I'm not bugging the system, it'sjust broke.
Amen, bro.
And and people like, well, whydo you share on how you do
stuff?
I'm like, if I share people howthey do stuff, they still have
to do it every day.
(55:32):
They had to do it every day, andthat's the reason why blue
calls, blue call, because theycan do it every day.
That's right.
And and and just don't letanybody set you back, man.
Just just it and the podcastdeal, and you're showing your
job site.
Uh, I had another customer thatdidn't want me to video uh his
his job site.
Uh it was a rock wheel.
We had a rock wheel.
(55:53):
Oh, dude, I want them.
It was killed, it was sobeautiful.
That machine was awesome.
Anyway, that's a differentstory.
Okay.
All right.
Um, it was in Famous in SouthCarolina on that job.
Anyway, all right.
Um we were on the job side.
He wanted to video a quick.
I'm like, why?
He said, because people learnyour learn what we do on the job
side.
I said, they have to do it.
Everybody knows what needs to bedone.
(56:14):
Everybody thinks they know orthey know, but the execution
part is it's the reason whyyou're in business and why
somebody else is not.
That's right.
And then that's that's thereason why I say when I say blue
collar, I look at people thatcan execute.
That's right.
SPEAKER_00 (56:29):
We are.
We build America up and and therest of the globe.
No, Mr.
Sam, I can't tell you how much Iappreciate your time today uh
for joining us on anotherwonderful episode here.
You guys can check all episodesout at www.blue collar
businesspodcast.com.
Um let us know uh on the recwhat is it?
(56:50):
Form submission.
I apologize.
The submission form, there'ssomebody you know needs to be on
the show or a product andservice that you'd like me to
highlight here on the show.
Get with us over there.
Uh, if you're on a podcast,streaming platform or service,
give us a following rating.
It helps the show more than youknow.
I hope you guys got so muchinsight.
I learned a few things sittinghere, and that's the coolest
(57:10):
thing about doing this is I getto sit here and learn while
these guys get to sit here andlearn.
And it's only making better guyslike shout out to Adam Swain in
Colorado and you and your bunchout there and Peyton Hill out in
Jonesboro.
Like I can think of 10 or 15guys that are avid listeners of
the show that we help, you know.
Yeah.
They're gonna they're gonnaprobably be calling, hey Mr.
(57:33):
Sam, uh, what was this megaripper you're talking about?
I got a mountain to move overhere now.
SPEAKER_01 (57:37):
So, or just call me with any issue, any problem, and
we'll try and find a solution.
And and and you don't have tobuy it for me to do it.
That's right.
Because if uh I get big kickout, I get a customer, he always
calls me up and says, Say, Ineed this machine, go find it.
60 cents of the time, he's notgonna buy it.
But I do the exercise, but everytime that somebody asks me to
(57:58):
find a solution, I learnsomething and I can use it to
somebody in.
That's right.
Every single time.
SPEAKER_00 (58:04):
It's valuable.
You're inspiring.
I appreciate you for um willingto be a pioneer.
I love spotlighting pioneers inour industry going against the
grain that that go, no, I'mtired of this.
Oh, well, that's how it's alwaysbeen industry.
And we're gonna that's not toome and you both, my guy.
(58:28):
Oh, yeah.
But um seriously, thank you forstepping outside your comfort
zone.
And guys, go see Sam and histeam.
Uh LHM partsusa.com.
Check them out, lighthousemachinery and all socials.
And follow Mr.
Mr.
Light on the Lighthouse on, I'msorry, Mr.
Light on LinkedIn.
He's he's a pleasure to watch,and you get to see things like
(58:49):
mega rippers ripping up thewonderful countryside.
Guys, till next time, y'all besafe.
If you've enjoyed this episode,be sure to give it a like, share
it with the fellas, check outour website to send us any
questions and comments aboutyour experience in the blue car
business.
Who do you want to hear from?
Send them our way, and we'll doour best to answer any questions
(59:11):
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, Ty Kirby, and Iwant to help you what it took
me, trial and error, and a wholelot of money to learn.
The information that no one inthis industry is willing to
share.
Whether you're under that shadetree or have your hard hat on,
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instead of getting work done?
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You're ready to win.
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(00:51):
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The success of pros on Thumbtacksays it all.
Want to grow smarter?
Visit thumbtack.com backslashpro today to book your
one-on-one strategy session.
Big shout out to ThumbTaq forjoining forces with us.
As you guys know, we have beenum looking for blue-collar
(01:15):
product and services, and onethat I am very uh learning more
and more about every day.
I I was just on the phone withthem yesterday.
I've been an avid customer sincethey've been in our area.
Well, since I've known aboutthem.
Uh the gentleman here has moreinsight and knowledge than I
think we're gonna have time toshare about the used equipment
(01:35):
market, the new equipmentmarket, the dealership network,
buckets, attachments, everythingyou guys want to know inside and
out about kind of where theindustry is.
Um, this gentleman has insighton, and uh he is a U.S.
Army veteran with nearly 10years of service.
Thank you for your service, sir.
Um, but this gentleman has 25plus years in heavy equipment,
(02:00):
construction industries as awhole, but mainly based around
the equipment side, salesservice, etc.
Uh, none other than Mr.
Sam Light, owner of LighthouseMachinery.
Thank you for joining me, sir.
Thank you for having me.
Yeah, this is freaking awesome.
Sam Sherity is definitelystepping out of its comfort
zone, and I really, reallyappreciate you because there is
(02:21):
so many guys that are gonnawatch this, and ladies, I
shouldn't discount you guys,maybe sharing it to their
husband.
Hey, look, here's some insighton a on a topic we were just
talking about going into thisnew machine, etc.
So um there's so much to betalked about in the equipment
side of things, but um, as justas our previous guest guys, if
(02:44):
you guys want to go watch that,www.blue
collarbusinesspodcast.com or anyof your streaming podcast
platforms, uh, Mr.
Alex Kraft, shout out there.
But uh this aligns right uh Ilove how it's back to back weeks
because we're gonna be on thesame topic as where I was going
with that.
And in the heavy equipmentspace, excavation space.
(03:05):
Literally, this gentleman hassome cranes, all different sorts
of types of stuff.
Um I follow him on LinkedIn anduh check them out at
lhmpartsusa.com and lighthousemachinery.
So, Sam.
Thank you, sir.
Give us there, give us a littlebackground where Lighthouse came
from.
I know with 25 plus years ofexperience, you have probably
(03:28):
seen it all, the mistakes, wherethe industry was heading, where
the industry worked before, butum I probably made most of the
mistakes.
Me and you both.
That's why I have this show, andthat's why I try to share with
the audience to hopefully notend up like me, you know.
SPEAKER_01 (03:43):
But talk about why lighthouses, who they are, and
where you're going with so togive a backstory to it, um ran
dealerships, uh a dealership andsales team in Arkansas for a
long time, uh, 14 plus years,and then went and uh ran some
dealerships uh in the Carolinasfor eight years.
(04:04):
Anyway, I just um working thedealership side and the changes
from 98 to 99 to now is insanedifferently.
So um my last company was acorporation, um was corporate
ran, corporate owned.
He was an investment companythat owned it, and um um just
(04:25):
not what I wanted to continuedoing morally that too it just
um I'm I don't work for the themarket um the shareholders
understood, sir?
I don't work for shareholders.
I work for the customers and formy employees.
And that and anyway, uh but no,I learned a lot, and then um um
(04:47):
I was we were looking for areason to come back home because
um and um so we've we decidedthat hey, we're gonna move back
to Arkansas.
We're gonna move when DollinPlace lived in Aristotle's in
the north of the world.
SPEAKER_00 (04:59):
That's right, that's right.
Hillbilly country.
SPEAKER_01 (05:02):
My wife's rewarded and I'm gonna like settling.
We didn't anyway.
So during the 25 years, uhnotice the transition of the
dealership and OEM network.
Um your old people, not say oldpeople, your experienced people
that knew the parts, knew theequipment are leaving.
And um the new guys are comingin, don't know nothing at all.
(05:23):
And so in the training side ofit, a lot of the dealerships are
departmentalizing, firstimparts, the imparts, friend
service.
There's no cross-training,there's no share of information
of why you need these seals forthe engine, why you need this
parts for this this part of theuh the equation of the machine.
None of that was being taught.
And so uh also um during COVID,there was a striction of the
(05:46):
supply chain.
And that showed, boy, was thereit showed where all the all the
uh shortcomings are through thewhole system, not not pointing
figures to anybody, but theentire system was screwed up.
The industry is all in ashithole.
(06:13):
So we started Lighthouse, um,one to uh sell equipment.
Uh if you deal with RichieBrothers or uh let's say anybody
in particular, um they havetheir their tooling, they they
they're good at some things, butuh the charges are expensive.
Yep, 10-15%.
And usually the guy doesn't knowwhat they're talking about,
(06:35):
usually.
Usually some of them are notsome are very not.
That's right.
And so um, and COVID hit and hadthese OEM guys said, Sam, come
help us liquidate assets.
Okay.
And so that's right when the uhoil fields went to crap.
And so uh went out there, oh, itwas awful, man.
It was it was excavator stackedup like hardwood across the
(06:58):
field of machines with no marketto go.
Also, due to contractualrestraints between dealerships,
it was hard for them to movethat stuff.
And so we went in there and cameup with a plan to move that
inventory.
That's what it startedlighthouse.
I had a contractor in in SouthCarolina, love that man to deaf,
Clary Hood.
My left lender, he said, What doyou want to do?
I'm gonna start something.
I don't know what it is.
He said, Well, how much youneed?
(07:19):
I said, I'm gonna need this.
He said, Go see her, she got acheckpoint.
Go like out of nowhere.
Why?
And then I said I got on theroad and I went and saw
customers that I had arelationship through the years.
One with Grant Garrett.
Yep.
Drove here.
So Grant didn't talk to you.
We'll start this business.
I don't know what it is, butit's gonna be something.
(07:40):
Can you help me?
Yes.
Ronnie George with GrantMountain, uh, with McGeorge
contracting.
I um I can go through the wholelist of people throughout the
country, Rogers Group, Marvinwalked in, said, guys, we're
gonna make something, and uhwe're hoping to be a resource.
So we started looking at assets,and that's where the cranes and
we sold some stuff from the appholts, uh, just stuff that no
(08:05):
one really knew about and didn'tspend time focused on it.
That's right.
Okay.
So eliminated the assets onequipment, and then during that
process, well, one of my oldproduct support guys, Marty,
says, Sam, you need to start theparts business.
Marty, no.
And Teddy's like, no.
He said, No, start the partbusiness.
(08:25):
And he came on board after aboutfour months of wearing me out,
and he sold$150,000 in parts inthe first month.
My just on his phone callingcustomers.
Well, what Marty had was aknowledge of 30, 40 years, and
people can call him and give itto him and walk away.
And he'll handle it.
(08:46):
He just walk away.
And I said, Marty, holy cow,Batman.
I said, uh we gotta replicatethis.
He said, I've been telling you,you gotta do it.
He still rose in my face.
And so then we brought on BradPruitt because he's somebody
that has the knowledge on partsI didn't have.
And so we brought on Brad, andBrad is welcome knowledge.
(09:06):
And then we started lookingaround for people.
And how do you take somebodythat's in our industry is less
than one percent of thepopulation?
Our our inner w less than onepercent.
It's insane.
How do you train them?
How do you bring them in and andteach them what we need them to
learn to be successful?
SPEAKER_00 (09:26):
Really quickly, I have in the last six months
started an internal trainingprogram uh with video and video
capturing everything.
But no, I'm with you.
It's very hard.
It's just it's strategy that youhave to find.
Like I try and get a guy thatknows what a grade stick is
anymore.
(09:46):
You know what I mean?
You have to be adaptable intraining.
But that's that's been kind ofour number one thing was hiring
the right people.
Sounds like you know exactlywhat you're looking for, but
training somebody new is oh,it's the most expensive thing we
go through as business owners.
SPEAKER_01 (10:04):
And we go through so many people to get to that one
person.
That's right.
And we have right now we havesome amazing people.
I mean, yeah, you do, man.
Devin, Jordan, Katie, um, Brad,Marty, uh, Dustin.
We got three people, we gotpeople up now in New York and
and North Carolina and Floridathat are coming on board.
Um I want to see more of that besuccessful.
(10:28):
Um, but anyway, so back to theyou're fine, back to the parts
side of the equation.
Uh when we started doing parts,uh the COVID hit, and some of
the OEMs came to us and said,Hey, we need parts.
We can't get GET.
I need we need you to figurethis out.
And so we started bringingcontainers and container loads
of of GET from all over theplace to fill in the short, the
(10:50):
sh the short uh supply here.
And uh, and we were the ourbiggest customer was dealers.
It's still today, our biggestcustomers for parts is dealers,
hands down.
60 to 70 percent of our partsbusiness is sold to dealers.
Wow.
That's staggering, actually.
SPEAKER_00 (11:12):
Wow, that's awesome for you.
SPEAKER_01 (11:14):
Well, you're gonna get you don't get better.
The easy button for you.
See when you walk into adealership for the most part,
you got phones ringing, somebodyin the shop needs something.
That's right.
And just all this stuff goingchaotic.
So um, are these your glasses?
Yes, sir.
I'm so sorry.
I thought that was remote.
(11:34):
No, sorry to take you offtraffic.
And then um, and so uh customercalls in and wants an
aftermarket solution or a usesolution, and the guys don't
have the experience.
So they just call us and wewe'll provide options for them.
Um sometimes we can make moneyoff of it, sometimes we can't.
We just we do what we can do forthat side of it, and and that's
where we're headed to.
(11:55):
So um every dealership is in myopinion, um have a struggle with
the parts, whether it beself-inflicted or OEM
inflicting.
And uh, and our job is to helpmitigate that risk and that that
that issue.
And so far it's been it's beenvery profitable for us.
SPEAKER_00 (12:15):
That's amazing because like you said, man,
you're concentrated on thecustomer.
I'm a customer.
I can tell you for a fact theyare 100% concentrated.
I haven't bought a machine, butum buckets and the inventory
that did you automaticallystart.
I mean, you guys have a massive.
(12:35):
So our inventory runs.
How did that start working?
SPEAKER_01 (12:38):
So the inventory, we started out with nothing.
Yeah, I mean, of course.
And our po bore we were workingin our pro board at my house.
Okay, and that was it was it wasit was definitely unique.
It worked.
Um, it worked.
We got out of there because wehad these containers coming and
we ended up buying thewarehouse, and and we're ex
we're we're busting that we needa bigger spot.
(13:00):
But right now, we're just youknow the growth.
Business, the businessstruggles, Bob.
So uh the thing is though, uh,how do we maximize inventory and
offering to our customerswithout the huge investment?
Okay.
So what we've done was uh oncewe prove ourselves to our
suppliers and to our neuralnetwork that we're actually
resource for you, not a neatcompetition.
(13:21):
That's right, we're here to helpyou and the end user to keep up
running, whether it be yourrental fleet, because we're a uh
equipment share certifiedsupplier.
Really?
They can call anywhere in thecountry, they'll call us one
stuff.
And so uh we're there's severalcompanies that we do that with.
(13:42):
Um anyway, so they'll um the westarted creating a database of
suppliers and what they're goodat.
Now, not all suppliers supplyall good parts.
No, I agreed.
There's joke, yeah, okay.
Yeah, yeah.
And we've we've had we'velearned the hard way uh we've
(14:02):
experienced you know, that wethought was from a credible
vendor and it wasn't, but youdid it because you took care of
your customer.
You had to.
And so during that process oflearning, um, we create a
database where people, endusers, the dealer can go into
our website and put an apartmentnumber that pulls up what's
(14:24):
available in the continental US.
Wow.
Okay.
Now we're trying to stay focusedin the US, but uh, we're coming
to find out we're having to shipa lot of stuff out of Europe
right now, especially on um onroad products, we're having to
bring stuff in.
Um but um but mainly being inthe United States.
And anytime that we see um anissue, like for instance, we'll
(14:46):
have a run of five or six uhsame parts being asked for from
different parts of the country,then we'll all automatically go
out there and start searchingwhere is that where's that
pocket inventory that can feedthe needs of everybody else?
And uh and what a model, man.
No, once that once we find outwhere the honey hose are, this
sells in two weeks.
Right.
(15:06):
Until the OEM can catch up.
SPEAKER_00 (15:08):
Well, on the That's insane.
The inventory side of things Iwanted to really highlight on,
guys, is that man, I just boughta bucket from you guys for our
Kamatsu 360.
We were kind of talking abouthow unique of a size I was
looking more for a 36-inchbucket.
I would have actually liked it alittle smaller, and you ended up
(15:29):
having on the yard a 30-inch uhinstruct bucket with some going
through some major rock in thatarea.
It's kind of shallowed up now.
But either way, man, same day,Jordan's standing out there
going, hey dude, I think thisbucket will work.
This one here, let me measurethis.
Let me and dude, just the way hecommunicates with his customer.
(15:51):
Um, you don't get that kind oflevel of service.
And he he cared.
He cared about the crew sittingthere waiting for the bucket,
you know.
But he had it on the yard.
Next day it's on the machinedigging.
Now, granted, we're right here.
That makes that that's a loteasier, but there's there's guys
all across the country, and Iknow you'll ship to them.
Well, yeah, we should we shippedtwo rippers to Hawaii last week.
SPEAKER_01 (16:13):
Did you the little rippers go?
It went on the uh John Deere470, and we shipped um, yeah, it
the freight was like four grandto get that ripper there, but
they bought the ripper and threesets of teeth in Alaska.
From now until the end of theyear, we'll ship tons of stuff
(16:33):
to Alaska.
Really?
You can chip in Portland, get ona boat, and go up.
Oh, we'll um getting ready forwinter, everything's getting
down timed.
Uh frost rippers, we sell a tonof frost rippers up in that area
and up and uh also all along theCanada Canadian border.
Hey, shout out to my Kanuckies.
But that um but we haven't instock, right?
(16:54):
Um we don't have everything instock, we never will have
everything in stock but uh andwe'll do as much as our capital
allow us to do.
But but the resource is isknowing where things are in the
country.
If you know that, the otherthing that that I'm trying to
teach my guys, and they're greatguys.
I'm the team is is slowly comingtogether, but they're great, is
(17:17):
ask the customer what the assetis.
If it's a$10,000 machine, do weneed a new part?
Do we need a reman part?
Come on.
Are you planning on using it fora season?
Are you planning on fixing itand send it to auction?
What is the game plan on over toassets so that we can search the
best product?
Right.
And most depending on the sizeof the company, your size
(17:40):
company, you know what you needand know what the options are.
Normally, normally, but a beercompany, they have a personal
agent, asset manager, and um,they're not thinking about all
that.
And also they're not thinking toask that from a dealership.
They're just going to use newparts.
SPEAKER_00 (17:56):
Well, that's literally where I'm going next
is let's talk about thedealerships.
And uh literally, you hit it onthe head when we were just
pre-talking here before the showand and the struggles that you
saw within the dealershipnetwork, not only for the
dealership, but mainly for thecustomer and what they were
(18:18):
dealing with from all levels,from sales to service.
And um the biggest thing Ipicked up from last week's show
with Alex was that there's noincentive for the dealers to get
any better because there's notgoing to be another cat dealer
moving in on Riggs territory orHolt's territory or Fabric's
(18:40):
territory.
There's just not.
They know they're the onlyperson.
And I know I'm opening it to meup, man.
I'm telling you.
I'm telling you, I figured Iwould I would catch a bone or
two.
But it is it's so true.
And thank God for companies likeyourself that go, hey, we have
got to fix this industry.
This is crap.
(19:00):
The customers are getting hosedon, and it and literally that
the software that it takescoming out and the mileage trips
and hey, uh, and the untrainedtechnicians that they're sending
out there$200 an hour to changea filter that you couldn't even
diag over the phone, and youtold me it was an injector and
it was all this crap, and youscared me, and now I got to pay
(19:22):
$2,800 for you coming out andchanging a filter or whatever
the case may be.
Yes.
But you there has to be otheroptions and not just to hear
that dealers are coming to youand going and your team and
going, hey man, this guy's got auh larger excavator with 9,000
hours on it, the new part.
Oh, it's gonna take like eightweeks to order.
(19:44):
Do you have anything?
Reman, is there anything that wecould, you know, at least offer
the gentleman outside of new?
Because I promise you, andnormally I run a newer fleet.
That's besides the point.
But if I'm going in an olderpaid-off excavator, say a pit
machine, I'm not gonna probablynecessarily slap a brand new
whatever it is.
If it's a uh critical part, ofcourse you're gonna go back new,
(20:07):
OEM, whatever to get thelongevity out of the machine,
but sprock it or et cetera, youknow what I mean?
SPEAKER_01 (20:12):
So it you and I'll tell you a quick story.
Please do.
We were talking about you know,used parts and stuff like this
and and older machines.
We were in Austin at aconference, um uh uh equipment
management conference, and I wassitting there at the table, and
the guy sitting beside me wastalking about how he couldn't
get parts to finish rebuilds oncat machines, and that cat could
(20:35):
not let him buy parts outsidethe dealer network or the supply
chain network.
So they're getting bombardedwith fines and fees because
they're they had to rebuildthese machines at the refills
sale to get them out.
And there is a in theircontract, they get they had to
pay for a real machine, pay forthis, pay for that.
And we were sitting theretalking, and in every part that
he uh we're discussing, I calledup Marty and called up Brad.
(20:57):
I said, What about these parts?
What about what about theseparts?
And they said, Sam, yeah, I knowwe got them right here.
They're Cat OEM.
We can get them.
So, but they wouldn't allow themto buy it through without their
contracts.
And that goes back to the dealnetwork.
Uh the deal networks uh isdifferent than a car dealership.
Oh, yeah.
They're restricted.
(21:17):
Okay.
They can only sell in theirtrade area.
If you sell outside trade area,then there's a penalty.
And then the gentleman'sagreement between dealerships.
I'm gonna poach on you or poachon me.
Right.
And I can tell you a lot ofdealership meetings, that was
the struggle and the fight.
It's like you sold this customerin my territory, now you gotta
pay me.
Well, that creates borders.
Yeah.
Also, they don't want to worktogether.
(21:40):
Some of them don't, some of themdo.
And that and so that sharingparts inventory to help each
other out.
They try to do it throughdifferent OEMs, had different
programs, and it didn't work tothe full effect it needs to
work.
And uh customer suffers becausewhere you're gonna go.
Are you gonna drive all the wayto Oklahoma City to get it, want
something from one cat whereriggs on that?
(22:00):
No.
SPEAKER_00 (22:01):
You're not gonna tell them to pick up the phone
and call Jordan and light out.
SPEAKER_01 (22:05):
Exactly.
Okay, and guess what?
We have access to a system thattells us where the cat part is
and reach out and get it.
Wow.
And that and that's what that'swhat kills me.
Take care of the customer.
Will you make less money if youwere outside your outside your
dealership?
Yeah, you're probably gonna letmake less money.
Okay.
Uh, but do it and get thecustomer up and going.
(22:26):
And then uh, and some of theprograms penalizes the dealers
from doing that.
Anyway, that has createdopportunity for Lighthouse to
create something that doesn'texist.
Yeah.
And that is, and you think aboutit, the old school guys, um,
like from Heavy Quip or from theother, they're closing up.
Yeah, their knowledge is gone.
(22:47):
Or they're getting bought out byinvestment companies.
And here we go again.
It's about the dollar versus thecustomer.
Going back to that corporateledge, I mean, I'm not
interested in that.
So the the part side of theequation is for us one, to to
breach break barriers and supplythe customer with option the
(23:09):
best option we can do.
And that's what we want toaccomplish.
SPEAKER_00 (23:13):
Literally.
And um the dealerships, man, thesoftware.
I know you have I know I figuredthat would be a next uh pretty
good proprietary software topic.
Oh my god.
SPEAKER_01 (23:26):
If you require me to pay you to come out to my
machine to diagnose it, you arenot gonna charge me.
That is captured audience, thatis called trade restriction,
that is holding me hostage.
And I wish that we, as anindustry, I'm talking about
contractors, go to ourlegislative and and tell them
(23:47):
create a law to where I'm notheld hostage to this.
Uh-huh.
And that's a great idea.
They can do that.
We can do that.
And there's been discussionsabout it.
And the OEMs, I'm not saying allof them, but they're having
discussions on how to combatthat or how to help that.
I've had I've been inconversations with in with OEMs,
and they're like, okay, we needto start facilitating this.
(24:10):
And then the dealers go, well,that means we lose revenue.
And we can't charge you$2,000for a service call every time to
go look at something and tellyou that it was a filter.
Yep.
Well, if I had access to monitormy own machine and to dynox with
my own machine, let's do that.
There was a company that we metum last no, it was the beginning
(24:31):
of this year, and they have anAI, all they're going to AI all
of the service manuals where youcan talk to the phone and put in
what your symptoms are, and itscans the service manuals and
put out which they check.
That's like if that's completed,how much money would that save a
contractor on service costs?
(24:52):
Yep.
On BS service costs.
Now, if it's something major,yes.
And I want my dealers to makemoney.
I want them successful.
I want to them to make money andbe able to take care of me when
I need them.
That's right.
But not hold me hostage.
SPEAKER_00 (25:07):
And that's killing us.
I can only imagine, man.
I mean, contractors as a whole,I am a little bit different.
Um, I basically pay them toservice my machine through the
entire warranty.
And I already know that I'mgonna have to do one hose.
You go out there, hey, I needthis hose.
Well, it's a it's a sealedsystem.
(25:27):
You're gonna have to have uscome out and reprogram that
sensor to read this line, thatline.
Like, what?
So I should have just had youguys to come out to begin with.
And, you know, earlier in theyears of Sycon, I didn't know
what I was doing when I wasbuying equipment, just buying
equipment.
Oh, the cheapest price possible.
I didn't know you could putservice packages in.
I didn't know you could putmileage in it, that you didn't
(25:49):
see a bill on your incrementalhours, and that they're
servicing the machine.
So when you go to resell it, Ididn't know any of this existed.
And so thank God I did beforeall this software.
It seems like in the last five,seven years for sure, the
software has become a completeissue, especially for farms,
farmers, them guys.
(26:10):
I feel so bad for those guysthat have shops.
They have learnt the knowledgewe were talking about.
Those guys are fading out, youknow, but they know the
knowledge how to work on thesetractors, and uh, but they can't
because they need something togo beep, beep.
Right.
Click okay, yes, sir, recharge,regen, whatever it may be.
But it's just so epic.
SPEAKER_01 (26:29):
The komatsu service program, they it's a really
great program.
Dude, I love it.
Yeah, as a matter of fact, um,I'm building a rental fleet now.
Um, and and I'm gonna do thebest I can to have power as my
serving service and do komatsumachines because of the komatsu
care.
Um I'm not plugging in at all.
(26:49):
Oh, it's fine.
No, I'm just Kamatsu where youat.
But uh, but uh Komatsu care andall that look, I've got a long
frontal reach on I got a longreach on on Red right now.
In South Carolina, I'm launtinghere and Lender uh is is doing
doing the service work for megoing out there.
So there that model's doinggood.
Now, is all dealers great?
(27:11):
No.
No.
But um, but if I had my choicefor the market area I'm in,
agreed.
Power is my company.
Uh South Carolina Lender is mycompany.
Yeah.
So um that's how we use forthat.
SPEAKER_00 (27:22):
But that gives a little reassurance and
affirmation that I'm not crazy,that I did pick the right dealer
back then, you know.
But back to pop back to power,though.
SPEAKER_01 (27:30):
Scott got a good team.
Yeah, he does.
Scott's a good team, solid.
Yeah.
Uh there's I was telling tellingum oh, what's his name?
The president of power, Tim DMoon.
Oh, okay.
Yeah, yeah.
That's talking to Andy, I waslike, Andy, you have a great
team.
It was in springtime.
I'm really happy to be part ofthat.
But anyway, back to service.
(27:51):
If if one,$200 an hour isridiculous for what we're
getting.
Untrained, untrained, yeah,multiple trips, yeah, because
the guy couldn't figure it out,downtime, and there's no one to
hold him accountable.
We're held hostage.
And so I'm starting to see moreand more technicians leave the
dealer network and start theirown companies.
(28:13):
And I'm starting to see a trendline on our revenue to those
independent uh contractors,service guys.
There's a company in uhCharleston that have six
technicians, that's all they dois independent.
I know a ton of service guys inthe Atlanta market that went out
and bought their own servicetruck and they're doing their
(28:34):
own deal.
And they're charging 120 to 140bucks an hour version with a
dealer charging 200.
SPEAKER_02 (28:40):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_01 (28:40):
Now, sometimes I question, well, their knowledge,
so when you start working for adealer, your knowledge hits a
wall to where you're not gettingthat training.
So eventually those machineswill fade out.
And whether where's the theknowledge side of it where they
can gain knowledge on the newerproducts?
So eventually, there has beenOEMs that have discussed using a
(29:02):
Tesla model as a celldistribution and setting up
service facilities to servicemachines through certified
technicians that are not part ofthe dealer network.
That has been discussed by a lotof people.
Well, yeah.
And the OEM will allow to keepthe margins of the retail for
themselves.
It's it's there's we can go downthat rabbit hole.
(29:25):
But there has to be discusseddiscussion looking at it, and
and to the point to where theyhave looked at what would cost
about contracts of dealerships,what would it cost versus what
they would gain, how longeverything else.
If that happens, then they wouldhave to create a um training
program for the independenttechnician to work on that
product, be skamatsu certifiedor deer certified or cat
(29:47):
certified, Sandy certified, orwhatever the case may be.
Um so I'm looking one, if we canlimit what we get in charge in
the field for BS service callsor Restricted uh access and have
some way to for them to trainour people.
SPEAKER_00 (30:06):
That's right.
SPEAKER_01 (30:08):
Okay.
And that person could be anindependent service contractor.
That's only 1099 with us.
Okay.
Train those guys until that wecan be more profitable.
And and that has to come aheadsometime or another.
It has to.
SPEAKER_00 (30:21):
The grid.
I think the you know, sittinghere on this side of the table,
I mess with Chat GPT and Grokand a couple other AIs, uh,
probably a little far too much,but I'm trying to obtain that
knowledge as quick as I canbecause I'm not a techie guy,
but you know, I never eventhought about taking a I'm gonna
try it now, is taking a usermanual uh from one of my
(30:43):
machines and spinning it in aChat GPT and ask the questions.
Yeah, I'm gonna ask somequestions and see if that works,
but because I I believe that'swhat they're they're doing as
well, whoever whatever dealerthat was, was basically dropping
it into an open AI languagelearning model and and basically
but think about the gentlemanthat is 70 years old who you
(31:06):
know is finally buying that lastpiece of equipment and he won't
and and can be able to just go,Hey, why is my you know exactly
it's gonna be impressive for youknow, or the young guys that
always have their phone in theirhand and can't get it out of
their hand and they're glued toit.
Hey, why why is this machinewrong?
So they can maybe, you know, notfix it, they're operators, but
(31:27):
at least when they pick up thephone and call boss, they can
go, hey boss, uh I changed fuelfilters out.
We had an extra pair there inthe trailer, but uh man, this
thing is acting funny.
I checked the code online andjust give me a little bit of
information so I can go out tothe dealer network or whatever
it may be and uh independentguy, and actually, I'm not if I
(31:48):
could fix it myself, I would.
If I'm calling somebody, most ofthe time I don't know what I'm
talking about.
So the more information I canget from them as fast as I can,
and the more information yougive the dealership, too.
SPEAKER_01 (31:56):
There you go.
You get because on the when Iwas working for the dealership
side, I had a customer callingme up and him complaining about
the service work.
And he comes in livid and umupset and and I understand.
I I feel you're paying five butthe heel.
But um, but then I go back to myservice department, and I'm and
(32:17):
I try to keep from doing it, butmy frustration, aggravation,
what I felt from him is startingto come out in my service
department, and I'm and I'm I'mtrying not to be that way.
But uh and say, Do you need totake care of my customer?
We come to find out thecommunication between him and
somebody else within the companyat his at their and um and all
the facts went there, so he waspiecing it together.
(32:38):
Uh but if we had a tool thatwould help our people in the
field uh get some kind of dataor get some chain of filters or
disc code popping up, somethingto help them uh the feed it back
to the dealership immediately bea lot faster and quicker.
SPEAKER_00 (32:54):
You know, there's a this may blow some of you guys'
minds that I own Kamadsuequipment, but uh a gentleman
shared there's one dealer out inSouth Carolina, actually, as
funny as that is, and I thinkit's North South Carolina or
North Carolina, but they have asearch bar that you can take
your code from your Komodsumachine and stick it in there
and at least give you some idea.
(33:15):
It it's um Carl sent it to meanyhow in an email, and I
checked it.
We had uh some codes thrown onour 360, and I got it halfway
dyaged where I could call myheavy guy and go, hey man, I
think this has something to dowith either this or this.
Oh, well, you probably ain'tchanged this out yet or done
(33:36):
this, have you?
And I'm like, oh no.
You want to come out and look atthat?
He's like, Yeah, yeah, I'll bethere and come out, you know.
But we do.
We have to have from the dealerside and from the customer side,
because I have been thatgentleman, I have 100% um gone
in hotheaded into situations notbeing trusted and verified in my
information before I movedforward.
(33:58):
Made an ass of myself sometimes,you know.
And but at the same time, thatdealer should be able to kind of
go, hey, I'm not gettingeverything I need for in order
for me to do my job.
Can I have this or somebody thathas that information, you know?
And it goes back to trainpeople.
Right.
And um, but my I can't tell youhow many times I get a I get a
(34:20):
call from a guy in the field,hey, this is so this is broke.
You want me to call over anddeal with that?
Well, my automatic answer isgonna be sure.
Yeah, I dude, I'm at it.
I'm dealing with this and this.
And by the time it comes backaround to me, hey, Sam called me
for this part, or my Sam, youknow, for this part and this
part, and it I think he reallyneeds this.
(34:43):
Can you like take some time andverify this?
But no, I agree.
I think you know, things likeback to Komatsu, my komatsu,
their their app, that's probablyhow you're watching your your
dredger.
Exactly.
And so, not to plug them anymore than they need, but I love
my komatsu app that I can seethe fuel burn rate.
(35:04):
How much idle time are thosemachines sitting out there?
Are we can we actually bill whenI go to send a bill?
Is the customer going to beupset because you know we we
didn't do eight hours worth of,we did three on a check is my
komatsu and go, oh yeah, mycustomer's right.
We only did three hours worth ofwork, you know, it hasn't
happened, but right that's theverification that I want as a
customer that's spendinghundreds, not millions, of
(35:27):
dollars on on these pieces ofequipment that I want to
hopefully last longer than thepayment.
SPEAKER_01 (35:35):
You know what I mean?
I know exactly what you mean.
Because this uh equipment is notgoing to get any cheaper.
And um we man uh this year Ithink we're up to$35 million in
equipment sales.
Let's go.
But in that same breath, I gotcustomers to buy them and and
(35:57):
they buy them, and I'm verygrateful for that.
And but I'm always scared.
Um not always scared, I try todo the research, but I try to uh
if the machine goes down, itbreaks down.
Yeah, and uh and back to what itcosts and stuff, every time we
do use machines, I do evaluationand try to get the programs that
that the OEM is offering.
So if if uh deer, cat, whoeveris offering 0% for 48, 36,
(36:21):
whatever, I I gotta take thatconsideration and then I look at
the use machine and say, doesthis machine has appreciated
enough to offset that?
Well, how can we expect thatcost expense uh expenditure?
And then also the warranty sideof the equation, does the
machine have a warranty on itthat offset the risk factor over
here?
And and then I look at the hourutilization of what the customer
(36:44):
is and pencil it out, okay, ifwe did finance this machine,
what would be the depreciationcost or be worth at the end of
the note?
Okay, we don't want to get tothe note and he paid off the
machine wore out, or everysingle business model different.
And so my main customers that Ideal with, I pretty much know
what their accounting structureis and how they will depreciate
(37:07):
out stuff.
So I'll put the asset togetherand propose these methods of
purchase, whether it be a rentalpurchase or uh financing or cash
or whatever.
And then uh then also theirbuying habits.
So a lot of my public tradingcompanies do not buy anything
until January.
So like there's some bigprojects that are coming up that
(37:28):
they don't have the capital tobuy the machine, it's not
approving the budget.
They get the money, it's not andit's just not something they
have the approval for fromcorporate level.
And we'll go out there and buythe asset and rent it to them.
And we then at any given timewe'll have five to six million
like that now out just fillingthat need because they need it
(37:48):
now.
They need it now, yep.
And the in that market may nothave it there, okay, because the
market's different all over thecountry.
And um and we'll get the assetand put it on rent to them um if
we have a plan in place.
SPEAKER_00 (38:02):
You bet, of course.
Yeah, no, but it's it soundstime and time and time again,
and I'm I'm very excited forthis story to be shared.
But I mean, seriously, you'vesat here for the past you know
45 minutes, hour, and talkedabout how you have found
problems, and here's thesolution.
Here's the problem, and here'sthe solution.
And the if you guys don't followLighthouse Machinery on
(38:25):
LinkedIn, I'll give you ashameless plug there because um
watching that ripper, it caughtmy eye.
I watched that thing over andover again.
And you talk about the the megaripper on the 470 and and and
give that little bit ofsolution, how your customer came
to you.
And oh, we didn't talk aboutthat, did we?
No.
Okay, all right, not all theway.
I could I stopped you off.
SPEAKER_01 (38:46):
Okay, okay.
So uh Terra Honk is a uh utilitycontractor, contract in Riley.
Um great Dale Wars, awesomedude.
Contractor, he also teachesschool.
Uh he's at uh North CarolinaState, I think.
Let's go ahead.
Yeah, he's a good dude.
Um he called me up and said,Sam, drilling blasting has cost
me a fortune.
We got some sensitive areas towhere we can't blast because
(39:08):
they got Dale Computer Umfactory and then Farmer Stata
Center.
Yeah, I said can't drill ablast.
And if we do drill and blast,the liability the liability
aspect of it is astronomical.
And he said, Did you ever seeone of those big rippers on
YouTube that they have in China?
I said, Yeah, I seen it.
And uh he says, Can you keep meone of those?
So I called guys over atInstruct in England and I said,
(39:32):
Look, shout out, yeah.
I said, guys, can you make thishappen?
Yeah, we do it all the time inAustralia.
I'm like, You're kidding me.
And he said, No.
I said, Well, put me pricetogether.
The first one we did was alittle PC 750.
And so uh huge, dude.
So, oh my God.
(39:53):
The see that baby work was wassomething.
Now, we've had some rippers wedemoed right here that didn't do
good on the 490.
SPEAKER_00 (40:00):
Okay.
SPEAKER_01 (40:00):
Um, we demoed to Grant.
Grant took it to four, GrettGarrett, yeah.
He took it, um, he was hadcustomers that had issues with
moving materials.
Like there's a place over herewhere they got um mines on the
ground, yeah, and they got thecore on top, and they couldn't
drill and blast.
And so they were wanting todevelop that in the subdivision,
but they couldn't move the rock.
(40:21):
Anyway, we tried it there, itdidn't work.
Anyway, but the mega ripper,it's on PC 750.
The arm itself, just the arm, is33,000 pounds.
Just on.
Because you have down pressure.
Yeah, the D11 ripper with acylinder that's this massive,
it's huge.
And anything it touches, if ithas a 15,000 uh or less uh PSI
(40:42):
rate, it just butter just ripsthrough it.
Now, the problem that we have,well, the problem, and also it's
a it's a guilty pleasure, is hehas to go he goes to uh tooth
every Tuesday.
I'm not talking about breaking.
I'm talking about you go upthere and you can pour water on
(41:03):
it and just you sizzle becauseit gets hot.
So that tooth.
So we had to import some teethum by the container load because
we get anywhere else or five,six hundred dollars things.
SPEAKER_00 (41:16):
Yeah.
They're stupid.
That is ridiculous.
SPEAKER_01 (41:17):
Yeah, and so we could I can import it for 200
bucks.
And I'm like, let's import themand then uh make sure this the
material spec is right, and uhand so that we don't kill our
profitless ding job.
So that job was great, and thenuh pay for the machine, loves
it.
I said, Sam, we got another jobthat's and they want to they
(41:39):
want these machines digginghere, and so we order another
one.
And that was that was excitingon that one, the 374.
The tough part of that equationwas, and this is something that
uh everybody that's listening tothis needs to pay attention to.
Uh the terror scenario.
Okay.
When we ordered that, that part,it was 35% terror.
(42:00):
When it came in, it was 100 andsomething.
SPEAKER_00 (42:03):
Oh my lord, no notification, no nothing.
Here's your bill.
No, we got notified.
Okay.
SPEAKER_01 (42:11):
Uh, but uh it was we got notified, but it already
shipped.
Okay.
Already shipped.
So he has a brand new cat 374still on the ground.
Okay, with no bonus stick.
Why?
Because he bought it because hewas and now I got this ripper
coming in.
I called him, I said, Daniel.
(42:32):
Oh I said, dude, I just got mybill to my tax bill from uh from
the feds uh from um on this onthis ripper, and we can't come
up with 780 grand more.
And he's like, no.
I said he did, he met uh notime, man.
Because the bill's here, it'shere.
Either I have to obey the at theport or pay the pay the tariff.
(42:54):
Well, what are you gonna do?
And so we either split it.
Good for you.
Yeah, well, no, it's not goodbecause no, but he made more not
even making money.
SPEAKER_00 (43:03):
I understand, but it's for the customer.
Yeah, yeah.
Point proven, man.
Oh, gosh.
SPEAKER_01 (43:08):
You're worried about the customer.
Oh then, and that's that's onething I'm finding right now is
that my customers or ourcustomers, or you, or whoever,
are based these projects andbeen these projects based upon
the cost factor they have atthat time.
That's correct.
And I am seeing where the theasset tool needed, customer
(43:31):
can't go up fast enough tooffset that cost.
No, I promise you.
You can't.
And and it and it's and it'sscaring the living shit out of
me.
Yeah, I bet it it is.
No, you're fine.
It's it's it's scaring mebecause uh I'm seeing it with if
what I have when I'm having topay for to replace my inventory,
it's like gas.
When gas goes up and you got andit's a dollar cost, now it's a
(43:52):
dollar twenty-five.
Well, you didn't make any money.
No.
Because you gotta buy 25% morefor the gas.
And politics aside, whateverthey're gonna do, understood,
but it is hurting our industryright now.
Uh once it once it settles andwe can catch up and we know what
the rules we play by.
Oh yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (44:13):
Pay pay it go on, but it's hurting us.
No, I could only imagine.
I mean, uh it it it I didn'teven honestly, of course it's
the parts game, uh tariffs,everything inbound.
So yeah, that's definitelyincreasing uh more and more.
But honestly, it's not justparts like that, it's also the
(44:34):
projects that we're building,man.
The tariffs, like when thisfirst hit the ground, to again,
politics aside, here guys, likewhen they first hit the ground,
we were bidding some work.
We thought, you know, after theelection year, here we go.
All this work's pouring out.
Here it is, March, and thencrickets, dude.
(44:56):
Hey man, did you see that bigold proposal we sent?
Yeah, man, uh busted out.
Hey man, oh yeah, we're gonnawait a year.
Hey, I mean, it was push, push,push.
We're still living the pushgame.
We're in the middle of it.
Now, don't get me wrong, youstill have projects going, etc.,
funding federally, but man, thecommercial world, the multi-flex
(45:17):
space, the multi-family space,anything, you know, cushions on
a dead gum fire sprinkler wentup like four dollars a piece at
one point.
There's hundreds of them.
You know what I mean?
Just the rings that cover thedead gum sprinkler heads, you
know.
It's things like that we don'tnormally think about.
No, but going into a buildingprice and you're sitting there
going, yeah, I've got this miland a half total site package
(45:38):
coming up, yeah, we're ready togo.
And then all of a sudden, heyman, uh, we're gonna wait till
next year.
Oh, okay.
Oh, yeah.
Oh, oh, okay, yeah.
I wasn't totally just planningfor this job over here.
You know what I mean?
Like, and you got a flip, and ifyou're not bidding any more
work, but the tariff game onjust the commercial, then you
start bringing in the interestrate game, as I know you don't
(45:59):
love.
And that was kind of killing,you know, land buying, land
development.
Nobody wants to purchase wheninterest's high.
Uh that's doing its purpose,right?
But we still have jobs to do,right?
SPEAKER_01 (46:11):
You know what I mean?
The interest rate is hurtingdeals too because it costs more
to for them to stock theinventory.
Yeah.
So it's anyway.
I just if if any contractor I'mtalking to now when we're
forecasting to achieve 2026, I'mtelling right now to have a 10
to 15% buffer for unexpectedwhatevers.
Whatever.
(46:31):
That's a big whatevers.
It is.
It is.
Now, at least you're talkingabout it.
At least you're talking aboutit.
Okay, forecast it.
Plan for it.
If you don't need it, great.
But don't get caught up in nextyear in like, holy cow, we blew
through our capital and we'renot enough machines to start
this job.
Yeah.
Or do this job.
Yeah.
Do a figure heavy on rental.
I'm starting to see now some ofthe rental companies, um and
(46:54):
this this happened hererecently.
I had fan rollers on the watercome from Europe.
Okay, home rollers.
Uh, and some of them from Bomactoo.
But the two in particular weresplit drum, vibratory, cab,
heat, and air, specific to a astate contract, and they had to
have it.
Yeah, okay.
Didn't have it in US.
Yeah, we're gonna give it forthree or four months if you deal
(47:15):
with it.
And so we brought it over, anduh they passed a steel tariff of
fish products that weekend, andit increased the the cost of
those machines by 15, 20percent, 15% overnight.
No, no, just it already shipped.
So my and and geez, so I calledhim up, and we we had to pay it
because that was specific, it'sjust like having the Cat 815
(47:38):
compactor for compaction uhtests.
You know, the engineer's notgonna sign off on anything
different.
He knows that's what it's gonnado, and he won't sign off on
nothing else.
That's right.
And so that's what that tool wasfor.
I just one for dealerships.
Um, I don't see how they canincrease the rental rate fast
enough to offset to get thereturn they need to have a
rental fleet, uh to have thatoffship for the contractor to
(48:01):
use.
Uh also uh contractors goinginto next year with a dollar
amount and then get there andwon't be able to write the
check.
Right.
Oh, my lord.
And there's some some companiesdon't have to worry about they
have enough, uh they're strongenough to to weather a storm.
That's countries now.
SPEAKER_00 (48:20):
No, it's already been a storm to this point, you
know what I mean?
Residual from things we justspoke about.
But yeah, I didn't even put twoand two together there, but on
on the whole tariff capacity,inbound, outbound, you guys need
to be absolutely payingattention to that because Wow
Factor.
Yeah, 50% on fashion goods.
(48:41):
God, well fish goods, dude.
$300,000 dozer.
SPEAKER_01 (48:45):
Well, so so they want you to break it down for
where the steel came from.
So, like on the rollers, the theengine is made in England.
Okay.
Okay.
The rollers made assembled inGermany.
Uh the shell, the the roundpart, that the actual is made in
Prague or somewhere.
So every, if it's not part ofthe EU, it uh it's a different
(49:08):
tariff.
If it comes in China, whichthey're not gonna tell me it
comes from China or not to fillin the paperwork.
So we've had to uh basicallyfollow the big boys on how they
report so we can report the sameway.
And that's becoming challenging.
SPEAKER_00 (49:21):
That's insane.
It is.
That is truly insane.
I told you guys we were gonnaget some and we're running out
of inventory.
SPEAKER_01 (49:28):
I am running out, I am running to inventory.
I am running out of inventorybecause people are buying up
stuff.
Everybody's had a 78% priceincrease in the last 30 days.
Yeah.
So and I'm sitting there tomyself, I've already quoted this
guy 100k for this machine or200, whatever it is.
I know for a fact that if you goto dealership, he's gonna pay
(49:50):
50, 30 more.
And I'm trying to fight the urgefor the greed urge of going up.
Yeah, because but um for themost part we're not because it
it'll come back to bite you.
I'll pay you the price, but it'she he's gonna remember that.
Yeah, or she.
And it'll come back to get youlater.
But anyway.
Hate to go off that part, butthat's something they we all had
(50:13):
to pay attention to.
SPEAKER_00 (50:14):
No, I am so glad you did.
I mean, yeah, it's subjectmatter.
We that's the that was the wholepurpose of the show, is the
subject matter.
You know, you, sir, yes, you'reyou're in the blue-collar world.
There's no doubt about it, butyou're definitely most smarter
than most blue-collar ranbusinesses, you know what I
mean?
And you've had the experience.
There was a question on this goahead that that hit me.
(50:36):
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If you're looking to work with amarketing team who does what
they say, does it well, and isalways looking for ways to help
your company grow, book adiscovery call with Ike by going
(51:20):
to bcperformance marketing.combackslash BCB podcast, or click
the link in the show notes slashdescription below.
Thanks, guys.
What takeaways were ablue-collar worker who is sick
of being stuck in the mud?
SPEAKER_01 (51:35):
Well, hit me so hard.
Okay.
Okay, and the reason why isbecause I've been in the
boardrooms where the people uptop were not the smartest.
No at all.
They were there because ofpolitics or for whatever
reasons.
Uh I've been there where mytechnician knew more about the
(51:55):
PL than the people that wereresponsible for it.
The inputs and outputs.
And all I can tell you is thatblue collar doesn't mean nothing
other than what you labelyourself.
And I tell guys all the time,especially on my on the park
side of the equation, you'resmarter than most of the guys
out there because you know howto make it happen.
(52:17):
Doing and thinking of it are twodifferent things.
If you know how to do it, don'tlet anything hold you back.
Because you can do it.
Don't let some manager or somewhoever uh restrict your
possibilities.
And and back to the militaryscenario we used to talk about
that.
As long as you're willing tofight, you can there's no reason
(52:38):
why you cannot get there ablue-collar guy that can
accomplish whatever youaccomplish.
Because um they had the skillset to do it, they just need to
do it.
Man, that's that's because I'm Italk to technicians all the time
uh uh at dealerships.
I talk to parts counter people,I talk to uh the guys in the
field running machines, and allof them are capable of doing
(53:02):
each other responsibility.
You just take the time to trainthem, teach them.
Um, but when I saw that, I'mlike, yes.
unknown (53:09):
Funny.
SPEAKER_01 (53:10):
They need to pull themselves up, let's go.
SPEAKER_00 (53:12):
Dude, I so you stole you stole a final question from
no, don't be.
I I'm glad you're excited.
I have asked that on all 50 plusepisodes to every single person.
And you should, I can't waittill we put a collage.
We put a small collage together,but I I think I ought to put an
episode of just people's answersto that because I've had people
(53:33):
from concrete guys on here tomega finance guys to you know,
gentlemen on a fleet ofequipment, whatever it may be.
And the answers are simpler thanmost, but at the same time,
you're absolutely right.
You just need to do it, you justneed to start.
You just whatever, don't letanybody I can't tell you how
(53:53):
many people told me not to dothis podcast.
I can't tell you how many peopletold me to you're gonna put your
utility work and earth work onYouTube.
I can't tell you how many timesI got told that, but all I knew
was what I knew.
And so I stepped out, starteddoing something a little bit
different, and there's alwaysreward in the value of helping
(54:15):
the guys that I was telling youvery shortly about, you know,
the the the folks that havereached out.
I can't thank enough to youguys, man, that have reached out
about the marriage podcast thatme and Sarah did.
And we we didn't talk abouthardly anything business.
It was more just our personallevel.
(54:35):
But the direct messages andemails that I received from you
guys, I can't thank you enough.
But that's the reason I'm doingthe show.
That's the reason I keep showingup every week and getting to
meet wonderful, you know, folkslike yourself.
They get to learn a little bitmore insight.
But there needs to be moreresources for that blue-collar
(54:56):
guy that wants to achieve, wantsto get out of the mud, wants to
go do something else.
He needs to be able to go find aresource that he can use, plug
in, let's get better as he'ssitting there doing his work for
the day.
But no, I ask every singleperson on the show, so I'm glad
you're excited about that.
SPEAKER_01 (55:12):
Because that was the one that stuck me the most.
Because I get um when I startedLighthouse, they said you you
know you're crazy.
Why are you bucking the system?
I'm not bugging the system, it'sjust broke.
Amen, bro.
And and people like, well, whydo you share on how you do
stuff?
I'm like, if I share people howthey do stuff, they still have
to do it every day.
(55:32):
They had to do it every day, andthat's the reason why blue
calls, blue call, because theycan do it every day.
That's right.
And and and just don't letanybody set you back, man.
Just just it and the podcastdeal, and you're showing your
job site.
Uh, I had another customer thatdidn't want me to video uh his
his job site.
Uh it was a rock wheel.
We had a rock wheel.
(55:53):
Oh, dude, I want them.
It was killed, it was sobeautiful.
That machine was awesome.
Anyway, that's a differentstory.
Okay.
All right.
Um, it was in Famous in SouthCarolina on that job.
Anyway, all right.
Um we were on the job side.
He wanted to video a quick.
I'm like, why?
He said, because people learnyour learn what we do on the job
side.
I said, they have to do it.
Everybody knows what needs to bedone.
(56:14):
Everybody thinks they know orthey know, but the execution
part is it's the reason whyyou're in business and why
somebody else is not.
That's right.
And then that's that's thereason why I say when I say blue
collar, I look at people thatcan execute.
That's right.
SPEAKER_00 (56:29):
We are.
We build America up and and therest of the globe.
No, Mr.
Sam, I can't tell you how much Iappreciate your time today uh
for joining us on anotherwonderful episode here.
You guys can check all episodesout at www.blue collar
businesspodcast.com.
Um let us know uh on the recwhat is it?
(56:50):
Form submission.
I apologize.
The submission form, there'ssomebody you know needs to be on
the show or a product andservice that you'd like me to
highlight here on the show.
Get with us over there.
Uh, if you're on a podcast,streaming platform or service,
give us a following rating.
It helps the show more than youknow.
I hope you guys got so muchinsight.
I learned a few things sittinghere, and that's the coolest
(57:10):
thing about doing this is I getto sit here and learn while
these guys get to sit here andlearn.
And it's only making better guyslike shout out to Adam Swain in
Colorado and you and your bunchout there and Peyton Hill out in
Jonesboro.
Like I can think of 10 or 15guys that are avid listeners of
the show that we help, you know.
Yeah.
They're gonna they're gonnaprobably be calling, hey Mr.
(57:33):
Sam, uh, what was this megaripper you're talking about?
I got a mountain to move overhere now.
SPEAKER_01 (57:37):
So, or just call me with any issue, any problem, and
we'll try and find a solution.
And and and you don't have tobuy it for me to do it.
That's right.
Because if uh I get big kickout, I get a customer, he always
calls me up and says, Say, Ineed this machine, go find it.
60 cents of the time, he's notgonna buy it.
But I do the exercise, but everytime that somebody asks me to
(57:58):
find a solution, I learnsomething and I can use it to
somebody in.
That's right.
Every single time.
SPEAKER_00 (58:04):
It's valuable.
You're inspiring.
I appreciate you for um willingto be a pioneer.
I love spotlighting pioneers inour industry going against the
grain that that go, no, I'mtired of this.
Oh, well, that's how it's alwaysbeen industry.
And we're gonna that's not toome and you both, my guy.
(58:28):
Oh, yeah.
But um seriously, thank you forstepping outside your comfort
zone.
And guys, go see Sam and histeam.
Uh LHM partsusa.com.
Check them out, lighthousemachinery and all socials.
And follow Mr.
Mr.
Light on the Lighthouse on, I'msorry, Mr.
Light on LinkedIn.
He's he's a pleasure to watch,and you get to see things like
(58:49):
mega rippers ripping up thewonderful countryside.
Guys, till next time, y'all besafe.
If you've enjoyed this episode,be sure to give it a like, share
it with the fellas, check outour website to send us any
questions and comments aboutyour experience in the blue car
business.
Who do you want to hear from?
Send them our way, and we'll doour best to answer any questions
(59:11):
you may have.
Till next time, guys.
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