February 17, 2026 • 32 mins
When the stakes are high and the bases are loaded, Brooks Fuller might be the Auburn man you’d want on speed dial – ready to deliver when it matters most.
“It's a blessing to be here in Auburn,” Fuller said.
Auburn tradition is a family affair for Fuller. His father, Mark, played baseball for the Tigers in the late 1980’s. His mother, Lori, also attended Auburn, cheering on the baseball team as a Diamond Doll.
“Baseball brought them together,” said Fuller.
Thirty years later, Fuller followed in his father’s footsteps, signing a scholarship with Auburn Baseball and Coach Butch Thompson as a pitcher in 2018.
He succeeded on the mound – and discovered a higher calling in the classroom.
“I came to Auburn to be an orthodontist believe it or not,” Fuller joked. “I got to organic chemistry and God had different plans.”
After reconsidering his academic path, Fuller transitioned to Auburn’s Harbert College of Business and changed his major to finance.
“I come from a background of entrepreneurs,” said Fuller. “So, I think it was in my blood.”
As they say, hindsight is 2020. But then came March 18, 2020 – and a big curveball for Fuller.
“That's really when my life changed,” he remembered.
Fuller was in the visitor’s baseball dugout at Wofford University when he learned the baseball season would be cut short.
“My teammates went home across the country, and I grabbed my backpack and went home to Moore’s MilI in Auburn,” Fuller recalled.
Back on Auburn’s campus, 4,800 dorm rooms were quickly evacuated. After seeing concerns being expressed on Auburn Parents Facebook groups, Fuller’s mother encouraged him to step up to the plate.
“In May 2020, people started shipping their dorm room keys to my parent’s house,” Fuller explained. “With Auburn's permission, my brother Brady and I, masked up, gloved up, went into the dorm rooms, packed them and shipped items to families via UPS. We were shipping literally all across the country.”
By summer’s end, Fuller and his younger brother had packed and shipped contents of more than 4,000 dorm rooms.
When Fuller returned to classes in August 2020, he met New Venture Accelerator Director Lou Bifano and began networking with Entrepreneurs-In-Residence Dan Leonardi and Ward Swift.
By spring 2021, Fuller began receiving text messages requesting his expert packing services once again. He started putting together his moving business playbook, eventually entering the annual Halloween Pitch and Tiger Cage Competitions.
Fuller’s baseball season ended in May 2021, and his new company Room2Room Movers was officially incorporated the following month with office space in Auburn's New Venture Accelerator.
Fast forward to 2026, Room2Room Movers is an established, growing company offering collegiate and commercial moving and storage services. As founder and CEO, Fuller says they’ve even expanded into more markets like the University of Mississippi.
“We've built technology where you don't have to call the office to book,” said Fuller. “You can go to our website, build your inventory, pick your date and schedule.”
Ironically, the former southpaw hurler doesn’t want to see anyone strike out on their entrepreneurial dreams.
“It's important to put your business plan together, understand your financials and be patient,” he said.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:05):
Hey everybody, welcometo the Everything
Auburn podcast.
It feels so goodto be back, man.
Carter, I know you miss me.
Came in hot.
I did I came with hotheadphones a bit loud.
Oh sorry. Oh you're good.
Welcome to it.
How are you doing?
I'm good.
Well, good.
Like new year.
Happy new year.
Haven't seen yet.
That's crazy.
Is the first timeyou see somebody
in the New Year?
You can say it.
And it is waytoo late in the year
(00:27):
to be saying it.
But it is. Happy new.
Happy new year.
Yeah, it's February1st month full by Oh Yeah!
Bring it on!.
Yeah, well, today on the podcastwe have a very exciting guest.
We have BrooksFuller, a class of 22,
2022 grad, finance gradand Auburn boy Brooks,
welcome to the podcast.
Thank you guys.
Thank you so much War Eagle!War Eagle indeed.
(00:48):
Welcome to it.
Dalton just said local kidfrom Auburn went Auburn
played baseball here at Auburnand own a business arm.
Is there anythingnot Auburn about you?
You're about the mostpersonally fan?
Another one, I will sayI was born in Raleigh,
North Carolina.
Okay. That's the only thing.
It's not Auburn about me.
I was there for six months.
So typicallywhen someone asks me,
(01:09):
where are you from?
I just say Auburn.
You have good memoriesfrom Raleigh.
I was six months away. Okay.
I've been back once or twice.
Other than that, no, I'm.
I've been here.
We'll probably stay here.
Parents are here.
Your grandparents are here.
And it's it's a blessing to me.
So we love over. Yeah.
Yeah. Well, wonderful.
Well, I mean,you played baseball here,
(01:30):
so let's just start with,you know,
kind of the fun bits here.
Walk me through what it was likegrowing up here
and getting to play sportfor Auburn, the team you grew up
watching your whole lifeprobably, I assume
wanted to playfor your whole life.
What's that experiencelike to be able to get to do
now retrospectively looking at.
Yeah, I mean, it was the dream.
My dad actuallyplayed baseball here in 1988.
(01:53):
I released,he played with Frank Thomas,
who's now a Hall of Famer.
Yeah, he's pretty good.
He's pretty good baseball.
I don't knowif I've heard of him before.
Never, never.
So dad was here for four years.
He met my mom.
She was a diamond doll.
So baseballbrought them together.
They actually hadtheir first class
in Haley Center,which is not too far
from over at Torrey.
And they fell in love.
(02:14):
They they,moved away from all over
and like I said.
And then he came back to Auburn.
The reasonwhy we left for Raleigh
to come back to Auburn,now, six month old, is
because he took the pitchingcoach job at Auburn.
So, he was a lot of Auburnbaseball. Yeah, yeah.
Let me talkabout a bunch of Auburn
today, I would imagine, but,not he was a pitcher coach here
for four years, and,when I was four years old,
(02:36):
he decided toquit coaching baseball
to stay home with his family.
More, which the.
The life ofa coach is pretty crazy, but,
you know, it's reallytough to be on the road
with young kids.
He was responsible for going outand getting recruits
and bringing them infor meetings and and visits
and stuff of that nature.
So after four years,he hung it up
in the coaching world.
(02:57):
We played it in Auburn.
And then I guessfrom four years old
till 18 years old,the dream was to play
Auburn baseball.
So I played forthe legendary maximum
Auburn high School.
He, he just retired at AuburnHigh School, but he was there
for like 30 years, won4 or 5 state championships.
I was fortunate enoughto play for him.
And then Coach Thompson,you know, gave us a scholarship
(03:18):
to come and play.
And that was a dream, right?
To play at Auburnto get drafted.
Oh, and play inthe big leagues was kind of
where my head was at from,you know, about four years old
until 18 years old. So. Wow.
So that's awesome.
All right.
Well, I gotta askbecause it's, you know,
your dad played baseball here.
You played baseball here.
We won't show on this.
(03:40):
You know who whowho is throwing the
who's the more he if.
You know,if you were to compare.
Hypothetically speaking,of course. You're right.
I don't have to tell menot to tell him about this.
Yeah, who's.
Who's got the arm?
I would say I had the arm,but dad had the career.
Okay, okay. Very diplomatic.
Yeah, yeah, he ended up playingpro ball for a few years.
(04:01):
Which I wasn't, you know,fortunate enough to play, but,
they didn'tthrow as hard back then,
for whatever reason.
He was a good pitcher,didn't throw as hard,
but played for longer.
So. England.
Okay, you gotta check.
You go check here.
See, you know, I'm always I'ma competitive one. Yeah.
So you gotta just kind of.
I am up a little bit. Right.
But soanother thing that we were,
(04:23):
we were talking about makingor talking about it earlier.
I came on producerjust off screen there.
Your time as a student didsome really cool things as well.
One of the coolest thingsI think Auburn does, we've had
been fortunate enoughto do some work with them
recently.
Was as a business student,there's some really
great resources that you got toshape that I guess shaped
who you are outside of baseball,you know, you great athlete,
(04:47):
but you're alsoan Auburn student
and do a lot of thingswith business school.
A lot of different,resources there.
New ventureaccelerator is a great one,
right?
It's one that I love thatI think I wish more
people knew about.
That is right.
So if you couldwalk me through it,
tell me what you didas a student and then tell me
how new VentureAccelerator kind of got
worked into yourinto your world. Yeah.
(05:07):
So I came to Auburnto be an orthodontist.
Believe it or not,baseball player.
But, that was the path I took.
I got to organic chemistry,and God had different
plans for there.
So maybe that's a, you know,yeah, I joke.
I started in businessschool, right?
And I switched to,film school or you.
(05:28):
Yeah. Liberal arts.
It's, mediastudies was the formal name.
The joke I always say isI learned one thing
in business school,which was really important,
but it was.
I shouldn't be in business.
So, Yeah, I took the pathof least resistance,
and I was like,which degree can I get
that has the leastamount of math?
That's the one that you knowI want to do.
I get it the moment you startadding numbers
(05:50):
with letters like algebra,I was like, I'm out.
I'm not an accountant.
That's why.
Yeah, for sure, which is great.
That's part of the reasonthose classes are there,
is to learn the skillsand also learn that maybe,
maybe we don't do this.
Maybe we do something else.
And that's what I learnedlearning what not to do first.
Exactly.
That's what college is for.
Yeah.
And I'm very thankfulto have learned it.
(06:10):
Absolutely.
I was a bit hairywhen I was going through it.
Continue through it.
So I learned what not to do.
You choose chemistry.
And being an orthodontistswitched over
to the business school,in finance,
and then learned a lotabout the new venture
accelerator entrepreneurship.
I come from abackground of entrepreneurs.
My dad, like I said, afterthe baseball career
(06:32):
and coaching baseball,he opened up a small business.
My mom is done marketing withsmall business.
She's a very creative brain.
So, I think it was in my blood.
I didn't expect itto be where we're at today,
but that's kind of.
That was my start.
At least with,the College of Business,
there are great opportunities,and I will retweet
your point earlier.
There's not enough peopleto know about
(06:53):
the new venture accelerator.
It's so cool.
It's such a great resource.
We did stuff like Tiger Cage.
We did a kind ofa, a feature on Tiger Cage.
Yeah, the Tiger cage, newventure accelerator.
All those resources are just,like, there. Yeah.
And there's so manydifferent things
that Auburn offersacross the board
that just you don't realize.
But New venture is like,you cannot I can't tell enough
(07:13):
people about it. Right.
And I didn't know about ituntil I took a class.
And the teacher Lou Alfano.
Oh yeah, he was thedirector of the MBA
and he just shared,if you have a startup idea,
if you have a young businessand need office space
and access to entrepreneurs,email me,
text me, I'm available.
So I chewed on thatfor a little bit,
(07:34):
and I eventually got plugged in.
And, Lulu and his teamhave built a great organization
over there. Oh, yeah.
They're getting funding.
They're getting more facilities.
It's first class facilities.
I'm not sure if you guyshang out in research parks.
Not the worst either.
No, no, some really coolspaces over there.
So we, Or our company, which I'msure we'll talk about here
in a second.
(07:55):
That's really where we gotour start was in the NBA,
and we're still there.
We, we we thoroughly enjoyed,the office space is Class-A.
The access to the entrepreneurswho have started a business,
scaled a business,sold a business,
and they're giving their timeback to guys like me
and and people in my, my office.
That's the coolest part.
(08:15):
You know, I get to hang aroundWard Swift and Dan Leonardi
and fellow entrepreneurs all daywho have gone before me,
and it messed up whereand what not to do
and then who have done it right.
And they invest back in us,which is which is awesome.
Yeah.
Looking back now, almostfour years post-grad,
it's good math.
Thank you so much. To what?
(08:36):
I guess I can do the basics.
What advice would you giveto one of those students
who has thatentrepreneurial spirit now?
Yeah, I mean,I would tell them that
learning the roomand me personally wouldn't be
where we're at todaywithout the new venture
accelerator, the HarvardCollege of Business.
(08:56):
And then a bunchof entrepreneurs and mentors
and over there,just invest time in is,
you know, I would alsotell them to help end and to go.
They have the ideait's important
to put your businessplan together.
Underst understandyour financials, and be patient.
But once you havethose, just go,
(09:17):
beta test if you need to.
If you're a software company,I think a bunch of people
get getheld up in the idea stage.
Sure. And it's really easy.
I mean, I do sometimeswe'll have a great idea
and we'll tweak it, edit it,and then we'll tweak
and edit it.
And next thing you know,it's three months later
and we have no ideawhat we're even talking
about anymore. Right.
Perfect.
Be the enemy of good.
(09:37):
Yeah, yeah.
So I just I try I encourage youall, man.
Put your,put your paperwork together,
make sureyour insurance is right
and make sureeverything is set up.
But then when it's time to go,just go and don't look back.
Yeah. Chase failure.
You're going to fail.
Expect to fail. Want to fail.
And then be smart enoughand have enough patience
to sit back and reflect, tosay, okay,
(09:57):
what didn't work here?
I'm not going to quit.
I'm just going to pivotand make it better.
So, yeah,get plugged in with the MBA.
Like I said, word Swiftis the Active Directory
over there.
Now you can find his emailon Google if you want to.
And there's a bunch of resourcesout there in order.
And there's a lot of peoplein Auburn
who have built big businessestotally and have lived here
and have retired here.
(10:18):
So, I thinkalways a great resource.
I would start there,but then there's
a bunch of people,you know, in the community
that will will investsome time in is what.
Absolutely.
That's great.
And I will also love to invest,if there's any entrepreneur
out there. There you go.
Not to plug myselfor anything, but go away.
My guy down text email me.
I would love to give backbecause there's
(10:38):
a bunch of people in my lifethat gave back to me. Yeah.
So talking aboutNew Venture accelerator and
then you mentioned Room2Room.
Can you tell us howthat came about?
And then you graduated in 2022?
When everybody else went homeduring Covid,
you were home already?
I was it's,it wasn't a apartment.
Yeah.
You'd have to go too far.
So did you just havesomebody reach out to you
(11:00):
and say, hey,can you ship my stuff back home?
Like, how did how did thiscome to be in a nutshell?
Yeah.
So really,it all goes back to March
18th, 2020.
We all probably knowwhere we were at that week.
Seared into the 80s.
Where were you? Just curious.
Somehow that's aso I was working
for athletics at that time.
I was working for the video teamand I was with,
(11:21):
Oh, were you in Nashville?
I was in Nashvillefor the SEC Men's
Basketball tournament,and we were excited
for that, by the way.
Oh, I know, all because we werewe were good for fresh off
a final for Isaac.
Should we have Capri here?
No. He was.
It was the yearbefore Shareef. Okay.
But yeah, we had likethe second or third, you know,
we're up thereand one of the best
records in basketball.
(11:41):
We started that season,I think it was 16, 15 and.
Oh, we had gone to shootaroundat Bridgestone.
We got on a bus to gofrom Bridgestone
to Vanderbilt for practice.
And which is not I mean, that'snot far at all.
Five mileshalfway through that trip,
BP standsup, turned the bus around
(12:03):
well, hopped on a planeand flew on. Oh, dang.
Pretty brutal.
Were you in an Auburn dorm?
No, I, I rolled spring break.
I was on spring break.
I was in Savannahwith some friends.
We were on the beachand we said, guess what, y'all?
It's going to be two weekslong. Let's cold.
And then, I rememberwe go got back to Auburn
and there were already casesof Covid in Georgia.
(12:24):
And so my parents right.
Just stay in Auburnand they even come home
to back to Birmingham.
Whenever I never went homeI stayed in Auburn
throughout all of that.
Yeah, yeah.
So anyway,anyway, where were you
the correlation.
Thanks for the correlationon spring break, which was that
week of March 18th.
And then Covid is really whyI even have
(12:45):
the opportunity to sit withyou guys a day.
That's reallywhen my life changed.
That's when Ring dream happened.
But on March 18th, 2020,I was in the dugout.
We were playing Wofford.
It was a Wednesday.
Oh, yeah,it was the eighth inning.
And Allen Greene, the 80at the time,
walked in the dugout,which typically doesn't happen
during the game.
It's not a great sign.
No, no, I was on the bench,watching the game.
(13:08):
There was theI think top of the eighth
or bottom in the eighth.
And Allen told us, you know,hey guys, you enjoy
these last two inningsbecause the season
is going to be postponed,which was,
the language at the time.
We're going togo home for a week,
come back, resume play.
So we got shut down.
All my teammates went homeacross the country.
I grabbed my backpack,Walton to Moores Mill,
which is two milesdown the shed.
(13:30):
Not not actually,but I kind of had some.
Might as well.
And, yeah,we posted up for a week.
I kept working out.
I kept throwing,trying to stay in shape
because we thoughtthe season was coming back.
And obviously it never did.
So all the students at Auburnwere told,
hey, you're on spring break.
You can't comeback to your dorm room
(13:50):
to pack up your stuffbecause you might have Covid,
and we don't want you guysbringing Covid
back to Auburn. So,4800 dorm rooms were left as is.
So everyone's bed and sheetsand towels and laptops
and everything were lockedin the dorm rooms.
Aubrey couldn't help it.
The students couldn't help it,and it just was Covid.
So about six weeks later,the season, you know,
(14:13):
was canceled by thenthe world is shut down,
but and I'm at home, I'mstill working as an athlete,
staying in shape.
But I had a lot of timeon my hands, and my mom was kind
of getting tiredof my brother and,
around the college.
So she walks. You can go.
Yeah. Right. Yeah.
So, she's a activemember of Auburn
and she's a realtor.
She sells houses.
She's always trying to help thethe community of Auburn.
(14:34):
And she was on Facebookand these, you know, parent
Facebook groups,class of 22, 23, 25.
And she noticeda little bit active
at that time. I think. Yeah.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
And the biggest topicduring this time was, hey,
my stuff still in the dorm room.
I live in California,I live in Birmingham.
I live not in Auburn.
(14:55):
What can I do about it?
And no one had a great answerbecause no one knew
really the the future.
So mom reached outto a few folks
I we know at Auburn and said,hey, like, you know,
these parents are askingthese questions.
I'd love to help them.
What should I say?
One thing leads to another,and we look up around
May of 2020and people are shipping
their dorm room keysto my parents house
(15:15):
in Mooresville.
My brother and I, with Orbitzpermission.
They're going into the dormswith masks and gloves on.
Wow. And UPS boxes.
We're packing them up.
We're taking ups.
We're shipping themliterally all across
the country.
Absolutely.
And so, so 4000dorm rooms over a summer.
It was fun.
It wasn't a company.
It was the Auburn familyhelping Auburn family.
(15:37):
And it was a momtrying to get her kids
out of the housefor being honest.
Not a bad workoutto, I would imagine.
Pretty good workout.
These are in Auburnas you guys. Yeah, yeah.
It was special though, you know,we enjoyed it.
It gave my brotherand I something to do.
Again, it wasn't the company.
We were reallycharging anything.
It's UPS, charges, something.
We would send him a receipt.
(15:58):
Maybe we got a tip,but it was more or less
just keeping us busyhelping Auburn.
And that was the start of a roomduring while
absolutely incredible,was one of the things
that I talked about itmore times.
I count it has come upon this podcast
even more is The Creed.
And so much of just like Auburnhelping Auburn,
it's what you do.
It's what we do.
There's a need.
Let's fill it right.
(16:19):
And that's just likeso ingrained
into what you're sayingand what you've done.
It's it's hard not to see it.
It's so plainly obvious to me,which is really incredible.
Right.
And so I'm sure rewarding.
Yeah. Definitely. Definitely.
And it's, it's kind of naturalfor us all when people tell you
you're here in schoolfor 4 or 5 years, you feel it,
(16:40):
you see it, and naturallywhen it's on your, you know,
lap like it was for us,the only call to action
just to help Auburn people.
Yeah, that's kind ofwhat we were looking at.
So you're doing this forhow long were you just doing
this?
Like, let me just help peoplewhere they need it. Yeah.
All summer.
So Covid cut from May to Augustwhen school started.
(17:01):
Because then Auburncame back in session.
And August soon as 3or 4 months of packing up dorm.
So when did itconvert from a thing?
I'm just doing to help peoplewhen they shipped me a key to
I can turn this intoa company. Yeah. Business.
I would say my brother and Ihad some good conversations
during the summer.
You know,you're stuck in the dorm
(17:22):
room, had some free time.
Yeah.
So we talked about.
Could this be something?
But again, I wasI was a baseball player
at the time, so.
And he actually was to at Troy.
So, school came back in sessionin August.
I went backto being a finance student
and a juniornow playing baseball,
which is a big yearin baseball. Junior.
So a draft year.
(17:42):
So I'm training. And,you know what?
I really startedto think about it
that fall, though.
That was when I took thethe business classes.
And that's when I met Louand the new venture accelerator
and then the Halloweenpitch competition,
which is something thatAuburn puts on.
It's basically like Shark Tankfor Auburn that.
Yeah.
You know, I took the ideathat Brady and I had
(18:04):
put it on paper.
Well, maybe we couldhave a college movie company
and pitched it at Halloweenpitch competition
and then pitched it at,at Tiger Cage in the spring.
But again, therethere was no LLC,
there was no company.
There was just a small vision.
If baseball didn't work out,maybe I could help
some college kids move.
Our baseball season waspretty rough that year.
So the next spring,our spring 21,
(18:27):
we weren't playing great.
Personally,I wasn't playing great.
And, I, I came back to my lockerone day in probably mid March
to a few text messagesafter practice,
some random numbersI really never seen before.
And, the consensus was,Hey Brooks, you know,
this is so-and-sofrom California.
You help move my daughter'sdorm room last summer.
Could you do it again?
(18:48):
Yeah.
The next person was like,hey, this person told me,
have a movie company.
Can I hire you to open? Wow.
And as a junior, 21 yearold baseball player,
I didn't text him back.
I was too busy.
Right?
Hey, you know,it's baseball or nothing.
Yeah, now you got to get it.
So I didn't textthe first group back.
Well, after a week,I had about 40 people
trying to hirethis movie company
(19:08):
that didn't even exist.
That's nuts.
So that's when I knewwe probably had something.
But my problem, I had wasI didn't have the time
to be the moverbecause I'm in the height
of baseball season.
We're traveling.
Yeah, we're going to placeslike Athens, Georgia,
Tuscaloosa, Gainesville.
So I had the timeto put it together on the bus,
the plane, the hotel.
I didn't have time to move it.
So we ran a small beta test.
(19:31):
I was behind thescenes putting it together
and a few of my buddiesfrom Auburn were the movers,
and I think we went like13 for 13 on May.
Move outs.
The the clients liked it.
The good.
They played good. Right?
Yeah.
We'll take that back to school.
And when that worked I knewwe had to do something.
So baseball seasonended in May of 21,
(19:53):
and Rendering Moverswas officially incorporated
with insurance websitemarketing in June of 21.
And from there,you know, it's it's 2026 now,
the last four and a half yearshas included,
a bunch of team membersjoining the team,
bringing on a playersfive stars, bunch of technology.
A lot of marketing,and then some expansion
(20:15):
to to the SEC schools.
Really the one we're at rightnow was Ole Miss, but,
I guess that's thethe quick elevator pitch
of how room to startedwhere we're at today.
That's awesome.
Absolutely, bro.
I think it's so cool.
Like was that was that I don'twant to do the math here,
but that's been five years,you know, said six years
since you're just movingrandom people to.
(20:36):
Now, if I told youthen where you end up,
you would have laughed at me.
You're walking outthe room, right?
Because that's a it'sa crazy journey,
but absolutely incredible.
And what a awesomesuccess story. Yeah.
Well thank you.
And six years ago was comingthat just loudly next to six
six years next month.
Yeah.
Let's not let's not remember.
It's crazy.
Let's not relivethat interruption.
(20:57):
Yeah.
What we Donhas some literature here.
Yeah. We want to brag on you.
This is very similar to.
We've hada couple professors on here,
and we always read the,write my professors,
if you will.
So this is as close to that.
This is with classesas we can break. My movers.
Yeah, let's let's headmove right by movers.
So you have fiveout of five stars
of Google reviews.
(21:18):
By the way, if you didn't knowgraduation.
Congratulations. Very.
And over 160 reviews.
This is a greatthis is a business owner.
This is a great.
He knows he knows he's checking.
He's a great day.
I might have lookedthis morning.
Well yeah. Yeah.
But some examples.
So this is fromsomebody named Christine
coming from out of state.
We're in the roomand my daughter's dorm
move and extremely easy.
(21:38):
They were courteousand incredibly easy
to work with.
Moving daycould not have gone smoother.
From a guy named Michael.
They showed up,got everything moved,
cleaned up and disappeared.
Just what we wanted.
And highly recommend thisif you've got a little.
It's the best.
How does that make you feel?
Now?
I just knowing that, you know,you have satisfied customers.
(21:59):
You're helpingthe Auburn family.
But now to know to thatyou're expanding across the SEC
and now you're at Ole Miss too.
So you're just helping people.
I mean, in multiple locations.
What is that like?
Yeah, I mean God is good.
That's a that's a group effortright there.
Yeah.
So, I'm getting to speakabout it today, but
that's the sales teammaking the good sale
(22:20):
comfortable sale.
That's a marketing teamletting these clients
know about us beforehand.
That's the operations team.
Train the movers to move it.
I guess. Disappear.
Right? Right.
And it's technology,allowing the client
to book online and getting thecorrect information
to the mover.
It's a board of advisorsadvising me and the team
about what we should do next.
It's accounting.
(22:41):
Keep it up to the books,and it's everyone. Yeah.
But that's special.
That's that'sprobably my favorite
part of business.
Is looking at my phone,seeing someone leave,
you know, a satisfaction,comment or a five
star review like that.
That's that's really cool.
Yeah.
So, yeah, we take pride in it.
We, we we studyChick-Fil-A a lot,
(23:01):
and we try and modela lot of the stuff
we do around customer serviceand operational excellence
around. My pleasure. Guy.
Yeah.
That that pleasure. Yeah.
But no, we really dotake a lot of pride in, in
getting clients to to enjoy theRoom2Room experience like that.
Those 2 or 3 did.
Yeah, absolutely.
Well, I rememberI mean for so many
(23:23):
I mean maybe this is likeyou probably,
you know, just breakout of your back yard.
But moving into college,especially as a freshman,
can be, a lot of words.
Datingis probably one of the best.
And so it was ait was an experience.
I was in college for six years.
Do you know how many timesI moved?
It was probably,what, 7 or 8? Six now?
(23:43):
Yeah.
Yeah, I wish I would have known.
It is a new it is a reallystressful time.
It's moving is stressful.
Yeah. Right.
Moving to college,especially if you're a freshman,
is extremely stressful.
Or if you're transitioning from,you know, maybe an upperclassmen
go from the dormto an apartment,
like there's always likethat is a big change.
(24:04):
And often the first timeyou've done that. Yeah.
And to have one less thing,there's a lot of things
to worry about.
But you just have like oneless thing to worry about
is incredible.
Like, I can only imagine,because I remember my move was,
did that one myself,my me and myself and my parents
and I think my grandparentsdid that move,
I think, and everything.
(24:25):
It was.
That was a lot.
Yeah, it's a lot of fun,but it was a lot.
I don't knowif I'd want to redo it
necessarily either. Right.
It is a lot nowif you think about it.
I mean, a freshman, there's aschool and they're here
for 4 or 5 years, maybe six.
I was in grad school, soI wasn't just that.
Yeah, but but typicallythey are moving every year.
(24:47):
Yeah. Yeah.
Because they're, you know,they go from the dorms
to the brand new apartmentto a house off campus.
So we have a, you know,a very unique opportunity
to welcome them.
Day one, tell them where you goand then to tell the parents
and the familyespecially, like, hey,
we have a safe, proficient,uncomfortable experience
if you need it.
Some people can be themselves.
(25:09):
But trust me,for the out of state
parents, you know, hey,you don't have to
come to Auburn.
You don't have to bookthe flight not to take the taxi.
You don't haveto spend the money
on restaurants and shoppingwith your daughter
and your wife.
If you want to trusta local service
and render a weekend offand be here for you
from freshman yearto senior year,
and there's a bunchof value in that.
(25:29):
So that's kind of ourmodel in a nutshell, is
how many timescan we serve that student
and how how great can we beduring those 4 or 5 years?
Yeah.
Another thingI wanted to mention as well,
if you're any doing any drivein from Auburn,
Birmingham, up towardsNashville, going up
the direction up 65might see some,
familiar branding upon some billboards.
You guys have been doingsome work with some athletes,
(25:51):
if I'm not mistaken.
Yes. That's correct.
All right. Walk me.
What's the initial worldlook like from a marketing
side of things?
Because that's the more you useexpanded into that realm.
That was fun.
My last year at Auburnwas the first year of any,
you know, so I got to seethe ground level
that's changed drastically.
Shortens. Yeah.
(26:11):
As you go. Right? Yeah.
It's a very hot topic.
I think it's greatfor the players,
but it's also greatfor local brands
and national brands.
But as a local brand,we try and do our research.
You know, who's the best player?
Who has the bestbrand on social media
followers engagement to.
They already do and will.
(26:32):
So we we'reconstantly monitoring,
looking for opportunities.
And then we reach outand see if it's a good fit.
You know, some athletes,they're not really into it.
Some athletes eat it up.
It really is a caseby case basis.
But our goal in Nilis to number one,
promote the athlete.
So I would love for KeyshawnHall, for example,
who's on a billboard right now.
(26:53):
Auburn starting shooting guard.
I would love for himto get some initial deals
because someone saw his faceon the room
during Billboard, right?
So that's going number one.
If the athlete doesn't enjoy itand they don't
soak it up and heat it upand get deals from
it, it's not going to work.
Then.
Number two,it does help with branding.
So to have your namenext to one all over
basketball's best players,one of the best players
in the country, it helps.
(27:14):
Yeah. Yeah.
So that's that'skind of our strategy there.
We love that.
We also dosome influences your work.
So some sweaty girls,some fraternity guys, some
some college studentson each campus.
We'll do our same research.
If it's a good brandand we we trust them.
They trust us.
It's it's kind of a similarset up there, but, no.
And it great.
I think it's great for everyone.
(27:34):
And we'll continue to do it.
So I used towork in athletics. Right.
And I kind ofand I used to do all the,
the media shoots and stuff,which I know
you've done as well.
I'm sure we've,I've done them with you.
I can, you know,they all blend together.
But to be able to be kind ofon the other side
of the business sidethat, you know, to see, like,
oh, let's get the photography,let's get the media,
(27:54):
let's get the branding.
It's got to bean interesting experience.
Having seen itto a certain degree
from the athlete side of things.
Yeah. Very helpful.
I understandthe athletes are on a
pretty tight schedule.
Yeah.
So we communicatethat with the team like,
hey, let's let's be prepared.
When the influenceror athlete gets here,
it's time to go.
(28:14):
And our goalis to get them in and out
as quickly as possible.
As long as we havequality content,
they get 6.5 minutes.
Yeah, yeah.
So yeah, it definitely help.
Just like it helpswhen I was, you know,
playing baseball,I got to see, you know,
we have a different perspectiveother than maybe
most businesses do it.
But yeah, our goal ismake it efficient, make it fun.
(28:35):
And then to make it, youknow, really high
quality content.
Awesome. Puffed up.
All right, well, let me ask youthe tough question then
break out the crystal ball.
Yeah.
What's you know,you're a few years
into this now.
What are the next few yearskind of look like.
Yeah.
I mean, we're excited.
Our team's mottothis year is chase failure.
(28:56):
So love that.
Have you guys have youever heard of that before?
I mean, that one specifically.
I have not,but I some facsimiles I'm sure.
But yeah, please, please.
I have never heard of itbefore either.
We went to aleadership conference as an
executive team in December,and the speaker
was talking to us about,you know, coming up
on the New year and people setresolutions and goals.
(29:17):
And he said, set your goalsand expect to accomplish them.
Go chase failure.
Expect to fail.
When you fail at something,you gotta look back and say,
why did I feel?
Which means you going to learnhow to do it.
And then hopefullywhen you learn, you get better
for the next time.
So,we're going to chase failure.
(29:38):
I don't know if that meansevery college
in the next 12 monthsor 36 months,
or 48 months or ten years,20 years.
But that is our goal, ourour slogan under
our logo is servingcollege talents.
So I believe with the teamand the technology,
and the operation,why not try and chase failure
and get to every college townever? Yeah.
(29:58):
So again,I don't know the timeline.
I'm not making any promises,but if you do a
little in stone today. Yeah.
If you werelooking at a crystal ball,
and this is not just mespeaking.
This is our whole team,all the families
that are involvedduring the year.
And we definitely want to bethe, the,
the movers in college townsacross the country
and maybe across the globeone day.
All right, well, we're gettingon there on time, but I want to
(30:19):
give you a chance.
This is your this is your plug.
This is your chanceto really kind of get it right.
To get in touch with you,find you socials, website,
where, whereif we want to get in touch
with you, where's the best placeto find it?
Yeah.
I mean, best place is,is Google Google Room2Room.
You can learn about the websitewe've built technology
where you don'thave to call the office
(30:41):
to book a news.
You can go in there,build your inventory,
picture date, you can reschedulein your portal, you can cancel.
You can sharecoupons with friends.
So that's where I would urgepeople if you need a move
or you wantto learn about the Room2Room
story, just Google us.
Room2Room Movers.
We do a lot on social mediawith influencers
and denial deals and stuff,so hopefully you'll
(31:01):
see us there,if we're doing our part
as a marketing team.
And then we would loveyour support.
It's a really cool journey.
Started with Covid.
Now we're expanding to,you know, Ole Miss
and other college towns.
So we'd love you guys to,to keep up with us
and play a partin our journey as well.
Awesome.
What we want to, thank youfor all the work you've done.
(31:21):
And what a great exampleof what Auburn means.
And the creed means manifest,right?
You know, post-grad alumhelping out the next generation
of students and Auburnalum and the Auburn family.
And you've donesome incredible work.
So we want tothank you for doing that
and appreciateyou spending time with us.
Tell us about it.
It's really awesome to hear.
Thank you for having me.
Thank you. Sir.
(31:42):
We want to thank youfor joining us.
We'll be back again next monthwith another member
of the Auburn family right here.
You can see us hereon YouTube if you like. What?
You heard.
You like what you saw.
I want to see more of us.
I mean, who wouldn'twant to, right?
We got more.
We got many, many episodesgoing back a couple years now.
So you can go back and listento some more awesome things
we be able to talk about.
And then till then,we'll see you next time.
(32:04):
War Eagle! War Eagle! War Eagle!
Hey everybody, welcometo the Everything
Auburn podcast.
It feels so goodto be back, man.
Carter, I know you miss me.
Came in hot.
I did I came with hotheadphones a bit loud.
Oh sorry. Oh you're good.
Welcome to it.
How are you doing?
I'm good.
Well, good.
Like new year.
Happy new year.
Haven't seen yet.
That's crazy.
Is the first timeyou see somebody
in the New Year?
You can say it.
And it is waytoo late in the year
(00:27):
to be saying it.
But it is. Happy new.
Happy new year.
Yeah, it's February1st month full by Oh Yeah!
Bring it on!.
Yeah, well, today on the podcastwe have a very exciting guest.
We have BrooksFuller, a class of 22,
2022 grad, finance gradand Auburn boy Brooks,
welcome to the podcast.
Thank you guys.
Thank you so much War Eagle!War Eagle indeed.
(00:48):
Welcome to it.
Dalton just said local kidfrom Auburn went Auburn
played baseball here at Auburnand own a business arm.
Is there anythingnot Auburn about you?
You're about the mostpersonally fan?
Another one, I will sayI was born in Raleigh,
North Carolina.
Okay. That's the only thing.
It's not Auburn about me.
I was there for six months.
So typicallywhen someone asks me,
(01:09):
where are you from?
I just say Auburn.
You have good memoriesfrom Raleigh.
I was six months away. Okay.
I've been back once or twice.
Other than that, no, I'm.
I've been here.
We'll probably stay here.
Parents are here.
Your grandparents are here.
And it's it's a blessing to me.
So we love over. Yeah.
Yeah. Well, wonderful.
Well, I mean,you played baseball here,
(01:30):
so let's just start with,you know,
kind of the fun bits here.
Walk me through what it was likegrowing up here
and getting to play sportfor Auburn, the team you grew up
watching your whole lifeprobably, I assume
wanted to playfor your whole life.
What's that experiencelike to be able to get to do
now retrospectively looking at.
Yeah, I mean, it was the dream.
My dad actuallyplayed baseball here in 1988.
(01:53):
I released,he played with Frank Thomas,
who's now a Hall of Famer.
Yeah, he's pretty good.
He's pretty good baseball.
I don't knowif I've heard of him before.
Never, never.
So dad was here for four years.
He met my mom.
She was a diamond doll.
So baseballbrought them together.
They actually hadtheir first class
in Haley Center,which is not too far
from over at Torrey.
And they fell in love.
(02:14):
They they,moved away from all over
and like I said.
And then he came back to Auburn.
The reasonwhy we left for Raleigh
to come back to Auburn,now, six month old, is
because he took the pitchingcoach job at Auburn.
So, he was a lot of Auburnbaseball. Yeah, yeah.
Let me talkabout a bunch of Auburn
today, I would imagine, but,not he was a pitcher coach here
for four years, and,when I was four years old,
(02:36):
he decided toquit coaching baseball
to stay home with his family.
More, which the.
The life ofa coach is pretty crazy, but,
you know, it's reallytough to be on the road
with young kids.
He was responsible for going outand getting recruits
and bringing them infor meetings and and visits
and stuff of that nature.
So after four years,he hung it up
in the coaching world.
(02:57):
We played it in Auburn.
And then I guessfrom four years old
till 18 years old,the dream was to play
Auburn baseball.
So I played forthe legendary maximum
Auburn high School.
He, he just retired at AuburnHigh School, but he was there
for like 30 years, won4 or 5 state championships.
I was fortunate enoughto play for him.
And then Coach Thompson,you know, gave us a scholarship
(03:18):
to come and play.
And that was a dream, right?
To play at Auburnto get drafted.
Oh, and play inthe big leagues was kind of
where my head was at from,you know, about four years old
until 18 years old. So. Wow.
So that's awesome.
All right.
Well, I gotta askbecause it's, you know,
your dad played baseball here.
You played baseball here.
We won't show on this.
(03:40):
You know who whowho is throwing the
who's the more he if.
You know,if you were to compare.
Hypothetically speaking,of course. You're right.
I don't have to tell menot to tell him about this.
Yeah, who's.
Who's got the arm?
I would say I had the arm,but dad had the career.
Okay, okay. Very diplomatic.
Yeah, yeah, he ended up playingpro ball for a few years.
(04:01):
Which I wasn't, you know,fortunate enough to play, but,
they didn'tthrow as hard back then,
for whatever reason.
He was a good pitcher,didn't throw as hard,
but played for longer.
So. England.
Okay, you gotta check.
You go check here.
See, you know, I'm always I'ma competitive one. Yeah.
So you gotta just kind of.
I am up a little bit. Right.
But soanother thing that we were,
(04:23):
we were talking about makingor talking about it earlier.
I came on producerjust off screen there.
Your time as a student didsome really cool things as well.
One of the coolest thingsI think Auburn does, we've had
been fortunate enoughto do some work with them
recently.
Was as a business student,there's some really
great resources that you got toshape that I guess shaped
who you are outside of baseball,you know, you great athlete,
(04:47):
but you're alsoan Auburn student
and do a lot of thingswith business school.
A lot of different,resources there.
New ventureaccelerator is a great one,
right?
It's one that I love thatI think I wish more
people knew about.
That is right.
So if you couldwalk me through it,
tell me what you didas a student and then tell me
how new VentureAccelerator kind of got
worked into yourinto your world. Yeah.
(05:07):
So I came to Auburnto be an orthodontist.
Believe it or not,baseball player.
But, that was the path I took.
I got to organic chemistry,and God had different
plans for there.
So maybe that's a, you know,yeah, I joke.
I started in businessschool, right?
And I switched to,film school or you.
(05:28):
Yeah. Liberal arts.
It's, mediastudies was the formal name.
The joke I always say isI learned one thing
in business school,which was really important,
but it was.
I shouldn't be in business.
So, Yeah, I took the pathof least resistance,
and I was like,which degree can I get
that has the leastamount of math?
That's the one that you knowI want to do.
I get it the moment you startadding numbers
(05:50):
with letters like algebra,I was like, I'm out.
I'm not an accountant.
That's why.
Yeah, for sure, which is great.
That's part of the reasonthose classes are there,
is to learn the skillsand also learn that maybe,
maybe we don't do this.
Maybe we do something else.
And that's what I learnedlearning what not to do first.
Exactly.
That's what college is for.
Yeah.
And I'm very thankfulto have learned it.
(06:10):
Absolutely.
I was a bit hairywhen I was going through it.
Continue through it.
So I learned what not to do.
You choose chemistry.
And being an orthodontistswitched over
to the business school,in finance,
and then learned a lotabout the new venture
accelerator entrepreneurship.
I come from abackground of entrepreneurs.
My dad, like I said, afterthe baseball career
(06:32):
and coaching baseball,he opened up a small business.
My mom is done marketing withsmall business.
She's a very creative brain.
So, I think it was in my blood.
I didn't expect itto be where we're at today,
but that's kind of.
That was my start.
At least with,the College of Business,
there are great opportunities,and I will retweet
your point earlier.
There's not enough peopleto know about
(06:53):
the new venture accelerator.
It's so cool.
It's such a great resource.
We did stuff like Tiger Cage.
We did a kind ofa, a feature on Tiger Cage.
Yeah, the Tiger cage, newventure accelerator.
All those resources are just,like, there. Yeah.
And there's so manydifferent things
that Auburn offersacross the board
that just you don't realize.
But New venture is like,you cannot I can't tell enough
(07:13):
people about it. Right.
And I didn't know about ituntil I took a class.
And the teacher Lou Alfano.
Oh yeah, he was thedirector of the MBA
and he just shared,if you have a startup idea,
if you have a young businessand need office space
and access to entrepreneurs,email me,
text me, I'm available.
So I chewed on thatfor a little bit,
(07:34):
and I eventually got plugged in.
And, Lulu and his teamhave built a great organization
over there. Oh, yeah.
They're getting funding.
They're getting more facilities.
It's first class facilities.
I'm not sure if you guyshang out in research parks.
Not the worst either.
No, no, some really coolspaces over there.
So we, Or our company, which I'msure we'll talk about here
in a second.
(07:55):
That's really where we gotour start was in the NBA,
and we're still there.
We, we we thoroughly enjoyed,the office space is Class-A.
The access to the entrepreneurswho have started a business,
scaled a business,sold a business,
and they're giving their timeback to guys like me
and and people in my, my office.
That's the coolest part.
(08:15):
You know, I get to hang aroundWard Swift and Dan Leonardi
and fellow entrepreneurs all daywho have gone before me,
and it messed up whereand what not to do
and then who have done it right.
And they invest back in us,which is which is awesome.
Yeah.
Looking back now, almostfour years post-grad,
it's good math.
Thank you so much. To what?
(08:36):
I guess I can do the basics.
What advice would you giveto one of those students
who has thatentrepreneurial spirit now?
Yeah, I mean,I would tell them that
learning the roomand me personally wouldn't be
where we're at todaywithout the new venture
accelerator, the HarvardCollege of Business.
(08:56):
And then a bunchof entrepreneurs and mentors
and over there,just invest time in is,
you know, I would alsotell them to help end and to go.
They have the ideait's important
to put your businessplan together.
Underst understandyour financials, and be patient.
But once you havethose, just go,
(09:17):
beta test if you need to.
If you're a software company,I think a bunch of people
get getheld up in the idea stage.
Sure. And it's really easy.
I mean, I do sometimeswe'll have a great idea
and we'll tweak it, edit it,and then we'll tweak
and edit it.
And next thing you know,it's three months later
and we have no ideawhat we're even talking
about anymore. Right.
Perfect.
Be the enemy of good.
(09:37):
Yeah, yeah.
So I just I try I encourage youall, man.
Put your,put your paperwork together,
make sureyour insurance is right
and make sureeverything is set up.
But then when it's time to go,just go and don't look back.
Yeah. Chase failure.
You're going to fail.
Expect to fail. Want to fail.
And then be smart enoughand have enough patience
to sit back and reflect, tosay, okay,
(09:57):
what didn't work here?
I'm not going to quit.
I'm just going to pivotand make it better.
So, yeah,get plugged in with the MBA.
Like I said, word Swiftis the Active Directory
over there.
Now you can find his emailon Google if you want to.
And there's a bunch of resourcesout there in order.
And there's a lot of peoplein Auburn
who have built big businessestotally and have lived here
and have retired here.
(10:18):
So, I thinkalways a great resource.
I would start there,but then there's
a bunch of people,you know, in the community
that will will investsome time in is what.
Absolutely.
That's great.
And I will also love to invest,if there's any entrepreneur
out there. There you go.
Not to plug myselfor anything, but go away.
My guy down text email me.
I would love to give backbecause there's
(10:38):
a bunch of people in my lifethat gave back to me. Yeah.
So talking aboutNew Venture accelerator and
then you mentioned Room2Room.
Can you tell us howthat came about?
And then you graduated in 2022?
When everybody else went homeduring Covid,
you were home already?
I was it's,it wasn't a apartment.
Yeah.
You'd have to go too far.
So did you just havesomebody reach out to you
(11:00):
and say, hey,can you ship my stuff back home?
Like, how did how did thiscome to be in a nutshell?
Yeah.
So really,it all goes back to March
18th, 2020.
We all probably knowwhere we were at that week.
Seared into the 80s.
Where were you? Just curious.
Somehow that's aso I was working
for athletics at that time.
I was working for the video teamand I was with,
(11:21):
Oh, were you in Nashville?
I was in Nashvillefor the SEC Men's
Basketball tournament,and we were excited
for that, by the way.
Oh, I know, all because we werewe were good for fresh off
a final for Isaac.
Should we have Capri here?
No. He was.
It was the yearbefore Shareef. Okay.
But yeah, we had likethe second or third, you know,
we're up thereand one of the best
records in basketball.
(11:41):
We started that season,I think it was 16, 15 and.
Oh, we had gone to shootaroundat Bridgestone.
We got on a bus to gofrom Bridgestone
to Vanderbilt for practice.
And which is not I mean, that'snot far at all.
Five mileshalfway through that trip,
BP standsup, turned the bus around
(12:03):
well, hopped on a planeand flew on. Oh, dang.
Pretty brutal.
Were you in an Auburn dorm?
No, I, I rolled spring break.
I was on spring break.
I was in Savannahwith some friends.
We were on the beachand we said, guess what, y'all?
It's going to be two weekslong. Let's cold.
And then, I rememberwe go got back to Auburn
and there were already casesof Covid in Georgia.
(12:24):
And so my parents right.
Just stay in Auburnand they even come home
to back to Birmingham.
Whenever I never went homeI stayed in Auburn
throughout all of that.
Yeah, yeah.
So anyway,anyway, where were you
the correlation.
Thanks for the correlationon spring break, which was that
week of March 18th.
And then Covid is really whyI even have
(12:45):
the opportunity to sit withyou guys a day.
That's reallywhen my life changed.
That's when Ring dream happened.
But on March 18th, 2020,I was in the dugout.
We were playing Wofford.
It was a Wednesday.
Oh, yeah,it was the eighth inning.
And Allen Greene, the 80at the time,
walked in the dugout,which typically doesn't happen
during the game.
It's not a great sign.
No, no, I was on the bench,watching the game.
(13:08):
There was theI think top of the eighth
or bottom in the eighth.
And Allen told us, you know,hey guys, you enjoy
these last two inningsbecause the season
is going to be postponed,which was,
the language at the time.
We're going togo home for a week,
come back, resume play.
So we got shut down.
All my teammates went homeacross the country.
I grabbed my backpack,Walton to Moores Mill,
which is two milesdown the shed.
(13:30):
Not not actually,but I kind of had some.
Might as well.
And, yeah,we posted up for a week.
I kept working out.
I kept throwing,trying to stay in shape
because we thoughtthe season was coming back.
And obviously it never did.
So all the students at Auburnwere told,
hey, you're on spring break.
You can't comeback to your dorm room
(13:50):
to pack up your stuffbecause you might have Covid,
and we don't want you guysbringing Covid
back to Auburn. So,4800 dorm rooms were left as is.
So everyone's bed and sheetsand towels and laptops
and everything were lockedin the dorm rooms.
Aubrey couldn't help it.
The students couldn't help it,and it just was Covid.
So about six weeks later,the season, you know,
(14:13):
was canceled by thenthe world is shut down,
but and I'm at home, I'mstill working as an athlete,
staying in shape.
But I had a lot of timeon my hands, and my mom was kind
of getting tiredof my brother and,
around the college.
So she walks. You can go.
Yeah. Right. Yeah.
So, she's a activemember of Auburn
and she's a realtor.
She sells houses.
She's always trying to help thethe community of Auburn.
(14:34):
And she was on Facebookand these, you know, parent
Facebook groups,class of 22, 23, 25.
And she noticeda little bit active
at that time. I think. Yeah.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
And the biggest topicduring this time was, hey,
my stuff still in the dorm room.
I live in California,I live in Birmingham.
I live not in Auburn.
(14:55):
What can I do about it?
And no one had a great answerbecause no one knew
really the the future.
So mom reached outto a few folks
I we know at Auburn and said,hey, like, you know,
these parents are askingthese questions.
I'd love to help them.
What should I say?
One thing leads to another,and we look up around
May of 2020and people are shipping
their dorm room keysto my parents house
(15:15):
in Mooresville.
My brother and I, with Orbitzpermission.
They're going into the dormswith masks and gloves on.
Wow. And UPS boxes.
We're packing them up.
We're taking ups.
We're shipping themliterally all across
the country.
Absolutely.
And so, so 4000dorm rooms over a summer.
It was fun.
It wasn't a company.
It was the Auburn familyhelping Auburn family.
(15:37):
And it was a momtrying to get her kids
out of the housefor being honest.
Not a bad workoutto, I would imagine.
Pretty good workout.
These are in Auburnas you guys. Yeah, yeah.
It was special though, you know,we enjoyed it.
It gave my brotherand I something to do.
Again, it wasn't the company.
We were reallycharging anything.
It's UPS, charges, something.
We would send him a receipt.
(15:58):
Maybe we got a tip,but it was more or less
just keeping us busyhelping Auburn.
And that was the start of a roomduring while
absolutely incredible,was one of the things
that I talked about itmore times.
I count it has come upon this podcast
even more is The Creed.
And so much of just like Auburnhelping Auburn,
it's what you do.
It's what we do.
There's a need.
Let's fill it right.
(16:19):
And that's just likeso ingrained
into what you're sayingand what you've done.
It's it's hard not to see it.
It's so plainly obvious to me,which is really incredible.
Right.
And so I'm sure rewarding.
Yeah. Definitely. Definitely.
And it's, it's kind of naturalfor us all when people tell you
you're here in schoolfor 4 or 5 years, you feel it,
(16:40):
you see it, and naturallywhen it's on your, you know,
lap like it was for us,the only call to action
just to help Auburn people.
Yeah, that's kind ofwhat we were looking at.
So you're doing this forhow long were you just doing
this?
Like, let me just help peoplewhere they need it. Yeah.
All summer.
So Covid cut from May to Augustwhen school started.
(17:01):
Because then Auburncame back in session.
And August soon as 3or 4 months of packing up dorm.
So when did itconvert from a thing?
I'm just doing to help peoplewhen they shipped me a key to
I can turn this intoa company. Yeah. Business.
I would say my brother and Ihad some good conversations
during the summer.
You know,you're stuck in the dorm
(17:22):
room, had some free time.
Yeah.
So we talked about.
Could this be something?
But again, I wasI was a baseball player
at the time, so.
And he actually was to at Troy.
So, school came back in sessionin August.
I went backto being a finance student
and a juniornow playing baseball,
which is a big yearin baseball. Junior.
So a draft year.
(17:42):
So I'm training. And,you know what?
I really startedto think about it
that fall, though.
That was when I took thethe business classes.
And that's when I met Louand the new venture accelerator
and then the Halloweenpitch competition,
which is something thatAuburn puts on.
It's basically like Shark Tankfor Auburn that.
Yeah.
You know, I took the ideathat Brady and I had
(18:04):
put it on paper.
Well, maybe we couldhave a college movie company
and pitched it at Halloweenpitch competition
and then pitched it at,at Tiger Cage in the spring.
But again, therethere was no LLC,
there was no company.
There was just a small vision.
If baseball didn't work out,maybe I could help
some college kids move.
Our baseball season waspretty rough that year.
So the next spring,our spring 21,
(18:27):
we weren't playing great.
Personally,I wasn't playing great.
And, I, I came back to my lockerone day in probably mid March
to a few text messagesafter practice,
some random numbersI really never seen before.
And, the consensus was,Hey Brooks, you know,
this is so-and-sofrom California.
You help move my daughter'sdorm room last summer.
Could you do it again?
(18:48):
Yeah.
The next person was like,hey, this person told me,
have a movie company.
Can I hire you to open? Wow.
And as a junior, 21 yearold baseball player,
I didn't text him back.
I was too busy.
Right?
Hey, you know,it's baseball or nothing.
Yeah, now you got to get it.
So I didn't textthe first group back.
Well, after a week,I had about 40 people
trying to hirethis movie company
(19:08):
that didn't even exist.
That's nuts.
So that's when I knewwe probably had something.
But my problem, I had wasI didn't have the time
to be the moverbecause I'm in the height
of baseball season.
We're traveling.
Yeah, we're going to placeslike Athens, Georgia,
Tuscaloosa, Gainesville.
So I had the timeto put it together on the bus,
the plane, the hotel.
I didn't have time to move it.
So we ran a small beta test.
(19:31):
I was behind thescenes putting it together
and a few of my buddiesfrom Auburn were the movers,
and I think we went like13 for 13 on May.
Move outs.
The the clients liked it.
The good.
They played good. Right?
Yeah.
We'll take that back to school.
And when that worked I knewwe had to do something.
So baseball seasonended in May of 21,
(19:53):
and Rendering Moverswas officially incorporated
with insurance websitemarketing in June of 21.
And from there,you know, it's it's 2026 now,
the last four and a half yearshas included,
a bunch of team membersjoining the team,
bringing on a playersfive stars, bunch of technology.
A lot of marketing,and then some expansion
(20:15):
to to the SEC schools.
Really the one we're at rightnow was Ole Miss, but,
I guess that's thethe quick elevator pitch
of how room to startedwhere we're at today.
That's awesome.
Absolutely, bro.
I think it's so cool.
Like was that was that I don'twant to do the math here,
but that's been five years,you know, said six years
since you're just movingrandom people to.
(20:36):
Now, if I told youthen where you end up,
you would have laughed at me.
You're walking outthe room, right?
Because that's a it'sa crazy journey,
but absolutely incredible.
And what a awesomesuccess story. Yeah.
Well thank you.
And six years ago was comingthat just loudly next to six
six years next month.
Yeah.
Let's not let's not remember.
It's crazy.
Let's not relivethat interruption.
(20:57):
Yeah.
What we Donhas some literature here.
Yeah. We want to brag on you.
This is very similar to.
We've hada couple professors on here,
and we always read the,write my professors,
if you will.
So this is as close to that.
This is with classesas we can break. My movers.
Yeah, let's let's headmove right by movers.
So you have fiveout of five stars
of Google reviews.
(21:18):
By the way, if you didn't knowgraduation.
Congratulations. Very.
And over 160 reviews.
This is a greatthis is a business owner.
This is a great.
He knows he knows he's checking.
He's a great day.
I might have lookedthis morning.
Well yeah. Yeah.
But some examples.
So this is fromsomebody named Christine
coming from out of state.
We're in the roomand my daughter's dorm
move and extremely easy.
(21:38):
They were courteousand incredibly easy
to work with.
Moving daycould not have gone smoother.
From a guy named Michael.
They showed up,got everything moved,
cleaned up and disappeared.
Just what we wanted.
And highly recommend thisif you've got a little.
It's the best.
How does that make you feel?
Now?
I just knowing that, you know,you have satisfied customers.
(21:59):
You're helpingthe Auburn family.
But now to know to thatyou're expanding across the SEC
and now you're at Ole Miss too.
So you're just helping people.
I mean, in multiple locations.
What is that like?
Yeah, I mean God is good.
That's a that's a group effortright there.
Yeah.
So, I'm getting to speakabout it today, but
that's the sales teammaking the good sale
(22:20):
comfortable sale.
That's a marketing teamletting these clients
know about us beforehand.
That's the operations team.
Train the movers to move it.
I guess. Disappear.
Right? Right.
And it's technology,allowing the client
to book online and getting thecorrect information
to the mover.
It's a board of advisorsadvising me and the team
about what we should do next.
It's accounting.
(22:41):
Keep it up to the books,and it's everyone. Yeah.
But that's special.
That's that'sprobably my favorite
part of business.
Is looking at my phone,seeing someone leave,
you know, a satisfaction,comment or a five
star review like that.
That's that's really cool.
Yeah.
So, yeah, we take pride in it.
We, we we studyChick-Fil-A a lot,
(23:01):
and we try and modela lot of the stuff
we do around customer serviceand operational excellence
around. My pleasure. Guy.
Yeah.
That that pleasure. Yeah.
But no, we really dotake a lot of pride in, in
getting clients to to enjoy theRoom2Room experience like that.
Those 2 or 3 did.
Yeah, absolutely.
Well, I rememberI mean for so many
(23:23):
I mean maybe this is likeyou probably,
you know, just breakout of your back yard.
But moving into college,especially as a freshman,
can be, a lot of words.
Datingis probably one of the best.
And so it was ait was an experience.
I was in college for six years.
Do you know how many timesI moved?
It was probably,what, 7 or 8? Six now?
(23:43):
Yeah.
Yeah, I wish I would have known.
It is a new it is a reallystressful time.
It's moving is stressful.
Yeah. Right.
Moving to college,especially if you're a freshman,
is extremely stressful.
Or if you're transitioning from,you know, maybe an upperclassmen
go from the dormto an apartment,
like there's always likethat is a big change.
(24:04):
And often the first timeyou've done that. Yeah.
And to have one less thing,there's a lot of things
to worry about.
But you just have like oneless thing to worry about
is incredible.
Like, I can only imagine,because I remember my move was,
did that one myself,my me and myself and my parents
and I think my grandparentsdid that move,
I think, and everything.
(24:25):
It was.
That was a lot.
Yeah, it's a lot of fun,but it was a lot.
I don't knowif I'd want to redo it
necessarily either. Right.
It is a lot nowif you think about it.
I mean, a freshman, there's aschool and they're here
for 4 or 5 years, maybe six.
I was in grad school, soI wasn't just that.
Yeah, but but typicallythey are moving every year.
(24:47):
Yeah. Yeah.
Because they're, you know,they go from the dorms
to the brand new apartmentto a house off campus.
So we have a, you know,a very unique opportunity
to welcome them.
Day one, tell them where you goand then to tell the parents
and the familyespecially, like, hey,
we have a safe, proficient,uncomfortable experience
if you need it.
Some people can be themselves.
(25:09):
But trust me,for the out of state
parents, you know, hey,you don't have to
come to Auburn.
You don't have to bookthe flight not to take the taxi.
You don't haveto spend the money
on restaurants and shoppingwith your daughter
and your wife.
If you want to trusta local service
and render a weekend offand be here for you
from freshman yearto senior year,
and there's a bunchof value in that.
(25:29):
So that's kind of ourmodel in a nutshell, is
how many timescan we serve that student
and how how great can we beduring those 4 or 5 years?
Yeah.
Another thingI wanted to mention as well,
if you're any doing any drivein from Auburn,
Birmingham, up towardsNashville, going up
the direction up 65might see some,
familiar branding upon some billboards.
You guys have been doingsome work with some athletes,
(25:51):
if I'm not mistaken.
Yes. That's correct.
All right. Walk me.
What's the initial worldlook like from a marketing
side of things?
Because that's the more you useexpanded into that realm.
That was fun.
My last year at Auburnwas the first year of any,
you know, so I got to seethe ground level
that's changed drastically.
Shortens. Yeah.
(26:11):
As you go. Right? Yeah.
It's a very hot topic.
I think it's greatfor the players,
but it's also greatfor local brands
and national brands.
But as a local brand,we try and do our research.
You know, who's the best player?
Who has the bestbrand on social media
followers engagement to.
They already do and will.
(26:32):
So we we'reconstantly monitoring,
looking for opportunities.
And then we reach outand see if it's a good fit.
You know, some athletes,they're not really into it.
Some athletes eat it up.
It really is a caseby case basis.
But our goal in Nilis to number one,
promote the athlete.
So I would love for KeyshawnHall, for example,
who's on a billboard right now.
(26:53):
Auburn starting shooting guard.
I would love for himto get some initial deals
because someone saw his faceon the room
during Billboard, right?
So that's going number one.
If the athlete doesn't enjoy itand they don't
soak it up and heat it upand get deals from
it, it's not going to work.
Then.
Number two,it does help with branding.
So to have your namenext to one all over
basketball's best players,one of the best players
in the country, it helps.
(27:14):
Yeah. Yeah.
So that's that'skind of our strategy there.
We love that.
We also dosome influences your work.
So some sweaty girls,some fraternity guys, some
some college studentson each campus.
We'll do our same research.
If it's a good brandand we we trust them.
They trust us.
It's it's kind of a similarset up there, but, no.
And it great.
I think it's great for everyone.
(27:34):
And we'll continue to do it.
So I used towork in athletics. Right.
And I kind ofand I used to do all the,
the media shoots and stuff,which I know
you've done as well.
I'm sure we've,I've done them with you.
I can, you know,they all blend together.
But to be able to be kind ofon the other side
of the business sidethat, you know, to see, like,
oh, let's get the photography,let's get the media,
(27:54):
let's get the branding.
It's got to bean interesting experience.
Having seen itto a certain degree
from the athlete side of things.
Yeah. Very helpful.
I understandthe athletes are on a
pretty tight schedule.
Yeah.
So we communicatethat with the team like,
hey, let's let's be prepared.
When the influenceror athlete gets here,
it's time to go.
(28:14):
And our goalis to get them in and out
as quickly as possible.
As long as we havequality content,
they get 6.5 minutes.
Yeah, yeah.
So yeah, it definitely help.
Just like it helpswhen I was, you know,
playing baseball,I got to see, you know,
we have a different perspectiveother than maybe
most businesses do it.
But yeah, our goal ismake it efficient, make it fun.
(28:35):
And then to make it, youknow, really high
quality content.
Awesome. Puffed up.
All right, well, let me ask youthe tough question then
break out the crystal ball.
Yeah.
What's you know,you're a few years
into this now.
What are the next few yearskind of look like.
Yeah.
I mean, we're excited.
Our team's mottothis year is chase failure.
(28:56):
So love that.
Have you guys have youever heard of that before?
I mean, that one specifically.
I have not,but I some facsimiles I'm sure.
But yeah, please, please.
I have never heard of itbefore either.
We went to aleadership conference as an
executive team in December,and the speaker
was talking to us about,you know, coming up
on the New year and people setresolutions and goals.
(29:17):
And he said, set your goalsand expect to accomplish them.
Go chase failure.
Expect to fail.
When you fail at something,you gotta look back and say,
why did I feel?
Which means you going to learnhow to do it.
And then hopefullywhen you learn, you get better
for the next time.
So,we're going to chase failure.
(29:38):
I don't know if that meansevery college
in the next 12 monthsor 36 months,
or 48 months or ten years,20 years.
But that is our goal, ourour slogan under
our logo is servingcollege talents.
So I believe with the teamand the technology,
and the operation,why not try and chase failure
and get to every college townever? Yeah.
(29:58):
So again,I don't know the timeline.
I'm not making any promises,but if you do a
little in stone today. Yeah.
If you werelooking at a crystal ball,
and this is not just mespeaking.
This is our whole team,all the families
that are involvedduring the year.
And we definitely want to bethe, the,
the movers in college townsacross the country
and maybe across the globeone day.
All right, well, we're gettingon there on time, but I want to
(30:19):
give you a chance.
This is your this is your plug.
This is your chanceto really kind of get it right.
To get in touch with you,find you socials, website,
where, whereif we want to get in touch
with you, where's the best placeto find it?
Yeah.
I mean, best place is,is Google Google Room2Room.
You can learn about the websitewe've built technology
where you don'thave to call the office
(30:41):
to book a news.
You can go in there,build your inventory,
picture date, you can reschedulein your portal, you can cancel.
You can sharecoupons with friends.
So that's where I would urgepeople if you need a move
or you wantto learn about the Room2Room
story, just Google us.
Room2Room Movers.
We do a lot on social mediawith influencers
and denial deals and stuff,so hopefully you'll
(31:01):
see us there,if we're doing our part
as a marketing team.
And then we would loveyour support.
It's a really cool journey.
Started with Covid.
Now we're expanding to,you know, Ole Miss
and other college towns.
So we'd love you guys to,to keep up with us
and play a partin our journey as well.
Awesome.
What we want to, thank youfor all the work you've done.
(31:21):
And what a great exampleof what Auburn means.
And the creed means manifest,right?
You know, post-grad alumhelping out the next generation
of students and Auburnalum and the Auburn family.
And you've donesome incredible work.
So we want tothank you for doing that
and appreciateyou spending time with us.
Tell us about it.
It's really awesome to hear.
Thank you for having me.
Thank you. Sir.
(31:42):
We want to thank youfor joining us.
We'll be back again next monthwith another member
of the Auburn family right here.
You can see us hereon YouTube if you like. What?
You heard.
You like what you saw.
I want to see more of us.
I mean, who wouldn'twant to, right?
We got more.
We got many, many episodesgoing back a couple years now.
So you can go back and listento some more awesome things
we be able to talk about.
And then till then,we'll see you next time.
(32:04):
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