July 15, 2025 • 50 mins
Have you ever wondered how some family businesses not only survive but thrive across generations? In this captivating conversation, Tucker Yarbrough reveals the remarkable journey of Yarbrough & Sons, a home service company that's grown from a $4.5 million business to pacing at $13 million by staying true to their roots while embracing innovation.
Tucker opens up about being a "trade baby" – growing up in the business his parents founded in 1988, stepping away as his parents encouraged, and then finding his way back alongside his brothers. What makes this story particularly compelling is how three brothers with different strengths have created clearly defined roles that leverage their individual talents. Will's systems-orientation, Colby's sales expertise, and Tucker's financial and marketing acumen combine to create a leadership team that's greater than the sum of its parts.
The conversation takes a fascinating turn when Tucker challenges conventional wisdom about branding in the home service industry. Rather than chasing trendy designs or constantly rebranding, Yarbrough & Sons embraced their traditional red and blue "sun and snowflake" logo as part of their legacy identity. This consistency has paid dividends, with their brand becoming so established that competitors now appear derivative of them, not the other way around.
Perhaps most revolutionary is their approach to marketing and pricing transparency. Tucker shares why they've moved away from pay-per-click advertising after discovering their branded leads convert at 3.5 to 4 times higher value. He also details their groundbreaking GetQuote tool, which provides instant online estimates to potential customers – a direct challenge to the industry's standard "call for pricing" model that frustrates so many consumers.
Whether you're running a family business, working in the trades, or simply interested in authentic branding strategies, this episode offers invaluable insights on creating lasting success through transparency, consistent values, and strong leadership. Ready to rethink how you approach your business and brand? Listen now and discover why caring about your brand more than anyone else creates unstoppable growth.
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From the Yellow Chair is powered by Lemon Seed, a marketing strategy and branding company for the trades. Lemon Seed specializes in rebrands, creating unique, comprehensive, organized marketing plans, social media, and graphic design. Learn more at www.LemonSeedMarketing.com
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:07):
Oh, what's up?
Lemonheads, Welcome to anotherepisode of From the Yellow Chair
.
I am Crystal, again riding solohere in our lemonade stand.
I cannot wait to talk to youguys today about trade babies
that's what I call us, and youcan see very few of us that are
actually in that club, but weknow what it's like growing up
working with family, loving theindustry for the passion that it
(00:30):
brings, the culture that itallows us and, honestly, how,
thanks to great customers in ourlocal markets, we're able to
feed and clothe and love on ourfamilies and have a great career
in our little areas where a lotof times we grew up in.
So I hope you grab your glassof lemonade, sit down so that we
can talk all about familybusiness branding and the sales
process.
Let's sip some lemonade.
(00:50):
Hey, sounds great.
Speaker 2 (00:56):
I love the Lemonheads .
Speaker 1 (00:58):
Oh yeah, what's up?
Lemonheads, that's our jam here.
So we have on our podcast todayTucker Yarbrough, which I have
been fangirling.
You guys so good marketingnotices, good marketing all the
time.
So, and you and I really metseveral times at some events or
service nation Alliance, whichif anybody's a long time
(01:19):
listener from the yellow chair,they know huge fan of service
nation Alliance and there's someother best practice groups that
really do some great things.
But really got to see Tuckerand I feel like I knew Tucker
before.
Tucker was cool.
Speaker 2 (01:33):
Yeah, you're on the come up.
Speaker 1 (01:36):
Yeah, meaning like I watched you guys like start
figuring it out, like we were inthe same boat, like Trey and I,
so my brother and I and you andyour brothers right Y'all were
everybody was just trying tofigure this thing out.
And I think you have a lot moreof my personality where you
love to talk it, you love tolove on people.
I think we all come fromChristian values and morals and
(01:57):
so we really just kind ofconnected over that and just
would kind of stay in touch alittle bit here and there.
But watching you guys build, uh, yalbro and Sons there in
Oklahoma has been so fun for meto watch.
Speaker 2 (02:08):
Yeah, we're, you know , trying to follow in the
footsteps of uh of giants.
You know it's uh, we had a.
We had a great foundation laidfrom from our parents and your
dad.
He's still in the business fulltime and so he's he's starting
to take some days off, but, uh,you know, he's still running
around up here having fun withus.
But I mean, yeah, I think itwas probably what five, six
years ago that we really kind ofmet and connected.
So I was an overgrown23-year-old trying to figure it
(02:32):
out and didn't think anythingwas a bad idea.
And seeing you guys atMcWilliams do what y'all did,
that was a huge.
I mean, it was a green light.
You don't need permission to dothings in marketing and branding
, but it's nice when you seepeople of kindred spirit and
kindred values doing similarstuff to you, you know, it kind
of gives you that marker of hey,okay, I think I'm on the right
(02:54):
path here.
Speaker 1 (02:55):
Oh, yeah, well, thank you so much.
It's very kind.
I just I recognize that youguys.
Just there was just somethingspecial about you guys, so
whether it was Jesus or justgood content or the combination
of both, I recognized it.
So, tucker, I know that.
I mean, I think a lot of peopleshould know you if they don't.
So tell us a little bit, justlike about who you are and kind
of the makeup of your business.
(03:16):
I think that's important to ourstory today.
Speaker 2 (03:18):
Yeah, absolutely so.
First and foremost, you've hitthe nail on the head.
I'm a Christ follower.
Foremost, you've hit the nailon the head.
I'm a Christ follower and youknow.
That is the core of who I am.
The onus of, kind of everythingthat I do is through that lens.
You know my family, you knowall of us.
We are believers and you knownot that we're a Christian quote
, unquote company.
However, if you work here, workalongside us and work in
(03:40):
proximity with us long enough,you're going to hear about Jesus
in one way, shape or another,and so that's kind of where I
want to start from.
But beyond that, you know.
So, growing up in the trades,like you said, we're in an elite
group of people trade babies,and so growing up you know mom
and dad.
They started the business in1988 and you know grew and
(04:01):
rocked along and grew to a shopof oh gosh, I think probably 10,
12 people in 1999.
And that's when, like theservice experts, roll up was
happening.
And you know, dad, he was moreon the commercial side of the
HVAC world and he had a coupleof contracts that went long on
him.
And so at that time mom and daddecided, ok, well, I think we
should try it, we should sell,go work for service experts.
(04:24):
And Yarbrough's continued tooperate because I think dad was
leasing out ice machines to alocal grocery store, to local
gas stations we still claim 88as our founding, and after two
years of working in the serviceexperts world, dad decided you
know what?
I don't think I'm such a badmanager after all.
And so my oldest brother forperspective, Will Will, was born
in 1990.
(04:44):
Colby, middle brother, was bornin 92.
And then I was born in 96.
Speaker 1 (04:47):
And so we grew up in the business and for anybody
listening to that like I'm sorrythat these people were born in
the 90s.
Speaker 2 (04:58):
As much weight as it puts on the folks who are older
than that.
You know it's the same feeling.
You walk into a room who areolder than that, you know it's
the same feeling.
You walk into a room, you knowI remember walking into the
we're kind of going off trackhere but walking into a one of
the first Service Nation eventsthat I went to, and you know, a
lot of times I was riding solobecause Will and Colby were in
the sales seat and trying to,you know, get that off the
ground and help grow thebusiness.
So a lot of times I was, I wasriding to these Service Nation
(05:20):
events solo and so walking intoa room full of seasoned
contractors that are, all youknow, 45 plus as a 23 year old,
and you're telling them you gotall these bright ideas you know
it's an intimidating room towalk into.
Speaker 1 (05:35):
Oh yes, I know, trey lived that life too, like we've
never done it that way or we'veall tried that and it didn't
work.
So for sure, for sure.
Sorry to take us off track, noworries.
Speaker 2 (05:40):
So and then in 01, they decided you know what,
we're not such a bad managerafter all.
And dad told the I think, toldmy mom the consummate lie that I
think all trades professionalstell, which is don't worry,
honey, this time we'll staysmall, we'll only take care of
the people that I can take careof, and we'll rock from there.
And you know, and you know thisas well as all of the listeners
(06:02):
know this If you take care ofpeople really well meaning your
team and your customers, workfinds you, word gets out and
money will follow that kind ofculture.
And so they grew from startingover pretty much zero in 01 to
about 2015, 2016,.
Stuck at the five to four and ahalf million dollar mark.
And all the while, mom and dadtold me, will and Colby I think
(06:25):
it was the great reversepsychology trick of the century
which was hey, go do somethingelse, there's got to be an
easier way to make a living.
The HVAC and plumbing world, thetrade space, is hard work.
There's got to be an easier wayto make a living.
And, ultimately, we want you todo what God calls you to do.
So the standard, the goal, youknow, wasn't hey, come back and
(06:46):
work for the Heat and Air Shop.
It was hey, go, do what Godwants to do and be a productive
member of society.
That was kind of the floor, andso by 2018, me, will and Colby
had all found our way back tothe old Heat and Air Shop.
We joined the Service NationAlliance in 2018 and then really
started to grow from there, andover the last six, seven years,
we've gone from a four and ahalf million dollar company to
(07:08):
this year we're closing on.
We're probably pacing for about13 million and so trying to
grow and, like I said, followingthe footsteps of some giants.
Speaker 1 (07:18):
Oh my gosh.
Well, listen, I love this storybecause you know what it
reminds me of is being steepedin history, like when you
understand where you came fromand what you've been through,
and just a little nod to ourother contractors that may be
listening that you know,honestly, everybody goes through
like trials and tribulations.
We all try things that don'twork.
(07:38):
We have to pivot.
We get like imposter syndrome,like I can't be a manager of
this, like who?
Why was I thinking that?
To just like your dad had thatcome back around moment, to wait
a minute, I'm not such a badleader after all.
And so just reminding everybodythat most journeys are not full
of straight and narrow.
They're definitely full ofturns and bumps and things.
Speaker 2 (08:01):
That's one of the things I tell dad is he's just,
he's just a, he's just a 40 yearovernight success.
I mean, that's all it is.
40 year overnight success,that's all it took.
Speaker 1 (08:09):
Well, and you know, like you know, I am so guilty of
this.
You know, social media becomespeople's highlight reels and so
they're on their like best monthever and I'm like, okay, and I
look at maybe a client orsomebody who's really doing
great things and they're growingvery intentionally, but it's
not these skyrocketed numbersand they get discouraged and I'm
(08:29):
like, man, you don't know, youdon't know you think overnight
they built these companies and alot of people do build them
quickly, but it's not withoutrisk or without money or
investors, or there's always astory there, Right?
So kudos to those that are juststeadfast and strong, like
running the race veryintentionally, honestly, very
virtuously, and just doing goodthings.
(08:52):
So I love to hear that story.
So I know that, speaking, youknow this whole family, you know
bond that you guys have.
So it was my dad, my grandpa,then my dad, then my brother,
and then my brother and I andnow my sister owns a pest
control company.
So we all live in this homeservice industry life.
So I know your brothers kind ofhold some different roles.
So like, who sits at what seatat the table?
Speaker 2 (09:14):
Yeah, so that is, we are now at the size of company
where an org chart is becomingvery necessitated, not because
we've got overlapping orcompeting egos or anything like
that.
Me, will and Colby someperspective.
And I hate giving this answerto folks at the trade shows and
(09:34):
stuff, because a lot of times soI've spoken at breakout
sessions, I've done stuff atService Nation, things like that
.
I do some coaching as well, andone of the questions that I get
, because we're a familybusiness, is you kind of get
pigeonholed.
I'm sure you get similar,similar feeling which is like
you kind of get that pigeonholeof like, okay, how do you make a
family business work?
And you know and my answer alot of times isn't super helpful
(09:56):
it's, you know, it's parent.
Well, it's, you know, thisdynamic that me, will and Colby
have didn't start when we alljoined the business.
This dynamic started when wewere, you know, six years old
and 12 years old.
And you know and I tell thisstory all the time but one of my
favorite stories is it's justburning my memories we were
(10:17):
driving home from the office oneday and I was probably six,
which would have made, you know,colby probably around nine, and
then Will would have been12-ish and me and Colby.
Me and Colby are similarpersonalities, except we're on
opposite ends of the spectrum.
So we always have a similarends but it's always different
means.
And so Colby and I would argue,we'd bicker a lot as kids.
And there was one time mom was,I guess she'd had her fill for
(10:39):
the day, and she was driving usall home and she slammed on the
brakes.
We were bickering and all of usthrew forward and she snapped
her head around and she said hey, I don't care if you like each
other, but you will love eachother.
Um, and that's kind of like thebaseline of like me, will and
Colby.
Like that's a core memory forall of us.
And so the seats that we holdat Yarbrough and Sons are
indicative of of that respectfor one another.
(11:01):
That's Hey's.
Hey, we might not like eachother right now, in this moment,
we might have differing ofopinions.
However, at the end of the day,like I love you, I respect you
and I want the best for us, um,and so that is a like getting to
this point.
You know, it's been a 29 yearjourney of figuring out how to
foster the relationship betweenme and colby.
But where are we setting thebusiness right now is we're
(11:23):
actually more defining some ofthose roles.
So we're in the process of thiswill be the first time I've
said it publicly.
So how about that?
Will is going to be moving fromWill's kind of a pinch hitter
between residential sales andcommercial sales.
Will is a very systems drivenindividual.
Will likes to see things in aprocess.
(11:43):
He wants an SOP, he wants tosee a thread pull it and tie it
off tight, and so we're in theprocess of moving Will over into
our GM spot.
So Will's going to take over asour GM.
I'm still I'm operating as ourCFO Right now.
I've been our CFO slash GM andI've been doing a poor job of
GMing.
I fly at 60,000 feet and 100miles an hour and I'm going to
(12:05):
get a process implemented to adecent degree, and then I'm
going to take off running againand I don't do a great job of
tying off those leads tight.
So Will's going to be moving tothat GM seat.
Colby is a residential salesfull-time and Colbyby we're
moving him over into ourdirector of sales position.
(12:27):
He's still gonna be selling,but also wearing the hat of
director of sales and getting.
We've got two commercial projectmanagers as well as another
residential sales guy that he'llbe managing as well as himself
as far as processes and all ofthat and really taking more
attention with getting him inthe truck with some of our
technicians and teaching themhey, here's the sales process,
here's the why.
And teaching them hey, here'sthe sales process, here's the
why behind what we're doing andhere's how we can find success
(12:49):
together in this.
And so we're kind of goingthrough a little bit of a org
chart restructuring as we speak.
But it's exciting times becausewe're trying to catapult our
growth.
We want to three and four Xover the next five six years and
we want to do it the right way.
We want to do it in a way that'ssustainable for our team.
You know, because ultimatelyour goal and you know our goal I
(13:11):
say it's our goal but it's apersonal mission statement of
mine that I wrote back incollege.
I was prompted by a professorto do this and he said you know,
write a personal professionalmission statement which is kind
of the directing mantra for yourprofessional life.
And so for me, I see thepurpose of my professional life
is to create success for others.
I would rather enjoy a lesserpeak with more of my team than a
(13:33):
higher one alone.
And so it's about the team.
It's about creating success forthose people, whether that be
wealth or whether that be timeoff, whatever that looks like
but create success for thepeople who've spent their lives
working alongside us atYarbrough, uncensored, because
we have a seven and a half to 10year tenure at any given time.
You know we're sticky Peoplestick with us, and so they
(13:55):
choose to make a career here andwe don't take that lightly.
Speaker 1 (13:58):
Wow, I love this.
And you know, y'all also have adedicated marketing person, yep
, right.
So again, like when we werefirst doing this at McWilliams,
people thought we were crazy.
Speaker 2 (14:09):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (14:09):
They were like what do you mean?
Do you have a full time?
Like this is what you do, fulltime.
And I'm like absolutely mybrother did.
You know he was very, you know,efficiency driven, and so one
of the things that he said to mewas you know, you always can
take, probably can take on morework.
So I would many times I wouldthink I don't know that I can
(14:32):
keep like up with all thiscommunity marketing and video
marketing and social media andall you know dealing with all of
our co-op dollars and brandprotection.
I mean, you know it just getsso thick in there.
But he kept saying you knowit's prioritized and organized,
and so that was really a keything for us.
And then you guys have Bryceright.
Speaker 2 (14:52):
Yeah, yep Bryce.
Speaker 1 (14:54):
And so it's a full-time employee, that his
sole job is working on yourmarketing, and what all does he
do?
Speaker 2 (14:59):
Yeah.
So I remember that was, youknow, talk about like the shock
in the industry of like you havea full-time marketing person at
your size, you know we wereright at nine million, maybe
just under nine, whenever webrought him in.
I remember making that pitch tomy dad.
You know it's, you know dad's a, he's a quick adopter to
(15:20):
technology, you know.
But even you know him, it's ahe's.
He's an old school contractor,it's a show up, do the work, and
you know, but he sees the valueof the, of the marketing.
And so I remember pitching thatto him.
I'm like, okay, we've got to do, we've got to do more.
I can't handle.
You know, at that time it was,you know, cfo, bad GM and
director of marketing were kindof the hats that I was wearing
(15:41):
and it wasn't going well, youknow, and I was doing all that I
could, you know.
But I knew that there was justthis another level that I wanted
to get to as far as brandubiquity and putting out content
that entertains people and thateducates people and that makes
us the company that people like,so that whenever they think of
a home service that they need,we come to mind.
(16:03):
And so Bryce had done a.
He'd been a journalist and thena videographer and he had shot
a couple commercials for us.
I'd freelanced him and at theend of one of the commercials I
asked him, as he was packing upall of his stuff.
I said you know, bryce, this isa very forward question, very
poignant question, and tellingme to pound sand is an
(16:25):
acceptable answer, but it's atwo-parter.
First, do you like your jobwhere you're currently at?
He kind of hemmed and hawed,and then I said secondly, how
much do you make?
And he told me how much he made, and so that kind of gave me a
basis of where we needed tostart, where we needed to be
kind of entering in at, and thenneeded to start where we needed
(16:50):
to be kind of entering in at,and uh, and then, so it wasn't
long after that uh, that we, youknow, made a job offer to him
and he joined the company andhe's been with us, uh, four
years now.
Speaker 1 (16:55):
So, yeah, and I listen.
You know I'm passionate aboutthis um, about how people
discredit marketing.
They think that like anyone intheir office can do it, and then
they're like super frustratedwhen things don't work.
And listen, if you think aboutthis, I want to ask this one
question to you Y'all, rowanSons only relied on paid ads and
website.
How successful do you thinky'all would be?
At the right place you are now.
Speaker 2 (17:15):
No.
Speaker 1 (17:17):
And so I try to tell contractors this every single
day of my life.
Web and digital is superimportant piece of your strategy
.
Don't sleep on it.
Be intentional about it, investin it, but it cannot be where
you die.
Speaker 2 (17:35):
Yeah, you will die.
It's a quick path.
I'll take it a step further.
Even Over the last, probablytwo years, I mean we've, we've
pretty much seen ourselves outof, out of the PPC world.
We're, we're, we're just, weare conscientious objectors, we
are just choosing not toparticipate.
One, because private equity ispouring so much money into it
(17:56):
that you know the cost per lead,mathematically it doesn't make
sense.
And so, and then we did an auditon all of our, all of our leads
and conversions and saw OK, ifsomebody comes in, you know,
this wasn't clarity that wewould have had, you know, five,
six years ago.
So you've got to startsomewhere.
So the contractor who doesn'thave this, start pulling this
(18:16):
thread tight because it's, Imean, it's worth its weight in
gold, which is get clarity onwhere your leads are coming from
.
Which is, get clarity on whereyour leads are coming from.
And I don't mean there's a fineline between laissez-faireness
in your marketing and, likehyper-efficiency and trying to
make sure that like, oh, I wantto track every dollar.
We need to be somewhere in thatmuddy middle where we know
about where they came from, butthere's still some vibes to how
(18:37):
our branding works.
There's some things that you'rejust not going to be able to
track and you have to be okaywith that.
But we did an audit on where didour leads come from and how did
they convert and we saw, okay,if they were coming through a
paid source like PPC really andtruly it was PPC and direct mail
or if they were coming througha branded source and our branded
ads converted at like a threeand a half to four times higher
value for us than that of a PPCslash direct mail ad.
(19:02):
So and of course it does it'seasy to say that now, but saying
that to somebody who that'stheir whole lifeblood, it's a
hard thing.
It's not going to be a flipthat you just switch overnight.
It's been a transition ofgetting off of paid ads and more
into putting money intobranding for us.
So it wasn't just this binarydecision, it was okay.
We have to slowly starttransitioning to this so that we
(19:23):
can drive more and more brandedconversions because, look, the
math shows that it's worth threeand a half to four times higher
value for us than that of ageneric ad.
And they have loyalty becausethey found us through Yarbrough
and Sons or you know, trying tofind, or one of the infinite
various misspellings ofYarbrough and Sons.
Speaker 1 (19:43):
Well, and I can imagine I mean you're right.
So it's really a game Like.
We get confronted all the timeit's like my marketing doesn't
work.
And 99% of the time when theystart talking to Lemon Seed and
just to be clear, lemon Seed andYarbrough Suns do not work
together.
I just recognize good marketingwhen I see it and so you know.
But we talk to clients all thetime who are like my marketing
(20:11):
doesn't work and when I get downto it it's a PPC problem.
They have invested 10, 15,$20,000 a month in PPC as a $2,
$3 million contractor andthey're like it's not working.
And I'm like because that's nota smart way to do business,
that's not a smart way for us todo marketing.
You know Lemon Seed has thisthree bucket approach to
marketing, kind of like a budget.
Everything has a place andeverything has a clear set of
(20:32):
expectations of how it's goingto perform.
So it's super important to methat clients really understand
the importance of a holisticmarketing strategy.
So I know that we go on and on.
Speaker 2 (20:48):
I want to touch on just one thing on it.
I think we had a Facebookexchange you and I did about
this similarly just a coupledays ago, which is one of the
things that I have coachedcontractors and talked to
contractors about this, abouttheir marketing, their
financials and leadership,things like that.
But one of the things that,like the hill that I will die on
and you will as well, I'mcertain of it, with Lemon Seed
(21:09):
even is to the contractor outthere, like Lemon Seed is
fantastic.
They are great at what they do.
They cannot, just, by functionof their position, cannot care
more about your marketing thanyou do as the contractor.
Marketing than you do as thecontractor.
You have to care more about yourbrand.
You have to care more aboutwhat you come off as than anyone
else that you're going to hire,because everyone else that you
(21:30):
bring in is an additive to, nota supplement for.
So when you bring lemon seed in, when you bring in a marketing
company or a coach or whatever,the most that they will ever be
able to do is an added value towhat you're already doing.
They're not going to supplementand just overtake it.
You know it's like a I put itin the example of it's steroids
(21:50):
it's.
You know, you need to be fit inorder for steroids to function.
You know, if me and you startedtaking steroids, we're not
going to look like ArnoldSchwarzenegger just by
happenstance.
Arnold was Arnold because hewas working really hard and then
we had to add, you know, addperformance enhancing drugs, and
so as a contractor, no matterwho you bring in, you've got to
care about your brand to adegree that then invigorates
(22:12):
lemon seed to go.
Hey, we can double down on this.
Hey, I see what you're doinghere.
I love it, let's do it.
And no, yeah, go ahead, Sorry.
Speaker 1 (22:26):
No, no, I mean, I was just going to say you know, I
say that it's a terrible salespitch to say you can't just
click the Lemon Seed button andwalk away.
And the reason that I say thatis even with my own brother, one
office away from me, hecouldn't turn marketing on and
walk away from me.
We still had to meet, we had tocollaborate, we had to work
through operations and marketingtogether and we worked for the
(22:46):
same company in the same office.
So when Lemon Seed is workingwith our clients, I'm telling
you I made a post the other daythat said, one of the biggest
things I see in leaders ofcompanies is being indecisive
and how indecisive they can be.
And so what happens is, again Iget a contractor who doesn't
want to deal with marketing.
(23:06):
They don't want to deal withtheir brand and their marketing.
But then they look up andthey're like well, but I want
all of these magical things tohappen, I want video content.
Sir, I live in Texas, you livein Virginia, so you got to do it
, you know.
So you're exactly right, youknow.
There's just a lot of power inunderstanding that,
(23:28):
understanding the part that youplay in your marketing for sure.
So I wrote it down.
It's an additive to, not asupplement for.
So love that comment.
So I think the other thing thatI love to touch on with you
guys is y'all built such a goodbrand and listen, I'll be honest
, y'all don't have one of theseoverly produced, one of these
(23:53):
overly produced big fancy brands.
Even Y'all have a verytraditional red, blue, hot and
y'all have still grown and builtwhat truly is a brand, which is
how you make people feel.
Speaker 2 (24:08):
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
I think the the we we had aconversation about, you know,
okay, do we rebrand?
Or what's the, what's the goal,what's the push?
And ultimately, what it camedown for, like, came down to for
us, was our vision forYarbrough and Sons is that of a
legacy company.
You know, something that standsthe test of time, something
(24:30):
that you know either is passedon to the next generation of
Yarbroughs or, you know, sold tothe employees one of these days
.
You know, and it's a brand thatultimately, when people and
again, and I always want to walk, you know it's a fine line of
walking, of bragging on your ownbrand but not wanting to put
(24:50):
down anybody else, of course Idon't one of the things that we
considered whenever we werelooking at how do we go to
market?
Do we rebrand before we investall this money in building?
You know the sun and snowflakethat we've got and really what
it came down to was like no,this is, this is, this is who we
are.
It's when people see us, I wantthem to think you know it's a,
it's Coca-Cola.
(25:10):
You know it's not fast fashion.
You know it's something thatstood the test of time over
decades, not something that justpopped up overnight and as a
sizzle in the pan, and so in theOklahoma city market right now,
I'm sure there's a couple thatare similar to us, you know.
But I think we've gotten so farahead in the sun and snowflake,
(25:31):
the red and blue game that forthe most part it's now almost
derivative of us, and not theother way around.
Speaker 1 (25:40):
Which I love this for y'all.
This is like one of the storiesthat I preach, like we have a
graphic design team that isphenomenal Emily, my partner
phenomenal.
She has a vision, likeYarbrough and Sons, because it
is important to understand.
It is so much deeper the.
(26:09):
The logo is the flower on topRight.
It's all the.
It's all down in the soil whereyou build good brand Right.
So I love that for you guys and, honestly, like I just own it
is.
Speaker 2 (26:22):
And there's a there's a cool story to it too.
So one of our installers whoworked with us for 20 plus years
.
He was a good artist.
He would draw tattoos in hisspare time and all sorts of
stuff.
He drew the logo for us.
He's no longer with us.
He had a bad work accident he'srecovered from, but he had to
(26:43):
get out of the industry.
He's doing other stuff now, butyou know he drew the logo for
us, and so there's a piece ofthat lineage, that heritage of
you know we are.
You know, yarbrough and Sonsand this is true for any company
.
We are the accumulation andsummation of all the people who
poured into the brand.
You know it's not DarrenYarbrough and Lisa Yarbrough
accumulation and summation ofall the people who poured into
(27:05):
the brand.
You know it's not DarrenYarbrough and Lisa Yarbrough,
it's everyone who helped buildthis thing.
And so there's a story and aleverage point for us to tell
hey, this is a company built byus and us is the royal us.
Speaker 1 (27:19):
Yes, I love that.
Well, I'm going to lean intosomething from building off of
that.
So you know, when you have astrong brand in your market,
people know who you are.
They know they can trust you.
You run a good business.
It tends to overall help sales,right, because I know you guys
can't be the cheapest one inyour market, right?
So how do you think having abrand, a solid brand presence in
(27:42):
your market has really helpedyou guys grow your company?
Like, do you do you?
Well, I know the answer to this, but I know you know how
important it is to have such asolid brand for asking for more
money, basically, yeah, I thinkso with with with your brand,
you know it's.
Speaker 2 (28:04):
I think brand is a lot like character, and
character is you know what youdo when nobody's looking who you
are, when the door is shut andthe lights are off, and I think
your brand reflects a lot ofthat as well.
And so it's how we show up,it's how we knock on the door.
I think the buzzword right nowin the industry of branding is
it's the logo, or it's a truckwrap or it's whatever it is.
(28:24):
But I think a brand is so muchmore than anything visual.
It's a, you know, it's aspiritual connection with the
company of how they make youfeel, how they showed up, how
they treated you.
You know, would you send themto your mom or grandma?
And so building that brand is,you know, ultimately, that it
goes back to one of the corevalues that your dad has, you
know, stood on for years, to oneof the core values that your
(28:46):
dad has stood on for years,which is, if you take care of
people really well, you know,business and money will follow.
And one of the ways that weleverage having the brand that
we have is we get to takecontrol of the narrative we
produce the most content.
I would go like I'm going to goband for band with any HVAC or
I would even say trades basedcompany in the country.
I don't know that anybody isputting out the volume of hours
(29:08):
of content that we're puttingout any given week.
You know we're posting six andeight times a day at any given
you know, at any given timeacross any platform.
And I look this way because I'min Bryce's office and so you
know we're posting, we'reposting a ton of content out
there.
And it's all because we want totake control of the narrative,
(29:30):
because if we don't, someoneelse is going to tell our story,
someone else is going to, isgoing to say the thing that you
know in in something negative.
I think it's anecdotal, but Ithink the status is like a
negative comment is seven timesmore likely to get shared than a
positive one.
If no one's going to be outthere to be our positive
mouthpiece, then you know, thenwe better make dang sure that we
are.
And so we want to take controlof the narrative because
(29:50):
ultimately we got tired of youknow, and I'm sure everybody
across the country has done thisIf you Google, you know how
much does it cost to replace anHVAC system?
How much does it cost to replacea two ton HVAC system?
You're going to get, Iguarantee it, pretty much across
the country.
Your first two results aregoing to be HomeAdvisor and
(30:10):
Angie's List, and then probablyit's going to be some variation
of Porch Thumbtack or a New YorkTimes article.
So those are going to be yourtop four or five results, and
you and I know as well asanybody the cost that they're
saying is absurdly low.
If we sold systems for that,we'd be out of business.
(30:30):
Not only would we be out ofbusiness, but the small guys
would be out of business atthose rates.
And that's why a lot of onetruck shops that don't take
their numbers seriously do goout of business because they
Google that number and say, okay, well, I guess that's where I
need to be.
And so if we don't start puttingout transparent pricing, then
(30:51):
you know and transparent, noteven just pricing, but
transparent business practiceswhy in the world would we expect
anybody to do business with us?
Because, chris, I'll ask you aquestion Would you, if you're
looking for a car and you'relooking at a car, I don't care
what kind of car it is andyou're scrolling through auto
trader or whatever you know,whatever source you're going to
to look for.
If the only thing it said onthat car, as far as price was
(31:13):
concerned, was call for pricing,are you going to go call that
dealership?
No, absolutely not.
I wouldn't even consider it.
I'm out 100 percent.
So why are we asking ourcustomers?
You know why.
Why are we asking our customers?
Speaker 1 (31:22):
You know why?
Because it matters.
You know what I immediatelythink.
So again, people that they,their families, own companies,
you know it's.
They're waiting to hear what mylast name is, to tell me what
the price is, or whateverthey're waiting to say you know
my husband is African-American,so are they waiting to see what
color I am, to see if they'regoing to.
And it's crazy, right, it canbe crazy, people can get in
their own heads.
(31:42):
But you're right, like withthat lack of transparency, comes
more confusion and lack oftrust.
For sure, transparency.
I remember when we startedsharing with our team our actual
numbers people are like y'allare crazy.
I would never.
And I'm like you know what'simportant is number one.
(32:03):
If you're not doing stuffthat's out of line, then you
won't worry about it.
But you know, and most peopleknow, the owner makes more money
, so settle down with that.
But what is a challenge to meabout it is I share our numbers
with our limited team.
Our limited team knows what ourgoals are and what we're doing.
Now.
Do they maybe not understand?
(32:24):
Like I'll tell you what I loveto show people?
Show them how much it costs foryou to provide them with
insurance every month.
Yeah, show them how much itcosts for these big retreats and
things that you do or traveland things like that.
So it's good in those ways.
But me it's about beingtransparent to my team and to
our clients.
(32:44):
Like Limiting has transparentpricing.
Like we don't like hideanything inside of packages
because we're like we're an openbook, because I want you to be
an open book with me.
Like that street goes two waysbut for sure, transparency.
Pricing is so important and andtwo.
Speaker 2 (32:59):
Like y'all actually, I think around the same time,
whenever y'all started, uh,sharing numbers with your team,
that was, I think maybe y'allwere like a couple months in,
and that was whenever I like, Ithink, I met you guys and you
said that you're doing it.
I was like, yep, that's whatwe're doing, and so we've been
doing it ever since as well, andit's in the same, you know,
that same kind of vein oftransparency and wanting to
(33:20):
drive high character.
You know, and the reality is isif we don't take control, not
even just the narrativeexternally you know, we were
talking about the pricing sideexternally but if we don't take
control, branding and marketingalso as an internal operation,
and so if we don't take controlof the narrative, of how the
business is doing, where we'regoing and what the direction is,
well then everybody's going tobe left to tell their own story.
(33:41):
So if we're not the drum beaterfor our own business within the
business, then shame on us.
Because if things are, you know, say, we play break-even ball
or even just lose just a littlebit of money for a season of
time, well, those things startto show up in the business.
There's a vibe and you know, orif you make a little bit of
money and there's some profit,you know nothing absurd.
Let's say you're hitting justabove average.
(34:03):
You're hitting like 6% and 7%,because I think our industry
average is about 3% or 4%.
Let's say, you're doubling it,you're hitting 6% or 7%, well,
there's going to be signs in thebusiness.
And then if you're not beatingthe drum as to what the
expectation is and where thatmoney's going, well then the
team on both ends of it job, oron the high side, if we're
making a little bit of money,well then they might be thinking
(34:29):
well, darren's sitting on thebeach drinking Mai Tais every
weekend, so what the heck am Idoing here?
So we have to take control ofthe narrative and share where
we're going, what we're doingand what the vision ultimately
is If we want people to buy inand make a career with us at all
, because why would we have theexpectation to make an
investment in us if they don'tknow where we're headed?
You know, and ultimately I wantto be you know, I can't say the
(34:49):
Kansas City Chiefs because I'ma Broncos fan, so I can't say I
want to be the Kansas CityChiefs, but I want to.
You know, I'll be the NewEngland Patriots.
The New England Patriots not agreat time for anybody involved.
Speaker 1 (35:12):
I love sports analogies.
My team is full of a lot ofgirls and one day I said, okay,
I'm going to call an audible,and they just all looked at me.
I was like friends, go watchthe football game, go watch any
sport.
Well, and then one day I said,and I'm terrible about them.
Well, and I even said one day Isaid, listen, I need y'all to
get in the paint with me downhere, like let's score some bats
(35:35):
.
And they were like they nevercan follow.
So I loved I just am a sportskind of person.
So I love these analogiesbecause, honestly, like, I just
want contractors to make theconnection of the importance of
things, like you mentioned itearlier, getting in the game
Y'all.
When you run companies, whenyou're a general manager and
owner operator, whateverleadership position you sit in,
(35:55):
you have to have your head inthe game.
Another thing that I find quiteironic I will work with
different contractors and theywill be literally crying like
this is out of control for me.
And then I'm about to be inTurks and Caicos for two weeks
with lack of phone reception andI'm like OK, like so, remind me
.
Like so you feel like thingsare burning down, but you're on
(36:17):
a cruise ship.
Now, listen, you deserve it.
So I'm not saying that, but I'mlike man, sometimes we don't
have the luxury of hitting thevacation road when our team
might be falling apart.
If anything, it almost dangnear, feels like abandonment,
you know.
And so I'm like man, you know,when you talk to people that
don't run companies.
They're like, oh, you're theowner, like don't want a
(36:38):
vacation, and I'm like the verylast thing I would do when my
team is in the middle of summeror my team is in the middle of
you know, whatever's going on,and I storm for me to be like
you know I'm going to stay here,but y'all go ahead and hit the
streets or y'all got to digyourself up.
Now, listen, I'm about to boardthis airplane, but y'all figure
out why we can't make goldRight.
(36:58):
So sometimes I'm like, hey,maybe you should spend a little
bit more time like in thebusiness, and you know what
we've done.
Tucker, though You've heardmany of this, you got to work on
the business, not in thebusiness.
Well, that's great when yourbusiness is operating at good
efficiency and capacity.
Speaker 2 (37:12):
And can I share something with you?
I hate, with all of my being,work on your business, not in
your business, thank you.
It's an oxymoron to me.
I hate it.
So I think I think that is themost misguided bit of
information for it.
Because who runs businesses?
Let's founders andentrepreneurs.
(37:32):
Well, who are founders andentrepreneurs?
They're ADHD folks, and if wetell them to go work on
something and not in something,well, guess what's going to
happen?
We're going to go chase athousand different rabbits
instead of doing the thingWorking in our and I get the
spirit that it said in Correct.
The spirit is great.
You know it's mean and finetune the things in your business
.
It's all those things.
(37:53):
However, in order to work onyour business, you also need to
have a connection with thepeople in the business.
You need to be in the trencheswith them.
You need to be showing up everyday Because, again, it goes
back to the same thing I saidabout vendors People on your
team are not going to care asmuch about the brand as you do,
and if you don't show a highdegree of ownership and care
(38:15):
about the brand, then why in theworld would anyone on your team
?
Speaker 1 (38:23):
Absolutely, and you know I love that sentiment
because I will say thatsometimes to my contractors.
I will say now listen, you'reworking so much in the business
that you can't work on thebusiness.
So I have a contractor rightnow.
Sweet guy, does great work,fantastic technician and
installer.
The problem is I need him tolook up, right.
I need him to look up frominside of the condenser and
let's look up at your P&L.
(38:44):
Like you know and I think, hehas the opposite of that of like
.
I just want there to be thishappy medium of you're working
diligently, getting processesand SOPs and expectations in
place, where, slowly but surely,you still have your eyeballs in
the business and you're stilljumping in where needed, but you
are able to take a higher view.
So I get it, I'm like you, Iget the sentiment, but I also
(39:06):
don't want people to feel like,just because you need to go dunk
in a truck today, you're not afailure.
Speaker 2 (39:11):
Yeah, but I also don't want people to feel like,
just because you need to go in atruck today, you're not a
failure.
Yeah, you know, and I thinkthere's there's so many
leadership lessons that you candraw from.
But yeah, it's fresh on my mind.
I've been working through, uhfor the fourth or fifth time, uh
, jocko's leadership, uh, jockoWillink, he's a former Navy SEAL
, uh written several books.
But leadership strategy andtactics add that to your reading
list.
It's incredible.
But as leaders, a lot of timeswe get told it's like hey, you
(39:32):
got to detach, you got to, youknow, step back, and that way
you can look at things.
But I think there's this Jocko.
He gives a great example of it.
Doesn't take much to detach,you know.
So he gives an example.
They were clearing this oil rigand they were, you know, sitting
there trying to clear thiswhole rig and you know, the
platoon commander, they were allsitting there and everybody's
just looking down the barrels oftheir guns waiting for
something to happen.
(39:52):
And you know, jocko was a hewas a junior guy at this point.
He wasn't the man in charge,you know, but they had stood
there for long enough that hekind of got uncomfortable and so
he said well, I just raised mygun to the port ready position,
which is up, he said, saw thescenario that we were sitting in
and gave an order and peoplewent, and that's sometimes all
it takes to detach.
Is that six inch removal fromthe problem.
(40:13):
A lot of times we think, oh, wegot to detach, I'm going to
Turks and Caicos, and that's notat all the remedy.
Speaker 1 (40:23):
I'm going to detach with like a drink and a beach.
It's very true and you know Ilove this the whole concept
behind like man Trey.
I'll say this for my brotherand I'm sure you have this same
thing from your dad or brothers,one of them or yourself.
You know he never fully removedhimself from, he was in service
(40:45):
meetings, he was showing up atjobs, he was actively engaged in
understanding and treatingpeople for people right.
It wasn't just another installcrew, it was Brandon and Caleb,
not install crew number 10.
Now we had lots of processesbuilt around install crew number
10, but at the end of the daywe knew the faces behind those
(41:07):
numbers, the faces behind thoseinvoices coming through, and
I've always admired that.
About my brother is like he'snot really a softy, like in the
sense of he's not overlyemotional at all.
Sometimes I'm like, are youemotional at all?
I'll have to poke him.
But I, on the other hand, havelearned a lot because I tend to
be an empath, so I will take on.
And so I've had to learn like Ican't save everybody in my
(41:30):
business but I dang sure cancare about them a lot.
Speaker 2 (41:32):
Yeah, yeah absolutely .
Speaker 1 (41:34):
And that, like when, let me see, even when we kind of
restructured ourselves we callit 2.0.
And when we did that, likeEmily and I, like literally, I
felt like we held hands andjumped off a diving board
together.
Speaker 2 (41:49):
Like we can do it together.
Speaker 1 (41:49):
Yeah, yeah, absolutely.
So just just keeping keeping awatch on your team.
Well, tucker, I know we'reabout to wrap up here, so tell
me what you guys.
I know you have some new coolstuff out.
I love the new Facebook group.
You can keep them all up inthere.
I love talking, so tell mewhat's new for you guys.
Speaker 2 (42:06):
Yeah, so we.
So I've been doing coaching forthe with the Service Nation
Alliance for the last probablythree years or so, and then just
speaking at different breakoutsand things like that, and
ultimately Trades Consulting.
You know, I think, likeeverything that we start, we
started a thing called TradesConsulting.
I founded this like a year agoand it's kind of sat on the
(42:27):
shelf, didn't really have time,really wanted to work out kind
of what we wanted from it, whatthe vision was for it, and so
after months of kind of goingback and forth of what we were
going to do because ultimately,like you said, we talked about a
bad sales pitch earlier and mybad sales pitch whenever
somebody would bring me in forcoaching with Service Nation and
(42:48):
I'm still doing coaching withTrades Consulting my goal is for
you to fire me.
I want to be with you for fourto six weeks.
I want to see it.
You know, find a thread, pullit tight, make sure that we have
the system and processimplemented and rock on from
there, you know.
But then I realized, okay, thatcan't be all that it is, and so
I started.
I've put in the hours, me andChatGPT.
(43:08):
We've worked really hardtogether and we built.
I built a tool called GetQuotethrough Trace Consulting and
GetQuote is.
We talked about transparentpricing and GetQuote is our
online instant estimate tool.
It was built by me, acontractor, for contractors.
You know I'm not trying todisrupt the industry, not trying
to just completely throw.
(43:29):
You know it's not an AI tool.
It is a simple function thatallows us to collect customer
information.
They can fill out a form inless than a minute and get clear
pricing on what a five tonsystem would cost or what a
system.
I don't do tonnages because mosthomeowners don't know what
tonnages are, so I do squarefootage.
So what's a rough ballpark forthis size?
(43:50):
So whenever a homeowner goesthrough our tool, they're able
to get pretty dang near exactlywhat we're going to sell a
system for, unless we have to dosome ductwork, repair, things
like that.
There's some extenuating stuff.
So we built that as aconversion tool for ourselves,
(44:17):
because we're like, okay, ifwe're going to coach people
through tradesconsulting, weneed to give them a tool to help
convert leads, because it's a,I think, an epidemic in all
industries, but most of the timeclients don't have a
contractors don't really have Ihesitate to say this there are
some that have a call volumeproblem right, but I think as
big of a call volume problem aswe may have I think we some that
have a call volume problemright, but I think as big of a
call volume problem as we mayhave, I think we also might have
a call booking problem andconversion problem.
And I think it's a lot easier tosolve your call booking and
(44:40):
conversion because we cancontrol those variables.
Whereas call volume, well,there's some weather dependency
to it, there's economy factorsto it, there's things outside of
our control, and so I want totake some extreme ownership and
say, okay, how can we convertthese things?
And so that's why we builtGetQuote.
We built it for ourselves.
Ultimately, if we don't sell,an instance of GetQuote.
(45:01):
it's worth it.
In three weeks it's generated$46,000 for us.
We've sold pretty much online.
We just send a technician outthere to verify what they've
quoted and then we've sold it.
And so we're in the early daysof building out TradeStock
Consulting.
We're super excited about kindof what we got going on.
You know the full vision of itreally hadn't been fully cast
yet because it's a moving target, but we do know that we have a
(45:26):
really powerful tool.
We've got it down to as cheapof a price as we possibly can.
We've got it down to where it's$4,500 a year.
If you pay it annually or ifyou want to pay monthly, you can
cancel at any time with eitherof those.
But ultimately for us it'sdriven in at this point $46,000
and about 20 to 30 qualifiedleads, and they have a lower
(45:47):
conversion rate.
Speaker 1 (45:49):
But you're driving business to that.
Speaker 2 (45:51):
Oh, absolutely.
Speaker 1 (45:52):
Social media or emails or what are you using?
Speaker 2 (45:54):
Absolutely so.
Everything, everything.
Speaker 1 (45:57):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (45:59):
So really and truly, it's social and email is the
biggest two.
So, and we we started withsocial and the social we've kind
of all I'll send, post this.
I'll send you the link to acouple of the ads that we're
running to point people to itbecause I think it'd be valuable
for anybody.
Anybody rob and duplicate ourstuff, because we rob and
duplicate everyone else's.
(46:19):
Nothing is sacred.
The best idea wins.
We can't just go to marketasking people like hey, here's a
instant estimate tool and youshould use it.
You know it's not a verycompelling or entertaining
message.
And so, you know, we had a sillyad where we've got a putting
green in the front of our officejust like a little strip of
(46:41):
grass that ends in like a hole.
And so Bryce had an idea of hey, I want you to, you know, hold
this golf ball up and say, likeyou know, every time I hit this
ball it makes the weirdest noise.
And so I set the ball down andI stroked the ball in and, lo
and behold, I made it.
But the whole time Bryce wasshooting a slow-mo video of the
ball rolling down the green andit's me whispering.
(47:03):
We added audio over it and it'sme whispering saying get an
instant estimate fromYarbroughandSunscom.
It's just things like that.
Or like we had one where wewere.
You know, similar deal, sameformat.
We had a nerf football.
And so the ad needs to beinherently watchable.
It needs to be entertainingbecause we scroll, for I don't
know if you get your, you knowif you get attacked by your
iPhone, uh, every week, like Ido on the screen time report, um
(47:27):
and and it's oppressive.
It's like, hey, you spent 12and a half hours on your phone
today and we're scrolling.
You know we're scrollingmindlessly, and so, to punch
through the noise, the ad thatwe make has to be entertaining,
and so everything that we'redoing, we're doing that and we
our email list is really justhitting up old customers and
letting them know hey, we've gotaging equipment.
If you're curious about what itcosts, here it is.
(47:47):
And, yes, our online estimatetool has a lower conversion rate
because people are gettingprices.
They want to see what's the carcost.
Eventually, you and I both knowthey're going to need a car.
Eventually they're going toneed to replace their HVAC, and
I have no data to back this upwhatsoever, but I just have a
core belief that in the next two, three, five years, the
(48:11):
businesses who operate with thehighest degree of transparency
are going to be the ones thatwin, because AI is going to cut
through everything like a hotknife, and the only thing that
we're going to be left with isthe brand that we've built, the
prices that we have and what arewe going to go to market with.
That's what we're going to beleft with.
(48:31):
Everything else will beconsidered fluff, because AI is
going to come through and slashit.
Speaker 1 (48:36):
Yeah, yeah, I'm telling you I love the
authenticity side.
I think that's definitely goingto be a cool thing.
And then, tucker, if anybodywanted to just get in touch with
you, we're going to put allthis in the show notes and when
we share it on social media.
But what's the best way forthem to get in touch with you
about anything you've said today?
Speaker 2 (48:57):
Yeah, so they can get in touch with me through my
email.
Either one of them so it'stucker at yarbroughandsonscom
it's a long one, but it's allspelled out or tucker at
tradesconsulting.
Either one of those and I'llsee them'll see him, uh, and
we're excited, you know.
And again, if anybody hasquestions about what we're doing
even if it's just marketingoperations, anything like that
like I've given away more hoursof coaching than uh, than I ever
(49:20):
could bill for, um, I, I enjoytalking with like-minded people.
I enjoy talking withcontractors who are trying to
build something.
Um, because ultimately, I thinkthis industry is full of the
greatest people in the nation,because they operate America's
life support system, which isour HVAC and our plumbing,
absolutely, and they deserve tobe compensated like such.
(49:41):
So building cool businesses andtalking to contractors who are
after building cool businessesis one of my favorite things to
do.
Speaker 1 (49:47):
I love it.
I love it, tucker.
You're doing great things.
You and your brothers, brycey'all are all just amazing and
wonderful to listen to.
So congratulations on all yourcurrent success and the success
that I know that's coming soonthat you guys keep seeing.
So here's what I do want to sayto all of our listeners.
I really encourage you to takeTucker's advice.
Coming from the industry withno.
(50:09):
Neither one of us have anythingto gain from this advice.
We literally have lived thelife of watching people be
dedicated to growing theirbusiness, dedicated to changing.
Tucker mentioned it earlier.
His dad is, you know, is notafraid of technology.
My dad wasn't either.
So even at 64 years old whichis how old my dad is like he's
always like hey, I'm learningthis new AI because we want to
(50:32):
stay active and we want to staycutting edge as much as we can,
but also keeping the heart ofour companies.
And so, trevor, thank you somuch.
I wish you guys the best andall that you continue to do.
And, guys, thank you forlistening to another episode of
From the Yellow Chair.
If you loved what you heard,please like us on all of our
socials and leave us a review,and we will.
Oh, what's up?
Lemonheads, Welcome to anotherepisode of From the Yellow Chair
.
I am Crystal, again riding solohere in our lemonade stand.
I cannot wait to talk to youguys today about trade babies
that's what I call us, and youcan see very few of us that are
actually in that club, but weknow what it's like growing up
working with family, loving theindustry for the passion that it
(00:30):
brings, the culture that itallows us and, honestly, how,
thanks to great customers in ourlocal markets, we're able to
feed and clothe and love on ourfamilies and have a great career
in our little areas where a lotof times we grew up in.
So I hope you grab your glassof lemonade, sit down so that we
can talk all about familybusiness branding and the sales
process.
Let's sip some lemonade.
(00:50):
Hey, sounds great.
Speaker 2 (00:56):
I love the Lemonheads .
Speaker 1 (00:58):
Oh yeah, what's up?
Lemonheads, that's our jam here.
So we have on our podcast todayTucker Yarbrough, which I have
been fangirling.
You guys so good marketingnotices, good marketing all the
time.
So, and you and I really metseveral times at some events or
service nation Alliance, whichif anybody's a long time
(01:19):
listener from the yellow chair,they know huge fan of service
nation Alliance and there's someother best practice groups that
really do some great things.
But really got to see Tuckerand I feel like I knew Tucker
before.
Tucker was cool.
Speaker 2 (01:33):
Yeah, you're on the come up.
Speaker 1 (01:36):
Yeah, meaning like I watched you guys like start
figuring it out, like we were inthe same boat, like Trey and I,
so my brother and I and you andyour brothers right Y'all were
everybody was just trying tofigure this thing out.
And I think you have a lot moreof my personality where you
love to talk it, you love tolove on people.
I think we all come fromChristian values and morals and
(01:57):
so we really just kind ofconnected over that and just
would kind of stay in touch alittle bit here and there.
But watching you guys build, uh, yalbro and Sons there in
Oklahoma has been so fun for meto watch.
Speaker 2 (02:08):
Yeah, we're, you know , trying to follow in the
footsteps of uh of giants.
You know it's uh, we had a.
We had a great foundation laidfrom from our parents and your
dad.
He's still in the business fulltime and so he's he's starting
to take some days off, but, uh,you know, he's still running
around up here having fun withus.
But I mean, yeah, I think itwas probably what five, six
years ago that we really kind ofmet and connected.
So I was an overgrown23-year-old trying to figure it
(02:32):
out and didn't think anythingwas a bad idea.
And seeing you guys atMcWilliams do what y'all did,
that was a huge.
I mean, it was a green light.
You don't need permission to dothings in marketing and branding
, but it's nice when you seepeople of kindred spirit and
kindred values doing similarstuff to you, you know, it kind
of gives you that marker of hey,okay, I think I'm on the right
(02:54):
path here.
Speaker 1 (02:55):
Oh, yeah, well, thank you so much.
It's very kind.
I just I recognize that youguys.
Just there was just somethingspecial about you guys, so
whether it was Jesus or justgood content or the combination
of both, I recognized it.
So, tucker, I know that.
I mean, I think a lot of peopleshould know you if they don't.
So tell us a little bit, justlike about who you are and kind
of the makeup of your business.
(03:16):
I think that's important to ourstory today.
Speaker 2 (03:18):
Yeah, absolutely so.
First and foremost, you've hitthe nail on the head.
I'm a Christ follower.
Foremost, you've hit the nailon the head.
I'm a Christ follower and youknow.
That is the core of who I am.
The onus of, kind of everythingthat I do is through that lens.
You know my family, you knowall of us.
We are believers and you knownot that we're a Christian quote
, unquote company.
However, if you work here, workalongside us and work in
(03:40):
proximity with us long enough,you're going to hear about Jesus
in one way, shape or another,and so that's kind of where I
want to start from.
But beyond that, you know.
So, growing up in the trades,like you said, we're in an elite
group of people trade babies,and so growing up you know mom
and dad.
They started the business in1988 and you know grew and
(04:01):
rocked along and grew to a shopof oh gosh, I think probably 10,
12 people in 1999.
And that's when, like theservice experts, roll up was
happening.
And you know, dad, he was moreon the commercial side of the
HVAC world and he had a coupleof contracts that went long on
him.
And so at that time mom and daddecided, ok, well, I think we
should try it, we should sell,go work for service experts.
(04:24):
And Yarbrough's continued tooperate because I think dad was
leasing out ice machines to alocal grocery store, to local
gas stations we still claim 88as our founding, and after two
years of working in the serviceexperts world, dad decided you
know what?
I don't think I'm such a badmanager after all.
And so my oldest brother forperspective, Will Will, was born
in 1990.
(04:44):
Colby, middle brother, was bornin 92.
And then I was born in 96.
Speaker 1 (04:47):
And so we grew up in the business and for anybody
listening to that like I'm sorrythat these people were born in
the 90s.
Speaker 2 (04:58):
As much weight as it puts on the folks who are older
than that.
You know it's the same feeling.
You walk into a room who areolder than that, you know it's
the same feeling.
You walk into a room, you knowI remember walking into the
we're kind of going off trackhere but walking into a one of
the first Service Nation eventsthat I went to, and you know, a
lot of times I was riding solobecause Will and Colby were in
the sales seat and trying to,you know, get that off the
ground and help grow thebusiness.
So a lot of times I was, I wasriding to these Service Nation
(05:20):
events solo and so walking intoa room full of seasoned
contractors that are, all youknow, 45 plus as a 23 year old,
and you're telling them you gotall these bright ideas you know
it's an intimidating room towalk into.
Speaker 1 (05:35):
Oh yes, I know, trey lived that life too, like we've
never done it that way or we'veall tried that and it didn't
work.
So for sure, for sure.
Sorry to take us off track, noworries.
Speaker 2 (05:40):
So and then in 01, they decided you know what,
we're not such a bad managerafter all.
And dad told the I think, toldmy mom the consummate lie that I
think all trades professionalstell, which is don't worry,
honey, this time we'll staysmall, we'll only take care of
the people that I can take careof, and we'll rock from there.
And you know, and you know thisas well as all of the listeners
(06:02):
know this If you take care ofpeople really well meaning your
team and your customers, workfinds you, word gets out and
money will follow that kind ofculture.
And so they grew from startingover pretty much zero in 01 to
about 2015, 2016,.
Stuck at the five to four and ahalf million dollar mark.
And all the while, mom and dadtold me, will and Colby I think
(06:25):
it was the great reversepsychology trick of the century
which was hey, go do somethingelse, there's got to be an
easier way to make a living.
The HVAC and plumbing world, thetrade space, is hard work.
There's got to be an easier wayto make a living.
And, ultimately, we want you todo what God calls you to do.
So the standard, the goal, youknow, wasn't hey, come back and
(06:46):
work for the Heat and Air Shop.
It was hey, go, do what Godwants to do and be a productive
member of society.
That was kind of the floor, andso by 2018, me, will and Colby
had all found our way back tothe old Heat and Air Shop.
We joined the Service NationAlliance in 2018 and then really
started to grow from there, andover the last six, seven years,
we've gone from a four and ahalf million dollar company to
(07:08):
this year we're closing on.
We're probably pacing for about13 million and so trying to
grow and, like I said, followingthe footsteps of some giants.
Speaker 1 (07:18):
Oh my gosh.
Well, listen, I love this storybecause you know what it
reminds me of is being steepedin history, like when you
understand where you came fromand what you've been through,
and just a little nod to ourother contractors that may be
listening that you know,honestly, everybody goes through
like trials and tribulations.
We all try things that don'twork.
(07:38):
We have to pivot.
We get like imposter syndrome,like I can't be a manager of
this, like who?
Why was I thinking that?
To just like your dad had thatcome back around moment, to wait
a minute, I'm not such a badleader after all.
And so just reminding everybodythat most journeys are not full
of straight and narrow.
They're definitely full ofturns and bumps and things.
Speaker 2 (08:01):
That's one of the things I tell dad is he's just,
he's just a, he's just a 40 yearovernight success.
I mean, that's all it is.
40 year overnight success,that's all it took.
Speaker 1 (08:09):
Well, and you know, like you know, I am so guilty of
this.
You know, social media becomespeople's highlight reels and so
they're on their like best monthever and I'm like, okay, and I
look at maybe a client orsomebody who's really doing
great things and they're growingvery intentionally, but it's
not these skyrocketed numbersand they get discouraged and I'm
(08:29):
like, man, you don't know, youdon't know you think overnight
they built these companies and alot of people do build them
quickly, but it's not withoutrisk or without money or
investors, or there's always astory there, Right?
So kudos to those that are juststeadfast and strong, like
running the race veryintentionally, honestly, very
virtuously, and just doing goodthings.
(08:52):
So I love to hear that story.
So I know that, speaking, youknow this whole family, you know
bond that you guys have.
So it was my dad, my grandpa,then my dad, then my brother,
and then my brother and I andnow my sister owns a pest
control company.
So we all live in this homeservice industry life.
So I know your brothers kind ofhold some different roles.
So like, who sits at what seatat the table?
Speaker 2 (09:14):
Yeah, so that is, we are now at the size of company
where an org chart is becomingvery necessitated, not because
we've got overlapping orcompeting egos or anything like
that.
Me, will and Colby someperspective.
And I hate giving this answerto folks at the trade shows and
(09:34):
stuff, because a lot of times soI've spoken at breakout
sessions, I've done stuff atService Nation, things like that
.
I do some coaching as well, andone of the questions that I get
, because we're a familybusiness, is you kind of get
pigeonholed.
I'm sure you get similar,similar feeling which is like
you kind of get that pigeonholeof like, okay, how do you make a
family business work?
And you know and my answer alot of times isn't super helpful
(09:56):
it's, you know, it's parent.
Well, it's, you know, thisdynamic that me, will and Colby
have didn't start when we alljoined the business.
This dynamic started when wewere, you know, six years old
and 12 years old.
And you know and I tell thisstory all the time but one of my
favorite stories is it's justburning my memories we were
(10:17):
driving home from the office oneday and I was probably six,
which would have made, you know,colby probably around nine, and
then Will would have been12-ish and me and Colby.
Me and Colby are similarpersonalities, except we're on
opposite ends of the spectrum.
So we always have a similarends but it's always different
means.
And so Colby and I would argue,we'd bicker a lot as kids.
And there was one time mom was,I guess she'd had her fill for
(10:39):
the day, and she was driving usall home and she slammed on the
brakes.
We were bickering and all of usthrew forward and she snapped
her head around and she said hey, I don't care if you like each
other, but you will love eachother.
Um, and that's kind of like thebaseline of like me, will and
Colby.
Like that's a core memory forall of us.
And so the seats that we holdat Yarbrough and Sons are
indicative of of that respectfor one another.
(11:01):
That's Hey's.
Hey, we might not like eachother right now, in this moment,
we might have differing ofopinions.
However, at the end of the day,like I love you, I respect you
and I want the best for us, um,and so that is a like getting to
this point.
You know, it's been a 29 yearjourney of figuring out how to
foster the relationship betweenme and colby.
But where are we setting thebusiness right now is we're
(11:23):
actually more defining some ofthose roles.
So we're in the process of thiswill be the first time I've
said it publicly.
So how about that?
Will is going to be moving fromWill's kind of a pinch hitter
between residential sales andcommercial sales.
Will is a very systems drivenindividual.
Will likes to see things in aprocess.
(11:43):
He wants an SOP, he wants tosee a thread pull it and tie it
off tight, and so we're in theprocess of moving Will over into
our GM spot.
So Will's going to take over asour GM.
I'm still I'm operating as ourCFO Right now.
I've been our CFO slash GM andI've been doing a poor job of
GMing.
I fly at 60,000 feet and 100miles an hour and I'm going to
(12:05):
get a process implemented to adecent degree, and then I'm
going to take off running againand I don't do a great job of
tying off those leads tight.
So Will's going to be moving tothat GM seat.
Colby is a residential salesfull-time and Colbyby we're
moving him over into ourdirector of sales position.
(12:27):
He's still gonna be selling,but also wearing the hat of
director of sales and getting.
We've got two commercial projectmanagers as well as another
residential sales guy that he'llbe managing as well as himself
as far as processes and all ofthat and really taking more
attention with getting him inthe truck with some of our
technicians and teaching themhey, here's the sales process,
here's the why.
And teaching them hey, here'sthe sales process, here's the
why behind what we're doing andhere's how we can find success
(12:49):
together in this.
And so we're kind of goingthrough a little bit of a org
chart restructuring as we speak.
But it's exciting times becausewe're trying to catapult our
growth.
We want to three and four Xover the next five six years and
we want to do it the right way.
We want to do it in a way that'ssustainable for our team.
You know, because ultimatelyour goal and you know our goal I
(13:11):
say it's our goal but it's apersonal mission statement of
mine that I wrote back incollege.
I was prompted by a professorto do this and he said you know,
write a personal professionalmission statement which is kind
of the directing mantra for yourprofessional life.
And so for me, I see thepurpose of my professional life
is to create success for others.
I would rather enjoy a lesserpeak with more of my team than a
(13:33):
higher one alone.
And so it's about the team.
It's about creating success forthose people, whether that be
wealth or whether that be timeoff, whatever that looks like
but create success for thepeople who've spent their lives
working alongside us atYarbrough, uncensored, because
we have a seven and a half to 10year tenure at any given time.
You know we're sticky Peoplestick with us, and so they
(13:55):
choose to make a career here andwe don't take that lightly.
Speaker 1 (13:58):
Wow, I love this.
And you know, y'all also have adedicated marketing person, yep
, right.
So again, like when we werefirst doing this at McWilliams,
people thought we were crazy.
Speaker 2 (14:09):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (14:09):
They were like what do you mean?
Do you have a full time?
Like this is what you do, fulltime.
And I'm like absolutely mybrother did.
You know he was very, you know,efficiency driven, and so one
of the things that he said to mewas you know, you always can
take, probably can take on morework.
So I would many times I wouldthink I don't know that I can
(14:32):
keep like up with all thiscommunity marketing and video
marketing and social media andall you know dealing with all of
our co-op dollars and brandprotection.
I mean, you know it just getsso thick in there.
But he kept saying you knowit's prioritized and organized,
and so that was really a keything for us.
And then you guys have Bryceright.
Speaker 2 (14:52):
Yeah, yep Bryce.
Speaker 1 (14:54):
And so it's a full-time employee, that his
sole job is working on yourmarketing, and what all does he
do?
Speaker 2 (14:59):
Yeah.
So I remember that was, youknow, talk about like the shock
in the industry of like you havea full-time marketing person at
your size, you know we wereright at nine million, maybe
just under nine, whenever webrought him in.
I remember making that pitch tomy dad.
You know it's, you know dad's a, he's a quick adopter to
(15:20):
technology, you know.
But even you know him, it's ahe's.
He's an old school contractor,it's a show up, do the work, and
you know, but he sees the valueof the, of the marketing.
And so I remember pitching thatto him.
I'm like, okay, we've got to do, we've got to do more.
I can't handle.
You know, at that time it was,you know, cfo, bad GM and
director of marketing were kindof the hats that I was wearing
(15:41):
and it wasn't going well, youknow, and I was doing all that I
could, you know.
But I knew that there was justthis another level that I wanted
to get to as far as brandubiquity and putting out content
that entertains people and thateducates people and that makes
us the company that people like,so that whenever they think of
a home service that they need,we come to mind.
(16:03):
And so Bryce had done a.
He'd been a journalist and thena videographer and he had shot
a couple commercials for us.
I'd freelanced him and at theend of one of the commercials I
asked him, as he was packing upall of his stuff.
I said you know, bryce, this isa very forward question, very
poignant question, and tellingme to pound sand is an
(16:25):
acceptable answer, but it's atwo-parter.
First, do you like your jobwhere you're currently at?
He kind of hemmed and hawed,and then I said secondly, how
much do you make?
And he told me how much he made, and so that kind of gave me a
basis of where we needed tostart, where we needed to be
kind of entering in at, and thenneeded to start where we needed
(16:50):
to be kind of entering in at,and uh, and then, so it wasn't
long after that uh, that we, youknow, made a job offer to him
and he joined the company andhe's been with us, uh, four
years now.
Speaker 1 (16:55):
So, yeah, and I listen.
You know I'm passionate aboutthis um, about how people
discredit marketing.
They think that like anyone intheir office can do it, and then
they're like super frustratedwhen things don't work.
And listen, if you think aboutthis, I want to ask this one
question to you Y'all, rowanSons only relied on paid ads and
website.
How successful do you thinky'all would be?
At the right place you are now.
Speaker 2 (17:15):
No.
Speaker 1 (17:17):
And so I try to tell contractors this every single
day of my life.
Web and digital is superimportant piece of your strategy
.
Don't sleep on it.
Be intentional about it, investin it, but it cannot be where
you die.
Speaker 2 (17:35):
Yeah, you will die.
It's a quick path.
I'll take it a step further.
Even Over the last, probablytwo years, I mean we've, we've
pretty much seen ourselves outof, out of the PPC world.
We're, we're, we're just, weare conscientious objectors, we
are just choosing not toparticipate.
One, because private equity ispouring so much money into it
(17:56):
that you know the cost per lead,mathematically it doesn't make
sense.
And so, and then we did an auditon all of our, all of our leads
and conversions and saw OK, ifsomebody comes in, you know,
this wasn't clarity that wewould have had, you know, five,
six years ago.
So you've got to startsomewhere.
So the contractor who doesn'thave this, start pulling this
(18:16):
thread tight because it's, Imean, it's worth its weight in
gold, which is get clarity onwhere your leads are coming from
.
Which is, get clarity on whereyour leads are coming from.
And I don't mean there's a fineline between laissez-faireness
in your marketing and, likehyper-efficiency and trying to
make sure that like, oh, I wantto track every dollar.
We need to be somewhere in thatmuddy middle where we know
about where they came from, butthere's still some vibes to how
(18:37):
our branding works.
There's some things that you'rejust not going to be able to
track and you have to be okaywith that.
But we did an audit on where didour leads come from and how did
they convert and we saw, okay,if they were coming through a
paid source like PPC really andtruly it was PPC and direct mail
or if they were coming througha branded source and our branded
ads converted at like a threeand a half to four times higher
value for us than that of a PPCslash direct mail ad.
(19:02):
So and of course it does it'seasy to say that now, but saying
that to somebody who that'stheir whole lifeblood, it's a
hard thing.
It's not going to be a flipthat you just switch overnight.
It's been a transition ofgetting off of paid ads and more
into putting money intobranding for us.
So it wasn't just this binarydecision, it was okay.
We have to slowly starttransitioning to this so that we
(19:23):
can drive more and more brandedconversions because, look, the
math shows that it's worth threeand a half to four times higher
value for us than that of ageneric ad.
And they have loyalty becausethey found us through Yarbrough
and Sons or you know, trying tofind, or one of the infinite
various misspellings ofYarbrough and Sons.
Speaker 1 (19:43):
Well, and I can imagine I mean you're right.
So it's really a game Like.
We get confronted all the timeit's like my marketing doesn't
work.
And 99% of the time when theystart talking to Lemon Seed and
just to be clear, lemon Seed andYarbrough Suns do not work
together.
I just recognize good marketingwhen I see it and so you know.
But we talk to clients all thetime who are like my marketing
(20:11):
doesn't work and when I get downto it it's a PPC problem.
They have invested 10, 15,$20,000 a month in PPC as a $2,
$3 million contractor andthey're like it's not working.
And I'm like because that's nota smart way to do business,
that's not a smart way for us todo marketing.
You know Lemon Seed has thisthree bucket approach to
marketing, kind of like a budget.
Everything has a place andeverything has a clear set of
(20:32):
expectations of how it's goingto perform.
So it's super important to methat clients really understand
the importance of a holisticmarketing strategy.
So I know that we go on and on.
Speaker 2 (20:48):
I want to touch on just one thing on it.
I think we had a Facebookexchange you and I did about
this similarly just a coupledays ago, which is one of the
things that I have coachedcontractors and talked to
contractors about this, abouttheir marketing, their
financials and leadership,things like that.
But one of the things that,like the hill that I will die on
and you will as well, I'mcertain of it, with Lemon Seed
(21:09):
even is to the contractor outthere, like Lemon Seed is
fantastic.
They are great at what they do.
They cannot, just, by functionof their position, cannot care
more about your marketing thanyou do as the contractor.
Marketing than you do as thecontractor.
You have to care more about yourbrand.
You have to care more aboutwhat you come off as than anyone
else that you're going to hire,because everyone else that you
(21:30):
bring in is an additive to, nota supplement for.
So when you bring lemon seed in, when you bring in a marketing
company or a coach or whatever,the most that they will ever be
able to do is an added value towhat you're already doing.
They're not going to supplementand just overtake it.
You know it's like a I put itin the example of it's steroids
(21:50):
it's.
You know, you need to be fit inorder for steroids to function.
You know, if me and you startedtaking steroids, we're not
going to look like ArnoldSchwarzenegger just by
happenstance.
Arnold was Arnold because hewas working really hard and then
we had to add, you know, addperformance enhancing drugs, and
so as a contractor, no matterwho you bring in, you've got to
care about your brand to adegree that then invigorates
(22:12):
lemon seed to go.
Hey, we can double down on this.
Hey, I see what you're doinghere.
I love it, let's do it.
And no, yeah, go ahead, Sorry.
Speaker 1 (22:26):
No, no, I mean, I was just going to say you know, I
say that it's a terrible salespitch to say you can't just
click the Lemon Seed button andwalk away.
And the reason that I say thatis even with my own brother, one
office away from me, hecouldn't turn marketing on and
walk away from me.
We still had to meet, we had tocollaborate, we had to work
through operations and marketingtogether and we worked for the
(22:46):
same company in the same office.
So when Lemon Seed is workingwith our clients, I'm telling
you I made a post the other daythat said, one of the biggest
things I see in leaders ofcompanies is being indecisive
and how indecisive they can be.
And so what happens is, again Iget a contractor who doesn't
want to deal with marketing.
(23:06):
They don't want to deal withtheir brand and their marketing.
But then they look up andthey're like well, but I want
all of these magical things tohappen, I want video content.
Sir, I live in Texas, you livein Virginia, so you got to do it
, you know.
So you're exactly right, youknow.
There's just a lot of power inunderstanding that,
(23:28):
understanding the part that youplay in your marketing for sure.
So I wrote it down.
It's an additive to, not asupplement for.
So love that comment.
So I think the other thing thatI love to touch on with you
guys is y'all built such a goodbrand and listen, I'll be honest
, y'all don't have one of theseoverly produced, one of these
(23:53):
overly produced big fancy brands.
Even Y'all have a verytraditional red, blue, hot and
y'all have still grown and builtwhat truly is a brand, which is
how you make people feel.
Speaker 2 (24:08):
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
I think the the we we had aconversation about, you know,
okay, do we rebrand?
Or what's the, what's the goal,what's the push?
And ultimately, what it camedown for, like, came down to for
us, was our vision forYarbrough and Sons is that of a
legacy company.
You know, something that standsthe test of time, something
(24:30):
that you know either is passedon to the next generation of
Yarbroughs or, you know, sold tothe employees one of these days
.
You know, and it's a brand thatultimately, when people and
again, and I always want to walk, you know it's a fine line of
walking, of bragging on your ownbrand but not wanting to put
(24:50):
down anybody else, of course Idon't one of the things that we
considered whenever we werelooking at how do we go to
market?
Do we rebrand before we investall this money in building?
You know the sun and snowflakethat we've got and really what
it came down to was like no,this is, this is, this is who we
are.
It's when people see us, I wantthem to think you know it's a,
it's Coca-Cola.
(25:10):
You know it's not fast fashion.
You know it's something thatstood the test of time over
decades, not something that justpopped up overnight and as a
sizzle in the pan, and so in theOklahoma city market right now,
I'm sure there's a couple thatare similar to us, you know.
But I think we've gotten so farahead in the sun and snowflake,
(25:31):
the red and blue game that forthe most part it's now almost
derivative of us, and not theother way around.
Speaker 1 (25:40):
Which I love this for y'all.
This is like one of the storiesthat I preach, like we have a
graphic design team that isphenomenal Emily, my partner
phenomenal.
She has a vision, likeYarbrough and Sons, because it
is important to understand.
It is so much deeper the.
(26:09):
The logo is the flower on topRight.
It's all the.
It's all down in the soil whereyou build good brand Right.
So I love that for you guys and, honestly, like I just own it
is.
Speaker 2 (26:22):
And there's a there's a cool story to it too.
So one of our installers whoworked with us for 20 plus years
.
He was a good artist.
He would draw tattoos in hisspare time and all sorts of
stuff.
He drew the logo for us.
He's no longer with us.
He had a bad work accident he'srecovered from, but he had to
(26:43):
get out of the industry.
He's doing other stuff now, butyou know he drew the logo for
us, and so there's a piece ofthat lineage, that heritage of
you know we are.
You know, yarbrough and Sonsand this is true for any company
.
We are the accumulation andsummation of all the people who
poured into the brand.
You know it's not DarrenYarbrough and Lisa Yarbrough
accumulation and summation ofall the people who poured into
(27:05):
the brand.
You know it's not DarrenYarbrough and Lisa Yarbrough,
it's everyone who helped buildthis thing.
And so there's a story and aleverage point for us to tell
hey, this is a company built byus and us is the royal us.
Speaker 1 (27:19):
Yes, I love that.
Well, I'm going to lean intosomething from building off of
that.
So you know, when you have astrong brand in your market,
people know who you are.
They know they can trust you.
You run a good business.
It tends to overall help sales,right, because I know you guys
can't be the cheapest one inyour market, right?
So how do you think having abrand, a solid brand presence in
(27:42):
your market has really helpedyou guys grow your company?
Like, do you do you?
Well, I know the answer to this, but I know you know how
important it is to have such asolid brand for asking for more
money, basically, yeah, I thinkso with with with your brand,
you know it's.
Speaker 2 (28:04):
I think brand is a lot like character, and
character is you know what youdo when nobody's looking who you
are, when the door is shut andthe lights are off, and I think
your brand reflects a lot ofthat as well.
And so it's how we show up,it's how we knock on the door.
I think the buzzword right nowin the industry of branding is
it's the logo, or it's a truckwrap or it's whatever it is.
(28:24):
But I think a brand is so muchmore than anything visual.
It's a, you know, it's aspiritual connection with the
company of how they make youfeel, how they showed up, how
they treated you.
You know, would you send themto your mom or grandma?
And so building that brand is,you know, ultimately, that it
goes back to one of the corevalues that your dad has, you
know, stood on for years, to oneof the core values that your
(28:46):
dad has stood on for years,which is, if you take care of
people really well, you know,business and money will follow.
And one of the ways that weleverage having the brand that
we have is we get to takecontrol of the narrative we
produce the most content.
I would go like I'm going to goband for band with any HVAC or
I would even say trades basedcompany in the country.
I don't know that anybody isputting out the volume of hours
(29:08):
of content that we're puttingout any given week.
You know we're posting six andeight times a day at any given
you know, at any given timeacross any platform.
And I look this way because I'min Bryce's office and so you
know we're posting, we'reposting a ton of content out
there.
And it's all because we want totake control of the narrative,
(29:30):
because if we don't, someoneelse is going to tell our story,
someone else is going to, isgoing to say the thing that you
know in in something negative.
I think it's anecdotal, but Ithink the status is like a
negative comment is seven timesmore likely to get shared than a
positive one.
If no one's going to be outthere to be our positive
mouthpiece, then you know, thenwe better make dang sure that we
are.
And so we want to take controlof the narrative because
(29:50):
ultimately we got tired of youknow, and I'm sure everybody
across the country has done thisIf you Google, you know how
much does it cost to replace anHVAC system?
How much does it cost to replacea two ton HVAC system?
You're going to get, Iguarantee it, pretty much across
the country.
Your first two results aregoing to be HomeAdvisor and
(30:10):
Angie's List, and then probablyit's going to be some variation
of Porch Thumbtack or a New YorkTimes article.
So those are going to be yourtop four or five results, and
you and I know as well asanybody the cost that they're
saying is absurdly low.
If we sold systems for that,we'd be out of business.
(30:30):
Not only would we be out ofbusiness, but the small guys
would be out of business atthose rates.
And that's why a lot of onetruck shops that don't take
their numbers seriously do goout of business because they
Google that number and say, okay, well, I guess that's where I
need to be.
And so if we don't start puttingout transparent pricing, then
(30:51):
you know and transparent, noteven just pricing, but
transparent business practiceswhy in the world would we expect
anybody to do business with us?
Because, chris, I'll ask you aquestion Would you, if you're
looking for a car and you'relooking at a car, I don't care
what kind of car it is andyou're scrolling through auto
trader or whatever you know,whatever source you're going to
to look for.
If the only thing it said onthat car, as far as price was
(31:13):
concerned, was call for pricing,are you going to go call that
dealership?
No, absolutely not.
I wouldn't even consider it.
I'm out 100 percent.
So why are we asking ourcustomers?
You know why.
Why are we asking our customers?
Speaker 1 (31:22):
You know why?
Because it matters.
You know what I immediatelythink.
So again, people that they,their families, own companies,
you know it's.
They're waiting to hear what mylast name is, to tell me what
the price is, or whateverthey're waiting to say you know
my husband is African-American,so are they waiting to see what
color I am, to see if they'regoing to.
And it's crazy, right, it canbe crazy, people can get in
their own heads.
(31:42):
But you're right, like withthat lack of transparency, comes
more confusion and lack oftrust.
For sure, transparency.
I remember when we startedsharing with our team our actual
numbers people are like y'allare crazy.
I would never.
And I'm like you know what'simportant is number one.
(32:03):
If you're not doing stuffthat's out of line, then you
won't worry about it.
But you know, and most peopleknow, the owner makes more money
, so settle down with that.
But what is a challenge to meabout it is I share our numbers
with our limited team.
Our limited team knows what ourgoals are and what we're doing.
Now.
Do they maybe not understand?
(32:24):
Like I'll tell you what I loveto show people?
Show them how much it costs foryou to provide them with
insurance every month.
Yeah, show them how much itcosts for these big retreats and
things that you do or traveland things like that.
So it's good in those ways.
But me it's about beingtransparent to my team and to
our clients.
(32:44):
Like Limiting has transparentpricing.
Like we don't like hideanything inside of packages
because we're like we're an openbook, because I want you to be
an open book with me.
Like that street goes two waysbut for sure, transparency.
Pricing is so important and andtwo.
Speaker 2 (32:59):
Like y'all actually, I think around the same time,
whenever y'all started, uh,sharing numbers with your team,
that was, I think maybe y'allwere like a couple months in,
and that was whenever I like, Ithink, I met you guys and you
said that you're doing it.
I was like, yep, that's whatwe're doing, and so we've been
doing it ever since as well, andit's in the same, you know,
that same kind of vein oftransparency and wanting to
(33:20):
drive high character.
You know, and the reality is isif we don't take control, not
even just the narrativeexternally you know, we were
talking about the pricing sideexternally but if we don't take
control, branding and marketingalso as an internal operation,
and so if we don't take controlof the narrative, of how the
business is doing, where we'regoing and what the direction is,
well then everybody's going tobe left to tell their own story.
(33:41):
So if we're not the drum beaterfor our own business within the
business, then shame on us.
Because if things are, you know, say, we play break-even ball
or even just lose just a littlebit of money for a season of
time, well, those things startto show up in the business.
There's a vibe and you know, orif you make a little bit of
money and there's some profit,you know nothing absurd.
Let's say you're hitting justabove average.
(34:03):
You're hitting like 6% and 7%,because I think our industry
average is about 3% or 4%.
Let's say, you're doubling it,you're hitting 6% or 7%, well,
there's going to be signs in thebusiness.
And then if you're not beatingthe drum as to what the
expectation is and where thatmoney's going, well then the
team on both ends of it job, oron the high side, if we're
making a little bit of money,well then they might be thinking
(34:29):
well, darren's sitting on thebeach drinking Mai Tais every
weekend, so what the heck am Idoing here?
So we have to take control ofthe narrative and share where
we're going, what we're doingand what the vision ultimately
is If we want people to buy inand make a career with us at all
, because why would we have theexpectation to make an
investment in us if they don'tknow where we're headed?
You know, and ultimately I wantto be you know, I can't say the
(34:49):
Kansas City Chiefs because I'ma Broncos fan, so I can't say I
want to be the Kansas CityChiefs, but I want to.
You know, I'll be the NewEngland Patriots.
The New England Patriots not agreat time for anybody involved.
Speaker 1 (35:12):
I love sports analogies.
My team is full of a lot ofgirls and one day I said, okay,
I'm going to call an audible,and they just all looked at me.
I was like friends, go watchthe football game, go watch any
sport.
Well, and then one day I said,and I'm terrible about them.
Well, and I even said one day Isaid, listen, I need y'all to
get in the paint with me downhere, like let's score some bats
(35:35):
.
And they were like they nevercan follow.
So I loved I just am a sportskind of person.
So I love these analogiesbecause, honestly, like, I just
want contractors to make theconnection of the importance of
things, like you mentioned itearlier, getting in the game
Y'all.
When you run companies, whenyou're a general manager and
owner operator, whateverleadership position you sit in,
(35:55):
you have to have your head inthe game.
Another thing that I find quiteironic I will work with
different contractors and theywill be literally crying like
this is out of control for me.
And then I'm about to be inTurks and Caicos for two weeks
with lack of phone reception andI'm like OK, like so, remind me
.
Like so you feel like thingsare burning down, but you're on
(36:17):
a cruise ship.
Now, listen, you deserve it.
So I'm not saying that, but I'mlike man, sometimes we don't
have the luxury of hitting thevacation road when our team
might be falling apart.
If anything, it almost dangnear, feels like abandonment,
you know.
And so I'm like man, you know,when you talk to people that
don't run companies.
They're like, oh, you're theowner, like don't want a
(36:38):
vacation, and I'm like the verylast thing I would do when my
team is in the middle of summeror my team is in the middle of
you know, whatever's going on,and I storm for me to be like
you know I'm going to stay here,but y'all go ahead and hit the
streets or y'all got to digyourself up.
Now, listen, I'm about to boardthis airplane, but y'all figure
out why we can't make goldRight.
(36:58):
So sometimes I'm like, hey,maybe you should spend a little
bit more time like in thebusiness, and you know what
we've done.
Tucker, though You've heardmany of this, you got to work on
the business, not in thebusiness.
Well, that's great when yourbusiness is operating at good
efficiency and capacity.
Speaker 2 (37:12):
And can I share something with you?
I hate, with all of my being,work on your business, not in
your business, thank you.
It's an oxymoron to me.
I hate it.
So I think I think that is themost misguided bit of
information for it.
Because who runs businesses?
Let's founders andentrepreneurs.
(37:32):
Well, who are founders andentrepreneurs?
They're ADHD folks, and if wetell them to go work on
something and not in something,well, guess what's going to
happen?
We're going to go chase athousand different rabbits
instead of doing the thingWorking in our and I get the
spirit that it said in Correct.
The spirit is great.
You know it's mean and finetune the things in your business
.
It's all those things.
(37:53):
However, in order to work onyour business, you also need to
have a connection with thepeople in the business.
You need to be in the trencheswith them.
You need to be showing up everyday Because, again, it goes
back to the same thing I saidabout vendors People on your
team are not going to care asmuch about the brand as you do,
and if you don't show a highdegree of ownership and care
(38:15):
about the brand, then why in theworld would anyone on your team
?
Speaker 1 (38:23):
Absolutely, and you know I love that sentiment
because I will say thatsometimes to my contractors.
I will say now listen, you'reworking so much in the business
that you can't work on thebusiness.
So I have a contractor rightnow.
Sweet guy, does great work,fantastic technician and
installer.
The problem is I need him tolook up, right.
I need him to look up frominside of the condenser and
let's look up at your P&L.
(38:44):
Like you know and I think, hehas the opposite of that of like
.
I just want there to be thishappy medium of you're working
diligently, getting processesand SOPs and expectations in
place, where, slowly but surely,you still have your eyeballs in
the business and you're stilljumping in where needed, but you
are able to take a higher view.
So I get it, I'm like you, Iget the sentiment, but I also
(39:06):
don't want people to feel like,just because you need to go dunk
in a truck today, you're not afailure.
Speaker 2 (39:11):
Yeah, but I also don't want people to feel like,
just because you need to go in atruck today, you're not a
failure.
Yeah, you know, and I thinkthere's there's so many
leadership lessons that you candraw from.
But yeah, it's fresh on my mind.
I've been working through, uhfor the fourth or fifth time, uh
, jocko's leadership, uh, jockoWillink, he's a former Navy SEAL
, uh written several books.
But leadership strategy andtactics add that to your reading
list.
It's incredible.
But as leaders, a lot of timeswe get told it's like hey, you
(39:32):
got to detach, you got to, youknow, step back, and that way
you can look at things.
But I think there's this Jocko.
He gives a great example of it.
Doesn't take much to detach,you know.
So he gives an example.
They were clearing this oil rigand they were, you know, sitting
there trying to clear thiswhole rig and you know, the
platoon commander, they were allsitting there and everybody's
just looking down the barrels oftheir guns waiting for
something to happen.
(39:52):
And you know, jocko was a hewas a junior guy at this point.
He wasn't the man in charge,you know, but they had stood
there for long enough that hekind of got uncomfortable and so
he said well, I just raised mygun to the port ready position,
which is up, he said, saw thescenario that we were sitting in
and gave an order and peoplewent, and that's sometimes all
it takes to detach.
Is that six inch removal fromthe problem.
(40:13):
A lot of times we think, oh, wegot to detach, I'm going to
Turks and Caicos, and that's notat all the remedy.
Speaker 1 (40:23):
I'm going to detach with like a drink and a beach.
It's very true and you know Ilove this the whole concept
behind like man Trey.
I'll say this for my brotherand I'm sure you have this same
thing from your dad or brothers,one of them or yourself.
You know he never fully removedhimself from, he was in service
(40:45):
meetings, he was showing up atjobs, he was actively engaged in
understanding and treatingpeople for people right.
It wasn't just another installcrew, it was Brandon and Caleb,
not install crew number 10.
Now we had lots of processesbuilt around install crew number
10, but at the end of the daywe knew the faces behind those
(41:07):
numbers, the faces behind thoseinvoices coming through, and
I've always admired that.
About my brother is like he'snot really a softy, like in the
sense of he's not overlyemotional at all.
Sometimes I'm like, are youemotional at all?
I'll have to poke him.
But I, on the other hand, havelearned a lot because I tend to
be an empath, so I will take on.
And so I've had to learn like Ican't save everybody in my
(41:30):
business but I dang sure cancare about them a lot.
Speaker 2 (41:32):
Yeah, yeah absolutely .
Speaker 1 (41:34):
And that, like when, let me see, even when we kind of
restructured ourselves we callit 2.0.
And when we did that, likeEmily and I, like literally, I
felt like we held hands andjumped off a diving board
together.
Speaker 2 (41:49):
Like we can do it together.
Speaker 1 (41:49):
Yeah, yeah, absolutely.
So just just keeping keeping awatch on your team.
Well, tucker, I know we'reabout to wrap up here, so tell
me what you guys.
I know you have some new coolstuff out.
I love the new Facebook group.
You can keep them all up inthere.
I love talking, so tell mewhat's new for you guys.
Speaker 2 (42:06):
Yeah, so we.
So I've been doing coaching forthe with the Service Nation
Alliance for the last probablythree years or so, and then just
speaking at different breakoutsand things like that, and
ultimately Trades Consulting.
You know, I think, likeeverything that we start, we
started a thing called TradesConsulting.
I founded this like a year agoand it's kind of sat on the
(42:27):
shelf, didn't really have time,really wanted to work out kind
of what we wanted from it, whatthe vision was for it, and so
after months of kind of goingback and forth of what we were
going to do because ultimately,like you said, we talked about a
bad sales pitch earlier and mybad sales pitch whenever
somebody would bring me in forcoaching with Service Nation and
(42:48):
I'm still doing coaching withTrades Consulting my goal is for
you to fire me.
I want to be with you for fourto six weeks.
I want to see it.
You know, find a thread, pullit tight, make sure that we have
the system and processimplemented and rock on from
there, you know.
But then I realized, okay, thatcan't be all that it is, and so
I started.
I've put in the hours, me andChatGPT.
(43:08):
We've worked really hardtogether and we built.
I built a tool called GetQuotethrough Trace Consulting and
GetQuote is.
We talked about transparentpricing and GetQuote is our
online instant estimate tool.
It was built by me, acontractor, for contractors.
You know I'm not trying todisrupt the industry, not trying
to just completely throw.
(43:29):
You know it's not an AI tool.
It is a simple function thatallows us to collect customer
information.
They can fill out a form inless than a minute and get clear
pricing on what a five tonsystem would cost or what a
system.
I don't do tonnages because mosthomeowners don't know what
tonnages are, so I do squarefootage.
So what's a rough ballpark forthis size?
(43:50):
So whenever a homeowner goesthrough our tool, they're able
to get pretty dang near exactlywhat we're going to sell a
system for, unless we have to dosome ductwork, repair, things
like that.
There's some extenuating stuff.
So we built that as aconversion tool for ourselves,
(44:17):
because we're like, okay, ifwe're going to coach people
through tradesconsulting, weneed to give them a tool to help
convert leads, because it's a,I think, an epidemic in all
industries, but most of the timeclients don't have a
contractors don't really have Ihesitate to say this there are
some that have a call volumeproblem right, but I think as
big of a call volume problem aswe may have I think we some that
have a call volume problemright, but I think as big of a
call volume problem as we mayhave, I think we also might have
a call booking problem andconversion problem.
And I think it's a lot easier tosolve your call booking and
(44:40):
conversion because we cancontrol those variables.
Whereas call volume, well,there's some weather dependency
to it, there's economy factorsto it, there's things outside of
our control, and so I want totake some extreme ownership and
say, okay, how can we convertthese things?
And so that's why we builtGetQuote.
We built it for ourselves.
Ultimately, if we don't sell,an instance of GetQuote.
(45:01):
it's worth it.
In three weeks it's generated$46,000 for us.
We've sold pretty much online.
We just send a technician outthere to verify what they've
quoted and then we've sold it.
And so we're in the early daysof building out TradeStock
Consulting.
We're super excited about kindof what we got going on.
You know the full vision of itreally hadn't been fully cast
yet because it's a moving target, but we do know that we have a
(45:26):
really powerful tool.
We've got it down to as cheapof a price as we possibly can.
We've got it down to where it's$4,500 a year.
If you pay it annually or ifyou want to pay monthly, you can
cancel at any time with eitherof those.
But ultimately for us it'sdriven in at this point $46,000
and about 20 to 30 qualifiedleads, and they have a lower
(45:47):
conversion rate.
Speaker 1 (45:49):
But you're driving business to that.
Speaker 2 (45:51):
Oh, absolutely.
Speaker 1 (45:52):
Social media or emails or what are you using?
Speaker 2 (45:54):
Absolutely so.
Everything, everything.
Speaker 1 (45:57):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (45:59):
So really and truly, it's social and email is the
biggest two.
So, and we we started withsocial and the social we've kind
of all I'll send, post this.
I'll send you the link to acouple of the ads that we're
running to point people to itbecause I think it'd be valuable
for anybody.
Anybody rob and duplicate ourstuff, because we rob and
duplicate everyone else's.
(46:19):
Nothing is sacred.
The best idea wins.
We can't just go to marketasking people like hey, here's a
instant estimate tool and youshould use it.
You know it's not a verycompelling or entertaining
message.
And so, you know, we had a sillyad where we've got a putting
green in the front of our officejust like a little strip of
(46:41):
grass that ends in like a hole.
And so Bryce had an idea of hey, I want you to, you know, hold
this golf ball up and say, likeyou know, every time I hit this
ball it makes the weirdest noise.
And so I set the ball down andI stroked the ball in and, lo
and behold, I made it.
But the whole time Bryce wasshooting a slow-mo video of the
ball rolling down the green andit's me whispering.
(47:03):
We added audio over it and it'sme whispering saying get an
instant estimate fromYarbroughandSunscom.
It's just things like that.
Or like we had one where wewere.
You know, similar deal, sameformat.
We had a nerf football.
And so the ad needs to beinherently watchable.
It needs to be entertainingbecause we scroll, for I don't
know if you get your, you knowif you get attacked by your
iPhone, uh, every week, like Ido on the screen time report, um
(47:27):
and and it's oppressive.
It's like, hey, you spent 12and a half hours on your phone
today and we're scrolling.
You know we're scrollingmindlessly, and so, to punch
through the noise, the ad thatwe make has to be entertaining,
and so everything that we'redoing, we're doing that and we
our email list is really justhitting up old customers and
letting them know hey, we've gotaging equipment.
If you're curious about what itcosts, here it is.
(47:47):
And, yes, our online estimatetool has a lower conversion rate
because people are gettingprices.
They want to see what's the carcost.
Eventually, you and I both knowthey're going to need a car.
Eventually they're going toneed to replace their HVAC, and
I have no data to back this upwhatsoever, but I just have a
core belief that in the next two, three, five years, the
(48:11):
businesses who operate with thehighest degree of transparency
are going to be the ones thatwin, because AI is going to cut
through everything like a hotknife, and the only thing that
we're going to be left with isthe brand that we've built, the
prices that we have and what arewe going to go to market with.
That's what we're going to beleft with.
(48:31):
Everything else will beconsidered fluff, because AI is
going to come through and slashit.
Speaker 1 (48:36):
Yeah, yeah, I'm telling you I love the
authenticity side.
I think that's definitely goingto be a cool thing.
And then, tucker, if anybodywanted to just get in touch with
you, we're going to put allthis in the show notes and when
we share it on social media.
But what's the best way forthem to get in touch with you
about anything you've said today?
Speaker 2 (48:57):
Yeah, so they can get in touch with me through my
email.
Either one of them so it'stucker at yarbroughandsonscom
it's a long one, but it's allspelled out or tucker at
tradesconsulting.
Either one of those and I'llsee them'll see him, uh, and
we're excited, you know.
And again, if anybody hasquestions about what we're doing
even if it's just marketingoperations, anything like that
like I've given away more hoursof coaching than uh, than I ever
(49:20):
could bill for, um, I, I enjoytalking with like-minded people.
I enjoy talking withcontractors who are trying to
build something.
Um, because ultimately, I thinkthis industry is full of the
greatest people in the nation,because they operate America's
life support system, which isour HVAC and our plumbing,
absolutely, and they deserve tobe compensated like such.
(49:41):
So building cool businesses andtalking to contractors who are
after building cool businessesis one of my favorite things to
do.
Speaker 1 (49:47):
I love it.
I love it, tucker.
You're doing great things.
You and your brothers, brycey'all are all just amazing and
wonderful to listen to.
So congratulations on all yourcurrent success and the success
that I know that's coming soonthat you guys keep seeing.
So here's what I do want to sayto all of our listeners.
I really encourage you to takeTucker's advice.
Coming from the industry withno.
(50:09):
Neither one of us have anythingto gain from this advice.
We literally have lived thelife of watching people be
dedicated to growing theirbusiness, dedicated to changing.
Tucker mentioned it earlier.
His dad is, you know, is notafraid of technology.
My dad wasn't either.
So even at 64 years old whichis how old my dad is like he's
always like hey, I'm learningthis new AI because we want to
(50:32):
stay active and we want to staycutting edge as much as we can,
but also keeping the heart ofour companies.
And so, trevor, thank you somuch.
I wish you guys the best andall that you continue to do.
And, guys, thank you forlistening to another episode of
From the Yellow Chair.
If you loved what you heard,please like us on all of our
socials and leave us a review,and we will.
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