How to Start a Christmas Lighting Business: Listener Q&A

🎄 Ever thought about running a Christmas light business? This is your behind-the-scenes masterclass.

In this special episode, a podcast listener flips the mic and interviews the host, Anne McGinty, about how she started a seasonal Christmas lighting business.

The listener comes prepared with thoughtful, detailed questions about every step of starting and scaling a holiday lighting operation.

If you're considering a side hustle, craving entrepreneurial inspiration, or curious about a surprisingly lucrative niche, this deep-dive delivers practical tools, strategy, and real talk.

This is more of a How-To episode.

Subscribe on Apple Podcast , Spotify or YouTube.

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Website: https://www.annemcginty.com/

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/annemcginty

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Today's episode is a little different from the usual
format.
A listener reached out withquestions about how I started
and ran my Christmas lightingbusiness and, instead of
replying one-on-one, I suggestedwe record the conversation,
just in case others out thereare curious too.
For context, I co-owned aChristmas light installation
business with my husband, mark,for 13 years, before selling it

(00:22):
in 2020.
We spoke about it in an episodein season one, so if you're
curious and want to learn more,you can always go into the back
catalog and check that out.
We built our business from theground up, starting with one
truck and doing all the jobsourselves, then gradually hiring
and scaling.
By the time we sold, thebusiness ran for six months a

(00:43):
year with six trucks and about20 employees.
If you've ever thought aboutlaunching a Christmas lighting
business, or you're just curiousabout seasonal businesses with
high profit potential, thisone's for you.
It's more of a how-to.

Speaker 2 (01:00):
So I currently am in construction.
Okay, so I've been working as aproject manager for a general
contractor with this particularcompany for almost 12 years.
I've got a wife and two smallgirls and have been starting to
understand that I do have a goodjob and it's a steady job, but
for what I'm trying to do andprovide for my family I'm going

(01:21):
to need to have something elsekind of bumping things up.
So I've been kind of on thisside, gig side hustle journey
here for a while, which hasactually led me to discover you,
and so I was just veryintrigued by your story and
oddly, I think I think I toldyou this in my email that was
the second story I had heardthat week of a Christmas light

(01:44):
company and the immense successthat has come with it, and I was
just like, wow, this is crazy.
So figured I would reach outand first of all, I want to say
thank you for actuallyresponding to me.
I didn't expect to actually geta response, and if I did, I
thought it might be from anassistant, and then it was
actually you, and now we'retalking, and so it was just very
amazing.
So thank you.

(02:10):
Yeah, of course I'm happy toshare everything I know.
So what do you want to know?
Oh man, I have a whole list ofquestions here and I've tried to
kind of compartmentalize theminto categories.
I'm sure I'm going to be kindof like a squirrel and all over
the place and you're going tosay something that's going to
lead me to another question, sowe'll just start from the top.
So I've got materials as one ofthe first things that popped
into my head as I was listeningto your podcast.
And you know what, what are youproviding to these homeowners?
Are you coming in with like amenu and saying this is our
typical package, it's all white,led and it's, you know, basic.

(02:34):
We're going your your roof lineor wrapping your trees.
Or are you offering many lightsto do tree trunks and then
bigger lights to do the canopy?
And just how much in detail areyou doing?
Yeah, Okay.

Speaker 1 (02:47):
So you've got a gazillion questions in there.
To start, to start out, thefirst year we got the bare
minimum that we needed to, justin order to get started.
So we got a basic inventory ofand this was when it was
incandescent.
So we transitioned to 95% LEDtowards the end like, well,
maybe around the middle of whenwe had our business, but

(03:09):
definitely towards the end andwe were constantly trying to
push people to move towards LED,both for its environmentally
friendly reasons, but alsobecause it makes installations
so much easier.
You're not dealing with brokenglass, you're not dealing with
calculations for incandescentlighting, which is just, it
guzzles so much more.
And then you end up having tocreate a more complex puzzle.

(03:29):
So that was LED.
Five mils are like the littlehats.
Then you've got LED minis,which they're more similar to
like a typical mini Christmaslight.
They have like a little bit ofa bigger bulb on them and then
from there you start going likeC7, c9s.
They are the bulbs that getscrewed into the sockets and
that's along an SPT wire, solike an SPT wire with little

(03:50):
sockets in them that you can getit spaced like six inches apart
, 12 inches apart, 18 inches, 24inches.
You can buy the spools and thenyou can custom cut them and
they come in green, white, blackso that you can try and match
the trim of whatever structureyou are installing so that
during the daytime it has theleast impact for anybody that's
looking at it.
The SPT wire it comes in eitherSPT1 or SPT2.

(04:14):
Spt1 is really thin, spt2 isthicker, spt2 can handle a
higher amperage.
We typically stayed with SPT2.
And then you buy the littleSPT2 plugins.
So you, the little SPT2 plugins, so you can buy those in bulk
online.
Some are better than others,some are easier to use than
others, because they've gotthese little prongs that push up
into the wire and then you canslide it on and that's how the

(04:35):
prongs engage with the wireinside the copper or whatever it
is inside the casing, and sothen you can custom cut any
length, right?
So if you're doing a roof line,the bigger the roof line, the
bigger the bulb, but more likedistance.
So for commercial roof lines wewould often use C9 bulbs.

(04:55):
Those are bigger, and forresidential roof lines we would
use C7.
So C7 LED bulbs.
They come in warm white.
S4 lights is where we used toget a bunch of our lights.
I cannot speak to the quality ofwhat they are doing today.
It's been many years since Iordered from them.
They are a wholesaler, so theydon't sell retail.
So you will need to get areseller's license, which is

(05:17):
literally you fill in a formonline and I think you get a
reseller's permit like instantly.
So I think in order to purchasefrom them you're going to need
a reseller's license.
We know some people who chose tojust pay the taxes up front on
the materials and then they didnot want to deal with filling
out the paperwork for thereseller's permit.

(05:38):
You got to figure out what kindof accounting you want to do.
We did it that way.
We did wholesale, we got thediscounts.
Eventually we started orderingpre-season in bulk and you get
an even bigger discount.
But so LED C7s C7 spool weusually did like one white and
one either green or black,depending on what was available
Boxes of SPT plugins that fitthe wire gauge that you order

(06:02):
for those spools.
And then we do cases of LEDfive mils in warm white.
We tried to stay away from theLED minis when we could, mainly
because when you install themthey can catch on things a
little bit more because they'vegot a point on them, whereas the
little hats like were supereasy.

(06:22):
We would pre-prep all of ourmaterials before we showed up at
any job site.
So before the season startedyou don't need to do any
prepping for the spools, but forthe LED 5 mils you need little
snips because you have to cutoff the tags, otherwise the tags
are really ugly in the treesand things.
You just do a little snip inone spot and then it pulls right

(06:43):
off.
So as many cases as you canafford of that, that's going to
be the number one thing you puton bushes and trees.
So, as you were saying, we'rejust talking about residential
at the moment and what you do isyou kind of create an assembly
line so you can be quick at it,but you snip, snip, snip, snip,
get all the tags off and thenyou start usually with the

(07:04):
female end.
You grab one in your hand andyou just start rolling it around
to create kind of like a ball,because then you can take the
ball, you can take the male end,plug it into the extension cord
, wherever you've set that up,and that's where you start and
then you just grab the next oneand you can continue.
But let's see beyond that.
You need regular outdoor heavyduty green extension cords or

(07:28):
black or white like whatever itis.
Again, that's going to be themost hidden as you go from the
power source to where thevarious lighting is right.
So let's just take a standardhouse.
You find the outlet in thegarage.
You're like great, I'm going touse this outlet because it's
got 20 amps on it.
Nothing else is running on it,so it can be dedicated to the
lighting.
You'll go from there and you'llput like a timer right.

(07:52):
So an outdoor rated timer youcan use indoor if it's indoor,
but usually for 20 amps, 15 ampsfor sure, if you I don't know
if you'll be able to find 20 amp, cause they were kind of tricky
, but 15, 20 amp.
And then from there you'regoing to put, say, an extension
cord to run from the garageoutside and then from there it's
like they're called heavy dutyadapters.

(08:13):
They're like three partadapters and they've got, you
know, the prongs so that you cansplit your lighting display
from there.
So you kind of want to have anoverall idea of the plan.
When you meet with the clientthey're going to tell you what
they want to do, like I want to.
You know, do the roof line andI want to do these windows.
I kind of want to do somethingaround the doorway and I want to

(08:34):
do these bushes and trees.
So for you it's a puzzle.
It's like great, how am I goingto get electricity to each of
those parts so that I'm not likerunning lights across the lawn
Right?
And then what else did you sayin there?
You said supplies, so laddersper truck.
Okay, we would have a stepladder, then we would have a 24
foot self-leveling ladder so youcan get self-leveling feet

(08:55):
where we were in the Bay area.
So we needed ladders that couldgo on uneven ground.

Speaker 2 (09:01):
Right.

Speaker 1 (09:02):
And they have these self-leveling feet that are
really cool but you buy them asan aftermarket thing.
So 24 foot ladder and then likea 32 foot extension ladder, so
those are both extensions.
We got a painter's pole withoutthe roller, so just the hook
with the pole that helped ushook things.
You know, box of timers,several timers.

(09:24):
We would pre-program the timersbefore the season started.
Just, you would not believe howmuch human error there is in
setting timers AM, pm.
Like whoops, I turned it on togo on at 8 AM and off at 4 PM
instead of the other way around.
And then if you do have areaswhere you suspect like
sprinklers might get water intothe connections, you can use

(09:49):
dialectic grease which you putin there.
But just forewarning that it'sa little bit messy and so when
you come to take the lights down, it's just something that has
to be wiped.
It's just a little bit annoyingbut it helps to keep the
moisture out.
You can't, do not tape yourconnections.
Tape connections are likethey're so dangerous because
water will get through that tapeand then it could cause a

(10:12):
fluctuation in the electricalsystem, it could trip it, it
could cause a fire hazard thatway.
So don't tape.

Speaker 2 (10:18):
So any of you guys use any of that.
I seen like the little plastichousings that kind of go over
the connections.
You guys play with any of those?

Speaker 1 (10:25):
We did not.
Okay, but that was just us.
I know there's a lot ofdifferent methods.
There's the heat shrinking,there's maybe a silicone I think
it was and beyond that, oh,staple guns, j21 staple guns.
So J21 staples and staple gunsare light duty.
They more or less pop out.

(10:48):
If you are taking the rooflinelights off and you're able to
hook it and then you're pullingit down and it's not on any sort
of trim, it's in the gutter,then the gutter will, the clips
will all just go a little, it'llliterally unzip.
So you'll just go like this andyou'll, you'll watch it and
you'll be like wow, that's likea domino effect.
Every now and then the clipsget stuck so you can use that
painter's pole to fetch themdown without going all the way

(11:09):
up there on an extension ladder.
And then for the staples, weand this was just us, I don't
think every company does this,but you know we were trying to
offer a really like a reallyhigh quality white glove service
.
So we would make sure to takethe staples out if they were
visible.
I know that other people justleave them in, and the problem

(11:30):
with leaving them in is thatthey might rust and then they
might create a little bit of astain mark on the window trim
and like we just didn't want todo that to our customers.
So you need clips.
So they have all-in-one clipsthat are suitable for roof
linesters.
The staples will go on wood.
And then zip ties.
You need, like black zip ties,clear zip ties.

(11:51):
Again, make it blend and whatwe would also do, so that we did
not have to put a ladder up.
Let's say that we wanted to ziptie a cord to the top near a
gutter, near the downspout orsomething like that.
You don't want to wrap aroundand you don't want to zip tie
tight, because then you have togo up and snip it.

(12:11):
But if you put it on somewhattight and then you snip one side
of it, it's enough to just holdit.
But then when you come to takeit down and you'd give it a
little yank the zip tie justcomes off and you just have to
go and collect it in the grassor wherever it falls and along
with everything else.
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (12:29):
Okay, so with that, the efficiency of the install.
I do remember I'm sorry, yourhusband's name is Mark, Is that
right?
Yeah, yeah.
So I was listening to yourpodcast with him the other day
and he had mentioned somethingspecifically towards installing
with efficiency.
For you know the takedown,which is kind of what you're
talking about.
So yeah, the the clips.
You're using those on like um,so I'm in colorado, we have a

(12:52):
lot of tile roofs in the area onthat, so I can actually clip to
the tiles.
Or are you guys going to likesoffits, gutter?

Speaker 1 (13:00):
okay gutter, or you can go right underneath the
gutter and there is I don't knowwhat that's called.
There's usually a trim piece.

Speaker 2 (13:10):
The fascia board.

Speaker 1 (13:11):
Maybe, yeah, you will .
This is going to be a customtrim.
You're gonna have to figurethat out like one by one.
I we didn't work with a lot oftile out here, so, okay, I know
we had some spanish terracottatile jobs and, yeah, the clips
are a little funky on thosebecause you want them to sit
really straight, right, yeah,and, and when the tile is really

(13:31):
thick, there's probably at thispoint somebody who has created
a clip that is specifically forthat tile, so you might just
have to search that one okay,but beyond that, if you're like
at the eve of a roof and so areyou clipping on like the fascia
board, or would you guys,because there's probably no
gutter on the ease, right?

(13:53):
even the roof.
So when it was shingle shingle,there are shingle clips.
Those are easy because you justclip along the eaves You're
talking about, like theridgelines.

Speaker 2 (14:02):
Yeah.

Speaker 1 (14:03):
Yeah, the ridgelines.
So you just clip to theridgelines.
Tile is a little tricky becauseif you walk on tile you can
crack it yeah.

Speaker 2 (14:10):
And that's actually one of the questions I have.
Do you guys experience any ofthat?

Speaker 1 (14:14):
I mean, it sounds like you don't have a lot of
tile, but we don't have a lot oftile, but we we would usually
explain to the customer thatyour roof is tile and walking on
tile is it's just it mightcrack it.
So we would maybe steer themaway from trying to do the ridge
lines on their roof if they hadtile.
Okay, we would focus on otherareas, other landscape features

(14:37):
or other things.
And if they want you to do thetile and they're willing to have
tile replaced as needed shouldit break, this is all just stuff
you can include in thedisclaimer.

Speaker 2 (14:48):
Okay, so is that something you guys kind of would
exclude if you were to damagetile use?
Hey, this is just kind ofinherent risk You're going to
have to be willing to deal withafter we leave, or is that
something that you would remedybefore you left?

Speaker 1 (15:00):
We for sure would let them know if it happened, and
then they could have theirroofer come and replace that
tile piece.
I mean we're not roofers, so Idon't know how complex that
procedure is.
If it was easy like, hey, justpull this one out and put the
other one in, but if there wasany risk to the integrity of the
system, then I mean I wouldjust say, look, we'll let you
know, we'll try to step lightlyas much as we can and just know

(15:23):
that there's a risk, and sowe'll definitely notify you if
there's a crack.

Speaker 2 (15:27):
Okay, what about, like, leaning ladders up against
houses?
Did you have any issues with,like I don't know, damaging
stucco or scuffing paint oranything like that?

Speaker 1 (15:37):
So with like new construction places.
It's so funny because thewindow trim is sometimes made
with styrofoam.

Speaker 2 (15:44):
It is yes.

Speaker 1 (15:45):
You know it is the oddest thing.
We did not have very many newconstruction places and, yeah,
you do have to kind of be awareof that, so you can't really
lean up when it's styrofoam.
You have to lean up on theactual face of the building but
not directly on the styrofoam,and we tended to so while we had
these.
They were like cushiony partsthat went on top of the ladder

(16:10):
so that when it pressed againstit it wouldn't put too much
pressure.
Okay, we had this onecircumstance where when we
rested the ladder up against thehouse and we had those, when
they stepped on the ladder itactually dragged down on the
surface and it was that thehouse had soot on it.
So the house had, like from thecars it hadn't been pressure
washed maybe in several years,and so the legs of the ladder

(16:34):
like kind of just made theseclean marks.
But that was the only housethat we experienced that with.
We didn't have other houseswhere that was an issue.

Speaker 2 (16:43):
Interesting.
So with with the materials, um,a couple of questions here.
Is the homeowner purchasingthose?
I mean it's part of yourpackage, so you guys are
supplying them correct.

Speaker 1 (16:56):
Yeah, we, you can do it either way.
Supplying them correct yeah,you can do it either way.
We started out where we wouldsell them, the lights, and put
them in a bin and then theclient would store their lights
at their house.
We stopped doing that afterseveral years, and especially
when we switched over to LED,because what we found was our
team would turn up at the house,open up the bin and then

(17:17):
something would have stoppedworking, or maybe they decided
to change the look of their joband these custom cut lines no
longer made sense and it juststarted feeling inefficient,
like we're wasting all of thistime at the job site trying to
sort out how to use thecustomer's existing supplies.
This would have just beeneasier if we could have just
gone to our sort of stockpileand gone hey, there are bins of

(17:41):
led five mils.
We've already estimated thistree needs 10 strands, that tree
needs 15 strands.
Just use it.
And then we would lease thelights and supplies to the
customer and we would replacethose lights and supplies on an
ongoing basis, like about everytwo to three years, and then we
just priced that into thestructure of the job.
So we always, always wanted tohave great quality products.

(18:02):
If you keep the LED lights fortoo long, they look faded, they
look old, they kind of just looklike they've had a life.
So the new lights they canblend with your existing stock
in like a pretty natural way,because it kind of just creates
a bit of a speckled you know,starry night look.
Anyway, every season we werereplenishing and adding and we

(18:22):
were testing outside of theseason.
Anything that looked like it wasnot good enough quality got
recycled and then we would justkeep our inventory.
That way we started having binswhere it was like short strands
of C7s, long strands of C7s andthen if the person had a
roofline and we felt that theywere consistently going to book

(18:42):
that roofline, we did startbinning their roofline lights
and we would label their binwith the person's name and the
address and we would keep thatin our storage and just make a
note on the work order that thisperson has a bin, one bin, two
bins, three bins, four, how manybins they've got in our storage
so that they could getretrieved for that job.
If you think about it, ifyou've got boxes or bins of

(19:06):
extension cords and yourthree-point adapters and your
LED five mils and your bulbs andall your things, and then you
just have these custom cut linesfrom previous years.
That's so much easier to workwith than showing up to a bin
and going what have they got?
And like did the customer usesome outside of the season and
not put them back?
It's just, it became easier and, honestly, it's more profitable
to lease the lights.

Speaker 2 (19:27):
When you say that you're like doing the
replacement, are you replacingjust the bulb?

Speaker 1 (19:31):
No, the whole strands .
So yeah, we the LED C7s and C9s.
They last quite a while, likewe would If we stored that
customer's roofline lights in abin and we pulled them out.
When you test them you'll beable to see are any of them
faded and you can replace thoseas they're faded Again after
about two to three seasons itwould fluctuate depending on the

(19:52):
supplier.
You want to replace those bulbsentirely, just to keep the
display looking top-notch sothat it doesn't look old.
You know what I mean.
Yeah, we were constantly makingsure that our trucks had a
fresh face.
We just take care of thebranding that way, and quality
of your work is represented inthe quality of your displays and
the quality of your products isshown.

Speaker 2 (20:14):
So yeah, so what about timing In terms of your
advertising?
When did you start advertisingfor the season and when are you
trying to start booking andactually starting your installs?
I think I heard you say one ofyour podcasts you started maybe
early November with yourinstalls through kind of
mid-December.
Is that kind of the installrange?

Speaker 1 (20:33):
So first season?
Yes, by the time we sold ourbusiness, we were installing
lights in July.

Speaker 2 (20:37):
Oh, wow.

Speaker 1 (20:38):
It became a six month season towards the end, and
that was because of thecommercial jobs big properties,
parks, things like that whowould want their lights up
before Halloween, and theydidn't necessarily care when the
lights went up, as long as wecould guarantee they were up in
time for Halloween.
And you know, they startprobably opening for Halloween
at the end of September.
Even so, the very first year,though, our first job was on

(21:01):
November 4th and we printed outtwo to a sheet, these little
flyers, and we probably printedoff a hundred of these, cut them
in half.
I gave half to him and I tookhalf.
He would literally skateboardaround blocks and drop these off
.
You can't put them technicallyin the mailboxes, because that
is like US property.

(21:22):
You can, however, rubber, bandthem to you know gate entrances
or doors or things like that.
And it really it was less thanan hour, I mean it was probably
only 30 minutes.
We were walking and I got thefirst phone call and we targeted
a very, very high net wortharea.

(21:43):
So we weren't living in thatarea.
We drove to that area, parkedour truck, got out, started
doing these walks among theblocks and dropping off until we
ran out.
And then, once we got that call, I kind of used the whole.
I mean it makes me cringe alittle bit now, but that concept

(22:03):
of fake it till you make it alittle bit where the person
called and I just acted like Iknew exactly what I was doing
and I just said, hi, this isAnne at the Christmas library.
I was like would you like toschedule a free estimate?
And she said yes, and I waslike, great, How's tomorrow at
this time?
And I did the estimate and Iwas so nervous and she didn't
ask how long have you been doingthis?

(22:24):
She didn't ask any questionslike that.
If she had, we were at thatpoint a part of a network.
So I sort of fudged a littlebit and just said the Christmas
light pros have been installingsince, blah, blah, blah.
I've been with the company forless than a year.

Speaker 2 (22:41):
Okay, that's.
One of my questions is do youthink that being honest about
hey, like we're brand new orwe're just getting started Do
you think that would have helpedor hurt in any kind of way?

Speaker 1 (22:51):
I think it's fine.
I think, honestly, what peoplewant is authenticity.
They want trust, honesty.
I always think in sales orinteractions it's a nicer way to
move through the world ishonesty and not the salesiness.
So in some senses I know ithelped us that we were beginners
because clients as we were.

(23:14):
You know, our business wasmaybe eight years old at that
point.
And I have this one client inmind, he's actually a, he's
famous, well-known, and he andhis wife came and they just said
, you know, it just brings asmile to our face we're so proud
of how far you've come withthis business we see your trucks
everywhere and we're just sohappy that we were one of the
first you know and and so theyknew.
Obviously we're just like eagerto do a good job and grow a

(23:38):
business.

Speaker 2 (23:39):
So with that first house that you priced, I
understand you guys kind of tooka course right and it got some
help from the Christmas lightpros that you were associated
with, right.
Yeah, did that teach you how todo the pricing?
Or how did you walk up to ahouse and go okay, this is what
it's going to cost?

Speaker 1 (23:55):
It did, it did and there's some very general
pricing.
I mean I can only speak to ourarea and our area.
Everything out here isexpensive.
So you know, we at the timewhen we first started would send
a team of two people and do $.
Then we would just tell theclient that the takedown is

(24:21):
included free of charge.
Because truly that's kind ofhow we worked out the pricing
was that we were charging forinstall, knowing that the
takedown is so fast and that'swhat we started with.
We ended up changing it as timeprogressed and the skills of our

(24:41):
team improved and we startedhaving supervisors with crew
leaders, with crew members andkind of factoring in like okay,
the crew members are, they'rebrand new, they're just learning
.
It's not that the stuff isdifficult, but you speed up as
you go.
So my husband could do a jobsolo in like two hours that a

(25:04):
team of two might take threehours to do towards the end.
You know what I mean Because hewas so fast at it.
So if I, if I was sending himon the job, then I would
increase that how much we werecharging per hour.
If I had multiple supervisorson the job, then I would
increase.
You know what I mean, but if itwas mainly just one crew and one

(25:25):
leader, then it was $2.50 anhour.
And we started sending teams ofthree and we started doing
$3.75 an hour.
The jobs were, you know,getting more complex and we
found that what is thatexpression?
Whereas the sum of its, the sum, is not equal to its parts.
So it was like three peoplecould have so much more

(25:47):
efficiency than two people.
Yeah, we ended up sticking withteams of three.

Speaker 2 (25:53):
Okay, so we'll going back to the pricing.
So you're, it sounds like,regardless of the number of
people you're figuring, roughly$125 an hour per crew member.
It seemed like.

Speaker 1 (26:04):
Yeah, the pricing is a little bit nuanced because if
you're at a job where everythingis trees, let's say you get a
job doing like a cityscape andit's all trees on the sidewalk,
not only is that more timeconsuming, you have potential
vandalism that you have aregoing to have service calls for
which you charge for, but thenyou're setting up power like

(26:28):
every two to three trees.
If you do one block of treesand you try to daisy chain all
of them together, by the endyou'll have voltage drops.
So you want to at least try tohave a power source in the
middle of the block and thenfrom there go tree to tree to
tree.
But residential it's a littlebit more just about figuring out
again like where's the powersource?
Because you might not be ableto run everything off of one

(26:49):
power source.
And so if you have to use threedifferent power sources, well,
now you have three differentmain extension cords, three
different timers.
All of that adds up likeextension cords.
We might charge out at 20 bucksan extension cord to lease it,
which is great because you'rebasically making your margin
every year on the product andthen the timers we might charge
out at $40 a timer to lease thetimers have like a one-year

(27:11):
lifetime like they do, that wecould not find a great timer
supplier.
So anybody listening in whoknows how to make timers like,
yeah, there's a need for goodtimers.
And I think it's nuancedbecause some areas will take
longer than you think and bemore of a headache and some

(27:32):
things will be reallystraightforward.

Speaker 2 (27:33):
So, as you're, you're not like leaving a customer's
home with a quote in hand forthe customer, right?
You're having to go back andcalculate okay, I need so many
lineal feet of lights and somany timers and extension cords,
and then you're packaging allthat together and providing a
quote 24 hours later, orsomething.

Speaker 1 (27:53):
Yeah.
So we always ran our businessby like the sooner the better.
So if you meet with a client,if you have the ability to get
them their quote by the end ofthe day I would, because speed
really matters in customerservice they will trust them
that if they call you and theyneed something, they're not
going to have to wait untiltomorrow to get a response.
So the sooner you can get itthe better.

(28:13):
I would go usually with like aclipboard, generic piece of
paper.
I'd write down the client'sname, address, phone number,
email, any contact information.
Then I would put power source.
I'd note what the power sourceswere that we were going to use
for that job and then from thereon, like a left column, I would

(28:33):
put the type of supply so LED,five mil, warm white and then I
would put kind of in caps in thedescription area like large oak
tree to left of front door,something.
Really you got to make surewhoever's reading that knows
exactly what you're talkingabout.
And then I would be veryspecific and I'd say wrap tree
from two feet up to 15 feetusing six inch spacing.

(28:58):
That means, like on the spacingof the strands, that I would
make a note where it sayssupplies needed.
It'd be like extension cordthree point adapter.
You know 12 strands of 25 footled, five mil warm white, six
inch spacing like very specificright, because you want no
discrepancy.

(29:18):
And then that way you then yougo to the next thing.
You're like LED C7s warm whiteLight.
The roof line from the leftcorner, including the center
peak, to the right Does notinclude ridgeline.
Estimated use of approximately75 feet LED C7s, one extension
cord, one adapter.
I would spell it out because ifthey chose to get the whole job,

(29:42):
say, I'd know exactly what toorder because I put it on there
and then that was both for me,it was for the client and it's
for the installer.
So I would do the whole jobthat way.
I would try my best not to doan a la carte menu pricing.
I would explain to the customerI'm going to provide you with
the pricing for the whole joband this is this quote is fixed,

(30:04):
it doesn't go up or down unlessyou change, you add or take
away.
Then it was I would put laborprice X, that's your hourly that
you've figured out for yourteam, then leased lights and
supplies and I'd put the valuethere of what that was, and if
there were any discounts,obviously, and then the total,
and then the total $2,250.
And then in the final box Iwould put the details of what I

(30:27):
thought were pertinent, likeincludes installation, servicing
and takedown.
Includes all leased lights andsupplies.
And we never even got signatures.
I would only get signatures forcommercial jobs, but other
people may disagree with that.
We didn't have people whoreally backed out, so it never
was a need.
And then there were the terms,of course.

(30:50):
So payment is due within sevendays of installation, and then,
if you have specificinstructions for them, like
later on, you can say that youknow the timer will be in this
location.
The hours are set from this tothis.
All you need to do is plug inthe extension cord into the

(31:10):
timer on the day that you'reready for your lights to start
coming on, and that's how wewere able to install before
Thanksgiving.

Speaker 2 (31:16):
Okay, what about customers asking for special
decorations like giantsnowflakes or blow ups or
anything like that?

Speaker 1 (31:28):
I mean there's there's a balance between trying
to meet your customer with whatthey want and with doing what
is best for your company andbusiness as well, while keeping
in mind storage and just addedcomplexity of you have to order
that specifically.
A lot of times those flats arehuge and so storage is something

(31:51):
you can charge for, or you cansay do you have a place to keep
these in the off season?
Or we can offer you storage forX amount, and then you can
obviously increase your totalrevenue that way.
But if the customer asked, wewould search it for them and
offer the pricing.
The displays are expensive, sowe would sell those items to

(32:12):
them and add our margin, andthen ideally they're responsible
for the storage because, likewell, we were in San Francisco,
so for us it was like great, nowwe got to store an eight foot
waving Santa, like who wants tostore that?
And yeah, so we did do some ofthose, but I'd say that the big

(32:32):
displays and ornamentation wereprobably less than 5% of our
clients.
The things that were reallypopular and they're
unfortunately bulky are thoseled spheres.
They're like they come in likesix inch, seven and a half inch
and 10 inch and they just arethree dimensional lighted balls
that people hang from trees.
It's pretty.
But again we tried tostreamline as much as we could,

(32:55):
kind of gently nudge customersinto using the line of items.
That would be both beautifulbut also efficient for the team,
and we wouldn't say no, but wewould provide them with the
option.

Speaker 2 (33:10):
So when you're going in, you're quoting a project,
you're saying, hey, we'retypically using a warm white
bulb.
And if they're going, hey, Ireally want the you know Clark
Griswold special with.
You know colors and all thatkind of stuff, is that something
you're negotiating or oroffering, or yeah, yeah, yeah
for sure.

Speaker 1 (33:26):
We did some color jobs and the led colors are just
really neon.
So they're not.
I don't like the way they lookpersonally.
So then that leads the dooropen for potentially doing color
and incandescent.
The incandescent game is acompletely different thing
because you've got now glassthat you have to deal with,

(33:48):
broken bulbs, entry for water.
You've got calculations youneed to run, so you can run.
I'm not fresh on my math, but myhusband would know I think it's
like 110 C7 incandescent bulbsin one run before you need to
have a brand new extension cordbecause the SPT2 wire, the SPT2

(34:09):
wire, cannot hold the load ofbulbs beyond that.
So you get what I'm saying.
Like then you're using a lotmore extension cords, a lot more
outlets.
You're splitting things up more.
It is more complex, it's doable, but if you can steer someone
into using LED 5 mils then orLED C7s, then you're just

(34:31):
minimizing the need for servicecalls.
You're minimizing the need forpower.
And whenever we didincandescent lights at the end
which again was very fewcustomers, very, very few we
would make them purchase thoselights because they have such a
high failure rate, the filamentsthey burn out and you can't

(34:51):
install them when they're lit.

Speaker 2 (34:53):
I unfortunately have experience with the incandescent
lights.
It's what we put on our housecurrently.
And when you were describingthe unzipping, I know that all
too well because I clip to mytiles and it goes up and down
the peak and every year withoutfail I'll get to the very end
and I'll drop it something andit'll just unzip the whole thing
and I break like six or sevenbulbs and I'm starting all over

(35:16):
and it's so frustrating.

Speaker 1 (35:18):
So frustrating.
Oh so you've this, you haveexperience, I do, I do, I mean.

Speaker 2 (35:22):
I'm I'm very handy.
I do all my own projects aroundthe house.
I've I've had several smallside gigs that I've ran over the
years, like staining fences.
I had a small deck and, um, Ideck business.
We did decks and pergolas andarbors and monument signs.
Just some small projects hereand there.
So I do have.
I'm very handy, so I'm very-.

Speaker 1 (35:41):
Perfect level of experience Like honestly that's
what my husband came from.
He had me to handle the otherside of it.

Speaker 2 (35:48):
Yeah, and my wife is you, she's very, she's an office
manager, she knows the books,the insurance and all that stuff
.
So I'm like babe, we got this,we just got to marry our you
know skills together and thenrun and do it.

Speaker 1 (36:01):
Yeah, you do.
You do have this.
You've got the honestly theperfect skillset, Both of you
combined.

Speaker 2 (36:21):
Yeah, well it's.
I think that's probably why Iwas so drawn to your story.

Speaker 1 (36:25):
I'm like this.
This sounds like it's my story.
You know, I feel like I couldreplace my family with your
family and kind of have the same.
You know it sounds like thesame story.
So it's to remember that wewould think this when we had our
business.
We're like there are the peoplelike us.
They just do it themselves,Right.

Speaker 2 (36:42):
Yeah.

Speaker 1 (36:43):
And then there are the people who are like us, who
don't know how to do it.
Well, they're just going tosurvive without.
And then there are the peoplewho want it, even though it's a
luxury service, and they'rewilling to spend for it because
it's not.
It's not a significant amountto them.
So you kind of want to findthose people.

Speaker 2 (36:57):
Yeah, it's been something I've learned with
staining fences.
It's like you know, I stainedmy own fence and then my
neighbor was like, hey, wouldyou mind doing mine?
And then it just kind ofprogressed and now I've done
several hundred homes in myneighborhood and I just like I
walk away and I'm like it's suchminimal skill, it's work, but
the skill level is so low.

(37:18):
I just like I'm shocked thatpeople will pay me what I'm
charging to do it and I'm notlike remind myself like you
can't operate a business likethat, cause there's always
somebody who has a different,you know, skill set or need or
want or whatever that's going tobe willing to pay for that.
So I I laughed when you guystold the story about your
husband's comment to thereporter.
I'm like this is me, this issomething I would do and say

(37:40):
shoot myself in the foot andthen totally blow everything up.

Speaker 1 (37:43):
I still tease him about that today.

Speaker 2 (37:47):
It's great, I loved it.

Speaker 1 (37:49):
So what else?
What else do you feel likeyou'd need?

Speaker 2 (37:52):
So your employees.
I have a whole group ofquestions here regarding them.
Where do you find them?
How do you retain them?
I know you talked about alittle bit about bonuses to try
to get them to come back andsign up early.
What are you paying them?
You said you had a three-personcrew.
I'm assuming one person is alead, the other two are labor

(38:14):
quote unquote.
Are you paying them differentwages?
How does all that kind of shakeout?

Speaker 1 (38:20):
That would really vary depending on how long the
person had been with us.
There's the beginning of ourbusiness and then there was at
the end.
So at the beginning we hiredfriends If we couldn't find them
through friends or friends offriends.
Then it became it wasCraigslist, which is like you
cannot use Craigslist these daysLike for that purpose.
I don't think it's not the sameas what it was.

(38:41):
Maybe you can.
We tried rock climbing gyms,anywhere where you might find
somebody who is capable withheights, ladders, yeah.
And then we ended up trying tojust keep the team that we had.
So anytime we found someone whois just a really good employee,
we would give a raise everysingle year.
So anytime we found someone whois just a really good employee,
we would give a raise everysingle year.
When we first started, I thinkwe did, you know, $15 an hour

(39:02):
starting and then towards thefactored, the bonus potential
was one individual performance,two team performance and then

(39:31):
three company performance.
So we used a multiple thatbasically, if you get a one for
each of those, then you get yourfull bonus, because it's 15%
times one times one times.
So you get full 15% Every year.
Our company hit our target.
So that was always a one and wewould tell people that up front
.
The team performance, like howdo they work with everybody?
And then the individuals, howare they working as an
independent person?
And honestly, most of the timewe just gave everybody their

(39:52):
bonuses of 15%.
We did hold back a few timesand that was mainly for the
obvious reasons.
And the other bonus we startedbringing on was a return for the
season bonus.
So the 15% bonus for the seasonwe would pay that out at the
end of the season after takedown.

Speaker 2 (40:12):
And that 15% of what.

Speaker 1 (40:15):
Wages.

Speaker 2 (40:16):
Just total wages throughout the season.
Total wages for the season Okay, so if they brought in 10 grand
over the course of the season,just giving a bonus 15% of that.

Speaker 1 (40:25):
Yes, yes, exactly.
And.
And we would pay that out aftertakedown because of employee
retention, like if somebody leftin the middle of the season and
they didn't make it through,they're forfeiting that bonus.
Okay.
And then we would do a signingbonus where it's like, okay, you
were with us last season, hey,we'll give you a thousand
dollars just to come back forthe next season, and that will

(40:46):
be paid out in December and thefinal paycheck of December, so
that you're guaranteeing you getthem for the for the whole
install season.
They still are eligible fortheir full season bonus, which
gets paid out after takedown.
And that system worked reallywell.
We actually got it from afriend of ours who was an HR at
a tech company and that was whatthey did and we were struggling

(41:06):
with how to retain employeesand pay them sufficiently.
Towards the end, we had someteam members who were making
like, hey, we'll give you$10,000 just to return for the
season, and then you get your15% bonus on top and now you're
on $45 an hour, you know.
So it's.
It was really kind of a gradualprocess.

(41:28):
We started with the bear ofwhat we could afford just to get
started.
Again, that was like minimumwage.
I don't even think we didbonuses that first year, so
minimum wage and then all theway until what I just described
there towards the end.

Speaker 2 (41:42):
So there's a team lead, yep, and he's getting paid
slightly more than than theother two that he's leading,
right, yeah, do?
Does each team member have aspecific role, or is it they
just kind of all showing up and,hey, billy, you're going to be
on the roof today, mike, you'regoing to be moving stuff over,
or how does that?

Speaker 1 (42:03):
So that would be up to the team lead.
So the team lead would andagain, this is all efficiency.
So the person who is a teamlead was motivated to get the
jobs done in a quality mannerbut also efficiently.
Just, you know, that's going tobe really good for for them and
their bonus, and then theymight be able to take off from
work a little early as well ifthey finish early.

(42:23):
So the team lead wasresponsible for driving the
truck.
So they have slightly moreresponsibility just from the get
go.
They're driving and then usuallyin the training what we would
say is on your way to the job,basically delegate what the plan
is, because your job as a teamlead is to go and ring the
doorbell and talk to thecustomer while everybody else is

(42:47):
preparing lights and supplies,getting ladders off and
offloaded and doing whatever thesetup is.
So he would talk to the clienthey, we're here, we're here to
install your Christmas lights.
Could you open up the garagefor us?
I'll let you know when we'redone and we're taking off.
So then you know, while he'sdoing that that takes five
minutes the other people arepulling out the letters and

(43:09):
they're just sort of settingthings up, and then usually the
team lead would jump intorunning all of the power,
because the power is like alittle bit more of a
sophisticated process, becauseit is that puzzle, and they
could tell the person okay, Iwant you to start with the mail
end on the c7s, on this upperleft roof line, on these trees.
I'm gonna get power to the cruxso you can start there,

(43:33):
somebody out on the roof andthen somebody on the landscaping
straight away, and and then,once the lead was done with
running all of the power, thatactually the running of the
power actually takes some time.

Speaker 2 (43:41):
Yeah.

Speaker 1 (43:42):
So once they were done with that, then they could
go and jump in wherever it wasneeded.

Speaker 2 (43:46):
Okay, cool, what about you don't do any kind of
like permanent installation on ahome, like to speed things up
for the next season, like, doyou have a homeowner?
It's like, hey, we're going tobook with you, you know,
indefinitely.
You know, starting now, we'regoing to install hooks on your
house to make the installationgo quicker.
So you're not doing the clips.

(44:07):
Do you guys do anything likethat?

Speaker 1 (44:09):
We would try to avoid permanent installations if we
could, mainly because we didn'twant to be responsible for the
integrity of the exterior of thehome.
Because we didn't want to beresponsible for the integrity of
the exterior of the home, so ifwe would put eye hooks in
sometimes if necessary, becausewe were going to span a long

(44:29):
distance with Beecher lights orsomething like that, for example
.
But it always made my husbandjust slightly uncomfortable
penetrating the exterior surfaceof a building with a bolt, even
if he siliconed it and dideverything that he was supposed
to, because he just felt likeI'd rather not be the one
responsible for this.
So if it made sense to installa permanent fixture, we would

(44:52):
put that in the description onthe estimate that it requires
the installation of a permanentfixture, we would give the
dimensions and the details ofwhat that fixture was and we
would put details of how wewould waterproof that surface.
But then also add in adisclaimer that like we're not
responsible if water somehowgets in to their structure and

(45:16):
creates dry rot over seven years.
You know, it was like we justdidn't want the liability.
It may have been that therenever was a concern for that,
but we were always just tryingto minimize liability.

Speaker 2 (45:28):
Yeah, I get that.
I try to avoid that on my ownhome and I know what I'm doing.
Yeah, yeah, you just don't wantto deal with it.
What about proximity?
So I'm assuming you guys have acentral location, a warehouse,
an office or something of somesort, or all the trucks coming
back there at the end of the day, all the crew members are
meeting there to get theirmaterials for their day, and I'm

(45:51):
assuming they're not doing ajob, coming back getting
supplies, doing another job andcoming back they're leaving from
the headquarters with fourhouses worth of materials or
whatever Exactly.

Speaker 1 (46:02):
Yeah.
So again, there's a how we didit at the beginning and then how
we did it at the end.
At the beginning it was it waskind of just like a figure it
out as you go.
We had one truck at thebeginning and then that season
we ended up running two trucks,but we just had a pickup truck
and a box truck and we did haveone central location, but that

(46:26):
central location was ourapartment and so all of our
supplies were in the apartmentand you would just grab stuff
and go and if you really, youknow, forgot something and you
just run back and get it.
But as we grew, then you know,my, my husband and I purchased
the property that we were livingin.
It was a building in the cityand we ended up using the

(46:47):
garages as the storage and hebuilt shelving in there that was
perfectly suited for our needsand that is where we would have
the trucks parked, was in thatarea, or the lead could take the
truck home.
So if they took the truck home,then we would ask that they get

(47:08):
.
The lead's responsibility wasto go and get the lights and
supplies and to make sure theyhave those at like 640 in the
morning, because we did.
We operated 7.
We operated 7am to 330 to tryand work around traffic and they
would get the lights andsupplies and they would meet the
team at the first job.

Speaker 2 (47:26):
Okay, so just the lead is picking.

Speaker 1 (47:29):
Yeah, or they'd catch a ride, or they'd meet at 640
if they wanted a ride and they'dgo and catch a ride to the
first job, okay, but yeah, theywould bring everything that they
needed for the day If theyforgot anything.
A lot of times that meant ahardware run, hardware store run
, and so we had credit cards forour leads or supervisors, at
least Towards the end.

(47:50):
We had supervisors and pickuptrucks that could buzz around to
any of the job sites and helpwith these little needs here and
there.
We also I was going to saytowards the end, when we had
like six, how many trucks did wehave?
We had like six trucks.
So towards the end, what weended up doing was always
grouping installs by locationand takedowns by location,
because our one truck number onecould be on Sacramento street

(48:15):
and then literally two blocksaway, could be truck number two
working at a different job, andif one of them was missing the
other, then they could.
Just they knew who was nearthem and they'd be like hey, I'm
, I ran out of my SPT spool,like I don't have any SPT white
wire, have you got any?
And then they could just sendone of the crew to go run to two
blocks to go and get thesupplies from the other truck.

(48:37):
But that was towards the end.

Speaker 2 (48:39):
And you guys were using box trucks outfitted with
supplies and whatnot in or notpickups.

Speaker 1 (48:44):
Okay, yeah, yeah.
So box trucks, and the reasonwhy is that they're moving
billboards.
I would tell my husbandconstantly I know when you guys
are in transit, because that'swhen I get phone calls.

Speaker 2 (48:55):
Okay, that makes sense.

Speaker 1 (48:56):
And all the trucks were pretty, so like they were,
all we did red and white, light,red and white lettering, so it
was just stood out like a Macy'struck.
So I don't know, if you payattention to box trucks that you
see sometimes they're reallywell-designed and sometimes
they're busy and you're like Idon't even know what I'm looking
at.
So clean design, real clean,easy to read and easy phone

(49:17):
number to remember.
So if you want to get an 800number, something that's easy
for people to remember withouthaving to write down your number
, and that was great.
So he had to build ladder rackson the top, which he did with
wood I think.
And then he had to have a wayto secure the ladders on top.

(49:38):
So he had bolts that the chaincould go through or whatever he
was securing it with for safetyso they didn't get stolen.
I mean, we're in the city so wehad to, like, think about those
things.
And then inside on one side ofthe truck, he built shelving.
Big bins could fit underneathon the bottom and then he made
like a little shelf so that ashe's driving around you know, I

(49:59):
don't know if you've ever drivenan rv or anything but like
stuff's not falling out.
So he had a little lip and allthe supplies were neatly
organized and then on the otherside of the truck was like where
he would put uh wall mountedladder situations for the step
ladders, and then the floorspace could be used for the

(50:20):
spools and things like that.

Speaker 2 (50:22):
Okay, the materials.
You mentioned, I think, asupplier earlier was there one
specific supply location thatyou're going to get all the
materials.

Speaker 1 (50:33):
Okay, so definitely S4 lights was our typical one.
That's where we got our spools.
S4 lights was our typical one.
That's where we got our spools,our spt wire, maybe even our
plugins and the led 5 mils andthe led minis, like basically we
got all of our lights from them.
The extension cords we got fromhome depot or lowes and we
would order in bulk.
If you get a, if you must knowlike if you have a contractor's,

(50:54):
then you can get pricing therewholesale and so we would place
a bulk order with them.
And if you're in a pinch andyou just need LED Christmas
lights and you can't get thestock in time, because there
gets to be this point whenshipping is backlogged and
you're like I need supplies, youcan go to the box stores in

(51:16):
your area and you can use thosefor a season.
But it's not something that Iwould recommend because the
spacing on the bulbs is notideal for professional
installation and the length ofthe strands is also not ideal
for professional installs.
We wanted LED 5 mil strandsthat were at least 25 feet long
and sometimes longer.

Speaker 2 (51:37):
You mentioned the spacing.
Is there a typical spacing onthe lights?

Speaker 1 (51:42):
We liked six inch spacing for LED, five mils,
because LEDs are really bright.
So if you're doing four inchspacing or two inch spacing then
, like, sometimes it's just likea little too much.
And and with four inch spacingon the bulbs, if you're spacing
your strands six inches apartwhen you're like twirling the

(52:05):
lights around, then it looksmore like a line.
And if you're doing six inchspacing, with six inch spacing
on the install as well, it'smore lightly speckled.
So that's just an aestheticinstall as well.

Speaker 2 (52:19):
It's more lightly speckled, so that's just an
aesthetic.
Okay, more alternating.
Okay, cool Insurance.

Speaker 1 (52:24):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (52:25):
You have a big insurance requirement.
What did that look like?

Speaker 1 (52:30):
I mean, you don't have a big one, but people like
to know that you're insured andbonded For commercial jobs.
They're absolutely required.
They will ask you foradditional insured certificates
in order to do the work.
We we had an insurer who gaveus unlimited additional insured,
so it's not like we had to payextra every time we asked for
that and the insurance was so.

(52:53):
There's workers comp and thenthere's general liability and I
want to say the generalliability ended up being gosh.
I'm like digging here, maybe1500 a season, something like
that Workers' comp was a lot.

Speaker 2 (53:07):
And then you're baking that cost in, obviously,
into your pricing.
So is there a assumed laborcost, added material costs, and
then you're putting whateverpercentage on top of those to
round out the whole number.

Speaker 1 (53:20):
No, I just was assuming that was all included
in that hourly.
Oh, part of it, yeah.

Speaker 2 (53:26):
So is that included of like your, your assumed
profit is also baked into thosenumbers as well, yeah, okay,
okay, cool.
Is there anything I haven'tasked or you haven't already
shared that you think is likeman?
You really need to know this.

Speaker 1 (53:44):
I think that the box truck is kind of key.
It's helpful because at thebeginning it can dub as both
your warehouse and your installtruck and everything all in one
place without having to lug andagain you get the advertising.
When we first started one ofour first jobs in this
neighborhood where we reallywanted to work, mark was like

(54:07):
hey, this job's only going totake us, you know, three hours.
We both decided we'll make itstretch out so that you're there
just for the exposure to theneighborhood.
And again, if you're a reallyauthentic, kind, honest, you're
clearly wanting to do the bestwork that you can for the
customer, then they will seethat and then they will also

(54:31):
recommend you to their neighbors.
You can also say you're ourfirst job in this neighborhood.
You're our first job in thisneighborhood and you know, if
you're happy with the work andyou like what we've done, we'd
really be honored if you wouldlet any of your friends or
neighbors know and you can askthem to leave your review.
We never really did anythingwith reviews because it just
didn't matter for us.
But yeah, there are ways.

Speaker 2 (54:51):
So you said reviews.
So are you guys?
What's the importance of awebsite getting started up?
Do you guys have all that setup when you were first getting
going?

Speaker 1 (55:00):
I think a website's pretty important because they're
going to want to know thatyou're legit and that's at least
one step to feeling legit, somevalidation, yeah, yeah.
And I would try not to put yourpersonal phone number on
anything, because you'll justget too much spam.

Speaker 2 (55:19):
I made that mistake.
I blocked five numbers a day.
It's so obnoxious and I can'tthank you enough.
When you actually responded tome, like I said, I was really
blown away.
I've emailed people that I'vediscovered online before and you
get some assistant or someautomated message or no response
at all.
And the fact that you'veactually not only responded to
me more than once, but alsotaken an hour of your day to

(55:41):
talk with me is just amazing.
So I wanted to say thank you.
It's awesome.
So thank you for your time.

Speaker 1 (55:47):
Yeah, yeah, no, I'm more than happy.