May 27, 2025 • 57 mins
Most roofers chase big revenue goals...$5M, $10M, even $20M.
But Aaron Rogers from Pro Exteriors realized something shocking: His company made more net profit at $4M than most do at $10M.
In this episode, you'll hear:
- Why growing too fast can kill your margin
- What to track so your P&L actually means something
- How to build a lean team that stays happy and productive
- The “sweet spot” where profit and personal life thrive
- How Aaron uses his business as a tool to GIVE BACK — through his 501(c)(3) nonprofit, Hammers for Heart
Aaron gets real about burnout, chasing empty goals, and how he found purpose leading a mission-driven roofing company. If you want to make more money AND live a better life, this episode is for you.
👉 Ready to grow your business the smart way?
👉 Want to get off the revenue hamster wheel?
🔗 https://www.askproexteriors.com
Listen to the episode on Spotify & Apple Podcasts (257) 👇
🎧 https://roofingpod.com/spotify
🍏 https://roofingpod.com/apple-podcasts
PODCAST SPONSORS:
- The Roofing & Solar Reform Alliance: https://roofingpod.com/RSRA
- JobNimbus Marketing Services: https://roofingpod.com/jobnimbus-marketing
- PowerUp Agents AI: https://roofingpod.com/power-up-agents-ai
- Day 41 Thrive: https://roofingpod.com/day-41-thrive
IG: https://www.instagram.com/roofingsuccess/
FB: https://www.facebook.com/groups/roofingsuccess
Join Our Facebook Group: https://roofingpod.com/facebook
📱 Text Jim @ (612) 512-1812 – Say Hi!
💬 Leave Us a Review: https://roofingpod.com/review
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
What if chasing top line revenue is costing you
everything that matters?
In this episode, I'm sittingdown with Aaron Rodgers, a
seasoned contractor who's donethe big revenue years and
realized it wasn't worth theburnout.
Now he's running a lean,profitable business that fuels
his mission, supports hiscommunity and keeps his team
(00:20):
happy.
Aaron is a numbers guy throughand through, but he's also
someone who's discovered thatreal success means margin on
your P&L and in your life.
From developing simple butpowerful team metrics to using
AI for smarter decision-making,this conversation is full of
practical insight, but whattruly makes Aaron stand out is
(00:42):
how he uses his business as avehicle for giving back.
Through his nonprofit Hammersfor Heart and a deep commitment
to service, he's buildingsomething much bigger than just
another roofing company.
In today's episode, we'll coverhow to grow without going broke,
how to use your data withoutdrowning in it, and how to keep
(01:03):
your team and yourself alignedwith what really matters.
Let's get into it with AaronRodgers.
Welcome to the Roofing SuccessPodcast.
I'm Jim Alleyne and I'm here tobring you insights from top
leaders in the roofing industryto help you grow and scale your
roofing business.
Aaron Rodgers with ProExteriors how are you man?
Speaker 2 (01:26):
I'm wonderful, Jim.
How are you?
Speaker 1 (01:28):
I'm doing well, man Doing well.
We were talking I don't know ifit was earlier this week or
last week and had someconversations and, man, you're a
numbers guy and so we're goingto definitely get into that here
in a second, but I want tointroduce you to the roofing
(01:49):
success community.
Give yourself a little intro.
How did Pro Exteriors getstarted?
Speaker 2 (01:58):
Okay, so 2005 or so is I started my company,
beginning in 2005.
My father was a contractor, soI've kind of been in the
industry since you know oldenough to basically follow him
around and pick up nails.
Yeah, so 20 years in justcelebrated our 20th year,
Started really kind of focusingon exteriors and roofing in
(02:21):
around 2009.
I've been fortunate to be ableto grow my company to what I
consider to be a pretty goodsize and have a pretty good team
along the ride with me.
So it's been fun.
Speaker 1 (02:37):
That's a.
You came up in the business andcontinued on and continued on.
What?
What was that?
You know?
What was that journey?
Where did you ever have otheraspirations as a kid?
And then you just kind of fellin, fell back into the roofing
or you know, contracting androofing or what.
What was the?
What was the draw for you?
Speaker 2 (02:57):
I tell you, I so growing up, I always loved cars.
Speaker 3 (03:00):
Uh, and I don't know if it was, I mean, I think every
little boy grows up.
Speaker 2 (03:03):
You know, all our favorite characters always had a
really nice classic car, and soI always grew up really wanting
to work on cars.
I actually went to our localcommunity college for automotive
technology to basically learnhow to fix cars, work on cars,
and I believe it was the secondsemester.
We had a career mechanic comein.
(03:26):
Guy owned his own shop and Ithink he had six or eight doors
and he started talking about themoney aspect of things.
Six or eight doors, I've gotsix, eight mechanics and if
(03:47):
you're looking to make more than$25 an hour, this isn't the
career path for you.
And that was the last day I wentto that class, unfortunately.
So I switched my major tobusiness and I think once I
started learning how businessesoperate, that became more of the
passion of being anentrepreneur.
Working with my hands andnumbers was always super, super
(04:07):
easy for me.
So, my father being acontractor, I went and started
doing work with him part-time.
As I was taking businessclasses and really, really
quickly, while watching him,watching him interact with
clients, I realized that I couldmake a career path out of this
and in reality, I enjoyed it.
Speaker 3 (04:26):
Who doesn't?
Speaker 2 (04:26):
like building stuff with their hands.
And then, you know, a year orso later, but a year and a half
later, I made the decision tomake this like my long term
career, started working with myfather full time and then,
really quickly, I was like youknow what, I don't have the
personality to be behind someoneelse, like, if I'm going to do
(04:46):
this, I like the opportunity tokind of be the front person, to
be the guy that's kind of youknow, steering the ship.
And in the middle of 2004, Isaid you know what, I'm going to
start this right, got mybusiness license and January 1st
of 2005, officially, was inbusiness for myself.
Speaker 1 (05:02):
So how did dad feel about that?
How did dad feel when it whenit was like all right, I'm going
to, I'm going to venture off onmy own.
Speaker 2 (05:10):
Yeah, so I think my father was always supportive.
Um, I think he uh, you know hehad been in business for at that
point, just over 20 years.
I think he's still a contractorthis day.
He's.
He's been in business for avery, very, very long time.
So I think at that point myfather never really had
(05:30):
aspirations to go and be thishuge brand name.
He always just wanted to besomewhat smaller.
Him and another guy, him andmaybe two other guys.
He never really took onprojects that he himself
couldn't handle.
So when I decided to go out anddo my own thing, I think he was
.
I think he was excited, um, inhis own way, uh, I think maybe
(05:50):
it was kind of like okay, we'renot going to do this together.
So I think there were someemotions that maybe he didn't
share with me, but butultimately I think he was
supportive All right, aaron.
Speaker 1 (05:59):
So you know back to.
We got the story, we understand, you know the journey, you know
you grew up in this right andand and.
There's a lot of lessons to belearned along the way.
You'd mentioned to me in ourconversation that you're a
numbers guy.
Speaker 3 (06:15):
I love that.
Speaker 1 (06:20):
And so let's start with this what are the most
important metrics that a roofingbusiness owner should be
tracking?
Speaker 2 (06:29):
Okay, most important metrics.
So obviously everyone wants tolook at profit, you know, I
think I think profit isimportant, but obviously there's
other metrics that kind of goalong with profit.
So what is it costing you toget the leads?
What's your closing ratio foryour sales guys?
(06:49):
What things do you sell?
What products do you sell?
What services do you offer?
Which of those has the bestprofit margin?
Are there some things that youoffer just as kind of an
ancillary service but in realitythey don't actually make any
real money for you?
Are there certain things thatyou're just as kind of an
ancillary service but in realitythey don't actually make any
real money for you?
Are there certain things thatyou're just not good at?
So I think there are so manythings that you need to track or
(07:14):
should be tracking.
It can get overwhelming really,really quickly.
Speaker 1 (07:20):
Let's do it this way we're going to start building
metrics for, for a, for a, for aroofing company as it is as
it's, as it's getting startedand growing.
We'll, we'll frame it that wayRight now.
We'll, like man, it's day one,it's you, you're, you're.
You're the salesperson, You'rethe, you're the.
(07:40):
You know, you're the job sitesupervisor, You're the office
manager, You're the job sitesupervisor.
You're the office manager,you're everything.
Yeah, at that level.
What are you making sure thatyou're paying a lot of attention
to your budget.
Speaker 2 (07:59):
I mean, I think, when you're first starting off, I
think having a proper plan and atrue budget, I think when you
first start out, having a budgetlets you know.
Let you know you know, are youtracking, are you on pace, are
you hitting your targets?
So I think, paying attention tothe metrics of your budget, you
know, this is my, my marketingspend, this is my equipment
spend, this is my overhead spend.
So I think those metrics arethe first and foremost, like you
have to have them set up beforeanything else.
(08:20):
And I think when you, when youget going from there, then you
can start kind of diving intothe weeds a little bit more and
start looking at closing ratiosand and, uh, net profit, you
know per trade item, and youknow kind of more refined data,
if you would.
Speaker 1 (08:38):
So yeah, how does uh, you know, if someone doesn't
know how to even put a budgettogether, where do they start
with that?
What are, what are some?
Speaker 2 (08:46):
of the man.
Honestly, I always tell people,like people are so scared to
ask other business owners andyou know, I think the first
place you start with anything isis go to a competitor, go to
somebody who's been doing thisfor a really long time and says
like, hey, man, I'm going to,I'm going to hang up my own
shingle and I want to make sureI do this right.
(09:06):
What are the traps or thepitfalls that most entrepreneurs
fall into?
You know, contracting is areally weird space.
It's a really fun business tobe in, but most guys don't last,
you know, by five years.
So, first thing I always tellpeople is don't be afraid to ask
for help.
First thing I always tell peopleis don't be afraid to ask for
help.
Go to somebody that you know inyour market that has a good
personality, and ask them outfor coffee, ask them out for a
(09:28):
beer, and just say like, hey,man, I'm trying to put this
together.
Where would you point me?
Yeah, and then, honestly, wehave so much information at our
fingertips these days.
Yeah, everything you need toknow for the most part can be
found online.
I mean, jim, you're inmarketing, I look at, look at
the AI stuff that's out rightnow.
I mean, if that had been here 20years ago, I mean I think all
(09:50):
of us would be in a muchdifferent place as far as, like
our business growth andeverything else, because half of
that stuff is is done for you.
You type in a few, a fewprompts, refine it a little bit
and then spits out thisbeautiful product from the
backside.
I mean a lot of that stuff,it's not that hard.
You get a chat, gpt and type inlike hey, I'm going to start a
roofing contractor business.
(10:11):
Can you give me a very basickind of light on a budget put
together?
And then you have to go in andfill in the more refined details
to get the real numbers on thebackside.
But so much information isavailable to you.
Speaker 1 (10:25):
It can be very easy nowadays, right?
There's really no excuse forany of this, and I love that
chat GPT reference.
I had my friend, jonathan Masson the podcast some months back
last year actually and he's anAI prompting expert, ai expert
and has a prompting framework,and so just go in and tell it
(10:48):
what you want it to be.
You are the chief financialofficer of a large roofing
company.
I'm a startup looking todevelop a budget.
You know.
Please ask me any.
You know help me.
Can you help me with this?
Please ask me any clarifyingquestions.
And that.
Please ask me any clar.
You know, help me.
Can you help me with this?
Please ask me any clarifyingquestions.
And that.
Please ask me any clarifyingquestions.
At the end, you start to havethat conversation with it and
(11:12):
it'll ask you well, you knowwhat's your goal for the year,
what's your?
You know what do you do, andyou just start answering the
questions and you're right, man,it's just going to spit it
right out and it's a verybeautiful thing when used
properly.
Yeah, and so nowadays, theanswer to how do I get started
is chat GPT.
Yeah, claude, yeah.
Speaker 2 (11:35):
I mean, all of these AI tools are so complex and so
easy to use at the same time,and they can be used for almost
anything.
You know you're struggling tohave a hard conversation with
somebody, whether it be anemployee, whether it be a friend
, a loved one, whomever.
You go and you type in a fewbits of information what's a
delicate way to approach thisconversation and it spits out
(11:58):
some prompts where you're likeall right, so maybe it's not
going to be as difficult as Ithought it would be, so you can
use that stuff for anything inlife.
Speaker 1 (12:04):
Anything, yeah, yeah uh, check our sponsor power up
agents ai, great in terms ofvoice, ai, something that you
guys should check out, becausethat's a whole nother level to
this stuff.
Um, but now, now, as you'removing through, you're starting
to hire people.
You know, when you, when youstart getting those first hires,
man, I, I think that you I'm abig fan of EOS, the
(12:27):
entrepreneurial operating systemdeveloping key, that first
salesperson, maybe you start tohire, maybe a job site
supervisor or a productionmanager.
Speaker 2 (12:52):
So I measure.
My first measurement is alwayskind of like company culture,
you know, is this, does thatperson kind of add into our
culture?
And, you know, does it kind of?
Not only does it add to it, butthere's actually mesh kind of
in with that company culture.
That's usually the first thing,because man, you know you can
have, you can hire one bademployee and it ruins the
(13:13):
company culture completely andthen everybody's productivity
goes down.
People aren't as happy to cometo work, you know.
So that's always first andforemost like hire for
personality, uh.
So for for individual metrics,like salesperson, salespeople
are always the easiest metricsto come up with, right, um,
because it's a very tangiblething.
Like you know, you get two,three or four things like I need
(13:34):
you to sell X amount, I needyou to close at X amount, um,
and I need your margin to be atX amount.
So, like you get real three,real simple things and then you
can refine it from there.
Like you know, our in our areawe don't get a lot of snow, um,
but we have slight seasons, uh,we live in a real big like
(13:55):
second home market.
So, um, in the summertime youmay not be doing these big
complex remodels and, in kind,of the beach area that we live
in.
So you kind of have to take thatsales data and kind of skew it
Like January may not be a bigticket month and same way with
February is kind of things arewarming up a little bit.
So and then each subsequentemployee past that is going to
(14:19):
have their own set of metrics.
Right, job superintendents, youknow what are we looking at as
far as like, are subcontractorshappy?
Are our employees happy?
You know what kind of materialloss are we doing.
Are we staying on budget withour materials?
Are we staying on time and onschedule?
And that's important for acouple of different reasons.
Right, you know you onlyassumed you were going to be
(14:40):
there for seven days and you endup being there for 10.
You know, not only is itadditional labor costs, but you
also have lost revenue on thosedays from, you know, the job you
were hoping to schedule onthose days.
Um, client happiness is alwayssomething we talk about a lot.
We want to make sure ourclients are just ridiculously
happy with our projects.
Um, and then, you know, when itcomes to, like, our repair tech
(15:01):
guys, we want to make sure thattheir their output is.
You know we have a certainnumber of rooms for output to be
this gross revenue number.
Um, you know, we start talkingabout reviews.
As you kind of get along thealong the path in business you
want to talk about, you know howmany people can get reviews and
how many reviews can we geteach month?
Um, yeah, I, I mean, there's alot of metrics that you can put
(15:27):
in place.
Tracking them is the harderpart.
You know you could put as manymetrics in place as you want,
and obviously most of us in thisbusiness use CRMs and they'll
track a lot of it for you.
But you know somebody still hasto look at that data and then
go from there.
Speaker 1 (15:40):
So but yeah, who looks at the data?
How do you determine who looksat what data and who's
responsible for the outcome ofthat specific?
You know the data that you'remeasuring for that specific
outcome.
Speaker 2 (15:55):
So we run our business on like basically four
and a half departments I won'tcall it a full five departments
because we run operations andproduction kind of is one big
department but each departmenthas kind of their own key person
and each one of them is kind ofis kind of managed to oversee
(16:18):
certain metrics for theirdepartment.
You know, I won't say thatwe're as consistent as we need
to be, as far as like our weeklymeetings with each department
head to kind of go over thosemetrics with myself.
Be as far as like our weeklymeetings with each department
head to kind of go over thosemetrics with myself.
Uh, I'm probably the worstperson ever to work for when it
comes to like giving somebodyelse a task and then allowing
them to complete it.
Um, I'm not a micromanager butI have this like do it now
mentality where I don't alwayshave the patience to be like,
(16:40):
hey, this is, this is your task.
Um, you know, you have twoweeks to get it done.
Because by the end of that week,sometimes I just want to get it
out of my head essentially so Idon't always allow everybody to
bring metrics to me.
I more so have the abilitywhere I work, nonstop kind of
deal, and yeah, I can separate.
(17:00):
If I have three minutes of acommercial break while I'm
watching a show or somethingwith my kids, you know I'll jump
on my phone real quick andcheck a metric and you know,
check that box off.
Speaker 1 (17:10):
Make sure it's checked off.
Speaker 2 (17:13):
Yeah yeah, adhd is a curse and a superpower at the
same time.
Speaker 1 (17:17):
So that's right, that's right.
I think that's a that may be acommon trait of a roofing
business.
Owners right Like.
Speaker 2 (17:25):
Oh, isn't it weird.
Speaker 3 (17:25):
Yeah that's weird.
In other words, right.
Speaker 1 (17:27):
Like, or business owners in general really.
Um, you know, you mentioned youhad years where revenue didn't
grow but profit did.
You know?
Let's talk about that a littlebit, okay.
Speaker 2 (17:41):
Uh, I think when we talked before we, we talked a
little bit about how when youfirst start your business,
you're growing and you're happyto kind of see revenue grow.
And I think a lot of people gettricked into the idea that if
gross revenue grows thenobviously you're more successful
.
And that's not always the case.
Um, you know, we, we've hadyears where our uh, you know,
(18:07):
we've added a million dollars inin gross revenue but only added
three percent to our net profit.
Um, you know, it doesn't matterhow many millions of dollars in
business you do, if your netprofit's not growing along with
that, it's it's all for nothing.
Um, we, we used to do some newconstruction stuff and we
realized really quickly the thesaying in this business is 90%
(18:27):
of your headaches come for 10%of your clients.
Um, so that was it, man, we, webrought on, uh, like one year
we went out there and we had acouple of good size projects and
we brought in, I want to say,$1.7 million in new business
that year from a couple ofprojects.
And, uh, at the end of the yearI'm going where's the money?
Didn't we just do $1.7 millionin new revenue?
(18:49):
Where did that money come fromor where did that go?
So I think the more importantmetric is always net profit.
Speaker 3 (18:59):
You can grow a million dollars year over year
over year.
Speaker 2 (19:02):
If your net profit isn't kind of growing in that
same case, then you're workingfor nothing, and none of us got
in this business to work forfree, so don't get stuck in that
mindset.
When I reach $5 million, I'msuccessful.
When I reach $10 million, I'msuccessful.
Let's look at net profit.
(19:23):
When I reach $2 million in netprofit, I'm successful because
that's the number that's moreimportant, because you know, it
may not take as many millions ingross revenue to hit that net
profit number as it does to, youknow, to do the other thing.
Speaker 1 (19:35):
So exactly, it's a.
It's a funny thing, I don'tknow, man, it's a, it's like you
, it's just human psychology.
I think some sometimes rightwe're just chasing this big
number and not as many peopleshare their net profit, maybe
right.
So maybe that's what it is,that we don't have those numbers
in front of us as often.
(19:57):
It's much easier to say oh, wedid 18 million this year, we did
6 million this year, we did 50million this year.
Right, yeah, and no one really.
There's not a lot of sharingaround the net profit numbers
and so um maybe that's a youknow, maybe that's a reason.
But if you were to like, let'sgive a range, like because
(20:21):
you've you've had the years withwith less profit and more
profit, you know, if you said,you know, on the low end, this
is man.
I don't want to drop below this, but, boy, when we're fully
optimized, I want to be aroundthis.
Speaker 2 (20:39):
Yeah.
So for us, I would say our mostprofitable year was like in the
$4 million range.
I think the $1 to $3 million isreally easy obtainable number.
To hit three million, I thinkthe the the run from, say, three
to five million or three toseven million is a lot harder
(21:03):
climb than I think most peoplerealize.
You know, going from three tofive is a really it requires a
lot more equipment, more trucks,more people.
More people requires moremanagement.
You know more management ismore overhead.
Now you need managers formanagers.
So I think that there's ways toscale up, you know, to 10
(21:27):
million, 20 million and all.
But you know, I think our bestyears, where not only was profit
good but our team was happiest,that everybody had a personal
life and everybody enjoyedcoming to work, and it wasn't
like, oh God, here comes Monday,was that sweet spot, man, like
(21:48):
$4 million.
We've broke $5 million and itwas okay, I enjoyed it, but I
wasn't.
You know, $4 million.
You know we we've broke a $5million and it was okay, I
enjoyed it, but I wasn't, youknow, wasn't great.
Um, you know, worst year weever had was when we had our
best gross revenue and everybodyat the end of the year was
exhausted.
Um, everybody was not happy andI think we all came together
(22:11):
and we're like we don't reallywant to do that again.
Um, so yeah.
So I, you know I, I haveopportunities that I could take,
I have ways that I could kindof scale up to to be that 10
million dollar contractor.
I'm good man.
(22:33):
Yeah, I'm happy where we are.
Uh, you know I, I got four sonsand a wife at home.
Speaker 1 (22:35):
I am perfectly content that's right, it's the
more important things in life.
But but also that you made agood point there, and that's the
team and the, the burnout thatcan come, the employee turnover,
the you know, you know it gets.
It gets to a point where itit's it.
They don't, they don't want tocome to work today because
(22:59):
they're no, they know that it'sjust.
There's something it'soverwhelming, right?
Um, how did you, you know?
How have you balanced that, nowthat you've gone through those
lessons, right?
is it are you just looking at?
Hey, we just, we stick in thisrange of revenue and and, and we
don't feel it anymore, or or.
You know how are you managingthat?
Speaker 2 (23:21):
So I mean every year, you know, I'll put a number in
front of myself and I'll say,like you know, if I, if I hit
this, then I'm, I'm good to go,I'm perfectly content.
You know, content.
I prefer to be happy andcontent and have a nice easy,
(23:43):
manageable company withemployees that are super happy,
versus setting a goal in frontof myself that I know it's going
to tax everyone.
Money is a great thing to have,but it's not the most important
thing to have.
Our company has made kind of alarger push to be kind of a
larger name in our community,not for our size but as far as,
like what we do to get back ourcommunity involvement is like
(24:06):
built into our core values.
So I found a nice happy balanceof, you know, the time that I
can give outside of my company,the time that my company itself
can give back to you know thingsin my community.
I strive more so to make surethat we are at a place where we
can always do that stuff, versuslike adding all the pressure of
(24:28):
trying to grow to a certainpercentage point every single
year.
So, as long as I can, you knowwe go into every year with like,
so, like going into.
Last year we had a nice littlepartnership with Habitat for
Humanity, we had a nice littlepartnership with a local kids
camp here and we had kind ofsome ideas as far as, like, what
(24:49):
we wanted to give back.
So we went into this year, uh,basically tripling If, if we put
it into like a dollar amountwhere we want to basically
triple what we were able to giveback to the community going
into this year.
So my goal is more so wrappedup around that I know roughly
what I have to grow in order tolike maintain that level of
(25:11):
giving, grow in order to likemaintain that level of giving.
Um, so I'd rather go at it likethat.
It's not, it's not so much thethe profit for me is, it's more
so like how can I use this build?
This business is kind of a uhlike a tool or a vessel to kind
of do more kingdom work, servicework, whatever.
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (25:28):
Before we carry on with the episode, let's give a
shout out to one of our sponsors.
I talk to contractors every daythat feel stuck, not because
they're not working hard, butbecause they're missing the
structure to grow without chaosor their culture's falling apart
(25:51):
, because their team's unclear,unaligned or just burned out.
Unclear, unaligned or justburned out.
And when change hits, they'rereacting instead of leading
because time and prioritiesaren't under their control.
Day 41 Thrive helps to fix thatwith proven strategies for
growth, culture and leadershipthat actually work, ready to
thrive beyond the storm.
Visit the link in thedescription, or visit the R in
the description, or visit theroofing success podcast website
(26:14):
on the sponsors page to startyour journey today.
I think maybe this is somethingto discuss then, because I
think when we get started it'shard.
The why is to make a living.
Speaker 2 (26:29):
Yeah, Right, yeah, I mean for me.
For me it was to how can Isupport my family without you
know struggling, or yeah, soyeah.
Speaker 1 (26:38):
Like in that that that's really the initial why.
When did that?
Why change for you what?
What changed?
And then how did you determine?
This is the new thing.
This is the new thing I want tofocus on yeah, so, um.
Speaker 2 (26:54):
So I'll say about uh, maybe six, seven years ago,
maybe as far as eight years ago,I don't know.
Covet time is kind of like thatfour-year span, that's right.
Yeah, nobody really knows whenall that stuff happened so we'll
say, seven years ago I starteda uh a charity called hammers
for heart it.
It's a 501 C three charity thatwe started um to kind of be
able to do, like some smallercommunity stuff, uh, you know,
(27:18):
building ramps for, you know,handicapped people, um, senior
citizens, things like that,doing small home repairs, yard
cleanups, you know, kind ofwhatever projects came our way.
Uh, we were already doing that.
We decided to start the 501c3to kind of make it a little bit
more official and to kind of puta name over it.
So you know, if otherbusinesses wanted to get
(27:39):
involved, it wasn't like, hey,give me money so we can do this
thing.
So we started that and you know,for we did a handful of
projects every year and thenCOVID came and you know,
everything kind of got weird andit kind of sat on the back
burner year.
And then COVID came andeverything kind of got weird and
it kind of sat on the backburner and then in.
So the real big push is I foundfaith a little less than three
(28:02):
years ago and in the process offinding my faith I realized that
for so many years I chasedmoney and, like a lot of us, if
I just get to this amount ofmoney.
That that's my happiness.
Um, the weird thing is is isyou never, ever, hit that goal?
no matter what the number is.
The first time you hit the daythat I so, the first time I ever
(28:25):
hit that metric where I waslike that amount of money,
that's what I wanted, that'swhat I have was the saddest day
for me, because I just I justmoved the goal line and once you
hit it the first time, it makesit easier to hit it the second
time and you keep pushing andpushing and pushing and you
never end up being satisfiedwith it.
So I found my faith and Irealized that I wanted to do
(28:48):
more kingdom work.
And I realized that the companythat I built is kind of this
ginormous tool that I could useto just kind of do more kingdom
work.
And I realized that the companythat I built is kind of this
ginormous tool that I could useto just kind of do more kingdom
work.
I hired somebody that wasactually at the time he was the
worship leader at my church.
He was making a move in hiscareer and I asked him if he
wanted to do some contract work.
(29:08):
Ended up coming on with me fulltime, um, so that was kind of a
big big deal, uh, to havesomebody that worked in, uh in
in ministry to come on board, um, and in the process of, like me
and him kind of having more andmore conversations, uh, we made
it a much larger conversation,uh, as far as in the actual
(29:30):
office.
I told him that, like, this iswhat like feeds my soul.
This is what makes me super,super happy.
This is the avenue I want toapproach.
Like, everything else that wedo just becomes like the thing
that feeds this, the mostimportant part of all of this.
Our company just feeds that.
So, uh, we kind of did somesmaller things in the beginning
(29:50):
of him coming on board with us.
Um, you know, we kind of didsome smaller things in the
beginning of him coming on boardwith us.
One of the things was we putout there in our marketing.
We started a thing called theCommunity Pro Pledge to let
people know that we're here forour community.
We'll do these projects.
We've done two food drives nowwhere we've raised a very
considerable amount of food fortwo of our local food pantries,
(30:15):
considerable amount of food fortwo of our local food pantries
We've done.
We did like an adopt a highwayhere locally, which we just got
done, doing our quarterlycleanup, the local camp here we
were able to basically tear downa building and rebuild their
canteen to serve the kids in thesummertime.
And then last year we did sevenHab, seven habitat for humanity
brews.
So, um, so yeah, so that thatwhole conversation just kept
(30:40):
evolving and every time we didmore service work I just, you
know it made me happier andhappier, happier.
I've had more business ownersin our area reach out to say,
man, hey, love what you're doing, like, let me know how I can
get involved.
So like that, in my personalopinion, is a is a larger, uh
kind of barometer to successthan anything else.
(31:01):
Yeah, when when you can inspireother people to kind of, do you
know more things that you know?
Serve others versus themselves.
Uh, I mean, I think our worldwould be a better place if
everybody just served othersmore than themselves.
Speaker 1 (31:13):
So you, but using.
I think there's another part tothat that I think I want to
point out is that you're alsousing your gifts and business,
right, that you're using your,your talents, to then be able to
right, like I think that that'sthat.
You know, I think it could go.
Some people want to help toomuch and they, and then maybe
(31:35):
they, they, they, just they,they they're not using their
gifts properly, right?
So you know, um, how, how hasit been okay for a contractor
that that's thinking about goingdown this route also?
Right, I've had a couple on thepodcast that on this route also
.
Right, I've had a couple on thepodcast that that have you know,
uh, nonprofits also and, andand have a strong mission in, in
(31:57):
the, in the way that they servethe community and serve causes
in their, in their businesses.
Yeah, and you know what arewhat were some of the things in
getting that type of structureset up?
Like, how does how does someonego about starting a 401 C three
and you know, and making thatan actual, like, yeah, this is
(32:17):
official, yeah, someone canwrite a check, donate their time
, donate their services and andget that tax write off.
But also, you know, like, whatwas that process like?
Speaker 2 (32:28):
Because that's a, that's a whole process within
itself like Cause that's a,that's a whole process within
itself.
Yeah, I mean.
So if I've been completelyhonest with you, I was very
fortunate to have somebodywithin the company that kind of
took that burden onto themselves.
I mean, starting the 501c isn'tlike a terribly, terribly
involved process, you know it's.
It's more of a hurry up andwait type deal.
(32:48):
You know you fill out thepaperwork, you kind of put a
name behind the whole thing, youput a mission, you put officers
in place and then you wait forthe IRS to tell you yeah, you're
good, you got your nonprofitstatus.
The harder part of that isfunding is always an issue,
especially if you're a no-name501, nobody really wants to give
me money for these projects, soyou're going to self-fund a lot
(33:09):
of it.
But if you're going to gothrough the process to do it all
and you're going to make it abigger thing for yourself and
your company, just stick with it.
Over time you'll have more andmore people that will buy into
what you're doing.
Always be very, very verbalabout it.
Don't be afraid to talk aboutit.
(33:29):
It's not a secret.
Not everybody's going tobelieve in what you do.
You don't need everybody to buyin, you just need people to
listen and understand that, hey,you're open for these things
and then, honestly, sometimesyou just have to learn how to
say no.
There are people out there thatare in desperate need of the
services that you can providefor them.
(33:49):
It's unfortunate and there arepeople out there, and then there
are the other side of thatwhere there's people out there
that look at you and go, hey,this guy's doing stuff for free.
So you have to come up with avetting process to take a
project and, and you know, meetwith the people, figure out if
if they're legitimately in need.
Um, you know, we've beenfortunate.
(34:09):
To my knowledge, we've.
We've never had anybody take usfor anything.
But yeah, I mean, if you wantto have a conversation, just
start asking around.
There's, there's so manyresources.
Don't be, don't be secretiveabout it.
If you want to do it, juststart asking around.
There's so many people outthere that have done it or are
willing to help you do it doneit or are willing to help you do
(34:35):
it.
Speaker 1 (34:35):
Uh, yeah, and this, and small things too, is is, you
know, being involved with yourlocal, with local charities in
your area?
You?
don't have to start your ownright.
Habitat's a great one that Iknow.
A lot of contractors you knowdo a lot of service and have
habitat for humanity and thingslike that.
So you know, starting there isa great place too, right getting
, you know, just gettingsomething going.
And then another part of itbecomes the team aspect of the.
(34:58):
You know Charles Antis andTamara Chase and some people
that I've had on the show thatalso are very philanthropic in
their, in their roofingbusinesses.
They, it, it.
It becomes a culture thing intheir business.
It becomes part of the team.
Um, uh, you know the um there.
(35:21):
There's so many aspects to itwhen you, when you, when you,
when you, uh, when you bring itin, and you'll get that feedback
from your team that this is man, yeah, we, we really enjoy this
, Like we'll go out and do thiswith you, we're in with you.
And how has that shift happenedwithin your team, Are they?
Speaker 2 (35:48):
like, do they have a different motivation?
So I think that some peopleshare the same motivation that I
(36:09):
do.
I think there's other peoplethat may not have the same heart
behind it.
I don't ever get anybody thatwas like, no, I don't want to do
that, um, and and when we allcome together, when, when the
entire team is together doingthese things, we're laughing and
carrying on the entire day,there's nobody that's moping
around going.
I can't believe we're here, um,you know, I there's.
There's times where, uh, there'stimes where I ask people to
(36:31):
donate their time, and thenthere's times where we do these
projects during normal businesshours, where everybody's blocked
a check.
So when I have the opportunityto do something where people can
donate their time, I don'treally have an issue with people
saying like, no, I'm notavailable that day.
I have a handful of people inthere who have several kids and
(36:51):
families and busyextracurricular activities with
coaching and everything else,and when they say like, hey, I
wish I could be there, but I'vegot other things I have to do
that day and I'm perfectly finewith that.
So they can be involved if theywant to.
They can be not involved ifthey don't want to.
I don't hold that against them.
This is my thing.
I'm fortunate to be in theposition that I am and, uh, I
(37:13):
love to have them with me, butif not, like it's still going to
charge forward.
Speaker 1 (37:16):
So I recently had a gentleman on the podcast,
jonathan Cron, sten Jake Cron.
He wrote a book called thebillion dollar blueprint yeah,
both billion dollar bullseye,not billion dollar billion
dollar bullseye and he talked uh, we talked a little bit about
which was very enlightening inin my conversation with him was,
(37:36):
um, an internal mission and anexternal mission of the company.
Yeah, you, you can't expectyour team to buy into your
internal mission and have thesame, uh, same enthusiasm about
it, right, like what you would.
What you can hope for is thatthey buy into the external
(37:57):
mission of the company, the waythat you serve your customers
and take care of your customersRight.
And so you know with thatbalance and and that that
awareness, it's like, hey, it'sokay, right.
Like it's okay, hey, your kid'sgot something going on.
I'm not mad that you can't comeand you know, work with us on
(38:17):
this, you know project, orwhatever.
Speaker 2 (38:21):
That's a great way to frame that the internal and the
external, yeah that's what Ithought man, that was an awesome
one.
Speaker 1 (38:28):
That was very impactful when, like that, uh,
that, when he said that, um, sonow you do, you've, you've kind
of created some other communityinvolvement.
You just continue the you know,along these lines of community
involvement.
Um, you started.
Um you started a podcast.
Yeah, the U S the pros apodcast.
(38:49):
Yeah, the you Ask the ProsAnswer podcast.
Speaker 2 (38:53):
So everyone check that out.
Speaker 1 (38:55):
You Ask the Pros Answer.
So we'll get to some listenersover there and let's describe
what you kind of the conceptbehind it, how you got that
started.
Speaker 2 (39:07):
Yeah, so Cole, like I said, cole was a guy that was
uh in the ministry at my churchthat came on board with us a
little over a year ago.
Um, you know, we wanted to kindof increase.
He's our marketing manager, sowe wanted to kind of increase
our our marketing more, um,locally.
And uh, podcast is one of thosethings.
I listened to a ton of podcasts, um, you know, I listened to a
(39:32):
lot of audio books.
I read a lot of books.
Uh, so like I'm a nerd when itcomes to this business.
Um, most of the people thatknow me uh know that like I'm
the guy that can quote specsfrom certain materials or
install guidelines.
Um, so I'm a wealth ofinformation, and sometimes
entirely too much information.
So it was like, how can weharness that, put that out to
(39:54):
either and let people know howbig of a nerd I am?
Um, so we started the podcast.
Initially it was kind of morelike let's talk about the
products, let's talk about theright things and the wrong
things with installations, thecommon things that we deal with.
You know, what should you bedoing as a homeowner, how to
hire somebody, how to vetsomebody.
It originally started like that.
(40:14):
Eventually your content getskind of stale because it's like
all right, here's another 20-30minute podcast of this guy
telling me how everybody else iswrong.
He's right.
So then it was like all right,so who else can we bring on?
Let's bring in people that arekind of like contractor adjacent
.
So we had we've had a couple ofdifferent real estate agents on
um.
One of our most recent podcaststhat just dropped was a guy down
(40:37):
in north of virginia that uhhas a landscaping company.
He just started a 501c3 calledrelief cut.
He's going to be doing um, likesome kind of property cleanups,
uh.
So we're looking at not onlykind of helping him, kind of
boost that thing, but we were inthe beginning talks of
potentially finding a projectwhere my team can go down and
meet him and his team and we cankind of do a project hands on
(40:59):
together, which I'm lookingforward to.
I hope that all happens.
But yeah, so it's kind ofevolved and I'm excited to see.
You know, when we originallystarted and we called you, ask
the pros.
Pros Answer we're pro-exteriors.
Yes, we're professionals, we'rethe pros in our industry.
But I think this podcast isgoing to be more so like the
(41:20):
pros in every industry.
So I think, it's going to expandinto everything you know, other
trades, businesses, otherservice businesses, kind of
wherever we can get somebodythat we feel is like.
You know somebody who has theright qualifications, has been
in business for a while, who hasa good story, and you know at
least, like you search outpeople that that, that fit, that
(41:40):
that mold.
We're going to be doing kind ofthe same thing.
Speaker 1 (41:42):
So yeah, yeah.
How's it been for you?
What, what's been the journey?
Like what?
Speaker 2 (41:59):
were some of those first episodes.
Was it like, oh man, I don'twant to be on camera?
Were you like, put me on camera, let's cut it up.
I can BS with the best of them.
Um, I can do it face to faceall day long.
You turn a camera on.
It's probably the only time youever seen me really be bashful,
so I've gotten used to it and,uh, I've kind of learned the
(42:20):
tricks of, like how to actuallylook at the camera like I'm
doing right now.
Um, how to, you know, pretendlike the monitors, you know, not
in front of you.
You know those little tricksthat aren't really natural in
the beginning.
I've learned how to sit stillin my chair and not do this.
Speaker 3 (42:35):
In the beginning.
Speaker 2 (42:36):
I hated it because all I look at is, of course,
like everybody, I look at thescreen and I look at every
imperfection I can find on myface.
So, as it's gone along, youdon't really pay attention to it
anymore.
They get super, super easyafter you get so many under your
belt.
Um, you know, it used to take alittle while to kind of put the
podcast together without kindof glitching or losing your uh
(42:56):
spot train of thought, um andcole, having to pretty much edit
everything down to the finishedproduct.
Now there's there's been acouple times where we go in and
we knock out a 15, 20 minutepodcast session with, with no
issues whatsoever, hardly anyediting needed to be done.
Um, so, yeah, so it's, it'sbeen, it's been fun.
Um, I'm looking forward to it.
It's something I really, reallyenjoy doing.
Speaker 1 (43:16):
So yeah, those conversations are fun, man, and
it is.
It's, there's something aboutbeing putting yourself on camera
.
It happens, I have 10 year oldtwin boys and my son james, you
know, will record me doing thisand then he'll watch it and he's
like that's not what I soundlike.
Speaker 3 (43:34):
I'm out of here like that's not me don't put that you
know.
Speaker 1 (43:38):
So it's not I'm wearing that what it is.
I remember when I switched to a4k camera I was like, whoa man,
I got some, oh yeah you know,yeah, when my hair gets a little
longer, my grades have come inpretty, pretty solid on the side
of your.
Keep it a little shorter than Iused to.
Yeah, it's just do it, man, andand and it's.
(43:59):
How has the response been?
What has what, what things camefrom it that you never thought
would have come from it?
Speaker 2 (44:09):
things came from it that you never thought would
have come from it.
Yeah, so, uh, so I didn'treally know what to expect.
You know, you put a lot ofeffort into a lot of marketing
and you know you don't reallyknow whether or not you're
really going to get anything outof it.
Um, I don't know whatexpectations I had going into it
as far as, like, is this goingto be?
Um, you know, is this going tobe for leads?
Is this going to be forbranding?
Is it going to be just purelyto get our message out there?
(44:31):
Uh, so, you know it's, it'sbeen interesting to meet with
clients for the first time andhave them being like, oh, I
actually watch your podcast.
Um, or, you know, I do a lot ofstuff with our local chamber of
commerce and you know, being atan event and being like, oh,
actually I've seen your podcastand I've seen your podcast and
(44:52):
you know it's, it's interesting.
Speaker 1 (44:52):
It's a weird feeling.
Speaker 2 (44:53):
You know it's a weird feeling and the first thing
that comes to my mind is like oh, I wonder which episode they
saw.
You know you hope it's one ofthe better ones, but you know it
is what it is going to take.
The good, the good, the goodrecordings and the bad
recordings are all the same.
So that's right, but yeah, soit's been.
It's been interesting to uh, tosee people actually watching it
.
Um, I've had a couple offriends that you know I've been
(45:17):
friends with them for 20 plusyears and don't really see them
anymore and to say like hey man,I just want to let you know I
just saw you.
You know, you just popped up onfacebook or instagram or
something.
He's like, I feel like everytime I I log on.
You're on there again.
So I was like that's prettycool.
Yeah, I'll take that so, yeah,it's amazing.
Speaker 1 (45:35):
It's amazing what putting out content does.
Like it, yeah it, who's?
You don't know who sees it.
It's, yeah, you know, andreally it's the people that
don't that aren't commenting.
They're not liking liking, butthey see it.
Speaker 2 (45:50):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (45:51):
People see it man.
Speaker 2 (45:52):
I think the other point is like it's almost
freeing.
You know, as a foundingbusiness owner, you are the face
of the company and then, askind of like your company grows,
you know, depending on how youchoose to run your business, you
could still be the face of thecompany.
I choose to kind of like leadfor everybody, and if I have the
opportunity for somebody elseto kind of be the point person,
(46:14):
I'd rather somebody else be thepoint person, um.
So it's been fun to kind of see,uh, like people recognize the
company without knowing it's me,um, and knowing who our company
is, without realizing, like,I'm the owner of that company.
So that's kind of cool to havepeople buy into what our company
(46:35):
mission is and our core values,to be able to hear people talk
about it in a way that's likenot like God, you know that guy
from Progsteriors.
So people talking about thecompany in such a positive way
has, I think, has been one ofthe results.
I didn't necessarily kind ofunderstand going into it.
Yeah, yeah, that's awesome.
Speaker 1 (46:53):
That's a good one.
I know you're enjoying theepisode, but let's give a shout
out to another one of oursponsors.
As a roofing marketing agencyowner and coach, I've seen it
all Great marketing wastedbecause no one follows up fast
enough.
That's why I built Power UpAgents, not just a receptionist.
Our AI handles the entirecustomer journey.
No one follows up fast enough.
(47:13):
That's why I built Power UpAgents, not just a receptionist.
Our AI handles the entirecustomer journey, from answering
the first call to booking thejob, to post job surveys and
reviews 24 seven, inbound,outbound, even multilingual.
If you want leads followed upinstantly and customers nurtured
automatically, visit the linkin the description or visit the
(47:35):
sponsors page on the RoofingSuccess Podcast website.
Your full AI team is ready.
You're out in the DelawareMaryland area.
I don't think you're too farfrom dc, right like a little
(47:56):
over two hours yeah, a littleover two hours.
So maybe the, the, you don'thave as many of the the the dc
area employees working out inyour area, but you know we're
heading into some job cutsrecently and uh, yeah, the
economy has had its itsfluctuations and things like
that.
Yeah, um, you started in 2009.
Speaker 2 (48:17):
Yeah, so we we started in in 2005 and we kind
of like yeah, yeah, yeah.
So, uh, mary, the love of mylife in 2006, had her first
child in 2007.
You know, I was still a kidwhen I had my first kid.
So as my company kind of grewand I had my first child, I
(48:43):
really wanted to have my secondchild.
I told my wife I'm ready for mysecond.
She goes well, we can have asecond child if I get to become
a stay-at-home.
And I'm like, of course, nobrainer Again.
I didn't know we were going tohave a mortgage crisis.
I didn't know the economy wasgoing to tank and people were
going to lose their homes leftand right.
I hadn't been through anythinglike that before as a business
(49:07):
owner.
I didn't know what that meantfor me.
Before, as a business owner, Ididn't know what that meant for
me.
I think the saving grace was Iwas still a smaller company.
I didn't have a lot to lose.
I didn't have a lot of crazyoverhead.
So I was fortunate to be ableto grow through the mortgage
crisis and the recession.
I had my second kid in 2009.
(49:27):
The company continued to grow.
I had a third kid in 2012 and,and you know it's it's been,
we'll say, for the most partsmooth sailing.
Um, you know I I always tellother business owners when I get
the opportunity to talk to them.
I was like I'm a wealth ofinformation because I've made
every possible mistake you canmake.
That's right.
You know, I've made mistakesthat have cost my company a lot
(49:48):
of money.
I've been burned by othercompanies that have cost my
company a lot of money.
I've been burned by othercompanies that have cost our
company a lot of money.
So I'll tell you all the thingsnot to do and then all you have
to do is write them down andjust not do those things.
But yeah, so having a companythat was kind of just kind of
starting to get some momentumgoing in a down economy, it
(50:09):
teaches you how to be a littlebit more scrappy with your money
.
Teaches you how to market whenmarketing dollars aren't quite
as easy to obtain, when you haveto be a little bit more
strategic about your bidding tomake sure that you keep your
pipeline full.
Yeah, so there are a lot ofgreat lessons to be learned in a
(50:34):
down economy, but those lessonsneed to be kind of applied.
When things are good, too, it'sreally easy to have a great year
.
I mean, I don't know a singlecontractor who didn't have just
a banger year during COVID.
You know money was.
You know money was cheap.
Everybody was throwing itaround like it wasn't ever going
(50:56):
to go anywhere.
A lot of people that were inthe labor force started their
own companies.
A lot of those guys haverealized that, you know, jobs
are a little harder to get nowand they filtered back into the
labor pool again.
But yeah, so I've filtered backinto the labor pool again.
But yeah, so I've been aroundfor a couple of down ticks, I've
(51:16):
been around for some up ticks,no-transcript.
So you just pay attention tothat man, you track your numbers
and you realize like hey, wehad an off month and off quarter
.
Why is that?
(51:38):
And usually, um, usually, youcan pretty much figure out where
that's, where that's comingfrom.
Speaker 1 (51:44):
So yeah numbers are important that that's it and
it's.
I, like you said, being leanright, like if you don't realize
that these are the good timesand you are budgeting as if
these are the good times or thatthese are normal times.
(52:05):
You will soon find out thatthey are not normal times.
Speaker 2 (52:09):
Agreed.
Speaker 1 (52:12):
This thing ebbs and flows, and so you know you can
yeah when you have your firstmillion dollar year.
Speaker 2 (52:19):
It doesn't mean you owe yourself a F-250 King Ranch.
Speaker 1 (52:22):
That's right.
Speaker 2 (52:23):
Too many.
Do you know too many?
Speaker 1 (52:25):
do you mentioned, if you just did all the stuff that
you said was a mistake, or orthat you didn't do right, that
you would uh, that, that thatyou know that would be the the a
good start, right, we'll callit a good start, right there
there's just do that.
Just just don't make themistakes I did.
(52:46):
Yeah, let's end with.
Let's end it this way.
I usually ask in a differentway, but let's ask, or let's say
, what are the three to fivemistakes that you do not want to
make in your roofing business?
Speaker 2 (53:03):
All right, so, first and foremost, stick to what
you're good at.
That would probably be mynumber one thing.
If you have a client that wantsyou to do your roof, but they
also want you to redo theirkitchen or they want you to redo
their driveway, learn to say no.
Stick to what you're good at.
That's where your money is,that's what you're really good
at.
That's where you can keep yourbrand kind of in place.
(53:25):
Learn to track your numbers.
Um, learn to track your numbers.
Uh, be aggressive with trackingyour numbers, because you'd be
surprised how good you'd begoing with a lot of money in the
bank and then all of a suddenyou turn around and it was like
where's all my money?
Um, uh, be aggressive withgoing after money owed.
Uh, learn.
Learn the red flags of whensomebody is going to drag paying
(53:49):
their bill.
Learn the proper way, becauseevery state has different laws,
but learn how to lead somebody'sproperty.
Learn what your timeline is andbe aggressive with sending out
your red letters and going afteryour money, because it can add
up real, real quick.
We've been in a couple ofdifferent times in are in the
last, say, 10 years where we'vehad hundreds of thousands of
(54:13):
dollars owed to us and it sucks.
It's not a fun feeling, but ifyou wait too long, you're never
going to see that money soyou'll have no real legal
recourse.
And so be aggressive with makingsure you're watching those
numbers.
Hire for personality and teachskills.
I've hired a lot of people thatwere great craftsmen, very good
(54:35):
at what they do, but theirpersonality sucked and they
failed quickly.
Yeah, so everybody has theirown version of hire slow, fire
fast.
I hire fast and fire fast.
To me, I don't take anythingpersonal, it's just business for
me.
I hire you because I hire fastand fire fast.
Um to me, like I don't takeanything personal, it's just
business for me.
I hire you cause I like you andI think I might see something
(54:56):
in you.
And if you don't work, I don'tcare.
If you've worked here for twoweeks, I'm.
If it's not going to work, it'snot going to work, I don't need
to prolong this.
Speaker 3 (55:03):
Um and then honestly, uh don't let your business
become your everything.
Speaker 2 (55:14):
You know it's very easy, especially in the first
handful of years you start inyour business.
You have this goal of like Iwant to be this, I want to be
this, and you're putting everyhour that you can into something
and you know it can affectrelationships, friendships.
You know, I know there's timeswhere you know I have four sons
Like I said, my wife stays home.
And there's times where I havefour sons like I said, my wife
stays home.
And there's times where I'm anearly riser.
(55:35):
So I'll wake up at four o'clockin the morning, get on my
laptop, work until I canrealistically get ready without
waking her up.
I'm out the door, I start doingmy thing and I'll work till
five, six o'clock.
I'll go home, I'll eat dinnerwhen everything's all said and
done, kids are content and I'mback on my laptop doing work
again.
Um, that's not really a life.
Uh, you know, nowadays peoplerespect like he's a grinder,
(56:00):
he's a hustler.
It's great you can do all thatstuff or hire somebody to do it
for you.
It doesn't always have to beyou, you don't't have to be the
guy.
Um, you know, build a life andthen let the business kind of
afford that life.
Um, but yeah, and then ifyou're not having fun, just
don't do it anymore.
So nothing's worth doing ifyou're not having fun.
Speaker 1 (56:22):
That's awesome, man.
Aaron, thanks for your time.
This has been another episodeof the roofing success podcast.
Speaker 3 (56:28):
Thank you for tuning into the Roofing Success Podcast
For more valuable content.
Visit roofingsuccesspodcastcomWhile there.
Check out our sponsors forexclusive offers, shop for
merchandise and sign up for ournewsletter for industry updates
and tips.
Also join the Roofing SuccessFacebook group to connect with
other professionals and stayupdated on the latest trends.
(56:50):
If you enjoyed this episode,please subscribe, like, share
and leave a comment.
Your support helps us continueto bring you top industry
insights.
The website link is in thedescription.
Thanks for listening you.
What if chasing top line revenue is costing you
everything that matters?
In this episode, I'm sittingdown with Aaron Rodgers, a
seasoned contractor who's donethe big revenue years and
realized it wasn't worth theburnout.
Now he's running a lean,profitable business that fuels
his mission, supports hiscommunity and keeps his team
(00:20):
happy.
Aaron is a numbers guy throughand through, but he's also
someone who's discovered thatreal success means margin on
your P&L and in your life.
From developing simple butpowerful team metrics to using
AI for smarter decision-making,this conversation is full of
practical insight, but whattruly makes Aaron stand out is
(00:42):
how he uses his business as avehicle for giving back.
Through his nonprofit Hammersfor Heart and a deep commitment
to service, he's buildingsomething much bigger than just
another roofing company.
In today's episode, we'll coverhow to grow without going broke,
how to use your data withoutdrowning in it, and how to keep
(01:03):
your team and yourself alignedwith what really matters.
Let's get into it with AaronRodgers.
Welcome to the Roofing SuccessPodcast.
I'm Jim Alleyne and I'm here tobring you insights from top
leaders in the roofing industryto help you grow and scale your
roofing business.
Aaron Rodgers with ProExteriors how are you man?
Speaker 2 (01:26):
I'm wonderful, Jim.
How are you?
Speaker 1 (01:28):
I'm doing well, man Doing well.
We were talking I don't know ifit was earlier this week or
last week and had someconversations and, man, you're a
numbers guy and so we're goingto definitely get into that here
in a second, but I want tointroduce you to the roofing
(01:49):
success community.
Give yourself a little intro.
How did Pro Exteriors getstarted?
Speaker 2 (01:58):
Okay, so 2005 or so is I started my company,
beginning in 2005.
My father was a contractor, soI've kind of been in the
industry since you know oldenough to basically follow him
around and pick up nails.
Yeah, so 20 years in justcelebrated our 20th year,
Started really kind of focusingon exteriors and roofing in
(02:21):
around 2009.
I've been fortunate to be ableto grow my company to what I
consider to be a pretty goodsize and have a pretty good team
along the ride with me.
So it's been fun.
Speaker 1 (02:37):
That's a.
You came up in the business andcontinued on and continued on.
What?
What was that?
You know?
What was that journey?
Where did you ever have otheraspirations as a kid?
And then you just kind of fellin, fell back into the roofing
or you know, contracting androofing or what.
What was the?
What was the draw for you?
Speaker 2 (02:57):
I tell you, I so growing up, I always loved cars.
Speaker 3 (03:00):
Uh, and I don't know if it was, I mean, I think every
little boy grows up.
Speaker 2 (03:03):
You know, all our favorite characters always had a
really nice classic car, and soI always grew up really wanting
to work on cars.
I actually went to our localcommunity college for automotive
technology to basically learnhow to fix cars, work on cars,
and I believe it was the secondsemester.
We had a career mechanic comein.
(03:26):
Guy owned his own shop and Ithink he had six or eight doors
and he started talking about themoney aspect of things.
Six or eight doors, I've gotsix, eight mechanics and if
(03:47):
you're looking to make more than$25 an hour, this isn't the
career path for you.
And that was the last day I wentto that class, unfortunately.
So I switched my major tobusiness and I think once I
started learning how businessesoperate, that became more of the
passion of being anentrepreneur.
Working with my hands andnumbers was always super, super
(04:07):
easy for me.
So, my father being acontractor, I went and started
doing work with him part-time.
As I was taking businessclasses and really, really
quickly, while watching him,watching him interact with
clients, I realized that I couldmake a career path out of this
and in reality, I enjoyed it.
Speaker 3 (04:26):
Who doesn't?
Speaker 2 (04:26):
like building stuff with their hands.
And then, you know, a year orso later, but a year and a half
later, I made the decision tomake this like my long term
career, started working with myfather full time and then,
really quickly, I was like youknow what, I don't have the
personality to be behind someoneelse, like, if I'm going to do
(04:46):
this, I like the opportunity tokind of be the front person, to
be the guy that's kind of youknow, steering the ship.
And in the middle of 2004, Isaid you know what, I'm going to
start this right, got mybusiness license and January 1st
of 2005, officially, was inbusiness for myself.
Speaker 1 (05:02):
So how did dad feel about that?
How did dad feel when it whenit was like all right, I'm going
to, I'm going to venture off onmy own.
Speaker 2 (05:10):
Yeah, so I think my father was always supportive.
Um, I think he uh, you know hehad been in business for at that
point, just over 20 years.
I think he's still a contractorthis day.
He's.
He's been in business for avery, very, very long time.
So I think at that point myfather never really had
(05:30):
aspirations to go and be thishuge brand name.
He always just wanted to besomewhat smaller.
Him and another guy, him andmaybe two other guys.
He never really took onprojects that he himself
couldn't handle.
So when I decided to go out anddo my own thing, I think he was
.
I think he was excited, um, inhis own way, uh, I think maybe
(05:50):
it was kind of like okay, we'renot going to do this together.
So I think there were someemotions that maybe he didn't
share with me, but butultimately I think he was
supportive All right, aaron.
Speaker 1 (05:59):
So you know back to.
We got the story, we understand, you know the journey, you know
you grew up in this right andand and.
There's a lot of lessons to belearned along the way.
You'd mentioned to me in ourconversation that you're a
numbers guy.
Speaker 3 (06:15):
I love that.
Speaker 1 (06:20):
And so let's start with this what are the most
important metrics that a roofingbusiness owner should be
tracking?
Speaker 2 (06:29):
Okay, most important metrics.
So obviously everyone wants tolook at profit, you know, I
think I think profit isimportant, but obviously there's
other metrics that kind of goalong with profit.
So what is it costing you toget the leads?
What's your closing ratio foryour sales guys?
(06:49):
What things do you sell?
What products do you sell?
What services do you offer?
Which of those has the bestprofit margin?
Are there some things that youoffer just as kind of an
ancillary service but in realitythey don't actually make any
real money for you?
Are there certain things thatyou're just as kind of an
ancillary service but in realitythey don't actually make any
real money for you?
Are there certain things thatyou're just not good at?
So I think there are so manythings that you need to track or
(07:14):
should be tracking.
It can get overwhelming really,really quickly.
Speaker 1 (07:20):
Let's do it this way we're going to start building
metrics for, for a, for a, for aroofing company as it is as
it's, as it's getting startedand growing.
We'll, we'll frame it that wayRight now.
We'll, like man, it's day one,it's you, you're, you're.
You're the salesperson, You'rethe, you're the.
(07:40):
You know, you're the job sitesupervisor, You're the office
manager, You're the job sitesupervisor.
You're the office manager,you're everything.
Yeah, at that level.
What are you making sure thatyou're paying a lot of attention
to your budget.
Speaker 2 (07:59):
I mean, I think, when you're first starting off, I
think having a proper plan and atrue budget, I think when you
first start out, having a budgetlets you know.
Let you know you know, are youtracking, are you on pace, are
you hitting your targets?
So I think, paying attention tothe metrics of your budget, you
know, this is my, my marketingspend, this is my equipment
spend, this is my overhead spend.
So I think those metrics arethe first and foremost, like you
have to have them set up beforeanything else.
(08:20):
And I think when you, when youget going from there, then you
can start kind of diving intothe weeds a little bit more and
start looking at closing ratiosand and, uh, net profit, you
know per trade item, and youknow kind of more refined data,
if you would.
Speaker 1 (08:38):
So yeah, how does uh, you know, if someone doesn't
know how to even put a budgettogether, where do they start
with that?
What are, what are some?
Speaker 2 (08:46):
of the man.
Honestly, I always tell people,like people are so scared to
ask other business owners andyou know, I think the first
place you start with anything isis go to a competitor, go to
somebody who's been doing thisfor a really long time and says
like, hey, man, I'm going to,I'm going to hang up my own
shingle and I want to make sureI do this right.
(09:06):
What are the traps or thepitfalls that most entrepreneurs
fall into?
You know, contracting is areally weird space.
It's a really fun business tobe in, but most guys don't last,
you know, by five years.
So, first thing I always tellpeople is don't be afraid to ask
for help.
First thing I always tell peopleis don't be afraid to ask for
help.
Go to somebody that you know inyour market that has a good
personality, and ask them outfor coffee, ask them out for a
(09:28):
beer, and just say like, hey,man, I'm trying to put this
together.
Where would you point me?
Yeah, and then, honestly, wehave so much information at our
fingertips these days.
Yeah, everything you need toknow for the most part can be
found online.
I mean, jim, you're inmarketing, I look at, look at
the AI stuff that's out rightnow.
I mean, if that had been here 20years ago, I mean I think all
(09:50):
of us would be in a muchdifferent place as far as, like
our business growth andeverything else, because half of
that stuff is is done for you.
You type in a few, a fewprompts, refine it a little bit
and then spits out thisbeautiful product from the
backside.
I mean a lot of that stuff,it's not that hard.
You get a chat, gpt and type inlike hey, I'm going to start a
roofing contractor business.
(10:11):
Can you give me a very basickind of light on a budget put
together?
And then you have to go in andfill in the more refined details
to get the real numbers on thebackside.
But so much information isavailable to you.
Speaker 1 (10:25):
It can be very easy nowadays, right?
There's really no excuse forany of this, and I love that
chat GPT reference.
I had my friend, jonathan Masson the podcast some months back
last year actually and he's anAI prompting expert, ai expert
and has a prompting framework,and so just go in and tell it
(10:48):
what you want it to be.
You are the chief financialofficer of a large roofing
company.
I'm a startup looking todevelop a budget.
You know.
Please ask me any.
You know help me.
Can you help me with this?
Please ask me any clarifyingquestions.
And that.
Please ask me any clar.
You know, help me.
Can you help me with this?
Please ask me any clarifyingquestions.
And that.
Please ask me any clarifyingquestions.
At the end, you start to havethat conversation with it and
(11:12):
it'll ask you well, you knowwhat's your goal for the year,
what's your?
You know what do you do, andyou just start answering the
questions and you're right, man,it's just going to spit it
right out and it's a verybeautiful thing when used
properly.
Yeah, and so nowadays, theanswer to how do I get started
is chat GPT.
Yeah, claude, yeah.
Speaker 2 (11:35):
I mean, all of these AI tools are so complex and so
easy to use at the same time,and they can be used for almost
anything.
You know you're struggling tohave a hard conversation with
somebody, whether it be anemployee, whether it be a friend
, a loved one, whomever.
You go and you type in a fewbits of information what's a
delicate way to approach thisconversation and it spits out
(11:58):
some prompts where you're likeall right, so maybe it's not
going to be as difficult as Ithought it would be, so you can
use that stuff for anything inlife.
Speaker 1 (12:04):
Anything, yeah, yeah uh, check our sponsor power up
agents ai, great in terms ofvoice, ai, something that you
guys should check out, becausethat's a whole nother level to
this stuff.
Um, but now, now, as you'removing through, you're starting
to hire people.
You know, when you, when youstart getting those first hires,
man, I, I think that you I'm abig fan of EOS, the
(12:27):
entrepreneurial operating systemdeveloping key, that first
salesperson, maybe you start tohire, maybe a job site
supervisor or a productionmanager.
Speaker 2 (12:52):
So I measure.
My first measurement is alwayskind of like company culture,
you know, is this, does thatperson kind of add into our
culture?
And, you know, does it kind of?
Not only does it add to it, butthere's actually mesh kind of
in with that company culture.
That's usually the first thing,because man, you know you can
have, you can hire one bademployee and it ruins the
(13:13):
company culture completely andthen everybody's productivity
goes down.
People aren't as happy to cometo work, you know.
So that's always first andforemost like hire for
personality, uh.
So for for individual metrics,like salesperson, salespeople
are always the easiest metricsto come up with, right, um,
because it's a very tangiblething.
Like you know, you get two,three or four things like I need
(13:34):
you to sell X amount, I needyou to close at X amount, um,
and I need your margin to be atX amount.
So, like you get real three,real simple things and then you
can refine it from there.
Like you know, our in our areawe don't get a lot of snow, um,
but we have slight seasons, uh,we live in a real big like
(13:55):
second home market.
So, um, in the summertime youmay not be doing these big
complex remodels and, in kind,of the beach area that we live
in.
So you kind of have to take thatsales data and kind of skew it
Like January may not be a bigticket month and same way with
February is kind of things arewarming up a little bit.
So and then each subsequentemployee past that is going to
(14:19):
have their own set of metrics.
Right, job superintendents, youknow what are we looking at as
far as like, are subcontractorshappy?
Are our employees happy?
You know what kind of materialloss are we doing.
Are we staying on budget withour materials?
Are we staying on time and onschedule?
And that's important for acouple of different reasons.
Right, you know you onlyassumed you were going to be
(14:40):
there for seven days and you endup being there for 10.
You know, not only is itadditional labor costs, but you
also have lost revenue on thosedays from, you know, the job you
were hoping to schedule onthose days.
Um, client happiness is alwayssomething we talk about a lot.
We want to make sure ourclients are just ridiculously
happy with our projects.
Um, and then, you know, when itcomes to, like, our repair tech
(15:01):
guys, we want to make sure thattheir their output is.
You know we have a certainnumber of rooms for output to be
this gross revenue number.
Um, you know, we start talkingabout reviews.
As you kind of get along thealong the path in business you
want to talk about, you know howmany people can get reviews and
how many reviews can we geteach month?
Um, yeah, I, I mean, there's alot of metrics that you can put
(15:27):
in place.
Tracking them is the harderpart.
You know you could put as manymetrics in place as you want,
and obviously most of us in thisbusiness use CRMs and they'll
track a lot of it for you.
But you know somebody still hasto look at that data and then
go from there.
Speaker 1 (15:40):
So but yeah, who looks at the data?
How do you determine who looksat what data and who's
responsible for the outcome ofthat specific?
You know the data that you'remeasuring for that specific
outcome.
Speaker 2 (15:55):
So we run our business on like basically four
and a half departments I won'tcall it a full five departments
because we run operations andproduction kind of is one big
department but each departmenthas kind of their own key person
and each one of them is kind ofis kind of managed to oversee
(16:18):
certain metrics for theirdepartment.
You know, I won't say thatwe're as consistent as we need
to be, as far as like our weeklymeetings with each department
head to kind of go over thosemetrics with myself.
Be as far as like our weeklymeetings with each department
head to kind of go over thosemetrics with myself.
Uh, I'm probably the worstperson ever to work for when it
comes to like giving somebodyelse a task and then allowing
them to complete it.
Um, I'm not a micromanager butI have this like do it now
mentality where I don't alwayshave the patience to be like,
(16:40):
hey, this is, this is your task.
Um, you know, you have twoweeks to get it done.
Because by the end of that week,sometimes I just want to get it
out of my head essentially so Idon't always allow everybody to
bring metrics to me.
I more so have the abilitywhere I work, nonstop kind of
deal, and yeah, I can separate.
(17:00):
If I have three minutes of acommercial break while I'm
watching a show or somethingwith my kids, you know I'll jump
on my phone real quick andcheck a metric and you know,
check that box off.
Speaker 1 (17:10):
Make sure it's checked off.
Speaker 2 (17:13):
Yeah yeah, adhd is a curse and a superpower at the
same time.
Speaker 1 (17:17):
So that's right, that's right.
I think that's a that may be acommon trait of a roofing
business.
Owners right Like.
Speaker 2 (17:25):
Oh, isn't it weird.
Speaker 3 (17:25):
Yeah that's weird.
In other words, right.
Speaker 1 (17:27):
Like, or business owners in general really.
Um, you know, you mentioned youhad years where revenue didn't
grow but profit did.
You know?
Let's talk about that a littlebit, okay.
Speaker 2 (17:41):
Uh, I think when we talked before we, we talked a
little bit about how when youfirst start your business,
you're growing and you're happyto kind of see revenue grow.
And I think a lot of people gettricked into the idea that if
gross revenue grows thenobviously you're more successful
.
And that's not always the case.
Um, you know, we, we've hadyears where our uh, you know,
(18:07):
we've added a million dollars inin gross revenue but only added
three percent to our net profit.
Um, you know, it doesn't matterhow many millions of dollars in
business you do, if your netprofit's not growing along with
that, it's it's all for nothing.
Um, we, we used to do some newconstruction stuff and we
realized really quickly the thesaying in this business is 90%
(18:27):
of your headaches come for 10%of your clients.
Um, so that was it, man, we, webrought on, uh, like one year
we went out there and we had acouple of good size projects and
we brought in, I want to say,$1.7 million in new business
that year from a couple ofprojects.
And, uh, at the end of the yearI'm going where's the money?
Didn't we just do $1.7 millionin new revenue?
(18:49):
Where did that money come fromor where did that go?
So I think the more importantmetric is always net profit.
Speaker 3 (18:59):
You can grow a million dollars year over year
over year.
Speaker 2 (19:02):
If your net profit isn't kind of growing in that
same case, then you're workingfor nothing, and none of us got
in this business to work forfree, so don't get stuck in that
mindset.
When I reach $5 million, I'msuccessful.
When I reach $10 million, I'msuccessful.
Let's look at net profit.
(19:23):
When I reach $2 million in netprofit, I'm successful because
that's the number that's moreimportant, because you know, it
may not take as many millions ingross revenue to hit that net
profit number as it does to, youknow, to do the other thing.
Speaker 1 (19:35):
So exactly, it's a.
It's a funny thing, I don'tknow, man, it's a, it's like you
, it's just human psychology.
I think some sometimes rightwe're just chasing this big
number and not as many peopleshare their net profit, maybe
right.
So maybe that's what it is,that we don't have those numbers
in front of us as often.
(19:57):
It's much easier to say oh, wedid 18 million this year, we did
6 million this year, we did 50million this year.
Right, yeah, and no one really.
There's not a lot of sharingaround the net profit numbers
and so um maybe that's a youknow, maybe that's a reason.
But if you were to like, let'sgive a range, like because
(20:21):
you've you've had the years withwith less profit and more
profit, you know, if you said,you know, on the low end, this
is man.
I don't want to drop below this, but, boy, when we're fully
optimized, I want to be aroundthis.
Speaker 2 (20:39):
Yeah.
So for us, I would say our mostprofitable year was like in the
$4 million range.
I think the $1 to $3 million isreally easy obtainable number.
To hit three million, I thinkthe the the run from, say, three
to five million or three toseven million is a lot harder
(21:03):
climb than I think most peoplerealize.
You know, going from three tofive is a really it requires a
lot more equipment, more trucks,more people.
More people requires moremanagement.
You know more management ismore overhead.
Now you need managers formanagers.
So I think that there's ways toscale up, you know, to 10
(21:27):
million, 20 million and all.
But you know, I think our bestyears, where not only was profit
good but our team was happiest,that everybody had a personal
life and everybody enjoyedcoming to work, and it wasn't
like, oh God, here comes Monday,was that sweet spot, man, like
(21:48):
$4 million.
We've broke $5 million and itwas okay, I enjoyed it, but I
wasn't.
You know, $4 million.
You know we we've broke a $5million and it was okay, I
enjoyed it, but I wasn't, youknow, wasn't great.
Um, you know, worst year weever had was when we had our
best gross revenue and everybodyat the end of the year was
exhausted.
Um, everybody was not happy andI think we all came together
(22:11):
and we're like we don't reallywant to do that again.
Um, so yeah.
So I, you know I, I haveopportunities that I could take,
I have ways that I could kindof scale up to to be that 10
million dollar contractor.
I'm good man.
(22:33):
Yeah, I'm happy where we are.
Uh, you know I, I got four sonsand a wife at home.
Speaker 1 (22:35):
I am perfectly content that's right, it's the
more important things in life.
But but also that you made agood point there, and that's the
team and the, the burnout thatcan come, the employee turnover,
the you know, you know it gets.
It gets to a point where itit's it.
They don't, they don't want tocome to work today because
(22:59):
they're no, they know that it'sjust.
There's something it'soverwhelming, right?
Um, how did you, you know?
How have you balanced that, nowthat you've gone through those
lessons, right?
is it are you just looking at?
Hey, we just, we stick in thisrange of revenue and and, and we
don't feel it anymore, or or.
You know how are you managingthat?
Speaker 2 (23:21):
So I mean every year, you know, I'll put a number in
front of myself and I'll say,like you know, if I, if I hit
this, then I'm, I'm good to go,I'm perfectly content.
You know, content.
I prefer to be happy andcontent and have a nice easy,
(23:43):
manageable company withemployees that are super happy,
versus setting a goal in frontof myself that I know it's going
to tax everyone.
Money is a great thing to have,but it's not the most important
thing to have.
Our company has made kind of alarger push to be kind of a
larger name in our community,not for our size but as far as,
like what we do to get back ourcommunity involvement is like
(24:06):
built into our core values.
So I found a nice happy balanceof, you know, the time that I
can give outside of my company,the time that my company itself
can give back to you know thingsin my community.
I strive more so to make surethat we are at a place where we
can always do that stuff, versuslike adding all the pressure of
(24:28):
trying to grow to a certainpercentage point every single
year.
So, as long as I can, you knowwe go into every year with like,
so, like going into.
Last year we had a nice littlepartnership with Habitat for
Humanity, we had a nice littlepartnership with a local kids
camp here and we had kind ofsome ideas as far as, like, what
(24:49):
we wanted to give back.
So we went into this year, uh,basically tripling If, if we put
it into like a dollar amountwhere we want to basically
triple what we were able to giveback to the community going
into this year.
So my goal is more so wrappedup around that I know roughly
what I have to grow in order tolike maintain that level of
(25:11):
giving, grow in order to likemaintain that level of giving.
Um, so I'd rather go at it likethat.
It's not, it's not so much thethe profit for me is, it's more
so like how can I use this build?
This business is kind of a uhlike a tool or a vessel to kind
of do more kingdom work, servicework, whatever.
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (25:28):
Before we carry on with the episode, let's give a
shout out to one of our sponsors.
I talk to contractors every daythat feel stuck, not because
they're not working hard, butbecause they're missing the
structure to grow without chaosor their culture's falling apart
(25:51):
, because their team's unclear,unaligned or just burned out.
Unclear, unaligned or justburned out.
And when change hits, they'rereacting instead of leading
because time and prioritiesaren't under their control.
Day 41 Thrive helps to fix thatwith proven strategies for
growth, culture and leadershipthat actually work, ready to
thrive beyond the storm.
Visit the link in thedescription, or visit the R in
the description, or visit theroofing success podcast website
(26:14):
on the sponsors page to startyour journey today.
I think maybe this is somethingto discuss then, because I
think when we get started it'shard.
The why is to make a living.
Speaker 2 (26:29):
Yeah, Right, yeah, I mean for me.
For me it was to how can Isupport my family without you
know struggling, or yeah, soyeah.
Speaker 1 (26:38):
Like in that that that's really the initial why.
When did that?
Why change for you what?
What changed?
And then how did you determine?
This is the new thing.
This is the new thing I want tofocus on yeah, so, um.
Speaker 2 (26:54):
So I'll say about uh, maybe six, seven years ago,
maybe as far as eight years ago,I don't know.
Covet time is kind of like thatfour-year span, that's right.
Yeah, nobody really knows whenall that stuff happened so we'll
say, seven years ago I starteda uh a charity called hammers
for heart it.
It's a 501 C three charity thatwe started um to kind of be
able to do, like some smallercommunity stuff, uh, you know,
(27:18):
building ramps for, you know,handicapped people, um, senior
citizens, things like that,doing small home repairs, yard
cleanups, you know, kind ofwhatever projects came our way.
Uh, we were already doing that.
We decided to start the 501c3to kind of make it a little bit
more official and to kind of puta name over it.
So you know, if otherbusinesses wanted to get
(27:39):
involved, it wasn't like, hey,give me money so we can do this
thing.
So we started that and you know,for we did a handful of
projects every year and thenCOVID came and you know,
everything kind of got weird andit kind of sat on the back
burner year.
And then COVID came andeverything kind of got weird and
it kind of sat on the backburner and then in.
So the real big push is I foundfaith a little less than three
(28:02):
years ago and in the process offinding my faith I realized that
for so many years I chasedmoney and, like a lot of us, if
I just get to this amount ofmoney.
That that's my happiness.
Um, the weird thing is is isyou never, ever, hit that goal?
no matter what the number is.
The first time you hit the daythat I so, the first time I ever
(28:25):
hit that metric where I waslike that amount of money,
that's what I wanted, that'swhat I have was the saddest day
for me, because I just I justmoved the goal line and once you
hit it the first time, it makesit easier to hit it the second
time and you keep pushing andpushing and pushing and you
never end up being satisfiedwith it.
So I found my faith and Irealized that I wanted to do
(28:48):
more kingdom work.
And I realized that the companythat I built is kind of this
ginormous tool that I could useto just kind of do more kingdom
work.
And I realized that the companythat I built is kind of this
ginormous tool that I could useto just kind of do more kingdom
work.
I hired somebody that wasactually at the time he was the
worship leader at my church.
He was making a move in hiscareer and I asked him if he
wanted to do some contract work.
(29:08):
Ended up coming on with me fulltime, um, so that was kind of a
big big deal, uh, to havesomebody that worked in, uh in
in ministry to come on board, um, and in the process of, like me
and him kind of having more andmore conversations, uh, we made
it a much larger conversation,uh, as far as in the actual
(29:30):
office.
I told him that, like, this iswhat like feeds my soul.
This is what makes me super,super happy.
This is the avenue I want toapproach.
Like, everything else that wedo just becomes like the thing
that feeds this, the mostimportant part of all of this.
Our company just feeds that.
So, uh, we kind of did somesmaller things in the beginning
(29:50):
of him coming on board with us.
Um, you know, we kind of didsome smaller things in the
beginning of him coming on boardwith us.
One of the things was we putout there in our marketing.
We started a thing called theCommunity Pro Pledge to let
people know that we're here forour community.
We'll do these projects.
We've done two food drives nowwhere we've raised a very
considerable amount of food fortwo of our local food pantries,
(30:15):
considerable amount of food fortwo of our local food pantries
We've done.
We did like an adopt a highwayhere locally, which we just got
done, doing our quarterlycleanup, the local camp here we
were able to basically tear downa building and rebuild their
canteen to serve the kids in thesummertime.
And then last year we did sevenHab, seven habitat for humanity
brews.
So, um, so yeah, so that thatwhole conversation just kept
(30:40):
evolving and every time we didmore service work I just, you
know it made me happier andhappier, happier.
I've had more business ownersin our area reach out to say,
man, hey, love what you're doing, like, let me know how I can
get involved.
So like that, in my personalopinion, is a is a larger, uh
kind of barometer to successthan anything else.
(31:01):
Yeah, when when you can inspireother people to kind of, do you
know more things that you know?
Serve others versus themselves.
Uh, I mean, I think our worldwould be a better place if
everybody just served othersmore than themselves.
Speaker 1 (31:13):
So you, but using.
I think there's another part tothat that I think I want to
point out is that you're alsousing your gifts and business,
right, that you're using your,your talents, to then be able to
right, like I think that that'sthat.
You know, I think it could go.
Some people want to help toomuch and they, and then maybe
(31:35):
they, they, they, just they,they they're not using their
gifts properly, right?
So you know, um, how, how hasit been okay for a contractor
that that's thinking about goingdown this route also?
Right, I've had a couple on thepodcast that on this route also
.
Right, I've had a couple on thepodcast that that have you know,
uh, nonprofits also and, andand have a strong mission in, in
(31:57):
the, in the way that they servethe community and serve causes
in their, in their businesses.
Yeah, and you know what arewhat were some of the things in
getting that type of structureset up?
Like, how does how does someonego about starting a 401 C three
and you know, and making thatan actual, like, yeah, this is
(32:17):
official, yeah, someone canwrite a check, donate their time
, donate their services and andget that tax write off.
But also, you know, like, whatwas that process like?
Speaker 2 (32:28):
Because that's a, that's a whole process within
itself like Cause that's a,that's a whole process within
itself.
Yeah, I mean.
So if I've been completelyhonest with you, I was very
fortunate to have somebodywithin the company that kind of
took that burden onto themselves.
I mean, starting the 501c isn'tlike a terribly, terribly
involved process, you know it's.
It's more of a hurry up andwait type deal.
(32:48):
You know you fill out thepaperwork, you kind of put a
name behind the whole thing, youput a mission, you put officers
in place and then you wait forthe IRS to tell you yeah, you're
good, you got your nonprofitstatus.
The harder part of that isfunding is always an issue,
especially if you're a no-name501, nobody really wants to give
me money for these projects, soyou're going to self-fund a lot
(33:09):
of it.
But if you're going to gothrough the process to do it all
and you're going to make it abigger thing for yourself and
your company, just stick with it.
Over time you'll have more andmore people that will buy into
what you're doing.
Always be very, very verbalabout it.
Don't be afraid to talk aboutit.
(33:29):
It's not a secret.
Not everybody's going tobelieve in what you do.
You don't need everybody to buyin, you just need people to
listen and understand that, hey,you're open for these things
and then, honestly, sometimesyou just have to learn how to
say no.
There are people out there thatare in desperate need of the
services that you can providefor them.
(33:49):
It's unfortunate and there arepeople out there, and then there
are the other side of thatwhere there's people out there
that look at you and go, hey,this guy's doing stuff for free.
So you have to come up with avetting process to take a
project and, and you know, meetwith the people, figure out if
if they're legitimately in need.
Um, you know, we've beenfortunate.
(34:09):
To my knowledge, we've.
We've never had anybody take usfor anything.
But yeah, I mean, if you wantto have a conversation, just
start asking around.
There's, there's so manyresources.
Don't be, don't be secretiveabout it.
If you want to do it, juststart asking around.
There's so many people outthere that have done it or are
willing to help you do it doneit or are willing to help you do
(34:35):
it.
Speaker 1 (34:35):
Uh, yeah, and this, and small things too, is is, you
know, being involved with yourlocal, with local charities in
your area?
You?
don't have to start your ownright.
Habitat's a great one that Iknow.
A lot of contractors you knowdo a lot of service and have
habitat for humanity and thingslike that.
So you know, starting there isa great place too, right getting
, you know, just gettingsomething going.
And then another part of itbecomes the team aspect of the.
(34:58):
You know Charles Antis andTamara Chase and some people
that I've had on the show thatalso are very philanthropic in
their, in their roofingbusinesses.
They, it, it.
It becomes a culture thing intheir business.
It becomes part of the team.
Um, uh, you know the um there.
(35:21):
There's so many aspects to itwhen you, when you, when you,
when you, uh, when you bring itin, and you'll get that feedback
from your team that this is man, yeah, we, we really enjoy this
, Like we'll go out and do thiswith you, we're in with you.
And how has that shift happenedwithin your team, Are they?
Speaker 2 (35:48):
like, do they have a different motivation?
So I think that some peopleshare the same motivation that I
(36:09):
do.
I think there's other peoplethat may not have the same heart
behind it.
I don't ever get anybody thatwas like, no, I don't want to do
that, um, and and when we allcome together, when, when the
entire team is together doingthese things, we're laughing and
carrying on the entire day,there's nobody that's moping
around going.
I can't believe we're here, um,you know, I there's.
There's times where, uh, there'stimes where I ask people to
(36:31):
donate their time, and thenthere's times where we do these
projects during normal businesshours, where everybody's blocked
a check.
So when I have the opportunityto do something where people can
donate their time, I don'treally have an issue with people
saying like, no, I'm notavailable that day.
I have a handful of people inthere who have several kids and
(36:51):
families and busyextracurricular activities with
coaching and everything else,and when they say like, hey, I
wish I could be there, but I'vegot other things I have to do
that day and I'm perfectly finewith that.
So they can be involved if theywant to.
They can be not involved ifthey don't want to.
I don't hold that against them.
This is my thing.
I'm fortunate to be in theposition that I am and, uh, I
(37:13):
love to have them with me, butif not, like it's still going to
charge forward.
Speaker 1 (37:16):
So I recently had a gentleman on the podcast,
jonathan Cron, sten Jake Cron.
He wrote a book called thebillion dollar blueprint yeah,
both billion dollar bullseye,not billion dollar billion
dollar bullseye and he talked uh, we talked a little bit about
which was very enlightening inin my conversation with him was,
(37:36):
um, an internal mission and anexternal mission of the company.
Yeah, you, you can't expectyour team to buy into your
internal mission and have thesame, uh, same enthusiasm about
it, right, like what you would.
What you can hope for is thatthey buy into the external
(37:57):
mission of the company, the waythat you serve your customers
and take care of your customersRight.
And so you know with thatbalance and and that that
awareness, it's like, hey, it'sokay, right.
Like it's okay, hey, your kid'sgot something going on.
I'm not mad that you can't comeand you know, work with us on
(38:17):
this, you know project, orwhatever.
Speaker 2 (38:21):
That's a great way to frame that the internal and the
external, yeah that's what Ithought man, that was an awesome
one.
Speaker 1 (38:28):
That was very impactful when, like that, uh,
that, when he said that, um, sonow you do, you've, you've kind
of created some other communityinvolvement.
You just continue the you know,along these lines of community
involvement.
Um, you started.
Um you started a podcast.
Yeah, the U S the pros apodcast.
(38:49):
Yeah, the you Ask the ProsAnswer podcast.
Speaker 2 (38:53):
So everyone check that out.
Speaker 1 (38:55):
You Ask the Pros Answer.
So we'll get to some listenersover there and let's describe
what you kind of the conceptbehind it, how you got that
started.
Speaker 2 (39:07):
Yeah, so Cole, like I said, cole was a guy that was
uh in the ministry at my churchthat came on board with us a
little over a year ago.
Um, you know, we wanted to kindof increase.
He's our marketing manager, sowe wanted to kind of increase
our our marketing more, um,locally.
And uh, podcast is one of thosethings.
I listened to a ton of podcasts, um, you know, I listened to a
(39:32):
lot of audio books.
I read a lot of books.
Uh, so like I'm a nerd when itcomes to this business.
Um, most of the people thatknow me uh know that like I'm
the guy that can quote specsfrom certain materials or
install guidelines.
Um, so I'm a wealth ofinformation, and sometimes
entirely too much information.
So it was like, how can weharness that, put that out to
(39:54):
either and let people know howbig of a nerd I am?
Um, so we started the podcast.
Initially it was kind of morelike let's talk about the
products, let's talk about theright things and the wrong
things with installations, thecommon things that we deal with.
You know, what should you bedoing as a homeowner, how to
hire somebody, how to vetsomebody.
It originally started like that.
(40:14):
Eventually your content getskind of stale because it's like
all right, here's another 20-30minute podcast of this guy
telling me how everybody else iswrong.
He's right.
So then it was like all right,so who else can we bring on?
Let's bring in people that arekind of like contractor adjacent
.
So we had we've had a couple ofdifferent real estate agents on
um.
One of our most recent podcaststhat just dropped was a guy down
(40:37):
in north of virginia that uhhas a landscaping company.
He just started a 501c3 calledrelief cut.
He's going to be doing um, likesome kind of property cleanups,
uh.
So we're looking at not onlykind of helping him, kind of
boost that thing, but we were inthe beginning talks of
potentially finding a projectwhere my team can go down and
meet him and his team and we cankind of do a project hands on
(40:59):
together, which I'm lookingforward to.
I hope that all happens.
But yeah, so it's kind ofevolved and I'm excited to see.
You know, when we originallystarted and we called you, ask
the pros.
Pros Answer we're pro-exteriors.
Yes, we're professionals, we'rethe pros in our industry.
But I think this podcast isgoing to be more so like the
(41:20):
pros in every industry.
So I think, it's going to expandinto everything you know, other
trades, businesses, otherservice businesses, kind of
wherever we can get somebodythat we feel is like.
You know somebody who has theright qualifications, has been
in business for a while, who hasa good story, and you know at
least, like you search outpeople that that, that fit, that
(41:40):
that mold.
We're going to be doing kind ofthe same thing.
Speaker 1 (41:42):
So yeah, yeah.
How's it been for you?
What, what's been the journey?
Like what?
Speaker 2 (41:59):
were some of those first episodes.
Was it like, oh man, I don'twant to be on camera?
Were you like, put me on camera, let's cut it up.
I can BS with the best of them.
Um, I can do it face to faceall day long.
You turn a camera on.
It's probably the only time youever seen me really be bashful,
so I've gotten used to it and,uh, I've kind of learned the
(42:20):
tricks of, like how to actuallylook at the camera like I'm
doing right now.
Um, how to, you know, pretendlike the monitors, you know, not
in front of you.
You know those little tricksthat aren't really natural in
the beginning.
I've learned how to sit stillin my chair and not do this.
Speaker 3 (42:35):
In the beginning.
Speaker 2 (42:36):
I hated it because all I look at is, of course,
like everybody, I look at thescreen and I look at every
imperfection I can find on myface.
So, as it's gone along, youdon't really pay attention to it
anymore.
They get super, super easyafter you get so many under your
belt.
Um, you know, it used to take alittle while to kind of put the
podcast together without kindof glitching or losing your uh
(42:56):
spot train of thought, um andcole, having to pretty much edit
everything down to the finishedproduct.
Now there's there's been acouple times where we go in and
we knock out a 15, 20 minutepodcast session with, with no
issues whatsoever, hardly anyediting needed to be done.
Um, so, yeah, so it's, it'sbeen, it's been fun.
Um, I'm looking forward to it.
It's something I really, reallyenjoy doing.
Speaker 1 (43:16):
So yeah, those conversations are fun, man, and
it is.
It's, there's something aboutbeing putting yourself on camera
.
It happens, I have 10 year oldtwin boys and my son james, you
know, will record me doing thisand then he'll watch it and he's
like that's not what I soundlike.
Speaker 3 (43:34):
I'm out of here like that's not me don't put that you
know.
Speaker 1 (43:38):
So it's not I'm wearing that what it is.
I remember when I switched to a4k camera I was like, whoa man,
I got some, oh yeah you know,yeah, when my hair gets a little
longer, my grades have come inpretty, pretty solid on the side
of your.
Keep it a little shorter than Iused to.
Yeah, it's just do it, man, andand and it's.
(43:59):
How has the response been?
What has what, what things camefrom it that you never thought
would have come from it?
Speaker 2 (44:09):
things came from it that you never thought would
have come from it.
Yeah, so, uh, so I didn'treally know what to expect.
You know, you put a lot ofeffort into a lot of marketing
and you know you don't reallyknow whether or not you're
really going to get anything outof it.
Um, I don't know whatexpectations I had going into it
as far as, like, is this goingto be?
Um, you know, is this going tobe for leads?
Is this going to be forbranding?
Is it going to be just purelyto get our message out there?
(44:31):
Uh, so, you know it's, it'sbeen interesting to meet with
clients for the first time andhave them being like, oh, I
actually watch your podcast.
Um, or, you know, I do a lot ofstuff with our local chamber of
commerce and you know, being atan event and being like, oh,
actually I've seen your podcastand I've seen your podcast and
(44:52):
you know it's, it's interesting.
Speaker 1 (44:52):
It's a weird feeling.
Speaker 2 (44:53):
You know it's a weird feeling and the first thing
that comes to my mind is like oh, I wonder which episode they
saw.
You know you hope it's one ofthe better ones, but you know it
is what it is going to take.
The good, the good, the goodrecordings and the bad
recordings are all the same.
So that's right, but yeah, soit's been.
It's been interesting to uh, tosee people actually watching it
.
Um, I've had a couple offriends that you know I've been
(45:17):
friends with them for 20 plusyears and don't really see them
anymore and to say like hey man,I just want to let you know I
just saw you.
You know, you just popped up onfacebook or instagram or
something.
He's like, I feel like everytime I I log on.
You're on there again.
So I was like that's prettycool.
Yeah, I'll take that so, yeah,it's amazing.
Speaker 1 (45:35):
It's amazing what putting out content does.
Like it, yeah it, who's?
You don't know who sees it.
It's, yeah, you know, andreally it's the people that
don't that aren't commenting.
They're not liking liking, butthey see it.
Speaker 2 (45:50):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (45:51):
People see it man.
Speaker 2 (45:52):
I think the other point is like it's almost
freeing.
You know, as a foundingbusiness owner, you are the face
of the company and then, askind of like your company grows,
you know, depending on how youchoose to run your business, you
could still be the face of thecompany.
I choose to kind of like leadfor everybody, and if I have the
opportunity for somebody elseto kind of be the point person,
(46:14):
I'd rather somebody else be thepoint person, um.
So it's been fun to kind of see,uh, like people recognize the
company without knowing it's me,um, and knowing who our company
is, without realizing, like,I'm the owner of that company.
So that's kind of cool to havepeople buy into what our company
(46:35):
mission is and our core values,to be able to hear people talk
about it in a way that's likenot like God, you know that guy
from Progsteriors.
So people talking about thecompany in such a positive way
has, I think, has been one ofthe results.
I didn't necessarily kind ofunderstand going into it.
Yeah, yeah, that's awesome.
Speaker 1 (46:53):
That's a good one.
I know you're enjoying theepisode, but let's give a shout
out to another one of oursponsors.
As a roofing marketing agencyowner and coach, I've seen it
all Great marketing wastedbecause no one follows up fast
enough.
That's why I built Power UpAgents, not just a receptionist.
Our AI handles the entirecustomer journey.
No one follows up fast enough.
(47:13):
That's why I built Power UpAgents, not just a receptionist.
Our AI handles the entirecustomer journey, from answering
the first call to booking thejob, to post job surveys and
reviews 24 seven, inbound,outbound, even multilingual.
If you want leads followed upinstantly and customers nurtured
automatically, visit the linkin the description or visit the
(47:35):
sponsors page on the RoofingSuccess Podcast website.
Your full AI team is ready.
You're out in the DelawareMaryland area.
I don't think you're too farfrom dc, right like a little
(47:56):
over two hours yeah, a littleover two hours.
So maybe the, the, you don'thave as many of the the the dc
area employees working out inyour area, but you know we're
heading into some job cutsrecently and uh, yeah, the
economy has had its itsfluctuations and things like
that.
Yeah, um, you started in 2009.
Speaker 2 (48:17):
Yeah, so we we started in in 2005 and we kind
of like yeah, yeah, yeah.
So, uh, mary, the love of mylife in 2006, had her first
child in 2007.
You know, I was still a kidwhen I had my first kid.
So as my company kind of grewand I had my first child, I
(48:43):
really wanted to have my secondchild.
I told my wife I'm ready for mysecond.
She goes well, we can have asecond child if I get to become
a stay-at-home.
And I'm like, of course, nobrainer Again.
I didn't know we were going tohave a mortgage crisis.
I didn't know the economy wasgoing to tank and people were
going to lose their homes leftand right.
I hadn't been through anythinglike that before as a business
(49:07):
owner.
I didn't know what that meantfor me.
Before, as a business owner, Ididn't know what that meant for
me.
I think the saving grace was Iwas still a smaller company.
I didn't have a lot to lose.
I didn't have a lot of crazyoverhead.
So I was fortunate to be ableto grow through the mortgage
crisis and the recession.
I had my second kid in 2009.
(49:27):
The company continued to grow.
I had a third kid in 2012 and,and you know it's it's been,
we'll say, for the most partsmooth sailing.
Um, you know I I always tellother business owners when I get
the opportunity to talk to them.
I was like I'm a wealth ofinformation because I've made
every possible mistake you canmake.
That's right.
You know, I've made mistakesthat have cost my company a lot
(49:48):
of money.
I've been burned by othercompanies that have cost my
company a lot of money.
I've been burned by othercompanies that have cost our
company a lot of money.
So I'll tell you all the thingsnot to do and then all you have
to do is write them down andjust not do those things.
But yeah, so having a companythat was kind of just kind of
starting to get some momentumgoing in a down economy, it
(50:09):
teaches you how to be a littlebit more scrappy with your money
.
Teaches you how to market whenmarketing dollars aren't quite
as easy to obtain, when you haveto be a little bit more
strategic about your bidding tomake sure that you keep your
pipeline full.
Yeah, so there are a lot ofgreat lessons to be learned in a
(50:34):
down economy, but those lessonsneed to be kind of applied.
When things are good, too, it'sreally easy to have a great year
.
I mean, I don't know a singlecontractor who didn't have just
a banger year during COVID.
You know money was.
You know money was cheap.
Everybody was throwing itaround like it wasn't ever going
(50:56):
to go anywhere.
A lot of people that were inthe labor force started their
own companies.
A lot of those guys haverealized that, you know, jobs
are a little harder to get nowand they filtered back into the
labor pool again.
But yeah, so I've filtered backinto the labor pool again.
But yeah, so I've been aroundfor a couple of down ticks, I've
(51:16):
been around for some up ticks,no-transcript.
So you just pay attention tothat man, you track your numbers
and you realize like hey, wehad an off month and off quarter
.
Why is that?
(51:38):
And usually, um, usually, youcan pretty much figure out where
that's, where that's comingfrom.
Speaker 1 (51:44):
So yeah numbers are important that that's it and
it's.
I, like you said, being leanright, like if you don't realize
that these are the good timesand you are budgeting as if
these are the good times or thatthese are normal times.
(52:05):
You will soon find out thatthey are not normal times.
Speaker 2 (52:09):
Agreed.
Speaker 1 (52:12):
This thing ebbs and flows, and so you know you can
yeah when you have your firstmillion dollar year.
Speaker 2 (52:19):
It doesn't mean you owe yourself a F-250 King Ranch.
Speaker 1 (52:22):
That's right.
Speaker 2 (52:23):
Too many.
Do you know too many?
Speaker 1 (52:25):
do you mentioned, if you just did all the stuff that
you said was a mistake, or orthat you didn't do right, that
you would uh, that, that thatyou know that would be the the a
good start, right, we'll callit a good start, right there
there's just do that.
Just just don't make themistakes I did.
(52:46):
Yeah, let's end with.
Let's end it this way.
I usually ask in a differentway, but let's ask, or let's say
, what are the three to fivemistakes that you do not want to
make in your roofing business?
Speaker 2 (53:03):
All right, so, first and foremost, stick to what
you're good at.
That would probably be mynumber one thing.
If you have a client that wantsyou to do your roof, but they
also want you to redo theirkitchen or they want you to redo
their driveway, learn to say no.
Stick to what you're good at.
That's where your money is,that's what you're really good
at.
That's where you can keep yourbrand kind of in place.
(53:25):
Learn to track your numbers.
Um, learn to track your numbers.
Uh, be aggressive with trackingyour numbers, because you'd be
surprised how good you'd begoing with a lot of money in the
bank and then all of a suddenyou turn around and it was like
where's all my money?
Um, uh, be aggressive withgoing after money owed.
Uh, learn.
Learn the red flags of whensomebody is going to drag paying
(53:49):
their bill.
Learn the proper way, becauseevery state has different laws,
but learn how to lead somebody'sproperty.
Learn what your timeline is andbe aggressive with sending out
your red letters and going afteryour money, because it can add
up real, real quick.
We've been in a couple ofdifferent times in are in the
last, say, 10 years where we'vehad hundreds of thousands of
(54:13):
dollars owed to us and it sucks.
It's not a fun feeling, but ifyou wait too long, you're never
going to see that money soyou'll have no real legal
recourse.
And so be aggressive with makingsure you're watching those
numbers.
Hire for personality and teachskills.
I've hired a lot of people thatwere great craftsmen, very good
(54:35):
at what they do, but theirpersonality sucked and they
failed quickly.
Yeah, so everybody has theirown version of hire slow, fire
fast.
I hire fast and fire fast.
To me, I don't take anythingpersonal, it's just business for
me.
I hire you because I hire fastand fire fast.
Um to me, like I don't takeanything personal, it's just
business for me.
I hire you cause I like you andI think I might see something
(54:56):
in you.
And if you don't work, I don'tcare.
If you've worked here for twoweeks, I'm.
If it's not going to work, it'snot going to work, I don't need
to prolong this.
Speaker 3 (55:03):
Um and then honestly, uh don't let your business
become your everything.
Speaker 2 (55:14):
You know it's very easy, especially in the first
handful of years you start inyour business.
You have this goal of like Iwant to be this, I want to be
this, and you're putting everyhour that you can into something
and you know it can affectrelationships, friendships.
You know, I know there's timeswhere you know I have four sons
Like I said, my wife stays home.
And there's times where I havefour sons like I said, my wife
stays home.
And there's times where I'm anearly riser.
(55:35):
So I'll wake up at four o'clockin the morning, get on my
laptop, work until I canrealistically get ready without
waking her up.
I'm out the door, I start doingmy thing and I'll work till
five, six o'clock.
I'll go home, I'll eat dinnerwhen everything's all said and
done, kids are content and I'mback on my laptop doing work
again.
Um, that's not really a life.
Uh, you know, nowadays peoplerespect like he's a grinder,
(56:00):
he's a hustler.
It's great you can do all thatstuff or hire somebody to do it
for you.
It doesn't always have to beyou, you don't't have to be the
guy.
Um, you know, build a life andthen let the business kind of
afford that life.
Um, but yeah, and then ifyou're not having fun, just
don't do it anymore.
So nothing's worth doing ifyou're not having fun.
Speaker 1 (56:22):
That's awesome, man.
Aaron, thanks for your time.
This has been another episodeof the roofing success podcast.
Speaker 3 (56:28):
Thank you for tuning into the Roofing Success Podcast
For more valuable content.
Visit roofingsuccesspodcastcomWhile there.
Check out our sponsors forexclusive offers, shop for
merchandise and sign up for ournewsletter for industry updates
and tips.
Also join the Roofing SuccessFacebook group to connect with
other professionals and stayupdated on the latest trends.
(56:50):
If you enjoyed this episode,please subscribe, like, share
and leave a comment.
Your support helps us continueto bring you top industry
insights.
The website link is in thedescription.
Thanks for listening you.
Popular Podcasts
Bookmarked by Reese's Book Club
Welcome to Bookmarked by Reese’s Book Club — the podcast where great stories, bold women, and irresistible conversations collide! Hosted by award-winning journalist Danielle Robay, each week new episodes balance thoughtful literary insight with the fervor of buzzy book trends, pop culture and more. Bookmarked brings together celebrities, tastemakers, influencers and authors from Reese's Book Club and beyond to share stories that transcend the page. Pull up a chair. You’re not just listening — you’re part of the conversation.
Dateline NBC
Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations. Follow now to get the latest episodes of Dateline NBC completely free, or subscribe to Dateline Premium for ad-free listening and exclusive bonus content: DatelinePremium.com
On Purpose with Jay Shetty
I’m Jay Shetty host of On Purpose the worlds #1 Mental Health podcast and I’m so grateful you found us. I started this podcast 5 years ago to invite you into conversations and workshops that are designed to help make you happier, healthier and more healed. I believe that when you (yes you) feel seen, heard and understood you’re able to deal with relationship struggles, work challenges and life’s ups and downs with more ease and grace. I interview experts, celebrities, thought leaders and athletes so that we can grow our mindset, build better habits and uncover a side of them we’ve never seen before. New episodes every Monday and Friday. Your support means the world to me and I don’t take it for granted — click the follow button and leave a review to help us spread the love with On Purpose. I can’t wait for you to listen to your first or 500th episode!