Growth Without Burnout: Balancing Team Wellness with Business Success

Speaker 1 We've decided to create some guiding principles to align us, focus us. And first things first, is let's go back to the things we know work and have worked.

Speaker 1 And there's certain things in home service business, at least in our business and all businesses, that these are the measurements that matter. These are the processes that matter.

Speaker 1 Big ideas are great. They're over here.
Let's go to these things and find out which one you want to do.

Speaker 1 There are many different models, but there is some KPIs across all home service that are the same. You can measure them this way or that way or this way a little bit.

Speaker 1 But at the bottom line, like there's certain things that are just the foundations.

Speaker 1 And if you don't have those in line, then all these other big ideas and all this other stuff people want to go find, they're not really relevant.

Speaker 1 If you don't know your booking percentages, you don't know your conversion percentages. You don't have your average sale.
You don't even know your recall percentage.

Speaker 1 There's things that you just got to get back, your LTO turnover percentage or turnovers, whatever your language.

Speaker 2 Welcome to the Home Service Expert, where each week Tommy chats with world-class entrepreneurs and experts in various fields like marketing, sales, hiring, and leadership to find find out what's really behind their success in business.

Speaker 2 Now, your host, the Home Service Millionaire, Tommy Mellow.

Speaker 2 Before we get started, I wanted to share two important things with you. First, I want you to implement what you learned today.

Speaker 2 To do that, you'll have to take a lot of notes, but I also want you to fully concentrate on the interview. So I asked the team to take notes for you.
Just text notes, N-O-T-E-S to 888-526-1299.

Speaker 2 That's 888-526-1299. And you'll receive a link to download the notes from today's episode.
Also, if you haven't got your copy of my newest book, Elevate, please go check it out.

Speaker 2 I'll share with you how I attracted and developed a winning team that helped me build a $200 million company in 22 states. Just go to elevateandwin.com forward slash podcast to get your copy.

Speaker 2 Now let's go back into the interview. Guys, welcome back to the home service sex for today.

Speaker 2 And I say this often, but Aaron's one of my best friends. Aaron Gaynor, a lot of you guys know who he is.

Speaker 2 He's a plumber by trade, got into the HVAC industry as well because when you're in plumbing, it makes sense to get into HVAC. He's located in Columbus and his son goes to school at ASU.

Speaker 2 So he's always back in Phoenix. And what's so great is we get to just, just me and him.
He got into Golden Tea.

Speaker 1 We have a lot of fun when he comes over. He stays at the house.

Speaker 2 And I've been to Columbus. He's invited me out to Ohio State Games.
And we got so much in common. So it's like, why wouldn't you be around people that are pushing and pushing you and vice versa?

Speaker 2 So Aaron's on here. He's an expert of plumbing construction strategic planning.
Got a great story. A lot of you guys know it.
Aaron, it's a pleasure to have you today.

Speaker 1 Absolutely, Tom, man. I appreciate you having me on.
And likewise, it's been a great friendship, man. I appreciate you and Bree and all the people from A1 that I've got to meet, man.

Speaker 1 You guys have been just amazing. So, yeah, it means a lot to me.
Thanks, Tommy.

Speaker 2 Yeah, we had a powwow about, I would say, two, three months ago on just your whole leadership team and our leadership team just discussing really Power BI and reporting and making sure that we're aligned.

Speaker 2 We're not competitors. We use our LSD group.
which is a cool group, but me and you are probably two of the closest outside of the group when we get together. And

Speaker 2 you're just blowing shit up. You know, the deal is Tom Howard came on here because we were just talking about people that were going to be at the freedom event.
And he's like,

Speaker 2 Aura told him to do an analysis of all the top companies still growing because he said, there's like this 10 or 20% of people just absolutely still growing.

Speaker 2 And then everybody else seems to like now more than ever, it seems to be either falling off or picking up. Like the gap is widening.

Speaker 2 And I know he had called you and you had made this statement of, dude, we're just doing what we always do. We're grinding.
We're figuring stuff out. We're looking at the data.
We're shifting.

Speaker 2 You know, we're working on marketing. We're making sure our top guys are happy.
But, you know, we're paying attention to things. And it's been rough for you.
I mean, not every department's killing it.

Speaker 2 And not every month, we're going to miss budget this month by a little bit.

Speaker 2 And I could have hit it, but I told Cortec and I told everybody that we work with, I don't want to send the guys to urgent care. It's 120 degrees.
I said, I could pull it.

Speaker 2 I could could have the guys work, but what happens if we lose just one of our A players?

Speaker 2 Like, was it worth it? Or can we have a great? I said, we're not going to hit it. I'm making the executive decision, but we better freaking murder the first 10 days of August.

Speaker 1 Yeah.

Speaker 2 So anyway, but what are your thoughts? What's going on out there? What's

Speaker 1 I think you hit it on the head here? I think there's a lot of people that are still growing and doing the right things and got back down into the grind of. you know, the fundamentals, right?

Speaker 1 We went back to create some guiding principles of how we want to operate.

Speaker 1 And one of them was back to first guiding principle for us now is first things first and it's like the things that really matter let's do the first things first you know and not chase all these other things and that's been important

Speaker 1 to getting back to those fundamental kpis that matter and not even just the kpis but the people right as you just mentioned like we could burn the people out we could work the crap out of them and get the outcome that we want but you know at the same time like I'm in this for the long game still.

Speaker 1 You are. We are.
The companies are in the long game.

Speaker 1 We want to make sure we keep the right people and you know grow that business and let the other people in the industry know that are looking for jobs that we are in this for the long haul.

Speaker 1 I mean, today alone, we just brought on nine new technicians this morning. And you know, in a market time, when you hear most people are trying to, they're not growing, they're down.

Speaker 1 There's not as much opportunity. And I just shook the hand of nine new technicians in all departments, plumbing, HVAC, electrical, and drains today.
And so we have some stuff going on.

Speaker 1 I'd agree, like July is a little off for us. We've been pretty fortunate so far this year.
We've grown probably around 33% still this year.

Speaker 1 And but July probably is the first month we're feeling a little off. Some of the weather dipped on us.
And I think,

Speaker 1 you know, we counted on some weather instead of worrying about, again, the operational excellence, you know, being consistently great instead of being dependent on weather.

Speaker 1 And so we're going back to those fundamentals.

Speaker 2 I want to just tell you a quick story about this weekend. I had the marketing team over for four hours, three people.

Speaker 2 And we sat in the, you know, the game room with the golden tea. And

Speaker 2 we actually got marketing turned down in most markets. We're learning a lot more about capacity.

Speaker 2 And I'm very happy with my marketing team because I love it when they're throttling, waiting for operations. And so Luke came over and I'm talking about where I want this company to go.

Speaker 2 And he said, how do you expect that to happen? I'm already doing too much.

Speaker 2 And he goes, I came here intentionally to talk you out of some stuff. And I said, Luke, how many direct reports do you have? He goes, 12.

Speaker 2 I said, so let's go through and box all these out of every direct report. I said, how much are you working on safety? He goes, not at all, really.
I could give that to Adrian.

Speaker 2 And I'm like, so where are your biggest time crunches out of all 12? And we looked at them and I said, so are they the right people if you're still having to dive in this deep?

Speaker 2 And I said, so let's make a plan to set a threshold for the next six weeks if they're the right person or bring on more.

Speaker 2 And I said, if we brought in the Messiah, like the best of the best, do you think that they could alleviate 50%? We brought on this girl, Christina, from Service Tight.

Speaker 2 And she's handling all of Service Tight and price book issues, everything with Dispatch Pro.

Speaker 2 And I said, do you really want to be the bottleneck? Because that's what you're saying. You're going to inhibit growth.
And I know it sounds really bad. And he goes, no, but what do you want me to do?

Speaker 2 And I said, quit being everything for everyone and start hiring better. Who, not how?

Speaker 2 I said, you're taking on more than you could chew because you're not thinking around the next corner. And I'm also bringing on a role full-time for marketing to new people.

Speaker 2 That's going to be instead of just

Speaker 2 every single radio, TV, billboard will incorporate we're hiring. Every Velpack clipper will incorporate we're hiring.
Every newspaper will say something we're hiring.

Speaker 2 And then we're going to start contacting. We're using software to start reaching out to.
a thousand people a day through social media. Instead of just an ad on social media, reaching out to A-players.

Speaker 2 And then the KPI is just around how many people showed up to the hiring event and were A players.

Speaker 2 And everybody's asking me, Cortec, all these companies, like, why do we need that? And I'm like, because I've got a guy that sold seven signature packages in a row, four months old.

Speaker 2 You get me just 10 of those guys. They'll do more than 200 of the other guys.
I need to find them. And we need to do better at personality profiling and better at weeding people out.

Speaker 2 And I'm like, there's nobody focused on it.

Speaker 2 So I have this vision that you know about it. And now we've got everybody in full alignment at the price of exactly where we need EBITDA to be down to the dollar.

Speaker 2 And that's really nice to know exactly, like precisely where we want to be. And I know you're really big on KPIs.
You're one of the few people that I know that live, die, and breathe by it.

Speaker 2 I know a lot of other great CEOs and founders, but me and you are like, you know your stuff pretty damn good and you're obsessed with it and Mike's obsessed with it and you got a great team.

Speaker 2 When do you think you hit that level of looking at the business differently? Because you were exactly like I was.

Speaker 1 Well, I mean, I don't know if I know exactly the level, but I think it's just being curious, right?

Speaker 1 And starting to really understand that, you know, I think when I joined Nextstar, it was obviously a big help. You know that, joining the Nexstar network and understanding the KPIs.

Speaker 1 And, you know, their founder, Frank Blau, his comment was always that, fall in love with the numbers. If you don't fall in love with the numbers, you're not going to know your business, right?

Speaker 1 And so, you know, when I learned that through my business coach and through Jim Hamilton and Jack Tester, that really understanding the importance of understanding what KPIs matter.

Speaker 1 And that was my statement earlier is going back to first things first,

Speaker 1 get to the fundamental KPIs first that really matter. And then there's an array of so many things.
And as you get higher up the levels, there's so much reporting. I mean, we cut data.

Speaker 1 We just went through a four-year report of all of our drain.

Speaker 1 calls and data and sales and where we've gone and where we think the market leads are where we've gone down where we've gone up you know where we fell short on product lines that we used to sell four years ago versus where we are today.

Speaker 1 I mean, we had a big case study just done of all this, brought our managers in, brought everybody in, and went through it all to bring awareness. So, you know, we will dig through numbers big time.

Speaker 1 And there's a place and a time for those for sure. So I'd say, as you started scaling, you just started to realize that you needed to be more aware of the numbers because the business gets bigger.

Speaker 1 And if you don't know the numbers, you can't know every person like you used to, right? Tommy, I mean, you talked to every guy, knew what they did every day, every week, all these things.

Speaker 1 It started getting bigger, more robust, more things happening. Like the way to keep a pulse on the business is through the numbers.

Speaker 1 And I think as we went from 10 million to 20, we went from you know 8 to 12 to 21 million to big as 30 million in that range, and they're like knowing the numbers became like everything.

Speaker 1 And I really had to dive in really hard.

Speaker 1 And now, you know, today, as your size and our size, we're growing to it's like I need to be able to scan through different locations, trade lines, call center, all these things to understand where the holes are and then go talk to people, whether that's talk to our you know VP of ops, VP of sales, GMs, whoever they are, I still like to be very engaged and have those conversations, whether that's good or bad.

Speaker 1 That's just the culture I engage in and I enjoy.

Speaker 2 You know, there's this looming question I always get is, who do you use for this? Who do you use for that? Who do you use for this? Who's the best person for this?

Speaker 2 And what's weird about that question now, hindsight, to me is.

Speaker 2 Like, usually the companies I bring on all do good because I hold them accountable and I have perfect attribution.

Speaker 2 And we agree that they're screwing up and they self-recorrect and there's consequences. And it seems like most people are looking for this magic, this magic in a bottle, like this one good hire.

Speaker 2 If I just had somebody that could run my PPC, if I just had somebody that could hire people for me, let me just say this. I don't believe that it, I think it's the owner.

Speaker 2 I think it's the founder that typically is the person in the way. What are your thoughts on that?

Speaker 1 So I think it's this. I think, first off, to your point, though, a lot of people go, well, who do you do this? How do you do that? Who do you use for this? Who do you do for that?

Speaker 1 It's like, look, we've stumbled through many of different people over time. I think you have too.
And some we found very fortunate, like, you know, getting on Service Titan a very long time ago.

Speaker 1 You know, hey, we happened to find Service Titan at the very right time when it was coming up. And we jumped on 10 years ago.
You jumped on over around a long time ago.

Speaker 1 That's like, somebody asked me the other day. It's like, well, how do you know who is the next thing? It's like, I don't know if you do, but.

Speaker 1 Sometimes you get lucky and you find the right place and the right vendors to work with. And sometimes you don't.

Speaker 1 You just make the adjustments as you work forward and find people that are willing to change and navigate the situation with you adapt open-minded and can work with the business and scalability that you're looking to grow and of course there are some vendors that are just solid you know that you've worked with some very good vendors that are just solid vendors that you've had for a long time that you work with and then some of them you come to a conclusion over time is that they've been great to you but they can't operate at the same level you are with the needs that you need today and that's why you start bringing key people into those roles internally at some point in time too right so it's really hard to get it all and fit it in one box for everybody because you do, I get these questions too.

Speaker 1 And it's like, there's not really one box that this all fits in. It depends on where you are and the size of your business, where you are in your personal development yourself too.

Speaker 1 Like how much do you know about stuff? I think people think they just want to go out and hire somebody to solve all their problems. And nobody's coming to save you.

Speaker 1 I mean, at the end of the day, right? Like the only people that can really save yourself is the founder and the team that you have. and really dive in and say, what do we need to learn?

Speaker 1 Not who can do it. What do we need to learn to be able to do this?

Speaker 1 Because you go hire a great vendor but what if you don't know anything about what they're doing and you can't answer ask any questions you can't challenge them you can't change anything because you don't know anything right and i think that's dangerous and i've seen a lot of companies um i don't know if i'll use the word taken advantage of maybe maybe tommy i don't know companies have been taken advantage of by vendors but by guys that don't know what they don't know or when i say guys it's people in general sense don't know what they don't know and then they get disappointed the vendor when it's also their responsibility to manage the vendor just like it would be if they were their employee Well, it's kind of like they said it and forget it, like your SEO company.

Speaker 2 They're like, oh, yeah, we're doing stuff.

Speaker 2 And the person just sits there and six months later goes, I'm not really getting results. I don't think.
I'm like talking to my SEO company. Like, we've got different people on every single thing.

Speaker 2 The one thing we found is we don't use one company for everything. I think that that's a mistake.

Speaker 1 So do we

Speaker 2 jack of all trades. So I hold them accountable and I'm on the phone constantly.
You called me up. You said, hey, dude, there's this thing called Rilla.
We like it. You might not like it.

Speaker 2 Also, someone called me up and said, hey, Josh Campbell said Evoca. I'm not saying it's not a great software.

Speaker 2 We have not figured out a use case to put that into effect until it goes a little forward in technology.

Speaker 1 Likewise.

Speaker 2 We call each other.

Speaker 1 Yeah.

Speaker 2 And we've got a pretty good network because we're willing to go help somebody. How many people have I sent to you to come shop tour your facility?

Speaker 1 A lot. I just.
You just sent me a guy from Florida the other day that text me and I just set up a call with him this week to follow up with him.

Speaker 1 A guy just the other day, Michael, Mike or something, I think it was. Many people.

Speaker 1 I mean, just I think two days ago, somebody just reached out to me from you said, hey, you want to talk to a guy who knows plumbing? Here you go. And for sure.
And I appreciate those. It always helps.

Speaker 1 It's nice because it makes you reflect too and be able to have conversations with where people are going because it also gives you insight.

Speaker 1 And frankly, sometimes we're not so connected to the ground anymore of like what's going on that it's nice to hear from companies that are on their way up and things that they're thinking about because sometimes we get, you know, we can also get in a box too, Tommy, right?

Speaker 1 We start to get locked in a little bit of a box of what's out there i know we have a lot of resources and a lot of people but it's really good to hear from companies that are growing and what they're thinking about and ideas that they may be doing that we're not thinking about too so i enjoy those conversations but a lot of people by the way a lot plus the ability to they ask for help yeah those are the people i want my friends around because i said you want to know how to really make Aaron do backflips for you tell him one day we want to be part of eco plumber Have Aaron Whiteboard with you on where that would need to be and how it would need to look like.

Speaker 2 You want to see, he'll help anybody. He'll help the man on the street with food.
But you really want to make him get excited? Say, listen, we've studied your brand. We've listened to your commercials.

Speaker 2 We've watched your interviews. We want to be under your foundation.
What would the company need to look like? And then coordinate a meeting with him once a month, once a quarter.

Speaker 2 And if you hit those milestones and you do everything he says, he'll buy you and you'll roll equity into a massively successful company.

Speaker 2 And now he's winning and you're actually going from point A to point Z, but you're skipping most of the alphabet

Speaker 2 because he's on your team.

Speaker 1 I enjoy that stuff. It's fun to do that.
You know that we've had many conversations and we both enjoy the idea of helping people.

Speaker 1 You know, sometimes there's in it for us and sometimes it's in it just to help people because people have done it for us.

Speaker 1 And I think that's been important in our journey, at least what I believe from our conversations, at least for you and I and some of the guys that we're friends with, is that, you know, how many people we've reached out to prior that helped us get to where we are.

Speaker 1 And I think it's our obligation to give back. I mean, on Sunday, I was at the gym and the chief plumbing inspector for the city of Columbus called me up.
I got a phone call at Paul Doyle first.

Speaker 1 I was like, oh, chief plumbing inspector called me on Sunday. I was like, oh, crap.
I wonder what this is about. Right.
And he goes, hey, Aaron, I'm at Home Depot.

Speaker 1 And I ran into this guy who owns a plumbing company here. And I just started talking to him.
He told me. that he wants to understand he's aware of who you are.
He owns a construction plumbing company.

Speaker 1 I told him about your story. I said, I know Aaron pretty well.

Speaker 1 I'm going to call him right now and see if I can get you to talk to him and set up a meeting with him this week so he can help you understand how to operate your business better.

Speaker 1 I was like, sure, hook me up with him. And this is right from the chief plumbing inspector on a Sunday at Sat Home Depot.

Speaker 1 So, you know, I talked to that plumber because I remember what it was like to be like that. And I think that's important to keep doing that.

Speaker 1 And we still have people that we look up to, right, that we talk to today. So, and they're, and they're always very gracious.

Speaker 1 So I think being gracious at what you do while managing your time properly, which you know that could be a challenge to, but manage your time for your team and the people that are committed to your team while helping the other trades is very important.

Speaker 1 And it's talking to people at all different levels of skills in all these areas, right? So you have to kind of understand who you're talking to, where they are, and what they want to accomplish.

Speaker 2 100%.

Speaker 2 And you got this mentality with Eco Plumber and now HAC:

Speaker 2 grow or die.

Speaker 2 And that's kind of how I'm looking at my personal life, my business, my mental stage, the working out, the reading books, the educating, the asking more questions to just go for no, to not be afraid to ask at a whole new level.

Speaker 2 Tell me a little bit about your mentality about grow or die.

Speaker 1 I would think that one of the reasons why we ended up hitting it off pretty well when we met years and years ago is similar. We both were very ambitious.
We both wanted to grow.

Speaker 1 We both wanted to learn. We both had things that we could learn from each other.
And we both were also very humble that we had a lot to learn still, right? I think that was it.

Speaker 1 And we challenged each other, you know, in a conversation a couple of times with things and we wanted to get better. And I don't know.
Sometimes people say, well, what motivates you?

Speaker 1 I mean, there's a many of things. Sometimes it's hard to always explain.

Speaker 1 I think it's just a fire inside you that you, some people are just born with and you just want to go and you want to accomplish things.

Speaker 1 But I think grow or die is a core value to our organization, core value that I believe in strongly that you have to be moving forward. I mean, what else is there? You know, just sitting stagnant.

Speaker 1 not pushing yourself mentally or physically, pushing your business limits, pushing your knowledge. I think it's just a boring life.
It's just not a lot of fun.

Speaker 1 There's so much more out there to learn and expand and do. Get outside of your comfort zone is always challenging.
So I think even this, we've been hitting the gym.

Speaker 1 I've been going to the gym for a year now. I'm non-stop trainer three times a week.
As long as I went traveling, staying committed. I know you have.

Speaker 1 It was something that we challenged each other to about a year ago. You know, I've really embraced it.
I've been hitting the gym mentally, working on my diet.

Speaker 1 working on my physical ability was something I've never done. I've been a runner before, but I've never really was in the gym really pushing weight.
And, you know, even this is a new challenge for me.

Speaker 1 The other day, I bunched 300 pounds, and then this last weekend, I pushed up 315 for the first time ever. So, like, that alone is the mental challenge, right? Of pushing yourself.

Speaker 1 And I think those things carry over. I think it starts in, starts maybe in the gym.

Speaker 1 It starts in, you know, in these challenges of starts reading a book and then taking a little piece of that book and going to action on it. And those things start to build momentum over time.

Speaker 1 I think everybody wants it to happen overnight. But I mean, it's been 17 years.
Tommy, how long you've been doing this now? Your business? 18 years. Going on 18.
18 years.

Speaker 1 18 years, right? 17 years, 18 years. I mean, these aren't things that we built overnight.
I mean, these were long days where nobody gave a shit. It was just us mentally by ourselves.

Speaker 1 And those mental, building that mental strength back then is paying dividends today. And you still need it because it's a new mental game.

Speaker 1 So I think it's important to really think about your life in a grow and die and build some plans around that and goal setting. thinking about where you want to go in a year.

Speaker 1 And, you know, when we started talking last year about physical fitness, I kind of wrote one of my goals for the age of 45 was try to be want to be in the best shape of my life at 45 physically and strength and i've accomplished that i set that goal out i'll be 46 next week and i benched 315 pounds before the end of this year was is a very high staple mark many people don't bench i'm not saying that to brag i'm saying that because i was weighing 173 pounds i weigh 205 now And I could barely bench press 245 a couple of times.

Speaker 1 And I just grinded it out for a whole year. And finally, before the end of the year, one week before I turned 45, I hit it.
Right. And that was just the grind.

Speaker 1 And same thing with the old, you know, the most people have heard the story is building a decade plan to hit 100 million next year.

Speaker 1 And it's just staying the course with a long plan and realize it's going to take a lot of effort to get there. If I'm

Speaker 1 heard, I'm just telling the story here, I guess, a little bit.

Speaker 1 No, I love it, dude.

Speaker 2 The stories are what people want to hear about. You know, I'll tell you a quick story.
You rented a house right on the mountain, and you had Chase over there in Phoenix. Yeah.

Speaker 2 And I walked in the house and you had your shirt off, and you were making burgers, and Chase had his shirt off. And you're like, hey, want to get in the pool? And I never told you this story.

Speaker 2 I've never told anybody this story, but I was like, no, I'm good. It was because I didn't feel comfortable with myself.
I felt like a disgusting slob.

Speaker 2 And I wasn't like fat fat.

Speaker 2 But according to the Dexa scan, I was obese.

Speaker 2 And I was just like, man, this kind of sucks. That was one of the many things.
It just, that was one thing. And then it was another thing.
And then it was another thing. And then it was another thing.

Speaker 2 For me to look in the mirror and finally say, dude, this is stupid. Then I did some simple math, 168 hours in a week, 10 hours of working out, 50 hours of sleeping, 50 hours of hard work.

Speaker 2 Still gives you 57 hours. to do stuff.

Speaker 2 And so you can still read and walk and further educate yourself and go on dates and spend time with your kids.

Speaker 2 That doesn't leave a whole lot of time for Netflix specials and late drinking nights, but that's okay.

Speaker 2 Because, you know, Aaron, I didn't know what an A-player was at this company until I got 100 technicians. And really, I redeveloped what that avatar was in my mind.

Speaker 2 When I had five guys, I thought the top guy was an A-player. When I had 50 guys, and now I got hundreds and hundreds.
And I'm like, holy shit. And now I'm redeveloping what an A-player is for myself.

Speaker 2 And I was never a morning person. Now I'm up at 5 to 5.30 every morning.
And I'm not bragging about that. It's like I just want to wake up.
It's like I wake up without an alarm.

Speaker 2 And I've never, since I've been a kid, been a morning person.

Speaker 2 I'm a night owl. But then I realized, what do I get done at night? What's like something I'm like, man, I'm glad I stayed up that long to do that.

Speaker 2 Man, if I didn't stay up that night, I've just realized this little bit of dopamine I get with drinking. And trust me, I'm not done drinking forever.

Speaker 2 And I'm not going to not, like, I think you could drink responsibly. I tell you this, I'm done binge drinking two nights in a row.

Speaker 1 I mean, unless we're at Bermuda.

Speaker 2 Unless you're not a Guest Barrow.

Speaker 1 So I think that's how you start to get a little old, Tommy. That's you're getting creeping into your mid-40s now.
Those drinking days don't rehab. You don't bounce back as easy, bro.

Speaker 2 Well, the thing was, I know if I could drink four nights in a row and I just was like, dude, I'm still successful. I tell myself, you're still getting up for the meetings.
I was just foggy.

Speaker 2 I'd show up to the meetings and I'd show up.

Speaker 2 And when I put my shirt on, I just wouldn't look i never put my shirt on in the mirror i'd walk out i'd never make eye contact with myself i literally put my shirt on in the closet with no mirror and i just to say i'm busy and it wasn't even this vanity thing it was just like oh you're busy dude who cares and people would be like i'll work out then i'd be like oh yeah look at that douchebag he's so obsessed with working out like what the hell like it's like ridiculous but then i started feeling what it felt like what my body feels like what my brain feels like with this aura of energy that I can fight a freaking bull, that I show up in a bigger way, that I'm more focused.

Speaker 2 And then people around me are like, I want what you have. I don't need to persuade them.
I don't need to tell them to believe in something. They go, we see it.
When we talk to you, we know it.

Speaker 2 And what is that doing to A1? We've lost over a thousand pounds in the last two months, cumulatively, of reported weight at A1.

Speaker 2 So like, it's something to be proud about. Sure, I'm happy for myself, but I'm more excited that I can influence people to take, like, cherish their self, the temple.

Speaker 2 But the feeling, the brain power, the just energy level is where I'm excited about.

Speaker 1 Yeah. So I think what I hear from this and reflecting on this is that, look, if you want eight players, you better be an A player yourself as CEO and owner or in a leadership role, right?

Speaker 1 People want to go out and I want eight players. I want to eight players.
Well, are you being an A player in every everywhere you can?

Speaker 1 Look, everybody has ups and downs in life and challenges and stuff in area, but putting your best foot forward in all the things that you do too, right?

Speaker 1 And I never, you never shared that story before about coming over and cooking. I remember that day for sure, we cooked out, we hung out, we ended up playing cards.

Speaker 1 I think we ended up going to the sons basketball game, some other stuff, right? You and Jim Crestle.

Speaker 1 Yeah.

Speaker 1 So, but you never shared that. And I never knew that.
I mean, to me, you've always been a pretty confident guy in all your settings and all your areas.

Speaker 1 And to be vulnerable and share that, I think is important because we all have some vulnerabilities. And people have heard my story.
My dyslexia was always mine. I was always concerned about it.

Speaker 1 I was always worried about it. I was always worried that people would judge me, make fun of me, not, you know, challenge to deal with that.

Speaker 1 And then getting that out in front opened up the world for me to say, you know, this is who I am. This is what I have.

Speaker 1 You can't change being on dyslexia, but on dyslexia, but you can do things to improve it and work towards making you better and know how to operate and stuff. Same thing here.

Speaker 1 You can change your physical ability. There's certain things maybe people have that you can't, but there's things you can.

Speaker 1 And the point you made is like, look, you just got a mindset of like, I want to show an example.

Speaker 1 I want to influence people and show that by doing, not by saying, and showing up to the gym, getting up early in the morning, you know, building in routines, being disciplined at what you do, showing up as a respectful CEO and owner or manager or leader or whoever you are in your organization are important things.

Speaker 1 And being disciplined on those things over and over and over and over and be able to say no to alcohol sometimes. Look, we've had many times we've drank and many times that we haven't drank.

Speaker 1 You don't need to drink all the time, but there's times where you can do it and manage it and have fun and there's times you don't.

Speaker 1 Like, it's just like, but if it's interfering with the outcomes of being prepared for meetings, being clean-minded, taking you away from the gym or making excuses that you're already busy, here's a perfect example.

Speaker 1 I mean, you, as a guy, look how much you have going on. I mean, you're involved with so many companies, you have a podcast, you have all these things going on.

Speaker 1 You're making time for your health, you're making time to talk to people, you're making time for all these things. Yeah, at some point, you do have to give up other stuff.

Speaker 1 And Netflix specials should be something I give up.

Speaker 1 I don't watch TV, give that shit up and focus on the things that matter. And leadership is really about the actions, not the words, right? And I think it's good to see.

Speaker 1 And I've even heard from when I was visiting you before, some of the people from A1 diving in and seeing and starting to get work out and lose weight and do stuff.

Speaker 1 And I've seen that in my own organization here too, as I've started to work out more and more people have embraced it more than ever. I never realized that just by going to work, doing it.

Speaker 1 You know, I get guys saying, talking about my arms and other people and your fitness and doing stuff. And it starts engaging them.
They're like, I want to do that. What are you doing?

Speaker 1 How are you doing? What's going on with this? And it feels good to help other people along that way. And I think that's our responsibility.
I mean, I just do.

Speaker 2 Well, listen, I will say this too: I've intentionally put people around me, whether it's Andy Elliott, whether my cousin Michael, who had to either get on medication or make a change.

Speaker 2 When I saw Ishmael, part of me celebrated for him, and part of me wanted to, you know, slap him because he was getting bigger. And I'm like, man, Ishmael, like everybody noticed.

Speaker 2 And I'm like, if Ishmael is doing this, I have no excuses. And I look up to that guy in so many ways.
But I said, that wasn't one thing. You know, you could talk about the story of you and Chase.

Speaker 2 You could talk about Ishmael. You could talk about my cousin Rachel calling me.
You could talk about going and seeing Travis Ringy on the lake.

Speaker 2 We were building a house and just seeing him say, No, I'm not drinking right now. And I'm like, dude, we're on the lake.
We're like tied up to five boats. Have a beer.
He's like, no, I'm good.

Speaker 2 And I'm like,

Speaker 2 I need to be better. I need to be better.

Speaker 2 Hey, guys, I hope you're enjoying today's podcast. A quick reminder: the Freedom event is happening on September 25th to the 27th.

Speaker 2 In today's tough economy, with PE firms invading, lead costs spiking, and customers cutting back, it's time to protect your bottom line in your future.

Speaker 2 At Freedom, you're going to learn how to bulletproof your business from home service legends like Paul Reed, owner of Northwest Roofing, a $30 million a year business.

Speaker 2 Aaron Gaynor, the owner of Eco Plumbers, a $75 million business.

Speaker 2 Ken Goodrich is chairman of Gettle, a $250 million business. And Leland Smith, founder of Service Champions, a $500 million business.

Speaker 2 Listen, you can keep doing what you're doing and hope for the best, or you can arm yourself with the proven strategies I've used at A1 Garage Tour service. Get your tickets at freedomevent.com.

Speaker 2 That's freedomevent.com. Now let's get back to this episode.

Speaker 2 But that's what I set myself up with. Think about it.
I kind of put myself in this environment where, even though I didn't want to hear it, I kept going back. I kept talking to Travis.

Speaker 2 And then me and you would talk. And you're like, dude, what are you doing? What are you doing? And then, you know, you talk to Dr.
J and you're like, dude, I'm going to do this.

Speaker 2 And then you started going to the gym. You signed up for a trainer.
And then it was like, then we made a bet. And I won the first one.
You won the second one.

Speaker 2 And I got to say, I fell off a little bit, but the biggest thing for me was getting Bri involved. Like she co-plunged with me this morning.

Speaker 1 Like having her,

Speaker 2 she never once worked out in her life, never once lifted a weight. Not once.

Speaker 2 I mean, I'm sure she did something like jump rope or something, but now she's like, she's becoming the best version of herself and watching her.

Speaker 2 It's like a rose starting to blossom because of the way that she feels about herself. I'm watching her because she feels so comfortable with herself.

Speaker 2 It's changing the way she's treating people and her understanding. So I agree.

Speaker 1 It's definitely a piece of it. I think just surrounding yourself.
We all know, like, right. First is take responsibility for everything that's around you.
Second was go learn the information.

Speaker 1 Third is, you know, kind of me is like from the speech I did for you before is when I did the freedom thing is then surround yourself with people, you know, successful-minded people.

Speaker 1 And that's what you're doing. And you take little pieces from everyone.
I didn't do this. A lot of this from you.
I saw Travis at the very first vertical track.

Speaker 1 I think it was or the second one, one of them. I was like, damn, this dude's a beast.
Like, I want to be a better shape like that. Right.

Speaker 1 And then, you know, seeing Ishmael started sending sending us pictures of working out. We can go a different direction with some of those pictures.
Maybe we could leave a few of them out.

Speaker 1 But, you know, and then you reflected on all those things, like surrounding and reflected on them and then just reinvented ourselves.

Speaker 1 And just say, I'm going to be a physical, I'm going to be in shape. I'm going to be clear-minded.
I'm going to do this stuff. And got to work and made it a priority.

Speaker 1 And I think those are, you know, if that's the topic we're on right now, that's what it's about. This is all about reinventing ourselves.

Speaker 1 Everybody that's listening to these podcasts, yours or Chris's or any of these ones, are trying to reinvent themselves into something something they want to be. And we did that journey.
I did that.

Speaker 1 You did that. We've reinvented ourselves, but you have to have a clear vision of what it was.
And you got to be around people. And if you can't be around them, listen to them.
That's where I started.

Speaker 1 Trust me, nobody would talk to me when I was a plumber in my trunk by myself very much. And I didn't even know who to talk to.

Speaker 1 But, you know, great books like my book, This Think and Grow Rich that I still have here, books you have behind you. they're all connections to informing yourself to be able to reinvent yourself.

Speaker 1 And that's, I think that's the journey we're on, right? And what's the next journey? What's the next version of Tommy Mello, right?

Speaker 2 What's the next version of aaron gayner what's the next version of a person listening to this today and you know you have to define what that is for sure well i think you have a responsibility to share success and it's not a selfish or gloaty thing it's you know when ishmel sent us the pictures and when you started with next star and you kept hearing these success stories and you kept forcing yourself in I think a lot of people, they want to jump on the phone with somebody or listen to a podcast, and that's the new vision, but they don't do anything about it there's like so many people that are like yeah i'm going to get to that but if you only knew and they find themselves doing mostly minimum wage tasks they're still there putting out fires handling the calls no one's booking going to the one star bringing the guy parts because that was aaron that was me and you and i i want to make this very clear

Speaker 2 everything that we're discussing right now me and you are the epitome of like

Speaker 2 Like literally, we did everything that we're discussing. And we're not on some high horse telling people you're an idiot.
We're just saying, because we've done it, we're damn near two decades into it.

Speaker 2 Maybe we could shift your course to not make the same mistakes we did.

Speaker 1 Well, I'd agree. And it's going to first start being open-minded, understanding what the differences are and what you need to do.
And yeah, I mean, I've done it. We've done everything.

Speaker 1 And I remember going to my next star meetings, they're like, stop doing this. It's like, well, that's what I do.
And it's like, don't do that. Do this.

Speaker 1 And you're like, and it's hard at first because you're so used to doing it and you fall into the trap of your own day to day and you feel busy, you feel important, right?

Speaker 1 And you got to change out of that to realize what actually grows the business, the old mindset of working in it, working on it.

Speaker 1 And you got to really find time to work on that business and start setting in real strategic plans, real operational guidelines, really sitting down and saying, these are how we do this.

Speaker 1 This is how we do that. This is how we do that.
And then adjusting in all walks of life. And it starts with you personally.

Speaker 1 I truly still believe you can go out and get all the operational stuff you want. If you don't improve you first, it doesn't matter.

Speaker 1 I still truly believe most of this journey was around setting a personal ambition for a reason and a purpose, which is my reason.

Speaker 1 I'm not saying that's everybody, but having a real purpose to why you're getting up and what you're doing and where you're trying to go and start really working on the idea of, you know, work on yourself more than your business is really personal development and growth.

Speaker 1 I still truly believe that most of the success it came from really working on myself first and then going to work on the business. That's my belief.

Speaker 1 I'm not saying it's everybody, but I do think that that helped me get up off the ground. And then seeing what other people were doing in their businesses inspired me to do more in my business.
Right.

Speaker 1 So that's, you know, how I see the journey for myself.

Speaker 2 Well, if I went and talked to my younger self when I started the business, young Tommy could not have just handled the 10 pages of simple bullet points I would have told him.

Speaker 2 Although I would have trusted the future self and said, you're probably, I guarantee you, you're not lying to me. You're me.

Speaker 2 But I would have said, Look, it's like my dad has told me, you know, what I used to hate is if I wish I knew then what I know now.

Speaker 2 But until you experience it and you make, I've got this saying I'm going to talk about a little bit on the freedom event. And it's a mistake is a mistake, but a second mistake is a choice.

Speaker 2 And a lot of people just keep running down the same mistakes. They allow their top guy to dictate the meetings.
They literally like, they just don't change.

Speaker 2 And it's like they get in this, they're not doers. They hear the advice.
They take the notes. They comprehend it.
They just don't do anything about it.

Speaker 2 Like, how many people do you think that you've told something to that just even management that you're like, dude, we've talked about this. Why are you still doing this?

Speaker 1 A lot. I mean, even on our own management, we still have this.
It's not like it's perfect here on that.

Speaker 1 I think we can all, I mean, just talked about some opportunities that you have with Luke from a conversation who's a great operator and a great guy, still needs, you know, some guidance, right?

Speaker 1 I've had many, I mean, there's a lot of great Next Guard members that I've seen that have done great things.

Speaker 1 There's a lot of Nextcard members that have gone back to the meeting every year, over and over for years, and they're doing the same things again and complaining about the same things, but never have done anything.

Speaker 1 And people I meet, it's like, what do you think is going to happen here? Every year it's the same story. At some point, I don't know what to tell you either, right? And that happens a lot.

Speaker 1 I mean, we see that a lot. People do know they're just, I think they're scared to take action.
And I don't know why.

Speaker 1 I'm pretty action-oriented overall, made my mistakes, but you definitely got to dive in. and be okay failing forward with it for a lot, you know,

Speaker 1 saying, but that's the reality.

Speaker 2 There's another another thing here I want to talk to you about because I think that this is the one that most people need to hear right now. And that's L.

Speaker 2 L Levy was very, very smart because he told me, he looked me dead in the eyes, sat down, and he said, I'm not sure if I want to work with you anymore. He said, you've got too many ideas.

Speaker 2 You're listening to too many people. You're reading 20 different books that sometimes are opposing views.
You want to do 20 things at once. There's an order of operations.

Speaker 2 And he goes, if you don't stop and implement the things that I teach you and you keep talking to a million people, then

Speaker 2 you're not going to be successful with my teachings. So you got to make the decision whether you're ready to go or not.
Because I will gladly give you your last payment to me back.

Speaker 2 And we could go our separate ways. And it was a hard conversation he had to have with me.

Speaker 2 And what I'm saying here is sometimes we want to hear some people, they go on a Facebook group and they get 25 answers. It doesn't bring them any closer.

Speaker 2 I knew Al had a good track record of working with companies. I knew he was trustworthy.

Speaker 2 And, you know, me and you both have probably been to the point where we're going to get 20 people's solutions and make, find out what we like and don't like and make it our own.

Speaker 2 But I feel like most of these people are like, they'll talk to Ken Gooderson, they'll talk to me, then they'll talk to you, then they'll talk to Ishmael.

Speaker 2 We all give different answers and then they try everything and they don't get anywhere. And you listen, you got really close with Jack Tesser.

Speaker 2 I mean, what do you think about information overload where it's like you're so wandering for you're asking too many questions and not listening to the people that have been?

Speaker 1 I agree. No, I totally understand.
I mean, we've done it to ourselves here.

Speaker 1 That's why what I just said earlier in this call is like we went back, we've decided to create some guiding principles to align us, focus us in first things first is let's go back to the things we know work and have worked.

Speaker 1 And there's certain things in home service business, at least in our business and all businesses, that these are the measurements that matter. These are the processes that matter.
Big ideas are great.

Speaker 1 They're over here.

Speaker 1 Let's let's go to these things and find out which one you want to do there's many different models but there is some kpis across all home service that are the same you can measure them this way or that way or this way a little bit but at the bottom line like there's certain things that are just the foundations and if you don't have those in line then all these other big ideas and all this other stuff people want to go find they're not really relevant if you don't know your booking percentages you don't know your conversion percentages you don't have your average sale You don't even know your recall percentage.

Speaker 1 There's things that you just got to get back.

Speaker 1 Yo turnover percentage or turnovers, whatever your language you got people use for that like there's certain things that are fundamentals your 10 pluses you're not 10 pluses your membership how many memberships are you selling percentage to calls ran like these are the fundamental things that you need to know and then go figure out how do i coach them better so know the metric and then figure out how to coach it and i did that too i did a lot of that at times i still do you know especially in our roles today a little bit there's a lot of big ideas a lot of great ideas i mean you and i've talked about lots of ideas and you got to be careful how much of those you can implement and how much can your team actually handle while you're trying to throw all these things down at them and yourself.

Speaker 1 So I'll use an example is I joined Nextdar and learned a lot of stuff at first.

Speaker 1 And then I was like, all right, I'm going to go around and go spend some time traveling, visiting locations, traveled some places, saw some places, spent probably about two to three years really going and basically soaking up everything I possibly could.

Speaker 1 And then I said, all right, pause. I got to go to work.
I don't need to know anything new. There's nothing new right now that I need to know because I haven't even put all this stuff in place yet.

Speaker 1 I got to stop and I got to go to work. And that's when I put my head down and just got to work on the things that I need, know I needed to do.
And we just spent a couple of years doing that.

Speaker 1 Not that I didn't interact and do stuff. I just really wanted to say, if I'm going to be the best plumbing company that I can be, what do I need to do? And I need to really focus on what matters.

Speaker 1 And that's what I did. Because there is a lot of information overload for sure.
I think there is. Well, you go to the right events.

Speaker 2 I used to go to every event. And now I go to the right ones.
And I only listen to the people I respect with a proven track record. And just, it doesn't mean a lot of money.

Speaker 2 It means they might be the best marketer. They might be the best hiring person.

Speaker 1 They might have figured out the best way to track fleet.

Speaker 2 Usually someone in the places I go have a superpower. And those are the people I want to talk to.
Because like.

Speaker 2 If your fleet's breaking down and you're not getting trucks on time, you got capacity issues. If you can't hire the people for your trucks, you got issues.
And there are a lot of things, man.

Speaker 2 As the company grows, people are like, man, but the problems are not the same. And I will choose my problems today over what they were when I started.
Like, is this guy going to show up sober?

Speaker 1 Is he going to steal from me? Is he working with all these problems today versus the old problems all day?

Speaker 2 Well, dude, the good thing is I can write a check now and I don't have to worry about it.

Speaker 1 I'm like, hey, yeah, look, I'll pay. Fine, good.

Speaker 2 Like, I enjoy the fact that there's a lot more freedom now.

Speaker 1 I think your point is, is like, pick something and do it, right? Pick a group.

Speaker 1 you know your group that you build now and you're doing you know if you're going to do it buy into it you got to buy into it, right? I'll use an example for me.

Speaker 1 Like, you heard me say this book so many times. I preach it, not because I wish I had stock in it, I guess, at this point, but I just said, I don't know any better.

Speaker 1 This has a model for me, think and grow rich. And I'm going to buy into it.
I'm going to buy 100% into it. I'm going to do everything the book told me to do.
Write down my purpose.

Speaker 1 Do the affirmation part, right? Auto suggestion. Answer all the questions.
Write out all the goals. Write your purpose.
Write how you see the future, right? There's all the stuff in the book.

Speaker 1 I just said, I'm going to do it. I don't know any better.
I don't have any other thing. I've read many different stuff.
At this point, I'm just going to buy in 100%. And that's what I did.

Speaker 1 And when I bought in 100% to that, then bought in 100% to Nextdoor when I joined that and other things over time, my success rate went up. It's when I started mucking it with everything.

Speaker 1 It started getting, you know, messy and trying to learn, not trying to do too many things at one time. So I do think the point is pick something and do it.

Speaker 1 While still educating yourself, I don't think you should stop educating and learning, but don't allow it to disrupt the plan. Don't start.
It's really a challenge. Tom, we both have done this, right?

Speaker 1 How many times have we gone into our business and we started implementing something and they start finally getting doing it? And then we're thinking about it.

Speaker 1 And then we change it on them four weeks later already before it's even had enough time to even really see the success. And then a new idea, new flavor of the week.
New flavor of the week, right?

Speaker 1 Because we taught, we heard some new podcasts or we went to a new seminar. We went somewhere else in our team.
Then we're adjusting them and they're adjusting them and adjusting them.

Speaker 1 And then at the end of the day, we're going, oh, none of this is working. Everybody's, well, it's because we keep disrupting it.
We don't allow it to actually develop over time. Give it a true

Speaker 2 soak up. That's a great one.
What can the team digest? What can they actually digest? And what I've learned is you only struggle with your weakest link. What's the bottleneck? And now I'm like, look,

Speaker 2 my whole last year has been who is the right people that have been where I want to go because we're at a different level. I don't need to hire somebody at 60 grand and want them to perform miracles.

Speaker 2 Now I could actually pay 300 grand to get somebody that's like, dude, this guy's going to come in and build what we need, or gal, and they're going to do exactly what needs to happen because they got a proven track where they got.

Speaker 2 And here's the cool thing. I could hire them as a consultant for six months, make sure we work together well, make sure we hit the milestone, make sure there's a symbiotic relationship.

Speaker 2 And if there is, they'll take us to new mountains. Like they'll take us to Mount Everest to the top.
And you start looking for who, not how. And because I used to just think, what are the systems?

Speaker 2 What is it going to? But maybe sometimes it's this leadership and this key role. I want to ask you, why in the hell?

Speaker 2 And I agree that you did this, but man, you were a big freaking company when you said we got to rebrand. I was 40 million when I decided to do it.
But you said, hey, listen, I'm going to just rebrand.

Speaker 2 What went through your mind? What do you regret? What has it done for you? I'm just curious what the mind thought was of that.

Speaker 1 Yeah, I know. It was a big pick.
Yeah, we're a little over 40 million too. So same time, right? It's well, a couple ones.

Speaker 1 One was, you know, we wanted to bring in the multi-trades and we're trying to figure out how do we bring that name in because everything was around eco-plumbers.

Speaker 1 Some of it was refreshing the brand for the next evolution.

Speaker 1 Some of it was to really get past, you know, the idea of like building a brand, an actual brand brand, a brand mark, a word mark, which we ended up going with, building more of like, how do we develop this into a better brand than just a local home service plumbing company, right?

Speaker 1 And so it just felt like we needed to do it now if we were going to do it. I felt like at some point you got to a certain level, it's going to be a lot harder to rebrand.

Speaker 1 And then we wanted to also go from, you know, we had a little bit of a brand story, Tommy, but we didn't have a brand story as much as we were very much a transactional company, very much offer-driven, drain-driven by offers, drain, you know, plumbing offers.

Speaker 1 We marketed a lot, but we were very offer driven and not brand centric to really build more know, like, and trust with the community through a brand that they could relate to, a brand story that meant something we were very dependent on google google offers and things along those lines that were just that so we wanted to build more brand presence we wanted to clean the trucks up make them very visible make them stand out more which we get a lot of statements on there so there's a lot of array of decisions in there and we wanted to re-energize the company to the next evolution as we're thinking about going to 50 million to 100 million.

Speaker 1 How can we get our company excited about a fresh new look and align the company? So there's a lot of layers layers there. So I don't know where you want to unpack, but that's kind of where it was.

Speaker 1 And, you know, and I think to me, it was like, we didn't really have when we first created a little character in the eco stuff.

Speaker 1 You know, we had Dan Antonelli end up doing our brand, which you know, but we didn't have like a brand agency or brand.

Speaker 1 I think it was kind of like we kind of pieced it together as most people do when they first start their company and didn't really have any major rhyme or reason why the brand and the logo look like it did.

Speaker 1 Were we successful in the big picture? Of course. I mean, we were a 40-something million dollar plumbing company in a market.
Like in the big picture, that's pretty successful.

Speaker 1 But it wasn't the vision for ourselves completely. We wanted to be bigger, have a bigger vision, a bigger brand, and multi-trades underneath that.

Speaker 2 So, were you happy? Tell me a little bit about, so what was the reveal to the team? And hindsight, what kind of feedback are you getting?

Speaker 2 I'm just curious the success, how you would put it into your own words, because like Euler, you listen to that guy. He's the most nervous guy in the world about this thing.
Like, oh my God.

Speaker 2 And then he did it and and it like changed everything. What was your experience?

Speaker 1 I mean, I'm happy with it. I think, you know, there was a lot happening all at one time.

Speaker 1 So trying to, we opened up multiple markets, brought in multiple trade lines and a rebrand in a new brand story. So, you know, I'd say we're

Speaker 1 talking vehicles.

Speaker 2 You had to figure that out.

Speaker 1 And it rebrands.

Speaker 1 Walls, building, billboards, radio ads, TV, all of our literature. Yeah,

Speaker 1 guns, shirts, like everything. So in the midst of it, for a moment, I'm like, what did we we do here, man? Like everybody is just feeling like overwhelmed with all the change, right?

Speaker 1 But now afterwards, it's great. I mean, it's fell into place.
The people I hear all the time, I see your trucks everywhere more than ever. They stand out.
People like the colors, the vibe of it.

Speaker 1 I think it's been successful. I think the overall rebranding has been successful for us.

Speaker 1 We really stayed focused on plumbers, electricians, and HVAC technicians to really stay with the people that do the work, not the trade line itself, really representing the trades people was our goal.

Speaker 1 And that's what we wanted to do. We didn't want to lose that as eco plumbers was about the plumbers, right? So we really stayed true to that in our rebrand message.
And it's been successful.

Speaker 1 I mean, I feel like it's been successful. I all brand to hear it.
We did new radio ads. We've done new stuff.
It's allowed us to move more towards a get eco really is our domain.

Speaker 1 And we've been pushing that and more people are looking towards us as get eco. as our domain name and that's how they find us and be able to really make that more of an actionable campaign message.

Speaker 2 Well, you don't rebrand and tomorrow. It's one of those things where you stay committed to it.

Speaker 2 And, you know, I wanted to ask you the next five years, maybe just the next year, what would you say you're focused on more the next year and the following year? So 2025, 2026?

Speaker 2 And there's no right answer here, and it might be both, but revenue or EBITDA? Because I think there's times for both of those.

Speaker 1 Well, I'd say EBITDA, we're probably definitely focused on EBITDA right now.

Speaker 1 I still think there's a lot of market share opportunity with some struggling happening to be able to capture some market share. So if you wanted to balance both, I think there is a time for both.

Speaker 1 I still think we want to hit the $100 million goal. Next year has been our benchmark.
You know that that's been our 10-year goal was to hit 100 million next year, which we feel good about.

Speaker 1 But I wouldn't say that I would try to overly sacrifice the idea of getting strong EBITDA and cash flow to try to hit that $100 million.

Speaker 1 right now, right? Need strong app. You need, you know, I believe right now in the marketplace is, you know, we definitely want to make sure you have a strong cash flow.

Speaker 1 You know, EBITDA isn't all your cash flow. So, but, you know, strong EBITDA should bring strong cash flow.
You really need it right now.

Speaker 1 I mean, I think if we stockpile some cash, dry powder, whatever language you want to use, there's some opportunities in through 25 into 26 that I think there'll be some great opportunities for all of us as we move into 2026.

Speaker 1 I think you see that too from conversations we've had. So I'm focused on that.

Speaker 1 like just cleaning up operational stuff, but also not just ignoring the opportunity that there is market share growth opportunity still.

Speaker 1 I don't think you should just leave it on the table and not, you know, push a little bit, be somewhat at risk, be okay with a little risk to push forward to capture market share while you can, because there are some companies that are, unfortunately, that are struggling a little bit right now with the economy and the market the way it's been.

Speaker 1 And I think there's some opportunity to take market share while you can. So it's a balance depending on where you are, I guess, in your evolution of your business.

Speaker 1 Tommy, but I think right now we definitely have some EBITDA goals that we'd like to shirt up and make sure that we're staying really strong in our cast position as an organization to be ready for, you know, as we come out of 25, into 25, out of 25, 26.

Speaker 2 Yeah. No, I agree with you.
I mean, I'm on this short, like 20-month run, and I'm literally like, I'm out of time.

Speaker 2 I mean, literally, when the 12-month starts, you got to make these decisions now to get the people on the bus and the systems in place. Like, I've been through this already.

Speaker 2 So now I'm like turbocharged. I'm not nervous.
This is when you see me go into like full robotic. Like people don't understand how hard I could be focused on the big hairy additious goal.
Having fun.

Speaker 1 You're going to be. I would say this is an area that I've learned a lot from you on.
You very much have helped me. You know, we talk about friends and people ahead that have done something.

Speaker 1 I mean, this is something I've leaned on you as we think about, you know, growing our EBITDA and, you know, what it looks like from equity partners and other stuff into, you know, into 25, 26, which is something that was on the table for us to have a conversation about at some point, right, as the business scales, but really just the operational part and the things that you've accomplished.

Speaker 1 So, you know, I look to you and some other people, leaders in this industry that have done that to help for guidance on that. So it's exciting, though.
It's exciting.

Speaker 1 I remember driving around with you in your pickup truck and telling me this is an EBITDA goal I'm going to hit. And by this time, and I was like, damn, that seems crazy.

Speaker 1 You're like, no, I'm going to do it. And you did it.
You did it.

Speaker 2 Well, I don't have a choice. Like, I will not sleep.
I got to self-correct. If I miss a day or a week, I don't wait to miss a year.
I don't know what that's like.

Speaker 2 But now I got the stuff at my fingertips to see, okay, self-redirect, self-redirect, self-redirect. Like who, not how.

Speaker 2 But, you know, we got this event coming up. And by the way, I've never had a speaker at any event that had a better reaction to you speaking.

Speaker 2 And I think that that's important because, by the way, Aaron's first event speaking was our event. I mean, I went through, we practiced.
He sent me videos. I I mean, I think one of them was at 3 a.m.

Speaker 2 He did it. And like, you know, Aaron's got great stories and he's going to be, he's a class act.
And he's not one of these guys that like, he doesn't like stage speak.

Speaker 2 I never want to be known as a speaker, by the way. You just tell great stories of life.
And that's who you are. And, you know, this is September 25th in San Diego.
It's freedomevent.com.

Speaker 2 I don't think there's a better spot on the planet, although I'm against California legislation. I think San Diego in September is going to be phenomenal.

Speaker 2 I'm excited to see you there more than anybody. And, you know, guys like Ken Gooderich is coming, Leland's coming, Paul Kelly's coming, and Darius Lyvers is coming.

Speaker 2 And like, you know, it just happens to be the same time as our friend Julian Nexstar. And I didn't do, like, I had the event picked before that.
And I hate that that's happening.

Speaker 2 And people got to make a choice. And I don't care who they choose.
I just know this. There's something magical.
It's not a drunk fest. There's a lot of relationships that come out of it.

Speaker 2 And I hate, dude, I didn't mean to do that. I just wanted you to know, I know you're really close to those guys.

Speaker 2 And that was like not an extra.

Speaker 1 It's been part of my journey. And part of my journey for sure.
And I respect Next Star and always support them. And I support my great friends.

Speaker 1 I mean, you and I become pretty much close, very close best friends in many ways, right? At times over the last couple of years of the stuff.

Speaker 1 And I'm here to support you and you as a person, as an individual that has, you know, helped me personally and professionally. So I'm excited to be there.
I appreciate the kind words.

Speaker 1 I enjoyed the opportunity. The opportunity you gave me to speak in front of, I don't know, hundreds of people at the last event.

Speaker 1 And the response that I got from people is just something I'll remember for the rest of my life. I mean, it's unbelievable.
So thank you.

Speaker 1 And I hope that anything I can do to help inspire people to grow their business or improve their lives is the reason why I do these things. And I appreciate you having me part of that lineup.

Speaker 1 I mean, those names that you talked about are legends in the home service alone.

Speaker 1 So to be part of that lineup and be there with you and support what you're doing, man, I'll do it every day of the week.

Speaker 2 It's going to be fun. And the last thing to close us out, and I'll let you close us out is

Speaker 2 I'm building a big ass calendar, and I promise you and a few other people that there's going to be certain things on my calendar that align about us getting just whether out of the state, out of the country.

Speaker 2 You know, I missed the running with the Bulls in Spain. And I don't want to miss any more of those trips, man.
Life's too short.

Speaker 2 I'm not going to let this business, I'm going to not let anything take away this bucket list. And it's something that I've been thinking a lot about.

Speaker 2 And I'm going to be way more intentional with making sure those dates are carved out and they're ironclad.

Speaker 2 So that's something that's been on my mind, not just with you, but just my mom and my niece and nephews and just everybody. Simbree.

Speaker 2 But you could say whatever you want. Maybe we didn't talk about something, but you could close us out here, brother.

Speaker 1 Well, that's a lot to say. Say anything you want at the end.
So, no, I would agree, man. I think trying to find times to be around people that you enjoy.

Speaker 1 I mean, look, life and work do take up a lot of time. They do.

Speaker 1 I mean, especially in the summertimes when this business is really active and you want to be there for your company and be there for the people that are on the ground working.

Speaker 1 But, you know, finding time with people that have impact and have influence on your life is important. And I agree.
That's why I know we booked a trip to be together right after the first of the year.

Speaker 1 And I'm excited for that to spend time. around people like that.
And, you know, this journey has been just amazing, man.

Speaker 1 You know, sometimes you get caught in just what we're doing all the time and just working and grinding and, you know, solving problems and learning.

Speaker 1 And to get a chance sometimes to reflect and even just right now, just sitting here reflecting, thinking about, you know, where when we met to where you are today and to where I am today is just impressive.

Speaker 1 And many of the other people that we've got to know along this journey and see what they've developed and grown into.

Speaker 1 And, you know, some of the people that you mentioned that will be talking at your event or other events I've seen and see them grow and now be sharing and giving back.

Speaker 1 It's pretty crazy, man, what this industry has given to us.

Speaker 1 All home service industry, not just plumbing electrical hvac roofing you know garage doors etc everybody that's doing this has so much potential and opportunity and it's uh it's been a fun journey man i i mean i don't know man i wouldn't change anything i mean there's things that i would probably want to have different but this is the path we all had to take to get here and you know i thank god for it for sure man because here we are you know i get to have good friends and good conversations and share information and still keep learning.

Speaker 1 I've still got a lot to learn. And I'm excited about it.
I'm excited to be there for your event and spend some time with just great people, man.

Speaker 1 There's so many good people in the home service industry. There's just so many.
There's just so many. There is, man.

Speaker 1 There's all the way from the people that have accomplished stuff to the guys that are the women and men in the trades that are just trying to figure out how to still grow their business.

Speaker 1 There's just so many great people, man. I'm glad that we get to support them.

Speaker 2 I can't wait. I am more excited than I've ever been about an event with this event.
And I'm more excited to watch.

Speaker 2 The people come up and change their lives, become better mothers and fathers and husbands and wives and leaders to their people. But I'm going to let you get going, brother.

Speaker 2 My trainer is waiting for me. And,

Speaker 1 dude, I can't wait to see you.

Speaker 1 Let's see it, man. Let's see what you got.

Speaker 2 Dude, I'm telling you, with dude, 305,

Speaker 2 it was 245s on each side and four tens

Speaker 2 on the incline. And, dude, it was my fifth set.
I said, let's go one more. And I got it for six.

Speaker 2 So, like, dude, and I'm hitting legs way harder than I've ever hit because that's where I'm going to put the most muscle on.

Speaker 1 But you'll see me. You come prepared on September 25th, brother.
I will. Appreciate it.
Thanks for joining us, Tommy. Thanks, my man.
I'll see you soon. See you, buddy.
All right, brother.

Speaker 2 Hey there. Thanks for tuning into the podcast today.
Before I let you go, I want to let everybody know that Elevate is out and ready to buy.

Speaker 2 I can share with you how I attracted a winning team of over 700 employees in over 20 states. The insights in this book are powerful and can be applied to any business or organization.

Speaker 2 It's a real game changer for anyone looking to build and develop a high-performing team like over here at A1 Garage Door Service.

Speaker 2 So if you want to learn the secrets to help me transfer my team from stealing the toilet paper to a group of 700-plus employees rowing in the same direction, head over to elevateandwin.com forward slash podcast and grab a copy of the book.

Speaker 2 Thanks again for listening and we'll catch up with you next time on the podcast.