Transcript:
Well, happy Friday everyone in the Service Legends Facebook group. Hope you’re doing well. Welcome back to another episode of, uh, of our podcast here, our show. And we have something special for you guys today, part of our client Spotlight session. Um, we have I’m going to I’m going to call him Rush. We have Rush here today, man. Welcome to the show.
Thank you for having me. Yes, sir.
Um, most of you might have seen him, whether it’s in one of the, you know, epoxy gods, Facebook, you know, Facebook group or commenting in there runs a really successful business in around Dallas, Texas. I’m not sure exactly if you’re in Dallas. I think you might be just north, right?
It’s a little bit. We’re in Addison, so it’s right there.
Yeah. Um, which I’m not sure if you knew, but, you know, when I was a kid, I lived in Dallas for a little bit, you know? Didn’t know that. Yeah. Yeah. Um, but I was born in Indiana, Lafayette, Indiana, but moved there and, um, but loved Dallas. But for those of you that don’t know who Rush is, he’s a he’s the visionary behind Rush and Reef Concrete coatings, accomplished entrepreneur from Houston, Texas, now in Dallas. Of course, he has a passion for sales and a firm belief in personal relationships. He has built a thriving business, leading one of the area’s youngest and most vibrant teams. He brings a fresh perspective and innovative approach to the concrete coating industry. He has an unwavering dedication and hands on approach that has driven success for his company, but not only his company, for his team himself and personally as well. And he really inspires a lot of other people in their entrepreneurial journeys, man. So that’s that’s my take on it. But if you could just give us some context, man, maybe a little bit of an origin story. I think what’s always interesting is, you know, we talk a lot about with people and we hear a lot about at the events and things like that, like what’s happening now. I always I’m always curious, like what led up to the start of that entrepreneurial journey? Because for me, like that, that type of activity is, uh, is very interesting. And, you know, I think it translates into kind of the next five, ten, 20 years or whatever of that journey. So just give us a little bit of context who you are and maybe a little origin story, man.
Yes, sir. So, uh, my name is, uh, Rasheed Mac. My first name is Isaiah, but it’s my dad’s name and his dad’s name and his dad’s name, So I just. They call me by my middle name, and then Russ just kind of was a nickname I was given for another coatings company. I used to work for one of the guys there. Uh, um, I started when I moved to Dallas in 2013. I was actually moving down here to train for the Olympics, and there was a guy at the gym that had a coatings company I had never heard anything of like concrete coatings before, and he kept asking me to help him, help him. And I was just like, Nah, that’s not really what I do, man. I wasn’t really I’m not really a manual labor guy, uh, especially not for free. So, uh, but eventually I was like, All right, man, I’ll come help you, uh, and then help kind of turned into instead of him being there with me, just me being there by myself. So I learned how to do the floors, um, fix machines, go pick up materials, do was book. I was literally doing everything.
So at that point I was like, I have no problem doing that, but I’m gonna need a little bit of, you know, compensation to be able to. We can’t see eye to eye on that. So at that point I was like, Man, I have this skill. I didn’t know what the market was like for somebody that could do what I did. So then I hit on Google for the first time ever after doing floors for about three years, uh, companies hiring for concrete coatings. Man, I was like, Dang, there’s a lot of people that do this. I thought it was just him and maybe a couple other people had no clue. So, uh, what year was this again? This was probably when I left him. It was 2018, but I’d already been doing floors for about four years. But I still had never I had never seen another flooring company before. I didn’t know anything about. There’s like in Dallas, probably a couple hundred companies. Yeah, I didn’t know that. So but I needed to work and I was like, All right, let me look online. Epoxy company. Just so have you heard of garage experts?
Yes. Uh, versatile franchise.
They own them? Yeah, their company. So a guy was like. I called him. His name is Tim. He’s like, Hey, yeah, I’m hiring. Can you start right now? They gave me the address.
That’s a very common thing at home service, right? Need help now? Start tomorrow. Right.
So I go to help him. So his story, he. He just bought into a franchise trying to get money. He didn’t know anything about floors, but he knew about business. So I kind of knew a little bit of both. So I came, helped him with the floor, stuck with him. Uh, I had a friend of mine and this is where Reef comes in because people always give me credit for Rushing Reef. But it wasn’t just me. All right? I want to make sure that that’s clear. It was not just me. Want to write that one down? Yeah, do it now. But it wouldn’t have been what it was without him. So he used to come back up, back and forth and help me when I was working with the other guy because it was just me by myself. I’ll call him. Hey, man, can you come help? So when I start working with him, I put him on with a guy garage experts. One day he comes home from vacation. The guy garage expert is like, Man, I’m dumb. I just want to sell the company. We ain’t paying no wine, you know? He’s just mad, you know? Maybe him and his wife got. I’m trying. But he said it again. He’s like, Man, you guys should, you know, buy this and take it over from me. So we’re thinking like, all right, we. So he was trying to get us to go to franchise route and, you know, go garage expert. So we flew out to Anaheim. That’s where their headquarters is. I’ve been there.
I’ve been over there.
Oh, yeah. So we went there. It was like maybe four of us. They gave us Cheesecake Factory. They gave us a tour of the facility. But we well, I was actually learning a lot. I was on board with doing the franchise because when we were going to buy the stuff from the guy, he already had the wrap trailer, the vehicle, the brochures, everything. Yeah. Speaking with my dad and with Read, they were kind of like, What’s the point of owning a franchise? Because my dad was like, you know, if I drive down the street and see that trailer, they don’t mean nothing to me. I don’t know that they were it’s not like McDonald’s. Like, I know they have burgers, so why would I pay all. No, no shady garage experts. Why would I pay all these fees? And still people don’t know who you should have to walk up and explain to them who you are and what you do. You might as well go your own way. So we left Anaheim, came back to the guy, told him, we’ll take everything. So we got the machines from him the Grinder, the Grinder, the trailer, everything but a vehicle. We did. We bought a truck from them, too. And man, just by the grace of God, we didn’t have to have any money. He trusted us. He just gave us everything and said, Pay them back in a year. So he gave us a set price for it and we just worked did that 20 18th August of 2018 and then 2019 stuff started to pick up and then Reef actually ended up moving back to Houston at the end of that year. So that’s when they just kind of just was just myself. But we had already had the name going, all these shirts, trailers, wraps. I’m not about to change it. So people ask me, I’m going to keep the Russian reef name and then just been rolling ever since.
Yeah, that’s wild, man. It’s such a really interesting story too. And, um, what’s interesting for those of you listening and, you know, live or on the replay or Apple, Spotify, which by the way, we’re almost I think we’re at like a couple thousand downloads a month. So thank you guys for, for listening and downloading and sharing. Um, like Andy Frisella says, you know, like there’s no fee, right? We don’t do sponsorships here, things like that, which we could mean like we could make money from this, but, um, that’s not what we’re doing. And so just share it with your friends, guys, other contractors, things like that would be very helpful. Um, but this story is so similar, you know, and I think one of the coolest things that you know about you and I felt like I already knew this, but this validates that. It’s like, you know, you, you see problems or situations and you see the opportunities in them. It seems like, you know, um, and Mark Cuban talks about that all the time. He talks about, you know, look for industries or situations or whatever that you can disrupt, you know, And, um, and that’s kind of what you did, you know. Um, and so, you know, I think what’s interesting is, you know, I think most entrepreneurs or most home service business owners that are just like you or me, they experienced that situation or that that problem, but they don’t see it as an opportunity. You know, Um, and I’m not, you know, I’m not sure why we’re made that way. I just know that that’s a thing. Um, and I know it’s a roadblock for a lot of people, and I’m just curious to touch on that for a second. Like when you see opportunities like that, whether it’s then or now, like what is like, what is your thought process? Is it is it like, is it is it just impulsive because you know, as an entrepreneur or is it do you think about it more now or what’s up with that?
No, that’s a but that’s a gift and a curse sometimes because I’m not just like that with business. I’m like, as soon as like if you and I are sitting in a room and come up with an idea, boom. All right, let’s start it right now. Like, why do we why do we need to wait till tomorrow? Next week? Let’s get the ball rolling. So I’m just a real. I’m real, you know, lively, ready to move out if I hear a good idea. Like, somebody yesterday was like, Hey, man, somebody’s trying to sell this laundromat. I’m like, All right, let’s go meet him right now. Let’s go right now. So I just like to take advantage of opportunities given because you never know, you know, Because if I didn’t take. Because I actually wanted to quit doing floors when I first maybe like the first year and I get my dad a lot of credit for like, everything because he was like, why would you quit? Somebody’s paying you. It wasn’t that much, but paying you to learn a skill that you can check off. And he said some people got to pay to learn. Even if this guy paying you pennies, he’s still paying you to learn something that you can take and do for yourself. So that’s a.
Great point because, you know, there’s a big, big talk in society right now. It’s like start a business, do your own thing, make ten grand a month or whatever, right? Not okay. It’s great. I mean, I know people that are that young doing those things, but they don’t. They struggle a little bit because of that. Those, those, those experiences, you know, that are invaluable. Um, and so I like that about your story too, is you kind of like got in the trenches, if you will, and like you understand the business. But I think when you, when you get in there, it’s not just understanding the business and being better at, you know, smarter and knowing more. It’s also you get to experience how to lead people and, you know, and what they’re going through and what the like, you understand the whole like, um, process. My guest last week, Jason Walker, has a Hvac training company, uh, talked about like the baton and the Olympics and how, you know, that’s like us in business where they’re handing the baton all the way through. It’s like us. It’s like sale to onboarding to production. And it’s like, I think if you don’t have those experiences like you did, like, you know, it’s hard to really know how to build those processes. Do you feel like those experiences helped you kind of like understand not only how to run the business, but like all the employees kind of what they’re doing, what they might be going through and kind of equip you to better maybe lead them?
Definitely. I think knowing what they’re going through on a day to day, um, it keeps them accountable and you accountable as well. Because I see a lot of times people jump into, especially in Dallas and the flooring business, um, if you have no clue what’s going on, your guys could tell you anything and all you can really tell and you could get mad at them and say, I don’t believe that, but you don’t really know. Yeah, you know, So I see that a lot where people just jump in or just throw money in and not really understanding, you know, the step by step or day to day process of, okay, what’s taking them so long to do this and what’s. Well, yeah, they’re hand-ground, but there’s glue on the floor. You ain’t give them a cut wheel to get. So you have no idea what that’s like or Hey, they need these diamonds for this floor. What’s taking them so long to grind? Well, they got medium bond. They probably needed some hard 30 or something for where they’re at and you got medium 70s so it’s taking them twice as long to grind. But I think just going through and when I say I started, the guy started with, I literally went from grinding with a swing buffer and anybody had used it before. You know, you first turn it on, it throws.
Want to see that one, dude? Hey, hey. If you guys want to see Rush on a swing buffer out there in Dallas, comment below. No, when.
I first started because he just he had the grinder with like the little Home Depot blades or whatever on there. And I went to the on floor. Uh, and even though Lavina existed, I remember one of the first big jobs I did with somebody, it was 6000ft² and we were using a 16 inch swing buffer and a 16 inch, uh, on floor. It took us like a week to grind, like we could have had a 30. Lavina And did this in a day and a half, if that, or a day with two people. So just those experiences actually doing different things, different machines, knowing, you know, the day by day stuff, it really does help. And, and like you said, the leadership aspect. And then as a owner and knowing what it takes to actually complete certain tasks. Yeah.
Because it’s like, you know, it’s impossible to like develop KPIs or performance based, you know, bonuses or, you know, incentives or, you know, any of those things. If like, you know, if we don’t know the KPIs, well then how can we hold them accountable? How can we coach and lead them? And I find myself at, you know, with more team members, it’s like, you know, I find myself coaching more and leading on things because we know the juice, like we know what’s up, you know, And you know, it’s our duty to serve them in a big way. And, um, how many crews do you guys have running now over there? Is it still one or is it 2 or 3? What do you have over there?
So I have two and then I have three subs that I use because I’m kind of trying to get out of the any anybody on these coaching pages. Nobody, nobody wants to mess with a metallic. So I found some real good metallic people. I never learned Polish and I did it a couple of times, but not enough to where I’m like advertising polishing, but don’t turn it down. So I just found somebody that could do that, really. So I got it set up for metallic, my policy and my flakes and solids. I got two two crews for that. So we just keep that rolling.
That’s really cool. Okay. Um, yeah, Cardinal has had some subs as well for certain things. Um, what’s interesting, so we have the Service Legend Summit October 5th through the seventh. It’s going to be here at the Gila River here in Phoenix. I’d love for you to come, man. Um, and, uh, I got some great people speaking. I mean, I got Tommy Melo is going to open us up. Just sold a one for, like, I don’t know. I think it was valued at like almost $700 million. Um, and he’s going to be opening this up and we.
Got the garage.
Yeah, he’ll be speaking. Uh, we’ve got, uh, incredible amount of. I mean, it’s, I probably get shot if I go tell my team. I just told everyone, so I’m just gonna say Tommy. But anyways, we also have one other guy that I’ll share. Uh, Pete Johnson. Uh, that’s the first time I’m announcing this, but Pete Johnson from Balance will be speaking on field leadership. And what’s interesting why I brought that up is he shares like the same values of like kind of what we’re talking about with the team. And but he also does polishing is like a training class on polishing on things like that. I can connect you if you need to, but he’s just big on that field leadership and how important it is because as we run these businesses, you know, we have sales, marketing and you know, the admin stuff, but you know, all of the accounts receivable, all of the go backs and overtime, all of that’s going to be in production, you know, And if that’s not sound, I mean like you’re going to be bleeding money. And I wanted to chat about that, you know, um, how you kind of maintain the production and, you know, like in a healthy way and kind of keep things moving along without bleeding money out, you know, out the back door.
Uh, so it wasn’t healthy at first because for a while, anybody that started a business, you know, it took me a long time to get an assistant or trust somebody that’s like, Hey, they’re going to answer the phone. They’re going to make sure that people pay. People get receipts. People answer for a while, man. I was just I had three phones at one point and I would answer a call if somebody sent the lead thing at 12:00. I’m just doing I’m on it. If I’m on vacation, I’m on the beach, on a forward on a jet ski. I have my work phone. Like the phone is driving. Yeah, for real. I stopped the jet ski and took over. I was like, Yo, no.
Way you did.
That. Makes no money. Yeah, I was on a man. I took it on a boat. Like I kept my work phone everywhere it with me. That’s pretty.
Interesting. Guys, if you’re listening live on the recording, if you’ve ever answered, if you’ve ever called a lead on a jet ski, let us know in the comments or if you’ve done anything crazy like on a, I don’t know, four Wheeler side by side, I don’t know because, you know, I’ve had some interesting scenarios, too. So there’s always very funny, you know?
Yeah. I just don’t I just didn’t like to, to miss anything. So, um. But going back to the question. I really try to, you know, just to tie back into the leadership thing, just making sure that I put everything in place so that we don’t have as many hiccups on the job. I’m not having to go back and bleed money because I don’t because, you know, whenever you have to start going back and doing stuff, that’s when then I got to and if it was my it’s even worse if it’s your fault, because then I got to pay them. All right? Now I got to pay them to go back out and do this and pay somebody to go back out and do that. So I try to make sure I have everything in place. And that’s what took me so long to actually get out of doing the floors. I was lying to myself, telling myself I liked it, but not when I was honest. But it’s really just I didn’t want to hand. I was scared to hand that over to somebody else and trust that somebody’s going to care about your business the way that you do. Um, because if they don’t, then they’re not on the hook for anything. They just leave and go get another job and this is your baby, so you’re stuck here with it, trying to figure out how to make things work. So just putting procedures in place and then just trusting the people that you pick, um, that are even if they don’t care about it, like it’s theirs, they care about it enough to make sure things get done right because callbacks will get you. That’s the, I don’t know, another thing in this business that will make you bleed worth that.
Yeah I’ve, I’ve lost tens of thousands of dollars. Well, not just me, but, you know, my partners, my partner with my parents, like Cardinal and my older brother, and they run it and everything like that. But. But yeah, that, um, owner owner, uh, contributions are not fun. Owner distributions are fun, but owner owner contributions over and over are not fun, you know? Um, but yeah, yeah. So this is great. Um, and so you guys are focusing on, you know, the traditional flake system maybe, and then you’re kind of subbing out the metallics, it sounds like. Um, do you find that like in your area, people want more of one? Any given service over there or.
I mean, yeah, Flake is pretty much going to be the every most people don’t even know about a metallic unless most of the time it’s women. They go on Pinterest and stuff like that and they’re like, Oh, I saw this floor and that’ll get you to it. As soon as somebody say Pinterest, you might want to walk away. You’re like, Wait.
Wait, wait. What was that again? Pinterest. I’ve never heard of Pinterest.
Unrealistic. And that help you bleed fast too. Managing customers expectations. What a flake floor is pretty cut and dry, which is what we do. I’d say 90% of the time. When you’re doing garages or commercial spaces, they’re either going to go, you know, flake or a solid floor every now and then, grind and seal. But that’s going to be the bread and butter, the metallic. I don’t know why it comes in spurts. Like I’ll have months where it’s like once a year, half the jobs are all metallic. Why? I have no idea. But, uh, yeah, managing those expectations with the metallic. That’s what got. That’s what really got me in the beginning. Because you’ll bleed. Because anybody know, you can’t really do a touch up because it’s going to stand out like a flake floor, you know, sand it down, throw the flake over there as long as it clear is not too thick, you know, it’ll blend the metallic. I mean, if you got something that’s this size in somebody’s house, you might as well do that whole floor. Because just trying to do that spot, if they’re a picky homeowner, you have to redo the whole floor. So managing expectations and, um, that’s kind of why I got away from those. Just find somebody that only does this and I haven’t had any problems with since then, but I think that’s a part of leadership also knowing, hey, yeah, it’s not my thing, but he can do it. So there you go.
Yeah, yeah. Like that. Like being honest, like with yourself. And, um, because sometimes that’s entrepreneurs. Like we were talking about like, ideas and we love doing things. And I think as we realize as we get going, like, that’s cool, but like, um, there’s a concept. I forget who said it, but, um, vision without implementation or execution is delusion, you know? So it’s like, you know, guys like us, we’ll talk about stuff, talk about stuff. But the real guys that that I see that are like, you know, eight, nine figures and beyond, they’re really good at the vision, but also good at integration and execution and, and um, and that’s what, you know, I see what, you know, what’s happening. And I think there’s a lot of, you know, owner operators that might have a company that’s, you know, eight people or less that are that that are kind of running the day to day, that are kind of running project management. Um, and I think that we forget sometimes, um, that yes, we have ideas, yes, we have things. And I’m, you know, I’m probably talking to the choir here, but the execution factor, you know, is, is that day to day management implementation. Um, and I wanted to talk about that for a second. So, you know, in the midst of like when you’re working on stuff and then you’re working in stuff, how do you find time to maybe balance that, you know, is, you know, is there a specific like process that that you have or like or time management or time blocking or, or or something like that where you kind of, I guess, focus on like, hey, you know, I’m working in the business now, I’m doing these things, but then, hey, here’s my time. Like I’m working on these things or whatever.
Uh, so maybe for the last couple of months I’ve really been almost completely hands. Is off. Um, I have my old, like, commercial clients that I may go see, but other than that, uh, I try to focus on how I can take this money I get from this and try to get it into something where I don’t have to work as much for. Um, but because I don’t since joining you guys. And then maybe just, just word of mouth, I haven’t really had to do a lot of work as far as bringing customers in. Like I could just people are going to call. So at that point, it’s just once I get in front of people or my sales guys get in front of somebody just closing the deal. So I don’t really spend a lot of time thinking about, uh, I don’t know if it sounds bad, how to improve, because where we are right now is just like, it’s just clockwork. Uh, most of my time. If I am thinking about that, it’s improving my relationship with the guys that I have or just tidying things up on that end. But as far as the customers and getting jobs and the day to day on that side, we don’t have any issues. I just try to make sure I tighten everything.
Like if I bring somebody new in and stuff, like they get to the job and don’t have any brushes and they want to go to Home Depot. No, we had 300 brushes at the at the at the storage. And you didn’t grab them, but going over stuff, you know, tidying up small things on the on that end. But as far as the data for the business, I really just try to let my, uh, because you know how it is and you get the business. I pay people and still do that. You will pay people and still do their job. You know, I’m paying that system to do X, Y and Z and I’m still doing her job. So I’m like, Man, there you go. Let them do their job. Yeah, it’s not a problem. Know I don’t really get a if it’s no problem with the jobs I don’t get no I don’t get a call. So I really just try to focus on just expanding and getting into other things because I’m like I say, it’s just not something I really love. I love business, but I just stumbled on to a floors. This wasn’t yeah, I was like, Oh, I just love this. Oh, I just happen to be good at it.
Yeah. I’m the same way where it’s like, you know, and we’re seeing a lot of more like a lot more entrepreneurs or private equity coming to the space. And I mean, traditionally home service, you know, you’ve got, you know, their fathers, their grandpas, you know, did it right. Like, you know, he like like my wife’s dad, my father in law. He is a brick mason his whole life. His dad’s a brick. Mason His brother’s a brick. Mason Their cousins are Brick Mason And they’ve from Georgia and, you know, and, um, Illinois and. But that’s how it normally goes, you know? And I think we’re just seeing a big wave of, of, of like more business related people fall into home service and it’s never been a better time for that because most of the competitors don’t know how to do what it is that we’re talking about. And what’s really cool what you mentioned is all the things that you mentioned is, is on the business stuff. Like you’re like thinking about the business from a like you’re looking down on it and how to make it better. Um, and the only time you’re able to do that is when you’re not in the weeds, you know. And well, how do you do that. A team right systems. And so it’s really cool to, to hear this bro because I remember when we first chatted, I know all this wasn’t in place, you know, a couple years back.
So and I wasn’t I wasn’t a. Every year I go through this, I’m like, Man, I’m done with this. I’m done with it. I just go I tell people all the time like, Man, you know what? I’m gonna just sell this and do something else. I feel like I can. I feel like I can make anything work. So sometimes I’m like, man, I don’t. I just. They’re like, But you’re making money. I’m like, Yeah, but I can make money doing something else. And and I’ll go through the phase and I have to call my dad. He’s like, Why would you do that? Like, just kind of if you want to start something else so bad, then expand, like do something else in this industry or just take it to another city. But I, I go through that every year, like at least for a month or a week, like, man, I think I’m done.
Yeah. Well, the cool thing is, is also at the Service Legend summit later this year, uh, early October. Um, one more little thing I’ll share is Jeff Geer of Concrete Coatings and Revamp, um, which they’re buying companies just like Cardinal and Rush. Right. Um, and I think they bought like seven companies last year. They have like ten different companies and they, uh, I think collectively that like those ten different coding companies, they’re all like cardinal, like Rush all do one day floors and they, uh, I think it’s like valued at like almost $200 million now, like collectively. Um, and then they did like $85 million last year. And so he has a company called Revamp and they’re buying coding companies. He’s going to be speaking at our event all about how to exit your concrete coding company. And he’s going to be there. I’m like, So if anybody wants to sell their coding company, you got to come to the event. Not saying it’ll happen. I’m just saying you’ll be right. A few people that are looking to buy companies, So, um, but the really cool thing is, is everything that you’ve done, dude, is like, so mission critical to be, to, you know, to make the business attractive, you know, the systems and because if, if you are the business and you’re doing everything and like if you get hit by a, you know, a bus and it’s done, well, then they don’t want to buy that, right? Um, so it’s really cool to hear that you’re doing a lot of that man, and I imagine has, has a lot of that helped maybe like your personal life, whether it’s just mental bandwidth and all that.
Or definitely especially the assistant part and the, the thing with the phone like I would go to the gym, like when I see that phone, stay with me. I was like, when I used to go out, I’d be out, got my phone because I would check, I’ll be out. I’m checking my emails, I’m checking everything. Uh, I didn’t want to miss. When I’m in it, I’m in it, bro. You sound just like me, and I don’t want to. That was Kris.
Best, by the way. Kris Best.
Oh, okay. That’s my metallic guy.
Oh, is it okay? Yeah, he’s listening. Yeah.
Um.
I was talking about the, um, uh, um, the exiting stuff and, you know, setting the system up and personal life, how that could affect. Um.
It definitely helps with the personal life because it kind of putting those systems in place allows you to take a step back and just go, You know what? I’m gonna let them do that. Because I was getting I never like to say I’m stressed out because I feel like people just say I’m stressed or depressed or I’m like, Well, you just need to relax. Ain’t nothing wrong with you. You don’t need to go. You just need to take a step back. So I will have times where I just, you know, I’m going to leave my phone at home. And then but as soon as I came home, I’m back to my phone. But that’s that really helped me. Putting things in place allowed me to take a big step back. And I do want to share something real quick forgot to mention. So. When in 2019, after I kind of took over in 2020, I was doing some sub sub jobs for a guy that everybody knows. He don’t have a good name. I ain’t going to mention him though. He pretty much. Did a bunch of work for him. He would pay me at the end of the week, one weekend. He did. He decided not to pay me and I got screwed out of a lot of money, but I still had to pay, you know, the people that were working. That’s when I was doing floors. And I just bought a brand new trailer, a brand new livina 230 sixes. My livina had three hours on it. I woke up to go do a job. All of my stuff was gone and 2020 I started over from scratch.
Wow.
Yeah. January 2020. No, I had a blower and a mixer, but I had to never know.
You’d never know.
Yeah, I had two jobs to do that day, so I rented a trailer, went to Home Depot, went to go get a trailer, went to go rent Lavina Rent at the A vacuum. And I literally that same day, I just didn’t think of, you know, like, woe is me. Yeah, I’m mad. But I was thinking like the customer don’t care that my stuff got stolen. Nobody care about that. Yeah. So I loaded the stuff up. Just start knocking the jobs out and slowly build myself back up. But yeah, all of my stuff got stolen. I had nothing.
That’s crazy, dude. Um, yeah, well, I mean, that just speaks to the resilience side, too. Um, and that’s what’s crazy about this country about, you know, like, well, there’s like, the cancel culture, all this stuff going on or the victim culture. I mean, not canceled, but like the victim mentality, you know, of like, it’s so prevalent and it’s so it’s so dream soul crushing and it’s all internal. It’s all internal. And. God, there’s so much opportunity out there, man. It’s just. It’s just ready for us, you know? It’s here. There’s people, there’s connections. There’s so much money out there and there’s good out there. And, um, you know, I love that you focus on, like, I know you’re aware of the bad, but, like, you focus on the good, you know? Um, and I think that’s something that we all need to learn, you know, uh, and instill, you know, in our, our kids and our team and, and things like that. And it’s not always easy to be that example when things aren’t going great, but our team requires that, right? That’s what our duty is as leaders and, you know, honoring and stewarding our team and our customers, our finances and things like this. And, um, you know, I, I should be interviewing your dad next, I think, Uh oh, for real. I got a crazy story.
Went from the, um, military to writing software for the space elements at NASA. Wow. Working overseas, too. Then he just jumped in the business. And same thing. Why did he quit his job at NASA? To sell his fishing eggs? Wasn’t a good idea, but he just wanted to do something for himself. And that just led to this. And this. And this and this. And for you know, I.
Love seeing that because he did that now. Now you did this and now your team’s doing this and now your impact like. And that’s what Service legend was all about when I first, uh, well, we started as Davis Construction Marketing LLC, but when we rebranded and thought about like, who are we, what do we want to do? What are we really doing here? And came down to service. Legend But it’s short for home service legend. And to me, what a home service legend is, is you, right? It’s not someone who just focuses on the money, but it’s focusing on the team, the community, the impact. And so we call it more profit, more freedom, more impact. And so more profit is first because you can’t really do anything in this world without having revenue in the door. I mean, let’s be honest, right? You can’t buy trucks, software, whatever. So you need that money in the door, which is all about your lead to cell cycle and figuring those things out, knowing how to provide. And then once that starts happening, you can experience some freedom because you can hire team members, you can buy new trucks and. Right. They have new trucks. They’re not using yours, whatever. Like you have a little bit more freedom back not to sit on the couch, but now you have the freedom to make an impact in your business on your team.
You can pay them more, get better trucks, donate to charities. You’re you want to, you know, donate to that you’re passionate about. You could, you know, sponsors, local teams. You could be a better father, husband. Like that’s the time where you can make that impact, you know, And I feel like and the reason why I bring that up is I feel like you’re in that impact stage where you could make such a big impact. Um, and it’s, you know, it’s just waiting for you, you know, and, and I know you’re already doing it, but that, that impact stage is what I see Tommy Mello doing. And other mentors that I look up to is they got the profit, they got the freedom, but they didn’t just keep it. They made an impact. They just and they made that decision to make an impact on others, you know, and I think that’s I think that’s what we’re all here for, serve others and make an impact. And I think the more that we focus on that, the less we focus on ourselves. But the but the better things happen to us. I don’t know how that works, but. All right. What are your thoughts on that?
Uh, definitely. And somebody just messaged me the other day and like you told me, you never know. You know who’s watching? Like you told me, I’ve been watching you from afar. I have. I’ve had people tell me, uh, man, you’ve been an inspiration. I’m thinking, like, why? Like, all I’m doing is working, man. Or, you know, just make sure you do, you know, your job to kind of, like, give back. And whenever you do that, you do get blessed. And I don’t believe that that’s that’s luck. Whether you believe in God or the spirits of the universe or, you know, whatever, you just continue to do good, it’ll come back to you. So that’s actually what my next step is. If I was to sell, I want to go into like charter schools or any type of school and teach people how to do floors because not everybody wants to go to college. And people make people used to make fun of me for doing floors, believe it or not. You know, they ask me why I was in college. I stopped going, Why weren’t you doing? I don’t think people really realize how much money is involved in the home service business. And it’s crazy. People are the ones, the people laughing and spending the money, but they want to sit down or a deal on something that can give them. Yeah, but yeah, whenever you whenever you do good or continue to try to reach out and look after people, whether that’s, you know, your team looking out for them, giving them more money now the jobs are getting done faster or better or, or your assistant or like you said, your home life, uh, it always seems to come back full circle.
Yeah. Yeah, 100%, man. Um, well, that’s really cool, man. It’s been a joy to chat with you. Um, I want to ask just a couple final thoughts, but, um, what’s next for, for the business practically? Because, you know, because, you know, here what’s next for you, but practically, like, do you have any, you know, new services, new team on a scale or like kind of what’s what’s next for the business outside of exiting? Like in the meantime?
Well, I’m trying to find a way because I’m like, right, the business is profitable is good, it’s good business. So now I think I’m trying to figure out a way to semi exit. So and I think I figured that out. I don’t want a franchise, but what I think. I may end up doing that and just become a. Where Russian reef may just become like a guess a sales like I just want to just do that I don’t want to have to manage three trucks at trade. Hey the trailer got a flat tire. Not my problem. You know, I don’t want to have to worry about that if I could, just because I like to do sales. Now you can give me to sell anything. So I’m working on something similar to franchising, but I’m going to give my employees the opportunity first to kind of try to work something out with them, even if they don’t have the money to kind of try to get them into, because that’s an opportunity that I got. I’m not selfish. I don’t want, uh, which is not a good mentality to have you a business owner. Like because I always tell my dad like, man, I don’t want them to work here forever. And most people say, You want to find people that don’t mind just having a job. Because if you think like me, I’m not I’m not somebody that’s going to be a good employee for long.
Yeah. Because I’m going to learn how to do it and want to do my own thing. But that’s what’s next for me. I’m probably just going to end up trying to put like if I have five employees, to me, I see that as that’s our opportunity to have five different companies, five people that I train. So I know how the job is going to go. Uh, and I could just get more done and not have to worry about, um. So much on the granted, you’re still going to have to deal if they’re a sub or whatever. You still got to deal with it, but less overhead for me and having to worry about less things. As far as storage vehicles, all that. If it’s just me, my assistant, a couple sales guys in the office, I think that’s what’s next for me. And I’ll be like semi completely exiting the handling all the installation side. Yeah, that’s the customers are the people that give you the most problems. Even if you do good work, you have, you know, people that just. Unreasonable at times. And that’s what kind of makes me go, You know what? I don’t have to deal with it. I have to deal with this. So that’s what’s next for wrestling.
Love it, man. Well, you know, I’ll be watching for sure. Um, and then just one final piece of advice. You know, for someone that might be, you know, let’s just say they’re maybe, you know, a year or two behind you, you know, and kind of what you’re up to like, Well, what type of advice would you give to them? Um, you know, other than if they’re in your area to be a subcontractor for your company.
Uh, don’t stop working. And you in business, and especially when you’re working for yourself. And that’s the beauty of you. Always one shot away. You one job away, one connection away. Uh, there you go. The power. Yeah. I’ve never even heard of that. I’m gonna check it out.
But really, here, I’m going to send you a copy, okay? Yeah.
You one shot away. I remember the first. Um, because people ask, how do you get these big commercial jobs? How do you get this? I don’t know. Just not quitting. Keep going and you’ll just walk into something and next thing you know, you went from doing 400 square foot garage. Somebody call you, Hey, man, I got 60,000ft². Da da da da da. Hey, people ask me, How did you get that? Man, I just kept my head down, kept working, didn’t get down on myself, did a good job there, and then it just keeps on rolling, so. Don’t. Don’t give up. Don’t stay off social media looking at what everybody else is, because I know a lot of companies out there that look like they’re working all the time and they’re not. They recycle and stuff, but we really work every day. So don’t try to compare yourself to what somebody else is doing. Keep your head down and keep working. And when you look up, you’ll be on top.
Love it, man. I’ll leave that right there. Dude, thank you so much for. For jumping on, man. Your time. I know you’re busy. And thank you guys for listening live. Thank you guys so much. If you were live. Can you put in comments hashtag live? The reason why I’m asking you is because when you do that, the algorithm likes it. It’s good for Facebook and then it gets to more people. So it would mean the world if you could do that. And then if you’re on Apple or Spotify listening, if you could leave us a review, shoot me a DM, let me know some feedback would appreciate that. And then if you’re on the replay, if you could put in comments, hashtag replay again, it’s just for some algorithm boosting. Okay, so if you could do that, I’d appreciate that and have an amazing weekend, guys. We’ll see you guys soon.
One thing, Ryan. Yeah. Hey, uh, for the people watching, so normally he has on his thing. Rolex Ryan for the name. It doesn’t say Ryan Davis. He normally had one on this hand and one on this hand. So for today, just to kind of make it seem like he’s just like an everyday guy like everybody else, he put on his Apple watch.
So just I actually love this thing so much. Oh, yeah. Because I can actually read the time. I’m like, yeah, 1149 Boom. That’s all I use it for all the.
Time on mine. Like this one. I don’t when I get them, I just wear them for looks. If I want to check the time I look at my phone.
Hey. Well, I was going to try to, you know, let you prepay in advance for like a year and you give me, like, one of these watches or something like that. I like that. The iced out one.
We’re going to end the call right there. And. Yeah. All right, guys.
See you guys.
