S01E03 – When does the P.O.P. Apply?

On this episode, Jason and Chris discuss when they believe the Principle Operating Principle is applicable in today’s market across multiple types of businesses.

Transcript

Hey, I’m Chris Taylor. I just wanted to welcome you to my backyard.

Hey, y’all. This is Jason Gould. Thank you so much for listening to Mastermind Midland. We are on my good friend Chris Taylor’s back porch. We’ve got dogs barking, cars driving by. We’ve got the grill firing up over here. You’re going to hear mowing yards. You’re going to hear all of that. We hope it adds to the experience, and we thank you so much for participating and partaking in our conversation today. Hey, guys, thank you for joining us on the podcast. Today, we’re going to be talking very importantly about what exactly is this declarative value proposition of the primary operating principle, and does it apply to you? When does the primary operating principle apply? I think you’ll find this is a completely different conversation to where you think it’s going to go, and look forward to having you guys experience it. All right. Today we’re going to be cooking some Wagyu tenderloin steaks with some taco seasoning as well as some green chili seasoning, add a little bit of kick to it. We’re drinking Heaven’s Door bourbon today, making some Tennessee or Smoky Mountain Sunrise. I think that’s what you called it. Yeah, Smoky Mountain Sunrise with maple syrup, totally crazy, like something like you’ve never had before.

We got some brisket poppers, some fresh fruit, and some grilled green beans. So y’all don’t miss out.

What I really think is important, especially that we’re three episodes in right now, is really just to bring up the fact that we are in your backyard. This is real. This isn’t like, yeah, Home Depot’s going on back there, right? Or like Lowe’s, depending on the type of week you said. So like that’s going on, but the truth of the matter is that’s the genesis of these conversations. We have had hours upon hours of, literally our entire friendship was birthed out of this idea of masterminding, which is why we’ve called this podcast Mastermind Midland. And we’ve actually started a couple mastermind groups here in Midland that, I mean, for whatever reason they kind of fizzled out, but the common denominator through even those groups is two things. First of all, it’s you and me. And second, it’s the whole concept of coming together as entrepreneurs and as growth-driven professionals from various industries and backgrounds. Coming together to bring that diversity of thought and into these type of problem-solving conversations. Sure. And it is so unbelievably fun. It’s so rare to find. And so like these two-hour podcasts or three hours, whatever they turn into, it’s not like it’s the first time we’ve ever done this.

No. It’s the normal operating level of our relationship. Like seven years of just, this is how we interact on our downtime.

Yep. It’s enjoyable. Yeah.

And it’s so… The reason why we even started those mastermind groups is because being an entrepreneur is so lonely.

It is. And we just… It’s so hard because the whole concept of even being an entrepreneur in the first place is that you’re diving into unknown territory, at least personally. There’s a lot of things that have been done before, but maybe not done in the same way because timing and culture has a lot to do with where you can do the same thing, but it’s gotta be done differently in order to achieve the desired result because people have changed, our culture has changed. The way we do business has changed. I mean, COVID is a great example of like, we talk about it as a dividing marker in our timeline that before COVID, I remember when it was like this and since COVID, it’s like this now. It’s like the new September 11th. Absolutely. And so when you’re diving into something that’s new, it’s like, man, you might be starting a restaurant and other people have started a restaurant, but how many people have started a restaurant since COVID? Yeah. And that dynamic and dealing with Uber Eats and DoorDash and all these other things that people are using as a regular means of transaction now that never was prevalent before.

They were available, but it wasn’t widely used. And so we’ve adopted new things into our culture that’s changed how we do business in different sectors indefinitely. So that definitely speaks to the fact that there’s probably more of us now.

And then just marry that with the idea of it’s lonely because most people don’t think the way that we think. No. Most people don’t operate in the same spheres with the same type of problems that we have. So you can’t just go have a beer and talk about this type of stuff or a really good old fashioned that you’re going to, I hear you have a new one for me today. So I’m talking about new experiences and entrepreneurship. I came up with a new drink for this podcast. I call it a smoky mountain sunrise. You can use this with any type of bourbon. I’m specifically excited about it. I think it’s one of my favorite concoctions. So is this patented? Are you sure there’s not a smoky mountain sunrise out there? Is this correct? I have no idea. I’m probably going to step on somebody’s toes, but I’m okay with that. I’ve got big shoes. All right. And so today we’re going to try this out. We’re using Heaven’s Door today, which is what we previewed to you guys this last week. Now this is a co-branded and made by Bob Dylan in Tennessee. And the gates on the, the logo here on the front of the bottle was actually a replica of his gates that he made at his ironworks facility.

So Bob Dylan actually made a gate that looks like this. So it’s pretty cool. It’s hand labeled by barrel, alcohol volume, what bottle number it is. It’s a 23 proof. So this is some stout bourbon. So tread lightly, but definitely a pretty cool bottle. And I’m excited to try this one. I’ve actually never, never tasted this one before. So the way that we’re making our drinks.

So I might not make it through two of them today. We’ll see.

But we’re going to smoke them. So I’m going to keep that volume a little bit lower because we learned last week that you definitely don’t want to fill it too much or you don’t get the smoke effect. Sure. So we want to do that. But we’re going to start out. You know, with the West Texas old fashions that we’ve been making, we were using honey. We’re going to use mesquite honey specifically. Today we’re going to be using 100% pure Vermont maple syrup. And so with this generally what I’m going to do is just cover the bottom of the glass with maple syrup. Absolutely.

Now, my mom’s info come from Maine. So yeah, I like the maple syrup.

Yeah, I love maple syrup. It’s the only syrup I eat. I don’t want that that high fructose corn crap like I want real maple syrup. So then we’re going to add our aromatic bitters. Okay. Definitely go a little bit heavy on those. It adds to a lot of flavor because this has got a lot of a really complex flavor profile. There’s a lot going on here. We’re going to add the water to the glass on top of that. Not a whole lot. Just kind of bring your level up so that way you got something to mix with. And the maple syrup actually blends really well compared to how the honey did. The honey was a chore and kind of made Jolly Ranchers almost. So this blends really well. It dissolves well in the water. It accepts the bitters flavor quite nicely and as strong as you would think that the maple flavor would be, it’s really not that overbearing. So don’t go light on the maple syrup because you think it’s going to overpower the drink because surprisingly it’s almost kind of mild. Just a hint. Once we’ve got that going on, we’re going to go ahead and insert our ice cubes.

We got a new ice cube tray today, so we’re doing square cubes instead of the spheres that we’ve been doing. Okay.

Let’s see if you can do it without splashing it.

Yep. And I’ve also got my mixing spoon this time. So no splash. Look at that. No splash. We’re getting better. Cool. Okay. Once we’ve got the ice cubes landed, we’re going to go ahead and add the bourbon on top of that.

Well, you’re not going to have a whole lot of room for yours.

The top of this one, it’s such a tapered funnel that you actually end up with a surprisingly large volume with a short increase in distance from the top compared to a cylindrical glass like this one over here. And so you get more in there than you think you do. Once we’ve got that, we’re just going to give that a quick little stir. Not too crazy. Just kind of mix that together, bring some of those flavors together before we add the smoke. And then today I’m smoking with Applewood chips. There you go. So kind of following in that Vermont fashion with the maple syrup and the apples. I remember when I lived in upstate New York, we go to Vermont and I actually have a buddy that has a maple syrup farm now. And we’d always go over there and get apples and stuff from the orchards over there. That’s cool. So it was always a lot of fun. I liked Vermont. It’s really pretty, super green. Much different than the West Texas that we’re used to where it’s dirt.

It’s just so different than all the other places in New England. I remember growing up in Connecticut and Pennsylvania and yeah, Vermont’s just a completely different place.

It is. And it’s so small. Like it’s kind of wild, but it’s got a lot going on. So I really liked Vermont. One of my favorite beers that I’ve ever had called Switchback is actually brewed in Vermont. Oh cool. And it’s a really great beer. There you go. Man, nothing beats the smoke coming out of it. All right. You’ve actually got too much volume in this glass. Told you. Let’s do it a little bit differently. It’ll be all right.

Oh, there we go. That’s awesome. I actually like that better. I like the smoke coming out of it the way that it is.

We’ll make it work.

Very cool. Oh, for presentation purposes. That was awesome. Very cool. Actually reminds me of a story of Stone Cold Steve Austin. Remember back in the Attitude era?

Oh yes. Yeah, Stone Cold. So like someone was like, man, you waste so much beer when you smack them together like that. And he’s like, you know, it’s more about the presentation of doing it than exactly drinking beer. Right. So we added the maraschino cherries and then a half a slice of grapefruit. Now I use grapefruit over oranges because we’ve got so much sweetener in this drink between the bourbon and the maple syrup and everything else going on. That little bit of bitterness actually balances it out. So interesting. And then we’re going to take a cinnamon stick and we’re actually going to stir that together. And what’s really cool about the cinnamon stick is it adds a hint. Like it’s really aromatic as you’re drinking it. And then as you get about halfway through the glass and that cinnamon flavor will really start to smoke it, settle into the drink and add a really dynamic flavor. That’s really cool. And so with the grapefruit, it kind of makes it not such a holiday style drink because with the cinnamon and the aromatic bitters and the bourbon and the maple syrup, man, it really almost wants you to throw you right into Christmas time.

But the grapefruit kind of brings you back to I can have this anytime and be OK with it. So here is halfway through this season, sir.

Halfway through this season. You’ve outdone yourself, my friend. Thank you, sir. All right. So literally, I have never had this before. This is my first time ever drinking this. We’ll see how it goes.

Whoa, whoa, whoa. What do you think, sir? You definitely taste the maple syrup. Yep. But it’s not even in bearing. No, it’s not.

It’s the first thing that hits you. And it’s definitely the aftertaste that you’re left with.

And that you can smell the cinnamon.

You can smell it comes to your nose before you take the taste.

Right. That is so cool.

Yeah, definitely. The aromatics of it are insane. It adds a whole different dynamic, but it doesn’t hit your palate right away. And that bourbon is smooth.

That is a really good pairing. I don’t even think you intentionally meant to pair it that way with the maple syrup, but it goes really well with the maple syrup.

Yeah, man. Just trying some new stuff. I think it came out really good. It’s a super well-balanced drink. If you’re wanting to make a cocktail that your mom could drink, this is it. You’re going to see grandmas everywhere drinking these Smoky Mountain Sunrisers. So yeah, super delicious drinks. Now we’ve got our conversation starters in hand. Why don’t you go ahead and…

I’m still so fascinated about this drink. Give me a second. Every time you drink it, there’s a different sensation. It does.

And the applewood smoke that’s in there too, man, it blends with the cinnamon smell. It’s so crazy. It’s such a comfort drink almost. If there was a comfort drink-That’s a good way to put it.

This is it. It makes you think of grandma’s kitchen at Christmas time with the sunshine of summer and the warmth. I don’t know, man.

It’s everything in one. It’s happiness in a glass. Happiness in a glass. What bourbon should be.

For sure. It’s definitely a drink that you sip it to experience it. It’s definitely hipster. You don’t just-Slam it. This isn’t your typical old fashioned. No. For sure. Yeah. Man, really good. Okay, conversation. Yeah, let’s talk about business. We’ve laid a lot of groundwork the last two weeks. For us, this is the first time we’ve had a conversation like this because normally when we come in, five, six hours can fly by. Oh yeah, for sure. We’ve gone from here to here to here to here. The next thing you know in a six-hour timeframe, we’ve helped each other map out the next six months of our business. For sure. Right? This isn’t that.

I would attribute a large part of my success and personal and professional growth to our conversations if I was being 100% honest. I’ll drink to that. Absolutely.

Yeah, I can see the trajectory of where you’re going and where I’m going and seeing each other’s influence in that.

Absolutely. For sure.

And my friend, that to me is true friendship. Without getting mushy. It’s so crazy. Man, I remember when you’re a kid and you do something great, everybody’s genuinely happy for you. When you grow up and you do something that’s truly great that outperforms what everybody else is doing, you don’t get that same warm welcome. No.

In that case scenario, you’re treated with suspicion. Right. Yep. That sounds like a dog. Yeah, we got a little bit of a dog going on over here. Yeah. This dude is going, I mean, he’s not mowing the yard. That’s a saw. Yeah, I don’t know. I don’t know what he’s doing. I think he’s laying bricks. There’s no telling, man. But I know what he’s not doing, filming a podcast with an amazing cocktail. Or we’re drinking amazing bourbon. Yes. And about to grill some really good food. So before you turn on the grill, I need to turn on the grill. Okay, turn it on. Yeah. And then let’s go ahead and go with the setup. So we’ve got poppers and they’re actually brisket poppers today, which is just jalapeno stuffed with brisket and cream cheese wrapped in bacon. So that’s our little precursor today. And then we’re doing Wagyu steak again because I haven’t had a good steak in a few weeks and I am rearing to go and it’s my favorite. So I’m down for that. We are going to make a little different this time, though, just in seasoning. So mix it up a little bit.

And then we’ve got some green beans we’re going to throw on the grill and we’ve got some fresh fruit. And so some of that stuff going on today. So typically for my poppers, I’m just going to light this thing up at about 350. So we’ve got that grill getting warmed up. So let’s get our conversation warmed up with it.

Yeah. So let’s just make the statement that we’ve been building for the last two weeks. Sure. And the statement is, and then we can go back and forth and talk about this because you’re going to have a completely different take on the statement than I will. But what we definitely agree on is the statement and it’s twofold. Number one, your offering as a business is only as profitable in today’s market as it correlates to people’s ability to experience the value that you’re offering and the service and the product and the products themselves can’t be what you monetize. Right. The experience is what you monetize. Those two things are interwoven into the experience. I agree. So with that being said, success is directly correlated to how well you operate with this primary operating principle that you and I have fully embraced as the driving force behind our businesses, even though they’re in two separate industries. Sure. What I don’t know and what we need to talk about first is if our definition of success is similar. Does that sound fair?

Absolutely. So my question is, since you’re launching off of this and I think it’s a great place to launch off of, is how do you define success? Let’s start there and then I’ll follow in with how I look at it.

So okay, so you want me to go first? So I’m going to reference my phone because I was very intentional to think through this answer. Okay. So every word I have here is very thought out and I don’t want to miss it. Success is the substantial, substantial, and that word’s important, substantial increase in value in your business offering from that of your competition. Okay. That’s how I would define success, with the belief that everything else will follow.

I think that my definition of success is I’m such a results based person. So I would say that my definition of success is based off of the results and the satisfaction of the people that I serve. I think is really my metric for defining how I view success. So I serve both my staff and my clients.

Man, you are getting all that smoke off of that grill right now. Man, it’s just, it’s working with the drink.

So I’m good. Adding some flavor. Sorry to interrupt. So whenever I have staff that aren’t doing well and professionally or in their private lives like that, that tells me that I’m missing something and I’m not achieving a level of success that I want to be achieving. Same thing with my clients. If they’re not having overwhelming results from the services that I provide that have a dramatic impact on their lifestyle, then I feel like that that’s my responsibility. That’s what I’m going to go after. Yeah.

So I like the intrinsic ownership, even the extreme ownership, if we can steal from our good friend Jaco over there that we don’t know. The extreme ownership element of it.

Man, that cinnamon starting to really sink in. Yeah it is, your grill is really starting to go to town. So let’s let some of the smoke out.

Yeah, I was about to say, dang dude, you need to let that go.

Yeah, let that air out a little bit.

The camera crew is about to shut us down. Dang. I know. Heck yeah. As long as the fire department doesn’t show up, we’ll be okay. We’ll just keep filming. Just keep going. Yeah. Um, so, so what I think though, okay, so I love the extreme ownership element of it. What I think you’re missing in your definition is some, some point of reference to compare it to because if it’s just how you feel or if it’s just, and I’m totally open to the fact that maybe this is how it should be, and I’ll let you expound upon it if that’s the case. Okay. What I’m missing is some objective truth that you can use as a point of reference to correlate that, that metrics those results to. Right. Basically, what I, Because it can’t just be your feelings.

No, it’s not. I actually do use hard metrics, um, that, uh, data that I collect through various means, um, through my entire process of managing my business.

So then is success of utilitarian value to you?

Absolutely. I run my business based off of it.

Okay. So the only problem if we’re going to use utility as an absolute is the fact that utility is not an absolute. It’s a floating dynamic and it has to be because if you get so rigid in this concept of what success is today, then whenever the culture or the industry or something shifts, then you’re not positioned to shift with it.

So I think that you need to be moderately fluid in what your definition of success is and you can use similar metrics, but I think that you, that that definition should evolve as your business grows. Okay.

And you know what? Maybe I’m not being absolute. Actually, I’m going to challenge my own thought process there. In this definition, I gave you substantial increase in value in your business offering from your competition. Right. The competition is constantly, is a moving goalpost. Sure. Okay. So then what we have to say success is, is your ability to be flexible in your environment and still achieve the result that you’re going after. Yeah. Yeah. It definitely has to be related to something because you have to be doing better than what that something is. Right. So whether that something is your competition or that something is your personal best, personal best past experience, past experience.

I mean, I mean I, I’m big on, on slow shifts. I used to be like, Hey, let’s just flip this thing around and spin the board and see what happens on the other side. Like what you’re doing with your business now? Yeah. But it is what I’m doing with my business now. But that, the only reason it has that appearance is, is a whole lot of nuance changes all happening at one time. Sure. And so I’m not actually flipping the board around on this. I’m taking what was already on the board and I’m changing position just a little bit. And let’s just modify the playbook and move that X to where the O is. And it’s not a big, it’s big in the amount of different things that are happening at once. But any one of those things is attainable immediately because it’s such a small shift. Okay.

Okay. So notice what we didn’t say in our definition of success. We didn’t relate it to any type of a monetary factor.

No, I, I don’t like to associate money with success. I think that if we got into the world of personal success, which I think is, is separate from business success, I think that those are two different dynamics. They’re really two different entities with two different purposes in life. So in personal success, I think money is a factor, but you can’t put a price tag on it. Because I know people that I view as successful that makes $60,000 a year because they’ve set their lives up in such a way that $60,000 gives them the level of success that they desire to achieve happiness. And I know other people that, Well, you just defined success right there, but whatever level your business is at to achieve happiness.

Sure. The bad thing is, is that happiness, what’s that? What’s happiness?

That’s a very broad spectrum question. To me, happiness and freedom really go a lot in the same lines. And I don’t, I’m not gonna say that’s even necessarily true for everybody, but for me it is. I want freedom to help people. I want freedom to have the time to spend with my family and the people that I care about. I want to have some sort of platform, which in this case is my business, to have an impact in my community and the world around me. All those things I think are a culmination of happiness that’s like, I need that fulfillment as a man to know that I’m making a difference and I’m leaving the world different than I came into it. Sure. Yeah.

And I think that that’s an aspiration.

It’s an aspiration. And I think that there’s a recipe for success and happiness in that thought.

Okay. Okay. Yeah. Man, for the sake of this conversation together, and really it’s not just this conversation for what we’re trying to accomplish in the podcast itself as far as attaining an audience. It’s also just in the trying to tease out what is the best, right? And so in my mind, what is the best? And this actually leans into your idea of utility. Has the most maximal, for the sake of using, at the risk of using a redundancy, the most maximal effect for everyone. So what I want is a definition of success that is scalable. Yes. And so the primary operating principle is the strong relational focus between client, customer, those that receive your offering and those in your employees and team members, those that interact with the offering. Yep. So maximizing, so maximizing relational growth and automizing all of your processes to free up as much time to focus on those and not on the process itself.

Correct. The process is nothing more than a means to an end. It’s necessary to cross the finish line, but it doesn’t have an impact on what the finish line is.

So maybe in that regard, the definition of success is actually successfully implementing the primary operating principle.

Sure. I think in today’s culture that’s absolutely relevant. I think that’s where the conversation is going is like some cultural impact as well as like it’s just, there’s so much involved in that, in this box to unpack. The culture-Well, first of all, do we agree on the definition of success?

Yes. Okay. And then what we’re basically, what we just proposed to everyone then and to ourselves is that success is a byproduct of self-fulfillment. Agreed. Okay. I don’t know if I fully am behind it, but I get it. Like so the idea is if you focus on maximizing relational growth, and again, for the sake, I’m just trying to make sure we’re all on the same page. Painstakingly before we move forward. Sure. We want to make sure a good foundation is laid before we start building up walls here and realizing crap, we don’t have a sure footing. The idea is maximizing relational growth to those that receive your offering and those that participate in your offering, plus automizing business processes as much as possible so that everyone involved can participate in the experience of the relationship is in itself a sufficient enough definition of success.

I am a firm believer that if you achieve that level of success, then all other levels of success will follow. Okay.

Let’s challenge it.

Why? Okay. Let’s talk about your scaling standpoint. I think that that’s a valuable dynamic. So that’s internal and external pressure that causes, that allows you to scale or prevents you from scale. Internal pressure. Money is a factor in business. It has to be. It’s the lifeblood of a business. Without money, a business doesn’t exist. But money can always be remedied through a variety of different things. Through saving, investing. Money is something that you can develop over time. You can also get it really quick. Saving and partners. Money is something that’s fluid. You can be really creative on the money end. Something you can’t be creative on is your staff, your employees. People I believe are the key to scaling. You can always purchase equipment. You can always get money to purchase equipment. Most people that are selling equipment, like in my industry, will finance it to you for a long period of time and let it just pay for itself. So the equipment is, for all intents and purposes, free. When you look at it from that dynamic, it’s like, hey, I’m going to spend $100 a month on this piece of equipment starting this month, but this piece of equipment generates $500 a month for me in revenue.

So therefore, this piece of equipment pays for itself and generates $400 a month profit. So I don’t look at that from a scaling standpoint because that’s available across the board if you’re using equipment or whatever. But people is the bottleneck in scaling. If you don’t have people to fill the void of what you’re expanding to, then it’s impossible to grow. And so forming relationships is vital to the growth of any company. If you cannot do that, then you will never grow. You’ll be a one man show, that mom and pop shop that got two stalls and that’s what you do. And yeah, mama runs the books and daddy runs the wrench and they never grow past that. And it’s not because they weren’t good. They could have provided the best service possible and they’re experts and they perform incredibly well and they have maximum efficiency and done everything else right, but they never grow out of two bays because they never brought anybody else in. And it’s almost selfish because they have something so good to give to their community. And they’re so focused on keeping what they’ve got for themselves that they don’t share it with other people and bring them into that process and allow their employees to participate because they don’t have any.

They don’t want to do that because it’s extra work and it’s extra overhead and it’s all these things that it’s not. It’s necessary. It’s vital.

So many service industry jobs fall into that trap. And I think that’s the real value in what you’re articulating because in the end, they don’t have a business, they have a job. They have a job. They have enough of a business to support a job. And so that is directly proportionate to an inefficiency of being able to properly identify on both ends that you’re unable to deliver an experience on the back end of your team development and the front end of your relationship to your customers slash clients. And the reason for that is you’re too involved in the process. You’re too involved in the process because to you, the process is the offering. And the process is not the offering. The process is services. And in the end, you’re unable to deliver on experience because you focused on services.

Well, and it’s crazy because it actually affects their price point. The way they conduct business affects their price point because they don’t have the value offering upfront to attract higher paying clients that are willing to spend more money for a higher level of service. Because you’re not capable of providing a higher level service because you don’t have the manpower or bandwidth to do so.

Dude, my industry is so similar. And the problem that people run into my industry is so similar. Like most advisors believe that their primary value is in creating and constructing portfolios. But when it comes to investment, that’s just something that happens in this day and age. I can do that. This is in the 90s. I know I can do that on E-Trade. You’re about the same. Yeah. Yeah. So someone who’s an outsider to my industry immediately sees the problem to that. Right. But my own industry doesn’t see the problem in that. It’s like, listen, your job can be automated. You’re 35 basis points on Vanguard and you’ll starve on 35 basis points. So you really don’t understand what your value is. Your value is now commoditized because you have solely married it to a service. Yep. And not an experience. So yeah, maybe success can be married to maybe we are on to something. Maybe this primary operating principle is the key.

I think it absolutely is. I think that’s something that you’ve hinted at. I’d like to flush it out and I’ll start with it and I’ll let you fix what I said wrong. But I think that what we really need to identify is what business we’re in. This goes back to like the movie Founder where it’s like, hey, we’re selling burgers. Like, no, you’re not in the burger business. You’re in the real estate business.

Yeah. What was that? That was a great movie. That was Michael Keaton’s movie. Founders. I love that movie. Yeah. Ray Kroc. It’s the McDonald’s story. And so I think that’s a really profound moment for so many entrepreneurs whenever they recognize that businesses aren’t face value. What you’re in the business of doesn’t necessarily isn’t reflective of your services or your products. It’s there’s so many other factors that are involved that you have to really look at the underlying problem. And so like I’m going to steal a little bit of your thunder. Like you, you’re in the service industry and you, you technically am the same as you are financial services. But like, like you said, there’s more to it than just a portfolio. That’s the product. That’s the byproduct. What you’re selling them is the value of what you offer them and the customized needs meeting that happens there. And that’s where I’m the individual base on the individual basis.

And so we’re moving into that culture where customizing everything is important. I mean, let’s talk, we’re talking about McDonald’s. So I remember as a kid, when you went to a restaurant, I mean, 20 years ago, man, 20 years ago, I kid, I was in high school, but still, uh, when you went to a restaurant, you ordered what was on the menu and it came the way it came. Sometimes you could, Hey, leave the onions off, leave the pickles off, whatever. But like it wasn’t common. Um, now I can look, pull up DoorDash on my phone. And when I order a burger, it’s got a list of everything that’s on it. And I get to pick what I want and what I don’t want. Yeah. And that’s a great illustration of what most people are looking for in a relationship with a business is something that’s customized to meet their needs specifically, because even though we have a lot of the same problems, the roots of those problems stem from different things. Um, the impact of those problems on our lives because of our life position is different. And so we’re all impacted differently, even if the exact same result happened like COVID.

Great example, same thing happened to everybody. We all got to stay home. We all, uh, had to wear masks and do all this other crazy stuff. It doesn’t matter. Everybody had to do the same things everywhere. Coast to coast, few exceptions, some more extreme than others, but the general dynamic of this country was the same everywhere. And everybody’s life was impacted with the same events except for Florida, Texas, and Tennessee.

Go ahead. Yeah.

But the way that individuals were impacted by those events were completely different person to person. Yeah. People had needs that needed to be met in different ways. And whenever you’re out there serving those needs on an individual customized basis, like you’re going to create a client, you’re going to create a relationship with your clients or customers. That’s unique to what’s happened in any other place they do business with in your specific industry. And you’re going to develop relationship and trust, and you’re going to know their needs and know how to better meet their needs and create shifts within your business to figure out some of those dynamics. It’s like, man, I got a lot of customers with this need that we’re not fulfilling very well. I think I can do better at this and serve these people better. And that’s how I do business. Not what I’m doing. I fix cars. Like that’s what we do. But the way I gain customers and the way I do transactions is based off of the needs of the customer. How can I better serve them? How can when they wake up at 7 30 in the morning to take their kids to school and their car doesn’t start, how can I make their life less stressful this morning?

And I send one of my guys in a four door quad cab pickup to take that mom and her two kids to school, take her to work. And I’ve got a wrecker coming to get her car to my shop.

Do you charge for it?

And I don’t even charge for it.

See you give away the service for free because the offering is in the experience. See that’s where I was hoping you were going to take that. I’m selling the value. You’re selling the value. OK, so what’s your value proposition? My value proposition is… Most people aren’t even going to they think, OK, Chris Taylor is a mechanic. He owns an auto he owns an automotive shop. In the next couple of years, he’s going to be scaling. He’s going to be buying multiple automotive shops, putting them under the same umbrella. They wouldn’t even guess your value proposition if they were just thinking under the terms of the typical odd automotive shop. What is your value proposition? My value proposition is that I understand the impact that your car or not having your car has in your life. And I’m addressing that concern and making that as easy as possible for you through this difficult transition, which I’m going to make as short as possible at a reasonable level. So I I look at everybody’s car for free because I don’t know what’s wrong with it. I know what they told me. I know what the symptoms are, but I don’t even have a game plan.

I have so many customers that come into my I guarantee I get two to three a week. I call them hero calls. And someone comes in with a problem and we do our free check and we actually fix their problem during that that that 15 minute no wrench inspection where we’re trying to see where we need to go with the vehicle.

Do you charge them for it? It’s free. It’s like, no, if I say it’s free, it’s free.

So that’s you taking a risk on the product and service level to take your offering to an even higher level. I don’t view it as a risk. Some of my guys have even brought it up like, man, that’s kind of risky the way you’re doing business. I was like, it is not risk. This is an investment in the relationship with my community. Okay. And by the way, holy shit, I’m buzzed right now. Those things are stout and delicious. Delicious. Got to be careful. Oh, man, but we’re having such a great conversation right now. So let’s keep the ball. I mean, so like, let’s keep it rolling. I mean, that’s what I want people to realize that you have brought your value position and I presented it up front down to the relational level.

That’s it. I don’t care about you are literally a problem solver.

That’s it. And I’m solving more than just their car problems because solving their life, their life problems because it’s like through vehicles, their car is broke. How is that impacting them? Let me address that. Their car is going to get fixed either way. It has to. It has to get fixed or replaced because it’s such a disruptor in their life that it’s something that’s going to get resolved one way or the other. And I am somewhat, I’m a guide through that process to help them get to the other side because there are some times I’m like, dude, this is not worth fixing. Like it’s not like I really think you can take the money it would cost to fix this car. And I think you can go down to this car lot and replace this thing and be in a way better position. I don’t fix every car that comes into my shop because it doesn’t make sense every time. And I need to be realistic about that.

I’m so glad you brought that up. That’s what people are going to have to realize that if you play in these waters, the idea in the product oriented business space is that if the man wants a green suit, sell them a green suit. And then in the service oriented area, it was almost like, man, everyone that can fog a mirror is our customer. That is not how you play. I don’t play that way. I don’t. And no, not every customer that comes in is right for me. And what’s nice is the way that I do business allows everybody the opportunity to see if they’re a fit, but allows us early on to identify whether we’re going to be able to do business together or not. And that’s good for them and for me.

And I’m going to steal one of these. Yeah, go for it. And with no money involved, like I don’t even want to be transactional until the very end.

Like money is not at the forefront of my mind when I’m conducting business because I know that if I’m conducting it well, money will be there at the end of the process. And so yeah, I provide all this value upfront. I check these cars in for free. I tell them for free, man, if they don’t repair, there’s no charge. When I say free, excuse me.

Wow. I was like free.

When I say free, I mean free. And I am totally transparent with my processes in that regard. So we are in danger of skipping a podcast right now. Like that tells you just how passionate we are about what we do, dude, and the years of conversations that we have had in building this. So let’s stop right there. And I think we’ve thrown the poppers on. Let’s throw the poppers on. And we’ve teased enough value for another conversation when we delve into the what. We’ve already talked about the who and the why. And what I want to talk about in this podcast is the when. And that’s really boiling down to demographics. So let’s see if we can properly identify demographics while you talk about these poppers. Okay. The poppers, these are, they’re super simple. I buy these pre-made, but you can make them real easy at home. If you just get some precooked brisket, chopped, obviously, because I don’t know how you’re gonna get sliced brisket inside a jalapeno. And then mix the brisket with the cream cheese, throw them inside, half sliced jalapenos that are seeded and deveined and wrap those in bacon, throw them on the grill.

And those are probably going to cook for about 20, 30 minutes and let that bacon crisp up and we’ll be in a pretty good spot. Oh, just got a glimpse of those wagyu. Oh yes, man. They’re thick and fat, man. They’re big girls.

I gotta talk about how much I’m a lightweight right now. I’m so cuddly. That was great. Holy cow, dude. That was less than one. I haven’t even finished it. It didn’t even taste like alcohol. Oh no, that is so dangerous. Like that is the most dangerous drink you have ever created of the last two drinks. It has zero alcohol flavor. And this stuff is just like not a far stretch.

It’s not a, it’s a short kick to moonshine. Like it is strong, man. You’re feeling it too, right? A little bit. Okay. Tell me you’re feeling it so I don’t feel like, you know, I’m an absolute lightweight. Yeah, bro. I mean, I’m feeling it. Oh man. Oh, wow. Are you, are you guys feeling it? Not like you are. I don’t know. It takes a lot from me. I’m a fricking lightweight, but that’s not a negative. Wow. That is delicious though. Holy cow. Like that is deceitful. The last two drinks that you made in the last two seasons, they’re basically the same. Basically the only difference is we added smoke and then we used two different bourbons. And so that’s just a traditional West Texas. This is a very different dynamic from those. Oh my gosh. In fact, this is almost not an old fashioned.

Yeah, it really isn’t. It’s not like any old fashioned I’ve ever experienced. No, I’m almost afraid to finish it. I think I’m going to get the water here and then I’ll have you make me a second one. Okay. If there’s anything, this is adding to a very good conversation right now. We’ll work on that. Wow. Because the thing is, when you and I normally talk, and that’s what I really wanted to delve on, the reason why we started these mastermind groups isn’t the fact that… Okay, we need to find our people. And this is what I honestly believe. In the end, we’re the ones that change the world. The government doesn’t change the world. We change the world. Because we’re the ones that are moving things. We don’t even feel the impacts of what we do now. If we’re right, and that’s a big what if, like if you’re right, if you’re right like Elon Musk level, if you’re right, you don’t feel the impacts of it until 20, 30 years down the line. Sure. It is very lonely what we do. So to be able to find people, and man, if there’s any hope in this podcast, it’s just that we find people like us that want to mastermind how we do.

Well, not just mastermind, but people that actually want to master their own lives. That want to-That’s masterminding.

Ultimately, business is an extension of yourself. It is.

And that’s something I know a second ago, financially, business and personal are separate. They have to be from a money perspective. And so I did highlight that aspect of it earlier. But as far as a lifestyle decision to become an entrepreneur, there’s no boundaries anymore. It’s just you. And everything that your life is, is an extension of you. Your family, your children, your friends, your sports, your hobbies, your business, all these things are all you. And I think that that’s why it’s so important to measure success on personal fulfillment, because all those things are all encompassing. It’s one life.

Yeah.

Whenever you’re an employee, you get to leave work at 530. Exactly. And that problem stays in that building you just left. When you’re the owner, that problem is wherever you are, because it’s your problem. And I just want other entrepreneurs to know that. You know what? There’s nothing wrong with you, even though society may condemn you from time to time.

But society needs you. We’re the ones that actually create opportunities for employees, for other people. We’re the ones that create economies.

I’m going to put a pin right there just for a second. Let’s take a short runner off of that. And we define success. I think that we also, this is a great opportunity that you lined up to talk about what failure is. I think it’s important because failure, I see so many people are like, man, I’m failing. And they might be failing in an event. In a short timeline, they might be failing. Things might not be going right. I’ve been there, done that. You’ve been there, done that. Where we feel like we’re failing. And what I do-In season and out of season. Yeah. It’s not a one time thing. It’s not a one time thing. And I am a firm believer in what all the other online Googlers talk about that the only way you fail is to quit. I’m a firm believer in that. I think that’s literally the only way you fail. You might not achieve success every time. But the only way you ever genuinely fail is to not continue achieving success. One hundred percent agree.

And I don’t want to dive too far into that.

But I think it’s important to identify that, that an event, a bad day, something catastrophic happening is not a failure. It is another opportunity.

Yeah. But I can see where you bounced off my idea on that. Because when you’re an entrepreneur, the reason why you feel so lonely, it’s okay that no one can relate to your successes.

Yes. But nobody can relate to your failures. No one can relate to your failures. That’s what makes it so hard. Yeah. Even, okay, so even our camera people right now and we’re teasing them right now, but we really love these guys. So I mean, even we can throw a shout out, FilmHunter Media, man. We’re not dealing with employees. We’re dealing with entrepreneurs. These guys are even entrepreneurs. So not only can they add to the show, which will include our camera people into the show in the future. I really want to do that.

They’re included in the food and drinks on there.

Yeah, they are. They are. So that counts, right? Yeah. They’re grateful for that. They’re grateful for that, because we’re paying them. But the idea too is that they’re an audience for this show. This is such a huge tribe. And I wish we had a culture that didn’t demonize entrepreneurship to the extent that it does sometimes. I wish that it really actually… That we kind of had a place in mainstream culture, but even if we don’t, it’s okay, because we’re going to still keep doing what we’re doing.

I want to take a minute. I think that’s a great thing. I’ve got a point that I think could bring some greater appreciation to entrepreneurship. It’s just a concept. There’s nothing factual about this, but I think that you as a viewer could take this and just internalize it and think about it. But I’ve heard a lot talking on social media lately about how there should be a cap to maximum income. Oh, really? Yeah, absolutely. That there’s people that believe that nobody should ever be a billionaire because that’s so far in excess. And I’m not going to deny that it is that far in excess, because it is. I don’t need a billion dollars to be happy or be comfortable or be healthy. That’s not the point. And I’m going to make this point. Would you be willing to risk your entire paycheck for an opportunity to make 10% more? And I’d be willing to bet the answer is no. That you’d be willing to risk. Every week, throw your paycheck out on the table and roll the dice and you either make nothing or you make 10% more.

Yeah, the average person doesn’t do that.

The average person is never going to do that, but that’s what entrepreneurship is. It is literally risking everything that you have, your house, your car, your family, your everything and throwing it on the line and saying, you know what? I believe in so much what I’m doing that I’m willing to risk my entire livelihood and all my assets to achieve a higher level of success and 10% doesn’t cut it. If I’m making a hundred grand, I don’t want to come back for 110. I want to throw it all online and come back with a million. And so when we’re talking about billionaires, guess what? Those guys are throwing millions on the line and they’re not going to throw it on there for a couple of million more. Like the risks and reward has to weigh out. And so I would just want to put that into perspective for people and like, Hey, would you risk your whole paycheck every week and take full responsibility for that for a little bit more or a lot a bit more? And so don’t do not be upset with entrepreneurs when they win big. Yeah. Because they earn that right.

And they sweated it out and they lost plenty along the way to get there.

I promise. Okay. So that actually speaks to a greater point. And that is that a rising tide does lift all boats, right? Yes. So when they succeed, everybody succeeds because this is where your jobs come from. And if you doubt that, try and get a job from a poor person. It doesn’t exist.

It doesn’t exist.

And when they fail, they own it. So when they succeed, everybody else owns it. When they fail, they own it. And somehow this isn’t treated as an honorable thing. Right. I think it’s perfectly fair. I think it’s honorable.

And not only that, it’s absolutely necessary in a capitalist society. So I will tell you why you probably are hearing on social media that there’s an income gap because there’s this painting in a broad brushstroke that all entrepreneurs are the same way. And then they take entrepreneurs and then they marry that with this corporatism. And we’re not corporate. We are not at all. You and I are the polar opposite of corporate culture. I think it’s a great interlude. Yeah. Yeah. So like if that’s the demographic that we’re speaking to, wrong demographic, right? So like everyone thinks that entrepreneurs are the next Enron. We don’t want to be that. That is not true at all. But I mean, in this super ideological soaked culture where everything is understood through the lens of ideology, what’s lost is this true spirit of freedom and entrepreneurism. Because now we have to put ourselves in an ideological box. So either you believe in the blue box or you believe in the red box. And neither of them are the box. And look at the race. Oh, flip it. That makes me happy. It’ll also make you a little more sober.

I might need to eat those while you’re one of those while you’re doing the Wagyu. You know what’s another demographic to entrepreneurism? Oh, do you need to throw something else on there or are we still good on the poppers? We’re still good on the poppers. We’ll get those going. We got some time. So good. So then let me finish this thought. So then another demographic of entrepreneurship is family. There is a super strong focus on family that no one ever talks about. And even entrepreneurial podcasts isn’t talked about a whole lot, which surprises me, man. So like, for example, and then I want to see where you go with this because I know we’ve got different thoughts on this.

So like my girls are here today. And why are they here? Because I want to teach them entrepreneurship. I want them to learn freedom. I want them to know my little one right there made a still motion video all on her own. That’s so awesome. And you know what? My impulse as an entrepreneur is I want my kids to be involved here with Filmhunter Media because they can learn things just through osmosis of being around it and exposed to it and having that opportunity that never existed for us when we were kids. That’s what we do with our families. Yeah. So I don’t know if that’s where you thought where I was going to go with it, but that’s where I went with it. So why don’t you take it?

I think that’s really important. I mean, we talked about this last podcast, but I don’t think that you can. I’ll risk it. I don’t think that you can really undervalue the proposition that like, um, and family so important. It’s like, I’m going to make you another one. Jesus. Finish your water. It’s so delicious. People don’t understand how delicious that is. Um, but yeah, so where was I going with that?

Okay. So the family thing. Um, I think it’s so important to account for the human element in general. And so we think about our families and Hey, yeah, I’m, I’m not just building this, um, generational wealth. We hear, throw that term around a lot, man. I’m not handing my kids any money. Like I’m going to make that clear right now. That’s my money. I earned it. And, uh, and that’s the same thing.

They’re like, dad, we’re like really successful right now. I’m like, your mom and I are doing well. My bro, my youngest two are very happy. Happy to tell people that they are rich and I am very happy to correct them and tell them that I am rich and they are fortunate.

That’s a good way of putting it, man. Your mom and I are doing well right now. Y’all are broke.

Yes. And all my kids work. They’re a little entrepreneurs. Um, my, my eight year old son, um, he does, um, streaming for video games, like things like that. And I’m out encouraging my kids to pursue whatever makes them happy, whatever they’ll feel fulfilled in, whatever they feel has value in their life. And if that’s video games for an eight year old, to me that makes perfect sense. Like, and that’ll transgress into something else as he gets older. And if it doesn’t, then, and he’s successful in it, then congratulations, bro.

Like you mean to use the word transgress or transfer? I don’t know. I’ll leave the word to you. That floored me, dude. You said if that transgresses into something else, okay. Transfers into something else. Maybe. Cool.

So yeah, I mean, there’s a lot of different dynamics, but like even with my guys, like I think the human or my clients, I think that’s what makes what we’re doing so valuable in general is that we, it’s not treated as a card to fix. It’s a person to take care of. It’s not treated as an employee to make money off of, it’s a person to invest in. And all of those kinds of things. And really appreciating to maximum potential, the people element that we do, we grow our business and scale our business with people and we conduct business with people and we take that home and we, and all those things add up in our households to people that grow into people. So like, yeah, yes, yes, yes.

And the people element is so undervalued in a lot of different industries that it’s so transactional and it’s so product based where you’re buying a burger.

So just be happy with your greasy ass burger. Like no, I want it with a smiley, some.

And also that goes into this aspect of the social economy. People will only buy into businesses that have like a social element to it. That’s another dynamic of the experience based economy. And I think what that is is a translation of that relational level. They want to have a relationship with their product that transcends just the product offering itself. Yeah, the product or the services is almost the role of it.

It’s a necessity in most cases. I mean, especially like in me, like I’m an automotive, like you have a car, you need to fix it. If you’ve got a house, you need a, you’re going to need a plumber at some point. You’re going to need an electrician at some point. You’re going to need all these people. Like those are necessities to modern life to have whatever your problem is fixed. You’re going to do it. Like I promise you’re going to do it. Whether it’s you found somebody on Facebook or Craigslist or you hired a company or your, your dad does it or your brother, it doesn’t matter. I guarantee you’re going to resolve this issue. If you’ve got no running water in your house, you’re going to get it fixed. It’s not a question. So why are we selling on the proposition? I hate that whenever I first got automotive industry, there’s some of you guys like, oh yeah, man, this is the best business ever. Shit sells itself. And it kind of did. But I was like, it doesn’t have to be that way.

Cause these people are going to fix it anyway. Why can’t I just provide them an immense amount of value? A really great.

Um, well, it adds to the commodization fact itself. There is an aspect of self-interest. It is if it’s just, Hey, the water, the water’s out and we need to fix that. We need to get water. Then if all’s it is, is the service, then you’re commoditized. Your value is just a commodity. It’s a rise to zero. It is. So you have to be able to offer an experience that delivers a value that says, Hey, you should pay me more than your competition. Which you see what I did right there. I just took that and tied that back to my definition of success. Very nice. Okay. Man, this would be a great segue into now let’s and I think we’ve already, this has been an amazing conversation by the way.

It’s been pretty different compared to our other two.

So yeah, this was the perfect buildup and I think we just let it all out and that might be the alcohol that just kind of put down the, uh, the walls there. Blame it on the maple syrup, bro. But after you’re done throwing some food back on the grill, let’s segue and talk about, um, specifically demographics and let’s really try to define what that is.

I agree. So we’re going to do some green beans today. I like to use on the grill. These are fresh. Um, just cut green beans. Definitely not out of a can. Hate that crap. We’re going to throw a little bit of olive oil on there. Nice. You don’t have to go too crazy, but it needs something to kind of saturate with. And then we’re going to do some salt and pepper. And you can go heavier than you think on the salt and pepper on this stuff. Cause it, I mean, that’s a lot of green beans. It’s not just a single serving. True. And so a lot of people I found whenever I see them cooking, like they, they season it like they would season their plate. And uh, it’s like, man, this is four plates worth of food. So, and then I’m actually going to throw on some smoky mesquite seasoning today. Add a little bit of flavor to it.

Well it goes with the theme of our bourbon as well.

Yes. And so we’re going to add that in there and we’re going to wrap that up and throw that on the grill and get that kind of steaming. And that way it’ll be right. So man, take a whiff of that. Oh, that’s good. Oh man. Like we’ve, this is going to be such an aromatic meal. I’ll tell you what, between like the smoky mesquite seasoning and the bourbon and the cinnamon sticks, like there is a lot of smoke, there’s a lot going on out here. I’ll tell you what, my water, my mouth has been watering the whole time we’ve been out here today. You know, my wife’s been trying to get me to eat more vegetables and I have, and really it’s because we’ve been grilling a whole lot more. Okay. And, and uh, it’s not only therapeutic from like a really stressful day, but man, it just gets you to eat more vegetables because vegetables really do taste phenomenal when they’re seasoned right and they’re grilled. Oh yeah.

They’re amazing.

Huge fan. Yeah. So, um, I’m going to tie this, circle this back and then segue into demographics. Please do. Okay. So circling back to one of the points that I wanted to make about, um, masterminding and, and why we do it isn’t just the lonely effect as well. It’s, it’s also this, this idea of how much we get to accomplish and influence each other. And I think we highlighted that by saying, Hey man, we can look at where we’re at with our business and look at the last seven years of conversation and see how we really influence each other. We wouldn’t be successful in the businesses we’re at today if it wasn’t for the conversations that we’ve had with each other. That’s just a fact. It is. And the fact that we, we decided to start this podcast and expand that, um, it’s just amazing that we get to the technology and the platform itself now allows us to take this idea and these little masterminding groups that we’ve started and kind of failed that because they kind of fizzled out over time. I wouldn’t say give it structure and expand it. I agree.

I wouldn’t say that we failed. We ended up connecting people that didn’t share the same vision. Sure.

Sure. Sure.

And so, cause not all entrepreneurs are the same either. They’re not the same. We don’t have the same goals. You and me, the reason we connect and the reason we can continue to mastermind is because our common end game goals, regardless of industry action, our purpose is the same, which is to deeply serve our community. Yeah. And even though talking about the last two podcasts, we arrive at it from a completely different completely different place, but our end game is the same and everybody else has participated with us in other masterminds doesn’t necessarily have that same end game.

So true. So let’s talk about demographics. Okay. So good. Yeah, man. So again, I wrote this down just cause I didn’t want to forget about it. So demographics is normally defined in sociological terms or socioeconomic population size, growth, density, validity, like level. And that’s not what we’re talking about at all. So demographics, you’re going to come at it from a different place than I am. Sure. So let me kind of just highlight where I’m coming from it, where I’m coming from. And then I really want to know where you’re coming from. And just like how we kind of work through this idea of success, let’s work through this idea of demographic. Sure. So I look at it more from the idea of distribution scales. Okay. And let me be more specific when I say that, like we’re not all created equal. And I know in today’s culture, that’s a very controversial thing to say, but the truth of the matter is, is that we do fall under different dimensions of an intelligence distribution. I thought we were going to fall under different spirit fingers. We’re not all on the idea of like, okay, so intelligence isn’t distributed equally, I guess is what I’m trying to say.

We do come from different perspectives there.

I would also venture to expand upon that and say experiences not distributed evenly as well.

Experiences isn’t driven, intelligence isn’t. The socioeconomic aspect of it, since you brought that up, that’s a good one too. That’s different. Occupations were in different ideas of this distribution scale. Not all occupations are the same. They’re not. Not all industries are the same. So here’s the question, Chris, if that’s how we’re really going to look at, well first, no, let’s question this. Is that really the demographic? Is that really the lens of how we should be looking at this conversation when we discuss demographics? When does the primary operating principle apply? I think that there’s, right now, there’s not a super clear answer to that. I think that it’s kind of 50-50. I see a lot of industries moving towards what we describe as the primary operating principle. Some people that have already achieved it, that do this, that’s how they conduct business. Chick-fil-A is a great example of that. Best Buy is actually moving in that direction, believe it or not. A lot of your online based stores have been in that direction. We just didn’t recognize it for what it was because it was so new we couldn’t see what was happening until later.

But Amazon Prime, I can order something online, have it in two days. Then I’m going to throw in all these added values. You get free TV and all these other things. They’re big on their value proposition. Well again, that’s taking it to the corporate level. That’s another demographic. Are we dealing solely with corporations? Are we talking solely with small business owners like you and me?

I think it matters everywhere. Realistically, on a long term scale, and when I say long term, I mean 10 years. I think that this is absolutely where we’re moving and that it’s imperative that you start moving in that direction. I don’t think all industries need to jump on it and shift everything in their business today.

Okay, so which ones don’t? This is what we’re really trying to struggle through, right? I mean, it’s like-You know what? Let me rephrase.

Okay. Do you have to? No. Would any industry benefit from making this shift? Yes.

Okay. I think-I would say there’s some industries that are an absolute yes. My industry, if you don’t, you’re an idiot.

I think that service-based industry as a whole is an absolute yes. You have to be making this shift. Product-based industries need to be moving in that direction.

I think that’s-So what would be the product-based industries? Shoes, towels, bedding, products, whatever, consumer goods. A lot of those are distributed to service-based distributors now, right? Correct. You don’t just have a sole product-oriented business anymore. Maybe I’m wrong.

I think you are, especially, man. When you look online, there’s so many people promoting their own products through web pages and things like that. It’s easy for one-But people don’t buy into products as much as they buy into the services, right? That’s the chicken before the egg. Well, and I think that the word service in general needs to be replaced with the word relationship. The reason-That’s what you and I would argue.

Yeah, absolutely.

I think that that is absolutely the truth, and here’s why. Man, great example. Great example of this, specifically. I had a customer this week. I personally knew the guy, but he didn’t know I owned the shop. Brought his car in because he found us on Google and brought it in because we had good reviews and he had heard some good positive feedback from other people that have done business with us. Brought it in. Okay. Okay, whatever. And so then I ended up figuring out that this is the guy that I actually know. I thought it may have was. It was a common name, so it could have been anybody, but it ended up being the person that I knew directly and ended up calling like, hey man, you didn’t even tell me you were bringing your car down here. I didn’t even know that was your shop. Like whatever, because we’re just acquaintances, but we know each other from some different events and things like that. And ended up talking to the guy and he had not approved all of his services that needed to be done to his vehicle. He had approved like two thirds of them.

It was like, now I’ll get someone else to take care of that for me. I called the guy just to check up on him. Man, I hadn’t seen you in a while. I didn’t even know your car was in the shop. Like whatever, and just conversation, just whatever. And then he’s like, oh, so you own this shop and this and that. Oh dude, like all that stuff they quoted me, take care of all of that because now I know who I’m doing business with. Isn’t that something? And it wasn’t the company name. It wasn’t the guy in the office. It was me. It was that individual relationship that’s like, oh, I know where this is going. I know you and I know you’re not going to let me down. So just take care of everything that I need because we have a relationship.

The scariest thing I ever did was leave the security of the firm that I left. I have to be careful how I phrase this because there’s regulatory considerations. Not to say this, man, the resounding feedback that I got was that my relationship isn’t with the firm that you were with. My relationship’s with you. And there’s an intimate relationship when you’re talking about this is the money that people, this is family’s money that I manage. This is all their hopes, dreams, and aspirations is wrapped into this. And they had to make a value judgment. They had to say, okay, is my value judgment with the firm that he represented? If that’s the case, it’s got to stay at the firm. However much I love Jason or is it with Jason? And 95% of them said Jason. And that was asking them to take a huge risk. Absolutely.

So that’s what we talked about as far as the relationship dynamic in service-based. We both gave great examples of service-based and you said, how does that apply in a product-based? Does product-based employees exist?

Well, what I really asked was, is there any more product-based businesses that solely exist and they’re offering their value is tied to just the product and not the service?

The answer is successful ones, no. There are product-based businesses that literally all they do is sell a product. But the way that they sell the products is by developing a personal relationship with their client base and then meeting a need within them. Not even Verizon and AT&T even are product-based. They’re solely service-based. They give their phones away practically for nothing at cost. Generally, yeah, that’s not where they’re making their money.

Who makes money on just the products?

Well, even look at video games like Fortnite, great example. So free game blew up, took over the freaking internet in five years and becomes the world’s most played game because they gave it away for free and generate more revenue than any other game that’s existed from in-game purchases. My kid’s poison is Roblox, but it’s the same concept. So I think that that is the greatest illustration of what we’re trying to describe is man, give away all your good stuff for free and then just create a transaction on the backside because they actually want to give you money. It’s the experience. Yeah, they’re happy already.

Actually, that’s perfect because what Fortnite and Roblox are selling is an experience that you’ll have with us that you won’t have with anyone else. And in return, we will give the products away for free.

Yeah, even when I come in my free checks, we fix someone’s car for free in 10 minutes or less, people want to give us money. And we’re like, no dude, like there’s literally no charge. I don’t even know.

There’s no, I don’t even know. Isn’t that amazing? I didn’t give you anything. Like I literally just plugged this thing back in and made your life better. That’s awesome. I was so happy to be part of that process. But like I can’t take your money because I literally didn’t do anything that’s that grand. I know the impact is grandiose, but the effort that I put into it was standard.

So maybe that’s the key demographic to the primary operating principle. It’s people that want to operate at that level to where you will do that and people actually assess your value so much higher than what you’re giving away for free. So for example, when I made this transition again to the deal that I did, I found out that I could charge people double what I’m charging them. That’s crazy. Yeah. I could literally double and they wouldn’t think that I was defrauding them. The perceived value is so much higher than what I’m actually charging in proportion to what I’m actually giving away.

Well, I give away a lot now. So I didn’t even always operate the way I’m operating now. I used to charge for absolutely everything. Nothing was free. Like nothing ever. Not a red penny. If I found it on the ground, I’m adding it to the bill. Like that’s how I was taught. That’s how I was mentored and that’s how my industry has been and continues to operate in a large portion of it is everything needs to be paid for. And I don’t have a problem with that inherently. I think that that’s reasonable. I think you’re providing something. You should be compensated for it. So I get that. I don’t think it’s a poor philosophy. I just don’t think it’s optimal. Key word, optimal. Optimal. So I operated that way for the first 18 months in my business after I purchased it. Like same way we’d always operate and sure I made money and we generate revenue and profit and all the good things that a business does. But I was like, man, there’s gotta be a better way. I know that there’s bigger numbers out there for me. How do I get them? And ended up going to a conference and they’re like, man, give more stuff away.

Like you need to provide value upfront to develop trust and build that relationship on your dime and start investing in your clients instead of letting them invest in you. And what I found in that is-That’s the selflessness of entrepreneurship.

Well it’s also the selfishness because the concept behind that-Self interest.

Self interest. There’s a balance to it, but the idea behind that is just a different, is a change in the sales dynamic from where we used to be, where we hard sell everything. I’m going to convince you, you need this, so you’ll buy it. And this new sales concept is I’m going to present this to you in the form of a solution so that way you recognize the value in it and then you choose to buy it. Which is very different. Very different. And so what we’re doing is we’re literally providing so much value upfront that the idea of a purchase on the backside, walking away from that is inconceivable because I’ve given you so much that when I have an ask, you feel obligated to meet the demand.

I love the fact you just used inconceivable. Maybe I am a Nazi for certain words that are used, but do you, you might never go back to that movie, the princess bride. Have you ever watched that? Inconceivable. Inconceivable. Yes. Everybody’s seen that. It’s like every man’s favorite romance movie. There you go. Right? It’s the one we’re willing to watch.

That’s the only one I’m willing to watch. My wife’s first movies you want to watch me was the notebook and I barely made it through that. Yeah. A little bit rougher. Dang. Those are looking good, man.

Yeah. I think it’s time to go and pull the poppers off and let’s pull them off.

Get that going. Do you need anything from me? Are you good?

I’ve got it, man. Awesome. So, uh, and so, all right, so let’s revive right where we’re at. Cause I just lost my spot.

I don’t know if we’ve successfully defined what we believe demographics are, but I think we have indirectly. I think so. I don’t think that there is a real genuine clear line definition. I think that this really applies to everybody. I do believe that it applies to everybody differently. Um, yes. That, man, if you’re in the car industry, it’s going to look different than being in the financial services industry. It’s going to be different than being in the orthopedic shoes industry. But we’ve made a sufficient enough argument for the fact that whatever space you’re in, it applies. This applies at, at, at best it’s optimal at worse. It’s an absolute necessity or your value will be commoditized.

And I think as time moves forward, you have to make this shift. It’s only going to shift more and more toward the necessity.

Yeah. Towards the necessity. At some point it’s going to end up going to where if you didn’t make the shift, you will fail. And it’s by your own choice, by failure to adapt, you became too rigid. You excuse me. Wow. Man, that stuff makes me burp. Okay. But, uh, you gotta be flexible enough to adapt and shift with what’s happening and what, uh, provides the most value to your client base and your organization as a whole. Heck yeah. All right guys.

Oh yeah. It gets you some of that. Yes sir. Yes sir. I’m going to definitely grab one. Do you girls want one? Do you guys want a jalapeno popper? They’re spicy. No? No, no spicy peppers. Oh, Sarah’s my brave one.

Yeah. Yeah. Come. There we go. Come right here and grab one. Yeah. Here we go. You’re welcome. It’s hot. It’s hot. You may want to put it on the cushion. Put it on the cushion. Man, thank you for doing this dude. That was an awesome choice. Yes sir. Jalapeno poppers. Brisket jalapeno poppers. I’m going to let that cool down a little bit and then I’ll dive in. I’m going to have a little bit. And it’s a great appetizer.

Oh man, everybody loves these things. Everybody knows what they are now. They’re not a secret. No. Texas might have kept them a secret for a little while, but not that long. They didn’t last long.

And I mean the Wagyu and the greens dude, when we eat them, this is a great appetizer. So sorry to the camera guys, only get one. Just kidding. If you guys want to grab another one, you can grab another one. Good. Then if we’re on the same page when it comes to the demographics, then there’s some assumptions that we’ve agreed to. Okay. We’ve agreed to the fact that people, we do assume that people fall under the category of different distributions of intelligence. But what we’re saying is to an extent that doesn’t matter. It doesn’t. Is that a correct assumption?

Yes. And I want to take it one step further because this is the place where I want to take it in the conversation that I think is super valid and important is knowing who you are as a person and as an organization, a business, and being able to correctly identify the people that you are best equipped to serve. I think that that’s so important that marrying yourself to a demographic or to, I hate using the word demographic, to a persona, to a group of people that you are best fit to serve. Because let’s think about this. Casio makes a watch that tells you the time, that’ll tell you the date, that has a stopwatch and all these other cool things on it. Okay. And that watch costs $25. Rolex makes a watch that does less things that costs $12,000.

What’s the difference? The average person would just say brand name. Yeah, but the difference is the needs of the person purchasing the product.

Okay. A person that is capable of purchasing a Rolex devalues their self and their position by going out and buying Casio.

That might be a provocative thing to say. Please expand further. But before you do, let me tell you, the reason why you’ve been seeing me stir the cinnamon stick is also I’m procrastinating because I’m just coming off the buzz. But second, it’s because I want to mix the cinnamon in with it and it works. Oh man, the cinnamon adds to it. The second glass, you really taste that cinnamon. It’s awesome. I love the cinnamon. And it is a completely different drink. It’s awesome. It’s an evolving drink. I think it’s perfect for our conversation. Yes. Oh, this is a great conversational drink. Yeah. All right. Let’s move on that further because like I said, potentially that’s a very provocative statement. It is.

And honestly, I believe it’s intended to be because it goes back to the Ray Kroc conversation. Are we selling burgers? Are we selling real estate? If he was selling burgers, he’d go broke. But he decided to make the right call and invest in real estate and know exactly what business he was in and burgers. So rich people make the right decision to buy Rolexes because? Well, because a lot of different reasons. I don’t own a Rolex. I probably don’t know if I ever will own a Rolex. But the fact that Rolexes exist for those people that are capable of affording them, it’s a status symbol. It’s more than just a watch. It’s something to be recognized.

Well, let me rephrase the question this way. What’s the value in a status symbol? Maybe we should approach it from this direction.

I think it has a lot to do with your projection into the world of who you are and what you’re capable of and what you’re about. So like a person that has a genuine real deal Rolex is obviously has more capacity for change than someone that doesn’t. As far as a financial standpoint, looking at that, someone that can afford to spend ten thousand dollars on a watch is in a far different position than someone that can afford to spend twenty five dollars in a watch financially. And so if you can afford to literally drop ten grand on a watch versus twenty five dollars on a watch, I mean, that’s four forty. That’s four thousand times in scale. Yeah. Your capacity for investment. And that’s significant. I mean, when you look at it just purely by numbers, four thousand X. That’s huge. And so that person can literally go out and change the world four thousand times faster and they wear it on their wrist and show the world that I’m that four thousand X guy versus the one X guy. And there’s nothing wrong with either one of those guys. Inherently, they’re both equally valuable as a person, but what their impact or life changes or how they present themselves to the world is dynamically different and also accurate.

So I’ll give another.

I think that I poorly explained that.

I will. I’ll give another angle off of it. We’re looking to there’s someone in our business that we want to show appreciation for the value they represent in being a part of our business from its infancy stages. And I was going to buy him a watch. Guess what watch I was going to buy him a Rolex Rolex. Why? Because I wanted to have a physical depiction, a profound value of what the profound value is.

Absolutely. Absolutely. So I think that that’s a much simpler and better way of explaining what I was trying to achieve.

Oh, man, it’s hard. It’s hard because what we’re trying to tease out in this conversation and again, to move on to a point that we discussed earlier, we’re not used to having these type of conversations. This is actually really organized and structured.

Yeah, normally we’re free for all.

Normally we’re free for all. But we’re trying to do this because the task we’re trying to undertake is important enough for us to take the time and attention to do this. And that is really flesh out this primary operating principle. And at the end of this this conversation, if we’re going to say the primary operating principle is for everyone, despite whatever industry that they’re in. I want to be for damn sure that that is a correct statement. Because I don’t want someone to say, hey, I can quit my job tomorrow and I can jump into this game if that’s not the case. Does that make sense? Okay, I think that I agree with what you’re saying.

If you are not an entrepreneur yet, the idea of listening to this and jumping out of your job is like, if you’re listening to this right now, you’re probably a candidate for this type of a principle.

Right. But if you’re working a nine to five job, don’t just jump out. Let’s develop that because let’s be honest, we didn’t just jump out completely. This is almost a decade of evolution for you and me. Yeah, I’ve been building this for a long time. And so it happens over a period of time. It’s not like, oh, we started businesses and we’re instantly successful. We’re instantly rich. We instantly have relationships. We instantly have all these things. No, this one guy, man, he’s been in business for 50 some odd years. Client of mine. Okay. And I’ve done a lot of work with the guy. I know the guy really well. And he owns a business as well. I build metal buildings. Really nice guy. And he says that he’s generated 80% of his lifetime revenue in the last five years. That’s amazing. And he said that I am an overnight success that took 20 years to get there. I love that statement. That’s such an amazing statement, but it’s so true. It’s so true.

It’s 20 years in the making and then what man, once it hits, it’s just like, yeah, unbelievable how high you can really go. So jumping in and saying, I’m not an entrepreneur and I’m listening to us and I want to be an entrepreneur man, like count all those ducks and count all those eggs and line them up and re-line them up. Like you are not ready. I promise. What I want our next… If you’re an entrepreneur though, and you’re saying, Hey, I want to do business better. I think that you can absolutely adopt this and dive right in. I don’t think there’s any reason to wait. And I believe that I, once I fully had a grand idea of what this actually looked like, I executed fast. And that’s what we were talking about earlier. It’s okay to fail. I’m changing everything all at one time because I have a complete vision for what my business looks like to the detail. And oh man, there’s another one of those.

Yeah, I know. I’m starting to do it too.

And I can go and execute just on that vision of what I want this to look like and what I want my customer experience to look like and what I want my technician’s lives to look like. And I know what all that stuff looks like with such clear perspective that I can go and execute just on that alone.

What I want our next conversation to focus on is where in the process or where in the timeline people should make certain shifts. I think that would be a very important conversation to have. Okay. But have we talked about everything possible that we can about when the primary operating principle applies?

I think it applies all the time. Relationships first, automation to facilitate relationships. That’s the end game. If you do all that, then everything else will work out, promise. All your processes, systems, checklists, whatever you’re using should be wrapped around that. It’s like let’s free up as much time for relationships as possible. Let’s automate everything we can and create systems that make perfect sense, that are congruent with our relationship goals and operate that way. And it takes time. Like I’ve started operating that way and I am three weeks into a drastic makeover for my business and we’re still struggling. We don’t have it down. But man, we’re so much closer than we were three weeks ago. And so that’s why I look at it as like, man, am I there yet? No. Am I where I want to be? No. Am I on track for 90 days?

Yes. Yeah, man.

And so I set a really realistic goal and I broke it down into steps and I went and have been achieving those steps. And man, am I moving at the pace that I really want to move? No, but I gave myself enough time to account for the fact that I know shit ain’t going to go right every day. Right. I had a crazy week. Half my staff was gone sick. I had a guy out for surgery. I had all kinds of stuff I didn’t even know I was having. But you know what? We still went out and executed based off my new plan. We maintained our relationships. I made my customers happy and we still performed 50% higher than we normally perform with half my staff. Heck yeah. Like, this stuff works. Good, man. Like, it’s unbelievable. Like, there’s no going back. I would never trade this for what I had before.

Well then I think we have accomplished the goal of the conversation, man. Let’s talk about the stakes and then let’s spend the rest of our time talking about failure. Because I think really honestly the most value is not talking about our successes. It’s talking about our failures. Yeah, man. And then next week let’s really hammer down that where, where, where the shifts happen. Okay. That sound good? I think that’s freaking great.

So let’s do it.

Wagyu tenor loin steaks. These things are rock star steaks. Like best, my favorite. Like hands down for sure. So today I’m using TD’s Brewing BBQ Zesty Taco Seasoning. I know this seems super crazy on a steak, but I promise, promise, promise.

Are you sure you’re Texan?

I am a Texican. Come on now. We’re going to add some taco seasoning to this. So go crazy with it. Like this stuff’s so good. It doesn’t add a lot of spice. It adds a ton of flavor. This is totally where you want to be. So I go on the flat sides of these thick steaks with the taco seasoning. Now that they’ve been sitting out here at room temperature for about an hour, they’re nice and moist and that’s going to help them cook to the right temperature in the center that I’m looking for, which is usually a medium.

And by room temperature, he means 95 degrees on a Texas summer day.

Heck yeah, man. That’s pre-game in the steaks. Pre-game in the steaks. These things are already toasty. And just like Jason. So, and then I’m going to go and throw some extra black pepper on there because why not? We’re Texas. Holy cow. It’s some black pepper right there. All right. All right. And you just kind of press that right into the steak. So that way it sits there and does what you want it to do. And it does make a big difference. Just sprinkling it on and letting it fall off is, it is not the same. So you definitely want to make sure you’re patting that into the meat. So that way you get that saturation, it sticks while it’s on the grill. Char some of that stuff. Now what we’re doing this time is I had this TD’s Brewing BBQ, three chili cilantro. Now this stuff has got some serious kick. So if you get some of this online and you’re thinking about adding it to whatever meal you got, like add cautiously. And so we’re just going to lightly sprinkle this along the side of the steak. Because I do not want to go crazy with this because it will actually make it inedible.

This stuff has got some serious kick. Okay. So we’re just going to dust that just like that right down the sides. That way we got that 360 seasoning on these thick tenderloins like you want. If you’re not seasoning 360 on your steak, then you’re missing out. I promise. Like I don’t care if you got fat runoff or trims on a ribeye. Like you need to season the whole steak and copiously like do not miss out. And anybody that’s eating one of my steaks, like we don’t use steak sauce when we’re done. Like no, we don’t. Nothing like that. These things are ready to eat, ready to go. There’s no question that they’re absolutely delicious, packed with flavor from one bite to the next. And it is this, it’s the only way you go, man. So do not be afraid to season your steaks. I see that so often where people lightly sprinkle them. It’s like, man, these things need some stinking flavor. Beef is good, but it’s real good when it’s flavor. We don’t need anyone to sign a waiver to eat these steaks right now. No sir. Lightly dusted with that green chili and we’ve got that taco seasoning on top, which is adding a lot of flavor with very little spice.

And what we’re going to do is go ahead and crank that up to about 425. Hey man, are you going to eat another one of these, uh, jalapeno poppers? Uh, no, feel free, man. Do you guys want another one of these jalapeno poppers? I think you’re going to my little girl here. Yeah. Make sure I can stand. Holy cow. Yeah. Spin around, jump on one foot.

I think let’s go.

You guys want one? Go ahead and grab. All right. My face is right in this camera right here. All right. Cool.

And I’m going to let that warm up just a little bit to 425 and we’ll throw those steaks on and sear them. All right. Let’s talk about failure. Failure. Man, this is the risk, right? Because like it sucks talking about failure.

I love talking about failure. Do you?

Okay. First you talk more than me then. Cool, man. I love failure. Like it’s as long as you fail, it’s so exciting. Forward. Yes, it is. It is exciting in the fact that it’s where the most. It is not exciting when it happens. It’s the most miserable. But it’s where the most growth comes from. It is where the most, most growth comes from for sure. Like I guarantee all of my big successes are a result of my most massive failures. Right. A hundred percent of the time. If I was doing something that I was kind of good at, like if I never stretched myself enough to go deep enough in to epically suck at it, then I never got epically good at it. So what is your greatest failure?

Do you think? That I don’t think it’s possible to have a straight line singular answer to that.

I need to think about that some. What is the greatest? I could tell you the time in life that I was failing the most. Okay. And that would be immediately following my divorce. Okay. So 2010 to 2012, like that two years was epic failure. Like we’re not going to go into singular details because I sucked at everything I did during that time span. Wow.

In every way. And it’s a terrible way to start off a decade, huh? 2010 to 2012. Man, but I look back and those are my fondest years because I figured out so much shit. Like it’s unbelievable how much better I got at life. Like can you give some examples?

Okay. Um, just finances in general. Like I was broke. Um, I figured out creative ways to generate money. I didn’t mind working this. I know because he’s a client of mine. Go ahead.

I was broke broke. Like next level broke. Yes you were. On top of that, it forced me to explore different industries that I wasn’t familiar or had no experience in, which got me into automotive industry. So like one of my greatest assets right now is a direct result of that time period and me sucking at life and not having a direction to go.

So AT&T, military.

Unemployed for six months. Wow. Got into the car industry and uh, unemployed. At Midas, right? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And that was in that two year timeframe. So Midas, I learned a lot about what I liked and what I didn’t like. I liked the industry. I didn’t like how it was handled in every shop and I was like, I can do better. And so that’s like, that’s my epic failing point is that specific two years and it shaped everything I am today. I had other things.

Okay, well that’s a big statement to make. It shaped everything you are today. How?

Um, it was a low point in my life. I was next level broke. Like I couldn’t afford gas. I was donating blood to buy cheeseburgers off the dollar menu. Like um, like super broke. Like what any of you could imagine like being broke is like I was that broke and then some like. So how did you sucking at life lead to the opportunity of where you are today?

Back then?

I’ll tell you what, when you get burned by fire, you typically do not go around it. Okay. If you stick your hand on a hot plate and it burns you and blisters up, how often are you going to go back to that plate? Never. Never. That two years of my life was my hot plate. That was the fire and I, it inspired me to put as much distance between me and that place as possible financially. Amazing. Um, I don’t ever want to be that close to broke. I want to be as far away from that as possible to the point that it actually drove me to like, Hey, I have a dollar sign on my happiness, which ended up being negative at a point in my life where I actually didn’t have a purpose outside of a dollar sign. Um, that a lot of personal growth has had to take place since then for me to realize the value of me as a contributing member of society and what I have to offer people outside of a dollar sign. Wow. Um, so, but all those things had to take place for me to get to where I’m at.

Um, but yeah, I mean that 2012 man, I didn’t make, I don’t think I made 14 or $15,000 a year.

Did you ever think back then you’d be where you are right now? Absolutely. Really? Yeah. That’s not a typical answer.

I knew that I was destined for more. Why? Because if I believed anything else, I don’t believe I’d be here today. Isn’t that something?

It’s like almost a zero sum game.

Yeah. It’s like, if there isn’t something better than I don’t want to see what tomorrow looks like.

I don’t believe that logic. Yeah.

And I literally went to work every day for a whole year at a company I hated believing every day that that was the day that there was going to be a client that walked through the door that provided me with an opportunity I didn’t have the day before. You know, this entire conversation that we’ve had, there’s been one consistent theme.

And that is that if you’re going to have the type of life that we’re talking about, you’re going to need to have the type of business that we’re talking about. And if you’re going to have the type of business we’re talking about, that’s the POP, right? The primary operating principle. If your life is going to pop, if your life’s going to pop, you’re going to need to have a mindset that embraces faith over fear.

Oh yeah, for sure, man. I ain’t scared of anything because I’ve seen the worst. Like I’ve been to the absolute bottom of the barrel. I’ve been at the bottom of the pit. I’ve been in the darkest cave. I ain’t scared of the dark no more.

There’s something to be said that to be the best version of you, you have to peer into the darkness. You have to look into the worst possible version of yourself.

My most commonly asked question is how am I such a good technician? Like I’m pretty good at business. I’m a master at fixing cars. Like that is my craft for sure. When there is nothing in the world, I do better than that. Period. Awesome. People ask me all the time, how do you get to be that good at one thing? And your answer? My answer always is I broke a lot of shit. I broke more shit than anybody else was willing to. I dove into things I had no business diving into because I have to figure it out. How am I going to get better if I don’t have the experience to get better?

That was a direct result of faith over fear.

Yeah. I ain’t scared. I believe in myself enough to know that I can get myself out of a jam. Why? Because I’ve been in enough jams that I got myself out of that I believed I could do it in any jam. And that allows me to move forward confidently. It doesn’t matter whether I’ve got a $1 jam or a million dollar jam, like we’re going to get out of it. It’s okay. I can scale that all the way up and know and trust myself enough that like, man, I got this. And I’ve got enough relationships now that I definitely have this. Wow. Because I was good on my own. I’m great with a group.

Yeah. And that’s the that’s the idea of relationship building on the back side as well as the front side.

For sure, man. And it’s fine. It’s vital as your team. Yeah. Both sides of it. It counts on both directions for sure.

You ready to throw these steaks on? Yes, sir. Let’s do it. Throw those on and sear them up real quick. And then this is always the most delicious looking point of the podcast.

Oh, yeah, for sure. Well, we’ll just leave the hood open for these guys and let them sear up. Normally get about five minutes on each or a couple of minutes on each side. Let them kind of darken up and crust over. And then we’ll go ahead and throw them on the top rack and close it and let them cook to that. I love the fact that this part of the podcast is always when he keeps it open. Yeah. You get all those smells and all that good stuff. And I mean, honestly, it just goes to show the fact you don’t need to throw the steaks on long, right? Yeah, it doesn’t take that long.

Even with a thick steak. Like I honestly prefer cooking a thick steak because I can control the temperature a lot better. Those thin steaks, man, it’s make it or break it. You either got it right or you didn’t. And it’s almost inconsequential what you do. Like you just get lucky.

Yeah. You know, another thing that I love the most about masterminding and what I’m hoping to see happens from this podcast and kind of building our tribe and finding more people around the country that are like us is, uh, I don’t know, man. Um, is the fact that it shows that you don’t have to be a guru to be successful. You don’t, you don’t even have to be an expert. You can be normal. You can make a good, strong effort in the right direction and count a lot.

I mean, we’re looking at million dollar a year incomes and that kind of regular, we’re just regular guys. Yeah. Like for real, what’s this mythology and culture that believes that you have to be a either screwing someone to make a million dollars a year or that you have to, um, that’s why you have conversations like there should be a cap on incomes. Cause really what that boils down to is that there should be a limit on how much you should screw someone. Yeah, because they, they tie ethics to income and there is an association there. There’s a lot of people that make unethical income. Um, but that’s not the vast majority. It’s honestly not the vast majority. Those are your in wrongs. Those are the ones you see in the news. It’s like how many thousands or millions of businesses are there in the world and how many of them actually make the news for doing something unethical.

You know what I hope? I guess I just get really philosophical when I’m looking at steaks cooking. But do you know what I hope, man? If there’s anything that’s accomplished from this little podcast that we shoot out into the ether is that, um, we’re adding to the fact that this whole corporate ideology, then I use that word very cautiously. Yeah. I hope it dies. It needs to die. It does. It’s a thing of the eighties and nineties.

Well, and we know it’s, it, believe it or not, it’s actually, it’s actually dying.

That’s the future.

The data shows that it’s dying. And here’s why. And I know it is. I went to this conference a month ago in Nashville and we had a guest speaker that was talking about, um, the economic climate in general. Um, different things that are happening. And one of the things that they highlighted was job growth. That’s been a big conversation since Trump’s administration, honestly. Um, sure. Sure. Um, unemployment and job without a doubt.

Okay. And what this guy came on the stage and does, he presented the stats and he showed basically small business versus big business, small business or big, big business corporate America, where you’re talking about has actually been shrinking their job base by about 10 to 15% annually for almost the last five or six years.

Oh, that’s so interesting.

And so they’re actually losing employees and maintaining revenue.

That makes so much sense. Okay. Small businesses like us have picked that up and added over 20% of the job base for the last 10 years. Yeah. And it’s been done so effectively that we’re actually creating every new job in America is not created by Amazon or Walmart or Elon Musk. It’s actually created by young entrepreneurs that are new in business that these people are creating more than triple the jobs than these big multibillion dollar corporations.

Further solidifying the belief that I have that we as entrepreneurs are the ones that really create our communities and are really creating the future. We are genuinely the backbone of this country.

I mean, that is, I know that sounds so grandiose, self gratifying, but it’s the truth. Like the numbers support it that it’s that without small businesses, this country would have already sunk. And it’s so vital that we keep growing and form such a inclusive community among ourselves that we can actually create big change on a national level and not just how we’re performing in our community, but how we’re performing in our country and our country is performing in a global economy as a whole. And we are the driving force behind that because corporate America honestly doesn’t give a damn they’d sell out to China for a nickel if it made sense. Without a doubt. They would. And they’ve proven that.

There’s a great podcast produced by the Daily Wire called The Enemy Within. I’m giving kudos without any monetary compensation here. How terrible of a capitalist of me. But The Enemy Within, I think it was made by a guy named Michael Knowles. But anyway, that series highlights how basically what you just said, how corporations have sold out. They are 100% money. They’re price tag driven. They are not people in relationship. What we’re looking to do is create a value proposition that is actually greater than just the pursuit of money. It is because it’s not even part of the equation. And believe it or not, the price tag that comes with that is actually higher. It’s inherent. Yeah.

You don’t even have to try for it. Yeah. It’s just there.

I don’t know how to answer the question. And I know we’re coming to an end here with these stakes, man. I’ll just pitch it to you as a way to kind of shut this down. I don’t know how to answer my own question. I don’t know what my biggest failure is. So I know that’s not fair that I pitched that question to you and I can’t answer it. But how about I just let you pitch the question how you want to pitch it. And if you want to pitch it the same way, I’ll try and figure out how to answer it. Okay.

I define failure as an opportunity in my life. So what’s the greatest opportunity? So what is the greatest opportunity that you’ve had the opportunity to take advantage of?

I like that. Okay. That might help me actually frame my thoughts. It’s the greatest opportunity that I’ve had the opportunity.

You know what? You know what? Let me just redact that because-Okay. Go ahead. What’s your greatest fear was going out on your own? No. No? Okay. What’s your greatest fear then?

No. I actually going out on my own was the easy part. Why it takes so long? Say this without crying. Man, my greatest fear is to fail my family. Okay. And at the head of that, because of my belief system, because of my worldview, my greatest fear is failing my savior. Okay. Which obviously would be incorporated into the family structure, right?

Sure. As the head.

And that’s not to say that if my kids ever come out and say that they’re atheist, that I’m afraid of that. That’s not what I’m saying. Actually, if my kids came out and said that they were atheist, we would have very good conversations because then we would have very intellectual conversations, right? Awesome. Let’s examine theism and atheism on their merits. Let’s weigh the pros and cons. My greatest failure, my greatest fear is in… Man, you only get one life. You only get one go around. What if at the end of it, I look at it and I’m at that judgment seat and I look my savior square in the eyes and I said, man, I sold myself short for the false security of comfort. Okay. That’s what I’m afraid of.

That’s reasonable.

And I think that’s, man, what I appreciate the most about you is that you lead me out of my comfort zone when there’s a temptation for me to come into it. You definitely challenged my way of thinking.

And it’s so crazy. I think my life has just led me to a place where if I’m comfortable, it’s uncomfortable. Yeah. But that’s a really productive place to be.

It really is because I’m just not used to it. Like I’m used to chaos and confusion. Like how’s your day going? Chaos and confusion and I’m loving it. Yeah. Controlled chaos, controlled confusion. And it’s a different dynamic. Most people, they want the same thing every day, but what’s their reality? Do they get the same thing every day? Never. Never. They want it. Why do you even want that?

Like that sounds boring. Like let me ask you this. It’s like if you had donuts every morning for breakfast, a bean burrito every day for lunch and a peanut butter and jelly every day for dinner, like are you going to live the best life ever? Yeah.

Yeah. No. The answer is no. Another good way to phrase that man. But that’s comfortable. Another good way to phrase that is that I’m afraid to live in a state of death. And a state of death is defined by stagnation, dying on, withering on the vine. Yeah.

And that comes to one of the things that one of my mentors-If you’re not growing, you’re dying. If you’re not growing, you’re dying. I love that statement. And it’s probably one of the most true statements in business. I think it’s true on a personal level as well. Like I talk to a lot of people that are older. I’ve made a habit of that since I was a kid to like listen to the old people. They know something I don’t know. Yeah. Promise. Yeah. And one of the things that I see consistently when I talk to them is when they retire, they lose their passion and goals. Like that’s it. They quit living in-They’re dead in 18 months statistically. And it’s crazy because they literally gave up their purpose for, I don’t think they know what they gave it up for. I think that’s the problem. And you have to have that driving force. Like if you’re literally not growing, you’re dying. And that’s the best example I have of that. It’s like I retired, I literally have no purpose anymore. And your body just shuts down and goes to the Lord 18 months later statistically.

Man, what do you say to that? Yeah. Like you literally just chose not to grow anymore. And therefore everything shrunk up because all those juices are flowing some other direction. Yeah, man. For sure. And I’m a big advocate for that. I think that that’s important personally. I think it’s important for business. People that say, oh, we’re good. We’ve got this size business with this many employees and this many customers. That’s as big as I want to get. Well, the problem with that is the population is continuously increasing. The market share is constantly shifting. The industry and society and culture is constantly changing. We’re talking about an experience based economy and not a service based economy. If you fit inside this can at some point, nobody wants this can anymore.

Yeah, exactly. So you can’t say this is good enough. I finally made it to the can. I was just a little puddle a little while ago. I’m in a can now. I’m doing great. I never want to grow out of this can. Well, guess what? Eventually this can will be crushed and somebody else will come in with the glass and replace it with something better.

Honestly, I can’t think of a better way to conclude this podcast when it comes to demographics of who best applies to the primary operating principle. I can’t think of any way to boil it down to that. It all boils down to mindset and how you’re positioning your value moving forward. So man, that’s awesome. Next week, let’s really delve into this idea of where do we make shifts? Yep. I think that would be good.

Yep. And we’re going to try out some Buffalo Chip Woody’s Reserve bourbon this next week. I love this bottle, man. It makes me think of like a Clint Eastwood movie. So I think it’s cool. It reminds me of the old West. Makes me want to go hunting. Yeah, it makes me want to do something. I don’t know. I don’t know what it is, but we’ll figure it out next week.

So if you want to make some old fashions with us, that’s what we’re doing. Buffalo Chip. Absolutely.

And I have no idea. We’ll surprise on the meat next week. Whatever sounds good. Sounds good. Awesome. Thanks for tuning in with us and we hope to see you all next time.