Speaker 1: 0:11

all right guys, welcome to episode 18 of it's personal an entrepreneur's podcast. We are super excited to have dean with us on this episode of old glory washing solutions. Uh, dean, really, because we call this the it's Personal podcast, where we like to start with most of our guests is a little bit of a personal background of about you and how you got to where you are now. So obviously most people and a lot of our listeners in Bay County know you as the owner of Old Glory Washing Solutions, but as you and I have had some discussions previously, we know that's not where you started. So I'm just going to let you kind of take it and give us a little Reader's Digest version of you know how you ended up where you are now and what your pathway was to starting the business that you run now here in Bay County. Love it, I appreciate it.

Speaker 2: 0:56

First of all, thank you guys both for having me on Absolutely. It's our pleasure. It means a ton to me. So, born and raised in New York, started off suburb of Buffalo Bills fan, orchard Park, new York to be specific. Okay, bills Mafia.

Speaker 3: 1:09

Come from.

Speaker 2: 1:10

You're crazy.

Speaker 3: 1:11

That's it. Do you jump on tables? I haven't jumped on a table yet, okay.

Speaker 1: 1:15

The Jags beat the Bills in the playoffs. When I still lived in Jacksville, they burned trash in our parking lot. That's all. That's all I'm saying.

Speaker 2: 1:21

Because you know, tennessee banned tables when we played the Titans last time from going on an airplane. So it's definitely a problem. But no, grew up there Amazing parents. I tell people I was either cursed or blessed to be born into the car business. So my dad is a general manager of a Chevy store in Buffalo and fought and fought and fought for me not to follow his path. Currently he's still in the business. He's still in the business right now, 64 years old, living the dream every day. Yeah, um, something like that. But you know he's getting ready to retire, coming up soon. But so I went in the car business, started off, you know, basically cleaning cars, you know knuckle dragging.

Speaker 2: 1:57

As a kid following the path was about 18 years old, was about to go into the military in the air force. Originally my parents this is like the height of nine, 11 stuff going on my mother was terrified, kind of begged me, please don't go. Well, my little brother went and joined the infantry anyway and a year and a half later I followed. Okay, so went into the military. I was in the army, um, out of the New York army national guard for six years. Did one tour to Afghanistan with some of the greatest people you could ever imagine from that state and from this country, which is super cool Got out, chased my dream of becoming a police officer, like a lot of people very admirable career did that. And then kind of got the call one day for my dad that they were looking for some help back at the store.

Speaker 1: 2:38

And you were? Were you actually? Did you like you were a cop, I was a cop for the city of Tucson.

Speaker 2: 2:43

Okay, yes, so very similar to Afghanistan. Okay, yeah, very wise. Yeah, I'll tell you, the nicest people on the planet, but it is a rough place. You know? How did you end up in Tucson? So I was stationed in Sierra Vista, arizona. Oh, okay that makes sense.

Speaker 2: 2:57

So is it the place you kind of go to with your girlfriend or friends to hang out on the weekends? Yeah, so that's where my wife and I met. She's actually prior service. Also, she was in the army for six years, born and raised in the bible belt and you know, bruce, mississippi. No, that's why we and how we kind of filtered our way back this way, but spent basically from 2015 until 2022 in the car business, went from a used car manager to a general manager at another store close by an independent store, spent a really a bunch of time with again, my bosses were next level. Both Chris and Travis were just amazing. Spent a ton of money doing stuff like coaching right, people don't run real, people don't find the value in that. So they spent sometimes $10,000 a day for me to spend with Andy Elliott To bring people in. Yeah, yeah, to train, to really develop me as a human, to then develop a staff and really bleed that into our customer. So you're not just like everybody else, you know. Yeah, so that was cool.

Speaker 2: 3:52

Fast forward. My mother-in-law got sick down in Mississippi, got it Kind of went through a cancer bout with leukemia. We decided to get closer, basically move down here, get closer, basically move down here, get closer to her, ended up bringing her down with us here in 2022. Through God's grace, she got a transplant last year. Wow, it seems to be going down the path to be cancer-free. Oh, that's awesome. So it's super cool. So I tell people we live on the beach Life is short, okay, and this is, as far as I'm concerned, one of the coolest places you can live on earth. Yeah, yeah, I agree. So that's my story. And then we, basically from 2022, in november, decided november 10th is our anniversary. I decided to form old glory, obviously after old glory, because I figure, what's better than bleeding america through and through? Yep, and let's figure out a problem like. The problem is, if you drive around bay county or or anywhere around here, everything's dirty yeah, yeah.

Speaker 1: 4:40

And then and the name. I I agree with that. I think there's a lot of stuff that needs to be cleaned up and the name works because restoring it who who doesn't say the catchphrase restoring your home to its old glory?

Speaker 2: 4:50

Right, right, exactly so. I tell people, you know, obviously I'm a vet by general manager that works for me Scott, he's retired air force currently bringing on another guy in the army. I mean, I've got great staff, a great team, and I tell people we are surrounded by some of the best people in this area. You know, some are from here, some are not from here. You know, kind of you get a little bit of a clash once in a while, but I think it keeps this place, you know, level headed, it keeps this place moving forward and we're trying to be a big piece of that.

Speaker 3: 5:16

Did you have any Bay County connection prior to 2022?

Speaker 2: 5:19

No, gonna laugh and I gotta. I gotta give him a little shout, a little love. So the first person I ever met here was bubba mccance. Okay, okay. And bubba took me to church on a wednesday at emerald coast fellowship. Yeah, said you got to come for church. We get free dinner.

Speaker 2: 5:32

Yeah, I'm thinking why I can't pass on free dinner right, yeah, yeah, I mean, would the soldier and me pass on the free meal? Yeah, I get there and I meet amazing people like yourselves through, through connections, through church, yeah, through the neighborhoods. I mean I was really embraced in this place. You know, and it's done some transactions with Bubba before. Yeah, and it's bad and he loves you guys too, trust me, it's. I tell people in our world pressure washing, real estate, whatever. First of all, you know, we give all our glory to God, number one, always Okay, but he puts us with the people we need to be with every single day. If you're like, well, that's a competitor, that's. This is to listen. First of all, one of us can't handle it all. Okay, yeah, we need each other.

Speaker 1: 6:10

And that's what this is about. That's why I love what you guys are doing. Yeah, no, I agree, and I I start each day kind of saying you know, put me in front of the people I'm supposed to and let me not worry about those. That living life? I think? No doubt. So, okay, so pressure washing 2022, you kind of came down here for familial reasons. What made, what made you start old glory Like that business?

Speaker 2: 6:33

pressure washing Because I have a cousin. Well, he's a pseudo cousin, it's not technically my blood, but close enough. He's like sure, my best friend starts one of these businesses a teacher full-time in New York Okay, kind of, starts throwing this math my direction on on how you can make some money. Okay, really, where the growth is in this. And the coolest part about my job is you need me again in six months to a year. Yeah, right, so it's kind of cool.

Speaker 2: 6:56

It's not a heart surgery. I need it once in my life. Hopefully never have to see you again. Hopefully when you call me or you call my company, you're happy because you know that the results you're going to get is going to just blow you away. Okay, and I've been blessed by meeting realtors like yourself, by meeting property builders like Brian Knox, these guys from Coastal, I mean these guys call me and say listen, my client comes first, do whatever it takes to make them happy. I mean, do you know how powerful the message is Like talk about working with God's children every day? I mean I wake up every day just like look up. You know I follow Steve Harvey as well, a big podcast guy, right, and his thing is if you wake up every day and just say thank you because someone else didn't get that luxury, that you have to wake up and say it. And I said that when I met you. You know I said it was kind of crazy.

Speaker 1: 7:37

I followed you guys before and it's we get put with, we're supposed to be with, to change this place. I think the place that where bay county's going is almost scary. How cool it's going to be.

Speaker 2: 7:54

Yeah, I agree, I agree. So so you kind of landed on pressure washing. And then how did you start like, honestly, bought a trailer off of facebook. Okay, I did the you know the cool, fun, entrepreneurial thing spent all your money on one thing it hope it's successful. But I've always known if you can bleed your passion in your profession, you'll be infinitely successful. Right, yeah, it's just how it works. If you could become just truly the Tom Brady of your industry and that's what we're trying to do then you'll be successful.

Speaker 2: 8:18

And we started with basically a half of a trailer we'll call it in one truck. Then I lived out of a camper on the beach here when I first moved here. So kind of weird. Yeah, to a beautiful home in North Shore with my beautiful wife and two kids and my mother-in-law, you know, two blocks away. And now we're four trucks, fleets, teams, a general manager, marketing guy how much staff do you have now? So at any moment it rotates. So I've got three full-time guys, I've got a sales guy full-time, I have an executive assistant. Thank you, vicki, for being alive, because without you I would die.

Speaker 2: 8:49

I feel like she is just she handles so much for me. It's crazy right? Um? So I've got, and I've got a mitt full of I'm blessed to have a mitt full of actual firefighters that work off duty with us because, they've got a flexible schedule. Smart, yeah, duty with us because they've got a flexible schedule. So I kind of pitched them all. I said, listen, you get to use a hose on stuff more than you do in your other jobs, so come on over, right? Yeah, that makes sense.

Speaker 2: 9:09

And they love it. We've got Extra money too. They are just awesome, awesome, awesome. We've been blessed and our growth path is like everybody else you start small. We basically started picking out neighborhoods or picking real estate guys or whatever and trying to get some closing business or some listing business and that's turned into we just signed a contract and it's it's emotional to us. We just signed a contract that we're going to cover three States for a company Wow.

Speaker 2: 9:33

So we're going to cover from basically the Mississippi border all the way through golf County for a company, for all their locations, for all their locations. That's cool. So it's a big, big deal.

Speaker 1: 9:42

So was it just like you and the trailer and some minimal equipment in the beginning? Was that really? It was one sales and the service.

Speaker 2: 9:50

I did everything you could do in a company, from fixing the machine to cleaning the house, to knocking on doors to hey, can I clean your house for free? Mr Real estate agent that you got listed because of videos or something, just get some videos and some content up and we achieved our goal. We did a 105-star Google review.

Speaker 1: 10:07

I think that's such an understated strategy in business these days, especially and I know a lot of people are not going to like me saying this but especially in real estate. I know a lot of people who are very successful in real estate who have a story about listing a house for next to nothing or asking can I just list your house? They never tell people that or promote that A lot of businesses don't promote that.

Speaker 1: 10:29

they did that at one point. It doesn't mean you're going to do it forever, but literally, if you've never done something and you need to show that you've done something, sometimes doing something for nothing is the best strategy to do it. I mean people really undercount that strategy in sales or service or really anything like that to getting a foot in the door and shoot content, have a testimonial, a review, whatever it may be, you got.

Speaker 2: 10:47

You know one thing that I'm not used to where I'm from and it's very tight here. You start to get into panama city's. You know niches, like the neighborhoods are very niche here. Yeah, you got the cove via king's point. Yeah, well, what ended up happening? And then you know, it's true, through god's grace we ended up like finding a random person in each of these things. So, jennifer Haligas, she actually kind of we got to her to do the Cove sign for free. It was one of our first projects. Well, not thinking about it, we're basically parking two trucks at the busiest intersection in and out of the Cove. Yeah, it makes sense. People are calling us left and right and we've got such amazing people that we do business with down there and all over Bay County, but like they've latched onto us, we do a ton of business.

Speaker 1: 11:26

It's like something we talked about in one of our former episodes, which was just like you have to be careful with this statement, to taking it to the full extent, but say yes to every opportunity, cause even like an opportunity that might seem like it's not so fruitful, uh, can turn into things like that, right? Yeah, you got to have the right mindset to be able to say yes to some things to get in front of the next thing.

Speaker 3: 11:48

You don't mind?

Speaker 2: 11:48

literally just the cove sign on the street, literally the cove sign it used to be, so the front of it used to be all bushes Okay. Yeah, it was kind of a weird design, but it's okay.

Speaker 3: 12:05

So we actually came scrub the brick, the granite by hand, some little old lady stopped.

Speaker 2: 12:06

She's like I'm so glad you're here, I'm so glad to see you put this beautiful sign in and it never gets touched. I said the problem is is in budgets that's this big, don't worry about fixing infrastructure and making sure they're homeless in houses and stuff like that, especially after michael. I mean, you guys took a beating and it's like I understand why it's the way it is, but if we don't step up and help in our own community, then what are we really doing?

Speaker 1: 12:25

yeah, yeah yeah, and there's a lot of opportunity for maintenance slash beautification in panama city.

Speaker 2: 12:32

It's just a true statement yep, we just signed it. We just I don't know if you want to call it signed up, but we were just approached by a local painter. Um, so you guys had structure painting. Buddy boykin called and said listen, if you want to do something in your town, I've got the job for you. Lynn haven I. He's starting to do this fitness kick, right? Yep, so he said, I run by these benches at lynn haven, at the park, by the bridge, every day and they're disgusting. So I'll make you a deal. I'll get the paint company sherman williams and lynn haven to donate the paint. I'll do the painting for free if you pressure wash the tables. That's actually a really that's actually a really cool idea. So we're getting ready, so we're doing it. So we're going to prep it. He's going to paint it, and Len.

Speaker 1: 13:06

Haven jumped all over it. Yeah, that's a really cool idea and a good promotion opportunity. Yeah, get you a plaque. Yeah, one of those. Yeah, yeah, when I die one day they'll Exactly. That's awesome, though. So what would you say like if you had to give like a? So obviously I'll put it this way there's probably a lot of competition in soft washing, pressure washing and some of the services that you provide. What is the differentiating factor like that, you think, has allowed you to have that growth.

Speaker 2: 13:39

So I'm so. You have no idea how excited I am to answer your question. This is bumps. So a few days ago, somebody referred to us as well.

Speaker 2: 13:46

Pressure washers are a dime a dozen, right, okay, and I will tell you, it doesn't matter what industry you're in, there's a lot of dime a dozen type industries. I mean, to be fair, real estate, right, call it what it is, it's a penny a dozen. We are so far from the dime a dozen pressure washing company. Okay, I tell people we don't hire, you know, we don't hire like a guy for an afternoon to come in and just fill in to do some random job. No, okay, my guys train continuously, whether it's in the field, under the mentorship of myself, mentorship of my general manager. We also do a lot of online training. Okay, because I want my people to be true pros.

Speaker 2: 14:21

Yeah, okay, I tell people and I use it as a joke and I hope to be there at one point in my life I said, listen, I want to be the goat of pressure washing. Okay, I feel like, well, anybody can pressure wash. You're right, you know, it's simple. Just pick up the pressure washer and blow a house over the technology that we use in our game is specifically in old glory. I spend all the money back. Right, you know how it goes. You, especially in real estate, you're constantly spending money to get listings or move your business forward. We're doing the same thing.

Speaker 1: 14:47

Yeah, you, you make a lot and then you've already got five things that you need to reinvest into. You gotta reinvest. Be like, why would you?

Speaker 2: 14:53

do that better, so you're not taking enough back for yourself. I said, first of all, my customer hasn't gotten the treatment yet, the maximum treatment that they deserve. For me to take my part, yeah, not there yet. It will come. It will come, I know it will. But you know the technology that we use, the training, for instance. We just train with a company, right? So we're a little guy in the world, which we're not so much anymore. We wanted to start paver ceiling, but March of last year we reach out to all these companies. Everybody tells you, when you get bigger, reach out to us bigger. I said, bro, I hate to tell you. I follow all the Facebooks and all these organizations online. Trust me, you'll know who I am. Give me, give me 90 days, yeah, right. So I find these guys surface logics. They're down out of. I believe they're like the Pompano Boca area. I saw these Florida. Right, you should look these guys up.

Speaker 2: 15:36

Next level CEO Amazing. Their sales territory guy, james Amazing. I call these people up within like 72 hours. This guy's on a plane in 30a teaching us how to seal pavers from the manufacturer. Interesting, never happens, right? Yeah, yeah, that's you get a.

Speaker 2: 15:54

Watch a webinar or read this book. Yeah, you know what you guys know because you guys are ground pounders. The only way to do it is to physically put hands on. Yeah, you know, I was standing there with the training for the first day. I said, listen, I want to become the precision paver guy. So we've got houses in this neighborhood, in this area that are $50 million. This is not some hack task Like. You need to know what you're doing.

Speaker 2: 16:15

James comes out on the phone with us, mentors us. I mean next level experience. These guys are going to, if they're not already. They've been in business for like 50 years and they've grown through family, but these people are going to take over the world. I mean just their ownership in us, in helping us, and then like our ownership with you guys in your field and business and what you can do for your client. I mean those guys give. Those relationships are like chilling to me. Yeah, and there are such good people out here right now. And the dime a dozen mentality is the reason why some people think that other people are dime a dozen is because they've never seen real quality. Yeah, they've never had the real estate agent who's come in and literally held grandma's hand through a transaction and not let her get abused by the guy doing the home inspection. Yeah, you guys provide a service. Yeah, we provide a service. I tell people I was put here. My gift is not pressure washing, your gift is not real estate, your gift is people.

Speaker 1: 17:05

Yeah, Okay, and if you can take care of guess what, it doesn't matter what task you do.

Speaker 2: 17:17

Yeah, and, and it's the ability to like anticipate what people need before they can anticipate it. Yes, you know, in that given field, right, that's that next level. How many people do you meet with to put a house up and they're like almost weird, terrified to talk to you. Yeah, they don't know how to communicate. Yeah, right, our, our job as sales people, if you will which I, some people think that's a negative. I think it's the biggest blessing you can have, yeah, is we are constantly just communicators. We can deliver the message five different ways so that everybody can understand it throughout the process In their own way, in their own way.

Speaker 1: 17:40

So would you say, like what I'm synthesizing through that is, would you say that your business is probably successful because you're good at that part of it, versus focusing solely on just pressure washing? Correct, because I think that's any service-based business. That's like a crux that you see, or like an inflection point of growth is, you can be really good at the service part of it and knowledgeable and educated. But there has to be that like sales and marketing aspect to it that's genuine and understood by the public to be able to really scale too.

Speaker 2: 18:13

And every person when I show up at a job is amazing the response and it almost makes me feel a little sad for the previous generation. Everyone says you showed up. I said did you think I was?

Speaker 3: 18:22

not going to.

Speaker 2: 18:23

She's like actually you were 10 minutes early, so they taught me in the army, if you're not 10 minutes early, you're late, right? And and I said, do people not really show up? She's like a lot of stuff happened since michael and it's really hurt this place, but I but I bring this sense of optimism right this is changing dramatically. The, the old guard of the business, is just here. That game is getting pushed to the side. Oh yeah, yeah, because the grinders and the workers are here.

Speaker 1: 18:49

Oh yeah yeah, no, I agree, and I think, uh, I think there's such a um, there's such a lack of of teaching in corporate, even corporate level sales of, of of showing up consistently with habits for like prospecting and follow-up up and that being a pathway to results. But I think that the market is getting tough enough or competitive enough again, with enough other factors making things difficult. Completely agree that you're having to do. It's natural selection is taking place, but I think it's a good thing because I think it's going to elevate the experience that people get in these different industries and some of the other noise is going to fall by the wayside.

Speaker 3: 19:34

Well, I think consumers are also starting to be a little bit more intentional about decision-making in terms of who you're choosing for the service. Real estate, soft washing, whatever the service may be, I think people are in a situation economically, financially, where they want to make the right decision. I'm going to do this. I want to know who I'm doing it with. Yeah, I don't want to just google it and take option a on the google search.

Speaker 1: 19:56

Sure you know, just because option a paid to get to option a, option c or d may be really the the better option and I would use this as an example to like something that's showing me that that there is a a gap that can be served out.

Speaker 1: 20:09

There is the amount of business that this year we have been able to convert off of, like a phone call or getting in front of someone just being basically not phenomenal, not special, just being a basically good informed human on the phone, and that converting into appointments and actually doing business with people, getting a review that the sheer number of times that we've done that and we have some more that are possibly percolating right now shows me that there's a huge gap in, like, the average person that's reaching out, or that last agent they were listed with, or whatever it may be. Um, because, because even even yesterday, right like on the phones, you're talking to these people and they're like I've had hundreds of people call me, but then it's not to pat yourself on the back but you're like I'm not doing anything that special, but this person is setting an appointment with me next week, and they're like I've had 20 people call me already. There's a gap in how people are delivering information to people. That is there to be taken.

Speaker 2: 21:08

That's because everybody that trains sales they have a book, right, okay, I don't know if you've ever learned how to sell from a book, but here's how it doesn't work. Okay, if you're reading taglines out of a book, I understand. If you're trying to grow and you're learning rebuttals to certain objections or whatever, I understand that. Or even theories to follow, even, or even theories to follow, even theories to follow. But I got a call the other day for someone who wants to take my advertising, not in Bay County, okay, so that's a problem for me. We try to keep everything local if we can, because these are the people in our churches and our schools, right, right, yeah, I try my best to do that. But when I get a phone call and it's like sounding like a rope, it's like hello, hi, website needs better seo, that is, search engine optimization. Click, yeah, who? I do? Just call me on the phone. Listen, I went on your website. It's garbage. Yeah, okay, say what you just real, I don't like having a conversation. Yes, tell me how to fix the problem.

Speaker 1: 22:03

I will spend infinite amounts of money sometimes like being able to punch people in the face with the truth, but have them know it's coming from a genuine place of wanting to do what your service is for them. To help them is a much better approach than trying to appease people. Yep, it comes across way more genuine.

Speaker 2: 22:23

We fight that with the price game all the time. We get a call what's the cheapest you can do this service? I said honestly, and don't take this the wrong way If the cheapest I can provide a service is what you're looking for, I'm not. I'm just not your guy I give you. Not willing to do it that way. No, I'll give you 50 guys that don't carry workers comp, don't carry general liability, don't have all the commercial autos and stuff that we have to protect. They're going to spray the paint off of the side of your house. I have. I tell people this right, if you have a home that's five, six, $700,000, 5 million, do you think someone should clean it for $400? Yeah, does that make sense to you? Because to repaint that house costs 35,000. So it's just the numbers.

Speaker 1: 23:03

Don't set in, you get into this level of detail and machinery? Is someone going to use for 400 bucks on a house that costs that much? That's that big going to use?

Speaker 2: 23:11

for 400 bucks on a house that costs that much, that's that big, that has that much detail, correct? I mean, we just brought a mechanic on. That's a south walton firefighter. Every like once a week right now he's rotating machines out, but that's like overkill.

Speaker 2: 23:18

I said you know what it doesn't stop me from doing all day long. My guys can go to work. I don't have to call your aunt who's expecting for their, your niece's wedding at the house on saturday. Hey, we're not going to make it because our machines went down. You know we spend the money to put it back because I want you to have an experience with me and my team. That is just over the top. Yeah, and you don't think that we're a pressure wash company. The reason why I didn't name myself, you know so, and so your pressure wash. I said I named my company. Oh, glory washing solutions for a purpose, right, because I am a solution to a problem that you have. It's a big difference, right? I mean you can go to urgent care, you can go to a thoracic surgeon. I hate to tell you they perform very different tasks. Yeah, that's true.

Speaker 3: 23:57

Yeah.

Speaker 2: 23:57

And it's like I tell people all the time. I heard a real estate story recently. You can go online now, never even talk to a human, and they'll handle your paperwork.

Speaker 1: 24:16

I should buy a million dollar house like that. That sounds like a great, yeah, I mean. The truth is like real estate is so consolidated. There's a million different ways to do things, like you can, you know. You can go online and pay for 199 bucks to list your property on the mls yourself. Yeah, um, you can go have someone facilitate paperwork online for a flat fee. There's a million different ways to do it. But there you know.

Speaker 1: 24:30

What we talk about all the time is there real estate transaction we do.

Speaker 1: 24:33

There's always a unique situation that comes up Too many to count and the ability to know how to handle that unique situation, or when to stonewall, when not to stonewall, when to give, when not to give.

Speaker 1: 24:46

Those are the differences between timelines of something selling, missing out on an opportunity and giving up too much. And I just think, if you're only transacting one house every 10 years or five years and it's not something you think about 100% of the time, not something you're studying 100% of the time the small percentage that you will pay a professional to help you navigate will actually make you end up in the green, not the red. People think in terms of cost and they can calculate that. They can't calculate that other portion, and so all they see is I'm saving this, but they don't really understand how much they give up and how many things can go awry in a transaction, including timeline, like if you have to move or you have something specific, a health issue or just any motivating factor that would be making you sell that has a timeline on it and you're trying to do it yourself. That can be a very difficult thing to navigate and you may end up making a rash decision and then paying a commission seems like a measly cost.

Speaker 3: 25:45

Yep. Because I think that's what's hard to overcome sometimes with people when you just leave the difference in the commission on the table because you don't know what your properties were Correct. I mean there's a variety of different ways.

Speaker 1: 25:57

You mean Zillow doesn't tell you all there is to know about real estate To the dollar, to the cent. There's an epidemic of people referencing Zestimates in real estate.

Speaker 2: 26:07

And a lot of people forgot that they did get sued for changing their Zestimates I know Multiple times, multiple times for changing it in their favor while they were buying.

Speaker 3: 26:13

Well, if you're on it, enough and watch it, just because I watch certain properties, you know, as they're on the market, off the market. I watch the Zestimate on a weekly basis because it's based off their algorithm, which means that if Like how long?

Speaker 1: 26:26

it's been there without X amount of people clicking on it and if your neighbor's house is for sale and it's $100,000 over listed.

Speaker 3: 26:34

It's going to affect your Zestimate on your house because it's part of the algorithm.

Speaker 2: 26:39

It's pulling the data.

Speaker 3: 26:39

And if they go do a $50,000 price reduction to get themselves within the market, then all of a sudden yours goes down as $50,000. And so it's all.

Speaker 1: 26:49

And not only did they get in trouble for that, but they use estimate to start a home buying arm. Yeah, that was the algorithm they used and people looking at satellite images which is not a good strategy, and they bought a bunch of homes and that whole division went bankrupt. Like it was not a good strategy, they overbought and like couldn't move these properties, and so that's what? If you're going to use that to evaluate your property, it's crazy. It's like Pecunia.

Speaker 3: 27:15

It happens all the time. Pecunia's estimate when we listed was $289. Yeah, after we sold it in less than 40 days, pat on the back. Uh, this estimate now, if you go look at it now, this estimate is 319.

Speaker 1: 27:27

yeah because that's what it's old and it's been 60 days.

Speaker 2: 27:30

So, just like real estate, the car business, right?

Speaker 1: 27:32

yeah, so I'm in the car business it's got to be a hard one to to discuss price with people everybody wants to room, zoom, carvana, carmen, all these companies, right, kbb, kbb.

Speaker 2: 27:46

Here's what's funny. Of course, car guys latch on a car. Guys like real estate guys latch on a real estate guys. All your friends are in the same business. Yeah, so we do some business with the kramers. Yeah, okay, we're blessed to clean their facility. Yeah, you want to talk about classy? Okay, truly classy. You can walk into the dealership. The owner will be there. He's always there. Yeah, okay, whether it's senior, will one? There's a kramer, I mean will is out, someone's out in the parking lot. You dress up in a suit, jump doing you know, current wheels over a car. So they are the greatest. I love those people, they're wonderful and we clean for them. Personally also, and I'll tell you when you think you can buy a car on a roomcom or whatever other website they created this month and you have a problem, guess what? Go call the call center in indonesia because you're not getting it. If you've got a problem with your car or a process, know that you can go to a chris kramer, for instance. Okay, and he will sit there figure out your problem.

Speaker 2: 28:40

Have a conversation like a human being.

Speaker 1: 28:42

They're generational families of great people and I don't. I think too, like carvana and some of those sites are so funny because they their whole tagline is like no haggling. But then when you start like trying to apple to apple their vehicles with other stuff, you're like, yeah, there's no haggling because you're just screwing me, like like I can't handle how much.

Speaker 2: 28:59

And they sell you a car out of state on purpose yeah so that the rules don't apply in the state that you're in all the time. Yeah, so, like lemon laws and all these weird things, people forget that. They don't even pay attention to those things. So each dealership has a person. I didn't even think about that. Each person, each dealership has quote unquote a general manager or an operations guy. So if there's a problem, at the end of the day you get through service, the sales guy, the sales managers, whoever there is a guy or, and they make a lot of money because they have a lot of problems. They do, I'm sure. Yeah, and you go to, like a Kramer, for instance and I'm not picking out, I think they're amazing. Okay, go there. If you have a problem, they're going to take kick review. Yeah, go to Carvana. Guess what? You're getting Nothing. You bought a car and I'm sorry man certified auto brokers in grand island, new york amazing, I still buy carson to this day. Two weeks ago we just bought a three-quarter ton from them. We do a ton of service business with the kramers. We do everything we can and try to keep it here because you got good people.

Speaker 2: 29:55

It hurts me to see people leaving to do business with people out of town. You know a lot of contractors we see in 38 all the time. Well, I hired these people out of birmingham or atlanta. I couldn't find a guy to put your windows in a bay county, yeah, or walton county or opelousa county or escambia county somewhere. Well, they're better up in, uh, you know cobb county, are they? They're cheaper, oh, yeah, they're cheaper, yeah, okay, it's like, just keep it here, like there's good people. You're surrounded by them, yeah, okay, every corner, no matter what you need.

Speaker 2: 30:23

You know you guys are a great, great way to get to us. You know you can get to me, obviously, through my website. My cell phone number is plastered on every vehicle we have. It's not a work number, it's myself. Yeah, we put people. That's cool with good people. That's my thing. Okay, we are creating an alliance here. You guys have your, you have your podcast. You know we truly I preach this alliance to my guys and my friends here. If you need somebody I learned this in new york and you, you'll probably understand it you always got a guy. If you're from New York, yeah, everybody in New York's got a guy. Everyone loves to have a guy. I'm the guy. So if you need somebody that does a podcast bingo. Yeah, okay, you need someone that lays your pavers, seals your pavers, clean your house. You need a thoracic surgeon. I mean we radiologist on on text.

Speaker 1: 31:11

You know you need a radiologist call, no problem, we'll get you. Yeah, yeah, like because we put ourselves with good people. Yeah, makes sense, and that's what you do. That's what this is about. So what for? For a little shameless plug here, for your business? What all services do you provide now?

Speaker 2: 31:18

so I tell people we do everything outside the house, okay, as far as cleaning is concerned. So we started soft wash, pressure wash, which obviously are very different tasks, as you know, sure, both of you guys okay, okay, um, that's our big baby. But we've transitioned a little bit into stuff that our customers ask us for. To be honest, we just perfect that task and it kind of added that extra arrow to our quiver. If you will, we do everything from soft wash, pressure wash to trash, bin cleaning, gutter cleanouts, roof washing, paver sealing, cleaning, gutter cleanouts, roof washing, paver sealing. I mean we, which most companies kind of encompass those in the pressure wash world.

Speaker 2: 31:53

But I tell people that we look at each individual task as a different branch of my business. So myself and my general manager, we focus on tasks like to the point of almost craziness and really just absorb ourself in it to perfect it. I mean we've got guys like I think you guys know Brian Knox very well yeah, good builder, friend of ours. He'll just give us a piece of pavers or give us gutters or something. You look at my backyard and we'll be out there testing new products on gutters. Interesting Competition doesn't do that, they test it on your house.

Speaker 3: 32:20

Yeah, okay, we just heard a story in Margarita book.

Speaker 2: 32:23

I ruined seven thousand dollars in nutters I saw that yeah seven thousand dollars on a job. He charged him 300 bucks for guess what?

Speaker 3: 32:29

he doesn't have insurance so he just used a bad product he just used.

Speaker 2: 32:32

he didn't know what he was doing. He just used a bleach product on a galvanized, on a galvanized galvanized piece of steel, it instantly instantly, you know changed the color. It's crazy. This is an art. Okay, there's a science to this. I mean, they most. There's a lot of different materials. Most pressure wash companies carry around an MDS book, okay, with all the chemicals in it, and then most companies that produce, like the guys over at Service Logics, they don't outsource, they have a chemist. I think about that. Imagine getting a degree in chemistry, getting hired by a paper sealing company you guys, we're going to perfect the product we deliver to the customer.

Speaker 1: 33:09

It's powerful stuff. So what is the major benefit of paver sealing protection? Okay, okay. And does it eliminate, like the wash out of the sand? It eliminates the washout. So the product that we use so that it doesn't get you over time, you don't have some of that issue, even on my yeah, so we do repair and then we obviously teamed up with a company to do new paper like install stuff.

Speaker 2: 33:25

If you need big hardscape we talked about, but we do paper correction so we'll level that patio or driveway or whatever you need out. Okay, clean it, steam, clean it. So if we need to pull it, we have hot water application. We can actually pull the oils out of it or whatever you might need and truly get it set up. The prep work to seal it. We offer everything. We offer non-slip product, water-based productswater-based products. I mean there is no product that works for everything. Sure, there's. It's customer specific. We can. We do like Travertine and Shellstone. People are like I don't know, you can seal that. I go because you can't with the stuff you buy at Home Depot, certain stuff. Yes, you gotta be a pro and you down. I said you want to come do a ride along like a police officer? Come sit in my truck. I will show you how this is and how easy you think this is.

Speaker 2: 34:19

So, what is something about this business that you're in now that you didn't know when you got into it? That surprised you, or like that you wish you knew before. I'm a team guy. Okay, probably the army pounded it in my head a little bit too much. Okay, there, the army pounded it in my head a little bit too much. Okay, there's not a lot of team cohesion amongst companies in this area. Yeah, everybody wants to fight about everything and the way they fight is price, so they want to drive the cost and quality down. Okay, yeah, I come from a world that, whether you're a cop, real estate doctor, every doctor know each other. All the car guys knew each other. You know we used to laugh. I'm gonna go to the car dealership down the street. I pick up the phone. Hey, guess what? By the way, this guy's coming over in a blue camaro.

Speaker 3: 34:53

Just so you know he's on the way he's on the way driving nuts we have.

Speaker 2: 34:56

We gave him 20 grand for the car. Okay, thanks, he'll walk in the light of their face. They gave me 35 000, like guess what? Be real with me. Yeah, be real with the people. Let us all work together. Like I said before, we can't handle everything. Yeah, okay, we don't really have the urge to handle every single person's house in the whole company. Yeah, it makes sense. It's not realistic. Okay, and I want everybody to eat. I truly do. I want my staff, I want the good companies, but bring the good ones together. Yeah, I always say, I always say it all the time if there could be just one brokerage full of every good real estate agent, yeah, It'd be a wrap, and the reality is, you know how it is.

Speaker 2: 35:27

There's 20 something hundred of you guys and girls, okay, and how many of you are full-time crushers? Not many, yeah, maybe the top 200. Yeah, it's crazy. It's the same way in my field. There's a thousand pressure wash companies. We're a dime a dozen, right, but we're not. There's two or three of us that are going to take care of you and if there's a problem, which it's possible, we're going to show up the next day to correct the problem. That really shows your character, right? Nobody's perfect. The surfaces are 50 years old here, some of them. Yeah, things happen, absolutely. You got to be here to show up after the fact, and that's what we do. We'll never leave a customer high and dry.

Speaker 1: 36:10

Yeah, no, I agree with all question. Okay, uh, if you could give one piece of advice, whether it be personal, professional, a combination of the two, just one piece of advice from your life, kind of up to this point to now that you would like to leave with people, what would that one piece of advice be, grind?

Speaker 2: 36:21

just grind. If you want to know why you're not successful because you're not working, if you wonder why? I tell every single person I was taught by andy elliott learn time blocks. Okay, block out your time and actually look at it. If you spent one hour a day as a salesperson on the phone for one continuous hour, it would blow your mind the result. You got guys out there doing it for eight hours a day. And you want to know why? They drive lamborghinis, 11, 5 million dollar houses. And I tell people all the time we don't offer anything. Like I don't have some service, like I didn't create water. Yeah, like I don't have some proprietary object that nobody else can can, can, go get. But you know, what I have is this hardest working staff that you can ever ask for. Yeah, grind every single day and if you grind you'll be infinitely successful. And if you don't know how to grind, you can call my cell phone number.

Speaker 1: 37:03

I'll teach you, yeah and and I think I remember when we first met you telling me like when you first got into the business, you, you just made a massive hit list and just woke up every day, full-time, trying to get business from that hit list yes, if you walked in my house as law enforcement you could be concerned.

Speaker 2: 37:19

Were all these names on my wall under my quote-unquote hit? List okay I need a hit list on my wall. People, what's with the hit list? I wanted to know who the people were that had influence To get to. To get to, okay, and it's not like an arrogance or anything else. It's not that I only want to work for the guy who has 50 billboards, but the reality is is I want you in my corner, I want to be your guy. That means more to me than money. Yeah.

Speaker 1: 37:40

Undervalued tasks networking with people, even if you can't explain the exact reason why you're going to meet with them and networking and to spending time block time on the phones talking to people, even if you can't explain what you think the end result is going to be every week, every day, don't stop.

Speaker 1: 37:57

Those are two undervalued tests that if you just keep doing them and doing them and do them, it's kind of like uh, it's kind of like the quote um that the Spurs had hanging up in their locker room. You know, like I, I saw a guy chiseling away at a rock and the first hundred times it didn't do anything, but the hundred and first time it broke. And I knew it was the hundred hits before, not the hundred and first that made it break. Yep, and that's what.

Speaker 2: 38:18

That's what sales is really yep yeah it's the ones who are willing to perform the consistency over time. Yeah, you are never going to pick up the phone first call and deliver the deal of deals. Become Mark Zuckerberg overnight. I hate to tell you. He didn't become himself. No, he didn't. Tom Brady didn't throw one ball in his life and become the guy who was the greatest at that time no, Well, Dean, I appreciate you taking the time out of your very busy schedule to come be with us on.

Speaker 1: 38:40

This was a super fun episode. That's going to be episode 18 for its personal and entrepreneurs podcast. We hope you tune.