Lawn Care Hustler's Bootcamp Finale

I recently went through the epic Lawn Care Bootcamp hosted by my friends Megan and Joey Coberly, Kevin Salters and Stephanie and recap what I learned in this business bootcamp. 🎟️ Equip Expo 👉 Save 50% off Equip Expo Ticket w/ Promo Code PAUL: Register Here https://bit.ly/EQUIPEXPO 📚 Level Up Your Money (New Release) 👉 Get Your Paperback Copy! https://pauljamison.org/book 🎧 Level Up Your Money (Audiobook) 👉 Listen on Audible https://pauljamison.org/audiobook Rehlko Engines - Guiness World Records Attempt https://pauljamison.org/4oUln4C 📲 Connect with Paul - Visit Official Website https://www.thepauljamison.com/ 🛠️ Paul's Recommended Tools & Professionals 📚 The Landscaping Bookkeeper – Know your numbers, stress less: thelandscapingbookkeeper.com https://thelandscapingbookkeeper.com/ 📈 Lawn Care Launch: Click Here https://thelandscapingbookkeeper.com/lawn-care-launch (new program for business owners) 🌐 Footbridge Media – Get a pro lawn care website: footbridgemedia.com https://www.footbridgemedia.com/paul-jamison?ref=pauljamison 💻 Horizon360 – All-in-one contractor business software: gethorizon360.com https://gethorizon360.com/ 📞 CallRail – Track where your leads are coming from: callrail.com https://partners.callrail.com/cc4gs529efdp 📦 Business-Building Resources by Paul Price Increase Letter Template https://www.thepauljamison.com/resource_redirect/landing_pages/2150230978 Contract Templates https://www.thepauljamison.com/resource_redirect/landing_pages/2150230978 📚 Paul's Most Popular Business Books How to Build a Thriving Lawn Care Business: Buy on Amazon https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0D4K835L4 Cut That Grass and Make That Cash: Buy on Amazon https://www.amazon.com/dp/B08SP7MQ13 Level Up Your Money (New Release): Buy Now https://pauljamison.org/book

• 0:00Speaker 00

  This episode is brought to you by Motive. Growing a landscaping company means more trucks, more trailers and more equipment and more revenue doesn't always mean more profit. Motive gives you one platform to see where your vehicles and equipment are, cut idle time and fuel waste and protect your crews with AI dash cams. Motive customers report 20% annual savings on maintenance and fuel. See what it could do for your business at gomotive.com. Again, that's gomotive.com.

• 0:31Speaker 01

  Hello and welcome to the Green Industry Podcast, your go-to guide for building a more profitable and thriving lawn care and landscaping business. Your host, Paul Jameson, is the author of five bestselling books, including Cut That Grass and Make That Cash and his latest, Level Up Your Money, all available on Amazon and Audible. Now get ready for more expert insights and practical strategies to boost your business and level up your life. Here's Paul Jameson.

• 1:07Speaker 00

  Welcome, welcome, welcome. I hope you are doing well. I'd like to share with you some takeaways I have from a recent bootcamp. This is not a bootcamp where I work on my six-pack abs and these big triceps. It's a bootcamp, although I am working on those things, Mr. Producer. This bootcamp was on business fundamentals and it was presented by my friends, Megan and Joey Coburn, Lee, Kevin Salters and Stephanie. And it was a wonderful experience. So we literally just got done and I'm going to share with you some behind the scenes content from the Zoom call we just did with the other bootcampers.

• 1:48Speaker 00

  When I started business, my first business in 2011, I didn't understand how business worked. I honestly, I didn't know a lot of the language of business. I definitely didn't understand how to run a sustainable, successful, profitable business.

• 2:06Speaker 00

  And I just basically just kept making mistake after mistake after mistake after mistake. And the consequences of those mistakes were so severe. I was like, okay, well, I'm not going, I don't want to do that again. For example, getting behind on taxes and paying an absurd amount of penalties and interest. It gets old real fast. You're doing all this work and then you just, your money's just going, it's like it's, um, you got a hole in your pocket. It's just being devoured by penalties and interest. Well, why didn't somebody teach me how the taxes work when you're a small business owner? I had to basically learn it through the school of hard knocks.

• 2:48Speaker 00

  And anyway, the lawn care bootcamp is basically everything you need to know about how to run a successful business. And one of the, there, there's four teachers of this program. One of them is Kevin Salters, who's been around our industry for over 40 years. He's worked for the biggest company in our industry, BrightView, formerly known as Brickman? Brickman? It's been a minute since their old name, but BrightView is the name now. He worked for another large company called Russo Lawn Care. And he now runs his own nutritional fertilization and weed control business. I give him a hard time. He calls it nutritional business, but uh, he, he loves getting that nitrogen and nutrients into the turf.

• 3:30Speaker 00

  So anyway, he's one of the teachers as well as Megan Joy Cobra Lee from the landscaping bookkeeper team, and then Stephanie, who's their marketing specialist. So in this bootcamp, we met every day for 21 days, or pardon me, we, we, we worked. They sent me a really nice workbook and we worked every day on 21 days on something specific about business fundamentals. And then once a week we would meet. So we had a total of four meetings on Zoom, which was a lot of fun. So, and I'm gonna, I'm gonna share with you part of that call today, but it was really

• 4:09Speaker 00

  good to, to go over standard operating procedures that we've, we've shared some insights on the podcast here with that, talking about establishing our man hour rate. Those were just two of the 21 days. And so for 21 days, we just covered all of these.

• 4:31Speaker 00

  Business fundamentals. So here's, here's a few of my key takeaways and then we'll, we'll, we'll get on the call with everyone else. So you can kind of hear um their takeaway. So takeaway number one, this is something I'm still trying to make sure I'm perfecting, but you want to always separate your business accounts from your personal accounts. So if you go out and buy a cup of coffee and it's a personal cup of coffee, right? It's a beautiful morning and you just go and you like a nice hot cup of coffee. Now, Mr. Producer, I don't want to tempt you here. Am I tempting you? No? Okay. Mr. Producer hasn't drank coffee in a while. He, and I'm very intrigued by this.

• 5:14Speaker 00

  But he, he, he just, he didn't want it to have control over his, you know, he wanted to conquer coffee, not caught, you know, be addicted to coffee, if you will. So he hasn't, he hasn't drank coffee in a while. But um, maybe that's the reason. It's okay to talk about this? All right. Well, because we, when we went to, um, when we were in Louisville at a Equip Expo, I ordered a cup of coffee and it was nasty. I don't know what the, I don't even know what that was. But I almost spit it out. It was so bad. And Mr. Producer is sitting there drinking his water. He doesn't even drink coffee anymore. But anyway, if you go and buy a cup of coffee, personal use, right? Just, you're just gonna, it's a beautiful morning and go get a cup of coffee. Don't pay for it out of the business account. You don't want to, you don't want to muddy the waters,

• 5:55Speaker 00

  right? You go and you buy something for your personal, then you, right? Your gym membership, personal expense, you, you pay for that out of your personal account. Your groceries, right? You go to Publix or Kroger or whatever grocery store. What? I, it's Kroger, right? Why do people call it Krogers? We don't, we don't have Kroger in Florida. We have a place called Publix. Uh, where shopping is expensive. They say it's a pleasure till you check out. I, I go to Aldi's. Uh, I like Aldi's a lot. You gotta put your little quarter in there. Well, anyway.

• 6:34Speaker 00

  Um, when you go to your grocery store, whether you go to Aldi's or Kroger, Publix or Ralph's, buy, what's that? That's the name of a grocery store? Buy low?

• 6:50Speaker 00

  Okay, well, listen, it doesn't matter the name of the grocery store. The point is if you go buy groceries, buy it out of your personal account. So this is, this is basic stuff, but, but we're going to have on the program, uh, maybe on the next episode, or is it two, two episodes down from now, I interviewed a business broker and he's going to explain to us about how to sell our business. And so one of the cleanest things we can do is keep our, our books squeaky clean from day one. So when we go to get our business evaluated one day, they do the valuation, they can see exactly how much our business earned in revenue.

• 7:34Speaker 00

  So all the money that you make from your business, if someone pays you cash, which I don't know why they would, but don't go put that in your personal bank account, put that in the business account. Shout outs to Horizon 360's CRM. You can get paid online, you don't need to be collecting cash. But anyway, you put that money that you earn in your business account and then all the expenses that you have out of your business, you pay for that out of the business account. And then separate from that, you have your personal accounts for your groceries and your gym membership and your, your kids are in daycare, whatever your personal lifestyle stuff is, you pay for that separately.

• 8:14Speaker 00

  And then based on the structure of your business, there's ways properly to pay you, the owner, from the business into the personal. So anyway, Kevin and Joey and Megan and team, they, they clarify all of that. One thing I liked about the bootcamp was my friend Sheila Chaplin joined us for some Q and A to go over everything taxes and she's, she's been a huge blessing to me and, and helped me with all of my decisions on making sure I'm setting enough money aside for my taxes and. You know, figuring out how much money to invest. Should we invest it into a Roth IRA? Should we invest into a solo 401k? So anyway, if you guys are ever looking for a certified financial planner,

• 8:55Speaker 00

  Sheila Chaplin is awesome. She's a part of the the boot camp there. So I'm just going through my notes here. They talked a lot about, and this is something I'm currently back to the drawing board on that. And I think we always should be, but I'm really, really trying to get my thoughts collected about what services I'm offering and who is my ideal customer?

• 9:25Speaker 00

  And so I think it's important to really think about who is your ideal customer?

• 9:35Speaker 00

  What's what's their household income? What's their interest? Geographically, what street are they on or what neighborhood are they in? The more dialed in you could get, the better. And I backed into this. I, for those of you who are new to the program, I started a lawn business in 2011. And I was living in Georgia at the time. I was all over Atlanta. I'm talking Lawrenceville one day, then I'd go out to Winder in the same day. And the next day I'd go over to Johns Creek and then I'd do some yards in Duluth. The next day I'd go out to Swanee, Georgia. I mean, I was driving all over Atlanta. I didn't have an ideal customer. I just basically was a yes man to, um,

• 10:17Speaker 00

  I was working for a lady who had a real, real estate agent who had a whole bunch of different houses, which was convenient for her, but not for me, spending all this windshield time driving through Atlanta traffic, which eventually drove me out of the state. The traffic was so bad. And now it's getting bad and down here in Florida. Y'all need to stop moving down here. Y'all from New Jersey, New York, why don't you go back there?

• 10:43Speaker 00

  I know we got a lot of listeners in New Jersey and New York because the stats show I'm not alienating y'all, but I'm alienating the people from New Jersey and New York that are all moving down here. And now the roads down here are getting all congested. I tried to escape the traffic of Georgia, Atlanta, come down to Florida. I mean, it's crazy. It's crazy.

• 11:10Speaker 00

  Anyway, who's your ideal customer?

• 11:15Speaker 00

  Where do they live? And what services do you want to offer them? My mistake when I started was I just offered everything to anybody, literally. Customer said, hey, do you do this? I said, yes. Next thing you know, I'm up on my customer's property, pardon me, up on my customer's roof. I thought I could just take my blower and blow their leaves out of gutter. They're like, hey, can you go up there real quick and just get the leaves out the gutter? Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. No, no problem. No problem.

• 11:44Speaker 00

  His name was Justin, my customer. I get up there. He makes it sound so easy. Oh, yeah, yeah, I got a ladder in the back. I'll help you, you know? And I'm a sucker. I just, oh, yeah, yeah, no problem. Whatever you want. I'm up and I'm up on the roof. And again, I didn't know who my ideal customer was. I didn't know what my ideal service was because this clearly was not ideal. Me up on a roof. And I take the blower to blow out the leaves and they ain't moving. They're like gunk. They're like mud. It's like leaves mixed with mud, mixed with twigs. And I literally have to take my hand and just scoop out all of this. It's like gumbo soup

• 12:22Speaker 00

  of just leaves and mud and water and twigs. And some of y'all know, you're like, I've been up there, Paul. I've been, I know exactly the concoction you're talking about of all of this nonsense. And my customers just think, oh, yeah, just clean out the gutters real quick. Well, it didn't, it was, there's nothing quick about it. And then I had a guy I used to work with when I did roofing named Mickey. And he told me a story. I'm laughing, but it's not funny, but, but anyway, Mickey, he fell off the roof and he landed in the customer's butch, uh, bush. He was doing a leaf cleanup. Now he, he, he's alive. He, he thankfully is still, well, at least back when he told me the story, he was still alive. So it wasn't

• 13:07Speaker 00

  a fatal injury, but who, who wants to fall off a roof and land in, you know, thankfully he landed in the customer's bush and not like on the, the, you know, sidewalk or something like that. He, but, but anyway, for some of you, for me, certainly, leaf clean out, out of gutters is not my ideal service. But if you don't take the time to be intentional and figure out, okay, who's my customer? Where do they live? What services do I want to provide to meet, to serve them? Cause yeah, there's a lot of customers out there who need their gutters cleaned. But that doesn't mean you have to offer that service. There, there needs to be a blend where we really think critically. What problems do my customers have?

• 13:52Speaker 00

  I got a lot of problems. But which ones do I want to solve? And then actually build your marketing, your equipment, your staff, everything around serving that ideal customer at the highest level by offering certain set of services. So anyway, in the lawn care bootcamp, we go over,

• 14:17Speaker 00

  um, not we, like, I'm not a teacher, but I'm, I was just a student. But it, it, it really convicted me. I got, I gotta get more dialed in of who my ideal customer is, how I'm going to serve them. Anyway, in the lawn care bootcamp, they covered so much more about branding and, and, and the marketing, but, but before you start getting into branding and marketing, you gotta, you gotta really identify that, that ideal customer. And so anyway, we're going to take a quick break. Um, speaking of this coffee, Mr. Producer, it's one thing you're not missing out by drinking coffee. Sometimes it just hits your gut real quick. And you're like, I think I gotta go to the bathroom right now. So, what that is code for is let's say your quick word from today's show sponsors. Let me go

• 15:01Speaker 00

  to the bathroom and I'll be right back. Quick break, right?

• 15:07Speaker 00

  Horizon 360 is a proud sponsor of the Green Industry Podcast and I have a promotion today to help simplify your day-to-day operations. With Horizon 360's real-time equipment tracking, you can gain immediate actionable insights into your fleet's performance, whether it's tracking location, usage, or maintenance needs. This means you can make smarter decisions on the fly, reduce unnecessary downtime, and ultimately cut costs while boosting productivity. It's a game changer for contractors who need to stay on top of their equipment without guesswork. Head to the show notes and enter the promo code PAUL for an exclusive seven-month free trial of Horizon 360.

• 15:48Speaker 00

  Crest Commercial is the only solution for commercial landscapers to convert to electric. With the power of gas, no downtime with their eight-minute charging system, and industry-disrupting warranties that offer six years or 3,000 full life cycles on the CyberPack batteries, there is no reason to not make the switch. To find out more about the free demos and how you can start saving up to $2,000 per year per crew, visit crest.com today to find your local dealer. All right, all is well here in the Green Industry Podcast Studios. And yeah, that's a good idea. Mr. Producer said, maybe we should get a sponsor, a coffee, coffee brand

• 16:29Speaker 00

  to sponsor us. I'll delegate that to you, Mr. Producer. Knock yourself out if you guys tune in. Today's show is brought to you by Dunkin' Donuts. The green industry runs on Dunkin'. Hey, it could work, actually. It could work. What's the other one? Timmy Hoes? We don't have Timmy Hoes down here in Florida. We have, we have overpriced coff- where I live, we have all these hotels. So if I go into the hotel to get a cup of coffee, because they got Starbucks in the hotels or whatever, you know, little wannabe Starbucks things in there. And so I go the other day to get a cup of coffee, $6. And then they give you

• 17:14Speaker 00

  the little book, black fancy book, like you just ordered a steak dinner, and then it says, tip. I was flustered. You gotta give a tip for the coffee.

• 17:28Speaker 00

  And then there's pressure because there's a pen and it's not as stressful when it's on the screen because it shows you want to tip them 10%, 15%, 20% or other. And then they're staring at you to see if you tip them or not. And then they go make your coffee. So they're like, what if I don't give them a good enough tip, what are they going to do my coffee? It's like stressful. It's a whole nother world over there at that hotel because then they give you,

• 17:51Speaker 00

  they put your receipt in one of them black books, into the black book, you open the black book, you got the pen and you're sitting there and it's $6 and then with whatever it was over $6 and then ask for what the tip amount is. And then you got to total it up for one cup of coffee.

• 18:09Speaker 00

  Yeah, I gave her a tip. What do you do? You're not going to tip her? Well, that's, that's dangerous because then she's gonna go make your coffee. And this lady was grumpy. It was like 6 a.m. The reason I went there is because the other, the other place I go to didn't open to seven. So anyway, I went there and probably not going back again. Seven or eight bucks for a cup of coffee. Forget about it. That's, that's too much. All right. Well, let's get back on tree back here lawn care boot camp. As a producer, you're a character, sir. Um,

• 18:44Speaker 00

  we're, what we're going to do here is at the end of our lawn care boot camp, we were on a zoom call and we were just chatting it up. A whole bunch of my friends were on the, took the boot camp with me and we had a good little conversation. So let's, let's fire that up, Mr. Producer.

• 18:58Speaker 02

  Don't forget to send me those.

• 19:00Speaker 03

  Absolutely. Yeah.

• 19:03Speaker 04

  You're running in the dark.

• 19:05Speaker 02

  Yeah, yeah.

• 19:07Speaker 03

  You're running in the dark, can't see anything. Yeah. Yeah. No QR code for green.

• 19:13Speaker 03

  I'm looking back for it so I can put it back on the screen. There it is.

• 19:18Speaker 03

  All right. Well, it was very nice meeting every single one of you. Thank you for taking a chance with your $50. We have thoroughly enjoyed seeing you guys here. If there's anything in the future we can do for you, email me, [email protected]. Easy to remember. Also, tomorrow is the last official day of Boot Camp. The assignment for the day is to send us a review. That's a part of that $100 gas gift card.

• 19:51Speaker 03

  What are we calling it? Competition that we're running. And so those of you who have been very dedicated in sending those, don't forget your week three recap. And then do tomorrow's task, which is to send us a video testimonial of Boot Camp. We will put that in the drawing. There's probably about two or three of you, I suspect, are gonna finish that up for me, whether that's tonight or tomorrow. And then by Friday, you'll get an email of the winner. So those of you who finish that, I'll put you in the hat for the drawing and then we'll pull the final winner by Friday and email everyone about who got the $100 gas gift card.

• 20:31Speaker 05

  And truly, guys, we really appreciate any reviews that you leave us because that's like my favorite part is just hearing how we maybe changed your life or your perception of business or whatever. I really, really appreciate all the reviews we get. So thank you for any that you that you send in in the future.

• 20:47Speaker 05

  Got anything else?

• 20:48Speaker 03

  I don't. Anybody?

• 20:49Speaker 05

  I think that's everything I got.

• 20:50Speaker 03

  Anyone else?

• 20:53Speaker 04

  I just wanted to say thank you.

• 20:56Speaker 03

  Thank you, Ryan.

• 20:57Speaker 05

  Thank you, Ryan.

• 20:58Speaker 03

  I appreciate that feedback.

• 20:59Speaker 05

  That means a lot.

• 20:59Speaker 03

  It does mean a lot. Yes.

• 21:01Speaker 05

  We truly care about our work, so feedback is just always much appreciated.

• 21:08Speaker 02

  I think y'all cheated yourselves on what y'all charged because This, that was truly a nominal fee for everything that was put in this class.

• 21:17Speaker 04

  Thank you.

• 21:17Speaker 02

  And if you were, if you, you know, y'all are trying to teach us about, about numbers, but y'all have lost money doing this.

• 21:26Speaker 05

  We lose money on the bootcamp for sure.

• 21:29Speaker 02

  Exactly. For the value that you get.

• 21:33Speaker 02

  And, and even.

• 21:34Speaker 06

  I second that Greg, I second that for real. Cause you know, from other people that have courses, you pay a lot more and be part of their downloading their stuff or being their bundle. And it's only you on your time, just being what they've already recorded themselves saying where, as we're here with you guys every week or, and, or you get the messages every day to keep you on task, to keep you thinking how to make yourselves better. And I think that, that goes a lot. So definitely thank you guys and thank you to the other, other people in this, in this, uh, on the chat as well. So, you know, I'm learning from everybody. So thank you guys for, for being available.

• 22:11Speaker 04

  Thank you, George.

• 22:13Speaker 02

  Well, for the, us older people, having it in book form is so much better than, I can refer to it a little easier. Yeah. I'm not super technical. I can work most of my stuff not to, well, you found out tonight, I can't, can't view that. So I mean, but for the most part I could do it, but having something tangible in your hands.

• 22:38Speaker 03

  Yes.

• 22:38Speaker 02

  Is, is.

• 22:39Speaker 03

  That's not just an all people thing. I think the young people will.

• 22:43Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 22:44Speaker 03

  Back to tangible things in short order. I think that's a human thing.

• 22:50Speaker 02

  It's, if I write something down, I remember a lot longer.

• 22:54Speaker 03

  Sure. No.

• 22:55Speaker 02

  So.

• 22:56Speaker 00

  And the workbook, Megan, this is Paul here, long time listener, first, first time caller.

• 23:03Speaker 00

  The workbook, I've, I've taken so many courses and so many programs and I've, I've in not just in our industry, but like in other industries, I've taken so many of these. And I've never gotten a workbook and it's not just like a workbook, like the graphics and design of it is epic. So I think that that workbook is just fantastic. I'm actually in a program right now in a different industry and I'm like, cause I am like printing out all the documents and like, I'm making my own like workbook, but I'm like, why didn't they provide a workbook? And I'm, I'm literally like the guy that's taking notes. I printed out like all the things and your workbook is absolutely world-class. And like, yeah,

• 23:47Speaker 00

  Greg, $50 is, you know, you, you could charge a lot more, but.

• 23:51Speaker 03

  Oh yeah. We've heard and honestly, that workbook is my pride and joy. I have to admit, we put, me and Stephanie put that together in one week because we really wanted to run one before, um, what's it called? Quit. We wanted to run a bootcamp, just kind of get that first one out, out from under us and have something we were like seriously excited about because we had done one. And so me and Stephanie put that together in one week.

• 24:16Speaker 05

  Absolutely fantastic. This team we have is just amazing. Like we, we have every, every piece that can, that can build anything with the marketing, coaching, finances, like together, when we put our heads together, it's like, we can really, we can really build a little bit of anything. Just the very, the various types of brains that we have.

• 24:34Speaker 03

  Any and all feedback is wonderful because obviously our brains don't matter if it's not connecting with what you guys need. And you know, specifically, we, we really are looking to help mostly under a hundred K at this point, but under 300 K. That's where we cap it on our website.

• 24:51Speaker 05

  And thanks so much for the feedback. I mean, truly, we want to see, we want to see everyone succeed. And I'm just tired of all this corporate takeover stuff and everything looks the same. And you know, it just seems, making an image, driving up to Atlanta, it's just like the same businesses over and over and over again. It's like, where's the mom and pop shops at? We're getting all taken over by all this private equity and everything. And it's like, you know, nothing wrong with that, but you know, I do truly want to see some, I want to see small businesses just kill it. Cause everybody works so hard and they're only missing a few things. And if you can get that information to them, uh, I think we'll see a resurgence of, of, of ownership and in small entrepreneurial companies.

• 25:28Speaker 03

  All right, y'all. Well, I have to admit, out of the two bootcamps, I don't know that you want to know this, but I'm just talking because y'all aren't. Um, after the two bootcamps, y'all are quiet. Our first bootcamp had like three participants, I mean fifteen total, but the, the, the actual live stuff, about three regularly came. And you guys are so quiet. Maybe we got a class of like.

• 25:51Speaker 02

  I can tell you, I've, I've got

• 25:56Speaker 02

  ten years in. And this has helped me more than anything I've done in ten years.

• 26:02Speaker 05

  Yeah, that's awesome.

• 26:03Speaker 03

  Yeah, it's great to hear.

• 26:04Speaker 02

  I mean, I, I started, I started out doing foreclosure work, but I worked my way into just straight up long landscape, totally out of that foreclosure market. And, uh, yeah, this is, this has done me more good than, uh, anything, any other class that I've taken and, uh, I mean, not, not downing the other classes by no means.

• 26:30Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 26:30Speaker 02

  But the, the information was a little bit

• 26:36Speaker 02

  uh, easier to, uh, absorb.

• 26:39Speaker 05

  Hmm.

• 26:40Speaker 02

  It was easier to absorb.

• 26:42Speaker 05

  Good deal.

• 26:43Speaker 03

  Yeah, we wanted, we know you guys work hard and like Joey said, there's just some solid foundational pieces that we wanted to get across. So, thank you for that feedback, um, and Paul for the feedback on the book.

• 26:55Speaker 05

  Yeah, thanks so much. I mean.

• 26:56Speaker 03

  Appreciate it.

• 26:57Speaker 05

  Having meaningful work is everything to us. So, thank you.

• 27:00Speaker 03

  Absolutely. Yes.

• 27:03Speaker 03

  All right, you guys, I'm sure you guys have things to get through. Any, anybody traveling for Thanksgiving?

• 27:10Speaker 03

  No, Greg says no way. No, no, Bill, I guess you guys are still working, aren't you?

• 27:15Speaker 02

  I've, I've got one more. I'd, exactly. But, uh, I'm gonna be off the road by about two o'clock tomorrow, hopefully. And I don't want it, all, all the Marines will be letting out of Camp Lejeune down here. It will be a madhouse.

• 27:30Speaker 03

  Yeah, Joey and I, we have an eight year anniversary today and I remember the day we got married, it was Thanksgiving travel and we were in, we were in ridiculous traffic, not even around this place. I mean, Atlanta, you can expect it, but I just remember thinking, I'm never traveling this Saturday after Thanksgiving.

• 27:50Speaker 03

  Oh, thank you. Thank you, Marcus. Yes. It's been a good eight years. All right, y'all. Let me know if I can help. Like I said, you'll be getting an email just summarizing everything. Um, Greg, I'll get you those PDFs. In the new community, I will make sure all this gets uploaded, videos. Um, and

• 28:09Speaker 02

  I think I've already signed up for all of the

• 28:12Speaker 03

  Free classes?

• 28:13Speaker 02

  The free classes, because I signed up for, when we signed up for Kevin's the other night. I think it, there was a dropdown bar where you could sign up for all of them, and I think I did all of them.

• 28:24Speaker 03

  You can click all of them. Yeah, we'd love to see you there. We are, I, I love those workshops, man. I love them. I think they're so great. Instead of it being a fire hose, you can actually sit down and get some things out of your brand on there.

• 28:34Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 28:35Speaker 03

  Yeah, come see us again. We'd love to see all y'all again.

• 28:38Speaker 05

  Absolutely.

• 28:39Speaker 03

  And thank you, David. We look forward to working with you.

• 28:41Speaker 00

  Hey, Joey and Kevin, so I don't have to email you. Let's wait till, let's wait till Joey gets back from his trip and we'll do a podcast.

• 28:48Speaker 05

  Hey, sounds great.

• 28:51Speaker 03

  Put it on a schedule that you know you get a time to go.

• 28:54Speaker 05

  It sounds good.

• 28:56Speaker 07

  Hey, Paul, question for you. Do you play in your tournament?

• 29:01Speaker 00

  So I, I, I hurt my ankle, my knee, and my groin. It is a long story, but I

• 29:07Speaker 07

  I heard the podcast. I didn't know when it was.

• 29:09Speaker 00

  So the tournament, the tournament was Saturday morning. It's a club championship. It's a golf tournament at the golf course I play at. And I woke up Saturday morning and I was so tender and so sore, I had to, to text the tournament director and basically withdraw. Cause I had already paid to play in it. You have to, you have to pay to sign up and all this stuff. And I was like, I just, I'm in so much pain. I'm not going to be able to play. So it was so frustrating because I, I felt like I could have won the, won the thing, but I, I was icing my ankle and all this stuff. So I didn't play. But thanks for listening to the podcast, Ryan. That was the one with, um, the football coach or the basketball coach?

• 29:48Speaker 07

  Yeah, Ron, I believe.

• 29:50Speaker 00

  Yeah, Roy.

• 29:51Speaker 05

  Roy, Roy Heinz.

• 29:53Speaker 00

  Roy Heinz, man, that was, that was motivating talking to him.

• 29:57Speaker 05

  He is amazing.

• 29:59Speaker 00

  Yep.

• 30:01Speaker 02

  I listened to Joey's, uh, today when he was talking with, um,

• 30:08Speaker 02

  About the, about the, the broker. Yeah, the broker.

• 30:13Speaker 05

  Yeah, yeah.

• 30:15Speaker 02

  That was, that was pretty, that was pretty interesting and I, and.

• 30:19Speaker 05

  I've been trying to find a broker to talk to for a while. So I was really ecstatic when I saw how much experience he had. Um, and yeah, he's a great guy, man. I had a, he's a, he's a trip. So he, I, I think, uh, I think, uh, he's gonna be on Paul's show.

• 30:35Speaker 00

  Yeah, I'm in, I'm interviewing him on Monday. So I'm, I'm really, really looking forward to that. I, I, I feel like there's gonna be a lot of these people, Joey, that are gonna build these businesses and sell them for big money one day that are coming through your program. So it's super exciting.

• 30:50Speaker 05

  Yeah, that's one reason I was looking so heavily for somebody like that. So I could refer to somebody I trust. Cause you know, I, I don't like to just refer to anybody. I like to, to build that trust foundation. He's, he's a great guy to push people to when they, when they need to sell.

• 31:03Speaker 00

  Yeah, I went on a date last week with a business broker. Um, she's 32 years old and she knew her stuff, man. I, I mean, we're sitting here talking business like crazy. But then she's like, do you want to adopt children? And I was like, no, I was like, I want to, I want to have my own. And she's like, well, I, I feel like I want to foster. And so we, we didn't see eye to eye on that, but she knew business. I mean, she, we were talking, I mean, this woman, you know, she's helped sell a lot of businesses. I was like, man, I thought I met my wife and then she's talking about fostering kids and I didn't, I didn't quite know about all that. So I was like, I was hesitant. She's like, I don't think we're gonna match. Cause.

• 31:42Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 31:43Speaker 00

  I want to foster kids and she wants foster kids. I, I didn't quite want that. So.

• 31:48Speaker 07

  Do both. We did.

• 31:51Speaker 05

  You did both?

• 31:53Speaker 07

  Yeah, we did.

• 31:54Speaker 05

  Awesome. That's awesome.

• 31:55Speaker 07

  We had two and then we adopted three.

• 31:57Speaker 00

  Oh, wow.

• 31:57Speaker 05

  Nice, nice. Dude, that's awesome. We've talked about, we've talked about it. I don't know. We'll see.

• 32:03Speaker 00

  It's amazing.

• 32:06Speaker 02

  Um, what the broker was talking about, what I mean, what really got me when the, on your podcast, Joey, was when he said he had to tell that 72 year old man that his business won't worth nothing.

• 32:17Speaker 05

  Yeah, I mean, I'll tell you what, Greg, like, whenever I got into this, you know, a lot of my family, because I'm from the country, man, I'm from the boondocks. And a lot of my family works hard and their whole life, they don't have nothing to show for it, or they don't have a business with this valuable or anything. And so I was like, man, if I could really help people grow small businesses that that actually is sellable and that has value, you know, we wouldn't have so many people struggling at the end of their life. And I mean, that's a lot of my family, man, that's a lot of reason, you know, why we started this thing. So, uh, it's, it's very common, very common.

• 32:52Speaker 07

  Yeah, because that's one of the things that we've learned is, like, a lot of it, I just own a job. I don't own a sellable business right now. I just own a job and that doesn't get you anything.

• 33:06Speaker 05

  Yeah, your job as CEO is to build a team that can run your company better than you can. So, you know, I mean, if you, if you don't, it's, it's hard to have, I mean, you can't really sell a job. I mean, you can sell the assets and everything, but.

• 33:20Speaker 07

  And that's where the SOPs and all that kind of stuff, that's where you build your value.

• 33:25Speaker 05

  Yep, yep. Hiring processes, SOPs, having a, having a source of lead generation coming in. It's, it's all systems and processes that you're selling for the most part.

• 33:35Speaker 04

  And Jim, Jim spoke about that. And, you know, I have two companies right now in my area that are just going to twilight away. They're just going to close their doors. Maintenance's been doing it a long time. And then Jim also talked about that. Sometimes very unfortunate things happen and you have to get rid of a business and that is happening to a third person, all in lawn maintenance in my area. There's going to be three of them that next year will not be performing services. And they, two of them are retirement age. They should have something from that. And the other one basically is the proverbial hit by a bus type thing, and he's not going to be able to perform work. So those are three closed businesses that are not going to have the opportunity to, to be sold.

• 34:16Speaker 02

  Well, that's like me and you discussed last night. I'm, it's time for me to work on my business, not in my business, fill in where needed, but have them going out and let me sell work.

• 34:32Speaker 05

  I'll tell you that the the main difference in wealth in this country is strictly divided between those who own and those who don't own things. And so you you have to create your own

• 34:45Speaker 05

  company or or stocks. You have to own things. Otherwise, it's just the the rich get richer and the poor get poorer. And I can't stand it when the poor is working super hard or the middle class is working super hard and they just the divide keeps getting bigger. And it's all based around this concept of ownership. I mean, every single bit of it. So, uh, you know, building your company to you may not want to sell it, but building it to where it is sellable. At least you have that option and and that equity built up. So.

• 35:10Speaker 02

  And that's that's where I'm looking at with most of my employees. All they're looking for is Friday afternoon in the weekend. Yeah. And it's it's sad. They uh, those they're they're hitting me up for money money on Monday and Tuesday. So.

• 35:24Speaker 00

  Why don't you pay them on Monday instead of Friday?

• 35:28Speaker 02

  Uh, I got to have some help. That's why. Because they wouldn't none of these around here wait over the weekend to have their money. Because everybody's used to that end of the week paycheck Thursday or Friday.

• 35:42Speaker 07

  I used to pay people on Wednesdays.

• 35:47Speaker 02

  Middle of the week?

• 35:48Speaker 07

  Middle of the week. That way, uh, it kept them coming back and they didn't ask me. They stopped asking me for money during um, because that that was one of my issues, Monday, Tuesday. And then I got comfortable. I got lazy. I kind of reverted back to paying people on Friday. Now I have one person. It's it's without fail. My wife kind of makes a joke about it. By Tuesday night, no later than Wednesday, I'll get a text message late at night. Uh, I need this because of what the I mean, there's always some kind of excuse. And yeah.

• 36:34Speaker 07

  So last time I didn't pay them. I made them wait.

• 36:41Speaker 02

  They come in with their lip poked out because they're pouting.

• 36:44Speaker 07

  Yeah.

• 36:48Speaker 05

  All right, everybody. I got to head out here. We're eating dinner up here. So I'm getting pretty hungry over here. Dude, it was a pleasure, you know, going through boot camp with all y'all. I truly enjoyed getting to know all y'all as best I could. Thanks for everything. Thank you for the kind words. And Kevin, you got anything to say?

• 37:07Speaker 04

  I just hope I get to the chance to talk even more and learn more about you folks as I can help some of your issues that you're having with some of the experience that I had. Again, don't forget that we do have our internal social media piece that you can still be in contact with all of us. So we're not going to go away. Megan's going to move you over into that bigger family of other boot campers that now just become in our ecosystem. And we just want to keep continue with growing, growing our network so that we get bigger and stronger all together and yeah, create this little family that geez, think about meeting up at a quip or other shows where we have some, some big meetings together and actually have some fun together.

• 37:50Speaker 00

  Well, I plan to stay around to pester you some more, Kevin.

• 37:54Speaker 04

  I gotta learn more about pine straw then. Maybe we'll have to bring Paul in on that one.

• 37:58Speaker 00

  Yes, sir. I've laid a lot of bills of pine straw on my day, Kevin.

• 38:05Speaker 05

  All right, guys.

• 38:07Speaker 04

  It's been an absolute pleasure.

• 38:09Speaker 05

  Absolutely.

• 38:11Speaker 04

  Y'all take care. You all, you all have a great Thanksgiving.

• 38:14Speaker 00

  Yeah, see y'all. All right. Well, thanks again to Megan and Joey and Kevin Salters and Stephanie for putting together the wonderful lawn care boot camp. I really enjoyed going through that. And I know so many of you were on the Zoom calls with me and we had some fun over there. But what's really fun is actually winning in business, actually having profit and having profit year after year, success in business. That's what's really fun. And so I appreciate Joey and Megan. I mean, I've talked about them a lot on the program because they are my personal bookkeepers and they help me understand my numbers. And beyond that, they help me understand business fundamentals. I'm a big sports athlete type of guy. I enjoy

• 39:02Speaker 00

  You know, I don't watch a lot of football, but you know, I'll watch a couple, you know, a couple of football games a year. If Ohio State goes to the playoffs, I usually watch those games. And I was going to say if the Cleveland Browns go to the playoff, I want those kids, come on, let's get real. What if the Cleveland Browns are going to the playoffs? We, it's been a long time back. Yeah, that's right. Back when I had hair on my head, more hair. I still got a little bit of hair. I'm not, I'm not caving in those guys that just call it a day and shave, you know, go bald like, ah, no, I'm, my hair, I still fighting for my hair. But, um, where were we going? Cleveland Browns playoffs, football fundamentals. Thank you, Mr. Producer, fundamentals. So the business fundamentals, I really just want

• 39:46Speaker 00

  to make sure I'm doing everything right. Like I'm, I'm focused on the right customer, providing them with the right service and serving them at the highest level to, to create repeat business. And I am keeping all of my records clean and I'm doing things pricing wise where it's profitable. So as anyway, Megan and Joey have really helped me with all this and Kevin Salters and Stephanie and the whole team over there. So I'll put the information in today's show notes for lawn care launch. You want to join their next bootcamp, their next round of bootcamps. I believe they'll be doing another one soon.

• 40:25Speaker 00

  And you can do that 21 days. Just like Greg said there, Greg, Greg Fields on the call earlier there. Um, this, this was awesome. So I had a good time and definitely look forward to, um, putting these fundamentals into practice and seeing, um, my business go to the next, next, next level with a strong foundation. Cause when the foundation's rock solid and strong and you're growing your business, then it, things really, really get fun. So you can accelerate the wealth doing that program. All right. Thank you for listening. It was a good show. I enjoyed it and I'll catch you on the next one.

• 41:17Speaker 01

  Hey, it's Marty, producer of the Green Industry Podcast. This episode is over, but check the episode notes for links to products and services that you heard about during the episode. And thanks for listening.