The Small Business Safari
Have you ever sat there and wondered "What am I doing here stuck in the concrete zoo of the corporate world?" Are you itching to get out? Chris Lalomia and his co-host Alan Wyatt traverse the jungle of entrepreneurship. Together they share their stories and help you explore the wild world of SCALING your business. With many years of owning their own small businesses, they love to give insight to the aspiring entrepreneur. So, are you ready to make the jump?
The Small Business Safari
From Window Cleaner to Exterior Lighting: Lighting up a Niche | Ryan Lee
Ryan Lee joins the podcast to discuss his journey o to successful landscape lighting entrepreneur, he discusses how focusing on a specific niche can lead to massive business growth in home services.
GOLD NUGGETS
Dominate a niche. By dropping every service except landscape lighting, Ryan positioned himself as the expert, commanded premium pricing, and built a brand that buyers noticed.
Marinate your price. Share price ranges early—before the site visit—to filter tire-kickers and walk into every sales call with budgets aligned.
Design your life, not just your business. Therapy with his wife and disciplined delegation moved Ryan from “always grinding” to present dad and strategic owner—proof that systems beat burnout.
MORE ABOUT RYAN LEE:
• Interested in lighting: Check out his podcast "Lighting for Profits"
• Book recommendation: "Buy Back Your Time" by Dan Martell
If you're ready to grow your business or find your perfect niche, check out Ryan's resources at Landscape Lighting Secrets on YouTube and Instagram or find his podcast "Lighting for Profits" on your favorite platform.
https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLrfM0oJ4wAwL62RdWMAa3e1mxNVO62W5S
https://landscapelightingsecrets.com/
https://www.facebook.com/ryanleebottoms
https://www.instagram.com/landscapelightingsecrets/?igsh=MWppeTVydDMxNGh6NA%3D%3D#
https://www.linkedin.com/company/landscape-lighting-secrets/
From the Zoo to Wild is a book for entrepreneurs passionate about home services, looking to move away from corporate jobs. Chris Lalomia, a former executive, shares his path, discoveries, and tools to succeed as a small business owner in home improvement retail. The book provides the mindset, habits, leadership style, and customer-oriented processes necessary to succeed as a small business owner in home services.
So you started a podcast in landscape lighting, which is as niche-y as I can possibly imagine.
Speaker 2:It has to be. It has to be the niche-iest niche I've ever niched.
Speaker 1:It is the niche-iest niche of niches.
Speaker 3:He's the niche-iest niche of ever, niches. Put that in the gold nuggets. Welcome to the Small Business Safari where I help guide you to avoid those traps, pitfalls and dangers that lurk when navigating the wild world of small business ownership. I'll share those gold nuggets of information and invite guests to help accelerate your ascent to that mountaintop of success. It's a jungle out there and I want to help you traverse through the levels of owning your own business that can get you bogged down and distract you from hitting your own personal and professional goals. So strap in Adventure Team and let's take a ride through the safari and get you to the mount. What's this shit, alan? Because I'm gonna make this thing go. We gotta get going. Everybody, you dial in and try to figure out what's going on. Here we go. This week just got another email, did you, saying hey, chris, thanks for the shout out, appreciate it, appreciate it, nary. So everybody knows.
Speaker 1:I'm part of the National Association. You're just name-dropping because oh, who's president? Oh, that's me.
Speaker 3:Yeah, that's right. That's only in Atlanta, though. This is a national person who said hey, I just love how you pumped up Nary. Let me tell you why that's cool. I'd seen her two months ago at a conference and she said she went back to the podcast and she is a loyal listener checking things out.
Speaker 1:Love your banter. One of the things she said was stop using the f word was probably what she said, really, instead of the less, alan, I think so baby, yeah so don't use the f word and nary in the same sentence.
Speaker 3:So yeah, you can use st thomas of francis of assisi, that's right, which he has done, and I have, by the way, and drop the f bomb. And I have said sometimes the catholic church, we got to get the f out of our own way. I've done that too, but let's keep going, shall we so? Um, we got a great guest on today, man. This guy totally different service is he different?
Speaker 1:because he's so good looking and all that hair.
Speaker 3:All right guys go to YouTube Once again, alan and Chris.
Speaker 1:Cindy, why do you do this to us?
Speaker 3:Yeah, cindy, you're listening to this. It's your fault and I'm blaming you, and you could deposit right now and amp me up and put Ryan down, or can you take Ryan's beautiful head of hair off his head and give it to us? Look at the beard and the beard. I know he's got everything.
Speaker 1:Oh, he's got it all. Whatever I feel like we're doing a S&L skip he's just shallow.
Speaker 3:He's going to have nothing to add today. Guys, we got Ryan Normally.
Speaker 2:I'm just here for my good looks, which that's why I'm not good on podcasts, because I'm better just on, like just pictures and videos, you know.
Speaker 3:But if I have to talk, this could be bad, and the worst part is he has a better radio voice than we do he really, and I am on the radio, you're on the podcast, everything we said we have a face for radio. Now he has a voice for radio.
Speaker 1:Thanks, for putting up with us ryan, thanks for coming on, man.
Speaker 3:We can't wait to keep talking to you. Let's get going I love it.
Speaker 2:Thanks for having me. It's an honor, honestly. Uh, I've already had a blast.
Speaker 3:And then we we haven't even gotten started yeah, the stuff off air was pretty good yeah, guys, we we talked a little bit off air, but we left it in the green room and we're going to leave it right there because what's more important for all of us you're driving around is you really don't want to know that Chris is Pope fanboying right now, because when we're taping this, the conclave is going on. This is a big time for all of us in our Catholic faith, really excited about it.
Speaker 1:Who did you put your money on?
Speaker 3:So I went for the. So I put money on the Italian guy one and I went Asian guy second. But I will not bet on that because that is for blasphemy. That's bad people. What are you doing?
Speaker 1:Dad doesn't listen, so I'm good you can just go to confession, though for that right I can't. It all gets resolved on.
Speaker 3:Saturday bro, I can do anything. Quick story I may or may not have ended up in the detention office in high school when I argued that the word F-U-C-K was not in the Bible. Therefore it's not a bad word. May or may not Will not tell you.
Speaker 1:So unpack that a little bit. So any word that's not in the Bible is not a bad word. Was that your logic? That's where I fucking came from.
Speaker 2:Okay, and how did that go?
Speaker 3:Any word that's not in there is not exactly right I didn't see that you know it had the other ones, but it didn't have this one and I did not use his name in vain it sounds like you just like to make up your own rules to whatever game you're playing. Hello welcome to my world, ryan so welcome to why I'm not a lawyer, uh, which is why my son's going to law school, and one of the best friends is a lawyer and now a judge.
Speaker 1:Yeah, chris needs to be surrounded by people who care about him, who can also protect him and keep him out of a lot of problems that he usually creates for himself.
Speaker 3:Yeah, so Welcome to Own your Own Business, ryan, you've done this, you've started your own business, you've rocketed up and you're actually giving back. We're going to talk about your podcast later, because one of the things we we love about that is that you did it, and so when I saw your profile come up, I was like, oh, we've got to have you on, so talk a little bit about how did you get into this biz to begin with, just the biz you're in yeah, the quick backstory, really it's.
Speaker 2:It didn't start with this business. It started with another, another one when I was getting married. I was completely broke and $8 an hour was not going to cut it, so I decided, man, she must have been really in love.
Speaker 1:Oh stop right there. It was the beard, I guess. Back up, honey. I don't have any money. He's got great game, bro. Look at me, he must have great game.
Speaker 2:He is a great singer. Oh, dude, yeah, that's, that's like the ultimate right.
Speaker 2:I mean, you don't ever want to get married with money, because then you find out later they don't. It wasn't the beard, you know what I mean. So no, literally I was. I thought I invented the window cleaning industry. I the only experience I had with window cleaning was at the gas station where you got the squeegee with the backside rubber thing. I literally I went down to. I looked in the phone book, I found a cleaning store thing. I literally I went down to, I looked in the phone book, I found a cleaning store. I go down to state street.
Speaker 2:This was back in 2001. And I go in there and I'm like do you guys have like a like squeegees and stuff? I want to clean windows? You know, like the gas station they go. We don't have that. But we have this whole cleaning aisle. And like I didn't invent the cleaning industry, it was already there. They had squeegees, holsters, all this stuff. So we literally got like knocked doors that whole summer, made some money, made about 15 grand and could afford to get married. I mean, it wasn't, like you know, super posh wedding, but it was enough to get married. So that was my introduction to entrepreneurship. I was like, wait a minute, I can just go hustle, grind, knock doors, make money and not have to, like, have a boss. That was pretty epic.
Speaker 3:So let's talk about that for a minute. You know a lot of us. How long have you been doing your business now?
Speaker 2:How many years? Well, I started my lighting business in 2007. So, whatever, that is 18 years now.
Speaker 3:You still tell that story and you can see that glimmer in your eye, and I've talked about this before. I go back to some of the most fun times I've had was probably that first second year I was in when I was out there finishing something up for a customer or helping out one of my guys, and the customer is just so thrilled and they give you $20 as a tip and you're like wow, and here I am now, you know, not being able to see all that, just getting the reviews and everything that we do, and I think a lot of us would go back to a simpler time. We wouldn't go back to that simpler money which, by the way, I was kicking my ass kicked in, I was not making any money, but you had that fun, you had that hustle. Is that something where it like lit you on fire there?
Speaker 2:Well, yeah, well, it was a blast. I had never experienced anything like that. I had, I guess, a little bit like even growing up I would go knock doors and like shovel walks and make 20 bucks and I was like Holy cow, like I have $20, because earlier I didn't have $20 and now I can spend $20. So I kind of had that you know experience. But I didn't. Also, I didn't have like family or a father to show me how to start a business or anything like that. I just thought that you were supposed to go to school and then get a job and then and then after school it was going to be like a sweet job too. You know like at least 100 grand company, car cell phone, like all the the bells and whistles. You know insurance. I don't know why insurance is attractive, but it was like at the time it was so yeah, that that was awesome he was. He was way more progressive than we were at that time yeah so you didn't have anybody, like I had a rich uncle.
Speaker 1:I mean, there's always somebody in your life you're like oh, I want to be like that and that's what drives you into. I mean, we always talk about it on our podcast. Entrepreneurs are either just like extruded from the corporate world or they came from you know some sort of family that was full of entrepreneurs.
Speaker 2:No, I, literally I went to. I went to school so fast forward. I. I did that thing for the summer, but I didn't know that I could make that a business. I mean, I had no confidence in that. I just knew that I made money and got married. But then then my my goal was to go to school. I wanted to be. It was the. I was going to be the first one in my family to get a degree. I was going to change my family trajectory forever. So then I go back to school and now I can't clean windows because that's two hours away. And I literally got an $8 an hour job In college. I made $8 an hour working at the computer lab and I was kind of proud of it too, because I moved up. I started at $6 and then seven and then eight. Right, I didn't, I didn't know. Yeah, like I was a badass, I was like assistant manager of the computer lab. You know two, two labs on campus, all right mental image.
Speaker 1:This guy is really good looking, but my mental image is like totally best by a few, or I were, you know, assistant manager of the computer lab. It would be what you think, and then exactly ryan. Ryan does not.
Speaker 3:All of a sudden, all the hot girls are like oh, I like computers we'd have the collared shirt with the short sleeves and the tie that doesn't go a little bit under our belly. But the small, this small stuff. And then we'd have the uh, the two tight pants and, like, um, I got the badge that says assistant manager right here.
Speaker 2:Yeah, what you need, girl, I got you yeah, you need me to pull up google for you. Maybe a little safari, a little chrome, what do you want?
Speaker 3:oh, I got your google, I got your safari. Hey, baby, look at that, he's talking. All kinds of sexy talk.
Speaker 2:Now I even took adobe class, so I learned photoshop, illustrator. What do you need? You know what I mean, like talk dirty to me right?
Speaker 3:oh my god, he was the man and he was buried at the time which is even more.
Speaker 2:Yeah, that's that. That became a problem, so counseling yeah, counseling.
Speaker 3:Next thing, you know your wife's like what's his problem? Well, he is trying to pick up girls at the computer lab at work. Well, his, his, his uh line is uh, do you want to hear about adobe?
Speaker 2:yeah, no, really dope that's pretty much how it went down so no I didn't have like, I just wanted to get a degree and make money. I I was driven by money, partially because I think I grew up a single mother and we didn't have money. So what did she do? She was an accountant, so she worked for an insurance company and went into work every friggin day, did the same thing for like 30 plus years, uh, and she set a good example for you.
Speaker 2:Oh yeah, like hard work and get what you want, whatever. But I also felt like, well, what are those guys doing across the street because they have a boat, you know what I mean? And we don't have a boat and we're not even rich enough to get invited to go on the boat. You know what I mean. So I I did get motivated to to want money just because I didn't have it.
Speaker 3:I think so you didn't have the male role model. That's so interesting, uh. But the mother, uh, obviously for a lot of us is a very big deal. Grandmmothers form a lot of where we're at. She taught you how to make wine, right, my grandmother? No, she taught me how to cook. My grandmother did not teach me how to make wine.
Speaker 1:Oh, it was the uncle. It was all the uncles In the bathtub.
Speaker 3:All the bathtub. Jim the Semido, he loves it, he loves it. So I grew up Sicilian family over here and so, yeah, that was not a fun. Actually, I look back at it very fondly Because my guts almost came out of my body. How'd you?
Speaker 1:get to Texas. You started in Salt Lake, right? You grew up in Salt Lake.
Speaker 2:So at this time, my brother it's kind of interesting because my brother and I are like polar opposites, I mean, I'm kind of like the one who's saving the family name. He's kind of like trying to destroy it at the same time Are you older or younger, I'm the baby.
Speaker 3:I'm the youngest.
Speaker 1:And you're saving the family.
Speaker 2:Well, it's a work in progress. I hear you, bro. So he moved to Texas. We joke and say he was running from the law. But legitimately he was running from the law, and I'm not kidding when I say this at one point and I know it's just utah, it doesn't compare to, you know, other 49 states, but he was utah's most wanted at some point. Really, yes, dude nice gold nugget.
Speaker 3:Here we're talking to the brother of utah's most wanted at one point this makes us true crime.
Speaker 1:We're gonna be in the top oh my god, our podcast.
Speaker 3:Yeah, why you're?
Speaker 2:gonna go viral podcast. Yeah, yeah, it's definitely a true crime, no business talk.
Speaker 1:What did he do? That's a whole other episode.
Speaker 3:We just got to plant the seed Utah's most wanted.
Speaker 2:He's running from the law, moves to Texas to live with my aunt and uncle. He's out there and he's trying to figure out what to do His reset. I said, dude, I'm in college and I'm working on graduating. I said you should do window cleaning because I invented the window cleaning industry.
Speaker 1:That's right Back to the window cleaning. By the way, I invented it.
Speaker 2:You know what there's?
Speaker 3:these stores.
Speaker 2:You can go buy products now. Back then you didn't used to be able to.
Speaker 3:There's Steve Jobs. There's Steve Jobs, you didn't use to be able to. There's steve jobs. There's steve jobs. There's bill gates, and then there's me. I know how to clean windows. I've invented pretty much, yeah, still salesman even then.
Speaker 2:I love that but I literally said I'm like dude, for like 750 bucks you get a ladder, a squeegee, a bucket. If you hate it, two days later you'll have your money back and then you can figure out your life. But, as as your younger brother, that's all I know how to do. Go, do that. The houses are bigger in Texas than Utah. People have more money. You're going to go from like a 12 window house to a 50 window house. You know, I think it would be good.
Speaker 2:So he literally just started doing that and before you know it, he's got a business not quite a full on business like real business, but definitely solopreneur making a hundred 150 grand a year. And he's doing that. Now I'm finishing school, I get my marketing degree and then I decided I'm going to get my MBA. I'm in these classes and we're talking about like scenarios of, you know, manufacturing and economics, finance, marketing, sales, and all I could think was like dude'm gonna move to texas and blow up my brother's window cleaning company. We're gonna take it from this solo thing to like 26 million locations and like be bazillionaires, right, well, I convinced my wife.
Speaker 3:okay, we're gonna probably designed your yacht in monaco already, didn't you?
Speaker 2:yes, it's there. I haven't picked it up yet.
Speaker 3:Yeah, yeah, peoples, I let them use windows of the seas.
Speaker 2:Ooh, I like that. Yeah yeah. So I'll have this master plan. We're going to move down there. We literally go down there and buy a house. Like we go down there to look for a house and buy a house. We buy a house. We're celebrating. Oh my gosh, this is going to be so cool. He goes oh hey, I forgot to tell you I did these landscape lighting jobs and I was like what's landscape lighting I have. No, I don't even know what you're talking about. Oh, people like the houses, the trees, all this. I'm like what kind of idiot would spend money lighting houses and trees? I don't even know what that means. Remember, we grew up with no money, right? I said no, they spent a lot of money and I did these two jobs. They were $4,000 each. I said, hold on one minute. If you're telling me that I can go out and sell a $4,000 job in the same time that I can go do a $250 window cleaning job, I'm going for $4,000 all day long, right?
Speaker 3:All day baby.
Speaker 2:So literally that night, we got on Google, we started researching domain names.
Speaker 3:I'm like we're not cleaning windows, we're gonna be a lighting business and that's how we got into it. Dude, that's awesome. They all right.
Speaker 2:I but again, eight dollars an hour, kid. Um, how did you buy a house? Well, through that time, uh, after I graduated, I got a job in um marketing and you know I told you I was going to get like six figures signing bonus yeah, that's tough it was 40 000 no car, no benefits, gap, no, nothing.
Speaker 1:The 40 000 once upon a time, was the number dude uh that was our, our age even then.
Speaker 3:Um I, I. So. I went to school, got my master's degree. All my buddies did not. I got my master's in mechanical engineering, almost got my PhD, long story short, did not do that here. I am really smarter than them and I meet my wife, who was my girlfriend at the time, and they're all making three times as much as my $38,000 a year job. I'm like. So much for being smart dumbass.
Speaker 2:Right, that's how I feel.
Speaker 3:And oh, by the way, you get to work six days a week in manufacturing which I went.
Speaker 2:So it took me four years to get my marketing degree. I got that marketing job for 40 grand. Then I decided, so I got my mba while working. So it was like the executive mba, you know okay, solid means you're working while you get your mba?
Speaker 1:yeah, follow you, yep all right, so that's how you're qualified uh, that was definitely pressure from the father-in-law.
Speaker 2:There you go. He was like listen, um, if you're gonna amount to anything, you're gonna get an mba.
Speaker 1:Really, I don't know that he said those words, but that's what I heard I hear you, my, my daughter was in love with you for eight dollars an hour, but you better get your mba, yeah all right, so I'll just 40 40 grand a year.
Speaker 3:Although for us we didn't have any kids at the time I was like dude, we're rich like we never had this kind of money, you know uh, when I met my wife, uh, she was working at ibm in charlotte, north carolina, um and um. The first time I met her family, I was in grad school, and all of them are from detroit, michigan, and we all worked in the automotive industry one way or the other. And when I went back, they all looked at me and the first time I met them, literally they lined up to say goodbye, because I went to meet them at Thanksgiving and they're all in the Italian family too. And they all came up to me and said hey, if you need a job, hey, sounds like you're done on your luck. Hey, if you need a job, hey, you, you know we always can get you on the line. Hey, and I was like your whole family thinks I'm deadbeat. What the hell. She goes well, you don't make any money and I work for ibm.
Speaker 3:I'm like, yeah, yeah, but, but, but I'm going to be a mechanical. I mean, I'm going to be a. You know, I'm getting my phd. And she goes yeah, my family doesn't understand that. They're electricians, line workers, uh, uh, machinists. I'm like, yeah, but I was a machinist. They're like, yeah, but they, they, they think you can't figure out how to get a job, so you went to school. I'm like, oh, my god that's how I felt.
Speaker 2:I mean, I'm pretty sure family freaking, I'm pretty sure her dad was like that. And now that, now that my kids are getting older, I understand it a lot more. I got a daughter who's a senior and I'm going to like vet these guys that she's going to date, right. But at the time I'm like, dude, screw off, like you don't know who I am, you don't know who I'm going to become. Like why are you judging me? But obviously he's looking out for his daughter. But I think it was like, dude, this guy is not going to perform. He's coming from a divorced have, a uh, a good trajectory. What's he gonna do? So I was like, okay, I'll do my mba. Like I just you know I'm gonna work and I'll do it at night.
Speaker 2:Um, during that time, I worked at that marketing company for a year and I was getting like, dude, I'm worth more than this. This is pissing me off. I was asking for raises, I was asking for more work. They were like, nope, this is what you do. So I went and got a sales job. I was like, no, I'm gonna go make money. And I went and interviewed. I sucked at interviewing. It took me like literally like 50 interviews.
Speaker 1:I'm not even kidding did you just like go look at me? No, I mean alan, really, so that wouldn't work.
Speaker 3:Okay, you're hired he's joking, because he was at enterprise you would have hired him in a heartbeat. 100 right, but he has to have chops yeah, but he does well.
Speaker 2:Yeah, but I didn't know what I knew now I didn't have the confidence. I didn't. I mean, this was you know, I'm 21 years old, right? So I'm trying to. Now I'm 25 years old, I'm interviewing for these, I'm interviewing for these jobs now, I'm sorry.
Speaker 2:No, you know when I'm interviewed for these jobs, I get the sales job my no. You know, when I'm interviewed for these jobs, my very first year I make a hundred grand. I'm like the top rep that's how I afforded the house. Like I started making some really good money and I was like, hey, do you guys care if I just work from Texas, like if I moved to Texas, can I work remote? And this is crazy. This is before COVID, before remote workers existed. They're like yeah, you're killing it for us, we don't care where you work from, just keep doing your thing.
Speaker 3:So you're able to build your business as a side hustle while you're getting a full-time kick. All right, that's awesome, great move. All right, you went down there, brother, down there on the lam doing this when in Texas, dallas-fort Worth. Okay, so you can't find them, and let's face it, that last name, you can't find them.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I can't tell you any more specifics.
Speaker 1:Yeah, we're going to leave it right there, so for that first year I did both.
Speaker 2:And what was kind of crazy is I had big, big goals for the lighting business and we didn't hit those numbers. But we did $350,000 our first year and those numbers. But we did 350 grand our first year and I was and I was still working full time. But now, instead of the top rep, I was not the fifth rep, the 10th, I was like 15, 20, I mean, I just wasn't. You can't be a master at both, you can't. You can't do both.
Speaker 3:Yeah so we use that to seed the business. You got into it. You started landscape lighting. You, uh, you guys totally ditched uh window cleaning because you can only make so many dollars. $7 a window, what was it? What would you guys charge a window?
Speaker 2:Well, dude, when I started I had no idea I was charging three bucks a window in and out and I was like, but it was like 15 bucks an hour. I was like double the normal rate. You know what I mean.
Speaker 3:So I didn't know what I didn't know. But you know that now is that it should have been seven a window all day long.
Speaker 2:Well, now I I pay to get my windows cleaned and it's eight dollars a pane, so you're talking like 16 a window. Yeah right, oh well, and I happily pay it because I don't want to clean windows. I got better shit I gotta do. I can make more than that I'll never forget.
Speaker 3:As a handyman company we uh we cleaned windows. Once I quoted it, the lady called me up and said next time somebody tells you or asks you to clean windows, just tell her or him. You don't know how to. It was that bad. I said I'll come back and fix it. My guy had streaks all over the flipping place.
Speaker 3:I was like you're right, because back in the day it was seven, seven inside and out. That was before 19. But here we are in 2025. Building materials have gone up 40%. Yeah, just in five years, labor has gone up another X percent. Doesn't matter, the numbers we have in our head have got to stop, because that's just not the truth. So you get into lighting, and it's definitely a luxury business, it's a want not a need.
Speaker 1:Did you do any uh crazy jobs for dallas cowboys or anything like that, any celebrity jobs and?
Speaker 2:we yeah, we did. We did some high-end jobs, for sure, and some of them you have to sign an nda and, like you, you literally can't say anything about it. What did they want to light up?
Speaker 1:what's that? What did they want to light up? What's that? What did they want to light?
Speaker 2:up, just their house, their pool area, their cabanas, all that, actually, the more interesting people were like. I remember I went and did a quote for a Dallas Cowboys player one time. And this is the challenge when you deal with some of these well-known public figures, even if they're not even well-known, if they, if they're making money, they, if they don't trust you like a thousand percent, then they think you're screwing them over. I went and gave a quote to a lady. We set up a demo, showed her what it was going to look like.
Speaker 2:There wasn't much to light, to be honest, and it was only 3000 bucks. I told her hey, it's 3000 bucks. Are you kidding me? What are you ripping me off? Because my husband's on the team? Blah, blah, blah. I mean, she went off on me, wow, kicked me off the property and I'm like three thousand dollars, that's our minimum like if you had more I would charge you more. There's, this is all like this. Is it like this is gonna? This is what it looks like. It's three grand. You can't find anyone to do it for less. I mean you can always find someone cheaper, but you're not gonna find better, you know so let's talk about that for a minute, because I want to dive into the sales process.
Speaker 3:We talk a lot and we've, you've, you've been on, you have your own podcast and we're going to get to that in a minute. Um, but the sales process. What did you learn and where do you feel like your sales guys now need to understand the sales process the best?
Speaker 2:well, I learned a lot, um, through that experience. Many others, um, I, I developed a whole sales process based on all the mistakes I made. So one of the tips like that lady had no idea and if you've never had landscape lighting and you hear an average job is $12,000, that's going to seem high to you because you just don't have a reference. Someone could have a $300,000 car sitting in their front yard and still think $10,000 for lighting is expensive because they've never paid it Right, but they know that those types of cars cost 300,000. So no big deal.
Speaker 2:So one of the tools that I really started using was called the price marinade, so we would tell people up front on the phone pre-qualifying. Hey, just so you know, our minimum is about 3,500 and an average job is between eight and 10. Does that sound about like what you're looking for? And some people would be like no, that's a lot of money. I thought it was going to be 500 bucks. You know what? Feel free to look around If you feel like you know you guys decide to do professional lighting. You'll see that it actually has a lot more than 500. We'd love to come out and call you, but totally understand, don't want to waste your time and we wouldn't go out there. Sometimes those people call you back two days later and be like you know what, we just didn't know. We did ask around our friends and it turns out that's what it is. Why don't you guys come out and give us a quote?
Speaker 3:So you have a pre-qualified lead and you did not waste your time educating somebody and sending somebody out for an $80 lead or a $100 lead that you paid for for somebody to drive out there, just to tell somebody that, well, what were you thinking? Well, I was thinking that there are solar lights that you can just plop in for $1 a piece from the dollar store.
Speaker 3:That's not what we're talking about, man and sometimes you can get the bite, but sometimes you've got to do that price condition. So I think again, pre-qualifying your customer is such a big thing.
Speaker 2:It totally starts with that. It saves a lot of frustration on both ends and I, you know as much as I was pissed that lady wasted my time. She's still pissed at me that I wasted hers. She just didn't know. So it would have been real easy to have that phone call or conversation on the phone to say, hey, this is where it is. The problem is know, especially with lighting, people, even rich people, go to costco and you can get a kit for like 500 bucks. So then they're like what's it going to cost 500 bucks to get this installed? It's like, well, maybe, but not from us. You know like we're going to use much higher quality lights with 10, 15 year warranties. We're going to put a design together. We're going to actually bury your wire. Do proper connections, proper wiring methods, proper transformers. Make sure everything's vaulted right. There's a lot more to a professional lighting installation than a diy all right.
Speaker 3:So as you grew your business, um, you started to figure out the price conditioning, do this, do that, um, what were some of the big things you had to learn from scaling?
Speaker 2:well, one was, you know I. I thought it was just easier to just do it yourself. It's so hard to um learn to delegate, because the first time you ever do something you suck at it. So the first time you hire someone you tell them hey, do this thing, and they don't do it. They don't do it the way you, you think they should, and the problem is your common sense is not their common sense.
Speaker 3:It's not common, my friends.
Speaker 2:Common sense is not common. Yeah, they would own the business and you would be reporting to them, type thing. So that was a really hard thing to learn, because you try it once you hire someone, you tell them what to do with your common sense. They don't do it. So you're like screw it, I'm going back, I'm just going to stay small. And you gave up on all this potential of your future opportunities just because you weren't good at training, just because you weren't good at delegating. That, to me, is the hardest part of scaling.
Speaker 3:Yeah, great point, I love that one. All right, so you went down there, you and your brother. You go into business together. Did you stay in business together?
Speaker 2:Well, that's why we're here. So I read this book called Traction, and Traction is like the Bible. It's like, yeah, gino. So I read that book and literally midway through and talking about some different things of hiring and the right person in the right seats, I knew when I was reading that book that my brother and I were going to have to break up because we basically were two visionaries. We were two people in one box trying to run the company.
Speaker 2:He wants to go left and he wants to go to the lake and wake surf and you know party. And I want to go right to build an empire. I want to do we're going to Houston, austin, we're going to blow this thing up, exit for 50 mil. Like, I'm going big. He's like, dude, you work too much. I'm like you don't work enough. So, like, if he wants to go left and I want to go right, we go right down the middle. No one's happy and that's that was this huge epiphany. So done, he's like dude, I'm you're. I'm a guy for you're the business guy. I can fix stuff, I'm street smart, but I can't do this. So he ended up buying me out of the business in 2019 okay and it worked out well.
Speaker 2:You guys are still brothers, still brothers, it's not you know a lot of people will go oh man, I want to do what you did and sell your, sell my business. I'm like, why, like, I want to do what you did and sell my business. I'm like, why, like, if you knew the whole reason why I sold my business, I didn't want to sell my business.
Speaker 3:You sold it for your family.
Speaker 2:Yeah, why would you spend 10 years building something and then give someone the upside Like? That was a huge on paper mistake on my part, but it wasn't a mistake, it just had to be done and it's. It's been really good for me because I didn't make a ton of money off that exit, but what it allowed me to do is do what I want to do Right. And now there's one visionary at the top of a company and I get to steer the ship. And so now I started landscape lighting secrets where we basically it's a community, it's a coaching and community program where we help other people start and grow their own landscape lighting businesses and collapse time. Just eliminate all the mistakes I made over 12 years, basically.
Speaker 3:Love it, man. Collapse time. I love that phrase. That's a great phrase. And you're still great with your brother, so that's huge. You know, coming from an Italian family where they say blood's thicker than water, I can argue that one a lot, because there's a reason. I went into business by myself and didn't involve any of my family.
Speaker 1:So you started a podcast in landscape lighting, which is as niche-y as I can possibly imagine.
Speaker 2:It has to be. It has to be the niche-iest niche I've ever niched.
Speaker 1:It is the niche-iest niche of niches.
Speaker 3:He's the niche-iest niche of ever niches. Put that in the gold nuggets well, it's kind of crazy.
Speaker 2:So I I didn't even mean like. I didn't mean like, oh, I'm gonna sell my business and then I'm gonna coach others and like this is the plan. Like no, I don't, I don't know how to plan that. Like there's no way I could figure this out. When I sold my business, I was trying to figure out what I wanted to do. I was doing some digital marketing for, for, for people. I had friends that own businesses and like dude, how do what you did with your company for us? I'm like, okay. So I was doing Facebook ads, online reviews, um, google ads, websites, and I was doing, okay, covid happened, half my clients fired me. I don't know if you guys remember, but like everyone was freaking out and they were like dude, we don't know what we're going to do.
Speaker 3:You think, yeah, yeah, they, they and they were like dude we don't know what we're going to do.
Speaker 2:You think yeah, yeah, and I was kind of relieved because I was like dude, I hate this. Like these were some of the kind of friends of mine and one month they'd be like dude, you're awesome man, you got us 60 leads Like this is freaking phenomenal. The next month they're like dude, must be nice in Utah riding dirt bikes and mountain biking. Huh, we only got 30 leads, bro. I'm like you only got 30 leads. Like I'm sorry that you're successful and they're like well, but the month before was 60. I'm like okay, like we're not having this conversation what's a utah version of?
Speaker 1:you're dead to me, chris. What do you think?
Speaker 3:uh, that's a good one. Yeah, how do you use that? Yeah, you from utah went to texas. Probably figure out some really colorful words out of texas. So do you do in Utah, when somebody says that and you can't say, go fuck yourself, that's exactly right. So what do you say?
Speaker 2:Like because in the South we say bless your heart, yeah, yeah, I say bless your heart, and then just don't answer their phone call anymore. Yeah, you know, I love it, especially when people go.
Speaker 3:Well, chris you're so crude. I love it, especially when people go well, chris, you're so crude. We bless their hearts. I'm like you're saying the same thing, you're just saying it differently, and you're just putting a velvet glove over that. Brass knuckles that I'm flying through anyway, let's go.
Speaker 2:They weren't bad breakups. It just was like you know what. I totally understand. I'm sorry that you don't want to work with me and I'm grateful. You know grateful. You know what I mean.
Speaker 2:So then then I started going. You know what? I have a chance. I have a real chance right now to reset and do it whatever I want in my life. What do I really want to do?
Speaker 2:And I was at a marketing conference and they were talking about what you're calling and what are you good at and what are you pro at. And I'm like I don't know. I'm like decent at a lot of stuff, but I've never really thought I'm like the best at anything. But I kept coming back to this, like I was like mountain biking, dirt biking, fishing I like these things, but I'm not going to teach someone how to do it, even lighting, like there's people that are better than me. But I just kept coming back to it and I had people reaching out saying how did you grow a lighting business to like a few million dollars a year? That's insane. You only did lighting. And, like you didn't do drugs, you didn't sell anything. I'm like no, just lighting.
Speaker 2:So I hired a coach and I said help me put this together. I want to teach people how to grow their businesses and I was going to be home service secrets. I was just going to teach painters anyone who's dealing with a homeowner let me teach you my proven processes. But my coach was the one that goes dude every time you talk about lighting. That's when you light up, like you don't care about roofers and painters and stuff, like, and you've never done that, like just be the lighting guy. And I'm like but the lighting guy is like too niche, like who's gonna listen? Is there? Is there, I don't even know if the industry is that big. So, um, I decided to kind of almost prove him wrong. I was like all right, I'll show you.
Speaker 3:Yeah, right and uh screw you, dude, because I know there's money, more riches, my, my boat's in Monaco still waiting for me. It's not on the Lighting Pros podcast, exactly.
Speaker 1:All that said, what is the size of the lighting industry in the US? Yeah, let's go.
Speaker 2:It's freaking awesome. I mean I just don't see myself doing anything else because we have so many people now in our program and then I decided to start a podcast. I'm like you know what I'm going to. This is going to be my marketing tool. I'm going to build an audience and, uh, it's literally my number one lead generator is my podcast, because you get to build this relationship with people and and let them into your life and tell these stories and everything else. So we don't have, we're never gonna have, millions of followers, but it doesn't matter. Like the people that do listen, the people that do follow, we're changing their lives and it's never like I don't. Really. I joke around like, oh, we're going to go viral, but I don't want to go viral. I just want to go viral within the lighting community, viral where it matters.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I would still want to go viral. I am.
Speaker 3:I'm a whore. I'm a whore, come on. Hey, I'm an italian whore, so he can't imagine that so anyway so back to this. I think one of the things that people uh miss and it's really scary to niche down, but you know it, we know it, we've talked about it to a ton of people, you got a, got a niche man. I mean our podcast. We're serving people trying to scale a small business. We've talked about this over and over. We're in entrepreneurship. Wish we were in true crime. Almost got there.
Speaker 2:We almost did today. You're welcome. We've done it a couple of times, right.
Speaker 3:We've been there a couple of other times. One of them is probably the best one ever Paul burleson, who just got inducted into the national hall of fame for uh home services are you? Serious. I didn't even know what that is, but that's amazing.
Speaker 2:Paul burleson. Yeah, he's a great dude. Did he make? Did he make that up like does he come up with his own awards? Seriously, that's a great idea, ryan I don't know, paul, I do that I made.
Speaker 3:I don't know if you guys know this, but I'm the host of the number one landscape lighting podcast in the world well, and you invented uh window cleaning it's the only way I love that, you know, I love the chutzpah of a young man saying but go back to when you're a kid, is it chutzpah or is it chutzpah?
Speaker 2:well, I don't know, since I I gotta google that jewish friend ever means yeah that I ever met my life.
Speaker 1:You don't use jewish words if you don't know how to say it.
Speaker 3:I have Jewish friends.
Speaker 1:Now I can say that.
Speaker 3:How do you spell it? I don't think it works that way. What is it, chespa?
Speaker 2:Chespa is a Spanish language word.
Speaker 1:Yes, let's go. That's not what you were saying.
Speaker 2:Remember. I lived in Texas. We don't speak Jewish, we speak Spanish.
Speaker 3:We speak, we speak.
Speaker 2:Spanish, we don't speak.
Speaker 3:We speak.
Speaker 2:We're not part of the US.
Speaker 3:I know that one.
Speaker 2:My son's in a school in Waco, Texas. We speak Texan.
Speaker 3:Holy crap, you were in Dallas, which is a little bit more metropolitan, but man, when you got to Waco, man, there is one country and they call it Texas. It ain't the US, bro.
Speaker 1:Absolutely. I was like, no, we're all part of it.
Speaker 3:Thank God for them. Yeah, no, it's hilarious. They have their own truck down there, their own pickup model.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and you should buy a Ford. No, it's still Chevy no it's not. It is F-150.
Speaker 2:Settle the story right now. What do you drive? Does this how it ends? He probably drives a Prius. It's not going to end.
Speaker 1:Don't say that, ryan, are you serious? Don't ruin it. Don't you dare say that about Ryan, that handsome good-looking man drives a big Chevy truck.
Speaker 3:He drives a Ford no.
Speaker 2:The reason I drive a Ram is because it's got six seats for my four kids and my wife. But I do want a Ford. I've got two Ford Broncos and then my truck is my Ram. So I would be driving a Ford if I could get the six we will allow that.
Speaker 3:All right, I will not allow that. But Ken, coming from Detroit, you have no idea. Growing up, my dad bought I guess this story is so adjunct, but I'm going to do it anyway. My dad bought a Suzuki back in the day what I know because he had to go back and forth to his facility, because he was a civil engineer and he had to keep going back and forth. So he bought it.
Speaker 1:Sam in a Suzuki? I don't see it.
Speaker 3:I know, and it was a stick shift, which again it was the cheapest thing you could buy, because that's Sam, so cheap, and that's my dad, my dad's from Buffalo, new York, son of an Italian immigrant, the whole thing, and he gets it. So I go out, I take the car out to meet my girlfriend and I show up at their parents' house and Grandpa's there and Grandpa sees me and likes me, grandpa and the entire family supplies parts to the Big Three back in the day. This is you know. And he sees me, he waves, he locks the door and walks away.
Speaker 2:I thought he was joking.
Speaker 3:He was like don't ever come to this house again with that car and I was like, oh, uh, heard, done. That is awesome. Yeah, we're going back to the oldsmobile. So, all right, ryan, you've done. You found your passion. You know it's hard to do what you've done the leap, but also I don't. I have to imagine what was the hardest of all of them Going out there and hustling, when it was a single mom doing windows, going out there, moving down to brother starting a landscaping lighting business, leaving brother and starting your own business. What was the hardest of those three?
Speaker 2:Hardest one was the middle of the lighting business. I wouldn't say the hardest was getting started, because there's that honeymoon phase where you're like, dude, I don't give a shit if I'm not making any money, we're just having fun. You know, like this is the american dream to be broke and out doing what I want and not having a boss. But I would say after that, like years three through nine, that grind phase was the worst.
Speaker 3:Yeah yeah, I think that's where people uh miss that. You said that three through nine and it wasn't like all bad because you're in the middle of it and you're you're digging. But you're digging and you're like you're digging, wait a minute, my, my boat in monaco is still waiting for me and I've got the name picked out already and it's going to be an awesome name. What was it again?
Speaker 2:windows of the sea, windows of the seas. I think that's what windows of the seas yeah, thank you for reminding me. I actually forgot that it was sitting there. I'm assuming they're chartering it out or something. Yeah, they're waiting for you. They're waiting for you people.
Speaker 3:You're like, no, I can do this, but you're like, no, but the america dream is, I'm supposed to be broke. You go back to the most romantic phase of all of our businesses. It was the beginning, um, and how we did it. But where do we want to be? And you know, people say your why and alan, we talk about this a lot. My why has evolved so hard and, yeah, so many different ways is it?
Speaker 1:really um, yeah, from like big boat and fast cars to fast cars and big boat it just changes the order.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I think so no, so not fast cars. I'm out because I can't get into those things anymore. Is that why you're just drinking water.
Speaker 1:You're trying to slim down so you can get into a fast car.
Speaker 2:You want like a CRV, like a Honda CRV, oh my God.
Speaker 3:You just said blasphemy. You know what? Honestly see again Honda CRV. That's not in the fucking Bible you can't say that. But for me that's a bad word that's worse than the F word. Well, you can say it, because it's not in the Bible, exactly.
Speaker 2:You can use that one. So how old are your kids now? Ryan, We've got 17, 15, 12, and 10.
Speaker 1:Talk about your wife a little bit. She's had to put up with a lot. She bought into eight bucks an hour. She went to Texas, I'm assuming, oh yeah, raising the kids. She's still here.
Speaker 2:I don't know how, but it's crazy.
Speaker 1:What's the beard? We know that.
Speaker 2:Yeah, obviously it's the good looks.
Speaker 1:It's crazy, dude, if I didn't have her.
Speaker 2:Someone's got to be raising these kids. You think I'm taking them all their stuff and doing their. She's literally over there right now doing homework with the kids. Like my kids would be dropouts. They would be nothing like. It would be a bad situation over here burden on society.
Speaker 3:Do not for your wife do not take that as a reason not to go with ryan and his coaching uh, with landscape secrets, because he's here to coach you, not his kids. Yeah, exactly, I'll leave them to the, to the wife yeah, no it, and that's that's the thing.
Speaker 2:Like, when they were young, I didn't. I, I was not a good dad. It's not that I was a bad dad, but I just wasn't present. And what's crazy, you talk about your why. My whole purpose of doing this and being successful and like doing this thing and showing the world was so that I could be the dad that I didn't have. And and then, ironically, I'm out looking at lights, doing demos, moving lights around until midnight and my wife's going where the hell are you? We're popping out kids like crazy. So we literally went to therapy to figure this shit out. She had to call me out and tell me you suck. And I'm still grateful for that, because I didn't know. I literally just thought I didn't have this example of like this mold, like this is what you got to be, and that's one of my whys now is like, hey guys, this isn't just about making money, it's what has to be true to make money and be a good father, mother, leader, because you don't have to pick one over the other.
Speaker 1:For years I did and unfortunately, I chose my business and I didn't have to you didn't know what you wanted to be, but she helped you see what you needed to be.
Speaker 3:Yeah, yeah, but it's way more intentional now it's, it's still a hard uh it you know, back to the. Remember the old seesaws, ellen, oh yeah, yeah, it's a hard seesaw to balance, you know, uh, because we talk about work-life balance and, um, people think it's 50, 5050, and, brother, it ain't. It never is, it just is not. Not if you're going to do this, not if you're going to start your own business, what you do get is personal freedom for your time, which is awesome, so you get a chance to be involved with your kids and present at the most important times of their life, whether it's sports or after school activities. And then maybe you're working to the wee hours after they go to bed or whatever it is. But promise you, it is not easy, it's still hard. You have to go back after it and get after it and go work and later doing the other things earlier. You're getting up at 5 am instead of 6 am. You're doing things earlier so you can be there when they wake up, get them off to school. I mean, that's the part that's rewarding the reason.
Speaker 3:When I started my business I look back on I was in a country club community. All the entrepreneurs were playing golf on friday afternoon and I was down at the bank working and I started saying wait a minute, among other things. I was like how come you guys are all golfing on Friday, you guys are all made, and then you find out after you get into it. Yeah, they golfed on Friday, but guess what they did on Saturday morning Worked.
Speaker 2:Saturday and sometimes Sunday.
Speaker 3:Uh-huh, amen, that's what we did, but you do it because you love it, but that's where you're able to be a present father, and so it's hard, but it's fun, man, it's so rewarding right oh yeah, I mean, the thing that I wish I would have done earlier is just be intentional, because, like, if you want to golf fridays, you totally can.
Speaker 2:If you want to golf wednesday, like you actually can have freedom. But the problem is we start our businesses for the freedom and then we don't have enough intention behind it, so it actually becomes a trap and we're like handcuffed and we have to go do all these things because we we think that it requires us to do everything. So we're putting out all these fires. So what we do is we help people prevent the fire from happening altogether, you know, and then replace yourself early, early on, so that you're not wearing these five, six different hats, and then it's actually fun. Like on, so that you're not wearing these five, six different hats, and then it's actually fun. Like you should have fun every day at work. You shouldn't be pissed like crap. It's Monday, I got to go in, you start this thing.
Speaker 3:Well, I do that every Monday anyway. It still doesn't matter, 17 years into it.
Speaker 2:Brian, do you help people other than people in the lighting business? Not right now. I mean, it's not that like. If someone wants to call me, I'm like do you do lighting? No, all right, screw off you're. You're dead to me, double fingers from birds yeah, pretty much I'm anti anything lighting, so you don't do lighting well screw you.
Speaker 3:You're gone. You're a loser.
Speaker 2:I guess you hate money and you hate your life. Enjoy being miserable wisdom from ryan.
Speaker 1:Droplets from ryan right, I just I was to the bone to ryan.
Speaker 3:Ryan says do you love lighting?
Speaker 1:no, I was testing his commitment to the niche pre-qualify, pre-qualify baby way big right.
Speaker 3:We've. We've had a painting pros guy on who said I said hey, would you uh, happen stance like take a handyman up at atlanta? No, and he went, no. I said, even if he's at five million a year, he goes. No, I'm like wow, that's dedication. I said I'm not kidding, I'll, I'll spend money with you, you still know. I'm like all right, fair enough let me how much we talking.
Speaker 2:You know what I mean. Right, but he, but he stopped.
Speaker 3:I was like all right man, I was like all right, but stay true to it, because your niche is bringing the riches. We talked about that.
Speaker 2:Yes, no, I love the lighting community. It's definitely my passion. But seriously, how much?
Speaker 3:were you talking? I love Ryan. He's still got it, baby. All right, let's go. We got our famous four questions, Ryan. Before we do that, how does everybody find you and your podcast and who you are?
Speaker 2:Well, just, you know Google or something, I don't know. So I've got a few different things. I got my YouTube and Instagram at Landscape Lighting Secrets. On both of those, ryan Lee on Facebook, but there's multiple Ryan Le lee's so I don't know how to write me there. You're tough, you need a lot of mia. Yeah, there's a lot of ryan lee. So, uh, my podcast is lighting for profits and I will say I do have people that comment and leave reviews on there. Like man, I'm not, I'm in painting, I'm in another industry. This is all helpful stuff. So, like, screw you. Yeah, I'm like, please unsubscribe. Like, if you give me another five-star review again, I'm coming after you, bitch right, come on, man, you got to get me back on there.
Speaker 3:We got it. Let me, let's come on, we'll chop it up. I'll kill those lighting guys. I'll tell them all kinds of stupid handyman, stupid landing landscaping stories I've ever done.
Speaker 2:They're gonna love me yeah, we don't want to muddy up the waters, we don't want them getting diluted here. You know, we want them to stay, stay in the lane with lighting.
Speaker 3:Keep me away from them, then, all right. All right, let's go back to it.
Speaker 1:Look at this guy. He's super niched. He's got the background and his shirt that he's wearing, dude, it's the same as the background. I mean he's laser focus.
Speaker 3:I love brand, but hey, I mean, I mean seriously right, and can I bring the pipes right, bringing it down? I got the trusted toolbox. Let's's go, all right, let's go Give us a book that you would recommend to our audience. Trying to scale a business, to start a business.
Speaker 2:The first book that I read that got me going on my path not the first book ever, but the first book like business book was E-Myth Entrepreneurial Myth. Yeah, man.
Speaker 3:Gerber's been a classic. Yeah, so good. It helped me actually in the middle of it. It helped me stop being so frustrated because I wanted to be the big brain, I wanted to be the manager and I wasn't the best technician in the world.
Speaker 1:Look at the big brains on Chris. Look at me, baby, I got big braids.
Speaker 2:All right. What I thought the entrepreneur was was you're supposed to be good at all those? It gave me the same thing it gave me. It liberated me from this feeling of like why do I suck at being a manager, like is this, like other people are better than me at this and it's like, yeah, because they figured out that they're not good at a manager and they just hired out so that was right, that was huge.
Speaker 2:So e-myth the second one. Let me just throw that out. There is newer book called buy back your time, and the reason why I like that one is because, once you understand the e-myth and understand the whole process, buy back your time, like this, is the whole blueprint for replacing yourself and going from operating your business to owning it.
Speaker 3:So he talks about hire an admin, then you're going to replace fulfillment or your installation, whatever it is then you're going to replace sales, write down, buy back your time and edit this out, but she won't.
Speaker 1:But it doesn't matter kidding cindy, give me the cliff's notes on buy back your time.
Speaker 3:All right, love that one oh yeah, cindy, really tell me. Tell me how to buy back by time I love that.
Speaker 2:All right, what's a favorite feature of your home? Feature of my home lighting the outdoor lighting bro what do you got?
Speaker 1:so what does the lighting guy have on his own home?
Speaker 3:You gotta send us an email on that one, Is it like? I wanna see what it looks like.
Speaker 1:Just like you know the whole neighborhood Woo.
Speaker 2:No, I'm thinking we turn our lights on and the whole state just dims.
Speaker 3:I'm talking Christmas vacation lights Every night. Oh, there goes Ryan again showing off yeah, everybody. And he's got a big penis in the middle of it. Go down, look at me. No it's actually not that at all, but somehow you threw that in there.
Speaker 2:No, it's tasteful lighting.
Speaker 1:That's the thing. Welcome to my world, Ryan.
Speaker 2:Yeah, a lot of it always goes back to penises with him.
Speaker 3:I don't know why it really does, still watching for the Pope and talking about penises.
Speaker 2:Thank you.
Speaker 3:That's the reason we have confession every Saturday morning.
Speaker 2:Typical Catholic joke, right oh.
Speaker 3:God All right. Oh my God, oh, here we go, you ready. Can you handle it?
Speaker 1:Outdoor lighting. That's my favorite feature. Outdoor lighting, of course. Specifically what though?
Speaker 2:He outplays the convention which outdoor lighting.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I mean. What is it? I mean, does your house look amazing compared to everybody in the street?
Speaker 2:Well, yeah, I mean, of course, but I don't know. So if I I don't know Like, I like my backyard, we built a pool last year, so that's fun. Okay, when you say feature like, do you want me to name like a?
Speaker 1:specific peak. No, I just kind of want to know in outdoor lighting like. What is the deal? What is the big deal? Like what?
Speaker 3:So I have outdoor lighting on the front of the house.
Speaker 2:If you're, chris, yeah but did you get professionally designed the you want your neighbors to say suck it yeah I do, by the way.
Speaker 1:That's right. What do you send you?
Speaker 2:I'll send you guys some some photos of like yeah, we're gonna post those photos.
Speaker 3:Go check me out instagram, chris lalamia. I'm gonna post those things out there.
Speaker 1:We'll get it and it's gonna be under chris lalamia hashtag. Suck it, oh yeah, 100 every time, and thanks to ryan.
Speaker 2:Yeah, because most people don't know what good outdoor lighting looks like. Like any lights better than no light. I agree, can be a challenge, because you probably think your house looks good where you send me your picture. I'm going to tear it apart.
Speaker 3:I'm going to tell you dollar lights in the backyard because my wife put them out there and I was like, I'm like, and that probably looks good to you. My wife can spend some money, bro, so I was like I wasn't gonna tell her give me your number yeah, I know, yeah, ryan ryan, this is a good prospect for you, she goes, those look good.
Speaker 1:I'm like, yeah, baby, those look great, I just love if nicole says this is what I want, that's what chris buys, that's exactly well, that's why he's a good husband.
Speaker 3:Yeah, yeah, so I got the front yards all lit up at the backyard with the pool.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I'm like all right all right, I I did have a guy and he lived in like my neighborhood in texas, was like a just a what I call a regular neighborhood 250 000 home and he spent like 14 000 on lighting. And I'm like, what the heck is it like? Did you? Did you hear? Did you hear what I said? It wasn't 1400, it's 14 000. I'm like, dude, you're, you're like, and he, he's like, yeah, is that not normal? I said no, it's totally normal. Yeah, and he told me he goes what Mrs Martin wants, mrs Martin gets. Yeah, and I'll always remember that.
Speaker 3:Never write the check for the customer that they want to write Exactly. You will never spend that money, but if they want to, god love them, let's go. Yeah right, all right. Next question so we talk about customer service and we've been talking about a little bit, just once in a while a little bit yeah so, but we're kind of customer service freaks let's go, alan. What's a customer service? Pet peeve of yours.
Speaker 2:When you are out there, you're the customer well, actually I got uh two that come to mind. Number one, you know, what I hate is and this happens, I don't know how it's like the universe is god's trying to tell me something, I don't know. I go into a restaurant and I say, yeah, table for two. And they, instead of being like welcoming, they're like okay, um, it's gonna be like five to six minute wait. And I'm like and and and then what? Like? What are you talking? Are you trying to talk me out of coming into the restaurant right now? Like, why don't you say it in a nice way, to be like no, not a worries, if you want to have a seat, we'll get you seated in the next five to ten minutes.
Speaker 3:You just hit it right you just hit it with oh my god, I had a sales guy. I'm training him right now. So we do the whole sales process. We're in handyman remodeling business and we're doing handyman and he does the whole thing. We go through 35, 40 minutes with this guy and he looks at the guy and says so, do you have a hope? Number?
Speaker 3:okay no, not really. He goes well. It looks like it's gonna be between 22, $2,200 and $2,500. I'm like, dude, you're like we're telling a eulogy. I'm like here comes the end of our relationship. I've enjoyed our 35 minutes, but now it's all over, Because I'm sorry to tell you that for you to have everything taken care of that you just got told it's going to be this much money for us?
Speaker 2:Oh, we're not going to work, is it?
Speaker 3:that you just got told it's going to be this much money for us, we're not going to work, is it as an award-winning, well-noted company? I'm like, dude, are you joking? He goes. I did. I said you planted that thing. I said we'll sell it because, um, he, I'm on the radio, the whole thing. But I would say, but you just went. Oh, I'm so sorry, that frustrates me like no other.
Speaker 2:It is about how you present it and this isn't just a one-time thing. I'm telling you now I've keyed my wife in on this. I'm like does it seem like they're trying to tell us to not come in and now she knows she's like man? Everywhere we go, they do the same thing. I'm like why? Doesn't someone come in and then give them some training.
Speaker 3:Instead of saying good news, I can get you in five minutes. You're like oh my God, you're right, five minutes here in Atlanta. Sometimes, if we don't have a reservation on the weekend, it could be an hour and a half. I'll take it.
Speaker 2:This, literally, is their tone. Yeah, it's going to be like 20 minutes. Dude, if I owned this restaurant, you'd be fired immediately. Yeah, oh, I love that. That 20 minutes is nothing like. We came to wait 20 minutes yeah, you know what I mean, like where's the bar I'm in?
Speaker 3:all right, last one, give us a diy nightmare story. Diy, yeah, you did something, fire happened, water maybe impaled yourself, just cut a little finger off or something yeah, so I got something I did at my own house, but I have all 10, that, uh, literally three of the five, 10 have been impaled. Yeah, wow, oh yeah I mean it's called a hand clamp, bro. I'm like, oh shit, I just put one through my figure I think I don't.
Speaker 2:I don't necessarily have anything like extremely gory or anything to do with penises, but I would say it really comes down to the fact that anytime I try to do diy, like I think it's going to take an hour, and I'm telling you, dude, luckily lowes is not too far, because I'm back and forth, back and forth, and sometimes it takes more than the day, it takes two days and my wife's like looking at me, like her dad used to look at me, like I don't know what I'm doing, like I need an MBA and I'm like listen, I know what I'm doing here.
Speaker 2:The YouTube video shows this gasket, but when I opened it up, it didn't have this gasket. That's the only reason I'm going back, not not because I don't know what I'm doing. I know what I'm doing, I'm highly qualified, but this YouTube video showed the wrong gasket. So it's not me, it's the video, it's the gasket I love the five.
Speaker 3:You know what that's? A DIY number story. People go, oh, I can do this myself. I'm like all right, and then they'll never tell you, because nobody ever calls back the contractor and says oh, by the way, it took me all day to do what you told me, it would take an hour and I was not willing to pay you $180 for one hour. I'm like, okay, but that's exactly what happened. You went back and forth to Depot Lowe's Menards. Wherever you are, it happens a lot.
Speaker 3:Four or five times and you go damn it, damn it, damn it One more time.
Speaker 2:And then all of a sudden, yeah, then you, then you open up the next layer of the hatch or whatever, and then it's like now I gotta go get the different tool. Are you kidding me? Now I'm involving auto zone in in addition to the hardware store.
Speaker 3:This is bad. This is bad. Riley from lighting has happened. It's gotta go. Alan. Landscape lighting secrets. Do you know why? I know that. Why do you know that? Because it's all over.
Speaker 1:He does awesome. You ready to go? I am. Are you ready to go?
Speaker 3:I don't know yet, I'm still thinking. I just want to bask in the glory of landscape lighting, of.
Speaker 1:Ryan, it's amazing he hit on one.
Speaker 3:I'm actually just basking in people. Those are hilarious Because this is so fun, because when people do that, they have no clue that they just wasted their entire flipping weekend. Do something they're like oh, anybody can do this. Anybody can do this.
Speaker 1:I'll put my own lighting in. I'll go to Costco and get the kit. Yeah, I'll do that.
Speaker 3:I just love that one. I'm basking in the glow. All love that one. I'm just I'm basking in the glow. All right, kids, we learned something this week. We did. We gotta go, we gotta make something happen. You know what you gotta do. I hope you learned something too Fast forward one and a half speed. I doubt you can listen to me in one and a half, because you gotta try as hard as you can that's what Chris says Do as I say, not as I do.
Speaker 3:Because I do it over time. We got to keep going, keep getting up that mountain. Let's go make something happen. Make it go. Let's go make some flipping money, baby.
Speaker 1:Cheers everybody.
Speaker 3:Thanks, Ryan, Thank you for listening to this episode of the Small Business Safari. Remember your positive attitude will help you achieve that higher altitude you're looking for in the wild world of small business ownership. And until next time, make it a great day.
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