In this episode, host Martin King talks with guest Andrew Brown about his inspiring journey from witnessing the aftermath of 9/11 to starting an online tool company dedicated to getting the right tools in the hands of skilled trade workers. Andrew's engaging videos highlight the importance of skilled trades in everyday life and the urgent need to address the skilled trade worker shortages in America. He is working hard to get his message in front of young people and calls on all Americans to come together to solve the labor shortage challenges.
Short teleprompter script: Hi, and welcome to our latest podcast episode where we talk to skilled trade pros and hear their inspiring stories. Today, we have a special guest, Andrew Brown, who witnessed the aftermath of 9/11 and was inspired by the first responders and skilled tradespeople who answered the call. Andrew went on to start an online tool company, tooltech.com, dedicated to getting the right tools in the hands of skilled trade workers. In this episode, Andrew shares his insights on the importance of skilled trades in everyday life and the urgent need to address the skilled trade worker shortages in America. So, click on the link in the post to watch the entire podcast episode and join us in this important discussion.
#skilledtraderescue, #skilledtrades, #apprenticeships, #careeradvice, #careerchange, #career,#internships,#careergoals,#vocationaltraining, #bluecollarjobs, #bringbacktrades, #bluecollar, #tradesman, #tradeswoman
In this episode, host Martin King talks with guest Andrew Brown about his inspiring journey from witnessing the aftermath of 9/11 to starting an online tool company dedicated to getting the right tools in the hands of skilled trade workers. Andrew's engaging videos highlight the importance of skilled trades in everyday life and the urgent need to address the skilled trade worker shortages in America. He is working hard to get his message in front of young people and calls on all Americans to come together to solve the labor shortage challenges.
Short teleprompter script: Hi, and welcome to our latest podcast episode where we talk to skilled trade pros and hear their inspiring stories. Today, we have a special guest, Andrew Brown, who witnessed the aftermath of 9/11 and was inspired by the first responders and skilled tradespeople who answered the call. Andrew went on to start an online tool company, tooltech.com, dedicated to getting the right tools in the hands of skilled trade workers. In this episode, Andrew shares his insights on the importance of skilled trades in everyday life and the urgent need to address the skilled trade worker shortages in America. So, click on the link in the post to watch the entire podcast episode and join us in this important discussion.
#skilledtraderescue, #skilledtrades, #apprenticeships, #careeradvice, #careerchange, #career,#internships,#careergoals,#vocationaltraining, #bluecollarjobs, #bringbacktrades, #bluecollar, #tradesman, #tradeswoman
Welcome to the Skilled Trade rescue podcast. My name is Martin King as always your dedicated host. Well, we have another special guest for the podcast today. This is a guy named Andrew Brown. If you've been hanging out on LinkedIn at all and you're connected to the tags of skilled trades, there's a good chance that Andrew's videos have popped up in your feed at one time or another. His videos are very entertaining as well as informational. Now, Andrew is a college graduate, but he actually jumped over into skilled trades, I think in a really unique way. Now I'm going to tease it a little bit had to do with his experience on the ground in New York, during 911. So this is something I think that's heartfelt. And I think it'll be connect to a lot of you out there, I hope. Well, without further ado, let's jump over to the podcast. And before we do, I'd like to ask all of you out there if you'll please comment, click liked whatever the the appropriate thing is in the platform that you possibly seeing this video, it helps us get our message out to more people. All right, let's jump over to the podcast. And welcome in Andrew Brown. Yeah, again, thank you for having me. So to give you a little context about me and sort of my background, I have to take you back to September 11 2001, when I was 23 years old living in New York City, and the planes had just hit the twin towers at the time. And like everyone else, we were in complete shock. And I got this feeling inside, that I had to do something. And I called up my friend in Rhode Island at the time and I said to him, we need to go down there we need to help. And after some convincing back and forth a couple days later, he did show up, he showed up in a big blue truck with an American flag on the back. He was dressed as a tradesperson and had a separate pair of overalls and a hard hat for myself. And I found myself with him going down the West Side Highway from checkpoint to checkpoint. And then we parked the car we make it down to Ground Zero at that point. Don't ask me how we got through the checkpoints, get out of the car and then all of a sudden I found myself on ground zero where it once stood only a few days after helping our emergency workers and trains tradespeople find survivors. And I was watching the tradespeople on site. And I was watching them with no PPE on no protection and running into unstable structures. And using any means necessary to find survivors. And you talk about trajectory changes, and personal you know everything from from a personal standpoint of changing the way I viewed the world, changed everything for me. And after that experience, I quit my job was working in it at the time literally gave my two weeks notice. And I spent weeks, couple months, sleepless nights, I'm trying to figure out how to get back to the trades people that I saw a gap in the ground zero. And that's where I co founded an online tool and equipment business named tool fetch with my brother, about 23 years ago, we're still going strong, we still love the business today, we sell tools to the skilled trades, so professionals like welders, carpenters, plumbers, and other blue collar trades. So these are the men and women. We're building and repairing our bridges or tunnels or roads. And we offer one of the largest online tool and equipment catalogs on the internet with many different products from 650 different vendors, products like lifts, cement mixers, drain cleaners, harnesses, stuff like that. That is my way to get back to the skilled trades that have been doing that consistently over the last 20 to 23 years. That is one heck of a story, Andrew. Wow. That's a big Yeah, it's interesting on how I hear that story. Not quite like that. But I hear stories about people being at a crossroads and being exposed somehow some way to one of the millions of skilled trade jobs out there and that I hear that type of story where Wow, this is really interesting. I had no idea what makes these things happen. And well bless you man for responding to it, you know, servicing the call. That's that's really great. How did you get into doing skilled trade cheerleading because that's what I call your you're one of this. When I when I talk to folks about you have going on and this guy's a cheerleader, man, he's, he's the 18 How'd you get into that doing that if you've always been like socially, social media active or I just I just ran into you a couple maybe a few months ago. Yeah, so interesting enough. So I've been doing this really for for 20 to 23 years. So I speak to welders and plumbers and electricians around the country. And I've always heard their stories. I've already spoken to them. And we talked about we the conversation always comes up about the wages. It comes up about the skilled trades gap it comes up about people retiring and not kids want not not wanting to go into the trades fields. And I just, I just got fed up, I just want, you know, it was kind of like one day like, you know what, why don't I start putting content out there, just just start talking about the skilled trades and the different topics. And I did that starting last year around September of 22. And I did that on LinkedIn. And what I found after a handful of videos in messaging is that there were so many people in the skilled trades on LinkedIn, I didn't realize that I just didn't know and the engagement, the feedback and the conversations, and just, it just amplified everything, what I was listening to, throughout my career, and just kind of kicked this messaging piece off, for me to be almost like a voice or a beacon, or that the blue collar skilled trades doesn't have that they just don't get the recognition they deserve. And I just made a commitment to show up every day with a video with a message and just keep putting it out there about the skilled trades. And I've just been doing it consistently, every single day, since since last year. But I've really been doing it, you know, behind the scenes, since I really started my journey, obviously, coming off of 911. But I never did it socially, obviously. Until recently, you're doing a great job, because I found you know, I've commented on a lot of your stuff and you make your stuff entertaining. And I think that if we're going to get the next generation into trades, we have to meet them where they're at, and not do these long winded videos. And I learned that the hard way. I've been doing this a while too. And you're not going to make a 30 minute video talking about how great the skilled trades are. If you can't say your message, and I think you do most of yours in less than a minute. I think that's just I can't believe how much content you squeezing lasted less than a minute. It's it's pretty impressive. What are some of the biggest headwinds you think that are, you know, standing in a way of getting the next generation in here to replace us old guys? I mean, what, what are some of the big headwinds, the resistances? Why aren't we getting enough? Young people, men and women into skilled trades these days? What's your opinion about that? Yeah, so some of the reasons why or why this is happening, really comes down to the messaging. So where are kids getting their information from? Guidance counselors, parents, teachers, what are they preaching? Right? I always say in when somebody's growing up in a household, and what are parents saying? Or parents when when college comes up? What is their what is their thought on college versus another path, like a trade spat what's being spoken about in the household? That's one aspect. And then when kids are in school, when they're sitting down with a guidance counselor, and they're let's say they're, I don't know, 17 years old, what's being spoken about? Is it just college? Or possibly is trades path even discussing same with teachers? I always say that teachers and guidance counselors are the best marketers for college because they're giving them free referrals. Right? Where is where is the trades path? Where is the discussion? Maybe it's happening? Maybe it's not happening. I also feel that what happened to all the shop classes at school used to take a shop class, right? It was almost a prerequisite that you needed to work in woodshop, or some sort of shop to to understand how tools work and build stuff that can create a spark for a kid who's got mechanical ability, right? And can work with their hands. If that's not it, that's shot class is not there, the guidance counselor's telling you to go to college, right? Your teachers saying the same thing your parents, you know, you kind of follow that suit. It's nothing. There's nothing wrong with college, I am more of an advocate of giving kids options. So they can say, okay, yeah, you can do the college thing. But you can also do this trades thing, that obviously less debt, you start making money, become an apprentice, and there's, you know, a tremendous ladder for success for you to build up your skills and maybe become a business owner one day, or maybe run a construction company one day, and it takes time and it takes energy, but it's a great skill to have. And I think we're doing a good job. me putting my messages out you doing your podcast and everybody else chipping away at this old adage, just we need to all work together. And through social media, like you said, he's giving the ability to put that out there to kids that are consuming the content. So that's why for me, I keep showing up every day to keep doing it because people need to hear it six times, seven times, eight times, 10 times. You know, you get to say it once. You just got to keep saying it again. Then it resonates from there. So it's just all of us working together. Yeah, I am On the kind of the same path you are, everything you said, I think I had to hold back a couple of tears, that the stuff you just told me, because that's that's, that's what I'm seeing is as well, is a headwind. And I'm going to take that one step further. And I've got some videos coming in about that. I've been working with an economist on data. And I think in that same scenario that you put out there the discussions with the teachers discussions with guidance, counselor's discussions, you know, beginning discussions with colleges, one of the things that is just flat out wrong out there is the wage data. Matter of fact, I'm running a survey right now on on LinkedIn. And I'm also running a national survey, I'm trying to get people involved in it, where the lot of major markets in the US and you pick the trade, but a major market, the data put out by the government, the Bureau of Labor Statistics is just flat out wrong. You know, like, for example, an HVAC, that's the where I'm coming from HVAC industry, the national average is $48,000. According to BLS, well, there's no, there's no qualifications to that number. They don't talk about it, was this union, non union private? You know, what is the prevailing wage project, none of that is come up with a discussion. And what I found out is, and this is all public information, if you want to really dig for it, what I found out is is most of the wage data that's that's reported by the BLS their their, most of their data comes from Malin questionnaires. So I asked you, if you mail out 1000 questionnaires to a Bay Area contractor, or group of contractors, who do you think's can have the time to fill that out? Not people that are super busy, I can tell you that. And anyway, what happens is all this data that comes back in is understanding that wages, and who are the first individuals to pull that out and just slide it into the parents nose and the students knows the guidance counselors, and, you know, the admitting the college folks, and some of the teachers are just gonna say you don't make any money in skilled trades in 2023. That's just not true. That's not true. So what do you what do you think about that? If you think that's a an issue? Yeah. And that this goes back to the old adage of your messaging, that it's, it could be unsafe planets, it's 30. It's, it's, it's, it's option B and so many for the bad kids, you know, you don't do well in school, that you could be a plumber, that's it falls into that same sort of category. That right, where, where are they getting sort of the information, kids need to, obviously, obviously, do their research. And not just obviously, you know, teachers might give some information on something or maybe the minute guidance counselor's says, you know, to a kid, hey, you know, you know, you're, you're better going into college for four years, and you'll come out and you'll get a white collar job and that type of stuff. And here's a prime example for you. He talked about wages. My kids and I play the game of life, you don't play the game of life. Yeah, life. So there's an upgraded version. And it's very different than when I was a kid. But it gives you two options. It gives you a career path, and it gives you a college path. The college has says you got to pay $100,000 to the bank. Okay, so my daughter, she gave $100,000 to the bank, and she chose to be a doctor and as a doctor, you make 130,000. That's, that's what the game said. Right? And the career path, the career path, said, Do you want to be a racecar driver? Do you want to be an actor? There was not mentioned of a tradesperson there was no mention of a plumber or electrician? Nothing. And it said in bold writing. And I did. I wish I had it. It says in the directions, you're more likely to get a better paying job. If you go to college. It was in bold in the instructions. Boy, yeah. So you know, the it's even even comes from your board games, right? That it's stating that the college is the better path, you're more likely to make more money. And it's just it's not true. You're coming out with a tremendous amount of debt you're coming out with and for me and my personal experience, I went to college for four years, I came out more lost out of school than when I was in school. Right. I went from major to major trying to figure out what I was doing. And I switched. And then I went into something completely different. But I had a life changing event and I love him. But you know where you get your information from? Right. This is what happens. Yeah, that's a great segue. So yeah, I think you were talking about this not too long ago. What do you think that that AI Artificial Intelligence is going to do? Who, to the folks that are getting these college degrees? I mean, I see that to be a major disrupter even for the teaching industry as well, right? Yes. Um, what do you think about that? AI is a game changer? We're so in the beginning stages. I mean, this is bigger than the internet, right? Or a lot of other things in the past handful of years. And everybody is, to some degree concerned, does it replace a teacher, kids? Doing reports based off of AI, you know, what, what happens to all the learning that you would do normally that now AI can do, but the same thing could be said for when the calculator came out, you don't have to do all the formulas, everybody was saying stuff like that? I think it will, I think it will be beneficial for certain aspects. In white collar jobs, there are a lot of jobs, I think that might go away, or a lot more jobs that will be created. And I always say, when it comes to the skilled trades, you can't replace the plumber that needs to work on the pipes, right? You still need an electrician, you still need someone to fix your boiler, right? That's not going to go away, it might help with automation, right? Some of that repetitive stuff, that maybe it's more kind of back breaking work, that stuff can maybe go away when it comes to the skilled trades, repetitive work, but you still need an individual, you still need the mind of an individual to figure out things, I think it will help sort of amplify and make things a little bit better. But I don't think it's going to change the skilled trades and aspect where it's just gonna, it's gonna be some robot AI driven, you know, building a house, maybe one day in a way, way future, but not not today or tomorrow. But from a white collar standpoint and their jobs, they're going to be probably some jobs that will all eventually go away. So I'm you're still early in this whole thing, but time will tell to see how that affects. Yeah, that's one thing that's, you know, Mike, in my conversation with, with younger folks that are I talked to college graduates that have done, you know, they've exercise what they've learned, and they're, they're working in jobs that they went to school for, and they're not happy. And I know a lot of people like you that went through college that decided, you know, maybe I want to try something a little bit different. And what's really interesting is at the beginning stages, when when these folks are thinking about getting into trades, they there's a disconnect between what trades do for to keep the wheels on in America, and the example I like to use is data centers, you know, a data center, people hear about them, they they know, they're they exist, a lot of them. But nobody really makes the connection, you know, like what we're doing right now. There's just you and I having this conversation right now is processed through some blade server or some who knows where the heck the darn things at. And if that thing if that server gets too hot, the humidity is not right. The powers not right. Andrew Martin go away. We're gone. So same thing with Google, you know, you put in a request to or AI for that matter, you know, it will not work unless they have data centers to to run process all that vast amount of information and without HVAC techs, electricians, plumbers, control experts, you know, people would do building automation without all those people working in concert, we don't have what we have. It's just I mean, and I get these blank looks like, what really? Yeah, a lot of that. A lot of that is, you know, people take it for granted. I flipped the switch on my light switch, and let's go on, I flushed the toilet and the toilet flushes, right and everything in between that you have in your house, to the bridges and tunnels that you travel over to the elevator that you ride, everything is touched by some sort of trades related field. And I always make a joke that if we woke up tomorrow, and poof, all the trades people have gone, right, man, we'd be in a bad bad place. But to re emphasize, you know, over the next five or 10 years, if 40% are leaving the workforce or in retirement age and not enough are coming back in to replace them. We're not going to be in a good place. Yeah, it's only a matter of time. That's for sure. So Andrew, you talked to a lot of trades people in your business and stuff. So do you have like a couple stories, you know, maybe like somebody who you know, that went to college and actually decided to go into the trades or maybe somebody who was really conflicted and right out of high school, and they decided to go into the trades then You've done some amazing things what any stories that come to mind, inspiration, nothing. Yeah, unfortunately nothing specific that would comes to top my head I just all these, whether it's somebody who reaches out on LinkedIn and talks about their, their, their kid who's interested in the trades and that they're, they're 20 something years old and they're doing well and they're there. They're on their way to make over six figures, to listening to somebody I just spoke to who's alignment. He's in his mid 20s. And he's, he's doing extremely well, you just hear all these different stories of people that have really succeeded. If you're a skilled trade Pro, or a business owner that employs skilled trades people, you may want to check out the BST skilled trade career development process. I know that's a mouthful. What we cover in this process is the four key elements that can help transform an okay or even a good career into something amazing. We cover technical excellence, work ethic, how to build generational wealth, and most importantly, how to maintain work life balance, which is exceptionally challenging these days. We're having a free workshop on BST coming soon, we're currently doing pre registry on it. Now one of the things about this workshop since it is free, we're limiting the size. Because this is an interactive workshop, we're going to try and learn as much as help others in the skilled trades. So go to skilled trade rescue.com Go to the top any one of the menu bars look for BST to read up on what's going on with this process. And pre register for this workshop that will be coming your way soon. All right, well, without further ado, let's jump right back into this episode of the skilled trade rescue.com. Podcast. In the trades, nothing specific that I can really tell you. But just just just hearing all the different aspects and engagement getting that from people I mean, on social media to people, obviously, that I speak to on the phone around the country. It's more positive, it's more positive. And it's just it's it's uplifting. To hear these these these stories of success. I always say that the people ask, well, who was the big house in the corner post, the guy owns the plumbing company, quick plumbing, I don't understand that. Like, it's just it's mind boggling for people to really sort of understand that there is a lot of success, especially today in trades, because there's so much work that's available. And here's a perfect example. I was sitting around with some friends on the weekend, and someone was saying something like, I can't find anybody to come in and do my kitchen. I'm like, of course not. They have so much work they have, they don't want to you know, they can pick and choose the jobs they want, and ask for the money they want. And, you know, from the trades perspective, you're in a really good place over the next handful of years, this is this is this window, that you can really do extremely well, because of all the people retiring, but you really come in and make your market trades. What do you what do you think that, you know, folks like us could do better at or to more of or, you know, what, what do you think that folks that are enthusiast for skilled trades? Besides what we're currently doing? What do you think we can do to help promote skilled trades that we're not doing now? I'm constantly asking myself that question is promoting this success stories of what you do and why you do it. So you're not just building a school, you're building a school for kids to learn, right? You're you're you're repairing bridges and tunnels for people to travel over, you're building a building that creates jobs, you need to share with kids, because they're intrigued, but they don't understand the big, possibly the bigger picture. And especially if a kid is in a, let's say in a career fair. And he's looking at colleges, and he's looking at a couple of companies and stumbles upon a construction company. And the construction company, you know, shares the experiences of what you can do and it's it there is this sense of fulfillment and accomplishment to really work with your hands especially if that if that kid is interested, you know, as mechanically inclined, sharing those success stories, sharing what it takes to stair step, that ladder of success that you can be except start off as apprentice maybe you can be a journeyman or master and work your way up and possibly have your own business. I just think it's it's people in different trades, sharing success stories, sharing a day in the life of what it's really like, how long it takes, obviously, to go through that path. But I think the success stories and I've, I've highlighted some people over some of my videos of people who have been successful, and people see that and they say wow, that that's that's amazing. So I think cluing people in to people's lives. It's how it's changed that through the trades, is how you get that message across, especially on social media. Yeah, yeah, I like to see these field people that are, you know, the turnout is a journeyman, they, they get to work, you know, in the trades, and they're doing really well. And they're looking around and saying, Well, okay, what do I, what do I do next. And there's, there's huge opportunities in the in the business side. So you have certain number of businesses out there, that their family, so you've got, you know, kids that are coming up, and they're going to replace their, their parents. But there's a lot of companies that I think especially now that are run by people in their 50s and 60s. And I think there's space in there for, you know, the top notch techs, to start to express to the ownership that, you know, hey, I'd like to have an opportunity to somehow some way, get an ownership stake in this company. And because one of the things that a lot of people working in with their hands, don't necessarily think about is our entire tax system. For middle class people like me, the only way you're going to really build dramatically build wealth, you can still become a millionaire, working out with your hands and being a technician for sure. But if you want to control taxes, owning your own business is the only way to do that. And trying to try to, you know, get the message out to people working in the trades, you've got 567 10 years in and they want to kind of take their career to the next level. You know, business ownerships, definitely a good track. Yeah, entrepreneurship, right, people, you know, I'm an entrepreneur, you know, 2223 years. So in the business, I think one piece of advice is mentorship. So if you are interested in your own trades, and you have this light, you know, pique interest of maybe one day, I can be CEO, or, or the owner or I can start my own business, it's working with somebody who's been there, done that will shave off so much time. And I wish I did that as a kid. I wish I did that. In the beginning. I did not do that, until that a few years ago. But I think working with somebody who's been there and done that mentorship and training can really guide you in a path or glide path. That may be you it would take you a lot longer to do. So I think, I think doing that and attaching yourself to somebody who is a little bit wiser and older and can really give you that that that push along. My might cut out a lot of yours. You're doing it yourself. Yeah, I've I've told this to everybody that Listen, I've never been to Harvard Business School. But I know I paid the tuition a couple times over from the stupid mistakes I've made. Sure. You know, it's like, no, yeah, you're exactly right. You know, there's been Crossroads Well, in business ownership, that, that I was blessed to have a couple of key individuals that, you know, were able to, you know, call BS on things. Because, you know, when you're a business owner, a lot of times you can get caught up in your own reality distortion field, as Steve Jobs said, and it takes a mentor to, you know, kind of knock you up the side of the head and say, That's not real clear thinking there, you know, and you have respect for that person. So you tend to listen a little bit. Right? Exactly. And for me in my journey, I'm a part of a group called Vistage is a group of CEOs around the country in everybody's study groups, over 20 different CEOs that I meet with on a monthly basis, right? So they do say, yes, it's lonely at the top right. What do you talk to? Well, the business group gives me an ability to hash out issues, problems and things that I just didn't know. So I'm all about learning, and I'm all about being open to say, I don't know, how do I do that. And that's where the learning aspect comes in. You have to be willing to take open criticism, I would say and feedback, how to keep driving forward in your entrepreneurial path. I want to delve into the mentorship sort of the day in the life of a technician so let's say you got to you've got a welder and you know he's been at it or she has been at it for a couple of years. And you know, they're feeling kind of stuck and kind of frustrated and you know, they will be a prime candidate to to find a mentor. So how does it How does a typical person does our welder friend? What steps do you think would be smart for them to take to find a mentor in the welding industry, for example? Yeah, well, hopefully it's somebody possibly at the company itself. So if you are Working at a typical organization, hopefully there is somebody that is a little bit higher up and is willing to be open to work with you. That's obviously one aspect. Trades organizations, the, the welding society and reaching out to them, obviously, they have different ways that you can connect with different people, people in your community, or in the welding community, hopefully, you can attach to somebody like that. But, you know, it's it's all about, obviously, networking, it's all about meeting new people, and getting different perspectives on things to help you keep evolving, especially in your trade of what you're looking to do. But it's really up to you to do that. Right. You can't you can't sit back and just just wait you need to be proactive, you need to be out there need to be networking, to be around the people that are going to propel you up for you to take that next step. But you got to be you got to be willing to do that. Right. A lot of people some people don't want to do that. Some people are happy, and they want to stay where they are. But some people really want to level up like you really need to push to find the right individual or group of people to to talk to him. quick announcement about a new ebook that we have out called technical excellence. This is the foundation of the BST skilled trade career development process. Some of the things that we'll be covering this book include the power of mentors and how to find the right ones that will help you consistently move your skilled trade career forward, creating your vision, what do you want to get accomplished over the next three to five years in your skilled trade journey, success strategies. So once you've developed your vision, you need to you need strategies that will help you execute that process to get things going and keep them going success habits. Everybody has good habits and bad habits. Within the book, we help identify what habits are hurting your career. And we try to replace those bad habits with ones that support your career. Taking in feedback, this is a learned skill that is very, very critical. When you have a challenge. You're getting your mentors involved, you measure those challenges against your vision, your strategies, you need to get advice, and learning how to take that advice, apply that advice to the challenges before you is a definitely an important skill that will serve you very well over your skilled trade career. For more information on the technical excellence ebook, as well as other ebooks that we have coming up, go to skilled trade rescue.com, go to the top of any one of the pages and click on the Learn ebook link. And that'll take you to our ebook page, you can read up on what's going on, there's some discounts if you get a chance to watch the video on the page. And I hope you enjoy this book and you get a lot of value out of it. One of the things that that before we wrap things up here, one of the things that I hear a lot is around year four or five, somewhere around there, nowadays, because these, these people working in skilled trades are so busy that they there's higher percentages of people getting burnout. And one of the things that you know, is it's really a tragedy, I think because you get people that are you know, they're enjoying skilled trades, but they're just working, working, working and their life balance gets out of whack. And, and they end up jumping out of the trades for you know, some other type of an occupation. Because they're, they're just burnt out. And I don't see that changing. I see that kind of accelerating a little bit. Because, you know, we're we have the shortage, you know, as more baby boomers retire. If you are good at what you do, you're you're gonna you're gonna have more hours than availability to work or people don't want you to work more hours in Europe. You can and you get burnout. And I think that I think that's another headwind. What do you think about the burnout factor? I mean, look, there's burnout, anything, right? It could be the trades or something else that over time that you're just you're doing it over and over again. Right. And there's so much work out there. That there there comes a point that, you know, what am I doing, you know, what, what's the plan? What's the next step here? What's the what's the next one year, two year, three year, five year plans? It is a difficult it is a difficult situation, because here's a perfect example of somebody whose services are drier, and he's 6667 years old. And we got to talking about the trades and he said to me I got the perfect job, I make good money. And his case, he doesn't work long hours, but nobody wants to take over my job. Nobody wants, nobody wants it. And he's scratching his head saying, Why doesn't anybody want to take it? You know, again, it goes back to kids not getting the right messaging and wanting to go into other things that they don't see the possibilities for what's possible in the trades. And what happens is, he retires, and that's it. Right, no one takes no one takes his place. And it just keeps amplifying and amplifying and amplifying. And that's kind of just where we need to work on the messaging and really share the success stories of what is possible in the trades, that you really can climb the ladder, and you can really work your way up to get to a certain level. Again, going back to your point, you know, it's, it's, it's a problem. And it's something that we need to all need to work together to solve. I don't think there is one fix, per se. And that's why we're each kind of doing our own, you know, messaging and, you know, battlecry, for people to work together and to try to solve this overall problem of the skills gap and all that type of stuff. Cool. Let me let me frame out my last question for you, Andrew, I, I would love to hear your input on this. So speaking to parents, that, you know, might have sophomore junior seniors in high school right now, coming out of the pandemic, they the, you know, what they saw over the shoulders of their kids during the pandemic, they didn't particularly care for too much. And now, you know, the kids are sitting down for their SCT tests. And those conversations we talked at the front end of our conversation are starting to happen between the parents, and the student and the son or daughter that's getting ready to graduate and the son or daughter is talking to the guidance counselors, and possibly they're getting stuff showing up in the in their mail from, you know, all the gazillions of colleges out there that want want them to come to their college. The parents are thinking all right, well, you know, we've worked really hard to build up this college fund or not. And, you know, we, we know that our son or daughter is going to lean on us for guidance. What's the best advice that you could give to parents out there? That, you know, that are they know that they know their kids the best? What kind of advice can you give to the parents as they're trying to guide their their youth to make a good decision? Regardless of your skilled trades? What kind of advice would you give? Yeah, so I look, I'm gonna run into that situation when my kids are a little bit older, and my kids are a little bit younger. So I can't have that conversation yet. And at some point, there's going to come a time where it's college, trades path or another another direction. And one, I think parents firstly, just need the right information. So even if they are talking about the skilled trades, they're there, they have the right information, so to in front of them, because if they don't, and they're they're preaching sort of the old adage, that it's just not the right way to go about you should be going to college, you should be getting a four year degree. That's that's one thing. But also sitting down with kids and saying, Okay, well, if you're going to go college, that's, that's great. But us as parents, and a lot of parents, unfortunately, can't afford college, well, you're going to need to take out a loan, and you're going to need to pay your way Your work your way. And when you come out of college, you know, you're gonna have to find a good job to pay all that back. Guess what, you know, what, if you want a house one day and take a mortgage, and that's more debt there, there has to be just sort of like, discussion of not over the next handful years, what it looks like over the next 10 years for you when you're out of college. What are you going to do, because I think that it's not the same as it once was, college is a lot more expensive than it once was. And you're coming out with a lot more debt. And the the the options, especially when it comes to a white collar job are not out there that they once were. So I can again only tell you from from my experience about bouncing around from major to major. And then, you know, also talking about, again, the skilled trades if the parents will give that sort of option. I can't I can't, I can't tell you that they can. But I'm hopeful that they can at least provide that option for the skilled trades and just you know, come out with less debt. You can go into trade school, you can become an apprentice, you can make money, you know you're ahead of the game as opposed to going sort of a cow trout coming out with a lot of debt. I think every family needs to sort of weigh out those options, but give your kid options and let them decide. Yeah, that's great. Great answer, man. All right, so we're gonna wrap this up. Andrew is he is the Tool Guy. It's tool fetch.com. I guess that's your website. Tool. fetch.com. Yeah, yep, you can. You can find me on LinkedIn under my name under Andrew Brown YouTube under tool fetch. Or you can just reach out to me in any point I always like to talk to people in skilled trades or want to talk shop about tools.