The Apprenticeship Every Plumbing Owner Skips

👇 Take the Trade Traction Score Assessment and discover what to focus on next in your business:  https://tradetraction.scoreapp.com

You finished your trade apprenticeship. Someone showed you the tools, the work, what to do and what not to do. Then you filed an LLC and woke up the next morning with nobody teaching you anything. Dennis says there's a second apprenticeship most plumbing owners never hear about, and skipping it is costing them far more than they think.

In this episode, Dennis breaks down why knowing the trade and knowing how to run the business are two completely different skill sets. He shares a surfing story from Hawaii that mirrors what most owners are doing in business right now, explains why six years of dabbling at something taught him less than weeks with a coach, and gets into the real cost of going it alone. It's not just money. It's time, relationships, and marriages.

Topics discussed:

00:00 - Your apprenticeship is not over
00:45 - The business side nobody prepared you for
01:55 - The Hawaii surfing story
03:20 - Even when the economy dips, trained owners still ride
03:55 - The real problem with figuring business out alone
05:01 - What six years of dabbling taught him about coaching
07:43 - The cost no one talks about: time, relationships, marriages
08:14 - Why good tradespeople go bankrupt
09:16 - What a business apprenticeship actually looks like

The Podcast that helps plumbing and heating service contractors stop working for free and actually turn a profit. 

Connect with Dennis:

Linkedin: linkedin.com/in/dennis-hamon/?skipRedirect=true
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/dennistheapprentice/
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100064205912242
Tiktok:https://www.tiktok.com/@dennistheapprentice

Thank you once again for your support and don't forget to like, subscribe, and share this podcast with your peers! Stay tuned for more exciting content coming your way every week.

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

Your apprenticeship is not over. There's a second one most plumbers never even hear about, let alone start. Hi, I'm Dennis, Dennis C apprentice on most socials, and I spent 25 years in the trades. I built a beautiful plumbing company with $12 million and sold it. This is trade traction. You came up the right way, right? A mentor showed you the tools, the trade, what to do, and what not to do. Then you filed an LLC and woke up the next morning with nobody teaching you any of it. In the next few minutes, I'll tell you what that second apprenticeship is, why every plumbing owner I talk to wishes they'd started it sooner, and what it costs you the longer you go without one. You think plumbing is complex. What do you think about business so far? Licenses, entities, invoices, software, the phones, payroll, taxes. Why is there no money in the bank? Insurance, business and personal and health, and the trucks? And where's John? It's nine o'clock and he's a no-show again. Phones? What phones? They haven't ringing hours. And when they do, it's not a customer, it's another solicitor. Know what I mean? Sound familiar? Wow, business is a whole nother animal. And for some reason, it doesn't occur to us that we need another apprenticeship. A business one. Why don't we think of that? You know, it's kind of like renting a backhoe. You know, you go to the rental place and man, they'll rent one of those to anybody. Isn't that weird? And all you gotta do is they ask you, you know how to run it? And you say, Yeah. And then they give it to you. That's kind of how it is in business, right? Like you say, hey, I want to be in business, and they let you. Yeah, just pay a business license and off to the races. You got this, buddy. You know, it reminds me of the last time I went to Hawaii. You know, I was in Hawaii, the right place, in my opinion. I was there when the surf was up. There was actually a storm, and they were saying it was like one of the best surfs in ages. I got myself a surfboard. So I was in the water, in the high surf. The surf was up. I'm in Hawaii, it's warm. And you know what I did? I bobbed around for four or five hours till I was completely beat and exhausted. And I never got up. I never got on that board. I just bobbed around. Now, check this out. You know what's crazy? Is there were lessons. They said, Do you want lessons? And I said, Nah, I got it. I didn't have it. Are you kidding me? I just bobbed around out there for hours. And I was exhausted at the end. Yeah, it's kind of fun. I got a story to tell, but I never surfed the wave. Isn't that how it is in business? Like, you got the business license, you got in business, you got some calls. Did you ever make a profit? Did you ever stack cash? Did you ever get rich yet? Now, here's the deal. I bet you can figure it out. Like, if you would have given me several more weeks, I would have probably got up. I'm fairly athletic. I could have figured it out. I had two weeks to be in Hawaii, and I never figured it out. And you know what? The surf wasn't always up. The surf went back down. So I missed my opportunity. And see, the economy is that way too. The economy goes up, the economy goes down, business gets easier, business gets harder. But you know what? Even when the surf is down, you know what's crazy? There were surfers out there having a wonderful time. Even when the surf wasn't giant like it was that one day. So that's how business is. You can get your truck, you can have your license, you can have your, you can know how to do the work, but running the business, why don't you spring for some lessons? Isn't that weird? Why don't we think about that? Why don't we think about getting an apprenticeship, a business apprenticeship, getting some lessons? Here's the problem about trying to figure business out on your own. You're not getting any younger. And neither am I, frankly. Right. And so take it from me. I'm 55. I had a lot more energy when I was younger. In my 30s and 40s, I did have more grit just to grind. Like when I think back about the hours I grinded in work, I was always the first one to work. I was always the last one to leave. I usually came home, had dinner late, put my kids to bed, and I usually went back to work. And I did that for years. I'm not sure I could do it at 55, right? And so, do you want to wait till you're 55 to figure this out? I hope not. I mean, there's more to life than struggling to figure out the business. Business can be beautiful. You know how you see the surfers and it looks beautiful. They make it look easy, right? And that can be you in business after you get some lessons. Does that make sense? I'm actually totally inspired by this thought process because of my experiences in podcasting. You know, I got involved with podcasting kind of a weird way. I was doing these Instagram reels about how to be a better apprentice as Dennis the Apprentice back in the day when I still owned my business. I'd make a little one-minute video on the way to work. And it kind of got semi-popular because I was the only one really talking to apprentices, and Dennis the Apprentice has a ring to it, kind of, you're right. Not Dennis the Menace, but Dennis the Apprentice, right? And so, and then I had bought a Zoom Drain franchise, and I got invited by Zoom Drain to go to the wet show and podcast there. And my very first podcast, I was live at the wet show. And so I knew several of the bigger influencers in social media, and so I called them up and I'm like, hey, I'm podcasting at the Zoom Drain booth at the wet show. Will you come be on my podcast? And you know what? Every one of them said yes. Like Eric Ani from Mechanical Hug, right? And and uh George the Plumber and John Thompson the plumbing god, right? All these guys came. And Danny G, the rapping plumber, all these guys came and I podcasted my very first time live at the trade show on the floor. But I hadn't worked up to figuring out how to be a podcaster. So I go back home and I've been kind of playing around and dabbling. I go to trade shows and stuff, but I've never got a consistent episode out every single week. I've never got my whole routine down and built a podcast like some of the podcasters had. And so recently in the last year, I finally said, you know what? I need to get myself a podcast coach. And I did. And I am shocked at how much I've learned and how fast I've learned. And I've been dabbling with podcasting for probably six years now. And I have learned so much so fast. And I still, obviously, have so much more to learn. But that's kind of like business. It's like, it seems like I the the when I talk to clients, a lot of my clients have been in business three, four, five, six years before they finally raise their hand and go, hey, you know what? Could you help me out? I think I'm not something's wrong here. It's still hard. Things aren't quite working, right? So that's why I'm inspired. I'm inspired with from my own experience surfing in Hawaii. I'm inspired by my own experience learning how to podcast. I've learned so much so fast as soon as I got a coach. So here's the thing: you may figure it all out on your own, but how long will it take? And how much is that going to cost you? And I'm not talking about money. I'm talking about time. I'm talking about relationships. I'm talking about marriages. How many marriages fail because the business owner didn't stop and get a business coach and get some help? Business is a wonderful place to be. It can be a wonderful thing. It can also drive you straight into the ground. You know how many people go bankrupt every year? A lot. We should look it up. Tons. Is it because they're bad people? Is it because they didn't try? Is it because they didn't know how to do the actual work? Probably not, right? Probably they just didn't understand. They were overwhelmed with the business side of it. They had the mechanical side. That's why they got in business. But there's a whole other side that they don't tell you about, right? And it's the business side of it. So, so don't waste your time, don't waste your money, don't lose your marriage, don't wreck relationships with your children by working too much all because you just needed some lessons, right? Like back in Hawaii, right? I was in Hawaii. I was in the right place, the right time, the surf was up. I even had a surfboard. And it was a good one, as far as I can tell. I just bobbed around and wasted my time. Never got up. Don't have any good stories to tell, except a bad one. So, all this to say, you've served your apprenticeship in the trade, but have you served your apprenticeship in business? And the apprenticeship is having some coaching, working under a mentor, working with a mentor. Having someone that's been there and done that, show you the tricks of the trade, show you the shortcuts, show you what to do first and second and third, showing you what to do, showing you what not to do, showing you what book to read, right? How to make the phones ring, how to hire the right people, how to let them go, how to know when it's time to let them go. How to know when it's time to hire someone, how to know when it's time to buy buy a new truck, how to know when it's time to buy that big, beautiful shop you dreamed of. How to know when it's not the right time to buy the shop, how to know what price to charge, how to know how to sell it to the customer, how to handle the complaint, how to get a review. There is so much to learn. We haven't even talked about taxes or payroll or accounting. So take it from me, get yourself some lessons, and most likely it will take you several mentors along the way, right? Even in the trades, you didn't just have one, you didn't have one guy teach you your trade, did you? It's probably, you might have had a couple, but you learn from several people, right? And little, you put it all together, and then what's kind of crazy is like there's one code, but there's all sorts of little different ways to do things, right? You figure out your own way. You learn from this guy and learn from this guy, and then you do it your own way. And that's how it is in business. I had several coaches, I had several mentors, and I learned a little bit from all of them. And I came up with my own way that worked really, really well and built what I call picture-perfect culture. And the picture-perfect culture is a culture that creates happy customers, happy employees, and happy owners because it's actually profitable and it's possible. All right. If you are ready for a mentorship, if you're ready to continue your apprenticeship, if you're ready to start your apprenticeship and business, I would love to help. There's nothing more rewarding than helping someone that's gambled, put their life, their name on the line, and gone for it, right? I'd be so honored if you'd like and subscribe, share this with a buddy that needs to hear it. And if you're interested in a mentor, I'd love to talk. You can reach out in the DMs. I'll put a link in here for a way to get a hold of me. I'd love to help. All right, see you next week.