Rebuilding Humanity

Coming on March 15th, 2025 is the Richmond Home & Business Show, a groundbreaking showcase of the partners and possibilities in and around Wayne County for your home! To kick it off, we invited Brandy Sifford, one of the event organizers, to give us an inside look at what's coming next weekend!

Transcript

Is, you know, in business, sometimes you just got to start and you're going to screw it up and you're not going to like things, but it's like you got to just start it.

So we started it and you can't finish unless you start right. That is the biggest thing that people it holds them back in life. Right? I mean, they're afraid of failing. And what is failure? It's the first attempt in learning. You have to start somewhere. Yeah.

welcome this edition of the Hoel Truth Podcast today our special guest is Brandy.

She is coming from, the Richmond Home and Business Show. So, they reached out to us about a week and a half ago about seeing if we'd be interested in a sponsor. So we decided, let's get Brandy in here. I'll let you introduce yourself in this kind of. Tell us a little bit of your backstory. Okay.

Great. Good morning. My name is Brandy Sifford. I actually am a real estate agent with Remax at The Crossing. My event partner and I, Casey Mogul, is also, real estate agent. And, after working with a lot of our clients, we decided that a home and business show was much needed in our area of Richmond. There's a lot of clients that needed good contractors, and they needed good recommendations.

And honestly didn't know where to start with the even process of buying a home. So we have built this event to cover all the bases that you need first. Starting out buying a home. If you're looking for remodels, repairs, we've got a list of contractors that's going to be there that's ready to want your business. And that's what it's really about.

You know, the people that's going to be at the Home and business show want to be in front of the customers. They want your business. They want to see how they can help you. And, that's been our mission is to help local businesses, small businesses that need help in advertising and just ways to bring it to the community, to better the community.

So, before we hit record on this, we were kind of talking like how you got into this. So, how you became a realtor and whatnot. Okay, so I have actually ran events for 15 years throughout Indy and other trade events, same concepts of marketing and advertising and ways of, helping their businesses get in front of, the community.

And, being a realtor, getting into sales was a no brainer. I've been in sales for a long time, so I'm very in tune with people. And that really helps with sales to know what are they needing? What are they not knowing that they need. And so this is why the home show kind of was best of both worlds with my trade event business and then, becoming a realtor.

So you said you used to run the gun and knife shows, how many of them a year did you run? I, I still work that job. Okay. So I helped a promoter. We do 50 shows a year all throughout Indiana, from Evansville up north to the Lake County Crown Point Show. Oh, wow. So it is literally 50 shows a year.

We take off for Christmas and Easter and that's it. So it's it's every weekend. Every weekend. Holy cow. Yep. So we're in Bloomington this weekend. Lebanon next. But it's consistent and that's great. But it's my my focus is bringing that atmosphere and the event side of it. And how can I help local. So it's been a lot of fun to see how they're different, from the gun shows versus the home show.

But all in all, it's for the people, right? It is to help local businesses. It's nice. So what is, how many vendors do you have, lined up for the Richmond? We actually just booked, three more. Even last night. So we are sitting. If I had to estimate because I didn't count with those, include it.

We're at least probably mid 30s pushing 40, different vendors. So the Coleman Center is like 24,000 square foot, I believe it's 120 by 122 square. Yeah. Looking at our layouts, we are filling up, but we are. We have a few vendor spaces still. We've got food trucks that's going to be out there. We've got five for sure.

We have fat heads all race ice cream, outlaws. Chicken on a stick out of Winchester. Okay, I hear they have excellent chicken. Can't forget about Charlie's pork chops. And then we have, I think it's Phillips family farm or, Farm Grill. Okay, so they're going to be there, and, we have another event. That's not ours, but they are just with friends that are setting up in the Tom River building next to us.

They are a huge draw as well. So the food trucks is a benefit to them as well. And that's what we wanted to make a place where everybody can come in, you can get your stomachs full, you can eat, you can shop, you can meet new people. Well, and you know that just kind of brings up something. Before you said your phone was running into a competitor, and I and I genuinely, I actually own part of a feed business with a guy because I, me and my wife don't have enough to do with three kids or anything business, you know.

But, you know, he made a good point the other day when I was speaking to him. He's just like, you know, why can't why can't more people work together? Yeah, it's the better, you know, to better everybody's experience. And like, one thing that I talk about, like I want the customer experience. Like that's what we really talk a lot about.

That's what we really try to focus on. You know what? What does the customer experience look like when they when you when you deal with whole roofing because like, you know, for us, like contractors don't answer the phones, they don't show up to appointments, right? They don't give estimates on a timely manner. And, there's just no communication.

And it's like, I just I just don't allow that. Like, guys like, we're we're running this business with excellence. Like, you know, if you submit a Google, you know, request at 930 on a Saturday night, like you're most likely going to get a response, then like we have a group chat between me, Adam and Lee and the sales manager, like, okay, where are we at on this?

At a minimum, I'll reach out and be like, hey, Sam, I'll get with you tomorrow. You know, a lot of people don't expect a response at 930 or 10:00 on a Saturday. But I also know the importance that if a tree just fell and hit your house. Yeah, exactly. You really want me to respond and say, yeah, I'll get out there with a tarp or I'll be up there first thing in the morning, you know?

So that's, that's something that we, that we want to provide, you know, our, our customers. What are some things that you do as a realtor that you feel, sets you apart? Well, you know, I can kind of piggyback off that being always available because as a business owner and self-employed, I don't have a 9 to 5 job.

Okay? So if you want to succeed in business, you need to be available to your clients and customers almost all the time to provide that excellence. It's hard, but yet that's what we need to do for people to help to earn their business. I have clients that message me at 12 1:00 at night, and if I'm up, I will respond back, right.

You know, I don't work Monday through Friday. I work Sunday through Sunday. But it sounds like, you know, you guys are the same mindset of we have a job to do and we want to do it to the best of our ability. And in order to do that, we have to be available. Right. So you said you had three kids.

You know, you have a wife, you have a life, right? Right. And it takes a lot of effort to provide excellence. But here you go. You're doing it. And that's awesome. But that's kind of what sets me apart as a realtor is that I'm always trying to work in their best interests. I'm not pushy. A lot of people are laughing.

A year later, they reach back out. Brandi, you met me. Were you? Did you know, a showing and blah, blah, blah town, do you remember? And I'm like, absolutely. You know how things go and oh, we're ready to buy. I have shown numerous houses to one client and they're like, we're so sorry. You know, it's taken so long for us to to find a home.

They said our house is our biggest investment, our largest asset. And the most important part, you know, when you get off work, what do you want to do? You want to go home, right? You want to have a place that is safe, comfortable. You want to make sure you made a good decision. So you have a lot of people that's like, are you ready to buy?

Are you ready to buy? Are you going to go buy this house? Like this is perfect, right? And then you see clients go, no, it's really not. My thing is that impatient, if it doesn't meet the client's needs, keep looking. Right. So I kind of stand out in that aspect of just knowing that I wouldn't want to be pushed.

You know, I treat people like I would want to be treated if a tree falls on my roof, I'm gonna want somebody to answer at 10:00 at night and come save me, you know what I'm saying? So it's the same in all businesses. We want to work to help people and more people need to help people. That was part of our thing with clients is that contractors weren't responding.

They're not getting people to show up. You know, they have an appointment, they're calling me. Hey, the guy you recommended didn't show up. And it's hard for us to make those recommendations if we're not recommending good referrals. So that's what the whole home and business show you get in front of somebody, you get to meet them, you can meet their personality.

Are they going to be a good fit? Are they truly caring in your, you know, whatever it's relating to? So I'm glad to see a good roofing company that's truly interested in helping their clients. So I was speaking to Casey and she decided to be under, you know, a little ill the last couple weeks. Yes, it has went through all of us so terribly.

She punted this, podcast over to you. But one conversation, trust me, I begged her to come. And, she wishes that she could be here. And one thing that we had a conversation about, though, was like, there seems to be a market shift where people want to be one on one again. Yes. We're a few years ago you could get away with.

I mean, during Covid, whatever your belief is in that, I won't say anything because I made this somebody off, but, like, there was times that, like, a people wouldn't even come outside. I'd talk to them at the front door. I would go doing a roof inspection. I would send them an email or a text message with like, what I seen up there and send an estimate.

And there was several jobs I sold without like, ever technically, like maybe like shaking their hands like some me. I'm just old fashioned, like, look, somebody and shake their hand. You know, I judge by, you know, if you're if you're a male, like, do you have a firm handshake? You know, you size people up like that. Yeah. Okay.

But we really and I and I try to study business trends and that kind of stuff. And a couple podcast I listened to one guy owns a lot of stores. And he says that the foot traffic has actually picked back up in the last 12 to 18 months, because people do want to, you know, people want to on a Saturday, they want to come to a home show.

Yeah. And get out and, you know, get some freebies and, you know, get some. It's human nature to want to be with other people. I mean, we're not made to be hermits living in our house. What is that? That's not living to me. Get out there, explore, you know, test boundaries in life. Don't be afraid to fail.

You know, start something because you can't finish something unless you start it. So stop being afraid to, to make these connections with people. And that's what when you come into the home and business show, you're not just looking for one aspect of your home. I mean, this is going to hopefully broaden people's, knowledge of different home aspects, maybe things that they didn't know that need it fix, maybe somewhere that they didn't know where to start.

Who do we call? Well, I have this issue. Is this a, foundation basement contracting issue, or can we get insulate, you know, to fix our house? What truly can they get out of it? So other than the massive loads of door prizes we plan to give away, we are going to try to make it as fun and exciting as possible.

So one thing that I do want to touch base is that we have silent auctions. Okay. And that that came about because we wanted to work with habitat for humanity. Being a real estate agent obviously goes hand in hand. You know, they build homes, they sell homes. It works. But they do a lot for our community and they're not recognized as much as what people realize.

I mean, we need to do better, right? So I started this with getting the promotions for silent auctions. So that way they get 100% of the proceeds for it. So anything that people want to drop off and donate baskets, anything home related? We're just trying to make it exciting. So my plan is to start at like 10:00 and then, end at 11:00 and start a new auction.

So that way customers don't have to hang out for all day waiting on this auction to end. So you see something on the 12:00 auction list? Well, go talk to your roofing guys. You know, make conversation, come back and bid on the auction that's coming up. So we'll kind of keep it really intriguing and interesting throughout the day.

And, they gave us a microphone as well there. So that'll be exciting. We're going to go around, talk to people and stuff like that and kind of get everybody involved, you know, and, be personable. Right? Right. It's good to have a personality. Yeah, yeah. No, I mean, no, you're I mean, that's that's exciting. Like, just to just to have that enrichment because I'll be honest, like, if you go to any home show, there's like 74 roofing contractors there.

Yes. And it's like we don't even go up there because it's like it just didn't make sense for it just doesn't make sense for us. So like when I seen it, like I seen the message about to Facebook, I was like, yeah, we're doing this. You know, we've got a great team behind us that we've got ideas and, you know, we're going to have some interacting things at our booth.

Awesome. You know, and some giveaways and that kind of stuff. Just because I don't want it just to be like, oh, I just had my roof down last week or last year, you know, like, I want to, I want to I want to gauge the audience, engage. Yeah, yeah. And have fun because, you know, like my son, he may show up in a Pink Panther outfit because we're, we're owners.

We do a lot of Owens Corning, roofing shingles. Okay. So, we'll see. Like I said, we're going to we're going to try to have some fun, some fun with it. We're going to continue to help push it and promote it, with like, the silent auctions do you have that shed's already kind of laid out of like when you're how many silent auctions throughout the day you're having?

I'm doing four starting at ten. So at 11:00, I'll pull the one silent auction sheets. Gather up everybody for those auctions, and then the next set will start at 11, and then so on. Last one standing at 2:00. Okay. So something else exciting that we're doing too, and I keep forgetting on this part, is that we have a live remote.

with G101.3. Okay, so they're actually kicking off the silent auction. It's going to be there at 10:00 with us. So we can kind of touch base with habitat for humanity. They can speak on their new project. They've got a big house that they're starting on, looking for donations, needing help and stuff. So that's a lot of where my, what I want to say, the, the incentive to help them came from, you know, it's spring time.

There's a lot of builders and stuff that's needing to get supplies to habitat to help with this house. So I'm hoping that as a community, you know, roofing, you might be able to assist with some of their needs. And truly help these families that are in need of the help. So, this is and this is I don't really know.

I mean, I don't know what habitat for humanity is. I get the whole concept. What is is there like a loan? How is that set up like district regions? Is there a local chapter in Richmond like how's that? You know, I don't know if I would call it a local chapter, but I do know that there are different, like this one's called Good News habitat for humanity.

Okay, so I know when I was looking them up, I actually called an Ohio place. Because I thought it was our local. So there are different, I guess you would call them chapters, but so to speak, different, organizations for County, maybe it would be a good way of putting it. Okay. So it's more county focused surrounding areas.

Okay. Another reason I ask is many moons ago, me and my wife, we moved to Tennessee. I worked for Dave Ramsey for about a year, and the church that we were attending, we, we built the walls in the parking lot and then they hauled it off. And it was so funny because, at that time, my boy was about 18 months.

My little girl, my boy was 22, almost two. My little girl was 3 or 4 months old. And they found out the church I, I volunteered to help. Well, then they found out that I had done some sales and some project managing and they're like, hey, we need you to lead. Yeah. Like, okay, so I get stuck, I get stuck, I get for Life honor to help break honored with like four, 13 and 14 year old girls.

Okay. And I thought, holy shit. And my wife is like, this is just God preparing you. Yeah. For your future. And now since I have two girls, you know, and it was so funny because, like, we had a guy next to me, like, you know, we're kind of working our ear. There's a guy, he's got, like, four teenage boys.

And in the beginning, I'm thinking, oh my gosh, I wish I had them boys over here than these girls. We built two walls with the girls I did. Yes. And I think they made 2 or 3 potty breaks, which is, you know, you know, how you girls are. They all got to go to the bathroom together. Absolutely no tag team.

But we, we literally built two walls before they had the half a half walls done. And it was, it was it was funny because my wife's like. Like it was just it came back to me like, okay, just, you know, enjoy it. And I did like, you know, but I grew up with brothers also. So I was like, you know, but it was it was, it was fun.

And that house, it was built in Tennessee. The walls were technically, but I can't remember it. I don't even think it put was put up in Tennessee. It was put up somewhere else. So, Yeah, I've just we've never, I guess, I guess there's not a big presence in our general area for habitat, but I guess, you know, you pretty much said it.

They just don't get the publicity that they need. So, you know, you can volunteer and help with the building of your own house and stuff like that's mandatory, with their helping to provide that home. Yeah. But it's nice because my, my goal too is, you know, if I ever I work three jobs and I'm also a mom, so, if I get time, my goal is to truly help because I do have more skills than I want to have sometimes when it comes to home remodeling.

You know, nobody really wants to do drywall or mudding, but unfortunately, I know how. But I've got skills and I would love to be able to go volunteer eventually and help them, because I think everybody should know how to do these things. Right. Again, you don't know until you start something and you have to learn new skills or what's the point, right?

So how old are your kids? She's seven. Okay, okay. Going on 17, I should say, attitude wise, but, yeah, she's my one and only. Okay, okay. And she would have loved to have joined us today too, because when I told her I was coming down here, she was like, mom, can I skip school? And I want to go help you.

I'll talk about our home show. So she's my little, partner and everything that we do. So will she be at the home show? Absolutely. All right. I'll still be up at the front door, stamping hands, trying to help everybody. We'll get it. We'll do a Facebook Live with her because I've got, So mine are six, eight and nine.

Six and eight year olds are guests. And my six year old, she skipped school. Any time she can get to go pick up a cow or just, you know, with the feed business, we went out and did a couple of expos. You know, beef expos, beef home shows, pretty much. And she skipped and we went to Iowa for five days, and that's awesome.

Yeah. So, but kids need that experience. I mean, obviously they need school, they need education, but the schools can't teach them or life skills that, you know, I feel like I'm teaching my daughter. She has been in the business side of things since she could talk. I mean, we were doing the events and stuff throughout Indiana. She was four years old and she's like, hi, I'm Haley and this is my mom, you know, would you like to buy this?

Right? And I looked at her with tears in my eyes and I was like, I'm so proud. That's my daughter. She's four years old and she is already starting to understand business. And, she knows she has to work for what she wants. And I think that's a great mindset to bring up the next generation of back to the traditional values.

If you want it, you have to work for it. It's not going to be given to you. Well, and one thing that I've noticed in like studying business and stuff like the Amish do a really good job of having apprenticeships. They do great as a country 50, 60, 70 years ago we did. But we really, you know, it's show kids in school, mom and dad go to work and and you know, moms that got to work are great.

Moms that get to stay home are great. Like, I feel like we've tried to demonize women and like, you know, you're a horrible mom because you do work three jobs. Oh, you're lazy, mom, because you stay at home like, I know you can't win, right? You know, like, genuinely like we need it all. Like, yes, your daughter's going to.

That's going to be part of shaping her like she's seen her mom, Buster. But, you know, and, and that's awesome. But, I mean, I love I love school, I love education, but we failed our our country with the lack of, like, them understanding. Like when I get a chance to go, we sponsor a lot of, 5 or 6 high schools with the Dave Ramsey, financial class because they teach them about budgeting and what insurances they can also and investing because that's not being taught now.

And, I love going to talk to these kids because a lot of times I just tell me, I'll give you three pointers to be successful in life, show up to work early. Stay off your darn phone and like, look at people like, you know, it's amazing when I go into we go into the high school classes and talk to them like the people, the kids, they just look down exactly the whole time.

And I mean, like, so what I started doing is when we kick off the class, I make everybody stand up, say their name, what grade Durant and what their future plans are. And if they're a freshman and they say, I don't know, that's an answer. You know it is. And then it's funny because then I'm like, okay, what questions you guys have for us.

And some teachers do a really good job and they make the kids have 2 or 3 questions. And then there's some classes that it's like pulling teeth to get them to talk. And then all this like look over and say, hey Brandi, what do you do you not have any questions today? Because I know they're not because I made them introduce themselves nice.

And, and I always, I'm pretty good about, like, making people feel uncomfortable and like, you know, there's always, like, two girls that chit chat the whole time. Yes, but never can ask questions. So, I mean, it's, but there's there's just a lot of that, like people kids have to learn it, you know. And my kids, I mean now we've built a team where a lot of them are doing the day to day stuff.

But when we started, we started out of our house and I had a truck and my wife had a tall hoe and about blew the radiator up. I blew a radiator hose pulling, and we had two dump trailers go to the dump that morning. One was on my truck, one was her on her Tahoe. After I blew the radiator hose up, I was like, all right, I've got to get you a truck so my kids can have a conversation.

And, you know, I also feel like when kids see us have business conversations or just adult conversations, like, not in like a weird, like private adult conversation, we're just talking business or buying a gun or purchasing something like to like for them to understand. Like it takes money to buy that. And, you know, and I'm very I'm very I'm very I make sure my kids understand like Adam working for us helps pay us our bills.

So like, I want my kids to come into the office and respect every single person in this building. And I also want them to understand that they these people, Adam Lee, Jonathan, the sales team, they choose to work for us and and we're thankful for that because, you know, now my kids like teasing them. You know, Adam, Adam's great.

He volunteers at, Mahoning Valley Christian Church camp out here, and my kids found out about church camp for the summer, and they want to go. And Reagan starts asking me all these questions, and Reagan's my eight year old, and she would say here, she should probably run the podcast because she could ask you questions all day, right?

About my seven year old's the same way, like she would have. She wakes up asking my wife questions and my wife's like, Reagan, leave me alone. Give me a half an hour. Let me get some coffee, you know. Oh, yeah. But, like, they we came here after school yesterday. They ran up here to ask Adam questions about the church camp.

I'm like, as a volunteer there. We've done some work there. I was like, but I've never been there during a week. I was like, I, I can't answer your questions, but, you know, Adam's been with us over three years now. So like, our kids, like they've they've watched our kids grow up, like, let's talk in the family. Yeah.

I was talking to Elly. Her little one was an practically an infant when she started working for us. And she just got paperwork yesterday for preschool, and she's like, this is kind of hard, Bob. I was like, that is. Yeah, I get it, you know? But to me, it's it's why I do what I do like to, to be able to provide jobs like, you know, Adam gets to use his skill set of being a tech guy in Rushville.

Like, awesome. There's not a whole lot of jobs in Rushville for a tech videographer guy, you know, fortunate Adam went and got that skill set and you know, but you know, you talking about you got to try stuff new like Adam when he started working for me, he did whatever I needed. There was one day he'd focus on Facebook posting.

The next day he'd be pulling a dump trailer to a job site, and I was just like Adam Bear with me. I promise you, I'll eventually get you doing the stuff that you should be doing every day. You know so well. You kind of have to be diverse, I mean, in this life, because the thing is, is, you know, we have endless knowledge available to us, so why not put it to use?

I mean, you might not know something, but take a little bit of time, study it, and you can maybe find a new hobby or something that you truly are passionate about. And that's been my goal as a mom, is to expose my daughter to different things so she can grow up and go, you know what? I know how to do this.

I know how to do that. But I'm not afraid of trying this, to build that self-esteem up in her and just let her know the, you know, sky's the limit. Well, and like, they got to try stuff and they've got to be like, my son's gotten into show and cars and like, he gets up every single morning.

And now I guess that makes the sisters get up early job. They go out and feed him before school every morning. Oh, yeah. Yeah, I hear him like I'm awake, but I hear him out there getting up, you know? But I tell him I was like. But you don't realize being consistent, that's like, you're going to be so far ahead of people your age.

Like, I mean, I mean, he already is. I mean, he ran he ran a skid loader. The biggest killer you can find, you can put him in there. That is amazing. And he's he's operating it, you know, in you know, I'm I'm on a kick that I have a belief that this the problem with our country is the lack of men that's willing to step up and be a dad and, like, lead.

Yes. And teach and, like, you know, I'm impatient. Okay. I want it done. Yesterday, however, like, I realized, like, I've got to let my kids do stuff. Like we're doing something out in the barn the other day, and I could have done it four times faster, and I just had to sit there and encourage him. And, you know, that's hard to do that.

And I'm the same way. Like, if I want something, I want it now. Like, why isn't this done? But yet that's how they learn, right? And you have to let them make the mistakes. You have to let them fix the mistakes. That is the key. You know, it's not about making them. It's about okay, so I messed up.

How do I fix it? You know, maybe I didn't feed correctly or I forgot something. You know, go back and do it until it becomes habit. Because everything that you do gets easier the more you do it. And that's, you know, what we're trying to teach the kids nowadays is practice, practice does truly make perfect. And you can't be afraid of, well, what if I do this?

Or what if I do that? It's just try, just try. So that's kind of what the home show, you know, telling my daughter, I said we don't have, you know, an hour mark left on this world. It's going to be our name and reputation. So treating everybody to the best of our ability and treating them the way I want to be treated, I've taught my daughter that our reputation means everything.

My reputation and any business that I work with, anybody I, you know, come into relations with. You just want to have that. So she's like, mom, why is this home show so important to you? And I said, not only am I helping people, but it's about building that reputation with people to say, you know what, call Brandi. She'll help you.

And she realized that because she's going to be growing up in the same area and with the same morals, you know, from me. And that's what I'm setting her up to have something in life, hopefully to look up to and to be proud of. Well, I mean, you know, we talk a lot about legacy around here. Like, you know what what will your legacy be?

You know, and, you know, and like you said earlier, like you got to start before you can finish, like, God put that crazy idea in for me to own my own business. Years ago, I had no idea what it would be. I was doing environmental consulting. I had a great boss, for the one company that I worked for, and I enjoyed working with him.

But I found Dave Ramsey on the radio, and I heard him say, one day, like in ten years, make sure you chose or make sure you're intentional of where you're at. And I, I looked at my wife and I was like, I just wake up every day. It worked out. I like to play cowboy farmer, you know, mess with some cowboy far below, like my job was set up where a lot of it I could do on my own.

So if I wanted to work from 5 to 1 to 2 to 3 like I could and be home by two, 3:00 to go feed cows, whatever. Like I had that flexibility, but it was like I just knew that that wasn't really like what God's vision or plan was. Me long term. And so I told my wife I was like, we're going to finish paying off this debt.

I'm going to buy you a bigger house. Because we started in a two bedroom, one bath house in Glenwood. So, you know, good starter story there. Yeah. Yeah. Like I mean like my mortgage payment was $232. What? And it was like, can we get those times back again. Yeah. Yeah. Well, I mean, that's what happens when you buy a $20,000 house.

Okay. You know, but, you know, so we bought a house and I said, I'm going to go find a job that I. It's 100% commission. Because I think I can sell. Yeah. And, so I found a roofing on Craigslist, and, I interviewed with one company. I met with the sales manager. They had a company head to at the time.

I met with one of them. And, like, we got talking, and he's like, well, here's the pay structure. I was like, I was like, okay. He's like, you get a little bit of training pay. That's 100% commission. I was like, that's fine. I said, I've we've got money saved. And, you know, our house is paid for. And he looked at me and at the same time we said, Dave Ramsey.

Well, he was digging out of several hundred thousand dollars in debt from a failed business. So, like, we had that mutual like he knew I knew what he was going to do, paying off his debt. He knew what I'd been through to do it. So like, you know, and he pretty much is like, I'll tell you, if you work, it'll work.

Yeah. And it took off and then it was like, then it just a couple things happened. I was like, okay, it's time to do this in my hometown. Because all the big companies in Indy, I worked for a couple of them. They would always complain about having to come out here to do work. Well, now it's funny because now they're out here marketing in this area because they realize the potential and, you know, and I just laughed because I'm like 7 or 8 years ago you guys could have seen the come out here.

Yeah. You know, so and labor was so much more expensive because, you know, you have drive time, you have everything else. So your customers prices go up because you don't have somebody local, but your local guys are willing to help you because they don't have that hour drive just to get to you and this and that. So it's able to save them money.

And it's a local. Yeah. And I mean it was just, you know, and like I want to have a heart and soul. Like I want a team that that cares. Yeah. You know, like I want a culture here that like no matter like. And I tell the team as our team gets bigger, like, it's more important for our team to believe in our culture as much it is me.

Because in the in the beginning, if it's just me and Emily and two other people, it's easier to instill that culture. But it's one now that we've got some leadership levels here and production guys are coming in to work on their Jonathan, sales guys are coming to work in under Chris like they've got to hold that. You know that culture.

So yeah I mean so that's just kind of how like all this, all this came into place and I mean we went I went to work for Dave Ramsey, to sell for him, like, I believe in a system. We live that way. Our businesses ran on his principles. And, we, like, came back. I was like, all right, we're going to go back home.

We're going to start a roofing company. Awesome. And I decided to do that in October. October of what year? 17. Okay. So like this for a while. Yeah. So. But, like, what kind of idiot doesn't keep his salary job in Nashville, Tennessee for six months and come back in March? But, you know, it worked out, you know.

So, so one question I like to ask, I'm trying to get in the habit of is like, what is a failure that you know, that you learned from or something that now you just like, just really laugh really hard at, like, why did I even think that would work? Or that's funny because I did this, but this didn't necessarily work.

But it taught me this. Oh, so see, I, I can't okay, so that's great putting me on the spot for it. But I can't really say of a certain failure because I don't look at things as a failure. You know, I'm kind of much of the mindset, though. I started out with a two year accounting degree. Okay?

I didn't know why, but I knew I needed it. I just said, you know, I'm good with numbers. I need an accounting degree. I want to run a business one day. So I lo and behold, I didn't know I'd be doing this several times. You know what I would get into? Was it absolutely necessary? No. It could have been a failure and a lot of money and student loans that I didn't need at the time.

But, there's really nothing that I set my mind to that I truly fail on because it's it's always a learning process. You know what? The real estate. I went in and I heard so many horror stories about people fail this. Don't get discouraged. I'm on my fourth or fifth time. I walked in with a mindset and told the woman behind the counter, I said, I'm here to pass my exam today.

Failing is not an option. And that's kind of my mindset of it. I, I put 100% into anything I do. I don't expect to fail because we try so hard. And that's what Casey and I when we started this. We're like, we hope everything's going to go great. You know, this is our mission. This is what we want to do.

And we have busted our butts. I mean, day and night, working through everything, trying to figure out what's the best way to help everybody. And it looks like it's going to be a great success. I mean, failing is not an option. Well, and, you know, and, I've got a business coach, a friend, a mentor, and it's like, if you look, if you look for how the homestead could fail, like you're going to find it and you're going to do it, fix it.

You know, I had a guy that I had to fire and he told people that every Monday he showed up to work. He was scared I was going to fire him. Part of that was he was feeling guilty for not doing his job. Yeah. However, even my business mentor coach told him he's like, if you continue showing up every day with that mindset, yes.

One Monday morning he's going to fire you. Yeah, it was a Monday morning. I had to fire him. And you know, and I don't say that in like a flex, but it's like, you know, you've got to teach that mindset like I believe in speaking stuff into existence. Now you do have to put the damn work into it.

Also, like for this home show to be successful, you shouldn't just wake up every day like, hey, this homes show is going to be successful, then not do anything going to be so great. We're so excited. We're just going to show up and throw some, you know, people into a room and it's going to be wonderful. I know there's a lot of planning, a lot of stuff going into it, but you do.

You have to believe. You have to believe in yourself, and you have to believe that what you're working for means something to somebody. And the the amount of vendors that had such a positive comment on this, it's amazing because Richmond hasn't seen a home show and I guess 20 years, that's what I was told. So to hear these guys, you know, Brandy, we needed this.

We needed to, you know, have something to to pull it together. We're so happy that you're doing it. I mean, that's an insane positivity that make you want to get up in the morning and go, I am doing this for the good reasons. And it's just it's all a mindset you have to believe. And one thing that I've learned as a small business owners, like we've got to be more intentional of encouraging, like, I've got to be more intentional, encouraging you like, because like in business, it's hard enough.

Yeah it is. Life is hard. But you get in the gut exactly all the time. But it's like, you know, like I, I try to like one thing I really appreciate when my dad did for me, like, I always seen him be super respectful to just even the guest, the lady taking your money for gas and. Yeah, you know what I mean?

Like. And I'm not saying that's a low job. It's just an entry level job, you know? But I've just. And I'm not saying I see my dad respect everybody. Now. He was mean as shit to us kids. But he would be really nice to you, but, I mean, but still, like, you know, I try to, I, I try to instill like.

Thank you, I appreciate you. Yes. Because like, and it's something I've been trying to and we try to send thank you's with business. After somebody does business with us. But I've been really trying to get the team just to say thank you in general. Like, hey, thank you for calling in today. You know, just because, like, when is the last time you did business with somebody that they said, hey, thank you for coming in today.

You know, restaurants sometimes are restaurants probably a business that's pretty good at that. But, you know, it's not enough to say it on the bottom of a receipt anymore. We really need to be that person that says, you know what? Thanks. Right. Thank you for allowing me on the show. Thanks for, you know, coming participating. We appreciate everybody who's making life what it is.

Because if we don't build each other up, there's a 100 million things that's going to knock us down. So we have to to build each other up. Yeah, yeah. And I mean, like I said, it's just the I just got some people coming on my mind that are good about, you know, saying thank you. Everything is negative. Yes.

A friend I know those people and I'm like, how can we turn this into positive? You have bad stuff happening. But you have to realize we all have bad stuff happening in our lives. We don't want it to happen. But you know, somebody is in a grouchy mood. You go out to a restaurant and your server is griping, complaining about something, okay?

Which happens far too often. But, or maybe I'm just the person that people want to gripe too. I don't know, I hope not, but it's kind of like you still want to be nice. You don't know what the other person's going through in life. You don't know what's making them have a bad day. Are they always this way?

Hopefully not. I mean, you have some that are really grumpy old people, but I get that. But you want to try to bring something to the table to make somebody's life better. I mean, if we all did that just a little bit every day, I mean, that's what I taught my daughter when she first started preschool, kindergarten. They said, you pick the kid that's causing trouble in class.

All right. Maybe they're struggling at home. Maybe there's something going on, you know, in their head. Be nice. Pay him a compliment. And I tell you what, she was like. Mom, I don't want to work with this one kid. He's always disturbing everything I said. How about you compliment something about him? Distract him from something that is making him not feel comfortable.

And I instill that into our very young to say, let's just try caring. Why is that so hard? And it's worked wonders. I mean, and I just wish we could all do that for our kids and the future generation coming up. Well, and, I mean, I look back, as I got older and you're like, I just look back on things, you know, and, like, you can see, like, there's a couple kids on our bus that they were bullies.

Yeah, well, then I got to know their stepdad in real life. Yeah, when I was an adult. And I'm like, no. Trapped in poor kids or bullies and. And now them two kids are. They're good dudes. Like, they're they're contributing to society and, you know, but yeah, it's just, you know, I, Adam probably knew I was going to say this, when you said that people, you know, vent a lot.

It's like, oh, how are we attracting our life? Like, how are we creating it? Because, like, you know, and I try not to get spiritual and religious or anything, on but like, and this kind of blow this is this, this. People disagree with this sometimes. But you know, it says that we are I have no idea how that was silence.

And it's not silenced. But we create. God created us. All right. So if so, we like if you look at the life that you create your life, like, even in not failures, but times that you learn a relationship, a business dealing like how how did you create it? Were you desperate for that job? Were you desperate for that client because you thought you had to sell them a house?

And little did you know, you're going to show 70 houses and make $1,200 income. You know what I mean? Like, right now I think of the very first job I did, I lowered my price because I had to have this. This guy became the biggest pain in the you know what? Like he was blaming stuff the Hvac guy did.

Yeah. On the roof. And I was like, but if water is coming in from your Hvac exhaust inside down into your furnace, that has nothing to do with the roof, right? And he called me back and he's like, I'm sorry, that was my Hvac guy. You know what I mean? Right? So that's one thing that I try to focus on is like, you know, how are you creating?

How are you, you and Casey creating a successful home show? Like you guys, you're out there pounding the pavement. You guys, you were kind enough to give us some of your time this morning, Casey I couldn't understand hardly. And she was so soft spoken. Last week when I spoke to her voice, she literally talked to me on the phone for like, 40 minutes, you know, and I was just like, yeah, we'll just we'll do the top tier.

We'll help you guys out, you know? And that's why I was like, okay, how can we help them? Like we've got the podcast. I'm like, let's, let's bring, you know, let's bring awareness, you know, to that. So right in Casey, she is it's hard for me as a female because I've been in such a male industry for so long.

Okay. So when Casey and I started working together, she has a lot of the same mindset that we will work and work and we don't know when to quit. You know, we're always adding stuff to her plate. We're helping her family. We're doing everything that we can to do the best we can. She's a very positive person, and that's what I was like, instantly drawn to her.

And I said, it's nice to see somebody with the same morals as me. As the same motivation, I guess is huge. And this is only the beginning for us. This may be the first home and business show that we're bringing to Richmond, but there are other events that we are just so excited and we're like, March 15th is one, but we are starting March 16th on a whole different new journey.

We're not sure what it is yet, but there's more to come. I mean, we just we work so well together and she is so determined. I mean, we are both sacrificing family time. We're sacrificing sleep sanity. I'm living off caffeine, but we are doing this because we know that there's a good purpose for it. And, I just I love working with her.

I love the ideas that she has. She's inspiring. She's the designer. It's just been amazing to have her as the greatest friend in my life. Awesome. So. So she really is going to be a huge part of this. And I can't wait for you guys to meet her. Awesome. So recap Richmond Home Show March 15th from 9 to 5.

From 9 to 5. Silent auction start at ten. The G101.3 live remote starts at ten. Come and get food. We'll be serving breakfast up until about 1030, 11:00 inside the building, and then it'll be lunchtime for your chicken on a stick and get ice cream for the kiddos and all the fun stuff. Nice, nice. Well, I want to say thank you, for your time.

Thank you for putting us on because we're excited because part of our we want to continue to expand our business in Richmond. So it was it was a perfect fit for us. So we're looking forward. We got some pretty cool ideas, to, engage, you know, with, with the crowd and, have a good time.

So. Well, thank you for having us, you know, to come to your podcast. Thanks for participating in the home show. Most importantly, thanks for coming to our area. Because as a realtor, we know roofs are the number one important thing for a home. So if you don't have a good roof, you know, to call these guys that they want your business.

And, I'll be passing it on to all my clients as well. Perfect, I appreciate it. Like super excited. Have a great day, guys. Thanks for tuning in.