25 - Building Exceptional Relationships: The Power of a No A**holes Policy - Matt Quirie

Matt Quirie joins Sam and Jason Yarborough to share his insights on building strong relationships, maintaining a positive company culture, and the importance of effective communication. 

He emphasizes the need for mutual respect, active listening, and trust in all relationships. Matt also discusses the impact of implementing a "no assholes" policy at ROI DNA and how it has positively influenced their company culture. 

He advises establishing successful partnerships based on trust, value, and shared goals. Additionally, Matt talks about his personal project, Ubiverse, a resort in Downeyville, and his vision of creating a space for community, nature, and learning.

**Key Takeaways:**

- Mutual respect, active listening, and trust are essential for building strong relationships.
- Implementing a "no assholes" policy can create a positive company culture.
- Partnerships should be based on trust, value, and mutual goals.
- Building trust and maintaining open communication are crucial in partnerships.
- Providing value and bringing new ideas can help establish and strengthen partnerships.
- Effective communication requires continuous questioning and clarification to ensure understanding.
- Documenting agreed-upon goals and priorities can help maintain consistency in partnerships.

**Quotes:**

- "Mutual respect is the key to any relationship." - Matt Quirie
- "Active listening is about really taking in what people are saying versus thinking about what to say next." - Matt Quirie
- "Building purposeful relationships requires respect, trust, and community." - Matt Quirie
- "You can't assume at face value the answer is what it means sometimes." - Matt Quirie
- "Having agreed-upon goals and priorities documented is a huge head start in partner relationships." - Matt Quirie

**Chapters:**

00:25 Introduction and Thanksgiving Recap
01:26 Introducing the Guest: Matt Query
02:14 The Power of Relationships
04:24 The Importance of Active Listening
10:21 The 'No Assholes' Policy at ROI DNA
12:53 Maintaining Company Culture Amidst Growth
15:32 The Challenges of Upholding Core Values
24:15 The Importance of Trust in Partnerships
25:33 The Role of Transparency in Successful Partnerships
26:46 The Impact of Trust and Understanding in Partnerships
27:38 Building Trust in Partnerships
27:54 The Importance of Communication in Partnerships
28:04 Building Successful Partnership Models
30:04 Challenges in Partnership Dynamics
31:32 The Impact of Partnership Tiers
32:59 Building Trust Beyond Individual Relationships
34:09 The Role of Incentives in Partnerships
35:47 The Importance of Defining Core Focus in Business
37:53 The Role of Partnerships in Business Growth
40:58 The Importance of Establishing a Strong Foundation in Partnerships
47:10 The Dream of Building a Community Resort

Transcript

Sam Yarborough: 0:26

Hey, hey, friends. Hope you all had a great Thanksgiving. Gobble, gobble. We are super pumped about today's episodes. Um, lots to uncover. I thoroughly, thoroughly enjoyed this conversation. But first We just got back from a little trip ourselves. Yeah. Where'd we go? How was it? Well,

Jason Yarborough: 0:46

Thanksgiving trip out to see the whole Yarby family. That'd be my family. Uh, got a chance to fly out to North Carolina. Took the whole crew out, both babies. That was a trip in and of itself. It's

Sam Yarborough: 0:58

getting better though as

Jason Yarborough: 0:59

they get older. Yeah, it's getting better. Jack's got a, a fond appreciation for his tablet. So, you know, that's, that's the best way to fly, I think, with kids. Yeah. It was fun. We had a good time in North Carolina. I got to see my whole gang and ate way too much turkey and, uh, kind of feeling the effects of that still. It is a, you know, a Thursday following last Thursday that I'm still feeling kind of full, but I love me some turkey.

Sam Yarborough: 1:25

Yeah. So you knew our guest much prior to me. Actually, this was my first conversation with him. Hopefully the first of many. Yeah.

Jason Yarborough: 1:34

So one of the fun things about this podcast, right, is I get to introduce my friends to you, your friends to me. And this is one of those guys that I've just kind of naturally latched on to the very first time I met him. But Mr. Matt Query is a founder of ROI DNA, just a total badass, total rock star. I love the guy to death. He's built a really great business in ROI DNA, but more than anything, he's just a really. Really good person. Anybody that knows him would say the same thing. He's one of those guys that everybody wants to be friends with. He's super active outdoorsman. He's a big lover of music. He's just every guy's guy, right? That's just, you kind of want to be friends with. And we got really deep with Matt. Well, deeper than I've gone with Matt before in the past about like, Relationships, how he builds relationships, the power of relationships, and, you know, what it looks like to build those purpose built relationships and some of the key tactics to, to deploy in building relationships.

Sam Yarborough: 2:29

Yeah, I mean, the thing I appreciated most about him was it's not all talk. He definitely, Talks the talk, but probably walks the walk

Jason Yarborough: 2:39

first. Definitely walks the walk, and anybody that knows ROI DNA from events, they have buttons, shirts, stickers, probably more that say no assholes, and like they embody that within their company culture.

Sam Yarborough: 2:52

So let's leave it there, because without further ado, this is a great episode. No assholes.

Jason Yarborough: 2:58

Absolutely. Everyone should take this one to heart. Enjoy! Enjoy! What's up, Matt Query? How we doing, my man?

Matt Quirie: 3:05

I'm doing awesome. How you doing? Thanks for having me.

Jason Yarborough: 3:08

It's so amazing to have you hanging out with us. We're stoked to have you. Got you full on from the, uh, the property with your puffy looking like Matt Query does. Looking good. So we're, we're going to have some fun today.

Matt Quirie: 3:19

Yep. Excited to be here.

Jason Yarborough: 3:21

Yeah.

Sam Yarborough: 3:21

I am personally super pumped for this episode because Matt, you and I have, this is our first time talking

Matt Quirie: 3:28

I know. I know. It's kind of weird. Because I feel like I do know you through all the conversations I've had with Yarby over

Sam Yarborough: 3:34

seriously, likewise. So

Jason Yarborough: 3:38

just talking that. Uh, so the podcast is really just a way for us to introduce us to each other's friends and have a conversation that's recorded.

Matt Quirie: 3:44

That's rad.

Jason Yarborough: 3:46

So yeah, man,

Sam Yarborough: 3:48

from the conversations I've had with Jason, um, one of the things he has really, he talks about a lot with you and I think you pride yourself on as well is good relationships. Um, and truly that's. Why we started this podcast. Um, we personally have seen the power of relationships in our personal life and our professional life. Um, so as somebody who prides themselves on relationships, I want to hear in your opinion, what the non negotiables are for a good relationship.

Matt Quirie: 4:24

Non negotiables. Um, uh, so I think mutual respect is, is the, the key to any of those things. Um, and in really, really respect and not just, you know, listening or pretending to listen to something, but I mean, mutual respect comes with, there's a, there's a technique called active listening, which, um, you know, my awesome wife may or may not say I'd use as often as I should. Uh, but it's, it's really, really about the relationships. Like how much am I actually taking in? Um, With what people are saying versus how much of my mind is Hampshire wheeling of what to say next and like stopping that Hampshire wheel You know and in really being present with the conversation and the people so for relationships It's it I'd say the respect and the listening Trust of course is is a huge, you know kind of goal for that And just community I think you know for me even work as a community. You know, we, we talk about kind of what a relationship is, and when people get hired, uh, at our ID& A, The first thing I say, or what was part of the interview process, is like, Hey, this is a team. This is not your family. Family first. Friends first. Like, take care of your core community first. But this is your second community. Like, this is the team to go kick ass with. Um, and really making a differentiation. Because I don't want to, you know, BS anybody that work is the ultimate thing in life. Because there's so much more to it. And I think that those, those relationships, you know, that's kind of like the basis for kind of the work relationship arc for me.

Jason Yarborough: 5:48

I love that and want to get into the team stuff here in a little bit, but I'd like to dive into some of you were just mentioned about, and even actually talked about this at breakthrough not too long ago, but the, the active listening part, I think out of all that you just mentioned, mutual respect, active listening, trust, and community, like active listening might be the hardest. Right? Cause I'm, I'm very goatee. I get into these conversations. I'm like, Ooh, how am I going to follow what he's saying? Like, Ooh, I'm getting like Jojo, a little circus monkey. I'm all excited. Right? So how do, how do you, Matt Query, like calm the mind and, and kind of stay engaged and present without like having 700 thoughts going 700 different ways.

Matt Quirie: 6:22

Yeah, and, uh, make no mistake, my mind is not calm. Like, it's, it's really a challenge for me, too. So,

Jason Yarborough: 6:28

I believe this.

Matt Quirie: 6:29

I've, I've learned, I've learned to compartmentalize a lot, which I didn't know I'd have the skill at doing. And that takes, it's still, it's, it's constant learning. You know, I think, One of the things that, um, uh, I hopefully will, you know, take with me until the day I stop learning is the day I'm dead, right? So the evolution of ourselves as human beings in those conversations. And so when I'm getting a lot of information thrown at me, I am in the background taking mental notes of things to come back to that are relevant not to me, but to that person in the conversation. And I think that's, uh, there's, there's, there's times for it in different ways, right? So if you're having a normal conversation with your buds, um, and really talking about just fun stuff, those flow naturally. But when you're in a new relationship or a new communication with someone, like say in a business relationship, Um, I think it's really important to, to take everything in before, Oh, and I did this too, and I did this too, is just really think about, Okay, great, I did this too in the back of my head, just let that go. And then be like, okay, but there's something to talk about there. There's nugget information of similarities, or there's something to expand upon what they said, uh, because you have a similar thought train, or a different thought train to have a discussion about. And just let there be a pause. I think a lot of people have lost the pause.

Sam Yarborough: 7:44

In all assets of life.

Matt Quirie: 7:46

Yeah. Oh, yeah. Yeah. That's a whole nother, yeah.

Jason Yarborough: 7:49

Much deeper conversation, but I like that. I wanted to, and to what you're saying, not that I'm, this is kind of ironic, but, uh, the, the need to validate. It's what you're kind of getting at. Right. And one of the things I'm actually actually trying to work on is not feeling that need to validate. So I'm not trying to validate what you're validating by saying you don't need to validate,

Matt Quirie: 8:09

Yeah. No, no, I get it.

Jason Yarborough: 8:11

but

Sam Yarborough: 8:12

irony is stiff.

Jason Yarborough: 8:13

very hard part to work on is like, you know, especially if like in the context of building partnerships, right? You both want to let you've been down this track together that you've seen success, you know what it looks like and you know how to do this. And so like kind of refuting the need to validate. Right. I think is a huge aspect to, to building, you know, mutual relationship and, you know, mutual partnership and trust.

Matt Quirie: 8:35

Yeah. And I think, I think if, if you really take that, that's a strong desire, a human desire, right? The need to feel validated. And I think a lot of people don't, um, realize that they really need acknowledgement. And that tends to stray conversations versus having a conversation. I think when you get rid of that, you kind of strip that back saying, okay, in this conversation, I'm just going to let it flow. And I don't need acknowledgement of my, you know, check boxes of life. I want to share experiences in something. But if, if you, if you really listen and let the people have their output, I think you, you kind of let go of a little bit of that. But we all need validation to some point.

Jason Yarborough: 9:14

To some point, yeah.

Sam Yarborough: 9:15

I think that's so strong though, because from a partner perspective, from a human perspective. Empathy perspective, if you can approach conversations and say, okay, just like me, the person I'm talking to also needs to be validated. So how can I remove my needs from this circumstance and help them fulfill theirs? Then it's going to come full circle and that's how you're going to build great partnerships professionally

Matt Quirie: 9:42

Yeah.

Sam Yarborough: 9:42

and personally.

Matt Quirie: 9:44

Exactly. That full circle. I fully agree with you, Sam. That is, and that's, that's the, I think that's a trick I continually try to push myself to is like, yeah, I actually don't need to say anything. I can just listen to this whole conversation and maybe at the end have a dialogue back and forth. But there's sometimes. You know, we just sit and listen. I, my, I joke around at my work life that I'm chief therapist officer for our clients many times and, and that might be my next life. I might, you know, go take six years of school and learn how to be a therapist, but, uh, um, that's, uh, I'm, I'm not that. So I, I really appreciate people who can do that naturally.

Jason Yarborough: 10:19

Yeah, when you start those classes, let me know. I'll join you. So, let's jump into the uh, The real thing I wanted to get into here is uh, At RYDNA, I know this for a fact cause you know, you and I have been partying together for a few years now. Uh, you have a strict no assholes policy. I've got a, I've got pins that say it, I've got a t shirt that says it. Let's talk a little bit about this uh, no assholes policy at RYDNA.

Matt Quirie: 10:43

Yeah. Uh, we gotta get you the beanie apparently. We'll send a

Jason Yarborough: 10:46

Ooh, there's a beanie. I do

Matt Quirie: 10:47

the beanie.

Sam Yarborough: 10:49

For the record, I have none.

Jason Yarborough: 10:50

envy. I got to feel validated with my swag,

Matt Quirie: 10:53

There you go. Alright, well, Sam, you've got a whole package coming your way then. So for, for that, it's, it's a nuts thing to it, you know, I might've been the, the spark of it, but it's really the whole team that carries that policy and the, the team we've built around internally. Um, and it, it was born out of, you know, I grew up taking out the garbage for, you know, digital teams. I grew up doing affiliate program, email data, and I did every channel myself before becoming lucky enough to, to run teams globally for companies. And when kept going, uh, or getting kind of falling up that ladder, uh, I, uh, I just kept running into situations where people were aggressive, angry about stuff, angry at other people, and it's just work, for Christ's sakes, like, you don't have, you know, like, it shouldn't be driving you to, you know, blood pressure through the roof, and so my last job, serious job before I took this, I blew up a boardroom meeting pretty, by just telling someone, yeah, go ahead and do that, I don't know why you hired me, and so I was kind of tired of dealing With assholes. And so I'm like, you know what, that's gonna be the number one principle. If I restart something and I started my own consulting thinking I would have a, you know, an easy, flexible job. And I was lucky enough to have a lot of people I knew who I met friends in the industry who found out what I was doing. And then, so we got clients really fast, which I was not expecting. This is 14 years ago. Um, and so it was kind of fun. They're like, Hey, let's put out who we are and build a good culture first. And, and really by doing that, the people working there are going to succeed. Um, or they're going to be people that gravitate towards that, that have an awesome expertise and really focus on culture first versus what the revenue is or, you know, how many tick boxes we, we, we knock off. Like is everyone working together, happy working together, enjoying their work life, um, making a difference. You know, for the clients that we're working for, uh, and enjoying doing along the way. And that kind of, you know, moved into bring your whole self, be inventive, do it right, and no assholes. And that's been on the website, some form of that for almost the whole entire website existence.

Sam Yarborough: 12:54

I love that because I feel like. In, in boardrooms that I've sat in and, you know, executive teams. For whatever reason, those two philosophies feel like sometimes they can't exist at the same time. And that's not true.

Jason Yarborough: 13:14

I think the ROI DNA website even says that, that

Sam Yarborough: 13:17

Yeah, that was the goal, or,

Matt Quirie: 13:19

Yeah, yeah, yeah, the goal is, is really, you know, change the thought process around what you have to deal with. And it doesn't mean people don't have a bad day. And I think, you know, we continually tell the staff that, like, hey, just because the client was a little upset, you know, doesn't mean they broke the no assholes policy. But there's some that have, and we have fired massive clients just because, um, you know, it's, it's just, it's uncalled for. There's no reason to, you know, I get everyone stressed, but I get, you know, like. It's, we bat a lot of A's, no one's perfect, and I think coming to the table with that attitude from the beginning really sets a tone of, yeah, expect great results from us, and if we're not doing that, you can get rid of us for sure, that really happens, but, um, except for the downturn, which everyone's going through right now, um, but I think from, from us, it's like, you know, being part of a team, and we extend that, that kinship, teamship to our clients, which is why we have long client relationships for many years. Yeah.

Sam Yarborough: 14:13

So, as the co founder of ROIDNA and as MacQuery, as a, as a person, you've been very intentional about how you surround yourself with, whether it be customers, employees, partners, friends, family. Um, how have you quote unquote, done your homework, um, and built up your asshole meter to make sure this orbit around MacQuery is exceptional?

Matt Quirie: 14:40

Um, I, I would say it's the orbit around the team too. So I, uh, I worked really hard to get my name out of this, you know, because, uh, um, I, when we first started this thing, like, uh, I saw a lot of agencies and it was, you know, Joe Smith agency or whatever it was, right? I'm not gonna name specific names, but it was all about bravado and ego and, and chest pounding. So, uh, I think the first thing is. It is not about Macquarie. It's about the team's health and the community health, and I think that's important, which really allows, um, an interview style for us. I'd say we, we missed 99 percent of the missteps from that, uh, from an interview process, multi step, multi processed, and every single person in the company still gets interviewed by the co CEOs at the end, myself and Michelle. So that does not, that rarely gets passed. It only gets passed if there's a circumstance where you have to replace someone quick and, um, but so hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of people have been interviewed here. Uh, and. On top of that, they pass a couple different levels of people and we have, we give them a questionnaire about kind of how to ask questions. We try to also, you know, sit in on some interviews with people who are more junior and then afterwards give them some pointers on how to really suss out, you know, what was being said in that conversation. Um, and, and try to get people to not mistake liking the person immediately versus... understanding what their body of work was, and liking the person. Um, and so I think it's a process, it's not perfect. Um, and I think surrounding ourselves with that, so if you get through that stage, I say we work really hard to make you work in the company as well too, in terms of if something's not working communication wise, we've got a really radical candor type of communication. And that's not my term. That's a term from another.

Jason Yarborough: 16:24

it's a great book.

Matt Quirie: 16:25

Oh, okay.

Jason Yarborough: 16:27

it's, uh, this is, it's, it's fascinating because like. You hear these, a lot of these companies starting off with this great, wonderful culture that they're all about enforcing in the early days, right? Like, we're gonna stick to this, and then 5, years down the road, like, the pressure builds. And so, like, certain elements of the culture begins to change, and it's bit by bit. It's never one big chunk, but bit by bit it begins to change, and the next thing you know, you've gotta... Completely different culture driven, not by your core values, but by, you know, check boxes and numbers you've got to hit, right? And everything you just said, like, I can confirm that you guys 100 percent live by and it's wonderful and beautiful to see. But, you know, how have, how have you guys been able to stay the course when I'm sure there was points in time where there was pressure to continue doing quote unquote more?

Matt Quirie: 17:19

Yeah, um, you know, we stayed the course. You know, it was, we were owned by ourselves until a year ago. So it wasn't, there was pressure, but not much pressure. It's kind of more pressure on ourselves. And we grew from, you know, infancy to now north of 130 people. Plus, with that, yeah, which in culture does change. So, you know, it's never gonna be the same as your 10 person company or 20 person company when it gets to 140, 130, um, you know, plus contractors about that. It's, it, it, it has to change because. Those the people that you're adding on haven't experienced the kind of multi year team attachment or and they don't have as much Intrinsic like trust that you got to build and things you got to build within there um, and I think the way you kind of keep that culture is if we we um We really tried to you know, be culture first and it was the stack rank was Culture, uh, revenue, and then EBITDA somewhere down there, right? So, um, that's, you know, that's growing and that changes as you get bigger because you got more females to feed, you get more people to, you know, kind of continue that culture and you have to be cognizant of, like, running a company, um, on that side. And I think, I think for us, In the, you know, the first ten years, yeah, it was, it was hard when we had a big client that we had to get rid of, um, and it was hard to make hard decisions, like, you know, I'm sure in that first ten years I had to get rid of at least one C level exec, uh, yeah, that was a really hard decision, uh, you know, broke the no asshole policy internally, and, and it was seriously broken, and, and I think there's, there's things like that, that, um, you just gotta make those decisions in their heart, their heart, their, They're, you know, gut wrenching, you know, big, fat, you know, monsters in the closet. And if you let those sit, that's where culture, I think, really starts to degrade. And I think that's the taking action and doing things as fast as you can. Entrusting your gut, I think, is that too. If you're really going to take this type of culture mindset and you feel something's off, it's off. And a lot of people I think in, especially in business, you don't want it to be off. You don't have to deal with the monster in the room. You don't have to deal with these things. And I think the sooner you do that, the more chance you have of keeping and growing a thriving culture.

Jason Yarborough: 19:26

Right, you want to keep everything as PC as possible if you're trying to run a startup and run a business.

Matt Quirie: 19:31

Yeah.

Sam Yarborough: 19:32

I mean, from a, I'm so curious about this because I agree with everything you're saying and from face value, it's like, yeah, duh. But then when, when rubber meets the road and you're looking at a huge customer who has violated your no asshole policy or your core values, and you're looking at a number that you're about to cut from your bottom line, that's a big deal. Um, can you talk about like. The actuality of having to make that decision and stand behind it from a

Jason Yarborough: 20:04

Yeah. I'd love to hear that.

Matt Quirie: 20:06

Yeah. I mean, luckily we've had to make those decisions in the past where we actually had a lot of cash in the bank. So the decision was to, okay, we're going to get rid of this big client. And luckily from the history of the company, except for the very early years. No one's ever been more than, you know, let's say 15 percent of the total revenue of the company. We've been very diversified across companies. So it's not like, um, you know, a lot of agencies are stuck in a tough situation because they've got one 30 percent marquee client and then they've got a bunch of different ones, right? And being in that position, um, my co CEO actually in the very early years was like, you have to diversify now, looking at the portfolio, like, okay, I'll go do that. You know, so teamwork and we diversified. So when we had those decisions six years later. Um, like we had a pretty massive company and the, the CEO of that company was very rude to the staff. It got to yelling points. It got to, uh, expletives. It got to the point where I had to call up and say, Hey, if you're frustrated, you can call and yell at me anytime, but you cannot do it to the staff again, ever. We will terminate immediately. Um, and just, it's your choice, and you can have an out right now. I just said, from here on, I'm going to be on every call, and here's what's going on from that side. So I think you've got to stick to it. And if you stick to it, what happens eventually is the team gets behind it, um, and people see you're sticking to it, and people see you're making tough decisions. Maybe you didn't make them as soon as they'd like, because you're also trying to balance, you know, the revenue coming in the door, people's jobs, and all that side. But eventually, we've, we've... almost always made the right decision within what I'd see as an acceptable amount of time. And we're not perfect. I'm sure I've failed plenty of times at like, you know, really identifying those things. But I think for the most part, we were batting pretty good about that. It's, it's, it's tough. It's not easy.

Sam Yarborough: 21:51

Yeah,

Jason Yarborough: 21:52

Here's what I love about that. It's like from a leadership level, like you're standing up for your employees and you're like, you're sticking to your guns with these core values at whatever cost necessary, protecting the team, looking out for them and sticking to the core values. And there's a beautiful leadership lesson in that. And like most people would, you know, try to smooth it out with the customer, you know, make it right with them as we're on this side of things, you're really sticking to your guns on what you believe. And. I think that's kind of what separates you guys apart from a company, from an agency, you know, from what the work that you're doing and that you really believe, you know, in the best of, you know, yourself, your people, your business, and you want to, you know, bring that to life and everything that you do.

Matt Quirie: 22:34

We try.

Sam Yarborough: 22:35

I think it's so great I mean where my head goes immediately is parenting. Um, I heard this thing the other day, which I just loved It's like don't make a rule until you're willing to Uphold it every time

Matt Quirie: 22:48

Ah,

Sam Yarborough: 22:50

And I think that, I mean, disciplining, I'm going to go here. It's not the same as building culture, but it kind of is. It's like, Nope, in this house, we don't do that. And if we don't stick by that rule every single time, then we, our boundaries get really loose. And it's sometimes so obnoxious and so difficult to like stop what you're doing and uphold the rule. But if you don't do it, then you shouldn't set it. And I think that's really paramount to building culture too.

Matt Quirie: 23:19

Yeah, I, you know, I have a parallel to that in my, I mean, I have a 13 year old and a 20 year old and I have told my 13 year old that the dishes now go into the dishwasher, not just the sink. You're now a teenager. Um, she's now 14 as of two days ago, but, um, and my wife sat down and was like, Hey, did you show her how to put it into the dishwasher? I'm like, you're right. I have to do a dishwasher one on one first before, and then I got to uphold it, but I can't uphold it until I give them the tools as well too. Like, I think that's a, that parenting example is awesome. That's a great analogy. I never thought of it that way. Yeah.

Jason Yarborough: 23:50

So now you have to put up the dishes every time as well, just to set the example. Yeah,

Matt Quirie: 23:53

Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah, that's, yeah.

Jason Yarborough: 23:56

So let's, let's pivot a little bit to talk about your work and building partnerships, right? When, when I was at drift, you were our top services partner. No, you're like six inches, top services partner, and probably a few others. Like, how do you, how do you guys go about approaching that to building that level of trust and relationship? With the people you partner with, it's like you guys, I feel like, Hey, if you don't know Mac query, Mac query doesn't half ass anything, but also I feel like really ROI DNA doesn't half ass anything as well. So like the, the partnerships that you have, you're really good at, and the people love you. So like, how do you guys take that approach and build to that level?

Matt Quirie: 24:36

Yeah, I, I gotta say from, from our partnership with you, uh, Drift, it was, you know, it's also the, exactly the partnership. Without the other side there, without you and Bennett, you know, being there as the really trustworthy, you know, go getting partner side, it doesn't work. And I think, we've tried many partnerships in the past, and I think learning from what failed was, Partnering with companies that over promised on the partnership. And then stuck you with, you basically kind of mulling through and helping them close business versus really being a true partner. Like how can we leverage each other's talents? And I think looking at, you know, we have partly partnered mostly with SAS software companies. Um, you know, we've had partnerships with a bunch of large ones, which I shall not name, uh, in the past, it didn't work out super well. And in all of those failed for two core reasons. One, the person on the other side had just a sales number on their head. And, and, and didn't, all we were was a, a means to that number. Right? And that does not work. And it could work for some, sure. Again, it's, it goes back to not really building a relationship. really building value on both sides. Uh, two is a full transparency. You know, Hey, this is what we are really good at. Um, and this is what we're not good at. And this is from, you know, I'll put this from a software side. We work with many software companies that say, Hey, we need the expert, you know, um, account based. Experience account based marketing consulting to go with our SAS product so that our SAS product is, you know, really entrenched there and actually think that our customers get the most out of it. We've had a couple of big large companies have that promise. And then go into, oh, well, now we want the consulting and now we want this side and, and it becomes kind of a myopic self fulfilling prophecy and those don't work either because, and there's so much to do that there's an infinite amount of installation hours that any SAS company can get if they really want that. I don't want that. I want the longterm, like, Hey, what's the strategy and planning? Yeah. We'll implement for you too. And do like a. A high level white glove implementation and all that because we bring all the other expertise of the channels and the deep expertise of all the subject matter experts, uh, like the average is 10 plus years. So it's really when when you align those goals together, I think the most successful partnerships are the everyone's got the cards on the table face up. Everyone understands what those cards are too. I think the, yeah. The nomenclature of communication, uh, it's, it's amazing to me how many times I think I'm speaking English to someone and we're speaking totally different languages. Um, uh, and, and I think in, in double downing. And so it's, it's, it comes back to, um, also the trust. Those things we started off this, this conversation with, uh, the trust and, and listening and understanding. So there's the two strongest relationships we've ever had was with you all at Drift and with Sixth Sense, which we've, you know, it's one amazing partnership. And that Sixth Sense one has actually since created a model for other partnerships for us with our other partners now too. And we're, you know, people, partners come to us like, Hey, that one looks awesome. How did you all do that? I'm like, well, we did it because Elliot and Justin at Sixth Sense and, you know, Latane and that team really dove in with us and the trust was there. And now we're, we're all combined, you know, like. Making more out of those partnerships and this kind of ecosystem of partnerships, which is really flourishing because there's a lot of trust. And I think that's, you know, it comes back to the communication and building real relationships. You know, I

Jason Yarborough: 27:59

absolutely.

Matt Quirie: 28:00

yeah.

Jason Yarborough: 28:01

You guys have a, have a, uh, world class partnership of six cents. And this is the first I'm hearing about the model that you've actually built with them is, is that something that you're able to, to framework and take into other partnerships as you're, you know, starting to look at new potentials?

Matt Quirie: 28:16

Yeah, absolutely. And we're straight up with it, too. And I think it's the flow is this, okay, we, the ones that don't work are the ones that basically forced into some sort of action with their SDR BDRs. And we're just a, you know, kind of closing arm for them, or we're giving them leads type of stuff. That doesn't work. I think for us, the ones that model is working is the ones Hey, here's here's kind of our services. Let's work together to build a map of where the overlaps are. Yeah. Um, we don't expect you to give us all the clients that you have. We got to work with multiple partners. We totally get that if there is a really good fit on both sides. You know, we're bringing clients to you when we think it's the right product for the installation, for the journey, for their customers. Um, and the other same side there, once those relationships are built and the trust is built, it's that model works super well. If you can get everyone on the same page and it's, it's worked really well now for three, uh, of our partnerships and, and starting to thrive. And it took a long time to get there. I had some, you know, I had some very large companies, one of the biggest in the world, you know, basically go to partner and then basically try to take the whole entire deal from us. You know, when, when I was a little 30 person company, you know, so it's, it's, it can get dastardly out there in terms of, you know, sales quotas and goals. And so I think you start from there. Yep.

Jason Yarborough: 29:34

So I'm curious about something that I've never really asked a services partner before from like a partnership aspect that you talked about. You really knowing when you're just a revenue goal or. Pam has a number attached to them. That's affecting you. Like, what does that feel like from your side? Like when you know, you're just like a revenue number for some company, but you're not like a value add It's like I know there's a ton of programs out there like that But like I'd love to hear like what it feels like from the partner perspective when you know, that's the case

Matt Quirie: 30:05

Ah, it feels terrible, man. It feels, uh, and actually, uh, we just had a similar one recently where it was inferred that if we don't jump on this, our reputation was going to be dinged within the company and they wouldn't refer us more clients, all that stuff. I'm like, yeah, I just got on the phone saying, this isn't going to work. You know, I, I understand you have a revenue goal. We're not going to be that goal filler for you that way. So you should probably go get another agency. And, you know, there's mea culpa, mea cuppa, I'm like, no, no, this, this is just not, I mean, this is not the way we work. I feel, it feels, it feels terrible. It feels like there's some weird undue pressure that has not, we already have our own pressure. I don't need your pressure of a partner quota. And that's a rough thing to do. Um, on the flip side of that. Um, which is the same thing on any of our clients that we really trust and believe in. And they say, Hey, we've got this, you know, we know you got this customer, they're in line for this. Can you give them a call and check in and see where this is? And we do that immediately. You know, it's because there's that trust has already been built. Um, but yeah, we've been, we've been like the, uh, I don't know, the gap filler for many quotas in the past in terms of, you know, I go pitch about seven deals cause they pull me in these things and they've got SDRs from another company asked me when they think it's going to close. I'm like, Hey, this is your deal. Yeah.

Jason Yarborough: 31:20

Yeah.

Matt Quirie: 31:20

Yeah.

Jason Yarborough: 31:22

I hear you. So, along those same lines, like, what's your thoughts on like, uh, being allocated or associated to a tier within a program?

Matt Quirie: 31:33

Oh, um, well, I think for some, yeah, that's tough. You know, it's, it's again, it's again, it's, it's looking at the rewards, you know, for how much work efforts put out, right. And we've, we've luckily always been at pretty much the top tier and in boat and all sometimes maybe just hitting the corporate, not enterprise, but, uh, in the early days. Uh, so yeah, it's, it's again, like, I think we got to get off hamster wheels. I think we get back to value conversations of what's going to work for the customers both for, from both sides, from the tool application side, partner side to the consulting side and go that way.

Sam Yarborough: 32:12

One thing that just really stood out to me is, as you were talking about your, your partnership with Sixth Sense, um, and you know, you're talking about Elliot Latney, the team over there. We hear from partner people all the time of like, well, I'm out here building great relationships and I'm doing the good work, but then I pass it off to the rest of my team and it's just lost. Um, and. What you just explained and what is so obvious, but the trust has to extend beyond yourself. And I think that's where your culture is so paramount and important. Um, so my question to you is for a solo partner manager who's out there building great relationships. How can they help build that trust beyond themselves and instill this culture of, like, collaboration and relationship and trust to the other members of their organization?

Matt Quirie: 33:13

Yeah. So I think it comes down to having, you know, you got to get that one core example. Um, we worked with yet another huge enterprise company years ago, and we were probably one of the top refers for their product for a long time. And the sales team, you know, through partnership, the partnership side, unfortunately, was dinging. Sales reps, if a partner got some of the consulting deals, they would actually take 10 percent of their, their, their payout away if they used a partner. And it got really weird, you know, and it got to the point where like, why are we partnering with you all because you've disincentivized the whole rest of the group. And so they actually flipped it the other way. Um, so, which was, you know, brilliant, finally. You know, the SDR BDRs, if they worked with a partner group and got a good partner in there, that solidified the actual tool being used, then they'd get a bonus of 10 percent or 5 percent or whatever it was. But it was, it was, it was in the spirit of the partnership side. So I think to get the rest of the team around it, there has to be something that incentivizes them. That's either a net zero to a plus, but it's going to get things moving better in a way from a culture perspective. And, and that can be incentives if you, if you have an SDR BDR, but I think more important. Investing in, in people that understand how to build relationships and partnerships and building that group out as It's own kind of mechanism, um, and once you have a couple of wins that show, hey, the net effect of bringing a partner in is that we have, you know, a 60 percent reduction in churn rate and a 70 percent increase in adoption, um, uh, speed and stuff like that. And once you have that kind of build, I'd build that one or two cases that you really want to focus on, get those through, even if you've got to deal with the SDRPDRs and go through the whole thing and not that SDRPDRs are bad, but a disincentivized or not aware group yet. But you gotta, you also gotta build trust in that organization as well, too. It's like, hey, trust me this one time, this will work out this way, um, and that

Jason Yarborough: 35:12

Yeah, I was about to say the same thing. Like, we're back to the trust factor. It's like, you got to get that level of trust from the leadership that you can provide, you know, or hit the goals that they've set in front of you that you can meet expectations and, you know, and you need to do that, right? That's what you're saying. Start small, scale intelligently.

Matt Quirie: 35:28

Yeah. Agreed.

Sam Yarborough: 35:31

Okay, so speaking of scaling intelligently, if Mac query and team or to start a service agencies in the great year of 2023. Where would you start and how would you approach it? Would you do it all the same?

Matt Quirie: 35:47

Uh, from a business perspective, I don't, that's the first time I've heard anyone call it the great year of 2023. Um, uh, uh,

Sam Yarborough: 35:55

been some sarcasm in there.

Jason Yarborough: 35:58

The Lord's

Matt Quirie: 35:59

I hope so. Um, holy crap. Uh, what did I do differently? We're starting from scratch. Uh, yeah. There's a lot I do differently. I, I, I, I would, um, so not so. I think, you know, like hindsight is 20 20, right? So I would even move faster on the things we had to execute on in terms of not, um, Not wait on, trust your gut more, and, and, and as long as that gut is within the focus of where you're going. I'm not saying trust your gut to make ten different decisions and try a hundred different variables, you know. Optimization is great, but like when you're building a company you got to kind of stay focused on the core. Um, and really define your core faster. Uh, I would basically, we decided to move into strictly B2B. We'll take a B2C client if it's a If it looks like fun for the team or it's a friend family, it's used in the past, but we're really 100 percent B2B now. And had we done that earlier, you know, I think, you know, we grew super fast once we did that. We, we had a focus of our organization besides just the culture. We, we had a differentiator in the market. Um, so I'd find something that differentiates you, uh, and, and, uh, I guess, I guess, so quicker decision structure, you got, if it's going that way, find a core focus that you can excel at, and, and it'd be at least in the top three, um, and then, uh, yeah, I'd put culture things in as fast as you can in terms of really building that, that team environment faster.

Jason Yarborough: 37:36

Interesting. I love that. Um, how would you focus on, on partnerships and your partner strategy on top of all that? So, you know, defining the core, getting everything, you know, moving faster, where would partnerships fall into how you're starting and how would it differ from what you've done in the past? If at all,

Matt Quirie: 37:53

Yeah, no, it totally would. And I, I think looking at what. What types of partnerships, um, are mutually beneficial faster in terms of, and I wasn't a big in the, uh, uh, In the early days, I wasn't a big proponent of, of partnerships because it seemed like a lot of time wasted. So it's, it's really, yeah.

Jason Yarborough: 38:16

We're coming back to that, but keep

Matt Quirie: 38:17

Oh, gosh, yeah. And, and that, but the time wasted was not knowing how to approach those, right? So now we're, we're pretty quick deciding if we're going to partner with them or not. We have, you know, no more than five partnerships we're really focusing on. Um, and again, the whole thing is focus again. And I think, um, I would, I would leverage those. If you're starting out, you don't have much leverage as a partner yet, right? Because you don't have a name out there, you don't have a brand out there. You're kind of unproven, uh, but I would start looking at the top five potential partnerships and starting those relationships. So back to the trust thing, Hey, I'm an up and coming company. I just want a little bit of your time to talk about how we could help you out or, you know, help your consulting out or help your tool be more sticky within your clients. Um, and from that perspective, like it just starting to build those relationships first, you may not have a partnership yet, but there's relationship building. You can start way ahead of time. And if you, if you're focused on kind of that same core vision, it'd be a lot easier to build

Jason Yarborough: 39:15

how do you recommend or coach people to invest in those relationships and build those relationships up if it didn't already exist?

Matt Quirie: 39:26

if they didn't already exist. Um,

Jason Yarborough: 39:28

So you're reaching out to someone new you could potentially be a partner of, you're trying to establish a relationship. How would you coach someone to go down that path?

Matt Quirie: 39:39

yeah, I'd say, well, one, I'd say, look for, you know, it depends on how early you are in your career, but I'd look for connections and people that know those people in those companies and start, you know, using your network first, obviously, um, and then bring something of value to them. You know, it's not just about just having a conversation, it's, it's bringing something of value that, that they probably want to talk about or an idea or something. I think this is the, um, one thing is basically if you brought a new idea to that business that they could leverage to actually grow their business. Some people are so hesitant to share ideas. They're like, Oh, they would kill if we did this, but I'm not going to tell them because it's my idea. I'm like, Oh, you're right. You're never going to bring that idea to fruition. So just leverage their damn platform and give it to them because they're going to give you more business doing it. I think people are, that's something people really miss. I would spend my time coming up with some concrete ideas around either how my service or my extension of, of product can help you and how, how, or how you could do better yourself with that. And some of our top clients, we give them, you know, dashboarding ideas all the time that we could get paid to build right now. But if it was in the product, it'd make the product better and we'd still all win.

Jason Yarborough: 40:45

Let's go back to the, uh, partners being a waste of time. What, uh, it's okay. So you, in the early days, you weren't big on partners,

Matt Quirie: 40:56

Yeah.

Jason Yarborough: 40:56

were a waste of time. Why, why did we think that? And then how'd that change?

Matt Quirie: 41:01

We finally, well, I think we finally put our foot down in terms of what we're willing to do. Because in the beginning we were, you know, wanted to grow and we wanted the partnership, uh, because obviously the SaaS companies were bigger brands than us. Uh, and And we really believe in the product. I think that was the first thing, too. You know, we partnered with some pretty major optimization companies. Um, I was on the advisory board for a couple products. Uh, and, uh, those basically required by Adobe. So we had some strong ties of partners. Um, in the early days, the wasted time stuff, though, was inevitably in some of these things. They bring us into these, we got brought into a lot of enterprise companies. Um, but the people bringing us in were unqualified to Qualify the client. Number one, um, they were, you know, maybe senior SDR BDRs off the partnership team that would just, you know, bring us into to talk about the product on their behalf, which is fine. I did that ad nauseum, but the the waste of time was there wasn't a good structure within their partnerships teams. To really have a true partnership, it was just kind of flinging stuff at the wall. So, you know, even though these companies seemed to have a good promise, uh, seemed to have a good, uh, kind of flow path, there's a lot of work. And if you're not willing to, if you, if you don't have the time to do the work, and you don't have the focus on it, that's one thing. But if you're. If you think it's a great company because of the brand name and what they have as an offer as a product, they may not have the partnership engine built yet. And you're going to be dealing with a lot of like, just a lot of red herrings. There's just stuff coming over and over that you're like, I'm not sure what's coming at me. You know, I'm going to go do all these calls. And the next thing I know I'm called on like, Hey, when's this going to close? Like, I have no idea. You know, I'm not here. And so, so, so I think the, the waste of time was, was honestly the thing we said, like not having all the cards on the table to the start. and making assumptions of how you think it's going to go versus, um, really defining parameters of how much time you're willing to put into it, how much time they're putting into it. Are the ideal client profiles that they've brought to the table worth your time as well? Are those decision makers, uh, even qualified to make a decision on their own team? Because when you're doing partnership, you've got that level of like, not only am I going to deal with that company that they're bringing to me, I'm going to deal with, um, the partner, that company they're bringing to have, how, how hard do they qualify them? Do they have the budget to do it? Do they have the decision maker? And a lot of times, the ones that were a waste of time were just people assuming because someone had some title they could make the decision and they're talking to them. They had no idea of budget, uh, time frame, and so the qualifiers were not there. So making sure your partners actually have some qualifiers, and that's huge. Yeah.

Jason Yarborough: 43:41

man. That yeah. I hope there's a lot of partner people listening because that piece right there is super, super important. I think you're, what you're talking about here is like really establishing a foundation that meets the expectations and sets the partner up for success and providing value out to them. And every time I've taken on a new program, that's exactly where I've started, right? And I feel like that's, you know, why some of these programs are more successful than others because like they, you, you can set the, The foundation, you can set the level of strategy according to the expectation of the partner. Right, whenever I go into a new role, I try to meet with partners, I'm sure I've met with you. It's like, you know, what's, what's working here? Wait, what's wrong? What's right? What's wrong? What's missing? What's confused? What are your expectations? And what would make us the most valuable resource to your company? That's my, that's my questions, right? And you can begin to rebuild or build from there. And begin to set you up for success in every endeavor that you go in together.

Sam Yarborough: 44:44

I have one question there to kind of tie. Back to something you said earlier about how you think you're speaking English, but it turns out you're not, how do you make sure that like you ask these questions, Jason's talking about, you're setting these foundational expectations. How do you make sure that everybody's hearing the same thing, if that makes sense?

Matt Quirie: 45:09

Yeah, um, you gotta keep questioning. I mean, so you can't, you can't assume at face value the answer is, is what it means sometimes. And, like, that communication has to be just double sure. I would, I would, I agree with you. There's so many times where we say, hey, we want this level of client and at least this many hours for it to be worth us to actually take the time to do. And on this side, yep, yep, okay, cool. And next week... Oh, we've got a enterprise client and they want five hours. Okay, so no good. So like, keep getting people back to the parameter in a nice way. It's like, hey, that's awesome. We'd love to work with that client, of course, but we can't spin up a team around five hours for you. And the time to do this five hours is going to cost us 25 hours to 30 to 40 hours on the back end. Um, you know, and just, just making sure those, um, it's a hard thing to do. Sam, there's no. There's no, uh, getting things in writing, of course, like, I think this is one thing that does help because many times in partner roles in internal SaaS companies, those partnership teams turn over and, you know, and that happens a lot, like we had one that turned over, I don't know, four times in two years, you know, so now I'm dealing with, you know, this people I've never dealt with before and, and they don't have anything defined from the last relationships because those people left. And so having from your side, whoever, you know, having that same list of priorities and agreed upon goals, just documented. That's a huge head start to most conversations when you have a whole partner team switch. It's like, hey, here's what we had before. Let's go over this together. And let's really talk about the parameters by which we should work together. Um, yeah. And,

Jason Yarborough: 46:53

your mutual action plans, kids.

Matt Quirie: 46:55

There you go. Yeah.

Sam Yarborough: 46:59

Okay.

Matt Quirie: 47:00

bullet though. Yeah.

Sam Yarborough: 47:01

gears here a little bit. Um, again, I have heard a lot through the grapevine, but I want to hear it from the source.

Matt Quirie: 47:08

Okay.

Sam Yarborough: 47:09

Tell me,

Jason Yarborough: 47:10

grapevine.

Sam Yarborough: 47:11

yeah, there he is. Tell me what's going on with the resort in Downeyville.

Matt Quirie: 47:18

Oh, Ubiverse. Um, yeah, it's, it's, it's pretty exciting. You know, never thought we'd be doing something like this, uh, on a personal level and, and fun stuff. So, uh, we got a lucky opportunity, uh, through, uh, awesome rock climbing buddy of mine, friend, who, uh, was part of a, a group that owned a resort out in Downeyville. And by that I mean, like, it's cabin y in the woods. It's not, you know, nothing posh out there. And we were looking for a piece of dirt. We were looking for a piece of dirt to build a cabin on. This has several. Um, so we're building a place where community can gather. And it already has a bunch of cabins, so you could have a exec retreat, you can have a wedding, you can have, um, there's a big field. We built a music stage, a proper one, with trust and system and everything. Uh, we had our first break in last summer. But it's really gonna be a place where people can reconnect with nature on the Yuba River, North Yuba. They can have groups, you know, and be in a, you cross this little bridge and you're on your own island. It's in the middle of the National Forest, so it's really out there. Uh, and it's, it's 72 acres of hiking, uh, mountain biking around, um, and, uh, and jumping into the river. Uh, if you like cold dips, those are going on right now. Winter's coming. Uh, lots of fun. Uh, but I, it's really the dream is to have it, uh, function as a place where people can recharge. Function as a place where people can come to build team community function as a place to to learn trades So we've got a bunch of chainsaws. We have a sawmill up there We have a bunch of forestry equipment as well, too And we're hoping to build a place where arts music and a lot of revelry can be had there So it's just just the beginning. Yeah Whoo

Sam Yarborough: 48:54

moving in. I also am like, this is such a dream of ours, but Jay, maybe we just have to host the first annual Friends with Benefits retreat. Bring your friends!

Jason Yarborough: 49:11

Yeah, exactly. The first friend's retreat. Um, can't leave it at that. We, we have spent... copious amounts of time and text, uh, talking about this, this property, this resort and pictures. And I am just riddled with envy. And yeah, this is like a huge dream of ours, like for Sam and I, and I know it was a dream of yours to, to have something like this, so like. You know, as far as, like, realizing and fulfilling a dream, like, how is, how is this making you, Matt Query, come more alive?

Matt Quirie: 49:44

Oh, man, I just couldn't be more grateful to the, to like the friends and family that have been, you know, allowed this to happen. You know, it's all, it's all built through real relationships and, and, you know, people I love being with and that, that we even had this chance, you know, to do that as well too. Yeah, pretty, pretty frickin rad, you know, like, now I'm, uh, enjoying kickin ass at work and, you know, I've got Wi Fi set up up there as well, too, so I can get a bunch of Zoom meetings and then take my lunch break, might be, uh, you know, sawmillin for an hour, and, uh, chainsawin some, uh, things down for an hour, splittin wood for an hour. Um, Uh, it's, it's pretty damn fulfilling, and so it couldn't, yeah, just, uh, surprising and, and humbled that I'm able to, to be a steward of some, some place like this. Ha ha ha

Jason Yarborough: 50:26

Wow, I love it, man. Like, yeah, we, Sam and I talk about this all the time, and we, we daydream on Zillow way too much. Uh, so, like, we're,

Matt Quirie: 50:35

I know that feeling!

Jason Yarborough: 50:36

Mm-Hmm. Yeah. You should, uh, gimme some coaching on how to, you know, keep those desires a little bit lower than what they are. And like, we actually take rides out to look at properties that we see on date nights. So

Matt Quirie: 50:47

Oh, that's

Jason Yarborough: 50:47

level of like, give us the dream

Sam Yarborough: 50:50

We're putting it into the universe. Here it

Matt Quirie: 50:52

Yeah.

Jason Yarborough: 50:53

Yeah. And so, yeah, we should a hundred percent like look at, you know, doing something out there with you guys

Matt Quirie: 50:57

Oh, you should come to the you, but come out to the universe and we'll, uh, talk about how to manifest a, your dream of doing it too. That'd be fun. Yeah.

Jason Yarborough: 51:06

looking at air flights, looking at flights right now. I

Sam Yarborough: 51:11

Matt. So we, to, to bring this full circle, we like to close with a question that's totally unrelated to everything we just talked about. Um, I think somewhere I read that I'm not going to get this terminology correct, but the theme is on point. You are a campfire enthusiast

Matt Quirie: 51:26

Yes. Yeah.

Sam Yarborough: 51:28

for those people

Jason Yarborough: 51:30

they call those, uh, pyromaniacs.

Sam Yarborough: 51:36

Tomato, tomato. Um, for those people who maybe don't know how to build a campfire or who have never done it, two sentence tutorial on how to build a good campfire.

Jason Yarborough: 51:56

He's thinking, people.

Matt Quirie: 51:59

and build big.

Jason Yarborough: 52:01

Oof,

Sam Yarborough: 52:02

think that that could translate to everything else we just talked about too.

Jason Yarborough: 52:07

So deep. So are you a, uh, are you a, build a teepee to start the fire? Or are you a square kind of stack to start the fire?

Matt Quirie: 52:15

The best fire ever built. I was doing, um, a three day vision quest out in the Sierras. It's the only time I've ever done that, by the way. And,

Sam Yarborough: 52:21

Okay. I was going to say, we're having another podcast on that alone.

Jason Yarborough: 52:24

Yeah, I need to know about, I don't even know about this.

Matt Quirie: 52:27

and my, uh, my, my thing for the three days was to get over any fear of the dark. And so, I just had no fires for three days. But what I did do, was I started with pine needles, and built them all the way up to, you know, smaller, but bigger and bigger and bigger and bigger pieces, until I had a, like a teepee tower size, of about three feet tall. And it was, it was up by Five Lakes and Alpine Meadows because you go over the hump and you're in the middle of, um, desolation area. And then about three weeks later, I came up to camp with some friends up there, maybe a couple months later, and the whole thing was still there. One match and it went up. Yeah, it was just awesome. That was the best one ever I

Jason Yarborough: 53:03

fun.

Sam Yarborough: 53:05

That's so

Jason Yarborough: 53:06

I love it. Outstanding. So we gotta, we gotta come to the property. We gotta do some camping together,

Matt Quirie: 53:11

Hell yeah.

Jason Yarborough: 53:12

but, uh, man, this has been as great as I expected it to be. I really appreciate you hanging out with us and joining and getting a chance to introduce you to Sam. This has been so fun.

Matt Quirie: 53:22

Well, very, very grateful to be on the show. Thanks so much for having me.

Sam Yarborough: 53:26

Matt. We're friends now.

Matt Quirie: 53:28

Hell yeah!

Jason Yarborough: 53:28

it. We're coming to the property, but with that, appreciate it. Thanks for listening, everybody. We'll see you next time.