S2 E9 Building Backyard Dreams with Columbus Hardscapes | Jennifer & Rob Hewitt

Episode Description:

In this episode of Cosmos & Commerce, hosts Janice Francis and Michelle Cook sit down with Jennifer and Rob Hewitt, the powerhouse duo behind Columbus Hardscapes. Listen in as they share the journey of growing their company from a small lawn-mowing gig into a premier outdoor living business, crafting dream patios, and more.

Rob and Jennifer open up about the challenges they’ve faced, including workforce turnover, seasonal demands, and finding the right team. They reveal the marketing strategies that helped propel Columbus Hardscapes, from direct mail campaigns to social media and creating unforgettable Home and Garden Show displays. The Hewitts also discuss the unique, family-centered culture they've fostered within their team and how it's driven loyalty and retention.

Learn how they balance personal and business life, the importance of resilience in entrepreneurship, and their latest project, Columbus Hardscapes Cares, which gives back to the community by creating outdoor spaces for families in need.

Key Takeaways:

• Entrepreneurial Growth: Rob shares how he built Columbus Hardscapes from his lawn-mowing days through college and beyond.
• Workforce Solutions: Discover how the Hewitts have created a family-first atmosphere to retain talented staff in a challenging, seasonal industry.
• Effective Marketing: Insights into their approach to customer acquisition, including targeted direct mail, social media, and standout exhibitions at local shows.
• Balancing Business & Personal Life: The couple emphasizes the value of keeping evenings and weekends free to recharge with their family.
• Community Impact: Hear about their new charitable initiative, Columbus Hardscapes Cares, designed to support families with accessible outdoor spaces.

Lightning Round Highlights:

• Biggest inspiration, tips for aspiring entrepreneurs, and more in a fast-paced Q&A!

Tune in for an episode packed with insights on hardscaping, business growth, and maintaining work-life harmony. Don’t miss the wisdom from this episode—subscribe, rate, and follow Cosmos & Commerce for more entrepreneurial stories and insights!

Connect with Columbus Hardscapes:

• Facebook & Instagram: @ColumbusHardscapes
• Website: ColumbusHardscapes.com | InstallMyPatio.com

Follow Cosmos & Commerce on Buzzsprout to stay updated on our latest episodes. Cheers to building your own success!

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Transcript

Hello and welcome to cosmos and commerce Today we're coming to you for the first time Live in person. We've got a round table discussion going on here The podcast for stone business insights meet cosmic cocktails I am janis francis with remax connection in the humble crate artisan marketplace And joining me as always is the ever energetic Michele Cook from Body Ache Escape Massage Center.

Together, we're here to fuel your mind and invigorate your entrepreneurial drive. That's right, Janis.

Today we will dive into the world of hardscapes and bringing your home outdoors while talking with the Hewitts, the husband and wife owners of Columbus hardscapes, Jennifer and Rob. Welcome. Welcome Jen and Robert. Thank you. It's a pleasure to have you here with us. We're excited to learn all things about hardscapes, [00:01:00] patios, and much more.

Welcome.

All right, Rob, can you share a story behind beginning the Columbus Hardscapes? Sure. Thanks for having us. . So Columbus Hardscapes, I started actually in 2012, but first of the company was started in about sixth grade, pushing a lawnmower around the neighborhood, trying to make some money.

That evolved through high school. I ended up with a crew mowing grass while I went to school. And eventually, as I got into college, the company continued to grow. We finally branched into some hardscapes and patio building. And by the time we graduated or I graduated college, I had met my wife and soon to be wife again.

And the business kind of took off from there in 2012, we formed Columbus hardscapes and [00:02:00] shut the other business down and that has just continued to blossom. And a fun journey. Jen, the brains with the brawn there. How long have you been with Columbus? We met in 2004 and I would say I got involved in the business around 2008, 2009 and I was doing mostly behind the scenes stuff on QuickBooks.

As much as I could, I wasn't really trained in QuickBooks, but I had been working for Fifth Third Bank. and then Chase Bank until 2012 when I quit my job and to stay at home with our son. But then this past year I went full time. March was my one year anniversary, full time. Yeah, that's good.

Rob when you started, what were the biggest challenges you faced? During the beginning of Columbus Hardscapes, and how did you overcome that? People, it's [00:03:00] always the hardest thing to work with. It was a real struggle for many years to come up with the right people. I'm very thankful every day now that we have the team that we do.

It certainly didn't happen overnight, but finding people that care about the same kind of work that you do is absolutely key.

I would think that's a little bit difficult in the landscaping business because that's So seasonal, you probably have a lot of drop off. Absolutely. Yeah. We had, traditionally there are a lot of

yes, there's a lot of drop off . There's Yeah. A lot of turnover's. A lot of turnover in a seasonal business like that blue collar. Yes. Do you feel like you're starting over every year or do you have a lot of people that do come back? So we're in a position now where we recently have changed over and we've gotten them.

A lot of local Hispanic help and those guys are incredible. Yeah. So we don't have the turnover that we did. In fact we now have enlisted guys that want to come and work for us. [00:04:00] Really Good work ethic and Yep. Yeah. And they're begging us to come on. We just don't have the sales capacity at this point to to warrant more people. Yeah. I read some of the reviews on. Columbus Artscapes on Google reviews, and I see a lot of the same names are like, they did such a great job, and they mentioned the same names like throughout the last couple years, and I was like, okay, so when I thought about the turnover, that's when I thought, oh, yeah, that's great.

That's really good. Can you share a moment or an achievement that you consider your biggest success with

Think recently, or I would say last year I went to the business summit that the chamber put on and the AI that I learned about there has really helped me a lot with the social media marketing . That and also going full time. In March of [00:05:00] 23, I've been able to get a handle on the finances better than I ever have before.

And we're just getting everything in line where we want it to be. So you do all the marketing and all, do you do the website and everything? No. I do the majority of the social media posts. We do have someone that is helping us with direct mailing and some other marketing tactics. including the website.

For me, one of the biggest accomplishments and achievements that I've had is actually just being able to take a vacation. Yeah. Knowing that we have the right team and the right people in the right place to manage while we can step away for a week or whatever. It's just never before I've been able to be done.

I get that. Yeah. I think that's a Geek moments in all entrepreneurs lives. Every time that I plan something, and I've talked to other realtors in my [00:06:00] office, every time you plan something, that's when everybody wants to see a house. Yes. Yeah, it's every time you plan something, it's like, The universe is what I would be doing then always planning a vacation in your case.

Yes, I know. I should probably, you're right. I should probably, I got my paper calendar right here. Just make them all refundable. Yeah. Okay. Going back to the marketing, what has been out of everything the most?

Think this one. Yeah. So for many years, we did zero or very little marketing. Majority of our work came from word of mouth, as we've tried to grow Columbus hardscapes we learned that all of that needed work isn't sustainable just by word of mouth. So we need, we needed to start investing in some marketing.

Today we have several avenues that we're working. Each with their own [00:07:00] benefits, but direct mail, while it's expensive, is still one of our, we see one of our higher returns. Really? Yeah. Okay. What do you send in the direct mail that like makes people call? We send a a really nice high end postcard and just a little information if you really, yep.

What size? Okay. Five by eight. Yeah, it might be five by eight. Okay, but the main thing I think that's most important about that is that it's in a neighborhood that we're either doing a project in or we finished a project in. So they've already seen our trucks with the logo on it. And so it's just like hitting them another time with our information.

Oh yeah, I remember them. Yeah. What's another? Marketing. You said you have lots of strata or lots of social media, a lot of Facebook and Google and then the home and garden show. Yeah. We've, a lot of companies we'll get into the home and garden show and they'll [00:08:00] do it for a few years. And larger companies start backing away from it because they just don't see that return for us.

We've always separated ourselves from other companies at the home and garden show. So instead of having a big garden display right in the middle of a show, we'll take the back corner and we'll build something that's bigger and better than all of it. So we create a destination for people to come to instead of, a herding of the sheep.

. So that, how a garden show is cool. You walk through and. You smell the tulips, and you see the actual hardscape. So this year the Holman Garden Show people reached out to us and have asked us to be one of the lead sponsors. So we're going to be in the opposite building of all the gardens, but we're going to have the biggest group in the show.

Congratulations. That's cool. It's going to be epic. It's going to be a big group. Yeah. Now when you're there, what is your strategy to collect names? [00:09:00] So actually I don't try to I'm a firm believer that if people want to work with us, the best way to attack that is for them to come to us.

Yeah, they will reach out to us. We stand back if people come into our booth, we'll ask them if they need anything or have questions. And if they start talking about a project coming up, then we can start. initiating that conversation and working through it a little better. We have collected names in the past.

That's how we started out the Home and Garden show. And it was a lot of time and a lot of effort reaching out to all those people and going out on appointments just to find out that they're not the right people. Yeah. Normally people that will stop and talk to you at the Home and Garden show, they don't want to talk to 30 patio builders.

They want to pick two or three that they're interested in. set an appointment and move on. And so instead of trying to make sure that every client or every passerby [00:10:00] gets a postcard or gets a flyer or whatever, and burning through all of that money, making sure those people get that, it's better for them, for us to take a step back and let them come into the group, let them come to us, because we know then that we're, we've already narrowed the pool.

And it'd be just so welcoming. Exactly. And that's what draws them in. Yeah. several entrances to the booth. Lots of pretty things. Lots of cool stuff. This year, we're actually going to have a pool in our booth. Oh, wow. Oh, that's pretty sweet. Like how big? A full size pool. What is a full size pool? Not as deep.

What's a full size pool? Is that Olympic size? No.. That'd be some great marketing, but we're not there yet. That's cool. Yeah, it should be fun. So we've already talked a little bit about the high turnover and employee retention. [00:11:00] Can you tell me if you have any strategies to keep employees is there anything you do to make yourself in such high demand?

We are Like a family oriented company. So we encourage our employees to be involved with their families, even, with time off and stuff like that, family's important to us. So we want it to be important to our employees too. So we give them family time during work hours, but we also have a family atmosphere when they're at work.

So every Wednesday we have a production meeting. We gather and eat lunch together and we talk about what's going on in business and what's coming up or what our goals are so that everybody's on the same page and things like that. In October, that we attend the HNA GIE Expo, which is the Hardscape North America Green Industry and Equipment Expo. [00:12:00] It's in Louisville, Kentucky. So we take our team and they're significant others and we put them up in a hotel. Our vendors will usually invite us out for drinks or dinner for one night.

And then another night we take them out to a nice dinner as a team building experience. And then obviously attend the show. That's one thing that we do while we're down there. That's a really nice thing. And then during the holidays, we'll usually have a holiday outing with everybody and their spouses again.

So just like family means a lot to us and we consider our employees part of the family. I think they would look forward to that every year. Yeah, the ones you have been with you, yeah, for a while. And just like Jen has no problem yelling at our children, she carries that into the office as well.

I don't know how much this applies to you guys.

Do you employ a lot of younger people or is it less? [00:13:00] We have a few younger people, but it's the bulk of our team. Is experienced. Okay. In this field. So while we don't have many younger generation, we do have a lot of, I don't know seasoned, seasoned employees. Yeah, I think that's a good way to put it.

A lot of the employees we do have also own their own business. So a lot of them have owned their own business. So they've carried over a lot of that drive and a lot of, intuition, business intuition into what they're doing now. I love it when I hear that in an interview, Oh, I owned my own business and I don't want to do it again.

I'm like, you're hired. Yeah, we're never going to leave. But to elaborate a little bit more on this on the family side of the team, the family atmosphere is incredibly important, but we also don't believe in micromanaging. [00:14:00] We hire them to do a job as long as the work that they're hired to do is getting done.

We don't care at what hours or how it's getting done. So if they need to take a morning off to get the kids on the bus or mom sick or whatever it may be, then do it. One of our guys who's been with us several years. It's three kids and all of them play hockey, and that's a huge undertaking for them as a family.

So we try to support that and make sure that he's got plenty of time to get his work done, but also get out at two o'clock or three o'clock, a few days a week to make sure he's at all of the hockey practices. So there's little things like that I think go a long way with building culture within our company.

Yeah. So Janice was talking about how you have a bunch of good Google reviews. Do you have any strategies to get good Google reviews or how do you keep your reputation? So impeccable is a [00:15:00] pretty big word. What I will say though is that I'm a firm believer that image is everything. And so we take an awful lot of pride in maintaining and using new equipment and making sure that our teams have.

nice uniforms, nice outfits, and that everybody communicates well within the crew and project managers and so on. And by having some of that newer equipment and everything, that's, we're certainly maintaining quality or a quality presence, better than having a rusted truck sitting in front of somebody's house all day, dripping oil or leaving exhaust pipes on the ground.

We prefer to turn our equipment over and turn our trucks over every three or four years. And it's amazing because even something as small as keeping your equipment maintained, will be mentioned in Google reviews. [00:16:00] So additionally, it also helps draw our clients to us. People that see nice equipment want to work with nice companies.

So that draws clients to us and makes us recognizable. Also to our competition, and that's a big thing in this industry. There's a lot of people that build patios kudos to every single one of them, not everybody does it the same and that's okay. It's taken us a long time to get to where we're at.

But there is, there's definitely some competition out there. Once we have the job, then it boils down to communication and quality control. We spend a lot of money and time on different software that helps us connect with our clients. It helps keep their job and our team all connected there.

As long as our clients understand the full process of the job and what to expect, then they're good. Everybody's doing their job, everybody's getting it done. As long as our management team is checking in with the crew and confirming our quality standards, then it's good [00:17:00] for us too. All in all of that stuff is how we drive good reviews.

At the end of the job, we're, checking in with the client, of course, to make sure that they're happy with everything. And then we ask them to leave a review on the spot right then. We'll give them a thank you card with a QR code so that they can scan it. And it goes right to our review page and they can go from there.

When you're talking about your uniforms and your equipment, it made me think of this podcast I recently listened to. Have you guys ever heard of Cody Sanchez? Actually have a major girl crush on her. She talks about buying businesses and she just started this podcast. That is really good. Put it on your list.

All right. But she interviewed this window washer company owner and he was talking about the uniforms and he said something else that might be an idea for you guys. Take it if not, whatever. But he said that he buys his crew lunch every day and that [00:18:00] keeps them around. Oh. Okay, so I was like, okay, if that works for you, then we'll do quite a bit.

Have you thought about that? You're like, we're very if Rob and I are ordering out for lunch, we always ask whoever's in the office, who wants this? And if they do we'll put it. on our tab. There have also been many times when, we'll throw a hundred dollar bill at the crew or at the crew leader or whatever and say, hey, lunch is on us today.

So yeah, I agree that's huge. He said that I, not only coheres his team. Yeah. It makes people see them when they're out at the restaurants instead of bringing their lunch. Oh yes. And yes, they, the people at the restaurants start asking questions and they come up with a salad because they'll see them in their nice. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Make a note.

Yes. I am writing that down. So you guys work together. What's your daily [00:19:00] routine and as entrepreneurs and do you have anything special that you guys do? We don't really have anything specific or any specific routines, that I could attribute to our success. We do try to keep our evenings and weekends open to spend time with our cloning business.

It takes a toll on everybody. We put a lot of time and effort into. the business. And so we try to make sure that we're not working, or at least one of us isn't working past five o'clock. We want to make sure that we're, we have the evenings. We want to, we really try not to do anything on weekends.

So if anything, as far as a routine, that would probably be it trying to relax on the weekends, right? Take advantage and spend time with the kids. Yeah. Trying to take as much downtime as we can when we're able to. How many kids do you have again? Three. I met them Saturday night at the murder of a story.

All right. Do you guys have any habits or rituals you believe that has [00:20:00] significantly impacted your business journey positively.

Um, I just got done saying we try not to stay late but occasionally I do stay late. And I. I as a business owner tend to get more done between 4 30 and 6 o'clock in the evenings than any other time when there's nobody else around. Yes. Yes. No distractions. That would be one of the things that, that I've found I have to do occasionally again, try to limit it as much as possible.

We covered this, but how do you maintain a balance between your personal and professional life? Being a business owner and how is it working with your spouse? Yeah.

We make a really good team and he excels at things that I don't and vice versa. And. I love working with him. Aww. I would agree, as long as I do what she tells me to. Like you're bossing them all around at the office, right? [00:21:00] Are they all guys?

Yes, they are currently. Yes. Okay. Have you had females? We have not. Yes. It's been a while, but you have. Yeah. Yeah, but not recently. We're actively looking for sales people though. What does the salesperson need to do best? Go to the person's house and and meet with the people.

There's going to be an aspect of design also. So there would have to be some design experience or interest even. Would they need like a degree in design or anything like that? Just like a true passion for it. Yes. Yeah. True passion for, having an idea of some native plants to Ohio is great.

But again, not necessarily that can be taught. Yeah. But yeah, outside of that, just a really solid sales. What would something like that pay?

Know somebody that's looking for a job. It's, with our sales team, we would [00:22:00] either offer a salary, just like a base salary, plus commission, or a little bit higher salary with no commission. So it's based on experience. Experience, yeah. For example, an experienced salesman. might make, with commission, it's endless, you can make as much as you want.

I would say, fifties to sixties, somewhere in that range. They can go from there though too, based on sales. Yeah. That's the nice thing too, about what we do is, so many of the jobs today are growing in size. You could, work one and get one really good job, that's a half million dollars and make a really great month, for a year.

That would make somebody's year. Absolutely. Yeah. Have you seen an uptick in business since COVID when everybody was like, decided I'm staying at home, I'm [00:23:00] just doing my backyard, I'm putting in a fence, pool, hot tub, whatever. So we did, we saw a huge uptick during COVID. It was fantastic.

I believe that has since subsided and in fact believe that the market has slowed down tremendously with home improvement and especially outdoor stuff probably within the last couple months even. So I've heard of a lot of other companies that experiencing slowdowns as well. We are just like them.

But we're hoping that we're investing a lot of extra money in the marketing and trying to drive extra leads and so on. It always gets a little precarious before a big election. Yes, it does. And it does absolutely anything. An economy stinks. Yep. It does. My shop skin says yeah.

We're having a summer slump. Yeah. One of the interesting things about Covid is that with so many people working from home. We had a lot of spectators, [00:24:00] before we could go in and do a job and they're at work from nine to five. And then after COVID it's they have their eyes on the project at all hours of the day.

And so we hear a lot more from the clients than we did before COVID. So you might not be micromanaging, but they are.

All right, if you could spend, I don't know who wants to take this. But you have to tell me somebody beside each other if you could spend all day in a backyard oasis with any Entrepreneur or business owner in the world dead or alive who would it be and why

no, this was yours Because he did save me Illuminated

I have to look this up because 

he's just like a no bullshit. This is what it is. Don't try and tell me any other way, I like that. Yeah. And he's the first one that came up [00:25:00] Sebastian. Angus? . E N G E S. Alright. We'll call him Bash. Yes! 

Cool or hot tub? What's your go to? Cool. I, if I had to choose between the two, I definitely would say hot tub, but I'm not much of a water person, so I would not prefer either one.

Yeah. Oh, but you guys have a pool, right? Was that in your backyard? Yeah. So why do you say pool? I guess I'm a little biased because I sell 'em. Oh, you sell pools? We do. Oh, that's why you're having a full sized pool ground. They're on Inground. Yes. Yeah. Yep. We only do Inground. But we do inground spas as well, which are really cool.

And have the ability to turn them to flip a switch and basically turn it into a cold plunge as well. So those are all the rage. Yeah. That's a big rage right now. But I like a pool because I, [00:26:00] especially in Ohio when, whenever we can get in the pool and play with the kids or play basketball or throw the ball with my son or some of that stuff.

I think pools are just inviting in general. Always like this 90 degrees outside. And I love for my backyard to be the backyard that all of their friends want to So that's my favorite part of our property is that it is inviting and I like to host people and have a good time, watch people have a good time too.

Yeah. I always loved it when my kids were growing up, when all the kids would play in my backyard. Yeah. That way not only do I know where my kids are, I know it's going on. Yes. Yeah. Yes. I like that too. What piece of advice. Would you give an aspiring entrepreneur looking to start their own business?

Seeing rob go through what he's gone through. To get to where we are today. [00:27:00] We've been through so many ups and downs I can't even tell like even if I tried to explain this to somebody starting their business it would I couldn't Come up with the words to say sometimes how hard it is. And my sister's husband owns his own business and I'm seeing them go through the exact same things that we have been through, and I would just say.

It takes. A lot of grit to get through everything and just to not give up, that would be the easy thing is just to throw the towel in. But just sticking with what you know and love and just seeing it through because we're finally starting to see our hard work pay off. And it's, it feels even better having gone through all that stuff, I think.

Yeah. When I took this class called Emerging Entrepreneur and The start of every class, he would [00:28:00] ask where we are in the rollercoaster. 'cause it would look like this. Yeah. And usually people were in the dip a lot more dips in their, there's lot dips. There's a lot of dips. Yeah. I would say actually though also kind diving into that finance piece is always so difficult.

And especially in our business, cash flow is king, and so we have so many. projects now where when we close the job, we don't actually collect a whole lot of the money until we start the job. However, we, if we're doing an in ground spa, that has to be, custom made and shipped and brought in well before the job starts.

So we do collect some of that expense up front, but I've always felt like. I've always personally had a hard time asking our clients to spend [00:29:00] more money or asking our clients to pay for something before we can deliver it. So I've always taken it upon myself to order the material ahead of time on my dime.

Knowing that we're going to collect a lot of that money on day one. Because of that, having those those dips on that rollercoaster and the cashflow piece has always been a challenge. When one month you're collecting several hundreds of thousands of dollars and the next month it's 50, there's just things you got to plan for Does you have any success with that line of credit that we talked about?

We have not gone after that at this point. Yeah. Fortunately, we haven't had to, which is great. Yes, but that's what they were saying. We have to do it when we don't need it. Yes. We are awesome.

So knowing what you know now, is there anything that you would have done differently? . We were talking about this and I right away said, I don't think we should have done [00:30:00] anything differently because I feel like we've grown through everything. And when I said that, he was like, that's a perfect answer.

But on his mind right away, a thousand things came up of different, different ways of doing things that you learned from everything that you went through, right? Absolutely. Yeah. And a lot of the issue that I've always faced is that I have a hard time selling to a customer something that I don't, and with this business and the way that it's trending and the way that it's moving, there are so many variables and so many pieces.

bits of information I have to know about in order to sell it. So I'm constantly trying to learn about new things and follow the trends and all of that, but one of the big things that I did figure out finally, recently is to hire out things that you're not good at, and so instead of having somebody that, or instead of me trying to handle all of the maintenance on the [00:31:00] trucks, just hire a damn mechanic, bring them in and let them do what they're good at.

Project management, I can't know I can't be out selling patios to people and trying to manage all the projects. So that's why we ended up hiring project managers, and as the business grew like that, it became more and more clear how many people that we actually needed to make an efficient business.

That's the big thing for me I think that we've learned. And again, that's only happened in the last few years. Yeah. Absolutely. Yeah. Okay. That's how I feel about cooking and cleaning. That's why I like to fire it out. Yeah. What's really ironic. What's really ironic is that I don't know my own grass.

Yeah. That was another thing that we got rid of. Yeah. It's the weirdest thing to look out and see a company show up and mow my grass. Yes. That's how I started out. Yeah. All right. Nine a [00:32:00] success. Yeah. Yes. Oh my goodness. So what resources would you recommend to someone looking to start their own entrepreneurial journey?

The best thing that we've done in the last two years.

Getting other people involved and what I mean by that, or I would say, get yourself involved in other things because you don't have to know everything.

One of the first managers that I had always said, use your resources because you don't have to have all of the knowledge about everything, but you have to know where to find it. And so one of the things that have been huge. With our business in the last two years, I think is when we joined the chamber, the local chamber of commerce, and just started getting involved more with the community, but also other business owners.

And that's how I met you two [00:33:00] lovely ladies. And it's just it's so easy, when you're focused on starting your own business. to get caught up or overwhelmed with everything. But when you have other people that are doing the exact same thing, in another business or whatever, that they can help you strive in things that you wouldn't have known about.

Another thing is the SBDC, small business development center. But there's just, there's a lot of opportunity out there to get involved with other business owners and for people that have been through this already to teach you or lead the way for you, basically. Yeah, I totally agree. Yeah. So you were talking about, it's the Pickerington area Chamber of Commerce that we're involved in where we met.

Are you involved in any other chambers, Licking County? We have not. You're not involved in that's okay. One at a time. You got the best. That's right.

Yeah. You got the best. And I know I called you a [00:34:00] murderer earlier and I feel like I need to like, you just highlighted the big, huge event of the summer for the Pickerington chamber, the murder mystery Same night. I don't know. Let's call it. Yes. Yes. And both of you were suspects. Janice and Jennifer.

Yes. But Jennifer was the one there was. How many was there? Eight people. Eight suspects. Yes. It was a large amount of suspects. Yes. I couldn't believe I couldn't believe myself. I was sitting right. It was a surprise to all of you. Yes. Oh, I was sitting right beside her and Jim came I heard Kim, I didn't say, hear the words, but then I looked over and she handed her something and she goes, yeah, right now.

Yeah. She's I'm like, what are you handing me? And she's it's. The, it's what? The Nightingale stole. . [00:35:00] You're the Nightingale. Oh my God. It was hilarious. It was hilarious. Yeah. That was a lot of fun. And then when Chief Chainy came up and handcuffed her, oh yeah. It was oh yeah. Oh yeah. And then her kid, wait, she, got her.

Yes, it was so great explaining to my children how mommy's being arrested. They're freaking out. Mommy, no! And the jinn goes out, I love you! And now they're traumatized. I can't believe I didn't traumatize them. Oh, it's fine. Why is mommy a murderer? What's a murderer? What's that mean? They've got all kinds of lessons.

Oh my gosh. He let her go right away. Yes. Oh, that's great. I'm sad I missed it. It was so much fun. It was from four to eight. It was four hours of [00:36:00] staying in character. Were you a hippie? I was a hippie. It was people interrogating us. 50 teams, not all 50 teams came in and asked us questions, but there were a lot of people.

There was, and then people were taking it very seriously. Yeah, there was a lot of costumes. I was like, was it like notified that they should dress up? Yeah. Yeah. The best costume won a prize. Yep. And yeah, if they asked me a question and I was like, I'm not sure what you're talking about. They keep asking me like, are you sure that you don't know about XYZ?

I'm like, yes. Yeah. They asked me something about whatever County where you killed the first person. And I was like no, I didn't even know about neither did I. She's got a second life going on. And then there were some questions where I was like, [00:37:00] are you talking about Columbus hardscapes? in real life or for the murder mystery?

Let's be clear here. Let's be very clear. At least in my store. I, yeah. And I had people ask me questions. Then I had the lady back there saying, can I buy this? That's on the wall. And I said yes, you can. So what were your sales that night? I meant to look that up today and I forgot, but it was a good day.

Good. Yeah. It was awesome. I know. I know, right? That was fun. I actually was looking and we actually had a little bit of a down tip because apparently people don't want to purchase from a murderer, a multi murderer company. Thanks, Kim. Kim put a disclaimer in there. Oh any what do they say? Any, Publicity is good publicity.

There you go. I don't know. This may not work. [00:38:00] All right. All right. What are your future plans for Columbus Hardscapes? Or are you personally? Are there any expansions? We've got a lot of things we're getting into. One of the big projects that we've started working on is expanding our facility.

Bye. Bye. Buh Bye. Bye. I think we're going to be purchasing commercial property and building a new facility within the next couple of years. That's going to involve a full blown design center. We want to have a huge space where people can come and see the patios, see what we do, see how we do it, but also look at all the different products we can offer.

Including hopefully having a couple of demo pools installed and everything so they can see differences. So that's the big thing that's going to be an expensive thing to do, but that's the biggest expansion plans we've got right now. Probably rent the pools [00:39:00] out. We were even contemplating that.

Yeah. Or even, maybe not even for rent, but just having community days or something like that. Have one indoor and one outdoor. Okay. Yes. I like that. Oh, gosh. Janice is our first member. Oh, you can have members. Membership. Other than that we continue to grow. We're pushing, we've got some big goals for. To finish out the rest of this year even bigger goals that we're looking at for next year We want to continue to grow our team, and that's going to start with sales people and additional project managers.

So If they're doing their job, you're gonna have to hire Really? Yeah. Something we didn't even touch on though, is that we also do snow removal. So I saw it on your website. Yeah. Yeah. Snow removal is a really big thing for us. It's a very lucrative part of our business. [00:40:00] And there's different ways that companies can get involved in snow removal.

Whether it's hourly or it's per event or per the storm. But we've actually diverted over and we've started using all seasonal contracts. We get paid whether it snows or it doesn't, which is great. And, Years like we've had the past couple years, it's worked out in our favor. Years that would be heavy winters, it may not be quite as lucrative, but we know we can still make good money at it.

So we are really pushing and trying to grow our, the snow side of our business. That must be commercial. We specialize in like warehouse properties and very high end logistics. 

Okay, you guys, we're going to switch gears into the lightning round. We're going to ask fast questions and you get the first answer that comes to your mind. What is the book you posted as a gift or the book that made the biggest impact on you? [00:41:00] The Four Agreements. Do you know that one, Michelle? I think I have it on my bookshelf. I'll let you borrow it. Michelle has read every book. Every sheet. Oh my gosh. Michelle is like the smartest person.

What is an unusual habit or an absurd thing that you love? I love learning about other businesses. Me too. Go figure.

What is your proudest accomplishment? My kids. Second proudest? Your business? That is another kid. Yeah, that's included. That's your first baby, actually. Yes. . So what is your current passion project?

Rob always has a passion project. He, there, if I can be content with how things are, but he looks around and tries to make things better. Everything can be better one way or another and he knows how to make it [00:42:00] happen. So I would say right now his classroom project is our master bathroom. One other thing that we have not talked about either is Columbus Hardscapes Cares. I don't think we should. Okay. Is it something new that you haven't gotten off the ground yet?

We, yeah, we did Do you know Libby in Pickerington? She's a young girl that had brain cancer and she went through You put something about that on your Yeah. I saw it. Yeah. So we Started a non profit. Yeah. We haven't filed for the 503. Yeah, 503. C3 5123. Yeah. But we have the name filed.

We just don't have the other paperwork filed, but we wanted to pick Maybe one project per year that we could give a huge discount. I don't know, we took off like half of what their price of their patio was going to be and just said, we'll [00:43:00] figure out the rest of it. And so that's something that's a passion.

It's a passion. It's a goal. Just giving the charity. Yeah. Picking a charity annually that you want to contribute in a positive way to their life. That's a great idea. I did that. I created a foundation called the Healing Hands Foundation. It fizzled out, but Cause I wasn't as passionate about it as I should have been.

But I would have fundraisers to fund the healing hands foundation. Then in turn, we would pay for people's massages that would come in because I didn't want to, people always ask massage therapists to donate their time for things. And I was sick of that. No, I've got to make, pay my own bills.

So I thought this is a win. We could have the people come in. And the non profit pay for their massage. They get it for free. The massage, they still get paid. Yeah. Yeah. They had to fill out a little form to say why they wanted it. But it was fun for a couple years. And then [00:44:00] I like that though.

Healing hands. I like that. Yeah. And I like your idea too. Yeah. The situation with the Pickerington girl was struck us hard. She attended the same church that we go to. We heard about her and seen a lot of information and stuff. And when they ended up for when I ended up at their home, and they were describing their.

their wants and needs and, little things like they needed a structure so that she could sit outside and not be in direct sunlight, and her body could not regulate temperature anymore. We've talked about adding some infrared heaters to the structure, adding ceiling fans and things that would help, control that and then creating a space where, she could play with her siblings if she's a twin, and she wants to be involved.

That was a big deal to me, was trying to make that happen. And I knew that we were going to be well over budget, for what they wanted to spend. So I put a design together that met all of their needs [00:45:00] and wants. And when they came in, I presented it and then we basically just said we're just going to get the whole thing done.

It's more than double what you want to spend, but we're just going to get it done for what you want to spend. Yeah. So it's little things. That was a big deal to us. Yeah. They were very appreciative of the force too, but it's something that we want to try and get better at too is pushing some of that and what did you call it?

Columbus hearts take cares. Yes. Yeah. Yeah. You need to talk to your accountant to set that up just right because there could be some major tax benefits to you guys with that. Yeah. Yeah. All right. So I think we covered this. What was your first job? Yeah. My first job was cutting grass. It's all I've ever done.

And that's how I got things started. I did work at Wendy's for a short amount of time and I worked at Sears during the winters for a couple of years selling TVs. Anytime that I talk about him being the best sales person out there. [00:46:00] I say that when he worked at Sears in the electronics. area, he sold the biggest TV on the floor to a blind man.

And that is a true story. Wowee. Tell me more. I know this is lightning round, but I want to know more. Yeah. Go. The guy came in, an older gentleman, and he was clearly blind. And I saw him walking around and standing in front of all these TVs. and my fellow sales associate and I were going back and forth and finally I was like, if you're not going to go talk to him, I will.

Yeah, exactly. So I went up to him and I started talking a little bit and I'm like, forgive me, but why are you looking for a TV? I can sell you a really nice radio, and save you a whole bunch of money. But he's no man, he's I want to have a really nice TV so that when my family and friends come over.

They want to come back. [00:47:00] I said if that's the case, sir, you're really going to want this one over here because this is right when plasma TVs were coming out. So yeah, and then I convinced him that he absolutely needed to have the extended warranty on it because it's a plasma TV. You just don't know.

So yeah, it was a really good sale. And my fellow sales associate just sat back behind me shaking his head taking notes trying to figure out, how this, how we just pulled this off. That's pretty cool. Yeah. Okay. So what's your pump up song?

Do you have a pump up song? Get you going. We both do and they both are They both have, they're both, they're inappropriate. Oh,

Would you rather have the ability to create a backyard oasis for a billionaire anywhere in the world, but could not talk about it or [00:48:00] receive a one-time? Shout out from a national influence.

I would receive the one time shout out from a national influencer, just because it's good for business. The other one, it's like it never happened because that's where I'm in less, they told other billionaires, one billionaire, a project for a billionaire is going to be seen by other billionaires and millionaires.

Yes, and it's going to spread Okay, you might make equal money on both I mean we're getting the national influence with these right now you guys so oh, yeah, we're hoping Yes

We had the opportunity recently to do some work For a couple of very influential people in the Columbus area that have a lot of money and a lot of say in some things that go on. And what I [00:49:00] realized is that those people have people to do things. And so while I thought that I was designing something that would work for this client, in fact, his financial person wanted exactly that, but for six figures less than what they were willing to pay and what he thought it would be worth.

So the response that we got from the client was, sorry, it's up to him. He's in charge of my money. And so that left a really. sickening feeling because we put a lot of time and a lot of effort into design work and prep work and bringing all kinds of subcontractors and everything into this project.

And it was going to be a it was a seven figure project. So it was going to be massive. And to just get completely ghosted and completely, turned off by it was just Surprising. I have [00:50:00] a question regarding that. Yeah. Second time you brought this up. This was a lot. And then there was one earlier where the client used your design.

Do you charge for those designs? We do. Yeah. We, so we provide a two dimensional plan or just a flat bird's eye view. Okay. for no charge. That's a given. We have to have that regardless even for our crews to work off of. But what we charge for is our design package and that's a 3D program.

That's the whole thing. So we have renderings, we've got movies that we put together and walk throughs. We try to do the whole thing there. We typically charge like 1, 500 for a standard patio, but for. really large projects like that, a lot of times we don't charge for the design.

And the reason is because a lot of those people that are spending five, six, 700, 000 on a backyard, there's no point in me [00:51:00] asking for 1, 500 up front. And if I ask them for that, or even more, sometimes it's a turnoff, sometimes it's instantly like, they, why would I pay you for you to have the ability to build this?

You know what I mean? It's a catch 22. It really is. So one of my sales guys he's had more success collecting the 1, 500 deposits than jobs he's sold this year. He's done a ton of design work and collected a whole bunch, of that, which is fantastic. And he's still done great in sales and he's selling and everything as well, but he's found that there's a lot of.

There's a lot of benefit in that. Yeah. It just seems like they're picking your brain and then taking your ideas and then maybe they're going to be using those ideas. You are 100 percent correct. Yeah. Also a sickening field. Yeah. I think there just should be a way to contain all that so that they don't use your stuff.

Yep. We had a earlier [00:52:00] this year again, we had a mother and father that built a house and then right next door on the piece of land, right next to them, their son and daughter built a house or son and daughter. And they we had the opportunity, they were brand new homes. So it was a clean slate. Those are the best projects.

We love going into nothing there. And we went in and we built beautiful designs for both of them. And they both completely just took our designs and ran the companies that ended up installing work, didn't charge for designs. They didn't charge for nearly where we were for the quality. Sold them on cheaper products.

Sold them on a whole thing. I know that exists. I know that other companies and other people were in a different spot than we are. That's great. That's fine. But I completely agree. I wish that there was a way that we could curtail or keep on our proprietary design stuff.

There really isn't though. Have you, do you, did you, have you guys joined a country club? No. [00:53:00] I know that's a weird question, but I'm thinking about doing that because I feel like. That might rub elbows With people that I need to meet for my little side hustle. I was talking about earlier. Yeah But when you were talking about the billionaires and stuff, yeah, I like that Yes I hear you should go off season like not golfing season and it's better deals yeah, that's a good idea. I like that. Like I said, she's the smartest person I know. Oh, please. Okay. You guys. Thank you so much for joining us on Cosmos and Commerce. This has been amazing. Yes. It's been so fun in person. I love it. For real. Yeah.

I know our listeners will have so many takeaways and ideas. Please tell everyone where they can find you. Facebook, Columbus Hardscapes, Instagram, Columbus Hardscapes we're even on TikTok. [00:54:00] And ColumbusHardscapes. com. Yes. Install my Yep. Columbus heart safes.com. Columbus Install my patio.com. Oh, you got 2, 2, 2 updates.

Okay. Very good. And a huge thank you to all of our listeners for joining us. We hope you were able to sip some wisdom, saver, some insights, and are now ready to build your own success. Don't forget to hit that subscribe button and stay updated on our latest episodes. And if you're thirsty for more, find us@cosmosandcommerce.com.

Until next time, keep sipping, keep savoring, and keep succeeding. Cheers! Cheers! Thank you! Yes! Boom!