Behind the Toolbelt
Behind the ToolBelt is a live, raw, and uncut podcast that brings real, unfiltered conversations about business, leadership, and the entrepreneurial mindset. Hosted by Ty Cobb Backer, CEO of TC Backer Construction, this live show features industry leaders, innovators, and experts sharing their experiences, strategies, and insights. From building successful companies to overcoming challenges, each episode offers valuable perspectives for entrepreneurs and business owners and leaders looking to grow, and make an impact.
Behind the Toolbelt
From Cars to Roofs: The Unexpected Connection Between Industries
Ty Cobb-Backer sits down with Woody Casey, owner of AJ's Dent, for a candid conversation about entrepreneurship, building trust, and creating industry connections that transcend traditional boundaries.
• Woody shares his journey from college graduate to paintless dent repair business owner
• How a chance invitation to a roofing convention created unexpected industry connections
• The surprising parallels between the roofing and automotive repair industries
• Building a referral system between roofing companies and dent repair that creates transparency
• Overcoming trust issues to empower team members and delegate effectively
• The entrepreneurial mind described as a "merry-go-round" with multiple ideas spinning simultaneously
• Finding solutions by stepping away from problems rather than forcing answers
• Redefining success beyond financial metrics to include family presence and personal growth
• Learning to give clear direction while still empowering team members
• The importance of vulnerability and humility in leadership
• How struggles and challenges prepare us for future opportunities to help others
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Welcome back everybody to Behind the Tool Belt, episode 276. I'm your host, ty Cobb-Backer, and thank you for joining us on this Wednesday edition. Today we have another special guest. Stay tuned and we will be back after our short intro from our sponsors.
Speaker 2:Welcome to Behind the Tool Belt, where the stories are bold, the conversations are real and the insights come to you live, raw and uncut. Every week, host Ty Cobb-Backer sits down with game changers, trailblazers and industry leaders who aren't afraid to tell it like it is no filters, no scripts, just the truth. Please welcome your host of Behind the Tool Belt, ty.
Ty Cobb Backer:Cobb-Backer, welcome back to another episode of Behind the Tool Belt, the podcast where we dive into the minds of industry leaders who are changing the game construction contracting and beyond. Today I have another awesome guest, my friend Woody Casey. How the hell are you doing, buddy?
Woody Casey:I'm doing good. Thanks for having me.
Ty Cobb Backer:Yeah, thanks for coming all the way up here. So, if I didn't mention yet, woody is in studio live with us today. He flew the whole way up here from Dallas, texas, and Woody and I have a little bit of a history. I met Woody a couple years ago. Vic and myself, and I think Chris Hofstra, ran into you at SRC in Denton. I think that was the first time we ever met at that ice storm in Denton, texas, which is still one of probably my favorite conferences.
Woody Casey:Just because it was an incredible experience because, being snowed in for several days, it was a core group of people, it wasn't big, sorry. April hall, um, she puts on an amazing show every year. It's my favorite of all the ones I get to go to, but attendance kind of fell off for because of that snowstorm. But for those of us that were there, I got to know a lot of people very well in the three, four days that we were snowed in, so it was an amazing experience I wouldn't recommend it for a conference.
Woody Casey:But you know, having done it I look back at that's some of the funnest experiences I've had as far as the conference goes. Just being confined in a space with people and having to get to know people because you're forced in for an introvert it's perfect for me to make me get out of my shell.
Ty Cobb Backer:So, yeah, I can agree with that Same same and most people wouldn't believe it, but I I'm also an introvert, introverted, but that, that show was a good show. I got to Steven Spence. Like you said, there was a core group of people. Steven Spence with project map, it got to know him real, real well and there was a there was a good group, good core group of people and I think the hotel handled it well as far as like not running out of supplies because that was, like, my biggest concern.
Woody Casey:There's a lot of things that that hotel did behind the scenes to make sure that we were taken care of, and one was the most people probably don't know this, but the staff didn't go home. They stayed there in the hotel. They gave them rooms so they were on for a while, they'd be out, they'd get some hours off and they kind of rotated. But, yeah, the staff didn't go home and so we got to see the same people over and over again and there was the uh, the odd night where I have to stay up all night, um, having fun, um, and the girl that did the breakfast comes down and she goes you guys are down here already. She goes, I'll get breakfast, and I'm like, holy crap, it's time for breakfast already. Yeah, it was. It was a lot of fun. So, yeah, yeah, that was a. That was an odd fluke for me to be able to stay up all night.
Ty Cobb Backer:Yeah, I normally don't do that yeah, no, we ended up staying up pretty late too. We actually ended up. We rented it. I think it was a jeep wagoneer the the new Jeep Wagoneer four-wheel drive. We're from up north, so a little ice storm isn't going to affect us. So we went and found a Buc-ee's that was open. Never got to experience Buc-ee's before and it was an experience that I will never forget. And that place was packed Like there was people from all over the country in this one Buc-ee's, I feel like all over the world. It felt like because nobody was on the road, but when you went to Buc-ee's it was lit up like a fricking Roman candle.
Woody Casey:Buc-ee's is one of those. I didn't realize what a tourist attraction it is. Friends of mine from another state were there and they're like, well, we have to go see a bucky's and I'm like it's a gas station. Why, like well, we've heard about it, we've seen it, you know it's on our list of things to do and it's like okay, but they have gas stations everywhere yeah, yeah, bucket list, I can believe it.
Ty Cobb Backer:I mean, we've gone to a couple of them. Uh, there was the newest one that we've been to is right outside, I think greenville, south carolina, going down 95, or Charlotte, maybe Charlotte, north Carolina, somewhere down 95. For us it was the newer. We watched it being built so we had to stop in there. But I don't think we'll do it again. It's just too busy, too crazy, and we were hauling a trailer the Beyond and Tool Belt trailer heading south and it's just too much. I don't know how truck drivers they don't allow truck drivers in there, yeah, I oh okay I don't.
Ty Cobb Backer:Eyes aren't allowed in there yeah, I don't blame them because we barely got through with the trailer on the back, yeah, it says no semis allowed.
Woody Casey:Okay, so makes sense, makes sense. They uh, when they opened the first one, so the first one outside of texas went to florida and that was, I mean it made you know Bucky's expanding and all that. So it's, it's good on them. They've created a very definable niche, so to speak, and you know they have, they've, they've branded some of their own stuff.
Woody Casey:I was on a plane one time we talk about happenstance kind of meetings I'm on a plane one time with the guy that supplies the soda, little small town guy that just happened to start supplying sodas to bucky's and then his company has expanded because of how big bucky's has gotten and he's like it's I never thought I could get this big, let alone have a, a brand like this that carries me, he goes, I'm getting into other places because of them. So it's one of those things that you know the high tide raises all boats kind of a thing. Yeah, and if you go into buckies they don't have they got a few of the name brands. You know the, the top brands, but they're all this off brand and nothing is that brand because they're good sodas.
Woody Casey:But yeah yeah, it's just one of those things where they have this little supplier or had a little supply.
Ty Cobb Backer:He's getting bigger now, yeah, but it's you know, it's just right place, right time yes, exactly, we were kind of talking about that earlier, where your network becomes your net worth. Yeah, and that's a perfect example of, you know, providing a great service and a great product at a, you know, a reasonable price, I would imagine. And now he, he has the opportunity to provide buckies with all their beverages, or their sodas that particular soda, I guess. But no, it's good, it's good. So for those of you that don't know Woody, I guess we should probably introduce Woody and tell us a little bit about Woody.
Ty Cobb Backer:Woody isn't from the roofing industry and I want to get into that conversation like where that connection came from, and I'm sure you can that conversation like where that connection came from, and I'm sure you can, you can share that with us on from your background of things like that. But we met Woody at a roofing convention and I got the, I get the, the the privilege to be in a mastermind group with, with Woody as well. Vic got to share some time with him this past. What was it January this past? What was it January this past? January, I think we all went to Cayman and Woody has been a huge influence on me, especially when it comes to stepping outside my comfort zone Because scuba diving is not, you know, I don't know, very comfortable.
Ty Cobb Backer:At times I don't know very comfortable. At times it's become comfortable for me. But you've been an inspiration for me of watching you and how relaxed you are in the water allows me to know that this is fun. It reminds me you watching you and just having fun under the water and stuff like that. So I appreciate that and I appreciate you a lot. So give us a little background. Tell us what industry you're in and then how you a lot. So give us, give us a little background. You know, you know what. Tell us what industry you're in and then and then how, how you got to this industry. Okay, and then what it was like, what it's like now and how you got here.
Woody Casey:So what you want, what you're saying and what I'm hearing is you want me to talk for three hours nonstop.
Ty Cobb Backer:You put it into a 30 minute.
Woody Casey:Yeah, my name is Woody Casey. I'm the owner of AJ's Dent. We are a paintless dent repair company. We fix hail damage on cars, minor dents, door dings, that kind of stuff. But I'll have to paint the car I got in the industry in 95. Kind of a fluke I was working at in Omaha, nebraska Shout out to Eric. I was working in a place called Q's automotive and, having graduated college a couple of years before um and having realized that I was not built for corporate um, I was not built to sit in a cubicle and I was not built to play nice in um, those kinds of settings I learned I was fine in college.
Woody Casey:But when I got out of college I realized that there's no filter between my brain and my mouth and my mouth runs faster than my brain. So, um, being in a corporate structure was going to work for me. So I was working in an automotive industry which, growing up on a farm, I've got very good skills with cars and I can fix almost anything except clocks, um. But I was working in an automotive and one of the guys I work with had quit and comes in a week later and says he's learning how to fix dents in cars without having to paint it. And this is a 95. And I'm like, yeah, it's impossible. I've been around cars all of my life. If there was anything out there like that, I would have heard about it. He goes no, no, it's true. And so I went and checked it out, interviewed, got hired and started my career there, worked briefly for that company those in the roofing industry can relate to not getting paid. I worked for two months. That well, I worked for six months for that company, for about two months. For not getting paid, um left that company. Um, there's a short story about how we got aj's dent the name. But um went on to start my own business and start working as a subcontractor for other people moved to colorado in 98. Um had an opportunity. I worked for a company called adb auto body and glass from 97 to 98. They opened up some stores out there. I went out there. We parted ways about six months later and I started on my own, had a great time living in Colorado, working there, built a decent sized business there.
Woody Casey:The downturn in the economy in 07, 09, we took a big hit. I lost 30% of my body shops. They went under um, some of them owing me money which caused some financial hardships for me. Um came back from that and you know we're still going strong. So we're still trying to go strong, I guess Um. And the second part of your question is why am I in the roofing space? Yeah, so about six years ago, I guess.
Woody Casey:Now um shout out to charlie china, um friend of ours, went to work for him out in vegas and he was uh tied in to win the storm. And I come into work one day and kim goes tosh is going to um sell us tickets to a roofing convention. So we're going to do a zoom call and I looked at kim and I said, uh, you know, we work on cars, not roofs. And she goes. Tasha's a good friend and tasha's done some of our marketing and some of our um uh, internet stuff, a website design, and good friend. So she's like we can spend an hour listening to her to give a pitch. She needs way to practice on. I'm like, okay, great, sit spend an hour listening to her to give a pitch. She needs somebody to practice on. I'm like, okay, great, sit down. And she goes through a pitch. She does a great job. Charlie's off screen a little bit just coaching her here and there she gets all done. And I lean over to Kim. I said, buy two tickets, I don't care what they cost, just buy two tickets. It'll make her look good, you know.
Woody Casey:So we did a couple months go by and kim goes hey, you know we got these tickets to that roofing thing. And I'm like again, kim, that's roofing, we're in cars, and she goes, but it's in vegas. And I'm like, okay, we'll make it a company trip. I said, um, get your husband, get two rooms, we'll get tickets, airplane tickets, we'll fly out there for the weekend. Call it a work trip, air quotes and, uh, have some fun in vegas. And I like to play poker and you know, if I don't go to the roofing convention, I'll just play poker for the whole time. So we go out there and, of course, we got to put on appearance because we didn't pay for the tickets. So we go down and the first people we run into is the Valor Roofing out of Denver, colorado Friends Wars. I'm like, oh well, there might be people here, we know, so start walking around.
Woody Casey:This first time I ever saw Sam Taggart I watched these guys get up on stage and get awards for being million dollar producers and I was in the process of trying to hire outside salespeople and there was some roofing companies you know a lot of roofing companies there and starting to have conversations with them, realizing that we have a lot of things in common. We have to deal with adjusters who don't know what they're doing. We have to deal with insurance companies who don't want to pay for what we do and, at the end of the day, we have the same clients, their customers, who have hail damage on roofs, have hail damage on cars. So, coming back from that event, and I can honestly say Sam Taggart is probably the one who had the biggest impact on me at that event and just his his mindset on sales and stuff. Maybe start to think about that.
Woody Casey:So, coming back, I sat down with Kim and our IT guy and he said I want something that I can present to roofing companies. There's plenty of crossover between roofers and paintless dent repair people, and I know plenty of companies in my industry that will see a roofer, a sales guy, walking down the street and say, hey, for every car you bring me, I'll give you a couple hundred bucks. So that guy spends half his day selling cars back and forth for this PDR company, painless dinner company, and the guy who's paying him to be on the doors is losing money. So I didn't want to do that. So I wanted something that was transparent, something that I could be held accountable for, because going into it, I realized that those clients are the roofing company's clients, not mine. So I have to be at a high standard in order to get them to refer, because you don't want to refer somebody that's going to do a bad job. Right, if you're putting a roof on there and you outsource your windows or your gutters, they got to show up the day they say they're going to. They got to put on a quality product, otherwise it makes you look bad.
Woody Casey:So I want something that were, if six months down the road there's a problem, the roofing company can call me and ask me and I will know what's going on. So part of that process was that we use JobNimbus. It doesn't work for my industry but it works great for yours. So we started using that as our CRM so that we could track every interaction with every customer. So you can call us six months from now and ask us what happened. The other thing that I told my IT guy was I want something that is gets it. When we get the leads, we know where it came from and they're not just out handing out business cards. So something that was trackable.
Woody Casey:So he built us a webpage. So we built a landing page for every roofing company that we work with. It's logoed with their logo and it's a little bit about us and a little bit about how the process works. But, most importantly, there's a client fill out form on it and they fill that out. We get an email. It shows us which roofing company sent it, which sales guys sent it to us. So cause we pay commission back to the roofing company.
Woody Casey:Support and our checks don't go to the individual sales guys, they go actually to the roofing company because I want every owner to know what their guys are doing, if they're giving us leads, if they're not giving us leads, what the return is on that. So I want everything to be able to go through the company owner first and then out to the sales guys. So we pay commission back to the roofing company and then they split up between them and their sales guys. So that's kind of how all that kind of came about. And we worked. We've had the privilege of working with I couldn't tell you how many roofing companies, but we've worked with quite a few, mostly in the hell belt Atlanta, chicago, minneapolis, denver. Our brick and mortars are Denver for for 20 years, um, dallas, fort worth area for eight and minneapolis for three.
Ty Cobb Backer:Wow that you know, for someone like me that makes complete sense. You know what I mean, but I and that's why I wanted you to explain it to our viewers here, because, you know, once they found out that that you own own a, a Denton repair company for vehicles, they're probably like why, what's the connection? You know what I mean and I and I'm and I'm asking that question because I asked myself that question when I saw you in Denton Um, so that's why I wanted to explain to you. But but, um, that makes so much sense. And it's funny story too about when the storm. It's funny how, when the storm has such, has had such an impact on our industry, whether people want to admit that or not.
Ty Cobb Backer:You know to go, cause you know conferences, you know there wasn't many back then, and so we, we went out to Vegas, cause I think the first couple of few at least, were in Vegas, at least the one that we went to was in Vegas. And we went out there and we came back different, like, first and foremost we thought that we were hot shit on a silver platter. But when we got there we realized real quick that we were just a cold turd on a paper plate doing the volume that we did at that time, okay, but because of that, it had opened our eyes to so much more and we discovered that we weren't by ourselves anymore. And you said Sam Taggart had an impact on you.
Ty Cobb Backer:Well, scott Riopala I don't know if you know him or not Interstate Roofing he was one of the speakers there and he is giving me goosebumps right now Just thinking about it had such a huge impact. His personal story resembles a lot of Jana and I's personal story, and so it resonated. Everything that he was talking about, from the ebbs and flows and personal difficulties and professional difficulties and everything Like basically, he just shared a story up on stage. It wasn't like he was dropping nuggets out there, it was just more inspirational.
Woody Casey:He's a true bootstraps. Yeah, from nothing, yeah.
Ty Cobb Backer:Something saying you know that's it's giving me goosebumps right now, I mean. And then we ran into Eric and Paul Reed for the very first time that met Eric and I was terrified to go over there again I'm an introvert, right. So on the expo floor everybody's got their signs up and it said roofers in recovery. So that could mean one of two things that could be a recovery. There's a lot of insurance adjusters and claims and and and just it. It's an insurance storm restoration recovery.
Ty Cobb Backer:You know, conference that we're at, but we were kind of like what, what is that? So janna, being the little social butterfly that she is, she walks over to their booth and basically their booth is like three couches and a coffee table with just some dudes sitting around cutting it up. And Jana was like hey, what, what, what is this about? And of course we've learned. We learned what it was and of course this is like the greatest day of my life. I would listen to Scott, rita, paula on stage. We're at a roofing conference. We're not in this by ourselves anymore, you know, it just opened up the whole roofing industry to us and and so it sounds like you kind of had that same aha moment when you came back home, your juices were flowing, you know.
Woody Casey:It's yes In a way I never really imagined you know, I we talk about this a lot.
Woody Casey:I don't really consider myself a smart person, but I know I am and in some ways. But when you meet people like Sam, like Scott, like Paul and other people that are in the industry and you know I've got a lot of friends in the industry now that they may not be any smarter than what you are they just think about things a little bit differently and learning how to open your mind to other possibilities. In my industry I've made a lot of mistakes. I was very close minded for a long time. I was very being an introvert, you know. I got a lot of things on my plate for a long time and I did very well with it, and then that plate started to shrink and I couldn't think, I couldn't figure out how to get off and get another plate, so to speak, and so my plate started shrinking, started shrinking, started shrinking.
Woody Casey:And then 07, 08, 09 hit and it really shrunk and I struggled and I went back to what I knew, which was traveling and chasing hail and, yeah, I can make great money doing that, but that's not where my passion or I wanted to build my business, not work for somebody else's business. So, going to the roofing conference and I tell this to everybody in the in the roofing industry I have better friends and more connections inside the roofing industry than I ever did in my own, and it's weird to say that because I've been in mine for 30 years. I've been in roofing for like six not that I'm actually in roofing, I'm just in the space and the friends I call when I need somebody to talk to are in the roofing industry. The friends I call when I need advice, the friends I call when I have a great day they're in the roofing industry, they're not in mine. It's amazing how the roofing industry is where I wish my industry was. My industry is starting to get there, but it's a decade behind the roofing industry. We're still in my industry. There's still a lot of cutthroats out there, a lot of shady characters, a lot of guys who do business every year and then change their company name so they can hire new guys and screw more people over and I know it's happened in the roofing industry. But you guys are rising above that a lot faster than we are and I really love that about your industry that you got guys who will put on mastermind groups with other roofing owners and be supportive even if they're in the same market. It's amazing to watch that and that camaraderie and that, that kinship, fellowship, that's there. I absolutely. It's one of the things like I get goosebumps sitting here talking to you about this because it's it means so much to me because I've been able to do things in my life that I never thought I would. Some it's from the connections I've made in the roofing industry and some it's just from the industry that I'm in because it's like roofing, it's good money. You know, yeah, I have a college degree but I got a lot of friends that are in my industry that maybe not made out of high school but they're making six figures a year.
Woody Casey:I've traveled all over the world We've talked about this before in scuba diving. There isn't hardly anywhere in the world that you can go scuba diving that I haven't been. My list of places I still want to go to is small. My list of places I want to go back to is very huge and I get that freedom and that financial ability to be able to do that. And my girlfriend and I are going to the Maldives in a week and I can't wait to take her there. You know going to the mall these in a week and I can't wait to take you there. You know I don't get too excited about things until I get there because I've had bad trips, but you know I'm talking about it like this. I'm fucking excited about going. You know, I get a 10 days. I get to go scuba diving. I get to show this stuff off to a girl I love. You know it's, it's amazing to me. So, and it's I can truly say that scuba diving is one of my biggest passions.
Ty Cobb Backer:So yeah, I know that for sure and I've got to witness that and experience that with you, alongside with you. You mentioned something earlier. You know about not being the smartest guy and and and and I think you know it sounds negative, but but I know you're not putting yourself down. And then you did follow up with saying you know it sounds negative, but I know you're not putting yourself down. And then you did follow up with saying you know, in certain facets, certain areas, right, or you don't think of things the way that other people might. And I think, as business owners or parents or leaders of whatever, I think that can be one of our greatest strengths knowing that we do have deficiencies, weaknesses that we're not so good in. And obviously you've identified that.
Ty Cobb Backer:How long did it take you and we talked about this earlier before, offline here but how long did it take you to be able to put the pride and the ego down, like, when did you identify, like, look, I'm going to raise my hand, I'm waving the white flag here. I need to surround myself around smarter people, like, what? Was there a moment, was there a tragedy? Was there something in your career where you're kind of like you know what I need to open up and I need to start asking for help so probably a little bit of it started.
Woody Casey:Um, there there's. There's a couple of turning points in my life. Um, one was, uh, realizing that family is not family, um, that the family will take if you let them, and I thought that I could be the Superman and the hero for everybody, and it cost me a lot, um, so, coming on the backside of that, um, I had to kind of change a little bit. But when I say I had to change, it probably took me three or four years. Um, in our mastermind group, eric's talking about trust, and for me it's trust. Um, I got to the point I didn't trust anybody, and not to go too deep into this, but I told you, I've been. I went to therapy a long time ago and what my therapist told me is, when the people that teach you how to trust meaning your parents break your trust, it is hard to recover. And so there's a point in my life and I can't pinpoint it specifically, but it's probably eight, nine years ago where I kind of just threw my hands up and said, okay, god, if this is what you're going to, this is the way you're going to treat me. I'm just going to just open up and let everything happen that can possibly happen to me. I'm tired of being closed off, I'm tired of living a negative life, so to speak. And I just said you know what, I'm going to start trusting people until they prove I can't. And then I'm just I'm a pessimist. I tell people I'm a pessimist with an optimistic hope. And it's funny and people like well, why are you a pessimist? Well, if you believe the worst, the only true things that surprise you is things that are better. So if you go through life as a pessimist, your your. Your emotions that come to you are happiness and joy because things are better than you expected them to be, whereas if you're an optimist and things happen, then you're the opposite of that You're sad because bad things happen. So if you expect the bad things and you plan for them, then everything that happens to you is easy. You know, one of my favorite shows is Navy Seals, and the only easy day was yesterday. So if you kind of look at life as you wake up, you know it's going to be a battle, but you're prepared and you're going to get through it. And then tonight when you go to bed, you can reflect on it and see how well you did. So back to that trust thing. So I started opening up.
Woody Casey:I have a Kim that works for me. She's my operations manager. She has stuck with me through thick and thin. She's been with me now, I think, 14 years, 15 years, something like that. She's seen the good in me, she's seen the bad in me and she's still there. Her family's my family. So Kim has I shouldn't say this on the air Kim has access to everything I own. If she really wanted to screw me over, she could. She's probably the one person in my life that has. She has my personal bank accounts. She has all my information. She has every password I have. Because she's a person who runs most of my business life and my finances. I have to trust her to do that, and I do. She's been a wonderful person in my life. She's happily married. So not to me, but yeah, it's.
Woody Casey:Trusting her was probably one of the ways that caught me to start trusting others and I look at people who are surrounded by a lot of great friends and I tell people I don't have a lot of great friends, I have a lot of few. I have a few friends that I greatly admire and appreciate, but over the last six, eight years my friendship circle has grown immensely to. I couldn't even tell you how many friends I have now. You know it's it's. It's been a complete changing. But back to your original question was I don't know when that really took hold in my life. It's been a very gradual climb for me. It's something I struggle with. You know we talked about judging people based on appearances earlier. I still fall guilty of that and I'm pleasantly surprised a lot when people aren't what they thought they were in a negative way.
Ty Cobb Backer:So yeah, no, great response. I like it was a great answer.
Ty Cobb Backer:Like not no, not knowing when that exactly took place. In it, it's progress, right it it. It takes time, I think, cause I was just sitting here thinking back to like that I'm still not perfect at you know. Um, you know, I still want to know all the answers, I still want to be Superman, I still want to get in there and help people and and uh. But you know it, I think there was, there was, there was a tragedy in my life where it began, I think, and it may have started even before then, but and I talk about this a lot as well it was the passing of my mom, and before she passed away, she, I had the privilege to have her move in with us for a couple of years up until she literally passed away in our home and we were out one night and, and you know, everything came through my cell phone, everything came through.
Ty Cobb Backer:I mean all of it sales calls, repairs, service, everything leads. It was the company phone and I know I always answered it, but I was really burning both candles at the end here. You know I was, you know not that I was taking care of my mom. My significant other, jana, has, god bless, her too took care of my mom full time basically, and at that point in time she had worked at TC Backer Construction. My son busted out two kids back to back. We got two beautiful grandchildren. So she at that time it was kind of like a decision we had to make. You know, jana, who I had lost, who was my ride or die co-pilot and drove me because I had lost my license for a long, long, long, long time, I think almost 15 years total. And so Jana drove me to the appointments, sales calls, I mean all of it measurements, meetings, all kinds of stuff. But anyhow, we decided to for her to to be at, stay at home, grandmom and and take care of my mom at the same time, which was beautiful for both my mom, her and the grandchildren Joel and Quinn. And so I had lost my voice of reasoning, not that I couldn't talk to Jana, but she wasn't with me every day, but anyhow, we went out to dinner one night and my mom said two things to me that were very profound and we've heard these a lot, but I heard it. First thing she said to me was is that life is too short? No shit, right, Looking at a woman who's battling her second battle with cancer, and she said you need help, was the second thing she said to me. And, boy, she had no idea how true that was, psychologically, physically, mentally, emotionally at that point in time, because the phone rang. The phone rang and I actually red buttoned it for the first time because that's how I fed my family, that's how I was able to have my mom move in with us and take care of her, and not that my mom, she, they own a bar and a restaurant. My dad's still with us, thank goodness, and um, you know. So she, they, they own a bar and a restaurant.
Ty Cobb Backer:I grew up in the hospitality industry and um, but I heard what she said and I think that's when for me, my guard, I have trust issues. I always will. I work on it on a day to day basis and I really feel like a lot of it comes from not just pride, you know, and ego, and but it's fear of trusting people because of and I think a lot of it had to do with my old misbehaviors, you know what I mean. It's almost like if you're significant others accusing you of you know cheating on them all the time, chances are they're probably cheating on you because they have a guilty conscience. And I think I think for me, growing up in a, in my profession here, because I I've literally used to be the youngest, but now I'm one of the oldest people here at TC Backer today, the top five, I would say, of the older old heads. I'm an old head today, right, I guess a 50, 50 ish is considered an old head, but anyhow, I feel like you know.
Ty Cobb Backer:So I went and I tried to find some help and we did, we had a great team. But I didn't run it that way, like I didn't empower people, like they kind of waited outside my door and waited for me to give them direction, opposed to empowering them to make decisions on their own kind of thing. And the culture was good. It was a good, it's a good way to run things if you want to stay relatively small. But I knew that there were so much more and I felt like I had a lot of time to make up because I had pissed away most of my childhood and my teens and early twenties and and just pissed away and just felt like you know, finally I got my shit together and I got to make up for lost time. So, like I'm running, running, running, put my head down, running, and then when she passed, like I, just how I grieved with it was is I went to work. And then when she passed, like I, just how I agreed with it was is I went to work and I worked hard and have I still really haven't even looked up the enjoy it yet, I think.
Ty Cobb Backer:But anyhow, I knew that I wasn't the smartest. Ok, I knew I wasn't the smartest person in the room and I heard it, I read it, I'd listen to it, someplace where it's like I needed to surround myself around smarter people than me and certain aspects of of my professional life, and so I had to find these people that I trusted. You know, maybe not with my personal bank account and things like that, that that that kind of trust that's. But I understand having a Kim, and you've spoke very highly. So, kim, if you're watching this Woody has never had an ill thing. He always says very positive things. So whoever this Kim chick is man, she must be a rock star. But I too have a Kim here that has been with us for 11 years now.
Ty Cobb Backer:I've had Perry, who's been with us damn near 17 years now, and these people who are smarter than me if it wasn't for Perry, you know we had a decision to make back in the day Do we go with Peachtree Accounting or do we go with QuickBooks. And back then I don't even know if Peachtree is still around. We chose, thank goodness, quickbooks. Perry helped get that up going.
Ty Cobb Backer:Like I'm not a CPA, by no means, you know so I delegated and empowered again here we get empower people to and leverage their strengths, because Perry's pretty nerdy and he's good with numbers and very organized and you know, that way gave Jana some time to to kind of back away from the business a little bit.
Ty Cobb Backer:And then, like Chris Baker, we got Glenn. Like all of these really smart people that are making decisions right on a day to day basis, and they're probably having a meeting upstairs right now that I don't even know what the fuck they're discussing, and they're probably having a meeting upstairs right now that I don't even know what the fuck they're discussing, right, but if we want to be and want to have impact and want to empower people and create change in people's lives, we have to let go. And I think if you can really have that mindset of you know, getting the ego, getting the pride, getting the fear, removing fear and again, I'm not saying that it doesn't creep in every now and then and I don't wonder what the hell are they talking about?
Ty Cobb Backer:Are they talking about me? Are they talking about how shitty of a leader I might be? And that's crazy talk. Do you know what I mean? But I do feed myself shit sometimes, you know, and I know that I'm the only one that can really blow this thing up meaning in a bad way, if I stormed out, if I'm having a bad day, and I take it out on them, or you know, and and rip away that responsibility that I gave them and and I think by me removing that nobody can do it as quick and as fast and as hard and as long as I can, you know cause I thought that I held on to everything for so long too long, you know and thought nobody could do it any better. This is what's crazy is is I think everybody in this building has done everything that I've ever done way better than I could do it then and definitely now.
Woody Casey:For me it was control. I'm a control freak. I want to know everything. Like you said, I want to. I know everything and I want to be involved in everything. And one of those side effects of not trusting people is not sharing.
Woody Casey:And I don't know if Kim knows I tell this story, but I owned a men's salon for almost a year and Kim made a mistake one day. So I came in the next day and we were going to have a conversation about it and I said why did you make this decision? And she goes because of this, this and this. And I was like well, what about this, this and this? She goes.
Woody Casey:Well, I didn't know that and my problem was I was always taught information is power and power is what you want.
Woody Casey:I realized that for me to be more successful and to be better, I have to freely give all the information I have.
Woody Casey:You may not agree with it and you may not understand it or whatever, but it's my job and I tell people this all the time that I'm going to overshare, I talk too much, I know that, and I'm going to tell you too many things about myself, about my personal life, about all the bad things about me, but I always figure that the more information people have, the better decisions they can make. And that was kind of a turning point for me and Kim and our relationship was the realization that if I'm going to let her have the power to make the decisions, I also have to give her all the information I have. And I tell people this all the time If I die tomorrow, the company's not going to suffer, but if Kim dies or quits I'm screwed. You know, because she does so many of the our relationship is is very symbiotic. There are a lot of things that I'm really good at and there are a lot of things that she is really good at, and the thing is, is those don't they're?
Ty Cobb Backer:not the same.
Woody Casey:Um, there there's overlap, but there's not that much overlap. You know, people in my life girlfriend get upset because I don't know what day of the week it is, I don't know what's on my calendar, I don't know what's my schedule like, because Kim does, you know, and and if I want to do something, kim has to put on my schedule so that I know that it's coming up. I can lose months because I got my head down and I'm working and I don't know what. Someone will say hey, you know, this trip's coming up in January. Yeah, we've got months. Dude, it's December. Okay, that means I got to start figuring that out, you know, so it's.
Woody Casey:I don't. I don't think of a calendar in linear. It's kind of abstract for me. So you can tell me something's coming up in October and I'm like, okay, and I'll forget about it. I don't think that it's five months away or six months away or whatever. It's just it's abstract, it's out there somewhere.
Woody Casey:So the other thing that Kim has helped me do is get the rubbish out of my brain.
Woody Casey:I'll come in and we don't do it now as much as I used to, but we have what we call data dump days where I'll come in and I'll have 15 different things rolling around my head and I can't think straight because they're cluttering up my mind, and so I'll tell Kim and she'll write them all down, and then we'll go through and cross out the ones that are not our bad ideas and we'll look at other things about hey, let's find somebody that can do this for us or do that, or this is something we're going to work on and, unfortunately for Kim, a lot of that falls on her shoulders to get that stuff done, because I think of these things and that I need to implement them, but I have no idea how to implement them, so I have to make her go find somebody that can implement that or teach us how to implement or make us better. So, yeah, for me it was learning to give up control and I still struggle with that.
Ty Cobb Backer:Yeah, yeah, me too, me too, and I think transparency you touched on transparency there. It's like the more information that we devolve, divulge, the better off we are, because the more that we hold on to and the less that they know they can't perform at the level that we're expecting them to perform at, and less mistakes are made. You know what I mean? Because she made a mistake and how we I think we deal with that too and realize those aha moments Like it sounds like you had like an aha moment, like no shit.
Woody Casey:I tell everybody that story about kim and I I know tim kim takes it good, naturally, like she should, but you know, for me that's that's so key for a lot of us that we were talking about salespeople and and and giving in and potential. And you know, we look at, we hire them based on what we think they can accomplish and then when they don't, is it because we didn't pour enough into them or they're not performing on their own and me just pouring everything I can into somebody One, I get emotionally attached to that person as an individual. I don't want them to fail, but also having enough realization that you can't make somebody succeed if they don't have the drive, the work ethic to show up every day and get it done. You can train somebody to be the best, but if they never implement it, they're never going to be. So that's kind of that, that dichotomy, and we talked about that.
Woody Casey:I told you about that nfl sonya, that nfl coach that said, son, your potential is going to get me fired. Of that, that dichotomy, and we talked about that. I told you about that NFL Sonia, that NFL coach that said, sonia, your potential is going to get me fired and I have to remind myself of that when I am looking at somebody's performance is are they performing to where they should be? Are my expectations too high for them? Am I not allowing them enough grace to fail and then succeed? Or are they just not performing because of something on their end? Yeah, and sometimes it's a hard look inside and for me, I always beat my own standards. You know, in our mastermind group I talk about sales, that that's where I struggle and that's what I'm trying to hire and get done, but I don't always hold myself to that same accountability that I hold the, that I want to hold the sales guys to Right.
Ty Cobb Backer:So, yeah, that was weird. Things got glitchy. Now I'm guilty of that too, you know. I'm guilty of not holding to my own standards that I expect everybody else to. And I was talking to Jana last night I think it was last night about um being able to read my mind. Like what do you mean? You can't read my mind. Like, and she has, she's learned how to read my mind.
Ty Cobb Backer:Because I was giving Tam shit the other day. I was like you need to know what I need before I know I need it. You know what I mean? It's kind of like Jana was like she can't read your mind, you know what I mean. And I's kind of like Jan was like she can't read your mind. Do you know what I mean? And I don't know if Tam would be watching this or not, but we were kind of having a discussion about Tam, my assistant because not that she fails, by no means, she has definitely improved the quality of my life and the business just because of like yesterday she was like don't forget this, don't forget this, don't forget this. And then, five minutes later, she knows me well enough to remind me again Did you do this, did you do that, did you do this, you know, and it's like we, we need that.
Ty Cobb Backer:But getting back to like the direction thing, like I've been using, there's a cemetery over here. I've been using that as a metaphor here lately. You know I'm guilty of telling people just go go to the cemetery with zero direction, just get over there, you'll figure out what you got to do when you get over there. Okay, well then they're kind of like duke to doing their way over there, trying to figure out like why the hell is he sending me over to the cemetery, when all along what I needed you to do was is there's actually an oak tree that's in that cemetery over there, and every time the wind blows it's damaging the top of one of the tombstone. Okay, well, if I would have gave you just that much clarity, you'd be like oh shit, okay, grab the chainsaw, run over there. But then when you got over there, you discovered there's two other oak trees and because of the empowerment right they already know they might say hey, there's two other oak trees over besides one. Do you want me to take care of them? Yep, so they're over there. They clean up the oak trees. Well, then they discover shit. There's leaves all over the place. Maybe I'll rake it up. They'll rake up the leaves, then they discover, hey, the grass is getting a little too tall. Yep, mow the grass, then they can start seeing the actual faces of these tombstones. They're like, hey, we can't read the words, maybe we should power wash it. Right, but with just that little bit of clarity up front, right, it doesn't even have to be a whole lot, but just some direction, right? So they're not like trying to figure it out. And then I'll get pissed because they didn't figure it out with very little. Just go over to the cemetery. As far as directions go, right, cause I'm I'm guilty of busting people shit up Like what do you mean? You didn't figure it out, just figure it out, you know.
Ty Cobb Backer:And for the longest time, glenn's job description. He asked me what I had went through and asked everybody to write out their job descriptions for me. And Glenn calls me up. He's kind of pissed off at me a little bit, quite frankly, because one I think he thought that I thought that he wasn't doing enough and that's why I wanted everybody to write out their job descriptions. And had nothing to do with that. And and Glenn's like, and he was like what is my job description and, honestly, the only thing that I told him was is whatever it takes, and that was good enough for him, like it really was. But like a year later I'm like that's not good enough either, like I really literally have to.
Ty Cobb Backer:So here, most recently, I'm writing clarity notes to everybody from Ty, clarity notes from Ty and I've done four so far.
Ty Cobb Backer:I've reviewed three of them with three of our teammates and after the conversations, because we're implementing some new things and some changes are coming and stuff like Like I don't know how to do this shit, but we're going to do it Right, I'll have these great, grandiose, fricking ideas. I don't know how to F, we're going to do it, but guess what? We're going to find someone or you're going to figure it out how to do this, and I know that about myself. So, anyhow, I, giving more direction and being more clear, I think is something over that I've recently have really trying to hone in that skill because fortunately it is a skill and it's something that I can work on and I can get better at. And that's only because if I'm not clear on the vision, how am I supposed to expect our teammates to be clear on what they're supposed to be doing every day and the importance of what it is that they're doing and how it affects everything else.
Woody Casey:Clarity is. You sparked something in me just with that. You know I'm trying to hire salespeople and I just think salespeople are salespeople because that's you know, not being in the sales side of things, to me it's like go out and sell. You're like how You're your sales guy. You should know how you know. So having that clarity is something that is definitely something I need to work on. And when you're talking about job description, kim and I have a running joke that her job description is written in pencil because it's subject to change it and change it whenever I need it to be.
Ty Cobb Backer:Your job is whatever I tell you your job is yeah Right, yeah no, and basically that's what I was telling Glenn like whatever it takes. But that was enough motivation for for me to for him to be like okay, whatever it takes.
Woody Casey:We talked about that a little bit earlier. One of the best pieces of advice I ever got from somebody was, you know, not being the smartest person in the room and hiring the smartest person in the room. And we talked about A and B students work for C students and when you give an A and B student clarity and direction, they're going to follow that to the end of the road. But if you do that with a C student, they're going to go okay. And then what? Or they're not going to go on that path because it doesn't fit their. You know the way you know their brain works. And then what? Or they're not going to go on that path because it doesn't fit their. You know the way you know their brain works, and I have this conversation a lot that my brain doesn't work linear, you know it works abstract, it's a visionaries, you know it's, it's I'm all over the board, you know. So I can't sit and be task orientated as much as I used to be able to because my brain world, you know, and it's off.
Woody Casey:On another tangent, I'll be in the middle of a conversation with somebody on the phone and forget that I'm in the middle of a conversation on the phone and start dialing somebody else. And I've done that and it's like crap, I forgot. You know, sorry, you know, because they hear me. What are you doing? I'm like, oh fuck, I was calling, all right, you know because they hear me. What are you doing? I'm like, oh, I'm just calling somebody else. You know, it's like crap. You know so it's, I've done that and I and I.
Woody Casey:The thing is, I can say I've done it more than once. Yeah, you know so it's. My brain just doesn't always work the way other people's do and it took me a long time to realize that it was okay to do that, yeah, and to be that way. You know, that's probably when you're talking about you know, coming into your own and figuring out your own path. That, for me, one of the biggest realizations and what I saw. And I told a friend of mine this a long time ago that they they asked what I was thinking and I said you really want a lot of thinking, or you know like yeah, I'm like okay, imagine a merry-go-round with 12 horses on it.
Woody Casey:You got the lights, you got the music, you got the disco ball in the middle. It's flashing lights, it's loud. Each horse in that merry-go-round is a completely different topic, and I'm thinking about four at any one time. And if you imagine four of them being lit up and then one's going to start to dim and two more, so I'll be thinking about five and then that's going to drop down to three and I'll be back to four, my brain just scatters out like that and somebody will have a problem, something in the business or something, and I won't have the answer right away and I will kind of ignore it.
Woody Casey:And all of a sudden in the back of my brain comes this flashing beacon of oh, here's how it's solved, here's how you fix it, here's your, your operation, here's the plan, the procedure, whatever. And it just shows up in my brain. And but if I sit there and concentrate on it and try and fix it, I can't get the answer. But if I let the back of my brain just have at it, it's amazing. It'll come to me either late at night or first thing in the morning, and also I'm like oh yeah, that's how we do it, so yeah, no, I'm, I'm, I'm a lot of the same.
Ty Cobb Backer:It's funny you're talking about trying to call somebody else while you're already on the phone with somebody else. Yesterday I caught myself. I called somebody and put my phone down and jumped on my laptop, literally forgot that I called somebody and I could hear them and I was like, oh shit, they're like Ty Ty Cause I didn't have it on speakerphone. So I'm guilty of similar things to myself, cause my brain it moves a hundred miles an hour and for me I call it my twilight. Some of my best solutions or ideas come to me right before. I don't know if I'm waking up, but I'm still asleep, okay, and I'll have these like aha moments of like this is exactly what we need to do to fix this or some of my. I think my best ideas come to me in that twilight, like when I stopped thinking and stop being so fixated on a solution for something because that's not conducive to me is like I'm trying to force a fix. You know what I mean it's like, but if I can just walk away from it, you know for a little bit that usually always the the idea of what we need to do or the direction of the vision that we need to go in. That's when it comes to me. Now I am also good at like. This morning, baker came to me and he was like hey, there's something that that transpired overnight I need your guidance on. Like oh, okay, cool, um, and it was just kind of like bam bam, bam, okay, cool, yep, nope, we'll just do this. Because of the experience that I do have and and the empowerment that I've given him, I was kind of actually glad he came to me looking for advice, um, because I I had, you know, experience in that similar situation that he's dealing with or dealt with this morning. But big, big, grandiose, you know things. Because, like I was telling you earlier, this winter has been rough for us up here, this, this past winter, and things were slow, which slow means cashflow slows down. I'm already thinking of next winter. You know, most people just show up to work every day. They don't even think about maybe they're thinking about Friday and payday, you know, on Monday, but and that's not a bad thing either but I'm already thinking what can we do? What can I control? I can't control the weather, I can't, I can't do it. So one of the plans that I've come up with. Obviously we're kind of pulling things back. You know things like I had a Verizon cell phone okay, we use AT&T.
Ty Cobb Backer:I had owned a landscaping business for about five years, acquired one and this past winter we decided that all of our contracts ended. We had a three-year contract with a local county and everything just kind of just. It was just that it worked out good. I saw a window, I jumped out of it. I was like, look, we're off the hook, we're done. Nothing was wrong, it was profitable, we did good. But I knew how busy this roofing season was going to be, with some new, larger accounts, that we landed more sales reps, because we also do a lot of new construction and different avenues insurance, new construction, retail. We kind of have our irons in a couple of different fires because I've learned going through seven, eight, nine and ten that you can't keep your eggs all in one industry or form of roofing, that you know that we do Shit. I kind of lost my train of thought here. Where the hell was I going with that? Woody, help me out here.
Woody Casey:Don't ask me Okay.
Ty Cobb Backer:Squirrel I just had a squirrel moment, but shit, I don't, I totally forgot where the hell I was going with that and that's, that's one of the. Yeah, I do that too. Yeah.
Woody Casey:You go down a tangent and forget what your point was.
Ty Cobb Backer:Yeah, I totally forget what the hell my point was. On that you have no idea, okay.
Woody Casey:Stop processing, getting somewhere.
Ty Cobb Backer:Yeah, oh, so I'm thinking of next year. Things were pulling. Oh, so I'm thinking of next year. Things were pulling. Oh, so the Verizon. So it was 150 bucks a month. That's $1,800 a year. Do you know what I mean? So it's like. So it's given me time to kind of go back through and dissect things, because there's no sense in spending $1,800 a year on a Verizon Verizon bill.
Ty Cobb Backer:That Horizon no longer exists and everybody knows it was tc backer anyhow. So if there is something that they want to call us for, they'll just call the number here. Because we rebranded everything. It was red, black and white. It looked. If you out of your profile you would have thought it was a tc backer truck and not a horizon truck, because we complemented both facets and we still do some landscaping, but not at the commercial scale that we were doing. We had a bunch of commercial accounts and stuff like that, but so we kind of just dissolved. That brought the manpower, brought the vehicles, brought the resources over.
Ty Cobb Backer:So there's been things changes coming because I'm already thinking about next year. Like we're not going to do snow plowing next year. It just turned into an overtime fricking fuckery free for all of overtime. That people you know, not that they didn't deserve it, but it's overhead that we don't need to absorb next winter If there is another long winter, right Between equipment breaking down the financial burden that that creates, and then the trucks down and we're not getting out to these parking lots fast. It was just this whole thing. It was like you know what. We don't need any of that stress.
Ty Cobb Backer:So, through why this was happening to me?
Ty Cobb Backer:Right Cause I wanted to look at it Like why is this happening to, why is this happening for us right now?
Ty Cobb Backer:It had me dive back into what we can do to improve things next winter and that's being the visionary right. I might not be able to do all of these things right myself, but because of the team that we've created here, it's kind of like all right, we need to make sure we cut back on overtime next winter. We need to dissolve Horizon, we need to get rid of the Verizon bill, along with all kinds of other things. Could I sit around and make all these phone calls all day long and and delete this and and subtract that, and yeah, of course, but because I've learned to trust my team, I guess, circling back to the whole trusting, I don't think this is where I was going with this, but at least we're not just oddly staring at each other right now, not saying anything but the circle back on our conversation of empowering other people and trusting other people. You know, thank goodness I've been able to trust people enough to handle things that need to be done within the business, even when my back is turned.
Woody Casey:And it goes back to surrounding yourself with people. My favorite thing is just surrounding yourself with smarter people, you know, and and part of that, and to go back to a little bit, what we said beginning was, you know, being the dumbest guy in the room. You know, I don't say that from uh, uh, self-deprecating or self-grandiocing kind of a thing. Um, to truly learn to be humble around people and we talked about this a little bit earlier um, about being in a room full of people you respect and being vulnerable inside that room. You know, it's to me, it's created avenues and it's created friendships I never thought I could have, you know, because I don't come in there with my chest out and a big head on my shoulders.
Woody Casey:Trust me, I've got an ego. You know, I've got pride and I still have that. You asked that earlier when, when could I set the pride aside? 20 minutes ago, you know, or 20 minutes from now. You know I'm very prideful. You know I'm. You look at where I came from and the amount of traveling I've done and the things I've got to do all over the world and see, I'm very prideful in my stuff, but every, every once in a while, when I get a little bit too big of a head on my shoulder. The man upstairs kicks me in the nuts and says, um, pay attention, yeah, this isn't about you. There's something else and you talk about. Why is this happening for me? I love that mantra because I just had this conversation with a friend of mine, um, a couple weeks ago. He's went through some issues and it's like, remember, you're going through trials and tribulations right now for a reason, it seems to prepare you for something that's coming, which is probably the truth, but you don't know what's coming up, and it could be years ago.
Woody Casey:A friend of mine's her dad died and they were very, very close and she was upset and we were having a conversation about it and she's like I can't understand why god would take such a wonderful human being. You know my father, this that I said you have no idea. I said there may be a time when you're standing at the airport and you're in line with somebody who just lost their father and you can offer words of comfort and words of words of wisdom to them, and it may be only a five minute conversation, but that conversation can mean the world to that person and without you having gone through what you went through, you wouldn't have been able to help that person in that moment. So, yeah, our lives get hard, our lives get get get tough, and there are things that I've gone through that I'm like why, why do I have to go through this? Why is this happening to me? We talked about my 2023 year, which was a crap year of a year for me. I don't know why I went through that I probably never know but I got through it. You know there are times where I was outside kicking a tree because I was just angry at the world and angry at everything, and but I got through it. You know I'm not as financially set as I would like to be where I'm at right in my life right now, but there's a path forward and every day, like I said, we get up and we take that extra step and we go one more step, one more step and pretty sure you're going to be there. So you know, it's just it's truly being humble is very hard. It's probably it's a lot harder to be humble than it is to be prideful.
Woody Casey:And we talked about being comfortable, being uncomfortable, and that's part of it. You know, I'm putting myself in places where I'm extremely uncomfortable Roofing shows, conferences. Last year I spoke at three of Chad Michael's events. The smallest was 150, largest was like 300. Being up in front of there for 10 minutes terrifies me. I get tunnel vision. I have a hard time just putting words in front of each other just to get them out, and I've only got. You know, the first time I spoke was like three months. The last time I spoke was nine. You know, I got more comfortable doing it and it wasn't as bad. So but yeah, it's still still tough.
Ty Cobb Backer:Yeah, it is being resilient to, you know, bouncing back, you know, after bad news or bad situation or even a bad year, you know, and having the tenacity to just keep moving forward. You know, I think that's the thing about entrepreneurship that social media lately, or nowadays, or always has been, doesn't show. You know that it's always the glam shots and it's not. It's never the ugly stuff. And if it is ugly stuff, it's usually somebody pointing other people's shit out, right, and they're probably the ones that are pointing the finger have three pointing back at them. You know what I mean. And this isn't easy and it hasn't been easy. It's, you know, we've been doing this for for 17 years now and it's, it's not, it's not being been easy. You know there's always, you know, a correction year here in aerothon in the mix, or just an off year, and and you know it always looks pretty on the outside. But you know, but it it, it isn't, it's, it can, it can, quite frankly, get pretty ugly at times.
Woody Casey:That's one of those things about social media is nobody ever posts their negatives. Um, they're there. It's all about the, the trips, the pictures, the, the wild moments, but you don't see the 23 hours in 50 minutes of all the crap. They got through to get that 10 minutes and I can. I can.
Woody Casey:I'm as guilty of this as anybody being jealous of other people's success, and I've had to teach myself to be grateful for other people's success and to offer genuine words of I am so proud of what you accomplished. You know, you and I talked about what happened to us in the past and things like that. Where you're at today isn't anywhere near where you used to be. Congratulations, you know, being able to say that and genuinely mean that it's. Sometimes it's a struggle for me, because you look at people who you don't think work as hard as you do or put in the effort you did, and they were blessed with a storm at the right time, or they hired the right person to create their sales team that made them millions of dollars, and you're like I went over your struggle and trying to figure that out. Why are they winning and I'm losing? They're just winning differently. You're still winning If you wake up every day and you go to work and you're trying, you're still winning, and congratulations for that. But sometimes it's a struggle and that's pride saying why is it them and not me, pride saying why is it them and not me. You know. So, having kind of trying hard to put my pride and my jealousy aside, which I struggle with, to be able to be happy for other people's accomplishments, to me that's one of the biggest things that probably turned the corner in my life was that attitude of gratitude that you learn that, dude, just because somebody else is successful doesn't mean you can't be.
Woody Casey:You know, it's not like there's limited amount of success out there, you know, and everybody's success is different, you know. You look at I'll use my, my mom's generation for an example their greatest success was raising a family. You know, they didn't care about jobs outside of the home for the most part, but nowadays that level they don't look on them the same way. But you raise kids and put them out in the world and they're doing fine and successful. That's success. Yeah, you know, that's just a different level of success. You can see guys who have all the money in the world and a crappy home life. Their kids are worthless, and they may see me successful in business, but they're not successful at home. So success is relative to wherever, how you define it.
Ty Cobb Backer:Yeah. However, you want to grade that Now. It's funny you brought that up because yesterday I felt like I was pretty, I feel like I had a pretty successful day, and it wasn't financially, it wasn't, you know, monetarily, it wasn't, wasn't even professionally. I felt like, you know, jana had to go to the doctors and get some, I guess, some medical procedures done and I was grateful that I was able to leave work and go and be there for that and take her and bring her home. And then later that day my son called me, twisted his ankle and he called me right. I went, I picked him up, I was available, Right, and we were sitting in urgent care last night for a couple hours and you know I wasn't like gosh dang kids. You know I got better things to do.
Ty Cobb Backer:My gratitude was my mindset was man, how grateful am I? I wouldn't rather, I would rather not be anywhere else, but right here with him, right now, you know, and I felt like that to me in that moment because I don't always have those moments, that attitude of gratitude, of how successful that to me I had a successful day. I was there for my family all day, all day doing dad shit. You know what I mean and how grateful I was to be able to do it. I was also at work. I was in and out doing. You know I didn't let anything over here fall to the wayside or anything like that, you know. But that's not what I meant by the successful part of it. The successful part of it is that I was. I was there for the household. You know what I mean, cause Jana's usually the one holding the fort down. You know what I mean. She works her ass off now, more than she probably did when she worked here at TC back every single day taking care of all of us knuckleheads on a day to day.
Ty Cobb Backer:And it was, it was, and it wasn't even like it's my turn. You know what I mean. To babysit. You know I don't babysit my children. I'm a fucking father today. You know what I mean. And and do dad shit, and that's how. Really, yeah, I look at work as as success too, but not as important as I used to like. My priorities are a little bit different today and I think that just is is maturing as as an adult today a little bit, and not letting my ego and selfishness get in the way of. Like man, I should be at work right now and um you know making money and uh, you know it's not, it's not.
Ty Cobb Backer:you can have all the money in the world and still be miserable as hell. You know, and I've been there, I've done that, and you know what. It comes and goes and ebbs and flows, man, and it's like I had to seek out happiness in other realms, outside of money.
Woody Casey:When Junior my son was little I did pretty well. Not great by anybody's standards, but I did well and I didn't make six figures in a year. You know my average years were 40 to 60, but I was a stay at home dad Well not stay at home, but yeah, I worked.
Woody Casey:But when you talk about success, at that time in my life my success was my son always made it to practice because I took it. You know I never missed a game. You know, from the time he started soccer up until high school, you know I went to every practice, every game. I think in all those years I think I can count on one hand the number of practices I missed because I was out of town. But to me that was that's my. My greatest achievement was being able to do that for him and for me I mean, now that you know he's on his own and 32, and yes, I am that much older but that's one of those things I think about in those days of watching him practice and watching him play and just being on the sidelines, just enjoying the fact that I got to do that. I'll take that to my grave.
Ty Cobb Backer:No doubt man. No doubt, no doubt. Well, we've been on here for an hour and 12 minutes and it's getting getting to be close to one 30 here, woody, and I know you've got to take off soon, but thank you for sharing your insight with our audience. Man, thanks for having me, I hope it was entertaining for everybody.
Ty Cobb Backer:It was great. You did a great job. So thank you so much for coming on and thank you everyone for joining us on this episode of Behind a Tool Belt, and if you found any value in today's episode, share it with someone in your crew and make sure you subscribe for more interviews with leaders in our trade. So until next week, you guys take care of each other. And again, woody, thank you for joining us, thank you for having me. You guys have a great day.
