The Entrepreneurship & Innovation Studio

Prime Shine Car Wash: Business, Family and Growth with Evan Porges

• Stanislaus State • Season 1 • Episode 2

Share episode

Welcome to another compelling episode of the Entrepreneurship & Innovation Studio, where we explore the passion and purpose of entrepreneurs in our community. In this episode, we revisit the remarkable ascent of Prime Shine Car Wash, this time through the lens of Evan Porges, one half of the dynamic father-son duo that revolutionized the car wash industry in the Central Valley.

Evan takes us on a compelling journey, recounting his transition from a liberal arts major to a dedicated entrepreneur. He reveals how his path to success was paved with invaluable mentorship, a commitment to lifelong learning and unwavering support from his family. Join us for this candid and insightful conversation about the art of building a business that is not to be missed.

Co-produced by the Warrior Entrepreneurship and Innovation program and the Office of Strategic Communications and Marketing at Stanislaus State. The E&I Studio is edited and recorded in the KCSS studios on the campus of Stanislaus State.
The views expressed by guests on this podcast are not necessarily those of the University.

Welcome to the Entrepreneurship and Innovation Studio, where we explore the passion and the purpose behind some of the amazing people in our community and above all, their stories. I'm Dr. Pablo Paredes Romero. In all my career, I've been fascinated by entrepreneurship and innovation. From the moment an idea is scribbled on a napkin drawn on a tablet, whiteboarded, spoken out loud in the shower or in the car on the way, someone's nine to five. It's all about the work and the art behind the venture. Evan Porges is the son and the father and son at primeshine. He's almost paramilitary in his demeanor until he answers your questions, speaking thoughtfully and almost vulnerably. He's one of the most instantly likable and impressive people you'll meet. Fathers and sons, taken together, are a complex phenomenon as relationships go. Add to that the emotional charge of starting, growing, expanding, maintaining, and selling a successful business. It's not drinks at the clubhouse. It's passion, principle, and political pugilism. All while forging a bond that defies any one day, week, year, sale, client, or call. If iron sharpens iron, then the blast furnace is a place of creation. Let's talk about community. Tell me about the community in which you grew up. There were multiple communities, and so grew up in Los Angeles. Big community, a lot of motion. You see action, you see glitz and glamour and life at a certain pace. Obviously a beautiful area when you're young, those things, I'm sure they're affecting you, but you're not really realizing you're just a kid. You're growing up in that environment, but you are, you're still taking it all in. Then I moved to Modesto. That community I found obviously in more ways than one, obviously it's a much smaller community, but it was a community. I don't think growing up in a big city like Los Angeles, you really get a sense of community. And so for us, the move to Modesto, it was after my people thought, boy, that must have been really and for me it really wasn't. That was not a difficult transition. And quite frankly, the people and the friends that I met in the Modesto community in the three years that I was here, I went to high school. Far deeper relationships than the twelve earlier years in Los Angeles. In terms of your DNA, what did those two communities imprint in that, would you say? I think growing up in La. That portion of my life helped form, I'll say some risk taking, the sense of adventure. And it was a totally different time than obviously today's times. But my mom would just in the summer, I'm ten years old, and she would say, here's $5 in your Op wallet, grab your boogie board. I remember this. I'm taking you to the RTD and you're going to Redondo Beach today on your own, you and a buddy. Here's $5 that'll cover you and jump on the bus with your boogie board and have a great day. Just be back for dinner. That's true. That's the way it was then. There wasn't fear. And so that teaches you, it teaches you responsibility. It teaches you again to be able to accomplish something. What sounds as simple as jumping on a bus here and going there and getting back, but that's a part of the imprinting of teaching you life skills. And so I think growing up in that area helps with that. And then you move to a town like Modesto, and I think that's where you develop more of your people skills in a smaller community, people have your back more, at least I felt, than in the bigger city. It's more of a dog eat dog world. There's so many more people, but you move up to a town like Modesto, I think that's where I really started to develop my people skills, my enjoyment of people, my wanting to help people. I think that's where a lot of that started once we got up to a smaller town, so totally different person. Had you stayed in La. You think? Yeah. We often talk about in terms of opportunity. In Modesto, we ultimately became, I'll say, a big fish in a small pond that shouldn't be taken negatively. We're nothing in Los Angeles. We're certainly not who we've become or what happened to us in a town like Modesto or the Central Valley where that relates to is we were able to help more people here. We were able, with our lives in our position, to give back more in a community like Stasaus County than ever in Los Angeles, where you're a little fish in a big pond and you're nothing, the dynamics are totally different. Totally different. So what does the word community come to mean to you in your life? Community is people helping each other. It's creating new ways to make the whole community successful. You have these different levels of community, because I also think about when I read this question was, I have a community in my own house, right? And so you have your smaller community that's just focused on your immediate family, and then you have little larger your friend circles and different circles, and then you have your city and your county, and it gets bigger from there. I think for us, community is really our immediate circles that are looking out for each other. That's what has become most important for us at this phase in our life. It's being able to give back to the community that no doubt helped us get to where we are. Speaking of the business community, and we'll talk about that for a little bit, if you'd like. How is the business community here in the Central Valley evolved? Do you think this is when the business starts? I'll say that you had a really kind of I'll say more of a it was just grassroots. I mean, I want to say I want to say mom and pop, I want to say to some degree hokey. But it was small town. We thrived on things. Like there was an organization called Trade Club where we would go and everyone would throw their business card into a raffle machine and it got picked and you want whatever you want something. It wasn't extravagant but you want something. Right, okay. And chambers of commerce and it was much smaller and small thinking back in those days. But as I think as time went on, obviously with the internet explosion and the world influences, I think it was important for businesses in small cities, turlock and Modesto to take advantage of that kind of technology. And so it did evolve out of that little small mom and pop to much more sophisticated and we were right in the middle of that. That was kind of fun to be a part of. Whenever we did anything in the business I encouraged all of us to think of ourselves as a capital B business and not a lowercase B business. I want businesses to think of themselves as something bigger. If you start small and think small, you'll just be small and you can be small. You can be a small business but still thinking big. Where do you see it all going here in Central Valley? Where do you see the business community evolving into it's a tale of two cities. What I see is some of the larger mid market and larger companies selling because of opportunity and business climate. So I see that happening to a lot of our local mid market and larger companies and then I see the little guys staying smaller and doing fine. But it's evolving not just in Modesto because let's face it, you could drop down from anywhere into Modesto and if you looked around at the retail environment you could be in any city USA. And that's good and bad. They're all the same. That's troubling to some degree. But I think for business today you either get big or you stay small. Being in the middle, you're going to get eaten. That's just a reality and that was a reality that we found. What is the single most important thing you would tell the new business owner in the Central Valley about Central Valley? A little bit of what I just said was plan bigger, build bigger, expect more. I think one of the reasons why the Central Valley still lacks some of the more popular retail markets and stores and what have you is that the demographics of our community and what you'll read know, whatever kind of done in Brad Street and whatever sources you're getting. The demographic numbers and the economic numbers of this community doesn't tell the story about what is here and what is capable here. And so even when I find myself involved in some small development projects, what I am reminding partners and others who are doing it is do it big do it bigger and do it better. And we discovered that in the wash business, where several of them were just built too small, and so we couldn't ultimately do the volumes that we wanted to because they needed to be bigger. And so that would be my advice to folks coming to business here, is expect whatever your pro formas are, double them. Got it. Let's talk about learning. What would you say was your most powerful learning experience as a small business owner? You do look back. You do find certain intersections where you discovered you had what I'll call the chops to do this. When you're 22, 23 years old, and you're fresh out of school and you've had all kinds of different jobs, and you wonder, where's my future? Everyone does. There will be a defining moment. And my defining moment was when we had an employee, was actually an employee that was an acquaintance of my father's. He hired him. My father hired him, and the guy was out of control. I don't know if he was on something. I don't know. And that's not a digit norm for hiring the guy. The guy was on something, okay? And he needed to go trying to get a hold of norm. This was early 90. I mean, it's not as easy as it is today, right? We didn't have cell phones and all. I don't even know if we had pagers, right? Anyone listening? Remember pagers. Pagers. So any event you make a decision. The decision was you go up to the guy and you say, back in those days, you don't have HR departments and need checks before they leave and all that. You just say, Get off the property, you're fired. You'll get a check when you get a check, and that resonated with me. I can do this. And I have the chops. In a moment of tension and conflict, what do you do? Do you flee or do you fight? Do you make the right decision? And I look at that as an early example of a time and place where I made that right decision. What did it tell you about yourself in that moment? At that point in that moment, it said you had what we call in Yiddish, the chutzpah to make the decision. You weren't going to wait for someone else. It was okay to live or die by that decision. And the company, even early on, we had a culture that you can make decisions, and there wasn't going to be a negative ramification for making decisions. What does lifelong learning mean to you? What does it mean? How do I continue to do it? You continue to evaluate day by day things that you're doing and applying the lessons that you've learned in the past, because you're always changing and evolving. You really are. And to that end, I think you just have to stay constantly aware. You can read. You can go see people, talk, and you can do all that, and that's all great, but I think I've learned the most just by watching and being aware. And I'll even say, even as a kid, I was always curious by watching people, whether it was watching the guys do the trash, watching. We had a landscaper, Paul Takahashi, I'll never forget him. I would watch him every time he was there. And you just learn so much by watching and observing, and I learned a lot from people like that by just watching and learning. And so lifelong learning for me is just that you're constantly observing. There's a sort of devotion to craft, no question, that you get from observing people. Who or what has been your greatest teacher. Obviously, my father and I in that relationship that we've had, very fortunate. I mean, I'll say I've worked for him for 53 years, mostly successfully. Family businesses are just that, with challenges. But there's no question he's been a significant mentor and teacher to me. But what I'll say about mentors and teachers, it's equally as important to learn what not to do as it is what it is to do. And so if he was here, I'd share stories, wouldn't hesitate. But he, over the years has showed me how I don't want to be equally as how I do. And that's okay. That's important to me because we're different people and we have different styles. And quite frankly, to that point, it was almost tongue in cheek over the years, when we'd go into business meetings, he would say, okay, you're going to be the good cop, and I'll be the bad cop. And that was sort of our roles, and that's okay. We did that well together, but no question, and we'll probably dig a little more deeper into that. But he was a tremendous teacher to me. I think it's really important to seek mentors also in your life. And so some have fallen into my lap, and there's a fellow by the name of Chuck Katie who owns a chain of car washes up in Portland, and he owned the chemical company that we bought all our chemicals from. Him and I had a lot in common. We just hit it off. I was very fortunate that I'll say for the past 30 years, he's been in my life, and not just with business skills, but personal skills as well. He's taught me, and then I sought out relationships within our industry, the business industry, the car washing industry. I would get a trade journal. There'd be a Focus article on the best in our industry in Indiana that happens to be in Indiana. And knowing that I was going to be in Indianapolis for the Indy 500, I called him out of the blue and said, you don't know me. I'm this little operator with four stores in Modesto, California, and I'd love to buy you a cup of coffee. I'm going to be in for the raise. And he goes, I'll do it on one condition, okay? And he says, Bring all the marketing materials that you have as I want to learn from you, okay? How powerful is that? Okay. So here I am calling this guy who's running in my mind, they still have the finest operation, one of the finest operations in the country, and he wanted to learn from me. That was big. And in fact, we did meet and coffee turned it into lunch, lunch turned it to dinner. And the relationship is still around today. There it is. I'm a teacher, but I'm also a student. Really interesting. And I'll say those three stories and my father, Mr. Katie, and then the Indianapolis folks probably are the three that most influenced me, no question in my business career. What do you feel you are most apt to teach another human being? It's funny. So I circled not golf. Not golf. Okay. What I think made us successful, how do you teach it? Hard work, dedication, focus. That's what you teach? If I could, if there is a way to teach that, that's all we did is we just worked hard. We stayed focused on what we were doing, and you've heard me say it, that we were never interested in money. And making money, that was never a focus or a consideration. Money was just a byproduct of hard work, dedication and focus, consistency, doing the very best we can, making it better. Clean, dry and shiny in our industry was always our mantra. It's got to be clean, dry and shiny. Right? And so we focused on that, and the rest followed. Research is a topic of some discussion in the circles in which you surround yourself right now here at Stan State. What role do you believe research plays in the everyday life of a small business owner and what role do you think it should play? Yeah, that was as interesting as I thought of that question, because I think small business needs to be careful on research. I mean, spending a lot of money on something that may not work. And we were cautious. And at times we got caught with being on, I'll say, the bleeding edge of technology and research. I think small business needs to, again, be cautious of how forward they are with new technology. I think for us, one of the more successful ways we approached the business was I'll say benchmarking instead of innovating. I don't know if we ever innovated, necessarily. Prime shine wasn't our invention. It was innovative to bring it to the Central Valley of California, but it wasn't our invention. The concept existed. Primeshine. The brand didn't. It just took someone with Cajones to say and Norm to say, I think this will work here in the Central Valley of California. So that was innovative. But in terms we as the business grew, we sometimes bid off a little more than we can chew too early. We looked to benchmark, we looked to industry experts. We looked to get help with problems and to collaborate with others. And so, like Mr. Katie, I talked about earlier. So Chuck owned the chemical company and 20 washes, and so what a great collaborator he's making. The chemicals we're struggling with certain they're not coming out clean, dry, and shiny. Right? He's going to help us with that, and he's going to help, and he's going to do the research. So I think for us, it was more about partnerships than innovating and research. What is it that sends you down the wormhole of research? Like, what do you geek out on? I have no idea what that question means. Okay, we're going to stop this right now. You could leave it in, honestly. Okay, so here's the moment. Here's the moment. You're on YouTube and you find yourself ten minutes into like, how did I get here? What do you love learning about? So it's funny because Leah, my wife, she'll see me there on the iPad, whatever, she's like, Where are you? So that's the question, right? I love planning trips. So for me, it's travel, how to travel, how to get from A to B, what to do when you're at B, restaurants, hotels, I love all that stuff. And so I guess that's where I get lost, is finding and making sure I plan all the trips for the family. And maybe I got that from a bit from Norm. He does a lot of that too. That's where I end up on the Internet looking at restaurants and reviews and hotels and that kind of stuff. You think there's any connection between the crafting of the experience, the designing of the experience, and what you did at Primechine? I think that's a wonderful connection. Growing up in the 80s, we were students, whether we knew it or not, of the retail experience becoming something that corporate America started to pay attention to what was going and getting a cup of coffee in the or in the I mean, you'd go to the diner, the coffee shopper, I mean, there was no experience. Sure, it's an experience, but it wasn't what the Starbucks created. I grew up watching what Jamba Juice was doing. When you would go into the Jamba Juice stores, you just felt happy. Why? The wallpaper, the fruit, the way they designed, you know, the bright colors. And what I would do when I was in these types of retail establishments, first thing I would do, I would take all their literature of, come work for us. This is what we do. And again, that's benchmarking, I didn't innovate it, but what I did and what I like about benchmarking is better word than stealing, cheating, all that. It gives you the opportunity to see what these very smart people have put together in corporate America and then apply it to yourself in a small business. And so you take those types of companies. Southwest Airlines. Same thing. Prime shine was somewhat the brand evolved out of Starbucks, Jamba Juice and Southwest Airlines. And I would look at Southwest Airlines and I'd watch the guys on the tarmac and see how they logistically move things around. And then you looked at how we at the wash ultimately move things around. I think we got to look for models in all different industries, not necessarily the one that you are necessarily in, because the reality of what we found, our industry, the car wash industry, really lagged far behind in technology. And there was very little investment in technology in that industry. And so if we were going to push our industry, and at times we were pushing, not innovating, but pushing, we'd push our vendors. It was because we said we need more like we see over here. And so we did that often with our I'll say all software providers, POS providers, those types of people. I've heard you discuss innovation just for a moment and what your sort of perception of the word is and its application to Prime Shine. Stripped of context, what does the word innovation mean to you? It's solving a problem or a niche or a void that exists in a particular industry. And we filled a void in niche in the community by dropping this product, this service, into modesto. And so that was innovative and so that filled that niche. The other thing, what's really unique and what was brilliant on my father's behalf of timing, of bringing that service into the Central Valley was it was also the late 80s, early 90s, we were starting to value convenience and time. So there was this convergence of what was going on at the time and introducing this model, because in the car wash industry, there's basically three models. There's the self serves that you pull into the bays and you do it yourself. There's the full service where you get out of your car, give someone the keys, and you go in the luggage shop, deli, whatever, and then they wave the towel at the end and they've dried it. And that takes 30 minutes, could take an hour, right? And so this middle that existed across the country didn't exist in California because no one thought that it would work here, because Californians are vain. Californians want people to see the car they're going into. They want a grandstand when their car is ready and all that stuff. But at the time, convenience was starting and QuickServe was starting to come out, which is the reason why the first name of the company, it was Prime Shine Express. And the logo emphasized express. And because my father really liked that word and obviously it connotated speed and in and out and all that, which was new concept as the years went on, because that concept of convenience was becoming so readily in every industry. Everything was express. You had Express sandwiches, you express luggage. You had Express shoe repair. You had express dry cleaning. Everything was express. So people were just calling us Express, and I didn't care for that. And so we rebranded to emphasize Prime Shine. I really want Prime Shine to become that synonymous with washing your car. I wanted people like, you go get a Kleenex, right? That's a brand. That's not what it is. Xerox was right. I want Jello. That's a brand that's not a product. But it became that, and I really wanted Prime Shine to become that. And ultimately, at the end, that yeah, I think we were pretty successful with that right here, right now, where we find ourselves in the current business climate, current business community. What do you believe that the word innovation should mean to us here and now in the Central Valley? Hopefully, we're going to look at the products and the resources that we have here in the Central Valley in terms of innovation. And I know there are efforts to look at our biomass that we create within the AG industry and say, what can we do with that? That's on kind of a large scale. I think in the Central Valley, if there's something that I think we should focus on is to elevate what we used to call it's good enough and the good enough fault. And what that means is, I think, a lot of times, because there isn't as much competition to be excellent like there is in a major market. When you're in Los Angeles, there's so many options that you better be excellent or you just don't last. In the Central Valley, we tend not to have that kind of competition. And competition does drive excellence. And so I think in terms of innovation, I would like our Central Valley businesses to be aware of and try to drive excellence in their product, in their employee care, in their customer care, and their service. We think that way necessarily, which is one of the reasons why had a level of success, because we focused on making sure that our employees were taken care of very well so that ultimately they would take care of the clients. I want to go back to the middle. We were talking about innovation and Prime Shine, how there was one model, obviously self serve, and the third being the end of the bookend being the could be an hour, 45 minutes to an hour. Take me back to that moment where you were defining the middle, and you knew it before most people did. What was that like? What made you draw an involuntarily, quicker breath when you realized it? I can't take that away from my father. That was his breath. I'm still in school. I'm getting my degree. So I graduated in December of 91, and the first car was washed in April of 91. I graduated just a little bit after, so I can't share in that first breath of what it was like, I can tell you. I'm sure he probably shared with you, but if he didn't, he was routed to go look at this model in Portland and then one up in Reno. And when he saw that model, for him, it was the sea parted. It was an epiphany, is the way he describes it to me, that that was exactly what he was looking for. It was also a business that sort of suited his personality because he was a New York type, A kind of guy. And so the sitting and waiting for your car to be washed and cleaned and dried, it was so unproductive. And so when he saw that model and then up in Portland, when he saw Chuck Katie's locations, how they were modernized and so it took what was typically in the Midwest exterior model, old dingy run down. What Chuck Katie did up in Portland was that he modernized and made it sexy, cool, techie, fun, all glass. You could see out, non claustrophobic, lots of light things that were all very so, again, this benchmarking concept or seeing a model and saying, let's apply that. And I think that's really a skill and important for all of us in business, is to you don't necessarily need to reinvent it, but I think it's important to put your spin on it. It's like in football, these things like it's a copycat league. Yeah. I mean, all plays are kind of fundamentally building upon others before them with their own spin. And I think that's okay to do. Let's go into application. There's sort of an interesting dichotomy between theoretical, conceptual knowledge and application. These streets, what we do out here. What does the word application mean to you in the context of a business education? You meant how many have I filled out in my life? Fair amount. So I was talking to Frankie earlier. I had a lot of jobs up until Prime Shine, once hired by Prime Shine. Maybe it was nepotism, but I stuck around for that 28 year run. Tough job. So at times yeah, at times. And you asked a question about that later. So I don't have a formal business degree. I was a polySi major liberal arts people. That's my background. In terms of applying yourself, I think, because a lot of times we hear that term, you didn't apply yourself. You didn't apply yourself enough. And I don't know if this is kind of where you're trying to go with this, but I think it's a shame when we lose focus and try to do too many different things instead of keeping things a little more narrow, focus, supplying ourselves and really digging in deep. I think that's where we learn the most and can do the most good battles. North of your neck sort of type thing. Yeah, that's there. What do you think it should mean? What should it mean to, for example, our brilliant business students here at Stan State. Our brilliant students here at Stan State are going to want to balance both their in room learning and experience with their real world learning and experience. Because there's nothing in a book, there's no professor that's going to prepare you or teach you how to fire that guy when they're out of control. And you need to make a decision. You just have to be there at the moment and collectively think about all your life's experiences and make the right decision at the right time. But a book is not going to do that. So you need the classroom experience because you want to engage with your other students and you want to hear the professor's perspective. And you certainly need to learn what we're teaching our students here. But really to get the fire in the belly and to get the knee jerk reaction, making decisions, it doesn't come by anything that you're going to necessarily learn at school. That's not to say, hey, come to school, but you got to be out in the real world too, doing things, and we talk about it a little later. I think, if anything, what I want our students to do is I want them to engage with other people. Hopefully the university is aware of that and making sure that that happens. Because today, so much of our youth, they're engaged with everything other than another person. And some of the most important business skills that have been helpful for us are people skills. Being able to communicate? Absolutely. What would you say is applications? Find this reward clean, dry, and shiny. When you've applied yourself to a particular problem, to a particular situation, the reward is self satisfaction. You always know when you're satisfied. I mean, you have this feeling you're sitting up a little taller, you're high five in the air. We all know it. When you've applied yourself and done well, that's dopamine driven and you just love that. And so those were the big wins that we looked for in the business, was just self satisfaction or even team satisfaction that we applied ourselves to a particular situation and it worked out. What do you wish to learn one day and apply irrespective of audience, meaning who sees it or who knows about it? I think we have. I think we are. What do you wish to learn one day? I think we're very fortunate 53 and have the opportunity now to give back and apply what I've learned over 30 year career in business and in the community. We're very fortunate. And what I really enjoy is and I've helped young folks start their own businesses. That really drives me. So it's happening right here, right now for you. Yeah. What do you feel our students would be best served to know about applying what they learn here with us? It's really important to be in the classroom and engage and read the books and do the tests and all of that, but force yourself to find yourself with other people in other situations, in situations where you got to make decisions, situations where you might be the leader. Put yourself in groups, and sometimes you're the leader, sometimes you're not. And that's hard, too. You got to learn how to follow the leader and be okay with decisions that you wouldn't be okay with. I think that full, rounded experience for the students should be a combination of both out in the world and on campus. Who is Evan Porges? I think I'm a fun guy. I think I'm dedicated, I'm creative, I'm involved, I'm funny, I enjoy a good time. I'm probably less serious than serious. In my day, I enjoyed leading, and in that role, we always tried to have fun while doing it. For who Evan Porges is, hopefully he's been a good stepfather, a good son, a good husband, all those roles, good community member. I've tried to give back. I was very fortunate to have fallen into a business model that did suit a lot of my who is Evan Porges? Because Evan likes to create, evan likes to work with his hands. Evan is a good marketing guy and advertising guy. Evan had a lot of energy back then, and so the business worked for me because I was mechanical and I was creative, and so it really worked well. I happened to also have a penchant for things being organized and clean, and I was that kid, and I still am. I'm the guy who makes the bed. The day can't go on unless that bed is made and tight and there's intentionality, and that's a personality type. I can't stand a mess. I can't stand things being cluttered and out of place. And so that worked very well when working in the business that we were in and scaling the business we were in. Because the systems that were created were created out of necessity, because everything had to be organized. Because you can't scale a business if there's no organization, even before we even get there. Best practices, safety, all of it. Yeah, right. So going back to younger Evan, what was he like? Yeah, I'd like to say that he was the same guy. Right. One of my very first jobs was delivering newspapers in Southern California, and we lived in part of Los Angeles that was on a hill, and so delivering papers, it was fun on the way down, not so fun on the way up, but the papers would get delivered to us from the company. And this is back when kids could do this. I don't think that happens anymore, but the bulk papers get dropped off a little bit after four in the morning with the inserts, and that's what time you'd get up, and so it start. I think I credit the newspaper job to establishing my biorhythm. I'm a morning person. Okay. I had no problem getting up early, folding the papers, putting the inserts rubber band, putting them in the carriers, your front and back, you're there and then you're on your bike. Yeah, I can smell it, right. I can smell the ink. I can look at my fingers and see what they looked like from the ink. That was hard work. That establishes yourself. And I think, again, credit my parents for just saying, yeah, not only are you going to have a job, but we insist that you do these things. And so that was very influential, always hardworking. And then you fast forward. In high school, I started my own landscaping company. Was called Evergreen Enterprises Pickup Truck. And I would throw all the landscape material, the machines and back and go mow lawns, edge, even Mr. Takahashi. I told you, I watched him landscape. And so I learned how to do plumbing and PVC and put sprinkler systems together and all that stuff. Wow, how old that was in high school? I was in high school, so I was driving at the time. So I was 16 when I started that. Evergreen Enterprises. It was fun. An office job wasn't going to be in the cards for me. Again, it's a little ironic and appreciative that Norm started the car wash business because it just worked for me. It really fit well for my personality of who I was. When did you know the office job wasn't for you? Well, I never really had never I never had an office job. My job's through college. So then I go to Arizona State in college, and I'm a short order cook. So then I'm learning those skills. I'm cooking burgers and fries and hell, there's no crazier morning than when the Phoenix Cardinals are playing local. At the time when they first moved back to Phoenix, they played at Sundivil Stadium, and I worked at Duffy's Bar and Grill, just outside off campus by the stadium. Sunday morning on game day, and I'm running the fry machine and the grill machine and burgers. And you transition. It starts with hash browns and eggs and then transitions to burger. It's insane. There you go. But again, for the lessons in life, what that taught me, there's no more efficiency that you need to learn than a short order quick kitchen yes. Of kicking out orders that are coming in. And so go back to application and learning from your life's lessons and applying. So all these different jobs I applied, even though at the time I'm not thinking the way I'm organizing my burgers here, this is going to help me wash cars. You don't think that way, but it does. It comes back in terms of efficiencies and logistics and all of that. It become part of your chops, no pun intended. Comes part of my chops, yeah. To answer some of your questions, you have the question here my least favorite job, because in college I had a bunch of jobs and the least favorite was and again, it taught me what I'm not. I'm not a salesman. I sold sporting goods and treadmills at Sears, and I had to wear the three piece suit and the tie and go and sell treadmills. And it was the worst. I hated standing there on the floor for 8 hours a day in Sears inside telling these people how great these treadmills are. But by the way, you're probably going to want to buy this three year warranty. It was horrible. What made Evan ill suited for selling treadmills in three pieces at Sears? I mean, look at me, I'm sitting here in shorts and flip flops, right? Mean, yeah, that was not going to be my forte for sure. But then when I discovered that that wasn't for me, a buddy of mine says, hey, listen, my uncle owns the largest furniture store in the Phoenix area, and why don't we work in the warehouse and do deliveries? And I'm like, I'm all over that again, outside working with hands a little more. And so lots of great stories and for two years we delivered furniture out and around the Phoenix area. And I loved being out and about helping people. It was sort of this and again, little similarity application. What I liked about the furniture delivery was there was this at the time, I didn't call it this, but there was this instantaneous gratification for the customers getting this product in their house and being wowed later in life with the car washes, we experienced the same phenomenon with instantaneous gratification. You have a dirty car at the start and 100ft later it's clean, dry and shiny. And that's this instantaneous gratification that you see. So there was this application that I learned earlier at an earlier job that applied later. Where did Evan see himself? Now then? I never pictured myself where I'm at today at all. You just don't I know there's a lot of people that say you've got to write your goals and put it on the wall and shoot for an aim for it. I was never that person. We just worked harder, worked smarter, got up earlier, stayed up later, and just always focused on making things better and the best. I mean, I can tell you life changed with failure. And my failure, I was a liberal arts major, political science. And so what that meant because the washes hadn't started, you declare your major and even after the wash start, I don't know that that's what I'm going to go do. That what I was going to do was I was going to go to law school. Okay? And then I took the LSAT. Yeah, it was the most humiliating but also humbling experience for me because it's not the way my mind is clearly not wired to have succeeded in that standardized testing environment. So that failure for me, that failure was critical, because I was either going to have to figure out how to do better if I wanted to get into a law school, or at the time, the washes had just opened and Norm extended an opportunity and said, why don't you come home and see if this is something you like? And if it know we'll have that discussion, what it looks like down the road, what was the moment like right after that offer was made to you? There's some hesitation. I mean, I think we all you have this when you leave for school, you have this I'm never coming home kind of attitude. I didn't have a whole lot of that because for me, as I mentioned earlier, I liked modesto. A lot of my friends that grew up here were like, I got to get out and never come back. That never really occurred to me because the three years that I was here for high school, they were great years for me. And so coming back, it didn't bother me. I didn't have that. The coming back was being a part of a startup. That's what it was. It wasn't this. There was one location and was there room for me? My brother in law was working for the company at the time. What's that dynamic going to look like? I met this girlfriend at Arizona. She wanted to come out. What's that going to look like? I'm working for my father, who's also going to be my boss. What's that going to look like? And so, yeah, there were a lot of concerns. At the same time, better than anything else, I had the time right, come home and hang out with dad and do this. And it was a lot of fun. The roles and the power dynamics involved in a father and a son assorted family working at a family owned business, when did you first become aware that that was an evolving thing, an evolving phenomenon? Yeah. I mean, I think anyone who's listening, who is in a family business or thinking about it can empathize that the roles within the business, they overlap. There are times where is dad dad or is dad boss? Well, he's kind of both, but when does it start and stop if you invite your father over for a barbecue on Sunday, is he your father? Is he your boss? Those are challenging things that we experienced, and I'm not sure if we mastered any of it, but I think we did a fair job the best we could. I mean, we're still best friends and hang out. It didn't shatter our relationship, and that happens. And so we worked hard. We always said most important was going to be our relationship out of any of these differences that we have. And so we worked really hard. We also said that the business had to be successful in order for any of the other relationships to be successful. And so we made sure that we focused on the business first. To that end, we did have to depart with family members over the years, and those were some really tough decisions. And again, a part of the chops that you have is when you need to part ways with family members and how you do that. But again, as the business got bigger, we had to make sure that we were making decisions for, at the end, all 250 employees and not just one individual employee, which is hard to do. Who do you remember from your earliest allies? They could be employees, supporters, mentors. And why I said it earlier, I can't overstate the influence my father apparently, like I said, primarily has had on me. I mean, I worked for him I'll say I've worked for him for 53 years, good and bad, right before he was my boss. I mean, as a kid, he was a hard working guy, so I remember him just workaholic, working hard, working hard for the family, but then making sure he had enough time for coaching us and cubmaster and those things. So he did the best he can. But again, that's early. Sure, there were coaches, there were teachers, professors, bosses. There were a lot of people along the line. Later in life, in one of my high school jobs, I worked for Jack Frost Ice, and the owner of that company, Wayne Henry. I would see him loading and stacking trucks with ice with us, and that made an impression on me. This guy owns this company and he's doing the same thing we're doing. Those are these little things that, again, you don't really think about it how big of a deal it was at that time, but there's nothing better than you having a boss in the freaking trenches with you the best. And then, obviously, Mr. Katie, as we've talked about that guy, there's been no bigger ally in my life than watching how he handles himself and how he conducts business been just phenomenal for me. One to ten on the inspiring meter, an eleven. What would Evan Now say to start a conversation with Evan then these questions. Pablo, what would Evan now say? To start a conversation with Evan then to go back to your question, that would be interesting to say now to Evan then how will you judge yourself if you're successful or not? That would be interesting to go back and say, how will you judge yourself when you're 53 years old? How will you judge yourself if you've been successful or not? No light icebreakers of this conversation? No. That'd be an interesting question to ask a lot of. Call them, whether in their teens or in their young 20s, in their school, how are you going to define life being successful for you? It's really interesting, and hopefully because we tend to be so thing oriented and monetarily oriented, that stuff tends to be the focus. And I hope I would have had the thought at that time that it's not about stuff and money. Your major in college was polysyrene. Yes. How would you say that it altered the course of your life? That wasn't going to be ultimately my course in life. I hate politics. If I had to do it again, I for sure would have chosen a different major. But you choose a major, right? To do something. What? Maybe I'll go to law school. Okay. You should be liberal arts. Pi. Psy. You just fall into these things at times. I guess going back, I would have done something different. Not sure what, but it wouldn't have been that. Because, again, I don't enjoy politics per se, but it was interesting. But again, for me, college isn't about the major per se, unless you're going to be going to that next level and you need that certain degree in order to get to the next level. It's about dedication. It's about, hey, I started this and I finished that. That life skill is more important. It's about people skills. It's problem solving. It's navigating the challenges, finding your classrooms. There are so many more lessons in education than what your major is. But it wasn't as fascinating as, say, people ask me. There was a question, what would have been a major that would have been curious? Or what some of your favorite classes? And really what I was fascinated in was the social sciences. Not the political sciences, because the social science and the art of being able to predict behavior, that just fascinated me. And so when I had the opportunity to jump out of the major and take some classes, it was the social sciences and the science of how people behave. People react. That really was interesting. Adversity, being on the ropes. It's all part of the story. Take me back to the first moment that you had the towel in your hand. Describe the scene, the what the where, the why of it. Like the car wash towel in my hand. Actually, that was a metaphor for something else. But it applies nicely in the car wash world, doesn't it? It does. We talked a little bit about one of those situations earlier when we had to make a decision unless absolutely necessary. We used to not have to make decisions, or we encourage ourselves to take a deep breath and not make it necessarily in the heat of the battle, when emotions may dictate a decision versus thinking through and being logical. That being said, in the wash business, things happen so fast that you're making decisions all day long. And yes, the heat of the battle. When you go through the washes today, you see people guiding you on and hitting a button. Back in the day, we use brushes and some scrubbing, and we're throwing water on car. I mean, it was really tough back then. It was a really different world than it is today. But again, we tried to not make decisions in the heat of the battle. If we didn't have to did you ever want to throw in the towel? I don't think I ever really 100% contemplated throwing in the towel. As I talked about earlier, the challenges of the family business, and I'm young and I want to start my own family, which was a time I got married. That marriage failed, and I think that was a defining moment of who you are. I realized I couldn't be everything to everyone. I couldn't be this great boss, I couldn't be this great son. I couldn't be this great husband. I couldn't do it all. I couldn't be this community guy. I can't do it all and be everywhere. And so she was encouraging me to move. She didn't like being here. She wasn't from here and wanted to move, maybe, hey, let's go. Life will be great if we lived in Pleasanton or Livermore, Walnut Creek or just somewhere other than Modesto. But it would have been impossible for me to run the business, to grow the business, to be in the community. Because I really firmly believe that if you're going to be in business in this community, you have to be in this community to do your business. And so that means being here, going back and forth, being a bedroom boss, if that's a phrase. It is now. I just made it. Being a bedroom boss, going back and forth, it doesn't work. And so ultimately, as hard as those decisions were made, that marriage wasn't going to last. And whoever else was going to be in my life moving down the road had to understand that I'm fully committed to this business and fully committed to its success. And it's a family business, and that's going to be a part of it. Also, on the subject of family, what role has family played throughout your journey and how did it evolve? For our family, the business was the business that was number one, and that was fine. We had divorces, my parents got divorced, my sister got divorced, I got divorced. I mean, so you have all these fractionated family experiences, and it's not this big extended children and grandchildren and their grandchildren and everyone's together. And it's a different scene with us. It's not a bad scene, it's just a different scene for us. I would often question, are we a family business? How do you define yourself as a family business? So ultimately, it was just him and I. So is that a family business, father and son? I don't know. I guess because we had family members in and it didn't work. I guess in that respect, that was a part of the journey, was giving family members opportunities. We did believe in giving family members opportunities. Why not? They're family. But the hard part is, if it doesn't work, what do you do? And you try to make people successful as best you can, and if they can't, then you got to move on. So that family dynamic certainly did influence me along the way. But are we a family business? Yeah, I guess. Father son. Yeah. Part of the difference is also, you got to understand, I joined the company so early that him and I built and grew this thing. I didn't give birth to it, but I raised it. There is this little different interesting that I started with it so young, so early in its stages, that it's a little different dynamic. So Norm and I, it's a little more of a partnership than it was this father son, and that's okay. That worked for us. It's an interesting duality, the way you describe it. Was there anything that told you at any point that, yeah, it was always supposed to be him and me. I owe him a debt of gratitude. I don't have an MBA, don't have a business degree. But the debt of gratitude is that early on, I think he just enjoyed spending time with me. But I think also subconsciously, he realized early on that if this kid I'm 21 years old, if this kid's going to be a part of this run this, grow this, lead this, he needs to be exposed. And so I'm very, very fortunate that I had a father, because I've seen a lot of examples in our industry and others where the patriarchs or the matriarchs are like, no, you just stay in the warehouse and do your thing. We're going to go off and make business decisions. How on earth are the children supposed to learn the business, learn the business of the business if they're not involved in those discussions? And I call that being in the room. And so I was very fortunate that my father always grabbed me to be in the room. And so we're washing cars. He would say, Schedule yourself off the line. We're going to go meet with the banker. Schedule yourself off the line. We're going to the marketing person, we're going to the architect, we're going to the engineer, we're going to the lawyer. And so he gave me the opportunity early on to be exposed by virtue of being in the room, to these lessons, of running the business outside the business that did multiple things. And it taught me in that world, it taught me the language of that world, the business world outside of washing cars, but it also garnered the confidence in those professional providers, in me. They got to know me okay. And then, so it wasn't like there was this baton transition. He handed it to me, and now I'm president. It was sort of this seamless event because I was always involved with the professional providers, the CPAs, the lawyers, the architects. It was really, quite frankly, again, the brilliance of Norm was recognizing that maybe he just wanted to hang out with me, but that really helped me develop the family, was Norm now in my life, with my wife and, say, the step kids, my bonus children that plays a whole nother role in our life. And Leah, I've been with Leah 20 years and so we had maybe ten locations ended with 20. And I can tell you that having the support of your wife, your girlfriend, your wife who became my wife in the endeavors that I needed to do to grow the business to support me on the business trips and the development and the planning commission meetings and the late nights. And the early mornings. You can't do it without the support of that person at home. And I didn't have that the first time around. What I had was the push and pull and the fight and don't do that with Leah in my life, it was the opposite. And she encouraged me and supported. Know no question in part how we ended up where we ended up. It's a force multiplier, isn't it? No question. What does the word leadership mean to you? Am I a leader? Am I a good leader? I don't know. Probably depends on who you ask. Okay. Tim Harms, who's a CSU grad and was with the company the longest in lots of different roles with the company. He made a funny sort of story one time about the seven stages of how I used to make decisions. You, me. Okay. And he was with the company for 18 plus years. We grew up together. He started in 1998. So he had all the way through the access to all this. And I learned from this because this was early and maybe it was always the way it was. I started with someone have a great idea and I'd start with no and then work my way back to eventually. That's a great idea. Okay. I wish I would have thought of it myself. Something happens in the middle. There's a lot of different middle stages. There's some pain in the middle. I liked being the guy to make the decision, not afraid to make the decision. I want to make the decision. But in the leadership roles at the end, as the years went on, I really enjoyed much more being part of the listening, actually finding comfort in being the least smart person in the room. The success of Prime Shine as we grew and professionalized the company, is that we surrounded ourselves with professional managers, CFO, HR, engineering operations. It were way smarter than me. And so if there's anything that I missed today about being not having the business, it's the collaboration with that team, solving problems together. You have to understand as a leader that you don't always have to have the answer. In fact, no one expects you. I think a lot of leaders find themselves where, my God, I got to solve this. No, you don't. You might need to have to figure out how it gets solved in terms of collaborating with other people and finding other sources and what do we do? And let's work on. This together. And this was something in my early days, I always felt like I had to have the answer, and if I didn't, that was a failure. With some maturity and realizing also with maturity and also outside experience. I think it was really important for me. What grew my leadership skills was by volunteering on different nonprofit boards and seeing how other organizations are run and sitting at boardrooms with other professional leaders and business owners, et cetera. And that was very helpful for me in my leadership skills and training. A leader, they're a people person. They're empathetic. They make employees be the very best they can be. And so one of my I found myself a role of a leader was in many, many times, if you were in a role that you were struggling in, it's my job to find a role that you're going to be successful in. And I viewed that as one of the biggest challenges. But the biggest part of my leadership skills was trying to be successful, making people successful. Who is the leader who impressed Evan in his early years and why? We talked a fair amount about some of the leadership and what I saw growing up. Again, I don't want to overstate it, but my father, for a lot of different reasons, was a leader because he was able to not just in work, but then also as a father. For me, I really thought about this question. I'm trying to think of who this great Ronald Reagan? And this is why none of that hit me. That mean I don't have, you know, go get him. The mean I didn't have any of those types of, you know again, my father was certainly very influential bosses along the road, just observing a lot of different leaders and leader styles. Who was your hero growing up? I can't point to that Super Bowl quarterback, that hero, that actor that I don't it's not part of my vernacular. I'm sorry, I don't have that. Who was your hero growing up? I can tell you who my hero now is. Who's that? And there's no question it's my wife. I married her. She is incredible. Single mom, raising two children, having two jobs, super successful. I mean, that's what it's all about. So I look at what she's done and who she is and what she does now she's involved in the community, and that's a hero to me. How did your relationship with Stan State begin? So I think you go back to the earliest days is coming on campus, meeting Walter Strong, Marveling Hughes, those were some past, present and past development folks, and they were brilliant. And we started getting involved there. Norm joined the he was on the foundation board, and so we started the Porges family started getting involved and Champions of American Dream program was one of the earliest experiences coming on campus. Later on, we would then do job fairs here and those were always interesting. In the latter years of the primeshine, all five of our it department were all stan state grads. So STANSLAW state played a tremendous part in the success of primeshine. When you think of stan state, what comes to your mind first? The first word that came to my mind was opportunity. Hopefully the community views this institution as a springboard for opportunity. In the last year, actually, we've been spending a fair amount of time on campus, and that's been great. So I just view this as a tremendous institution for folks to find opportunity and find what the next stage of their life is. What do you see for the wii and its place in the region going forward? Hey, I'm super excited about the wii. I'm excited that you're running it, being a part of it, the ideas that you've been bringing to the table recently, it's cool. Hey, listen, entrepreneurship is by far one of the greatest ways for folks to find upward mobility within their community. Entrepreneurship comes in lots of different forms and fashion, and so we are blessed to have been found success starting a business, growing a business, running a business. If we can spark some of that into students that they realize that entrepreneurship can be an option for you, that necessarily you don't need to go work for the big guy. There's a misperception that there's comfort with working for the big company. Then the risk that may be involved with starting something on your own, that's a false sense of comfort, because, let's face it, people are getting released all the time in companies. There's no loyalty from the big company anymore, very little one. So I love that the wii has an opportunity to inspire and have the students think of something that they might not otherwise think about with entrepreneurial, entrepreneurial option. We were very fortunate to have you speak to a class of students last term. Describe the feeling that you had speaking to them. Yeah, I really enjoyed coming into the classroom. I learned more from them than they get from me, for sure. I love the questions, love the rawness. I love, in some ways, naivety of the questions because they don't know they want to know. Or anyone that can bring in is, I can give you some real life experiences of hiring and firing and customer issues and going to court and getting sued and successes and failures and starting things that didn't work and going to planning commissions and city councils and drawing up plans for a new facility. I mean, I can give you all these real life things because we did it. I think more than anything, I think the students eyes light up when you start talking about some of these the real life things. And maybe that goes back a little bit to what we were talking about. The difference between what you learn in the books and then what real life examples can bring you. And so as the week continues, I think it'll continue to be very important for us to get some folks out from the community to come on in and give some real world examples, because that's just really where the rubber meets the road. What about that experience? Would you share with or say to our next speaker? From a logistics standpoint, I'd say do a better job than I did with getting the students to all sit closer in a bundle. It was a little challenging because everyone's spread out. I mean, everyone wants to sit. I probably should have said, all right, everyone, let's all huddle down together. Let's make this a little smaller, little fireplace chat. Besides that, I would just say, have fun with it. Open up. I rattled off some facts and figures because it's curious. I think that's also it's very helpful for the students to hear some numbers and things, right. To be able to get something tangible. That is a very different philosophy from generational philosophy thinking. My father, in the early days of the business, he wouldn't share any numbers. I mean, that's very entrepreneurial. You start and hell, even cars washed per day. Nothing is shared. And then as I'm starting to come up in the leadership, I'm like, well, how do I inspire these young people? How do we say need to wash more cars? And they'd be like, More what? What's the number? Right? We evolved as a company, but in the early days, that was really interesting parts. Bit of a tangent, but it was fun to share some real life examples and numbers. And that's what I would tell the next speakers, is don't be afraid to share some real numbers with people. And they're looking for that. They're looking for that. Yeah. They don't have no tie to what that might be. So whatever you're comfortable with. Book that changed your life. I enjoyed reading, for the most part, business books. And so for me, it was books like Good to Great and beyond the Golden Arches, the Servant Leader. Those types of books were books that certainly changed my life because they changed my business life. The Starbucks books. Again, I would read books that I was able to apply those lessons to the business that we were growing. Story or song that made you say, that's me. That's my life. These aren't to complete the sentences, are they? Not yet. Those are coming up. Working at the car wash. That's great. Working at the car wash. I mean, that's a classic. Did you ever play it at no, we never played it. I'm sorry. Didn't get that deep. There's nothing that I look back and hits me as, that's my story. What role did Spousal support we touched on this earlier, but what role did Spousal support play throughout your journey and how did it evolve? We talked about earlier when I didn't have it, it was a mess, and it doesn't work. It does not work. If your home life is not in tune with your business life, it doesn't work. They have to be in sync. You have to have the support. And so I know both sides of that. I know when I wasn't supported, and then I know when I was in a relationship where it wasn't. And I think you can only be as successful at work as you are at home. What aspect of business came most naturally to you? So, for me, I was a marketing, branding, and advertising guy. That was my supernatural. And I still would enjoy loving that part of helping other businesses. The branding and the marketing, the creative. Again, maybe going back to school and picking a major that might have been a little more on the creative side, might have been a better path for me. You're asking what was natural? That just comes natural to me. Creating campaigns and coming up with clever stuff is just more natural for me. So it won't surprise you when you ask me, would you fake your way through until help arrived? It's the financial side of the business. And although today I'm pretty good with spreadsheets and PNLs and read a PNL backwards, all that stuff. And also, as we talked about earlier, what's helped me with that is serving on boards. And so you're getting familiar with lots of different income statements and balance sheets. And so that's been very helpful for me. But generally it really didn't worry about money. And so it wasn't our focus. The larger we got, the more critical it was that we understood our means. And so we ultimately hired a CFO that was able to relieve Norm of the day to day finance duties. And the CFO was really able to help me financially manage the business with the decisions I was making. The new locations because the repercussions of a mistake are that much larger. There's a lot of stuff that I remember from my previous career and just in the research and the literature about family, old businesses, and fathers and sons, fathers and daughters. Take me back to the moment that you saw that spark, that light, that most inspired you in Norm's leadership, like that individual character, personality, his own individual brilliance. How did it feel to become his business partner? I've learned a ton from Norm, and a lot is who I wanted to be, and there was who I don't want to be. And that's mean, that's fine. But again, as I think, as we talked about, he has a super high level of integrity. He has a passion for perfection. I would watch him negotiate contracts. I was in a room where this is young, you're young, and you see him, he's getting into a disagreement with a real estate agent. And he felt as though something was unfair on the contract. He got up, tore it up, threw it on the table, and walked out. Well, that makes an impression on you, right? There you have it. Okay. Those are types of things I learned from his style. Again, he took me to an awful lot of the business meetings that helped me be in the room. So again, going back to the earlier comments of The Brilliance, I think for Norm's, leadership was grabbing me and getting me in the room so that I can learn firsthand how to run the business side of the business. How did it feel as his son? People ask me, why do I call him Norm? I was about to do that. So our relationship, it's still different, it's more partner. I mean, he's still my father and he's my father, but again, he's my boss for so long. I think when I graduated college, when I came to work for the business, it just didn't feel right to be at the sites and call him dad. And I did in high school. I kind of once got to college, and after that, he became Norm, and some people just thought that was weird, but we never did. I'll say this father son per se is just partners. It worked for us. As the business evolved, we did have to define our roles because we were starting to have conflict, because I wanted to be in charge. Well, he was in charge. Well, are you in charge? Because your role is changing, too? And so how do we figure all this out? And ultimately, we came up with a list of who's doing what, and it's not super complicated. You're in charge of this, I'm in charge of this. And then we're going to formally get together and discuss what we talked about or what decisions we've made so that we're all informed. So those were some important things that we did. We put together a board of advisors, which was really important for our business, and I'll say probably for the last ten years of the business, we had an outside board of advisors, not a board of directors, and they had no fiduciary responsibility, and we didn't pay them a whole lot. But we took them to lunch after a morning meeting and talked about what's going on in the business and decisions being made, and they held our feet to the fire and asked great questions. I think that was really important, the evolution and growth of the business and in the relationship for Norm and I, because we always said if we're stuck on a decision, we'll let the board of advisors get in the middle, and we never really were. I think we're very fortunate. The two of us, for the most part, were in step with each other, that we complemented each other. So his finance abilities very strong. And not that he's not a creative guy, because he is, too, but I'm probably stronger on the marketing and the branding and all that. And so we complemented each other and that really worked. Complete this sentence. Recently I've received an honorary doctorate. The longer I live, the more I realize what a blessing it is to be healthy. Just get out there and talk to people face to face. There are always people who have more stuff. Life is there to be shared with those you love and enjoy being with. The last time I did something for the first time was speak in front of 10,000 people. I should really understand that it is more important what I don't say than what I say. I should really not be so critical. Winning teaches you nothing. Losing teaches you to question what you can do better next time. Being a father teaches you the importance of sharing. Sharing time, experience life, ideas, thoughts and compliments. The acquired taste from which I have taken away the most is having fun. And and you know that having fun. We went through an exercise about ten years ago in Prime Shine where we did a mission value Vision, mission and values statement. And when we put those statements together for me and everyone would ask and we actually put it together on a graphic, on a wheel, which made sense, a tire wheel. But for me, the most important word on there was fun. I just think that if you're not having fun doing something then why do it and find a different way, a different direction, or not do it. And so fun was sort of a guiding principle in light for us if we're going to do this. And the business was fun and we made sure of it and I think our people really appreciate that. So that's the acquired taste I have random association. You know the rules. I'll say a word and you say the first word that comes to you. You didn't give me the words here to absolutely not risk it's. Worth taking expectation keep them high vision don't lose sight of it. Craft fear. Search and rescue intentionality start your day with it temperament try to stay even keeled father best friend son did a decent job. Family, family story. I've enjoyed talking about mine. Thank you, Pablo. Legacy making a difference. Collaboration the best way to get the best result. Entrepreneurship the best option. It's not all about winning. Mentor critical routine important to have freedom. Whenever I come back to the US, it's nothing like hearing welcome back to the US. Experience no substitute. Quality what you shoot for. Objectivity important to seek all angles. Alignment what your car should have alignment at least in the business world. I mean, I think it was good to have lots of different thoughts and opinions and angles and think eventually, once you make a decision, you align yourself and you're all on the same page. But it's important, I think in the early stages of a decision that you're not all aligned. And now we come to the section we affectionately know as the eleven, having taken it from Lipton, who took it from PvE, who took it from Proust. What is your favorite part of starting something new? There's no right or wrong way. What is your least favorite part of starting something new? People saying no or doubting. What interests you the most? Doing projects and helping others. What interests you the least? Starting another business. What music, artist, genre, or song reminds you most of your early days in entrepreneurship and innovation? So this was the early 90s now, so I was all about all about the REM, the U two, the Black Crows and the Counting Crows. Excellent choices all. What food or beverage reminds you most of your memories of your first startup? Down the street from the first prime channel was a sandwich shop called Sandwich by the Inch. And you could literally go in and order any amount of inches that you wanted. No way. It was cool. What was your favorite? Turkey and avocado. Throw me four inches of turkey and avocado and I'm good. What profession? Non entrepreneurial. Do you admire? The know? Frankie and I were talking about this earlier. Really? Maybe because I worked with my hands growing up and in the business, it was all hands on and I think any profession that works with their hands, I admire the most. What job prior to entrepreneurship, did you like the most and why? Talked about it. The furniture delivery. It gave us freedom as we got to run around the town in Phoenix, got to run our own schedule, see the community way before what it is today. But also as we talked about that instantaneous gratification of seeing people happy with their new furniture. It was really cool. What job prior to entrepreneurship, did you dislike the most and why you heard it? Sears. That's right, the treadmill. And I'll not forget the image of you in a suit tie selling treadmills and maintenance agreements. It was a horrible job. Cooped up inside. If heaven exists, what would you like to hear God say when you arrive at the pearly gates? Hopefully welcome. You've made a difference in a lot of people's lives immediately thereafter. What idea or innovation would you like to pitch him? Her. They it with the universe as your marketplace. Hey, I'm washing cars up in heaven. We're going to have a 200 foot tunnel. It's going to be a beautiful thing up there. That's what I know how to do. So that's what we'll do upstairs. Evan Porn, just thank you for coming by. Thanks a lot, Pablo. Thanks for listening to this episode of the Entrepreneurship and Innovation Studio. This podcast is part of the Warrior Entrepreneur Ownership and Innovation Program, affectionately known as the we. Our series is recorded on the campus of Stanislaw State at the KCSS radio station and produced by Frankie tovar follow and subscribe on your favorite podcasting platform. I'm Dr. Pablo Paradis Romero, wishing you the best of everything. Always.