Blue Collar Business Podcast
Welcome to the Blue Collar Business Podcast with Sy Kirby. Dive deep into the world of hands-on entrepreneurship and the gritty side of making things happen. Join us for actionable tips on scaling your blue-collar business, managing teams, and staying ahead in an ever-evolving market. We'll also discuss the latest industry trends and innovations that could impact your bottom line. If you're passionate about the blue-collar world and eager to learn from those who've thrived in it, this podcast is a must-listen. Stay tuned for engaging conversations and real-world advice that can take your blue-collar business to new heights.
Blue Collar Business Podcast
Ep. 12 - The Key to Financial Success
How do you secure financial stability and growth in the blue-collar industry? Our guest, James Lipsett, an account manager at Ritchie Bros, shares insights on the significance of clean financial records and the art of building robust relationships with financial partners. We promise you'll gain a deeper understanding of how strategic financial planning and adaptability can fuel success, even as market conditions evolve. Get ready to discover the pivotal role accountants play in your journey towards sustainable growth, and why their expertise in setting clear financial goals can be the game-changer for your business.
Contracts, paperwork, and trust are the trifecta for securing financing, especially for startups with guaranteed work. James and I unpack how lenders gauge your business's potential and why nurturing long-term relationships with financial institutions is crucial. We also discuss the importance of setting clear expectations with clients and partners to maintain both healthy cash flow and operational efficiency. It's all about making wise financial decisions, and we share personal experiences that highlight the value of cautious investments and building a brand that resonates with both clients and employees.
Sales strategies tailored for blue-collar businesses aren't just about closing deals — they are about building trust and showcasing a strong brand. Together with James, we explore the necessity of adaptability in business planning, the power of employee satisfaction, and why authenticity in client interactions is non-negotiable. We tackle the challenges of bidding and the fine line between survival and profitability, offering insights on strategic bidding and how a dedicated sales approach can transform your business. Whether you're a seasoned entrepreneur or new to the industry, this episode is packed with actionable advice to guide you through market changes and foster business growth.
Sy-Con is a family-owned civil contractor specializing in water, sewer, storm drains, & earthwork.
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Hey guys, welcome to the Blue Collar Business Podcast, where we discuss the realest, rawest, most relevant stories and strategies behind building every corner of a blue collar business. I'm your host, cy Kirby, and I want to help you in what it took me trial and error and a whole lot of money to learn the information that no one in this industry is willing to share. Whether you're under that shade tree or have your hard hat on, let's expand your toolbox. Welcome back to another episode, guys, of the Blue Collar Business Podcast. You guys are going to hear a little different accent coming out of me. Today I'm joined by our first Canadian guest.
Speaker 1:You guys may have been wondering this whole time why I've got a maple leaf on the hard hat of our logo. I'm actually Canadian, my homeland is Canada and I immigrated here into the States in 2001. And anytime I come in contact with a Canadian, it just comes out there hey, fella. I've had some great experience with this guest over the last year and a half. He's opened up my mind to some different financing options and also just shown me a little bit behind the scenes of hey, this is what we're looking for, this is what we need to kind of help me when we get to the next step. He's always shooting me emails hey, we got this program, we got that program. So you guys that are having to take big chunks and figure out how to rent, lease or buy, this is the guy you need to talk to. So stay tuned.
Speaker 1:But, furthermore, if you guys have been loving this, make sure you guys have checked out bluecollarbusinesspodcastcom. It is where you're going to find all of our episodes. You can stream directly from there. Whether you're watching on YouTube, um, or listening on to any of our streaming platforms Spotify, iheart, apple, itunes, all of it, um, doesn't matter where you're at. Make sure you're following and giving us a like per episode and check out at the website. If you don't have a streaming platform, you can watch directly from there.
Speaker 1:But me and James James Lipset furthermore, he's an account manager with Richie Bros and he has my account, a couple of accounts and, man, he has been encouraging, to say the least, even in discouraging moments. Sometimes these financing conversations aren't the funnest and at least I get reasons as to why that something didn't happen, et cetera, and maybe what we can work on moving forward. And we've established such a great relationship and a friendship a business relationship first, and a friendship coming as of just here recently for sure. But we're going to talk about some interesting things today.
Speaker 1:When you talk with a finance guy, you've always got to be worried about what's that accountant saying and what are we sending over to these financial people. We're also going to be talking about the experience James had with blue collar businesses across not just here in the States, canada, literally just about anywhere and the importance of sales. A guy that has had some history in the sales market can tell you a little bit about it and the importance of having that. And, last but not least, we're going to be talking about the adaptation it takes to stay thriving in this industry, or in any industry, from the blue collar standpoint. So, furthermore, thank you so much for joining me, mr James Lipset, with Richie Bros, how are you? How's things going?
Speaker 2:I'm great. I'm great, cy, I'm great. Thanks for having me on. This is awesome. I really appreciate it.
Speaker 1:We've had this one scheduled out Thank God for shameless plug for podcastvideoscom but they have had this scheduled out and I have been really looking forward to talking to you, not just about financing, because it can get kind of uh, you know, there's these options and their packages are always changing, so it's not like you can just go here. You go, guys, this is what you should do. You've got to be talking with that banker, got to be talking with that accountant and you know how do you? What would suggest? I'm not going to say how to, but what would you suggest from a guy that has to sit there and look at excavation utility guys, financials kind of up the skirt, if you will, behind the scenes. What are you looking for from an accounting standpoint? That is number one going to either help or maybe hurt an individual from getting a deal.
Speaker 2:Well, essentially, what we look for is we're trying, from our standpoint, we're trying to build a relationship. You know, when we're looking through financial statements that essentially we want to make sure that you know you're not, there's not a lot of you know missed payments, you know delinquencies, especially like derogatories, previous.
Speaker 2:You know you know child support payments, stuff like that. That's a big big. You know stepping point from memory from where we go. So, um, just having you know starting off, like it all depends on where you are at in your um. You know your, your company, right, like where are you starting? Are you, are you brand new, right? Are you getting your first truck? Or you know, do you own a company like yourself where you've got multiple pieces of equipment on multiple different stages? You know across the town, across the province or, sorry, the state um oh, the old province area we're gonna do that a lot today, I think they're gonna enjoy it, my guy.
Speaker 1:But from from the accounting standpoint, though, what can these guys say? I'm going, I'm brand new. I'm saying I'm that brand new guy. I really want to step off into this equipment world. I can't really get past the Mini-X and the skid steer. From the accounting standpoint, what should they be looking for and what should they more or less stray away from from the accountant standpoint when they're trying to display? You know, get things ready throughout the year so they can be actively ready to go. Here you go, james, I got this deal, I'm ready to go.
Speaker 2:Cash flow is big Cash flow is big and everyone says.
Speaker 2:You know the classic saying cash is king, right, yep, right. So what you want to do basically is you want to have a good balance of your cash flow to your leverage, to what you're borrowing, essentially right Now, when you're first starting off, you want to make sure that you've got you go three, four, five months with all your liabilities that you have out there. You know you know if you have employees, if you're starting by yourself, right, you know what your fuel costs are. You know. You know what your payments are going to be, right and be and be solid. That you know if work sends out, that you can make sure that you're not going to. You know. You know get into a cash crunch right, so you want to make sure that that cash flow balance is always, is always right. You know, right on right on par there, so you don't want to have.
Speaker 2:You know you want to get started nice and early as well, like generally, most, most financial institutions look for two years time in business, right, so you want to make sure that, um, that you know you are getting started early and we call it the. You know the the first loan is going to be your bite, the bullet lock, right, you're not going to generally not going to walk in unless you have really good, you know, if you, unless you have a course graphic guarantee, right, um. Or you know you've got multiple partners, um, generally, if you're going off, you know starting out, starting out, you're going to, you know, want to try and get a lower loan. You know shorter term right, and you're going to see the higher interest rates, right, like, there's not much way around it. You don't have any, you don't have a pay net, right, we haven't seen your past payment history, right, and what this will do is this will actually start building your business, your business, from the ground up.
Speaker 2:Right, get get into, you know, a short-term loan quickly. You know, get that established right away, right, um. And then, as you grow, right, as you know, more and more business starts to come up you want to look to expand. Then you can go to your financial you know um advisor, you know myself or your or your, your bank, and just say okay, so you know I've advisor, you know myself or your bank and just say okay, so you know, I've started off.
Speaker 2:You know, I've got your payment history now right, we've got good cash flow, We've got that good balance between cash flow and leverage right, and then you can start commanding. You know better rates, better terms.
Speaker 1:So and it's all about you know who you're working with too right, that's where I was going to go with that One hundred percent.
Speaker 2:Yeah, you've got to be in my position, I've got to be honest, and sometimes it's hard, you know. You've got to tell, you've got to tell your clients just straight up, like, my end of my day is I want to make sure that your business is growing, right, you know, and your cash flow always will go like this, right, but as long as the company is growing, at the end of the day, right, that's all that matters, right? So you know, and you know you've got to build that trust, build that honesty, as well as set expectations, right, you know? Basically, hey, this piece of equipment, I can get this amount of years, this amount of months on it. Right, you know, and be frankly honest, okay, it's going to come with this rate. Here's your monthly payment. Can you make this work? Right?
Speaker 2:Last thing I want to do is lose, you know yourself to lose another, you know, a startup. You know right off the bat, because then you know you've lost that, that relationship you lost. I want to see people grow Right, I hope you will be. You know, and it works back and forth. You helped me out as well, right, and?
Speaker 1:and so you know basically, yeah, cashflow dude, cashflow is everything and, speaking from experience, when you get overextended on your cash flow, I try to be as honest as I can on this show. James, and speaking from my experience, this whole podcast is designed to help the blue collar businessman. You know the entrepreneur that's trying to make it, trying to figure out, hey, I'm really good at this trade and I can do it repetitively, but he may be, and maybe, a great leader, but a terrible businessman and how to advance and use the leverage that he's already got going on. You know what I mean.
Speaker 1:A lot of these guys have got a ton of work but they don't even know how to freaking put it on paper to go. Hey, james, look how much work I've got in front of me. Man, look, banks respond well to that, even if your financials are a little rough. As long as you've got three or $4 million in contracts or you're say you're a startup, maybe you got 50, a hundred thousand dollars worth of guaranteed contracted work from the start. That's a big deal to a guy like you because you're sitting there going. Oh, this guy understands the importance of putting the work on paper.
Speaker 2:I wish I would A hundred percent, a hundred percent and we're more like. We're not. You know black and white when we, when we we work with multiple different lenders, right, so we're able to, you know, listen to the story, right? See, you know, see that contract you have, see that piece of paper, see that. You know guarantee from you know, whatever. You know if it's trucking, you know we've got this much work here, right, it's all dependent like on you know how you build your brand, how you build your company and how you know the contacts that you're working with and how they can, you know, help you out by. You know, putting together quality letters that'll come to someone like me, Because most of the time I don't have the opportunity to speak with someone like you on camera, right?
Speaker 1:Right.
Speaker 2:Right, it's mostly over the phone, right? So you know, when we see we're not going to talk to most you know of these contracts, right, we're not going to ring up the person, and you know like maybe a haul reference.
Speaker 2:We would, right, you know, if they're getting. You know if you're, you know, doing long haul transport or something we can, you know, phone up a dispatcher. Yeah, they've been working together two years, you know, plus years, yada, yada, right. But you know, when you like with yourself doing big government contracts and stuff, right, we can look at that piece of paper and say, okay, well, we've got something going here, right. And the last thing you know, and in the, in the length of term, like how long is this contract going to be Right? So when does this? When this ends, so what's the plan after, like, trying to help my customers?
Speaker 2:you know, move forward and think forward as well, right, so when this contract ends, ends, you know, what are we thinking after that, like, do we want to put it on a shorter term? Do we want to buy it out? Right, like, we've got to have all the products, uh, ready and and educate, right, but educate my clients to make sure that they know, you know everything that I can do for them, right, and you know um, and and that I can do for them. Right, and you know um, and, and it's. It's basically like that, it's. It's it's building trust and and you know, and you know, getting everything together so that you know we can work together towards a five-year plan, right.
Speaker 1:Dude education from y'all's standpoint. The banks everybody thinks that banks are there to help you. A normal man and woman, married couple got W-2s yeah, you can go to the bank prove income. But a guy that is wheeling and dealing trying to make his way if you're starting with no capital, is wheeling and dealing, trying to make his way If you're starting with no capital, grassroots, from absolute dirt floor, nothing. It's a lot more difficult. And if you do get in some cash flow pinches, there's man. It's so hard to get out.
Speaker 1:I'm still currently finally on my way out of one, but it took some major change here in, you know, peeling back not just the books but going out to the field and watching and going. Why is this happening? And it's because and it's hard to take when you own the business, because it's my fault and I'm not putting proper procedures and structure in place. But the same goes for your money, guys is you want that accountant to set you some guidelines and parameters to stay within? Ensure that you're going to him first. And hey, the plan is this year to do a million bucks. Where do I need to be keeping my cash flow? Where's my overhead need to be? Do I need to be a 300K? Do I need to be a 500K? Keeping my cashflow, where's my overhead need to be? Do I need to be a 300K? Do I need to be a 500K?
Speaker 1:Because, at the same time, I don't want to pay too much tax. I want to pay enough tax. I know this is probably a little blurred lines from Canadian to US, but don't get me wrong. I want to show enough money to the financial institution to go, hey, I make money with my business, loan me that excavator. But at the same time, I don't want to sit there and go, hey look, I made $800,000 this year and have to go pay taxes on that and give it back straight to them when I could have used some of that money to better my business in a piece of equipment. I'm not saying not pay the government by any means, but literally it's like I would rather own an asset than I would pay it in tax if I need that asset. So to that point, guys, I would 100% let your accountant set your parameters and guidelines and goals, but then lean on the relationships like James is talking about.
Speaker 2:And lean on. Find those relationships first, nurture those relationships. Ask questions and go.
Speaker 1:Hey, James, I'm thinking about this, Am? I talk about relationships on the show. Literally every single episode, I think this comes up. But in business, business is relationships. I don't care if you're selling freaking Twinkies or you're putting pipe in the ground or pushing earth, it don't matter. It's all about the network and the relationships you're in and who you're working for. Man, I wanted to, before we move on, I wanted to jump on that cashflow. If you don't set expectations with the people that you're working for, guys, yeah I promise you, your cashflow is going to take a crunch and it's going to take a hit, especially if you're. For some reason, everybody wants to jump in the commercial game this year, thinking it's going to solve all their problems, and then they find out oh my God, I don't get paid for. But like four times a year, every 90 days, like this, is terrible.
Speaker 2:You've got to have a plan. You've got to have a solid plan and you got to stick to it.
Speaker 1:Dude, that's discipline. You know what I mean. Whatever that accountant says, stick to it. Lean on folks like James and go from there. But, dude, talk, talk a little bit. You've mentioned a little bit about, you know, working with my size of company, which, um, most of the listeners, I would assume, no, but we've got roughly five crews uh, utility and earth moving crews, and we have equipment for each and every one of them, trucks for each and every one of them, so they can only understand the size. But maybe talk about I wish I'd have found you sooner is the point I'm trying to make. But if I would have found you in year three, year four and started making a plan with you, obviously I'm not going to know all the work that I want is or not going to be on when you're a three or four year contractor. You're not sitting here going oh well, I got the next five years figured out. Hell, you're just trying to make it to the end of the month, you know and if you're nine years in.
Speaker 1:You may still just be trying to make it to the end of the month if you don't put a plan in place and execute it. But talk about how you can help guys like me on the up and up from you know a startup to where I'm at.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, no, absolutely, and you said it off there. Like, the five-year plan isn't in pen, right, it's not in stone. You keep that in pencil. You know, like, and because it's going to change, it's inevitable, right, you're never going to, you know go, the direction is always going to change, right, and as long as you know you have, essentially you're not, you know, driving your entire business in one direction. Right, like you've got to be able to. Really it comes down to the business owner and your sales game, like you mentioned it earlier. Right, like, you've got to build relationships. You've got to, and it's not, you know, you know there's, there's hundreds of excavating companies, right, thousands buddy.
Speaker 2:Yeah, there's, there's. They're not buying the excavator. You know they're buying the fizzle, right, they want to know you, know they, they, they know you, right, they know your product, they know your, your, your employees, right, they know the quality. Like it's, it's simple things. Like you know your, your piece of equipment comes off one job it's going to the other. It hits the shop, it gets, it gets blown off, right, real quick.
Speaker 2:You build your brand right and and you know, and it's those small little steps, it's those little things that can really, you know, change. It's those small little steps, it's those little things that can really change how that five-year plan is going. Because as you build that brand, as your business starts to grow, it's going to get more seen, you're going to get more visibility, and that's 90% of sales I shouldn't say 90%, but there's a great deal of sales is, you know, training your team so that you know the, you can, the sales come to you right, you don't have to hit the pavement, right.
Speaker 1:You know people are calling you. It's too crazy in the market too.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, exactly Exactly. And the more you know, the best salespeople are your employees too, right? Because if they're going out and they say, hey, man, we had this great day, Like you know, they're at the bar, they're hanging out with family at the end of the weekend, right, they're, you know, elated about how well they're having, like, how the job's going right. You know all of our equipment's great. You know it's always clean, right. They're excited to work as well, right, and that energy is infectious, right. So you know, and you know, kind of coming back a little bit too, like when you're first starting out, you know it's important to have that you know kind of standard for yourself as well, right, Like when I was, I used to drive right and I did low bedding as well, and my low bed was the cleanest low bed you've ever seen in your entire life, like. I washed that thing probably twice, three times a week, any downtime you know, with low bedding, especially with logging.
Speaker 2:We did logging up north in canada, right, um, you're working your logbook to try and keep that equipment moving. Because equipment's not moving, companies not making money. You know your fellow colleagues aren't making money. You got to keep right, so you got to keep moving. But you've, you've got to keep. You know, like I'm very proud guy, right, and you know to keep. You know what you can control, keep your controllables right. Um, you can essentially Right If you're, if your employees are basically, you know, doing, you know that that type of of of work when they're, when they're you know, kind of rambling here but like what I mean by train your team is.
Speaker 2:You know, the more people talk about you, the easier it's going to be to get sales Right. So yeah, especially when you're first starting out, right?
Speaker 1:You do a good job. And then, uh, through our YouTube membership program, um, small shout out, shameless plug there for PsyCon's uh, youtube, and I know you've been an active subscriber, I think, for probably roughly a year at this point I would hope so. Um, I was just talking to him on the phone and he sends me a picture and I was this guy. I need you to understand. I was this guy. Oh well, if I just have this, I can do that and I can do that. Well, if I had this, I could do this. And he sends me a picture and he said what do you think? And I said what's your sales like? Huh, I said, well, what's your sales like? What's your backlog like? Like, how much work you got.
Speaker 1:You want to go buy this fancy service truck? Well, it would just make doing utility work so much easier and it would just make everything so much easier doing septics, because where he's at, he's way up north, up close to you, but in the states and, um, they do some really deep septics up there, getting the sand anyways, I don't know if enough about it to talk about it. But, um, he sends me this truck and I'm like man, well, how much utility sales. We got, oh well, um, okay, well, how well, how many septics we got lined up? We got to have septics lined up. We got an excavator, we got a skid steer and he's like, well, none.
Speaker 1:And I'm like, well, why in the hell are we worried about buying anything? Cy Kirby and I need you to understand, james, I'm talking to myself because I was this guy in year and two and year and three and year and four. I get it, boys and girls. I understand your thought process. I understand. Oh well, if it would just make it easier on my guys, I could train my team All this. If you just go into debt and buy this one thing, that's OK. Go buy whatever you want, as long as you got the freaking sales to support it. And that's that's what I'm trying to get at. And he, um, I said he's got a couple of guys. I was in the same boat.
Speaker 1:It's hard to sell work and do the work and estimate the work and build the work it is. It's so hard. I don't envy those days. I hated those days, didn't think I was going to get past them.
Speaker 1:But here we are now and so basically, I just told him I said, dude, you've got an awesome website, why don't you throw 500 bucks at Google Ads? Why don't you throw 100 bucks at Facebook Ads? Why don't you throw 100 bucks at Facebook ads? Why don't you know in these different markets to try and bring in some leads? Well, I'm doing that. Well, how many leads do we get? Well, I got four or five calls. I said okay. Well, how many do we convert? Well, I haven't even sent them estimates yet.
Speaker 1:Well, you're missing the point, bob. You got to have the freaking work to keep the machines moving. Who cares if you're out there meeting production at that point if you ain't got nowhere to produce at after you get off of what you're at. And not only is it easier to have a sales and finance or a financial phone call with a hefty backlog, whether it be 80% of your year, 50% of your year, but if you just have that document and contracts in place, people are like you have this, you know where you're going in the next year. It's a big deal. But, sales man, as you know, we started a digital marketing campaign, video campaign, not only just to bring awareness to what the trade, the blue collar trades, but specifically about excavation, earthwork and utilities. That's below everybody's feet and nobody has any idea it's there, but their toilet flushes and the tap turns on and the the ground gets leveled just magically overnight and roads appear, hey so, and they just want to piss and moan and complain. Oh, you're in my way, on the way to work. You know. Well, I'm trying to repair this water main so half the town can have. You know what I mean. But what I'm trying to get at is that marketing yourself and what you're doing.
Speaker 1:I thought I was five, six years in James and I really thought, man, how, how come everybody ain't just calling me, how come they don't know about me, man? And I really sat there and I complained about that for and just got myself festered into almost a depressive state of why aren't these people using me? Why aren't those people? Well, because, buddy, they ain't got a freaking clue who you are. That's why and it's a lot easier where I'm trying to go with this Sales is abundantly easier when you have a marketing program.
Speaker 1:There's not a bad marketing program out there. Marketing is marketing. Put yourself out there and people will go. I'm just now getting guys that I went to high school with 13, 14 years ago, and going hey, man, don't you have a mini X or something you know? And they're just now coming to and I'm like hey guys, I'm almost been doing this 10 years. How? How? I mean, we've been Facebook friends for 12. Like, how can you? You know anyways, but sales is a lot easier when you put yourself out there, market yourself and, in your experience, talk about your version of sales, my guy.
Speaker 2:Well, yeah, and for us it's, it's, it's over. Deliver right. You've got to be able to. You can't put yourself in a position where you know you're going to let your client down right. You know things. Obviously things do happen right, like you can't. You know, with breakdowns you know, people getting sick.
Speaker 2:We all understand that, too right, but you really want to over-deliver. You all understand that too right, but you really want to over deliver and and and when it comes to sales, to really find your style. Everyone's there's. There's a lot of really good content on youtube as, as a blue collar, you know, um business owner. To start off, just just watch a couple videos, right, it'll really clear some of the you know, kind of clear points that you want to really get when you're doing a sales call, right, because you're, you're, you're, you're using people's time.
Speaker 2:You, everyone's been cold called these days, right, and and to be to find your own style, right. One of the things that drives me most is when someone cold calls me and cold calls me and they say to me. They say, oh, hey, james, thanks for taking my call, how are you? I'm like good, how are you? Oh, I'm really good. Thanks for asking. It is the most disingenuous thing I don't know I've ever heard in my entire life and I shut off. That's just me, right? I don't know. A lot of people use it. I don't know. And you'll find your own style. I'm calling new businesses all the time, right, you know?
Speaker 2:And and you know it goes back to that. You know you got to build rapport. You got to build you know that honesty, right, and then qualify your, your client as well. Right, you're in a landscaping company. Right, they're looking for X, x and you know you're only doing Y, y to. You know, for this one job, to, to, to stretch yourself out and do a bad job, just to get that, because you know you're kind of, you know you're kind of pinching right, like. You know, you know the bills are coming up. You know you've got to over deliver on everything that you do. Right, and you know honesty is key. You just say to them hey, you know what, I really appreciate you giving me the opportunity to bid on this job kind of out of my scope, right, maybe next year, right by that time you'll probably have it completed. But you know, and you build that rapport and you know the neighbor down the street will call you one day and be like hey you know I was talking to Cy.
Speaker 2:You know he said you guys you know kind of work together but you didn't. You know you didn't get anything going but you didn't. You know you didn't get anything going, but you know I understand that you do and I saw your work that you were able to do at this place.
Speaker 1:Right.
Speaker 2:And it's that it's using everyone around you to help market your business and all that. And that's a huge part of sales, right, and and you know, and that comes just down to you know, qualifying what you can do and for what they're asking, right, and that comes with some really, really good questions, like prospecting questions, basically.
Speaker 1:Right.
Speaker 2:Can I do what this person's asking? Am I going, you know, am I bidding on this job and I don't have the proper equipment for it? Right, right, you know. And then you get the job. You go to the bank hey look, I've got this wonderful letter saying I've got this job coming up. And then you get the job. You go to the bank hey look, I've got this wonderful letter saying I've got this job coming up. And then we go back to the accounting. Right, you don't have the accounting set up, right, you know. And then things start to fall apart. So try and expand or trying to grasp too far away, you know, you kind of, in a way, stay in your lane. The nice part about business is taking risks, right.
Speaker 1:But know your limits right. Oh yeah, so I would my my test of that. I am the gambler, I am the risk taker, I am the idiot that faked it till he made it. And, uh, I took those one-off jobs and sometimes, buddy, it didn't work out. Sometimes I found out a new um, a new Avenue that I could chase, but it is going to take me some money to get into.
Speaker 1:And because I took this one particular job and it did work out say it'd be septics, or say it'd be digging for a concrete guy or whatever the concept may be when you're first starting out, you find that one thing and you're like, hey, I'm kind of good at this. We'll build a model around it and do it repetitively, because if you're doing good quality work, that's the easiest thing to sell in the world. If you answer your phone, show up and do the job and bill it, you'll recoup money on it. Don't get me wrong, boys, we're all chasing money. Welcome to the game. If you're going to be in business for yourself or do work for others and contracts, you're, you're always going to be chasing money. That's not getting any better. I hope one day to be helping lead the change and fighting against retainage and fighting against how this crappy construction industry pays its subcontractors, but that's a that's a whole different topic for a whole different day but and and and and and two, like don't get me wrong, don't like I'm not saying don't be brave, right.
Speaker 2:Like get out there, go, go for it. Right, If you believe that you can do it, absolutely. If you know that it's out of your scope and you're, you know you're just going to try and collect that you need to do a terrible job, take that paycheck and run, you know it's. You're not setting yourself up for future success, right. So you know and and a lot of people will be, like you know, grateful that you were on it up you know, upfront and honest about that, right. But but by all means, take risks, be brave, go for it. That's. That's the whole fun part about about being in business right for yourself is that you get to. You know. Well, it's kind of like you gotta, you gotta go for it once in a while, right, like you gotta, you gotta my yin and yang, bro, if it wasn't for sarah um, go check out episode two, blue collar business podcastcom.
Speaker 1:Um, and you can see how sarah is the yang to my ying when I am uh, let's take off and launch straight to Mars. She's a hey. Now we don't even have fuel in the rocket. Calm yourself, let's think about this. Let's freaking plan just a little bit. What in the hell are we going to do with a rocket when we get in the air when it ain't got no fuel?
Speaker 1:So you've got to have that relationship and thank God it happens to be my wife, and sometimes I really wish it wouldn't be my wife, because a lot of times there's conversations that aren't fun to have from a husband and a wife standpoint. But go check that episode out, you'll see our chemistry and how we've made it work. But, dude, the sales side of it I can't stress enough. Number one is sales. I can't tell you guys, it has it. It doesn't matter, um, but selling a crappy job, going doing the crappy job, is not going to build any type of profitability anywhere. It's going to have you paying that job off. Can't pay it off and you're on the next job and they're still yelling at you because you haven't finished the last job, because you can't afford to, and it sucks. I've got two jobs right now. We've got 14 active projects and two jobs. That, as I've been very open with you, james, I've been restructuring my business and, as the podcast know, I have been taking a much different approach to inside accounting, production levels estimation. We have completely revamped how we've bid a job.
Speaker 1:So from the time of getting that sale, getting it in the door and getting numbers back out. But what expectation are we setting when we send those numbers? Are we trying to be the cheapest in town? Because I'm not, dude, I'm not trying to be the cheapest in town anymore. Everybody's racing to the bottom. And who does that hurt you? You bunch of dummies. You know what I mean. I'm not trying to be any way, but like, let's race to the bottom and leave no profit. That profit is your money After you pay your equipment, after you freaking pay for fuel and you pay for the guys. Let me tell you something up front every week they want a paycheck. You don't get yours until the job's done.
Speaker 1:And when you start having 20, 30 employees, man, you have to estimate and produce what that estimate is estimated at, if that makes any sense. Because there's only two problems Once you sell a job and it goes bad, it's only estimation. I just spoke about this last week. Estimation or production, those are the only two buckets, at the end of the day, that make a job go bad. If you estimate it, you can't take a bad number from your desk and go beat it in the field. Let me just can't happen, never will happen. I promise you.
Speaker 1:If there's somebody out there that could have figured out how to do it, it would have been me, and I still got my teeth kicked in and caused myself a lot of strife and a lot of stress that wasn't needed because, hell, it wasn't going to work out anyways.
Speaker 1:And so I think there's a big testament to staying in your lane. I know I went all the way around the circle to get back to this, but staying in your lane, dude, if I wouldn't have ventured out in those startup days I know we've been kind of speaking to that zero to three, three to five year mark guys and dude if I would have been more appropriate with exactly what you've said. And yeah, don't get me wrong, take those little bit of risks, find out if I can do it or not. But while I'm 80% producing over here in my um for my concrete subcontractor or for my fireline guy or for my electrician who does a bunch of underground primary and that is my primary game, and leave about 75 percent and try and sell 75 percent of that work and then, yeah, 25, 10, 20 percent of our revenue, let's go play over here but we know, we're over here for sure.
Speaker 2:You know what I mean go ahead, yeah, no 100, yeah, mitigating your risk, it's, it's just that, right. You gotta, you gotta, be adventurous, you know, like I say, you gotta be bold, right. But you know, don't, you know, put all your eggs in one book, in that basket, right? Like you're saying, you keep, you know, keep that 80 of your. You know, this is what I do, this is what we do, right I'm not all for one guy either.
Speaker 1:Boys spread the love.
Speaker 2:Absolutely, Absolutely it was, it was. It's fun Like I've got a friend who's a buyer at a major Canadian gold mine up in Canada here.
Speaker 1:And the first thing she does on the show. What's up? Can I get them on the show? Absolutely yeah.
Speaker 2:Dude, come on, how cool would that be, yeah, yeah, no, I can, definitely. I can definitely talk to her. She, uh, um, but the the fun thing is is be proud of your, like you're saying, be proud of your quotes. Don't, don't race for the bottom, because the first thing she does is, when she quotes, you know there'll be a uh, you know mind supervisor or something like we need grinding media or or you know a new rolling mill or something, go get some quotes. First thing she does is drops the bottom two right off the list. She says I'm not dealing with the cheapest guys, because you get the cheapest work and you get the cheapest result, right? So immediately those are gone. So go in there and be proud of your quote and say you know, because it does, you got to stand behind it because it does basically in a way, tell who you are as well, right, yeah, man, if you're the most expensive or the cheapest, you might not be getting it right 100%.
Speaker 1:And I can tell you, since we've been talking to that zero to five-year mark, you do have to. I understand where they're going to say well, dude, you have to be cheap, Especially in 24, James. I mean, the work has dried up and I know you've seen it as well, selling equipment, the major majority public work has really dried up and the major private sector has really dried up. The bonding companies have really tightened up. Everything has tightened up, and it's an election year, so we already knew things were going to tighten up. But in that zero to five year mark you have, man, I lost my train of thought. I didn't write my note. Editors, you're going to have to cut this. I'm sorry, I totally lost my train of thought. What were we just speaking at?
Speaker 2:I made a note.
Speaker 1:I made a note on the Estimates. We were talking three to five. Oh, cheapest, cheapest price, cheapest price. This is why I sit here with a pen in my hand, dude, cause I look like a freaking moron and the editors probably absolutely hate my guts, dude Um.
Speaker 1:I always have a phone call from my wife and I know they're probably going to edit like all my phone calls with my wife over the so cheapest priced and I've got bid more. All right, editor, sorry, circling back guys. Sorry, circling back guys. Sorry, being the cheapest priced in that three to five year mark guys, I understand how you're going to sit there. Well, everybody's racing to the bottom in 24, man, I can't even survive.
Speaker 1:I was sitting in the same boat with you guys in February doing the size of work I'm doing from that 500 to mil five contract range and I had the same people look at me and go stop bidding cheap work. You're not even got appropriate labor burden in here. You don't have appropriate overhead in here, you don't. And they really, I mean, slap me around, dude. I've been doing this eight years. I got a pretty good idea how to make money, or so I thought I know how to do it. Not the correct way, and I'm not saying everybody's got to do it one way or the other, but there is a correct, profitable way of doing this and it's sales one, processes and procedures two, and being disciplined enough to give your team those processes and procedures to execute and over-deliver the sale so they come back for the next go and that cheapest price from a long time. I call that survival work now, because literally, you're barely barely surviving.
Speaker 1:Trust me, boys and girls, when I say I freaking know, and you're sitting there going Cy. You haven't given us any solution to this problem. You're just telling us to don't send out cheap. Yeah, there's, it's super easy. Guys, Bid more, equals, win more easy. Guys, bid more, equals, win more.
Speaker 1:When I'm talking you don't want anything but 10 to 20% conversion rate on the stuff that's going out of the end, people are like what, that's silly? Oh, how much do you? But, dude, do you want to make money or not? And it doesn't, it doesn't just. Oh, we sold a profitable job. Now you can go out and do it. Now you got to make sure your production is doing how, exactly? How the estimate almost to a T. How did they bid it? Did they bid it with a 360 or did they bid it with a 210? You know what I mean? Production rates very big time. So you have to. You have to get through the survival work. You have to do some of that survival work, there's no doubt about it. But at the same time, pick and choose who you're doing that survival work for. They better have a crap ton of volume to get that cheaper price. That's all I'm saying.
Speaker 1:I've done it personally. I wouldn't have built PsyCon to what it is if I didn't hop on a lesser margined, higher volumed quick paying work, margined, higher volumed, quick paying work. And it was our lane dude fire lines boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom. And. But it got to a point they were 25% of my revenue, 150% of my stress, yeah, and it wasn't hardly profiting anything in unless the guys come under in on time. So, dude, I would tell you guys, if you're sitting there in your truck, listen to me right now.
Speaker 1:And Mr James here, speak about sales. And you guys, you guys are freaking crazy. I'm sitting out here with two guys. How am I supposed to sell? Well, you've got to figure out are you a salesman or are you a production manager, because when you're in that hinged area, especially excavation and utility contractors, but if you're an HVAC guy, if you're a Sparky, a concrete guy, I don't care who. You are listening to me right now.
Speaker 1:If you're sitting in a position with one crew and you seem to just never have a good, steady flow of work. You need a freaking salesman that does nothing but sell. But is that you? It may not be you. You may be an awesome tradesman at what you do and perfect that craft every time, but may not have the people skills. There are services out there. You don't have to go hire some schmuck that's going to leech on you for six, eight months and collect a check. You can go get results driven subcontractors that help lead generate to bring it right to your phone so you can be talking about it. Look into that stuff, guys. Dude again, educate yourself. But literally either pick to be the salesman or, if you're not the salesman in my case I was, but I still chose because I'm micromanager and I still chose to do both for a long, long time Then we brought an estimator in.
Speaker 1:Well, to my principled point here, guys, I'm sitting here doing the level of work. We're having to bid out 10 times the amount of work to capture 10 to 20 percent Right. So that's, if I'm trying to capture anywhere from five to 10 million, I'm sending out 50 to 75 million dollars worth of bids. That's insanity. So you need an estimator who is just looking at numbers, and this is this is kind of up here a year, year 9, 10, and I may be doing it completely wrong, but James is what I'm doing. So I've got my estimator Dylan, who happens to be my first ever employee Go check out episode number six, dylan Cecil at bluecollarbusinesspodcastcom and we talk about how his transition came from ditch hand to now in my lead estimator top dog.
Speaker 1:But his problem was James, is that he could estimate the job. He knows the lingo but he just really wasn't a top-notch salesman. He didn't have that sales drive whatsoever. And so we're sitting there going. What do we do? Every single time? He was pumping out good numbers. I'd have to run up there and I'd have to sell it and get us into that contract phase.
Speaker 1:So I brought in a freaking salesman. Literally he takes what Dylan's estimating and in our world, in the commercial earthwork and utility world, there's a lot of in-depth. You have to go. It's underground, for God's sakes. You don't even know what's in the freaking ground and so you're estimating for all sorts of types of parameters and variables coming at you. How do you converse and get that job sold and provide good numbers from the same person trying to bid $50 million for the work? It's just not going to happen. But it's not about how big the numbers are, guys, it's all about percentages. If you're trying to do $1 million to $2 million with six guys and it's just you you're in a worse position than I am. You've got to find your sales expertise. Once you have a good, steady flow of sales, then we can start working on our team building and we can start putting in processes and procedures for our team.
Speaker 2:So um, and I like, and I like what you said there too, because there's two types of people in business. Right, you're either in service or you're in sales, right, sometimes you do both, like you've you've put on multiple hats, right? Generally you don't do sales and service at the same time unless you're at, like, a farmer's market and there's a guy you know making a birdhouse or something and you're like, hey, that looks pretty good, I'll probably buy that, right? So it's hard. Usually. You got to, you know, stop, you got to take some time in your week because sales is so important, guys, it's so important, you gotta take that time to switch hats and and go out there. You know, buy, buy books. I've got probably 40 sales books, right, and and I don't like, what's your top three? Read my top three the little red book of selling, um, that's, that's the, the best one. Right now I'd have to go to my shop here you're good.
Speaker 2:So little red book of selling yeah, it's, it's, it's incredible actually I've got it sitting behind it's by jeffrey gitmer, um, yeah and um the the name is escaping me, but I really enjoy this guy on YouTube. He really drives it home when it comes to how to start off. Because you can be an introvert, you can be an extrovert. You can learn how to do sales right. If you know your product, if you love your product, you believe in your product, you can sell your product 100% of the time and you just need a little bit of help of you know how that process works, right, like, where to start, what questions to ask? Right, and make mistakes, don't be scared to.
Speaker 2:You know, call someone and you know, oh, hey, how are you? And you know, ask dumb questions, right, like, and you know, and be vulnerable and you will find, after a certain amount of conversations, for your type. You've got to find, like I said before, you've got to find your type of sales. Everyone has a salesman in them. They've just got to be able to leave straight. Oh, here he is right. Here it's Simon Squibb is his name, simon.
Speaker 1:Squibb. Yeah, Simon Squibb.
Speaker 2:And yeah, I don't even want to try and guess where his accent's from.
Speaker 1:I just insult three or four different countries here.
Speaker 2:But yeah, no, and he's got one really good program I think it's called the 10 Steps to Turn your Sales Machine right, and it's not going to work for everyone, Right, but as long as you're picking up one little thing, that's what all I try and do. If I pick up a book, right, I will look, you know, for one little thing, right. And just to take anything from that, right, I add it to my. I call it my gun. I've got my gun has bullets in it, right, and each one of those bullets has a different label on it, right?
Speaker 1:And you've got to be prepared and you've got to have that be able to action that you know I've got about 25 different questions that I've got poised.
Speaker 2:It sits on my desk with me, right, and you know, when you listen to someone, you got to really. You got to really. You know you got to connect with them right away because people get, people are busy, they get sales calls all the time. You got to connect with them and and in sales you really want to match their tone, right, you know size is a. Hey, how's it going, james? He's having a bad day and I'm like oh hey, how's it going Right, like we've never talked before.
Speaker 2:It's a cold call, right, like you're over the top with energy. You're going to drive that guy nuts and he's going to try and get you off the phone as quick as possible, right? Or he's just going to hang up.
Speaker 2:Or he's just going to hang up right, and that's a big thing about sales guys is you've got to take losses too. You've got to be brave, you've got to get out of your comfort zone. You've got to ask meaningful questions. You've got to do a bit of research before you call them. Right. Know your customer before you call them is huge too. Right, match their tone, right, you know, talk like they do, sound like they do. Then you're talking to a friend After you know if you can get on the phone for two or three minutes, right, you know you've made, you've made huge strides, right. Really mimic their tone and watch their like if you're in person, watch their body language. Those things are huge because then they feel like they're talking to a friend and then, like we, like I said earlier, like you got to be honest and you gotta. You know you've got to set.
Speaker 1:You know expectations and you have expectations Once you get that rapport.
Speaker 2:You get that business going, even if you read 10 minutes a day. If you're sitting in your truck, you've got a second. Throw one in your bag. It's not going to flip to the middle of the book.
Speaker 1:That old bag here Teller.
Speaker 2:Sorry bro.
Speaker 1:I still say it too. People teach me all the time. Oh one of them. Bags, huh, they call them sacks around here oh okay, gotcha, gotcha.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it's so funny, dude, but you're, you're right on nail on the head, dude.
Speaker 1:And I want to add to that is that, dude, no isn't a bad word, no is just a. If you're a yes guy and you always got to have a yes and it's instant gratification, you're going to end up costing yourself a lot of money and stay in your lane. Learn to hear the word no and trust me entrepreneurs real entrepreneurs I understand how freaking hard it is to hear the word no. I promise you there's 33 year old, nine year old, nine years in business immigrant has heard more no's than probably 10 of y'all listening. Because I pushed the envelope more than I ever. I'm not worried about the question I'm asking. I know the question I'm asking before I'm asking it. Nine chances out of 10 already know the answer 95% of the time. But you still got to try. You still got to put forth the effort to to push that envelope. If we're not literally pushing the envelope on every single parameter that's put on me, how am I supposed to grow? I'm not. I mean, you're just going to get comfortable.
Speaker 1:You're going to die as a business and you're going to get complacent. You're going to allow complacency. I did. I just come off of a really bad year of complacency and comfortableness and had to change it. I had to change it. I had to crank up the accountability and the uncomfortableness to allow growth within our business. Business and man, talking about growth and change, you've seen this market change quite a bit just in the last four or five years. But, man, how do we, as from your side of the coin, how do we adapt to this ever-changing market? That is all, not just market industry as a wide, whole spectrum. Prices are changing, fuels changing, gps I mean the way we perform our job in my world is changing faster than anything, going from old school broom and stick grade rod to the machine basically doing it for you. And what have you seen from your side and how are people successfully adapting to what's coming?
Speaker 2:Well, I think that people, that it comes back to you know what we were talking about right at the start. Right, Like having that five-year plan, having it penciled in right. Like having that five-year plan, having that it penciled in right, knowing what you're getting started. You know getting your um sorry, getting in pain at getting your, your credit bureau started. Knowing what your cash flow should be right, don't get overextended, don't keep too much cash. Right, like you, you got it's all having that balance and and know like it's.
Speaker 2:So the people that are the most successful at it are the ones that take that five or ten minutes, 15 minutes a day and educate themselves. Right, there's so much data online of projections of where your industry in specific, if it's construction, if it's short haul transport, long haul transport, if you're doing mining there is so much data that you can look up and it gives you an idea, right, and I don't, obviously you've got to, you've got to have a look and and you know from your perspective as well, because that's industry wide they're going to be looking at the grand scheme of things, right, the grand scheme of things right, your niche market. You know where you're at, what state you're in. You know and try and do your best to predict what is going on. Is it time to buy a new truck? Is it time to hang on to this one and see?
Speaker 2:You know how much longer you know we can get this motor to last? Right, as long as, at the end of the day, that your business is slowly trickling up, that means you've done a good job and that's what we've seen, you know, over the last few years. Is the people that are coming out of this stronger than they were, you know, in 2022 or 2021, right, Are the ones that had that plan and, like I say, it wasn't in stone, right, they had a pencil little plan, but they kind of had an idea and they had good people around them to give them good advice. And I understand, completely understand, as a new business owner, your cash flow and your capital is not going to be as large as some of these bigger companies.
Speaker 2:They're going to have people around them that are industry professionals.
Speaker 2:James, a lot of guys from zero to three don't even know what cash flow means yeah, no, no and and yeah, it just comes down to education and and you know, give yourself that extra leg up than your competition, because your competition I can guarantee you from a vast majority of people, from my business experience talking to people, have not done that. And and if you're spending, if you're reinvesting in yourself every day, you're, when you talk to that accountant, when you find that accountant, right, I mean, you're big enough, I'm sorry to start shopping and get an accountant because you're now, you're too busy. You know you're wearing your sales hat, you're wearing your service hat. You don't have time for an accountant now, right, but you know a little bit about that industry to find someone who knows what they're talking about, that are going to say things when you're, you know they're going to be cold calling you, essentially right, or you'll probably be reaching out to them. You know take some advice from or some suggestions from. You know local colleagues, or you know advertising or whatever, and you know you're basically going to be interviewing them. The best way to interview someone is to know more than they do and if they're saying the same things that are along your level, that is going to make your business drive up just to. Even if it's a little bit right, we always want to go forth in a positive direction, you know, you know, you, you, you want to have those people around you or even just talk to those people. Right, you know, you don't have to hire someone full time, right, Take an hour at a time, you know, just call the office and say, hey, this is kind of my idea.
Speaker 2:I'd like a little bit of advice. You know what's that going to cost me? Can I, you know? Can we go for dinner? Can I, you know, come into the office for an hour? What's that going to cost me? Can I, you know, can we go for dinner? Can I, you know, come into the office for an hour? What's that going to be? Right, but already already have yourself educated. So you kind of have an idea of you know what you need to hear and to make sure that that individual's kind of aligned with you, know your, your business trajectory and what, and kind of what, your goals are at the end of the day too, right?
Speaker 1:So Dude, it's been so much fun sitting here with you and talking and hearing your brain tick just a little bit and bouncing these questions off of you for sure. But I got one final takeaway for you. I ask everybody that comes on this show what's the final takeaway for that blue collar worker who's sitting there? I don't care, mentally, emotionally, physically. It can be a guy down in a mud hole sitting there listening to this on his AirPods. To the guy roping a building full of electric. To a guy hanging a piece of iron. What can they be doing other than educating yourself, because that's number one. But what can they do to get themselves out of that mud physically, mentally? Thought process?
Speaker 2:I would say invest in yourself every single day, right, if that's, you know, getting more education, that's like you say, that's obvious. Right, but pushing your, pushing your boundaries to push yourself every day, right. Get out of your comfort zone, right, and we talked about, we talked about, you know, make sure that you're, you're eating your steak, but, but have those little bit of extras too, just to see if there's something else that you're really, really good at. That you had no idea. Right. Keep, keep, you know, exploring new ideas, keep moving forward and keep investing in yourself.
Speaker 1:You've got 15 minutes to scroll Facebook. You've got 15 minutes to pick up a book that's within, hopefully, hand-grab reach, so you can grab it and really start. Man, I can't tell. That's going to be out on the PsyCon YouTube page and we're partnering up with another actually massive YouTuber in our world who has designed a training program just for our guys, but not just at a professional sense, but at a personal sense too.
Speaker 1:I want my guys, to you know, not just grow professionally, I want them to grow personally. I want them to you know, buy a house. I want my guys to you know, not just grow professionally, I want them to grow personally. I want them to you know, buy a house. I want them, whatever their goals may be, I want this company and this business to be an aspiration and a passageway for them to achieve their goals.
Speaker 1:So, man, james, it's been so much fun sitting here talking with you. I can't tell you how much I appreciate your time. I know time is hard to get a hold of nowadays, so I appreciate you and your answers. But, guys, if you've enjoyed our time, you can get all of our episodes and more at the Blue Collar Business Podcast website bluecollarbusinesspodcastcom and check us out there website bluecollarbusinesspodcastcom and check us out there. If you guys are maybe got some suggestions for me about new guests, maybe somebody I'm not thinking of. There's a contact form there on the Blue Collar Business Podcast website. Shoot us a message and let us know who might need to be on. I appreciate you guys' time. James, thanks again for joining me.
Speaker 2:Oh, it's an absolute pleasure, Cy.
Speaker 1:Dude, I look forward to the next time. I look forward to having you again and we'll go from there, buddy. Until next time, guys. You guys be safe, be kind and be humble. If you've enjoyed this episode, be sure to give it a like. Share it with the fellers. Check out our website to send us any questions and comments about your experience in the blue collar business. Who do you want to hear from and comments about your experience in the blue collar business? Who do you want to hear from? Send them our way and we'll do our best to answer any questions you may have. Till next time, guys.