Ep. 60 - From Machines to Mentorship

Payroll panic, pricing doubts, and the pull of the machine, if you’ve ever felt that tug-of-war, you’ll feel seen here. We sit down with John to unpack how Dirt to Dollars grew from hard questions in the field into a coaching program grounded in reality, not buzzwords. He explains why context matters more than clichés, how to price for risk without flinching, and the simple shifts that move a crew from chaos to consistent wins.

We get specific about the owner’s turning point: stepping out of the cab to lead with clarity. John’s skydiving story nails the instinct we all fight, grabbing the “pilot’s chair” when the real job is to jump. We walk through what working on the business actually looks like: forecasting pipeline, tightening service mix, compressing geography, coaching foremen on plan-first execution, and measuring jobs with honest cost data. You’ll hear a standout success story from Gabe, who dropped maintenance, specialized in hardscape, focused on density, and grew average ticket to $25–30K by aligning operations with strategy.

We also pull back the curtain on scaling media. With a dedicated content lead, John built a system for filming, editing, posting, and analyzing what actually sticks. It’s not vanity; it’s a growth engine for SEO, hiring, lead quality, and community trust. And when the world broke after Hurricane Helene, that community fueled service over profit, fuel runs, radios, no power, and months of grit helping neighbors rebuild. A year later, the impact is still visible, and the lesson is clear: healthy businesses can say yes when it counts most.

If you’re stuck in the mud, mentally, financially, operationally, this conversation gives you a practical path out: narrow your services, price with courage, empower your people, and commit to consistent action. Subscribe, share with a friend who needs it, and drop a comment with the one move you’ll make this week. Your team and your future self will thank you.

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Chapters

• 0:00 Welcome Back & Part Two Setup
• 1:34 Sponsor: Thumbtack Spotlight
• 2:09 Dirt To Dollars Origin Story
• 6:18 Real Talk On Pricing And Payroll
• 12:15 Coaching With Honesty Over Hype
• 18:05 Wins From The Community: Gabe’s Pivot
• 24:35 Expectation vs Experience: Delivering Value
• 28:07 Working On The Business, Not In It
• 33:24 The Skydiving Analogy For Letting Go
• 38:20 Hiring A Content Lead And Scaling Media

Transcript

SPEAKER_02: 0:09

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, Ty Kirby, and I want to help you 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 of the Blue Collar Business Podcast. This is part two of the conversation with John. Um man, what a delight the first episode was. We dove straight in. What are the similarities and likeness of our two businesses and the experiences we both have had leading up to this point? If you've missed it, go check out any podcast streaming platform. Go check it out, Spotify, iHeart. Give us a rating and a follow while you're over there. In this half of the conversation, John opens up about building his Dirt to Dollars coaching program. It is so unique, guys, and he's helping so many different types of businesses, but also create helping them create content, empowering their teams, and the impact his business has had in Hurricane Haleen. This is uh special to my heart. It's a powerful look at leadership and growth and giving back. Let's jump right in. Uh, this episode today is brought to you and sponsored by Thumbtack. Tired of spending all your time searching through week leads instead of getting work done, Thumbtack brings you work, you're ready to win. You get visibility and automation to run your business without those headaches. Plus the flexibility to scale across crews and markets. You'll always know where your money's going and what it can deliver. The success of pros on Thumbtack's says it all. Want to grow smarter? Visit thumbtack.com slash pro today to book your one-on-one strategy session with the pros over there. I just want to shine a little light on dirt to dollars here, man. You've you just hit 100K on YouTube. That's insane on the JCP channel. I wanted to highlight that. Congratulations. But what you're doing with that coaching program, man, is you're helping other me and you're out there that are sitting on their edge of their bed on a Tuesday or a Thursday night going, how am I gonna make payroll? to where's the next job? I got all this equipment. And there's not enough resources out there, my guy. And you have a I'm part of your free community. Checked it out, wanted to make sure. And dude, there, the amount of people that are in there talking, helping, true. I mean, the internet is full. We talked about it before the show. Like the amount of hate, it's just frothing, ready to jump on anything that you throw out there with hate, and to see a community come together and truly try and help each other, and not just you, I mean, like other parts of the community jumping in, dude. It's inspiring and it's admirable. And I wanted to shine some major light on it. And what gave you the idea to start dirt to dollars?

SPEAKER_00: 3:18

Um, just like everything I've ever done, man, it's kind of this game organically. Like, you know, we started posting the content out there, and and uh this goes all the way back to the beginning of the conversation of just like always just being honest and transparent and just showing everything of like the good, the bad, ugly, everything in between. Because, you know, I think our content does so well because we just show the reality of what's going on, whether that's great or whether it's just an absolute train wreck. Um, and you know, the it's relatable because these guys uh we've I've we we show, like, hey, I've been in the same spot, and sometimes I'm still in the same spot where I'm like, fuck man, how am I gonna come up with payroll this week? Because this retaining wall job was a complete catastrophe. And so it's relatable to these guys, and then and then and they just started reaching out, like, how do I do this and how do I do that? And and how is how are you able to do this? And why did you price the job this way? And so I'm just I'm I'm just answering these questions because I've been there, you know, and and I and I and I I feel it, you know. I mean, like I want to help these guys, and and it's so it's easy for me now because I've like I said, I've got I've got punched in the mouth so many times that I I know like it's just second nature now. Uh so the answer is very easy. It's just like why not share this when I I wish I had someone at for 11 years to go to and be like, dude, how do I do this? But like you said at the very beginning of this call, like why the fuck is everything such a big secret? You know what I mean? Like, why why do these guys act like all this information is so protected and like we can't help one another? Like, dude, even guys in my local community, like they'll show up in my office and be like, dude, I don't know how like what am I supposed to do on this job? Like, dude, come in and sit down. Like, we're not we don't have to compete, you know. There's so much work, dude. And like, let's just help one another out, you know. And I I don't I don't know what the what the big thing is is like keeping everything a secret and like wanting to compete with one another, and and then like you're not even competing, you're all racing to the bottom because you're not sharing information, you know. So the coaching thing just kind of happened organically, man. Like, I'm just answering all these questions for these guys and I'm giving the knowledge out for free. And we we really at the end of the day, like we give the information out for free everywhere, you know. And yeah, but the coaching program allows us to be able to sit down with the guys and be like, dude, what are you dealing with right now? Like if I'm giving the information out online, like it's just like, hey, this is what we did, and this is how we're doing it. And but for me to give you, if you saw were to come to me and be like, hey man, how am I how do I handle this? I need to ask you 10 questions to give you the real answer. That's another thing, too, is like there's so many guys out there that like they they give you the feel good answer or like the the the the content answer, but I I won't do that. I even tell the guys on in the program that are paying me, like, I'm not gonna give you a bullshit answer. Like, we I need to know these several things about you and your business and how things are going before I'm even gonna start to answer your question. And sometimes you kind of gotta like peel back as the as the person who's paying for the coaching, like you you gotta take the pride and set it aside, and you gotta set your ego aside because at the end of the day, like we we may be the best dudes on a machine, but none of us like started as business owners or knew all this shit, you know. So now we are have having to climb off the machine and go learn all these things that really aren't that much fun, you know.

SPEAKER_02: 6:44

Nah, dude, they suck.

SPEAKER_00: 6:48

So yeah, I just try to help the guys there, man, because I've been in the same spot and and after doing it so many times and learning it's um it there's a lot of things that come to me that are very easy that I can give the information for, and there's things that I'm still learning that I I share with the guys as I learned, you know.

SPEAKER_02: 7:04

Um literally at the same kind of point. Obviously, we're smaller in our content creation, but um at the same point, man, I have folks weekly at this point sending me an email, or LinkedIn is a big place for me, or Instagram, whatever, and will it come, hey, we've got these three or four guys, this guy's stuck here, this guy's there.

SPEAKER_00: 7:27

And I'm kind of finding myself almost passionate about it because I get very passionate about it, man, because like I said, I've I've been the dude who's like ready to pull my hair out. Like, how do I how do I feed my family and pay my payroll? And at and that's like if you like when you when payroll comes, like it's not just your family you're feeding, dude. Like you you got multiple families, multiple children that are relying on you, you know. So it's it's pretty fucking stressful, dude. And and if I can help someone who's in that position, like that, I'm very punching about that, you know.

SPEAKER_02: 7:59

Yeah, and well, this is my next question for you, buddy, because you know, I have had small success stories from helping guys along the way, YouTube members and and what and whatnot. But man, when they call me back in a couple of months and go, hey, dude, it worked. It's like this overwhelming, I can't even tell you, dude. Like, it's just like this little punch in the heart, like, hey, had a boy, side, way to help him. Because you're right, dude. When they come to you, they're like, oh my God, everything's just falling apart. I don't know. Like, slow down, bro. Okay, it sounds like this and this is out of whack. Tell me what's going on here. Okay, tell me what's going on here. Okay, this is your problem. Go fix this, and it will stop creating that. And they're like, Are you sure? Yes, bro, I promise you. I I was stuck in the same freaking spot and I chose the wrong lane to get run over in. And then I came back across the road and figured out this is to fix. I promise you, by experience, not because I read some book, not because I freaking uh went to school, whatever the case may be. Like, literally, dude, I lived it. I know exactly where you're at, but it's just the the feel-good when they actually do have some success off of your own experience. You're like, man, I remember that 15K hit that I took for me to be able to tell him that so he could avoid that. But maybe is there one guy that you're uh that really that comes to mind that you've been helping through uh dirt to dollars uh coaching that really sticks out to you, that really gives you a little bit of heartwarm, heartwarming to talk about and and really maybe proud of?

SPEAKER_00: 9:40

Man, there's um there's a lot really, and and and I don't say that to sound boastful, um, but uh so we did the coaching program really like 100% for free for several months, then Helene hit, um, and we got way too busy with Helene working, trying to help folks, and we kind of just had to completely stop the program, you know. Um, and we've really only been doing it, I think, for four-ish months now. Again, we kind of picked it back up, and uh so what's really cool at this point now is um there's folks that were in the community when it was free before Helene. So uh Helene's actually, I think, today, a year ago, maybe a day or so out. But um, so yeah, so uh there's guys now that are like at a year cusp of of working with me, you know, and then there's guys that are like a couple months uh into working with me. And what's really cool, man, is like to see the levels of like so for example, I just had a guy back on the call, Gabe, um, who owns Gabe's uh long care and hardscape, and now it's just Gabe's hardscape. I talked him in the just not doing any of the maintenance, and uh real success story, man. Of of uh dude, he was in the same boat, ready to pull his hair out, had a bunch of guys who were cutting grass for him, and you that's a different employee usually, and uh just dude couldn't couldn't get over like profitability. And and um on uh the call two weeks ago, he's his now uh it's really unique, man, because in the long care world, these guys believe in density, right? Like of just staying in a really small area to be able to kind of encapsulate that whole area, keep your cost down. So Gabe has taken that mindset and turned it into the hardscape stuff. So he's got this really, really dense small market that he works in, which is really only about a 30-minute window from either end, and his average job size is 25 to 30,000 bucks. Uh so dude, he is crushing it.

SPEAKER_02: 11:48

Wow, shout out to Gabe, dude. Wow, that's impressive.

SPEAKER_00: 11:53

Yeah, and so there's there's there's other guys now who are in the program, you know, on the four-month side of this. And um now that I have like these comparables and I'm investing more time with these guys, we're seeing the the year condense way faster. So now there's these guys that are that are at Gabe's position but are only four and five months into this, you know. And so um you you know that because like the coaching thing just happened organically, like you're I'm always scratching my head like shit, man. Am I adding enough value to these guys? Like, am I really truly helping these guys? And so I know what you mean, bro. And so, and you know, I'm I'm charging them now too. Like, you know, they they they pay for my time to hop on there, and so it's just like everything that I've ever done. Like, I want to deliver the most value possible for what you're paying, you know. I I feel like I need to give you 10 times what you're paying for, you know. And and I think that's what's led to my success in business is I always try to meet that e-gap, right? Like that expectation over experience. And um, so it's really cool now that like I'm kind of seeing the differences in the program working faster and faster and faster. And I'm super excited about that moving forward of like, how much better can I get with this? You know, and the cool thing is, like, like you said, when folks are reaching out to you, and and you're you can give that advice from like a a different pair of lenses, you don't have the emotion involved of like, dude, that guy is your problem. You need to do something about that guy, or you need to sit him down. This is what the conversation needs to look like. Because you don't have the emotion of like that person has worked with him for eight years and knows everything about his life, and uh and there's so many other things with business that you can just look at like from the 30,000 foot view looking down. That's so easy for us, you know. Um, but because like the guys have their head in the sand of in the business and trying to just like there's they're in survival mode, you know, that it's it's um it's very difficult for them to to see uh a lot of things, the roadblocks, you know.

SPEAKER_02: 14:00

Dude, working that was one of my largest struggles was relinquishing working in the business, empowering my guys, making sure they feel supported and not micromanaging. I'm not they they probably some of them would probably that's been here uh five, six years have probably called me a micromanager back in the day, but I just cared and I cared about them. I cared about the project, I cared about you know our customer, and I just cared a lot, let's just put it that way. And so, but I gotta be able to empower them, let them run the project without just hovering in the business when I should have been unplugged a little bit about what's going on in and working on that next thing that he's wondering about. Hey, is boss gonna take care of this? Is boss gonna take care of that? On the on the business, hey, are we really gonna get a software setups for project management? Are we really gonna, you know, all those questions, they're waiting on you to perform. But it's like, it's kind of this weird feeling I don't know how to describe to people, is because your heart longs to be in that machine. You're you that's your passion, you want to be there. That's the fun part of the job for us, yeah, is spending five minutes in a machine. But my as my construction-based CPA tells me all the time, is that's do you want to make$30 an hour? Right. Go work for somebody, run a machine, buddy. Your time is unbelievably valuable. You are doing your guys a disservice when you're on the equipment. You need to be working on the business. Now, there's a big difference between, hey, showing up on a job, hey guys, let's talk about how what this plan is, where what is your mindset to get to this point? Hey, we need to be here by Thursday. That's what your schedule told me. Tell me how we're getting there and how can I help you? That's that's a totally different, that's great time utilization for working on the business because you're training in the business individuals. But man, it's so hard. It's a it's such a feeling I can't describe of kind of punching yourself in the, you know, in the face and going, uh, dude, you're not supposed to be here right now. You're supposed to be there here. What about this that you said you would take care of three weeks ago for that guy that you're trying to kick him out of the machine to show him how to do it? And it you know, you laugh because you know exactly what I'm talking about because you're like, do, but do I really drive away when it's 108 degrees outside and they got to work their ass off the rest of the afternoon so I can go type some blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, whatever it may be. And it's just so it doesn't mix with our heads, and that's where a lot of these blue collar guys fail. And they, they, they, they're just stuck on being a tradesman. And I'm like, guys, look, you've got to elevate yourself. And hopefully, through this podcast and resources that you offer, you know, literally teach them that it's okay to elevate yourself. They're your entire business is waiting on you to do it. Everything you're complaining about, everything you're asking about, stop working in the business, work on the business. Dude, I I'll never forget it. My CPA came into my office, God bless his soul, and he looked at me. This is one of the first two meetings. I've had some really crappy CPAs over the years, bro. And dude, like, that's a whole podcast by itself. But this guy is unbelievable, deals deals with some major, major, major companies. And he looks at me sitting in my office after he just wrecks my world and tells me how stupid I am.

SPEAKER_01: 17:27

Yeah, that you spins around and he's he's looking at this.

SPEAKER_02: 17:32

I we have a low boy, love our low boy, moves our gear, and I love driving it. I couldn't think to put somebody in that truck. I was scared to death moving 100,000 pounds down the road. And he looked at me and he said, Look, if that if I see a video, if you're in that truck and there ain't a damn good reason you're in that truck, we ain't working together anymore. Damn, I'm dead serious.

SPEAKER_00: 17:56

And I'm like, That's accountability right there.

SPEAKER_02: 17:58

Holy crap. But he's just he had to get it. He knew I was talking about it, but he had to get it through my thick skull. Like, dude, you have to do this or you're not gonna survive, you're not gonna be able to scale, you know?

SPEAKER_00: 18:11

Yeah, for sure. Um, have you ever been skydiving before?

SPEAKER_02: 18:18

No, bro.

SPEAKER_00: 18:20

So uh a couple years ago.

SPEAKER_02: 18:23

I got no problem going in the ground.

SPEAKER_00: 18:26

A couple of years ago, I went and got my skydive license. You gotta jump 26 times within a certain time period to be able to go get it and you know, jump by yourself and and stuff. And so uh, like I said, they call them a little bit of an adrenaline junkie, but the first the first time when you go, you know, that you're strapped to someone, of course, you gotta go tandem. Um, and you know, you kind of hop w hobbling up to the to the door, that door opens and it just blasts you in the face, and and they they went, they they scream in your ear, which sounds like a whisper, um, and they say, Don't grab the pilot's chair. Um, and and you're you're going up there, you know, and your first instinct is to you, you're you're there's such a small con you want to grab that chair like for safety and to stabilize yourself because you've got this wind just blowing past you, you know, and um and and and and instinctly I reached for the chair and he slapped my hand down, you know, and it just they now they're forcing you with their knees, driving you to the edge, and and uh you know, you practice over and over and over before you go up on the ground, and they and and there's a process, you know, they say lean forward, lean backward, and on three, so one, two, three, we're skydiving. Uh, and on three, they're pushing you out because at that point it's a liability for everybody, you know. And and if you go to grab and hold on to anything like that chair, you could rip that if you're holding on to that chair and the wind catches you in the tandem, pilot's coming with you, you know. So it's a liability thing. Can you think about that? This is an extreme analogy, obviously, but like getting in the truck and driving away is like that instinctual, like you know, but you know, like your your mission is to get to the ground, like you're there to skydive, not to stay in the plane. And it's the same thing with being a business owner, like you'd we're here to be business owners, not to be in the machine, you know. So it's I what you were saying, I I think that's a good analogy of like it's so weird, it's a weird brain thing of like getting in your truck and driving away when you know, like especially when you know the guys are like behind on the job, and and you know you can just crawl in the machine and and and get them right back on pace, you know. That's a very, very, very big difficulty that I have. Like, you gotta kind of watch them feel almost to like help guide them along the way and say, This is why we're feeling right now. And instead of just maybe do get out of the machines and let me get on here, you know, you're working like crazy and you get them caught back up. But they didn't learn nothing, and you learn you didn't get any further ahead, you're still stuck in the same spot, you're still holding on with that that collets chair, you know. Like you you gotta let go and skydive, you know.

SPEAKER_02: 21:05

Dude, what an analogy. I'll never so I I you may have that skydiving license. My uh goal is to eventually have the pilot's license, so maybe we can do a different collab there. You ain't kicking my big ass out of a bear plane, but that ain't happening. It just my heart started pounding when you're like, oh, you're walking up to the door, and I'm like, ha, no, that's not for your boy. But let's uh let's talk two two other things real quick, buddy. I know you you're too close for time here. You're good. Um, I've had a full-time content creator, marketing person behind the scenes. Um, man, have I caught some flack for it? I can't even tell you, and then I know you have too. When how did that come about? I know I didn't were you doing your own filming starting off like I was and editing, and it was just way too much. Tell us a little bit about Miss Riley because she she deserves it.

SPEAKER_00: 22:02

Yeah, man. So um, you know, we were marketing for the business. I've done it for years and years and years. Actually, if you um you go back and find a book that's called You Ask We Answer, uh Amazing Content sales book. Um, and basically it's like anytime someone asks you a question in business, you answer that question via video, holding your phone, recording yourself, you know, and answer that question. And there's so many reasons behind it with SEO and keyword and all this stuff, you know, you put that out there and it drives traffic to you. And so that's what I started doing. And and uh we were doing it obviously to drive leads to the business, you know. And um in 23, um we I had a six-person marketing team uh at JC properties driving leads to the business. Um and we have so many leads organically, like we didn't need leads anymore, you know. And so I was like, all right, guys, stop trying to find leads, just go find me help. Um, and we spent a lot, a lot of time and a lot of money um trying to resource more talent, you know, and uh that's a whole nother podcast we could talk about, but um we we we realized like the efforts just it was was there was no ROI on it, you know. And um and so I started like building a personal brand alongside the marketing, you know, and um Riley was all Riley did at that time was did some of the editing and posted, you know, and and and actually did very little editing. We had a remote editor in California that was editing for us, and um, so she really was just doing the social media blasting stuff, you know, email marketing and stuff like that. And um I felt like her and I were on the same wavelength more than everybody else on the team, and we were having all these meetings and and uh, you know, just ROI just wasn't there on what we were needing. And so I ended up letting most of the team go and just kept rally on. And uh I was still at that point like gathering my own content because now I don't have someone follow me around with the camera. That was one of the positions that uh you know was dissolved, and so I'm just out in the field with my camera filming myself or a GoPro and a stick, or sometimes we'd hire a drone pilot to come out and do some video, and I'm bringing it all back, I'm sending it all back to Riley, and I'm like, edit it, let me see it, you know, let's make the decisions together. And finally, I was like, I don't have the time for this, Riley. Just post a share. Just post it. I don't even want to see it. Uh get it out there, you know. Like my my brain is like, you got to put out so much content to to get a a a small percentage of it back, you know? Yeah, you just keep pumping it and keep pumping it and keep pumping it and see what works and learn from it. And we were we were analyzing every single video, what worked, how we what the hook was and what the image was and all this stuff, you know, and um and I was doing that at first with the rally, and I was like, I I just can't do this, you know. So you and we kind of like built a little bit of a system of like how we were analyzing them, and and I just like gave her the reins of she continued to do her own analyzation and seeing what was working, and um, and and so I then I got to the point where I was like, I don't even have time to to film, like, because she was like, John, I need the content. I can't edit and post with I don't have anything, you know. So I was like, Well, get in the truck, get the camera, get in the truck, we're going to work, you know? So now she's now she's filming, now she's editing, now she's posting, and um, then it was hard to like figure out a schedule of like how to gather all the content, how to edit all the content, how to post all the content, and and what our post schedule was gonna be because you know, YouTube rewards that very heavily of like consistent posting at certain times. And so then we had to figure out days of like when she was gonna be out in the field with me, and days that you know it takes hours and hours and hours to uh to edit a 30, 40 minute video, you know. And um so yeah, it's dude, it's like it's still a it's still a moving target, you know what I mean. And and the thing with like content is like you if you think you've got it figured out, everything has just changed, and now you gotta relearn everything. It's it's a it's it's an evolved, it's an evolving world that like yeah, every there the analytics are rewarded differently, and um, so you can never like take your eye off the ball of the analytics and watching how things are rewarded and what does well and what doesn't do well, you know. So, yeah, that's that's where we're at now.

SPEAKER_02: 26:34

No, I didn't same almost the exact same story, my guy. Obviously, you were uh more focused on the lead gen side. I literally was just like trying to to show the back end of commercial construction, especially dirt and and and the pipe game and more the civil side of things. Dude, it was like three, four o'clock. I've got at this point uh our third baby wasn't here yet, but we had two young babies and uh business, and it's like running another business. I don't know how to describe it to other people, and they're like, oh, YouTube and all that stuff, that can like there is so much. If you're gonna do it well, you can do it really crappy and just throw a bunch of stuff up. And don't get me wrong, you're eventually gonna get there. But if you're actually trying to bring value, strategy, content, all of the things, it takes a lot of time behind the scenes just to make sure that it Tuesdays and Fridays our videos go out and we've done double uploads, we've done everything under the sun, analyzed, and we were so heavy. Um, through literally this year, and some of the podcasts I've had and some of the folks I've talked to, it's just like post more. You need to post more valuable content. That's the only hidden key. But a lot of people think we're absolutely insane that how can they do both? Well, it's great people. I I would not have anything online if it wasn't for Will at this point. I would have burnt out four months in, you know, two, three o'clock in the morning trying to edit, and I'm sitting there at the computer like this, you know, and it's Tuesday night, and I gotta get up and I gotta go and do PM duties and sell work and all the things. Like I wanted it to keep going because I knew there was value not only for the company, but also too for the guys watching it. And then the podcast came along, but literally, I I know that having a marketing person behind the scenes is is kind of a quote unquote new thing, and it's so funny, man. The local market around here is uh now everybody's got a drone on their jobs, and everybody's shooting videos.

SPEAKER_00: 28:46

Here come this nine. We get a lot of slack from the local guys of like, oh, there's Mr. YouTube, or you know, all this bullshit. Yep. But now I see them trying to do the same shit, you know what I mean? Which is cool, which is cool. Like, we need we need more voices out here, like showing what the possibilities in the trades are. Uh but like Brad, don't be throwing stones when you live in a glass house, you know what I'm saying? Like you're you're you're bullshitting because you wished you had done it three years ago, you know what I mean? Uh it's a lot easier to send it. Go ahead. And and it's like you said earlier, like there, like there's there's there are vultures out there that like want to just hop on your content and talk all the shit in the world. But like you said earlier, you know, when you have those success stories, they're like, Man, it worked out, dude. Thanks for the advice. Like, bro, I will take 10,000 idiots talking shit on social media for one person of being like, dude, thank you so much. You're it you inspired me to start my own business, and I'm profitable and I can feed my kids. And dude, I I wish I could show you how many of those I get a day now. And like it the the it is turning a little bit. Like now I think there's a little bit of credibility versus like when I was new to. this space and like people are they don't know me and know who I am and now I've been doing it doing it for a few years. So like okay well maybe this guy does know what he's talking about.

SPEAKER_02: 30:07

So there's a little less of the negativity and more of the uh and again it's a time and of people watching the videos for so long of being like maybe I should take that advice or I did take that advice a couple months ago now it's working and they and they reach out and I'm sure there's people that that even do it and and and still don't want to reach out because they're you know it's a little weird you know and but dude it's it's totally worth it when you get someone that's like you know thanks for the advice it's worked out or you inspired me to go start my own thing or you know even a question you know because it gives you validation of like well these guys think that I know what I'm talking about you know yeah no I do bro it's uh I literally say it on the podcast all the time me and Sarah um just did a four-part mini series on this podcast and it was about marriage and business and how we've been married 11 years last Saturday and she has been my partner in crime through it all like wouldn't have made it without her but we talked about intimacy emotional closeness like everything that a wife and a and a husband go through and then stack business on top of it and dude the amount of people that come out of the woodwork just especially on those episodes I've I've I've heard a plethora from guys trying to level up etc but men just dude my wife sent me this I didn't even know you had a podcast bro like this is really good like it helped my wife and you know and I'm like these are these are local guys too these ain't out in the world like these these are guys that were hating not too long ago calling well I know you were talking to this guy saying how big of a dumbass I was for doing this and now and it's just that validation it is and it's not about them it's about the good ones that you are helping whether you know they got to eat crow in their glasshouse or not you know it it it kudos you know what I mean but sure the the the the one of the last things I know you've talked about it enough but Haleem dude the way you guys impacted your community I don't think has had enough spotlight on it. Yes you were doing work yes you were doing things but I know from just the little bit I've been talking to John there has been a lot of things that we didn't see behind the camera with that equipment burning fuel burning truckloads burning man hours to take care of people and uh I'm gonna I guess we're at the end of the show as I I haven't really said it anywhere else. I think uh you guys will be able to go watch our YouTube collab of me and John we're we're heading out there next month by the time I think this comes out but we're gonna go put our eyes on it and uh I'm I'm a year past is it's it's probably still at a point that I can understand uh that part of the country man just from just from videos like I don't think most of the world understand I'll never forget opening Facebook and watching people four miles they said this were waiting for propane to heat their families like I can go off into a whole nother tangent that should never be a thing ever especially in this country but that really put it in my head I'm like wow talk a little a little bit about not only just that but how it impacted you my guy yeah so we've um you know being in the tree business like there's there's tons of of quote unquote storm chasers you know like that like there's great money to be made chasing storms and and um I've never believed in that like I I've never believed in I don't care how much money there is to be made like I don't believe in like going and and profiting off of somebody's devastation really because like whether it be a tree on a house or someone lost their whole house or man the the stories on on on in the news and stuff like absolutely do no justice of like how many lives were lost here.

SPEAKER_00: 34:01

You know so um we helped obviously because these are our neighbors you know I mean like this is where we we live you know like we really like didn't have a choice you know what I mean like if you're a man and live in this area like do pick us up and go help where you can you know and like we were very capable like this that's what we do is what we've done our whole lives you know very equipped um and and I had an amazing team behind me to help do all of it and uh yeah like the we're a year later like to just to give a small taste of the impact like this is a year later and like you can't get a hotel here because there's still families like with their house is gone. Like they live in a hotel now you know and there's like communities that have like they brought trailers in for these people uh to live in and there's all these RV parks that are like just you know they were they're temporarily set up for people to live in you know and like uh again like unfortunately those people have their lives there's there's so many people that man it's like it's it's so terrible to like stand and talk to these people that like watch their their significant other or their family like in the house and the whole house just gone you know so uh man it's it's incredible and it's something I never ever ever want to experience or live through again no matter what monetary value could ever come from it you know uh but dude it's it it it today I mean there's obviously like all the imminent stuff of like trees on houses and uh a lot of roads are put temporarily back um but there's still like miles and miles and miles of road that are gone like maybe your house is fine off in the woods somewhere but you still can't even get to it because there's not a road there anymore you know or uh and that's like dot stuff never mind all the bridge there's so many waterways here like at there's so many people that you have to cross a bridge off the dot road to get over to your house and um there's no bridge there you know so uh best case for them they're they're parking and walking across a a a bridge uh a make a a wooden bridge you know to get up to their house and they're carrying groceries all the way up there and yeah for for months dude there was no power uh it took a long time to get cell phone service like we'd have to drive an hour in the opposite direction just to be able to like start making phone calls so like we had to go back super old school to radios and like meeting points at certain times of the days to like kind of get re collaborated with everybody and fuel it took months for fuel to get here so we'd again have to drive an hour the opposite direction to get fuel to go an hour back to work and yeah it was it was crazy man and you know we live in such a like convenient world that like there's no restaurants like people you know are I'm cooking like there's no grocery stores you know so dude it was the wild west for a long long time and and it it will be years and years and years before like these mountains even start to look normal again like there's never mind the roads and bridges and houses and stuff that are gone like you can just look through the mountains of all the trees that are just down and like as far as your eyeball can see there's not tree standing in a lot of areas where just like the tornado just rushed right through you know wow man we had uh we had a tornado rip through Rogers a year ago like directly um nothing nothing to the magnitude not even it's not even comparable but we opened I felt so bad we were in the direct path but we we didn't get hit god thank god but my phone dude I'll never forget Sunday morning waking up and everybody's blowing us up and there's there's businesses gone houses gone and I'm like I just felt like this longing to help and we had an acre of land if you're ever here you'll see it's right on the highway and dude I literally put a Facebook post up and it was like all right you guys can start dumping here I'm working with the fire department we'll start pushing a brush we took in like 2800 loads of just for people to get on their house like the first week we did it completely for free.

SPEAKER_02: 38:24

We had three pieces of equipment out there burning it and you know there's things like that I know you have done behind the scenes and I just wanted to tell you thank you man but you're right it's your community it's your neighbors why wouldn't you step in in every way that you can and man I wish I'd have known you back then I would have loaded the low boy and we'd have been I mean if I could have got to you from what I heard you know there was pieces of 40 that you couldn't even get to you guys. Blue collar performance marketing's passion is to bring attention to the honest work done in blue collar industries through effective results driven marketing tactics. They specialize in comprehensive digital marketing services from paid advertising on Google and Facebook to website development and content strategy. I started working with Ike and the team earlier this year and they've had a huge impact on our specific marketing campaign and trajectory of our overall company. Their expertise in digital ad management website development social media and overall marketing strategy has been an absolute game changer for our sales and marketing at SciCon. If you're looking to work with a marketing team who does what they say does it well and is always looking for ways to help your company grow, book a discovery call with Ike by going to BCPerformancemarketing dot com backslash BCB podcast or click the link in the show notes description below. Thanks guys.

SPEAKER_00: 39:43

Last question tell Miss Riley I'm wrapping up last question here uh that I ask everybody on the show and I'm so enthused that you were here today and we went a little long but what's the takeaway for the blue collar worker one of our guys one of a guys starting up one of the guys in the coaching program who's just sick and tired of being stuck in the mud man mentally physically emotionally all of them you've been there tell us how we get out well dude the number one thing man is like again earlier you know I said I I'm a gambler and that's because the reward that can come with all this stuff dude is like it it's really endless as far as you you want it to go man you know and and and and that's I mean many things by that not just monetarily you know I mean financial freedom life freedom like you said with your spouse you know I'm sure that you guys have created a bond that you if for some reason she wasn't there anymore like you can't recreate that with someone else you know um so there's there's so many there's so many aspects of this that can be so great if you just have a little bit of the knowledge to get to that point. I understand how miserable it can be until you kind of like get over that bridge or start to get over that bridge. But dude once you start to it becomes so fun. It's like a I don't play chess but I always you know I always say it's like a chess game because like then you just like you got you got to start like moving dials and watch and see how things work and and not only are you do you get to do it for yourself and have all the reward but like if you do it right you're now getting to do that for all your employees as well you know and dude it's really it's all about just having the correct knowledge and again it goes back to like we can be the absolute stud on the machine out in the field but that only gets us so far. We now have to learn all the things about business ownership which frankly 98% of the guys that like start their own business because they're really really good at the service we just don't know and and there's so many things like there's so much of this that like we know we don't know right but then there's a whole nother level of things that like we don't even realize we don't know that that the information's out there to help us get over and man it's it's not you don't need a lot you don't need a lot of information it's just it's it's very simple it's just a few things that you need to understand to all of a sudden like be like wow dude this is actually working now you know and now I'm profitable and now I can take these vacations with my family and I can buy the things I needed to buy and I can fix the bullshit in my life that has been broken for so long you know and um man it's uh it's it's just a little bit of information getting it from the right folks and it doesn't have to be me it doesn't have to be from you just find someone who's done it for a little bit longer than you. You know we've we all have to learn the same way you know and um it's all really from experience you know the shortcut is paying someone who has done it for a long time you know but dude just find someone who is open to helping you right because there's that stupid weird thing like people think everything's a big secret and don't want to help a lot of folks man but just find a mentor dude who can steer you in the right path and the the other side of this bro looks so much better.

SPEAKER_02: 43:05

Yeah it does no it really does man I can't thank you enough for coming on today my guy go find it's J is John Seaman on YouTube or JCP? It's it's official John Seaman on all social media there you go guys go find him he uh he'll be dropping you little knowledge bombs he may be not as smiley happy maybe a little sweaty out there on a machine but he's dropping knowledge bombs all day long for you guys uh be looking uh out for on on both sections of our socials uh we're really excited John's invited us to come out there spend a little bit of time uh I'm ri I'm I maybe shouldn't say the word excited but I am uh excited to go hang out with him but also look at the impact of Helene and and really put a a full encapsulating mindset as to what the impact of the entire country of that section of the country. So be looking out for that go check out blue collar businesspodcast.com for the rest of all 55 plus episodes or if you're on a podcast streaming platform drop us a rating and a follow guys until next time you guys be safe if you've enjoyed this episode be sure to give it a like share it with the fellas check out our website to send us any questions and comments about your experience in the blue car 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