Elevating Trades: The Power of Professional Branding and Standards

summary

In this episode, Derek Cormier shares his journey from police officer to successful HVAC, plumbing, and electrical business owner. He discusses the importance of professionalism, branding, standardization, and strategic marketing in elevating trade industries.


 keywords

Trade Industry, Professionalism, Business Growth, Branding, Apprenticeship, Marketing, HVAC, Plumbing, Electrical, Industry Standards


 key  topics

The importance of setting standards and professionalism in trades
How branding and appearance influence customer trust
Implementing apprenticeship programs for skill development
Strategic marketing and customer targeting in trades
Overcoming fears of business growth and standardization
The role of mentorship and industry collaboration


 guest  name

Derek Cormier


Titles

From Police to Profitable: Derek Cormier’s Trade Industry Transformation
Elevating Trades: The Power of Professional Branding and Standards


 sound bites

"Set a standard for your business."
"Your brand influences customer trust."
"Find a mentor and industry friends."


Chapters

00:00 Introduction and guest background
01:01 Derek's journey from police officer to business owner
02:11 The importance of professionalism in trades
04:20 Setting standards and company appearance
07:13 Sales and professionalism in the trades
09:00 Managing team standards and culture
12:17 Inspiration and resources for trade business growth
16:53 Overcoming fears of business standardization
23:14 Implementing apprenticeship programs
35:54 Branding and marketing strategies
49:08 The importance of branding and visual identity
55:56 Building industry relationships and mentorship
58:00 Final thoughts and industry advice

 resources

Nextar Best Practice Group - https://nextar.com
The E Myth by Michael E. Gerber - https://www.amazon.com/E-Myth-Entrepreneurship-Small-Businesses-About/dp/0887307280
Bent: How to Win Back a Wayward Team - https://www.amazon.com/Bent-Win-Back-Wayward-Team/dp/1936696444
Waste No Day Podcast - https://wastenoday.com
Dan Antonelli's Branding Resources - https://www.kickcharge.com


 guest links

LinkedIn - https://linkedin.com/in/derek-cormier
Website - https://climateexperts.com

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Transcript

Branden Sewell (00:00.751)
Hi, my name is Branden Sewell. I'm the owner of Seal Pro Painting and the host of the Off the Ladder Podcast. And we exist to help home service business owners learn so that they can lead well and ultimately live life off of the ladder. I'm excited to have today's guest. His name is Derek Cormier, and he is the owner and founder of Climate Experts. They're based right here on the Space Coast in my market. I'm excited to have you here today and jump into this conversation.

If you could really quick, Derek, for my listeners, just tell them a little bit about yourself and your background.

Derek Cormier (00:32.898)
Yeah, for sure. So, first off, thanks for having me on the podcast. And a little bit about me. I grew up in this area. I went to high school on the Space Coast. I moved down to South Florida and I was a police officer for five years in Hollywood, Florida. I grew up in a construction family. My dad was a GC. wanted me to take over the family business. I said, no way. Became a cop. Missed Melbourne and the Space Coast, so ended up moving back home. Cops were not paid enough here.

So I went back into the trades. I worked for a lot of companies here that just had poor culture, no growth, no real career path. So I started with one truck, climate experts in 2016, just me and a truck off of Craigslist running calls off of Craigslist when that was a thing. And we doubled every year since we started. And I think we're at about 70 employees now. And we do three trades. We started out with H V A C. I was

class A license holder. I got my plumbing license in twenty twenty three and just got our electrical license. So we now do all three trades. So yeah.

Branden Sewell (01:42.547)
That's awesome, man. Wow, what a testament to what's possible. you know, 10 years in business and you've accomplished a lot. So that's really that's really awesome. I'd love to dive into that. you know, one of the things that we just briefly talked about before the show is professionalism in the trades. And obviously that's a conversation that I've been a part of more times than I can count. and it it's a topic that comes up extremely

you know, just really often, whether you're talking about, you know, I think the the trades that really have the spotlight on them are trades like yours, HVAC Plumbing, Electrical, because you guys have professionalized more than other trades, right? there's a lot of trades out there where the professionalism is lacking. and the the biggest problem that I see is that there's too much like finger point pointing and

And not enough accountability and ownership that's taken by the ones that can make the difference, right? So the reality is, is the same people that are complaining are the same ones that have the power to make the change, but you know, nobody does it. So it's kind of frustrating. And I'm unfortunately in one of those trades that I would say is like maybe in the middle, like there is some level of professionalism.

But there is a because there's such a low barrier to entry for painting, there is just, you know, it it runs rampant of the lack of professionalism. And so I'd love for you to jump in and talk about your perspective, right? So how do companies l or or sorry, trades or businesses that maybe aren't in the same place as HVAC plumbing and electrical,

Do you have any advice or insight into things that we could learn from what, you know, HVAC Plumbing and Electrical has done well and things that we could implement, and other trades that listen to this, what they could implement to make their business better.

Derek Cormier (03:54.285)
100%. I mean, no matter what trade I was in, I would have a standard, right? You need to set a standard for yourself. And what I typically see is if the leader of the business doesn't set the standard, like if you show up to work in a t-shirt and sandals, it you're setting the standard for your company. And don't get me wrong, I did that in the first probably four years. I'm a surfer. I surf. And I would, I would show up to interviews. Like, yeah, I saw the background.

Branden Sewell (03:59.122)
Uh-huh.

Branden Sewell (04:14.118)
okay, awesome.

Derek Cormier (04:20.024)
I would show up to interviews in sandals in a t-shirt. People thought it was cool, they thought it was fun, but it wasn't really a place that people respected to work at. It was a place where they had fun. And that's kind of where our culture has shifted to where it's always been a fun place to work and a good culture. We you know we smile, we laugh, we get along. But as we've gotten more professional, there's more accountability, there's more knowledge. when people call us and have us do their work, they know we're gonna do the right thing. We have a process in place.

Branden Sewell (04:47.71)
Mm-hmm.

Derek Cormier (04:49.676)
So, really, how you show up, how your business looks, customers are gonna be judging you based on like that's how the job's gonna go. Okay, do these guys have a process? Do I have to worry about getting the the right person at my home? Or can any employee from that company come and do the job right? Like, can I negotiate pricing? If your pricing's not set and you don't have a structure and a standard for that, that's also an issue because they're just gonna negotiate with you constantly. They're not gonna respect your price. And really, that's because.

There's no value. You didn't you didn't figure out a way to build value. And that starts with how you look, how your company looks, how your brand looks. So whether I'm in painting, concrete work, landscaping, whatever it is, I'm gonna have a very professional image. First off, I'm gonna have a standard of how all my employees need to look. Like, sure, they could have beards, but they have to be trimmed. You know, their hair can't be everywhere. if they're gonna wear hats, it's gonna be a company hat. My uniform actually has to look professional. So

Branden Sewell (05:35.016)
Mm-hmm.

Derek Cormier (05:43.307)
If we're going into your home, I see us kind of as an advice advisor. Like all my employees have to wear polos that are service technicians, project managers, and our installers are the only ones that can wear t-shirts that still can't have rips, holes, tears, mastic paint on them. because again, they're in addicts that are 150 degrees. So each role has a specific uniform that they have to abide by. And it's a standard, just like in the military. Like there's a standard. So I think any trade.

Branden Sewell (05:58.974)
Mm-hmm.

Derek Cormier (06:12.874)
No mat no matter what, can at least come up with some sort of standard. I don't think you need to wear the full buttoned up white polo with long sleeves and slacks. I mean, I know we live in Florida, but you need to set some sort of standard. And I think it's just an excuse that we hear from a lot of tradespeople that, you know, if you look too dressed up, you're a salesman. You don't really know the trade. You're just a sales guy. We hear it all the time. And it's really interesting to me because without sales, you have no work.

Branden Sewell (06:24.072)
Mm-hmm.

Branden Sewell (06:34.77)
Mm-hmm.

Branden Sewell (06:38.223)
Right.

Branden Sewell (06:43.09)
Mm-hmm.

Derek Cormier (06:43.938)
I don't care how tough you are, how how good you are at the trades, how skilled you are, if there's no sales being done, you don't have jobs to work with your hands. So I think in the trades, we look at sales as this negative thing and it's not, right? The better you are at communicating, everything is sales, literally every interaction. Even if you're an installer, you sales is involved. So I think we need to get out of this perspective that if you look too clean cut, if you look too professional, you're a salesman. No.

Branden Sewell (06:45.832)
Yeah.

Branden Sewell (07:13.585)
Mm-hmm.

Derek Cormier (07:13.982)
I am a class A licensed H VAC contractor. Most of you guys have EPAs. Like I can do any install myself. I could, I could do the work today, inside and out. I could take any technical support, call over the phone, and handle it. So that excuse is out the window, right? That doesn't mean you're a salesman if you're if you're dressed professionally. So I think there's we just need to raise the standard. And I think because a lot of the guys that get into the trades are the tough ones that have hard skin that are willing to do the hard things, right? Work in the 150 degree attic. I think

Branden Sewell (07:27.612)
Mm-hmm.

Derek Cormier (07:43.736)
think that we allow the unprofessionalism a little bit more because when you get a hard skin, you know, you're not as aware of, you know, how you look or how you sound. So yeah, I think that's just an excuse, honestly.

Branden Sewell (07:50.792)
Mm-hmm.

Branden Sewell (07:55.859)
Yeah, that's good. So a follow-up question to that. You know, you said initially in like that first few years, you know, even yourself, you were like a little bit more, you know, loose with the standard. and then obviously you adjusted that over time. I think because I've even experienced this as myself, like my business goes through like natural prog progressions as as I'm learning and working on myself as the owner.

my business naturally goes through these seasons of growth or professionalism or the standard changes or increases. can you speak for yourself and your experience? How did your team adjust to the standard or that bar being raised? Where maybe I would assume you might have had team members who were there when the the standard was maybe a little bit more relaxed and then you had to like tighten it down a little bit.

can you just share a little bit about that, maybe leadership side of that and how you manage the team and the culture that way?

Derek Cormier (09:00.782)
It's great question. And you know, it's funny when you think about it. Back then the environment was way too comfortable. Results didn't look good. Our numbers didn't look good. Everyone wasn't making amazing money. We had callbacks, right? When the when everything's a bit too comfortable and there's not standards, like why would people do extra work if they're not being held accountable? Like it's just logic, right? Facts over feelings is something I say every day. This is business, right?

Branden Sewell (09:11.208)
Mm-hmm.

Branden Sewell (09:22.278)
Right. Mm-hmm.

Derek Cormier (09:28.15)
Facts over feeling. So if you're running your business on feel, right? this feels really good, this culture, then you're just gonna be set up for failure. So in the beginning, I ran my business off of feel, a hundred percent, completely off of feel. Like, this feels nice. This feels good. And as I started to make mistakes and look at my PL, and you know, the profit wasn't there and the numbers weren't there, and you know, employees that weren't working out.

Branden Sewell (09:31.262)
Mm-hmm.

Branden Sewell (09:39.656)
Mm-hmm.

Derek Cormier (09:55.363)
weren't following process, you just wanted to show up and do what they wanted to do, be cowboys and run their own process out there. I'm like, okay, why is this happening? So I visited other shops. I mean, that's the first thing I do. I don't know at all. I'm constantly getting ideas from all different types of companies. So I visited other shops that were a little bit bigger than me, because I've been to the 50 million, 100 million dollar shops, and it's just way too far ahead to actually implement all those things. So I go to shops that were a little bit bigger than me, and I'd be like, okay.

Branden Sewell (10:07.965)
Mm-hmm.

Derek Cormier (10:25.698)
What are they doing well? And I'd find ones that I actually were doing well, right? Profitable. The things that I wasn't doing good at, I would look for shops that were doing those things. I wasn't going to look for the happy good culture shops. I was going to look for the financially successful shops. And what did I see out of all those shops? They had standards, they had accountability. Everyone was wearing uniforms. Literally, if any employee walked into their shop, they had to put booties on to walk in their own shop. Every time they made their employees put booty at booties on.

Branden Sewell (10:33.8)
Mm-hmm.

Branden Sewell (10:42.802)
Uh-huh.

Derek Cormier (10:55.65)
To get them in the habit of that's what you do when you're in a customer's home. And I'm like, okay, if you're gonna set the standard of this is how employees have to dress and act in your shop, they're definitely gonna do it in the employee's home. If you don't set that standard, they can wear backwards hats, t-shirts with ripped holes, whatever shorts they want, bright pink sneakers. What do you think they're gonna be doing in the customer's home? And what do you think the customer's gonna think when you're looking to charge all this money and this person's got their hat backwards and it looks like they just got up?

Branden Sewell (10:59.326)
Mm-hmm.

Derek Cormier (11:25.3)
And they're not very professional. Like they're gonna be like, no way, dude. And then they call someone out that actually looks like a grown-up, an adult, you know, with a polo shirt tucked in, belt, slacks, looks clean, has a tool belt, has a process, communicates well. I mean, that's what people want. I designed this basically because as a police officer, I know no families want anyone in their home that are someone you can't trust or that's someone that is gonna make you feel unsafe.

And that is what you're you hear in the trades, is people just don't feel safe with tradespeople in their house. So I said to myself, I need to create, you know, an employee that is going to be professional, background checked, that is gonna keep the homeowner safe. That's my number one priority, that they're not gonna take advantage of the homeowner or hurt the homeowner. And that is completely different from how our industry is designed.

Branden Sewell (11:53.487)
Mm-hmm.

Branden Sewell (12:12.251)
Mm-hmm.

Branden Sewell (12:17.178)
Yeah. you know, it's funny. I was gonna ask you, I had written down to ask what was your, you know, inspiration to professionalize. and you mentioned going and visiting, you know, the shops that are where you want to be or more successful and implementing what they are doing. are there any other inspiration or resources that you would be able to, you know, recommend or refer to somebody who is looking at their business and saying, Hey, these are

I I I know there's a problem. I need to address this, but they just need some type of resource to help them, you know, know how to implement it. Are there, you know, podcasts or thought leaders or books or anything like that that you would recommend to the audience to check out that maybe helped you in your journey?

Derek Cormier (13:05.868)
Yeah, so the first thing is a best practice group. And I mean, every trade may or may not have one. In HVAC, plumbing and electric, there's some pretty good ones. we're a part of one called Nextar. So they literally, I joined them about 2020, I believe. So I think about a four years after. And I didn't know business, right? I didn't know the structure. I was just a technician that started my own business. So they literally gave me the structure and

That's what gave me the ability to visit these shops without it being awkward. Like we're all part of this best practice group. They would literally set me up with a shop that I can go visit. And because everyone was trying to follow us a good model, like Nextstar took the 1,000 best HVC plumbing and lecture companies in the country. they're all in the same group. And then they do research on what works for each company in each market. And then they created a system that works for all of those companies. So this is proven based on analytics, right? They're gonna look at their PLs, they're gonna look at,

Branden Sewell (13:37.255)
Mm-hmm.

Branden Sewell (13:42.28)
Right.

Derek Cormier (14:02.888)
their operations. So once I joined that, it forced me to professionalize. I didn't have a choice. I was paying for this membership. Anytime you pay for something and you don't do what it's wanting you to do, you are wasting money. So, like it's just like coaching too. Like if you get a coach, it's honestly sometimes worth it just because you're gonna want to get your money's worth out of it. books, there's a really good book called The E Myth.

Branden Sewell (14:11.357)
Mm-hmm.

Branden Sewell (14:16.743)
Yeah.

Derek Cormier (14:28.978)
And they have a version for for HVAC that I really liked. And it's it's a really good business book for someone that ha does not have business knowledge that talk that talks about kind of how to grow your business and how to run your business. another book that I really like, it's called Bent, How to Win Back a Wayward Team. Those were two big books, as I was growing that really gave me some good realizations. E Myth was more about the business model,

Bent was more about a good employee. What I thought a good employee was was not what a good employee was. Like, and it actually teaches you how to grade employees, coaching up versus coaching out, how to hire properly. And yeah, I'd really recommend that. And, you know, there's a real there's a lot of podcasts that I I listen to that I'd recommend. One that I, if you're looking for, you know, in the trades, kind of some sales trades podcasts, I really like Waste No Day.

Brian Burton runs that. It's a it's a really good podcast. it's it's more towards plumbers and HVAC and electricians, but anyone in the trades that kind of goes into a home and sells really could listen to this podcast. I mean, technicians, owners, it's it's a really good podcast. They have all types of guests. They do live role playing on on the podcast. And what I like is it's not just like sell is sell. It's like, you know, take care of the customer, do the right thing, provide value. So

those are some resources that I think would really help people professionalize their business.

Branden Sewell (15:58.259)
That's good. Now, if you don't mind, jump into this because I think some people listen to what you're saying, right? And they're they're inspired to professionalize, right? They see the problem and they know they have to address it, but maybe they have some like fears or reservations of like, I know, or they're like like they they've kind of already assumed or created in their mind the issues or the problems that they're gonna face when they try to do that.

If you could, would you be able to share with the audience maybe what some fears you had of like professionalizing or growing your business and maybe the things that like, you know, just kind of bring some reality that, hey, I feared this, but once I did it, this was the benefit and how it really worked out and maybe some of those myths that you like you had to like overcome in your mind and how they actually played out, if that makes sense.

Derek Cormier (16:53.044)
A great question. Yeah. So my biggest fear was always employees were to quit because they were hard to get. They were extremely difficult to get in the trades. I mean, in HVAC, we're we're going into really hot attics. We're doing duck work. Like it's not fun work, it's dirty work. Like an installer, it's a tough job in HVAC. Nothing about it is easy. So it's really hard to get those employees and then train them. You know how much money you have to invest in these employees to train them? They don't come trained. There's no good trade schools in Brevard County or in Orlando.

Branden Sewell (16:59.614)
Right. Yeah.

Branden Sewell (17:05.649)
Uh-huh.

Right.

Derek Cormier (17:22.456)
Like, so you're getting brand new people typically that need training, even if you're getting guys that are experienced, like they're not really experienced. They're because no one's training them. So you hire this employee that was expensive to get, and then you put all this money into training. And then if you make a lot of changes too fast, you're my fear was like, okay, they're gonna quit, right? And they're gonna take this training that I gave them and they're gonna go take it somewhere else that isn't gonna manage them. So that was always my fear. Like, okay, if I make this too difficult for them and there's too much growth, that

Branden Sewell (17:25.896)
Mm-hmm.

Branden Sewell (17:30.878)
Mm-hmm.

Branden Sewell (17:41.533)
Mm-hmm.

Derek Cormier (17:51.363)
They they might quit. So in the beginning, I that that really ran how I made decisions. And I made decisions way too slow until finally, after I visited enough businesses and I because once you see it done and you see it in real life, like it's not a theory anymore. You're like, and once you meet people that are these owners and these managers, and they're not that smart, they're not better than you, they're not geniuses, they don't have MBAs, they don't, they just

Branden Sewell (18:15.454)
Right.

Derek Cormier (18:19.682)
Graduated high school. Some of them don't even graduate high school. And like, if they're able to do this, I'm able to do this. And that's, I think, what was the differentiator for me because it's like not a theory. Like, that might work for your business. Like, nope, they're in a similar market. Some of them are in harder markets, they're less educated, they have less resources, and they're doing this and they're winning. So I'm like, I can't ignore that. That's a fact over feelings. So I think once I saw that, it motivated me that this is what I'm gonna do. And I had to make a plan and I had to be.

Branden Sewell (18:22.323)
Right.

Yeah.

Branden Sewell (18:34.099)
Mm-hmm.

Derek Cormier (18:49.586)
willing to have a backup plan in the meantime. So I made sure I was recruiting on the back end, knowing some of those people were going turn over. And when they did, I thought it was going to affect the business more negatively than they than it than it did. They all the employees were like, once I I'm gone or you fire me or I quit, your business is going under. All of them would say that. Literally our business would double as soon as they were gone. Cause the culture got better, the person actually came and followed the process. And I'm just like, holy crap, like

Branden Sewell (19:07.262)
Right.

Branden Sewell (19:12.705)
Yeah, it's so funny.

Derek Cormier (19:18.86)
I should have done this sooner. Like, this is insane. And no, as soon as I started seeing those results, like I was like, no, I'm not, I'm not doing this anymore. And the trajectory just got stronger and stronger and stronger. And then when you get people that come into your business that are true culture fits and want to follow your process, like it just becomes easier. You don't have to micromanage those people. They're not the ones always complaining. They're not asking for a hundred raises, they're not calling out sick 24/7. So, like you don't realize the amount of

Branden Sewell (19:20.623)
Yeah.

Derek Cormier (19:46.856)
you know, time that they're adding to your schedule until you start, you know, getting some good ones in.

Branden Sewell (19:50.546)
Uh-huh.

Branden Sewell (19:53.937)
Yeah, it's so funny. I can remember there there was a season where I was you know, I would say I'm probably not as far along as you are, so I still have those fears sometimes. But I had this one guy who worked for me for like a little over a year and you know, he asked me for a raise and I said, Look, I'm not giving you a raise. like here's the issues that I'm having with you. If you can work on these things and improve them, then we can talk about a raise. And

He just basically gave me the ultimatum that if I didn't give him more money, he was gonna go start his own business and his yard signs weren't gonna stop were gonna start popping up in in my town and he was gonna, you know, take over all the business and blah blah blah blah blah. And I was like, Good for you, man. Go do it. Like, you know, cause y what you realize, like for me, I've been in business for about to enter into my tenth year. It's like I just realize how hard it is. And I'm like, okay, we'll

One, you obviously don't realize how hard this is. Or and then two, on the other side, I'm like, and if you are successful, then good for you, man. You earned it. Like go go do it. But I'm not gonna let you stay here, if that's the attitude you're gonna have. So

Derek Cormier (21:08.504)
Did you do you make your employees sign a non-solicit agreement? You should. So yeah, it's it's really important. And and and that's another thing that too, like I am real big on liabilities. Like I protect our us so well with that. It's just it's my mind as a cop, right? Look for threats and eliminate the threats.

Branden Sewell (21:12.135)
No, I don't.

Branden Sewell (21:27.016)
So explain that for b like 'cause I I've n I've actually never heard of it, so if you could

Derek Cormier (21:29.74)
Yeah. Yeah. So so you can do a non solicit agreement that they can't solicit employees if they ever leave. And you can do a non solicit agreement that they cannot talk to your customers. They not cannot call your customers. They cannot cross promote after they leave your business, regardless if they go somewhere else. So every single owner should be making their employees sign a non solicit for employees and for customers. Like every single one. Like it's you can you can make it on Claude. Claude could be like an attorney.

Branden Sewell (21:35.577)
okay. Gotcha.

Branden Sewell (21:45.138)
Gotcha.

Derek Cormier (21:58.691)
And you can make it on whatever you use. I like Claude, but you every employee should be doing should be doing that.

Branden Sewell (22:03.942)
Yeah, that's good. let's jump into this. kind of some of the you know, the practical side of things. And, you know, I I love some people may like him, hate him, whatever. I've listened to Tommy Mello for a long time. And I love what he's been able to do with the garage door industry and you know, like how he professionalized that, you know, built a training center, built a process for like bringing on guys, training them.

and all of that, like you know, really professional technicians. you mentioned that you have a what is a state certified apprenticeship program? if you could it just kind of jump into that. What does it look like for someone, a new employee to on board with your company? What does that process look like? what is their training look like? And how does that experience

differ than maybe the unprofessionalized company and why does it make a difference and how do you think that it it serves your industry and helps raise the standard?

Derek Cormier (23:14.35)
So, this is a strong one that I think it'd help a lot of companies if you start implementing a process like this, because this is how I took back control of not letting employees run my business. And the ones that want raises and not having to give any of that. we give raises, but they're deserved. They're not like, hey, give me this or else. Like, we don't have those conversations. And this is how we get so many people in the door. Like, man, we get probably like two to three hundred applications for our apprenticeship program a week. So, because there's not a lot of good pay to

Branden Sewell (23:24.85)
Mm-hmm.

Branden Sewell (23:30.902)
Right.

Branden Sewell (23:36.147)
Mm-hmm.

Branden Sewell (23:41.985)
wow.

Derek Cormier (23:43.663)
apprenticeship programs around. So we could be really nitpicky with these people. I mean, we get some serious talent. And it is so much more, it makes you feel so much more powerful as an owner when you know you've got, you know, 10 people about to graduate this apprenticeship program. And you can start cycling and coaching out the bad fits, right? Proactively, not reactively, reactively is like, something bad happens and we got to fire them. You have to start becoming proactive with your recruiting, right? So you're, you should

Branden Sewell (23:45.266)
Mm-hmm.

Branden Sewell (24:00.882)
Mm-hmm.

Branden Sewell (24:05.062)
Mm-hmm.

Branden Sewell (24:08.659)
Right.

Branden Sewell (24:12.478)
Mm-hmm.

Derek Cormier (24:12.98)
always be and you hear it all the time always be hiring like right it sounds great but no like seriously always be seriously hiring and that's why I love that book bent because it teaches you to rate your employees so you know 100% who's being coached up and being coached out there is no in-between there's not a maybe like you're being coached up you're being coached out so that when we added that process like that took so much stress off of me because like man like we can create our own we don't even have to rely on finding this experience pool of people that have the right experience and

Branden Sewell (24:26.651)
Mm-hmm. Right.

Derek Cormier (24:41.962)
hopefully they have the culture fit too. We call them unicorns. And it's it's just really unrealistic. I just visited the the shop and they actually call them retreads, like a retread of a tire. It's really funny because they don't they don't really hire retreads and they're a $47 million business. They do HVAC and plumbing and man, amazing business. They started the same time as me. So it's like, I grew fast, you know. No, they're 47 million, they have eight locations and

Branden Sewell (24:52.698)
Uh-huh.

Derek Cormier (25:09.89)
They don't hire retreads. You would think a $47 million company, how do they find talent? HVC professionals, plumbers, they build them. They have an academy like we do. So we ended up getting registered with the state of Florida. And what that does for you, and you can do this through a company called Career Source, Career Source of Florida. There's they're all over. And they will set you up with this for free if you're big enough, right? You have to be large enough to be able to like sponsor candidates to go through your apprenticeship program.

Branden Sewell (25:18.087)
Mm-hmm.

Derek Cormier (25:39.961)
You have to be able to have enough candidates. So you have to come up with your own curriculum. You have to have a space where you're gonna be able to train them, and you have to dedicate some time towards paid training. really, it's not that hard. You can create create a curriculum with AI. So they the reason why you'd want to get it is the state will give you funding towards that academy. And if this student is maybe not maybe they're financially right, they're like,

Branden Sewell (25:53.019)
Mm-hmm.

Branden Sewell (25:59.807)
Mm.

Derek Cormier (26:08.918)
You know, 20, 21, 22, they're not, they don't have a ton of money saved, or you know, they haven't been making a lot of money. They're gonna qualify for a grant where career source will pay half of their salary for their first six months. So you don't wanna train someone and waste all your money on them. Like there's there's programs like this that can pay some of their salary. Now they have to qualify for that. And do we get every single one to qualify for that? No, but that's a resource that we have that we're not spending as much in our training.

Branden Sewell (26:27.699)
Mm-hmm.

Derek Cormier (26:36.706)
And like I said, they have grants towards where they can set up a classroom for you. You can get some tools and things like that. So, but you have to have a legitimate program. So while you're small, you're not going to be going towards that. While you're small, you might just want to start with like an apprenticeship program with some structure where you know they're not just a helper for you for for 20 years. Like we don't hire helpers. We never have, we never will. We don't hire helpers. Like you're an apprentice to become a junior technician or junior installer in 30 days. So if you don't become one in 30 days, we're not keeping you. And

Branden Sewell (26:36.732)
Right.

Branden Sewell (26:55.388)
Right.

Branden Sewell (27:01.192)
Mm-hmm.

Derek Cormier (27:05.592)
For those first 30 days, we have a curriculum that I built. So they come in our classroom for four hours a day. We have a dedicated trainer and they do real life skills practice. So they're brazing, they're doing duct systems, they're testing voltages. we have a little classroom that we built. It's not huge, it's you know, it's the right size. And we even have homework assignments for them. they're video homework assignments because every millennial nowadays has ADHD. So we can't, you know, give them things that they're not gonna do. So

Branden Sewell (27:32.188)
Yeah.

Derek Cormier (27:35.095)
Short little video assignments. They have little quizzes at the end they have to complete. If they don't complete their homework that night, they don't get to come in the next day. They're done. So if they don't show up on time, we send them home. They're done. So we we have standards. We don't even allow our employees to smoke. No vaping, no chewing, no cigarettes. In the trades, dude, like that's unheard of. We don't allow it. Not in the parking lot, not in the company van, not on the job site. Zero. Guess what? How many problems we have? None. Guess the quality of employees we get.

Branden Sewell (27:35.325)
Right.

Branden Sewell (27:42.322)
Mm-hmm.

Branden Sewell (27:53.894)
Yeah.

Branden Sewell (27:59.359)
Mm-hmm.

Yeah.

Derek Cormier (28:04.376)
Great. I'm not saying you're not quality if you use tobacco products, but that's just a standard we have. If you want to do that outside of work on your own time, we don't care, right? We're not going to allow you to drink on the job. Why are we going to allow you to smoke on the job? Again, like, and then also we're, we're, we're testing people's indoor air quality in their home as we're like adding, you know, VOCs to their home with cigarette smoke. So it's like, it's just not a good look. So that program will graduate someone into a junior technician in 30 days and

Branden Sewell (28:11.589)
Mm-hmm.

Branden Sewell (28:21.118)
You're right. Yeah, for sure.

Derek Cormier (28:32.738)
They typically are out on the road. And we then we had further training to get them to a senior level and a lead level. And now we came up with that, those that progress there. And we we invested in a full time trainer when it was just too much on the managers and we saw the program did really well. If you look at the results of our KPIs on Service Titan, that's our CRM, on an experienced employee, maybe here two years versus a brand new a junior maintenance tech that just graduated the program, they double our experienced employees.

Branden Sewell (28:51.283)
Mm-hmm.

Derek Cormier (29:01.058)
Because they're full in on the process, they follow the process, they have a good attitude and they kill it. Here's the reality, though. And I want to say this to everybody, and I know I've been talking a long time, but I want you to know the reality. The trades is hard as shit. Some of your employees are not gonna be five-year, 10-year, 20-year employees anymore. That that day is done, right? In reality, you're gonna burn out a lot of these young guys because they don't really wanna do it. They're trying it out. So when you have an academy like this, this is ongoing every 30 days, so you're producing these people.

Branden Sewell (29:01.299)
Yeah.

Derek Cormier (29:28.364)
You're not so depressed when these people burn out, even though you took really good care of them, even though you paid them really well. In reality, I know that's what it is like in the trades today. This is you're not going to get people that are going to work for you for 10, 20 years anymore. That's done. So have realistic expectations and you won't be disappointed.

Branden Sewell (29:28.585)
Mm-hmm.

Branden Sewell (29:43.601)
Right. Yeah, that's good. Now obviously I I mean I don't know if what your opinion is on this, but I as somebody who is in a trade that I feel like is under professionalized, when I hear what you're saying, I'm like, holy crap, what an uphill battle. what encouragement or what things like for you know, trades like you know, landscaping, lawn care.

painting. what advice would you have to those trades on professionalizing their industry? Do you think that we need to adopt like the same things that like ex and do it the exact same way? what kind of advice would you have when getting that that started? you know, it's you know, frankly, like I I'm a I'm knowledgeable of a

we have what's called the PCA in the painting world. So they're kind of like the regulators of the painting industry and trying to like professionalize it. but I know some of the leaders, right? Nick Slavic, Jason, I can't remember his last name, but they have these their own thoughts on how to professionalize it. And I'll be honest, like a lot of it seems to kind of

revolve around like just trying to have better pricing that's you know dialed in and then but then they also ha like a lot of them run like subcontractor models which I hate where they're huh yeah it's like I I I just like how do you professionalize a industry if you're just going to build it off of subcontracting? Like it I just I don't know it just doesn't seem right to me but

Derek Cormier (31:25.806)
Same. Same.

Branden Sewell (31:40.136)
But anyway, yeah, if you could share your perspective like from like an industry like mine, like what what advice would you give?

Derek Cormier (31:45.559)
If I was in landscaping, I would destroy all those landscapers. Not I'm trying not trying to be cocky because I know what customers want. Like I I'm I'm a marketer, right? Like you see the branding. I built all this branding. Everyone knows our trucks in our area. Like it's not a surprise. I built the branding that way. People think we're private equity. They think we're corpor a corporation, right? Cause like it looks really professional. Like, man, that's that thing looks well run. So if your landscaping business looks like Chuck and a truck, just you know, one guy with a cigarette in his mouth like that, you don't know is he's gonna show up this week or next week.

Branden Sewell (31:48.638)
No, no, I yeah.

Branden Sewell (31:55.144)
Mm-hmm. Yeah.

Branden Sewell (32:02.462)
Yeah.

Derek Cormier (32:14.838)
Like, yeah, people are gonna be willing to pay a certain price for that. And it's not gonna be a lot. It's not gonna be enough for you to sustain the business. You're gonna break even every every single month. It's gonna be stressful. Look at companies that are successful in the world, right? Look at Starbucks. Even Dunkin' Donuts is they're okay, but like I won't go to Dunkin' Donuts because it's a joke. They're unprofessional. They get your drink wrong. Like I don't think they're they're like the the best consistency with their coffee. Like my wife kind of likes it sometimes, but most of the time she hates it. So like maybe one out of ten, she's like, it's a good drink.

Branden Sewell (32:41.906)
Yeah.

Derek Cormier (32:44.16)
Starbucks is consistent. I'm bougie with coffee, so I don't really drink that that much anymore. I'll drink like an expresso at like a private coffee shop because I want to invest in a local business. But if I'm going to a chain, it's gonna be Starbucks because they're professional, it's consistent. I will pay more money. I will pay double the price versus going to Dunkin' Donuts and getting shitty experience. So customers care about the experience. That is the number one thing they care about, right? The product has to be good too, but the first thing is the experience.

Branden Sewell (32:52.414)
Uh-huh.

Branden Sewell (33:04.158)
Mm-hmm.

Branden Sewell (33:08.327)
Mm-hmm.

Derek Cormier (33:11.658)
Is the experience really well when they show up in a beat up truck with a plumber's crack, dirty, smelly, huge beard? Your wife, the wife's are usually the ones at home, the ones that deal with the contractors, that feel unsafe, like they don't want you in their home. They don't trust you. They're not gonna buy from you typically unless you're the cheapest person ever. And then they don't even care if the value is good and you're not even making any money at that job. You should have stayed home.

Branden Sewell (33:27.645)
Mm-hmm.

Derek Cormier (33:37.145)
I mean, what's the point in going to someone's home and making no money and doing all this work and busting your ass when you could have stayed home and made no money anyways? So it's like in reality, it's just it's it's ridiculous. So I would just look at it like any company that you do business with, like you want someone that's professional, that has standards that you trust. And it's no different in landscaping and in painting. And what we do is we compare ourselves to well, I'm going against those guys that are unprofessional, they're much cheaper.

Branden Sewell (33:44.926)
Right.

Mm-hmm.

Derek Cormier (34:07.522)
There's always going to be a cheaper price. That's not going to go away, right? There's always going to be handyman. I'm not competing with handyman. I understand that my trade has some licensing that maybe, you know, a handyman can do some stuff for painting and some stuff for landscaping. But again, if you don't, if you don't add enough services to your business to protect yourself. So if I'm doing landscaping, you know, obviously I'm gonna do tree trimming too. I'm gonna do bushes. I'm gonna I'm gonna do where I fertilize and I spray. I might, I might tack on some pest control if I can get a license in that too.

Branden Sewell (34:10.27)
Mm-hmm.

Derek Cormier (34:35.554)
You saw my model where I added on plumbing and I added on electric. I want to stay in the home. The goal is to stay in the home. If you get the right customer that wants someone that's professional and does a good job, stay in their home. If you do this one tiny service and you need thousands and hundreds of thousands of customers and you have to hit so many doors, it's gonna be a really hard business model. So I would recommend that you make your service a little bit more wider so you can stay in those really good customers' homes and you don't have to fight so many of those little bidders because.

Branden Sewell (34:54.846)
Mm-hmm.

Derek Cormier (35:05.41)
The customers that love you will keep spending money with you. And I I can tell you, if there's not a lot of people professional in the painting and the landscaping industry, and you are the one that is, there is a guaranteed market that wants you. And you just have to find those customers and be good at marketing. And then once you get those customers, stay in their home.

Branden Sewell (35:08.508)
Right.

Branden Sewell (35:24.486)
Yeah. I think we've done decent. You know, I think it's like a it's a different challenge that we face because we're I'm trying to be honestly one of those leaders of that change in my industry and professionalizing it. So there's a lot of things that you know I'm doing that I look around and I see a lot of my competitors or even people in this local market that I know that they're not doing, but I'm trying to be like the one who sets that standard.

you know, that's one of the reasons why I started this podcast because I'm like, man, I just want to try to get this information out to our industry of like, hey, you don't you don't have to stay that way. You don't have to do business the way that it's always been done. You can be one of the people who brings change to your industry and professionalizes it. And man, if just more people could understand that. Like if I had

I feel like I would be better off if I had if I could go out and and help, you know, five, ten companies in my local area help them professionalize because I feel like it just helps elevate the expectation even that homeowners have, right? instead of, you know, me showing up and you know, please if you don't agree with what I'm about to say, please share your opinion because I respect what you say.

But when I show up, it's almost like I feel like my customers look at me and think like, wow, that's that's nice, but it's unnecessary. Or like I like I'm saying, like if I show up, if it you know, I show up to my bids in a polo and slacks and I try to look nice and presentable and all my vehicles are wrapped and you know, we try to present a professional experience, the way that I feel about it.

Derek Cormier (37:01.164)
What what is what do they think is unnecessary?

Branden Sewell (37:20.318)
currently is that customers may look at us and they don't understand the value that that brings and why we're so much different than the guy who shows up in the you know, like in a painter shirt and painter's whites and in their work truck that's beat up. You know, so I I guess I'm just right.

Derek Cormier (37:41.721)
Not your customer, Brandon. That's what you need to look at. That's not your customer. You can't make everybody happy. This is what we do. That's what I failed in business in the beginning. And this is this is the part of professionalizing. Like, what do I do? You can't make everyone happy. If you're a people pleaser and you're a business owner, fucking run or change, right? Like, don't stay a business owner because you won't make any money, right? Stop being a people pleaser. Who cares if people hate everything about your polo and your slacks and your wrapped vehicle? Those aren't your customers. I don't care what their feedback is, they're not my customers.

Branden Sewell (37:55.761)
Mm-hmm. You're right.

Mm-hmm.

Branden Sewell (38:07.453)
Mm-hmm.

Derek Cormier (38:11.65)
The ones that are buying from you are your customers. So if you go to someone's house and you provide an estimate, is that a customer?

Branden Sewell (38:11.816)
Right.

Branden Sewell (38:20.818)
Well, I would say not yet, no.

Derek Cormier (38:22.646)
Yeah. Well, we some people see them as a customer, right? They'll put more direct mail to them, they'll have more marketing campaigns to them, even if they never bought from them. Like, and again, like so it's like they're not a customer, right? That not yet. They didn't buy anything. So, right, maybe start getting from your customers that are buying from you. Why did you buy from me? we loved how professional you were, and all the other ones were smoking cigarettes outside of our door and

Branden Sewell (38:32.008)
Mm-hmm.

Branden Sewell (38:36.702)
Mm-hmm.

Derek Cormier (38:48.098)
You know, the bids weren't, you know, weren't detailed. We didn't even know what they were gonna do. We didn't know what type of paint they were using. We didn't know the warrant. They didn't even say warranty. So like find out from the customers that do like you what they like about you. And that will reinforce that you're doing the right things, right? But getting feedback from customers that are sorry, people that are your customers, they're not even your customers. So like that feedback is worthless.

Branden Sewell (38:54.683)
Mm-hmm.

Branden Sewell (39:09.522)
Yeah. You know, it's funny, like I like I've just been kind of mulling over what you're talking about right now, even recently. And I was talking to I I don't know if you know the realtor, Zach Spurlock. he's a pretty high he he only sells like luxury super high end real estate in our area, and he's been feeding me some referrals

And so I'll go out and I'll bid these jobs that are in like what is it? is it it's that area down in Melbourne Beach. It's like a that that one, but I think there's another one. Logger is it loggerhead or something Turtle Island or something? I don't know. But anyway, they're down there in that Melbourne Eat beach area. And and so I've gone into these bids, I'm like, you know, these are multi million dollar homes and

Derek Cormier (39:45.1)
Lansing Island?

John's Island.

Branden Sewell (40:04.624)
I'm thinking, like, this is my ideal customer. They're gonna understand the value and the professionalism that I bring. And then they're like, hey, can you get this done in two weeks? I'm like, no, I'm booked six to eight weeks out. I'm like super busy. and you know, I'm trying to present our professionalism. I like give them a price and they like bulk at it. I'm like, dude, I've got people who live in, you know, five hundred thousand dollar to a million dollar homes who don't even question my pricing.

Who like when I show up and I say, Hey, we're booked six to eight weeks out, they don't even they're like, yeah, that's fine, we'll wait. And so I'm like trying to wrap my head around like why 'cause I was like, Man, this is gonna be it for me. I'm gonna get into this market and these people are gonna understand. I'm like, Man, that

Derek Cormier (40:49.528)
I've got a really good resource for you and anyone listening to this podcast. So there's a website called Melissa.com. Now, Melissa.com is a data aggregator that has a lot of information about homeowners in our area. So hopefully most of the people that listen to this podcast use a CRM. You know, so CRM holds all your customers' data, you know, who you sold to, how much you sold to them for. If you've been in business, you said you've 10 years.

Branden Sewell (40:53.118)
Yeah, for sure.

Mm-hmm.

Derek Cormier (41:19.276)
So you can say, all right, in the last 10 years, here's all the people that bought for me. You can even say, let let's say a big ticket for you might be like four grand, right? Or a whole house. I don't know what it costs to paint a whole house. But for me, like maybe I'm looking at they at least bought a system. So I might say minimum eight grand. So anyone that spent eight grand with me in the last 10 years. So I'm gonna throw that list into Melissa.com. They have something called listware. So you can take that Excel file from your CRM.

You could put it into listware. It's going to tell you all the demographics of that customer. It's going to tell you the best zip codes that you do business in. It's going to tell you the age range, right? Who's the head of the household? How old are they? It's going to tell you how much income they make. And then it's going to tell you who your ideal customer is. I know who my ideal customer is. They're typically 55 plus. they make about 80 grand plus. They're not the half a, they're not making half a million dollars, right? I know my target.

Branden Sewell (41:58.707)
Mm-hmm.

Branden Sewell (42:15.144)
Mm-hmm.

Derek Cormier (42:17.066)
age of my home, I know how much the home costs. I know if there's children in the home. I know if there's seniors in the home. Typically our customer has children in the home and seniors in the home. Why do you think our ideal customer might have children or seniors in the home, Brandon?

Branden Sewell (42:30.362)
Well, I would say that it's probably because they have there's more of like a i it the HVAC becomes more of like an emergency for them.

Derek Cormier (42:41.336)
They care about doing it the right way. That's our mission, caring to do it the right way. They literally align with our mission. Like they're like, we care that we want this done right. We don't want someone to do this on safe like they burn our house down. Like we want to trust this company. So there's a lot of single people out there that we're not advertising to them. You know what I mean? Like there's a lot of people that are making a million a year. We're not advertising to them, right? They're gonna get a construction manager to get a sub to do it cheap as possible.

Branden Sewell (42:47.89)
Yeah, yeah.

Derek Cormier (43:08.11)
Because that's how they want to go about it, because this might be their 16th rental property. They're not even living in it, right? So, like, this is why I'm probably not gonna go over, go after rental properties. We're gonna go after, you know, owner occupied. I'm sure you know this too. So, like, it's like property management, like that's gonna be a different profile. Are is property management be willing to pay as much as someone that lives in that home? Right. So, like when you start looking at it this way and you figure out who your ideal customer is and you create that profile.

Branden Sewell (43:27.741)
No.

Derek Cormier (43:35.527)
and I I, you know, I I gave this advice to another HVAC company in Oregon because I coach people for free because I want to help the industry as well, like you. And it was cool. They after they figured out their ideal customer, it was like the 45 year old like dad, like the engineer, like they had even had like a name for him. I forget what it was. So like they they had this like really good profile. And now what you can do, because direct mail still works.

Branden Sewell (43:53.149)
Mm-hmm.

Derek Cormier (44:02.196)
Is you could do a neighborhood search in those zip codes that you make the most money in, and you could literally find the demographics of the people that are that are in those homes and you can direct mail straight to them. And we do something really cool where we get robots. If I I might have a letter here I could show you.

Branden Sewell (44:05.928)
Mm-hmm.

Branden Sewell (44:26.438)
Mm-hmm.

Yeah.

Derek Cormier (44:29.47)
Inside of there's a letter written by the owner with a magnet and a sticker. And you can do this pretty much in any trade that you I know some people will throw like the plastic business card with a rock in the driveway that just pisses people off sometimes, you know. Door hangers sometimes piss people off. So, like this doesn't make people that mad. They're like, Okay, this looks like a personal letter for someone. I'm not gonna throw this right in the trash. Postcards go right in the trash, and then they open it up. And if it's a genuine short written letter from the owner that just says, you know, hey, you know, just to let you know, we work.

Branden Sewell (44:41.982)
Right. Yeah.

Derek Cormier (44:59.104)
Neighbors were given this offer, 10% off, whatever it is, free inspection, whatever you do, make sure it's a really strong offer. And and yeah, I mean you could add a sticker in there, a magnet, people put magnets on their fridge, and it's not expensive. And you know, this could be time consuming if you have the time you could handwrite all these, if you have a really targeted list. But we have a company that the robots actually hand write them on there, and the amount we get from direct mail is is great. Cause

We're not playing the Google PPC game. So that all that we're talking about, Brandon, is it's it's marketing, right? Like if you have a strong marketing plan and you know who to market to, you won't be dealing with this identity crisis of like, do I become professional? Do I stay the same? Do I do what everybody else is doing? No. Hell no. Stop. Be an individual. People want things that are an experience that are different. We talked about that. People will pay tons of money for Disney. People will pay double the price for Starbucks. Like, but

Branden Sewell (45:32.989)
Yeah.

Branden Sewell (45:45.544)
Yeah.

Branden Sewell (45:54.12)
Mm-hmm.

Derek Cormier (45:55.223)
You have to have a stronger plan and you have to only go after customers that are your profile. And if you think that you need to go after every customer, you're gonna be wasting your time.

Branden Sewell (46:03.96)
Yeah, for sure. That's good. I've used some different programs in the past. Like send out letters was one that I use for doing something similar to what you do. and then there's some through R CRM. We actually use Jobber, but they have like postcard mania and things like that that you can connect with. So I'm just curious, what which service do you use for doing yours?

Derek Cormier (46:28.226)
I use a company called Pen Litters for for that. And we so we don't do postcards to new customers because they usually get thrown in the trash. We used to do like the geofenced ones, you know, you like you did a house and you hit all the neighbors. We stopped doing that. the reason why is because you could have had people in those homes where they were the renters, like they didn't even live there, they didn't have the right income, the demographics. So like we stopped. So we do new homeowners because those are great people that want to do things right and get their house set. So we do new homeowners that does really well.

Branden Sewell (46:30.438)
Okay.

Branden Sewell (46:39.708)
Mm-hmm. Okay.

Branden Sewell (46:47.368)
Yeah.

Derek Cormier (46:57.58)
And then we target those zip codes that we do really well. And then we only hit the demographics that match it on Melissa.com.

Branden Sewell (47:03.912)
Gotcha. That's great. So I'm assuming that inside of pen letters they they give you the ability to just put in all the demographics that you want and then you just send. And does it connect to s

Derek Cormier (47:14.158)
So Melissa.com, I get, I get all my well, pen letters will do the list for you, but I'm OCD control freak. So I go on Melissa.com and I get my own list and I just send it to them. So Melissa.com, you can you can do you can all yourself. There's no contract, you can, you can, it's it's not expensive. It's just it's information. So like the first thing you need to do is figure out your ideal customer, right? And that could be length, that could be they spent a minimum amount of this, they could it could be amount of purchase, you can decide what that is.

Branden Sewell (47:20.092)
Yeah.

Gotcha. Does it connect to s

Branden Sewell (47:37.054)
Mm-hmm.

Derek Cormier (47:43.522)
Upload that into listware and alyssa.com. It'll tell you the demographics of your ideal customer. And then you could take that info that it gives you. You can throw that into AI or Chat GPT and say, hey, from this information, tell me who my ideal customer is. It's going to literally tell you that.

Branden Sewell (47:56.947)
Yeah. I wanna be respectful of your time. We've got about seven more minutes to go over some things. one of the things that I've been really impressed with with you guys, and you mentioned this earlier, is your brand. and so if we could just close out for a minute and talk about that, because that's something that I worked really hard on in the last year, year and a half, on going from just having like all white vans and trucks.

to where I have been working on wrapping every single one of my vehicles one by one. So and you know I've I got my inspiration originally from Dan Antonelli. I had him on my podcast and I read his book and took a lot of advice from him. I didn't use Kick Charge to do my brand. I've done everything myself actually.

But I just wanna get some of your thoughts on how important that is prof for professionalism. and you know, yeah, just kind of end us out talking about that, some maybe some of your philosophies on your brand and and how important that is.

Derek Cormier (49:08.728)
It's funny you said that because I'm the same in the same spot. I read his book. I wanted to use him, but at the point I couldn't afford it. So I created my own and it grew over time, right? Like so probably rebranded three times myself, did it myself. obviously we started out at Climate Experts, Aaron Heat, just H V A C. and I just had this cheap, drawn out penguin, like just blue. It was just it it didn't stand out. we had a white truck.

Branden Sewell (49:29.384)
Mm-hmm.

Derek Cormier (49:38.445)
You know, with like the magnet and the logo, like you couldn't tell us from a mile away. I put the manufacturer logos on my truck like a dummy. Like, I'm gonna get co-op. Like, it's just dumb. Like, you when people look at those events, they see like train, carrier, like, what is that? What what's the company though? Like, I see like the manufacturer on there. So I did all the wrong things. and then I read his book and I learned and I rebranded to Climate Experts Aaron Heat. And I that's when I kind of got my main colors where first were blue, like like royal blue.

Branden Sewell (49:55.686)
Right.

Derek Cormier (50:07.596)
Navy blue and red. And I also learned that was cliche because you think about AC, it's like hot and cold. Everyone's blue and red. And I'm like, crap. I messed that up. But then when I added plumbing and electric, I rebranded again. And that's where I added kind of the yellow for electric and the teal. and our trucks are pretty unique now. Not many people have the yellow stripe and the teal and the blue. So, like now when we're driving around, you can tell it's our trucks. It's not the I mean, even though the blue and the red one, we had the full wrap trucks in it.

Branden Sewell (50:15.25)
Yeah.

Branden Sewell (50:32.843)
yeah.

Derek Cormier (50:36.108)
You know, we were different, but it it just differentiated us even more. And I I read I read this book, Pink Goldfish, and I recommend anybody read it. It's a really good branding book. And it talks about being unique. And you know, like there talks about a company that had all pink trucks. Like everyone knew that brand. And they even aligned it to like breast cancer. So like there was more of like an emotional feeling behind it as well. So when I read that book, I was like,

Branden Sewell (50:42.622)
Mm.

Branden Sewell (50:59.134)
Mm-hmm.

Derek Cormier (51:02.156)
Wow, like I I knew a lot of the tactics, but I think too many of us try to look like cool or tough or like I got military camo on my vans. Like I got the strong man on my like if it looks scary, like most of your business is gonna be approved by women. Like and I did this wrong with my social media too, with my branding. Like I got my branding down to where like it it did really well. And then my social media in the beginning, like it wasn't really.

Branden Sewell (51:10.206)
Mm-hmm.

Branden Sewell (51:14.59)
Mm-hmm.

Right.

Branden Sewell (51:22.034)
Mm-hmm.

Derek Cormier (51:29.9)
tailored towards like women wanting to like feel like we were reproachable. It was like tailored towards like men and like construction. And there's just a lower barrier of entry. Like I deal with residential. So like if I was like a subcontractor dealing with contractors and I wanted to impress them, sure. But like I needed to like educate homeowners in a way that made them feel safe so that what they'd want to use us and feel comfortable with with the process. So when I created my brand, I wanted it to be friendly. I mean you see our mascot we have a big

Branden Sewell (51:37.352)
Yeah.

Branden Sewell (51:41.65)
Mm-hmm.

Derek Cormier (51:59.363)
Jack Penguin, but he's smiley. He's like name is Chili. and I did that just because, like, I think, you know, we grew up a lot of our generation, millennials, with like Disney, you know, cartoons. And it just makes us feel good. I've had people call my office line and leave a voicemail and say, like, hey, I just want to let you know, every time I drive by your shop and I see your mascot, it just makes me smile. Like,

Branden Sewell (52:02.364)
Mm-hmm.

Branden Sewell (52:12.336)
Mm-hmm.

Branden Sewell (52:22.844)
Dude, I had that happen for the first time last year. Yeah.

Derek Cormier (52:25.558)
Right? Like how like how cool is that? Like that you're just making people's day better just by like your branding and your logo. And like it pays for itself. We get so many calls where people just just call because they see our vans. And then again, like if you it's could be hard to track, but like if you track that, you're gonna make money just on them calling to see your brands. But also, you might have three vans on the road. Now everyone recognizes your vans. They're gonna like be Well, your vans are everywhere. I see them everywhere, and you're like,

Branden Sewell (52:35.496)
Yeah.

Derek Cormier (52:53.47)
Your mind you're like, I only have three vans. They think you have like they think you have like 20. And they're like, wow, you they must be good at their job because like I see them everywhere. So like, and then obviously branding will just lower your marketing expense, like by far, because you know, if they're doing branded keyword searches of your business, it's so much cheaper than you know, the AC repair near me or painting near me. So I mean, it just it helps on all aspects.

Branden Sewell (52:54.833)
Yeah yeah.

Branden Sewell (53:00.826)
Mm-hmm. Yeah, yeah.

Branden Sewell (53:18.908)
Yeah. I, you know, after reading Dan's book, you know, there was something in there, there he had a graph that showed like the six months where like when somebody rebranded and showed like their Google Analytics and how there's just this huge curve upward. And that that happened for us. as soon as I got the vehicles wrapped and rebranded, it was like within a couple months I noticed that our Google

organic traffic just sky started skyrocketing. and that's been huge for us because then, you know, really, all of our organic Google and everything just went up. Like we were getting way more calls. and I thought it was really funny that you mentioned to like people calling you just to like mention your mascot. Like I had that happen for the first time last year and I got a voicemail and there was this lady and she was like, hey

I saw your van, saw the seal and I was having a bad day and I just wanted to let you know when I saw the seal it made me smile and like turn my day around and I was like, That is so random, but cool. Like Yeah, so yeah w

Derek Cormier (54:24.406)
That's awesome. I mean, you know what? Like what you're saying about your industry, right? That there's not a lot of people professionalizing. That's freaking great for you. My industry, they're all doing it. So then I'm less unique. Like I'm just if you could be the one in landscaping and painting, and you know, that's unique that can stand out. Like, I'd even look like Slugabug. Slugabug, they're do, dude, they're locally owned. They're doing so well. And look at them. They're very professional, right? They got the polos, like their vans are wrapped. Like,

Branden Sewell (54:33.441)
yeah, I know. Yeah, yeah.

Branden Sewell (54:50.931)
Mm-hmm.

Derek Cormier (54:52.532)
Everyone in our area knows them. Like they compete against the big conglomerates and they do freaking well. So like

Branden Sewell (54:58.664)
That's so funny. I didn't know that they were local. I thought they were like a big you know, what's

Derek Cormier (55:05.592)
Private equity. No, they're a hundred percent locally owned. Yeah. They they kill it and they they they they really take care of their employees. Like, yeah, I I really like that company.

Branden Sewell (55:07.836)
Wow, I didn't Yeah. That's

Branden Sewell (55:14.162)
Yeah, it's amazing how like you you mentioned like people think that you're private equity. I'll be honest with you, I thought you were when I fur I think I you even like we had a brief exchange on social media where I thought you were and you like kind of told me like no, we're not. but yeah, we get that too. Like a lot of people ask me if I'm like a franchise because of our brand. And I'm like, no, just I just care and I want to

make us look really professional. So in some ways it's a compliment. and yeah, that's a whole nother conversation for another time about what your thoughts are on private equity. Don't have enough time to go down that rabbit trail today. Yeah. But hey, I I w like I said, I want to be respectful of your time and I really appreciate it. I think you brought a r a lot of value today. honestly I'd be interested in maybe offline trying to schedule a a follow-up interview.

Derek Cormier (55:56.909)
Yeah, we don't have enough time for that yet.

Branden Sewell (56:13.838)
And to dive into these topics even more, maybe we can talk about private equity in that conversation. but yeah, I just appreciate it. usually when I wrap up, I just open up the floor. If there's anything that you wish you could have said or feel like you didn't get the opportunity to mention or talk about, I just give you the last couple minutes to bring it to a close and then I'll close out.

Derek Cormier (56:37.56)
Yeah, what I would close out with is, you know, any business owner in any trade, I would recommend that you find a mentor or someone you respect that lives a life that you want to live, right? So like if you got kids and you're going after the guy that's single, driving the Ferrari, it's all fake, right? Running Airbnbs and taking videos of himself with his coaching plan, like that's been an in and out of jail. Like, find a real mentor that you respect, right? Like if you're a family man, like that that

Branden Sewell (56:53.95)
Mm-hmm.

Derek Cormier (57:04.716)
Is home with his family that takes care of his family, that takes care of his employees, that actually makes money, right? Everyone says revenue, but profit, right? Like that's that it's a nice person that wants to help you, right? Like I'd say find a mentor. Cause if you don't have one and find them in your industry, like or the closest that you can to your industry. Like, and and believe me, they're they're out there. Like, don't say they're not out there. They're out there, right? Find them and then just make friends with them. I think in this industry, like we see each other as competition and it's just, it's sad.

Branden Sewell (57:09.426)
Right. Mm-hmm.

Derek Cormier (57:30.787)
Like it doesn't need to be that way. When I stopped that mentality when I joined Nextstar because it forced me to, I was like, wait, what? Like we're in a group together where I have a competitor like an hour away that's competing with me and we're supposed to like be a part of the same thing. Like when I shifted that mentality and the competition went away, like, my God, dude, it got so much easier. And then I just used those resources and now I have friends and now we help each other out. And I just say, change that mentality. Like, have a mentor, make friends in this industry.

Branden Sewell (57:35.39)
Mm-hmm.

Yeah.

Branden Sewell (57:47.304)
Mm-hmm.

Branden Sewell (57:51.016)
Yeah.

Derek Cormier (58:00.498)
you know, we've got painters refer pest control companies. We're in addicts every day and like they tear up duck work. You know, we're friends with all these trades, like even other HVAC companies. We don't do commercial, I refer someone to the commercial work. He refers me residential. you know, when we're super busy and they're in our market, I'll refer stuff like over. So I just get get out of that competition mindset. Like we're all in this together. There's enough customers for all of us, especially the ones that want to do it right. But like find a mentor that you actually respect and then

Branden Sewell (58:09.458)
Mm-hmm.

Branden Sewell (58:14.984)
Yeah.

Branden Sewell (58:19.955)
Yeah.

Derek Cormier (58:30.23)
And you know, follow their model. Like obviously they've done it. It's not impossible.

Branden Sewell (58:34.556)
Yeah. That's really good. I'm a huge advocate for coaching. I've had multiple. I that's honestly how I've gotten to where I am is is through coaching and being a part of different programs like that. And so definitely agree with that. Well, thank you again, Derek, for your time. for those of you who have listened to this episode, I f I hope that you found it helpful and hopefully you got some good takeaways. as always, implement what you're hearing.

really that's where the change happens is when you take action with what you hear. So if there is something that you took from this episode, write it down and put together a a plan to take action on it. if you are listening on YouTube, please like this, share it, comment, share your feedback. if you are listening on any other major podcast platform, please rate and review the show. That helps us to reach more people.

And if you need resources for your business, as always, check the show notes below. If you use my affiliate links, I do greatly appreciate it as I do get credit for that. And it does help to support what I'm doing here with the Off the Ladder Podcast. Thank you so much for tuning in, and I'll see you next time on the next episode of the Off the Ladder Podcast.