Blind Ambitions
Blind Ambitions podcast offers a captivating journey into the world of the solar industry. Each episode features special guests actively involved in the industry, providing unique perspectives and insights. The show not only explores the latest in solar technology and trends but also delves into Abby's own life and career, offering an in-depth look that adds a personal touch to each episode. With a diverse range of guests, the podcast promises a rich and varied exploration of the solar sector, making it an informative and engaging listen.
Blind Ambitions
Episode 1: A chat with John Frampton
Use Left/Right to seek, Home/End to jump to start or end. Hold shift to jump forward or backward.
Welcome to episode 1, Abby and John Frampton talk about the present and future of the solar industry. They also discuss their families and find commonalities in their experiences. The episode offers a simple yet engaging blend of insights into the solar sector and personal stories.
So the industry is in an interesting place right now. Sales in general, um, in my time in the industry, I've never seen a time where people are talking about how do we generate sales, right? It's been a whole lot of tailwinds. Of course, in my time and space, your you know, entry into the in industry was a little bit sooner than mine. But what are you seeing from your perspective?
SPEAKER_02Yeah, uh it's it's interesting, right? Now, the the way I see the industry is it actually it feels like it's 10 years ago when you actually had to really sell the customer. Try for it. Yeah, you actually had to work. And I think what happened there, because there's a lot of doom and gloom in the industry right now. And where there's doom and gloom in an industry, there's opportunity.
SPEAKER_01Right.
SPEAKER_02You just have to pay attention and look for it because the industry is actually still doing really well, just not compared to the past two years.
SPEAKER_01Right.
SPEAKER_02But what I think happened and is happening is people are adjusting to not selling solely on price. People have been selling month one savings and they got used to it. And it feels like now people have to sell the 20 to 25 year, in some case 30-year vision of why this makes sense in the long run. And that's how I was introduced to the industry was the long run. Not you're gonna save, you know, a huge amount month one. It was you're gonna save money over time. This is why it's worth it.
SPEAKER_00Right. That's such a perfect like lean into whenever you have to develop a skill, right? It always comes back to like be a little weapon in your pocket later. Yes. I'm sure your team loves that, that you can speak to that from example.
SPEAKER_02Oh, a hundred percent. But I'll be well because we sold all PPAs back then.
SPEAKER_00That's crazy.
SPEAKER_02And so, I mean, all PPAs. I'm not talking like 90%, all PPAs.
SPEAKER_00I didn't realize that.
SPEAKER_02Billions of dollars in revenue was created of installations on PPAs.
SPEAKER_00Wow.
SPEAKER_02And that's just from the guys out knocking doors and gals, and it they were setting their own appointments, they were closing their own deal, and they were getting paid 23 cents. Yeah.$230 a kilowatt.
SPEAKER_00Yeah.
SPEAKER_02Do the math, and people were excited about it. So when I got into the industry, the pay was way less. The customer savings was over the long run. It was a PPA. So month one savings was never, you know, this big selling point. In fact, it was never a selling point. And we dominated. I mean, you remember that. We were we crushed. And this is from 2013, 14 to 17, 18. We were crushing the industry, and it was based on you know, pitching the customer the long-term vision and also pitching the people that came to work and sell that stuff the long-term vision.
SPEAKER_00That's crazy. What markets is that? Vegas, I know, is big.
SPEAKER_02Vegas was huge. Vegas was one of the markets back then where people were saving money because it was just outrageous out the gate. But Vegas people just that's not even true. It wasn't even right out the gate. But Vegas people were just so excited because they'd wanted solar for so long. And so we had people that would literally walk out of their houses and track down the guys and say, hey, when you're done over there, will you come over here?
SPEAKER_00How funny of a story is that? Sorry to pause you, but Vegas, uh, my time in Vegas, right, talking to salespeople, it was like, you cannot get them to open the door. The only way you can get in a door in Vegas is if you have a preset appointment over the phone. That's always what I heard feedback, right? Um, so man, how crazy is that to be on a where you got somebody chasing you down in the case. Crazy.
SPEAKER_02Well, and then if you know, people that don't know this, but in Vegas, they decided on a whim to turn off net metering, and we had 6,000 jobs in solar that we had to shut down and pull out. So at Solar City, we pulled out all the stops to try to try to reverse um the call on it. And I mean, we I think we even brought Mark Ruffalo in to talk to the city council.
SPEAKER_00That's awesome.
SPEAKER_02And it was a huge deal. And we had people out signing waivers and flyers trying to get this overturned, but those jobs, 6,000 jobs shut down. We took our team and put them in Texas. And Texas back then was just, it was so new, but you had to work with the utility companies in a totally different manner. Deregulated markets are so different. So different. But we still made it work. So we had all these headwinds coming at us. There's all these reasons in 2000 from 13 to 18. There's so many reasons why we shouldn't have succeeded. Right. And we did. And all I think has happened, I mean, clearly the economy's been rocked by uh a number of different things, but the interest rates being one of them. So yeah, of course that's gonna be a headwind coming our way. But I'm an optimist, Abby. Like I can't still see the industry for what it is, which is we're changing the world. We're changing the way America runs their power in their homes. It's a it's a big deal. And it's still a really good deal for the customer, it's a good deal for the environment, and it's a good deal, I mean, the utilities. We're taking pressure off the grid, and it's it's still a great deal for people who install, uh, manage the accounts and sell.
SPEAKER_00I love that optimism. I also feel like any situation, when you're able to step back a little bit or elevate your perspective or point of view, and you really can start to see things on a five-year scale, 10-year scale, that's what you're touching on, right? You're talking about this period of time and how, you know, in the trenches, how it felt, and you know, looking back and kind of that additional perspective that's gained, it's so huge. And I just think it's so interesting because I hear a lot of the doom and gloom, and I've been through the worst, I've been through the shit, right? Yep. And the perspective that that situation afforded me is also this longer term to kind of go, okay, well, I experienced the tailwinds and the highs. I also experienced as an entrepreneur 2020 as an essential business.
SPEAKER_01Oh, yeah.
SPEAKER_00Growing, you know, 300, 400, 500X, and we were leaving laptops out on desks for people to just show up in a mask and pick up and go home and trying to train them remote when we, you know, we're still trying to figure out our LMS, just all those systems, and you kind of go, how is this ever gonna work? Right. And you learn on the fly, but you also develop so much confidence as an entrepreneur, like, yeah, the market's down right now. But when you look at, to your point, the curve that we're on and the pickup for the next five to 10 years, I share your optimism. I think it's amazing. Reminds me of the that uh, you know, the saying in in investments, in investing, we're like when anybody else is being, you know, super um cautious, it's when you need to be aggressive. Oh my gosh. That's when you need to be a little cautious, right? How true is that?
SPEAKER_02Oh, so true. Abby, that was the next thing I was going to say is you look at all these investors. No, no, no. Like this is it goes perfect. You look at all these investors, I think it's Warren Buffett or I don't know, somebody that's really famous and smart, but you always hear they buy when the economy's down. Right. Or they buy when the market when the stock's low, and then they sell when it's high. And if I'm a person in this industry right now, whether I'm installing, back office, or I'm out selling, man, this is where the if if the market is down, that is my opportunity to go shine, create a brand and a name for myself and a big customer base. And then you start working off referrals, and I think people are they just got so used to knocking on a door or making a cold call, and the customer is like, wait, I'm gonna save how much? It's like, yeah, that's month one. You can still tell them how much they're going to save. It's just over a longer period of time. Right, right. And so for if I'm if I'm out there right now, I'm pushing as hard as I can. And we are at NEVO. That's what that's what I'm doing right now with my teams. I'm saying, hey, there is opportunity like crazy right now.
SPEAKER_00Absolutely. You're so dead on. It's like um you don't build those entrepreneurial skills by having things easy and handed to you and laid in your lap. You just don't, right? It sucks at the time, and man, it's it's tough when things start, you know, unwinding. Um, but that's really how I look at it. I look at it, what we're doing, you know, with our business here in Radical. And I think we're entering this space from a different perspective as far as entering, we're introducing new concepts. When you're on more of the innovative scale and you're building something new, right? There's a lot of um market adoption that has to take place. You know, the the old me, the younger me, the less, you know, more scrappy in some ways, but the less um refined me would have said, you know, this is taking too long, or I need to have this sort of momentum, I need to feel this, or uh, you know, this isn't working, this isn't working, bail pivot. Um, I find myself looking at all of business now just in terms of planting seeds and the investments, right? We're all making strong investments right now that are gonna pay off in big ways, I think.
SPEAKER_02Well said. It is and it's true. I I I don't know. I just look, it's not fun to have companies in your in your in the space you operate in go out of business. Right. It isn't. And if if it is fun for you, you're in the wrong business, number one. And two, uh, you don't realize it's hurting your business at the same time. And so it's it's not so when I say there's opportunity in what's happening right now, it's because look, some of the people that are going out of business right now, it it's uh a lack of planning, you know, six, seven, eight months from now. And it doesn't mean they're bad operators, doesn't mean they're bad business owners. It means they got excited when it and a lot of them, Abby, they got in when it was easy.
SPEAKER_00Right.
SPEAKER_02You had the exha exact opposite. You got in when it was hard, and then it got really good, and then it got hard again. It's like too good, yeah, yeah. And right now you're that's why you're so even killed, is because like if people don't know this, if you have a question in solar about starting the business from the sales operations, any side Abby's who I'm calling. In fact, Abby, if you don't mind if I share it, before we started Nevo, I remember telling my business partner, uh Tyler Bradshaw, I'm taking Abby to lunch. He's like, Really? I'm like, dude, she lives by me. And can you imagine how much she knows? And we went to lunch, and it was over three hours of you just spilling exactly your whole experience, but I still take nuggets from that conversation, and I'm grateful I get to know you. But if you're in the industry and you need help, Abby's the one to call. There's no question about it. So I called.
SPEAKER_00You're too kind. This is reminding me actually of one of the worst moments in my career at a complete bottom. And I had heard a lot of who John Frampton was, right? Because your industry or your reputation procedures you, right, for sure, especially in the realm of what you've been able to accomplish.
SPEAKER_02Some good.
SPEAKER_00All good. Um, you know, and and I got a random text message on my phone said, you know, we don't know each other well. This is John Frampton, but I just wanted to, you know, give you props to the things that you had accomplished and, you know, the footprint that you made or left behind kind of in space. And it was a lot of encouragement, words of encouragement from someone that I really didn't know well. Um, someone that could have, you know, done what a lot of people did, kind of looked back and went, oh, you know, that's that burnout has nothing to do with me. Um in and those experiences, you know, I remember each one of them. They're all super special, but that was that was an extremely special one. And I find it so fun now knowing more about your experience, um, some of the lows that you've had in your career. It's no wonder to me, you know, that that we see things the same, that we click, that we we have this sort of perspective to bring, because I feel like the industry has some really smart leaders and um a lot of wisdom collected from a lot of different perspectives. And I see so much more collaboration than ever existed back then, and that makes me really, really happy.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, no, me too. And I'm and I'm grateful you were open to having that conversation because it it helped bring so much perspective into starting NEVO. And I told you this then, I'll tell you it again. But I mean, you're you know, I was just telling Steve, Abby's husband, that she's like Beyoncé. She's got one name, it's just Abby. Nobody ever says your last name because it's just Abby. And I I have no doubt in my mind that when this solar game, you know, 10 years from now, you're gonna be running the whole industry. But with that being said, it's because of the pain that you went through. It's because I mean, we were running one of the biggest sales forces ever. And Elon came in and turned it off. You know, Tesla acquired Solar City.
SPEAKER_01Right.
SPEAKER_02A lot of people got really excited. It was like, oh my gosh. We knew eventually, you know, that was part of the original game plan that Elon rolled out. It's like eventually these companies come together and it becomes a trillion dollar company. Uh, but he's just like, hey, that solar stuff's not working for us right now. We're gonna go ahead and put it in a corner. And we were just devastated. But as crazy as this sounds, Abby, that's the best thing that ever happened to me in my career. Right. That low point, uh, and it was painful. I know you know this pain of feeling like you let so many people down and let alone your own family, and it's you know, people look at you like, oh, they're gonna be just fine, they'll just keep crushing, and you're just like, am I? You know, this is I could do you realize what what we built?
SPEAKER_01Right.
SPEAKER_02And I know you feel like that with Empire, but man, it was the best thing that ever happened to me because it opened up new doors and new opportunities I wouldn't have looked at. And two, the lessons that I was that I learned. I learned more about what not to do, right? Or what I what I could have done different than what I did right. And we did a lot right. Yeah. Abby, we did a lot right. But I learned way more from the the the downtime. Pain's where all that growth comes from.
SPEAKER_00Oh, it's so true. Um, you know, I think that the frustrating thing for me, the thing that I just I'm pretty stubborn. I could be super stubborn. Most people that know me know this, but I would be damned if I didn't figure out how to turn the experience into something that was valuable. And I thought that would come easier and faster. And, you know, there was just so many, it's been a long time now. And I thought, okay, beat myself up. This should have all come to me now. This should be more clear. I didn't, and then you continue to see the industry in this space where other companies have fallen the same fate, you know, and and so many other people are um, you know, four and five different companies in and out that they've been with, um, you know, layoffs, and and it's um it's been really humbling. And it's only been just, you know, the past six to twelve months or so that they're just coming left and right. And it feels like the timing's great. It feels like I can see the why in some of it, and I can see the value um and the perspective, and it's something that I'm super grateful for. And I never thought I would say I'm grateful that that happened. And of course it's it sucks and it's painful, but I am grateful that I am who I am now as opposed to that person then. I just feel so different.
SPEAKER_02And it was it was all for the better. And it and it was. I mean, you think about the uh, you know, the people that have any success story, you know, any success story, they they tend to talk about their failures and they have to interject. I mean, even Hayes, you know, will we talk about the things that he almost failed at or that he failed at because that's where all that growth came from.
SPEAKER_01Yeah.
SPEAKER_02But, you know, it's it's it's funny because it's really hard to see it in the moment. Just like right now where the industry's at, it's hard for people to see. It's it gets sometimes I wake up and it's hard for me to see it. But it's hard to see like why the industry is so good. Right. When you wake up and all you're seeing is just negative comments and people leaving, you know, companies restructuring, companies going out of business. Like when that ADT thing came out, I I actually thought that's smart. Like they're closing down branches to stay in business. Absolutely. It actually made me happy uh being in the same space. Like that's that's good. Because if ADT solar doesn't work at all, that's not good for any of us.
SPEAKER_00Absolutely.
SPEAKER_02But they're making it work. And you know, like we talked about earlier, that's where all that opportunity lies.
SPEAKER_01It's so true.
SPEAKER_02If you are in this industry, I don't care if you're brand new to it, if you've been in it for 10 years, the opportunity is at the dip, not the top of the dip. Right. And you don't even want to catch it on the rise up. Like if you're in the dip and you and you crush, you're going to be miles ahead of everybody else on the way up. And so not like you're trying to beat out all the competition, but your customers will feel that confidence. They'll feel it in your company, they'll feel it in your delivery. And at the end of the day, this should be a referral-based business because customers love solar. They do. They love having it on their roof, and they it's a badge of honor. When we got into it, it was this is gonna look really ugly on your roof.
SPEAKER_00Just trust me on this. You just trust me.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, but now it's like people are really proud to put that on there.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, I love that. Oh, I love that. You know what that made me think of you and I both have um a shared uh love and admiration is probably accurate um for Hayes and for you know a lot of that founding group. Um, just to share an experience that that this really reminds me of. I had the opportunity of going um with Hayes and some of the group at Goodleap to uh Bentonville, Arkansas. And we were meeting with the leaders leaders in Arkansas, the governor, um, and really trying to invoke and spark a conversation um of how to be able to produce a landscape where the uh commercial space could could meet their net zero goals in the state of Arkansas because there's just so much business, right? There's you got Tyson Foods, you got Goodleaf, you got a lot of these these folks that have these uh really audacious goals um, you know, for their for their um energy, and the the state limitations are um are still in place, you know, just like they are in a lot of other states. And there's so much in the realm of you know, headwinds and or policy change, and so much um good to come in the future after all of the these efforts. And I got to sit at that table and uh just really sort of observe the the orchestrating of that conversation and the collaboration from the groups there. Um and it was just so eye-opening for me because it it as someone that came into Nevada at the perfect time, your point, nobody was there, everybody had been sort of chased off after this change. We entered into the Nevada market and it became our best market. Uh, so fruitful for us as a business. It was kind of the right place, right time, which so much of business is, is timing, right? And I was on the receiving end of getting to um reap the rewards of all of that effort that went into make that change uh in Nevada to make it a wonderful market that it is today. Um so sitting at that table, just kind of watching that, realized that hey, all these conversations took place then, and you know, we all kind of come into this at different places, and just um an interesting sort of, you know, out-of-body experience is probably a little bit more accurate, but an interesting perspective shift to see how that all happens and how much goes into it, right?
SPEAKER_02So much goes into it.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, it's nuts. Uh, you guys at NEVO, just a quick shout. Um, are one of those companies, you know, when people come to me and say, I've been displaced or I'm, you know, I'm not here here. Um, you know, where should I be? Uh full disclosure, a lot of times I I tell them that they need to look at what you guys have going. Um first and foremost, because you're great people. Um, people that lead a company with heart, you know, are are um are winning 10 times over. Um and uh outside of that, you guys just have um so many excellent things I could tell from from my vantage point that you're making moves looking at the longer term and you know, positioning yourselves. And tell me a little bit about um when you first launched as NABO, I assume that you were leading primarily with purchase, like many companies were. Um, and you've probably made a pretty big pivot there. Tell me about that.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, I mean, we we were all loans or cash. And I mean, we was just a few months ago we switched to having a PPA and a lease option.
SPEAKER_01Yeah.
SPEAKER_02And it's funny because when I went to my team with it, they freaked out. Wow, how are we gonna sell a PPA? Like, how does that even work? And yeah, you guys don't understand. At Solar City back in the day, they asked us to start selling loans, and we freaked out. Like, how are we gonna sell a loan? So it's just really funny to hear it contrast. But the we yeah, we've we've made uh a pivot like everybody else for the most part. PPAs in some scenarios make more sense for the homeowner, but what we've talked to our team about is do what is best for them. Right. Don't sell what's easiest to sell, do what's best for them. And that's why I think we're gonna end up ultimately having uh the strongest sales force out there.
SPEAKER_00I love that.
SPEAKER_02Because we're we're teaching them to educate the customer, and we're trying to educate them so that they can do that, but yeah, you have to learn two different financing products. It's it's it's a little bit harder. At the end of the day, it's kind of the same.
SPEAKER_01Right.
SPEAKER_02You know, it's like, oh, you just have to wrap your head. But they're very, very different in that same breath. The process is different, how you get paid is different. Um the uh the customer's response, you might hit them with a uh a loan, and it's man, they're sold on that. But it actually makes more sense for them from a tax perspective to go this route. And so I I think the the biggest key is just understanding the products and how they work and making sure you're educating uh educating everybody on your team on how these works. The back end, the only people it really doesn't affect is the people installing the jobs. For the most part, that stays the same.
SPEAKER_00So it's absolutely a different product to sell. It's absolutely um such a different product for the homeowner. And I love that you touched on, I love your perspective. I, from my vantage point, you know, in my day, the TPO space, the PPAs and leases were looked at as I'm crushing it in sales, but I've got this 10% of deals I have to leave on the table. You have to have another option so that we can pick up this 10 to 20% of revenue, right? The opportunity is there. And so we we looked at it from that perspective. It was always a smaller book of business for us. And so we did enter into the space and we we launched those products. And what we learned sort of the slow and hard way, and there's a long list of those things, we learned sort of the slow and hard way that um project management, getting approval for these projects was so much more lengthy and intensive. And um it really did cause a delay in payment in our pipeline. It caused, you know, some interruption. Thankfully, it was such a small, again, percentage of the overall. But I think if I were to go back and give myself advice entering into that space, knowing a lot of companies are entering, you know, into that space, kind of shifting, um, I would say a lot of the red tape, a lot of the requirements that seem very nuisance and very frustrating, and you go, oh my gosh, I wonder they get nothing done at these companies because everything just takes so long. I would look at it through, from an operator's perspective, through the lens of a lot of these requirements that are put in place, mirroring them or a version of them, or putting in similar stop gaps within your own business, within projects. We found after a lot of growth and scale was actually the key to us being able to standardize our entire pipeline to come through smoother. A lot less sticks overall. Um, and so, you know, where we were a little resistant to it in the beginning, I say, you know, don't change everything overnight. Changes in solar need to sort of, you know, happen a little um even keel where possible. But I think there's a gem in there that I wish I could go back and tell myself, which is there's some good stuff in here. You know, implement a lot of these um these checks, even for production. You know, we don't if you're not providing a production guarantee, great. Verify the production of the system you're going to install. That's right. Deliver a good product. Um just even those basic requirements moving into a TPO space can rock a lot of companies that aren't really used to doing it. There's good things that it's going to shine some light on for you.
SPEAKER_02Even with us, we thought we were prepared. I mean, uh it's hard to get more prepared than Somebody who's sold that product and knows that process is as long as I did. And we were not prepared. Like we just weren't. We didn't understand. I mean, Snova was the one that we were dealing with. And our mantra, and it's it's largely based off a lot of our conversations over time. We we pay when we get paid. Right. And that's actually a really good thing. People have been loving it. Fantastic thing. Because uh companies that are great, the good leaps of the world, they pay within 48 to I mean 72 hours is a long is way long. So we tell our people we'll pay you the next week after install. Well, Sonova, their process is so different. And whether it was 90% them, 10% us, or vice versa, it rocked us. We were just like, how do we figure this thing out? And that's why you know my business partners are way smarter than I am. So Tyler and Jake put their heads together, grabbed our amazing team, and put a process in. But to the people out there freaking out, my installer's not paying and this, that, and the other, there could be some red flags there, but for the most part, I see it's a really it's just an uneducated uh view. They just don't know. Yeah. Uneducated is the wrong word, but they just don't know. They don't know how it works. And so we're just really transparent at NEVO. We just tell our people flat out, hey, this is how it works. And this is why our business is going to be here in 20, 30 years, because we're making decisions like this. And sometimes they're not popular. But but to go back to your original question is yes, uh, if there was if I had a magic wand, I would have brought you down in July and had you meet with my team and say, hey, this is what I would do. We would have saved a lot of a lot of headache there.
SPEAKER_00You posted the other day that you were the youngest of seven, and we probably jammed on this, but I forgot I'm the youngest of seven. What?
SPEAKER_02Are we recording? What?
SPEAKER_00I have never met another person that's the youngest of seven kids. Your experience as the youngest of seven kids. Were they nice to you? Were they mean to you? Were you close in age?
SPEAKER_02I it was the best. I'm the youngest. Like I was treated like gold. Yeah, like I always tell people, I joke, like I jokingly say this, but I'm dead serious. Like, I was in I was born like and they just instilled confidence in me.
SPEAKER_00Oh, 100%.
SPEAKER_02Being the baby was the best. I've got two older sisters that were they're the the best. So it's like people are like, oh, you had two moms. It's like, no, no, no, I had like two extra like aunts that were just so nice to me. Um, my family all calls me Johnny, nobody calls me John. Uh and then I've got four older yeah, four older brothers, so five of us total, two girls. It was the best though. I I love it. And and so I always wanted a little brother, which is you're referencing my post. So the irony is yes, I have five boys, no girls. Um but I really wanted a daughter, just for the record. And so that kind of that kind of weirded me out that we got five boys, but my I've got 30, 40 some odd nieces and nephews. And so, and it was cool because I'm closer in age with them, so it's the uncle role is more like a big brother.
SPEAKER_00My older siblings started having kids.
SPEAKER_02How do we not know this until now?
SPEAKER_00I literally have never been.
SPEAKER_02How many people are there the youngest of seven that aren't polygamists? Or are we? Or are they? Mom, dad.
SPEAKER_00So I they all left the house. I cried, I didn't want to be alone. It was so horrible. They all started having kids, and next thing I know, it's like I have all these little siblings, and they're my nieces and nephews. And so that was so fun for me. My nieces are um, I used to like throw them in my car, take them probably places I shouldn't have in high school. That was my experience, was like they just had these little best friends for me, and I didn't have to be alone anymore.
SPEAKER_02But I mean, what two minutes ago I was recording a video for my niece Allie? Shout out to Allie, but and you just totally got it. You're like, Yeah, yeah, no, I get it.
SPEAKER_00No, I love that.
SPEAKER_02Still full. I I owe everything to my siblings, my parents. They they raised me. It was it was an army raising raising me.
SPEAKER_00But uh so much more though about you just makes sense to me now, knowing that, because the competence piece you talk about is just it's so I do.
SPEAKER_02My older sister is three and a half or so years older than me, and maybe eight, maybe three. Anyways, but she I was just always like just her little buddy, just hanging out with them. And then my brother next to her was seven years older, and you know, he used to beat the crap out of me in such a good way, but he helped make me competitive, and and then um, and then all the way up the line, I got another sister. So it's just like you know, I th I'm pretty sure I wasn't planned for the record. Um, you know, she I think she was tenure when when I was born, and so she's more of like my my nanny, you know, all growing up. And when I call her every time, she still answers the phone, Jonah, no matter what. We could call her right now. In fact, we should test it just to see if it works. But um, my uh, you know, and then I've got three other brothers on top of that. And it's it's just it's the best. Like I just such a huge advantage.
SPEAKER_00So, what role do you fit in now? Like, who are you?
SPEAKER_02What's your role? In the family? I don't know. I think I the uncle, the uncle.
SPEAKER_00The uncle.
SPEAKER_02The Framptons are pretty dang funny, so it's a really tough it's it's hard, yeah. You have to know when to step back and let others shine. That's fine. Um, but no, I think I think my role is probably just an uncle. It's been that's been my favorite piece about being the youngest, is my nieces, nephews. I'd do anything for them. They're the best.
SPEAKER_00I love that.
SPEAKER_02That's so good.
SPEAKER_00Sorry, I had to round on that. That was a good mic.
SPEAKER_02That was good. Hold on, we gotta test this though, just to see if it works. All right, let's see if I can get this in the mic. Okay, so we are testing of whether or not my sister will answer the phone, like I said earlier, and yell out, Jon A! We'll see. She does it, it'll be the first time in like 20 years, she doesn't.
SPEAKER_01Janney.
SPEAKER_02Nettie. You're live on the podcast. You're live on a podcast. Anything you want to say about your little brother?
SPEAKER_01Oh, my brother, little brother is the most amazing little brother anyone could ever have.
SPEAKER_02See?
SPEAKER_01Let me tell you some stories.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, we'll stop there. We'll stop there.
SPEAKER_01Love you, none of you.
SPEAKER_02She's even driving. Oh, yeah, yeah. She's never in 2019. Since I can remember. But uh that's adorable. It's the best. I love that.
SPEAKER_00So we've talked a lot about the industry, lots changing, um, collaboration growing for sure. I want to talk a little bit about the Residential Solar Association. You and I are part of this very, very important, um, amazing group of people. When I say important, because I genuinely believe that uh really good and and necessary change is coming. Um, and I'm just really grateful to be kind of on this side of the line.
SPEAKER_02You know what's interesting about is you you talk about the the board and the committees and everybody that's a part of this, we've got some of the strongest women in the game on this call. Uh Chrissy's on there, we know what she's done at Titan. That's insane. Kirsten is just a freaking rockster you saw on the call today. Um we got Julia from Goodly. So good. And then Abby. It's just like it's it's an all-star cast, but a lot of people don't know what it's about and why we are so passionate about putting it out there and pushing it forward. But now you can give us a quick elevator pitch on what you think the RSA means. What does it mean to you, Abby?
SPEAKER_00Yeah, I think the the reason I was so excited to join or to be a part or to um get involved. There was a little hesitance at first, right? Kind of going, well, what is this? Or, you know, is this kind of just you know a cool kids' club, which, you know, I think other people have maybe had that kind of uh initial thought, and rightfully so. Um I'm excited because I really, as I mentioned earlier, been looking for every opportunity that I can to turn some of my previous experience in this industry into value, um, turn it into wins, not just for myself, but you know, as many as I can. And I think that um you know the concept of even collaborating on simple topic of best practices. What have you learned? What have you seen? What do you know? How do we combine those into, I mean, a success track, right, for companies that are coming up in this space. The most important uh point that I think a lot of people miss in our super highly competitive environment is that when all companies are thriving, we are all winning. It just creates more and more opportunity. And I think that's the biggest shame sometimes when that that piece is missed. So back to that seed planting. We're planting seeds right now into the next five to ten years of people that are coming into space and doing so in the right way.
SPEAKER_02When I think of the Residential Solar Association, it takes me back to my time at Solar City. So when I was with the 800-pound gorilla, uh, when we started Nevo, I called Lyndon Rive and just asked just to pick some pick his brain. So Elon uh was our chairman, Lyndon was the CEO of the company, and we all know how passionate Elon is about accelerating. I mean, what is Tesla's uh mission statement? Like accelerating the world's uh sustainable energy or something like that. Right, right. They're really passionate about it. But Solar City was putting in, I and I asked him specifically, hey, how much did you guys put in? And I couldn't remember the number, how much did we pay for in governmental affairs? And it was 20 plus million a year that Solar City was putting to help fight the fight to keep solar moving forward. I think what the solar city. Yeah, right, and we miss them now, they're gone. And GoodLeaps picked up some of that, and and they're really pushing hard. I know Goodleaps in this for the right reasons, but the RSA is more for the residential piece to keep us moving in the same direction and the ultimately the right direction. Right. And right now we don't have anybody for the most part advocating for us when it comes to policy. Right. And uh eventually people are gonna come in and they're most likely going to regulate us because the way that we're selling this is I feel like everybody that's in the RSA right now, we're all doing it the right way. But you have the rogue people out there that are selling it to customers for more than they should. And so the RSA is about collaborating, bringing this together, helping write what we think the regulation should be, and having that prepared for if and when now when regulation is gonna come at some point.
SPEAKER_00Right.
SPEAKER_02But that way they have something to go off of rather than a whole bunch of people that have no clue how our industry works just enforcing these new rules. Yeah. It's really important for the industry. What the RSA is doing is so important for the whole industry. So there shouldn't be anybody that should object. Everybody should be trying to join because we need we need everyone's help.
SPEAKER_00Absolutely. That was that was kind of the pivotal moment for me when I came to the in-person meeting the first time. Um, heard kind of the breakdown from conversations that were happening, you know, on the CSI and and really just this concept of somebody whose name I've never heard. I don't know how you know they're really involved in the space, they're certainly not ground level, they're not these people who can sit across the table from, you know, and and really know where the industry's been in where it's going, as it pertains specifically to the residential space. And the concept of this person, you know, dictating what the regulation you know should and could be like is terrifying for me. And that was a reminder for me, or kind of a jolt, that I do have a very healthy, strong love for this industry and where it's going. And and I think um, you know, that in a space, finding like-minded people to join um is so important right now more than ever.
SPEAKER_02We're in this for the long haul. Like we're so everybody that's a part of the RSA. I mean, you got uh Jake Kilgore is like one of the greatest humans on the planet, but he's the vice president, I believe. Uh Mark Bench, who's just amazing on all fronts. For those who don't know it, Mark Bench used to be a top, top, top sales rep, and he's turned into this unbelievable operator and runs one drawer great company. But Mark's amazing. The whole board and committees, and anybody I've seen that has joined so far, this is the A-team. Like they're and we're all collectively working at a nonprofit just trying to help the industry continue to move forward. Abby, I want to actually just something relatively personal, you don't have to answer it if you don't want to, but you did something that almost nobody has done in this industry. You've you created a company, uh, you and your husband scaled that to where you guys were just crushing. And I said earlier that we don't want to look in the past, but I think it's really important that people know how big of an impact you had on the industry and scaling your business the way you did. And to me, that gives me more confidence in radical than if you had come in with a perfect track record, nothing went wrong, and now you're doing radical. It's like, no, no, no, I'm gonna bet on the person who's been through some shit, who's seen how the industry works, but you operated at an extremely high level. Uh, what kind of volume were you guys doing? How big a deal were you? And uh I don't know, I feel like people aren't talking about how amazing you are.
SPEAKER_00That's kind of you. It it is such a fun memory for me to think back on, and I can I can look at all the highs, right, and and see them just clear as day, and they're they're so good. Um, but yeah, it was it was just true grit and entrepreneurship, just like in its best form. We had so much fun and we put heart and care for the people that were around us first in everything that we did. And so many people, you know, said, like, how did you you know achieve this, or how did you reach this, or how did you, you know, recruit all of these people? And we really looked at every single piece that we were doing and said, you know, how do we serve first? How do we, how do we um focus on the experience that everybody's having, you know, when they kind of come close to the business? And um it was it was wild. I I constantly feel like we were just blessed with opportunities and experiences that most people will never have in their life. Um the numbers are even just you know kind of tough. How many markets were we in? We were in you know 18 plus states and many offices within. We were over 500 people, W-2 employees at one point in time, and our sales force was you know over a hundred dealers, ranging from you know, smaller guys, ones and two, career guys, um, to huge national teams that we were negotiating with, you know, how many states you're gonna sell with. And um, we were constantly changing and reverting our offerings, just making sure that we were on the front end of every single curve and just capturing every bit of opportunity there was. And it was amazing. It was um it was something that I'm just so grateful that I gotta be a part of.
SPEAKER_02Well, I was thinking about it. That you know, the industry we owe there's we we need to pay homage to a few people in the industry. Lyndon Rive, uh Tongy Sarah, starting the best, starting two companies and coming together in the end. Uh Hayes Barnard, who's just pushed and helped, you know, push this industry forward. But Abby, you're on that list. I mean, Solar City was to give everyone context, Solar City, we had the next number two through number 76. So the next 75 competitors combined equaled the same size as Solar City. Like that's how big they were. And they didn't make it. And but man, they pushed the industry so far forward, and you opened the door for so many people to come in, like myself, truly, uh, it even gave confidence to a lot of people. It's like, okay, we can do this. But the the knowledge and the experience that you had, I think there's not a price tag you can put on that. But I want you to know from somebody who's been in the industry for 10 years, you made a massive impact, and the whole industry owes uh some sort of homage to you because we've all learned from you. And if people don't know that, you you heard it here first. Uh Abby, you're incredible, and I'm grateful that I know you, and I'm grateful that you're so willing to share your story. You've always been so open about it, and uh it's amazing.
SPEAKER_00Thank you. I will just say we are in a state of more headwinds right now. If you can hang in the game, look past it, constantly be able to adjust and identify any way that you can grow on a personal level and stay focused on those around you, all of those pains that we're all feeling right now are going to be worth a whole lot more for the collective in the future. John, you the best.
SPEAKER_02Well, thank you. I appreciate this. Uh brought to you by John and Abby. Godspeed, indeed.