Episode 8: Rising and Rebuilding

In this episode, we sit down with Jess Philips, the Chief Sales Officer of Quativa, to delve into the dynamic world of the solar industry. Jess shares his journey from entering the solar sector at an early stage, experiencing unprecedented growth, to facing the heart-wrenching decision of closing doors. Both Abby and Jess discuss their personal experiences with setbacks and the resilience needed to bounce back. They explore how perseverance, continuous learning, and embracing new challenges are crucial to regaining success. Additionally, Jess gives us an inside look at the latest innovations and upcoming offerings from Quativa, including new financing products and technological advancements that are set to revolutionize the solar industry. Tune in for an inspiring conversation about overcoming obstacles and the bright future ahead for solar energy.

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:03

Welcome everybody to today's episode of the Blind Ambitions Podcast. I have an incredible guest with me today that I've been so looking forward to, Jess Phillips, the Chief Sales Officer of Quativa. Thank you for joining me today, Jess.

SPEAKER_03 0:17

Excited to be here.

SPEAKER_00 0:18

We have some really good stuff to get into, but um I kind of want to start at this point. I want to jump into what I'm gonna call the Qua Tiva journey. I uh have so much respect for Quativa. I come from a marketing background, and I really love the way that Quativa came out with just a really new, unique approach from my perspective. Uh loved the way that you really kind of jumped into the marketplace. And I'm eager to hear from your perspective just kind of a short little walk me through the journey and where Quativa is at today.

SPEAKER_03 0:51

Love to. Well, thanks for letting me on, Abby, and excited to talk with you today. Um yeah, Quaativa, we've been, you know, the idea was like six years ago now, I think when Dallin, our founder and CEO, Dallin Geats, had this idea. You know, he comes from SOAR like us and has the same similar background of running a both sales side and installation side, big company in California, and he just saw a need for you know better technology. We're really a young industry and still are, right? And um, so he he went to work on that idea probably six or seven years ago. And um, I was like the first employee, I guess you could say, of Quativa. Awesome. Uh, about four years ago. And you know, we've like most businesses, you have an idea and a way you think it's gonna go, and then you you make pivots along the way. So, you know, we came out really focused to be something that could connect sales dealers and installers in a better way using technology. And we still do that, but the biggest change we made was we really kind of bit off more than we could chew. We wanted to really help the industry and probably did too much, trying to do too much at once. And what we the the with what we learned from our experience was we were the middleman between the money, so a sales dealer would get paid from us after we got paid from an installer.

SPEAKER_01 2:13

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 2:13

And then also project management, same thing. We would try to help with the project management side because we knew there was a lot of friction in those two areas between sales companies and installers. And part of why we made that decision is we were just attracting some of the best talent in the industry in those two worlds, and we wanted to take advantage of it, especially while our technology was still developing and it wasn't what it is today.

SPEAKER_01 2:35

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 2:35

And so um we really learned a lot because our best sales partners and installers started requesting, like, just let us work together on the commissions and the and the project management. And and then the industry started to have you know some things that were starting to go backwards. Yeah. Some companies going out of business and cash flow problems with installers. And if we didn't get paid, we couldn't pay the sales dealers. And then we had a big one go out in Florida, and uh, you know, we probably had five or six hundred projects a month that was flowing through Quativa to them, and then all of a sudden they stopped paying. And it caused us a lot of problems, it caused a lot of our partners a lot of problems, and it really hurt us as a company. And it forced us to make that decision, you know, to pivot pretty quickly and to get out of the middle of that.

SPEAKER_01 3:20

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 3:21

And it made sense because now our technology is so much better, and so we really play the role as the tech platform point of sale system. So we work with installers today, um, and we provide the sales technology through the Quatiba app that they can provide to their sales dealers or sales reps that are internal. We've got canvassing built in, we've got the financing integrated, we've got a proposal design, everything's all in one spot. That's kind of what we're famous for.

SPEAKER_02 3:44

Very cool.

SPEAKER_03 3:45

And now that's that's our our model. So we work directly with the installers and provide that service to them. So the marketplace concept we really pivoted away from. So that's really what we're do today.

SPEAKER_00 3:56

I uh absolutely commend you guys for trying to take off, uh bite off a really big problem that needs to be solved in the space. I know that you've been in the industry for a long time, as have I. I think it's really interesting as you see these cycles, right? When I came first came into the industry, everything was fully integrated. And then we started to move into this very split-off dealer-related model. And I think a lot of what I'm seeing right now is the welcoming or the expansion of some subcontracting, right? Which is exactly what you guys saw. I think there's a lot of that direction that we're gonna continue to see the industry to go, and I think you guys are in an awesome position. But I will tell you shout out here to Dallin. Uh, when I first got into the industry, I think he's incredible as far as architecting uh tech solutions. I've heard wonderful things about Quaativa. Um, haven't used it myself. I've heard phenomenal things about it, and came as no surprise to me. Um we, as installers, EPCs, heard a ton of positive feedback on the everybody in solar calls it a CRM, but it's truly a project management solution from an install perspective, right? Um that was at play on the ESP side. Um anyway, ESP folks helped us out a great deal. We had uh a jump start from from tech from them, which was um really a game changer for us. So I'll always be grateful for that. But yeah, lots of respect for all of you and for everything that you have built and for hanging in there and redefining and pivoting your model. That's that's huge. I mean, so many people in the space right now are experiencing what I call like the 60% of a business's success is timing and just what's happening in the space, right? My first time as an entrepreneur, I didn't give that the weight that I should have. It was like maybe a little bit ego enchanted, which is either I'm gonna make it or I'm not, and I'm gonna fight hard enough or I'm gonna work hard enough. And as you see enough and you see the cycles, you kind of go, so much of what's happening is the landscape. And you gotta know when to charge and you gotta know when to pull back, but also shit just happens. Like it just does, and you gotta be able to pivot. So good on you guys. That's incredible.

SPEAKER_03 6:00

Yeah, yeah, it was uh it wasn't easy too. It was hard because we saw some of our partners really getting hurt by this. We got hurt by it big time, and and uh it was something that you know, I think when stuff like some of the installers weren't able to pay, they also don't answer the phones and other things going wrong, and so it's hard because we would, you know, our sales partners would call us and we try to like help them, you know, we'd we'd take legal action, do what we could, but we realized that um it was we were playing a position that there was even in our best days, we couldn't do anything better than what they were used to before.

SPEAKER_00 6:32

And so that's a tough spot to be in.

SPEAKER_03 6:34

So yeah, it really it really has been a great pivot. Like our partners are really happy with how we changed that. And we're uh we we canceled every contract with the sales partners and installers, and we were we were doing phenomenal. We we probably had about five hundred to six hundred million in projects sold through Quatiba when we decided to make this pivot.

SPEAKER_02 6:53

Wow.

SPEAKER_03 6:53

And literally start over, canceled every contract and and uh you know started started from scratch. So today, you know, we've got a hundred and five installers now live.

SPEAKER_00 7:03

Awesome.

SPEAKER_03 7:03

And we've really just focused on Arizona, California, Florida, Texas. Uh a lot of that's because the new Bright Star lease from Service Finance that's with us exclusively.

SPEAKER_00 7:11

And I'm so excited to hear more about this.

SPEAKER_03 7:12

We'll keep expanding again, you know, after we get those, get those rolling really well.

SPEAKER_00 7:16

Yeah, I'm I'm just loving the story of tenacity. Again, so much respect, and also such a great example for so many out there that are struggling and trying to figure out is this just me? Am I not, is this not, you know, am I not for entrepreneurship or whatever it is? I love finding people that have a unique story and perspective like yours. Definitely gonna go down that path here in the future. But you brought up the new Bright Star Lease. I'm hearing a ton of buzz about this. I want to hear it from you. Give me everything.

SPEAKER_03 7:41

Yeah, super excited about it. I mean, been doing solar 15 years, and I kind of had this epiphany. I was in uh one of our new partners in Arizona. We were in, you know, got actually got out from behind the computer, the Zoom calls, got into the conference room, and one of the sales guys in there was like, Man, I've been waiting for something like this to come out where the bank is actually gonna underwrite based on the utility savings. So let's just cut right to it. This is the most exciting part about it, uh, where they're looking at are you saving the customer 10% or more? And if you are, they're not gonna look at DTI because you're actually lowering their debt-to-income ratio. I remember when I was selling people, you know, and I got my first declines 15 years ago. I'm like, I'm lowering their bill. I can't believe they just got disqualified when I'm lowering their bill over you know their income compared to their debt. I'm lowering their debt in a way, right? Their monthly payments. So for 15 years, I've been waiting for something like this to come out. We even co-founded a finance company years ago to try to make it make something like that happen. And here we are. And so this sales rep said to me, like, I've been waiting for this for you know, uh for a while. I'm like, how long have you been doing this? It's like three years. I'm like, I've been waiting for this for 15 years, man. This thing is awesome. So I'm super excited about it. Um, it's just incredible. We have Blackstone that's actually funding these leases. Truist Bank actually owns Service Finance, so there's a bank behind this. So my biggest concern was when you look at how this lease is structured, it's very installer friendly, and then you've got really high approval rates. We're seeing over 80% approval rates in the beta testing of this thing. And my biggest concern is when you have a great finance product, we've seen it, it runs out of money pretty quick because everybody jumps on board. So I'm excited that it's backed by the sixth largest bank, and then we have Blackstone that's funding these as well.

SPEAKER_00 9:30

Yeah, that sounds incredible. Forgive the ignorance on this question. I think I've got kind of a gut check, but what would you say as far as failures for DTI or debt-to-income ratio? Like what kind of opportunity do you think has been left on the table just with that small change?

SPEAKER_03 9:43

It's huge. I mean, we've been able to really get into the numbers. Um, I was really involved in the solar finance world in like 2015 to 2018 when um I was part of Enium Capital Group. We were one of the co-founders there, and just you know, was on the board and got to learn and really understand that world better, but wasn't in it day to day. And it's so it's fun to get back into it now and help structure how this lease was built. And so one of the things that I learned that I've I've realized is kind of a myth for our industry is everybody's so focused on the FICO score. What's the FICO score? Uh we see like the average credit scores coming in are still like 740. The average. Wow. We still see declines, right? And so what I've learned is the number one reason is debt-to-income ratio is why people are getting disqualified.

SPEAKER_01 10:31

Wow.

SPEAKER_03 10:32

You know, especially with what's happened economically, you know, people's bills have gone up and it hasn't really matched their income. And so that's what's really hurting people right now with declines, is you know, I I hear it a lot, we've we get to meet with tons of people across the nation, yeah. Installers and sales reps and dealers, and and they're seeing more and more declines. And I think some of it also has to do with like some of the other finance companies and and funding issues and timing around that. But a lot of it's just America's debt-to-income ratio has changed and they're struggling. And so I think this is huge because it's not a gimmick, it's not like a loophole. We're actually lowering their bill. Right. So why should we consider the debt-to-income ratio when we're lowering it? And so that's it. It makes sense. You've got some really smart money behind it, you know, they they know their stuff. Blackstone, right? Truth Bank, Service Finance. So um, this is here to stay, and I think it's gonna be huge. And so to answer your question, in results, we've seen approval rates go from 50, 60 percent, sometimes even 70 percent, to where it there isn't a place we haven't seen it go at least 80 percent with this new under savings-based underwriting, is what we're calling it.

SPEAKER_00 11:43

That's huge. Uh one of we came into this space as installers 2017 or so. We were kind of on that front end of leases were very common, and the front end of loans were sort of taking over the marketplace. So I cut my teeth, I learned in the loan.

SPEAKER_01 11:59

Yeah, same with me.

SPEAKER_00 12:00

And so I remember the decision to kind of add leases to our offering. It was that sort of a decision. We looked at how many times we have reps in homes and how many times we're having to walk away for some reason or another for declines, and or if they didn't qualify for the tax credit, right? And so we looked at the data and said, we think we can pick up an additional 20% minimum that we're leaving on the table just by adding the lease option. Uh, we saw that, implemented it, it was incredible, which I'm gonna kind of circle back to because it did bring up a lot of interesting things for us as an installer. So I want to hear, I want to hear installer perspective. But I I think that since the industry has made this massive pivot, interest rates are through the roof, and we're seeing so much more. The lease is kind of the vehicle driving the sales in the industry right now. I just think that's incredible because exactly what we need right now is uh stimulus in sales, right? And so not only do we get to, you know, you get to kind of be on the front end of that, pivot over to the lease space, but to have the DTI gap is huge.

SPEAKER_03 13:00

You triggered a couple things for me to say about that. Um, so first of all, Quativa's growth has been slowed tremendously. We started over about a year ago, cancel all of our contracts, and started to get it going again. The number one reason is we didn't have a TPO product on our platform. And so this was huge, right? Like Service Finance chose Quattiva to exclusively launch this product with. They needed a tech platform to do the design, to do the proposal. They needed something that was accurate, right? Especially when you're gonna be underwriting. We did a software update today to make what we believe will make Quativa the most accurate proposal in the industry. That's right. Um we're pulling uh data from Genability, we're even able to look and project the next year's savings based on what the utility has already said they're gonna, you know, if the utility says, hey, we're increasing rates in October, it's already built in.

SPEAKER_01 13:46

Oh wow.

SPEAKER_03 13:46

So it's incredible the accuracy and what the tech's doing now. And uh that's a big reason why they chose this, is they wanted this lease to be really easy to get funded. So when you talk about the funding guidelines, like they need nine photos.

SPEAKER_00 13:59

That's what I was gonna say. Talk to me as an installer. What do I what do I need to know about this?

SPEAKER_03 14:03

So when we've met with installers, especially the ops and finance side, they're just thrilled about this thing. So I like to get really transparent. We launched this thing in March, and the CEO, the ops, the finance, all those comp all that part parts of the business, we're so thrilled because it's so much easier to get funded. It's unique because it's an equipment lease, not a production-based lease. So that's unique compared to any of the other leases out there.

SPEAKER_00 14:29

That's crazy to me.

SPEAKER_03 14:30

So, bottom line is without getting all the details, it funds like a loan. They're not overly focused on the production. Of course, they care it's gonna produce and it's you know, you still got to prove that it's installed correctly, but they're not gonna be worried if you moved one panel like a few inches a different way. Which we get to hear all those horror stories of what's going on right now and how hard it is to get funded with TPO products.

SPEAKER_00 14:52

It's real.

SPEAKER_03 14:53

So that's one of the things I love about this thing. But the truth is, is there wasn't anything really shiny for a sales rep. Why should why should I take the time to switch to this product? And I think sales reps are starting to realize that it's really been a struggle for installers to get paid on some of these other TPO products because of how stringent they have to be to make sure this thing's gonna produce correctly. So now with this new savings-based underwriting, sales reps are just thrilled about that, right? Because you get more approvals. Yeah. If you do have to you know lower your PPW a little bit to get that approval to make sure they're saving 10%, it's better than making nothing. The guidelines I've seen is if your utility that you're selling with is at 15 cents a kilowatt hour or higher, you probably you'll be able to price it at least$3 a watt and and not really run into any problems getting it at 10%.

SPEAKER_01 15:43

Okay.

SPEAKER_03 15:44

California, you're never gonna have a problem. Maybe in South Florida, some parts of Texas, but for the most part, you can really make the same commission as before, save the customer 10%. When you talk about regulation and all these things coming, I was just gonna say this lease is so awesome for that. Because now you're protecting yourself as a sales rep. Like I I had you can't qualify them unless you save them 10% based on this proposal.

SPEAKER_00 16:06

That's huge.

SPEAKER_03 16:07

So you're gonna be protective when regulation comes, when they look at your deals and what you've done. And uh, it's great for the customer, it's super friendly, easy to fund for the installers, which eventually funnels to the sales rep. So we have this unique vantage point with what I get to do now, where I get which is what I love about doing solar. Like, I get to hear all these success stories, and frankly, I'm become some of their therapists, right? Like, I get to meet with all the installers and sales teams across the nation and hear what's going on, and it's amazing how a year and a half ago it was 80-90% loans, and it has completely flipped.

SPEAKER_00 16:42

Crazy.

SPEAKER_03 16:42

I had never even been part of a TPO product until this. So it was a learning experience for me as well. But it's amazing to see how much this has helped stabilize and even help companies grow again. I call it the time machine. We're getting low payments again, like we did two years ago before dealer fees skyrocketed. So that's some of the advantages of the lease in this one specifically, is it's just easy to sell through the Quatiba platform, easy to get paid on, and easy to stay paid. There's no clawbacks or any risk to getting a clawback or a net funding down the road because it's not producing exactly what you said. It's not structured that way, it's very safe and friendly.

SPEAKER_00 17:17

Oh, that's really cool. I love every time I hear something new and outside of the box coming to the space. Just gets me excited because the one guarantee that we've all seen in solar is change, right? It's like you say it's kind of crazy to see everything pivot over to TPO, and when you take a further step back, it's like it's really not. In the grand scheme of all of the changes on the local levels, let alone kind of the national scale. This is a game of uh staying very, very nimble and adapting to change very, very quickly, which absolutely, right? I do. I won't speak for you. So um man, I yeah, just touching back on the timing piece, um it sounds really, really exciting. It sounds like the timing could not be better for this product offering in this space and time in the industry. It's wild.

SPEAKER_03 18:06

Yeah, I mean that's one of the things that's just got me so excited as I meet with all these partners and they're telling me what they're struggling with and how many times in business it feels like it's unfair where you're like, oh, the timing's wrong. We were perfect, we had this great product or whatever, and there's some headwind that you just didn't see coming. We both talked about this in our previous lives, and and this feels like finally that that's here. Like uh timing-wise, this is so needed for so many reasons, right? Like, easy to get funded, easy to sell it. The customer saves money, the way it works in our tech is I'm so excited about how it flows. You don't have to be writing down their social security number and rerunning their credit, it does it all for you, and it will automatically calculate what you need to sell them at to give them 10%. Wow. Just in real time. So technology is finally starting to like really hit our industry, our young industry, in a way that's gonna really help help you in the home in real time and you know, show customers a savings, and it's a 25-year term that you know they're guaranteeing that that system's gonna work. So and again, it's backed by some some pretty big money and some smart people.

SPEAKER_00 19:12

That's really, really cool. I know that I am ready to hear some positive stories, some success stories coming from this space. It's been a little bit of a rough year or two. I do think though that there's a lot of value in those stories for sure. Obviously, I've got uh a pretty public and loud um failure in my entrepreneurial journey that I try to share as much as I can because I feel like it's uh now, speaking of the timing again, is the time to be really transparent about businesses failing and or learning and adapting and trying something new. Um if it wasn't for people that had some of that perspective and experience and sharing that with me kind of through some dark times. I don't know, I may not have decided to give it another crack, another shot. Like, I don't know, but I want to, on the tails of that, take a couple of steps back here and talk to you about Aric.

SPEAKER_03 20:05

Yeah, lovely.

SPEAKER_00 20:06

Because the first time I heard the name Jess Phillips was the CEO of Aric, and I was just coming into the space, and you guys were crushing it, especially in commercial. Yeah, just doing kind of the beautiful large-scale projects that uh man we were just envious of, and Aric was the shit, and we really wanted to show up and be like Arik. Your people loved you, such a great thing going. And unfortunately, like at the time, that was kind of a wild and shocking story, but now it's like commonplace super every day. But for me, it was like, and Arik was just gone one day.

SPEAKER_02 20:40

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 20:41

And at the time, you know, I felt for you and what you were going through. Little did I know I was going to have a super similar journey and that you and I were gonna have some legitimate scars that we could kind of share with one another. But uh talk to me about that experience just from how far you know back it is now. What do you how do you feel when you think back on the Arik days?

SPEAKER_03 20:59

Yeah, it's uh something I really look at overall. I smile and enjoy those memories and what I learned and proud of what we did. And it's wild to think some of the stuff we pioneered, and now I see stuff that like I think if I shared some of the things, like you'd be like, you didn't make that up. That's saying, or renting power instead of owning power, like it's just different things like that. That's really fun to look back and see how it's really influenced the industry. And yeah, we were really dumb to start a solar company in 2010 in Utah. Power rates were like 11 cents maybe back then.

SPEAKER_01 21:31

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 21:31

Now they're a whole 12 cents, right? And so um, but we did. We we really thought uh you know, we had a good idea with solar and started out of my partner's garage, Trent. And um, you know, just like many of you, just let's go sell some solar, let's knock on some doors and try to do it on the weekends and behind the scenes and after work, before work, whatever it took.

SPEAKER_01 21:55

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 21:56

And after a couple years, we we got enough traction. I think we sold 12 homes the first. First year, and then it was like 52 homes the second year in 2011. And I think if I remember right, end of 2013, it was I think we did like 150 homes. And I did the math and realized that made us the largest in Utah back then. It was crazy, like thinking about how small that is now. And then of course, solar just skyrocketed, and by 2016, Utah was known as the fastest growing solar market in the nation. And then we had the famous battle with Rocky Mountain Power, Berkshire Hathaway-owned utility, and that really set the market backwards in Utah. We were able to get a good settlement. I was involved in that a lot. But it was uh it was quite a journey. So we got into commercial 2015. We did Rio Tinto Stadium, which is you know now has a different name, but it's Rio Salt Lake, the pro soccer team's you know, uh soccer stadium.

SPEAKER_01 22:53

I remember that project.

SPEAKER_03 22:54

And it was uh two megawatts, which made it the largest or the fourth largest pro sports venue in the world for a solar system, or in the US, I should say. And so um that was big. That was big for um for Utah and even nationwide. It was a really cool project, especially for a relatively small organization, you know, a pro soccer team in Utah. So that was a really fun one. We learned a lot, and that's when we got onto the more of the EPC side. We were more of a interesting like sales dealer, plus we did permitting and we just would outsource the labor. And so that's when we made the decision to to bring in and and really just merge with our our NSTAR that did such a great job and um really well-known, um experienced installation company and and helped develop NABSEP curriculum and all kinds of stuff. And so learned a lot, started to really understand what kilowatt hours meant, gigawatts and all that stuff.

SPEAKER_00 23:50

A lot more people should understand that.

SPEAKER_03 23:52

So yeah, I we got into commercial, and the next thing we knew, we were doing you know, Adobe and uh Adobe's building UNLV, all kinds of different cool projects, and uh grew the residential commercial side to four states Oregon, Idaho, Colorado, Utah. And I guess the pinnacle was really 2019 we did uh Soleil Loss, and that is a project in Harriman, Utah, of all places, and it was the first master plan community to be able to go off-grid. So 600 sewn-in batteries, one in every living room of the 600-unit apartment complex. It's all brand new, all built from scratch, planned this out.

SPEAKER_01 24:31

So cool.

SPEAKER_03 24:32

And uh our one of our billionaire clients wanted to really be the pioneer of that. And just like with the homeowner, you know, when they're like, what about batteries? It was like the same conversation. It was like, you don't want to do batteries, like it doesn't make sense yet, whatever. And he reminded me, like, no, I want to do batteries because I'm a billionaire. I'm okay pioneering something and not making money on this. I want to start this trend. I want to build this this uh virtual power plant. So this was uh this was the first virtual power plant like this around, and it was with Sonin, and Shell Oil just bought them. So those of you that came to SPI and Salt Lake in 2019, we actually got to speak at that event and talk all about it. Yeah, it was incredible. Yeah, it was and uh definitely had a lot of smart people help us build that project and five megawatts of of panels throughout the project and carports on the roof. And then, yeah, the the people that are renting these apartments, they started this tradition where they get a little name tag and they name their battery because it's sitting in their living room, like right next to their fridge.

SPEAKER_01 25:39

Crazy.

SPEAKER_03 25:39

So they had this tradition now that they name their their battery that sits in their living room. So really cool project. And it ended up winning Energy Project of the Year in the United States in 2019.

SPEAKER_00 25:48

So what a cool story.

unknown 25:50

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 25:50

I was already thinking what I would name my battery in my living room. I would probably name it WALL E.

SPEAKER_03 25:55

That's a good yeah. I think that was this kind of looks like a WALL-E.

SPEAKER_00 25:59

That is seriously such a cool story. Um yeah, I I I can't help but smile when I'm listening to you talk through that and the way that you just kind of beam because losing a business and having some of the messiest, muddiest things you can imagine happen to you is so tough. It is like like dying and coming out the other side somehow. And when you're in it, it is uh horrific. It's just it's it's so challenging and so painful. And I want I kind of want to walk through what that was like for you. But the ability to look back and say, we were a part of this, we pioneered this. Yeah, we lost. But someone has to pioneer these things for everybody out there who's thinking, is this worth it? Should I be doing it? You're pioneering something. This is all part of a very necessary phase where we're at right now to get to where we're going. And at some point in time, you're going to have that moment if you stay in this long enough, I believe, where you're gonna look back and say, we coined that, we started this really cool thing, we created this trend, we created a culture, we impacted how the future of an entire industry moves forward. And can you like, is there anything cooler than being able to say that you did that in your lifetime?

SPEAKER_03 27:09

No, yeah, it's fun to look back. I mean, you're right, like then things got really heavy, really hard. We had brought an investor, and think what the biggest thing that happened is we we had$119 million in commercial projects signed with plenty more in the pipeline, especially after doing that project and the notoriety around it. Yeah, and we needed more money to grow. And uh we made the decision to offload residential, just kind of sell it. And uh you need residential to help with your day-to-day cash flow when you're trying to run a commercial side. And we were trying to do both, it was just a lot to do, right? Anybody knows, and so are like I give advice like be a sales doer or be an installer, don't try to do both, it's hard, whatever. And that's coming from somebody that did both all three and commercial. Yeah, and so we knew we we wanted to focus in on that. We had now all these contracts and we had this notoriety and experience and partnerships. So we we sold the residential side two weeks before COVID hit. And then COVID hit, and within I remember the way I look at COVID hit is when the jazz game was canceled.

SPEAKER_02 28:19

Yep.

SPEAKER_03 28:20

Uh, and then the next day the whole NBA season was canceled. That's when I felt like I had my out-of-body experience of like, we are in really big trouble. Wow. Because we were in a susceptible position without that day-to-day cash flow, and within four days, every commercial contract canceled.

SPEAKER_00 28:37

Yeah, just for clarity for everybody out there, I was living that on the Resi side. We did commercial as a very small piece of our side business, and Resi was our primary. And when COVID hit, everybody was afraid. But for us, as deeply entrenched in Resi as we were, residential boomed. Like we were one day going, we're gonna be out of business, and the next day we were going, we have to now hire an additional hundred heads with masks on remotely.

SPEAKER_03 28:58

It was Yeah, it wasn't a weird thing, like it was like home improvement everything. My ex-wife now, which she was in, you know, spas and landscaping, and it I feel like everything froze for a month or six weeks. And then it just, I'm like, you're having record sales. Like I'm thinking she's in trouble too, and all of a sudden all the home improvement stuff took off because everybody was at home looking for things to do.

SPEAKER_00 29:19

It was in a we were in essential business. So not only like everything that we sold had to come in, and it had like we were sending the guys in like they were wearing their capes, they were coming to save the day and get these projects going forward, and it was like the biggest roller coaster. Not to detract from your story, but I just want to add that context that cutting Resi off right before that happened.

SPEAKER_03 29:37

Timing.

SPEAKER_00 29:38

Timing. I mean, you could have never, never foreseen that. That's why.

SPEAKER_03 29:41

Yeah, how would we see that? We have all these contracts, we can we can offload residential, go from 260 employees down to 30. And we already have all the contracts, and we already have the partners, and one of them is a billionaire client that's done a hundred million dollars already with us, and he's telling us he's gonna go to the moon with more of these virtual power plants that he he owns 56 apartment complexes and he wants to retrofit all of them. So I I mean you just don't see that. We talk about timing and and these are the things that people don't understand. And and yeah, so that happens, COVID hits, and all the commercial contracts cancel. And our our new investor who wanted to take over as CEO six months earlier, so he took over. I wasn't even I didn't even have a title at this point, even though I started the whole thing and and all that. And so he just said, Hey, I'm tired. You know, he had plenty of money and could do, you know, whatever he wanted. So he just said, I'm tired, I don't know what's gonna happen. You know, like if you think back to where we all were, nobody knew. Anybody that says they did, they're making it up.

SPEAKER_01 30:35

Absolutely not.

SPEAKER_03 30:35

And so he just said, I'm tired, let's just dump it. And he just we just sold it off to the commercial side, the construction side to uh to our building or a client, and he just he continues to build projects today with some of our same people.

SPEAKER_02 30:47

Wow.

SPEAKER_03 30:48

And I know a lot of our other people ended up coming, a lot of them came to you, which I was really glad to hear they found a great home. And yeah, all of a sudden I went from speaking on stage at SPI, energy project of the year, to six months later, I don't know if I'm gonna be able to keep my house. Yeah, you know, and that's that's really what changed. And then I I found Quativa literally the first, you know, I had my best friend since we were 20 years old. I went on an LDS mission in Cleveland and he got into the tech world.

SPEAKER_01 31:13

Okay.

SPEAKER_03 31:14

And he started in Vivant, in Vivant internet, security, everything, and he got his whole education paid for and learned the tech world there. And then he was hired by Kativa. So technically he was the first employee, but he moved on later, so I claim that now.

SPEAKER_00 31:30

Our secret.

SPEAKER_03 31:30

We're still great friends, and he's still in the industry and does really well. But he said, Hey, why don't you come see what we're building at Quativa? This is still early. No, you know, it's at least six months before it can even be used. I didn't, I didn't understand what it was. It was such a new concept. I'm like, what is this? You know, my yeah, and I had my head down on what we were doing. So I checked it out, met Dallin and Gary and David, and you know, didn't look left or right after that. I was like, this is cool. I can use what I've learned in SOAR, but also learn all these new things from tech and these other people that I get to learn from still to this day. Um, the roles they play and the respect I have for them is is awesome. And so I saw it as a fun challenge, something new we could do, and I don't have to worry about payroll anymore. So I was in.

SPEAKER_00 32:14

There's nothing worse than worrying about payroll. It's a special kind of hell that we all just voluntarily sign up for, right? Here we are again.

SPEAKER_02 32:21

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 32:22

Um okay, so you brushed over that pretty quickly. You went from on stage to I don't know how to pay for my house. Yeah. And you found your next opportunity, which I'm sure was healing. But I went through that little patch that was mysterious that we just comed over, and it was dark and horrific for me. What was it like for you? Did you did you feel how what was it like losing the title of CEO and founder of this mask company? Just let's just stop there for a minute.

SPEAKER_03 32:50

Man, you know the good questions to ask. Sounds like you've been there. Um yeah, that was really difficult. I was young. I was, you know, I think I was probably 30, 29, 30, 31 when we were really rolling. And um, you know, we just when we started our company, we just thought there'd be like 10 of us. Our goal was like, let's see if we can make enough money to pay our bills and maybe take some Fridays off and like work with like 10 cool people.

SPEAKER_01 33:16

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 33:16

And the next thing you know, it's 260 employees and all this, nothing. And so, yeah, we one day my partners came and said, Hey, we're big enough, we need to have titles. We didn't even have titles, and you're gonna be the CEO. I'm like, is this because I was late to lunch? And I'm the last like that's how I felt it got selected, but yeah, I'm such a people person and culture person like you. Yeah, and I think that's why they wanted me to have that role. And otherwise, I just had some incredible people around me.

SPEAKER_01 33:43

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 33:43

Eventually brought in an amazing CFO. My original partner, Trent Van Seis, is the COO. He's actually the COO of Quativa now, which is awesome. We got to continue to work together.

SPEAKER_01 33:52

Very cool.

SPEAKER_03 33:53

And otherwise, we just attracted some incredible talent. Like that's really what happened. And I just feel like my superpower was helping attract the talent, building a great culture, and then they'll take care of everything. And so even when we started doing commercial, I never even went and saw the projects. It sounds weird, but like I just really liked working around the people and helping their success stories, right? And so that was the hardest part, you know, was uh you know, losing that connection and and worrying about what's gonna happen. Like you get so, you know, your um your identity gets so tied up in your business. And even after I became aware of that, like, hey, you should watch out for this. You know, I'd hey, give me some advice to whoever else has been there. Be careful about your identity getting wrapped up in it. It's like even being aware, it's too hard. Like my neighbors, my friends, everyone knew me as that, right?

SPEAKER_00 34:42

All of your relationships are built on built on this. If you would have looked me in the face, like for starters, so many details of your story are just so familiar for mine. So this is I uh I'm getting free therapy from you. So thank you. But uh, you know, yeah, people you if you looked me in the face and said, you know, is this tied into your identity or you know, is your business tied into your identity, or are you even basing, you know, your ego or your I would have said, absolutely not. I'm I'm I'm solid in who I am, and I'm I was you know the most humble person out there, and I'm dealing with uh imposter syndrome daily, just like you. I didn't start out saying I was gonna build a 200 million dollar company. This wasn't even about money. I was just here to like love people, and the thing blew up, you know, in spite of all those things, and I did my best to just try to steer, try to steer with this massive thing. And so many of us that hit that at the right time with this incredible growth that we never signed up for, you know, and did our very, very best. Um I absolutely lost every part of my identity that I wasn't even expecting because I didn't think was wrapped up in it. I kind of went, I don't know what I'm good at anymore. Clearly, I'm good at nothing because of all of this failure around me. I don't know how to move forward. I don't know what I have to bring to the next situation or the next circumstance. And that was the weirdest for me to just kind of lay in a puddle for a minute and be like, I can't provide anything to anyone, which of course isn't true, but there's nothing like being actual bottom to help you and to force you to rebuild yourself in a really different way, right?

SPEAKER_03 36:16

Absolutely. Yeah, I'll you know, kind of share from my side what it was like. It it absolutely just tears you up and you know hits you. I I summarize it by saying like everybody thinks everything's going so well, and like, congrats on your success and everything. And I would have literally trade like 18 months in jail, no visitation rights, I would have easily made that decision within one second to switch to that situation and the hell I was in with how bad that was at the end and trying to figure it out, navigate it, and not have control.

SPEAKER_00 36:45

Not let people down, and all of these people. I mean, you touched on that on the Quativa piece too. Like the pain of letting partners down is it's brutal. Yeah, it's your people that you love so much.

SPEAKER_03 36:56

Yeah, and so it was hard. It did force me, you know, to really rebuild myself. I mean, I did, you know, went definitely to a dark place. And you what I was doing when I met Trent when we started Aric, I was selling cell phones for Verizon Corporate, and he was like an executive there.

SPEAKER_01 37:14

Wow.

SPEAKER_03 37:15

And I'm like, you know, we started talking about doing a solar company. I'm like, if this guy's dumb enough to be my business partner, like I'm in. He's already climbed the ladder at this corporate America thing, and he's where I thought I was gonna go, but he's leaving, he's already arrived up here and he's jumping off. Maybe I'll save 10 years of my life and and whatever he found up there that's not great, which was mostly work-life balance. I'll learn from him and skip that step and let's go start this thing. And and uh we had so much fun along the way and learned so many great things, but also, you know, wouldn't trade the experience, which I never thought I'd say, of like going through losing all that and then truly having to figure out who you are and do all the work. I mean, I had anxiety I'd never experienced before, waking up in the middle of the night. Like, you know, one I think the thing that a lot of entrepreneurs can relate with is like it was crazy how one week you would feel like we're rich, let's let's book a trip to Hawaii, let's go, and that like the next week you're like cancel everything. Like it and it makes you start to think you're crazy sometimes because it's so hard to know you know how things are going that way like that and make decisions that way. So, yeah, when we went through all that stuff, I had to start over, and I remember thinking, Am I if could I even get a job at Verizon selling cell phones? Should I go back and do that? Like that's how low you get sometimes.

SPEAKER_01 38:35

That's true.

SPEAKER_03 38:35

And now, you know, just doing tons of work, you know, yeah, I'll be the first one to admit, like I went to therapy to like heal this anxiety that I had developed. So I knew even if I won the lottery, the anxiety would stay if you don't heal the root issue.

SPEAKER_01 38:49

Absolutely.

SPEAKER_03 38:49

And then I just uncovered all this other shit that I needed to work on. Yeah. And it's been quite a journey. It took a couple years. I mean, I even, you know, after that, then of course, your relationship, you know, I ended up getting divorced eventually. Worked on that for a really hard, really long time. So I feel like I had a divorce with my business, and then that. And the I guess the success story is like you can do a lot of work. I think I did over 400 hours of therapy.

SPEAKER_01 39:15

Wow.

SPEAKER_03 39:16

I mean, uh, that's not a like look at me, I did 400 hours of therapy. Some people probably think that's like, wow, dude, that's embarrassing for you. No, I don't really care. I would just tell you that it you can do the work, and I think, you know, like you said, that humility really kicked in. And I I really did think I was as humble as you could be for being a 30-year-old CEO. Right. Whatever. And I people would tell me that. I think that was one of the hardest parts that I realized is like how many people were just, you know, as living off of this validation from people just because they felt like maybe they had to, or whatever it was. So I really got to get true comp learn true confidence and actually really like what I have today, I you know, the lesson I got out of that was totally worth it. So now, you know, the experience I've got from it, being able to really know who I am and and have confidence in in myself and what we can do and what what we've done in the past, like it's just incredible the experience I've been able to get from that. So yeah, traumatizing for sure, but here we are. So anybody else that can write with that, like uh, you know, the common humanity in that I I love sharing with you. It's been awesome to talk about that with you when we met earlier, and and um yeah, it's been wonderful.

SPEAKER_00 40:26

It is um healing, but it's also just it's incredible. You have a story that I mean, you could swap stories at any bar anywhere, and I bet you win. That's just wild. Um I think that the the part there that I couldn't stop thinking about while I was listening to you is that you don't think that a lot of these things and these experiences are built on validation from others. Like you don't see it, but really that is the core foundation you have because people are saying you are this 30-year-old CEO of a multimillion dollar company and it becomes sort of this thing that you have to gut check against. And when the bottom, when that foundation is suddenly gone, it is a free-fall effect. And I had to really look back to the things that I had done on my own without any other platform and the things that I that gave me true confidence because I earned it slowly on my own, right? And that's not to diminish the things that I didn't do with a massive team, it's not to diminish the incredible accolades I had for my role. It's really just to say that like I had to redo it again and I had to prove to myself a little bit. And the you said true confidence, which is exactly how I would describe it. True confidence is trusting yourself by seeing the cool shit that you can do for yourself on your own. And sometimes you just gotta like do it again, prove it to yourself over and over again. And I think that's kind of the coolest thing of being about being like in deep water, right? So it's opportunities.

SPEAKER_03 41:49

The the two things that came up for me as you talked about that was um yeah, the first one is a story where I remember my ex-wife now, but we were married, and she was like, we'd been married for like 10 or 11 years, and she was like the feedback I was giving was like, you're just not great at communicating. Okay, I'll work on that, you know. And then I go to work the next day, and they're like basically giving me an award for saying how great of a communicator I am, you know. Like, and so it was very conflicting, and I think a lot of you guys can probably relate with that. Like, I think there's part of it, like you can be two different people, absolutely, right? With your work and your home, and you can show up differently. And I just need to learn how to do that stuff better. But it was also a false sense of like it's hard to know what your weaknesses are when some people just tell you what you want to hear and stuff. And so it really was great for me to go through that experience to like, oh, I wonder what I what matters to me, what what where do I really think I'm at? Who cares? Because I can have completely contrasting opinions, and if I'm just living off of everybody else's validation and what they say, like they could literally have a completely different experience. Like I was in that situation. So learned a lot a lot from that. And then the other one was just I think the other thing is there's a lot of people, I'm sure, that can relate to this that are hearing this, that have worked just as hard as you and I have, that are just as talented or more, and maybe they didn't have the timing that went in our favor for some time. He also had some things that really, really screwed us over timing-wise, that I finally have come to realize after doing all this work, weren't even my fault.

SPEAKER_01 43:24

Right.

SPEAKER_03 43:24

Like there's nothing I could have done about it. But you take so much responsibility to the point like because we're trained, like, take responsibility, you're the CEO, but you can swing it so far that it just destroys you. And I did that. Yeah, I did that. Yeah, we were reading Extreme Ownership as our company book. And you can take everything too far and really can become destructive. So the story I'd say is our billionaire client, he also was a great mentor, you know, somebody that hundreds of businesses and billionaires just tick differently.

SPEAKER_01 43:54

Totally.

SPEAKER_03 43:54

And I went to him and showed him our financials and said, We need your help. What do you think we should do? And um, he told me to. Come back the next day with all the details, and I gave him those. And I and he was very optimistic. Like, oh, you just have a capital problem, we'll just raise some money. Which I'm like, is it that easy? You know, I said they just think differently, and good lessons to learn from stuff like that. That's another topic. But I remember I'm like, you know, a little desperate, feeling a little definitely felt pretty small and scared to tell your biggest client that you know you need some help financially. Right. What if he doesn't like that and just stops working with you?

SPEAKER_01 44:27

Right.

SPEAKER_03 44:27

And then so out of desperation, I just kind of said something like, Hey, we're gonna, I was walking him out to his car, he was gonna go to Europe and and on a trip, like literally go right to the airport. I'm just like, hey, one more thing. Like, want you to know when you help us, like, we're gonna make you proud. And he's just, and this guy, billionaire, doesn't give out a lot of accolades or anything. And he said to me, You've already made me proud. Like, very few people can do what you've done. You just have a capital problem. This is easy. And that was like such a big deal to me, right? Because it's like, man, billionaire says that what I've done is pretty incredible. And I'm thinking I'm a loser. I ran, you know, we're in trouble right now. You know, our cash flow is an issue, and so it's just awesome to get perspective like that along the way. I think we're so hard on ourselves. And so what I would say to the whole point of that was we're so focused, I think, on results.

SPEAKER_01 45:18

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 45:19

Like you and I had some great results for a long time, and then we didn't. But it failed, so they they don't know anything.

SPEAKER_00 45:25

It doesn't matter, didn't count.

SPEAKER_03 45:26

And I had somebody come and say, like, I would love for you to consult with me because all I care about is I don't even care about all the success. Just tell me whatever happened at the end so I can avoid that. Oh, great. Like, I had no idea. I thought nobody wanted any of that. Like they're like, that's the value. And so it's really changed my perspective. Like, even a billionaire, like, do you know how many failures? I mean, I watched him have failures.

SPEAKER_01 45:48

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 45:48

And the way he'd respond to him is just like, oh, next, whatever. And I it kind of like in my mind, I think I thought, like, you have to have success by the world's standards of success, or else you're a failure. There's nothing else in between. And so I don't I think about it like Steph Curry misses more shots than he makes, and he's the greatest shooter of all time. And so I think his focus is like, did I have the right form? Yeah. Did I like have the right release? Was my focus right? Whether it goes in or out, like you just it's not always just about the results. Like, did you have the right form? Are you doing the right moves? Are you executing the way that you know you're supposed to? And then live with whatever the results are. Sometimes it's the whole market shifts. What are you gonna do?

SPEAKER_01 46:30

Right.

SPEAKER_03 46:31

You know, and I think that's what destroyed me was I was like, I gotta move the whole market. COVID, COVID just took us out. And I'm thinking my joke with people close to me, my my inner circle, my joke is that God finally sent COVID to take Aric out because I would not let it go.

SPEAKER_02 46:48

Oh my gosh.

SPEAKER_03 46:49

Sounds like the world revolves around me, and I know it's a joke, but like I would not let it go. I would do crazy stuff to keep it going. Home equity lines, raising money, like pivots, selling, like it was insane what we were dealing with. And I look back and it was just destroying me, and I think it was like, let's just send a pandemic but finally let Jess let this go. You know, the world doesn't revolve very good.

SPEAKER_00 47:11

Literally had chills when you said that because that is my experience to a T. I I was literally ready to die on every sword possible to make sure that this thing lived. And I look back and go, no wonder things got as insane as they did, because I would not let it die. It's because you thought it was you.

SPEAKER_03 47:30

You thought it was you that was gonna die. Yeah, you're fighting for your own life and you realize this isn't me. So it's it's hard because I think part of that though is in order to have the success that we did have, you kind of I feel like you do have like part of it's it becomes you.

SPEAKER_00 47:44

You gotta be in it.

SPEAKER_03 47:45

So I don't over apologize that it becomes me. In order to have some of that success, you've really got to go all out.

SPEAKER_00 47:49

Right.

SPEAKER_03 47:50

But I think trying to keep a little bit of that balance is is important.

SPEAKER_00 47:54

The perspective is so cool. I had a similar experience where a mentor of mine reached out after everything had kind of hit the floor and he said, Congratulations. You're now part of a 1% that has a failure like this. And not only does it teach you all the things to never do again and gives you all the new perspectives and all the ways to come out better and bigger, but it changes you as a person and it is the next step to being the person you need to be to have something incredible and have it long lasting. And at the time I couldn't even let it sit in. I just remember being so just repelled by that message because it felt like pouring salt on the wound a little bit. Like, that's not me, you've got me wrong. And as I went through the entire journey and I like looked back at that message so many times, I now look at it and go, There is so much truth in this, and I am so grateful for that experience. And I never, to your point, never thought I would say that in a million years being grateful for dying by slow, burning alive.

SPEAKER_03 48:53

Yeah, it was like, oh, you'll always say, you know, in life, you'll say later that, you know, this was uh worth it or whatever. I'm like, cool, doesn't apply here. I will never say that the amount of pain, worry, like your family, your marriage, all of it. Like, there's no way. And it didn't take long when you I'm just glad I did the work to like really understand it and heal from it the right way, versus just kind of like tuck it on and move on. So yeah, I have no shame to talk about the success, the failure, whatever, and and I feel like I finally really understand like what I could have done differently, and more importantly, what it was not in my control, and stop carrying that. Yes, and just accept it is what it is and move on. And you know, know that I have weaknesses and strengths, and just play to my strengths and acknowledges the weaknesses.

SPEAKER_00 49:43

Good on you. I'm so impressed with what you've done since, and I have so much respect for you and your journey and everything that you're doing. To end this incredible interview, which I'm so excited to share with everybody, maybe give us one piece of advice person to person. Most of my audience are entrepreneurs, CEOs, business owners. What would you say for someone who's listening to this and going, okay, I can relate to that, but I don't want to be in that spot, but they're ch they're challenged right now, they're struggling. What would your one piece of advice be?

SPEAKER_03 50:13

Oh man, so many things that you know could come to mind, but just I think knowing that you're not alone with whatever you're feeling, like someone else has been through it, the fear of all the stuff, like you don't have to fake it and be like, I think I I felt like being the CEO, like I've got to have all the answers. I gotta always look a certain way, make sure that you know, it's just like anything else in your life. Yeah, you can't, yeah, you can't let any fear and yeah, you can't share the financials with every employee in your company, they don't want that.

SPEAKER_01 50:43

Right.

SPEAKER_03 50:44

But I think showing them that you're human and like you don't have to know all the things and just play to your strength. I think we think CEO or whatever your title is, whatever your role is, that you have to know everything else. And so I think you know, just knowing that like whatever you're experiencing other people have, it's normal. Whatever you think is failure or success, it's you know, it's really just defined by you. The only story that matters is the one you tell yourself. So I think that's what I'd leave you with.

SPEAKER_00 51:11

That is incredible and beautiful. Thank you so much, Jess. Thanks for your time. I'm so excited for.