Episode 011- Men-torship with Seth Chapman

On episode 11 of "The Good-Year's" Podcast, Brent sits down for another Men-torship discussion with Seth Chapman.  Seth is the owner of Chapman's A/C & Heat, one of the fastest growing A/C & Heat companies in the Southern region, Perry Outfitters, and Island Bait and Tackle in Southwest Louisiana and is most known for his online persona (with a following of around 50,000), his passion for the outdoors, and his devotion to his wife Darian, and their new daughter, Lily.  

This podcast really gives you insight into the personal and professional struggles Seth faced while starting a business and simultaneously caring for the deteriorating health of his late wife, Delanie, continuing to expand his business after her passing, finding love again, and eventually marrying and starting a family with his current wife, Darian.  Seth's story is a testament to love and determination and one that we love to see unfold in the wake of his continued success. 

You can follow Seth Chapman below:

Instagram:
Seth's Personal Page - @chapman_dmax
Chapman's AC & Heat - Chapmans_ac_heating
Perry Outfitters - @perry.outfitters

Facebook: www.facebook.com/seth.chapman.315

Website: https://www.chapmansac.com/

Youtube: www.Youtube.com/@chapmancompound6602

Transcript

0:04

We are Brent and Lindsey, Goodyear, husband, and wife duo here to share our unfiltered thoughts on marriage, parenting, faith, family, and everything in between. We promised. I ask the hard questions and share perspective as we navigate life in all its unexpected. Curve ball, field glory. So here's to authenticity, here's to growth and here's to embracing the good years. All right, Seth Chapman. What's up, bro? Hold on, man. Thank you for inviting me. Yeah, man. I'm glad you said yeah, dude. I'm, uh, I'm excited to have you dude. I've, uh, watched, uh, from afar, you know, just following you guys on Instagram and on, uh, Facebook. And I'm glad to see that, uh, I get to talk to you in person. There's, you got a pretty wild story, man. So I'm excited to, uh, to get to share with everybody else, you know, thank you. Yeah, this would be the, uh, the first time people have gotten bits and pieces over the year, just, uh, from, uh, Promotional videos I do or people who know me directly know the stories, but this will be the first time that Everybody gets to hear the whole thing start to finish. Yeah, it's awesome, man. I'm excited. So Um, I guess we'll start with dude. It's so tell people, give you, give like a little introduction, tell people where you're from, um, and what you do. All right. Uh, like I said, Seth Chapman, um, originally from Esther, Louisiana. Uh, I lived there until Hurricane Rita, which we actually just had the 22nd Uh, whatever anniversary, almost 20 years ago. I think it's, yeah, 19, was that 2005 maybe? 2005, yeah. Okay. 19 year anniversary. So I lived, uh, in Esther until then. It's right on the coast for everybody, uh, listening. Um, close to Intracoastal City, Poquan Island, that whole thing. We got flooded, lost our house, uh, and moved to Maurice, higher ground. Mm hmm. Uh, and that's where I've been since. You know 19 years. Yeah, that's awesome, man. Just got to get north of 14 apparently nowadays My roots are still in esther, you know, I have a camp down there and uh, my first two years I lived in pecan island So we really we gradually moved farther north and farther north Uh, I think I I wouldn't have thought of esther being uh too far south, but we grew up in perry. Yeah, so Um, right matter of fact right on the other side from your store and, um, I'll see you circle. Yep. That's right. I'll see you circle. You got it, man. Uh, we, I grew up there for us since I think I was two. We moved there through when I moved out to go to college. And, um, uh, Esther, I know that area was hit really hard for the, for Rita and all that. I mean, the water essentially came up, I think almost to Perry. I want to say something like that. It did. Yeah. They were, they were launching boats. A lot of people were launching boats out of yards around the Perry bridge and Taking the intercoastal taking the vermilion river to you know intercoastal or dude, that's crazy boats. That's crazy. I remember So my mom taught at seventh ward forever, right? And I can remember one of her friends lived. Um So you go to seventh ward and whenever you get to that caution light right next to the dollar general you take a right Yes, and you go out that way and it's just straight country out there, right? Yeah, the whole area Yeah, yeah, and we were pulling mud You Out of the cabinets of, uh, in the, their kitchen of some of the teachers, dude, it was so bad. So I could see how y'all had to, you know, scoot out of there and get a little bit further north, you know? Yeah, nobody was prepared for that. It was, uh, it wasn't until, uh, local police and a few state police started knocking on doors and said, hey, we're actually, uh, making y'all leave. It's mandatory. You'll have to leave. A few people got away and stayed in their attics and they actually had to get cut out their attics Mm hmm, not not two three miles down from where we were But yeah, we all left and sure enough It was a good thing because the the water actually our house was on a cement piers three feet Wasn't strapped down because it didn't need to be you know, big house And no the wave picked it up and took it Set it down on the highway. No way dude. So there was water in the attic, you know, nine feet Oh, yeah, everyone only been about six foot if it would have stayed on the on the piers bad enough though. Yeah God, we ruined it no matter what. Yeah, they had some friends of ours that live across from the fire station out there in esther and um, they were telling the story of how um, Their dad had written their social security numbers on their arms and everything like as they were trying to get out And they said they could hear it coming through the trees or through the woods came fast. Yeah, and they said So they heard it, they ran inside, they did that, and then they ran outside to the truck and by the time they got in the truck, the water was coming over the hood of the truck, so they were like, Barely able to get out. I was dude. I couldn't imagine. Um, it was minutes. Yeah. Being in that, I couldn't imagine. It's crazy, man. And then you think about like, like Florida just got hit. Like as we record this podcast, Florida had just got hit with North Carolina and everything. And I don't think any of those people were quite prepared with like what was coming, you know, they really weren't. And I have a good buddy that came visit me from North Carolina and, uh, they had just experienced, um, a S a 2016 style flood. Like we had, Uh, and it flooded a lot of houses and it was just rain and then they get hit with a hurricane right after yeah So it flooded it and then in different areas, they'll flooded it again. Yeah, I saw something yesterday that Over there the river normally peaks at like one and a half feet or something like that And it during the rains it peaked at 22 and a half feet. I'm like, bruh. That's so much water yeah, it is it's unreal man, but um but now so You guys moved to Maurice. Um, y'all got north of all the, the nonsense that happens south of 14 now. That's right. Um, and then, uh, so for everyone listening, Seth owns Chapman's AC and Heat. You know, is Chapman's AC in here or just Chapman's AC? Chapman's AC, whatever you want to do it. Chapman's AC and Heating, Chapman's, Chapman's AC. It's all good. Yeah, yeah. So everybody knows it. You, you can't miss them because they're the ones with the old stuff. Old duck camo trucks driving around. And I guarantee I see at least one every single day. Yeah. Y'all, y'all are all over the place, man. But, um, so that business of yours, um, I think everyone is kind of aware that it's just kind of skyrocketed, you know? So tell us. You know, what were you doing before you started Chapman's AC? How did you get started? And um, and what's what's the ride been like man? Because I feel like we're in the early stages like how old are you? I'm just turned 32. Yeah, you turned 32 and you and you have a thriving business, you know that almost nobody can say that so I want to know like What the ride's been like up until this point and uh, and at the end we'll get to the legacy of Seth Chapman and what, what's coming for the future. Yeah. Yeah. So, uh, I'll start with, um, of course I was in high school. I wanted to remain Catholic, uh, lived in Maurice. So, uh, I would say closer to senior year, uh, I had to break it to my, my parents that I was not going to college. I was like, Hey, uh, College isn't for me. I need to work on my hands. I know College isn't gonna be for me. It's not that I struggled in high school Um, because if I applaud myself, I did great, but I just I didn't like it I didn't like studying. I didn't like book work So my dad said yeah, look no problem. You don't have to go to college, but you got to go to trade school You got to go do something um He said you can go do plumbing electrical air conditioning. I was like man air conditioning that Kind of sounds fun. Uh, so he said look i'll pay for you to go to You Uh trade school and it was cheap back then, you know I'm, so grateful for my dad for making me go do something because if it wouldn't have been for him I would have just gone Working to all field like 90 of louisiana does yeah, and i would have been happy. Um, And because I and i'll get to that in a second I still ended up in the oil field and as much as he tried to keep me out of it Like everyone in south louisiana, you can't get out of it man. The industry's so big here. Um, so I uh, He sent me to trade school. Uh, and I was uh, In high school, I was actually working at AutoZone. I love vehicles, right? So I became a manager at AutoZone in Abbeville, uh, at 17 years old. So I was working over there and meeting new people, um, networking really, you know, I would see so many people come in there and I was going to trade school for air condition. Um, and one day A lady came in and awesome. Awesome. One of the best bosses i've ever had Uh, rachel was her name. She owned landry's he's seen heating out of erath And I said, hey, I said i'm in school for air conditioning If you're hiring whenever i'm finished, um, I would love to come work for you And she said I would love to have you, uh, call me whenever you finish. So, you know, i'm about halfway through trade school and I was like I feel like Auto zones holding me back. I need to I need to learn the trade before I get out of school and I'm just hit blindsided by all this Stuff that I don't really know because I'm not working hands on in air condition So I called her and she said I would love to hire you right now. So she actually put me in a truck while still in trade school, allowed me to drive to trade school and work for her the rest of the half of the day. Wow. Um, great, great lady. Uh, she has, uh, air source one now. Um, Oh yeah. I see. I see that. I see their trucks all over. Yeah. Rachel Andrews air source one. That's awesome. So I worked for Rachel for, um, I finished trade school, worked for her for about another year doing residential and I got a job opportunity. Uh, it's so funny. Um, with that, If I'm not mistaken, your uncle. Yeah. Uh, my brother told me that at OAR. Yeah, OAR. That's hilarious. So I got a call, uh, Mark is your uncle, right? Yeah. So I got a call from, um, one of his, uh, managers, uh, Hoss, they called him. Oh, yeah. He's a big guy. Big guy. Oh, yeah. I remember. I've heard about him. Hoss was great, right? So Hoss called me. He said, uh, Hey Seth, I heard you do, uh, air conditioning. Uh, would you want to come work offshore? I was like, yeah, man, I think I will. Um. So, uh, left Landry's AC. I went work offshore. I loved it. Uh, and that's an experience. I wish I could attach pictures to this because that's something like offshore air condition, offshore in general is wonderful. So as much as my dad tried to keep me out of the off field, I still ended up in it. He was probably like, Oh yeah, but I did air condition. Uh, that's, and that's all I did. Um, I worked for OAR. It was offshore air and refrigeration for, uh, about two years. And then, uh, I left OER cause I wanted to learn, um, I wanted to learn some electrical. So I went to a company called Stallion Offshore. I worked there for about a year. And then I was like, you know, I just want to continue to one up myself. So I want to learn, uh, pneumatics and stuff like that. So I went to a company called Control Concepts or W Industries. So I did air conditioned pneumatics, electrical. Uh, I stayed more in the electric facade. I worked in west texas and then around 2016. We had a huge downturn of the all field It was horrible. I I can recall I think I went through So i've always been on the business development side, right? And I think I went through three jobs in like a year and a half or two years, but it was it's hard Yeah, and the people were just like look man We're We'll give you a shot make something happen If not, we we can't give you a lot of time times are tough And uh that I very much recall that time You know, you're you're eating you're eating vienna sausage and beanie when he talks you're like Well, am I gonna be laid off next month? Yeah, especially as a what were you a tech or something? Yeah. Yeah, I was I was a I was just a service tech. I guess you'd call it Yeah And if they can't if they can't find enough work and the work keeps slowing down as that work slows down the tech's gotta The techs get laid off third party's always the first one to go. Oh, yeah, that's tough, man You Um, so I was home for like three months, right? And I was married already at this time. I got married about 2015. I've been married a year to my first wife, Delaney. So I was broke. I had no money. I had a credit card with like 7, 000 available balance. And I was, uh, all I knew was air condition. Really? And I was, you know, You know, we can get into this later, but I'd already built a presence on a couple of social media platforms. Just, I'm not going to say by the luck of the draw, but it was all based around vehicles, right? Love my big trucks, stuff like that. So people knew me for my toys, really. Spending more oilfield money than I was making. And that's why I had those cool toys. Yeah. Yeah. Like, like most, like most of the office people spend more than they make. And then, you know, you're 2021 making a hundred thousand a year. And in 2015 or 16, that was great money for, uh, 20 or 21-year-old. Oh, that was really good money. And I was spending it all, I was so, so childish back then. You were, you were bawling that's what was happening. No, I really was lifts and four wheelers and side by side stuff that, and I try and I try and mentor my young guys now I'm like, I don't want y'all to struggle like I did. And look, a lot of them take my advice. I help them with their credit at Chapman's and you know, stuff like that. Yeah. That's awesome, man. I think whenever you become a boss, I think it's important to mentor those under you. Yeah. And I'm still, I'm, you know, I'm still young, so I'm only 10 years older than a lot of my guys that work for me. So I know, I'm like, look, this was me like six years ago. Just listen to me. Yeah. Yeah. Uh, and that's how Chapman started, uh, was out of necessity. I was laid off three months. I had no money. I bought some tools. I posted on Facebook. Okay. Anybody need a little bit of air conditioning work. Let me come clean your unit for you No way and it's snowballed. It's snowballed from that's crazy, dude. Yeah, just just from asking a question. I mean, yeah Oh, there's you can still find the the original post on facebook march area of 2016 Yeah, it was like hey guys. I'm uh in my off time. I'm gonna I'm gonna do some air conditioning work. If you need a unit clean now change capacitors, whatever you want to do it real light Um And then I get a little bit of feedback and it, uh, uh, it worked. I had a, I had a big jacked up truck, of course, cause I was in an office, I was driving that around and it was killing me. I wasn't making any money, spent it all on fuel and repairs. I bet man, I bet. So, um, I guess just for context, so you started out, I was, you said 2016, yeah, March 2016, 2016, just you, just me. And here we are in October of 2024. Yeah. And how many trucks do you guys, or how many guys do you have now? So we have 20 working trucks on the road. Um, I have. 28 guys and six ladies. Wow. So I have a great office staff. I have managers, I have a bunch of technicians and not including any of my personal, uh, Work truck. I drive every day, but I have 20 wrapped working trucks. No way, dude. That's a lot. Yeah Sometimes it's unbelievable. I look, I look back at it and it, uh, Yeah, there's so much to talk about like I would, I would buy trucks before I had people to put in them because I couldn't pass up a good deal on a truck because I knew that if I bought a truck, I would force myself to put somebody in that truck and find work for them. You feel they're like the pressure of, man, I put this money into it and now I have to pay for it. So I would kind of throw my guys to the wolves. Most of them, I would say 90 percent of them would react how I would react and figure it out. And a couple of them would pull back and I'd take them out and put them back as a helper. You know, it's all on how the person reacts to being thrown. Yeah, yeah, but sometimes they, I mean, you, you are probably going to know, like, if you work with those guys enough, if they're capable for the next level, and it's going to be scary for them. Uh, to go to take that chance because you know, they just never been there before, but if you've been there and you know what they can do and if they're capable of it, you know, to give them that opportunity and then, you know, sometimes people just need someone to just trust, like to just show them and just say, look, I know you can do this. You know, that's what they need sometimes. So man, that's, that's a crew. That's a crew you have now, dude. That's wild. They're wonderful. And you know, I get asked the question a lot. Why do I. Why do I put the wheels in the tires and why do I do all this stuff to the truck? And i've answered this in a video before and it's actually a real viral video on tiktok It has almost a million views because it's genuine and the reason is because I I like my vehicles, right? So I was in that that truck my first Two months in business and it broke down so I had no way to get to these customers houses that I was building relationships with uh, and i'd already um You My wife had a vehicle, uh, I bought her a Yukon when I was in all field struggling to pay for it So I had her older vehicle. It was a 99 camry or an 01 camry So I would I would I was like, well, I gotta work, right? So I would load the back of this camry with my torch and tools and capacitors and parts and vacuum pumps and freon And I would go run service calls but I would for instance this subdivision We're in right now was the biggest subdivision. I took over because I have friends in okay I would park around the corner And I walked to their house so they wouldn't see me pull up in a Toyota Camry because I was like, man, if they, you know, I'm not embarrassed about the Toyota Camry. I loved it, but I was worried that they were going to think this guy's working on a Toyota Camry. What at a heart? Yeah. Walk around the corner. I had my nice shirt on. I'd fix the air condition and they'd be like, Oh, where are you going now? I'm like, Oh, I have another call. Around the corner so I'd walk back to my vehicle and I'd make the block. Oh So they never knew they never knew I was in a oh one the white Trying to hide it just a little while and I had to use that for about a month and until I went to the bank And I took out a 4, 000 loan that shows you in the beginning, you know 4, 000 is a lot of money Oh, yeah, and I didn't have I didn't have 4, 000 to buy a work truck and I bought my first work truck With a bank loan and uh with a service bed it was ready to go So I loaded it up and that is what set me apart from a lot of the single Uh single employee companies with just one truck and it's hard working out of a bed truck Service beds are very organized. And then once I found out How easily it was to organize it. That was it. Yeah, I started buying more and it was on, huh? Oh, man, and then you you did the lifts and the uh in the tires and all that I mean when you see those diesels running around they're leveled and I mean they all got the same wheels. Yeah Yeah, I have 20 sets of gm factory five stars. I put them on all the trucks Yeah, so they all look alike. I was about to say is that just because you you just like that? It was it was a it was a hard wheel to find a long time ago and I put it on the first truck And then I got my second truck and I was like, Oh, look, I found a set of wheels. So they matched. And then once they started matching, I continued. That's just what it's gotta be. It's just what it's gotta be now. And interco tires. I'm a big interco. Brand ambassador. I love interco. I have a good relationship with the owners. Um, shout out interco And I run intercos ours and everything. Um, which people will laugh at because they They think man, they don't make great mileage and some of the tires don't but I run the ones that do get better miles Yeah, yeah No, that's cool, man So since you've been in this business right now that it's here It's uh, what I would consider to be pretty big man. Um, I mean 20, would you say 28 trucks, 20 trucks, 20 guys, 20 trucks, 28 guys. Um, that's nothing to shake a leg at dude, that's, that's a big operation you have going now. Uh, now, now I, I would imagine. In your business, you're starting to make layers, right? Layers of, uh, management to start managing so that you can scale some more. But in your earlier days, um, even whenever you had one, two, maybe three trucks, what were some of the, the, the hard lessons that you had to figure out? Cause usually when people start, typically any, anytime anyone starts a business, but usually whenever you start. The way you did. Yeah. There's some tough lessons that have to be learned and some, some things that's got to hurt for you to appreciate that as you grow, you're like, all right, let's just, let's, let's learn this lesson, not repeat it. You know, what were some of those big things that you feel like, um, really shaped the way that you run Chapman's now? Um, the, the, one of the biggest lessons I can say is, uh, is trying to do it all yourself. I, I would say the first, uh, let me see. 2016 2018 until 2019. I tried to do it all myself and I had gray hairs at 28 and I was stressing, I had high blood pressure. I wasn't even in bad shape. I was just stressing myself out so much that, uh, I was forgetting things, right? I'm not going to tell you I'm very organized. I've just started to use Google calendar because people send me invites. I'm like, well, that's pretty convenient. So I was very disorganized. Uh, I wasn't on a digital platform for, um, scheduling and stuff. And I would try and do it all. And I would have customers mad and I'd say, Hey, look, I'm sorry. I forgot. And they were most of them were understanding what I learned is Delegate something as fast as you possibly can as long as somebody can do it 70 percent as good as you you have to get rid Of that task and give it to them and then they will eventually Perfected and and do it a hundred percent as good as you. Mm hmm. I would have done that a lot earlier I would I feel like my company would probably be twice the size it is now if I would have done that Two years earlier really and the reason is because I my fourth truck on the road Um is kinley broussard was kinley broussard. He is now my operations manager And to tell you how important Kinley is to to me so I hired kinley as my fourth truck very scary hire. He was an expensive hire to me, right? I look back on it now. It wasn't really expensive. I was just scared scared. Yeah Yeah, so I hired kinley and we went from four trucks to 20 trucks in June Four years. And it took, it took me four years to get four trucks. That's crazy. So now you're scaling. Now we're scaling. And that's because, uh, one morning he walked up to me and it was nine o'clock in the morning, my phone and rang 35 times. I had 15 unread text messages, Facebook messages, and I was sitting down with my, my head in my hands and I was like, dude, I can't do it. And he was like, what do you mean you can't do it? I was like, we can't do all this work. I have no idea how we're going to do it. He was like, give me the phone for a day. And I was so hesitant. I was like, I can't. Yeah. This is like the lifeblood of this company right now. He was like, just trust me. Give me the phone for a day. I gave him the phone for a day. And it was the, I felt free. I don't think I even worked that day. I went like Rodeye and Lafayette or something. And I was like, oh man, this is nice. And he was like, see? So that's what molded him to that operations manager. Position he forced it on me and sometimes as the owner you have to accept defeat and be like, you know what? I can't do it all. Yeah, and now i've learned it and I try and tell people you can't do it all Yeah, and I think that wisdom is uh, incredibly important and and that's I will say that that's that goes even into your family life. So like me and my wife lindsey, right? We have two young kids and um Uh, we're trying to manage, uh, schedules and, uh, now we're starting to get into after I'm going to say school activities like Jackson's in, he's our almost four year old. He's in jujitsu, you know, but there's a lot of running around for us that's starting to happen and we're having to navigate and Um, almost delegating to each other. Like, okay, you take care of this, you take care of this. Cause I am the type to be like, man, I'll, I'll do it all. No problem. Especially if like my wife's having a tough week or works been, you know, tough or whatever's going on. Cause she works in a oncology, right. With cancer patients. And that can typically be draining for those people who work there. So yeah, we, um, We really try to do a good job of trying to delegate things because if if I try to do too much Then I'll find whenever we get home. I'm like worn out I don't have any energy to give to the kids None nothing to give to her because I've used it throughout the day the whole time, you know so now we're trying to Split things off more and that's really working and that's that's more on a smaller scale probably compared to what you're doing because your stuff Probably doesn't stop. It's like all day every day from all these people I tell people that but you know, it's like your struggles are not my struggles, but they're still struggles So they can all hold the same magnitude across the board. I tell my guys I'm like people are like, how do you do it? I'm like, you know, it's no different than you doing it. I just have more people to help me do it It's we probably have the same amount of stress. It's just different stress. Yeah, and uh, you know Yeah, it's not like your stress is less than mine because it's it's it's all stress, you know trying to spread yourself thin Yeah, it feels the same for sure. You know that that uh that that heart pounding feeling You're like, how am I gonna figure it out? And it doesn't matter what it is, you know Yeah, but my the first thing I think that was ever delegated to me. I remember my mom told me she was like Brent I can remember Um, so like on Alice Eats Circle where we grew up, right? Um, it was just me, my brother, and my mom, right? And she was like, you are at the point of age where you can mow the yard, okay? And, bruh, I did not like, I did not want to mow the yard. I can remember like, hating it, which, uh, I'm such a typical guy now. I love mowing the yard, you know? But at the time when I was a kid, I just wanted to go play, you know? But she was like, you know Brent, I needed the help. I couldn't do everything anymore. You know, I needed you to start helping me at least with the outside stuff to where I can start taking care of everything else for our family, you know? And she was like, so the thing that I delegated to you was mowing the yard. And she was like, I knew. Whenever you mowed the yard, it was not going to look good. She was like, it was not going to look good, but it was going to get done. And so whenever you said, you know, they might not, your employees are at the time, they might not have been able to do it, uh, at a hundred percent like you could, maybe it was only 75%, but it was done. It was done. And it was one of those things that you didn't have to worry about anymore. So when you said that, for some reason, My that, that thing my mom said popped up into my head and she was like, I knew it wasn't going to be great, but it was going to be done and we could, we could move on. So that is a similar deal of what you have, but yours is just way more complicated, way more at scale, but that's with 20 people, you know, it's, it's crazy, man, but no, that's, that's, um, I think that that's incredibly important, dude. I could bet there's a lot of business owners out there who try to do everything and then they get stuck at where they're maxed out. That's it. You know, plateau. That's right. And they can't do any more in their work. They're working for the business, not, not letting the business work for them, you know, and, uh, still working. for somebody and they have less time off. That's right. And they're working all the time because they can never let it go. Yeah. That's tough, man. That's tough. I would have done that. I would have, I would have changed that two years earlier if I would have known, you know, but I didn't, I didn't have any mentors. I didn't take any advice from anybody. I was like, I'm going to do it. I'm going to figure it out. Yeah. And I guess, you know, yeah, sometimes it took a little while, but it worked. Yeah. Sometimes the, you have to humble that ego and be like, okay, the, those people who have come before me, who've done it, what it is. Help me out a little bit, but that's good. You're figuring it out, man. That's you have no choice, right? Yeah, no choice. No choice That's good. So tell me this man. I think um You know being that you have 20 trucks now and there's so much going on What do you think is the reason that you guys grew so fast? Do you think it was? um, you know learning how to delegate or are there is there something else that you find that That made a difference because I feel like every year you guys are just like More and more everywhere like y'all have what a location scott now. Yeah, I have a that's where my that's where my main location Is I moved it away from my house, which is the best thing I could have done That was another reason for growing is you have to have separation I would wake up every morning and at the time I only had, I was running 10 trucks out of my house. Okay. I wake up every morning and I didn't mind it, right? I love all my guys, but it was draining because I, I never had an off switch. Yeah. When I'd go to bed, trucks were leaving. When I'd wake up, trucks were already at my house. Oh, man. Um, so, uh, it was never off and the dogs would bark and, uh, you couldn't walk outside, uh, Uh, and pee in the yard, you know, it's funny, like everybody was always at your house. So having a separation allowed me to have time to be like, now we can grow. I was holding myself back being at my house. I was, I was at my house a long time, uh, up until two years ago. This December will be two years. I bought really like a center where like a hub more, more 10 trucks to 20 trucks in two years. Yeah. Um, yeah. Could you imagine 20 trucks pulling up to your house every day to get parts and everything they need for the day? And I had everything over there. Like I built a nice shop. Um, I had a little office, all the ladies worked out. I had two ladies at the time working out of the office, but we had to, we had to move. Dude, that's crazy. That's crazy. So I would say, um, what, what helped the growth so much was, um, delegating, delegating things for sure. For an, um, Social media presence is another big factor, um, building a personal brand. I've said this a couple of times in different videos I've done for like my promotional stuff is that people buy from people. Um, oftentimes they could care less what product they're getting as long as they know. Somebody is as long as they know the person putting in the product is going to treat them right. So, you know, I could, I could sell the lowest brand air conditioning equipment, or I could sell the highest one, which most people think is trained because train does the best marketing and is, it doesn't matter because Seth Chapman selling it or Kenley Broussard. There's trust there. It's not Chapman's AC. Um, and if it is, they know who's behind Chapman's AC. They have to know who's putting it in. Yeah, no, I agree with that, man. I think, uh, especially, um, Like I, one thing that I can, I really appreciate about you guys and I'll get back to exactly what you were just talking about is one is how quick you guys have been. Yeah. Um, because they, we went through a time where it wasn't, it wasn't me. It was my mom where she had, she built a house on her house. It's like three or four years old now. Right. Yeah. Uh, just north of Abbeville and another AC company put in the AC system for it. Right. Um, and. Two, I think it was like two years later, the AC just went out all of a sudden in the middle of June, right? And yeah in South Louisiana for those who don't live here who listen in South Louisiana in the middle of June It is hot. Okay, like hottest month. Yeah, it's brutal So, um, us not having AC or my mom, my mom, who's in her mid sixties, not having AC is like not an option. Right. So she calls and they're like, okay, well, we'll be there tomorrow afternoon. This is at like three o'clock in the afternoon. Then she's like, I'll be there. They'll, they'll be there tomorrow afternoon. So she had to leave her home, go sleep at my brother's house. Um, Stay there all day the next day before they showed up at like five o'clock the next Afternoon, and then she had to cool her house down which probably took An hour or two, you know, of running an AC for it to cool down to what it needs to be, you know? And I'm like, man, that makes no sense, especially for like people who don't have an option, like their AC broke or something's wrong and they can't go somewhere or they can't afford to go to a hotel room for one or two nights before the AC company gets to them. So, um, I was like, man, that's just so inefficient. And then ours goes out like a couple of days later and my wife's nine months pregnant. I'm at a golf tournament with, um, some clients of mine out in Jennings and it's like seven o'clock in the afternoon. And I call you guys and I'm like, Hey, listen, I'm desperate. My wife is so pregnant and it's hot. Y'all have to go fix it. And y'all were like, yeah, no problem. Uh, so we hang up. One of you guys calls me and he's like, Hey, Mr. Brandt, I'll be there in 30 minutes. So I think within 45 minutes to an hour, Um, I was calling. They were like, Hey, everything's good. AC is back on, you know, and by that time, not much had the temperature hadn't changed much. Right. But I was like, Oh, man, thank you so much. But. It's been like that every time that i've called you guys it's like hey, mr Brandt will be there in 20 30 minutes or whatever, you know, and um, I feel like that sense of urgency Yeah is really helpful Especially when it's hot outside, you know Um, I think that's something that I have found as a consumer that you guys have done Differently is that there's a sense of urgency almost like Almost like the oil field, you know, like, you know, when, when you work in the oil field, everything has to be done yesterday and wait, hurry, hurry up and wait. That's right. So that's something I found that you guys have been really good at is, um, getting places really quick. Um, and that's I can speak, I can attest to it for sure. That's and you know, that's a good point that I missed earlier. I'm so glad you said that the that's really what what I base I base our service department off of so for instance, uh, if we wouldn't have answered that call it would have been like, yeah, man We can get to you like tomorrow at three We probably wouldn't be having this podcast right now Because you would have found another company that could have gotten to you right there and there are some that could get to you Right there and I built relationships on look i'm going to be there as soon as I can and as soon as we can Sometimes it's 30 minutes. Sometimes it's two hours. It all depends Um, but what I found in south, louisiana is totally different from other places around the world around the united states is Um, you'll, you'll have your loyal customers, but if you're trying to get a new customer and you don't treat them as, uh, as if they were a customer already, and you say, yeah, I'll get to you as soon as I finish up these other people, they're going to call somebody else. There's, there's 55 companies in Lafayette. They're going to call one of them and somebody's going to go and I want. Every customer and I think that's why we've grown I I say yes, and oftentimes I don't know how we're gonna do it Um, but it very seldomly bites me in the ass. I'll say yes, and we'll get there Yeah, um, I had a friend of mine, uh, one of my best friends matter of fact Um, he was doing a remodel on his house And they needed to upgrade their ac and um he called This was probably in 20 22 Maybe 2023. I'll say 2022. He called, uh, four, um, AC and heat companies to come quote a new system. And none of them showed up. Unbelievable. I'm like, I'm like, can you imagine like, Hey, here's this work? I have a new system, right? Here's this easy work I have for you. All you have to do is show up and, and you'll essentially have the work. And that's customer retention. I know. You put a new system in, but you guys showed up. Cause I told him I was like, bro, I'm telling you. Call Chapman's and he called y'all. Y'all showed up and I'm pretty sure y'all put in this system. I'm pretty sure y'all did. Oh, that's awesome. Yeah. And he told, he told me that, um, the reason that sticks out is because another guy that he was talking to, um, had the same experience because, uh, I don't know if people are just having a hard time finding texts, which is kind of like everybody, you know, that's a good subject. We can catch on later. Yeah, I think, I think that's a tough thing because the oil field, we're seeing that right now, right? It's so hard to find skilled labor, but he, he knew another guy and that guy needed a system for his shop, uh, for, uh, a big shop that the guy had. Right. And he said the same thing. He called three or four companies and none of them went out and one of them finally showed up. I can't remember if it was y'all or not. Um, but the guy told my buddy, he was like, dude, yeah. I spent 120, 000 on a new system. And how easy is that to answer the phone? You just answer the phone and show up. That's all they had to do is show up. But they just wouldn't do it. And I think that's just part of, um, it might just be part of, you know, people being, um, Maybe not wanting to grow that much. Like some companies get comfortable where they're at and that's okay. But then there's, there's guys like you were there like, no, I want it all. Yeah. I want every customer. And if, if you're, if you're, if you have a customer that doesn't answer the phone and they call us, I'm going to take them to service and service properly. Every customer we possibly can. Yeah. I don't, I don't blame you, dude. Especially at what? 32. You said, yeah, 32 years old, man, so much room to grow. Like so much. Uh, I've said it before, but in the next. Five years. I want, I want to at least double my trucks, which would be 40, which would put me as, as close to the biggest air conditioning company. There's still, there's still one that's been open a really long time. I'm not going to name drop on here, but they're a wonderful company. Yeah. Um, they've been open 75 years. Yeah. I have a feeling. I think I know what you're talking about. Twice my size. So, um, the air, you know, I hope they take it as a compliment. They know who I'm talking about. If they hear it, that I strive to be as big and, and service as many people as they do. Yeah. Um, yeah, but I mean, like you said, they've been open 75 years. It's the second time you've been, how old are you guys? Give yourself a little grace. You're halfway there, but that's crazy, man. But it's good that, that, that you're so young and that you've had so much success so early, that's going to allow you that. Um, you still have that, that go getter attitude, you know, cause some, some guys. Um, as they get through their career, you're, I mean, you know, this, the more people you employ, typically the more headache you're going to have. Right. Yeah. And some people are just like, man, I'm 50. Um, you know, maybe five years away from retirement if they've been successful. Yeah. And they're kind of like, I want to. I want to pull the reins back. So maybe I give some of my operations people a little bit more responsibility, you know, trust them a little more and not can take a step back and let them kind of run things, you know, but then when that happens, how do you grow? You know, you can't, so I think to be involved. That's right. I would believe that. Yeah. Uh, there's, you know, there are people who are so, so much better at. Processes and delegation than I am and I watch I watch different things They do some people can just buy a company start it out put their team on it and it grows Uh, i'm not at that stage yet. I like being involved in a lot of operations I'm not involved in day to day operations, but the big stuff the important stuff To the non important stuff. I like being involved here and there. Um, and What I've noticed over the years is when I pull myself out a little bit to breathe, um, the company will, will maintain, it'll, it'll do fine. It'll grow at a very slow pace, but if I pull myself back in and come up with a new idea, it skyrockets and then it plateaus again. Um, so. Until I make a process that can clone me, I'd like to be involved in it. Yeah, that's going to be tough to do. It is, it is. That ownership, um, skin in the game. Yeah, yeah, yeah. It's, that's hard to replicate. Yeah. You know, unless you find somebody else that you're like, hey, here's whatever percent. That's right. But they just bring so much tremendous value to you that it's worth it. Like, you know, but. That's hard to, it's a hard thing to replicate, but aren't y'all doing stuff? Like, uh, I think I saw a picture, maybe y'all bought like a barge boat or something and y'all are starting to do systems, a shallow water inland, maybe. That's right. Yeah. Inland Mars, shallow water, oilfield contracts, uh, stuff that you don't have to, um, that I can literally dock my boat anywhere around here and go drive to it. No, no Gulf of Mexico, deep water stuff. Yeah. Yeah. Um, I do want to do that, but that's another story. Yeah. I'm like, well, that's some growth. I see the markets. Yeah. Yeah. I bought a, I bought a deck boat, a cabin deck boat. We can put all of our units on another toy. Yeah, yeah, no, really. It's kind of, it's kind of a dual purpose. Right. Um, cause I have some land out in a place called, uh, Shinya TIG. And uh, we load up our folders and stuff take it take it over there But the justification was we also take care of some hunting camps that you can only get to by boat So I can throw units equipment dollies, whatever we need and bring it out there Uh and service them and that's some high dollar cams, bro our camp. So we're off of white lake, right? Yeah, and our camp you can only get to by boat, but we got window units, dude A lot of them do A lot of them do. God, I couldn't imagine a camp that you can only drive to that has like a central unit or something like that. Bro, that's some big camps. We take care of a very prestigious hunting camp that has eight central units on it. No way. And it's out in the marsh. Um, it's, it's been, it's been around for decades. Um, and, We we take care of that dude, that's huge. It was enormous. Yeah that We'll talk offline about what that one is. I think I have an idea, but that's crazy. Yeah, that's real cool Very very important people have gone to it. Uh, it's just a big big old hunting camp. Yeah, and it's large man Eight units that's crazy dude, but that's good I mean to have the boat to be able to go there and service them like imagine how small their um Their list of ac companies are to come service that you know only one now Yeah, they used to have to shuttle the the The previous ac companies they go to the dock load them up bring them back Oh, I need another part go back again, and it's a 45 minute boat ride each way Oh, man, so I can bring a whole bunch of stuff with me and we fix multiple units while we're there. Yeah Oh, man, I there's nothing worse than shuttling back and forth We do with our friends. Yeah when they when they come to the dock We're like, all right, we'll meet you at the dock, you know Yeah, so they come to the dock and we got to come from our camp go pick them up and we run gator tails Oh, yeah, a few mud boats, you know But Yeah, but it's like, I mean, our boat ride, it's not long. It's my gator tail is probably 12 minutes if I'm booking it, you know, me and one or two people. But, um, it's just the fact of having to like, you go there and then you gotta, you load all this stuff up and then you go back to the camp and. Back in the day, my poor grandfather, bruh, as he got older, he wouldn't remember he'd forget a shotgun at the landing. So we'd like drive all the way back to the land and go get the shotgun, come back. And then he would always leave his truck keys at the camp. So we'd get back to the landing, go back to the camp, go get his truck. Well, that's shuttling back and forth a lot, man. But. A 45 minute ride one way. That's a hike, man. That's a big hike. Um, but no, that's cool, man. It's really good to hear the, the backstory about Chapman's, you know, like I, I guarantee you, everybody who listens to this is going to be like, I know exactly those old school camo trucks. I've seen them, you know, sometimes you just don't like pay attention as much, but you see them, you know, so I know they're going to be like, Oh yeah, I know exactly who that is. But it's good to know the story, man. I You need to take that, um, that post that you made that Facebook post, the first one, you need to put that on like a huge, like, um, like a frame, like a big canvas and put that in the office somewhere and be like, this, this right here is what started it all, you know, but, um, but man, Outside of the business side on the, on the personal side, I think you have a really unique story and, uh, I'm, I'm excited to, for people to hear, you know, um, let's talk about, um, you know, your, your first, uh, wife Delaney. Yeah. So yeah, whenever, um, so where did you guys meet? How long were y'all dating before y'all ended up getting married? So cool story. Uh, like, like, like I mentioned, we moved to Maurice and none of this would have been possible without Hurricane Rita, right? I would have lived in S the rest of my life, probably never had a girlfriend because we were so secluded. Right, so move to, move to Maurice, um, 2000, I don't know, 2006, I guess we were over there. Uh, a couple years go by, um, I'm going to remain Catholic, right, but I'm in Maurice, so I'm around the North American crowd, I'm meeting, I'm sorry to hear that, I'm meeting North American friends, you know, the big, the big VC North American feud, yeah, yeah. And then, um, one of one of my neighbors, um, neighbor girl that I was friends with, uh, her best friend was Delaney. So they would walk right. And they would, they had a little walking path and my dad lived on the corner. Obviously they'll do my dad. I was, I was 16. Uh, so they'd walk and, um, uh, I just, you know, I was mowing grass one day and I, I saw him, I knew her friend. So we talked and whatever, talked a little bit. This was back in my space days. So any young people listening don't know what my space is. Um, you judged your friends with your top eight. No, that's a fact. And whatever music you had playing for sure on the top eight, then it went to like top 12 cause everybody was getting all pissed. So back in the, my space days, you know, it was those, you didn't have Snapchat. You didn't say add me on snap. You'd say, Hey, uh, go have me on my space, whatever. So, um, You become mutual friends, you talk for a little while. Um, and her name was Delaney. And so 2000, 2009, 2010, I was, uh, I was a, a junior in high school. Me and Delaney both Junior, she went to North May and I went to vc. Uh, we became friends, uh, and we started dating. Mm-Hmm, And like, um, lemme see, January, February, March, March, 2010. Um, and. That was it. It was like, okay, well I'm, I'm gonna marry this person. This, this works. I have no idea why, but I'm gonna marry you for sure. So, um, we, you know, we started dating, um, we were together, we got married, um, May 30th, 2015. Okay. So we had together five years before we got married. But before that, uh, we, she graduated high school. We both graduated high school. She starts in college. She, she's getting, um. Short of breath really she's very fit. We were both in track like We're in good shape. We were like in our prime shape. She started getting out of breath. It was very odd, you know so she had asthma when she was a kid and she um She go to the doctor. Oh, yeah asthma's coming back. Whatever. Okay, cool You know do some little breathing treatments. Well, like before she turned I think i'm trying to remember She either had she had her 19th birthday in the hospital and that's why i'm kind of basing the timeline off of So she had gotten she'd gotten. Um You Real sick like short of breath. So hey, let's go to the hospital. So we go to the hospital. Uh, We weren't living together yet. I was still living at home. I was I was 18. I still live with my dad She was living with her mom um We spent every single day together. So, you know, I knew everything that was going on. She was in college. I was in trade school So she was getting short of breath. Anyway, go to the hospital Doctor's like your your lungs Are functioning in like 40 right now and they were like, Okay, why? So they do the test, you know, is it cancer? It's not cancer. Uh, and it's a it's a hard diagnosis, right? There's so many things to go through So she was declining in the hospital, um rapidly So long story short she has um lupus they find out. Hey, you have lupus it comes back Well lupus is very manageable many many many people live with lupus. So lupus is what lupus is a is an autoimmune disease Uh, it attacks It can attack you in many different ways. It can give you, uh, rashes from the sun. They call them butterfly rashes. Uh, it can attack your internal organs and it can attack your external appearance, your palate. So many things it can attack. Um, so anyway, they diagnosed it with lupus. Well, the lupus attacked her internal organs, uh, and it caused a pulmonary hypertension, which is, uh, look, I'm not a doctor. It's funny. My wife is actually a registered nurse. It's hilarious. My wife's a nurse practitioner, so we got to be careful. We got to get it right. So, so pulmonary hypertension, uh, it's, it's basically restricted arteries between the heart and the lungs in that general area. It's, it's pulmonary high blood pressure is essentially of heart. So, um, Um, the heart wasn't pumping the blood efficiently to the lungs and vice versa. So they were like, no problem. We can get under control. This is what it caused. Hey, it's going to be fine. So they pumped her up full of steroids. You know, the whole nine, she has her, she spends her, uh, her 19th birthday in the hospital. I spent my 19th birthday in there with her and then she turned three days later, turned 19. So it was a lot at the time to take in. Uh, but anyway, they got her on the medicine. She was good. She was fine. Medicine's a new part of her life. She comes back. She's healthy for the most part. We're doing our daily activities um Couple years we get married a couple years ago, but she finishes college This sets her back a semester because she was she spent like two weeks at the hospital, right? Wow, and I'm Progressing this timeline quick. She was very sick. Yeah, like she was in the hospital close to dying And but boom snapped out of it. They found the right medicine for her Lupus. Boom. She came back like me and you were talking right now. No problem. So get outta the hospital, finishes college a semester late. She was a CPA, she goes, uh, she was becoming a CPA, um, she got her, uh, accounting degree. Mm-Hmm. And we move in together right away. Uh, I, uh, 2000, I graduated high school 2011. I bought my first house in 2012. I was in all field, so it was easy. Right. Yeah. Like I said, made a bunch of money. Spent it all. So I had a, had a house node, bought a house. We moved in together. It was great. Proposed got married, uh, 2015, May 30th. Um, 2016, um, early 2016. Um, no, maybe the end of 2015, she kind of, her health kind of started declining a little bit, but it was like, Oh, we got to adjust the medicine. You're good. So no problem. They adjust the medicine. Uh, I'm still working offshore. So. Uh, I get laid off, like I mentioned earlier, start my business March, 2016. Um, very glad I can be home now because I can spend time with my wife. I've been gone for pretty much the whole time we've been together of our married life. Um, around 2017 ish, early 2017. Right after I started Chapman's in early 2016, I get about a good year of it. Her health really starts declining. They try to switch the medicine. It doesn't work. They say, hey, look, we have to put you a PICC line. Your wife's gonna know exactly what I'm talking about. Yeah. PICC line goes in your arm. Um, and she has to, her new day of daily life is carrying around this big cassette pump. It's about the size of a, uh, Imagine like, like, like a game boy times five, right? Okay. Cassette pump. And it has a medicine cartridge and it pumped medicine to her heart all day. She wore it in a belly band and you couldn't see it. Only thing you could see is a little line going on. So our new, our new daily life was cleaning this line. Uh, and look, it was fine for like six, seven months back to normal. She was getting medicine directly to her heart. It was supposed to be temporary. Hey, look, it's going to be temporary. You'll get your heart back, right? Um, we're going to visit other. Uh, opportunities after well, it didn't work. So they said, Hey, look, we have to put you a central line now. Um, which is another cassette, another tube in her chest. It ran up in her artery in her neck and it went directly to her heart. So now she has two cassettes she's wearing in this belly band. This is like probably four pounds of, your quality of life is just, is just, She, you couldn't tell it affected her whatsoever, but it sucked for her. We would change the pumps. We'd clean her port sites every day. So that's a lot for a 23 year old, right? Husband and a wife, um, it limited a lot of stuff we can do. She couldn't get them wet. She couldn't take showers. She had to bathe. It was hard, but it was daily life and I was like, Hey, look, this is part of it. We're going to do it. It's part of it. So we did it. We did it. Look, we, we go to Disney. She was a Disney fanatic. She loved Disney, which is funny because I introduced my now wife Darian to Disney and I'm like, what did I do? I thought I was out of now. It's on. Now it's on. We go six times a year. She's a Disney planner. Um, that's funny. So, um, the pumps were working. Um, they were working great and we were going, we had to, um, we had to, um, What's the word I'm looking for? We had to look into lung transplant. She needed, she needed new lungs and that was going to fix the problem. A full lung transplant, which is scary for anybody listening. That's a big deal. It's a huge deal. Um, so we went through the classes for lung transplant, um, did everything and they were like, all right, well, you know, whenever there's a donor, we're going to do it. That's going to fix you. You can get rid of these pumps, et cetera, et cetera. It's going to be great. So, Thankfully I have Chapman's AC, right? I'm able to not have to work. I have a couple of guys that work for me. Hey, look guys, thank y'all so much. Uh, one of my best friends now, um, worked for me at the time. He doesn't work for me anymore. He, uh, he's, he went to take over his dad's company kind of in the same field. Anyway, he worked for me, allowed me to do these things, be with her. Um, what a blessing though. Yeah, definitely. And I go to the hospital, we go to all her visits. She had to go to new Orleans, right? So long story short, The pumps were not working anymore her She was too sick for a lung transplant. We we didn't have kids early on because Uh, we she could get pregnant, but she they were worried about her bearing child labor the stress on the heart You know so much on a woman bearing child So the pregnancy, the, um, the birth and everything. So we were like, you know what, we'll revisit it after the lung transplant. So we didn't have kids. We thought about adoption a couple of times, but you know, she was real sick. So we, we didn't, and it was so much better off. I love my, my, my daughter now, but there's no way I could have done that at the same time. Oh, dude. So God's timing. I was about to say, I think about what we went through with just whenever we first had Jackson, like just trying to put, put myself in your position a little bit, like. The, the transition from going no kids to one kid was, was, it might've, well, have been 50 dude. I was so difficult for us and I cannot imagine. Having to manage, like learn to manage a child and then have to work, like just from a guy's perspective, how to worry about my wife and how sick she was. And then, you know, um, her being limited and being able to do what she can because at that point it sounds like she was just trying to survive, you know? Oh man. And we downplayed it a lot. You know, it shocked a lot of people whenever the 90 passed because we were, we were pretty private up until the end before she died. And, um Then we kind of, hey, look, you know, ask him for prayers. She's, she's actually really sick. We downplayed it because he was like, you know, it was nobody else's burden, but ours, right? We're going to, we're going to fix it. We were pretty private people. Um, so long story short, um, five days before she passed away on November 26, 2018, the doctor was like, hey, look, it's not looking good. And I made him be blunt with me. I was like, Hey, how much time do you think theoretically she has? Somebody would, would, um, pulmonary hypertension has a lifespan of about 35 years without treatment. She was 26. So we, we had prepared ourselves and it's, you know, it's easy to talk about now. It used to be hard to talk about. We prepared ourselves over the years of, of her being sick. Hey, look, you don't make 35 might be it. So that's hard. It's a hard pill to swallow. And we knew that before we got married. Um, So anyway, november 26 2018 she passed away, um, totally totally um Give me a second. Yeah Take what you need Uh, that was difficult, but she prepared me She prepared me for this so um It worked out Yeah, I remember whenever y'all had, um, When y'all had somebody had posted something or it might have even been you it was like a um It was either like a tribute to her or kind of just letting everybody know that she had passed and yeah I remember when I I didn't even know y'all like I knew like of you know Of you just because of the social media presence and everything, you know, but I didn't really know y'all and I remember like For whatever reason that just stuck out to me that I was just like impacted me. I was like, bro like I can't I just felt like I felt like I knew you a little bit Just because I was just like, so sad for you, you know, cause I was like, man, it's like unbelievable, you know, somebody young that young, it struck a lot of people. Yeah. And when people are so young and they pass away, it's like, it's, it's such a, um, it's such a sad thing. Cause you're just like, man, that's they, if I feel like they just missed out on so like what could have been, what would have been so much, you know, and, um, and especially like, I really felt for you because, um, He said that would have been in 2018, 2018. Yeah. So me and Lindsay were together then. And, um, I'm just like, I couldn't have imagined like losing my wife and how hard that would have been, especially after everything y'all had been through, you know, and like, you, you're like, you're her ride, obviously her ride or die, man, you were right there with her the whole time we were doing it. She pushed me for Chapman's. She was like, Hey, look, you know, when I, whenever I quit my, it's so funny, we'll backtrack. I, uh, I told her, uh, I was like, I was home for a while and I was like, Hey, uh, Domani, we're broke. Uh, we have no money, no money. And look, so we were paying for her medical bills and her expenses and like the medicine she was taking, what she would take was like 2, 500 a month. Oh, insurance insurance would cover like 20, 000 of it. Oh, no. I have to pay 2, 500, which is a lot of money. Dude. That would be the biggest bill Lindsay and I have by far along with house notes My house note was 500 a month. I'll never forget it. And uh, I still have the house. So she was like I mean, yeah, just just do it. I was like, I guess I mean Okay, it might not work like you can use my car. Yeah, you take my car So when people ask me why do I think it worked and it's because I had I literally had no choice It had to work. I had no choice No plan B. No plan C. All what was was a plan A and I was gonna do it. And I was like, my worst case is I just go back to the oil field. Mm hmm. And so, I didn't want to though. Yeah, I was gonna make it work. So, Yeah, man, that's pretty much it. She pushed me. She was the reason, um, a good, a good woman. And which is the same reason I'm still Successful today is because I have a wonderful wife right now who never tells me no, I don't think that's a good idea She's like hey, I trust you just It was beautiful to hear you speak about Delaney man, I think that's the full story front to back. Yeah, I feel like people Like again, I didn't know y'all, but I feel like you can, sometimes you can look at people and you can just tell, dude, that's a good, that's a good person. And I feel like you can look at pictures of her and just be like, man, there, that was a good woman. Oh yeah. Yeah. She was, she was wonderful. She was happy all the time. I could not have been in good spirits being that sick. I would have been like, well, I'm just going to go live in a camp in the woods somewhere. You know, but she had, she had so much to live for and she fought until the very, very, very end. Yeah. Yeah. And yeah, I mean, it was a very, very good woman and she was the reason Chapman's existed because I was like, Hey, do you think I should do this? She was like, yeah, go ahead. That's beautiful, man. That's beautiful. A lot of guys think, um, um, that, that they are the ones who, um, you know, who are the success, like are the big success. But a lot of time what, what really successful men don't understand is that it's typically the woman who's behind them. Who's really the reason that they're such a big, big success, you know? And, and a lot of times Good women help are 90 percent of what makes a man great, you know, so I think, uh, it's, it sounds like in this case, man, that she was the one who really believed in you, which allowed you to have the confidence to go forward. And that's a beautiful thing, man. I think he honored her well telling her story. It was a, it was wonderful. So, uh, Now, you know, you're remarried remarried remarried with and now you're dead. I am. Yeah, so we're months, bro What is that like a little girl a little girl? Yeah, what is that like lily grace lily grace, man? It's the best day ever and it's funny where she got her name, right because whenever you're married You and your wife will always talk about names. So, Lily is the only girl name that me and Delaney had picked out. Really? And, Lily was Darian's girl name since she was a little girl that wanted a girl named Lily. Oh, you're giving me the chills, dude. No way. Yep. So, we were like, Oh, we have to name her Lily. You know, we, we had multiple boy names picked out, but Lily was the one. How crazy is that? Yeah, it's, it's, man, it's wonderful. And, and I, I, to touch on, uh, Darian, I met, um, Darian early on after, after Delaney had passed. Me and, um, Darian's gonna laugh at this. We're four years apart. She, it's like three years, six months, and whatever days, but I always, I'm always like, yeah, we're four years apart. So, I didn't know her, right? She was a, a whole, you know, Four classes under me. She went to Kaplan. I just never heard of her in my life. A Kaplan girl. She's a Kaplan, she's a full blown Kaplan. They're feisty, dude. Them farm girls are feisty. So, um, that was interesting because like, usually you, She had never even heard of me. And I look, I'm not, I'm not saying to have a big ego, but I was like, you never heard of me. What do you mean? You never heard of me big enough. If you haven't heard of me, you know, I was, I had like 40, 000 followers on Instagram and all her friends follow me, but she had never heard of me. I was like, okay, whatever. So, uh, she's just playing hard to get. That's what it was. I had some, after the lady had passed away in November, this is around like January, uh, of 2020. Uh, 2019. I had some friends invite me over. They're like, hey, come get out the house. Come hang out with us. Uh, and I wasn't like being a recluse, but I just wasn't doing much, you know Um, I just lost my wife. I was like, I don't want to do nothing So anyway, it takes a little time, you know to especially your wife. I can only imagine so I was like Well, I I realized I had to go do something. So they were like look we're cooking We're cooking at the at the shed come over. So I went to eat whatever. Um, I had my little dog Bandit. That was me and Delaney's dog. Um, we still have him. He's about to turn 10. Oh, we got him as a puppy. So he's a multi, he's a multi pool. Multi pool. Yeah. Yeah. He's sweet. That's funny. So I brought bandit with me and Darian was at this, was at this function. Never, never knew her. Never. So she was there with some friends and we talked a little bit. I remember she held bandit. Um, that was it. Nothing, nothing ever came about it until a couple months later. Um, I think I added her on Facebook. I was like, Hey, that's the girl. I was at the. So she was holding it. I don't know on Facebook. She still didn't know anything about me. She added me on Instagram, did the whole stalking thing. And she was like, Oh, he got a business. He's just like everyone else. So those, those, um, entrepreneurs that it's not really a business. It's probably his dad's and look, not downgrading anybody that gets a business from their parents. I'm just, I built it. So they did some digging. She was like, Oh wow. He has a business. Okay. So we started talking a little bit. And a cute dog. And a cute dog, And when I say I had a business, I, it was, it was me and two guys. It was, it was like barely a business, you know? I was two years in there wasn't really a whole lot going on. Y'all were doing it though. Y'all were doing it? We were doing it. I had no camo trucks yet. They were white. I had like three, no, I had two trucks. Um, it was good. So we became friends, started, uh, hanging out, talking. Um, she was. I can tell. I don't know if I would have been able to do what Darian did. Right. I'm, I'm going to say I was sorta in the public's eye. I just lost my wife, I'm grieving. And she as a young woman, 21 years old to take on that amount of load or stress from somebody like me, I don't know how she did it. Um, and still so compassionate about what she My first wife remembers her birth dates remembers remembers everything hand picked by Delaney without a doubt Yeah, so that's that takes us. I think that takes a really special moment to still honor Your late wife. Oh, it absolutely remembers everything too. Like I don't remember half of them. She remembers it all and I was like look, I'm a I'm 26. Uh, I'm not, I'm not trying to be a 45 year old dad. I was like, we're going to do this. If we're going to do it. Yeah. So we dated for like a couple of years and, uh, she's going to, she's going to be mad at me because I can't remember the exact days. Anyway, we did it a couple of years and I was like, you know what? I proposed to her, uh, hunting, actually in Arkansas, my favorite place. And we got married in nine months and had our little girl, uh, Two years, two years later. No way. Yeah, dude. What, what a couple of years, man. I mean, you're back on it. It's only been, it's only been eight total since I started the business. And so I feel like some of the older people that are hanging around, they're like, Seth, you've lived a lifetime, you know, people don't experience this type of stuff until they're in there. 70s or 80s losing a spouse or starting a business or whatever it is, you know, yeah, I think whenever um, Someone like you goes through that kind of stuff that the kind of heartache that you've been through Yeah, I think um, it forces you through this maturation process, right where you um, You start to look at life More in more of a wise way, you know, not not as foolish, you know, you you you get mature really fast You know, like we have we have lost in my family, you know, um, My grandparents died during Hurricane Gustav. Man, I remember that so well, too. Bruh, it was That was, that was Everybody was distraught. It was, it was crazy, man. I was up in Shreveport with some friends playing golf, you know, like, cause it wasn't bad up there, you know, but, Um, My grandfather was my best friend. He's the one who taught me how to hunt, how to fish, you know, Um, What was his nickname? Uh, Dickey. Dickey. That's it. Richard Broussard was his name. They called him Dickey. He was a big hunter. He was a huge hunter, dude. Like, um, sometimes, he was a big hunter, but more than anything, I think he wanted to make sure I always got enough rest and I would get so pissed at him because we'd be going hunting in the morning and he'd be like, all right, but, you know, I don't know. I just, I didn't want to wake you up and I'm like, dude, I'm ready to go. I'm like nine. I'm like, let's go. Let's go, you know, but yeah, he was a big duck hunter and he was the, he was one of my best friends, man. And, um, he was that male role model in my life to show me, um, what it was like to be a man, you know? And, um, I could go over to their house at nine o'clock at night and he would make me food if I was hungry, you know, like he, he just, he was just good, man. He was a good man and really good to us. And I remember that was my first big loss, you know, and I felt like I'd lost a part of me, you know? And it was. I remember dealing with it was so difficult. It was unexpected. Yeah. It was so unexpected. It's tragic, you know? Yeah. It was really tough, man. Like, uh, I dropped out of college for that semester. I dropped all my classes just cause I couldn't get up in the morning. I probably went through some kind of depression or something. I just didn't know, you know, but, um, uh, I had a really hard time. I wasn't showing up to work, you know, like I just had a really hard time dealing with some things, but, um, that, that loss forced me to, you know, Into looking at life a lot differently, where I was like, Oh man, it's not just, um, I don't have to not worry about things anymore. Like now I'm 22, 23 around that time, maybe 21, something like that. But, Um, I had to start learning like these things happen now, you know, and, uh, you having to go through that at such a young age, man, I feel like it, I think it, I think it absolutely changes people. You know, I don't think you, I don't think you go through stuff like that and you come out on the other end of the table person. I think, I think you're kind of like, Whoa. That happens and I'm only what, well, how old were you when she passed? I was 26. 26. Yeah. 26 and your wife, I mean. Yeah, it was, and that's what affected the community so bad. I mean, I sincerely think it, it deeply affected so many people because they were just like, I cannot believe it because mainly we didn't show how sick she was. Right. It's not like she had cancer, go fund me, this, that and the other and we, and we talk about it for so long. It was like, Hey. My wife's alive. My wife passed away. All of a sudden. In effect, it's like almost like a, like a car accident, right? Yeah. It affects so many people. Yeah, man. That's crazy. So let's talk about Darren a little bit, man. So y'all got married, y'all, y'all had kids. It, so she's four months old now. Yeah, that's awesome, man. I saw that. Um, whenever you say you proposed to her while y'all were hunting, there's a video somewhere that I had seen and, um, you tell the story of what, what the video was like. I don't want to, I don't want to. So it was, it was wonderful. Uh, we were at my buddy's. Uh, and my buddy has a big lodge, uh, in Lake Village, Arkansas, shout out Iron Wolf Outfitters. One of my good friends, Seth Carver, same first name, uh, I said, Hey Seth, uh, we, we go hunt there every year. And I said, this next year I'm bringing my dad, I'll bring a couple of friends, et cetera. Uh, and I said, I'm going to propose to Darian out there. Once we get like, and we had to kill ducks, right? We killed like 48 or 50 ducks. It was a good hunt. It was a good hunt. It was cold. Darren was shivering. She was freezing and we were all in layout blinds. So we got up And we were taking the pictures like I put the I put the the strap around her neck the typical louisiana style Full of you know mallards. It was beautiful ducks. It was picture perfect. It was cold I don't think it was it was sleeting, but it was very close Yeah, I had real cold. I had people with the with the phones out like we're taking duck pictures and uh pulled the ring out You know, I proposed to her and she couldn't she freaked out She loved it. So she a big she's a big hunter and so she she was she was always very interested in hunting You Before we got together, but she wasn't taking two too much like her dad would take her every so often Um, she would go hunting with a couple friends, but I'm a water fowler that I, I live and breathe waterfowl and I, I can relate you know, I get it. You know, it's the same. So I love air conditioning. I love waterfowl more So, uh, I turned her onto it. And she is, she is a woman in water fowl. She goes on hunts by herself with girls like big girl hunts. She loves it. It's a part of her just like it is me. Yeah, so she so she loves to duck hunt Yeah, and you're a and so do you and then y'all were able to kind of meet in that through a proposal and everything That's really cool, man. Y'all able to share that that that passion together and then now y'all are joining them, you know That's right. We went on our So we went on our honeymoon Whatever and then our first anniversary we went hunting in Canada. Oh cool our second anniversary We went back hunting in Canada and just so happens our anniversary is October 16th So the, uh, Canada's end of their season is that weekend.'cause their season ends way earlier before ours begin. Yeah, it freezes up. Yeah. Yeah. So our last two is, uh, actually it'll be our third anniversary in this October 16th. This, you know, in 12 days. It's my son's birthday. Oh, wow. So, so wait, it's gonna be y'all Third anniversary. Third anniversary, yeah. Okay. He's gonna be four. I was like, man, he was born on y'all's, uh, y'all's, y'all's wedding day. Yeah. Um, so Darren's wonderful, uh, and I'll touch back on that Disney thing. Darren had never been to Disney ever in her whole life. I've been to Disney 50 times with Delaney, so I was pretty, I thought I was pretty versed on Disney. Well, I was like, Hey, we're going to go to Disney. I'm going to take you. Um, I forgot. Honeymoon. Um, no, we just went a random trip. Okay. Um, I was like, I'm going to take you to Disney. I know you've never been. We're going to go and I'm gonna show you everything. We went to Kabul for our honeymoon. Oh God. And so I took her to Disney. She was like, I can't believe I've been missing out on this forever. You know, she was a beach girl. She was a Tennessee girl. They didn't go to Disney. It was like, she's from Tennessee. No, no, no, but vacations. Oh, like summer vacations. They go to the beach or they go to Tennessee. That's it. Uh, the mountains, you know. Um, so, Never Disney World. Never Disney. And then, listen, I took her. And she was like, I cannot believe I've been missing out on this and we've probably gone 15 times. No way the last I don't know three years. Uh, she became a disney planner. She's a disney travel agent. Oh, she's like hard hardcore She is 100 addicted. No way. She plans trips for everybody. Um directly through disney She books your rooms, you know the whole night she sets up your meal plans It's like plug and play. You open up your phone, you look at your app. Oh, I have a meal at this time. And she sets all that up for you. That's cool, man. So she's like, she fell in love. Yeah. So when, when, when we met, she was still in college. Um, so she was going to be a registered nurse. She only had like, I don't know, a semester left or something. Um, I was doing air condition, obviously. So she finished college. Um, she moved in with me, my not much long after, you know, we got married and the whole nine, she worked the whole pandemic. Uh, and then she felt like. A lot, like a lot, your wife can attest to this, how a lot of, um, first responder workers, it burned them out. And they were like, um, it just, it just hurt their taste for the field they were in. And she was, um, bedside, she was med surge and everything. And seeing so many people pass away from COVID, she was like, I can't, I don't want to do this anymore. Um, so she quit and she started working for Chapman's and then she started Disney planning. And, um, One day, I, I bet her, I was like, I bet you can't get your real estate license. And she was like, okay. She got a real estate license. Yep. So, so, so now she's a realtor, Disney planner and works the back end, the Chapman somewhere, every now and That's it. Oh. And now she's mom, you know? Oh, yeah. Now, now she's a full-time mom. Now she's a full-time mom. She stays home with the baby. And, uh, I try and give her breaks as much as possible, um, because that is a job in itself. All the women that have, that are stay at home moms or any mom in general, but staying home with your baby every day is, that is a job. That's a tough job, man. Yeah. Um, me and Lindsay, um, we talk about like, uh, Like when duck season comes around, I, I try to go as many weekends as I can. Like we got to the camp for the weekend with our hunting group. You know, we have a good time, man. But, um, since we had kids, it's been hard for me to like go for the weekend and then be able to come back, you know, so I typically I'll go in the morning, come back, um, go Sunday morning, try to come back for like 11, 12, something like that, you know, um, but. With Lindsay watching the kids, she recently went to new Orleans on a girl's trip, like two or three weeks ago. So I had our 15 month old and are almost four year old by myself. And it was, I love them so much, dude, I love them so much, but they're just 15 months old and four dude. It was so much work. So, uh, when she got back, I was like, I cannot tell you how happy I am to see you. I was like, I don't know how you do this. Just sometimes like. And when I do for work, I'll leave and I'll go to like Houston for two or three days or I'll go to like Midland. It just kind of depends on what's going on. But, um, whenever she leaves, dude, I'm, I have a hard time. Like I'm like, I feel like I'm just not built for that. You know, like little ones like that for multiple days in a row. I'm just not built for it. So those moms who can do it day in and day out, bruh, shout out to y'all. I respect it. Superwoman. I see it. She'll she'll leave for an hour and i'll i'll be with lily and i'm like, oh man You do this all day All she did was cry the whole time i'm exhausted. Yeah Oh, man, that's that's awesome that y'all are getting to experience that man. How has it been? Um, like being a dad. I know y'all are only a couple months in but it's just It changes you, you know, and, and you know, you don't, you can't literally, you can't listen to anybody's advice until you experience it yourself. Like you could have told me that 15 times, but like, Oh yeah, I'm sure it will. No, it changes you. It totally changes. And I'll tell, I'll tell all my young guys, this y'all have no idea until you have children. Um, it just changes you. You, you think about things differently. You, you drive differently. You, everything is different. You're right about that. I don't think I've seen. Yeah, everything is different now. And look, I love my fast vehicles, but I drive so careful with, with Lily. Uh, man, I had a guy, um, whenever I was working at a construction company, uh, just South, uh, in Henry, uh, I used to work at Acadian contractors. Right. Shout out Acadian. I love Acadian. Yeah. They good people do all their work. Oh yeah. That's right. Uh, that's right. Y'all were over there doing some work with the, with the president, the vice president, the owner. Awesome. Awesome people. They are good people, man. Shout out to the resorts. Um, so I was over there one time and Um, one of the inspectors for one of our clients came and he drove up in a a white corvette, right? I don't know what kind it was. It was a I think it was like brand new a 2022 2023 at the time, right? and um I pulled up and I said, man, is that thing fast at all? And he goes, you want, you want to try it? And I said, I said, yeah, let's go ride, you know? And he was like, all right. So I got in and we were driving out, you know, of Acadian's big, long drive, you know, gravel drive, you know, that road to get to Acadian it's, it's, it's. Terrible dude. It's the, it's one of the worst roads in South Louisiana outside of like probably three 35, 35, but, um, so we get, we pull out, dude, we were at a hundred miles an hour, like right. We took the first curve at like 75 or 80. Okay. And then we went like a hundred and then 130 in no time. And I was hitting him. I'm like, bro, I have children. I got children. We're going too fast, dude. It was. Scary how fast that thing was, but. I say that because I was like the only thing I could think of when we were going that fast was my kids and I Was like dude, you gotta slow down. Yeah, i'll walk back don't I don't want anything to do with this anymore So yeah, we I drive differently now. That's a fact. Absolutely. That's a fact. That's fun Oh, yeah, man, so four year old, uh, not a four year old four month old little girl Um lily and uh At this point y'all up, she's probably at least in a good spot where she's like really responding to y'all smiling. Is she giggling yet? Oh yeah, she's giggling. She's um, she's belly laughing. That's my best. Darian's been getting her to belly laugh. It's so funny. She's rolling over, like she's rolling on her side. She's trying so hard to roll over. She sits up well and she's a Velcro baby. We, we ruined her early on. Yeah, she cries we pick her up. Oh, no, so many people are gonna are gonna be like you can't do that But my god, you know, but I love her man When it comes we me and lindsay struggle with that a lot We were trying to figure out like what's the uh, i'ma use for those everybody listening quote unquote, right? Um the right way to do things. That's right. And when we had jackson Um, if he would cry in his crib, Lindsay was a big believer in like, you know, we've got to let him cry it out a little bit, you know, try to get him comfortable. Yeah. And I was like, no, I don't like mice. If he's crying, he's caught. I feel like he's calling out to me and I'm going to go in there and I'm going to see about him. So bright. He'd cry out in the middle of the night. I'd go in there. I'd, I'd tie him a little bit, put him back down. And sometimes it had happened a lot, you know, throughout the night, but I just felt like that was just what we, what he wanted, like, what do we need to do? And I just couldn't stand listening to him cry, you know, and then Marlo came along and I was like, I just need rest. I just need sleep, dude. She'd cry, you know, Lindsay, Lindsay sees about her more like Jackson, when he has nightmares, I get up and I go in, but Marlo, um, you know, I don't, I don't I'll always believe if they were upset, man, especially during the day reason. Yeah. I feel like there was a reason. And I like, uh, I'm just an affectionate guy. So I like to pick them up and love on them, you know? So we were always big on, on picking them up. So we probably, I never heard Velcro baby before, but that's it. That's probably was ours. She likes to stay on you. You put her down. Nope. Pick me back up. Yeah. Oh, bro. Wait. Um, one of the things that I love from Marlo is that now that she's 15 or she's 16 months now, but I would say right around 12 or 13 months She started looking at me differently and it was like Like she would like tilt her head to the side and she would look at me like I love this man. Yeah, like it was it was just something different and then she's been like attached to me like ever since like She wants me to hold her. Um, she wants me to do her bottle and everything, you know, it's been uh It's been uh It's it's just different. Like I always heard like, like, like we wanted a boy real bad. Um, I wanted a boy real bad I want someone to come brush blinds with me. I want someone to come to the farm with me, you know everything But um when we had a little girl we were so ecstatic but Now I'm like, Oh man, I didn't, I didn't know. I didn't even know I wanted this, but I needed this, you know? Oh yeah. Oh, she's going to want it to be a girl. Dad's going to love you so hard. It's going to be bad. Now we would like a boy now, right? We were like, okay, good. We got our girl. Hopefully we get a boy. If not, we'll get another girl. Maybe we'll get a boy after. Well, I don't know how many kids we want. It's like, not until you have one. You're like, okay, I think I could do this again. Yep. Um, some days you're like, woof. Yeah, that's what we had to, and we were like, never again, like that baby stage was so hard for us. I was like, never, ever, maybe we'll adopt, you know, um, as, as time goes on. But I was like, if a baby could come out at like two years old, bro, we'd do it all day, all day. But no, I can't get through that baby stage anymore. So, um, and I saw that. A couple pictures of darian just to go back to her. Um, don't y'all go on? Um delaney's birthday to uh, Disney or something like that to kind of like celebrate. Yeah, so we missed it this year because of lily obviously Um, but yeah, we'll we'll go on either uh, november 26 Which is her passing anniversary or her birthday october 3rd. We're going in december. So that's kind of our Her birthday trip. It'll be Lily's first Disney experience. Oh, man. Um, but yeah, we would go we used to go every, uh, I mean we would go multiple times a year. Yeah. Yeah, dude. That's awesome. I think I think it's so important that That you've remarried somebody who is open to honoring your late wife, especially someone who was so instrumental in um In your life, not just from a business standpoint, from you starting Chapman's, but that support system, that, that role that she played and the things that you've been through, that the, that Darian's support has, has been open to honoring that. I think that that takes a really special person to be able to do that. So that's a, it's a beautiful thing that y'all get to share it, man. It's a wonderful thing. No, it is. And we. But look, I have so many families now, right? I have Delaney's family. I have Darian's family. I have my family We all co mingle we all mesh so well. Um Delaney's mom Actually works for us at Chapman's. Okay. Um, so And Darian's mom Delaney's mom. Everybody gets along and they all accept each other. It's yeah, it's great That's a beautiful thing, man. No, that was the only way I would have wanted it, right? Is if we can honor my late wife's memory. We got a little picture of her and you know You It's not like a shrine, but we got a little picture of her and, and some, uh, some crosses and essays in the living room at all times. Yeah. Well, you don't want to forget her. You know what I mean? And it's good to be reminded of the impact that she's had on you, you know, up to this point. And the fact that she supported you through, you know, getting to getting Chapman's gone and that's going to be what essentially builds, you know, y'all's legacy, you know, and she was instrumental in that, you know, and that's a wonderful thing, man. So what's next for, for Seth Chapman? I saw you bought. Uh, the Perry, not the Perry, what I call the Perry store is the little gas station. But you bought, was it CNJ's? it was CNJ's, uh, and I renamed it to Perry Outfitters. Perry, I figured it was, it was, it was, uh, the right name. Um, I'll start with that one. So one day, I used to shop there all the time. Great little store. Um, well, it was getting to the point where the previous owner was like, you know, I feel like I'm, I'm tired of it now. I'm ready to get out of it. So she shut it down. And I was like, man, I like stopping there. It was more of a fishing store whenever she had it. Uh, and I was like, I really like stopping there. I always got my drinks, my Red Bulls, whatever it was. So Uh, I'm at the, I was at the point in Chapman's where, um, I've bought a couple of assets. I had four rent houses, you know, I branched off from a couple of other things and I had rent houses and a little bit of farmland. Uh, this was a year ago really a year and a year and a month and Where I had some assets and I was like, I would like my business is running itself. Well, I don't have to be there I just have to be there for extreme growth. It can it can be on autopilot without me there Um So I was like I want to branch into something and like I mentioned I love hunting I'm a huge advocate for waterfowl and deer and I like all that and I was spending a lot of money on hunting every year I'm like, what if I can have a business that will pay for all of my hunting stuff and also give jobs to five six People whatever it takes in and give a good Multitude of products to the community that's lacking in this area. So I bought the store I watched price decreases over over the the year two years It was for sale and it got to the point where I was like, wow, I'd be crazy to not buy this Yes, there's such a good chance. So I bought it and got on with a bunch of cool companies hunting companies You know like boss shotgun shells. I'm the only one that Is a boss distributor around here. I'm the only seller of boss Um, and anybody listening that is hunting, you know, i'm a lacrosse dealer and katie gator waiter and rick i'm writing tangle free All the big hunting brands because i'm in it So I put them in the store and people were like wow, this is this is like there's some legit stuff here now Legit stuff. It's like a little a little lafayette shooter. Shout out lafayette shooters the best outdoor store In Acadiana hands down bro. We shop there all the time. We love Lafayette shooters If Lafayette shooters if y'all are listening, we would love for y'all to sponsor this podcast, bro I love it over there. I made awesome relationships. I do all their air conditioning work. I love all the people with Lafayette shooters Um, and you know They were, they were, um, me and me and the manager are, are decent friends. Right. Cool guy. Mm-Hmm. He was, he was like, man, that's cool. You know, I'm glad you're doing that. And I, I can't hold a candle to them. Right. I'm a gas station with a couple hunting things. Mm-Hmm. So I still buy all my big stuff from'em, but I'm brought something to Ver Vermont Parish that ver main parish needed. Yeah, I agree. Um, I'm a hundredth of Lafayette shooters. Uh, and I got chips and they can get their snacks in the morning before the blind. Right. Yeah. I'll tell you real quick. I used to have a dream when I was a kid to own a outdoor store in Abbeville called Abbeville Outdoors. Yeah. When I, when I was young and I was like, I pictured it being like the size of Walmart and all this stuff. And then I grew up and I was like, I can't support that. Like what, what am I thinking? You know, but that's cool that you have a, that you have that store because it really is cool. I've been there a couple of times, man. And it's kind of unassuming. Cause. When you drive by it doesn't look huge. Yeah, but when you go in there's this whole back section full of stuff You know, I filled it front to back. I have coffee. I mean, I it's funny I got bolt plugs and all kind of baits and artificial baits live baits red bull. I love red bull. Yep I got every drink red bull beer, you know, I got everything um, and it's funny how that how that works because that led me into Wanting a bigger location or another location? and I found um You Found a location in Forkett Island. Uh, it was previously mawn paused. It's been there 20 years. It was kind of the same thing, but it was mainly just a bait store slash kind of feed store, um, right next to the Cajun diner. And I was like, well, I have one entrance to. Going hunting and now if people come from Kaplan, they're going to pass up They're not going to pass in front of Perry. Well now they have to pass in front of either location I get over at Forked Island bridge. That's it. You gotta get over it. That's right. Um, so we picked that location up and It's I called it island bait and tackle and it has all the same stuff as Perry And so I got two locations now and uh, they're fun. They're really just fun. I give jobs to a few local people I think I have 10 employees between the two and uh, they bounce back and forth to either store So that's a different environment Different people. Um, and it's, it's just fun. That's awesome, man. Well, I think, I think, uh, if you're having a good time and, and I think it's worth doing for sure, you know, like obviously Chapman's is your, is your, your big goose, you know, that's the one. Yeah. That's, that's the main one. But if you have some passion projects on the side, especially if you love to hunt and you can have a couple of things that pay for themselves, make you a little money, you could have some fun in the meantime. I think that's good. You know, that's a good thing to have. So what, what's next for you? You, uh, is there some more hunting stores or is there something next for Chapman's? What's. What's the next big step that you that you're looking at? Yeah, so, um, I Now that I have these two stores going it's so funny. I didn't I didn't intend to have the second store going um, I want to branch out to Farther with chapman's ac. Um, i'm i've been you know It's like I I can I can uh, What's the word metropolize maybe in this area and and and do Lafayette real hard, right? But I feel like i'm already a pretty good size in Lafayette. I don't want every customer in Lafayette I just want the majority of them. Yeah, just give me most of them Uh as much as I would like to branch out to baton rouge Um, it's it's just too hard with the basin bridge getting stuck on it So I think our our next step may be lake charles We're gonna we're gonna branch out to lake charles a little bit and do some work over there Um, but i'm just gonna continue on Maintaining the consistency of our customer service, that is my biggest thing is I want happy customers and everybody messes up, right? I have a lot of chances every day to mess up. It's how you handle it that really sets you apart from the others You can mess up and just ignore that one star Google review But I'm gonna answer that one star Google review with facts about what really happened Um, yeah, I think you're spot on, man. So the oil and gas, what I've always been in has been service, right? Yeah. Construction fabrication. And I always tell our clients, I'm like, look, if you're looking for the perfect contractor, but we're, we're not your company, we're not your company. And I was like, and if that is what you're looking for, you'll never find it. No. You know? So I'm like, it's not about, um, who can do the job. Perfect. It's. Who can do the job and whenever they make mistakes, they know how to fix them and they know how to respond to them because there's some companies that make mistakes and they can't figure out how to get past them, you know, but if you can learn, if you know how your people make a mistake, but you know how to correct it and make it good at the end of the day for what your client wants, I think that that shows a lot for a good quality company, you know, yeah, absolutely. That's, that's a big one. That's awesome, man. Well, I think, uh, I think you have a really, um, good start. I think you've been, uh, Outrageously successful up until this point, man. I think you have some things that have happened to you that are going to shape the way that you think moving forward. And, um, that, that, like I said earlier, that maturation processes has already taken place. It's, it's going to continue to take place, man. But I think, you know, just being going through what you've been through and where you're at now, I think you've been incredibly blessed. You're, you're incredibly lucky, very blessed. And, uh, it's been fun watching, you know, from the outside before we even got to know each other, it's been fun watching. And, uh, I'm curious to see where. Where the rest of it goes, man. So, um, yeah, I can't wait. Yeah, man. So I appreciate you coming in, sitting down, dude. I think we're about an hour and a half in. That's all flies by good content. Yeah. Oh yeah. It goes by quick. Yeah, it's, it flies by man. So look, if people wanted to reach out to you on like Instagram, Facebook, what are your socials? Uh, so, uh, Instagram, my personal page. It's so funny. It's my original one, how I kind of got. It's uh, Chapman underscore, uh, D max cause I had a big Duramax truck. And I just never changed it. I was like, Hey, people know me by that. Yeah. Yeah. Facebook, Seth Chapman. You can follow me there. Uh, it's a, it's a professional page. So you can actually follow me. Uh, and the reason, um, the reason I'm verified on there is because whenever I do giveaways, um, there's so many fake pages. That we're trying to scoop in in the comments. So, uh and and fool the people commenting under to get like the giveaway. Yeah, your giveaways are crazy Like they're big when you when y'all do giveaways, dude, they so many people respond to them. I've never seen anything like that It's crazy and I it's like I can um, I can Save part of my success is because I put myself out there on social media And I I don't say I know what i'm doing. I'm, not a marketer genius, but I know what people react to So i'll make things that people react to So yeah, seth chapman chapman's ac perry outfitters island bait and tackle all on facebook Um instagram my big one i'm on tiktok to the chapman compound. There you go 40 or 50 000 on instagram and tiktok. Um, dang i'm on youtube But I you know, I probably should focus more on youtube, but I just I don't I it's it's It's hard. I'm not a, I'm not an editor. I'm just a content creator and I don't know how to edit the thing. Yeah. It sounds like what you need is a marketing team. Yeah. I did just start a marketing team. That was one of the delegation things is a burning stick creative. Now I tried to do it all and I was like, well, I can't do it all anymore. I'm not posting enough. I'm suffering on the social media side. So, so I delegated that to them and they're, they're wonderful. Burning stick. Yeah. Me and Lindsay have learned, you know, doing this podcast and our little joint Instagram account that we do just for like, uh, we're kind of just doing it for fun. And I told her that I was like, I'm, I'm down for like focusing on it. But as long as we're having fun, I want to do it as a job. That's right. It's not a job like this, this kind of stuff I enjoy, you know, like sitting down and actually talking to people. It's a good outlet for me. Yeah. You know, I like getting to know people and then me and Lindsay, when we get to do it together, it's almost like, Intimate time that we get to have together and just people just get the benefit of just being able to listen, you know, but, um, the marketing side, I can attest to it's, it's tough, man, for us having to make reels and it's just what you got to do. You know, if you, if you want any kind of growth or content, you have to put out content. And then I work full time. She works full time. We're full time parents of two kids, bro. It's like, it's a lot. So I'm like, hopefully we'll get to a point where maybe we'll be able to like hire somebody just to do some content where we can like, Film all of our podcasts and then, um, have like, I know a guy who edits and all that good stuff and he does a great job, but like just a film podcast and everything. It's an investment in the cameras, the mics, like everything. It takes, it takes money, man. And then until that podcast is making money to cover it. I'm like, it's hard. We got regular bills to pay, you know, you do. It's absolutely true. You, you, I guess it was kind of the point where I had this guy reach out to me and me and him or me and him are real good friends. Austin Belair, AV films. Yeah. VC alum, bro. Oh yeah. And he, he just one day. He's he's an entrepreneur too Uh, and I use that word lightly, like a lot of people take that entrepreneurial word and they just, you know, they're Forex traders, whatever it is. And they, anyway, so he, he, I'm not going to say he forced himself on me, but he was like, you need to let me do some videos for you. And I was like, yeah, dude, I guess whatever. And they turn out awesome. It's like, you have to put yourself in front of people and that's what we're doing. He put himself in front of me. The videos are great. Me and him mesh, right? We have the same. Smart attic attitude. I'll add little little clips here and there from like feedback I get from customers. One of them was a And he added it in a couple videos It was whenever I did these trucks camouflage and a couple people from River Ranch, right? Our prestigious area was like nobody's gonna want to see those camouflage trucks in River Ranch Well now we're probably the biggest company in River Ranch doing million a million dollar homes So he added like the little comments about you know, River Ranch. That's hilarious. I love River Ranch, right? I would have a house over there, but just there's some people that don't Thought those trucks weren't very pretty. Yeah. Yeah. And he, as long as they're talking about it, I'm okay with that. Do you, do you want to be cool in the summer and warm during the winter? Or do you want, do you want the trucks to be pretty? You got to figure out what you want, you know? No, it's awesome, man. But yeah, man, thank you so much for having me. Yeah, bro. I'm, I'm glad you're a, I'm glad you said yes, man. I really was interested in your story. I felt like you had a good one to share and it was good. I really enjoyed the conversation, man. Thanks for coming on, bro. All right, brother.