Selling Cars, Not Snake Oil: And Sometimes Bourbon

Opportunity doesn’t always announce itself; sometimes it looks like a rent hike that forces you to choose who you really are. We sat down with Clay Jaqua, owner of 505 Motorsports in Farmington, to unpack how a near-crisis became the catalyst for a smarter move, stronger numbers, and a clearer lane. Clay’s story runs from a 20-year-old dad asked to leave college, to fourteen formative years in a Ford store, to a Dairy Queen detour that sharpened his love for the car business. Along the way he built a community-first dealership with a showroom of classics and performance gems, and a lot tuned to a $15–20K sweet spot that actually matches how locals buy.

We dig into what most people get wrong about selling cars: it’s not the metal, it’s the options, the financing, the trust, and the follow-through. Clay lays out why small, nimble operations can adapt faster than big lots, how to pivot without losing your brand, and how to use consignment and bank relationships to make deals frictionless. He shares the mindset shift from “get rich quick” to “build slow, protect the downside,” plus the unsexy habits that create staying power: own your building when you can, avoid overextension, and let small margins add up. In a small town, reputation is oxygen—fix what you can, don’t duck hard conversations, and put people over the policy when it really counts.

We also talk creative marketing that actually works. Clay’s viral social videos aren’t slick; they’re genuine, funny, and unmistakably local—proof that a clear voice beats a big budget. For owners chasing discoverability, we cover local SEO, Google Business Profile basics, and why consistent YouTube walkarounds plus TikTok and Instagram Reels can lift brand search for terms like “505 Motorsports,” “Farmington used cars,” and “classic cars Farmington.” Finally, Clay opens up about freedom, family, and a new bourbon venture—Burnt Tavern—as the next chapter in staying curious without overreaching. If you’re building a resilient business in a volatile market, this conversation is a field guide: stay open to opportunity, make risk survivable, take care of your people, and keep your sense of humor.

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Be sure to follow or subscribe!  And, if you're a local business owner who'd like to be featured - or know someone whose story should be told - get in touch at Ken@StrategicHorizonsConsulting.com

This show is brought to you by Strategic Horizons Consulting (a division of Ken Collins Marketing).

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 1:05

I'm here with Clay Jacoy, the owner of 505 Motorsports. Yes, sir.

SPEAKER_02 1:10

So tell us a little about yourself. Oh my gosh. I don't know. I mean, I'm for the most part a lifelong Farmington kid, you know. Yeah. Wasn't born here, but moved here. I was about 14 years old and high school, ran off to college for about one year until they asked me to leave college. And uh all in fun, it was kind of happened that way. Yeah, kind of happened. It was just sort of like you, uh, you really don't like to go to class and you really don't like to participate in turning grades in, so uh I don't think we need you here. And uh so yeah, as um as I'm on my way back to Farmington, find out I'm gonna be a dad at the ripe old age of you know 19, 20 years old, and just kind of had to get on board with life and and uh stayed in Farmington and at 53 years old now, I'm still here. Yeah, yeah, still here doing doing my thing and uh selling cars and playing in real estate and newly in the bourbon business. We could talk about that later, but yeah, just man, I've kind of plugged myself into Farmington as a lifelonger and uh I love it here. Love to give back to my community, so yeah, it's a great gig.

Launching 505 Motorsports With Curtis

SPEAKER_00 2:16

So yeah, we're sitting in your new location for 505 motorsports, and um because you used to be on uh East Main, right? Like way out on East Main. Yeah, and um highly visible spot. And I was a little bit worried about you moving down here, but apparently it's even better. It is on Sanu Boulevard.

SPEAKER_02 2:37

Yeah, you know, we opened 505 Motorsports. I had a business partner at the time uh who I think of as a brother to this day, Curtis Cassida, who you you know Curtis. Uh Curtis and I started 505 Motorsports in 2010.

SPEAKER_03 2:49

Okay.

Landlord Shock And The Big Move

SPEAKER_02 2:50

And uh Curtis in 2017 said, hey man, I'm I'm ready to do something else. And we had a buy-sell agreement. I I bought Curtis out, you know, in 2017, and we stayed at that location over on East Main. I don't even know, we're kind of across from East Main pond, right? That's where we were, East Main trade. And uh so we we did great over there. We we really had a good run, and we were renting that building, and the landlord of the building came to us and uh said, Hey, you want to buy it, buy the building? Absolutely, we want to buy the building. And fast forward about six months later, the landlord came to us and said, Just joking, I no longer want to sell the building. Uh, and if you want to stay, your your rent is gonna go up 70% in two months. Uh, to give you an idea, it was almost$13,000 a month. And we said uh thanks, but no thanks.

SPEAKER_03 3:42

Yeah.

New Location, Better Numbers, New Focus

SPEAKER_02 3:43

So I was in a pickle. We had to figure out what to do, you know. I mean, I I thought, is this my sign? Is this my sign to get out of the car business? You know, maybe maybe God's telling me to do something else. And I've already been down that road. I wasn't good at anything else, so I got back into cars, right? And so uh, so anyway, this opportunity came up to buy a building on San Juan Boulevard, 2350 San Juan Boulevard. There used to be a business in here called Renta Wheel. So so if any of your listeners would know this, this uh kind of a crazy concept in my brain. I guess you come in and they did sell rims, but you could also make payments on your wheels and tires for for your hoop dee, whatever you were driving. Right. And uh I can't imagine what the repo rate might have been on those. But but uh that's the building. So now we're buying this building. So with the with the help of Four Corners Community Bank, who I've been with forever and ever and ever, uh, we are currently buying this building, and this is the new home of 505 Motorsports. August of 24 is when we opened, so about a year and a half ago, roughly. Yeah. And the business I I think it's good because when my accountant calls me up one day and says, Hey, I don't know what you're doing, but your books have never been this good. Um just keep doing it. Keep doing what you're doing. And uh we do attribute it. I think we attribute it to the location, which is fantastic. Yeah. And um, it's just something about when you're buying a building, you tend to work a little harder than when you're sure paying rent and just having fun. Sure. So it did kind of it did kind of turn out to be a little little more work, but it's it's paying off and we love the location. We have a beautiful showroom. So I mean, if people want to come by and look at some cool cars, yeah. We have uh keep about eight or ten indoor cars, uh about another 65 or so out on the lot. And we're we've been very, very busy at the new location, and we have all types of financing for all situations. So that that's made a big difference. Is you know, getting a little more involved in the business once we moved over here. Yeah, it's been great.

From Ford Store To Dairy Queen Detour

SPEAKER_00 5:46

Awesome, man. Yeah. So thinking back to the beginning, when when did 505 motor store sports stop being an idea and start becoming real? Like how did that process happen?

SPEAKER_02 5:58

Um, oh man, you're going way back. So uh so my my story was I was with Zimes Ford. I have much love and respect for the the Zimes family here in Farmington. They uh they really offered me a great opportunity. As I said, I moved here when I was 20. Uh I did. I came back from college right about the age of 20, 19 to 20, and I had a kid on the way. They offered me a position working at Zimes Ford, and that lasted about 14 years. I did almost every position you could imagine at Zimesford, short of turning wrenches and working on your car. And you nobody wants that because it's not good. Yeah, I know my limitations. So uh, so so in 2005, my wife and I decided maybe we need to start thinking about doing something else than just you know being in the car business. So we decided to buy a Dairy Queen restaurant here in Farmington over by Brookside Park, Farmington High School. We bought that in 2005.

SPEAKER_03 6:57

Okay.

SPEAKER_02 6:57

And my wife ran it for about one year as I still worked at Zimesford. And finally I decided it was time I needed to get she decided it was time that I needed to get over there and help her. And so uh so I went over there, started doing ice cream, and about one year of being an ice cream owner, I quickly decided I wanted back into cars. And that's a tough gig. You know, much love for all these restaurant owners and things like that. Yeah, it is. That's a tough gig. And so, about one year into the ice cream biz, I decided that I have to find my way back into cars. So a friend of a friend said, Hey, contact Curtis Cassida. He owns a little small car lot called Snyder's Wholesale on Schofield. Right up Schofield, if you turn where the movie theaters are now, then you go up about a maybe half a mile. There was a little tiny, almost look like a home with a chain link fenced in area. And and Curtis had about 15 cars over there. And I literally walked in his shop one day and said, You don't know me, but this guy said to come see you. And I've been in the car business a while. Uh, you want to do cars together? And Curtis looks at me and goes, Yeah, we can do cars together. That's that's fine.

SPEAKER_00 8:12

That's amazing.

Partnering With Curtis And Early Hustle

SPEAKER_02 8:13

Yeah, that's fine. And I said, All right, I have about five cars. I was I was flipping cars on the side, and I have about five cars, I'll bring them over and we'll, you know, just see where it goes.

SPEAKER_03 8:22

Yeah.

East Main Era And Growth

SPEAKER_02 8:23

Two years later, from 08 to 10, you know, Curtis was handing me keys to the building and saying, Hey, I'm out of town this weekend, go open the store. Would you talk to customers or whatever? I never 100% bought into Snyder's wholesale, but but we were business partners in this in the sense, right? So uh so I had the Dairy Queens, I would show up at 7 a.m. in ice cream land, make sure that the orders came in. Hopefully the employees would show up. Uh sometimes they did, sometimes they didn't. It's not a given. So when the employees would show up those days, I would stay till about noon and then would kind of get help get through the lunch rush. And uh say one o'clock, I would jump over and put my car hat on, and now I was a car salesman. So I would go over to Snyder's wholesale and sell cars. And so for two years, that was my gig ice cream in the morning, cars in the afternoon. And uh after being with Curtis for two years and uh putting my my clients in contacts with his clients in contacts, we soon realized, hey, we got something going here. We we need bigger, we need a bigger spot. And everything just organically happened. I don't know that we hit the streets real hard looking for that location out on East Main, right? But all of a sudden, one day there was a for-rent sign on this building out there, and and uh we drove by and took a look at it. We knew uh who owned that building, and they said, Yeah, sure, we'd love to have you guys. You want to partner with Sunglass? Sunglass at that point in time, we kind of shared that building with Sunglass. Sunglass on one side of the building had a little showroom in there, and they would do fireplaces and window displays, and they were getting into the residential uh side of things with sunglass. We did cars on the other side, and so that became our home. And uh so I went ahead and stayed with that ice cream business until 2016, so 11 years after wanting to get out of the ice cream business, I continued to do ice cream in the mornings, car sales in the afternoons, and uh sold out the Dairy Queen in 2016 and have more or less been with 505 on a daily since then. Wow, yeah. So that's awesome, man. I don't know. Strange, strange thing.

SPEAKER_00 10:43

Do you find that um maybe some of that is um is a mind frame thing, right? So if you're a person that is open to opportunity, um then opportunity just finds you. You know what I mean? Like you weren't looking to start a car business, but you did, right, and you weren't like really sitting down and going through the effort of finding the perfect location and all that kind of stuff. You just found it.

SPEAKER_03 11:14

Right. Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 11:15

It's just kind of there. So do you think that's an important part of that is being just always open to opportunity?

Opportunity Mindset Over “Get Rich Quick”

SPEAKER_02 11:23

Always. Um, even to this day. That is that is my mindset. Uh I mean, I could oh man, I could take that so many different angles. Like I knew at an early adult age that I always, you know, we all look at that get rich quick thing, right? Like, like how Amway, uh how are we how how can how can I better my my living at an early age? Yeah. And after participating, some some ideas worked, some ideas didn't, but I mean, after just trying so many different get quick rich schemes, right? They were all legal, but but they just didn't they didn't work, right? Like uh and so I I realized if I wanted to be independent or have an entrepreneurial spirit, which I do, I was just gonna have to buckle down and do it myself. And so I I learned quickly that in my life I've never found the get rich quick. Right. Um I do know a lot of people who think, wow, you're a business owner, you're rich, right? Well, they haven't walked in in many business owners' shoes. They so business owners, I tell you, you know, on the outside you may look like you have it all together, right? But on the inside, there's a lot of behind the scenes moving parts. And uh so yeah, they they don't, you know, I at 53 and being in the car business for uh geez 33 years, right? Started when I was 20, 33 years. I I like to think that I've put in my time to at least I know what to expect. I also um I just had this conversation with a with a friend the other day that was, you know, I've I've never been given anything. Um my my parents have passed away and they were able to take care of themselves, but I I didn't inherit. I didn't, you know what I mean? So so I I I say that my wife and I have worked hard. We just had our 24-year anniversary, and I feel like we've worked really hard to acquire what we have, made some really good decisions. Yeah. Um, and and and just with that entrepreneurial spirit about us, we always look for an opportunity that makes sense. Yeah, not every opportunity makes sense. And uh, I think that's kind of passed along to our kids. Uh looking at our kids now, they they have kind of that same mentality about them. One thing that I like to preach is I know a lot of people in life who work for someone, and I'm not I'm not, you know, poo-pooing on anybody who works for other people at all. At all. But what I found in my life is I could not imagine working for somebody, uh amassing some savings, built having a house, having car payments, having kids in college, and showing up for work one day, and 100% out of your control, yeah, you are told you no longer work here. Yeah, you're fired, we sold the company, the company's gone broke, whatever it is, like like, and how do you go back to your family and say, hey, listen, I have to sell the house, we have to sell our cars, you know, pull little Johnny out of college, whatever it is. Yeah, and I had always said I wanted to be successful because of me, or I wanted to be a failure because of me. Yeah, like I want to know that I have control over either one.

SPEAKER_00 14:54

Um yeah, whether you make it or break it is 100% you.

Risk, Control, And Owning Outcomes

SPEAKER_02 14:58

It is, yeah. And I I within reason uh I can somewhat control my destiny uh along business avenues. And uh, and so yeah, so having having the wherewithal to decipher between a good opportunity and a bad opportunity has allowed me to grow beyond 505 motorsports, you know. I mean, we've been doing this a long time, and and has uh allowed me some financial freedoms to be able to maybe invest in other opportunities that that have come up. Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 15:28

So man, I love that. There's so much to unpack in there because there is that thing. I I I meet a lot of people, there's a difference still in what like going back to my original follow-up there that there's a difference between deciding to look for an opportunity and being generally open to opportunity. And I think that's the difference between some people you'll see, and it looks like the cards just all fall in their favor all the time. And and that isn't necessarily true, it's just they're completely open to that without actively trying to be open to that. Oh, yeah, right. Yeah so that it's just always a radar that's going on and like, oh, opportunity. I wasn't looking for that, but yeah, I see it. Right that's right there, and so I just think that opens up so many more opportunities when you just maintain that as a personality trait that you're open to looking at whatever opportunity, and not like you said, not everything, because not everything makes sense, and some things are just plain stupid, right? But yeah, um, when you're open to it, you don't miss the ones that are good, right? Yeah, because you weren't actively looking. So if you're not actively looking, you don't see that one that just passed you by until you start actively looking, but five of them already just passed you by, and now you've got to find the next one coming, right? And you could have been five opportunities ahead of the game by now. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 16:54

And um well, there's I had I had somebody tell me a long time ago, um, and uh Dick Ledbetter, he's he's passed. His son, his son Kelly's great guy, great guy, yeah. And um, and we spent a lot of time with the Ledbetter family up at Purgatory. We we spent 15 years up on the mountain at Purgatory as our kids were growing up, and uh the Ledbetter family is like they're they're the mayors of Purgatory, right? And so Dick Ledbetter once told me, he's asking me about the business, and you know, are you still seeing any any good deals out there? And I said, Yeah, you know, I need to get with you someday and get a line of credit. I said, because uh I said, I I don't have enough money to take advantage of these good deals. And he said, I I to the day I remember this, he says, Listen, the money will run out long before the good deals will run out. Yeah, and he says, There's always good deals out there, yeah. The money may not be there, right? And it was great advice. I didn't, you know, it took me a while to kind of cross years, yeah, chew into it later. And I'm like, that was so smart. Like there's always gonna be opportunity, but if you don't, maybe the money wasn't there for a reason at that time, or that wasn't the right opportunity, and therefore the stars didn't align for that opportunity. So, so yeah, I mean, I I think I can attribute a lot. Uh, I mean, I'm a God-fearing Christian. I obviously I give a lot of you know, faith uh and and praise to God and my family and my wife and my mom and dad raising me great, all that good stuff, right? But but as far as being the adult and making business decisions, um, I do think you get kind of a a gut for what what's going on.

SPEAKER_03 18:31

Yeah.

Serendipity In Real Estate And Deals

SPEAKER_02 18:31

Also, like yourself, I've been plugged into this community for a long, long time. And so, so we do get an opportunity um with you know, meeting new people or meeting, you know, new business opportunities do come our way, but that doesn't always make them good opportunities either. So so yeah, I I just yeah, I I feel very I think a lot of things in my life have happen have happened organically. I'll give you a really quick example. Uh I had gotten into some commercial real estate for a while. Well, I'm still in commercial real estate, but there was a building here in Farmington that came about. I probably shouldn't say the building or the the the people that are in it now, but there was a building that I I know had been there was a previous business. And the I'm thinking, how is this company paying for this big beautiful building? There's never any cars there, the comp the the company can't be doing good. So, opportunity in my head, bing bing bing. I get on the county assessor website, who owns this building? I looked up who owned the building. This was about over a two-week process. I looked it up, I stumbled into a phone number, I dial the phone number, and some guy answers. And he lives in Durango and he says, Oh, yeah, I've owned that building for 20 years. And I said, Well, I've been in Farmington a long time, and uh, I'm just looking for some commercial property. And if ever you want to sell the building, and the guy goes, You're not gonna believe this. Last night, my wife and I had a conversation at dinner that said, Yeah, you know, hey, we're getting up there in age, we've had this building for a long time. Maybe we should think about selling the building. Yeah, and I mean, things just happen for a reason. So you go four or five months later, I wound up buying the building. As as I'm buying the building and closing on the commercial real estate with this guy, he goes, Hey, there is a major nationwide company that wants to rent this building. And I was kind of keeping that in my back pocket. Uh, I wasn't gonna say anything, but now that you are becoming the business owner, you should contact these guys and see if they'd like to rent the building from you. So here we are, uh, six months after I bought the building, a huge, huge company nationwide went in there and I signed a 30-year lease with that company. And so now I'm leasing this building for 30 years. Uh and and so it just organically happened. But had I not, Ken, had I not just driving by in my brain thinking, opportunity, yeah. Uh, how can I find out who owns this building? If I hadn't done that, there probably would have been a for sale sign out there. I would have missed it, somebody else would have got it.

SPEAKER_00 21:07

He would have looked for a buyer, he would have found a buyer, somebody else would have benefited from the person that wanted it. Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 21:15

Right place, right time, or or just taking some initiative to ask, right? Like, like, like how many girls have you asked out on a date in your lifetime, right? Like, well, it might work, it might not, sure, but sometimes you just gotta swing for the fences.

Sales As Dating And Negotiation

SPEAKER_00 21:29

So I have a consultant friend that uses that um in in a a B2B business to business kind of um prospecting way, is dude, it's all dating. Yeah, it's it is. He's like, you were really successful dating. So, because I've always struggled with sales, right? And so here I am talking with the sales guy. And so I've always struggled with sales, and he's like, dude, it's just dating. I mean, that's all you're doing. You're just having a back and forth with this person, right? You're courting each other, right? You know, and you just gotta close the deal, right? Seal the deal. Yeah, it doesn't always work, but sometimes it does.

SPEAKER_02 22:05

That's right. Yeah, yeah. The art of the deal. Yeah, we had uh we had a little church group last night over at somebody's house, and uh the the the topic of conversation was like how to talk to a non-believer, you know. And and and I I just said, you know what? It's very similar to what we all do in our everyday life. You you have a conversation. Hopefully they're willing to have the conversation also. I said it's very similar to my negotiating a car sale, right? Like, like I'm gonna put my best foot forward, they're gonna come back and put their best foot forward. You you hope you can make the deal work, and if not, you shake hands and say, Hey, it didn't work this time, we'll try again. And you all go off on your separate way. So yeah, that's just sort of life, I think.

SPEAKER_00 22:44

I found that does help um manage my own sales expectations. Yeah, because I used to have a tendency to hang everything on that deal. And so if that deal doesn't go through, it was like the end of the world, but it's not the end of the world, it's the end of that deal. Yeah, right. And so I I had to remember that. The dating thing did help me with that because I didn't approach dating that way. Right. But she said, no, I'm gonna I'm gonna end it now. Right. It's over, game over. I'm 19 years old and she just turned me down. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 23:17

So I mean, even to this day though, I'll tell you, even to this day, um there are there are deals, uh, I shouldn't say deals, maybe conversations that I that I I have with friends or business associates or or just everyday people that I I don't want to ask questions. You know what I mean? Like sometimes I'm still shy, and I've been doing this a long time, and I'm still I still don't want to ask the question. Uh and so I I think that's why we have gut feelings, that's why we have intuition, you know, read the room, right? Kind of kind of understand. So not every deal is gonna work out, right? Whether whether it's as simple as asking somebody out on a date or or closing a multi-million dollar, you know, business deal. Not every deal is gonna work out. Yeah, so so you go with your gut on some of this stuff. Yeah, love it. Yeah, yeah, that's good.

Purpose, Pride, And Giving Back

SPEAKER_00 24:08

That's awesome. So, what part of doing all this feels the most meaningful meaningful to you, like even on the hard days?

SPEAKER_02 24:19

Um, I have a lot of answers to that, really. Um I am I'm I'm self-driven, right? But that doesn't mean that I am always motivated and always driven, right? Um it's like I love what I do for a living. There's never been one day, this is never one day where I say, man, I just don't like what I do. There's days I wake up and say, I may not want to get out of bed and get dressed and go to work. Sure. Right. But so for me, I think, you know, just the the self-drive to be able to get up and go do what you enjoy to do, that's highly motivating for me. Um being able to throw on a pair of shorts or pants or a ball cap, or I don't, I'm not a suit and tie guy. So it's so so that's you know, being able to set set that in my own world. But also um again, multiple like multiple things going through my head, like giving back to the community. Okay. You can do that to an extent. Uh, I wish I could say that we've donated to every single person who's walked in and asked us to fund their kids, you know, football team, baseball team, softball team, girls, volleyball, you name it. We've we've been asked, but I love to give back.

SPEAKER_00 25:37

I remember you actually telling me one time uh years back that you you were quote unquote in trouble with your accountant because you were doing that too often. So you were donating too much to too many people. Okay, I'm not sure how long ago that was.

SPEAKER_02 25:54

But listen, this is hilarious. I told you my accountant called me not too long ago and said, whatever you're doing, keep doing it. Yeah, there was an exception. The exception was do you realize that, and I I guess I shouldn't say this number, but I will. Do you realize that you last year donated$84,000 in contributions out in the community? Yeah. Uh and look, maybe it's you know, to these teams, maybe it was to a golf tournament. Um, we have some uh underprivileged people that we've we've helped out. Um we've donated, you know, a car situation recently. We donated a car to somebody recently. So so yeah, I mean it that still happens. I don't know how long ago that was, but that is something that I need to kind of dial back to.

SPEAKER_00 26:38

It's been going on for a while now.

Team Loyalty And Niche Showroom Strategy

SPEAKER_02 26:40

But it does answer your question. You know, that's something that we always want to maybe that's why things happen organically, you know. Maybe, maybe I'm being rewarded, maybe it's sure pennies in heaven, maybe it's you know, put putting it out and hoping it comes back tenfold. Um, but but we do we do like to we do like to help out when we can, yeah, and doesn't mean it can always happen. So there's that. Um I also love the fact that currently I have four employees, so we're not big business, you know. I'm not I'm not, I mean, we've had as many as probably seven, you know. Um, but but we currently have four employees, including uh plus myself, so so plus myself, but I love the fact that my staff have all been with me almost since the beginning. I have one one newer guy who's been with me for two, two and a half years, but I've known him for 15 years in the car business, right? And he wanted to make a change, and so he kind of came over to work for us, and so it it feels really good to know that I can employ them. Yeah, who they have families, they can afford to, you know, take vacations or have Christmas for their families and kids and things like that. And so um, so I think the personal pride of being connected to the community and uh loving what you do. And then there's also kind of a I don't know if you want to call it selfish or pat yourself on the back or what, but when when you see your your company name out there or you see your logo somewhere and you're like, hey, that's cool, that's us. Yeah, you know, like I started that. Yeah. So so it's good, but we're never big-headed about it. I I'm not a big-headed person when it comes to that.

SPEAKER_00 28:17

I view that part as like a parent, like a proud parent. Yeah, you don't get big headed about your kids. Right. But you see them and you're like, dude, yeah, that's my son, that's my daughter, that's that's my kid right there. Yeah, you know, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 28:29

This thing started, this thing started. I mean, literally, this started with about 10 cars. Curtis and I had about 10 to 15 cars roughly. Yeah. And that's that's how this started. I mean, now we carry 75 on an average, you know.

SPEAKER_00 28:46

Um, and that seems to by like be your lane. It is like where where you are most comfortable.

SPEAKER_02 28:55

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 28:55

That's right there.

SPEAKER_02 28:56

Yeah. Um and we've moved through a few niches over the years. Um, me personally, where I'm at now, myself within the company, is we're looking at you know, eight to ten cool cars on the showroom floor. Yeah, that's really become my niche. So I somewhat manage the high-end sports cars, the classic cars, the muscle cars, the built four by four trucks.

SPEAKER_00 29:20

Um that's that's stuff that you drag off to Barrett Jackson.

SPEAKER_02 29:23

Yeah, Barrett, just got back from Barrett a couple months ago, had a lot of success there again. You're 13, I think, in a row. We've done that now. Um, that's where I spend my time and energies. And then the, you know, my my family, my employees, uh, right? Uh, they're not really family, but they're like my family. They are they they're managing the outside lot, they're talking to customers as they've walked in while we're talking, you know, they're they're answering phones. Um so we have a good we have a good little niche going and it works for us right now. Yeah, what we're doing.

Freedom, Community Stories, And Impact

SPEAKER_00 29:53

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. That's awesome. Yeah. Um is there something that that this has given you that you didn't expect from the business?

SPEAKER_02 30:04

Um I mean, freedom. There's no doubt about that. Sure. You know, freedom. Uh again, if you didn't know where where I came from, right? If you didn't know where I started and nothing was nothing was given to me in this life. And so just the grind, you know, and that I and it's it's still a motivating factor is the grind to do better. Uh sometimes it shows, sometimes it doesn't, you know. My crew laughs at me if I come in at 10, 10 30, but they don't care. You know, so uh I'm likely not going to be the one that locks the doors when we're when we're getting out of here at night. But that's okay. I've earned that. You have. And they're making, they're making, you know, uh, they're making a paycheck to to be here and they and they accept it. And they they I think hopefully knock on wood, they enjoy what they do. They tell me they do. I don't know if they're lying or not, but but they tell me they enjoy doing it. So um, so I mean, I don't know. I I think just just uh the people that I meet, the contacts that I run into. Um I ran into some people a couple nights ago. I was at the mayor's ball just a couple nights ago, and these people go, Oh, hey, you have 505 motorsports, and I go, Yeah, and they go, We bought a car from you, and two days later we got hit by a semi-truck and it totaled. Yeah. I was like, what a horrible story. And uh they go, yeah, we came in and we came in and told you about it. And I'm like, I I just don't remember. I mean, I'm getting old, but I don't remember that. And they're like, well, it was in 2014, and I'm like, oh, okay, okay, I get it. You know, I've met a lot of people and all that, but we just sort of picked up into a really cool conversation, and so and then it starts slowly kind of coming back. Oh, I remember it was, and I always remember the vehicles, not so much faces or names, but but I tell, oh, the Black Range Rover, yeah, I remember that one. That one was really cool. I got that from such and such. So I think that just the stories, and I do it gets a little old and tiresome, but I always enjoy when somebody comes in and says, Oh, my uncle's brothers, cousins, twin sisters, aunt had one of those 1970, you know, Mustangs. And so you always know you're gonna get a story when you run into those people. But um, but you know, being in business for myself, it's been very rewarding and my family, my kids are all successful, we're empty nesters, they've all flown the coop and they're all doing their own stuff. Yeah, um, and so just to see where they're going and taking bits and pieces of mom and dad with them and kind of what they've watched us do, it's it's nice to see them apply that to their lives. So those are things I didn't expect. That's awesome. Yeah, that can be passed on, yeah. You know, yeah, that's perfect. I don't think any of them want to be a part of the business, which is okay too.

SPEAKER_00 32:34

That's fine.

SPEAKER_02 32:35

Yeah, it's it's totally cool. I got no problem with that. They they they they all have their own passions and their own cars are my passion, and they all have their own things that they're involved in. And I don't see them coming back someday and saying, Hey, let me take over the the business. Uh but that's perfectly fine. Yeah, I'm not I'm not worried about that. So um, but they're all so far, knock on wood, they're all doing great, very successful. I got four kids floating all over the country now and they're doing great. So yeah, so yeah, it's very rewarding.

Why Selling Cars Isn’t Easy

SPEAKER_00 33:02

Is there something here that um that people like a part of running the business that people assume is easy, but definitely isn't?

SPEAKER_02 33:10

Selling cars, yeah. I mean, literally, like like uh we offer a consignment program. Okay, so if you don't want to sell your car yourself, if you don't want to have people come to your house and drive your car, if you don't want to advertise it, if you don't know how to use a computer, whatever it is, we offer a consignment program. And it it amazes me how many people will come and say, I've been trying to sell this car for six months and I can't get it sold. Yeah, you know, and we just heard you do consignments, and so we, you know, we take that car and knock on wood, we we sell it quickly, and they're like, How how? How do you well it's just kind of what we do? I mean, we we have contacts, we have advertising, we have uh banks who'll do loans, we have the ability of taking cars on trade or you know, campers on trade or razors on trade or whatever it is. We we have a lot more options than just you know, Joe Blow on the street trying to sell their car on the corner, and so but I think you know, selling selling cars, um, a lot of people just don't grasp that. Right.

SPEAKER_00 34:12

Yeah, yeah, it's it's um for a lot of people that's a big purchase. Right. I mean, even if it's a used car, it's still you don't often go out and spend multiple thousands of dollars on something. Right. So cars and houses, those are for the average person, those are the two biggest things you'll ever spend. I've always heard, yeah. And so yeah, I mean, when you're a person that you spend every day of your life doing something besides that, right, and then you find yourself in the situation I have to do this thing, and I have one option to buy this, right? Cash. Right, right, or to sell it. Yeah, you need to pay me cash, yeah. But that's the only option. Yeah. So um it it is makes it that much more difficult.

SPEAKER_02 34:54

Yeah, and I I still recognize that, you know, even though you and I are sitting next, there's a beautiful silver 1982 Jimmy uh truck, GMC truck sitting right there. I just bought that last week out of Albuquerque. Uh the guy had it advertised on Facebook Marketplace. I I saw it, and I love I'm a sucker for old trucks.

SPEAKER_00 35:14

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 35:14

And I look at it and I contact the guy back and forth for like four or five days, look at it, and I go, okay, I'll buy it. He goes, Well, do you want to come see it? I'm like, nah, I don't need to see it. Yeah, I don't need to see it. I mean, you've got pictures here. I I I'm I'm good. And so the guy was kind of like, wow, that's I don't think I've ever met anybody that you know pays like$40,000 and you never even came to saw it, came to see it. And I'm like, Well, I I I see enough. We're good, we're good. So yeah, but I still recognize that for a lot of people. Yeah. That's awesome. Yep.

Consignment, Financing, And Options

SPEAKER_00 35:44

Yeah, I mean, that's something I didn't think of, but it makes total sense until you just said it that you know, when you're an individual person trying to sell a car, you're not gonna finance the thing for them. You're not gonna, there's like the only one option. Right. You need somebody to come and give you pay cash check if you're comfortable with doing that. I wouldn't advise it, but yeah, cash. Yeah, cash and it's not really an option for a lot of people.

SPEAKER_02 36:10

Or they have to go to their own bank and get a loan where we can we can provide that, you know, all within house. You know, so so people show up and an hour later they're driving out and and you know, your vehicle that you've asked me to sell for you, and it's just it's streamlined and then give it a couple days and they come collect a check from us. There it works out great. Yeah, yeah. So yeah, so yeah, that I mean it's that's been good. You know, in my own personal life, I say that cars are the only thing within my household that my wife does not give me any flack over purchasing, right? And I in a joking but true way, like, hey babe, look what I just bought today, right? And she'll be like, Yeah, okay. I'm like, no, do you understand what this is? And she's like, Yeah, whatever. Sure, sure. Yeah, but I'm like, hey, I want to, you know, at the house, I want to build an outdoor kitchen. She's like, nah, maybe we should talk about that. I'm like, well, all right, I'll stick with what I know. Uh which is what my accountant says, too. Hey, you should, you know, I just recently I said I kind of got into the bourbon business and I called my accountant about it. He goes, What do you know about bourbon? And I said, It tastes good. That was my exact answer. It tastes great. And he goes, Well, uh, you're really good at selling cars. Maybe you should just reinvest and do more cars. And I'm like, no, I want to get in the bourbon business. And so so sure enough, my myself and six others in Farmington started a new uh new bourbon company called Burnt Tavern, uh based out of Lexington, Kentucky. And um, we call it Farmtucky because you know, here we are, Farmington guys uh brewing up some bourbon in in Kentucky. So we have our farmtucky, but uh, but yeah, it's been a fun venture so far, about a year and a half in, and so um we're we're really having fun playing in that business. Yeah.

Bourbon Venture And Staying With Strengths

SPEAKER_00 37:52

Oh man. Um, is is there any is there like some kind of obstacle that you faced over the past year that that in where so we're moving past? I know this was kind of a probably a a really stressful thing going through the process of of what you were going through with the other building and then uh what do we do? And like find a new location and everything, and stress about that because you were in a highly visible location over there. Sure. And then like ah, what's gonna happen? But turns out great. Right. Great move. It did. So after that, is there's is there like something um that you didn't expect to face, like some kind of obstacle that you didn't expect to face?

Obstacles, Pricing Sweet Spot, Adaptation

SPEAKER_02 38:33

I mean, the day-to-day, of course, I don't think there's been anything dramatic. Um, it was quite an adventure. I mean, we had to spend a lot of money to to move into the building. We had to prep this building for our needs. We had to spend a lot of money on fencing and we put in a beautiful sliding glass door to open up our showroom and let us pull cars in here. Um but I mean, we haven't had any major obstacles. We have, I told you earlier, we've kind of we've we jump in and out of niche markets for whatever works for 505. Yeah. And I think right now we're in a niche market where for us at this location, we're trying to keep the pricing of cars under about$20,000, with the exception of the showroom cars. But I mean, the cars out on the lot and cars that we're advertising on the daily, you know, those are those are our market at this location has been maybe like in that 15 to 20,000 as our sweet spot. We we have some trucks out there that are more. Yeah. But we're finding that as a year and a half being here, what what clientele is driving by? You talked about visibility. Um, what clientele is checking out our advertising places? You know, we advertise in a variety of places. A website and Facebook and all the all the books, you know, you do that. But then radio and we try and find all the different markets to advertise in. Um, so where are we getting that response and then what what is that clientele base? So I don't think it's any different than probably most business owners or companies. It's it always changes, it always evolves. And I do think that you just have to be present to know, like, hey, if this isn't working, what are you gonna do? Have have a backup plan, you know, B C D all the way to Z, because I've had it all. I mean, over 30 plus years in the car biz, uh, we've made a lot of changes. Um, so so I I think that also just goes back to there isn't there isn't a playbook to owning a company. There isn't a playbook to running your own business, no matter what it is. Right. There's not a playbook.

SPEAKER_03 40:34

No.

SPEAKER_02 40:35

Um, we we had an employee who who was working for us not too long ago, great kid, 16 years old, high school kid. Um, but he would come in and I would poke fun at him if he was sitting here with us and be like, listen, every day he walked in was kind of a new day, and like, hey, don't forget what what you're doing today, right? Like, so I created a playbook for him. Like, every day we're gonna take the trash out, we're gonna wipe these cars down, we're gonna make sure we have our license plates on, we're gonna do all this stuff. Uh, and there were several days we'd get off script and he would be, hey, go do this today. We can't we can't stick to that playbook. Now we gotta go do this. And yeah, so I think with anybody, you have to have flexibility and be able to adapt to to what what the business throws your way because literally there's not no two days that seem to be the same.

SPEAKER_00 41:19

Yeah. Do you do you find it's easier? Um like there are some big car dealerships. We have got a lot of car dealerships in town. A lot. There's there are some big ones. Do you find it is easier for you and the size that you're at to um not pivot because that could that could potentially go outside of your brand and what you're known for, but like Bob and Weave easier than the big guys. Uh-huh. You you were talking about different niches, like we're doing this now and then we're gonna do this. Right. And and a a bigger businesses find that very difficult to do. Like that engine is very hard to re-steer.

SPEAKER_02 41:58

Right. Yeah, I mean, I have two thoughts on that. Number one was when we first got into the car business a long time ago, um, we looked at a lot of dealers around the area and they seem to stick to one theme, right? We want the newest, the best of used cars on our lot, or these other guys, or we want the worst of the worst used cars on our lot. And I'm like, why? If you're a quote unquote used car dealer, 505 Motorsports sells used cars, why would we capture ourselves in one market only? Why not sell anywhere from a thousand dollar car when you have an opportunity to a hundred thousand dollar car? Absolutely. Because I can do that. I mean, I have with my New Mexico dealer license, there are no restrictions as to what used car I can sell.

SPEAKER_01 42:45

Right.

Small, Nimble, And Staying In Lane

SPEAKER_02 42:45

So, so I I I would say, yeah, what you're saying is pretty accurate. I can I can tailor my business uh a little more broad spectrum of of whatever niche market works at that moment. I mean, it's it the car market or any business is is just like the stock market, right? There's an up and there's down. Yes, definitely. As the economy is good, maybe we're selling cars that are a little more expensive. And as economy, you know, is did I say up? When the economy's up, we're selling a little bit higher car. Sure. When the economy's down, maybe we're having to revert to a little bit lower priced car. So so there is that, but um, but I've had opportunities. The second part of that answer is I've had opportunities to open other dealerships. I've had people say, hey, I I I'm getting ready to sell this building over here, this would be a great place to have 505 Motorsports West or 505 Motorsports East or whatever it is. Yeah. Um I have found that if you don't live above your means, if you play within, you know, the parameters that you're comfortable with, I don't want to open another business. Just because you open another business doesn't mean you're gonna make more money. Right. I mean, that really is you might have twice the overhead. You're gonna so you might be making the same amount of money with twice the stress and twice the overhead.

SPEAKER_00 44:00

You potentially double your opportunities, but you most definitely double your logistics, your problems, your whatever, everything else.

SPEAKER_02 44:10

So yeah, and and it's just for where I'm at now, and that's why I started kind of branching into some other stuff that we've already talked about is I love cars. That's my go-to. Like I like if if I didn't even own 505 Motorsports, I would be selling cars on my own, like right out my front yard. Like that's just who I am. You know, you you see some of these old retired guys that are 80 plus, God bless you, you know, that are just flipping some cars out in the street corner.

SPEAKER_00 44:33

Because they just love it. That would be me.

SPEAKER_02 44:34

Yeah, that totally would be me. Yeah. So uh so I hope I hope I can someday. But I have had opportunities to to get bigger, to grow, to open another location, and that's just I'm not interested in that.

SPEAKER_00 44:45

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 44:45

I'm not uh, you know, I'm happy to see there are uh a lot of dealers in town that have grown. There's a lot of dealers that have, you know, bought other dealerships out. You know, there's a well known name in town that that seems to keep growing and growing, and that's great. Uh, it's just not for me. Sure. That's not what I'm interested in doing.

SPEAKER_00 45:04

Yeah, everybody's got their Lane. Yeah. And the easiest way to stay out of trouble is to stay in your lane. Yeah. You know? 100%. I mean, it's not always what you want to do, but you know, for the people that are like super ambitious and they want to, you know, ever own every car dealership in the state. Right. Sure, there's a path for that. And you've got to really go out there and but if that's not what you're trying to do, and you know, and you find what works for you and you're happy and everything's blazing around, you know, on whole cylinders, and you're thinking, yeah, this is it. And and to try and upset that boat, you could potentially knock everybody off.

Risk Management And Not Overextending

SPEAKER_02 45:42

So yeah, and I just don't want, I don't want the exposure. I mean, I do feel uh sadly, you know, right? Like right now we're kind of in this little war situation with Iran and stuff, and and who knows where that could go. Well, I would hate to see that that it gets a little closer to home, or financially it starts to wreak havoc within the United States. And then you have these companies that are suffering. Maybe they're they've they're overextended. They, you know what I mean? Banks start banks start reeling in bank loans and things like that. And that's not how I've set up my success. I I I try and stay within my lane, that was a great term, and and my own financial abilities to where if something does go bad, I I'm not gonna drown. I I'll I'll be okay. I'll survive that. Yeah. So so I don't want that exposure. So um that's kind of how I run my my businesses.

SPEAKER_00 46:34

It's so funny, just all those little like little tidbits of advice you get out of books or speakers or whatever, you know, stay open to opportunities, be financial responsible. Like these seem like, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. But like that's how you live and it shows. Yeah. Like there's an actual result to that.

SPEAKER_02 46:55

There is. Like literally, if if something happened and I mean, if I got sick, right? If I got sick and had to close this business down, well, I can sell the property because now I'm buying it. That's great. Uh so I'm in a good financial situation there. The cars are paid for. I can, you know, but that didn't happen overnight either. Right. So so there's the situation where it didn't just all happen overnight. And it's a long-term strategy that you sort of have to build towards. Um, my wife could never work for me. Just example. Sure. She, you know, she'll be like, well, well, like what's what what what's our budget this year? What's our goals this year? What what what's our five-year plan? And a lot of businesses strictly work off of those. Sure. That's not what I do because I felt like I would be setting myself up for failure. Like, like, oh, I didn't hit my goal this month or this year, or five years from now, I wasn't where I want to be. I think to me, that'd be a in my fragile little world, I guess. I don't know. I I just I I would hate to be faced with like, you didn't accomplish what you wanted to accomplish. Right. Versus, I don't really know what it's gonna look like in five years, but when I get there, I hope I'm okay. Yeah. And if I do make it there, then well, it was a success. Like I didn't that's the way I want to run my life. That's the way I want to run the business. Like, like, is there money in the checking account? Yeah. Awesome. Are the bills getting paid? Yeah. That's a success. Done. Yeah, done. So so yeah, I mean, it's it's an I don't know, it's it's a simplistic way of looking at it. But that is true. My wife couldn't do it. My wife is a planner, my wife is kind of a budgeter. My wife would be like, hey, you're writing a check for that car. You know we don't have the money for that, right? And I'm like, Yeah, it's fine, we'll make it work. She's like, what do you mean you're gonna make it work? We don't have the money for it. Yeah, but we'll make it work. It's just that's I got it as an opportunity. I have to buy that car. I I I have to have that. So uh and and then um, yeah, sometimes sometimes my banker might call and say, Hey, you wrote that check. What are you doing?

SPEAKER_01 48:55

Yeah, I'll be like, ah, don't worry about it. We'll take care of it. Watch. Yeah, just watch. Hold my beer. Yeah, hold my beer. Yeah, I'll cover it. Don't worry.

Simple Systems, Flexibility, No Playbook

SPEAKER_02 49:03

No, they're they're they're cool. And I say that all jokingly, but but you do learn, you know, running a business or having a business that it doesn't always work. Right. And and businesses do fail. They do. I'm not I'm not oblivious to that. But I just think working hard, having good ethics, taking care of people, um that is another thing we really haven't touched on, is like living in a smaller community, right? Like I I want to run a good business, I want to be a good steward to the community, I want to be a good steward to people. I don't ever want to put somebody in a bind by selling them a car. That's a problem. So there is plenty of situations where I sell a car and they come back, you know, maybe a week or two or a month later and say, hey, I'm I I'm a single mom or single dad, I gotta get these kids off to school and I've got my my vehicle's not running right. Well, let me fix it for you. Because that's not I don't want to be the the guy in town that's like, well, too bad you bought it so long. See you later. You're on your own, not my problem. And so um, and so then that touches just on the on the the final part of my life would be like when I die, is anybody gonna show up to a funeral, right? If there is one, but is anybody gonna show up? And then what are they gonna say? And so I think living your life and running your business on somewhat similar ground is I want people to say, Oh, you guys remember when 505 was around? That was a cool place. Or we, you know, those guys treated us good, and I it's kind of the same thing. Small town, you need a good reputation. Yeah, you you you can't be the known as the dealer in town selling crappy cars and not taking care of people. You want you want especially in a small town, especially in a small town. Selled lincha. Yeah, yeah. So so that's not who we are or how we run the business. And sometimes we win, sometimes we lose. You know, ultimately we want to make a profit. We don't we don't have to make it all on one sale, but uh, but small profits add up over time, and so that's that's what we're all about. We just we just enjoy what we do, and again, I mean we're here, right? We got people walking in the door, you can hear our the ding the door dinger, yeah. And we just hope they keep coming in. And I just heard cash. This maybe gentlemen looking to pay cash for a car. So that works out good.

SPEAKER_00 51:11

Nice, yeah, yeah. You mentioned um success a minute ago. What how has that changed for you? Like your definition of success when you first started compared to say now, and how has that changed over time?

Long Game, Resilience, And Reputation

SPEAKER_02 51:26

Um, I mean, I'd be lying if I said like there wasn't financial success, right? So there is financial success. I mean, I I was blessed to be able to, my wife and I to be able to build a house five years ago that we think would be our forever house. So so there is the financial success. Sure, that's great. Again, didn't happen overnight, you know. So so um so to have to have a little breathing space, our kids are all gone, we're what we call empty nesters, right? So we can travel a little bit more. And um she still works, she's a school nurse at Navajo Prep here in town. I mean, so it's not like you know, she's sitting at home as as I like to joke with her, you know, eating bun buns on the couch watching Oprah. I mean, you know, it's we're not we're not doing that. So so there is that, but um, but you know, you're the other thing, and you even touched on it too, was success for me is knowing that my kids have grown up in a good household. Right. They now have their own relationships in life, they're all either married or on their ways to being married, and um, and so they're all successful. And and we like to think my wife and I like to think that we've kind of sent them out the door with with the tools to be successful. They've watched us work hard, they've watched us struggle, they've watched us succeed.

SPEAKER_00 52:41

And how you react to those situations, right? You do in those situations, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 52:45

Yeah, yeah. And and to be able to kind of pass that along to our kids and now see the successes they're already having, you know, at at such uh young ages for you know, in their in their early 30s down to 22 is my youngest. And so um that's success, you know. I mean, driving by and seeing your business, that's success. We talked about that. Yeah. Um, having people come or people come up to you at events and saying, hey, you know, we bought a car there and got hit by a semi, but but you know, it was a good car for the two days we had it, that's success, you know. Like it's just yeah, I don't know.

SPEAKER_00 53:19

I I know I don't really think of it. Um I think it was purposefully open-ended, right? Because success means if you just say success, right? That means a lot of different things to a lot of different people. Some people will go right towards the money, the financial end of it. Some people go towards the feeling, right? And the maybe quality and that sort of thing. So it was purposefully open-ended.

SPEAKER_02 53:40

Yeah, the first thing you think about when you say success is like the financial end of it, right? So so yeah, I've been able to enjoy some successes financially, of course. Uh I'm not stacking, you know, money in my closet and right, and and and you know, living on that. It's we we still make a paycheck, we still pay the bills just like everybody else, still put my pants on one leg at a time. I mean, this is so so that's the first thing you think of. But really, success as I am getting older is, you know, can I not have to work until the day they put me in the ground? Right. Success. Can I can I can I make some uh make some changes in my life to where we can in our older years be able to, you know, travel a little bit and go see the kids where they live. And so so yeah, success comes in many different ways. I think success is as long as you keep doing what you love doing, as long as you want to do it. Right. That's my success. Yeah. And as long as I love it, as long as I can do it until the day I don't want to do it, that's success.

SPEAKER_00 54:40

Yeah, yeah, yeah. We're built for doing things, not comfort. Right. Right. We're built for the struggle, we're built for the you can define struggle all kinds of different ways, but we're built for doing things, being in motion, right, doing things. Right. So yeah, if you can continue to do things up until the very, very end, and you love those things, I mean what else is there? That's success right there.

SPEAKER_02 55:11

Yeah. And again, I mean, I I say this again is that I'm putting my pants on the same as anybody. I'm putting my pants on the same as uh the poor guy whose business maybe didn't succeed. And and now he's trying to figure out a way to come back from that, right? So, so there's no difference. I still have bills to pay. I still, you know, so so yeah, I think as long as you know, the uh the the main thing is it's a lot easier to go to work every day if you enjoy it than if you're going to work and you hate your job. Yeah, that's no fun. So so find something you enjoy doing and and try and make that your career or try and make that a goal to find something you enjoy or something you're good at or something you can give back to others, um that I think is success.

SPEAKER_00 55:59

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 55:59

Yeah.

Defining Success: Money, Family, Time

SPEAKER_00 56:00

So I I was just about to ask you, like, if is there anything that you want to say to other business owners? And it might be that, but like if you have advice for other business owners, just or maybe not even advice, just something you want business owners to hear.

SPEAKER_02 56:14

Well, I mean, business owners, it's a it's a I've had a lot of opportunities of late in the last five years, I've had a lot of people come to me and say, Hey, I have a good idea. Would you be interested in wanting to start this business? Right. And so I'm like, that sounds like a great idea. Where I'm at in my life, so talking to other business owners is do you have the bandwidth? Are you young enough to deal with staffing issues? Start deal with starting out hurdles, right? Stumbling blocks. I've been doing this 30 plus years. I there's probably not a lot of hurdles that I haven't been over in 30 years in the car business. So for me to start over, I think staffing is very difficult, not just in Farmington, New Mexico, but everywhere, everywhere in the country. It's a universal difficulty. So so there's that. So the flip side of that coin, if I was going to give advice, would be I treat my staff, and there's not many of them, I treat them like they're my family. I called them my family when we were talking because I'm only as good as they are.

SPEAKER_03 57:22

Yeah.

Practical Wisdom For Owners And Leaders

SPEAKER_02 57:23

If they're showing up and they're doing what they're supposed to be doing and they're selling cars, getting cars ready, buying cars, whatever it is, I'm only as good as my staff. And so, so, and I want them to know that. Like, like, so if I was going to give advice to other business owners, it's you know, you're hiring them to make you look good, or you're hiring them to uh run your business when you're not there. So treat them as such. Yeah. And and um, my son, my son, he was 19 years old living in Seattle, Washington at the time, and was in between jobs and said, Hey, I have an offer, I have an offer on the table to go wash dishes at a pizza restaurant,$11 an hour. I said, Well, let me ask you this if you're not gonna go wash dishes for$11 an hour, what are you gonna do? I don't know. I guess you should go wash dishes for$11 an hour. Okay, fast forward seven years. Okay, that one pizza restaurant has now grown into, I want to say 13, just uh 13, and they are one of the fastest growing uh franchise opportunity lists right now. They just opened a new franchise in Tempe, Arizona. They're getting ready to open one in Frisco, Texas in June. My son is now the head of the franchise department. There's three owners, and he's the general manager of the company. Yeah, so he went from$11 an hour to over six figures a year, plus bonus, plus gas cards, plus plus, plus health insurance and everything, because they saw the value of that one employee. Right. So business owners do recognize value of employees. Yeah. So take that employee and keep him so you don't lose them to somebody else or her. I say that, you know, him or her to somebody else, because those are the employees that make the business owner look good, that that keep the business owner from being down here till you know 1 a.m. every day and back opening up at 7 a.m. Yeah. So that that's my advice. Take care of your staff and your people. I know a lot of companies here in town who do that. I I I hear about them all the time, and different business owners come and talk to me, or I talk to them. Sure. And so I know how valuable that is. Um, and then maybe lastly, would be I don't ever take myself too seriously. Um I had a situation where uh I was being shopped heavily for a new insurance company. So I had four insurance companies wanting our business for an insurance. And the insurance company who I was with, they didn't win out this time. I'd been with them about three years. Fantastic. Love them all. I like friends. I that just and I said, hey, you know, sorry, I I'm gonna have to switch. This one is a little better opportunity for me, a little saving in the in the pocketbook, better coverage. And he was cool enough to be like, man, that's fine. Don't worry about it. We're still friends, it's not a big deal. Right. Well, that's the way I don't take myself too seriously. If you, who you have bought a truck from me in the past, uh went and bought your next car somewhere else, I would never walk up to you and be like, what the heck, Ken? You didn't buy your vehicles from me. What are you doing, man? Yeah, so so I'm never taking myself so seriously that I feel like my acquaintances, my people, everybody in my life should only be buying cars from me and 505 Motorsports. That's ridiculous. So don't think too high of yourself as a business owner. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 1:00:43

So speaking of that, I was just talking with RG about it. Um, gotta talk about the videos, man. Oh, geez. The uh the advertising, yes. The first one I saw, it's been a little while now. The first one I saw, two things went through my head. One, it I just started cracking up immediately. The other was that is brilliant. Like absolutely brilliant. They're just ridiculous, but man, they just fit like you, you know. I have never seen you as like a goofball, but I've just seen you as a good person. And that very thing that you say, just like don't take yourself so seriously. Right. So you feel comfortable enough with yourself to where you could stand in front of a camera and do some goofy idea that you just dreamed up. Oh, within minutes. Yes, and throw that out there. Yeah, and it's brilliant.

Don’t Take Yourself Too Seriously

SPEAKER_02 1:01:38

Yeah, so um, so we have been using a new ad agency for us out of Durango uh called Ascent Digital Advertising. They're great people, they're homegrown as well, they're all local to the Four Corners area. And uh so I I it started with just these ideas of uh they came to me and said, Hey, we we want to shoot some some silly little commercials for the social medias, Facebook, um TikTok, and what's what's the Instagram? Thank you. That's how old I am. I don't even know the names of these things. So so anyway, so so uh they they send me over like some ideas, like, hey, before we get there to shoot in two days, look at these ideas and see what you think. I never even opened the email. I just didn't. I'm like, so they show up and they're like, well, what did you think of that? And I'm like, oh yeah, I didn't look at it. They're like, well, we're here to shoot commercials. Well, I don't let's figure it out. Like, I don't, and and so the guy goes, um his name is Matthew, Matt. He does my video production stuff, and he says, uh, like, wouldn't it be fun if we just did kind of like like like you're just blowing through the door like you're buying a car, and like the aha, I'm here, look at me. Like, look at me, I'm here. Yeah, and so so I said, Hey, you know, we took a car in on trade not too long ago, and when we popped the trunk, there was a fur coat in the trunk of that car. And it was three sizes too small for me. It's like a women's small. And uh, and so I said, Wait, okay, let's put let's put this little fur coat on and let me blast through the doors, put some sunglasses on, and I'm here. Where do I sign? Show me the X to sign, right? And so it was one of our biggest ads we've ever done. They put like the Macklamore uh pop and tags, the music behind it. Yeah, and I tell you, I knew it was a success when like people from church and like all oh, by the way, the Macklamore song had some cuss words in it, right? And I said, no, no, no, we're not doing that. And I'm not approved, don't get me wrong, I'm not, but I'm like, that doesn't go with what I want to represent. Yeah, so so if you want to run the edited version of that song, I'm perfectly fine with it. And it was such a hit. And I got people from church and people like my friends who live in Texas and all over the country were hitting me up, like, what in the world? Where did that come from? Like, and they're like, We've never known you to be like that. And I'm like, honestly, it's the old inner clay coming out, right? Like, I don't know. And now, so my daughter also does. She recently graduated Grand Canyon University and she does some digital advertising. And in the future, I'll be using her, she's growing her business and stuff. And um, and so she's she's doing fantastic. And she texts me literally about a week ago and said, Do you realize you have 15,000 followers on TikTok? I'm like, first off, I don't even have a TikTok account. So how would I know that? I have no idea what that is. Right. And she goes, All of your videos go on there and you have 15,000 followers. And she's like, I am so jealous right now. Because she's trying to get followers for her business. And yeah, I said, Well, listen, if you just want to act a fool and not care about it, right? Have fun, don't take yourself seriously. That's it. It works, I guess. That is exactly it. So, anyway, we've had a lot of fun with with those videos. Sometimes they work. I I drag RJ into them and he hates me for it. He yeah, he hates me. There's some new ones coming out that are pretty funny as well. So, organic.

SPEAKER_00 1:05:05

That's what makes them so brilliant, is because so many people are not willing to stand in front of a camera and do that. Yeah, I have no shame, I guess.

SPEAKER_02 1:05:13

Yeah, I have no shame.

SPEAKER_00 1:05:15

I don't you did what you were taking selfies, they wanted pictures. Yeah, yeah, but selfies.

SPEAKER_02 1:05:20

Yeah, like, well, can we see some pictures before we buy it? And then I'm like, yeah, sure.

SPEAKER_00 1:05:24

Sultry selfies.

unknown 1:05:25

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:05:26

Taking pictures of myself, and then they're like, no, of the car.

SPEAKER_00 1:05:29

Of the car.

SPEAKER_03 1:05:30

Oh.

Viral Ads, Authentic Humor, And Reach

SPEAKER_02 1:05:33

Well, it's all organic, it's organic silliness. Yeah. And it just really does stem back to whether you're successful or not, you do have to laugh. It's fun to make other people laugh. Yeah. And uh, if you can get paid doing what you love, that's a that's a bonus. We all have to get paid for something. We gotta feed our families, but uh, but it really is a lot of fun, and I've had a good run. I've said I've been saying this since I was 40, literally 40, so now I'm 53. I've already said. If I died tomorrow, I could say that it was a fantastic run. It was a fantastic run. Like I my entire family, nobody in my family lived past 50. So my dad, my dad died at 50. Wow. Uh, I've had three brothers that have all passed away. My my oldest brother was 46 when he passed away, and then 39 and 38. Um, some of them were tragic accidents, but my dad and my oldest brother were uh health-related issues. So I do kind of take my health somewhat seriously at this point, but yeah, I'm dead serious when I say that. It's like I've had a great run. Like, I mean, why why am I the one out of out of uh four of us, my my dad and my three brothers, why am and my mom's past, and why am I the one that's still here? Yeah, and uh that brings some some humbleness that brings like grateful, grateful, yeah, gratefulness. That that just brings like you're not bigger, you're not bigger than who you think you are. Sure. Just just go do. Do your thing, have fun, put a smile on people's face, treat people the way you would like to be treated, and things will organically, I've said it over and over, fall into place. And so now you do have to put in your time. Yeah, you do definitely. You got to put in your time. Unless you hit the lottery. And I haven't bought a lottery ticket in a while, but yeah, you can't sit on the couch and wait for it to fall on your lap. Yeah, it's tough. I don't know, maybe anymore, right? Like like there was a joke not too long ago about somebody making millions of dollars showing their feet on OnlyFans or something like that. So I do think I missed the boat. I got good feet, right? So I need to rethink my strategy. Yeah, or my thumbs or something. I don't know.

SPEAKER_00 1:07:45

And there's something for everybody. So maybe I wouldn't have to shave them and I could just do that. Just totally. It's gotta be somebody out there in the hair.

SPEAKER_02 1:07:52

Yeah, my toes are a little fuzzy, but but but I I you know, kudos to that person, right? Like they they they figured it out early that found their niche. Yeah, from the couch or or the bed that their feet are gonna make a million. So brilliant. So yeah, so now I'm actually rethinking my strategy. This car thing is a lot of work. My feet go with me everywhere I go. So yeah. Nah, it's it's good. It's good. So um combine the two.

SPEAKER_00 1:08:21

Do that stereotypical view of your feet hanging out the car window. Hey, there's an idea for next time.

SPEAKER_02 1:08:31

Stay tuned. Stay tuned. We're gonna have some feet hanging out a window and post that on uh CarsforSale.com and OnlyFans combined ads. Yeah. Making my millions. Well my God.

SPEAKER_00 1:08:46

Uh man, it's always fun to chat with you. I appreciate it. It's and I I've been meaning to come down. I can't believe like time flies so fast. I can't believe it's been like a year and a half now. Is that?

SPEAKER_02 1:08:58

Yeah, uh August, August of 24, and here we are, what, you know, March. It's almost two years, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 1:09:04

Yeah. It's taken me this long to get down here. So that's a travesty.

SPEAKER_02 1:09:07

Yeah, you know, the funny thing too is you talked about um you were a little worried after we left out there because of the high visibility. We soon learned we had high visibility, but I don't know that it was good visibility. Just because maybe so you're on a road where people are going by at like 55 miles an hour. I don't after being here, San Juan Boulevard is like the traffic flow on here is great at should be 35 miles an hour. People go by here at 100 every day. But like, yeah, but we do have a lot of visibility where we are now, and we're finding that there are more people turning into our car lot now than we ever had out there. So just the the you know, you're always gonna have your people who are attracted to you on your ads, you know. Um, but but the as far as people coming onto the lot, we have much, much higher traffic count on this property than we had out there. And so amazing.

SPEAKER_00 1:10:03

I didn't think it either. I didn't think that. Literally, I but as you're describing it and I'm thinking it through, I'm thinking, yeah, I think there's something to that.

SPEAKER_02 1:10:11

That was a lot of pass-through traffic. There's a lot of pass-through traffic over there. Um, here is a little more deliberate traffic, and we're finding that people, you know, we're capturing a lot of drive-by traffic that will just turn in because they kind of see our sign or they see our cars out here, which is great. But they're going a little bit slower pace, and so we're getting a little bit better headcount. So um, and I think we've been in, you know, maybe we have some brand recognition, maybe some name recognition since 2010 is when we opened. Right. You know, they hear 505 motorsports. There are a lot of 505 businesses now. Yeah, there are, but uh, I don't ever think that you know I was the first one that had 505 or should be the last one that had a 505. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 1:10:55

So it's like San Juan. Yeah, exactly. Yeah, bunch of those.

SPEAKER_02 1:10:59

Yeah, so yeah, so it's good, but uh when did you buy your Titan? And do you still have it?

SPEAKER_00 1:11:05

I do still have it. Yeah. I've been thinking about coming down and chatting with you about that. I have another one, I have another Titan, yeah. When was that? Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:11:15

I'm thinking like maybe 15. Was it 2015? Was it 10 years ago?

SPEAKER_00 1:11:20

Maybe somewhere in there.

Location Visibility And Real Traffic

SPEAKER_02 1:11:21

Yeah, that's what I was roughly. That's kind of what I'm thinking. So yeah. I always remember it because it was the gold titan, the only gold titan in Farmington.

SPEAKER_00 1:11:30

And can I tell people on Mike kind of how that evolved a little bit?

SPEAKER_02 1:11:35

Yeah, refresh me.

SPEAKER_00 1:11:36

Because I had a Jeep.

SPEAKER_02 1:11:38

Yeah, I remember the Jeep.

SPEAKER_00 1:11:39

And it was on a loan. I was paying on that thing. And um I just came to you and I said, dude, this is what I need to get out from underneath the loan. I can't have a loan anymore. And um, what do you got? And so you showed me a few, right? And uh I had my eye on a different one that wasn't one of the few that showed me that we could make make a deal on. Um and uh you said, All right, well, that one's a little bit different deal. So we worked out some some mutual mutually beneficial trades to to get that deal done. So basically I walked away from a loan and uh had a vehicle. Yeah, yeah. That was amazing. Yeah, no, that's great. And you actually had that thing sold, I think, before we um uh finished paperwork, the Jeep.

SPEAKER_02 1:12:30

Oh, the Jeep, yeah, probably, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 1:12:32

Because I mean it's a it was a Wrangler, so yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:12:35

I think we have about eight Wranglers on our lot now because we just we do so well with Jeep Wranglers. I mean, so yeah, uh the Farmington obviously being kind of a SUV-ish and four by four country. This is the Jeeps have done really well for us. But I remember I these are the two things I remember about your your truck, is the only gold Titan I've ever seen. Right, maybe to this day.

SPEAKER_00 1:12:55

I wasn't actually a fan of the gold color.

SPEAKER_02 1:12:58

Yeah, you gotta be careful where you go because you're spotted. I see it all the time. Uh, and then it had like a like a uh a muffler on it that sounded like you were racing everywhere. Yeah, it was a mean sound to it.

SPEAKER_00 1:13:09

Yeah, that was part of it. I was asking you about that when I went out and started it, and I'm looking at Jerry going, this one. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, it just started it and it went whoa.

SPEAKER_02 1:13:19

Yeah, it had this loud rumble to it, and I'm like, wow, okay, yeah, what this? Yeah, yeah. So those are the two things I remember about it. Yeah, those are the two things. So yeah, it's been fun. Uh, it's always good to get down and visit with you. And um, if ever you need anything, holler at me. Definitely appreciate you.

SPEAKER_00 1:13:34

So, how do people find you? I mean, you said the address earlier, but uh just reminding people uh online offline both.

SPEAKER_02 1:13:40

Yeah, yeah. I mean, um, our website is the name of our business. It's super easy, 505motorsports.com.

SPEAKER_00 1:13:46

Yeah.

Competition, Longevity, And Community

SPEAKER_02 1:13:47

So um we're we're actually going through a restructure on our website starting in April. So it's gonna look it's gonna look completely new. We've decided since new business. Now we can move into some back end stuff that we can help that people will start spotting. So 505motorsports.com, you'll see a new change on that next month. Obviously, all the socials, 505 Motorsports. You know, we've already covered that on Facebook and Instagram and TikTok and YouTube. I love my YouTube. I get to uh if you want to see some cool cars, yeah, go to my YouTube because there's there's some really cool cars on there. Uh, and then 2350 San Juan Boulevard, you know, right in the middle of San Juan Boulevard, uh just down from High Country. And uh we love working with those guys as well. Uh all the high country guys are really good to us. Uh we like think we work well with everybody, and and we have. I mean, we really, really have. Somebody came to me the other day and said, like, why are there so many used car lots in Farmington? And I said, It's number one, I think it's always been that way. And number two, it doesn't affect me. It doesn't. They're like, does it bother you when you see a new like since we've been here? I think maybe three used car lots have gone up within half a mile of us. Yeah, and you know, listen, again, you can't capture all of them. Right, maybe competition breeds success a little bit, so so you know, that's what we hope for. But uh, I don't know, you know. My my wife says, Is it easy to sell cars? And and we talked about that. I I it's not easy to sell cars. If every if it was easy, everybody would do it. Everybody would do it. Yeah, but yeah, but it's just what Farmington does, man. There's a lot of used car lots. So so to be around, and not a lot of them stick around. Yeah, right. Not a lot of them stick around. And so for us to be here now for uh going on 15, 16 years, yeah, I think that's an accomplishment. Yeah, definitely. Yeah, so yeah, so a little name recognition there, but but yeah, we're not hard to find. We're around. Just uh just look for the goofy guys on the social medias, and yeah, we'll keep posting our funny videos. I've got a friend up uh near Tell Yuri Ride, Colorado, old, old uh crusty cowboy. Yeah. And uh he texts me every single time he sees one of the new commercials. Yeah, love you, George. He texts me every time he sees one of those commercials cracking up, yeah. And uh and then he says, send me a bottle of burnt tavern, would you? So I don't know. It's like like he's trying to butter me up for me to send him a bottle of bourbon. But uh, but nah, he's a good friend, and uh and even an old crusty cowboy can love our goofy commercials, then it's working. It's working. That is it's they're perfect, yeah. Yeah, we're easy to find. So thanks for having me. I appreciate it.

SPEAKER_00 1:16:17

Well, maybe I'm gonna have to come back at some point later in the year and and uh we'll do this again, but for the bourbon. Yeah, because that sounds interesting to me.

Where To Find 505 And What’s Next

SPEAKER_02 1:16:24

Yeah, absolutely. Yeah, I I've got some great stories about that. Yeah, and uh so stay tuned for Burnt Tavern, as we say. Yeah, awesome. Thanks, man. Thanks, guys. I appreciate you.