EP: 207 Anton Martin w/ English Air Inc HVAC - Innovations in Efficiency

What a great episode with the Expert of Experts,  Anton Martin from English Air, Inc. His 26 years of experience in the service industry brought a wealth of knowledge to our discussion, making this a must-listen for anyone in the home service industry who came from humble beginnings. 

Here are three takeaways from Anton's wisdom-packed episode: 

• Diversity Drives Innovation: Anton highlighted the need for the HVAC field to hire people of color. By welcoming different kinds of people and encouraging community involvement in trade schools, we not only give underprivileged kids more power but also encourage new ideas that reflect the communities we serve.
• Efficiency in Technology: It was great to talk about Variable Refrigerant Volume (VRV) systems. These systems could change the way air conditioning works by using less energy and making people more comfortable by better-controlling humidity. 
• Vision and Mentorship in Business: Making a clear vision statement and spending money on a mentor makes a huge difference. Anton's journey from being a business owner who could do everything on his own to becoming a mentor and leader shows how important it is to raise standards, learn from the best, and let others grow by delegating tasks and giving them power.

Anyone in the home service industry who wants to improve their career or business should watch the whole episode. Anton shares his knowledge, business insights, and unique way of dealing with family and leadership. 

Learn more about EGIA - https://egia.org/

ACHR Podcast - https://www.achrnews.com/media/podcasts/2904-achr-news-podcast

Find Anton:

On The Web: www.EnglishAirInc.com
E-mail: service@EnglishAirInc.com

Join Our Group: https://www.facebook.com/groups/hvacrevealed
Presented By On Purpose Media: https://www.onpurposemedia.ca/
For HVAC Internet Marketing reach out to us at info@onpurposemedia.ca or 888-428-0662



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Chiirp: https://chiirp.com/hssr
Elite Call: https://elitecall.net
On Purpose Media: https://onpurposemedia.ca 

Transcript

Anton Martin: 0:02

I spoke to, I asked the guy for advice, we was in one of these meetings, and I says, what do you do when you spend, and this is what a lot of business people do, what do you do when you spend a lot of time putting out fires? And do you know what he said to me? You got to let people fail.

Evan Hoffman: 0:19

Well, Thad's joining us from Dallas, Texas. He managed to check into his hotel room down there. He's actually at an agency training event for us to better our business. He's there. We're trying to sharpen the saw and get better at that, but still wanted to make sure that he was joining us for the show today. So thanks for taking the time, bud.

Thaddeus Tondu: 0:36

Hey, you're very welcome. It was coming in hot and heavy on this one. Had a lunch. It's a nice Texas barbecue, actually, with our good old buddy Jonathan Bannister so.

Evan Hoffman: 0:43

Busy day for you, but it's going to be a good show here today. We've got Anton Martin with us. He is with English Air Inc down in Orlando, Florida. He's going to be bringing some heat and some knowledge today with his lovely Florida accent and I'm really excited for it. He's got 26 years of experience. He was a pipe fitter back in London, England, and ended up getting into heating and air conditioning while he was over there and then when he came over to the, to started his company. He is with EGIA and has done a lot of teaching and training there. He was on a panel and that's when I first bumped into him is when we were at Epic about a month ago down in where are we, Los Angeles and in Anaheim.

Thaddeus Tondu: 1:28

And I was going to say Orlando, but that's next year.

Evan Hoffman: 1:31

That's next year but he's one of those people who's known as the expert of experts. When it comes to solving problems, he's the guy that, that other companies will call on to try and solve problems and get equipment repaired when nobody thought it could get fixed and I'm really excited to dive into kind of the future of systems and what the changes are coming, how to stay ahead of technology and innovate and grow your company, innovating both with the new equipment, but also with people and in your recruiting and all of that as well. So I think it's going to be a great conversation today.

Thaddeus Tondu: 2:07

It all sounds good to me.

Evan Hoffman: 2:08

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Evan Hoffman: 3:20

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Thaddeus Tondu: 3:54

All right without further ado.

INTRO: 4:03

Welcome to HVAC Success Secrets Revealed, a show where we interview industry leaders and disruptors revealing the success secrets to create and unleash the ultimate HVAC business. Now your hosts Thaddeus and Evan.

Evan Hoffman: 4:19

Anton, welcome.

Anton Martin: 4:22

I'm just blown away by this intro. I'm just like, wow you guys are like professionals, man.

Evan Hoffman: 4:30

We've been around the block, time or two.

Thaddeus Tondu: 4:33

Yeah it's been a, it's been, a couple of years. Maybe 200 plus episodes.

Anton Martin: 4:38

200 plus? I didn't know I was in the presence of such talent. I thought you was just regular jokes.

Evan Hoffman: 4:46

We are just regular jokes. We just have a lot of fun while we do it. We may as well put on a show too.

Thaddeus Tondu: 4:51

Yeah, a hundred percent. Exactly. That's exactly right.

Evan Hoffman: 4:54

Yeah. Awesome. Anton, why don't you share with everyone your journey into HVAC? Because I think it's unlike most people who have joined the trades.

Anton Martin: 5:02

So listen, before we go to my journey and I know this is all live, you're probably going to edit it, but I just got to ask you an uncomfortable question.

Evan Hoffman: 5:09

Giddy up.

Anton Martin: 5:10

Am I the first black man you've had on the show? Listen I like straight out. I like straight out. I might, I want to know if I'm your first, because

Thaddeus Tondu: 5:17

I like straight up myself, but, I'm trying to think, don't want to at the risk of offending potentially another black guest that was on the show, I think you might be.

Evan Hoffman: 5:29

Yeah, I have no idea.

Anton Martin: 5:30

If I'm not your first, I want to be at least your most memorable.

Thaddeus Tondu: 5:35

I think we're off to a good start.

Anton Martin: 5:39

I only asked you that question for one reason to make you just feel uncomfortable because that's what I like doing.

Thaddeus Tondu: 5:44

Is it weird that I wasn't actually, I wasn't actually uncomfortable with that question?

Anton Martin: 5:48

Okay, then I'm gonna have to go deeper. Until you say stop.

Evan Hoffman: 5:52

Pineapple's a safe word. It's okay.

Anton Martin: 5:57

You said we could have fun. You didn't say how much fun.

Thaddeus Tondu: 6:01

I think we're off to the races on planning fun right here.

Evan Hoffman: 6:04

Absolutely.

Anton Martin: 6:05

So the question was, is how do I get into the HVAC industry? So this is a crazy true story. I was working as a pipe fitter in the House of Parliament. Now the House of Parliament is the English equivalent of the White House we worked on steam pipes. I was a helper and we had an AC guy come in. Now we don't have much AC, when I left there wasn't much AC, just masonry and commercial buildings and when this AC guy came in, all the women in the office were ooh ing and ah ing. Because it was hot, and they'd been waiting all day and this guy turns up and they're like, The AC man is here! Woohoo! And he hadn't even done anything yet and he wasn't a regular AC guy, he was an AC guy who keeps his tools in a suitcase and I was like, I want to be that guy. That's the guy I want to be. I want to be the guy that when he comes through the door, everyone is so happy to see him before he's even done anything at all.

Evan Hoffman: 7:03

There you go. The superhero, right? The guy that everyone's looking forward to see.

Anton Martin: 7:09

Say again?

Thaddeus Tondu: 7:10

I was gonna say, you want it to be deliverance for females?

Anton Martin: 7:13

In a hot and cold type of way, yeah or should I say hot and cool, sometimes we make them sweat, sometimes we cool them off.

Thaddeus Tondu: 7:23

I haven't even had a drop of alcohol today, but I've been up since 2am, so I'm almost the equivalent of being drunk in some of my mindset things, but.

Anton Martin: 7:32

Another reason why I left England is because of alcohol. I used to go out drinking. I only used to go out with one or two people who knew how to control me because I used to have dreadlocks. I was like the black Fabio and I used to go around London saying, I cannot believe it's not butter and girls used to milk.

Thaddeus Tondu: 7:49

I do want to make a, I do want to make a correction that not the first black guest we've had Lilah Jones on but you are the, definitely the first black male guest. Oh.

Anton Martin: 8:00

Okay, alright, cool. you've had some women, now it's time for a man.

Thaddeus Tondu: 8:04

Yeah. Cool.

Anton Martin: 8:07

So what's your next question?

Thaddeus Tondu: 8:08

So why do they call you the Mr. Fix It?

Anton Martin: 8:10

Who told you that? Who told you that? Where'd you get that from?

Evan Hoffman: 8:13

I did my research.

Anton Martin: 8:15

You did some research, huh? You did some research. So I did used to have the nickname, The Expert's Expert. And yeah, it is true. A lot of AC companies and manufacturers used to call us when everything had hit the fan, when people threatened lawsuits and we got in there. But I don't use that no more and you know why? Because I'm trying to be humble in my old age. Not only that, all these other AC companies that we did work for and the manufacturers, a lot of times we come in incognito. Like they didn't know it was us you had to know, hey, we've got this issue. They're threatening you need to call English Air if you can find them we were like the A team and we played the music before we come in. I was like Mr. T with the bald head.

Thaddeus Tondu: 9:01

Oh no, that was that's not Mr. T. That's Flavor Flav.

Anton Martin: 9:06

Flavor Flav! But yeah, so that was a nickname that was behind the scenes. But we don't like to brag about that because the reality of it is, is that we filled in a niche. The contractors just needed some help and, they didn't want to get embarrassed oh yeah, we couldn't fix it and blah, blah, blah. Now, how did we get into that position? I'm a geek, man. I'm an AC geek. I eat and sleep AC. I eat and sleep AC. I just don't have the double rimmed glasses, you know what I'm saying? I love AC out of the Yahoo. I do. I just, I love AC so much there's actually pictures of me in magazines, hugging AC units. I'll tell you why I love them so much go ahead.

Thaddeus Tondu: 9:46

Why do you love them so much?

Anton Martin: 9:48

So there's two reasons. A. So when I was a pipefitter, my old man says, Come to America, man, I'll put you in school, you can do AC at the Cape. They will fire the electricians, they will fire the plumbers, but they'll never fire the AC guys and I was like, why dad? He says because AC guys can do plumbing and electrical. I was like, wow, not only that, people don't want to be hot. I was like, wow. The other thing is I started studying AC. AC is like everything. It's like physics. It's geometry. It's math. It's all the sciences and everything combined. I feel, are you guys familiar with the Avatar?

Thaddeus Tondu: 10:25

Do you have customer avatar?

Anton Martin: 10:27

No, the avatar, like the cartoon, there's Air Benders.

Evan Hoffman: 10:30

I know the move, the movie. Yeah the Air Benders and stuff like that. Yeah. Yeah.

Anton Martin: 10:33

The Air Benders. Are you familiar with the Air Benders? Yeah. Thaddeus. Thad I'm seeing a blank on your face.

Thaddeus Tondu: 10:39

No, I've watched the Avatar movie that was about it.

Anton Martin: 10:42

Okay so Evan, I need you to educate Thaddeus after the movie about the Last Airbender. You got it. So educate him and get him to watch the whole series and then you can watch the movie and then you can watch the Netflix remake. If you ever watched the Avatar, there are there's three types of benders. One is earth, the other is water, then there's fire, and then what's the last one? Earth, wind, fire and I think. As an AC guy, you do all four. I feel like we're the avatars. I feel like the avatar. That's what I feel like being an AC guy. I light my torches and I feel like I'm a firebender and then I've got a lace and pipe. I've got a bigger house and now I'm an earthbender. You know what I'm saying? So I just feel like to be an AC guy, you almost have to master all the elements.

Thaddeus Tondu: 11:30

What makes you holist, it makes you holistic.

Anton Martin: 11:32

Holistic, yeah.

Evan Hoffman: 11:34

Yep, absolutely. Now you've delve heavily into inverter systems and wanting to solve problems, moving towards that direction. Why is it that you feel like inverter systems are the future when it comes to HVAC equipment?

Anton Martin: 11:47

I'm gonna tell you a crazy story. This is true. This crazy story is true, though when I used to have to travel a lot and I was on the road for a couple of hours, you'd fall in asleep and I'd try to stay away from the caffeine because I'm super crazy hype as it is. I won't sleep for days, you give me half a cup of coffee. I had this friend and I'm gonna just name, drop his name because I just love the man. His name is Neville Peters. Neville Peters is an Englishman amongst Englishmen and he speaks exactly like us and his name is Neville. Neville is a wonderful man now, Neville is an engineer and he's an old school engineer and he designed AC systems. He designed AC systems mechanical. He could design a whole hospital on pen and paper. So went on a long journey. I would talk to him. Now, his claim to fame is he actually, you won't believe this, could, I don't know if you'll find it, but he actually designed the recording studio that the Beatles made their music in mechanically and he broke records when he did it because the sound level was so quiet in there. He went on and he ended up doing them for the jazz musician. What's his name?

Evan Hoffman: 12:47

B. Miles?

Anton Martin: 12:48

No, he's passed now. He's a big guy.

Thaddeus Tondu: 12:51

B. King.

Anton Martin: 12:51

B. B. King. That's it. He did one for B. B. King. He did it for, and he ended up traveling the world doing this anyway, when I'm on a long journey, I give him a call and we talk about AC and we geek out. And he starts telling me about VRV, Variable Refrigerant Volume and for those who are not in the in crowd, Variable Refrigerant Flow and it blew my mind what he was talking about. I went to a facility. Now, I hate to say it, but I'm a walk in thermometer and as I walk into a facility, I'm doing air tests, right? And I can feel, I can almost tell you, yeah, I walked into this facility. It was about 76, 75%, 75 degrees. It was about 65 percent humidity. The filters were probably not changed as often as they should be. A little damp in the air and then as I walked through, I walked into a room that was 75 degrees at 50 percent humidity, and the air felt crisp and clean and cool and he said, this is the VRV system and I was like, wow. It was a church. It was a church and then they took us to a YMCA here in Florida and I was blown away. Then I looked at this thing and I thought, wow, I saw a system that was a 10 ton system that could ramp down to about 15 percent capacity. That means I had a 10 ton unit pulling the energy of a one ton unit. It was like me walking into the science musician. I wanted to push buttons. I wanted to touch stuff. I wanted to pull out my gauges. You know how it goes. Us AC guys, we like to whip out our gauges every now and again. I wanted to whip out my gauges. I wanted to pull out my gauges. I wanted to slap on my amp probe and I wanted to see what this baby was giving us and I started researching this stuff and it was mind blowing and then I found out that Daikin invented this stuff 25 years ago and I said to myself, why are we not doing this in America? The other side of this, and this was, this is where it was like a perfect storm we hit 2008 bubble. When we hit the 2008 bubble, we had a lot of the new construction people coming into the replacement market and they were killing the market because new construction, there's no margins and they were beating up the margins because they had all these guys they're trying to fill hours for and so I went back into commercial. I used to work for Trane. I worked for Trane for five years. I went back into commercial and I realized this VRV is the future of air conditioning. At this time there were three training labs in the whole country and I went, flew out to California and I trained on this stuff and I fell in love with it and it's mind blowing. I've got a video that I really don't share the, of a hospital, that put on a 10 tonne VRV, and the 10 tonne VRV is pulling less energy than an exhaust fan that's pulling poop out of the bathroom. A 110 volt exhaust fan. Is that mind blowing? Mind blowing. So this VRV is a mind blower, but people are scared of them.

Evan Hoffman: 15:50

So why is that? Why is it that contractors are afraid? Why is it that they don't want to start implementing these systems? Why is it that they're afraid to sell it? Why are technicians afraid to sell it?

Anton Martin: 16:00

First thing is that I hate to say it, but our industry is an old boys network and This is the way I've done it for the last 35, 55 years. Beer can cold, there you go. You know what I'm saying this is,

Thaddeus Tondu: 16:14

beer can cold.

Anton Martin: 16:16

You feel, you charge it till it's beer can cold this is the mentality of, I would say, almost the majority of AC companies and they're afraid of it they're afraid of anything new. I even see it with the engineers when they're designing the systems, that they do cut and paste. listen, I was gonna give this guy and the energy efficiency standards haven't even caught up to the efficiency, and I'll explain that in a little bit but I was gonna give this guy one crazy hell of a deal because I knew that once he got this one system in his Metro PC store, then he'd put him in all of them. So then the engineer says I heard VRV systems will not pull out the humidity and I'm like did you do a load calculation on this building? Yes, I did. Can I see it? Oh, I don't have it available right now. I don't have it available right now. Because you didn't. What you did is you put your thumb up, you said hey, I've got X amount of square feet, it's a commercial property, I've been doing this for 20 years, bam, stick a package unit on the roof and I said to him, there wasn't even a package unit here before? He's yes there was. I said, did you go to the facility? No, I didn't. He says, I went to the facility, and I saw it was a split system. It was a 10, 15 tonne split system, and the air handle was downstairs. Did you see that? No. Did you know there was no penetration? No. But guess what? People will listen to the engineer quicker than they listen to the contract. Because he's the engineer, it's like people will listen to the doctor quicker than they'll listen to the nurse. But the nurse has got more time for you now I'm not saying now, don't get me wrong now, I'm not saying everyone go listen to the nurse and ignore the doctor. You listen to both and you look at the facts. So that's the first thing. The second thing is the end user. So let me see if I can explain this in simple language and I can get waffling about this stuff. So you can shut me up anytime. Cause you get me talking about AC, I'm rolling here. So variable refrigerants, what happens is this. I can give you a VRV system and it's rated at 17 Cier, right? I can give you a two speed system and it's rated at 17 CIIR then I can give you a single speed system, and it's rated at 17 CIIR. I guarantee you, the two speed system will save you way more energy than the single speed system. And I can guarantee you, the VRV system will save you way more energy than the two speed system. But they all have the same CIRA rating. Why is that?

Thaddeus Tondu: 18:25

That you got to guess. Why do you not?

Anton Martin: 18:26

Because they rate them at peak load.

Evan Hoffman: 18:29

Correct.

Anton Martin: 18:29

And whereas with a regular system, you might have a 50 percent runtime and with a two speed system, you'll probably still get a 50 percent runtime. With a VRV system, you're probably going to get an 80 percent runtime. So guess what? Before peak has hit. It has removed most of the load already. Because guess where all the load is? All the load is in the moisture that's in the air. All the load is latent. I say it's similar to a car back in the day, I bought my wife a Tahoe and I'm waffling here, and I'm gonna get to the end so you guys can get some words in their I bought my wife a Tahoe, and she's Man, this thing drinks gas! I says, listen. You can pull off from the light and pull 4000 revs, and you will suck all the gas out of the tank. But you can also do 70 miles an hour at 2000 revs. So just pull off slow and that's exactly what an inverter does. It starts up slow, which is where most of the energy is used on startup, and it ramps up according to the load. I never see a VRV running at full load and that's where they rate it.

Evan Hoffman: 19:27

And it's about, in terms of how do we communicate this to a customer? It's all about comfort, right? Do you, when using the car example, when I was a comfort advisor, I would always use that as my example do you want the car ride where you're just flooring it and then it's nothing? Do you want it where you can go halfway or floor it or nothing? Or do you want that smooth transition? That smooth comfort all the way from zero to 60?

Anton Martin: 19:48

Because if I'm going, if I'm going at this, if I'm, cause here's the thing, if I'm running at a lower rate, say if I've got a three ton system and it's only running at one ton and it's running longer, guess what it's doing all the time is running. It's pulling moisture out of the air and comfort is not temperature comfort is humidity.

Evan Hoffman: 20:05

Correct. We've got a client that's down in Louisiana. So in the summertime, often they're dealing with a hundred percent humidity you guys in Florida, same thing, big humidity issues in the home, a lot of mold that develops when you oversize or undersize equipment, because it's not pulling that humidity out of the air

Anton Martin: 20:22

and with the VRV systems, you can slightly undersize them because they will overperform. I had a commercial facility that had 16 tons of AC. One compressor had died. So we had it, we isolated and was running on one because it was two condensers tied together. We run it on eight tons of VRV system for a year, and nobody noticed a difference until it got to the cool season. Then we could take the whole system down people don't know how good the VRV stuff is.

Thaddeus Tondu: 20:49

So how do you get the message out further then? Because if you're talking how good it is, how efficient it is, you think about electrification and even what's happening in some of the grid. The grid, loads that are on there right now, like shit here in Alberta up in Canada, we had a minus 35 Celsius, which was equal to minus 35 Fahrenheit at that point and they actually emergency alert to say, turn off lights, save power our grid is at max I'm sure that we see that in California, they're starting to see some of that too, right with electrification. So how does this message get out further? How does this message get out louder? How do more people understand the benefits of putting it into their house?

Anton Martin: 21:22

I think, first of all, we need to do more podcasts. We need to talk about it more. The other side of this is that somehow we've just got to educate because I know 96 percent of my residential cells are inverters. Because what I've done is I've said to my customer, where can I give you the best bang for your buck? Where can I, if I look at my efficiency ratings, I have from 14 up to 20 CIIR and I says, the best bang for your buck is this 17 Sier system, and not only will it save you money now funny situation. I was in a meeting where people, a lot of times I'm in, I'm at places where people say, What you doing here? I was like, yeah, I got an invite. That's why I got a big mouth people bring me along. I'm great for entertainment, but no. So I'm at this meeting and they say, Anton, do you use that 1, 600 federal rebate? And I laughed. They're like, why are you laughing? And I'm like, do you really want to know? They're like, yeah, tell us. I was like, I never use it. And they're like, why? Cause I tell my customers, would you like a 1, 600 rebate now? Or would you like to save 1, 200 on your utility bill every year for the next 12 years do you want? Because if you want to see,

Thaddeus Tondu: 22:34

I'll take the rebate. No, I'm kidding.

Evan Hoffman: 22:36

Take the rebate and put it on black, right?

Anton Martin: 22:39

I want my money now oh, so mathematically, anyone with any sense realizes that, but you've got to have the conversations, but I think too, you've got to, you've got to get the fear out of it from the contractors, because if the doctor says, I want you to take this medicine and he gives that medicine to the nurse to give to you, the nurse likes, I wouldn't take that medicine. The last guy who took that medicine, it was terrible. I wouldn't do it. Then you're going to be thinking twice. So the contractors have really got to look at themselves, but we're going into a market now, especially with the electrification, where everyone's now, everyone's more now green conscious and energy conscious because energy conscious is smart building. So contractors need to educate themselves and they need to educate their guys. It's not a VRV system is not a crash band. Thank you, man system and if that's what you want to do, that's fine. That's fine. But that's not what a VRV is because one of the manufacturers, their compressor, they make their own compressor and it will go from 52 Hertz up to 230 Hertz. So this thing can be squealing and running some high pressure and so those lines are going to be clean, those joints are going to be tight. So this is something that contractors have to differentiate themselves and just do a good quality job and their customers will love it and they'll tell their friends and they'll tell their neighbors. The next thing they'll be doing podcasts just like me.

Evan Hoffman: 24:09

No, I wrote down it's a belief in sales and you used a health example and I think that's brilliant because if you've got a health issue and you go to a surgeon he's going to want to cut you open. If you go to a pharmacist, they're going to want to prescribe something. If you go to a naturopath, they're going to do Reiki on you and poke you with needles and do all kinds of weird shit and voodoo stuff, right? But that belief is what's necessary, right? And when you look at someone like a Brent Buckley why is it that he can sell a 50, 000 job, a 100, 000 job? Like it's nothing. Why? Because he believes in it. He's got that faith that what it is that he's offering to a customer is in their best interest. Why is it that 96 percent of your sales are inverters? Because you have that belief that what you were doing is what is best for the customer.

Anton Martin: 24:54

And that's, our goal. Our goal is to deliver five star customer service and to give the customer what's best for them and I think every contractor wants to give the customer what's best and we have to go there and we have to realize that we are the experts and they're relying on us. So it's important that we do our homework. To me, the VRV is like the cell phone, the smartphone. When it first came out, people's no, I just need my phone to make calls and I was like do you know you could use it as a compass? Nah, just make phone calls. Would you know there's a GPS on it? No, I just make phone calls. I was like. Do you know what you could do with that smartphone? You're buying all these other stuff and it's right there with the VRV and it's a case of you're going to end up having to, you got a smartphone, you need a smart AC system.

Evan Hoffman: 25:40

I agree. Get up to date with technology.

Anton Martin: 25:42

There you go.

Thaddeus Tondu: 25:43

Yeah, I know that you're coming up, your phones rang a couple of times and you're right on time on where you said your guys are going to start to blow you up a little bit with nearing the end of the day. I do want to get into 1 topic that you said that you wanted to chat about and that was the EGIA Foundation and looking at the Electrical and Gas Industries Association. I was wondering what EGIA stood for until I read the notes. Today I just know that they had their event Epic down in Los Angeles. I'm being a little facetious on that one. But now as a board of directors on there and working into that, what are some of the things that your, I guess when you move into a board of directors for something that is a large of an organization that quite a bit of learning comes involved in that quite a bit of experiences come involved in that quite a bit of, I don't want to say the word power, but knowledge and experiences. I'm trying to think of the other word for power.

Anton Martin: 26:28

Influence.

Thaddeus Tondu: 26:29

Influence. There we go. That's the right word I'm looking for. Influence comes within that and so walk us through the journey of what it's like getting into there and how the EGIA has has helped you with where you're at in your business.

Anton Martin: 26:41

I considered it a great honor to be asked to be a member of EGIA and if anyone's not a member of EGIA I, I suggest every contractor become a member of EGIA. Not only do they have great events every year but their training portal is second to none take a picture of EGIA, look them up, look at the stuff they have. It's helped me. I wouldn't be in business today if it wasn't for EGIA. The truth of the matter is I'm a the reality of it is, and here's my profession. I'm a great AC guy and I'm working on being a great businessman and EGI has helped me do that way back when I nearly had an accountant put me outta business when it was just me and another guy and she's you owe me IRS$13,000 and I was like, what? Are you crazy? I think we're lucky if we just broke even this year, like what is going on? And I said, run the numbers again. No, you owe him 13,000 bucks. And I went on to EGIA, and I went through the stuff and I educated myself about the cash accounting and the accrual accounting and I went back to her and I says, listen, you need to change our accounting practice to accrual instead of the cash. That's gonna cost you a fortune. I was like I need you to do it. So she went and did it. He's actually it didn't take me hardly anything. There's no extra charge. I just have to move some stuff around and now you only owe 3000 bucks.

Thaddeus Tondu: 28:01

You don't know what you don't know, wow.

Anton Martin: 28:03

That paid for membership, like for a few years. You know what I'm saying? Just being able to educate myself on the business stuff. I didn't go to school for business. I didn't go to school for accounting. I'm an AC guy and EGIA has taught me all those other things. That I didn't know, and I've spent a lot of time in there learning that stuff, going to the classes, learning from other contractors. The stuff that I didn't go to school for. So when I got asked to be put on the board, it's my way of giving back like EGIA has been so good to me, so good to my business, so good to my employees, my family, my kids, school, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. I could go on and on in this industry. So EGIA was just a way of me giving back and And not only that, they're a great bunch of guys too. They're great people. Great organization. I can't say enough about EGIA.

Thaddeus Tondu: 28:54

And what I love about that story is the fact that you're like, hang on, pump the brakes a little bit. Something doesn't seem right and I think a lot of individuals that have went into running their own business, Just didn't have the business experience to go in it and that's okay by the way, that's okay. If you don't have the experience, but at least it's a hundred percent in our lane shit, I have a business degree and when we started our marketing company on purpose media, guess what I had a little bit of business experience, but fuck the shit that I learned more actually running a business is phenomenal and they can't teach that in school. I mean there's some principles that you can get on, but personalities and managing humans. You can't really learn that from an HR textbook from a professor who's likely never managed people. But the thing is that you said that I'll walk, I won't get down my rabbit hole on that one. But the thing that you said is you went and sought the information or you went and sought how to understand this. You went and figured it out. Now, are you still, are you an accountant? No. Are you an expert? No. Do you know how to read books? Yes. That's the big thing.

Anton Martin: 29:48

That's the big thing and then you learn this stuff and you don't even learn it from that professor who's in class who has never done it. What you're doing is you're actually learning it from people who have been in the industry for years and years. Like I've done this not once, not twice, not in one business, but in 10 businesses. I've not done it in one state. I've done it in 10 states. And you've got people all over the country who have put their input in there and some of the best trainers and it's all on demand. Do you know what I'm saying? I come home at the end of the day and so I, it's funny because people don't realize how much stuff is on there. Like I had a situation where I was hiring bad. I wasn't hiring the right people and I didn't know what, and I went in there and I asked some people and they said, I don't know why it just went dark on me here. I went in there and they said first of all, you need to get your vision statement. I was like, what? I says, I'm hiring back. Get your vision statement, get your core values. I said, I'm hiring back. Obviously you didn't answer the question and then I realized what they were saying is that first of all, you've got to define on paper who you are and then you find someone to fit and I could have never learned that any other way except for going in there, being in the class, asking the question face to face, like how do I get better at this? And then he says, go to EGA, search this, vision, core values, mission, put those into place. Once you figure out who you are, then you'll figure out the people who fit into your team and the light bulbs went off and then they came back on again.

Evan Hoffman: 31:16

We've got some symbolism going on now, but it's, are you treating the symptom or are you treating the cause? Yes and that's what having access to mentors, to leaders, people who have done it before you who have gone down that path, who have already suffered through the pain and the struggles and all of that, the failures. What did they do to overcome that? Let's compress decades into days and move forward.

Anton Martin: 31:41

And Weldon Long was an inspiration. When I first heard the Weldon Long story, I was inspired. The first epic I went to, I heard Weldon Long give his story. I bought his book. It was up in Destin, Florida. And I drove back and listened to the audio book on the way home and I said to myself, wow, it was the power of consistency and now every employee in my organization gets that audio book when they start the power of consistency and it basically says, listen, you can do this and they all know that I'm going to push them. you want to grow, this is the company to be at. If you don't want to grow, don't join us. Because we're growing and I'm going to push you to grow. I'm going to make you work on stuff you've never worked on before. I'm going to have you solving problems you didn't think could be solved. I'm going to send you to job sites that engineers have walked away from. Because that's what we do.

Evan Hoffman: 32:30

Love it. Raise your standards.

Anton Martin: 32:31

Are we having fun yet, guys? We having fun.

Thaddeus Tondu: 32:33

I'm looking at the time I know you gotta go, I'm like, man. Keep me

Anton Martin: 32:38

longer. I know you want me. I know you want me. Ha. Ha.

Thaddeus Tondu: 32:41

One

Anton Martin: 32:41

thing people,

Thaddeus Tondu: 32:42

I don't think, obviously the benefits of joining an EGIA or look, any other best practice group for that matter it doesn't necessarily have to be EGIA. Find one that I, that you identify with that works for you and you get the information to be able to help you and your business get there, cause success leaves clues and just following people that have done it, right? You might as well ride on the shoulders of people that have already been there and done that because the experiences you're going to get are great. One of the things that I don't think often gets talked about is the idea of giving back and the idea of being on a board of directors for something like an EGIA. What's that experience like while doing that while also running a business at the same time? What you learn from, so the mistake I made when I started this business, I didn't plan to build this great massive business and make, it was just the next step for me, and then what happens, you do work, you just grow. I built the business around myself, which I shouldn't have done and going away and being involved in these things makes you have to go away and be involved in these things, which makes the business have to run itself. Now between you and me and the four walls and the 15 trillion listeners to this, the best way to earn a living is not having to be there and still make the money. Does that make sense?

Evan Hoffman: 33:53

Makes sense, just harder to do than it is to explain.

Anton Martin: 33:56

All we got to do is we can make an AI of you, do some videos, let him figure it all out. He could probably answer all the questions just like you did, have all your mannerisms, and then you could just, you could actually probably send it out to search for some people to interview as well.

Evan Hoffman: 34:11

We're working on creating it, it's gonna take some time, but it's in development.

Anton Martin: 34:14

The hardest thing in business is learning to let go and, I spoke to, I asked the guy for advice. We was in one of these meetings and I says, what do you do when you spend, and this is what a lot of business people do, what do you do when you spend a lot of time putting out fires? And do you know what he said to me? You got to let people fail. And I don't like letting people fail. I don't like failure. I don't like it, but I realize, and if you have kids, this there's a time you got to let go of their hands. There's a time you're not going to be there and a lot of times they fall down once, but guess what? They get back up and they learn to walk and soon they're running. But if you don't let go of their hands, then you're not making Independent, good employees. What you're making is you're making dependence. Dependence on you being involved in this thing helped me to disconnect and let go and it also helps me to give back and it also helps me to see other ends of the industry and it's also, it set me up for my second life. I want to grow up and be one of you guys one day and not have to go out there and swear. I go out there occasionally, I've been given so much. I can't contain it. I've got to share it with the planet. I love that. Now, can we talk a little bit before we go? Can I mention one other thing? Sure. My podcast on ACH News.

Thaddeus Tondu: 35:22

Sure.

Anton Martin: 35:22

Minority recruitment. So we realize that in our industry, there's a massive workforce shortage and we're all talking about women in HVAC and, but we never talk about minorities. I want to encourage everybody to try to get involved in one of these community trade schools for kids who grew up not very privileged, not knowing what they wanted to do and trying to figure out a path in life because this industry is so good and there is such a workforce out there. Weldon Long was one of those guys, you know what I'm saying? And he found the A CH, the HVAC industry. There's so many people out there in the minorities, and the minority could be anyone in, from a woman to a Ukrainian, to a German, to a black guy, to a Spanish guy, to whoever, to a Chinese guy but we tend, and this is an American mentality, and I really encourage people to listen to the podcast about minority recruitment. We tend to just flock to people who are like ourselves. I want to hang around with people who wear their hat backwards, because I wear my hat backwards.

Thaddeus Tondu: 36:29

I normally don't wear my hat backwards, for full disclosure.

Anton Martin: 36:33

it's just, it's human nature. It's a nature. You almost have to be, you have to be proactive in mingling with people who are not like you, who don't think the way you do. There's a guy who was a epic called Duncan, I think his name was Wobble or Waddle. He made this phenomenal message phenomenal message. He made a statement that will, is etched in my mind forever. The statement was diversity creates innovation old people mingle with young people, white, black, Chinese. You get a different angle of life when you start to learn how these people think. Does that make sense? And it will help your business and if we're in, we got it, we've got to reflect the communities we're serving. You know what I'm saying? Let me give you one last example and I'll let you close up. I was at an event. 1900 people there. The stats I've read, is that there's probably about 14 percent black folk in America. There were 6 black folk in that room. 1900 people. And they're all ACVAC leaders there were 6 minorities in that room. There's an issue. But we can fix it and the way we fix it is by talking to people like me hire a black man today. It's funny. A guy says to me, Anton, why are you doing all this? What you want to get out of it? I'm the reason why I'm doing all this is just to say thank you for everyone who gave me a job, you know what I'm saying, who gave me a chance because as I said, I came here with dreadlocks. I was a street kid and this industry has done the world for me I've been married 25 years, got a wonderful wife, wonderful business. I can't believe I'm living the life I'm living, but thank the American dream and guys like you.

Evan Hoffman: 38:08

So was it part of the humility as to why you got rid of the dreadlocks then?

Anton Martin: 38:12

No, it was just a phase of life. I was a boy who liked to play a little bit, fabio and also I couldn't believe it wasn't butter.

Thaddeus Tondu: 38:19

So we're ACHR news podcast. I believe was where you said that was we'll find the link. We'll put it in our show notes. So when everybody's listening to this on team replay, you just got to go to the show notes. You find that you click on it. You can listen to the podcast minority recruitment and how to be able to get better and adding more diversity into the workplace, because really it's, it, that is a testament to, and I remember a previous business that I worked at their model was, we don't care where you're from or who you are, what color your skin is, are you the best at what you do? You're hired that's it, right? And when you don't care about that, now you can create a device, diverse workforce, because you're hiring the best and there's a lot of great people that are out there that are in the minority.

Anton Martin: 38:57

Yeah and sometimes it's just learning to communicate with these guys because they think different. Just the generations think different. We all know, we all think different and we have different buzzwords. We have different thoughts and et cetera. So you've got to, you've got to learn how to communicate with people. If you, my workforce here is diverse. I've got a Jewish guy. I've got a Palestinian guy. I've got a half Scottish, half Korean girl. I've got a Spanish guy. I've got a Cuban guy. I've got a country boy. I got them all and they all get along, we all get along great together and we all, we're all on the same team. We're all, we all try to do the same thing feed our families and take care of our customers. Yeah, great stuff. Good stuff. Listen, it's been a joy and a pleasure being with you, and I hope that wasn't just for me.

Thaddeus Tondu: 39:38

No, it was definitely a joy and a pleasure, but before you go, we do have one last question here for you, Anton.

Anton Martin: 39:43

Yeah, go ahead.

Thaddeus Tondu: 39:44

What is one question that you wish people would ask you more but don't. And it can't be anything that we've talked about on the show, because I'm sure that you probably, I already thought where I think you were going to go, but just, I gotta put that caveat in there. Most times I don't caveat it.

Anton Martin: 39:57

Can I put a VRV in my house? Oh, we asked, we've talked about that already. Is that, does that not qualify?

Thaddeus Tondu: 40:01

No, that can qualify. That can qualify. So that's for a residential customer company. What about another business owner? What about another person in working in the trades?

Anton Martin: 40:09

Oh, another business owner.

Thaddeus Tondu: 40:11

Yeah or a technician or somebody else working inside the trades.

Anton Martin: 40:14

What is the most important characteristic of a VRV? Of a of a successful business leader.

Thaddeus Tondu: 40:19

Okay. What is the most important characteristic of a successful business leader?

Anton Martin: 40:23

In my personal opinion, vulnerability. You know why? Because we have to be teachers and if we sit up here and I act like I'm perfect and I've never made a mistake, I put myself on a pedestal and then when they make mistakes, they don't know how to deal with them. Does that make sense? If I'm not willing to be vulnerable, because I tell my people, listen, I don't care if you make a mistake. What I care is that you're honest, you come to me and then I can help you. Here are some mistakes I made, and this is how I got through them but I also learned that with my kids. I joke, Hey, I, my kids found out that I wasn't perfect when they're about three years old, I was like no one gave me an instruction how to raise the kid that's related to you, you know what I'm saying?

Thaddeus Tondu: 41:04

No return policies.

Anton Martin: 41:06

No return policy. I've never done this. It's different when you babysit someone else's kids, but now they're your own and they're with you 24/7, so you make mistakes and and I sat there and I realized I've got to let my kids know the truth of who I am. I'm trying to be a good dad and yeah, I screwed up. I was too hard on you in relation to this. It's funny cause my sister comes around the house and she says to me, Anton, I know it's, you're different with your daughter than you are with your son and I was like, what do you mean? She says, you're so hard on your son and you're so easy on your daughter and I was like, you think so? And I looked at it and I was like, yeah, you're right and I had to apologize to him. But I said to him, listen, it's a tough world and I want him to, I wanted him to be able to face, I've been put down a lot in my life, but it just fuels me to get stronger matter of fact, I love it when people put me down, you know what I'm saying? Because it, it just lights stuff up in me. I turned into a beast, an animal, I turned into an animal, I'm a soccer guy. So I wanted to try and instill that same mentality into him and we'll be playing sports and I'll be like, you ain't never getting round me. You ain't never going to win. You ain't never, and I want him to, I want him to have that fire and that tenacity that I have.

Evan Hoffman: 42:18

Can I ask you something on that?

Anton Martin: 42:19

Yeah.

Evan Hoffman: 42:20

Why don't you want her to have that?

Anton Martin: 42:21

The reality of it is that and this is a very broad stereotype. We as men in the world tend to see the world as going at it. Women tend to see the world as coming to them most of the time, most of the time. that's a really broad stereotype. So women are like flowers and men are like trees. That's an old stereotype. It's an old stereotype and it's not, so I was very, it's funny because, back in the day I got spanked. My, my son got spanked, but my daughter really didn't get spanked. But the reason why she didn't get spanked is because she didn't want to get spanked. She saw him get spanked. She's I want to get spanked for nothing. So she fell off her bike one time. She don't want to ride the bike ever again. She was very delicate. She was like a vase and he was like a tree trunk and I was a little bit too hard on him. Now, don't get me wrong, she's a tough cookie and there's a lot of women who are tough cookies, and I think it's very important for people just to be themselves. I was told, Oh, you'll never be a technician. Oh, you'll never do this. Oh, you'll never do that. But I think it's very important for people to be themselves so.

Evan Hoffman: 43:20

No, I agree. I was just curious on, why was it apologizing to him on being harder on him and not apologizing to her for not being harder on her? And is she delicate? Because you weren't.

Anton Martin: 43:32

Here's the thing. Imagine this, right? My son is stocky little dude, right? And I'm a pretty big dude. I'm not that big. I'm like 5'10 Barely 200 pounds. But I'm pretty athletic and we used to play soccer in our front room with my daughter, who was just a rake. So she goes in hard. She go in hard. She had to fight with me and him all day long, playing soccer in my front room, before mum finds out and we were pushing each other where, and I'm telling them to be careful, but she's a tough cookie. She's tough because she grew up with a big brother. She is tough. She still plays soccer. But here's the other side of it. She's more like me than my son is. My son is a lot more like my mum. My wife he's more like my wife and it's not that he's soft. He ain't soft in any form or way. He's just, he doesn't have that, Let's just go for it! He's one of these cats, if he makes a mistake He gets so down on himself. He beats himself up so much that it froze him off his game. So I want him to be able to roll from the hits of life. And that's what I was trying to teach him. And she's getting it too. And I'm still learning. My, my son is 23. My daughter's 21 and they both work in the business and I'm still learning how to be a good parent. But I love my kids. They're great kids. They're great kids, man.

Thaddeus Tondu: 44:48

It's funny, just as you just as you figure out them at one juncture they change. I got a 1-year-old and a 3-year-old. So I'm in the, I'm in the thick of the shit. Right now. I, it's But it's, and Evan has three that are older than that for, I think I know their ages, but I'm not gonna say it for fear of getting'em wrong. But it, but as soon as you figure them out. Then they go ahead and they change, right? Now you've got to learn and adapt with them while they're going through their change too, so you can still show up as a good parent.

Anton Martin: 45:15

The interesting thing is, internally they don't change. Internally they don't change. Like, where their core is. Their DNA is the same. What I found was the biggest key for me in the period in this thing, especially as your kids grow up, is watch them and find out what they like, because once they hit the hormonal age, they forget everything. Hahahaha! They forget!

Thaddeus Tondu: 45:36

That's what my dad saying was young, dumb, and full of cum.

Anton Martin: 45:41

Yeah, everything and I'll be like, I just think my son, remember, you like planes. You like flying. That's what you like and I think to my daughter, remember, you like soccer. I don't know what I like. That's what you like. You've liked that your whole life. You still like it. Get out and play. I don't know if I want to do it. Just do it. So I think with the kids and I do that with employees too. I figure out what they like, and we work on a, we work on a goal plan for them. I was like, hey, this one guy's man, you love commercial sales. I see you do a couple of them. We need to train you up to do that. Right now you're a service tech and you're starting to get into the light commercial. We'll get you into more, we'll get into commercial sales and another guy, man, you like residential installs. It's just what he likes. So we're going to funnel you into that and make you the best residential install and then a residential install trainer and whatever. You study these guys and see what they like and just encourage them to go along that path, which is. Which is made for them. Cause you see them, there's certain things you do with your kids. You see them light up, right? You see them light up. You got to remember those moments. Cause they're going to forget them. You got to remember them. Evan, how old are your kids? This is a test question.

Evan Hoffman: 46:50

13, 10 and 8.

Anton Martin: 46:51

Oh, wow. You a good daddy. You a good daddy. So my funny joke is I've been married 25 years. I think there's only really. To be a good husband, good dad, all that, there's only a couple of things you need to know. You need to know the kid's birthdays. You need to know what day the garbage has to go out on. And you need to watch one girly flick a month, at least one girly flick a month.

Thaddeus Tondu: 47:12

See, my town has an app on their, on the phone. So it pops up a notification to remind us that the garbage has to go out for the pickup the next day. Yeah, my three year old asks every morning, garbage truck's coming today. I'm like, no buddy Thursdays. It's only Friday.

Anton Martin: 47:26

You're training it well. You're training it well. It's funny. You know what? Chris Rock says, listen, if you're a good husband and a good dad, There's really only one reward. And everyone's what's that? That's the big piece of chicken. That's what your reward is and he says, one time I ate the big piece of chicken and my mom went mad. She's now I'm going to have to sew a wing and a leg together to get that.

Evan Hoffman: 47:47

From the what was that? Bigger and blacker and uncut, right?

Anton Martin: 47:50

Oh something like that. Chris is hilarious. I love that guy. Oh, listen, this got brought up and I don't know why I bring this up at all and I need to go, but I'm having so much fun with you guys. My name is Anton and that, that movie, you've seen that movie back in the day, Undercover Brother. You've never seen the movie Undercover Brother with Eddie Griffin?

Evan Hoffman: 48:07

I've definitely heard of it. I can't, I probably watched it one time.

Anton Martin: 48:10

Oh, you've got to watch the movie. Undercover Brother with Eddie Griffin. When he goes undercover, he's got to learn how to eat mayonnaise and he changes his name to Anton.

Thaddeus Tondu: 48:20

All right, so he's got a big, he has a big afro in it, doesn't he?

Anton Martin: 48:24

He does.

Thaddeus Tondu: 48:25

Yeah, no, I've, I, yeah, 2002 is when it came out and I've, I know that I've watched it, but I'm not generally the best at remembering movies or movie quotes. But I know that I, I remember seeing it and I'm sure that I've watched it.

Anton Martin: 48:36

All right, guys, can I go?

Evan Hoffman: 48:38

Yes, you can go. We appreciate you. Thank

Anton Martin: 48:40

you

Evan Hoffman: 48:40

so much, Anton really quick, if people do want to get in touch with you, Best place to do that, just reach out office at englishairinc.com and of course, check out his website englishairinc. com to learn more about their business and if you want to learn more about the VRV systems from him, make sure you go check out egia. org as well, where I know they're putting out constant content around all of that and a plethora of resources available.

Anton Martin: 49:07

Can

Evan Hoffman: 49:07

you say

Anton Martin: 49:07

that word plethora again?

Evan Hoffman: 49:08

Plethora.

Anton Martin: 49:12

Sounds like a song! Plethora! Plethora! Whatever will be.

Thaddeus Tondu: 49:18

Perfect way to end a show. Thank you. Thank you for singing. Thank you, Anton, for taking the time out of your day going longer than we originally anticipated and planned for. So thank you so much for that as well. The information and knowledge that you shared today was paramount and there was a lot of great tangents that were, had a lot of information to unpack. So thank you for dropping all those knowledge bombs.

Anton Martin: 49:38

Hey, my pleasure my pleasure. Thank you guys for having me. Anytime you want me again, I'm right here for you.

Thaddeus Tondu: 49:55

Well, That's a wrap on another episode of HVAC Success Secrets Revealed. Before you go, two quick things. First off, join our Facebook group, facebook.com/groups/hvacrevealed. The other thing, if you took one tiny bit of information out of this show, no matter how big, no matter how small. All we ask is for you to introduce this to one person in your contacts list. That's it. That's all. One person. So they too can unleash the ultimate HVAC business. Until next time. Cheers.