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The Small Business Safari
Have you ever sat there and wondered "What am I doing here stuck in the concrete zoo of the corporate world?" Are you itching to get out? Chris Lalomia and his co-host Alan Wyatt traverse the jungle of entrepreneurship. Together they share their stories and help you explore the wild world of SCALING your business. With many years of owning their own small businesses, they love to give insight to the aspiring entrepreneur. So, are you ready to make the jump?
The Small Business Safari
Value-Based Selling & How to Implement a Process For Business Success | Jay Eibler
What if you could transform your passion into a thriving business while mastering the art of sales? In this exciting episode, we journey through the world of small business ownership and sales coaching, starting with a captivating story from the automotive industry. Our guest shares their fascinating career path, from a love of cars to a pivotal role at Volkswagen Group, highlighting the importance of strategic planning and methodical preparation. With personal anecdotes and lessons learned, we caution against the pitfalls of impulsive business decisions and emphasize the value of a solid growth strategy.
Listeners are treated to an engaging exploration of sales training and entrepreneurship. Dive into the unconventional yet impactful sales training methods and learn how the Sandler system revolutionized modern selling techniques. Our guest recounts their transition from a structured corporate career to the risky yet rewarding world of entrepreneurship, sharing insights into building a business from scratch. This episode is packed with tales of resilience, the power of masterful communication, and the art of embracing "no" in sales to foster genuine client relationships.
A thrilling narrative wraps up with an exploration of value-based selling and the emotional dynamics of purchasing decisions. The Sandler method's effectiveness is brought to life through stories of setting upfront contracts and managing expectations. We also share a lighthearted Thanksgiving tale involving a bear, a hot tub, and a deep-fried turkey, bringing levity to the conversation. Whether you're a budding entrepreneur or a seasoned sales professional, this episode promises valuable insights and strategies to help you navigate the entrepreneurial landscape and achieve your goals.
and we took the exact same route that every single dealer took us on the test drive. This guy, he just goes. He's the one who explained to me the difference between German and Japanese cars. We get on the same route and he goes. Hang on. A second pull over and he waited for traffic to clear, whereas the rest of them we were just in bumper-to-bumper traffic. You know, really fun test drive to clear, whereas the rest of them we were just in bumper-to-bumper traffic. Really fun test drive. We waited for traffic to clear and he goes. There's kind of a 90-degree turn at the end of this road and he goes. When I tell you to hit it, I want you to floor it.
Speaker 1:And he goes do not take your foot off the gas until we get around that corner. He goes, trust me, and I'm like are you freaking, kidding me? And I mean he just absolutely demonstrated the handling capability of that car Sold Done.
Speaker 2:Welcome to the Small Business Safari, where I help guide you to avoid those traps, pitfalls and dangers that lurk when navigating the wild world of small business ownership. I'll share those gold nuggets of information and invite guests to help accelerate your ascent to that mountaintop of success. It's a jungle out there and I want to help you traverse through the levels of owning your own business that can get you bogged down and distract you from hitting your own personal and professional goals. So strap in Adventure Team and let's take a ride through the safari and get you to the mountaintop. Oh my God, we've got to launch this candle. We've got to get this sucker going. We've got to get out of here and get moving.
Speaker 2:Hey, everybody, you're going through the adventure team right now and we are talking about the wild safari that is small business ownership. And man, what a great time to be in small business it's 24. We got an election coming up here in the US. Things are happening, but they're saying that more and more people are getting into their own business and starting their thing, because 25 should be a good year.
Speaker 1:And it's easier to start a business today than in any day in history.
Speaker 2:Any day in history. Right now it's easier We've talked about this before is that it's a great time to do it? But you got to be prepared, man. You can't just say, hey, I'm just going to go out there and just start a business, drop whatever I've done, cash my 401k. Tell your wife, tell your kids, hey, good luck, because I just sold the house and I'm gonna go start nothing. The wrong freaking thing. You got to do it. I'm not picking you that was years ago.
Speaker 2:It's just like isn't that what we all do? It is, but you can't pick the wrong thing and you can't come into it without a plan. That's what I just heard about.
Speaker 1:Oh, so my mistake was I had a plan, but it was just the wrong thing.
Speaker 2:You got to do both Well you had the right thing, you just had the wrong time, man.
Speaker 1:Oh.
Speaker 2:God the wrong time.
Speaker 1:Why are we digging this up again Now?
Speaker 2:I'm all bummed out, don't be bummed. I'm talking about oh, you got it. That's why this is why I brought this up Okay, got an email from one of our listeners and said hey, I've been listening and I know I need to do a plan, but this idea I just got to do it Because if I don't buy this business now, I'll miss out on the opportunity. And I wrote back and went whoa Tiger, there is plenty of time to be out there in the wild running with the Safari. But if you don't have your pack ready to rock and roll, if you don't know what you're going to do and you don't have a plan on how you're going to take this business and move it to the next level, you're just buying a huge nightmare.
Speaker 1:So we uh, you just saved that person a gazillion dollars.
Speaker 2:I think I hope so. Uh, well, at least I, because I told that man that opportunity is going to be there. Nobody's snapping that sucker up. It's not, you know, it's not a bad business. I don't want to get into too much of it, but it could be a good business. But you better have a plan, man, because even a good business uh in in your case good business with a great business plan, a great operator, shit still goes wrong, man. Yep, I mean, there's so many variables outside, outside of your control.
Speaker 2:So that was the feedback I gave him. I was like whoa man, whoa man, don't be sold on that. This is not the late night. Hey, I got a plan for you. Are you interested yet? Oh, but wait, there's more. No, you got to slow it down, man, be methodical before you jump in and then, when you're ready, jump it. Don't let that hold it. But don't get sucked in, because somebody said they could sell you a biz without you having a plan, getting a chance to really understand their financials, understand what you're going to do to make that business better than it is today.
Speaker 1:You know, chris and everybody listening, I do give Chris a lot of crap and I love the fact that people reach out to you every week and I love the fact that you are a busy dude. You're kind of a big deal and you spend time with every single one of them. So hats off to you. I'm not wearing a hat right now.
Speaker 2:So I appreciate that. No, I mean, I tell you what I didn't even. I was waiting for the other shoe to drop, but no, I do, I take the time to. I'll spend 30 minutes with anybody.
Speaker 1:You used to do a backhanded compliment from me aren't you.
Speaker 2:And what is funny, as I did, we've had one of our guests on the show, wayne Schroeder, who is a business coach, just actually picked up a brand president position with iPhone, which is a franchise brand for insulation, and he called and then I called him back. And then he called me back and I texted him and said hey, man at the gym, I'll call you right after. And he said you may be the busiest person I've ever met in my life. Do you ever sleep? I said oh, yeah, a ton, don't worry about it. I said I get the best three hours you've ever seen every night. I said no, no, I thought that bad, but still, wayne, props to him. I know he's actually pointed some of his franchisees to start listening to this, to understand that franchising is one thing Franchisors are here to help but they're not here to help you run your business the whole way through. You still have to have some chops and understand some things around those edges. Fill in those gaps that the franchisors have.
Speaker 1:Speaking of franchisees, you remember our friend Mary Block, who was on the show that's right Mary Block with the Blazing Scooters from Mobility Plus and we were talking about jousting and we were talking about racing the scooters and she was having fun with us. But my in-laws are moving to town and so my wife and I had a date night and went over and visited Mary Block at her store and I got to tell you what was the speed with the governor Four miles an hour. Four, it accelerates really fast to four. I actually had to dial it back and it kind of snapped your head back to four. I actually had to dial it back. I'm gonna snap your head back to four miles an hour did you?
Speaker 2:did you look over your wife, put the racing gloves on and go? I feel the need, the need, for she slapped her hands for speed.
Speaker 1:No, I missed that, but I gotta say shout out uh, she was awesome and my mother-in-law is quite nervous. It's a big move. She's moving across country in her 80s, grampy and gram, both just packing up and coming to Georgia. She needs a scooter. And so, right there, mary goes. Well, you want me to shoot a video for her, and so I took my iPhone and she goes hey, grammy, and she goes. You know, you know, welcome to Georgia. Blah, blah, blah. It was the coolest little three minute video you could imagine. Just boom on the spot.
Speaker 2:Oh well, and send it to my mother-in-law now that sales, yeah, loved it. So we have tied in a couple things and we've got to get to our guests, because we brought a guest in today. We talked about franchising, franchise or franchisee, but we just tailed it back to sales. Yep, and we have a guy who's a master of sales and actually is just getting into his own entrepreneurial journey uh, getting into sales coaching. We got Jay Eibler from the Sandler Institute here. I had a chance to meet Jay and get to know him over the last couple months, as he's here local, but you're going to find out, man, this guy's got a lot of history and a lot of good experience. So, jay, welcome to the show.
Speaker 3:Thank you, Chris. It's awesome to be with the show. Great to be with you, Alan, as well. Yeah, likewise.
Speaker 1:Happy to be here. It's awesome to be with the show. Great to be with you, Alan, as well. Yeah, likewise Happy to be here. By the way, Jay, have you played St Ives with Chris? I have not played St Ives with Chris either.
Speaker 3:Nope, nope. That makes two of us. When I pulled into the subdivision for the first time, he did give me a pass to get in, so I did pass the security guard but I have not played golf here yet.
Speaker 2:Two of us here are probably going to play before one of us does, if you know what I mean. You keep working hard for it, buddy. Someday we'll let you in, jay, that's. I'm glad that the guards actually let you in, because not everybody can get let in. I just had this happen to me two weeks ago. I had one of my guys, uh, in his own truck bringing me something and, uh, they said, hey, you're with the trusted toolbox. They said, yeah, but I'm just bringing this for my boss and I'm in my own contractor entrance they said no, you have to go around to the back because which is no small feet, that's no.
Speaker 2:I mean, that added like 20 minutes to the thing. And he's like man, I'm sorry, boss, I'm like don't be sorry. And I called up there. I'm like guys, give me a break. He was bringing, he's bringing me my laptop that I left in my office.
Speaker 3:Man come on chris, it's site security.
Speaker 2:They did ask for my driver's license and fingerprints getting in here, so so now you know that this podcast is highly secured, yeah, so you can't just walk up and get on this show. We invite only the best, so let's get after this man, jay. Uh, as I I told alan before we got started, this special surprise is that you and I share a kindred spirit of the same motherland. We are both from michigan, that's right. Great Lake State, that's right. It's the greatest state to be from. I would echo that. Yeah, so go back and visit all day long. So, jay, let's talk a little bit about it. We talked about the entrepreneurship, bernie, that you're on now, but the sales journey how did it all get started? What'd you do coming out of going into college?
Speaker 3:Yep, uh, went into college, uh, always passionate about cars in the automotive business, so I did my undergraduate degree in automotive management, so always had a passion for cars. Um, right out of college, true michigander, true michigander, right, I mean, you're in the right place. Having said that, I didn't go to work for the big three, actually went to work for volkswagen group trader trader.
Speaker 1:So you're not welcome back in michigan, so I had to leave.
Speaker 3:Yeah, and they've since moved out. But yeah, no, right out of college, got a job with the volkswagen group and what did your?
Speaker 2:mom and dad say to that one uh, were they in the automotive industry?
Speaker 3:they were not we raised you right my dad was a teacher my dad was a teacher so, uh, they were just happy. I I graduated, passed no more tuition bills and I got a job. Got a job right out of college. So they were cheering me on.
Speaker 2:So that's awesome, cause I will give you my story. So my dad was not in the automotive business we are in Michigan and my mother was a nurse so again, not in the automotive business and my first girlfriend her whole family made parts for the automotive business. Well, my dad always had Oldsmobiles and then we had a Ford Econoline you know the shagging wagon, yeah, van. And then he had to start traveling around and so he traded in a car and got a car used and it was a Nissan. Right, I pulled up to my girlfriend's house with the Nissan and I came walking up and her grandfather's there and he's waving at me giving me the old hi sign. I smile, smile and I see him do this and he goes and clocks the door and walks away and I walk in and the entire family is lined up going what are you driving?
Speaker 2:Wow, oh, it was on, you don't do that wow oh my god, I had to sit there and defend him and say well, first of all, it's my father, it's not me, sir, right? I mean, I wasn't even certain, because we don't do that in michigan, just drove the bus over your dad oh, I don't. Oh, oh, hey, all right. So, girlfriend, high school hello catholic boy, that's right. Hey, you know where I was going. Somebody's getting a bus dropping over, but sorry. So you go into volkswagen, but you immediately move out of state, yeah so uh, probably four years in michigan now.
Speaker 3:At the time volkswagen was based in troy, uh, so that's where I started. Um, but yeah, immediately started this track where I was moving every couple of years so went from michigan to californ, california, to Arizona, back to California, all over the country. Really I've lived in every part of the country with Volkswagen. So 30 year career with the group and got transferred here to Atlanta Gosh, actually, I'll never forget it. We moved here. We started our house hunting journey on September 11th 2001.
Speaker 2:So keep that in mind. That's 9-11-2001.
Speaker 3:Yeah, yeah, so you were here when that happened, we were living in boston at the time, so we flew in, flew in from boston keep in mind that boston's one where one of the planes, uh, came departed from. Yeah, we were in our hotel waiting for our realtor to start our house hunting journey. But yeah, we were in our hotel waiting for our realtor to start our house hunting journey, watching everything unfold on the news. So so, yeah, that's when I moved here and been here ever, ever since in Atlanta, holy cow that's.
Speaker 2:We've had a guest on, ian Hay, who's now a three-time guest on our podcast. He is the now on his way to the SNL five-time record of all. But Ian talked about with 9-11, that became his journey into Homeland Security Was that right being private sector being able to help people with that? And we've talked a lot about that because here, on the heels of yet another anniversary of this Sure, we all remember vividly where we were and you just replayed that it's a moment where you never forget hey, where were you?
Speaker 3:We absolutely remember literally waiting for the realtor. Oddly enough, our realtor's husband was in Boston. We were moving from Boston so he was sort of stuck there because everything shut down, as you know. So obviously we didn't start house hunting that day, but that's when we started our move to Atlanta. How?
Speaker 2:about that. Yeah, that's something. So, Jay, in your automotive management career, you obviously found your way to the sales side. So talk a little bit about your first sales. Let's talk about how I first hit my chops, how I started doing sales and then automotive sales. As we all know, we all have that car used car salesman idea right in your head. So what did you do?
Speaker 3:So probably early on in my career, I got some good advice from some mentors that the fast track at the time was to get into the sales area. So I did so probably I don't know five or six years into it, I got on a career track. A Volkswagen group had a very specific career track, various jobs that you would take, which is why I moved around. So first job was a district manager calling on dealers in Phoenix, arizona. It was my first gig and, yeah, I just fell in love with it. I always tell people it's like a sport, right, it's challenging, you need to prepare like a sport, you win and lose like a sport. And so, anyway, five, six years into my career, I stayed in the sales area and ended my career with Volkswagen Group in 2019 as a sales leader here in Atlanta.
Speaker 2:So when you get into sales, did they train you? Did you kind of like trial by fire? What did they do, especially at German, I mean Frequency Deutsch, I mean these guys had SOPs all over the place.
Speaker 3:Yeah, sort of on the fly. So it was one of those situations where here's your territory, here's your laptop. Actually, at that time, here's your laptop, here's your pager I don't think we had cell phones then here's a map.
Speaker 2:And this is your territory, thomas guide. Yeah, start, start. Oh, it sounds like the enterprise days are coming back.
Speaker 3:Yeah, seriously seriously and start start calling on these dealers. And so, uh, training came over time. You know various courses and two days we'll get to that eventually. We'll get to that eventually, but literally, um again, I think. Eventually I got a bag phone remember those in the car, but I would be the guy that would pull over at a pay phone with my pager and return calls. So that was in the 80s, I guess.
Speaker 2:Think about that. Right, you got Jay sitting on the side. In Arizona it's dusty, the cars are flying by him on Route 66. And he's over there. 25 cents Deposit, 25 cents more for a more call what?
Speaker 1:no? No wait, wait, wait, don't wait. God, hang on.
Speaker 3:Anybody got a quarter no, at least they gave me a number, right, they gave me that call-in number so you had a call number. Punch in the number, so I make your phone calls, but literally at a pay phone.
Speaker 1:I'm not kidding you so I'm gonna say the best salesman experience that I ever had at a car dealer was at a vw dealer here in atlanta. Was that because of you?
Speaker 3:uh, jim ellis, yeah all right, well, I'll take some credit for that.
Speaker 2:Absolutely yeah, that look at this, I mean joking right now no, as a matter of fact.
Speaker 1:Uh, I needed a just a runaround car, and I like german cars because I'm tall and so I like bigger cars. I love that, yeah, and I also like the fact that they're just more about connecting with the road, whereas it seems seems like the cars from Asia are a little bit more about the tech, and it's just by our preference, sure. So my wife had an idea of what kind of car we were going to get, so we had this list. I slid the Passat in about fifth Okay. And we ended up getting there and it was that same dealer row and we went from one to the next, to the next. I said the exact same thing to everybody. I'm like we're looking at these three cars. You're number two. Please tell me why your car is better than the other. Help me make this decision. Okay, and we? We took the exact same route that every single dealer took us on the test drive.
Speaker 1:This guy, he just goes. He's the one who explained to me the difference between German and Japanese cars. We get on the same route and he goes. Hang on a second, pull over, and he waited for traffic to clear, whereas the rest of them we were just in bumper to bumper traffic really fun test drive. We waited for traffic to clear and he goes. There's kind of a 90 degree turn at the end of this road and he goes. When I tell you to hit it, I want you to floor it, and he goes do not take your foot off the gas until we get around that corner. He goes, trust me, and I'm like, are you freaking, kidding me? And I mean he just absolutely demonstrated the handling capability of that car. Sold, done it was, it was they were amazing.
Speaker 2:This is sales on sales man. Yeah, I mean, you came in. You're like dude. Did you even use? Hey, I'm in the business. No, no.
Speaker 1:And I will walk from. I will not buy something if they don't at least give it some good, solid sales effort.
Speaker 2:I mean I'm not letting them take an order. Good, solid sales effort, I mean right enterprise order. So enterprise sales, right growing up. That way you know their training program. I mean at the time probably second to none. I was gonna say it still is, to my, to my knowledge, yeah, it's combat sales yeah, right, I mean you just you're in there, you're knowing how to do it, so so, jay, you're out there. You have to deal with somebody like this.
Speaker 3:What a joker but I would say, oh, and he did his job, because back in the day when I was working with dealerships like a jim ellis it was, you know the competitive advantage of a vw was you got to drive it right, yeah. So, whoever that was, I probably know who that guy was orlando, yeah, okay I do know orlando.
Speaker 1:Oh my god, ball world, and I mean, this was a long time ago. I remember his name of alan.
Speaker 2:Yeah, no, I mean as far, everybody's starting to know. Alan it's so funny too is hey, can you say hi to your co-host for me? I just got that the other night when Jay and I were there Does that hurt a little bit, chris.
Speaker 2:I'm like, hey, I'm right here, right, yeah, hey, the star is right here, right, the co-host. Hey, everybody needs an epic man, I'm not All right. So yeah, they did say she said say hi to Alan. Well, hello Amanda. So all right, so you do VW. So I mean, how do you train these guys to sell like that though?
Speaker 3:Yeah, so you do a lot of ride and drives, right? So, to Alan's point, you got to get in the car. So we would do a lot of events for salespeople, put them in tracks and closed circuits and do a lot of do ride and drives. You mentioned the competition, hot competition. I won't mention the competition, but we'd have a Volkswagen and some of the competitive makes and get them in the car and drive it, get them excited about it, cause, uh, it does, it does make a difference. So, um, a lot of, a lot of product training. We didn't do a lot of sales training. We left that up to the dealership. As far as process sales training, we focused on product training primarily.
Speaker 1:And it didn't feel. I mean, because there were a couple other I would go through my little spiel and they were immediately trying to sell me up to the next vehicle. And I'm like I already told you I've narrowed it down to these and this is my budget, this is the car I'm interested in. Show me the car I'm interested in. And then they would go through the questionnaire and I'm like so we, orlando, yeah, and he's actually hearing me, yeah, and then he, he goes. Well, I'm, you know, those are all good cars which I loved, that, yeah, he goes. But there's just sort of a preference, you know, do you like this style, do you like that style? And then, so I never once felt like I was being sold, I was being shown, I was being educated. And then we hit that corner and I'm I'm not driving, miss daisy, but I'm not.
Speaker 2:I'm not a driver like you, chris well, I've seen you before because you, you, it's so funny. You said, hey, I'm a big guy, I like to get in small cars. I'm like, are you kidding me? I've known you. Every time. Ever since I've known you, you've had, you've had a big truck. Yeah, well, f-150. Well, when you had the, when you had the, uh, when you had the design no, you still had a truck then no, I had a mercedes oh that's right, yeah, all right.
Speaker 2:So you weren't stick, you weren't uh slipping uh furniture on that thing.
Speaker 3:No, yeah, but. But. But, alan, the reason I know orlando is because, uh, you know, like any business, 20 of the people in that business do 80% of the business. He's one of them, which is why I know that name.
Speaker 1:Well, and you see the desperation.
Speaker 3:How about that?
Speaker 1:Well, most people know and I'll say no with air quotes that the salesperson knows that if the person leaves the lot without buying the car, that you're never going to see them again. You're done. Yeah, I don't think that's the case with Orlando.
Speaker 2:Absolutely not see him again, you're done?
Speaker 1:yeah, I don't think that's the case with orlando. Yeah, absolutely not, and he's perfectly comfortable with you leaving and I mean it. Just it was a great train. I love that dealership, I love it so and jay will take credit for that. So just a little bit just a little bit. No, it's all the day you're doing your vw thing.
Speaker 2:You're learning sales. Uh, well, not learning. I mean, obviously, we just talked about it. You're teaching it. Yeah, um, and then in 2019 we're done, did you? Did you say, hey, I'm retiring with? So let's talk about the entrepreneurial journey. What? What leapt you into this? Because a lot of times, sometimes we choose and sometimes it chooses us. Yeah, what I mean?
Speaker 3:yeah, how about a combination? So um, the journey is as follows so 2019, like any big corporation going through some restructuring, right? And so, because of that, I had an opportunity to make a decision Do you want to stick around and see where you land in the restructuring, or do you want to leave right In my case, an early retirement. So I was in a position where leaving was pretty lucrative. A good opportunity. So you won. You won the corporate game.
Speaker 1:I won the corporate game. I won the corporate game.
Speaker 2:Now keep in mind hey, he got the flip and go watch. And a real deal, let's go.
Speaker 3:Cheers, Cheers to that. Keep in mind, though, it was November 2019. And remember what happened in March of 2020. So I say that to say, started networking and thinking what plan B was going to look like, and then everything shut down for a while. But to your point about the entrepreneur Jared.
Speaker 2:I always had in the background that I wanted to do my own thing, right, all right. So you were that guy right at work. So again, you were at Volkswagen. And when I left the bank, I left Truist. Well, no, it's SunTrust Truist now. When I left, I can't tell you how many people came and goes. Oh, I just wish I could do what you did. But you know, the truth of the matter is no, you don't. Because you love that you got a paycheck every two weeks. You love that your health care was taken. You love that you had a 401k. You loved, you, love love. And, by the way, if you were not feeling too good on monday, you're still getting that check.
Speaker 2:You know what, If you wanted to take off for a couple of days, you were still getting that check. You know what? Run your own business? That's why I tell people all the time this is the hard part. You want to talk about a gut check, and I heard this before. The first time you know you're an entrepreneur is the first time you have to make payroll and everybody and you're going to grab that check just so everybody else gets paid except you. And when that happened I went, oh my God, he's right. And then I went, oh my God, what have I done to myself so?
Speaker 3:true, so, true so you said.
Speaker 2:but you said have always wanted to be in the enterprise, so tell me what you did to research or look into it, or always listen to other people.
Speaker 3:Yeah. So right after leaving VW, I took a couple of I'll call it a path of least resistance. So I had a couple of jobs in the industry that were just that easy path right, staying in the industry While that was happening, thinking, okay, what am I passionate about? What do I want to do? On the second half of life I call it and a couple of things I was passionate about One selling. I did that for half of my career. Enjoy it. I think it's a challenge, it's a sport, as I said earlier. The other piece of it was developing people. I always really enjoyed leaning into my people. So as I was thinking of how do I do something that brings those passions to life? Um, training and sales training um, was was the key right. And so I actually looked at, about two years ago, buying an existing Sandler franchise. That's what I was going to do. And as I was kicking tires right a good car term it got sold. So it was sold.
Speaker 1:See, you should have jumped on it without a business plan, right, chris? No?
Speaker 2:absolutely not. You know what. He is so much better off right now because, I'll tell you, the guy is actually hitting this entrepreneurial journey exactly when we're talking about this. You got a leap. You got a leap of faith. He's leap well, he's leaping now, but he's leaping. You know what he's leaping? He's gonna find himself watch this, yeah so.
Speaker 3:So, based on that, reach back out to sandler, which, as you know, is a franchise business and there was an opportunity still here in atlanta.
Speaker 2:So not buying a franchise you mean there's another opportunity, alan. Holy shit, I thought this is the only one-time deal. Billy told me that if I don't buy this stretch seal now and black steel now, that it's not going to be here tomorrow, I gotta have the salad shooter, because if I don't have the salad it won't be here tomorrow.
Speaker 1:Qbc told me, so I need my salad shooter.
Speaker 3:You got lucky jay, there we go what was that, chris?
Speaker 2:that was a me saying that's bullshit. It was my plumber from jefferson would say that's some bullshit.
Speaker 1:I haven't quite earned the finger yet, but he's getting there, he's working it.
Speaker 2:That's that's that's the, that's the precursor to that. That's what he knows. He's that's what he knows. He's one. Okay, because when I flip him off on podcasts that people don't see us, he goes. You know they don't see you I know he goes. Hey, everybody, he slipped me off again.
Speaker 3:Oh, we're not being taped here. We're not. We'll be on YouTube.
Speaker 2:Word picture this is YouTube Okay, but a lot of us listen to us on podcast.
Speaker 3:Perfect, so yeah, so started from scratch.
Speaker 2:Did not buy an existing business about a year ago, so you've been at it for a year, yep, and you had your plan. You're ready to rock and roll. We get into sales. I know we talked about we're going to come back to the techniques. So they taught you the techniques, but you have found your own way to start building your business. So what are you doing to build your business?
Speaker 3:Yeah, so absolutely great. So they do teach you the technique. Obviously, sandler, like any other program, they have a program. So certainly some training and getting certified in that. But you know, it's interesting primarily to your point about a plan doing a lot of networking, doing a lot of cold outreach, doing all the things, quite frankly, that I train clients on how to do that stuff right, um, we create a cookbook and the cookbook is your plan. To your point earlier about a plan, and it's it's cold outreach, it's networking, it's looking for referrals, leveraging your existing sphere of influence, um, and growing it client by client it is silly watching jay do what he's doing.
Speaker 2:so sandler is a is a commodity, if you will, but it's actually a really known commodity Once people see it and understand the Sandler sales process and how it helps them in their business when you don't have a sales process documented. So in my company, here's my growth path. I was really good at sales. No, I really wasn't, but I was the owner and I was super passionate. I won a ton and then I became a sales trainer because I was training my other estimators. And I was a really shitty sales trainer because I knew how to sell but I couldn't train these guys because I had never been trained in this stuff.
Speaker 1:so then I was screaming at him. Didn't work right, well it should have.
Speaker 2:I don't know why that's a bodily harm you know, and I always felt it was a great leader, developer as well, but and so that's why I have a damadal, I mean, come on, guys if you want to see the damadal I have. I posted it on have you quite a bit.
Speaker 2:oh good, oh yeah, yeah, ron. Uh, you met ron truman, my west virginia operation. I said, ron, get in here. I said I got the damadal out. He goes oh sir, am I going to get one? I said you're going to get one of them, but but just the only one. But back to it, we didn't have it. So now I have a sales process and then I brought a Sandler group in to help.
Speaker 2:But here's what he did. He didn't say hey, I'm going to lay Sandler on you guys. He goes, let me understand what you're doing first. And then he says, huh, I think Sandler can help here, here and here. And this is before I met Jay. And sure as shit, within one year my sales guys have already improved 5%. Now it's not like 55%, but especially in home service sales, with where we're going right now with the downturn, it actually started to improve and I was so excited.
Speaker 2:And then Jay met my sales manager, goody, who you know at a BNI group because he's doing the right things to build his own business. Saylor tells you hey, we do this, but go out there, build your network. So what's that do? Well, that opens up to NERI, which you guys all know I'm part of NERI and I'm part of the national NERI group and so that's all the remodelers all around the US. Is NERary in Australia? Nary's not in Australia because the National Association of the Remodelers Not national, not international. I guess we're North American, north American. So in fact we're not in Mexico but we might be in Canada, I mean you know we've got an intergalactic audience, we do.
Speaker 1:You can't just throw a peck talk like that. Yeah, you're right. You can't just throw a peck talk like that.
Speaker 2:Yeah, you're right, I got to throw this up. So I'm part of a national board, the remodeling industry. They asked me to get involved, which is really cool, and talk about marketing, which is even better, and so I'm the head of the marketing committee. But back to what Jay's doing, excuse me, as he's building his business, he's getting himself out there and he's doing all the stuff that all of us do in the beginning. You're doing shit. You're like man, I ain't making no money. Oh my God, I got to drive two hours and do this.
Speaker 3:Oh, my God.
Speaker 2:He just asked me to come speak and give a freebie for an hour to 22 people, and it was so funny because he just did this on Tuesday, which was very timely, and what you don't know. What I said behind the scenes was we had 22 people and, uh, my nary compatriots, uh, here in atlanta, were like I'm so thrilled, I'm like, no, I'm so pissed that the fact that this guy came in and dropped all that gold and we had only 22 people and they went. Well, we just heard from three of them who are ready to go. They're like so maybe it works, maybe maybe it doesn't, you don't know.
Speaker 1:We don't know what an interesting thing that you have to employ what you're selling in order to sell what you're selling. Yeah.
Speaker 2:So yeah, crazy right.
Speaker 3:Yeah, that's right To Chris's point. I recall, to your point about plans starting a new business, a guy that's been doing this what I do for a long time in another part of the country. His advice to me was hey, man, in the first 12 to 18 months stay away from sharp objects, because it's tough.
Speaker 1:That's really good advice. Good advice it's tough.
Speaker 2:So there's some times where you want to sit there and go. Do you guys even know who I am? Yeah Right, so I started. There's some times where you want to sit there and go. Do you guys even know who I am? Yeah right, so I started my business and I'm in somebody's house and this guy's talking down to me.
Speaker 1:I'm like yeah, I used to have. I had a crane deliver my desk through a tower window in atlanta.
Speaker 2:True, true story, by the way, really, yeah, yeah, okay, no, I did yeah oh, there's you.
Speaker 1:I was never that pretentious.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I was. And yeah, literally four weeks before that, when I started my business, I was in the CEO of SunTrust's office giving him the numbers that he didn't want to see that the economy was going to really be hurt, but not in my business. So, yeah, and this guy's looking at me, I'm like, do you even know who I am? Yeah, but you can't do that because, as you know, in sales especially right, check your ego at the door. Absolutely they're the most important person in the world. Talk to us about your sales and in what you've learned and what you're doing yeah, no.
Speaker 3:So, um, again coming out of, oh gosh, 20 plus years of selling and being a sales leader, uh, and interesting, going through again in corporate America a lot of different sales training programs. And I say that to say one of the things I like about what I do is it's not that. So you put your team through a two-day program, they teach them some word tracks and some tricks and you think, all right, we're going to sell more. And I'm sure you both know it doesn't happen that way. The reason I use these sports analogies is we're at St Ives, right, you can't be a scratch golfer overnight and you can't be a rockstar salesperson overnight. So what I like about our model is it's reinforcement, it's coaching. It's not two days, in many cases it's a year or more. And I wish I, quite frankly, I was in corporate america as a sales leader. I wish I had sandler. Quite frankly, uh, I didn't. I had different programs and processes that were not as effective so let's talk about that for a minute.
Speaker 1:Um, and actually I I told jay before I'm like, don't go on and start talking about sandler because, um, as he already knows, I'm a big fan of the process so I and I kind of want him to, because my whole career has been in sales and I've had a lot of sales training and I've met Sandler, trained people, and that I kind of hold them in this higher regard. It's hardcore. And I've seen, really I've seen the books, but I don't know what they do. It's kind of a mystery to me.
Speaker 2:Let's talk about this for a minute. So the guy who set it up for me and I'm going to set this up for you is you have three kinds of sales processes out there in the entrepreneurial world. Right, you have carnegie, which was built in the 20s or whatever, and that's you know. Learn uh, win friends, influence people. But he was also an incredible salesperson to sandler. David sandler came in and said you know what I like the process, but let's do this. And the third one, and this is the one that chris is employed you just fucking wing it and that's what I do, baby uh, but and and uh.
Speaker 2:He looked at him and said he looked at our whole group and said look, I can't train chris, I can. I can sure as hell help you guys, because you will never be like Chris and and. And I looked, I looked at everybody and nobody wants to. But but back to the Sandler process. So tell us a little bit about some of those techniques, because this is huge, In fact, in the entire things of psychology which I know you were trained in, Alan, this is great.
Speaker 3:Yeah, there's a big psychological element. To build on your point about David Sandler 50-some years ago he created it. A salesperson, he was struggling and he started to realize there's some psychology involved in it. So he incorporated that in the system. But to build on what Chris said, yeah, we see it when you mentioned the different systems.
Speaker 3:There's traditional selling, and I did it for many years. And there's traditional selling and I did it for many years and that is present to as many people as you can. Try and overcome objections, try and close and hope and pray. We often say in the industry it's the show up and throw up. As many people as I can let me present. So that's kind of the traditional model. I did it for years with some success. The buyers have gotten smart and the buyers put their guards up and protect themselves. I mean because it does work. It's just painful. It's painful, a little manipulative, so buyers have learned a way to navigate that as well. So I say all that to say the Sandler system is more conversational. We often say in the Sandler world Chris probably appreciates this it's going for the no, it's looking for a no early on in the process.
Speaker 3:Can I tell a quick, very quick story, please Along those lines. I was coaching someone yesterday who is just struggling in the world of sales, struggling prospecting and getting leads. He's in the refrigeration parts business Not that that matters, but he's sharing with me what he thought was a good prospect. Who's gone dark on him? Just Jay, he won't respond and we have this thing we call close the file, which is essentially saying go for the no. I said send him an email, leave him a voicemail and say hey, I assume it's over. Should I close the file? And Chris and Alan, it's amazing how that works. So today that was yesterday Today he texted me and said Jay, I sent him that email, he's reengaged with me. We're going to move forward with the next step.
Speaker 2:Get right out of here, let's go. Should I close the file?
Speaker 1:Close the file. Huh, I'm using that tomorrow there you go. I'm going to sell a freaking building tomorrow.
Speaker 2:You know what we're learning? All right, everybody's learning. All right, let's go back to the school of Sandler. Oh my God, we're going back because it's good stuff. All right, so that's one story.
Speaker 1:But we still are kind of a fan of the sandwich clothes right, go ahead, go ahead, go ahead.
Speaker 3:Please tell me about the sandwich clothes you know what?
Speaker 2:Actually, I don't tell tales. That's a great episode. Go back. You can hit me up on email. I'll give it to you, but let's get back to. Jay, because I love Jay's closing stuff, cause you asked some questions what is different about Sandler that helps these guys sell, and I think that's what we all need to hear.
Speaker 3:Yeah, these guys sell and I think that's what we all need to hear. Yeah, so I would say the biggest difference? A couple of things. One is masterful communication right Through every step of the process, being we call it disarmingly honest. And when I say go for the no, it's in almost inviting not almost inviting the client at every stage to say if this isn't working, feel free to check out now, say no, right. But the other thing I would say is the qualification step, so spending a lot of time trying to understand hey, is there a problem that you have that I can even solve? Is there even a fit right?
Speaker 3:Before we go any further and talk about money and the decision, is there even a reason we should talk? Let's uncover, we call it pain and if I think I can solve it, let's continue. And continuing means let's talk about money, right, let's get that on the table. Let's not make a pitch and find out they don't have the budget so early in our process, as Chris knows, let's talk about money.
Speaker 3:It's sometimes uncomfortable, but let's talk about money in a very disarming way and if we can overcome that and overcoming that means our solution provides an ROI and we really spend a lot of time to say, hey, does it make sense financially? And then, if it does, then we move into how do we get the decision done right, so we don't find ourselves in a situation where I've got an ally, but there's three or four layers above him that actually make the decision. So let's navigate that effectively and once we've done all that, and if we've done all that properly, then it's not a close, it's not an action, it's, it's an agreement. Let's shake hands and let's, let's do business, and that is very different than a lot of traditional processes.
Speaker 2:So really big upfront, talking about this, and I think, uh, this isay and and the crew is really good and jay is, because he, he knows it. That's what I love about this because he got into the entrepreneurial journey with sandler. I think he's picked the right uh system for him to get into. When I, when I listened to him, I knew him after he had jumped in already. But this is one where I go, guys. He hit his leverage point so hard and I don't think he thinks that Sandler's going to just make the gold come down. He's not going to make it rain. He knows he's got to go out there and prospect. That's why he's doing the BNI, that's why he's doing the things with us. But he realized he's got a great product behind him and a great system. So back to that system and product, which is awesome. How about this one?
Speaker 2:You talk about that with that pain point right up front, and that's a great disarming statement. When you're in somebody's house, you know, guys, you guys all know I'm a remodeler handyman. We're in home services. We did 2,700 jobs last year. So when we're in there and we're talking to people, we only win 40%. So we saw 6,500 people. Yeah, my guys are in there and but you talked about it's B2C, it's B2B. You said let's uncover that pain point. So talk about those disarming statements that you use to get somebody to tell you. Here's my real pain, cause we all want to tell you it's money.
Speaker 3:Yeah, yeah, no, no. Look, we spend a lot of time in that, what we call the pain step right and it's really trying to understand, in a very conversational manner, what's going on. Right, and we will, we usually. Usually what you hear in the beginning is not the real issue, right? So you know, whatever the issue might be, they might share that. Hey, you know what in your world? Right, I've got, you know, I got a problem in the house, whatever it might be. But we really spend a lot of time getting to the why and really understanding what's going on right and are they motivated to address it? Right, chris has heard me say that before.
Speaker 3:It's one thing to say, hey, I got a problem, but then we want to spend some time. How big a problem is it and are you motivated to address it? And really, really, we will often say that people don't argue with their own data. Look, we want them to tell us I need to fix this. Okay, great, and if we think we're the solution, then we'll talk money, then we'll move forward with the process. But it's really trying to understand hey, do you have a problem? And how motivated If you're not motivated that motivated?
Speaker 1:piece is huge. It's huge Because you can see it's a problem and you can see they can probably afford it, but do they just? Are they motivated to do it? Going back to my background and you shop.
Speaker 3:Are you kicking tires? If you're kicking tires, then okay, maybe we should save each other time, or are you motivated to do something? So that's absolutely huge.
Speaker 2:Well, let's go back to home sales. And so, alan, I'm going to bring it right back to you when I went to Alan's house and we've done a lot of work at Alan's house, thank you, alan, you know that because you know you trust us, we're going to make sure it happens. But there was one thing that came up and you said, hey, I want to put this deck outside, so I want to grill there. But we also are kind of thinking about doing our kitchen. And it was just me and Alan and we're buds, we're talking, and I pulled a full-on Sandler on him.
Speaker 2:I'm like so what's the pain? He goes, well, I don't know. I said, well, is Judy around, that's his wife. And then next thing, you know, judy came in Because I have no pain with our kitchen. He has no pain with our kitchen, he has no pain. I, judy. Judy had a lot of pain with the kitchen, but her pain was not enough to overcome the price objections of a full-on, absolutely blown out kitchen remodel. And so she told me right away, that's not the way to go. I got the no on the kitchen remodel right away. I'm like all right, let's go back to what you really want. And then she was bought in, alan was bought in. It was all sandler sales and this did I technique you I love that I feel.
Speaker 1:I feel like it was manipulated. Well, but you're my bud so, but I have to say, we sat out there and we're married 32 years. We sat out there a couple nights ago, nice, and it's a little private barbecue deck. There's a nook on the back side of our house that can't be seen from the street. Perfect, yeah, and it was. We just took out a window, put a door, put a little deck there.
Speaker 2:I'm not going to lie. Actually, this is me and helping my bud out and I thought this was awesome.
Speaker 1:It's so awesome, but every time we sit down it's like God.
Speaker 2:I love this little deck and they have this huge deck in the back of their house. Right, they have a. They have this expansive huge deck in the back of their house in a beautiful community and don't let them kid you, he's in an awesome place, um, but we did this and they walk through the pantry, they go out there. But I knew I was like oh yeah, after listening to him, but I sampled him right off the bat, yeah, because I wanted to hear from them. I feel dirty now, yeah, but, but you don't, because we got it out right.
Speaker 1:It was a total conversation. Now I didn't realize you were applying a technique because I thought you were my friend and I just thought we were having a conversation, but apparently I was being-.
Speaker 2:Everybody in my entire life.
Speaker 3:Now we would not say we Sandlered somebody Just for the record For the record. We would not say we Sandler'd somebody Just for the record, for the record what we would say, what we would say so hey, sandler, david's not alive anymore Shit.
Speaker 2:So I did not Sandler anybody. He solved a problem.
Speaker 3:He solved a problem.
Speaker 2:Am I right?
Speaker 1:He made it easy, he took it corporate on me.
Speaker 2:There's a reason I left corporate bro. The he made it corporate on me. There's a reason I left corporate bro. The reason is dude. I was on the corporate strings table twice. I was on the couch twice. It's time to move on. Oh yeah they, they went. Oh my god, he doesn't look like the rest of us. I didn't know you're in banking, so it's interesting okay oh, it's way interesting. And that's what they said about me.
Speaker 1:I'm not I'm not done feeling dirty, but I will say I love it, baby, let's go. Chris made it easy for me to get what I wanted. That is how I would phrase it.
Speaker 2:So actually what I learned? I love that Through the sand Again.
Speaker 1:I was. You used the force on me. I mean I was winging it.
Speaker 2:This isn't the kitchen you're looking for. This is not the kitchen you're looking for. So back to winging it. But I could not train, my guys could not have been able to pull off what I did. In fact, as we went to implement it, my guys struggled with it. They're like Chris, I don't see what you're seeing and, needless to say, there was a lot of non-Sandler conversations happening behind the scenes where they worked for me.
Speaker 3:And I was like like you're gonna figure out how to make that happen. But how does, how did david sandler feel?
Speaker 1:about obscenities and throwing things. Uh, probably wouldn't be a fan. No, we would not be. Yeah, it's very conversational in certain yeah, certain homes yeah, well, I I.
Speaker 2:It's very conversational in my office. There's no, there's a recent trash. Can we do?
Speaker 3:we do say make it your own, we do say make it your own, and we're not big on word track, so use your own words. So if it fit, if it works, then you know. All right, who might argue with that right?
Speaker 2:so we talk about the sandler process. So, uh, here we are in the last 10 minutes of our man. This has been so fun just talking about this we're really down to 10.
Speaker 3:We're down to 10 guys time flies when you're having fun. Is that all right?
Speaker 2:he did it again. We're having a lot of fun, a good time. So let's talk about the sandler process. So, yeah, again, upfront conversation. You do that, do this. So I'm listening and I'm thinking, you know what? Yeah I got sales, you know no problem. And um, yeah, I want to grow and I want to scale, because a lot of our venture team wants to. Um, but why? Why, sandler? So tell me why we would go there, yeah so.
Speaker 3:So to your point about sales. I know sales. What you often hear, what I often hear from business owners, is they are not. There's no consistency in prospects. I didn't hear that. By the way, I'm not playing tennis but I'm going for more bourbon.
Speaker 2:Oh okay, alan's got to go practice tennis after this and I was like like, screw you, dude, give me a little more swing fluid there. All right, let's go.
Speaker 3:So let me rewind.
Speaker 2:So I'll rewind, uh hey, michael cut that out. No, guess what michael never gonna cut?
Speaker 1:never cuts it because he went to a big boy job and he stopped doing all that stuff, man, michael it's, it's basically his imaginary at this point he's my intern used to cut this thing up for got it okay, but he never did and so chris listens at like three times speed, so he sort of misses the fact that you're listening to this great podcast and all of a sudden there's the uh hey, michael, cut here and go back 30 seconds it's notes notes to production, notes to production that are just out in australia.
Speaker 2:To be fair, we're gonna come back to uh jay in a minute. But, to be fair, everybody's podcast at one and a half. I can't even listen to ours at one because, uh, you talk too fast, alan. Oh, maybe it's one of us, okay, maybe it's me all. Right back, jay, please can we so process.
Speaker 3:Yeah, so process. I think that's what we're talking about. So, um, look, often what I hear from business leaders sales leaders that are doing it as you said, winging it is. You hear things like inconsistent lead volume, inconsistent pipeline. They're trying to track deals and they get really happy about their pipeline and find out they only close 50% of that. And all of that happens when you don't have discipline around a process and a system. And so when you follow a process and a system, it's predictable. It's predictable and oh, by the way, you spend time with the right prospects who become clients and you're not wasting your time chasing people.
Speaker 1:How big of a deal is that? Because I think that's super important figuring out who isn't your customer, it's huge.
Speaker 3:It's huge. It's huge. That's why, as I said earlier, early in our process, it's really understanding if there's even an opportunity, if there's even a fit and, as I said earlier, allowing the prospect to say no and also getting permission for us to say no. This probably isn't going to work and that's huge to your point and that's okay.
Speaker 1:That's okay because I feel like if I had a sales training and they're like you know, especially at the corporate level, and they're like, just get to the no and you're thinking, okay, I'm, that sounds nice, but I'm gonna get yelled at if I don't take that no and turn it into a yes so in my company I actually this is the one thing I would tell you my sales team they are applauded for the no.
Speaker 2:Really, yeah, I do. I say guys, push for the no. He said chris is uh, and so good, he has said the same thing. Chris has always trained me to push for the no. Can you but?
Speaker 1:can you kind of illustrate why? What that no, no, what that looks like. I'm thinking about somebody listening to this like what does it mean? Push for the no? Right because I want to know, because I could get a no, real quick if I'm like, hey, it's two million dollars for your little deck there well, all right.
Speaker 2:So if it's a huge uh, so again, if you do the upfront work that sandler teaches you to do, upfront contract, yeah, you, the upfront contract. Is it okay for me to uh be honest with you can, all right. Is it okay for me to be honest with you? Is it okay if I interrupt you? It sounds like dating in college now. Well, welcome to sales.
Speaker 1:He didn't say it was a sport. He didn't say it was a sport and hello. May I have permission to look at you fondly. So to build on my uncomfortable All, right, listen, okay, go ahead.
Speaker 2:The minister's son who did no wrong, and I'm the Catholic boy who did no wrong, and then I'm the Catholic boy who did everything wrong. That's why we get along so well, right, but this is why I get away with everything. And then I prayed for myself on Saturday morning and get it all exalted. It was all good. That's why we have penance. I can do everything wrong all week. So, anyway, back to the Sandler thing. You upfront contract really quickly, right, and you start to establish that rapport and then they go.
Speaker 2:that's when you got them. No, but no, hang on, because what do they all lead with, especially in home service sales? I don't have the money. All right, hang on. As we've all figured out, you guys know this is that five. It's the fifth biggest problem is price, cause there are things before that. I want quality, I quality, I want service, I went there's. If you ask people to prioritize, the money is at the end, but they need to see it's a value. So you start that early and that's where you push for the no yeah, what does that mean?
Speaker 3:what does push for the?
Speaker 1:no, so, so yeah.
Speaker 3:So to build on, just yeah. So to build on chris's point, upfront contract is really setting expectations right. So, um, and by the way, when you say ask for the no, many traditional salespeople will say I can't do that, so I'll back up. An upfront contract is very simple. It's setting the stage upfront. Why are we meeting? What's your agenda, mr or Mrs Prospect? I'm going to ask some questions. So I have an agenda and at the end of that initial conversation let's decide if we need to move forward.
Speaker 3:Because it could be very early on in the process. You realize there's just a disconnect. So them asking for the no might be as simple. As I was talking to somebody at the NERI meeting who does high-end pools. It might be very early in the process understanding, hey, I got a budget 50 for 50 grand and I don't know pools but and the average cost might be two or $300,000 or more, it might be very early on saying you know what? We're not a fit. That's asking for the no. Now do you have a conversation? Do you find out if there's really an opportunity to do a large? Sure you do.
Speaker 1:You don't end there but you're essentially giving the customer permission to say, oh sorry, that's not in the ballpark. Is that where you say, hey, we've got financing?
Speaker 2:and we can get the so money again is-. Is there any way? I?
Speaker 1:can get this pool in your yard today, sir.
Speaker 2:What have we all been trained? As homeowners and as people who have grown up with dirt, poor parents or middle-aged parents in Michigan, we've all been trained that the only card we have to play is our price card.
Speaker 1:And we hold our entire deck close to our hand and I've always what I learned in sales, the hard way is I don't necessarily think it's the number, it's the fear of being screwed.
Speaker 2:Right, well, it's a value, right Back to it. So if I told you you could have this jetty for $120,000. Right, well, it's a value, right and back to it. So if I told you I can you can have this jetty for 120,000.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and you can say no, but I said no. But if I had, if I had 10 people come and they said 120,000, then I'd go oh, that's how much the debt costs. But I'm trying to pretend like I know what I'm talking about. I don't. I really don't know how much it's going to cost. So you throw any number at me. I'm not really sure. I don't really know if that's a good number or not, so you don't.
Speaker 2:We talk about that one too, so you want to price shop me.
Speaker 3:Go ahead, Jay.
Speaker 2:Well, no.
Speaker 3:Because, first of all, we would argue to your point that it's never the cost, it's the return. Right, if I spend x, what's the return on investment? Seldom it's the cost. Yeah, people will shop you, etc. And and do we have to get price competitive? And we do. We talk to our clients about that. We absolutely do. At the end of the day, we would argue it's, it's an emotional decision. First of all, first and foremost, right, when you picture that beautiful deck in your backyard, right, there's an emotional. Or your wife does um, and then it's, and then it's is the benefit the roi, whatever that might be, does exceed the cost? It's never. It's never the number, it's what am I going to get?
Speaker 1:for that we always, by the way numbers to rationalize our emotional decision it's my deck, but she does come out there and we have a nice time. We put a little candle out there. Yeah, you know what I love that?
Speaker 2:you say that because you know she doesn't listen to this when she's not in the room I'm the one that up until now yeah yeah, it connect, you know, it connects me with my smokehouse it does.
Speaker 2:No, it's been a great connector. In fact, that was the most fun that I've had, uh, designing something. Because I was like because it was a hard space to design out. Yeah, because the ground was running away. It was up, yeah there's a lot of uh moving parts back to that. But back to this I want to go see this deck now?
Speaker 2:yeah, you actually should. You would look at and go and you're like you give the, you give me the uh and I would give you the uh, jay go. Uh. I can't because he's under my employee, but yeah, that's when get one of those.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that's when you get hit with the Dammit doll. Here comes the Dammit doll Bam.
Speaker 2:But no, it's a really cool deck. We did a great job on it. But Alan and I worked really hard with it, but when we got into it he started saying, well, we're thinking about doing the kitchen, and that's where I can't. This is where I helped him. What's the Sandler phrase?
Speaker 3:Bet me over Free consulting. Oh, you gave him some free consulting. No, I Sandlered him.
Speaker 2:I was like no, no, no.
Speaker 3:First, you did not Sandler him.
Speaker 2:You did not Sandler him. I did, though, bro, I so did. Mike cut the Sandler. Why is Sandler so good? I'll tell you. Why is sandler so good? I'll tell you why. Uh, because it helps you train your guys and to help sell your services, because and ladies, of course, I mean, in fact, in my world, ladies could be a way better salesperson. Uh, but going back to because we're, we gotta wrap this sucker up, man. We're, uh, man, this is so good, right you know, I want you to know.
Speaker 1:She still talks about that kitchen, so it's still there. You might get both. Yeah, no boom hey, all right.
Speaker 2:Well, I back up the sandler.
Speaker 1:You can't do it well, david's done man come on, dad, goodbye, get over this stuff.
Speaker 2:Oh my god, I think I just heard this ghost. But so we're talking about this. Here's how it's helped me so much and and that's why, when Jay got into this business and he came to us and he had this model with him, but he had the business sense behind him. There has been two other people here in the Atlanta market that have called on me and I didn't do it, didn't do it, didn't do it. And Goody said hey, you got to talk to him and I talked to him. I'm like you know what this guy kind of gets it he's not doing the pushy sales shit. He's not doing that. Hey, sandler's the best ever. Oh my god, all your teams you know all 15 of your sales people knew, oh, he didn't do all that. He didn't come over the top and like, overwhelm me, he, he actually sandler me. But uh, here we go again.
Speaker 1:Right, mike, you got that jay, let me put a little more bourbon in here so I loved it, but I loved that he's doing it.
Speaker 2:So he's working. He's working the angle, he's working the angle, he's working it and I, I mean, I'm in his camp man, I am absolutely uh 100 telling you guys, you guys want to get into a sandler, you want to understand more about it? Go figure it out. J Jay Iver at Sandler sales.
Speaker 1:So it sounds like the program's customizable though. No, no company's too big or too small, and yeah, that's correct, yeah, so let's give it up the pitch.
Speaker 3:Yep, no, absolutely, so, uh, so, absolutely right. So, uh, it Can we adopt to many industries? We absolutely can. And to your point, Chris, yeah, reach out to Jay Eibler with Sandler here in Atlanta.
Speaker 2:We'll put that in the show notes so you guys can figure it out, because I know you're all driving around. You're trying to go out there and make money, because that's what we're all doing every day. Wouldn't it be nice to make more money? You know, if you could. Just Sandler people. Can we go back to the Simon Sinek?
Speaker 1:What? Back to the assignment. Cynic, what's my why, my why? I know your why is because you want to be on that big freaking boat with a giant wake, knocking people off of their paddle boards and stuff all I'm thinking is is he not there yet?
Speaker 2:is he there yet he's? Pretty close okay, where are you going? So I'm going to go to lees, actually play with the monkeys, actually, after I go to the atlanta braves, uh, suite tomorrow night.
Speaker 1:Nice, look at you look at me like that Is that the trusted toolbox suite.
Speaker 2:No, I got to fight it in, because I'm kind of a big deal. Are you kidding me? I can't do that. The guy doesn't know how to sell. He does know how to sell.
Speaker 2:I get in there because here's what Sandler taught me a lot, too is you don't know what you don't know. I'm going to leave you guys with that nugget. We've had a lot of gold nuggets tonight, but when I learned that one, that was a game changer for me. You don't know what you don't know. I grew up as Alan will contest, and you guys have all listened to me Attest Whatever. See, I'm that smart. Because he's wrong.
Speaker 2:All right, check the facts. I want you to slash my wires? Yeah, I am. So it's it's. It's hard to go. I don't know what I don't know. And then, when you find that I don't know what I don't know part out, you find out that maybe the kid didn't want a jenna, maybe the kid didn't want this or that or the other, and so you're trying to figure it all out. And that's the hard part, because you're like, well, your house is in shambles, so you need to get it all fixed. Like I don't care about that, I just want new countertops. Like okay, why? And so you started asking those questions, and that's where it gets hard and you said the keyword.
Speaker 3:Why getting to that? Why I really try to understand that. Jay Abler God, we could talk about the why, and I could do the last four questions, but guys, we're out of time. Yeah, can we do a go Lions? Since we're both from Michigan, can we do it one more time? Go Lions, go Lions baby, let's go.
Speaker 2:Are you kidding me? I've been my entire life. I've been my entire life. You got the right coach. I got the right coach. Absolutely Grew up. So did Jay. Here's how we grew up. We had four channels because we were old.
Speaker 1:I'm going to put it on my channel.
Speaker 2:One of them is PBS, no, and the three networks. The fourth one was CBC. We had the Canadian, you had the Canadian broadcast, of course. Yeah, bro, bro, that's right. We were right on the border so I could watch Canadian hockey.
Speaker 1:Yeah it was big Hockey Night in Canada. Is Canadian hockey different than other hockey?
Speaker 2:Yeah, we were the best, and I say we because I'm in Michigan Hockey.
Speaker 3:Night in Canada.
Speaker 2:Hockey Night in Canada, bro, the best, don Cherry yeah.
Speaker 1:Don Cherry, absolutely oh. I remember Don Cherry the big mullet, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2:Don Cherry, absolutely. Oh, my god, cherry, the big mullet. Yeah, yeah, don cherry. So I so my uh, my kids, uh, friends come over and say is your father um? Is he from canada? I'm like, oh, screw y'all, I can't even do y'all.
Speaker 3:So anyway, we only have four.
Speaker 2:All right, check this out. Growing up I could not watch a Lions home game until I came out of network. So every Thanksgiving we would go to Toledo, Ohio, to my aunt's place, and watch my only Detroit Lions game my entire life growing up, unless they were traveling. Oh, because of the blackout. Yeah.
Speaker 1:Do you?
Speaker 2:remember those deals? Yeah, because if you didn't have and we had the Silverdome was growing up on the act michigan, which was huge and we could never fill it up and I could never watch the lions and we only had again, right, there's only four networks for us, but three. And then back to high school, or, uh, nfl. They would only play two games in one and one game at four, is that it? And we were never on it, so I didn't have a chance to ever watch my team.
Speaker 1:But they were on every Thanksgiving, though, weren't they?
Speaker 2:They were.
Speaker 3:Absolutely.
Speaker 2:That was the thing. So we'd go to my aunt's place and my dad and I would lock down. My dad was a Buffalo Bills fan because he was in Buffalo and we would lock down. My dad was a Buffalo Bills fan because he was in Buffalo and we would lock down. And he wasn't a sports fan. I was a sports fan. I mean, this kid could not get enough sports in his head. I mean I had every sport I ever played. He learned with me. He learned to skate with me. He learned to play baseball with me. He learned, I mean, everything we did. We learned to play soccer together. He was my coach, wow, and uh, yeah. So he watched with me and my, uh, my mother you know, god rest her soul who used to say I forgot how hard it is to watch a sporting event with Chris.
Speaker 2:And when the lines were on, I mean it's full on. And so last last Thanksgiving we're in the North Carolina mountains with my family, my kids and I'm doing the old deep fried turkey, yeah, and they're like uh-oh. I said, oh no, we got this, we're going to beat the shit out of these bears. And they lost. And my son looked and went uh-oh, and they all went out to the hot tub. I said, yeah, chris needs about an hour Because I was so mad. Hey, but this is a different year, this is our year, right? I think this is our year, I think so, right. So, jay, what do you think? What?
Speaker 2:time right we're one I know we're one and oh right, I got my lion's jersey.
Speaker 1:I got my that was a game, oh my god, wasn't it yeah?
Speaker 2:I heard it off because I went.
Speaker 1:No, I, I went I can't Because they were giving it up at the end.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and I had just gone to the Falcons game and I'm a Falcons fan now because I moved here. You can really pick them, can't you Dude? All right, all right, the Patriots sucked back in the day, all right, come on. All right, guys, we're out of here. Back in the day, guys, we're out of here. You know what? Forget all that sports talk. Actually, don't forget that sports talk. Remember it, live it, learn it, love it. Get out of here, go out there and make some fucking money. Let's go, baby.
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