How I Built a $1.7B Business Repairing Garage Doors

0:00 We're gonna spend$4.3 million this month in marketing. And here's what I've learned. Tommy Mello! Tommy Mello, Tommy Mello! The founder of A1 Garage Door. You're doing this blue collar thing, but at this really big scale, and I love that combination. A1 Garage Doors, we fix, we repair, we maintain, and we replace garage doors. A1 from day one. The original valuation was Now the business is north of eighty million of you. No shit. I've read hundreds of books on sales and even more on marketing. So ring ring, I pick up what are you telling'em. You never say the cost, you say the investment. You never say the most expensive, you say top of the line. You never say the cheapest, you say builder grade. These words Matter. Tommy, giving us the talk. What other businesses have you seen?

0:45 in the services industry that you are shocked at how big they are. Most of what I've done is repeatable. It's not like this crazy thing that only works in garage doors. Don't overcomplicate it. Dude I've known you for twenty seven minutes and I love this guy. Tommy, what do you suck at? Where's your weakness right now? I was gonna go broke. There was a stripper living in our Dallas warehouse with my manager. We were doing so well, and then we went to jail. There it is, there's the weakness. I feel like I can rule the world, I know I could be what I want to. I'll put my law in it like a day song on the road, let's travel now. Yeah, we listen I I listened to a dozen. What do you think? I I love the come up stories and like I hate how every single guy is pushing entrepreneurship.

1:31 'Cause it's cut out for Forty five percent of the population. Like you won't Be able to handle this. The the rejection, the failure. The five years of taking a loan against your house.

1:41 The people that quit and cheat and lie, the canceled appointments. The long drives, the The hard nights, the walking out of the movie theater to go run a job, like I just I don't feel like everybody's cut out for it. And some people that invest in a bitcoin early, like they don't know what it's like. So so who do you think is head out for it? How do you know?

1:58 Well, there's there's this thing called Driven. It's a book. My buddy Gary wrote the book and it's actually If you're a hunter, it's in your DNA. It's literally a different chromosome. And There's so much more usually it's A D D.

2:12 Usually You're dyslexic, some people. But it it just means you have a high tolerance for failure. You're you're you're okay working a lot. Uh you don't ever mention the words work life balance.

2:23 You're off balance on purpose. And there's seasons of life. And you actually have a bigger why. And by the way, you can't quit. The goalpost always moves. There's no like finish There's no end zone.

2:34 So If you're gonna start from nothing Uh the chance of success. Is uh Less than ten percent.

2:42 So you uh so for the audience, you started this thing called A One Garage, which at this point I think does north of three hundred million in revenue. You took some chips off the table, you sold about half or a little bit less than half of the business recently for I I think north of a billion dollar valuation, is that right? The original valuation. was about five hundred and forty million. We were at twenty seven million. A výber. Now the business

3:07 It's north of eighty million of Ebene. So now it's worth Close to one point seven. Wow. And how long ago did you start the company? Uh, two thousand seven. So the first ten years were practice.

3:18 And explain, what does the company do? So p people understand who who you are and what you do. A one graduates we fix We repair, we maintain And we replaced cross shores. And we do this in now twenty three states, thirty seven markets. We run

3:34 On average twenty five thousand jobs a month. And give us the origin story. We don't usually like the origin stories, uh, because you can You know, you can get those elsewhere. But I gotta ask. I gotta know. Well, this is I mean the the end point that's so interesting. I gotta know the beginning. You know, when I was a kid, my mom was a real estate agent, my dad had a transmission shop.

3:53 He didn't pay the IRS, so that got taken. They got a divorce. So I learned to shovel snow mowans in Michigan. I got a job when I was twelve washing dishes at four dollars and five cents an hour. And I always had the entrepreneurial gene. I started a landscaping business when I moved to Arizona.

4:09 And I was living at this house, seven hundred dollars we paid rent for three guys. I paid Two hundred, by the way, maybe two hundred. The guy with the master paid three hundred. And one of the roommates

4:20 was manager at a garage store company. He goes, dude, I cannot find a good painter to s save my life. If you guys know anything about painters, They're pretty unreliable. And so he's like, Can you paint Grasdra's, by the way? I'm busting tables, serving tables and bartending, and I'm flipping bow flexes. I buy them on

4:36 Craigslist sell'em on the Arizona Republic. I've sold over three hundred both flexes. And then I did total gyms and I sold over a thousand cars. Buy'em. Fix'em, clean'em, sell'em. And so I'm doing all these things. And I mean I am hustling.

4:50 I am like the epitome of hustler at this point. And I was like, Sure, how much you gonna pay me? He's like, I could pay you a hundred dollars to paint per garage door. But you gotta pay for the paint. And the tape. And the paper.

5:03 So I was like I had a G twenty infinity in ninety six. It had a hundred and twenty thousand miles on it and it was cheap on gas. And by the way. Two thousand six, two thousand five, this is when the real estate market was booming. And so I hired a painter, this old man, and I paid him

5:19 Three hundred dollars. Per door to teach me, taught me on three doors. I went to Home Depot, bought a Magnum 5. Paint gun. And I was off to the races and I got good. I could paint ten doors a day. I went through the yellow book and called every garage drawer company.

5:33 I'd say seven out of ten, I became their primary painter. And does the garage door company mean like I install a new garage door or your garage door needs some type of service and I fix it? So The garage door company does both. They fix them and they replace'em. Every time they replaced one.

5:49 If it's an HOA property or a house, paint match. I was the guy they'd grind out a little section. They'd give it to me. Usually the owner would meet up. I'd get ten from one guy, three from this guy. And I go knock'em out and I literally use MabQuest.

6:03 to build my routes. I mean this is back in the day before GPS. You mentioned that you called all the garage companies and you became the primary for whatever, seven out of ten. So what was the pitch? So ring ring. I pick up, what are you telling him and what what worked there? Cause it sounds like just being a reliable guy who's gonna do what he says he's gonna do was a was a differentiator here. What did you say on the phone? Yeah, so I mentioned the company that my roommate worked for. I said I've been paying garageers for several months. I show up on time.

6:32 I work the warranties if there's any, which is rare because I spend time with the clients. I'll pick up the samples myself, I'll pay for the paint. I'm only charging a hundred dollars. Uh that includes drive time and all I ask is that I get paid when I finish the work. I clean up after myself. I'm Very reliable.

6:50 And Most of these guys didn't have that service to offer. So I said, it's just one more thing. You could charge three hundred. Give me a hundred out of it. You know, this is another way to make money. It's another way to go into HOAs.

7:02 And they're like, You sound hungry, kid. Yeah, let's meet up. I'll give you a couple, we'll see how you do. In Arizona it was easier in the summer'cause it dries real quick in the winter when it's kinda wet outside and it's cool. You you gotta go on real slow. It takes a little longer.

7:16 And you gotta tape the windows, if there's windows it could be a pain in the butt. But I got really, really fast and efficient. And so I'm meeting up with these technicians And Every technician because half the time I met up with the technicians to get the sample.

7:30 And they're like, dude, I just made three grand this week. And I'm like You made three thousand dollars as a technician. And by like I said, the real estate market was booming. People were just like their real estate was going up so fast, they were just like, Fix it. I went out with a guy, he charged a hundred and fifty dollars per remote.

7:47 And I'm like Who would pay Go to Home Depot, pick'em up for ten bucks. At the time. So my other roommate got a job working for him as a technician and he approached me. His name's Gabe and he goes, We should start our own business.

7:59 And I was like, Well dude, I'll form the L C I'll get the E. I. N. number. I I'll get us going. I know enough. I can handle the marketing, but you're gonna have to teach me how to be a technician. He didn't know much. Because their training was crap. So I g I went to all the manufacturers that got trained.

8:14 I had the business with Gabe for three years. Uh he also smoked about a pound of weed per month at the time, so that was like It was like he'd be eating and by the way, he's still my best friend, but he he'd be like listen, after I finish lunch, I'll give you a call back. And I'm like I I watched him answer the phone so every time he went out of town I take the phones.

8:34 And man, we made a lot of money when I took the phones, but I also ran all the calls. Because this is when I quit the bus boy job, all I kept was a bartending job. twenty ten I gave him an ultimatum. I said, Dude, you're my best friend, you're my roommate and my business partner. You take the business and the debt. I'll start my own.

8:52 Or you could give me the business, I'll take on all the debt you're in the clear he goes, I want to move to Montana. I wanna be closer to my brother. I said great. And at this point just Quick little to top it off.

9:04 I had six employees full time two ten ninety nines. And by the way, people were still in toilet paper. Uh I didn't have a real office, so I rented my first real office. We were working out of our house. And I was kind of like just

9:17 At night. Just Holding my hands over my face, going, What am I doing? I can't I don't trust anybody. So who do you what do you do when you don't trust anybody you call mom?

9:27 So I call my mom in Michigan. I said, Mom, I don't know what to do. I said I could really use your help, but I don't have enough money to pay you good money. I could afford to pay you fifteen bucks an hour. I can pay my stepdad sixty five grand. Which by the way

9:41 My mom's best year in real estate, she sold fifty five houses. So she She's done well. She's like, Tommy, I don't know. I'm like, listen, Mom, I'm your only son. I need your help. You think about it. I love you.

9:54 She called back in two weeks, said we're gonna sell our house, we're gonna move our lives to Arizona. Oh my god. Baller Mom. Hey everyone, really quick, if you're enjoying this episode on CEO stuff, so delegating, having hard conversations with your team, hiring, then I've got something for you. So the team at HubSpot, they actually went and put together a bunch of best practices that Sean and I use in our own companies. And they put it together in something that's really easy to read and understand and so

10:21 If you wanna just save yourself 10 years of headache and heartache, then you should check it out. I wish we had this a long time ago. It would have helped me a lot, but there should be a QR code on your screen that you can scan or a link in the description. So check it out. It's totally free and Totally awesome. At the time the business is doing what, roughly. So like you know,'cause that's a big leap of faith. It's a million and a half bucks a year. It's and by the way, like a lot of people have a tough time hitting a million, but I was the highest ticket writer for seven years.

10:50 And then I finally started to delegate. Like any time we weren't gonna have payroll that my mom would call and say, Hey 'Cause I'm working on marketing and hiring and training. She's like, I need you to go run two jobs today. And then in twenty fourteen I found a good Integrator. The dude was super smart and he still tells me the stories. He's not here anymore. He he's r kind of retired now. He's younger than me.

11:10 He goes. You would pay me two grand one week. And then not pay me for two weeks and then give me like twelve hundred bucks the next time. He's like we uh we w didn't even have any type of payroll worked out the first year. I was like, Yeah, dude. But twenty seventeen we got on the right software.

11:24 And man, all of a sudden we were doing seventeen million but keep being hardly any of it. Next year we did thirty million. Next year we did fifty million and we've never lost money. And Profit or revenue.

11:38 S well, basically since the beginning, but twenty seventeen we were just on a rocket ship. So you were you made a joke that you The first ten years were practice. So on your tenth year of business, what was your revenue and profit? Revenue was seventeen million and that was out of grit. That was just like working nights, weekends and holidays, just overworking.

11:58 And I remember L came in and said, Let me tell you something, buddy. I'm looking at your P and L, I'm looking at your Balance of your income statement. Revenue is for vanity and profit is for sanity.

12:09 You're not making any money. You're just a squirrel. Running around in circles. He goes, We need to figure out how to make serious profits. So I was seventeen million, everybody's like, Man And I'd puff my chest out everywhere and I'd say how much

12:21 Revenue. We're making Revenue means nothing. I don't even talk to anybody about revenue anymore. The name of the game is You Gotta Make Profit. Well, do you remember your profit on seventeen?

12:31 I was made uh you know, w I was paying myself a hundred and fifty grand, taking a couple hundred grand out. There was not a lot of money left. By the way We didn't have a great CFO or controller at the time. It was it wasn't super lined up. That's one thing that changed my life is getting control of the money. When you said as you were growing, sorry, how how many markets are you in to do that, you know, that type of scale to do seventeen million in revenue? I started in Phoenix, then I went to Tucson in twenty twelve. Uh twenty fourteen we're in Wisconsin and Las Vegas, uh Milwaukee and Vegas. And by twenty seventeen I was probably in seven or eight markets, but Phoenix was just

13:08 Massive. By the way, I had to close down four markets a year later. I had to close down Dallas. Houston, Atlanta. In Tampa, and if you want to talk about somebody having to swallow their pride. And basically say you're a failure. But I was gonna go broke these

13:22 There was a stripper living in our Dallas warehouse with My manager. I mean I just didn't have the systems in place to scale as quick as I thought we could. Right. And what I tell people now

13:33 They're like, What had it changed? I said the hustler had to die. For the leader to be born. And I truly mean that. Now I'm a systems guy. На аситдан і наверкан системс і процес. And if the system's broken

13:46 Either there's no system, it's the wrong system, or the system's not being followed. And that's like I mean I'm a student for life. I'm the most curious guy. I walk in, I take notes. I try to stay super humble.

13:58 And I'm always learning. I've always got three to five coaches at one time. I need help all the time and I extract and then I implement. So I I have a ton of questions on the courses and the seminars and stuff because You you've talked about them a bunch and and

14:12 I'll get to that in a second, but first You mentioned four stories. So the the technician who you used to cold call, your integrator, your mom, and service titan. Where you convince them to do something special. Uh Were you always convincing, or did you like have to read to get good with words? I mean, how how is like you've the way that you're telling these stories, I'm like, this seems like a no brainer. This also seems like this person's incredibly persuasive.

14:36 I I don't necessarily know if uh I learned that. My dad when when I'm five years old I remember. This day vividly. I was in Royal Oak, Michigan, and this is the longest driveway I've ever seen in my life. And there was a yard sale or a garage sale. My dad always stopped at those. And I found this C B radio and I'm picking it up and I'm playing with the antenna and I got the little I'm like

14:56 Five oh five oh and I'm like just talking into it and I put it back and we walked back to the car and my dad looks at me and he goes, Hey, Tommy You really wanted that, didn't you? I looked at him I go, Yeah, Dad. He does Here's five dollars, go get it.

15:11 I go, Dad. There's a Scotch tape on it that says twenty dollars. He goes, I know, go get it for five. And it didn't make sense to me. He goes just go up to her. I want you to smile. I want you to point at me.

15:25 And say my dad and I were wondering if you'd take five dollars for this radio. And I'm talking this was like I was worried. I'm looking back at my dad and he's like, Keep going. And he's waving and he's like, Keep going And I look back at him every five steps.

15:39 And I walk up and I mean, man, I had It was like I was anxious as hell. And I go, ma'am, I was just curious, would you take five dollars for this radio? And I go, That's my dad over there, and he's waving and smiling. As she gets down on one knee. She pulls out the scotch tape, she takes the five and presents it to me.

15:57 And I'm telling you guys. The radio was awesome, but I walked back and I learned a lesson that you'll never lose in life. Like don't be afraid of rejection. You go up there, you ask. Y you just go for no. And

16:11 I think that he tell me at a young age I watched him negotiate things I never thought possible. I just You know, he used to say, I wish I knew then what I know now. And what he told me is like don't be afraid to ask the girl out. Worst case scenario her loss.

16:25 Don't be afraid of what people think about you. You're living in your own world. He goes a lot of people are gonna have contempt, they're not gonna like you, you're gonna be more successful. But don't worry. This is the world we live in. Continue to run.

16:37 Like look Hang out with people you got a common future instead of a common past. Figure out how to get in the right circles. And so And my mom, I always say my mom gave me more love. She said, You could do anything, I'm gonna get behind you. Like if I went to prison, she'd move next to the prison to see me every day. Like my mom loves me. If I said Mom I got in a really bad wreck, the person's not okay. She'd grab a shovel. Be like how do we

16:59 Get rid of this mess. My dad just was like I'm gonna teach you sales. I'm gonna teach you persuasion. And so the combination is just I think it it it turned me into like a the belief system.

17:11 that I have somebody no matter what. That's why my mom and stepdad moved out. And then my dad was just like you're gonna have the skills Because you're gonna be around me and he was good at it. You said he used to negotiate things you didn't think possible. What do you mean by that? We went to Mexico.

17:25 And there was a jacket for two hundred fifty bucks leather. He walked out of it for twenty bucks. And he is like watch this. And he's like They're they're like, Senor, no, no, no. It's uh me, me in the middle, one hundred. And he's like

17:39 Tommy, we're out of here. And like He meant it. He's like, I don't need the jacket. You don't

17:46 We we rebuilt a C ten Uh truck. And I mean I spent the whole summer sanding this down. We got it painted, me and my dad rebuilt the engine, we put the transmission in. And it was sitting in my front yard and I said, Dad, a guy came by offered me ten grand.

18:02 He's like take it. He's like, You haven't driven it in two years. And I go, Dad, me and you do this together. He goes, Take a picture of it. You'll remember it. We could do another one.

18:12 He goes, You're not driving it, sell it. And I love that because I was like, Man, I was all sentimental about it. He's like Tommy It's just material things, dude. You could buy another one. We'll do another one. Take a picture if you want to remember it. But that's just how it's how he is, you know.

18:26 Today's episode is brought to you by HubSpot. Did you know that most businesses only use 20% of their data? That's like reading a book but then tearing out four fifths of the pages. Point is you miss a lot. And unless you're using HubSpot, the customer platform that gives you access to the data you need to grow your business. The insights that are trapped in emails, call logs, transcripts, all that unstructured data makes all the difference because when you know more, you grow more. And so if you want to read the whole book instead of just reading part of it, visit hubspot.com. You were telling the story and I feel like the story had like the

18:57 the humble origins and the figuring things out. And then it was like Zoom. We're doing seventeen million a year, thirteen million. It it it sped up real quick, so I wanna I wanna go back to that. Because you seem to me Like a guy. Who

19:09 If you don't have the answers up front. you'll find a blueprint. You find the guy to train you to do the garage is to how to how do you paint the garage. You find a coach, you f you're So I like this word blueprint a lot. because I think that people underuse

19:23 Blueprints. They exist. You can follow'em. You can build your own thing, but it's very helpful to start with a blueprint. What were blueprints you saw because It didn't sound like any of the people around you initially We're doing hundred million dollar, you know, garage repair. But at some point you got that idea. At some point You start to figure out, Oh, I need to scale this thing, I need to do this, and do that.

19:44 What were the blueprints that made you think that? Oh, I'll give you real quick example. We're getting ready to expand into Saint Louis. I'm like my good buddy Chris Hoppins, since uh he's been in Saint Louis for a long time. In fact, his parents started in like the eighties. So I said

20:01 Chris, can you jump on a call for about an hour and give me the good, bad and the ugly about the marketing, what's important in Saint Louis. And by the way, worst case scenario, he says no, but he's like Tommy, absolutely. He goes, I'll even give you my heat map. I'll tell you what zip closes to stay out of, I'll show you Stay out of the The east part, he goes this north area and he literally gave me the keys to the city.

20:20 He saved me a year of mistakes. And so What I've always said is success leaves clues. If you want to find out how to be number one on Yelp. Go find an eight tracker roofing company.

20:31 phone up and you call them and you say, My name's Tommy Mello. I wanna let you know I'm super impressed by your company. I read your book. I've used your business. I wanted to buy Your whole company lunch today.

20:42 Might cost four hundred bucks, right? You bet you buy get'em Chipotle. If I could get an hour of your time. I promise I'm not going into your industry. I got a lot to share with you as well. Seen a couple of opportunities, but I want to understand how you dominate Yelp Then you do that with Anges list, Thumbtack, Google, LSA, PPC.

21:00 Success leaves clues. They're right in front of you. It's right around the corner. All you gotta do is ask. So my favorite three letters in the world are A S K. So I did this, I learned how to sell memberships. See, when I had the podcast

21:12 I could get the best of the best. I started it Early twenty seventeen. This is before podcasts were a real thing, so I'd be like, Man, I'm having problems with Payroll. So I'd find like the top person that wrote the book on payroll.

21:25 Yeah, I I mean my podcast was simply selfish. It was like man, uh I got a question for you. Uh if a you got a W two versus a ten ninety nine. And they they need to show up to meet and they'd be like bam bam bam bam bam.

21:39 And then I'd get like Okay, what happens cash versus accrual? I get a CPA on. And then I go, Okay, what happens when you want a greenfield versus buy a company? What's your integration checklist? And I don't know why, but

21:51 Almost everybody was excited to just give me everything. They're like, dude, you're just in the garage industry. Like sure. Take it. You could have it. And

22:00 I've always just been super humble. What Especially like the people that have been where I want to go. And I walk in and I'm like, Man, I am so impressed. Like I will do whatever it takes to like

22:10 You you really are like Like most guys that come up, like your sh you y you don't think your shit doesn't stink. And I'm like, man, I I come from very humble beginnings. I'm just trying to get ahead. I care a lot about my family.

22:23 I'm just literally I'll do whatever it takes. If you need money If you need me to introduce you to somebody, if you want me to come mow your lawn. Whatever you need. I want to learn from you. So I told Sean a story about a a buddy of mine from my high school who um

22:37 And uh bought his parents' HVAC company and has since blown it up. And Sean made fun of me. He goes, You're not even the most successful person from your high school. Well, that person is Chris Hoffman, uh the person you just referred to, Sean. Uh he's done the same thing where he's like blown this up. Um, these services businesses. But what I've noticed actually about Chris as well, but I'm actually or Chris has this trait. And I'm inspired more so that you have this trait, Tommy, because our listeners of MFM are are like Sean and I and we have this attitude where we're really good at starting stuff. But sometimes you stay scrappy and you stay as a hustler. And unfortunately after some type of mark, I don't know, the ten million in revenue range, the five million, the fifteen million revenue range, that hustle, that scrappiness, that like just go and get shit done, that actually kinda holds you back.

23:23 And I'm going through that right now with my company of like being systems focused. And you have done a really good job of showing how a person goes from like being a hustler to systems and scaling and hiring a good team and and being the executive, I would say. And you actually have this really good quote. I think you said that in order to scale, I had to kill the hustler inside of me, or something like that. Yeah, yeah, the hot start of that for the leader to be born and and I'll tell you I I delegate to elevate. People are always like, dude, I'll outwork you. I remember add my let's say and I could work.

23:51 Three days in one day. My my day starts in six hour increments and I work three of them in eighteen hours and I'm like Dude, I don't respect anybody that works harder. I know there's people shoveling poop somewhere. And a field. That are working way harder than me. I look at skill way differently. There's certain people I hire that can handle the task of three people.

24:10 Forty hour work weeks in ten hours. And so I came up with paying for performance. And paying for outcomes. And I will be Very transparent that I am

24:21 The dumbest guy on my team. I mean when it comes to the C suite VPs directors I'm just a visionary. I dream really, really big. I love sales and I love marketing.

24:32 And I love relationships and culture. I am not gonna be a specialist. I live in a different planet. I don't live within the walls of this company. I I'm creating a personal brand and by the way, there's sixty two guys training next door. Five of them. found me on social media said I want to work for that guy.

24:48 So building a personal brand for your business really matters. And You know, the thing I ask now is would I work for you? What I buy from you. When my grandma buy from you

24:59 I wanna go have a beer with you. You tell great stories. You don't hand you don't shake my hand like a limp fish. You make eye contact, you smile a lot. You're interesting. I'm gonna ask you tough questions to see how you figure things out. There's no right answer.

25:12 And so the I started thinking about this about five years ago. It's who, not how. Who is the right hire? Not what's my strategy, not what system. Systems are super important. But what's the next hire that I bring on the bus that'll take me to the promised land?

25:27 And when you start thinking like that and you fill you stack the deck with A plus players Your job gets easier. Like it's gotten so easy. And whenever it gets easy, we explode. The business explodes. So you go through these peaks and valleys. And I'm like

25:40 I will tell you guys we did three fifteen, three hundred fifteen million. And I'm like, there's no reason we can't be at a billion in two and a half years. And so I gotta set that vision and people are like, dude, you're crazy. And I then I gotta map it out and show them this is all that would need to happen. The average technician did a seven hundred thousand now. And so what would need to happen for us to do this? We would need to have this department, this department, this department.

26:00 We need to make sure we got trucks on command. Need to make sure we got a good greenfield strategy. And you start reverse engineering your goals, you create some accountability and consistency. And all of a sudden You wake up.

26:12 And it's there. That's awesome. I love hearing you talk. I get excited, guys. I l I love entrepreneurship. And I I run towards failure. Uh.

26:21 I don't really care what people think. I'm not gonna lie to you guys and say I really do care what a lot of people think. I care what my parents think. I care the people I work with. Uh I'm not the guy that just says I don't care at all what anybody thinks. I'd love to pretend that's the truth, but I guess now I think I'd rather be respected than loved.

26:37 But by a lot of people I choose love first. Yeah, but do all any of your employees actually think that you're a dick? I mean you don't seem you don't you come off as like a a pretty caring Yeah, like who like who thinks that you're disrespectful or rude. You might be a guy that says, Look, it it's not working out, unfortunately. But I think they would still have love and respect for you. No, I don't fire anymore. I I had to fire five people that were direct reports to me this year, this past year, but Uh I when Adam started in twenty fourteen, I said, You're gonna be the bad cop'cause I'm not good at it. But I do have to have these fierce

27:11 Hard conversations with people. And it's not easy, but it's for the best of them. Like if you think about who changed your life. Was there like I I had a coach. That literally made sure I got a warm mill. Like I

27:22 I respected him. I mean he literally told me I'm not gonna play. Like if my grades weren't good. If I didn't show up and give it a hundred ten percent. So he didn't play me two games. But he made sure, listen, three nights a week he was going to buy me a meal with dinner.

27:34 Because he knew my mom was working three jobs. And I found out I respected him more than I loved him, but the the respect turned into love. And that was a lesson for me. Is I gotta be straight up. I'm gonna tell you what you're doing great, but I'm also gonna tell you

27:47 You're not living up to your potential. I see something better in you. And it's my job to pull that out of you. And I'm either gonna pull that out of you. Or I'm gonna force you to quit or you're gonna not have a job here.

27:57 I'm gonna give you the invitation to go work for one of my competitors. Me and Sean were talking about uh like these inspirational leaders and stuff last episode. And w I think we're w we I told a story about how I had a cross country coach that was like this year you're gonna learn how to be better men and we're gonna do it via running. And that's kind of the same of energy that you have, which is Uh you know, you young technician.

28:19 Uh, you're gonna learn how to be a better man this year. And I'm gonna do it by teaching you how to smile when you meet a customer, how to say, Yes, ma'am, no, sir, how to you know, like it's like more so we're gonna learn how to live great lives and be great high class people, but we're gonna do it via, you know, serving the customers wonderfully. It's a hundred percent right. I used to find fours and try to make them sevens. Now I have sevens and try to make them tens. And so now I've got a much harder way to get into the company. So I did orientation yesterday with sixty two people. And I said, You should feel proud because it takes fifty interviews to even get one of you to this room. But now the hard part starts.

28:55 And we got a bell you can ring if you tap out. We get about two people a class that just say this is We don't w th they gotta clean after they're done. They gotta show up. If you're late one day There's a good chance for sending you home. Th there's a bell, so uh during training, anybody can just go literally ring a bell and quit. It's the same as the Navy SEALs.

29:12 Are you ex military? You have that vibe. No, I'm not in the m I never was in the military. Okay. You mentioned this guy, Al. In passing, you said my mentor Al. And I'm always curious about mentors because I think everybody wants a mentor. I think

29:27 Few people ever end up with that special kind of relationship with a great mentor. But One of the great things is when somebody has one, they can kinda share a story that you know, it kinda becomes our mentor too. And so can you tell me a great owl story? What did what did this guy kind of

29:42 Make you realize or or teach you about. So he was the second guy on my podcast. And he wrote a book. It's on my shelf over here. It's called The Seven Power Contractor. Explains the different stages of The home service industry and he's He had gone through every master class and just studied.

29:58 How to build a business and he had a business with his brothers and his father. And one day they just got fed up. And his daughter. He had his camcorder on the back of the room recording his daughter at a play. And his wife comes up to him and says El

30:12 You know what your daughter says she wants at school today? She says she wishes her dad was around more. And He goes, Natalie. I mean it gives me goosebumps, but he goes, Natalie. I'm gonna disappear for about a year.

30:25 I'm not gonna be around as much, but I need to systematize this business. I need to get SOPs. I need to make sure that I can spend time With m my two daughters and you. And so we're gonna go on a vacation for two weeks and one year. And I'm not even gonna look at my pager. I mean, this is back in the day.

30:43 And Yeah. Mm He met me for lunch. And I handed him the book I was working on, the home service millionaire. He flipped through it and said, This is garbage.

30:52 Because you need to rewrite it. And I said, Okay. And he he goes, the thing that I wanted to work with you originally, Tommy, is you brought a notebook and you wrote down everything I said. He goes, That's the only reason I thought about working with you. He walked into my shop that day, he goes, Can we go to a shop tour? I said, Sure. He goes, Why do you have all the calendars on the wall? Haven't you ever heard of Outlook or Google Calendar?

31:12 Twenty seventeen, that was around then. It was early stages. Avive Google Uh calendar but He goes, I tripped on a cord. That you had

31:22 A microwave. plugged in at he goes, dude, this is not organized. And he goes, I could have stolen your whole warehouse, the garage was open, no cameras, your forklift was sitting there. He goes, Show me your manuals. All I had was this like onboarding manual. He goes, Well, how does anybody know how to win?

31:38 He goes, How do they n how do they know Are you allowed to get tattoos on your face? Are you what happens if your truck breaks down? Like who do you call? What happens uh

31:46 If you lose your gas card. What happens if you need PTO for Christmas? He goes, How do people know this? He goes, It's all in your head. He goes what I'm gonna ask is you're gonna pay me a hundred and fifty thousand dollars. And by the way

31:59 I didn't have one hundred fifty to give him I had to take an equity line. out of my house. So that's why I had to pay attention. And when I walked in there, if I I started talking or talked about a book, he goes, Stop. You're gonna listen to what I'm gonna teach you or I'm gonna quit. You're gonna figure out exactly what I'm gonna teach you and you're gonna do this perfect.

32:17 You're gonna stop reading books. You're not gonna do stuff any other way than what I teach you. You're gonna turn your cell phone off when I'm in this room. And you're gonna get your two top guys, we're gonna sit here, we're gonna work through each and every scenario. Every manual.

32:29 And then you're gonna read these manuals out loud with every employee, have them initial every single one. And then you're gonna read a page out of the manual every week. In your meetings. And man. I was eighty h I still am.

32:41 And he's like, You are gonna focus. You're gonna be all here. And we're gonna sit in this room for eight hours, three days a week. The dude that drove a Mercedes, he He pull back in the same spot really slow. It was always detailed.

32:54 And every time he left. I'd get forty three cent forty three dollars and thirty eight cents. Was how much he paid in gas. I get a bill for it. Like this. I mean he was just

33:05 High C Tay personality dialed in. Like it's my way or the highway. And that's what I needed. He was tough. And he'd bring in a consultant to get us our financing figure out that he trusted. And she's like, I don't know if I want to work with this guy Said, Listen, I'll be quiet, I'll do whatever you say.

33:22 And he goes, Trust me. He goes, he'll do whatever you say. I'll make sure of it. And that's what I needed. And it was tough love.

33:28 But He set me Up for A lot of success. Was he are are are you now I I've never heard type C personality, uh, but are you

33:38 Are you whatever that personality type is of just paying attention to the details, are you It sounds like maybe you're a three out of ten. What are you now? Are you like really high or are you just improved? Well I I was pre dental, so I love math. I took advanced calculus and I got obsessed with geometry and Um

33:55 Calculus and and algebra. So I'm a numbers guy. I've always been. But I'm still a macro guy. I still look at the big picture. I'll dive into certain areas. I always say I live on Mars, I look at Earth for volcanoes and earthquakes.

34:09 But I'm still not the details guy. I Don't I love my CFO and my controller. And I love my HR team.

34:18 But I don't really Interact with them very often. I am Working on operations. And marketing.

34:26 And culture. And and always driving sales. I don't wanna be good at these other things. I wanna take I wanna go continue to be the best at what I'm great at and continue to hone these better skills. And delegate the rest. I don't want to be well rounded.

34:41 I never want to be good at that stuff. Because it tortures me to have to do that stuff. Like for me to do payroll, which I had to do for a long time. I mean it was like pulling teeth. So The first thing I got rid of if you p set up your org chart.

34:53 And you've got you wear a lot of the hats? First thing you do is circle what you hate. So now when I come into work I love coming to work. I'm like, man. I'm on a podcast right now with you guys.

35:05 Everything's getting handled. I just got back from Costa Rica for ten days. You think we lost money, you think when The owner, founder, CO left that things didn't go right. We set records the whole time I was gone. Like

35:16 I don't need to be here. And that's what we've set up is We go on the pinnacle trip, my whole C suite. All my directors, my area managers go. My top

35:25 Forty technicians and installers go on this trip. Do you think we lose revenue that That that week when we leave? We've never lost revenue. We've talked a lot about in this systems. I think if we're playing a drinking game and somebody said you know, if you're taking a shot every time we said systems, they're they're dead now. Um but uh but I but

35:43 It strikes me that You Really harp on this because that's what was hard and broken for you. And you really had to put in work. To get great at that and it's kind of like

35:53 You feel the the benefits of having not everything on your shoulders. But it I I I gotta believe that in order for your company to succeed, you know, you don't you don't grow because you have a great operations manual per se, right? You grow because you're great at sales and marketing. You sort of survive and thrive if the operations can back that up. And I'm guessing it sounds like that the sales and marketing were more things that were more in your core competency, you did a good job of early on, and you you haven't been as d demand constrained.

36:22 But I wanna know more about that. So I wanna know What did you do to kick ass in sales and marketing? That was different. than the average service company. What were the things that you did that made you guys rock and roll in terms of demand.

36:36 Well, step one was naming your company A one, so you show up first in the white pages, right? Yeah. Well that was stupid because there's ninety three other A one's, even though that irrevocable and contestable tr um trademark. So th that's m my biggest mistake was being A one, honestly. You know, sales cure everything. And to get sales you need

36:53 Good leads. And I'll tell you this, I'm not afraid. We're gonna spend four point three million dollars this month. In Marocity. Not afraid.

37:02 It's been a lot of money. And here's what I've learned. I was thirty million dollars, I met a guy named Dan Antonelli that Al Levy, my My coach. He referred me, he goes Tommy, he goes I think your raps are garbage.

37:15 Reps as in uh car reps. The the vehics. Yeah. The best way to do it is I took a picture of your truck, I made it black and white. And tell me what pops out of you.

37:28 Because that's the best way to see like what pops out in You got Angie's list Yelp. You got your phone number, your your your everything. You got springs, rollers, cables, bearings, all this crap. He goes, I want you to go to this company called Kick Charge and I want you to use Dan Antonelli to redo your brand. I call Dan Antonelli and he gives me an estimate. Guess how much it cost me?

37:47 To get a new logo and new brand and The trucks. Thirty five thousand dollars. And at this time I'm going, I'm thirty million dollars. I'm like, dude, it's working. Why would I switch? And I just I trusted Al.

38:00 And I bit the bullet and I did it. And then Dan called me this guy. And we got a character. Like the the logo's awesome. He studied every one of our markets. We don't want to look like any other thing. We wanna pop. We don't want our phone numbers or or website on it. You don't even need any of that or Angie's list or what we do. It's just garage door service. And uh he goes.

38:21 I want you to change all your email signatures with this. Every one of your yard signs, every one of your coupons, every single thing needs to be this brand. And I remember three weeks later there was a line of people that wanted to work for us. Like I was like, Man, this is like Yeah. You know, I'm putting everything on the line.

38:39 All my time, energy, effort. But I had such a crappy brand. And now now I spend a fortune on T V, radio. Yeah, that's that's exactly the before. That's that's what it was. Oh yeah. So

38:52 Look at how crappy that is. What is that? I can't even see it. What what is on What the above your above the uh the red wall. It's like what is the bricks of a garage. It's like the the front the outline. Yeah, that's that's like uh two garages that are carriage style with like Like brick rock and text. And then you go to this.

39:17 Yeah, so I said, Dan, I want that old fashioned feeling like the May Tag. In the seventies when you trust the guy to come out. And it's like y it just It it pops and it's trust. Trustworthy.

39:28 So if you walk in my place Dan designed we brought the brand inside. So we've got all the brand inside of the building too. Like we live and breathe the brand. And people don't talk about this stuff, but like Nike is a brand. That's why they pay Tiger Woods and Roger Federer and Like the the brand is what You could buy a T shirt the same as Nike for twenty bucks, but you're willing to pay a hundred and twenty dollars because of the brand. Right.

39:52 So what does our brand mean? It means my dad taught me you could do three things in business. You could be the best. Без варанти, без технічні. Best quality. Best you know, everything.

40:03 You could be Best timing. If it happens today, you bring your car in, we can fix it today. Or you could be the cheapest, he said, pick two out of the three. You'll never be all three.

40:12 You can't be the cheapest. The best And on their timeline. And I got this guy Milwaukee, best mechanic I've ever met. He's the cheapest, he does me right.

40:23 Right now he's four months out. I can't use him. He's four months out. So I called him up, I said, Hey, why don't you triple your prices? I'll pay triple. Because you're honest and you do great work.

40:34 But this is the hardest thing for people to learn. You you wanna start out and be the cheapest. But then you realize you don't have enough to hire people. Or pay for the right software. Or buy new trucks. Or invest in great inventory.

40:46 And I'm not saying Like One of the things that I learned a long time ago in sales is I don't give Yes or no? Like if I walked up to you, I'd say, Listen.

40:54 These are the three options. of what we have for springs. We got the one year, the five year and the lifetime. You might say, Hey, that's too much. I say let's just pick another option. Let's make something that works for you and your family. I'm here to earn your business. And then I shut up.

41:09 And I've got other options of everything we do. I don't give yes or no questions because that's stupid. Either you're gonna say yes or no. I'm gonna say, Listen, let's just pick something that makes sense for you and your family. And I've studied, I've probably read I've read hundreds of books on sales.

41:24 And even more on marketing. And that's where I go to all the Google events, I show up to different offices. I Like I speak on a lot of state like I live and breathe marketing and sales.

41:34 And honestly. I hate the I hate that word, honestly. I shouldn't have said that. I s I always say that's a no no. I hate a lot of words, but you never say the cost, you say the investment. You never say The most expensive, you stay top of the line. You never stay the cheapest.

41:48 You say Builder grade. You never say You could cancel it anytime you say you have the right of rescission. These words.

41:56 Matter. But what matters more is the weight. I say it. When I'm making eye contact. Would you go to a doctor if the doctor walked in?

42:07 And just looked at you and said, Hey, the here's your medication. Now the doctor walks in. He smiles, he says, Let me ask you a few questions. How's the alcohol? What's the stress level? Are you are you any recreational drugs? How much are you working out?

42:22 I'm gonna run a few tests here. We're gonna look in your eyes, we're gonna look up your nose, your ears, they're gonna have you cough. We're gonna run a few tests. And then the doctor says, Listen, what's what's better for you, C V S or Walgreens? All right, here's your prescription. Here's what's gonna make you better. Do you ever go

42:38 Uh I'm gonna need a few estimates, Doc. No, because they're the authority. They diagnosed the person before the problem. They spent the time. They asked the right questions. And they nurture you along the way and you believe them.

42:51 And they didn't say um like, you know, well uh but w um No, they said here's exactly What we're gonna do. To fix you up. And we're the doctor the minute we step in that garage.

43:03 And that's what the that's what I train the guys and I go over and over like I don't believe you. I don't believe you because you don't seem confident. You don't Either w you don't believe in yourself. Or you don't believe in the products or you don't believe in me.

43:16 And the company. Which one is it? And let's work on let's work on it. Mm. So you I you th this is I could do this all day and I love I love training guys because I'm like

43:27 Smile more. Offer coffee on the way, play with the dog, get to know the clients, if they love Bernie Sanders. Talk about Bernie Sanders. If they love fishing, ask them what kind of fish they like and what kind of pole they have. But you gotta be genuinely interested. Don't fake it.

43:42 If you hate babies, don't talk about babies. You know? Find something you love. And you correlate well to to them with and and You'll enjoy every minute of your life. Dude, play with the dog is so true.

43:54 Th w I have I've had a couple of guys c uh come over to do some work and they the ones who play with the dog instantly, I'm in on them because they're in on me and the most important thing that they saw in the house so far. I had a guy come in to to do a repair and as soon as he walked I have a tiny dog, like an eight pound dog, and he goes Whoa, killer. And then he goes, I don't want no I don't want no problems. And I just immediately love the guy. He could have sold me anything. He was like there for the heater. He could have sold me a washer and dryer if he wanted to. No, that's great. I always say listen.

44:23 We don't we don't ring the doorbell because strangers ring the doorbell. Friends knock. These simple little things Listen, uh I'm starting off a seven eleven. Could I grab you something, get you a coffee?

44:33 No no no no thanks. Listen, you come to my house, my fiance's gonna cook for you. Don't make me guess. Do you like Green Monster or should I get you a coffee? And I want to bring you something because no one that ever fixed your house brought you something. Wait, so you guys order coffee for or you you you have like a system for ordering drinks or or whatever. So they could order I got guys that order donuts and apple cider in Michigan. And and Wisconsin. And all you do is expense it.

45:00 Y you take a picture of the receipt. And it comes back on your check that next week, including the taxes. So you could buy I mean w we try to say keep it under thirty bucks, but literally I don't we don't really care. Like my goal is that Every single person gets offered something on the way.

45:16 Have you seen the average customer value or a customer order go up because of so what what you're saying, by the way, is like a world famous uh it's the rule of reciprocity. It's Robert Ciudini's book, Influence, which is basically like I if I do a favor for you, so if we' it me and Tommy are next door neighbors, I go, Hey Tommy, can I borrow a cup of sugar? You give me a cup of sugar. The next day Tommy comes to me, goes, Hey, Sam, can I borrow your car for a day? Because of the rule of reciprocity, I feel in debt to you and I will do something, even if those f two favors are not equal, I will do something to get back to so we're even,'cause we want to feel even. And so the idea here is if you bring a customer a coffee, even if it's a two dollar coffee, they're more likely to spend an additional five hundred dollars in garage stores. And ha so my question is have you seen uh the average order value go up just because of that simple shape. It goes up Dramatically, and it's not a question if you're gonna use this, it's how much are you gonna spend. Robert Cadini became a good buddy of mine, him and Bob. No shit.

46:07 There's seven rules. Of influence. I got I studied him at U of A in my master's program when he's an ASU professor. They're an arch nemesis. I got to meet him, he comes to the house now.

46:20 My CO And head of sales just went to his conference here in Tampe, Arizona. And the more we could apply those seven principles, we're always looking to apply more and more. And it's not to manipulate people, by the way, he says you gotta use these for good.

46:36 And I mean I ask him questions All the time. He needed a garage. And I'm like, dude. This one's on the house.

46:43 You know, like it's gonna be the Taj Mahal too. And uh that that's just He he's just the one of the smartest guys I've ever met. All right, let's take a quick break because I gotta tell you a story. Let me tell you about the first time I tried to run payroll for my team. I was using a traditional bank and you know the type. It's got a janky interface. It's built like a two thousand and two tax form. And it was open only during business hours. And I hit send.

47:06 And it froze. They flagged the transaction, they locked my account, they put me on hold for 45 minutes, and then they told me I gotta visit my local branch. And that was the day I started looking for a new banking solution. Uh after asking a few founders what they were using, I found out about Mercury. And so now my payroll is two clicks. I can wire money, I can pay invoices, I can reimburse the team. All from one clear. That's why I use it for

47:26 all of my companies. And so do two hundred thousand other startup founders. And so if you're looking to level up your banking, head to mercury.com and apply in minutes. Mercury is a financial technology company, not a bank. Banking services are provided through Choice Financial Group, call them NA, and Evolve Bank and Trust members FDIC. One of the the many interesting things about you is a basically a lot of times that um

47:46 courses to kinda get shit on. People make fun of like courses and people make fun of seminars and stuff like that. And books fall in that category, but it seems like you are prolific when it comes to hiring coaches, hiring consultants. uh taking courses, taking seminars. Things that people would say Even at seventeen million in revenue, they would say, But Tommy, you

48:05 Why why are you paying money to govern come into this course? What courses uh and books have like uh really moved the needle for you in your life? It sounds like you've consumed a lot. Well, I'll tell you the the the latest one was Buy Back Your Time and Dan Martell He goes, Let's just do this. He goes, When when do you think you're gonna sell? So we wrote it down. He goes How much do you think you'll make? And I wrote the number down.

48:27 Then he goes, How many hours do you w work a week? I go, Probably fifty. We did the math, he goes Do you know how much you make per hour? And it's like hundreds and hundreds of thousands of dollars. And he goes.

48:39 You got a great business mind, he goes Tell me you got a good chef. And I'm like a chef. I don't need A sh like.

48:46 He goes, What do you normally eat? I'm like, Uber Eats. He's like Tommy. You don't understand. He goes, if you want to become the best for your people Because you have a driver, right?

48:56 I go, what why would I I me a driver He goes, How often do you drive a week? I go about eleven hours. He goes, what if we could buy back 11 hours for you to be productive?

49:06 And he got me to look through a whole different lens. He brought he got me so now I got a house manager. We've got a chef. We've got a driver. My dogs are walked twice a day. They go to doggy daycare. Huckleberry and Finn are our dogs.

49:20 Um And uh You know These mentors Dan Martell is a big one.

49:26 Uh I go to very, very I I go to the all the home service ones, but You know, most people sit in this This procrastination and indecision. There are software that I've used that were crap. But you know, we just got on one.

49:40 It increased our conversion rate on door cells by eighteen percent and our average ticket by three percent. And it picked up an extra five million of EBITD because it eased the dealer fees. Because I B heard about it from a buddy of mine. We were on it within six weeks. But To not do these things, so many people are like, Man, one day

49:58 I'm gonna get started. Right after the wedding, I'm gonna be on the diet. Right after uh the golf tournament. And they they live in this world of like, we're just not ready for that yet. Man, I I'm like, let's just fail. Who cares? Let's let's fall down a bunch of times.

50:12 We're gonna fail a lot. But we're gonna figure it out before anybody. You said you guys uh sold a sold a piece of the business and you were at like whatever, twenty something million and even now it's eighty million. What was that big jump? Did you guys start rolling up other businesses or what what what happened what what went w so well?

50:29 So three years. We buy twelve companies. We've grown I think it's seventy eight percent organically.

50:38 And then the sa the twenty two percent was by buying companies. And What we did is it's kinda funny because I call my vendors and I say. Tell me how you win.

50:50 How do you m meet your bonuses? What is your objective this year? For like the veters that I'm gonna spend eighty million dollars in garage stores this year, I say, What product mix do you need us to be at? And I say now if I do this for you When do I get a bigger rebate? Like if I sell a hundred orders to somebody, they're paying a different price than if I they

51:09 By one door. So I work out these things. So You know, we've got economies of scale, we've got efficiency. And

51:17 You know, the crazy thing is what a a great home service business does fifteen percent of the bottom. Well Almost double that. And I still see because of our efficiency, like you might have a call center rep that could book twenty calls a day. Mica book sixty.

51:31 So let's say you're paying yours twenty, I'm paying mine thirty five. They're doing three times the work. You know what I mean? So you get these economies of scale And uh People don't like when I say this, but if you work at A one, most people will hire you in their garage door business because we've got we we buy six thousand dollars of tools, we train, we train, we train.

51:50 You know, when I played football, I played two a days. I practice twice a day for six days to play one game. At home service, you say You're gonna go with our best guy for two weeks and you're on your own forever. Training is not something

52:01 We do it's who we are. And we continue to train it's not just in sales. It's smiling. It's making sure you're efficient. You showed up to your first job within fifteen minutes. These new one on one forms I'm working on, I'm more excited about that than anything this month.

52:15 So one on ones with the technicians and installers. So They're very complex to get the data I'm looking at. But What I'm building is If this is where you're at, it's a series of things to get good at. If you're not great at this, we gotta get you good at this before we go on to the next one.

52:31 And then there's a recipe for each one. So now it's standardized. Now in any market This is the one on one form you're gonna use. And you're giving the exact same thing across the board. Then you're gonna do ride alongs for two days. You're gonna go back to Phoenix for a refresher for five days.

52:46 You're gonna do role play for one day in the training center. Whatever that looks like, we're building all that right now. And my expectation is It'll increase uh It'll increase revenue by forty percent.

52:57 Wow. What uh has AI Changed your business at all yet? Have you seen any impact with AI? Call center and dispatch. And

53:07 Quite a few things in marketing, but Call center obviously. It's it's coming to the spot where this year Right now, uh yesterday. My AI agents were at eighty seven percent booking rate, my real agents were at ninety two percent.

53:19 So it's a five percent variance. But the AI continues to get better. And the goal is not to get rid of people. The goal is to go on a hiring freeze. And keep the best. So right now I got sixty eight agents.

53:32 Let's say I go down to forty. They last forever, but I never need to hire another agent. Because now you're just Blocking and tackling. Dispatching W what our dispatch software does is regression testing. So you could feed it data, credit card score.

53:46 How much did they pay off in the home? How many garageers do they have? And then it looks for outliers. And it knows what technicians do well on this type of job. And The most important thing is customer satisfaction.

53:58 Net promoter score. And my internal net promoter scores. So I'm not just looking to sell I'm trying to create a relationship Building. Uh uh you know, get you on a membership.

54:07 Which we call protection plan. And be your garage draw company for life. I'm not trying to go wham bam thank you, ma'am. I wrote a big ticket. Let's get out of here. I'm trying to say What's right for you? You're selling the home, Miss Jones. Let me make sure you pass inspection. We want to work on your new home.

54:22 You know, that's what's important is we we need to build relationships and that's very rare in the home service industry. I never would've thought and and it makes it's it's it's like uh obvious in hindsight, but I never would have thought that a garage door business could be as big as you and you seem like you have a ton of growth ahead of you. You haven't even scratched the surface. What other businesses have you seen in the services industry, um, that you are shocked at how big they are, or you think that most of our audience, which is uh largely Internet or tech based audience would be surprised about.

54:51 Ha. I'll tell you my favorite one is uh pest control. Tell me tell us about it. Well well the fact is

54:58 Pest control. Is the only company that went public. And right now they're paying twenty two to twenty five ex ebida. So if you could get your business to make two million dollars. You're gonna get fifty million.

55:12 And The best guys that do it. It started out the Mormon guys out of Utah with Knock on doors door to door. They're very good at it. If you sell religion and They don't tell you this.

55:23 So you start out by door to door and then you get good at advertising on Google and radio. And you just You you optimize for routes, but anybody could do it. I mean, you're literally there spraying, you're looking out in Arizona, you're looking out for scorpions, spiders, making sure There's no pigeon stuff like that.

55:38 What pest control company is is public. What's the big one that went public? They they bought so many companies, but uh Termin X went public. So um all right, I'm looking up at Terminks. They have uh it looks like uh nearly a five billion dollar market cap.

55:53 Shockingly busy. Yeah, well that's the deal. And then they have subsidiaries on top of that. And when you go public, it's like how many companies can you buy because you're raising capital from the investment pool. And it's almost like you've got to eat. When you go public, you gotta eat. You gotta buy. I mean that's one of the prerequisites.

56:11 If you do an IPO. And there's a lot of advantages, but then you got starbanes oxy and all this other things. Like this is the kind of stuff I get really excited about, but You think about He here's something to understand about home service home improvement. Is it demand generated? Like if your pipe breaks, you're calling me.

56:27 Today you need it fixed. Windows You know, I want new windows, maybe a window broke. Uh I'll get the glass fixed, but windows So the multiple of a demand driven industry where I need it done.

56:39 And and pass control's one of those that's not necessarily needed it done, but'cause that company went public, they're paying a lot more and it rose the market cap. But A a window company might get eight to twelve X. Whereas HVAC plumbing electrical garage doors there's just these must

56:54 Must use Are getting You know, fifteen to twenty. When you get past twenty million of EBITDA. The I remember during like Covid those multiples were going in cr like if if Correct me if I'm wrong, but it appears as though that there was like a pre and post Covid number. Like the post COVID number just

57:11 Exploded those multiples. Here's exactly what happened is think about it, you're a venture capitalist, you're PE Uh you're going, man. All of our hotels

57:20 No one's going to Airbnbs. The nail salon just shut down'cause people are living their houses. The movie theaters went bankrupt. Where can we put our money? And they looked at this simple blue collar that we were like we were like second class citizens. And they go, Wait a minute. These guys have predictable income. They're needed.

57:38 They've shown month after month, year after year that they could continue To grow and they're sophisticated. They use things like Power BI. These things advanced analytics. And when they realized that, the money started shooting in.

57:51 Like crazy. There's miracle stories. And the multiples are still really, really high. What they did learn is you gotta keep the founder involved. Because the founder. You know, it's kinda the glue.

58:01 And if you pay the founder a lot of money, are they gonna stay on a And get happy. And keep the culture. 'Cause imagine giving a guy that worked his ass off a hundred million dollars. And having him hey dude.

58:12 I want you to stick around and and be the same. I want you to work harder than you worked before. It's few and far between. So they're getting pretty sophisticated now, but There's a lot of home service industries, man. I'm telling you this. Like the future of A one

58:25 Many splits in the garage. Garage flooring. E V chargers, pass control front doors and windows. Like if I could get into those. I'm running twenty five thousand jobs a month. Seventeen percent is finance, it'll be thirty five percent this year of our revenue, which is low. It needs to continue to improve.

58:41 But hey, you qualified for twenty thousand. Do you want me to make this cross door livable? And you can set up a gym, we'll do the floors and we'll put You know, it'll be warm in the winter, cool in the summer. And by the way, we noticed all these spider webs in your garage. You want us to take care of that? And by the way, the garage probably you want it to match the front door. And you qualified for it, we can make it a low payment.

59:01 You know, the garage door I got really lucky. Because Dre model magazine eight years in a row said Grossers are the number one investment. Wall Street Journal came out with two articles last year. Two hundred and sixty eight percent return on investment. You put a buck in, you take two sixty eight out. And then we trademark the garage door the smile of your home. So I'm going into the garage.

59:20 And the plan is to create other opportunities. In the garage. Dude, this is fascinating. This is not at all what I thought this episode was gonna be. You're this mix of a bunch of things that I really love. You're uh you know, one third um just pure hustle and common sense.

59:38 You're one third Self develop d self development, personal development, you know, uh learning machine. Just how can I low learn, grow, and be better? And then one third is basically like I'm gonna play Uh play big.

59:52 So you're doing this blue collar thing, but at this really big scale. And I love that combination. That is that is a lot of fun to me to to have this conversation. So I I'm glad you came on. Check this out, Sean. So I've been following you, Tommy, for about two years now. And uh you you get me amped up. You know, I'm not in the b I'm not in your space at all, but I feel like I'm learning so much, but I also like feel like I'm getting amped up. But Sean, Google Tommy Mello conference. So he has this conference called the Freedom Event. And if you it and whoever's listening, Google that and go to the the page the the the video is him with his arms out and like fireworks shooting up with him on stage. It's pretty awesome.

1:00:28 But Tommy da obviously he has a behemoth of a of a business. But then it looks like you have a side hustle of being like sort of like a A home services influencer. And if I had to guess, like your conference and I think you had a course or a community, something like that, if I had to guess, that's doing all right too. Yeah, we had fifteen hundred home service contractors in our last one. This year we'll have thirty five hundred. And the average person that's worked with us increases by seventy percent their first year.

1:00:54 And that's profitability'cause that's what we shoot for. And basically Most of what I've done is repeatable. It's it's not like this crazy thing that only works in garage doors. It's knowing the numbers. It's paying attention to the important things. You don't need to be good at fifty things.

1:01:10 Or five hundred things. You need to be good at Five things a thousand times over. So it's understanding. Don't overcomplicate it. It's pretty simple. Can you explain how this media side of your business stuff forget the actual Nuts and bolts of what you're doing.

1:01:26 The podcast, you have media. And so explain how this why you do it and how the how the m sort of sort of like from a business perspective Um, why do you do this and how does it work? What is the goal of how you're doing this? For example Are you throwing this event because you want to be the largest kind of event, trade show in your industry and that's a a good business to be in? Is it because

1:01:46 You wanna have a relationship and go buy the top one percent of these companies and it's lead gen for that. Is it Yeah, w why are you doing all this and how does that work? Well, first and foremost, I used to just have a garage door. Uh uh we realize the industry's so crappy. The industry would have to improve. People need to raise their prices and show their worth. So

1:02:06 We figured out that we would have to other train other garage rot companies, so we invite hundreds of garage drawer companies. And then I looked out in the audience And it was all plumbers and roofers and Pest control and even mechanics. And I'm like, this is supposed to be a garage door.

1:02:19 Show. And we didn't really filter who was coming in, so I was like, look, I wanna keep garage doors kind of In our realm. And then I started this other thing called home service freedom. And The real reason is people open the door to me.

1:02:33 People gave me the time of day. People let me come into their home, their business, and they gave me the answers. And people call me up and they're like, dude, I'm getting a divorce. My kids are leaving me. My dad, I took over his business, he just died. I don't know what to do. And quite frankly, Al Evey and all my other

1:02:49 You know, Dan Antonelli with branding and we've got this formula of like the step by step Uh it's not for everybody. Like I said in the beginning, not everybody's meant to be an entrepreneur. Some of them are meant to be entrepreneurs. But the other thing, uh the the selfish byproduct is if I love a company And they show up and they do the work. I could date'em before we get married.

1:03:08 Because I know if I invest with them I'll give him endless amount of money. I can personally give'em what's worked in like really one on one,'cause I can't coach anybody one on one. I got twelve hundred fifty people depending on me here. But the idea being

1:03:21 I gave you guys a bunch of other industries that A one wants to get involved in. I like no one trust these people. They know they're gonna win with me. So it helps grow the core business too. If we ended up doing a deal I have no expectation of doing deals. And I don't know if anybody wants to do a deal.

1:03:36 But I know this that if it came down to it and we loved each other And we worked well together, and there was a win win for both of us. A one and this other business that You know. It just makes sense. You know me, I know you.

1:03:49 So yeah, there is a byproduct, but the fact is Now I know everybody. And guess what happens? I'll show them everything I know. Who do you think they call when they figure something out? When they figure out Google's new algorithm or they figure out a certain thing on meta

1:04:04 Or they figure out a new mailer technique that I've never heard of. Who's the first person they want to call? They go Tommy? You've taught me so much, I feel indebted. I've I haven't come to you for three years, but I finally got something I think you're gonna love. You gotta try this. And I I get those phone calls ten times a week.

1:04:21 I'm on uh home service freedom dot com. It looks like a community plus like uh you give a playbook. The headline is really good. It says uh accelerate five years of growth in twelve months. How much does this cost? So there's three different programs. We only got twelve companies in the top program, but You know, we got a basic one, it's a few hundred bucks a month. The next one It it's uh

1:04:41 It's about fifty grand a year. I mean it's not crazy. I'll tell you, we took a we we took a roofing company. They was doing twelve million dollars, bringing home about three hundred grand. Within one year they're doing thirty million

1:04:54 Bringing home six million. And a lot of these things are just turning the knobs a little bit. And paying attention to some things you're not looking at. The data? The KPIs will set you free.

1:05:07 And the fact of the matter is I'll I'll come to you guys and I'll say, Hey, what do you think your booking rate is? They'll say, Well, me and my wife answer the phones were probably ninety percent. I'm like, You don't understand. It should be a decimal place. It needs to be exact. It should be by CSR.

1:05:21 Like I know every single one of my CSR's booking rate. I know exactly what we're training'em on every day. I know exactly my technique. You should see my scorecards. I mean you th these are world renowned, like we spent millions of dollars to build this internally. And they are the baddest ass thing you'll ever see in your life.

1:05:37 Tommy, what do you suck at? Are you are you what are you bad at? Where's your weakness right now? You know, my my fiance might say I'm not the best communicator. I don't talk about my feelings. Um Yeah. Uh I don't really practice we could be I like I said, I I I don't like to piss people off too much, fierce conversations. I'll do it because I love them, but I'm not gonna have these conversations with a lot of people.

1:06:00 Um I would say With my family, I like to do stuff, but my mom wants to sit there and chat. And I love my mom more than anything, but When I was a kid we'd go to a movie, we'd go bowling, she'd take me like she's she got really involved.

1:06:13 And I just have a hard time because Sitting there and chatting. It's okay to catch up on things, but it's gotta be something optimistic for me. I have a hard time talking about I I don't go down this

1:06:24 Never anymore am I talking like I I'll mention like what's going on in Minnesota or Ukraine or whatever, but I can't live in this Negativity zone. So I'm trying to be the best son I could. The best fiance I could.

1:06:37 The best brother I could to my sister. And the best uncle I could to my niece and nephew. And I know I got a long way to go. Like at least I could say that out loud and I recognize it. Tommy Mello is uh Tommy dialed in. I mean you you've got it figured out, man. Like it's it's you're you're you're very inspirational. I'm a work in progress.

1:06:58 What's what's the goal? You you are uh You're wealthy. You did it. You you pulled it off with this company. Are you trying to buy the Cardinals? Like what what what's the goal out here? You know, I was playing with Chat GBT yesterday, and and I would love to tell you there's a goal. You know, we're building a beautiful house in Idaho where we're gonna be doing events. And then I build in my dream home in Paradise Valley here in Arizona. But

1:07:19 You know, I've got I got my life, I'm forty two, I'll be forty three in March, and I got my life at forty five. On my casket, you know what I want? I don't want the best entrepreneur wealthy. I want it I want number one The best dad ever. And I don't have any kids yet.

1:07:34 I'm a lay bloomer. Luckily my fiancee's twenty seven. She's worked with me for nine years. Uh no. No, yeah. Yeah, nine years'cause she was definitely eighteen when I met her. No public math, huh. Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah. We were doing so well. And then we went to jail. There it is. There's the weakness. Uh definitely Definitely nine years. And uh

1:07:57 So I I feel like for me the next journey is like listen. I wanna be a great dad. I wanna be a great husband. We're getting married next January first. And

1:08:09 I wanna live. I wanna be where my feet are, I wanna go all in. I want people to know how much I care about them, I wanna communicate better, I wanna make sure That it's not always about money and finance, it's not just working out. It's just Becoming better every day. Better your best. I always say I'm the best I've ever been, but the worst I'll ever be,'cause tomorrow I need to be a little bit better. And

1:08:28 I can tell you guys uh I'm generally a happy person. I say once a month I kinda get down on myself. And I'm like, Why do I work this much? Or why don't I do this or why don't I do this? But Y y you guys might look at people that are wealthy, I'll tell you the most billionaires and I meet a lot of'em. They're not happy. Some of'em are suicidal, alcoholics, drug addicts.

1:08:48 They got everybody chasing them because of their money. They don't they they they're not really good people. So it be they get they begin to look at themselves and say I the only reason people like me is'cause I work my ass off and I've got money. And that's not gonna be me. I wanna continue to be humble.

1:09:06 Stay the blue coll guy I've always been. Remember that I started washing dishes and mowing lawns. And just creating the best rel I I don't want a million friends. I want twenty friends that I wanna be lifelong soulmates with. And and guys, it sounds really good and I do got a lot of great things going and I thank God and Jesus Christ every day. But

1:09:25 I've got a lot of work on. Uh uh every all the listeners just know That you might think being rich. Famous Instagram famous and influencer is gonna solve your problems. But that's not the answer. It's it's looking inside.

1:09:41 And becoming your best self. Have you ever seen the Savannah Banana? Yeah, yeah, they were just at an event I was at. Those guys are awesome. So Jesse Cole came on um maybe eight weeks ago, six weeks ago, and Sean and I uh he probably is in our top five favorite people that we've talked to. Very inspirational. And it's so interesting. That you guys

1:09:59 Look very different. You have incredibly different businesses. And yet there's this spark that you both have that Sean and I find incredibly Inspiring. contagious like it basically a conversation with you, we probably leave feeling now I I know what a ten out of ten in terms of operating our lives are at.

1:10:18 We have to step it up. Tommy, you said something earlier. You said I used to hire Two's and try to make'em sevens. Now I her sevens try to make'em ten's. Me and Sam is like the reason we do the podcast is

1:10:29 You you find tens to make you realise oh you're still a seven. Give you s give you Area you know, s break your frame a little bit. And say, Oh, that's an area I could be better in. Oh well, he really had a certain spark, or he had a certain point of view, or he had a A habit.

1:10:44 that I'm gonna pick up here. And so, you know, t for me, that's the biggest thing with this podcast is to is to just kind of continually surround ourselves with people who are excellent in some area of their life, hopefully multiple areas of their life. So that we can kind of realize, oh you you know, you're actually a seven. There is actually much there are more levels to that thing that you're you're you're trying to do. Uh I wanna finish out If you guys allow me to just

1:11:07 I want you guys to think about this going into this year. And and if you could. I I Recommend everybody write these down. First one is family and friends.

1:11:16 That's the first half. The next one is faith. And this could be in any order you want. The next one is fitness. The next one is finance. The next one is future self.

1:11:26 And the sixth one is fun. And I want you to set goals for all these. If you're if you don't believe in God, you skip faith. I I highly recommend you figure out what to believe in because I do believe we're going somewhere great. And then I don't want you to set a yearly goal. I want you to get Jess Se's big ass calendar. I want you to start journaling. And I want you to use a blue pen

1:11:46 There we go. Blue pen and a white piece of paper. And I want you to write your goals down. And I want you to put'em in your shower. Your vehicle, your refrigerator, on your desk. Four spots and I want you to sign up on the bottom.

1:11:58 And then I want next to each one of those six, I want accountability partners. That you know are gonna hold your feet to the fire. That it then I want you to put your why. And it's Simon Cynic one oh one, but it better be a big ass Y. And you better have people that are willing to tell you you're failing and you're letting yourself down and you're letting me down. And I want you to post it on social media. I want you to come out of your comfort zone.

1:12:22 And I want you to say this is what I'm going to do and don't set a yearly goal. Weekly or monthly. Steps. It could be calories. It could be body fat.

1:12:31 You know, it could be going to church. It could be Jesse Asters Jesse Asters, I'm gonna time block Time with my family and that's what I'm putting on here first. But these simple little tools.

1:12:42 The accountability partners And you better meet with those accountability partners weekly. And it better be hard conversations. And it better not just last through March and then fall off like most people do. And it's gotta be a strong

1:12:55 The Chaudini talks about this. I got this bracelet says keep your commitment. You better commit and you better yell from the rooftop that you're gonna do this, and it better be a huge why. And and the only other thing is try to get into better circles. If you want to be a great golfer, go golfing with three scratch golfers, you're gonna be better. Get into the right circles and you do what I'm telling you to. On all six of those, your life.

1:13:18 It's planned on. It's reverse engineered. It's manifested and it will come true. Wow. So I do. Sything we say after this, we'll just make the podcast worse. Just do do the line and let's end the pod. This is perfect.

1:13:33 That's it. That's the part. I feel like I can rule the world announce But I want to I'm putting my all in it like my day's off On the roadless travel never looking back All right, my friends, I have a new podcast for you guys to check out. It's called Content is Profit, and it's hosted by Luis and Fonzi Cameo.

1:13:54 After years of building content teams and frameworks for companies like Red Bull and Orange Theory Fitness, Louise and Fonsey are on a mission to bridge the gap between content and revenue. In each episode you're gonna hear from top entrepreneurs and creators, and you're gonna hear them share their secrets and strategies to turn their content into profit. So you can check out content is profit wherever you get your podcasts.

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