Subscribe
Share
Share
Embed
Welcome to Portfolio Perspective: Managing Risk & Seizing Opportunity, a podcast focused on the asset-based lending industry. Join Andrew Pace, Chief Client Experience Officer at Asset Compliant Solutions, as he interviews experts, shares insights, and explores strategies for managing risk, optimizing portfolio performance, and seizing opportunities in an ever-evolving financial landscape. From regulatory changes to technological advances, each episode provides actionable takeaways and deep dives into industry trends. Whether you’re a lender, servicer, or recovery expert, this podcast offers valuable perspectives to enhance your approach and improve outcomes.
The first key in borrowing money, whether it's from the private sector, whether it's from friends and family, or whether it's from a chartered financial institution, is your presentation, right? You need to know your business. You need to know all different aspects of it. You need to be able to explain it. And then your actions that you say in your policy and procedure manual have to match what you really do in your business day to day.
Andrew:Welcome back to ACS Portfolio Perspective. I'm your host, Andrew Pace, Chief Client Experience Officer at Asset Compliance Solutions, joined today by Kip Amstutz, President and CEO of three sixty Equipment Finance. Kip is a true entrepreneur who started his first equipment finance company in 2001 with a business plan and a promissory note from his father. Since then, he's built three sixty Equipment Finance into a 50,000,000 annual origination platform, specializing in some prime equipment financing across yellow iron vocational trucks, manufacturing equipment, and medical transactions. With a finance and entrepreneurship degree from Baylor, Kipp is one of a few people who are actually doing what they studied in college.
Andrew:Under his leadership, three sixty has maintained a lean, scalable operation of 16 people, while pioneering the use of AI tools for fraud detection and credit decisioning. As an EOS practitioner, Kipp brings both entrepreneurial vision and operational discipline to growing a balanced, diversified portfolio across 47 states. Kipp, welcome to the show.
Kip:Thank you. Thanks for having me. I appreciate it.
Andrew:Well, it's great to have you. Let's start at the beginning. Every successful company has an origin story, and yours is one that really captures the entrepreneurial spirit of our industry. So you launched your first business in 2001 with a business plan and a loan. Take us back to that moment, and what inspired you to take that leap, and what did those early days look like?
Kip:Sure. Well, one of my first jobs out of college was for an equipment leasing company here in Austin, and I worked there for three years, and it was a great opportunity. I had a chance to learn credit, learn collections. I ran a sales team. I did sales, and so I got a lot of experience and exposure in all different aspects of the business.
Kip:The downside of that company is that the president of the company was committing bank fraud, and so that was uncovered, and the FBI actually came in and shut the business down. And so, I wrote a business plan. I got two of the employees at that previous company come join me, and I went and met with my dad, who is just a really smart, wise man that I've always had a lot of respect for, and he red inked up my business plan and asked me a lot of questions. What are you going to do about this? What are you going to do about that?
Kip:And at the end of the day, he loaned me money to sign an office based sublease and buy some computers and some furniture, and we opened the doors. And we opened in September 2001, which as you can remember is a pretty interesting time with nineeleven. So, I think there were some times when I thought, Oh my gosh, what have I gotten myself into committing to employees, an office based lease, and trying to start a business during nineeleven? But we're still here twenty four years later, almost twenty five years later. So yeah, it was a great experience.
Kip:I couldn't have done it without my dad.
Andrew:Yeah, so I started ACS in February 2001. Okay. Yeah, so was a big moment, that September, Yeah. So you've since built and merged two companies along the way. What were some of the biggest lessons you learned from those experiences?
Kip:Well, we initially set up two different companies because we were doing two different types of credit profiles, and one had already been set up, and honestly, I believe that the second one would do well, but I didn't want any negative implications from it to impact the other company that had been in business since 2001. So we call it prime and subprime. We had a prime portfolio, which are bankable type credits, both small ticket and mid ticket. Then we had this subprime portfolio, which are all small ticket transactions. We ran them with the same business practices, obviously different credit underwriting model and a little bit different philosophy on collections, but we ran them with the same group of people.
Kip:We had people that kind of wore both hats. Some people worked just for one of the companies. A lot of people worked for both of them in theory. And at a certain point, we were like, Why are we doing repetitive tasks over and over again? So we merged them too.
Kip:So whether that's one bank account, one set of books, one logo and image, one website, there were some real synergies to bring them together, and we chose the name three sixty Equipment Finance because we thought it was a better marketing name. It's named after a bridge here in Austin, Texas. It's an iconic bridge, so it's got a cool logo, and also, when you're a number, you're normally listed first in the attendees of certain things. So there were a lot of reasons why we chose that name, but we merged those two companies together, and it's been a good thing for us to do that.
Andrew:In looking at 360s evolution, what key strategic decisions do you think had the greatest impact on your growth trajectory?
Kip:Yeah, so I think the first one was becoming or evolving from being a broker or an originator, where, not to sound negative, but you're only as good as your sixty day pipeline, right? If you take a week of vacation, or you don't market as hard or sell as hard, your pipeline tends to shrink and get smaller. Evolving from that into a company that has a balance sheet where we have recurring revenue from the leases in our portfolio. We're continually trying to grow that. It's just a different paradigm that I think the first model is a little bit more, you're focused more on your short term, short term, short term, and the other model, you're focused on building value in your business.
Kip:So, I think that was one of the big steps for us, was evolving from just an originator to a full service finance company that has collections, documentation, funding, remarketing, and whether we outsource some of that or whether we handle it internally. At the end of the day, we're involved in every aspect of the business.
Andrew:Ambition and sustainability sometimes can pull in different directions. How have you balanced the drive for growth with the need for steady, disciplined operations?
Kip:My experience has been when you have steady operations and you have rules and regulations and a credit box that you stay true to, that you can still maintain growth through that. It's disciplined growth. It's not growth just for the sake of saying that we've grown and we've added to our net investment or our overall lease portfolio. It's growth that we're looking at portfolio balance, we're looking at performance, we're looking at a lot of other metrics. And so to me, we set the parameters for how we want to run the business.
Kip:We put resources behind sales and marketing and getting our name out there more. And if we want to grow and we're doing that properly, the growth just occurs organically.
Andrew:So that foundation set the stage for how you approach lending. Let's shift gears and talk about how you've mastered the subprime market and managed risk in such a dynamic segment. So you've built a portfolio that's diverse across both equipment types and geography. Why is that diversification so central to your strategy?
Kip:Well, first of all, you're nice. I definitely have not mastered it. I wish I could say I have, but I think anyone that can say they've mastered this might be speaking too soon, because there's always some sort of challenge or economic downturn around the corner somewhere. It's bound to happen. I think for us, there's a couple things that we've done.
Kip:When we were starting the subprime lease portfolio, we involved third party originators, and that's been real key for us for a couple of reasons. Number one, to build out an internal sales staff is very expensive. You've got the overhead, you've got additional offices, all the other expenses that come with that, whereas third party originators, you pay them basically based on their performance. So when they fund a transaction that you, in theory, are going to be profitable from, they're going to profit from that as well. And so you don't have that sunk cost of an internal sales force.
Kip:That's one thing. Second thing that third party originators do is they give us geographic diversity. So we have them located all across The US. They're selling into multiple different verticals or markets. And because of that, it allows us to have a balanced portfolio and not just be, for example, in oil field in West Texas, where if the oil and gas industry suffers a downturn, we're gonna have mass losses, write offs, repossessions, etcetera.
Kip:Same thing for weather patterns. If you're only doing deals in South Florida and a hurricane hits, or you're only doing deals in Northeast and there's a huge snowstorm, people are limited. They can't work for a while, and so they're most likely going to become delinquent. So one of the keys for us is what states are we involved in, which right now we're in 47 out of the 50 states in our portfolio. Is there any state that we have too much concentration in?
Kip:We look at that, and right now we feel really good that, obviously, states like California, New York, Texas, Florida, are more highly populated, we have more exposure there, but we don't have too much exposure in one state, one vertical, or one equipment type. And that's, I think, really key when you're in the subprime business. And then the final thing is we have five tiers of pricing. So we have credit differentiators that allow us to offer different rates depending on how it scores within our system. And so I think what that does is we look pretty consistently on tier one, which is our lowest pricing, in theory, should perform better than tier two, than better than tier three, better than tier four and five.
Kip:And we look at that and we make sure, does our credit underwriting match the performance? And if it doesn't, is it because it's a certain equipment type? Is it because it's a certain vertical? What leads to that? Maintaining data on that is key so that we can make key management decisions on portfolio balancing.
Andrew:Thank you. How do you cultivate and manage those third party originator relationships to keep the quality deal flow consistent?
Kip:Yeah, it's a challenge, right? Especially because most third party originators have a funding source or a funding mechanism for their better credits, and they tend to see more of the better credits, and so sometimes we're an afterthought, right? So we have to make sure that we stay in front of people. So we do a couple different things. We attend trade associations.
Kip:That's how I've seen you at a lot of them. You've been nice enough to buy me a steak at a couple of them, so thank you for that. We have representatives at multiple trade associations to let people know, Hey, we're in business. We have an appetite for funding your subprime transactions, and reminding them that we're there. And we try to participate in those, whether it's serving on a committee, or sponsoring a golf tournament, or doing something that puts our name in front of people.
Kip:So that's one thing. Second thing is we have broker relations managers that travel to select broker shops or third party originator shops, locations, and visit with them. Take them to dinner, take them to lunch, sit down with their staff, answer questions. We try to do that with our strategic best brokers to maintain a relationship and to have a personal connection with them. We also do regular marketing campaigns.
Kip:We do two a month, one that's normally a transaction of the month that outlines something that we've financed for a customer to hopefully peak a third party originator's interest in, Oh, I didn't realize they did that type of equipment, or, Oh yeah, I wasn't thinking about them, be top of mind. And the other marketing piece is normally something that is more aligned with education, so maybe it's a Section 179 flyer, maybe it's something about new technology that we've adopted, maybe we have a new portal that we're rolling out, whatever that is, it's something that hopefully generates some buzz around the three sixty name.
Andrew:Thank you. And I want to say thank you also for your generosity for being a platinum sponsor at the NEFA Pause for Potential charity event that I was on the planning committee for, and can't thank you enough for your generosity and your donation.
Kip:For running that. That was a fun event.
Andrew:It was, it was a great event. We have a great committee, we had a great committee chair, and everybody got together. Feedback from that was great too. The one complaint I guess is we wish we would have had more kits to put together, because it seemed like we put them together too quickly.
Kip:Yeah, you had too many people show up to help.
Andrew:Yes, that was it. We weren't expecting that many people to show up. That's right. So you maintain a balance between holding and selling assets. What guides your decision on when to retain versus when to sell?
Kip:Well, it's a great question. I think if anyone's being 100% honest, the first decision is how much access to capital do you have, right? So, you can't hold anything if you can't fund it, And so what we've done is we are counterintuitive. We sell off all of the lower risk, lower rate, better performing paper, and we try to sell it off where we maintain servicing so that we can keep our name in front of the customer, and we can manage the customer experience. And then we hold all of the subprime paper, which from a bank standpoint, they would say, Why would you want to hold that?
Kip:You're going to have some delinquency, you're going to have some collections, etcetera, and we hold it because there's a yield premium in it, and that allows us to utilize our capital to the fullest extent, in our opinion. So, we've started holding a little bit more of the prime paper, but historically, we would only hold the subprime. And I can say we started the subprime portfolio in 2010, and we've never sold one of those deals. We've held every single one of them from origination to end of term, or to charge off if we have to charge it off and we try to collect it over time, work out a settlement. So, that's what we've done.
Kip:As we continue to grow, and as we continue to explore new sources of capital and additional capital, I can see us starting to hold more and more of the prime business.
Andrew:You've often described your approach as credit conscious, serving early stage businesses without taking true startup risk? How do you make that distinction in underwriting?
Kip:Yeah, I think a big thing for us is we're a cash flow based lender, is what our underlying credit model is based on. So if someone has a business that is three months or six months time in business, but they've already been able to generate the cash flow requirements that we require for approval, then to us, they're a good operator because their ramp up time has been very minimal compared to what a normal business might experience. So, they traditionally are going to get declined by traditional lenders because they don't have that two or three years time in business requirement. But for us, we're able to look at their revenues. We have an introduction to them where we can ask some questions.
Kip:Maybe they had industry experience, so they were able to port over some customers right away. Whatever that situation is, if the revenue and all the other parameters of our underwriting meet the expectations, then we're fine financing something for someone that has that less than two or three years time in business.
Andrew:Thank you. With the talk of a possible slowdown ahead, how are you positioning the portfolio to remain resilient if the market softens?
Kip:Yeah, there definitely is a turndown coming around the corner, whether it's one year, or five year, or ten years from now, it always happens, right? It's just a matter of time. So, I think there's a couple things that we're doing. The first is we're sticking to our credit underwriting model. So, we've done that very diligently since day one, and currently our charge offs, or our net loss, is the lowest that it's ever been.
Kip:I think that's because we have a really good team, we have a really good process, and we stick to our underwriting parameters, and we haven't gone outside of those just for the sake of growth. The other thing is portfolio balance. So there's some industries that are more cyclical than others, to name a few of those. It might be the restaurant business. It might be oil and gas.
Kip:It might be over the road trucking. And so of the things that we've done, which has probably limited our growth a little bit, is we have either stayed out of those industries, or we've been very, very conservative in the types of transactions we'll do in those industries, or the dollar amounts that we'll do, or the structure. And so, talking to other people in the industry who had a lot of exposure in over the road trucking over the last two years, it's really, really hurt them. And even though we have a little bit of exposure in that industry, ours performed pretty well because we were pretty conservative and we're not all over the place in that industry. We're very select and in a niche of what we'll do there.
Andrew:That risk discipline is impressive, and a lot of it ties to how technology is reshaping the way lenders operate. If you don't mind, let's explore how AI and automation are influencing your business and the industry as a whole. Let's start with fraud prevention. How are you using AI tools to detect inconsistencies or verify bank statements in real time?
Kip:Yeah, so we incorporated that practice maybe a year and a half ago, and we looked at a lot of different providers that offer that service. We tested each one, and we came away with a partnership with someone that we think had the best product at the time. So, underwriting is revenue based, and so bank statements are a huge component of what we underwrite. And so, being able to tell if a bank statement has been doctored, if the numbers don't add up, if the font is not the same as what a typical Chase, JP Morgan, even regional banks, it's getting smarter and smarter through AI learning. It knows what those look like.
Kip:So we've had bank statements come through that someone's just added a one in front of one of the deposits, and then a one in front of the ending balance, and instead of having $50,000 they have $150,000 ending balance, or $1.5 right? It can make a huge difference. And so the ability to use technology to detect that, that the human eye might not be able to detect is great. So that's something that I think a lot of lenders are using, and I think if they aren't, they definitely should consider it because one or two fraudulent deals can be very hurtful to the overall portfolio where you have nothing to show for something that you went out a significant amount of money on.
Andrew:Sure, sure. Debt entry and credit decisioning have traditionally been time intensive. How have you automated those processes to improve speed and the accuracy?
Kip:Yeah. So it's something that we're working on every day. We have a technology committee. We have a dedicated tech expert on our staff whose job is to go out and look for emerging technology, present it to us, discuss the pros and cons, test it. So for a company our size to have a true IT or technology person on staff is probably kind of rare.
Kip:What I see is AI tools that are either in the market or are emerging that are going to be game changers. For example, that might mean traditionally you receive an emailed handwritten application, right? And there are AI tools now that can take that handwritten application and move all the data from that into the proper fields, and whatever your CRM is. For us, it's Salesforce. It can upload all the bank statements, vendor invoice.
Kip:It can move all that data into the appropriate fields. If there's a question, it can red flag so that you can have a human element look at it, confirm it, and it gets your transaction ready to be reviewed by your credit team in a matter of seconds or minutes, as opposed to having to rely on someone where there could be some human error to input all that. It's also at the point now where there's tools that are giving you suggested outcomes on the credit decision, putting it in whatever tiers you might have, risk adjusted pricing it, all the different things, and we are currently testing and using some of that. We're still a little old school. We have the human element, there's no AI or computer generated approvals yet, but we're comparing them to how our credit team approves.
Kip:I think in the near future, it's very likely that some of our approvals will be AI generated, or computer generated, where as long as they meet these certain metrics, maybe you have a credit person sign off just at the very end initially. But over time, is what we're working with, speed and efficiency, and staying within the parameters that we have, and AI and technology allows us to speed that up dramatically right now.
Andrew:That's awesome. And as you continue to grow, how do you think about scaling through technology investment rather than expanding headcount?
Kip:I think it's a weighted balance for us. I think I put myself in this situation where if I call my credit card company, and I get a computer on there, and I can't get someone to answer the phone, I get pretty frustrated. I just want to talk to someone who can listen to the actual question I'm asking and not a bank of questions that have been pre programmed. So I think there's a balance for that, and I still feel like one of the things that differentiates us is our team and our customer service. And so I think we talk constantly when we look at where are areas where we can incorporate technology, but it doesn't deaden or lessen the customer service experience for our customers?
Kip:And so, that to me is the balance of there's areas where technology can be huge, and then there's still other areas where I feel like the human element and the emotion that someone can show, and the connection you can have with someone where you have a relationship with them is stronger than any other speed or whatever else there is out there. So to me, it's kind of a stair step, right? You hire the right people, and then you bring in certain technologies that help them do their job better and more efficiently.
Andrew:Yeah, just compliment, use AI to compliment your existing team, right? You have balancing the strengths and the weaknesses, and just use AI to offset some of the weaknesses. And you've shown technology can enhance performance without losing the personal touch, which naturally leads to another key part of your success, which is building culture and capability with such a small focused team. You've grown to 50,000,000 in annual originations with just 16 people. How have you built such an efficient, productive team?
Kip:Well, I'll give one caveat. We're not at 50,000,000 yet, but we're getting really close, so we're building towards that for full disclosure. But I think there's a couple things. The first thing I would say is I think every person that represents three sixty feels like they are respected as a person. So I know it sounds cliche, but we definitely involve our employees and allow them to give feedback.
Kip:We have different teams that are tasked with different assignments where people feel like they're contributing. It's a culture of respect. It's a culture of inclusion. I like to think we spend a lot of time here more than sometimes we do at our house or with our families, and so I think everyone gets along well. Maybe they don't always agree on things, but we do it respectfully with each other.
Kip:So that's one thing. Another big thing that we do is we use a tool called culture index, and culture index is a profile test that allows us to understand the DNA or the makeup of how someone is wired for a couple different characteristics. And so we try to match new hires or our current team members into a position that caters to what their strengths are and how they're wired. So I'll give an example. Someone that's your accountant or controller most likely likes to shut their door, work through all the numbers, doesn't want someone to come in and talk to them for forty five minutes about what they did over the weekend, or if they do, they want to do that when they're ready to do it and when their door is open, not when they're working on a spreadsheet or month end close or whatever it is.
Kip:So that person is wired very different than maybe a salesperson that's very talkative. When they need some energy, they've got to get up, go around, and they like to stop by everyone's office, Hey, how you doing? What are you doing for lunch? Whatever it is. So the first key to that is knowing how someone's wired and being aware of it so that you communicate better.
Kip:So, for example, that sales individual, when they come to my door, I've got to understand that I've got to stop what I'm doing and engage with them because that makes them feel respected, heard, etcetera, more so than I can go into the accountant's office and say, Where's the month end close? And they're like, It'll be done in five minutes. That sounds like a very blunt, brass conversation, but we just know that that's how we talk to each other, and it's fine, and neither one of us are going to take that personally, right? So, that awareness and that education, and having people buy into that, and having people understand how their different coworkers are wired has been really good for us from building the team.
Andrew:Thank you. So you follow the EOS framework, as we do, and a disciplined meeting rhythm. What does that look like week to week, and how has it helped keep everyone aligned?
Kip:Well, you know it as well as I do, but for those that don't, I think what it does is it keeps you really on track and focused on the things that are important for your short term goals, your quarterly goals, and your annual goals. I think the first thing is, if you're not setting goals, you're not gonna reach your goals, because you don't know where they are, you don't have them defined, and so EOS forces us in a great way to sit down and discuss what are our goals, what do we all agree on, our management team, what are we in unison about, And we write all the different thoughts down, and then we go through and we say, What are the most important things? We discuss it, and we align and come together with, These are the four most important goals annually, or whatever that is. So we define them, we write them down, and we continue to look at them and monitor how are we doing in regards to those. Same thing with quarterly, same thing with weekly.
Kip:So I think one thing EOS does is it's a defined meeting system where you have an agenda, you've prepared for it, you try not to get off track, and if you follow it closely, you really won't get off track because you have timers or software that helps you run it. The other thing it does is it provides accountability, right? I don't like going into my L-ten meeting, is what they call it, and saying, I didn't get any of the things done that I said I was going to do in the last week, right? And so, you tend to perform better, you tend to have accountability, and accountability breeds excellence and better results, in my opinion. So, I like this system.
Kip:I think it keeps us on track, and so it's a good thing for us, and it's definitely impacted us positively.
Andrew:Yeah, I would definitely agree. And as a CEO, how do you balance on working on the business strategically versus being pulled into the day to day?
Kip:Well, I think the real key, because you have to remember, we started really small, right? When we started, I had three people. So the real key is hiring people that are exceptional at what they do, that have a different skillset than you do, or that your other team members do, and letting them run with that. It's a hard thing to do, right? I joke, but when I first started the company, I was the CEO, whatever that means, and I was the janitor, right?
Kip:I remember we didn't have a mail slot in our door, so I brought a saw up there and sawed a hole in it and installed a mail slot. I was doing everything, right? And then as the business grows, you have to learn to give up certain things and hire people that do those different than you sometimes, right? Different doesn't mean it's not good, it just might mean that it's different. So I've had to really learn it.
Kip:Different isn't bad, right? Different is they're doing it the way that they want. And maybe at a certain point, if you see some real detriment to that, you coach them up or you explain why you might want it done a different way. But not everyone is built exactly like me, and not everyone is going to do things exactly like I do it, and that's okay. It's actually probably pretty good.
Kip:And so we've been able to build a team here of people that have some amazing skills, far better skills in certain areas than I ever could or would have. And so they run that certain aspect of the business. And as long as you treat them well and they feel respected and they continue to have a chance to learn and advance, in my opinion, they're bought into the team and the team continues to elevate and get better.
Andrew:Thank you. And as far as capital raising and maintaining lender relationships are obviously crucial for growth, how do you approach those conversations and keep partners engaged?
Kip:Well, I think the first key in borrowing money, whether it's from the private sector, whether it's from friends and family, or whether it's from a chartered financial institution, is your presentation, right? So you need to know your business. You need to know all different aspects of it. You need to be able to explain it. And then your actions that you say in your policy and procedure manual have to match what you really do in your business day to day, right?
Kip:But I think the number one thing that I would say that we look at too, that we try to qualify is your character, right? So I think it goes back to what my dad taught me, which is, let your yes be yes and your no be no, which means if you say you're going to do something, you need to be there, you need to do it, you need to be on time, and you need to do it to the best of your ability. And if you say no, then you need to say no and not better deal, not do anything. You need to be very solid in your word is either a strong yes or a strong no. And so it's one of the things that my dad embodied and taught me.
Kip:Not only he would say it, but he lived it out over the years. So in my mind, if you're borrowing money from anyone, they have to trust you. And that trust comes with full disclosure. Hey, when things are tough, you got to tell them, Hey, things are getting a little tough. Here's what's happening.
Kip:When things are good, you tell them the good in things, and you communicate, you make yourself available, you make yourself vulnerable, and you build trust over time. And sounds cliche, but your integrity is all your decisions over your life, and one or two bad decisions, and you lose all those years of maybe good decisions that you made. So I think that's one of the big keys that my dad taught me that I try to take with investors, with employees, with finance sources, whether you have recourse or don't have recourse, you're selling deals to a funding source would be, are you dealing with a person of integrity?
Andrew:Yeah. I mean, one, Oh, crap moment can ruin a lot of high fives, right? For sure. For sure. So looking ahead to '26, what are your top strategic priorities, and what does the next phase of growth look like for March?
Kip:Yeah, great question. The first thing is AI implementation, right? So we're currently testing a couple different AI tools, and so that can be a game changer for us in regards to an automation of input of data, and it can also help us with fraud mitigation, all the different things that we've talked about previously, but it can also really speed up our process, which, as long as we're not cutting any corners, the faster we can do things, the better chance we have for those to close. So I think that's one of the big things. We will also be expanding our team in 2026.
Kip:So for us, our hiring process, our interviewing process, how we vet candidates, and making sure that we are hiring the right people for the right seat on our bus is key. I think hiring the wrong person is way more costly than anyone ever gives it credit for, just because you got to stop and redo it again, and you lose a lot of momentum, and all the training that you've done is kind of down the tube. So I think hiring effectively the right people for the right positions is really key for us. From a growth standpoint, we'll be trying to originate more. And so for us, marketing and sales is huge.
Kip:How do we reach more people to tell them about the product that we have, and how do we get higher utilization, better close rates, all those different metrics that we're looking at. And so, you know, one of the things that we did at the 2025 is we hired a company called Tamarac to build a Power BI data room for us so that all of our data, whether it's from our servicing platform, whether it's from our front end, or whether it's from our accounting software, all gets thrown into there. We can slice it, dice it, however we want, and we're making decisions now. I compare it to a pilot. I actually am flying by all the instruments, and I've got all kinds of GPS and all the latest tools.
Kip:Whereas, a couple years ago, I was kinda like, it seems windy and cloudy. Maybe I shouldn't fly today. Maybe I should wait till tomorrow. Right? It's all more based on a hunch.
Kip:So we definitely data, I think, is a big term in our industry, but true data, data that's really indicative of how things are in your portfolio so that you can look at those metrics, is really key.
Andrew:Thank you. One final question. Die Hard. Is it a Christmas movie? Yes or no?
Andrew:Us your thoughts.
Kip:Yeah. So I'm going have to go with no. Although it does have some Christmas stuff in it, Die Hard to me is a true action thriller. It's riding up elevators, shoot them up, all the other stuff, and so that just doesn't really go with Christmas for me. So I think Home Alone or something that's a little bit more cheerful maybe is more Christmas oriented to me.
Kip:It makes me think of Christmas more so than Die Hard, but I can understand how some people view it as a Christmas movie. What's your take?
Andrew:I'm going to argue for the other side. I'm of the opinion that I feel like it is somewhat of a Christmas movie. Mean, takes place during Christmas Eve party at Nakatomi Plaza, right? Yeah. Which is central to the plot.
Andrew:Okay. A lot of Christmas themes are woven in. A lot of music, A lot of Christmas music and imagery, the lights, the songs. Just to me, it reinforces the holiday atmosphere and the hope and redemption part of it, right? The journey about restoring his family, saving lives, and things like that, the lines with the spirit of Christmas.
Andrew:So I think it's a holiday tradition. I think it's become kind of a holiday tradition, and I think it's a great thing to debate, Now especially around the
Kip:I know why you're in sales, because now when I see Die Hard come across my TV over Christmas, I'm going to think of you, and I'm going think, Oh, this is a true Christmas movie.
Andrew:That's great. Yeah. That's awesome. I've been asking you quite a bit of questions. Do you have any questions for me before we wrap up?
Kip:Yeah, I'd love to hear how did this podcast or this webcast start?
Andrew:Actually, around this time last year, were going through our EOS annual meetings, and just looking for new ways to promote ACS and get more involved in the industry. So yeah, the idea started last year this time with Michael, our Chief Marketing Officer, and suggested that if I'm open to it and willing to put myself out there to do this. So I think you're number 15. I think we've had 15 or 16 episodes that we've recorded. And I feel getting more and more comfortable as I do them.
Andrew:It helps when I have great guests and experts like yourself- You're being kind. Participate and make me look good. No, it's been great. I enjoy it. I put a lot of work into it, and obviously we have a great marketing team, and a great creative team that really puts all this stuff together, makes me look good.
Andrew:Like I said, I wouldn't be able to do this if it wasn't for great guests like yourself. Well, thank you. Yeah, so that's really when it started. About this time last year, the
Kip:interview and
Andrew:wanted to try something different.
Kip:Very interesting.
Andrew:So
Kip:my other follow-up question to you is, because you love golf and I love golf, is what's your favorite golf course you've ever played, and why? Wow.
Andrew:I have two. I'll say PebbleBeach. I played there this past February, was able to go out there with my wife, and for a special birthday of hers, I won't give any numbers, we were able to go out there in February, so we played Pebble and Spyglass. I would say that was always a bucket list. And I'd say Shadow Creek.
Andrew:I invited to play Shadow Creek this February too. So I was Oh, able to play both those courses in the same month, and it was because of a friend and a client invited me to join him, and the host who brought us on the course. I would say that was pretty unique, because they limit the number of rounds that they can It's play on there every really by invite only. You walk in the locker room, and you see all the famous people who have lockers in there, and the course is just It seems like you're playing golf in mountains, kind of like in Georgia, South Carolina, with all the pine trees. You wouldn't think there'd be pine trees in Vegas, but they're all over the There's pine needles everywhere in the course.
Andrew:Yeah, Just that's unbelievable. So Love what about you?
Kip:Favorite course I've ever played? I have two, really. This is a humble brag, but I had someone take me to Augusta National for my fortieth birthday and played there, and it is every bit as amazing as you would ever think. But the thing about it was I was so nervous the whole time. I don't know that I really enjoyed it as much as I would have liked to, because I really had a hard time relaxing, because I was just really, really nervous.
Kip:But it was amazing, and for anyone that's never been there to a master's practice round or a tournament round, it's perfect. There's not a piece of grass out of place. There's no trash. Everything is just perfect. It's hard to describe, especially for the golf enthusiast.
Kip:But one of my favorite courses that I ever got to play is I went with some buddies from here, Ireland, and I played a course called Old Head, and it is the greatest piece of real estate I've ever seen. It's basically a peninsula that goes out into the ocean and comes back, and every hole you could basically fall off a cliff 200 feet into the water. There's one hole that's not on the water, the first hole, and then the rest of them are all on the water. And it was raining, and the wind was blowing 30 miles an hour, and I played one of my best golf rounds ever in those elements, and I just would look out at the ocean and look at the piece of land, and I just wasn't on. It helped that I played well too, so those were probably my two favorites.
Andrew:That's awesome. Yeah, I had that feeling playing Pebble, it was windy. Yeah. Maybe low 60s, upper 50s. Yeah.
Andrew:I'd say Bandon Dunes, I was invited to play Bandon for I was out there for four days, and it was kind of those kind of elements, forty, fifty mile an hour wind gusts. Yeah. Hitting a rescue club into a 100 yard par three, right?
Kip:Yeah. That's great.
Andrew:Because you got the wind straight in your face, or hitting a rescue club into a 300 yard par four or three fifty par four, and driving to Green. So the putting was heavily impacted by the wind too. So that was probably, I'd say, a very close close third for me, the whole experience of Bandon. Ironically, the guy that built Bandon Dunes is from the town to where I live in East Aurora. Found it.
Andrew:So there's a little story there, connection to Western New York. Yeah, no, I mean, Augusta. I've yet to get out there for even just to watch a practice round or a tournament, let alone play it. So that's awesome that you got to do that.
Kip:Yeah. Pretty neat experience. It was a surprise gift to me that I had no idea was coming. Don't So think I'll make it out there again, but I'm always holding out hope.
Andrew:Maybe for your fiftieth or sixtieth perhaps, right?
Kip:I don't know. The fiftieth's already gone, so it'd have to be the Okay.
Andrew:All right. Well, maybe Tobacco Road, or you got Pine Hills is another Pine Hills is supposed to be There's
Kip:plenty of good ones out there that you and I haven't been to that we need to go play, so we got the rest of our lives to figure that out, right?
Andrew:There you go. Well, we'll have to carve out some time to go play one of those tracks.
Kip:That's right.
Andrew:Love it. Well, would say this has been a fantastic perspective on what it takes to build and sustain success in the business from your start as a true entrepreneur with a family loan to leading a company that's grown into a national player. Your story highlights the power of persistence, smart risk management, and disciplined execution. I really appreciate you sharing your journey and insights today. For our listeners, be sure to follow three sixty Equipment Finance and connect with our guests to keep up with their continued growth and innovation.
Andrew:Thanks again for joining me on the ACS Portfolio Perspective. And to our audience, thank you for listening. Be sure to subscribe wherever you get your podcasts and stay tuned for more conversations with people and perspectives shaping the future of equipment finance. Until next time, I'm Andrew Pace. Thanks for tuning in.