Bryant Gillespie: All right, guys.
Welcome to the next edition of the better sign shop podcast
we're down a team member today.
Sign shop Yoda is, I don't know, galaxy far, far.
Something like that.
I don't like that either.
We're missing Peter today.
So it's just Mike, the sign burrito king of California, Riley and myself.
we do have a special guest joining us today a little later in the episode.
So I'm excited for that.
but to kick things off, Mike, what's new with you, man.
Michael Riley: Oh, not too much.
been a busy week for me.
No progress on the house this week.
My, catalytic converters were stolen off of my truck.
So it's been in the garage, so I haven't been able to
Bryant Gillespie: are
you
Michael Riley: anything.
Oh, that's serious.
Yeah.
It's awesome.
Yeah.
Meth heads are a problem in Oregon.
Everything you hear on the news is true.
Bryant Gillespie: Like just in your driveway, somebody came and in the middle
of the night, stole your catalytic.
Michael Riley: no.
So it's been like a hundred degrees here for the last couple weeks.
It's been like an insane heat wave.
And, I, for this remodeling project for our house, I just bought like a
18 year old beater Nissan frontier that I could use just as a work truck.
And, it overheated in this a hundred degree, whether I was hauling
top soil in it, it overheated and left me alongside the road.
I just had my wife come pick me up and I left it there thinking,
okay, it'll cool down overnight.
I'll come get it in the morning.
we live out in the country, so I figured it'd be safe.
next morning, somebody actually, they stole my catalytic converters.
They cut my fuel line and siphoned all the fuel outta my gas tank.
They damaged my fuel pump in the press.
it's four grand worth of damage to this truck.
It's hardly worth $4,000
Bryant Gillespie: Oh, my gosh,
Michael Riley: and it's been at the
Bryant Gillespie: your gas as well.
Michael Riley: Oh yeah, dude, straight up.
just drained.
it was a full tank of gas too.
And it's like bone dry now.
but yeah, no, they did.
They did $4,000 of damage to this truck.
And I don't even think the truck's worth that much.
And so right now I'm just waiting on the insurance company to pay me.
I haven't had a vehicle in a week and a half, so no work on the house, which
is fine, cuz it really sucks during landscaping at a hundred degrees.
So I'm not, I guess I'm not complaining that much, but so
that's, what's going on in my life.
How about
Bryant Gillespie: man that's some redneck West Virginia shit right there.
Michael Riley: Oh, it's rampant out here in Oregon, like every night on the news.
There's some new article about catalytic converter thefts and like
the new cottage industry, like anybody who has a welder around here now is
like making rebar cages to, to weld over people's catalytic converters.
So people don't steal.
'em like, it's like becoming a hot industry in Portland
Bryant Gillespie: us crazy with
Michael Riley: yeah.
Yeah.
Bryant Gillespie: next business idea right there.
Michael Riley: I know, I, I had.
Bryant Gillespie: cages.
Michael Riley: Yeah, it's nuts.
I had to call and file a police report for the insurance claim on it.
And the Sheriff's deputy that I talked to he's you're like the fifth one
today that I've had to do this for.
He's it's pretty much, all I do is just gotta let converter reports, man.
It's just what you signed up for in the police academy.
I'm sure.
yeah.
It's awesome.
Yeah.
How's how's your week been?
Bryant Gillespie: Well, I think the last episode I mentioned the previous
week, the babysitter was sick.
the babysitter is on vacation this week.
So, another lovely week of having all the kids at home, driving my wife crazy.
other than that, we're getting ready to travel out of town over the weekend.
So we're looking forward to that.
We're headed, to Pittsburgh to visit my wife's.
gonna
Michael Riley: Pittsburgh's an awesome city.
Bryant Gillespie: yeah.
I used to live up there for a time.
but yeah, looking forward to that.
Michael Riley: you gotta go to Mente brothers and get a big, pastrami sandwich.
Bryant Gillespie: A big sandwich.
Yeah.
I gotta make sure I keep with the dad bod here.
Michael Riley: Yeah.
Gotta work.
Bryant Gillespie: Yeah, I do like per manes.
there's a lot of great breweries up there too.
So I might try to take in some of that.
Michael Riley: Nice.
We'll have a safe trip.
Bryant Gillespie: As safe as you can be in a car with a bunch of females,
Michael Riley: saw the video that you posted on Facebook.
Bryant Gillespie: but
Michael Riley: yeah, I think that's gonna be our next cease
desist letter will be somebody filing a sexist claim against you.
Bryant Gillespie: Yeah, I did look at the analytics on Spotify and
it's 95% of listeners are mail.
Hopefully we can change that in the future.
But yeah, that is what it is.
It was also kinda strange that.
it shows what music they listened to and it was like post Malone.
And then the rest of it was superstar country singers.
Michael Riley: the post Malone doesn't make sense.
That's an odd fit with
Bryant Gillespie: weird.
I don't, I've not been in a shop.
obviously, I haven't been in very many shops here as of late, but, I've not
been in a shop where they're blasting post Malone while they make signs, but
Michael Riley: Nah, that's weird.
What kind of music you like?
Garth Brooks and post Malone.
Okay.
Bryant Gillespie: yeah.
So let's get into the topic today outsourcing.
what did we title this one, outsourcing your way to freedom?
that one's, that's a really ambitious title.
I like
Michael Riley: I like that though.
Yeah, it's got a ring to it.
Bryant Gillespie: Yeah.
That's gonna sell some tickets, sell some seats.
today we wanna talk about outsourcing as a tool to improve
your business, and whatever improving your business means for you.
Mike, where do we wanna start on outsourcing today?
Michael Riley: I love outsourcing.
I think that it is, the easiest way to grow your business with the least amount
of resistance and, money out of pocket.
it's a great way for any small shop to,
greatly expand their product offering without having to take
on a huge amount of overhead or.
New employees or, new skill sets that you just don't have, or that don't
in your aren't in your wheelhouse.
I'm amazed.
I talk to so many shops left and right now, and I'm amazed at how many more
shops are moving in this direction and they're starting to focus on
what they're really good at in house.
and only doing that.
And they're, the trimming back and it seems like that's the trend right
now is to become as lean as you can in how focus on your core strengths
and then outsource everything else.
when I sold my shop going on 10 years ago now, There were some really good
vendors out there for certain things.
But, it seems like
now, The marketplace for outsource services in this industry is huge.
and I think you can run an entire sign shop without ever, getting
outta your pajamas anymore.
If you align yourself with the right vendors.
it's pretty amazing.
I'm sure there are still some pretty, pretty gnarly vendors out there
that aren't that great, but it seems Anything you need in this industry.
Now there's somebody out there that's an expert in it that can
wholesale it to you for, pennies on the dollar compared to what it would
cost you to manufacture it in house.
So leveraging those vendors and manufacturers, and, or would be a great
way to, really expand into new markets offer services or just, make your
operation leaner and get, get rid of some stuff that you do in house currently.
Bryant Gillespie: Yeah, I would love to run a side shop from my pajamas.
That would be the dream.
yeah, if you're like Peter, I think he came in to, I don't know
if it was one of the podcasts, but he had the Hawaiian shirt on.
So maybe you wanna run your shopping, your pajamas or your Hawaiian shirt
or from the beach or whatever, that was the promise that we sold.
in a former life, right.
Was, Hey, do work from the beach manager shop from wherever you're at.
so I, I definitely feel like that is more accessible and easier to do today.
Why do you think that is become a trend?
Michael Riley: I, I think technology's gotten to a point where the.
the project management and the communication is pretty streamlined
with, as good as technology is now and systems for managing, orders
like that and remote customers.
and I don't know.
I wanna say that maybe COVID has had something to do with it, although
that's totally anecdotal and I don't know for sure, but I think.
COVID has really proven to a lot of people that you can work remotely.
you can do a lot of things that you don't have to be in
your physical building to do.
so I, I think that's opened a lot of people's eyes to the reality that, Hey, we
can run a sustainable profitable business.
By just outsourcing things, most things, everything.
but I'm not sure I'm not, I'm assuming it's just a combination
of a lot of things, technology's getting better and better.
Equipment's getting better and people's eyes are open to, or maybe their minds
are open to other ways of doing things.
Bryant Gillespie: Yeah.
Yeah.
I think COVID definitely has accelerated that, I obviously there were some,
there were quite a few shops that closed during COVID or went out of business and.
I think you've seen some consolidation.
after that, of course we talked to a couple shops that have actually
grown through COVID, which was, yeah, a nice thing to hear on
one of those calls the other day.
But, definitely, I think technology is kind of the leader
of that and, being able to.
Coordinate with your entire team via zoom or text or email or slack,
definitely facilitates, working remotely.
and I think working remotely also goes hand in hand outsourcing.
but yeah, shops have been outsourcing larger projects.
For ages.
in our old shop.
We didn't do any electrical stuff or the few projects that we did,
we would outsource to, one of the other local electrical sign
companies that specialized in that.
did you guys do a lot of outsourcing back in the day or no?
Michael Riley: Yeah.
Not as much as I, I would've liked to.
I think looking back I should have outsourced more.
my, my shop was almost the outsource.
Outsourcer the wholesaler.
I did a lot of wholesale work and actually Jeremy, our guest coming on here in
a little bit was one of my customers.
I used to do, a decent amount of wide format printing for him.
so my business model was almost to be, the wide format vendor to, to the sign
industry where people could outsource.
And we did a fair amount of business in that.
And that's just the natural direction that my business took, especially
after the economic kind of crash of 2008 and 2009, in my market,
it became much harder to sell.
Expensive signs, electrical signs and, hand carve signs,
gold leave, things like that.
Even that's what I, that's what I got into the industry to do.
we definitely had to pivot pretty hard when the economy crashed and wide format.
Really took over and, I had all this equipment sitting around.
I'm like, I'd like to keep this running, even if it's for, a
little less money per square foot.
So we carved out a pretty good niche in doing a lot of wholesale,
like rap printing and decals and.
whatever kept the printers running and it was profitable and it was good for us.
If I could go back in time.
I'd probably have one, one printer in a house for quick turn jobs and that's it.
it's, there's so many good wholesale vendors out there now for anything that
I think you'd almost be crazy to try and get into that side of the industry
when you can outsource it for way less than you can produce it and house.
so yeah, the economy was weird, around that time for us.
And I always struggled to find really great vendors.
I had a few in my back pocket that I leaned on a lot, but,
like I said, like there compared to what's who's out there now.
what's about available now.
Like it wasn't that great.
10, 15 years ago.
Or I would've outsourced more.
I I think I could have built a pretty solid business with, like I said, in
my pajamas without any employees or equipment at all, if there were the
vendors that are available today,
Bryant Gillespie: Yeah, that's an interesting point.
as Mike, the most of the industry is probably smaller shops.
obviously we've got like a, quite a big mixture of different shops
within our mastermind group and the Facebook group that we run.
But, most of the shops that are probably listening to this are probably smaller.
maybe they're solo guys or they're got 3, 4, 5, 6, 10 people.
what would you recommend for them moving forward?
Speaking from past experience.
I, and I think you guys took this path as well.
in the old shop, we would just buy a piece of equipment.
If we wanted to start offering, flatbed printing, we would go
out and buy the flatbed printer.
and some of that was, tax driven at the end of the year.
A profit that you could either spend or, pay a lot of taxes on it.
So it was kind of, Hey, let's, let's continue to fuel the business
here, but, some of those purchases know, we didn't really have the
business to justify a a hundred thousand dollars printer at the time.
we made it work, but, definitely wasn't a great decision.
at the time, looking back.
Michael Riley: Yeah, that, that was definitely my experience too, is like
you end up with equipment because you just don't have a good source for that.
that's how I ended up with a C E T flatbed too.
and that's why I'm now bald cuz of that printer.
I'm amazed.
You still have hair after running one?
Bryant Gillespie: I think I got like the fourth or fifth model after you to
Michael Riley: that's better than the first one off the line.
Like I got holy crap.
Yeah.
That's a big reason that I ended up with, a decent amount of equipment was just
because I've got customers begging me for this product, whatever it may be.
And I there's just, there's no good.
There's no good sources for it.
Especially like when you get into flatbed printing and you wanna move beyond just
like foam core and corrugated plastic, and you wanna start doing some of the
cool stuff with it, like printing on fabric or, like I, I had a customer, he
was a, He had a dry cleaning business.
He had seven or eight locations and they did home delivery and
home pickup, and they wanted some really cool, like in-store displays.
And instead of just making it like a retractable banner stand, we
actually ran a bunch of six panel hollow cord doors through our
flatbed with their graphics on it.
And we put door handles in the whole nine yards and that was
their, like their standup display in their lobby of all their.
They're, they're dry cleaning stores advertising their
home pickup and delivery.
Cause like they, you just had, they give you this bag and you're hanging on your
Bryant Gillespie: gotcha.
Yeah, that's pretty neat.
Michael Riley: so it was like, it was a really, it was a really cool way to
do something tactile and dimensional as a retail P O P type display.
You can, there's no way you can outsource that back then.
I guess it's debatable if you could even outsource it today, just given shipping on
a, a bunch of doors, but stuff like that, it just, it made it really difficult to.
To outsource and to be able to offer those kinds of things.
And, if you want to set yourself apart from your competition and be the go-to
place for customers, when they've got some wild, crazy, hair, brain idea,
you gotta have the equipment to do it.
Bryant Gillespie: is that a
good strategy or do you want to be that shop?
I think we all do, and like being like years removed from the shop
now, I still feel that itch.
I want to go back and make something or start a shop.
Michael Riley: That's a good question.
is that why is that ? Is that a good business model?
Bryant Gillespie: Yeah.
It, I always enjoyed those projects, but if I just, obviously I don't have
the numbers in front of me, but if I go back and I like, think through
those crazy off the wall projects that we did like that printing corn hole
boards, like actual Birch plywood, running it through the flatbed.
Those are no doubt, really cool projects, but I don't think we ever made any money.
So I don't, yeah, we probably lost money on all those jobs.
Michael Riley: yeah.
Bryant Gillespie: I guess that brings satisfaction, but
obviously we're in business to, to make money.
Michael Riley: right, Not stir our egos.
it's a tough call.
If that equipment is critical to the operation, or if it's just something
that you want to have to, to be able to use it when the need arises.
I would say you're probably on the right path that just buying it cuz you
want it cuz you think you need it cuz you think you're gonna get these cool
orders is definitely not the approach to take, even though we've all done that.
and again for me, 10, 15 years ago, I probably wouldn't have gone down that
path if there were better vendors that I could align myself with, but it's easy
to fall into the trap of thinking, okay, I'm paying somebody, like I'm paying like
signs 365, I don't know, 80 cents a square foot for corrugated plastic yard signs or
whatever they charge you per square foot.
I don't even know what it is anymore.
oh man.
If I had a flatbed printer, it's cheap.
it's dirt cheap, right?
it's easy to say, if I had a flatbed printer, I could do
that for 20 cents a square foot.
Like it's three times cheaper.
that's so much more profit margin, but really the difference between 20 cents
a square and 80 cents is not that much.
It's not gonna make it or break it.
And that flatbeds gonna cost you a fortune and overhead to keep there,
to save that little bit of money.
So I think most shops, if they would really were to sit down and do the math.
of what it would cost truly cost to manufacture something in house
with overhead and staffing and maintenance and the whole nine yards.
It financially, it makes a whole lot more sense to outsource most
things, unless you're so big.
And your volume is so massive where then those pennies really count.
But for the average shop, like pennies don't matter.
Like they really don't and getting caught up in the pennies is dangerous.
Bryant Gillespie: Yeah, and I think it's easy to underestimate like
the service and time involved.
I'm sure like printers and equipment have gotten better over the years,
obviously, but still even if you spend, you look at a purchase of a big piece
of equipment, like a router table or a flatbed cutter flatbed printer easily
like a hundred grand for something.
You look at that as okay, it's a hundred grand and then we're good.
you, what you don't see is the, like the maintenance costs, the time that you're
gonna spend on servicing that piece of equipment when it goes down the headaches.
, so I think we're telling a long-winded story to say, if you're
out there now and you're looking.
Hey, should I buy a router or should I buy a brand new flatbed printer?
The first question you have to answer is gonna be, do I have the volume
now to make all the payments on that and, make sure I'm covering not
just the loan payments, but also the ongoing expenses associated with that.
and does that make sense?
Financially,
Michael Riley: Yeah, the maintenance thing is definitely something that I think a lot
of people fail to take into consideration.
I'll use my C E T flatbed as an example, things you don't really think about a
lot, but if you get one head strike on that and you damage ahead, like it's not
a, it not a $400 Epson print head that you see in like a ma mock or something.
mine had eight spectra heads at 2,500 bucks a pop.
And if you scratch the nozzle plate on two of those, not only are you
down for a week, you're also out quite a bit of money to replace those.
that's stuff that you just
Bryant Gillespie: factor in.
Michael Riley: you just don't really, you can't really, it's hard to factor that
stuff in because it's such an unknown, but that's why I say you really need
to have the volume to justify those.
and it's not like a machine that you just buy and put in place.
And then you forget about, especially when you're moving up into larger
equipment like that, it's a, it's an ongoing, constant maintenance.
Requirement and maintenance on those things.
The bigger the machine is the more expensive they are to
maintain and keep running.
Bryant Gillespie: Absolutely.
So look at the advice here is outsource all your stuff.
Hey, whatever piece of equipment that you're trying to buy, find a vendor
for that, keep them as busy as possible until you have the work to justify
that printer that router don't buy.
Just because you want it, or it's the end of the year and your accountant says, Hey,
we need to spend money to save on taxes.
Michael Riley: And I think there's like keeping up with the Jones kind
of thing in the industry as well, where oh man, like the sign shop
down the street, they just bought.
They just bought a new flatbed.
So like I'm not gonna be competitive with them unless I also have a flatbed as well.
It's easy to fall into that trap too, where you've gotta keep up with your
competition or you feel like you're gonna lose customers with them.
Cuz they've got all the fancy toys and equipment and that's
not how it really works.
And you shouldn't ever buy a piece of equipment because
your competitor did, you know
Bryant Gillespie: or just because you want the toys.
Yeah.
Like I've mentioned, that was like a big thing for us was
like, oh yeah, we could do that.
We could do that.
Yeah, of course we, no, we got that in house.
We could do that.
And I feel like we talk to a lot of shops where the strategy for a lot of
them is, Hey, we're a OneStop shop.
and yeah, I think.
there's multiple ways to success.
Obviously.
Like some shops have success with that model.
but it is stressful.
It's a lot of headaches for the owner doing so many different things.
You really split your focus and it becomes hard to be great at all of them.
so not knocking you, if you are a one stop shop.
That's okay.
but there's different ways to have a successful sign shop.
And I think that kind of leads us into what we're gonna chat
with our guest Jeremy about is what's the ideal shop for you?
I think I could say this and it'd be true for you too.
Mike, when I say it is like, when we were coming up, it
was like, Hey, we gotta grow.
I wanna have the biggest shop possible because that's how I'm gonna make
the most money or have the best exit or, whatever the ideal was at that
time, it was like bigger is better.
and I feel like that shifted some.
Michael Riley: that kind of goes back into what I think it was on
our very first podcast episode.
We talked about, this.
The business mentality of grow or die is kind beaten into all of our heads.
and this sort of goes hand in hand with that where you feel like if you're
not constantly moving forward and growing and expanding your business,
then you're doing something wrong.
If your sales aren't always going up by 20% every year, you're doing something
wrong and that's not necessarily the case.
And that's a really bad, rut to fall into.
it will compel you to buy equipment that you don't need bring on services
and staff in house that you don't need in, in pursuit of this growth
goal, which, growth isn't bad.
But like we talked about in that first episode, you gotta manage it
aggressively and outsourcing as much as possible is one way to really.
Control that growth and keep it on track and keep it from just, spiraling outta
control, where you're buying tons and tons of equipment that you don't necessarily
need, or that you'd be better off letting somebody else buy in wholesale to
Bryant Gillespie: So my next question for you is what can't you outsource
or what should you be outsourcing?
what's our saying in the group that we have.
J F I just.
Michael Riley: JFI just fucking fiber.
It I love fiber.
It has its place.
No, I think that question is going to depend on the individual shop owner and
what, what their core product offering is.
they produce in house and you know what all the ancillary things are that their
customers are asking them for, that they maybe don't do in house, but things that
are really commoditized in our industry now wide format printing in general,
I think falls under that.
To me, I can't imagine trying to, have a big roster of, roll to roll
equipment in house, trying to print wraps and decals and things like that.
Print quality's important, but honestly, like I guarantee you, there's a
wholesaler out there that can print better than anything you can print
in house more accurately faster, and, just as cheap for square foot.
It's just one of those things that lets somebody else do it.
They, somebody who does it all day, every day is gonna do it better, faster.
There's no reason to try and print
Bryant Gillespie: Do you have any recommended vendors on that?
Aside from the obvious like signs 365.
Michael Riley: Science 365 was like the only one back in the day that I
used, there were a few like smaller shops here and there, but, I, I
don't know how science 365 is doing.
I haven't used them in years.
but that I used to love those guys.
They had a great online portal for ordering.
It was really easy.
their product offering is pretty cut and dry.
They don't get anything super custom and stuff, but for, corrugated
plastic, basic self-adhesive vinyl banners and stuff like that.
Like they're great.
They generally get the product to you in one to two days, your customer
will never know you outsourced it.
So vendors like that are fantastic.
used to outsource a lot of channel letters to like direct
sign wholesale and Econo channel.
both of those guys are still around, doing well, but honestly, I'm so far
removed from the actual like sales and manufacturing side of the industry.
Now I really don't know who.
Who the good vendors are anymore, but everybody that I talk to, that's
outsourcing, they've all got, a list of, heavy hitters in their back
pocket that they re rely on, regularly
Bryant Gillespie: do most of your assigned design clients, are they outsourcing
stuff like channel letters or are they, they're manufacturing themselves.
Michael Riley: A lot of.
Most of my design clients are larger sign shops that, that are, electrical shops.
most of them occasionally outsource work, but more, more like as an overflow type
thing and not as like a core product offering, if you're in the, if you're
trying to compete in the electric sign business and you're trying to do any
sort of volume at all, you're really.
You need to build stuff in house too.
although I do have one client who has, I think they've got 10 or 12
installers and a fleet of trucks and everything, but they don't actually
manufacture anything in house.
They outsource it all and they're super successful and they do really well.
and then I've got other shops that just, outsource the random channel letter
sign here and there to keep their.
Their shop floor unclogged with commodity where like in the electrical
sign industry, a set of channel letters on a Raceway is pretty much the same
as is commoditized in the same way that a banner is for a vinyl shop.
So that's something you can
Bryant Gillespie: there's a thousand different vendors for that.
Michael Riley: And you can't really, you can't really screw
up a channel letters either.
Like they're pretty basic and simple.
So most of them try to focus on their core compet competencies in house,
which is, the fabrication stuff and really doing a good job with that.
And anything that's just cut and dry type signage.
they, they usually outsource just to, to free up the production floor, which is
another great reason to outsource too.
Not necessarily just to.
Expand your product offering or get into new markets, but just as overflow or,
that's the majority of my design work is just overflow work outta people's
art departments that they're too busy to handle certain jobs in house.
So they need to, offload some of that, not that they're outsourcing all their design
to me, I'm just getting a portion of it when they're too busy to do it in house.
So keeping, keeping your staff free to focus on what they
do best is another really
Bryant Gillespie: I think that's, a great point.
I think it's it definitely understated as well.
yeah.
How many guys did we talk to on the mastermind calls where
like, Hey, we've got more work than we can handle right now.
Michael Riley: Yeah.
And they're having a hard time finding employees too.
that's obviously something that everybody's struggling with is
finding staffing and after COVID staffing up is becoming a really.
Really difficult challenge to overcome for, I think everybody in this industry,
I don't think I've talked to anybody.
Who's oh yeah.
I'm having a great time hiring people.
everybody's not enjoying that process.
Like it sucks.
It's hard.
so yeah, just out a necessity because you can't staff up or you wanna run
a lean crew in house outsourcing is a great way to allow you to do that without
theoretically, without sacrificing quality or having to charge your customer more.
Bryant Gillespie: So I like those points, Mike, and I think that
kind of naturally leads us into our conversation with our guests.
All right.
So welcome to our guest, Jeremy Seager.
Mike, since Jeremy was a former customer of yours, why don't you
give him the, the introduction?
Give him the, the rah, bring him on
Michael Riley: Yeah.
So we got Jeremy seekers with, sharp mill graphics with us today.
yeah.
I did a little bit of wholesale printing for Jeremy way back in the day.
Gosh, what was that like?
At least 10, 12.
Years ago, 15 years ago.
Jeremy Siegers: well actually I got into business.
It was 2002.
So I maybe
Michael Riley: It's been a Yeah,
Jeremy Siegers: it's been a while
Michael Riley: but that was, that was, he was a science 1 0 1 customer
I think is where he found me on there.
Jeremy Siegers: the original the original social networking of the signage industry
science1@one.com
Michael Riley: Yeah.
I was actually just on there the other day and it's, it's pretty dead now and
it's, it's not as active as it used to be, but still some of the old school
Jeremy Siegers: I bet.
I bet your Geno's still there.
, You know
Michael Riley: he's pretty much the only person still there.
seems like, but, yeah.
Yeah.
So I, I, I met Jeremy, years ago just, doing some wholesale, like rap printing
and decals and things like that for him.
stayed in touch over the years.
Jeremy has, since.
kind of had a pretty monumental shift in the way he operates.
He's he's gotten rid of his, his actual brick and mortar, shop and, and his staff.
And now he, he's a one man operation and he outsources everything,
which is why we wanted to have him on the podcast episode today.
So welcome, Jeremy.
We're glad you were here.
Bryant Gillespie: Yes
Jeremy Siegers: I'm glad to be here guys.
Glad to be here.
Michael Riley: so I, I guess like if you, if you would kind of just paint a,
a quick picture for, for our listeners of sort of, you know, your, your original
entry into the industry, what you did, and then, you know, how that's evolved
and what led you to your decision to, you know, get rid of everybody and
everything, and sell, sell the farm and just, just do what you're doing.
Bryant Gillespie: Yeah
Jeremy Siegers: well I got in the business, like I said, like 2000,
2003, actually started working for a family company, family sign shop,
right outta high school, and, uh, started, days before digital printing.
I was running an automatic screen printing press.
We were screen printing, big campaign signs, four foot bite, eight foots.
And, nowadays all that stuff's, all digital and, I love doing that sort
of stuff, and it was just even back to high school, all my elective classes,
all art classes, it was all drawing ceramics and all that fun stuff.
But.
in high school, to do that sort of art and bring that, how do you make money
doing that sort of art, like just drawing.
And I really didn't see, sort of future in it.
But then when I got to working at the sign shops like, whoa, I mean like,
this is, this is commercial art people.
They need this stuff, and it just opened my eyes to another world
of art, it was commercial art.
And, so I worked there for, a while and.
Probably about six months or so.
And I'd come home from work every day, and tell my parents, oh, I made this, we did
this, oh, we, we made it to this company.
I made contract with Coca-Cola Pepsi and so it's fun, and after about
six months, one of their, their kids graduate from college, came
back to work for a family business.
And they're like, well, Jeremy, we don't need anymore.
I'm like, oh man, look what.
I was just, I was so bummed.
I was so bummed and, but I, I loved, I loved everything about it.
it was like my art background and, the business side of things.
And, so yeah, one day, I was, mean the internet was just kind of starting
to, to come around at that point.
So I just happened to, I think it might have been AOL like dialup or something.
So I was happened to be on the, went on the internet and was just doing a
little bit of research and came across.
An open house, MCO, which was small, grim co at the time
they were having an open house.
So me and my dad, once Saturday, we go to a, open house of grim co here in Chicago.
And, the big players are there, the big, suppliers, the big, manufacturers and
end up coming home with, little plotter, software and a couple rolls of vinyl.
I just started teaching myself, started playing around with it and, Got into
his, a little hobby, and I started then I, started going to college and, went to
college for, computers and networking.
then, so yeah, it's this little hobby, just go to college classes during the
day, come home, do my homework, go work, start, learn more about Sy lab
and making a few things here and there.
And next thing you know, My, my grandfather, my mom's dad, he had a, he
owned a wrecking and excavating business.
So he had big caterpillar tractors and, and, John Deere equipment.
And it's like, Jeremy, Hey, or you got some, you're getting
an assign making business.
did you be interested in, letters on my tractors, with, with
our company name, like, sure.
Grandpa, I'll give it a shot, and.
So, start load his tractors and then, other people, Hey,
Jeremy, can you do this?
And one thing, I'm, I'm now this little side, I've got a little side
business, I'm making a car payment, I'm
paying car insurance while I'm going to college full time.
This is great.
And going and, just.
goes from there, then, I'm actually disabled.
I have muscular dystrophy, so I get around a mobility,
scooter and a power wheelchair.
And so at the time, the goal was I was going to school for computers.
Cause it's like, all right, I'm not gonna be able to have, a real
physical job, I'm, I'm not gonna be able to, pick up a lot of heavy stuff.
I'm not gonna be able to really do a physical type job.
So that's why I went to counselor, computer.
so the end game was you want me to get done with college, get my degree, go
get a job as a network administrator or something like that for a company,
and then have my side business at the same time, world, everything was, great.
so now by the time I get done with college, I'm getting around on
mobility scooter full time, and start going on interviews for my job and.
Every interview I would go into, every person I interviewed with every HR
person they'd see me on my scooter.
They'd just, they'd stick their nose up at me.
That's they did not want anything to do with me cuz I was disabled.
They just were discriminated against me.
they didn't care.
If I was the smartest guy in the room or smartest guy in the building,
all they saw was my disability and it was heartbreaking, and
Bryant Gillespie: I can
Jeremy Siegers: for a good solid, for a good solid year, I interviewed.
Trying to get a job with my degree interview after interview at roll in
same result, same thing, everybody just stick their nose up and all
they thought was you're gonna be taking off of work all the time.
You're gonna be on medication.
You're gonna be a liability.
And I did this for a good solid year, but in the meantime, on a side, I'm still
building my business, my signage and graphics business around my disability.
It's that's still growing.
Nobody cared about my disability.
Everybody has cared.
building a relationship with me and how good of work I did.
They didn't care, if I was disabled or not.
So after a good solid year of interviewing, I sat down with my
parents, like, guys, nobody's gonna give me a shot with my degree.
Nobody I've been doing this for a year and after.
So at that time I told him like, I'm just gonna run with my business,
that I know I can thrive at.
That's built around me.
And that's what I.
and I've been doing this now, what, 20 years later.
And, I'm a nationally certified disability owned company with a
organization called disability.
N I got a state of Illinois certification as well, and doing work
with large companies, small company, meatless, medium size companies.
And, yeah.
So then, so that's pretty much that in a nutshell, but then once kind of.
over the years, you hire employees, you train 'em to get 'em to be
right where you want 'em to be.
and then, you trust them to, to do what you need 'em to do, but then they up
and quit on you, And it's like, then it's, you gotta start all over trying
to find someone again, And I got sick of doing that, I wear so many hats, I got
tons, I got gray hair underneath this hat.
it just tons of gray hair, but
Bryant Gillespie: Yeah, I've got streaks going
through here, man.
They, the hair on
Jeremy Siegers: of doing it, over the years it's just, something had to
give, I just, I was wearing so many hats, operating, I could still run
equipment, I get around mobility, so I put more miles on my scooter than I,
than most people would do just walking around and, would get to a point where.
I was wearing, I just wear wearing way too many hats, and then I'd be going
out to supervise installs because I, the guys that would have working for me at
the, they, if something wasn't in maybe it's just me being, a perfectionist
where I needed to go on the big installs because at the end of the day, owning
the company, the buck stops with me.
if something happens at that install or something's crooked or something's
messed up, it's coming back to.
the customer St.
Jeremy, Hey, this is messed up.
Not only do I have to, pay outta my own pocket to remake it, I also to
pay outta my pocket to reinstall it, pay outta my pocket to, to have the
same guys go back and install it.
And what if they messed it up again?
So it just, it got to be too much, I'd be out on installs and, my phone's
blowing up because people need quotes.
I need other stuff going on that I needed to be back in my office to manage.
And so, I did it for years, and then COVID hit and the whole world slowed down.
it was still busy, not with the same sort of work, but other work, all
the social distancing signs, the D kills and all that sort of stuff.
But all the other stuff just kind of slowed down and it gave me a lot of
time to sit back and think about it.
you sit there and you watch the news, you watch everything and it's.
If this is ever gonna be over, or when this is gonna be over, what do I want
to be doing for the next 10, 20 years?
30 years, whatever, it actually gave me time to sit back and reflect
on the last 20 years of my life and what I want to be doing for
the next, 20, 30 years of my life.
Can I continue doing it this way?
Do I want to keep wearing all these hats?
I don't have a big shop.
I never had a big shop.
I always have built relationships
with
Bryant Gillespie: What did you guys, if I cut in on you,
what did you guys look like?
prior to COVID like, what, how many employees did you have Like yeah
What What, was the kind of general
the
feel for the
Jeremy Siegers: had three, I had three employees.
I mean it nothing big, but I wore so many hats, or I did so much and I had.
sub subcontractors that, I relied on for, fabricating, big signage,
who also had, bucket trucks, I'd hire them to go install.
So I didn't have to have all that,
Bryant Gillespie: of equipment did you guys have in house
Jeremy Siegers: digital printers plotters laminators.
Bryant Gillespie: kind of the, the standard sign
Jeremy Siegers: yeah, So I didn't need to invest in other stuff.
Cuz I'd had relationships with subs that had it already.
They made the big investments in all that, and over the years, that's what
there's been a lot more dependable, subcontractors, wholesalers or whatever
you wanna say that's all they do.
they invest the millions of dollars in the equipment where,
why would I, why should I do it?
I can call up, you like, for instance, like, TJ, I think it's, GCI digital.
Yeah.
Excuse me.
GCI digital throughout Ohio.
he's buying equipment like every other week, and he gets it to me.
And in a couple days, or signs 365, all these companies, they just deal with
guys like us who have the experience that we know what we're doing.
They don't have to deal with the end.
They just have to make it, print it, ship it, it's just, I see their
mindset, why they're doing it.
And so why should I have had to invest in all that equipment, all that overhead
and when it didn't make any sense,
Bryant Gillespie: If we go back to like, what was the, the tipping point for
you We hit COVID things slowed down.
Jeremy Siegers: Yeah well, it just, it just gave me so much time to
reflect, a year or two, however long it was, however long I don't even,
it's, it's COVID is a blur now.
it's just, it's like a blip where it's like it's just like
a bad dream or, just the fog.
But, I kind of decided my car, do I want to keep doing this or.
change up, change everything up, so I kind of just decided, as soon as I decide
I wanted to change things up, I really kind of came up with a plan, like, all
right, well, how am I gonna do this?
who am I going to, basically build relationships with, and what
relationships do I have in place already.
Turns out.
I had a lot of relationships in place already.
It's just, I didn't need all the employees.
I didn't have that money already, but still had workman's and workman's
comp, which I didn't need anymore.
Got rid of the workman's comp didn't need all the equipment sold all my
equipment, and I basically just work out of office now, I almost like an
internet connection, my email contacts, basically what I'm doing now, it's just.
it's going about a different way, it's just, it's going good.
because then there, it came time too, like, all right.
In 20, 30 years, being here in, the Chicagoland area, I hate winter.
I absolutely hate winter.
I want to go summer warm.
I love to go to Florida or go to, Tennessee or something, but the
way my business was set up, having equipment, having all this stuff.
I'd be stuck here.
I don't want to be stuck here.
I want to be have the option.
So whether it's 5, 10, 15, 20 years, Hey maybe me and my entire family, my
sister and my brother-in-law my niece.
Maybe we're gonna maybe we'll decide to move somewhere at where I was.
I couldn't do that.
So right now I can do that.
Alls I need is a computer and internet connection, Where I could basically run
my business anywhere in the country, in the world, if I wanted to, I'm not
leaving the country, but you know, not saying I'm even gonna move at all, but
the option to do it is there now that I never had, or even thought about, three,
four years ago before COVID, so, oh it just opened up my mind, it just gave me
that time to think that I've never had that time to think about before ever.
Michael Riley: how has this move to getting rid of your
staff and your equipment?
how has it affected your, your sales and your bottom line?
have you lost any customers or have any customers lost faith in you?
I guess, because you're not manufacturing anything in house
or has it really changed your.
Your your bottom line much at all.
Jeremy Siegers: no at the end of the day, know, I'm actually kind of making
more money cuz I'm not buying materials.
I.
Buying consumables.
I'm not pulling my hair out, looking for stocker materials, cuz all this
supply chain issues and all that.
I don't have to worry about that anymore.
if I can't, know, I don't have to call gr CRICO or any of the other
companies, Hey, can I get a roll?
IJ 180, can I get this?
Can I get, oh no outta stock.
I don't have to worry about that anymore.
I have to my suppliers and subconscious worry, worry about that now.
So it's just.
I don't have to worry about that anymore.
Michael Riley: how did it affect your bottom line sales?
Did your sales go up
Jeremy Siegers: they've gone down a little bit, but they're starting to come back up.
I like some of the clients that, I'm.
I'm kind of picky now who I'd like to work with, it's just, I have,
industries and clientele that, I enjoy working with more so than others.
So I try to market towards that sort of persona that I'm interested
in building relationships with.
And, companies are people who aren't interested in the relationship.
I'm not interested in working with you, I'm in it for the relationships.
at the end of the day, I like, seeing how my clients are doing, how their family's
doing, how's their business doing.
And then I feel, they like to hear the same thing about me, call up on the
phone or do a video call or whatever, and, shoot the shit for a little while.
And, cuz the NA business has built on relationships, that's your.
Your wild card when it comes down.
if somebody's nitpicking above price, someone's gonna pick, Hey,
I got a relationship with Jeremy.
Jeremy's a great guy.
I'd rather send him the work than some, Joe Schmo that has, a couple bucks
cheaper, who he's never gonna talk to,
Michael Riley: when you pulled the trigger to make this pretty change
in the way you operate your business.
Did, did you make any sort of announcement to your, your customer base?
Like, Hey, we're going to, you know, fundamentally change the way we
operate or did you just keep going on this business as usual with them?
And did they know.
Jeremy Siegers: No, I didn't tell anybody.
until like a project with them came up.
it's, I didn't make like an email announcement.
Hey, I'm doing all this, changing things up.
I just went on as business as usual and they really didn't care.
it's just because they were in the, they were in the relationship with me,
and as long as I was able to take care of 'em and I had all my ducks in a
row or whatever I was gonna do to make sure whatever they needed, got to them.
when they needed it and they got what they needed.
They're fine with that.
it doesn't matter to them really who actually made it, I'm still,
again, the buck still stops at me.
if I'm gonna have someone else do it, I'm gonna make sure they're just as good as
what I was able to the, to knock out for 'em you are still using the same materials
that the quality is always gonna be there.
It's just, I'm physically not making it anymore.
Dating really care
Michael Riley: do you ever run across situations where that does factor
into a customer's decision making?
you isn't manufactured?
Cause I used to get I used to get that a lot where like, I, there were
certain bids that I just couldn't win.
If we weren't gonna manufacture a hundred percent of
Jeremy Siegers: You the project in yeah.
I haven't come across a lot of 'em, but you know, you're, you're
submitting, a bid for, a larger company.
They wanna know you,
they basically wanna know you, everything down their size of your underwear, and
just you know, it's like, come on, you really need to know all this.
you're gonna get, but I get it from their point of view,
Michael Riley: I I think that's a, that's a, that's a tricky one to overcome.
I feel like cuz I know a lot of customers, larger customers, especially they,
it's not so much about whether you can.
Produce the, the product and meet the deadline.
It's, it's more about, do you have the capability to to, back it up
when, you know, when, when the shit hits the fan and this project goes
sideways, will your vendor be, be
Jeremy Siegers: right
Michael Riley: to, to, make sure this still goes through on
Jeremy Siegers: right That's why, picking and choosing.
solid relationships with, suppliers and vendors.
top of mind, all the time, I'm not gonna go to someone just
because of the cheapest price.
I, I pick my relationships with my suppliers and vendors just
as if I pick my clients or my clients pick me, cuz I know if,
Bryant Gillespie: that's a, that's a good point.
I think, you know, for all these guys listening on the podcast, I, don't
know that we would recommend like a total shift like that, but, you know,
outsourcing is, oftentimes a dirty word with customers and clients like,
Hey, we're not gonna do this in house.
and, and, you know, I think that's changing a little bit, or, or it seems
to at least anecdotally, but yeah, I was definitely curious about that
when Mike was asking those questions
Jeremy Siegers: it's, it's different structure, different folks.
I wouldn't recommend what I'm doing for everybody.
some people, it just, it all depends.
What you need or want outta life?
I personally, I don't need the big giant shop.
I don't need the millions of dollars worth of equipment.
I don't need all the big employees, the big overhead, the big nut to crack every
month, I'm content with what I have and what I can grow, and then still be.
Sleep well at night, and not have to worry about all those giant overhead bills.
I would like to travel more and do more stuff where I don't have
to be worrying about all that.
there's nothing wrong with all that, with all that.
that's perfectly fine,
Bryant Gillespie: me about the transition process.
Like, Hey, today I decide.
like totally shifting my business.
how long has that taken you from the the time that you made the
Jeremy Siegers: Well, when I first started, kind of when I started getting
into it, the first thing was doing was just building a new website, had a
new website built kind of, where, you know, everything's kind of, supplier
based, where there's nothing that's.
totally custom that I guess you can say that's in there, still do custom stuff.
I, my portfolios, we all have custom stuff in 'em, but a lot of it just,
whatever, suppliers are providing, so, mainly geared towards, the medium.
to, four to 500 companies where they need, promotional products, they need, business
cars, they need flyers where they need a lot of it, where, so not necessarily
not necessarily custom, but then, I'll do still offer the custom, dimensional
letters, dimensional logos on the wall or whatever that, I'll get from a, a
supplier, and other signs that you all get from a supplier, but, kind of just
switching gears from, Hey everything's custom, Hey, we make everything custom
in house to getting away from that, and.
That took a little bit of work, but you still, I gotta build out
some more pages on the website, to get some more traffic to it.
I don't have a lot of pages on there.
Google likes, more content.
So working with my web developer to, to get that going,
and yes, yes.
I gotta get blog posts going and all that stuff.
And, it's like, I'm not as busy.
It's like, I.
Busy, but I'm a different busy now, I'm not worried about the employees.
I'm not worried about making stuff.
I'm not worried about all that, but I'm more focused on the marketing side.
Oh wait, now we gotta do new more website pages.
Hey, we gotta do more social media.
So now it's, now I'm wearing more of a marketing side of
the hat, as opposed to before.
I didn't have time to do any of that
Bryant Gillespie: Yeah, that's a good.
Jeremy Siegers: rose ain't really thinking
Bryant Gillespie: what's.
we've harped on that on some of the other episodes of the podcast of the
need to like get out of the production mindset and, and into that business
owner, marketing sales side of it
Jeremy Siegers: Right
So
this is I actually, I got a perfect, line.
I spent too many years working in my business and not enough years working
on my business, meaning the marketing side and all that sort of stuff, And,
now I do have time to do all that
Bryant Gillespie: So your new model is, like very dependent upon like
the different vendors that you're working with How are you, like, what's
your model for vetting these guys?
Or, you know, how are you finding new vendors?
Jeremy Siegers: well I'm actually a part of, I joined, an
organization called I promote you.
They're actually one of the largest promotional product
companies in the country.
They're a top 40, company.
And, I'm an affiliate of them, basically they, they have their
own system in place, they have.
they got buying power, they got buying power with all the big, suppliers
for promotional products and, and, they do financial backing too.
Any purchase order I have, they handle it all.
so if someone co customer comes to me with a, a hundred thousand dollars
order, I don't have to basically bankroll that, pay the supplier up
front and wait for, to get paid.
I promote you'll.
And then I'll get paid when they get paid.
So I don't have
to go get, line of credit.
I don't have to rack up credit card bills.
I don't have to do any of that, which is great, because being, a
certified disability company, I do have the opportunity to get in the
doors of a lot of large companies with supplier diversity goals.
And they all have net 30 net 60, some of 'em have net 90 days.
I can't bankroll, these large purchase orders for that long.
There ain't no way.
And, I don't feel I should have to finance 'em either, And, and
so, so yeah, that was, that was a, kind of a, big hurdle to get over.
but I'm there, I'm doing, it's, it's a good partnership with them, but then,
other suppliers, like on the sinus side, being in the business so long, I've,
back to signs 1 0 1 days, Some were in there, now these Facebook groups,
there's a couple good Facebook groups that have, suppliers on there and,
building relationships with them too, And, and, yeah, so it's, it's just,
you kind of, it's just the tricks at a trade you you've been in for so long.
I kind of know, you learn, over the years and it just it's experience.
someone's starting out in the game now.
Hey, I would've been in the, in the, in the signage print and
promotion product business, and I have absolutely no experience.
I would not recommend this whatsoever.
Bryant Gillespie: I think that's important to qualify.
Yeah.
This is not financial advice Yeah If you're new to the business if
you don't have an understanding of
signage, do not do this.
Jeremy Siegers: Uh, Nope And, yeah, you would not recommend it, maybe you
have to know a lot about this industry in order to, to do this sort of thing,
and, even, yeah, I, yeah, I don't re I don't recommend it, go work for another
company for a while, or, you need years of experience with, from everything
from design through production, through, F fulfillment through installation,
through permitting, you need all that experience that, if you don't have it,
then you're just gonna be per yourself.
you'll be ending sooner than you get started.
So
Michael Riley: So now that you are on the, kind of the tail end of this, this pretty
major transition with your business, Jeremy, what would you do differently
with now that you have the benefit of, you know, 20, 20 hindsight vision?
Would you undertake this process of, of, you know, downsizing and getting rid of
your equipment and staff and everything.
Would you do anything different in that process or did you,
were you pretty happy with
Jeremy Siegers: Yeah I'm, I'm, you know I'm, I'm more happy with it, it's just,
with me having, muscle dystrophy as well, I have, some health issues that a lot of
people don't have, And so it's, I'm able to still, kind of build my own schedule.
Hey, if I can't get up at, 6:00 AM to go to work, or if I have a doctor's
appointment or if I'm, if I'm, got.
Aches and pains where I need to, take a break at lunchtime and go
stretch out in, my recliner for a little while I can do that.
when I had all that other stuff going on, I wasn't able to do that, and I'm
getting older too, it's just, the, the older you get, everybody's got more aches
and pains, but, we might are a little bit
different.
Yeah.
Mine are a little bit different than everybody else's, but so I'm kind of,
adapting, my, my, my disability kind of, progresses as the year years go on.
So I'm adapting my, my actual life to my disability.
And I've been now adapting my business life to my disability.
And, it's going, it's going well, taking on, back to, I first, got this, I, idea,
the ultimate goal was to, Hey, I'm gonna, get in the, the door of, these huge
corporations and, that was kind of my, my, my big goal is actually, I'm kind of my
main focus, to do those, those, those huge companies, but it's just, I'm learning.
this, 2000, 22 that's, it's a lot tougher than I thought, these huge companies,
they have departments, many departments
Bryant Gillespie: a, challenge to navigate for you
then.
Jeremy Siegers: yeah Yeah It's just, it's just, it's, it's it's time consuming
where it's like, can't we just, just get, get an order going here, and then,
Bryant Gillespie: It kinda sounds like one of the conversations we were
having, between Mike and Peter and I about, customers versus accounts,
it seems like you've made the shift, as a, a smaller sign shop.
A lot of the customers that you're serving are smaller businesses too And that.
That makes it easy to do business with them.
There's only one decision maker but obviously, it's not a large corporation.
That's just going to continually feed you business over and
Jeremy Siegers: right
Bryant Gillespie: So.
Jeremy Siegers: right Yeah So, but on the flip side, it's like, so yeah, dealing
with all these different groups are pain on the butt, but ideally once my foot's in
the door, I'm in with one group and then, the ultimate goal is, Hey, well, that
group then refers me to another group.
And an app group refers me another group.
And actually I'm doing work with all these different groups in the same company and
that just, they all got their own budgets.
For
purchasing, whoever they need.
So that's, that's the goal, and that's what I'm working on, but I'm still not,
I'm not focusing solely on working with the large corporations anymore, cuz
they're, it's just, their buying isn't as, consistent as I needed to be, Hey,
Jeremy were ever thinking about, doing a project in, in, in a third quarter of,
2023, it's like, well, what about now?
it's like, come on,
Bryant Gillespie: Yeah I think that's a a challenge for everybody out there Yeah
Jeremy Siegers: the bills gotta get paid, So it's like I still gotta focus on,
the small, the medium, even large size companies that still have somewhat of.
a easier, purchasing, program, I guess you can say where you're dealing with
only a few people and they need stuff throughout the year, every year,
and it's easy, and those are the ones that, keep the bills paid and,
keep the, keep the cash flow going.
And, and then working with the, the, the huge companies.
That's that's, I guess that's just like an extra perk now where it's
like, I'm still gonna focus on it.
I'm just not gonna spend as much time focusing on it.
Bryant Gillespie: Well, it sounds like you got a plan for moving forward
what are you most excited about?
with this new model versus your previous model of, Hey, I've
got overhead, I've got all this
stuff.
What.
Jeremy Siegers: well, once I have, like a good system, once I
get the, the marketing in place.
where I can get, systems in place.
cuz for me right now, it's, it's just about marketing, it's just about,
spreading a word, building more relationships, where the new
relationship come, come in and and they're, they're built on my new
kind of platform here, where I can kind of streamline everything, And I.
The relationships in place.
I have backend financing in place.
I have everything in place to be successful.
It's just bringing a more clientele to keep that rolling and growing.
And, and I'm not saying I'm never gonna hire any more people again, I'm just
gonna hire them in different roles.
I'm not gonna hire.
For production.
I'm not gonna hire them for that.
I'll be hiring them for like, being like an account manager or, to, to
manage, or maybe sales people or something like that, where it would
be a little bit different of a role
Bryant Gillespie: Cool.
Well, I really appreciate you, you jumping on with this Jeremy I've always really
admired like your branding and like the marketing that you do, I think your
site is a good example of what, shops in the industry should be targeting.
But, I think this is a, a great story and, I really like.
like this transformation of like, Hey, what I had previously,
wasn't working for me.
So I changed it And now the, the businesses built around your lifestyle
instead of like us building our lifestyle around the business.
I, I think that's the, the big point that, that you drove home for me today
anyway, is, if you are a shop owner and you're stressed out, you've got.
All this overhead, you're working too many hours.
You don't enjoy it, make a change start building the business around your
lifestyle.
Jeremy Siegers: cause there, there has to be, There has to be an end game.
for everybody, where do you see yourself in 20, 30 years?
are you gonna, you gonna sell your company or, I or are you gonna do something else?
I do you wanna travel more?
Do you wanna spend time with your family more?
it's just, yes, you wanna be successful, but there's always a price on success.
there's, there's always, you're losing something somewhere, if you want to keep
growing and growing and growing and grow.
your family's suffering, you're, you're losing friendships.
You're not spending as much time with your friends either.
I love doing it.
I love my buddies calling me up on a Tuesday.
Hey Jeremy, Hey, you wanna have a few beers tonight?
Sure.
I can do that.
outta a Tuesday, it's like, cause I don't have to worry about, being at a shower
first thing in the morning or having to worry about, but that's, it's, it's my
personal choice where, where my mindset is, where, Still wanna be successful,
still want to do all sorts of stuff.
It's just, is it just doing it in a different way?
Bryant Gillespie: So
for anybody who might be interested in, checking out the website or
learning more or getting in touch with you, you know, how can they contact
Jeremy Siegers: yeah Well you can visit sharp mall.com, S H a R P M I L l.com.
or you can, you can email me.
I Jeremy, J E R E M Y charnel.com.
or checking me out a LinkedIn or I'm on all these, these Facebook
groups for sign and graphics too.
Bryant Gillespie: Well, yeah, thanks again for coming on man Uh, really appreciate
it And uh, yeah looking forward to, to, seeing where you go with this thing
Jeremy Siegers: Awesome, man.
All right, take care
Bryant Gillespie: we'll see you, Jeremy.
Bye.
Jeremy Siegers: All right
bye.
Bryant Gillespie: so closing this one out guys.
I really enjoyed this episode.
I think Jeremy's got a great story so let's get into
rapid fire takeaways, Peter.
He's not here.
So, Mike, what's your takeaway on today, man?
Michael Riley: I like that he ended on a work life balance note, which I feel like
every one of these conversations we have goes back to, people seeking out better
work life balance, which I'm happy to see.
I hate the.
The grind till you die mentality.
and I that's been so pervasive, I think, in, in work culture
in general for so long.
I'm really happy to see people, trying to change their situation and adapt, like
you said, their work life to fit their.
You know their lifestyle versus trying to adapt their
lifestyle to fit their work life.
so for me, I think the biggest takeaway there was, this is a great
way to achieve some of that work life balance and de-stress your life
a little bit and, achieve some of that, personal life outside of work.
enjoyment and balance.
I know for me, It's a huge reason why I do what I do, where I work, from home
in my pajamas, cuz I it's, I don't, that's the lifestyle that I want.
I want the freedom to do what I want when I want to do it.
and anything that you can do to work towards that goal
you're trying to achieve.
and remember that we're, no matter what we do, whether we work for somebody
else or own a business, that it's only a means to an end so that we have.
the lifestyle that we want.
So this seems like a great avenue to pursue, to, to achieve that.
Bryant Gillespie: Out.
It's all about lifestyle no, I, yeah, I agree.
I like, I was gonna say the same thing.
so I don't know that I have a great rapid fire takeaway out of that,
like the Gary V hustle, porn stuff.
Like you gotta be grinding.
you gotta.
The 80 hours a week.
Like I've done that.
And I still do that sometimes.
when I've got, sometimes I've just gotta crunch on a project and get it done,
but on the whole it's not sustainable.
It's not the way that I wanna work.
Michael Riley: I totally know what you're trying to say.
I remember at my shop, like I, I kept a blanket and pillow and I
can't tell you how many times I slept on the floor under my desk.
Not necessarily because I had to, but because I felt like
that was a badge of honor.
Like I'm an entrepreneur and I don't leave my office ever look how hard I work.
And that's such an unhealthy mentality to, to maintain.
And you will, you'll hit a wall and flame out spectacularly.
If you, if.
Do that too long.
Yeah, you're right.
the whole hustle and grind mentality, that's been, viral.
I don't know what the right word for it is, but it's, there's more to life than
working and, I think a lot of people lose sight of the fact that they start a
business and become entrepreneurs because.
Because they're trying to achieve a better lifestyle, but then they don't.
Then they work themselves to death and that's completely counterintuitive and
works against the whole goal that you set out for, even if that goal is only
subconscious and you don't even realize that's why you went into business.
That's why everybody goes into the business.
There's no other reason to go in business than to control your own destiny.
Bryant Gillespie: yeah.
You want a better environment?
That's exactly what I was trying to say.
I just couldn't say it.
yeah, yes.
Michael Riley: cups of coffee have you had today?
Bryant Gillespie: I don't know, like six, but no it's no, it's like
Michael Riley: just need an IV.
Just, just pump it, pump it into your veins at this point.
Bryant Gillespie: so I, if you would like to be a guest on the
show, definitely shoot us an email at, Hey, better sign, shop.com.
Or if you just have questions or topic suggestions, shoot us an email.
We'll probably email you back.
We're good like that.
All right, Mike.
Hopefully next week, we'll have Peter back from the galaxy far, far away.
So maybe next week we'll have a new nickname for you.
Michael Riley: every week, my identity is different.
it's hard to keep up with myself here.
Bryant Gillespie: sounds stressful.
That's why you're you have no hair left?
We can't come up
Michael Riley: it's true.
Bryant Gillespie: All right, guys.
Thanks.
See it.
Michael Riley: goodbye, everybody.