Learn how to build a better sign and prt shop from a few crusty
sign guys who've made more mistakes than they care to admit.
Conversations and advice on pricing, sales, marketing,
workflow, growth, and more.
Your listening to The Better Sign Shop podcast with your hosts, Peter Kunis,
Michael O'Reilly, and Bryant Gillespie.
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Alright guys, welcome back to the next episode of the Better Sign Shop podcast.
I've got my co-host, as always, Peter Caris, the sign Shop Yoda.
Pete, how are you sir?
Pretty good.
I'm pretty good.
Uh, no longer sick.
Getting ready to, uh, ring
in the holiday season here.
Finish up here with a couple of decorations.
I am working on my first Christmas life-sized wooden soldier.
Now, now hear me out
on this.
Hear me out on
this because when you go down this rabbit hole,
it's a long journey.
Okay?
Uh, with my sign shop experience and using all raw materials, I've been able to build
a seven foot wooden soldier for my kids, and they're absolutely in love with it.
Now, I'm not finished.
It's, I will reveal the finished product on Christmas Eve, but this thing.
Is huge.
It's made out of all raw materials.
There's nothing bought from, you know, a supplier I'm using like those, uh,
you know, like those banner tubes and the vinyl rolls for its arms and
legs and doing
it very sparingly, but it is coming out looking awesome.
I'm I, I'm excited to see it now, dude.
I, I can imagine your kids are stoked for it.
I'm using some of
my, uh, experience working with raspberry Pies and I, I got some
of the Christmas music playing.
I got, oh no, I got his arms gonna move a little bit.
His eyes are gonna have LED lights in it.
It, I'm, I'm, I'm, like I said, you go down a deep, like I said, you can
go down a deep rabbit hole and make like, uh, a very nice put together.
Soldier to the point where it's like, man, can I sell this thing?
Like, can, can, can
I make
these?
Don't do it.
Don't
do.
And can I make a business outta this?
And, and, and in a lot of regards, that's a great segue into today's, uh, episode
here is what, and what we're gonna be talking about with our guests about like
how you, how easy it is to take something
and make another business model out of it.
It was like a
byproduct.
Maybe this time of the year, I'm thinking about selling seven foot wooden soldiers.
Wooden
soldiers.
Yeah.
That's a good market.
Maybe.
Maybe that could be my new
franchise business.
Who knows?
I tried that once with cornhole boards.
Like we built a set using our flatbed printer, like we had some half inch birch.
You know, real smooth finish.
Uh, we printed it direct on the flatbed, so you could still see the
wood grain coming through on the ink.
Oh, that's cool.
And we, uh, like we built these cornhole boards and then we made the
mistake of having a client come in.
They were like, holy crap, did you guys make these?
We were like, yeah, we did.
And they were like, okay, let I, I'm, I'm smashing records in our business.
Um, this was a, a coal mine at the time.
Um, they were smashing records in their business.
They were like, Hey, I wanna order 35 sets of these for my guys.
So being, you know, Hey, like the, the sign guys.
We were, can you guys make those for us?
Yeah, of course we can.
Great.
So then the sign shop turned into wood shop for like two weeks or a week.
I can't remember how long it took us to produce those, but that's a, a lesson
that I learned of, you know, just because it's fun on the surface doesn't mean it's
necessarily profitable on the back end.
Profitability, fun.
It all goes into it, right?
I mean, I think I have a similar story.
It wasn't quite cornhole boards.
My, my ex-business partner, he wanted to make, uh, cutting boards, engraved,
cutting boards, you know, and I'm like, ah, pretty sure you can get that at
like, in any store or online store.
But it's amazing the raw materials that we use here in the sign
industry with the tools that we have.
How much is it really capable to generate revenue in
other ways?
It could be, it could
be acrylic plaques, it could be cornhole boards, it could be wooden
soldiers, wooden soldiers, sneeze guards from during the pandemic, right?
Oh
yeah.
I mean, absolutely.
How can I forget about that?
How easy was it to like laser cut acrylic to make a.
Sneeze guards, uh, like face shields,
what, whatever, whatever it was in bulk.
I mean, you can really do a lot.
And that's what we're gonna be talking about here today, right?
Yeah.
Without further ado, let's bring on our guest.
Alright guys, we are back with today's guest, Paul Gardner of Sign
Enterprise and like 35 other businesses that, that I find fascinating.
Paul, welcome to the podcast.
Super happy
to have you.
Thanks for having me.
Yeah.
So you and I have, uh, chased each other to get you onto
the podcast for a long time.
Um, really enjoyed all the conversations that we've had leading up to this.
And like every time that we chat, you've started something new.
You got your hands in something new.
You know, I was just telling Peter about a few of those things before we jumped on.
But for the audience, you know, give us.
Your story, give us the story of Sign Enterprise just for some context.
Sure.
So, uh, this is actually busy season for me because all of my
businesses are busy right now.
And, uh, originally started out in the sign business.
I got into the sign business.
It was, it was kind of a, uh, a hobby more than anything.
I was, uh, I, I used to race go-karts when I was a kid.
And then I graduated into racing, uh, cars.
And if you know anything about the racing industry, you're
constantly pairing up stuff.
So you're constantly going into the sign shop, the local sign shop.
And, uh, so I got familiar with printers and plotters and whatnot.
So.
You know, this is in my youth.
This is as a teenager, and I, I, I, I was using this local sign shop and, uh,
I would go in there and, you know, just try to make it as cheap as possible.
So I, I started designing stuff myself, which I probably made it hard on him.
Um, it's kind of funny because the guy that owned that sign shop, uh,
did work for me up until a year ago.
He, he retired, but he, uh, I bought him, I bought his company out later.
But anyways, uh, I, I, I probably made it really hard on him, but
I tried to design my own stuff.
I'd come in there, you know, with the, the idea and the concept, and I would
tell him, Hey, don't worry about it.
I'll weed the vinyl.
Just give me, give every, you know, I would try to make it as.
Absolutely cheap as possible.
And back then, you know, people weren't printing, they were
airbrushing to get the effect, you know, that's what they were doing.
Sure.
And so it was a whole other, you know, talk about labor intensive.
It was major labor
intensive.
Let me ask you one question before you continue.
Did you ask him to sponsor you?
Yeah, I did a million times.
Yeah.
I started hating race car drivers after I became a side guy.
It's funny because, uh, you, I had all these friendships within the racing world
and of course when I opened a sign shop, I realized to my real friends' work,
'cause most of 'em did not wanna pay.
You know, I was like, man, I could sponsor every one of y'all
and it'd be broken in two months.
So,
yeah.
No, that's a awesome origin story, man.
I love
it.
That that's where it kind of started.
And then, um, I was just looking for a, you know, a, a summer job.
Uh, ended up working at a, uh, a transportation company.
And that transportation company was hiring a sign company from
New York every year to come.
They would to buy up a hundred trailers every, every summer.
And those a hundred trailers were getting, you know, decals were being
installed by this company outta New York.
And so I looked at the owner, I said, I know how to install those graphics.
I had no idea what I was getting into because I'm thinking, okay,
I've done race cars and go-karts.
I can do this.
Not thinking about the fact that these are 53 foot trailers, but
the, and again, this is back before printers, you know, were relevant
and there wasn't before Air aggress.
Yeah.
And, and we were using, you know, hardcore 3M reflective vinyls.
It was, it was intense.
Um, but I got, I became a really good installer.
I mean, obviously I learned the hardest way you could possibly
learn how to install a vinyl, but, um, I got really good at it and.
I got out when I, when I finished college, my wife and I got married.
It was, it was just about a month before we got married and I was
working in corrections and I hated it.
I just hated corrections and yeah, I was working at six at
night till six in the morning.
I had 12 hour shift.
And we live in Virginia.
My wife works in DC at the time and she was leaving work by 6:00 AM not getting
home till 6:00 PM And so I was like, oh, we're gonna, we're gonna end up in a
divorce our first year 'cause we don't see each other, but like three times a month.
Yeah, right.
So it's like, this is terrible.
And so I said something to a buddy of mine, I said, I'd love to start
a sign company if I had money.
And yeah, that's just my thought because I have no idea how to start a business.
And I looked at him, I go, your parents know all about starting businesses.
Maybe they can help us because they ha owned a carpet business.
So all of a sudden he's my partner.
Well, that lasted one week.
He fell out.
He doesn't wanna do it.
He just wants to stay at home.
And I ended up borrowing $5,000 and I bought a used plotter,
um, and some equipment.
And that's how I got my start.
And so move forward, you know, 20 plus years since then, I've acquired, um,
six sign companies, um, companies that usually were struggling, having problems.
I hired them for their people and brought the owners in.
And then I also acquired some companies that were doing fairly well.
Just the, the, the ownership was at the point of retirement.
And so that helped me, you know, grow quickly.
And then through the sign industry, just like we were speaking about before, it's
like if you learn the sign industry, you can pretty much get into any industry.
And since then I've started, um, a few different companies.
Um, I did end up purchasing a, a design build landscape company.
We do a lot of entrance monument signs.
And so we were hiring the Masons to come in and do all that work
and we're doing the landscape and we were doing the whole package.
So we were hiring and outsourcing that work.
So what I decided to do is just bring that internal And
so I was able to buy a company.
I'd been around for 25 years locally.
I.
The owner retired and, um, I took that company over.
And then I'm really big into the lighting industry here recently,
and the announcement hasn't been made yet, but I just bought, um, the
largest permanent light, uh, in, uh, company in, in the United States.
And they're out of Texas.
And I definitely am gonna introduce this to the sign industry, you know,
and over the next year it's something that the Christmas light industry, so
I'm in the Christmas light industry, which if you know anything about
the Christmas light industry, it's really blown up the last few years.
Everyone's, you know, they even have television shows about it now.
So I.
And
No, no.
Short part of your own as well, right?
Like
Yeah.
And it's, it's, it's, it's pretty fun.
And it's, it's an intense business.
It's a whole nother dynamic of, of people that you're dealing with, but
it's the same end result, you know, it's like you get the same kind of baggage,
you get the same kind of responses.
It's, but it's a different, it's a different vibe.
It's obviously seasonal.
Um, and then I also am in the landscape, uh, lighting business.
So all that led me to this permanent light, uh, industry that I'm in now.
And so now I'm, I'm, I'm, I bought 50% of a company that has
been around for, uh, 11 years.
And, uh, the, the manufacturer's doing really well.
They have been.
Primarily selling to the Christmas light and landscape lighting industry.
And so when I got my hands on, I'm like, this is more sign business
worthy because we have the equipment.
And so I bought into the company specifically to push
it to the, the sign industry.
And, you know, the sign business has definitely opened up a whole, you
know, avenue of opportunities for me.
And I, I've, I've, I've expanded the sign business along the way, and it's
allowed me a lot of opportunities.
I just, I, I embrace the opportunities I've had, I've had a lot more
opportunities than I even speak of.
But, you know, in the business, in the sign business, you
work in business to business.
So all you meet is business owners.
And you constantly are, are, are being consumed with ideas and
so your mind just keeps running and my, my mind runs nonstop, so
Yeah.
Clearly, clearly.
No.
Yeah.
And, and I can't wait to get into all of those things.
Um, if we back up to talk about like, signed enterprise, just just
for a little bit, like, like roughly what's the, the size of the shop,
what are you guys doing sales wise?
How many people do you have?
So we have, I don't know the exact count of people because we have
three locations, but it's around 50, um, 50 people, employees.
Okay.
Yeah.
Gotcha.
Um, as far as, uh, sales, our central location, which is our, our main location,
we, we do between five and 10 million.
Gotcha.
Okay.
So when all the sales come in, we'll be between five and 10.
I think this year we're gonna end up being around 7 million for the one location, so.
Gotcha.
As far as our, you know, as far as the way we work, so we have a central location,
which is where I work out of, that's where we manufacture about 90% of our signage.
We have another location that really is just an office.
That location is just south of us, about an hour.
And then we have another location.
We manufacture about 10 to 15% of our signage.
And, uh, that location has, you know, we have, we're fully outfitted to
manufacture install, and we have offices there and we have sales reps outta there.
So we, we, we separate the businesses for different reasons, but they
contribute all as one company and they're all under one umbrella.
Gotcha.
And, and like, what type of projects are you guys doing?
Like, you know, who are the clients that you work with?
Um, you know, there's, there's obviously like various facets to
the sign industry, so I just wanna clarify for the listeners out
there.
So, when I first got into the industry, honestly, my ideal client was the
guy that wanted a cruising, a memory sticker on the back of his car, or
the race car driver who wanted a free sponsorship, you know, just from decals.
Uh, I have definitely graduated past that point.
And, you know, I, I enjoy the decal industry.
I enjoy vinyl, I enjoy banners, I enjoy yard signs.
There's a lot of money in that industry.
But specifically in my area, what I noticed is there was, um, a lack of
good, knowledgeable professionals in the, uh, lighting part of the industry,
uh, the electrical more specifically.
And at the time when I got into it, LED wasn't even really a thing.
It was kind of coming into the horizon, but it was a thing that I started
embracing early on and said, okay, I could see this take off in the sign industry.
And I can remember specifically all the, the locals were using Neon and I can
remember specifically talking to those guys and they all, you know, rejected
the idea that LED would take over.
And so I was like, you know, if I'm right on this, and based on the technology, you
know, that I'm seeing advances in this industry, most of the time the old school
sign guy gets stuck thinking he's right.
And I'm like, it's probably the same thing in the lighting industry, even though at
the time I know nothing about lighting.
And so I'm like, I'm gonna learn as much as I can about LEDs.
So I went overseas.
I went to China out of all places, and I was like, I wanna learn
about LEDs as quickly as possible.
And so if you've ever been over to China and you go to Guango or
Shenzhen, you'll be consumed with manufacturers in the lighting industry.
I, I, I've visited in about 10 days, I've visited probably about 50
locations of manufacturers, different type of lighting manufacturers.
Wow.
And so that opened my world up to the lighting industry.
And so I got, I got used and familiar with the terms early on that it, it, when
people were manufacturing this locally and, and, and in the sign shops, I was
very familiar with what they, they were producing and what was good quality, what
wasn't, because that really gave me an advantage in that part of the industry.
And, um, I think from there, I don't know exactly when this happened, but
I will say that I went to ISA and I, I would say this is probably not that
long ago, maybe about 12 years ago.
So it was after I started the electrical.
But, um, I mean, I guess 12 years is a long time, but, um, it's,
it goes by so quick for me, it just seems like it was yesterday.
But I can remember we went out to dinner one night and I always, I always laugh
about this because we, we were, um, we, we were sitting at a table outside on
this balcony and all these people were, and I was with a bunch of sign guys.
Like, I just got invited to this impromptu dinner with a bunch of sign guys and
I only knew like two or three of them.
And, uh, we're sitting on this balcony and all these people are flooding
in and I'm like, what's going on?
And they were like, oh, there's gonna be a Snoop Dogg concert.
So I actually was, I called my wife, I'm like, I'm in a Snoop Dogg concert.
I'm literally, I'm like, that's not my, you know, that's not my, my, my style.
So my wife was, it was kind of funny 'cause we were there for like two and
a half hours at that table, but we literally had a front row seat, Snoop
Doggs, like running underneath and us, that's where the, the stage was.
Sure enough, I, I got the, the, the, the restaurant said, y'all
are so lucky y'all get this table.
Everybody wants this table.
And, but our party was so big, they had to give us the table.
But during those conversations, listening to Snoop Dogg, it was hard.
But we, listen, I, I listened intently.
There was this guy, and I don't know him to this day, I can't remember his
name, but I remember we were exchanging and we were just sharing pricing, like
where, what's your minimum pricing?
And at the time, I don't know specifics about where I was and where he was, but
I remember we were like night and day.
And he specifically was like, double what?
I was on his hourly rates, on his man rates, everything.
And I was just like, okay, well why is that?
Because this guy lives in a very, you know, um, rural area.
He doesn't live in a area where it's, um, overly populated with businesses.
He said he has to drive for the average, you know, good business an hour.
And here I am overwhelmed by business opportunities.
I'm thinking to myself that just doesn't make sense, right?
And so when I told him that, he looked at me specifically and he said, Paul,
you seem like a pretty smart guy.
He goes, but man, your pricing is way too low.
He goes, I'm telling you right now, you could get double.
For what you're producing, the knowledge you have.
And I thought to myself, if this guy's right, then I'm really missing out.
This is where the struggle is happening.
So with without hesitation, I kid you not, I mean this is, that was the lecture I got
and that was like a weekend or whatever.
I come back Monday morning and I doubled my prices overnight.
I doubled my prices.
Wow.
Across the board.
And no exaggeration.
People have asked me this a few times 'cause I'm also, I'm a, I'm a, I'm a
business coach and I coach businesses and I tell them, it's all in our
heads how often we believe that, you know, if, if we're delivering.
Now, this is what I always tell people.
If you're delivering the exceptional service and you're giving people
the type of experience they expect.
You should be able to raise your prices and there shouldn't be any pushback
because if you are attracting those type of clients that demand that type of
service, they're willing to pay for it.
And so at the time I was really, even though I was young and I was learning
still, I was still delivering a much better product than the competition.
I knew that, like up here, I, I could tell, I was like, I'm confident what
I'm delivering, but I wasn't confident.
Well, you took pride in it, right?
Yeah.
I mean, like, we talked to so many owners that do, like, they take deep
pride in what they do every single day.
And it shows that it is just Yeah.
Up here
though.
Yeah.
It's like, I mean, I, I want it to be the best, Brian, just to
be able to deliver to my clients because I know what I would expect.
Right?
And so I just examined myself daily and I was like, what can I do better?
What can Paul Gardner do better to deliver?
And so I tried to get all the education I could, as much as
I could, as often as I could.
And, uh, when this guy told me this, I, I, I, I, I went in and I,
I looked at the girl in the office.
I was like, all right, we need to double our prices.
And she's like, what?
I'm like across the board.
And I said, we're gonna have a minimum rate.
I do remember this part, our minimum rate, now it's now it's more, but our minimum
rate at the time was gonna be 3 25.
So no matter what, we were gonna be $325.
And I don't know what we were at the time.
I wanna say we were only like $90, like $90, you know, something simple.
And I said, we gotta have a two hour minimum on every job we do.
And so when we did that, we implemented that change.
Immediately I'm thinking to myself, okay, I'm gonna sacrifice some business here.
I'm gonna lose some business.
But I can honestly look at both of you and say, I don't know
of any business we ever lost.
As a matter of fact.
We started the, the, we started just pounding the pavement and
getting more and more work.
And we were so busy.
I don't think if we did lose business, I noticed it because the compounding
effect it was having, raising our prices, I was able to bring in more revenue.
I was bringing in better people.
I was bringing in better equipment.
I was educating myself quicker.
There was so many things that happened along that journey of that price
transition that I, I'd never looked back.
I never even thought that was a bad decision.
And so I've constantly increased my prices since.
And our, our minimum prices is even higher now, and no one, you know, bats an eye.
And I know the type of service that we're delivering, the quality of service
we're delivering is better than it was.
Therefore I have every right to demand that type of price.
And plus there was covid, so we jacked the prices up a lot then.
Yeah.
As, as you had to.
No, I mean, that's a great point because it, like, obviously you do have to
have that, that level of service that you're providing in order to do that.
But like so many times we sell ourselves short of like, just like, oh, no
way we could raise prices on this.
Or like, oh, we can't get it in, in this market.
And for a lot of owners, like that's not the case, you know?
Mm-Hmm.
It is just not the case.
Like, would you, like, it sounds like that was a, like a pivotal
moment in like your signed career.
Like would, would you say that's like the turning point for everything else to, to
come?
Yeah.
Yeah, definitely.
So, I, you know, I, I plan on, so all my companies right now are under
an umbrella of Sign Enterprise.
And so we, we've constantly separated those companies.
Over the years, and this, this is the last year that Elf Pros
will fall under the umbrella.
And so it'll go on its own here, uh, next 2024.
So in each case where I've started a new business, now I,
I, I look at the average market.
I look at the average market, and I'm like, what is, what is,
what is the industry asking for?
What is the industry willing to pay?
And I take all that information and I'm like, okay, everything
based on the averages.
What can I do to make it better?
And then based on that, how can I charge more?
And so when I started, just to give you an example, I started my
Christmas site business four years ago.
We started out the highest priced Christmas light installer in the area.
And, and we've increased our prices in the last four years.
To this day, we're the highest price.
We actually have guys that are pricing the same type of work that we
are doing for a third of the price.
And I know this because it's very, that industry is, it's not
as broad as the sign industry.
There's only a certain type of applications, right?
And so the pricing margins are very transparent and people
put that stuff out there.
And so a lot of people tell us, you know, we're the most expensive.
And we understand that's not our type of clientele.
But here's the thing, the type of service we're delivering and the
experience that people get with that service is, is not even comparable.
And we know that.
We know the type of quality, the product that we're using.
We know that a lot of the manufacturers of products that they're using are
just outsourced overseas, which most of the LED products are.
It's just, you gotta know the different things about diodes, chips, you gotta
know different things about casings, the type of wiring you're using.
And I know all that stuff.
So.
When I am delivering a product to my client, I'm guarantee 'em that this
is the most premium product you can get your hands on right now when a lot
of the guys, they don't know enough information to know the difference
between that bulb and the next bulb.
And so, yeah.
Then on top of that, the type of service we're giving them is exceptional.
You know, it's, it's, it's the Starbucks of the Christmas light industry.
You know, we're gonna go out of our way to perform and give them this,
you know, this ambiance of ideas and gets the Christmas spirit growing
and, and, and we do so many things.
Like one of the things we do is every year I.
We go back to the, um, to, to the customer's home a
couple days before Christmas.
So we're actually doing this in a week.
And, uh, we'll deliver, uh, I don't know if you've heard of nothing, bunt
cakes, but, uh, we do all their signage.
So I made a deal with the owners and we, we do a little barter there.
And so we deliver bunt cakes to all of our customers.
So we deliver hundreds of bunk cakes, and of course we have a mascot with the
Elf Pros theme, and his name is Winky.
And so we show up in the mascot with the bunt cake and kids love it.
And it's just that kind of exceptional experience that people expect
nowadays because we live in a world of experiences, whether it's
online, whether it's in person.
And I read this book years ago, it's called the, uh,
um, the Experience Economy.
Um, and, and Joseph Pine wrote that book.
And the, the idea is to kind of.
Turn your business into the same concept that Di Walt
Disney turned Disney World into.
Yep.
Yeah, it's like to make everything an experience.
And so when you go to Walt, you know, when you go to Disney, anybody
that's been the magic Kingdom, it's quite the experience, right?
And it doesn't matter if you're four years old or if you're 40
years old, the experience is grand and you're gonna enjoy yourself.
And so we try to do the same thing within every industry I own.
Yeah.
And, and when you do that, like the price doesn't matter, right?
Because No, it doesn't, you know, like I, I've taken my kids to Disney
several times, and like my wife and I have like, you know, obviously like
it's an expensive proposition, like, you know, you know, going well into it.
Like, like, hey, this is gonna take a nice chunk of change to do what we wanna do.
But like, when you're in the moment, like you don't blink
an eye about it, like Yeah.
You know, to, to see like the look on your kids' faces or, or just have that, that
experience as you mentioned, like, like the money doesn't matter at that point.
And like, how do you guys.
How do you work that into like the sign side, right?
Because, so the sign side on the Christmas light, you're, you're selling
to consumers, you know, they, they want to, you know, impress their own
families, impress the neighbors, you know, spread Christmas cheer, all of that.
But like, how do you work some of that experience magic into the sign
industry?
So that is the challenge, right?
Because it's not the same.
You're dealing with, you're dealing business to business.
You're not dealing with the, the, you know, the homeowner who you
get to see, you know, the joy on her face when you push the button.
It's like, you know, we always, always think of ourselves as
like, um, what, what is it?
Chevy Chase's Christmas, whatever that one was.
We plug it.
It's like we always do that.
We make the homeowner come out, come watch this.
I'm always waiting for that one where it doesn't work.
Yeah.
But you know, you get to see the response because when we deliver the
cakes, when we send the emails out, when we do the things on social media,
I mean, on our, on our Elf Pros, um, uh, Facebook page, we're getting
50,000 engagements a week right now.
And so during Christmas, that's phenomenal.
I mean, that's, that's a lot of, and that's local, by the way.
That's a local engagement.
So that's, that's a phenomenal amount of engagement in one week.
Whereas in the sign business, I'm lucky if I get 50,000
engagements in a year, so Yeah.
Right.
It's like, okay, how do you, how do you, yeah, you made a sign
who,
yeah.
So how do you create that type of experience?
So it's definitely I'll, I'll be honest with you, it's definitely something
I haven't injected into the mold of the sign industry as much, but it's
something I'm definitely thinking about, how can I create more of this
experience factor in the sign industry?
One of the ways I have done that is.
And I'll tell you, we do work for some of the biggest companies in the United
States, and we actually do work for some of the biggest sign companies.
And the one company who's, you know, one of the more recognized companies in the
industry, they, they, they sent us a lot of work and they, they recently told us,
uh, one, one of the PMs called me and I guess he needed, he needed a favor.
And so he got my number.
He called me.
He said, look, I really need a favor from you on, and your PM said y'all can't
do it, so I'm hoping you'll help me.
Someone told me to call you.
So I'm talking to him and he goes, wow.
He goes, I'm gonna be honest with you, I've been with this company for 32 years.
And he goes, you have the highest rating.
And I've only seen this high rating one time across the
board with other sign companies.
He said, we have a rating system and you, your company has the
highest rating in our system.
You can possibly get.
He says, I've only seen it one other time in 32 years.
So in my opinion, I'm like, okay, we're creating a great experience for people
by just communicating well, because I feel like that's what we do really
well, is our communication factors.
Mm-hmm.
Are, are, are prevalent in every meeting.
Like, how did we do here?
What did we not do well, you know, how can we fix, fix this?
And we put systems in place.
So my, my opinion is everything, every reaction should have a response.
So everything that happens now needs, you know, we need to, we need
to, whether it's a negative thing that happened or a positive thing,
now we need to respond to that.
What's the response to that?
And so.
When we have a, an exceptional install, everything goes exactly as planned.
You know, we let the customer know, Hey, this was an exceptional install.
This is a, everything happened just as planned.
If things don't happen as planned, you know, we let 'em know.
We let 'em know that, hey, there were some, you know, barriers.
There were some things, obstacles, but we got through it and, and, and,
and we finished a job and we got it complete and everything looks great.
And so we, we communicate often.
We, we we're a big com uh, proponent of using things like company cam.
I don't know if a lot of your clientele is using that, but we use company Cam.
You know, I, I think I, I, I, I, in my sleep, I'm getting pictures from people,
like literally my, but I, I company Cam is going off the rails with us right now.
It's, it's like we use it in all of our businesses, but that
information is information that.
The PM can instantly get updates on the job, send it to the customer,
the customer's being told in real time how things are going on a job.
I mean, the customer really that we're speaking to might be in Texas, but
their location might be here local.
And so for them, that kind of feedback and that type of
communication is, is unparalleled to most people in the industry.
I'm not saying there's not other people using company cam, it's just the way we
use it, I think is, is is not the norm.
And so that type of instant communication, constant communication
has been the exceptional experience that we've been delivering thus
far in the design industry.
I love to hear you say that because that, like, communication is like one
of the biggest fail points or break points or where just things fall apart
that I've seen for a lot of shops that, that we've had on the podcast.
You know, we had, like Pete and I have done a couple of, uh, interviews
with, with, uh, shop owners where things are just falling apart
because of communication issues.
Like, hey, we're, we're not passing the torch correctly to the next department
or communicating back to the client.
Um, but client communication being like the most prevalent one of like, Hey,
here's all the details of the project.
We're just gonna squirrel ourselves away for a couple days, come back with an
estimate like, Hey, do you want it or not?
And then like, oh, hey, here's the mockups that we created.
Boom, boom, boom.
Then you don't hear from somebody else, like, you know, what, what kind of systems
do you have guys have in place for that?
Like what, like how did you get to that point?
You know, like, so obviously.
You know, uh, I would say aside from company Cam, I guess, yeah.
Yeah, I mean, there's a lot of things we use.
Um, I'll be honest with you, I'm not even familiar with some of the apps
that we're using now because there's some that we're using that have been
implemented by the leadership here that I'm not, I don't even know how to use 'em.
We're using a product now called chirp, and I'm not even familiar with how
it works, but it's basically, it's a communication with the customer through
text, you know, and it constantly is giving them, you know, updates and
it's o obviously at the end of the job, it's letting them know the job's done.
It's communicating to them how well did we do.
So we're getting that feedback.
Generally speaking, uh, people are more prone to, um, communicate more.
Well.
I say generally speaking, I'm not the best when it comes to
texting according to my wife.
So that's, so, so I'm more of a phone call type of guy.
But I think the general population is used to communicate and quickly and,
and responding promptly with a text.
So that's where chirp comes in is, and you know, when you think about the design
industry, at least I haven't thought about it until we started using this
particular, um, software, is that we normally were communicating through email.
Email.
And to me that's a slow communication anyways because, you know,
the person's gone for the day.
I've always, so when I was the technician, when I was in the
field, my system was pick up the phone after I'm done with the job.
Hey, your, your sign job's done.
You know, take one picture, send it to 'em, you're good.
Now there's this whole other system, right?
There's a hundred pictures that go with that job.
There's constant communication, email, phone calls, text messages, and I think
that's, you know, some of the things that we've implemented over the years that
have been probably different than maybe what the normal sign company is doing.
Um, I know that some of the other softwares that we're using aren't
even relevant to the sign industry.
Um, some of the, some of the things that we're, we're using are kind
of things that we would use in other industries, and we've merged
'em over into the industry here.
The other thing that, you know, we, we like to do is we like to
know ourselves what our staff is doing on an hourly basis.
Like we wanna know what's going on.
And so we evaluate each job every day.
When it comes in, they have the paperwork they turn in, and all that
gets uploaded onto the computers.
There's spreadsheets that we have that.
All that data is, uh, inputted by, uh, an an individual and it goes to the PMs
and the PM can see, okay, did we allocate enough time for each of those jobs?
I feel like one of the things in the design industry, and you know, we,
we still struggle with this time at times, our estimator has this idea
that a job's gonna take eight hours.
It's a full day's worth of work, two crews, four men on the job.
And then it turns out the job took 12 hours.
Well, 12 hours, four times, four extra hours.
That's a lot of overtime.
That's a whole other day's worth of work for a whole crew.
And so you can lose a lot of money that way.
And so one of the things that we constantly are doing is evaluating
how we're pricing things and are our guys communicating to us.
Because, you know, it, you guys have been signing industry
long enough to know it's like.
Most jobs are not what you, no matter how good of a site survey you do,
they're not what you thought they were until you start exposing things.
And so then all of a sudden you, you run into, you run into problems.
And so one of the things that is on our contracts is we make sure
this is very specific and they sign it, is that, hey, all this pricing
is based on normal conditions.
And we actually talk about drywall behind the wall, you know, exposed
walls versus non-exposed walls.
We talk about hitting rock.
We talk about things that you are gonna run into in the, in the case that
you do run into 'em, that you already have that in there in your contract.
So we do a lot of change orders, but that all, that, the change order is only
effective if you communicate upfront and all that language is in your contract.
Yeah.
And so you have to do that.
So
I'd like to interject here for just a quick minute and, uh, ask
a couple of questions because I.
Ryan's been asking all of the
questions,
dude.
I, yeah man, I, I was, I was waiting
for you, man, and I'm sitting here just with
waiting for an opportunity.
So I have some, I have a couple of points here I'd like to ask about.
I would like to, I would like to actually ask a very direct question here.
Uh, in your opinion, you've gotten to five to, I think you said you're
gonna do $7 million this year, so we'll use that number here.
So you're a $7
million.
That's the sign.
That's the sign company, but our combine companies will probably do close to 10.
Okay.
So the sign company's
doing 7 million.
Right.
And you just mentioned a really interesting piece here that comes up a
lot on our calls and, and certainly a lot in my meetings with my clients is that.
Do you find it that you are not I one of two reasons.
If you're questioning your pricing, I, I find it that it's one of two reasons.
So I'm gonna ask you very direct, which one do you think in your
business is something that affects
your company?
Is it
not charging the right rate or not charging the right
amount of hours?
Hmm.
Well, let me put it to you this way.
I might not be able to answer your question, but I might
answer it in a different way.
So, a lot of installs are specific to how many hours are you working on those jobs,
but we do not price jobs based on hours.
Okay?
So let me give you an example.
And I, I, I, I've preached just to a lot of sign guys.
I know.
So when you're doing work for other sign companies, they
wanna know your hourly rate.
And I, I won't go into specifics, but we have one contract and it's
a million dollar contract a year.
We do a million just for this one client.
They make us document, so they have their own system.
We have to, when we get to the job site, and they, and this is tracked, I mean,
they got GPS capability, they'll know where there, they'll know when we leave.
So when we get on the site, we have to log into their system, we're on site, we have
to then fill out their own spreadsheet.
That's different than ours.
Have to dot, you know, fill in all the dotted lines.
And then when we leave, we have to clock out.
So we, we red strap and we leave the site.
They want us to only use the hours that we worked for that job to be, to be billed.
Is I, is that how one of your clients are or is this just one specific one?
No, no, this is one client, but they're, they're probably
first or second largest client.
I mean, they're, they're up there.
So this one client required this.
So just to give you a backstory on this, I bought, I bought a company a few years
ago that had been around for a hundred years and that was their biggest client.
When I looked at how they did this, I had a problem with that.
And here's why.
It's because, first off, I pay my installers a lot more than
local installers get paid.
I have the best working for me.
I also have the best equipment.
I mean, if you go outside, all of our trucks are 2017 or newer.
You know, they're all five years old or younger, and we have good equipment.
We also are fully outfitted.
We have some of the best tools and we have some of the best training
I feel that the industry can allow.
And so when our guys go out, I'm confident that they're gonna do it in a fraction
of the time than most saw installers.
So why should I be penalized knowing that I'm gonna get it done in a
fraction of the time because I'm providing the better equipment?
'cause I'm providing the better install.
So I've gotten far away from, now we have our hourly rate internally, right?
So we have our internal hourly rate.
When someone calls us off, you know, say it's just a random store
owner who has lights out, we give 'em a minimum charge and we tell
'em it's a two hour minimum rate.
That's a little different.
But when we're pricing jobs for installs, or we're pricing jobs of
our own that we're manufacturing and installing, we're pricing out on what
the value of that job is worth to us.
So a lot of the jobs, if you were to do it hourly, you would only get paid like
600 bucks, but we're getting paid 1800 and it's just because we're doing it in
three hours versus, you know, a whole day.
Okay?
And so we know this going into it.
So we, I feel like most guys are not doing it this way 'cause I've
talked to a lot of sign guys now.
I don't know what y'all, y'all have experienced a lot more here
recently with your podcast and the, the circles you guys are in.
I don't know what you guys are seeing, but I'm seeing guys are still
doing everything based on the hour.
That's what I've been seeing.
Yeah.
It's, it's,
I think it's very normal to be reliant on time and materials.
It's a, it's a, there is a formula, there is a calculation
to how to become profitable.
I think for my question here, it was more, you, you're not a $500,000 a year company.
You're not a million dollar a year sign company.
And there are a lot of our clients, a lot of our listeners here are in
that world of 2 million or a sub 2 million gross operation where
they're struggling like, what is, why am I working my butt off here?
And, and.
At the end of the day, I have nothing to show for it other
than my bills being paid.
And, um, I basically bought myself a job.
And there's been a lot of messages here of, well, maybe you're not charging
enough and, or maybe you're not charging enough hours or you're undervaluing
how long projects are going to take.
It is interesting to hear how a shop, like yours is saying, I'm
pricing based off of internal value.
Uh, I would say that that's not the normal.
I, I, I like, I love it.
I have met shops that do that.
I think Brian and I have a, a colleague here that we know of.
I remember thinking of one off the top of my head
that this
sign's gonna last you 20 years.
So it's, I'm putting a crazy price on this project because that's what
it's worth to you, the customer.
Mm-Hmm.
Lots of, lots of really interesting theories around pricing.
Uh, I wanted to, before we got too far ahead, I wanted to
ask my second question here.
Uh, and you alluded to this.
Sign doing a change order and, and having that ability
of pivoting,
uh, if the job went outside the boundaries of a normal, uh, scope of work.
Now, that
is hard to do, right?
I would say that that's hard to do if you've never mentioned it before.
The the, the job commenced, right?
If you're mentioning it midway through or even after the job
is over, it's a hard sell.
So what are you doing in the beginning to communicate that to
your customer on, you know, if this happens, it's gonna be this price.
I mean, after all it is, they are called estimates, right?
So this is your estimate and it's estimated it could be this way, but if
it doesn't, it could be X, Y, and Z.
And how do you navigate
those waters?
So I think the biggest thing is the upfront contract is
we, we emphasize the details.
In the bottom and we make them assignment.
And we are very specific to, to indicate the fact that this is just an estimate
and it's based on normal conditions.
So we know specifically the two things that we run into are when we're digging
a hole, if we're gonna run into rock, if we're gonna run into boulders, if
we're gonna run into, if some type of obstructive device that our equipment
won't dig through, then we're gonna have a problem as, as a matter of fact,
recently we were in the mountains of Virginia and we were digging, and we
didn't even make it two inches and we're hitting like a boulder and it ended up
costing us, our cost was $16,000 to drill through that, that rock, original cost
for that to the customer was $3,500 to drill that hole and put the foundation in.
So we would've lost.
Or tell on that had we not had the language we had.
And so the customer understood it.
It was a gas station, they understood it, they realized that
they wanted to sign there, they were gonna have to deal with it.
I feel like the other thing that you run across more often than not is,
obviously most of the surveys, and a lot of times we're not surveying
some of these jobs because we're getting 20 locations at a time.
They want a simple survey just for measurements.
We don't get into the inside of the office space 'cause they don't want us
disrupting their, their work at the time.
So we might pull out a drop ceiling tile or something just to see what's
behind there, but we still don't know exactly what's behind that wall.
And I would say on a weekly basis, we're running into, you know, o
obstacles on channel letter jobs where you can't necessarily just throw the
whip in and pull it through the wall.
There's, there's.
I beams in the way.
There's, you know, there's separations of, of, of, of roofs and, and, and,
and, and, uh, the, the office space.
And there's just things that are unforeseen.
And in those cases, we always contact the client immediately.
So it's our job to communicate to our PMs.
You know, the installer is supposed to communicate to the PM
immediately when they realize this.
The first thing our guys are supposed to do is go inside and start drilling and
one guy's on the inside, one guy's on the outside and see what we're up against.
And as soon as possible, the earlier you let know the better.
And the sooner you can communicate that, normally we're not charging
a lot more, you know, it might be an extra two hours worth of work.
Nine out of 10 times, you're not gonna have disruption
in the job because of that.
There are a few instances, a few times a year where someone's
like, well, we don't have.
The, the PO is what it is.
We gave you our full budget on that.
We don't have any room.
We've gotta go back to the client.
It's gonna take a little bit.
So then we give 'em an option.
Well, if we have to leave the job site and come back, it's even gonna
cost an extra 600 bucks on top of that, or whatever the case may be.
So all of a sudden that changes the conversation.
They were like, okay, you know what?
We're gonna just accept the responsibility on this.
Go ahead and do it.
And so I can think of very few instances where we've had to leave the job site.
Most of the time they're going to pay for it because they're going to have
much, you know, much more coming to them.
If they don't, it's gonna be more difficult to get the job done later.
Yeah,
no, that's, that's great.
Hey, like to me, like the story here is just like, you guys are way more prepared
than the average shop for all scenarios.
Like, we've got a communication plan in place.
For anything.
Uh, basically like, hey, if, if somebody loses a shoelace on
the job or like, hey, like, like we've, we've got a, an action plan
for it.
I don't know if we're that good 'cause we were just talking about that
earlier where we have found that, you know, we need to have an inventory of
truck equipment because sporadically equipment ends up missing on a job site.
Hmm.
And things come off a, a truck, you know, we've gotta have a system for that.
But this is, I mean, this is part of the growing pains, right?
I mean, one of the advantages to owning other businesses in
different industries is you, you get exposed to other ideas, right?
And so I will say that a lot of the ideas compliment the sign industry.
I would say they actually would be better in the sign industry than
the current industry they're in.
I'm like, wow, why is the sign industry not familiar with this?
Right?
Like the landscape lighting industry.
I learned a technique and something in the landscape, uh, industry that.
Allowed for me to do things quicker and easier and cheaper in the sign industry.
And so I think it's, you know, I don't know, maybe I, being a serial entrepreneur
can have, its, it, its, its cons too.
But I feel like there's more pros to it just because I get exposed to a lot of
different ideas from different worlds.
And those worlds might not even have any relevance to the sign industry.
It just turns out most of what I'm in is related to the sign industry.
'cause I'm in lighting or manufacturing of some sort.
But I have learned as much, if not more from people outside of our
industry when it comes to ideas to implement within our industry.
Mm-Hmm.
And I feel like sometimes we're so consumed with the ideas
of the guys in our industry.
I'm not saying that that's a bad thing, by the way.
I think it's a great thing you guys are doing.
But even interviewing out, interviewing people outside of the industry might be
an option, you know, or something where someone's just successful in business.
Bringing them onto the podcast because that's where I've gotten a
lot of my intellect and my knowledge.
'cause I'm definitely, I'm as blue collar as they come.
I grew up on a farm.
Problem solving was like kind of my go-to, but problem solving
for me was a everyday occurrence.
I'm like, there's gotta be better ways.
And it was systems, it was like implementing systems for everything.
Yeah.
So
problem solving.
Yeah.
Huge thing.
Like, you know, we've got probably just a few minutes remaining.
I definitely wanna touch on that side of it, man, because you, you've got all
these different businesses, but yet when I look at 'em and when you describe them,
they all compliment each other very well.
And, and like, the big question that I had coming into it was,
was this in, was that intentional?
Like, did you do that by design or was it just like a, like a
Bob Ross like happy accident type
of thing?
Well, so I'm probably not your traditional business owner.
I did not go to school for business.
Um, my major was criminal justice.
I had no foundation of or understanding of how to run a business.
I, I was very passionate about at the time, vinyl graphics.
I, I mean, it sounds so simple, not so complex, but at the time it was right,
because vinyl was still kind of a newer thing too, you know, in, in the nineties.
I mean, I, I remember when I bought out Dowling Sign, which
was a hundred year old company.
I ha I have one employee who has worked in the sign industry for 50 years.
Wow, he's 70 years old.
He started in the business for 20 years and he can tell you every story
about the advances in technology.
And it's an interesting story.
Lemme tell you, his interview would be much better, I guarantee.
But he, you know, he would tell me of all the advances.
And I think to myself, I remember when I specifically was doing the airbrushing,
and I'm sure you guys have seen those old methods where the guys would airbrush
the vinyl first, then go cut it, and you had to align everything perfectly.
And it, it was quite the task.
But, you know, the, the reality is I did all those things because I loved it.
I was passionate about it.
And then when I became, I, I guess, a successful business owner in the
sign industry, I figured some things out that I was like, you know what?
I enjoy building something from nothing to something I.
So I started some other companies and then I saw some struggling businesses
and I had some rapport with some of the owners of those businesses.
So they had reached out to me, what are you doing that I'm not doing?
And next thing you know, I'm buying those companies out.
And when I saw the things they weren't doing, it really shocked me.
I was like, you know, it doesn't take it a rocket scientist.
'cause I'm definitely not one to figure out that you have a communication
problem, you have a personnel problem.
I mean, when, when your guys, I mean, so I have a no smoking policy at at work.
That sounds really like that's going out on a limb in the sign industry.
Right?
I saw on some of the group pages, that conversation got brought up
and I was like, you know, people probably wouldn't wanna work for me.
But the reality is I don't, I mean, I have a lot of smokers that work here, right?
I mean, I would say probably a third of the staff probably smokes.
Um, I don't know who all of 'em are, but I know who a few of 'em are.
But the, the fact is, what we found is that it was distracting from the things
that need to get done during the day.
And it wasn't a professional outlook.
We were actually at complaints at times where the installers were going out on
job sites and leaving the cigarette butts.
And, you know, it's just, I'm unprofessional and I couldn't, I, I really
couldn't control it because I was saying, guys, this is a bad business practice.
Don't do this.
Guess what?
Right.
A week later I'm getting a call.
Same thing.
Yeah.
And, and so what I found is that there was no labor laws that told,
set indicated that I couldn't do this.
And when I looked into a lot of big businesses to it, as a matter of
fact, the federal government does it.
So, you know, they have no smoking policies, you know, and so what I
implement it is that, hey, is while you're on the clock, while you're
driving our trucks, while you're on job sites, while you're in our
facilities, you're not allowed to smoke on your breaks and designated areas.
You're allowed to smoke.
And I can tell you this, that changed.
The, the, the pendulum a little bit because all of a sudden I started
attracting certain individuals that were like, you know what?
I wanna work around guys that are just passionate about this business, love this
business, and want to get something done.
I'm, I'm, you know, and I found that people shared the same type of passion I
did, even though they weren't the owner.
They, they, they loved the industry.
And so people all of a sudden just were like a magnet to my company.
And so we attracted really good, you know, um, employees.
And on top of that, we attracted people outside of the industry.
I quit.
That's another thing, by the way, if I ever was gonna suggest if I was gonna
start anywhere with some of these guys that, you know, maybe are struggling,
don't always look within the industry.
I did that for so long and that was the kryptonite that I didn't realize was
like hindering me from growing because I was bringing in someone with bad habits.
And I'm not saying don't hire within, I'm just saying look outside.
There might be good people out there that are worth hiring and can
learn just about anything we do.
So I would definitely suggest that.
Going back to your, your, your conversation with me earlier, Peter, is I
would have a hard look at the pricing that most people are looking at and are they
looking at it as like, this is what fast times is charging, this is what Joe signs.
Joe is down the street.
Yeah.
Is that what they're looking at?
Are they just average pricing?
Are they really looking at what they are doing on a daily basis
to put out a good product?
Right.
Or they, or do they really understand the, what it costs to do business?
Because if they're just looking at the averages and everyone calls fast science
because they're like the model, right?
They have a huge, you know, they have a, a, a, a few huge, uh, uh, platform to work
off of when it comes to average pricing.
But the reality is I'm probably not gonna compete with them in certain
areas when it comes to pricing.
And so I don't use them as my model for pricing.
I wanna deliver a particular product to a particular client, and I wanna make
sure I understand my cost to do that.
And when I do, then I have to understand the markups to be successful.
And the markups, everybody is like, oh, just 50%.
You know?
I'm like, no, no.
Yeah, yeah.
It's 50% won't get you anywhere, so, no.
Yeah, I
love that.
Um, and because it, it, you know, when you think about it, when it boils down to
it, the same product, the same sign to a different client holds a different value.
So there's two sides of the coin, and that's definitely one of
the things that, that we preach.
Like you have to know your numbers, like what does it
cost to actually deliver this?
But the rest of it is up for interpretation, right?
Depending on who the client is or what the job is.
You know, are you dealing with Joe's Pizza down the street that has one
location, or are you dealing with a, like a national chain of pizza shops?
Yep.
You know, like, like their tolerance as far as price is totally different.
I, I'll tell you too, that something that really helped
me is when I was doing a job.
For a larger corporation.
They sent me the sign package, so it was a modeled sign package
that every location I had to do.
And I asked specifically, I said, what is your budget for this?
And they told me what corporate's budget guidelines are for those signs.
I was blown away.
It was actually the opposite of what you would think.
It was much higher than what I would've originally priced it at.
Then I realized I was selling myself short.
I, that was like the a moment for me where I was like, wow, if they're doing this all
over the country, then how am I selling myself this short when I live in an area
where I know is growing and can afford it?
And so I realized I was undervaluing myself.
And then I started understanding what it cost to really do business
too, because all this time I was just average pricing and I was like,
obviously I'm putting a lot more emphasis on the quality of the product.
I'm delivering a better product.
But yeah, I'm pricing like the guys down the street.
That's not, that's not a good way to, to run a business.
Well, uh, I think we're about at time.
I, I don't wanna keep you, Paul.
I know you're super busy.
I would love to do this again sometime soon, man, because it like, ah, I feel
like we could chat for days about it.
Yeah.
Um, what's, Hey, one question that we always ask everybody to kind of wrap
things up, like, what's, what's the future for you, for your business?
Like, is, you know, you've got a soapbox here.
Like is there anything you want to, to say to the audience or do you wanna close with
Well, I have six kids, so my goal, my goal right now is to get them out of school
and, you know, starting their own careers.
And, um, you know, my focus right now isn't on retirement or what to
do, you know, uh, 20 years from now.
My focus really is to just continue to build the businesses
so they can run themselves.
I, I, I'm very blessed.
I don't have to go into the sign shop.
I do it because I love going into the sign shop.
I, I, it took me years to figure out the model of allowing myself to
not be the guy that had to be there.
And that to me is the key, if any, I don't care if you are running
a $2 million shop or $20 million shop, it wouldn't matter to me.
I think you need to set that as your goal.
Make it so you don't have to be there 24 7.
I ran myself ragged and Peter, I believe you, you, you've owned your
own company yourself and you know, you guys know all too well how you
can be a slave to the business.
Oh yeah.
It's all consuming.
All consuming.
No, and and, and I don't know if you guys know this or aware of this or not,
the suicide rate is higher for business owners than it is for an average employee.
The divorce rate is higher, and there, there's a reason for that.
And it's because we become so attached to the business and, you know,
we're all, we all as, as, as men, we wanna provide for our families.
I think that's probably my goal, ultimately, right?
That's, I mean, before being successful and being a millionaire
and all these things, I wanna be, I.
A provider to my family, I wanna make sure they have a home.
I wanna make sure they have food on the table.
So a hundred percent you think when you're, you think when you're at work, you
know, at eight o'clock, nine o'clock, 10 o'clock, midnight, and I, I'm not gonna
ask 'cause I already know the answer.
All of you have probably at some point done the all-nighter and I feel constantly
regretful for those times I did that because I didn't know what I didn't know.
And it was just simple little things.
I had to implement changes within my own business.
It was all self-inflicted.
The reason I was staying at work after five o'clock and when I made
my priority, i, i time blocked.
So I said, you know what, if my priority is my family, then I'm gonna
make sure the majority of my time is contributed to them on a weekly basis.
And I would encourage anyone who's struggling with that to, to whatever
you gotta do, if you gotta get up an hour earlier, if you've gotta force
yourself to leave an hour earlier, whatever you've gotta do, start time
blocking your time for your family.
And it will force you.
And I'm, I'm sure you guys have, uh, done this yourself When you've gone to,
to Disney, when you know you're leaving the next week for a vacation, you're able
to get a lot more work done that week.
Mm-Hmm.
Because, you know, you don't wanna have to deal with it on vacation.
Well, you just gotta learn how to do that on a weekly basis.
How can I get more work done and less time so I can, you know, attribute
the majority of my time to my family?
And so that's, that's what I would encourage anyone to do.
That's what I've done.
That, that has allowed me to open these other businesses and continue to do that.
But I'm never, I'm never at a point where I've become complacent
and say, oh, I figured it out.
I'm still, I'm still learning, you know, listening to you like.
Your podcasts and other podcasts that are out there getting as much education.
'cause guess what?
Next week you might have a guest on here that might give me that idea
that I've never thought of, and save me another hour of my week.
So that's all it takes.
That's the reason why we
do what we do.
Even if it you, you're probably not the average viewer.
The average listener is not gonna sit here and listen to an hour
worth of knowledge they might grasp.
A, a nugget here or two.
And, and, and that's why I do it because I, I come away with every one of these
episodes and, and, and I, and I've learned here something here today.
Uh, but, but again, I've
seen Peter's notes, man.
They're like, if you are, if each episode after he is done,
if you are listening to this and, and you're thinking like,
how do, how do I grow myself to a five, $10 million company?
You probably could learn a lot from just listening to what
you've discussed here today, Paul.
So I wanted to say thank you for coming on.
This has been great for me.
Uh, I, I think we should definitely have you on again and, and, and
let's talk some more about some of these businesses that you have.
Maybe you'll be in another business by then, who knows.
But, uh, happy to have you on here and thanks for jumping on our, uh,
on the Better Sign Shot podcast here.
Yeah, well, I appreciate it.
I appreciate what you guys do.
Keep, keep doing it.
And, uh, I, I wish you the best.
When's the,
when's the announcement on the lighting company?
So before ISA.
Okay, so before INA.
Yeah, for sure.
So are you guys gonna be there?
That's the plan.
Okay.
Well hopefully we'll, but definitely keep us on the loop on that.
Um, happy to spread the gospel.
Yeah, yeah.
No, absolutely.
It's, it's gonna, it's gonna be good.
I can tell you this, I've only been doing that for a little period of time here,
and it is a money maker for sign guys.
I mean, really, truly, I'm not just saying that because
I'm about to push the product.
It, it, it is something that sign guys can do in their sleep.
It really is Awesome.
I look forward to it.
Paul, thanks for coming on, man.
Alright guys.
Fountain of knowledge.
Super excited.
We could do
this.
Yeah.
See you.
Thank you very much.
All right, bye-Bye.
Take
care, man.
Alright guys, that's the episode.
Wow, what a doozy.
Um, I, I feel like we could have probably talked to Paul for like
three days at a time here, but, uh, Pete, rapid fire takeaways.
Yeah.
Well, I mean, let's talk about the obvious one.
The obvious one being how easy it is to get into the lighting business.
I'm not too familiar with this area, but as somebody who has taken my service,
my sign service vehicles and used them to hang my own Christmas lights, I mean,
like, yeah, if you could make a business out of that, uh, that sounds phenomenal.
I'm sure we could have gotten into like all the processes and, you know, it
is a totally different business model and I would've liked to have heard a
little bit more, come to think of it on, you know, how he structures that
business versus his sign business.
You know, how different those worlds could be.
But ideally you buy the supply, you use your truck, you put on another shirt, you
go outside and you hang some lights on people's, on people's houses, and then
you gotta go and take those lights down.
I think that that's part of the model too.
If I had to guess, it's a, it's not just installing, it's removing.
So, you know, what do those rates look like and.
I think it could be a great money maker for a lot of shops
with, with bucket trucks.
If you have more than one.
It's a great way to get them out into the service area and start making some money.
Yeah.
It's just super excited about that side of it, or, yeah.
I wish we had more time to dive into that, but, uh, for me, I think the, the
biggest takeaway is Paul was just like, Hey, this guy imparted the wisdom on me.
I need to double my prices.
Like, let's not waste time on it.
Like I, I go back and double my prices.
Right.
Like, for me, I, I think like increasing your pricing.
I, I don't think we've talked to a shop owner yet that we weren't like, don't.
Oh, yeah, yeah.
Like, Hey, you need to increase your prices or you should increase your prices.
Uh, and what was that?
I don't think I've ever given that advice.
Like, no, you need to lower your prices because you're too high.
Not once.
Yeah.
I,
I don't think I.
Say, I think I could say the same, you know, maybe you'll deal with a
client that's, or a shop owner that's 10% lower than they should be, 15%
lower than they should be, but double.
I mean, that takes a lot of, that takes a lot of guts.
It also takes a lot of self-awareness.
Like he seemed pretty confident in the quality of his work, you know?
Yeah.
And he's, he, some of the other takeaways, just minor ones for me, where he did say
that he's like the top paying sign shop in the area, so he only hires the best,
you know, and that, that is interesting.
That is interesting.
If you're gonna be that top paying guy, you gotta produce the best, but
you also gotta charge the, the most.
So there are some balances to that, that, uh, I would love to
ask him on our, on our next time.
But he was a great guest, a great entrepreneur, a
great, uh, sign shop owner.
And, uh, I think a lot of our shop listeners here can, can
learn from, from Paul and, and what we've discussed here today.
All right,
let's, let's take it out guys.
That's the episode.
If you are interested in being a guest on the podcast, hit us
up at hey@bettersignshop.com.
And if you are a shop owner, join our community.
It's free.
We have a Facebook group.
Uh, there'll be a URL somewhere in the description, like it is free for
owners and leadership of sign companies.
Uh, we screen all, everybody that comes through the door, so it is a safe
space to talk about all these things we talk about on the podcast, except
you could talk about your own business.
And that's it.
Um, we look forward to seeing you on the next episode.
So that's the episode.
I hope you enjoyed it.
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