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'NWA Founders' is a voice for Founders, Owners, and Builders driving growth in Northwest Arkansas, hosted by Cameron Clark and Nick Beyer.
To recommend a guest or ask questions, reach out at nwafounders@gmail.com and follow us on YouTube and LinkedIn for video content.
NWA Founders - Blass Full Audio
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Alex: [00:00:00] I want to like die trying that I did everything I could to do it. No matter what you invest in, everything's gonna have its problems.
Lauren: You gotta trust your gut to some extent.
Nick: So what was the vision?
Alex: A crazy young guy that approached Ms. Hunt but was not named, um, that was me at that point in time. I was young and crazy.
Lauren: Sometimes, like if you really feel so much conviction about something, don't worry about what other people are thinking or saying, just, just do it. Just do it.
Cameron: Alex and Lauren Blass sitting here this morning at your family office. Blass family has been in Arkansas since the 1800s being entrepreneurs, starting businesses, first in the retail space. It's kind of evolved in, like, what your family office is today, and really excited to talk about the different arms between Blue Ribbon Industries and all the different development deals y'all have going.
But before we kind of dive in, I'm curious, like, what is the most challenging piece today between all the different arms of the family office? Yeah. B- [00:01:00] from a broad perspective, what's the hardest thing kinda day to day? Y'all are doing some really amazing things here in Northwest Arkansas.
Alex: I'm gonna let Lauren answer-
that question to start.
Lauren: Well, where do you wanna start? I mean, I think that, kind of to your point, we're in so many different things that I think that there are challenges in all of the different areas, right? So I think with the operating companies, so we have Blue Ribbon Site Services and Blue Ribbon Dumpsters.
That's kind of a new LLC that we're spinning off because we've seen a need in the market, and that's really taking off. And so it's kind of just how do you manage that staff? We have around, what, 25 employees now. Yeah. And so I think, you know, with that kind of a business in, in the construction world, it's very much cash flow because we don't get paid until the other subs get paid, right?
Yep. And so that with all of these very, very expensive pieces of equipment, you know, and you think about the depreciation schedule for all of those and just how much you're having to pour back into the business, [00:02:00] to me I think that's a really big challenge on that front. Then I think on the development side, I mean, obviously, you know, like, just with the financing and everything there, and it's just tough.
Like, new construction is really, really tough. And- Yeah, good
Cameron: luck making money in it right
Lauren: now. You're right. Well, and I'm sure, I mean, you know- Yeah ... like with Pinnacle Village, we've had that for eight years now, and we're finally starting to actually move and do things. Awesome. Yeah. But that has been, again, just really getting moving on that, and then we've just broken ground on our 130-acre neighborhood in Springdale.
We worked with the city on that for over a year to get approval. Mm. It's just so slow. Yeah. So I think you've got so many irons in the fire, and there are so many fires in different places, and it's kind of like, where do I focus my attention today because I can't give my attention everywhere, you know?
And so I think between the two of us, we very much divide and conquer, and I think our skill sets are so very, very different but complementary. So it's like Alex, we know what he's really, really good at, we know what I'm good at, and we just can [00:03:00] kind of tackle together.
Nick: What is he good at and what are you good at?
Lauren: He's-
Alex: I'm glad we have this on the record, by the way.
Lauren: I think that Alex is an incredible visionary. Like, he is one of the most creative people that I've ever met, and I think that if you tell him no, he's always gonna find a workaround or a solution, which I think is super, you know, it's just very impressive.
And I think from my CPG background, you know, I was a strategist. I worked in client service, but ultimately at the end of the day, you're teeing up for the creative team. Like, "Here's the strategy that we're trying to accomplish. You guys go and dream really big and figure out how to bring this awesome campaign to life."
They'll go, they'll ideate, they'll come back with these big ideas, and then it's kind of up to us then to say, "Okay, of this, what can we actually accomplish, and what are the steps that we can take to accomplish that? Who are the different, like, third-party vendors that I can use to bring these tactics to life and make the strategy come to life?"
And so I think with Alex, like, me having kind of that different background, it's like [00:04:00] he has all of these massive ideas, which are crazy, like, 99% of the time, and then it's like, okay, how do I take your vision and what you wanna do and bring that back down to reality? And, you know, being new to development, construction, like, all of it, I'm not afraid to be like, "I have no idea what I'm doing," but we have an incredible team of engineers and architects and all the people that I can rely on to say, like, "I don't know how to get there.
This is what I'm trying to accomplish. You help me." And so that's what I think he's really good at, and I think I'm a really, really good project manager.
Cameron: Mm. Anything you wanted to add to there?
Alex: Um Lauren is the person that keeps us all in line and keeps the ball rolling. With all these projects, the, a lot of times you have the visionary people, and there are so many different things going on.
I am very much an ADD person. I feel like I could be, like, the poster child for ADHD in a lot of ways. And while we have a lot [00:05:00] of ideas, it's really... She really helps from an d- day-to-day operation, keeping the ball rolling. On development projects, I mean, there could be anywhere from 20 to 40 different irons in the fire on the same project on following up on geotech or civil or legal or FEMA or the Corps of Engineers.
There's just... You know, there could be-
Lauren: Designing the clubhouse ...
Alex: interior design, and so there's a lot of different pieces with that I, um, I enjoy working on all that, but having someone with as much detail focus as she has, nothing gets past her. It really helps kinda move the ball along. And that's kind of been, like, one of the challenges we've had with, um, our Pinnacle Village development that we've been working on for a long time, is we have...
In our core partnership on that, we have a lot of really good visionaries as far as our, from a partnership perspective on, "Well, this could be really good and we have this relationship," or, "We have this idea here and we bring this other group in." But [00:06:00] then it's really hard to get all those different cooks in the same kitchen to kinda, like, move along, and, um, you know, not everyone's based in NWA as well, and, and they're, the other partners are very busy across the country.
So kinda shepherding, getting things moving along. There's been a transformative shift since Lauren's been kinda, like, working on, like, that project on following up with all these guys that are, a lot of them are, like, our parents' age, that sh- she'll put them in line like they're her kids to be like, "Hey, like, we gotta make a decision.
We gotta keep moving. Like, let's keep the ball rolling." And it takes someone with, like, that kinda drive to, uh, to keep these things moving.
Lauren: Which, to be clear, that's very, like, especially, like, year one, I was just trying to wrap my arms around, like- Mm ... what are we even doing here? Yeah. Like, what am I doing and what is my role?
And so I think the first year was kind of just trying to, like, understand this entirely new world. You know, because on one side with the Sage piece, I'm, I'm learning brokerage. On the other side with Alex, I'm working in development. And [00:07:00] so, to his point, we're working with the Ali family. They're our partners on the Pinnacle Village development.
And so year one I'm not gonna come in hot and be like, "What, what are what's happening here?" And then I think by year two, I think I'd kind of earned everybody's trust and respect of, like, she's really just trying to move this along and help us make thoughtful decisions. Trying to make
Cameron: it happen.
Lauren: Yeah.
Trying to make it... Like, we gotta, we gotta- Yeah ... we gotta move. Yeah.
Cameron: Hmm. What would y'all tell another, couple that works together, that wants to start a business together? What, what advice would you give?
Alex: I would say that working together has been the most challenging thing that we've gone through in the 16 years?
17 years 17 years we've been together, and we talk all the time that we have gone through, in, in our opinion, everyone has their stuff, but, uh, we feel like we've had a lot of curve balls thrown at us in our lives of, we've lost three parents between the three of us, and- Between
Lauren: the two of
Alex: us. But between, we've lost three parents between the two of [00:08:00] us.
And, um, and other challenges like that. We've lost some other family members and, you know, other, other things we've had to overcome. And all that being said, I think the hardest thing was getting to a point to where like when you're working together, it's at the level that like how we are, it's really hard to...
It, it changes the complete dynamic because the biggest challenge is it's like when you, you le- when you don't leave work, the work comes home with you because it's, it's always there. There's always another problem. There's always another fire, and that's if you have a, a business of three people or of 300, there's always gonna be a problem that needs to be addressed.
And so while I say that it's the hardest thing that we've gone through, it has also been the best thing I've ever gone through with her. And I think that early on as, you know, over the past two years as she's kind of integrated in, uh, especially like in the family operations and like [00:09:00] the Blue Ribbon world, I look at the world completely different than how she does, and that doesn't mean that how I look at it is right and how l- how she looks at it is wrong, or vice versa.
It's just, it's two totally different mindsets 'cause we're we're set up too very differently. And so that was really hard at first to kinda get to where I c- you know, she understood where I was coming from and vice versa. But I think after we got through that, I think that it made us stronger as a marriage stronger as business partners.
But it wasn't easy, and so like don't think that it's gonna always be fun and easy, but I think that at the end- But I
Lauren: think we also have like 17 years of history, right? So it's like, "I've got you. You've got me," and I know that. Yeah. So like at the end of the day, even if we don't necessarily agree on something, it's like I think that we both want the best for each other, and I think that that was the biggest thing of like I give you a lot of credit because me coming in and being like, "I think we g- need to recalibrate some things around here," you know, and just kinda taking a look [00:10:00] at some of the stuff that was...
You know, we had a business unit within Blue Ribbon site that was profitable, but it was pulling so much focus. You know what I mean? Yeah. And so it's like, "Does this really make sense in the long run, or can I cut this and focus on our core competencies and really drive the businesses that are actually like true revenue drivers for us?"
Yeah. And I think he had a lot of heartburn about that for a while. And same thing, we were laughing beforehand with this man off camera talking about just, like, different pieces of equipment and things, 'cause Alex loves toys. And one of the things that he purchased was a stage, you know? Yeah. And so I look, and we're paying interest payments on this said stage that, like, never gets used and whatever.
And I'm just kinda thinking to myself, "Does this make sense? Do we need these drones? Do we need..." You know what I mean? Just kind of, like, going down a list of all of the things, and I'm like cut." You know what I mean? Yeah. And so, I- so that's a struggle, you know? And I think there are some other people that we love, love, love, and I consider them family, but you know, when you are just overhead and you are [00:11:00] not tied to revenue- then we gotta have a conversation. Yeah. Right? And so I think that at- the first, I would say, nine months of me being in the business was the most challenging, because it was just kind of, like, upheaval of, like, I know where you're trying to get this, and now let's actually get there.
Cameron: Yeah.
Nick: So what was the vision?
When you came in, what... Was there a vision, and you came in to help with that vision? Or are y'all- This, yeah, I mean, this is- ... forming the vision together as you go?
Lauren: Yeah, I mean- So what, I guess- ... this is definitely Alex's baby and vision.
Alex: So I guess to, to start a little bit with that, maybe a, a little bit of background on how we got to that world.
So I was working at Sage Partners at the time. I think one of your other in- uh, podcast might have referenced a crazy young guy that approached Miss Hunt, um, but was not named. Um, that was me at that point in time. I was young and crazy, but we, um, when the Sage Hunt offices merged part of that we inherited a landscaping operation that did Miss Hunt's properties.[00:12:00]
And, um, post-merger, I was in, like, an operational role at the time with Sage, and I approached the other partners about the idea of, "Well, hey, what if we were to scale the landscaping side up from instead of just servicing Miss Hunt's buildings, what if we were to add some more guys and do the other buildings that we managed at that time, and it'd be kind of like another vertically integrated service offering?"
And I should have, and I'm, I'm putting this on record for everyone at Sage to hear, I should have listened to the older partners at the time, but they were like, "That is a huge undertaking. It's a totally different business. We're not looking to jump into that world right now. But if you really want to, you know, we won't stand in your way."
And I was young and hungry, and I was like, "Absolutely, I wanna do this." And so I went out and got an SBA loan- And bought a little landscaping company up in, uh, uh, in Bentonville called Rodden Landscaping that had, uh, a really good set of [00:13:00] guys and girls that worked there and some good accounts. And we...
The thought was let's scale it for a little bit, show proof of concept, and then it was, my thought was it was gonna potentially roll into Sage to show that, like, we could grow a landscaping operation, and then it kind of became a, uh, you know, a, a larger piece than what we thought it would be. When, I think when we bought the business, uh, it had 14, 15 employees.
Yeah. It was under 20. And, um, within the first year, we, um, it had more than doubled in revenue and size, and it just kind of kept growing from there, and we were like, "Well, we actually kind of got something here." And so, uh, started continuing to grow the landscaping world, and then we just started looking at what are other service offerings in this area that, um, that we could go after, and started going into other things.
But I guess the, to kind of roll it back from a vision perspective, what I saw working at [00:14:00] Sage was through all the relationships at Sage, it's a unique business that has a pulse on so many different things happening in, in such a fast-growing area and has relationships with all of the major power players in the area at the same time.
And I viewed Sage as not a real estate company, but an information company, and if you could leverage those relationships, you could go into offering services like landscaping towards adding value to investors, manage- property managers and making everyone's lives, at the end of the day, easier. And then it was like, well, what could be other services that could be added on from there?
And that's where it kind of, it started growing into a lot of different things. We had the idea of having all these other service offerings and We grew into a whole bunch of things really quickly, and [00:15:00] looking back now, it wasn't the best thing to do what we did. But it took some time to kind of have some introspective on it.
And at the same time, when we were rapidly growing these service offerings her mom had passed away a couple years earlier, but my mom had been diagnosed with cancer, and we were very close. And the way that my coping mechanism was instead of having, you know, the emotional, uh, intelligence of trying to deal and process with that, I was like, "I'm going to grow and scale this thing as big and as crazy as I can so I don't have the, uh, time or the energy to focus on stuff at home with my mom."
And so we went from, in like a 18-month period, we went from a landscaping company to a, uh... We were gonna-- We had, we started a trucking business. We became the second-largest dump truck operation in NWA in less than two years' time. We started a site work business [00:16:00] doing, like, site work, earth work. We started a topsoil screening business.
We started a dumpster business. We bought land to do a wholesale nursery operation on and started-- We didn't get that completely off the ground, but we did do some work on it Um, on top of real- several real estate development deals, and so it was like I accomplished the goal of having no possible time to think about what was going on at home, but then it was a challenge of like, okay, it's like, it's really easy to get into all these businesses, to like then like keep everything where they need to be moving forward.
There's only so many hours in a day, and there's only so many fires you can fight. And until you have like a good team of, people below you that you can trust,
Lauren: mm- Well, I think that was a challenge. Like-
Alex: Yeah ...
Lauren: m- because at that time I wasn't involved, but I could see it all happening, and I could see that he would start these businesses with the best intentions, and then it was like, "Okay, well, [00:17:00] great.
Who's picking up the ball? Who is gonna help you?" And I think that he made a slew of hires that could've told you they're not gonna work out. Like, this is not the right person for this job. Do you know what I mean? Mm. And it's a very heavy lift. Yeah. And I kind of, I'm very much, I'm a very cynical person, but it's like if you want something done right, you have to do it yourself, and you have to be bought in, and you have to see it through from start to finish.
And so again, that kind of goes back to it's amazing to say that you have all of these things, but if you are absolutely drowning, for what, and so then it was kinda like, I think the past couple of years have really been like unraveling from that, of like walking it back of what actually makes sense, what is profitable, you know, what was just like grief, and, and, and how do we figure that out?
Alex: I think, and to that point, I think the, the biggest challenge that I would say that w- I've learned starting these businesses, and, you know, to anyone out there that's getting into this world, no one cares about a business like an owner or [00:18:00] yourself. And the other challenge is, like, there's really good talent in NWA.
There's no, no doubting that. But good talent has to be paid accordingly, and when you're in, like, these small businesses, you know, you have all... You could be like, "I wanna go and hire another person that has the qualifications to run this," but when you're in that small infancy, there's not the cash flow to support paying someone that they can turn around and go to, like, one of the big, companies up here and get what they're rightfully o- owed.
So then it's like this challenge of, with any business, you have to get it big enough on your own not making any money-
...
Alex: To where then you can then support bringing someone in. And there's always kinda like this hard thing where it's like I went through for, like, four years of, like, eating fast food because, like, I wanted to put every dollar I could back into this business.
Now it's profitable. This guy walks in, or girl, f- day one, and they make, like, $150,000, and I would have loved to have had that for the past [00:19:00] four, four years. But, you know, that's, that's how the world works, and so it's, um, I think that's, that's one of the biggest lessons I learned is, like, you gotta scale these things on your own.
I worked in the restaurant world, uh, in college, and I, I was part of a restaurant when they opened up, and I learned from... It was Alan and Shawna Brumitt that have, uh, Sassy's Barbecue down in Fayetteville. And, um, in talking with them, it was like, if you start a new restaurant, it's basically like a baby that you have to take care of like a baby until it's, can, you know, be old enough to take care of itself, and it's, like, takes a couple years to do that.
And it's like that with... I learned that in the restaurant world from them. But in any small business, it's like you gotta put enough time in it to get to the point to where it can support itself. And there's no shortage of opportunities in NWA, but you have to be focused in on, like, what are the things you wanna focus on, at this point in time as opposed to trying to do too much at, at one time.
But since Lawrence come on, it's, um, w- [00:20:00] we are able to g- we're able to grow the business in a way that it's we're really excited for where we're going, and we feel like the While we had challenges in the past that I incurred, I think that through all that it's honestly made us a better business and we're more set up for success than someone that's just coming in out of the blue, 'cause it's a lot.
I'm, I tell people I'm really good at telling you what not to do. I'm still working on what to do, but there is a lot of value in knowing, like, the right paths and the wrong paths.
Lauren: Well, and I think, too, we just kind of learned from how quickly he scaled the business, like slow, controlled growth, right?
Mm.
Alex: Yeah.
Lauren: You just, you don't wanna grow just to grow.
Alex: Yep.
Lauren: And so I think now as we're kind of approaching, like, growing the dumpster side of the business- ... and those things, you know, in our model it's very, very clear of, like, we're trying to hit these milestones by this time. Mm. And it's not just kinda like, let's just go and see what happens.
Nick: How does your personality deal with that, though? When you see a sheet that Lauren lays out and it's like, "Here's where we wanna be one year from now, two..." Does your personality... Are [00:21:00] you now in a place where you can accept that? Or-
Alex: Oh, absolutely. I wasn't at first when she came on, and it was like... it's hard coming from, like, being in a business for several years and you've, you learn a lot through the, your challenges.
And, you know, even your wife that ran a, national business is who's, she's way smarter than me, it's still hard to hear from another opinion at first. And so, like, we... That was, like when we talk about, like, there were some challenges up front, but, like, now it's like- We both understand where each one's coming from, and so, like, anything she says, I'm 100% aligned.
Um, we are getting to where if something I say is sometimes aligned. But, uh, but as far as the direction that we get from Lauren, that I get and the rest of the team we all know that she's coming from a good place, and it's, it's been really helpful. So we- I
Lauren: think I'm a very direct person, too, and very blunt.
Mm. And I think sometimes that can be off-putting, because if people don't know [00:22:00] you, it's like, "Who is this, and where is she coming from?" But then I think once you spend time with me and you get to, like, understand me and it really is coming from a place of love and I just want what's best for everybody, then I think you kind of see me in a different light.
Nick: It's gotta be done right. It's gotta be-
Lauren: Yeah ...
Nick: it's gotta be done, like, when it needs to be done.
Lauren: Yeah. When it
Nick: needs to be done.
Lauren: Yeah.
Cameron: So talk, let's talk about some of these real estate deals y'all have going right now. Like, what is active under construction? What's on the horizon? And it's, it feels like everything's here in Northwest Arkansas, right?
I, I mean-
Lauren: Besides Capitol Park and Little Rock, yeah.
Alex: We have an investment portfolio outside of Arkansas, but we're, like, we're passive investors. The- Yeah ... um, when, when I got into the real estate world my dad who ran the family office, he was very much about getting out of Arkansas. My grandfather had all of the, our investments were very centralized on mostly warehouse product in Little Rock.
That's where he lived. That's what he knew. And as my dad came on his focus was growing into investments outside of [00:23:00] Arkansas to kind of diversify, as well as getting into, like, some venture capital type deals. And then, um, when I started coming into the world and working at Sage, um, and living in Northwest Arkansas, we kinda started refocusing on our latest deals being in NWA because there's few areas that can compete, if any, with Northwest Arkansas from an opportunity perspective.
And so, um, we started looking at doing Anything and everything in the commercial world. So we've, we've done industrial, we've done flex, we've done retail, we've done office. Uh, the only thing we've not really touched is multifamily. We've invested in multifamily in other areas, but as far as individual projects, and here I'll let Lauren talk about, because she runs the day-to-day real estate stuff.
Lauren: Well, I mean, so Bellevue, that delivered what? In, like-
Alex: 2020 ...
Lauren: 2020. Phase
Alex: one.
Lauren: Yeah. So we have two phases. The second phase delivered in 2022. Um, and so those are fully leased, which [00:24:00] is great. So really, like, on that side, and then for Capitol Park and Little Rock, I'm just the asset manager. Sure. Yeah. So, and I do a lot with our property manager as well, because again, it's kind of one of those things where we own the buildings, I wanna know the tenants that are there.
I think maybe some owners are hands-off and don't wanna mess with it. But, like, for Alex's dad and, and Capitol Park, that's been in the family since the late '60s. Wow. And some of those tenants have been there for 25 years. And so, you know, I think a lot of brokers probably wouldn't wanna work on that property because it's just renewals.
You know, we've got one vacant spot. Yeah. And it's a ton of renewals. Yeah. I think I've done probably over 10 since I took over last August. I mean, it's constantly rolling, and they're all short-term, you know? Yeah. And so I think that, there, again, not a lot of money there, but, like, no one is gonna care about that like I care about it, because it's our family legacy, right?
So I wanna meet those tenants, I wanna walk the park. We went back for Thanksgiving this past year, and you know Wicked Mix? So it's like pretzels and, um- Yes ... it's kinda like... it, the- it's delicious. Yeah. Okay. So they're made in Little Rock. They're [00:25:00] made at Capital Park. Okay. And so they have, like, their whole factory set up there.
Nick: Oh, wow.
Lauren: I called the guy, um, who I worked with to do his renewal and just said, "Hey," it was the day before Thanksgiving, "can we bring our kids and just take a tour?" 'Cause they love to watch Unwrapped on Food Network. Yeah. And so they got to go and put on their hair nets and, like, walk through, and it was so cool.
Oh. And so stuff like that is just, like, it's special, and I feel like it gets our kids involved, too, and they get to be a part of it. Yeah. So I just, I love it. But that's Capital Park. That's Bellevue. NWA Industrial, we just got our C of O for that last June, I think. Last June or- No,
Alex: it's April.
Lauren: Yeah.
Alex: So we have, um, our first phase, it's, it's our first industrial project up here.
It's a flex warehouse along, um, Interstate 49. I tell people it's it's the white warehouses that are next to the old Iglesia Church and the Stone Garden place. Uh, now it's part, now it's y- a Ewing facility. But those are... Uh, each building's 40,000 square feet. Lauren mentioned that it, uh, we got our C of O last year, I believe, [00:26:00] and we're just now starting to get some really, really good, uh, leasing activity.
Lauren: I mean, yeah, industrial's been tough. Oh, yeah. It has been dark.
Cameron: Well, and getting those high rents.
Lauren: Yeah. Yes. You know? Yes. The- So the first year it was slow going, and now I feel like all of a sudden, for that front building, we've leased everything up except for two bays, which is great.
Oh,
Cameron: that's amazing. Yeah.
Lauren: But it's almost like it hit all within, like, a three to four month period. Yeah, since
Alex: the beginning of this year really.
Lauren: Yeah.
Cameron: And it's, like, gotta be done, and then people can s- you know. Correct. Especially the small bay users, it's like they just, they want it done.
Lauren: Right.
Alex: Well, and what I've heard from Lauren at Sage is that it's one of the more called on properties and, like, the LoopNet l- uh, hits on it.
And it seems like kinda like the central messaging is there's all these people that are coming from, like, 71 Business, that they want their business to be in, um- Like they wanna be in Benton County closer to where everything's at. And so there's all these calls like, "Hey, this is exactly what we need." And then we give them the rental rates, uh, which are in line with what the rates are today with cost of [00:27:00] construction, interest carry, all that.
And they'll be like, "Oh my God, I'm paying $7 a foot on 71. Like I can't, I can't spend that much." And so there's a lot of challenges with that I think we're starting to get over. But, uh, on the flip side, the rents 1X it up with where we're going on commercial rates, 40, $50 a foot, it seems like a really good deal.
So it's all kind of relative. And one thing that we've kind of, that we've learned wearing kind of two hats of like an operating business and and being in the real estate world is there's some things that you can connect with like a small business operator that, that you don't really think about.
So like on our landscaping side our landscape side of the business has a CEO that runs the day-to-day of it now, and he's part of like a national peer group that they kind of- Oh, good. Yeah ... give you data on like what you sh- you're spending on rent and, and different things. And so, like a year ago it was like, "Hey, like we're, we think we're paying too much in rent.
We need to be like at this rate per foot [00:28:00] because of this national average of where the rents should be." Well, we don't have a lot of old buildings in NWA like you do in a lot of other established markets, and so the only spot that you could get that rent was out by like Springdale Airport. And then we started layering in, okay, well most of our business on the landscaping side is in Benton County, Pinnacle, Bentonville Square, that type of stuff.
And then so we looked at, okay, well- We have like, say, 100 employees, and the drive time, the fuel burn, the wear on the truck, and then the pay rate of paying those guys to have to drive from Springdale versus here, it was going to be several hun- Well, I can't remember what it was. It was like-
Lauren: It was exponentially
Alex: more
Lauren: expensive
it wa-
Alex: Yeah, you couldn't even get the rent low enough. E- even if you got the rent down to $2 a foot, it would s- Still wouldn't make a difference. Yeah ... it would still be more expensive than our rent here because of the drive time and the payroll difference- Yeah ... of unbillable hours. And so, what we've tried to talk [00:29:00] to some small businesses that have looked at, like NWA Industrial, it's like, well, you can't just look at it from a rent.
You gotta look at what your bottom line will do from unbillable hours and just visibility and growing in this area. Um, but that's a big challenge I think, you know, people in this area have to get used to, and I think that you know, there was a sticker shock about two years ago with, across the board with inflation, that now people are starting to understand this is kind of the new normal.
Yeah. Yeah.
Cameron: It's the market. Yeah. And it's like, if you want new space, like that's what- Yeah.
Alex: Yes.
Cameron: Yeah.
Nick: Is there something y'all would've done differently with that project? Or you think it was just kind of the timing of when it came on and-
Alex: We're, so we're looking at building another building to the south that we have some partners in our current building that own the land to the south or part of the land to the south.
And so it's like, if we build a new phase, what would we do differently? Um, we did some glass garage doors on the front that we will probably convert to, like, storefront glass. It's probably the biggest change. We, when we first started marketing the building, we got a ton of calls for, like, [00:30:00] smaller space.
Like, 25- 2,500
Lauren: square feet or less. Mm-hmm. Yeah. And our cuts are, uh, 4,432. Okay. And you could break it up, but it would be hard. Yeah. And it just wouldn't look as nice, and then you're putting in a bunch of doors in the back. Yeah. And so- Not worth it. No. And so as we were talking about this next phase, it's like, okay, well, maybe let's do 2,500 square feet.
Yeah. You know? And so that way if people call, the bigger space doesn't work, great, I've got this inventory over here, and maybe that helps. Yeah.
Alex: Yeah. So those are the two biggest thing. We didn't... There wasn't a lot of other changes with it. Overall, it's... Maybe we might make it two feet taller in the front building because people like...
We have two buildings. The one in the back is, uh... The idea was we were trying to, like, make the one in the back taller to where you could see both from the interstate. We should have made the other, the back one much taller so you could've seen it. But, uh, you know, people really like a little bit more clear height, and it doesn't cost that much more on a building to do that.
Like, you're not adding more glass. It's just metal paneling. So we'll... Those are kind of the only changes we're looking at for the next phase.
Lauren: Well, this would be controversial, but I would say go back to concrete and not do the [00:31:00] paver system.
But-
Nick: Why?
Lauren: It's just... So on the front end, it's cheaper, which is nice.
Yeah. It's environmentally friendly. Great. You don't have to do the detention pond. Mm. So on its face, it's great, and I think that that's what the city of Rogers is moving towards. I think the struggle is the maintenance- Yeah ... that you don't think about, and having to sweep it monthly, and then having to go in with a vac truck maybe, like, once a year, lifting up the pavers, cleaning them, striping them- Okay
is more of a challenge. So- Yeah ... you know, it's just things that, like, I don't think you would necessarily know until you get into it. Mm-hmm. And now that we're in it, I'm like, "Oh,
Cameron: there's a different way to do that. Yeah.
Alex: It, kinda, it cuts both ways, though, I'll say, 'cause... So, like, on our first phase, we did what's called a PICP paver system, and it's kinda becoming a new thing that people look at as an option.
It's, uh, there's a lot of situations where it doesn't work because you really don't want it to go in and then you have much construction afterwards 'cause it's really easy to get them clogged 'cause the water drains between the cracks of the pavers. Yeah. But on the flip side, [00:32:00] on, like, on our current land where we have the two warehouses, we have another 100,000 square foot warehouse that's gonna go behind there.
The steel is already on the ground. We're just... We wanted to get our leasing up a little bit more on the first two buildings before we start on the third. It's kinda hard to go to investors and be like, "Hey, the front buildings are empty, but let's build another." Build another. Yeah. And so, but now we're, we're starting to get a lot of really ac- good activity, so, like, I think we're getting close- It's time, yeah
to having that conversation. But Um, and this is where, like, Lauren talks about, like, I always have these crazy ideas, and some of them work, some of them don't. But with the paver system, we ran the numbers, and it's cheaper than concrete. It has the strength of concr- it's stronger than concrete. It has a longer life expectancy.
But the other thing that it did is by putting the... When you put these pavers in and you put gravel underneath there, the water gets detained in the gravel. We wouldn't be able to fit the third building on there.
Cameron: Yeah.
Alex: And so while there are challenges to [00:33:00] having the maintenance, we'll get a whole nother building that wouldn't otherwise exist.
Now, like, on the second phase that we're talking about of the flex buildings, there's not... We can't add pa- enough pavers to get a second building in there, so it doesn't really- It's been just that. Yeah ... so it doesn't really make sense. So it, it, it has a case-by-case basis. I don't think I'd ever do it, like, on a subdivision, because every home builder comes in, and they're gonna clog it up, and then it's gonna be a mess.
But, like, if you can put it in, like, a... If you're building, like, an office building, and it can go in, and then there's not in- much dirt coming in afterward, it makes sense for something like that, or retail.
Lauren: Yeah.
Nick: Talk about Bellevue, 'cause that was... I mean, I remember 20... Did you say 2020 is when y'all...
When did you start construction on Bellevue?
Alex: We, so we started in October of '19.
Nick: Okay.
Alex: I'll know the... I'll remember that because we had just gotten the job trailer and the generator for the job trailer delivered the week that tornado came through here, and it, like, destroy... It was crazy. [00:34:00] Our job trailer got, like, rolled, and then, like, one building up, the distillery was being built, and, like, you could...
The, only the axle was left of the job trailer. So, like... And it was, like, 30 yards away. So we started in October. And then, uh, we delivered in November of '20. Uh, we also built during COVID, and so that was a challenge. I would be at the job site, like, every day, and that was during, like, the whole social distancing stuff, and that was a little bit of a challenge at the house because Lauren was like, you're gonna be spreading it in the house."
I'm like, "We, you gotta be there 'cause, like, things come up every
Lauren: day." I was also pregnant with our third. Oh, yeah. And so I was very, very nervous. You know, and working in an agency, no one was going back to work, so I literally... I mean, I worked from home for, like, three years. Yeah. And so then him being on a job site every day was scary.
Yeah.
Alex: Yeah. But, um, so we mo- so we, m- uh, Blue Ribbon moved in in November, and, um, and then Rendezvous [00:35:00] Junction the brewery moved in pretty soon thereafter. And, um, and then a, an agency called Paradox, um, came in, and that, that filled up everything but the top floor. Uh, later on, uh, Keller Williams, Mike Dooley took the top floor, and then we, um- started working on phase two, uh, which was We wanted both buildings to look like...
Everything Miss Hunt does in this area, it, it has a very unique look that's beautiful, and it's like you can tell, like, that's a Hunt building.
Cameron: Yep.
Alex: And so we were like uh, and I was like, "I wanna build something that is like the antithesis of that, that it looks like something that's been here a long time."
And so everything we did from a design perspective was trying to, like, have an aged, older building. So, like, the antique brick, uh, we put, like, the muttons in the glass to make it look like the old warehouse windows precast. Um, and, uh, I think it turned out really well, and, uh, they're very well-received.
Um, there's [00:36:00] some other development stuff being looked at in that area, and I think they're gonna maybe emulate some of that look 'cause it's different and, like, so it doesn't all feel like the same. But yeah, so that, those, those have been fun projects. We've got the golf simulator in there. And then, uh, CCF or Fulcrum has taken most of the
Lauren: second building.
The full top floor, and then the last vacant space remaining, they just moved in,
Alex: that's amazing.
Lauren: Yeah.
Nick: There's a lot of office and some retail in there, and then you got industrial. Like, is there... As you guys think through maybe future plans, like, is there one that y'all get more excited about?
Alex: I think, um, I think retail is the most, like, fun, sexy to be like, oh, like, we're building this.
And you can tell people. Like, no one's gonna come to you and be like, "You're the hero that brought this office building in." But if you, like, put together a project, like a retail development, and you bring someone that's, like, first to market in the area, and you feel like everyone's like, "This is the greatest thing [00:37:00] ever."
Like, so, like, there's something fun to that from that perspective. I
Lauren: ki- I mean, honestly, for me it's hard to say because it's all new, right? Mm-hmm. Like, I'm just, I'm learning so much that it's all interesting, and I think at my core, I just really like to learn. So it's just, it's fascinating, and they all have their different things.
I know he just said that, but, like, I like office, right? Yeah. Like , I have been an office user for 16-plus years, so, like, I do find that to be interesting. And, you know, I do think about the functionality and what that looks like, so I enjoy that. But I think for me, my favorite honestly is Capital Park, like I said, 'cause I feel like it's my baby,
Alex: well, and I think that office is fun for you from the perspective of b- in the vendor world, like, it's such, like, a, a world where, like, everyone's jumping around. Like, no one stays at a company for more than a couple years. So through her history at all, uh, at her, the agencies and her, uh, CPG background, she has so many friends that are now, like, key decision-makers at all these different companies.
So I think it's fun from your perspective that you can [00:38:00] call, like, someone that you used to be in the trenches in a cubicle with. Now they're like a SVP, and you get to go out and, like, tour space with them, and it's helping out a friend, catching up on old times, but, like, leveraging everything you've, you know, your career in a, in a different way.
Lauren: Yeah.
Alex: I mean, it's fun
Lauren: Well, and then also too, just, you know, I spent so much time in New York and Chicago and seeing those office buildings- Yeah ... and, and how they're... I mean, they're incredible. A lot of them- Yeah ... are so incredible. You know, going to, like, Three World Trade and all of those things. Uh, it's just, it's neat,
Cameron: okay. Some of these other new, new deals y'all have going right now. Mm-hmm. Um, what's under construction and what's on the horizon?
Alex: So-
Lauren: Neighborhood?
Alex: Yeah. So under construction right now, we're doing our first master community neighborhood called Trade Winds. Come up with by, the names by Lauren. She can weigh in on the name.
But we, uh, it was the former land that we bought to do the garden center for Blue Ribbon on. And with the demand and for, you know, the housing shortage up here in NWA, it was kind of like a couple years ago when we put [00:39:00] the Blue Ribbon stuff on hold from the garden center. So I were like, "Well, what's the best use for this land?"
And it was kind of like a no-brainer. Let's start looking at single family. And so we've, we've gotten into that world. We had our groundbreaking three weeks ago. Mm-hmm. Yeah, congrats. And s- thank you. That, uh, that was fun putting, pulling that together. So that one's underway. It's the first three phases are single family housing That Brintnamm Construction is buying all the lots uh, as we get final plat.
Uh, we're building out a really big amenity package that will support the single family side, but then our goal is after the single family's built, to roll into doing a build-to-rent neighborhood similar to, uh, Brintnamm's Grove product off Pleasant Grove. Yep. And, um, rolling into that. And then the last phase is looking at doing some what we call neighborhood service retail on the corner of Wagon Wheel and, and, uh, 112.
You know, your, like [00:40:00] a nail salon, things that you'd want close to like where you live. But we want there to be more rooftops in place before the coming- some of that stuff comes in. So we've got that, and then we have,
Cameron: It looked like it was over 50,000 feet, right? I mean, is that-
Alex: Yeah, it's like, I think it's like
Lauren: 55- 55,000.
Okay. Yeah. Mm-hmm.
Alex: We have a spot for like a pad site. You... if like a restaurant wants to come in. Like a
Lauren: little coffee shop or something.
Alex: Well, a coffee shop and like a restaurant. Um, and then we have two in-line retail buildings. We're working with RDOT right now on right of way acquisition. They're gonna take out the, uh...
There's an old farmhouse on the corner right there, and a big roundabout will go in, and then they're gonna reroute, uh, Wager Road is on the other side of 112, and Wager will be brought down and connect at that roundabout. So I think that maybe Wager eventually becomes, you know, a, a Wagon Wheel Road extension as well.
So that'll become a pretty busy intersection over time. So, uh, we're really excited about that one. Anything you wanna add on Trade Winds?
Lauren: No, just that, I mean, like I said, it's been like a year [00:41:00] plus and it... well, really two years. But I think there were so many things that you just don't know what you don't know.
Mm-hmm. And then getting into it and having to do a cultural study- Yeah ... and, you know, working with FEMA on a CLOMR, and just all of those things. Like, there's just so much that's gone into it, so. And
Cameron: what's the timeline on a project like that?
Lauren: I mean, I think the outlook for this is like six to seven years in totality.
Yeah. So.
Alex: From where we are now.
Lauren: Yeah.
Alex: Yeah. Yeah. It's, we've been working on it for at least two years. When we started getting into the single family world we was like, it's a, it's a whole nother animal from anything else we've done. And but- We feel like there's a lot of opportunity in that world.
And what we jokingly say on this Tradewinds project is it's been like we've gotten like a master's degree in like any possible challenge you could have like on one project. From we were in two water districts, we had to get into one. We were in two cities and the county, so we had to de-annex annex in from a county.
We had, uh, [00:42:00] wetlands that we've worked through. We're working with FEMA on floodplain.
Lauren: Stream bank restoration. So
Alex: we had to do a stream bank restoration and-
Lauren: Blind cave fish.
Alex: The blind cave fish had already been dealt with or already had been inspected, but the, uh... We were... You know, you work through these things and like you don't know what you don't know, and, um, like in January this year we'd gotten, um You know, you get your information from your civil team, and they're like, "Hey, we're almost there.
Corps of Engineers, it's g- we're hearing it's about to get signed off for final approval." And then, like, then, like two days later, they're like, "Hey, Corps came in, and they said you gotta do a cultural survey." And we're like, "What the heck is a cultural survey?" Like, we had no idea. And they're like, "Well, it's basically like you hire, like, an Indiana Jones guy to go out, an archeologist, and they sift for archeological remains."
Cameron: Wow.
Alex: And they do, like, a-
Cameron: Did they
Lauren: find anything?
Alex: No. So-
Lauren: A nail ...
Alex: so th- they did find some things, and it scared the crap out of us 'cause, like, I had one of my guys out there. I was like, basically, like, every two hours, like, go ask- He would call ... I was like, "Go over there and ask them [00:43:00] if they found anything," 'cause they're just, like-
sitting there painting. And at one point, they're like, "Well, we did find three nails." And I was like... And he called me. He's like, "They found nails." And I was like... So I got on, like, Google, like one of the AI search things. I was like, when did Native Americans have, like, metal? Yeah. You know? I was like- Yeah ... I gotta figure out, like, is this, like, culturally relevant of, like, something, like we're gonna have a whole thing because these nails were found in the ground.
Yeah. That ended up not becoming, like, a thing. But, like, it's like you just keep having these other challenges that come in front of it. So, like, now, like, any project we do, it's like we got this huge checklist that was kinda created from the... That's what we were talking about, like, just, like, you learn from the problems that you've had.
From that one project, we've learned all these things we need to be looking for that we had no idea that you have to potentially go after.
Lauren: Yeah.
Alex: So,
Lauren: um- I mean, we knew it was in the floodplain, to be clear. Yeah. Like, that was not a surprise. But the rest of it-
Cameron: Yeah.
Nick: You don't know it until you're in, you're in it.
Lauren: Yeah, yeah.
Alex: Yeah.
Nick: And was that a project y'all started working on before you came on, or-
Lauren: That was really, like, when I- I was the first ... decided to get my real estate license [00:44:00] because that was when I was in my sabbatical era for, like, a year and a half, and I was working on offering memorandums for him.
And I started to work on the OM for that. And I thought, "You know what? Like, I really wanna go all in on this. I think I can help you." Mm-hmm. Um, and this feels like a very big undertaking. And so then I just started showing up to meetings with Crafton & Tull, and all these people are like, "Who's this w-" You know what I mean?
I'm just, like, in the corner taking notes, trying to learn as much as possible. And yeah, just kind of went from there.
Alex: Well, and I, I think, I... So when that project started, she wasn't 100% convinced she wanted to be in this world. That's right, yeah. And I was like you learn the most when you can... It's really hard to learn, like, the whole world when you start, like, in the middle of a project.
I was like, this is a really good one. Come in in the first conceptual design discussion, and you, and then see it all the way through. You learn a lot making it through the full cycle. It's almost harder to come in, like, halfway 'cause then you're like, "Well, why was this done?" Well, there was all this stuff that happened before that, you know, got-
Lauren: Well, and I also think, too, for me, it was like I had had my own career for 15 years.
And then coming [00:45:00] in, I didn't wanna just be, like, Alex... Like, who's Alex's wife that's there? Or who is, like, Gus's daughter-in-law, you know? And that's very much, like, in this world, that's what I am, and that is totally okay. But I think that, like, you know, going from an established career to then just, like, you're truly starting over Um, from square one, that was just kind of like, do I really wanna do this,
Alex: so that's one of our upco- uh, projects. The other one, uh, on the commercial side is Pinnacle Village. That is a 27-acre mixed-use site here in Pinnacle, uh, that we have had for around eight years that we've been working on. We've ha- we've learned a whole lot on that one. Lots of ideas. I think that the biggest challenge and things that we've learned is we have incredible partners on the deal And through them, a lot of relationships across the country.
And so we would bring in these huge national development groups, and they would be like, "We wanna partner and do the whole master plan with you." And so, like, we'd kinda like stop everything and give them time to, like, [00:46:00] get comfortable with the site, and that could be 8 to 16 months. And they would be like, "Okay, like, we're going down the path of this."
And then, and, and, uh, the, one of the ch- the biggest challenges we had with that is you have these analysts and these people looking at it that aren't in NWA, and they're not seeing what's happening here. And like-
Lauren: They underwrite it so conservatively. Yeah.
Cameron: Yeah. They don't see a 5% office vacancy and understand you can push rents here, and like, I mean, yeah.
Alex: And like, and on the multifamily side six years ago, I was like, "We need to do a wrapped product in NW- uh, in Pinnacle. There's no wrapped apartments here, and there is a demand," and I'd seen it through her on the vendor side, her friends that are making well into six figures, but they're traveling, four or five days a week, and they have come from New York or Chicago or these bigger cities where they have really nice apartments, and but there's not nice [00:47:00] apartments, and they're making all this disposable income.
There's not a product offering here that, that gets that. And so for years we would try to, like, get these big groups to be like, "There's an opportunity here." And they're like, "No, it's not gonna happen. It's not gonna work." And now probably one of the biggest regrets we have internally is we're like, if we should've built the apartments six years ago when construction prices were what they were six years ago and rents have subsequently exploded.
Now the challenge is, rents are continuing to go up, but construction has gone up so much, it's still, like, it's hard today to make, make those bigger projects work. But, um-
Lauren: Well, and I think, too, like, with that, and this may be controversial, but I feel like, you gotta trust your gut to some extent.
And I feel like Alex had a very clear vision there, and I think that if he had not listened to all of the outside noise, like, yes, it would've been incredibly expensive back then, but I think it could've been done, right? Mm. And so I think that sometimes, like, if you really feel so much conviction about something, don't worry about what other people are thinking or saying.
Just do it. Just do it. Yeah. Just do it.
Alex: You know? Yeah. One of the- That's good ... [00:48:00] probably one of the biggest regrets I have on, in this area and things that I've learned is there's been, like, four or five things in, like, Pinnacle alone that- That I've been like, "Hey, like we need to do this. We, it needs to be done this way."
And then people would be like, "You're crazy." And now every single one of those things has been done basically in that way. So, um, and it's hard like when you're younger and you, you know, you don't have the, some of the confidence that like, you know, you've, you really know what you're doing or you, you know, your, your gut is right.
Moving forward, not, you know, we, we know what we know. And so we've, we've learned a lot on that regard. But Pinnacle Village overall, we had these challenges in the past that kind of just ate up these big blocks of time. And then finally, and as Lauren came on, we were kind of wrapping up with, uh, a really big national developer that's got some ties to NWA That kind of is kind of, it came in at the very end.
They're like, "Well, we'll do a deal, but basically you need to throw in the land at under your, at a negative basis [00:49:00] for us to do it," because they're so big, and their overhead, and, like, the way they underwrite it. And we're like, "No, like, there's, there's no way that makes sense." And Lauren came in at the perfect timing to be like, "We can do this.
We need to just stop with all the no- noise of these other groups. We need to take pieces that we can do on our own. There's no reason we can do it." And and since then-
Lauren: I think if you do it in bite-sized chunks, right? Like, it's very overwhelming when you think about the entire thing. But I think if you can think about it of like, okay, we know we need retail.
We are desperate for more retail space, and I think if we can throw up this 25,000 square foot building and get something going there-
Cameron: It's gonna lease ...
Lauren: mo- like, just move, right? And that's not a big equity raise. That's pretty simple. Then you've got that. Then, you know, office, I mean, that's a lot more of a raise but, we're 95% drawn already, and we've had these plans that we've just been sitting on.
So it really just needs to go through VE, and then we need to get moving.
Cameron: Yeah.
Alex: We're trying to bring some other things in that are in the works, but not quite ready to talk about it. But [00:50:00] there's a lot of really good positive activity happening on that site. We've got a hotel group that's, um- Under
Cameron: contract
Alex: under contract as well. She's got some leases signed on the retail already. So, uh, and then there, there's some other things that are really close, but we're not quite there yet to talk about. But, um, I think o- it'll be overall, there's a lot of really exciting things on that project that I think people in Pinnacle will be excited about, but I think people in Northwest Arkansas will be excited about as well.
It's a big enough draw of what we're working on.
Lauren: Yeah.
Cameron: What do you think Pinnacle needs next?
Lauren: Well, I'll say this- Yeah ... because I just signed it. Um, Salata, so very high-end salad concept. Mm-hmm. I'm very excited about that. Just, you know, like, we don't have a lot of options for- Right ... healthy eating around here.
So I think that being next to all of the office towers, that will crush. Very excited about that.
Cameron: Can you talk about where that's going?
Lauren: Yeah, so that's going in the retail building. Okay. Yeah. It's 2,500 square feet. At Pinnacle Village. At Pinnacle Village. Yeah. Um, they've got a patio, so that's great. Very excited about [00:51:00] that.
Yeah,
Alex: man. That's awesome.
Lauren: Mm-hmm.
Alex: I think that what Pinnacle needs i- at the end of the day, and this isn't necessarily, like, a specific user I think the biggest challenge that Pinnacle has, and this is for anyone that owns land in Pinnacle and looking at developing, I think that Pinnacle has the opportunity to become the downtown of Northwest Arkansas.
And I think that collectively, the people that own land and are looking at developing in this area need to all have the mindset and the focus on, like, we need to all work together to build the density to make this the downtown of NWA, and, you know, rising tide will rise all ships. It's, um, it's a lot less risky to build, like, a two-story building and, you know, just flip out of it or, you know, just build a two-story building and hold it.
But we're not gonna get to becoming, like, people that come into [00:52:00] NWA are not gonna be like, "Oh, that, that's the downtown," when you have that mentality. And it's really easy to say that. I've... We've been on the side of, like, it's really hard to make the numbers work on these bigger buildings. But in the long term, if people are looking, like, with the vision that Ms.
Hunt has of building these, building this area in a way that it, it will become this, h- the density from office and multifamily, which then supports bringing in higher-end retail and then more entertainment retail, and it becomes, like, this area where people, I know it's catchy, but, like, the live, work, play.
You can't do that if, pad sites are being sold off for, like, you know, like, fast casual restaurants. Um, it's really- Or
Cameron: every pad site's a bank.
Alex: Yes.
Lauren: Well, that's, so that's exactly what I said when I started working on Pinnacle Village. I was like, "What I don't want is, like, Taco Bells and..." Like, no shade, but you know what I mean?
Like, I want this- I love
Alex: Taco Bell.
Lauren: We love Taco Bell. But I want this to feel elevated, right?
Cameron: Yeah. [00:53:00]
Nick: Is it too late for that?
Alex: No, I think that there's some really good pieces of land that could be done that way. And I think that naturally over time where you've seen that lower density development, there'll come a point that the land value will warrant that those will get redeveloped into higher density things.
I think that, um, what could be really beneficial for all of Pinnacle to be able to support that density as well, um, has anyone talked to y'all about TIF kinda coming to Arkansas yet?
Cameron: A little bit, yeah.
Alex: So with TIF being on the ballot in November for the state, I think that will open up opportunities all across the state.
But in particular in Pinnacle, I think that with the powers that be with, um, with- within the city, within the school district, within the development community, if there is a way to work together to develop a plan to build these, uh, parking [00:54:00] structures, that, that's the biggest challenge that from a development side right now is it's like an office building or an apartment building costs so much just to build the building itself right now without factoring in parking, and there's only so much you can drive rents on from an office or an apartment side.
Otherwise it's gonna sit vacant. And so the, the only way, uh, from a lot of people to get the returns that they need to be able to make it underwrite with a bank or to an investment group is you have to look at surface parking it, and that's what's eating up so much density here. Or density capacity is, is these surface lot developments.
And so I think as a community of developers and a city, if there was a plan to work together to create these TIF districts or STAR districts, uh, STAR is going after, um- Rehabilitation ... yeah, STAR, but I don't know what they're calling it in Arkansas, but basically you go after, you can go after either property tax, stepped up basis, or sales tax, stepped up basis, or a combination [00:55:00] or, or a credit form.
Those could be done in a way that you could build out a network of parking decks like you see in bigger cities that a deck could be shared between more than one development.
Cameron: Yep.
Alex: And that makes it to where then you can build these taller buildings, and at the end of the day, overall property values will increase, which will then help the schools and make this become like the area that it, that it needs to be.
But it's gotta be a partnership with the, with, you know, city, local, the school districts, the, and the development groups. We're all in it together, and we can truly make something special. But it's, it's really hard to get all those different groups even at a table together, let alone like all like kinda singing the same tune.
So that would be my thought. Yeah. I'd also love to see more Asian restaurants 'cause I love s- I love sushi, and there's not like a sushi spot here.
Lauren: There's a new one in Pinnacle Heights.
Alex: There is one, yeah, at, uh, the Meiji, uh, owner, but I don't know if it's a full restaurant. I think
Nick: it's-
Alex: It's
Nick: bites, yeah
Alex: I think it's like bites.
Lauren: Okay. [00:56:00]
Alex: Which I will still plan to attend there as well 'cause that's, I think Meiji's like one of my favorite sushi spots here.
Lauren: Yeah.
Alex: But if you're listening, more sushi.
Lauren: Yeah.
Alex: Yes.
Nick: Any- anything else on the development piece? Any pieces that we didn't talk through that...
Lauren: No, I think those are the main-
Alex: Those are the biggest ones that are like active right now.
We, we've got some land pieces that we're working on, some ideas on commercial, Commercially and single family. I think that- Boat
Nick: storage?
Alex: We're working on a concept out out on Beaver Lake, but it's not it's not far, too far along to where we can talk too much on it. But I think that we're open to doing more commercial, but I think that our, our focus will also be doing more single family in the short term.
Hopefully giving some time for, uh, like the commercial rates compared to cost kind of getting in a better spot, and maybe interest rates getting a little bit more com- uh, competitive. And so in the meantime, we're working on some single family concepts as well. Beyond Tradewinds, hopefully [00:57:00] without flood plains and cultural studies and learning- Just a
Lauren: flat piece of land.
Yeah.
Cameron: How is the, the structure of the family office now? What are y'all looking at today, and then maybe how is that gonna change in the future?
Lauren: That's a good question. Um, I mean, really it's the three of us. So it's Alex, me, Alex's dad, and he's 74 years old. He's in town. He comes in all the time, and, you know, he's a part of everything that we do with Blue Ribbon and all of it.
And I think that, you know, he's really started to transition a ton of stuff to me, and so I, my goal is to really figure out, for the long term, do we intend to keep Capital Park? You know, that's 344,000 square feet. That's a very big asset, and it takes a lot of time, and if I continue to be up here, what does that look like?
And so, you know, I think for me right now, I'm trying to really... i've gone through, revised the leases. Everything is now triple net as we do all of these renewals. We're starting to really clean up the spaces, white box them as people do leave. We've put in security gates just because it's Little Rock, and there are challenges there.
But, you know, it's [00:58:00] how do I, how do we figure out, you know, what do we wanna do with that? Do we wanna keep that for a lot longer, or do we want to figure out how to deploy that money into three or four other assets that, you know, are maybe up here or across the country? I don't know. So I think those are kind of just challenges and things that we're talking about.
Um, and then it's continuing to grow Blue Ribbon, and like I said, the dumpster side. I think that that was, to me, like white space in the market, right? Like, now you've got all of these national groups that have come in and gobbled things up. And so I think when you call someone, you're not talking to an actual person, you're talking to a call center, and then it's taking several days to flip the can, right?
Like, I'm sure that you experience that. Yeah. And so with us it's, you know, as white glove as dumpster can be. It's like you're actually calling a person. Someone is guaranteed to come and flip that for you within 24 hours. You need
Nick: it quick, yeah.
Lauren: You need it quick. Um, and so I think that we're really focused right now on home builders and volume with home builders, whether it's Brintnam, who we're in partnership with, or Buffington or now Toll Brothers.
But [00:59:00] you know, that's, that's kind of where my focus is going to be, at least for the next year to two years.
Alex: I think from a family office perspective, I think it'll be continuing to, if it was up to me, growing in the NWA world. I, the, the biggest challenges that I've found is like no matter what you invest in or what you're passionate about or what, what gets you out of bed, everything's gonna have its problems, and it makes it that much harder to solve them when you can't drive down the street and deal with it.
I think, uh, it's been very good for our family, like my dad's diversified a lot of our holdings outside of Arkansas into these other groups. But you're very beholden to these to these groups and like if things start going sideways, you're just kinda like you're from afar watching it burn, and it's like you wanna...
I'm the type of person, like I wanna go out, and even if like I can't fix it myself, I want to like die trying that I did everything I could to do it, and that's just like how I'm, I'm built. So like I, I [01:00:00] want to be focused, m- maybe diversifying into more different things in NWA, but I wanna be somewhere where like we can be there when, when things go sideways.
But We came, I came up to the, uh, NWA for college, and I never thought I would stay, stay as long as I have. And once we started having kids, we, you know, you look at, you know, where you wanna ru- raise, ra- raise your family, and we're like, there's nowhere in the country that has more opportunity than NWA, in my opinion, truly.
From when you look at when our kids were born to by the time they graduate high school 18 years from now, I don't think you'll look at anywhere on the map that will have seen that kind of growth and opportunity. And if we... You know, it's silly for us to spend time focusing on other markets that we don't have the relationships that we've built up here.
And so we wanna continue to cultivate those opportunities wherever those might take us.
Nick: Yeah.
Cameron: Yeah. For someone who's out of market, what are the fundamentals here in Northwest [01:01:00] Arkansas that... Why do you believe what you just said?
Alex: So coming from Little Rock, um, there's a lot of things that are just here you just take for granted.
For example, the, the worst public school here I think is still, like, the, one of the top public schools across the entire state and would be an incredible school in most markets. So there's no... Like, the public school system is incredible. You just look at what that does from, like, we have a lot of friends that live in, like, Dallas, for example.
And unless you're in the, you know, in the right school districts that are so expensive from a property perspective, what you have to spend in private school compared to reinvesting that money into, like, a retirement account or a larger home or investing into your business, you know, that makes a huge difference out of the gate.
Cost of living here compared to other markets, while it's gone up a lot, it's like, to people that have been here for a while, they're [01:02:00] like, "Oh my God, I can't believe it's so expensive now." But then still compared to a, a lot of places in the country, it's still a deal here. So I think that's enticing as far as bringing more people into the area and, and causing the growth.
Crime is, you know- Being in Little Rock when I'm down there, it's to the point, and I love Little Rock and I love, where I grew up, it's to the point you leave your car unlocked where we live so they don't break your windows out and stuff like that. And you, you ha- it's not just central to Little Rock.
There's a lot of places in the country that have challenges like that. And to come to an area like NWA where, like, you-
Lauren: You don't even think about ... you don't even- I mean, I'm from here, you know? And so then when I- when we started dating and going to Little Rock, it's so different. You know, I'd never had to think about stuff like that before.
Alex: And then you look at the, you know, what I call, like, the founding families up here, the Waltons, the Hunts, the Tysons, that have put so much back into this community that have all these offerings that, you know, you [01:03:00] don't find in other areas. We've toured... We- we've- I've been lucky enough to tour some really interesting people in the market.
Um, like I call it like my chamber of commerce tour, like showing them like everything in NWA. And these people are, you know, have seen... are very world- worldly on seeing the best of the best in parts of the... all over the country and the world, and they're blown away with some of the things that we have here in NWA.
Obviously, you've got like the arts center from the Waltons, but you've got the biking and there's just, you know, we could spend a whole podcast talking about all the incredible things that are up here. But it, that piece in and of itself, but it's, um... And then just the job growth. Everyone is hiring.
Everyone's looking for people. Uh, I, I kind of work in the blue collar world and the white collar, and I have, in the blue collar side, I have guys, friends that own plumbing businesses, electrical businesses, AV, and they're always like, "Do you know anyone that we can hire?" Like, "We need people." And then on the flip side, we [01:04:00] have friends that have businesses up here that are vendor to vendor businesses, vendor businesses, uh, you know, you, you name it, and everyone's like, "We need more people."
And they're willing to pay because the demand is here. And so you've got all, you've got all the right pieces to make this an area that's not, I don't think, gonna slow down anytime soon, and that's why we're focused on looking to grow Dumpsters and grow in the re- the residential side because we don't see it slowing down in the, on those fronts.
Nick: Okay, talk about Blue Ribbon, 'cause we kind of glazed over that. It's a huge business. Talk about the size, the scale, how many employees, and then let's dive a little bit deeper into when you came on board, some of the things that went, you're like, "This doesn't make... Why are we doing this?" Yeah. Let's talk a little, like dive a little bit deeper there.
Lauren: Okay.
Alex: Um, our parent company that we have in place now is called Blue Ribbon Industries. It's kind of just like the holding piece that everything is owned under. And, um- [01:05:00] So it's not r- you don't see that name as much out there. It's on the, it's on the building, uh, over on Bellevue. But, um, under Blue Ribbon Industries, our largest operation is what, uh, we call Blue Ribbon Outdoors, and that's the first business that I, uh, put together starting with the Rodden landscaping acquisition.
The employee count varies based on the time of the year. We, um... It took us years to get in the program, but we have, like, the H1-2B visa program there, and so that's been able to help a lot to where you can... In the winter months here, we don't have a big snow removal business where, like, you have further up north, so there's less business 'cause there's not grass mowing and whatnot.
So it's challenging to keep as many people on year-round. With the H-1B2 program, we're able to kind of right-size to what the amount of guys are throughout the year, and then the H-1B2 kind of helps account for that increased demand from spring, [01:06:00] summer, and, you know, part of fall. But that's the largest operation.
I'd say 80, 85 employees on-- would be a k- a good number there. Dan Arnsberger is the CEO that runs the day-to-day operation there. So Lauren and I are not involved as much on the, on the day-to-day operation with it. It all works together and we, when we're doing development projects or site work jobs, we'll bring in the landscaping guys to help with it.
And the idea is we'd... In a perfect world the vision was to kind of create these service offerings. Everyone that owns a building has landscaping challenges. Everyone that's building a building has to do site work, and then they have to have dumpsters. And being on the side of... I've got-- I'm a, I have my general contractor's license, and I'm doing some construction projects right now.
The biggest challenge that, that I've seen, and I've seen it for a while, is like [01:07:00] There's just so many people you have to keep up with on a construction project. As like a superintendent or like a PM just to keep a project going. And so, y- there's value in being, like, that one person that you can call, and you can offer these different service offerings.
And as long as you're... As long as all your service offerings are n- you know, one's not pulling the whole thing down, 'cause that's the challenge, is if you had one that kind of craps the bed, then it could affect your other business units. But as long as everything is, performing how it should, there's a lot of value to a construction operator, to a property manager, to have one person that handles more of your day-to-day challenges.
Um, and so our focus was always, like, let's build these services that are... There's not someone that's like an 800-pound gorilla in this world that's doing all these different things. So it started with Blue Ribbon Out- Outdoor is what it's called now.
Lauren: And I think that's something, so to your point, I haven't spent a [01:08:00] lot of time on the outdoor side because I think I've just been trying to wrap my arms around everything else.
And I think, you know, Dan and I have a really great relationship. We actually are gonna have lunch together after this. But I think that, you know, that's one of the things, too, of like how do we partner more to have these complementary services? Because it makes sense, and I think that's a miss, right?
Like, that's a lost sales opportunity. So I think that we need to get tighter on, you know, how are you going after new business acquisition? I think that they do a lot of high-end residential, but not as much commercial. But obviously we're so plugged in with the commercial side, so how do we kind of go and do that?
And again, it's just like there's so many things to tackle in a day that hasn't been priority, but that's one of the things, um, from a family office perspective, that's on my list for this year as well.
Nick: And is that, that business primarily maintenance? Is it projects? Is it half and half?
Alex: What's the- Uh, so, so we call it m- uh, recurring maintenance- Yep
and install work. I would say that it's close to 50/50. It depends on the time of the year, and even from year to year it can change. You [01:09:00] could have, like- You could land a couple really big, uh, install jobs and so it skews your, you know, your, your pro- uh, your income for that year and that's the challenge like when you like value a business or just projecting for a business, recurring revenue is worth a lot more because you don't have to go out and hunt, you know, what you know, you know, you eat what you kill on the install world or like any type of sales role.
And so you, you make a higher EBITDA valuation on the maintenance side in like a business, and that could be for landscaping or a HVAC company, but your margins are always higher on the install, but it's so, hit or miss on like how much is gonna come in that month depending on just, you know, there could be, local market conditions, there could be macroeconomic conditions.
One challenge that we had like early on, we'd, we bought our second landscaping company in April of '20. We had our building under construction. [01:10:00] We bought Blue Ribbon Lawns from Kerry DeLauter and we were like in the peak of COVID and no one knew how the COVID world was gonna like go at the time and our finance team was like, "No more hiring.
The world is coming to an end. Like we've gotta like, we just gotta like batten down the hatches. We gotta make it until this pandemic's done." What we should have done is hired every person with a pulse right then, because by that summer everyone was trapped at home working from home, and they're looking out their backyard and they're like, "I need to fix that," or, "I wanna make this better.
I'm... You know, I need my outdoor space," 'cause of the dis- social distancing and all that. And so then we, we were... You know, it was a challenge to keep up with the demand because of that. So, like, install that year was astronomically high. So it kinda, it, it kinda ebbs and flows a little bit.
Cameron: Is the big growth, like, potential right now the site work arm?
Alex: So- ... so the, from a business perspective, I think that, [01:11:00] I think there's a lot of opportunities on the landscaping side. That is not our focus on a day-to-day, 'cause that's Dan's world at this point. But I, I think that there's a lot of opportunities there. We've... I think there's opportunities to grow the commercial.
I think that there's opportunities to grow the residential, maybe i- even getting into, like, a different service offering that's not just, like, the premium stuff. It's a, it's a totally different business unit, so it's like you have to learn and, you know, put some risk into that. But I think there's a lot of opportunities on a lot of fronts there.
And expanded service offerings, power washing, you know, other things that need to be done at a home or a commercial property. So I think there's opportunities there. Um, from our side, uh, a couple years ago when Dan came on, all the operations ran up through me, and that was landscaping, trucking site work, dumpsters, topsoil, the farm.
That's what we called the... Bluebonnet Farms is gonna be the neighbor- uh, the garden center. [01:12:00] All that rolled up to me. When Dan came on, it's kinda like Dan was like I use, like, the Mr. Miyagi Karate Kid, like, wax on, wax off. Like, he just wanted to focus on... He's like, "I just wanna focus on landscaping."
So then I was like, "I'll take everything else." And, we, some of them we spun off cl- you know, shuttered. But the ones that we kept, I was like, "I'll be the one that, I belie- I believe in these pieces." And, um, within those, I think that there's only, like, so much you can grow, like, a topsoil business.
There's a, kind of a market cap around here. But on the, on the flip side, like the dumpster world, I think that, you know, the sky's the limit of where we can grow that. And, um, so that's, like, our, I think our biggest offering. Our biggest focus is growing the dumpster in the next few years. I think there's a ton of opportunity on the site work side.
There's no shortage of construction The challenge with site work is it's, it's very little recurring business. It's mostly all [01:13:00] install. So, like, every month you gotta eat what you kill. And in the, um, in the construction world, it's very much like we'll have times where we've sold in a ton... We'll have, like, nine projects, like, lined up, and we're like, "We're gonna have to hire more guys."
And then all of a sudden, well, one project got delayed because of financing. One, the city came back and wanted them to add another road, so, like, we gotta go back to that. Another, a tenant fell. So all of a sudden you went from having nine projects to all... It's gotten to where we had none. And you're like, "We had nine signed contracts, but they all got delayed of things that had nothing to do with stuff that we had, weather-"
Lauren: Well, I think that's, like, the good and, and good, good and bad piece of being vertically integrated, right?
Yeah. So, like, with our site side, it makes sense. Once Trade Winds kicks off- Yeah ... and all of our other developments, it's awesome.
Cameron: Yeah, and there's constant work. You know what's going on.
Lauren: There's constant work. Yeah. But when it is delayed, like, a year- Yeah ... past when it was supposed to start, and we haven't been out selling, because the sell cycle's long.
Mm-hmm. You know, a lot of these things take [01:14:00] six months to a year. Yeah. And so we had kinda said, you know, "We're gonna slow down here because we wanna have our crew focused on Trade Winds." Yeah. Well, then it didn't happen. Well, now you're in a pinch, you know? Like, that's when cash flow really becomes a problem.
And so I think this past year, the directive, at least for me, has been Growth is a good problem to have, right? Like, we can figure it out if you continue to sell. If we need to hire in more crews, if we need to buy more trucks, that's totally fine. Mm. But, like, none of thi- all this goes away if we don't have the sales there to support the business.
Mm. Um, and so now we've really just gone out, and we're really not thinking about Trade Winds. We're thinking about how do we grow the business outside of our development, so regardless of what happens with what we're doing, it's always gonna be self-sustaining.
Nick: You got outdoors, then you have dumpster, you have site work.
Alex: Yes. Those are the... So we, we had a trucking business. We had 54 dump trucks. That was one of the operations that, uh, that we ran u- ran under Blue Ribbon Trucking, and that was, like, one, one of those businesses [01:15:00] like each day you've gotta sell every dump truck out the door for jobs. And those got...
if you're doing RDOT work and RDOT decides not to shut down a road that day, well, now you've gotta find a spot to put all those trucks. Either way, you gotta pay your drivers, you got a note to pay, you got insurance. And, um, what really hit us was post-COVID the... we had, like, a service team 'cause those trucks, there's always something breaking.
And even with, like, us servicing the trucks ourselves, the cost post-COVID when ev- all, all the materials, everything started skyrocketing the cost of maintenance skyrocketed. And then what was kinda like the final nail in the coffin for us is the insurance premium, we got reclassified from one year to the next on, like, like the business that we're in from an insurance perspective.
The trucks got reclassified, and our premium went up net increase of, like, a million dollars from one year to another. And we're like, "We... Did you th- did someone tell you we, like, ran over, like, a school [01:16:00] bus of kids or something?" 'Cause, like, we didn't have, like, any problems. Like, why is there, like, this crazy change?
And they're like, "Well, there was just a reclassification in the business." And, like- you can't really argue with it. And so we were like there... But at the time, every- there was shortages of trucks, and so, uh, with our partners, we were lucky to s- you know, shutter that pretty quickly. We were like, there's, there's not enough time, you know, for the amount of time we're putting into it, and with these new cost escalations, if we tried to pass that on to the people in the market for like a, a hourly rate or like a cubic yard rate, like you would be out of the business.
And so we're-- And that was one of the first ones that we're like, we need to focus on things that have, you know, you don't have to eat, you don't have to hunt every day for it. And that was one of the challenges, like, so when everything split and I took over the site work side before Lauren came in, I was like, I wanna keep this thing as nimble as possible, and I don't wanna...
I, I wanna add [01:17:00] as little as possible because of like the, those challenges from growing too big. And so like we learned the challenges on one side of like they're... It's really easy to get into a business. It's a lot harder to get out of a deal. That's real estate, that's an operating company. The, um So we learned a lot from that on the trucking side.
And then on the site work side, we almost went too far the other way at first to where it was like we wanna be really conservative. We don't wanna grow this thing too big. For the first few years, um, Justin, who's our head of operations there, God love him, we built out a shipping container, and, like, his office was just like, he was like a nomad, and it was like we built everything in a container that we owned, so, like, our overhead was zero.
We just put the con- shipping container, whatever the project was we were working on, and I was like, "We're gonna d- run this thing as nimbly as possible." And there was a little bit of, like, when you- on the trucking side, like, we had safety officers and, like, multiple HR staff and IT teams to, keep up with [01:18:00] all their stuff.
I was like, "I wanna have a business which is, like, me and the guy running the crews, and we're just... It's simple and easy." And it was, it w- the problem in this world is you either have to be, like, really small, or you have to get to, like, a certain size. And so we're, we're in that period right now that we're scaling up to, like, kinda, like, that next level.
We never wanna be someone that's competing with, like, the big site work guys here, but we want... We gotta be bigger than we are now but not on that level that we're going af- you know, having to go after road projects and, and the really big things.
Nick: So the goal to be, to be able to do a whole neighborhood yourself, like that, is that-
Lauren: No, because we don't do concrete.
Okay. And so we do a lot, we partner a lot with ESS. So we say that we're kind of like the little sister company, and they come in first, and we kind of are underneath them doing the smaller things that they don't necessarily want to do. And so I think that it's more we had a meeting yesterday. It's like we work really well with ESS and some of the others.
How do we go after those others as well? And you might not wanna do, like, the [01:19:00] conduit, or you might not want to do the swap and s- some of those just basic things. How can we help you?
Cameron: Kinda getting to where we're r- wrapping up here, the you talked a little bit about the future. A- anything else that, like, over the next five years, like what you hope you know, across your different companies or, or developments?
I know those are, like, some of them are already in the works, like, "Hey, this is where we wanna be in five years with this." But anything else you haven't said, hey, for the future maybe people can expect from, the Blase family?
Lauren: I just wanna see these projects that we've got in the pipeline finished.
Yeah. And that's what I wanna see, and that's where I will be happy. So I wanna say that we have set out to accomplish these goals. We have, accomplished them. And then I think for the future, Keith kind of said it earlier, a lot of these projects are big projects. I want a simple neighborhood.
I want an easy one, just s- 10 homes. You know what I mean? Just come in, do the site work, and move on. That feels good. And I think for me, like, I feel so much more comfortable, like, in the opco world. Like, that just from my background makes sense, you know? And so I think that my focus after [01:20:00] this development piece, I mean, and I know we'll always continue to develop in some way, I really wanna just focus on the businesses and growing those businesses.
Alex: I would say I think that I agree with everything Lauren's saying. Uh, my goal... So, like right now, as we said, uh, we're in Lauren's office at our office. It's Lauren, my dad, and myself. And so at the end of the day, there's a lot of stuff that has to be done every day that the challenge is, like, you have to get these things done, but then it's taking away time from us working on things that could be much better use of our time.
And so we're at that small stage of this new family office we moved in here in January. We wanna get some of these pr- uh, get a little bit bigger in size to where then it's like you could have a team that's not just the three of us, but people that are like-minded that could help, especially with some of, like, the day-to-day things that takes time away from opportunities elsewhere.
And so, like, I would like to see where we've... And we're on [01:21:00] that path, we're just not quite there yet of having a couple people that maybe work with us on the real estate, the development side. The operating companies, they've, we've got a great team there. They will continue to grow, and we'll add more manag- management there that will free up those that are best at business development and things that help really scale the company.
It's, um, I, um- I, I listened to a, a podcast the other day, and someone was saying that it's expensive to be poor. And that doesn't mean, like, necessarily, like, poor like in, like you don't have any money. That's obviously a way of it too. But it's, it's expensive to be, like, a small business to where, like, you have to be doing all these things because then it's taking away that it, it's costing you money that you're not out there doing the things that makes the most money for it.
So it's, it's really hard in a small business to get to that size to where, like, you're not over here paying the electric bills and the, these things or, you know, tracking down why is this water meter high, and I gotta go- Right ... [01:22:00] gotta deal with this, as opposed to going out and meeting with, the next subdivision deal.
But if you don't do this, you don't have your water, and you can't function without that. So it's like that's the challenge that any small business has is getting to that point that you're, you've got the people around you that you can focus on where your time is most important.
Cameron: Two questions we ask at the end of every episode.
One, why build a business in Northwest Arkansas? But I actually wanna scrap that 'cause I think you answered that earlier unless there's more you wanna add. But the main one is how do you define success? And I'd like for both of y'all to answer.
Lauren: Ooh. Okay. Well, suc- so this is gonna be an interesting answer, and probably, like, a multi-pronged answer.
Success for me, and background, we have three kids, so we have nine, seven, and five. They come into this office every afternoon. So at 2:30, they're here. I work with e- them on their homework, and it's their family office as well, right? Like, they are so entrenched in the business that they hear the calls that are happening.
They know the, our employees. You know, [01:23:00] our director of site, Justin, has worked for us for almost a decade, and that's like an uncle to him. Do you know what I mean? Yeah. And so I think success for me is, one, family legacy and continuing this family legacy because this is a fourth generation now. So, you know, I, um, I've obviously married into this, but I want people to be like, "She was additive," you know, and helped grow this.
And then I think, too, coming from corporate and take... I took, like, a year-and-a-half sabbatical after our third, when she was a year old. I always felt like I was having to separate my time, and I felt like I, you know, was at work, and I had to work like I wasn't a mom. And then I would go to school, and I would feel guilty of like, "Oh, okay, well, I'm, you know, I'm not able to be a homeroom mom.
I'm not able to do all of these things and help with book fair and whatever." And I just always felt so bad, like I just was not winning at anything. And so now it's very much like, how do I integrate my life as much as possible? So it's like my family, my kids are a part of this. I can still work. I can work with my husband [01:24:00] and my father-in-law.
Like, that's success to me. Just surrounding myself with family who loves me, who supports me. Like, that's the best.
Cameron: What do you say to other women that may feel like that?
Lauren: Oh, quit your job. For, like, truly. Like, if you have the ability and you are on the fence, because I just... I was so burnt out. I was trying to do it all.
I was working, like, 60, 70-hour weeks, and it's kind of like... So I was an SVP at an agency leading, um, Coke North America, their commerce marketing. Before that it was Unilever and Mondelez and all these big, you know, Fortune 500s. And the job title is incredible, right? And you think that it's glamorous, but in reality it's, um, you're on calls all day long.
And a lot of times you're not even needed in the call. It's more so you're the figurehead just in case something goes sideways, and you're sitting there to chime in. So then it's like the actual heavy work that you need to get done isn't done until the evenings or the weekends, which is when I want to be with my kids, right?
And so I think that it got to the point where [01:25:00] I was traveling all the time. When I decided to leave, my oldest was five, so he was in kindergarten. And it just got to the point where I felt like I was missing everything. I felt like I was so exhausted. I got to the point where, like, remember when I couldn't feel my leg at all?
Like, it was numb from my knee down for, like, a month.
Alex: Well, and your eyes, too.
Lauren: My eye. Like, so many things. And it was very much like I knew in my heart that I needed to take a break, but it was like my body was also saying, like, "You gotta stop." And so I remember I was, like, having an MRI. We thought that I had MS, and I was sitting there thinking, "This is deleterious to my health at this point.
Like, what am I doing?" Mm. And so I resigned, and then my boss was going to Europe for two weeks, and he said, "Can you just stay for like six weeks? Like, you cover while I'm gone, then give us a month to kind of, like, hire and backfill your position." And that six weeks was enough for me to kind of, like, second-guess my decision, and to be like, "You know what?
No. Like, I, I, I don't wanna walk away from this. I've built [01:26:00] my whole career. Like, what will I do? Who am I gonna be?" You know what I mean? And so I rescinded my resignation and said, "Never mind." And then it took me, like, another 10 months of nothing is changing, my health is deteriorating, I am so overwhelmed.
And then, you know, I finally just took the time. I took a year and a half off, and it was the best year and a half because it really gave me clarity on like, who am I if I'm not my job title? Like, who am I as an individual? And then, you know, I just kind of spent a lot of time thinking about what I wanted to do, like what's the impact, what's the legacy I wanna leave.
And it really... You know, I think, like I said, it was kind of hard to be like, do I wanna be Alex's wife coming into this entirely different role, starting completely over, because I'm a broker at Sage as well, and I'm an associate, right? Like, I am the oldest per- You were there the other day. But I'm the oldest person there by 15 years, right?
Like, but those little angels, like, they are so sweet. They are my besties. I love them. And it's just, it's [01:27:00] honestly really freeing, you know? It's just- Yeah. It's, it's been great. So that's what I would say. Wow. Long-winded, but that's what I would say.
Cameron: Thanks. Alex, how do you find, how do you define success? I
Alex: should have gone first.
Um, how I define success so I grew up- In Little Rock, in, uh, in the Heights where ev- everywhere knew everyone. And I was very much like my father's son, and I was convinced that I wanted to branch out on my own. And, like, what I saw as success for the longest time when I came up here was like, I wanna prove myself in everything that I can do, that I, you know, I'm, you know, stand on my own, make my own name for myself.
And so for the longest time it was like, I'm gonna do all these crazy things. And it was that's, that combined with like my mom being sick led me to trying to be doing so much at one time. And learned a lot from there. [01:28:00] But I thought that, like, I wanted to be... My success was like, everyone knows my name and like, you know, I've, I've made these list of accomplishments, whatever that might be.
And, uh, you know, from, from losing a parent, from having three kids, from having Lauren in my life a lot of that's changed over time. And you know, it, it's easy t- for people to, like, have, like, that soundbite and be like, "Success is my family," and things like that. But it really, it truly is like Well, the way that I look at as being successful is getting to be able to spend ti- the time that I do with my wife with our kids, with my dad.
It's really, really fu- Like, the... It's great when a deal hits and, like, you know, the check clears type thing, to be clear. But, like, it's really, it's the most excitement and the most fun, and if you're in the real estate world, you know that most of the times not everything aligns [01:29:00] your way. But, like, when you get to work on something with Lauren, with my dad, and, like, it all goes right, that fun, that excitement, that joy that we got because we all worked together and we got it done, that feels better than anything, anything else I've ever experienced in my life from, like, a, from a business career perspective.
Knowing that, like, we did it together and we, you know, we accomplished something, that's, that's been really cool. And then having the flexibility to where, I mean, w- in the, in today's world with technology, it's a blessing and a curse. Like, we, we have the means and the ability that we do get to travel a whole lot, and I'm thankful that we get to do a lot of really fun adventures with our kids.
But in order to be successful, that also means that a lot of the times that's walking, uh, in the Disney,
Lauren: The wizarding world of Harry Potter on a call or, you know- Yeah. Like, that's just how it goes.
Alex: But, like, that's, [01:30:00] it's what it takes to be successful, and it's still, you know, while it's not fun for that moment, then you get to go and have, like, a, you're waiting three hours for a two-minute ride, and it's really fun, but you got to do all that because you kept, kept the wheels on the bus while you're there.
So I'd, I'd say that, from my perspective, it's success is not d- At the end of the day, it's... And it's easy to say all that. You then, y- Number one, like, you have to make sure you're taking care of your family. So, like, you gotta be in a position to where, like, you're not worried that, "Am I gonna pay the mortgage this month?"
You're not worried, like, "Can I cover, like, the utility bills?" Or, you know, in today's world, like, daycare is so expensive, and just going out to eat, I mean, it's crazy what the, what it costs to live in the world today. And, you know, I don't want to take for granted that, like... And we've had challenges along the way where it's like, I don't know if we're gonna be able to cover it all this month because of challenges in the world.
That's just how it happens. But so, like, I always think in the back of my mind it- it's [01:31:00] this s- success is having that freedom of, like, not having that on your plate, and most people in the world don't have that, unfortunately. But for us personally, I would say it's, family and, and getting to work together.
Nick: It's awesome. Uh, well, one of the things we do at the end of every episode is we walk through kind of the big themes just through the conversation that we learned today, we think our listeners will learn. Um, and the three words that really come to mind, we'll start with vision. I think you highlighted that about Alex, like from the beginning, and even just together, like, it sounds like this vision is now colliding, and it's not just one.
It's like you both have a vision of what you wanna do and what you wanna build together. But even just talking through the projects, Bellevue Industrial, like, there... Those are some... I remember growing up, there wasn't really anything on the east side of- There wasn't anything on the west side of Pinnacle, but there especially wasn't anything on the east side of Pinnacle.
So to see that area really transform, it took a lot of vision east of the mall there. And so, and just even hearing about what you guys want [01:32:00] the next five, 10 years to look like for this area and for Pinnacle it takes a lot of vision. And so both on the business side and on the family side, it, it feels like the vision is a really good word to describe what you guys are doing together and, and what we learned.
I think the second one is strategic, and I think that's a really big gift of yours, Lauren. Like, coming in and saying, "Chop chop. Focus, focus, focus." Everyone needs strategy in their business, and it seems like that's a gift that you've had you were born with, you've grown into. And sounds like, it's gonna be a huge asset to the family and to the businesses moving forward.
And then I think the last piece, this would be maybe more of your gift, is the word conviction, and Lauren's probably gonna laugh at that. But you use the words like die trying, like, "I'll die trying." And I think if you're an entrepreneur, if you're building something, you have to die trying. You have to have conviction.
And I think hearing about the arms of your businesses, like, these are [01:33:00] labor-intensive businesses. These are capital-intensive businesses. These are businesses that you will die trying, and so that was just really cool to hear. I think I left with, like, you have this really strong superpower of being convicted about things, and you have this really strong-
superpower of, like, "Okay, I have a strategy. I can- Yeah. "We have this conviction, but, like, here's how we're gonna do it." And, uh, it really, it all ties together with, like, okay, here's our vision as a family five years from now, 10 years from now, and I don't know. It's really cool. So we learned a lot. We think people will learn a lot from you guys, so thanks for your time, Lauren and Alex.
Alex: Thank you.
Nick: Thank you.