Alan Lockridge welcome to acquiring mines thanks will appreciate you having me and uh certainly appreciate what you do for the community uh about both acquisition and running the business after the acquisition which sometimes is the harder part yep for sure uh well I appreciate that Allan and we're going to get uh into both those topics you bought a business in a category that doesn't get a lot of attention from Searchers it doesn't check the boxes let's say no recurring Revenue consumer big tickets discretionary I'm talking about residential construction a niche within residential construction and yet here you are your business is healthy steady no big swings as yet growing so we're going to learn what it's like to buy such a business and why Searchers should maybe be a little bit more open-minded about residential construction residential Contracting businesses but start us off Allan please please with some background on you sure thanks will uh I spent about 20 years of my career in professional Services Consulting Services um and uh that was really a kind of a project-based business which is is kind of how we LED here today but uh along the way I worked for uh you mainly three uh small consulting firms and uh over the course of my career all of those consulting firms were either acquired Andor had an IPO activity uh during that time and as we grew bigger uh I felt less and less uh enamored with the organization and so in 2015 when my uh last company that I was with was acquired uh joined a big International firm as part of that and really didn't feel that I fit in anymore and wanted to get into that so something smaller uh my original intent was probably to go back to a smaller consulting firm uh and so I took a package to to leave that firm just to get out it wasn't really a good fit for me anymore it was kind of taking some time to think about it and uh and that's when you know a friend of mine suggested I should look into into buying a business and so uh after 20 years of leading Consulting teams uh some at pretty significant scale about 30 million a year and 300 so uh individuals on contracts in any given time kind of decided it was time to look for something different and Allan this friend of yours who recommended buying a business uh so I I take that to mean you were telling him that you weren't that excited about going back to Consulting why did he volunteer this idea of all ideas which is pretty off the Beaten Track for your own career yeah I I think we we had discussed in a preall I am uh a member of a a men's workout group called F3 and this was a a guy I was running with in the morning and and sometimes uh we do workouts early in the morning and and those guys get to be good friends and get to know a lot more about you and sometimes put a miror up that you don't even see uh to what's going on in life and and he kind of knew I wanted something different and and frankly at the time I had never even heard about buying a business right so my intention was to go back and to just be part of a small company I didn't I wasn't really a I don't feel like I'm a startup guy uh but certainly can come in and operate and grow and uh and so he kind of threw it out there that's just kind of got the bug going and and took it from there had he done it just curious he well he was a uh a small banker and so he'd been on the other side uh doing lending for these companies so he had seen uh the entrepreneurs from that perspective great and did and so it immediately resonated with you you didn't find it to left field because probably that's the that's the default reaction for a lot of people buy a business what are you talking about you know I'd have to go back and think I mean it was just you know I I was I was kind of in this period uh when I it was kind of towards the end of the calendar year so I wasn't really actively looking for a job I was kind of going to wait until the the new year started so I had some time uh kind of started to to get into the reading I met with uh a local broker here which circled back three years later is the broker I actually bought through uh but uh and they had a pretty good presentation for new buyers and just kind of you know just kind of it was intriguing and realized the opportunity was really there that I had never really known about before well you and you and so many others and that was about 2017 2017 okay great okay so the holidays he he plants this seed you start going down the rabbit hole you like the idea uh and and what is the final kind of step to make this real and decide that this is what you're going to go do you know I don't know if there was any individual piece I just started kind of digging into it further I did uh started going on a couple of uh visits to meet with business owners on particular businesses uh none of those early ones really led to an Loi but it was just just a bit of a a teaser into what I might get myself into really you know I think I caught the bug pretty quick at that point thinking that this could be possible uh you know certainly it could make the numbers work out I was always interested in a self-funded search um you know I had some some Capital set of side um didn't really part of the the going off on my own was having that autonomy and and didn't feel the need to to bring in investors at that point um had a fairly good Network otherwise that I could reach out to if I needed help otherwise um but wanted to do it on my own great and so were you you were imagining an SBA Style 10 20% down that's correct yeah I was I was always going to take out a loan for it okay well tell us more parameters around your search what size of business geography Etc yeah so I was heavily focused on the Charlotte North Carolina market where I live I had you know at the at the time well currently I have a daughter in college and in in high school at the time they are Middle School and High School uh really wasn't a need to move uh extended family brothers and family are uh parents are here too so I didn't really want to move and at the same time the Charlotte Market is a very growing market so I always felt that we were in a place that uh new and potential uh customers were going to continue to be attracted to so you almost have to stand here and you're going to get a greater growth rate than average in America um you know which would be more challenging if you were in a in a in a a different Market where people were leaving and and you're always trying to kind of regain that traction so um that definitely narrowed my search pretty tight on on the market so I was pretty broad on the types of work but most of it was always going to be manufacturing or Services based just because that was my background Services was your background manufacturing is actually one that's often avoided by Searchers so why why did that why were you open to that I was looking at things that were a little bit smaller I was open to it I was an engineering college so some of the technical pieces never really scared me uh off too much um do I think I was going to buy you know a sizeall manufacturer with a ton of equipment no I mean but when you're when you have to keep the aperture wide you start digging around at all kinds of stuff um and some of the manufacturers I looked at were kind of small sign companies things like that that were doing custom work but but on a small scale sure the sign company that's one that you you see on bis by cell I found one that was pretty unique though that I I did have an Loi on but Co kind of killed um and they they did some more uh custom banners large scale you know think uh Stadium sizes and so forth so they were they were kind of in a niche in the local market and had you quit your W2 and you were going all in full-time on this or what did it look like kind of your day-to-day I had already I had already left I took that buyout package and left uh the company I was with so I was I was full-time into it and spent full-time into it for about a year and um ended up going back I I had hire colleague who had an opportunity just to uh go back and do some work so I did go back and work uh in a in a bank for a little bit uh you know look at the end of the day you start wondering how long this process is going to take and the cash starts to drain away so you just think what can I do to keep me uh you know stable until then um and so did that for a couple years but honestly that really helped out because during covid the market sort of dried up pretty tight so it's definitely a lot harder to find potential leads and so and were you said you talked to uh a broker were you doing just broker search or were you were you trying to look under every Rock uh I did broker search I did a little bit of Outreach and I did hire a uh buy side broker that I worked with for a while and he he did a good job yeah so it was a uh a company they they work across the country based out of Tennessee uh but they they they are continuously doing a search and they're kind of compiling all their potential targets and then when somebody comes in uh there was a small upfront fee they start to kind of reinvigorate some of those targets and bring them up to you that that might be a good fit uh and they kind of support through the acquisition process um for a couple reasons none of those worked out I would have paid them on a um at at purchase a percentage of the purchase price so I wasn't paying an ongoing monthly fee but would have paid them a percentage of the of the sale price at the end and but you did also pay an Initiation fee yeah it was pretty small a couple thousand bucks I think okay and how was that experience did you find that they were providing good deal flow even it sounds like you didn't end up closing with a business that they brought to you yeah I did I mean I I think we found good deal flow um I had two under Loi uh both were good I think one uh one fell apart kind of at the last minute like some of these things do just kind of final negotiations between the seller and I it just didn't work out um that was in a a disaster restoration business and then the other one was that Banner company um that was going along pretty well but took a 40% hit on Revenue in covid and that kind of slowed things down and that deal kind of fizzled uh at that point so so they actually it was a positive experience working with out because each of the deals had its own re reasons for failing but they brought you quality deal flow yeah they did and there was a couple others in there that were uh reasonable some other some other lines that I think I would have been attracted to either I was in the middle of another Loi and didn't have the capacity to kind of take on both but um yeah I would I would I would recommend it as a way to do it especially for somebody who's you know doesn't have the capacity to spend you know 100% of the time on cold Outreach and really trying to drive it that way or or narrow Market search so you would recommend it you thought even though again didn't work out exactly in your case you thought it was a valuable service and you could see it working out and being worth the money yes yeah I I could and and the reason it didn't work out weren't really relevant to the broker per se just they die like all deals have an opportunity to die mhm can you say what the what the uh uh price would have been the commission would have been if you had actually yeah okay okay great thank you Alan all right so you so you you got two businesses under Loi and then the third was the business you ultimately bought that's right yeah and so tell us about that business how you found it and then the bullet points of the business sure so uh the business popped up on a local brokerage uh here that I had followed and I actually had a lot of respect for one of the first ones that I had met with uh they do a pretty good job in the in the market here it it kind of popped up it just highlighted some things that I was interested in um and more as I read the Sim I thought man I I really feel like I I know this business and uh so I reached out to the broker uh with interest and we spent about an hour together and at the time you know he wasn't necessarily sharing the name of the firm uh you know he's just trying to gauge legitimate interest and and capacity to buy and so forth and we get about 45 minutes in the conversation and I said said is this the Stoneman and uh he was surprised that I knew and so it turns out that um it the company that I bought I actually personally used four years prior uh to build uh a pool and and Grill Island and things in my backyard um not funny and the reason I use them is because the owner uh the prior owner was also in the F3 men's workout group and I had spent time with him and knew him you know reasonably well would say that we weren't uh we weren't best friends that were hanging out every day but you know our circles would would certainly run into each other uh here and again uh so you know had a had a had a good knowledge of the owner certainly a thorough understanding of the product and how they offer it and uh and so it just kind of really fell into place in that sense well obviously one technique for Searchers to diligence a consumer business is to shop the business themselves uh but you're the tickets the cost for the service that the stonem man delivers is not one that you can shop because we're talking five figure purchases if you hadn't already you would never be able to do that so what a happy coincidence and obviously you had been pleased with the service other otherwise you wouldn't have continued with the conversation with that broker that's right and just uh timeline here Alan so how long have you been at this this is the broker that you had reached out to way back when the first colleague of yours recommended you buy business so it was uh I think the first reach out to them was in 2018 and then I I met with them about this opportunity in uh 20121 so kind of onun the tail into covid which was a real Boon for the ston man because it was construction based you had a lot of people who were now staying at home and wanted to spend the money and upgrade whatever uh homebased entertainment they had and so uh it was construction business so it wasn't limited or shut down because of covid uh I think they shut down for the time maybe two weeks until they open back up as an essential business and and really just kept rolling and kept rolling and and then some and and growing faster yeah yeah well I want I want to hear a little bit more about that but first just to so we have a full picture of your search so 2018 to 2021 uh some you know searching pretty intensely but also taking going back and taking some Consulting work yeah and using a bided broker so but would you characterize your search as a threeyear search two to threee search uh where you're devoting a lot of that time and energy during those two or three years to the search it was pretty considerable probably you know I think during Co it got a lot less I just saw a lot less deal flow I wasn't actively pursuing um and primarily because I was uncomfortable with being able to even get clean financials with the bounces and ups and downs that that Co brought so it just was going to bring more challenge um you know I had I had a tight Market fit being in Charlotte and I was I was trying to be pretty particular right I wanted something that um that I thought was going to be a bit of a niche that was going to be a little bit uh of an opportunity to kind of stretch some boundaries that you know some some basic things weren't going to do I have I have good friends that that owns Home Services business right the HVAC guys and all that stuff and and while they look pretty on paper you know the challenge on their they've got their own challenges right the the Market's difficult your your paid to advertising is expensive your technicians are hard to find so it's sure it's not as glamorous as the book makes it yeah yeah okay great well you decide you like the St man um or you decide to at least proceed with it but tell us a little bit more about the business please size employees Revenue give us more of a picture of what this business is all about sure in the uh preceding years before I bought it in in um between 18 and 2020 they grew from about 4 million to about 5 and a half million in Revenue um they internally it's a small team of 12 and uh but we have a lot of external subcontractors that we use uh we've got half a dozen masonry teams which is our primary and and while they are subcontractors they and they own independent entities we we work with them every day of the year for the most part so we're we're really close to those those teams and and what they can accomplish and and and being able to support them along the way uh so so yeah about 5.5 million uh at the end of 2020 um the sde had really jumped in 2020 uh was they were kind of average in mid- teens but kind of jumped up to low 20% SD uh on that year I think a lot of it driven by uh just pretty much running hard during covid and and a lot of growth coming in due to folks calling in and said they some of the back office wasn't really supporting that level of growth now so you knew it was going to even out a bit as we get further down the road MH and so was it priced off of those generous 2020 numbers uh or probably BL 2020 numbers though I um it was a two and a half multiple off the 2020 numbers oh good so you know I mean if you if you if you averaged out the last three years it was closer to a three multiple but yeah but really kind of balanced out for the fact that it was in a growth mode and not not steady at that that rate yep great and and so it does uh hardscaping so give us what is the what is the service delivered and what are kind of average tickets sure we do uh 95% residential hardscapes in and around the Charlotte Market uh that includes outdoor patios Grill Islands fireplaces fire pits we also do covered structures Pavilions um they might be attached to the home they might be detached we do pergolas um we do a lot of pool surrounds we don't the pool digging per se but we do the um the surrounds and so forth specialize in a lot of Natural Stone so while we can do some manufactured pavers and things like that we also do um a lot of just natural stone stacked and veneer uh which is which is really kind of the niche that we can kind of we can play and and help you know drive a premium at that our average ticket over the course of the year is about 70,000 so and that ranges from uh 15,000 to 300 plus and it's really despite the fact that you said you'll do pergolas and and covered um covered spaces and so on it's called the ston man you said your your differentiator is Natural Stone sure and that and that these you got these Crews of Masons that you work with so it's really that's really where the the majority of your work is is in laying Stones yeah that's that's that's probably how we go in with the basis of it and the rest of it just sort of grows on as as the projects get bigger and the needs get get wider and you know often times folks want a fireplace but if and we can do that a lovely fireplace but you know they they want it inside a little building so they can uh hang out in the winter time and and have the fireplace on and and be covered from the elements okay and so just to wrap up the deal um can you well first of all so this is 20211 yeah you're recognizing that there's a covid bump that's occurred uh by that time it's well documented in the news and you can probably seeing it in the numbers maybe the seller telling you um but um were you not spooked just by Co in general just the uncertainty of making such a big move in your life when this thing is going on all around us at that point not really um you know we had been going on for about a year of this um yeah and you know I saw the market continue to grow I saw folks continue to buy um I I I there's still a lot of huge Market in Charlotte having been in you know Charlotte's big for for for banks and having been in that space what I do know is that for banking Banks like Charlotte because the Market's cheap for for labor relative to New York City or Chicago or places San Francisco and so there will continue to be a draw to bring in some some low compensated Talent into this Market uh because it's beneficial for the industry and um so I just I just kind of was bullish more on the Charlotte market and I knew Co was going to go away y yep great okay and so wrapping up the the the deal can you share the terms you you told us what the multiple was but can you share any more about it yeah so sell was pretty adamant about not taking a seller note so uh just went in a pretty straightforward uh 10% cash on my side um I used a robs uh I 401K roll over for that and 90% SBA loan I think at the time it might have been easier to to drive that through the banks because the cares act had increased how much the SBA was backing to the banks uh I think it's typically 75 but they moved it to 90 during the car act time so the banks were probably a little more flexible about not taking that seller note um in this case you you know yeah that's that was a risk on my end to not really tie anything to the seller but again you know we had we had a relationship prior to me buying the business we have quite a few mutual friends I there really wasn't there was more social impact to both of us you know to try to make it work and and treat each other fairly which not that that was needed I think we had a really great relationship and still do but um that was the back stop in that case yeah yeah sure sure that's I think that's valuable hard to measure uh how much that mitigates the risk but it certainly does yeah the and why was the cell was the seller at retirement age why was the what was the reason we are actually pretty close to the same age uh and he was he was really looking for a change he built this from scratch uh soon after he graduated from college and was just looking for a change and you know I I joke with people who who are talking about buying businesses and what it's like to meet with owners and I they say what's the common theme for people leaving and I said for me the common theme was well I've been doing this about 20 years and I really feel that there's this entrepreneurial path where people spend 5 8 10 years building and then they get to a level where they're comfortable and they float that with some comfort and then then and then he hit about 20 and and and like a lot of the owners I met with they just didn't have the energy or the desire to really you know push on on new boundaries or increased scale or you know things like that and so he just was was kind of looking for a change and he you know his 20 years was just happened to be younger than most because he started so he wasn't necessarily looking to retire period but retire from this business yeah yeah and and he was looking for a location change wanted to move to the mountains wanted to live a different life for a little while so that's what he did great okay Alan and tell us a little bit about robs uh you uh Define it for those in the audience who aren't familiar and then why you used it how you know what the process was like sure I know you've had a couple of uh entrepreneurs on recently you used it so so robs is a format where uh you can use money out of your IRA or 401k to effectively acquire stock in in the company you're going to buy um so uh just like your IRA you can you can buy stock in apple or Microsoft you can buy stock in your own individual entity uh there's a lot of IRS rules around it there's there's a couple of vendors out there who who do the support you you know you pay them a fee and they they kind of help fill out all the paperwork and all that stuff for it um so for me it just worked I had some capacity in my 401k to spend there um and it was easy and then once you have that open that that I I could have funded more dollars in if I needed to if I started to hit you know needed more cash in I could have reinvested through the 41k um I did not need that and actually in the long run I didn't want my 401k my IRA to be the owner of the business which is effectively how the robs works so um at about 18 months into the business I actually had the business valued valued and repurchased the shares so I I basically bought the the the stock back from the 401K and Clos that countdown so now um it is no longer known to the company it's just me my recent guest or update guest Doug John's did the same thing bought used robs and then bought out his his Ira so that ownership returned to uh he and his wife um and so I thought that that was an unusual thing that Doug did I just recently had a conversation with somebody who said no that's actually what a lot of people try to do you did that yeah so tell us a little bit more about that because one of the things that people won't like about robs at first blush is that it's like oh wait my IRA owns the business I don't or owns a material part of the business I don't which is true initially but it's also common that you Circle back that the acquisition entrepreneur circles back around to buy out the robs tell us a little bit more about that process sure so if you if you choose not to buy out the process if you choose not to buy out the robs which a lot of people do uh eventually you would you would pay off your SBA loan the business would have a valuation hopefully greater than when you started and and if you ended up selling that business the entire proceeds of that business would be would go back into your IRA or your 401k and um effectively no tax payment at that time right they would be taxed upon uh when you when you take the money out as you retire um the opportunity to buy it out earlier because the business is still sitting on a sizable loan the total valuation of the business is a lot smaller so it's a cheaper option to buy it out earlier in the process than than waiting to the end and effectively having to completely Reby the business um so that's kind of why I opted to do it quickly I would say my provider it sounded like they weren't doing it very often most of the most of the time they close out the robs was up on sale but well I and I think that Doug John said the same thing and that's why I was under the impression that it wasn't common to buy out buy the IRA back out because it seemed like Doug really had to kind of struggle to figure that out hand inand with his provider I would say the same oh really I say the same so yeah interesting because I it makes sense but as I said I had this side conversation this week with somebody who said No it's it's quite common to do that um but let's also just drill down on your point there Allan about the if you wait to do this right the evaluation of the business goes up and you get stuck because to buy out your IRA you need a lot of a lot of money to effectively you know because the evaluation of the business has gone up so both you and Doug did it relatively in relatively short order after becoming owners of the business but then the question is well if you could do it 18 months later how did you have the money to do it 18 months later if you just didn't if you didn't have the money to just buy the business without your IRA 18 months prior when you initially bought the business business proceeds I I rebot it I basically bought the shares out with the business proceeds over that 18 months so um I took the gains from the business over that 18 months and and essentially bought out the shares with those gains so so the business is doing well enough and profitable enough that what you know that what it's generating right you can take and take and just put back through and buy out your IRA that that that that's exactly what happened yeah and so yeah it's also kind of a nice feeling so it was you know I the valuation was higher than I bought it so the IRA got back more money than it took out and you know personally I feel at this point um I don't really have any investment in the business it's all been paid back so all of my initial Capital has been been been paid back with returns and so now the only thing I have is I have the the SBA loan but that initial Capital has all been sort of you know as if it was an outside investor as if I had a an outside shareholder that I paid back but still maintain 100% of the but but that's irrespective of robs that just happens to be your case like the equity that you brought yeah that that's just me I mean could I have could I have gone in and not used the Rob's account yeah I mean there there was some other options on the table that just seemed like the most beneficial at the time and and robs has its pros and cons I totally get that and and there existed a possibility where in 18 months I didn't have the capital to repay it right I mean if I had not had that early success um or if I chose to reinvest the money elsewhere then I would have been holding on to the Rob still and so were you really trying to this was a this was your plan that you wanted to buy out the robs the IRA as quickly as possible okay um great and just to emphasize the point that you made a minute and a half ago that the equity that you brought to the table has all been has all been paid back whatever you put in yeah uh is all has all come back out has you've been made whole so at this point it's all gravy but let's not forget the loan you still have a big big old SBA loan but if you're looking purely like if you're spread you know if you're modeling out what your return on investment has been your investment is already paid back correct yeah yeah so that's that's pretty powerful great it's great alen so maybe now would be the time to ask about the fact the nature of this business okay that it is um residential construction you you were already seeing that it was had swings in your case you were seeing it on on the upswing because of Co but you know any big upwing in a in a business or an industry suggests that swings occur period therefore down down swings as well you probably already recognize that new that um it's consumer it's discretionary not recurring you've been searching long enough you were you know you're a career consultant that you you know you understood the the attributes of a of a solid predictable business um in residential construction doesn't have those so why did you and and if you were reading you know I don't know how immersed you were in search reading the literature in the communities but um people you know talk about talk about you know good business bad business and residential construction you know is one that people are you know has kind of red flags around so talk us through how you got comfortable about this business about this industry uh sure well I think a benefit I had from the earlier acquisition opportunity on a disaster restoration is that I had I had needed a general contractor's license and so I had acquired that so that enabled me to kind of Jump Right In that was a that's that's a big hurdle for a lot of folks who don't already have the GC license to be able to come in and operate the business so that that was one benefit that I had going for me uh to kind of jump in on the technicality side uh as far as as as residential home building and things like that if I I don't I don't think I would have jumped in if it was sort of a pure or traditional home builder um you know a small home builder in the market I don't think that would be a good fit I think the competition is too steep for that um I think what we do is is a niche um it is discretionary spend so certainly uh but you know we've got a over 20 year brand reputation um solid Google reviews in the market you know we do get a lot of referral calls I mean so there was some there was there was opportunity for me that I saw to really boost the the marketing and how we went to Market and and kind of grow in that respect um and so it just kind of created some opportunities to to to to show that again and and I said earlier I was kind of betting on the Charlotte Market I I I see all of the Business Leaders come in I see major corporations shifting headquarters to Charlotte and so you know every time they say oh so- and so is going to shift their headquarters to the market well I think well that's that's a hundred or a thousand or 2,000 Executives that are going to come here and they are our target market yeah and so you know is it does it have its risks if the market takes a downslide of course um but I think everything does I think everything does and and one thing that I've listened to all a ton of your podcasts and I I certainly appreciate all of them but the differentiator with me maybe to some of the folks is that being in my 40s when I started this process versus being in my 20s is that I see through myself and through my friends um the risk of a W2 employee especially as you get older in your career 40 50 years old and many of them are in and out of jobs they're they're expensive they they're easy to cut when markets get cut when when times get tough in individual big business so I wouldn't go into this thinking that a W2 is a risk- free proposition versus going into a business and so you know I I have a lot of friends a lot of colleagues that that are are in a cycle of looking for jobs and being out of work for six months and trying to find the next thing and and they're going to be doing that until they're 65 years old um or or when they choose to retire and so when I balance the two of them together there's a risk over here of the market shifting there's a risk over here of being a W2 as you get older in your career because it's not it's not a risk-free proposition and so you're your another way of what you're saying is because you're in your you were in your 40s and you got friends in their 40s and 50s and watching them in their careers you know a young person might think oh you know when you're that age you're established you're more established you got more experience you're safer you know I'm in my 20s I don't know anything I you know I feel really exposed in my in my job and I'm just trying to do the best I can to prove myself and climb the ladder it must be nice to be higher on the ladder because that's where security is and you're saying uh-uh I don't not in my personal uh experience uh and and you know the the colleagues and friends that I have um there's always a struggle and and you know I think when you're 20 it's a lot easier to hop out because usually your your income base is a lot smaller they can kind of drive a lot out of you but as you get older that that Dynamic shifts a bit yeah yeah so that's how that's how I reconciled it with the ston man is there risk in it yeah there's risk but there's risk in everything it's a what what was what was best suited for me and what I could manage and my whole Consulting career was Project based and you know the revenue and say more about that Alan I wanted to draw you out on that because that that would yeah as I mean you had a career where project-based work was the norm so it didn't seem like this you know Kryptonite to you say more about that yeah and so in our Consulting Services you know we were working with you know different Industries and you know most of the time if you if you had a good contract it would last a year um but most of the they wouldn't sign generally more than that often times a lot less and so you had to go out there you had to perform you had to try to grow the work you had to try to reup the contract and so it was it was pretty regular when you were sitting especially towards the end of the calendar year you're sitting in October and you're trying to project revenue for February and it just wasn't there and you you got to kind of trust the process I've got the right people I've got the right systems I'm doing the good work it will come and and that's really what we have here we've got a good brand reputation we really focus hard on on maintaining those client relationships and that we work with today the homeowners uh and doing good work for them and getting solid reviews and referrals and if we keep doing what we can do and do that well that outside stuff just tends to work itself out yeah yep and one of the reasons we like recurring revenue is it gives us visibility into future Revenue sure uh and project base doesn't have that depending you know their degrees but give us a sense of like in your case because because you've told me offline like what is what is your visibility into into 2024 yeah our Target really is is on our sales is about 75 to 90 days out so 75 to 90 days yeah and so what happens is if if we end up having good good times and we're we're selling Beyond 90 days I will actually try to do perform more with the work faster because we we we we tend to get uh homeowners who will will go somewhere else because they want it done faster and so you don't want to lose the project cuz you're not going to for 120 or months um so you want to take that opportunity when you have it so but at the same time there's a lot of planning process and and whether it's permitting or engineering or architecting you know different designs you know it it takes us 45 or 60 days to get out there so we we need at least that much time but but not too much time okay Alan so and so when did you close when was the final when did it become yours so it was April of 21 so from the day I found it to the day we closed was days flat so pretty pretty rapid time well it was it was slow slow slow slow slow fast right like so many things in life that was was pretty much pretty much it great great okay and this April will be three years this April will be three years okay great well um so once you got in there what did you find give us a give us a sense of what the transition was like with an eye toward what you saw as opportunities sure to improve grow the business yeah so when I first got here I had about I think we we probably had about a 60-day transition planned um prior owner would have stayed on more if I needed him uh the unique thing about our business is that because we do Project based work really within 30 45 days not all in the same project but I I saw the beginning the middle the end of everything right so I'd kind of seen some version of Soup To Nuts of it all so you know really got engrossed quickly I think for for what I saw as the opportunities uh one our our project management team was was stretched pretty thin at the time and what that does is it just leads to inefficiencies in the field right that they're they're not able to check up on projects projects start to make mistakes we have to do rework and that slows things down um so we brought in additional project manager uh really focused on operational efficiency um I will say last year's Revenue was pretty close to on par with uh 20 23 was pretty close to on par with 21 and we did it with five teams instead of six so we were able and that was just you know reducing the rework reducing the weit time you know kind of the operational challenge that we had um also wait sorry sorry Alan you you you suggested that you guys your team had been stretched thin yeah but now you're saying that two years later you have a smaller team but the same Revenue which sounds like an even more thinly stretched team what am I missing the challenge was I used to have two project managers each running a total of six teams and they were stretched out between all of those and so I brought in three project managers brought an additional one and now they collectively run five teams um gotcha and so they are able to spend more time at the project to make sure that the the folks on site you know have the material they need are are are more efficient right what was happening before is material was delayed so crews are waiting around or uh we we were just rushing between job so we missed something and instead of taking a left we went a right and then we had to go redo the work and so you just kind of had some of those mistakes that would come up by being by having our management team stretched then gotcha gotcha so more management layer enabled less crew layer yeah yeah we're able to kind of achieve uh you know similar similar Revenue with with and you know ultimately the homeowner's happier right we get in and out faster we have less mistakes on the job which you know we never admit to being perfect everything we do is custom everything and so there's always going to be issues and mistakes and things we have to correct and and we work through that um but the less we can do overall would be as nice you had told me that digital marketing uh was not something that had been embraced uh under previous tenure owner's tenure that's right yeah they were running off of some homebuilt websites uh and actually the website was not really much of an issue but there was no search engine optimization uh there was a couple of really weak Google ads that were out there that I had no idea how to drive lead flow I would just say spend more money on Google and hope more leads come in um so I ultimately outsourced all of that to a third party so they they build our website they do regular updates they handle social media they do search engine optimization and and and ultimately we're at one point hosting the CRM tool which we didn't even have when I first got here the CRM tool was a stack of paper and with each customer on it and stack of paper would get shifted out between sales teams and they had had a notebook and I had no idea how many leads they had or who they were calling on or if they had forgotten somebody and I really had no insight into what was going on um so we been kind of pulling all that tight together and uh and have been really satisfied and I think you had the co rush and that has probably leveled out and I talked to our vendors and so forth and uh they're they're slower than they were um we've stayed steady and I really attribute that a lot to really really focus on driving that marketing making sure that we're the number one or number two on the search engine uh that our Google ads are functioning that our meta ads are functioning that kind of stuff so your Revenue in 2023 the the year just ended is about the same as 2021 yeah which superficially suggests no growth but really the industry has probably seen a decline and you've held steady yeah and as you said you've become more efficient So you you're doing the same amount of work with five instead of six teams so so and we did grow that first year so we're already up we're averaging about 64 65 64 65 and it was and what was it when you took over did you say 5.5 yeah five and a half great so we kind of had a big stick growth and now it's leveled off a bit but yeah I would expect I would yeah I mean if you can if you can you know be in a in a in an industry with a business that was a direct beneficiary of covid like res like doing home stuff at home building not home building out home projects yeah and then maintain that you know that's the new normal for you as opposed to a decline like an e-commerce business which see which saw these incredible spikes and now these incredible valleys yeah um that's a that's a big win so you're psyched oh yeah I'm happy I mean you you always have you know dreams and goals of of doing more but I also again 20 years of Consulting businesses I've I've I've seen these small companies the revenue never goes straight in that angle you want it goes up probably faster than you want and then flat lines and then up faster than you want and as long as you can keep the the flat periods short and reduce any down periods you know have to wait for the really good years to boost it the next level and your margins you said somewhere I didn't write it down as you were talking but it was Teensy but but all maybe but north of it got to north of 20 what do your margins look like around 18 um and you know which is which is better you know if when you talk about home building things like that that's that's far better than than a home builder would get um and so that's why the niche market kind of is a is a a bit of a benefit there yeah and you know 18% of 6 and a half million a nothing to sneeze at there uh it's pretty great yeah um is 6 and a half million or 5 million when you bought five and a half million when you bought it is that a pretty big player in this niche market you'd said that you're kind of one two in terms of brand but in terms of size yeah it would be we would we're definitely near the top I think that um it gets a little blurred when you include some companies our industry do a lot of Maintenance a lot of landscape maintenance uh and Landscape installation which we don't do and so there's some companies out there that are certainly driving a lot more Revenue but there's a big arm of it that would be uh either commercial or residential Landscape Maintenance and so that would kind of be a differentiator um or folks that are doing larger commercial jobs uh but the margins wouldn't be there for that I mean i' I've bid on a couple of commercial jobs more just to dabble in it and it's it's a this just not worth it frankly for us to do really yeah yeah well and what about Services some sort of recurring I recognize that you'd have to spin up an entirely new division of of do kind of landscape Services that's a frankly a different business but you're you know you're touching a lot of your end customer already you could see you could see that as a as a way to go and and I feel like guests that I've had who have bought businesses that are Project based you know their grand strategy of buying the businesses is to then diversify away from project and into more services to build a recurring component into the business doesn't sound like that entices you at all well I would say that there is an enticement to have a recurring Revenue business but I I haven't figured it out and and and it's not residential maintenance um again that's that's a hard place to compete with the margins are really thin and and you know for us to do it in a material way that would have an impact on the on the the balance sheet of the company over the long run it it would it would be taking the eye off a ball I'd rather focus on some areas that we can grow in that we don't currently service you know in our space to really kind of round out our offerings um and that would be more Project based and you know we don't really do a lot of installation of the full landscape so we'll Outsource some of that um we you know so if we brought that inhouse we could we could still continue to drive um good Revenue off of that and and decent margins and not be stuck with the maintenance um and and I don't I don't find too many folks and I I don't think there's too many on on your podcast either most of them are doing commercial uh maintenance versus residential that's a residential is a tough business any you know I'm I'm getting the the sense Allan that this has been a pretty comfortable I don't want to I don't want to downplay hard work uh your hard work but a pretty comfortable transition position in your in your career to small business owner business buyer were there any down moments that I I that were really tough any fetal position moments I don't know if we were full fetal position I think there was there was some stress uh at the at the beginning um you know I had I had gotten some uh really bad advice on on managing the QuickBooks transition um and this is a company that lives 100% on QuickBooks all of our estimates are in QuickBooks all of her invoices is QuickBooks I mean it is it is the lifeblood of it and we got to a point about two months in probably less than that when I realized it um I I had to shut QuickBooks down I had to pay a third party to essentially rebuild it and we were on pen and paper for three weeks um had a couple of for for a variety of reasons not necessarily new ownership but had a couple of drivers leave one project manager quit and then my office manager who's helping with the uh QuickBooks transition her husband took a job and in Florida and so all of a sudden I'm kind of offline on my accounting system my bookkeeper needs to leave I got drivers leaving so that was pretty stressful for a little while um thankfully uh I was able to keep on our bookkeeper she's still with us uh she does everything remote now um which is a big change from the prior owner the prior owner had not been in a big corporate environment where people were working remote and probably wouldn't have been okay with that in fact he said he wouldn't have been okay with that um but but it's worked out for us and um and she's she's been great and so um being flexible uh on some of those situations um I I joke it's flexibility at the time I don't think I had a choice but we made it through we made it through do you think that there weren't any bad surprises or uh fetal position moments because it was just a quality a quality business I mean it seems like there was plenty of stuff to improve but there was you know you got good cruise that you like and nothing that you know hit you upside the head when you got in there as a surprise the seller was you know in your community do I mean do you think that that's why um it kind of was as smooth granted not fully totally easy and smooth but as smooth as um as it was because it can certainly be choppy Ian I think that's a big factor I think a big factor too is that our you know my personal motivations and Mission aligned with the company before I got here so um you know what are those well so we we we kind of we and we go through this every Monday that you know we're here to um be the best outdoor living Company in Charlotte by improving the lives of our our team our community and our customers uh every day and we talk about core values of extreme ownership and listening care um that family is a blessing so my team has never worked a weekend since I've been here um they get time with their family uh and do the right thing and and we meet every Monday and we go over those values and we talk about ways we met those values the prior week and we talk about ways that we didn't meet those values and how we can improve and so it's a it's that constant repetition of how we can learn from our mistakes and do better and and be open and honest with each other when we do have mistakes so there's really nobody's really hiding anything uh and and I think that really helps kind of keep things moving along and I think the fact that the prior owner and mine values that aligned in that it just kind of flowed right through and I they they were printed on the wall when I got here and they remain and they'll remain forever as far as I know yeah well but it sounds like you you are uh but you've got this Monday kind of ritual where you're reinforcing and being really repetitive and you know one of the the jokes about being a good leader is at least in a corporate context or business context is you know if you're not repeating your the Mantra whatever it is the values or the mission to the point where people are kind of rolling their eyes or making fun of you you're not doing it enough sort of thing um but it sounds like you I mean rep repetitive was your word so it sounds like you you really you really Embrace that approach to leadership and and and then it's it's working yeah I totally believe so and you know a lot of that was the prior owner and that was the value of the business you know beyond the the p&l right that that really kind of shown through few more minutes here Allan let's hear like the day-to-day what it's like to actually be in a business so you know we' picked at um the health or the the um you know why a business like this is appealing or not yeah uh and we've heard your perspective on that but what about just the kind of the day-to-day so paint a picture for people um so they can help you know imagine what it would be like to to actually buy and run one of these businesses and let's start with the licensing so you had gotten your tell us all about what the requirements are for a GC getting a general contractor's license and why you need it and then how much you know actual expertise you're bringing to bear in in in your job in your ownership today sure uh the general contractor's license and and the qualifications vary by state so I can't speak to okay you know folks everywhere um generally requires some form of uh exam that you take at one of the testing centers that you know you see all over the country whether you're taking real estate broker license or or general contractor's license so you pass that exam um and Allan it's and it's all about basically being handy building stuff I mean I'm really ignorant about this I mean it's so so technically questions about drywall it's an open book test but you take you take 15 books in there so you got to know where the stuff is and they've got Blueprints and they'll ask questions about the blueprints and how much material take off you need and what are what are Co specific code requirements and things like that so um okay it takes a lot of prep work up front to kind of understand where everything is it's it's nobody memorizes all of it up front I I will say that the the the real premise and why the states look to a general contractor is not so much that you know everything about everything about code but you know where to find it and you you can follow it because you know you'll have inspectors come in and they're they're checking behind you so you don't you can't get too far off the track um but ultimately it's it's that are they are the general contractors capitalized in such a way that it's unlikely you're going to get halfway through a project and run out of money and leave a constituent really of the state stranded with a half done project and no money and so that's a lot of what they look for not so much whether you had prior knowledge or skill but do you have the skills to to run the business and there's a lot of business questions in there you know how to operate how to pay employees how to pay your taxes Etc and can you can you functionally run this business in a way that you know should uh properly be able to satisfy the obligation to the homeowner that they paid for um so so do I have a ton of direct knowledge no I mean I certainly relied on the team as I came in um you know there's certain projects that are going to require engineering so we we get you know full stamped engineering drawings to build to so it's not as if we're coming up with it uh on our own um following the code book and the experience of the team here U is there a lot to pick up yeah but I think any business that you're going to buy is a lot to pick up so for for me most of my day is you know I've got an operations team and I've got a sales team I spend a lot of time with the sales team um I ultimately approve all this the the the final estimates that go out the door to make sure we're making proper margin and so forth um but this we've got a project director who's been with the company for a decade who's fantastic and um he works with that team on a day-to-day basis in the field making sure that they can deliver on what we're we're building out there and you're not uh interacting directly with the homeowner it's all your various Frontline people be it's sales on one side or project on the other are doing that I I do pick up sales although I'm trying to continue to push more of it away so there's some of the the projects that I'll sell um some of them are usually special case maybe I had a personal relationship or it's technically complex or something like that that I'll get called in to to kind of work on it um there's a lot of homeowners that I don't meet uh certainly wish I could sometimes just the capacity to be able to be out there all the time and do that um so when I do meet them you know unfortunately sometimes it's when things aren't going so well and they'll ask to meet and you know we'll kind of meet and work through things and um I'm always willing to do that and step up and you know I I I tell the homeowners I'd say you know ultimately the buck stops with me so if it's not going well in the field I'll make sure it gets taken care of well you you certainly seem uh relaxed about it Allan but but you know let's uh what about those times where you know this is a very big spend for homeowners it's in their home so it's as we all know people are extremely sensitive about their homes as I would be as you probably are about your own home so I imagine there's really can be some unpleasant moments where somebody's not happy with something's going on in their home it's cost of doing business but anything like more to say I mean do you have a temperament the temperament for that or is it is that one of those like if you can't handle an unhappy homeowner every now and then stay away from this business you know what are the most unpleasant kind of parts of of running a business that's kind of basically construction GC business yeah well you never want the homeowner to be unhappy but the challenge is is that when we're doing custom work you know we try to replicate trying to create a vision and and and then build that with the customer um the reality is is that two people's Visions are never exactly aligned and so they sometimes will think it was going to be this way we thought it was going to be this way and and sometimes we get a little bit sideways um we you know we we do our best to to figure that out most of the times we can get through it and you know there I would would rather take on a little bit of expense to fix the problem and end up with a satisfied customer in the long run um and then deal with that we you know we've always offered a 5-year warranty on our work which is much longer than most of the industry would provide a lot of times it's just a year and so we I've got a people on staff and we do that every week we just go out and fix things and folks are surprised I mean um and if we're if we're doing pretty well sometimes we're out there within days and they'll call hey I've got this minor problem and sometimes it's the next day we're out there fixing it and it's just it's just a great customer experience to kind of drive that forward and it really doesn't cost that much in the grand scheme of things yeah um yeah so that helps I would say that you know again you know in Prior career I don't I I don't imagine anyone's got a career out there today that they're not dealing with unhappy customers at some point in time um it it was always a fear of mine especially when I took over the business you know people are spending this amount of money in the back of their home and and then the new guy comes in and you're trying to articulate like wait I'm spending $100,000 or more in my backyard and and you were doing what last month yeah um so that was certainly a risk factor um but I worked hard to to overcome that um I I tell the team I consider our Google reviews it's that Fortress right that you continue to drive good Google reviews and then if you do have a customer that's not working out and they decide to get online and say things you know whether they're true or not is irrelevant it gets out there and um you know the more we can kind of build that f-star review criteria the the more drowns out those customers who who um you know we we just can't come to terms with for some reason but um thankfully it's been three years and um still all five star reviews so congratulations Alan that's great a couple more kind of technical or financial aspects of the business that that make it uh appealing and strong um negative cash conversion cycle tell people what that is and why it's great and how you have it uh so you know I told you we meet every Monday and and part of that process is the way our business works is um we take an upfront payment a deposit on the project about a third uh generally about a week before we start we've got some smaller deposits before that and so we are collecting a third of the money up front and then every week on that Monday meeting we meet and we go through billing which is just a great practice to make sure are we billing are we collecting and that's a weekly ritual to make sure that cash is you the invoices are going out and the cash is coming in and and so we Bill progressively along the way U the more work we're do in a week the higher the bill might be so uh customers are going to get two three or four bills depending on the size of the project along the way bigger projects might be more spaced out um so that makes sure that we are always collecting as we do the work as I pay the crews we're collecting that money in and then typically by the time we we get to the end of the project it's a small 5% or so that remains uh that really remains and is at risk you know of potentially not getting it um at the same time I've got you know Net 30 Terms or so on most of my vendors and so you know I'm buying material on credit I'm collecting the money I'm doing the work and then 30 days later I'm I'm paying the vendor so it's it's a fairly flexible in that extent that um you know our average our average invoices outstanding usually it's about eight days worth of invoices On Any Given well that was the next metric I wanted to get to the DSO I which was not an abbreviation I'd heard before tell us what DSO is and and elaborate with what you were just about to say that was a metric we used in Consulting day statements outstanding so how how many days you know uh can you calculate for your Revenue outstanding so if if for instance you're doing uh $12 million a year um in any given month that's that's a million a month so if you have a million dollar in accounts receivable outstanding you would have you you'd say I'm a 30 days DSO um if you were at half a million you'd say I'm at 14 days so at any given time we've got about eight days of our annual revenue out an account receivable right whereas in a Consulting field it was pretty typical to be 30 or 60 days out so you're sitting on on cash waiting to come in for an average of six 30 to 60 days where we're sitting on an average of of eight days um and it's not uncommon we will we will speak in our Monday meeting and we'll send out invoices and our office manager in Florida she'll send out invoices as we sit there and and I'll get pinged before the end of the meeting the payments made that's great so um yeah so that that's definitely helpful to kind of keep things going and um doesn't get us too far in a pinch with a customer who may not want to pay um or or may hold us out until the end I think the other thing to say about your business is that you're and it's clear with the ticket price you know $50,000 what did you say the median 65 $65,000 job median price 70,000 um these are these are welltoo customers so they're people who have money and it's always nice to serve a market where there's money yeah and you know beyond the the money part is that we get to go out and and build these spaces and um I can't tell you how many of them are thrilled because now they spend time with their family and their friends and you know we build spaces for and Community to come together ultimately which is which is kind of a nice feeling so there's a lot of things you know HVAC might be fairly regular business but you know there's nothing you still at the end of the day are having to fix somebody who's in dire circumstance because the Heat's out or the AC's out and they're they're spending money they didn't plan for don't want to um but while there's risk in the um discretionary spend it is a nice feeling to be able to do something for folks and and kind of create that environment that they can they can enjoy with their friends and family and and and really really enjoy and they'll send us pictures afterwards of them sitting around the fireplace with their kids cooking s'mores and um at night right up to Google reviews baby yeah upload those photos yeah that's great no that is no of course that is great that is great and um you know I love sitting around the fire like everybody um so being the one to kind of create be able to create the environment for a family to be able to do that I could totally imagine um that being really gratifying and you know a broader point about discretionary businesses that are providing a discretionary service versus a need to have service yes we when we're just looking coldly at the the um how robust these businesses are the need to have is of course where you want to play but the need to have is often things that people don't want to be spending money on they're compelled to spend money on it so they're not necessarily happy about that and the discretionary on the discretionary into the Spectrum it's the things people want and therefore when you deliver the service they're happy they're excited right um and so the whole kind of psychic Vibe of the transaction is different yeah uh yeah there's definitely a a good feeling about it at the end of the day and you know like we we go through all projects and they all have their ups and downs but ultimately um you know we feel pretty confident uh just about every time they they're they're much happier with the space than they used to be yeah that's great um just a couple more questions on your business and then I'll close us out the um you had said that you're you run pretty lean and you've got Crews who are do doing the work and but these are Subs correct so just kind of a a light education for people on what a construction business might look like that you have either internal Crews or that you're that you're subbing them out what are the kind of pros and cons how how to think about that if somebody's looking at a SIM for for a business like this and they see you know a lot of subed work or you know not all the team is all internal right uh you know I think it depends on the relationships with your subcontractors if if you were a smaller business that couldn't support them full-time uh and you're kind of going in and out of usage and they're and they're spread thin between or they're spread across multiple uh General Contractors it would be more difficult uh what what the pro for us is that it helps manage cash flow right if we don't have work we're not spending money on on employees at that point um the other Pro is that's why you do it right that's the key reason why you do it right why one would do it um we also pay them a fixed rate uh not hourly so uh we pay the firm the the the Mason firm the fixed rate to do the project so they're incentivized to be as expeditious as possible to finish the job whereas if you had hourly employees you would you would also have the challenge of you know how many hours you're going to bid on the project are the crews efficient and effective and and their motivation necessarily financially is to spend a lot of hours on it not necessarily how fast they accomplish and so it sort of aligns incentives on both sides to make sure that we're as efficient as possible we do make them do the repairs so they don't they don't get into Advantage by rushing and making mistakes because they're going to have to go back and fix it so there is a balance there um and that's why we have the project management team that's going to go out there and and effectively manage them um you know so it's you know most Construction Industries are going to run in that manner but there's certainly some that that have some of their teams or more teams inous versus external um I think it's going to depend on their relationships one of the ways that we're able to keep them is that I pay them for the week every week and so um they they know that that paycheck is going to be weekly and it's going to be steady and that's something that they really need and appreciate and that keeps them really steady and wanting to work for us versus holding them out for two weeks three weeks or longer um they're having to pay their Crews and they're they get tied on cash and what is is the flip side you you've made it sound like why wouldn't you just be using Subs what's the there's got to be a con oh the con is ultimately you don't have full control over them um it's it's hard to kind of motivate from a career growth perspective uh so you know there's that side of things that you can't necessarily do but you know it is the trade-off on the other side uh these teams have no problem getting more employees if they need to grow um I've never had a resource problem with them they're always able to find and and and guys that that are good Masons that can help out um so the community is pretty pretty robust in that sense and that that really helps us and so the 12 employees that you have that you have 12 employees proper are all back office or not back office but excuse me back office plus sales and project managers correct yeah yeah great okay and then the weather we we touched on that before we hit record weather's a function uh when you got people working outside this for some reason I don't know that this has ever come up with any of my guests but uh it's staring me in the face so you are subject to the weather so you can have a rainy week and lose money talk to us about that yeah um we can have a rain we can lose money that's pretty much it um yeah so obviously most of the time we can't do a lot of work in the rain there's certain tasks that that that are a little more functional um it is a blessing to be in the charlot Market farther south so we can work full year round um yeah some of these firms that would be in New England or or in the farther north regions they just shut down I mean they couldn't do work at all in the winter so we can work year round um when it does rain yeah we we we pack it in there's days that the guys aren't working um on the other side of having subcontractors is I'm not footing a bill for a bunch of employees who aren't doing anything that day which is helpful um we generally work 5 days a week um but the crews especially if there's a rain day that week will ask the homeowner if they can work on a weekend um and and try to make up that time so there's a good amount of time we can we can make up in that fashion not always but but we can work that Saturday or Sunday to to kind of make it up I would say most homeowners are are more than willing to let us work extra days because you know at this point we've torn up their yard and we make a bunch of noise and dust and so if we can finish faster they're perfectly fine with that yeah yeah yeah so but it is impactful first quarter is usually the worst um On The Other Side by August it gets really hot and the the crews just aren't as fast but you know it's it's hard to be doing the work they're doing any day much less when it's 95 degrees out yeah yeah so but yeah well there's a challenge but but it's kind of built into the model though right well when I when I bought the business weather was here so I knew going into it what the revenue and the margins would be whether considering that that has not clearly materially changed um you know there always going to be rain days that's one thing for sure Allan anything about the nature of this business or o being the owner of this business that you would want people to know that I we didn't touch on um I think we covered on on quite a bit I think you know ultimately what bought me into this is and and and kind of going this path was was the people you know found a great owner that I already knew which is Serendipity for sure but you know luck favors are prepared uh as well um the team is great um you you know the support from my family my wife is has to be there right I mean it's this is I think you had a guess on prior to this this is not this is not a W2 job where you can go in and maybe don't like it and you can quit two weeks you know with two weeks notice this is you know Jumping All in with both feet and and and kind of everybody around you has to be committed and okay with that and uh and and part of it and and the fun part the challenges you know that I I think is is is frankly just going home at night because it gets really exciting and I could probably stay here till midnight every night enjoy the work I do but I do try to make a hard stop and and get home and spend time with wife and and have dinner with the family um and make sure that stuff still happens because it's always here and it's it's endless and it's it's enjoyable sounds great Allan yeah sounds great you know I get I get sick of uh hearing the phrase come out of my mouth and others it's not all unicorns rainbows um but sometimes sometimes it works out really well you got it sounds like a a great thing that you've done for yourself and your family and your and the business you bought again great people great priate ownership kind of setting things up and and being patient right I mean it's I was never in a rush to buy a business in six months and if I had I might have made different choices it may not be happy so it's just a you know waiting around there's lots of businesses for sale but there's not there's not not as many worth buying yeah well and particularly again in your category I mean I can go on bis Buy sell now and see a lot of remodeling type businesses home construction um type businesses then that you really would they really are dangerous businesses to get involved in um so even though you bought one of those you found a really good one a really sizable one and one where you knew the owner all the things we've touched on so great um and one with a great brand you know the stonem man so everybody so have you fully have you fully embraced the mantle of being the St stonem man or do you still think of the other guy the seller as the stonem man I think I fully embraced the the mantle so the the prior owner was was Scottish and uh early well early on a lot of the the marketing in the advertising spend would be uh pictures of them in kilts and uh it was very kitchy but he will say you know it it drove a lot of early on traffic CU it was you know it was memorable uh tot and even even prior to me taking over they started to get away from that cuz they wanted to kind of you know kind of increase the the brand but um there is kind of that backdrop uh I'll still find old pictures and things like that with guys and Kilts and and anytime My Friends Ask me to uh you know do I still have it I just let them know it's it's at the dry cleaner I haven't been able to find that one well that's great Le let's end it there Allan uh if people want to reach out with any questions what's the best way to do that sure they can uh reach out on LinkedIn um and the other option is is that our corporate address it's Allan aan Stoneman rocks.com Stoneman rocks that's great yeah Alan Lockridge thank you for the time thanks for sharing your story really appreciate it thank you well thank you for allowing me to come do that I hope you enjoyed that interview make sure you subscribe to the acquiring minds Channel below we are now publishing twice a week so tons of new interviews and stories to come stories that will help you along your own path to acquiring a business