#296 - Todd Spencer

0:01 My brain is exploding. Todd Spencer is a just a really great guy. He's a consultant in our industry who has worked with some of the best companies out there. He's done this for a very long time. Smart guy knows a lot about how to get guys like me to become more productive, to kind of hang between the lines a little better than maybe we do on a on a day-to-day basis and somebody who you know, is available to all of you. So I definitely would recommend that if you are looking for somebody to talk to in your business, if you're looking to get ready to sell your business or if you just need some guidance, reach out to Todd.

0:45 Really, really good guy. Hello, and thank you for joining me today on Gears of Gear. This podcast is brought to you by AVL Media Group. AVL is one of the leading distributors of professional audio, video and lighting equipment in North America. Please take a moment with me and watch their video. AVL Media Group is an award-winning distribution company that has been established for over 25 years as a trusted brand in the professional audio, video and lighting markets. Our new state-of-the-art facility includes a beautiful showroom space that is available for demonstrations, training and special events. This grants us the opportunity to share our knowledge and provide a unique hands on experience to all our clients. Our large warehouse facilities both in Canada and the US allow us to keep a vast inventory of all the brands we distribute. We can get you what you need, when you need it. Our first class team of industry professionals is focused on delivering outstanding pre and post sales service and support to all our clients, ensuring mutually successful partnerships and long term growth.

1:57 AVL Media Group, your premier North American distribution partner. And today's podcast is also brought to you by Gearsource. Founded in 2002 with an ambitious mission to support live events, businesses buy and sell gear globally. Since that time, the company has transacted in more than 100 countries, selling 1/4 billion dollars in sound, lighting, staging and video gear. Gear Source continues to evolve the platform for massive global growth, enabling localized currencies, payments in escrow to protect buyers and sellers, AI powered logistics behind a new global logistics brand, and more.

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3:32 Hello and thanks for joining me. So today's podcast is being recorded on a Weird Monday podcast recording. Usually we record on, we've just switched to Tuesdays and Wednesdays. It used to be Wednesdays and Thursdays, so keep that in mind if you're looking to come on the podcast. But today we're recording on a Monday and and it's for a a reason because that's when both parties were available basically. And it's an important podcast, which I'll get into in a couple of minutes. But this happens to be not on not only any Monday, but as a very special Monday. It's the day after Super Bowl. And so first of all, what you think of the game, and I think I like almost everyone who doesn't live in Kansas City, was rooting for somebody to beat the Chiefs.

4:24 And why is that? It's not because I hate Kansas City. I actually like the town. I like the people there, very Midwestern values. I used to have a franchise there and it was one of my favourites. Really good people. It's a small market, so it's always nice to see when small markets win in the Super Bowl. But you know, I think I'm just against dynasties. I don't like dynasties for any sport, whether it's hockey or football or, or basketball or whatever it is. You know, I guess basketball might be a bit of an exception just because of how great Michael Jordan was. But I'm, I'm just not a fan of dynasties, you know, and it's just that I think that it's so hard to build 1.

5:10 So you really should be a huge fan of dynasties. But at the same time, it just gets boring watching the same team win every year. And I guess if you're in that market, it's great. It's it's, I've never been a part of that. I've never been a part of a dynasty. So maybe that's why, maybe I'm just bitter. I don't know. But I was happy to see the Eagles win. I thought they really deserve to win. I think the score was much closer than the game. You know, at the end, Philadelphia wasn't paying attention to whether or not the other team scored. They were just running the clock down, letting other people on the field so they could say they played in the Super Bowl, etcetera. So they weren't taking the very the game very seriously. So I think anything over six points is kind of questionable in that game.

5:55 The six points they actually really did score. You know, Kansas City got them and they got the other points too, but I think they got them under sort of suspicious surroundings, whatever you want to call it. But anyways, congratulations to Philadelphia. The city and the team well deserved win. And even though they're burning their city down, I'm pretty sure fans appreciate it. I know all the ones that I know who aren't burning the city down right now really do appreciate the the win. So besides that, the ads, of course, have become a big part of the Super Bowl culture.

6:35 I don't generally care. I know that Doritos usually have the funniest ads and Budweiser with the Clydesdales usually have the, you know, the heart pull ads. I don't know. I just thought it was pretty boring. I thought the commercials were pretty blah. Like nothing really jumped out at me. I kind of liked the Harrison Ford Jeep ad. I thought it was pretty nice and really, really well done and probably money well spent for Jeep to really identify themselves as part of the the sort of core fiber of America. It was pretty cool. And I just happened to be shopping for a Jeep for for my house in Canada right now too. So, so I thought that was nice.

7:22 The AI joining the game was interesting to see. You know, Open AI spent $30 million on an ad to basically tell people, hey, we're more fun than just being a bunch of programming geeks. And I didn't get it didn't make much sense to me. It didn't make me want to use AI or use specifically open AI any more than I already do. Or ChatGPT. The Meta one I thought was OK. You know, I, I know a few people, including Eric Loder from Elation who wear those. I think they're called Meta glasses. I'm not sure, but I know a bunch of people who wear them. Not a bunch. I know a few who wear them and swear by them, think that they're a really cool sort of next step in eyewear.

8:05 And I don't know, I don't know how I feel about it. I don't know if I want to record all the actions that I see on a daily basis. And I don't know if I want to be constantly connected. Like I'm already pretty connected having a phone and a computer near me at any given moment. But having those glasses where you're literally 100% connected 100% of the time, I don't know if I want that. But the ads were pretty cool. One of the things that actually my girlfriend noticed was that there were three different characters from up Shits Creek or Shits Creek. I don't think it's called up Shits Creek, just Shits Creek. Three different characters on the and don't ask me to name actors.

8:47 I don't know names. Eugene Levy. That one I remember, but I don't remember the woman's name, and I don't remember the sun's name, but they were also the sun was in the Meta ad. The woman, I don't even remember which ad she was in. And Eugene Levy was in the one where his eyebrows flew away, which I thought was pretty hilarious until there was another ad, which was very strange. I don't know if it was a coincidence or if they're part of the same company or something, but another one where a mustache flew away. And I was like, well, this is a strange trend for Super Bowl ads. So yeah, that's it for the ads. And then, of course, the halftime show, which is the most probably dividing halftime show I've ever seen, you know, racially dividing, nationally dividing, artistically dividing, whether or not you like the music.

9:36 You know, old people versus young people, I guess in a sense, because old people were like, what the hell was that guy saying? Like couldn't understand a single lyric except turn off your TV, which I think a lot of people did anyways. You know, the, the I'm getting a little tired of the racial thing, you know, like just basically being shoved in your face constantly. I'm not a racist. I don't need anti racism messaging. So for me, where you're just constantly pushing it, to me that is racism. Like maybe maybe we shouldn't talk about it quite so much. Maybe we're just all people, right? So that's sort of my take on that. I know everyone has their opinion and I don't care.

10:18 I'm OK. If you loved this and you thought it was incredible messaging, I'm perfectly good with that. And I've actually seen some friends of mine say things like that and I'm OK with it. But for me, it was just a little too much. And and then also, you know, the show itself, the the production, there's been a lot of back and forth and, you know, especially on the Facebook groups that get pretty crazy anyways and opinionated and divisive and all of those things. But a couple of angles, one being the lack of color, the fact that they only used white light was an interesting way to do it. And did I love it?

11:01 Not really. I mean, it was kind of boring. I thought, did I hate it? Not really. You know, I, I didn't go one way or the other. To me, the show just seemed almost like it was being done under work lights, you know, like it was, it was being rehearsed and, and they didn't use the show lighting. They were using work lights or something. I don't know, it was just weird. It was, it was very different, very unusual. Maybe I'm not an artist, maybe I'm not artistic enough to really have seen what parts I was missing. Also, people, you know, applauded his performance, his dance performance, which to me was just really not very exciting or interesting. So I don't know. I didn't get it, you know, was I out on the Internet saying this was disgusting, the worst show I've ever seen? It certainly wasn't the best, but I didn't post about it and I'm not going to post about it.

11:52 But, you know, it pushed me to remember halftime shows like Prince in Miami, which was unbelievable. You know, that version of purple rain is burned in my brain forever on the, you know, the Prince logo, whatever his symbol shaped stage, which I thought was incredible. It it the lasting value of that. Like I went back and watched it again this morning. Incredible. Just an incredible halftime show. The Stones, Paul McCartney, you too. Who else can I think of? You know, just so many memorable halftime shows. Tom Petty, I thought was great.

12:32 You know, so many incredible halftime shows. Even to be perfectly honest, Rihanna last year, although I didn't love the show, I I shouldn't say I didn't love the show. I don't like her music. I don't necessarily think she's that incredible, but the show itself was incredible. And the fact that a pregnant woman was flying around was pretty incredible. The production was pretty incredible. So that had a lot of positive stuff to it, I guess. But, you know, for me, this certainly wasn't up there as as the best ever or, or probably closer to the worst for me. Was it the worst? I don't think so. You know, I can't think of a particular one that I liked less than this one. But you know, for the people who did it, I'm sure they put in a lot of effort and I'm sure that they think what they were doing was edgy and, and incredible.

13:26 And again, maybe I'm just ignorant, you know, maybe I just don't know enough to know what I don't know. And so I'm not dogging it at all. I I'm just saying for me, it wasn't my favorite halftime show. That's all. That's it. No other statement beyond that. And So what else? Oh, by the way, on that halftime show, I, I read a post that said something about this being, you know, an incredibly artistic approach to Black Americans navigating an authoritarian government. All this stuff, like, again, bit too much for me. At the end of the day, this is a football game and the halftime show just should be the time when people get up and go to the bathroom and get another beer, you know, and some people sit in their seat because they want to watch the ACT perform or whatever. But I don't know that we need to be making these massive statements during a football game. Like I've never been for sports getting involved in politics or artists getting involved in politics or politics getting involved in sports or whatever.

14:33 Like just, you know, let people enjoy the damn game, you know, and, and the halftime show should just be entertaining for everyone. It should be all inclusive. It should entertain everyone. It shouldn't point fingers at anyone. It shouldn't make a statement. Again, my opinion only. So on to today's podcast. I'm often asked of who I personally and, and as my businesses as well use either as advisors, personal advisors, a board of advisors. You know who who I would have on that board of advisors. You know, I'm always really quick to give advice. So who do I get advice from?

15:15 And today's guests, Today's guest is one of those advisors who I trust a great deal. In fact, Todd, today's guest has helped me to navigate through probably the most difficult time in my own business over the past few years and coming out the other end finally, but you know, really, really a challenging time for me due to some stuff that I'm not going to get into right now. But, and since then, we've become not only good friends, but we've also become sort of back and forth advisors. I help him on some of his own business problems and he continues to help me on mine. We have a standing call every Friday that we're on and we talk about the industry, we talk about what's going on out there.

16:00 We talk about our own businesses, we talk sometimes about our families, but just a really super smart dude, extremely level headed, just a great personality, compassion and, and you know, just one of the most patient people when it comes to dealing with my journey, for example. And so Todd Spencer has a career that spans more than 25 years, with firms varying in size from 1,000,000 to $3 billion in revenue. Over 18 years in executive leadership roles, working with both startups and established companies to guide strategic and operational growth, acquisitions, turnarounds and business sales.

16:45 Established track record of success in strategic plan development, operational optimization, new program design and deployment, business acquisition and sale, and the executive leadership of multifaceted global teams generating success with a client centered culture. Established credibility and industry reputation. Partnering with AV and specialist event companies to achieve their growth vision through transformative strategies. Providing consultative guidance to executives, entrepreneurs, and ownership groups to maximize the value and output of their business.

17:26 Todd is also the current acting president of ESTA and just a great guy. So I'm really super happy to have him on today. And please welcome Todd Spencer. Hello, Todd. Hey, Marcel, good morning. Happy Monday. Happy Monday to you. So Todd and I were just having sort of a continuing conversation of the Super Bowl to which he probably paid less attention than even I did, especially to the halftime show. And but we both kind of agree, you know, that I think it's it's a football game. It's meant to be fairly light hearted and you know, something you consume with beer and nachos. Not necessarily like, you know, AI don't know thesaurus to try and figure out what words you should use to describe its impact on society or whatever.

18:23 Anyways, that's where my head's at with it. The football game was fun because I didn't want Kansas City to win and they didn't by a stretch. Who are you going for? Really, neither of the teams are teams that I've followed over the years, so yeah. Me too. Yeah. Me too, yeah. I just see, you know, I, I talked about this on the, on the intro, but I'm just sort of not into legacies or, or these not legacies. What do you call them? Dynasties. Dynasties. I don't like dynasties when when teams win 3 or 4 championships in a row, it just gets really boring. Like you want different teams. I was really looking forward to, you know, seeing Buffalo finally get back in there, as much as I hate Buffalo because they're in my conference, right? Or my division, but I wanted to see Buffalo and Detroit, like half this country or most of this country wanted to see, you know, sort of two kind of underdogs who hadn't won it in God knows how long.

19:23 And I just thought that was going to be the ideal game. So when it ended up being Philly and Kansas City, you just kind of had to pick pick 1. So and Philly needs something to celebrate because you knew you knew they were going to burn their town down South. They needed something to smile about at the end of all of that. And God knows they haven't disappointed from the few posts and stuff that I've seen, the news that I've seen, they they're ruining their town again. That's another thing I don't really understand. Another head scratcher is we win championships and then we go. Let's. Flip over cop cars and burn our town down. I don't understand that mentality. It's just not something I ever felt like doing when I won you.

20:07 No, I haven't actually seen that. I've I've been neglectful of the news the last sort of 24 hours. So that's it. That's the first I'm hearing, yeah. Any 24 hours where you're able to neglect the news is probably OK. It's probably not a bad thing. Mental health break. So thank you for coming and doing this. I really appreciate it. And I think there's a lot of far more important things for us to discuss than the Super Bowl. And I just felt like it. It's a another sort of weird time for our industry and we've gone through so many of them starting in 2020. Like if you think back to 2019, everything was so normal. Like every year we were growing a little bit year over year, a little bit year over year, a little bit year over year. And since that time, it's just been unpredictable, bat shit crazy, not enough of this stuff, way too much of this stuff, you know, big top, top line sales, bad bottom line, a mix of a lot of really unusual things that I think many people in our industry and even myself included were maybe not really well enough educated to deal with. You know, like we didn't, we didn't have the training or or background to navigate some of these waters that we've been forced to go through.

21:34 So, you know, I think that first of all, I want to go into your background just for a minute because for people who haven't seen your previous podcast or whatever, you have such an interesting sort of group of experience in that, you know, you grew a company from zero to sorry, there's a bug suddenly flying around my head. So it's not just me losing my mind. There's a bug that has just decided I'm going to annoy the host. You know, not many people can say they've grown a company from 5 million to 20 million, let alone from zero to what was it, 2 billion or something, 1 billion.

22:18 In in overall organization, but had direct hand in, in about 1/2 a bit little over half a billion, yeah, 5600 million. I mean, so what's that like? Because I would expect that when you're growing a company from zero to to 1/2 a billion dollars, there are a lot of different businesses wrapped up in that, right? There, there are. I mean, there's a lot of graduation to it. And one of the common misconceptions I think that people have is they associate the longer they've been doing it with, the more able they are to make the transition. And having consulted with many of these organizations of all sizes, now, I, I would almost say it's the opposite.

22:59 The more time you've spent in a certain lane, almost the more valuable having some outside perspective is to weigh in and, and offer what that next step sort of looks like. And I, I would say a lot of it has to do with just the mindset that you needed to start. It is not the mindset you're going to need in the next sort of 6 or 10 iterations of the company. If you're really lucky, you know, most people start in that kind of, as I've said, all hands on deck or three Musketeers mode where you have a lot of utility players and that's really helpful in the beginning. You kind of need that. You need people to jump in and tackle whatever task is on deck and trust them to get it done. As time goes on though, you start stepping on each other and you conflicting that if done poorly will kill your business.

23:45 If it's if it's done poorly enough, if it's sort of just ignored and and everybody says we just need to work harder, it'll continue to survive, but it will hit a limit. And usually that limit is no higher than about 20 or 25,000,000. There's some unicorns out there, but in terms of that founder LED utility operated player business one year 25,000,000 is feeling significant stress. You're going to have a lot of other culture issues happening inside. But yeah, yeah, that's, that's really true. And especially as the company starts to look at who it wants to be at sort of 50-60 million, again at 100 million, two 50 is different still so on and so forth. If you don't have a playbook for what each one of those levels looks like, it creates a lot of pain for you. Rather than than saying, you know what I think, I think we need a peek at the playbook for how to get from 60 million to to 500 million.

24:37 How many steps do we take and what are they? What about though, even even that business from zero to 25,000,000, you know like you said at 25,000,000, you kind of, you know what, what got us here isn't going to get us there past 25,000,000. You need more of an organizational structure, less of a fly by the seat of your pants entrepreneurial structure. But even going from zero to 25,000,000, like what are some of sort of the, the thresholds that you hit where you go, Oh God, I didn't realize this was going to happen. Like, I would assume, you know, one of the things I know I learned as a business owner is just because you're growing doesn't mean that you have money, have capital and that you're going to have enough capital to continue sustaining that business.

25:24 And but what are what are like some of the lessons along the way even in that zero to 25,000,000, which I would guess probably a large majority of the people who listen to my podcast are in that range, like maybe half or something are in that that sort of size. Yeah, I would say it's the most consequential range. It is the, in my opinion #1 decider of whether you will grow the company past 25,000,000 or not is your ability to navigate a few fundamental things within that threshold. Otherwise it'll cap it, as I said, at the 2025 million and you'll sort of continue to write it out. The thing is that that generally happen is you start a business at zero and you're working real hard and you get some clients and your, your success is project based. So you equate success and making more money to how many projects you get or how many events you do, right. It's it's a very tactical connection. Very transactional too.

26:19 Very transaction, yeah. And that ceases to be the case north of 25,000,000 and and especially north of a hundred 200 million definitely. And so as you think about that, the steps in the in the under 25,000,000 as a founder who gets their business to say 3 or 5 million, you're going to see a few things. The first of which is you can't do it all by yourself anymore. The second is, is your mindset as a founder has to change from more tactical operator to one who's who's kind of a beginning executive leader. You're you're working, you're working above the business in some ways to direct the activity rather than being out, say, doing all the business yourself or being the point person to your customer. And that's a big shift for people that are in that that scope.

27:07 The other thing that happens is that about four or five million, your working capital as a founder starts to get real interesting. Interesting. I mean scary. Because. They're not used to holding a reserve, maybe to the level that they have. They see that income and they go, wow, this is awesome. It's going to continue like this. And more. Spend more, make more. Spend more right and the way that you look at your business once you get above that 5 million, you know now you might want to start doing some capital planning on on assets you want to block by you might want to start thinking about, hey, do I have the right organizational structure and the people there. I got a team full of techs, which is what I've had since 0 million right that are that are out in the field that are doing all the things needed.

27:53 But now it's kind of on me all the time to be the backstop and have the answer to every technical question that comes at me. Is that who I want to be in this version of my business? And I would say the answer is no. But those are some of the things that I see that happened pretty commonly that if you haven't experienced it, you don't know to be aware of it and you also don't know how to solve it. And so if you can solve for some of those things early on, you will set yourself up to get to 15/20/25 and then ultimately can grow a lot further. Well, I know in my own company, like one of the things I noticed very early on, 20 years ago or whatever, is I sort of crossed a, a threshold where I was actually able to pay myself a real salary, like a real amount of money that that almost got back to where I was pre starting my own business.

28:43 And I was like, well, wait a SEC because I didn't really start the company because I thought I was going to go out and make tons of money. I did it because I wanted the freedom of having my own business. And I just felt boxed in by working for other people, which for some people is an issue for some isn't. And and that's why there are employees and there are business owners and there's entrepreneurs and there's managers and there's all different types of people. Thank God. But I know for me, like I went through, first of all, an emotional thing where it was like, well, can the company afford to pay me? Like, do I deserve to take, you know, $100,000 salary out of a company that's only doing $1,000,000 a year in business or whatever?

29:28 And so getting past that guilt, but also building that into the business. So the business knew that it had to pay me. And I'm just making these numbers up, but let's say $10,000 a month as the, as the founder, CEO and also the main sales guy, the dishwasher, the floor sweeper and everything else in between to build that into the company's budgets so that the company. And it's almost like I'm sure you're familiar with, with Profit First, the book and the philosophy and mentality of Profit First. I feel like for founders of these small businesses that are going zero to whatever that is not a, that's not a mentality that you think of.

30:17 You're thinking pay everyone else 1st. And if there's a nickel leftover, I might be able to afford to eat today. So is that a challenge that every startup business owner kind of goes through? It, it depends. I, I sort of see it all over the spectrum, but I think that it, that is a common one that is there. Or on the far other end of the spectrum, you have the CEO that gets a big project or, or founder, I should say in this case, and sees a lot of money in the bank account and says that's great. I'm going to take my dream trip now and then can't make payroll the next time around. I've seen that as. Well, I know those people as well. Yeah, you're right. Yeah. Yeah, it's finding that that sweet spot, you know, of how to how to keep it sustainable. Yeah, yeah.

31:03 I mean, I just, I always liked that profit first mentality where it was profit first didn't necessarily mean that I'm going to get paid and, and everyone else, you know, go # sand it. It just meant that I was going to focus on like multiple buckets in this bucket might be for paying, you know, overhead. And this bucket might be for paying taxes and this bucket might be for paying, you know, whatever the other part of that is. And but one of those buckets has to be profit. You have to account for profit because otherwise it's it's just too easy to let it disappear. And Oh yeah, we can afford to discount that again, or we can afford to lower the price on this service or pay an additional person or give everyone another raise just even though they got one last month or whatever.

31:53 It's too easy to do that stuff if you're not really focused on profit, not just. And you know, that sort of spins into I think a little bit of where our industry has gone on a journey over the past 18 or 24 months where we were so Uber focused on top line revenue that and you know, arguably some of the biggest and and possibly even the biggest companies out there are struggling with right now. You know, I know that there's one in particular that's trying to sell and their problem isn't top line revenue. They've done very well growing their top line revenue, but the problem is they haven't made money while doing it.

32:34 They've been reducing their their EBITDA and and and their profit while growing their top line revenue. So like you said, there's a balance, but I'm guessing that that changes as well. That whole dynamic changes when you're going from zero to 5 million and then 5 to 15 or 20 million and 20 to 50 or whatever those numbers are. Yeah, but. Yeah, I kind of, I kind of refer to that as the sweet spot when I'm working with people because of the sweet spot changes depending on market conditions, depending on your customers needs, when there's oversupply in the market, then you have to change gears a little bit to sort of meet maybe who you want to be to distinguish yourself and still win business, right. I think about it like a car on the freeway. You get on the freeway and you set your cruise control and your cruise control is optimized if there's nobody else on the road for getting you there fastest with best fuel economy, right? Like there's factors that figure into it. But what happens when somebody pulls in front of you on the next on ramp and you have to slow down? Well, you can't just crash into them, right? You still have to slow down.

33:44 You have to adjust, but in that adjustment, you're no longer in the sweet spot of of where you'd ultimately like to be, but you are in a spot where you might have to be for the moment you maintain other factors you care about. And so I think that's what people get too locked into, especially in smaller companies is they're not dynamically saying, am I in the sweet spot of where I need to be this quarter or this year? They're very frequently saying, well, it's worked this way for a long time. These are our customers, we're very relationship driven and we stay the course. Well, that can be tough if somebody gets on the on ramp in front of you with the flash of your car, you know, and, and I think that's the real challenge is you have to be a dynamic thinker, but you also have to know how to look for the sweet spot in all areas of your metrics. And that extends not just to revenue and EBITDA, but your staffing metrics.

34:37 How many people should you hire and when and what should be the criteria. So you're not too late to the game, but then you're not hiring too early and carrying a lot of overhead you don't need. There's a lot of factors. Well, and at the same time, I think our industry is 1 where a lot of those things are not prioritized. And so, you know, one of the things we learned during COVID was the lack of having a, Oh my God, I'm losing the word that forgetting to keep money on the side. What what is that called? Again? I'm losing my mind. Reserve your yeah. Reserve, reserve. There's the name, you know, forgetting about keeping a reserve.

35:17 And and so, you know, in business one O 1, they teach you maybe to have three months or six months of reserve. And obviously COVID taught us, you know, that you need 36 months of reserve or whatever it is, which is not reasonable, of course. But you know, I know in our industry we've had some really bad habits and that being one of them. But also like, you know, I remember VER when they lacked like inventory control management software and they were doing gazillions of dollars in revenue. But ask them how many of a particular projector they had and where they were.

36:00 They couldn't tell you. Like if it's sitting on the warehouse floor, I can rent it out. Basically. If it's not, I can't rent it out. And I'm sure it wasn't quite that bad, but I know that in doing business with them, there were always those types of, of issues where, you know, I've, I've dealt with so many companies that haven't had, they have rental software, but they don't have any inventory management. So at any given moment, you know, they can't tell you how many of something they have, what they paid for the last one versus the first one and all kinds of stuff like that. So I think as a as an industry as a whole, we haven't been that disciplined. Yeah. I mean it, it makes great sense.

36:42 And you know, I'm kind of reminded of the the chat we were having about sort of that part of the industry, that state of the industry and, and what's the mood right now? What is that kind of feeling like? And I think it is divided for some of the reasons that you said. You know, when we think about companies that are primarily equipment dealers handling box sales, I would say they're feeling pretty exposed at the moment. They're feeling more commoditized than they would like. The results in 2024 showed this and caused them to push more into service offerings. But they were, this was a new effort for them in 24. They'd they'd been accustomed to sort of just doing box sales in the past. And I would put dry hair rental companies in this as well.

37:22 You know, there's some real inherent challenges to being that limited in terms of what they could offer to the market that unfortunately has had a huge amount of competition. Now whether or not that evolved into design and build projects with a focus on more relational and less transactional had a huge impact on businesses and and in my opinion will. So as we think about sort of where the market sits right now, those businesses I wouldn't label as in crisis, but I would say that most of them aren't hitting their growth budget year over year. Now I do want to be clear that a lot of the companies that I've seen that are working in that space actually did grow their EBITDA year over year from 23 to 24. That being said, they didn't enjoy the budgeted level of growth that they had targeted to achieve in that period. So that was challenging.

38:14 So they grew. They just didn't grow as much as they expected to. Exactly. Exactly. And now by contrast, the providers in the live evidence sector that had a strong balance of Labor and equipment provision that were supported by some design build construction capability did a lot better and they were clear standouts. There it was. It was a way for them to de commoditize their offering. And in my opinion, it worked and it's going to continue to work. When I think about those companies, you know, that we're sort of talking about in the, you know, the sub 25,000,000 sector. And I, and actually I would say it's even true of the larger matrix organizations too, and the 1 billion pluses. They saw a lot of opportunity and growth in that design and build aspect of what they could be doing with the gear they might already own or already be dealers with. And, and so I, I think that's going to be really an important feature for people to look at going from. Yeah, yeah.

39:15 Well, and you know, another thing that I seem to have learned over the past couple of years especially is that it, it appears like almost like the the ball, the the problem is moving around the room. So, you know, like for a period of time you've got an inventory problem, you know, you've got a lot of customers that are asking for X and you have Y and you've got too much money into Y because the price on Y has come down. And so now you got to unload YS below what you paid for them and buy a bunch of XS so that you can capitalize on these these opportunities.

39:56 And then you go and start to go after these opportunities and you realize the margins have come way down on them. Or, you know, all of a sudden there's a shortage of capital in the market or all of a sudden there's some other problem in the market. And it just feels to me like it, you know, it's a moving target as far as trying to nail down, you know, what my challenges are like. I know one of the questions I've always asked on the podcast, especially while we were going through the sort of. Post COVID mayhem was, you know, inventory or people like what's your bigger problem? And the answer was always either both or or it depends what week you asked me.

40:36 You know, so like again, when you're talking about less sophisticated businesses, perhaps in the five to 10 or $15 million range, who, you know, they have software they have, they might not have a CFO, they might not have a COO, They might not have, you know, sort of that financial modelling or business modelling stuff that that larger companies would have. They don't have a board. They don't have maybe have advisors like you who can guide them on some of these things. So how do they navigate? Like how do they you know? How do they know which problem to solve and when?

41:19 In a sense I guess is what I'm asking. Yeah, I mean, it's a great question and there's been a lot of leadership whiplash is the way that I sort. Of said yeah. And, and it's, you know, the ball moving around the room. Absolutely. It's hard to know what the priority is on any given day. And I would say it's been exacerbated by the fact that we had so many executive leaders, whether you're ACEO or a founder SAT above the business and we're a little more future looking. But as the pandemic hit, they became more tactical. They had to work in the business by necessity and they haven't extricated themselves from that. So they they've kind of put themselves in a situation where now they are relied upon as a daily operator in their business and they have not put together.

42:08 A plan. To get back to being founder or CEO in a more strategic future looking way. And, and why I think that's really important is because you were talking about how it affects the different issues. You know, what about the labor, what about the equipment? The one person in an organization that affects every department is the leader, is the CEO, is the founder, right? Every decision they make affects the company universally and then it gets obviously executed by any of their department heads. And and so I think there's really there's. Three questions I would. Say, for any founder or CEO to ask themselves if they're finding that they're in a position where maybe they're they're feeling a little bit overwhelmed or maybe they're something doesn't feel right.

42:54 Ask yourself three things. Number one is, does my schedule have more tactical action items than strategic future planning items? Yes or no? Do I have? More than seven. Direct reports and the third question. Is have my. Direct reports indicated to me that I appear overwhelmed. Or am I canceling calls with them frequently? If you say yes to any one of those and if you say yes to all three, especially get somebody to walk. Alongside that, what? Do you think the sweet spot is? For for founders, CEOs, as far as director reports, how many should they have or how many should they not have? What's the break point? You know I, I from. Experientially, I would say if they all have different titles and functions, 5 to 7 is really what I've seen people be able to effectively manage when you get north of seven, and again, especially if they have different roles, it's going to be really difficult to manage.

43:46 If for instance, though, you have maybe regional territories where it's 3 or 4 territories under different people, but they're officially doing the same job, that can be easier to manage because you're not measuring different metrics, right? You're measuring the same metrics. You're just measuring them across maybe a few different direct reports is what I prefer. But I think that's really important. And you know, to your question on how do founders think about those kind of things, I think I think first you have to sort of self assess it. You know, does this sound like me? Does do I feel overwhelmed? Do I feel like maybe some of these things are happening? If so, the choices. I'm making universally.

44:28 Affecting the organization of what I'm doing. Am I creating a situation? Unintentionally? Of course, but a whiplash situation inside my own organization to say, OK, today labor is more important, let's put our efforts and energy into strategies around labor. And then the next week, again to your point, no, no, no, it's about equipment. We need to hurry up and sell some equipment and retired off the books and buy some new things. And, and what happens ultimately is that you wind up destabilizing the very thing that you're trying to protect. That's a great point. I, I mean, I just think that's such a, a different dynamic depending on the size of your business. Because, you know, for example, like for a small company, a $5,000,000 company who needs equipment to do a job that they've committed to doing and suddenly the bank doesn't want to give them the credit to get that equipment.

45:22 You know, that can be a devastating issue versus a larger business. And you know, I'm not belittling anyone's problems against anyone else's because, you know, like one thing I learned in business is, is if you want to make more money, solve bigger problems basically. But to a small to $1,000,000 business owner not being able to get the line of credit to put those lights out with, you know, Weezer or some smaller act than Weezer. I can't think of anyone. But, you know, you've committed to that act. You've committed to the lighting designer or to the production manager or whatever. And now you suddenly can't get the gear because, you know, either you got stiffed by the supplier because they gave them to somebody bigger than you or your bank isn't going to give you the money or whatever it is. Like that's a major problem versus the big company who might be working on $100 million line or a $200 million line. You know, that's going to solve a lot more problems. It's going to go across the entire business and solve a lot of problems probably for the next 12 or 18 or 24 months. Not just I need to get these lights out on Weezer this week or else I'm dead.

46:39 Like I'm so done, you know, so different. Dynamics. Of course. Because I it's that's. Such a great. Example, because I literally had this come up with a client who was feeling really trapped into a space where they had good opportunity they couldn't get the capital to, to fund getting the equipment they needed to put out on projects. And I think one of the biggest challenges that that especially smaller companies sub 25,000,000 do run into that we're talking about is when you get in the mindset that you have all the answers for your company and everybody's coming to you and asking you for all the final answers. We sort of just get in that rut of thinking that will always be the case, right? Like, if I can't figure it out, nobody can figure it out. Yeah.

47:22 And I, And to that I would say, please challenge yourself to think that might not be true. Be open to the possibility that there might be a way to get to. Yes. It's just you don't know what it is because you haven't experienced it. So I literally had a group that came with that exact problem. And the way that we wound up solving that problem was we needed to forge a partnership with another group that had a lot of equipment on the shelves that we knew had low asset utilization. They just weren't renting it to the level that we wanted or that they wanted and and so the the group. That I was working. With said, well, yeah, but you know, we, they're not going to just let us have it for like 6 months. And I said, you don't know that.

48:04 You're just probably not talking to the right person to say here's the revenue model that I'm working with, here's the opportunity I have. Do you want to participate in this because you have the gear and I have the contract. Let's figure this out. And And at the end of the day, it did. And you know what he spent on purchase? Nothing 0. You know, and it was just a. Matter of saying OK, how does this how does this math look for both of us how do we both make money in this equation and I need a ton of gear and I need it for like 12 week the 12 week tour. How does that work? And he, he was so locked into thinking I have to buy all this gear or so like I have to buy it. If I can't buy it, I can't do the job. And really actually all we needed to do was find somebody that had the gear that they desperately wanted to rent and get them together with the person that had the contract and negotiate a reasonable deal that solved both of their problems. And it did.

48:55 And they both made money. So but it's it's still weird because. I think as a business owner, you're, you're expected by your staff, the bank, your friends, your family to be a genius on all things. Like you should just absolutely know everything about everything. And as situations change and, and you know, maybe you don't have like, for example, the average guy out there in a small rental company doesn't know if it makes more sense to buy or rent that gear, cross rent that gear. They look at it and they go, well, you know, it's 12 weeks at $100 a week, that's 1200 bucks. My purchase price is only 3000. I'm paying for 1/3 of the price of that gear on one rental like it'd be stupid not to buy it.

49:44 Well, maybe not. I mean, let's. Maybe stretch that out a little past those 12 weeks and see what ownership looks like, the cost of ownership, the cost of money, you know, what you could have been doing with the money instead of buying those, those lighting fixtures or whatever. So I mean, there's, there's this perceived level of expertise on all things. And you know, I know I've done pretty well at learning how to navigate some very difficult waters and some some really nice calm waters as well. But I've bumped my head 1000 times on things that I just didn't know anything about. I didn't know, I didn't have the education or, or, you know, experience to be able to understand that I was stepping into, you know, dog shit like 20 times in my career. And, and then just by the time you stepped in it, it was like, Oh my God, you know, what's that smell that Utah that didn't mean that, that you yeah.

50:42 And so I don't know, like it's, it's, it's always, don't get me wrong, business ownership for me and, and being ACEO and being an entrepreneur is the greatest thing in the world. You know, I'm entirely unemployable, I think at this point. But still, like some days you just go, you know why didn't? I see that coming. You know you don't have eyes in 52 different locations around your head, right? Like, yeah, you got. Blind spots all. All business owners have blind spots. You know the president has blind spots. Let's current president decide. Any president you know has blind blind spots. Billionaires have blind spots. It, it happens, it's just when you're $1,000,000 company dealing with a very small set of resources, capital, inventory, whatever, you can't make $1,000,000 mistakes. You just can't.

51:38 You could make $20,000 mistakes occasionally, not very often, but you can make them occasionally. But you can't make $1,000,000 mistake because that's going to put you out of business. It's going to end your, your, your whole thing, whatever you're doing, right? Well, that's, that's it. And that's. You. Know why I was saying, I think it's very consequential that size of business is? It will dictate. Whether you get to the next level or not, your ability to navigate what you don't know. And I mean, for all of us, right? And all of us humans are really, most of us are pretty bad. It's it's self-assessment, right? We look at something, we go, I'm great at that and somebody else goes layer it up. But let me ask you an.

52:20 Even simpler. Question So like let's say I'm a $3,000,000 business and I can see signs that I'm going to grow to, you know, here in 2025 I'm going to grow to $5,000,000. You know, how do I know? Like are there alarm bells or anything that go off that say that I'm going to either run out of knowledge, skill set, you know, experience or capital or inventory or whatever? Like how do I know what I don't know? I would. Say if you're. Seeing that you think you could grow more than 20% year over year, that should raise a flag. And the reason it should raise a flag is because your business is about to get hungrier than it's ever been and it's going to impact all of it. It's going to impact staff, cash flow, morale, potentially the culture of what made you special to begin with it it. So I think you can intake, in my experience, about 10 to 15% of growth year over year and still pretty much maintain. It'll be a stretch, but you can do it. Once you start getting 20% or or north, it gets really hard and people get excited.

53:30 They go, Oh my gosh, we got contracts. We're going to be 100% year over year. Think about that. That's going to be. You know, there's some things that are going to have to change in that. So that that's what I would say for a simple metric, 20% year over year. If you've never experienced that before, that's probably a good time to to know that you might need a little more experience or might need a little more staff or technical abilities weighing in on that. Well, I'm I'm a big. Fan. Of a book, and I can't remember the name of it, but I think it's called 10X is easier than 2X. And the entire concept is to grow a business 2X, meaning I'm doing 5 million and I want to grow to 10 million in whatever period of time this year, in the next two years, whatever it is.

54:17 Most businesses just have to work harder to get from 5 million to 10 million, from 1,000,000 to 2 million. Let's even make this easier. To get from 1,000,000 to 2 million, all I really have to do is is work twice as hard and I'll get there. I just have to do more of the same stuff. The same stuff, but more of it. Put it that way, to get 10XI have to think differently. I have to, I have to really reshape how I'm doing things because I can't work 10 times as hard. I can't work 10 times as many hours. I can't just, you know, 10X my output or my inputs expecting a 10X output. So I have to.

54:58 Something has to change and that's really where a lot of the magic happens is when you really rethink your entire business and say, you know, like you get into some like who, not how kinds of things too. You know, it's not me that's going to do everything that's going to get us from 1,000,000 to 10 million. Now I need to rely on some other people. What do those people in skill sets look like, right? Like do. You do you agree with that kind of a? Philosophy I I do, and actually. Those three questions I mentioned really drive into some of that stuff. You know, do I have more tactical things on my schedule than strategic ones? How many direct? Reports do I have. It's it, it speaks to the aspect of am I trying to just work harder and control more stuff or am I repositioning my thinking to achieve much bigger growth there? And, and as a part of that, one of the, the, the key signs too is that people go back to what they know. So if for instance, you feel like you're in a spot where I want to grow, I want to, I want to be able to to do the 10X type approach, but.

56:10 You're in that. Space where you say I just don't have time for a strategic call today I I. I would challenge. That to say you should make time because if you don't have time, it means you're just continuing to think in the same thought patterns and to rescue in the way that's comfortable for you, for the business. Well, and I'm sure you've done this A. 100 times because this is your gig as a consultant, but I know with friends of mine who have come to me and asked like there's been a couple of fairly specific types of questions. 1 is that I can't, like I'm growing my business from 1,000,000 to 2 million, but I can't afford the inventory that I need or the people that I need to get it from 1,000,000 to 2 million.

56:53 And that's a fairly easy discussion because you know, the inventory is going to make you more money, the people are going to make you more money. Where's the issue? Like the people are going to take work that you're probably doing today because your company's transitioning out of everything, relying on you into having other people around you as a structure around you that takes on that additional work and allows you to grow the company even larger. But you know, I, I mean, I just find that, you know, and then. The other question is. Is things like, you know, I can't, I don't have time to, to do all of these things I need to do. And I'll start asking people questions about what exactly they're doing, you know, so where are you spending all your time?

57:40 Well, you know, when I first start out in the beginning of the day, you know, I go through 100 emails that are coming. You know, fifty of them are spam and then the other 50 are, are just, you know, shows that we're going to be doing over the next couple of weeks that people have questions about them. And so I think first, you know, like 100 emails probably doesn't warrant you getting a, you know, like a, an assistant. But if it's 500 emails or something like that and you're spending three hours going through these 500 emails, you could get an assistant for very little money, especially if you go to, you know, the Philippines or something like that.

58:21 And, and you get a, an assistant, you can get very good ones for, you know, 5 or $6.00 an hour that can get through your e-mail and respond and do all kinds of things very, very well, very efficiently. And that frees up your time to do that next level of stuff. But you know, you get beyond that and they start getting into things like, well, you know, I had to go on Canva and create a couple of diagrams that I need for this meeting that I'm doing tomorrow. OK, So you know, there's this thing called Fiverr and it's called Fiverr for a reason. You can pay somebody 5 bucks to create that diagram that you need. And of course, now as you know, there's AI that can do it as well. And so, you know, the only, the only areas where I find that you need to sort of look away from the cost versus benefit sort of ideas is when it gets down to family or just doing things that you really love to do or need to do for health or things like that, like going to the gym.

59:20 You're never going to put a value on going to the gym. You're not going to put a value on going to your kids birthday party or going to watch their school play or whatever. Right. You're not going to say, oh, well, I could pay an assistant to do that. No, of course not. You know, first of all, you'll be divorced, your kids will hate you, all of those things, right? So, you know, I, I find we business owners tend to be our own worst enemy because we think first of all, we think we're the smartest people in the room and, and therefore we need to do everything like, if I want it done right, I better do it myself. That mentality, right? How many businesses have you seen that destroyed I, I? Would say quite a. Lot, yeah, and.

1:00:02 You know, ironically. Experientially, I would. Say 90% of business owners or CE OS say I don't need help seeing blind spots, I don't need help coming up with ideas. I don't need help talking about big changes in the organization. And yet almost 100% of them will say, yeah, you know what, that was really valuable time if they can get connected with somebody who partner with them in that journey. And, you know, whether that's a mentor or an advisor, whoever sits in that space with them. So that statistic alone tells me we're really bad at self assessing what our needs are and and what we think we have to do. So, So yeah, I mean, statistically we have some evidence that says it's far more people benefiting from from asking questions than those that think they have all the answers for sure.

1:00:57 Well, you know what too like. I think another way to say it is, is when you're going from zero to $1,000,000 as a business, I think the general philosophy or, or sort of guiding light is to say yes to everything, take on everything, say yes to absolutely everything you can. If you want to grow, you have to really learn to say no a lot. And, and it becomes much harder than saying yes. It's hard to say no, you know, to a customer, to an employee, to an opportunity to, you know, and I listen to so many different, believe it or not, you're not the only consultant that I listen to and pay attention to. So I listen to other people and they always talk about like, you know, you need to, you need to sort of narrow the rails on your business. Like if you're trying to solve for 50 different problems out there, 50 different things like, well, first we're a SAS company and then we're a rental company.

1:01:54 And then we're also this company. We're also like, you know, you know how many rental companies I've spoken to who are software companies, like they've created their own SAS system that they then go out and market to other companies. And then they've created some software for lighting software that's like a Wizzywig kind of thing, but with a special little thing. And they go out and market that to other. And when you start digging through it, you go OK. So how much are you? Making on the lighting software, well, you know, we don't really make any money on it. Like, I think we've sold maybe $5000 over the last two years. And how much time do you spend on that? You know, And when you start digging through it, the problems become so obvious. Yeah.

1:02:37 Oh yeah. The organic growth over the. Years of just the things that happen and that you sort of say this is a part of the business that we do without going back to curate that list and and check it and say, yeah, but should we be doing that or yeah, we should be doing it? What margin should we start saying no AT? And there are some really good examples around that there. There was a group that I recently worked with. They were troubled by having margins that were very low for what they were doing and within a period of about seven months, we 7. X the margin.

1:03:17 And it didn't take anything exotic. I mean it, it was really a matter of understanding that customer segmentation. So who they thought their customer was wasn't actually who their greatest impact customer was. They didn't properly tell the story of how they were servicing customers and what their distinction was. So they had to lead with low price. So no surprise they couldn't protect a margin because they were a low cost leader just to get any business in the door. So to go from that sort of model to seven months later having polished marketing materials, the same group of customers essentially coming in, but now those same customers are paying three and four times what they were paying before because the cost structure reduction that's amazing. EBITDA is 7 XI mean it's yeah, you know the interesting. Thing about all of that, like first is one of the things I learned along the way is you have to have the courage to to raise your prices.

1:04:17 You know, you got to be willing and have the courage to raise your prices and you should always, always be looking to raise your prices. It should be a part of your business, you know, and and I forget what the second point was, but it was a really important one and I'll come back to it. But you know, like it's just, it's we're always under selling ourselves. We always think our problem are, are the problem we solve is worth less money than what we're actually charging for it. And we're just lucky to be making any margin at all. And that's just silly, you know. And again, I mean, the, the focus part of it, you know, you, you mention it by margin, but I, I just think it, the whole idea like even if you're making 50% margins on a new line of business, I think the thing you, you need to be doing, like focus is a big word for a lot of businesses. They think they're focused on 10 different things. Like these are our 10 markets that we focus on. Well, focus means that you would go from here down to here. That's focused, right?

1:05:18 And so I think instead of the wider you can go, the narrower you need to go and then figure out what's really working for you and then do more of that. Like people are too quick to go, OK, we're doing this really well and how I want to do this, and then I want to do this after that. And then we're going to do this one up here too. And you know, you end up losing sight of what you did really well to begin with. And I know I've done this 20 times in my career. So I've banged my head a lot and made mistakes. And therefore I can say that, and I know it's true, but you know, focus is a really powerful word and, and it's can be very powerful in a business, especially when you're small, like the, I think the smaller you are, the narrower that focus needs to be.

1:06:05 Uh huh. I. I agree, I think if you have. More than five priorities, you probably have none in terms of what business is doing and events. It's kind of hard, right, because we have glitzy shiny objects to chase. There's cool stuff in what we're doing. You know, you think about some of these tours or the events out there, what's happening with film and TV markets now. It it there's some really cool stuff happening both technology wise and just in terms of the finished product, you know, whether it's on a stage or on a tour or, or or on TV. And so I think it attracts that, you know, you get a little taste of that and you go, wow, yeah, we did this segment really well. We want to do more of that and let's do more of this and that and you start bolting on other things and it's not always the best idea. No.

1:06:49 Well, I mean. One real world example, I know so many small rental companies who are lighting companies and saw this flashy shiny thing called LED screens and went and got bank lines to to buy these incredibly expensive, you know, 2.9 mil LED walls. And then realized that, you know, the price that they thought was $400.00 a tile is 40 bucks a tile. And the return on investment isn't very good. And the cost of ownership is really high. And they're constantly updating this stuff to where now it's 1.9 mil, now it's .9 mil. Now the processing just got better and everybody wants that one instead. And, and you know, the cost of ownership and video in general, like is, is that flashy, bright, shiny thing that every lighting company wants to expand into because they're like, well, we already got a crew out on the show site. It's not that hard to learn these extra little bits where, you know, we're, we're rigging a lighting package or we're rigging a video package.

1:07:54 Doesn't really make much difference, right? Makes tons of sense. But they're just entirely different focuses and entirely different disciplines. So I I think that's a great example. And I came to mind is that I don't think they also thought that 15% of their inventory would be down for repairs at any given time. True that. Yeah, LED. Tiles, yeah. No, very. True. And so I know, I know several companies who have sort of divested of their LED video inventory because of exactly those reasons. Like, first of all, it, it cost a lot more money than we expected. The return was a lot less than we expected.

1:08:35 The downtime was a lot less than we are, more than we expected. And the customers were more demanding than we would have ever imagined. You know, and it's just this constant evolution, you know, it's like if you want to rent video projectors in your world, in the AV business, if you want to rent video projectors to, you know, the Google conference or the Apple conference, this is the latest state-of-the-art, you know, most incredible laser projector, latest model, best lensing, all this stuff that's 150 grand or whatever. But if you want to put a video projector on Weezer, you know, or on some slub act or something and they just want some video on a screen next to the, you know, for iMac or something.

1:09:23 You can get away with a used, you know, 10K or 12K projector that you're going to pay, you know, nothing for. And it'll be fairly reliable and you can sell it at the end of the show and get the same nothing that you paid for it and it becomes a pretty profitable experience. But even then, like should you own a bunch of 10 or 12 K video projectors if that's not your business, I think. One of the best questions a small business can ask themselves is how do I do this for zero out I and challenge yourself just even if it seems completely in this industry. Yeah, and you? And that's why motors, I mean, maybe you could rent. Motors, but even then you got to get them certified and all that stuff and you sure well it to me it's more. About the thought process that that's it, I'm starting a trust and motor.

1:10:10 Company. There you go. That's what I'm starting Marcel's Trust and Motor Company. Use a partner do you want it to be? M&T or T&M or something, you know, trust and Motor Company. Oh. Yeah, I think it's a good discipline. I think it's a good. Personal challenge when you're running a business that has equipment aspects involved, how do I get access to equipment for 0 cost? And just all just thinking. And maybe the answer is you can't and that and that might be part of it. But what I've seen more often than not, and it could be across all the, you know, all the different pieces that you need, but just at least challenge that thought for a moment because almost always you'll come away with being able to find something that you could do for a lot less.

1:10:52 And then it just means you're going to be a lot more profitable. At the end of the day, focus on that relationship. Don't focus on who owns the most gear in a big pile. At the end of the day, I I don't think that's a that's a hard game to win. Yeah. Well, and gear ownership. Looks really sexy until, you know, you got to pay for it and and you know. Yeah. And then COVID happens and you're stuck with a warehouse full of gear that's not worth very much money to anyone. So switching gears a little bit, like you, like me, have a. Unique business and that. You get to talk to a lot of different people and you're very neutral. So nobody's, you know, intimidated or threatened to talk to you about their business. Similar to mine, you know, gear source.

1:11:35 We get to we're, we're sort of like, you know, Switzerland or whatever. Like we, we really were not aligned with any particular brand or manufacturer. We just want to help everybody, you know. And so people will talk to me quite openly, but same with you. And so are you like what's the mood as far as as you're concerned in the inventory right now? Like are you seeing people are really super positive about 25 or they're a little nervous or it's just an extension of 24? Like what? What are you seeing in general?

1:12:15 Yeah. I I think. I think people are really it, it is a bit divided and I, I think like your source, you know, you, you too think about how to help people save money, right? And how to sort of be in that space of get what you need. And, and so sort of in line with, you know, with my comments, I think that's, that's a really great place for people to sort of stop and challenge, right? Like they're not going to get to 0. It's just about challenging the thought process of like, instead of only having the blinders on and thinking, OK, I must have, I must have the highest price employee that only does these things, or I must have only the brand new technology. That's exactly this thing like think about other options, right?

1:12:58 Because they're out there and and like your source, there's a phenomenal resource there to be able to look at and and have those thoughts right and have a good conversation about it. So I think I think that's a big piece of it is, you know, people are sort of looking around IN25I. I am seeing that bit of whiplash with people in the industry. Some of them had a good 24, sure, their EBITDA was a little bit better and the revenue was a bit better, but it didn't hit their budget target that they were hoping for. And some of them feel OK about that and they're like, hey, it's just the nature of it right now. Other people have taken it really hard and they're, I won't say declaring an emergency, but they're, you know, they're feeling a lot more stress about that. And, and I think part of it is self-inflicted. You know, we have to look at things in my opinion less from a standpoint of the number on the page is always reasonable. Sometimes the number on the page is not always reasonable and you'll know that because the market conditions won't allow it to be reasonable.

1:14:03 If the market, if there are outside factors that you can quantify, that you can point to, that you can say, yes, these are objective real reasons why we didn't hit that target, then I think that's worth having a different conversation about sort of, you know, holding that differently. If you really truly didn't hit the targets, but the opportunity was there, your win rate was crap, you had a lot of issues messaging your customers, that's a different issue. And and so that you know, I think that's something different to think about. South in 25. Here's what I see. You still have a lot of those post pandemic, much smaller companies that open to gear rental business in their garage that are still out there. They're still freelancing. There's less of them now, but they are still, you know, they're still out there being able to serve the market and the access to that has had an impact on mid and large players in some markets.

1:14:57 So I think that's. Something that's. Still being played out. I think the other thing that we're seeing in 25 is if you are, as I was saying before, heavily focused in just gear rental or gear sales and you're not in a situation like like a gear source, but you're somebody who has a brick and mortar, you have all the stuff sitting on the shelf. Are you really thinking about what? What the sweet? Spot of that. Inventory level should be or do you still have 50 LED walls that you know that are not going out and maybe should be redeployed, you know that that be that should be moved on. And I and so I think those are that's a key part of it. The flip side of that is I'm seeing companies that are in that design build space that are doing a lot of permanent install work.

1:15:47 They're doing, they're doing front end design and new construction and that market is accelerating dramatically. So that's why I say I think there's a bit of whiplash for some some organizations that came out of the pandemic and you've got this sprinkling right, of some executive leaders that are still in tactical mode and haven't gone back to strategic mode. You have some businesses that are still over capitalized that are trying to figure out how to both right size their inventory and get the different inventory that they need. That's even more important. And then you've got the added effect that you have the teams under them who are trying to interact, but it's much more utility player now because you you have your executive leader that's now working in the business.

1:16:27 And so by definition that creates a utility player environment. So I think I think that's sort of what I'm seeing right now. Yeah, so. In general, though, would you say that because I know? That like. I'm hearing such a wide, you know, some people thought 2024 was the greatest year ever. I just had a conversation with a very good friend of mine a couple of days ago that said it was his, the last half of 2024 was was a disaster. It was just a complete disaster. And he's, you know, big time, big time guy with a pretty large book of business and, you know, just said it's a disaster. I'm hopeful for 25, but you know, I don't see any miracles coming. Little more negative I would say like, you know, believe it or not, I mean, again, without getting political at all, you know, I'm still hearing, you know, I'm holding on to my money to see what this president is going to do. You know, like I don't know about you. I'm sure a lot of your clients, because I know the types of clients that you deal with, but I have never changed anything I'm doing in my business based on who the president is or what they're doing.

1:17:39 Like I got to do what I got to do regardless of what the president is going to do, right? So if I'm heavily reliant on a particular market that is going to be impacted by this president or this president, I'll pay a lot more attention to that. But I think in general, if your business was going to do $10 million this year with Kamala as the president, you're probably going to do $10 million this year with Trump as the president. Get on with it, You know what I mean? Like it's probably going to be about the same as it was the other way. Again, certain markets I think are going to be impacted a little differently. I think some of the tech markets are probably going to see and just wild profitability going forward because he's being very supportive and very friendly to some of those and putting some, you know legislation in place to help them to clear a path for things like AI.

1:18:34 But other markets are probably not going to do as well because you know, he's maybe less friendly to those markets or something. But I think in general for our business that's not going to have an impact. But you know, things like you, you've mentioned a couple of Times Now dry higher I, you know, I know a lot of people in the dry hire business and that. Is a business that. Requires some strong nerves, you know what I mean? Like not to react too quickly, but not to react too slowly either, I guess because you're sitting on just massive piles of inventory hoping that someone's going to need it. And you know, you're not dealing with end clients.

1:19:15 You're you're basically on the backs of the rest of our in industry, hoping that they're doing well enough that they're going to need your inventory and that also that manufacturers are doing well enough so they're not going to be cutting deals like crazy, making it too easy for those companies to buy inventory. So now buying becomes a better solution than renting. So a lot of different variables in there for sure. Oh yeah. Absolutely. I mean that customer value piece is really it's a challenging balance to maintain because customers are really savvy. The commoditized piece is tough, right? The dry hire rental market is your customer expects you to have the thing that they want and if you don't have it, your odds of renting it potentially go down dramatically because it's a very transactional business. Once you get more relational with it, now your customer might be a bit more open to, you know, I don't have those movers, but I have these movers and maybe you would consider that they have the same features and certainly they're dry hire companies that do that very successfully.

1:20:14 But I I think that that's a. You know, that's a key piece of it, it because in the absence of having that, that relational focus there, you do wind up just sort of filling the rider and, and in which case the lowest price wins well, and. You've mentioned. That one a couple times too, the lowest price thing. And you know, the good thing about being the lowest price guy or girl is that you don't have to do much work to to get the sale. You know, you just have to make sure that that price on your website is lower than everybody else's and you're going to get the sale. The bad news is someone's always going. To find a way. To be lower than you. And so it's also just as easy to lose the sale. And the problem with being the low price leader is you always have to have the lowest price and make the lease margin. And, you know, it's just not a business I want to be in, you know, and I don't know why anybody would. That's the least fun business I'd ever want to be in to be the low price leader.

1:21:13 Well, and it's. It's kind of intuitive to. Trying to keep up with video and lighting technologies and audio technologies that are that are changing and customers know they want the newest and the best, right. So it is. It's kind of counterintuitive just to have a bunch of capital outlay and then rent it for the absolute lowest price and have no margin, only shorten cycle. Of when you can use it. It's kind of yeah. Nonsense. So what do you think, you know, aside from maybe, well, I guess we don't really have supply chain issues anymore. So what do you think the big challenges are this year for companies in our industry? Yeah, I think, I think that. Really.

1:21:57 Challenging. Themselves to think about what their unique values are, is important this year. And the reason I say that is having talked with a number of different organizations across the industry and seeing that their approach to how they want to be unique is, is also the approach to how many companies say they want to be unique. So, so by definition, they're sort of all evolving, but they're evolving in very similar ways. Yeah. And, and so you're not really setting yourself unique. You're sort of at that point. I think the better way to say it is you're evolving with the trends, right, which is, which is great.

1:22:38 And you should do that. But to be unique in a space sort of sets you above and beyond in a way that differentiates you from the pack, right? And so I I think being really. Honest. About is what you're saying you want to do in 2025 with your company? Is it really unique or are you just evolving with the trends and, and get really honest with yourself about which one of those is? And it's, there's, it's not a positive or a negative. It's just, I think an awareness to be honest with yourself. And, and if you say, OK, we're, we're keeping up with trends, then know that you might still have exposure from somebody who comes up with a unique solution that's still in your, your set of companies.

1:23:21 So I, I think be really aware of that because I don't think this commoditized issue is going to go away anytime soon. I, I think that that customers are more interested than ever in new technologies and, and, and what that looks like for, for them and being able to thoughtfully redeploy gear or change gear. There's companies that are serving markets that need equipment that was popular a few years ago and they have clients that want that. And so I think it's equally, I think it's very important both sides, but be. Really honest with yourself. About the customer that you are trying to serve and you kind of hands to those you know really, really narrow that focus.

1:24:01 Don't try to serve all customers all the way around. Really focus on who your customer segments are. Yeah, you got to exactly what I. Was thinking is is the whole what do you call it? ICP ideal customer persona, you know, really understanding exactly who your ideal customer is. And I think so many customers don't, you know, they just their ideal customer is somebody who's got a, a need and a checkbook. And, but what if you really knew what motivated your very, this very narrow lane? What motivated those people to want to do business with you or to want to do business with your competitors?

1:24:46 And what if you were able to, again, just do more of that thing, whatever The thing is that like feed them exactly what they want to eat. And you can't do that on a wide audience. You can only do it when you get really narrow on your audience needs and that persona that that ideal persona of your customer, because your customer is going to be different than PR GS customer. Then, you know, solo tech's customer, then the next company's customer. And you know, one of the, I think one of the superpowers of the smaller businesses in our industry. And I think they lost sight of this. A lot of them lost sight of this is that I've always felt like small businesses should do business with small businesses, large businesses should do business with large businesses. And when you start to mix those up, it becomes problematic. So when PRG rents to a DJ who's doing a, you know, a bar mitzvah this weekend, it's probably not going to be the user experience that that DJ expected.

1:25:49 He's not treated very well potentially by PRG. And that's no slight on PRG. It's just that his show is being loaded out at the same time as, you know, Beyoncé and the Super Bowl, you know, and this DJ wants to be treated special because he's spending $1000. Like, that's a lot of money. You know, it's half my, it's half what I'm taking in to do this show this weekend. And so versus if you had a small like one or $2,000,000 lighting company, they're probably going to know the guy's name. They're going to see him drive up and they're going to go, oh, there's Bob. I know he's doing a bar mitzvah this weekend and he's renting some stuff from us and he's going to be treated special.

1:26:33 And so I'm not saying that that DJ is going to become their ideal customer or anything, but it's a better match. You know, it's, it's like, you know, it's small business and small business and same thing when a small company tries to do a show for Google or something, they usually fall short either on, on personnel on gear, like they don't have the latest greatest stuff. They don't have enough of it. Their truck was too small to meet up to the dock. You know, I mean, just all kinds of different problems can occur because they don't belong there necessarily, right? And so match. It is a tough. Match and I'm not saying. You can't reach like of course a small business can reach a little higher than like if I'm $1,000,000 business. That doesn't mean I should only deal with DJs, but I shouldn't go after Beyoncé's tour this year because it could likely bankrupt me if I were to get it.

1:27:27 It'd be the worst thing that ever happened to my business because I'd have to take on so much debt to get the gear and people that I would need. And I don't have any experience dealing with Beyoncé or Beyoncé size acts. And so I don't belong there and I'm going to have problems. So I think that that's a challenge to like, I think there's a lot of companies out there that think they can grow in to be the Super Bowl provider this year or Beyoncé's rental company or whatever it is. And there's a good chance they don't belong there. And, and they're going to bump their head pretty hard and it's going to cost a lot of money and may, may, really may end them. Yeah, I think small companies.

1:28:08 Definitely don't have any surge capacity, right, whereas larger companies do. And I think if that's a, if that's a factor, it absolutely comes into. Play. Yeah. So do you think that? The period we're in right now is. Are we in? A and I'm going to read it to you exactly as I wrote it, because otherwise I'll screw it up. Transition, stagnation or growth period right now? I would say it depends. Who you are if you're a company that's reliant on 80% or more of your business coming from sort of the sources. That we were talking.

1:28:48 About if we're really focused in that that dry higher equipment rental box sales my. Suggestion. Would be to get in front of some strategic thinking right away in terms of how you want to future proof or, or build some other roadways for that particular business. If if you're concerned, if you, you know, if you feel like, hey, we're, we're kind of softening out here a little bit or we're stagnating. If you find yourself in that situation and I know that some of those organizations are then that that's probably I, I would say strongly that that's a very good place to be thinking if if you're more of a 5050 mix and you have some other diverse lanes of.

1:29:37 Travel you. Know labor and equipment and maybe you do some some design and install features then I think you probably still need to you know you will always benefit from future thinking but you're probably going to have a much better year in terms of statistically what I'm saying is one man's opinion right but I think in terms of the data that I'm seeing and what I'm experiencing with with groups that I'm working with that seems to be pretty clear to me that you really need to thoughtfully plan ahead and. And. And again, you know, ask for that outside perspective, ask for that, that that weigh in because this is the moment to do that.

1:30:19 If you're in one of those 80% companies I just mentioned and you've been waiting for the right moment to think about what's our next strategic move, this is your sign. Yeah, this is the moment to do that for sure. If not, you know, you're, I think you are in a different area to be able to do that. The other thing I would say is if you're a company who's heavily balanced in the labor market, in the labor provision, maybe you're a labor broker or maybe you you're, you're one of the companies that offers gear and labor and design build and you sort of do it all, but you have a really robust usage of Labor. You've got a big labor force. Think about getting involved with some of the workforce initiatives that are out there.

1:31:03 You know, if you're somebody that has a a big training program and you have a skill set matrix and you're, you know, you're trying to build talent for your own business, there are some very good, very important efforts happening right now to do that for our industry. And that would be another area I would say don't wait. Get involved. Yeah. But so you know, one of the things that I've had some conversations with a few column sort of mid level private equity owned companies or at least private equity partnered companies who have sort of been sitting on their hands for the last year or more.

1:31:43 And several of those people, or at least I shouldn't say several because it sounds like a big number, but in the last week, I've spoken to to three different companies who have all basically said the same thing to me, that by the end of 25 or early 26, they're going to be acquiring more companies. And they see that that's the sort of atmosphere we're going to be in by the end of 25, early 26. And you know, drilling down into some of those reasons, they feel like there's going to be a capital crunch again on those businesses. Businesses are going to need help from some more patient capital.

1:32:24 They feel like there's going to be another inventory problem and where companies are finding. Themselves left out on. Some of the new inventory, which is another thing I want to get into, some of the new technology that's coming out right now or whatever the reason, but is that something that you think matches with what you've learned as well or what you've heard it it does so? Those groups, as you might imagine, are very strategic and they're thinking they're looking years out, they're watching this, this ebb and flow that we've lived through over the last few years. And they've already done exactly sort of what I mentioned a minute ago of, you know, if if this is your moment and you haven't put together some future plans with bigger ideas and bigger influence and now is your moment to do that, they've already done that. And so because of that, they've looked out to that 2526 and they know that 25 is likely to be a very good buy year for some of those companies who who have plateaued a bit in that space. So yeah, I I think that's that's exactly right. Does it also have to do with?

1:33:33 Cost of capital, like is that a big one of the big things that they're looking at like as their cost of capital goes up, their desire to buy maybe a little edgy, you know, companies or whatever goes down. And especially like our industry is I wouldn't say unique completely, but it's special and it's need for capital for CapEx in particular like this, this massive need for CapEx in our industry seems to be different than most like most, most in most industries you don't have to spend, you know half of your sales every year on buying new gear, you know, buying new inventory.

1:34:13 So Speaking of inventory. You know one. Of the cool things, I guess what happened, if I look backwards into the crystal ball a little bit, you can see that when COVID happened, obviously a lot of companies stopped spending on research and development in our industry. We're not talking about, you know, multibillion dollar companies where they could just spend because they know the sun's going to come out at some point and they can they can just keep spending like crazy on R&D. Our industry doesn't historically spend a huge amount of money on R&D anyways, you know, in comparison to like you know, tech companies and stuff like that where where you know it, it could be, you know, half of your sales number could be spent on R&D or whatever.

1:35:02 But So what happened is I think what a, when, you know, 212223 happened, what we saw was product that was meant to come out in 2020. And what we're seeing now is stuff that's catching up. And so I think it's exciting times right now for new gear. I think we're seeing the moving light manufacturers in particular are coming out with some really cool new stuff. Some of the companies, some of the companies are still a little vanilla in their in their new product releases, but a few companies have done a really, and I won't mention names because I still need all of these people to be my friends. But you know, some of these companies have come out with some really incredible new technology. And I think we're really going to start pushing that forward again to where, you know, if you bought lights in 21 or 22 brand new, there's a very good chance that, you know, come 2026, those lights are going to be old technology. Like we're going to really start seeing some incredible new stuff happening.

1:36:06 Consoles, you know, I don't know where lighting consoles are going right now. I would expect that we'll see an MA4 console at some point in the not too distant future. I've heard high end has a hog 5 coming out. Audio consoles, there's a lot of cool stuff happening there as well. So you know, but what about like are you seeing first of all, are you seeing the same kind of thing in, in the technologies that you follow in particular? Yes, I, I, I. Agree with that. I think that is happening and I think that the that it goes back to that thought process of what are we sitting on right now that maybe we're not using and or we have customers coming to us asking for stuff and we don't we don't know how to sort of connect the dots right and get it to market for them.

1:36:57 So I think, I think that that aspect is definitely happening. And what I'm saying, I would also say that the, the coming into 26 people are definitely considering what technologies customers can afford and, and from what I'm seeing, customers are actually interested in spending more on that. There are some especially on the, on the AV corporate side, I'm seeing that customers are, are responding to the idea of beginning to grow their meetings back again and be able to have a level of technology that's maybe a bit better than it's been in the past. They're, they're still coming online, but they are certainly pushing that direction.

1:37:41 And so I, I think the trend does support that, that by 26 we're going to see a lot more asks, but strategically. Again, like if I'm a $5,000,000 rental company, most of my customers are not national touring acts. Most of my customers are not, you know, the largest tech companies in the world. Most of my clients are, you know, sort of mid to small level clients. The spec is usually mine. Like I need to be disciplined, but you know, I need to be disciplined and realize that every time one of these sound lighting video manufacturers comes out with something just a little bit different or just a little bit better. Like I think if you look specifically at moving lights, for example, as long as I have LED wash fixtures, LED hard edge fixtures, chances are they have zoom, they have framing, they have prisms, they have all those things that every light has nowadays unless.

1:38:51 I really. Need for my shows like for one, you might need IP rated fixtures that you didn't have before and I can see a huge reason to invest in IP rated fixtures. But you know, aside from that, like, should I be doing what we all do with iPhones and every time a new one comes out, should I be rushing to the store and buying that new one? Or should I be looking at my inventory and going, you know what, my EBITDA this year went up to X, whatever it is. And my current gear strategy makes a lot of sense. Like, and I flip flop on this a little bit because I always liked the Bob Cannon model where, you know, at two years, no matter what, something was put up for sale.

1:39:39 And my Cannon, the Sun remarkably is incredibly similar in his strategy on gear. And you know, for that reason, you always end up with the latest greatest stuff. It's in good condition. You know it's going to work when it gets out on the show site and you know that it's going to maintain a certain level of value and on the used market too. But what like if, if I'm a client that has hired you and I say strategically, what should I be doing? What are you going to tell me? I'm going to tell. You to look at your customer. Set and think about your customer expectations. What did, what do they expect? Because that's going to drive your demand, right? And I, I have a client that's very much in the spectrum right at this very moment.

1:40:22 So this one hits home for sure. And I would say you probably are in a place where you want to buy some different gear. But before you buy that different gear, model it out. And what I mean by that is take take the time. Well, that's a beautiful song right in the middle. Of our right, I I apologize. I didn't realize my my Mac to do that. The one of the things that I think is really important is model it out financially to figure out what your your rate of return is going to be on this and how quickly you think you can pay it back and have a couple of stretch goals for a couple of things.

1:41:04 So I think I think what happens for people is they see a lot of things that they think are really cool because there's a lot of really cool things out there, but they invest too much on check them out technologies that you know that are that top end of like, well, let's check this out with our customers and see how it goes. I think you should do that, but I think you should narrow that to a, you know, to say look, our capital budget, we're going to put 10% towards check them out technologies and the other 90% we're going to put towards equipment. That. We can verifiably or at least rationally say we're going to repay this equipment in a certain period of time and and there's some magic numbers around that.

1:41:48 What do you think that period of time should? Be and I guess it's different for all different levels of companies, but is there a in general number? Yeah, in in general. I would say if you're because you gave the AV example, I think you need to be able to pay that off within, ideally within the first six to eight months to a year. Is a is a pretty good framework in my opinion now that's of technologies that are sort of in the you know, high end video or lighting categories, particularly audio may have a little more malleability. Obviously rigging has a much longer lifespan and it's not the technology there isn't changing it at all right.

1:42:31 So so you have to really qualify which pieces of gear you're talking about. But but I would say if you're getting an initial rate of return that's, you know, north of 60% to 100% in that that first year period, you're in the ballpark. That's yeah, that's. I that's a shorter. Number than I expected to hear from you. I thought I was going to hear two years because that's what I see on so many of the moving light purchases these days. You know, they and the other thing is I, I think that companies are basically calculating the entire income from that rental towards that moving light purchase when they're doing that math because they're trying to justify the spend, right.

1:43:12 So they're going while we're getting you know, $200 a week and they're not putting any money into prep labor, any money into it relamping if they're lamp based fixtures or maintenance or repairs or any of those things soft costs, they're not considering any soft costs, just the hard cost. But the other thing that I think is exciting right now is moving lights. Again, in particular are we went through a period of time like I think with lamp based moving lights. We we were at a point where a good lamp based moving light, like a, you know, a, a mega point or a, a Viper or whatever. The, the top sort of level moving lights. Those were lasting a good 6-7 years where they were sort of at the top of the game and they were, you know, well maintained and they were in good condition and all of that stuff. Then we went to the early LE DS and we were seeing really short windows on where you could capitalize that cost and then the price was just dropping so quickly and everybody wanted the new model because they were coming out so quickly. And now I think we're back to a point like, you know, for example, I mean, we sell Mac Aura LED wash lights all day long.

1:44:27 They, you know, as fast as they come up, come up for sale on the used market, we sell them and that's a light that's probably been out for, I don't know, 7 or. Eight years at this. Point maybe more and different models obviously get bigger returns and stuff like that, but I think we're back on moving lights to where you can buy a light and expect to get a good five or six years out of it. If you're in that sort of BB plus a market, if you're in AC market, you could probably get 20 years out of it still, you know, But if you're in in those upper echelon markets, you're going to be able to use it pretty widely for a good period of time. Yeah, totally.

1:45:11 Totally agree. And I think in the example of keeping your initial rate of return high, I'm thinking specifically about that AB market where you're, you know, you're turning and burning with those events that are they're coming in pretty hot and heavy. But the viability of that product to continue to rent it and sell it. I I totally agree. I think it's, I think it's north of two years. And and I don't disagree with the two year metric. I think it just depends sort of who you are in that space. If you're, or if you're an in house provider versus a non contracted provider that's more of a dry hire. I think that's a distinction there that that matters. Yeah. Yeah. Well. I. Mean in house providers are obviously getting much higher, higher rental rates than than.

1:45:57 So moving on here a little bit because I know I don't have you all day, darn it. But one of the things I wanted to talk to you about a little bit is international markets and in particular the UAE. And the only reason I'm really getting into you on this one is because half the time when I call you or whatever, you're like in bed, sleeping in Dubai, you know, in, in, you know, early morning or the, or lunchtime, I'm having lunch and I call you and you're, you're in bed like everything. OK, Why are you waking me up? And so, you know, explain to me what that markets like today, 'cause you know, I don't, I, I wish I knew a lot more about it than I do, but I don't know a ton about, you know, Dubai and, and the UAE in general. And the Saudi market I know is constantly evolving right now. And so give me a, a bit of a snapshot on what's going on over there.

1:46:59 Sure. Incredibly. Fast growing market, particularly in KSA, Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. There has been enormous government investment to develop the events and entertainment sector. And it's been done sort of twofold #1 is that they want to create a more engagement and more attractions and opportunities for people living in Saudi. And the other part is they want to attract more tourism in Saudi. And so a lot of people may not know that it's, it's a very recent development over the last sort of two or three years, I believe, where you can get a tourist visa now to travel to Saudi Arabia. And the implications behind that are that the development of infrastructure specifically to support tourism has has needed to grow.

1:47:53 And so that's a key focus, focus for the Kingdom for sure. They really are investing a lot of money and effort in not just building event services and events venues. And I think of of things like middle beast that has multiple stages. It's it's an enormous festival on concert experience sort of wrapped up and it's the biggest in the world that I'm aware of it what it does. And so there's a massive amount of production happening in in the region. And it is an exciting time in the sense that there's a lot of it that is growing and it's growing at A at a substantially faster pace than what we're experiencing here in the United States.

1:48:39 But it's, it's also in a place where while there are many things that are very mature, there are some things that are, are still evolving. And the, the demand for high tech and high touch there is, is extraordinary in, in the best of ways, in my opinion. So the quality of product that's expected, the level of of high touch service that is expected along with that is real. And when I think about the the. Evolution of that. And, and what's happened there? So certainly there are many private companies, there are a lot of small companies and large companies alike that are in the region and like the US and anywhere else, you know, there's, there's better years and there's slower years.

1:49:28 And they've certainly felt some more recent effects of of that being a little bit a little bit softer, maybe this softer start to the year in the UAE. But from my perspective, in my opinion is it's a phenomenal market in terms of its growth potential and so. Is the driver behind? That like the the driver behind the move into tourism and stuff, is that getting away from being exclusively oil based income or revenue That's part of it I. Both. Countries have looked to diversify their income over the years. And so Dubai, UAE started that many years back by recognizing that they didn't have the most natural resources available to them and ultimately they would have to find other revenue streams.

1:50:17 And they in, in my opinion, they've done it very successfully. Their tourism market is, is fantastic. KSA in similar vein has tremendous natural resources still, but are looking at how to improve access to attractions and entertainments for, for people living in Saudi, but also wanting to be able to grow that, that access to, to events and entertainment to people coming into Saudi as tourists. So yeah, it's, it's, it's very much that's, that's very much a piece of it. But I would say that Dubai started that process more or less 20 plus years ago, whereas it's really only been in the last kind of five years where KSA has had a had a really focused push there well and is there also and.

1:51:06 You know, again, this is just all my impressions of a guy who's an idiot and has never been there. And so I don't have any first hand knowledge at all. So I'm learning from you. But I get the impression that Dubai has become much more Westernized and you know. Accepting of of Western. Culture and things like that, whereas the. Saudi. Is still a little more rigid and and conservative and is that is that true or am I I would I? Would say that broadly speaking that's true in in places like Dubai there are are certainly some expected. Cultural respects.

1:51:56 To be paid in terms of, you know, public affection or things like that that you want to be mindful of as as sort of a, a, a good citizen while you're there. But that being said, I mean, I think there are. Many. Differences in terms of the labor and workforce, in terms of how the companies even operate, in terms of how they they, they. Manage their. Operations, there are some things that are substantially different from the United States, but I would say in terms of the is it is it a place where a lot more of the entertainment that we would see here, you would see there yes, 100% the end product in terms of, you know that level of entertainment, the level of quality of production there is extraordinarily high and, and I I would say in KSAA bit different KSA is is evolving very quickly. I mean, from a standpoint that there are there are elements of society that are are very conservative and, and have certain certain cultural expectations and there are some of it may be being generational.

1:53:21 There are younger Saudis who are more desiring of that entertainment and maybe a bit more of a bit more of their ability to express themselves and, and, and a multitude of ways. So, so yeah, I would say both, both evolving, but KSA evolving very quickly in terms of maybe what what Americans or or Westerners might have in the back of their head as, as what it is. I I would say that most of the people I talked to have not really a correct perception of of many of the elements there. Yeah. And so. Is it like what are the restrictions like as far from a business standpoint like can I go open a business in Saudi?

1:54:12 That's. That's a tough. Question. Really. Yeah. So the the short answer is yes, you can. There are a number of things that you have to go through in terms of licensure and in terms potentially of sponsorship of of a local who is joining your business effort, depending on a lot of different factors. They will have requirements in terms of having a physical office there and maybe even in a certain place. So there's, there's a lot of, there's a lot to know in terms of how to do that. Is it possible? Yes, I would say that that largely though, if especially if you're a small business, it, it probably is not going to make sense to set up shop there because it's going to cost you a lot to start that structure and get it in place.

1:55:08 But it's but it's possible. What about the big like? Multinational chains, you know, like the four walls and PR GS and stuff. Do they have local offices? They do OK. And so do they have. To do that with local partners, so it. It depends the rules. Have changed quite a bit and the rules between KSA and UAE, while similar, are not entirely the same. OK, So in UAE it is possible to be entirely owned without being a local, but there are some provisions to that and and a fair number of complexities. When you're looking at larger organizations like that, that are able to put a footprint, put a building and hire locally and maintain a a certain level of of staffing locally, then you can begin to enter that equation and and have an office there.

1:56:01 But but yeah, there's there's a lot of sounds complicated. It it. Sort of in. Comparison to what we talked about in U.S. business, Yeah, there's it. It's a bit different. Yeah. What about? Gear like I. I remember with a different company that I had back. This was a long time. Ago maybe, I don't know, 1617, eighteen years ago and we were selling product into Dubai I believe and it couldn't be Chinese made product. Are there any kinds of? Restrictions like that, like like you can't sell used product there, you can't sell product of certain origin there.

1:56:44 You can't. That you're aware of, I'm not aware of. Intricacies around that. OK, OK. Yeah. Just curious about that, Yeah. And so I know you're you're doing a lot of work over there. Is that primarily companies from here that are now doing business there or are you actually working with like Saudi based companies? Both really interesting. That's. Quite the growth. I'm just going to sign on clients in Saudi Arabia so that some. Organizations looking to. Expand where it makes sense to do so from the United States into the UAE or KSA. And also some organizations in UAE and KSA that are, are looking for help achieving that next level of growth.

1:57:30 Sort of asking the question like what's next in the playbook for us? How do we get to that place? We're seeing a lot of opportunity here help us shape what that looks like. And, and so that's that's kind of the nature of it. Are we starting to see companies? Over there, getting large enough to where they're thinking of expanding into North America or Europe or other parts of the world I. Think that's a TBD? I think there's, there are, yeah, I think that's a TBD at the moment. Most of the organizations that are locally based are really primarily focused at the moment on growth within the region.

1:58:12 It's. Interesting because. You know, obviously like the, I don't know what it's called Saudi sovereign fund or whatever it's called, but you know, there seems to be such a climate over there for the government to invest into businesses. You would think that and they they come over here and they buy American companies and stuff as well. You would think that they would go, hey, Todd, we want to grow your bit, help you grow your business in and expand into the United States or England or whatever it is. You would think that that would be a thing, but it's not. It depends on. You've got a lot of these. It depends.

1:58:52 Answers. Yeah, it depends. On the level of value it brings for specific projects right by the government, if there's a clear and direct link of a technology or a service that they need and it's a hand in glove fit, then the the answer is yes, you're probably gonna get a lot of support in doing that. If the answer is I'm not sure and you know, you're just another company sort of coming over here, then it's it can, it can be a much more complicated, costly process. And I've seen it, I've seen it go both ways. Interesting. And are there any that you're willing or able to talk about big success stories or even on the flip side, cautionary tales, scary stories?

1:59:38 Couldn't say any company names but. I would say that I would. Say that if you're an. American business looking. To. Expand and or provide products or services in some way to the Middle East. Definitely partner with somebody who's. Been there, done that. It's it's not a thing that you kind of want to. Reach out and find. A a local attorney and start up a business and approach it the way that, you know, potentially you might in the United States or in the UK. And I've worked with a number of companies that did just that.

2:00:20 They reached out, they thought, OK, I'm going to, I'm going to call a local resource and they can do the paperwork. And they did and, and they set up shop and they were able to get their licensure and, and so the, you know, the, the local resources did absolutely everything that they promised them they would do. But here's what kind of. Came to be. After a period of time is that they didn't really understand what they were in for in terms of what we would think of as taxes to be paid year over year or licensing fees and got some very, very large bills after their first year in business that completely negated everybody profit that they made during that year and had they actually ask some. Different questions or.

2:01:03 Worked with somebody that that knew about our industry, that knew about that market that do it some things to like, you know, ask this question or do this or maybe don't do that. And so they, they approached it like forming a business in the United States and they, they did not have a good experience based on that. So I would say, I would say that's a, you know, cautionary tale. Don't assume. That it will be. Like starting a business in the US, it definitely will not. What about them being? Friendly. To like an American knocking on their door and saying, hey, I, my name is Bob, and I'd like to, you know, become your lighting provider. That probably doesn't go incredibly well, or does it? Not unfriendly.

2:01:44 I find the market, I find, I find that the people in the markets are very friendly. But that said, it is a very relationship based market and there's been a lot of expat influence and foreign owned company influence over the years that people are sort of understandably distrustful. You know, you, you Johnny come lately that's going to show up and make all kinds of promises. And when they realize they have to get on a 16 hour plane ride to go from the United States to Dubai to to actually engage and be present and be a real partner, they lose interest real fast. And and so that's I've seen that play out many times.

2:02:26 So as a result of that, a lot of people in the market, as I said, very understandably kind of want to see you produce some results first before they engage you. And and so all that to say, if you don't have a really good plan or already some history in the market or working with somebody who has history in the market, it's going to be a very tough road. And and I, I would, I would strongly discourage just jumping in like that. Yeah. Well, and again, I think. It, it, you know, it's like another one of those bright flashy objects, you know, like if you're in the United States and you haven't maximized your market here, why are you looking to do that 17 hour plane ride to go visit customers in, in Dubai or, or Saudi?

2:03:08 Just because someone told you it's a great growing market? Well, I mean, if you've completely maximized what you're doing over here and you can't possibly find another customer in the United States, then maybe that's a, a really challenging growth market, but one that you could do well in otherwise. Like focus on what's next door before you go flying that far to chase a customer. One of the last big topics I want to get into because I know I can't keep you forever. Here is is sort of a nasty word in in our industry some days or a really good one. It depends on which side of it you're on. But private equity, I think in some sense, private equity gets a bad rap and shouldn't.

2:03:54 And I had this argument with, with someone at LDI won't mention his name because he was angry for some reason that I still to this day don't know because I'm not on like he, he basically took me to be saying, you know, that private equity is really good and it's great for the industry and great for the world and all this stuff. My statement that I had made to him is the size of the shows have necessitated a need for capital that's not available through conventional sources. You know, you cannot go after a Beyoncé with a bank loan. You just can't. So if I want to go after Beyoncé, I'm going to need to get a serious amount of capital from somewhere or Taylor Swift, for example, you know, huge amount of money to invest into doing a show of that size.

2:04:45 And I won't say it's impossible for a privately held company, but if you look at like Bandit and and Upstaging, those are two really great privately held companies that don't have private equity in them as yet anyway. And those two companies can go after virtually any size show they want to. They're well established, they're very profitable. They they obviously have good sources of capital when they need it. But for most of the rest of the population, they need that boost when they're looking to go after a lot a larger base of clients or a larger type of client. And so I do see a place in this industry for private equity. I've also seen some negative impact from private equity to some of the bad things that that have happened as a result. So you know how.

2:05:42 How do you look at both? The the plus and minus of private equity as it is related to our industry, whether it's, you know, backing roll ups or just backing a large company and taking part ownership or or you know majority ownership or whatever in that larger company. But how do you view this whole topic? Yeah. It's a great question. And it's a space that I. Sit in a lot as you know, sort of being between a company owner or founder LED business that might be in the process of being acquired by private equity or might be looking to a private equity company that owns a an event based business. And they're looking to grow it and sort of figure it out.

2:06:23 But they're realizing that the traditional methods of what you would normally do somehow fall a little bit flat when you apply them to the event industry. There's some accounting foibles and differences that don't sort of line up the same way. When we look at how event projects are spaced out, they're not always very clean. In fact, they're almost never clean month to month. You know, that's true. So there's a lot of things that affect that. And I don't, I agree with you. I I think that that there are definite pros and cons. My feeling is you can get into a really excellent situation if you have a private equity group or an investment group of of any variety who is really.

2:07:06 Thoughtful. About what what they know and what they don't know. And in those groups who are looking to invest but say for instance, maybe already have assessed that they don't know how to run an events business, that's not a company that they've had in their portfolio before. It's not anything that they've done. Personally, I think the greatest piece of wisdom there is to engage somebody who does know and who has and also who sees both sides of the coin, right, who looks at it and says, OK, from an investor standpoint, what are the metrics, What are the success measurements you really need in order to make this a good investment for you? And equally to the owner, to the founder or the, or the group of owners, What do you need to feel like it protects the DNA of what made your business special to begin with?

2:07:54 If you can bring those two things together, it can be magic. It can be really, really good for everybody involved. But I do think that there's a, there's a, you know, kind of a, a set of things that you have to flesh out between each other to have some guardrails and say, OK, this is an area where where we're going to need some help. And it's I and I also think there's some common misconceptions. So from a founder standpoint, I think a lot of. Founders look at. Private equity as a checkbook and they think 8, they're just going to write the check and it's going to be great. And there's an endless pile of money behind it. And so we can invest and I can hire 10 more people right in and all the thoughts that sort of go down that that road.

2:08:35 And from a private equity standpoint, they're looking at it to be able to sustain and grow that business to meet certain profit margin targets, right? I mean, these are these are very logical and reasonable asks of somebody who's investing in your company place in the middle. Between those. Is where they get derailed. So you might have for instance APE group that says we want to see sustained 15% EBITDA margin year over year. That's what we will judge as success. And when you look, when I look across the table and I look at the founder, their eyes are about this big around because they've never sort of processed it that way is like I have to hit the certain target, right. So then what happens is there's a fear and there's reaction and that's the place where those things usually get sideways. So if you can be in that space in between to say, OK, let's take a pause for a moment.

2:09:30 You're looking for 15% margin on this ongoing. You're concerned because you haven't really aimed at that before and you're not sure how to measure that. Let's put together a structure that respects both sides of what's happening. And I would say 95% of the time, if you can get to the root concerns, you can get to the solution. It's, it's most of the time I find myself thinking, what's the conversation we're not having that we should be. And because people will will react. And once they're reacting, they're not thinking about like, OK, you know, Oh my God, I'm so scared about getting 15%. Yes. But remember, we looked at your pipeline and you have a customer segment that's untouched that meets exactly what products and services you offered, but you've never built a marketing campaign to go after them. So let's talk about how much money that actually constitutes. Oh, that.

2:10:21 That. Does it for you, you get a blended margin about 15% and you get the revenue target and then suddenly the walls start to come down, right. But I I think that's the conversations you need to be having. Yeah. So if. I'm if. I'm a company owner, a lighting company, sound company, rental company, whatever. And I've positioned my company to sell and I start having these companies reaching out to me, these private equity groups reaching out to me. First of all, how should I prepare myself for my company? Like what what are the things that I'm going to need to be thinking about? And obviously this is, you know, a week long training coaching session for you just to go through this. But give me some real high level sort of pointers on how can I be prepared for that first meeting with that private equity group and what are some of the things that that I'm going to need to be thinking about, I guess, yeah. That's a great question, I would say. For a first meeting, you really want to be prepared with beta. They're going.

2:11:28 To want to. Know quantifiable figures, stats around what your business is doing from a, you know, from a revenue standpoint, from a profit standpoint. Give us some high level commentary on here's the buckets that that revenue arrives in. What's your revenue mix? Tell us a high level overview of your customers. Who are you selling to? Tell us why any of it matters. You know, get me the highlights of why I should care about buying your business. And I I, my observation is a lot of times founders can come to it with a lot of emotion. And I would say do your best to try to just step back from that. Know that none of it's an indictment when they're asking questions. They're asking questions from a place of just purely looking at the numbers and trying to make an evaluation from that. It's not an indictment on whether you run a great business or not.

2:12:20 It's not an indictment on whether or not your business can actually grow the way that you think it can or whether your brand is as loved as you might emotionally feel connection to it. So I, I would say definitely organize yourself, come with the appropriate data and, and there are, you know, certain data sets that you're going to want to have in that, but but come with that. And then also try to take nothing personally. Just just know that this is a conversation meant to understand the fundamentals of the business and, and, and kind of try to keep yourself in that space and you'll have a much better experience. And I would say if there was a third thing, be patient. Know that the process of either buying or selling a business has a lot of ups and downs to it.

2:13:07 And if you haven't done it before, a lot of owners, whether they're on the buy side or the sell side, if they haven't experienced it, tend to think it's going to go really quickly. You know, we had this great conversation. We're going to get an LOI in place and then we're going to be done with this deal at the end of the month. And the challenge there is the more sophisticated your business is and or the more sophisticated the PE group is, it's going to take a little more time. And there's going to be conversations that come up where somebody might say something that feels offensive from an emotional standpoint. You know, they'll, they'll be digging into the numbers. And, and what you might hear instead is you're telling my business that it's bad, right? And I've spent 30 years working.

2:13:53 Your baby's ugly. Yeah. I mean then. And and so I would say be patient with yourself, be patient with the people that you're talking to, assume best intent, take nothing personally. And if you have some other data that that helps convey your point, lean into that rather than saying, well, you know, everybody loves us. It's it's a bit like going to the bank and saying, OK, well, why should we give you this loan? Well, because we're the best. OK, well, tell me why you're the best to give me something specific. Back that up with a little bit of math. Will you? No. I mean, it's such a. Valuable and, and perfect point that you're making about the emotions and, and I want to ask a follow up sort of question about that. But you know, so many owners have really virtually every owner has slaved to build this business for sometimes in, in the case of many of these companies selling, it could be 40 plus years, 50 years sometimes. And, you know, so in their mind, you know, I've worked 50 years to build this thing.

2:14:58 And you know, therefore it must be worth $100 million. You know, well, probably. You worked about. Five years to build the thing in the next 45 to, to burn it down in a sense too, you know, so, you know, like the fact that you've worked in it for for the last 50 years really just means that it gave you a it gave you a paycheck. And yes, you might have been growing it every year for those 50 years. Chances are you weren't. And but keeping the emotions out is so important yet so incredibly difficult because it's your baby. You know, you've literally, this is all you've done the last 50 years and it must be worth $100 million.

2:15:41 So when they tell you, I'm sorry, but it's probably worth 15,000,000 or whatever, you know, your, your instant reaction is to jump across the table and beat the guy. But that's probably not going to make a deal for you, you know, So I mean, it's so why is it, and is this just part of exactly what you're saying right now? Why is it that in a relatively short time, so many founders end up on the outs with the with the private equity guys and the relationship becomes adverse fairly quickly in some situations. And, you know, there are a few situations I'm aware of where, years into it, it's still a great relationship between the former owner and the private equity company.

2:16:31 But what are the things that tend to make that a problem? Communication. And, and having clarity on what it is you should be communicating and when. So one of the things that most of us in the events industry, if you, you've been on that side of it, you're, you're behind the scenes, we're really bad. Most company owners and founders in the events industry are really not wired to get out in front and shout about their success and shout about who they are and and be really sort of crisp about. All of the. Pieces, it's just not really the industry that we're in it that way, right?

2:17:14 It it goes better if nobody notices what we do, right? They're looking at the lights and they're wowing over the talents and the incredible staging, right? And so. So event company owners are by nature sort of hard wired to not go out and shout about themselves and and they often have a creative piece about them that got them interested in the industry to begin with. Now that's a divergent thought process from somebody who's going to be investing in your business. They're investing in your business to to capture more market share, to grow a brand that they already have or to experience and grow a brand that they would like to have. They want it to be a profitable add to their portfolio.

2:17:56 There's very clean things that they're looking for and where a lot of founders tend to start focusing more and more because it's where they've always been. Is that like, well, I love this piece of the business, though. I got into it because it was creative, because I got to go to the shows, because I got to, to have the emotions and the feelings on the floor at sound check. And those were the thing. And those are all those are all great things. And so I, I find myself having this conversation a lot, which is you've built a really great business and we need to understand what makes that really special to you. And there's a lot that goes into that. But going through that process with a founder is, is honestly one of the very first things that I do.

2:18:39 And the reason I think that's important is because when you're communicating back with a private equity firm on that, you can express to them here is what they feel is really special about their business. Now you've given them context. Now you've given them something to look at because otherwise, in the absence of that, they won't have an automatic appreciation by just looking at the numbers, right? Sure, you you have a wildly profitable business or you don't and that's great and you can make a decision on that of course, but but I think that's where things start to kind of diverge for them and and then it. Just gets worse because you. Have an ownership group that's saying hey, you're not hitting targets and instead.

2:19:21 Of having. Somebody on the, you know, on the on the founder side who's still participating in the business, maybe still, you know, lead officer in the business, the whole. Cycle of reaction. Starts over. I'm reacting, I'm offended, I'm taking it personally. This feels like an emotional attack. And now, now we're writing stories. This is what we do psychologically as humans, right? You think I'm bad, you think I'm incapable, you think I'm not worthy of being this position, right? And so, so then you get adversarial and there's, there's a lot more to it, but these are very known constructs. And there's a good way to stop that and defuse that bomb from happening. But it's you have to have been through it enough times that you kind of know, OK, everybody at the table, this is a bomb and we're going to defuse it before it, it explodes on us. And here's how we're going to do that. And here's the best way to integrate what's happening. But is there an ideal?

2:20:14 Period of time that a founder who is selling their business to private equity should expect to stay in that business where it's healthy, it's productive, it's etcetera, but then they need to be planning to move on. I would say 3. Years. It's fairly ideal. Five years. If. You're, if you're really loving what you're doing and it's a really symbiotic relationship and everybody's having a good time, then you might have a lot to offer in that five year period and being really engaged. I would, I would also say that that's another conversation that I have with founders as a part of the what's really important to you in this exit? And most of them will say, well, I don't mind staying on a bit longer if I'm having a good time.

2:20:59 Let's talk about what having a good time looks like for you. What is what does that say more? What does that mean for you? You know, and you can, because you need something really specific to be able to articulate to an ownership group. And, and what I usually find is you, you can measure. OK, so what's having a good time for one person is I'd like to have six weeks of vacation off a year. And I'd like to sort of sprinkle that across each of the four quarters. And I'd like to not work more than X number of hours a week. And I want every Friday, right. Like let's get really specific about what you're ask is because little stuff like that built up over time just creates that resentment between the PE firm and your ownership group that's saying, hey, that guy's never in the office. What's happening? Where is that owner's expectation might have been, well, you bought my company. I'm sort of just here as a mentor slash advisor to what's happening.

2:21:47 And that that is not a good place to be at that moment because now you've got completely missed expectation. You've got an ownership group that was counting on hitting certain targets as key to them making the investment. And now the person that they entrusted to to really run that ball down the field is, is now no longer interested in doing that. And that's, you know, it's funny but not. Funny at all. It's a terrible, tragic story, but I won't mention any names or get into any detail. But I saw that happen in in the very worst way. So the owner negotiated a deal where he could work remotely and he could work remotely for, I believe it was 80% of the time he could work remotely. 20% of the time he'd be in the office and but they didn't define what that meant and so got the big check and basically moved to another country. And, and so then they got into a bit of a pissing match and an adversarial situation and, and it got a little bit legal. And, and in that process, you know, it was kind of like, well, you know, you weren't doing your job anymore. Yes, I was, I was remote.

2:23:03 And they said, yeah, but how can you be remote and run a team and a crew and a, you know, a company and be a part of this thing and part of the success and everything when you don't even live in the same country? Well, that was what I negotiated it, you know, it was clear. It said, I'm going to work remote 80% of the time. I'll be back in June, don't worry. You know, and so, I mean, I watched this whole thing unfold and both sides were right and both sides were wrong at which is probably a perfect shitstorm at that point, you know, it was just a perfect shitstorm. Like nobody was going to win. Nobody was going to come out of this alive. It was just going to be a disaster. And that's how it ended up. It ended up they, they finally fully separated and there was a battle over, you know, what some of the deliverables were meant to be and, and that got resolved in the courts and, and the deal ended really ugly, you know, but it was, it was sad because it was all based around something that I think both sides thought they had perfect clarity on, but neither side did in a sense.

2:24:10 So, so give me, we've talked for way too long already. So I'm going to give you an out here, but give me 3 big takeaways. We've talked about 100 different things, but give me 3 big takeaways. If I just listened, if I was so bored that I listened to Todd and Marcel talk for two hours and 6 minutes, right now, give me, give me the gold that I can take away from this talk. I would say. I guess some things to think about in this year, if, if you are a founder, if you're operating a, a small business, you know, under 25,000,000 a year and you're in that place of wondering what the year is going to hold. What I would say is no matter where your services are, no matter what market you're in, invest in yourself. Always be growing and learning and surround yourself with people who who bring that same respect and focus and sense of urgency to the table that you can have as partners. I would say that most people who are. Business.

2:25:19 Owners, founders, even executive chairman for boards, portfolio company board directors, they've lived for the three different variations of how to run a company and what what their personal bias is. We all have one, right? We all look at our own experience and say, hey, that's the only experience that's ever been. I would, I would say the number two thing is reach out for perspective. Don't be afraid to find a voice, a partner and advisor, a mentor. Have that person who you trust that will be a positive, productive part of your ecosystem, not just anybody, but somebody that you trust in that space that can help infuse some thoughts, challenge some areas and think about it in a, in a peaceful, positive way.

2:26:11 I would say don't be afraid of, of doing that. You know, and, and especially if you're somebody that is already feeling overwhelmed, a lot of people wait too long to say, I need help, you know, and a lot of people are still sitting there with sort of those three things that I shared with, you know, do I have more tactical things on my calendar to do, to do today than strategic? Do I have more than 7 direct reports? Do I have feedback coming from my direct reports that maybe I'm canceling a lot of calls or meetings with them or that I appear overwhelmed? These are good indicators that it's, it's time maybe to think differently about what you're doing in your business and be open to that because it won't change unless you change those behaviors. And as the leader, you're going to set the tone. So I, I would say those are really, really key areas. The last thing I would say is workforce development matters. We're in a point in our industry where regardless of whether you're on the equipment side, the labor side, if if you're on that design and build side or on the contracting slash construction side, we are all.

2:27:14 Looking for people? Who are capable and can can be a part of the projects that need to move forward if you're a if. You're an organization. That is needing people. Remember that one of the the biggest things we can do is help on ramp people into the industry help. Let people know what matters. Let them know what skills matter, what they need. Give them the road map to be successful in that. So that's that's what I would say. Awesome stuff, awesome stuff. And by the way, the number 21, you're that guy for me. So you're, I have two or three or five, maybe less than 10 people who I really trust to have those types of conversations with. And you're one of them.

2:27:56 And so I appreciate you for that reason. And also because of that, how can people get in contact with you? And, and folks, this is, this is not a paid endorsement. This is no, this is a personal endorsement. This guy's really good. He helped my business. He continues to help my business. He helps a lot of other businesses and smart, you know, great guy to bring on board. So how can people reach you? I really appreciate that. A good way to reach out is message me on LinkedIn or you can. Contact me on the website. At ventanahyphencapital.com or you can. E-mail me at. T Spencer at ventanahyphencapital.com. Beautiful.

2:28:41 Thank you SO. Much for doing this and thanks for all the advice and hopefully people will actually heed some of it. Oh, thanks for having me, I. Always love chat. With you. All right, Todd. Thanks.