when i started doing this podcast a year ago i knew it’d give me an opportunity to meet great people in our industry chris prohler ph group down in texas is one of those guys we got personal we discussed scrap and shared some great family business stories good times and i hope you enjoy this podcast all right everybody another day another uh scrap live podcast i could get the pleasure today of sitting down and another zoom call thanks to kovid 19 bs that we’re all dealing with um i would have liked to do this one at history or something like that but as the world turns and this is where this is where we’re at this is what we’re dealing with but we’re not going to stop just it’s a true scrap industry deal we just we just play the cards we’re dealt and we go so i’m sitting here with chris prohler from the prolog group down in houston texas and a fourth generation scrap guy and i couldn’t be more excited man just to sit down and pick somebody that’s got some longevity in the industry once again and uh see what’s going

on so welcome chris thanks for taking the time out of your crazy schedule man i appreciate it brett and uh i’m excited this is actually the first zoom call i think i’ve ever been on in my life so i think it took me about 47 minutes to figure out how to get on but um i appreciate it and uh you’re the first person i wake up to every morning brother i mean you’re either moving a truck or loading and you know loading this loading that i commend you man you’re a hard hard worker we try man i mean we we got a great team over here we got a bunch of ass busters i mean these guys show up every day in gals and they just get after it and so i think it’s my job just as you well know is to just you know let them know hey man i recognize what you’re doing like it’s not going sight unseen you know we’re i’m i’m willing to put in the hours if you’re willing to put in the hours and vice versa so you know that’s that’s what i like about it

i mean this industry is kind of a little bit old school still and the fact that we got you know people out there you know we’re still operating big equipment we’re still you know in the weather every day and it’s just got that element of old school blue collar to it that i just kind of have a fond appreciation of yeah my dad told me probably 25 years ago he said in this business or any other business absentee ownership does not work and you at least for for us and our team and going back to what you mentioned it’s all about the team it’s all about the culture uh it’s about the guys that are out there you know busting their ass you know burning steel picking up scrap uh you know just really having them embrace what we’re doing and we are a family and and going the extra mile for them and making sure that that that they can take care of their kids and their kids can take care of their kids so we we we really believe in legacy here and um my son i’ve raised him he’s my stepson

he’s going to be the fifth generation so he’s been with uh with the company for since its inception uh got out of a non-compete in 2016 so close to four years and and he loves the business unfortunately i told him that uh if you get in this business uh it’s like going to prison without the possibility of parole so if you’re in it you’re not going anywhere yeah once once it gets in your veins it’s it’s tough bad it’s tough to uh it’s tough to it’s tough to escape so crazy yeah give me a little bit of background so i know you’re fourth generation um the proler name i’ve i’ve i’ve known that that last name for a while and i and it’s but i’m i’m super curious just give me a give me the the history of your guys’s family in the scrap industry cool so in the late 1800s um my great-grandfather ben proller uh he started with a wheelbarrow and a horse in in houston and uh was collect collecting rag bones and scrap and you know anything to feed his family and uh you know the the business

really started picking up after world war one and um the company became uh proler international well in the in the mid 50s my my great uncle and my my grandfather and his brothers which was izzy who’s who is my grandfather his brother sam jackie and jaime they all were basically responsible for inventing the first automobile shredder which was known as the polarizer um so that that transpired in the in the mid 50s and in the late 60s proler international they changed the name and was i believe the first new york stock exchange recycling company on the board so um which was you know pretty cool yeah that’s pretty deep history when you start thinking about the first automobile shredder which now they’re they’re very plentiful um you know not just here in the united states but across the world to think that your family has a big piece in creating that um which is a game changer for our industry obviously that you guys got to take a lot of pride in that over there yeah it’s really um it’s really unbelievable to think about how someone you know in my family could go

and engineer and draw and the whole story how it transpired is really kind of cool but we’ll save that for for another day over over a cup of coffee or something but i um i take those things really serious man and and it took me a long time to tell people that or talk about it because it just felt first off i had nothing to do with it it had it had to do with my grandfather and his brothers and my great-grandfather who just busted their ass just to support their family and um it took me a minute to just to be proud of that and say you know what that’s something that’s really cool and and and still in europe i think they still call shred polarized which was you know the commodity and that’s how they used to sell it as motorized that’s cool yeah so from the shredder to uh having a seat on the new york stock exchange um so and that’s in the 50s were correct the 50 i think yeah 59 i believe they invented the shredder 68 the company went public and um kind of fast

forward and um 19 my my grandfather who was who basically raised me i was with him every weekend of the world izzy was just i mean i would have loved to have have had him for another 20 or 30 years or forever he was just an amazing amazing man and um you know he would take me to the scrap yard every weekend and and but you know i’m not like a guest that is going to tell you that i was in the yard working i was and i was just playing with the scale and walking around and doing whatever a ten nine eight year old kid does um but it it was it was really neat and um he passed away in in 86 and um my father and godfather stayed on and they sold the the the use and division to accompany uh which is dureshborg uh it’s a big big company out of out of europe and my dad and godfather ronnie started polar southwest um in 1990 excuse me 92 93 and i was off at uh i was in uh school at the university of washington at that time and

about six months after they they started the company my father out of nowhere called me said would you mind sending me your transcripts i’m like oh god i mean it’s not a call you want to get yeah he’s getting you he’s really coming back in i love it i don’t know i don’t know what he was doing but i you know i was trying to like figure out how do i manipulate these i’ve got more years and hours i mean it was a challenging time trying to figure out how am i going to explain this to my pops and i just basically sent him everything and you know within 48 hours verbatim he said pack your the party’s over so so i you know what i said i packed up the car drove home from you know seattle to houston which was an absolute nightmare in itself yeah that’s a long time totally it was ridiculous i think i got to el paso and i walked into a convenience store and said you know how long is it to houston and they said you’ve got another 12 hours i think i called my dad

and said you’re gonna have to get me on a plane or something i can’t take it anymore i thought i was home yeah i didn’t realize it so anyway i i came home and and a week later this is a fact you know he you know we’re just starting you know and and my uh my dad and godfather they’ve handled a lot of these industrial accounts for a long long time and um had some great contacts and a lot of business you know went with my dad and and ronnie and during this time i we were just you know doing you know buying and selling and and doing as much much as we could but every day it was really cool my godfather would come in and ring a bell and we’d get a big account and um i wasn’t in the office at that time my dad had me burning scrap i was i was burning some um mandrel bundles and i don’t know if you know what mandrel bundles are but it’s it’s it’s tough to cut so i’m out there with a a guy that does this for a living that

burns nine tons ten tons a day he gives me the torch and i don’t think i cut a half a pound before my fine my father used to you know cruise around on his his uh golf cart and he and he pulled over and just saw how pathetic i was with the torch in my hand he said you’re costing me money get off the torch so he got me off the torch and then you know really we were doing a bunch of you know demo jobs like small demo jobs and clean ups and i would got a question for you did your dad call you because he just struck out on this new venture and he knew he needed help like people he could trust or is it is that do you think that’s i mean in the back of his mind your mind do you think he’s like man i need i need help i need boots on the ground like or i mean or is he just frustrated with uh your yeah the lack of of going to school and saying it’s raining outside in seattle every day yeah um that’s a

breath that’s a great question i might have to ask him but unfortunately he’s probably going to say you were just sucking in school and it was time to get your ass out dad’s have that intuition right you you’re just talking about your boy earlier and you just have that intuition when you know your kid can do more you know i have that with my oldest boy right now i’m like son you are half ass in it and i could call you out from a mile away you know like you’re not full of you ain’t fooling anybody we’ve been there before right and and my dad you know one thing i committed to him several years back i’m like i will never lie to you again you know we had a we i wouldn’t say we had a challenging relationship i mean as you know at least my experience and that’s all i can speak from i’ll never give you my opinion or what i what i think but my experience was it was it was difficult working in a family business and i did it for close to 18 years and uh i just

i would have i spent a lot of time with dad but looking back i wish i would have just spent more time he’s the best operator and and whether i’m biased or not i’ve never seen a guy turn their inventory stay on top of their business like my father he he’s he’s phenomenal but going back to intuition i’ll tell you a quick funny story and i don’t mean to get in the weeds sometimes people say parole or you need to land the plane so i i try and and you know this is your show i don’t want to take it over it’s your show man this is like we’re talking about all that i love so okay family business father-son dynamics scrap stories like the reason why we do this podcast is all those reasons i mean i have a dad it was this bit was my boss for ah from 2004 to 2000 and for 12 years and we ne we didn’t there was months we didn’t talk to each other and we were operating the same business my wife be like have you talked to your dad yet and i’m like

that guy i can’t do them right now and she’s like you guys my mom’s the mediator so trust me like when you talk about father dynamic like son work environment scrap like you’re not gonna bore me with stories in a week yeah no it was you know and it was more for me wanting to be a bigger part of the company and and mind you at this point i’m 25 you know 28 30 years old and of course he had a method to his madness right yeah um and i wanted to be involved in those meetings and understanding why he is you know asking for another buck a ton when he’s selling 80 000 tons a month and and and thinking to myself god what a negotiator i mean you know i it’s hard for me to ask for five cents let alone a dollar i mean he he’s and he says you know look son the mill will get that buck back maybe in two months we might give him back five bucks but this month we really need that dollar and you know just some of those you know little nuggets you

get yeah but what the the story i was going to tell you it’s just it’s classic i at least it is in my world i don’t know if you remember those little nextel two-way radios oh yeah we had them yeah yeah so you know it was my my dumb ass idea to go and a buddy of mine was selling them so i’m like michael i want you to come pitch my pops on getting these two ways they’ll be great so michael comes over he sells them we end up getting them and changing over and i went into sales in 1997 and i’ve been on the road probably um six eight months and never once had my father ever called me to check in or just because that wasn’t his deal i was answering to my godfather and he he just as long as he saw business coming in and i was producing yeah um he was fine so the first day i decided to go you know it was a day like today it’s 60 not a cloud in the sky we don’t get many of these in houston i decided to take

the you know a few hours off and go and go you know play some golf so you know we’re about to tee off i’m literally i’ve got my driver in my hand and my phone goes chi-chi come in son and i’m like god i mean amazing timing and he says to me i said yeah go ahead dad he goes where are you and i just couldn’t i just had to come clean i said i’m playing golf he said i figured and and and that was cool but going back to intuition it was a beautiful day he knew exactly what i was doing yeah and so i haven’t spoke to him in eight months on the two-way radio the first day i go to go play some golf and he hits me on the phone once and over on that it just killed me so in our office my dad and i had very similar struggles i mean at the time when i started we were 22 person company um that include our trucks and pipe and everything and and then as we kind of built out 0405 06 the market started changing

started getting a little bit better you know we started we we didn’t necessarily add a bunch of facilities but we were growing we were adding trucks and we were adding you know equipment and how old were you at this time brett well before i was 22 23 years old um so i had just graduated my undergraduate uh from college uh and and so i always tell the story you know i graduated on saturday my dad showed up nobody in my family had ever even went to college let alone got a college degree it was a big deal in my family too absolutely even go to college right so i went to school i got my uh my uh business admin degree and graduated on a saturday and i’m all excited thinking i got a couple weeks to go hang out with my buddies and go party and whatever and my dad he’s excited as and i was kind of half-assed joking with him hey when you want me to come start he’s like monday be fine i brought the trailer put all your in there so i got like one day off and

you knew you were going straight to the business when you were getting from i knew from when i was five years old what i was gonna do my whole life really i’ve always known there’s never there was never ever a question in my mind what i was gonna do when i got older i always knew wow that’s that’s cool i never even thought about the recycling business until i got the phone call to get to get your ass home i mean obviously i was around it but never really thought that i’d work with with my dad yeah so it’s a cool experience i tell i mean there would not be like i said there’s nothing it wasn’t the years where we would just i mean go ahead to tocas here i am a younger guy i’ve got a bunch of ideas how i think we can grow the business he’s just in operations mode trying to keep we had trucking brokerage at that time and trucks and scrap and he’s trying to keep all the with the plates spinning and i wanted more of a bigger role in our business and we used to

have this big scrap brass eagle in his office and we do our production meeting there every monday morning and it was just it came in a scrap i had the the wing welded back on but it was just this i don’t know it was pretty big size and and one time him and i were getting into it at the production meeting in front of everybody and he said he went over and he grabbed that uh really fast eagle and he put it right in front of him he goes i’m the eagle in this room and that he’s like okay i was like all right i mean you’re a big dude though what are you what are you what are you six four two thirty no you’re a big guy yeah six one i was like six one two forty five i played football in college and uh and i always you know out of touch but it’s still your pops exactly and i always thought he could take me all the way through like even my freshman year in college i was still was nervous because he was just a tough guy and uh

when he did that i kind of was like all right and then you know then the joke always became like well we know who the eagle is in the room you know and so it was it was a it was a funny story hey dad can we do that without the whole company in the room you know just you and i now you’ve got the whole company thinking it’s it’s i have the same with uh and you know what’s crazy man i i uh i am my father’s son meaning there’s just times i take the good and the bad but when i’m talking to my my stepson and he wants to reinvent the wheel and i and i love having those conversations but don’t come in here wanting to buy eight trucks and you know doing the math and here are the projections i’m like you you need drivers you need insurance the liability it’s just like my father used to say to me before you come in my office you better have all these questions answered and you know before you come in with with some dumb ass question or something yeah and

so and when you are your father’s son like there’s a lot of truth to that man i you know my dad and i have a amazing relationship right now i mean and we’ve had it for a long time but as the years you know as he got closer we want to retire and be done our relationship only got better and then now he’s been retired since 2016. so i mean we have a great relationship i bounce ideas off him all the time but i was we had a grand opening for our trucking shop a couple months ago last at the end of last year and my dad was there he had a cigar and just just drink having a couple drinks having a good time and you know big grin on his face and somebody and i looked at my wife who was there and i said um and a couple of my buddies and i said if you ever want to know what i’m going to be like when i’m 62 i said look over there i said this is on the wall like i can’t tell you know so uh but but

brett how you know for me and and some of my internal struggles um you know i i and to this day and i’m gonna be 50 i still seek validation from my dad i still seek approval i still want him to be proud of me i mean it’s it’s it’s cool that your your your dad is you know is was there any kind of competitive did you feel competitive spirit between you guys obviously without saying it but just feeling that yes when we were both working yes there’s very much so and it wasn’t necessarily uh whose idea is better per se as much as when you’ve been doing it for so long like your dad or my dad that’s all they know i mean my dad he grew up in the scrap business you know his whole life um that’s all he knew he didn’t drive and truck and scrap i mean and it was a very old school way of doing it and so we always had um we there was always that somewhat of a tension of like what’s the next step but i will i’ll give my dad like the an

immense amount of credit because he watched how hard it was for him with his dad in the transition area period so in 1997 my grandpa wanted to re my dad wanted my grandpa to retire my grandpa wanted to retire um and uh but my keep in mind my my grandpa never paid my dad any money like you know the minimum whatever you get away with minimum wage that’s what he paid him right so my dad never had us unbelievable he never had any money was it more of a control thing was it more of a control thing with your grandfather yeah i think there was some of that for sure and i don’t know you know but my dad you know he’s pretty you know he’s very logical and he’s very he’s you can think through a lot of the process and kind of see the long term and so he was dealing with schnitzer steele at that time and he had formed some good relationships and he basically was able to make a deal with schnitzer where they bought 50 of our company and that took that money and bought my grandfather out

of the business so then my mom and dad became 50 owners of the business with schnitzer steele allowed my grandfather to retire and that kind of what got the wheels and motions to actually for them to grow the business a little bit and kind of get it on its you know on its feet and get going so you know there’s always been you guys had a jv you all had a bit you all have or had a jv with schnitzel where they bought into the company and it allowed your your your father to take care of your grandfather exit the business and provide liquidity for growth 100 we bought our new sierra shear at that and then you know they gave us cash flow to buy some bins and roll offs and kind of get the train train going i mean in the form of a loan so in two and that was in 97 and then in um uh so they were a privately held company they were not even publicly traded in 97 so they didn’t become public trade i think until 99-ish if i recall um and that definitely changed

the dynamic you know you go from being a public maybe 2001 but right in that in that area from being a privately held company to now become publicly traded but my dad will and and my mom who’s very involved in the business will tell you that that was the best deal they ever made because it taught him how to be more professional right it taught you how you know you you weren’t just a mom in a pop scrap yard over in idaho you you had a real business a real you know from the accounting side to the you know for the front end of the back end real systems and processes and it gives you scalability and being that your public gives you a little leverage when you’re dealing with with with people knowing that they’re sustainability right i mean perception anyway 100 and you know uh customers were more willing to listen to us because they knew we had the financial backing to to pay the bill regardless of the market i mean there was a lot of those components that you know that were really big in like the growth of our

business even in o4 when you know i came in full time it was you know we were still you know we just had the two locations it wasn’t we weren’t a huge company or anything but just you know my ability to come in and bring a new twist to it and my dad’s willingness to let me do it i think is the biggest thing you know giving me the rope to make some mistakes and to do that absolutely it was huge for for heart for our business and when you go back to your son wanting to buy five trucks and do all that and talk about drivers i used to tell my dad i’m like i want to put a yard here i want to put a yard here i want to put a yard here and my dad be like who the is going to work at all these places or who’s going to run it you know who are you gonna stab who’s gonna who are you gonna have do it and i said i don’t know i’m gonna find people like that’s what i do and he goes absolutely yeah he

said good luck human capital is very very scarce and and scarce in our our industry right i mean it’s hard to find people that want to get involved in our in our business and i tell people all the time it’s the sexiest business i know i mean just it’s it’s it’s it’s tough to find great talent because most talented people own their own businesses right so did you so you guys went from two locations to eight over how long you know we had our most growth so we we had in 2008 was when the market was just absolutely on fire the ferrous side uh and then an 09 end of 08 and no nine it crashed ill liquid what’s that didn’t sell i said it was ill-liquid yeah it was terrible going going from 800 scrap to not getting you know from going through our costs going we have because we still had to pick up the scrap we still had to process it and we can’t sell a pound yeah crazy it was a just a crazy crazy turn of events and what happened was is the real estate market over here

got you know we got really hot going into that and then it just plummeted well we um because we had a trucking company and because we had uh planned ahead to a certain extent um we had basically liquidated all of our inventory going into the crash so we were sitting on asphalt right i mean nice we got you know and we got lucky yeah yeah there’s a lot to it there’s this you know it’s it’s like absolutely you know all of our receivables were paid so we kind of were sitting there you know we we we ended up having to lay some people off at that time which was the first time we’ve ever done it the only time um and uh but we were sitting there kind of calculating what was our next move and we big commercial good commercial deals on property came up and i was like you know what it we’re putting a scrap yard in like i i’m gonna we’re gonna do it let’s go for it you know we’re sitting in a good position financially you know we’re financially uh strong um not just cash flow wise but

uh balance sheet we were always very conservative um and we still are to this day and did you in your daily roles we don’t have titles at this company i mean probably like a lot like you i just we’re all firefighters right yeah do you do you manage the p l on the balance sheet i mean from a like just from a micro to macro level are you on top of it how often do you look at that stuff i have two just killers on in the accounting department i have my mom who knows that knows what we do and how we do it inside and out that’s awesome and then i have a guy that i hired about a year two years after i started um smart just good guy and by probably one of my best friends if not my best friend who him and i share in office i mean right next to each other so i don’t even need to keep an eye on the piano because i got i got two sets of eyes that i that i trust um so all you’re looking at is the inventory yeah

i manage it from a macro like equipment wise and then they tell me yeah you can afford that or you might want to wait um and sometimes i’ll just go with my gut on what i feel it needs to happen and what how much risk i’m willing to uh to kind of take on but those those are the things you know that you know that have really helped us build and coming into that that market you know we were able to make some you know financial moves to get us positioned in some other markets um that we’ve been wanting to get into for a while but the real estate component was just such a big hurdle to overcome and so from that 09 to 2014 15 is when we really pushed and we grew our pipe business and grew some other um some other business that we had so it just kind of enabled us to it kind of a snowball deal it enabled us to kind of really really grow but really what it comes down to is like yourself is man when it’s when it’s all like it’s all you and you’re

the guy that’s in charge of making sure everybody’s gonna eat tonight there’s a lot of pressure in that but man when it hits and when you feel like you’re right sometimes you just have a hard time as an entrepreneur or whatever just not pushing your chips to the middle of the table and saying if i’m going to bet on anybody i’m going to bet on me you know you know i’ve never um when i left sims in 2009 so we were working on well the board was working on an exit strategy and my dad would kind of phase out his ceo and i would come in and i just mentally knew that that i wasn’t there to take over that responsibility and and we um you know several years prior to that anybody that that has any any type of you know wanting to go do their own deal especially when you’re in the scrap business and you’re handling 10 15 20 000 tons a month it’s really easy to do the math and say okay if i took 2 000 tons and i made 30 bucks after cost that’s 60 a month that’s

720 a year golly i need to go do my own deal not knowing about anything else so so when i you know i went to dad and and early 09 i said look i want to give this a shot on my own um and i it was a i’ll never forget that day sitting with him and my godfather and and basically you know my pop says look son i’m never gonna you know stop you from from doing your own deal and um he said just as long as your business doesn’t conflict with mine um we’re fine so i ended up leaving all on good terms didn’t go after any of my old business my father is a big teddy bear but he is um he’s a uh how do i say this with a little bit of couth he just has a killer instinct okay and and he’s just i mean to this day i’m intimidated by him right but we have an incredible relationship it got a little severed when i left but so i started my own business and and um had some some success and whatever that means and we grew

way too fast and um in 2000 you know when the market’s good there’s a lot of revenue right and people get enamored with revenue and you know i’d rather do 10 million a year and make two than do 50 and make three it’s just i don’t care about that anymore but but but i left the company and we grew very very fast i was way over my skis and and from just being inexperienced and um and and had some really challenging times and uh and then and then 14 uh a private equity group came in and bought the assets of the company i had a two-year non-compete and that that was the toughest two years of my life um mainly because i felt like i left my my dad down and and myself down and and it was it was very very challenging and i and i basically had basically a breakdown and i i’ve never been in that position where you know i’m my biggest critic i’m sure like you i mean there’s no one harder on me than me and i always felt like i had to measure up to

izzy and my dad and uh it took me a long time to get really comfortable being who i am and and accepting that and being able to walk away from people and not give a what they think about me because regardless of what i do and how successful i am or or you know people like to see people fail it’s unfortunate and um that that that setback was a great opportunity for a comeback for me and if you would have told me in 2014 that i would be where i am today and i’m not talking about money i’m talking about emotional and and physically and and and understanding what’s truly important uh and that is at the end of the day you know being a good father and being present for my two daughters that are the loves of my life one uh i have a 14 year old her name is izzy in a 12 year old london and and understanding what it what it’s all about after going through you know you can’t put a price tag on pain right when i when you feel shitty on the inside it’s it’s feeling

shitty and and i look back and i’m like i never thought i was gonna get through that and i’m i come out on the other side and a lot of things have changed i’m a work in progress but you know knowing that i don’t need to go and do things that that i can’t afford to do just for approval or whatever that is ego is a is a is alive and well with me and and i i think that humility and grace and and and asking people you know tell me your experience how did you do this how do you how did you get from point a to b how did you deal with your father you know yeah because you know i compartmentalized all that stuff and it was eating me up i don’t mean to get vulnerable i’m just sharing i don’t know i this is what this is the this is you know our industry because we are blue collar and we are you know supposed to be hardened tough you know all that jazz you know i think about you know going back and you know saying you know being

your worst critic or your your best critic whatever it is i think regardless of the industry or the business that you’re in your ability to sit there and analyze the decisions that you’re making whether you’re in whether you’re analyzing them from a critical standpoint or saying you know this makes sense this doesn’t make sense or why is this important to me why is why do i care what this guy says or that gal does or whatever all those pieces of the puzzle i think are uh are super crucial so i know that that’s that’s what makes you a good operator you know um or it makes you a good owner or makes you a good manager whatever that is your ability to look inside yourself and evaluate what you’re doing is the most important regard i always say what everybody else is doing like what’s good for your business what’s good for your family what’s good for you like who i don’t give a who gets elected to be president like i i know who i voted for it wasn’t biden but you know what i don’t at the end of the day like

i can’t control who gets elected all i can control is the set of circumstances that are laid in front of me and trying to make the best that i can out of it and everything what is best for you and your family yeah period take care of the family take care of you know your work family your home family and then everything else and have a long-term patient perspective everything else i think will eventually work its way out if you take that long-term approach and that compassionate people-first approach but you have to start with yourself like you can be as nice as you want to 100 people but if you’re not kind to yourself and put yourself first you know and give yourself that affirmation of like hey what they say or what they do it is what it is that’s not going to affect my day-to-day business what’s going to affect my day-to-day business is my attitude when i walk in the door absolutely what’s going to affect my business more how how do i how do i communicate with my people this is how i

want is how i want it done well if you’re just a jerk and you’re always you’re high on your own hog then you’re never going to be able to communicate that as well so your ability to communicate from a positive a reaffirming standpoint like hey the market’s struggling don’t worry you’re all going to get paychecks the market’s great don’t worry you already get paychecks we appreciate what you’re doing like let’s go and just that that atmosphere but it starts with you and it ends with you you’re absolutely communicate that and feel good about what you’re doing it’s um it’s uh sometimes i suffer from reality distortion disorder when i’m like am i right um i mean you know and and i wouldn’t say that our company is a meritocracy but we’re pretty close i mean we come together we collaborate we make decisions um and at the end of the day you know hopefully you know for baton you know 500 you know you’ll get in the hall of fame every day of the world but our business being that it’s so you know commoditized it it it makes it difficult but going back

to what you were talking about and what we’re discussing um it it’s all about attitude i’ll i’ll hire heart overhead every day of the world you can’t teach attitude and trust me and and if you it have you read the book good to great yep great book um learned a lot from that book and and i still struggle as a leader i i i’m not a great communicator i sometimes just expect people to read my mind well that you know i need to understand i i need to get more methodical and put myself in in one of my teammates shoes and explain what i need instead of them trying to figure out what i need and it’s just a it’s it’s progress it’s not perfect communication game right like it goes back to your ability to communicate whether you’re communicating with your wife or you’re communicating with your non-ferrous manager whatever that is like it’s a communication game and it’s a communication world the better you can communicate the better you are off in in general you know and i think that’s you know like one of the reasons why i do this

podcast is man i’d like to communicate i want to know because i know i don’t know everything and i want to hear from guys like yourself who have walked similar shoes i want to hear from um guys that have walked very different shoes than me and just try and get all these ideas and all this uh input and then just try and sort it out the best i can try and do the best what i can with it so it’s it’s a it’s a communication business and it’s our business our industry is very relationship driven right so your relationship it’s everything it’s everything um we you know whether you’re dealing with the mills or you’re dealing with you know manufacturers you’re you know handling their daily scrap it in this generation it’s you know the texting and and emailing i i i kind of dig texting i hate talking on the phone um just because i’m a natural introvert so you know most of my day is is consumed with you know figuring out what our next move is or how are we going to sell this and you know should we buy this

you know do we can we afford that and we’re kind of a growth company i tell people we’re a 120 year old startup company and and it is all about communication and and just asking and and and hey can can you help me this month whether it’s with an industrial account or a mill i need some help and and i couldn’t do that seven years ago just because of my own insecurities and and lack of experience so and just and it just falls back on establishing those relationships and making and getting those those relationships where you have the ability to be you know whether it’s you want to use the word vulnerable or where you want to use but you’re just your ability to say like i don’t ask unless i need it or feel free to feel free to ask me if you need something whatever that is like that that symbiotic you know hey we’re all in this together type of deal and i think establishing those and those take time and that’s why i say i tell people all the time to like oh would you be worried about if somebody

came in and put a scrap yard in here or there to compete with you and i said here’s the deal i said you can buy all the best equipment go buy brand new stuff buy the best facility build build it i mean build the title build a 30-year relationship see how long that takes build it build the taj mahal scrap yards and then beat me at my game which is relationships customer service my word is everything i mean you beat us at that then you deserve the business absolutely you’re gonna beat me on new i mean good luck i i don’t i don’t worry with and it’s probably probably me i don’t worry about what my customer what my my competitors doing i can only focus on what we’re doing i can’t help if they’re coming in and they’re 40 over the market of one of our customers that doesn’t mean that we’re going to change our whole formula we just need to adjust and and express to our customer why staying with proler is the right move and what we’ve done over the longevity of our relationship not some new company that

comes in and they’re 50 60 bucks a ton fob the box because they pre they can’t be 50 bucks a ton over and you know over th they can if they’re doing things that that we just don’t participate in but it’s those relationships that our customers now for the most part understand that those numbers they don’t make sense they might for a month but they don’t do from in the long run yeah see i get all passionate talking about it i get i get hyped up you know no time no no i’m curious um you sent me a couple of pictures the other day uh you text me a couple pictures cool videos uh do you want is that something you want to enlighten enlighten everybody on kind of what you guys got going on over there yeah man what what a um it’s a it’s an emotional deal but we um we acquired a shredder three years ago and and we were looking at east texas you know doing demographics and and and understanding where would be the best place um strategically for the shredder so we ended up fine a gentleman that

basically runs a company was friendly with uh he was with commercial medals for nine ten years and he was friendly with um this guy that that owned this business and inviter which is 15 miles from beaumont let’s just say it’s an hour and 45 minutes from houston to vitor east so he he we approached them we acquired his the assets of his company and we had the shredder we finally after two years of blood sweat and tears turned it on the 28th of january and it was emotional man i was thinking going back to things that i wouldn’t talk about years ago because of my own my own insecurities i’m like you know what i’m effin proud man another poller is operating an automobile shredder and it felt really really good and and so right now we’re basically you know doing some trial loads and we think you know that that we haven’t finished the downstream we’re working on it but i got to tell you brett i mean just sleepless nights and you know the budget got a little out of control and and you know it was it it’s it’s crazy operating

a shredder and just because you know my my grandfather and his brothers you know invented it i’m learning new stuff every day man i don’t have a clue about shredders it’s but so that’s been the positive for me of just understanding how the machine works and how to get the biggest bang for your buck and you know basically making the cake like they do at mills and finding the right chemistry so yeah our shredder was turned on like i said on the 28th and and um we really feel really really good about it and i’m truly grateful to to the team that that put it in and just kicked ass doing it um man it was crazy i wish it was on you know in in in december and we could have got a nice little hit for a couple months but you know if you lied right you’ll get it you know like i i get the feeling from talking to you that you’re in it for the long haul so you may not get it in february but i think that this year and this is just my opinion i’ve ever get

it out there i think this year is setting up to be a pretty good year um i think the the steel mill is going to try and take some gas out of it this month just as because they think they can and if they get away with it more power to them i’d do the same thing if i was them but uh yeah that’s that that’s for a whole another call right yeah that’s a whole line yeah that’s right yeah that’s a whole different deal but i think just going back i think that you’re in a good spot as far as you know that thing is gonna it’s it’s gonna do what it does it’s gonna pay the bills and you can count this you know your uh great grandfather is looking down and saying yep like another parlor’s running a shredder and what do you believe in i mean believe in the god and all the whatever that is but you can at least know that there’s a lot of people that are kind of part of that deal on your team absolutely man i really believe that’s cool man i really believe

that that day and and i’m a spiritual guy right i believe in something bigger than me whether it’s my kids or this beautiful day um that my dad you know was you know i couldn’t wait to send him the video and thinking about my grandfather and and at the end at the end of the day it took me a long time to understand that’s what it’s about right that’s what it’s about it’s about the legacy and and you know this business requires you to bust your ass to be successful period and and um you just embrace that every day absolutely embrace that it’s just a game changer i tell you know my wife’s a school teacher right i mean school teachers in idaho they don’t get paid a crazy amount of money uh but she does it because she loves it and she asks me well do you want you know she wanted to stay home after our second boy you know for a year because our first boy she had she went right back to work within a couple months and the second one she’s like i want to stay home for a

year and i said that’s fine i said do whatever you want to do it doesn’t really matter to me you just make yourself happy because i don’t want to come home to you know someone that’s unhappy just bitter you know you come home here’s the kid you’re like i’ve been working for 15 hours that’s not healthy for a relationship no and so she took a year off and she couldn’t wait to get back to work right and and she she goes to work every day i go to work every day and uh but when we both and the cool thing is is i watch my mom and dad go to work together every day for 30 years they work most those years they worked in the same office and come home and they talked about work and they talked to us so i’ve been involved in the scrap business since from a very very very young age whether it’s at home or there and i i love the fact and i haven’t have a tremendous amount of appreciation for my parents because they taught me a lot just by listening to those conversations you

know i was i felt like i was already ahead when it was my turn um but that i can come home and my wife can tell me about school and third graders and and we don’t hardly talk about scrap that often because that’s not a big interest to her and i’m okay with that and uh but just that that that deal if you are you doing something you love you don’t care about the money as much anymore like it’s not as big of a deal i care about the money because i want to keep the lights on i want to grow not because i want to know what i can buy i don’t yeah when you’re happy doing what you’re doing you don’t need a bunch of extra well that that that stuff comes whatever that you know stuff is whether it’s you know go put on a pair of johnson murphys and then go put on a pair of cole haans the cole haans feel better right i mean go fly first class and then go sit in the back it feels better to you know just you have more room you can

hang out but but other than that you know i like nice too i mean unfortunately but not for anybody else but for me i don’t i’m not saying hey look at me that’s the last thing i want to do but you know talking about your wife and your your parents i don’t have enough you don’t have enough time as many times as i’ve been to my father and i’ve been told no business at the dinner table tonight we are not discussing business but it’s it’s our commonality right it’s what we do i mean it’s what we talk about and you know whether it’s you know my stepmom or you know my sister or my kids we’re not talking about business tonight but yeah but good luck you know that yeah thank you yeah thank you it’s what’s clothing us right now it’s giving us the ability to to drive from our house to dad’s house you know understand that uh there’s an element the other day my son i always ask him we sit down and eat dinner and uh i said how was your day today i asked both of them i said

how was your day what happened today that was cool and that depends on their mood sometimes bad good i bet that’s it good like what what’d you do like what happened because anyway what was so good about it like why was it so good and uh and the other day finally and they never they’re like well how was your day today dad i said good yeah thanks for asking i tell my kids all the time can y’all ever just call me without asking for something just call me and say you know it’s so crazy these days i’ll be in the media in a meeting or working and my kids will facetime me 87 times until i pick it up i’m like it’s such a different generation now with with the phones and and kids and and you know i’ve taken my girls to several yards and they just they don’t you know i’m like this is hopefully y’all are going to want to be a part of this one day they’re like we don’t want to be involved with that dad that was my next question for you is and people because people ask

me all the time so i love flipping the flipping the question other people is do you do you welcome it do you look forward to it and do you think that your your daughter’s daughters obviously your son is involved do you think that your your other two kids will want to be involved in the in the business you know i’ll say this i um today short answer is absolutely not um i think that that and that’s something that i would never even you know push on them or or you know if if they are that would be awesome i want them to do whatever they want to do whatever makes them happy and you know right now uh london wants to be a a lawyer and i think izzy wants to be a a an entertainer but but who didn’t want to be an entertainer at that age but yeah they they have no they yeah i’m like come on let’s go to the yard no daddy no daddy and it’s just it’s it’s conversations that are that aren’t aren’t held that much because they they’ve been around where they understand and they see

my dad and i talked about business and sometimes it gets heated and they misconstrue us having heated conversations it’s just passion right and you know like i used to tell my dad the law the louder you talk the less i understand you so you know we don’t need to yell and then next thing you know i’m i’m yelling at my my stepson and not yelling because i’m pissed i’m just passionate why can’t you see this yeah so it it they don’t they don’t really um they have no desire to be be be part of it and they don’t even want to discuss it even when i show them videos i’m all excited about here’s a life-changing moment in our in our life girls are like that’s great daddy can you order us you know some sushi or something oh i know i know i mean i i got boys it’s the same way so how old are your boys i got 11 and 7. unbelievable so it’s yeah that i mean and my my you know my 11 year old i’m about to start bringing him down here on saturdays and letting them

earn some uh money but uh let me know how that works out for you yeah i’ll let you know i mean i mean it’s going to be one of those like i’m not i’m telling you not asking you type of program but at least for a while i’m just going to at least kind of get him motivated but absolutely i want i want the same thing for my kids i just want to be happy i wanted to go find something they’re passionate about because what i don’t want them to what i don’t want them is to be like feeling like i’m putting pressure on them to to come do something that i love right just because i love it doesn’t mean you will and i’m okay with that i think it’s so crazy that you knew it’s such a young age that that this is what you were going to do i mean that that’s that’s really really cool man i i i look back sometime in my child’s and i’m like i don’t even remember what i what i thought i was gonna do it just it’s life is just it it goes

by really so fast yeah and next thing you know i’m gonna be 50. i’ve been in this business 28 years and it’s the beautiful thing like i said earlier is like even with the shredder i there’s so much knowledge to be learned i mean i’m learning so much and and i don’t know if this is fortunate or unfortunate sometimes i think it’s unfortunate on the non-fair side of the business i that part of the business is so difficult for me there’s so many different commodities and so many different this and that if it doesn’t stick to a magnet i have no clue what it is just being totally honest well that’s that’s the beauty the beauty of like i mean when you’re honest with yourself and you say okay like this is the gaps i need to fill i heard somebody say it one time and i really you know i i really took it to heart was don’t people say oh you need to spend some time you know filling in these gaps of your knowledge right and there is there is an argument for some of it but there’s also a

point where you can go acquire that knowledge with the right people with the right hustle to where you play on your strengths spend your effort on your strengths and then fill the gaps but if you’re over there wasting your the time where you can be spending it on the stuff that you really know and that you really understand that you’re really good at but you’re over you’re spending time on the stuff that you just it doesn’t learning 60 61 and 63. that’s not gonna that’s not going to pay the bills today i want to make i want to try to make money every day that’s that’s a big goal of mine not often does it work but we try every once in a while yeah it works out every once in a while so spend your time and effort people on the ship that you’re good at and that you like and you’ll be all right absolutely yeah if i was to if i was to speak to a a group of more than two people and and and and mentor them and i love mentoring people it’s it’s we all have our weaknesses

we’re all flawed as humans we all have issues not not just because the outside of the house looks beautiful doesn’t mean the inside is so perfect and and i tell people all the time look you know i would have killed have done well in college and and you know when i text i don’t know if it’s t-o-o-o t-double t-double oh just like you know i don’t i pay attention but not that close but i’m like just execute on you and and leverage your strengths you don’t have to know it all that’s why people do different things yeah and and it’s true and and and i spend a lot of time in the weeds which i need to really start saying guys i can’t do that it’s funny the day day before christmas eve i i called two guys that are on the team and i’m like guys i need help i can’t call the freight company i can’t call the trucking company i can’t set it just you know sometimes and that’s my fault is being a bad communicator but sometimes i just have to you know just say

i need help guys i need help and and what’s amazing about my team is is they they they all are just you know they’re they’re you know they’re like i said it’s more of a family we have intimate conversations like we’re having that are meaningful i want to know about you and why you why you know how you know tell me about your life and the history of your life and you know because it’s interesting right i mean that’s how relationships that’s that’s the basis of relationships that’s the basis of of our industry that’s the basis i mean it’s a you know it’s a i i interviewed a nathan fructor and he called the scrap is a people commodity because it’s still something you touch you feel and it’s a people commodity and i just always loved that anyway he said it and that’s that’s what it is so true i look at these guys that are trading and making big big money and i always have to excuse me tell myself we have a tangible asset right i mean it it’s it’s you know i’m like sometimes i’d like to throw on a

suit and go make 50 100 a day or whatever and and but that’s what i love about this business it’s tangible you can watch a big piece turn into a little piece and go on a barge and then go to the mill and watch it melted make hot roll i think there’s something to be said for that there is man how there is any any parting shots you want to leave everybody with i like i said i i can’t thank you enough for taking the time out of your schedule anything you want to leave everybody with well my time is cheap brad that’s most important uh yours isn’t i uh i um i wanted to thank you for for having me on and and you’re like i said i wake up to you every morning you give me give me motivation and i’m honored that that that i’m a part of this and you know if if there’s anything that we can do when you’re down south let me know because i will take you up on coming to to um boise and we’ll go to sun valley and do some spring skiing and

not talk about you know uh p s and cud and why the mills took it down 80 when they should have been sideways and you know yeah well i just the feeling is mutual man like i said i i love these interviews just because it gets me the opportunity to pick someone’s brain and just kind of understand them as a human and why they’re involved in this industry that i like so much and and thank you for taking the time and got it i wish you man nothing but success and i’ll be waiting for the phone call to get your ass up to idaho or when i come down there absolutely my friend have a have a great great day and um keep me posted i will thank you man thank you everybody you