thank you welcome to a scrap life a podcast solely focus on the hustlers Grinders operators and business owners who live and breathe the scrap metal industry every day we are the original recyclers no suits required just guts and hard work here is your host Brett Eckhart all right another episode of uh scrap life I’m sitting down with Matt Menudo oh who’s over in uh Duncan South Carolina he’s with CRC Scrap Metal Recycling and a little quick like background on why we’re sitting down here today as you guys probably know about me I got a special kind of spot in my heart for people that are just got a little hustle and a little uh go get them in them and I met Matt at uh isary down in Nashville and he approached me and we started talking and uh because hey man how listen you listen to your podcast we start talking talking scrap he was showing me some videos of his roll-offs and the camera systems having to roll offs to kind of monster flow and whatnot and uh I gave him my information we connected and he just stayed on

me he’s like hey man let’s let’s talk about doing a podcast whatever and then and as busy as everybody’s schedule is I feel like you’re never too busy to connect with other people in your industry and connect with ideas and thought processes and kind of uh help each other out so kudos to math for making for staying on me and these are the podcasts I love man talking talking to people about the industry talking people about you know what I love so thanks for uh thanks for coming on Matt yeah for sure Brett you know you had your little uh Entourage there and I knew that if I was at Israel one of my things was to talk to you and get on the podcast uh I think honestly I think I’m the first person in the South so I’d like to give that shout out we hope this interview more of my uh comrades in the future um I definitely like to invite you to come to our Southeast meeting in November for Israel I think you’d really enjoy that we could probably get a live podcasts going there a lot of guys

in the industry in the South guys girls a lot of true Grinders out there um yeah I appreciate you putting me on the podcast man and you know what man persistence wins and I don’t give a like if it’s whether it’s time to talk to talk on a podcast whether it’s just in business and life in general like people talk about like a little motivational spark here and there but the really the real wins are like the people that are just the most persistent the day-to-day like the just keep picking at something keep going keep pushing and um and so for me like I love just persistence right I mean I mean you know you’ll you’ll figure it out in life if you just keep trying and trying is it just is similar it’s so similar to persistence just just the effort every day and trying to kind of get going so in regards to the South like we were just talking I’ve spent some time in the South um down Atlanta area and but there’s there’s so much you know opportunity out there there’s so much you know industry out there

and so many Hustlers out there so many guys like yourself and like you said females like yourself out there that are like that are in this industry in the scrap metal recycling industry that are just kind of out there doing it every day so I am going to make it a point an effort to you know to spend some time kind of digging around out there and uh trying to get some more podcasts with guys like yourself in the South so give me a little bit of background on CRC kind of what you guys are about maybe a little history um the company yeah so a little history lesson on CRC it was uh started by a gentleman Ronnie strange uh he’s about 82 years old now he actually comes into work pretty much every day um he actually works more up on the car side he started in the business I don’t know 40 50 years ago he sold two of his entities that are actually behind us and across the street to LKQ uh his third business is CRC services so he enjoys sitting up in front of computer and uh buying

cars at auction oh he’s pretty cool so he’s so his original like he cut his teeth on the auto salvage side if he saw Cuba’s facilities to LKQ which is I’m sure most people know if they’re you know probably the largest you know publicly traded you know Auto Salvage um or Automotive Parts recycler however you want to politically correctly state that but in the country and in a lot of other countries as well right yeah you know I think what he’s told us is that he is one of the original acquired yards like in the top five uh the a r salvaged behind us um and that was that was probably 20 years ago or something like that okay you know you sit out five or six and then we started at about 15 16 years ago okay and we started just the so the CRC stands for Chuck Ronnie and Charlie he had two other partners his two other partners are still around they have a yard in North Carolina you know they end up getting the business up and going they ended up starting another parts place across the street in this

time frame um obviously LKQ still I know yeah that business became wildly successful they wanted in on that they they got in on that um and you know crc’s kind of gone from like a small Peddler yard to one of the bigger Peddler yards in the region but as they’ve done that uh myself and a few other guys we work with his grandson Blake Stanley uh and Blake’s kind of been like uh the vision behind CRC uh kind of bringing it more into the 21st century with uh technology and stuff but they’re just you know the strangers and the stanleys they’re just really good people to work for you know the culture uh it’s myself Blake a guy Mike Johnson we’ve all known each other in in industry for like 10 years so that’s what that’s where I’m going to ask you so how how do you get how do you go from you know this third generation family business and how do you come along and get involved with CRC so I actually uh started my career in 10 years it’ll be I think it’s September 4th of this year uh 10 year

I started with Triple M Metal in South Carolina actually not from here um my scrap father is the guy named Bobby Frank he worked for Metro Alloys in Atlanta we were just talking about uh he works for SA Recycling now him and his father Sheldon Frank they ran kind of the Americas canadian-based business um you know things happen in the business he kind of moved on uh you know I kind of controlled uh and worked with triple M’s industrial business in the Southeast so a lot of big Automotive accounts okay I was very lucky to meet a lot of good people along the way there’s a lot of yards we’ve worked with um but a lot of met a lot of good people there’s a lot of good people at Triple M that I still keep in touch with um are you second generation then are you second generation you said your scrap father or was that just uh that’s the guy that brought me into the industry okay he’s like a mentor yes yeah you’re either born into this life Brett or you come in through another thing so he’s like yeah

100 yeah yeah scrap father if that makes sense yeah some of the big some of the biggest contributors um like I mean in our business you know because obviously we’re not in the necessarily humongous uh industrial type area right so pretty much everybody in our business or a lot of our key players with the exception of maybe one or two has all been people that didn’t have any scrap background right and I kind of recruited them into into the industry versus say so I didn’t kind of like in your area we were talking about your population and because there is so much industry there is so many facilities and scrap yards and you know multi-generations you know of the recycling facilities over there I mean I could see where you know you’ve got you know people that are their third or second fourth whatever that is Generation you know kind of moving in between companies and kind of helping each one of them grow in their own right you know so yeah it’s always interesting to talk to people that didn’t know anything about the industry somebody kind of baited them in and

then oh yeah start the hook and once you’re on man it’s you know I I grew up Myrtle Beach I went to Clemson University I went back I worked in hospitality so you know the service side the people side and solving problems was what I did with very limited resources so then when they told me that was going to work in Metal Recycling and it was going to be like junk metal and whatever I remember telling them in the interview with his father in the second interview I said look the people are going to be easy the scrap’s gonna be hard and they were just like what we got to hire this guy he’s he’s the game changer we need to help go to the next level you know because a lot of traditional scrap yards family on business people know the scrap I mean it’s in their blood right yeah dealing with the people they’re like oh God they you know they don’t know what they’re doing at that plant they don’t know what’s going on like they’re either gonna hire somebody or they’re going to learn to deal with people you don’t

have a choice you know yeah business right well when you talk to people you know like they’re like what do you love most about the industry right and you know some people I mean some people like run equipment some people like that but I mean primarily like when I talk to people and I interview them or just shoot the with them like what do you like the most about the Artistry like the people man like there’s because there’s so many personalities right I mean it’s it’s I mean from the guy that wears the greasy jeans to work that’s got more money than you can shake a stick at to the guy that’s got the sport code and the slick back hair and all the jewelry and it expands both both it spans the full gamut right the full rainbow I like to say right you know you get all colors all ethnicities all you know personalities and it’s just an overall fun industry if you understand the people right and you understand kind of everybody’s got their own way of doing stuff I think too like you know you talk a lot on your

podcast about the younger generations and you know I think for me the biggest thing is asking a lot of questions keeping in touch with a lot of people you know get yourself a mentor whether it’s Brett Eckert or it’s you know for me it’s Chuck Miller or David Davis Tennessee and calling them um or the uh calling them up and just shooting the with them learning about their business taking an interest in their business is a big thing there’s a lot of people out there that have a lot of stories and you know I don’t know as many people like in the northeast or even on the west coast um but I’d like to you know get to know them I think the history is super important um I think like I said finding mentors even people that are I have people that are my peers that we bounce ideas off each other but going back to CRC you know it’s a group of us there’s five or six of us one guy’s a little bit younger he’s like 25 but most of us are 35 and 40. uh half of us have worked

at other businesses so uh half of us have worked at bigger businesses you know the triple M’s the Commercial Metals um so we have a lot of experience and honestly somebody said what do you do for work and I was like well you know we you know I have a networking event I go to and I’d go we make big things small and we you know we send them to steel mills I was like yeah I was explaining I was in the uh taxi cab one of the taxi cabs of History going to the event and there was some older ladies in there and said what are you doing and I was talking about sustainability and Recycling and somebody said you’re doing God’s work and I was like yeah I think that’s that’s right I would say that’s right too yeah 100 and I think that’s where go and going back to that point I think that’s where and you know kudos to guys like you know John Sacco who are trying to change The Narrative of you know just the you know the old school Scrap Yard junkyard you know and trying to

say really explained in layman’s terms to people what we do right I have in my mind like the scrap is the roots of what we do right and I never ever want to Discount like the the scrap mentality the guys that just found a way to reuse and in turn what would what would one would perceive as trash into some sort of value right so I have a hard time you know just taking the word scrap out of the vocabulary because you know it’s like almost someone trying to do away with your your last name or with your roots right but the reality of it is like you need both like and it’s just like the you talk to your friends in a certain way and you talk to your grandparents in a certain way right so when you’re trying to describe what you do and if you’re talking to an older lady and she’s trying to understand you then you go into the sustainability recycling you know doing you know God’s work in her and her terms right yeah and when you’re talking to your friends man like this podcast is scrap man

we just talk scrap you know like we’re talking about you know the grittiness the grind of the industry versus you know what I’m trying to explain to the banker you know why I need you know five million bucks to buy this piece of equipment I’m talking about sustainability I’m talking about recycling I’m talking about you know Commodities I’m talking about recycled Goods that I’m turning into Cash generating you know business so right I feel like you could it doesn’t have to be one or the other it can people you know this is an and world not an ore if you want to be successful and I think you need both you need to have the ability to be flexible in your conversation so 100 I agree with you I think there needs to be a balance um in what’s going on I think that uh we can do both I think it’s a know your audience kind of deal if it’s me and you on this podcast it’s scrap if it’s myself and Mark Frederickson president of the scra in Columbia talking to lawmakers it’s recycled material and I think over time you know

we can’t we can’t discount like you said the history back in the day the guys rolling around with the horse and buggy it was scrap these were jobs that you couldn’t get because you were let’s say you were Jewish or you were Italian or you were Indian you know you were working in the waste management business you are going to be a doctor or a lawyer those jobs weren’t for you they weren’t even available to you right yeah 100 and that’s why I hate to I don’t want anybody to think even for me that I discount you know what what the the language and the verbiage is about right I think that’s important for people to understand like I I’m just a naturally like I like to Pope fun and right that’s just the way I just like to do it I I like to surprise half the time I think I’m funnier than I probably am but it’s more just to kind of give everybody a little bit of a you know laugh every once a while but but it is a serious concept right and it is words the word the wording

the verb is you use around what you do for a living is important but it is an audience it’s an audience deal um so I’m glad that you kind of touched on that that you kind of you know kind of went through that and I I think that’s important I was sitting at the Israel meeting in Mobile last year when uh Cheryl Coleman came down the VP of sustainability and they basically said they just dropped it in our lap like hey the world’s changing sorry and it you know the message was delivered like a sack of rocks so you know a lot of us we have scrap in our name you have scrap in your name your podcast is follow uh scrapping it yep yeah it’s still the Institute of scrap recycling yeah right I think that’s coming man it’s everywhere right right like it um they you know we’ve been doing this for so long hundreds of years man uh you can’t just drop the book of new definitions on people especially when it’s in their name I mean some of these guys I know are fourth and fifth generation yeah you said

it’s like all right your last name’s venuto now it’s gonna be uh Smith because you know that because it sounds anymore yeah we don’t want to deal with this you know what you’re Sicilian and you guys are tired of the mafia your last name needs to be Smith right like I’m glad we’re having this discussion because I want it I want it out there I want it out there for everybody to kind of understand the nuances of it it’s and it’s not or it’s not recycled or scrap it’s both depends I mean it’s you know it’s like the good to me it’s the it’s it’s part of like being in the club man like you’re in the club and part of the club I always think about it like let’s say the Hells Angel Motorcycle Club Hills angle angel motorcycle club they get a bad rap because they there’s a lot of stuff that they uh and then it’s a bad analogy but it is what it is because for a long time they maybe they did they took shortcuts and they didn’t do things the right way whatever else they’re criminals but there’s

also those other they do a lot of good you know and there’s there are there are Industries out there that we do is so much good that it maybe gets overshadowed by you know second generation operators or whatever you know people that you know didn’t really know how to present themselves as the real value they brought to the table and so we were I think you know as an industry maybe we’re going from the Hell’s Angels to more of an established cleaner cut you know motorcycle club but we’re still a motorcycle club you know like we still don’t want to buy just a ride we still you know but we but we do a lot of charity work we do a lot of work for our city our County I would say we’re like I would say we’re more like the Shriners because the Hell’s Angels can get into the civilians yeah that’s true they were more like the Shriners where we’re doing a lot of cherry work but then we’re also still partying down at the event yeah that’s a better I like that analogy so we’re the Shriners club we still we

ride on motorcycles we got our hats you guys get down pretty hard in Idaho apparently man yeah but we have a but we have a good time you know we enjoy each other’s company and we but we we we’re doing it for the right reasons yes yes yeah so CRC you know one of the things that intrigued me is um the the technology of our business you and you you kind of brought this to my attention at Desiree and you were showing me that in your rollout boxes you guys have you know cameras so you can monitor as they fill up right yep and one of the coolest things when I go to to Israel convention or here in September we’re gonna go to scrap Expo um to see the equipment we get a touch and feel it operate it which is the real differentiator between the Expo and Israel where you just get to look at it all polished up right um but I love just because I’m an equipment junkie I’m a technology junkie and as far as like what what’s out there for the industry I’m not a super tech tech

savvy guy but I’m always looking to see what the next thing in the industry is and you’re showing me on your phone you’re like dude check this out and and you’re showing me videos of all you know a lot of your roll-off boxes and kind of what level they were at so what kind of got you guys going down that path what was the kind of spark that you guys said hey this is something we need to kind of deploy with with our customers or or internally yeah so um we don’t have a uh one thing is we don’t have a dispatcher sitting at a desk we have a yard manager and a dual role that is communicated through another technology we use called slack you know so we have different channels set up to communicate with the yard um Blake and his grandfather are big on hiring people that are very professional this is the job we need to do uh but also in that same sense like I said the culture is very important here I mean when they when they wrote me a letter it said hey we want you

to work here we only want you to work from eight to five and after five unless it’s an emergency we’re not going to contact you and we don’t want you to work so yeah I think that’s very important finding that balance whatever it might be you know if you’re selling non-ferrous it might be a little different because uh you’re talking to people overseas right um so he’s he’s communicating through slack and internal messaging system um and there’s a lot of different channels we won’t get into all those but if somebody wants to call and ask about it no problem yeah apology one thing is he can use compology to uh we can see how much is being loaded in the containers uh we can anticipate kind of uh certain scenarios uh with when we need to service people uh you know we guarantee a certain window to our customers uh that we’re going to service you in 48 hours which is Big right some customers we don’t sign up because we know that we can’t provide these service agreements too so not everybody’s going to be a good fit for CRC and in

like anybody’s business so we can kind of anticipate loads the other thing was I think we were putting roll-offs out we didn’t have a great tracking system and you know I don’t think Excel is that great um so I think we’re losing roll-offs yeah so now we we can’t lose roll-offs as long as that camera and tracking system is on there so you can actually get on you can click street map you can click satellite you can see your container at the customer uh when you put a customer in you build like a geofence around it so anytime that container is dropped in that area it automatically assigns to that customer sometimes we have a few customers right beside each other across each other but you know you know the customers after looking at the material who they are yeah what is it like what is on a just a rough estimate what’s that uh cost per roll-off basis look like oh man that’s a good question I don’t um so it’s like maybe and I think everybody’s different maybe it’s a hundred bucks a camera 150 a camera and

then you got to pay the service which is like uh 10 bucks a month seven bucks a month they you know I don’t know the exact numbers yeah but just just trying to rough it out for say somebody that you know has got a hundred boxes right or yeah yeah 200 boxes yeah yeah but also you I mean I’m just in my my own mind right it’s you know there is a and there is something about the customer service aspect of it right because in the name it’s even in my um short tenure right from say I started about 20 years ago I mean this next year will be 20 years since I’ve been working full-time other than just growing up in it and in 20 years time it has become I was telling we were having I was having this conversation with the with uh one of the banks or something the other day and they’re talking about kind of our business flow and structure and I was like you know we used to be 75 scale traffic maybe 20 25 you know bins roll-offs um trailers our business in that

20 years has 100 flop right to where we are a primarily a Ben rolloff um trailer you know outside you know mobile daily mobile crushing outside which is we’re a service based company and I think it’s not just us the people that have had success in our industry I became they’ve realized that it is that the industry has become a more service based industry where unless you’re in a very you know high traffic location City in a metropolitan area you know the way you’re going to be able to compete is Ben’s roll-offs you know so it’s going to become service so how do you make the customer service experience exponentially better um it’s cameras in your roll-offs so that they don’t have to call in and say it’s ready to flop right it’s knowing you know so they don’t have to it doesn’t overflow and create them an issue on their end right it’s and you guys have found a kind of a unique way to create that customer experience to me that’s when I look at it that’s what I look at I’m like oh okay like you’re trying to make

the customer experience even better yeah so they can actually opt into an email or text it has a volume sensor on it obviously if they loaded the front of the bucket it would not work but most people load scrap kind of in the middle of the box so there’s a volume sensor it it can read you know 10 30 and when it gets to 80 it’ll start notifying you basically every three days until you commit or don’t commit to servicing the box and it’s an automatic deal right yeah it gives them big time peace of mind that somebody is kind of like a big brother is watching their material real um to our knowledge we’re the only company in the upstairs South Carolina waste or metals that have this technology out there well and also you know from a safety standpoint I could see how it would prevent because we’ve got some boxes that we’ve had to drop 20 yarders or they’ll overload it right I mean because it’s all you know it beam Cuts you know plate Cuts I mean it’s heavy material and if we don’t drop a 20 and we don’t

pick it up right when we’re supposed to that thing will be overloaded and because the guy tipping it the bins rotating the bins it’s on the production floor and Manufacturing floor he he doesn’t care what that box was he’s just trying to keep his area clean get his job done right and then when our driver goes to pick it up and he can barely pull that thing on the truck you know all of a sudden you’re like man so from a safety regulatory standpoint it doesn’t take many of those overloaded containers to actually pay for the technology right to monitor the flow and all of a sudden like your money ahead and customer service ahead yeah we also can see if people uh if we have a theft problem um we can notify the customer look you know here’s the picture because it’s taking a picture every four hours and it’s taking pictures at night and it can take pictures in a sealed container yeah it’s like black and white when it takes a picture but still you know we have some containers that have lids on them with turnings and that are sealed

and fluid we can see all that it’s not yeah it doesn’t work great inside of building but you know when they open the roll-off door sometimes we get a shot of what’s going on yeah um because it needs satellite access right so inside a building’s not cut um but yeah I think uh getting back to the customer service I think that works I think you know we can communicate with our customers uh monthly uh through an email I think two you know if you’re my role here at CRC is business development getting our name out trying to get new industrial accounts right commercial accounts I think too if you’re a buyer you need to separate yourself from just price right and people talk about relationships and what’s that look like Well it can’t look like Matt venuta or Brett Eckert paid me x amount a ton one month and paid me 50 less six months from now it has to be Matt venuto and Brett anchor are good guys I know him personally you know they send us Market updates they communicate with us I see brown LinkedIn I know exactly what he’s

doing with his business you know Matt’s communicating he’s coming by to see us yeah Personal Touch right and you don’t if you’re just the man coming in there with the price it it’s not the same way easier if you’re just a price guy you’re easy to replace that’s awesome right I had this conversation we do our production meetings every Tuesday and that’s usually when I do like my truck top where I’m like driving to my my office and I just kind of running through my day in my mind or kind of what’s sticking out and uh what’s kind of burning up my brain that that that morning um and I was I had the conversation with our guys in the production meeting and we we have like one guy from every division our guy that runs our local dispatch one guy runs our Ferris yard the other guy runs our over the road trucks and we get everybody together once a week we sit in that mean and it and it could cost us money to have that mean right because that’s an hour of everybody’s time that you have to get it together

and go through and your HR you know guys who runs our insurances in there so we talk through stuff and we just trying to everybody gets their chance right bring it up let’s discuss it let’s let’s hammer it out um a lot of bright Minds that look at things from very different angles and it helps us kind of work through issues problems or opportunities um and I had and and that I had the conversation everybody I said here’s the deal prices going down this is the this is the this is the math right down 30 on the coast 50 Midwest 60 South 50 South you know just depends on where you’re at I said but then Market’s off and I said not this page lie to be any better but everybody’s selling to the same Market to the same price and everybody’s going to pay within a certain amount of the same price the only differentiator that we have is our customer service and our quality of service because the markets to Market we’re all selling the same people it doesn’t matter right so we either we pick up efficiencies in the yard but

which means we more efficient how we handle material we’re more efficient how we bring it in but more efficient where we dump so we don’t handle it twice and the and the key component is we are better at customer service than anybody else go over and above and give value right now because the pricing is coming down and as soon as the pricing comes down and they see the price come down then they’re going to look around and they’re going to look for other options thinking that maybe you’re just dropping their price because you need more margin right so when the price comes down is when your service level has to come up yes you can give more service more valuable service than you were when the price was up because the price is up everybody’s making money you know they look they don’t look as hard at the cost at the value or the that they’re receiving right I think you’re a bigger company or a public company when price comes down service comes down and it it that is that is the depth of those guys when they have that problem um

you know we’ll take for example George Adams said never underestimate the small scrap dealer and I think a lot of people are looking at the industry and they’re like they see all this consolidation but I’m telling you right now like he said never underestimate the small guy the small guy will always have a service mechanism in this industry right oh yes and it might be in Demopolis Alabama it might be in Duncan South Carolina it might be in uh you guys Boise Ohio Idaho yeah um it might be in Northern California but there’s always going to be service based I think too you know we’ve Diversified our business into cardboard and into the waste industry so as the metals are starting to get more soft here in the future I heard you talking on one of the podcasts we’re probably heading into a little bit of a recession I think it’ll be segmented um you know businesses have to diversify themselves I don’t know what it looks for other people but I think the unless you’re really big in industrial business diversification is going to be the key for a lot of these smaller

outfits and the bigger outfits too because what’s going to happen is I mean and I’ve seen it I’ve I’ve watched it you know a couple went through a couple of these cycles and what will happen is the bigger outfits they’ll start cutting heads right I mean they’ll start cutting fat pretty quick which is what then you know then they’ll get to a fairly lean point which is probably where they should have been the first place but pricing allows you to kind of you know keep that around and then when you get to that lean point is and they’re fairly sound operators and if the market keeps coming down they’ll they will cut to the Bone they’ll get rid of muscle they’ll get rid of everything they’ll catch the bone which is when their service drops if you have to bandwidth if you’ve got the the Longevity if you’ve invested back in your business and you’ve invested back into your people you will allow yourself the ability to maintain that level of service that level of communication with your customer that will then allow you the opportunity to grow your business in a down Market

because you can compete with service you can’t compete with price you know you can for a short period of time until somebody comes in and offers a bigger price then so you can then compete with your service and you will grow your business believe it or not and I’ve I’ve only because I’ve done it through two or three of these Cycles I’ve grown when the market gets shitty but it’s only because I was willing to commit to the service side and then when the price comes back up as long as you maintain that level of service and you’ve chased the price back up with your customer you you have a really good chance you know oh yeah I think two the industrial businesses it’s becoming more tough it’s uh I think I think for everybody to say hey we’re gonna we’re gonna hit base hits on every deal like you know someone there’s gonna be some give and take in that business it’s very challenging where we are in particular on the very uh larger accounts you know the Mills are bidding against you in the room uh yeah that’s a very competitive Network

when you’re talking about things like that uh it’s extremely hard we got Mills sitting on top of us we got more Mills being built as we speak um you know CRC doesn’t participate in really any of that stuff in particular which is good for us um it’s such a dog eat dog world but you have to if we’re not talking about big accounts and we’re talking about service based businesses yeah you know one of my best friends in Myrtle Beach he he works in insurance and he works for an independent insurance agent a friend of ours owns a business and he he doesn’t talk about price he talks about service and what they can provide to the customer right because Insurance real estate I mean we can talk about all kinds of Industries Brad yeah price if you’re leading with price you might get a customer but you’re not going to maintain it it’s you’re going to be just another dude man yeah you gotta you got to bring some other sort of value mechanism to the table and whether that’s a personal relationship whether that’s a customer service whether that’s a combination of

you know a few different things with it with a consistent price you know and I say consistent in the fact of um not the highest right not the lowest but you’re just going to be consistent with the market with them you’re going to move with the market and but the level of service the level of value you’re going to bring is going to be over and above and here’s the deal it’s I always say you’re not going to compete with the Mills on Prime scrap when they got a mill there and they got two scrap yards two you know big recycling facilities around that can they can drop boxes that have endless access to roll-offs and trailers and whatever else and you’re not going to compete with them on price right because they’re just going to look at as an input cost and off they go right pass through yep yep and so companies straight pass through the pump baby right yeah and in those scenarios is that business you really want and I think you have to really try and engage that and say is that business that I’m actually going to

generate enough revenue on to cover the cost of the box to cover the cost of the driver to cover the cost of the truck to cover and then you start going through all that and here and then you start trying to figure out what your margins need to be are those assets better deployed to another account to another you know commodity grade to another and you could really start trying to analyze your business and say okay you know where is my you know sweet spot gonna be what’s my Niche and I think that you’ve got to figure out what your Niche is figure out a little bit of diversification off those niches so you can kind of uh weather some of these Market changes and focus on that focus on providing value I think too you know if you’re getting into that let’s say we serve some national account for somebody uh you know something I learned a few years back from an owner was uh look we’re gonna we’re gonna interview you and you’re gonna interview us and we’re gonna see if it’s a good fit the good thing about CRC is that

like I said we have some guys that have worked at bigger companies we’re gonna tell you straight up one if we can provide the service at two if we’re going to do the business for you and I think that that is a big thing too you know smaller companies sometimes will bite off more than they can chew you’re rarely going to find us in that situation um not to say that we’re not going to be aggressive on certain accounts because there are going to be those accounts that we want that we’re going to be aggressive on but uh you know these big bushling accounts or even uh I don’t know Monster plate accounts like really big you know we’re not gonna and we’re not gonna stretch ourselves out so far that we can’t service our current customer base either that’s the key right that’s the key right there that you just said yes I’ve watched people do this too many times chase that top line revenue and then hurt their business overall because they went after that big account and let’s say they landed it because they had a great price or they had

a great sales you know pitch or whatever the case may be but at the same time you then put all your effort and resources into service in this account it honestly could give two shits whether it’s you whether it’s a blue box or Redbox a pink box they don’t care they just want it service and they want paid right yeah then you then you you sacrifice your other maybe smaller is your smaller accounts your smaller um contributors and you basically sacrifice the service what really got you to the point that you that you’re at in the first place you sacrifice service with them and that’s really your base and if you sacrifice a service with your base to chase you know to chase the big guy yeah I don’t more often than not I’ve seen it you know really be detrimental to the to the business as a whole I think two people got to think uh you know you can’t think so much micro like hey how many accounts we’re gonna get this month how many we’re gonna get this year industrial business is so cyclical up and down you got to think

you know five ten years from now what are we going to look like and it’s a long uh there’s a lot of owners out there that expect results you know uh these things are long dealing deals you know that could take years to land to even get bids on uh yeah I think the guys here totally understand the long game they totally understand that not every ball we’re gonna hit is even gonna uh get us a run or get us to first base they understand that not every Venture is going to be a winner for us um we uh kind of understand who we are like I said you interview us we interview you if it’s a good match you know on these bigger counts then let’s do it let’s try it you know and we’re not afraid to uh to compete in this Arena you know even the local guys are very competitive but you know even with that said if we if we pivot to something else uh something important to me is uh serving our association so as much as we compete with these guys in the local area we also

can sit down and um you know the South’s a little bit different so we have Israeli Southeast as our association uh chapter right we have seven states the gulf is different we’re the southeast okay Florida North Carolina South Carolina Georgia Alabama Tennessee um in Virginia so we in the seven states we also have seven State associations right so what happened back in the day I think during the catalytic converter uh stuff we were history was controlling the money in the Southeast and there were so many issues we were having it was very segmented so we had to start State associations kind of around that 08 area Barry wolf who’s the Charleston steel he would be a great podcast guy okay he was the first president of the South Carolina recyclers Association and actually uh the guy that worked here the guy that works Here Blake Stanley he’s been a president I’m on the board now uh one of my big things now is one to try to recruit new members um both for the scra and for Israeli Southeast if you’re Recruit new members to history Southeast then obviously they have to join the

National Association as well so that’s a that’s a harder ask at times for more money depending on who they are um but we have had some success there you know um if you talk to anybody at Israeli National they will tell you that the southeast has run really well uh and we share a lot of ideas with national about you know how to run the organization and whatnot we are the biggest chapter I think we’re 285 we’re getting close to 300 members like I said Brett will see you in Savannah in November yeah man send me the invite a lot to figure it out I still got a way to make it happen I mean I think two with like the younger generation you kind of have to find your Niche you know I found my Niche and you know I’m a sales guy right so I’m out of the people and we’re recruit members but not only recruit members like you know our associations don’t survive and people need to know this without our offenders right the guys that sell us the cranes the the ladies and sell us the balers uh Sierra

uh Jessica you know everybody knows her um you know not only do they sell us equipment uh they also serve in leadership positions both in the scra and other state associations as well as Israeli um so that’s a that’s a big thing you know uh I think our vendors are owed a shout out on this podcast I’d like to thank all of them even people that aren’t vendors that might be listening uh you know joining Israel I think is a big deal I think they can gain a lot of value in it and you’ll know going to the meetings the guys that are consistently at the meetings are making a lot of the big sales I’m sure I know that when when CRC is pitched uh Blake and Mike Johnson their pitch first thing Blake gases are you an injury member in Our unscra member if they’re you know in the state right because they want to know there’s a lot of Israeli members that’ll ask you that question and ask you like as a fellow recycling as a fellow recycler fellow uh um operator is that what you’re saying is that where you’re

going with that yes yeah yeah I think it’s a big deal I think people that support our industry should get a you know extra vote of confidence right um yeah I think it’s like anything remembering yeah they come to the meetings and join it you know in our sponsors right like we’re sending sponsorship right right uh out right now for the scra meeting which is going to be in Charleston South Carolina um I think that’s a big deal you know I think it’s a good time to promote I think it’s networking right it’s you know you’re protecting your industry you’re talking about your industry um you’re promoting your industry in a positive manner it’s networking it’s it’s a lot of that I mean I think that’s the you know I I’m I’m not as much of a and I’m just being real Frank like because I like I’m not a I’m not a bullshitter but I’m not as big on um you know saying that Israel is a requirement for me to do business with you right right because I believe that it’s networking it’s building a positive network but I do believe that

Israel does positive things for our industry um and I think that’s a big that’s a big part of it I think you know like what you’re saying is is it and for me it’s not a requirement you know I want to do what I want to deal with the person I want to deal with the company I want to be um you know I want to know who I’m dealing with obviously if you’re willing to spend the money to be part of a trade Association you are you know you do feel strongly about the value you do feel strongly about you know what the industry um does for you for your company and and whatnot you know my my big my big pushback on it say even a national level is is is it uh does it bring you all the value do you get the value that you’re paying for it and if some people say I get open above and it’s so it’s probably the people that commit to the meetings that commit to the yeah talking to commit to the lobbying the commit to to that right I know so I’m

like you you got to kind of pick a lane like you know go on and do it and and kudos to you and if not if you’re you’re you feel like your time is better spent on building your business I understand that too right I think it’s an and goes back to like kind of being an and bigger 1 000 right like there is there there are they are doing great things and they are helping our industry and they are pushing it forward and when you sign up to go to you know the Israeli National and you pay that money you know you you’d like you think that you’d like to believe that that money is going towards promoting the industry in a positive way so you so you went to the national meeting that was held in the south in your opinion let’s hear your opinion on it what’d you think of the meeting I think that it should be held somewhere new every year I like this out I mean like I said I spent a lot of time down there going to Atlanta and whatnot we were talking about head of

the podcast um I like I thought the Nashville venue was great because it gave people in the South access to what least easier access to a convention versus trying to fly and get into Vegas or California or whatever that’s just you know that’s that’s it’s a lot tougher that’s the same reason why I love the scrap Expo like the scrap Expo that’s coming up in September that’s down in uh Louisville I mean that’s awesome it’s it’s it’s it’s different than the Israeli convention it’s more set up for the small medium-sized operators and it’s a much it was it was a needed twist for our industry right because if if National Convention is a way to connect with you know some of the larger consumers and you’re going to get you know like 40 50 countries where individuals coming in that are consuming your material on an export basis plus your domestic big still Mill consumers if we had a convention every year that was set up and really designed around the small and medium-sized operators for us to connect right guys like yourself my cell that we could connect and say what

are you guys doing over there it’s different what do you how do you guys do this how does your marketing look how does your customer service look when you do this what equipment are you using to process scrap to get ready for the mill like all those things that is why I guess I got a lot more love for the City Scrap Expo I’ll attend the isary stuff like I I can appreciate what they’re doing but because I am just a kind of a small piece of the puzzle right um I want to connect with other small pieces of puzzle because I think together we help each other out so much more and that’s my passion you know my I don’t have a passion for Lobby right yeah the way guys like Saco and Adams and some of these other guys do that work and I don’t discount that work because that’s hard work and that takes money and time and effort and whatnot so from from my you will always get the tip of the hat for me because I know what that value that brings yeah so if that’s not my jam

how do I make the industry better well I make the industry better by helping small and medium-sized operators connect and help each other out and be better that’s the value that I that I feel like I can provide the industry as a whole right right and that would be my role in if it was a big company that’d be my goal is like hey let’s connect all these guys let’s help them promote their businesses let’s let them talk about where they’re from what they’re doing and let’s I’m going to tell them how I do and maybe you can glean off one or two um but it can be both right it can be it can be all the above all the above are necessary and and so it’s funny because I’ll tell you another thing uh a little bit different so I in a networking group outside of the association’s um there’s a membership fee we pay for every month but it’s guys from different industries that support the industrial business in and around this area so I think it’s I think it’s key to not only understand your industry and be in

a continuous Improvement learning situation uh but also to note you know the guys that sell forklifts how do they do it who do they talk to usually they talk to facility managers which is good and we have a guy selling HVAC equipment there’s actually another guy that you’re going to do a podcast with he’s uh his name’s Igor he’s from overseas he started a business I think he has he follows you Brett I talked to him he um it’s called heavy Hall Industries I believe uh I think he has 40 trucks now right and he moves all kinds of stuff all over in all 48 states but he’s here he’s the owner of the business he’d be a really good guy to talk to he likes some stuff he likes the truck stuff you do yeah outfit and stuff you know that’s not really my jam I’ll tell you that but yes totally into that I’ll connect y’all I think that would be a great podcast because he’s a guy that came here you know started working as a trucker independently and him and his brother have grown a business that honestly in this

area has no limit to it absolutely no limit and he’s one of the most humble guys you’ll ever meet in your life you know I love it man that’s so tell me about before we go tell me the future of uh CRC what do you guys I mean what do you what are you guys trying to do what are you trying to accomplish how do you see um your your place in the industry like what do you what’s the what’s the grand plan or what do you look forward to any of the above I’m willing to uh CRC is just gonna keep doing what it’s good at uh always looking towards new technology to help improve the business make it more efficient um you know I see myself in the industry as uh you know one of the young leaders helping people out helping younger people I tell everybody you know you can call me anytime we can shoot the um I think that there’s a good opportunity I think there’s a big push you’ve seen for sustainability and ESG that’s that’s becoming a huge Topic in this area especially with you know BMWs

here they have a lot of European suppliers that uh these you know Europe’s like 20 years ahead of the US on the CSG stuff so you’re going to see a big push how does that balance with South Carolina and people that have been here a long time you know or we went from a very agrarian society to uh the reason BMW came here was we had a massive uh manufacturing kind of tier 2 machinist space and so we’ve evolved right we have BMW here we have Michelin has I think seven or eight plants in the state they’re North American headquarters is here we also have boeings here they’re in Charleston building the Dreamliner so you know CRC is going to operate in that you know the business that works for us like I said it’s not going to be the big business um yeah business right um but doing business with all their suppliers growing the industrial base very important to us but also uh you know playing a role in recycling and sustainability in South Carolina is big for me uh the guys here support that which is good you know I love

it I love it I think the big takeaway for me is um you know that as much as the consolidation that’s going on even in your area with steel mills and you know big scrap companies buying out you know the smaller guys there will always be a role for the small medium-sized operators when your focus is customer service and you provide some value to the in to your customers via drop boxes be uh you know going over and above in a tough Market you know it with exchanges and you know I think that I have a hard time believing that the big business will just squeeze out all the small business because you’ve got a lot of guys and gals in our industry they’re used to tough times who grew up with tough times that have a we have kind of a cockroach mentality you can step on us a hundred times and we just keep climbing yeah we keep crawling and that’s why I love this podcast the way I love talking to guys like you you know that uh that are out there putting it in and every day right they’re

they’re they’re scratching their clawing they’re trying to build real businesses um that bring more value than just no knock to your buddy that’s just selling insurance right like right right you know and I think that you know I got a really good friend that sells Insurance um so but the what we’re providing what we bring to the table needs to be you know needs to be said it needs to be you know communicated depend on the audience and you just communicate it and uh I thank you man for you know sticking with me and having the patience with me to put this podcast together and I’m happy we were able to sit down yeah for sure sounds good man all right man have a great uh month and go out there and make it happen yes sir forever man yes sir