welcome to a scrap life a podcast solely focused on the hustlers Grinders operators and business owners who live and breathe the scrap metal industry every day here is your host Brett eard all right here we are is 2024 I’m sitting here with Matt Michael John Ron G from La scrap and not la like you West Coast guys think Louisiana scrap I’ve been excited about this one because I’m a family business guy right and it’s not very often that you get Fathers and Sons to sit in the same room still like each other and be able to uh talk about scrap the scrap business right so thanks for coming out I appreciate you guys taking the time and uh how’s the show going you guys anything anything fun other than like at night when you’re done with the show we were talking about earlier how’s the show going for you guys the show’s good um we’ve been coming to e for about the last 15 years or so and uh the the the cool thing is you get to see a lot of the old friends that you’ve known all these years get to catch

up with them and their families yeah and you get to see whatever the latest and greatest is as far as equipment goes um and then the last thing is is uh being able to see uh what new products that are out there that that we can use to improve our business is there anything that caught your eye out of curiosity like on the new product side anything that you kind of made you go well there’s some new uh material handlers I’ve seen out there that I hadn’t seen before for sure um it’s always interesting to see the kind of new uh new things out there in that in that front for sure well you guys run Cogan at least from one of the videos I saw online when it was picking off that big uh Airway T airplane taxi way right like that was a pretty cool video like a drone video yeah and he had Ford what they were they 835s on it uh we’ve got 835s and um several smaller ones but 830s I think now they they transition but uh yeah we do Cogan mainly and uh we have some we

bears as well and um combination those too you happy with them oh yeah yeah yeah for sure both of them I mean they kind of serve their own purpose or um yeah they it depends on the type of you know yard we’re at whether it’s going to be tracker um be on hard wheels but most of our stuff’s on concrete so we use uh not much tracks but we do have a decommissioning site that’s got you know obviously on dirt so we need to have some tracks for that it’s been great for us the reason I asked that is not to get you to disparage one or the other is because I’ve only I remember when we got our first CER book and it was an 8:25 and it was a game changer for our business right I mean we’ve had we just all we had was excavators with the 3×2 eth grapples that was all we had and I remember we got our first cabog and I was like oh wow like the production the the ability to move stuff and you could operate in a little tighter area cuz you could

stack a little higher and I was just it just kind of was mindboggling for me how one machine could kind of transform your yard and so I’ve only ran we ran all coggans and they’re all 825s they’re the same couple years different you know depends on the years we bought them so I only know one machine that’s why I’m always curious like when you think about it like just more just add a picking your brain like this one serve a better purpose or what where was the switch made and you know so my goal has always been in the business to be the best yeah so it means a lot of things right start off you need to have the best employees how do you get the best employees you have to pay above Market on wages mhm you have to have benefit plans that are the best and you have to let all of your employees know that they’re part of your team the way you do that is I try to walk every yard talk to a lot of the employees the first thing I always ask them are you happy MH

and I want I want to get the feedback on that that that’s important the second thing is is always what do we need to do to improve you’re you’re the eyes out here for the company and uh I need your feedback if you think everything’s going great that’s fine if you see something that you think that uh that we need to change you have an idea that might be better yeah let’s go I like it what’s your take on that Michael what’s I mean I want to get you I want to get you in this conversation and I want to know your I want to know your point of view cuz the reason I say that is because I feel like in order to have a successfully successful family business everybody’s got to kind of have a Lane right I have it with our guys that and they might as well be my brothers I’m like this is your lane this is your lane this is your lane we’re all going down the same same Highway we’re trying to get the same spot but if you stay in your lane we’re going to be

just fine right so how do you guys carve those Lanes out between the two of you three of you like what does that look like what’s your what’s your day today so my day to day is golf asset recovery has had is uh Surplus sales um for e-commerce website okay um a lot of the boats that are decommissioned we go on there and take off all the usable Electronics engines gears basically anything that is of value that over and above price of scrap correct de so we kind of created he created another basically business based on stuff that we were doing with our decommissioning s on boats which was we’re just going to be throwing it in the trash but there these is actual valuable things that we can we’re doing enough of it to where we can create value so um and obviously engines GS sets everything we we come out of these need to be managed as well as you know pipe plate valve that kind of thing on the Surplus side so what was that facility for you guys a green field site was it an acquisition you know cuz

when we started talking you know I just assumed okay like Louisiana grab you guys just had a couple kind of traditional you know scrap metal recycling facilities and then we started you know the farther we got along the conversation like oh no we have you know we have this facility and we can do this and then I started seeing the videos I was like oh like you guys got you guys can take down some big some big scrap and so that it kind of boggles my mind cuz I’m I’m Inland right I’m in the middle of Idaho like we the idea of ship breaking cutting up you know barges and big stuff it just it doesn’t really TR I mean I just haven’t really been around it so for you guys was that something you saw a niche in you guys Greenfield de side or did you guys buy an existing so SE one was existing that we bought in Lake Charles okay and we had a Greenfield site in our Gul Coast facility in Gibson so the Gul Coast site is almost 100 acres there and it’s a very sizable slip um so

our goal was to morph it into a not only Marine but industrial but uh but that was a Greenfield site so uh it was the old Avendale Shipyard site that’s there um so it’s got it had pretty good you know bones to it before getting there and plus um you know strategically it made sense for us to to go that from a geography standpoint or just from a grow standpoint um both you know GE geographically you want to be towards the gulf you want to have quick access to the gulf and you want to have a facility that can kind of handle pretty much you know any size there’s no Hider width restrictions depth is the in the water is the only real thing that you’re kind of about yeah so as as a dad did you did you always want the boys in in the business with you did you were you did you ever think about it I or did you did you want him to go do something different or did you want them in well I wanted the boys to do whatever they want to do okay now they didn’t

have an option when they were growing up uh both of them came to work for the family business when they were 14 years old and uh so they knew the business and um you know I I want them to uh there’s a lot of family businesses where it’s assumed that you’re going to jump in and uh you know you’re going to do that but I wanted them to know they’ve got an opportunity to do whatever they want to do so that’s and they both chose uh to uh to be in the family business and uh it’s worked out well it helps when you’re a decent size business too cuz it kind of creates a little bit of uh buffer right to like I mean if you guys are doing everything from you know recovering you know you basically big big big Iron cutting you know asset recovery all the way down just your traditional day-to-day you know just buying from the retail public there does create enough avenues that you can kind of everybody can kind of March in their own lane if you will and so what’s your in your day-to-day

Matt what does that look like for you um you know so you know in the scrap business a lot of hats yeah for sure yeah I understand that but there’s got to be a way for you guys to not yeah bump each other too hard um so you know business development manager really and then kind of managing of Lake Charles or Lafayette in the Gul Coast sites um in addition to Steel sales and it’s kind of what I’m do so I guess you can call it a COO role if you will but um you know my day my dayto day is kind of you know is busy obviously but and that’s the hard part is kind of delegating and and once you’ve kind of you know it’s hard to let go of some of those things it is I I 100% know that’s a that’s a I mean you probably know that John is is hard to let go it’s it hard to give up things that you used to do one at one point and let but it’s transitioned over about the last uh 3 or 4 years okay I have a really

strong uh management team and uh I always like to tell them uh they’re they’re better than me yeah and so I’m morphed into more of a cheerleader and I like that role and uh but I’m also the still the owner I’m not out yet I still have a little bit of power and control there you still got some skin in the game so you screw up one time you’re out no but uh thank God um the people we have are just outstanding yeah well you can’t grow and build the size of business you guys have size of business we have if you don’t have good people right I mean it’s that’s the name of the game and it’s you don’t have that mean whether it’s Sons or you know or just people that are you know not necessarily family but good people like that was always my thing I didn’t have I didn’t have a bunch of iing I had a sister and she wanted to be a school teacher so was I had to go recruit quote unquote family into the family business to get if I wanted to grow it you know

that was that was the only option and that’s what I had to do so what do you guys do I mean cuz you guys have done some acquisition right and and and that’s been a pretty big part of your you know growth trajectory yeah yes does what that has to create some sort of uh uh dynamic or some some makes some things a little bit more difficult because you’re trying to kind of get somebody another company and weave them into your existing culture so it’s corporate culture and I’m all about that and um we’ve been able to the Acquisitions that we made have have just uh assimilated and and fit right in and we have a strong corporate culture and at the end of the day I feel like uh regardless of uh whatever acquisition we make that uh they’ll blend right in with our corporate culture so who drives that for you guys like interally who drives the like that cuz somebody’s got to be pushing that I mean and and consistent with that does that come from the two of you does it come from other others within your organization so we’ve

got at our higher kind of our GMS at at locations all have 20 plus years experience and so they’ve been in the business a long time and so it’s it’s it drives from the top I mean I started with my father obviously and um the type of Acquisitions we’ve made they’ve meshed very well with our Coral culture it’s obviously something we look at when considering potentially going to grow it was that a big part of the vetting process when you were looking at it I would say for sure it yes yeah people want to just look at the financials right and they want to just look at oh does it make money does it not I mean well again back to back to his point people right so people is the key and so you’re not only buying a business you’re buying you know and typically in our acquisition for the for the ones we’ve done so far we’ve kept on the family that has been there and that’s important to us I mean obviously so typically it’s family run organizations that were looking at and so um that is definitely part of the

vetting process is the people that are there as well my wife and my I’ve got two young Sons I got a a 10-year-old and a 14-year-old um two boys so that’s why I was like excited for this podcast cuz there I can see it right whether they want to be in it or not like that’s a whole another deal but I can see where it could go um but we my kids love shark tanks so we watch I watch Shark Tank all the time and and I tell them I said watch watch Cuban cuz to me like the way he goes about like there’s often times I don’t think Cuban really believes in the business but he loves the the person and he’ll he’ll go out a deal where it’s like that doesn’t really make Financial sense and he’s like whatever like but you can tell like when I when I watch it just cuz I know that’s how I look at things I’m like very people driven I’m like okay if I can get the right people I can probably put about any business together and we we’ll do

we’ll do okay right and then you got to kind of put the other pieces in place to really make it grow but he’s often times making deals just for the entrepreneur just for the person that’s sitting there pitching them and I feel like that can get lost in that acquisition process of you know that’s what’s going to drive that business and then and then you give them then the the gasoline on the back end to that they might not have been getting you know from the previous ownership group or whatever the help they need the tools they need to to build it I feel like that’s kind of a big part of it is that has that been a has that been a big part that’s you hit the nail on the head it’s all about people the Acquisitions we’ve made I’ve never really lost any of our uh managers over about the last 20 years yeah none speaks to the I mean what you guys are doing to to take care of your your team I mean that that’s a big that’s a bold statement right to say we haven’t lost anybody in

20 years that we didn’t want to lose that wanted us you know that we wanted to keep you know like we’re able to keep one that speaks to people believing in what you guys are doing and where you guys are going so where are you guys’ facility located what so we’ve got four we’ve got Lafayette it’s kind of the headquarters uh I guess you could say and then Fort Allen Lake Charles and Gibson Louisiana okay yeah and now how far are they from a mileage like how far are they away from each other roughly speaking cuz I don’t know that geography well geographically uh they’re all about an hour okay an hour stop from lafette with lafette being the home base home base simply because that’s where I’m from so do you all all live in Lafia yet yeah we do yeah cuz I would assume you’re the facility you’re working out of for the most part on the asset recovery side is not in Lafayette right no it’s in lafette it isn’t okay yeah so a lot of things we bring back to Lafayette but the larger stuff we keep at the other

yards and and sell out of there okay on the decommission side yeah yeah right so what’s the coolest thing you’ve seen come through are something that’s like interesting people wouldn’t think who come through there about the uh the boat from Tampa with the uh offshore where they had the helicopter and it had a uh Fisherman’s Paradise Fisherman’s Paradise had a bar and a restaurant in the boat yeah we I think we took out the fish tank right in yeah we tried taking out the fish tank so very large it like for a restaurant inside the boat oh wow it was I don’t know how many thousands gallons but it was a pretty were you able to get it out yeah got it out got it up it’s actually still in our gibon facility we’re trying to figure out what the heck to do with it you know what office we can put it in you know the problem is when you get into bigger scrap and then you want to save stuff is it’s bigger and you got to take some much you know a little scrap yard you get little stuff you can

put a little stuff in the corner you guys get big stuff like multi thousand or multi thousand gallon tank so you got to find a big home for that yeah you can you can turn into a hoarder pretty quick in the scrapes you know I mean man I where you you know you I’ve been doing I my wife thinks I’m crazy but I was like I’ve never been to a town that I haven’t wanted to go see what the what the stards are she’s like we’re in Hawaii and I’m like for our honeymoon we you know I was you know we had just got married and she’s wanting to do go see this go see that and I was like I just and we was going through kind of an industrial area and I was like I know I just know when my bones are just grabb around here so just like enough like enough like for a week just give me a week and I was like uh let’s go over here I want to go see even if I just like looking over the fence like at least I get to see

what it is but I mean has it always been that way like for you I mean you how did you get into the business what what’s the uh so I work for the 24th largest company in America I work for their drilling company in Lafia Louisiana and uh the company had to sell their oil and gas interest there were a big conglomerate and we we made the uh all the the data room we put all the information together for that and I knew I had about 9 months was the process so me and my co-workers and U we looked at uh you know small business opportunities we went through the franchises McDonald’s and Burger King and whatnots M and uh looked in the phone book there was a business broker things were so bad all was $10 a barrel the oil and gas market which is our Our Town lafette it was gone and so I figured if I’m going to stay that’s the only opportunity I’m going to have yeah so there was an ice cream uh uh business that had two locations this is September um not the smartest guy sharpest

tool in in the shed but U I realized that ice cream going into winter might not be the best thing so there was Cas flow for a while there was a recycling company and back then uh felt like uh you know that’s the wave of the future uh uh the business was uh I was able to uh get self- financing from the owner and uh it was a reasonable U offer and and uh and so that’s how I ended up I had a 64 and a 2-year-old mhm and uh I had to borrow money from my in-laws to finance uh uh CDs at the bank their CDs for a line of credit and uh jumped off into it and uh with two employees and back never look back that’s I love it but the key there is it gives you if you by going through that process I know that whatever happens I’ll be able to figure it out so you did that by you did that by yourself you did didn’t have any business partners at that time I mean other than obviously your in-laws loan everybody loan you

some money to get that was just CDs that they pledged just to the bank okay just to get you some Revenue I’ve cashed down my 401k to uh to put the down payment if you will on the business he financed U uh 50k over 50 months cash through the mail going to Dallas Texas that was interesting yeah I get go to the post office box get the little green cards back uh and I had my little stack of cards this was an old gas station it was built in like the 40s huh and it was in dis repair I’ll just say that so you were sending 50,000 at a time to the through the mail no $1,000 a month, through the mail cash through the mail monthly for 50 months for 50 months huh so all of those things cuz I didn’t have the money to do otherwise yeah and uh so it’s one of those rags to Rich type thing well you bet on yourself right I mean always I’ve always been confident in my abilities um and I just felt like if it doesn’t work out I just go get

a job yeah no big deal I tell this to people all the time and and I probably some of them think I’m crazy like they’re like why would you do that I’m like what’s the Worst That Could Happen take my birthday away yeah like what are you going to do you’re like why would you start that why would you do that why I said cuz I feel like I can I can figure that that deal out like I don’t I don’t jump at every opportunity but if I see something that I’m like I could do that and I think I could be good at it like I’ll shove them all in and be like yep let’s go just and because I don’t have I to me I feel like I’ve I’ve learned a lot of hard lessons over the years right and and I feel like it may take me a couple years to get back but I know I could I speed up the process because I’ve I’ve made a lot of the mistakes already so I know kind of I be able to kind of work my way through it as long

as I don’t burn anybody in the process then and people will still want to do business with me right they’ll be like yeah let’s go let’s figure it out you know I think that’s the key is the relationships and the network and building those over time and keeping those intact regardless of what transpires you know on the the business side so so that’s that’s awesome so you started the one facility and how long until you got the number two well it’s it’s a small deal where I had one of my small dealers that came in and uh he had two small locations one man little um Ro towns MH and uh that didn’t work out and ended up shutting those down within a year and then uh I guess my big break was I was delivering to a uh nonfer to a company in New Orleans and they decided to uh close the business and that was all the small dealers in south Louisiana okay and I call them up and uh said hey if you’ll give my phone number to all of these other dealers tell them I’ll buy the material after Louisiana

I’ll sell you whatever you want and U it was kedco out of uh St Louis okay and they they gave everybody my number um everybody started coming in and uh that was uh that was the big Catalyst that moved me ahead by light years so what what created that opportunity what was it a relationship you had at kco was yes Jeff Marlett was his name and I had dinner or lunch with him uh yesterday here and that was trust there was a trust factor in there somewhere that he he thought you could you could handle it do it that was 33 years ago time yeah time so which mean puts you guys at I mean you you’re you’re a little probably a little younger than me but what’s your age 40 how old are you 38 398 38 so I’m 42 so you were like you were still at the pretty at pretty pretty close to within the first handful of years right cuz if you said I mean it was 33 three just trying to do like basic math um which can be tough after a few days in Vegas we like figur

it out so what so your your first business you you your first location had to be in what late 70s mid late 70s well 88 88 okay December the 1st ‘ 88 was when I had had the acquisition and I started uh the I was the last guy out at the drilling company handing in the keys did you bring anybody from the drilling company over into the into the scrap I did not you did not again it was just a two but there was but even down the road where you had known there’s some some quality people that you could bring in that that never that never some children of some people I used to work with yes okay yeah they came to work for me and uh in one little one other little thing happened that one of these dealers out in New Orleans called me one day and said hey I’ve seen a bunch of Steel uh heard about a bunch of Steel down in in the Caribbean in Jamaica I said well my brother in New Orleans knows the the manager of the biggest alumina manufacturer in Jamaica so I’ll have

my brother give you a call my brother calls me about 3 hours later says uh we are being we’re going to be partners with baring and uh we’re going to Jamaica and we’re going to be in the scrap business and me and my him and my other brother would be 5050 with Barrett we’re 50 he’s 50 we go to Jamaica we lose our ass uh we relocate that business to Baton Rouge Louisiana uhhuh uh my uh my partner and my my brothers Dash on the uh their interest in the business because it’s got a negative Network and then uh Barry ends up uh dying it goes to make his interest it’s 50 % goes to um the bankruptcy court and I buy it out of bankruptcy court for a very low of about $150,000 wow and then um my manager chip dejon built that business and it went like a rocket ship and um that’s what got us here today that’s awesome yep all of those things about so how much of it do you attribute to luck and how much do you attribute to skill like if you had to I mean is

it is it a lot of is it a lot of skill luck and 20% skill okay do you agree with that I’d say more like 50/50 but yeah yeah I mean what do you think yeah I think it’s more 50/50 yeah but you got to have the Huts spot to you know you got I got kids at home you know they got they eat they go to school we got to pay for school and I kept you know it’s one of those you got to really uh make a commitment and boy you know if it goes bad you’re out yeah go get another job yeah I mean and and that’s the the beautiful thing about the the this business in this industry is if you know the business and you know the industry and like I said before if you don’t screw anybody right so your name is still worth something it you you can work anywhere like you can find a job if you want to stay in it right like cuz it’s just such a unique deal and what what we’re doing every day there’s only so many people that

can actually understand it and really like it and want to stay in it so yeah I’m with you that’s one of the reasons why I’ve been able to push CU I’m like let’s go one one other thing I did and I’ll make this quick um you’re good I I love it I you I can so what happens is if had whiskey we might go for hours I get I get 30 dealers they’re bigger than me I’m in a little gas station 150 ft by 150 ft if uh if we don’t have a truck come in I got a million pounds in the yard we got a problem right so what I did I got to meet every one of them personally and uh I would be the guy that would be on the forklift out there unloading them they would be sitting in the air conditioning inside um my deal was I could get them unloaded in 30 minutes an 18-wheeler and you know how that goes you you’re in the business and I get them paid and get them out the competition you’d be there all day all day and they always

would’ have downgrades these guys I got to know them their wives their children and even their parents and we were we’ve all been really close over the years and so the bottom line is that we didn’t have time to weigh everything if you can unload something in 30 minutes you can’t so I just take their they they’d send me their manifest I’d unload everything and just write them a check I never weigh anything not too many people will do that so and and you win a lot of U Respect by doing that and most of the time I’d find where they on the Manifest they ship more boxes and we’d weigh those up and tell them look you got an extra you know I mean someh it was pretty pretty material yeah and people really uh appreciate that right yeah it’s it’s goes back to trust right and I feel like if someone has to extend the hand of trust first right someone and and I always I’ve been I’ve been always more well served like saying I you know give I mean I’ll vet stuff obviously I’m not just say yeah go ahead

see what happens you know but if if if I said hey I’ll give you a shot like I I trust you most people like they they actually value that and they actually want to prove you right and I think there’s a lot in what you just said is like this industry no matter how many apps and no matter how much crap they want to put on like somebody’s selling and post this and do that like you know this bill ating with this manifest with this like there is a certain amount that that needs to be done especially with some of the theft stuff going on I I I understand that but this industry is built on people trusting each other to do what they said they were going to do not sign Billings not sign contracts just hey I’m going to I I trust you like and it cuz here’s the deal if if you if you me once or whatever I’m out like I’m not going to do business with you and I’ll probably tell 10 people that you did it right which I’ve always said I want to tell 10 people how

good you how good you treated me cuz if you if you took care of me I want you to get more business because that’s good for me cuz all of a sudden like you’re in a bigger position a better position I could probably get a little more money out of you for my Commodities because you now have the ability to pay more cuz you’re bigger and you’re better and and but somebody has to extend the hand of trust first right makes sense so you proud of your boys absolutely what makes you the most proud about this you being the position that you’re in I mean what’s the when you look at them I mean what what kind of makes you smile the most well several things right number one I get to work with my boys every day yeah uh number two is knowing that uh you you they’re happy in what they’re doing in life uh you know Warren Buffett’s saying you want to go um skipping and whistling to work every morning and not that they do that but I know that they’re happy in what they do they’re satisfied and uh

so we get to work together and uh we get to figure out uh any problems and uh it it’s worked out great that’s awesome now they might have something to say about yeah I’m I’m you know that’s coming next like so so boys so yeah what’s your take on it I mean proud of your dad what what do you mean you happy you happy you’re doing what you’re doing like what you’re doing to me there’s no greater business in the world than SC business obviously we both grew up in speak for myself but I always knew I wanted to be in the business you know um from an early age uh it’s just you didn’t never know what the the next thing’s going to come through the door that you’re going to see or the next person you’re going to be or what industry you’re going to deal with and obviously we learn learn from him I mean he’s from we’ve seen it where we started obviously um you know I was young but that’s funny is we’re our current office is across the street from the gas station and where he started right

so literally going to work every day we it was the memories I have are some crazy crazy stuff the old yard I mean I can remember you know there was like a there was a little person I guess you could call him unload and scrap with no shirt on you know back then and I was kind of just like my mouth open like well that’s a deal like that’s a normal oh hey hey clay or whatever his name was I’m like oh that’s a normal thing all right awesome and and so it’s those guys and then just seeing the whole thing from the beginning but uh but yeah I mean yeah I love I love what I did for sure all right Michael yeah I mean we basically grew up in a scrap yard so um you know at an early age what you say 14 14 14 I mean we worked every summer um every day in the summer so you know we saw all kinds of stuff and the worst the job we’re not talking about any office they’re out running cans to machine he’s smart you know he started on the

cans right so like the dirty’s job the roaches the snakes all the stuff water baby diapers chre I know that especially if you you’re 16 you start having a couple beers with your buddies and the next day you got to do that I guess the worst job ever yeah I know so what’s funny is we had friends too work in the business too you know they need summer jobs they all quit within like 2 weeks every one of them and they’re you know so say these hard guys or whatever but you know metal Metal’s uh it’s not for everybody but it’s for you yeah it’s for me um yeah it’s been it’s been great but again going back you know you work those Summers and you realize I don’t know what I’m going to do with my life but definitely don’t want to do manual labor I don’t want to have to you know bust bags so um but going forward you know back in it and love it what’s the can I ask one question real quick what’s the future of what we see a SC look like two things improve our business

number one take care of our well take care of our people number one how do you know there’s a lot of ways to do that by doing that you’ll improve your business and and improve our business and expand and grow so that our key people will have more opportunity as as we grow the business that’s the good news is that financially we’re in a position that it’s it’s not a uh it’s not going to be a problem for the rest of our life what does it look like to you Matt well I think you know we’ve we’ve grown pretty you know we’ve made some Acquisitions in the last 7 10 years uh which I think will continue uhhuh and in our Industries you have a lot of um you know opportun so I think you know I’m happy where we’re at today but I I think we got room to improve and obviously grow what’s it look like to you Michael yeah I mean strategic growth uh and making sure that you know our existing locations are functioning right and making sure you don’t get too big and you know neglect somebody and making

sure everything is cohesive so my last question question of the day what’s your advice for other family businesses in this industry how do you make it work so well the best piece of advice you could give them whether it’s encouragement or just something that’s really helped you guys have success and and keep the relationship I can tell there’s a there’s a there’s a there’s a relationship here that’s there’s a but it’s it’s not a I’m doing this and you’re doing that like there you there’s a real respect how how do you in how do you keep that and create that our management styles not from the top down it’s from the bottom up and that’s that’s a key uh to me the golden rope that’s a big deal I’m big on that treat other people like you want to be treated and your life will be good yeah I mean um I’ll say you know I guess it is a rarity that we all get along you know what I mean it’s a family business and and working filing because you got you got Dynamics right you know it’s our kids are all close

our wives are close we’re very very fortunate that we’re all so close and doing what we want to do I mean I think we’re all happy and that where like you said if we’re we’ grown it to big enough to where we can each have responsibility lanes and and obviously provide value that’s the biggest thing is providing value but um be happy what you’re doing and again it’s stem from from him and we learned a lot we learned a lot of that hard work it’s not lost on us cuz we we experienced it we were there we saw it um that’s a big part of it and that’s hard to probably transition as generational businesses go right to get that same absolutely be willing to work on be willing to because I I know what it is to me but I’m I’m curious to you Michael what what’s that piece of ADV what would you give other people out there that have siblings in the business that family business what what’s I mean having I’d say different Lanes like you mentioned earlier is I mean to some degree important so you’re not always overstepping

boundaries or getting into conflicts at work which would then translate to you know conflicts in personal life but um so I mean I’d say that’s a key key part of it yeah um and it is still nice to go down to office you know get a babysitter yeah yeah exactly just right down the office uh so it’s communication for me right it’s your your ability to keep communicating and there was whenever my dad and I ran into issues it was because we weren’t communicating we weren’t we weren’t saying we weren’t we weren’t you know being able to lay it on the table and say this is what I think and this is why I think it right it was just no this is what we’re doing and anytime we ever got into an issue it was because of our of a lack of communication but as soon as we cleaned up the communication all of a sudden you we solved the problem but anytime there was a breakdown in the communication that was that’s where our breakdown was so that that’s what it’s been for me and so I’m that’s why I was curious

with what that was for you guys well I just want to say thank you thank you guys for taking the time it’s it’s awesome to meet you in person we we talking on the phone and uh I I think you guys got a Good Thing Man and and you you you guys are very blessed in the fact that you do have that relationship and I don’t don’t ever take it for granted great thank you thank you for hosting us yes yeah thank you force to meet you good to meet you as well for sure thank you thank you nice to meet you thank you yeah I’m glad we were able to do it