Free Money, Free Coaching and Government Contracts with the SBA

Hey,

Hey.

Hey, it is that time. 4:30 Pacific time on Wednesday. We got Saul. What's going on, man? Not much. Loving the music, man. Gotta get up and start dancing right now. That's how I'm feeling after that intro. So, I know that's the way to start any day, any afternoon, or any evening. Right. That's right. So, hey, for everybody listening, this is a really cool episode um that uh Saul and I have been talking about for a little while. Um we actually met up a couple weeks ago at uh at an event uh for the Nevada Small Business Council. So, uh that was a really great meeting um you know, meeting up with you at that event, too. But, uh what this going to be about is uh Small Business Administration and uh what what you guys bring to the table. So, uh, tell everybody a little bit about yourself. Uh, you know, obviously you're not the Small Business Administration. You work for the Small Business Administration. What's your title and what do you do there? Sure. Absolutely. Well, first and foremost, thanks for having me on. Yeah, it was a good conversation that we had couple of weeks ago and now here we are. So, I am Saul Ramos. I'm the district director for the Nevada District Office. So, I am based out of Nevada. However, SBA or the Small Business Administration is a federal agency and you're likely to find district offices all over the United States. So, what I'm about to share quite frankly applies to anyone throughout the United States. Yeah. Yeah. So, I mean, and and you know, I've been fortunate enough to use uh SBA a couple times and uh and a lot of times people think it's just uh businesses business loans and uh things like that. So, it's not just business loans. Um, and I think funding and and loans is probably primarily I mean, isn't that when you think that when someone thinks SBA that's probably what they think of the most? Oh, absolutely. Absolutely. As SBA Capital and honestly oftent times we have folks calling us because they think we're we're the lender, we're the bank. But I'll dive into that in a little bit. Hey, pretty cool that you were able to use SBA. Maybe I should interview you and tell us how that experience was. Yeah, you know, it was I know we kind of briefly went over it, but uh it was uh I I did the PPP like a lot of people, paycheck protection, and uh that that really helped a lot, man, during uh you know, during that time when everybody kind of shut down through COVID and and things like that. And then, of course, man, I mean, if I I'm so surprised people a lot of people I talked to didn't take advantage of that because they were forgiving a lot of that as well, right? I mean, I'm sure you know a ton of people that used uh PPP and you were probably promoting that just left and right. Yeah, absolutely. Okay. So, here's a quick little plug. Since you mentioned payment protection program, PPP, that was actually done through the through the lenders. If you all remember, you went and applied with the bank and there was a couple of steps to it. So, here here's the plug, right? You applied for the PPP, you received the money, quite fine and dandy. Everything worked out well, but you also need to apply for the forgiveness. There's that last the last step. You have to submit that forgiveness application because if you don't, it will become a loan. We don't want that. And by now, it's probably a little bit too late. But if you haven't, watch out for that. I think I was first in, man. I was like I was like that an old uh MVIN's commercial. Open, open, open. I remember that. I wanted to be first in line, right? And then I got that and then same thing, man. I was just bugging. I mean, this is where the relationship with your bank comes in, too, right? So, you know, if you got a good relationship with your bank and and I think in a couple episodes from now, we're going to talk about banking relationships, but um I like you said that it wasn't that you guys were the lender, but you guys in a way were you would this kind of fall up underneath some of your guaranteed loans that SBA does? Yeah, you could say so. I mean, it was 100% guaranteed by the by the government. So the bank once the bank got the money back. But nevertheless, you know, we want to get they also had not just that they had um besides that the you know the that you

Had disaster loans that were coming on in some areas were considered disasters. There was also some some microl loans. Tell me a little bit about microloans that I don't think a lot of people understand and that doesn't hit you as hard as doing a a major loan either. Right. Right. So SBA SBA has many programs. We have the microloan programs. We have one called the 7A program. We have one called the 504. So microlo loans meaning, you know, between, you know, 5 to 10,000. They can even go up to 350,000, of course, depending on what you consider micro, but it's intended oftent times to get to get you started, to get you started, get you going. So SBA does play in that small space, if you would call it, and we also play in in the larger space up to 5 million or 5.5 million times. So, um, for a lot of people listening, I mean, we we our industry is a lot of small businesses. That's why I was really excited to to talk even further with SBA besides my experiences that I've had with them over the years is, um, how is it for a small company that's just starting off uh, to try to qualify for one of these startup, you know, startup businesses trying to get one of these loans? Um, what does that entail? I mean, you I'm sure you've dealt with people are like, man, I'm scared to apply. I don't know. I haven't been in that long. I don't have any assets to use all my money to kind of start this thing and uh, you know what I I'm venturing out on my own. I mean, how can you guys help with that? Yeah. Well, as I mentioned, first things first, we we usually start the conversation one, understanding kind of filtering it out. You know, where are you at? At what stage are you in? Are you a startup? Are you already in business? Are you looking to grow and expand? So, that's going to be kind of the first conversation. So, and I might be jumping a little bit ahead here because we are going to talk about business development. Yeah. But if you are starting, one of the first things we're probably going to recommend is that you seek business development, counseling, technical assistance. You probably heard that word business plan. Do you have a business plan or are you still drafting that idea? Is your idea still in your head and you haven't put it on paper? So, all those little pieces of information are going to be critical and important. Having a business plan, you've heard that over and over, right? But and and here's the other kicker that do you understand your business plan or did you pay someone to do your business plan? Hey, I write it for you and you haven't even read it yet. Exactly. So oftent times that happens, right? Hey, you don't want to do it. You want to pay someone, but you want to understand your business plan. So that's that's part of the step. Do you do you have collateral? Do you have some money skin in the game? You've heard that term, right? what how much are you putting in? The likelihood of you getting 100% financing is not going to happen. So, how much of it are you going to put in? Do you have collateral? How is your credit? Right? Do you have a solid credit? And and so there's so many different variables. I wish I can start in one place, but the reality is that that you quite frankly, in my opinion, you cannot because each person is going to have a different situation. And here's where that business development comes in. where are you and how can you how can we help you? So, we play a little bit in that role and I know that's a topic we're going to be discussing. So, I'm going back to the to the lending programs. Yeah. You mentioned microloan programs. You I mentioned 7A504. Yep. And I mentioned earlier that we get phone calls because they think we're going to put out the money and it's not that. SBA guarantees the loan with the bank. So the money you get is coming from the bank and the bank is reaching out or using the SBA program to slap or put a guarantee behind it. And they do that because they want to mitigate or reduce the risk, right? If if if they're going to put out money and and if they're doing it on their own, we'll say ABC bank, well, they're 100% exposed. They do business with you, they may get it, they may not get it back, depending on how the business operates. But if you if they use the SBA, they're going to put a guarantee and they usually go up to 75%. When

You're e when you're exporting, it can go as high as 90%. So imagine on a $100,000 loan, the bank slaps a 75% guarantee. Now they're feeling a little bit more comfortable putting that money out because they know they're going to get 75,000, right? Whether the business and we want businesses to be successful. So that's the benefit for the bank. What's the benefit for the borrower is? Well, the idea is that there's more capital that's going out to our communities. I'm oversimplifying it because as I mentioned before, there's all these different variables, right? So, please, what I am not saying is that you're going to go to the bank and say, "Hey, I want an SBA loan. Give me the money." Not likely, right? They're going to question. They're gonna just like anything in business, they're they're going to want to know more how you and and and remember, when you're dealing with banks, they want to know how you're going to pay them back. Yeah, that's what it's going to come down to, right? Are you do is your business producing enough income to pay me back? Or if you're going to start a business, what's the likelihood of it going to be successful? What experience do you bring to the to the table, right? What what partners, if you are bringing any partners, how how are they going to play a role? What's the industry? There's industries that are very high risk for some lenders and they're not going to touch it. So, microloan Right, I mentioned the the the kind of range and then you have 7A. The 7A program, you can consider that one of our flagship programs. The number seven and the letter A. Why? Because you could use it quite frankly for anything, right? Purchased another business. You can use it for inventory. You can use it for working capital. You can use it to purchase real estate. Yeah. So the the use of pros is it's quite long and the you can say that's that's one of the benefits right you can use it for many things a line of credit almost in a way right you can even use it as a line of credit we have that program under the SBA I mean 7A umbrella some can say the disadvantage is that it does come in with a variable rate right there's lenders that lock it in for five or 10 years and it'll reset themselves so that's something conversation you want to have when you're looking at it. So, SBA7A program in in a nutshell, oversimplifying it there, but just to give you an idea. Yeah. So, similar to an FHA loan in a way, the government you're basically guaranteeing the loan and and in turn the bank is looking at a lower risk loan in general regardless of of you. It's a lower risk loan. So, that would that would I would assume affect the interest rates as well. So, now you're looking at a loan with a better interest rate with a guarantee behind it, right? It could. the usually the the smaller the loan, the higher the interest rate, right? Right. Because they have to make up some of the money and the the larger the loan, sometimes the lower the interest rate. So that's kind of a little bit of a rule of thumb and there's many different variables. Now, what's the takeaway here is that when you reach out to us, one of the first questions that we'll usually ask is who do you bank with? You're banking with someone. Maybe it's on the personal side or maybe it's already with a business a business account and the likelihood of us saying hey have you spoken to them some folks say no I haven't even thought about it and that's where the conversation comes in okay go speak with your banker so that they can develop that idea more because a true banker or a good banker I would say is going to give you a buffet of different options they're going to say hey we have ABC products Right? ABC bank products. We have this one. We have this product and we have SBA. So, they'll give you different options. And the idea is you choose what is best for your situation. Sometimes it is going to be SBA, sometimes it's not. Yeah. Well, I bank with my wife. So, um if I need any money, I put in a request and she either approves or denies it. So, will um you guys by any chance FA come in and like guarantee some of that, maybe increase my odds of getting the money for my wife?

You know, nothing like that. No, but I like that you said the 7A loan um kind of like a line of credit. So, it can be used for real estate even though your 504 loan is for major purchases like land or buildings. Right. Right. Right. Right. And so, here's the kicker. Now, I'm going to play off the whole your your wife is the bank. Right. Because I'm gonna regret saying this already. Now you're in trouble. Now you're in trouble. But okay. Now, remember I mentioned who the whole conversation, who do you bank with, right? Yeah. That's one way to start and you can say that's your organic approach. The other platform that SBA created, it's called Lenders Match. So now we're we're we're we're picking it up a notch. Now Lenders Match, let's com let's compare Lenders Match like to when you're dating online, right? I' I've never done the online and on online, but what I hear is that you go online, you type in kind of everything that you like and they'll match you with a date. Yeah. Well, in in that similar notion or idea, SBA created lender match where the borrower is going to say, "Hey, this is what this is my type of business. This is how much I'm looking for. All the bells and whistles, everything that you need and it's going to match you with a lender. So, you may not get a date, but you might get a lender that want borrow help you borrow money." So, there you go. You never know, get some money and you might end up with a date. moving to what you what we you were kind of like getting into was uh some of you stuff you do offer that a lot of people don't know and I think this was really really shocking for me too when we were talking um you know at that that that mixer that we were at. You kind of mentioned some of this and somebody else mentioned it the free business counseling uh the consulting counseling. So, uh, and you were kind of saying that would be the first step that you might guide people towards if they were talking about getting a loan or even a business plan. And within some of that, you help with the business planning, financial forecasting, even marketing help, right? And some legal guidance. So, tell me a little bit about that. I think that's something I really want our members and people in the industry to uh, you know, get a grasp of of what they can get for that and and is that something you have to already be have a loan with you guys or have something going with you guys in order to take advantage of? give us some background behind that. Yeah, absolutely. I mean, here here's no cost advice that you get, right? And and it's non-monetary, but boy, the value that it brings can generate a lot of income because you are setting yourself with a strong foundation if you're able to set everything right. And we're talking about just with the license, right? I mean, there comes times where I don't even know where to go, how to set up a license or how do I set up, how do I structure my business? We have classes, workshops that go over all this material, how do I read a balance sheet, how do I forecast, how you you pretty much name it. There's going to be a topic that SBA partners are going to either provide one-on-one counseling, training, webinars. So there's an abundance of knowledge resource. So how do you get this information, right? Or how do you get this knowledge? Well, you get it through our resource partners. SBA has four under the umbrella of SBA. We'll start with the Small Business Development Center. And they'll use the acronym SBDC. SAM B Boy Dy cat SBDC. You can go online SBA or or go to SBDC and you'll you'll see all this. Many of them are going to be tied in with universities. So for example, in Nevada we have a relationship with University of Reno, University of Las Vegas. So our SBDC's have that connection. What does that mean? Well, think about it. They now they have access or you have access to a lot of institutional knowledge, a lot of institutional information. That's where the market research that might be able to pull information that other institutions or other partners would not be able to. That's one example. And then we have a woman business center. Of course, the

Name itself says woman business center. If the director will be here, she'll be the first to tell you it's open to everyone. Although it says woman business center, but there is a there is a level of connection. When a woman entrepreneur speaks with a woman adviser, there's a whole different level of connection that I'm sorry, you know, you and I may not be able to pick that up, but they they do, right? So, there's a different connection. We have a veteran business outreach center, very similar when one veteran, entrepreneur, business owner speaks to another one. I mean, there's there's just that connection. So, so folks may enjoy that, may prefer that. And then we have score. SCORE is a little bit unique in its own way because they're volunteers. Yep. All these other all these other partners that I mentioned, they're getting paid. Well, SCORE does not get paid. They're volunteering. Many of them are retired executives. I use the word many because not all most of them are actually working in the industry where there are considered subject matter experts and they want to pay it forward. They want to share this knowledge. So now you have four different partners that you can tie yourself into. You can leverage all of them if they fit your if if it fits what you're looking for. Or if you just want to leverage one, you certainly can. I like to think about it. It's like creating your informal board of advisors. Maybe you like SBDC for marketing. You're probably going to like score for who knows the the accounting, the budgeting, the the forecasting. Maybe women business center provides you some other assets and maybe the veteran center does. So you get you get the idea. So here here's the thing and it this is so timely because just yesterday I was at an event and in that event was a score volunteer and we started speaking and I introduced him to someone and this is a guy that is owns five restaurants. I don't know how he finds time to volunteer but he says you know what I want to pay it forward. If anybody wants to start a restaurant I'll be glad to help him out. He says, "If I were to charge, I probably would charge $400 per hour to help folks, but he's doing it because he wants to volunteer." And he told me, you know, one of the things that kind of frustrates me with score, and I'm like, "Uhoh, what is it, man?" I'm like, "What the heck did we do? What do we all right, here it comes. Let me, you know, I could take it in the chin." He's like, some of these people don't show up. They make an appointment and you know how frustrating it is. I'm setting aside time. you know, I would be charging $400 an hour for this, but they don't show up. So, if you are listening to this and if you are making an appointment and if you're truly committed, my recommendation is stick to stick to it because I feel that's what makes a difference. And and I I'll be glad to share some stories of some of folks that have benefited from from SCORE. So, you tell me. Let me stop let me stop talking. I'm just getting excited. No, no, no. I love it. I love it. I love it. That's great. This is I mean this is why we wanted you on because uh without someone like you guys coming on and actually explaining these resources to us I don't think our industry would fully grasp it. I mean we hear a lot of people just saying hey uh SBA SBA this SBA that but it's always loans. It's always you know I don't know if I'm going to even want to look into it. So um I love that you came on here. So it sounds like the score is like a group of mentors in a way. Absolutely. They they provide mentorship. It's one of the unique things about them and the partners that we have. It's one-on-one mentoring. So, I'd love to share a quick story if you want me to. If not, we'll keep going. Love to hear. Love to hear it. Yeah. So, so just just last month, we celebrated what's called National Small Business Week. So, it's it's one of these celebrations nationally where, hey, we want to celebrate small businesses and we have different categories from small business, person of the year, exporter, familyowned, etc., etc. This one gal that was recognized last month as the exporter of the year about 13 years ago was having lunch with her girlfriends and she is a female aviator, female pilot, right? So they they were having lunch and they're like, "Hey, have you ever seen that the watches that we wear are so they're for

Guys, we have smaller wrist, you know?" So she had already been thinking about this already putting some of the the parts and was pretty much 50 60% you know and launching it and through the conversations with her girlfriends during lunch someone told her have you ever thought about speaking with score who right so she got she explained they're mentoring pretty much everything that I explained so she goes back home she goes online types in score finds out that the score office is three blocks away from what where she lives. She goes in into score. You fast forward, meets up with a mentor, a mentor who had who was retired in this situation but had a wealth of knowledge when it came to supply chain. It came to exporting, you name it. They started working on it. They launched the product. It was so successful that now you find it all over the world. She's exporting all over the world. And and the the reason I share this is because it just didn't happen overnight. This happened over 13 years, right? And last month when we celebrated National Small Business Week, she was recognized and that score mentor was sitting in her table 13 years later. They still have a relationship. And that's what I'm trying to share that it's not a transactional. if you could if you wanted to be a transactional or you can make it transformational where you're checking in with us and she did and and now she's creating watches for these adventurous women not just pilots, scuba divers, ladies, I mean females that race, you name it, but she's changing that and then that's what it's all about. Entrepreneurs are disruptors. They're going to change it and we're just glad to be part of that journey. Yeah. Well, at FWA it's National Small Business Week every week. So, um there you go. I love it. So, you're welcome back here anytime. There's no doubt. So, that's really cool. I'm I'm excited about uh taking advantage of some of these resources, you know, and um because I mean, obviously, there's just and that's just you're just barely even tapping, I'm sure, what you know, as a small business what you can what you can do to take advantage of with SBA. So, again, you don't have to you don't have to be a you don't have to have had a loan with you guys or had some sort of uh inter interaction with you guys through any kind of official uh you know, means at all. You can just call up and take advantage of this. How would somebody across the country do this? I mean, how how would they reach out to you guys? Yeah, I I would recommend starting with the website. That's the easiest one to start. SBA.gov. So, sba.gov like government at the end. And on there, you you'll find different tabs. You'll find a tab for funding. You're going to find a tab for counseling and you dive into it. It's very much user friendly, local assistance. Type in your zip code. Bam. It's going to give you all the list of the partners that I mentioned, the score, the SBDC, Small Business Development Center, all that good information. It's going to give you a tab on on contracting. I mean, you name it. SBA in one way or another is going to be tied in. We do advocacy, we do contracting, financing, counseling, exporting. We're tied in in quite a lot. you segueed into it for me. I mean, I'm one of the one of the reasons people are tuning in in our industry is, you know, I'm a small fence company and uh I struggled with this for a long time. And I went to uh got my that registered through SAM and got my son's number. I do all the things to try to get in the system and figure out how we're going to bid this government contracts. And you know, typically we get reached out to by other people um that are just trying to look for contractors, do the work, but it's just it's really confusing for small companies to figure out how you're going to do this and you're nervous about it. So um for government contracting you guys have some resources that are available right to help them win contracts and compete with the larger companies. What do you guys offer with that? Yeah absolutely. So if you think about it the government the federal government is one of the world's largest buyers. They buy pretty much anything and everything from you can say from from equipment you know from re services you you name it. they they pretty much they buy everything right now and it's it's a lot of money that's out there. So what the government did or

In this case the SBA is that they set aside contracts for small businesses. Why did they do that? It's because they wanted to level the playing field. So I think it's about 23% of contracts are set aside for small businesses. So what is considered a small business? Just as a rule of thumb, less than 500 employees or depending on your industry, you they're going to look at the gross gross revenue, but it's pretty high up there. I think construction might be close to the 30 million, So that's that's up there. So many the likelihood of you being a small business is going to be very high. And if you have any questions, reach out to our office, right? Our sba.gov. And then what the government also does is that they have these certifications. You've probably heard the term certifications. So it's another way of setting aside contracts for small businesses. And if you fall within the certifications, well, there's going to be contracts set aside for womanowned, for example, womanowned, veteran service disabled, and we have another one called the ADA program. Many of these are going to tied in be tied in with some social economic status, right? And of course, you have to be 51% owned. So, for example, if you're a womanowned business, and if you say you are, well, then 51% of that business has to be owned by a woman, right? So, there's there's all these eligibility requirements that you would go through. It's it is a process, right? It is a process. You would have to apply for it. There is an application. They're going to look to see if your either product or services is being bought by the government so that you can compete. So you go on on sba.gov. I think the website might be my SBA certification. That's it's very userfriendly. So you go on there and you're going to complete the application. It does not go to the district office for for example I'm in Las Vegas. It doesn't come to me. It goes to headquarters. They're going to screen it out. They're going to vet it out because why? You're dealing with the government. Are you do you have the capital? Do you have the workforce? Do you have the licenses? Do you have everything? Because once you once you enter with the government, things move pretty quick and we want to make sure you can deliver. So, a lot of that just to I'm oversimplifying it there. Yeah. Yeah. And and then we have another one that's referred to as hub zone, HUB zone. That's called historically underutilized business zone. Has nothing to do with your social economic status and all that good stuff. It's actually based on the location of your business and the government created a website. So if you're in any doubt, am I in a hub zone? You can go to sba.gov, search hub zone. It's going to give you a map. You type in your address and if you are in that underserved area, then you can apply to get that certification. Well, there's a caveat. At least I believe 33% of your employees must live in a hub zone area. Not the where not the hub zone where you're located, but any hub zone area. And the whole idea is that the government is doing their best to stimulate economic development. So we open the doors for government contracting, but you also have to hire within that hub zone area to keep the economic development. So oversimplifying it, but just to give you an idea, four programs that include certifications. You go through a process, you apply. One is called womanowned small business and there's economic disadvantage womenowned as well. And then there's the service disabled veteran. There's the ADA program and hub zone. So you have four programs, four certifications that you can pursue. Why is that important or why should you want to consider it? because it's an opportunity for for you to grow your business. It's an opportunity for you to diversify your business. I'll share another quick little story. There's a gentleman that applied for the ADA program and he was already working for someone and he was building a lot of relationships within these government facilities, I would say, to the point that some folks are even telling them when are you going to start your business? Right. So to to your point, he he who did he speak to? His spouse, his wife, and even the spouse told him, "What's been stopping you? Let's do it." Right? So the energy was there. He got going. He did it. And he launched his business. Three years in, he was already, you

Know, feeling pretty good, building his capacity from from capital, from workforce, from bonding, you name it. So he got into the ADA program. boy, this person, this business is excuse, they're killing it. I don't know what other way to say it, but they been in the program for about two years, they're up to 30 contracts, and that's unheard of. That's unheard of. So, what I am not saying is you get the certification. No, this this individual has put blood, sweat, and tear in all different ways from growing the business, from working relationships, and now leveraging the certification. So, it's a way that he's growing his business. So, it's a pretty cool. We're excited for him. As a matter of fact, two years ago, he too was received the uh I believe familyowned small business of the year recognition. really a lot of folks that we're proud of here in Nevada. I'm sure there's many out in the states, but hey, this is how we do it in Nevada. Yeah, we love Yeah, we I mean, we love our small businesses out here. I mean, that's where we met at uh you know, Nevada Small Business Council where I was getting an award from the Lieutenant Governor's office. That's right. Small Business Council. So, we um we know what it's like to struggle and and uh fight our claw our way through uh you know, red tape and everything to to make our businesses grow. And I and and I think that you know what's great about the stories you were saying is they started off with you guys. And you know, this is the important part of getting some of this counseling early and structuring it to where you're not just out digging holes every day. You're running your business. And uh I don't think that we get this information early enough. I think we always wait until we're so busy, so swamped, we're overwhelmed, we're behind on filing uh something that's got whether it be your corporate documents or your taxes or whatever. And then we get desperate and then we start reaching out for counseling to fix problems. So, um, you guys coming in early can probably help them form a better business plan, do some financial forecasting, some marketing, um, you know, and and some guidance on that. So, um, I love that you said that they started with you early and they stuck with you guys and years later they're booming and they're booming because you guys helped them structure it correctly and they listened, right? Not just not just attended some classes, they listened, They they they What's that saying? They they applied the knowledge. And I love what you said, Brian, earlier about wearing the multiple hats as a business owner. That's as real and genuine as it gets, right? You name it, they're probably doing it. And and and I believe here's where the philosophy comes in. Are you working in your business or on it? And and that's I think where folks once they pivot from working in it to on it, they they'll see the growth. And that's what we've I feel have done with a lot of these businesses. Yeah, it you're going to start working in it. There's no way no way around it. That's just going to happen. And when you and and that's quite all right. That's normal. Every I feel that a large percentage of folks deal with that. And once you start changing that mentality to you're working on it, that that I think that's where it starts and it becomes fun, but it's really hard for us small businesses, especially if we started off I want to say uh you know there's no wrong way to start a business. If you want to start one, you start one. But if you start off where you're the one out there on the daily grind digging the holes and doing this and it's really hard to transition into running your company and even I struggled with it and even recently, you know, I've got people running it now, but I and I used to preach this all the time. Hey, it's not really a business until it runs without you being there. Otherwise, you just created a highpaying job for yourself, right? And uh you need to figure out and you got to let some stuff go uh you know, in order to start running your company. And uh make the people step up and they will they'll step up sometimes if you got the right people. maybe they're being held back because they can because you're too accessible. You're always there to solve every problem. So, it is nice, you know, if you get some of this advice early on. But, um, obviously a lot, you know, with

The success of the story you just told us, I'm sure some of that had to do with the training and education that you guys offer. Yeah, it it does. It does. It does. And it also play I I believe it's it's also the the entrepreneur that is the one that turns that page and everything that we just said applying the knowledge going from are you working in it to on it to your point are you accessible delegating there's all these different tools bells and whistles and it's really whatever you take out of this right I mean sometimes you're going to attend a training and all you got is one thing but hey maybe that's one more thing that you didn't know So training and education, of course, SBA plays a huge role. SBA.gov, go to the website. We have online classes. We have a business plan model. So a lot of that you can find on sba.gov. What I say though is don't stop there. I just shared with you four resource partners under the SBA umbrella. Guess what? I'm almost certain that within your county, within your state, there's going to be even more resources. There's this whole ecosystem and that's really I I'm going to toot our horn here for in Nevada because I I feel that's one of the things that makes us different. We work very closely with a lot of different organizations to the point that collectively in Nevada we created a road map and if my friend Marcel will be here from Nevada industry he will be preaching about the road map because it really was dealing with the government so the resources are not much but it's a PDF document in with interactive links that's how old school it is but it works it works because people go if you're in northern Nevada and you want to open a license, you go to this interactive map and it's going to say, "Okay, what county?" Boom, boom, boom. And it's going to give you all that information. Okay. So, what what I'm saying is that yes, SBA provides a lot of resources from education, from online tutorials, but my recommendation is don't stop there. Engage other partners. And I think that's what we've been able to do successfully in Nevada. Create a road map where you're going to get lost. It's gonna happen. But let's minimize that and give you some direction so you end up in the right place and with the right person. I I think that's the other layer that behind I'll use the road map as an example, the document. Behind that document, there's a person that you can speak to. So behind the SBA website, there's a person that you're going to be able to speak to and there's a district office and there's a small business development center. So there's and I think that's the beauty once you get two the individuals together good synergy is going to happen. So you have the webinars, the workshops, the mentorship um programs and I'm really excited to dive into that. I'm going to go I I started popping into it a little bit to take a look and I'm going to make a lot of this available to um the FWA members and hopefully to the whole industry. Uh I'm going to create some better links to link back to you guys. So, if anybody's interested that's watching this, you're going to be able to go pretty soon to fenceuniversity.com and we're going to take all the relevant uh workshops and and stuff that you guys offer and we're going to put those on there. So, quick easy links um around and you know, you said there's behind obviously some of these links there's obviously a person you can talk to and um is it hard to get a hold of people in these states? You know, if you wanted to physically talk to somebody, I don't know how they do it in other states, but we give out our cell phone numbers here in Nevada. So, they can call us, they can text us. We are accessible through the SBA. The resource partners, they have their websites. Now, one thing about the resource partners, you do have to register as a client and and there's a rationale behind it. These are nocost services. Yeah. So, think about it. They have to capture the client intake so that they can continue to receive funding. So, there is a little bit of that logic or madness behind anything. And so once you do that, you're in the system and you they'll work with you etc. So there is going to be that layer. At the SBA district offices, we do a lot of the you can say business development,

Facilitating, connecting the dots, ensuring that you're guided in the right direction. Oftent times the district offices are you can say grassroots with a lot of organic information. I do that all the time. Sometimes just the other day someone we were speaking about it and it's not an SBA program but they were asking me about abatements and that's a program with the governor's office. It's not mine but I have a relationship where I can say hey you know what you might want to reach out to this person. Yeah or the other day they were asking me about tax credits. It's like hey you might want to reach out to that person. So we act a lot about like a bridge a facilitator a lighthouse guiding folks. There's more that we do beyond that and I don't think a lot of people I mean I'm a member of the what Nevada Federation of Independent Businesses the NFIB so I you probably heard of them locally around here and stuff as well and they do a lot of advocacy for small businesses but I don't think people realize that uh you guys you guys are the government right you know but at the same time you're adv you know you're you're an advocate for the small businesses which means uh you guys would help fight to reduce even ironically you're the government right but you're going to help fight to reduce regulatory burdens so um it might seem confusing to all of us, right? So, but uh nonetheless, uh to ensure fair treatment for uh small businesses, you know, in federal policy. So, how does SBA get involved in that? You know, is that something that you'd be able to kind of uh give us some pointers on? Yeah, absolutely. You mentioned earlier the the word red tape. How can we cut through that red tape? Well, ironically enough, a couple of months ago, the agency created a a red t red tape hotline phone number right there. There you go. You're you're I'm going to read it out for for those that might be listening. 800 827-5722 800 8275722 and you select option three. And I'll give you a quick example. We we we spoke earlier about government contracting and how they're going to do vetting, how there's a certification, all these things you have to be ready for when you're dealing with the government. One of the things that I feel many of us, including myself, have probably dealt with has been cyber attacks or somebody stole your your information. They they you receive these letters. I was telling my wife, boy, I've gotten we've received like four letters where our information has been stolen and it's happened to large corporations. Well, do you think it's not going to happen to a small business owner? The likelihood is yes. So what the government did a couple of years back is they said okay all small businesses that are engaging with the government we need to certify that you have created all these firewalls you you name it I'm not going to get into it but the bottom line is that the information is protected from cyber attacks because let's think about it you're working with the government uh they're going to look at that as a window or a door open to take some of that information. Yeah. Well, these certificates, all this, all these things that were being asked by small businesses was costing thousands of dollars. So, someone I'm sure probably called the 800 red tape hotline or there were several folks and said, "This is costing a lot of money. Is there a way to stream like this? Can we do one one certification instead of getting 510?" And I'm overexaggerating here, but the government is now looking at that and saying, "You're absolutely right. Why should you have to pay five times y x amount of money when maybe there could be one that there's there it's in conversation but that's just an example of how some advocacy happens and there's advocacy happening all over I'm oversimplifying it but just to give you an idea of of different ways that the government is looking at ways of streamlining yeah and if anybody knows me they know that uh um I got this number just at a click of a button because uh I spend a lot of time uh I spend a lot of time doing that. Um, but uh, next week though, we've got some cool stuff coming up too. We'll be talking to people. Uh, five things you should post

Every week. I just want to put the plug on that in case anybody's listening. Five things you post every week that you're probably not uh, regarding your business and what whatever it's going to be about for marketing things like this that you need to get out there regarding jobs you've been working on and uh, marketing things. So, we're going to be going over that next week. um we won't have you on there unfortunately, which would be great to have, but but uh um we are we are glad you came on here and hopefully um we're going to get a chance to see you at the fence show. I know we've invited you and SBA to the fence show coming up in October. Um we're definitely going to be trying to get you on stage and if anybody's got any questions regarding SBA, um drop them in the comments. We'll be um even if you're watching this on social media later, um drop it in. We'll try to get those answered. um or send one of us a message and uh we'll get those um try to as much as we can get those answered for you. If not, get over to the Fence Show Security Expo in Las Vegas. Go to fence show.com. Um Saul, I'm going to invite you. Hopefully you can make it in October. Let's make it happen. Right. There you guys have it. SBA is going to be there. So, uh get your tablets out there, your Blues Clues tablets, and start writing down some questions and shoot them to us. That's right. Sel, any last minute things you think people need to know about SBA before uh we let you go? I I would just say I'm I'm very glad that I had an opportunity to speak on this platform because you've probably heard this. You don't know what you don't know. And if you didn't know about SBA, well, I think we've done our job. We've shared some information. Don't let it stop there. Apply that knowledge and let's go from working in your business to on it. Take advantage of these resources are at no cost. many of them. Of course, if it's a loan, you got to pay it back. I'm not It is It is a loan. You have to pay it back when you deal with the SBA and those programs. But I'm just uh I'm just happy to be here and I'm glad that we got connected. I I go back to that whole philosophy when you put two individuals in a room, a lot of good things happen and hey, we ended up connecting and now here we are. So, sharing sharing this good stuff. Yep. Swapping stories about small businesses, which what we uh spend our lives doing, right? So, thank you. I appreciate it everybody watching. Thanks for tuning in. If you caught the tail end of this, um, you really, it's really worth going back and re-watching it and catching what we were talking about in the beginning because I don't think there was a minute or two that wasn't packed with some information that every small business should know. So, um, don't think that it's not worth going back and rewatching. I might even go back and rewatch it because you shared a lot of information that, uh, I wasn't aware of that SBA did. So, thank you. We will see you. I'm sure I'll be talking to you, uh, before October, but I'll be definitely seeing you in October. I appreciate it, everybody. Have a good evening. A pleasure.