5 Minutes with Brian

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Hey, hey.

Heat. Heat.

There it is. All right, everybody. Thank you for tuning in. Um, this is Susan, one of Susan's favorite uh type of podcast, Five Minutes with Brian, because she gets to just throw everything at me and uh completely unedited, not warning me of anything to say, and uh I got to kind of wing it and get to know everybody at the same time. I know a lot of the people we're going to um already know that's coming on here. Uh like Rowdy, what's up, man? Hey, man. I'm so glad to be here. And look what I got behind me just in your honor. That's a nice looking tool. What is it? This is my very first NW quick pull. Uh, and you can see it's beat to hell. Look at it's got paint everywhere on it. And it's got the old style. You changed things a lot since this one, haven't you? Well, we upgraded the chain a little bit. Yep. And looks like you need some new stickers. Some new branding stickers. New stickers. Yeah. But I got that back here in your honor, Rowdy. Thanks for always uh supporting everything that we're doing. So, I know you're you're back in uh Washington, I'm assuming. Finally. Finally. Yeah. What were you on the road for what, two months or three months? It felt like a year to all of us watching. We planned that for eight weeks. And the deal was to go clear around the United States meeting as many fence contractors as I possibly could, shake their hands and do demonstrations. It turned into 11 weeks, almost 11 and a half weeks. And so, got to tell you, when I got home, I was really happy to sleep in my bed because I got to tell you, every single night was a different hotel. We I got up at 5, six o'clock in the morning, started working. By 10 o'clock, they kick me out of the hotel and I got to shake as many hands until five or six o'clock in the evening, then drive for three to five hours to the next town, check into a hotel room. I got to tell you, it was it was a great experience, but it was exhausting. Yeah. I think I saw you in Florida and then it seemed like only two, three weeks later, I saw you in Indiana and it was just like I mean, of course, right before there, we were at Fentech in Indiana. So, it was Indiana, Florida, back to Indiana. I mean, you were and then you were all over the country. So, it was really cool. It was really cool to watch it. I know a lot of us watched your journey around there and all the people you met too. U so that was uh you know that was awesome and you were bringing people with you wherever you went. I mean sometimes you go to an event and and some of the people there was because of where you stopped the last three days prior, right? Well well not only that but we were reaching out to people on social media because we we post stuff about the quick pull all the time. People are like you know if I knew it would work I'd buy it as well come on out to fence games. Come out to demo days. If you really want to try it we're going to be driving in posting and try it. And so people showed up just to try it. I mean, there was there was and it wasn't just uh it wasn't just big names, big big fence companies. There was lots and lots of little fence companies that had, you know, five or less people in their crew. And those are the people that I was so happy to see because some of them people have never been to something like that. They never got to come out eat cotton candy with us. Yeah, that's pretty cool. I enjoy seeing because knocking on the door, throwing some dirt on the on the floor and saying, "Hey, I can clean that up with this dandy new vacuum cleaner I got." Right. That was some old school sales there. You were knocking on doors showing your stuff. So, we could all learn something from that. Hey, you know what? The other thing is is that I've been inviting people all along all this entire year to the the fence show. You know, most fence most uh trade shows are kind of expensive to travel. It's expensive to stay, but I understand we got a deal on the hotel there in the South Point. What's that cost per night? It's 85 bucks. And I mean and the whole I mean this whole show is built around obviously getting as many people as you can and not just bringing just the uh you know top of your company but right down to hopefully bring in some of the crew in the in the field and some of the people working in your shop and in the

Office because I really believe if if these people see how big our our industry is and how massive it is and how much opportunity there is to even move into other fields of our in our industry and other you know learn that that we're connected to so much more than just getting into a truck and driving around every day. So, I think that's why uh it was important to keep the rooms as low as we could. Well, they get to see the new stuff that Sean King's coming out with or the new stuff in Milwaukee. Oh, we got a burst here. Zack. Zack. Surprise, Zack. So, I know we're not I'm not going to cut into your time, but is listening. Uh Rowdy's going to be helping throughout this entire thing. So, he won't be pulled off in five minutes, but everybody else is going to. And we have no idea when she's going to pull you off, by the way. She's got a timer, little egg beater thing going or something. So, Zach, Zach, I think you don't even need much of an in, you know, much of an introduction. Uh, wood defender. So happy to be here. Wood defender everywhere. Everywhere you go in the fence fence. You see wood defender. I feel like I'm going everywhere, too. I'm actually planning a trip to the Northeast next week. So, I'll be up in that area. If you guys are up there, give me a shout. No, I like the old school vacuum door to door sales technique. I was trying to think, how could I do that with stain? It's like, oh, I got some stain on your fence. Sorry, it looks a lot better now. to wear that can. Every show I go to, the wood defenders, you got that little girl in that that that costume, the wood defender can cam. I love that. I wanted I wanted to wear the can and they were like, "No, no, we'll pay for you not to wear the can." That's right. And I was like, the 55gallon drum or the tote. I mean, you have a little brush up here on top of your head. It's the wood defender barrel. Yeah, that's right. I would I've got the physique for that. That's where my body belongs. You could do like they do at the mall. It's like when they, hey, you don't you like, you know, they want to shine your shoes or something and they only shine one shoe and then you got to pay to get the rest to get the other shoe shine. You could go out there and say, "Hey, you know what? You want I'd like to stain your fence for free and then you go out there and you just stain like four or five boards right in the front and then now they got to pay to stain the rest because it's going to it's going to look out of place." Yeah. So, so tell everybody about Wood Defender. I mean, you guys you guys are more um you know, obviously more than just a stain company. There's uh you know, product lines and everything behind it. So, let's let's tell everybody about Wood Defender and thank you again for coming to the fence show. We love having you guys over here. Super pumped and really looking forward to October. Um, so yeah, Standard Paints is or Wood Defender is part of Standard Paints kind of our umbrella company. Uh, we do marking zone markers, parking lot, that kind of thing. Wood Defender has been around since the 90s and that was kind of our our horse, our flagship line. Once we started that going, um, it really took off and so the owners, they thought, let's actually take this thing and run with it. used to be called standard paints fence stain. Didn't quite have the same ring to it as wood defender. So, that happened in the 90s and Mr. Turner decided to run with it, but it's a 100% oilbased penetrating stain. Um, the benefits of oil based versus water-based or latex are kind of innumerous, but I'll do a couple of them here. So, it won't peel or crack or chip or it shouldn't. Any well-made oil base should not do that. Um, it'll be good for residual work. So, if you have painted a fence, we've all seen that it'll chip and crack and peel, right? So, no product is forever. That's just a given. If you hear of anyone saying, "I've got a 100red-year warranty on this coating." I don't know about that. Maybe check red tape on that. Maybe just double check. But, it will peel or crack or chip if it's water-based. With oilbased, the beauty of that is it just fades over time. So, all you have to do is go back and put another coat on. So, those are one of the biggest advantages

Of being 100% oil based. Yeah. Now, can you use it for decks, too? Say for decks. Say again. Will it work on decks? In other words, oh yeah, absolutely. Yep. So, we actually gonna tear up. Yeah. Yeah, absolutely. So, we have a couple different lines. So, we have a fence formula and then the deck formula. The deck is a more extreme climate formula. It's designed to hold up for snow load patio furniture. I saw your little co-host that you had over there, Rowdy, your little dog running across the deck. It'll hold up against claw marks, that kind of stuff. So, it's designed to hold up against that kind of wear and tear. So, but there are two different formulas. Yeah, absolutely. See, I didn't know you had multiple products like that. And the other thing you talked about was uh parking lot striping. You know, we work with parking lot people because we pull out the Ballards together on some of this. Yeah, absolutely. Well, I was going to say we might have something new at the fence show if you guys come by. 1310 is the booth. We're going to be shaking up the industry. Just tell me more. Tell me more. What is Well, I was gonna I was gonna tell Rowdy I have a I have a 4,000 mile and a 3,000 mi and an 8,000 milei motor oil based stain. Okay. There you go. That's how it all started. Those old farmers, they took their old used tractor. Yeah. Then it gets it gets darker the the higher mileage. So, yeah. There you go. Absolutely. Well, I really appreciate you guys having us on. We're doing some of the education, too, for you guys. We're really grateful for that opportunity. I think that's Wednesday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, somewhere in there. But um we are we are definitely excited to be there again in Vegas. So you guys, we need some announcements and and go vote by the way for Zach because we're going to be giving the instructor of the year award going on and you can go to fencow.com and you can vote for somebody um one of the instructors if you know him. So share share that link and help him get that plaque as well. Um and some other perks, it's going to get you on a a wall of instructor fame forever. was never going to come down on every show for the as long as we have the show going. I'll have to get my hair done for sure. Oh no. Hey, what's going on? Hey, how are you? Good. Michelle from Greenwood Fence. My counterpart Lisa is not with me, but I did put it as girls of Greenwood. We are here. Wanted to say hi and so excited for the show. Um definitely looking forward to another great year showing you what uh what we've got new coming out. You know, last night the other year we had the outside demos. We had the outside show where we could demonstrate our stuff outside. You got to be putting up that fence like like you snapped it together in 10 minutes. The entire yard because everybody else is driving in post and having to fit pieces and cut them. No, no, you put it together and made it look easy like even I can. It's so easy. It's so easy. Once you do it the first time, it becomes easier and easier and um it's just getting that little finding the tricks of the, you know, how to how to make it go a lot quicker. So, but it's great. You know what? We're very hands-on as far as helping our contractors. They'll FaceTime me, they'll call me, and I'll walk them through any question that they have. So, that's one thing that I love about, you know, our company that we don't just send you the product and say, "Good luck." We're there to walk you through from start to finish and we love seeing the end results. Send us pictures, videos. We love it and we'll post it and do a nice shout out for everybody. So, yeah. Yeah. And I think we did one at Las Vegas Fence and it was a weird grade change and I mean and I from what I remember from the guys told me it was a lot of calling and talking to you guys and you guys, you know, we're there for Yeah. you walked them through it from what I heard and otherwise I would have gotten some more feedback on it from them but they said yeah no we just had an issue they used to watch some they sent us some videos and they talked to us and guided us through it. So you guys

Always have a lot of energy um wherever you go and it's fun um it's fun to have you guys at the show every year and know and seeing you guys. Yeah. So that that's super cool. Super cool. What else you guys got going on? Tell everybody a little bit about the product though because I mean we don't even know you girls. Yeah. So we are um a comp we we handle our composite with our aluminum frame uh system, our aluminum post and and rail system. We have five colors in composite, two colors in vinyl, and we're introducing something new at this show. So uh we're very excited to be able to uh facilitate and help our friends on the West Coast. Um you know, but we I'll leave it at that. So we've got some new stuff coming out that we'll introduce. Yeah, we're excited. We always introduce new stuff for for the show. So, we're excited to launch that. And then, um, but as far as our product goes, you know, we're definitely we've got our commercial division as well. Typical is 6x6 for our our sections, but we can go up to eight and we've got our 4x4 line post ready to hit those commercial jobs going 8 ft with our composite. So, um, you know, we're we're rolling that out, doing well with our commercial division, and definitely excited to explore no new avenues. We actually just did the architect show in San Diego uh two weeks ago. So, that was exciting to be able to meet new people and kind of get our name out there. And um but we look forward to the fence shows. We love being able to meet people and let them know what we're capable of doing. So, we're to know, do you guys have uh how-to videos and how that all goes together? because you guys we are actually we're actually going to be uh setting up some new stuff for the classes so that we could certify uh installers now. So, we are working on that. Um but we do have our videos on our website on how to put our fence together. We also now are rolling out Spanish in Spanish our uh instructions as well for you know the people who uh you know are installers because you know we do have our guys in the back that help facilitate instructions. you know, I'm pretty good at that, but not Spanish. But we've got our guys in the back. But now we've got both English and Spanish as far as our instruction manuals that, you know, are are going to be uh uploaded onto our website. I'm jealous. That's one of those things I wish I could do. I'm working towards it. Brian was saying that he's got a store up and coming and and it's in Spanish. Yeah. Well, you know what? It's like, you know, we we love our our installers and we want to be able to, you know, anybody that speaks. We've got Polish um workers in the back. We've got Spanish so we can help facilitate pretty much any language to be able to, you know, get our product installed properly cuz that's important. You know, like I said, we don't just say, "Here's our product, good luck." It's our name on that product. So, it's you that's installing and it's our product that's going to be the end result. So, you know, how long does the product last? Is it got a does it? Well, we have our we have a 20-year warranty on the product. So, you know, we take we take pride in all the feedback that we get from our contractors and we make those tweaks and we're constantly evolving, making it easier and last longer. Hey there, so good to see y'all. Howdy. Rowdy, you know, Gary, we don't see you that much anymore. I feel like uh Karen's becoming the face of this whole thing. What's happening, man? I don't remember you in person. I was gonna say I think it I think it's probably better that way quite frankly. Yeah. No, we're not complaining. Okay. Okay. We're good. I mean dayto day I'm talking to people all the time across the country. So yes, it makes sense for me to be moving across the country too and seeing you at events and things like that. So for show and and in Vegas and all that, it's gonna be fun. Yeah. So, for everybody that's listening, um, they're with Easy Louver. They are Easy Loover. So, uh, one of the most really cool, unique, simple, but yet really cool concepts, huh? I remember when I first met you guys, you had these things, these little things about this big sticking out of uh, Karen's purse, right? Running around. We're busy. I don't even know what I we don't know what that is. And then now I

See all these pictures everywhere of these finished products and I'm like, I get it. I get it. and it was just a really cool idea that you guys brought to the market. So, tell everybody about Easy Louver and I'm sure uh I know you know Rowdy and stuff really well. We all kind of know each other and the four of us know each other really well. So, uh we're pretty familiar with it, but tell everybody else about Easy Loover and how this whole idea came about. Well, I tell you the thing when we started this company, people weren't thinking about louvered so much, but Gary was and he built a louvered thing by hand, which is a pain. And so then he designed and and now we manufacture and sell this product that makes louvers so simple and easy and it's just a whole lot of fun. We keep seeing all kinds of new product projects that people come up with and it's really a lot of fun. Yeah. In fact, one of the I think one of the funnest new things too is there a lot more builders we're working with on a regular basis that are you know using it to differentiate themselves to improve. So, super grateful for the large, you know, that a lot more builders this year than we have had in the past. So, Oh, absolutely. Yeah. And we just did like a big website redo redo kind of thing. And so, there's a whole network of builders on there because we have homeowners reaching out saying, "Hey, I don't want to do this myself, but I love it." And so, we got to hook them up. Yep. And you're gonna be Oh, yeah. We're gonna be What's your booth number? 401. Aren't you guys similar together? Yeah, we are. Orlando is gonna be there in Evan Gardner, too. Right. Wingman. It's like Manufacturers Row right there. Corner. Innovators Corner. There you go. Right out front, too. As soon as you walk in the door, it's right there to your left. We'll be standing there. Yeah. And this show is built to find uh find products like yours and bring it into the market and kind of expand our um our you know our market, you know, to a degree. Get people get people outside of uh the norm because I tell people all the time, you're out there already doing this, you know, don't pass it up every time on on something new. Don't pass up the gate operators. Don't pass up um all the accessories and and maybe they want to do something else around their air conditioners, the louvers and stuff. You've already done the hard work, you know? Uh sell some of this stuff is easier. So these louver things though, when I first saw one, it was about this long, right? The sections. Do they come in different sections now or is it all same the same? It's that simple. There's still the two foot length like that, but then you can stack them easy. And and we also we have different colors though now like we have a black powder coated and that has just taken off. We have so many people who are doing like cedar and black powder coated works out beautifully. And then also white powder coated which is just beautiful for along the coast. We're getting a lot of interest with that. In fact, any color you want really. That's a powder coating color. As long as you want 50 pairs or more, we can powder coat it whatever color somebody wants. So, what about like zebra stripes or polka dots? That we could do that. It'd be expensive, but we do. I know you'd do it. Yeah, we'll do it. Especially for you, you know. So, they can they they could come see. Are you going to have some samples at the fence show in October, right? Not only samples at the fence show, we're going to have a couple of different sizes. So, you could lo use aluminum slats or 6 inch and 4 inch, but Okay. We got a brand new product. It's the thing people ask us the most. Does your product do this? And we're like, yeah, no, it doesn't. But we're coming out with one. So, we got a big new update that's coming out at your at the V show. So, it Well, if I told you I don't Oh, Susan got you. What's up, Brian? Suspense. How you doing, Brian? Rowdy.

So, so Brian's one of my oldest friends in the industry. We go back. We were young men once, him and I. All right. back in the 2000s. Early 2000s. Yeah. Yeah. How are you doing, man? Down there. Got your California shirt on right there. We know where you're at. Yeah. Repping. Nice weather wherever we're at. Cold to me is reaching down the bottom of an ice chest. I know, right? So, everybody's listening, this is Brian with BD Loops. Um, if you are in the access control industry or even getting into it from the fence industry, you've probably heard of Bey Loops because it is, I would say, the number one brand of loops in the industry. I, you know, I I mean, I don't know if it's just the US, but I would assume you've branched far beyond the US, right? Yeah, we're all throughout US, Canada. We we're partially worldwide, but our main markets are US, Canada, North America. Yeah. So, um, tell everybody about Bey Loops because I think we need to tell them. I mean loops people might get it. BD loops is a preform loop manufacturer. A loop is a vehicle detection device. Uh you often install loops with gate, doors, parking, drive-through security equipment. It is copper wire that goes in the ground, detect the vehicle to do something. It could open a gate. It can turn on a traffic signal to notify you that hey, I need to go left on this lane. It can count cars. It's how your morning traffic report is done. And I made a loop that can be used in new construction applications and also replaces traditional hand wrap style. And uh I've been doing it since 2001 and we're excited to be a part of the fence show. I'm also going to be in education structure uh with the fence show as well. I'm no stranger to that. You know, I've been doing it with FWA's university uh major industry trade shows for a long time. And I think this one's going to be exciting. Uh, as they always do, FWA is big on hands-on type education, and I got a lot of things planned for this year's training on the loop side of things. That's awesome. And I I've used your loops forever. I mean, as far back as I can remember it. And we've do um we've always done either hand and pre-formed and, you know, whether they're ing ground or saw cut. And you guys have just perfected it. And I say this to a lot of people when it comes to loops. like you know it's the difference is also the fact that you can call and you call and the odds are you're going to get you most likely if there's an actual issue or something you're there all the time I mean I know you take your vacations and time off but and stuff like that but typically if there's an issue you're going to walk them through it if there's a custom scenario and this loop is going up over a speed bump and in front of a a fountain that's spitting out aluminum chips or something you're going to help them figure out how to make it work for motorcycles and bicycles and I mean it's a it's not just buy a loop off the shelf and you know at Walmart and figure it out. So it's it truly is and I don't think and I I can honestly say no one's ever returned one of your loops that I know of. I don't know what what's your return rate if you want to share it with us. They basically don't get returned. They they just work. And we have that record because since day one I've always had a policy of every single loop gets tested three ways before it gets bagged. So you know you're going to get a working completed product. That's just how we designed it. And they're all in stock ready for same day shipping. We've never missed a shipping day either. But in addition to loops, you know, we also do all the accessories for the loops, too. So, we got loop sealant to seal them in. We got testing devices to test them. Uh loops are our focus. That's what we focus and do well on. So, we're going to continue to do that. Well, I like it. Yeah. Yeah. And I've been I've been I'm fortunate enough that I've known you a long time and I've been through m you know, a couple of your different locations where you've been making them and I've seen I've seen your testing process. And when you say each loop gets tested, you're not kidding. I mean, it's not like a a 20 second test. I mean, they're actually they're actually gone through some rigorous tests. Everything from dipping in water to I mean, your what you do to go through it.

I mean, it's it's stuff that I don't believe anybody else in the industry does. I mean, they may and if they if if somebody else does, drop it in the comments and I'd love to talk to you guys about it, but let's remember, you only get one chance to get a loop into the ground and have it work. And so I I have to make sure 100% that it's going to work every single time. That's what we do. And we design ours to be as bulletproof as possible, too. So, I mean, yeah, that's that's what we do. That's what we're focused. That's why we're successful. Yeah. And we got videos um of you. Obviously, you've been a huge part of helping us anytime we do trainings and stuff. Um and we've got a lot of videos. Anybody reach out to us in the comments if you want to hear more about um that or watch any videos. We'll drop them in. But um we got a lot of videos showing how you not like you said not the loops but the sealer and the accessories, the the rollers, everything to keep it so this goes Oh. Oh, he's got Brian at the fence show. What's going on, man? Hey, how's it going, guys? Videos on social media. You look good, man. You're doing good. Oh, thank you. Thank you. It's uh it's been an exciting uh year, year and a half. I joined uh joined up with my salesman here uh back in March of last year and wow it's been a roller coaster of uh changes and updates and integrations and all kinds of stuff over here. So nice to nice to meet you guys. Hey how are you doing as far keeping up with uh technology? I mean it with AI it's just advancing advancing advancing. It's got to be improving your life immensely. It is it is definitely improving our life. It's it's improving our lives a lot on the actual fence construction side. So, as you guys are aware, we have Empire Netting and Fence is one of our other companies in in the family of companies over here. And uh we're starting to see, you know, people writing their own apps and writing their own automations and workflows and hey, I really need to do something over here with this. And they're building their own systems internally. Uh so that's really exciting. We're also building some new software uh that's really going to be not just for fence companies but really any kind of uh fence company or any kind of construction company that's going to be more uh project management and financial analysis related. So, how are our projects doing? Uh, you know, we we got these projects that were we bid out at this much. We budgeted expenses are this much and we can now track all of those and and so that's a that's a new release that's going to be coming out very shortly. But, uh, uh, on the my salesman side, just the automations and integrations have been uh, really fascinating. We're now able to tie into all kinds of different CRM softwares and uh, automation systems. So, we're seeing people do all kinds of things with uh their marketing, uh their their CRM, their sales, and it's really accelerating things for our customers. Nice. So, Randy, I know obviously we all know Rachel really well, Matt Warner, and everybody. Um so, um we haven't had a chance to talk a lot obvious as much as I've talked to both of those two obviously over the years, right? So, uh tell me about Boggy. What is that? What's that? Where'd that come from? I want to say it if no one else is going to say it if they can't see your name on the on if you're listening. Uh nickname Boggy. Uh so I want to know where that came from, man. So uh so Matt Matt and I go way back. Literally we've known each other since we were four years old. Uh we're god brothers. Uh best friends. I've known each other for years and years and years. So I actually couldn't pronounce my last name when I was really young. So instead of Randy Barger, it was Randy Baggy. And uh Matt heard Matt heard one of my parents call me Boggy one time. And he's like, "I like that. I'm calling you Boggy." And for years he was the only person that ever called me that when I started working for him. He says, "Man, I got I don't think I can stop calling you Boggy." And like, "Just roll with it. I'm good." So now everybody knows me as Boggy. I I just picture Matt hearing that and he's he I just picture him going, "Yep. Yep. vlogging. I'm gonna stick with it. Exactly. So, so you're are you new on the my salesman side of it more? I mean, are

More on the face of it? You've always been in the back or were you on the Empire Netting side for, you know, a long period of time and then you came on? Tell me about your story, how you came into uh working with Matt. Yeah, so I've been in IT for a lot of years. I've been working for other companies, had my own business in the past a couple of different times. Uh, and when Matt came up with the My Salesman idea, I actually kind of helped him do a few things like get his initial website up and running and do a few things, but uh, he didn't have any any kind of money to throw at the My Salesman business at that time. So, uh, I just kind of helped him, you know, get a few things up and running. Then he had Rachel come on board and she's just kind of run with it ever since then. And now that uh now that all the companies are really growing and accelerating is like I really need somebody that can just take take the my salesman part and kind of manage that from a sales perspective and I need somebody to help us bring automation and technology into the rest of the company. So I kind of have two roles. I'm product manager for my salesman and I'm technology officer for the rest of the company. So it's been uh been quite the whirlwind. So Matt works for you basically now. I get it. I get it. Matt works for you now. So, uh, what's going on, guys? Real quick, though, everybody that was just listening to Randy, we didn't get a chance to discuss my salesman. Uh, awesome program. Uh, reach out to us in there. I'm sure Randy will reach out back to you. Or come to the fence show and see my salesman. They're always there. We love their support. Um, hey, What's going on? How you doing, Brian? Alex, how are you? We haven't met. We haven't met, so this is all new. I feel like we have. I just feel like we have because of how much interact. How much do we see each other? I guess online t-shirt. T-shirt. What's it say on your t-shirt? Oh, it's backwards. Shoot. No, it's not here. Fence and deck manufacturer. And then you got I'm a marketer. So, Fence and Deck Marketers. Yeah. Nobody likes you know, nobody likes the marketers. Is there anybody who who's next? Is that Are we down to this guy? Is that what it is? the product. Alec, thank you for all your support and everything you've been doing too um with helping with marketing and stuff for us too and you know everything we're doing on the on the fence show and stuff and you're going to be um helping out with some of that marketing on that uh at the expo with trainings and stuff I believe as well. So I saw some of that. Let's tell everybody about your company though and uh see what uh what we got going on with you guys. Sure. So uh the company's name is Fence and Deck Marketers. Um try to make it nice and obvious you know what we do. So we're uh marketing for fencing and decking companies and those are the only types of companies we work with. So um very niche focus and um really in the past before starting it I would work with kind of anybody and everybody but I really wanted to focus on these industries and ever since starting it we've got really immersed in um in both of them but basically what we provide is we do websites SEO optimized for AI which is huge now uh Google ads Facebook ads social media so yeah basically all digital marketing services and uh you know just for fencing and decking Yeah. And we've got some pretty hardcore dedicated fence marketers. We got, you know, with between Sam Nutello, Benji, and everybody in our industry is pretty ingrained in um you know, and some of the other ones we've got um going on. So, um it's it, you know, the fencers uh we're a we're a different breed of people. We uh we we know our industry and you got to really kind of come in for a while and get to know us, it feels like. Huh. Yeah. But we need people like you because, you know, just because you build a nice fence, that doesn't mean the word's going to get around. Somebody's got to spread it. Yeah. Yeah. Best known beats best every time is kind of what I say. You know, if you're There's plenty of guys out there that just build the nicest, you know, most phenomenal fences out there, but if nobody's ever heard of you, you might get skipped for the person that uh does a little bit better market.

Yeah. Basically, unfortunately, what do you feel is that I'm going to ask you a couple questions anyway. What do you feel uh you guys focus more on like uh AdWords or more on uh you know getting in organic or what do you think? Yeah, so both. So um SEO AI that's you know the organic stuff is really what we hammer on first because that's where you're going to get the best ROI typically the best leads but you know eventually that runs out and you want if you want to keep growing you got to you know diversify and you got to go further out. So that's when Google ads, Facebook ads things really come into play. So yeah, it kind of depends on the business. You know, it's um it's never one sizefits-all. You know, some are really aggressive, some are just kind of at the tail end of their career and just kind of, you know, want to maintain. So it's it's just whatever their goals are is kind of what we tailor our suggestion. Sit down sit down and talk to them. So you have a podcast, I believe, too, right? Yes, sir. So um Fence and Deck Mastery Podcast. That's um Yeah, that's And I like this is a this is a cool format. I mean that I mean I love that it just kind of cuts people out too. So you're everyone's a little bit surprised. It's pretty fun. I don't even know when it's happening by the way. I can't even It's just all of a sudden and she knows there's probably some it's it's somebody I want to talk to a little bit longer and she's I think she does it on purpose because sometimes you see she brings somebody on and then we get like a warning and sometimes there's no warning. I don't know where that comes from. Have you seen it's always when you ask what's the new product for this year and all of a sudden oh here comes Susan. Come to the fence show and find out. Yeah, we're excited. Yeah, we booked uh we booked a booth, I believe, or we're in the process of doing that. So, yeah, I'm excited to be there with you guys in person and get to meet y'all and uh yeah, want some training? I'm always always on board for that, too. But it be cool just to hang out and, you know, meet you guys. So, will you be doing some recording and and stuff for your podcast at the show? Will people be able to come up and jump on or maybe get some videos with you? I've never really done that. I mean, it probably should quite honestly, but yeah. I mean, I usually just have the booth. We actually bring this really cool big uh pull-up bar. So, you basically get $100 cash to bring cash with me if you can hang for 100 seconds. Oh, is that that spinny bar? Yeah. Yeah. I was at I was at Fence Tech, so we brought it there. I mean, it just, you know, makes it makes it a fun day to kind of watch people do that. And uh Oh, here we go. Look at there. Howdy. Howdy, baby. How are you guys? What are you doing? Why does this say Why Why does it say Imperial Sean? What's going on with that, man? Yeah. So, uh, is this like your own your emperor status or what what's happening here? I'm I'm trying to be like Brian. That's what's happening. So, I I'll give you guys the the three minute elevator story kind of how it all happened, right? So, um, when I got out of college, I was in the banking world. A lot of people know that. And one of my accounts was a company in New Paris called Vinyl by Design. It's in northern Indiana um not not far from Michigan. Rowdy was just over. Well, both you guys were over at my place. So, it's it's right there. And um what they are they're a wholesaler, you know, so they would wholesale uh they would uh they would wholesale um vinyl, aluminum, wood, and chain link, right? So there's a big hub for everybody and um during COVID they passed away. That was also the same time I went to CMM with Steve. So um FSG bought them and um you know I was at CMM everything was going great and um I got word about January that um they were going to be possibly looking to sell the asset sale of a lot of their stuff and and get out of it. it just wasn't really a good fit for FSG. FSG kind of focuses more on larger cities and things. So, um, you know, big reason to go to these shows is for networking, right? That's why it's one of the biggest things you get from these, you know, the fence show, especially in Las Vegas. And I had met

Todd Jeff from Imperial Fence. So, Todd and his wife Laura have Imperial Fence. They have five locations. um you know, Chattanooga, Alabama, Atlanta, Indianapolis, and now Northern Indiana. And uh and um I called Todd and I said, "Hey, what do you think about me and you taking this over?" And he said, "Absolutely." So, here we are. We um we we're signing the lease tomorrow and uh opening doors August 1st. Wow. So, anyone who needs material in northern Indiana, um, you know, Ohio, Michigan, Illinois, and Indiana, basically from like Indianapolis over to Cleveland, Cleveland up to Grand Rapids, Grand Rapids over to Chicago. Uh, I'm like a centralized dead in the middle hub for everybody. Go ahead. Plug it right now before Susan cut you off. Yeah. Imperial Fence of Michigan. We have a Facebook page. Give us a like. Imperial Fence of Michigan. You missed. Follow me on Tik Tok. Hey. Um, yeah. So, you guys must have some money or something because that same asset purchase in like February, I put an offer of like 180 million on. So, you guys somehow somehow you guys beat me. Man, I didn't know you wanted to come to Northern Indiana, Brian. Hey, I want to know how you're drinking coffee at 4:30 your time. You know, we have a place next door and uh the girl just said it when I was getting my coffee out of there. She's like, "You're drinking coffee and this heat's 110 here today." Yeah. 110 degrees at 4 in the afternoon. Brian's over here drinking coffee. I love it, dude. Coffee. It's dry. I could drink coffee. Yeah. It's wetter than the dry heat out there. I could drink coffee anytime. I don't care. Midnight, I'll drink coffee and eat a burrito and I'll still go to sleep, you know? It doesn't doesn't phase me. Yeah. I got a couple quick questions before Susan cuts me off. So, how many vendors do you guys have now for the event like the expo? How's it looking? It's got to be 150 or so. Awesome. Somewhere around there right now. And then um there's always a rush, you know what I mean? A little bit. So, I mean, it'll it'll most we're pretty consistent. It's it's going to be it's going to land somewhere between 150 and 200 um you know, in that range. So, it's by the time it's done. So, she's running out. She's running out of boost. They're going fast. Yeah. pretty much 10 x10s. You're going to have to, if you want something bigger than a 10 x10, you got to start getting multiple and adding them together. Um, if you can find a spot where there's, you know, unless there's somebody that bought one like right, sometimes they buy like right in between and you can't. So then we can always kind of ask somebody. But one thing about us is we don't move people. You can't come and offer more money to get uh, you know, to get moved from from your spot and throw somebody else to the back. It's you know, if you if you if you stuck with us and you you committed to us early on, that's your spot, man. We you know, we don't move the floor around. Sean, I'll see you later. Bye. What's up, guys? What's up, man? How are you doing? Well, doing well. Nice to meet both of you. This is kind of cool. So, hey, um, tell everybody about you. I mean, we we've never actually visited. I mean, if we met, I don't think so. Huh. Yeah. So, there's like a lot of conversations with Susan and so on. So, what's going on, man? Tell us tell us about uh is it Alivio? Alo. Alo. I wasn't going to butcher it like that, Brian. I appreciate the effort. Yeah. So, Alo, we're a we're an AI tool. Um, and we're built for exterior home contractors. We've got a ton of roofing contractors that use us. Okay. And we've just started getting into fencing. And so, that's how I found the fence show. I was like, I fencers fencing companies found us. Now I need to go find where all the fencing companies hang out. But basically what what our agents do is we answer phone calls and web leads. So Google LSA form fills on your website, Facebook forms, and we qualify and then book those leads into appointments. So we're reading we're reading calendars, we're scheduling appointments, we're doing it

After hours, weekends, holidays, all those kind of things. Um I don't think we've ever met. I was at uh a different software company company camp for eight years and we we definitely worked with some fencing companies then. Um but it you know that exterior trades where you go out, you give a price and then it's more than just like an hour of work and you're off to the next thing. It's just perfect for us. And the tickets, you know, fence tickets and roof tickets can be very similar in price. Oh, it's it's a it's it's amazing. Uh you take Charlie from OneTap. He's uh if you if you know One Tap Connect, I know I know Rowdy, you do, but um as well, but anyway, he is really big on the roofing side and then he kind of branched into the fencing side. Um I think one of his first fencing ones was the fence show. And um it's amazing how similar the roofing and the fence industry kind of is. Obviously, except one's on the ground, one's on the roof, I guess. But um one has a lot more ladders. But uh other than that, it's a pretty it's amazing how the the bidding process and everything works. And the customers are a lot pretty similar. I mean, just even look like the marketing like marketing guys are our favorite partners. Our marketing companies are our favorite partners because they're only as good as the lead follow-up and we're only we're only as good as the quantity of leads coming in. my my salesman like I'm excited for the event obviously to get and talk to fencing contractors and obviously hopefully get fencing contractors using our software but even the partnerships that we'll be able to build while we're there and those kind of things. So yeah, there's a lot of fencers walking around a lot of small businesses what this thing was built for. So and we are the show where a lot it's it's built around uh small fence contractors from one truck all the way up to 20, you know, and it's even 50 and beyond. But it's where you'll see a lot of those guys walking around. And I say this about the fence industry. You may be shaking the hand of this guy that just started last week with one truck or maybe he's working out of his wife's minivan and uh you know, three months later he's got a truck. Six months later he's got two guys working for him. Uh you know by the end of the year he's got two three trucks out there and uh he's one of the bigger guys competing in town. Rowdy, you've seen it, right? It's amazing. Amazing on how and you get out of life what you put into it, you know? And so I can totally see this taking off for you. I mean, everything's getting to where it's automated. I'm fighting it. I gotta be honest with you. I'm one of those old I'm fighting it. I literally make phone calls and answer my own phone. I can see it coming fast. It's one of those things where Yeah. I mean, honestly, rowdy, like especially web leads, it's so good that you wouldn't know any different. Um, and we have a saying where on like after hours calls, weekends calls, your homeowners, they want confirmation now that somebody's going to come out and give them a price on a fence way more than they want conversation later. Like, yeah, they they don't care about talking to somebody three days from now. They're like, "Hey, I want a fence. I want I want to know if you can come out and give me a price on a fence." We FaceTime people on Sunday mornings, East Coast time. So, I don't know what time that is my time. All I know is I'll wake up, FaceTime somebody to give them pointers and tips on the quickpool. And it could be Mother's Day. It could be Thanksgiving. I'll do it. I don't I mean, but how long can I do that before all of a sudden? In all fairness, tries to FaceTime me at like 2 a.m., you know what I mean? Sometimes, and it's dark, so it's like Who's this guy? Where did he come from? Ain't you two guys in the same building right now? No. Mark in the office right now. I'm up in the heat. California. I'm in sunny Nevada. Oh, look. Oh, here comes the boss. Everybody be quiet. Yeah. Watch out. I'm chewing gum now. Lou gave me gum. So, what are you What are you guys up to? you uh you guys are uh busy all over the place. You got expos and trainings and I mean what's uh what's happening

With you guys? Yeah. Well, we got a lot of exciting stuff happening, you know, with our we got a new website coming up. We've got uh we're going to be using some AI and uh it's uh we've got actually financing that's happening by next week. So, Wow. Wow. makes life a little bit easier for, you know, for those big purchases. Who' you go through? Who did the Was it your own personal credit union or bank or did you have something like Hearth or one of the big names do it for you? Yeah, we're using one of the big names. That's cool. I was dip into our savings account, start financing people or how's that work? She would. That's been known to happen. Yeah, but I would want Mary knocking on my door. you would not Yeah. Yeah. The the Hungarian mafia, you do not want to get involved with that. But I don't savage. If Mary called you and said your $159 payment's due, you'd be paying it. You Yeah. I know people I don't even like the way she said that. Do you? Well, she's figured out new uses for the NW quick pull. Well, I was really doing it at demo days, but that's a lot. That's that's really impressive. So, tell everybody about your guys, though. I mean, I we're talking to you like we like we already know the products. So, what um JC Guri is a sign manufacturer and stickers? Yeah. Decals. Decals. Decals. Decals last longer than stickers. That's what I'm talking about. We do make and have been since the 70s made the uh keep on fencing de or the bumper sticker. And then this year at uh at the fence show we're actually going to have it's tra we trademarked it and it's uh we're going to have the uh apparel. So hoodies, hats, t-shirts that say and that's a big big deal. Yeah. And so it's uh you know I wear Triple X Mark. We'll make it happen. Hoodie. I need a hoodie. Jason Write that down. Rowdy triple. You say triple XX XXX small. Hey, I plan on eating a burger or two between now and then. Yeah. Save me an extra extra. Awesome. As I was doing my accounting, I did hear um a lady talking about their composite and their decking. And one thing to all you decking people, they're a manufacturer, I believe, but we also do decals, you know, just if you want your name or phone number on your products, that's what we can do to help you out with that. Name plates. Name plates. And we also do a phone back uh name plate where it's like a fence sign with foam back tape on it. And when you stick it on your product, people can't tear it off. And that's what we want. You want things to stay and keep your name out in front of people to get more business. Am I right? That's right. Yep. We involved u I mean we've been in the fence industry actually Mr. Guri in the 1920s. So uh actually JC Guri came around in 1949. Mary's dad bought in 1970 and we brought all the manufacturing inhouse. But um we came out with the the foam back which Mary was talking about which it's peel and stick right once you stick it on you know it's 90 pounds per square inch. It's not an easy thing to get off. And you know the the decals on that NW quick pull kind of just wore off, man. So who are you getting those decals from? Get them from us. Get it from us to last longer. We can help you with that. This whole time people would have been reading NW Quickpull if you Oh, they're gone. Hey, man. So I So I get my decals from JC Guri to put on my hinges. Oh, nice. Oh yeah. How you guys doing? Man, I'm looking forward to sharing a booth with you. Yeah, I know. 401. I know. If I was listening 401, man, 41B. 401b. You know, I think from demo days, was it one of your videos ended up being like millions of views from uh That was No, that was from that was from

Vegas last year. Oh, was it? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So, you had another one though from Demo Days you have to see. for some reason. Uh, if anybody ever wants to get views, just go get some videos of your hinges. For some reason, I don't know why. I don't Yeah, I have to look at that one. Um, but I love it. I love it though because, you know, that's the biggest thing is just getting it out there. Nobody else has a product like that. I I've seen your product, but I've never seen anybody else produce a product like yours. That's that's good and bad, you know. Well, you know, it's like people, you know, there's no competition. There's no I mean when you get it right there's no competition, right? And that's good, but it also makes it hard because nobody else is getting it out there. That's a possibility to actually do this. So all the work involved in the business is letting people know, you know, all the marketing, everything is just to let people know that it's available because it's, you know, it's a new thing that people don't know that it's available, right? So that's the hard work. So, so let's tell them let's tell them what we're talking about because it's a unique product. It's not something you're going to walk into um just any hardware store and find. So, when we say it's unique and nobody else makes anything like it, tell everybody what it is, what we're talking about. So, we just make uh we make hinge sets for uh gates that have to lift up a hill. So, typically out of double drive, you know, where the top gate's going to hit the ground as it opens, um we'll we have a hinge set that'll lift the gate as it opens for all different kinds of material. Um, we do some custom stuff and yeah, so the biggest thing that you know coming from a visual person, you know, you drive around and you look at all these nice fences that people did and what's the big first thing you look at is the gates and the gates just look like crap, right? Because they got them off the ground because they got open and the dogs get out. So now you can put our hinges on there, keep everything tight to the ground and and the whole your whole fence job looks nice if you if if you need that, you know, to fix that situation. So, what's the biggest gate you've ever hinged? I think it was uh I think I got a video on YouTube. It was like 25 foot wide, like 8 foot tall, had to go up about 20 in and they put an operator on it. Yeah. Chain link. That's where we get a thousand comments saying that would never lift 500 lb. That would remember. It's like Yeah. But they just tear it apart. They try, you know, the online stuff. But it is true. Well, that that one actually so so that one actually failed a little bit when they first put it on. They didn't attach it and I I was mis I didn't have the right information how big the gate was. So, we we went ahead and made a separate part just for the on the gate side to double up how how much uh strength it had. We made that overnighted it to them. Didn't charge them. And you know, they wel I'm like you guys have to weld this on. You know, anytime you're dealing with round round pipe, chain link. I'm kind of changing that a little bit because I've been struggling with that a little bit, having guys be My goal is to get everything installed easily in the field for everybody. It's not, you know, I don't want them to have to think through stuff. Just bolt it on like like you've been doing regular hinges, right? So, that's my goal. And when it comes to the round stuff, it gets a little tricky. And when you get to the bigger gates, you know, there's a lot of torque on there and stuff. So, typically, you're going to end up having to weld stuff on and do stuff like that. So, so you little kids can hang on to swing on. I know. If little kids can't swing on it, listen, you're going to be my tester. We're gonna make At the end of one of my gates in Vegas, I'm going to have a chair there and that's where you're going to be sitting and the gates's going to be opening and closing. People that use your products in your hinges. Love them. I haven't heard a single person that doesn't just absolutely love them and end up wanting to stock some in

Their definitely picking up. You know, there was some apprehension at first, you know, how's this thing work? How the guy's going to use it? And then, you know, now guys are like, hey, I want to stock up on this. So, they they're buying, you know, which is what we do, you know, with defense company I work at, right? So, we we have them available. So when you have that last second thing, I I have I do a lot of overnights, you know, people need at the last second. But if you can stock up on them and charge the people, you know, this isn't something you're giving to the people, you know, this is this is an option for you to help sell that fence. You could put a gate there and have it look nice. Charge them for it, you know, so it's not an expense to to the installers, you know, the fence companies. So yeah, everybody come to the fence show, see these hinges in person. If you want to be famous, get a video of it and uh post it on your social media. Hey, Kevin's gone. Hey, Terry. The man that needs no introduction. He's not You're not You guys are Are you guys in the same state if I recall? Are you up in Where you at? Up in Tacoma. [snorts] Yeah, I'm I'm just down at the battleground exit. Exit 11. Yeah, just about uh maybe a 100 miles south of me. Yeah, that's what I thought. It's a small world. You got to go down and visit them. That's the Well, I only get to I only get to see when we're down in Vegas at the show. Yeah, but I need to make a trip up there and do some demonstrations. Next time you have a customer service appreciation day, you call me. I'll come up there and help you promote it. And we're working on putting one of those together here pretty soon. So, I'll get a hold of you beforehand. I would love to have and let me know. I'll I'll help I'll come up as well. I'd love to see it. Perfect. Yeah. I don't think I've ever seen the branch up there. And anybody that We're talking about Builder's Fence here, you guys. And uh me personally, my relationship with Builder Spence goes back decades and decades. It was uh back to Bobby when she was there and she was my very I'd say she was probably um miss Bobby to death. I mean I mean you call up she'd be like, "Hey sweetie." I mean to the I mean you could call her 10 years later and she she knew who you were and it was just an amazing lady. I miss her. Um yeah, some of you seen Brian's is old, but yeah, but um so my relationship goes back, I don't know, 30 years or so with uh builders on that. And uh you guys have been a rock in the industry for small businesses. And I say that a lot because I believe it to be true. Um it's a place that never turns a small business away, small fence company, and uh is always, you know, goes out of your way to help everybody. So hey, I don't want to be the sales guy for builders. You do it, man. What's going on with builders? I know, you know, we're just moving and shaking, Brian. Uh, we've got a lot of good things going on right now. Um, we've made a lot of changes to kind of update our company. Um, changed the new ARP system and it just kind of bringing us up into the 21st century, which is which is really cool and exciting. Um, it's it's made our processes a lot better. Of course, if anybody's gone through that, they know it's a struggle in the beginning, but once things start me meshing, um, everything from our purchasing side to our sales has has just gotten better because of it. So, uh, we're all really pretty excited about that. Um, and with our leadership, Gabrielle and Steve, we're we're looking at some new opportunities and new ways to help our customers. So, um, things are things are good. Things are things are really good. We're having a lot of fun. Um yeah. Have you got any new products? We we have changed a lot of products. Um and as as as things go with the industry, you know, a lot of things have changed, so we're trying to keep up with that. Um a you know, especially with the no dig system is getting really popular. Everybody seems like a lot of people are starting to go to driving post. So, um, we're trying to kind of capitalize on that and help people out with that because things have things have just changed a lot in our industry

In the last four or five years even. Um, so we're just just trying to keep up with the trends. Um, always looking for new products to to be able to market to our customers. Um, so yeah. So, you're a distributor um for everybody that's listening to um the fence and gate industry and um the products you would typically do you change them per region? Like I know you're all the way from you know where where I am down in uh you know southern California, Nevada area all the way up into Washington. So, do you change your products from Washington to here? Do you find that chain link is different up in Washington is down in California or Nevada or wood? It is a little bit um it all of the product lines are different and it even even in my market up here, you know, my branch services Idaho, Oregon, Montana, um into Nevada, Utah, and Washington. And the way our our builders do things up here is vastly different than how they do it down in California, Arizona, New Mexico, you know, um even out to into Texas where we where we get some of our stuff. So yeah, things things change a lot. Um, and even the type of fencing that we do, we do a lot more wood up here in the in especially over on the wet side. Hey everyone. By the way, do you see Susan there? That is what she's doing to me the entire time because she thinks I'm bor because she thinks I'm boring is why. So she does this just in a normal Zoom meeting. I'm in the middle of a meeting and I'm I'm trying to do there's like eight people in there. She's like, I'm like, what? Moving on. Susan, I know you guys. So, Terry, we will see you at the fence show um coming up in October. And again, I mean, I want to say one thing um about builders, too. You mentioned uh Gabrielle and and and Steve and everybody. Um that's still a core and this is perfect because all you guys are the the the core family-owned businesses here. You know what I mean? Right down to Yeah. It's pretty similar. Mark and uh Mary, you know, they're the the sons and daughters of of the people that founded the the builders and like just like JC Guri and stuff and and stuff. So, it's really cool to see that uh some of our old school companies are are industry are still out here and still supporting the industry, right? And uh getting involved. So, it's cool. So, thank you guys for that. And this you guys, I mean, come on, you guys. Uh you know, we're Karen and you guys, we're uh same thing, right? This is the hopefully first generation. You're going to pass this down to some more family that's going to take it over. And uh Rowdy, I don't know who's going to take over for you. So is going to live forever. So So everybody coming on and watching this, you guys, thank you. I know we're going on an hour here. I could do this for the next two hours and love it. But um we will see everybody um next week, same uh same time. We're looking at Thursday 3:00 Pacific time uh is the new uh the new show hours. Well, no. There's no such thing as Pacific's the only time zone you guys should all just start adjusting your clocks.

October October uh 5th to the 9th we're going to be in Las Vegas for the fence show expo 7th to the 9th and you can see all the people we were talking to today and many many more. Um a lot of stuff cool stuff. This is going to be I believe the most exciting show we've had and almost all of our shows I think are pretty exciting to start with. Right. Well, this one's going to um blow it out of the park. So, and it's because of all of you guys. So, and everybody that's listening. Uh Susan, I don't know if you had any last things you wanted to add, but I appreciate it. I'm just ready. I just I'm excited to see my family and all my friends. Can't wait. I'm the least stressed about this show. I feel like we've done it so many times that I feel like we're um not only ahead of the curve on registration, pre-registrations, and hotel room block, and it's like and it's like all the exhibitors are kind of getting lined up, it's just getting easier, and I'm less stressed about every little detail. um you know that's gonna happen. I know there's always something missing like there I thought they were going to put a banner over there or something but I'm the least stressed I've ever been going into one of our shows and it's because of all you guys. So thank you. You do a good job. You do a good job. Appreciate you everybody's listening. Thanks again. Have a good evening. We will see you guys next week. Bye guys. Adios. FWA, it's time to go full throttle. Fence show October 7th through 9th. Go to fence show. Go to fenceshow.com to register now. Make sure to check out our podcasts.