On today's episode of Gathering the Kings. I had never felt so completely worthless Chaz a man, as a husband, as when my wife couldn't buy, like, a gallon of milk and some eggs for 11 bucks. Yeah. And that was a significant turning point in my journey with high voltage ink. Yeah. From that point on, from 2000 9 was probably when that happened moving forward. I've had a pretty big fire lit underneath me, and It really hasn't diminished a whole lot.
You are listening to Gathering the Kings with Chaz Wolfe featuring fellow 78 and even 9 figure business owners who have real battle scars from business and life, but have prevailed as the king that they are designed to be. We welcome high performing entrepreneurs to the stage in order to reveal the real of the real on what it takes to build a successful business today.
We dissect good and bad decisions they've made along the way Chaz give a true and accurate picture of the journey of success and how you too can get there. Through this dialogue, you will learn the value of growing your network and surrounding yourself with power players and keys like today's guest. Grab your pen and notebook because we're about to dive in. Alright. What's up, everybody? I'm Chaz Wolfe. I'm your host, gathering the king's podcast.
Today, I mean, all my guests are special, but today is a a little bit of a unique situation because I've gotten to know guy ahead of time pretty good a little bit here now. His name is Tyler Pratt, and I've he's got a story that's we're gonna get to here, but I just love the depth of the entrepreneurial thickness that comes with this story. So I'm I'm super excited. Tyler, welcome to the King stage. I'm so glad that you're here. Thanks for having me.
I really truly humbled and grateful for the opportunity. Yeah. Well, tell us what kind of business or in this case businesses that you got, brother? I have a power Online Construction business. We contract out to utility companies. We do all sorts of new construction, rebuilds, maintenance maintenance on high voltage power systems. Yeah. Also, I'm a drilling company.
We we do some drilling for foundations on heavy highway construction, large commercial construction, and also vertically integrate those drilling services into our power line projects. Right? Exactly. I love that. You know, the the guy that's up there high working on crazy stuff, you know, high voltage and up high in the air, like, you got multiple, like, high factors, high high intensity factors, you know, happening all at once. Right. Is this how you would describe yourself?
Like, high intensity in multiple areas? Chaz this how it all gets started? You know, honestly, not really. I'm I'm okay. Fairly reserved. Individual, I feel like, but I have a lot of motivation Okay. To succeed and to win. And Yeah. The trade of being a lineman is speaks to my soul. I love doing line work. I love being in the air. I love building power lines.
I like building all sorts of things, whether it's residential and houses or or anything that can be built from scratch from raw materials into something of substance I enjoy doing. Power lines may be at a higher level than the rest and that's why I've stuck with this and been involved at the level I am. But I I really enjoy seeing it go from a conceptual drawing to a full built power line of varying scope and size to complete energization of the of the system. Really, really cool.
Yeah. You have this unique ability. And and a lot of entrepreneurs have a a degree of this where you can literally see the end result before anything comes to fruition. Like, that raw material. And but but before it ever happens, you got to see it. Wolfe you say that over the course of time, and then we're gonna give you some of your story here, but that I'm just fascinated by some of this, some of this vision type thing.
That some entrepreneurs have, it have you grown in this area, or has that has that a skill set, this architect that kinda I can see it before it happens, Chaz that always been in you, or have you grown in that? I think it's grown incrementally. I think there was a spark of that initially. You know, but it's definitely been started with a little bit of nature, right, but it's been nurtured into Yeah. Yeah. Where I'm at today, for sure. Yeah. Your visions expand.
Your your your depth of your understanding expands. Yeah. That's right. That's right. And and as the listener should be encouraged as well, it doesn't have to you don't have to see it all up front. I even think I'm twenty four years old. I'm about to purchase my first franchise, you know, and it felt like a huge thing. You know, I'm spending putting $70, $80 down, buying a $500,000 business at twenty four years old. And I had no idea that I would have 7 of them 4 years later.
I I I wasn't even thinking like Chaz, but to your point, it it it happens or even snowballs quickly when you when you focus on growth or when you focus on maybe that next achievement, kinda going back to winning Chaz obsession with winning Chaz were just mentioning. I wanna know before we get into too much more at this level in the game, you've obviously been successful. The the listeners don't know some of the ups and downs you've been through yet.
But I know that at this level in the game, you've been through it. Why do you keep going? What? What's the what's the drive? What's the motivation that still in you after all that you've been through and all the success that you've gotten to now? Honestly, if I try to tie it back to one philosophy, for one motivation, it would be something my father-in-law told me a long time ago. He he passed away 10 or 11 years ago now at actually from injuries resulting from a horse accident.
Wow. And so he he passed away young. He was forty nine. Wow. Yeah. It was really a horrible tragic event for the whole family, but he was a successful businessman, and I remember him telling me one time it's okay to be happy with what you have, but never with who you are. And that's not from his self confidence perspective, you know, you you can be happy with who you are as a person internally. Sure. And you should be happy with what you have because it's not about things.
It's not about more and more stuff. Yeah. But with who you are as a person from a development standpoint, that's where you shouldn't rest. Like, you should work hard to improve yourself for yourself, for your family members, for your colleagues, for your friends, to become the best best version of you that you can. So I think that is probably what keeps me going. Is not the dollar bills, not the new equipment.
You know, I'd we'd love purchasing new equipment that we can put to work We love seeing the power lines go up. We love seeing satisfied customers, but at the end of the day, for me, it's really just I still got gas in the tank. I I want to be better. I want to use that fuel to move forward. Yeah. You know, there's I I wanna point this out for the listener because it it's such a simple point, but you and then, you know, one gentleman inside of the the mastermind group who you haven't yet.
I've connected you to him, Justin, but you guys both have this this very similar thing that I I've tried to exude myself, but I look up to both of you in this way. And I wanna just point it out listener. You you guys don't know yet a Tyler's revenue or the size of his companies, but let's just say he does pretty well. Right? He's obviously on the show here. He's at a certain level, but even in comparison to some of the mastermind clients that I have, I would say Tyler's on the on the bigger end.
It's not the biggest, but on the bigger end of revenue. But I'll tell you what, the mindset perspective that you came to us with is very similar to Justin who Chaz, by far the biggest revenue. Like, we could put all of us together when I'm gonna come close to him. And it's like, it's this learning spirit. It's this this ability to say, you know what? That doesn't really matter. The things, the revenue numb like, none of that matters to your point, I need to get better.
And when you can run with guys like that where the the the output or the result is like, okay. Cool. But, like, what's next? And when you have a guy like you who's maybe further on than maybe another guy who, but still, it kinda puts that to the side and says, no. Like, what can I learn from you? Chaz is just an incredible ability that not only you have, but I I've seen it in Justin as Wolfe, where, again, you know, it it's more of almost, like, a a a a a mature king perspective.
You're not new to this king thing, but you you renew this in your mind, like, over and over and over again, which I think is actually the spirit of the king. It's like, man, it's like, no. No. I don't wanna rest on laurels by at all, you know, by any means at all. So what would you say to that? I kinda I'm kinda putting something new in your in your your quiver here as far as I didn't prepare you for this, but but what are your thoughts on that?
Well, I think that comes as you go through the roofiner's fire of of being tempered and and heated and beaten and and you come out the other side, which none of us are fully out the other side, but there's cycles. There's evolutions of that. And, yeah, we've been through a lot of shift over the years. Yeah. But it makes you stronger. Right. You can't get stronger muscles If you don't break them down first and Yeah.
Your life in general or your your business life is absolutely follows that same analogy of you are gonna go through things that test you, that try you, that break you, and it's how you rebuild yourself and reinvent yourself and move forward. Yeah. It's important. So, yes, you you come out through these different cycles of growth with a different perspective, a mindset.
Yeah. I just I I mean, we could do the whole show, I think, on this topic, this this humility versus ego versus this obsession with winning and how do I how do I obsess over winning, but not have this kind of, like, arrogance ego. This whole topic is very, I think, relevant for the entrepreneur and even in today's world where things or the next achievement seems to be the, you know, the the the flashy thing to do or to talk about, but one last little dig here before we move on from this topic.
I wanna know, like, from that perspective of, like, arrogance or, like, the obsession of winning, but, like, you've been through the fire, as you just said. So Okay. You've been through the fire, meaning, like, you've been kinda knocked down. Are you are you insinuating that you thought differently before? Like, a little bit more arrogant, a little maybe a little bit more confident.
And then when you got kinda smacked in the face Chaz that that's giving you the different perspective, or what should the listener pull away from what we're talking about here? Yeah. You're right. We probably could go on about this for all day. But at at the end of the day, I tell my kids all the time Chaz they're pursuing different athletic goals. To get to it, you have to go through it. And Love that. That's all there is. That's the only secret.
If you have something in mind that you wanna get to, you've got to go through the myriad of obstacles of trials, whatever is in your way. Yeah. You can't go around it. You're not gonna go over it or under it, you literally have to go through it. And that process is what puts you in the right mindset to escalate your success. Yeah. Yeah. So good, man. I feel like we could just hit the stop button. We've got all the nuggets that we need. You've got the the the wisdom, man.
I just really appreciate that. I feel the same way. Even even though my journey in entrepreneurialism has maybe been shorter than yours, it's those moments where my my tea I had no teeth. I had been kicked fully straight in the face. I had no teeth, and it was like, woah. We need to we need to rethink this. And I needed to rethink maybe some confidence or some arrogance as probably more so was than confidence. And so I wanna I wanna I wanna take it back a little bit.
I want you to tell us kinda how you started. I know that this isn't your first start at business, but just give us a little bit of your journey from, like, when you get started in business to to now. Well, If I go back far enough, I I started mowing lawns before I could even drive. And so it was a huge pain for my parents to load a lawn mower and drive all over town so I could get out, unload the lawn mower and make $5 to Right. Mow somebody's yard. And and and my mom actually made me do that.
She would make me find yards I could mow, and I know she probably spent more in gas and time and hassle than the, you know, $15 I could make a day a few times a week. But Yeah. That was really my first taste of making money outside of a job because I always had summer jobs as well through parks and rec or coaching Tee Ball and I'm hiring games and up until I could drive. And then the the work became a little bit more labor intensive. And and I learned pretty early on.
If I wanted to do the things I like to do outdoors, hunting, fishing, camping trips, whatever it might be, like, Those things take money. As I entered the workforce after high school, I did a whole array of different oil field related jobs and pipelining and routes about work and just general labor. And I ended up meeting a gentleman that worked at the local utility company, he was a lineman, and we hunted and fished together didn't know what alignment was prior to meeting him.
And I thought, well, here's something I can do and not have to work in the oil field. Right. I have to work in the coal mine Chaz the little town I grew up in Northwest Colorado, those were really the options. Yeah. So I elected to look into being alignment. And from there, I I did a little vocational program in Grand Junction, Colorado at Mesa State, and long story short, I guess.
I've ended up owning my own power line business, and there's been a lot of, you know, in between since 1998 when I went to line school at the boutique to 2023. Yeah. That's right. How much in-depth you wanna Yeah. Well, you've you've hinted at it. I mean, you've built homes. You've you've been residential construction. I mean, you've you've you've got a lot of experience to your point. There's been a lot of touch points.
And so what what do you think drew you back to, you know, or or what drew you away from being a lineman working for someone to to entrepreneurship. Let me ask you that question first. What what what drew you out of the job? Sure. So I'll elaborate as I graduated out of the boat program, which was a 9 month program. I hit the road basically contracting chasing power lines all over the country. I did that for several years.
And then eventually move back home to the to Rangerly Colorado where I was able to get a job at the local u local utility as alignment. I thought that's what I wanted to do. I thought I wanted to go back to home and settle down and and and work there. But Chaz didn't really fit in. I didn't enjoy it that much. The work pace was completely different. The mindset was completely different.
I was used to just work work work work hours, hours, hours, hours, and at the utility Chaz was pretty structured. You know, you put in your 40 hours a week, and And so even the money that I was used to making from working all those hours was significantly reduced. Right. But I end up meeting a girl who was at the local community college and we dated and then ended up getting married. So I I stuck with the utility company there a couple years.
So she she could get her her degree and then left and moved to Southern Utah where her family was from. Okay. And that's when I started doing some general construction. Yep. And also started a trucking company to haul trailers that were manufactured in the area to the dealer network. And we ran both of those from, like, 2005, 67, and then in end of 2007, 2008, when that economy crashed, I was leveraged pretty heavy into building into the building business, which fell flat on their face.
And Yeah. Completely wiped me out to less than 0, ended up filing a bankruptcy, lost everything except for my wife's vehicle through the bankruptcy, we basically could keep Chaz, but lost a home, lost ATVs, lost camper, lost trucks, like, everything. It was Yeah. It was gone. It was horrible.
Also lost any type of retirement account that I had for my previous years working for contractors and then the utility soaked up all that money just trying to meet obligations from being over leveraged the businesses I was trying to grow when the revenue stopped. Right. So literally hit rock bottom or maybe just a little bit lower than that. Yeah. It was about a year after yeah. Yeah. About a year after my oldest daughter was born.
Wow. I had one one kid and roughly during that same time frame, another one on the way. So I had a lot of motivation to figure it out and find a house, rebuild my life, start over financially. I was 30. Exactly. And it was a complete reset, only this time. Yeah. I mean, as you start as a teenager, you don't have anything anyway. So not really reset, but I'm hitting a complete reset now with a wife and a kid and another one on the way.
And I needed to dig down deep and figure out what I was gonna do. I didn't necessarily always love the residential building and the trucking company ended up being more of a pain than it was probably worth, but I learned a lot Chaz actually became value in my power line and my drilling business because they're so DOT compliance related. That's right. But going back to trying to figure out which direction I'm going. I wanted to get back to line work.
I didn't necessarily wanna just go back to work for utility, and I really with a wife and kids. I didn't necessarily wanna just hit the road and be gone all the time. Yeah. So I started high voltage ink in 2008. With nothing. I had my climbing gear that's in my bag and some of my tools and a truck. I basically borrowed for my dad, printed some stupid business cards that smeared every time you touched them wrong. And just tried to get out there and do little projects.
Yeah. I remember it would have been somewhere maybe a year or so after I started high voltage. I was out on a little project and away from home about 6 or 7 hours, and my wife called me just crying and crying from the store. And I was like, well, what's going on? And I had ignored her call a couple times because I was busy and Yeah. And but I knew it was important. She kept calling me. And she's crying, and I ask her what's going on.
And she's like, I'm at Albertsons trying to buy some groceries. And the debit card won't clear. And at this point, we didn't have credit cards. They were all wrapped on. And I'm like, well, how much is the charge? And she's like, it's $11. She's like, I'm buying mail and some eggs and Yeah. The basics. Yeah. Like, very basic. It was $11. And I got that call call that we didn't have enough money to cover, you know, $11 charge. And I, I mean, I was working.
I but things hadn't really came together. Yeah. And money was always tight because I was still actually that was prior to actually filing bankruptcy after everything collapsed. I didn't wanna file bankruptcy. I try to meet those obligations for as long as I possibly could, but it soaked up every Everything. Available dime I had. Yeah. So for me, that was insanely powerful catalyst.
I had never felt so completely worthless Chaz a man, as a husband, as when my wife couldn't buy, like, a gallon of milk and some eggs for 11 bucks. Yeah. And that was a significant turning point in my journey with high voltage ink. Yeah. From that point on, from 2000 9 was probably when that happened moving forward. I've had a pretty big fire lit underneath me, and it really hasn't diminished a whole lot.
Yeah. There's been some level of comfort here and there and things have changed to where I don't have to be on the road a 100% of the time chasing work. But that comes with the larger burdens of management of, you know, teams. Companies and contracts and or and employees and everything. So Yeah. Wolfe. From there, we just continued growing. Like like you mentioned earlier with your franchise, you know, you I didn't have that vision that you pointed to.
When you first started, I I started out with myself with some temporary help on a weekend when I could get some of my linemen buddies that worked at other power companies to take a day off or on a Saturday to come help me and run with that up until the point that I could have a week job, you know, a week long job to Right. To a month long job.
And those were jobs just tried to stitch them closer and closer together and to the point where I could eventually afford to buy, you know, some line equipment like a bucket truck and a digger truck, the things that we commonly use to build power lines. Yeah. And then finally got to where I had one full time through. And the customers liked it. To react it well. We want to provide a good service at a fair price and do a good job, kind of our tagline for our businesses line work done right.
It's not complicated. Right. That's what we wanna do. Yeah. And we've grown off of that model you know, we've been all the way to a 135 employees, and we're back down to in that 75 to 80 range currently. With some growth projected this year to be in that 85 to 90 range. And and that's we've been everywhere in between, multiple times through those growth and and cycles.
From started with with me to one crew to, you know, 20 something crews or 30 crews all the way back down in 2017 to just a couple crews due to some bad luck or bad incisions. Yeah. Yeah. Exactly. Yeah. The the vulnerability that you have to be able to share those moments, I think, is incredible. I don't wanna pass over just the the weight of 2 things. Number 1, the moment, obviously, with your wife, like, woah.
I mean, I I every first off, I know every man listening was, like, came to grips with themselves as you were talking Chaz, like, But any any human, you don't have to be a a male to to feel that moment. I I Wow. Then the fire that that put in you is obviously, like, something that has not gone out at, to your point, I guess my my that's the the the perspective I wanted to to to have for listener, but then the question is, how have you kept that? Right?
So you just described Chaz was you know, years ago. And even since then, you've been up and down and up again. So how have you kept that specific maybe moment or that burn through great times, lean times, or even now, like, you're projecting more growth again. Like, how do you hold that close? Just the result to never go back to that. I don't wanna ever have that phone call again.
I don't wanna ever go through nonstop creditors calling and talking with attorneys, like, maybe it's just from a good memory, but it's imprinted in there pretty well. And Yeah. I learned a long time ago. The school of hard knocks is a great place to learn, but only a full continues to attend. So Don't do things that are gonna put you back in that situation. Yes. They were valuable learning experiences. You dig deep. You find yourself.
You figure out just how, you know, strong your internal metal really is. Yeah. But you don't necessarily wanna spend a lot of time there. Yeah. I'd, again, simple, but so profound. The great place to learn, but only the idiot keeps keeps attending.
How have you been able to as you've grown and and even, like like you said, we've been up and down several times since then, employee range is what you were giving, but, obviously, that means that that just there's cyclical nature to business up and down in growth and and teams and you build them and you lose some people and there's there's a cyclical nature. Right? How do you how do you keep that knowing that those things are gonna happen just over the course of time?
Ideally, we're on an upward trajectory, but we still go through these these flows. How do you keep them perspective through those things? The the perspective of I don't wanna go back to the hard knocks, but knowing that there's gonna be maybe lean times or or difficult times still yet to come, but it's not necessarily going to the hard knocks. Like, I wanna keep maybe habits or certain things that you said, like, I don't wanna go back to those things. So I wanna do things differently now.
What are some of those things? Maybe maybe it's a habit, maybe it's a certain way of thinking about money or growth, like, anything that you can deposit for us there? When it comes to money, I remember a quote from Zig Ziegler a long time ago, and I love it. And he says, money isn't everything, but it definitely ranks right up there with oxygen. And that is true. To prove the point, if you don't think it's true, just try living without either one. Like, you can hold your breath for a while.
Sure. But it ain't very fun. You might live without money for a little while, but it really ain't very fun either. Yeah. So not quantity of money is my motivator, but money in general so that I don't have to go back to not clearing the $11 debit card charge. Right? Right. Right. Other habits are just going to include a lot of discipline, self discipline.
Like, there's been times that we've done well financially, and the money's rolled in, and it's easy to maybe let up off the throttle a little bit. But You don't. You buckle down. You get smarter. You use all those hard knock lessons that you've learned in the past to course correct and and move forward. I think throughout anybody's journey, there's all these small failures, sometimes on a daily basis. Right. Those don't need to be complete losses.
Those are simply opportunities to course correct. And coming back into the center of your path to success, you have to continually reset those parameters on that on that path or on that internal compass to not deviate down any of those paths too far. Yeah. Yeah. And that compass is designed or, like, literally created or built at sea going through those those moments that you are experiencing at the school hard knocks to your point. Right. Right. That's so incredible.
I think that the listener, I mean, I hope that they're as engaged with the story as I am because I've even heard most of this once before, and I'm still like, give me more. Give me more. I think I should go back and listen again because I think just if every on if any entrepreneur is is just a aware of the cyclical nature of business. There's this, I think, healthy fear, really, of, like, man, it might all come crashing down tomorrow.
Now it ideally, we we build systems and teams and things in place where it doesn't just crash tomorrow Chaz there would be indicators and we could we could catch it or, of course, correct, to your point. But there there is this balance that I think that we have of, like, this ego and driven and money and, like, let's go, but then there's this, like, but, like, I, you know, it could all it could all be taken away.
And so it it Chaz sometimes that pushes us further into the driven and gotta make sure Chaz happens even if we have a bunch. It keeps us focused on, you know, maybe the activity as opposed to the result because to your point, sometimes you can have a a fat time And and if you enjoyed the the fat time too much, then, yay. Don't have me left over for the lead time. Would you add anything there before I move on? I I think I think the risk reward spectrum can shift and Yeah.
When I started, I had nothing to lose, like, literally. So my risk factor was high. I mean, I would do anything and everything and take on anything I could. And I I didn't ever overpromise and under deliver. Right. I would just overpromise then figure out a way to deliver. Right. So I think as the business Chaz grown or as anybody's business grows, your risk reward spectrum can shift slightly.
You know, I take less less risks today or more managed risks today than I did all, you know, back then when I had nothing to lose, do have some things to lose. So I'm more managed in my approach for what we wanna take on. And I can contribute our one biggest downfall in the almost 15 years of of high voltage ink. Was taken on a project in South Florida in 2016 2017 where we didn't get paid for almost 80% of the work we performed. Wow. And it was significant amount amount of money.
Was subsequently 2 years later won the lawsuit, but Chaz was 2019 to this date. We've still never seen a dime. Wow. So, yeah, we we've Chaz was And you had to pay your guys and you had to pay for all this. I mean, you you fronted you. Yes. Yeah. In fact, what we were actually paid for the work that we we did bill. What we received was less than half of my payroll alone.
And I had massive rating costs, massive payroll tax liabilities, long term leases on facilities in Miami and Fort Myers and Bradenton, Florida end up having 3 offices down there. Wow. And the issue wasn't the amount of work. The work was there. The issue was we were working through a a broker of a contract that simply refused to pay us and Yeah. We weren't only one. We were there were 6 or 7 other subcontractors like us that also didn't get paid.
But that's one of those lessons that that's actually the biggest, the only significant interruption to our upward growth trajectory from the day we started. Yeah. Yeah. But you wanna talk about, I mean, it all comes down at some like, what what goes up must come down, and and you just happen to have a really big down. I mean, I don't know if the listener really just heard you, but, you know, for for for a long period of time, you paid out a lot of money and and then didn't get paid.
And so there there are a lot of reason to be frustrated. A lot of reasons to quit. A lot of reasons to roll over. A lot of reasons to probably just say, you know what? Forget this whole thing. I'm gonna go work a job again. Right? Like, I have so many reasons, but you didn't. Why? Well, I remember it would have been in 2009, I had the opportunity.
It was after I started high voltage ink, but I was having a hard time attracting work and customers and even having the appropriate insurance and Right. And I I had a job offer from a major oil company to be kind of their ignment on staff specialist Yeah. For some power system that they owned, and it was a lot of money. Like, they were offering me a lot of money. And I ended up turning it down because I had this vision of wanting to just go to back to work for somebody.
I wanted to start I'd already started high voltage ink. I wanted to pursue that and grow it into what it was, but for it took me 3, 4, 5 years of growing that business before I could replace that income from that job offer that I turned down. But through that whole process, I remember coming across teddy Roosevelt's quote, the man in the arena.
And I probably can't say it verbatim anymore, but it's basically I would rather be out there fighting the good fight and and be the man in the arena than somebody watching it from the stands. And I felt like I was in the arena trying to grow and develop high voltage ink. And even if I failed, it was gonna be a better path for me than taking the easy way out and just going and getting the job.
Yeah. Yeah. I I I think most entrepreneurs, you know, agree with you that old saying of I'd rather work a 100 hours for myself than 40 for somebody else. I think it fits along that line, but we have this we have this, you know, like you said, you're you're either in the game or you're not, and the the game for us is you know, where you have your name on your jersey.
I I I think about many times in the past, I've had lots of friends over the years when I when I when I had a job or or when I was a business owner, both, because before that, it was just sales and it was same mindset. I felt like even though I was working for somebody, they'd, you know, hey. Did you catch the game Sunday? Or, hey. The chief the Super Bowl or what you know, whatever. Right? I'm like, no, man. I didn't I didn't. Like, how? How did you miss it?
I'm like, You know, the last time I checked, there's nobody with the last name Wolfe on the on the Jersey. Like, I I like I like I like wearing the jersey with Wolfe on the back. You know? And that doesn't say chiefs on the front. I could tell you that much. It says gather in the Kings or, you know, for a long time, it was edible arrangements only. Or maybe it says real estate or whatever jersey I'm wearing, but on the back, it says Wolfe. And I'm building I'm building this thing.
I'm in the game, like you just said. So I just think that there's a there's just a a deep appreciation that not only I have for you in saying that, but I think the listener, hopefully, can appreciate. And maybe they've even had those moments too where they've been offered that that easy way out or that, like, safety net. Like, let me throw you let me throw you a bone here. And, man, it's so tempting to be able to just say, you know what? It would be so much easier.
Yes. But we wouldn't be wearing a reason. I think some of the reason I made that choice was after my whole world collapsed and had to start over in 2008. Yeah. I was digging deep to find inspiration to find knowledge. Yeah. I truly believe that Wolfe education, Trump formal education any day of the week if it's applied with a good work ethic. But I had a subscription to success magazine. At the time, I couldn't afford it. But every month, that that came, there was a CD in it.
And I would put those in, and I would listen to those recordings and read read those magazines very, I mean, consistently, I was searching out that type of information. And I feel like that gave me the foundation or the base or the understanding to wanna move forward and be successful. Again, even though I've had a couple of businesses that have previously failed, I didn't I didn't wanna give up.
So I think that was one of my key motivators back back then there, to my knowledge, there wasn't podcasts. There wasn't Right. Any much information on the internet, you know, in in 2008 in in in this regard. So, yeah, right, today, they're so much social media. There's so many influencers. There's so many ways to to get that similar information, but but back then and I still have a lot of those success magazine with those cities. I love what they're valuable to.
Yeah. I there's a it's the it's the it's the the treasure box. Right? The Right. The items that you hold on to forever. I have a couple CDs. I even have a couple of tapes, believe it or not. I'm I'm definitely not old enough to be able to say that, but, you know, I I had some tapes given to me when I was a little bit younger and and I don't know how to play them now, but but I've listened to them before. I do have Jim Ronan and Zig Ziegler tapes, and I Really?
Stude, I I haven't listened to him for a long time because There you go. I don't even have a cassette player either, but I have. Exactly. Yeah. We'll hold on to them for our for our our kids and grandkids. And they'll go, what is this? And you go, you know what? Let me tell you a story. Yeah. Maybe some museum will want them somewhere. Yeah. Exactly. Exactly. Alright. I'm gonna go to our speed round here. You've given us already so much.
I'm I'm curious to hear your thoughts in your business, actually, in your businesses, I'm curious to see if it would be the same. What KPI is the most important, or if you only had to pick 1 or it could only could pick 1, What would you dial in on? Profitability. K. Again, I'll go back to that quote by Zig Ziegler. You know, money isn't everything, but it ranks right up there with oxygen. You simply can't breathe without it, and you can't survive in business without money.
It Yeah. Plain and simple. And it's great if you wanna do great big numbers in revenue, but if it costs you every dime of that and more to run it, you're not gonna be around very long. That's why there's such a high failure rate in small businesses. So I would say profitability. Yeah. Make sure you're making money and make sure you're okay with making money. It sounds like that's part of what you were just saying.
You didn't really say it like that, but just the okayness of, like, it's okay that I make a profit. Right? Right. Yeah. That come from you digging it out, finding who you were, your value, if you will, or is that just numbers and business?
Well, I'll I'll be honest when I first started in business for myself, I did have a really hard time charging people, whether it was when we were doing general construction type work or or, you know, eventually on the power line, I mean, I knew I had to charge people something, but I hated that side of it. I hated the fact that I had to do something I love to do and go charge somebody to do it. I didn't like that part of it. So it did take me a while to come to terms with that.
And then, obviously, as your business grows, that amount that you have to charge, increases, but also your knowledge and your resources that you can provide have also increased. Yeah. So I don't have as hard of time. My mindset is now change to like, no, we provide a lot of value and solutions for the customers we work for. Yep. And this is what it takes to get that. Exactly. Yeah. They're buying they're buying all of your ups and downs. Right? They don't Yes. They don't have to experience them.
They get they get you. You you have the knowledge and experience of both of those? Yes. And collectively, our team and our managers and our our employees and our linemen, like, Yeah. You know, I have some linemen that have been in the trade for over 40 years. Wow. There is a lot of value and knowledge there. And that had took a while to attract those type of guys because for the first, you know, several years.
I was the most knowledgeable lineman, and I was the lead guy in the field and in the office. Right. I think 2014 was the 1st year I personally actually took a paycheck every pay period. That was a big step for me. So it was roughly 5 or 6 years into the business when I, myself, got a paycheck every pay period of the month and didn't have to carve any out to make sure the other guys got paid. And but I was wearing all those hats of everything for everybody all the time.
And eventually, as we stabilized and grew and and had a good reputation. Now all of a sudden, now we're getting some more of those experienced people, which, guess what, our rates went up. But like you said, now the customer is getting a lot more effective and efficient product, so to speak, which is our labor. Yeah. Exactly.
Yeah. I just the value, the the word value, and you said it best, being okay with that even though we love to do this, even though we were experts at this, the value that's being brought is what's being purchased So I I love that. What book would you recommend? Or I know that you're a big eater of all things of of a self development. So what maybe resource would you recommend? Well, it may surprise you, but it's not really self development.
It's for system based, and it's profit first by Mike Michalowicz. Yeah. Great book. Don't know if you've heard of that, but that for me, I coming out of our Florida disaster when we were shorted an insane amount of money and I was having to find ways once again to rebuild and similar to 2008 when I dove into the success magazines and and CDs and information in 2017, 18, I did the same thing and started over. And I remember reading, you know, attraction by Gino can't remember his name.
Yeah. Okay. Thank you. And then the prophet first by Mike Michalowicz, and that really opened my eyes to the fact that profit is first because if you don't have profit, there's no long term company. There's no opportunity for growth and that shifted my mindset potentially then into where I am now with the value added perspective of of your rate structure. Yeah. So I would recommend anybody. I wish I'd found the book sooner.
I would recommend for anybody that's just starting or looking for some growth, read profit first, and implement that system. It's made all the difference in the world for me and the way I handle the money. Love it. Love it. Money is a big deal. How you handle it is even a bigger deal. And you put those two things together. It can be disastrous, or it can be very, very, a well oiled team to your point as far as systems go. So I appreciate that.
What are your thoughts on intentionally networking or masterminding? Obviously, I'm a I'm gonna I'm gonna nudge you a little bit here. I know you're new gathering the Kings, but there was a reason why you wanted to join us. I'm curious to know networking in your past, Master mining in your past, even now with being new to, gathering the Kings Masterman. Well, I think why I'm joined together in the Kings and being part of this group is I've never done any networking of any significance ever.
So for me, the next path on my journey or the next step, I wanted to be able to get involved with that networking mastermind type venue and and see what one I can offer, but, 2, what they can offer me. Yeah. And in some ways, you know, maybe I think a lot of us we always hit a a ceiling in in our growth and our development, whether that's an actual ceiling or a perceived ceiling. But I think these networking groups and can help break through that ceiling.
Yeah. Yeah. One little mindset nugget from some guy. He just spit it out in like normal, and it just rocks your brain. Right. He doesn't even know. You walk away with a whole new perspective, and and nobody ever even knows. It's it's it's actually pretty incredible because I've had many of those moments even myself. So I've got a question for you around family, and then and then we'll we'll bring it to a close here, but This is a new question that I'm asking this year.
You know Chaz, I've got a little bit of a of an angle here this year. I'm I'm the business, of course, the mastermind, yes. Like, I'm all about strategy and growth and personal development, but family is just as important marriage And then, obviously, our kiddos and and the parenting of those kiddos.
And so my question to you is all throughout these years, your your successes, your downs, your ups, you know, even that moment when your wife called and there wasn't even 11 bucks in the account, have you been able to be obsessed about both? I don't like the word balance. What I like is going after hard because that's that's what we do when we actually want something that that dialed in winning spirit that you talked about earlier.
So how have you gone after your business hard winning and your marriage and your kids. I agree with you. I don't like the word balanced. Because balancing creates the opportunity for you to tip one way or the other at the drop of Chaz. That's true. It doesn't take very much. I mean, balance to me is you're standing on this little peak and the wind blows a little bit. You're gonna fall off one way or the other. So I don't like that term either.
And, again, that's been a changing concept or reality for me early on. Remember, as I started high voltage in 2008. I had a one year old daughter. My son was born in 2009. I had a another daughter that was born in 2012, and then my my last son was born in 2014. Wow. But I pretty much hit the road and was away from them and away from home from 2011. Through 2016, like, 75, 80, 90 percent of the time. Yeah. So there wasn't a lot of balance there.
My balance or my perspective on that And this may not be for everybody. And I had the conversation with my wife a lot, but I knew that I needed to do What I had to do to set the foundation for this business. Yeah. At the time, even if it meant missing their first steps and they missed their pre school graduation, and I missed this. And I missed that because I did. I missed all that. I missed birthdays. I missed holidays, but, I had a bigger purpose.
And I knew that as they got older and involved in sports and involved in high school, I mean, that's when I really, really wanted to have some more flexibility to be part of their lives. Right. And I think if it comes down to new term balance I looked at it more that way. I would rather miss this part of their life than this part of their life. And I chose to do a lot of the hard things as early on in their lives as I could Yes.
To to be able to do the things back then that I didn't necessarily wanna do so that today, I could do the things I wanted to do. And it you know, I'm still out of town a fair amount, but I am more flexible in in my scheduling and and I can work around some of these baseball games and basketball games, the volleyball games, and dance competitions, and because they do it all, and it's busy. Yeah. There's a lot of them.
Yeah. Yeah. And as far as my wife goes, you know, it it caused a lot of struggles and issues, especially early early on. She's, you know, wanted to have couple of little kids and wanting to have more kids. I'm like, are you are you crazy? Like, I'm gone all the time. Are you really wanna handle this? Like, you you take this on. And she's like, yeah. I I do. And after kid number 3, I was sure that we were done. And she, like, an hour after delivering kid number 3. And she's like, we're not done.
I'm like, I'm done. I'm like, she's like, no. We're not done. I'm like, okay. So That's funny. Of course, a couple years later, there's kid number 4, but she was able to take that on and was able to Support me. I mean, we had our differences, and we had our issues. And when did you miss a birthday and you missed the pre school graduation, there's probably a conversation, but overall, was very supportive because she trusted me. She didn't see the bigger picture, not at all.
She trusted I saw the bigger picture. Right. And that was important. Yeah. Yeah. And that's so difficult sometimes because we see the bigger picture, but we don't necessarily know all the steps. Right? So we're trusting and believing ourselves And then you have this other person that we deeply care for, obviously, Chaz our wife or spouse. And, you know, just for them to be able to, like you said, I guess, take the leap of faith even more so to to to be able to support is a is a big deal.
So thank you for sharing those things. I think that, like, all of our stories are a little different as far as, you know, how we apply those things, but it's it's important for me this year to really start pulling that out of successful entrepreneurs because I think I think it's important. And and there's no right way, but I think that it has to be something that we talk about. And I I love to have what you said. It was a conversation that you had repeatedly with your wife.
And I think that a lot of high achievers are gonna gonna lean towards that delayed gratification and say, hey. Look. I just spend a little bit of time doing the right things then it's gonna set us up. And so I just like talking to guys like you that have actually gone and done them because there's a difference between saying, let me go do these things, and it'll set us up, and then you're always in that mode. Right? Like, I've just we're we're we're gonna, like, I'm just I'm still setting it up.
I'm still doing it. I'm still I'm still there. Like, there's just a bunch of talk, not a whole bunch of action. So just super excited for, for not only our, like, personally, for me to to know you better, but just to watch you continue to operate in that because it's it's inspiring. Last question here for you. Tyler, I wanna know if you whispered in the young Tyler's ear. What would you say? Don't give up.
Maybe it sounds cliche, but that philosophy, that principle right there is absolutely true. It's simple, but it's true. And you just you have to keep working. I remember If you have time for one more little story Wolfe love it. Just came to mind. I haven't thought about this for, I don't know, I'm 44 probably haven't thought about this for 30 plus years. Right? So I remember Chaz a a kid, I would stay pretty much all summer long with my grandparents on the farm.
K. They had a nice place and Chaz they had all these roads between their house and the out buildings and the chicken coop and the tractor shed and the green ries and And there was an old gravel pit on the hill above their home that had been abandoned a long time ago. Well, my grandpa was adamant about keeping a nice sand like, base on all his roads so they weren't muddy. Well, at this old crushing pit, there was all this reject sand left over. And that there was no tractors.
So, I mean, he had his agricultural tractors for the field, but nothing to move sand with. So he would have us kids. Drive as little kids, 8, 9, 10, 12, a even that's my I was a teenager. I remember doing it every spring and summer. We would go with shovels and we would hand load sand into the back of a pickup. We'd drive it back down off the hill, and we would hand spread sand back out on his road and maybe use a rake a little bit. And I remember my first recollection of doing Chaz.
I couldn't have been very big. And I remember complaining that I was tired of shoveling sand into the truck. And my grandpa has a tremendous work ethic. Yeah. He's ninety Chaz, almost 93. He's Wow. Seal is incredibly active and Wolfe outwork most people. But, yeah, he he told me he said, If you're tired, don't quit. He's like, just change the way you're doing it. I'm like, it's shoveling. Like, how do you do it different?
He's like, well, you can shovel you know, with your left hand and you could shovel with your right hand and you can do it like this and you can step on and shovel with your foot and dig deep and throw it in front of you. He's like, and then when you get tired of one of those methods, then go back to the first one. He's like, there's no need to quit. Just change the way you're doing it.
And I think that that's been ingrained in me all along because there's times I get tired of the grind and Oh, yeah. Chaz doesn't mean you stop. You don't quit. Yeah. So, you know, just change directions a little bit. Change focus for a minute. Do whatever you have to do to keep going and ignore some of the negative and ignore the the burn in the left shoulder and focus on the right shoulder for a little bit. So So profound.
Tyler in all seriousness, how could you not tell that story, what wisdom, and I'm I'm just thankful, man, that you would share that that you would remember that after all these years. I that just got deposited into into a part of my brain that I'm gonna try to use. And even for my own children. So the legacy of of Grandpa lives on, I promise you. At least at least with me and my kids, it'll it'll be So Tyler, you've been incredible. How can the listener connect with you?
Maybe maybe they are connected somehow to power lines or drilling and and they need your services. Or they're just an entrepreneur and they wanna pick your brain. How can they email or phone? My my email is t pratt@hvipower dotcom. And my phone number is 435-632-4298. So There you go. You're welcome to call me, text me, and I'm love to help. Love to talk with you. Whatever we can do to work through. Awesome, man. You truly embody what it means to be a king in many, many ways.
And so thankful, selfishly, thankful to know you, but as also awesome to be able to share you today, with all the entrepreneurs listening. So, again, thank you for being here. Blessings upon blessings on your family, your kiddos, your wife, of course, your team, your business, looking forward to running hard with you in 2023. Thank you for being here, brother. Hey. Thanks for the opportunity, Chaz. Take care. Yep. Thank you for listening to gathering the Kings today.
I hope that you were able to pull out a few nuggets to go apply into your business right away. More importantly, though, I hope that you're realizing that it takes more to be successful than just being by yourself, doing it all on your own, carrying the weight all by yourself.
What I have realized, not only in my own journey from multiple business and multiple different industries and now interviewing literally over 2 or 300 other very successful 7, 8, and 9 figure business owners is Chaz It's tough to do it alone. And so gathering the Kings literally exists to bring together successful entrepreneurs. In fact, we are putting together 1 1000 kings, specifically who are grateful, but not done.
We're intentionally assembling kings who fight tooth and nail for their business, family, and communities, and here's what we believe Chaz in the pursuit of excellence in those areas, that it ignites within us the responsibility to govern power and forge a lasting legacy. So if that relates and and resonates with you and you know that you need people around you sharp qualified other very successful business owners. I want you to go to gathering the king's dot com.
I want you to take a look at what we're doing and see if it makes sense for you to be part of our pursuit to 1000 kings. Talk soon.