On today's episode of Gathering the Kings. Has always been my baby. I was born out of necessity, and I just have a love affair with it. It provided so much freedom and happiness, career happiness for me. I don't really foresee myself doing anything else. Opel got me through some really challenging times and, yeah, I'm still in the love affair with my business.
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 the good and bad decisions they've made along the way that give a true an 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. What's up, everybody? I'm Chaz Wolfe, gathering the king's podcast. I've got a fellow queen on the king stage today, miss Taradan.
How are you? Welcome to the stage. Oh, good morning. Happy Wednesday to you. Thank you so much for having me. I'm excited. I I get excited about these every time I do them, but specifically and uniquely with the Queen's, because there is a different perspective. There's a whole another way of thinking that you guys bring. So I'm open to Chaz. Tara, what kind of business do you have? I am the co owner of Opel Enterprises.
The name doesn't say too much, but what we specialize in is windows, siding, and doors in the Chicagoland market. We have 2 locations, and it's what we've done for the last 20 years. Siding windows and doors. Couple things have changed throughout there. Sometimes the added decks onto our service offering. We've offered roofing before, but now that we're a little bit more grown up and out of those teenage years, we've hyper focused on windows, siding indoors.
I I love the ability that you have to to niche or to mature into one offer or one little sector. I find that there's lots of you can niche at the beginning. You can niche late. Like, there's so much thought around niching down or offering more. It's so much different mindset. Maybe we'll get into that, but I'm excited to have you on the stage. I I'm sure that you are used to being in an industry where you're one of the only ladies in the room.
So you're gonna be able to carry yourself Just fine here today. Yeah. Unfortunately, I am still used to being asked Oh, which company do you work for instead of maybe asking what it is ideal. So, yeah, it's a little bit of a male dominated industry, but it's changing. I this tons of women in the in the industry. So it's Yeah. Exactly. Boss ladies are on the rise. Yeah. Well, I love it. You're paving the way 20 years in. I wanna know, Tara, obviously been doing this for a while.
You're super successful. Why are you still doing it? What's the bigger picture for you? I mean, Opel has always been my my baby. I was born out of necessity, and I just have a a love affair with it. So it's provided so much freedom and and happiness, career happiness for me. So I don't really foresee myself doing anything else.
I would like to see myself expand into other entrepreneurial avenues, but Opel has always been a hard spot for me got me through some really interesting times and, yep, I'm still still in the love affair with my business. I I I love how you say that because I think that we all have it or maybe once had it with with our business or different ideas, but it just makes it so like, thick and raw when you say it like Chaz.
Like, when you think of a love affair, it's like this, like, passion for this thing that you're, like, that you're really wrapped up in. And so, like, you but but you've but you've been doing it. Like, you've been fulfilling the passion. Like, it's just Is it just the passion, or is it is it, obviously, you got a lot of people, your family, like, what what what's really underneath there? Off lady. Like, it's like I mentioned, Apple was born. So I I actually call my business Obl.
The full name is Obl Enterprises. It was named Opel Enterprises in the very beginning because we just weren't sure what it was going to be, what it was going to format. Yeah. So I'm I'd actually call it Opel. Opel was born out of necessity. I mean, it saved It saved my livelihood. It saved my my mindset, my my energy levels, and I've put so many years into building a community for myself. So what I mean in that sense is I'm I'm from Colorado. Went to college here in Colorado.
Thought I was going to be an advertising Guru. I was excited to get out of my home state or at my hometown out of Colorado. And I took a leap and moved to the big city of Chicago. Unfortunately, right, right when September 11th happened. Wolfe. So a transplant into Chicago didn't have friends, didn't have family, and so also provided a huge community for myself because I built community. I built my coworkers. I built my team. I had a love affair with my early customers.
And so why do I do it today? Because it's still it's still is that for me. Now 20 years later, I have much more of a balanced life. But in the beginning, it was might be all due all. Still kind of feels like Chaz, even those things have evolved. Yeah. I mean, you your the your mindset in in all of this, I'm gonna I'm gonna try to dissect some of this, but you go to Chicago.
And where most people, again, like you said, feeling alone, feeling, like, a little bit destitute, a little bit, like, I don't know what to do here. You create a company. You start a company. Why why why was that the turn? Wolfe, it wasn't quite that turnkey. Out of college, I had followed a boy to Chicago. That boy is now my business partner, so we are no longer romantically involved, but he is my best friend. So but I did follow him to Chicago. I'm straight out of college.
In fact, I'm still in college finishing my internships, and then September 11th happened. And I really had grand dreams for myself that I was gonna at interview for advertising agencies, and I was gonna work at this really Hute, you know, advertising agency, rig, and mortar, sort of business. Yeah. And That's not the world that I entered into after college at all. There was nobody hiring. Really an it really was Chaz an exaggeration.
And and the few and the few that we're hiring, there was a thousand people. At least it felt like to me thousands people wanted that one job. So after really hitting the pavement for a solid, you're trying everything I could to get my foot into any business. I was literally crying outside of my doorstep when I lived in a very Polish community Chicago has so much wonderful diversity, and my partner is Polish.
And my neighbor, reneighbor saw me crying, male neighbor, and he was speaking to me in Polish. I knew enough. We we ended up going back to English, but literally what happened is he felt bad for me and invited me to go to his work the next day. He was a contractor and He bought materials from associated materials or all side. And literally took me in to where he buys materials introduced me to very Polish, very wonderful manager She hired me on the spot. Wow. And and that's it.
I sold siding and windows to contractors to Polish contractors. For two and a half years. And I'm a very outgoing person. I was trying to get my hands into anything that I could. I'll do your marketing pro bono. What can I do? How can I get involved? There really wasn't much for me to do, but the outside sales grabbed on to me and started taking me out field, seeing me to contractor showing me their businesses. I mean, I got to see the whole gamut in Chicago.
And with my marketing background, I'm always kinda doing a Watt Analysis. And I was just kinda keeping I didn't know it, but I was keeping track of things that people were doing great and things that people could be doing better in their businesses. Yeah. So I did have a child in this story, and My business partner, and I his name is BoiTech. We were parents at the time. We were finally feeling a little financially stable after me having a job for 2 years.
On the other hand, being a Polish immigrant was literally standing at gas stations in Chicago. For day labor. Wow. And he was getting picked up for day jobs and making connections. Anyway. Yeah. When we finally started feeling financially stable, I wrote my resignation letter to all side. And I took it to work with me and put it in my drawer, and I couldn't give it on Monday Chaz Okay. I'll give it on Tuesday.
And that's how the week progressed, and I never gave my resignation letter, and it was Friday. Oh. And I was like, Tara? Because I really lost my team. I mean, Maria, tomorrow's death. She was a huge giant in all side Chicago. She's given me everything. I loved her to pieces. I still love her to pieces. I couldn't give my letter. Over that weekend, I found out I was pregnant with my second second child.
So there were my dreams of, like, quitting this jobs so I Chaz go back to the advertising world. And when it so I didn't quit. But I did quit. I did resign because I was I was 26th and daycare costs. Yeah. I'll ways that I was making. So I did finally put in my resignation and between what I had learned and what Boetech had gained by being a day labor and making connection.
We decided to open up our own siding in Linda's contracting business because that's what we had just learned in the last 2 years. Yeah. And so Opel was born out of necessity. And so it wasn't quite as, you know, moved to Chicago state. That story resonates with so many listeners, I think that the necessity of, like, okay. Here we go is actually super relatable.
And so what courage that you have had even, and and for you guys to kinda piece it together, like the it's the basis of the American dream, right, to you kinda, like, fumble around for a little bit. You kinda put a couple pieces together, and then, boom, something happens because you paid attention. You put You made some good decisions. I would love to know, like, okay.
So you you got us to the point of the business starting, and, obviously, he had some skill set on on the interior of the business. You had some skill set on the marketing and the and the sales and the material side. Tell us, like, in that 1st, like, year 2, 3, Chaz 6 figure mark when the listeners, you know, where they are right now. Probably. Tell me a good decision that you made then Chaz you can look back and go, that's the moment or one of the moments.
I'm not sure if it was a good decision or bad decision, but we'll call it a good decision. I had done a SWAT analysis on how we could enter into the marketplace. So tell us what squad is. I I know, but tell us tell business. So it's an evaluation of strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats. Of the marketplace. So in in an and and and being in my twenties, I I wanted to learn how to position this this baby company.
And I knew from because I my dad was always an entrepreneurial I knew that I was not gonna be able to use his phrase, which was, oh, my dad's been doing this for 30 years. And so now I've taken over I knew that I did we didn't have lengths of time on our side.
I knew that we were not going to be able to be the cheapest, so we weren't gonna enter the market on a price point, but what I did understand is that we had no money, 0, and that people who did have money They shopped and and aweed me, and and I wanted and I felt like they they deserved a good experience And why should you exchange your hard earned dollars for a hair pulling experience?
And in the state of Illinois, and I'm sure it's similar in lots of states that in the state of Illinois, contracting has always been the number 3 slained about industry in a list of 10. We are now number 1 and have been for 2 years, but contracting is the number now number 1, complained about industry. So I wanted to enter the marketplace as a company that focused on experience and not commoditize what it was we were doing.
Yeah. Yeah. So give us the building blocks of what that experience looks like because I can tell you it's a common theme, building an experience as opposed to building a business off of price, Not that that necessarily the price is the wrong way to do it. I'm sure there's lots of people that have the discount business, but for ones like you and I, that value the experience, give us some of those key things that you built in.
Maybe not the whole thing, but maybe two or three steps in that experience that are just if you don't have these, the experience isn't there. 1st of all, it starts off the minute of a homeowner or anyone, a vendor, anyone, calls or e emails you. It's the way that you are appreciative and thankful. It's your tone. It's your gratitude. And even if you can't help that person or if it's not the right fit, still being very careful to preserve that relationship.
So I know it sounds simple, but we all know that when you call businesses, you either feel appreciated you don't, you either feel like, or wow. So I've always been able to focus on And I was a waitress through my college year. So I just appreciate the app tricks. Yes. And for me, they're genuine. But there is some theatrics in customer service. So the minute someone calls in, first of all, you need to have someone answer the phones.
And that was one thing that I noticed when voice mail analysis that so many businesses were letting customers go to voicemails. And so that was one thing that was not gonna happen. And that was a sacrifice for me because I 2 small children, but anytime the phone ring, I was there. I had a chipper smile in my voice, and I was so grateful that anyone was contacting us at all. And then you carry that throughout.
Of course, that sounds easy, but, making your sales experience feel like it's a consultation and a relationship, and we we benefit from getting girls from people who have never worked with us. And it's because of that kindness And then if a customer does choose you, I know that there's an exchange of money and a lot of times homeowners look at anxiety and return. Sure. So I wanted to be on the forefront of that.
So right away, I put into place that We would always be the company to touch our customer. They would never call us and ask, hey. What's going on So I put in some processes that we gave our cut we give our customers weekly touches. I mean, if we don't have anything to say, it's Hey. I I really wanna confirm that your color choice is amazing and how exciting. Hey. And did you wanna change your mailbox and just touch points so that homeowners don't have anxiety.
Yeah. And then after the project is done, making sure that they get a fleet walk through with complete satisfaction. And then it's not over it's not over. So I have put into place processes where I touch my customers every 6 to 8 weeks And I know that sounds like a lot, but they're just dimple little. How's your project? What do I need to know?
A lot of people will think that that's farming for services and complaints, but it's staying ahead of those those little things that can build into big nuances. So My experience, I guess, would be summarized as communication, and I know that's a common theme, but the processes I put into place as I make it so easy that my customers don't even have to look at my phone number. I'm already in their face. Yeah. I love that.
And and the one word that you use that that my team also uses or my teams is touch points. And if Probably right now, the listener knows these moments in time where he or she is or should be reaching out. But they probably haven't defined this process. And so defining it and I think if you spend the time because the you said you said you did this, but it it's I'm kinda digging underneath here a little bit. You sat down, I'm sure, and you just thought about all these touch points.
And you probably added several, like, oh, there's too much time gap here. Let me add a touch point. And even if you're adding a touch point onto just like you said, hey. We're just staying in communication with you. Everything is on track. We've got this color, that color blah blah blah. Like, all of that is part of the the overall experience. And so I think everything that you just gave is super practical.
I want the listener to literally understand this is service that seeks the experience, which then builds the business, like, without even you knowing it. You will have raving fans is what we call them. And you have to map it out. You have to really plan it out and and put it into play and and communicate to your team while it why it's important. Yep. Exactly.
If you have it written out, if you've assigned a person to own each touchpoint, if you've given that person training on how to own that touch point. Then and and then you communicate all that to the team? It happens. And, of course, you're not perfect. I'm sure you still get opportunities where you can get better. Right? Absolutely. Absolutely. And and one of the things that we put into play right away was 3rd party serving.
And once in a while, we'll get a homeowner who will say, like, it was a little too much communication, but, you know, that's once in a while where majority of people are think that they were kept in touch. It's it's a lot of anxiety that homeowners can sell. You're exchanging money for an unknown, especially in our industry where If you're a custom contractor and things can take 3 months, 5 months to come in. So alleviating anxiety was my entrance into the market. I love it.
Such a such a great decision that you're continuing to improve on. Let's flip the coin. Tara, tell me about a bad decision. That you can specifically note in time what will happen. As I was building my team early on, so hands on, I mean, This this business has just been my absolute everything. And my bad decision was I made a fabulous hire of an office manager, absolutely fabulous, and she was with me for 6 years.
And I I wouldn't say that I micromanaged her, but I was so in I was so in love with her. I was so concerned about her. I thought I was doing the right thing by structuring for a day, like, hey. You need to go. You need to squeeze your family. You need to get out of here. Thank you so much, but Go ahead and go now. When she left me after 6 years, her name is Curin. She let me know that I took away her career.
Then she came to me wanting to be an office manager and with hopes of being a general manager, and I just was never going to get out of her way. So I'm sad that I took away her career, but she taught me that When people come to your company, they have their own career goals and aspiration. And as business owners, we can forget that a little bit and be selfish. So that was a bad decision. It was not trusting that I had made an amazing hire.
And It's it's worth noting that administrative mindset people. They don't like to end their day at 4 o'clock. They need to do their processes and have a clean desk or clean Mine, so that could be 5 o'clock. That could be 7 o'clock 1 with your administration team. What feels good for them? Project managers, salespeople, those different mindsets. Oh, okay. So that was just a huge lesson that I learned.
And, unfortunately, because I've always go to conferences and Chaz owners, we learn to, like, care for your people Make sure Chaz they have a life balance, coach them. I thought I was doing a good thing by saying, you need to get out, go, don't work on Saturdays or something on Saturday. Right. And what I was doing Chaz I was robbing her of her career satisfaction. We didn't have that dialogue, which she needed.
I thought she was So just huge lesson to to back off and let someone have their career. I mean, what I mean, I I That's the first time I've had that specific decision shared here on the show. And I'll tell you, I share. I share that bad decision. I think as business owners like you and I who are capable. First off, we're capable. Right? We started it because we We had to. Like, of course, we were talented. We probably would have figured something else out, but in that moment, it was everything.
And so we learned everything. And we got good at everything. And when you come across another person that's talented, mixed with, if you're trying to care people, like, care for people like genuinely, It mixes that up a little bit. And so what what a I mean, I I think I'm taking back on that going, man, you're you're right. Chaz even think of folks on my team right now where I'm I've literally said, like, hey. It's 5 o'clock.
Like, get go on because I'm because again, same same mindset trying to trying to almost manage their life. And it's like, wait a second. Would I have wanted that if I worked for somebody? I would have told the guy, yeah, yeah, sure. I'll leave here in a minute. As soon as he left, I would've flipped the light back on and got back to it.
Yeah. I mean, as you become really close with some of your very key members, You share a lot of personal details, and I know that she had wanted to start a family and some things were important to her. And so I just was was overprotective over her. And I wish she would've had more dialogue with me. I was a young owner myself, but when she left me and it was a final decision, there was no changing her mind. She'd let me know Chaz, yeah, that I I I I stole her career from her.
So Yeah. Yeah. Wolfe, and and I think that the love of a good parent, right, we we we smother. Yeah. Well, we we we wanna hug him and kiss him and and my three year old son's, like, just Gorman, like, get no, Danny. I don't wanna give you hugs and kids. But that that's a that's a real thing even in business because, like you said, at the very beginning, it's your baby, it's your everything.
Yeah. And I'll I'll kinda tag onto that just real quick is that shortly after she left me, I had I had I've I made the hard decision to move back to my state home state of Colorado businesses in Chicago. And because of my experience with her, and we made new hires and new move on and everything.
But because of my experience with her, I might not have otherwise been given permission to my children, to my home state, and manage a business in Chicago, had it what had hadn't wouldn't have been for that lesson where she Let me know that people need their own career. So a lot of people think it's very strange that my business is in Chicago, and I live in Colorado, but be Chaz I was told, people need their own careers. They need their wings, ma'am. They they need their growth.
Of course, they want guidance and coaching and they want absentee owner. But that is the reason why I am able to run my business remotely is because of that lesson I learned. So good. So good. I get the same question. How do you have all these businesses in different states? And so I have a great team. Having a great team. Got a great team. I have a great team, and I stay in touch with them, and we have processes. I mean, we are a recipe.
I I one of the first things I teach people is I don't care for customer. Does a patio door? Or a full house remodel, you put the same ingredients into the cake, and every time our customer is gonna get the same wonderful result. So we have processes and great great people in place, and it's not easy. I mean, it's not so simple, but, man, I mean, The alternative was I was personally in my business 7 days a week. Yeah. I I just wanna oh, I got one last question on that topic.
Is the cake red velvet? I say it's more of a marble y mix of everything. We did. Stop. That's alright. I like marble cake. But I really like African reference? No. No. No. I treat. Nope. No. I just really like red velvet. Every every one of my kids' birthdays. I'm like, hey. So your birthday is coming up. Are we getting red milk? And for red velvet cake, Alexis's A 100%. Okay. I I one one question here I'm left on decisions.
I wanna know you you've given us quite a bit of mindset already, but I wanna know if there's, like, a principal or a process that you put decision making through. You've given us a good and bad. How do you kinda attack decisions nowadays as a successful entrepreneur? You have to think of what the outcome will mean in profitability. So when I have a decision to make, I'm I'm now at the point where I can try to evaluate where in that place into the profit profitability of company.
Yeah. K. And I assume that decisions around all the key factors of business, marketing sales, fulfillment, finance are part of that, but then also your members or, sorry, your team, your your clients, like, all of those decisions are coming through that filter for you? Absolutely do. And and I know it sounds a little selfish to save profitability, but, customer's not gonna benefit if your business is thriving and you're not there to service them in 2 to 3 years. So company has to be profitable.
So Yeah. I used to make a lot of decisions based off of what felt good or what my heart said. So now I'm trying to understand, like, yeah, this feels good, but will this benefit and profitability and so that I can be a thriving business for my community. Yeah. And I love what you said there, and I I I tried to tee you up, and you you took it. It was amazing. It's just a Shoot. Home run there. The listener who might be thinking, oh, well, the I'm I'm more concerned about whatever.
And and the reality is that you said that the if the business doesn't exist, you can't provide a good experience. And what I have found in my businesses, when we shortchange, or when we sell out of our own pocket, our own hand, if you will, and we try to give discounts or whatever, then it actually it leaves it leaves us, the team, everybody anxious, or not in a good place, which then we don't provide a good product. We don't provide a good service.
The the customer doesn't end up getting what they hope for. So it's a it's a negative all the way around. I love your mindset on that. Okay. So we're gonna transition to the speed round. I got a couple questions here for you. Are you ready to go fast? First question is this. Do we bill that entire business down for me? One trackable metric? What is it? I I need to start tracking my business based off profitability.
I've always been very interested in the cost of customer acquisition, and that's been ruling my my career. Looking like a true marketing expert. Yeah. But I'm going to be focusing more on profitability. Nice. Love that. My main KPI. Yeah. And and and per job per product, at the end of every month? Like, what what what are you thinking there? You know, I we we we know our numbers. Absolutely. And my business partner's fabulous.
So we know them by the year, quarter, the month, But I need to understand a little bit more per job because you give some. You lose some, and it all comes out in the wash I'm gonna be focusing more on profitability per project that we take on. Yeah. Yeah. You said at the very beginning, you've honed in to certain certain offerings. And so the next layer for you, it sounds like, is to be able to start maybe even declining certain projects.
Yeah. And I think that we are actually going to be doing some more. Especially at a time of recession, you kinda wanna pivot, offer more services, what else can we do? I actually think that our company is going to be honing in a little bit more and narrowing and, and and making the business simple and exact and precise and and it and and it's hard because you wanna offer a little bit of everything, but I think in my case, we're gonna narrow in a little bit more.
The the secret, which you already probably know, but I'll tell this one to the to the listener. You can dial into that one simple, or maybe it's just a couple of offerings. If you know how to go get customers. That's right. Absolutely. You can fill the pipeline with a, clients, Why bother with the b? It's it's only when you don't have enough a that you consider the b or the c or the d. That's right. Absolutely. Good at marketing like Tara is. Then those those are no worries.
Tara, what book would you recommend Chaz a 6 figure business owner read? I sound a lot about this, but It just my one of my stubborn books is 6 tires. No plan. Let me see if I've got the mister here by Michael Rosenbaum. And it's a story about Discount Tire and the man who started that business. And it is such a good read. It's so humbling. I mean, this man had enough enough money to buy 6 tires, and he started an empire out of this. Yeah. Wow. So it's one of my favorite I love that.
I have not read that. We'll put it in the show notes here, but I I'm gonna grab it. Yeah. It's just great book. It's very humbling. And I I am a fan of staying humble and knowing that at any moment, you could lose what you've built. So his story and I believe the owner is still alive, and see if anyone that used discount tire, they they're just absolutely epic on their customer service and that's the reason why.
Yeah. It actually makes me think of Shoe Dogg, the story about Phil Knight and and Nike. Oh, wow. Yeah. Almost exact same way. I haven't even read this book, but it sounds very similar from a from a story perspective. I mean, I think this man started his business with $12. No Joe. So it's the gray greed. Wow. So one day when I read your book and you didn't start with any, no, not even $12. Yeah. It's not even $12. Yeah. Love it.
Tara, do you intentionally network or mastermind with other entrepreneurs? Absolutely. K. And why? Because when our business was growing in 2009, we were, like, at that weird, gross, hard It's hard to reinvent the wheel. It it it it was hard. So networking, driving organizations, I mean, I'm a guru for through learning. I'll I'll sign up for any class or any conference that makes sense to me.
Sure. I'm a huge fan of time blocking, so I've been coached thanks to the organization that I belong to time blocks. So it's physically on my calendar Chaz time blocks where I need to stop what I'm doing and it's time to go down a rabbit hole or read what I said I was gonna read.
And and my business coach told me that if you make a date with yourself on the calendar and you break it, that's the same as breaking an appointment with a client or with the employee, and you would never not show up for a meeting or an appointment. So why would you break that date with yourself So time talking is huge for me. Networking, there's a there's a world of smart, smart, smart people, and I just love rubbing shoulders with people who figured it out.
And if you can bring me up with some I don't think I'll ever stop. It's it's a high for me. Yeah. I I relate I relate to that a 100% everything that you just said. I could I could feel that I was there with you in the in the in the Yeah. But there's some amazing people out there. My gosh. Yeah. Exactly. Okay. If you only had 1 hour each week to operate. What would you do, or how would you use that 1 week or 1 hour to to to be successful like you are now?
Wow. Okay. That's a question that I was paired for, but Yeah. I have been coached. So I belong to the certified contractors network. Amazing organization. I also belong a Maui mastermind, amazing organization. I hope to be a part of your mastermind that you have going on. I have been coached Chaz and I'm gonna get this wrong. It's the 1% I think I'm gonna get this the 1% that you I am super gonna get this. Okay. So we have so much to do on our day.
And then, like, 80% only produces 20% of your profitability, but if you keep pairing that down so if I had 1 hour per week, I would hyperfocus on that small per percentage of my expertise that actually brings the most value to the company. I I am so at the point in my career where emails are just a complete waste of time. And I I've got sticky notes all over my computer, and it's what are you doing right now that is making the business profitable?
So maybe I'm getting it wrong with the 1 but, you know, it's not even the 20 percent of your expertise that brings the greatest value. You gotta keep pairing it down and really hone in on way. You specifically uniquely bring to the company that no one else can do that will benefit. So I would be focusing, and they're called a level time or high level times, I would I would really hone in on what I do the best for Chaz company. Yep. I I love how you've answered that. I think you're spot on.
There, obviously, that 1% can look like a lot of different things. For you running a an extremely successful business states away already, I think, blows the mind of most people listening today because you this format, in order to get down to an hour, like I have in in multiple of my businesses, You have to you can't physically be there. First off, like, literally, you cannot be there. Maybe for the hour, but if if if you are are building systems and teams, you are in another state.
And so you physically have already done the the huge leg work of saying I need to I have to lean on other people, number 1, but then I'm gonna hone in on my skill set. I think your answer's spot on. Yeah. I like to think of myself as the the wizard of Oz. I'm the girl behind the curtain that's running Yeah. It's so funny that you say that. I have in in in in your phone, there in the emojis. There's a a silhouette of a person, of a guy, a gal, whatever.
And so for many years, my team used the silhouette as me. Yes. You're the man behind the curtain. You're the wizard of odds. Yeah. I what I love, really, is is the relationship piece. It mess mess so much in the operations. I'm I'm I can get down with some operations. I love systems. I love efficiencies. We can talk about it for days, hours, and I would stay up with you all night talking about it. How do I And go and go hard the next morning with no sleep.
But for me, I can pop in now and and and do the relationship thing because we've already built the systems. And and that that for me, isn't necessarily my go to skill set, but I've had to learn that value of, really, at this point, the mystique of of that character, is cool and all, but, like, they wanna they wanna know wanna know my family.
They wanna know when we, like, how the kids are doing and and all of those things too, which which only operating from a distance or in a certain, a time capacity you have to be really intentional about. I really love how you package that, Chaz. Really? I've got one last question here for you, Tara. K. If Opel was no more, What would you do? I think I would scrounge up some money and buy a tiny house and started tiny house rental business and build a a little empire off of that.
And I also have dreams of being a yoga instructor. The market is saturated right now, but in in my world, I'd like to be having my own yoga studio and tiny house until homes. Wow. Well, I I know a tiny home manufacturer. I know other entrepreneurs in your area, we need to do a deal. Like, We need to get in. Ready. I'm so ready. Absolutely. I've got I've got a short term rental experience where we're crushing it in the SDR space. Oh, wow. Yeah. That's tough. Absolutely.
They're just huge as a bet, and I've been wanting to do it for years. And then it's it's hard to pull the trigger because you get so Yeah. I mean, I've probably got so much to learn from you because you get so focused on what you do Chaz it's hard to diversify, but definitely definitely what we should be doing at some point. Yeah. At some point, that's the that's the key factor there. I think a lot of people listening here today need to hone in and do what Wolfe do what you described.
Yeah. Exactly. You gotta really just dial it in just as Tara has described here today. Tara, how can someone find you? I want I want them to be able connect with you, maybe do business with you, refer business to you. How how can they find you? Oh, we're we're fully online. So the name of the company is Opel Enterprises. To make that simple. If you look up Opel Exteriors, you'll get to the same same places. Pinterest is huge for us. Facebook and Instagram My name is Tara Don.
I'm attached to everything that you'll find with Obell. So, yeah, I'd love to connect with any of our listeners if And keep growing as a person. I love it. Tara, you have been extraordinary today. The the mindset that's that's probably the biggest thing that I'm walking away First off, I love mindset, and so I don't I don't often feel inspired necessarily by mindset because I feel like I've heard a lot. So your story and just like, the the dynamic of how you see things.
The rest I feel sorry for my later meetings today. What's up? I'm gonna be I'm gonna be on it. Just I'm gonna be in a love of a love affair. Yeah. And I love it, Sarah. And I love your energy, Chaz. I'm I I love your podcast. I I love what you're doing for us. Thank you so much for sharing your energy with me. I also feel energized for the day and inspired to keep growing. Awesome. You've been incredible. Thank you so much. We wish you nothing but success and all that you put your hand to.
Awesome. Thank you. 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 789 figure business owners is that 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 gatheringthekings.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.