On today's episode of Gathering the Kings. So how does an entrepreneur be open minded, but also protect what they believe is right for their business because There's not a lot of people rooting for us. Am I just being entrepreneur who's overly optimistic or might be real about the cost, the risk, or there's a time to strategically have a promotion where you're not making money.
But if you don't make sure the numbers make sense and make sure that you're getting value out of your work, you're really stealing from yourself. One of the things that we start each day with is the idea that we're here to make somebody's day. And so that's kind of our Mission at Five Lakes, and in my personal life is, can I make somebody's day today? 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 decision 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 dive, you will learn the value of growing your network and surrounding yourself with power players and kings 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 Kings coming back to you here today. I am your host. I've got 2 kings on the king stage. We got double trouble here today, Jared and Paul Smith. My brothers, your brothers. How you guys doing? Great. Thank you. You're doing great.
Thanks for having us today, Chaz. Absolutely. You know, for just for the listeners sake, it's been a minute since we've done, you know, double trouble here in the seat here, but I've enjoyed the past ones, and this is gonna be extremely fun. You guys have a great business. I love the energy that you guys are already bringing just in our pre conversation here. So Fellas, tell us what kind of business that you have.
Yeah. We are we're a coffee company, so we have few different aspects of actually our business. We started as, coffee shops back in 2002. We opened our Wolfe, it's 2003, opened our first coffee shop. K. And then about a year later, we actually start roasting our own coffee. So now we're coffee roasters. We have our coffee shops. We have company owned stores, franchise location, and then we do online sales. We'd have, you know, different ways of doing it.
It's off, surround, or based off of coffee and caffeine. And caffeine, hey. Well, I we were just talking a second ago, and and Paul had mentioned that you guys have, I think you said an angry coffee? Yeah. So the angry bird coffee, it's a highly caffeinated dark roast. We came out with that a couple years ago. It's our number one seller. It's fantastic. Okay. And then recently, so I'm a light roast drinker. Maybe we'll get into that later. Instead of the dark roast, we came out with happy brew.
So We've got a an angry brew. And if you feel like you're more of the happy type personality like myself, you like a light roast, we have the happy brew highly caffeinated coffees. Okay. Okay. So I can still get highly caffeinated, but I can choose my my angry or my happiness. Right? You sure can. Yep. And then you can see that's the Angry Brew logo there on my hat. There you go. So we so we have literally happy and angry right here on the show with us. Yeah. There you go. Got it.
Wolfe, and I think you actually know who's who now is who that out. So Yeah. Absolutely. Well, first off, I I gotta go back because Jared, you said you have a coffee company. And I love the way that you said company because that's how I say it too. And it just I just see you guys as just you know, down to earth, guys that are just figuring out this coffee business.
It sounds like you guys are I mean, you already had an amazing success track record, but with one franchise location, online sales, corporate like, you guys are about to just, like, explode. It sounds like something excited for some of this growth conversation, some of these decisions, I'm sure you guys are having to make. Before we go into, like, practical stuff, I wanna know high level. I'm gonna ask you individually here because you guys are obviously individuals.
I know your brother's probably super close. I'm gonna guess these answers are gonna be pretty different. Maybe some some similarities between them, but, Paul, I'll start with you. I wanna know the deep seated why? Like, what's the burning desire? Why do you do this? Why are you doing? Like, why are you winning at life? Yeah. So I think one of the things that we have, and it's probably a common trait with entrepreneurs, we're really persistent. So The persistence is a big part of our success.
I think the thing that drives me other than you know, creating an atmosphere and a place for people to connect and then obviously discovering the magic of freshly roasted coffee. The deep The deep part that motivates me is just the opportunity to create something. So we started from scratch with our company, and that was 21 years ago.
And just the opportunity to build, staff, a customer base, a brand, a logo, that's something I absolutely love, and it gets me motivated and gets me up and added every day. Yeah. I love that. I say something about myself and my daily visualization that I'm a builder. Yeah. And, sounds like they're we're we're similar in that way. I think all entrepreneurs should agree get excited about creating and building. That's kinda how we're designed. So I relate to that completely.
Before I uh-uh, like, I've got so many more questions, but I gotta give Jared a chance here. Jared, what's your burning desire? What what gets you up in the morning? That's a great. It's a great question. You know, I like to say my faith is number 1. Then my family and then business. And and then getting just into that business part of it is and I think I agree with Paul. We used actually, before we did, we were in business before coffee, we were builders.
And at that point, we were creating something with our hands. We were out, you know, hammering, pounding the nails, and I've always just enjoyed that part of it. And then with with this business, we're creating or creating coffee shops to get to work on the design of new coffee shops. So we're we're creating something and building in something.
And I think trying to build something that's gonna last too, you know, not just not just something, you know, business that we're gonna be able to hopefully hand down to our children. For the future, and then also the opportunity just to build relationships through that. Yeah. I mean, there's so there's so much that I enjoy about it that get me going. So I keep talking about that, but I'm sure we'll get more into that detail, that type of stuff Chaz we go.
So Yeah. One thing one thing Jared didn't mention is a deep factor for him Chaz safety, and you can ask him about that later. Is that the the the the the the spawn word there? Just safety. Okay. We'll get to that here in a second. Don't let me forget the safety story. What you said there, Jared, was really impactful because actually a couple things. I wanna get practically into one of the questions.
But, of course, the the priority or the order that you have in life, you know, your faith family business, I think that that order is what a lot of people maybe talk about or think about, but whether they actually live in that order is something completely different. And so maybe we'll get to some of that here in a bit as well. But you said something also that you used to be a builder, an actual builder. You guys were building and and on the job side and that type of a thing.
And I could tell you right now because I have a company that builds, and I have retail franchises. And they are So different from each other. How in the world did you transition from that to that, please? Go ahead, Paul. Wolfe, so we grew up. Our father was a builder, and that's where we learned our skills. And so in the year. And we had taken breaks. He went off to school, and I was out east. But in 2000, we came back to our hometown together.
And he wanted to start building houses and some spec houses. And and so we started actually doing Chaz, and it was just for a couple of years. And a friend had mentioned to us this idea of, actually, at that time, opening a chocolate store. And so we said, hey. We we like that idea. We like business. We like as yourself, we wanna invest in things that have value. Yeah. And the more we looked at it and and discussed it, the more excited we got about doing that and being involved with it.
So that's what happened. We actually started out, and we started to kinda create this company And and as we talked through it in some of the early stages, we we decided that chocolate was just a seasonal thing. And so we wanted to add coffee, which we knew was and that was still early in the the coffee days, but was something that was growing And, also, we were passionate coffee drinkers. We weren't coffee snobs at that point. Just passionate coffee drinkers. And so angry and happy.
Wound down the construction and and started building this this company. And and then like I mentioned, actually, Every job we did, Jared was hurting himself. And so we felt like to spare his life, we almost needed to move out of construction. Yeah. Well, and I'm sure that, like, I I am getting some smurks and some and some smiles there, but I'm sure that there's, like, a truth to Chaz. And that's maybe the angle here. Because the entire time, as you're telling the story, I'm like, okay.
I hear you. I hear you. But but, like, I there's just a really that you are either both of you are just either opportunity guys where you heard a chocolate opportunity and thought, wow. Yeah. That sounds awesome because I love opportunity or the widget of business rather than the trade of building, or or was it something deeper? Like, you know what? I see myself I enjoy this, but physically, it's gonna take a toll on me. We need to transition. Or was it maybe a mixture of both?
I think I think it was a mixture of both. I mean, with construction, you always It's either hot. It's or it's too cold or it's wet or it's snowing. So there certainly was just this aspect of, like, This is something that we can do in a more controlled climate. And so there was that aspect of it, the physical part of it. Then I think the other thing is I don't know.
I'm just the way I'm wired as a person, I'm always I don't do I only follow through or try, like, 1% of the ideas that go through my mind on a monthly basis because I'm always for for some reason, I'm just wired. I'm always thinking about Oh, that's an opportunity. That's an opportunity. Oh, that's a business. We could try that. So I'm always thinking about Chaz. And I I think just Chaz opportunity to try something new was exciting for me anyways.
Yeah. Wolfe, that's a great point here because I think all entrepreneurs to a degree recognize opportunity. Right? That's that's why we're entrepreneurs because we took Yeah. The initial opportunity. But what you just said was that you have constant ideas or this constant flow of what about this? What about that? And this fresh thing, which I think a lot of people can relate to. I know I sure can, but eventually Chaz can be cloudy. And you guys have really done well on this one lane.
Now you've done several things in that lane. Is that how you've been able to kind of curb that is you've stayed in the coffee lane, but we've added online. You stayed in the coffee lane, but we added a franchise. You know, like, that how you kinda been able to feed that need for for new? I think for me, yeah, I mean, I I think of these ideas, but then I I get back to work. And I've I've got so much going on. We're either designing a new store or thinking about a new way to open a store.
Yeah. We're developing new packaging, new products, like the anger room, highly caffeinated coffee. You know, that was just something that came to us, and we developed that. And, that took some time of testing and sending in the coffee to the lab to make sure we had the right amount of caffeine and roasting it and just developing that flavor. So I think I overnight, I I think of those ideas and then I get back to work and I get busy doing what's at hand and that keeps me.
Distracted from doing those other ideas. And a lot a lot of the ideas I think about are related to work, so some may not be. Maybe they're just hobbies I like doing, and I think of how it could be a business or something. But then, typically, I just try to focus that on the on the coffee business. Yeah. I think it's really, really good insight. I know that it feels natural to you because that's just what you do, but this is a really this is our phenomenon with entrepreneurs.
And then inside of the entrepreneurial world, there are people like you that it's, like, just a factory and it just pumps. We use the culture index, and on the culture index, you can, you know, basically, you can see someone's ingenuity is really what it's graded Chaz. And most people are pretty linear thinkers. Like, hey. Let's just take this thing we've already got. We don't need to change it. Let's just run with it.
That's how most people think even entrepreneurs And then every once in a while, there's a guy like Jared. It's kinda crazy like me. Someone is a little bit Chaz. And guess what? I'm in that boat with you as well. And what it does, actually, is it feeds us to think like that, but we just have to know how to curb it like you're like you're saying.
And also too, we gotta put a little space between us and most of our team because it they can't handle not that they can't handle us, we cause too many problems, too many, like, left. Right. Left. Right. Left. You know? And it exhaust. At least I don't know if this is your experience, but it has been mine. Would you would you agree with that or tell us a little bit more there for you?
For me, I I mean, I would agree with that because that that's certainly a challenge just in the day to day even with all the stuff that's going on at 5 Lakes Coffee is staying focused. What project do I have going on that I need to stay focused actually get it accomplished versus, you know, my mind's going on to another project Right. Or another idea, even within 5, like, coffee.
So, yeah, so just staying focused, maybe not distracting my brother so he can get what he's working on done and not moving on to another project. Or ideas. So, yeah. Yeah. There's Chaz to be there has to be a process for ideation. Right? Like, we we gotta think about things. Maybe we write them down. We process them a little we take them to anybody because we know if we start, you know, taking ideas of people, it it is a distraction potentially, pretty high potential.
But still still needed nonetheless for guys like you and I. So, Paul, what's the flip side of that for you? Like, are are are you an idea factory as Wolfe? Are you, like, you know, crazy brother, and I'm just trying to, like, dial most of the operation. I I think I'm the same in that regard. And but we work well together, partially because of that. And like you said, you need a sounding board.
And so we have, in the past, overwhelmed staff or certain staff, especially marketing, they're like, what? You wanna do what? But together, we can sound things off each other, and it works well because we're both into that. And then and likewise, you know, really kind of preshow we're talking about personalities and Each one of us has a different personality. So and and we complement each other very well, and that's been great for our company.
And a lot of times, people are like, how do you work with your family? And well, we do because we're different personalities, and he's got strengths that I lack and vice versa. Chaz works really well. And in the early days, let's face it. It's a lot of hard work, and there's a lot of miserable times, and so misery loves company. And because we've been able to get through some of those things. Great to have a sounding board, whether it's just the time to complain.
You know, I can I have somebody I can complain to for a few minutes, and then it's off my chest? Forget about it. Or if it's an idea, we can bounce it back and forth. And come up with an actual idea. That's a good idea. Maybe my idea is not very good, actually. But by the time I bounce it off, Paul, we've actually we're we we started at one point, and we get to a whole new point. Just try talking and bouncing those ideas off each other. Yeah. That's right.
I actually think that you guys have something super special, and it's not because necessarily that it's hard to work with family. It it can be But I just think, like, what you're saying, you have the ingredients of, you know, obviously, working together, either complementing each other, working well together, respect. That's what I've probably more than anything, just a mutual respect for this is how you do things. This is how you do things, and this is how we're gonna work together.
Plus, if one of you is drinking happy coffee, then You both of you can't be angry. That's true. Exactly right. It's alright to be angry when you're drinking a lot of coffee anyways. So Well, that's, hey. You know, there's I'm sure there's a there's millions, actually, that would very much agree with that statement. So maybe that's how we'll that's how we'll title this this this podcast. Can't be angry if you're drinking coffee.
Okay. So let's transition a little bit to practical inside the business. You guys have grown not only the business in a in a in a just a phenomenal way, but you've done it in ways. You've got the online channel. You've got the physical stores that you guys own. You know, you started to franchise a lot of different things going on here. And one of those would be a lot for a lot of entrepreneurs listening. And you guys have 3 channels plus probably a whole bunch else.
So tell me just a really good decision. That you've made as building Chaz. Maybe something that's kinda been the domino effect of that's led to a lot of the success that you guys have had. What would that be? Yeah. If I could if I could jump in, I want Jared to tell the story, but we learned, and this is probably a decade ago, that not to become too attached to any one idea or product. And so we had a we had a great product that was holding us back.
And it was it was extremely difficult to to terminate that product. But once we did it, then we learned that it's okay to make those types of decisions. Yeah. And and when you're focused on how does the business grow? How does it do better? Become more efficient? It's made it easier for us to make those types of decisions. Having gone through Chaz, And I'm thinking of one initial time, and then we've gone through it multiple times since then. So I don't know if you wanna Yeah. Please.
Because we're over here on the edge of the seagull and wait a second. You had a great product and you rid of it. Wake, what? Jared, please, fill us out of the list. Yeah. So we, as we talked, we're a chocolate company right at the very beginnings. When we added the coffee, one of the things we came up with was this MoCA that we called when at the time, we were great, like, chocolate company and then great, like, chocolate and coffee, but we call it the great lakes mocha.
And we actually took real chocolate and we put it in the cup and we melts that it in there. There was this whole long process, and, I mean, it was, like, it was the premium MoCA chocolate drink, delicious, I mean, it was great. But it was it was difficult to make, and either you made it wrong, and it was great, but it was also easy. I mean, make it right, and it was great. Or Yeah. It was also easy to make wrong.
Yeah. And when we opened one of our stores Chaz really got busy really quick and we realized, you know what? This drink that we thought was actually, you know, super awesome, and we had an emotional attachment to it. Right? We Wolfe figured it out and came up with a recipe, and we love this drink. And we thought it was what was gonna make us famous. We realized Chaz this drink was actually holding us back.
And, so it was not it was it was a it may sound simple, but for us, it was a really hard decision. And took us quite a while to finally, like, okay. You know, there's this back and forth thing that we talked about. We're like, okay. We're ready to just get rid of this drink. And, I mean, amazingly, I don't know if if it was this, but we instantly got busier when we got rid of that drink.
Yeah. Yeah. Let's talk about that because I can only I can assume some things here, but let's talk practically. You make that decision. Yeah. I could see how that could be hard. It was probably a leader of some degree in sales because that's always difficult to give away money. So you think. Right? And then on top of that, it's it's a it's a personal creation. It was this wonderful thing, and you're a this emotional attachment too.
I can only imagine all the people listening right now going, Oh my gosh. That's that was my blah blah blah product or my blah blah blah service. So you got rid of it, and you said you got busier. Why? That's a great I I I don't know for sure, but I think there was there were so many things about doing those whole nice backs. We're slower. If if it was hard to train, you know, our team members on how to make it. So you're slower.
If it goes out and it's not done correct, then there's a bad experience Chaz somebody's having. Right. And it was it was more expensive, so it was costly. So we had to charge more. So just a bunch of aspects of that drink that were, I think, holding us back. And I I had a conversation with a customer back then I remember very clearly, and it actually was one of the things that got me on board Chaz Jared, because it was his idea to get rid of that drink.
And it was that they would they would come into our shop for that drink because it was more expensive. And as a treat, they'd come once a week or once a month. Well, they're drinking mochas somewhere else every day. So didn't even realize we had regular MOCAs because we emphasize that so much. So once we we did away with that, We still have great mochas, just not the melted chocolate. And the price then was competitive.
And all of a sudden, I think those people realized as well that Oh, you have what I drink every day. You're not out of price. It's not just a special occasion. And so that was a big part of it too. And and certainly, there are people that missed it and thought it was a bad decision, but, you know, the numbers and and the business prove otherwise.
Yeah. I think this is a a good example here to kinda almost delineate down retail versus just other businesses because the number of cuts that you have to sell of that product to really make it worth it. Yeah. Yeah. You were charging more, but it's not like you were charging $500 for a cup of coffee and making this great margin to really cover the slowness or the mistakes or whatever, but we're talking about maybe construction, you know, okay.
So I wanna do a a $60,000 bathroom versus a $20,000 bathroom. Yeah. There's some different product in there, but a lot of that's gonna be expertise and just a better different home that you're doing it in, a different type of client. And so you can you can you can provide a different service and get a different margin. That's like a one shot deal, and it's like, okay. I'm only gonna work with $60,000 bathroom clients because I don't need as many.
Wolfe, in a volume business, you can't really do that. Yes. You wanna be premium. Okay. Fine. But, like, to be, you know, $6 when everyone else is a dollar 50 or whatever example is here and on top of that, you're slow and on top of that, the experience is a top notch. It just makes it really difficult.
So I can see how being more streamlined in a volume based business, still still nice, still premium, still the best cup of coffee I've got, or I wanna come back to, they just opened it up, it sounds like, to the real volume. Of your cash. And I I think the biggest lesson that we learned really was to be willing to let go of some things because because I see businesses Yeah.
Or people who own businesses all the time, they become emotionally attached to an to something that was just their because it was their idea, They're mostly attached to it. So they're not willing to either let go of that idea or maybe they're not willing to listen to somebody else's advice. Or bring somebody else in because, man, dog on it. This is my business or this is my product. I developed this.
Yeah. You know, I am not changing this, and and they hold on to something that actually is making them fail versus be successful. So I think the biggest lesson I learned is, you know, just being open to to change. Being open to be a wrong. It's okay to hear us. You know? Ding ding ding ding. Chaz much as I think I'm always right because we always think we're right. You know, just just being open to the idea that I'm not always right. And and there's times to move on from an idea.
What what about the entrepreneur listening right now who's thinking, well, you know, I was told to, like, you know, protect my dream. And don't let people influence me because, you know, I'm the only one that's gonna get it done. And, you know, like, there is truth to that. I'm I'm obviously painting a, you know, a polarizing picture here. But because what you're saying is true, which is you have to live really light, open handed.
The people that I know that live life with closed grip hands on money or business or opportunities or ego. Everything that you just said it, like, it just stops. Like, it's a they're not a a flowing conduit. Right? When you live open handed like this or open minded, it also opens you up to possible. And then now we're over here, Negative influence, family members at SAS shouldn't be doing this. No. Don't get rid of the cup. You know? All of the negatives.
So how does an entrepreneur Be open minded like you're talking about Jared, but also protect what they believe is right for their business because there's not a lot of people rooting for us. Chaz yeah. That's well, that's the that is the challenge. I mean, I remember my younger self. I was really tight. Like, comp competitive. I was like, okay. We're gonna gonna keep everything secret and, you know, not let anybody know what we're doing and not gonna listen to anybody. We know what we're doing.
We're just gonna do this. And I mean, you need to be smart and you need to think about, you know, there's there's reasons people have patents. If you're designing something that's needs to be paying because you're gonna spend, you know, $1,000,000 developing a product. You've gotta protect that. So there's that aspect of it. But then there's just being open to communicating collaborating. You know, I think there's room for multiple people to be successful, even at the same things.
So even though, yeah, we're we're competing, like, You know, you're in the coffee business. I'm in the coffee business, and we're competing, and I'm not gonna maybe share my exact recipes, but think we can have open communication We can actually at root for each other to be successful and not necessarily root against each other. Even though, yeah, we gotta compete. We gotta advertise and market.
And get the customers come in our door, but I think there's some collaboration that could be working together. And, like, I think, like, what you're saying is, yeah, there's more gonna open up our opportunities, you know, by being more open to that, there's gonna be a lot more opportunities. So We don't have to, you know, fight as hard to keep everything secret, I guess. Yeah. Yeah. I think that you're talking about 2 mindsets, which One builds on the other.
The first is protect and keep, which is very warrior mindset. So it's very survival based, fear based. I gotta I gotta go win the battle today. Right? But then eventually at some point, you re you recognize that there's there's more strategy to the war than just this individual battle and you become King, really, and you can see things at a different level, whether it's collaboration, whether it's just open handedness, all of that.
And so, you know, I had just really, it makes me think of abundance. And so that's gonna be my next question. Maybe, Paul, you can chime in on this one, but what I heard Jared saying is that I just chose to live in abundance knowing that there's plenty which, you know, I had a guy on the show here in Kansas City. He's a another remodeler with where which is where my remodeling company is. I had him on this show, and we were talking about him.
I didn't mention my show or my my company once, and I'm talking about how good of a remodelary is. And we're talking about his projects and this and that and really getting into it. And later abundance came up for some reason. And and I saw I threw that out, and I don't even think he knew that I had a remodeling company because I'm you know, I I'm more of a a a visionary stake in the company. I'm not in a day to day.
And I think it even shocked him to know that I've been, like, literally taking the entire podcast to promote his business. When he has a business in my city that literally competes with me. And so what what would you say about this, Paul? Like, abundance, everything that Jared's given to us here, like, open open mindedness, open handedness. It's it's absolutely correct. And it's a lesson that we had to learn.
So I think in America, for instance, you know, we have a really individualistic society. That's right. And and that's certainly how I think we were raised. I was really thinking of myself, number 1, and it's through, not in this process of business, but through faith, like Jared mentioned early in the beginning. So realizing it's not just me, and I didn't just put myself here to take care of myself. But as you start to see larger responsibilities, family, friends, staff when you're in business.
Those things, you start to see that opportunity community. And so like you said, with the open handedness, And that's something I I think we've grown into, especially in the last few years, in particular, is is can we let go of some of these things? Can we Can we give back and give to the people that have supported us? And it would benefited us.
And and there's something to Chaz, and it it's even biblical, you know, that if you if you put it out there and if you give if you sow seed, for instance, right, maybe I have a handful of seed, but if I sow this seat instead of just hanging on to it. I I'm gonna yield a hundred times more, and it's gonna benefit not just myself, but my community and those around me and my family.
And so It's really it's it's a principle to live by, and I wish I would have discovered it when I was, you know, 20 instead of within the last, you know, decade. Paul, there's so much risk in sewing my seat. Right? Like, I just wanna hold on to it. Why are you telling me to put it into the ground? That's right. And but, hey. That's where the growth's at. That's right. Yeah. I can't grow in your hand.
And what mo what a lot of people, you know, that hold tight like that don't realize is that the seed won't last forever either. Used to you might think it, you know, like, you it makes you feel safe that it's in your hand, but Yeah. It won't last for a very long there either. So might as well. I think of of one other thing too, Chaz, as we're talking, you know, over the years, I've started to to pay attention and notice how many people have actually poured into me. You know?
So course, my parents and and then teachers, and then just people in the community that had goodwill towards me and my brother. And you start to see that We wouldn't have even been able to do this without the goodwill and kindness of others who have helped us along the way, who have given us free advice, Yeah. Even what you're doing with your podcast where you're sharing these stories, and so people can hear them, and they can contemplate Am I doing this right? How are these people succeeding?
And and that's those are lessons we've learned and it makes such a big impact now. I know if I could go back, you know, to when we when I was in my early twenties and we were really getting into the business. If I could give myself one piece of advice, I'm sure there's more, but it'd be just to be more open to listening and, yeah, collaborating and just not holding so tight on my ideas. Yeah. And and thinking that I knew everything. And I I know that's just part of being young.
I see that in my kids, you know, might not believe it, but I'm a father of 8. And Woah. 8. You've never heard that reaction, though. So Yeah. 8 is I always like to say 8 is great. So 8 is great. My my wife and I have 4. So she's like, I think I think you're at the cap there, but, Not salary. It's great. You heard it from from Jared. From the man. Okay? Hey, Kings and Queens. Jazz Wolf. I wanna talk to you about something that's super important to me. We put a lot of time and effort.
We, meaning myself and my team, into this podcast, into the content that goes out every single day. And if you have been getting any sort of value or insight from this, we want it to be able to reach other business owners too.
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Let's help each other grow. Okay. Well, let's flip the script here, Fellas. I'll talk about a bad decision, something that just sticks out in your mind Chaz maybe wasn't the greatest hour, but I'm sure you've you've learned a great lesson. Oh, yeah. So I guess I'll just start and go ahead. It was a location. So we when we were starting to expand early on well, this was clear back in 2008, we were opening what would have been our 3rd location at that time.
And the the place we were looking at had all the elements we thought would be important. It was near a ball stadium. It was on a highly trafficked road. It was near downtown. There's all these elements that looking at them individually, we thought, oh, this is fantastic. Gonna be great. Yeah. And but that that never fully developed. Of course, we hit 2009 with the economy downturn, which had some impact but, really, it was just a bad choice in our part location.
And it took us a while to to realize This location and these elements we saw were beneficial to our company, it might be in other spots, is not here. And so we nearly went out of business. We ended up closing that location. The landlord wasn't Didn't wanna work with us. It wasn't really friendly towards what was going on even though they were experiencing the same thing themselves. Yeah. And so when we quit that location, we had been losing money for 2 or 3 years Wolfe we had remained open.
More than we could afford to lose. And then we had to, you know, supplement somebody's lease after we left who came in behind us. And so we're doing all Chaz. But what happened and we went went into opening a another store that was successful, and that really saved us. But as we went through that process, of looking at all the dumb things we had done. You know, investing too much in equipment was one of the things.
And and then the location And then, of course, that MoCA that Jared spoke about, we started to see that all these things add up to really terrible ideas and and we weren't focused on the numbers Chaz well as we should have been. So our P and L, we knew we were we had good cash flow. And and so we're able to get through these things, and we just figured we'd make money, you know, at some point, magically. I don't know.
But, really, that that's when we start dialing in at that point also to the numbers and really looking at that. Like, those are so important. Is this profitable? Am I just being an entrepreneur, an entrepreneur who's overly optimistic? Or might be real about the cost and the and the risk. And so that that moment in time, and it was probably a year long process. Was really our schooling.
So we learned the numbers matter, your decisions matter, the risk to reward ratio matters, And so we're able to really tighten up a lot of our systems, processes, and get rid of the fluff, which is what you need to do to run a profitable successful business, not only to benefit ourselves, but our staff, and our community.
Yeah. You did a great job there of explaining the process And even though it led to a bad decision, and then the list of things that you learned, I think that that was a great explanation. On the front end, it sounded like you weren't calculated. You obviously talked about, you know, we We, you know, looked at the area. We looked at we thought we had it all together.
Yeah. But what I also heard maybe underneath Chaz, and maybe maybe this is my own story for Yondi is tell me if I'm wrong, but was there any ego in we gotta get the 3rd location open, or we gotta hurry up quick and grow. Right? And so some of the push Like, we oversaw some things, really, which means is that we kinda look just look past it because we wanted to hurry up and get it open. Is there any of that in there at all? I I think. Yeah. Yeah. I know.
And and I was thinking, you know, one of the things is part of being having the entrepreneurial spirit and having all those ideas, like, we're always wanting to be bigger than we are. Right. I I guess in a sense, we're just always wanting to expand. Do more and more and more and more And so I and I think that can be a mistake. Like, you talked earlier about, like, getting out of focus.
Like, we because we wanna grow and we're excited about our business and We wanna get bigger and we wanna add more stores and more employees. Sometimes we get ahead of ourselves. We didn't We didn't take a close look at the numbers. We're just like, okay. Let's get a store open. Yeah. So I think certainly, ego, Chaz play a part in that.
And then for me, it's just wanting wanting to expand, wanting to do more, wanting to build something that is bigger and better, and then you try to do it too fast. And yeah. And I know Paul kinda still I was gonna talk about the numbers, but I remember when I was working in structure for another gentleman before Paul and I got together. I don't remember the conversation exactly, but he said, yeah, don't worry about making money. You know, I'm just I'm just working.
That always stuck with me, like, like, yeah, but you can work yourself to death. Yeah. If if you're not making money, you're actually stealing from your, you know, if you have a family. That's right. Because now you're working all the time, but you're not really providing for your family. Yeah. So that's one thing is there's times to not make a profit. You know, there's times where you're giving to somebody or something, and and that's okay.
Or there's a time to strategically have a promotion where you're not making money. But if you don't make sure the numbers make sense and make sure that you're getting value out of your work, you're really stealing from yourself. And not only that, but if you have people who are responsible and, usually, we do eventually, either your wife or your kids. You know, your family. Your extended family if you wanna be able to help people out.
You gotta make sure that you're making money and and being profitable because otherwise, you're just gonna be striving and working hard and you and you're not gonna be able to spend that time with your family provide for their needs and stuff like that. So so there's a important part of of being proud. Sometimes people talk bad about business. Like, oh, You're just worried about profit. Well, if we don't make profit, you know, we can't we can't give our employees raises.
We can't give them new equipment that they can faster and enjoy their job better. You know, I can't provide a house for my family. And then I've gotta strive, and I can't take that time to spend with my kids as they're going up to you. So it's a profitability, super important. Yeah. There there's a whole lot of factors that go into that that no business owner should be ashamed of making profit because we're the ones that started it, put our neck on the line, whatever.
And and any employee, just like when you said, you work for a gentleman. I've worked for people. And do they have an opportunity just like we did to go Do it yourself. And, man, there's an uphill that comes with that, but if they're ones like us, then they should go do Chaz. And they'll they'll experience the same up and downs that we have, and and the reward comes with that journey. So I appreciate the authenticity there.
The the vulnerability of telling that you made some mistakes closing a location. I'm sure that cost you a ton of money. I know that when I had to close a location, it cost a lot of money. And probably more of a of an ego hit than anything, really. It was an ego to start it, an ego hit to to close it, but one of the greatest lessons I think for both of our stories that we can share now, because it really is just a bump in the road.
Like, yeah, in the moment, it felt like everything was falling down. Paul said, you guys almost went out of business. I feel the same way. You look back on it now, you're like, oh, well, I don't want that to happen again. No. But but it's just a little bump in the road. So You mentioned family. Obviously, you have 8 kids.
I want you guys to both answer this question again and individually here, but I am just a huge believer that Wolfe, now I always said it early, but now I know because I believe it, because I'm living it, that I can obsess over my family and my business or, you know, my businesses and my family, my kids, my wife, you know, if you've got other things in in your life that are important, I find that I find myself plenty busy with all my businesses, my Wolfe, and my kids.
But the point here is I'm trying to make is that A lot of times people tip the balance and go, what? It has to be balanced. And I just I'm like, not a fan of that word. I don't actually think it exists. I think obsession exists or intention And that's what it sounds like that you guys are doing, but give us some practical things on how you're running a big old business. You're on a podcast. You got 8 kids and Paul followed up with with an answer of your own. Yeah. Well, that's a great question.
I think there's seasons, you know, where you're just working. There there's gonna be a season where, like, I'm I'm maybe more focused on my business. May I mean, maybe there's, like, a 3 month season where we're opening a new store, I know I'm gonna work hard for 3 months, but I have to like you said, I have to be intentional at some point to say, okay. We've got this going. Now I'm gonna step back. Let this thing roll and make sure that I'm giving my family time.
So it's not a 100% gonna be balanced all the time, but we have to be intentional Otherwise, it would be easy to depending on your personality, either work too hard because you're always working at your business. You're always pushing that. Or if you have a personality that's maybe lazy, you know, you don't work hard enough and your business doesn't succeed because Right. There are seasons where, you know what?
It is time to get to the grinding stone, work really hard, work through this time, as we get this store open or open a new roastery or whatever your, you know, whatever your business is, but just not letting that continue forever. Because because you can get caught up in that and then your family suffers or your personal time, your house might suffer because you're not taking time to exercise, you know, or eat healthy or whatever those aspects are.
So Yeah. Yeah. You you gave in some other dimensions there, you know, for Paul, set you up with the same question here, but, really, it's you know, business front and finance, family, and marriage, spirituality. We've all talked about faith here today. Health and mental health, physical health, and and lifestyle. Right? And that doesn't have to necessarily mean material things, but it could also mean freedom. So, Paul, what how do you how are you doing all these things all at once?
Yeah. Well, I think you both have actually hit on the the keyword there as being intentional. So it is there are times when we really work hard And in the early days, you know, that was for an extended period of time. Now it's like spurts. And so it's important that our wives roll in on this venture. We couldn't have done it without them, and they support us in that and really allowed us to create what we've created.
But even now, today, I think that that's always kind of a little bit of a challenge. Sometimes I look at you know, the billionaires. And I I'm like, oh, well, what if I worked a little harder? What if I did this? And but what's then I ask myself, what's the cost? You know, where I wanna build this thing as big as possible. And, actually, we're we're starting to focus in the next couple of months on franchising, and we'll be targeting Michigan, Ohio and Indiana before we go out further.
Yeah. So we're we're working on growing it into a bigger business than it is right now, but, yeah, how do I be intentional about I say to myself, I don't have to become a billionaire. In fact, I don't expect to. Just put that out there, but I don't wanna focus all my my intention on gaining wealth or just the success of my business because I do want to this life is fleeting, and I realize that more every day, you probably notice I got white hair now. It wasn't white when we started this.
And so as you as you kind of run into your mortality and you understand life is is flying by all of us. I do want to be able to enjoy our work. You know, what's what's why do we work and not only to create something, but so we can support a family. So we can spend time with that family, And when it's all done and said at some point, I'll either retire or or just die. And and so that what's my legacy? Is it? Is it just this company? I hope not.
I hope it's, you know, that I pass something along to my kids, my community, my family, not just financially, but of myself and spiritually as well. And so it is, I think, just being intentional like you said, Chaz. Yeah. I think that there's a a whole army of entrepreneurs that feel very much like this. Yeah. It's a big reason why gathering the king's started off originally as a Mastermind group, but then even just the podcast, like, we get people that chime in all the time.
Small business is just getting started or guys that are doing 100 of 1,000,000. And it's like, you don't have to be, you know, the billionaire in your example that's only business and nothing else. There actually is a way for you to be able to have all of the dimensions winning in all dimensions. But I think the the the summary here for all of us is that we're not done. Like, even though We're we feel like we're doing it pretty good. There's definitely a way to still do it better.
There's definitely still more time to spend with the family and create more memories in legacy and community and love that word. But it's, like, also in the business and doing those things altogether at the same time. It's like, no. I we're going up, maybe. Like, we're grateful, but we're not done. That's for sure. That's right. I got a question for you both. Last one to wrap it up here. Paul, I'm a go with you first.
I wanted to know if you had the opportunity To whisper in the younger Paul's ear. Yeah. What would you what would you tell him? I would tell him to remember that it's not about him. And to enjoy what he's been given and also what I'm created for. Or what he's creating for. Right? I'm talking to my younger self. So to just enjoy those things and to have big picture, mentality. Not focused on here now, but on a lifetime and beyond.
I mean, I I look out and I see, you know, we're all gonna enter eternity at some point. What does that mean? I wanna consider that and and think about Chaz. And so I wanna remind my young self not to to fall in the traps of just this illusion of here now. But there's a lot of good things ahead and to be prepared for those to consider those and to listen to others as well. What what would you tell the younger Paul that he was designed for? Well, I'm designed to bring glory to god.
Okay. I believe that's my purpose. And so for me, it's not only my family life, but in my business life. I was created for the marketplace. I absolutely love it. I love business. I love the numbers of business. I love growing the business. And encouraging people. And that's a big part of our business is building relationships to encourage people. One of the things that we start each day with is the idea that we're here to make somebody's day. And so that's kind of our mission at Five Lakes.
And in my personal life is Chaz I make somebody's day today? And when I do, that's It's great for them. That's what it's all about. It's loving my neighbor. It's also filling to my cell. Yeah. Such a great answer. Appreciate that. What would you tell The younger Jared, if you had a chance to whisper in his ear.
I would, you know, Paul had a great great answer, so I don't I don't wanna just copy his answer, but One would be just to be more open to listening to especially people that had gone through business. You know, it's it's really easy as a young guy to just think I know more. I see this was my kids, but I know more than, you know, maybe somebody who's been in business for 30 years because they're older.
So just being more open to listening to the wisdom of those people that live life and experience those things. And then second, maybe, would be to just keep my eyes more open to the people around me and be more intentional about, as Paul said, making somebody's day is what we'd love to do at 5 legged coffee.
And we do that just in often, it's just in a small way, and it might just be for a quick moment in time with fresh cup of re roasted coffee, but just being more intentional in noticing people and maybe slowing down because it's really easy to be busy and about business and taking that moment, whether it's 30 seconds or 5 minutes, to be more intentional about making somebody's day in a little way or spending some time with those people that might
have something going on in their life that they just need somebody to listen or talk to. Yeah. Love that. Well, you guys have both been incredible here today. Amazing insights. Love the brotherly dynamic here. How can the listeners find you guys? Individually, as entrepreneurs, they wanna maybe connect or, of course, give us where we can find this amazing coffee, specifically if you are drunk to this angry, high caffeinated, or this happy, maybe, joyful coffee.
I want I want them to be able to find both. Alright. Start with 5lakes.com. That's our website, and that's spelled out You'd be able to order coffee online that's roasted. 2 order shipped to you within 24 hours of being roasted. Wow. So it wherever you're at in the United States, we ship, I think to all it was shipped to all states. All 48. All 48. Yeah. There you go. And then on the website, you can find our 8 locations.
So if you're in Michigan or Northern Indiana, you can actually find our locations. We're on Instagram. I believe it's at 5 Lakes Coffee. Same thing for Facebook. K. We have a TikTok also, and then I feel both on LinkedIn as individual. So you can look for us on LinkedIn as individuals.
Yeah. And I think, you know, one of the things that we do like to to do and and kinda what you're talking about, Chaz, is just connecting with people not only learning, we've had the opportunity now over the last few years to meet people that are way beyond us in business. And and get their insights. So if we're able to do that for somebody starting out, we'd like to take those opportunities as well. And they can just email contact us at 5lakes.com.
So if they're on the website, they email there Chaz all gets passed to us. And that's gonna be the quickest and easy ways through the website, and we'll reach back out to them. Perfect. And in the meantime, we'll put all that in the show notes Chaz well as those links to grab that incredible coffee. Thank you both for being here and giving the insights.
You've been a blessing, but also just a strategic and maybe catalyst for somebody listening to here today to learn and grow in their own journey. So, again, thank you for being here. Bless us to your families and all that you're doing in the coffee business. Thanks. Thank you, Chaz. 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 and multiple different industries and now interviewing over 2 or 300 other very successful 7, 8, and 9 figure business owners is that It's tough to do it alone. And so gathering the Kings exists to bring together successful entrepreneurs. In fact, we are putting together 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 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.