On today's episode of gathering the Kings. See things through. When you get started, see it all the way through. Don't give up early. 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 and accurate picture of the journey work 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? Chaz, Wolfe Gathering the Kings podcast.
I've got a special addition coming to you today coming from the DFW Airport. I'm always in my studio, but today, I had to squeeze in this wonderful interview with my buddy now. King, Matt Magnuson. Welcome to the stage. How are you? I am doing awesome, Chaz. Big fan of what you're doing here, so I'm very excited to have this conversation with you today. Yeah, man. It's a little interesting. Normally, I'm standing. I love standing. I'm a tall guy. I got a deep voice.
I gotta really project, but now I'm in an airport. I'm trying to be quiet. I think I'm the only one around, but it just feels a little different, but I'm glad I'm here with you. Hey. I'm glad that you made time wherever you're at get the podcast done, get get the things to do list checked off no matter what the circumstances. Unfortunately, I've tried to be a guest on a couple of shows, even recently, and they can't cancel morning of. And I just do not understand that.
In fact, I'm probably as soon as this podcast is done, I'm probably gonna make a some sort of a educational post about just doing the things that you're supposed to do that you say you're gonna do, like freaking showing up on time, not cancelling meetings and stuff like Chaz. But, dude, I'm so glad that you're here. Matt, tell us what kind of business that you have. So I own ICrial, which is a health and wellness center in Wichita.
We specialize in pain management, sports and fitness performance Chaz well as general health and wellness. And then we have a few services that are more on the beauty aesthetic side. Our whole body cryotherapy product is that flagship product that that we have within our center, but we have 7 other services, including IV infusions. We have a team of the licensed RNs that give different, nutraceutical IVs. We have infrared sauna's compression therapy.
Just a whole lot of things that are alternative to help people live healthier lives and just really overall elevate their lifestyles. I just I love how it's all connected to health. And, obviously, the IV stuff is still pretty new, cryotherapy. We were just talking about this before we jumped on here. I barely knew what it was simply just because I had a previous client that was in the industry. And here we are. You're in the wellness space. You're helping people with pain management.
I want you to go another layer just real quick here for the people who maybe don't know what cryotherapy is. Or when they hear wellness center, they're thinking, what does that really mean? What is an IV infusion? What what are these things? Give it just a take a take a away for 60 seconds. Let us know what you're doing practically in the marketplace. You're in Wichita, Kansas. Somebody's listening today, maybe in Wichita, and they need to come check you out. Why? What's their need?
What do you have? So every everything that we have is natural solutions to just elevate the lifestyles of our guests Pain Management is obviously a big component of that. So that's where crowd therapy comes in. It's a amazing alternative to using pain pills. I personally used it to recover from a car accident several years ago that left me very injured. And so I I believe in that product, but there are all these other services that we offer that do amazing things with IVs.
We can do things like boost immunity, help anti aging. We can even cure hangovers. No no matter what somebody's lifestyle is, We've got a natural solution that can help them feel better and live a better life. Yeah. I I like you said, on maybe on what side of the spectrum that they're on, if they're really intentional about putting the good stuff in their body, or they're just trying to recover from some not good decision. That you got them covered either way. Sounds like. Yeah. Absolutely.
I would say that we're more focused on helping healthy people get healthy or help people who are wanting healthy, but if somebody has a rough Friday night and has a has big plans on Saturday, we can help them get there. That's funny. I I'm glad that places like you exist because even my wife and I were huge on taking natural approaches to, really life trying to do things the how it was designed to be.
And so I just I love I love guys that are like you willing to step out, take a little risk and and supply the needs for those of us that's, to think a little differently. So we appreciate that. Before we jump into your story, because, obviously, I wanna hear about the car accident, how you guys started in business, all that fun stuff. At this level in the game, you've obviously reached a a certain level. Right? You've got a you've got a certain number of revenue. You've got a team.
You've got a business. You've got a structure. Like, there's a physical location and you're running a business and very successfully, why are you still doing it? For a lot of listeners today, they're hearing you go, he's made it. Why why are you still pushing at this level? I humbly disagree with those people because I don't think that I've made it, but to me, it's not necessarily about making it. It's about where I some problems in the world today.
We have, an obesity crisis in this country, and that's well documented. We've got an opioid crisis in this country And, with the with what I am doing with I cryo really helps individuals have that alternative to, to taking pain pills. So they're not getting addicted to pain pills. That's ultimately why I got in the business. I was looking for something other than pain pill and never heard of cryotherapy. When I first heard of it, the idea of jumping half naked in a box that's cool.
The negative 170 sounded like the dumbest thing I've ever heard till I tried it. And then I'm like, this is magic. This is amazing stuff. We have a lot of different things like that can really help folks avoid using that medication. But then on top of that, why do people not live healthy lifestyles? A lot of times, it's because they have that old football injury or that that, oh, they've got back pain. They've got hip pain.
Those different types of things that, you know, that have them sitting on the couch every night, watching Netflix ordering pizza. If I can help individuals start making healthy lifestyle decisions and turn things around. I'm giving back to the community that I live at. In in the state of Kansas, when the rankings come out every year of the most obese states, Kansas is always one of the the top ones on the list. And that that really bothers me.
So I really want to help and enrich the lives of folks within the community one person at a time. Yeah. I love that. So you're there's different buckets of people that I found that are motivated at a greater level for different reasons, right, the different buckets are representative of different motivations, maybe, or different wise.
Yours, obviously, you're speaking to an industry disruption, changing the Wolfe, like, this really big thing that you're talking about obesity and really helping people's bigger picture lives, like generational blessing coming through health It's a kind of a big deal, but guys, like, you just take that stuff on and eat it for lunch. And I'm excited for that. What got you there? Right? Or were you always like that?
Were you always wanting to change huge masses of population with a problem, or has that developed over time? It's something that's developed over time. People are surprised today when they hear about the fact that 11 years ago, I was about a £100 heavier. And daily nicotine user probably drank at least 3 cases of beer a week, and couldn't even run to the mailbox. Now I can run. I've ran 50 mile races, 100 k races, I'm training for a 24 hour race. Right?
So there was a process that got me there, and that that process was through changing, changing some life decisions and getting healthy. So Chaz that happened 10, 11 years ago is when I started that process. It was a a learning experience Chaz it took me a while to get to that point. But in Yeah. In the middle of that, I got in a car wreck when I was one night, stayed late at work, driving home.
I'm out of red light, and I'm at at I'm at an intersection behind an f One Fifty, and I just get slammed behind from behind my drunk driver. And those two collisions here rear ends me, I were in the F One Fifty, and I had 7 injuries to my spine coming out of that. And that was a long painful rehab process beginning to end took over 30 months. But, you know, really, it was amazing.
As soon as the injury occurred, my my doctors were wanting to give me pain pills, surgery, ended up being a discussion point, and I didn't really want any of that by starting looking for natural alternatives and found cryotherapy. Started using cryotherapy on a on a regular basis, started noticing the improvements. Anyways fast forward a little bit longer in in my recovery journey, and doctors told me Okay. We've done everything we can do for you.
This is after about a 100 and 45 doctor appointments. You need to have surgery, but you're beyond anything that we can do. And so I had belief in cryotherapy because I was noticing it make a difference paired with a lot of the, I discovered this type particular type of yoga called DDP yoga.
And so I mixed it in with the cryotherapy and started just feeling slow improvement, 1% a week, very slow, but I knew that if I just stuck with this consistently, over time that I would get better just the same way that you don't lose a £100 overnight. It is a very slow grind. And what's even harder than losing a £100 is keeping it off for 10 years. It's easy to yoyo diet. And so just throughout that process, I decided, you know what? I'm gonna start a blog.
And I'm gonna document this comeback that I have of using cryo and just using fitness as a way to repair my body slowly and get back into things. And throughout that journey, one day, the light there's a few things that kinda converged at the same time, but the light bulb went off one day. It was, hey. You need to open a cryo center. So that's really what led me to this point today.
Dude, I just first off, I think that your story is amazing separate over here, the fact that you would have that that mentality, right, because even just that, if the listener's paying close attention, which I hope that they are, what you just described, our business principles Chaz Wolfe, right, if you just get 1% better every day.
If you just consistently pursue the things that you know that you're supposed to be doing anyway, over a long period of time, just like you were just talking about with your health and being aware of certain things in in in your recovery, if I just do the things that I'm supposed to do over the course of the time. I'll get better. I'll stick to it. And I think that mentality right there is a large reason of your success. And so I just wanted to point that out.
Obviously, it's not just your fitness success, but it's probably your business success as well. And now you have a cryo center. So you know, Wichita, Kansas. Like you said, which which Edians as I as we call. They like to eat. And just like the Midwest, man, we got good beef. We got good food. And, good barbecue here in Kansas City that trickles down, sure to Wichita a little bit, and and people are in need of the service. So I'm just so thankful. Let's fast forward a little bit here.
The reality of mindset, because everything you've just been describing is all mindset followed by action. And I've just got done off my yearly read of thinking grow rich. So I'm like, hype on exactly this topic here, which is mindset followed by action. And so I wanna talk about action that you took early on. So you've already talked about the recovery or the partial recovery, how you got started.
Once you were in the business before today, though, I wanna know a good decision that you made that you can strategically look back and go, that right there was a good decision, and I wanna repeat it. I also want the listeners to know what it is. Yeah. So I think the the best decision that I've made, really, with the business is that I have services that nobody knows what they do.
People if I go into a room with twenty people, might find one person that knows what car out there, ideas, then you start talking about our other services and very similar. So my approach, the decision that I made very early on was we're going to educate the city of Wichita. On what cryotherapy is. We're gonna educate the city of Wichita with IV infusions and infrared saunas and localized cryotherapy all these services that we do.
And so I started just doing that on my own way before we even opened that cryo. I I told you mentioned that before before I started the business a year or 2 before I I started the blog and started journaling along with that blog, I started an Instagram. And so it's really using social media to educate people. After I made that recovery, I jumped from doing marathons to do an alter marathons. I'd never ran more than twenty six miles in my life before before the accident.
Now after the accident, I'm out there with spinal stenosis running fifty miles on a regular or a 32 mile overnight runs, just different things like that. So I've documented that through through my social media, but I've had that tie in to how I'm using Iacryo services because we've got different customer segments. We've got the pain management side. I've already documented I've got a I've got the best success story that I could possibly tell.
And instead of hiring an outside social media influencer or something else to endorse this product, I am my own case study, if you will, and from a pain management side. If I have that from pain management side, I can also do that from that athlete side. And as as I've really built this business, it's been more of a grassroots approach let's go to networking events. Let's go to running clubs.
Let's spend as much time in gyms as we can because I can't educate the public on what cryotherapy is with a 32nd commercial on the radio or 32nd TV commercial, what I can do is I can have a 5 minute conversation with somebody that at the beginning of, there's no way they would try cryotherapy.
But by the end of the conversation, they're either interested in it or they know they have a mother or a spouse or somebody that is in severe back pain or severe hip pain or maybe needs something to boost their immunity or something that ties into what we offer, and I'm able to get them in the center. And then when they have that success story, then that continues to trickle down. Yeah. Yeah. I love that.
There's obviously a lot of maybe strategic marketing plays you could, roll with, but your grassroots approach I think is applicable to every business. Even just to flip the coin here for half second for the listeners, just give them two sides of the story here. Even gathering the Kings, like, gathering the Kings for me Chaz started as a mastermind group and obviously has expanded to a podcast just because we enjoy not only meeting new people, but helping the people who aren't in our membership.
And so there's a lot of reasons why getting on a podcast here with you today, whether it's benefit of today or down the road. Now that's what we're talking about organic marketing. We're just talking about building relationships, education, serving, adding value. That's this is what you and I both are doing even right now, but you specifically on your side and me on mine. But then there's also the, obviously, that the other marketing plays.
I love how you've distinguished the the value of that organic education. It's tough, though. It's a long road. It's a slow grind. Like you said, like, your recovery. Is that kinda like what you're drawn to because of just this persistence mindset that you have? It's just Hey. Let me find the thing that's gonna be sustainable forever, but even though it takes me a while, that's okay. Cause that's to me, organic marketing is that. It's gonna lead to sustainable growth.
Eventually, but you gotta do it and you gotta do it well and you gotta do it well repeatedly over a long period of time. What are your thoughts on that? My thoughts, I'm very blessed because I do have that persistence, but I also have a service that I have passion about. And when you can max persistence with passion, almost seems effortless in a way. I love talking about cryotherapy.
I love talking about helping an athlete maybe prepare for a race or helping an MMA fighter prepare for a fight or somebody who has been has had chronic knee pain for 3 years or somebody who can't sleep, being able to sit down and have that conversation with them or even helping very frequently somebody comes to me for pain management. They're in I cryo, but they know that I lost a £100.
And all of a sudden, they're asking me questions about the diet and exercise and how to get started on a fitness plan. You know, that's the thing. It's not to go too far off that direction. It's amazing how many people in today's society just don't know how to get started. They have good intentions, and they wanna eat. Right? But we've had a diet industry that has confused the heck out of them, and people just don't know how to properly eat.
And if I have get to have a couple of the side conversations of Chaz intertwined doesn't feel like work, and the persistence is very easy. Yeah. I love that. I think that's that's a huge benefit to your mindset. I think Chaz passes along to everybody listening. Who's willing to pick it up? It's easy to not lose the passion, but it's easy to get the passion distorted in the midst of building a business, making mistakes, all the difficult things that we have to do.
And so it's incredibly refreshing to hear for the folks listening today. I know if if you're watching this on YouTube, you can see it, but Matt's been smiling this entire interview. I'm sure you could comment about your smile all the time. You got this big smile, and you can just tell the dude's passionate. He's happy about life. And so to his point, it makes it easy.
It doesn't feel like work, but we're obviously here as business owners because we're building something and those things aren't necessarily easy. Let's flip the coin here a little bit. Let's talk about maybe a mistake that you've made that's maybe made it a little bit more difficult. Maybe dwindle that passion a little bit for a few minutes, maybe. What was Chaz decision? Yeah. So it's stating Chaz the time of this question.
So the one thing that I learned was to spend more time working on the business and less time working in the business. That's right. And so the 1st several months we're open, I was definitely too far in the weeds because, again, this is my passion. This is my baby. This it's more much more than just a business to me. You know, I was in the way sometimes my employees and not letting them fail and learn, I was in the way.
Now one interesting factor to this is I hired my wife to actually be my manager. So that's an interesting dynamic. It it does. It's a very interesting and ever learning dynamic several months into opening I cryo. It was a realization that I had.
And it's still a process getting there in terms of stepping back, but what was what's interesting about the timing of this is just 2 weeks ago, I was at an I cryo conference where they had other franchise leaders who are couple years ahead of us in the process just sharing best practices. And universally, all of them said that answer that they were working in the business, not on the business. So it was validating to know that I'm not completely crazy.
I'm making a very common mistake, but at least was something that I identified and already started pivoting towards. Yeah. That's in that's incredible. The transition. We and gather in the kings, we call it the warrior to king transition Right? So the technician or the in the business warrior worried about the daily battle in the weeds, as you said, blood on the sword, You can only really be concerned about maybe 1 or 2 people, one on your left, one on your right.
As a king, though, the mindset is the team, your family, the community reaching out to those in Wichita Education. Like, it it has to be a bigger picture at that point because you're you have a bigger vision. And so I love that way that you've said that even in the super niche down business of cryotherapy, and you got together with all other only cryotherapists. That was an issue. And so I think that the listener right now is going, yeah, dude. How do I do this? I got two questions for you.
What happened that had already led you to kinda lead toward working more on the business? Was there a story there that ledging to that moment. And then what have you practically done to take yourself out of the weeds since then? Yeah. One thing that My wife and I identified that we could use very early on was a business coach. And so we found a very unique business coach that coaches couples who operate businesses together, love it. She actually spent decades as a marriage counselor first.
So it's a That sure makes sense. Yeah. It's great. So I think that we earned a lot from her, and she mentioned it to us early on, but sometimes you can't see that's forced to the trees. I think it was really accumulation of starting out the week and saying, Alright. These are all the things I wanna conquer. And then getting to into the business.
And then on Friday, it's 10:30 at night, looking back at what we accomplished during the week, and I didn't do this and that because I was in the business. Busy. So it was just kinda slowly learning how to give up the baby a little bit. Yeah. Okay. So practical steps since then of giving up the baby, what does that look like? So one thing that we did is we identified who our emerging talent was on the team first, and we gave them promotions with extra responsibilities.
They still do the day to day within center. We our type of operation, everybody does everything. We don't have a front desk person. We don't have a janitor. So you greet people when they come in the door, you answer the phones, you clean the toilets, you're also putting people in the cryotherapy chamber. Right? Yeah. But, you know, what are some tasks that social media, for instance? We've got a young lady who does an amazing job with that.
Don't touch social media anymore except for sometimes pitching ideas. I just get out of the way. Now she's our social media manager. And so we've tried to identify within our team, what what are their skill sets? What are that extra thing that they can bring to the table that we can just test them? It's gonna give them more a sense of ownership over the business and and what they're doing because they're part of the team. Instead of just in the day to day things, it's developing their skills.
It's giving them bench strength, but It's also freeing up the calendar to do other things that I know are important to the business. Yeah. With you giving away those things, those tasks, those day to day, in and out weed type tasks, it's freed up your calendar to then you said do the things that are more important. What if you recognize from that king's now perspective, that kingship, What's more important than welcoming a guest or answering the phone or cleaning the toilet?
What could possibly be filling your calendar now? Give the listeners some ideas of what you've been putting your hand to. It frees up the calendar, 1st and foremost, to just do more networking opportunities, whether they're it's within the fitness community or business leaders, So just having a little bit of that time, it also I'm a very analytical person. I've been an Excel geek since before Excel was even really around, it was Lotus 123 and Microsoft works.
I I've always been that spreadsheet guy. I'm spending a little bit more time really deep diving combing the numbers, just understanding different levers that I need to pull within the business. So I'd say that those are probably the 2 biggest things. Those also are two things that I find very enjoyable too. So it's some of the other things that that I pulled myself out of. I didn't really like doing anyway. Exactly.
And some of those things, like you said, it was your passion to start it, and so that's why you were maybe doing it. But now you get to actually work on the those higher levered tasks. I love how you use the word leverage, but we use the word leverage a bunch, leveraging time, resources, and key relationships. In essence, is what you just described. And so I just that perspective only opens up when you've allowed your brain and your calendar to to actually see those things.
And so you've given us great, not only insight, but then also practical steps. So thanks for sharing. What about a decision that comes to your desk nowadays? Do you have a process, certain steps that you take, a mindset that you can try to stay in when you're making decisions nowadays? It depends on the complexity of the problem. If it's a smaller, small to medium problem, it's really more just going back to the employees. What makes the most sense? They're the closest to it.
They're on the ground floor. They know where the bodies are buried. They know it's broken. It's really, hey. Help me solve this problem. If it's a if it's a more higher level or financial type of decision, again, it goes back to that cell thing. Let's let's take the set of data. Let's make some pivot tables. Let's look at this from every single type of angle that we could possibly be used to make the best possible decision. And that's really something that I did.
I I would say I think I tell younger people that no matter what job you have in your career, you should always build some sort of side skill that you're better at than the rest of your peers.
And so that's what Excel was to be for from a very when I was a baby manager, and I wasn't always the most inspirational raw raw type of leader wasn't always the putting up the highest sales numbers as a leader, but in terms of using data as a hack, to as a shortcut to accomplish goals, I was always light years ahead of my peers, and so I just continue to leverage that in the business world. Yeah. I think it's so good.
I think a lot of people listening here today, a lot of entrepreneurs get started in the business because they were good at whatever it is that they are doing. Whether it's marketing, whether it's building something of running a fitness business for you and for, myself, we got started in a business for a different reason.
And so we we got started more so, yes, out of passion, but we had that almost inclination to be able to use some of those skill sets that we had determined useful before getting into business, which I think is a great perspective, because that's not everybody's story. There's a lot of entrepreneurs Chaz have just they've got a skill set and they just jumped in with that skill set, which is fine. The skill set of running a business, though, is really what we're talking about.
You developing at this current time and which is what the listener needs to develop as well. It's not just the skill set of marketing or building a deck or running a fitness business or getting people in the chamber, it's how to actually run the business. Before we transition to the speed round, anything to add there? I don't wanna I don't wanna move on too fast from those important points. The only other thing that I'd add is what we're talking about decisions.
That's why I asked, are you talking about before I launch the business or Right. After the launch of the business? I would say several years ago, I became a 4:30 AM person, and I think that really changed my effectiveness and how I structure, my day to day, how I prioritize, and how I see things through. I think that I was when you spend your day doing something very difficult in the morning, I think it may see more mentally sharp. I think that's when you come up with the best ideas.
I don't come up with the best ideas when I'm already in the office. I'm already hearing noise. I already have emails coming to me. I already have phone calls coming to So if I start at the morning, 4:30, do an hour a half, 2 hour long, hard workout. During that hard difficult workout, I'm gonna think about people I need to call today. Thank people things that I need to add to that to do list. And then when I start my day, I feel like I've I have a head start.
An hour a half ahead of people who don't do that and not on top on top of Chaz, your everybody's day is filled with wins and losses. Right? And so you just hope that And the losses are inevitable, but you just hope every day you survive the day with more wins than losses. So, you know, when you start out that day with that difficult workout and you accomplish it, you already have a couple of wins for your day to start out with. So you're already on that upswing.
You have momentum starting out today. Exactly. I this is such a phenomenon to me. We're gonna stay here for a second because it was even just this week, and I haven't been a 4:30 AM person. So I can't necessarily say I'm on your level, but I've been a 5, 5:30 am person for a while. And I'll tell you the days that I don't do it for whatever reason, whether I just was I just couldn't, like, I could. I chose not to, or just days I I decided to be with the family or weekends, whatever the day was.
I'll tell you this right now. The days that I get up early and work out and do what you just said, I feel like the day, like, by the time the normal day would have started, I've already gotten so much done. Even though I haven't really done anything else, quote, unquote, for the business, my feeling of achievement and momentum, as you'd described, is like, dude, I've been up forever.
Like, I've got a half day in, like, I've already gotten half the list done, even though I haven't really worked on the list yet, I've been mentally going over the list. I've been mentally going to that space, even physically, I just wanted to hang there for a second because we hear this in books. We read it in books, and we hear it on podcasts and another shows and conferences and p you know, people that speak on stage. But it's real. It's a 100% real.
And so I I would encourage a listener right now. I know that you don't have to maybe it's not in the morning. Maybe it's maybe your time. Maybe your early is 8. And you work until midnight. Like, the time frame for me, particularly, doesn't really matter. You don't have to be 4:30 for me to, like, check the box and make sure that you're successful. The point is that are you doing the hard thing first? Are you choosing to get physical? All those things give you momentum.
Would you like to add anything? Yeah. I would just add that throughout the day, we have different things that drive different places emotionally. When you have those ups and downs and you have maybe a frustration or you just throughout the day too, there's so many sensory inputs between email and, you know, what we listen to on the radio on the way to the office and all those different things.
Doing that hard thing early in the morning, before any of that occurs really helps me think much clearer. The best ideas I come up with aren't sitting in the office at 1:30 in the afternoon. Where they happen at 5:15 AM when it's dark and it's cold and I'm running down by the river, then I'm like, okay. This this is something that we're missing. I need to make this operational pivot, or here's a great idea for our November marketing campaigns.
The things that I probably am not gonna think of when I'm in the office. Yeah. Giving yourself and your mind space. K. We're gonna go to speed round. First question in the speed round for you, Matt, is you said you're a numbers guy. You're a data guy. So it's gonna be a perfect question for you. I want you to dwindle the entire business down to one trackable metric. If you can only pick one thing to track, what would it be? I'm gonna answer this question with my head and with my heart. Alright?
So with my head, almost a lot logical is just gonna be the profit margins. Right? Right. Yep. Yep. But I think that as we mentioned, the services that we have are very emerging right now. So I know that in order to get the profit margins that I'm chasing next year and the next year and the years beyond and as I start working on my 2nd, 3rd, and 4th location, which I plan doing, over the next 5 years, I know that education piece needs to happen within this community.
And so the way that I really measure today, how effective we are is through my biweekly radio appearances. I there's a local radio station. I have a appearance on every 2 weeks. And when I'm preparing to go on that radio show, I think about the success stories that we've had at I cryo because I like to tell some of those stories on the radio. And if I can come up with 3 or 4 at the top of my head right away, I know that we've been doing something right.
And if I have to think and ask my team, then you know what? We're not doing quite as well as we could. And luckily, almost every single time I have I've gotta weed out what are the best what are the best stories to tell. And so as long as we're doing that, I know that each one of those stories, they're gonna yeah. This isn't, hey. I found a good cheeseburger. You're gonna find that. You're gonna tell 2 or 3 people.
If you find something that changes your life, if you've been taking creams, be that you're putting all over your body because you have psoriasis, You've been doing this for 20 years and you find something that you now just threw that bottle of cream in the trash, you're going to tell everybody. And so that's really where we are at right now in the life cycle of services that we have. So that's why I have to measure that now. The profit margins, they'll they'll come they'll come next.
That's phase 2. I love that. What book would you recommend, Matt, for a 6 figure business owner trying to grow their business? Leadership as an art by Max DuPree. It it's all about servant leadership. I can say that when you think about the books that you read throughout your life and which ones cause a pivot, I would say Chaz, it's been the top 3 influential book in my life, and it really helped me pivot my leadership style as a manager a long time ago.
And made me more more effective and maybe more focused on working for my people than my people working for me. Yeah. I love that synopsis. I wanna press that button just a hair just because servant leadership is something that I'm familiar with.
I've read multiple books on, but that might be a phrase that the listener is a little bit confused by give us just another layer there on on what that did for you as far as, like you said, positioning how you went about certain things or how maybe you saw people differently. Just give us just another layer there. I think that people are your biggest asset to how to run your business.
Are they the ones that are doing the day to day that obviously we're not gonna be involved in every transaction that occurs. They also know what's broken. They know what's frustrated. I think to run a good organization, at any level in any industry. I think you need 3. There's this triangle that I operate off of, which is people, process, and technology. One of those is broke. Then everything else breaks.
And so when you're looking to you're not having the profits that you have or you have you wanna improve your customer service or whatever the case may be. You look to those 3 things, and it may be you need to fix something in all three of those areas, but the fact is that these types of things that are impacting your business are also impacting your employees. Right? So you can you could pay your employees as much as you want. And give them all the benefits.
But if they, if they're continuing to do their job and they're frustrated because of something like they need a new computer and just not replacing their computer when all you gotta do is spend a $1000 and replace their computer. And now all of a sudden, their productivity jumps 30%. You know, that is serving that employee.
And so I think that, you gotta look in that triangle at your people first, and they're gonna tell you what's what's broken with the technology, what's broken with the process, and it just it's all intertwined together. Yeah. Love the answer. What do you think about intentionally networking with business owners or masterminding with other business owners? I think it's a phenomenal idea.
The I do a lot of networking both just in the business community Chaz well as networking more focused within the health and wellness side. And within the greater business community, there's always something to learn from other different business leaders. It's also just good to have those people in your network because they might have some benefit from you immediately or later down the road and vice versa.
And then within the health and wellness space, it's very important to me because there's there's a lot of disruptors out there right health and wellness is is really evolving. It's really emerging because people are fed up with the medical industry. And as I network, I see a lot of disruptors, whether they're chiropractors, physical therapists, even massage therapists, so they're doing things different than the way they've been done over the last 40, 50 years.
And understanding what each one of them do because they might have a particular niche. And, hey, I'm I'm the pain management guy, but I can't help fix something that's broken. I can recommend the best type of chiropractor based on their needs, whether it's Sure. Whether it's that they're that athlete that's beating up their body and has some pain and needs some things work on. Or they're the obese 350 per pound person.
I've got people within my network, and I know what those alternative again, they're disruptors. So they might one person might be into dry needling, another doctor into cupping, another I know a chiropractor that really doesn't spend a whole lot of time on chiropractic care. It's more about fitness. He's got a gym in the chiropractic office. Right.
And then I know another chiropractor got the most efficient system where you can get in and out with a with an adjustment in probably less than 7 minutes. That's great for somebody that that's the person that's busy on the go that to get a couple adjustments a week. I'm gonna send them to that guy. And conversely, they've these guys realize, hey. I'm the person that's fixing them, but they might I might have them.
I might be a PT, and I'm putting into my client on this 12 week recovery program, but that doesn't help him with the pain during that process. And instead of him taking that pain pill, hey. Go do the car out there everything and take down that information that way naturally. Yeah. Exactly. I think that what you've just described is, like, the building of the team, the assembling of the Avengers, the gathering of the Kings.
It's this idea of pulling people together so that you have a network so that you have these key relationships. I mentioned it a few minutes ago when you're talking about leverage, leveraging key relationships, and you just don't know where relationships go. It could be a referral. It could be a a strategic partnership. It could be someone that encourages you, someone that challenges you. I think that your open mindedness at networking.
And then those things that you layered in there are just beautiful. I hope that the listener pays attention. What I found more often than not, even myself, early on when I was growing my first couple of locations of franchises as Wolfe. The networking was important, and it was alright, but I was very transactional about it. I wasn't concerned so much necessarily with the long term relationship.
And that's just, I think, what you and I both are just hitting home is that maybe it's now, maybe it's later, maybe it's both. Either way the relationship matters. The next question on the speed round, and then I got my last one here for you. I wanna know if you only had 1 hour. You talked about you working on the business as opposed to in. If you only had 1 hour each week, to work on the business. That's all you had all week long.
What would you do in that 1 hour to be able to successfully run your company? I have for over 20 years, I've closed out every one on one that I've had with an employee with one powerful question. What can I do for you? So I would spend the first 30 minutes just what can I do for you? What do you need help with? Just understanding that. And then I'd be circling back up with the team, and we would just, delegate at a high level we need to be accomplished. And then Yeah. The next week, hey.
How's is that going? What can I do for you and just keep it rolling? That's good. Love the simplicity of the answer. Last question for you, Matt. Are you ready? I'm ready. You could whisper in the younger Matt's ear. What would you say? See things through. When you get started, see it all the way through. Don't give up early.
I did way too much of that in my life, and that's we're really running and losing that weight It it was more than just losing the weight and getting healthy and getting fit. It was that journey. And it can tell you that when you go through the process of running your first marathon, you can't just show up at the marathon. You have to stick with a plan all the way through. But then when you accomplish it, you're like, Holy crap. I just ran a marathon. 1% I did it. 1% of Americans run a marathon.
So I'm not telling you you have to run a marathon, but find those hard things and don't bail out early. And for me, it was the running. And so then that translated into my professional career. I can also tell you that, with that car wreck that I had in those injuries that I sustained, the fat mat, before Matt lost all that weight, He wouldn't have ever recovered from that injury because that injury required a lot of hard work to get there.
Obviously, it was intertwined with fitness and standing in a cold box 3 minutes a day, 5 days a week, I wouldn't have done those things if I wouldn't have gotten in shape first. And so I'd probably be sitting on the couch £300 Ordering DoorDash Wolfe watching Dahmer from beginning to end in 1 night. I'm so far from Chaz, and it's tran it's trickled down. What's made me a better father It's made me a better husband.
It's eradicated excuses because excuses are just they're just self imposed lies that we tell to ourselves to feel better about not doing what we we need to do. And when you lose £92, when you run a marathon, then all of a sudden, you realize, you know what? Every excuse I've ever told myself is complete garbage. Yeah. Yeah. It makes me think of David Goggins.
Obviously, I'm sure you're probably familiar with who he is, but there's been some physical things that I've done specifically around elk hunting where I've had to tell myself, you're not gonna die. Just take another step. You're not gonna die. And so I'm hearing that come through the screen and through the mic now with you. It's just this persistence that's just stay at it. All of the things, and we mentioned this at the very beginning of the show.
All of these things are so applicable to business. I had this realization about a year and ago, very similar to what you're saying is that I just kinda looked up. It's been 10 years. I told my wife, like, we've been, like, head down doing the thing. Multiple locations of a business, lots of real estate, starting some a couple of other businesses, being good with finances, really is just good decision, good decision. And there are some bad decisions in there too. Don't get me wrong.
But just a repeated persistence of good decisions is what you're saying. And I came to attest to that. I look back over the last 10 years, last 12 years. I go, how am I here? Whenever you're like, how are you where you are? Not the £300 on the couch. Scenario. So it's the 1% you talked about, just a little bit every single day, staying focused, staying persistent. I think if anything you've given the message, not only of a fitness, but also business, it's the same.
You wanna add anything to the to the listener here before we sign off? Well, you didn't ask me if I would what do I do if I lost it all? That's right. I changed the last question, but since you brought it up, I wanna know. What would you do if you lost it all? I'm I I've got what my next plan is outside of I cryo. Got it. Because I so I would just accelerate that plan.
I've got this idea that I'm working on with with some partners, and it's something that's very underserved, again, tied to health and wellness, but several several years behind being mainstream. And, so I would just completely accelerate those and just keep moving forwards. And in the meantime too, I've never had any downtime in my career. I've I started working on 1 of 16. I've had continuous employ you know, I'm I'm 47.
And if I would also take 2 months, go on a long long hike with lots of running and just have a detachment for about 2 months. I'm just very romanticized with that idea And I've been inspired by people who have done it, but, 47, I'd rather do that now than, you know, wait till I'm 60, 65 to try to do Chaz. But I think that it would be a good mental reset too to evaluate, okay, what what wrong? What am I gonna do better this next time?
And in the process, launch that new business Chaz well as I also have plans to I'd like to write a book 1 day, and so I feel like that would would better way than when you're just completely detached doing hard things. Because when you're doing hard things, you're a little bit more honest with yourself that It blows. When it comes to yes. That's right. Dude, you've been an absolute inspiration. I would read that book. So please write that book.
I think that I think a lot of people need to hear that message that this thing that we've been talking about, even your answer there at the end is just about persistence. It's about, hey. Great. And you said the whole thing with a smile. If I lost it off, he's over here smiling the whole time. Chaz to me tells me that you've got joy Chaz you've that you're excited about life and that it's not just gonna happen today. And it's okay. It's the journey, like you said.
So We hope that that the listener obviously got plenty from today. They were paying attention even the slightest. You had mentioned before we started the show that sometimes you've listened while you're running and you're paying attention, you gotta stop and take quick note. They had to do that several times in the show so that we thank you for that. We appreciate you being here. How can the listener find you if they're in Wichita? Where are you located? How can they find you online?
All that fun stuff? Yeah. And we're located in which dot 2616 North Mays Road. That is in the new market square area. For those of you familiar with that, You could find us on social media. We have a Dicryo Wichita West and same thing with Instagram. And you could find me on Instagram as injured.beast and I also have a blog injuredbeast.com. There's also a Facebook page as Wolfe. So three places to find me.
And I write a lot about cryotherapy and recovery, but there's a lot of different things around weight loss, nutrition. So it's it really started as the blog as I recovered from the injury, but evolve to more of just a health healthy living type of type of water. Yeah. We'll put you we'll put we'll put you up there next to the liver king. Are you eating raw liver these days? Do not eat raw liver. Yeah. Just kidding. We'll put all that in the show notes and so that they can easily find you.
Matt, you have been incredible. The next time I'm in Wichita, which will be soon, You and me are grabbing food, no doubt about it, and maybe coming to check out your cryotherapy center. I just love everything about your story. Thank you for being here. We appreciate you. Nothing but bless to your family, your business, your team, all of it.
Thank you, Chaz. I appreciate the opportunity to be on your show, and I'm looking forward to meeting up with person and maybe I can talk you in to let it be freeze you as well. I'll do it. Let's do it. In fact, I'm gonna bring a whole bunch of guys down, and we're all gonna freeze. It's a big company. Awesome, man. Looking forward to it. God bless. I appreciate the opportunity. Excellent. Thanks listening to Gathering the Kings.
We hope you got a ton of value today and learned a thing or 2 about taking your business to 7 figures and beyond. If you desire more and want a community around you to help you get there, I want you to go to gathering the king's dot com. That's gathering the king's dot com I want you to apply for our next becoming a king 90 day intensive.
We are extremely exclusive by nature as a group, What that means that we're really wanting only the entrepreneurs who take their business and targets super serious to apply. So if that's you, you think you got what it takes, to level up your business, I want you to go to gatheringthekings.com and apply. And we will see you on the other side.