Customer Obsessed: Proven Methods for Building a High-Standard Roofing Company with Robin Scherer

I'm here to bring you the best from the industry . In each episode , I sit down with top industry leaders to dive into their strategies and valuable lessons to help you find success in roofing . And valuable lessons to help you find success in roofing . All right , welcome to another episode of the Roofing Success Podcast .

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I'm the owner of Trust Roofing Company . I own it with my mom , winnie . I started roofing when I was 15 years old out in Los Angeles area for my dad , so I've been doing roofing and involved around roofing forever .

I did the physical side of the trade up until I was about 23 or so and then that's when I started this company out here in Florida with , again , my parents and we got this one started .

It started from the ground up Very , very small , very , very humble beginnings and we've scaled it up into something we're very proud of and just continue to work on that business process constantly and all the rest of it . But we love roofing and that's us .

People , product and process is kind of his little thing , but I really think that it's the people . And to go to build an eight-figure roofing company boy , that takes really good people . So I was wondering if you could like one of the things that I thought we could go a little bit deeper on is you know some of the specific strategies that you've implemented .

You know , while you're scaling to , kind of , you know , find good people , maintain high quality standards , things like that . Let's speak to that a little bit .

And what I would say really and it sounds , I don't know , it sounds corny or something , but it really is figure out what your core values are , what your business stands for . Why are you in business ? What are you doing ? What do you stand for ? What has brought you success so far ? So you might be an owner , operator and you might have been very successful .

Well , why , what are you doing ? Well , maybe it's hard work , maybe it's integrity , maybe you know , whatever those things are , okay , those are your core values . Figure them out , write them down and then hire and fire based off of those and nothing else , and do it ruthlessly .

And if you find people who are in agreement with those like you're a trust roofing , you know it's full ownership , responsibility , it's integrity , it's customer obsession , right , like . These are our core values . We have five of them , and finding people who will align with them is everything .

Because when you get down to the nitty gritty of like , oh , this is how you should do the sales process . This is how you should nail the shingle . This is how you should do that . I mean , I'm more able to train that stuff . And it's good to find people with experience too . Don't get me wrong .

It's better no-transcript profitably , which means we can't make mistakes , which means we got to make the client happy . So , you know , get people around that and you end up doing okay . Sometimes you'll find people who say they're all about that and they'll actually .

You know , I mean I don't know , gaslight's a strong word but I mean I've found people who kind of do that . They're like , oh yeah , I'm all about it , I'm all about it , I'm all about it . But then , when it comes to put your you know foot to the wheel , actually do the do and do it , you kind of realize that they're not actually about that .

So that's something . You tell you that they're all about these things . But their actions speak louder than their words and I would say don't be afraid of , you know , not hiring someone if you're not sure . And also say , don't be afraid of firing someone if they aren't a fit .

And I've made the mistake so often of holding onto people too long who don't , and it always , always hurts you in the end , when you do that , it does .

So we're only just making our best guesses with people , right , and everyone's going to put their best step , their best foot forward , right , that resume is going to look real pretty right . Those , they're going to answer the interview questions the best possible and they're going to really show the the good . You know .

When you ask them about their weaknesses , well , my weaknesses are , you know that I really , you know , I really care too much , you know . You know what I mean . Like , there's always that those things right , like , but I and I'm a big proponent of core values too that's an understanding your core values . So let's circle back to that for a second .

Let's start with how did you guys say , or how did you determine these are our core values ? What was that process like ?

So I had them kind of codified in other ways . But then I actually went in and , ok , these are the core values . And okay , these are the core values . And what I did is I just looked at really again that smaller scale , like what was it that I was doing , or me and my small team were doing , where it was smaller and really successful ?

What were the things we put the most attention on , what were the traits that really decided on that success ? And I found those and then I put those out there . And it can be hard because there can be some that , oh well , we do that too or we're that too . But it's not about just the what's good or what's a positive trait .

No , it's about what are the core ones , what are the ones really to put attention on ?

So I also , you know , I looked , you know you can look up what are some core values and you'll get a list about 200 of them , you know , and go through them and really go , well , what is really important to me , like if I couldn't have any other ones , but I could have those , and I would say , you know , make it a smaller amount , somewhere between four

to seven , you know , not too many . If I can only have those , which ones would they be ? And then really dial it in . And that's kind of what we did .

How are you , how are you going , how are you measuring your team or what are you doing in the interview process ? That is , let's start there . When you're interviewing someone , how are you determining if they are a fit for your core values ? Yeah , it's a . That's start there .

When you're interviewing someone , how are you determining if they are a fit for your core values ?

I ask . I will ask them about their former work and I will make it safe for them to say anything that they want to say or talk badly and ill of previous employers or previous situations . And if they start doing that , then I immediately know that they probably do not fit to our most important core value , which is full ownership .

Because if you're taking full ownership , guess what ? You just quit . You start . You don't like something or some situation , you just leave . You don't need to talk bad about them because that's not for you and you're going to move on . Don't like something or some situation ? You just leave .

You don't need to talk bad about them because that's not for you and you're going to move on . If you don't take full ownership , you hang around , you build up a lot of hate and upset for the work you're doing in the situation and then you're going to talk to me about it in the , in the interview that we're sitting there doing .

So if somebody starts talking bad about the situation they were just out , uh and and you know I decided to choose a good fit . So I'm moving on Like you could do it in a way that wouldn't be , but there's some people who really will , I feel like , talk ill of former work and situations .

So when I hear that , I really look at that core value and whether or not they fit into it . That's one thing that I ask about and look for .

I do ask them , like , for weaknesses , like you asked , and I feel like it's important for them to actually have a good answer to that question and not say something like , like you said , like I care too much , it's like man .

Well , if that was the case , you would be like a multimillionaire by now , cause you would just be so disciplined and so caring that , like this would all be working out Right , no , but it's like you know it isn't that way , right , and that's okay . We're human , like man .

I could just list , I could list for you in an encyclopedia all of my weaknesses , right ? I'm sure you could do the same .

And that's actually more important to be able to be humble , be able to know , hey , where I , where I've had struggles in the past , where I might have struggles in the future and what I can do to correct them and how that could influence and impact my job . Being able to be humble and understanding those , I think , is important .

So that's another question I'll go into . I'll ask them about their weaknesses , but it can be tough . One thing that I try to do is you want to filter the pool of who you're interviewing , and if you can do that , then you're less likely to find someone who really just isn't a good fit .

One of the number one ways that I do that is I really look at hiring from within , so like , if I want to be by that , let's say I have someone who really exemplifies the core values , like my guy , ian , in Inside Sales . This guy's like he embodies a trust , roof and core values . He's a badass , he's incredible , right . So if I have him .

Then we were doing like this arts and seafood festival and event and he brought his girlfriend over to like just help with the event for the day and I saw her and I was like you know what she ? She , she cares , she had that care factor . She just wanted to go , she wanted to work with the team , right .

So it was like okay , well , she doesn't have any roofing background , doesn't know anything , but I can train her . So I reached I right .

So if you can promote to your team , like I'll tell my team when I'm going to hire a new sales rep or when I'm going to hire a repair technician , I'll tell my roofers they're going to tend to recommend and bring in people who are more or less like them .

So if you like what you have right now , if you like that person , whoever they recommend probably not a rule , but they probably will have some similarities because you know a guy who's really good hearted and does good work and all this is going to want to bring in someone who's toxic to the culture , toxic to what we're trying to build .

So that would be a big successful action for me . I mean most of my team , I would say , has come that way . People who have , you know , knew someone else working here not all of them , but a lot of them .

I just that's not something I've done . Some have found success with it .

A lot of it is the you know , the people that you that that are coming from your current team , but now on an ongoing basis . How do we say , is this person living up to our core values ?

So , some weaknesses for managers I know it's a big weakness for me is doing that too much and overlooking just raw facts of like , hey , wait a minute , this person says that they're doing all this , says blah , but look at the results and look at what's actually coming of it and all of this and look at the actual data .

So that's been a weakness for me in the past . But I would say do not ignore the data , do not ignore the numbers .

If you have a project manager who consistently has large problems or situations on his projects , if you have a sales rep who just isn't hitting the numbers that you need them to hit like my company we've been doing this recently because it's been an interesting economic time and like trust roofing , there's a certain amount of revenue that a sales rep needs to

produce in a quarter just for trust roofing to be okay . Like , literally there's a certain amount of revenue for me to give them that number of lead opportunities , to put that marketing dollar out to pay for their truck and their insurance , I pay for their dental and blah blah .

And it turns out that like , even though they're commission only right , and you know I can't just have them kind of skating by and earning this certain amount or producing a certain amount of revenue for the company . So , looking at hard numbers , going , hey , he's not doing the number , but Joe is . They have the same opportunity . What are they doing differently ?

And if you know , you can try and try and try to get them to . You know , bring in what he's doing . But if at the end of the day they can't or won't or whatever , then it isn't . It isn't that the one thing I've realized . It isn't that that person is a bad or it doesn't mean they're not good enough . It doesn't mean any of that .

It might just be they're not a right fit , maybe for that role , maybe for the company . It just might not be a good fit , and that's okay sometimes .

Um , but doing what's right and best for the business at the end of the day and putting any kind of personal opinions or thoughts aside , I've learned recently is key in making those kinds of decisions and just do what's right for the company .

Usually your gut will tell you and you'll ignore it , and then you'll always look back and go man , I should have done that sooner or so it's true , there's always the .

I requested PTO for the first time in my life last summer , robin , so I've been like I have only been an entrepreneur my whole life and maybe in sales roles and things like that . Entrepreneur my whole life and you know , maybe in sales roles and things like that .

But but man it's , there has never been a man I I made a bad one there , like it was always that you know , it was always , man , we waited too long , always , yeah , very rarely .

You can look it up , eos people analyzer and it's a way to just like okay , every quarter you're kind of looking at , do they exude your company's core values ? And that that , to me , is a very , very simple one , but it's a reflective one , right ? You actually have to do it Like it's not , like there's no like in between .

Well , yeah , they did good today , you know it's like no . Over the course of this quarter , have they really like , have they lived up to this core value or are they kind of in between ? Like , have they lived up to this core value or are they kind of in between , or are they on the exact opposite side of that core value ? Right , are they ?

Are they really showing that they are not , that that is not a core value of theirs , you know ? So it's tough , man , people are , people is tough , but people , people are the business , right , and that kind of coming back to that people are the business , right , and that kind of coming back to that people are the business , so what kind of ?

You know , it's always fun to talk about the wins , but I think a lot of times the real nuggets come from the lessons right , the things that we've done wrong . What are some mistakes that you feel like you've made during this scaling process and what are some of those lessons that you've learned from that ?

mistake . So we had a hurricane , hit hurricane and this was in 2022 . It's probably around when I had that podcast call with you . So I didn't want to go and touch it .

I said I don't want to touch it because I know that my quality , I will lose my quality , I will lose my personal touch , like I'll lose that if we try to scale that big and that fast and try to go take on all this hurricane work . Right . So that was my thought . So then all my reps , two-hour drive away though from where we were at .

So then this is where I became the crazy person . I said , well , the only way I'm going to go is if we set up a physical location over there , we're going to freaking be there on base . We're going to do that . So , man , I went crazy . I mean , I invested in , we bought a house there , we bought an office there , bought , I mean , the physical building .

We bought an RV to fly this thing . Get going . I had a branch manager over there . I hired a bunch of people operations , people , production people some of them decent people but there just wasn't enough . It was stretching our web too far out .

We were overextended , we were not ready as a company yet to have a remote branch away from me personally as the CEO and try to manage . So you know , a lot of chaos ensued , like when we first started , like the sales were great and we sold so much .

How could you not , in that hurricane situation right , and obviously a lot of money was made because , again , right , there was a lot of work down little bit slower , not trying to go as quick at it , jump at it as fast and not have overextended myself as much , because what I had to do is I had to .

Basically , I closed that branch down as the hurricane work started to dwindle , because it worked during the hurricane . We had all that workflow , but then when that dwindled , the machine just wasn't working over there the way it does over here .

So I had to close that branch down , let go of some people who couldn't obviously move to work closer home and everything .

So yeah , if I go backwards , definitely wouldn't have extended that quite so far and would have been slower to hire on some of those hires , some of those hires that I didn't make personally , I had a manager over there make they were mistakes and they weren't good hires , weren't great comp plans , like there were just some problems .

So you know , learn from my mistake and don't don't overextend yourself too fast .

The first one is is in people like you you had mentioned you , you're , the company wasn't ready to have you be so far away as the , the , the CEO , the owner , yeah , you know there are . Again , I guess that comes back to people right , it's that leadership team and development of that leadership team . And uh , and you know that's a , that's a tough one .

Like , sometime you , you hired a , did you say a branch manager down there . I had a .

He was the person for that role at that time , that's all .

And you had to follow it in some way . Right , like there was a , you know you had .

People in business , all the time , you know , they will have a new thing come up or a shiny object and go try to grab for it Right , but that thing will hurt or cause issues for what's really the most important .

So for me , what was most important was my Clearwater Tampa Bay area presence and my roofing business here , my people here , my team here , and that Port Charlotte situation over there was just the shiny object . Did it make some money ? Sure , were there a lot of great jobs ? Sure , like , did it have potential ? Sure , of course it had freaking potential .

If I could have put all my attention on that , one probably could have made it work , but it was distracting me and hurting and hindering from what mattered most .

And I just want you know if I take the same amount of energy that I'm dealing with all these phone calls and all these drives and all these this and that situations over there , if I can drive that energy just into home base and what I'm doing here and the market here , you know , I know I would be more successful , so , and so I had to make the call on

, and then that's what I did .

So I really I tell people to really figure out what they want in life , what they want to go after , and anything that distracts you from that , just remove it . If it's some friend who you go and hang out with and it makes you negative , I mean get that part out of your life .

If it's this thing over here , you know , maybe it's a long , long drive , you're living too far away , you're driving an hour into work every day . Well , that's an hour in and an hour out . That might be distracting you , like . Whatever the thing is , make sure that your energy and your attention is going where you want it to go and you'll find success .

So for me at that time it was just too much going over there and not toward what was really important , which was my home base operation .

Right , Like how much time is it going to take , how much focus is it going to take , how much money is it going to take , how is it going to take away from the resources of the team ? So looking at it through the lens of opportunity cost will help you determine hey , maybe this isn't the right thing at this time .

That's right .

So , in the case of that branch over there , I think it was a big part of the people not the right people in positions and in space including myself right , I wasn't able to be over there and be the leader and I didn't feel like I had enough leadership otherwise at this new branch , this new endeavor on its own , to make sure that it succeeded and went okay

. And the other thing was you know systems and processes , like I have them and we're constantly working on them and growing on them , but we're a new company . We've been around for you know four years , three years , and you know less at this kind of a scale .

So when you're a newer company like that , you only have so many systems and processes trying to extend and trying to send them all over to another location . That was a lot too . So , but yeah , but yeah , your business is definitely a machine .

And that one over there was not , was not working the way that I wanted it to work and at the end of the day , that's a disservice to not only the employees who are over there but to the clients too , because you want the clients to get a certain experience and if that machine isn't able to produce that experience consistently enough and correctly enough and

obviously so it's profitable well then that's a problem for everybody across the board and including the employees .

So really , at the end of the day , when you you know pulling the plug on something like that was the greatest good across the board for everybody involved , sometimes there's like a you know , you can feel like , oh man , how am I going to possibly go over there ?

I had to drive over there and I had to let do a team meeting and let everybody know what was happening and make that announcement . You know , and you can run that moment in your mind . You go like there's no way I can do that . I got to figure out how to make this work . I don't want to . I can't . You know , let those people go . I can't do it .

You run that in your mind but you know it's not true . You can , and if it's the right thing to do and it is the greater good , you know , you just got to do it . Um , it's going to happen , it's going to be okay , they're going to move on . You know that kind of thing .

It's their business entities , right , your LLC , your corporation , whatever it is that and they're structured that way because they are a thing , like they're a . You know they are a thing and you have to keep that thing alive and sometimes it takes really , really challenging decisions . Talk about the customer experience a little bit .

And and what are some like unique customer experience things that you guys do at Trust Roofing that you feel really create a gap ? Right , how do you create that gap between you and the next company ? What are the things that you do in your customer experience that make you stand out and create raving fans , that make you stand ?

Like some policies on business Like , for example , we give a 10-year labor guarantee and I mean we really mean business with that . When we get a callback or an issue , we have seven techs who are on the road that are our in-house techs who are ready to go out to those sites and take care of them .

But in addition to that , they're doing repair work , maintenance work , and we have really quick response times to that kind of work as well . So having like a service and maintenance fleet , not only to do new maintenance and repair work but also to service your existing client base and your warranties , I think is huge .

That's something that we do , we as a company or a residential process . We pretty much have like a satisfaction guarantee .

So that can sometimes sound like a word that a business would just say to sell roofs , which it is kind of right , but we actually mean it Like we mean business on that , and what it means is , if you know , aunt Smith is upset because we rolled over the sprinkler head .

Well , even though in our fine print maybe it says we're not responsible for that kind of damage or something , we take care of it anyway . It's a few hundred bucks and we take care of it because miss Smith isn't satisfied and that's a problem for trust roofing . If miss Smith isn't satisfied for any reason across the board , that's a problem for us .

That means that we didn't do what we set out to do as a business , which is to create a great roofing experience for our clients and for our team . So if Ms Smith isn't happy , it's up to us to figure that out . So we have a satisfaction guarantee policy and we're pretty , pretty heavy into that .

Another thing is a roofing company is like under $30,000 worth of payment upon completion . We don't take any deposits , which a lot of people feel like is a huge peace of mind .

And we tell people is we're so confident in our process and in our company and what we do that we don't even take deposits underneath that number for our smaller residential projects and that gives them a lot of confidence because they've heard of oh , this company went out of business and you know they went out of business with my deposit or oh , you know it

can be uncomfortable for somebody , if it's a $15,000 shingle roof , to give someone seven grand before they've even gotten on the roof , before they've done anything yet , that can be a little bit uncomfortable for some people , some folks .

So that's something we try to do and , just across the board , anything I can do small to create a little bit of a better experience . One thing we just started doing . It's really small . When we hand a client on a sale , like a little folder showing the company , a little presentation folder .

We go over the quotes on SumoQuote digitally but we have a little presentation folder we hand out with some promotional materials , like JF shingles , if we're selling JF tile , if we're doing that , what have you ? We have a little handwritten card that my reps take a pen before they go in to present .

They write a little handwritten note to the client , something personal about them , about their roof , about their situation , and it's part of the sales process .

But just like little steps like that at the end of the job , when the job wraps up , the client automatically , once it hits a certain category , gets a box of cookies and that's a dope marketing thing and that cost me a few bucks every single time .

But just these little steps to try to just , you know , shine through in a customer's mind at the end of a job . You never know what that thing might be that might really stand out to them . I've had people tell me oh my God , thank you so much for those cookies . I appreciate it so much .

I'm referring you to my Uncle , joe , and you're , like you know , buy a couple cookies . It's like I don't even like cookies that much personally , but for somebody that might really , you know , stand out in their world . So just figuring out little things you can do to stand out and be different , I mean , it's always what we're trying to do .

You're doing things sometimes that weren't your fault , you know , but you're taking care of those things anyway . But a lot of companies shy away from that . Service maintenance . Yes , you know , man , I think that to me that's a great . Some of the most successful companies , I know , man , they lean into that .

We did a roof like three years ago , right , and when I look back at that roofing install , I'm going to tell you I think that it's in the bottom point , one percent of my roofing installs Right . So if I do a thousand roofs , hers is like one out of a thousand , like the worst , like it's really . It was a rough process . I felt like as the owner .

I tried to sub crew out one of the first times I tried to sub crew out . It was just a mess . There were some leaks during the install . We had to fix some drywall Process was slow , was messy . It was just not an install I was particularly that proud of . However , I took care of her the whole freaking time .

I stayed in good communication with her the whole time and I took care of the bumps in the road . I 100% did right and we moved on from that one . We moved on .

Three years later , she calls me and she's looking for a referral for like a screened-in something and she was actually asking me if I could do the work . And she said the reason I'm calling to ask you is because you , I did a good job on your roof .

Like , for me that was a disaster , that was a tragedy of a job for me , I thought , but for her I had bumps and I took care of everything . So she was asking me to take care of this project and I told her you know , no , I don't do those and I got her linked up with a good buddy of mine who's taking care of her . Now that just goes to show .

If somebody asks her right now , hey , you know , who do you want to ? Who should I do my roof ? Like , who did yours ? You know , tell me . She's going to say us , even though it was a one out of I'm serious , probably a thousand not good experience and not good job for this gal that I had Really wasn't my standard .

She still really will refer us and talk about us . So that just goes to show , man , you know , if you do the right thing , stay in good , high communication and you push through , even with a lot of the barriers and challenges and craziness that can happen in this industry , you can come ahead on top . It might . It might cost you some money to do so .

You might not be as profitable in the short run or the short term , but in the longterm you'll have a brand that'll outshine others who lean into the opposite . No , no , no , no , and a lot of this and not that mentality , that service-oriented mentality yeah , you have to .

You're like , oh , that , like those , stick with you and so , but the person that that , so the solution to that when they were in there , you know , facing that issue when you were the person to solve that problem for them , now that's memorable , it's a it's , it's really cool , it's it's it's a good way to put it , and so , in that , you have to .

What I heard also is communication . You use the word communication .

I think this is where you know we had spoken about this before about the professionalism of the industry , right , and communication is key , right , if you know you have to know what's going on on that job at all times , but the customer doesn't , and this is the biggest fault , like some of the biggest complaints about contractors .

If you look up Google reviews for for contractors in your area , you will probably find some negative reviews , that's that are like they didn't get me an estimate in time , they didn't get that's a communication thing right . Like they didn't show up on time . They didn't do this on time . They didn't . This didn't happen . It's all communication .

We just have to keep the customer from wondering . Is the way that I frame it right If you're- . Oh yeah , man .

Because as much as I believe in that and it's true for me we still have it happen sometimes . Hey , I was wondering you know the repair tech didn't show up here and you know it can happen . Right , repairtech didn't show up here and you know it can happen . Right , it happens . So I'm really working on it like crazy , because that's my mentality .

They should never be in the dark or asking questions about anything whatsoever , and even further on that to one degree or another , what we know and understand about their job and their process .

They should also know and understand Right , like , if I know that , hey , we need to do another magnet sweep next Monday , they better know we need to do another magnet sweep next Monday . If I know their permitting and permit is falling into X challenge , they should know that permit is falling into X challenge , right ?

Unless it's just , oh , I'm going to press this button and it's going to be done . Fine , they don't need to know about that . But you know , transparency is key and making sure that they're in the same spot in terms of their project , that we are as a company , and if both are in alignment , you're good to go .

It's when they go out of alignment and she thinks her drip edge should look this way and you think it should look this way , that's where the misalignment occurs and it could have just been a simple hey , mrs Smith , I'm installing this .

Will be a project manager when we install that drip edge , it's going to look a little bit like this because of this way that this is , would you be okay with that ?

How are you looking at these things ? What is your process ? What is your ? How are you looking at these things ? What is your process ? How are you determining what to add into your communication rhythm ? Take , probably , not take anything out , but how are you ? Yeah , no , I never take anything out .

Okay , automate an email for this , automate an email for that . You can automate a lot of these things and that helps a lot because that helps fill those gaps . So you know , yeah , your project manager , we're supposed to be in touch with them all the time , right , and my sales rep is supposed to always be on top of their stuff .

But , God forbid , somebody misses the ball on something . If there's an automated text that goes out or an automated this that you can set up , that kind of helps fill that in , that's really helpful .

So I've done some of that , which is cool , and then just constantly , constantly preaching and going over with the team what we're talking about right now in terms of communication with the clients and just trilling on it , running them on it and finding people who really like to communicate .

Because , like I'll give you an example , my sister Maggie , she never I'm telling you , she never has a problem with a client . You know there's people like this . They just never have a problem with customer . Why ? Because they're just so on the communication with them . They're so good at it . And that's my sister . She embodies that .

So finding people who kind of have that in them , who are very good communicators and like communicating and then embody the core values , you have a recipe for success . Because they just , I don't know , they're just going to communicate , they're not going to let their clients not be happy , they just won't do it .

But , like , you're supposed to send an email , send a text saying you sent an email and then , a day later , calling and saying , hey , I sent you a text and an email , an email and a text saying that , you know , did we solve that problem or are we moving forward on this right ?

Like that , the higher level of communication , and you got to work that into your flow . You know , and you can always be looking for opportunities . It's just asking hey , where did we ? When did the customer have a question ? If a customer has a question , you could find a way to put that , build that into your experience .

But if they're wondering , you're losing is the way I like to put it .

You're losing If they're wondering anything about your warranty information right , like you said that you have a 10 year labor warranty . Like if they're wondering how do how do I , how do I , who do I contact if something happens after the fact . If they're wondering how to refer you .

You're losing a lot yeah you're losing a lot , right , like a lot of a lot of companies won't say , hey , this is how , this is how the best way to refer us is this way , like you can , you can really go deep on this stuff .

But again , it's just small iterations over and over again , which I think you guys have done well and that's what's fun , like I think you've had . You have the mindset , and I think it takes the right mindset in business , man , stuff's going to happen every day , all day , year after year .

Stuff's going to happen , problems are going to occur , but if you learn something from it and look at it as the next opportunity , that's what you want . So I want to talk to you a little bit about that . Is that mindset , how you know ? Is that something that you've worked on over time ? Is it something that you ?

You know , you're kind of like man , I've just been , I've just been an optimist my whole life , like where did that come from ?

think of . Early on in this business year number two , we were small . It was me and my five guys and we were on it . We were on a commercial project . This is the same time I was on that other project that I was subbing out . This is an example of overextension , also so overextended .

I went over there to deal with the sub crew and deal with all this . They're on this big commercial flat and they had the whole thing open and a rainstorm came in that was not supposed to come in and we we did not . We had too much the roof open up . There were mistakes made on that process but it flooded the freaking place . It got this church flooded .

You cost a hundred and like $70,000 to renovate the inside of it and I couldn't get it . I covered under any insurance that I had . We couldn't get it covered under any insurance that the building owner had . So me and my mom footed the bill . We took care of that the whole way .

We got a crew in there , took care of the drywall , took care of the flooring , we took care of the whole freaking nine yards and we didn't have . We didn't have like the capital to just grab , we didn't have the liquid capital to grab and throw out of that . I mean I swiped and maxed out credit cards to do what I had to do .

I mean so's a crazy one , that's a wild one , but that's again , it goes back to that . It goes back to that mindset of stuff is going to happen and going to take care of it and perseverance and pushing through . But it also comes back to that concept of branding . And again I'll go back to Alex Ramos , because I like a lot of stuff that he talks about .

He talks about branding and he talks about your brand is like a bouquet of flowers and it only takes right . If you can have a beautiful bouquet , it only takes just a few dead ones to really ruin that and make that not something you would want to give to . You know your ideal client , right as a hey , this is who my brand is .

So that church for me , if I don't own up to that and take care of that 100% , that's a dead flower in my bouquet , that person who I get a nail in their tire because I didn't magnet it good enough . That's a dead flower in my bouquet and you just cannot allow that , you know . And also I have a personal brand me myself .

I want to take care of people and I can't have that there . So you know , I don't . I don't know my mom I think I got that from the most , though she is very fervent that like , if we make a mistake , if something goes wrong on our job and it's our fault , then we're going to take care of it 100% .

There is a factor , though , where you pointed out sometimes clients will say that things you did weren't your fault , and they , you know . So this can be very , this can be very difficult . I've had some of these where I really , you know , it just really wasn't anything that we did , there was no responsibility from our end .

And my rule of thumb on that is if it's small enough , if it's insignificant enough and it's going to make the client happy , then I take care of it . If it's bigger and I have to fight it , I will . But but having that , that mindset , I think , is very , very important .

I mean , this is , it's a crazy thing , but as you're starting businesses and growing and you know you're , you're younger , you're , you know you're not a , you know , I mean I don't want to say it this way like , but like you're , you're younger , you have like , how have you developed a mindset of how much opportunity you can capture in your business ?

Because I think that we put ceilings on ourself in that too , right , I think that a lot of people go man , I don't know how I could do 4 million in a year . I don't know , I don't even- .

Where did the belief that it was possible come from ?

Um , and there's a book by uh , by grant cardone . I'm a fan of him and he talks about the 10x rule . Right , if you're going to do anything , 10x it , 10x that mindset . So , like I'm doing roofing , and I thought what's the biggest number I think I could get to in roofing ?

And I went and I thought about this and I said 100 million was the number I came up with . So when I wrote my thing on trust roofing , like this is what trust roofing is going to do .

But by doing that I mean we're going to do 25 million in revenue this year , which isn't the biggest roofing company by any means , you know , not even in my area , but it's . It's a good size and we're making a lot of difference and we have all in-house employment here and we're doing , you know , about a thousand roofs a year .

So we're making that big impact . But there's no way I would be making this impact at 25 million If I had said , man , I hope I can do 15 someday or 10 someday . It would have been a lot harder to have reached that number , unless I really take I talk about taking on bigger problems . What's the size of problem you can take on ?

So when I look at the roofing industry , I go what are the problems in the roofing industry ? And you find customer satisfaction , communication , labor , install quality , the labor force , right .

You find all these problems and I try to own the whole beast , like how can we own the labor problem in roofing , how can we own the communication problem in roofing right and when you're trying to own the whole beast , it ends up being a lot easier to own it on that smaller scale of a 20 or 25 million dollar a year roofing operation .

So taking , you know , taking on a bigger , a bigger chunk of it and not being afraid to to do that . You know a lot of people . I don't know they , they don't want to or they're , they're afraid , or I don't know . But you really don't have to be , because we're all capable of great things . We all have greatness within us .

It's only ourselves that can hold us back , and I truly do believe that .

How do you leverage ? What can you leverage ? You can leverage your team , like a great team that actually gets behind that mission with you . You can leverage like marketing , like smart marketing techniques and tactics and things like this . Right , there are things you can get and work on that .

You can then leverage that time that you put in and that's always been my thing just hard work , putting in the hours , showing up , I mean , every morning . This morning I woke up at 4 am , I made my breakfast , I got here at the office , I started at 5 .

That's my drill , that's my grind and that's what I've been doing the whole time that I built this thing . So that's , for me , is putting in the hard work . It doesn't mean you have to put in 70 hours a week , 80 hours a week . You might be able to do it in 50 for your business .

But then at that point , it's figuring out how you can leverage some of those things I talked about , whether it's leadership qualities , whether it's marketing , whether it's whatever it is . How can you leverage that time to be more effective ? Like what are you best at ? What is your time most valuable at ?

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