Pro Marketer Starts Roofing Co Today | Brilliant or Financial Suicide?
Tim Brown, founder of Hook Agency, is launching Owl Roofing despite brutal industry headwinds. Lead costs jumped 38% in November 2024, and accounts receivable now stretch 12 weeks. He's betting on branding over paid ads, with a playbook of truck wraps, SEO, door-knocking, and stuffed-owl giveaways.
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Tim Brown is starting a roofing company. Yeah, Tim Brown with Hook Agency, the marketing guy that you know of, and he is doing it in what might be the worst possible time to start a roofing company. But in this interview with Tim, you're gonna hear his enthusiasm, his excitement, his strategy, the moves he's making in marketing, and some innovative ideas that you're probably gonna wonder, are they brilliant or absolutely ludicrous and ridiculous? Well, I'll let you be the judge, but I can tell you whether you've been in business for 5 years, 20 years or you're just getting started, you're gonna learn a lot about what it takes to be an entrepreneur and what it's gonna take to survive in the 2026 landscape in roofing. This is a longer interview, but do stick around all the way till the end because there's not a dull moment that won't bring you value to help advance your career or your leadership or your ownership in roofing. Thanks for being here with me, Adam Bensman. Let's rock and roll. So the, the main reason that I wanted to, to interview on here is you may have seen this, maybe not, but I published a report, the 2025 to 2028 Roofing Market Report on the industry changing. And I've been basically telling roofers they need to learn to become digital marketers or they're not going to have a roofing company anymore. And, and then I see you starting a roofing company, I'm like, point in case. So I wanted to just have a dialogue around like why it is that Tim, who runs Hook Agency, very well known. You've been, in fact, just on my other shelf, I've got the little playing card you sent me and, you know, your book, copy of your book that is back there. So you've done very well for yourself and developed quite a name. Why in the world are you running into starting a roofing company?
Yeah, I was encouraging my friend who is a door-knocking sales leader who runs a team ran a team at a different roofing company. And I just kept on being like, I think you probably are the type of person that should be an entrepreneur. And so I would encourage him and I was excited for him and I was kind of like talking to him about names and logos and things like that. And I was, I just felt like he was supposed to do this. Mm-hmm. And, and then when he decided to do it. Um, actually, he kind of was on my podcast and said some things like, I don't know if somebody should get into storm restoration right now. And the, the owner of his company did not like that, actually. Um, and so he realized he kind of just, he wants to be honest and he feels like there's certain things changing in the industry that he felt kind of need a new angle on things. And so when he— that was his moment where he realized maybe it's time. And I wasn't like at that moment pushing him. I'm like, I don't want to be the final push guy. I just want to be the early push guy.
Right.
And then he asked me, he said, yeah, but I want— I want you to come on board as an investor, as an investor, but also like a co-founder. And so I couldn't help but think long and hard about that. I have, I had clients in this area that I was pretty concerned about how they'd react to this and had some pretty deep discussions with them and my wife. And it was painful. It was not comfortable. Um, but I felt like it was the right thing. You know what I mean? I felt like it was the right thing for me and my family. So why take new risk when you've already kind of made a bunch of risk and it's worked out? It's like, I kind of just think you're rewarded in proportion to the amount of risk that you're willing to take in life sometimes. So I, it's greed. It's, I, I actually really believe that we're gonna do well and I like this industry and I like, frankly, I've romanticized the idea of starting a roofing company for a long time. So I'm about to get my ass whooped and you guys can all watch at Owl Roofing. Yeah, I love it.
By the way, I think it's, you know, it's funny. The obvious didn't even dawn on me until this morning. I was getting ready for this interview with you and I was like, no wonder Tim's doing this. Like one, I have been preaching that if roofers don't become digital marketers, their days are numbered. You know, in today's time with tech changing, tech enablement, insurance companies changing, the economy in a bit of a downturn, lead costs going up. November '24 is when leads across the board went up about 38%. You can see that. And, and, and I'm sure you can talk, speak to that as well. And right now it's like the, the perfect formula. Lead costs go up, volume is going down. And the math that I shook out is about a $10 million a year company with what they're spending on, on ads right now, uh, or on paid media to get leads. They'll, they'll earn $1 million less from their, from their current spend. So in other words, all things considered in the same budget, you're just going to walk away with $1 million in less revenue. So the, the secret to success, which really isn't a secret, especially when things are talked about, is learning how to get leads, learning how to have efficient systems to capitalize on those leads, learning how to squeeze out more from your leads. That's why just yesterday I ran a session in RSRA on the pipeline, the sales pipeline playbook for 2026, like how to structure your CRM and your lead pipeline. But anyway, you coming into the space makes sense because you're bringing the lifeblood. What's— can you share your partner's name? If you can't, I respect it.
Yeah, no, it's Noah Berglund. And Noah has been doing this about 5 years. And I would still say we're both a little, you know, it's going to be a little green, like both of us really. But we're bringing on people in production and stuff like that pretty quick and some other salespeople as well. So we've got teams starting to line up and we're kind of going hard out the gate. Yeah. And as far as like pure lead gen, which you can tell for Hook, like we try on brand, right?
Right.
Brand, we're doing our best. We're out there in the community trying to make sure reputation is good and doing our absolute best. And I think that there's, I think a lot of roofing companies are not trying that hard on brand because lead gen has been a little easier in certain ways or whatever in the last, you know, and door knocking is dope, respectfully. So we're going in on door knocking and a little bit of insurance upfront, but I think long-term, like my whole goal is to get the brand well-known. Nice. Spent a lot of time on the logo. Spent a lot of time on the name trying to find something that was iconic. And like, to me, brand drives down lead costs over time. Mm-hmm. And I've seen that very, very clearly. And it's like, for me, I keep on preaching that, but I also can't— it's, it's hard for me to sell that because roofers just haven't known. It's hard to be like, I like, I like giving people what they want, not always what they need. And I think what they need is better brands. You know what I mean? And I think ultimately that will probably drive Hook Agency to rebrand companies in not a long future, just like a prelude for like 2026 initiatives at Hook. But like, I think people need more iconic brands to be memorable in this environment where lead costs are going up.
Yeah, I would agree with that. In fact, I was— I've got a something I've never done before coming to YouTube, just a style of content. But the theme that I've been really leaning into with my members or our members at RSRA is organic content. This is the year you gotta do it. So many people haven't. And I want to explain why, because a lot of, let me, I want to get your thoughts on this too, Tim, because you're coming in, there's 3 main 3 problem points that I've seen in roofing companies, uh, that cause them to go outta business. 'Cause 85% of roofing companies don't make it 2 years. And I'm not, I mean, you know that, that's not like, let's just talk about why objectively, right?
Yeah.
Uh, number 1, they don't make sales. And number 2, they can't, well, I said 3, but I'm actually gonna boil it to 2 'cause I'm gonna marry sales and marketing. They're not making sales and they can't, they have cash flow problems. And especially on the insurance side, average AR is 12 weeks out. So if you go and sell 30 roofs and it costs you, I don't know, $10,000 to produce, you're paying your labor bills every week and you're net $30,000 because you're brand new with a supplier. You're still in the hole and you can't outsell. So you have to have cash to fund growth. So it's very tough to get profitable quickly. It's very, very tough. So companies bleed out or they'll sell a monster project that costs them a lot to produce. They don't have the cash flow and the reserves to fund it, nor do they have the cash flow reserves for their company. So cash flow is, is, is one. And the other one obviously is sales and marketing. And I'm marrying those together just for this conversation. And you are coming with the marketing side. It's like the, the one piece of the puzzle that everyone's like, I need to figure this out. I need to figure it out. So you not only know it, you have an agency to fulfill, I'm gonna guess.
Yeah. It's kind of like cheating. It is. I am, I'm totally cheating cuz like having somebody in place for that. And like having it be no cost to me is cheating. I'm gonna, and like somebody called me out on that the other day, 'cause I was like talking about our partners and I'm using all the relationships. I'm calling favors. I'm like, hey, please help. I, this is a totally new company. If I've done anything for you, please help. And people are helping me and people are giving me stuff or giving me discounts. So I have like, you gotta take every conceivable ethical advantage that you can. You know what I mean? Like, and that's what I'm doing. Um, and then the agency, like, it's, it's aggressive and it's very aggressive for somebody that's early to be doing as much as we're doing. So we'll see how that goes, but I still, and to my partner, I have to like hedge a little bit. I'm like, dude, this isn't the lead gen stuff. Don't expect it all to be cranking year one. That's why we have to go in door knocking. I'm gonna be hardcore on it. And that's why I'm gonna go out on the fucking street and put in door— like yard signs. And I'm gonna be at every intersection. I'm gonna be busting my butt. Yeah. On organic content and videos because— and local Facebook groups. These are all things I'm trying to do as much as I can of while Hook is taking time to get the system, like the organic rankings and things like that up. And that's all changing too, you know what I mean? Like, yeah, Maps is, is where it's at in a lot of ways, Google Maps. And like, so we got to get our reviews up, we got to get all that up. Like, there's a lot of things that I can do in the meantime, but it's, yeah, it's a little— it is a massive advantage to have an agency and that type of thing. So Certainly I have to acknowledge that.
So I want to ask you, uh, and I do want to touch on brand and then I want to get into some marketing tactics, some, some, some questions for you and then asking you like what you think's gonna be your biggest threat, but we'll save that for the end. So branding in your words, and I'd love to have an open, I've got my own opinion on this, on, on branding, but why do you think, like, if you were to, to define brand and what branding means, How would you define it?
Yeah, it's a mixture of, to simplify, it's a mixture of logo and colors and reputation. And I am kind of preaching this idea of seeds over leads, meaning if you can sow into your brand, if you can invest into your reputation and your logo and your colors and your name, name, right? In a way that makes people feel something. Positive, then over time that will feed you. So it's like, just like SEO is kind of a store of value that I can invest in even when I'm crazy busy, I can invest in. And when I'm very slow, it's the winter, maybe I can invest in, I can invest in these things that will feed me long-term. I think at its least sophisticated Marketing is one-to-one. I pay money and I get a lead, right? And most sophisticated, I'm building this entity that Google respects and that the community respects that will continue to feed me. And so brand is that entity that is memorable and consistent and is clear, you know? And so I say I want an iconic brand. Because I want to be able to embroider it on my shirts. I want to be able to put it on a billboard. I want to have a favicon on my website where the little— that's all very clear and consistent so that people are more likely to remember it. And if we have something cute and some stories and stuff like that, even better. So brand is all that culmination of your reputation and the name, logo, colors. Yeah.
Interesting.
So Yeah, I, uh, we're gonna see so, I'm gonna see so many more examples of like how I really do this as over this next year. Like how do I really, like, but for Hook, for example, I'm just at an event. I'm speak, I get to speak and I don't pitch and I bring as much possible value as I can because you get to own that value in their mind. Like if I give them a paradigm shift, if I give them a, Because the seeds over leads thing is big. I talked about make content that makes friends. I'm talking about what do you want to be known for? And if I can get them to shift the way they're really thinking about marketing, like really, then that value is forever a part of their brain. And then they go out on their own and then they see Hook later and maybe they want to work with us, but I didn't pitch because I'm really thinking about brand and positioning the whole time I'm there. And we're not like a, hey, sign up for this thing. Yeah, people signed up for a demo with us at the booth, but like we have these big sumo suits with our logo on them and we're just trying to get as much organic content as possible and we're trying to be nice. So like if I was to do that at Home Show and we'll see if I get a little bit more transactional, who knows? But The ideal long-term is like, hey, maybe we have like a balloon, like with the logo on it at the trade, at the home show. Maybe we've got a blow-up house, maybe with a place to take pictures or something like that. I'd be like, over time I want to, and this is an overtime thing, I think with all businesses, I think it gets a lot easier to do this and spend money on this as you have more resources, right? Yeah. But so you necessarily are more transactional, a little bit more like lead-driven at the beginning of your business. And then as time goes on, you start, okay, now I'm going to put 30% of my marketing budget towards brand. Now I'm going to like, the ideal is like, as you get over that $10 and $20 million mark, that it's like 50, 70%. I think, I think if I, this is what I imagine if I pass $20 million, that like 70% will be brand. And that's why we're like generally working with people in that $5 to $15 million range because I think that generally you have to go harder on lead gen. Yeah. In certain time periods in your business. And if you're not getting into that brand-driven company, I don't, I often don't think you actually get to go past $20.
Yeah. I would agree with that. I think there's also some nuances too. Like we've got some members in town that are 100,000, you know, you can get like, uh, smaller market share. Um, but yeah, fundamentally or conceptually, I totally agree. So Tim, you're coming in with a fresh marketing mindset. Give me a list in the top 5 things, like you're now co-founder, investor in a roofing company. What are the 5 most important moves that you're making from a marketing and lead gen standpoint that's going to direct your success in this new roofing company?
I'll lay it all out. I'm trying to document this whole thing, even if it sounds crazy. And frankly, some of these might be terrible moves, but I have been studying marketing for a long time, like 13 years. And I am— I do have some— some of these are going to be winners, I bet. But we're going— dude, I'm spending quite a bit of money on stuffed animals. So we have a stuffed owl that looks like our logo that I got done in China through Alibaba. And it's embroidered with Owl Roofing on the stomach. And it's got a little tag that looks like a Beanie Baby with our logo and a little poem about Ollie the Owl. And I'm going to be giving that out at like events and stuff like that in the areas that I'm hyper-focused on. So like even our daycare, I'm going to go bring 100 and 20 owls and put them in a thing with a banner. And I'm gonna get like this micro, like the brand feel is cozy. I want it to be cozy. And I'm aiming at moms that are like 45 years old and she is a working mom and she cares a lot about her kids. And so if we can give her kids something that is that they like and that she has an emotion towards that, then we're gonna get into her brain a little bit. And so ultimately I'm trying to get into her brain and I think part of it is, so that's one. And I'm giving you kind of like, I spent some money on them. I'm going hard. Like I'm investing in these owls, okay? I'm investing in these owls. Yes, truck wraps and yard signs. So for instance, like, our first couple truck wraps are going to be. It's like, you know, it's kind of— I actually am talking to my wife a lot about what she likes because I want a black wrap with like cool, like intense colors and stuff like that. She's like, I like subtle, man. I like a white truck. I like, you know, so we're going iconic and white with some pops of our like marigold orange yellow with like the like Instant Quote on the back and stuff like that. But truck wraps and then these yard signs. And my mode is, this is not a time or expense-intensive thing, but I am gonna go out on like personally on intersections and places where people stop and yard sign in the local area. And I'm thinking of this as like the 100,000 people area. And I'm trying to dominate a 100,000 person area. In addition, we are obviously hammering organic content for Google. I'm publishing a lot of blog posts. We're publishing a lot of landing pages with the locations. Google Business Profile, we're probably going to be pretty aggressive on that. And I think maybe even in a year or two, we're probably going to expand to kind of other locations in the Twin Cities with Google Business Profile, as long as we can get them up to 30+ reviews pretty quick. And so that's, so that's like 3. Let's see. So hammering SEO and Google Business Profile. I want like, usually I would say like LSA and Google Ads or something. We are going to do those things, but I don't know if that's like the secret sauce per se. That's just just like pay, like you gotta kind of get some leads. I think I'm just going to talk about door knocking, man. We're going hard on door knocking and we're making our brochures really good and we're making our paper stuff really good and we're making the— I think that the difference is like with what's going to be different about this company than most roofing companies is sales enablement is going to be taken very seriously. Like the presentation is going to be really good and on Engage. The brochures are going to be really nicely done and have like emotional hooks in them with their families and stuff like that. Like it's, it's about family and the proposals are going to look really nice. So to me, it's all those things right around the sale too, because like if we're getting in front of them right at the moment, we're actually in front of them. Everything should be really, really nice. And that's something I think we've done well at our company too, is like my marketing person was like, I'm done with all the stuff you told me to do, right? Like I've done it. And I'm like, well guess what? Sales needs your help. And you're, uh, I like, I like people that are really good at aesthetic design, right? Like I'm like, so person on my team that's super good at this aesthetic design, I'm like, time to flip, you know, close rate's a little down. That's our responsibility too. And as a marketer, it's— as a marketer, you can take more responsibility for close rate than people think with proposals, with slide deck, and with, um, you know, paper or other— in this case, I was like email, case studies, you know, those types of things, which is like follow-up. And so that's different. So that's the fourth. It's different than a lot of roofing companies. Once again, I just have to stop myself from saying LSA and Google Ads. Yeah. What am I really doing? So one of them is we are going to do video content on a regular basis. Yes. And that kind of feeds into the, we're going to push on our, um, organic Facebook groups. And actually, God, am I allowed to say like products and stuff like that? Because I'm like spending, I'm spending money. Um, Ride the Wave is a Facebook groups, like, promotion thing. And it's like, they're extracting heartwarming stories from me and the founder, the co-founder and stuff like that. And like, store angles. And then they're going to post to like, anywhere from like 20 to 50 Facebook groups in my area for me on a regular basis, like one a day. And so that's one where I'm spending money on that. And I'm excited about that. Ride the Wave. And then a couple other things I'm like spending money on and that like they're giving me deals, but bid mailers. Oh, you know, like them, you drive by, you drop a pin and it sends out quotes. I'm spending real, real money on that too. And then I'm— I already spent money on Shingle Tomb, which is like I'm calling it like the owl aftercare kit. It's just a bundle of shingles in a box. Mm-hmm. And it has our logo on it. It says, hey, thank you for your referrals. It's like, you know, this big box in their garage. And then on the front of it, kind of my secret sauce thing is going to be like, I've got a little card window, you know, it comes with a card window, but I'm putting like a big $250 on there for referrals. And so that, that box sitting there, it's functional. It's going to stay in the garage. And then the $250 is sitting, staring at them. It just reminds them that we'd love to, um, get the referrals. So those are all like kind of like the gimmicky things. I know what it really comes down to is like we just have to go hard on sales and like we need to make sure our sales guys are happy. I'm realizing, honestly, I'm realizing this game is like less about marketing and more about like, can we get 3 to 5 really good sales guys and keep them? So interestingly, because door knocking is sweet too, you know what I mean? And like, I like, I have to admit that to myself. It's an incredible strategy if you can get it good. But ultimately, I also think that this is going to feed information back to my agency, which is like, you know, how we can help other roofers around the country. Yes, the people in my area are going to be really annoyed with me because I'm going to be marketing pretty hard. But all the roofers around the country, we're trying, I'm trying to be famous in a 100,000-person market. I'm actually in the Northeast Twin Cities. I'm trying to get really good there. And I'll be able to feed all these lessons and build them into our systems at Hook so we can serve roofers better. I ultimately think that's going to be a very good thing for our clients. Mm-hmm.
You're gonna be able to learn in the trenches. You're gonna be able to take your learnings and teach others. You're gonna position yourself as an expert. You're gonna document the journey and have fun to market the hell outta Hook. 'Cause you're gonna be like, listen, I'm a marketer. Yeah. Who's doing this, like, Here's the case study. You know, somehow you're gonna have to figure out how to monetize printing bears and take Alibaba's business. I'm just kidding.
Uh, so I thought about, I thought about, I was like, I could sell this for like $5. It'd be like, yeah, this, like I said, some of these ideas might be like, who knows if they're gonna work, but if they do, I'm gonna share it back, you know? And in the meantime, it's fun and interesting.
I love that. And you know, the key point, 'cause like I said, I, I do think there's gonna be a mix of opinions and, and, and that's the beautiful part with business is you get to go play your own game. And the one thing that you just said is it's gonna be fun, you know? And, and when you can approach business from this place of fun and creativity, which I think is, is your strength, you know, like that, like I said, I got that goofy-ass playing card you sent, which I'm gonna grab right now.
You should show it to the audience. So we did this to, I think like 50 people in the industry or something, and I always appreciate your content.
Me here, Adam Bensman. Let me go to full screen just so everybody can see. You can keep, keep talking because I'm just going to go full screen.
Yeah. So we did this as like a way, like creative marketing to a small amount of people and spending a little bit more time, you know, on the thing for the person. So we made this, this playing card for Adam in promotion for this book, How to Become a Hometown Hero. And we sent it out. It's kind of a baseball theme. So you guys check that out. It's got chapters with like John Sinek and Marcus Sheridan wrote the foreword and Martin Pettigrew's in it and a few other people. So ultimately taking weird kind of creative shots, I think.
What's your big fear for doing this, man? You're jumping into a roofing company right now. Objectively, you're jumping in at the worst time from an economy standpoint. ARMA data for shingle production, distributors I've been told are peeling back from 90 to 120 days of inventory to 30. There are manufacturers shipping product all across the country because they didn't used to, but they can't move it. We're about a 30% decline right now. Peel back, we're returning to pre-COVID levels. Costs are going up. People are freaked out. What are you afraid of?
It would be really bad actually if I failed. That's true. It would look bad on the agency. It'd look bad on me personally. I don't expect to. I'm like, I believe that I'm going to do well. That being said, I don't have like this huge overhead ultimately for this company and I can start small and scrappy and I can try to stay that way. I think what's tough is when people can't scale down a little bit when it gets rough. Like, I think the ability to scale up and down is really important in a roofing company. So I'm going to build that in from the beginning. I'm afraid of hurting salespeople if they come work for us, that we wouldn't be able to provide the level of— because, because I'm looking for really good salespeople. I'm not looking— I'm not trying to fill it with 5 Yeah, schlubs that couldn't, you know, really sell something. I want to say I want them to be salespeople and then if they can work in insurance, great, you know what I mean? But I'm not trying to just get people that have already been so used to giving away free roofs that they're, you know, like, yeah, out of practice. And I think that it's an advantage that I'm able to be small. And I think like that makes it less scary. It's tough when you're $5 million or $10 million and you're, you're coming down from 10 to 5. That hurts. That's not fun. What I am scared about is, yeah, it's those people because I am putting my neck out there and I'm saying, trust me, and we're going to win and we're going to train and we're going to try really hard. And I'm making sure that they come in with that mindset, that they're willing to build their personal brand and that they're willing to train and they're willing to do referral relationships with realtors, insurance agents, and other home service companies. And if you're not willing to do those three things, you wouldn't be a good fit for this company. But there's always risk. And so the risk is that this, this up and down of roofing is not a short-term thing, that it's permanent, that the down right now is permanent. And I don't believe that.
No, it's not.
That's— so I look at what private equity is doing and they're not idiots. They're investing for the long term. They're buying up a bunch of stuff because they believe that it's going to be a 48% increase in home services over the next 10 years. And that, you know, I don't know what the exact number is, but that's pretty significant, the amount that they're expecting it to increase. And the ability to charge more for things that are hard labor and the things that are, you know, other like homeowners don't want to do anymore because they don't and they're not about to. Yeah, they're not about to get up there and put on their own roofs. My dad did, but he's not going to, you know, he's so it's kind of recognizing what I think is the longer term thing in the down. But the down being more permanent is what we're always scared of in any business, right? It's like this isn't just a 6 months, 18 months cycle. This is a, this is a 48-month cycle. And I just don't believe that. So that's why I'm making this move.
Yeah, I love it. And thank you for sharing that. And I know some people might be like, dude, you just drilled him and told him he's starting his business in the worst possible time. I'm sharing objectively, but the other reason is I, with you being such a strong visionary entrepreneur, I know that doesn't faze you, and I wanted your answer to do exactly what I think it did, is inspire people who are panicking right now. Like, you, you don't need to be doing this, and you're choosing to because of how you view business. And I do believe, after everyone— which hopefully people didn't shortchange themselves and stop watching this video— we are about to come into one of the greatest opportunities in roofing because all the spinoff companies that came during the COVID boom eras, the sales reps that started on, on their own, the mass saturation, that have never survived this, there's going to be a lot of turmoil. There's going to be a lot of companies that don't make it. There's going to be a lot in financial strain. And those that spot the moves to make and understand, hey, I just got to ride this wave. I got to work on my head up here. And from the financial— by the way, this wasn't a conversation I had personally with a financial analyst, but I did talk to some folks that are involved in private equity with multi-billion, with a B, backing. And they've got analysts analyzing the industry and they said things are going to turn up in '27. And that's why, again, as you said, private equity is not slowing their pulse. They're, they're making more strategic moves, but roofing will not go anywhere. It may not be booming like it was, but roofs will still need to get replaced. Storms will still happen. Someone needs to pay for them. You know, the part of the market that might suffer is carriers decide that they want to not pay for things. Yeah, there might be some suffering there. However, it's not gonna go away. There's new construction that's being built. There's apartments popping up everywhere. Multifamily is continuing to grow. It's the strongest moving sector because there's no home inventory. Storms will continue. Roofs get old. The median home stock is 45 in the US, meaning they're on their second roof cycle. The 2000 housing boom is bringing all those homes in the retail market right up to right now when they need a roof. So there's so much opportunity. So I want to end on a positive note, by the way.
And what do you mean if I don't have a storm? If Minnesota doesn't, because we have been 2 years without a storm, just to go Minnesota for a second for those in any market that is storm dependent a little bit, 2 years without a storm, you'd almost think year 3 unless we're in Colorado where there's like 4 years where there's no storm.
We went a bit.
But even if that happens, there will be a culling of the herd. Sorry. And then you get— if we got our process up on retail really tight, in financing because I'm going to be pushing on financing out the gate for, you know, every deal. And if that ends up being like, I guess my co-founder is leading sales, so we'll see how he like the exact nuances of that. But I'm pushing hard on financing. But if we got our processes right that way and then a storm hits later, I think it'd almost be better. So even if a storm didn't hit in Minnesota, I think I'd rather do 3 I'm trying to do 3 to 5. If I'm under 3, that was failure. So just, I'm not ripping on anyone. I have, like, I'm investing out the gate. I'm like not saying you should do 3 your first year. I'm like investing out the gate and going hard. I think that if it was 3 and it was like all retail, that would be crazy and awesome. So that's, I mean, that would be an amazing win from my point of view. So we'll see how it goes. You know, hopefully at least do a couple because Otherwise, this was a weird move for me.
For sure. You're like, otherwise I got a garage full of bears.
By the way, I might still, because there's 2,000 bears, so.
2,000?
Or 2,000 owls, sorry.
You put down some owl cash.
Dude, let's end on this. $3 an owl.
Yeah, $6,000 worth of owls. So let's end on this. What are you most excited about?
Man, starting a business is so fun in this situation. Our first business, this, I mean, Hook is like, I started down in a tiny little basement with no windows and, you know, shared a $500 office with another guy. And, you know, he had all of his, like, crypto computers that are, like, making lots of noise. So it's kind of fun to not— like, this one has windows. Like, I got windows. I'm still in a basement for the beginning of this company. I am starting with an office. But it has windows, so that's really cool. It's kind of, it's also remembering that I'm in the good old days. When I'm in the good old days, I think like it's fun to, like it is actually way fun to start a business in certain ways. Like I always tell people not to, 'cause I'm like, I can't tell if you're like a person who just like is okay with 80-hour weeks if you gotta do it. Like I, it's hard to tell if you're that type of person. If you're not, like maybe don't do it 'cause you might need to. Not saying everyone does, but I'm saying like you might need to. And so it's kind of just fun trying to recognize we're in the good old days. And I do hope it ends up being a place that changes people's lives and helps our community and makes their lives, like the homeowners' lives, better and our community better. Because we're going to give back. Like we're going to give back year one. I've already committed. I'm like, dude, I've got to make this go well because Quincy House is going to— we're giving $20K year one. And I'm, I'm ready to like, try to like do things in my local community where my family lives that make my life better and the people around me's life better. So I'm, I'm in this for my family too, you know, I'm in this for making my direct community good. And it's like a nest for my family. So that's what I'm trying to do is I'm trying to build something close to home.
Yeah, that's beautiful, man.
