#253: Save Your Retail Business From Extinction with Dan Holman, founder of the Wealthy Retailer

It's episode number 253 with one of my favorite retail experts. Get ready to meet Mr. Dan Holman from the wealthy retailer. Let's talk about your business strategy and the juicy details of what actually works, from mainstream fashion to fashion on Main street and the entire ecosystem behind it. How do we scale your company and do it with the balance and the happiness that we all seek? Let's hear from those insiders, experts, and strategists that actually make it happen. I'm your host, Ashley Alderson from the Boutique Hub, and I can't wait to chat.

Hey, guys. Welcome back to this week's show. I'm so excited. One of my favorite retail experts is here with me today. So I cannot wait to introduce you to Mr. Dan Holman of the wealthy retailer. And for all of my Canadian friends, we've got a Canadian in the house today. Should I say what's up? Or a.

Yes, yes, yes, yes. Thank you so much for having me. I appreciate it.

Oh, man. You know, how long ago did we meet? What was it like? Maybe three years ago we met?

Yeah, for sure. Three or four years ago, Definitely.

Yeah. I feel like time flies. So in case anyone has not met Dan yet, you're involved with Management one, and that's how we got connected. But you've been doing retail consulting for a long time. One of the top consultants in Canada, a sought after speaker in the United States. People have probably seen you at magic or other venues, but give us a little backstory.

Well, thank you. Yeah. I don't know if all of that's wholly accurate. I don't know if I'm sought after, but, yeah, I have been doing this for a long time. You know, I grew up in. I say grew up. When I was in my early 20s, you know, I joined a retail, a home fashion retailer. And we were a small little design studio. And I went through. When I joined them, we went through the massive growing pains of growing a business 10 times. You know, we were doing a little under 5 million, and when we finished, we were a little over 50 million. And through that period, man, oh, man, did I cut my teeth. And I learned all of the things that worked and all the things that didn't. And through that growth, I had worked alongside, you know, great mentors, great retail consultants that were specific to home furnishings at the time, you know, but I really grew an admiration for what they were doing. And as our business started to fail, which some do, you know, I can tell you now, 10, 12, 15 years later, all the Things we did wrong. Maybe it's more than that now, but yeah, 20 years later, I can tell you all the things we did wrong.

Then.

But, you know, I grew this admiration for what these people were doing. And I said to myself, as our business had started its crumble, that that was my calling, that being a consultant was my calling. And so in 2007, I started, you know, I started a consulting practice and I worked largely in the home furnishing sector because that was where I was sort of born and bred. And that escalated or evolved, I guess, over year, over the, over the years, sort of up to 2013, where I joined a company called Canadian Retail Solutions as they were launching a consulting arm. And the CEO at the time, Scott Smith, who is a wonderful retail consultant, one of the top guys, I mean, Scott is just at his core a genuine, in it for the right reason retail consultant. And I joined Scott and ended up, as things evolved, continued to evolve, we built a great practice and Scott went on and joined Management one as their director of operations. And I actually bought that company, Canadian Retail Solutions, and so operated that company for a couple of years and decided that that still isn't my calling. I still own that company and it does wonderful things for retailers. But it was really my consulting practice was where my passion lived. And so a couple, I don't know, maybe a couple of years ago, it's been now we launched the Wealthy Retailer. And the Wealthy Retailer really started as an educational series for the independent retailer. And we talked about all the, you know, we called it the six or seven steps that you needed. We've evolved since then. There's many, many more, as you well know. And the Wealthy Retailer was born and we created a company out of it. And it's now a boutique consulting firm that works with retailers coast to coast on the continent. So that's kind of where we are. Short story.

So awesome. And you're doing such big things with so many stores. Tell me more about the clients that you serve. Now, the boutiques, are they mainly in one genre or another?

They're not, you know, funny enough, I have, I have such a, I'm going to say, varied background. I certainly have, you know, my, my feet firmly planted in the home furnishings market. So I have home furnishings clients. I have, of course, have men's and women's fashion. We have sporting goods. I'm a, you know, I'm a bit of a sports guy. So, you know, I get close to things that I'm passionate about. So we have sports tractors, toys, gifts, you Know, home stores, clothing stores. So I kind of run the gamut for different types of stores. And I think that my ability to look at each store as an individual but also recognize the similarities between verticals, you know, has led to some success.

Man. And you've been. I mean, you've got diverse clients, and you've been in this industry for a while. You've seen all kinds of things, all kinds of ups and downs, right? Have you ever seen anything like we're facing today with, you know, I'd love.

To say yes, but that's just so far from reality today. We've been through lots of. Lots of turmoil, lots of challenge, you know, fires and floods and, you know, entire cities burned to the ground and having to rebuild and, of course, 9, 11. And, you know, we've seen all of that, but it has never been at this global scale. Nothing in our lives have ever been at this global scale where we've seen, you know, successive failures from, you know. Right. From everything from. From production, you know, and. And import and export and. And all the way down to that, you know, boutique. That woman that's running after chasing her passion and how she's been impacted. So. No, nothing like this, man.

Yeah, it's. It's certainly unprecedented, but I think you and I were talking about this a few days ago, that even with the madness that we're in the middle of right now, there's still two choices, right? You either can cower in fear and go, oh, no, this is the end of me, or you can allow this opportunity to let your creativity shine and to get nimble and to adapt and create something totally new and different. Talk to me about what you're seeing with your clients and just, you know, kind of observing what's happening in our economy right now of those who are adapting and those who are not adapting.

I have to tell you something. My very favorite word right now is adapt. And I am of the belief that adaption, adaptation prevents extinction. And if we do not adapt today, and by adapt, I mean take full advantage of the opportunities that exist. And we're seeing retailers that are adapting to their business, to a new model for the short term. They're figuring out ways to get in front of her, you know, virtually. And all the. All the ad speak about social distancing, which, again, you know me, I'm pretty well, I'm a guy that calls a spade a spade. Social distancing is becoming ad speak. It's not real. You know, it's so much like customer experience is becoming. It's fading to black. And in this last, certainly in the last two weeks, we just keep hearing it. Social distancing, Social distancing, social distancing. But socially, we need to be in front of her. We need to close that distance, you know, from, from afar. And, and we need to adapt. And retailers that are adopting, retailers that are changing the way they do business and deciding that this is the new normal, it's okay, I'm going to be here tomorrow. So now I need to take these steps.

Yeah, absolutely. And so what steps do you feel like those who are adapting well, you know, because I know you're, you're talking to your clients every single day. Those who are adapting well, talk to me about what steps they're taking daily to make things happen right now.

So I think that there's three things that we can do today. I mean, we can adapt by better preparing our store, by changing the way we talk to our customer, by the way we, by the way we show them merchandise. You know, I've heard great stories about home shopping networks and virtual tours and facetime selling and text selling and people doing Facebook lives that they've never done before. You know, Margo Kautman, another management one consultant, shared a story about her retail. One of her retailers that said, yeah, I've done Facebook lives and I usually get four or five people watching. Well, she did one the other night and got 44 people watching. She grew her opportunity bucket by 10 times by doing something that she really hadn't done before. So those ways of changing the way you present yourself to your customer deliver some success. The other thing that I think retailers can take advantage of today is really looking at their data. You know, I'm a numbers junkie, I'm a data junkie. I believe it tells us everything we ever needed to know. So looking at how you're managing data today, how you're filtering that data to tell you to allow you to make good decisions, how many people are coming to your website, how many people are leaving, where are they leaving? All the things that talk about customer engagement at a data level. And I think we need to be able to work that. And we're having conversations with our retailers today that are saying, you know, how many people are following your videos, how many people are, you know, are engaged in your Instagram, and if that's not growing, what can we change to get it to grow? And are we seeing a consequential, you know, relationship form from that? Of course, I mean financial relationship, but, you know, that might not happen today, but it will if we stay down this path and retailers are going to learn that I can engage her without her being in my store today, and I can make a very personal connection without her being in my store. And the other thing, the third thing that I think I'm seeing, you know, through this adaptation is people working on their own, their own personal health, the health, how they're educating themselves. You know, I've said, you know, this is the time you've sacrificed for however many years you've been in business. You've sacrificed your health, you've sacrificed your family, you've sacrificed in some cases your level of education because you get so caught up in it. Well, the in it is gone. No longer do I have the excuse. You know, I was busy with customers on the floor all day. Yes, you can be busy with your customer, but she's not in your store now from 9 to 5, 9am to 5pm she's more likely in the store from 5 to 9. And you can be educating yourself and joining groups and, and learning more and more and more about how to be a leaner, healthier retailer.

Oh, I love that. You know, number three, I like you like I'm a sports nut, right? So, number three, I've used, you know, this analogy a number of times. This is just the off season, right? And I know some crazy sports mom out there is going to start using the excuse, you know, three years from now. Well, why isn't Timmy, you know, starting on the basketball court? Well, because, you know, Timmy's Timmy season got cut short in 2020. You know, poor Timmy got taken advantage of. But the truth is this is just the off season. Everybody's in this off season together. And what Timmy chooses to do now in the off scene season is going to determine his success or failure down the road. You have to train right now like it's the off season. So every course that you've purchased but you've put in your email inbox, right? Or every opt in you've signed up for, but you've never actually read, like, now's the time to do the things and to grow your business so that when things come back around, because they will, the sun always comes up. Tomorrow it will. Now is your time to take advantage of that so that you are the starting player when the sun comes back up, right?

And I promise there is going to be significant attrition in our world. And that attrition is going to come because people didn't do what they needed to do. Stores, businesses alike and it's any kind of business. I mean, I know that we live in breathe retail, but it's any business if, if you're, if you're putting your head in the sand today and not thinking about what I'm going to do differently tomorrow so that when this happens again, I have built a sustainable business. I've done the things I need to do to, you know, part cash and, and to be leaner and to, to be less expense ridden and more, you know, variable driven, having the ability to be nimble. And you know, I dip, dive, duck and dodge. You know, you got to be able to move. And you know, I love that you use sports analogies. I've said for so long every great athlete, every great, every great professional has a coach in their life. A coach, the best athlete in the world. In my world, it's hockey. You know, Connor McDavid's the greatest hockey player to ever put on skates and he relies heavily on coaches and not just the guy that coaches the game, but his, you know, his sports psychologist. And you know, we all need that objective guidance, someone that can see it from afar and say, hey, let's try this, let's do this. And we are absolutely in training right now. This is the off season and every athlete today that has been parked on the bench has now determined or now decided that I'm going to be better coming out of this. I'm going to work on my physical strength, I'm going to work on my emotional strength. I'm going to repair the things that are broken in my body and in my game. And that's what we need to be doing.

Yes, exactly. Right along with this and with your number two that you mentioned, and this is something you and I have been just hammering, I know, for the past couple of weeks is that in that process of coming out stronger on the other side is we have to realize that you cannot grow a business by cutting expenses. You cannot save a business by cutting expenses. You've got to be able to find new revenue. You've got to get creative. You have to run a lean operation. I know you've been giving some very step by step strategies on that process as well. Talk to me about, you know, if someone's just now one of those retailers that maybe is more on the art side of retail and not the science side of retail, and they're like, oh, I've been avoiding my numbers, but now I know I need to dig in. What are some steps they could take to look for those opportunities to get Lean and also to find more revenue.

Well, I think it starts certainly by having a profit and loss. And when I say a profit and loss, I know that's a big word for some people. I just mean a down and dirty cash flow, you know, and it is so simple. And I have to say there are so many people that are standing in front of retailers today with their hands up, not out. There is so much help out there if you're somebody that says, man, I'm not good at numbers, just pick up the phone, text, email, call somebody. But it starts like this. This is how much money I have or don't have. Here's what my expenses are from last month. I'm going to go back last month or you know, from January, February, December, and I'm going to write down right out of my checkbook or right out of my checking account, here's every single thing I paid. And I start by going red, yellow and green. Green expenses that I must pay, they are essential to the operation of my business today. Now what's essential may be in question. I can tell you this, you know, things like rent and taxes, you know, utilities, those are non essential expenses right now. For retailers that are being challenged with, you know, forced to close their stores, rent has now fallen to a yellow or red expense. It's not green anymore. And so I'm looking at everything that's come out of my checking account and I'm highlighting it red, yellow or green. Red. I'm not paying yellow. I'll pay if I have money. And green are the things that I gotta pay to keep my doors open. You know, there's things that we have to do to keep moving. And it's the ability to identify what should I spend. And I'm building cash flows even for my businesses today. You know, from what? Not from revenue but from what I have in resource. Either cash on hand or my ability to borrow some money. Not that I want to see, you know, debt fund sustainability, but I do need some access to quick cash for my essential expenses. And I'm saying this is what I'm going to spend this month in March. And this is the cash that's left over. And here's what I'm going to pay in April and here's what's left over. And if there's not anything left over, you are left with one choice and one choice only, and that's to sell. And no matter what you've done, no matter what you think hasn't worked in the past, you're going to Try it again and you're going to measure its performance, change the factors and do it again. You have to drive revenue. You have to drive revenue. None of us, I mean, we're entrepreneurial businesses. We're all 200 bucks from living on the street. And that's the part that I need people to recognize. We're all in the same boat. We're all in this together. We're all 200 bucks from living on the street. And if we can think about it like that, all of our fears get set aside. If we allow fear to motivate us to be a driver, to take action, we're going to be fine. And you know, tenacity, I know it didn't work yesterday, but you know, we didn't have this virus yesterday, so. Or last month, so try it. So anyways, long blathering on story. You know, I start with a down and dirty cash flow. Here's my cash, here's what I am prepared to pay, here's what I won't pay, and all those things that I'm not going to pay. I now move into relationship protection mode and I start calling those, whether they're vendors and of course I'm not paying vendors right now. They have become a red expense on my, on my, you know, checking my balance sheet and I'm simply postponing that debt and saying, you know, unless a vendor, unless inventory is required from a vendor, I've suspended that payment. And so that helps me to protect not just my expenses but my cash flow. And you know, there is no replacement for poor operators. Nothing makes up for poor operation revenue, doesn't do it. So I'm really looking at these expenses now and saying, gosh, if it's not an essential expense today, is it going to be tomorrow? And the retailers that are able to, you know, consume that kind of information at an objective level today, at a hyper critical level today will be healthier tomorrow, man.

Absolutely. Talk to me, take this one step further. Let's pretend we're couple months down the road and our new normal has set in, right? And the retailers that are coming out the other side of this, they're going, you know what? I am committed to understanding my numbers like I never have before, besides understanding basic cash flow right in and out and how to run lean. Talk to me about the other numbers and reports you find to be most critical for every single retailer to understand.

What a great question. Okay, this is. I'm gonna go back to yesterday, a conversation. I had a retailer call me yesterday and say, you Know I gotta run my gross margin report. And I said, why? And she said, I have to know where my gross margin is. And I said, why? Because I have to know. And okay, Joe, but I want to know why you need to know what your gross margin is. It's not an important number today. And she said, well, I'm looking at how I'm gonna buy. You know, I'm building my buying plan for fall. You know, I got to know my gross margin. And I said, no, the number one thing you need to know is your cash margin, not gross margin. You see, we as retailers have been trained by accountants when it comes to numbers. We, and I love accountants, have them in my life, love them to death. But they teach us about, you know, not cash accounting. They teach us about, you know, in most cases, accrual accounting, which looks at gross margin and cost of goods sold as calculated numbers instead of cash in and out of the business. And so retailers today, when you're looking at tightening up, you want to know what my cash margin is? Cash margin is sales minus what I spent on inventory in the same period. What's left over is the cash. You have to now go and operate your business. So we should be running cash margin by category and then by vendor in every area in every category in our business. We should run it by our category and buy our vendor and consistently run it every season, run it every month, run it every week. Know exactly where your cash is coming from. And retailers today think that cash comes from sales. But cash doesn't necessarily come from sales or the lack of cash. It comes from the way we buy inventory. The way we spend is what drives what cash we have left. And when we look at cash margin ahead of gross margin, we start to realign our thinking. And so that's one. In today's world, you know, what reports am I running? I am absolutely, you know, from my point of sale system or my, you know, my Excel spreadsheet. If that's the kind of boutique retailer I am, that's okay, you know, but if you have a point of sale system, you know, I'm running sales by department, and I'm looking at the departments or categories within my store that are actually driving my business. I do not look at sales as a whole. We have to remember that if we're a women's, you know, boutique retailer, we probably have 10 different categories in our store that drive revenue, and we have to look at each one of those as if it was its own business or as if it were its own business. It has a responsibility, you know, to pay the rent, to pay all of its, you know, associated expenses. And we're not always looking at things like that. As retailers, we get caught up in the big numbers. I did a million dollars in sales. I have, you know, $500,000 that cost in inventory. Well, that's a problem. You know, you've spent $500,000 on inventory, which equates to a million or a million two retail to do a million dollars in sales. And we've got to be able to run these numbers to know where we stand. And those are really simple numbers. You don't need to be a scientist, you don't have to be a retail scientist to figure this out.

Do you think that there is something that your most successful clients have in common as they start to understand numbers and really start to let the numbers speak to them and tell them a story? Do you think that there's actions they take that those ones that really get it have in common?

For sure, they make decisions in their business based on fact, not based on what they believe to be true. As human beings, we do this in our life every single day. We make decisions on what we believe to be true. And what we believe is loaded with bias. You know, it is our belief system that sometimes, you know, leads us astray. It's what we believe to be true rather than some way of the justified or the data driven truth. And the retailers that are most successful remove emotion from every decision as it pertains to things like inventory. I know we need Emotion to run our businesses. We built our businesses on emotion. But the most successful retailers, every decision that they make comes from numbers. It's the. It is the substantiated truth in any business, man.

Sarah, Sarah Burks, who I know you've met on our team, she always uses this analogy, and I find it to be so accurate, you know, especially as women who love fashion, right. We're very involved in, in the aesthetic and the feel of when you go to magic. And it's, you know, the music's popping and it's merchandise. Well, you know, and you're so excited and you're like, I know that, you know, Tina's gonna look great in this and, you know, Kelly's gonna look great in that. And you bring all these things back to your store. And just like you said, you're so emotionally invested in everything that's in the store and that you're putting on the website and you're making decisions around that emotional place. But Sarah always uses the Analogy, you need to look at every single rack as if there are twenty dollar bills hanging on the hanger.

Yes.

You don't see a purple top, you don't see a great pair of jeans. You see dollar bills hanging off the hanger. And your game of business that you play every single day is how do you get those dollar bills into your pocket? That is your job.

Right.

And, and we, I think also a lot of times think of, you know, our mission in business always has a greater why. It's not just about the money. Right. We're, we're serving a greater purpose, we're helping people. But we can't let that cloud the decisions that we're making and say, well, you know, it's, I'm just doing a good thing by giving more discounts, or, you know, my local community just can't afford it, so I'm doing a good thing by making it affordable. No, the noble thing that you do is that you run a business like a business, and you put the money in your bank account so that you can help people with it.

Right. I think what we forget, you know, everyone has their own why. I have my own why, and you have yours. And if we peel back all the layers of stuff that clouds up our whys, we all want to live a healthy, happy life with the ability to afford the things we believe we deserve. And, you know, I've said this for a long time. You know, I live on this bipolar roller coaster of entrepreneurialism. Yesterday I was the smartest person in the world, and today I can't tie my own shoes. You know, that's how I feel. That's this emotional roller coaster that we live on. And we have to recognize that that emotional roller coaster is driven by our community, not by our business. You know, it's about the power of our community. I do what I do because I want my community to be healthy. And just like when an airplane, you know, you get on the airplane and they start the safety instruction and they say, you know, when those masks fall, put yours on before you help someone else. If you're not protecting your business, if your business is not healthy, you cannot help your community.

Yeah, that's so good. So good and so true. Right? Your family, your community, everyone around you, we're going to see so much change throughout all of this process. And you and I were just joking earlier about, you know, there's this balance between brick and mortar and online, and now everyone who's brick and mortar is going online and all this shifting is taking place get out your crystal ball for a second and talk to me about what you think is coming. What is the new future of retail going to look like?

I think that the independent, the person that has been so challenged in the past to compete with Big Box is going to recognize the power of Omni Channel and they're going to allow an omnichannel giving your customer the exact same experience, whether she's inside your brick and mortar store, physically or virtually, that we're going to recognize and make decisions in our business to deliver a unified experience for her, whether she is in physically or virtually. And that's not been the case up to today. There have been some that have adopted that very well. And there are some retailers, great retailers in the world, big great retailers that have done this, and we're going to figure out a way to do that. And the retailers that stand when the dust settles, you know, gosh, I want to say in a couple of weeks, but it might be a couple of months and it might be six months. Whatever it is, the retailers that remain standing are the ones that have shifted to deliver that, you know, what I'm calling a unified experience for her retail, for her retail customer, for her client.

Completely agree. How about as you look through that same lens and wholesale shifting, right, this is not just a retail problem, but it's a, like you said, supply chain problem. How do you see our wholesale industry shifting at the same time?

Oh, boy, I wish I had a great insightful answer for that. Boy. You know, I'm hopeful, I'm hopeful that through this global economic crisis, we recognize, putting value back into. We recognize the value in, you know, building supply chain at home and, and, and trying to get away from the global supply chain and, and us looking at being more socially responsible at us looking to, you know, resupport, you know, our manufacturing facilities that are at home versus those that are abroad. And I think we're going to see that, you know, with vendors saying, you know, I can't control what happens around the world, but I can control what I'm going to do here, you know, in my town, in my city, in my state or in my province. And I'm, I am so hopeful that we see homegrown manufacturing again. Yeah, that could be me being naive.

No, I think there's a lot of people that echo that same feeling, right, that we, we've really been putting our eggs in one basket for a long time. And I think seeing homegrown manufacturing is, is one thing, but you mentioned just, you know, a couple seconds ago about even just what is socially responsible and what is, you know, this, this rise in like ethically sourced pieces and more sustainable pieces. I mean, I think that's definitely going to be something that we see out of this entire experience as well. Do you agree?

I do, I do. And I, I still think that, you know, capitalism, you know, and opportunity, the opportunistic, you know, entrepreneur is still going to look to buy for one and sell for five. But I believe that social responsibility will start. I mean everyone has their own, oh my gosh, price, quality, value equation. And I today am prepared to pay more for something that I believe has greater value. And in my mind things that have greater value are perhaps, you know, the goods that I believe are ethically produced. And that's not to say that there's not great ethics out there and in every country producing. I'm not, I'm not the person that's going to say that, you know, I'm not living there. I don't know, that's not my culture. I only know it in my case. You know, I know what Canada is like, I know what North America is like. And I want to believe that there's better value in ethically produced products that are not price driven.

So even taking bits and pieces of both sides of that equation, right, the, the capital capitalism side of things, but also putting more value in where you see value being given.

Right.

In your store.

Sure. I mean, I think that, you know, I've, I've, I've advocated for this, I believe this. I stand on my soapbox every day and I, I say this. Customers don't care how much something costs. You know, customers do not care what something costs. They care about the value of something. They are not going to buy a $3 t shirt because it's $3. If they wear it one time, they're going to buy a six dollar. And, and you can, you can multiply that across any, any part of our market. It can be a sixty dollar shirt, it can be a six hundred dollar sofa, you know, a six thousand dollars dining room suit, or I mean people, people are going to change their value proposition. The more value we put in things, the more value our relationships have, the more people are prepared to invest in.

If there's one thing anyone listening today should take action on, what do you think that should be?

Adaptation. Learn how to adapt. Accept today, accept what the new normal is and recognize that the decisions you're making today will need to be changed tomorrow. And that's okay. You have to adapt every Day. We wake up, we get up every morning, and we say, what do I need to change today? How do I need to shift to find the success I'm looking for? You see, if my end game, if my dot on the map doesn't change and the road closes, I just figure out a different way around. You know, I'm going to drive across the country, and there's going to be 25 detours, but I'm still going to get to my destination. And retailers have to recognize that they have a destination. They need to know what that is and be prepared to take every required detour to get there.

Oh, that is so good. That is such a good analogy. And I just have to say, I think a lot of times we don't always know what the destination is. You know, it's sell as much as I possibly can. But that's not really a destination at.

The end of the day, that's an action.

Yes.

People have to know what their vis. Where they're going and that you can change where you're going. Today I can drive across the city. Tomorrow I can drive across, you know, my province, you know, the next day, I'm going to drive across my country. And as long as you. You have your destination in mind, that doesn't mean it doesn't change. You know, when you're building out your vision, your vision for your business, you know, your bhag, that big, hairy, audacious goal that you have for your business is out there. It has to be out there, or we'll never achieve what we desire.

Yes. All right, I've got a. I've got a personal shift in questions for you.

Okay.

Because this is so good. It's so good. But I. I've got to, like, peel a layer back, and I want to know. You are so inspiring to everyone who's listening to you right now. Right. You are. Where do you go to be inspired? Who do you look to? Who are your mentors? And what are you filling your mind with and your cup with every day?

Oh, my gosh. Thank you. That's a great, great question. So I have three sources of inspiration, and I think you've heard me. If you've not, you're gonna hear me say it now. You know, there are people in my world that I admire. Ashley, you are one of those people that I admire. I look to you to see, you know, what are you doing for your community that I could be doing better at. And I look to the people that are most relevant. And so, you know, from business Person to business person. I look for what's relevant in my world, and I lean hard on that information. I go out and consume, consume information that's relevant to me, and I get inspiration from it. I get inspiration from my business coaches. You know, I've got three people that I rely very heavily on for guidance for mentorship, and that changes. And, you know, who my mentor is today may not be my mentor tomorrow. People. I mean, we need to outgrow mentorship. We need to continue to evolve and elevate, you know. And so today, while I might look to, you know, I might look to Scott Smith to be my mentor, at some point I'm gonna move beyond Scott, and I'm hopefully gonna pull Scott along with me, because the both of us need to do that. And so I get my inspiration there. The other place I get my inspiration, you know, I'm a young grandfather. I like to think I'm a young grandfather, but I have grandchildren, and I get a lot of inspiration, you know, when I look to, you know, what kind of a community do we need to build so that these kids can have, you know, the same love for life, the same zest, the same passion for what they do as I have today. And so it makes me shift, you know, the way I'm doing things. I look for what the future is going to be for the people that are closest to me.

So good. Do you have. Do you have books, YouTube channels, or podcasts that you also have enjoyed that have added to that?

I'm an advid, you know, podcast guy. I spend a lot of time looking for podcasts that tell good stories. And so, of course, I have all of the, you know, the Retail Today with Bob Fibs and the Retail Insider, and, you know, those things that are retail driven. But I also look at podcasts that are outside of my world. And I, you know, I love Michael Lewis, and I love to live against the rules. And, you know, I love the. You know, how the Ezra Klein show, I mean, I listen to a bunch of that kind of stuff, but then I also love. I mean, I love Barstool sports. I love the rawness of how he built his business. I mean, barstool sports was really, you know, a social influencer that has become so much bigger than that today. And. And so, yeah, I do. I love podcasts. I'm not a great reader. I. In fact, I'm a terrible reader, but I'm a good listener. And so I listen to books. You know, I. I have a bunch of my favorites. You know, I Think. My favorite book of all time, my favorite book, my favorite movie. I've read the book. I've listened to the book probably ten times. Is Moneyball. It's. And of course that, you know, that's coming from a numbers guy. But I listen to all of those things, and anything that I feel like is going to give me something I don't have today, I go and find it and I ask my community, you know, what book are you reading? What book are you listening to? I throw them on my iPhone. My iPhone. You know, I travel a lot, so I spend a lot of time on airplanes. Maybe not this month, you know, 25 cancelled flights in the next six weeks. But that's how I listen. That's how I learn. I listen to a book and, you know, I'm a guy that reads one in five words, so I'm not a good reader, but I hear better, I listen better than I can read.

So, yeah, I'm with you on that. I can't read a book. I fall asleep within one page of turning a book. I just can't do it. So I've gotta listen. I'm right there with you. But thank you for that, by the way, and thank you for the kind compliments. I really appreciate that. And. And I just have to be honest. I, you know, I like that you're such a tell it like it is kind of guy. And. And I want to be the same way. To me, you know, you do what you say and you show up with integrity and you're humble and you're honest. Like, those are the values that really drive my life and that come from growing up on a ranch and kind of just how I was raised. And. And I love that you do that. And so, I mean, when I say that, I see those qualities in you and I value our relationship that we've been able to build because you're just so dang genuine, you know, I just. Everything you brought today is so much value. So I kind of want to end on this note. Your young grandpa, your cool grandpa, let's say that. Such a cool grandpa Dan. So picture this. I don't even know. Usually I tell people, like, oh, many years down the road, well, let's talk about tomorrow. You're sitting on the porch with your grandkids and you're just talking to them about the life that you lived and the business you created and the lives that you touched. I always want to know, what is the legacy that you want to leave behind for people?

Man, oh, man, you know, the thing about, the thing about humility, you know, it doesn't ask you to think less of yourself, but of yourself less often. And I want my kids to say that he did this for someone else. That he lived a life that was service above self. That yeah, we enjoy the thing. We enjoy the fruits of our labors. We travel, you know, we have every imaginable toy. We have access to everything we ever wanted. We don't want for anything. But it came because of my dedication to service above self, to seeing excellence in others ahead of myself. I'm a servant.

I love that. Dan, thanks so much for spending time with us today and sharing all of this awesome wisdom. We can't wait to have you back again and collaborate with you more often in the community. You are such a light. Thank you for bringing it to us today.

Thank you so much. I very much appreciate you saying thank you. Thank you. Thank you.

Thank you so much for listening to today's episode. I hope you loved all of the mic dropping moments that Dan brought to the episode. He's such a light and I truly mean everything that I say. I hope you follow him and the wealthy retailer because he has so many great points and pieces of knowledge he's always sharing. You guys, if you have any questions or need a resource or maybe a maybe it's just a feel good playlist or some engagement graphics or ideas on how to engage online or in your Facebook group with your customers right now, everything that you need from both the Boutique Hub and all of our partners, management one included you can find@the boutiquehub.com Covid this is our Corona Retail Resource center where we're listing all the tools that we can find to help you and your business together under one roof. If you guys have a question anytime on what's happening in your business right now, how you can collaborate with other retailers or wholesalers, or you just want to be a part of the Boutique Hub, Reach out anytime@ashleytheboutiquehub.com find me on Instagram at ajalderson. I would love to chat. I'd love to video chat with you or@the boutiquehub.com join thanks for listening you guys. Hey guys, thank you so much for listening to this episode. We hope that you loved it. Don't forget to hit subscribe and leave a rating and review down below for a chance to be one of our featured listeners each and every week. For more information on our spirit of community over competition and how to access complete show notes and bonus downloads from our guests, head on over to the boutiquehub.com and join the community. We'll see you you next week.