The Day I Almost Quit the Trades with Ismael Valdez | Podcast Ep. 110 | Toolbox for the Trades

All right here we go ready yes ishmael valdez welcome back to toolbox for the trades has it been two years.

Already no it hasn't it's been a year right it's two years no it's been two years it's been about two.

And a half years ishmael no more.

Two and a half jesus christ i'm sorry i'm sorry because i should have done this a couple more times and i should have given more back to.

You to the train no dude you give back to the trades all the time i'm so excited to talk to you for this episode this is a new concept that i'm working about i'm working with for our listeners and it was inspired by another listener it's about the day i almost quit so you are whether you want to admit it or not a figurehead in the industry of complete success running your like the best most successful business you can next gen by the way you guys just ran a billboard in my neighborhood in highland park in los angeles and that's actually i was like oh i got to have an ishmael for the first episode of day oma was good thank you you are you are something else my friend so i really appreciate you coming on and humanizing yourself so our listeners can you know hear a little bit about you and where you've struggled and hopefully day two can get some inspiration so let's kick this off shall.

We let's do it okay honestly you have like the chillest vibe like i love i love talking to you because you just you make me feel special i don't ever feel special by the way i'm always like go go go go go go and like those little comments that you say like hey you know it makes it makes it it makes me feel like i'm doing something good so thank you well you're welcome.

I truly mean it no i'm not blowing smoke i sincerely mean everything i say okay so you're welcome so the last time we spoke you grew from zero to thirty million in four years and you had a goal of hitting one hundred million dollars in revenue this was about two and a half years ago what has changed since then we're.

Gonna hit it we're at close to eighty eight right now we got two more months left that's yeah that's easy yeah we're gonna hit one hundred i think we're i think our budget and our pace and our go tracker is saying one hundred four unless we have like a really really good winter for november and december which it's getting kind of chilly out there we'll pass the one hundred five mark but yeah we're gonna hit it i told you man i don't if i set my sights to it i just i i put my head down and i just go.

For it oh my god that's incredible.

Congratulations how do you feel honestly like now when we talked about it the first time like i was so such in the trenches that i didn't really feel anything and now that like i took a step back i built my management team i have an executive level directors level now and like i get to do cool cool things like this jackie to talk to you about like our journey like i'm actually enjoying the hell out of like just sitting back and like looking at all these people and like thinking like man these people really like working here like to me that's like the most unreal feeling still up to this day when me when i watch these people work like my my teammates work i'm like dude i can't believe they actually love working here the way i love working here you know what i'm saying so it feels good to answer your question it feels amazing it feels dope to be able to do this you know what i'm.

Saying yeah totally i listened to our episode to prep for this one because i was like what did we talk about last time and you made a point of saying i want to make sure i create a place where people really want to work so the fact that we're revisiting two years later and you're feeling that more than ever you're able to recognize holy crap i'm about to fill this incredible goal i set for myself and i'm having fun along the way that's amazing man i'm so.

Happy for you thank you thank you.

Jackie now with all of that goodness put out there in in in the in the interview we've established that ishmael is doing very well in his business he's very happy in life i want to hear about the day you almost.

Quit the day i almost quit dude the day i almost quit tom howard saved my life anybody that knows tom howard you did tom howard obviously works at service sign he's got one hundred fifty two companies he he has technology companies plumbing business he's got everything so the day i almost quit was right before tom howard showed up to my shop man like i will never ever forget that day and and you know i i should probably start with the backstory of that i wasn't using service time properly and i was kind of gaming the system on how to how to use service titan i thought it was a dispatching software from day one so we never use the accounting the invoicing the paperless like all the features that it has we were never using it properly and and then service time found out they called me up and they said hey you know we need you to use it properly we need you to you know track your technicians all that and and and they were trying to charge me this ridiculous price for it and i'm like no i'm not going to do it there's no way it's just a dispatching software and and ara called me up and and this is honest to god ara called me up and said hey ishmael i really need you to use it properly i need i need to start charging for it properly i'm like look man if you can show me why this software is worth every penny that it's worth no problem i'll pay whatever price you guys want me to whatever the price was for the users at the time i'm like i don't care about that but right now i think that it's a freaking dispatching software all we're doing all we're doing is dispatching technicians for that's all we're doing and he's like look man i'm gonna send this guy named tom howard you know he's a contractor like yourself he been using service time for a while and and and i believe he can help you a lot and holy crap jackie like i like i will never ever ever have like the enough words to think like what tom did tom literally came in the business right when i was about to like call it quits and and which which goes perfect with the with the theme of of our podcast i will never ever ever have enough words to thank him because that day i still remember it was like november ish of twenty nineteen it was pre covered like you know and and he came in there and he was just supposed to show me how to use service time properly but knowing how tom is and i don't know if you guys know him but like tom is like a probably the tom is the elon musk of heating air conditioning of the trains right i'll i'll live on the cross saying that so so he comes in and he just analyzes the business and you know i'm literally a month away from drying up in cash flow i wasn't running the business properly i wasn't priced properly i wasn't running service time properly i was just selling selling selling selling selling installing and collecting which ninety nine percent of contractors that's all we're good at like we're not educated we're not you know we we're not financial advisors we're not tech savvy like all we know how to do is sell this box install this box and collect the money for that box we don't know we we don't know that that that that we're supposed to be priced properly and all that right so tom comes in there i'm about you know thirty maybe forty five days away from calling my vendors and saying hey guys like i don't know what the i'm doing and i need help right tom gets in there and just starts analyzing the business and and and sits down with me and and says hey man you know i know i'm here to show you service time you know but you have any other questions that you know i could help you with and i'm like yeah like dude i feel like i'm not like like the money in the bank is not matching to what like we're supposed to be doing and he's like what do you mean and i'm like dude like i have a little bit of money in the bank but we're doing thirty two thirty one million dollars in revenue shouldn't i have like a ton of money in the bank and he's like well show me your p l's and i'm like wait what is that that's how i was no i'm still dumb but that's how dumb i was and that dude that day he like what do you mean i was like i have some paper like so like some financials but i don't know if they're accurate or whatever you know we've been trying to do what we can with what we got kind of thing right and he freaking he's like holy ishmael you are running a thirty million dollar business employing i think at the time like two hundred people you are running a two hundred million dollars i mean a thirty million dollars business with a couple hundred people and you don't know your numbers and i'm like no man nobody's ever taken the time to say hey this is you know this is what a business looks like i was remind you i was twenty nine thirty thirty one at the time so i wasn't like you know i hadn't been in the business for that long i didn't know what i was doing i was just selling and installing like i said so yeah dude i still remember that day you know he went in there and he's like look man i'm gonna this is out of service times pocket this is like nothing to do with them like i i can genuinely see in your eyes that you're stressed out over you know this and and let's let's see what we could do right and he just for i think it was like thirty thirty days maybe three weeks almost a month he was there and i still remember to this day like you know i had a little shop in the west side of anaheim and yeah we dude jackie we were in there every day working on the business he was like dude you got way too many csrs you got way too much overhead you got your spending your marketing your marketing you're not tracking it properly you can track all this on service time i'm like nobody's ever told us this okay so so long story short you know he starts tracking the marketing properly he starts you know going from invoices that we were writing to consumers picking up checks and doing paper invoices to doing everything on the t tablet he's like dude you need to order tablets you need to order phones you need to order all this so we can automate all this and and then after we did all that he you know he started educating me on financials and that's when we like that's when it went from holy like i'm about to call everybody and tell him like i don't know what the i'm doing i'm stressed out i was drinking at the time you know and and and this is a little insight i shouldn't even say but dude i grew next gen the first three years i was drunk most of the time i was an alcoholic i was you know like a lot of people in the trades and i just didn't know what i was doing i was an alcoholic you know i i wasn't i wasn't i was so careless about everything because i thought that everything was just going to work itself out and you know finally that year i was about to call it quits and you know they said this they said ara made that call and you know they sent tom and we we turned it around in thirty forty five days we like went from not making profit jackie to like holy shit this is a badass business right yeah oh my goodness that's the day i almost called it.

Quits well i'm so happy you said that i don't know if you remember this but after tom went to your shop and did that whole thirty forty five day thing he actually brought you to the service titan offices and you spoke at our all hands and you were like i was using the business the software wrong tom totally showed me what it is and now i see so much value in this and afterwards we met for the first time because i was like hi i'm jackie i've seen you on facebook quite a bit we should get to know each other so that's so nice i just remembered.

That i still remember that honestly i i remember that ara came out and he was wearing some jordan shoes that i have given him and now some lebron james shoes that i have given him so i remember that day man that was probably that was a really.

Dope day too that was and thank you for being so open this is what i want to use these types of episodes to talk about right i love that you said nobody told me what to do because i feel there's so many of us and by the way you and i are very close in age and the fact that you run an almost a hundred million dollar business just faint whatever whenever you tell that but like we're the same generation right and like i totally get that that like what the hell am i supposed to do nobody told me i was supposed to do this and then i'm just so happy that tom was able to come in and pick you up and help you through that but like tell me a little bit about before that moment when tom came in like what were you feeling like were you sharing with anyone and your family your friends your co workers or you just all bottling that inside that was.

So so look our generation right our generation was like especially hispanic you know young male hispanic my dad always taught me to man the up and whatever you did you're gonna pay for everything right and i was always taught that way to to you know always keep everything inside and in the least people know that the less the drama the less the noise the less the problems right so i kept everything inside for three years i ran that company from we went from zero to thirty something mil for three three and a half years i ran that company and nobody ever knew if i had enough money for payroll nobody ever knew if i you know if i if i was going to make if i was hitting my goals or you know nobody knew anything about the company it was just me by myself it was you know if i had a shitty month and i didn't know if i was losing money if i wasn't losing money but if if i had a bad month nobody knew everything when i when i stepped in that door if i stepped out of my office right because i was always in my office trying to like fix things trying to you know figure out what was wrong with the business i'm by myself with no guidance as soon as i stepped out of that office i was you know i could i could have been crying in there i could have been like stressing out calling the bank for more money whatever the case was going on inside that office as soon as i walked out that door it was a smile for everybody and it was like hey man you know no in my mind i couldn't justify me having a bad mood or me treating people a different way because my dad taught me from a young age that i have to respect people and i gotta make sure that you know you know when when when things aren't going right in life it's my fault right and if i want to fix it it's gonna be me right so that's the way i was raised so as soon as i walked out of the door if i walked into the csr room or the production room or wherever i walked in it was hey good morning hey guys how is everything going hey go kick ass today hey you got three leads like it was that guy so so to everybody outside the world on facebook everywhere oh ishmael's killing it ishmael's doing fine ishmael is amazing right and that's but that's the way i was raised since i was since i was young.

Yeah i totally relate to that and i know a lot of people relate to that too especially in the hispanic community as you said i can just imag how much that must have sucked just so isolating not being able to share that stress with anyone dude it's.

It'S one of the toughest things i've had to go through between between you know being being an alcoholic and having a bad business and trying to figure everything out yourself like that was probably one of the most stressful points in my life and that's why i made it a point now you know now i push sobriety now i i'm on facebook helping people now i'm flying to vegas flying to texas to arizona to all these conventions on my own dime which i don't need to like i sold the company four or five months ago and i don't need to do anything anymore right and i still make it a priority to if somebody invites me to a to a convention or anything i get in there because there's somebody out there right now i'm telling you that is bottling up everything because they're too prideful of coming up and saying hey man i really don't know what i'm doing can anybody help me here and if i could grab one of those people and answer one of their questions like i've it just makes it it makes the journey a little bit better for me i love that.

So you're sober now i've been sober for four years now yes congratulations that is an incredible achievement oh my gosh congratulations seriously i know how hard that is man i wish i could give you a hug right now but we're virtual i'm giving you a virtual hug.

Four years of being sober and two years of not no three years of not smoking cigarettes which was tougher than being sober like the cigarettes is the devil man i love cigarettes up to this point but i still haven't three years i've been you know i haven't smoked one cigarette so i've been that's more proud of than than the sobriety.

One congratulations oh my gosh all right thank you for being so open and honest so going back to the fact that you're going to conferences on your own dime trying to get in the face of contractors who are growing so you can help them out the way tom helped you out what would you say to any contractors right now who are thinking of giving up on their.

Business business dude i'm telling you like if i could i've been in your shoes number one i've been like you know this isn't a a business expert trying to come in here and fix your because like i just don't believe in that like if i can give you guys one message like open up to people like there's a ton of good people in the trades like there's a ton of tom howards out there that are willing to drop everything that that they're doing there's a ton of auras out there there's a ton of ishmael's tommy's travis's there's a ton of us out there that are pushing sobriety that are pushing god that are pushing innovation that are pushing help for nothing in return like that's the dopest part of like what if i could say one thing that i'm really proud of that i've done in the trades is i have a good like an amazing group of people which includes tommy aaron gaynor chad peterman you know tom howard travis like all these big names in the industry we are all friends and our number one job our number one goal everybody we have i have this on a group message our number one goal is to go out there and help the people because dude jackie there is millions okay millions of contractors that are out there that are in my situation that i was in twenty nineteen and they don't want to ask for help because they're embarrassed because they don't know where to ask for help you know i feel like it's it's like a it's like a it's like an addiction like a like an alcohol addiction right you don't know how bad it is until you're like holy i have a dui holy i'm in jail holy like you know what i'm saying like guys if i could say one thing open up to people go online on service avengers and ask a question or go to one of these conferences and stop by stop me or stop one of these guys and say hey man you know this is my business i've been doing it for fifteen years ten years and i need help and i promise you i promise you god as my witness somebody will help you somebody in the trades will help you that's how dope the trades are yeah i.

Totally agree and i think the point that you're making as well service avengers your facebook group which is so positive so great i love seeing the stuff that goes on in there but i think it's really important to say that i find that when people on this podcast talk about how when they asked for help and they got it and it really transformed them and their business no one is going to come and judge your business no one's going to come and judge like i imagine any contractor who comes to help who comes and asks you for help ishmael you're probably like oh man i've been here before let me help you i drop.

Everything that i'm doing i drop every there was four different companies today touring the facility we give them paid plans we give them hr things we give them bonus plans we give them everything that we have here for free we just don't like people come in here talk to our managers to our executives to our directors to our to anybody we tour them around the whole facility and i tell them look ask them any question you want they're gonna answer it like that like trust me for myself to anybody around me we will do anything to help you guys and we don't want nothing in return we just want you the only actually there's one thing that i ask everybody jackie if i'm gonna help you if i'm gonna help you fix your business with whether it's a thirty minute conversation which i just had right now with this guy named jason i had a thirty minute conversation he has a two million dollar business and i'm trying to you know help them up and turn it around i ask one thing of everybody if i'm gonna help you take my time out of my day to do it you better go and help somebody else too that's the only one thing i ask for everybody i tell travis i tell tom i tell everybody guys if we're gonna help people you guys gotta make the message of if i'm gonna help you you better go and help somebody else too because there's a ton of people out there that need help and we all need to like in the trades we all need a glue to stay together to help each.

Other i one hundred agree i think that's a wonderful message and a great requirement to have for anyone who's going to ask from help for you from you all right so by the way i totally miss that you sold so congratulations you certainly you probably do not have to work are you president now is that your title i'm still the.

Ceo of here i still come in here every day i'm still addicted to this you know between this nuve which is our thermostat coming out data cube and the service avengers group that i mentor people on like i still come here every single day on saturdays i'm here like i never have to work for another one hundred fifty million years and i still do it just because i because of what tom did and how he impacted my life i feel that i have to give to people and that's what i do now oh.

My goodness what do you think if you could go back in time if you had a time machine what would you say to yourself in twenty nineteen.

I should dude i would have said hey man you need to stop drinking like way sooner than what i did i think i i think i was i was an alcoholic for way too long i started drinking since i was thirteen and and to me it was normal because my dad let us drink and you know it's it's just different the way we were raised so if i could go back i would say hey ishmael you need to stop drinking like asap if i could go down to twenty seventeen sixteen fifteen when i started the business i would say hey man you're about to go on a roller coaster of a ride that nobody's ever gonna prepare you for i like i need you to be sober so you can focus and if i would have done that i think i would have you know i think i would have been even i think i would have been five hundred maybe even a billion dollar company by now so but things happen for a reason i had to meet tom i had to meet ara i had to meet you jackie so you know i believe god i believe god put all all of us in in line so i i don't question him i just keep going i.

Love that so do you ever i don't i wonder if you experience it now because you do work a lot or you mentioned data cube your thermostat company you love doing this do you ever experience burnout.

I think i do so i think around december is when like every year i reset for myself so i have like there's one thing that i do i grind for for you know eleven eleven and a half months out of the year probably eleven and a half months out of the year and just the last two months out of the year which is you know christmas new year's all the holiday season you probably won't see me active on facebook you know my phone i'll probably give it to somebody for a couple weeks just so just so i can go look for myself again because i get lost a lot in this journey and i think i go hard for eleven months out of the year eleven and a half months out of the year and then i just i just take two weeks maybe three weeks sometimes and just you know i look for myself and i and i make sure that i that i that i find myself so i could go again for the next eleven months you know.

What i'm saying yeah yeah can you tell me a little bit about what you tap into or i mean i love the no phone the no social media but is there anything else you you crave to kind of do that.

Reset my girls my my daughters i have four daughters andrea sophia victoria and camilla and i think that i spent a lot of time i spend more time that i've been now that the transaction went through and everything but i think the last two weeks three weeks out of the year i really really like i think i i almost crave their energy where i just need to like be around them whether they're annoying me because they're fighting with each other or you know they're fighting about a toy they're crying whatever it is like i kind of sit back sometimes and i look and i just like i i feel blessed you know what i'm saying so i think it's resetting through them because i don't i owe them so much you know i spend so much time in the trades and in the businesses that i'm growing and giving back to people that the last two weeks three weeks of the year i make it a i make it a point to make sure that i that i invest all my energy and and that i have enough energy from them to to be able to to be able to go again for another eleven months you know what i'm saying so it's it's the phone the no social media the no noise and then just being around them and sometimes just you know watching a movie and and looking around and and seeing how blessed we are i think that's pretty that's pretty dope and that's what gets me through.

I love that yes you're leaning on your family you're leaning on your faith you're leaning on no social you're leading on you know withdrawing and all of that stuff yes ma' am i love that as we're talking about mental health basically in the trades is what we're talking about right we're talking about you as a business owner who was bottling it up all inside was raised not to ask for help you finally got that help it changed it transformed your life is there anything that we anything else that you'd like to say about this topic that you think the majority of contractors really need to hear i.

Think because the times are changing so much right now the next generation of contractors is getting involved right like the bottling up the not asking questions the keeping everything tight and not telling everybody that was the the old generation they kind of kept their own little secrets they didn't talk to each other the there was no social media so there wasn't like hey can i ask you a question from somebody in new jersey or florida right like we need to we need to adapt to those times and use social media as a platform of of gluing the trades together so like if there's one thing that i can like i can tell like everybody is like like there's it's super hard to be a business owner whether you're two million five million fifty one hundred fifty two hundred million dollar company we all have the same problems we all have the same struggles personally and in business okay and that's huge because most people just focus on the business side i have the same problems at home than everybody does i have the same problems in my business than you guys do there's nothing different at one hundred and fifty or five hundred million than there is at two million we all have the same problem and we all need to open up more about it and and and being vulnerable is actually okay for this generation like being vulnerable and opening up to like what i'm telling you guys nobody knew about like what me and tom had to go through with me and ara the conversation i had with them like meet like almost you know going insane from being an alcoholic like nobody knows that and it's okay to tell people that so when you guys come and ask for help like it's okay to be vulnerable you know what i'm saying it's okay to open up it's okay to not show that you know everything you know what i'm saying that was kind of like the the idea behind service avengers was was to make sure that we all talk to each other yeah just because i post something doesn't mean i'm always right just because i'm at a hundred million dollar company that doesn't mean i know what i'm doing i just posted something because it came through my thought and i want to talk about it with my peers right so if i could if i could have one message is just open up more like don't there's not a right or wrong answer this generation is more of like hey guys let's question everything that has been done for thirty years and let's innovate it instead of just being okay just being okay the way we the way our parents ran the business and the way the the the the last generation ran the the trades instead of being okay with that let's question it and maybe they were right but some things they were doing we can do better and that's okay there's nothing wrong with us being more innovative than them and then the next generation is the same thing hey they're going to come up with better ideas than we do let's open up to their ideas too.

I love that and i just pulled something from what you just said and i don't think i realized this about you before but you i love the be vulnerable message but i you strike me as a man who does not take himself too seriously and also is not afraid to be wrong so you're not striving for perfection no man i'm.

Striving for more all i'm trying to do jackie is is is put more thought into what we're doing like when i when i question things when i post something when i ask you guys something it's not because i'm right it's because i'm trying to create a debate between it because when there's debate and there's conflict and there's interaction there's there's actually progress going on right that's what i love about it it's not it's it it's not about being right or wrong anymore it's about hey let's try to figure things out and let's try to do let's try to do a different way maybe it works out better maybe it doesn't but at least we try you know what i'm saying i'm not there's no the one thing about me this is what i tell everybody when they come and talk to me i'm like look guys i'm probably the dumbest one in the room and i'm okay with that and when you guys talk to me i want you i want you guys to talk to me like if i was a golden retriever because i'm not smart at all okay so when you talk to me use single syllable words okay because you're gonna confuse me and i'm okay with that i don't need to be smart i don't need to be the toughest guy in the room i just want to know that there's people in that room that are gonna make me better and that's what i strive for you are.

Definitely a golden retriever personality type that is that is for sure very self aware but yeah i mean so sure tom came in in twenty nineteen he he he hunkered down with you for thirty forty five days helped you turn your business around but i'm sure even after that was done even to the path of a mil of one hundred million even to the path of having a successful transaction you probably still up along the along the way right yes.

Yes and you know what the cool part about it is and this is probably one of the biggest golden nuggets i'm going to tell you guys in here is the because i made the even even after i fixed the business even after we we became profitable even after all that had happened we turned the whole company around even after that i still kept making decisions right because decisions the growth the growth innovation all that happens when decisions are made that's the only thing that happens the the day you stop making decisions is the day you stop growing so when people come up to me and they say hey ishmael you know i have my three a three million dollar business i have you know i've been in business for five years and i can't get over three million dollars the only this is the simplest way i'm going to put it to you guys the only reason why you're stuck at one or two or three or five or ten or whatever you're stuck at is because you stopped making decisions i kept making decisions between thirty and one hundred and yes they were wrong one hundred percent half of those decisions were wrong and i don't care because i knew guess what i knew that if i made that decision i would know if it was right or wrong the reason why people get stuck is because they're too afraid to be wrong they always want to be right they always want to be right and being right is only so far in between that that slows down the growth being wrong is okay because you move forward.

Wow sorry i need i need a personal pause for that one i'm like.

Between thirty and one hundred million i was wrong one hundred million times and it was okay because i learned and i pivoted and i went the other direction but at least i made the decision you guys got to start making decisions that's the number one problem contractors have they're afraid to make decisions that i think was.

The biggest nugget you dropped on the end to the end very dramatic of you so what are you what are you working on now your last time we spoke your goal was one hundred million you're going to hit it this year you sold the business what are you really excited about what are you looking forward in the next couple of.

Years so we're part of wrench group now there's sixteen companies inside a wrench group there's one there's you know parker and sons morris jenkins there's you know cooler there's a bunch of really high level you know operators in there on the on the on the next gen side my my goal is to beat them right because there's no fucking way i'm taking number two on this like i've said it since day one i joined wrench i'm like you guys better buckle up because there's no way i'm going to be number two in this okay so right now there's a couple there's two or three other companies that are a little bit bigger than me and more profitable and all that and i told them it's just a matter of time before i catch up to you guys so my next gen go is to be number one at wrench right that's when that's my goal and i'm going to be it so jonathan when you're hearing this and kevin and paul and all you guys i'm going to kick your ass on the personal side is just dude i'm looking for happiness now man i'm not there's there's my personal side you know i got my beautiful wife my beautiful kids my i got i got all that my my brothers my sisters they're healthy like on the personal side all i'm looking for is happiness so whatever the form of happiness looks like that's what i'm looking for it's not about you know having the best car anymore or you know being the best at it it's just not like i whatever the the next form of phase of happiness is for me that's what i'm going to.

Look for i love that so much and you do have some nice cars so that's saying a lot i do if you want if you want if you want we can swap i can just give you mine i'll take yours it's fine yeah all right this is my new favorite question to end on and i would love to hear your answer if you had to choose a song to be the soundtrack of your life what would it be damn that's.

A freaking good one that is a good one man god there's so many freaking there's spanish songs there's english songs there's just i think i think you know what i relate to the most i think who i relate to the most and it could be a song or an artist i think i relate to drake a lot just because he came out of nowhere and just blew up and everybody was questioning everything he he was doing and oh he's only going to do one song and oh he's going to go away and you know eventually he and now he's like the biggest pop artist in the world i kind of relate his journey to mine because when i was coming out and i was doing ten twenty thirty million forty and everybody was questioning oh he's it's a it's a house of cards he's going to be out of business in a couple years he doesn't know what he's doing all that to finally getting to one hundred doing the transaction doing all that and just kind of staying quiet like i kind of relate his songs and his journey and his struggles to like what we've done like everything was a question to next and everything was like he doesn't know what he's doing at the beginning and you know he's growing too fast and you know he it was everything was a facade to people until the transaction went through we're doing one hundred five million dollars now and you know i'm happier than i've ever been so now i i i think we're at the same level where you know drake is just chilling he's a fucking multibillionaire and i'm just in the background just like smiling at people like hey man if you guys need help i'm here to help you man i'm not saying i'm better than you but you know i'm.

Willing to help great great answer ishmael valdez i am so happy that you came back on congrats on the transaction on the transaction and i cannot wait to re engage with you in a few years and find out that you are the number one contractor in the.

Wrench you best jackie come on you know you know you know that's going.

To happen i know it's going to happen.