Strategic Business Growth: Sherrod Baltimore’s Entrepreneurial Journey Part 2

Within two months, we had three buildings, 120 hours a week. So that's when I was like, all right, this one, I got a business like this trip that fast.

What would you say over the last couple of years if you had to look back and say, hey, these are maybe the top lessons I've learned from trying to get this business off the ground. What would those be?

Now I got employed. That's when I learned a lot about the entrepreneur life. I got to pause the services, we got to discontinue, we're not getting paid, and then we coming back foreign.

Lots of good history and, and lots of learnings there for everybody, right? It's, you know, life isn't as predictable as you would hope it would be. It's, you know, you could say NFL. You know, this is where I'm going to be. And you could do all the right things, and it's still not necessarily work out the way that you want. But it doesn't mean that life can't be better than you ever expected. And, you know, even just thinking of the football owner of the Red Blacks and the fact that he created a, a carpet cleaning company and became a millionaire, that he could invest in a, you know, a very well known, long established football franchise in Canada, like, that's, it's pretty cool, right? So, you know, the opportunity that lies ahead with everything that you've learned up to this date about discipline, consistency, resilience, hard work, you know, those things all continue to apply. So when did you really, you know, I know you're, you're saying, hey, I did three days and it was a lot of work and I can't do this. When did you really make that commitment to say, you know what, I am going to pursue this a little bit further. I just have to figure out maybe how I do it so that I'm not killing myself.

So right after the cleaning, I would say I start being very committed this year. You know, I'm very, very committed. But after that cleaning, that's when I got a little more serious, though. Like, hold on, I'm going to hire somebody. Google, how do you hire people? Like then indeed came up. And then all these people come up, Kijiji, you know what I'm saying? So I told myself, man, I can hire somebody to do this. And then 2022, that was 2022. I hired Karen, Ms. Karen, and I'm from Indeed. And I got her to do some residentials. And she was like, hey, baby, how you doing? I'm like, I'm good. I got a cleaning, you know, I'm playing football, but I also got a cleaning company. You know, it's like I'm really just starting. Like, I'm just looking for somebody to help me out. She was like, yeah, just pay me, you know, get a little 20 hour or whatever the case. I'm like, cool, whatever, you know, I just need you to help. I'm really focused on football still. I'm still, you know, in football, you gotta be locked in. You like training, waking up in the morning, six in the morning. Like, it's a very military mindset, you know, from when you're there to the end of the day. Like, it's very militant, you know what I'm saying? So, hi, her, she did like a one bedroom, whatever. She was teaching me some stuff. I learned a lot of stuff from her. And then like a week later, it was, you know the word. After that season, the word had got around. Like, I had a cleaning company, you know, I was doing these things and I had a cleaning company and was doing this in the offseason. So my yoga instructor. That's why I told her I had a cleaner company. She had an aunt who was the president of Brinley, Batter Bay Britannia, Batter Bay. And it was my first residential contract, my cleaner contract. She's like, you got cleaners? I'm like, yeah. She's like, yo, I got a commercial opportunity for you. Like, we got a resident. It's like five days a week. I'm like, five days a week. She like, yeah. I'm like, cool. Yeah, we got cleaners. Cool. We got. Tell her, call me. So she called me. She's like, yo, you got to. We need, like, by October, by November, it was the end of October, like, middle October. It was like a week left. And she was like, yo, we want to start in November. I'm like, cool. Yeah, I got them. I hung up the phone, like, yo, how do I get employees for commercial cleaning? Like, what is this? You feel me? So anyways, found out having someone. I sat down with a guy on a D, obviously, I did a little interview, come downstairs in my little restaurant, and I hired them and we got our first residential contract. Yeah. So that's when they got like, all right, 20, 23. It was like. It was crazy. We did really good. And I was. Every day was 40 hours a week. And then it turned to.

That's. Yeah, that's legit.

That was our first building. And then we got 80 hours a week. We did good. It was another building, had two cleaners for two buildings and then it was 120 hours a week because we did too good on those two buildings. So within one month we had, within two months we had three buildings. So 120 hours a week. So that's when I was like, all right, this one, I got a business like this tip that fast.

Yeah. And, and truthfully too, right, like you've got, especially in Ottawa, which that's, I'm assuming that's the background where you are right now. But like you've got some, you've got some status in Ottawa, right? Like relatively small, major city in Canada. It's the capital of the country and a lot of government employees there. And then they've got the Ottawa Senators and the Ottawa Red Blacks, right? Like two major franchise. So like you as you know, the individual that you are, pretty high profile, very likable guy. You've got some, you've got some swagger in Ottawa. So it's like, how do, how do we continue to use that, right, and say, hey, listen, you know, everyone knows Shrouds a hard working, solid guy, good human, you know, how do we get behind continuing to support this business growth? And you know, just football keeps getting in the way though, buddy.

Well, first love, this is what I do first. Keep the main thing, the main thing, this is secondary.

I hear you. I hear you. Yeah. So let's talk a little bit about, you know, how this year has been, right? So over the last 12 months, you've had a little bit more time spent with, within the business and trying to grow it. And I know we definitely have. We've worked pretty closely together. You've been in our wealthy entrepreneur program. You bring so much energy and commitment. And, you know, I remember us having a conversation about how you start generating some of these contracts, right? And you know, it's something, it was a conversation that we had that'll always stick with me. And I think I asked you, you know, how many, how many calls are you making a week or how many calls you make it. It was probably a week. And I don't remember what your number was for you. Like, I got like 10 call, I'm making 10 calls a week. And I was like, right, could you do 20? You're like, yeah, I could do 20. I'm like, just think about it, if you did 20, what that would look like? And then all of a sudden, you know, the, the, the activity started picking up. You know, the leads were starting to come in a little bit more and it's just like little Tweaks, right? What would you say over the last couple of years if you had to look back and say, hey, these are maybe the top lessons I've learned from trying to get this business off the ground. What would those, what would those be?

It'd be wise words for my Uncle Steve. I got a lot of lessons taught to me. Uncle Steve, they have a construction company in Montana and I'm blessed to have them. That's my other side of my family, the Langless family from my aunt's side. They really taught me so much. I was in Montana too, but I gotta. He gonna laugh when he hear this. I got a whole list. Got the beans and weenies phase, Gotta walk on the sunny side of the street. Erdberg get the worm first, stuff like that. So always have those quotes with you. But the three, it's a few main things that stick out with me is that I also learned from Uncle Steve. You want to have at least three to six months of payroll in advance. Another thing is you get paid monthly for corporations. Like when you doing commercial. Like, so when I first started, right? So I was telling y' all how it started off. Good, right? Like I was getting three. We had three full time employees, 120 hours a week. So that's two to three months. Listen, payday Friday, Uncle Steve. Payday Friday. If you don't pay your employees on Friday, what's gonna happen, Bob? They ain't gonna show up. You feel me? You know how I go. So I will send an invoice in. They say, hey, you know, you missed a little tweak, so you gotta send it. So if you send the invoice on January 1st, you're gonna get paid February 1st. So I'll send the invoice in January 1st. They'll send me it back two weeks from there, like, hey, you missed a couple invoices, you missed a couple dates, whatever. I'll send it back. So me not knowing when they send it back, you get sent back two weeks from that time. So January, February. No, it was November, December, January. I went home for Christmas. I will never forget that. I went home for Christmas. I was home for Christmas, and it's January, the new year. I'm sitting at home, it's three months. I'm calling my uncle, I'm calling Uncle Steve. I'm like, yo, listen, I ain't get paid yet. This is crazy. I got three employees working full time. Mind you, I'm thank God that football has blessed me, you know, saving money and stuff like that because you Just. I'm just using. I'm sponsoring my own business, you know, I. I didn't get no line of credit. Business credit, obviously, just started a business. So it's like. And I'm in Canada, you know what I'm saying? So it's like, yo, they like, nah. I remember Uncle Steve was saying, like, nah, you gotta get paid. You can't be working. You gotta go get your money. You know what I'm saying? I'm still learning how to be an entrepreneur, you know? So I'm like, I gotta pause the services. And in my head, I was like, yo, can I go to the grocery store and get my groceries and come back and pay at the end of the month? Like, bro, like, now I need my money. So I had to call them, like, yo, we're gonna discontinue the services. I haven't got. I haven't received no paycheck in three months, 120 hours a week. Y' all can do the math. You know what I'm saying? Like, it's, you know, every two weeks, you know? You know what I'm saying? I'm paying my employees 20, mind you. I underbidded myself. This is my first contract, so I was only charging $25. I'm paying my employees $20. Hour. I don't know, I'm playing football. I ain't even doing the math. I know I'm making some type of something. And then as the time went by, I stopped paying them 18. So I got a little better, you know what I'm saying? So. And then the next. The third one was like, I charged them 30 hour and I was paying 18. So I started seeing a little. I got a little better over time, I got a little better. My price is different now, but, you know, but that's Damn near like 7,000amonth. You know what I'm saying? So I gotta, like, you know, with my expenses, too. Rent and so it ain't start hitting me till Christmas. I'm like, hold on. I started looking at my account. I'm like, where the my money going? Like, wait, yo, this one I learned too. QuickBooks. It's like stocks. It's like stocks and bonds. You got all these invoices. It's like saying, I'm making 25, 000. But my account, where's my. Hold on? I hit a midlife crisis. I knew I shouldn't have started this business. I could have bought a house. What am I doing? I thought I was investing in myself.

You know what I'm Saying, I remember. Oh, I remember us talking about it. And you're like, bob, what. What is happening? It's like, I can tell you that's.

When I reached out to Maddie, like, yo, I need an accountant. Like, I gotta do my taxes. And I end up. Tiffany reached out to you. She did a little email. And I remember, like, yeah, man, I got my taxes, man. Coming up, but can I call you real quick?

Oh, yeah, we went. We went through all of that. Yeah, like, all of your accounts receivable. You're like, I don't understand. It's saying, I'm making this money, but where's my. Where's my cash? Right? It's like, yeah, it's all. All sitting there. At some point, when you collect it, it's going to be. It's going to feel good. And now I think at that point, right, those contracts had ended up. And then you got paid, and then all of a sudden you had all this money in your account and you're like, huh, I got all the money in my account, but now I have to look for the next contracts, right? Because it's only going to last so long.

It came back, like, quarterly. Like, came and start. I wish we. I wish I got the whole lump sum at a time. They stopped paying one invoice at a time. Like, it's over now. Can I get my money? Like, damn. But, you know, once that came, it's like, all right, now I got improved. That's when I learned a lot about the, like, entrepreneur life. Like, all right, I gotta pause the services. We gotta discontinue. We're not getting paid. And then we coming back. They. I had to tell them, like, yo. They like, yo, a week. I'm ready to work now. Like, what's up? They don't understand, like, yo, we're not getting paid. Like, I can't have you out here working. I'm paying you. You know what I'm saying? Of course you wanna work, you know, but I gotta, you know. So we tried to continue the services, but they had other jobs in the time, you know, it was kind of like shaky is, like, uneasy. But they told me, my first couple of years is going to be like that, like a seesaw. Like, it's going to be like a little funny a little bit. So I was, you know, embraced it, whatever.

Especially because you've got. You've still got football too, right? So it's like, yeah, it's challenging at best for entrepreneurs who are 100% committed to their entrepreneurial journey. And You've got this split where it's like, this is still where my heart is at, you know, although I really want to see this succeed. But it's like competing interests a little bit. So, you know, thinking of that too. Like, where is it that you see clean dreams going? Like, of course it's, it's, you know, rolling now. I think you've got some good momentum happening with the business right now, but still, you know, with the idea that football is. Is being played, is clean dreams like you're after football's over, sort of, hey, I'm going to turn my focus to this animal and. And now that I know it and I understand how it works and I know how to grow it, that, you know, it's going to be full attention at that point. Is that your plan 100.

And, you know, football comes to an end at some point in time in your career. Everyone hates to hear it, or even me when I'm in it. I always be like, Mama, play. I'm 40 years old. You know, you don't really hit you till it hits you, till you get released, which what happened to me last year. And I see us cleaning every building in Ottawa. All these buildings you see in the back, we're gonna be cleaning all those stuff like that. I ain't stopping until we clean them. And I'm gonna be an entrepreneur, which is, I'm learning now. Like I said, this is my first year where I really, like, I went to Montana for two weeks and I was out there just getting gems, you know what I'm saying? And learning the CEO life. Like, just walking behind over Steve every day and Aunt Missy and Katherine and those are his kids. And, you know, I'm going to their office and seeing they everyday life and seeing their life they making for their kids and waking up every day and just asking Uncle Steve a hundred questions. And I'm in an entrepreneur class with Bob, my man. Oh, Bob is you. But I feel like that was one of my. One of the things that kind of turned my switch on. I never forget when you came out here and we had a breakfast, we sat down. I'm like, bro, I will never forget. I'm like, bro, like, now football a little slow, like. And I was talking like, this transition. I'm like, man, I'm still playing ball, bro. I'm training. Like, I trained during the day. And we had a conversation. You said two things that kind of like stuck with me. Like, it's like, all right, bro. You know, you said, how many buildings I pitched Sales during the day. And that's what I said. I was doing that. Last year was my first year doing it a little bit. You like? I'm like, I'm pitching sales in the off season. Like, I go train in the morning, and I do it in the evening, you know, just a little bit, like five a day. He's like, you can't do 10 a day. I'm like, yeah, you know what I'm saying? I'm like, this. The first year I really trained in the evening and pitched sales in the morning. I had to get serious. I put the business first, you know what I'm saying? I'm like, man, you can always train. You've been doing this, but let's see where this business is going to go, you know? And you was like, bro, I got a class. I want you to, you know, come on back, man. See if you like it. You just pitch it like that. Like, see if you like it. I think it can help you. I'm like, all right, Yeah, I love it, bro. I need everything, you know what I'm saying? Like, anything I can get, teach me about. Because I had all this long list of stuff like, bro, I don't know about this life, bro, this entrepreneur. Like, I was telling you, all the stuff I just did. He like, bro, we all been through it, bro. I'm, like, looking at you like, yeah, trust me, the more money you get, the more bigger your business get, the more gonna happen. So that's when I was like, all right, I'm built. Built for this.

And for anybody listening, too. So Sharad's talking about our group called the Wealthy entrepreneur, which we actually just opened up for free to all of our clients. So any of our clients who are in that we do bookkeeping for accounting work for, you know, we're offering this for free. And I brought Sharad in as well, because he's such a great community builder and connector. And, you know, I'm. I'm excited to see what he can continue to build. I brought him in, too, before I did the free launch, just to. To be part of this, right? Like, it's a community where it's all entrepreneurs, business owners who have gone through all of these same challenges. And you know what? When there's hundreds of us put in a room and Sharad says, hey, you know, I really am struggling because this isn't working. There's five or six people who said, I had that exact same thing, and this is what I did that. That helped me get past it. And it's about the collaboration and community of. Of experiences that help us all go further together, which is pretty cool. So just a little sidetrack there for you, Sharad, but.

And we got guest coaches. You got to add that. You. No, no, no, no. I got to amp it up a little bit. He ain't telling it all the way. He not telling it all the way. And we got guest coaches. Once a week, we be having sales people come teach you about sales. We got account teams that come teach you about accounting emails. Like, yo, should you be doing? I ain't going to give you all the. You know what I'm saying? You got to come part of the class to get all the gym, you know what I'm saying? But it's a lot of specialists. Like a bro, I've learned so much in the last year. Obviously, this is my first year, really, you know, I'm like a rookie again. People been in business all their life, you know, but, bro, it is unreal how much stuff I done learned in the last year that's helped me every day from reading, from hearing this stuff from. I'm the youngest in my class in the class. So it's like people doing so much better than you and so much more than you. And it's like, you gonna be there. Don't worry. We all started this like, yo, I'mma be there. So it's like you got this kind of like, level to try to reach up to role models, like, you know, the stuff you, you know, you can. Something to commit to every day. It's also a class. So it's like you learning, you reading and these courses, you're accounting. I know how to do so much now. I could be my own bookkeeping, I could do, you know, so much. But in the class, they teach you how to, you know, spread out, brush out, grow your business. I can't give them all the gems away, but I had to add that it's too. It's too much more. You was dumbing it down.

You. You were. Well, thank you. You were just talking about reading my. My buddy Dan Martel's book. Buy back your time as well. Make sure you check out the time that he did the guest coaching in our program, too. There's a recording in there. Check it out. So he's. He did an hour training for us, so it's in the library. Check that out too. Read the. Finish reading the book first and then, and then listen. He was also on the podcast. So, like, we do bring in some pretty seasoned veterans to help Share their experience as well. Like, same with me, you know, I'm, I'm in there. We have a CEO call at least monthly where, you know, we sort of share what it's like to be a 200 person business and, you know, international expansion and what that looks like, the headaches, the accountability systems, the sales processes, you know, so. So the idea is in there that we continue to support each other and we learn from maybe some of those that have been there before. And we bring in guest speakers who are obviously much more established than I am as well, because we're still on our own journey. But, man, I'm so happy that you're in there, continuing to watch your growth and your energy and everything you bring to wherever you go is just so positive.

And I'm full contracts up now. I started off on that when that entrepreneur class, remember I hit you, I'm like, man, I don't know about this. We only got one active contract. I got released on the Red Blacks. Like, I'm still playing, but I'm gonna pursue this. Like, I don't know, and just teaching me, adding some little stuff to my sales pitch and email, you know, just from the class and meeting with you every day, you know, shit. I went from five places to ten places. One contract to fold. Now we start another one in September, you know what I'm saying? So we, we grow. It's, it's like rapidly, you know, I got to get back out here and hustle, you feel me? I get back to it next week on Monday. I was, I was waiting for the podcast. I was excited. I'm taking a weekend off after this, you know what I'm saying? I'm excited. I was excited for this podcast, like, mean a lot to me, man, especially like my entrepreneur career, you know what I'm saying? It's a few people that kind of like keep me on track. Especially like you, my uncle Steve, you know, I'm Missy and all them and Dave and. But as far as you is like, I came to you as an accountant, like I said, and you more like a big brother, like, nah, you don't want to do that. Hey, I do this, you'll never tell me what to do. But you always be like this, what I would do, you know what I'm saying? So I kind of like appreciate that, you know, because there's not very many entrepreneurs. Like, we got the langlet side of my family, but the Baltimore family, entrepreneurship is not like built in our family. So I'm like one of the first kind of, like, entrepreneurs. You got to learn how to do this. You got to be skilled. You got to be built for this. Like, you got to be like, hey, you got to have.

Yeah, it's not easy.

It's not easy mentally, you know what I'm saying? So appreciate you.

So, Sherrod, let me, let me ask you this, and then, then we'll wrap it up. One question for you, and I think, you know, anybody who's listening to this right now is just going to be like, oh, man, this guy is just the best. You know, like, you can't help but just. Just love you. Who is your business ideally looking to clean for?

Right.

You, you said, you know, you've got Ottawa in the backdrop. You want. You. You're committed to being the professional cleaning company that every building in Ottawa uses. What does that mean? Who are your target people? Because I would imagine that there's going to be a few listeners in the Ottawa area who are going to be like, oh, man, this is. I'm looking for this guy. Or we've got friends or real estate investors who are looking for someone who, again, disciplined, consistent, shows up, easy to work with, does what he says he's gonna do. Who is it that you're looking for and how do we get and continue to support your business growth?

Yeah, so, you know, right now we doing commercial, commercial cleaners. We cleaning a building right across the street. I keep my eye on it. They're building a parking garage downtown. So it's a lot of construction, if you've been hearing it. But commercial, residential, we do a little bit of residential. We still do. We like, you know, I'm still hustling right now. I'm a hustler. So we do residential, industrial and construction cleaners, final cleaners, post cleaners, all during, you know, construction. Eventually. I feel like, you know, as the years to come, where I say it's five, ten years from now is strictly commercial. But right now, we do a really good job at residential. I got really good cleaners, construction, post cleaners. We still learning and getting better, you know, over time, we consistently getting better. I'm taking, you know, the client's advice. Did we miss anything? Did we? If not, I'll come back and do it myself, you know, so commercial, residential, industrial and post cleaners, you know, construction cleaners. I feel like we're very skilled at it. We've been doing a good job, getting good rapport and industrial. We do clean pawn shops, offices as well. So, yeah, I just want to keep the doors open, call Us if you need us. We reliable, humble, very skilled at it discipline, good attitude and effort. When we show up and really do a good job. I want to keep building like these relationships and partnerships, you know, do good business and being respectful to people and nice.

Awesome and, and so where could people find you? I. I just pulled up your Instagram because I think that was where we first sort of started messaging back and forth. So obviously Sherrod Baltimore on Instagram at Clean Dream Services Inc. On Instagram as well. Where else can they find you?

Twitter. You could just type in Sherrod Baltimore as body more. Our website is Clean Dream services dot com. You can drop a quote, check us out. Any social media is Google Wiki. Just wiki me, Google me, whatever. I'm on this, praying this good report. I know people going to talk about you. Hopefully it's all good. So that's all that I'm available. Call Bob. He got my number.

Exactly. So. So anybody who's looking for specifically in the Ottawa area, right. Because if you were in my area, I'd hire you here to so expansion plans. Keep that in mind when you start expanding a little bit west.

That's my next level with my entrepreneur class. They be teaching me a lot of stuff. I'll be there.

Yeah, exactly. I know you will. Okay. So anybody looking for Sherrod, we're going to drop all the links in there as well. Listen, my friend, I just, I want to thank you for this. I want to thank you for sharing, just for being an awesome person who you just can't help but pull good energy from at all times. So appreciate you being in my world for sure. Contributing to the wealthy entrepreneur and I look forward to continuing to watch you succeed all day long. And you're just the guy that nobody would bet against you, you know, it's, it's, it's awesome. So appreciate you sharing today and yeah, looking forward to watching the journey ahead.

I'm proud of you, man. Thank you so much. Thank you, man. I love you so much, man. For real, honestly, man, you so man, you, you humble. You too humble. I'm gonna let you be humble today. Cause you on a podcast. I'm gonna let you know. You know what I'm saying? I call you, I call you now. I'm proud of you, you know, a lot of you doing a lot for a lot of people, you know, everybody is like, they love you so much, you know. So as long as I keep saying that, you know, you want to be like your peers and stuff like that. Stuff I'm just keep going in this business world and just keep excelling and keep growing.

Well, definitely entrepreneurs are where my heart is at. Awesome. Sirod. Thank you for everybody. I'm Bob Govreau, your host the Wealthy Entrepreneur podcast. Hopefully you've enjoyed today. So grateful to have my friend in here and share his story, both as a professional athlete and as an entrepreneur sort of getting a business off the ground. I think there's such valuable insights and perspectives on both sides of that and what it takes to be successful. And so for anybody who feels like there were some really great insights and those could be shared, please share them. Grab the link below. Share them out. We're here to support everybody in advancing in their entrepreneurial journey. As you know, our purpose is to empower entrepreneurs with the financial confidence to really continue to move their lives, their businesses forward, their communities forward. So any comments, questions, you know, you want to connect with Sharad, you want to learn a little bit more, Definitely drop a comment in, ask any questions. We'll make sure that we address them. Sharad gets to them as well. Make sure you give us a follow. We have a pod new podcast coming out every single week. Fortunate to have Sharad on this week, but continuing to have different trainings, different guests that we bring on with different perspectives as well. So we'll continue to release that out. Once again, I appreciate everyone for being here with us today. Exciting to talk about what it just takes to be a champion and what it takes to be an entrepreneur and look forward to seeing you all again next week. Thanks everybody. Have a great day.