Surviving and Thriving During a Downturn

The Small business show episode 384 for Wednesday, June 15, 2022. Greetings folks and welcome back to the Small Business show or welcome to the Small Business show if this is your first time. We are the show by, for, for and about everyone who is small businessing and we are here at BusinessShow. Co sponsors for this episode include Shopify.com SBS and TaylorBrands.com SBS. At Shopify.com SBS you get a 14 day trial and full access to Shopify's entire suite offeatures and tailorbrands.com SBS that's where you go. You get 40% off of this cool AI driven all in one platform. For anybody that is starting a business or a side hustle. We'll share more details here in a few minutes about each of those for now, here in Durham, New Hampshire, I'm Dave Hamilton.

And here in Lafayette, California, I'm Shannon Jean. Those are two nice sponsors, man.

Very useful, I agree. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Very, yes, very useful. I love our current crop of sponsors. They are companies too. They are companies that either I, I have used or would use and are super relevant. So, yeah, it's great. I love it. Yeah.

Awesome.

Hey, man, you know we had that, that conversation last week about expiration dates and appliances.

I do remember that.

Do you remember that? Do you want to know what I bought this morning? And I say I bought. Lisa went and bought it. I bought an oven. Yeah.

It expired. Right. The sell by date or the used by Best Buy, they call it now. Best Buy date obviously was 6, 1322.

That's correct. That's right.

Totally makes sense to me.

Yep. It died. And the good news is with all the supply chain issues right now, we had about three ovens to choose from. So it limited our choices. We didn't really have to get analysis paralysis because that wasn't, that simply wasn't an option. And so, you know, it was the one that fit into the slot where our oven goes. That's the one we.

That's good. That's good.

Yeah.

That's awesome.

Per our discussion last week, once we get through, we've got a couple of projects happening at the house here, but once we're through all of these, I'm gonna go buy two new refrigerators. And if they tell me it's gonna take six months for them to come in, that's fine. I wanna have some leverage in this scenario and clearly with the oven, I don't. So, yeah, we're gonna get out in front.

Yeah, that's really great.

Yep. Yep. You know what the problem was? I didn't do this last week. Ah, I didn't. Knock on wood.

Yeah. When we start talking about that.

Correct.

Yeah. That's good.

Yep. I should have. I know. I do it all the time. I did not do it last week. Look, look where we are. People laugh at me for being superstitious. I don't know, man.

Yeah.

I don't know. Yeah. I don't know.

I think it works. It's like when you barbecue or I use my smoker. You know, you have to clack those tongs in your hand a couple times. Yeah. Or to avert disaster.

Correct. That wards off disaster. That's right.

Absolutely. You know you're going to burn. Burn stuff or overcook it if you don't do that. So good stuff. So. Yeah. So I thought last we did our cost cutting while preserving value episode last week got some great response up in the small business support group at BusinessShow Co Facebook. I thought there was a good conversation. And this week we're talking about surviving and thriving during a downturn and. But I think you have a topic we want to talk about. Employment or employees. Right. Staffing and that kind of stuff. Yeah.

I saw a note and it's a note from the employee perspective. And I don't. I just qualify it that way. So we understand what we're talking about here. Both the employee and employer perspective are relevant because it takes two to tango. Right. Employment at will and all.

Yes.

And Lance, I saw posted on Facebook, he says, folks, if you are changing jobs, it's a new world. Here are some rules. And he lists three, but really he lists four. The first one he says, do not put in two weeks notice. More often than not, you will get canned on the day you put in notice. I've seen countless examples lately. Number two, I'm going to read these through and then I have some thoughts. Number two, you do not have to tell your boss, HR coworkers, where you are going next or for how much. If they say they need it for HR reasons, they're full of crap. Number three, they still have to pay you for all earned time and tips if you're in the restaurant business. And that's his number three. And then number four, he says, lastly, it is not your duty to worry about the company or how your ex coworkers will handle your departure. The company pays people for that. If they fail, well, we'll pay more, hire better. So in general, I actually, I agree with all of these except number one, the two Week notice thing. But you know, the other, the other, the other three. Absolutely. You know, it is employment at will and you, if you choose to leave, you don't need to tell people where you're going or even why do not. Right, that's right.

That's right.

And the same is true from the employer perspective. If you let someone go, you don't have to tell them why you're letting them go. You might want to. And you have to be careful about that. You need to sort of review HR policies before you, you know, you go through.

Yeah, but that's the key with at will employment. It's both sides can end the employment relationship for any legal reason at any time.

Right, that's right. Yeah. Yeah. If you, if you say, you know, if you, if you let someone go because of their gender, you know, the color of their skin or something, that, that's, that's going to be a major problem.

That's right.

Yeah. But yeah, otherwise. Now, regardless of your reasons for terminating someone as an employer, you may wind up with a, an unemployment claim that then increases your unemployment insurance rates. And that's just how that goes.

Yeah, that's. Yep.

But there will be an investigation that happens. The unemployment office will contact you. You get to submit your paperwork, which is generally a fruitless exercise because they're going to side with the employer. That's employee.

I live in, I live in California, Dave. So I don't need to tell. You don't need to tell me any of this. That's right.

That's true. In most states though, Right? Like the employee.

Yeah, that's true.

They generally will. Will. Will rule with the employee unless there is clear evidence that, you know, they were fired for cause and something egregious. Egregious, yeah.

And you really do have to prove that. I mean, do. Yeah, it's a, it's a challenge. And I get it. They got to be a say. I'm all for safety nets.

Absolutely.

People, we need them in our society. And there's no doubt about it, there's always going to be people that need some help and a step up or lift up. And that's what unemployment insurance supposed to do. And I agree with you. I mean, I do agree with most of these, although the tone of the whole thing is rather antagonistic. Well, and I would say I think.

It'S coming from a person who was let go. Right. It clearly. Yeah. I always read these things and strip the tone out because maybe it's because I've been doing podcasts for What? Oh, we hit our Mackab anniversary 17 years the other day.

Amazing.

And publishing on the web for 23, I've learned to have a pretty thick skin. A lot of times people will come in hot, you know, they've got their emotional baggage, which, and I say emotional baggage as a term of efficiency, not as a term of judgment. But you know, there, there's, there is, there are often nuggets of valuable information buried in vitriol.

That's true.

Right.

And so you're better at that than I am. I wish I was better at that.

I've had to become better at it. Let's make. You know, I haven't always been. But this thing about two weeks notice, I firmly and vehemently disagree. And the reason I disagree is when you let some. This two weeks notice thing, first of all is in most places that I know about a practice of a social practice, not a practice dictated by law. Right. As far as I've ever encountered, there's no law that says that either person has to give two weeks notice. It has become a social practice and a somewhat expected practice or at least certainly something known about.

And you think both from an employer standpoint as well.

Yes.

That's become practice.

I do and I think not. It is. I mean, clearly if you go out and you ask people what does the term two weeks notice mean? My guess is you will get the same answer from 10 out of 10 people out there, like people of working age 18 older would they know what two weeks notice is. And my guess is 100% of the workforce knows what this is. Right. And so that tells me that this is a social construct that we have put in place as a society. And that's fine. I think it's a good thing because it is. That social construction, I think not offering two weeks notice to an employer or to an employee burns a bridge. And I am a huge fan of not burning bridges. And I actually got into a conversation with the person who posted this and said, I agree with you, but two weeks notice, it's an easy thing to offer someone and it preserves at least that part of the bridge for the future. And they said, well, you know, these people, they just canned me. And this, that and the other thing, it's like, yeah, but never say never. Right. In five years are you going to want to work for that same employer again? You don't know. Are you going to want to work for one of your co workers who went off and is now a manager or a business owner somewhere else?

That's A good point.

You don't know the answer to these questions. Right. So offering that two weeks note in the moment, it might seem so hard to justify being, you know, quote unquote, nice to this employer or employee who has, you know, burned you in other ways, but it's just so easy. And, and his point about, you know, more often than not you'll get canned the day you put in your notice. In a lot, I don't want to say in all cases because I can't speak to all cases, but in a lot of cases that I've seen, when an employee says, hey, you know, I've decided to leave, if the employer doesn't want them to stick around, they'll say, thank you for your time. I appreciate the offer of two weeks notice. We, we're ready for you to leave now. And here's a check for your two weeks.

Correct.

And, and I've done that on the other side too. Like said, hey, you know, we're going to give you two weeks notice and here's two weeks pay, but please don't come to work again. You know, that's right.

I think it really depends. Yeah, depends on the individual. You have to be able to kind of read the room. Right. If it's a well loved or liked employee that's been an asset and they're going on to something different.

Yes.

You know, I celebrated that stuff. I'd be like, oh, we're so happy for you. Of course, loved having you here because you're sending a message to everybody else how you're going to treat them.

Right. If that's so right.

Yeah. So it's great when you can have that positive and you go, oh, hey, let's do something special. We'll, you know, barbecue or do lunch with everybody Friday and please keep in touch. And those instances are terrific. On the flip side, if there is some kind of antagonistic relationship, I do the same thing. I'd be like, hey, thank you for doing this. You know, I typically don't want that person around talking garbage for two weeks.

Well, and if they're going to work for a competitor or something, you know, there's, there's a, there's reason to sit and, and evaluate that. Right. Like, if I've had it where an employee has told me, okay, I'm giving you two weeks notice and I've been hired, I'm going to work for a competitor. And I stop and think, okay, you know, if like you said first, who is this person and what's the trust level here? What's the respect level? And assuming that's high, then the next question I ask myself is, all right, well, they already know what they know about our business, and that knowledge is gonna stay with them, and they're going to choose whether or not to use that when they work for this competitor. So.

That's right.

There's nothing that I can change about that. Is there anything that they might encounter or do in the next two weeks that would add to that in a way that I don't want to participate in? And if the answer is yes, then it's like, okay, off you go, and here's your check for your two weeks. Otherwise, yeah, stick around, help me transition. Thanks. I appreciate the gesture. Yeah, but it is a gesture, and. Yeah, yes, it is.

And I think that it is a good opportunity to make things nice. But if you can't, you just be quick about it and don't worry about giving that two weeks. That's the best money you'll probably ever spend.

If you have a problem on both sides of the equation, like you said, it telegraphs how you are going to behave in the future. And that means so much more than you might be able to see in the heat of that particular moment. And I say this to employers and employees because there are scenarios where either. Either side of this needs to terminate something and there's an emotional component to it. Offer the two weeks.

Definitely.

Yeah.

Good stuff. A good topic.

Yeah, yeah. When I saw it, I was like, oh, yeah, we got to. We got to dig into this a little bit. So. All right, so talking about surviving and thriving during a downturn, the next thing that I want to talk about, if it works for you, Mr. Shannon Jean, is our two sponsors.

Yeah, let's hear from them.

All right. Hey, did you know that you can register your business and listen to this podcast at the same time? That's right. Making your business official just got a lot easier thanks to our sponsor, Taylor Brands. This is pretty cool. Taylor Brands is this AI driven. One stop shop for all small business owners. Everyone who is out there small businessing like us. Right. The website takes you step by step through all the things you need to start a business or your side hustle all the way from logo to llc. And Taylor Brands can help you form your LLC with no paperwork or anything. You just answer some questions and let them do the rest. It's crazy. They also give you all the tools your business needs in one place. And with, we mean everything. Like I said, logo, your website, your domain name, your merch, your Social media posts, a digital business card and so much more. You're going to be shocked at how easy it is. They've taken all of the guesswork and the hard work out of this because they know how to do that stuff. So they built a system that helps you do that stuff. And all of our small business show listeners out there get a 40% discount. I know. Just go to TaylorBrands.com SBS that's TaylorBrands.com SBS for 40% off. So go to Taylorbrands.com SBS today and build the business of your dreams. Our thanks to Taylor Brands for sponsoring this episode. Haha. We love that sound here listeners. You know what that sound is? That's the sound of another sale on Shopify. Our sponsor, the all in one commerce platform to start, run and grow your business. Shopify is a platform designed for anyone to sell anywhere. Giving entrepreneurs like all of us the resources that were once reserved only for big business. And then we get to customize these for our needs. Right? To create a great looking online store that brings our ideas to life and all the tools we need to manage our day to day and drive sales. Sales. Making your idea real opens endless possibilities. And it's a journey. And that is the beauty of entrepreneurship. Right? Shannon and I, we've used Shopify over the years with various businesses we've had and it's. They make it so easy. You don't want to have to try and figure this stuff out for yourself. And the good news is you don't have to. And it's not just us. Millions of entrepreneurs use Shopify from first sale to full scale. And every 28 seconds a small business owner makes their first sale on Shopify. The next one could be you get started by building and customizing your online store with no coding or design experience needed. You can access powerful tools to help you find customers, drive sales and manage your day to day. Go to shopify.comsbs all lowercase for a free 14 day trial. And get full access to Shopify's entire suite of features. Start selling on Shopify today. Go to shopify.com SBS right now. Shopify.com SBS and our thanks to Shopify for sponsoring this episode. All right, so let's dig into this thing because if you've paid any attention lately, you can see that things regarding money are different than they were six or eight weeks ago. Gas expensive, stock market down, crypto in the toilet. Like all the signals are in flux.

Inflation record breaking.

Yeah, yeah. And will this, is this just a blip or Is this the cusp and the change and it could be either? I think, unfortunately, it's not a blip. No, I think so. And I hate saying that there's some pain coming.

I do, too. You know, we're total optimists and we talk about it, but we've done shows about problems being a complete optimist all the time and how that can lead you down the wrong road sometimes. And so I think it's time to open our eyes and talk about, hey, what happens if, you know, we talked about cost cutting. That was our first part in this series that we're doing on getting you through a downturn. And today I think there's some other things that we can touch on to help small business owners, you know, if things really continue to go south and we wind up in a recession, stay in the bear market, in the, in, you know, the stock market, inflation stays high. I think we're in for a little pain.

Yeah, I, yeah, I hope it's a little pain.

I think, yeah, they keep adjusting things. First it was going to be a soft landing and then, oh, a little bumpy and, But I don't know. And I think that, but I don't think this is a show like why it's all happening. There's lots of resources to go for speculation, finger pointing about what's going on. But we're here to talk about solutions and opportunities for small business owners. And I think that's what we're going to do today.

Yeah, yeah, right. The reasons can be researched, but what can we do? How can we buffer ourselves or capitalize on this?

That's right. Yeah. It's a frame, you know, you need to frame it as, okay, I need to be prepared. But also, hey, there's going to be some opportunities coming along and if you, you, you might have to shift your thinking and your, your employees thinking a little bit. But there, there's some good things that are going to come out of this. I guarantee it. The first thing I would recommend if you didn't listen to last week's episode from June 8, all about cutting costs while preserving value. You know, you don't want to gut your business. You always want to protect your assets. So go back and listen to that show and then add your own comments up, you know, feedbackus show co. Or come Visit us at BusinessShow Co Facebook and tell us what you're doing with your business so we can help each other.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, for sure. Yeah. Okay. So that's step number one. What's step Number two, protect your capital.

Is my number one really, number one a right? I mean, you gotta listen to that show. But yeah, yeah, you have to protect your cash because getting access to cash is gonna get harder and harder if things keep going the way I think they are.

That's true. I, I would say if you don't have a small business line of credit right now, go get one right now.

Yes. Not a loan, no line of credit you don't get charged for unless you have to use it, unless you tap into it.

Yeah, yeah.

And you know, there's a lot of resources out there for financing now. These, you know, cabbage, PayPal, even eBay does loans, and those loans are high interest rate loans. You know, you're much better off if you can go to a traditional bank. You may not be able to, um, but you want to try to get a line of credit or maybe you're, you've got enough equity in a piece of property or your, your own home that you can get a heloc, a home equity line of credit.

So, yeah, I would, I would, yeah, I would, I would think of that as sort of the, I don't want to say last resort, but, well, not the first.

You don't have to.

I would go, yeah, yeah, you want.

To try to get, obviously you want to try to get your bank to loan you money based on your own performance and history and your relationship with them and whether they ask for a personal guarantee or not. That depends on those, those three things. But I mean, I've, I've used HELOCs many, many times. And as long as you're smart about the way you manage it, it can be a great resource at a very low, low price point. Another trick. Yeah, another trick is if you already have a line of credit and you're thinking, okay, wow, you know, maybe you need to ask for an increase. Right? But maybe your bank's not comfortable doing an increase. But one of the things you can suggest is, hey, let's say you have a $500,000 line of credit and you're 150,000 or 200,000 into it, go to your bank and ask them to term out that current debt. So let's say you're 150 grand into it. Say, look, can we convert the 150 into a five year term loan and we'll just deduct that automatic deduction from our bank account every month and free up that 150,000 from your $500,000 line of credit. So in essence, you're getting that Increase. But the bank is often more comfortable terming out the loan. They love that residual income. It looks better on their books. They've just sold you another product.

Right.

So your relationship person at the bank is going to get a little something extra. And you've kind of snuck in and gotten. I mean, snuck in, but you've gotten an increase in your credit line.

That's really. Oh, I like that trick. I mean, it works.

I've done it a few times.

Yeah. Huh. Because if you've already been paying out on it, the bank knows you're good for it, right? Yeah. That's interesting.

Yeah. And term loans are cheap. I mean, like, if for $150,000, I mean, it's not going to cost you very much money per month in the grand scheme of things. And, you know, I would argue you're not even going to notice it. It's just going to come out of your. Of your, you know, your bank each month.

Yeah.

And the first time I had this, I had a company with the line of credit. And it wasn't my idea, it was the banks. They were like, hey, we want. Because typically banks want you to have 30 days each year where you're out of your line of credit, where the credit line is paid off. And often the first way you do this, the first year, is you don't touch it for 30 days, just in case, and then you start going in and out. But then the second and, you know, subsequent years, the bank likes to look and see, oh, you know, you were able to pay it down at least for 30 days out of the year where it was at zero.

I never knew that trick. Oh, that's. So that's a metric they look at. Okay.

Always. Yeah. 30 days. Have you been out a month? Did you pay it off? And I don't think it has to be sequential, but adds up to. Is there. Was there a month of time during the year where you were at zero? It shows the health of your business.

Well, yeah, it shows that you're not just, like, scrambling to stay, you know, half afloat. You can.

You can get living on your credit line.

That's it.

Live on that credit line. It's for specific things. Emergencies, opportunities, you know, inventory, whatever, expansion. And so that bank came to me and said, you can't keep 30 days out. We want to term loan this and then we'll let you have your credit line back. And I said, okay. And then I've done it a few times, and it's worked really well. Try that. If you, if you need it.

Oh, yeah, that's. And is there looking. And I realize this is a good problem to have, but looking at the reverse of it, if you've had a credit line and never used it, is there a recommendation to use it once a year for something?

Yes. Yeah. Because if you don't need it, they're going to come take it.

Yeah.

I mean, that, that credit cards. Do credit card companies do that? You know, we've, we've done shows all about how you build up these, these large amounts you can put on those affinity credit cards to build up points and all that kind of stuff. Well, especially like with American Express, if you're not tapping that card all the time, they're just going to lower your credit line. Yeah. Because they're like, well, you don't need a $50,000 credit line on your MX, but if you're in and out of it all the time, then you, you would. And then maybe you can increase it. So, and, and don't forget those credit cards. You know, if, if, you know, amex has some really creative business cards. They have a plum card that you can either pay off in 30 days and get a 2% cashback reward. Actually, I think it's one and a half now. It was 2% when we did it, of course, but yeah. And, or if you need more time to pay, they'll give you 60 days interest free. So you get to decide. And it's a great card. There's no limit. It's only based on your ability to pay it back. And it's great. Comes in handy. So different ways to get those credit lines and creative ways to manage them.

Huh. I like the idea of that card. All right. And that's a business card that you're able to do that. That plum card is called a plum card.

They still have it and I still have one. I don't use it as much as I used to, but I'm sure my lines dropped a lot. But it's, it is handy. And we used it for big inventory purchases. Because you wanted to get that, that 2% cash back.

Yeah.

You know.

Yeah. Right. Huh.

It's good stuff. What the. This is all related to your cash flow. Right. And I think what you have to do is if you start to see things getting a little tight, is do more cash flow projections. And instead of maybe doing monthly or quarterly, maybe you have to do them bi weekly. When I had times where we were struggling a lot, we were doing weekly cash flow meetings just to go, okay, what are we doing? What's due next week and how are we doing this? And so you got to keep up on it.

Okay. I'm thinking about this processing as we're having this conversation. Would. I think it would be good. I'm not going to ask for your. I mean, you can share your recommendation, but I have my own at times like this. If you've normally, let's say you normally have, I don't know, 20 grand worth of cash that you hold because you know that that's what it takes to run your business for whatever a month or a week or however long you, whatever your patterns are. I would say increase that number by 25% right now. Just give yourself a little bit extra cushion if you can. I realize not every business can afford that.

That's right.

Yeah. But if you can maybe defer some capital expense for a month so that you can build up a little bit more in that war chest. I'll say with every business I have. I am a huge fan of building up a war chest. Generally, I look at it as a fixed amount, and it's not really part of my cash flow picture. Right. Like the cash flow picture is its own thing. It's going, but having a war chest. And in some businesses, it can be small, and in some it's large, depending on what risks you might have, potential risks you might have. And. And that war chest has saved businesses of mine where it's like, you know, you hit a cash crunch. Because if you're just managing to cash flow, I mean, it's great. Like, managing to cash flow is super important. It's far more important than managing to your P and L. Right. But manage to cash flow. But if some. If you have some event that is either in your control or out of control, usually one event is fine. But when you start getting simultaneous events that negatively impact your cash flow, and some of them are the world, right. So completely out of your control. And then there might be one where you, you know, you made a stumble or something. Maybe you. Maybe you paid too much of your credit line or something and then realize, oh, crap, I'm short now, you know? But when you get multiple events stacking up, that's when that war chest pays off in a huge way. So think about that war chest and just stash it up. I've had partners yell at me about it. They're like, why are we. Why do we have $100,000 sitting here that we're not doing anything with? I know, I know.

You're doing something with it.

Bear with Me on this. This is what lets me sleep at night. And invariably within 12 months in any of those scenarios, I've had those same partners saying, okay, now I get it, thank you. It's like, yeah, no, the only reason I, you know, this isn't because I'm a genius. It's because I've screwed it up in the past and I know I don't want to be there again. So, yeah, I have the. We do our cash flow thing and then I've got a cushion that I don't really think about. You know, I know it's there, but you don't dip into it unless you need it, and then it's right there and it's good to go. It's, you know, it's completely unfettered. And it sucks because sometimes, you know, I mean, you might be able to find an interest bearing account that, that is also easily liquidatable, but it's not gonna pay you very much. And that sucks. But if it's the difference, one day it will be the difference between your business succeeding or failing. And that's a huge thing.

It is, it is. And that is critically important. And at the same time, looking at your cash, you should be looking at what's coming in the accounts receivables as well and tightening that up. Who's late? Who do you expect to be late? If you have some experience with them.

Yes.

And, and on the flip side of last week, we talked about saving money by paying early and asking your suppliers for discounts. Do you want to do the same thing for your customers that are paying, you know, and maybe offer them early or even on time discounts to keep that cash going, you know, coming in the door. It's really important.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. It's good.

So, yeah, yeah, yeah. I love, you know, cash. Again, cash is king. Inventory is not. You know, you need to keep enough inventory in, if you're in the inventory business, let's say, where your new products is, that getting rid of stale inventory, you should always be thinking about that. But now especially generating cash is the priority, not profits on something that's been sitting in your warehouse on the racks collecting dust.

Yep.

You start thinking, okay, what'll that do for me? And you know, how can you turn that into cash to build your war chest, pay your bills, you know, that, that kind of thing. But all this stuff that we're talking about now and I'm going to talk about in the next few minutes all relates to having access to cash. You know, your, your war chest, like Dave says your line of credit, all those kinds of things, really, really important. So we talked about employees and training and different things last week and using people for different stuff. If you have a sense or you start to see that specific departments or specific employees are having time freed up, you know, can you get them trained to take on new tasks and do things like, I don't know, social media stuff, marketing, different ideas, you're, you know, those are your real assets as your, are your people. And you want to make sure you give them opportunities to do other things as you go through this. What may be a challenging time. Yeah.

And you know, the beauty of the, What I'll call YouTube culture now is a lot of that training might be available for a lot less money than it would have been 10 years ago.

Right, That's a good point. Even for free, Right?

Or free. Yeah. But telling people, hey, look, you know, and you want to get buy in. So maybe not telling, but asking people, hey, okay, what skills don't you have that you would like to have to help with your job or the business in general? Right. Having the conversation that way, like, what could we add to the table? Okay, look, we can't hire someone, but here's a cool thing. We have free time right now because, you know, like, there's less business happening. So do you. Which one of these skills that we've just identified do you want to have in six months? And now I want to give you, you know, whatever, six hours a week, 12 hours a week, you can go and learn this stuff. Find a YouTube course. Find a masterclass course. I mean, masterclass costs money, but it's not terribly expensive. Right. Like, there's lots of these things. And go take a course and then come back. And what I love to do when I have somebody take a course is come back and teach us what you learned at the course. It's not because I want to learn this stuff or necessarily want the rest of the team to learn it. It's a good way to cement the knowledge that you just were exposed to by regurgitating it to other people. Right. Like that. You know, they say that the best way to learn something is to teach it. Well, you just were immersed in this. Come back, we're all going to spend two hours, you know, give me the highlight reel and teach me the things that are the most important to you. And that can really get. Like that ups your company's game. It upset employees game too, which is great.

But yeah, and they'll feel better about it. And yeah, this is a team effort.

Right.

Getting your people on board that, hey, we need to get creative. And this is kind of what we're seeing. And I think that's really good because you just never know the resources you have. Just because somebody's in the customer service department or in your warehouse or, you know, you just don't know. And they can really surprise you and, you know, become a different kind of asset for you.

Yeah, for sure. Yeah. All right. So, you know, at some point, Shannon, you're going to tell me about costs that you want to cut here. And I have been in the advertising sales business for 22 years, maybe arguably 23. I know when the economy turns down, the first thing that happens, even before the economy turns down, I've called it a leading indicator is when we see spends softening. That is a sign that things are going south. And. But it is also a trailing indicator when the economy comes back because everybody restores every budget they had except their marketing budget comes last. So it's the first thing to go. It's the last thing to come back. Are you going to tell me to cut my marketing budget?

No, I hate that. I.

Thank you.

This is an opportunity for you. Now.

It's what I always say. I'm like, these companies are. These companies are stupid. I mean, that's, you know, internally, that's what we say. It's like, if they're canceling now, don't they understand that, that they're like they're joining the herd. Why not come to me and say, hey, can I keep my spend with you but get double for it?

Yes. Like get. Ask.

Ask. Right, ask. Yeah, yeah.

As. And you're looking at your competitors, you'll see that they will stop, you know, oh, they're slowing down their advertising or they're doing things different. You know, that's your opportunity to jump in front of their customer base and gain that market share. And, you know, but when you're doing that, I also think you need to change the way you're advertising. When we start to go through or during a recession or whatever it is we're going to have is you. The. There's some different things to stress and some. And a couple of those things are stressing the value of your product or service and the durability of it. So how. It's a great value. You're going to get more for your money and how whatever it is, it's going to last a long time because that's the mindset that we're all going to be in. I don't want to spend this money, but if I'm going to buy this widget, what's the best value and which one's going to last longest? That's where to set up your marketing and to focus on.

I think, yeah, you need to be smart. Yeah, maybe, maybe you're not doing as much experimental marketing right now. Yeah, but your core, man. Like, I know I'm speaking from a position of self interest, but cutting your core out at times when the market is going soft. I've seen it kill businesses.

Yeah, it is. You're gonna have to claw back that come back up, somebody else is going to take advantage of that space. And you know, there's that saying, I think Warren Buffett, you know, it's like, you need to be greedy when other people are afraid. Something. I'm sure I'm paraphrasing that, but that's where we're going to be. So if you have solid business principles, you've got your cash situation, you've got a good war chest on hand, you've got access to some capital, you can do this stuff and be like, hey, man, we're going to do great. We just have to ride this wave because everything turns around. It's the beauty of capitalism. You're going to have. Everything's going to reset. And all these companies that were way overvalued are now back to reality. And it also kind of levels the playing field sometimes and gives you more opportunity because there's not going to be as many venture capital funded companies just losing, you know, millions and billions of dollars that perhaps you have to compete against so you'll have more opportunities. A couple last things as we wrap it up. I think there's some positives. I think that supply constraints tend to open up.

Are you telling me we're in the lightning round section of this year, Shannon?

That's it. I'm gonna do. I'm gonna leave you. I like to use the compliment sandwich.

Right.

We're gonna tell you the good stuff at the beginning. We're gonna hammer you with the negatives.

Because we do this lightning round thing every time. Last week I actually called it the lightning round. I think we're gonna get. I think this is the new get because. Because it's how this works. So let's embrace it, right? Yeah. Yeah.

I love it. So. So, you know, you're going to be able to get products and parts and components and things that you couldn't get because there's going to be less demand for them. So you're going to prices will come down on those parts and components eventually. And I also think the labor, Martin, the labor market, the labor market, easy for you to say, is going to loosen up and there's going to be more and more people out there to hire. There's going to be better qualified people out there to hire and that's going to help your business.

Here's my leading indicator on that stuff. This is one, it is without fail, has worked for me for 20 plus, maybe 30 years. Go out to eat in general, I don't mean any one specific restaurant or one specific weight person, but the, the overall quality of waitstaff will tell you whether the market is good to hire or not. If you've got great wait staff, this means that not enough people are hiring. If you've got crummy wait staff, it means everyone's hiring. Because in general, that is the catch all job. Right. It's the during, during pandemic. This, these rules didn't apply for obvious reasons. But in general, if you get crappy service at a restaurant, it's because the economy is thriving and companies are hiring left and right. And if you're getting great service at a restaurant and again, there's specific examples. There's some restaurants that always have great service because they pay well and it's the higher end thing. But go out to an Applebee's and figure out use that as your litmus test. Never fails.

Smart.

Yep.

Yeah, we see it on the Because I own vacation rentals.

Yeah.

And ever since COVID there's a big sense of entitlement in guests. It's, it's notice noticeably different.

How entitled how.

If if everything isn't perfect. The complaints are far more aggressive and quick. The expectation of the service level that they're going to get and these are standalone homes and cabins and things is much higher than people ever used to ask for. I just had a guest request that the property manager come over and help load their luggage in the car.

What?

I'm not making this up.

This isn't a whole show, man.

Yeah, exactly. And so Renee, my wife, who manages those businesses has been commenting. She's like, this is just crazy. I've never had these guests do this. I've never had these kind of complaints. I've never had this. And we have great ratings.

Sure.

And I, I, I will tell you, I'll keep you posted. Whether we see that change where people start to value more like, oh, it's so nice to get but I don't know, it's almost like some, there's a certain part of the population that's been coddled or.

Yeah.

Made to feel a certain way where they're very demanding and I think it's related to your, to your waitstaff comment.

Yeah.

So we'll have to see and I hope this is very short lived obviously. But I tell you what, as a guy that's bought inventory and deals my whole life, some of the best deals I've ever, ever come across have been during tough times for sure. Always better deals if you have the cash. And if you have cash, I'm telling you, you can get life changing opportunities that will come to you. Whether you have to partner with someone, whether you have, you know, you have to get your bank involved because your bank may not want to give you that extra money. But if you brought them a specific deal and showed them how it was going to work and what the delta was between the buy and the sale, somebody is always out there to give you money for the right return. So there are some good things you got to keep your frame positive.

And the flip side is if you're in the business of selling things, don't be too egotistical, don't be too proud. Be realistic about the market and talk to your especially your preferred providers, your preferred buyers that you have long relationships with. Don't be afraid to go to them and say, hey, look, we all know here and the economy's not quite there yet. We are not seeing the ad spend soften up. So for, you know, for those of you that were wondering it, we don't. That particular indicator has not happened yet, which is good. I will let you know on this show when it does, I promise. But you know, when that starts to happen, go. If that starts to happen, it will happen again at some point. I don't know if it's going to be this year. I think it probably will be, but I don't know. But whenever it does, you know, acknowledge it. The world's seeing the same thing you are. So talk to your trusted buyers and just say, hey, look, you know, if you have the cash to be smart with it and you gotta, you know, word this the right way. Depending on who the person is. Let's talk. Don't assume that you know, the prices from three months ago or the deal that I was able to offer you three months ago is the same as the deal that I'm going to hold you to today. Let's work together. And you can make a lot of money during a downturn.

Yeah, Yeah, I have deals, you know, I have this side gig with these, you know, high end handbags and I see it already where they're just like, well, if you take 500 of this, here's the price. I was like, wow. You know, so people that are don't have a war chest and are like, we need to build it up, got to get doing this kind of thing. So, so it's important to talk about. We'd love to hear from you feedback@businessshow co. Or come visit us businessshow co. Facebook. Remember, don't scrimp on quality. Don't lose the value of your business. Don't cut back on your customer service because that's what distinguishes you from everybody else.

Every business is in the customer service business. Keep yours there. Yes.

And come, come tell us, you know, how you're preparing or if you're preparing. You know, maybe your business is just set up perfectly and it's going to thrive automatically when things slow down.

Yeah, yeah, it might. Well, thanks so much for listening, folks. Let us know what you think. Like Shannon said, go to business show.co facebook or just send us a note. Feedbackus show co. Check out our sponsors. Taylorbrands.com SBS for 40% off. Shopify.com SBS for a 14 day trial. Keep living that charmed life. We'll see you next week.