The Most Overlooked $10K/month Business You Can Start This Weekend - Ep. #336

I just signed a $30,000 contract for this fall. Spring break, we cleared $12,000 in one week, 9 to noon. So you're done in the afternoon, right? Yeah.

That's like 3 hours of work.

Keep it simple, stupid. If you want to go all in, you can make a ton of money pretty simply. For those wanting to make 3 grand a month, this is easy. So in March to July, $50,600.

Wow.

It was basically like 8, 8, and then we hit a 12, then we hit a 16. It just kept scaling up and up and up.

I need to have a gong in here because every time I discover a business that you really could start with no I just wanna be like, bing, we found one. You know, it is a business you could start with, with nothing.

Facebook post. That was it. No pictures, no nothing.

Meet Mike. He's 50, got laid off after 20 years, and one night at 3:30 in the morning, he wrote a Facebook post from his garage. No photos, no website, no price. And that post became a $50,000 business in 5 months flat. Moms pay him $75 an hour per kid. The state of Florida pays him within 24 hours, and he just signed a $30 $3,000 contract for 2 hours every Friday. His startup costs were under $450, and really he collects money upfront, so he could have started this with no money, and you can too. And by the end of this episode, you're going to know exactly how to copy him this weekend. I'm going to show you the exact post in a few minutes, and halfway through this episode, he's going to give you the one sentence that got a tool company to send him $5,000 of free gear. And at the end, I'm going to give you the one word that turned a side hustle into real contracts. And also this whole thing, this whole business exists because Mike watches the channel and he was inspired by it. So please enjoy. Why don't you start by telling us who you are and what you do?

Mike Herrod here. I'm the owner of VoSkill. We're a trade school and also we teach shop classes to 7 to 18-year-olds based in West Palm Beach, Florida.

How long did it take you to go from last day on the job to launching this? How much time elapsed there?

So last corporate W-2 check was in March. of 25. And then we got our first paying customer, uh, the week of Thanksgiving. Um, but I had the idea, from idea to first customer was 7 days for the shot classes.

Wow. Okay. So 8 months, give or take, from your last paycheck to when you launched.

Yep.

But you didn't spend that whole time launching. You spent—

No, no.

One week.

No, the whole time was, you know, I basically 5 months licking my wounds, you know, trying to find work. And then finally coming to the realization that, that we are gonna open a school in a second and yada, yada, yada. And then Thanksgiving, it was taking so long, like, we gotta pay the bills. So one Facebook post.

How do you mean you didn't have the idea for 7 days before?

Yeah. So, so the original is the trade school, which is, you know, HVAC, electrical, and low voltage. That's the original. Okay.

Okay. So your woodworking business is not a trade school?

No, no, no, no. I saw all of these like bounce houses and a friend of ours sells girl teepees for birthday parties. I'm like, there's nothing for the boys. Like nothing. So yeah, Thanksgiving week, I was like, we need money. And Facebook post, woodworking birthday parties. Yeah, that was it. No pictures, no nothing.

Did you ever do anything with the trade school application or at all?

No, it's still in there. We finally got approved this July.

Okay, so you are gonna go through the trade school. It's gonna be a different business, but it's going to be fed by the woodworking business.

By the woodworking.

Yep. Beautiful. Okay, so you had the idea on what, November 20th?

Something like that. Yeah.

And you posted 7 days later or you opened your course that day?

No, I posted like that day. And then we had parties, events, classes. I think at the time we called them woodworking events, um, booked that following week.

All right. So you post about it and you just posted on your personal Facebook profile.

I, I, I like that. I did. And I don't hardly use Facebook just because—

You don't have a ton of followers. You're not an influencer. You just, your personal Facebook. Yeah. Okay. And what happened? What were the comments like?

How old do you have to be? Yeah. How old do you have to be? How much and when and where, basically kind of things. And I think I put homeschool parent. We're a homeschool family, even though my kids are 18 and 23. But I think we put homeschool on it. I pretty much, I think we did 100% on that one, put homeschool on it. And yeah, we did. And the first couple ones were in people's backyards. We took a folding table. Whatever tools I had, we pulled the table out. I have pictures. I have a big board over here with all the pictures. And I've got little 6-year-olds using handsaws, right? And 14 to 15-year-olds using jigsaws and power saws and all kinds of stuff.

Okay, so are you just like thinking up the answers to these questions as you're typing them? You're like, how old do you have to be? Like, I don't know, 5 to 15. You're like, how much is it? Oh shoot, yeah, how much is it? Is that kind of how it went?

Exactly, 'cause I had nobody to pull from.

Yeah.

You know, so, you know, I, I play with AI all the time, so I'm like, okay. And I think it was happening so fast then I was just like, okay. First we did 6, 6+, like 6 to, you know, 18. And then, and then I realized quickly you can't have a 6-year-old and a 12-year-old in the same class. They're just too different. They're too advanced.

Yeah. So what, um, today, what are your age groups? What are your categories?

So now we, we split 'em into 7 to 9, because it kind of seems a sweet spot. And then 10, 10+.

Okay.

So just 2. It's just 2. I really want to lop off the little ones just because they're just, they're, they're, I'm not doing the kind of mentoring I want to do with the little ones. They're fun. They have a blast. Right. But I'd rather, you know, teach the older ones.

Yeah.

But the little ones, man, it's like shooting ducks in a barrel. Like these moms call all the time.

Yep. Okay. Yep. So you think there could be a business of someone only doing the little ones?

Oh yeah, completely. In fact, when we started hosting them, when, when we started doing shop classes here in our trade school in the back office before we got open, we did spring break and summer camps. We cleared $30,000.

Holy cow. Okay. All right. So let's go back to day one. So you answer a ton of comments and questions, and then, um, what day was your first class and who all was there and what did you charge?

I think the first one I stole from you. We did it for free. So yeah, that first, that first couple of weeks between Thanksgiving and Christmas was, yeah, 2 free ones. And then we got a lot more inquiries and my wife's like, no, there's something here they can pay. Yeah. And then from that, we only, we only do paying ones.

In that original post, did you say that it would be free or you didn't and you just decided to make the first couple free?

I think we did do it free. I think I did. Yeah, I think I did do it free. Okay. I think I pulled it right out of your playbook. Yeah.

Looking back, that was an important part of it.

I think so too. Yeah. Because I had no social proof. I didn't have pictures. I didn't have videos. Now I have 10,000 pictures of kids.

Yeah. Yeah.

You know, videos. It's, and Google reviews and yada, yada, yada.

Um, was, was the inspiration for that partly from the guy I interviewed who has the line striping business?

No, actually it kind of, it woke me up in the middle of the night that week before Thanksgiving. Like I remember sitting in my garage at like 3:30 in the morning brainstorming this out. I think you had just done a video of the RC guy, the RC digger.

Yeah. Oh, and he did his first for free. Okay.

Yep. Yeah. And I was like, man, I still, I'm tempted by that.

Yeah.

Shiny scroll syndrome. But, um, I think that that's kind of like, wait, there's something here for, for, you know, that, that we can help the kids. And it's not so much. And then later we did a gig. Oh, I didn't put that in my numbers. And then, so I need to go back. December, we did a father-son build, right? For $38,000. Pairs. So little kids and their, and their, and their dads. So 38, and it was $1.50 a head.

For $1.50 for the couple or for—

No. Yeah, for the pair. Okay. So basically per kid. So it was 150 times 38 kids, however much that was.

Yeah. I don't know how much that was. Is that like $5,000? Or yeah, $5,000.

Yeah. Yeah. Geez. Yeah.

Okay. And that was your first month or no?

That was in December. Yeah. So yeah, it was a father-son Through Facebook, she heard about the free ones. Hey, could you do a father-son event? I said, sure. And what really kind of got my brain running, of all the dads, so plus 30, only 2 of them had touched a power tool in their life. Whoa.

And these are guys at a 38. Not even like a drill?

Not even a drill. They hadn't touched anything. And I'm like, okay, I've heard the trade problem is bad, but to never touch a drill in your life. And we're not talking big drills, we're talking little 12 volts.

Yeah, and these guys are like 30s, 40s ages?

Yep.

Holy cow.

Young kids, young boys, young boys.

Yeah.

That one we did a 3-hour event, and we did, which is why it was $1.50 apiece, it was 3 hours. And then they built these little robots. They built these little dudes here.

Oh, that's cool.

Right? I bet, I bet, I bet I built 500 of these so far.

Where did you come up with that? Like, why, why are you gonna build a robot? Where'd that come from?

I don't know. I think I was poking around on Etsy one day, And this goofy little wooden robot. And then I kept modifying it, modifying. So basically I prepped the bodies and then the kids cut the feet and the hands and they, they screwed, screwed the eyes in.

Okay.

And that's for the little ones. Like they, they eat that and moms pay $75 to build one of these all day long.

And you don't get that job unless you like get mass exposure by doing a free event. 'Cause that's where that lead came from, right?

Yeah, it must. And it, and, and we're not, I mean, the, the free events were like one with like 6 kids and one with like 5. We're not talking thousands. Yeah, like it was these random small, but you know, the homeschool community is so niche. So I tell people all the time, I'm like, this, this business and homeschooling, once you get in, you're set. You're in. They all talk. Yep. They all talk. Yeah. Half of our students are repeat students.

How many, um, how many events did you have that first November, December? So the father-son event.

Yeah, the 2 free ones, the father-son event, and then the 2 over here at the small group between Thanksgiving and Christmas.

Okay, so November revenue was $800-ish.

Yep.

December was like $6,000.

$6,000 because of the father-son plus the 2 little ones.

Okay.

And then a little bit in January, a couple shows or classes in January. And then another big one we did, and then I did $2,200, $2,500. We did one with the foster community. They brought their foster, the local foster kids in, and we did a 2-hour class, just teaching them how to, again, they made, I don't have them here, I'll send Miles the pictures, these little brain teasers.

Okay.

Little 550 cord, a nut and a washer, and a 1x4 piece of block. Like, we're not building pianos. I tell the kids all the time, we're not building robots or pianos.

Yeah.

Or satellites. So yeah, that was why we did 22. And I kind of paused it in March because we're looking at doing the spring breaks, People kept asking, can you do spring breaks? So then we did the spring break camps here in our site and then paused it a little bit and then did summer camps. And then I just signed, and I think this is what got Molly to really buy on, I just signed a $30,000 contract for this fall. We already started it.

Whoa. What kind of contract?

So 14 weeks for 40 students every Friday for 2 hours.

Homeschool students? And it's like a co-op?

It's a big co-op. I kind of think it's a private school, but it's a big drop-off co-op.

Okay. $30,000 for 14 weeks. How many days? Like one day per week or?

Every Friday for 2 hours.

Okay.

So it comes to— that one's about $55 a head per week.

Well, I mean, that's over $1,000 an hour.

Oh yeah.

Not including prep time, but—

Yeah, yeah. It's about $50,000. I think we cleared $1,900. I think the revenue is $1,900 per week. I pay me and my wife and my youngest son, Christian, he's 18, and I pay him and our youth pastor and a buddy of mine that work, you know, $150 cash. And they go help us. We load up 7 tables, 6 kids per table, folding tables with plywood tops on them. Because I learned the first time I didn't have— you try to clamp some of those plastic tables, they don't hold. So then I had the engineer put a piece of plywood on top and clamp to that, and then it works.

Okay.

And then we roll out the miter saws and stations, and then they spend 2 hours making a mess.

Yeah.

They built cornhole. They just finished the cornhole boards. And then this week we're getting ready to start PVC builds because it's not just woodworking. It's basically kind of shop skills. So yeah. In fact, I got to call her this week to see if she wants to do January too, because she wants to do another build in January.

What will you make in profit on that $30,000?

That's a great question. So by the time I pay, because I can do 10 students, no problem. Like we slowly built the toolkit up and I can talk about tools later if you want to. But with that one, we're going to clear, by the time we bought the extra tools and paid headcount and materials, we'll clear 10 on our end.

Wow.

We'll make real money when we do the one in January.

Yeah. And what, so let's say 33% on this $30,000 contract. What are your net margins on Like your average one-off class?

So, so like a class for the young ones, let's say it's 10, 10 kids, they're 7 to 9, right? I charge more for the 7 to 9-year-olds because it takes more oversight. So the per hours, like my little ones, I charge $75 an hour. My older ones, I charge $50 an hour. So for example, if we did a 1-hour class for 10 little ones, so it's, you know what, $750. Um, I'm about $150 in COGS.

Wow. And cost of goods sold. So $600 profit on a $750 class.

Yeah. Yeah. Because the only thing that's out the door is a little bit of lumber, glue, screws, paint, that kind of stuff. The tools and stuff, once you buy them, you recycle them every week.

Let's talk about tools. What tools did you have in the beginning and what tools do you have now?

So at the beginning I had, again, the basic wood stuff, jigsaw, miter saws, all that kind of stuff. I over-engineered it the first time. Like, I bought ridiculously too much stuff because I just, I didn't know what I didn't know. Now, basically, because I got a buddy that's thinking about doing the same thing here, basically to spin off a pretty decent program is about $425, and that'll, that'll get you enough equipment for 6 kits. And it just scales. Like, if you do a 12, then you need 2 bundles, or, you know, that's kind of— because basically I kind of bundled my kits by number of kids around the table. A table holds 6 kids, so that's basically that. I mean, we're talking—

this is— sorry, this is like a 6-foot plastic folding table from Costco, the Lifetime tables.

Okay, with a half-inch piece of plywood. I used to do 3/4, too dang heavy. So then I did half-inch plywood on top of it and then put a little track so it doesn't wiggle. And then, um, 2 miter boxes from Harbor Freight, they're $25. Um, 6 tape measures. These are expensive because what I found the first time I'd buy Harbor Freight ones They don't have the fractions on them. These kids don't know how to roll. So when you get the Milwaukee's, they have the 1/8, 1/4. So it's a lot easier. So I learned that that's a little more expensive. It's $100. 6-speed square from Harbor Freight, $55. Screwdrivers, sanding. It's so cool. Like you go to Amazon, there's those yellow sanding mice that looks like a mouse for your computer and the sanding disc sits on the bottom. Oh, that's cool. Yeah, it's super cool. The kids eat up a couple clamps. So all in, you're $425 for just hand tools.

And you make that back on your first class.

Oh, easily. Now, this is assuming that a guy's got like a miter saw to take a 6-inch stick and cut into a bunch of 20-inch sticks, right? Assuming he does. If not, then he's kind of by hand, which isn't a big deal.

You can do it.

And then for the older ones, this is where it kind of gets expensive. And this is why for the fall project, if we do another one, is we'll really make some, some good money. Is it's about $4,100 in power tools.

Wow.

For 6. Well, it's because This is 2 things. Number one, I started with Milwaukee because that's what we had for the trade school, right? And their sponsor, I cold called them. They said yes. I couldn't believe it, right? So what did you ask them? I said, hey, I'm starting a trade school. Would you sponsor trades or tools? Because I kind of figured out—

Sponsor as in given to me for free?

Yeah. Yeah. I think about like $5,000 so far.

And who did you call?

I just cold called a guy on LinkedIn who worked at Milwaukee. Who worked in Milwaukee. Yep.

And he's like, sure.

Yeah. I emailed him in and he called me. I remember I was sitting at the Home Depot aisle and he's like, 'cause, well, I'd been to corporate America, so I kind of figured out what the total lifetime value of a Milwaukee customer is. And I put that in the pitch. I'm like, I know these guys spend between $30,000 to $45,000 throughout their career. You want to get 'em at $18,000? Let's talk. So they did.

So that's brilliant. That's why I never thought to do that ever. Yeah. I just would've bought 'em.

You don't know what you don't know. I mean, I just, I figured the worst I can get is a no. So yeah, the power tools are expensive, but, and I struggle with this when we get, because we even have more contracts coming up in the future, is that yes, they're expensive. But when I looked at the other brands, like the Harbor Freight brands, they're too heavy for the kids.

Hmm.

Because they're full, big, full-size. Milwaukee makes these little 12s, right? Little tiny guys, which work perfect for the kids. They're small enough they can, and they have tons of power. And they're onto that buy one, cry once. Without a doubt.

Yeah, yeah.

You know, but you get them on sale. You know, you get them on Father's Day sales or Black Friday sales, and you know, you're you're and basically like a drill and a driver. What I do on my power tools, and I overdo them. I do two kids per two students per set of power tools. You could probably do three and stretch it more, right? So like three drills and three drivers. It's a combo for fifteen hundred bucks. You say driver?

You mean like an impact driver?

Yeah, little impact and little and a Screw gun.

Okay.

And then, um, 3 jigsaws, um, and then 3 nailers, like little pin nails, 18-gauge nailers, is $4,100. Um, but again, most of these guys have, like, when I first started, I grabbed whatever tools I had, a couple of Ridgids. I had some, some, uh, a couple of Milwaukee's. I borrowed some from my son, my youngest son, grabbed some of his tools. So the very first ones, we just took whatever we could.

Yeah.

You know, now I know the only, only my 13 and plus touch the power tools extensively. I've done whole classes where they don't touch a power tool. They're so happy doing the hand saws, which blew my mind. They love, they love taking a 12-inch board and cut it down to 5 inches, and then they cut it down to 3 inches and 2 inches. And then the last couple times I started bringing a scrap box just because I have all this scrap lumber. And last Friday, like, hey, Mr. Mike, we're done. Can we, you know, what do you want me to do? I'm like, I was like, there's a— and I guess one, I Either I said or one of the students said, I said, if you want to go grab something out of the scrap bin. Oh my gosh, you thought it was Christmas. Like these kids dove into this big bucket full of scrap pieces that was throwaways. They're hammering them together. They're screwing them together. They're gluing them, clamping them, cutting them. They're coming up with these crazy ideas. And I just sit back and make sure they don't cut their fingers off.

You know, is that not the most gratifying thing in the world to see boys unlock that curiosity for the first time?

I have never seen, and I've seen it many times, One example, this student, he's probably 12, maybe 10 or 12. He built a little squirrel house feeder. It looks like a picnic table that's made out of cedar. And it wasn't hard, but it was pretty difficult for him. And he spent about 3 minutes when he's finally done just holding it and turning it around, flipping it. He just kept flipping it. And you could just see his pride growing. These kids have never touched anything and they're afraid to break everything.

Right.

So we have these big posters we set up that mistakes aren't the end, quitting is. Like, I want you to make mistakes, then let's figure it out, you know? Um, since then there's been 3 other guys that are doing a similar thing since we started.

Locally or across the country?

Locally.

Okay.

Locally.

And are they, are they growing the pie or are they competing directly?

No, they're growing the pie. They're different areas. And, um, one of them, he's leaning more into the, the metal, metal G, which I can't do. Um, the other one, he's still trying, trying to find his feet. Um, but what I've heard from parents that have done the, especially some of the other ones, is I'm so anal on safety. Like they, we have safety posters, safety glasses, you know, we don't play that.

Um, where do you get the posters?

I just Canva and went to OfficeMax and got them printed.

Okay.

Yep. You know, ask, you know, ChatGPT. Now I'm addicted to Claude. So I'm like, okay, what should this poster look like? Or, you know, you know, and just Google safety posters. And then kind of get some ideas.

Have you had any accidents?

Nope.

Wow.

No. Praise God. Nothing.

What about insurance? I know. I already know. That was easy.

I thought that'd be hard. It's just our regular business insurance and regular business insurance for our suite. And he covers—

You say for the trade school, you mean? Okay.

Yeah. I pay like $95 a month.

Wow. All right, so we've talked about tools. So Milwaukee just sent you a box of $4,000 worth of tools?

Yeah. Over— no, a couple of different times. Sent me some tools, sent me some Packouts, sent me some Tape measures, you know, talk to this vendor, they'll send you a little more. Yeah, they're sprinkled in over, you know, several months. Not so much for the trade students or the shop class, more for the trade school.

Okay.

Yeah, I just reused them.

If someone were to start this and initially only start it for the 6 to 9-year-olds, what is the total startup cost required? $450, $500?

$450. And that's assuming you don't have anything. Like, that's assuming you don't even have a miter saw or a square. Yeah. You know, so say if you start at zero and I think even you borrow somebody's folding table, so it goes from $425 to $325. You borrow somebody's table.

Mm-hmm.

Right. And then everybody's got screwdrivers. Like who doesn't have a screwdriver? So you don't need those. So maybe you need the clamps, some tape measures, the miter boxes. You could easily do a, a, a class for less than $300.

Well, let's bring it down even more. How, how about people paying upfront, like deposits?

Oh, I don't go till they pay up front. They pay up front.

So theoretically, could you collect money for this class, use that money to go spend the $300, $500? Oh yeah.

Yeah. You could book 'em.

Yeah.

Yeah, you could. You could, um, do a simple Square thing and, and, uh, send 'em a URL. They pay full out and then, um, and use that $300 to $500, $700 to front load your first set of tools. And then from there you're just repeating.

I need to have a gong in here cuz every time I discover a business that you really could start with no money, I just wanna be like, bing, we found one. You know? 'Cause it's like, it's not even an asterisk. Like you post to your Facebook friends, you send a Stripe link, you get them to pay as they should. You should collect deposits upfront no matter what, whether you're brand new or not. You use the money to go buy the tools. Of course you're gonna need some expertise. Hopefully you already have that. Just some around the house garage expertise. Maybe you watch some YouTube videos. Uh, but it is a business you could start with, with nothing.

Yeah. And, and the, the amount of times I'm like, the moms, the moms, like my wife is like, All you talk to is women on Facebook. I'm like, they're the customers.

Sorry, babe, they pay the bills.

Yeah, like, they're the ones that pay me. But I hear every single class, you built that? You built that? Like, they're just amazed. And they're like caddies. I mean, again, it's just fun woodworking stuff. Now we're getting the attention of private schools. Hey, can you help us spin up a woodworking class? You know, more of the foster community. I think what really, I think what really kind of game changed it was here in Florida, we have Step Up, which is like a scholarship program. So if you pull your kids out of public school, the state will split the cost with you or something like that. We became a vendor, so the parents don't pay us if they're in that homeschool private school scholarship program from the state.

Oh, beautiful.

They register online for the class, right? Or book it. And then they put a code in that zeros out the cart, and then they go to their Step Up page. Find us on Step Up and the state pays us within 24 hours after they hit send.

Last I checked, the government isn't too price sensitive either.

They're not.

Yep. Yep. What was I going to ask? What do you think happened with shop class in the first place? That was my favorite class in high school. And surely they're not as common anymore, right?

They're not. They're not. They're like, you know, I'm 50. So when I was in high school in the late era and middle school in the '80s, yeah, everybody had it. We had all the way through high school. I think it's like everything else. And Mike Rowe talks about this at length. In the '90s, we started pushing everybody towards college. Like, you had to go to college. And I did too. I have 2 degrees. I had a ton of student debt. I was talking to a public school this weekend about the trades. I'm like, college isn't for everybody. There's a lot of paths in there. I think we just, we drank the Kool-Aid for college and thought it was for everyone. And it's not. And I tell, I have parents ask me all the time about their kids going to college versus the trades and stuff.

Yeah.

And I'm like, especially with AI, man, if you're not doing a STEM degree, don't even look at college.

Yeah.

Like if you get medical or something that required engineering, medical, totally get it. You know, but a marketing or a history or an MBA, you know what I can do with Claude? I built my entire— now we have an app. I built it all with Claude code. Listen to you and a couple other guys just figuring it out. I built my own CRM.

No coding experience?

None. None. You know, It does all my marketing for me, helps me figure out posts. It helps me do the messaging for the posters. It helps me come up with the project ideas. I mean, it goes squirrely, you know, if you don't check it, it'll go down a rabbit hole. But yeah, I think it was, they just, and now you've got a whole almost generation and a half that have never touched a tool and they're so afraid it's going to hurt them and cut off their fingers.

Yeah.

I was like, if you just do it simple, it's not, and safely, you'll have fun. And they all do.

Yeah. And I mean, table saws are the expensive thing, and you're probably not even messing with them. No, I say expensive. They're expensive. They're the dangerous thing. You're not even messing with those.

Yeah. None of my students have touched my miter saw or my table saw. Okay. This is just for me to take big sticks and little sticks.

What a scam. Now that I think of it, colleges and universities spent the '90s and 2000s preaching, you got to go to college. You got to go to college. Meanwhile, they're jacking tuition up 10% a year every year. They're like artificially creating this demand and then pumping their prices up. And it's never been less relevant or needful than ever.

Yep.

What a scam.

Yeah. In my industry, I was in construction and landscaping in the '90s and then went into project management and then went into sustainability, which is the greening side of it. Because I believe that to me, sustainability is biblically focused. Good stewards of the environment, treat your neighbor as you love yourself, and then be a good financial steward. It has nothing to do with politics. If you look at it biblically, it's grounded in scripture. I could point to the scripture to it. Obviously, I was a closet in my industry. I kept that very close to chest, did some great things, loved my career. But again, $180,000 of student loans, and now I'm running a trade school and teaching shop classes. Yeah.

Okay. What about girls? Are any girls in your class?

Half of them. It's almost half, not full half. So probably I'd say 35 to 45% are girls.

That's shocking to me.

It is. And they crush it. Like, my girls crush it.

Yeah.

They crush it.

In what way do they crush it?

Like, because I always tell the boys too, because I have a class with, with mix. I'm like, all right guys, who do you think is going to do better, the girls or the boys? Because the boys are all ego. They raise their hands. I'm like, nope, the girls. And they all like, their shoulders shrink. You know, and, and I'm like, all right, girls, why do you think you'll do better than the boys? And they all like, we'll listen. I go, yep, you'll listen.

You know, they're pretty—

and they're starting to get more girls in the trades. Very attention-focused. We joke the house may not be built on time, but at least it'll be built perfect. Right. Um, so yeah, over half of them are girls. And we've done skateboards. Like we built skateboards one time.

That's cool.

Laminated maple together and built skateboards. That was a huge success.

Wow.

And that was a, that was a $500 class per student.

Wow. And you got trucks and wheels and everything?

Parents bought the trucks and wheels. I just supplied the maple and the forms.

Wow.

So I was out $60, $70 per student and a class would run $400 or $500.

All right. Let's run through your, your numbers to date. So it's been almost a year. $800 the first month, $6,000 the next month. And then start in January and go to today.

So January, I wasn't doing as many woodshops out. Was about $800. February, I did a couple. It was $2,200 because we had the big foster thing. Then when we switched to in-house, which again, it's a different model. If I was to do it again, this can be done completely mobile.

It can be done.

You don't need to have it like my, like in March to July, I made $50 grand, but that's because we had the classes here in our commercial spot. Everything else is mobile. We take the shop to them, right? So you kind of, kind of, kind of slice the numbers apart if you really want to. But, you know, somebody could do this completely remotely, like completely mobile. Like you don't need to have a commercial space.

Yeah.

Right. There's a couple other ones. Um, they do it out of the garage. They do it at the parks. Like they'll go set up every Saturday at a park, you know? Um, you know, so there's, there's several different ways to, to, to line it. You don't need to have the commercial spot. I don't do as many mobiles. The only mobiles I do now are big mobiles, you know, 30, 40, 30 plus long, long builds, long programs, full semesters. Because I need to focus on the trade school.

And I imagine just a pickup truck or a van is sufficient. Yep.

Everything. We do 40 students. Everything fits in an F-250 Super Duty. Wow.

Okay. Yeah. All right, let me see. So how far are you traveling? Like, what does your radius look like when you do the mobile stuff?

The little ones, if it's less than— if it's 10, like, we'll cap it at 10. Usually we won't go further than 30 minutes from the house. The big, the big contracts will stretch it up to 45. That's about it. What I'd like to do is find other guys in those areas and basically let them run that cluster, that zone. We'll use the same brand that we've built, right? But again, they become satellite shop teachers and then they run their own and do a profit sharing. It's just, it's really hard to find guys that want to do it because they're working full-time or, you know, whatever.

Yeah.

Or they're just intimidated by tools or whatever. But I think at some point that's what I'd like to do.

Your numbers are, are misleading in a good way because you say, oh, $800 in January, $2,200 in February. You're only, that's only like 1 or 2 events, right? Yeah. Yeah. That's like 3 hours of work. Yep. Like very much in side hustle territory. I interrupted you. What, what were your numbers? And I know it's kind of murky, but just add 'em all together between March and—

So in March to July, so spring through summer, They were all here. 50,600.

In all of those months combined? Wow. And was it like growing? Was it—

Yeah, it was. It was basically like 8, 8, and then we hit a 12, then we hit a 16. It just kept scaling up and up and up. You know, we get a lot of, a lot of questions about winter breaks are huge. Like, I think spring break, we cleared 12,000 in one week. Only teaching morning classes. We're not all day. Like, we're teaching a 3-hour class in the morning. That's it. I think that's— that we stopped. Same with summer classes. We ran summer camps. We went 3-day and 5-day summer camps. They were from 9 to noon. So you're done in the afternoon, right? And they were $300 to $400. It's $300 for a 3-day camp, $500 for a 5-day camp for 3 hours.

What would you say the profit per year ceiling is for someone wanting to do this and not have any employees?

If you, if you did it with purely mobile, not, not a commercial space. So basically nights and weekends, there's no reason why you couldn't with a decent hustle. Say you filled a whole Saturday and a Sunday afternoon, you could clear probably $1,500 on a Saturday, maybe do another $600 on a Sunday. Right. So that's what, $2,000? So maybe conservative, say you did 2 weekends a month. So that's, you're talking $4,000 a month.

Part-time in your spare time, in your full-time job.

Yep, yep, yep, yep.

What about what happens when the Facebook posts run out, when you exhaust your immediate network?

That's what I thought too.

As if that ever happened.

I know.

Is it word of mouth? It just becomes a word of mouth?

It is. It's become word of mouth. And we're in 3 homeschool groups. One's got 9,000, one's got 5,000. I forget what the other one is. And they're everywhere. Every community has homeschool groups. And all these moms talk to each other. They all know each other. They all talk to each other. Very tight-knit group. We've done probably, I want to say, say on the low side, 500 students since Thanksgiving. It's been on the low side. We haven't even scratched the surface of just one homeschool group of 9,000 moms.

Right.

And there's new kids obviously aging up and aging out consistently. So you're always getting new students, you know? And then what's interesting is that then we started getting asked, For, hey, can you do an adult DIY class? Can you teach me how to drywall? Can you teach me how to hang a microwave or fix a door? Like, we get those all the time. We did a mother-daughter May build. I think it was like $500, $600 on the weekend. They made these little flower pots.

That's cool.

Yeah. And then we did a father-son one for Father's Day. They made the American flag, the wooden American flag, and it's like $300 a head. So, you know, sold 8 or 10 of those, you know.

Geez, you're just throwing around these numbers like, oh, $3,000 there, $3,000 in an afternoon. You're building this with scale in mind. And most people, like, they could do it mobile or they could, they could get cheaper rent. You get a much smaller place for $500 a month. I've rented a place in Huntsville, Alabama for $500 a month. It was 500 square feet and it would've been great for something like this.

What I did learn, and I think that's true too, if they wanted to go all in, what I found out in talking to moms, as soon as they saw our space, It put us on another level.

Yeah.

Okay. Because they're like, and it's interesting because I, I, my wife had explained to me, I'm like, I don't understand why this is, why they like the space so much. She goes, honey, it feels safe when it's in somebody's garage or in their backyard on a folding table. It just doesn't quite feel as safe. But if you have a commercial space, they know somebody's vetted you and, you know, so on and so forth. But yeah, you're right. If I was to do it again, I'd rent, uh, You know, they do those math tutoring places in strip— we're in a strip mall. I'd rent a small 1,000-square-foot strip mall, completely open it up, exposed ceilings and beams. Kind of like that RC guy, like he does for his RC tracks.

You don't need a bunch of build-out. No, you need to make it code compliant. You need a bathroom that's handicap accessible. Yep.

Um, make sure you got lights on, the fire alarms.

You can even do this in like a shared makerspace, like, or a shared warehouse, or those contractor garages. Where it's like 1,500 square feet, you know, like a 30 by 60 foot space.

Um, or an enclosed trailer. Like, I, I think version 3.0 is we get a big 36 foot enclosed trailer, right? Wrap it, all the tools are in it, and it's got bat wings that open up, and you pull up to the park or corporate events or whatever. Because you can do corporate events too. I mean, people have asked about corporate events. You know, you roll up and everybody has fun building stuff. Instead of having a part— a girls' Pottery Barn thing, you have a guys', you know, woodworking thing.

Well, it reminds me of those video game trailers.

Yeah. And the basketball guy, the guy that does the basketball. Yeah.

The basketball guy. Yep. Yep.

Same thing. Just woodworking.

What have all of your marketing methods been to date?

Me figuring it out by mistakes. It's all been Facebook. I mean, I probably spent maybe $200 in Facebook ads just for me getting desperate between, you know, classes and life. They never work cuz I don't know what I don't know. Um, but you know, Listening to you and others, posting consistently. Like, I have to post every single day. These moms are super busy, right? I just post. I just post pictures all the time, you know. And now, we've kind of gotten our voice to where basically what we're really trying to do is really, it's a mission. It's kingdom work through tools and training. That's kind of what I feel drawn to do.

Mm-hmm.

But what the kind of more tactical stand is like really confidence, like giving the kids confidence they don't have. And that confidence leads to responsibility and ultimately to servant leadership is kind of where I'm hoping they'll go as we go through the trade school.

Yeah.

But the confidence is, I'm telling you, dude, it fills, it fills your tank. It fills my tank every time. That's exhausting. I mean, I have a new respect for teachers. Oh, sure. Yeah.

Tell me about pricing. So I imagine if you post organically and you get, you know, 8 moms together who have 12 kids combined, You're charging each of them per head. But if someone comes to you and says, hey, I'm in charge of this homeschool group, you're charging the homeschool group or a synagogue directly per head? I do.

I do. And basically I, I step down the pricing. It's not, you know, $50 an hour, you know, um, and basically tier it down based on, you know, like now our big ones is 30 kids minimum. That's, that's into 40 kids maximum in our current system. And, um, basically like, okay, how long do you want? And then just figure out a pricing system from there. Um, I know the one we, the one we're doing now, they did a, they added a markup on top of it. So there is still wiggle room to the parents. Because nobody does this. Like there's no, these kids, these parents have no place to take their kids to teach them how to woodwork.

Now you said $50 an hour. Is that like, let's say there's only 5 kids. Where do you start per hour per kid? And then what do you scale that down to as you go to 50 kids or 30 kids?

Oh, um, honestly, I kind of keep the 50. Let's see, $50 and $75 for the little ones, right? Yeah. We've only got a couple of the bigger ones, the 25+. So I usually keep it at $50, $75 for the 2 age groups per hour up to— and usually most homeschool events and most events are sub-10, like they're in that 8 to 12 range. And then when you get the B2B model, which is very lucrative, that's where you're getting the $30,000 contracts and all that kind of stuff. Then it's a different price structure. So then I'm just like, okay, 2 hours, you know, just kind of, I just basically back calculated and kind of threw something against the wall. It stuck. And that's what I'm going to use going forward.

So call it, I think there's room. Yeah. So call it $50 per hour per kid at the older ages, $75 per hour per kid at the younger ages. And as you scale up, you can bring it down, but you're saying you don't really need to most of the time because you're not competing.

Yeah. You're not competing.

Yeah. Okay.

Yeah. And I'll learn more the next 6 months. We get more of these larger commercial B2B customers, private schools. Um, we got, we're getting plugged into the public schools. We do public schools too. Um, I think that's the trailer wrapped, you know, the whole, the whole enchilada. I think that'll be super cool.

Yeah.

But yeah, it could be like, and that's, that's why I was really thinking, I was like, this could be something that a guy just like, I just want to make an extra $1,000 on a weekend, take the tools I already got and make some smiles. Like it's that type of business. If you want to go all in, The world's your ocean. You can make a ton of money pretty simply, you know? But yeah, just for those wanting to make $2,000 to $3,000 a month, this is easy.

Do you have like an acronym or a framework or something that you use?

It's learn, build, lead. So learn it, learn it, learn a skill, whatever it is, build with it, and then lead others to it. That's kind of like the mantra, but not from like a business standpoint. I don't really have, you know, I guess Post cut cash. I mean, it's I mean, P C P C post collect host, right? Yeah, yeah, something like that. I mean, it really is. Yeah, that would be cool to have a good acronym. That'd be kind of cool.

Yeah, well, I like that post collect host. Like, post to Facebook, collect the money, or even just the first one might be free, right? Collect the reservations, and then host it.

Yep. Because you do, you do need to do a couple of them just to kind of get your feet wet and to get some pictures.

Yeah, yeah.

Once you get the pictures, and then if you want to go all in, then do a Facebook page. We did a Facebook page, and then, then we did a Google profile because we needed them for the trade school. But yeah, all of our reviews, if you look at all of our reviews for Facebook and Google, are for the shop students. Yeah, I think I ask them flat out.

Yeah, once you get pictures and videos, it just becomes easy mode.

Like then you do have— so one thing I did learn is, um, make sure to respect the, um, the parents that don't want their kids posted. Like that, that, that's—

Sure.

I'm like, okay. So we had to, like, at first we used to put name tags on their shirts so I could call them by their name. Now we put 'em on the workstation.

Yeah.

'Cause it's easier to go in and scratch 'em out. Right. And then we have all the parents sign a waiver, obviously. Um, and then within it says, hey, we can post. And most, I mean, 99% of the time the parents don't care. I've had a few of 'em that say, hey, I'm like, well, I can put emoji on their face. Like, okay, that's fine. So I just put emoji on their face.

Okay.

And post it.

Okay.

But there's so many pictures, you don't have to worry about it. I mean, there's just, you know.

If someone were to start this, like, what is— what are some non-negotiables that they need to do? Or what would step one be? Or what advice do you have for someone starting this from nothing?

Draw the line in the sand with safety and don't move an inch. Safety glasses. Like, don't even play with that because it takes one injury to wreck it.

The whole business.

Yeah, the whole business. Yeah. So like, you know, number one, eye protection. Like we have posters everywhere, a poster on the site. They don't touch the table without eye protection. Right. And then, um, I kind of have a persona, Mr. Mike. I have a little shop apron that's got all like my stuff in it. Right. And it's got eye protection, a big Velcro says eye protection. Um, yeah, definitely a hard line to safety. Um, keep it simple, stupid. Like, like you don't have to build these elaborate step stools.

Yeah.

Like they like making, um, totes and flags and bird feeders and don't over— and, and we, another thing, we used to go cheap on the wood. We'd buy the cheaper lumber just because to save money. Now we're like, no, we buy the, we buy the really nice, uh, uh, high grade pine. It's got no knots in it. It's, it's a, it costs more, but it's just a better experience for them. Um, and they don't have to paint or stain it. They're happy going home with raw wood.

Yeah.

All day long. Yep.

I like the idea of going to Etsy and just sorting by like most sold, most popular, both like physical things you could buy and then just copying that. And then plans. Like I bought chicken coop plans and shed plans from Etsy for like $15.

You could use those forever. That, that's how I got my American flag plan. $9 off Etsy, came with 2 file sizes. And then I went to Amazon and bought the star— what's it called? The stencil. The star stencil.

Right.

With the jig itself? Yeah, it's in metal and they rattle can it. Like, it doesn't need to be complex. We're not talking routers or fancy joinery. We're talking like we're putting butt joints and screws and I don't do nails. That's another thing. Don't do nails. I do everything with screws.

That's an injury city, right?

It is injury city. And then I just do the nails or the screws, those sheetrock screws. Don't buy the expensive ones. I buy sheetrock screws in the big buckets all day long. Right. Home Depots and Lowe's, they always have a scrap bin part all the time. Like, go grab scrap out of there. Right. And what I failed early, and I still struggle with this, I'm like, okay, I got to keep coming up with new projects. Right. Keep coming up with new projects. But really, I've got 10 projects, Chris, and that'll keep us busy for probably 5 years.

Yeah. Yeah. I mean, you need new projects if you're teaching the same kids over and over, but if you find a winning project, recycle it.

So what we do is basically for the recurrent, because now we do month, month programs, basically every week for a month, like every Monday or every Tuesday. And basically I have a bunch of black totes filled with kits, like a flag kit or a beanbag kit or whatever. And if it's a previous student, I'm like, hey, what do you want to build? Like, I want to build a flag. Okay. So I go grab the flag and they're building a flag and everybody else is building robots or beanbags or whatever. Yep.

What happens when the kid doesn't finish by the end of the class?

So the first couple times, yeah, the first couple times we went long because we tried to add paint and glue. Um, I've learned to simplify the project. You'll, you'll over-prep the first couple, first couple projects or first couple, uh, shows or classes or events or whatever you want to call them. You'll over-prep, like you'll drill more holes than you need to. And Harbor Freight, don't be too prideful with the tools. Go to Harbor Freight. They're going to break them. They're going to break them, they're going to drop them, they're going to stain them. Yeah, that was for sure.

Anything else I should have asked you but neglected to about the business? Do you have a carpentry background or are you just like your average dad?

Just an average dad.

I'm one myself.

Yeah, it's funny. The only reason I kind of got into woodworking was we bought a house in Maryland and my wife wanted a new kitchen. I got priced like $300,000 or $400,000. I'm like, I'm not paying $300,000 for a Boxes for cabinets. So I hopped on YouTube and built her entire kitchen off YouTube.

Wow!

And now I can hold my own. But again, don't keep it simple. We're talking ninety-degree squares, screws, and glue. It's it's it's not hard. But do not be don't be surprised when you leave tired, but like on fire because the kids are so much fun to build with. They are just an absolute blast, you know. And now I think I'm gonna do full. Just scrap bin. I'm gonna throw a whole scrap bin at once. They learn the safety, and I always start with safety. These are the five rules of the shop. Like we have a mantra: respect first, safety always. That's the mantra. Every time I have a class, I start with that and eye protection, and then teach them how to do the stuff, obviously. And then I'm like, okay, here's a bin. Go have fun. And man, it's like wildfire. It's like you put a whole plate of cookies out.

You should upcharge for that.

I should.

I mean, you like say, hey, show them like a quick. 15-second clip of what they do and be like, hey, for an extra $10 per head, I'll add the scrap pile.

Yeah, it is. And it's funny too, because the scraps are from a previous class.

Sure, it's free.

Yeah, it's just, I'm gonna throw it away anyway. Yep.

Yeah, that's amazing. Yeah. Do you ever post to Facebook groups or to Facebook Marketplace?

I think you could do Marketplace, but there's so much gold in the home. Oh, and but, and not just homeschool group, moms groups. Like Moms of Palm Beach County or moms of Austin, Texas or whatever, right? Yeah, you could just post to those groups. And again, it's not videos. We're talking a static image, right? Woodworking or shop class. Kids build confidence. Message me for details. That's it. No price. Don't put anything in a price, right? And then all the price goes on your Facebook page or because they don't read that stuff. That's another thing I learned. They don't read their website anyway. They don't read your Facebook page. They all want you to tell you they're right there over the phone.

I feel like you're underselling the genius of that post. Kids build confidence. Is that what you said? You're not selling the steak, you're selling the sizzle. You're selling the outcome, which is confidence. And as a dad of 4 kids, that is one thing I want them to have more than almost any other thing is confidence. Yeah.

It took us a while to figure that out. It took me a while to figure my voice out to figure out, because it was skills. And then I realized we don't teach woodworking. We help kids gain confidence through tools.

Woodworking.

Yeah. And it's a blast, man.

Oh man, it sounds fun. Mike, this has been incredible. Where can people find you or your business if they want to learn more?

Uh, voskill.com, which is vocational skills. Used AI to help us come up with the name.

Voskills, V-O-S-K-I-L-L.com?

Yeah. Uh, Voskill, singular, V-O-S-K-I-L-L.com.

And then where can we find you? Or should we just go through the website?

Yeah, go to the website or, um, we're on Facebook, Instagram. I think it's Voskill Training, V-O-S-K-I-L-L Training.

Okay.

Um, yeah, we do woodworking classes and mostly woodworking. That seems to work the best and it's the funnest. That's what I know.

Yeah. Beautiful.

I'm a huge fan. I'm so thankful for what you do.

You know, thank you, Mike. I'm thankful for what you're doing. I mean, you're inspiring people here, um, both locally and nationwide. Hey guys, if you're still listening to this, it's probably because you haven't had a chance to take your AirPods out. You're still mowing the lawn, you're still driving, what have you. If you're still here with me, I would really, really love and appreciate a 5-star review on Spotify, Apple, or wherever you get your podcasts. It would mean a lot if you want to go the extra mile, share this episode with a friend that might have an interest in starting a business. It would mean a ton. Hope you have the best day of your life today.