Talking Military Transition Struggles, Service Dog Training and more with Kevin Watts, Blue Cord K9.

Kevin, how you been?

Been all right. Been a while since we last seen each other. It has.

It seems like time flies, you know. I always look back and before I know it My kids are grown, and you know, just time flies. It seems like yesterday was COVID time, right?

Yeah, yeah, it does. It was just a minute ago.

Yeah, like 3 years ago. Well, I'm glad to have you on The Source Podcast. I'm AJ Vargas, and I have the voice of reason, Maya Simpson, with us. And then of course we have Kevin Watts with us today. And we're going to talk about some everything working dogs, right?

Everything working dogs and dogs. And as long as it comes from the canines, it's always a good day.

We have a saying at the facility, it's always a good day if we're working dogs. And I say, I stand true to that even on this podcast where it's a great day if we get to talk a little bit of dog stuff.

Yes, I love talking dogs.

Well, let's jump right in, Kevin. Tell us a little bit about yourself. Tell us about your background and, you know, for those that are listening that may not know you, tell them about your business and let everybody know a little bit about yourself.

Well, I'm Kevin Watts. I'm an Army Ranger veteran. I have 9 years active duty with almost 3 years over in Iraq. When I came home from overseas, I did the typ— the typical veteran struggle. I hit across all the drugs, the alcohol, you name it, I was there. Found my therapy in the dogs and working dogs. And throughout time, when the last time we seen each other, that was the start of my journey into the professional world of canines. Throughout other schools, I decided to start my own business.

I did it. That's, that's awesome.

Working dogs, it is my therapy. And I said, why not do it every day?

Yeah, that's right. You know, I can think back early on in my career and through all the bad times that I've had in my life, the one constant thing that's always kept me going, and when I just wanted to get away from everything or when I needed to get away from everything, I turned to dogs. And it always seemed like the dogs that I was working or training at the moment, especially in those lows in my life, they just knew and some of the best training sets I had, or even some of the best deployments I had, was during those times. It's just remarkable and hard to explain, right?

It is. I tell everybody all the time, what these canines can do for us humans is beyond incredible.

Yeah, absolutely. You're— you hit the nail on the head. Once I saw that you were on my schedule for us to talk today. I've been dying to ask you, why Blue Cord K9? Where did that name come from?

So I had a passion in my younger years, and that was my job in the Army. I was an infantryman, and the infantry is the only branch in the Army that gets a special blue cord, and we get the blue discs as well. So that was my passion. I loved it. I had no intentions of getting out of the Army. You would have had to kick me out, or carry me out in a coffin. And unfortunately, I got to medical retirement after 9 years in. And like I said, I struggled. I struggled. I didn't know what I wanted to do. I didn't know where I wanted to be. I didn't even know who I was. Through that and the help of my best friend, I found a lot of therapy and dogs. And then she, now my wife, helped me form what we have today. Which is working with dogs and helping other people with dogs. So my two passions went from the Blue Cord to the canine, and that is when Blue Cord K9 LLC was born.

Man, I love it. What a great story. And, you know, seeing a name that carries on a legacy for you and means so much is just remarkable. I think we all go back to our humble beginnings and we can all tell a story But that just excites me to hear that. That excites the fact that you're able to take something that you live for, you know, day in and day out with no change in your life in the foreseeable future at least, and then all of a sudden life changes and deals you a, a curveball and you turn it into something remarkable. That's, man, that's, that's amazing.

It, it has been a crazy but fun and rewarding journey, and we're still a young business, but we have helped a lot of people. And I— we're in it more for helping folks. I have handed away, I think, 3 or 4 service dogs free of charge, and you can't put a price ticket on that. And That's why I do what I do. It's not a job. It's waking up and just living life to the fullest.

You know, you don't hear that from a lot of people where they have the opportunity to get up every day and do something that they love. You know, they may say they have to go to the salt mill, if you will, and live through the next 8 to 12 hours on their shift or whatever. But you get to get up every single day and do something you truly love. Isn't that remarkable?

It, it's what I think defines a true passion. I had it. I— the last time I had it was when I was in. I, I don't recall working a day those 9 years, and I've been through some pretty tough times while I was in. Didn't stop me. And now I have that again. The other 13 to 15 years in between there, those are stories for another time.

Well, maybe, you know, that defines you though. And that's what I think people need to understand, that we can dig holes and get to the lowest pits of our life, but there's always a way out if we just search and we look for that. And then obviously bring some people in our lives that kind of inspire us and give us that direction. But we also have to be a little bit of a willing participant in that as well. We can shut everybody else off and pretend like we don't need help or pretend like, you know, we're better than that. But the reality is, is that if we'll just open our eyes and our hearts a little bit, it's amazing on what we can find, right?

I found that when I came through your school. What you just described happened back then.

Well, you know, I like to take credit for that, but it's some great people that are around us. That, that afford us that opportunity. And, you know, if I say it once, I'll say it a thousand times: dogs are just a catalyst. The last episode that we put out with Josh Hughes, I said the same thing. Dogs just bring us together, you know, and that's just a catalyst. But we have the opportunity to help so many people rather than pushing people away or creating a bad environment. We're not perfect, by any means. However, we really do have a heart to help others, and you spoke a little bit about that, and we'll get into that in just a moment. But you know what I want to hear is, because I hear so many veterans and service members that are in right now, and they talk about how they can't wait to get out, and a lot of them are the younger soldiers, but I always try to mentor them a little bit and tell them it's not as good on the outside as you think it is, and that grass is not always greener because you're still going to have to get up, you're still going to have to listen to somebody, you're still going to have to do the things that you probably think you hate right now. And what the Army does, or what the Air Force does, or what the Marines do, is they instill that discipline that you can take on throughout the rest of your life and apply it to any job, any career. But at the end of the day, that service is building that for you. and that shouldn't change. So can you speak a little bit about making that transition? Because you touched on it, making that transition from military life to civilian life and how difficult that was for you and why that was difficult for you.

Well, that is a very, very deep topic. I'll try not to take the whole time on it, but when it started, I was from Baghdad to civilian in 8 months. I had no transition classes there. They did my med board, they pushed with the PTSD, the TBI, and tinnitus, and before I knew it, I was out. I didn't know what happened, and I had to figure something out. Now, one thing the military gave me was a never-quit attitude, and You decide where your life is going, and if you never quit, whether it's good or bad, you're going to go one or two directions. And for many, many years, I had the negative outlook, and I looked down, I— it'll never get better. Well, I never quit. I never quit thinking that, and it never did get better. When I changed it and thought, it's time for a change— I— you can only hit the bottom so many times before there's only one way up. So I decided I needed to do something different and I wasn't gonna quit just as hard as I never quit any other time. And from that point on, we found your school. I attended that one. Now at that time, there's a portion in there where I waited for my service dog and I waited 3 years for it, never got it. I waited from several different companies, free service dogs, and I got my own, trained my own. Found my therapy in it. Then my best friend at the time was saying, hey, why don't you keep going with dogs? Now I do have a brain injury which hinders me from doing normal school, and if you look back on my classwork, you'll see my brain injury reflects that. But hands-on, that, that sticks with me. I got to a point where I couldn't continue my normal school, so I had to go to a hands-on, and we found your school, and That was amazing. I got to start, and from that moment I was like, no, this is the life I want to live. And Buck came at me pretty hard, and it's what I needed. And when I left your school, I looked back and said, that's what I'm gonna do. I'm gonna help others in some way. I didn't know how. I didn't have this magical plan not to be here. If you would have asked me at graduation time if this is where I would have been, I would have laughed at you and said no. But I love it and I don't regret it. And like you say, you wake up every day and it's just, it's a passion. It's what I do.

Well, that's, that, that's certainly awesome. And it is a journey that we all go through. And, uh, I say it's never easy, but if we stay at it and just chip away a little bit at a time, we'll eventually get at least down the path that we need to be. And that's where you're at now. So what was your biggest challenge in making that transition? When once you decided that you were going to open up a business of your own, you had the vision, obviously you had the, I know what I want to do with my business, which is to help others. But what was your biggest challenge in getting that started?

Figuring it out. Figuring out. Now, what I, what I tell people with the dog industry, when I decided to open that door and go through it, the dog industry door, I didn't realize what was on the other side. And at first I was like, I'm doing it all. I'm, I'm gonna take care of everything. I'm gonna train every kind of dog. And you can't, you can't, you gotta figure out what you wanna do, what makes you happy, and then go there. That was the hardest part. Now that we know what we want to do, Now we're just fine-tuning that. What my wife and I are doing in Blue Core K9 and the people that we hire, that's what our passion is— helping. Our passion is getting those through the dark times. We're not really dog trainers, we're handler educators and therapists because we've been there. We've walked down that road. We've all been alcoholics. We've all dealt with trauma. And when we decided to work in the dog industry, what are we doing? And that, that's where once we figured that out, now it's every day.

Man, that's, that's awesome. And I truly commend you for that because oftentimes we get caught up in the industry. And what I mean by that is, is we want to do everything. We want to do everything that everybody else is doing and whoever we take out in the end, it's okay. But what I see and what I hear from you is that you're following your passion, and that's to help others. And you really got into it with the right frame of mind and the right heart. And I know that'll take you far, um, because I've seen it time and time again. And then also what I hear from you is that you're staying within your lane. And what I mean by that is not that you can't, but you choose to do what's best for you and develop that at a very high level to where you provide the best service and the best training possible. Is that right?

Oh, that is absolutely correct. I recommend your company out a lot because that's a discipline I'll probably never touch into. Those that want like protection work and police work stuff, and I've seen you're opening some doors too Uh, which is why we're sitting here. That's awesome that you got this started, but yeah, I'm, I'm gonna fine-tune what I got and not try and dabble in everything.

Well, that's great, and you bring up an interesting point because, you know, we've been doing this for a number of years. I've been in the industry about 20 years if you take in the time when I was in law enforcement and then opening up CCU. Going full-time in 2009 and really starting with a dream in 2003. And it was just a seed at that time, and working through some private clients and things of that nature. But look how long it's taken me to get to this point. Is— it's not a bad thing, but it's a point that we try to drive home to everybody we have an opportunity to. We can do everything, but we can't do everything good. And even doing something as simple as sitting here talking to some great people in our industry on a podcast, we still wanted to do it in a way that represented CCU, and that was offering value for people's time. Because if I have an opportunity to sit down with you for an hour, an hour and a half, whatever we decide is going to be the end of this episode, like, it has to be worth our time, but it also has to be worth the time of our listeners. And if you're watching it on YouTube, our viewers, but at the end of the day, we have to add value. And I think in our industry, we get caught up sometimes in not adding value, whether through our services, through the dogs we train, or even through something as simple as a podcast. And, and we just want to do that. We want to pour into people and we want to give people an outlet to learn one more thing that they didn't know earlier today, and I know from speaking with you now that they're going to learn so much from you. And hopefully not just what they learn, but also what they're inspired through, through your story and through your— through what you've learned in getting into this industry. And that's just remarkable, absolutely remarkable.

And then the value— adding value, that is where I'm moving with it. I am currently running a pilot program of online schooling. We're about to wrap it up here this week so I can total everything out, see how it went. But all it is is education. I have someone in my close vicinity who believes dog training is a scam no matter what you do. And I thought of you when she's screaming this at me. I'm like, you, do you even understand what it takes to get those kinds of dogs? Yeah, we specialize in pet dogs and service dogs, and some of our service dogs— what, did we get lucky? How can you say dog training's a scam? So adding value is, is absolutely a necessity, and it's kind of where I'm focusing now that the business is running. How do we add value? Well, how do we educate our society?

Yeah, that's the hard thing. You know, you can't be perfect, especially when you're dealing with another living organism, right? Because you're going to run into problems and things that you didn't foresee, the environmental effects on behavior that you can't control. But really, people are paying for your time, your expertise, and your commitment to reach a goal. But that goal sometimes is pushed out further than you want it to be, and you have to take into consideration that a lot of the behaviors that you're fixing or that you're trying to repair or modify have been embedded as habits for a long time in that dog. And unfortunately, I think you called yourself a trainer, right? Is that accurate?

Yeah.

I didn't hear you say you were a magician, were you?

No, I got to make it all happen. I can't reach your dreams. I can help you try. But we can't make everything happen. You're correct.

Yeah, you can't wave that magic wand and just make things go away. And some people give, and I think too, that's part of the killer on that education is some people kind of tell people that, that they can wave this magic wand and just change everything with that dog and their situation. And then when it doesn't work out, it's the dog's fault or it's the owner's fault. Um, it's up to us, you and I, as being parts of this industry, to, to educate people. And we can't do it at the sacrifice of the dog's health or well-being, nor can we do that at the sacrifice of the owner's well-being. So we have to marry all that up together and, and try to make it work. And there's going to be people that are not happy, there's going to be people that are going to look at the results and think, well, you didn't do enough, or you didn't do this. But we make decisions on not just our experience, but also what science tells us. So we take all that together and begin to modify and, and make these things move in a direction that's most beneficial for all parties involved. And sometimes it just doesn't achieve what the owner's visions are sometimes, and Terry talked a little bit about that in a previous episode where he talked about a bad client that he had. And, you know, we're also dealing with emotions of the owners as well. Absolutely something we have to deal with when it comes to providing a service of training for a client. And I'm sure you see it quite often.

We do. We do. It's the hardest part that we're running into. Give me any dog. Give me any dog. Dog training is so easy. What do you want it to do? But now you're gonna put that dog with somebody. That's where we're seeing a lot of the issues.

Yeah, obviously we do handler training and owner training as well, and I still consider them handlers in some regard, but we're always trying to refine that process and tapping into that education piece to keep our owners well-informed, but try to also keep them on task. I say it's easy when we're training police or military because they're pretty disciplined and they know how to follow instructions and stay on a path for the most part. Not all the time, but the hardest thing— and I always say new trainers, I put them in the civilian division is what we call it— because there's so much to learn, problem solving, And how do you pick an owner that wants a dog to be put on a shelf and not train the number of hours that are required and not hold the dog accountable or be very consistent with the dog? How do you take that person and make it successful? So we have to come up with ways to do that, and we use a wide range of techniques to do that. So hopefully, and I don't know if we'll get to it on this episode, maybe it's gonna be another episode when we talk about specifically that maybe are not as committed as we are sometimes?

I think we as trainers are way more committed than a lot of handlers that I have come across. We too call them handlers, owners of dogs. You are in our eyes, in the dog's eyes, you are a handler. When they don't have that drive that you have, when they don't want to put that work in. Yeah. I don't know. Another topic for a rainy day.

That's right. The, I think the biggest and the most disheartening thing with me, and I think where I feel it the most is when I have a trainer that puts in so much time with a dog, goes well beyond, and the owner never sees that, and they don't understand the amount of work and heartache and passion that that trainer has and has put into that dog in the background. and you hand the dog back and the owner is— just doesn't see that. And those are the— some of the biggest struggles that I have when it comes to the relationship between a trainer and a— and an owner. And they just don't see that aspect of it. And maybe even sometimes the extra work that's put in or the heartache that that trainer's going through to try to figure out and unlock the key to success for this dog. And the owner just doesn't appreciate that at all.

Sometimes you gotta call it for what it is. And I had a house where they were a house of choices, okay? And if you've ever worked with a canine, and if you ever give a canine a choice, I promise you he won't choose what you want him to do. And the household was a mess, but they were a house of choices and would not back off. They wanted no correction. What do you do with that? How do you make them successful when you've got dogs biting at each other and going at people in the household? You tell them this isn't gonna work. That's what we do. And we get, we get some people that are mad at us, but they typically call us back a couple months later and say, okay, what do we gotta do to fix this? You gotta listen. What you said about the trainer putting all that work in. And the handler not seeing it. Gotta get that handler to see that work and appreciate that work. Because if you find that magic wand, let me know.

Well, you know, it's, it's always a work in progress, and we learn from every single owner, every single handler. I'm learning from you right now. Uh, we become students of our industry, and that's an important facet to be successful in this industry. Is that we have to be students and never scared to learn something new. I hate to go back to a previous episode, but Terry Adams talked about staffing. So I wanted to talk a little bit with you because you have trainers that work for you, you have staff that works for you, and I just wanted to touch on this just a little bit because I hear so many business owners talking about staffing nowadays, more so than I ever have in the past. And I don't know why, don't know if it's just the times, but early on in our business careers, I didn't hear as much talk about the problems with staff members and acquiring good staff. We've been blessed throughout the years to have great staff, but I want to go to you and see your perspective and see if you have some tough challenges with meeting staffing needs.

Uh, I would say we have at times, and there were other times where we were good. So we changed up our technique, the way we bring people on board. We used to do the application and you tell us what experience you got, and then we'll go from there. Short intern, so to say, of a rundown. You get to run with us with clients, and that was very risky because we're very specific on what we do and how we do it. We are more on the handler educator side. So there's dog training involved, but you're working with someone one-on-one, more or less. We don't bring dogs in kennel and we have a whole bunch of dogs. Matter of fact, I don't believe in in-kennel training unless absolutely necessary. I keep in mind, I deal with pet dogs and service dogs. I don't deal with police dogs. You are not gonna let a police dog run around your house and be free and make choices. I promise you, you're not. So you gotta keep in mind what I do. Versus what you guys do. If I were to train them, I build that relationship. If you train them, you build that relationship. So when we bring in staff, they need to understand you're not a dog trainer. You're not going to build that relationship with the dog. You're going to help the handler get there. You're going to work one-on-one with that handler. Early on, we found out that by hiring people from the outside didn't work out too well. I grew up in the gun industry as an infantryman. That's all it was, was weaponry. And if I had someone who never shot a gun in their life, I could teach them to reach out and touch far targets. But if you come to me talking about how you've been shooting all your life and your grandpa taught you, I already know there's a whole slew of problems. And that's kind of what we've seen when we were hiring from the outside. They came with all this great skill, but not what we do. So what we've changed to, and in the SOCOM world, Now, us Rangers get made fun of because we raise our own. Everybody else, they want to just go ahead and get on with the mission where we take that 18-year-old and we build him up. It's kind of what we do now with our company is you go through our program and we build you up. So that way, by the time you finish the program, the online course and the intern, you understand our philosophy and why we do what we do. Because as you know, in the industry, there's more than one way to train a dog. And if it works, is it wrong?

No, that— you're absolutely right, man. And, and I love hearing what you're saying right now. Hearing you say that you take from within, train them up, and make them into the vision that you have for your company is just refreshing to hear. I love it, um, because that's one thing that we struggle with in our industry is standards. And I see that a lot where we sacrifice standards for the fact of having a body that's training a dog. And I hate it. I love hearing that. And you didn't learn that from us, because we have a thing too where we only hire a student because we know where your core training has come from. And when we talk a language, we talk the same language. So if I bring something up to you on what you're doing or not doing I know that you've been trained a certain way, at least on the foundation, and then we can build off of that. And so I love hearing that. That's just remarkable, man. Very good. So what does your process look like in taking that prospect? Where do you find your prospects at then?

So we have been fortunate here lately to be able to handpick. And as you know, if you can handpick your team You will build the best team. Now, I went from the SOCOM world in Ranger Battalion to the regular Army, and I thought, you know, it'd be pretty similar. I was young and dumb, didn't know much. I didn't realize the difference of the two. And being raised within means a lot. You get to hand-select. Ranger Battalion isn't a everybody gets a chance. You've got to meet a standard. You've got to maintain that standard, and at any time, if you decide you're gonna let your standard down, you're out. You're gone from the team. There's no ifs, ands, or buts. It's a volunteer position. I took that mentality and brought it in here and said, if you can hold the standard, then you are welcome to part of what we do. If you cannot, you are welcome to the rest of the world. You go what they call worldwide.

Wow.

And we don't build fast. We're not a company that's throwing up thousands and thousands of dollars in advertising. We're laying in bed at midnight making up our own advertising. We're building slow, but what we're building is solid and hoping to make a change in the industry.

No, I think the impact and the change you're going to immediately see when you're looking back You know, even from the short time— and I say short time because you've been doing this a few years as a business, but you've been building this legacy for some time. Think back to basic training where your discipline was instilled, where your standards were instilled, and now you're just carrying that forward. So we can't discount that experience and those things now that you're bringing into your new business and building that solid foundation. Because where would we be if we don't have a solid foundation, right?

Oh, I could tell you all kinds of stories. How much time you got? Because when I came out of the Army, I had zero foundation and I came home to nothing. I came home to go get a job. You're fine. Don't worry about it. Quit thinking about it. Get rid of all your military stuff. I mean, the amount of stuff I heard to say there's nothing wrong with you. I can tell you where it goes if you don't have a good foundation, a good support team. Help me understand my TBI. Help me understand my PTSD. I just spent 3 years in a foreign country doing things nobody even thinks of. Once I started building that foundation— I still— now mind you, I started at rock bottom, and there's no better place to start than at rock bottom. And I started building. Little bit by little bit. And I've been in this— when I, when I first met you, I was already several years into building my foundation, and you guys helped me build that next step, that next row of blocks, and I just kept on building, and I never quit.

So now when we talk about hiring and building these people up and not being on the team, if they don't meet standards. Can you give us a little bit of perspective on how you maintain those standards? Are you there with every single dog, or are you there every step of the way, or do you have some kind of checks and balances that you use to ensure that standard's always met?

So it's like training. This is where I use the dog training theory. You train until it's second nature. When it's second nature, that's the standard. You never drop below it. And okay, I mean, I don't want to make it short, but it is that short and easy. Uh, once you reach this certain point and you maintain it and you show the discipline to maintain it, I don't need to make sure you maintain it. You will, because that's who you are.

So if I understand you correctly, And this is AJ Vargas's way of understanding, right? I'm pretty simple when it comes to things. You want them to do really what their character is. You're not putting that character in them, they already have it. You're just giving them the direction on how to follow that road to the end. And because they have that character, it's easy for them to maintain those standards that you have.

Yes and no. You gotta have the never quit attitude. If you get a tough dog, it'll make you wanna quit. You work with a smart dog that outsmarts you, it makes you wonder what you're doing. Or if you're working with a dominant aggressive dog, if you do behavior mods and that dog is just right at the end and it, there's nothing on this dog's mind other than wanting to eat you. If you quit, you're not gonna make it. So just give it a treat, right? Yeah.

I mean, that's how you fix it, right? Your aggressive dogs, you just give them a treat and they fix themselves, right?

Well, there's, I'm not gonna answer that because there's so many ways. There's so many ways that cat can be skinned. We're not gonna touch on that. But, no, once I see someone keep trying and you get up against some difficult dogs and you keep going, I know you're gonna be there because you're wanting to improve yourself. The only way to be a better dog trainer is to work with harder dogs. If you only train pet dogs and that's all you ever go out on, that's all you'll ever know. You won't know how to work with dominant aggressive dogs. You won't know how to work with police dogs or hunting dogs or other different types.

Well, that's great that you brought it up cuz this is 2 outta 3 episodes where this has came up, where we talked about getting out of the box and stop training inside that box. I'll preface it with this. I mean, if that's your lane, then that's your lane, right? I get that. But sometimes we get caught up in just training in the box all the time. Not only does it not challenge us, but we also leave some dogs that really could use our expertise, and they end up in shelters, or they end up getting euthanized, or something of that nature, when somebody with the expertise, if they would just think outside the box to help this dog we could save a lot more dogs from being surrendered or other things, right? And so it, it's kind of refreshing to hear trainers that are in my circle thinking the same way and thinking like-minded, that we can think outside the box and accomplish goals that really truly help the owners and the dogs out, right?

Yeah, I mean, that, that is my goal. I want to help people with dogs. I don't care what kind of dog you got. I don't care how old it is. I don't care what it's been through. We're gonna work on this. We're gonna help you out. We're gonna help your dog out. And that comes from everything. We've worked with police departments. I've worked with some search and rescue people out here. If you got an issue with your dog, we'll help you out. We do have a specialty. We don't do it all. And there's been times where I flat out looked at 'em and said, CCU is your best bet. I'm, I'm not even gonna pull your leg. Just go down there and talk to them. And I know that is what I tell— what I tell people. A good leader knows when they've had too much, when to say no, I don't need to do that.

Well, it still goes back to that team mentality, right? Like, every part of your team, whether it's us helping you or you helping us, if you're better equipped to help a client or a dog, why would I take it and Being a true leader understands that, right? I turn it over to you and say, hey man, can you really help these people out? This is what they're looking for. And even though we could probably do it and fumble our way through, you're going to be the better fit for them. And that's a, that's a great realization to be at.

Yeah.

When you understand your limitations as well.

Yeah, I see it a lot. People don't know their limitations. We have to see what a dog's limitations is. So many dogs are capable of a lot of things, more than what we as humans think of, and we have to see their limitation. But then you see humans putting limitations on themselves, and they limit what they can do. Don't open your team up like what we're doing and get more in there, and you've got a bigger— that, that's kind of how our whole business is formed. It's not It, it is one team, but it's a bunch of little teams. We've got a dog groomer. We don't groom here on site, but she's part of our team. If one of our clients says, hey, I'm looking for a good groomer, hey, I've got a great member on my team. Hey, I'm looking for protection work, I got me another great person on my team. I don't need to do it all.

Yeah. Well, that, and that's gonna bring the validity and the trust back to our industry. That's also gonna give you that trust among your clients because they're gonna say, and that word will get out, well, you know, Kevin could have took us in, but instead he gave us to somebody else that could have done a better job for us. And that respect, that integrity will come back 4 or 5 times more for you, Kevin. And, and, and I know that I've seen it so many times, time and time again.

I mean, I'm gonna be real with you. If we could just all get on that page in the industry. You're laughing like that ain't possible.

Well, I talked about getting arrows shot at us on our last episode, and sometimes it bewilders me to see how many arrows that we think we have to shoot at each other in order to make a dollar or in order to downplay somebody else. I think everybody in our industry has a good fit somewhere in our industry. Right? Just like every dog does. That dog may not be the best dog for that family, but that dog does have a place with somebody.

Yep.

Just like every trainer, just like every breeder. But we find ourselves so many times pushing arrows at other people rather than just dealing with our stuff and perfecting it and trying to do the best for our clients. And yes, that is an episode for another time. However, it's kind of refreshing to hear it come up and everybody's seeing the same things, but we really do need to get on the same page because really the people that are gonna benefit are our clients, our dogs. And if we just share information, I promise you, Kevin, I can give you 45 clients and you're still not gonna take a single dollar from us because there's so much to go around.

There is. Yeah.

And, but yet we think that we have to steal a dollar from somebody else by downplaying them or shooting arrows at them. I just, I don't understand it. I can't get caught up in that mix. I stay out of it on purpose.

Mm-hmm.

Uh, because I just don't have time. I rather focus my time on, on spending time with great people like you, learning from other people, working on dogs or helping clients. That's really where I wanna spend my time. I don't have time to be on social media telling people how crappy they are. It's just not worth the time. Yeah. But I see it time and time and time and time and time again. I, I don't understand it.

It's a cutthroat industry and people don't get that. They're like, oh, I want to go in the dog industry. Oh, you better get ready cuz it's a cutthroat industry. And you know, they're the way I see the industry. You got the cutthroat people. And then you got the new edge. And we, I believe as a society in dog training, we are on the cutting edge of new stuff. All the old techniques are fading out. However, there's still a lot of old techniques being used and they're the cutthroat group. This front edge, they're like me and you, like, I don't want anything to do with that. No, y'all go over there and trash talk each other, tear each other apart. That's why society thinks dog training's a scam, in my opinion.

You know, one of the best things I've ever done in my entire career, and I did it when I was in law enforcement, I built a network and I hung around great people, people that I can learn from, people that would hold me accountable as well. And even today, I live by that same philosophy. If you're here for the betterment of dogs, the betterment of our industry, absolutely, let's hang out. That's trained, you know, even just having you on the show, you're another business. And people would say, well, why would you have a competing business on your show and promote them? Why not? Yeah, I mean, at the end of the day, that also— and, and I go back to an old story that I tell about when we first started our trainer program and training trainers. I had a training director at the time that came to me and said, okay, what are we not going to teach these students? And I was lost, truly lost. I said, what do you— what does that mean? What are you talking about? Well, we got to hold things back, right, and not give them all of our secrets. I said, what are you talking about? He goes, well, if we tell them what we do and teach them what we do here, then they're going to go out and take all of our business. And that's how people think. They really truly think that way. And I told that training director at the time, I said, hey, uh, you better not take anything out of our manual. You better not, not teach people to the fullest, not mentor them, and not help them. That's why you have a trainer program, is because we need to be there to mentor people, to help them grow, and allow them to learn from our mistakes, because that's what truly builds that legacy.

Yep.

And what better way to keep you on your toes than to teach somebody your secrets so that they push you to be more innovative, to be more, I guess, not stuck in those old techniques and the old way of doing things. Yeah. Where you're always constantly trying to come up with better ways to serve our industry. And we have to take that approach, but that's why people like yourself are gonna be great trainers and they're gonna leave a legacy. That far surpasses their lifetime because of that.

That is, that is the thing that we do. We take all of our mistakes and hand that on to someone and say, hey, don't do that. Because when you look at a client, if you look at pet owners, and you could take this in any category, you could take it just a pet owner, you could take it a ring dog, you could take it police dog, service dog, that's a team. And, and you got to build that team up. I'm giving that team everything I got. I've got X amount of mess-ups that you could learn from, from me just talking to you, and you've got X amount of mess-ups that you could tell me. And us two as dog trainers, we got a lot of experience. But when you look at that one team, you've got to get that team to their goals as quick as you can and eliminating as many mess-ups as possible. We have a whole program written out that we basically walk with every dog owner and we give them homework and we work through them. We're with our clients for several months and we hand them off to an education, what they know and can carry forward. So they can call their friends and say, no, no, no, Blue Cord taught us something different. We don't have to spray them in the face with lemon juice. We could do other techniques. So, and that's what we do is we, we're, we're educating. And the more we can get out there, if you want all my notes, take 'em. Great.

Yeah, absolutely. I, we're at some staggering numbers. We're in a multi-billion dollar industry. Mm-hmm. Right. It's only gonna grow and it's projected to grow. And I, forgive me, I forgot the percentages on the growth rate, but it's staggering.

It is.

People care about their dogs.

I was just looking at it the other day. I think it's 35 to 45% in the next 3 to 5 years. Yeah, yeah, that's a lot when you're talking a multi-million dollar industry. And it's— we've been growing. Look at the history of it. The dog industry has been growing, but we're not growing with the old ways. It's just like as personal growth, if you never leave your comfort zone, if you never do anything different, you'll never be anything that you already are. You want to grow, you want to be different, you got to step out. We got to change the dog industry.

Yeah, absolutely. So that leads me into my next question for you, and this is from your perspective. Throughout the time that you've been in this industry, how have you seen the industry change and where do you see it heading?

Absolutely. So we've been with the old methods and we've got this new group doing new methods, and that's where I, I separate those two, the, the, the cutting edge and the, the cutthroat. I think it's going into more handler educating. I'm seeing a lot of companies starting up the train the trainer programs. That's what a lot of them are calling it. Train the trainers. We, we are just handler educators. That's the name we picked. I honestly, I picked it. I said, that sounds good. Let's go with it. Train the trainers. There's a lot of people that are doing that. Some people don't wanna see themselves as a trainer, although You just own Fluffy and you want to go to the ring. You are a trainer. Every day you're with that dog. Every time you're in a new environment with that dog, you are the trainer. So handler educator, train the trainer. I think that's where we're going. And I honestly agree. I think that's where we should go. Dog trainers are needed. Don't get me wrong. We do bring dogs in kennel. We do have to work dogs with just our staff before we introduce the handler back to them. There are those times, but the dog trainers where you go and drop your dog off for a couple months, especially this was my favorite story. No, Fido got training. He was 4 months old. I dropped him off for an 8-week program. We paid $5,000 and he still isn't doing what we want him to do. And if you just look at puppy development, I go, well, what'd you expect? But I, I'm not that rude because I know society's not educated like that. That handler has no idea that those 2 months that that dog was in kennel, nothing got done. Sure, the trainer showed a lot of great videos, but what happens 2 months after that when you talk puppy development? What happens 6 months after that training program's complete? So those old methods, what I call the old methods, the dog trainers, those I think is what is going to slip out. And this train the trainer is going to be the new thing. 'Cause honestly, it's, it's what we need. You need to know what you're doing with your dog.

I love it. Well, there's no better way to, to curb behavior or maintain behavior than consistency, right? We know that if we educate owners that we stay consistent with our dogs, dogs will adjust because they want to live in the most advantageous way possible. Which they don't want conflict, they don't want heartache per se. They want to fall in that groove. But where we fall into a lot of issues is where we don't stay consistent and the dogs don't understand. Well, yesterday you told me I can't get on the couch, but today I can. And they don't understand that variance, right? And you give them an inch, they're gonna take a mile, at least some dogs. And So that handler education is so vital in teaching that and maintaining, at least even if you're going to modify behaviors or change them, then somebody has to carry those behaviors on because if not, those habits will come back and you'll be in the same groove and the same place you started before you hired that dog trainer. Right. That's great to hear. I'm going to keep an eye out for that change in our industry and that, and that, I guess that curve that's taken that left turn going towards that handler education? Because I, I like to hear that. I think that's for anybody that's going to come into the industry or stepping foot into the industry, then from your words, they should be focusing on building programs to teach handlers and teach owners how to handle those dogs or how to maintain them, if you will.

Yep. It's, it's gotta be handler education. That's, and here, here's the thing I'll put, put out there too, that we can't just have one program fit all. Right before we sat down for this podcast, I went to one of our clients. He was one of the service dogs that we donated. He got into a motorcycle accident. His wife was in Germany. So 2 days after his wife got to Germany, he got in a motorcycle accident. Now, this dog was a well-trained dog. People coming in and out, feeding it, trying to take it to the hospital because he was laid up in the hospital while wife couldn't come home from Germany. Now, you can't just sit and talk about something and then go handle that situation. You have to know what's going on with that dog and what's happening. And that it came to— I had to do nothing with the dog. I just had to educate the handlers today on what the next couple months are gonna look like because of what it looked like in the dog's eyes these last few months. To us humans, we see it easy, but it's not the way the canine sees it. So I've seen two companies in the last couple months change, do more train-the-trainer programs, and it, it makes me happy every time I see a company offering that.

Good.

That's what we need.

That's great. That's great to hear. I love to see the trends and obviously in business we want to see trends early so that we can capitalize on those trends because we can find ourselves outdated and not keeping up with the times if we're not careful. And really, I guess migrating with our clientele because that's who we're here to serve ultimately. And if we can pick those trends out early and kind of forecast those and having meetings like this. Maybe it's something that we need to do more of, is have masterminds in our industry. And I think it'll benefit the majority of us to, to see those forecasts and really to keep us at the top of our game, because businesses are failing. And as business owners, you have employees. We talked about those employees, they depend on you. And as a business owner, you can't wholly focus on dog training, right?

No, no, there's so much more. There's so— I wish I could just focus on dog training. What did Fido do today? But no, there's so much more as a business owner.

Yeah. So staying up on training, that's why I wanted to push that out to our listeners, is staying up and on top of trends by talking to other trainers. What are you seeing in your region? What are you seeing coming up? Uh, that gives me a little bit of light and something to think about with my team. Hey guys, this is what Kevin said. Let's look into this, um, and, and see if we need to pivot on some things, uh, to help us to grow a little bit or help us to at least stay, uh, where we're at and move forward, right? So that, that's great advice to give us, Kevin. And, uh, I'm definitely gonna look back in 3 years and go, I remember when Kevin told us this is what was gonna happen. And, uh, I'm gonna give you full credit for it.

Well, I appreciate that, but it takes everybody to do it. So you get it. It's funny you mentioned the mastermind because that's what I feel like with our business. I'm just the mastermind at making all this, putting this all together. It takes my team to run it. I could not do this alone. Um, I, I am just a face of the company, so to say, because everybody in my team is— what, even you You're part of our team, the, the dog groomer, everybody that we have, whether it's internal within Blue Core Canine or Inner Circle. That's what I think is going to change it. We need to keep that consistency, like you said, and just go with it. It will change just like a dog's behavior. Human behavior's no different in my opinion.

Yeah, absolutely. So I wanna end on one last question for you. Because obviously you deal with a lot of dogs, and between you and your team and the many years of experience you have, tell us your toughest dog challenge and how did you fix that, or how did you work through it?

So are we talking dog alone or dog and handler team?

Uh, hey, that's your choice.

That's my choice. Okay, well, toughest dog was the diagnosis, was figuring out the dog's personality, what it was going through, what it was dealing with in the current environment. Figuring that dog out. The diagnosis is the hardest on difficult dogs, in my opinion. Once I have that figured out, the rest of it just comes together. It's an A/B option kind of in my head. but I gotta figure out that diagnosis first. And I've had some tough ones. Um, not many, most of 'em are just ill-mannered dogs, but some of the tough ones, it was figuring out who that dog is and what it needed. Uh, you mentioned about, there was a dog, it made, it made, it reminded me of Atlas. Atlas was in the wrong home and this dog owner just wanted the best for it. It would do anything and it would pay that much. And, and the answer was not to be in that home. And, you know, because once we figured out what was wrong with that dog and we found out through thousands of questions that it was fear aggressive and treated for dominance aggressive, and then it was shut down and into learned helplessness and it just sat there and shivered. Once I figured that out before we even did anything with the dog, the rest of it was easy. And now we get updates that just It makes the whole team smile.

Yeah, that's, that's remarkable and really gives you chills when you get those kind of stories and that feedback after you see a dog that has went through that type of period and has blossomed, right?

Yeah. But the tough part was that diagnosis. That's, that's where I let my anxiety lie. Like, man, if I do this wrong, what am I gonna do? Because if you do it wrong, you could hurt the dog, you could hurt the handler. You make one call, you could get someone bit. That's what people don't understand when you're trying to face, you know, the, the old way of asserting dominance and doing that, that don't work when you're dealing with some of these dogs. So figuring out what is this dog saying, but it's what they talk about.

We talk about handler education and we've had a case here recently was kind of the same way. And it dealt with socialization, but for the life of us, we could not get the owner to understand that not every dog, especially your past dogs, are the same as your current dogs. And there's a lot of things you can do, and you can read on the internet that you can do to try to fix problems, but there's a lot of things that you can do that are going to make them a lot worse. And as trainers, we have to be careful of that as well. And we much rather not make a dog worse than to do things that will absolutely make 'em worse just for the sake of pleasing an owner. And we just won't do that.

No, we, we are the same. We'll flat out tell 'em this dog don't belong with you. This is not okay. And yeah, no, 90, 99% of the time because there is that 1%. They work with us, we work with them, and we get that dog into the right place. Um, there's those few that are, no, they want it, this is it, and we say, I need you to understand this, and good luck.

Yeah, yeah, the, the infamous, well, so-and-so said they can do it, all right, well, let them have it, and they could probably do it cheaper, correct? Yep, absolutely.

Yep, go have fun.

Well, you know, there's a couple things that I want to make a point of since you brought them up. And, you know, because you guys specialize in service dogs and dogs that really serve others and helping others. But, you know, a major part of that is, is you also helping those owners. So I know you guys are impacting the dog's life, right? You're training the dog and all that. But I also absolutely 100% know that you're also impacting the owners, right? You came to training with us, but we know the impact that we have or can have on a student as well in their life moving forward. And you mentioned and touched a little bit on that, uh, as you mentioned, you know, the start of your career and how we kind of impacted that. And that doesn't go remiss for us, but I want to throw out a couple stats that, um, the voice of reason gave me. Uh, first and foremost, um, do you realize that less than 1% of individuals that need service dogs actually get them?

I was one.

Yep, that's crazy, right? And knowing that you had to wait 3 years trying to get a dog, uh, a dog that you absolutely needed. Yeah. And less than 1% of individuals actually receive a service dog. That's, that's remarkable. Uh, let me give you another one. Veterans with service dogs have shown significantly that their symptoms have been reduced by that service dog when they have PTSD compared to those that don't have service dogs. So we know the impact of those service dogs on people with PTSD. And the dramatic impact that they have on their lives. And I'm sure you can attest to that, right?

Yeah. Yeah. That's— that is our focus, our main in the service dogs, psychiatric service dogs. And we have watched— when you say change people's lives, we could do a podcast on it alone. These stories that I have from little girls in wheelchairs to veterans that can't leave their house, to law enforcement officers. Yeah, the amount of lives we change with the service dog. That's why I say the capabilities of canines amongst our humans is amazing.

Yeah, those are the intangible, right? We want to see— people want to see something. What does the dog do? But what about those intangibles where it's the comfort that the dog gives, the, the reassurance that the dog gives? Absolutely amazing, right? Those are the intangibles.

Yeah. There, there's a lot that happens that people don't see. And I personally, I personally feel that because being 100% disabled, having internal wounds that nobody sees, what they see is someone who's in good shape, has all their limbs and goes, why are you disabled? Why do you have handicap tags? Because what they don't see is that my back is going out and I can't hardly bend over. And my dog that picks things up when I drop it helps me a great deal. Or when I do bend over and it hurts to stand back up, I could call my dog and say a command. And that dog's in position where it helps me stand up. I don't need a cane. Yeah, it's amazing what they can do. And when people look at it and go, why do you have a service dog? I feel that one personally. I'm going to do a video one day about it because it's everywhere. The people coming up to you just because you look okay and they're like, oh my God, that's a nice dog. Wow, can I pet your dog? Would you do that to somebody in a wheelchair? And you go up to them and say, man, that's a nice wheelchair, can I sit in that? I want to see how comfy it is.

But there's only certain people that do that, and I can't mention it on this podcast, but we have a joke at the facility about that. So, uh, Maya's laughing because she knows what we talk about, but I know exactly what you're talking about. That person that always comes up even though it's placarded everywhere don't pet my dog, or don't, you know, dog's working and they're the first ones that want to put their face in your dog's face or pet your dog or come close to you and all these other things. So I'm feeling what you're putting down right now. Yeah. Uh, two more stats real quick. 20 to 30% of veterans, man, have— are estimated right now to have PTSD, man, with only Think about that with only 1% of people getting service dogs. You're serving an industry that's— that is absolutely in need right now, like 100%. And, uh, these numbers are staggering to me. Now, um, I'll bring up the be— the, the worst side of this, and I know you've probably suffered loss with people that were in your unit or people that you knew. There's not very many veterans today that don't know somebody that has perished to suicide. And, and I think back to being in law enforcement, man, and, and I'll share a story with you, uh, in relationship to this. Um, I could never understand how somebody could come to that point of suicide. Like, cognitively, I couldn't understand that. We're in an industry, meaning law enforcement or military, where we are conditioned to not show emotion. We are conditioned to fight through anything and everything, right? We are men on top of that, which also we have been conditioned to do whatever it takes to support our family, and we cannot show weakness. We are the epitome of Type A personality, and we cannot show emotion. And so for a very long time, I could not understand why people in law enforcement could come to that conclusion of suicide until it happened to a good friend of mine. And his name was James Bond. We called him Daddy Bohog because he was about 5'5" but was— or somebody knew getting into law enforcement. I knew him for many years. I went and watched his kids play baseball, and he loved his kids and he loved his family. And to find out that he committed suicide, really, like, like, it was so overwhelming for me to see that because of who he was. He wasn't some meek, weak person. He was like somebody that I looked up to in law enforcement, somebody that I wanted and I aspired to be because of his stature. But yet his personality and his strong emotions just really— it was just hard for me to believe that. But then after talking with, uh, people that, um, have came to that point in their life where they just feel like there's no way out And to see these numbers with over 50% or higher rate of suicide, greater for those that are in military or law enforcement than the normal person, or the civilian, I'll say, is just staggering. And so I say all that to say this, man, you know, as we bring this thing down to a conclusion and you servicing that industry where you're really truly helping people that need dogs for that purpose. What more can people do to help with getting dogs in these people's hands?

Make it affordable. Number one, I was personally there myself. I know what it takes to train a dog. We've gotta find a way, and that is what I specialize in. That's where my heart is. We've got Blue Corps K-9, but we got why I wake up every day. And I mean, you touched the subject, you opened it. I was there. I was at the bottom of the barrel. I contemplated ending life many, many times. And when I realized I couldn't, that's not who I was, that I had some other reason, then I started building up, and which is where I am today. And I still have friends that struggle. I've lost several. I could pretty much count almost every year I lose one. And I created a shirt, and it, it kind of went on. I'm gonna share a picture with you here. Uh, let's see if I can get the lighting out of it.

In my darkest hour, I reached for a hand and found a paw. That's awesome, man.

Now that, that's my Jekyll. He's my first service dog. He retired a couple months ago. He brought me through some dark times, and now I have all four limbs. I look good. I made it home, right? I should be good. But I wasn't.

Yeah.

And he brought me through it. I know what he did for me. He got me going out of the house. He got me learning what love is. And that's where you said we're conditioned— what we're conditioned to do is box up our heart, put it on a shelf, label it, and never touch it again. Well, at some point that shelf's gonna fall over, and that's when you deal with everything. That's when your heart gets exposed to it all, all the traumas that you've been through. And that's typically what, in my opinion, is where it goes. I didn't want to deal with anything. I didn't want to face everything that I've been through in my life. Death was easier. But then my dog kept pawing at me, kept bugging me. You know, I've got a friend that the only reason he's alive today is as he was holding his.45, his dog came up, set his chin right on top of the gun, and he said, you know what, I can't do this, my dog will die and I don't want it to suffer.

Yeah.

And he's still here today doing better. But yeah, it's something that we do. So that's where my heart is, is touching that industry. How can I help more? Take my stuff, go help more people. But To make it affordable, it takes many hours to train service dogs. We're with our service dog clients well over a year. We walk with them, but you know, when they call us or when I'm standing outside of PetSmart, this was just the other day, standing out there with the client and she's crying because she's trying to get her anxiety under control. I'm no longer training the dog. I'm helping her work her anxiety. And working those thresholds. And that was what that whole session was about. It wasn't the dog. The dog was good. And that, that's part of what we do is say, hey, I used to not come out of the house. I used to go to Walmart at 2 in the morning. I had bad photosensitivity from my TBI, so I wore sunglasses at 2 in the morning at Walmart. And you can only imagine what that brought in today's society. So my dog helped me a lot. Now, my first dog, He had his rules and his job. My second dog, Pearl, which you'll see— you see with me with her more often now, she's bringing me to new places. I didn't want to go there, but she's taking me there, and it's amazing. It's a fun ride. And that's what I see with every service dog team that I place with our veterans. That I, I got a veteran in Pennsylvania, wouldn't leave the house. His wife said, I just wish he would go with us. I just got pictures of the Halloween or, uh, Thanksgiving pictures where they're out in the hay and all that, and they're outside the house and they all got smiles on, and there's Arlo. There he is in the picture. Now, you know, you can't put a price tag on that, and that's what we need more of.

But how? Yeah, that's where these masterminds come in. I think the greatest is how do we service more people that need what what you have, right? Um, because of how much time it takes to train a service dog, how much time it takes to help an owner that can't leave the house at the current moment, you know, can't be around crowds, can't do a number of things that we would take for granted that's easy. And how do we, how do we come up to get at least one more dog in one more person's hand than we did last year. Um, obviously your company, your contact information is going to be in the show notes. Why don't you give everybody your contact information? Make sure you spell it out, that way they know how to get a hold of you. And, you know, it may be somebody that wants to donate a dog to a veteran. It may be somebody that wants to help support your program in a way that is not necessarily getting a dog.

We are limited on what we can do, but I will never say no to an opportunity as it presents itself. I will hear you out. We cannot help everyone. So we are limited, but yes, please do contact us. Uh, Blue Cord K9 LLC is the business name. You can find us on Facebook and Instagram. We do have a website, www.bluecordk9.com. B-L-U-E-C-O-R-D-K-9.com. And our email is bluecordk9@gmail.com, spelled the same way. And the phone number, 910-797-8858.

Well, I'm going to end the show like I do with every other show so far, and I'm gonna give 3 takeaways that I got from you. Okay, that I think that others can take away. And the first thing is, is— and you said this at the very beginning of the show— we, those that are listening, we decide where we go in our life. We have control over that to some extent. We can sit in our dark rooms, we can sit in the corner and suck our thumbs and make excuses, but at the end of the day, we control where we go in our life. And I think you came to that realization and it took you to where you're at right now. And now having the opportunity to help others is where that attitude took you, knowing that you control where your life is going. And that's something that I think can inspire each of us, knowing that and just keeping that with us and repeating that. We decide where we go in our life.

Every choice you make Yeah.

Now, for those that are in our industry, and those, or those that are, may, that may want to get into our industry, or maybe those young trainers, you said something else that was profound, and that was specialize and be the best you can be in that area of specialty versus trying to do everything. Some things are not meant for us, right? There's certain people I can't train. There are certain dogs that I might not be well with, right? But at the end of the day, if we can specialize in something and be great at that, it'll take you a lot further than failing and being mediocre on everything else.

Yeah.

All right. And then the last takeaway that I took from you was the fact that we can all have perspectives in our industry. Right? But where you are seeing our industry go and where you really want to see us go is for us to sit as trainers across the table from each other and learn from each other. Education for handlers and for trainers is paramount. And from Kevin Watts, you want to see our industry be at a point to where we can help each other out, where we don't have to bash each other, where we can really point people to the best opportunity to help them. And it may be somebody in their industry. So keep your network close and don't be scared to lose money over the fact of helping somebody find a better service or someone else that can help them. In their area just for the mere fact that you want that business. So those are 3 things that I think are profound that we can take from this short talk. And, and I'm sure we'll have you on the show again talking about some other stuff.

I'd love to go in.

Those 3 things I think hit home for me, and I think those that are listening can really learn from those 3 things if we keep 'em close. I appreciate you, Kevin.

Well, thank you very much for inviting me onto the podcast, and I have definitely enjoyed it, and I look forward to talking with you more.

Hey man, I am too. Guys, you've hit source with this podcast. Everything working dog from business to training. We are releasing, just so everybody knows, a midweek, what we're calling a short set. It's gonna be a 10 to 15 minute training perspective. Podcast that we're going to release midweek, just to give you that short set that you need in the middle of the week to try to help inspire some training as well. I appreciate you, Kevin. Keep it up, man.

Look forward to it. Have a good one.