30 Years of Business Lessons in 57 Minutes

September of 2012, we had a fire and we lost everything straight to the ground, straight to the ground, lost every single thing we had. And I was done. I was like, here's your sign, we're done. And I got a strong wife and she said, are you done? And I said, what do you mean, am I done? She said, are you done pouting? Are you done feeling sorry for yourself? And I said, well, not just yet. She said, well, get that way in a hurry 'cause we got stuff to do. If I say it, do it. If you don't have your word, you have nothing. You are morally, ethically corrupt if you don't follow through with what you say.

Today's episode is with Damon Albus. Damon has been running a business called 5D Custom Hats and Leather here in the Abilene, Texas area. He's been running it for 30 years. There are so many golden nuggets of wisdom and crazy stories. He literally made it through his entire business burning up in flames. So I hope you enjoyed today's episode as much as I did. Let's get into it. Today's episode is sponsored by Empire Management Group. Whether you're a business owner looking to improve employee benefits, strengthen your insurance coverage, grow your sales, develop your leadership team, or build long-term wealth, Empire Management Group provides practical solutions all under one roof. That's right. Their team helps businesses attract and retain top talent, improve operations, and create sustainable growth. Plus, through premier partnerships like Aflac, they offer career opportunities for individuals looking to make an impact in their community. Learn more at empire-management-group.com. Let's get to the episode. All right, so we'll just start. What the heck kind of stuff are you involved in?

Oh wow.

Because I know you— we just met.

Yeah.

And so I already know you're a professional radio host.

Wow, that's, you know, professional.

Is that your preferred title?

No, no, you know, I don't really— and people ask that, you know, what, what your title, what are— well, let's see, I'm a, uh, a hatter. I've been doing leather work and folks want to say, oh, you're an artist. No, I think artists are people that are like stuff in museums and stuff like that. No, I'm just a, a maker. Mm-hmm. I make leather stuff. So there, I've had a radio show for a good many years. And as I'd said, I'm on a little sabbatical from that just because it takes so much time. But the main thing that I'm the proudest of is I think I'm a fairly decent dad, but I'm one hell of a grandpa. And that's what I'm the most proud of, is that I've raised some really, really cool kids and some phenomenal, spoiled rotten grandbabies. And, uh, and we're working real hard to keep them that way.

Yeah. How many kids do you have?

I've got 3 kids. I got a Delaney, Dally, and Dash.

Okay.

And then I got 3 grandbabies, Paisley, Waylon, and Kenley.

Wow.

And that Kenley is a mess. She hits the door and beelines straight to Pop. Gotta give me a hug and a kiss. And she'll say, Pop, can I borrow your iPad? And I'll say, baby, it cost you a dollar. She'll come up, she'll give me a big old hug, and she'll say, paid.

Dang.

Oh, she's got me wrapped around her finger.

I love it. Are any of them involved in your business?

Every day.

How many? All of them?

So Delaney works for me, okay? She's full-time there. She is my, uh, uh, social media guru and, uh, kind of jack of all, master of none around the shop. She's receptionist, she takes care of the, the email, she makes the sweatbands. She does some embroidery stuff for us. I mean, she's just all over the place. Mm-hmm. And then Dally, uh, Dally worked for me for a good while, but now she, she teaches dance and does eyelashes, uh, and then she comes around, what have you. And then my, my baby boy is a professional baseball player, and so he's gone 7 months out of the year, and he just barely got home And day one, uh, he come in the back door of the shop and he said, all right, give me something to do. Well, there's a belt, knock it out right quick. So he sat down and knocked it out, and he is so good, he's so stinking talented, but it is absolutely not his niche. He can be in the best mood ever and he'll hit that back door of that shop, and when he comes in, it's like— Oh, it's like a different person. Totally different person. He just— I'm not gonna say hates it, but it's not his deal. Yeah, he don't like it. He don't want to do it. And I get it. My dad sold farm equipment. Okay, I didn't want to play in the dirt. I get it. Not his deal. Uh, but they've all got, uh, their own little niche in the business.

I love it.

And they'll all wind up with it someday, so they, they better take an interest in it. My son-in-law, Delaney's husband, the oldest husband, he's, he's been working for me for, gosh, 10, 11 years now. And don't tell him, but I don't— I, I couldn't get everything done that I do without him.

Yeah.

But I don't want him to know that. Okay, so don't Don't tell me.

Just bleep it out.

Yeah, bleep, edit that part out.

So how has it been working with family? Because I've heard some crazy stories whenever family members are involved in the same business. How has that been? Has it strained relationships? Has it made them better?

Like— Well, what time is it? What time? Because it— I mean, literally, you'll come in And you'll have a personal problem that bleeds over to work, and you either— you either sulk up or get over it. But I'm gonna have to see you for the next 8 hours. You're here, you're locked in. Yeah. Either that or walk off. Okay, so it tends to heal things a lot faster.

Yeah.

Either heals them or gets them worse. And thank goodness that I've been in a spot where it heals them up a lot faster. Because we do have to work together. And I think everyone knows big picture what we're trying to get done and trying to get accomplished. So either soul up and big on— put on your big boy pants and go to work and leave all that other stuff, you know, at the door, or let it sit there and fester and fester and pus up. And, and then you got a heck of a mess on your hands.

Yeah.

But I've worked with my wife, uh, you know, we're going on 30 years. Hmm. And she's there every day, all day. She helps out also. She takes care of the books. She boxes the hats that we ship off, and she labels, and she's, you know, the, the office kind of stuff. She don't want anything to do with the front of the shop. She says, I'm not, you know, the people person deal. And okay, once again, everyone kind of learns their niche and learns to stay in their lane. And make it all work and bring it together and great.

Yeah.

And you can ask her the same thing too, is what is your job? And she's going to say, I'm Grandma, I'm Lolly.

I love it.

And that's, that's kind of where our huge focus is. And

that's awesome. Yeah, I mean, we have a 1-year-old daughter in my life. So we're just getting started.

Yeah.

And we, even with one child, we could not do it without her grandparents.

Oh, without a doubt.

Her parents.

Sure.

So that's a cool title.

Absolutely.

Honorable title. How long have y'all been in business?

Starting 2, 3 months, we'll start our 30th year.

30 years.

Did you start it? Established in '97.

And you started it?

Absolutely, you bet.

What made you want to start?

Well, as I jokingly say— not jokingly say— uh, I worked for the state, and you can only do that for so long before you just want to run headfirst into a brick wall. Um, I started doing leather work when I was in college. I was rodeoing, and, uh, I quite frankly, wasn't really that good at it. So I needed some way to help pay for entry fees and beer money afterwards and what have you. So I started doing leather work, wallets, belts, you know, smaller type stuff, and throw them in the rigging bag and go to the rodeo and sell them wherever I was. And in Abilene, we had 2 hat shops my whole life growing up. Get out of school, come back. I was a parole officer. Okay, so, and I thought the law enforcement end of it is where I wanted to go and what I wanted to do. And, uh, man, there was just something about that hat shop deal. We had 2 and then we had none. And I always thought, man, the hats and leather, that'd be a pretty cool combination. I already knew the leather end of it. Yeah. You don't ever truly know all of it, but I knew enough of it that I was staying busy in my in my laundry room at my house every evening, that, hey, that'd be a pretty cool combination. And called a fella in Lubbock one day and, and just asked him, said, hey, I'm in Abilene, you're 2 and a half hours away. I'm thinking about opening a hat shop. Man, this old man talked dirty to me. He was just nasty. Why would I tell you anything? Yeah. You're just gonna take my customers and I ain't gonna tell you nothing. And then he made the fatal mistake and said, well, you come buy me out and I'll tell you anything you need to know. Hmm. I said, are you serious? Because I'm— my attitude completely changed. Well, uh, well, young man, well, absolutely. Yeah, I'd love to talk to you and I'll tell you anything you need to know. So that next morning at 9 o'clock, I was standing in his doorway in Lubbock. Looked around, you know, saw what everything was doing. We made an agreement right then that if he stayed on, or if he let me come and he stayed long enough to apprentice me, show me what to do, how to do, that I would buy him out. And so I had a buddy that was living up the road a good bit, and so I went and stayed with he and his wife and, uh, went to the hat shop and kind of learned the trade. And then eventually we bought him out. Hired him back to, uh, apprentice me longer. And then once I, once I kind of felt like, yeah, I've got a good grasp on it, man, I loaded up my toys and come back to Abilene because Abilene's home.

So what did you, what did you do with the Lubbock spot?

Yeah, we shut it down.

Okay.

So we just picked up everything and come here. And in hindsight, there was another guy that was chomping at the bits to open a shop there in Lubbock. And so I just kind of conceded and said, okay, I'm out of here. I don't want nothing to do with this. Don't want to live here. In hindsight, man, I should have kept a little something there and then just kind of branched out here. But the thought of opening a business and being at 2 places at the same time, uh,

yeah,

it just, it was beyond my energy. Yeah. At that time, I also thought the same thing. I went to school in Stephenville. What an ideal location for one. And my thoughts were, is to open a branch of 5D in, in Stephenville. And then had another fella jump in, James Andre. He's a great guy and I'm super proud for him. But he opened up Capital Hats there in Stephenville and he's doing great guns. But I always thought, man, that'd be a great location. You know, to put— even if it's just a place to come drop off hats, you know, have some there. But then you've got to find that person, which is the whole big deal in business, is finding that person.

Yeah.

That can do a mini-me, if you would, you know, that can do everything and that you would trust with the money and trust to do things the way that you would want to do it, a reflection of you.

And so that's difficult. Have you found anybody like that?

Yeah, but they're right here in Abilene. It's my son-in-law. You know, he's the closest I've got to that. And it's taken— it's taken 10 years to get to that point.

Yeah.

You know, I'm sure they're out there. I know they're out there. But in my world, we can only afford to pay so much.

Yeah.

Because we're not doing big multimillion-dollar something-something where I can pay really, really great salaries to find that person or to get that person, you know, to come to work.

Yeah. So how old were you whenever you bought out the one in Lubbock?

Was I 27?

Okay. So you're 27 years old. How in the world did you buy out a company?

Well, just a lot of grit and determination. Yeah. Buying the business I didn't buy a bunch of blue sky. I basically bought equipment, uh, the knowledge. I paid extra, you know, for the knowledge, the training, the this, that, and the other. But I mean, I was a $75,000 buy-in.

Yeah.

And it took years to pay that off, but I had a really good banker at that time that said, yeah, we'll do it. Saw the validity in it.

Yep.

And, uh, Saw the hard work hustle and put up the house for collateral and it was—

Got creative with it a little bit.

Yeah, but it's worked and we're 30 years later, here we are.

Would you do that again if you had to do it all over?

Do it all over? I would do so many things different. I would invest in Apple. I would buy this land that I passed up on because it was $1,200 an acre. You're out of your rabbit mind.

Now it's $20,000 probably. Exactly.

Oh, the things that I've— the things that I could go back and tell my younger self to do, but to do it all over again, absolutely. I have always said the day I get up and have to go to work, I'm done. I will lock that front door and I won't go back in. And in 30 years, I get to go to work. Hmm. I just— I love it. I love the people. I still do things on a handshake. Instead of a contract. I don't need no lawyers involved. And that's the type people I like dealing with, is a fella comes in and says, hey, I need this hat, or I want this leather product, or I want this. And I said, absolutely. I write up the order. If it's truly real personalized, I'll take a small deposit. And not— in 30 years, I have found that that's, that's not for me. Okay. That's just so he's got a little skin in the game and to make sure he comes back and fulfills his end of the obligation. But it's a minute amount. But yeah, the people I get to deal with on a daily basis, we get to shoot around, sit around and shoot the bull and, and tell stories and Yeah. To me, it's like recess at school, you know, all day long. That's awesome. And then, oh yeah, we gotta do a little homework when it's done, you know? Yeah. But it is what it is and we've been so blessed by it.

So what do you think the secret is to staying open for 30 years?

If I say it,

it won't be a secret anymore.

But if I say it, Oh, do it. Yeah. Your word. Your word. If you don't have your word, you have nothing.

Yeah.

You are morally, ethically corrupt if you don't follow through with what you say. And

you know what's crazy? I hear that all the time of people who come to us. Like, it doesn't matter. Like, there's been a lot of companies come through Adeline that kind of do what we do. And most of the time they're like, the bar, excuse me, the bar is so low within our industry, my industry here. It's like, as long as you deliver on what you say, like, are you going to get 4 videos this month? Then you're getting 4 videos this month. That's happened so much to where people have become numb to it and they're like, okay, we're going to pay you, but we're really not expecting you to actually do what you're going to say, which is sad to me. Yeah. I don't know how people do business that way. Maybe that's why they're out of business now. But I see that all the time and it goes for any industry.

And I've got a wonderful wife, absolutely wonderful wife that, that don't mind sleeping alone a lot of times. If I got a deadline coming, there's going to be an all-nighter involved.

Yeah.

Well, why? I mean, it's only X amount of dollars. The dollars are completely irrelevant. Totally irrelevant, but I told that person I was going to have it done.

Yeah.

And it was my fault that I didn't get done sooner because I was jacking around doing something else, or I let another priority take me away from that, or something else popped up that had a shorter deadline. But if I say I'm going to do it, it's going to be done.

Yeah.

And Then, oh heck, that timeline come up, well, get after it. And I'm only as good as the product I turn out. Yeah. And so many times I scratched it and went back on the, you know, on the deadline hour and said, yeah, it wasn't worthy of my brand on it.

Yeah.

And we're going to redo it.

So do you still spend a lot of time making most of the things or—

Everything.

Okay, what kind of stuff do you make?

Well, okay, in the, in the hat department, we make all the felt hats. We sell straw hats, okay, and we'll get them in from different manufacturers because that's a whole nother niche, you know, is the straw hats. So we'll get them and we'll sell them in the summertime, spring and summertime. But the felt hats We make them straight from the raw body, color, size, quality, uh, to fit the person's head. I got a very long oval head, I got a real round head. Hey, whatever. We make that custom for that person. Yeah. As far as the leather work goes, I say I make everything short of a saddle. And so, uh, I say bring in your custom ideas. We do a ton. Wallets, belts, notebooks, uh, briefcases, travel bags, shaving kits, a lot of that type stuff. Yeah. As I said, this may be the smaller end of it. We got some really awesome saddle makers out there that don't necessarily like doing the small stuff, and I like doing the small stuff and leave the saddle making to them.

Yeah.

There's stages whenever you're making a saddle that once you get started, you got to finish it. The leather is wet, the leather is cased, it's at this point, you got to keep going. Well, in my world, when that doorbell goes off or the phone goes off, I kind of got to quit what I'm doing and go take care of a customer and then come back to it. So it wouldn't be real conducive for me to do the, the saddle end of it. So I just say, I'll just do everything that the saddle makers don't want to do. So we kind of You know, bounce off of each other there.

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Has there ever been a moment? Because I know every entrepreneur or business owner goes through it.

Absolutely. Whatever the question is, there has been that moment you're going to ask in owning a business.

I agree. Go ahead. I agree.

I'll let you finish now.

Has there been a moment— and I'm setting you up here— has there ever been a moment where you thought you were gonna have to close your doors for good?

Oh, September of 2012. Yeah, September 2012, we had a fire and we lost everything straight to the ground. Straight to the ground. Lost every single thing we had. And I was done. I was like, here's your sign. We're done. And I got a strong wife, and she said, are you done? And I said, what do you mean, am I done? She said, are you done pouting? Are you done feeling sorry for yourself? And I said, well, not just yet. She said, well, get that way in a hurry because we got stuff to do. Yeah. Get this sucker back going. We got way too many customers. We got way too many people that I'm not a depend-on kind of deal, but, but want you and need you.

Yeah.

You know, so I was like, well, okay, let's go. Fantastic people. And the things that I learned from the biggest tragedy, uh, that we thought was the biggest tragedy in our life at that time, the things we've learned from it later on, if you'll let yourself stop and reflect back Holy cow, there's some phenomenal people out there. Holy smokes, the people that stepped up and said, hey, whatever you want, whatever, however you need. Darren Black, I can't thank him enough. He is a freaking rock in my world. Mm-hmm. Okay, he comes up and he says, hey, you don't worry about nowhere to go. He is fighting the fire, literally fighting the fire. Steps off the ladder truck, comes, gets right in my face and said, don't you worry about nothing. I got a building over on Oak Street. It's got retail spot in the front. You got workspace in the back. It's yours as long as you need it.

Wow.

As long as you need it. And I'm like, oh, of course my mind is just going bonkers at this time. My whole life is, you know, going up in flames literally right in front of me. And a couple days later, I called him and I said, were you serious? And he said, when do you want to meet me over there? Let's go. I said, well, what about now? He said, I'm headed that way. We went and looked at the building. He walked in the front. Is this something that you could get by with until you find another place to go, or is this— And I'm just like, dude, are there people like— are you for real? I mean, I'm wanting to pinch him. I'm like, you're wanting to give me a place? For nothing. No rent, no nothing. Get back on your feet. Get going. He walks out front. He grabs the for sale sign out of the front, right in front of me, picks up the phone, calls the realtor and says, hey, my building on Oak Street, take it off the market. I'll call you when it— when we're going to put it back on.

Wow.

Like, wow. So he He was one of the main ones, the most instrumental in putting us back into business because he gave us a home. And then a couple months later, I called him and said, okay, we'll just buy this building. So that's, that's how we wound up where we are.

So y'all are still there?

We're still there to this day. Today.

Okay.

Wow. Yeah. And then just the gifts in kind, the People that helped through this. I mean, it's just—

Yeah.

When you think you're at your lowest point, just take a breath and step back and look around you. I mean, there's some phenomenal people out there. There are some people that took advantage of you and took advantage of when you're at your lowest spot, but that's kind of part of doing business too.

Yeah.

Because I learned a lot of lessons from that.

Too. I can't imagine.

Yeah, but other than that, yeah, you know, every Friday when you're paying bills, you're like, my gosh, how can we keep sustaining like this? How, how can we keep going? And we don't have the money for that. And she said, well, we don't have to pay that until Tuesday, so you got 3 days, make us some money, you know.

Yep.

I always said in 30 years, okay, And, and people would say, oh, you make a lot of money in here, you make a lot of money. You know, at the first I was like, oh no, you know, no, no, we don't. Why? And then I stopped and thought one day. I said, yeah, we do turn some good money through here. Mm-hmm. And people see that when they're doling over the money or they're writing the check, or these days putting it on the card, you know. We bring in a lot, but they're not there that next morning when they see the envelopes leaving with the stamps on them. They don't see that part. They just see what's coming in. Yeah, but they don't see what it goes out to in order to make that. And so anyway, round story to get back to, I always considered myself to be a wealthy man.

Yeah.

When my wife can sit down And pay bills and not have to turn the computer on and balance the checkbook while she's writing. Yeah. Oh, I can't write that one yet. Let's pay this one and we'll put that one off. But I said I'll consider myself a wealthy man when she can sit down and pay the bills and never have to turn the computer on.

Yeah.

So are my standards that low? Okay.

Why do you think that Was like your? Why do you feel like it's a stigma of like, and I guess it might be the crowd that you're talking to, but like whenever somebody's like, it almost feels like they're judging or like hating on you because you do bring in revenue. Like even if you're a mid-sized business, it's like why do you think the world has gone to like? Is it a bad thing? to bring in revenue? Like, does it make you a bad person?

Remember where you came from.

Yeah.

You know, I know so many people that hit a lick somewhere, they get a job somewhere, they do something and they're doing really great, and then they join the country club or they start dressing a little bit nicer and they have, oh, look at the new vehicle I got. No, to me, it It's personal perception. Yeah. I pulled out a clean work shirt to come today. I've had to thumb through 3 or 4 to find a clean work shirt. Okay, I, I, yeah, I probably could have put on a nice— but, but once again, my thoughts of being a wealthy man Is being able to pay the bills without turning on the computer. And I'm dead set, that's— and other people have to see the zeros in their bank account.

Yeah.

Is it a jealousy thing? Is it— I don't know. I don't know, because there's people out there that really, really chase that dollar sign. That dollar sign is really cool, but what I've also learned From going from absolutely scraping by thinking, how in the heck are we going to be able to open the doors tomorrow? To now I can go open the door and like, hey, turn down the air conditioner a little bit because that bill is going to be pretty high. Yeah. You know, you still worry about the small stuff. Um, the more you make, the bigger your problems get, the more your worries get.

Facts. Yeah. The more expensive the decisions get.

I mean, I went from, from me and one hayman. This is my dad. Love him. Bless his soul. He, he said, uh, he had a hayman. I was like, Dad, hayman? You know, he was in the farm equipment business. So I'm thinking, oh, he gonna get to cut your hay or whatever? No. Hey man, would you come over here and go get those parts? Or hey man, would you go over here and— so I was like, okay. So I went from myself and one hayman. And my wife, you know, working, and we— oh, my kid did a, uh, had a business class one day and said, how many hours a week do you work? And I stopped and really put a pencil to it, and I said, I'm working, you know, 115, 120 hours a week. And they were like, no way. And I said, figure it up. I get here at 6 o'clock in the morning. Yeah. And at midnight is when I really start thinking, Wow, I need to start wrapping things up and go home. Yeah. And that was my world for probably 27 years. I didn't know any different.

Yeah.

One year, right at Christmas time, I hit the wall. I absolutely hit the wall and just could not go anymore. I walk in the house and my wife looks up and she said, what are you doing home so early? Are you okay? It was 11:30 at night and I said, something's bad wrong here. It was 11:30 and she's asking me, why am I home so early? I got there at 6 o'clock that morning. I was like, wow, someone's got their priorities real fouled up. I know. I don't know if what the question— I just kind of went off on a tangent there.

But what do you think? Like, what, what do you think caused that moment? Did something go through your mind of like,

yeah,

why am I doing this?

I got 3 kids that I didn't raise. I would take an evening off and get home and my wife would say, would you just go sit down somewhere? We've got a routine that we do. Well, I want to help you cook supper. Let me do the dishes or let me help. She would say, no, we'll go outside and go do something. Get out of our way. We've got a routine. And I didn't know what the routine was. Yeah. Those are my kids. This is my house. Well, her house. Okay. Yeah. You know, but it's the one that we pay for. It's the one everything. But I didn't know what their routine was. And I'm like, whoa, I completely missed a lot of time. Well, now, I never missed an event. I never missed a program. I never missed a meeting. I never missed any of that stuff. But just the normal everyday. Come home, kick back, eat supper, do homework, watch a TV show, or, or build a model car. I missed out on tons of that. It— all of that stuff happened at the shop where we were working.

Yeah.

Yeah, I might push a project to the side and say, hey, well, let's do something here. But then they left and went home, and I stayed there and finished working. Hmm. That— is that what got us to where we are now?

Yeah,

I'm, you know.

So what does it look like now then?

Work?

On a good day, on a good week.

On a good week, as far as me working?

Yeah.

Yeah, I'm, I'm leaving the shop between 6:30 and 8 o'clock and going home. I'm still up at 6 o'clock, you know.

Yeah.

My best work happens before my employees show up. Because when they show up, then I'm steadily, hey, do this and do that. Well, hey, what about this problem? What— well, let's fix this, this, and this. Hey, this guy's on the phone, or this one come in, this one wants to see you, this, that, and other. So during the work day, I'm busy kind of taking care of everyone else's issues. Then I get to do what I need to do prior to or after. Yeah. But my after has got cut down A bunch. I got a beautiful wife and I love spending time with her. And it took me a long time to figure that out. I took her for granted a lot. And I got one strong enough that's been there for me.

Yeah.

That understands, got the same goals as I do. But it took me a long time to figure that out. So Yeah, my partner has, has tons to do with our, uh, success in life as I do. Yeah, I'm the one that's actually doing the work, okay, at the physical part.

At the, at the shop.

At work, the physical part. But she— and I always, always joked and kid whenever our second one— she quit work the day before our second child was born. Uh, and I said— and I would joke and kid and say, oh, she don't work, she don't work. Yeah. But I wouldn't trade jobs with her for nothing because she was the chauffeur, she was the chef, she was the, the evening teacher, she was the one that scheduled this, this, this. And once again, yeah, the physical part of what I do, the building, the making, the selling, the this, that, and other, that's almost the easy part. She had the rough part. She was raising kids and And scheduling meetings and, and being the chauffeur for them. And

very important

role. Very important role.

Yeah, we added up because my wife is— she's— we've been able to have her stay at home so far. Yeah. And that's kind of the plan moving forward. Um, but we added it up. I'm like, man, if you made $20 an hour like you pay a nanny 24 hours a day for an entire year, your salary would be 300 grand a year.

And that's still not enough.

Yeah, and it's like, and that does not feel like it's enough. And so extremely valuable, extremely valuable.

What has marketing looked like for you guys in the business?

I'm in a very, very unique situation. There's not many of me out there, uh, as far as Hat shops. Okay, there's not many of me out there. Our closest one is going to be Stephenville. The next closest is going to be Lubbock, Fort Worth. So we're very spread out. I would have people come in and say, "Hey, you need to buy advertising in the Yellow Pages," or "Hey, would you advertise on this radio?" We advertise. And I would tell them, and I'm almost kind of like, awesome for me, uh, we don't really need to advertise that much because there's so few of us out there. We do the custom part, and I've always kind of joked and kidded, I could be in the middle of a wheat field and people come to us because we just have kind of that little niche deal notched out. So we didn't advertise, haven't advertised, uh, marketed out there a whole lot until just here recently because there's a lot more. You can get on the YouTube and you get on the, the TikTok and all that other stuff, and there's hat creasers out there. It's become, you know, since Taylor Sheridan— people want to cuss him, whatever, man, I'll, I'll bless him. For what he's done for the Western industry. It's cool to be a cowboy right now. So there's a lot more people that are putting up their garage hat shops and this, that, and the other. My daughter came on, uh, what are we, 3 months into it now? And started doing the social media and this, that, and the other. You can't freaking deny it. You can't deny it. She'll do a post and that next day, some, you know, there'll be 8 people come through and order hats. It's kind of crazy.

It's incredible. Good. Now you have access to the whole world.

The whole world. Free for free free.

Yep.

You know, free 99, except for whatever I have to pay her while she's, you know, doing the, the marketing and this, that, and the other. And yeah.

I think it's so powerful, which is literally why I got into the business.

But I got people, uh, yesterday I have a, a man call from Alaska. The day before, uh, my daughter gets an email, hey, will y'all ship to Canada? How am I— how would I ever found that fella in Alaska or Canada or, or everywhere else? I've got people saying, hey, we, we live in Oregon And we're going to take a trip and we just added you to our trip. We wasn't coming, you know, that far south, but we're going to do that just to come by and see you now.

Wow. All because of social media.

All because of social media and marketing out there.

Yeah.

The way we used to do it, the newspaper and regular radio.

Yeah.

Those kind of things of the past. I stopped and grabbed one of our newspapers the other day when I was getting my coffee in the morning, and I picked it up and I was like, are you kidding me? I remember when our Abilene Reporter News came twice a day and was, I mean, thick enough you saved it for a week for fire starter. Well, now you better save up for 6 months to have your, you know, paper to roll up your fire starter. You got barely enough to line your birdcage with.

Yeah.

And there ain't nothing in it, or what's in it is 3 days old.

Yep.

Social media.

Instant.

Instant. Right now.

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I'll see you in the Profitable Personal Brand Challenge. Let's get back to the episode. How much does a newspaper go for nowadays?

Yeah, I didn't even look. I don't know. I picked it up. I looked at it. Never bought one. This is crazy. This is crazy. It was like 3 pages. And I'm like, this is our Abilene Reporter news. This is our newspaper that we used to live by, you know, that, that, that kept circulation or kept the print open until 11 o'clock on Friday night. So you— that Saturday morning, You're getting the score of the high school football game. Yeah, right then. Well, now you don't get that till 2, 3 days later.

Yeah,

you can get on social media and find out. Yeah, during the game.

Yep.

Hey, it's the second half. It was 14-7 at halftime.

You watch it live.

Watch it. Yeah. Yeah, it's, it's very curious to see what my grandkids are going to have or are going to Get to be exposed to. Yeah, I don't know.

It's wild. I mean, you think about like social media and the AI stuff. Yeah. Yeah. I, I don't know, like, it's very hard raising— I mean, obviously, like, we're still gonna raise her in like a biblical foundation.

Absolutely.

At home. But it's like, as far as college and stuff goes, even whenever I went through college, I was still like, okay, not sure totally. I still did it. Not sure totally that I was willing to spend money on something like that. But like, whenever she gets to college in 18 years—

What does that look like?

Will there even be college? Will there—

Well, but, and then since COVID Do everything at home.

Yeah.

Do everything at home. Do it here. Online classes. Really? Online class? What are you gonna learn from a computer? Absolutely. But to me, my old mindset, my old person thinking, I gotta be— I'm taking notes, I'm gonna ask questions back. And I'm sure you can do that on a computer, but it takes a whole nother level of, uh, Want to? Hmm. Tash, that was real easy to say. What, what did you mean by that? Would you expand on that a little bit further?

Yep.

I'm learning something there. I'm not one to learn from reading a computer.

Yeah.

Listening to a computer. I, I, I just— I'm old and I get it, okay? But, and I got a daughter-in-law that has a remote job.

Yeah, those are getting real popular.

Real popular. It works out great for them because my son, you know, is, is traveling and he don't know, is he going to get traded? What team is he going to be with? Where is he going to go? It works out awesome for them because she can just close it up, pack a bag, and they're mobile and she's still working. But works out awesome for them. So it's, it's got its pluses. But I just wonder about productivity.

Yeah.

If you don't have to literally get up and go to an office.

Yeah.

You know, there's many a times that she's sitting back in her, in her PJs, laying in bed working.

And there's like the social aspect of it too. Like, I have considered looking into remote jobs at certain points in my life and they are appealing, but like, I Like human connection.

Even more so than that, homeschool kids.

Yeah.

Yeah. I can remember, so my oldest, my in-laws took care of her during the day when my wife was still working, and then we'd pick her up in the afternoon. And I— it was— she was getting about school age. We need to put her in a program where there's other kids. We found a Mother's Day program. Mother's Day out deal. I took her the very first day. She's bawling, squalling, screaming, ah, you know. Finally the teacher came up and she said, Dad, if you will— if you'll leave, she'll get tons. I promise she's gonna be fine. She's in great hands. Okay. So I stepped around the corner and she's in there screaming, bawling. Oh, she's, she's been with us. She's been in the shop. She's been around adults. Yeah. Her whole life, that's all she knows. Wife went and picked her up that afternoon. She come in, she come in the back door of the shop and she runs to me, grabs me, gives me the biggest hug. And she says, Dad, Dad, there was people there my size.

Yeah.

And I was like, whoa, you're right. She's only been around adults, adult conversations, adult this. She hadn't been exposed to kids. Kids, when they would come in, you know, what have you. But the social aspect of it is,

yeah,

extremely valuable and teaches people skills and how to talk, how to interact, how to do business with, how to—

Yeah, and it goes all the way up through going to work as an adult. Like, you enjoy— it sounds like you enjoy going to physical work. Yeah, because of the relationships you have there.

Well, 100%.

I think that's huge.

Yeah.

Well, what is the— what do the next 5, 10 years look like for 5D?

Who knows? Any plans, or you just going for it? Crazy world out there right now. Who knows?

Praying for no fires.

Yeah, let's just— I would be, I would be 100% completely content if we just continue on the way we're going now. I don't have— I would love to find a bigger building Because right now we've been blessed with so much business. We've got employees and we're tripping over each other. I would be— I would love to find a bigger place. Okay. Uh, but other than that, man, let's just keep rocking and doing what we're doing. It's been pretty darn good to us so far.

I love it.

I got other people that I've gone to school with and grew up with and all. That they're looking at retirement. Retirement. Oh, we're getting that close. They're thinking about it or have already done it. Or I just say, man, they're gonna find my fat bloated body in the back of this shop someday. I don't know what I would do if I— yeah, retired.

What does retirement mean?

Geez, I have no idea. I have no idea. The thought of me waking up and not having something to do, somewhere to go, Uh, a deadline to meet, a project I've promised to get done, to have that slate wiped clean. I, I, I've thought about it and think, would I even get out of bed if I don't have a purpose?

That's a— so that's something that I've thought about a lot because there's this whole movement within my generation of like, oh, we gotta retire early. We gotta be retired by 30. That's the goal. And then I'm like, what are you going to do after that? Like, you have so much time after that. Are you just going to—

Well, you know, years and years ago when they established the retirement age, you had about 10, 12 years. It was the life expectancy.

Yeah.

Well, now, holy cow, you retire that early. What are you going to do with the rest of the 50 years you are living?

I would get so bored. I would have to go build something else.

Yeah.

Like, like, so to me, I don't think there's ever truly retirement. Because after you retire, there's going to be something else that you're doing.

Yeah, I get, I get experienced folks that come in the shop that retired and they said, man, I'm busier now than I was when I was working. I got honey-dos, I'm fixing the house, or I'm fixing this. Grandkids. Yeah, so.

I love it.

I, yeah, I don't know if I could ever just shut down and say, okay, we have nothing to do, let's go to the Bahamas, or let's You know, none of that interests me.

I love it.

I'm just as happy coming back and sleeping in my bed.

Somebody who's on the fence about starting a business, building a brand, building something amazing, what would be your biggest piece of advice for that person?

2 things. Make sure it's a viable commodity. Make sure that it's something that you can sell, make, promote, do, that someone else is going to want. Because that's kind of end game, okay, is that you're doing something that someone else is going to want to purchase, someone else needs. And a, uh, Don't pigeonhole yourself. I really, really— my mail lady come in the other day. My mail lady loves making mums, homecoming mums. And she asked, she says, what do you think about opening a business making homecoming mums? She said, I want to, I want to quit the post office and I want to do that full time. And I looked at her and I was like— You're not going to make money. Really? Oh, okay. Well, you've got a really, really good business plan for 6 weeks. What are you gonna do the rest of the year? Well, I thought about maybe I might sell some candles or might something, you know. Yeah, that might be a great garage side hustle for a very short time. So Big picture, make sure it's a viable product. Yeah. Okay. And then something— the next thing is know what you're doing, know how to do it to the best of your ability, and have the confidence in yourself to do it. If you don't have the confidence in yourself to do it, well, I think I'll try. Yeah, maybe I can do that. Well, I'm not exuding very much trust in that customer, you know. So absolutely we can do that. Yeah, you know, and I've told many a people, hadn't done that before, and I'm real bad to stop, and people think I'm staring holes through them, but I'm running through it in my mind. Yeah. You know, how do I make it? Pieces, parts, this, that, and the other. And many times they said, well, how much is that going to cost? And I said, You know, if you have the trust in me to allow me to make it, let me kind of price it as we go, because I might throw out a real stupid number right now, but once I get in the middle of it, I'm like, oh, this dude's flowing together a lot easier than I thought. Oh yeah, well, I found a way to bypass that step, so— and it's actually better, you know. Mm-hmm. And then when we're done, it quite possibly could be cheaper than what I'm telling you now. Yeah. 9 times out of 10, if I show that confidence that, oh yeah, I can accomplish this and do this and this and this, they're like, hey, get after it. Yeah, get after it. Go to it. You know, rock on. All right. I'll call you when I'm done.

I love it. Well, where can people find you?

517 Oak Street.

Okay. Y'all got a website or?

5D Hats.

Okay.

Is the, um, uh, and in any of the social medias, 5D Custom Hats, 5D Hats, I don't know, something like that. I'm so blessed that I just say, you handle it and let me do the work. And, and she'll bring me reports and she'll tell me, hey, we got this many views, or this and this and this. I, I just like being the mushroom. Just keep me in the back, keep me in the shade, and keep, keep throwing crap on me, you know. We'll just We'll just keep going. Uh, you handle that end, you know, have great people, have great people and give them a job and let them do it.

Yeah.

Don't micromanage the whole deal that I get ulcers thinking about, oh, do I got to stand there and make sure they're sanding the hat enough? And they're this, that. No, my son-in-law is taking care of that.

Yep.

So let him take care of it.

Yeah. That's exhausting to micromanage.

Oh my gosh.

I refuse to do it.

Yeah. Yeah. It just, it just.

Oh, oh man.

Yeah, if you got a big problem, come here, let's talk about it. And that's another thing that I say, I don't like problems. I do not. I despise problems. Issues and recommendations.

Yep.

Don't come to me with a problem, come to me with an issue. Yeah. And you better have a recommendation how to solve it.

Yep.

How to cure it, how to work around it. We'll discuss the issues. Okay. We'll discuss what you think, how we should come to an understanding, what we think we can do. Yeah. But don't come to me with a problem. Everything's an issue. It's not a problem.

Yeah. I, I, I'm a big believer that as the business owner, if you're paying somebody to do something, you're paying them to deal with those problems as well. Issues. Issues.

And then if there is an issue— I guess it's just, is it, is it word games there? I don't like problems, but issues are fine.

What's the difference?

Yeah, to me, that a problem is a brick wall.

Yeah.

You know, an issue is a hedge. We can jump over that hedge. We'll cut that hedge down.

Yeah.

But it's hard as heck to knock that wall down. That's a problem.

That's like not good. Yeah.

Yeah. Come to me with an issue. Word games, mindset.

Yeah,

it's a mindset. Come to me with an issue and your thoughts on a recommendation. We don't— people don't think these days. They don't think. Common sense is a thing of the past.

Yeah.

Okay.

It was crazy. So a little story. This is one of the first times I experienced it. We were selling a vehicle probably a couple years ago. And the guy who came to look at the vehicle, his mom brought him in a, in a truck. And for some reason we had to jump a vehicle. We had to jumpstart one of the cars. Mm-hmm. At our house. And the guy, the mom had no idea cuz she never really jumped anything. The, the dude in high school had no idea. He was like, let me ask ChatGPT. I was like, dude, just open the hood, put the, like, That was the first moment I was like, dude, just think for a split second before going to ChatGPT about it.

Yeah.

Crazy times we live in.

But that's times we live in. Yep. My middle child, Dad, I need a phone. I need a phone. I want a phone. I need a phone. The kids at school have phones. I said, well, you go to school with a bunch of rich, spoiled kids. No, you're— I can't remember, 7, 8, 9 years old. No, you don't need a phone. No, don't. Yeah. And then she said it. Well, well, how old were you when you got your first phone? And I thought, oh my goodness, that's all they've known. That's all she has ever known. Phones have been around her whole life. I got my first phone at like 24, 25 years old. And I was forced to get it because my job required it.

Yeah.

So we did have to do a lot of independent thinking and ask questions and, and go out and manually pop the hood on the car and find out the positive, positive, negative, negative. Well, now this is all they know. ChatGPT is all they know. They don't know independent thinking. They don't know Yeah, working out problem solutions. Yeah, there's chat— that deal on YouTube is phenomenal. Yeah, for fixing your washing machine or, or figuring out how to, you know, put a carburetor on a pickup. You know, it's awesome for that. It's a heck of a learning tool. But there's also a heck of a lot for just, by George, doing it.

Yeah.

Using your head, not immediately go straight To the, to the cheat code.

I love it. Well, thanks for coming on today.

Absolutely.

Great advice, great stories. Go check them out on their website, social media platforms, 5D Custom Hats and Leather. Go check out some of the other episodes if you haven't already. Make sure to subscribe and we'll see you in the next one. Peace.