Ben Boulware | On the Homefront with Jeff Dudan #59

Hey, welcome everybody. This is Jeff Duden and we are on the home front with Clemson standout linebacker Ben Bulware. Welcome, Ben.

Good morning and happy Wednesday, I would say has been like, I'm still playing. It's been. Was it seven years now. So form. Former, like former has been old guy ball.

Hey, Wednesday's Wednesday's pads day, right? So we'd be, we'd be, we'd be, we'd be popping pads today.

Tuesday. Well, Wednesday. Tuesdays were full, Pat. Tuesdays really sucked. Wednesdays it was either hit or miss. We would go full pads or we'd go shells. Thursdays would definitely be like a walk through shells type deal we had. Tuesdays and Wednesdays are our tough days.

Yeah, yeah. Thursdays, sudden change specials, all that shells.

Praise God. Yeah. Mondays Coach Swinney would talk for three hours. And I was telling somebody the other day, like, when you're 18, 19 years old, you probably aren't aware of just the wisdom that is being just spewed at you. Because I remember just like, I need to get out of here. This dude will not stop talking. But now I'm just like, I would pay a lot of money to sit in those mental Mondays and let listen him talk for 90 minutes.

It wasn't that interesting that you got it for free for all those years and people pay them 100 grand to come give it to him for an hour or whatever they pay them.

I was talking about that the other day, like how we just got it for free from Sweeney and from, from Venables and just how elite, like creme de la creme leaders that they currently were, currently are. And those guys take it for granted and just obviously college football, this is a. Can go into a long conversation of where college football currently is. But if some of those guys and me back then would have just stepped back and realized the wise counsel that we had, That, I mean, that's top 00, like 1% of leadership that those two guys were, is just elite.

Yeah. I don't know Coach Sweeney, but the perception from the outside is that he holds. The locker room culture stays good, everybody participates. And as a result of that, you know, tremendous success for the program over the years.

Yeah. What the public perceives of. Of Coach Sweeney is what we saw. I mean, it doesn't get any better from a. Definitely from a coaching standpoint, but like from, from a leadership, from a wise counsel, from a husband, from a father Christian standpoint. He just got it like he's just made of the right stuff. And I know Clemson fans are been pissed over the past couple years because it has been. We haven't been playing at the level that we should be. And everyone just if a team starts to suck, you want to go to the head. Someone's got to get the blame for it. And I will to my grave. It ain't him. Like, I'm telling you, I just knew what the guy was made of. Like there's so many other dynamics to college football that are causing issues, but he is the top of the top. Him and Venables like.

Yeah. I got a question though. Do you guys ever take bets on whether he's going to tumble down that hill prior to the game? Because I watch him run down that hill and I'm just, I'm just waiting. I'm waiting for him to, to just eat it, but he never does.

I've only seen one guy, a freshman linebacker when my senior year hit the little jump and snapped his ankle in half. And it's, I guess it was, it was kind of funny then even though it was actually a bad injury, the guy was kind of a goober and he tried to be cool and jump like this little lip at the bottom. But yeah, almost every game you'll see someone roll an ankle because they just get a little too confident. So yeah, yeah, he is a, he's a good athlete though. So he's. I wouldn't put money on that.

Well, I've been in. It's one of the better in bowl experiences. My daughter graduated from Clemson and now I've got a son at Virginia Tech. And if you go to both of those game days, those are two great, great in ball experiences. Clemson is, you know, and they let everybody on the field after the game at Clemson that's kind of trust and inclusion that you know, the team wants and it's just, it's a real special place. My daughter had an incredible experience there. She loved watching you play. She really did. So you number 10? My son was number 10. He was a linebacker. So like we always, when I, anytime I saw 10 flying around, I had a little flashback to you know, he played, he played over to Elon and was a great high school player. But. Well, hey Ben, let's, you know, I'd love to, to know a little bit. I don't know that much about how you grew up. Can you tell us a little bit? Who is Ben Bulware?

So Ben Bullware is someone that grew up in an awesome, just family upbringing. Like I know everyone says like their parents are the best like from My point of view, like just our upbringing and family raising was. And I am aware of that now as I'm in the season of raising a 10 month old son.

Congratulations.

And multiple people are like asking you like, hey, how are you going to do this? How are you going to handle this? I'm just like, I'm going to try to my best to do it exactly how my parents did it.

Yeah.

Because we grew up in a super loving environment, but in an extremely tough environment. You know, you have, I have an older brother that played baseball at Clemson. He's two years older than me. I have a little sister who's roughly 14, 15 months younger than me and I have a little brother who is three or four years younger than us. There's four of us, so three boys, one girl. My dad started a concrete company when he was probably 24, 25 and still runs the company. So we grew up in a concrete environment. We grew up racing motocross. We were homeschooled until roughly middle school. But my mom, it was a combination of we were homeschooled because my parents are old school, are not fans of the public school system. And also we raced motocross pretty competitively. Like we traveled a good bit across the south every weekend. We were either in Florida, in Virginia or North Carolina racing. So the fact that my parents like didn't really like the public school system and the curriculum along with us being very competitive in motocross, we were homeschooled. I ended up having a pretty bad wreck through motocross that kind of like, hey, this sport's too expensive, too dangerous. We're going to transition into public school. It's probably a good time from like a social standpoint. And then let's transition into football. It's much safer than motocross. So yeah, we grew up super tight knit family. We have a pretty big family in the upstate. Everyone lives pretty closely. I have a lot of cousins that are all pretty good athletes that are close to our age. So the, the upbringing was as good as it gets, you know. So growing up in Anderson, South Carolina and then getting to play college sports, 20 minutes on the road, I mean really doesn't get for some people. Some people, like, I want to go across the world and get away from like, I love my family. My parents are some of my best friends. Okay. We have family dinners still to this day every single week. So I was thinking about going to Georgia.

Okay.

Wasn't going to offer me a scholarship because I'm the six foot white guy down the road. They know once they offer me, his brother's there, his grandpa played football there. We know if we offer this kid, he's going to come. So they were playing hardball, which pissed me off because I'm like, dude, I was the number two per espn, was a number two rated linebacker in the country. Like, I know y' all know who I am at Stanford. Stanford was my second scholarship. And then South Florida and Stanford were my first scholarships in high school. And I'm just like, these freaking meatheads down the road won't pull the trigger, right? They did after Georgia did. I remember being in Mark Rick's office with my dad crying, he pulled the trigger. That was super cool experience. Mark Rick, obviously is a, a coaching legend. And then a week later, Clemson pulled the trigger because I started playing hard, I started playing politics. I'm like, hey, maybe a bulldog. And finally they offered. I committed within seven seconds. And then obviously.

Oh, so that was the target, right? You were, you were, you were focused on that?

Oh, sure, yeah. Day one, my brother was playing ball there, my parents went there, my little sister ended up going there, all my cousins went there. Bullwares are, are Clemson folk. So when they pull the trigger, obviously committed on the spot. And then, yeah, had a pretty fun Clemson career, which we could.

Yeah, a few highlights, of course. College Football playoff national champions 2016. You also got the Jack Lambert Trophy. College Football Playoff national championship, defensive MVP, co defensive player of the year in 16. First team all CC 2016. Just, just an incredible career. And again, I, you know, you were standout to us as we were watching the games and, you know, just the way you flew around and the way you showed up at the point of attack, always, you know, shoulder square and delivering some, you know, delivering good thump. So really enjoyed watching you play and the way you did it. What did you learn from the experience at Clemson that you think will help you as you continue your entrepreneurial career? You've got a junkyard Fitness now, which is a gym that you started right there in Clemson. And I don't know what your plans are going after that, but you're, you're in the junkyard. By the way, I'll share with you. I shared with you. My daughter went to Clemson. She graduated there in accounting. She got a 4.0. She's in law school at NYU. She got accepted. So she's a first year law student at NYU and yet she applied for a job at your company and was turned down. So I'm not sure.

Really?

Yeah, man. Yeah, she had to go over to. She had to go over to F45.

Did she really?

Yeah, I think so.

Yeah.

Yeah, that's.

Did she say why?

No, I don't know.

I just.

I don't. I don't know what it was. I don't know what it was about. But anyway, you know, Bailey. Yeah.

So I can. So I just quickly looked up her profile. So one of the things that we. And I don't know any because I've never met with your daughter. One of the things that we make applicants do throughout the onboarding process is do at least 10 classes. Okay. Before they get to my interview. So I look on her profile. She's only done two classes and she hadn't been in.

All right.

So. But because people will see something on social media or marketing and I feel like we do a really good job from a marketing standpoint, like, oh, this place looks super cool. I want to work there. And like, okay, well, you need to come actually try this place out to see if it's something you like. Because Instagram and reality is a little bit different. So we make applicants do. Before they get through the onboarding process. 10 classes.

Oh, that's a good idea.

Just to make sure. Hey, did you actually like this place? Because.

Right.

Like you have to be pretty bought in to become one of our team members because we ask a lot of the people on our team, so we know that if, or for the most part, if someone will invest their time, energy and not money because we give those 10 to them for free. But if they will commit to doing those 10 classes before the on boarding process is done, we. We feel pretty strongly that they kind of check the. We call them the four Cs. And one of those Cs we look for when we hire someone is do they feel called to be in the industry? And we know that they feel called or care about it, they're probably. They'll easily do 10. So. Yeah, I don't know.

What are the other. What are the other three Cs?

So the other ones are character, competency, chemistry, and then call and care. So I obviously want high character folks.

Love it, Love it.

Anyone? That's perfect because I'm not perfect and I make a million mistakes. We want people that are obviously running a pretty similar race competency. We obviously want people that are competent, that can do the job at a high level. Me and my business partner, Marcus Brown, who I played football with, are two meatheads and we can't afford to have any other meatheads. On the team. Chemistry is obviously a big deal to us. Like, do they fit in with the team? We do a lot of like, if you ask any of our, we call them junkies across the upstate. Like a lot of those people will speak on culture and that's like, sounds cliche, but I like that's one of the things we really focus about like on the, like the community, the chemistry of the 1. Our team, but also our clients. And we do a lot of like just team events and if someone like we know that they're not going to fit in well with the team, like we're just almost. They're weird or just like aren't going to mesh well. Hey, you're probably not going to like working with our team if you're not friends with the team. So chemistry is a real big deal. We do team dinners, team outings, one on ones pretty much every single month. And then the last one is called care. Like do they feel called to, to be in the industry? So I imagine your daughter is an incredible woman. But you only did two classes, so she.

Well look, you gotta check the box.

Yeah, she didn't. If she didn't do those 10. Hey, I'm sure she's great, but she ain't getting thrown.

She's great. She's great. She's just not. She's not great right there. She's probably fine.

If she's at nyu, she is overqualified.

Well, yeah, she's teaching, she's teaching classes there. Core power yoga. So yeah, she's. She loves the fitness stuff and it's, it's a, you know, big part of what she does. But so, so junkyard. Like what's. Who's the client, what are the goals and what's the workout?

So the. I'll start with a little bit of history, then the workout. So me and I have a business partner named Marcus Brown. He played safety at Newberry and then his graduate year came to Clemson. Me and my roommate for four years at Clemson was his childhood best friend. So if we were playing on different weekends, he would come into town, sleep on our couch. So that's kind of how we got close once we closed the door with football. I'm like, hey dude, I have this idea about this hit studio. But doing it to music and I could dive right, really, really deep into the history. I know we have a time limit pretty much. He went to school for nursing. And if you know Marcus Brown, he is not a nurse. So he's just like, I don't want to Go to nursing. Let's do it. So we opened up our first location in 2018 in downtown Anderson, because I imagine that, hey, if this product sucks, at least I'm the hometown kid and people will give me a pity membership or a pity support. And luckily, it didn't suck and we treated people the right way. Opened up our second location in Greenville in the West Village, like downtown, in May of 2020. So looking back, probably the worst time in the world to open up a business. And we got through it. We didn't lose any money, we didn't make any money, but we did not close down. Didn't have to let anyone go. That's great. Kept the doors open. It was for sure tough. And then you operate a small business at 24, 25 years old in a global pandemic that'll force you to adapt and get creative. So we finally got out of COVID 2021 was good for us. And in 2022, we opened up our third location in downtown Clemson. And then in October of this past year, we opened up our fourth spot in Malden Simpsonville in a development called Bridgeway. So we have four spots right now, have roughly 70 people on our team. This is why I'm bald at 29 years old, because of all this. But it's awesome. Like, obviously I love the workout and I'll get into it, but also just, like, leading people and like, the relationship side of it is what is really, really fun for me. And then just growing a business that's, like, been bootstrapped. Like, me and Marcus bootstrap this mug. It was just us two. Like, I had, like, a lot of wise counsel with. With my parents who started their own company when he was my, like, roughly my age. But there ain't no, like, big money or, like, big backing. Behind it is me and Marcus and a lot of good folk that have just, like, been wise counsel for us to allow us to help us make wise decisions. So the workout, we're trying to get away from being called a hit studio because some people love that, some people hate that verbiage or, like, oh, we hate hit, blah, blah, blah, blah. It's all cardio. So we're trying to go into this verbiage, my rebranding standpoint, a functional fitness studio. So it's again, like, it's a workout, you moving your body. But I feel like for people that, like, care about that type of workout, classes, boutiques type stuff, the verbiage matters. So if you really put out that you're a hit Studio again, some will love it, some will just totally scare them off. So a functional fitness studio. We there's three things that kind of separate us. First thing is the format of the workout. So we're the only studio that I know of that uses treadmills, cycles, rowers, and then a functional lifting station. So there's typical stations in the workout.

In every workout you use all those.

Not every workout. Some days, like yesterday we did an all mat workout. So we didn't use any machines, it was all mats. So we pride ourselves in not being all cardio because some people love that, some people don't. So we want to be typically strad of the line of 50 50, where most on an average day you'll have 50% cardio, 50% functional movements, lifting. So like yesterday it was all functional movements, which our clients are, are loving you. You're getting this vibe in the world about like I follow Nick Baer. So this whole hybrid athlete like the running and lifting. So we just are kind of doing that, but along with a little cycling and rowing as well because those are obviously great workouts. So those four stations and the average normal junkyard workout, Run, ride, row. And then we say rage because it's good market all ours. The second thing that kind of separates us is we made this music software that allows us to work out to the interval of music. So we'll plug in this audio file. This is going to be very difficult to explain this without a visual. Um, it's super simple from a visual standpoint. Like my brother who has autism has done a hundred classes and he understands how the flow works because it's so simple. But when the beat, it will plug in an audio file. And this, it's essentially, it's our logo with like a green background when the beat and the music has not dropped the screen and the room is completely green. So we call it your pace zone. So if you're on the treadmill, we say it's like 60 to 70% of your max heart rate. You're walking and you're on the bikes, you're at a slow ride. If you're on the row, you're on a slow like row cadence. Okay? The beat and the music drops. And when you naturally would already pick up your pace because there's like a scientific study that when I'm, if I'm doing a presentation to companies to try to get them to get a corporate membership, I'll show study. But like if you're running and the beat and the music drops or picks up, you naturally just start picking up running a little faster. So all we do is create a visual for that. So the whole room will then turn to red when the beat drops. So now if you're running on the treadmill or if you're walking on green, you'd be running on red.

Yeah. And if you're colorblind, you're going from gray to gray.

You're colorblind. We actually have some. One of our coaches is colorblind and we've. All right, Marcus, who trains all of our coaches, has found a way to figure that out. But yeah, if your com brown makes it a little bit difficult, well, then you got.

You still got the music.

Yeah, we found a way to. To make it happen. We do all the workouts music. This is a software that, that we've created. You won't find it anywhere else because nice came out of me and Marcus's butt pretty much. Third thing that separates us is the coaching. So the same way that me and Marcus were coached at Clemson by coach Venables is in a professional way and a less cussing way how we coach our clients. I felt like there was a gap in this category of fitness when it comes to intentional coaching. So an acronym that we use at our business is the acronym coach. So call out and call higher. We, like in the training process really, really hammer that home. Like, you can't call someone higher and challenge them if you don't know how to call them out and know how to know their name. So, like, we really, like, that's one of the things I had to interview on Monday. And hey, this is the three non negotiables that, like, I really, really care about that I'm never going to kind of pivot from. First thing is names. Like, we are going to address every single person by name. It's the sweetest sound in any language to that person is their name. Second thing is cleanliness. Third thing is communication. Like, you're going to communicate at a high level if you're on our team. But you can't call someone higher if you don't know, like, your name is Jeff. Like, how am I going to lovingly criticize you? Like, if I'm. I'm going to give you feedback, bro, you only know my name, you know. So we coach our clients at a really, really high level, obviously with love and respect.

But.

But if you go to one of our classes or your daughter went to one of our classes and the coach knew, hey, Melee, she can run at 7, 8 miles per hour. And she's going in there dogging it at 4, our coach. Hey, baby girl. 8. They're going to press it for. And obviously not hurt anybody. But that doesn't happen in this, like, category of business. It's all rainbows and daisies and everyone's doing a great job. And Right. A lot of times they're not. And they need to be coached better. So those are kind of the three things that separate us from a workout and just our company is the run, ride, row, rage, the music, and then the. The coaching that we do. That is the Junkyard.

Awesome. And is it all group fitness or do you have personal training as well?

So you have 99.9% group. You'll have. We can get up to 40 people in a class, which is really fun. We have. We have like a higher tier membership called Junkyard. Plus that if we'll give these folks that are on this membership, like one individual coaching session a month, like with Marcus. So.

Okay.

99.9% of the other stuff is all group, though. We're not.

All right, and then how long. How long is the class?

45 minutes.

45 minutes? Yes. That's plenty. Plenty to get it done about what, a three minute warmup? Three minute cool down and everything else is getting after it.

40, roughly. Minutes of chaos.

Yeah, chaos. Utter chaos. Utter chaos. I love it. I love it. Four stores, all company owned. So I've been involved in two different fitness things over the years.

So speak on it.

So Burn Boot Camp.

Oh, yeah. Come on, let's go, y'.

All. Yeah. They're everywhere but Devin and Morgan walked into a building that I had for rent when they were working in a parking lot, and I rented them the space. We became friends and we, you know, talked to them about franchising when they decided they wanted to do it. So they're good friends of mine.

And you would give me more on the. I was well informed on Burn Boot Camp there. When there's. There's one in Anderson, there's one in Greenville.

Yeah.

So some of our main. The workout's very, very different. And I would even say clientele's a little bit different, but same model. So you were like one of the starting guys. Please.

Well, so I wasn't not an owner in any way, but just more of a advisor, mentor, and friend because I was already in franchising. And then I rented them a space. They didn't have any credit, they didn't have any money. They had been turned down for leases. And I'm like, well, and what the reason that I believed in Devin so much is because when I asked him, I said, why do you do what you do? His. His sense of purpose was so clear. He goes I'm going to build a fit boot camp for, for moms and I'm going to be the first billion dollar trainer.

Cool.

And like he, like he.

The starters of it.

Yeah. Him and his wife at the time. I don't. Yeah. I think they were either engaged or they were. I think they were married at the time. So I rented them a place. They did all the work themselves. They started it and then two years later they were wanted to franchise. So we, you know, so we, we. We had some sessions together and I just shared what I knew about it. And over the years, yeah, we're good friends. And then I also started. I, I actually acquired a business with two locations called Rockbox Fitness.

Exactly that that literally one of their. Are you still involved with them?

I own a few. I own a couple studios.

Gotcha. That we. That that's cool.

So work. Work with them. So that's also different kind of workout. But yeah.

So I've been in around the category though roughly same. That's all boutique group fitness.

Yeah yeah, yeah, yeah. So so been in around a little bit on the franchise side. So what's your. Are, are you gonna, are you considering franchising this or you're gonna keep it company owned?

This is a great question. Great question. So we've dabbled in this a lot. A lot over the past.

Yeah.

So how can I. I'll tell you everything. I don't bother me at all. So I won't get to like, I won't do names and stuff but so we had probably at the beginning of last year I'll call it a PE firm. They pretty much are a company that work with small businesses that are roughly our size, like 5 to 10 units and scale. So what is say a PE firm for lack of a better like clear explanation on, on who they are, started working with them over the past year. Good folk like some definitely some wise. We didn't sign any like deal but those initial like hey this, these six months we're going to create a growth plan for y'. All. And then pretty much it's just like over the past couple months kind of just died and fell off. Like haven't heard from them. So they're the two guys that I dealt with. They're like the two owners of the thing are like good people, cool folk. Got nothing bad to say about them. But hadn't heard from them in a couple months. They're watching this. They know I'm not lying, but I'm interested in doing it because I'm just, I'm aware, like to get good margins in this business. Like your margins increase if you do it the right way and are obviously super careful with obviously who you're working with, what market you're going into. We know what market works really well for us. Then yes, like you can probably get to where you currently are one day. Like you have to like you're fine with four, but you want to create some family, maybe generational wealth. Like you got to do what, burn boot camp, do like and get resources from other areas. So I'm interested in doing it. I'm building my house right now. We got our CO yesterday. So over the past, I'd probably say like end of Q4, January, February, I've been super too involved with building our house because I'm the one that's building it. But now since we got our CEO yesterday, we're about to move in, I can get really back into the weeds, just growing the business the right way. So yes, long winded way to say that we are. But I want to be super, super careful. Like I've met with a lot of people that are in leadership at Chick Fil A because like they, there's a way to scale and not do it too fast. Like Chick Fil A has done it the right way. You, you know, and they've been super careful. Like for the most part you can go to a chick, play anywhere and hey, my pleasure or it's going to be an incredible experience. So I've met with a lot of their, their leadership. I met with a guy that's in the process of opening his own and it's been like a year long process for him in the interview, just opened his own store. So I know that there's a way to do it at a slow enough cadence where as you scale from four to maybe 40. Hey, the, the same way that we operate this Anderson location that it was the day one is the same way we'll open up this 40th location wherever like you can't really tell a difference. And I want to be just careful about that because I know that can destroy a business and destroy reputation. So yes, again, long winded way to say I am interested in it. And this honestly over Q2, Q3, Q4 this year or when we'll probably start having conversations again. Not sure we're not like legally tied down to anything. So it is a. Yeah, junkyard is open for business.

And well, there's very, there's different ways to grow, grow business. And you got to consider all your options, right? If you ever want to be introduced to some interesting people in the franchise space to continue to round out your thinking, just, just let me know. There's a lot of people. Franchising is a very collaborative and tight community. And you know, we're particularly interested in the industry about expanding the reach and relevance of that business model. We think it's the greatest wealth creation business model ever invented. And when you find good people that have a business, there's a lot of people, like in any business that, you know, will consult with you or charge you dollars or things like that, but maybe they can't get you all the way there. So you have to, you do have to be careful with, you know, who you get to help you on, on all of that stuff. But generally when you find good people that have good businesses and they're looking to grow a business, you, you, you always want to collaborate and help because we want to make sure that the franchise industry maintains the highest standards possible.

Right?

And it does know. And even though we might be competitors and like, you know, Devin and I, man, we're great friends and that's all it's, it's been. We've done some business deals together, but I never participated in burn.

Edwards was Rockbox, though.

I just helped him and then, you know, with rock, like. But it didn't, our relationship didn't even glitch. I mean, it was just, you know, I'm in this space today, I'm not in it tomorrow. You know, life and business are infinite games. And you know, you spend your whole life, Ben, you will spend your whole life searching and looking for those, those few people that you can truly trust, right? For those few people that will really cheer for you when you do well regardless, that will be unselfish in their care for you and, you know, the way that they want you to succeed. And I think, and I've learned in my career that people will give you $10 for every dollar that you can take from them. And you know, it's not only to give back, but you need to give first. And you know, those are some things that, that I've learned in business that, you know, and you stick to those things and sometimes you get burned, just like with employees. Sometimes you get hurt because you trusted too much. But at the end of the day, man, you can't, you, you really Will go farther if you can surround yourself with a group of people that discretionary effort, that care. It's the football team and I'm a football player. I played, I didn't. I. So I played it. So I had a day at Clemson in 1990, by the way. Here's my Clemson story. I was a starting, I was a senior year. I was a starting fullback at Appalachian State University. Clemson was number five ranked defense in the country. There was a guy on the edge called Lavon Kirkland and you know, probably I think he was, I think he was among the first 260 to 270 pound linebackers in the NFL. Like that big body linebacker and they lined him up on the end of the line and we ran toss option so he was mine all day long. Like, you know, he was a beast. I got him down on the ground like one. I got him down on the ground a couple of, you know, a couple of times. But you know, generally we lost that game 50 to nothing. And it was, yeah, I mean it was close. I mean, you know, it was, it was close in the first half, but so I was a captain and I'm walking out of the tunnel and I'm, you know, in the front of the line and we just paused there at the tunnel, you know, for whatever reason to wait to go out. And the state trooper who was standing there, turned around, put his face right in my face mask and, and said, you all are getting ready to get your noses bloodied. And I'm like, even the cops.

All right, thank you for the encouragement.

Yeah, even the cops here. We don't, you know, and, but you know, there was 77,000, 77,000 people that day. You know, I was a juke, I was a juco kid. I wasn't a great player. And just to be able to walk out in that environment, walk out on the field. I think we received the kickoff, I was in the front middle of the kickoff line. So you know, I was out there for the, out there for the kickoff and you know, played the game at fullback and you know, and we did, you know, we did okay, man, but like we didn't have the speed and we didn't have the depth and it was just you, you guys just kept waves of people coming on the field, just, you know, but you know, App State's not a bad program. We've done well over the years.

Program.

Yeah, we know how to, we know how to win there and you know, very proud of the school and proud to be a part of that with coach Moore, but yes, sir. Well, last thing I want to talk to you about and. And then, you know, we got a couple. I got two questions left for you. Number one, you grew up in a family. You obviously a tight family. What's it like for you being a father?

So much fun. God, it's so much fun. It is extremely challenging. So where we've been is in this. So I'm in our little garage apartment right now. So we built this, we've got a three car garage, a little studio apartment above it, and me and my wife have been in it for the past two years. And it's fine with you and your wife. You introduce a little nine, ten month old crackhead little boy. It makes it a little bit more difficult when he's sleeping in the living room. You got to put him down at 7 o'. Clock. You got to just go in your room and stay there till the following day. So definitely has been a challenge. He didn't sleep till about six months. And the number one way to screw up a person's head and just body in general is eliminate them of sleep. So the first six months me and my wife suffered a good bit. And then once he learned how to roll on his face, then it just was nights out for him. But so much fun. We're getting into a really cool season where he's like not talking yet, just making a bunch of noises. He crawls around like a little bug. He's close to walking, but just so much fun and. But yes, it definitely is a challenge.

It's a big kid.

His head's big. I got a, I got a noggin. So his head's like on the 99th percentile. Everything else is he's average as grits. But he's 10 months old, so we got a little time. But we, once we get into that season where he's a little over a year old, I'm gonna start putting old buddy through some drills. Yeah, he'll be training coordination, but yeah, just so much fun. Definitely teach you how to be selfless. It's like gone are the days are about you or your wife. It's just.

Yeah.

All about him right now.

Well, I'll tell you, Ben, you know this because you grew up with a father who was an entrepreneur, but you giving your son exposure to entrepreneurship at a young age will give them an entirely different paradigm of way they think about things and self reliance. So, you know, and one indicator of future success as an entrepreneur is whether they had an early entrepreneur exposure, experience early in life. So, you know, it'll. It'll. You know, I know. Like, I had my son when I was building this. This business or the bit. My previous business. And I mean, he'd come to work with me. He'd sleep on a moving blanket under my desk. Man, we. We'd go to lunch, you know, he four or five years old, we just hold hands and walk across the parking lot and go get some fried trout and french fries. I mean, it's. Those are some of the best memories. So you've got all that right in front of you. So congratulations on that. I know you're going to be a great dad and hope. Hope you have as many as you want.

Lord will. Yeah, we're about to get in the house. Like, let's run it back. And she's like, I need to breathe. Like, no. I'm like, come on, dude. I grew up with four in our family, so, yeah, my older brother already just had his third. He's 31. He wants to have like six, seven. I'd like, Lord, bless us with three or four, and we'll be good with that. But my wife's putting her foot down right now, so ultimately, decision, but I'm pushing.

Yeah, well, things happen. You get. You'll get exactly the number you're. You're meant to have. Last question, Ben, if you had one sentence to speak into somebody's life, what might that be?

Golly. So one of the things that I've been saying for years, and I said it when we won the national championship, is on that stage was our team can control the input all year, all season, all night, and the output took care of itself. And for me, that's like, worked in my personal life, worked in football. It's worked in my relationships and. And business is controlling the input, not the output. So nice for me, just like controlling the controllables. Control the things that are in my grasp that I can actually control. And not if. If I do that day in, day out, continue to toil the soul, more times than not, the. The fruit will happen and the output will. Will work in my favor. It's a. I feel like sometimes you need luck, you know, but more times than not, it's how much work you can consistently and daily put in. So for me, that's been something that I've tried to. To live by, is controlling the input day in, day out. And if I do that, hey, whether the output works in my favor or not, I can go to sleep at night knowing that I did my duty. I tried. You know, I told the soul to control the input, not the output.

Well, brilliant. Thank you for sharing that. And Ben, it has been awesome to get to know you a little bit. I'm so excited for your business and really appreciate, appreciate you coming on the home front today with us. How can people get in touch with you or your business?

So our probably the best way is through Instagram. So our Instagram is at the Junkyard Fitness. Our business is just called the Junkyard. We added fitness on the end of it, like on our website because it was $5 to buy that URL at www.the junkyard was like 5, $4,000. So I'm a frugal businessman. So it's just called the Junkyard. But online and on Instagram is at the Junkyard Fitness. We're extremely active on social so following us on there we have a pretty creative. I won't spill the beans on our marketing tactics, but give us a follow on on Instagram and someone on our team might be reaching out to you very, very soon. And then my Instagram is just at. Ben Bullware. My social media sucks. All it is is I have three Saint Bernards that are extremely stupid and then my hairy little 10 month old son is pretty much all post on social media.

So I've seen it all the junk. Yeah. Ben Bulware. This has been awesome. And I'm Jeff Duden. We've been on the home front with Ben Bulware. Ben, thanks for being on and everybody out there, thanks for listening.