Nick Slavik Explains How Ask a Painter Live was Born

Hey, everybody, it is Jim Johnson here, your host on Contractor Radio and the head coach at Contractor Coach Pro, where we help contractors get control of their business so they can grow their business and hopefully find that personal and financial freedom they were searching for when they started their business. It's been awesome. We've been doing this for the last 10 years, and the stories that we are able to have now after 10 years of coaching has been pretty awesome. This podcast that I'm doing today is part of our Contractor Summer series, and I've got a pretty awesome guest today. I've been following this guy for quite a while, kind of stalking him. He didn't even know really, but I noticed he had a huge presence on social media. That's where I saw him first. And not only was his social media like, everywhere, but it was really good. He comes from the painting world. His name is Nick Slavic and he is with Nick Slavic Painting and Restoration. He is the founder, CEO and all things management, leadership, and everything else with his company. Nick, welcome to the show.

Thanks, man. Thanks for the opportunity.

Hey, man, it's an honor. It really is. You are like, in that painting world, you kind of guy. You see you more than I see anybody else out there. Maybe there's somebody I've missed, but you've been uber consistent. You actually have this thing called Ask a Painter Live. You've been doing that for, you said seven years. That's pretty consistent. And so I'm going to ask you about some of that here in just a minute. You also recently were voted in, I believe, as the chairman of the board for PCA Painters Contractors Association. That's. That's kind of a big deal, you guys. That's no joke. You guys have been around a long time. Excuse me. So for our audience, those guys listening and watching on YouTube, can you kind of give us a little bit of the background? Like, how did you get started in this? Were you always a painter? And how did you turn it into this, like, everybody knows, Nick Slavic thing?

Yeah, well, it does pay to be a loudmouth, a consistent loudmouth on the Internet. Right. So I got forced into this trade when I was 10 years old by my dad. My dad was a house painter and he got the whole family involved, mom, brother, me and everything. So from 10 to 18, kind of indentured servitude with the family business. 18 to 22, as you do. 18 to 22. I escaped and went to the army. Active duty service for a few years. Came out, used my GI Bill to get a college education. Got a bachelor's degree in business with a double minor and two forms of accounting, went to reform and rejoined the family business. And there was no place for me there. Father just didn't, didn't have a place for me. So I started my own business. And this is now the 15th anniversary of the Nick Slavic Painting and Restoration Company. And like you said, I've been, I've been a loudmouth on the Internet for a lot of years. I've been posting pretty consistently for over a decade. And I've been the host and creator of the Ask A Painter live show which is going on weekly now for seven years.

Wow, that's. That's pretty impressive. There weren't a lot of people posting and doing that kind of stuff 10 years ago that is still kind of brand new. What was the impetus behind that? Like, how did you know that was going to be a thing? Or did you?

Oh yeah, well, you're assuming I had this great foresight and stuff. And just like anything else, you know, it's like, hey, I'm going to start a painting business because I will be on the forefront of that and the trades are the wild west and I'll be there at the now. I just, I was always going to be a painter. I'm a servant leader. I like to share, I like to collaborate with other people. So social media was just an outlet for a introverted, passive aggressive guy from Minnesota to share all these wonderful things I see on job sites. You know, I would share all these little bits of houses that nobody else really sees or takes for granted but are very important to me. Fine craftsmanship, something unique. And it just spoke to a bunch of other weirdos like me out there who are kind of share the same values. So yeah, it's been, there's no foresight into anything. I just do that stuff. And it turned out to be a good strategy.

Yeah, it's worked out quite well for you. I first noticed you, you were painting, I think it was like this three story house and it had all kinds of intricate work on it and stuff like that. It was a long time ago. I don't even know if you remember, but you were, you were so into the details. And I went, does anybody watch that? Like, is that was that interesting to them? And then I kind of thought about my own world, you know, roofing and doing that stuff and like, who's going to pay attention to that? But we all kind of have our voice, right? And voice attracts a certain group of people. Have you found that to be true? With what you do. Like, did you have people start reaching out to you?

It does, yeah. So I. I have been called a lighthouse. I've been called a dog whistle to a certain very, very niche part of sort of like the populace of the United States of it. It's like you said, it's not just painters and roofers and other things. Like, I literally will go down a rabbit hole watching the best carpenters in the United States flash a rough opening in preparation for a window. Because there is an art. And watching any human do anything good, especially when it involves architecture, is so deeply satisfying to me. It's just. And I understand now why some people watch some of my videos.

Yeah. The ones that get me are the woodworking ones, the guys that do the woodworking. I mean, I can get lost in that all day long. And I don't even do that stuff myself. I just have an appreciation for mastery, I think, is really what it comes down to.

That's the best way to put it. Appreciation for mastery. I appreciate people who are really freaking good at what they do. And that is. Yeah, that's humbling.

So there's. There's a painting aspect to what you do, but there's also this restoration side. Do you get a lot of those special kind of projects to. To work on?

Yes. So when I, you know, I left my own family business. So in a town of 7,000 people, there were two Slavic painting companies in town. So my way of differentiating was not only service, but on the outset, putting the word restoration in my name. Because for anybody who loves historic homes, restoration is. It is a dog whistle word. It signifies something deep and meaningful to people who understand that that's deep and meaningful. So it does bring out. When I formed my company, I created my logo using fonts from the local newspaper from the 1800s. So I did some research into that. I found things I liked. I saw how the ads were made, the fonts were used and the colors and things like that. And then that's what I formed the company on. So if you're not into old houses, you think, oh, that's kind of a nice logo. If you're into old houses, you're like, that is my dude right there. He knows something. He knows something that I know, and there's not many of us that know that now.

Now, was that just, like, it made sense to you, or was it something that you had learned? Like, hey, to attract the type of client I want need to go this route. Was that. How did that work out?

Yeah, great. It's so flattering that you think there's any foresight into this. It was just. This is what I love. And I think part of the reason that my social media does connect with people and stuff is that literally my logo, my company, my social media, my company is just a reflection of me and what I like. It is not one of those things. Like, listen, my passion is fly fishing, but I'm going to get into chimney building because it's lucrative and that it's like, you can only do what I do in certain ways. When you love it this much, it gives you that drive to be consistent and do it. Nobody's broadcasted live for seven years weekly without missing a week. If you don't love it, that is the chore of all chores. If you do not like this.

So why do you love it so much?

Yeah, good question. I think so. It's a deep thought I have, or what I consider a deep thought, which is my father was a house painter and I magically turned out to be a house painter. So what I don't think think is that I surveyed every profession out there. I did everything. And magically, by kismet. My father was a house painter and I was a house painter. Like, wow, what are the chances of that? I just got in. I understand that people can have lots of passions. Finding your passion and exploiting it and staying with it for a very long time makes you an outlier. I was very lucky that I probably could have had a deep passion for 1500 things. Turns out that I was introduced to one at age 10 that scratched all the itches and I loved it. And that was it. It's like, you know, I'm. I always tell myself, don't, don't do the grass is always greener. What if I could have been a wildlife biologist? What if I could have been that woodworker? It's like, no, I. I truly get up every day with a passion for this. I love it. I'm not taking that for granted. And I will be interested in other things, but I'm not changing what I do. I love this.

That is awesome. See why I wanted to interview, like, this is why we do what we do. And I'm sitting here going, gosh, man, maybe I should quit doing this and go get after fly fishing because I'm pretty. Well, it's funny because I think that's first off a little lucky, right? Like, that just happened to be the thing, right? And it really did scratch all those itches because some of us out there, we don't. We don't have that. I got really lucky myself 10 years ago in an unfortunate situation. My grandfather was, you know, the end of time, and I got to spend the last three months with him, and he felt it was important for him to impart to me who I really was. And he threw quite a few questions. What I came to realize is the thing I'm passionate about is actually coaching.

Yeah.

It's not roofing and it's not painting. It's not being a contractor. It's not any of those things. It's coaching other people to install fundamentals, build on those skills, master them, apply a strategy, and win. Like that's I do. And I would do it for nothing, and I would do it for pay. I've coached everything from little bitty kids to college age in sports, leadership, sales, like, all kinds of things. And it took somebody, like, helping me to understand really, who I was. And this is the longest I've ever done anything.

Wow.

So many of us, I think, travel through life looking for that thing, that passion thing.