Staring Down the Barrel of the Gun with Business Leader Enrico Palmerino

Welcome to this episode of the Million Dollar Mastermind. I'm Larry Weddell. And before we get started, if you want to know exactly how to win again and again, go to Wydell on winning.com webinar now to watch something I've put together for you. Now let's get going into this episode of Million Dollar Mastermind. I am here with founder and CEO of Bot Keeper, and that is Enrico Palmerino. How did you make that big of a mistake at that early in your career? Do you ever ask yourself that question? Or did you get talked into it? Did you get ahead of yourself?

Did.

Did you just. There was just unavoidable. How did that. How did that happen?

So it wasn't so much like a, you know, think of it as, like, a small mistake that broke the model. You could call it like the big mistake was pushing so hard on growth and, you know, kind of running the fine line between, you know, reinvesting every dollar and maybe a little bit more back into the business was kind of the mistake that we made to, like, fuel growth. But our business model per predominantly predicated off of this concept of we're going to take. We're going to do analysis of your property, you know, large properties like IKEA, AT&T Kodak, Coca Cola, et cetera. We'll do the full analysis for you free of charge. We'll even go so far, you know, if you show you what. What it looks like your picture is going to look like, if you sign and say you want to go ahead with this plan of, you know, what your new lighting is going to look like and the savings and stuff. We'll make custom lights for you, and we'll use a bunch of the lights that are not custom that we make, too. We'll install all of those. So make them, ship them over here, install them, and then you're just going to be paying us a percentage of the savings you get every month for the next five years. And so very cash flow. Burdensome business, but really great margins and sticky kind of recurring revenue. And for a while, we were trying to just juggle what was a very financially complicated business model. But we pioneered this idea of lighting as a service and effectively had some delays in shipments because of a tsunami overseas. We had a product that we thought the molding could withstand multiple years, but we hit production too fast and, like, exhausted a lifetime of the mold before the production run was even completed. We had, like, one client, like, kind of be slow to making payment. An install job that went longer was taking Longer than expected. You take all of those things that are happening in a high growth business, like we went from my dorm room and zero revenue, eight and a half million. Like that is a very high growth, super stressful. And if we're pushing everything into it, you start to have like a few of these mistakes all come together at once. And it's like the perfect storm of an aw moment. We need to get the debt abilities needed and do what we need to do to make payroll. And that's the other thing too is like we prioritized our people over ourselves. So it's like yeah, effort, I'll go in debt but I'm not going to like make it, you know, I'll do that for the sake of making sure my employees can, you know, make rent and cover heating and you know, cover any utility bills that they have for their kids and families. So yeah, it wasn't certainly not recklessness but just the reality of, well one.

Could, one could say is that's where you got your real education.

Oh totally, yeah, I got, I got my street mba.

I'm most excited hearing about that part of your, where you've been so far in terms of being feeling confident about your future. The fact that you've been around the Horn of Africa, basically sailed in choppy waters and lived. It's a great testimony equal to the growth of your business. And it's got to give you. Don't you have a confidence about yourself from having made it through that that you would not have any other way?

Yeah, I, you know, I think the nice thing is it gives me, it gives me anecdotes that I can use when I'm telling my team like we'll make it right. I don't think it's changed my perception. I think like I've always been one that, you know, the worst thing you could ever do me do is tell me something's not possible because I will prove you wrong. Like that's, that's the mentality I think that I've always been at. So you know, the bigger the problem, the harder it is. Like the I more I enjoy it. Maybe I'm sick in that way, but I enjoy struggle and challenge and overcoming it because I just like, like pushes you to like new extent. But I think the nice thing is from having overcome these things, maybe there's a little bit of a level of confidence. Personally I'd say like more than anything it's just the ability to communicate to my team. Like if we're facing looking down the barrel of a gun. I can tell them, like, look, I've overcome this and like, and it's not just me, it's like, look, I've worked with a team to overcome this obstacle and overcome this obstacle and overcome that obstacle. And some of those obstacles might make the one that we're looking at right now feel like not that big of a deal. And I think it just helps keep people level headed and it reminds them that the best thing we can do is not worry and fear, but just put our heads down like, what's the first thing we need to do next? And then it's like step after step, like knock over incremental steps towards the right direction and all those steps add up and eventually we're looking down the other side of the mountain.

Hey, listen, there's a lot of information online, but there aren't a lot of people who have actually done something. In my case, I've actually built a successful business, has accrued over $5 billion in assets under management, and has done well even during trying times. Now if you want to know exactly how I've done this, go to Whiteellumwinning.com webinar Now I've compressed a decade of learning into five short weeks. Just for those of you who want to give your an incredible advantage and are tired of waiting and watching others move up. Well, so much of it is, I think some of them call it emotional intelligence, but the, the idea of thinking on your feet clearly when things get, you know, you're, you're, you're in an earthquake and the ground is shaking under your feet, but you still, you kind of able to compartmentalize that and not panic and go run off. You're able to stay in there and say, okay, what can I do about this and deliver for the people that are looking you to be the leader or to be the captain. You know, that thing about a captain is a great thing, but the deal is when people work for you, they need you to be the leader, be the captain in the tough times, not the, necessarily the, the easier growth times. And, and you've got to take, if, if you're not willing to take a part of that is, is having that attitude about, you know, enjoying solving problems and not running from it. It's like, okay, all right, I got that. Now here's what can we do? First step. You know, you always start with okay, first step. And then you start moving forward and then the whole whole dynamic changes with one step forward, doesn't it?

Totally. I mean, the worst thing you could do as a leader is not make a decision. Like no decision is the worst decision. So you have to act and like, you know, I look at it like almost you can get to the same place almost any way you go. One might be easier and the other one's like, might not be necessarily right, but then you're gonna have to iterate and like overcome that and re navigate your way back. But any problem, you can break it apart into a bunch of little mini problems and many problems seem easier to overcome and do those subsequently and the next thing you know, you've overcome the big one.

Well, this has been fun talking with you, Enrico. I appreciate your time and congratulations on your great start with Bot Keeper. You've got the beginnings of a juggernaut it sounds, and.

We'Re certainly having a lot of fun.

Congratulations on the team you've assembled and the track record you've got. I'm looking forward to seeing checking in with you down the road and seeing all the new things that you've learned and adventures you've had running your own business in a big way in, you know, a tough time for a lot of people in the economy and you guys are thriving. So congratulations, man, that's, it's quite a story.

Really appreciate it Larry, thanks so much for having me on.

Is there any last thing you'd like to give away to people that are, wanna branch out or they're, they're looking for an idea to grab on or a concept to, to break free? Any, any last word to add to what we, we've said so far?

No, I mean, I think, I think it like it all just fundamentally is rooted in value creation, you know, solving a problem. Like, how do you like the ideas that I've had stemmed from personal experience of like this is a, this was a headache at my last startup. Like our finance and accounting was a big headache. So what did I do? I took a step back, you know, when I was no longer in IT and operating, I stepped back, looked at it from, you know, a third party perspective, identified, you know, the ways that I would like it to go and how it could be better. And then you start kind of reverse engineering that to figure out how you deliver that betterness. And before you know it, you've got a business model or idea that solves a problem for some set of people and you gotta go to market with it.

Well said. Thanks so much, Enrico. I wish you the best.

Appreciate it, Larry. You as well.

If you enjoyed what you've heard and are dead serious about finding out for yourself exactly how this works in the real world. I've taken the most valuable business lessons I've learned over 40 years and and put them into something for you to watch. Go to whiteellawinning.com webinar now in order to move up as fast as possible. I'm Larry Wydell, and I run the Million Dollar Mastermind. Go, go, go.