C. Suite Unfiltered: Why Mike Turned Down $10M Offer

Welcome back to the Mike Andies podcast where we discuss the ins and outs of owning a small business. If you're new here, the Mike Andes podcast is all about taking your business to the next level. And welcome back to C Suite Unfiltered with your host, Lee park and Mike Candies. This is a personal one today. About a year ago, Mike turned down offers from venture capitalists to buy a majority share of Augusta Lawn Care to the tune of $10 million. Was it the right move? We'll find out when Lee pitches Mike the hard questions. Other topics covered include Fox dropping Tucker Carlson, plus some much needed updates on co pilot and the state of the channel. You can find Aldis and more over at the C Suite unfiltered channel. But let's get right into it. Here's Lee and Mike with the show.

All right, you're Tucker Carlson and Don living up.

Yeah, dude. If either of them would like a job on the C Suite Unfiltered, I'll, I'll go either way.

You know, it'd be an awesome show. Is if they both come together from completely different like opposite ends and made of network together. I think they do really good.

Maybe like. I know, but their audiences hate each other.

Yeah, I know but like dude, like you know, yeah, middle of the aisle.

I mean, I agree.

I know everyone, hey, look, like we're not, we don't, we don't discriminate against left or right or blue or red. We just want everyone.

Yeah, but then, but then you get no one. Like what, what sells in the media extreme?

Hey, we're going to take both extremes. We're going to avoid the middle and go opposite extreme.

What was that one show? We were pretty young, so some of our more senior audience members. Was it Hannity? Who, who was the guy with Hannity? Sean Hannity used to have a co host.

I have no idea who was.

It was still a Fox show but he was definitely a more like left leaning liberal Republican. So he's still on Fox. Hannity Combs. I don't know.

Can you imagine though if the two of them did news together? That would be so awesome.

Just like Don Lemon holding his pencil and Tucker Carlson doing the face. Have you ever watched him when he like when someone's debating him, he just.

Does that face and they just. And let's debate cross examinate people from like completely different angles. I'd watch that show. I'd never even watched the news. I'd watch that.

Hannity Combs. That's what it was. Alan Combs.

Yeah.

Oh, he passed away, so that's that. Well, but yeah, they were more of a debate style. And then Sean Haney Wentzella. But yeah, a lot of news today. There's a lot of things we could talk about. Tucker Carlson. I texted one of my buddies about it, who's more in the political sphere, like, stays up to date on it, and he said, it'll be good for Tucker go out on his own. I think so, too. Yeah.

Yeah. People underestimate just how powerful, you know, once you're out from beneath a network, how much you can do and if you can really start to do what he wants on social media and, like, he creates his own thing, dude, he could become huge.

Well, he's been getting out there. He's been doing, like, the podcast circuit.

Yeah. He was just on Nelk.

Nelk Boys. Yeah. Which they're wild. They Trump again.

I know. I listened to that.

Oh, really? I haven't listened to the whole thing. I saw some clips. It looked awesome.

Yeah. Yeah.

So then they got, like, super emotional. They were like, we need you back, man. It's like, all right, chill.

I don't know if we should be.

Crying over Trump right now, but, I mean, passionate.

Oh, man.

Yeah, man. Well, how's your week been?

Well, it's Monday, so.

So far, I mean. Yeah. But like, I guess in general, last week was horrible.

Thursday co pilot we had.

We went.

Went down for like 20, 30 minutes twice. So it was just part of. We had to get the server up, but then I was up all that night getting the server up live. So we took the site down for a bit and then put the server up. So it's good. But, like, we've.

We're.

I'm just trying to make sure that we keep it stable, but also keep innovating fast enough and don't slow down the rate of innovation. So that's what we're working on. It's been good. That was stressful, dude. Thursday was not a good day. That was horrible, like, painful. So I think we got some good things in place. I kind of brought forward what we were going to do in terms of testing for deployment and stuff like that. And then I got another developer coming in house. They're sitting right next to me starting Wednesday. We. I got him to start earlier.

So you have two in house, copilot folks, right now?

Three.

Three?

Yeah. Oh, two.

You're bringing a third?

Yeah. And then everyone else is like the teams that I've had from PvP and then what used to be lawn Pro. And they are all virtual.

Okay, gotcha.

We do a lot of in person, like on Slack and every single morning we do a video chat with all the. But there's like a. It's probably at least 10, 11, 11, 12 people now. It's quite a few. So it's growing.

Yeah. How are things at Augusta going? I feel like a good mix of our audience here on the pod aren't inside of Augusta. And the Public Channel has been a little bit more about the corporate locations and Chuck, the regional manager out there, who's awesome.

We're training up at least 12 to 15 more people over the next couple weeks. Because a couple weeks. The past couple weeks service autopilot was really slow. And then.

We had a lot of people get sick. A lot of people. And that's the downside of having everyone in house. Like, we still have some people working virtually, but mostly in house. And whereas last year was like half and half, now it's like 90%, 80% in house. So the problem with that is when there's sickness going through, man, you can wipe out the whole office in like a matter of a couple of days. And that happened. That really put us back. So I think the next couple of weeks will slowly chip away at it. It's just like once you get that far behind because everyone was like rebooting their computer multiple times a day, waiting for service autopilot and clearing cash of every. After every single task and doing stuff like that. So that really slow us down. And so I think we're like, I think in a couple weeks though, once we get the new teams up and then everyone's mostly healthy again. So like we'll get real cover. So I don't want to overreact because if we over hire then it puts more like we can't give as many hours to our existing team during the summer. And then fall and winter, it's really just the spring rush. It's very cute. So once spring rush is over, I'm sure we'll debrief. We gotta figure out a better way of dealing with like half of our staff being gone.

Yeah.

For a few days. And that really hurt us. But fortunately the franchisees understand, like, they also deal with employee issues like that, but they can control their schedule. You can put things off, we can't. Like, it just keeps coming no matter what.

Yeah.

So we'll get better every single year. It's still leagues better than last year, but it'll get even better next year to the same magnitude. So that's what? I kind of just kind of. I'm a little more relaxed about them because I know it's so much better than last year, and I just see all the flaws and what I want to change, but it's like, hey, we'll do that next year, and we'll make it better.

Right?

But, like, when you're in the middle of spring rush, we can't overhaul things. It just creates too much chaos.

Yeah. I saw some, like, minor recent changes, and you guys were very delicate, like, about how you presented it, because it is. It's a big team. People are stressed, and they're stressed out. It's emotional, and, like, you're working, like, 30, 40.

Yeah.

You're working as hard as you can, and then you're like, oh, great, now I have to do this new thing or learn this new way. And you guys, I would say, from what I've seen, because, like, I don't really work at the command center, but I see all the updates.

Oh, you saw the video?

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Oh, dude, I see it. I see it all. I see it all. It was great.

Pull that out of the bag.

Yeah, we hit him with the one, two punch. Because you did the inspirational video. And so. So it's funny. You did an inspirational video for our internal team of command center, and you post it kind of late at night. And I was just. My wife and I were just sitting in the living room. I think she was reading, and I was just scrolling on my phone, and I was like, hey, you mind if I put this on the tv? So we have a smart tv. So I threw it up on the. On the big screen, and we watched it together. And as soon as the inspirational video from you, which was fantastic, by the way, was over, I just looked at my wife. I said, yeah, I'm going to leave early tomorrow to buy treats for the team. So one, two, punch. You hit him with the inspirational word words. And I got donuts and coffee and snacks.

All you can do, man. Like, when, you know half your team's out because they're so sick, the other half is coming to work sick, and everyone is sick. And you've done everything to make sure everything's cleaned and sanitized. We had, like, aspirins and, like, vitamin C, Clorox wipes.

Yeah.

Like, every medication you go over the counter was like, just like, if you want it, you can have it. Yeah. I'm just glad there's no, like, OD.

We're not IDing here. Yeah.

So. But you're Just doing everything you possibly can. And you also just really careful because as soon as you hire, you slow yourself down for a few weeks because you got to train them up. So if you do too much of that, then you make it even worse. And then you just can't overwork people. So that's what. Yeah, that was. That was the rallying cry. It's like, hey, we really need everyone to work, but don't work too hard. So, yeah, I think you guys are.

Doing a good job.

You and Liz and the team over there. It's. It's leagues ahead of last year.

Right. There's still so many things I want to improve, but I just got to, like. Same thing with Liz. She has a whole bunch of stuff. She. She's already like, hey, we could make this better if people do fall out. Here's what we need to prioritize. So it just. It's way better than last year. It's gonna be 10 times better next year based upon some of the stuff she and I have talked about. But we're just like, hey, we only gotta work on what we have now.

Mm.

Yeah.

Makes sense. Um, I had a thought. I don't remember where I was going with it, but Command center. They're doing great, man. They are.

You asked how Augusta was doing?

Yeah, I asked how Augusta was doing.

I don't.

I don't know.

My corporate shops are doing good. The videos went out last week. That was good.

Dude, those videos are crushing, man. There was a guy, I was actually funny. I took a screenshot, I sent it to Chuck. So shout out Chuck. Just phenomenal manager. Just a great guy to work with. And someone commented on one of his videos, and they said, I'd quit, too, if I had to work for that guy. And I sent it to Chuck. I said, you're killing it. Bold of this guy to assume that you would even hire him in the first place.

Because I'm very certain that guy would not have been hired by Chuck based on that comment. That guy would have been late to his interview.

I was talking to Chuck. The challenging part is, like, so basically, Steven gets, like, 150 clips from them, right? And there's no order other than just time. And. And Steve has to make a story, right? And so he took, like, you know, probably 200 plus clips from Chuck last month and then split them up into three different stories, right? What people don't realize is that someone like Chuck may have said something three or four times in the month, but it sounds like he's harping on it because we condensed that into a five, ten minute video.

Right.

And so it can seem like he's really harsh against something. Like, really? He said it one week and he said two weeks later and said 10 days later after that. And then Steven's taken all that and put it very close together. So shout out to Steven. He's phenomenal at the editing side. And then Chuck does a great job. And it's just easy to get misinterpreted when you're getting that selective with your clips from such a wide date range. Yeah, it can make me sound like a jerk. And so I was texting back and forth with. With Chuck about it. I'm like, dude, you don't need to change anything. He's like, I should be soft. Like, I should be soft enough. I'm like, no, dude, you're just fine.

So I think it attracts two people. No, like, we're serious.

Well, I told him this. I mean, I told him earlier. I forget. Like, the bottom line is we are showing the bad and the ugly along with all the good. It's going to be very easy. It'd be very easy if in three to six months we just showed all the numbers from the locations and they're all. They'll all be doing fine. Right. Even the one that was struggling is already doing good this month. So it'd be easy to do that. And. But then the problem is if I do that in six months or 12 months or whatever, or next year, I'm like, I'm cash flowing $2,000 in distributions every month from all these locations. I haven't been there. Like, I could easily pull that card. The problem is people would join Augusta or they'd start their own business and they hit these. All these road bumps that he's hitting in the first place. Three to six months, and they'd give up because, like, oh, I must be doing something wrong or I'm stupid or like, and that's not true. Like, that's just how business is.

Yeah.

So us being really authentic and genuine. Yes. We might lose the person that is a fan and would otherwise join a gust if I just showed the positive. But I don't want them in the system anyways because they're going to. They're going to collapse as soon as they have failure. And so I think just being open, honest about everything. I told the chocolate, like, just show everything. Like, your raw emotion is fine. Because that's how they're going to feel when they. They have to go and pick up everyone's Slack or, you know, people quit last minute stuff like that.

Yeah, yeah. And I've had two people in introductory calls recently, new to Augusta, new to the channel, that want more information. And they two people have re just said that, like, Chuck's great. I love the transparency. I love that you guys are just showing this. And it does show the raw authenticity of like, hey, building a business isn't easy with Augusta, is it? A lot easier. Yeah, of course. But without it, it's. It's still going to be a challenge, right? So. Yeah, but those have been. Those have been great videos, man. I'm loving them. I'm loving what Chuck doing.

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I want to jump back though, to. To your YouTube channel, but let's rewind a year.

Okay.

All right.

So you posted a video and the title of the video is I turned down a $10 million offer to buy my business.

Yeah.

So do you. Do you remember this video a little bit?

I do.

I know you post a lot of videos, but. So you basically explain to the people that private equity tried to buy out Augusta and then. And then you go on to explain why you didn't sell. But I almost want to start there. Like, what did that feel like?

What. What did that feeling?

Or getting the offer.

So I was on. I was on the airplane. We were taxing out when I got the email. Yeah, I still remember it. It's kind of weird because, like, I didn't accept it, but like, it was. It was kind of surreal because, like, you don't ever put valuation on your equity. Right. And I don't really plan to sell, so it doesn't really matter a whole lot. And I've talked to a lot of these VC firms and private equity and talked about selling just so I can educate myself. But I've never got to the point where they give me. They offered me money. Right. They've. They've always like thrown evaluations and they want projections and all that sort of thing. So I've really stopped doing that the probably the past three months. I probably won't do it anymore like because I have no desire to sell and I got kind of what I need from those calls. But yeah, I remember when it came in.

What did I feel? I think there's definitely a sense of validation just because like someone, you know, values what you've done to that extent. And like I don't look so much for people validating me. But like the numbers, like I like that.

Yeah.

Like it's. I'm just not gonna lie. And then because I run the businesses so on such little cash, like cash in the bank in order to keep growing so quickly, it's like a nice like, okay, like I'm going the right direction even though it's hard and like I'm doing the right thing. Cause like I don't have to run this by board. I could email back yes. And like I'd have money. So that felt good. But it was, it was just like, okay, I'm doing the right thing and there's no there. It was zero inclination to kite bs.

Yeah. So do you want to share the actual number?

So no, I. All I can say because I have to sign NDAs. Okay. So I can say that I, I would have made more than 10 million personally. And also could I say pre tax or. And I, I was selling majority ownership.

Okay, gotcha.

Yeah. But they wanted, they wanted kind of like everything. They wanted the whole thing company.

So I think what's interesting to take it into context because you start with that video.

I want to just have been a horrible deal for me now even a year later.

Well, that's what we're getting into. See, see, you're jumping the gun here. So you start the video and you say, hey, this is, this is a hard video for me to make. I'll put the link in the description. Go back and why did I say.

It was hard for me to make?

I mean, you know, oh, because I.

Could have regretted it.

Yeah. So you were like, I could regret this. But you wanted to be transparent for your audience and really show, like, what you were going through and basically say, like, I got offered this large amount of money, over $10 million, and you were at a crossroads. So what did you feel like? That crossroads was sell out.

You.

Were you low on cash, like you were trying to grow?

Augusta, I'm always a little cash. I'm always stressed out.

But. But you, you. You don't really. I guess you don't explain, like, the crossroads. Does that make sense? So I almost want to get a little bit deeper.

Yeah. So I guess the crossroads would be like, okay, I've always said that I'm not going to sell majority of stake ownership. Augusta, this is literally, like, in my hand. I could do it in a second, and I could. I guess the temptation is, like, you immediately don't have this pain. And the pain is like, not sleeping at night because I'm stressed about cash. And you know, what happens when X, Y and Z and the building project and all these stresses and how much we just deployed for, like, corporate locations and all this stuff. Right. So that immediate. That stress immediately goes away. And that's 80 to 90% of the time when I can't sleep at night is because of money. And it's weird because, like, it's weird to have this really high net worth. But, like, from a cash perspective, I feel very poor.

Yeah.

Because I just keep, like, if I have anything more, okay. If it's more than a million, like, it's going out the door, and it's like, well, that's a lot of money. And cash is millions. Like, no, I can. In a month, all my businesses can burn a million dollars. And that's assuming there's not, like, a tax bill. There's not litigation. And I'm always in litigation. The past year and a half, I've never not been in litigation of some sort. So that's always, like, hanging over your whole head. Right. I've never had to pay a settlement I've ever had to pay. I've never been at fault. But you just don't know what those are going to go.

Totally.

I'm still in one right now for something that one of the franchisees employees did that I'm on the lawsuit for. So that's always hanging over your head. So, like, you got to watch your cash position because you never want to get wiped out. And when you don't have investors backing you up, like, you are the backstop. So, yeah, like, in the moments, like, I guess the temptation could have would have been, you know, you can immediately have this Ticket to, like, not have this pain anymore. And I think it just. It just sunk into me, like, this is a lifestyle business. I'm not selling. I love what I do. And if I took this 10 million or $20 million or whatever down the road, like, what am I going to do tomorrow? This is what I love to do.

Yeah.

So I would basically just have to go back to the drawing board and figure out another business. Why would I want to do that? I'd spend another three or four years, and in that time, I could have taken what I had and make it so much bigger. Compared to, like, the delta, between 0 and 10 million, I could have easily done. I'll do that in the next three to four years, and I'd probably have done that already. So, like.

Yeah, like, the. It's underestimated just how empty you'd feel as a business owner, pouring 80 hours a week, and then immediately you have nothing to work for. And, like, everything you've poured yourself into, like, the team and the culture, and, like, all of a sudden that's gone. Or worse yet, someone's telling you what to do. Like, that that's not gonna happen. So, like. And even for me, like, even if, like, they wanted me to still run a CEO, so. And they wanted me to have minority stake ownership, like, well, the problem is my whole ethos with the team is, like, they know that I'm not living on a lot. They know that I'm living small, and I'm putting everything in the business. And so I walk In, I have 15 million, whatever million dollars, and they. And, like, what's it for them? I don't have any equity for them any in the future. I have any stock options. I don't have anything to give. And so the whole dynamic would change. And because it's not for money from. For me, I can expect that from my team, and I can expect them to push.

So anyways, yeah, no, I loved it.

It would be painful to watch you operate under a board of directors.

No, it'd be no way.

Like, like, it would be so handful to watch.

No, dude, I'm telling you, like, it. There's just no way it would work ever.

Because that's how it would work, right? They would bring in a board of directors.

Yeah.

Oh, yeah. Well, you'd be acting CEO for three minutes.

I. I bet within three weeks I'd get fired. If I was a CEO underneath the board.

Yeah.

I guarantee it. Because, like, yeah, like, even the other day when I apologized like that and did the thing that that would have affected the holding group.

Right.

So that would have all been ran through. I'm. I'm under another cease and desist right now from another company. That would be a huge issue if I had a board with me. It's, like, not a biggie deal. I'm, like, recording my calls with the lawyers. Like, it's great.

But if I get a board, dude, everything has to be kosher and everything has to be dust done. Right? I'm not. Not having it.

So. So at the end of the video, you jump to an analogy and you say, you know, Grant Cardone attack him with a grain of salt, but he's obviously a successful businessman and that he. You once heard him say, and I'm sure other people have said this, probably Warren Buffett and others, but, like, rich people sell, wealthy people hold. And so that was the crosswords where you said, okay, I'm gonna hold. Like, I'm gonna hold on to Augusta.

So how do I say that's a crossroad? That's validation for what I felt. Right. So, like, I've always felt that way. But from a financial perspective, it's hard to walk away from the money. But you can. You can kind of validate it by saying, okay, like, statistically speaking, people don't sell. Have. Are wealthy. Very, very wealthy.

So you essentially decided, and correct me if I'm wrong, you sold off some real estate.

That's.

That's when you made this decision, was shortly after this video or right before the video.

Yep.

So you sold off real estate, and that was to fund what?

Yeah, so like, a year ago, we were trying to fund the whole building project, and we were looking at debt, which if I. If I would have done good and got loan like debt last year, it would have been really, really bad because you fix your rate on with the SBA when you finish your building project. So I. My. My interest rate would probably be like 8 and a half, 9% right now on that project. So the fact that I sold last year a lot of the real estate is super beneficial. I was able. 1031. All of that just completed, actually, today. My 1031. April 23rd. Say the 23rd. Yeah, yesterday. So yesterday 23rd. Yeah. So I got the paperwork today after the 23rd roll around. That was six months. So you got to do everything within six months. So I finished all that 1031. So I won't have to pay any capital, any taxes on all my real estate. I sold. Like, awesome.

Yeah.

And then we should be able to. If I sell One more piece of real estate. I should be able to get the building project for cash, which will be a big burden off which the alternative that was like, you could sell. I could sell a piece of the company. Like, I was going through all the options, right? It's like, do you take on debt, which didn't work out last year, fortunately. Could. Could I take on equity? That's why I was entertaining all these. Okay, potentially, do I sell 20, 30, do I get money? Just cover the building? You know, there's just all these different options you're running through in your head. Right. So I'm still stressed out all the time, dude. About money all the time. I don't think it'll ever go away, though. I think that number will go to, you know, eventually it'll probably be like, you know, if I don't have 50 million, I'll feel like I'm stressed out.

Yeah.

That's just the honest truth.

Yeah. No, I love it. And that's what. I kind of want to dive deeper because obviously this video, if you. If you watch it like you are. You are definitely more emotional and more stressed. Like, I can tell your guard is down a little bit more in this video. So that's why I wanted to get into it. So basically sold off real estate. That's the pay for the building. And then was anything else used for like P4P or for.

Yeah, so like Augusta or back then and to date, pvp, still a money loser. I think it's really important for Augusta though. So I've always done it. Obviously everyone. Augusta doesn't have to pay for it. So we. We opened it up to where people could help us fund it, essentially. And so that's been a big money drag. The thing is this. If I. If I wouldn't have continued with P4P stuff, I would never have been able to do Copilot. And like, I'm sure in like years this will all like make perfect sense. Like a perfect book. But like, it didn't seem this linear last year. And that is like just a few months when was. Did I make this video?

This video is from February 2nd.

Okay.

Of last year.

That's when I was. I started really thinking about. Do you know, I hated the CRM stuff. The stuff I was looking at.

And throughout 2022, I became educated about software and business and software as a service and what AI should be doing in this industry. But wasn't. I got Copilot. CRM dot com. Let's go. Before Copilot and Microsoft came up with their version of Copilot. It's like now you can't get anything. Copilot. I got copilot. CRM.com Baby, let's go. Before ChatGPT came along and all the rest of it. So I really started digging into the tech side. I haven't, I hadn't gone into tech stuff since I was in university and I ran. I've made some apps of my own just using Java and objective C for iOS devices, made some apps and stuff like that. So like last year I started digging back into that and I told a few weeks before this, that video.

I told August, I said the next five to 10 years, every dollar I make is going to go into software. And I also in that same conference told them I don't plan on making. Doing a CRM. Yeah, because I just thought like there other people would be picking up this, picking up all of these pieces like figuring this stuff out and being innovative. But then 2022, because the recession, like it just double compounded just what my feelings were towards the CRM world. So all that to say.

I don't know if in this video I was considering it was hard potentially because I want. I needed money for P4P and like it's still the same way as Copilot. Right. But I just truly, truly believe software is the thing we got to focus on for the next five years. And so I will constantly keep myself under a lot of pain because I'm just like spending money like I was just hired another developer. They're expensive.

Oh yeah.

So and even when I made this video, the cost of a developer was almost twice what it is today because all the big tech was hiring then. Well now they're all laying off. So it's actually been a real big help for us the past. It's horrible to say that other people are getting laid off. That's a good thing for me. But like it's just the truth. Like a developer. I could not get a developer for under $50 an hour, let alone 80. Because like in down in Seattle you get a hundred dollars an hour, $200,000 plus stock options, plus full benefits, plus gyms and massages at work. And it was crazy. So now it's totally different. No one's hiring and so it helps us a little bit.

Yeah, I was just talking to a guy who works at software development and he just told me he does 48 an hour. Like he was pretty transparent about it and I was like, geez, yeah, crazy.

So crazy higher, crazy low.

I Mean that just in the grand scheme of labor, it's high. Like, most people don't think 48 an hour is like, attainable, like most average area.

Last year, probably right around the time I'm making this video, I put one up for $50 an hour. Did not get a single application. I put it one up for $50 an hour recently. 30 to 40 applications in the first day.

That's crazy.

Yeah. Yeah.

That's nuts. So you. In this video, you say there's two things. You say two things need to happen in order for this. This play, this decision, this validation to. To be concrete. And you said, number one is the franchise needs to get to profitability.

Oh, yeah.

While expanding.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

So how do. How do we feel about that? Is the franchise profitable?

Yeah, so it's profitable now. Let's go. I really want it to get to 25% profitability. I'd like it to be around 30% profitable because it will fund everything we need to do in the next five to 10 years. So, yeah, like, I need it. I need it to be that profitable. So every one of it. So this, I think probably a month before this, I sent that text. I wish I would know what day this was. At some point, I text all of the managers. Remember I said, number one priority, every. Every business needs to get a profit. Every sector and department must get to profitability, and not just the whole company, but like, every department needs to be profitable. And so that was the focus all last spring. We had to do some really painful, stupid stuff that I didn't want to do in terms of raising prices on the franchisees at Command center and things like that. And that was really, really painful. But, like, we had to make sure we did not go down.

And I think it paid off, like, huge. And so, yeah, this year will be profitable. Every dollar will be spent on software, but will be profitable. And I want to get that to 25 to 30%.

Just for the sake of hopefully a little more. Less anxiety.

And that's while expanding. So obviously we have the challenges of expanding Command Center, Right? That's hiring, training, onboarding that you've already talked about, and then also expansion of new franchisees, onboarding them, getting them set up and supporting them for their success.

Yeah, well, this video was made right, for. For hell, yeah.

Oh, yeah.

March, April, May. Last year was hell. So that's when all of that had to go down. Turns raising prices. We dropped a lot of the ball at Command center stuff. Just, just massive, just huge influx. And then our virtual Team was just not set up for it because it was our first year trying to take 40, 50 people virtually.

So that was hell. So if I. Would you talk to me in this video? Maybe I would have taken the offer for 10 million if I would have had to live the next three to four months out. That was horrible, dude.

One day I'll tell stories.

Oh, yeah, definitely tell some stories. I remember some Friday nights, you, me, and Liz doing estimates. So the second thing that you said that needed to happen during this moment of validation or this Crossroads was P4P software. But you just kind of explained what P4P software is in the video. And I, like, I listened to this video like three times before, before the podcast. It was like, what are you actually saying about.

You have to remember this video probably made like 2 in the morning when I was really tired.

Like, you clearly explain. All right. The franchise.

Like, I could.

This is my bullet point. You didn't say verbatim franchise to profitability while expanding. That's the bullet point of what you're saying. And then my bullet point for PVP software is the reason it has software.

Yeah. So let's. Let's. So the reason that the franchise had to get to profitability is because I knew I'd have to sell something if we didn't.

Right.

I knew what we were going into spring costs a lot at command, like hundreds of thousands of dollars.

And so I also knew that P4P was costing me a lot of money. Like 30,000amonth we were losing on that. And so a 35, 30, probably the 35,000amonth. And so I just knew my burn rate was so high that if I didn't get everything to profitability as soon as possible, that we would. We would have to sell. Like, I have to sell something or go into massive amount of debt or sell the real estate. And so I ended up selling the real estate. Yeah, that's what I ended up giving.

Yeah. So.

But it's the second one. So I think the thing, the reason in the video, if I didn't actually state what exactly it was that I. I knew I needed to keep investing in building the product, but it was costing me, like, a lot. And I didn't want to. I didn't want to sink the whole ship, Augusta and everything we're doing, because P4P, I'm so, like, all about it. But it's also like, I believe in 110%, and I know historically it'll be correct, but in the short term, it's like a Very niche product that very few people will implement. And 90% of people that start off with a free trial do not get it because they can't implement in their business. They don't have a book manager, they don't do profit sharing. But like when I look five years of what I want software to be doing for August, like we have to have it and we have to pay for it. And so it's just that hard part. Like I'm, I was talking about this with Liz the other day.

The thing I am, I am. I live in a constant state of annoyance with everyone around me and the speed at which everything is being done. And it's not good, it's not healthy. And I'm sure that I'm one of those positive traits of it. Like yes, I get a lot done and stuff like that, but it's not healthy. And.

That'S partly, probably why this video is made is because like I want to go fast, but I have to for the sake of cash, stay slow and focus on operations and tightening things up. And that's hard. And that's, that's why it's tempting, especially during that time to sell part of the business. Because if I had $10 million, dude, I immediately get Dev team into in house, I'd immediately solve the problems at command center because it could over hire and overpay people to stay.

So it just, it's a total different dynamic when you're not having cash from investors. And so.

Yeah, it's, it was. Dude, that was. There's some crazy stories I've never told anyone that like I will eventually but like I got away a little bit longer.

Yeah, yeah.

From those few months. That's crazy.

If, if I may try to peel back a layer here. Are you annoyed that PVP software is now more popular?

I am very annoyed. It stresses me out, dude.

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I thought full transparency, that it would do pretty well financially because no one else does it like that.

In hindsight, if no one else is doing it, there's probably not a market need for it. And there's not, it's very niche. There's not a lot of people that will start using PvP and actually implement it fully in their business to look like this halfway thing. But then they don't need the software because, like, well, then just use Excel. But if you're not sharing reports with your team, if you're not using the AI that we have with 3D notifications to notify your team of certain things, if you're doing, you're not having them clock in and out on the app. If you're not doing profit sharing, open book management like this, it doesn't work. And so basically what I was asking people to do is revamp their whole business. And so to the to date, only Augusta Lawn Care franchisees really do that, which is fine because we give them all the support in the network to actually make the changes required for P4P to work. But everyone else is like, oh, like, I like this part of it and I like this part of it. And so it doesn't work. And so, yeah, like 90% of people that sign up with us a year later are not using it. There's a power group that use it and then do good and definitely do implement it, but. And it's possible, you don't have to be in August to do it, but like, no one does it.

Shout out ABC Lawn works.

Yeah.

John Garrett.

Yeah. So, yeah, I'm frustrated. I'm frustrated due to the fact that, like, people are going to be really mad at Augusta in 10 years and I'm going to point back and say, I gave you the exactly what we did and you did not do it. And people think that's arrogant, saying, I'm just telling you what's going to happen in 10 years. People are going to say it's hard to compete with Augusta. And I'm going to tell you, I laid this track of P4P. I did. I made a video about everybody. Oh, it's free, all the content and how, how to implement it and you did not do it. And help, by the way, here's your username that you signed up for one month and then asked for a refund. And I'm sorry, like, that's going to happen. So we need, we, we had, we Made a decision. We had to do it publicly just to fund. And it's, it's been helpful. We're almost at cash flow even on P4P right now. We're a little bit lost. But like, I think in the next month or two, I can get it to where the money we make from the public side funds development. And so if I ever started to make profit, I'd get more development. But I'm, I'm just so looking forward to integrating with copilot. People are going to lose their mind. The ones that are in copilot actually use it or in P4P and actually use it correctly. When we integrate with people, no one's going to use it hardly. Besides, franchisees guarantee it. Guarantee it. But if you fully integrate with P4P and then you pop it into Copilot, what we're going to be doing is nuts. Like a live dashboard on your phone as an employee vlc, what you're making as, as a speedometer, not like a, a very linear dollar per hour or even a paycheck on P4P, but now you're seeing live. Every time you complete a job in copilot, it's like updating your thermometer, updating your speedometer, and then you will see a live competition for your team the entire day, like, of who's making the most money today. Dude, we're going to kick butt.

I just had, I just had an idea. If I were doing interviews, I would have the dashboard just live on the screen. Oh, yeah. And this is one of our high performers. You can see he's currently at 27 an hour.

Yeah, dude.

Like, I, I have a lot of stuff we want to do. It's gonna take a lot of money. And so. Yeah, I just, I'm just excited about it.

Yeah, I, I, and I think that the reason, and I appreciate you answering the question, but I think it is frustrating for, for someone who kind of grew up in the system, seeing it get developed, seeing it implemented, and then now, you know, five years down the road, there are guys that are entry level employees at one of your shops that are guaranteed 18 an hour, and they're consistently making 24 an hour. Like, it's, it works and people just don't want to put in the effort.

Plus now they can afford medical benefits, paid time off, profit sharing, gym reimbursement, and that's because of P4P.

Yeah.

And so, but, but it was hard to implement. It is hard to implement. I get that. And that's why it hasn't done well, is it? It takes a full rebranding, like redoing your whole set, your whole company. And I hope that by controlling Copilot, I can make that way easier. Because if I can make it where it's really easy to implement with budgeted hours and scheduling, using budgeted hours and then using the rate and popping that in the right matrix and really making that focal point, I can make it easier to switch into P4P. Right. But yeah, it could still just. PVP is an Augusta thing. It still is.

Yeah.

So I'm looking forward to. They give me 10 years when I can point back and say like when. Because people will get mad on social media. They'll be like, yeah, it's impossible. Like you guys are, you know, yes, we will be cheaper than we will be able to compete at a lower price than anyone else. Like that's what software does. It's deflationary. And they'll get mad about that. And they'll get mad that we take all their employees and they can't find anybody because now we have thousand plus locations and we suck up all the talent and we can compete because we have all the ad dollars to go get the labors during spring rush. We will do that. And I will point back and I will say, I gave you guys every single point and juncture of what you should be doing. Your business. You didn't do it. And so it's like, I don't look forward to that day. But all along the way I'm mad because, like, why aren't you doing this? Like, I just can't. I can't believe it, dude.

Yeah, it doesn't make sense to me. So you said these things need to happen. Franchise profitability. No, you're good, you're good.

I love this.

This is what I wanted. Two things didn't happen. Franchise profitability while expanding check P4P software. I would say, you know, 12 month check in. It's like a half check.

Yeah.

Because you're almost at cash flow even.

Yeah.

And let's say you're almost checking and.

It'S been slower development than I hope for because of just the cash constraints. So because we had to slow down the burn to like 15, 20,000amonth. And so now we're down almost to like break even. But it's not. That one's not about the cash. It's like, I want, I wish I would have been able to keep spending on it to be able to have it further down the road. That being said, now as Co pilot. I kind of, like, probably took off a year of development because I'll be able to marry the two and bring stuff from copilot into PvP.

Right.

So.

And copilot's not even in the conversation in this video.

Right.

It might have been in the back of your head. Maybe you were toying around with it or not even. Wow.

I wasn't even thinking about it until I made a video for another CRM tearing them apart and sent it to. I was going to send it to their leadership team. I decided not to. And a week after, I got on the phone with Patrick, who had been. That I've been friends with for a long time, and we're like, dude, we should do this. And that's when it all started. Early October.

Nice. I remember you sent that video to. To us to.

To the leadership team and the franchise Advisory Council.

And the Franchise Advisory Council. And there were a lot of people on board, and I was very opposed, but I was like, this is a ride moment. So I was like, whatever you want to do, I'm riding. Like, it just felt like my opinion, like, we were going to play it however you wanted to play it. And like, my opinion didn't matter. I was like, I'm going to ride. I'll just really. I'll just be a rider. Yeah.

You never shared your opinion?

No, I never know. Not on that one. No. I was like, this is a ride moment. I trust you. Do I. Do I think it's the right decision? Not necessarily, but do I think, like, will it also give us maybe some leverage? Sure. So let's do it.

I have a lot of cards on that one. I got to hold until the end of year.

Yeah, we can't go into that. All right, so the end of this video.

Let's.

Let's wrap this up here on the breakdown of your. Your video from a year ago. You said. And I wrote down the quote you said, In 12 months, people will either say it was genius or foolish not taking the buyout from venture capital. Oh, funding your businesses by selling off your real estate.

Well, personally, I don't really care if people think about that decision. For me personally, it was like, 100% the right decision not to sell. There's definitely. From a economic standpoint, there is. There's definitely something to be said about me taking that money because, number one, I would be personally more well off now. Secondarily, the company wouldn't have. Would have been able to scale faster having capital backing. So from a purely financial standpoint. But Like, I would not be happy. The team around me probably wouldn't stick around. I would have to go build another team. Because usually you can't keep. Like, I couldn't just, like, take all the best people. Like, all right, peace. Like, that's all, man.

I would have left and just followed you.

So.

Yeah, no, I think it's the right decision economically. Probably someone could make an argument for it, but, like, I would then be like, well, yeah, maybe in the short term, like, year, but in five years, there's no way I'm going to care. And, like, I won't. Like, there's. There's an unhealthy thing about me being asleep at night because it means I don't care as much. Right. And so making my life easier is not necessarily better for the business. Business. And so this is why, like, you know, getting nicer houses, our cars, whatever. I'm like, don't do that. Because it's not necessarily right for the franchisees or for the business. Because by making. By me not being asleep means I care so much. And so if you take away that. I think you take away, like, the thing that makes me lethal against our competition, against other comp. Other CRMs. Like, none of them have that at night. Not a single One of those CEOs I've talked to, like, are waking up at night because their system went down or because there's a bug they can't figure out or because they're trying to find a developer. Like, none of them. Not a single one. And it's because their. Their incentive structure is that. That they have got. They've got the payout. I don't have the payout, and I don't want. If I can delay it the longest, I will be way more lethal. And I'm in it for the game. I'm not in it for the money. So, like, you know, what am I going to do? I think $10 million.

Yeah.

I made the video last week, and you see about it on my second channel. Yeah, revive the second channel. Yeah.

Second channel.

Yeah. Dude. Actually, I talked about this kind of.

Like, a little bit. You did? You did a little bit? Yeah.

Like, you know, immediately half of its tax, then you got to take the rest of the money and deploy it to be able to, like, beat inflation. So I've got. I have to go start another business. Well, what am I gonna do? Like, the best industry, like, the thing I know the most about, like, I wouldn't be able to compete in it. So I go sit in the sidelines for three years and I've seen plenty of people sell their business and then they go sit in the sideline for three or four years because they have to for a non compete. They come to, they come back and the whole industry is different. That's how we view a software.

Okay, well answer the question.

Okay.

If you is a genius or foolish.

Well.

It just depends who you talk to. Like for me personally, it's not even a decision. Yeah, like it's not even. I don't careless who kills me. Genius or foolish, there's always someone online, they'll take one of those angles. But like.

When you get to the point where we really like I care what people think, I really do, but I will never make a decision because of it. It hurts when people say negative stuff online or say that I'm doing things wrong or especially when it's people that you care about, like franchisees or family or friends. But like ultimately, even though I might care about what they think, it does have, it does not have it. It does not have a. Have a seat at the decision making table. And so like when I got that, the thing about the $10 million and all that stuff and like I just knew immediately, this is like the ticket to immediately having better sleep immediately, not having as much stress immediately. And it was not even like a thought that I'd take that option. And like, to me that was like, kind of like you jump off, like, hey, like all right, like we're in it now. Yeah, right. Because I've said no to this. I've said no to like the option like the exit ramp. And so it's liberating. Like it's, I wouldn't have any, any. I have no regrets about that. I don't think I'll ever want to sell. Like, I don't know, like one day I think I need to sell a little bit probably for the sake of liquidation, giving the team stuff like that. But until I go public with it, because public I can, I can still control, I can have super voting shares and I can still have control, but then be able to liquidate and allow the team to participate in that. And I think that gets interesting for me. But like I think we're 15, 20 years before like we have software and robotics so nailed that it's worth billions of dollars. And then I could do that. And that gets interesting. But like what am I going to do, dude? I don't, I don't want to live in a bigger place. Like this is great. I literally vacuum for the first time. So I moved in the other day because, like, I don't, Like, I'm not messy and, like, it's, like, super low maintenance. I was talking to one of my friends the other day, and he spends over $2,500 a month just on cleaning his house. No, dude, I don't want to think about, like, having a janitor and, like, figuring all this other stuff out. Like, I like it.

Yeah.

Simple. And I get to focus on what I love all day long. And then, like, on Saturday, I was like, I need to spend some time with my family. So I just like, hey, I'm gonna be here. And here, here. I got two couple hours. Like, let's just spend time.

Mm.

Like, full autonomy. I don't need a board breathing in my neck. Dude, I would rather die.

Yeah.

Like, genuinely. And people, like, think is, like, way extreme. You should say, I would rather die.

Yeah.

It would take away the oxygen.

Yeah.

There's freedom of movement.

Yeah, dude. Yeah.

I think that's too what, like, keeps me. And I want to speak for other employees, but, like, it's. It's freeing and it's exciting that, like, we just kind of have this freedom of movement. As long as we're bought into the vision, like, we just. We just get to do what we want a little bit.

The best part about entrepreneurship is the fact that you get to choose who you work with every day. That's the bottom line. And if I had to run that through a board, like, who my executives are going to be or whether or not we should fire someone, like, like, dude, that just, like, why would I even want to work here? And, like, if the money isn't going to do anything, well, then why would I take that? Like, it's a very easy decision. It wasn't. That's why I didn't even think about it.

Yeah.

Because, like, okay, the money. I don't need the money. It'd be a pain in the butt to have to figure out to deploy it, you know, in a capital efficient way and tax efficient way. And it take it rob me of the thing that I love most about my life, that I get control who I work with every single day. That's the best part. Like, I was annoyed by someone last week, so I fired them. I know it sounds really bad, but I was annoyed. And like, most people, if I would have been an executive that had my hands tied by a board, I had to run it through other people. I would have had to, like, make sure this isn't, like, discrimination and all this other stuff, I'm like, dude, like, you're just not working out. I did a really dignified way. Had a meeting with their manager and let them go. Yeah. And made sure I didn't embarrass them or anything. But, like, they annoyed me for days on end after being, like, warned and stuff. So, like. Yeah, Yeah.

I don't even know the context of that one.

I try to keep it.

Listen to this. Great.

You remember that? Like, my team members. Yeah.

100%. 100%. All right. Well, thank you for going down memory lane with me. I loved it. It was fun. Yeah.

I almost started tearing up there.

That's what I was getting towards. I was pushing a little bit.

Yeah. Anytime. Last. I try not to think about loss, honestly. Dude, last spring was. Yeah, that was quite the thing.

Yeah, we'll dive into that later.

So.

Not that. Not on this one. Do you have any. Not financial advice. Yeah. Not financial advice, folks.

Not financial advice. I guess I finished the 10:31 exchange yesterday, so I think the big thing to think about with 1031 exchange, you only have 6 months once you declare a 1031 exchange to spend the money. And this is what's crazy is I was really thinking, like, last year I'd sell this property, Right. It's my. It's one of my larger. It's my largest piece of real estate, and I thought I would sell it. I'm really happy I didn't, because the delay in the building project would have meant that I wouldn't have been able to use all the funds from this sale on the building project. So now I'm trying to. I have, like, plenty of time to sell this one. Maybe I make a little. A hundred thousand. Two hundred thousand dollars less because the market's come down a bit. But I want to pay taxes on it because I'll be able to do all of it in a 1031, and then that will pay off the rest of the. A building project versus if I would have sold it last year, Yes, I would have made the extra couple hundred grand, but I would have been on probably $800,000 in capital gains. That would have to pay tax on that. So probably, let's just call it 200 grand in taxes. I would have had to spend. So. Yeah.

So not financial advice.

Not financial.

It's not financial advice.

Well, that's how it is. Like, it's not financial advice because I'm giving financial advice and it's not financial advice for you.

Yeah, exactly.

Perfect.

But, yeah, 1031 is exchange you got six months. Just make sure you really have your timelines down.

Cool. I love it. Here's mine. And I feel like I was, I was very like on the forefront of this groundbreaking idea. Then I realized my groundbreaking idea was just meetings. Meeting, like having meetings.

Okay.

So structured communication.

That's my way of like what you're doing, Bellingham.

Yeah, that's my way of framing it. And then I was like, wait, that I just came up with a new name for meetings. Structured communication.

Well, we used to not have very much of structured communication.

Yeah, no, it's my new thing. I'm putting my, I'm laying my, my claim to structured communication. Wait for my book to come out. But basically, no, no, I think there's some value in this. So I think I've been dealing with. Obviously we have a lot of franchisees that are at the level of their business potentially being handed off to a general manager, potentially opening a secondary location. You obviously just opened four brand new locations, bringing your total to seven corporate locations that you have then entrusted Chuck and I to essentially check in and, and make sure they're running efficiently for you. And one thing that Chuck and I have found through our working with GMs is structured communication allows for a lot more effective leadership skill building. I think, I think that when you have a new leader or general manager, it is very hard to. If you don't have a lot of relationship capital, right, A new hire or someone that's maybe a new professional relationship with you, you can't just call them out when they're doing something, something wrong. And I think what you have to do is provide structured communication, I. E. Meetings where it's like, hey, this is what we're going to get into. During this meeting, we're going to do some self evaluation. We're going to talk about what our goals are. Then we're going to try to achieve set goals. So I was talking to a franchisee today. He said, well, my right hand man was my friend before we got into business. We're probably going to make a break, a million this year in annual revenue. And I'm thinking about location too, but I don't know how to approach those tough conversations with him. And I said, why don't you just tell him, hey, because we want to make this location successful, because I want you to be a manager of this location. What if every Monday we have a quick meeting and we just catch up on what happened last week and what do we need to work on this week? Now, now. And it starts to break the ice and then you can get into the more nitty gritty intangibles versus, you know, when it's, when it's a red flag issue with a manager or a leader, you just jump in and you say, hey, that's an issue, we got to fix it. But when it's more, man, I've noticed their time management skills are off. How do I address that? Well, I think it's through a consistent structured communication or meeting where you address like, hey, last week we got behind on X. Why do you think that happened? Hey, this week we were ahead on X. Why do you think that happened? And then helping them work and develop their decision making skills. So I think structured communication. So if you have trouble communicating with someone, maybe just set up some recurring meetings with them. I know you don't really like this.

No, I think it's good. I was, my head was going, how do I replace this? With software.

Yeah, fair.

Yeah, because that's, but it's the intangibles. Yeah, there's intangibles but like there's a certain level of this stuff that can be measured and like you know how many budget hours are completed per week?

Yes.

Estimate number of estimates, number of meetings that can all be synthesized and then. But in terms of the one on one, you still need to have that. And yeah, 100%.

Right?

Dude, I agree, 100%.

I think people need to implement more structured communication with team members and managers.

I agree with. Because, well, even at command center, having one on ones is game changer.

Yeah. Because I think it's very easy for me to see a manager and be like, your close ratio is low, get it higher. Well why is their close ratio low? Is it because they have bad time management skills and they're rushing around getting to estimates and they're not typing their estimates up at the property. Right. They're waiting till the end of the day, then they're forgetting which job is what and then they're putting together horrible estimates. Therefore they have a bad close ratio.

I like your idea of having the meeting with the GM potential GM before too. Because what you can say is like some really harsh things that you would say if they were in GM mode, but now they're not. So you have like an indirect target.

Yep.

So you could say like, I'm still the GM of this location, I. E. Owner, you're going to be the GM next year. If, if I, if, if someone was the GM right now, this is what I'd be saying and doing. And you could be really harsh and they'd get like the tone of where the standards at. And then they're not the target because they're not there yet. They're not the gm. And you can point your finger at the GM that doesn't exist yet.

Right.

And then they know that's the standard. Right. And so even like these videos that Chuck's doing, I feel like that's kind of what he's doing.

Right.

Is he is and he, he instilled it. Even like last week I saw like the improvement in some of their numbers is like he is indirectly calling them out. Right. In the meetings. He is doing somewhat like very, very pointed like calling people out and telling them they need to do better. But then also by doing like an indirect, like, like this is what a GM should be. You kind of indirectly say this is. You're not towing the line if they're self aware enough. I think that's what's helpful with like the franchise too. Like even on the roundtable, you and Chuck talking about what makes a great GM on the round table. Yes. Half of that was for owners to know how to deal and quantify and measure the success of their GMs. Was also for all the GMs listening. It was like our way of like notifying them for the owners who can't say those things. And so I think either having an intermediary like franchise or B software or having. Yeah. Scheduled meeting is. Yeah, 100.

And that's what I told the franchisee is I said if I texted you out of the blue things that you're doing wrong in your business, you would take that very harsh. Yeah, you just would. But if you schedule a coaching call with me and we get into your numbers together because we've both set aside this time you will not take it as harsh when I call you out for doing something wrong.

Yeah.

And he was like, yeah, that's why.

Profit sharing is so important. I feel like for a general manager because then your, your incentives are aligned. Right. Like if you don't give them profit sharing. I've seen this like every, like we could kind of assume general managers. I'll get profit sharing. I still see companies that don't do it and, and it's like I want the majority of their pay over the course of three to five years to become mostly performance pay based upon profit. The reason is because when I sit down I say things about numbers. Close ratio. I can. Then all I need to do is say, oh, profit is affected by close ratio. Your close Ratio is net is not good enough. And that is going to affect the profit like you see directly between your paycheck and the profit line and this other thing called close ratio. And so if you have the incentives all in one's align like I want more money, general manager wants more money. Great. Let's figure out this third party problem called close ratio or whatever it is. Right. So you know, that's good. Yeah. I think structure, communication, it's one of those things like we. You didn't have for a long time. Yeah. You almost pride yourself in like we're just like young company like structure and all that sort of thing. And then as time goes on you realize like why structure has to be in place for larger companies. And like it's, it's, it's even that video I made for Command Center. Like I don't know a lot of people's names.

I mean same like just being honest.

And like I hate that in Undergar. But on the flip side, like I have to remain within the structure of the, the organization because if I jump down and fix a problem for them, it creates a lot of issues for the people in between me and them, the middle management. And so like even the other day someone asked me a question and they wanted my advice. I like so badly wanted to answer because like I love answering questions. And I was like, you have to talk to Liz.

Yeah.

And I was like, don't say anything, Michael.

Don't do it.

Like you just know you're going to mess it up.

Yeah.

And you might give the right answer, but you're going to mess it up for the other person.

Yeah. So I invented meetings. That's my not financial advice.

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This has been the Mike Andy's podcast. Now you have some ideas on how to take your business to the next level. And if you like what you heard, we had tons of lectures, interviews and more over at the Mike Andy's YouTube channel. That'll be right up your alley. That's all we have for you today. We'll see you next time.