Mike Andes from Augusta Lawn Care shares what went wrong at a franchise trade show and talks through the disappointments that come with running a lawn care business: no-show employees, bad reviews, unpaid invoices, and accidental damage to customer property.
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So on today's vlog, we're actually going.
To show you a bit of a fail from last weekend. We went to the franchise show down in Tacoma at the convention center. And as I expected, the in person turnout was not that great. So we're going to show you some B roll of us going there. We go there to basically just sell franchises and we had a booth. It was our first time in an in person event since COVID And we were supposed to be here a year ago, but because of COVID now everything's been pushed back. I did not expect to sell any franchises and I didn't. I hardly even talked to anyone about the franchise. There was hardly anyone there. So.
Welcome to the fail vlog from Augusta Lawn Care.
Here we go.
All right. It's day one here at the franchise show here in Seattle. And so we've never done a trade show like this before. We were scheduled to do this though, before COVID So it's like a year and a half ago we booked this event. So I don't expect really a whole lot of leads or like anything like that or a whole bunch of sales in terms of the franchise. But we're gonna try it out, see how it works.
And we didn't, we weren't allowed to.
Get a refund for this, so we figured we might as well use it. But we'll see what we got. And at the very worst, it's a good day at the office here, sitting down and doing work.
I want to take this opportunity and talk about disappointment. Obviously this past weekend was a disappointment for us because all the time and energy in the hotels and everything, and it's just disappointing. You don't get anything for everything that you put into something. And I think as business owners, especially in the long care industry, every single day is like micro disappointment and dealing with disappointment. The disappointment of having an employee that shows up and comes with an interview and you're like so excited because this is the, this is the person you were looking for. They have the experience. They shook your hand, right? They looked you in the eye, they did great questions and, and they're gonna be the perfect employee. And guess what? First day of work and they don't show up. No show. Or the employees that they've had for a long time. And now all of a sudden there seems like they get more sloppy. They're not showing up to work on time. You always have to pick up after them. You have to nag them at little things in the business. And it's disappointing it's disappointing. When a customer is complaining, they put an online review that's like a one star. They're going or ranting about how you do such a bad job and you have no integrity and your business is bad and they've never had a worse experience. That's disappointing. The unpaid contract that you know you did the work and you slaved away on a job and now they're not paying you. That's disappointing. You looking forward to a big project? Maybe it's your first paver patio or a wall install and now that project is over budgeted hours. You accidentally split an Internet cable, you accidentally broke a water line, you now you're way over budgeted hours, losing money on the job and you're disappointed. Disappointed in yourself, disappointed in your employees, disappointed in customers. That is literally the hardest thing as a business owner to deal with the constant ebb and flow of disappointment.
And I encourage you, whether it be an unpaid contract, a no show employee or complaining customer, whatever's going on in your business, everybody else has gone through the same disappointment appointments. You are not alone. And you've got like, lawn care is not an easy business. And in this job market it is definitely not easy to run a lawn care business. There are absolutely bad days. There's really, really bad days. And maybe you have disappointments that are starting to accumulate in your own business. But you've got to keep laughing. You've got to keep your eye on the prize and on the goal you have set for yourself, for your business. Tomorrow brings a brighter day. And if tomorrow is a few years away, enjoy the night.
Hey, it's Mike here and I just.
Want to say a big thank you.
For watching the video. Trust me. Click the other video over here.
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Just, just go ahead now.
