Richard Potter: Weekend Side-Hustle To Full-Time Entrepreneur, Here's How Richard Built A Multimillion-Dollar Business And Quit His Day Job

I do really believe 100% from every part of me that everyone has the capacity to be able to do the things that they want and not to be held back by the mental baggage that's in our head that we want to push through.

Welcome to the do the Thing podcast. In each episode, we get down and personal with people who go after the things they want to make all their wildest dreams come true. Join us as we unveil and dissect a formula for what it takes to do the thing. Here is your host, Stacy Lauren.

Hi everyone. Welcome to the do the Thing podcast. My name is Stacey Lauren. I recently exited a business that I owned for 20 years and I've really just been looking for new opportunities. So I made the decision to learn to sell on Amazon. My past business was a brick and mortar business and I really loved the concept of owning a business and having more freedom choices. So the idea of selling on a platform like Amazon sounded like a great fit for me. I have several ideas about what I want to sell and a few brands I'm really interested in starting. It's taking a bit for the product development to get fleshed out more and so I've been kind of in this holding pattern till those products are finished. But at the core of all of that is learning about Amazon inside and out. So when I heard my next guest on a podcast episode talking about selling wholesale products on Amazon, I had to learn more about what he was doing. And oh my gosh, I'm so glad that I did. I had never even heard about selling wholesale on Amazon before and I was just so intrigued with the concept. No creating products, just buying products that are already selling really well on Amazon and becoming just another person that sells that product. So no guesswork, just a matter of knowing what steps you need to do to evaluate the product you want to resell. I reached out to him to learn more about how to do this and he had a four day intensive training coming up to show how he built his business business so successfully. The training was seriously one of the best trainings I've ever been. To keep in mind, I ran a business for 20 years and by the time I exited I had a team of 60 people. So I've been to countless trainings from the top level leadership training to mindset psychology, sales, and I mean, honestly a lot. I've been to a lot of training and this by far was one of the most organized, productive trainings I've ever been to. He and his team went through the ins and outs of running an E commerce business, buying products at wholesale and reselling them. He gave tactical strategies for how to find the products, source them, and then sell them. He showed us how to do it manually and also how to speed up the process with software. It was beyond anything I had hoped for. We basically got a roadmap on how to do the thing I've been wanting to do. When I got to the training, I said I wanted to sell products on Amazon and when I left I said I'm an E commerce business owner. So I basically got an entire mind shift of what I was doing by going to this training. So today I'll be interviewing Rich Potter from FBA Wholesale Hybrid.

Hey, Stacy, how's it going?

Doing great. It's so great to have you on here.

Yeah, thanks for the invite.

Yeah. So to get us started, why don't you just tell us a little bit about yourself?

Okay.

Yeah.

So I, I'm married, I got three little girls living in Arizona, live in Queen Creek, Arizona. And you know, currently I coach, teach people how to sell on Amazon. And you know, we have a, you know, pretty good sized Amazon business ourselves. So, you know, we've learned. Feel like we've kind of learned how to do it over the last seven, eight years. And so now we're coaching and teaching people how to do it. So. So yeah, I mean that's, that's kind of in a nutshell, what, what we're doing. We also have a few other things that we do. You know, we own and run an event business and you know, recently started up a, a rental business where we're doing Turo rental cars on Turo and, and Airbnbs and stuff. So we, we're into quite a, quite a few different things.

That is so cool. So you are literally doing the thing.

I think so, yeah. And loving it.

That's awesome. Well, so the thing that just impressed me the most about you. Well, honestly, I was already impressed before I even got there. I listened to you on that podcast where you were the founder of. What was it called again?

Yes, I believe it was Scott Needham, the smartest Amazon seller, the founder of Smart Scout and the CEO of Buy Box.

Yeah, and the craziest thing about that was I don't even know how I got on that podcast. I was listening to another one about private label products and then on how to sell private label on Amazon. And I guess you know how that algorithm happens where it automatically puts on something else or something happened where I was listening to this podcast with you on there and you're talking about wholesale products. And I had no idea, had never even heard about people selling wholesale products on Amazon. So it just sort of took me completely off guard with like how much I needed to still learn, you know, in order to really be successful, for me to be successful on Amazon. So yeah, it's been, it's been amazing number one, just to hear you on that interview and explain how it all worked. And then on the other hand, when I got to visit you in Arizona for your four day and getting to see your warehouse, meet your team, met your wife, it was just pretty unbelievable on how much the work that it had to take you to get there and how many things you had to overcome to be able to be in that position. So I'd love to just kind of talk about that more, more about how you got into. We'll start with the Amazon stuff, you know, Amazon in the first place, if you don't mind.

Yeah, absolutely. So actually for us it started with the event industry, with the photo booth rental stuff. So I graduated from Arizona state back in 2007 and I went to work for a distributor of electronic components. I worked for them for 12 years before I ended up quitting and running my own thing on full time. But back in 2014, my largest account, the company that, that, that I was managing, actually got bought out by a company in India. And you know, being in sales, you know, probably 80% or more of my, my pay was commission. And so I was worried that, like I said, it was my largest account. I was worried that about 75% of my income was just going to disappear overnight and they were going to move all production to, you know, a lower cost country. Right. And so when I, when I hurl that, I went home and I told my wife and I was like, we, we gotta find something else to make more money. I didn't want to quit my job, go find something else because it was a great company. I just figured like we just needed to start something on the side to start generating revenue until I could build up my other accounts and whatnot. So as we started doing some research, we kind of found and kind of fell into industry and ended up buying a photo booth. And so with the photo booths, you know, we, we provide the photo booth for weddings and birthday parties and corporate events and that sort of thing. And so that was like what, October 2014, we started doing that within two months, two and a half months, we bought another photo booth and then even started bubble soccer rentals. And so the event industry for us was a fantastic start and it quickly turned one photo booth turned into two. And today we have, what do we have? Eight photo booths. We have I think 65 bubbles for bubble soccer rentals. And I have a full team of event staff that do all those events for us. I'm not even sure the last time I went out and did an event myself. My team does all those for us. And so that's kind of where we started our entrepreneurial journey. And then it was a year later, 2015, where I was actually just kind of scrolling through my Facebook feed and I saw a buddy of mine that I used to wrestle with in high school, he had made a post that him and his brother were, you know, doing this Amazon FBA thing and they were killing it on Amazon. And I, you know, at that time I didn't even know that you could sell on Amazon. I thought everything on Amazon was purchased from Amazon.

Right.

So they, you know, they, they made this post that they were doing. I can't even remember. It was like 40, $50,000 a month on Amazon and they had gone through this launch course and so I started checking it out and, and just like you like it was, it was all private label focused, right? And so that was production to Amazon was through private label. And so we started looking at it and we didn't end up buying the course because it was a pretty expensive kind of launch course and all focused on importing products from China. And it just wasn't for me at the time, it just wasn't the right fit. Right. But having worked the last at that point, I think it was nine or 10 years in wholesale distribution. That to me is what made more sense. And so we did end up launching our Amazon business at that time. But rather than focus on private label, we decided to contact U.S. based brands, manufacturers and see if we could get their permission to buy their products and to sell their products on Amazon so, you know, wholesale. So that's what we did. 2015 is when we started. We did $350,000 on Amazon our first year. And then by year two we've grown our Amazon business to a million. And then it was, it'll be three years here in about three months that I quit my job and went full time. And yeah, I mean we've hired staff, we've, you know, I've got eight employees now and that includes two virtual assistants in the Philippines. We have a 4,500 square foot warehouse and we're looking, last year we did 3.5 million looking to do hopefully about four, four and a half million this year. And so, you know, I. I have an office manager, you know, kind of like my event industry, my event business. I wanted to set it up to where my team. I could build a team of experts around me and my team could run it for me so that I could then, you know, focus on the next thing. Right. So I now have an office manager, Richard, who basically kind of runs my Amazon business for me with, you know, Rome as my warehouse manager, and the two of them manage the staff and the growth, and I sit here at the office and kind of oversee it all. But for the most part now, I'm. I'm moving on to, you know, we're doing car rentals on Turo. We're under contract to buy our first Airbnb. We should close here in a couple weeks. So I'm, I'm now focused on that kind of stuff. So now I've been coaching, been teaching people how to sell on Amazon themselves for. For about two years now.

I love it. You're basically getting all kinds of leverage right now because you have an amazing team behind you. Then you're able to kind of open yourself up to all these different other ways to, you know, increase your revenue stream.

Yeah, yeah. See, that's the thing. I'm not. I'm not splitting myself too thin. I'm not trying to do, you know, a million different things. I. I kind of focus on one. I get it nailed down. I build a team around me that then kind of takes over. And then at that point, once it's, you know, fully functional and kind of running on its own and able to grow and sustain itself, then I kind of step out and then focus on the next thing.

Yeah. That's amazing. And, I mean, your team shows that they're just all amazing human beings. So my big question is, so when you're. When you realized your. The job that you had, the 70% of the income was going to be going away and you were like, okay, I think I want to do this event business. What had you decided to do that over? Like, just looking for another job?

Yeah, I've always wanted, like, I've been attracted always to, like, sales jobs and anything to where, like, I could dictate my own, like, future, my own income potential. Right. Like, I even, like, even in high school, I didn't want jobs that paid me in exchange for my time, like an hourly rate. Right. I wanted a job or a career that paid me based on my skill level, based on my performance. And sales was that first introduction to me, like, getting paid at least somewhat to where I feel like I was valued, right? And so I think it kind of got me thinking to, well, yes, sales is great. Like, I can get paid a commission, but what if instead of an owner of a business paying me the commission, what if I got to keep all of the profit as the owner of the business, right? So for me, like, I saw the potential owning businesses as a greater opportunity for me than to just go find that next job, right? So I, I, you know, that's kind of why we did. Why we did what we did. We, we first started looking for a gym. We wanted to open up our own gym. You know, my wife and I are kind of, you know, fitness nuts. And so we, we kind of wanted to go that way, but it was just too expensive and too time consuming. And I couldn't do it on the side in the evenings or on the weekends while I maintained my, you know, current income. So the event industry was perfect because we could do it on weekends. We could hustle in the evenings. Like, no one's doing a wedding in the middle of the day on a Tuesday while I'm at work, right? They're doing Friday night, Saturday night. So I could make. I could make the money with my new business while still maintaining, you know, my current income level. And then hopefully, eventually, like, we did, you know, replace it and then surpass it so that I could finally quit my job.

Yeah, with the first photo booth you bought, do you mind sharing how much that was?

Yeah. So, I mean, I'll tell you the whole story if you want to hear it too. We actually, we bought into a. We bought into a scam at first, right? So, like, we found what we thought was a reputable franchise photo booth franchise we bought. The photo Booth cost me $9,500, and when it showed up, it was a piece of junk that they'd imported from China that didn't even work, right? And so, and they sold, I don't even know how many dozens of photo booth franchises to people all over the country at about the same time, and then, like, vanished. So here I am, I'm $9,500 into my first investment in my first business, and it's a total failure because the photo booth doesn't work. It's a complete scam. I ended up shipping it back to them, and then they claimed to that arrived damaged, and they weren't going to refund me my money. Luckily, I insured that shipment back to them through ups.

Oh, wow.

Yes. Freight and the UPS freight actually ended up cutting me a check for like $6,500. It took nine months to get that, but I got, you know, 6,500 out of the original 9,500 back nine months later. So, you know, we kind of screwed up and we bought into a scam to begin with. But the idea I felt was right, right? So I, I really felt strong that we could, we could be successful in the event industry with photo booths. And so we ended up finding another company. We did much better research. They were a legit manufacturer of photo booths. And so I then put the next, I think it was $8,500 photo booth on a credit card and said, we're going to do this, we're going to figure it out. And so within I think it was three months, we had paid off the, we paid off the new booth and we paid off the scam booth that we had bought, and then we bought the second photo booth on credit and hired, and we hired two sets of employees so that our employees could run both events that we had at the same time and we could kind of manage the events from, you know, from home and from remotely whatever, so that we could kind of work on the business rather than constantly working in it. Right. So, you know, it was, it was quite the three, four months trying to figure all that out with, with, you know, losing so much money on our first ever venture. But, you know, it worked out for us. We, we, we didn't give up, which I think a lot of people may have given up at that point. And had we given up, I'd probably still be sit job, you know, and like I said, it was a good job, but it wasn't, didn't allow the freedoms that I have now. So I'm glad we, we stuck to it and didn't let that first little 9, $500 failure stop us.

Yeah, you're right. So many people would have looked at that as like, okay, I'm not meant to do this or whatever. But for you, you were like so solid on this being a good plan for you guys that you decided to continue forward.

Yep, yep, it's been great. I mean, of course that, that, that business is, was kind of shut down for about a year and a half during COVID so it was a good thing. We had other streams of income through Covid. Our, you know, our Amazon business did incredibly well during the shutdowns and during COVID and stuff, but the event industry was all but shut down. And now we've been back up running for probably about four or five months. So it's not quite what it used to be yet, but it's heading that direction. So it's nice.

Yeah, that's great. And it kind of gave you the practice, right, with like running a team and learning the skills you needed to learn in order to be able to Amazon business and also the coaching business too.

Yep, absolutely. Yeah. No, I think without the event business there, you know, it really did help us figure out how to hire people, how to interview people, how to train people and, and build a team of event photo booth attendees and game masters for the bubble soccer. So, yeah, it really led into how we approached our Amazon business. I know so many people try to run it by themselves. They think if they hire people, they'll be giving away too much of their money. But honestly, without the team I built, there's no way we'd be looking at $4 million this year.

Yeah. Wonderful. So with the, so with the first photo booth, when you were investing the money before you knew you were going to get scammed, how did you figure out that that was what you wanted to do? Did you, like, look at numbers? Did you do a risk analysis, like, or was it just like, oh, this would be fun? You know, what was kind of your, your thought process?

Yeah. Goodness. It's been so long ago, right? It's been eight years ago. Um, it, it won. It was something that we could start on our budget, right. Like, we could start for $10,000, we could get a booth. So the barrier of entry was pretty low comparatively to like a gym or a franchise or whatever. It was also something that, you know, we could work on nights, evenings, weekends. So it didn't allow, I didn't have to quit my job or anything. So it was, I think it had a lot to do with the flexibility and the just ease of entry into the industry. Right. You know, we're fortunate enough that we're in Arizona. It's, you know, I don't even know how many millions of people live here. So it's, it's a really big city. Lots of people come from all over the country, travel here as a destination place for weddings, for parties. There's, you know, the Phoenix Convention center is huge and draws all kinds of different conventions and corporate events. And so it's, it was a perfect city to do something like that because of the amount of events that are, you know, here at least eight to nine months of the year when it's not, you know, 115 degrees outside. But so the the market here in Phoenix was just, you know, prime for, for that type of, of business. So, you know, I didn't really do any sort of actual risk analysis or I didn't even write up a business plan. I just, you know, I looked at the market, I looked at the need and thought, there's a need here, let's jump in and figure it out. So we kind of figured it out as we went.

Yeah, I love that because it's so easy. I've talked to other people about this too, and obviously there's some cases where it makes sense to do this full blown, you know, business plan risk analysis, depending on the money. Right. And how much you're willing to, to risk. But it sounds like you sort of, you know, because it's easy to get into that analysis paralysis, you know, and so it sounds like you just dove in and said, okay, well, the worst case, it's $9,500 essentially.

Yep. Worst case is, you know, it doesn't put us back too far. We give this a try, you know, and I, I kind of stumbled into it, I think on like, it was like Craigslist. No, it was like those, what is that called? Biz Buy, where you buy businesses. So someone was trying to sell their photo booth business and that's where the idea came from. And you know, I didn't want to pay that person $50,000 for their photo booth business, but like the idea of it. So it's kind of how we, that's how we came across the idea to begin with.

I love, I love that. I've actually been doing that recently with Amazon businesses that I see on there, you know, because I'm seeing how much they're selling them for. And I'm, I'm trying to, you know, just kind of like get an idea of which ones are worth more and what they're doing.

So. Yeah.

So tell me. So, okay, I want to talk to you more about the management side of things because I feel like you have this natural ability, at least that appeared to me, of like just managing people. And that is not as easy as people would think it would be. Man. Finding the right team and managing people is probably one of the hardest things I think, that business owners have to go through. And it's the easiest way to bottleneck your success really, when you don't have a trusted team behind you. And you really mastered that. So, so I'm just wondering, like, where did that, did that experience come from your job, or did that experience really come from the event business?

That's a great question. I, I don't know. Honestly, like, I've always just kind of been a natural born leader. But, you know, in, in the sales job I had, I wasn't over anybody. I had no, you know, no leadership role, wasn't a sales manager. I was just the sales guy in charge of my dozen or so account. So, you know, my first experience in interviewing and managing really came from the photo booth industry. So we, I agree with you. Like, it's, it's tough to manage people and find the right talent and, and train people and, you know, people, you know, people are always trying to leave for that next opportunity and, you know, then you have to start over. You, like, it can be frustrating for sure. So we just, it was just another one of those things. We just kind of figured it out as we went. You know, we had a couple. We actually had someone slated to be our Amazon office manager and we thought she was going to be perfect for it. Ended up that she was, you know, not even that good of a person.

Right.

And so we, we figured that out before we got our first warehouse, luckily, and, and let her go at about the time that we found Richard, who, who is now the office manager. And, and to be completely honest with, with you, like, he was definitely not qualified at the time. He was just working the front desk at our local gym. You know, we saw him every day when, when we went to the gym and, and kind of struck up a friendship with him. My wife met him first at the gym and hired him to come over and run some of our, our bubble soccer events. And then, you know, he was just so reliable and such a great people person that we brought him into then doing photo booths. And then, you know, when the time came, we, we had him started doing some prep and stuff with their Amazon stuff. And, and he was terrible at it at first, right? Like, he was mislabeling stuff. He wasn't packaging things, right. And we had to retrain him. And you know, at first, you know, it didn't look, it didn't look like he would be the leader he is now, but the one thing about him is he's, he's super like, personable. And not only that, but like he, you only have to tell him to teach him something once, right? He's not good at it to begin with, but when you teach him and show him how to do it, like, he figured it out and you wouldn't have to retrain him and reteach him and it all just kind of worked out. We Just kind of helped him build those leadership skills and you know, now he's incredible. He's, you know, he's a 25 year old kid. He's young, but no college. No college, but the kid's awesome and he, he really knows how to, you know, organize himself and, and help run this team. So I think it definitely helps that I'm here every day. I haven't, you know, stepped out so much that I'm not present. And he can we spend at least an hour or two a day kind of running through things and him asking me questions and, you know, me giving him constant direction. But for the most part now he kind of runs the show here.

Yeah, I love that. As you're talking, I'm thinking, I'm wondering if your three daughters helped you because of your ability to be so patient.

Probably. I mean, God, I came from a family of all boys and I've been blessed with three girls. So definitely a change from how I grew up. But yeah, they can, those kids definitely teach a patience and for sure.

Well, yeah, because it sounds like, you know, it's. So it's kind of easy for you then to hire for values over skills because you know that you have the ability to teach someone skills as long as they have the values that you, you know, that you hold close to, to your heart.

Yeah, that's, that's exactly my hiring process. Right. Like I don't care a person's skill level, education level. To me it's all about values. Yep. Just the type of person they are, work ethic. Because I feel like I can teach, I can teach anybody just about anything. And if they're someone like, you know, that learns easily, quickly and has the right value set, then, you know, I can, I can teach anybody a skill that, especially in the type of businesses that we run. Like, you know, I don't need engineers or brain surgeons to come do what we do. So you have the right value set. I can teach you how to be a good part of our team.

Yeah, yeah, I love that. And then what? Okay, so now we're opening up the Amazon business. You're looking at private label. You're not wanting to spend the money on the course. And then you decided, okay, I'm going to try to contact these brands directly. Where, where did that come from?

Well, I came from the world of distribution. So we would buy directly from manufacturers, the brands themselves that made these electronic components. And then we would turn around and we would sell them to our customers. And so that was, that was my mindset for the last, you know, eight to 10 years doing that, it just made perfect sense to me that all these brands sold on Amazon. Why can't I just call them and ask to buy their product to wholesale and sell their product on Amazon? Right? So that's, that's really, I think it just came from my, my background because, you know, I think you alluded to it a little bit at first that when people are introduced to Amazon, they think of either private label or they think of arbitrage, you know, going to your local store and looking for clearance and flipping that stuff on Amazon or ebay. And that's, you know, not where I went. I didn't go either of those places because of my experience in distribution. I went straight to wholesale. So we, as we were thinking of launching this, this Amazon business, we were focused on launching a private label business first. And we were of kind trying to go through the process of finding products and figuring out what would work. And you know, we hadn't pulled the trigger on anything yet. And, and my wife and I were sitting in front of the TV one evening watching Shark Tank of all shows and we saw some guy pitched a product on there that is just a little like RFID card, right? And a great product. We thought, you know, I think one of the Shark Tanks guys, one of the guys on the show even bought the business. And we, we looked that product up on Amazon, just wondering like, I wonder if this sells on Amazon. Sure enough, it did. So the next day my wife, I can't remember if she called them or if she sent them an email, but she asked them if we could buy from them directly and sell their products and they, they agreed to it. So we, we reached out our success rate, which is not the norm in wholesale, but our success rate right out the gate was 100%. We reached, we got approval from the first brand we contacted and we sold that little RFID card for probably about three years before they decided to take all the sales in house and manage it themselves. But that was our first wholesale product just from watching a TV show, you know, made a phone call or again, I can't remember if she called them or emailed them, but they approved us right there on the spot and placed our order I think that same day or the next day and started selling their stuff right away. So, and then in fact the second product Shelly found as well, from a Facebook ad, she was just scrolling through Facebook feed, ad popped up and there's this little like beanie with the little headlights, little lights on the top of the beanie. And so she reached out to that company and sure enough, they were, they were willing to give us a wholesale account and allowed us to sell on Amazon as well. So right out the gate, two out of two. And we did, you know, I think $45,000. We started November 1, 2015 and did $45,000 in November and December combined.

Wow.

I was just kind of off the races after that. We kind of figured out a method to. At that time we were using Jungle Scout to kind of data mine Amazon for us and find potential brands that we thought would be good to work with. And over the years, we've kind of crafted a pretty good search criteria that helps us, you know, find brands more successfully. And we've since moved from, from Jungle Scout. Now we use Smart Scout. They're both great tools, but I just, I prefer Smart Scout because it's just crafted. It was created by Scott Needham, the CEO of Buy Boxer. He, he runs a wholesale business himself on Amazon. You know, he's doing 50 plus million dollars a year on Amazon, so he kind of knows what he's doing in the wholesale world. And that Smart Scout was just created for, by wholesale guy for wholesale people. So it's the perfect tool to go out and find leads for wholesale brands to work with on Amazon.

Yeah, I recently started using that too. And their team's great too. They do like a whole welcome call and I really, really. It's been, it's been great because I learned about it through you. So it's been great just to see how many tools there are to help people, you know, get successful.

Yeah, the last probably three, four years, the industry's come a long way in providing software tools and there wasn't a lot around when we started, but there's some great tools out there now.

Yeah. So the other thing I think you do really well is, and I'm just wondering where this comes from is you're not just looking inside the box, you're looking outside the box. You know, with, with. I noticed this when I was there during your training, but then I'm also hearing it as we're talking on the phone. I'm just wondering where that comes from. Like, how are you able to just. So I mean, it's been with everything that you've done, really, I mean, even from getting the UPS covered from your photo booth to, you know, looking at the gyms, you know, and looking at biz by sell and, you know, the stuff that I noticed in the training was just mind blowing. At how you're just looking at a 360 degree view of things.

Yeah, I wish I had the answer for you there. I don't know. That's just, that's just the way it's always been for me. I, you know, and I think a lot of it is I like to talk through my ideas with my wife. You know, she filters out a lot of. A lot of ideas that I might throw out there, you know, but I'm always throwing out different ideas and you know, she, I think she helps ground me and helps filter out the bad stuff so that when I do have good ideas, I can just, you know, I think that's, I'm really good at executing those. So. Yeah, I don't, I don't know where it came from, how I got it, but that's just who I am, I guess.

Yeah. So when you're seeing something new, like even. Let's look at Turo, right? Like, what's kind of, what's your. Like when you're first starting something new like that? What's kind of your thought process as you're like, okay, this could be a revenue stream. Is there something that you noticed with that?

Well, I would say, like, I initially just try to gather information, right. Like my first, the first exercise would be to just gather as much information as possible. So I really dive deep into podcasts and YouTube videos, audiobooks. I try to look for the experts in the industry and see what they're doing and see the successes they're having and even find reasons like, not to do it. Right. Like speak to or listen to people who have exited the industry to see if I can figure out like, why, where they messed up. Should I not be getting into it because these people are exiting or is it still a good opportunity because these people are exiting? Right. So we had, I think, heard of Turo probably a little over a year ago and you know, we'd kind of talked about it, but we had a friend, actually I think it was Shelly's trainer at the gym who, he did it with one of his cars for a little while, pulled it off, didn't like the experience, but we've always kind of kicked it around. And then we. A month ago I, I bought my wife a new car. So I bought her a new Lincoln Navigator and her, her Range Rover. It was, it's. It's paid for, still a great car. And we decided to give it a try with, with this car. So we've only been doing it for a month and so we just did it with what we had. Right. So we had a Range Rover. We threw it up on there and man, I, I created my TURO account and listed the rover and within 30 minutes got our first booking for that day. Wow. We had like three hours to go like detail the car, clean it out. And we haven't even done like a full clean because, like, I literally just bought her that, that Navigator, I think, two days prior. And so, you know, it still had all my kids stuff in there. It's probably dirty from, you know, my kids and all that stuff. So we had, you know, just a few hours to get it clean and get it to the airport, drop it off and. And away it went. Right. So, but we've been doing that for a month. I think we're booked out for the next two and a half weeks solid. So in six or seven weeks there's. It's only been in my driveway for three days, so it's incredible. Right. So the idea first was, okay, let's use our asset, this Rover that's paid for. Let's use that asset to then generate enough income to pay for the new Lincoln payment. You know, I think the payment on that Lincoln is 12, $1300 a month. So all I need is at least $1300 a month in revenue generated from this asset I already have and then my new liability is paid for. So it's kind of a mindset we've developed lately is let's use assets to pay for our toys. Right. So that's kind of what we're doing with the Rover now. But, but you know, in six weeks we've generated over $3,600 profit from that Rover. So it is three times paid for my monthly liability on the new car. So, you know, now I've spent the last probably three weeks diving into podcasts and YouTube videos and you know, I already know the next four vehicles I'm going to go buy now. Doing research on TURO itself to see like what, what rents out real well here in the Valley. And you know, now I've got my eye on a little Corvette and you know, a couple other we're gonna do. There's kind of, I think two approaches to tutorial that work pretty well. You got the economy car approach or you've got the luxury vehicle approach. And I think we're gonna go luxury and, and go with the higher end cars that rent out for higher daily rates.

And then that's fun because then you get to use the cars too.

Exactly. Right. Exactly. It. So I think my, you Know, I got a 2020 Ram Power Wagon that I'm actually going to trade in and going to try to trade it in for two. Two vehicles. And so I am not. I think I'm not going to have a personal vehicle myself for at least the rest of this year. We'll see what we do next year. But I'm going to go buy three or four vehicles to. To put on. Turo will have, you know, four or five total. And I'll just drive whatever's sitting in the parking lot there in my driveway. Right. So if we. If we book out four out of the five, I'll make sure I block out that fifth one so that I have something to drive. But I'll get to. I'll get to drive these nice vehicles myself.

Yeah, I love it. That's so cool. Okay, so I'm literally, like, sitting here, you know, thinking I'm trying to extract your formula for you doing the thing as we're talking. And I think we just kind of covered two things just from this experience, because it's cool and it's fresh, because you, like, have such a clarity, you know, on. On what you're doing. And so I think one would be, like, educating yourself, you know, on. Like, you're not. Your ego's not there. You're like. You're in a learner mode. Even though you're this amazing, successful, you know, business owner, you're not, like, oh, I'm too good to learn about this thing. You're, like, really open to what you're hearing, you know, and you're taking everything in, consuming information. So that would be one. Yeah. Second thing would be just. Yeah, like I said, the. Keeping an open mind and not saying, you know, no until you, like, almost see it all. Is that. Am I on track with that one, too?

I think that's a great. A great point. I would say maybe that third thing is we. I'm quick to make decisions, right? So I. I do my part in doing the research. I investigate it thoroughly, I feel. But then I don't get caught up with that paralysis by analysis. Like, I. If I feel it's a good idea, even if I don't think I've got it fully figured out, I jump in, right? I. I jump in both feet. Like, I don't, you know, I. I've only been looking into this turtle thing and doing this turtle thing now for a month, but I'm convinced it's a great idea for me. And so I'm jumping in both feet, and I'm gonna. I'm gonna continue to do my research, but I'm gonna figure it out as I go as well. And I'm not gonna get hung up on the sidelines wondering when is the right time to jump in. I should have done it two years ago. I should have done it. Or maybe next year's good. Like, no, I'm doing it now.

Yeah, I love it. And then it almost seems like another. Another piece of your formula is that brainstorming and soundboard with your wife.

Yeah. Yep. Absolutely.

Yeah. And then having, like, a sales mindset, you know, not wanting to trade times for dollars. Trade time for dollars. But also I've learned, because sales is my background too. And this actually was originally going to be a sales book. The do the thing started as a book concept where I was writing a book and the editor basically was saying, like, hey, you know, like, I see where you're doing the thing, but, like, you should talk to other people, too, just to see if they have different formulas from you. Because if you really want to help people overcome fear and be able to do the thing, you know, they might not connect to everything you're saying. They might want to hear from other people, you know, too. And originally it was going to be sales book because that's been kind of the backbone of everything, you know, that I've done. And what I've noticed is it's not really selling. It's just the concept you learn from sales. It's kind of like what Shelley did when she contacted the first brand or the second brand, and just like, oh, I'm just gonna contact them. Do you know how, like, that's like, one of the most. One of the hardest things for people to do, you know, is what. What she did, where she's just like, I'm just gonna call whatever she did. If she called them, emailed them, you know, just contacting them, that concept of just like, I'm going after it, you know?

Yep, yep. Absolutely. Just jump in. Just do it, you know, I mean, if you get the no, you know, I look at the no two ways, right? Like the no. If you get the no, you're that much closer to getting a yes. But also, like, you get the no, and nothing's changed. Right. You're no worse off for it. Right? So, you know, don't be afraid of the no, because you're still right where you were before, but then you're closer to the yes. And when you get the yes, it just makes a huge difference.

Man. That is huge, Rich. Like, you get the note and nothing has changed. I love that so much. I really do. It's awesome. Okay, cool. So, yeah, so I'm feeling. And then the other thing would be that outside the box thinking. I would think that's part of your formula because you're. And that's part of that open mindedness, I think too.

So.

Am I missing anything?

No, I don't think so. I think, yeah, you're right on target. Now, you know, the whole, this whole rental business, we want it to be, you know, not just cars, but Airbnbs as well. So that part of it we don't have figure it out, but we get to start looking at it in a couple weeks here once we close on our first airbnb property. So that'll be fun.

Well, yeah, and it's so fun that you guys are just already know how to like be able to figure this stuff out together. So it's like you, almost all these things that you've done already have been almost like practice now, you know, for each thing. And then having the, the team in place to run these other businesses, you know, is just, it's got to be like a, just an easy way for you to know that you can, you know, strengthen your other ideas, essentially.

Yeah, one, one business has always like led to and funded the next one. And the team, we've kind of brought the team along and you know, I wouldn't, I don't think I'd go out and try to buy five or six vehicles right away like I'm going to if I didn't have the team in place already. You know, I don't really want to be driving to and from the airport every day, but I have employees that I can pay to do it and you know, they're going to get paid to go drive nice vehicles and they're pretty, you know, they're pretty pumped about it. So, you know, we're bringing people along with us and paying them well and they're becoming part of our, you know, family. And, you know, the next thing is hopefully next year we're going to be launching the full fledged prep center for Amazon Wholesalers. So. And that's, and what's great about that is that's not going to be just mine and Shelley's thing. That's actually kind of the brainchild of my warehouse manager. So my warehouse manager, my office manager, myself, we're going to partner on it. You know, we're all going to be even owners on this and we're going to, you know, I'm gonna go out and hopefully build a 20, 25,000 square foot warehouse and the three of us are partnering on this venture of, you know, prepping for Amazon wholesaler businesses.

So I know about the prep center only from a high level view that you want to do it. Only because when I was there I was like, could you guys. I saw how amazing you were at the shipping details and how it extensive and I don't want to use the word exhausting because for me it's exhausting but for other people it might not be, but each detail that you meticulously care for each item. And so I know I had, I had even asked you if you could do mine. And so we had sort of discussed it but I didn't realize your, your, your goal with that which is awesome. That's great. What a great way to be able to give an opportunity to the team too.

Yeah, yeah, absolutely. Like I'm not afraid of my team going out and you know, building their own thing too because either one, like I can sit back and I can know that I helped them get there or two, which is this case is I can actually partner with them and help them fund it and go and do the journey with them, you know. So hopefully they're not going to be that story of you know, the failed business or whatever. You know, they can piggyback off of my experience and my expertise and even to some extent my, my, the money now that we, I can help fund the, the, the building. I can be that part of it, you know, I can be the, the, the investment part of it to help build it this time, but also be there and help them, you know, have build a successful business from, from the very beginning, you know. So I think the three of us together, you know, they're not just going to be my employees now, now very moving into partnerships with me which is I think incredible for, for not just them but for me as well, you know.

So yeah, like it's life changing.

Yeah, yeah, I think so. And that's, you know, I did this, that we got into business ourselves to change our own lives and now it's, it's really cool to be able to help others change theirs too. So that's, that's a great thing about businesses, you know, it's, it almost becomes like, you know, a bigger mission of changing lives and helping people and stuff. So it's cool.

Yeah. So what do you think has been the hardest thing for you throughout like your whole journey.

Man? Balancing my time probably right. Because you know, I've got three girls. I've got a family. I honestly love what I do. And. And so I think for me, the hardest thing is like, shutting it off and not being here at the office or not going into work and knowing that my team's there and they can manage it. I think it's something I need to do better of managing my time, focusing on my health, like spending time away and outside of this. And I think that's hard for me because I really do love what I do, and I love building businesses and growing businesses and. And all that. So I'm trying to find a way. I think I've been doing a decent job of it the last month or so, but that has been a struggle for me. You know, I used to love going to the gym and working out, and I haven't been as dedicated there as I should be, you know, and, you know, I find myself. Myself working till 6 or 7 at night and not because I need to, just because I like it. Right. But, yeah, I need to. I need to, you know, be more intent about stopping and especially right now when my kids are young and being there. So, you know, that's. That's, I think, where I struggle and that's where I'm trying to work. Work on right now.

Yeah, that's amazing that you're recognizing it because a lot of people will not notice it until, you know, they get burnout, basically. So I think it's great that you're noticing it now. And actually, that's the whole reason I have. I have another. I didn't even tell you about this, but I have another business I'm working on and developing a product for. It's a tactile habit tracker. But it's.

It's.

The concept of the company is all about rewarding yourself because, you know, we have such a strong hustle culture, you know, that it's hard to, like, be able to take that time to. To like, take care of ourselves, you know?

Yeah. Well, that's cool.

Yeah. So. Well, this has been amazing. I would love to see what would be like, your biggest piece of advice you would give to people on doing the thing.

Yeah, yeah, I've been trying to. You know, you kind of prepped me for this a little bit, so I've been. I've been trying to think about in the last hour here what I would recommend. You know, I think you just. You just kind of need to trust yourself, trust your instincts, and honestly just. Just go for it. Right. Like, I think we've identified a few steps in my processes and how I go about it, and everybody's going to be kind of different. But you know, take, take from it what, what you will and, and, and put it into place. But, you know, I think one of the things I've really learned the last year or so is where to, like where to put my money, right? Instead of like buying that next toy or that next car, that next whatever. Like my mindset has kind of shifted to now buy something that can pay for it, right? Get. So, you know, if you have $10,000 instead of go and buy that, that toy that you want, go put it into some investment, you know, and then I don't know what that is for you. Like maybe it's the stock market, maybe it's crypto, maybe it's starting your own business, you know, maybe it's. Maybe it's buying a car and putting it on Turo so that you can rent it out and make money to then pay for that toy, right? So then investing in assets to pay for the leisure, I think is something that I've really learned lately. So that is, that is something that I'm trying to put into practice in my life is anytime I want that next toy, that next whatever it is, like, let's find a way to create an additional revenue source, an investment or whatever that then goes out and pays for it so that I'm not, you know, it's not coming out of pocket. I've actually found something that, that produces enough to provide that for me, if that makes sense.

It does, yeah. That's brilliant advice. That is like so brilliant.

Kind of where I am right now. I wish I would have known that, you know, thought that way in my 20s, could have avoided a lot of, you know, credit card debt and stuff like that. But yeah, that would be kind of my, I think, my advice.

Yeah, I love it. I love it. Well, I know I've mentioned this a few times to the listeners, but I had attended your podcast or your podcast, I'd attended your four day intensive and it was basically like going to Amazon college, if Amazon was having a college. But I think it was even better because it was like all the shortcuts basically to on how to succeed. And I feel like I almost got.

A.

Like a quick. Like I almost didn't have to pay the mistakes. Well, you didn't make, you didn't make mistakes actually, now that I'm, now that I'm hearing your full story. But like, I think not having the same.

There are mistakes along the way. Like I mean we didn't, we didn't share it all. But I've made bad buys, right. You know, I mean I've, I've gone out and dropped $4,000 on a wholesale product that I thought was going to work and it didn't because I didn't look at my numbers right. Or, or whatever. So. No, absolutely. There's been mistakes in the last seven years. Those mistakes now rarely happen because we know what we know now and that we use the tools that we use. So yeah, I mean we've tried to craft this four day in person workshop kind of as like a full franchise training. Right. So like if you go out and buy a franchise, you go buy, I don't know, you go buy a Subway or something. Like they're going to send you to Subway University. You get a McDonald's, you go to McDonald's University. Right. You're going to be there for a week and go through pretty intense training on how to run the business. So that's what we've tried to do here is A to Z, like how to run a good replenishable arbitrage slash wholesale business. And I think, you know, I'm proud of what we've accomplished here. I think we've done a good job in the last year and a half creating and crafting this into what it is now. So yeah, we try to, that's exactly what we tried to do is make it so that you could avoid those, those setbacks. You know, you could probably learn what we're going to teach you by, by trial and error, by watching some YouTube videos. It's gonna, and doing it yourself. Right. It's gonna take you two or three years, but we can give it all to you in a week too if you want to shortcut it and get right into it.

Yeah. And it was just an amazing experience. So knowing just what it takes to put on a training like this myself because I've done it, you know, when I had a business but, or when I had my other business but you even the flash drive to the guidebook and it's just essentially like a roadmap. So I loved it and I appreciate the fact that I'm still able to do coaching with you also, which is also going to help me eliminate mistakes that I could have made without having your help. So I appreciate that.

Yeah.

And if you don't mind just sharing. Yeah. Where people can find out about you.

Yeah, absolutely. So you can, you can check out the website fbaholesalehybrid.com you can email me rich baholesalehybrid.com you can also join the Facebook group. All the same name, right? FBA Wholesale Hybrid. That's the name of the Facebook group as well. So join us there. It's a free group. You know, if you do decide to join the coaching or come to the in person, you do get access to our private Facebook group where we host all the, all the recorded videos and training in there so that you know, you can watch them again later and, and whatnot. So we do do like one on one zoom trainings. You can, you know, you can get just the one on one over zoom or you can come join us for the four day, which I think is, is the best way to do it, but you know, I'm partial to that, so. But yeah, FBA Wholesale Hybrid. So Instagram, Facebook, Tick Tock, we're everywhere. So we're trying to build up some content there. We're, we're pretty new at the social content game, but we are, we're working on it.

That's awesome. Well, thank you so much for your time. This has been great. I really appreciate it.

Yeah, thanks, Stacey, for having me on. It's been great.

All right. And I'll be talking to you at our next coaching. Bye.

Thanks for listening to the do the Thing podcast. We hope you enjoyed the show. But even more, we hope you'll be inspired to do the Thing. Do you have a burning question on Doing the Thing that you'd like answered? How about an inspiring do the Thing story of your own that you'd like to share? We'd love to hear all about it. Just leave us a voice message at do the Thing callcast Co or email us@helloothethingpodcast.com.