Episode 126 - Inside the Wild Growth of Bredin Brothers: How 2 Brothers Changed the Canadian Cottage Game

Aug 10

#126 | Emerson Bredin | Bredin Brothers | Inside the Wild Growth of Bredin Brothers: How 2 Brothers Changed the Canadian Cottage Game

In this episode of The Curious Builder, Mark Williams chats with Emerson Bredin of Bredin Brothers, based in Muskoka, Ontario. Emerson shares how he and his brother broke into the construction business without any family background, taking the company from a carpentry crew to a 20-person operation specializing in luxury cottages and boathouses. They swap stories about building luxe lakeside retreats, dealing with crazy price swings and tariffs, and juggling business life with raising a young family—plus a little Canadian vs. US construction talk thrown in!

Listen to the full episode:

About Emerson Bredin

I started Bredin Brothers with a toolbelt, a vision, and something to prove. In just a few years, we’ve become a trusted name in Muskoka—building custom lakefront homes and starting to going head-to-head with the region’s biggest players. With that momentum, I've also launched Bredin Developments to bring the same ambition into accessible community building across Ontario.

Resources:

Visit Bredin Brothers’ Website

Visit Bredin Brothers’ Instagram

Visit Bredin Brothers’ Facebook

Emerson Bredin 00:04
there's no family history on our side at all of anything to do, even with construction. So it was really myself and my brother who were the first ones to get into any sort of trade. It's not like we started the company together, and this was, it was, it was even a little bit of convincing to get get him to come on board first. I think he wanted to see that I was actually going to do something

Mark D. Williams 00:31
today on that curious podcast. We had Emerson printed on about Ontario, and it was really fun conversation just to hear a great entrepreneur mind he's got 20 employees and really growing the business quite quickly towards the end. It was really interesting. Just him being in Canada, being in the States, it was really fun to kind of dive into what they're hearing on their side in terms of tariffs and price volatility. So without further ado, here's Emerson Brennan, welcome to the curious builder Podcast. I'm Mark Williams. Your house today I am joined by Emerson Bredon from Bredon brothers up in Muskoka, Ontario. Did I say Muskoka? Right? Yep, yeah, Muskoka is right, yes, all right. Well, your second Canadian. We had Caleb McDonald on in Toronto. I don't know if you know. Oh, yeah, yeah. What's his company? Oh, shoot, I should know something. Ridge construction. They're a builder. Yeah, they are do a ton of remodeling. I met Caleb down at contractor coalition. Oh, man, how many years ago now? Two, three years ago, and so he's come on a few times. We did a we're doing a series called losers are winners. Actually, I think his episode might air tomorrow. We're recording this on a Wednesday, which is unusual. Usually record on Thursdays. But he anyway, so he'll air here pretty shortly. Ah, Kings Ridge, building group.

Emerson Bredin 01:43
Kings Ridge, okay, I don't know off top my head, but I'll definitely look

Mark D. Williams 01:47
he's he's a good person. You should definitely check him out. He runs a top notch company. In fact, Caleb and I have talked about it before. You know, the curious builder boot camp, which I've talked to before on the podcast. A little bit. He and I, he was kind of one of the first people that sort of woke me up to that like, hey, there's a lot of builders that are into athletics, obviously Canadian. I'm sure you play hockey too. I don't think you. I think he kicked out the country, if you don't. And anyway, he and I are running on the beach at at the contract coalition one, 530 in the morning, winds blowing in her face. And I was like, hey, you know what? We should really make a business out of this. So, you know, in the years after, we sort of joked about it. So that's cool. Yeah, enough about that. Muskoka, Ontario. So it's on the lake. You kind of, I mean, from what I can gather, you specialize in, like, boathouses, which is really rad. Some of the work I was looking on your website is super cool. How in the world did you get into boathouse or am I wrong? That's just what

Emerson Bredin 02:37
you market. No, yeah, it's so there's, I mean, there's 1000s of lakes up here, there's kind of what is usually referred to as your big three, which is Lake Muskoka, Lake Rosso, Lake Joe. There's now essentially number four in there, which is Lake of bays, where we're starting to do a lot of our work on so we're in a town called Huntsville. And then there's a few Lakes, Lake of Bays being one of them, which there's many lakes that make up that where you can get out there within, you know, a 1520, minute drive. So that's definitely becoming more popular to people wanting to move up here, if you're on the other ones, where you're Lake Joe or lake Rosso, your little town that you would go to is poor Carling, and there's, there's really not a whole lot there. There's some nice restaurants. It is very fun in the summer, but then in the winter, it just becomes a complete ghost town. Now, you're not up here in the winter at your cottage, but yeah, so that's, that's one of the reasons why some of the lakes closer to Huntsville, Bracebridge, even even Gravenhurst, are starting to become a little bit more popular is just because, when you're in, when you're on that Joe or Rosso area, you are quite secluded from everything, as opposed to over here. Okay, if you forgot something, you could drive 1015, minutes back into Huntsville, which is the the bigger town that's that's up here in Muskoka. One of the other reasons is Joe and Rosso in those areas. That's, that's where a lot of the big time cottages are. And it's, it's been that way for for a while. Where are the

Mark D. Williams 04:08
most? Where are most of the people coming from? Are they coming from Toronto or other parts of Canada, or where? Where

Emerson Bredin 04:13
are people mode? Well, I can't say, I'd say 50% are probably from Toronto. We're doing one for a client right now. He's up on Georgian Bay. He they're from Sweden.

Emerson Bredin 04:24
So they're

Emerson Bredin 04:28
I, I'd say half. So half are probably like, born and raised Canadian, or close to it, and then the other half are either from a different country, but a lot of them are still coming up from Toronto area. It's not bad. Like, you can get up here, depending on when you leave, you could be stuck in traffic, but you get up here within a couple hours, and so it's not too bad of a drive. And that's why it's become become so popular. But Muskoka, like, it's not even just those Toronto people, people come from all over the world to have a cottage in Muskoka, and just the beautiful lakes up here and everything like that. And. Know, there's different areas in the states that kind of have a similar Lake luxury cottage scene to them, but, yeah, that's, that's kind of a little bit

Mark D. Williams 05:10
how, yeah, that's cool. How did you, were you from this area originally? Or why did you decide to get into cottage buildings specifically?

Emerson Bredin 05:18
Yeah, I always knew I was going to get into building. I was most interested on the actual like GC, building side of things, and a company I essentially started in the trades as a carpenter and all of that. But I always knew I kind of wanted to get to that level, and I didn't necessarily want to start that in the town that I grew up in. So I grew up in a small little town called Paris, Ontario. It's it has developed quite a bit since, and that's about three hours from where I am up here in Muskoka now. But yeah, I knew if I wanted to get into it like I might as well go and try to work for some of those companies that are building these $10 million cottages and just sort of get some of that experience, see how those places run. You know, I'm a younger guy, so I it's not like I was there for 15 years and then decided to go out on my own. But I had a, I'm a buddy. He his family always had a family cottage up here in Muskoka, and that's how I kind of knew the area. And so, yeah, I just reached out to one of the builders up here, asked if they were hiring, and then moved up here in some old ladies basement in the middle of nowhere and started working as a carpenter. How

Mark D. Williams 06:30
old were you at that time? 21 maybe early. Was that? Was that Braemar combs?

Emerson Bredin 06:35
No brainmark was is back where I grew up, the three hours? Oh, I see. Okay, yeah. So that was down there. Yeah, there's one of the big one of the big contractors. They are one of the bigger ones up here. They're also out of Huntsville. That's totally

Mark D. Williams 06:49
because it's kind of funny, like, I'd love, you know, cottage has a lot of depending on where in the world you are listening from right now. Me being from Minnesota, I think of a cottage like, okay, cottages like a traditional little lake front. It's maybe tucked away in the woods. It's probably like 1500 to 2500, square feet, you know, you use it seasonally. Maybe it has AC, maybe it doesn't. And like, then you're like, Oh, $10 million cottage. So, like, how would you describe a cottage, if you had to describe, you know, like, what? A, what's your range of services and B, what do you define as a cottage? How would you describe what a cottage is? Because when you threw me with the 10 million I'm like, dang, that's that's not, yeah,

Emerson Bredin 07:29
it's no, it's not a cottage. I agree with you that the way you described it is, is very much a cottage. They call it cottage country up here. They call them Muskoka. But it is very much where a lot of the the rich and famous and wealthy people are building not a cottage, but maybe a second, a third, a fourth residence up here and spending significant money. I don't think you could ever go wrong in doing that. Just there's, it's not there's never going to be the situation where the cost of being on the lake is going down up here, or the cost of your place. Yes, you could build some crazy design that nobody ever wants, which some people do, but that's, that's kind of, what's, what's up here. You're coming up here to come up to Muskoka, to be on those lakes. Some of the people who do have genuine like family cottages up here, they're not too fond of people coming up here and making noise for two and a half years to build their huge place. But everybody had their place built at some spot.

Mark D. Williams 08:27
So it's true. I mean, regardless. I mean, builders everywhere can relate to that to some degree. I mean, if you're on the coast, right, West and East Coast, obviously those lakefront or ocean front, there's a finite supply. I mean, in Minnesota, we, you know, we're, our tagline is the land of 10,000 lakes. We've got a lot of lakes. So, right? You know, it's kind of the same deal the lakes. You know, it's never going to go down in value, kind of like, it's never going to be less expensive to build a house in the future. Like, I had a client their day that that told me, they said, hey, when is the best time to build? The best time to build was last year. The second best time to build is today, and the worst time to build is tomorrow. Yeah, that's like, I mean, I understand it's a bit of a sales line, but it's also kind of true, because, like, costs just don't go down. One of the questions I was curious about you have mainly just because I love travel, and you traveled a lot, especially when you're younger, and you're still young now, but like, you know, you were in, on, in on, on Ontario with Braemar combs, and then it says you were at, you're at, what's, what's y, W, A, M, ships in Kona, Hawaii. That was, I was like, Wait, why building? Yeah, you

Emerson Bredin 09:27
were in Hawaii. I'm not a ship builder in Hawaii, but, oh, I was, yeah, it's, it's called y WAM, basically. So the one that you described the ships, one that that is a separate one, so you can go and volunteer for this organization called YWAM, where, in Hawaii, they have one specifically called ships where, like, you're literally on a sailboat for months and months. But basically out of high school, I'd been encouraged, you know, that's kind of my time to go and do what I. Want, and to see what I want. And I am very thankful that I got that advice, just as a business owner, once you get into it, then it's seven days a week, non stop. But yeah, so essentially, out of high school, I took that opportunity. I didn't have very much money saved up or anything, so I was trying to find some organizations and cool spots where I could go and see a country like Hawaii and meet some other people my age and everything to at a very low cost. So there's this organization called YWAM. Their biggest headquarters is in Hawaii, and you would go there, and you would work five days a week, and then they would put you up in housing, they would give you all your food, and then I got to know some people through that, and on the weekends and stuff like that, we would go around traveling Hawaii, basically. So it was a bit of a, I don't know if you would call it a hippie stage, but yeah, it was definitely fun. Cool to see, cool to meet some other people. And then so I was there for about six months, and then I flew right from there to New Zealand. And then in New Zealand, I was working as a framer and farming as well. I was over there. And then I met, met a great family who I ended up staying at their place. They had this little camper van out in the back that had busted out windows in it where Ian, were you? So it was, we were near a small town called Cambridge.

Emerson Bredin 11:28
I think,

Mark D. Williams 11:29
Wait, did you say, you know where that is? Yeah, well, I'm trying to think of you on you've been I went to school in Australia for a year, and then we spent a couple weeks in Australia, or, sorry, New Zealand. My sister went to school in how's it? Wellington, Worthington. What's the, what's the main big city? And the South Island starts with the I thought it was a W. I should know this. Well. Anyway, Cambridge was, I can't, because it's Cambridge on the South or North Island.

Emerson Bredin 11:53
I don't know. I think, remember, I think,

Mark D. Williams 11:57
I don't know. We spent most, we spent most of time hiking and on glaciers. So I didn't really spend a ton of time up in Auckland or the north area. I just love anytime people tell me or say they're traveling down there, I'm like, Oh man, go to New Zealand, right? It's it's vibrant. It's amazing. Queenstown is everything in a Queenstown, no. Queenstown is further south. We stayed there. No Christ Church. Sorry. Christ Church was the main topic in the South Island. So I may

Emerson Bredin 12:22
know all the places of what they were called when I was over there, but yeah, forgets

Mark D. Williams 12:27
now. Now it sounds like you're reading Lord of the Rings. What does so after you were down, you're, you know, down there for a while, you came back. How old are you when you come back to Canada? Or,

Emerson Bredin 12:37
yeah, like early, early 20s, similar time I moved up here, so came back to Canada. Knew I wasn't going to school, so knew I was getting back in the trades, essentially, because I wanted to start making money again. I was making my Well, I came back, actually, with a lot. When I was in New Zealand, I basically three quarters of the time just worked non stop farming. So I came back with quite a bit more money, actually, but yeah, so I came back, and then within two weeks later, I found a job with the company up here, moved up here into that lady's basement in the the middle of the bus there, and started as a carpenter.

Mark D. Williams 13:12
You've been in business now for about six years. Is that

Emerson Bredin 13:14
right? So, so

Emerson Bredin 13:17
bread and brothers like us, as a general contractor is really only a few years old. I started the name Brendan brothers, probably closer to five years ago. The first couple years though, were, we were essentially a carpentry company. We didn't have any clients as a general contractor or as a builder. We would just essentially have our crew of carpenters. We would go to some of the bigger players up here, say, Hey, are you looking for a sub trade? You know, for framing, exterior finish, interior finish, whatever it was.

Mark D. Williams 13:45
And they were probably happy to hire you, because, if it's anything like most communities, if you're a couple hours away from, quote, civilization, having crews that they could depend on to build these big homes, they were probably that was probably very advantageous for both parties, you and them. Is that? Right? Yeah,

Emerson Bredin 14:01
there is, like, the Muskoka builders community up here is very big. Like, there's tons of contractors, tons of sub trades. So there isn't really, there's always the talk of, oh, I can't find guys, I'd say, in the industry, but there, there is a lot up here. So it wasn't necessarily, like, too big of a deal. I don't think that we were coming in as another carpentry trade, but, yeah, that's, that's kind of how we started. And then from there, just through advertising and stuff, then we got our first, you know, renovation job as a general contractor, and then it essentially all went from, you know, just a few guys swinging a hammer to to what to what it is now, a few, few years later, of 2020, people full time, on on salary, or certain on salary, just on payroll. And yeah, we're running about six to eight projects at once, fully as the GC. And yeah, so it's, it's come a long way since, since just a few years ago, really? Yeah.

Mark D. Williams 15:00
Yeah. I mean, that's super impressive. I was looking at the page, just your company page. I mean, you have a higher page, which obviously it seems like, Are you always sort of hiring? If that's the right fit, we

Emerson Bredin 15:07
we are always hiring. I think I have. I've slowed down on that a little bit like

Emerson Bredin 15:12
when you're when you're in the phase of of

Emerson Bredin 15:16
growth like that quickly and the momentum of everything, you are always looking for more people. But then there is a couple bad hires we made, you know, some mistakes we made just through those people and them in management roles and all this stuff. But, yeah, so we are always, we are always hiring now, but we're very much so always hiring for the right people now, not just, Hey, we just scored another job. We got to throw five bodies over there, and this guy said he's been a carpenter for 35 years. So let's trust

Mark D. Williams 15:44
them in most of your work. Is that coming through architects, designers, directly from homeowners, or how does the what does the scene up there look like in terms of architecture, home design, and, you know, interior design?

Emerson Bredin 15:56
Yeah. So we're as we're getting into these, these higher clientele, these, these higher net worth projects and all that stuff where we we've found that they're going to the architect and the designer. First they're saying, hey, I want to spend a year to two with you, designing my, my cottage, whatever it is. And then at that point, the architect is saying, Okay, we've got your drawings at a certain point. Now, here's three builders, GCS that we recommend. Go out and get proposals from each one of them. So we're kind of at that stage now where that's probably, it's probably like 75% of our stuff. The other is, well, maybe a little bit less than that. The other is word of mouth, and then the other is just somebody reaching out over the website, or they found us on Instagram or something like that. But most of it that's been a lot of our key understanding of where our projects are coming from. So real estate agents, interior designers, architects, those are, those are our three

Emerson Bredin 16:59
categories

Emerson Bredin 17:01
of services that that I now try to make relationships with, and yeah, just really sell our services to. And obviously, the one of the biggest things when when you're a builder, is, Okay, what's your what's your portfolio? We've only been around for a few years, so we don't have that big of a portfolio yet. There are some we're currently getting the whole website revamped and everything, but there's another few projects coming up that'll be classified as under construction, that'll that'll really put us on the map as well. So yeah, we're getting there. I

Mark D. Williams 17:29
was looking the website was impressive. He had a couple of projects that, and I think I sent you an email back. Were some of them high end renderings, and some of them are actual work. And walk me through a little bit from a marketing standpoint of I think the one that was at Lake of Bays is when I was most attracted to but when I looked at the trees, I'm like, those look those look simulated. Is that a project that has been completed, or is that a rendering of what's

Emerson Bredin 17:53
going on? Yeah, those are rendering. So we have two stages on our website. One is completed projects, and then the next phase is now what we're calling under construction featured work. So we're essentially putting those renderings up there to let people know that we are working on larger scale projects. Show, show a bit of okay, this is the basement renovation we started with, and then this was a million and a half dollar renovation. Then this was the $4 million build. And then now these guys are working on 8500 square foot cottages and $2 million boat houses and stuff like that. So, and that's, that's where we are are now. So like that, like phase one there, that wasn't a, that's not a full build, that was a big, big renovation. So we put about 2.5 into that. Ian,

Mark D. Williams 18:44
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Emerson Bredin 21:01
No, we're allowed to build new ones. The the grandfathering is a big part of it, especially if it's like two stories or something like that. The one that you see in the background here that that blue boat house there, there was an existing two story boat house there before. So that was essentially one of the reasons we ripped that one down and built this new one. That was one of the reasons why they could also get two stories again. So each Lake does have very strict laws around what even, not even just the boathouse like, what the cottage can be in general, and those are becoming more and more strict. We're not so much involved in those conversations into the fine details of them. That's more of the planning company that would be doing a lot of

Mark D. Williams 21:41
that. And is that the architect? Or what do you mean by planning company? Yeah,

Emerson Bredin 21:45
so there are services up here that they're called planners, and you would have the architect, you would have the planner, and then you would have the builder. So there are a lot of architects that say, Hey, we'll get the building permits and all that stuff for you. A lot of them do just sub that out to these planners, and they'll work back and forth with the drawings, with the township to essentially get, get the permits that you're looking for, if there's a minor variance involved, or something like that. But, yeah, some of

Mark D. Williams 22:11
the boats, I'd loved it just because I'm interested in it. So you've got the one, I guess it's t over your left shoulder. As I'm looking at this video, it's over, it's over your right shoulder, the blue one. So half of that, let's say, I mean, obviously a boathouse has to be in the water because the boat has to get into it. How are you are they floating systems, or using a pure system? Like, how do you actually build those?

Emerson Bredin 22:30
Yeah, so it's all steel piles. So your traditional way of building a boat house is what it's on, what's called cribs, which are, like wood beams that are stacked on top of each other, and then they're filled with rocks, and then that's what people would put their boat houses on. So a lot of a lot of boathouses up here still are on cribs, but 95% of the time, if somebody's saying, hey, I want a new boat house, we're just getting rid of all that, and then we're doing a full steel pile structure. So the barge will come out, there'll be an excavator on the barge, they'll have their steel posts, and then they're drilling those down into the lake bed or into bedrock, until you get a certain amount of tension. And then from there, once you have all your posts that are up, then you're putting, yeah, all your horizontal steel on, all your crossers to support it. And then you're

Mark D. Williams 23:23
you're building normal Do you know I know only because it's fun to remember this from like, high school, and it's Hudson Bay has, like, some of the most ginormous tide changes in the world. If I recall. Do you have any tide changing in on your lakes or no. I mean, that's a bay obviously going to the ocean. But do you have any tide work that you have to worry

Emerson Bredin 23:42
about? Not. The only thing we really have to worry about is water levels. But there's, there's essentially nothing that you can do about it. So for example, like on Lake Muskoka, they drain that lake

Emerson Bredin 23:53
by

Emerson Bredin 23:55
quite a bit every single year, coming into, like the end of summer and into the fall and everything. So that can, that can have a big impact on the water levels of your boat house, but that that's, that's really it like they're they're small enough lakes to the only time you have tide coming through is when you have a few boats going by, and then, you know, you either have a platform lift that sits out of the water, and your boat sits on it so it doesn't get affected by that tide, or you have your boat tied up. And yeah, but it doesn't really get too crazy on the water in

Emerson Bredin 24:27
terms of what's happening there.

Mark D. Williams 24:30
Yeah. What? How do you see you've got a pretty rapid expansion. I love the stepping stones from carpentry to 20 employees. That's impressive. Where do you see the next five to 10 years, what is your vision for the company? And I assume there's you have, I think you have at least one brother. I saw on your Yeah. How many brothers do you have, or how many family members are part of the

Emerson Bredin 24:49
company? Yeah. So there's four brothers in total. Now it's only myself and my one brother, Nolan, who are a part of bread and brothers. I just named it that because I like the name I was thought. Was cool, like, when you drive past the transport trucks and it'd be like, something bros or something inside, or something like that, yeah, there's, there's no family history on our side at all of anything to do, even with construction. So it was really myself and my brother who were the first ones to get into any sort of trade and take that route. And then when I started, Brad and brothers, yeah, we maybe had like, four carpenters at the time, or something, and then my brother was still working for a different custom home builder as a carpenter. And he eventually said, Okay, well, I might as well, you know, join the guys and stuff like that. So it's not like we started the company together, and this was, it was, it was even a little bit of convincing to get, get him to come on board first. I think you wanted to see that I was actually going to do something first, right?

Mark D. Williams 25:43
Did you have other entrepreneurs in the family?

Emerson Bredin 25:46
No, no, yeah. What? What made you

Mark D. Williams 25:49
do? You remember what it was that made you say, I want to do this on my own, or I want my own company?

Emerson Bredin 25:54
Yeah, I'd always had good conversations with my dad and everything. He's very he's very business oriented. He's a sales guy, through and through, and that's kind of what he does. He he was in Toronto for for decades, just doing his stuff down there. But we had always had conversations growing up of of starting a business and, you know, just kind of what that entails, and this idea and that idea, and I was always, I don't know, compared to the other siblings. I was always described as the one who's a bit of the, not necessarily a black sheep, but, you know, wasn't, nobody could really tell me what to do. And, you

Mark D. Williams 26:36
know, I'm guessing, yeah, I'm guessing you had four brothers. I'm guessing you're, what the second or third kid are? You the

Emerson Bredin 26:40
fourth? I'm right in the middle. So four, four boys, one girl to the Okay,

Mark D. Williams 26:44
I assumed you weren't. I assumed you weren't the first born. Because if you're following the birth order, right, you got to be a little bit of a rebel. You're a second or third. Yeah, there you

Emerson Bredin 26:51
go, exactly. And so I don't know I and I had this bit of a bad habit when I was younger. I mean, I was young at the time, so, but I'd always have this idea, start something and then be like, either this is boring or, you know, this isn't going to work. And then I would shut that down, and then I would, you know, think about something else, and then shut it down, and then think about something else. So I was always battling that growing up, of like, okay, what am I going to do? I'm not interested in this. I don't really like school, nor was I really good at it.

Emerson Bredin 27:19
And,

Emerson Bredin 27:22
yeah, I'm very thankful that I picked the route of the trade and going this route, because I really do have a big passion for building, especially custom home building and being up here in Muskoka. And so I'm really trying to create that, that team and that reputation where, you know, we're not just here to have a company. We really are passionate about the the industry, and I didn't even, I didn't even really recognize that when I, when I started it, you know, it's obviously a lot of work to grow and to start a business. And I do think, I do think that was some good advice to, like, when you're kind of at that stage of, I don't know what I want to do, or I don't know it's like, Well, you got to get going on something, and then you figure out if you like it or not. You know you can change as many times, but then you get to a certain if you're starting a business, then you get to a certain point it's like, okay, either I'm not going to go all in on this, or I'm going to keep going down that path of trying something else. So that's essentially what I did. But it's not people think they have this hurrah moment of, oh, this is what I was meant to do, or my calling. I believe some people do just I'm definitely not that person. But what always stayed true from when I was young is I'd love to start and run a business.

Mark D. Williams 28:29
I think, have you thought it only just been on my mind a lot, and, you know, I think, like you, I mean, there were certain aha moments, you know, I've been building out for 21 years, but, you know, you look back, you're like, Oh, I certainly could have been a lot, you know, farther. But everyone's journey is their own journey. And lately, I've been sort of obsessed with my why. I read this book by Simon Sinek. Know your why, and really just, it's very self reflective and, like, really isolating. What is it that you want? Have you? Have you had thoughts like that, where you're like, What is my why? Like, why are you now today? Because I ask, like, you know, sometimes people have a very clear picture of what they want their future to be. You know, maybe it's a 135, year plan, whatever it might be. Like, if someone was to say, like, what caught what is your why? Like, why do you wake up in the morning? Like, why are you excited? If you are excited, maybe you're not excited. But like, do you have an idea of what your why? Is your business?

Emerson Bredin 29:24
Yeah, I think they're, I think they're kind of two different things. Like, if you ask, okay, where do you want to be? You know, where do you see bread and brothers in five years, all that stuff. Like, I can, I can answer all that, but the why part to me is a little bit different. My My faith is a big part of what I do, and just in everything I try to do, I could probably be a lot better at doing certain things. But I think, I think a lot of the core values of what I believe, in my faith and in Christianity and all that is it does roll into to business and into growing a business. This, and to how you treat your employees, and to, okay, what's actually right and wrong here in treating the client,

Emerson Bredin 30:06
and I think that's,

Emerson Bredin 30:10
that's probably the starting point of where my why is Ian, I've got a got a young family, my wife, Olivia, we got a daughter who's 13 months, another one on the way. So that alone is a lot of pressure to support and grow that, yeah, but I think that's where it stems from. And then there's obviously the family aspect. And I just, I love the aspect of building a team and growing a business and having having it all stem from that. I mean, you could say, you could be growing a business, and say, Okay, here's our three core values, and let's go and try and grow that and everything. And so that's that. That's kind of where the the why part comes from. And it's, it's essentially just creating that, that environment, obviously, the the money that we pay our employees, that feeds their family and everything like that. And I do have a heart for for all those people, and in treating them fairly and right. And same goes for for our clients and everything like that. And other than that, though, I wouldn't say it's, it's much more complicated. Yeah, I know when you when you hear some entrepreneurs talk and everything, there was like this one moment in their life that you know changed everything forever. And I just felt a lot of my journey has been like, keep kicking and keep picking away at it, and you know, half the time you're gonna like it, half the time you're not gonna like it. And I don't know when I when I do look back and think, you know where we just were a couple years ago with bread and brothers and all that stuff. Obviously, I've been been doing something right to to get it to this point. So, yeah, I don't know. I don't know that's kind

Mark D. Williams 31:45
of, I mean, I mean, I hate to break it, I hate to break it to your high you're the high point coming on the curious builder podcast is probably the height of your career. I mean, it's downhill from the rest, right? Exactly. Yeah. I think what's interesting hearing you talk like I did not have a clear idea of what my why was. I was just completely unaware of it. I was kind of like, just keep swimming, or just keep just keep running or the next thing. And so it's like, I'm not, personally a very self reflective person. I think as I've gotten older, I probably have done a better job of pausing, and it's why we started the curious builder boot camp, or just getting away, because I think sometimes you have to, you have to zoom out, to zoom back in. And that old saying, Are you focused on the tree or the forest? And I feel like, as entrepreneurs, we sort of need either people. Sometimes it's events in our lives. Maybe it's obviously, you're in the young phase here of having small children, so there's that, like, now you're like, oh, man, I've got to provide and then, you know, lots of people, you know, there's things that happen in their families. Parents get sick, or whatever it is, and like, life happens to all of us. And someone asked me this morning I was running, and Tony, a guy who I run with a lot, and bike with a lot just, evidently, I just spent a lot of time with them exercising. But he said, hey, you've interviewed. Think I've interviewed, this might be like 120 526, people we've interviewed now in the last two and a half years. And he said, Do you find that there's a common theme that you've observed, and actually you just, you just, you just nailed it, which is, I think what defines entrepreneurs is very rarely does someone, in my opinion, know their why immediately. I think it takes some self reflection and time to figure it out. And if you know it, kudos to you. Because I think having a clear why is like a superpower, like, if you know very clearly and very simply, what your why is like. I think those are game changers at moments. But I think for the rest of us, for most of us, it's kind of like you figure it out in the years that happened, and like you gotta, gotta figure it out. And I for you, it's something my dad used to always tell me he was a business owner, and he used to always say, steady at the helm. And that was my answer this morning. Running was, I think what defines most entrepreneurs is, you know, high tide, low tide. You know, storms, sunshine. You know good times, bad times. You know, making a lot of money, not making a lot of money, like they're just sort of steady at the helm. It's kind of like I can't do anything when it's raining. I'm out here. I got 10 more miles to go. What am I going to do? I'm just going to keep walking. It's sunny and hot out. There's not much more I can do. I got 10 more. Like, the answer really doesn't change anything. Like, sure, it's a little bit more happy, probably, if it's not porn on yet, but at the end of the day, like, it doesn't really change what you have to do. And I've I sort of marvel at our industry right now. It's just brutally hot here for us. I hate the humidity. It's like 97% humidity where I'm and it was just gross. And I'm just thinking of all these really hard roofers and framers and concrete guys and excavators just sweating that just and they just, they don't complain, they just keep going. And I'm like, I think it defines their industry, honestly, is sort of that plucky attitude of just going to keep going. And it's remarkable,

Emerson Bredin 34:41
yeah, no, I'm 100%

Emerson Bredin 34:44
Yeah. Especially when you're when you're the owner, you get hit with everything so but you still have to have your goals, and you still have to have your path to get those and if you let any little thing, you know, knock you off that path, then you know it's probably not going to work out as being an entrepreneur and all. Honesty.

Mark D. Williams 35:02
You know, I think I had this thought the other day. I've actually going to be, I'll be down in Texas next week at the Sunbelt Conference, and I've got to give a, I don't even know how many builders are going to be there, but I was going to ask, I'll ask you this question I've talked about a lot of the podcast. You know, I probably have undiagnosed ADHD. But like, I kind of want to have a show of hands. Like, how many people in the audience has some form of ADHD. And the reason I'm where I'm going with this is, like, honestly, most business owners that I know are like, hyperactive have a hard time focusing on one thing for long periods of time. But in business, we're constantly being bombarded with, Oh, hey, you're short here, oh, client issue here, subcontractor issue here, employee issue. It's almost like a superpower, because, and it's like, when you don't have that stimulus, when things are actually steady, you kind of get this weird idol like, No, there's no issues right now. I don't even know what to do, because. And there's this thought process like, oh, man, if I had more time, if I had, like, a week, like, this dream scenario, if I had a week where I could just focus on the business. Yeah, well, news flash, if you got a week, you're probably not focusing on the business, because you're probably like, I got nothing to do. I'm gonna take it off. And so anyway, how would you respond to sort of that, you know that,

Emerson Bredin 36:12
oh, 100% Yeah. Like, my even to this point, I'm still trying to figure out, like, how, well, I kind of know how I do now, but just, just how I learn and then how I actually get something done. I'm very much a list guy. Like, if I don't have at least two, three lists going, then things aren't getting done every single meeting. It's just taking notes so I don't forget them. And you have to do that when you're, you know, running across multiple projects. But yeah, it's, I 100% resonate with that, and you're, you're right, like part, part of that skill is okay. You have all the noise coming in of running a business, and then you need to figure out, out of all that, what are these three tasks out of the 150 that I need to pick move forward with in order for, you know, things to keep progressing, and then as we get more and more employees, now that has changed from okay, it's not just me doing that. How do I teach other employees to do that? How do I say, Hey, I got to still stay focused here. But you know, you're our PM, who's running five projects on the go right now. You also have to figure out, okay, how am I? How am I filtering that noise, and what do I need to focus on right now? Because for me, my attention span is like next to nothing, even when I come in here, if there's something I know, I just have to get it done. It's closed the window, shut the door and, you know, hey, unless the house is burning down right now, like, just leave me in here for an hour. But

Mark D. Williams 37:45
let's actually, let's talk about that, because it's actually very similar to, I have you ever heard of the book or read it? Eat That Frog. It's a book. And I joke, unless you're Canadian or, sorry, French Canadian or French, like eating frogs is probably not part of your normal cuisine. And so the book is actually a very thin book. It's a great book. But basically the premise is, like, do the thing that you don't want to do first. So eating a frog. And every Monday, I have this little calendar thing. I use it. I like lists too. So I like, that's what made me think of it. And I'll write down the four kind of frogs of the week. Like, what are four things that I probably don't want to do them, but they're like, I know that they'll move the needle, like important things. And then, of course, all my lists, because most entrepreneurs, I would imagine, can relate to this, like, we love crossing stuff on off the list, so you create your whole list for the whole week. And if I'm honest, a lot of times, I don't focus on the top four, because the satisfying of just follow up with this brand or send this person email or schedule this it's like, it's easy that you get kind of a dopamine hit of crossing off all the little things, when really the whole premise of the book is, don't do a single item until all four of those things are done. And they might be big. Might be a proposal. It might be whatever it might be for a client. Or, you know, doesn't matter what it is. It's everyone's thing is their own. Like, I hate doing contracts. It's I just hate, and so it just so minute and so detailed and so focused, and I'm better up in the clouds and, you know, kind of the visionary seat for me, but, but if you can do those Monday and Tuesday, then even if nothing else happens the rest of the week, you've had a successful week, and you move the needle. I'm just curious. You mentioned, like, lists? Have you? How do you handle your lists? Or what is how do you handle, sort of making sure that you're staying on task for these important things that have to be done? Is it time blocking? Is it prioritization?

Emerson Bredin 39:30
Yeah, it's all, it's all like priority. So what I do is those frogs that you're talking about, I try to get those done. So if I'm not having client meetings on Saturday, then I basically try to take off half the day Sunday, and then I'm usually back here in the office for preparing my week and everything. Depending on how big you know, what those might be, I try to get them done during that time, or if I'm here, you know, way later than everybody. And there's people not just. Track me, then I try to get those done. But it's the it's the same cycle for me. So I create, I create a whole list, because I'm also one of the I'm also a person where, when I know something needs to happen and it's now on my mind, if I'm not either getting it done right now or I'm not putting it on the list, then it'll probably get it'll probably pop up in my mind on until next week again.

Emerson Bredin 40:21
So each week,

Emerson Bredin 40:25
as the week is going on, I'm creating basically another list for what the next week I want to get done, and then what I do with that list, because it is very sporadic, like just sometimes when when something comes up and I write it down the night before each day. I then take that full list, and I not necessarily the frogs if I don't want to do them, but I'll take, okay, what's, what's the five things that have to happen Monday, and then hopefully I get those done. If not, they probably go into the next day. But so I'm essentially taking, like, that master list and then breaking that down into more achievable goals of what I can finish daily. And that's that, that's how I keep track of things. Because if I with the size of the list that I have to do every week, if I'm just staring at that huge list every single morning, thinking, okay, you know what's number one here? What do I need to be getting done? Just probably a little bit of that ADHD that you were talking about, like that. It I don't get things done doing it that way. So, yeah, I basically have two lists, one master list, and then each day that list gets broken into a smaller

Mark D. Williams 41:39
one. What are you keeping it on? Is this a notebook? Is this, you know, digital format? How are you tracking all these?

Emerson Bredin 41:46
Yeah, so it's usually either just my Google Calendar and then a combination of notebook or just the notes on my phone if I'm out somewhere. But I try to I retain things a lot better when I do write them down. So that master list. I try to write it down in my notebook each day, and then I kind of pick away at it. I just put them on my phone here in notes, and then I'll leave it on my desk, and then it'll be like, All right, just one, done, two, done, three, done.

Mark D. Williams 42:17
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Emerson Bredin 44:26
Yeah, it's a combination of both, because it is a cottage, a seasonal residence. A lot of them aren't coming up here until it's a weekend. So that is very much part of it. The other part of it is just we're so busy and continuing to grow the company, and I now have another business called bread and developments, where we're now essentially acting as the developer as well. So there's right in town here stock townhouse development that we're doing. It's 12 units. I just put an offer in for 14 building lots plus 11 acres. That's along with it. Yeah, and so that's that's kind of the start to bread and developments as well. And trying to, yeah, just take some of those funds and keep that going, but also act on the development side as well. But my hunt, my 90% main focus, is bread and brothers like, we've got a long, long ways to go still, and I want to continue to grow that reputation for, you know, the next 20 years, whatever it is. But I'd also love to have something on the go where we're starting to do some of our our own developments too.

Mark D. Williams 45:34
What is if someone came to you today and said, Hey, I want you to start, how far out is your guys? With 20 guys, what? How far out is your backlog?

Emerson Bredin 45:43
So if we if they said, Hey, we've got everything in place. Permits are in place. We've got the drawings. We know what we're looking for, could you start mid fall? We probably could. Now that that's just because of the the number of guys that we have, and it depends on the job, like some, we would automatically just say, No, we're not starting until 2026 sometime. But I have found, like with running that amount of people, you almost need to, you almost really do need to overbook a little bit, not essentially overbook, but when you're in the lead stage of telling people, Hey, when you could start. Nobody's booked that time slot yet. So if there's six houses, I'm putting proposals on together right now, I'm going to tell all that we same time. Yeah. And then if you take it now, that's a year gone. So now you're pushed to 2026, but you Yeah, I found like that, that that funnel just has to it has to keep moving, to keep guys going, and to keep growing the business, as you have and so, yeah,

Mark D. Williams 46:48
have you? Have you experienced where if you don't feed the funnel, then you see it shorten up? Or have you not experienced that,

Emerson Bredin 46:54
not really, because I am, I'm very much

Emerson Bredin 46:58
sales oriented, so that's what I think about 75% of the time. Yeah, I'm just follow up all the time, not to the point where it's annoying, like these are when you're dealing with an expensive, emotional asset, like a cottage or a family cottage, whatever it is, you don't want to be you don't want to be annoying. So and you want to my follow ups. Like, they're not, hey, I'm just following up. Are we building or not? It's, it's all service oriented. Hey, just wanted to touch base about our last email thread there. We do have one or two guys who are wrapping up early the next Friday. I know you mentioned that there's a couple small things that you needed done over at your existing cottage. Like, do you want me to send some guys over there or something like that? Like, every follow up is prompting a response, but it's all service based. Like, hey, I'm here if you need me. I'm here if you need me. And,

Emerson Bredin 47:52
yeah, just

Emerson Bredin 47:53
showing them what our service is going to be before we even started the project without without being annoying

Mark D. Williams 48:00
that, you know, I'd love to get your perspective, you know. And you can go this wherever you want with it. It's not meant to be a little, really a political show. But the point of it is, is like, obviously, the last year has been super tumultuous from our side. You know, in the United States, you're in Canada, I'd love to get your perspective, you know, all we hear about down here is tariffs this and tariffs that. And, I mean, we hardly, my clients, ask me all the time, Hey, Mark, do I have to be worried about tariffs? And I'm like, I don't know. They change every 30 days or every 10 weeks or every it's just they're constantly changing. I don't even know. And it's like I'm running a small operation, building four to six homes. It's not like I have a direct line to DC, and even if I did, I'm not sure it would do any good anyway. But we hear all this stuff, and maybe instead of your window companies giving you once a year, usually in January, I think, is your annual couple percent raise. Like we're seeing, hey, it's going up 5% or 6% or we're seeing a gradual incline. And like a lot of our stuff, at least the United States, we're getting a lot of stuff is domestic, but not all of it, obviously a lot, especially like, you know, computer chips, appliances, things like that. We do a lot of wolf subzero, which is out of Wisconsin, but a lot of their parts are coming from China. I'm just curious, what on you know, in Canada? What? What are you guys? What are you experiencing in terms of, like, tariff and price volatility on your side of the border?

Emerson Bredin 49:17
I think so

Emerson Bredin 49:19
there's two sides to it. Down in Toronto, for example, there's like a record number of condos that are just sitting there, and they've been sitting there for so long, nothing's selling. Developers are saying, hey, we'll give you. We'll pay for half of a new vehicle if you just come by our condo and stuff like that. Even further down that way, where there. Hang

Mark D. Williams 49:41
on. Let me ask a question on that then. So it's been done, so pricing tariffs haven't really affected that. So the unit is ready to buy. Why are you like down here? We have a major housing shortage, meaning we're in Minnesota alone. We're 100,000 units short of what our population needs, which drive costs and. Make it more unaffordable. Are you saying in Toronto that you have an abundance of and not enough people? Or what is that? What? Why are these not selling?

Emerson Bredin 50:07
No. So there's like, there's kind of two things happening specifically Ontario,

Emerson Bredin 50:12
like you guys, we need

Emerson Bredin 50:13
X amount more houses by this date, and it's a crazy amount. It's like, it's an unrealistic number. So we need more houses. But the other part of that is that the cost of living over here is

Emerson Bredin 50:24
extremely unaffordable. So

Emerson Bredin 50:30
and what what is happening, kind of with, like, I don't know if it started with the tariffs or before the tariffs, but whatever happens in the states, like, we just kind of always sit here and we wait to see what happens. Like, you know, there's not much action being taken. There's not we just, we wait to see what happens. And so during that time, of us waiting to see what happens, which is the stage we're in right now, nobody's buying anything. Those big developments. They were, they're huge projects. Those were getting built through covid. So they paid, they did pay a premium on materials, because that very much was a thing. Also during that time, even up here, people were paying an insane amount above market value for houses just to get into them. And now there's this situation where there's more and more coming to the market. Nothing is selling, and unfortunately, a lot of people are going to lose their shirts, because a lot of those people were when they bought in covid, and they have no choice but to sell. But the issue is, even when they sell at what is soon going to be the new market value, they're like, they're going to lose all their money.

Mark D. Williams 51:39
So if you had. So if you have, if you mentioned that, so I just the real let's use an example. Let's say you buy a home. What 500,000 600,000 million, whatever it is in, what 2022, so let's call it a year after covid, if you sell it today, is it break even? Above, below? What do you mean by losing their shirts?

Emerson Bredin 51:58
Yeah. So specifically, up here in even just in Huntsville, like small little town Muskoka, there were places that any other time it would probably sell for, say, 500,000 and the people who purchased the house, they like, there were people On a $5,000 home, paying an extra 350 grand

Emerson Bredin 52:22
for the home. Some even, some, even,

Emerson Bredin 52:25
yeah, like it was, it's ridiculous. So, so that's a whole nother small house. But it's not like, it's all these wealthy people buying these homes. It was people who needed a home at the time. It was people with, Hey, let's bring family money together so we can, you know, get into this house and everything. And so that was, it was, it was crazy. So

Mark D. Williams 52:44
hype, I don't know. I believe this is the right term, hyper inflation. I mean essentially you had, I mean not totally, but basically, super inflated prices for but so now let's say you bought that house for 850 it should have sold for 500 you're saying today they couldn't sell it for 850 because they paid too much for it. So what are they paying for it today? Or what are they selling for it today? If they were to sell it, then this exam probably a lot closer to what it really should be, really. So you're seeing a massive price correction. Then, yeah,

Emerson Bredin 53:12
there, there are people who, like, are literally foreclosing on their houses. And they're like, Well, I don't know what you want me to do. Like, I can't pay this difference off and so now that's not everybody like that's an extreme that's an extreme example, but that stuff was happening. I'm not looking into every single market in Ontario, but if that's happening in a small town of Muskoka and Huntsville, I'd have to imagine it was happening everywhere else. And I did see that stuff happen firsthand, so that is personal experience. But now going back to the tariffs part, I think it caused so much uncertainty over here, and it still kind of is. And so more is coming to the market, more is coming to the market. More is coming to the market. And nothing's selling because nobody's, everyone's too, too scared of what's going to happen. And so if, if I go on, you know the realtor website right now, and I look at all the houses up here, in my opinion, 75% of them are still way too high. And it's not even, well, it's not even my opinion. You can see how long they've been on the realtor website for and it's, they're, they're just some people still think, because of that time, oh, I can, I'm going to get this much for my house, or I'm going to get this much for that. And it's, it's absolutely not the case. And so the market correction, which always happens, as you know, is more comes to the market. More comes to the market people need to sell, so they start dropping their prices. Those places do sell, then the value of stuff comes back, back down to what the new market value is, and it's what needs to happen, to be honest, like it's just still too expensive for

Mark D. Williams 54:55
what about when you're building new stuff? So let's talk about, I mean, applying. Expenses, or, you know, Windows, or, I'm not sure what if you had to guess. I mean, I don't even know what mine is, so it's hard for me to guess you. But, like, what percentage of the things that you buy are made in Canada? Do you think

Emerson Bredin 55:16
that we buy, like, for these custom cottages? Yeah, or more so in

Mark D. Williams 55:19
general? No, no, not in general. That's actually, that's a, maybe another podcast about beyond. That's beyond my understanding and knowledge base. Let's stick to construction. So like you're, you're doing a remodel on a boathouse. Let's call it a $500,000 boat house or remodel, or whatever. What percentage of the goods that are going into that home do you think are domestically produced in Canada,

Emerson Bredin 55:41
yeah,

Emerson Bredin 55:47
close to, I don't know, probably close to 50% maybe a little bit less. So you could, you could go almost up to 100% if you wanted to buy Canadian only. But once again, like I just said, a part of the part of the conversation is just the cost of things over here. So, you know, there's lots of windows and doors that come from the States. A lot of our Canadian cooling systems come from the States. We're just wrapping up a cottage. It's all sub zero appliances in there. A lot of the but you can get fantastic windows that are Canadian made. You can Canada produces a lot of steel. Canada produces, obviously, a lot of lumber. Canada produces a lot of glass. But the issue is, they're not necessarily, like big enough outfits, a lot of these companies, to where they can be as competitive as some stuff that come from the States or from Europe or China, wherever they're coming from. But I would say, like, in terms of products that we use, probably about half of it is Canadian.

Mark D. Williams 56:47
Do you have a push for by Canadian? Like, obviously, you know, with the current administration here in the United States and, you know, I'd say, I mean, there's, there's definitely certain manufacturing, let's just say even 34567, years ago. I mean, obviously there's a part of it where, you know, they market to, and I'm not saying it's good or bad, it's I'm just commenting on, like, what I see in marketing, which is like, hey, it's American made, which, obviously, if I'm a, if I'm a manufacturer that says I'm American made, I am. My value proposition is, you know, support your country, support your local people. Like, I get that concept, for sure. I'm just curious, like, what kind of is that a very prevalent marketing in construction, like, by Canadian it?

Emerson Bredin 57:28
Is it?

Emerson Bredin 57:29
It? That's it? The answer is no, until the tariffs happened, then everybody you know was Canadian, made Canadian, owned Canadian. Like they really started. It was honestly a nice thing. Like, you know, Canada manufactures and builds and creates fantastic products. And so it was nice to see that we did have a couple clients where they were, like, you know, even if this is 20% additional, if it's Canadian made, we want to go with that. You obviously have to be in a certain, certain position, which you know, our clients are to make those decisions. There's other clients where it's just, I want best product for for best price, as much as I can. That makes sense for us at bread and brothers, I would always choose

Emerson Bredin 58:14
Canadian. But

Emerson Bredin 58:18
if it's if it's a superior, superior product that isn't Canadian, and it's there's a significant cost difference, like in terms of a business decision, you kind of have to to make that to that choice. But there's plenty of fantastic suppliers, even local here to Muskoka, like Muskoka lumber and Muskoka rock, and they, they manufacture and produce, you know, beautiful products, and in that industry there, and a lot of the cottages up here are built with those products. But, yeah, it's always as much as I can is my answer.

Mark D. Williams 58:55
It's really just, I think you said it earlier. It's just uncertainty. I think of the corporations that we buy from, and I'm involved with maybe more than some just in terms of brand representation. And a lot of do it with what I do with the curious builder just get to talk to probably more corporate companies I would have thought for sure, more than I did three, four years ago, before I had the curious builder platform. And it's just interesting. I talked to their executives and where they're buying, and it's just there's there's just uncertainty. And I think just in general business, there's not anything new, regardless of what it is. People want to know certainty. Talk about weather, if you know it's cold, like, you know how to dress. If you know it's hot, you know how to dress. But like, if you don't know, you kind of have to be prepared for both. I mean, I you know, we have similar, obviously, winter climates, but which is, there's whole different levels of cold. Was it cold, cold, or is it cold? Cold? I actually have a, I have this Carhartt insulated jacket that I keep my truck and on those cold usually we're not going to make the client sit outside when it's minus below zero. But every once in a while, you're used to your office or your truck or whatever, and you do a electrical walkthrough, and as the owner, you're like, you're asking your clients to say, like, dang, it's really cold. It's it. Colder than my normal, mid weight, puffy and shell, like, I've got an extra jacket I can throw over my other two jackets to make sure, like, Okay, I'm not gonna freeze to death here. But I only just that was a silly analogy for uncertainty. Uncertainty is just not good, really, for anybody, and it's hard because we are obviously a service industry. We are servicing our clients, they're asking us to bring, you know, even bidding a project until I have plans and a design. I have a client right now who's very nervous about what it's going to cost, and like I all I can give you is parameters, but if they're not that great, until I actually get a price test, it's really hard for me to tell you exactly, then I can't really do value engineering or really dig into how it can help you. And uncertainties just causes. Some people are better with uncertainty than others,

Emerson Bredin 1:00:46
for sure. Yeah, we are, like, all those, those conversations we were happening like, that's, that's kind of as a real estate market as a whole in in Ontario, with relation to bread and brothers, we are very fortunate that our clients, this is a third, second, third, fourth, home for them. So it's not to say that the budget doesn't matter. Like, especially for those people, the budget absolutely does matter that. I don't like that misconception where it's right, they're worth a few 100 million, so they don't care. They're worth that for a reason. Trust me, they care, and they'll be the sticklers about it. And so it's not so much the budget, or, sorry, it is very important the budget. But, you know, they're at a certain point in their lives where, because of the market, if their place is going to cost an additional 10% as a whole, as to if they waited a few years, or if they did a few years earlier, they're still going to move forward with with the project. So we, I didn't even really think of that when I moved up here and I started bread and brothers that I really was entering into not a recession proof market. But,

Emerson Bredin 1:01:52
you know, it's these

Emerson Bredin 1:01:53
are luxury items, and luxury items are treated a lot different than other other industries. And yeah, like it. It sucks to hear about, you know, builders who build subdivisions and all that stuff further down south, who haven't sold a place in a year, a year and a half, whatever it is, or they're just moving so slow, and it doesn't make sense to drop their numbers or something. But we, we keep growing and keep growing that clientele up here, and I'm very

Emerson Bredin 1:02:21
thankful that I kind of made that decision.

Mark D. Williams 1:02:23
Correct me if I'm wrong, but I would imagine at this, at the the homeowners who are having multiple homes, they're not bank financing these remodels anyway, they're likely paying cash or out of money market accounts. Is that accurate?

Emerson Bredin 1:02:35
Yeah, well, we don't really, we don't really know, to be honest, like, right, how there, but yeah, I am assuming 95% of them are, yeah,

Mark D. Williams 1:02:44
yeah. Well, I wanna respect your time as well as the audiences. Maybe we'll just do two last questions. One is other than the birth of your child, which is by far the coolest news. What else you looking forward to, business wise or personal wise here for the second half of the year?

Emerson Bredin 1:02:58
Yeah, definitely the growth of Brendan brothers, we've got some pretty crazy projects that are coming up, and some that are even crazier, that are kind of in the works. So we're working hard to seal the deals on those. Those would really put us into the next category, and turn a lot of heads up here, especially in like the Muskoka builders community, being like, what, you know, those freaking Brendan brothers got that project. But so I'm very excited for that bread and developments, which I had talked about. There's a couple stuff that we're starting with that as well. So I'm excited for to get that going, and then, on a personal level, yeah, just obviously, our our young daughter and one on the way, and still trying to make sure that, yeah, I'm as involved as I as I can be. And yeah. And

Mark D. Williams 1:03:45
then my last question is, where do you look for inspiration? You know, you know, is it reading? Is it is it YouTube? Is it other builders in your community? Is it other industries? You know, as you look around at building your business or yourself, what do you find inspirational?

Emerson Bredin 1:04:00
I'm a big YouTube guy. Like, I just, I like that you get the information you need in a short amount of time. I would say it's not so much the a good portion of it is inspiration from the building community like yourself with this podcast, I know there's a couple other guys in the states who are pretty big, like, you know, ns builders and the finer touched homes guys and everything I really do, like following, which I never really used to when I started it, but following what you guys are doing, and just like the summits and the events and all that stuff that you guys hold, they're all the cool ones seem to be in the States. So hopefully we could eventually start something over here. You know, we could fly

Mark D. Williams 1:04:41
actually, it's funny. It's funny. You say, I've talked to Caleb about this, about maybe even doing now, we got two although you're still a couple hours out of Toronto, but we have the curious collectives in about four states. So you know, we're in Minneapolis, Arizona, Atlanta, Texas, and next year we'll be in two other states. But it'd be cool to go up into Canada. So we could. They were a multinational, curious

Emerson Bredin 1:05:01
builder. We'll buy, we'll buy your first set of tickets so you can count.

Mark D. Williams 1:05:06
I said, Yeah, I love it. I love it. I love it. Well, you often, if you're, are you a hockey player?

Emerson Bredin 1:05:10
I was, I was growing up, yeah, not so much anymore, but I I should probably be more active than I am. I'm sitting in front of this computer too much. But yeah, yeah,

Mark D. Williams 1:05:19
there's that. Well, the reason I ask is Caleb. So our next curious builder boot camp is down in Costa Rica, actually the end of January, I think we're half sold out, but half the people you just mentioned are coming to it already. Brad, he's bringing a couple of his people. Caleb's coming. He's bringing his, I think, his videographer with from Toronto. So you guys can fly out on same flight. But if you're into that sort of thing, it's like you can look at it. So last week, I think it's January, 25 through the 29th so it's

Emerson Bredin 1:05:44
okay, can you, I just want to write, what? What's that guy's name? Who's in trial? Oh,

Mark D. Williams 1:05:49
Caleb McDonald with, yeah, with kings Ridge building group,

Emerson Bredin 1:05:55
Kings Ridge,

Emerson Bredin 1:05:56
okay, if, like, if he's, if he's kind of getting involved with everything that you guys are, are all doing. It'd be great to connect with him and kind of see what we could, we could make happen as well.

Mark D. Williams 1:06:07
Yeah, for sure, well, and I think if you're, I mean, because you're, what, two, three hours from Toronto, yeah, we're like two hours. I mean, four times a year, it's not that big of a deal. I mean, it's a three hour. No, no,

Emerson Bredin 1:06:18
we would, yeah, if there was a built, like, a good building event in Toronto. I mean, two. Maybe there are some great ones to be I probably don't look enough, but, yeah, we, like, we would drive down there in a second where, when you build up here in Muskoka, all your projects, like being cottages down these back roads and stuff like we're used to driving so, and just, there's not necessarily a whole lot up here compared to like a Toronto or those cities. So most people up here are used to, used to

Mark D. Williams 1:06:45
driving. Yeah, they're driving a little bit. Well, no worries. Thanks again for coming on the podcast, and we'll have all your information in the show notes your Instagram. And if people are interested, they can reach out to you, check out what you're doing, and good luck with we'll stay in touch. But, you know, good luck for the second half of this

Emerson Bredin 1:06:59
year. Yeah. Thank you. You you as well. Thanks for having me. I appreciate

Mark D. Williams 1:07:03
it. We've had the podcast now for two and a half, almost three years now, and we have a consulting page, one to one consulting you can book my time for one hour. Perhaps you've heard a guest where you like one of the topics. Maybe you want an introduction to some of the guests that I've had on. Perhaps you want to talk about branding or marketing, or anything that we've covered on the podcast over the last two and a half years. You can book a time at curious builder podcast.com thanks for tuning in to curious builder podcast. If you like this episode, do us a favor. Share it with three other business owners. The best way that we can spread what we're doing is by word of mouth, and with your help, we can continue to help other curious builders expand their business, please share it with your friends. Like and review online, and thanks again for tuning in.