Episode 2—JKath Design Build + Reinvent
Episode #2 | Katie and Jesse Kath | JKath Design and Build
Details on owning and operating a custom cabinet shop and how it was almost shut down and sold for parts before its stunning turnaround. Now launching into a new e-commerce pre-made vanity line which is just picking up into 2nd gear. We dive into the influence of social media and how to vet all the leads that come in so both parties are a good fit for each other.
Listen to the highlights from the episode:
About Our Guests
We’re Jesse and Katie, the husband and wife duo behind Jkath. We love the historic homes and neighborhoods of Minneapolis and St. Paul. And, as busy parents ourselves, we know the architecture and layouts aren’t always conducive to modern life.
With our team of design and building experts, we reimagine homes to function for today’s demands while honoring the charm and history that makes them unique. In the end, you get spaces tailored for the way you live, with design elements that transcend fads. Just timeless, beautiful spaces for everyday living.
When we’re not immersed in our work, you can find us at a small local restaurant, sneaking away to our favorite family vacation spot on the Oregon Coast, or strolling our own historic Minneapolis neighborhood.
Resources
Visit the JKath Website
Follow JKath on Instagram
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00:00
Well, welcome to the curious builder Podcast. I'm Mark Williams, your host today I'm with J calf build and design and reinvent you guys, I've got Jessie and Katie. Welcome to the show, guys.
00:11
Thanks. Thanks for having us. Thank
00:13
you. We have been in the Minneapolis area together for a while now, but probably only recently been drawn together by some mutual friends. And now, we're going to start spending some more time together. So I'm sorry for being your friend. Because once you get a hold of me as your friend, it's really hard to shake me loose, I'm very persistent. So that's alright, we're here for it. Well, for those not from the area, or don't know who you are, once you give us a quick rundown on on your company, you guys have a really unique story. So I'm really excited to interview you guys.
00:41
So Jessie and her husband and wife, and we are partners in the company, Jesse founded it before he and I came together. And we'll probably elaborate a little bit more as we get into how he founded it. But we did start with a cabinet shop custom cabinet shop only. And now we do full higher end boutique renovations. As we were just chatting, you know, each project has you know, two or three or even more bathrooms, kind of a whole house. And then usually a large addition is in a lot of the scope as well. We have a team of around a dozen here in the Twin Cities. In addition to cabinetry and renovations, we also do all of the design in house, we do have a design branch to what we do. So we prioritize client work locally. But we also have the ability to do design work nationally as well. So we do, I'd say about a half a dozen or so projects a year outside of the Twin Cities area, I guess, actually, pandemic we probably did close to a dozen. So it just depends on what's going on. There's a little bit more work virtually at that time. And there was, especially in 2020 than there was face to face.
01:45
would most of that be you know, actually we'll talk about this in a minute where you guys are launching your vanity lines, which is really exciting. But so going back to what you were saying about maybe a dozen projects outstate was it design work only? Or was it the cabinetry in the shop that you would send out? Or what do you mean by that? Well, you would do stuff out state
02:01
design only. Okay, so then the the clients are hiring a general contractor in their area to execute the designs that we put together for them.
02:09
Okay. Nice, very interesting, and how most of these people are finding you on Instagram on on their blog or Instagram. They're 100% that amazing. Yeah, it's crazy. We've talked a little bit about this offline when Jesse and I were together a couple of weeks ago. You know, we obviously don't have nearly the profile that you guys do. And we do mostly new constructions, kind of in the one and a half to 5 million range. And we'll do maybe three to seven remodels. But I don't think I've gotten a single inquiry off of Instagram. So anyone listening right now, if you want to be the first I will offer $1,000 discount. But So how long has that been a thing? Because obviously Instagram hasn't been around that long and your business is exploding with inquiries. I think you mentioned the other day that the majority of your work now is coming from that avenue. Is that right?
02:53
Yeah, I think I mentioned that to you. It used to be where it was. People starting on a family, they were younger, they weren't really our demographic. And they would call and they were super excited about a project and they just didn't understand budget. I used to call them the Brittany's because it was like the younger girls like the younger generation. And they would call us and it just never was a fit. And then I took a call one day on a Sunday. And this was probably five, six years ago. Yeah. And that was the very first large project that came from Instagram. And I feel like since then it's really had a lot of legs from what the work that she puts in on it. And that's a full time job in and of itself managing your Instagram and dealing with she just she's engaged with design only right now potentially prospect for building. She's been answering this person's DMS for years years, just as a courtesy, right. And now they're looking to hire us to do design first and then build.
03:48
Yeah. Oh, yeah, it would be a larger scale renovation. But yeah, you know, the sales cycle so long with what with what we all do, I mean, probably longer for you than it is on the renovation side. So it happened overnight. I mean, it didn't feel like it was happening overnight. But those first two or three years you put into your mark digital marketing strategy. It just happened overnight, all of a sudden, it was slow and steady. But back on Instagram when it was slow and steady. There were other instant gratification moments happening. I mean, you would wake up to 500 new followers or room and board reground your image or rejuvenation or pottery barn or some of the brands that you're taking, were paying attention to you were nowadays it's not as easy. You don't wake up with 500 new followers. I think you know, we laugh a lot because I wake up and we've lost 100
04:34
followers. Do you think that was pandemic driven? No, no, this
04:37
is so this is pre when we're kind of ramping up our digital marketing strategy, but remaining consistent is always key. And I think it still is. And then when I say it happened overnight. It didn't happen to me, but it feels like all of a sudden we woke up we call it a January one and all of our inquiries that had been following us for so long. It was like we trained, right? Yeah, they start hating me train them with Ken sistent marketing messaging and a static a tone of voice a behind the scenes a just a little bit of just enough of a sneak peek into your family. I know some people are very successful doing a very large peek behind the curtain. I think we're, we're a little bit more modest in how we do that. Our kids are also teenagers and they're in the very awkward stage. Like, wow, we could probably I don't know how See, I don't know. Projects are selling for us right now. On Instagram
05:26
talking about having to be honest, though, you go to a job site on a Monday morning and people like how was your weekend? And? Or how Where were you on Friday? Right? You can't really tell yet. You have to be honest with what you were doing up to the second because she's probably posted about it.
05:41
Right? Yeah, especially for you if she's managing it. You're not sure what she posted her? Didn't ya better be nice. Just one more reason. I think you get is it safe to say that you get a lot of energy. When you see you mentioned like you get a milestone or like, you know, RH repost something, and there is a thrill of a sale. Like I know, obviously, I mean, we're all in sales, but you whatever. However that sale is you get some I know like if someone does something neat, whether it's Instagram, or it's a call or referral, you get come to this energy, how does that energy transfer into your craft, because just your your day to days are operating the team in the field operating the cabinet shop. And we'll talk a little bit about you know, I think it's really neat that you guys have your own cabinet shop. That's where you started. And I'd love to understand the dynamic there. But how do you take the energy that you're receiving maybe from across the United States into a local market like Minneapolis? How do you how do you use that energy to fuel your business?
06:36
The Vandy line might be one of them, right? I mean, I think that kind of like our teenagers, they get that instant gratification from being on social media, whatever it is, I think it is somewhat of a pat on the back. When you do get that feedback. And it does inspire you sometimes you get frustrated in this business, and there's some clients that aren't very appreciative. And then there's a whole handful of them that are and the people that are reaching out that have followed you a long time, it's basically telling you that they've done their due diligence, they've kicked the tires, and they trust you. And that follow ship, if you may with that allows people to get to know you a little bit without actually getting to know you. We're in situations now where we're never we're never but we're hardly ever bidding against others who are getting three other bids. You know, those days, maybe because of the industry are also gone. But that's helped us.
07:32
They know your story. They've seen the work you do. They've you know, whether it's a story or a post, but at this point, they've obviously checked out your Instagram and all that stuff. And so they feel like they have a relationship with you. Even though at this point, you don't really know them. Is that safe to say in summary?
07:47
Yeah. And I think, you know, it's justifying the investment as well. I mean, I, you know, it's it's six, roughly 6am. Every morning, I do my Instagram post, I don't schedule it, it is in real time I do the captions in real time. This weekend, I republish an old blog on seven meals when you don't have a kitchen. And there is no doubt on a Sunday afternoon when I'm putting together the canvas slides to load into Instagram and grab the links and do all the pretty images. Right? Don't ask why am I doing this on a Sunday, other people are taking their Sundays off or watching the football game or doing yard work or going for a walk. Now I'm finding time to do all of those things as well. But I also understand that that consistency, right it just it so when you get those small pings that justifies the investment and and it doesn't matter what what meals, I guess it matters what meals we think people should cook when they don't have a kitchen. I mean, my my DMs are full of comments on those slides right now, thank you for sharing, this is such a great idea. And I'm gonna give these a try. And so it's more than just the work right? It's just sort of that lifestyle component that we're bringing to the table. And I know that that's one area that we just scratched the surface on. But right now that's all we can do is scratch the surface because I think then you become more of a media company delivering additional content that would require almost a full time person in house to just or more right a team to manage well, a lot like what you're doing. I mean, this is a new arm for you. And it's yeah, it's effort.
09:17
Yeah, and I mean there's a lot of time involved I mean time is a resource that we all share equally and what we do with it is obviously very important with family business, all those things and time allocation. Just understand a little bit more about the cabinet shop just because I you know, I grew up around woodworking, my dad can build anything very heavy, and it takes him a long time to do it. And he only does one offs and then he gives it away. But I have a great appreciation for woodworking. Tell me a little bit about your background, Jesse as far as you know, how did the cabinet shop come about? And how did you start the company originally? Yeah.
09:47
Don't let me lose track of that question. But I think it was pretty cool last week when we were together two weeks ago, and we're together and you're telling me about how your dad built a good portion of Chaska. And we're doing it house 25 years old that it's time actually the case that your dad built it right? So that's pretty cool but that he's the 10 year warranty and burn. Burn the plan type of guy. Oh, you mean Mike? Yeah. Oh,
10:10
absolutely. I used to remember he take the you know, back then it was nothing digital, right? You'd have those lawyer boxes where you have to keep all your files for 10 years. He got we had a big burn Petey put a bunch of you know, he was a major Pyro, I think it'd be I wonder if he became a pyro because of the files or if he was a pyro before the piles. But anyway, he burned them all. Yeah, for sure. He has no plans. But I could probably tell you what, you know, he built a lot of homes that were very similar. So I could probably tell where everything is.
10:33
And also, if you're in the woodworking business, you tend to like bonfires, it's a good fire starting material. I started in this business, kind of a happenstance. I was in corporate. But 2000 is when I started in cabinetry. And I ran a high end run custom cabinet shop in town that worked with higher end builders. And I learned to be a builder from being around that type of work. So if you asked me to build something cheaply, and quickly, I don't think I could do that. Yeah, you know, I learned it from some of the big boys in town. And I appreciate that experience. And was about five years while we started this shop in 2010, in Shakopee in a smaller building. And then just through the years, it just grew our remodeling business and remodeling became number one, cabinet shop became a part of that. And I feel like about five years ago, we were frustrated with our direction, because our shop couldn't keep up with our business and our business. couldn't sell a project without a cabinet shop. So I thought about selling it. But then when I thought about my passion, and my passion is the woodworking part of it, and cabinetry. And that's one of our Forte's and the thing that is most important to me in a project. And as a builder in around design, you know that that's a big portion of the project. Also, it can be a big portion of the cost as well. So we decided to keep on truckin with it. And we moved our shop this last year into a much bigger facility with newer equipment. And we have big plans to grow our remodeling business with more capacity with a cabinet shop, right?
12:07
I don't even think though at the time, this might have been more than five years ago, we understood the value of that shop, because we weren't even going to sell it, we were going to close it, like just shut it down all the equipment redone with that arm and then just outsource all of our cabinetry. And I do remember, we did so this is before we had an office. I don't remember if we had an office yet, but for some reason we did a round of interviews at Caribou Coffee. And we we sat up with our coffee for like a half a day and literally had people come in in every 45 minutes to sit down in your beer. We're looking for a lead guide around our shop. And you know at the time, it was our last interview of the day. And I think we were we're close in the shot.
12:45
Landed dirt balls coming. Yeah.
12:47
I remember that coming from How did you how did you even get the treatment? No, they were they were they were actually your car ride out of the penitentiary. They're like we have your ride to wherever I need to go.
12:59
Craigslist, okay, yeah, cuz we weren't, you know, you didn't use we didn't use LinkedIn or now we're using LinkedIn and read and I think we're professional services to attract employees. But our last interview that came in, probably within five minutes, I think we were pretty close to offering him a job and he was a great asset for our cabinet shop for the years to follow. We now have a new generation of builders in our shop, which is exactly what we need for now the new direction that we're headed, and I'm very thankful that we hung on to it.
13:29
Yeah, that's an amazing story. I mean, it's, it's, you know, you see different builders, I love the thing that's different about remodelers and builders, and really any business, I love that you can be in the same industry and run your business a different way. And both be successful. You know, I guess for myself, you know, I build four homes a year, my dad was built for 30 years, he built 40 homes a year, our revenue was about the same. It's just interesting. And so one of the things that we often comment on his there are some commonalities. And you know, I was mentioning this on the podcast the other day, like, you know, whether you're selling water bottles, shoelaces, cabinets, I mean, there is some commonality between all business and I think one of them, my fellow business owners, I think one of the most enjoyable thing is to just ask someone like, I don't care what you're inventing, or what you're selling, I love to know about your business. I'm just curious about it. Do you find that you often well, it is nice to network with people in your own industry, but do you find yourself when you come across a business owner just be like, Hey, I've got a lot of questions for you, do you do you find that that's helpful to you?
14:25
The thing I like the most about being in this business, to be honest, is to meet people like you or to talk to other people that are you know, in the same struggle sometimes. I was just with another couple of builders, I don't know if I should name them or not, but we just had a ton of fun and we both find yourself somewhat complaining about the bad things, you know, but there's very few but we look at each other and we both know that if it was that bad if we didn't love it, and we wouldn't be in it. And so we find the things to pick about it but we love it
14:54
right I think is a little bit therapy right? You know, yeah, safe company. And so I think a little bit of it's like, you know, Um, I don't know enough about it. So not to minimize it. But I guess, you know, I think when you're in a group, and you're talking about something that's difficult, you're all you're all there to share something that's difficult and
15:11
invulnerable. Yeah,
15:12
that's I think that's you're right, you're
15:13
hoping somebody could help you feel better about it. And usually, it does help me knowing that we're all kind of in the same boat in different
15:20
aspects. And oftentimes, I find that it's not even something that somebody says, it's the fact that you nail that on the head vulnerability. It's the fact that someone's like, Yeah, this is hard. This is difficult. And I think then you need those superfans to, you know, they can be relatives that can be peers, you know, we have some mutual friends, you know, through building that are out state and, you know, even like this podcast, you know, you know, all the people that have come out like, oh, yeah, we'd love to come on, you know, that's great, you know, who knows what it's gonna become? Does? That's not really the point. The point is, you have all these super fans that you didn't even you know that you have people that support you. And we were just mentioning this on a podcast recently that one of the best pieces of advice I've ever gotten in my career was asked for help. And so often people, I don't know if it's pride, or ego, maybe a combination, but literally just say, will you help me. And I remember this a total personal story that it was, someone asked me for help one time, I don't even though we were friends. And I remember that, that I felt really empowered, that this person felt so to your Jessie vulnerable, that they asked me for help. And we became very good friends. And I've often thought of that, that asking somebody for help is one of the the strongest ties that you can get to friendship, because who do you normally ask for help? Yes, your spouse, your kids, your family. So if you were to ask somebody outside your network, your family familiar network, it's quite empowering. Actually. It's a big step. That is
16:44
it's, well, it's a gift. It's a gift, a gift to bring somebody in your network and lean on their expertise and everything you just shared. Although the question mark asked was not,
16:54
don't worry, I forgot it to Jesse. It was
16:57
it was do you along the lines of when you're another business owners? Do you want to know what they do what they say and find inspiration? But that was a good answer to whatever question you had brewing inside.
17:08
Katie is now taking over host responsibilities, because I also forgot the question. So thank you, for your question, please. Yeah.
17:16
But yeah, I mean, that's so relevant right now. But yeah, I belong to a few women, business owner groups, a couple different organizations, ones at a national level one is here locally, and one of the rules in our local business. And we know some mutual people in that group is that no two industries are replicated within each circle. So which is really cool, because at the end of the day, we have the same problems. We are all, you know, at certain times struggling with client communication, employee retention, you know, in some some folks, it's cash flow. You know, we've definitely been there in the past with cash flow, which is, you know, a burden on how to grow and how to get an office and how to, you know, find more employees, you know, how to scale? Do I shut it down? Do I go get a new job? Do I add benefits to my company, mean, we're all having the same issues and the same problems at the end of the day, but it's such a great opportunity. Now, I feel like this is there's more of these opportunities for women than there are for men. And I would love I know that there are groups that you guys could be a part of, but there's usually
18:15
meets our bar,
18:16
no, the golf course, golf course, golfing. But yeah, anyway, it's the same opportunity just be really vulnerable, share insights, we, in the last few weeks, I did a real vulnerable thing. And I opened up I have spreadsheets that I don't even share with Jesse, there are some very internal financial strategies that I do, and then how to just make decisions on the company. And so I shared them with my group and walks them through kind of an 18 month plan of how we were able to increase our cash flow runway and our burn rate and get to a point where decision making anything under a certain amount of dollars doesn't need to be a stressful decision. It's just you can do it in your sleep, you know that the cash is there, you can make those decisions, which gives you room to spend time on more stressful, kind of bigger decisions that are not in the day to day bigger levels.
19:02
You mentioned your you know, you have a very interesting background, even leading up to, you know, being a partner in this remodeling cabinet, everything business, how how much of what you just shared was things that you learned at your previous employee, or have you developed it on your own or walk me through a little bit about what you just share? Because even for myself, like cash flow structure of organization, that seems to be something that's constantly in discussion with an you know, it sounds like you kind of have created a blueprint. Is that something that I guess walk me through how you got there? Sure.
19:36
So I came from the hospitality industry. So I owned a wine bar in Minneapolis for just under 10 years. And prior to that I ran as a general manager and I went through college and did a few different things and ended up just I just had a love for the hospitality industry. And there's a lot of similarities to what we do. I mean, it's a fast paced environment. It's a lot of people management. And you know, there's a lot of similarities but in the hospitality industry, I couldn't tell you today's numbers. But back when I was running the bar in uptown, it was a 5% margin. And when I had my own business, so if you have a table for two, the average table is $100. If you think about everything that goes into the $100, your staff, your insurance, your rent, your food costs, your liquor cost, at the end of the day is the owner, you get to leave with $5, it's so low,
20:24
which is why we've had a low and building and remodeling,
20:28
which is why there's no room for error, you need volume to cover your air. I mean, if your bartenders are drinking all night, or giving away free tabs, I mean, there was just a practice where you would say to each bartender, you each have $100, free bar tab because you knew they were going to do it, but at least you could control it and say I know that my I'm going to give away $300 Worth alcohol tonight, but I'm not going to again, it's just that threshold of what can you write
20:49
out of curiosity, just send all that industry well enough? Was that a way to get more client like, hey, this a good client? I'm gonna treat their friends, or was it more just like,
20:57
both? Both? Yeah, but you're right. Yeah. I mean, it's partially it would attract their friends to come in, because their friends knew they could drink for free. But if you had 12 people sitting in your bar drinking for free, that's a problem. It is. But it also kept people in the building longer rather than having an empty bar. It just felt like there's no ambiance. Yeah,
21:14
a lot of people started drinking, for free
21:17
drinking in cabinet shop. bandsaw. So it sounds like a good company. Oh, that'd be a very interesting jigsaw puzzle, though, for my kids. So
21:26
okay, the owners at the time. And I don't know if this is a bigger principle, if they this is just their own, but I've adapted it was a declining checkbook. So we would take whatever cashflow I felt we had available for that week. So on the restaurant levels, week to week, me now or a little bit more month or quarterly budgeting, we would say if we had called $10,000 to spend in a week, it didn't matter how many reservations we had coming in, nothing mattered, other than you could only spend $10,000. And so I would divvy that up into the different purchasing departments Backhouse, the bar, the wine, and it was just purchasing for food and alcohol didn't include labor and some of the other items. And often the kitchen would say, well, that's not enough. We have 300 People come in between Thursday and Saturday. And we need you know, we're going to need at least 8000 That 5000. And we just had to remain very firm, it doesn't matter. You have to figure it out. Which means if you go into a restaurant on a Sunday, Sunday, and there's a lot of pasta on the special manual passes the cheapest food cost. So then you just rewrite your specials based on interesting what you could bring in. There's also a lot of seafood on Sundays, because we're getting rid of the Friday and Saturday inventory that didn't sell Mondays are never a great day to go into a restaurant, although we're going out to eat after this. And then a lot of restaurants will close on Tuesday, and those things fasten and then kind of went fresh. All right, when the pandemic hit back in 2020. I was like, earlier, the very early days, I think before we knew what it was, I would always look around and say, Why are we worried about this? We need to be worried about where we're going to eat? Who's Who's in charge of the menu, when they turned over their food last? Did they sell out? Are they busy enough to sustain the inventory that they have? Because food poisoning is a real thing. And it happens a lot, unfortunately, so
23:07
what Thursday, Friday, Saturdays are your favorite? Yeah,
23:09
when you can't get a table right? When everyone else goes out. But anyway, so there's a lot more to that declining checkbook, but it's a way to preserve cash flow and sort of just changing your behavior of spending. And so we do that internally. And, you know, with that we've been really mindful in the last 18 months of, again, just changing our cash flow runway. And you know, treating our new zero looks like a different number than zero now, right? I mean, we just have a different number zero. And when we approach that new number, we get nervous. Yeah. And then we make like a safety
23:43
net or trapeze deal. I kind of have the same thing. When we do a weekly report. We're switching right now from a cash basis counting to accrual, which is way overdue. And we're also switching accounting systems. We also have a new person, we brought on some way more overhead, we switched I mean, so I've got 17 balls in the air. And I feel as a business owner having done this now for 18 years and seven months evidently, according to LinkedIn, that's the first time I've ever actually known how long anniversary. Thank you, honey. I've been telling everyone for the last year I've been 17 years of business. And then yesterday I looked at my phone I'm like, Oh, I guess it's 18 You don't really track you know, now it's a little bit like your birthday reminded
24:18
of our anniversary or wedding anniversary that way. It's now Facebook.
24:22
Yeah, that one I actually know that one. Not gonna forget that one. And, but I guess where I was going with this is all the financial balls in the air all financial balls. And so you know, obviously, if you're in business for a couple of years, you're doing something right. And then if you're doing decades, clearly, but you know, you add some new stimulus, you add a new, you know, we've kind of catapulted and price ranges of what we do. So it takes a lot more cash than it did five, six years ago, just because the costs of you know, your bills, your overhead, everything is just more but it goes in and goes out pretty quick. And so we've actually worked with a accounting firm right now, but we're still in the very beginning phases. I just feel like there needs to be better analytics to help me make decisions because I really like marketing. And you know, you tend to spend money on things that you like to do, right. And so, you know, it's so difficult to track ROI, you know, on different things that you're spending money on. And you know, some are only digital and at some are like, I think, you know, Morgan, for instance, from construction to style, I think she said she only does stuff that's digital, because she can track it better. And that's her belief. And so, you know, we have a mix of print, we have a mix of all these different avenues. And it's like, well, it's hard to know which one is the best investment. And I like what you shared, you know, essentially, here's the dollar, here's the budget, and we treat it like a corporation, where I tend to be a pretty passionate individual. If I hear a good idea, I put the checkbook aside, I'm like, That's a great idea. I don't know how I'm going to do it, but I want to do it. And there's pros and cons to that. I mean, I do a lot of things. Some of them fail, some of them are great. But you know, I probably need to do a better job of staying on my own budget. How do you navigate your own marketing budget? I mean, are you pretty good at staying in your lane.
25:58
So we, gosh, we're a terrible case study and a marketing budget, because we don't really have one eye. So when we got out, we just recently moved into a new office. But our office one well, it's probably 2.0 1.0 was our living room. 2.0 was where we just left in Highland Park. And it was a bigger investment for the space that we had. So we knew it would probably work for a few years, it allowed us to make additional decisions, such as bringing on a few more employees, a place to store a lot of our client things that we're now taking over our home. But that was marketing for us, because it was a street level a cute little shop, storefront rather, in a very prominent place where there's a lot of foot traffic, we didn't feel that we had a lot of competition in the area. So that had our marketing budget. And so I had an X amount for rent. And I said, Well, we're gonna have to pull half of this out and put it into marketing. Honestly, though, other than that, we have not ever done any print advertising.
26:51
What was your thought? Because you're I mean, you're a very good marketer, in my opinion, just from what I see. So your marketing is working on me if nobody else, although I probably won't, you know, have you remodel my own home, but maybe I will, because your cabinetry is outstanding, why not print.
27:06
So we've been in it will probably come to an end. But we've been very fortunate and having a lot of our work published published within local magazine. So that advertising speaks volumes, you're getting multiple pages, you're getting a very high touch article written on your work and your team. And a few things have gotten national for publication which our clients are involved in national light. So just in like the kitchen and bath magazine, which is a national print magazine. And, and then with the occasional tours. So for bringing people in that way to pray to homes. We've done a few other tours in the past, although we have lost a little bit of steam on the tours, I think because we've just been so busy. The idea of carving out time, we just don't we just haven't had the bandwidth. But it's definitely on my radar for 2023 to think about. And I'll be quite honest, our client work. While it's been some of our favorite work we've ever done in the last year. It's sort of a hard finish line. It's been a really challenging finish line. So it's really hard to even kind of go back and say, Can I stage and shoot your house for my Instagram and website portfolio much less now? Can I take your house back over for a full weekend, the Ask used to be a lot easier. And we used to always be in a situation where we could give something and we can still can but we can say hey, you know you took out the cabinetry in your mudroom. Why don't we throw it back in right and in exchange for the tour. I feel like we are eating so many more expenses right now that it's hard for us to find the creative solution to doing a tour. It's like we've all whether the clients know about it or not. It's Oh my goodness, we're absorbing right? Don't you feel like we're absorbing a lot of costs just we're set
28:44
up to do the one and Regina for the dream home for the remodeling tour. When 2000 rubber nails 20 or 24. What they cancelled it because of COVID. So we really went the extra mile to provide a few extra things for that tour. And it just didn't turn out. But obviously we're a dream home in 2020, which was the beginning of the pandemic. We were the first to not have a few appliances and I thought this is ridiculous and embarrassing. Right you should back out but it was the beginning of what norm right. But that also, like you said did get us some
29:20
Yeah, we're still still riding in the house that didn't hit the remodeler tour in 2020 because they canceled it just one weekend I think before because remodeler tours that last weekend, I had a house during
29:30
the parade we made the first two weekends and they had that's because the third weekend was elective. And I think I so funny to think about some of the decisions you make three years hindsight, right because you don't know what you don't know. And I was like everyone else shut down. I'm like, I'm gonna be open. We got so much traffic. It was crazy because I was the only game in town. Nobody got to go. I mean, you can Yeah, well anyway, that's a whole nother discussion. That's a political topic that this podcast will not cover. But anyway, it was fascinating but then obviously it shut down. So yeah, I didn't think about the last weekend was
29:57
Oh yes, we never never got it. Yeah, we never able to Oh, yes, but we still I mean, I just had a new inquiry reach out, and they have the exact same home footprint in a different neighborhood. And we've been following year it was our dream Avenue Project. And they said, we basically want you to repeat right? Now, the downside was I think their budget was not enough. Yeah, maybe 200,000. Yeah, I,
30:17
I do a lot of parades. I mean, I didn't even count the number. But I bet I've done 30 or 40, we did five in one year, one time. And that's your marketing strategy. Right? It was, I mean, we probably get 70%. It's hard, because people, you know, we have a parade going on right now. And we have the dream home. And it's been great, because a lot of the normal competitors are not out this year for it's a lot of its timing, as you know, also the strata of the home that we have, I just feel like in this particular year, we're very well set up to be kind of, you know, the apex predator, if you will. And so it's been a phenomenal tour, but I won't actually know how good this tour is, for a couple of years. And people ask me all the time, the sales cycle, and, you know, I think you guys could speak to this a little bit, you probably have more repeat clients than I would, you know, I think at the end of my career, I can answer this question. Maybe I'll have a handful. But I mean, it's pretty rare that someone would build multiple, you know, multimillion dollar homes in their lifetime, unless you build for when they're young. You know, we're having we have one couple now that we built for about five years ago. And I would suspect in about five years, though, you know, a big part of our clientele is empty nesters. And so they'll downsize, right? And then we'll be there, you know, for that. But it's kind of interesting, you build this, this amazing relationship, you work with people, sometimes for years, forget the sales cycle. I mean, I've had some that are as long as seven or eight years, and then I'll have it like one time and done. It's an interesting industry, because usually, when you put that much time into something, you'd think you'd have this relationship that you're selling a widget or XYZ and you could do multiple, do you find that in remodeling, and especially maybe with this new vanity launch, that you're hoping to capitalize on a little more repeat clients?
31:51
So right now, all of our clients are from Instagram. I could be wrong about maybe one or two. But take a quick scan in my brain. I think all of our current work is Instagram. In 2020 and early 2021. Every single client was repeat clients. I think it's just a cycle. Yeah. But when I say repeat, we're going into the same home and doing a different scope. So I don't Can you think of any client that sold a house and hired us? Yeah, there's been one or two moved from the creek? Oh, yeah. Yep. Art and Avenue Project. Your we did some work in their first home, and then they moved. But I would say that we suspect a lot because our clients are young. So and if they're taking on such major innovations at a young age, they're not done
32:35
and agreed. Well, that's interesting. So most of them, I mean, just look. So this be curious. Your analytics, I would say 70% of my analytics on Instagram are women and 30% are men. And I think my demographic range is probably like 25 to 45. Same. Is that the same ratio of
32:53
women who are like, I feel like work like 65 women? It's super close. Yeah. Interesting. Yeah. Yeah. And they're young. Definitely young. And probably I always say I am my client. I'm so young. somebody's birthday. Happy birthday. I'm older than I look, I would say probably. But I am I am my client. So I'm which is probably been no surprise because I'm doing the marketing and a drawing that audience and but it's, you know, kids that are younger to middle school, we don't do a lot of high school empty nesters. But we will, because I think our audience will grow up with me and us a little bit. Ella, Jessie's just a few years older than me. And you know, we built our home a couple years ago, and I don't know if we'll do it again, if we're done. You know, I can't say for sure this is our forever home. But again, with with what we do for a living, it's probably any future work would probably have to be a marketing opportunity. Oh,
33:52
for sure. Yeah. I mean, you guys do an excellent job of marketing. And how do you how do you navigate this is something one of the reasons why I wanted to bring you on is, you know, the people that brought on so far onto the podcast have been, you know, business owners in the trades. And they've been the sole proprietor. In this case, you're a husband and wife team. Very curious to see how does that dynamic work a you have business partner as well. I know, partnerships can be difficult, you know, even if it's, you know, just two business partners. But how do you navigate you know, husband and wife while also managing like, you're both business partners. Well, Justin, I talked a little bit about this, but just kind of curious. How do you guys navigate those waters? Go ahead.
34:34
I can be exhausting sometimes. I think I'll probably let you answer the majority of this. But what I've been trying to do lately is when it's an off hour, which is hard for me, I don't have a lot of hours. Try not to bring it up. Try not to so when for me I'm always thinking my mind is going a million miles an hour and when I wake up the first thing I have that coffin wake right like I'm just like, wake up right away and then a million things are here. In my head, so instead of like rolling over and asking Katie a bunch of questions all at least wait until she gets out of the shower. So courteous. But I'm trying to keep that stuff to business hours more or less than Yeah, try not to have it in Indeed, our vacations and things like that. But, you know, being business partners and owning this business also allows us we work super hard, we work 24 hours a day sometimes, but then we'll sneak away for a vacation. And even though sometimes it's a working vacation, but we're allotted a lot of that opportunity, because we do work hard together. I think we do work well together. Sometimes the problem sometimes what, what happens is if so I've owned this company a long time. But I'm not necessarily the boss, like I kind of like say that she's the boss, she's she's kind of like the, the appointed CEO. But if I'm not producing a document for her, I'm not only laying her down as my boss, but as my spouse. So it's like a double sword double whammy,
35:57
double whammy. Yeah. I think it's helped growing a team having layers between us. So not everything needs to final between Jessie and I, it can go through a team member and Jesse or through a team member and myself. So that's been really helpful. We also don't spend a lot of our day to day in the same. I mean, just getting in a car today to come here is rare for us to be in occasionally, maybe once or twice a month, we might have a client and early. So even though we've built a team, we're still doing and we might always be doing it. I haven't figured this out, but we're doing I'm curious to know what you do those early sales calls, and we do a lot of vetting before we get into someone's home. But it's so hard because nobody can speak to the history and the richness of our brand and the quality of work. And you know, the fish, I don't know, there's so many things that we can that I mean, we can just sell our company, no one can do it as good as we can. Right? So I don't know how to outsource that. And sometimes it seems a little strange like, well, they see us, you know, building this brand online. And then here are Jesse and Katie at your front door, like should it be somebody else? Right?
37:02
Or if it is somebody else? And your names on the door? We've talked about this too? How do you convince them to trust your team? Right? You know, we can't be everywhere. If you were building just one house for one client. For one, two years, you would go broke? I mean, you need to have multiple clients, you need to be in multiple places at one time. And that's impossible. Right?
37:23
I think, you know, it's a huge question. I guess your earlier question I can answer kind of immediately, I've kind of over the years, I don't know where I learned it or, you know, I tend to adopt things and then kind of twist them to my own. So I'm sure I learned it from somebody else. But I tend to and just from expediency because it is just me. You know, I mean, I don't really have sales is what I'm best at. And but you know, you're really good at selling yourself selling your brand. And is that a scalable model? And I guess my question to you is, do you want it to be, you know, do you want to scale up? And obviously, with your vanity line? We can talk more about that if we have time? You know, it seems like yes, you do. I can speak for myself that when I vet someone like in the Parade of Homes, I guess have a comma. After after time, you just kind of do it organically. I remember I used to write stuff down and you know, after this amount of time, you just very comfortable in your own skin, you're comfortable in your own story. And I think that that translates has confidence. People feel very reassured by it. If you wait a long time to answer a question. People find that as like medicine, you know the answer to the end. And doesn't mean you're fast answers are always right. I've learned that the hard way. But you know, in the parade, you'll have let's say 40 to 60 people wandering in your house, and you've had prayed events, but where they're quite busy, especially on Ramallah showcase weekend, we had one or we had 1200 People in three days. I mean, it was a madhouse. And it was awesome. I mean, literally, you have about 30 seconds at most to qualify if this person's real client or not. And kind of my go to Line was, you know, Hi, Katie, Welcome to our home, I really like to give you the time that you deserve. Is there a time that we can set up in the next week or two where we can spend time and talk about your project? And that's it. It take it took me to you know, what, four or five seconds to say that line give you my card. I used to always try to get their contact info, but in today's world, nobody wants to give it and it seems very forced. So, you know, we're talking about capturing that in different ways. But that's kind of how I handle the parade. And then as far as actual phone calls, you know, but if someone will call up our website and say, you know, we'd like to have you come over. You know, I used to chase anything and everything forever. And obviously, I still remember I started in 2004. So I remember what you know, 910 1112 I mean, we would do anything you want me to hang on blind. Yes. Dogs
39:23
on your lap and yeah. Oh, women breastfeeding.
39:28
I went out. I one time had a black suit on different career and the lady had five white cats. I walked out of that house. My suit looked like Colonel Sanders and it was nice to sell copiers out of college. It was awesome. I loved I learned a lot about cold calling and just presentation but anyway, sat down on this Burnham was probably Dolores. And she sounds like someone who would have a lot of cats. Anyway, five white cats. I came out. I remember I went to the hardware store. I got a roll of duct tape. I rolled the duct tape around my arm and I started going like this all over my black suit. It was just nasty. Anyway, I digress. So I'll now have a phone call with somebody ALC I always say, I'd like to have a 10 minute phone call with you before we set up a meeting. So I'll call you, Katie. And I say, Hey, tell me a little about your project. And I don't really have a plan of what I'm listening for. But you can kind of, you know, you know, Brad love, it always says this at a ft construction, you know, kind of get to the point pretty quick, because it's not that I don't want to talk about price. And I don't want to be presumptuous about anything. But I also want to make sure that we mutually don't want to waste each other's times. And I think at the price point that we're at, people respect that. And so I just think, you know, what do you are, it's nice. If you have a parade home, this home was X number of dollars, how does that seem to you? Oh, well, you know, that's much more than I want. Okay. Well, you know, are you thinking smaller home about the same size, I immediately know that that's not going to work? It's not possible to do this home at the price of the so a few of those qualifying questions, the hard ones are when they're, you know, they seem like they might be a good opportunity. And I'm terrible at saying no, because at the end of day, if they're really nice, I'm a sucker for nice people. Because we work in such a difficult industry, if you get nice people, you just like, I just want to work with you. And
40:56
then on the flip side, you know, the ones that you don't want to work with, they're pretty yet to follow your gut, right? Yes. And we could back to your question about scaling, I think that we could probably have doubled, doubled our revenue this year. But we wouldn't have executed appropriately or in the right timeframe. Yeah. And really, when I go to work every day, the last thing I think about the money, actually, I think about just trying to like satisfy my clients and get done and finish a project and feel good about the next one. And that's, it kind of sucks, really. I mean, because we haven't been able to get there in a timely manner just because of everything going on.
41:29
I heard something today that is very profound it was that we should not be interested in customer service, we should be interested in customer experience. I thought that was a really interesting play on words a little bit what you were just talking about, you know, we would love to, you know, back when I don't know if you were like this, but when you built one home at a time, or like I mean, man, you could laser anyway, I know I want big jobs. Early on in my career, a because I was young, and you get someone who is old. And like, I remember when I was young, someone gave me a chance. And they want to captivate on that youth. And they're like, You know what, I know you don't know all the things that maybe this other builder knows. But I know you're really energetic. I trust you. I like you. I'm gonna give you the shot. We want a lot of jobs that went to maybe we still do. I don't know.
42:10
I think that one up though.
42:15
You're not young anymore.
42:16
A little bit more of
42:18
a gray. Now you're now you're just you're wise now I'm expensive. Yeah. Why is it expensive? That's funny. And so yeah, anyway, so it's, but you could give them that experience, because it was just you doesn't make it better or worse process. But anyway, that's because that's how you are, that's how I develop the business. I'm used to that. And now I'm at a crossroad personally where it's like, I have to take a step back to make the company grow. And I have to ask myself a serious question, do I want to do it? And it's okay to say no, I've had I work with a consultant. And he actually says, like, you know, you go through financials, and you go through everything he's like, you know, you know, I'm at a war with myself, there's a part of me that wants to do this style of home, in order to do that style of home, I have to have this kind of a team to do that, because I can't do that. But you know what this is over here. It's a good lifestyle, it's still good life, you know. And so it's hard sometimes when you follow your love of like the craft, and that doesn't always follow business. So
43:12
yeah, we're having a little bit of a change in business. And the next our next round of projects are starting October, November, December, and now in January, are much more modest, quicker turnaround. And I wonder is that a product of us feeling a little exhausted on just the you know, the big projects that won't ever come to an end? And that for lack of trying, you know, it's just the same industry battles that everyone else is having? But yeah, so you know, it's, it'll be interesting, it would be in a perfect world, we'd have a good blend, right, a few smaller and a few larger, but we're entering a handful of very, I wouldn't say small, but modest projects are still meeting our project manager minimum, and then some, and they always grow, right. There's always scope lead once you get going, but
43:55
how people reacted? I think, and correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't it on your set on your intake form online, that you'll get back to them if they're a good fit for you?
44:03
Yeah, so we Yeah, so we changed, we hired a copywriter. And when we redid our website earlier, might have been earlier this year, late last year, I can't remember. And we changed our language to apply to partner with us, which I love. And it has definitely reduced the amount of inquiries. I think it's just the process that I mean, we might have call it 10 or 12. Intake questions. There's a series of places to add an attachment. There's a budget question. So we have a few different drop downs. A
44:31
little bit like that pre qualifying phone call that out. How is the public responded to that? Because I love it as a business owner. Do you feel like if someone got offended at it, they weren't really your client anyway? Or how have you? Did you have a hard time with that statement?
44:44
No, it couldn't come up fast enough. I think I was spending so are you really? I was just spending so much time vetting? Yeah. And we had we used to run around all the time and not not all that long ago, I would say. I mean, I remember when we lost a lot of work and 2020 For just a very short amount of time, a lot of our contracts cancelled just because we didn't know it was happening. We hustled I mean, we had people already in the pipeline, and we ran out to so many different client houses. And we were a little bit nervous and panicking. But even prior to that, prior to the pandemic, we were going in a dozen or more client homes a month. I mean, it was when to say Jesse all the time that many, but it felt a lot. And now we do maybe two or three projects a month we'll go into and a lot of that just been from changing,
45:29
but you've already zoomed with them. You've set the expectations.
45:32
Prior to the refresh of our website, we had a similar form that we had rolled out about three years ago, but it was just a little less formal. So yeah, it's just trying to get to the right client. We haven't had a phone number published on our website in years,
45:44
so you can't call and where to find me seems.
45:46
Google. I know there's a weird number still published somewhere up with social, ya know, yeah. So, yeah, I mean, have we lost maybe a few key clients, potentially. But I think as we're honing in on our client being that Instagram audience, they don't want to talk on the phone anyway. Right. So I think our our bigger pain point is DMS on Instagram. And so it's been really helpful than to just respond and say, and I'll just attach the link to that apply to partner with us and DM and also please, please enter Sorry, sorry,
46:15
you know, do you respond to every single DM? Or?
46:19
Um, I think it gets most Yeah, most, I would say nine out of 10. There are some people that will go on, I think it's a lot of fishing. Right. Okay. Now, what color was that cabinet? And can you send me the link for that hardware? And, you know, once in a while, I don't know why I guess I just feel generous. And so I'm I am sharing the links, and I will be very transparent. And then there have been a few clients that have said, and I think I don't always realize it's the same person I'm sharing that information with because I'm not always going through the history of the DM. But I've had two people recently have shared a finish space. And they've said, Here you go, you helped me build the space, you answered all of my DMs. Wow. So part of me is like, well, Wow, I did that for free. Yes. And
47:00
especially you're now that you're entering or you have been in that design world for a while. That's how we get it, we have a couple homes that on our website, if there was a well known blogger, that was on Pinterest that post it must have been somewhere in Georgia, we I forget what our normal, nothing like you guys get. But it was like, I don't know the number 12,015 It was like 20,000 clicks on our website in like a week. And we normally get like 100 and it was like just this was like six years ago. And I got all these inquiries from Georgia, North and South Carolina at these great voicemails, I'm not going to embarrass everyone by impersonating my, my voicemails on the porch. And so, but they would want the plan, because thinking it was like plan.com, you can just, you know, a misconception in our field, right, and, you know, higher end homes, I've come to appreciate just how much I mean, I've seen architecture cost, you know, a couple $1,000 to, uh, we did one with an architect firm, it was $400,000 for architecture, and my mind was blown. But now as you understand, like, what now even listening to this, if you're not aware of it, you'd be like, Wow, how could you pay that? But I mean, the page was 20 pages, no, 200 pages long was the plan. And, you know, the architect was there for three years, and like they earned every cent. And you know, and so anyway, these calls would come off saying, Oh, we love the house that you you know, was posted. We'd love to get that plan what it lays out. And I remember thinking, well, like a that's not my plan, because I designed it for that client and I and so you know, obviously the entrepreneur who's like, Well, can I make money off of this? And so I was like, Well, hey, here's a link to our website, I'd be happy to set up a call with myself and you, and the architect will they'll charge by hour, I'll sell you the plan. I cleared it with the client. So I had this like form email. No one ever responded to that. Because as soon as I said, you know, this is gonna cost in the range of like, 10 to 15,000. For the plan. It was just crickets.
48:38
Yeah, we did the same thing after our dream home. Somebody from Montana wanted to build the exact same home. Yep. And I talked with our architect, and we both agreed that probably wasn't going to be a fit. And I think we pitched a number out and never heard back.
48:54
So yeah, and that's okay. I think I mean, part of his understanding the story now I get him quite frequently. And so now I my sentence is much shorter. And my my line is much shorter, but I'm still I still want to respond to people. You know, they don't, you know, they don't know what they're asking usually, otherwise, they won't ask it quite like that.
49:10
Well, I think from an inner know my own perspective on our marketing channels, especially on Instagram, as we do share a lot of single like Kitchen and Bath spaces on these. So I do think if people aren't closely paying attention, it might seem feasible that we would come in and do a $50,000 project or just a powder room only. So prior to having this intake form, we would get inquiries, everything from I have a $10,000 budget to a $500,000 budget. And if we said yes to the you know, 7580 $100,000 projects, we're saying no, we say yes to three of those, we're saying no to our one four or 500 plus $1,000 remodel, so we just needed to say no, right it's so hard it is say no, but we unfortunate I mean fortunately for our business, say no. A lot now. And so that's where that form comes into play. And then we it comes in and hits my inbox first and then I'm really the one that does all the vetting and looks for different fits our requirements in terms of geography, the budget, the scope of the project, their timing goals.
50:09
Is it a marketing opportunity? Yeah.
50:11
Is it a marketing opportunity? I mean, it's up there. I mean, marketing is a huge name of the game. So if it's a marketing opportunity for us, and sometimes if it's a really new home, it's not. I mean, there isn't much of a story to share with home. That's but we are in a couple of projects. Actually, we're headed out to a lovely home in a Dinah, that's just a few years old year, a year plus, so we're gonna do some, we're not tearing it apart, which is good. We're just enhancing out customizing almost everything, including scraping three floors of ceilings,
50:43
or that knocked on our
50:45
snack down to it's
50:46
more sound than the house that was only a year old skimming. Well, we don't have a lot of time, but I did want to touch base because it's important for you guys. How, tell me just, you know, I know you're launching this vanity business. Tell me a little bit about because that's, I've listened to your podcast recently. About a year, year and a half and development and you just launched here in the last month or two right in August. And how's it going? Well, yeah. For okay. 30 days in? Yeah, so
51:11
what good. So there's been a lot of traction, a lot of questions. We have not sold a vanity, but that wasn't the intent. I think if you know spring of next year, we still haven't sold in Vanity then we need to be Yeah, we need to either probably reprice or rethink the launch. But there's been a lot of inquiries, we have a sample kit on our website. So we have 10, finishes seven paint three stain, and all 10 finishes will apply to any of the vanities. So we have 25 Different manatees and a total 24 with a different size variations. They don't come with countertop plumbing, or hardware. So it'll probably be b2b. But I don't know. I mean, people are so savvy now and so hard for people to go find a remnant piece of quartz or stone or marble to put on their vanity, I think people could certainly pull off their own renovation. And,
51:58
and I apologize, I haven't looked at it. I assume it's on J cat.com. Yeah, how customizable? Is it? Or is it? How did you tell me about the design process of how you pick these, you know, select few, because you guys can design anything, your work is amazing.
52:10
So it started with what we had finished install images, that we felt confident. So we and a few of them, we had just finished the summer, which is why the launch took a little bit longer, because that project was so stiff earlier. So and we designed a couple of those vanities in mind with how could we make these repeatable? Yeah, when you say and they're
52:31
not, they don't attach to the wall so they can be right or left or less, you can still attach them to the wall if you wanted to, which a lot of bathrooms set up that way. But they're a little bit more unique there for their legs. Usually they're not just sitting on like a toe kick.
52:46
But instant variation. We've got a V groove, we've got one that doesn't offset sync. So just trying to add a little bit of a lot of
52:53
the weight to the of the white oak one with the rib the ribbons on it. Yeah, I love that one.
52:57
Yeah, the read the read.
52:59
No, we didn't do any reading. But some of the pre we didn't have the priests well, so part of the reason why we didn't and again, all this is up for grabs in the new year for any debriefing, because we wanted to leave that super high customization element to our client. I see. Or now that we figured out how we can build and ship of entity we will customize sure, you know, and if something is available 2430 and 42. And somebody needs a 38 there would be a little bit of added fees just to redraw on and get a bell. But
53:26
I would say that if we were to had this launched, pre COVID, or we would be retired
53:32
during too busy to show up for the podcast.
53:34
Retired. Wow. Yeah, believe it. I mean, we she got multiple inquiries for Van use per day. Right? Yeah, per week. I mean, it was just nuts. Because you couldn't get any kind of game room and board or to see
53:46
how, you know, obviously, all the systems have been stressed. And even though, at least for today, as of September, whatever today, as you know, we don't have, you know, everything shut down for right now. I think it's taught a lot of business owners and manufacturers in general, just how vulnerable our system is. And it still is what's interesting to me is, you know, and we don't have enough time to go into this right now. But like, how have we not caught up? How has things not gotten? I mean, the backlog I understand is so far back and with rising interest rates, you know, people keep asking me are things going to slow down and, you know, remodeling will always be strong. But you know, high in New Homes is strong, too. I mean, they're tangible asset. You know, your your liquid money is being depreciated with inflation. By the day
54:28
we've been we've been installing cabinet jobs without your slides. They've been an allocation. There's a primary supplier in the world, and they haven't caught up. And we're using other brands now that are stealing that market share. But it doesn't mean that you're going to have track any quicker just like Windows, you're not going to get Windows or any quicker. Right. So we'll see how that all plays out. Supply chain and
54:48
yeah, people are so tired of saying the word, Josh man and yeah, it's real.
54:53
It's real. We don't we don't try to use it much.
54:57
Well, I think the thing that's so frustrating Just to pick on appliances, you don't have any appliance sponsors yet. Do you on your?
55:03
Actually I have, I think there's gonna maybe be one. But it's more of a, it's more of a wholesaler versus a specific one. Gotcha.
55:10
I won't name any specific
55:12
install the whole appliance package. And basically, it's all getting rebuilt in place, because half the parts are not even insulated away.
55:18
Yeah, modeling would be way more difficult. I mean, the one advantage of a new home while is that you have a year to wait for it, we're remodeling, you know, we've been delaying our clients. And there's pros and cons to this, we make them make all the selections before we'll start, you know, we're starting one in January down by Lake Harriet beautiful remodel. And, you know, we ordered everything in June, knowing that we think that will be done in August of 2023. But it's just crazy to think like that.
55:43
Yeah. And we're ahead of it. So we'll, you know, we'll get the lead times. But the hard part is the manufacturers or lead times aren't accurate. So we do all the planning, we'll say, Okay, we need seven or eight months, and we will even give us give, give ourselves a buffer. So the order appliances will do some design work for three or four, and then we'll start the renovation. So you might have a 12 or more months span, and now we're finding with one particular very high end appliance brand. Yeah, that those lead times were never accurate. And they probably knew it, I don't know. I mean, I they probably just threw a date out there just
56:14
to keep the order ran into more
56:16
problems and keep the orders coming in. And just to keep it you know, the wheels moving, but I'm not sure I'm sure they're having, they're waiting for hardship or frustrating. So, you know, in some of these projects, we got rid of their appliances early on, and now we're saving them. And so now you have to have Kenny or Democrats on the front end and then somebody to come back on the back end to bring in the old nasty referred tank refrigerator from the garage that we sat on for eight months through you know, unplugged throughout the entire winter and bring it back and drag your don't touch the cabinetry because in your cabinetry has to come in and cabinet team. And I mean, it just goes on and on. And
56:48
on. Our our hardest thing has been punch lists, walkouts, getting out the door, it's like they never end Have you thought about I've thought about this, but I'm like, you know, I was I was told, like do one thing do it really well. And you know, hire out the other things, right? And, you know, it's, there's only so far you can go with that. And I appreciate people that want and multiple brand things, but it just it takes a lot of manage, we were just talking about time allocation, have you thought about doing warranty or having like a full time service person in house that does everything. And if so, like, you know, for instance, this was an idea that one of my PMS brought up he said, you know, rather than spending, let's say you spend 75 to $100,000 on marketing, let's just say that's what your number is hire a handyman, that is hard to find anywhere, but let's just say you can and you trust them, and they represent your brand. And all of a sudden you buy a sprinter van, let's call it $100,000, maybe more for all everything that's in there. You know, that's your marketing budget for let's say two years, you but that person you do know marketing, and that person basically serves your clients to the best of their ability. And it's that word of mouth that is just like, man, they are Mark Williams is there all the time? Do you think that's actually a wise move? I still think you still have to you still have to operate that as another business. If it's not making if it's no run on a world? Why do it anyway? What's your thoughts on having a full time working person?
58:03
It's really hard, right? Because you could do 95% of the job. Awesome. And then the last 5%, you just like literally don't have the manpower or the time and you're spread thin and you're trying to make countertop measures on other projects, etc. And it does take a special kind of person to be able to do a lot of that. Yeah, do it? Well, we've tried some outside companies and just never works out. Right. So I don't know, I don't know the answer. I don't know.
58:28
But I mean, there's a question. I think I'm gonna keep on asking, because I'd be curious to know what like, you know what some of the
58:33
bigger, maybe I'll just retire and just be punchless guy for everybody. Just shut my brain down and start smoking.
58:42
I mean, ultimately, some of my PMS who are very talented, I mean, I'll you know, I'll catch him in the field, and they'll just be doing the work. And I honestly can't get any of my subs. And we have great subs. So I'm not throwing the subs in. I mean, these guys are being asked to do so much. And it's the you know, if the client says, you know, hey, that screw is falling out in like a man to have them come, I'll just I'll go take care of it. But now my PMS are acting like a service guy. And then now they're failing, not failing, but they can't, they don't have the time. And I you know, this is a whole another podcast about leadership and what our role is in it, of how to lead out of this. And you know, when you start your company, or at least when I started mine, I never thought of myself as like, you know, I'm going to be a leader and get, you know, 300 people to follow me. I mean, that's not what I how you start a business or at least not me. And so it's like now is you're in this leadership role. And I hear I've heard you talk about it, you know, Brad and other other people that you look up to, and that you, you know, that you network with and you're like, it is something that you need to develop as a skill. It's no different than building a cabinet or building you know, as a building your business and building your brand. And so, yeah, it's
59:41
she always says delegate
59:42
to elevate. Yeah, and setting expectations early. You know, I, I think potential clients look at us with their eyes wide open, but we were just in a project a couple of weeks ago or days maybe and, you know, I'm very honest. I tell them, we're going to make mistakes and we're going to have hard conversations and when we do have a conversation, we hope it looks like this, I hope we can help troubleshoot with you know how we're using our cloud based software and how we're, you know, just the communication piece to try to set ourselves apart, but I would rather just tell people ahead of time before they sign a contract, we're going to have hard conversations, this is a hard job. This is a really big job, you're hiring us to do probably a transaction greater than when you purchase the home. And for most of our clients, it's probably the most amount of money, a lot of them are spending more than what they did on the house. This is the biggest financial investment they've made in their entire life, I'm sure that it's your case with every client. But so and part of that conversation should probably shift to what his punch list look like, we're not done on delivery day, we might be with you for weeks, three months, it could be six months, if we're waiting for certain parts to come in or light fixture that was backordered that we couldn't reselect we're going to be around nowadays a lot longer than we've ever
1:00:51
you find that your clientele like I know there's, you know, feature value financing. A lot of our bigger remodels are that way. Some are cash, some are, you know, a second line, what do you find that most of your remodel clients are paying for their projects?
1:01:02
We haven't used the title company in like three years. So it's all self financed? Is it? Crazy? Yeah. Big money. Yeah,
1:01:12
I have cash.
1:01:13
And that might be where they're taking you out of their retirement or the environment gets themselves or they're doing the cash out? refi or whatever? No, if the interest rates changing, who knows? But I feel like a lot of people were probably doing that cash out refi thing and having a pile of whatever it might be,
1:01:27
I see a big mix. I mean, I was just curious, you guys do a lot more volume than I do. When we did and, you know, like, like the average project size, what would be the average remodel project size for you guys? Well,
1:01:38
I think if you took an average would probably be three to 400. But some of the bigger stuff is like 800. But that's usually an addition. Right? Right. So if we do a full interior, which is what she was alluding to earlier, that we have a lot of controlled projects that are interior, they don't have exterior elements. Those are probably three to 354, depending because it's kitchen leaks into floor leaks
1:01:59
into cash, or they're usually staffed by monthly usually draw,
1:02:03
yeah, draw through the client. Some clients do sell finance, and they saw us a title company. And I think you and I have talked about that. We don't mind that. It just It helps us it helps keep the system but Katie's got that part of it down pretty well. And we use our software to communicate the bills do and things.
1:02:23
It's a different podcasts. Yeah, no
1:02:25
doubt. Yeah, like a long one. Yeah. Well, we're over our time as in not too surprising for me. Anyway. Thank you very much for coming on. Where can our listeners find you guys?
1:02:36
So our website is easy. J kath.com jkth.com. And Instagram is J calf underscore, design design build? I don't know it didn't make sense. It made sense. However, many years ago fear to start a handle today would look different. But that's our, our old, our old handle and it
1:02:53
works. Well. I will have for those listening. We'll have everything in the show notes. So if there's anything that you found interesting, you can listen to it again. We'll also have everyone's handles and their websites in the notes as well. Thanks for listening to the curious builder and thank you to Katie and Jesse for coming on today. Thanks for making the time. Thanks
1:03:09
for having us. This is fun to you guys.
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