How To Maximize Time Value and Revitalize Concrete Countertops in Challenging Conditions
Amidst sweeping blizzards, BG and Jon brave the cold to share insights on The Concrete Podcast. They delve into the value of time—how much you're willing to sell it for to clients—and the art of reviving concrete countertops, despite the challenges posed by the original sealer. In the icy embrace of winter, they share insights that cut through the frost.
TRANSCRIPT:
0:15
Hello, Jon Schuler.
Hello, Brandon Gore.
How's it going going?
Great, man.
Things are going well.
Yeah, real well.
Good.
Good to hear.
I went to Arkansas and Missouri last week.
I talked about it on the previous podcast and I took this guy Nick from 10 Works with me.
0:32
It was a crazy trip.
It was.
It was plane trains and automobiles, man.
This trip was It was bananas because it was it was one of the coldest days I've ever experienced in my life.
But it was negative air temperatures, like -8 The morning we left and the wind chill was like -35 negative 40, which for Wichita and Northwest Arkansas, that's incredibly cold.
0:55
We don't normally see that type of cold weather, but we left and it was 0% chance of snow the day before, but then they raised it 35%.
OK, whatever, 35%.
It's not bad.
We drive, we leave super early in the morning and we drive to get to Arkansas, get to Eureka Springs.
1:11
I got to take some topographic data of my land and because I have a project going to build there and I got to get some topographic data and I have this little tool called a Mosier.
It it's like a gyroscope thing that interacts with your iPhone and it records data.
It's pretty interesting.
But anyways, I get there.
1:27
I park my truck, no snow.
Roads are clear, no snow.
Everything's open.
I get out, it starts flurrying.
OK, whatever, I don't care.
Literally within 3 minutes it is like I'm in a snow globe that got shook violently and it's just like snow like I have never seen before.
1:44
It just comes down.
It's like somebody opened a zipper and just all those snow fell out of the cloud and it was crazy.
And so I did this.
I have to like walk back and forth through the woods, like in, you know, 1020 foot intervals and take points.
And so I'm doing that for about 20 minutes or so, back and forth, back and forth, back and forth.
2:04
And in that, in that time frame, the roads went from totally dry, no snow, to like 6 inches of snow because it's so cold.
The pavement was already frozen, so it didn't melt at all.
So it hit and you couldn't discern where the road was from where the grass was.
2:20
I mean, it was just six inches of snow everywhere.
And instantaneously everything shut down.
Like traffic stopped.
I don't know, did people just pull off the road and park?
Like, where did everybody go?
It was just like instantaneous.
Everything closed.
The restaurant across the street closed, gas station closed.
2:36
So I say to Nick, hey, let's, let's go into town and get some, get some BBQ.
So there's this massive hill, even Eureka Springs, that big hill where you go down and then you go back up where Thorn Crown is.
So we start down the hill and I have a Dodge Ram 2500.
So it's not a light truck, It's a heavy truck.
2:51
We start down the hill and there's some dummy just stopped going downhill, right?
And he stopped.
Yeah, he stopped because some other dummy spun sideways and is blocking the highway.
And they're not even attempting to move, They're just sitting there, you know, like, oh, don't know what to do.
Just let me block the highway.
3:09
So I'm not I can't stop #1 and I'm not stopping because if I stop, I can't back up and.
Place to go I.
Already have inertia, so it is what it is.
So I just creep around the guy that's blocking the road, and then I start going around the guy that's sideways and my truck just starts sliding.
I mean, it just loses traction and we're going to T-bone this dude.
3:28
Just sliding, sliding, sliding.
Luckily, you know, I let off.
I let off the brakes and the wheels turned and I caught traction at the last second and I went around them.
But we go down the hill.
And then as we're going down, cars are coming up and I'm like, oh, this is going to be a big, big, you know, mess because everybody's just going to get stuck with this guy, the sideways.
3:46
So I tell them, well, we can't go back that way, so we got to go around the other way.
So anyways, we go through town, everything's closed, Everything closed instantaneously.
And then it took like 2 hours to get around the lake, which normally would take 30 minutes the other way.
It took two hours to go this way, but it was a fun trip.
It was a good trip.
4:02
It was a good trip.
So.
Right on.
Well, now you just gave me a basic taste of why we lost that truckload of materials in Missouri.
Yeah, probably the same thing.
Yeah, for Well, nobody does know because we haven't talked about it, but we had 10 pallets or 12 pallets.
How many was it?
Well, the 13. 13 pallets.
4:19
All right, 13 pallets on a truck.
The truck.
Two things we've heard.
One is that it flipped, another that it jackknifed.
I don't know which it is.
But we still don't know yet either.
Until the materials get back.
Yeah, still haven't got back yet.
Hasn't got.
I think the guy stopped the Ramada and he's having a party or something.
4:36
And then the story was about going down a hill and, you know, ended up sideways and he just sat there.
I like, I don't even understand that whole story.
He just told like, I I get losing traction.
I get, I mean, you know, I live in the hills, I get it.
But you don't just get out of your car and be like, Yep, look at that.
4:55
There it is.
Let me just block every other car that's coming up or down this road.
You.
Know, I mean if you didn't like, you know, smash into the, I don't know side of the hill.
No, they didn't smash anything.
They just spun and they got stuck and then they just sat there.
They sat there, yeah.
Come on now.
5:11
Well.
And if it's slick enough, man, grab, you know, get grab a hold of a bumper, you.
Know what I should have done?
I should have videoed it too.
I should have rolled in one.
I'm like, hey bro, you can't park there, yeah.
Right.
And videoed it lost opportunity.
Gosh.
But so Nick, the guy that went, went with me, I told about that in the last podcast.
5:31
Like, you know, he's just like, hey, can I go with you?
I'm like, OK, you know, Yeah, I mean, I've met him.
He's a nice guy.
It was great.
It was great, 'cause we were driving.
I mean, it was, you know, like 4 1/2 hours from Wichita to Arkansas.
And then, you know, obviously hours that day, just getting back to town and and the next day we went to Springfield, MO, and then we went to back to Wichita.
5:53
So altogether, we probably drove 12, 14 hours altogether.
So a lot of great conversation, but I feel like I corrupted the guy.
You ever, you ever, you ever be around somebody, have you ever been around anybody where you think back and you're like, I think, I think I traumatized him in some ways.
6:08
So, I mean, I'm not going to give you all the stories I told this guy, but you know, we we get into Rogers AR, everything's closed, There's nothing to eat.
And the only place open which I've experienced this before is Waffle House.
Which, dude, I love Waffle House.
So we're driving down.
6:24
I see Waffle House open.
I'm like, hey bro, you ever been kicked out of a Waffle House?
And he's like, no, I'm like, I have three times that I can recall, probably more.
But three that that are are lucid.
As a matter of fact, I've been kicked out of this one once before.
6:40
You want to eat there?
He's like, OK, but I just yeah, yeah.
Anyways, it was a good time though.
But you know, we're going to get into the value of time here in a minute.
I think that's a good conversation, something I want to talk about.
Why don't I want to, I want to tie this to what happened to me on that trip.
6:55
OK, so we go to Missouri.
I have a project, a potential project in Missouri for a client.
Now, I've done work for this firm before and this is for one of the guy's personal house.
It's an insane house.
Insane house, I would say.
7:11
I don't know where the budget is, but I would guess just by looking at it, between 7 and 10 million.
If I had to guess, it's glass and steel and concrete for the most part.
And it's on two sides of a Canyon, and there's a glass and steel walkway.
It's 100 and some feet that spans the Canyon and connects the two halves.
7:30
So you walk through this glass tunnel to go from one side to the other side.
Yeah.
OK Cool house.
Yeah, really cool house.
And they want this huge rammed earth wall that screens the house and you have to drive through the wall.
The wall's like 30 feet tall and more than 100 feet long.
7:46
OK, so they've been asking me to give them price and timeline for since July.
That's when this conversation started was hey, we need price and timeline.
Great.
I just need a dimensional drawing of what you want.
Don't provide it.
Two weeks goes by.
Hey, we need price and timeline.
Hey, hey, yeah, I would love to do it.
8:02
Sure.
Just please send me dimensional drawing.
Two weeks goes by.
Hey, we need price and timeline.
I feel like this ground hall day.
Let's see this again.
All I need is a dimensional drawing. 2 weeks later.
Hey, we need price and timeline.
I don't know if these emails are getting through.
All I need is a dimensional drawing.
I mean this goes on and on and on and on and on, right?
8:19
And I'm I'm not getting anywhere.
I'm spinning my wheels.
So anyways, one of the things I do with the Rambres project is what I call a, it's a, it's a professional service agreement, but essentially it's where I do materials testing.
It's where they send me the material they want to use.
We RAM samples.
8:35
We submit the samples to laboratory for testing so we can get compressive data and we also submit the samples to the client for color because you know, you don't know what it's like a box of chocolates.
You know what you're going to get until you do it like it, you know.
So we need to test the material and see what the color's going to be.
And architects are usually pretty particular about color, pretty pretty particular like they they want to know the color, the texture, you know they want to know.
8:57
So after weeks and weeks or months of me saying guys, just please please submit a dimensional drawing.
It's the bare minimum of you know, requirements Just quote anything.
I send them the PSA of you know, here's this and APSA, it's $1600 for me to do the samples and anything beyond six hours, I bill it 325 an hour.
9:17
OK, 325.
Now it's my contract.
Dude.
I've been 3/25 an hour for years.
If you call, if somebody calls me and wants me to consult, 325 an hour, OK, that that's my number.
So anyways, so I got to go meet with his client in Springfield to just kind of get answers what's going on because they're under construction.
9:34
They send me weekly updates of the of the schedule.
So I go up there and I'm like, where's the wall going?
And the guy's like, this is the general contractor somewhere.
Right here.
Where?
Right here.
Here.
Like here to there.
9:49
Here here to where where's the wall?
Right.
Just I'm, I'm blown away.
I'm, I'm like, it's already blowing my mind.
So he's like, hey, can we talk?
Yeah, yeah, we can talk.
Can we sit in your truck?
Yeah, sit in my truck.
So we sit down and what?
Is he thinking?
Being recorded.
10:05
No, I just, I think, I think he's trying to like big league me in a way.
He's trying to like, you know, I don't know.
I don't know what this guy's deal is, but.
That is weird.
I'm.
Not I'm not.
I'm not incredibly impressed with his lack of professional professionalism to date, because if I ask for something very nicely and consistently and just say guys, I would love to provide it, This is all I need and you ignore it.
10:30
I'm already like feeling a certain way about about your professionalism, so yeah.
No question, No question.
So anyways, can we can we can we chat?
Yeah.
So you get in my truck and he's like 325 an hour, huh.
That's pretty expensive.
I go, yeah, dude, I love one of my favorite things in the world to do is not say another word, just go.
10:54
Yeah.
And so he sits there.
I mean, we sit there in silence for 20 seconds.
I just stare at him.
He goes, well, why 325?
That just seems really high.
I said yeah, OK, it is.
Why 325 you ask?
Well, I've been in business.
This is my 21st year in business.
I've been doing this for a long time.
11:10
I have a shop.
I have employees.
I have cost goods sold.
I have taxes.
I have profit.
I've done this long enough that I can add that up and get a yearly average and divide that by the number of hours I work.
And if you want me to do something, it's 3/25 an hour.
That's my number.
11:25
That's the number I need to not lose money.
If you want an intern to do it, I, you know, I occasionally have interns working for me.
He'll be 85 an hour if you want me to have the intern do it.
But if you want me to stop what I'm doing and not work on anything else but your project, then that's my #325.
Anything less and I lose money.
11:42
And I'm not going to lose money.
So if you want me to do it, that's my number.
And he goes, oh, OK, OK.
So anyways, And then then he's like, well, we're not going to do the material samples.
I said, that's fine bro.
That's totally fine.
You don't need to do the material samples.
This wall.
11:57
I mean, I'm not sure.
I haven't quoted yet, but I'm going to guess it's 3 to $400,000 for this wall, this wall.
If you guys want to spend that kind of money and just be like surprise and see what the color is when it comes out, be my guest.
If that's what you want to do, I wouldn't do it on a house like this, but if that's what you want to do, do it.
12:13
The other thing is I've already spoke with the structural engineer who did the rebar schedule on this and I spoke about this in the last podcast.
I actually gave him what I do and he ran and it's like, dude, if that's it's overkill, but if you want to do that, I'm happy to do it.
So that's what he did anyways.
But I talked to him and he said, hey, what is this test at?
And I said, well, it can test up to over 12,000 if we use our maker mix as the binder, we've tested it with that and tested it over 12,000 PSI.
12:39
But that's unnecessary.
We don't need that.
You know, this wall's 18 inches thick. 3000 PSI is sufficient.
And I feel confident that we can get this, whatever the subsoil is in the area, we can get it to 3000 PSI, but we need to do testing.
We need to test it and and see what amendments we need to make to get it to that.
12:54
So anyways, this guy's, you know, we're not going to do a testing.
So that's fine if you just want to see the color, you know, kind of like you don't know what the sex of the baby is until it's born.
And surprise, it's a girl.
Great.
Be my guest.
All on you, yeah.
Yeah.
Second part is you know the the structural engineer made an assumption that it's 3000 PSI.
13:11
Maybe it is, maybe it's 500 PSI, I don't know.
We haven't tested it.
But if you want to take that risk of we build this wall and it falls down because we didn't spend 1600 bucks to test it.
Again I think you're $700.00 pick up Dimes but if you guys want to save that $1600 and and just wing it, be my guest, right.
13:31
So anyways so that was my meeting with this guy.
But but the point of that Jon really was the time, the value of time.
And I watch we've talked about time so much and it's one of these things.
It's funny I see people that that have talked trash about what we say.
Oh my my, my value's $20.00 an hour.
13:48
OK, OK.
But I watched a TikTok video that it was a really, really good way the guy put it, is this guy that is an expatriate.
I think he lives in Belize.
But essentially he was saying that him and his wife, when they're in their 40s, they ran the numbers.
14:03
They crunched numbers of what they would need to retire at 65 living here in the US And if they scrimped and saved every penny, they didn't do anything.
They never took a vacation.
They didn't, you know, buy a bigger house.
They didn't remodel their house.
They they just saved every penny they had until 65.
14:22
They would barely, barely squeak by.
So it was essentially that .20 years of saving.
So when you retire at 65, they could barely squeak by at a very low quality of living, low quality of life.
And then he started looking at other countries.
He looked at, I think, he said, like Portugal and Belize and these other places, and I've.
14:41
Heard Portugal a lot?
Yeah, Portugal seems cool, but he ran the numbers and they could retire 10 years earlier.
Instead of 65, they could do 55 and they could have a phenomenal quality of life until the day they died, right.
And that's what they did.
So they saved and they moved to Belize and that's where they live now and I think they've been there for many years.
15:00
And but he essentially saying like the way to think about it is you are what you are selling to your employer or for us to our clients because we're self-employed is our time, that's what you're selling is your time.
You're trading your time for this.
15:16
That's what you're doing.
And you're not even getting a true value.
Nobody will ever get the true value of their time.
Nobody's ever going to pay you the true value of your time, but that is what you're selling.
So when I'm selling my time to a customer, like for this project, I'm putting my value at 325.
15:32
And that's not even coming close to what the value of my time is.
And the value of time it's on.
It's on a like a sliding scale in my opinion.
When I was young and I didn't have a wife, I didn't have kids, I didn't have responsibilities, My value time was a lot less in my mind.
15:48
My perceived value of my time was a lot less.
Now, had I gotten sick at a young age and died at a young age, my my time would have been much more valuable at that point, right?
But in that moment, I valued my time lower.
But as time has gone on, now that I have a wife and I have children and I have responsibilities and I don't want to miss being with my kids and seeing them grow up and be a part of their lives.
16:10
I don't want to be working in my shop till 10:00 every night like I used to.
My value or how I value my time is much different and much higher.
Yeah, I think that's one of the phenomenons though, that so many of us, including myself, you know, you just this way of looking at your time.
16:30
You know, how many footsteps do you have, you know, on this Earth?
And I guess part of that reason that so many of us didn't find a value because you don't know what the end game is, right?
Like, I think legitimately, if someone said hey just just heads up, man, 55's your number, 85's your number, hey, you're going to be here till 110.
16:54
You know, the fact that since we don't know what that end game is, so many of us instead through this course, you know, you just don't look at it that way.
But in reality is all of us only have so many breaths, you only have so many steps.
17:11
Something's gonna be the last time and that's the way it is.
So whether we're talking a project or whatever, that is, the reality, what you're charging for that is, you know, your moments here on this Earth.
Yeah, that's what you're trading.
17:27
That is what you're trading.
That's what you're trading.
You're trading your time.
Yeah, you know, you're in a unique position because your kids are coming to the end of high school and getting ready to go to college.
And so this is it for you.
This is it for you.
When they're gone, they're gone.
17:43
So these moments, especially right now, are super important.
You know, you went on vacation for a couple weeks and you don't make any apologies for taking two weeks off to spend time with your with your children.
But these are the moments.
And when that's gone, then that opportunity has passed and you'll never get that back.
And then you'll look back.
Well, what I sell it for 20 bucks an hour.
18:00
For those that time, it's crazy.
And you know what's 20 bucks?
20 bucks?
I go to Starbucks, I get 2 drinks.
It's 20 bucks.
This is what my this is what an hour of my time is worth, these two drinks.
This is what I'm trading an hour of my life to this person for this.
This is the value of right here, 2 drinks from Starbucks.
18:16
That's the value.
But nobody looks it that way.
Nobody looks it that way, you know?
No, no, we don't look at it that way.
Yeah.
Yeah.
And that's, that's the hard thing we've talked about.
I mean plenty of podcast about profit and balance between you know what your your net is and your expenses and I mean so many ways of of looking at that.
18:39
But you know if it if that's more to home or hits home for somebody to realize that no man, that's the reality you are making something and there's a value to that thing but the reality is you know you you just sold whatever moments you had that's what's in that project and what is you know what is that value to you.
19:05
And only any of us can answer that question if and as somebody, whoever that person is says legitimately well 20 bucks an hour, hey, I mean I don't know what to say to that that's awesome if that's the value for you.
But no, that's not for me.
19:20
It's not for me either.
It's not for me either.
And we've focused us personally, Kodiak Pro.
We focused on making products that make the most efficient use of our time, doing what we do.
You know, we've done this.
19:36
Again, I'm in my 21st year of doing this.
I've spent, I can't tell you how many thousands of hours unnecessarily in my shop because in my mind, I was saving money.
In my mind, I was, oh, look, well, I can go down and I get my Portland and I can buy a drum of polymer and I can buy, you know, and I'm just gonna make my own and I'm gonna save all this money thousands hours.
20:00
I had that conversation again.
I think I told you just a minute ago with, I mean, a guy's got some great projects going and we got into the conversation.
It was a good conversation.
It was not combative whatsoever.
So I don't want to make it sound that way.
But we got in the conversation just in general about some of the admixtures he's currently using and what he's paying for him and the, you know, and I just said, OK, and then he asked and so we got in this long conversation.
20:26
He's like, well, I I think this one's going to be more affordable, portable, and I'm like, but is it?
And he's like, well, what do you mean?
So again, I I always go back to me and my own life experience and that is for me to get white cement.
I have to travel.
Basically.
20:42
I lose a day of work to go get it.
So again, if using your $300.00 an hour, if that's true, you know that 2400 bucks in my day legitimately should be added to the cost of my Portland cement period.
20:58
I mean that's the way it is and vice versa.
The sands and and everything in between my storage, 3 pallets of materials, admix, sand and and Portland cement.
And then OK if that is true because I've heard this like you guys, it only takes me 45 minutes to bash the materials.
21:17
OK, well and I'm not saying somebody's BS ING with that, but what is that $45.00 an hour truly worth to you or excuse me, 45 minutes in dollars and cents actually worth to you?
Because if it's 20 bucks, well then I get it, man.
21:35
I get it like you're into this thing $15.
OK, well that doesn't seem like very much but is it is 15 bucks your moments on this earth?
Because I don't know, man.
21:51
Again, I can't put someone's value to him.
But no, not mine, no.
And and Add all of that up if you have something, you know, again I don't get me wrong.
We're back to something like rad mix.
Hey, if you're using your own sands, you're making terrazzo finishes, you're doing these kind of things that absolutely makes sense.
22:08
There's I have 0 qualms and I will support that all day long.
In fact I do that for projects where you know where a certain look we need certain sands.
You know, I'm just not going to use a fully blended mix.
But if something's fully blended and it it fits that profile, you know, everything I just discussed versus opening a bag, yeah, no, it's just no that it just, it does not equate, period.
22:36
In that conversation you had, I think was a good one, you told me about that conversation and it was somebody that is they're wanting to compare dollars and cents with the product they're currently using and switching to Kodiak.
And it was something that we did year, well, I'd say years ago, like a year and a half ago when we first started the podcast, we ran numbers, we got on the website, we downloaded the most current pricing versus our most current price and it turned out we were actually less when it came down to square footage price.
23:06
But that being said, it's been a year and a half since we've done it.
So I think we should do another price comparison soon.
No, no judgement on which product is better or performs better or creates a better product.
Just dollars and cents.
23:21
Here's the difference and that's it.
And so for some people that is an important conversation.
For others after they try a product and they see the benefits of it and they realize the time savings of not happening to slurry or all things they were doing before like oh, it's a no brainer.
But for some people, until they get there, they just want to know what's the dollars and cents.
23:39
And so I think we should do that exercise again, maybe the next podcast.
If we have time, we'll crunch the numbers and we can talk about it.
Yeah, I got a problem with that.
OK.
Yeah, I mean a non emotional look at it.
Just say hey you know, boom boom, boom boom boom.
It is what it is.
Here's a math.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
23:55
Math doesn't lie as as they say.
Maybe I'll find myself switching although no, I I can't go back to polymers though I think I told you I got some texts from a guy.
24:11
Again, I'm not knocking on any product but this is what he's doing and I was.
I was blown away that people I mean it just is.
So yeah, and we had a whole conversation about I tried to help him out with some defomers and push him in the direction and see what he can do.
24:29
And no matter what he casted, the manufacturers thought maybe different mold releases or whatever the case may be.
And Oh my God, yeah, that was just pretty crazy town.
But yeah, I got a phone call, guy called me and had a problem with the sealer and I talked to him for 20 minutes and they told me it was Omega.
24:53
I was like, why did you call me then?
You know, like, what have we been talking?
I thought you used ICT and had a problem and I'm happy to help you 20 minutes.
I talked to this guy, giving him all kinds of good advice, and then he's like, yeah, it was a mega.
Well, there you go.
I died.
25:09
I died laughing, you know.
Again, we said it over and over.
I mean, everybody's trying to do their best.
You know, I think we, all of us more than realized that.
And you know, you're just trying to around your practices and best practices and and so forth and so on.
25:26
Yeah, yeah.
So yeah, that would be funny.
It yeah, it was funny.
So we should talk about what we're going to talk about, which is how to rejuvenate or refinish surfaces.
And I mean that's poignant right there.
Somebody had a problem with the topical sealer and you know that is something that happens quite a bit where people need to go in and strip whatever sealers on there.
25:46
We see this question on the concrete forums on Facebook pretty much daily.
You know it it is.
Besides, how do I, how do I cast a 10 foot piece, an 8 foot piece to melamine which is like the other question I've seen 1000 times.
Then the other one is like how do I refinish these countertops?
26:02
I don't know what sealer's on it or I do.
It's a topical how do I get it off.
And so this is a good conversation especially for you because you have way more experience than I do.
It's something that I have strayed away from.
I'm just different.
I I I don't like liability.
26:20
Me personally, in a sense of I don't want to go fix somebody else.
I don't want to Polish somebody else's turd.
Like literally I don't want to Polish somebody else's turd.
If somebody used some crap concrete and put some junk sealer on it and a homeowner calls me and wants me to come in and fix it, in a lot of ways I'm assuming responsibility for this turd and when it doesn't turn out, they're mad at me.
26:40
That's happened to me once before, and it only took one time for it to happen to me.
Where I said I'm not doing this again.
Where I spent days, it was outside water, polishing A countertop to get, you know, get everything off the surface and and slurry it and Polish it and slurry and polishing it all smooth and sealed it.
26:58
And the guy's like, is it as good as it's going to get?
Yeah, yeah, OK You know, he's totally disappointed.
And I'm like, bro, I put days into that and it looked 1000 times better than when I walked in.
But in his mind he saw perfection and there's no way in some cases there's no way to to get to where they see in their minds what it should be because of what they have.
27:21
So anyways, my point is, I've strayed away from it.
I've strayed away from it me personally, but it is a very common question and it is a scenario that a lot of artisans face and it is something that we should talk about.
Well, I think as a as a material itself, yeah, I don't know.
27:37
I mean this again once.
This is one of those subjects that sometimes I jump in, it comes from every angle.
But here's just a reality.
Anybody who's been in this industry long enough, what we're discussing at the moment is always considered taboo.
27:52
Right.
Just like you said, polishing someone else's turd and and you know, depending on who you're talking to they may be you know, you know I make such good products it'll, you know I don't use things that need to be resealed or maybe a manufacturer.
I I don't sell things that need to be sealed and you know what kind of junk is out there?
28:12
But we're the only industry that does that, right?
I mean, furniture, it needs to be refinished wood.
I mean, whatever the case may be.
So I I still truly consider this an US problem.
It's not a materials issue.
28:29
In fact, just the opposite.
There's a few people out there.
Emma Thoralt, I think her name is and I really love her approach, meaning again like the rest of us, that this is a sustainable material.
The benefit is that they can be resealed and you know, manufacturers shouldn't get down on themselves because they have something that that scratches.
28:53
It's, you know, that's a topical plastic that's not going to last and and instead it just is what it is.
Anybody been here long enough, things wear out, period.
So where am I going with this?
I think if it was treated less as a taboo subject and we just all embraced the benefit of working with a material that can have a longevity, that really has the ability to be, you know, rejuvenated and resealed and but then again, there's a minefield.
29:24
I get it.
Because in my mind, the things that I've dealt with is, I mean, for the most part, pretty durable surfaces.
But I've certainly gone into places that you know, that have not been, well, let's just say have been subpar, right, for one reason or another.
29:45
But that doesn't change the fact that I was able to go in there sand, the surface is down.
Can I repair every crack?
No.
You know, I mean, I'm not going to make this thing, but I'll say the same thing.
You're not going to buy an old, you know, 55 Buick, and have it come off like it did the showroom floor when whoever bought it for the first time.
30:08
Well, unless they parked it in a garage and never drove it, right?
And then, you know, dude, I'm looking Before you go down the path on this, I'm sitting, I'm looking.
I have a Patagonia work jacket, right?
And one of the things I love about Patagonia is they have a whole system in place for repairing.
30:24
They know that nothing's going to last forever.
They know that.
And so they have a whole program where you can send your worn goods, you get it ripped, the zipper gets pulled off, buttons break whatever, and they'll fix it for a fee and send it back.
Right.
Right.
But nobody buys this jacket thinking that for the next 20 years it's going to be exactly, I'm going to wear it every day and you know, out in the field doing work and it's going to be exactly the same.
30:45
No, we anticipate wear and tear and they have a program in place.
But with our industry, it's like we put it in and we when the customer comes to us 234510 years down the road and they're like, hey, my countertops got some stains and scratches, we feel that that's unacceptable as a trade.
31:03
It should be perfect forever, but it is no, no, there's nothing that is perfect forever.
No, no.
You don't even get like materials.
You know, it's us that gets in battles.
What?
What sealer did you use?
That's not the good one.
It's this one, or whatever the case may be, but that goes hand in hand with some material representatives, right, who put certain names on it or you know, continue to beat their chest as it's the best in the world or the greatest or whatever.
31:34
Even while during the same time people using the greatest of the greatest or having peeling issues.
And you know, delaminations happen and this and that, but you don't see that in their TikTok videos.
No, but people, everybody.
You don't have to make a choice on whatever they feel comfortable using, whatever that is, You know, for me, for a lot of years, those topicals I used, well, I talked to us in the past, I used all of them, E 32, KEAP, all of them.
32:02
And I tried reactives.
They didn't work for me back then, but there were a lot of advancements made with the mix to make the reactives work better.
That was one of the secrets of getting reactive to to work with our type of concrete.
And anyways, so at some point now it's going on probably 1314 years.
32:19
I made the switch exclusively to reactive and never looked back.
I've been comfortable with that.
But that's a decision I made.
So you as the listener are gonna have to make a decision for yourself of what you're comfortable with.
And then once you make that choice, just stick with it.
And then and then.
Just and then embrace.
32:34
It exactly.
Embrace it.
Exactly.
And so in this case, yeah.
So I I just wanted to discuss you know the benefits both to sealing technologies and just concrete for what it is with the ability to restore, repair and rejuvenate and what does that look like again regardless of sealing technology except for maybe epoxies you know or some kind of polyespartic film those are a do over.
33:02
I I'm, I'm not.
I personally won't touch those, but anything with an acrylic urethanes, you know, any of these kind of sealing technologies.
I really prefer the ones with the reactive because they're much, much easier to repair.
33:18
But that's just the way it is.
So where do you start?
Well, first and foremost, and this is probably why a lot of people, other than their own personal pride, don't really embrace doing research because you you really need to be set up for it.
33:35
You really do.
If you're going to be sanding in someone's home, you need to have the right equipment, and that equipment needs to be a Rotary slash orbital Sander.
I prefer the FEST tool, but there's also the Bosch version and maybe there's other ones.
33:51
At this point, I don't know.
You need to have a combination of some good dry diamond sanding pads that that fit those backer pads so that whatever vacuum you attach to it, which could be a shop vac or like I have the the Festool vacuums, but there's also other ones out there maybe with some higher CFM or something.
34:15
Anyway, you got to be geared up for it, you know, If you're not geared up for it and then, yeah, then resealing can be a real pain in the butt, you know what I mean?
I get it.
But if you're geared up for it and you have the right equipment, it's like everything else.
34:31
You go in as a professional, you treat it as a professional job and you get prepaid, you know, or you charge professional fees to get it done.
And I have yet to have a client not go over the moon, you know, for what's done.
34:47
So back to that thing, be geared up.
That's I would say that's the number one, get the right equipment, have the right tooling, be set up #2, you know, talk with the homeowner beforehand and you know, make sure stuff's out of your way.
35:04
And what does that mean to me?
Well, or what am I trying to relay in that?
How'd the faucet removed?
You know what I mean?
If it's a top mount sink, you can't do anything about that but tape it all off under mount, sink again, tape it off.
I'm one of those that if there's a cook top or something, you know, like those drop in cook tops, have it removed, you know, get that, get anything out of your way that makes your time more complicated, you know, get it removed, slide in stove, whatever, get it out of your way.
35:40
That's super simple.
Which makes your whole sanding process and which I have found time regardless of what sealing technology I start with diamond pads.
And so I mean at the moment I think I've talked about this before, I used to use some of the, you know, cheap knock off stuff from China that a few companies had arranged.
36:02
But now Kodiak Pro has some very nice pads, worked with a very good company to have some really nice diamond pads that that fit various Packer pads.
So that's where I start with every time and I'm going to say a pro tip on that if it's a urethane technology, slow the Sander down.
36:25
I found very quickly that with your Rotary, specifically the Festool that I use, if you think putting on a higher setting would cut faster and instead, no, it actually it melts and gums up the sealer.
36:41
So I'm just going to put that up Sponsored by Kodiak Pro, Pro tip.
If you have a urethane technology, go on a slow speed and it it chews those urethanes up really quick and very nicely.
What about acrylic?
36:56
Same thing with an acrylic.
Still go slow with the more aggressive.
Speed.
Again, if you go too too fast, you know anything too fast is going to cause heat.
But the acrylics don't melt like the urethanes do just to be aware of.
So you may hit a sticky spot if you got too hot and then either way just back your Sander down and then keep going.
37:19
But again, that's the diamond pads, so.
Can you use these?
Dry sanding.
Obviously, 'cause you're using a vacuum, you're using these dry, you're not using any any moisture, yeah.
Yeah, you know, there's a funny thing I've I've tried wet, but again, a little spray bottle, like maybe you need a little bit of lubricant.
37:36
Don't get too crazy because you're going to splatter it all over the place, right?
But yeah, keep a Mr. bottle if necessary after that.
I'm telling you man this the sanding usually goes pretty quick if you have the right equipment and which makes seal resealing a breeze.
37:54
Again, I prefer ICT because of the simplicity.
It's not stinky, it's very easy to fly in someone's home.
So you know what I mean.
I don't have to spend a whole lot of time masking everything off and keeping order odors out of the home.
38:11
So the resale process is really simple And did I miss any steps I?
Don't know.
I mean, my concern has always been going into somebody's home.
Is the dust even with a festival dust extractor, is there a lot of dust in the air?
38:28
Not that I've seen, no.
The one time I did, and we did do this in a podcast, the one time I did and this was just me not paying attention, it's literally because the my my bag in the vacuum was pretty full and I just wasn't paying attention again, right.
38:44
I'm trying to rub 2 pennies to make a dime kind of thing and then I'm like, OK, wait a minute.
So I swapped out.
I put in a new bag and no, that was the end of it.
But that being said, they do have those meaning companies, isn't they?
They have those portable dust extractors like on wheels, remember, like when we were at Joe's or even at Dusty's.
39:06
They have it set up to take the dust.
Putting one of those in someone's home, you know, again, it's it's not going to hurt anything I guess I would say.
But when you have the Sander and the vacuum hooked up properly, I mean easily picks up probably 99% of the dust from what I've seen.
39:28
Gotcha.
From what I've experienced, yeah, yeah, there was only that one time and it was me not putting in a new bag, but I caught on that pretty quickly.
When I looked over, I'm like, was there coffee table that dusty to begin with?
I don't think so.
39:44
And changed it out and boom, that was the end of that.
I went over specifically wiped the table down just to make sure.
And yeah, no, no dust after that.
Nice.
Yeah.
I built a ambient air scrubber for my shop.
I saw it was on a TikTok.
Some guy had made one using a squirrel cage like attic fan or furnace fan and he just bought it off Craigslist.
40:08
The squirrel cage fan for like 20 bucks.
Essentially just built a box and put four air filters around it and kicked it on and it moved a ton of air.
Those things were like 500 CFM or more.
But the cool thing about those is they're they're designed for that like pressure differential for when you're sucking air through the the pads.
40:27
So they're designed for that.
And anyways, so I have built my own over the years or just a box fan where I put, you know, I built a box around it and I put a filter in it and it worked OK, but it never seemed to really work that great.
And so I said OK, I'm gonna build another one of these.
40:43
So I built a new one and I did 2 squirrel cage fans.
And the problem was I couldn't find any locally on Facebook Marketplace or Craigslist that weren't like, totally beat the hell and that I didn't really feel comfortable from a fire standpoint of like, wiring up and leaving it running.
So I got on Amazon.
40:59
I bought 2 new ones.
And they're smaller, but they're brand new.
They're clean.
They're not like, they don't have them mold in them or anything.
And they're each, like, 120 bucks.
I want to say 150 bucks, but about two of them.
And that thing is, have you.
No.
You haven't been to my shop, have you?
41:14
No.
Dude, this thing.
Well, I think I Facetimed you one day when I had it running.
It is incredible how good it works.
I kicked that on.
I mean, the filters, I'll replace them.
And then a week or two, they're totally full again.
But I'll kick it on when I'm, you know, even using my fest tool with the dust extractor or anything I'm doing, mixing concrete, anything that's going to put dust in the air.
41:35
And it picks it up quick, it picks up real quick.
So somebody could build something like that, designed to fit through just a standard residential door.
Put it on mine's on casters.
Put it on casters and you can take that to your resale jobs and just kick it on and let it run while you're doing it.
Yeah, set it up some place and yeah, just let it clean the air.
41:53
Why not?
But you know, you talked about this before, but I'll keep it up as an industry.
And I know we're a small little industry comparatively speaking.
We're the only ones that treat this like a taboo subject.
42:10
You know, there's plenty of people and companies as part of their, you know, fabrication business, they do repair, restoration and reseals.
Whether marble stone you know it it doesn't matter.
42:28
It's also say it's continues to too bad that it's not embraced as much as it really could be because but again maybe maybe it's because we're back to where we started this conversation people valuing their time.
Now don't get me wrong if I went into somebody's home for 20 bucks an hour.
42:49
Yeah, no.
Yeah.
I'm not saying we're not only is a not a viable business but I'm you know it's how would I say we, I know we've said this before if the value of you know I don't know how to describe it but if you came in that inexpensively it would give the persona that what was in the home was super inexpensive as well.
43:11
You know what?
Does that make sense?
Well, they wouldn't place the value on your service.
There.
Yeah.
Yeah.
That's where I'm going with it.
Yeah.
Yeah.
So, no, I mean, I I I actually do pretty well with it.
I enjoy it, as crazy as that sounds, and I don't mean this because I go in snickering, but I have seen some.
43:29
I mean, this has educated me beyond reason over the years, even though I know the raw materials, I work with plenty of the big companies from stall polymers and Dow and Evonik.
And I mean, I could keep the names going to see the, you know, the true life use performance out of various materials is continues to be an amazing education.
44:02
So which is great.
And then I like going in there and being able to tell somebody that they can be proud of their kitchen again, you know what I mean?
Well, it's yeah, it's totally cool.
You know, again, it comes down to everybody's going to need to do their math, their calculation for what is your time worth?
44:22
I'm gonna every time I get an opportunity, I'm gonna throw this recommendation, Profit First for Contractors by Sean Van Dyke.
Get the book, get the audio book.
I tell everybody about it.
I just told Nick on this car ride down Arkansas.
Get this book.
Get the audio book.
44:38
It will change the way you approach your pricing.
And I assure you once you get the exercises and if you start using the principles outlined in the book, you'll be profitable on your projects moving forward.
Where before you were sometimes you weren't, sometimes you didn't really know.
You know we made money from the year.
44:54
I'm not sure where where we lost money.
You'll have a better understanding.
But the other part of that is, you know, my number's 325 and I should really re evaluate that number because that was my number.
I don't even know how many years ago now I was in Tempe that we did it.
So probably 8-9, ten years ago is when we ran those numbers.
45:12
So I'm sure they're different now.
I should, I should definitely, probably be charging differently now than I am.
But that being said, every person should do that.
And if your number is 250 an hour, OK, great.
So if you're going to do rejuvenation on somebody's countertops, you know, they're countertops need love.
And you say, yeah, you know, my minimum is 4 hours, that's $1000.
45:29
And I have consumables, which I'm going to bill it, you know, $250 for the consumables.
So it's called 12:50.
If they have somebody come in and remove and replace those existing countertops, what's that, 7 thousand $10,000?
And they can pay somebody at 12:50 to come in and bring them back to to life again and give them another, you know, 5 to 10 years of use before they need to do it again.
45:51
That's a great value.
That's a great value for them.
And it's a good value for you because your time is being compensated for what you need to be compensated for, but you need to figure out what that is.
Everybody's different.
Every everybody's number is a different number.
So you know, I see I I mentioned this in the past, but there's a Facebook concrete group and they should just change the name to what should I charge concrete group?
46:13
Because every question is, hey guys, I got this project what would you charge?
And then you know 300 people chime in, I would be 14,000, I would be 50, I would be $1000 there.
It's just it runs a gamut from like crazy load.
Tune for one.
46:30
Dollar.
But the point is, all those answers are wrong.
Because that isn't this guy's business.
This isn't his location, this isn't his life circumstances.
It's not his shop, It's not his employees, it's not his tools.
It's none of that.
And so all those answers are wrong.
And I feel like saying none of these are the right answer, but it's it's that kind of let me run my business by committee mindset.
46:50
Let me just ask everybody's opinion and ask I'm going to run my business.
If you run your business that way, you're guaranteed to go out of business.
If you don't have a handle on your business, you're going to go to business.
Plain and simple.
And and there's there's levels of businesses and I've said this before when I always use my electrician analogy, right.
47:09
But there's there's so much work to go around.
It's like, you know, we talked in the last one, there's there's no lack of demand.
So a person needs to sit down and figure out what scale, both financially for yourself and otherwise, Do you want to fit your demand?
47:29
And if the $20.00 an hour demand is what you need, OK, I mean, no one's gonna knock it.
Just realize that the person doing $200.00 an hour is just as much in demand.
Yeah, if not more so.
And working with the clients he probably would want to work with.
47:46
My experience in this last, you know, 21 years now of doing this is the clients that I cut a break with.
The clients that have a sad story and they bring their violin with them and they're playing it nice and slow and soft while they're talking to me and tell me how they're on a fixed income.
48:04
And I've always loved concrete.
And when I was a little girl, I'd shrimped someday I'd have a concrete erosion sink in my bathroom and they have the violin.
I'm like, Oh my gosh, you remind me of my grandma.
OK, yes, yes, yes.
I'll do it for half price.
48:20
That that has switch flips and they're the war's client.
Where's my sink?
What is this?
What is this spot on the sink?
I brush my teeth and I see a spot that looks a little bit discolored.
And I want to know you're like, Oh my God, what did I do?
48:35
What did I do?
I cut this person a deal.
I listen to their sad story and they turned on me.
No good deed goes unpunished.
Tattoo it on your soul.
No good deed goes unpunished.
Don't do it.
I didn't you.
Didn't come on a deal you just sold.
You just sold your life for that time's moment at half price, that's all.
48:56
My point is.
In hopes that what you get out of it makes you feel good and hopefully gain some time at the end.
But that's nothing any of us can guarantee, right?
That's right.
So my point, Jon, is charge your prices.
Stick to your prices.
When the little old lady shows up your door with her violin and her sad story and her bowl of chicken soup and she tells you about how she's always dreamt of this, the price is a price, lady.
49:17
Take it or leave it.
I don't care because it's that client, and it's happened to me a handful of times over the years, and it's always the same thing.
They always have a sad story.
It's that client that ends up being one that runs you through the ringer.
And it's the ones that I give my my price and I do not deviate and I do not make apologies.
49:37
And this is my number, that those are the best clients.
They're the ones that don't hassle me, that when I install it, they love it.
They, you know, for years later they tell me how great it is.
Those are the ones that were the easiest.
I guess my point is if you're at the low price point or you, you lower your price a lot of times, somehow that attracts the clients you don't want.
49:54
I don't know why it is.
It's the low attraction.
Yeah, it's just that's what happens.
Hey.
So are are we moving on or are we still sticking?
Is there anything to move on to?
I am, yeah.
When are we going to go on on our.
Speaking of time and our time, when we're when are we going to start the?
50:13
The health thing.
Yeah.
I don't know.
Somebody texted me yesterday that wanted to do it.
Or maybe the day before, I don't know.
Soon, soon, soon, soon.
I'll just say that soon.
I got three projects that have been like 1000 LB weight hanging over my head that I just what, for whatever reason, these projects, every day I come in, I'm like, I'm gonna get some work done on these today and then like the universe conspires to like, keep me from doing that.
50:43
Whatever that means.
You know, I I didn't.
I guess I didn't talk about it.
Maybe I did.
I have a tenant.
No.
You didn't talk about it and there's a sewer line.
We're just going to say, yeah, your neighbors are taking super turds.
Yeah, so.
I'm not going to go all that.
50:59
I'm not going to go all that.
But I have a new tenant next door and the toilet wasn't working and this happened.
I let some other people use the space for two weeks.
A charity.
I donated the space to them and they clogged the sewer line so bad I had to get the guy come out to clear it.
And then they moved out and this guy moved in.
51:15
He's like, hey, there's something wrong with the toilet.
It's not it's not flushing.
And I'm like, oh God.
So I get it.
The guy to come back again.
He like, clears line again.
He's like there's some resistance.
You might want to get a camera inspection done.
So the guy comes out there's a he thought it was concrete, but there was a huge rock stuck in the line, right.
51:34
And it's it was close to the toilet in his suite.
That's where.
That's where they found it. 3 feet from the flange is where it was.
OK.
Is there anything can can this can this like take like a a snake or something and ram it and they're like, no, not really.
51:49
The only option is to cut the floor and cut that piece of section out and replace it.
OK, OK, OK, So what do I do?
I rent a jackhammer.
I spend a day dickin with jackhammer in that floor.
52:05
I mean first of all I started by drilling holes all the way to the floor.
It's like 8 inches of concrete because back in the 70s they went overkill.
This is like 8 inches of concrete.
I drilled holes about every half inch thinking like, well this will help.
I can just take a sledgehammer and just whack away at this and break this out in chunks.
After I drilled and it took a couple hours to draw these holes, and I take a sledgehammer and I beat on it, I beat on it.
52:23
It didn't, it didn't even do anything.
Nothing.
I took a rock pry bar and beat on it.
Nothing.
So I go down to Home Depot.
I rent like 100 LB Jackhammer, bring it back.
But that's going to be pretty quick, you know?
I've used a breaker hammer on my skid steer.
It's awesome.
You can bust out a whole drive.
I thought it was going to be something like that.
52:40
Wrong.
You're.
Not Jon, Rick, you're not Jon, Rick.
Yeah, and I don't, I don't have a 11,000 LB skid steer with a, you know, massive breaker hammer either.
So.
So I get over there, like, is this as fast as it goes?
Like it wasn't doing anything.
52:56
It didn't do anything.
It took hours of Jack Cameron, this thing.
Just Jack Cameron and and the the new tenant's sitting there.
He put his desk like in the back of this.
They do.
He's just watching me.
He's sitting five feet away watching me.
I have like a shot back running trying to like contain the dust because it's making a ton of dust.
53:14
And anyways, hours goes by.
Anyway to make that quieter?
It's like Shawshank Redemption.
Like when I'm chiseling through the floor and I'm carrying buckets, literally I'm carrying buckets of broken concrete outside and I feel like Shawshank Redemption.
Like I I crawled through like a mile of so I get through the floor, then I got to dig down.
53:31
Luckily they bedded it in sand so I made it easier.
So I dig all the sand away and it there was like a why there that I wasn't expecting.
But anyways, I cut out the pipe, cut it out and dude, this is.
Every now and then you get lucky.
And this time I got lucky.
53:46
I cut right here and then four inches over I cut.
And when I pulled it out, that was exactly the spot where that rock was.
It was like dead center of where I cut.
And that was just a guess.
I pull it out and there was a rock and it was turned sideways and jammed in there.
I'd take a hammer and beat it out, but you know, replace that section of pipe back, filled it with the sand again, packed the sand, mixed up concrete, poured concrete.
54:10
A whole day goes by and you know, with with the camera inspection, the two augers, the materials, my time I had a guy come down to help me for a few hours all together cost me about 2000 bucks for this rock.
This rock cost me 2000 bucks.
But anyways, I turn to the guy and I'm like, hey bro, oh by the way, I go down, I get, I get all the stuff, dude.
54:30
I get all the stuff to reset the toilet, new line, you know, new wax seal, new bolts blah blah blah, I reset the toilet silicone blah blah blah.
All right bro, toilet's fixed.
He just goes cool, I said.
54:51
I said buy a building.
They said it'll be fun.
They said it'll be a great investment.
They said two days of my life and 2000 bucks down the drain because of a rock and who knows that rock.
Maybe somebody flushed that rock, I don't know.
Or maybe the Rock's been there for 50 years.
55:06
I fell in when they built the building.
Who knows?
But anyways, this damn rock cost me two GS in two days of my life.
So anyways, time Time.
What's my time worth?
Apparently a yeah.
When you say your building was used for a meth lab to begin with.
55:22
Maybe it was.
Flushed it.
Down smoking, smoking on crack rocks and flushing, right Flushing rocks.
Flushing rocks.
Yeah, yes.
So anyways.
Yeah, so I want to get going.
Sorry, we got way off track.
I want to get on the health end.
55:37
Dude, I I started doing the cold plunge.
Have you done any of that?
Yeah, I really.
Like it?
I started with the I mean, I I go in between the shower and the plunge.
But yeah.
I get it.
I like it.
I I get.
For me, it's the whole mental aspect of doing something you don't want to do.
55:54
But I do enough of the things I don't want to do, you know, I do enough of it.
I go down the shop, I rip melamine, I take out the trash.
I I there's 1000 things I got to do.
Clean rocks out of the sewer.
Yeah, there's things you got to do every day you don't want to do.
So to add to that, like by standing in an ice cold shower, it just doesn't sound like my cup of tea right now.
56:13
Maybe some other point?
Well, the shower you can.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
I don't know.
I I don't mind the shower at all.
I actually, I prefer the how would I say it.
I prefer the shower to the plunge, quite frankly, because I'm one of those people that I don't know, man.
So just, you know, sitting in a tub, yes, it's cold, but I mean, like sitting there, that's that's like the longest 4 minutes of my life.
56:34
Like, oh, seriously, when is this timer going off?
But when you're in the shower, No, you know what I mean?
I'm.
You see it in my.
Hair.
So yeah.
Heck yeah, dude.
That's my time.
That's me time.
That's right.
56:51
That is me time.
Shrinkage.
It's shrinkage.
It was cold water.
You ever see that Seinfeld?
Water being this cold, do.
You ever see that Seinfeld or she walks in on George when he's changing on the swimsuit after he's been in a pool and he's like, it's shrinkage?
57:08
Oh man.
But no, I so yeah, I started doing that.
And I mean I've been working out back to that pretty steady.
So yeah, man, I'm, I'm excited.
Let's let's get this going.
But but I'll tell you the difference and I know it's probably going longer.
You cut it all out or whatever.
57:24
Remember when we first started this?
And I was I I truly believe when you start incorporating all these things again, how that overflows into everything else because it's your own well-being, you know, that you're taking care of.
57:44
And I'm going to say it's true.
I feel better, you know, when I talk to people or when I just yesterday, you know, take on another vanity project or whatever, just my whole being you just I I feel more relaxed.
58:00
I feel better focused.
So yeah, man, it's it's really cool to incorporate all this into what you're doing because it it pays dividends, I guess is what I'm saying.
Yeah.
Yeah, I know how we got on this 'cause I was saying that the universe has conspired to keep me from getting this client work done.
58:18
And it was last week.
It was this damn sewer line.
But anyways, my point, Jon, is I'm almost there.
I've got two of the three molds.
Done, done, done.
And I'm working on 1/3 mold today, probably coming this weekend, work on it some.
And then Aiden, my old employee from Arkansas, is gonna cruise up and help me cast and build the crates and and then I'll be done with it.
58:41
And so then at that point I can dedicate my time back to these things we've been working on.
Another thing is I I've been saying to myself, I need to take a break from client work for a little bit to focus on Kodiak, to focus on that stuff.
You know, we have a lot of customers we want to go to and work with, you know, start doing some more travelling and I need to do that stuff, I want to do that stuff.
59:03
I just don't have the time with the client work.
So I've I've been saying to myself, I'm going to, I'm going to take a break from client work for a minute.
I'm going to focus on Kodiak.
I'm going to focus on travelling.
And so I was in Springfield when I went to that client project.
Next door was another client that I that I've done work for and I stopped by his house and he's like, hey, I built a lake house, which by the way I was supposed to build that out of rammed earth.
59:25
But then COVID hit and his wife vetoed the whole rammed Earth Lake house he wanted to build.
That's a different story.
But he's like, hey, I built the lake house.
He did that A-frame and he's like I need a erosion sink and I need some chairs and tables.
Can you do it?
I need it by April.
I'm like, OK, just punch myself right in the Dick again.
59:47
You know, it's like I said, I'm not going to do this.
And here I did.
I did it again, you know, so I could see the light at the end of the tunnel that just, I just extended it, but whatever.
Anyways, but I digress.
1:00:03
We have the February 10th and 11th Concrete Design School.
Fundamentals Workshop coming up and you know it's a great class.
If you are new to concrete and you're wanting to get it started in the right foot and you don't want to make the ultimate mistake and attend a training class, it's going to waste your time and your money and send you in the wrong direction.
1:00:22
Then you, young man or young woman should please visit concretedesignschool.com, visit on the Fundamentals Workshop or I Can't talk.
Click on the Fundamentals Workshop and read about it and see what we cover.
It's a day and a half class.
It is a Saturday and Sunday class.
1:00:38
Jon.
A day and a half.
And the genius of this is you don't have to miss any work to attend this class.
You can fly in Friday afternoon.
After you get off work.
Hop a plane, Come to Wichita.
Come to the class Saturday, Sunday, half day.
Catch your flight out Sunday afternoon.
Be back to work on Monday.
1:00:54
Nobody knew you left in and out and now you're heading the right direction for your concrete career.
So if you're interested again, concrete designschool.com Fundamentals Workshop, February 10th and 11th day and a half, super affordable class.
And one thing I want to say about that, last thing I want to say about that is I talked to somebody the other day and he had, he had heard some.
1:01:12
He heard somebody say like you can't learn the you can't learn the basics in less than five days or something.
I said baloney, baloney.
The people saying that are hobbyists at best.
Do not listen to what a hobbyist has to say.
If you want to learn how to run a business the wrong way, then learn from people that run the business the wrong way.
1:01:29
We can do it in a day and a half, we've done.
In a day and a half we can do it.
Just because they can't doesn't mean we can't.
We can and we do.
So concrete design's cool.
Cool, man.
Yeah, it is cool.
It is cool, Jon.
Say I was trying to be like that guy.
Cool.
Cool.
Thanks.
He didn't.
He didn't say thanks.
1:01:46
How do you just said thanks that I spent two days on my hands and knees literally digging and how do you said thanks?
That would have meant the world to me.
But he just goes cool.
All right.
On that note, Jon Schuler.
Until next week, all.
Right.
Good talking to you.
1:02:01
All right, buddy.
Adios, amigo.
Adios.
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