Episode 17 - Michael + Danielle Gutelli of Clark + Aldine

Written By Mark Williams

Clark and Aldine: The crossroads of fate, how two paths joined to create a power house team of design and building

Michael and Danielle outline their unique branding and how each project has a naming strategy that makes them unique and special. A 2nd-grade teacher and a marketing and advertising guru left what they knew while having their first child to start a new business. 5 years and 10,000 hours of practicing their art form in the form of an informative blog transformed into a top-notch residential design and build team. A serial entrepreneur, Micheal used his passion and love for owning his own story to leap into business. Danielle and Micheal explain why a professional has fee service for a reason, and why would building and remodelers structure a free framework instead of charging for their expertise.

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About Michael + Danielle Gutelli

Named after the Chicago streets where Danielle + Michael first met, Clark + Aldine was born out of a love for design and everyday functionality. Their collective chemistry was discovered and nurtured by updating each of the 7 apartments they lived in over the 10 years they spent together in Chicago. A move to Michigan, and nearly 5 years later, their passion and design influence continued to grow, pushing them to leave their established careers behind in pursuit of building Clark + Aldine. Together, Danielle and Michael oversee all operations at Clark + Aldine, a Design + Build firm specializing in residential remodeling, interior design, and custom cabinetry. They currently reside in and operate the Clark + Aldine Studio and Warehouse spaces in Downtown Plymouth, MI with their two boys and dog, Niko.

Resources

  • Today on the curious builder podcast, we have Danielle and Miko good Telly with Clark and Aldine. It remodeling and building company out of Michigan. And you're gonna hear just some great laughs some real good insights, and really just a dynamic duo. This couple doesn't do anything separate. And it's a real credit to marriage and business ownership with your best friend and partner. Without further ado, let's listen to Dee and Michael share their story. Welcome to the curious builder. I'm Mark Williams, your host, and welcome to Danielle and Michael. Thanks for coming on, guys.

    01:15

    Thank you for having us.

    Mark D. Williams 01:16

    So we are in Huntington Beach, California. We were at the contractors coalition, the summit number two, we met Nashville at number one. And you guys across the room. Now we are up close and personal we I do all my interviews. In person with video. We're sitting we're sitting extremely close the set that we wanted to record it was not available. So we'll just have to make do with what we've got. We're builders, right? Isn't that what we're supposed to we do we take with what we have, and we build something amazing. So this interview is going to be awesome. I'm here for it. So you guys own and operate Clark and ElDeen. And my first question is, is how did you come up with the name Clark and Aldi and I want the origin story of your company. But let's start with your name. So

    01:59

    when we decided that we weren't, we wanted to start a business together, Daniel was adamant that our brand name needed to be something and something kind of like Crate and Barrel. So whole idea was whatever name we came up with meant nothing of significance to anyone but us. And when we both met in Chicago, I lived in the South Loop on South Clark Street. She lived in Lakeview on our Dayton and the two streets do not intersect. Where Clark and Aldine meet on the other side of Clark is school Aldi and turns into school. So while those streets don't intersect, that's where our paths intersect.

    02:42

    And so that's how we branded us. And then from there, what we did is any project that we have now, we name the same way. So it is a street that sentimental to our clients, and then street that they are currently living.

    Mark D. Williams 02:57

    I love that. That is I love how you've taken your name branding, and then you job site branded as well. Yeah, that's amazing. I bet your clients responded is really positive.

    03:07

    Because a lot of times we have clients come in and they already know what their name is going to be.

    Mark D. Williams 03:11

    Oh, that's because the story is you guys talk about your story on Instagram or your social feeds or on the website? And how would they know that talked about it,

    03:18

    it's on our website, it's on social,

    03:20

    we have a whole blog post about it, we do out to each project that we've done, probably should update that. I'm saying that.

    Mark D. Williams 03:27

    That's amazing. I kind of want to see if I can do that. That's really, that's really neat.

    03:31

    It's cool, because then you get to really intimately know your clients too, because they always give you the backstory of what their significant Street is and why they're choosing that. Recently, we've actually had a lot of Chicago streets. Okay, so that's always fun to

    Mark D. Williams 03:46

    do. How often do people address us Clark and use LD,

    03:50

    not as much as they used to in the meeting. But you can always tell when an email as automated, we all get junk emails. And now we're getting all the random junk calls every day for $3 million loans at 3.2% interest over 30 years. And they know nothing about our financials. But yeah, we used to get asked all the time, I would get referred to as Clark or they would ask, okay, who's Clark and who's ElDeen? So we'd have to tell the story, which is why we updated our site and came up with well

    04:15

    and our team talked a lot about like, really focusing on saying like, we're Michael and Daniel Kelly versus Clark and Aldine as our name and so actually, when we were in Minnesota with you earlier, Morgan introduced us from construction to style introduces this clerk and ElDeen and we were like, or Michael and she like didn't get it right. But that's a brand name. I was like, Yeah, but see people think we're clocking all day when you say Right.

    Mark D. Williams 04:43

    Well, I love it. I'm here for it. I want to I really want to give that a second look for even like brand new because whenever we're coming up with like on the portfolio, you're coming up with like any kind of get tired of transitional cottage you know, this traditional house and you kind of see the same words over and over. So like, you don't want to use the clients name to you to brand it because that becomes a privacy issue. And so you don't want to be like house number one. I love that this is both really engaging, but has a story. And I love that your clients have bought into this. And we do

    05:11

    have some clients in the past and some current clients where the privacy is a concern. So we used origins of the street name of significance in the current street name just to kind of throw people off internally. It's

    05:23

    yeah, whatever their name was, but like when I'm sharing it on social media, we change it up. Based on like, each of our clients individual needs. Yeah, and we never

    05:32

    show clients or an address of a house ever. That's basically in our standards will never do that.

    Mark D. Williams 05:40

    No, you will. Now you guys, have you mentioned that you started this when you first met, Were you dating and started a building?

    05:48

    No, no, no, we were married. I know what, seven or eight years when we started this? Yeah, actually,

    05:55

    my client both come from different careers. So I taught second grade for 10 years in Chicago. And then Michael was in marketing and advertising. And when we left Chicago, we had just had our first little guy. And we decided to move back to Michigan, which is where I'm from. And Mike was like, Well, why don't you start that blog you always talked about? I was like, okay, and the

    06:21

    real reason that was a possibility is because the new job in Michigan paid us more than we may combine or paid me more than we make combined in Chicago. So it was a no brainer, like start this, if we're ever going to do it. Start it now.

    06:32

    And so that's kind of how clerk melody started this off this blog.

    Mark D. Williams 06:36

    That's amazing. So what was the boat? What was the blog? What was the topic?

    06:39

    It was called mom way foobie. And I wrote about being a mom, a wife and a foodie. And I wrote on Monday, Wednesday, Friday. And for two years, I wrote a row. And I think Michael and my mom and maybe my girlfriends came and read the post, and then it kind of like little by little started to take its own turn and I went to a conference. And during the conference, one of the speakers talked about looking at your analytics, and I was like analytics. So like when who I'm like, do we have analytics? And he's like, Danielle, Every site has analytics. And I was like, well, we should look at ours because they save all of you that are coming to one post and we're writing about the wrong things. So sure, shit, we go to the blog, and we look up the analytics, and everybody's coming to this master bedroom revealed post that we had done on our house. And so then we kind of chatted, and we're like, well, maybe we should, Michael should write more on the blog. And maybe we should rebrand it a little bit. And at this time, we already had crocodile dating, like we already had that as a name. Because we The goal was for us to work together, we knew that that's what we wanted to do. And we wanted to build a lifestyle that Michael and I could work together and we could spend quality time with our children. And we basically write our own story.

    Mark D. Williams 07:52

    So you knew you wanted a business, you had the name of the business, but you didn't know what the business was.

    07:56

    And so we dabbled with lots of things from like family photography to website building, we shot for restaurants around social media.

    08:05

    For three years, the big thing we were doing was what I was doing for my day job marketing, advertising, social and digital. And it was a full 40 hour job on top of my career. So it's our story of 10,000 hours for five years, we put in that work, until we got to the point where it was like alright, we're 35 do we if we don't risk it now, we're not going to be able to do it. And so when we started

    08:29

    to blog about our home content, the beauty was like Michael wasn't like just this guy DIY and every Yeah,

    08:36

    that's that's one point I want to hit on. This wasn't like a DIY blog. I mean, yes, we did some DIY things. But that's not how it started. When I was 14, I got a job as a laborer on the job site, just picking up trash clean up getting beers for the for the guys at five o'clock, because that happened then doesn't happen anymore. And this was in St. Louis, where I where I come from, when I graduated high school at 18. I was making more money than I knew what to do with it. So I was like, Screw college. I love this. I'm not going to do anything other than this. I had all the toys I traveled cars money in my pocket like, life was great. There was there was no there was no risk. And it was beautiful. Did you work for like a single builder? Or did you work for a custom home builder. And once when I was 18 and graduated, I was running the drywall crew in charge of that. And I consistently was stepping up every year. So you're a project manager that basically yep, I was still doing some labor, but mostly managing projects. And I loved it. But the custom home market in St. Louis in 2000. Let's see that was 2001 2003 just slow down a bit. And I was burnt out because I was working seven days a week. And my other passion was graphic design. So I initially went to college in Chicago at Columbia for graphic design. But I didn't learn more than what I already knew in two years. So I switched that to marketing comms with an emphasis and advertise I was in. And that's what led to your career.

    10:03

    And so it's, it's really fun to look at your story like backwards because people always, I always say like, if you look at it forward, it doesn't really make sense. But as you're going backwards, like, oh my goodness, this makes so much sense to fall into place. Yeah. And so when we were blogging, Michael is actually doing things to be like legit know how to do. And then local people started asking us if we'd ever considered doing this with anybody else. And then it was like almost like that clicked for the two of us like, this is what we need to be doing. And so I set a goal. Yeah, I

    10:34

    set a goal. I set a goal. And I said, November 2, I'm done. Actually, I said November 1, and my last day at the agency was November 2. So I missed it by one day, it was a failure,

    Mark D. Williams 10:45

    no failure in your milestone of walking out. I like it. But

    10:49

    the hardest thing was getting my builder's license, because in Michigan, I don't know how it is in Minnesota. It's a 60 hour course, I obviously took it at night. And finished all my classes, studied my ass off for the test. And it took me a couple times to pass it was it was tough.

    11:07

    And it was to

    Mark D. Williams 11:08

    the point. So don't have a construction background. Other than Well, I guess you did your project managing Yeah,

    11:11

    I knew I knew enough about what we wanted to do. Like, I'll be the first to say, I don't know anything about foundations. I don't know about roofing like, I know simple fundamentals. But you know, I'm not enough to be dangerous. I know enough to be dangerous, where my expertise comes in is in remodeling. And that's why we do what we do. Yeah. So

    Mark D. Williams 11:30

    are you just for those listening? You're remodeling only firm? We are. As

    11:33

    of right now, we are a residential remodeling firm.

    11:37

    But I've never say only Yeah.

    Mark D. Williams 11:40

    I mean, the way you guys have transformed

    11:42

    from what you even become it, it is a goal for next year that will at least start we won't have it finished. We know what that looks like. But we will start our first custom home for yourselves. You're probably not. Not there yet.

    Mark D. Williams 11:56

    Yeah, well, yes. Back home. It will be a custom it would be custom. Okay.

    11:59

    Yeah. So your ideal world, it would be a spec. Yeah, it will be a I don't see that happening.

    Mark D. Williams 12:06

    And for those listening, I mean, essentially a spec home is on speculation, you would want to do it. I'm guessing because you could control all the selections, all the design, you can really let it be your brand. Exactly. Right. You know, when I started I've been building for about 18 and a half years. And when I first started I was I did a couple spec homes because house to get your name out there. And I wasn't nearly as fashion forward or into design. It was just hey, I'm gonna build a house. And halfway through, I'm like, This is amazing. I quit my regular job. I sold my Jetta, I bought f150. I got my builder's license. And I just that's what you do. You just build a house, I guess. And so And halfway through, I'm like, This is amazing. And so anyway, you're like you said, you look backwards. And you're like, wow, looking backwards, these different milestones, or these different events have led to where I am now. And I've often for me, quality was really important early on just trying to figure out your story. I mean, honestly, you're just compared to what I do now to then. I mean, it's not even a fair comparison. It's well, I mean, yeah, I mean, your experience, but looking back, it's kind of like some ways not knowing what you don't know is can be a blessing too, though. I think one of the biggest barriers to entry for someone to be an entrepreneur is they think they have to know everything. And I don't think you do. I mean, even even the podcasts are on right now. I was on Brad Levin's podcast from EFT. And after I got done, I had so much fun, I enjoyed it. And I was a speech calm major. And I guess, you know, guests, you just talk a lot. And you get a degree for that, which is weird. And, and thanks mom and dad for raising an extrovert. And I thought, Well, man, I want to do this. And so within 30 days, I had started the podcast, and you know, you guys are obviously episode number 11. And just go for it. And so anyone listening who wants to start a business, go for it, get an idea, go for it, it's okay to fail.

    13:51

    And it's okay. Where I think a lot of people fail, is they they think that they have to be the expert in the room. And they don't ask questions. I don't want to be if I'm the expert in the room, there's a problem. When we're, you know, for our company, are we the experts? Like are we experts in design build? Yes. Are we the experts in the room with our team? Yes. But so are they in what they do. But we all ask each other questions.

    Mark D. Williams 14:19

    I think that's very well said, I often use it as a joke. And you know, because I'm sure I some ways, you know more than you think you know, but it's a classic thing. If you don't know the answer, you know where to go, you know who to ask. And I think people especially clients appreciate honesty. You know, I don't know the answer. That's a great question. Let me get back to you with a solution. And you know, at our next meeting, I'll have I'll have a path forward. And I've often told my clients like you know, look at my hands. You know, these calluses are not from working on your house physically. Because if you see me pounding nails, like something has gone drastically wrong, and they usually laugh a little bit, but it's true, but like that's not my skill set. You know, my skill set is organizing the building. You know, design. You know, my mom was an interior designer, my Dad was a builder. And you know, you just that's kind of how I fell into it. And one of my questions for you guys is, I've heard recently that you become an entrepreneur for one of two reasons. Either you are forced into it because you don't want to do what you're doing. And you're like, Well, hey, this boss or this job, like, I'm gonna do it because of necessity, or you become an entrepreneur, because there are family members or inspirational pushes of Life. There's an idea of like, I want to do this for because I'm surrounded by other people that are doing this or Well, what was your path to be? How did you know you wanted to own your own business?

    15:34

    Well, I think Michael has always know that, like I have was, yeah.

    15:39

    And I mean, this isn't my first rodeo with entrepreneurship. I've had small record label, and I did artists management. My good friend, Cory, and I in Chicago, when we both like hated the agencies where we're at, we just said, Screw it, we'll just start on agency, because they didn't want to do social media, they thought it was a fad. This isn't like, I don't know, 2011 2012. So

    Mark D. Williams 16:00

    to that example, you were forced into entrepreneurship, you said you wanted to do something that you either like

    16:05

    it's a balance, being forced into it, and really having a passion and love for owning our own story.

    16:11

    Yeah. And I think for for me, personally, I love teaching, like every aspect of teaching I loved but I also loved the ability to be home with our kids when they were little. And then when I started a blog, I realized again, like the story going backwards, that I was teaching people but in a different way. And I was like teaching people how to love their home, and how to experience life and everyday moments, and like that you don't need to be an expert in design, you already know what you like. It's just a matter of me helping put that all together for you.

    Mark D. Williams 16:45

    Out of curiosity, what grade did you teach? Second, second, great. I agree. It's funny you say, teaching, because through the recession, I started 2005. So like eight through 12. Essentially, for us, that was a rough time, in some ways at the time. Looking back. Now, going back to your reverse comment, I didn't have enough to lose to go out of business. So many of my peers and billers that were above us either had spec homes, or they just had too big of a staff and they went under I mean, I was extremely lean, I had no overhead. And so really one job, you know, if you could just get one job piecemeal, another job. But anyway, at the time going back to teaching, I always wanted to be a teacher had I not been an entrepreneur. And I just love kids. And this is before I have three kids now. But before I ever had kids, I was like I'm just love them. So in the state of Minnesota, unlike my sister was in Montana, she has a degree been on teaching. And she did part time substitute teaching, and I thought this would be a great time for me to scratch that teaching edge. And turns out Minnesota, you can't be a teacher unless you have a education license. So I called some of the old teachers that I had gone to high school with that I really thought a lot of, and I just said, Hey, I'd love to do I can't do teaching. What about coaching? They're like, well, there's a new high school opening up. And you know, I was a cross country runner, like, Would you be the assistant head coach? I said, Absolutely. So for 10 years, until my second one came along, and I just couldn't balance building and having a family and all these other things that were balancing. But that was my outlet for being around children at work this case, they're all high schoolers. So it's really up and running with them. And they are children. But I found it extremely empowering, you know, to teaching and it's sometimes you don't know what you have to offer until you see someone asked a question. And on the job site. I mean, how is it related to building or any business? It's just I think educators are have amazing talent. I feel like you guys, just a baseline have way more patients. And I think there's I just think there's a lot of that. I think parenting, oddly enough is very analogous to having any sort of business building specifically. And well, I don't look at my staff as like my children necessarily, you know, I'm not their dad, they're not my son, or daughter, but it's like, you are encouraging them. Yes, you are not disciplining, but you are providing a framework of like, if you don't do this, then that doesn't work for us, our company. So in that sense, you're disciplining them, you a positive reinforcement. Anyway, as the old more and more I get into just like, you know, being a dad is a leader, it's so similar to running a business. And so just that family structure, and I think one of the secrets for our personal success, I believe is that we're a fairly small company, we build four high end homes a year and a handful of remodels. But we're able to use a lot of the same trade partners and subcontractors that also our family businesses. So for multiple decades, we've worked with the same people. And that's, that creates a really unique connection between you know, your peers, and I always say like, this isn't my I mean, yes, it's my company. My name is on it, but it's really we are building this home collaboratively. And one thing that we did a couple of years ago is we'll take pictures of all the people on our that work on our homes and like before we like upgrade a home event. I'll put all their photos, put all their photos on the yard, because I want paid for the artists. I did yeah, I mean I might be the frontman of a band, if you will. But at the end of the day, like I can't do that with all the other people that are surrounding me. And I really want to give that recognition to those people. I also think it lets people know that like, we value relationships, and you know, these are people, these are craftsmen and women that are putting their craft into your home. It's just the home journey is so emotional remodeling and new homes. It's extremely emotional. And I think when you when people No, it's kind of has this family bond to it. I think there's just a lot that goes into it that that makes it appealing to our clients.

    20:30

    I would agree 100%. And of

    20:32

    course, I'm like jumping into your storytelling of that aspect through like, the fact that you're showcasing his working in their home, they also are getting just a little bit more in depth to the process of what it takes.

    20:45

    And it creates internal champions for your brand. That's that's the big thing.

    Mark D. Williams 20:49

    You're listening to curious builder podcast. We'll be right back after a word from our sponsors.

    Mark D. Williams 20:58

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    22:20

    That's what's great about our team that we build, and we we've been through some changes. And again, it's like, look, you know, they were they were challenges. There were moments, especially this year, we went through where it was very challenging was super emotional, but we had to make a change. Looking back, I mean, some of the best decisions we've made in our team is super lean, there's five of us, including Daniel and myself, we are continuing to hire for another position or two. But our team is amazing. And they they are champions for our brand. They know what we're trying to build, they want to be a part of it. And I mean, that's what makes us happy at the end of the day.

    Mark D. Williams 22:56

    What are some of the roles that you have three other people besides yourselves, walk us through a little bit about some of the roles in your company.

    23:02

    So Matt is our GC, he's been with us forever. We're currently finalizing our transition from doing a lot of the build work to subbing out 90 percentile. So you self performed a lot of your own work for three years. Wow. And have

    Mark D. Williams 23:18

    all of you or your people on your team, my me,

    23:20

    Matt. And then we had a handful of others that were internal in with us that are no longer with us. And we did all the work. And it was actually

    23:28

    contracted out like trades, like electrical marketing and things like that.

    23:32

    It was actually last year in Nashville at the first contractor coalition Summit, which is part of the reason we're back. We'll talk about that in a bit. We had a call from our team that completely drowned a day two, and took us out of the q&a for day three. Wow. And it was very stressful. I was not happy. I wasn't happy with the progress and what was happening. I just realized through the conversations with Brad and Nick and all the attendees, it's like we can not do this as a at the time was like a seven person team and have multiple projects going on. Because we're all we're going to do is make clients upset because we're leaving, we're finishing one task we're leaving to go finish another task of another job, then going from that job to another one.

    24:16

    It was like a very eye opening experience for us coming to

    24:19

    realizing how unorganized we were because we were we were chasing the drawers. And we were trying to get as much children Yeah. And we were trying to get as much done as possible. And then when we once we scale back, we realize it's like most of our trades. They don't want to deal with clients at all. We've seen a lot of our subcontractors that were doing all the build and dealing with clients they don't want to anymore. So that's where we come in. We have a great team of trades that we work with. Again, we use a lot of them on every single job and it just makes our lives less stressful. And now Matt is transitioning fully out of that role. And he's got a baby coming in January. Though it's like perfect timing for us to complete the transition, and we can perform better for our clients. And we can juggle multiple projects at the same

    Mark D. Williams 25:08

    time. So walk me through that. So you had multiple projects, you were chasing the drawers and for those listening drawers says once a month, we'll submit you know, the progress, progress payments, and just keeping the cash flow, the blood of your, your company going, so you can pay overhead and all those types of things. It's really important. So are you doing one job at a time or now? Well, when this this bomb happened, right, you said,

    25:32

    multiple going on. But again, we were self performing on multiple, and we're talking to three person team, right? And I'm out of town, I was the fourth. And it was just like, we can't operate like this anymore. So now we are we do have right now, three active projects where we're on site, actually four active projects, we're on site. And we have another 18 that are a team that are in pre construction and design

    25:58

    that comes in with the design aspects. We have some jobs that are just design only. And then we have some that are like custom builds, where we're just doing, like custom cabinetry built ins, or something to that extent, inside those jobs. But to answer your question on the rest of our team, we have a project manager. Her name is Katie. And then we have a lead designer and her name is Lesley. And then there's Michael and I Yeah,

    26:22

    another thing that we did coming from last year is coalition started last earlier this year. I remember Nick Schiffer from NS builders was talking about a CFO for hire. Yeah. And we got the introduction to that individual. And it was one of those things where it wasn't high, high priority. So we kind of let it let it drop. And then someone locally who does the same thing saw they reached out to us because we won, we won some awards through Detroit design awards. And she reached out I was like, hey, congratulations, this is what I do. I'd love to connect, we took the call. And now we have a director of finance on the team.

    Mark D. Williams 26:58

    Now you subcontract her work,

    27:00

    I sent these out. You know, it's funny, he does it for just designers and builders. That's all that she does. She won't take on any other clients.

    Mark D. Williams 27:06

    It's funny, you know, one of the benefits of the contractor Coalition for both of our businesses. That's why we're here for both Round two is just not only the networking, the knowledge, I find there's so much value, essentially out of the classroom, if you will, there's a ton in I mean, there's the amount of information in these seminars are amazing. I know there's builder, 20 groups, there's anytime you can get education, I think I didn't put a big enough priority on that early enough in my career. And now it's like all in because I love learning. I mean, I was a good student in college. But I don't feel like a lot of the stuff that I learned in college is helping me run a business. And that's a whole separate podcast, probably. But I feel like these coalition's are anywhere, anytime that you know, maybe somebody's listening as a trade partner, maybe they're a plumber, or electrician. And I know you have to do continued education credits. But there are things above and beyond that about running businesses that have been extremely game changers of just how you structure something, maybe something you've done for a decade, but maybe how you how you bill for it, or how you look at it just slightly different. And all of a sudden now that maybe that pinch point is now a profitability point. I remember calling Morgan Molitor from construction to style who was in Minnesota. I said, you know, I'm thinking about coming to this this coalition summit in Nashville, you know, is it worth the investment? Cuz that's pretty expensive. Yeah. And she said, you will get the value out of it in the first hour. I'm like, that's a pretty big statement. But I wanted to I didn't want to read on the website, I wanted her to sell me on it. And I forget what she told me and I was like, Alright, I'm in. And, and she was within the first hour, it was how I charged on my design contracts. You know, I essentially, I essentially said, Hey, if you do this, the design contract for us is like a way into the door, right? And it really protects us so we can do the design. But if we don't get the build, we're still paid for our services. Well, what I always did is I credited him that money towards the future build, which just made sense. It was like, hey, you know, this, that was another it was a soft way for them to say, you know, get us in the door, then once you go, that deposit will go towards Well, you've now if they build with you, which 90% of them do you were doing the design for free? We used to do the same thing. And I did you know, did you change before you heard you change before beforehand? And I was just like, I can't believe

    29:13

    but the funny thing, guess who we talked to and decided that we were going to change that approach. Morgan

    Mark D. Williams 29:21

    It's funny because Morgan wasn't the one that presented that idea. I believe it was Brad love it at that time but it's

    29:27

    in that's the that's the thing I'll say about the coalition something to just our industry as a whole. The summit brought together probably 30 Different people 20 attendees and then there's a group of others that are around speaking, sponsoring. It's not just getting in with the sponsors and who are vendors and trying to get that relationship. I came in a little bit intimidated in Nashville because I mean, you guys are some big some big deals where you're at there's there's someone there's, there's heavy hitters, yeah, there's heavy hitters, and it's like, okay, well, we're kind of small potatoes. We're gonna do this. We know Morgan, she sold us on it. So we did. And now we're back. And it's like, we're all we've known each other forever. And everyone here is great, super responsive, we have a blast, absolute blast. I mean, I plan to come to all of them, you know, it's the

    30:16

    beauty is that it gives you a ton of knowledge that you're not going to get elsewhere. And you're not only sitting in on these conferences and getting that but then like what you said, you're having these sidebar conversations you're meeting and other people that are doing what you're doing, or doing something similar enough that that dialogue back and forth, and you're like, dang, why didn't I think about doing it that way? Or, Oh, tell me how you're billing this or how you're doing this. And just like, having an actual connection with a person.

    30:45

    Yeah. And it goes beyond in person. I mean, there's so many relationships I've made well, we DM each other all the time, it goes outside of construction, it's me posting something about how my my diets been off and my physique is off. And I haven't been training like I used to, and I'm feeling kind of shitty about it. But I'm getting back to it. And then somebody else that I met at the coalition, somebody need to drop names, but it's a true story. Like they reached out to me, I'm like, Listen, I'm in the same boat. I really enjoyed hearing this this morning. I'm with you. Let's like be champions to do better. And we're both down here again. Right. And that's that story came up yesterday. And in person connections are amazing. It's It's obviously the way we all prefer to do things I think most most humans do. And through the pandemic, that was that was lost.

    Mark D. Williams 31:31

    We're all starve. We're all started post pandemic, we're like, we'll go to anything we humans,

    31:36

    how much is it gonna cost? All right, let's go. But it truly is. And the group of people is phenomenal. And it goes beyond the summit, whether it's a text, a phone, call a DM, we're all connected. And it's just a great group, you know, you're not gonna learn everything there. There's a lot of value that's going to come after the three days,

    Mark D. Williams 31:54

    I had like 35 pages of notes. And I, you know, when I got back, I was like, this is a question, I actually don't even know what I've implemented or not. Because you know, you get back into the grind. And you're like, you're, you know, you're already a week behind, and you're catching up on emails, and you've got whatever going on, and you're like right back into it. But the energy, some of the ideas, I think, are laying in your brain. And then they come out in different ways. I went through maybe two weeks ago, through my 35 page note list, I made it all the way through. And I was amazed at how much I crossed off that I had done. But I wasn't actually following you know, a little bit like back in high school and your take a test that the teacher would allow you to do at eight and a half by 11 or notecard on the cheat sheet. So you'd write down all the formulas or whatever. Well, your remarkable is eight and a half by 11. That's true. And you would never and you would never look at it. Because by writing it down, you committed it to memory. Yeah. And and, and I think that the coalition those notes for me, it was like, you know, you absorb that information a different way. And then of course, you're talking about it. And you're right, there were connections, there's a couple other builders that would call me I'd call them and then you know, we're all going through similar,

    32:53

    ever everyone who's in this business is going through the same stuff, vendor problems, quality assurance, problems, cabinetry, everyone seems to be going dealing with millwork problems. And it I hate to say it makes us feel good. But it's it's validating that it's not us. It is a larger issue. And we're all going through it. And we just collectively have to figure out how to resolve I think the

    Mark D. Williams 33:17

    big thing too, and I think our generation I mean, I'm 42 You guys look younger than I am.

    33:21

    We're both near 40. Okay, yeah, within the next three months, well,

    Mark D. Williams 33:27

    next week, all right, well, happy birthday. But there isn't two weeks. The reason I bring up age is I feel like the generation before us, they were less likely to communicate and be like, hey, what do you make of profit for a year? Well, how do you chart what do you pay your employees? Like it's a secret, or they just aren't. And I would say early on in my career, even before I was aware of these types of events, I remember being told the advice was asked for help. I think there's something hardwired in people like if someone genuine in a in a real way, says, Daniel, will you help me? Almost everyone, you're not going to say no, for two reasons. One, it validates your friendship. And two, if someone asks for help, like it takes I think pride is what keeps people from asking for help. And I think if somebody asks us, not only is it empowering, in some ways, it's empowering to the person being asked, it's almost a gift to the person being asked like you respect me that much. Yes, exactly. And I would say anyone that asks for help, you know, you will, and you want to be respectful of people's time and those types of things. But at the end of the day, like we're humans, you touched on it earlier, Michael, like you know, and I think people respond to that. I also think you can ask you to clients for help, you know if you're trying to explain something to them, and I think because homebuilding and remodeling is so it isn't intimate process. You're in somebody's home. And it's very yeah, sometimes too much so but like, I think it's just they understand you as a person. And I think at the end of the day, if you're Picking a builder or a remodeler at the same strata, or, frankly, any business, if they're the same strata, they should be within a percent or two for cost. So you really shouldn't be making a business or you shouldn't really hire someone based on cost, in my opinion, you should base it on, do I do I think this person's values align with mine? You know, do they listen? Do I do I want to be around these people? And I kind of joke sometimes, like, if you don't like me, you really shouldn't hire me

    35:29

    that we say we say that with clients, because we always do an in home consultation. First we charge for it. It is for two reasons. One, we get to see the home, walk through it. Talk about any issues that we see some ideas, then we have a follow up. But the main reason is, what vibe are we going to get?

    Mark D. Williams 35:45

    Wait a minute backup. Tell me about that. So you're the first time you ever meet them? You tried before? Yeah. Okay, you have to tell me how this works.

    35:52

    So it, it actually started, oh, my gosh, probably three years ago, where we were getting so many calls. And we were going on site and we were doing the incident, they just like really didn't come into anything. And at first I was like, that's fine. You know, we're growing. This is something that we should, should we do, but we should be doing but what we quickly realized that because we do have a social media following and that typically is where clients are finding us that we were having people book us just purely so they could meet Michael and I celebrities like like they literally

    36:28

    like it was really weird, because we're not that big. We're not that big.

    36:32

    Like that, like people were like, I'm like, so nervous for you to be here. And it was weird, didn't even have a project or scale. And so then we started chatting again, with the friends and the industry of like, well, what are you doing, and so they started saying, like, just charge for that. And that'll weed people out right away. And so at first we were charging, like 150. And then we were like, we still were getting so many inquiries. And so then we upped it to 250. And we were still getting so many inquiries, and then we upped it to 495. Every still.

    37:03

    So the thing that we did recently, this year, we overhauled the website from top to bottom, brought in a team that's in the metro Detroit area to build a custom for us. One of the things that we did is we created a contact form. And because we offer services that are interior design, only design build custom cabinetry and built ins and content creation, we had four basically four different budget parameters to choose from. So it's all it's all based on, it basically selects people kind of filters down, and they still try to weave around and be like, Oh, because our interior design packages start the threshold is 10,000. So they'll pick that and then they were like, oh, we need to take down a load bearing wall and we want to expand our footprint. That's that's definitely not just interior design, right. But you know, the the parameters and the contact form weeds, a lot of people out right off the bat. But also when people people will ask the question was that 495 Go towards my project? No, you're paying for our time, because our time is valuable. And if we're spending, if we're taking 20 minutes to 30 minutes to drive an hour there 20 to 30 minutes to drive back, plus the 30 minutes prior before driving and the 30 minutes after because you're not really dialed in, you're not in the zone, that becomes a potentially a three hours out of the day. It's not just one hour, it's the entire crux of it. And I mean, we put all that and in into the next we're kind of undercharging. But that's,

    Mark D. Williams 38:31

    that is that's,

    38:32

    that's amazing. We have a great.

    38:35

    And we know a lot of other builders and things and designers don't

    Mark D. Williams 38:38

    do how do you? How do you receive that payment? You send a DocuSign you send a contract? Or QuickBooks Benbow or QuickBooks

    38:44

    Venmo for business, the Feds know about it. So does our CPA. Yeah. But I mean, we have a great success rate where nine out of 10 that we go to see,

    Mark D. Williams 38:54

    you know, early on in your career, I could speak for myself, I mean, you take any call go anywhere, because you just I mean, that's a classic business, right? And after a while, you're like, I don't need to do this for practice. I'm a professional, you know, you can't go to the doctor's office and get a checkup. You know, because you're interested in like, what's going on like that you're running a business? Yes. And, you know, obviously, the way I do it, I shouldn't say obviously, because you're instructing me right now that maybe I should even change how I do this. But I will vet them with a phone call for 15 minutes. And it just high level and I used to not like to talk about price because you know, I've had, every once I'm a eternal optimist, every once in a while, you know, maybe once or twice every 10 years, I get someone who said their budgets way lower and it turns out, it's five times the height, you know, it's like but so, you know, in your brain, you're like, well, that person couldn't you just don't know, but it's hard to run a business, you know, on on those wishful thinking. So, anyway, you have the call, you know, what's your timeframe? You know, what kind of size home are you looking at? You know, Have you have you ever been in one of our homes are you referral from one of our clients like trying to understand like all that's on

    39:52

    our contact form other than timing, so we basically can select, obviously they put their name, email, their address, So we can actually look up and see what the home looks like photos, they can attach pictures, some people have reached out and they've sketched out what they wanted to look like, or they have a blueprint from an architect that they worked with prior. They have, there's a whole section that they can fill out with, like, tell us everything, anything you want us to know. And then we have we have How did you? How did you hear about us?

    Mark D. Williams 40:25

    What how do you what do you say when because I'm just thinking, let's say it's a new build. And let's just say for me, it's a three or $4 million build. And let's say they're interviewing, like three or four other builders who none of them are going to charge for the service. And I would explain to them say, Well, we do charge, and here's why it's my time. And then their response is, well, your peers don't, and they're maybe they're perceived to be a, you know, a higher level tier than me anyway, what would be your advice to me to go back?

    40:51

    I would, I literally would be like, well, then maybe you should move forward with them.

    Mark D. Williams 40:55

    And then just called like, essentially, call their bluff or call it out? Yeah.

    40:59

    Like if you're gonna spend $3 million on a home, right? What's $500? Like, you're not even committed? And that

    41:06

    is the interesting point, because we have had those questions come up, and they'll they'll select the parameters of 200 to 250,000. Well, if you're worried about 495, do you really have that budget, because this, that you're investing into this into this project, from the start, you invested time, to research design builds, you spent the time to fill out the form to attach the documents to reach out, and now you're going to invest time in correspondence and potentially this in person consultation be

    41:35

    the only industry that just gives things away?

    Mark D. Williams 41:38

    It is and I bet you I mentioned we go to different parts of the country, like we're in California right now. And I asked, you know, percentage wise, like, what are they? You know, what do they charge in California? And he's, like, 17, to 20%, which, for new construction, which is significantly higher than it is in Minnesota? And, you know, remodeling, you know, that'd be you know, more in line with remodeling numbers, were in Minnesota anyway. And, you know, I think there is something to be said about, like, what does your area and, you know, part of the country, you know, what does it support? And so it's interesting, obviously, I've grown up in Minnesota, and so I'm biased against this, because I am Minnesota, and so I'm probably likely to please that, but I'm gonna, I might try it. It's interesting, though, because like, if What if an architect recommended a client to us, you know, now I have an architect who I also want to get at, you know, to a relationship with them. And I'd be like, well, I'd like to meet your client, but I have a charge of 500 bucks. I'm not sure that story plays really well. So I, you know, I, well, here's

    42:30

    nothing to think of, when you when somebody calls a plumber or an electrician, for a really small issue. They have a trip charge. And they also have a minimum charge. So I'm, which is usually reflective of the trip charge. But sometimes if you if I don't know the internal guts of a toilet need to be flushed out or whatever it is 10 minute job, you're paying $150 for that for 10 minutes and a $10 part. That's just the business if an outlet is gone bad and it needs to be swapped out. That could be 150 to $200 for a $5 outlet,

    Mark D. Williams 43:04

    right. But people are happy to pay it because they know like, that's just that's special. Yeah. But when it

    43:09

    comes to them spending on on their home, and this isn't for everyone. But we do see this in our industry where sometimes someone's going to invest heavily in their home, it gets questioned what what they're paying for. And we've gotten questioned to on like, our fees, like what, why is GC and pm so high? Why is interior design so high? I understand the electrical, the framing, and the insulation, the plumbing, I get all that. But why are these so high? I'm just like, do you want us to keep the lights on show up? But

    Mark D. Williams 43:37

    I would say warranty, I mean, you want me here we have to in Minnesota, we have to warranty your homes for 10 years on the structure. And I found this out recently in a podcast interview that we are held to a higher standard than commercial buildings, commercial buildings are like five years or less crazy. It is crazy.

    43:52

    And I get it because people are living in the domicile. But

    Mark D. Williams 43:56

    yep, in the lobby of it. It's a home. It's, you know, the American dream.

    43:59

    But you could say the same thing about commercial too, that you have all these people, different families, you could have 1020 3040 100 Different families in a commercial space. And if that fails, right, that's a mass catastrophe. It should just be the same across the board. Anyway, yeah, we won't get into Minnesota law.

    Mark D. Williams 44:17

    You guys, obviously are husband and wife, you guys are the owners of your company. How do you handle conflict management between yourself? Does it ever come up within the company, you know, essentially, like how do you make decisions as a team? And how do you I've always been interested in this in partnerships, especially when it's a husband and wife. How do you shut it down when you're on family time? Walk me through some of the things.

    44:39

    That last one we're still working on? Maybe on episode 111 You'll have us back and then we can talk about

    44:45

    I think that the beauty is is that Michael and I have always said that our relationship is the most important relationship and anything that we do like in our family, our relationship is the most important in our business. Our relationship is the most important so I'm really honing in on the relationship and like how we can effectively live, grow, develop together. So for that, communication obviously is key with everything that we do. We actually both see a therapist, we see her separately, we see her together.

    45:20

    It's not marriage counseling. I mean, we yeah, we see a therapist to talk about how we're feeling where the stress is where the anxiety is. For me personally, it's how what what tools can I put in my box that allow me to show up better? And stronger for my family? My kids, my team? Yeah.

    45:40

    I mean, mine's the same. Like I definitely see the same therapist.

    45:43

    Yeah. And the only reason she will see us together is because we're not there for marriage counseling. It has nothing to do with you

    45:49

    see a separate and together Yeah, because we have the option to she'll she sees like couples only to gather. Like you guys aren't each other's problems. But that's been super beneficial. We've been doing that. Three years, three years together, I started right after we started the best. So I've been seeing her for four years. And that was just like an immediate necessity of running your own company and realizing like, if you don't have yourself together, like everything crumbles. Yeah.

    46:15

    And again, you get really personal with yourself. Yeah. And I, I'm a, I'm a proponent for anyone who's any adult who's running the business entrepreneur, or if you're even just a professional, you're working for somebody else. After what we've dealt with, collectively, the past couple of years with the pandemic, it is extremely beneficial from a mental health perspective, to go talk to someone, you know, I just getting words out to someone who is not bias, and they're not going to judge you. They're there to help you is extremely,

    46:52

    should be doing that. But then, as far as like, how do we deal with like conflict within our team? There? We're just very direct. I mean, I'm a very, very direct person, Michael's a direct person.

    47:04

    I'm less direct than you. I'm working on it.

    47:08

    But it's kind of one of those things like, well, we'll go home and he'll be like, Well, why did you talk to me like that? And I was like, because that's how I talk to everybody. And

    47:15

    it comes up, okay. Yeah. But I'm married to you. Yeah, I'm not I'm not just anybody this this matter. Not a special ring. Yeah.

    47:22

    But I felt like you were talking to me like I was your husband. And I was like, Yeah, but I would have said that to Matt, too. And so I'm like, Okay, it's it's been interesting, because our team was even just having this dialogue. When we were doing an interview. And Leslie had said, she's like, Yeah, they're husband, wife. And she's like, but you never feel that tension. You never feel like a husband and wife arguing. And I was like, Wow, that's pretty rad. Like, you don't feel that way. Like, that's what we're trying to do. But, and then we we've also learned just to stay in our lanes. So when it comes to business things, if we stay in our lanes, things run really smooth. So if I stay in the design lane, I stay in the content lane and Michael stays in the build lane and he stays in the operational lane. Things run really well. It's what we try to jump into.

    48:13

    We don't micromanage sales together. Yeah, we don't micromanage at all. I'm gonna give one story really quick that happened lately. I think it shows the strength of our team and how like, I guess special it is and what we built a an issue came up with a client. The issue had been boiling over weeks, and weeks and months and months, it progressively got worse, someone we couldn't, we just couldn't satisfy and was extremely angry. It got to the point where she had just been very unprofessional to Matthew, as well as one of our tradesmen that was on the job, cursing, pointing out issues that weren't even work that we did. It was toxic before and then the pot boiled over. Matt had sent me a text message just saying, if this ever happens again, I'm out. So I said call me. He called me. He told me what happened. I said, is the client home right now? Nope, they stormed off and said, Okay, here's what you're gonna do. You're gonna pack everything up in the trailer, you're gonna hook the trailer up, you're going to drive to the workshop and drop it off. And then you're gonna come to the studio, and we're going to talk. We all talked collectively as a team. If I had listened to my emotion at the moment, during that moment, I would have just fired off in emails that were done Sia, Katie stepped in. She has a lot of pm experience. She said, I get it at somebody and Katie is our project manager. So she stepped in and said, Listen, I get it completely get it. I think we should handle it this way. And she explained it. And that's how we handled it. At the end of the day, we ended up we fired the client a went through three weeks of back and forth. We showed up on site to walk through everything and then we did everything we did everything we could, but the point. The point is it wasn't Danielle or myself. that said we're done. It was it was a collective team, it was all five of us that decided we're going to take, we're going to take a loss on this not a huge loss, but we're going to take a loss. But even what we responded to the client, we just said, the mental health of our employees means more than finishing this job. We're not going to put them in a toxic environment. How do we refuse to do it?

    50:19

    Well, the first time it was, it was very interesting. I did it in person first, then I did it on a phone call.

    Mark D. Williams 50:26

    So they were like, we're not we're not letting you you're basically they

    50:29

    tried to call our bluff.

    50:30

    Listen, it was polite. It was it was they were super apologetic, very understanding situation on the phone. It became toxic. And she started yelling over me. And I asked her not to speak, yell over me, because I didn't talk over her. They got angry. And I said, you know, I don't You don't need to answer this right now. I'll email you will follow up. So I filed up an email. And then it remained it remained on email. They never called me right after email. So then I, what I said, I brought basically broke up with them three times. But never did they pick up the phone. Because I think that they knew I mean, it. This wasn't our first go around with them. I'm talking

    Mark D. Williams 51:11

    about what was happening. I think it's interesting, we had a difficult client situation. And with a new home, I don't know if it's different. But we're about halfway through not even halfway through a quarter through, and I started seeing some major red flags. And I tend to be someone that's going to I'm a peacemaker. I'm Switzerland, and I have an optimist, you know, and so it makes me very good at remodeling, by the way, because I can look at anything and be like, this can be amazing. It also makes me very bad at buying property for myself, because I'm like, I can make this anything like wow, that cost a lot of money to do that. Later, yeah. But going back to the, you know, dealing with a I have this lawyer, actually, who teaches a continuing ed class, and it's called how to deal with a crazed homeowner. And I had one of these for a year, and walking through how to deal it was very different because they were they, they were having an enjoyable time. And so was our team, everybody was stressed out. And at the end of the day, like I am committed to building you a for my own reputation. And for what we do, like I'm building this beautiful home. And regardless of how rocky This is, like we're out to sea in a cruise liner. And even if I don't like the people that are on the boat, it's my job as the captain to get this boat to shore. And I didn't feel like I could just walk away. Plus, I don't even know how you do that. And I know why you would do it in a new new construction. Because I can tell you this, let's say I have been approached before where a builder was fired by a client, what seems to be almost an easier scenario. I don't know the legal legal parameters of firing a client. From my point of view, hopefully I never have to deal with that in my career. And I'll seek legal advice, obviously, if I had to do that. But you know, we were approached to homeless like halfway through, but I didn't want to take it on because how do you deal with your warranties Am I can't in my absorbing the foundation warranties, I like it's legal night, it is a legal nightmare. And in some ways, like there are times where a contractor isn't doing what they should do, it really puts the homeowner in a difficult situation to because let's be fair, both sides could be out of line. And let's just say the homeowner has to come find a builder, man, we have to we would have to charge a very high rate to take on this risk that we are now having to take on. And you hear these stories in the industry. Thank goodness, we've never had to deal with something like this. Where you know, maybe the someone's gone through a couple builders will talk about a red flag. I mean, like, yeah, there's at some point, you know, there's a there's a continual pattern here. And so

    53:34

    with this client, the beauty was no beauty in it, but like we weren't leaving the house on sale. Like yeah, we were in punch

    53:40

    list. Like it was just punch list. The biggest thing we had to do was grout a backsplash. That's it that's you're done with it. Yeah, yeah, everything else was done. Yeah.

    Mark D. Williams 53:51

    Again, you're listening to the curious builder podcast. This episode is brought to you by Pella windows and doors. They've just been an amazing partner over my entire career. I've been building for 18 years and I've pretty much built every single home with Pella being installed in in my homes and whether you're doing a small remodel, whether you're doing commercial are high and architecture, they have a product and a service that can fit any one of your needs. And on a personal level. And Peter over and management have just been incredible mentors to me, both as a person and as a business owner. It's been a very special relationship and their team, their general manager, their sales department and their service. I mean, you call them they're there. They backup what they say and they're the only window company that has a lifetime warranty on their windows. So when it's time to do a remodel or build a new home. Pella is the brand that we trust and we support please reach out to them at Pella northland.com or on their Instagram at Pella Northland. Give them a follow give them a like Be sure to follow what they're doing. And be sure to tell your Pella rep that you heard about him from the curious builder. All of our episodes and video are available at Curious builder podcast.com. And now back to our guest.

    55:09

    But that's not where we ever want to

    Mark D. Williams 55:10

    be. And that's what's hard too, because I've had it before where I feel like people use my own reputation as a weapon against myself. And what I mean by that is like, you know, we're conscientious, we want to do a good job, of course we care, you know what other people say to the, to the point of like, of course, you want a good reputation. That being said, like if someone says, Well, you know, Mark is this, that another thing, it doesn't really bother me, it's like, I know who I am, I know what I do. But you still want to have, you still want a reputation of being good, who want I mean, it's,

    55:38

    you just can't control what people are gonna say, when you're not around.

    Mark D. Williams 55:40

    And I think through this process, I finally there was a number of times where I couldn't call the clients bluff, because I wasn't willing to kind of go to the test, you know, of seeing it through it. And at the end of the day, they liked their home, I think just the process was very difficult for them. And, and they have a beautiful home. I think they love it. And I hope they do. And, you know, I've learned a lot, you know, one of my questions for you is, you know, do you guys have a story of a time that you've failed? I think you kind of just use one, but you know, but essentially, tell me about when you failed and landed on your face. But when you failed, and at the time you thought, Man, this is this is the end or this is terrible. But then, through the course of time, you realize that that maybe had been one of the best things that's ever happened to me. And maybe it's example you already stated, you know, at the coalition when you had to walk out because the thing was blowing up while you're gone. Yeah.

    56:27

    And that that that was definitely an example. And that actually bad actually ended up being funny enough, we've we've fired two clients this year. That one happens to be

    56:38

    this sounds really good. Oh, my goodness.

    56:41

    Yeah, this was just a year. And again, we No project is going to be it is going to be roses. No, skipping down the street, you know, just put on whatever magical movie scene that there is one of the hardest industries there is not only that, but we're coming out of a of a global pandemic. And people being gobbled up in their houses and stressed out and we're charged from, you know, the political landscape all every day, all day, and it's extremism. And we try and no, I do try to give clients or just people in general the benefit of the doubt, like, okay, they're, they're having a bad day there, they must be going through some things like, let's hear him out, let's just let's get it done. But when it keeps happening over and over again, there is no benefit of the doubt at that point. Like there's a larger issue. If we can't solve that issue. We can show up and do our job and do it really, really well. We are the experts. That's why you hired us. But unfortunately, this year, there's was two situations where we just there was no way we were gonna be able to place him. It was just unrealistic.

    57:49

    But I think in like, going back to what you were saying, as on both of those jobs, are there things that you've learned always, I feel like anytime we fail there, that's how we're learning and the mistake that we're gonna have we have, that's how we're learning. And so like, again, going back to us communicating so openly with our team and having those dials like what could we have done better to maybe prevent this from getting here? The one that Michael just told you about literally, that they had had occupancy of their house, and there were months, they were mad about

    Mark D. Williams 58:22

    a shelf. So it's just, I mean, that's unrealistic expectation, they were

    58:27

    mad about, like a drywall scenario, when you turn off the lights and you tilted your head. Like those types of things where we're,

    58:35

    we were we had to explain at 20 finish, and they're like, Well, should be 100. I'm like, we're never gonna doesn't work like that in

    58:41

    that scenario. But it just I think, ultimately, both of the issues that we've had recently come back to setting expectations, and how are we going to set these expectations? And what is this going to look like for us. And that's something that I we're continually trying to build that I'm like, also recognizing that we can't control or how clients are going to set their own expectations. But what I can do is try to have those deep, hard conversations during those touch points that I know are sticky. And so we've talked internally as a team. We're working right now to try to figure out like, I think that on our larger scope projects, we're going to have four meetings where you meet with Michael and I in person, and like those will be during those hard points. And then our DC and RPM are also going to meet on site weekly. How long

    Mark D. Williams 59:34

    are the durations of your priming the one time I guessing they range quite a bit, but

    59:39

    the one project that we were just talking about the one that we we left where they're still tile and grout, I mean, we had been on that job because it was since February? No but we had been on that job like pre Construction wise since since 2020. So

    Mark D. Williams 59:57

    do you charge out of curiosity in that situation? Do you are you charging hourly for your services, or how do you guys charge? So

    1:00:02

    for that contract? No, we're in, we're still trying to figure that out. So we calculate how many hours we think it's going to take for GC and project management. Every contract from an interior design perspective, there are hours, like a retainer of hours set in the initial estimate. And then if that I want that hour retainer hit 75%, we will let them know. And usually it's they have to re up hours. And

    Mark D. Williams 1:00:27

    so you're, you're tracking your hours when you're working? Yeah. And so I usually like buildertrend, or what are you using to track your hours?

    1:00:33

    We're actually using a design software that's called material. Oh, they were

    Mark D. Williams 1:00:38

    there be there? If I was a design, build firm that use that selection process, I was very impressed with how they presented that it's good. You used them before that.

    1:00:48

    We were in contact with them. Okay, that but we hadn't like fully committed, because, you know, if you like fully kind of just something, you're gonna dive everybody into it? I know. It's been a great platform, because we're so design heavy for clients. Yeah, like everything lives, they're

    Mark D. Williams 1:01:06

    very optically beautiful as well. I feel like, you know, one of the reasons why Apple products have been so successful as the user interface is so intuitive. I feel like while I have not used material, I just felt like it was like, Wow, this was I send it to a lot of I send it to a lot of designers that I work with, just to see if that was something that they could use, because I was impressed

    1:01:25

    by it. And then it's been awesome, because obviously, we know Marybeth very well. And so like we can schedule calls with her and tell her like, where are we're we're having difficult times, they've been just amazing that way for us.

    1:01:37

    But the one benefit to I just want to cap on this is through these tough situations. It has it has made our team dynamics so much better. And coming from a corporate world where these situations the clients have come up and there, there is no firing a $50 million a year client, you just have to get it done. And some of our employees have been in similar situations like that. I know, because they've said it, they truly value the leadership that we provide, and in importance that's put on their mental health and their well being. Yeah, so you can't win them all. Goal for 2023 is just knock it out of the park and make every client happy. Yeah, that's what we'll do.

    Mark D. Williams 1:02:17

    I mean, it's always the goal. I mean, it's like any relationship. I mean, you know, you both sides have to work on it, right. And so I mean, anytime there's kind of this conflict resolution, it comes up in a lot of, well, every job. And, you know, you sit down, you listen, my my kind of Mo is like, I listened to the client, you're listening to get it off their chest, and then you know, basically respond and say, you know, I hear you, I understand what you're going through. And it's hard sometimes, because a lot of times you want to defend your team, or you want to defend your point of view. But it's a little bit I mean, frankly, going back to the family similarities as a lot like having an argument with a family member or a spouse, and it's it's validated in that person's feelings, and understanding that they're heard and, you know, not being dismissive or coming. I think you'd come out with like guns blazing. I mean, it's sort of unfair, is I feel like the clients can kind of come guns blazing. I don't feel like we ever can't No, no. And so you almost always have to find a path of I mean, Switzerland has a great reputation, right? Everyone knows if I say, Hey, I had to act like Switzerland, like you're being a peacemaker. And so, you know, you're just trying to find a way to settle things down, because emotions are high. How do we get there? And there's, you know, every client is different. But usually, if you say, I'm sorry, you know, I had referred to I say this all the time on the podcast, that's just something that's pretty core for me, it's a soft answer. turneth away wrath. It's a verse in the Bible that I often think of, before I go into a meeting, and I try to say it to get my, my, because I might be worked up. I mean, obviously, we all have our internal emotions. And I'm like, you know, you're upset, or sometimes you'll, you'll see an email, you know, like, I'm not usually I'm really quick on responding. I'm going to wait 24 hours before I respond to this, because I'm not sure I trust my emotions about something

    1:04:01

    we've started doing lately. So

    1:04:03

    it goes with I think just setting boundaries and like really setting boundaries not only for yourself, but setting boundaries for your clients and your team and the more boundaries that you have. I think the overall better business owner you become

    Mark D. Williams 1:04:17

    Yeah. Kind of transitioning into a close here. How do you set boundaries between the business and your personal life? I mean, you have two children. Yeah, obviously, obviously, our you know,

    1:04:28

    we do all the things together. Yeah. Yeah. Thanks is a challenge where we noticed the challenges like when we when we have date nights, or the boys are put to bed or wrapping it up for the night like we we find ourselves talking about business all the time.

    Mark D. Williams 1:04:42

    But because it might be the only time you see each other that day, or you often during the day and different doing different things. Because you might be on the job and you might be designing you're not necessarily to get

    1:04:50

    we're not together 24/7 Every single day, we are in the studio a lot together, but just because we're there we're doing two completely different things that day. So we're focused on on different elements. We try as crazy as it sounds, we really try not to open the laptop, once we get home for the day. It's hard. And it takes a lot more effort the following day to knock out the checklist, which is, you know, when you come in the morning, you got 50 things thrown at you right away. And it's like, well, I had this beautiful

    Mark D. Williams 1:05:21

    plant I listed.

    1:05:25

    But we make it happen in some days, we do have to open it up, sometimes on the weekend, we have to open it up. But we definitely in rarely do it together. So if she has something she's gonna knock out, I'm focusing on the kids or dinner or laundry or whatever, and vice versa. I think every day, every week, we get a little bit better. It's very difficult, because we do everything together. And I just don't, I think we heard this the other day, too, that the work life balance is kind of a farce, it doesn't really exist. But we balanced the best that we can and that our kids are the most,

    Mark D. Williams 1:06:00

    I think I think it evolves. You know, I understand, I think balance is just that, you know, you know, we did yoga today as part of a team building exercise, right? And so you're holding a pose, some days, you're focused, some days, you can hold a pose, and some days you fall out of it. And it's kind of like, it's okay. I mean, I think business is a lot like that. And like, you know, some days you're like, you know, at the end of the day, you're shutting it down. And you're like, you know, today was not what I wanted it to be. But you know, tomorrow's a new day. And I think having a fresh perspective, I think is really important for any business. Oh, yeah. And I think

    1:06:31

    that for the two of us, it's just being really intentional with our time and what we're doing. And because we're together all the time, when it is we try to schedule weekly date nights with the two of us and like, we give ourselves like that first 1015 minutes that we can chat about work. And then we're like, Alright, on something else. Now, we're not talking about this or at home. I really get it not checking emails, once we get home, Michael's working on it, I'm working on it. But like, I don't wanna get myself fired up, over something like that, when I can be I need to be present as a mom right now. And I need to be president present as a partner right now, versus a business owner right now. And so again, those boundaries of like, this is what I work. This is what my mom, this is how I'm partner. And another layer, I'm creating my life in that way. Because for me, if I don't do that, and it all gets mixed up, I'm not I'm not doing myself any good. And I'm not, I'm just spread too thin.

    1:07:33

    Another layer really quick, I'll add in about I think it was on our 10 year anniversary, we went to a health and wellness retreat called Savannah, which is in carefree Arizona. Cool, coolest name ever. And we turned all of our notifications off. Since we've gotten back, those notifications have stayed off. No social media notifications, no email notifications, we get phone calls, texts, any health related things, but those notifications are off.

    Mark D. Williams 1:08:01

    It's interesting to say that I watched the social dilemma, which is a well known movie, right? Just about the prevalence of social media, your phone, all those things. And I tried to set parameters as well. But ever since then, which was a couple of years ago. i You can't get a hold of me unless you call me. I turned off and I found it was so unproductive to hear that thing. Didn't you sort of resent that sound of emails? And text? No, I don't want you to text either. I don't actually like texts. Unless it's text turned off on your phone completely mean the noises or just the text and you know, you can text me and I think you get into a habit like a check your phone fairly, you know, when I get up? If I'm walking downstairs, it's I mean, maybe it's no different. I think it becomes like a train habit. You can't interrupt me with the text, but I'll just like naturally look at it fairly regularly. But for me texts are, you know, I'm running five minutes late. I'm, you know, you want to meet for lunch. And I you know, we're certainly not the first person that has this problem. But a lot of times clients in the heat of the moment, take a picture of something, send you a video. And, you know, I tell my staff on my team don't respond, or I'll just say please put this in an email so that we can better track it and better serve you and which is true number one, and I really do make it a clear and that you know, for us, you know since you talked about the family for me, I'm home every day at five we have dinner at 530. I never email at night. I don't you know, it's just that and I tell my clients, I think your point about setting expectations. I think because our a lot of our clientele either has families or have had families. I think they understand it can relate to that and you really respect it. I think it actually elevates your brand. And and you know there are times there's always exceptions to a rule where something just needs to be done. Or maybe you did something during the day that wasn't work related. You're like now I have to squeeze it in and that's up to me that's on me. But I just don't think you can be the energetic self, the fresh mindset. I mean, we all need downtime. We can't have it on 24/7 When

    1:09:58

    you can't come in fresh the next day if you're working all night in something

    Mark D. Williams 1:10:01

    in something needs to inspire you. And you know, I guess maybe in a closing question I've ever asked us before, but just coming to mind right now, tell me one thing that inspires you to be better at your craft. Oh,

    1:10:13

    that is a good one. One thing that inspires me to be better at my craft,

    1:10:19

    the first thing that comes to mind for me, I mean, what really inspires me is knowing that our two boys are experiencing a life completely different than what we did. The value, the values, the work ethic, that tenacity that they're witnessing, and that we're instilling in them is going to build them into two incredibly powerful human beings. And we're also showing them that they can do whatever they want.

    Mark D. Williams 1:10:51

    That's a good answer. That's good. That's a Mic drop.

    1:10:55

    Yeah, I like tried to always post on Instagram before. I think, for me, What inspires me is just the continuous development knowledge of that you can do anything, and that you don't have to necessarily have a degree in what you're doing to be really good at it, and that you can chase your dreams. And those dreams can change throughout your life, that what you made a decision at 18 or 19, that doesn't have to be where you're stuck. You don't have to be stuck there for the rest of your life. And I think that so often people see, they get committed to like, this is what I went to school for. And this is what I have my degree in, or this is what I know how to do that that defines you. And so I am inspired by there's so many people out there now that are just doing their thing.

    Mark D. Williams 1:11:46

    Right? Well, I answer the question as well. I guess one of the things that inspires me is, I think Michaels answer was amazing. And I think that's something that I need to give more thought to, you know, I was inspired by obviously seeing people in my family that were entrepreneurs. And so it's like, you know, this empowering idea that, for us, it was always if you can dream it, then you can achieve it. And I think a lot of people think you have to be able to achieve something before you can dream it. But it's nonsensical. You have to dream about something before you can actually do something. Yeah. And certainly there's a lot. Yeah, there's a lot of, you know, they always say like write down your goals, or you'll never achieve them. And they have these crazy stats, I don't know how you track these stats, but they're like, 80% of goals that are written down will be accomplished. But it's true. Because if you don't write them down, like how could it ever have been born. But I guess for myself, I'm really, and I would say passion and empowerment by our peers and those around us that inspire us to be better. And I don't look at people in my own market. Like in terms of jealousy, or envy, that's never been something that really drives me. I'm really empowered and and passionate, like, that is amazing. It makes me want to be better, it makes me want to do better. And I think I think a lot of things in terms of sports, you know, that person is much better at basketball than I am, I really want to work on my shot so that I could be that good. I'm not sure who paid you to say that. But you know, just I think, I think when people can look around, and I think that's what can be very good about social media, but you have to be careful with it. And it's not something that affects me, but I know people that had does, where they've actually had to get off social media, because it it damaged their perception and their self value. And they spent them this too much time looking at other people, and it brought them down. And I can I would feel terrible if that was what you felt about it. And this isn't a great thing about myself. I'm just saying like, I'm so inspired by see a great photo. And you mentioned this group that were the reason we're out here. Like anyone that's here's like, they post something big or small. There was a remodeler. He was just starting, I mean, he was like doing everything himself. And I was like, you know, what he was posting was inspiring to me, even though from a strata level, we it wasn't the same. That wasn't the point. Like, I love what he was doing. And like I was so encouraged that he was like, going and getting it and when he got home, he's like I'm doing this, this and that. That is empowering. And I think everything about this coalition has sort of been collaboration over competition, and we're hearing that more and more in the industry. I think it's so healthy, and so empowering. And thank you very much for making the time to come on our podcast and thank you for having you guys back because you guys are awesome. All right. Thanks, guys. Thank you

    Mark D. Williams 1:14:35

    Thanks for listening to the curious builder podcast. If you liked what you listened to please give us a five star rating and write us a review. It really means a lot. It's a great way for us to just understand what you like about the podcast and while we can keep doing so like and review and please share with your friends and family. Find out more at curious builder podcast.com

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