Helping to Automate Industrial Workflows – Ep169

Enjoy!

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You have found Authentic Business Adventures,
this is a program that brings you

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the struggles stories and triumphant
successes of business owners across the land.

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You can find us locally
at the Sun Prairie Media Center

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and of course, at drawincustomers.com/podcast.

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My name is James Kademan, entrepreneur,

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author, speaker and helpful coach to small
business owners across the country.

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Today we’re welcoming/preparing to
learn from Matt Moseman of Develop LLC.

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And oh my gosh, I forgot the other one.

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NodeUDesign, NodeUDesign.

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I knew there was a big U in there.

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So, Matt, how are you doing today?
Excellent.

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Thanks for the invite.
I just I don’t know any paper in front

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of me I’d I to do this off memory,
so I apologize for that.

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Let’s start with Develop LLC.
Perfect.

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What is Develop LCC? Develop LLC.

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or Develop is just a product
development and automation company.

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All right.

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I started off with helping people or
businesses get their idea to market.

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All right.
That’s really the the main vision of it.

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So it kind of started off in one space.

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And as businesses go,

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it’s evolved into many other. That it’s
the name of the game, man, every business

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seems to evolve, especially
in the past year or two.

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Exactly.

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So tell me, how did you get
interested in that or even into that?

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Because I imagine there’s a lot

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of technical skill needed and there may
be a lot of capital as far as equipment.

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So product development, I guess,

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is just been a passion of mine,
went to school for mechanical engineering

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and then just got into the product
space of it, I guess.

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And that just kind of been
what’s been driving me on it.

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But as far as capital,

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it started off in my parents basement
as a small little machine that.

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All right.
Just bought and like we were kind

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of talking earlier, what it really started
with was making these inconstinence devices

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for urinary and bowel issues
just kind of something random.

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But that was the first client.
How do they find you?

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I was at just a standard dinner event and
that was a person I sat next to.

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They’re just like, hey, do you know anyone
that knows how to make these things?

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Yeah, it turns out I do.
Exactly.

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All right. So did you have to go to school

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for this, or is this something you
learned just from experimentation?

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You know, it’s kind of everybody thinks

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you need to go to school
for a lot of these things.

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And I’d say, yes, school,

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I learned a lot, but a lot
of it’s been experimentation.

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So I went for mechanical engineering

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and then went in the industry
for a little bit.

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And then I was back for actually
a masters in new product management.

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So focusing on portfolio management
is the way I like to look at it.

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Ok, a lot of people manage
a portfolio of stocks,

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let’s say, I like to look at products

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and see how we can drive
dollars with products.

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All right.

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The majority of the products that you
take care of are, I guess, help develop,

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are the outside clients products? Or do you
have any of your own that you’ve helped

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develop or invent,
I suppose would be at that point?

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Yeah, that’s actually a really good
question, because what happens

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in the consulting space,
it’s big ups and downs.

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So when we’re working with clients,

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obviously our internal
projects don’t get hit a lot.

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But you hit the valleys
and that’s where NodeUDesign.

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The other business came from.
Is we leveraged, because we have a team.

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And so we need projects that when we’re

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slower, we can leverage those assets,
if you will, or that skill.

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Nobody wants to just be sitting around waiting

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for the next project to come in or say,
sign the next contract.

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So literally, we just use that team
to help launch the next product.

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All right.
So when a client comes to you,

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are they looking to build, let’s say,
something like a pen

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or a table or is it a computer camera
speaker or something like that?

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Yeah.
What we try and focus on now is products

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that have mechanical
and electrical in them.

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So not just where we once started,

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where it was just mechanical
housings or mechanical fixtures.

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Now we’ve gotten into it.

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It needs to really have electronics

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and need a housing around it or just based
on having more than one set

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of engineering, because that’s the real
value we’ve added to our clients.

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Because you can do both.
Exactly.

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A lot of times they would have to add is

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like the act is like the general
for like building a house.

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They’d have to find somebody that could

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sub their mechanical find somebody
that could sub their electrical,

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somebody that could then
do their their software.

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They come to us and get one full product.
Wow.

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I imagine that’s just easier when you have

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an in-house team that can do that. Exactly.
Because I imagine otherwise there’s going

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to be some finger pointing,
just like when you build a house.

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Oh yeah.

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It’s that’s kind of the name of the game
is nobody wants to take accountability.

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So we kind of come in and say, what’s
really your your goal of this product?

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Where do you want to go?
And we take a lot of upfront time to lay

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that out before we even start,
because that’s how we found that hitting

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their goals at the fastest pace
and under budget is really key.

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So figuring out the project
all with one process.

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All right.
Basically,

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some people want to be very involved
and some people want to fill out those

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initial metrics and then
call me when it’s done.

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All right. So when a client comes

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to you, where are they in the process as
far as development? Are they reaching out

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to you to just see if it’s even a viable
product or even possible to make? Or is this

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something where are they
further along than that?

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We’ve seen every spectrum.

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Is this possible to make I have a patent

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on this, I need to find somebody
to help me prototype it.

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All right.

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I’ve gone to this other consultant or this

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team, and I’ve got a prototype
that is not at all what I dreamed of.

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Oh, I’m off space.

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Can you help us with that?

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OK, or, you know, anywhere in the middle.

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Interesting.
All right.

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Because I imagine talking to someone like
you were having to build something,

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it’s probably not the cheapest
thing in the world.

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You don’t have to talk about actual

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dollars, but you’re not doing favors
for them where it’s like

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for 50 bucks in a beer,
I’ll do this or something like that.

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Like there’s going to be a lot involved.

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And as far as designing and image,
the mechanical stuff, gears, machinery,

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knowledge is the circuit board
stuff that looks like magic to me.

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So I don’t even know how that happens.

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Getting the software onto those circuit

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boards, that’s even
that’s beyond Harry Potter.

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To me, that’s just.

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Crazy to think about all that has

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to happen and just the educated
person that has to make it happen.

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So someone, a client has to be fairly

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committed to making something
like this work? Yeah, definitely.

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And really laying out where those costs

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are going to be, because we want to we
want to get our customers to market

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at the end of the day, like,
you know, we want to make sure that they

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are a client, that we can help
and help within their budget.

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So a lot of times we’ll lay out this is
what our estimated cost is to market.

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And it’s kind of under promise
and over deliver rule.

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Like we tend to come in on the high end

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of what we expect it to be
and then aim to come in under.

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But really, you have to make sure

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that their expectations are correct on how
much this can cost to market,

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because you’re right, it it can be very
cost prohibitive for some people to do.

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Yeah, I mentioned it depends a lot on

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what the product is and what they
believe they can sell the product for.

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I was reading the book.

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Oh, is the guy that invented Teddy Ruxpin.

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Remember Teddy Ruxpin.

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No, Teddy Ruxpin for you kids at home.

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Teddy Ruxpin was Little Teddy Bear, OK,

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that you stuck a cassette in the back
of Teddy Ruxpin

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and as the cassette played, Teddy Ruxpin
would speak OK is most would move.

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So would he move at all or was.
No, no, no, no.

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This is 80s.
So

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he wasn’t very elaborate.

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He just sat there and his
mouth would move.

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But it was that was the toy to have
before Tickle Me Elmo came out.

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And interesting.
And I don’t know if you could stick

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a Metallica cassette in there and have
rock out or anything urban fun.

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I don’t know if the mouth was actually
in sync with the the audio

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on the cassette, but I do know
that this guy invented that.

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And then he essentially talked about

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bringing your invention to market
and essentially selling the rights.

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And then you can make a residual Nutt’s.
Yeah.

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Every time.
And Teddy Ruxpin flies off the shelf.

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Yeah.
Royalties.

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Yeah.
He also did the Nerf boomerang.

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Yeah, I remember the Nerf
boomerang so I remember that.

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Yeah.
I’m going to the title of the book will

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come to me and we’ll put
it in the description.

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But at any rate

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it made me think of something like what
you have going on because

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I mean everybody’s got that idea
for the super awesome products, right.

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The jet powered skateboard or whatever,
but they don’t know how to make it.

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So they come to you and they’re
like mad jet powered skateboard.

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Help me make one and then we’ll see if
there’s a market for it or something.

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Yeah, the market is up to them.
OK.

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Our goal is to get them to market.

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But yeah, on the sales and marketing
and surely their their aspect of it.

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All right.
All right.

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Now let’s think of those.

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I don’t know what they’re called our
boards or something like that where you

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lean different directions and it
goes forward and sticks or whatever.

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Yeah.

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OK, I, I stood on one of those for about
five seconds and end up on the floor.

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Yeah.

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And all I could think was who’s the guy
that invented this,

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who is the company like yours that put it
together and figured out the software

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for how much you lean those different
speeds and all that kind of stuff.

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Yeah, that would.

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And then who was the first one to write it
that said like, oh, this is easy.

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That one was probably some seven year old
problem because yeah.

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My son and his friend, they’re just like
all those curves around.

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Yeah.

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But it’s, I look at that or
I look at drones.

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The fancier drones where they can sit

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in a breeze and just hold still,
that’s pure magic to me.

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Yeah, definitely further
out than we’re going, OK?

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All right.

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We’re more on like the like based
on the Nottie design product line.

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We’re more on like.

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Real kind of lower level consumer

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electronics, we’ve done like
keyboard stuff like that, OK?

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The automation space that’s going to go
into like a controlled cabinet

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on a manufacturing floor,
actually stuff that we kind of hit.

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All right.

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We’ve done a little bit in the consumer
space, but that’s a little tougher.

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Gotcha.

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OK, just because it’s not as robust
or because it’s kind of like you got

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to hit it out as fast as you can in six
months or it’s not really our core.

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And like our our team’s not built around

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having the skills to do
a lot of those gotcha.

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Kind of organic modeling,
if you will, around that.

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And then just kind of the aspects
that bring a lot of that together.

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GACHET We’re pretty small,
so just a five person team.

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OK, so you stick more with manufacturing
the equipment that actually manufacturers.

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So we’ll help you.

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We’ll help do like turnkey
machines for automation.

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OK.
So if somebody has their widget

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that they’re making their floor and they
realize that say they have a couple

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of people on the line that are getting,
you know, a tedious task, then, you know,

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the rest are always saw or it’s
the bottleneck in the process.

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All right.

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And they want to automate that to get
more of their widgets out.

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OK, so instead of building them or

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creating the pen, you would be building
the machine that creates the pen.

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Yeah, that’s where we come in a lot.
Gotcha.

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So figuring out how to screw in the end,

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slip in the spring and now whatever
else they have to do to make it.

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Yeah, interesting.

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So how does a manufacturer find you?

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It’s been all word of mouth is how
we’ve worked with all of our clients.

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It’s kind of been just
a trickle effect, if you will.

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All right.
It’s kind of compounded.

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So are there some success stories about
something where a client came to you

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and said, hey, I want to build this widget
and you just figured it out?

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Nothing really like.

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Crazy that we can share a lot of our
stuff, like we’ve only been in business

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now for two years for our
cool stuff, if you will.

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We need the incontinence devices that are

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out there that people can see and some of
the stuff that’s been around for a while.

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But, yeah, a lot of this stuff is kind
of captured in some India’s gadget fair.

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OK, well, we don’t want
the FBI coming down.

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Everything’s shared.

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Tell me about if I’m one of the things
that is always a challenge to me when I

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think about business
is we’re going to start a business.

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There’s a capital outlay
for any given business.

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If you’re going to be a painter,
you get to buy a van, a bucket and brush.

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Yeah, but if you’re going to start
a manufacturing company,

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you’ve got to come up with machines
and stuff like that and come up

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with someone like you to help
design those machines.

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So when clients are coming to you,

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generally speaking,
are they newer or are they?

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They’ve been around for a little while.

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They have processes and some of those
processes are less than efficient.

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So it’s turned into more of like
the twenty to one hundred employee

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companies that have been
around for five years.

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All right.
Yeah.

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And how have you seen technology evolve
from machines?

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Because I imagine everything’s getting.

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I’m pausing to say, is it better or is it
bigger, bigger, better, faster, more so.

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How has technology
changed what you guys do?

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Everything needs to be connected to what’s

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happening on the floor,
needs to be connected to what’s happening

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on the accounting level and being able
to drive that data out and make it really

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easy for the people that aren’t constantly
on the floor to see what they’re their

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throughput is what the process
is and find issues.

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All right.

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So everybody wants
to know what’s happening.

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We’re now.

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So I’m thinking let’s just
talk about the pen, right.

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So the accountant or the purchaser,

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I guess it would be, needs to know
how many caps they bring in.

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They just got a P.O. for
one hundred thousand pounds.

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Sure.

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Now they’ve got a trickle
that all out of the pipeline.

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They’re going to get capped springs.

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I imagine there’s certain pieces that are

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going to be defective
that they’ll want to figure out.

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I’m thinking like springs’ or maybe
exploding ink or whatever it is

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that that all from the manufacturing line
can go back to an ERP system in real time.

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Till the controller,
hey, man, you got a problem?

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Yeah, we’re seeing X number of scrap or
we’re not getting the throughput we want.

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All right.

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You know, that is cool.
Yeah.

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Yeah.

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What gets measured gets improved,
I guess, as far as that goes.

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So that’s awesome.

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So do you work with certain ERP programs

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or just software programs in general
to help companies, or do they tell you,

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hey, we have this system we built or
basically we sent a packet of data

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that can get driven into however they
want, basically get it out to Ethernet,

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to an HTP portal and just
drive it basically to the web.

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OK, you can handle it from there.

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Sometimes we we’ve done some different
applications, but very nesh.

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OK, so you essentially say we have this

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information as a oh my gosh,
my software does.

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Is it getting put or I don’t remember
essentially that basic information.

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Most software is we have some API.
Exactly.

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If they can just take that software or

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take that information and put it
whatever database they need to put it.

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Exactly.
Gotcha.

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All right.
That’s interesting.

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So how did you end up deciding I’m going

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to go in business on my own
and this is what I’m going to do?

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That’s who.

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How did I decide,
like we had a job, you just like,

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screw this noise, I’m going to do my own
thing, or did you always want to start

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a business and didn’t know
what it was going to be?

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I think it just I don’t know.

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I just kind of grew up with that,
if that makes sense.

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OK, I guess kind of go
back in time a little bit.

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I grew up on a family farm,
so it’s like always waking up.

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You’re going to be out doing x y task.

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That’s something I’ve always,
you know, done together.

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And my first business was

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probably the same as everybody
else but a lawn care business.

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When I was 12, I realized

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I wanted to go work and get actual

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dollars, not just showing up the farm
and working and I getting paying rent.

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So you got a roof over your head.

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That’s I wanted to go make dollars
and I found out you had to be like 14 or

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something at the time
to actually get a job, so.

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Well, what can we do?

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So I started a small lawn care business
that was just a couple of neighbors.

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And then it quickly turned into, you know,
ten or twelve, I think it was at the peak.

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So it was just small.

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But that was when I was,
you know, struggling.

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And I did that from 12 to 18.

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You realize six years you stuck with it.
Yeah, I did that.

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And then while I was in high school,

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as soon as I could basically have
my driver’s license,

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I got a job at a manufacturing facility
where I was jibbering,

[00:15:54]
staying last and just on the factory floor
doing manual labor, basically.

[00:15:58]
But then I still did the long
care as well at the same time.

[00:16:00]
Wow.
So, all right.

[00:16:03]
You know, I’ve interviewed a few long term

[00:16:06]
people that just started out
either super young or to pay for college

[00:16:10]
or something like that,
and they built it into decent businesses.

[00:16:15]
I think I could name probably six of them.

[00:16:16]
OK, even locally here,

[00:16:19]
that they’re just like I didn’t plan
on doing this for the rest of my life.

[00:16:23]
No, it’s making money.

[00:16:25]
So, yeah, I never had like a trailer or
anything that I hooked up to a truck cause

[00:16:29]
I had to be able to drive
there with them for.

[00:16:31]
Oh, nice.

[00:16:32]
This is we have a finite
radius of where we can go.

[00:16:34]
So marketing is really easy.

[00:16:36]
I just basically printed out the fliers
and went around to the house.

[00:16:39]
Oh that’s awesome.
Yeah, that’s awesome.

[00:16:41]
Anybody get mad because you didn’t do it
the right angle or something like that or.

[00:16:45]
No, it was just like the grass is shorter.
We’re all good.

[00:16:48]
Yeah, I’m a bit OCD, so yeah I striped
every lawn and had fun with it.

[00:16:52]
Oh no it was, it was probably a little

[00:16:54]
over the top for what I was going for,
but I don’t know why.

[00:16:57]
I’ve always just enjoyed mowing lawns.

[00:16:58]
Sure I still do ours and so.
Oh all right.

[00:17:02]
That’s all good.
Yeah.

[00:17:03]
So you, you said the business currently

[00:17:05]
has been two years, but you’ve
been in business longer than two.

[00:17:08]
Yes.

[00:17:08]
So Ben Develop has been
around for six years.

[00:17:11]
OK,
two years was when basically I went full

[00:17:15]
time on it and then the co-founder
of Nottie Design also went full time.

[00:17:19]
So he works within develop and well we’re

[00:17:21]
building out Nodi Design
to get that product to market.

[00:17:24]
Really nice.
Let’s talk about no, you design, OK,

[00:17:27]
because you you had to help me
understand exactly what a node was.

[00:17:31]
Yeah.

[00:17:31]
So can you elaborate
on that just for the crowd.

[00:17:34]
Yeah, it’s it’s really tough to sometimes
break down, but in the automation space

[00:17:38]
there’s think of like a light switch or
a breaker panel in your house and a light

[00:17:42]
switch is kind of a passive device
that you always go out there and flip in.

[00:17:45]
It drives that power, if you will.

[00:17:47]
Back to your breaker panel.

[00:17:48]
All the data in what we’re
doing is driven that way.

[00:17:52]
So these switches that were on a lot

[00:17:53]
of machines were very sub located,
if you will, and then they drove back

[00:17:58]
to a larger panel where all
the controls is happening.

[00:18:01]
All right.
What we’ve done is we’ve put logic

[00:18:03]
on the switch level so we can
increase speed and precision.

[00:18:06]
OK, so the logic is essentially
at the light switch.

[00:18:09]
So that’s exactly.
Yeah.

[00:18:10]
Rather than at the breaker panel.
Yes.

[00:18:12]
And how does that make it more efficient?

[00:18:14]
So it’s basically just
produced in the loop.

[00:18:17]
It seems weird where like you might only

[00:18:19]
be going across the room,
but we’re talking milliseconds.

[00:18:22]
So the difference in speed can be

[00:18:24]
the difference between somebody
losing an arm or maybe crushing it.

[00:18:28]
All right.
So things like that,

[00:18:30]
it’s telling people that most
people would prefer to not lose it.

[00:18:32]
Exactly.
It’s good.

[00:18:34]
Interesting.

[00:18:35]
I was learning about the whole stock

[00:18:38]
market thing where there was the wire
that they were trying to connect.

[00:18:41]
I want to see from.

[00:18:44]
Oh, man, I don’t remember exactly where it

[00:18:46]
was, Chicago to New York that they’re
trying to make us cable trading volume

[00:18:50]
for fractions like
tiny amounts of milliseconds.

[00:18:56]
That’s just blew my mind how
much work was going into that.

[00:19:00]
But then you see how much
money they can make off that.

[00:19:02]
You’re like, oh, yeah, I get it.

[00:19:04]
There’s dollars in the data.

[00:19:05]
Yeah, it’s so interesting
that it’s so interesting.

[00:19:08]
So that said, you come across a company
that’s 20, 50 years whatever into doing

[00:19:14]
their thing, they may or may not know
something like this even exists.

[00:19:19]
How do you sell it or present it to them

[00:19:21]
and say, look, you’re doing well,
you can do better?

[00:19:24]
Yeah, that’s that is something we’re still

[00:19:26]
learning and selling the nodes we thought
we’d be selling, we made these separate

[00:19:31]
peripherals where people would
build their own solution.

[00:19:33]
People want turnkey.
So, all right.

[00:19:35]
What we found is we’re basically going
to a module solution so they’ll be able

[00:19:40]
to just drop it in and this
is what you’re going to get.

[00:19:42]
So I have basically led indication
for your costs, your users on the floor,

[00:19:48]
you’re going to be able to drive the data
via this language to your system, OK?

[00:19:51]
And you’re going to be able to have this

[00:19:53]
many inputs, outputs,
so you control X, Y, Z.

[00:19:56]
Throwing it down into one kit was really
the kind of the the education barrier we

[00:20:00]
needed to lower for a lot of our clients
was something we learned the hard way.

[00:20:04]
How do you do that on a universal level,

[00:20:06]
since people are making pens or tables or
water bottles like there’s so much riding,

[00:20:11]
what they’re manufacturing,
is there a lot of variety?

[00:20:14]
And what you have to keep track of or is
essentially just is spinning motors and.

[00:20:18]
Exactly.
So it’s just different motors,

[00:20:20]
different cylinders, different different
inputs and outputs into our system.

[00:20:24]
All right.

[00:20:25]
And basically, the program
just has to be written.

[00:20:27]
So the software is different

[00:20:29]
for that machine, but you can
use the exact same hardware.

[00:20:31]
All right.

[00:20:32]
Interesting, because stuff
just has to move or imagine.

[00:20:35]
Stuff has to be sensed like a light switch
or that water bottles in this position

[00:20:39]
on the conveyor belt where
it is and what’s next.

[00:20:42]
All right.
Where does and what’s next?

[00:20:43]
I love that.
So do you go to a manufacturing company,

[00:20:47]
look at what they have going on and say,
this is where I feel like we can help you.

[00:20:52]
It’s been a little bit of both where

[00:20:55]
we’ve gone into places,
kind of evaluated what they’re doing,

[00:20:57]
and we’ll just kind
of propose some solutions.

[00:21:00]
Otherwise it’s been them coming to us.

[00:21:01]
OK, so like I said,
word of mouth is the odd thing for us is

[00:21:06]
a lot of people just keep passing our name
on that we’ve worked with in the past.

[00:21:09]
That’s cool.
Yeah.

[00:21:10]
This the whole on the node

[00:21:14]
information, I suppose,

[00:21:15]
for lack of a better word.
Would they? Is that known technology?

[00:21:19]
Do manufacturers know that this exists?

[00:21:22]
It’s becoming more common.

[00:21:24]
There’s there’s a couple other
solutions out there right now.

[00:21:28]
It’s kind of like that, the mainframe PC,
what happened with computers,

[00:21:31]
where everything was one big PC and then
it goes down to number units,

[00:21:35]
it’s kind of the same thing
in the automation space where everything

[00:21:38]
used to be very small,
like this is localized.

[00:21:41]
And then it all went to these big,

[00:21:42]
bloated systems where you drove all
the cabling back to one solution.

[00:21:46]
Now it’s kind of doing the same thing
where it’s coming back to having

[00:21:49]
the controls closer, because now the cost,
it’s all about the cost basis.

[00:21:53]
Yeah.

[00:21:53]
Where now you can deploy
it more cost effectively.

[00:21:56]
All right.
Stuff smaller sub.

[00:21:58]
All right, subsystems, let’s talk
about failure rate a little bit.

[00:22:02]
I want to ask you about this before.

[00:22:03]
So hopefully it’s not a sore spot,
but I imagine if something like that goes

[00:22:06]
down,
does the whole line go down or how easy is

[00:22:11]
it to get back up and running
if something inevitably breaks?

[00:22:15]
It depends on the system that’s built.

[00:22:18]
We’re in I guess we’ve never gone
into a system where it’s a big line.

[00:22:22]
It’s typically one machine
gets one standalone machine.

[00:22:25]
So if it if that machine goes down,
it’s only affecting that area.

[00:22:29]
All right.
Gotcha.

[00:22:31]
And then when you’re working with clients,
this is something that I found to be

[00:22:34]
a challenge just universally
of any business that I’ve had.

[00:22:38]
Every client wants to believe
that they’re special,

[00:22:43]
their own unique way.

[00:22:44]
I’ll give you the example.

[00:22:45]
We had a client that I was trying to sell

[00:22:47]
in Calls On Call potential client,
and he had an appliance repair company.

[00:22:52]
Typical service company, right,

[00:22:54]
you need something fix, you call them up,
my refrigerator is broken.

[00:22:58]
And he’s like, James, this is tough, man.

[00:23:01]
We have so much information
we have to collect.

[00:23:03]
And I asked them, you know,
just walk me through it.

[00:23:05]
And he’s like, name,
address, phone number.

[00:23:08]
Then we get to know the model of the
refrigerator or whatever, and then brand.

[00:23:13]
And if they don’t know those other two
things, it’s not the end of the world.

[00:23:16]
OK, but is the formatter he was like,
oh my gosh, name, address, phone number.

[00:23:19]
How are you ever going to collect that?

[00:23:21]
Like we collect from pretty much every guy

[00:23:24]
that we have, because
just about every client that we have has

[00:23:27]
onsite service and we need to know
who they are and where they live.

[00:23:30]
Yeah,
but it was interesting from his

[00:23:33]
perspective and this is very common,
there’s that ego with a with a business

[00:23:37]
owner where they’re just like
no one does what we do.

[00:23:41]
We collect the address phone number.

[00:23:43]
So how do you deal with that?

[00:23:45]
Because I imagine a manufacturing

[00:23:47]
that goes even beyond that,
because you’re collecting different data.

[00:23:50]
That’s you.
It’s like it’s a spending thing

[00:23:52]
and a sensor that tells you if
this product is there or not.

[00:23:55]
Yeah, but to that business owner or
manufacturer, they’re like, oh, man,

[00:24:00]
this is way different than
anything you’ve ever seen.

[00:24:02]
Yeah.
How do you deal with that?

[00:24:06]
You just proved the solution.

[00:24:08]
OK, so everybody thinks it’s going to be
so crazy or so different breaking down.

[00:24:13]
All right.

[00:24:14]
What are the what are
the tasks that we’re doing?

[00:24:16]
OK, let’s create a spreadsheet,
if you will, or let’s line-by-line this.

[00:24:21]
Break it down and then deploy the solution
and just prove that it can be done right.

[00:24:25]
All right.
A lot of people

[00:24:27]
tend to look at a problem and you can zoom
in and zoom in like I’m looking at this

[00:24:33]
one water droplet on the bottle
and all of a sudden that’s a problem.

[00:24:36]
But it’s like just step back.
Sure.

[00:24:38]
And look at the whole problem as one
and then start breaking it down.

[00:24:41]
All right.
So just break it down.

[00:24:43]
Nice.

[00:24:44]
I want to speaking of breaking
down on a Segway into employees.

[00:24:49]
So can you tell me how you find employees
and what you look for in employees and any

[00:24:54]
challenges that you’ve had with employees
are a lot of questions there.

[00:24:58]
Yeah, how we find employees.

[00:25:00]
We have found them all on.
Indeed.

[00:25:02]
OK, everything has been posting it up.

[00:25:04]
They’re waiting for people to apply
for it and then interviewing the process.

[00:25:08]
All right.

[00:25:10]
The way that we’ve gone through hiring,
we’ve tried a couple different ways.

[00:25:14]
Our first intern was this is probably

[00:25:16]
the most fun way that we hired because
this, I guess, wasn’t actually through.

[00:25:20]
Indeed, we’d gone to Emslie,
which is where myself and the co-founder

[00:25:24]
and our design graduated and something
school of engineering walkies, OK?

[00:25:29]
And we knew some people.

[00:25:31]
There are some students and said, hey,

[00:25:32]
do you have some friends that are really
good at X, Y, Z for some software?

[00:25:35]
All right.

[00:25:35]
And so we gave them a task that would be
a problem that we would typically need

[00:25:39]
solved on our our application
and then said, all right,

[00:25:43]
we want you guys to submit your
solution the next couple of days.

[00:25:47]
Anybody that submits one
gets a hundred bucks.

[00:25:49]
Oh, nice.

[00:25:49]
So then we pick the best one out
of all the people that applied it.

[00:25:52]
Oh, wow.
Yeah.

[00:25:54]
Do they know that they’re
essentially applying for a job or.

[00:25:56]
Yeah.
That’s all very openly said.

[00:25:58]
You’re getting paid to apply and this is

[00:25:59]
the process to get into the kind
of we first had interviewed wow.

[00:26:03]
People all right.

[00:26:04]
And then like gave the option
to a handful of people to do that.

[00:26:07]
Interesting.

[00:26:08]
How did you know that the solution
that they offered was good or not?

[00:26:13]
So I’m not the software person.

[00:26:15]
OK, software application.

[00:26:16]
So that was strictly up to code.

[00:26:18]
OK, kind of narrowing that down.

[00:26:20]
He understands the software is kind

[00:26:21]
of just an idea that we wanted
to test on finding people.

[00:26:24]
All right.
And so it was basically seeing how his way

[00:26:29]
of looking at it was,
how efficiently they went about it.

[00:26:32]
All right.
If they asked questions because it was

[00:26:34]
interesting, we said you can
ask all the questions you.

[00:26:36]
Oh, and so we gave the option to see are

[00:26:39]
these people willing to ask, all right, or
are they just going to fail in silence?

[00:26:42]
Sure, fail in silence.
I love that.

[00:26:45]
Interesting.

[00:26:46]
It means a bad thing,
but I love that that name.

[00:26:49]
That’s cool.

[00:26:50]
So have you had luck with employees?

[00:26:52]
It sounds like you’ve had lots of luck.

[00:26:54]
Yeah, we’ve been really fortunate so far.

[00:26:57]
I mean, there’s there’s always the hiccups
where, you know, you want something done

[00:27:00]
on X, Y, Z, but, you know,
those are going to happen.

[00:27:04]
Yeah, it’s going to be different,
different parts of it.

[00:27:06]
But yeah, we’ve been really fortunate
for the employees we’ve had.

[00:27:10]
But it’s it’s been a young business too.
So I’m sure I’m going to.

[00:27:13]
Right.
I’m going to find my problems.

[00:27:15]
Oh, my goodness gracious.
I was just talking.

[00:27:18]
Well, the last woman that I interviewed,

[00:27:20]
she and I were digressing a bit about
employees because the question was,

[00:27:26]
what is the biggest challenge
in your business right now?

[00:27:29]
And it is rare that a business
owner does not answer employees.

[00:27:35]
It was not number one.
It’s number two.

[00:27:36]
Got it.

[00:27:37]
With no one being sales
or something like that.

[00:27:39]
Yeah, it’s rare that they say,

[00:27:42]
you know, the mail person just delivers

[00:27:44]
to the wrong box all the time
or something like that.

[00:27:47]
It’s like it’s employees
full of employees.

[00:27:49]
That’s interesting.
So you how many employees?

[00:27:51]
You know, so we have myself and podi OK,

[00:27:55]
I guess the two that are whatever
the founders, if you will.

[00:27:58]
And we have a machinist, Mike,

[00:28:02]
we’ve got Josh, who’s our
firm or an electrical tax.

[00:28:05]
So he does like all our
board testing integrations.

[00:28:08]
He’s doing a lot of our documentation
for our products as well.

[00:28:12]
And then we’ve got Luciano,

[00:28:14]
who is basically our high level firmware
software right on our our boards.

[00:28:18]
I guess we have a virtual
assistant as well.

[00:28:20]
OK, Beth has been great for that.
Very cool.

[00:28:23]
Tell me about the oh,
my mind is going here for a moment.

[00:28:29]
The partnership.
Yeah.

[00:28:31]
Because business partnerships.

[00:28:32]
There’s good, there’s bad.

[00:28:33]
There’s tolerable, I guess.

[00:28:36]
What has been your experience in finding
the business partner,

[00:28:39]
working with a business partner
and then just going through the decisions

[00:28:43]
that every business owner has
to make now with a partner?

[00:28:45]
Yeah.

[00:28:46]
So for Cody, that kind
of goes back, right?

[00:28:49]
Like I said, we meant MSO.

[00:28:50]
We the kind of a fun story of how we met

[00:28:53]
was probably the first
couple of weeks of school.

[00:28:55]
I see a couple of buddies went out.

[00:28:57]
We all got super drunk.

[00:28:59]
We come stumbling back and I come back
into the dorms and I smell pizza.

[00:29:03]
Oh.

[00:29:04]
And I just stumble into this room
and it’s Cody’s room and I walk in.

[00:29:07]
I’m like, we are going to be friends.

[00:29:11]
So needless to say, I ate like half
of his pizza that night, all night.

[00:29:15]
And ever since we’ve been friends.
Nice.

[00:29:17]
He’s been trying to get that have pizza,

[00:29:19]
but I don’t think I
ever paid him for that.

[00:29:21]
I’ll probably be owning some
interest on that money.

[00:29:25]
So that’s that’s, I guess, how

[00:29:27]
the business partner got
laid out on that one.

[00:29:30]
And that’s all right.
We both kind of obviously went through

[00:29:33]
school, graduated, went into industry
and kind of went through the process.

[00:29:37]
But I was I was crashing on his couch
when I was going back for grad school.

[00:29:42]
That’s when he originally showed me

[00:29:43]
the the nut of what we’re
making for the product line.

[00:29:45]
Oh, nice.

[00:29:46]
So he was just tinkering with it
and I was like, what is this?

[00:29:50]
And he started explaining what it could
do and what his vision was for it.

[00:29:53]
OK, like what are you
planning to do with this?

[00:29:55]
Oh, I just think this is cool and I
can take this to market or anything.

[00:29:59]
All right.

[00:30:00]
So that was just like over the course
of like, you know, several classes.

[00:30:03]
I was like, you’re going back
to college talking about it.

[00:30:06]
And then.
All right.

[00:30:07]
Eventually evolved kind of from there once

[00:30:09]
it was kind of a waiting on tech to some
of the tech, wasn’t quite ready to kind

[00:30:13]
of deploy the hardware
we wanted in the space.

[00:30:15]
OK, tech like what?

[00:30:16]
Different controllers and then the way
that the software has changed.

[00:30:19]
So Python’s becoming more and more known
for deploying automation solutions.

[00:30:25]
But really,

[00:30:26]
when he first started tinkering, I mean,
the idea was completely different.

[00:30:29]
And now pythons come to where you can more

[00:30:31]
people are knowing it
and can deploy history.

[00:30:34]
And what what type of time frame
are we talking between then and

[00:30:39]
when he first started tinkering with it?

[00:30:41]
I thought I’d be a good question,
actually go back and ask him,

[00:30:44]
because it was it was really just
his naming of it and the idea.

[00:30:48]
And then I guess really when we started

[00:30:51]
hitting it was two years ago when
we all really started evolving.

[00:30:55]
What’s the product going to look like

[00:30:56]
and how are we going to define it now
that the kind of stars, if you will,

[00:30:59]
of a line, OK, being able to deploy the
hardware and software on one solution?

[00:31:02]
Yeah.
The way we want it.

[00:31:04]
So it sounds like you guys are
cool as far as partners go.

[00:31:07]
Yeah.
It’s been like document it.

[00:31:09]
And we both, you know,
it started off as get this all

[00:31:12]
into a solid email trying to kind
of say how this is all working.

[00:31:15]
Right.
And then we’ve actually just gone through

[00:31:17]
the process of getting a full
operating agreement for that.

[00:31:20]
All right.

[00:31:20]
Laid out so, you know,
our roles and everything.

[00:31:23]
And if things you know,
we end up going for funding or we do

[00:31:26]
something, we already
have those boxes checked.

[00:31:28]
So we’re not slowed down by those things.

[00:31:31]
Interesting.

[00:31:32]
Yeah, I hear so many stories.

[00:31:34]
Business partners.

[00:31:36]
Many, good, many less than good,

[00:31:39]
but it sounds like you’re lucky that and I
guess you guys are have an advantage

[00:31:44]
similar to a business partner
with one of my businesses.

[00:31:48]
And I’ve had partnerships go away, so.

[00:31:50]
And I’ve had partnerships.
Very cool.

[00:31:52]
Yeah.
Well, I mean, currently it’s cool.

[00:31:55]
Where.

[00:31:57]
Our roles are very clear
as far as who’s got what skills,

[00:32:03]
and there’s with ours
is very little overlap.

[00:32:06]
Good, I guess we’re learning

[00:32:09]
overlap just from being in the
business part of the process.

[00:32:12]
Well, you I mean, like yours,
the mechanical, his software.

[00:32:15]
Very clear.

[00:32:16]
Yeah, it’s I’m not going
to write a line of code.

[00:32:19]
Yeah.
He’s asked me to try and I

[00:32:22]
we’ve tried.
Let’s just leave it there.

[00:32:24]
All right.

[00:32:24]
I can’t figure out software,
so that’s all right.

[00:32:27]
That’s all right.
I completely understand.

[00:32:29]
Yeah.
Software to me is still,

[00:32:32]
I would argue, to say either magic or just
it is another language.

[00:32:36]
Yeah.

[00:32:37]
And so you’ve got to know
how that language works.

[00:32:39]
But it’s interesting in like a language,
you and I speaking English,

[00:32:44]
even though mine is probably
a little less than perfect.

[00:32:47]
Yeah, I still struggle with English.
Right.

[00:32:49]
But we know what we’re talking about.

[00:32:50]
We’re computer if you’re off the computer
like no can do syntax error maybe.

[00:32:55]
Yeah.

[00:32:56]
Gosh, don’t you just know
what I’m trying to tell you.

[00:33:01]
So interesting.

[00:33:02]
Tell me about trying to sell companies or

[00:33:05]
clients with you being
a fairly useful company.

[00:33:08]
Do they ever challenge you and say like
you’ve only been in business a couple

[00:33:12]
of years or a few years, or
are you a younger guy like you’ve never

[00:33:16]
made marshmallows or whatever it is
that we’re trying to manufacture?

[00:33:19]
That’s actually a really interesting one,

[00:33:21]
because that’s something
we’ve struggled with.

[00:33:23]
OK, is Cody and I are both younger,
kind of new to industry.

[00:33:27]
The big things like, oh,

[00:33:28]
we have twenty years of experience
if you put us both together.

[00:33:32]
So that is interesting trying to go
into rooms because I kind of get the baby

[00:33:36]
face look like how the hell
is this guy going to hell.

[00:33:38]
Right.
Who is this.

[00:33:40]
Bring your kid to work day.
Exactly.

[00:33:41]
So it’s it’s again just
part of the solution.

[00:33:44]
So really what it’s been is
trying it a small project.

[00:33:47]
All right.

[00:33:47]
Don’t go for the big one if you don’t feel
like you can close on that because

[00:33:50]
on something or it’s a crack the door
open, crack the door and crush it.

[00:33:54]
All right.
And then just crush that project.

[00:33:56]
Nice.
I like that.

[00:33:58]
That’s cool.

[00:33:59]
Would you consider you or your business
partner more business savvy as far as

[00:34:04]
growing and setting the business
up and all that jazz?

[00:34:07]
So I have been tasked with the sales
and growth, if you will.

[00:34:10]
Sorry, the business aspect.

[00:34:12]
That’s that’s really my goal is
to get completely out from behind.

[00:34:16]
The mechanical engineering
in that aspect is OK.

[00:34:19]
I really enjoy meeting with clients.

[00:34:20]
I enjoy learning what their problem
is and how we can solve that.

[00:34:24]
All right.
And get them to a positive experience.

[00:34:27]
All right.
That’s I that’s what I thrive on.

[00:34:30]
Yeah.
Sales is the name of the game, right.

[00:34:32]
Nothing happens until sales made.

[00:34:34]
I guess that’s very true.
Very true.

[00:34:36]
Especially with what you have going on.

[00:34:38]
How tell me about the capital outlay as

[00:34:40]
far as equipment, all that is change
or how you’ve had to add to it.

[00:34:44]
You mentioned as you had employees
and you pivot the business a little bit.

[00:34:49]
Yeah, because money to pivot.
Yeah.

[00:34:51]
When it first started, it was just
a two thousand dollar little machine.

[00:34:54]
So it was really easy
to kind of figure that out.

[00:34:57]
But then as you kind of grows, you know,
go to the bank was really what we did.

[00:35:02]
We really state bank of Cross Plains
took a gamble on us.

[00:35:05]
Well, we heard no plenty of times.
All right.

[00:35:08]
Thing what our goal was and how we were

[00:35:09]
going to go about it and then
getting the financing around.

[00:35:12]
That was the no, because you guys were
young, the banks didn’t understand or they

[00:35:17]
didn’t even know what they were
helping you by kind of thing.

[00:35:19]
A little bit of both kind
of depended upon the solution.

[00:35:22]
I kind of got to the point where it
was like, you know what you sell?

[00:35:26]
I’d go in and just sell the vision.

[00:35:27]
This is what I’m going to do.

[00:35:29]
And then that’s when the state bank took

[00:35:31]
a chance on us, when I said,
here’s where we’re going.

[00:35:33]
All right.
Instead of trying to lay out, you know,

[00:35:35]
this is the process you’re getting
really into after sell the passion.

[00:35:39]
Gottschalk’s ended up how I sold that one.
Oh, I liked it.

[00:35:42]
Did you guys ever do a business plan,
business model canvas?

[00:35:46]
OK, perfect.
Only thing.

[00:35:47]
Exactly.
It’s I’ve seen the business models.

[00:35:50]
My theory is, is they’re outdated
by the time you finish it.

[00:35:53]
So probably theory,
at least partially to the business model

[00:35:56]
canvas has been a way to vector is really
the kind of the way I like to look at it

[00:36:01]
is where we’re going
and then what’s the long term goal?

[00:36:04]
But then let’s knock down
what’s happening in the middle.

[00:36:06]
All right.

[00:36:07]
So just kind of make sure to set
that path, if you will, use it for.

[00:36:11]
So business model canvas,
just for the people that may not know,

[00:36:14]
is essentially a very large
one page business plan.

[00:36:18]
Yes.

[00:36:18]
The ones that I have done, we’ve used
whiteboards, eight foot wide whiteboards.

[00:36:24]
But it wasn’t a fifty page or
two hundred page business plan.

[00:36:28]
It was all laid out right there.
Yeah.

[00:36:30]
Sticky notes.

[00:36:31]
So, yeah, just like these white boards
over here, the easel style or you know,

[00:36:34]
that’s what we did as each
section of the canvas.

[00:36:37]
We did that with sticky notes and I guess
we’ve still done it a couple of times.

[00:36:41]
But yeah, you just lay that out

[00:36:42]
with sticky notes, take pictures of it and
put it into the folder so you can see it.

[00:36:45]
And look back and tell me,
when you were putting that plan together,

[00:36:49]
what were some of the data points
that you had a rough time figuring out?

[00:36:54]
Oh. Look, we’ve got to figure out how did

[00:36:57]
you figure out what specifically your
market was?

[00:37:00]
Was that a guess or was it based on
some other business that you knew of?

[00:37:05]
I’d say a bit of a guess.

[00:37:07]
OK, you know, it’s it’s totally fine.

[00:37:09]
Yeah, it’s exactly it’s we’re still

[00:37:11]
figuring things out as we go
on exactly where we’re narrowing.

[00:37:14]
We’ve we’ve probably started to broad,

[00:37:16]
if you will, in the product
development and automation.

[00:37:19]
And we’re slowly narrowing that down

[00:37:20]
to the industrial aspect,
which is bring the riches.

[00:37:24]
So, yeah, rather than
being so spread thin.

[00:37:26]
But I guess at the beginning it was like,

[00:37:28]
how can we turn revenue
and figure things out?

[00:37:30]
Fair.
Totally fair.

[00:37:32]
It’s interesting.
When I teach a business planning class,

[00:37:34]
I always tell people 80 percent
of this plan is a best guess.

[00:37:37]
Yeah, you’ll get data and information
that you can then process and say like

[00:37:42]
this makes sense, but you don’t know
where you’re going to be in five years.

[00:37:46]
No, no.

[00:37:47]
I mean, can you imagine making a business
plan in twenty nineteen and then starting

[00:37:50]
your business end of twenty nineteen and
be like this didn’t quite go as planned.

[00:37:54]
I know it’s changed a lot.

[00:37:56]
Something changed.

[00:37:58]
So we talk about marketing a little bit as

[00:38:01]
far as location you
were or are in your garage.

[00:38:07]
Essentially we are in the garage.

[00:38:09]
I have the most understanding wife

[00:38:13]
and that’s just amazing.
Yeah.

[00:38:15]
Because we now have four cars

[00:38:16]
in the driveway all the time
for the team that’s in the basement.

[00:38:19]
All right.
Working away.

[00:38:21]
So actually, I should clarify,
the garage is actually we when we built

[00:38:24]
the house it as a three car garage
and then we did a three car under it.

[00:38:27]
So precast concrete.
Wow.

[00:38:30]
So it has about a thousand
square feet down here.

[00:38:32]
The goal is to always do a small
business startup out of that space.

[00:38:34]
OK, it’s like the end of the day you’re
going to have to go rent somewhere.

[00:38:37]
So it’s like let’s just build this back,

[00:38:38]
this value and that we
know we’re planning.

[00:38:40]
Yeah, that’s awesome.

[00:38:41]
So can you actually park
three cars underneath?

[00:38:44]
You could yeah.
You could park three cars in there

[00:38:46]
and see a 3D printer and a team just
in the off chance that you have that.

[00:38:51]
Yeah, that’s awesome.

[00:38:52]
Tell me about the science machine,
because I’ve seen a variety of those.

[00:38:57]
Yes.
And oddly enough, the last

[00:39:01]
I interviewed Dickinson Manufacturing, OK,

[00:39:03]
they can send super
awesome guy locally here.

[00:39:06]
And I remember looking at his machines

[00:39:08]
and the still of the three
and a half inch floppies.

[00:39:11]
Oh wow.
OK.

[00:39:12]
And I’m like, what is that all about?

[00:39:14]
And he explained to me,
like, that’s that’s fine.

[00:39:17]
The hardest part is finding
three inch floppies.

[00:39:21]
OK, interesting.
Well, that’s getting it from the CAD

[00:39:24]
program to the machine
for these particular.

[00:39:27]
He had some that were just
being some I think Ethernet.

[00:39:30]
But the floppy isn’t really.
But it was interesting.

[00:39:34]
I was just it’s not this is
not the business that I’m in.

[00:39:37]
So, yeah, this is just
the thing for this industry.

[00:39:39]
OK, so tell me, how did you
decide what CMC machine to get?

[00:39:45]
So I guess I’ve deployed
a lot of machines.

[00:39:48]
That’s really where a lot
of my house is a brand.

[00:39:50]
It’s a brand that’s up to you
that I’ve used in the past.

[00:39:53]
They’re really great
for a lot of applications.

[00:39:55]
We’ll definitely have one in the future.

[00:39:57]
What we started with was data on M8 Cube.

[00:40:00]
It’s very specific
for the electronic space.

[00:40:02]
OK, small machining.

[00:40:04]
So our hands were typical machines.

[00:40:06]
They have up to fifteen thousand rpm how

[00:40:08]
fast the tool spins were
running at forty thousand.

[00:40:11]
So really beneficial.
Wow.

[00:40:14]
For running on small diameter
tools and small features.

[00:40:17]
We can do it very fast and very efficient,
but yet that has its limitations on,

[00:40:21]
you know, the size of parts and the size
of tools we’re working with.

[00:40:24]
All right.

[00:40:25]
So really, really specific kind
of for that electronic space.

[00:40:28]
And then it’s very clean, too.

[00:40:30]
So we don’t have flood
coolant to deal with.

[00:40:32]
That’s always nasty ethanol.

[00:40:35]
So we won’t cut any deals or anything

[00:40:36]
that sparks, OK, it’s all going
to be plastics or aluminum.

[00:40:39]
Got very clean.

[00:40:41]
You’re not impregnating
the materials with oils.

[00:40:43]
OK,
sorry. Does that run crazy three phase

[00:40:46]
power or something like that that you
had to get special in your house?

[00:40:49]
We have a rotary face
converter in the basement.

[00:40:51]
So we do, yes.
So we have a unique power brought in.

[00:40:54]
All right.
Yeah, that is so interesting.

[00:40:57]
I was talking to a brewer
that had to bring in three face.

[00:40:59]
Oh yeah.
Like

[00:41:02]
I can wire just enough to be dangerous.

[00:41:05]
But three, you just like
above my pay grade.

[00:41:08]
Yeah.
That’ll blow me across the room.

[00:41:10]
All right.
That is crazy.

[00:41:12]
Wow.

[00:41:13]
So when you fire that machine up,
the lights dim across the country.

[00:41:16]
You’re now just in the basement, OK?

[00:41:19]
It’s just in the basement.

[00:41:20]
But they’re all led lights.

[00:41:21]
Yeah, it’s all right.
Yeah.

[00:41:23]
Was it tough to get down there?

[00:41:24]
No, we just had a rager
come in with the teller.

[00:41:27]
Had to learn.
OK, yeah.

[00:41:28]
Just say that just like the other day.

[00:41:31]
James is like bringing groceries.
Yeah.

[00:41:34]
All right.

[00:41:34]
I don’t even know what
you just said though.

[00:41:35]
What’s the teller handling a forklift.
Oh that’s a good thing.

[00:41:38]
Like you’d see on a job site for being
a bundle of is on your house or to buy.

[00:41:42]
Oh that.
The extension arm kind of thing.

[00:41:44]
OK, so to them it was like
dropping a hot tub off.

[00:41:46]
Gas is just another day.
Yeah.

[00:41:48]
Just different hot tub.
That’s so, that’s so awesome.

[00:41:52]
So you is it going to be
tough to move that then.

[00:41:55]
It’ll be the same thing, just in reverse.
OK.

[00:41:58]
Is that expensive?

[00:42:00]
A couple of thousand dollars, OK?

[00:42:02]
I mean, what’s the machine go for?
I don’t know.

[00:42:05]
That one was two hundred
and fifty is what we paid.

[00:42:07]
Two hundred fifty thousand dollars.
Yeah.

[00:42:09]
OK, so a couple of thousand
dollars to move it.

[00:42:11]
Yeah.
You don’t want to drop it.

[00:42:13]
No I don’t either.
That much money.

[00:42:15]
Holy cow.
So.

[00:42:17]
So you had to sell that to
the bank and be like look.

[00:42:20]
Yeah.
The value we can create with it.

[00:42:22]
All right.
And have you been able to do that.

[00:42:26]
Yeah, we’ve been paying for the machine.

[00:42:28]
No problem keeping stuff moving.
That’s cool.

[00:42:30]
That really that any R&D space that’s

[00:42:33]
keeping the projects on the engineering
and the team to go into the machine.

[00:42:37]
All right.
It’s not like the really heavy

[00:42:38]
manufacturing of that spindle
needs to be turning all the time.

[00:42:41]
It’s basically having the flexibility
here, not just same thing we talked about

[00:42:45]
with electrical software
and mechanical all in one stop.

[00:42:50]
All right.

[00:42:50]
We now don’t have to call somebody
to make those parts for us.

[00:42:52]
We just go flip the machine on

[00:42:54]
them that day or we want to make
a quick change to something.

[00:42:57]
We’re not waiting weeks for waiting hours.

[00:42:59]
Well, that’s pretty cool.

[00:43:00]
So that’s kind of the speed at which we
can do product development.

[00:43:03]
All right.
That’s very awesome.

[00:43:05]
So tell me, the six years since you’ve
been in business,

[00:43:08]
how what have you learned since you
started that you did not know that you

[00:43:13]
even didn’t know at the
time that you started?

[00:43:17]
I’d say one of the big things is
getting it and writing so nice.

[00:43:22]
You know, it started off and we were

[00:43:23]
talking about I think it was your sister
or something just on different businesses.

[00:43:27]
Yeah.
Not knowing certain things, the no idea.

[00:43:30]
Just doing different things.

[00:43:31]
And so it’s just basically.
Oh, here’s a project.

[00:43:33]
Yeah, I can do that.
Yeah.

[00:43:35]
Here’s a project.
I can do that.

[00:43:36]
All right.
And then the projects kept getting bigger

[00:43:39]
and you know, to the point where
you just kept trusting that the things

[00:43:44]
we’re going to go that way,
they were going to go and apparently

[00:43:46]
handshakes aren’t always what
they’re cracked up to be.

[00:43:48]
All right.
So I learned that one the hard way.

[00:43:50]
But basically now it’s we don’t do
a project unless

[00:43:54]
who’s taking the liability,
how the things are going to work out.

[00:43:57]
It’s laid out in the contract.

[00:43:58]
So it’s very well documented to say
this is your job, this is my job.

[00:44:03]
This is what you’re going to pay.

[00:44:04]
This what is the direction
money is going, whatever.

[00:44:07]
This is what you’re getting.

[00:44:07]
Yeah, kind of like those operating
agreements, if you will.

[00:44:10]
Like we’re sharing with our, you know,
the business partners, really.

[00:44:13]
So it’s like you just need
a kind of different scale.

[00:44:16]
But lay out the projects.
Yeah.

[00:44:18]
Nice.
That’s pretty cool.

[00:44:20]
So you are you a reader are audiobooks.

[00:44:25]
Is kind of more my audio books.

[00:44:26]
OK, do you read it or listen
to any business audio books.

[00:44:30]
It varies.
You can tell me.

[00:44:33]
No it’s, it’s, it’s,

[00:44:36]
I put them on OK but it’s funny because I
like put them on is background noise like

[00:44:40]
I never remember what I
like the names of all are.

[00:44:43]
But then like all of a sudden something

[00:44:44]
will pop up like oh yeah,
I remember listening to that.

[00:44:46]
All right.
Well let’s just put it to you this way.

[00:44:49]
What does a piece of advice you’ve gotten,
whether from an audio book or fortune

[00:44:52]
cookie fortune that’s been helpful
for you and your business?

[00:44:56]
Oh.

[00:44:58]
I see a lot of the best advice has come

[00:45:00]
from either family or friends or people
kind of looking in on it, but it’s like,

[00:45:05]
you know, sometimes I’ll
tend to overthink a process.

[00:45:07]
I’ve heard that where it’s like,
just don’t overthink it.

[00:45:10]
Just keep it simple, all right?

[00:45:12]
Where it’s like it’s so easy
to try and analyze it all.

[00:45:14]
And that’s kind of like I said, about
breaking things down with our clients.

[00:45:17]
That’s where a lot of that’s
kind of come from.

[00:45:19]
It just like just make it
simple, break it down.

[00:45:21]
That’s kind of been a big one.

[00:45:26]
I think of other
really good ones, I think.

[00:45:29]
The deep one that I guess there is a deep

[00:45:31]
one, yeah, my I have employees
that still need to learn to do that.

[00:45:35]
There are times that I
need to learn to do that.

[00:45:37]
But I guess you could argue there

[00:45:39]
sometimes I should probably
break it down more.

[00:45:41]
Yeah, I’m just like it’s
that big of a deal.

[00:45:44]
Solves the problem.

[00:45:46]
Then the employees say, well, James,

[00:45:49]
these are the 50 million
steps we have to do anyways.

[00:45:52]
You’re married.
Yes.

[00:45:54]
How long have you been married?

[00:45:56]
We should call Amanda, OK.

[00:45:59]
Has it been more than six years?
It is.

[00:46:02]
Five years is right.
We’re at.

[00:46:03]
So OK, so you and your business before

[00:46:05]
you’re married, it’ll
be five years and June.

[00:46:09]
Twenty six.
There we go.

[00:46:10]
OK, nice.
You recovered.

[00:46:12]
Yeah, we recovered sir.

[00:46:14]
So you owned your business
before you got married.

[00:46:16]
Yes.
OK, but you were together I imagine.

[00:46:19]
Yeah.

[00:46:19]
So how did that conversation go when
you’re like, Amanda, what’s up?

[00:46:23]
I’m quitting my job and I’m
starting a business.

[00:46:26]
I don’t think it was too out of left
field, considering we were actually next

[00:46:30]
door neighbors and I used to mow
her parent’s lawn occasionally.

[00:46:33]
Oh, funny, when we had
that when I was my lawn care.

[00:46:35]
So she was literally the girl next door,
literally the girl next door.

[00:46:39]
All right.

[00:46:39]
So, yeah, she’s so she saw you
start your lawn care business.

[00:46:43]
She’s kind of seen the things
that have happened and.

[00:46:45]
All right.

[00:46:46]
She’s, I guess,
very supportive of the passion.

[00:46:49]
She’s never really slowed anything down.
All right.

[00:46:51]
She’ll make me accountable when I’m,
you know, tend to move too fast, but,

[00:46:55]
like, just lay it out so I understand
what’s happening.

[00:46:58]
Why are we doing this?
OK.

[00:46:59]
That’s really that’s super cool.

[00:47:01]
So as long as I can kind of lay it out.
Yeah.

[00:47:04]
You know, she holds me
accountable to that.

[00:47:06]
I liked it.
And when did you build your house?

[00:47:09]
So that would have been we actually got
we moved in shortly after we got married.

[00:47:14]
Gachet about five years ago.

[00:47:16]
I love that when you built your house,

[00:47:17]
you made space for having
a business within your house.

[00:47:20]
I feel like that should be mandatory.
You know, it.

[00:47:23]
Yeah, it’s because it’s so I mean,
especially now there’s so many people

[00:47:26]
working from home,
starting businesses from home that you

[00:47:29]
just need that space, whether it’s
for a science machine or whatever.

[00:47:34]
Yeah.

[00:47:34]
You have to make sure you’re always
good with the right minor details.

[00:47:39]
Minor details.

[00:47:41]
So tell me about the future of develop.

[00:47:43]
Where do you see it going, let’s say in
three to five years, three to five years.

[00:47:47]
So I guess the the kind of the next metric

[00:47:49]
or the big thing is to get
out of the basement.

[00:47:51]
We just had an accepted offer

[00:47:53]
on a building that we’re hoping to move
into, nursing field corners, kind of.

[00:47:57]
We’ll see if all the the loans
and everything go through for that.

[00:47:59]
Right.

[00:48:00]
So I plug State Bank and again,
their play the game.

[00:48:02]
Right.
Know that’s kind of the next goal.

[00:48:05]
And really what we’re really passionate
about, creating products and helping our

[00:48:09]
clients get those to market or
manufacturing, if you will.

[00:48:13]
The big drive has been to create
jobs like I why that’s always been.

[00:48:16]
I love getting people to work at something

[00:48:19]
they enjoy and just getting
that energy around that.

[00:48:23]
Yeah, it’s kind of the goal is to create

[00:48:24]
a lot of jobs locally
in the next five years.

[00:48:28]
You know, it’s I find that fascinating
is when you start a business,

[00:48:33]
people just assume
you get a lot like almost anyone, right?

[00:48:37]
Any business, you must be rich.

[00:48:39]
But I feel like something that gets lost

[00:48:41]
is that once you get employees, you’re
responsible for that person’s livelihood.

[00:48:46]
Right.
Their food, shelter, fun,

[00:48:50]
that’s all coming from them doing work
because you helped create that work.

[00:48:55]
Yes, I feel like that’s a lot of money.

[00:48:58]
And if I look at it as pressure,
but I guess in the end you could consider

[00:49:00]
it that way, that kind of gets lost
in the whole business.

[00:49:05]
Owners have to do all this stuff

[00:49:07]
on top of keeping
bringing clients and keeping everybody

[00:49:11]
happy, making sure employees are happy
is making sure that employees get paid.

[00:49:15]
Exactly.
And that’s a that’s a huge responsibility.

[00:49:18]
You need to make sure you’re always making
that payroll or they’re not going to show.

[00:49:21]
Up next,

[00:49:22]
there’s a whole house just chatting
with someone who is is a contractor.

[00:49:27]
And he’s like, I was a little
late on paychecks at home.

[00:49:31]
It’s like you can’t.

[00:49:33]
That’s not a choice.

[00:49:34]
Yes, not a paycheck.

[00:49:36]
It’s not like they gave you not thirty.
No.

[00:49:38]
Oh, no, no.

[00:49:40]
So it’s so interesting how he just had

[00:49:42]
this laissez faire, like, oh, no,
it’s kind of a rough time now.

[00:49:45]
Like, no, no, they don’t.

[00:49:47]
And if they if they
believe that they shouldn’t.

[00:49:51]
Yeah.
It’s like that’s a whole domino effect

[00:49:54]
that you were just
kicking over right there.

[00:49:56]
Exactly.
That’s those are mine.

[00:49:57]
But yeah, it’s interesting
to add employees.

[00:50:00]
So do you see yourself doubling
in size in a few years, tripling.

[00:50:04]
Yeah, definitely.

[00:50:05]
Definitely doubling as
the next couple of years.

[00:50:07]
The space that we’re going into.

[00:50:09]
I’d love to see twenty engineers
there in the next five twenty.

[00:50:12]
All right.
Kind of the goal metric.

[00:50:14]
All right.
Is it big enough for you left space.

[00:50:16]
That’s where we could fit in that space.
Wow.

[00:50:19]
So that’s cool.

[00:50:20]
Yeah, that’s kind of the goal,
if you will, that vector we put out there

[00:50:23]
of what we want to see
in the next five years.

[00:50:25]
I love that space.
I love it.

[00:50:27]
So tell me, from all your experience

[00:50:29]
and helping customers,
employees, having your own business,

[00:50:35]
your own few businesses, I should say,
what is some advice that you would

[00:50:38]
consider giving someone that was thinking
about starting their own business?

[00:50:43]
Just start and then just keep moving.
All right?

[00:50:46]
Like, don’t
when it comes down to that business plan,

[00:50:49]
everybody tries to make the perfect plan
before they move or find the perfect time

[00:50:53]
to move like, oh, everything will be good
after I pay off my Christmas credit card

[00:50:58]
and I’ll use the money
once I’ve started saving.

[00:51:00]
After that, it’s like
just start something.

[00:51:02]
It doesn’t need to be drastic,
like you said overnight.

[00:51:05]
Just, you know,
turn the boat a little bit.

[00:51:08]
Yeah.
And, you know, make one call that moves

[00:51:11]
in that direction and then just
keep doing that day by day.

[00:51:14]
And it does just take a domino effect,
like just one thing at a time.

[00:51:19]
Hey, Warren Buffett said the way
to start making money is to start.

[00:51:22]
OK, so same thing.
I love it.

[00:51:24]
One of my favorite sayings
is keep it moving.

[00:51:27]
Yeah, especially when I’m driving.

[00:51:28]
So it’s just one of those things.
I love it.

[00:51:31]
I just keep moving.
So that’s cool.

[00:51:33]
Well, Matt, thank you so
much for being on the show.

[00:51:35]
That was an hour already.
It moves fast.

[00:51:38]
It does.

[00:51:38]
OK, just like we have 20 twenty
in that time machine and we’re here.

[00:51:43]
Yeah, just like that.

[00:51:44]
This is Authentic Business Adventures.

[00:51:46]
Thank you so much for tuning in.

[00:51:48]
Authentic Business Adventures is brought
to you by Calls On Call offering call

[00:51:52]
answering services to small businesses
across the country. On the web

[00:51:55]
at callsoncall.com.
As well as Draw In Customers Business

[00:51:59]
Coaching offering business coaching services
for businesses looking for growth,

[00:52:02]
which should be all of them. On the web
at drawincustomers.com.

[00:52:06]
And of course, The BOLD Business Book,

[00:52:08]
a book for the entrepreneur in all of us
available wherever fine books are sold.

[00:52:12]
We’d like to think you our wonderful

[00:52:13]
listeners as well as our guest Matt
from Develop LLC and oh my goodness

[00:52:18]
gracious, I’m going to forget
that other company again.

[00:52:20]
NodeUDesign. NodeUDesign.

[00:52:22]
So where can people find you? On our
website, social media. Otherwise.

[00:52:27]
Tell us the website

[00:52:28]
develop-llc.com and nodeudesign.com
and that’s nodeU with a big letter U?

[00:52:34]
Yeah.
Gotcha.

[00:52:35]
Awesome.
Yeah, give me a

[00:52:36]
call otherwise once you find it. Nice.
I love it.

[00:52:39]
Thank you so much for being on the show.
Thanks for the opportunity.

[00:52:42]
You can find us at drawincustomers.com/podcast.

[00:52:45]
Thank you for joining us.

[00:52:47]
If you could do us a huge favor
and wherever you see this,

[00:52:49]
if you could share it with all your
entrepreneurial friends,

[00:52:52]
throw a thumbs up on their, comment,
you can always reach out to us and ask us,

[00:52:56]
“hey, James, we’d like you
to interview this person”.

[00:52:59]
Thank you so much for tuning in.
We’ll see you next week.

[00:53:01]
I want you to stay awesome.

[00:53:02]
And if you do nothing else,
enjoy your business