From C-Stores to Life Lessons

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Glenn Plumby – Retired COO and Author

Podcast Overview:

00:00 Book addresses transition from academics to workforce.
09:29 Interest in extracurricular activities, soft skills crucial.
12:19 Successful loyalty program for convenience store chain.
19:24 Build diverse experience within a trusted company.
24:41 Labor key to customer service and satisfaction.
27:58 Store workers are undervalued during the pandemic.
35:52 Collaborated on book, marketed to universities successfully.
39:33 Building trust takes time, embrace people’s identity.
46:10 Taught operations about marketing, built understanding. Supported growth.
52:32 Transition roles improve performance, provide soft landing.
56:26 Time pie changes at 40, prioritize wisely.
01:01:50 Second wife supported and understood work passion.
01:04:35 Spouse neglect, prioritize connection, avoid future regrets.

Podcast Transcription:

Glenn Plumby [00:00:00]:
The marketing people, if they’re in a silo, they’re gonna come up with all these great ideas and half of them are stupid. Right? They sound good in a boardroom, but it just doesn’t work. We always reverse engineer In and put operating people in marketing along with some marketing, you know, talented people, and we were able to do that.

James Kademan [00:00:20]:
You have found Authentic Business Adventures, the business program that brings you the struggle stories and triumph successes of business owners across the land. Downloadable audio episodes can be found on the podcast link On at draw In customers.com. We are locally underwritten by the Bank of Sun Prairie as well as calls on call extraordinary answering service and the bold business book. And today, we’re welcoming slash preparing to learn from Glenn Plumby, operations and marketing expert, former executive vice president and CEO I’m sorry, COO of Speedway convenience store chain, and author of a great book called A Charmed Life. So, Glenn, how is it going today?

Glenn Plumby [00:00:59]:
Wonderful. Been looking forward to this, and, it’s been a great day.

James Kademan [00:01:05]:
Yay. You know? I love having people like you on the show. The people that have been there, done that kind of thing In of just the ones that talk about In, they’ve actually experienced it, lived it. I don’t maybe you’re still living it. Just you actually have the experience to to back up the information and advice that you

Glenn Plumby [00:01:23]:
give. Yes. Yes.

James Kademan [00:01:25]:
So let’s start from the beginning. How does somebody end up in the convenience store business?

Glenn Plumby [00:01:32]:
Actually, it’s really easy to get In the convenience store business. I mean, the barriers of entry are very low. And if you look, there’s a 150,000 convenience stores in the country, and roughly 70% of them are single site operators. So pretty easy to get in the business. Right? Alright. Kinda crazy, In it?

James Kademan [00:01:49]:
So when you hold on a second now. 70% of those are just one guy owns that one thing?

Glenn Plumby [00:01:55]:
Yep. Single side office.

James Kademan [00:01:57]:
Never guessed that. Okay.

Glenn Plumby [00:01:58]:
Yeah. Yeah. That’s because you’re around up in your neck of the woods, Kwik Trip and Speedway. These are big chains, multiple locations, and Yeah. Yeah. That’s actually the, that’s that’s not the norm. That’s actually different.

James Kademan [00:02:11]:
Interesting. You know, it’s funny you say that. I have a sister-in-law in Omaha, and I was taking my motorcycle from Madison, Wisconsin to Omaha, Nebraska, and I’m flying through Iowa, which k. I mean, there’s not There’s not. I saw Casey’s general stores.

Glenn Plumby [00:02:31]:
Yep.

James Kademan [00:02:32]:
Casey’s made me miss Kwik Trips so bad.

Glenn Plumby [00:02:35]:
Yeah.

James Kademan [00:02:35]:
Yeah.

Glenn Plumby [00:02:36]:
Because the

James Kademan [00:02:36]:
case is kind of beat up, dingy Yep. And sparse.

Glenn Plumby [00:02:41]:
Yes.

James Kademan [00:02:41]:
I remember staring at that fuel gauge going, I hope I can make it.

Glenn Plumby [00:02:47]:
Oh. Because you’re

James Kademan [00:02:48]:
in the middle. I mean, it’s corn and windmills.

Glenn Plumby [00:02:50]:
Yep. Yep.

James Kademan [00:02:51]:
Oh, it is. So it’s interesting how we just get used to we have gas stations every 10 feet here. Yeah. That’s not necessarily the case all over the country.

Glenn Plumby [00:02:59]:
Yeah. It’s all based on population. Where you have population, you have gas stations.

James Kademan [00:03:03]:
Yeah. I would have never guessed the 70% were just On person. Oh, no. That is interesting. Okay. Alright. So you I’m sorry. You’re you’re going into more information about the convenience store world before I interrupted you and bold surprise here.

Glenn Plumby [00:03:20]:
So I, you know, I I graduated from college, went to Miami University in Ohio, started with a company called Marathon Petroleum, and, the subsidiary, the retail arm of Marathon Petroleum is Speedway. So it’s been 41 years with, the combined between Marathon and Speedway. Last thirty, we’re at Speedway and absolutely love the business.

James Kademan [00:03:42]:
Alright.

Glenn Plumby [00:03:42]:
About every chair there and, was very, very excited.

James Kademan [00:03:46]:
So do you start just as the the checker out guy?

Glenn Plumby [00:03:52]:
Typically, if you look in our business, I I didn’t start there. But, you you we get a lot of people in college that start with us, taking money, and work their way up to assistant manager, to a manager, and the money’s pretty good for those people, especially for people without a Call degree.

James Kademan [00:04:12]:
Alright.

Glenn Plumby [00:04:13]:
But, Call the management level people above the store were all college degree people. And, I’ve hired a ton of people. As a matter of fact, that’s one of the reasons why I wrote the book In I’ve hired Draw of college graduates, and roughly 30% of them are gonna fail. It’s not because they don’t have the academic knowledge. It’s just because they can’t bring it to the real world, and they struggle. So the book is really meant to help, what I call people that are, transitioning from high school to college or college to the workforce to be able to make them, better understand how to use those academic talents in a real world environment. So that that’s really In why I wrote the book.

James Kademan [00:04:58]:
That’s cool. You know, it’s interesting. You remind me of me. I was working with my kid this past weekend. We’re running some wiring in the attic. He’s 10 years old, and I’m trying to get him to understand just how stuff works.

Glenn Plumby [00:05:12]:
Yep.

James Kademan [00:05:12]:
Around the house, under the hood, just stuff. Right? Stuff that you’re gonna experience in life. Yep. Assuming that he’s gonna have a car someday. I don’t know. Maybe they’ll be flying by then. But, anyway, hate I On to know, like, this is wiring. Electricity goes through it.

James Kademan [00:05:25]:
This is how we work it. He was getting so frustrated because he just wants to play baseball or soccer or basketball, some sports, just play with his buddies.

Glenn Plumby [00:05:34]:
Yep.

James Kademan [00:05:34]:
I’m like, look, man, you gotta know how to do this stuff. Not because you’re necessarily gonna become an electrician, which if you want to, great. Or because you get become a mechanic, you don’t have to, but if you want On, great. Yeah. So that when you have the stuff in the real world, you can actually talk from experience and knowledge instead of just trusting whoever it is that you’re hiring or to even know what the problem is.

Glenn Plumby [00:05:58]:
Yep.

James Kademan [00:05:59]:
A lot

Glenn Plumby [00:05:59]:
of people just

James Kademan [00:06:00]:
Don’t even know how to change a tire.

Glenn Plumby [00:06:02]:
They Call afford a super

James Kademan [00:06:03]:
fancy car, but they don’t even know how to open the trunk.

Glenn Plumby [00:06:06]:
Yep.

James Kademan [00:06:07]:
It’s just a bizarre I can’t have my kid be a moron. Yep. I’ve hired people that had parents that did not have that belief. I imagine you have too.

Glenn Plumby [00:06:17]:
Absolutely. Call the time. Yep.

James Kademan [00:06:20]:
You don’t mean to. They don’t tell you that in the interview. Right?

Glenn Plumby [00:06:22]:
Well, no. That that’s true. But, you know, you and I grew up in an age where you played all sports. You had homework every night. And if somebody gets you upset, you you you you you handled it face to face. Today, these kids, they play On sport year round. They never have homework, and they hide behind their phone. And, we have a 17 year old son.

Glenn Plumby [00:06:46]:
And in my book, I quote by saying, generally speaking, teenage boys are pretty stupid. But if you get a group of them together, they’re stupider. Oh, yeah. And and, boy, that that’s so true. But I liked it better when you and I grew up versus what my son’s going through today because it’s it’s not easy. It’s hard.

James Kademan [00:07:06]:
No. Challenging time. Very challenging time.

Glenn Plumby [00:07:08]:
It it really is.

James Kademan [00:07:10]:
So when you were hiring these people, what were the I imagine you learned just as you’re cutting your teeth on all this. You’re learning some things to ask or things to look for. What were some of the tricks or things that you would ask to try to figure out? Is this a person that’s a good fit or is this person that’s probably better off working somewhere else?

Glenn Plumby [00:07:27]:
You know, when I was when I was on campus interviewing, I never really got into the academic side because, honestly, if they’re sitting in front of me, they have the academic background. So that was really never important. What I was looking at is just for their ability to look me in the eye, have a general conversation, and be knowledgeable about a lot more things that’s going on around campus. Yeah. You get those kids that that, really wanna be a 100% academic. That’s great, But on the other hand, those people really have difficult time transitioning into the real life situation. I was a good example. I graduated from Miami.

Glenn Plumby [00:08:10]:
I I had a 3 o. I was in a fraternity. Most of my buddies had 3 fives, 3 sixes. When it came time to find a job, I had 6 job offers, and they couldn’t get one. And it’s really just because you gotta have the ability to to you gotta have some swag. You have the ability to carry on a conversation, and you gotta be able to look people in the eye and let them know how confident you are. So that’s really what I look for is just confidence.

James Kademan [00:08:36]:
Interesting.

Glenn Plumby [00:08:37]:
Because I I knew if if the if that person sitting across from me had some swagger and some confidence, they could be successful in our business. Because the convenience store business at the street level is not easy. It’s it’s a fair it’s a very difficult job. You know, you think about In. Graduate from Call. We put you in training for 6 months. We give you the keys to 10 multimillion dollar locations and say, Rob. And that’s daunting.

Glenn Plumby [00:09:03]:
That is very overwhelming. So you gotta have that matter of fact, we swagger was one of our terms that we used. You gotta have that swag to be able to walk In let people know, hey. I’m the boss, and this is what we’re gonna do.

James Kademan [00:09:14]:
That is cool. I love that.

Glenn Plumby [00:09:17]:
Yeah.

James Kademan [00:09:17]:
Love it. So would there be something that you would ask or, like, I don’t know, ask them how to change the tire or some question that would be outside the scope of what they studied academically to try to figure out if they had that swagger?

Glenn Plumby [00:09:29]:
You know, it was more or less just general On. What they did outside of school. That’s what I wanted to know. You know? And did they volunteer charities? You know? Did they get outside, just the classroom? Did they get you know, were they in fraternity or a sorority? Did you hold an office in those in those, things, in those, organizations? And I was looking for that next piece of something that I could build On. We would bring him in house so that way we could teach him the business. You can’t teach the ability to have a conversation. You either have it or you don’t. You know? And, and and like I said, 30% of the people we hired just couldn’t do it.

Glenn Plumby [00:10:11]:
Now they may have moved on In other parts of the organization and become an accountant or an HR person or something like that. But from a pure operation standpoint or a marketing standpoint, you had to be out there. Yeah. They have the ability to look somebody in the eye and and talk.

James Kademan [00:10:27]:
Alright. I know exactly where you’re coming from. I have call answering service and teaching people how to talk or be able to communicate with people.

Glenn Plumby [00:10:35]:
Yep.

James Kademan [00:10:35]:
And I can’t teach personality, man. I’ve tried. I’ve tried.

Glenn Plumby [00:10:39]:
Nope. No. You can’t. No question.

James Kademan [00:10:42]:
Higher personality. You can train the rest.

Glenn Plumby [00:10:44]:
That’s exactly right.

James Kademan [00:10:46]:
Tell me a story as far as marketing a convenience store. That seems like a challenge to me because you’re marketing to people that may not necessarily see you again because we’re on a road trip, or you’re just where you are and the people around you are your customers because they need to ask and you’re there. How does that work from a a realistic, we gotta market this business to grow it? How do you do that?

Glenn Plumby [00:11:10]:
You know, the convenience store business has some main main, things that you have to offer. Cigarettes, beer, soft Draw, and the business is trying to get into the food business, hot food, warm food. And that’s really where we were moving when I retired back in 2021. Tough business because number 1, you get a lot of people buy gas, and the big objective was to get them from buying gas inside the store because only 30% of the people that would buy gas would go inside store. And furthermore, the demographics of getting people in the store, women and youngsters, very hard to do. Guys like you and I, we’re comfortable in a convenience store. We go in there. We buy things.

Glenn Plumby [00:11:58]:
Not a big deal. You know, women, you know, it has to be well lit, has to be clean, has to be inviting, or else they’re not even gonna walk in the door. And then you got the youngsters. The young kids, you know, they’re they’re really not interested to to go inside either. As a matter of fact, we have a loyalty program called Speedway rewards. You may have heard about it.

James Kademan [00:12:18]:
Mhmm.

Glenn Plumby [00:12:19]:
Probably the most successful loyalty program in the convenience store chain. Probably, it may not be today, but in its day, it was probably the the the best one. We went to a university and we had we we were trying to get youngsters into the store. So we go to the university and we commissioned this study. They bring their top 20 kids In, and they they spend a month and a half studying the, the topic. We go there and have this big presentation. They give us this big presentation. And the first question I asked was, of the 20, how many of you went in a convenience store before you did this study, And how many kids put up their hand? None.

James Kademan [00:13:05]:
None?

Glenn Plumby [00:13:06]:
0. And I’m thinking, oh my gosh. Why don’t we do why didn’t we ask this question when we started. Right?

James Kademan [00:13:12]:
Save a few bucks.

Glenn Plumby [00:13:14]:
So, you know, the results were somewhat tainted, but, you know, it was still good exercise. But, you know, women and women and and the the new generations getting them in naughty.

James Kademan [00:13:25]:
So just to clarify, when you say youngsters, you’re talking 20 ish and less. Right?

Glenn Plumby [00:13:29]:
Yeah. Yeah. I’m talking I’m talking drive you know, when you’re driving a car through your early twenties.

James Kademan [00:13:36]:
So they they have a Call, they gotta fill it with gas, but they wouldn’t run inside to get a soda or a snack or something like that?

Glenn Plumby [00:13:42]:
The the the the the the the dominance of the evidence shows they buy their gas, and then they go next door to a McDonald’s or sort of a get their

James Kademan [00:13:51]:
drink. Really?

Glenn Plumby [00:13:54]:
Which when you look at that convenience store customer, time starved, you know, they’re all time starved, and that was probably what we’ve how we’ve leveraged the businesses. Hey. We’re fast. We’re inexpensive. We can get you in and out, but we still were was fighting these younger kids buying their gas, going across the street, getting in line to get a cheeseburger and a Coke, and spending 20 minutes doing it versus just walking in the door. So we were getting really good at it. We were getting really good at it in the late teens, early twenties, but, it was it was it was quite a daunting task.

James Kademan [00:14:31]:
Interesting. The name Arabian would never have crossed my mind because I do lot of road tripping, and there’s been more than a couple Calls that have been from a gas station. And it’s interesting that you say that now, I guess that didn’t even dawned On me, but I was a kid. The food at a gas station was you’re just asking for gut rot.

Glenn Plumby [00:14:53]:
Right.

James Kademan [00:14:54]:
Right. And now it’s convenient. It’s I wouldn’t consider it worse than fast food. And where before you’re like, I don’t know how long a hotdog’s been sitting there.

Glenn Plumby [00:15:05]:
So In your in your backyard with all the quick trips, they’re one of the best food providers in the business. I know that family really Call.

James Kademan [00:15:14]:
Yeah.

Glenn Plumby [00:15:14]:
And they do an outstanding job. No question.

James Kademan [00:15:17]:
It is interesting that you say that because we and I agree with you completely. I was there. We have quick trips all around us. I was there. I was grabbing something or I was with my Kademan, and we’re looking for something. He was helping me at the the office, so I figured I’d get him lunch at the gas station. Right? You did a good job, kid. And we’re looking at something.

James Kademan [00:15:36]:
They had some empty spots. And this woman from QuikTrip comes up, and she’s like, what do you want? She asked that to my kid. And he’s like, you know, I was looking for your quarter pound cheeseburger or something like that. She’s like, give me 2 minutes.

Glenn Plumby [00:15:48]:
Yep.

James Kademan [00:15:49]:
And I was like, what? And then I realized she’s the cook. Yeah. It’s a gas station with a cook.

Glenn Plumby [00:15:56]:
Absolutely. Absolutely.

James Kademan [00:15:58]:
It blew my I just figured it was some lady that slapped stuff in the microwave. No. No. They have a kitchen, and she’s cooking it for him. And I was like, oh my gosh. Yeah. This is a whole different game than when I was a kid. Whole different game.

Glenn Plumby [00:16:13]:
But the the the getting those younger kids to understand that and try it, you know, that’s what we tried. That’s what our big deal was trial. We wanted to gain trial. Alright. Can people at least try 1? And, you know, we Glenn over a a fair percentage of those, but but it was still a a rough rough show.

James Kademan [00:16:32]:
Interesting. Yeah. In Trip’s been, I would say Customers service aspect, what they offer. I don’t wanna say every time, but close every time I go in there and you just observe from a business standpoint to figure out what are they doing differently that other businesses are not.

Glenn Plumby [00:16:49]:
Yep.

James Kademan [00:16:50]:
It’s so interesting to watch. I give you a really quick example, which is one that you probably know the story a 1000000 times over. We used to live close to this BP gas station. I’m sure it had a name, but I just saw the BP sign on it. It was probably owned by just some guy or some woman who knows. On place right off an exit of a 6 lane highway, which is an eighth of a mile off of a 6 lane interstate. So great spot for a gas station. They have probably 14 pumps.

James Kademan [00:17:21]:
So we’re there. We lived there for a decade. That place is there, and it’s always kinda dingy. It had a Speedway. The subway closed up years ago. It’s just kinda it was never one that you would go to. You’d never make In a priority or anything like that. If you need a guess of desperation, it was right there.

Glenn Plumby [00:17:37]:
Yep.

James Kademan [00:17:37]:
Quick trip opens up maybe an eighth mile down the road. So further away from the exits, further away from the interstate, they probably have 40 Plumby. That place will be packed. And that BP is crickets.

Glenn Plumby [00:17:52]:
Yep.

James Kademan [00:17:52]:
Crickets. And I’m, and I’m just thinking if I was that BP person, I would have been thinking, like, all we had to do was be nice.

Glenn Plumby [00:18:00]:
Yeah. Yeah.

James Kademan [00:18:02]:
What did we not do? Because location wise, the BP one is way better. Way more convenient, closer right off the exit.

Glenn Plumby [00:18:10]:
Yep.

James Kademan [00:18:10]:
But that quick trip is destroying them.

Glenn Plumby [00:18:13]:
Yep. Destroying them.

James Kademan [00:18:14]:
So it’s

Glenn Plumby [00:18:14]:
They they do a fantastic job.

James Kademan [00:18:16]:
No motion. Yeah. So kudos to them because they they raised the bar in a place or in a a vertical that I feel that bar was pretty

Glenn Plumby [00:18:24]:
low. Yeah.

James Kademan [00:18:25]:
I still remember going to the gas stations with my parents where you had to get the hubcap with the key to go to the bathroom outside.

Glenn Plumby [00:18:30]:
Oh, yeah. Yep. Yeah. Yeah. No. There’s still some of that out there too. It’s pretty crazy.

James Kademan [00:18:35]:
Yeah. I remember asking my dad, why do we need a key? You know, he was just tiptoe around answering that question.

Glenn Plumby [00:18:41]:
Yep. No question.

James Kademan [00:18:44]:
So that’s interesting. So tell me, how do you move up from marketing into executive vice president and then chief operating officer?

Glenn Plumby [00:18:52]:
You know, first of all, I have an accounting degree.

James Kademan [00:18:56]:
Okay.

Glenn Plumby [00:18:56]:
Okay. So Miami University, I have an accounting degree. And, never really liked accounting, but I knew I had to know the numbers. And that’s really why I kinda got into it. So my 41 years, I was only in accounting for 4 years. Okay. And, you know, what I would suggest, the way to do that In, and it and it’s important for On kids to know this. When you’re looking at a company, you need to look at a company that was willing to put you in other disciplines.

Glenn Plumby [00:19:24]:
You know, you could start a company. You could be In accounting for 41 years, or you can go to an organization whose track record In. It’s admin accounting, Glenn we’re gonna put him in HR, then we’re gonna put him over here, then we’re gonna put him in operations. So what I always told young kids is is is trust the company you work for, sit in as many chairs as you hand so you build your internal resume. And what I look for were kids that had multiple discipline experience because I knew that they could be really good in operations. Same thing in marketing. I would say a very high percent of the people we put in marketing came from operations because they come from the street. They really know what the customer wants.

Glenn Plumby [00:20:13]:
They know what you know, the marketing people, if they’re in a silo, they’re gonna come up with all these great ideas and half of them are stupid. Right? They sound good in a boardroom, but it just doesn’t work. So we always reverse engineer In and put operating people in marketing along with some marketing, you know, talented people, and we were able to do that. So, you know, I had a mentor. I was at Marathon of Troy in the first 11 years, and I had a mentor that I worked for at the time. He happened to be the CEO. He’s the toughest guy I ever worked for. And, he saw something in me, and he sent me down to the retail organization.

Glenn Plumby [00:20:51]:
So he sent me from On to Speedway. And, which was which didn’t happen all that often. And I’ll never forget, the president of the Speedway also was a direct report of the CEO that I worked for. He wasn’t happy about me coming down there and I’ll never forget I went down there and I see him in the hallway he comes up shapes my hand and says Mr. Plumby welcome to Speedway, but you aren’t my choice, and he walked away.

James Kademan [00:21:24]:
Ouch.

Glenn Plumby [00:21:25]:
That’s how that’s how my career started at Speedway.

James Kademan [00:21:28]:
So Welcome.

Glenn Plumby [00:21:29]:
Yeah. Welcome. So it worked out eventually. We respected each other’s work. But, you know, I had trust that the people I worked for who put me in these different situations, really helped me build my internal resume. So, you know, I started from accounting, went into marketing. I ran marketing for 10 years, and they put me in operations. I ran operations for for 10 years.

Glenn Plumby [00:21:56]:
And then the last 5 years of my career, they combine operations and marketing together, and that was my that was my role. But, you know, it was really, really happened. And, you know, I say it in my book, you know, there’s 2 things that I really live by. 1, you treat people how you On be treated. And, you know, I live by that, and that’s that’s really important to me. And the second thing is you surround yourself with good people. And what I mean by that is I was never the smartest tool in the chest, but I had the ability to find people that that were in my organization that could really make a difference. And you let them run.

Glenn Plumby [00:22:38]:
You know, you can’t micromanage, you let them run. So I live by really those 2 those those 2, lessons, that I actually learned from my mom and Draw. And that really was a was a big piece of my success.

James Kademan [00:22:52]:
That’s awesome.

Glenn Plumby [00:22:54]:
Yeah.

James Kademan [00:22:54]:
Tell me from a operation standpoint of convenience store, I mean, we talked about the food and stuff like that. I imagine over the course of decades, even the fuel that was offered is changing.

Glenn Plumby [00:23:06]:
Yes.

James Kademan [00:23:06]:
So operations you’re having to deal with I mean, software In changing. The fuel is changing, they’re adding food instead of just being this a cooler, a bunch of cigarettes and some gas. Now you’re offering all these other things.

Glenn Plumby [00:23:19]:
Right.

James Kademan [00:23:20]:
Tell Tell me what have been some of the challenges that you had to deal with over the course of time as a c o COO?

Glenn Plumby [00:23:26]:
You know, number 1, labor.

James Kademan [00:23:29]:
Labor. Okay.

Glenn Plumby [00:23:30]:
Finding finding bodies and then cost per hour. So if you look at, you know, when we were when in in my my organization, our turnover was roughly a Draw.

James Kademan [00:23:42]:
Annually?

Glenn Plumby [00:23:43]:
In the store.

James Kademan [00:23:44]:
Okay.

Glenn Plumby [00:23:45]:
Because those those jobs are beginning jobs and a lot of college students, a lot of high schoolers, a lot of things like that. So we had to be a hiring machine. You know, we had to be an HR machine to be able to to really make the business work. And, you know, what we committed to was the people side of the business and the stores. As a matter of fact, our objective was to have 0 holes in the store on a daily basis. And what I mean by that is a 100% of our part time and full pipe full time position filled. And to have 0 holes on a daily basis was In insurmountable task that we were able to achieve, and that’s why Speedway was the dominant force that they were, when we sold out to 711. Because we had people in the stores taking care of customers, cleaning the coffee pots, stocking the stores.

Glenn Plumby [00:24:41]:
So labor is was was number 1 as far as the ability to service the customer. You have to have people in there to talk to and to take money. Because if you think about it, you know, you a single guy wakes up in the morning, goes in to get his coffee. That person that we have across the register, this is the first person they Call to that day. You know? Oh, that’s true. That cost he’s the you know, so we always try to train our people, let them know that, you know, if that’s a terrible experience, that guy could go on to have a terrible day. You know? So we we try to get our people to understand you gotta be pleasant, you gotta have a smile on your face, you gotta talk to people, and we got a lot of repeat business because of that. So it it’s it’s it sounds a little bit different, but that’s that’s kinda how it is.

James Kademan [00:25:33]:
No. That’s huge. That’s huge. In. Let me ask you a little bit deeper there as far as the labor goes to get it a Draw. Does that mean to deal with the Call and stuff like that that you ended up having to staff a Draw% or something of that nature?

Glenn Plumby [00:25:48]:
We had, we we came up with a a concept called recruiting centers. So, you know, we had 45 Draw stores, all company operated, 50,000 employees when we sold to several of them. Wow. And throughout the 40 states that we were operating in, we had HR hubs. So if there was a callout, the first option was to see if somebody who may be part time wanted more hours. And if that wasn’t if that didn’t work, the the op the manager would simply call the recruiting center, and they’d have a person there. So I would say we weren’t In a 125%, but every what we call district the district is 10 stores. Every district had their pot of people that they could go to, whether it be part timers that may need to add more hours or new hires that were waiting for an assignment.

Glenn Plumby [00:26:41]:
So and they did a fabulous job really kind of making that happen.

James Kademan [00:26:46]:
That is clever.

Glenn Plumby [00:26:47]:
That

James Kademan [00:26:47]:
is very clever.

Glenn Plumby [00:26:48]:
But, you know, when you’re talking about that many employees, a 50¢ cost increase in labor is a is a big number. So it’s a it’s a really a a fine you know, it’s a it’s a thin edge there between you gotta be able to manage the economics as well as you gotta be able to manage having that pot of people. No. I can hardly understand.

James Kademan [00:27:11]:
Pretty confident.

Glenn Plumby [00:27:12]:
They did a wonderful job.

James Kademan [00:27:14]:
Yeah. It In interesting during pandemic. You’d like, it was tough to find people.

Glenn Plumby [00:27:21]:
Yeah.

James Kademan [00:27:21]:
So I did a little motorcycle trip up north into the UP of Michigan. And you start out around Madison, On. You go to a convenience store and you see their hourly wage, like, no hiring. They’re hourly wage in the door. The further north you go into the kinda less populated areas, the lower that hourly rate was.

Glenn Plumby [00:27:40]:
Yep. Yep.

James Kademan [00:27:41]:
If you start out at 17, 18 around us, and then you go up and then it’s 10, 11.

Glenn Plumby [00:27:46]:
Right.

James Kademan [00:27:47]:
I didn’t see it anything lower than 10, but it was interesting just to see In though it was the same company Yep. Just based on location or that hourly rate was different.

Glenn Plumby [00:27:58]:
And and I tell you, think about it during the the the pandemic, offices were closing. All those people were working for home. Right? Well, the people in the stores still had to go in. They still had to service customers, masks, plastic things over the registers, cleanliness. And I give those people in the stores all the credit in the world because while the office staff is sitting at home working in their safety of their home, We still had people in the stores taking care of Customers. And, you know, that’s that that was probably one of my biggest, pet peeves I had during during the pandemic was, we we know we gave the notion that the store level people weren’t quite as important as the people who worked in the office. And I combated that honestly, but I was in the car throughout the whole pandemic going to visit stores. Knock on wood.

James Kademan [00:28:50]:
I didn’t

Glenn Plumby [00:28:50]:
get sick, but, you know, you gotta lead by example. And Yeah. In all those cases, we we we praise those people. No doubt.

James Kademan [00:29:00]:
Yes. The frontline people that run the country. I always think of the the janitor in the breakfast club. The movie is like In the eyes and ears of this institution.

Glenn Plumby [00:29:10]:
Right. Right. Yep.

James Kademan [00:29:14]:
So what inspired you to write a book? I mean, you got to retire. You can just sit on a beach and enjoy the rest of your life, all chilling and relaxing. Instead you decide to write a book?

Glenn Plumby [00:29:24]:
Well, you know, after 40 years In all the sea store food, I put £40 on. Right?

James Kademan [00:29:33]:
In Not a surprise. To go

Glenn Plumby [00:29:34]:
in the store, you gotta eat because they they ask you know, they, you know, you gotta lead by example.

James Kademan [00:29:39]:
So Yeah. Quality control. Right?

Glenn Plumby [00:29:41]:
Yep. So I put £40 on by the time I retired. And, for Christmas, my daughter got me, a thing called Storyworth. I don’t know if you ever heard of that.

James Kademan [00:29:52]:
But Story. What is it? I’m sorry.

Glenn Plumby [00:29:54]:
It’s called Storyworth.

James Kademan [00:29:56]:
I have not heard of that.

Glenn Plumby [00:29:57]:
And, it’s a service that, you get a question a week, and it’s meant to put your thoughts down on paper. You know, I’m 65. I retire. My daughters, who I’m really close to are worried, you know, about me retiring and all this kind of stuff. So they bought this service. So every so every week, I get this question. And this question’s like, tell me about your parents. You know? What was your favorite time growing up as a childhood? Well, 1 year, one of the questions was, what goals do you have in retirement? And, honestly, I hate that word goals now that I look back because that doesn’t go with retirement.

Glenn Plumby [00:30:39]:
Those 2 shouldn’t even be in the same sense. So long story short, I walk 8 miles a Draw. And, and as I’m doing this project for my daughters, I’m thinking about all these thoughts. So I just decided to dictate into my phone, some of these lessons because that’s what they wanted. They wanted to know more about me long term. You know, when I’m not around, they could they could remember. So I I dictate, you know, the book into my phone, import In Grammarly, Glenn it off to my daughters. They edit In, and lo and behold, they you know, it it was it was pretty good.

Glenn Plumby [00:31:22]:
So I sent it out to some CPG companies. I wanted their input and got some really good reviews, but from them, so I decided to publish it. Writing a book was never a goal of mine. I don’t even read a lot of books. But, as I really look at it, the ability to help these young kids transition either from high school to college, college to work, and even, even workers enter retirement is is not an easy thing to do. And I thought this could help with that. So it’s been a lot of fun.

James Kademan [00:31:58]:
Nice. Tell me, what is a CPG company?

Glenn Plumby [00:32:02]:
Like Coke, Pepsi, Altria, potato chip companies, cigarette companies. Those they Call them CPG companies.

James Kademan [00:32:13]:
Okay. So you submitted what you wrote to some of the people that you knew in those industries?

Glenn Plumby [00:32:19]:
Yeah. Because I said, hey. What do you think of this? Could this help you? Because they’re hiring people too. And I got a lot of positive comments back on it. And I thought, what the heck? I might as well take a shot at it and Yeah. See if it works.

James Kademan [00:32:32]:
That’s cool. So are you still doing the story worth thing?

Glenn Plumby [00:32:36]:
No. No. It, it it’s 52 questions, 1 question a week, and, I did that for all of 2023. So I have the book somewhere. They bound it together, and they make it pretty and all that kind of stuff. And it’s it’s it’s more of a remembrance for my daughters. It’s my thoughts grown up and really throughout my life.

James Kademan [00:32:58]:
Alright.

Glenn Plumby [00:32:59]:
Yeah. I I I strongly encourage it because it it’s, it was it was a fun thing to do.

James Kademan [00:33:05]:
That sounds cool.

Glenn Plumby [00:33:06]:
Yeah. And then to read it, you know, over the course of when the year’s over is is pretty fun too.

James Kademan [00:33:12]:
You know, it’s interesting you say that because I wrote a book, and I feel like it’s a pretty good book because every once in a while and I say that it’s pretty good book not to be the guy trying to hustle books, whatever. But Yep. This guy that I’ve, I do like to read. I love to read, nonfiction. I can’t wrap my head around fiction to save my life. But, anyways, I have a bunch of books and sometimes when I’m waiting for someone, I’ll end up picking up my book sometimes instead of other books. It’s interesting because you you start reading a story and you’re like, oh, yeah. That did happen.

Glenn Plumby [00:33:48]:
Yeah.

James Kademan [00:33:48]:
But I can because a lot of it’s just anecdotes and stuff like that. So I get the idea of what you’re saying where you write this stuff down, you journal, something of that nature where you can get these stories written

Glenn Plumby [00:34:00]:
Right.

James Kademan [00:34:01]:
For your friends, your relatives, your daughters, all that kind of stuff, but also for you to remember all the stuff that you’ve survived, Glenn from, that’s a huge deal.

Glenn Plumby [00:34:12]:
Well, and it was also a a way to say thanks. Right?

James Kademan [00:34:16]:
Oh, fair.

Glenn Plumby [00:34:17]:
You know, to my parents who aren’t here, but, you know, they taught me most of that. My wife, the pastor of my church, the several mentors that I had, you know, in the organization growing up, it was my way to say thank you, and I do that in the book too. I try to try to to try to make sure that, they’re given the the due credit that they should.

James Kademan [00:34:38]:
Nice. So when you’re let’s dig into the book thing a little bit. It’s In fun. And I know that there’s a lot of people that are would be or wanna be authors that would wanna know this. So you got all the stuff written. You get you get the blessing from people that are like, yes, Glenn. This is good stuff. You ought to publish this.

James Kademan [00:34:56]:
Yep. How do you go down the road of publishing that book? Did you find a publisher? Did you self publish?

Glenn Plumby [00:35:02]:
Nope. I found a publisher. It was really, really easy. I mean, very, very easy. It’s not cheap, but it’s not overly expensive either. But I found a publisher. I live in Dayton who is in Cincinnati, and a few of my friends used her in the past. And, you know, basically, we started in January, and In the one the one, thing I made her promise me is it was gonna be done before golf season started.

James Kademan [00:35:33]:
So I’m a I’m

Glenn Plumby [00:35:34]:
a really avid golfer. Alright. The last thing I wanna do is sit in the house on a sunny day and look at edits and all that kind of stuff. And we got it done. So we published you know, it came it went live on Amazon May 16th. Had a great, you know, first run. It was it was a best seller in a couple categories.

James Kademan [00:35:51]:
Nice.

Glenn Plumby [00:35:52]:
And, she did you know, I handed her the book, the rough draft. She hadn’t met her, went through Call did all the edits, then we sat down and said, okay. How are we gonna market this? You know, what are we gonna do? And it’s gone relatively well. Probably the most fun part about it is, I sent it out to a bunch of schools that I went to because I see it as kind of a compliment to the capstone class for seniors. And I actually had a call this morning, and I had got a call this afternoon after our podcast from couple universities I sent out to because it it’s relevant. It makes sense to them.

James Kademan [00:36:34]:
Wow.

Glenn Plumby [00:36:34]:
And and really what I want those college seniors that are getting ready to to go into the workforce and and try to help them with that transition. So that that that part’s, that part’s fun. I I really enjoy that, and, I’ve had a lot of positive feedback from the universities and, got a couple things scheduled. So that that that’s gonna be exciting.

James Kademan [00:37:01]:
That’s incredible. That’s super cool.

Glenn Plumby [00:37:03]:
It is.

James Kademan [00:37:04]:
Tell me, you had, On listing here, we have 10 simple but powerful lessons to enhance your life.

Glenn Plumby [00:37:11]:
Yes.

James Kademan [00:37:12]:
What are those?

Glenn Plumby [00:37:15]:
Those are those are the chapters.

James Kademan [00:37:17]:
You know?

Glenn Plumby [00:37:18]:
And and in the book, you know, each there’s 10 chapters, and under each chapter, there’s a there’s a subtitle. So for instance, 1st chapter is wipe the slate clean. K? And what I that taught me. When you work for a company, with the moment you get paid, you don’t owe the company anything, and they don’t owe you anything. Think about it. Entitlement. Right? How many people do you know that are working at a company and they wanna complain to you? You know, they’re getting paid every week, but they’re gonna complain to you because I didn’t get this promotion, and I didn’t get this, and they treat me like crap. Well, I went through life with the fact that, hey.

Glenn Plumby [00:38:04]:
You wiped the slate clean. They don’t owe me anything, and I don’t owe them anything. And In and the subtitle of that In, there’s really no scorecard in business or a marriage. You know, think about In. Because I relate every chapter from a business standpoint and then a personal standpoint. So, you know, that’s In of the first chapter. Treat people how you wanna be treated. You know? And my subtitle there is you rent a title and you don’t own it.

Glenn Plumby [00:38:32]:
How many people you know live through their title? You know? And at the end of your time, when that title goes away, people are gonna treat you how you treated them with that big title. And I know a lot of people that Glenn they gave up that title, looked around the room, and they just really didn’t have many friends. So I So I preach. You rent a title. It can be taken away anytime. You don’t own it. Surround yourself with good people. That’s the 3rd chapter.

Glenn Plumby [00:39:03]:
Trust is something you’re trust is something you’re given. It’s something that it’s not trust is something that’s not given to you. You have to earn.

James Kademan [00:39:12]:
Mhmm.

Glenn Plumby [00:39:12]:
And it doesn’t happen overnight. You know that that’s something that, and there’s a great story in there about that. When I first went to operations, I had 6 direct reports, and I came out of market. And there was a lot of distrust between operations and marketing, so they saw me as the editor.

James Kademan [00:39:31]:
Oh, that was nice.

Glenn Plumby [00:39:33]:
Yeah. So it took me a year and a half to get those 6 people to really see me as as their mentor. So that trust took me a year and a half to to really put together, and like I said, it doesn’t happen overnight. A chapter on change. You have to take people for who they are. You know? My favorite story there is, the night before I was getting married or the day I was getting married, I asked my mother to come in and tie my bow tie, and she said to me, you know, it’s not too late. This is the day I’m getting married. She liked my my first wife, but but she didn’t think she she she thought I wanted her to change.

Glenn Plumby [00:40:15]:
And I’ll never forget her looking at me saying, the woman you’re gonna marry today is a woman you’re gonna have to live with. You are not gonna change her. We Call told you we were married 20 years, had 2 wonderful daughters, and our friends today, but probably the best advice I’ve never taken. You know? Priorities. You gotta have your priorities right. Can’t do everything. Not enough time in the day. And you gotta you gotta make sure you take care of your spouse because that’s the one thing on the on the list of priorities that could go to the bottom if you’re not careful.

Glenn Plumby [00:40:47]:
So I Call about priorities. Expectations. Everybody has expectations. You gotta be able to manage expectations. You gotta be able to set expectations. You gotta Glenn rejection, things like that. So you really have to be able to to understand what expectations can do to your life. Be where your feet are.

Glenn Plumby [00:41:07]:
This is my favorite check. You ever hear that term? No. So, be where your feet are. How many times have you been somewhere working, and your mind is at home because you’re missing something because you’re not at home?

James Kademan [00:41:25]:
On. How

Glenn Plumby [00:41:26]:
many times have you been somewhere and you’re just not where your feet are? Your mind is somewhere else. So I was

James Kademan [00:41:33]:
In I was in my son’s baseball game yesterday.

Glenn Plumby [00:41:36]:
Uh-huh.

James Kademan [00:41:36]:
He had already hit, so he came and went. Right? He’s a good baseball player. So all of his other teammates are up, and a lot of them are not. It’s just league. So it’s Yep. It was boring game.

Glenn Plumby [00:41:49]:
Yep.

James Kademan [00:41:49]:
And I picked up my phone and started looking at I didn’t even have anything specific to look at. I was just going out of my mind, watching this poor kid try to pitch.

Glenn Plumby [00:41:57]:
Yep.

James Kademan [00:41:58]:
He’s not my kid.

Glenn Plumby [00:41:59]:
Yep.

James Kademan [00:42:00]:
But I had to set my phone down because I thought my son’s gonna look up at me Yes. Right from the dugout and say, what is dad doing? And he’s gonna look at me looking at my phone, and what is that gonna tell him? Yep.

Glenn Plumby [00:42:11]:
That he’s not Exactly right. Exactly right.

James Kademan [00:42:14]:
Sounds like, put the phone down, watch these kids struggle through a baseball game.

Glenn Plumby [00:42:21]:
Yep. And I struggled I struggled my whole career because I traveled all the time, went to a lot of cool places with vendors, and and I never really appreciated that that comment until later in life. And really what made me appreciate it are you a golfer?

James Kademan [00:42:39]:
No. I mean, I have golfed. I’m terrible at golf, so I usually just avoid the pain, not golfing.

Glenn Plumby [00:42:44]:
Well, I was invited to play to play a golf course in in Georgia called Augusta National, the master. Probably the most sought after, invitation you can get. Nice. And and, yeah, I promised my wife when I when I got there, I wouldn’t think about work. I wouldn’t think about home. I was gonna take it all in. Well, night before we we play, my supervisor calls me and says, hey. We want you to go on a temporary assignment for 3 months, and I had 24 hours to give him an answer.

Glenn Plumby [00:43:17]:
And I’ll never forget, I’m sitting there and I’m thinking, I’m gonna play the the most awesome golf course tomorrow, and I gotta think about this decision. And that was the point where I was able to put it out of my head, forget about it, and be where my feet were. And it was the most wonderful time that I ever had because never once while I was playing that golf course that I think about the issues with the pain. Team. And from that time forward, I was always where my feet were. So

James Kademan [00:43:47]:
Nice. That’s huge.

Glenn Plumby [00:43:48]:
Yeah. Another chapter is you can’t take it with you. Talking about money In charity, things like that. And then probably the chapter that I’ve heard the most feedback from, be like your dog. Be like your dog. So we have 2 Labradoodles. Now I’m in retirement. I Glenn a lot of time with them, And, man, they have it right.

Glenn Plumby [00:44:08]:
You know, dogs have it right. And I wrote a chapter with some nuances and funny stories about that. And then the last one is really looking. You know, you gotta be able to look in the mirror and like that like who that person is you’re looking at. Mhmm. If you aren’t, you gotta do something about In. True. Complain.

Glenn Plumby [00:44:24]:
Most of the people won’t complain. So that those are the 10 lessons in a nutshell. And like I said, I I I approach it from both a business standpoint as well as a personal standpoint.

James Kademan [00:44:34]:
That’s cool.

Glenn Plumby [00:44:35]:
Yeah. That’s cool. It In was fun.

James Kademan [00:44:37]:
I love it. I wanna dig into one of those if you don’t mind.

Glenn Plumby [00:44:41]:
Yep.

James Kademan [00:44:41]:
Because this is a challenge that I I have. Just the business that we’re in, trust is a big deal. Myself, getting new employees to trust me.

Glenn Plumby [00:44:50]:
Yeah.

James Kademan [00:44:51]:
Getting employees to trust each other.

Glenn Plumby [00:44:53]:
So tell

James Kademan [00:44:53]:
me about how did you build trust with your other operations crew when you come from marketing to the COO position? Yeah. So you’re essentially their boss, but they’re still apprehensive of you. Right?

Glenn Plumby [00:45:06]:
Right. So

James Kademan [00:45:07]:
what did you I mean, you were smart enough to realize, like, hey. These guys don’t trust me. We’re gonna take some steps to build this. Yep. What do you do?

Glenn Plumby [00:45:15]:
You know, I started at the I started at the at the street level. So I had I had roughly Draw of these district managers. They had 10 stores each. I got their birthdays, so I would call each one of those on their birthday.

James Kademan [00:45:34]:
Oh.

Glenn Plumby [00:45:34]:
Can you imagine being a entry level manager getting a call from the CEO on your birthday?

James Kademan [00:45:39]:
Nice. Okay. It it

Glenn Plumby [00:45:41]:
gave me a chance to get to know these people, for them to get to know me, and the ground swell up. People love that. People look forward to it. People talked about it. The ground swell was was enormous up the ladder. So while that was going on, essentially, for that year and a half, I was on the road straight. Every week, I’d be with On of those 6 managers. And over the course of the year, I taught them marketing.

Glenn Plumby [00:46:10]:
So to them in operations, marketing was the devil, and I taught them marketing. I taught them why we did things. I taught them how we did things. And I and I since marketing also reported to me, I was able to build an organization where those operations vice presidents had input on marketing. So now all of a sudden, they’re happy because they understand In, and they’re talking about it. And then really, the final thing that I did was I had their backs. So, you know, in our business in a c store business, you have to have capital to grow. You have to keep building stores.

Glenn Plumby [00:46:48]:
You have to be renovating Customers, and I believe in accountability. I believe in numbers, metrics, and accountability. And I would give the money to the divisions that showed me the best returns. And the ones that didn’t give money, I sat down with and said, okay. This is why you’re not getting it, and this is what you need to do to get it. So over the course of the year, those 6 direct reports knew I had their backs. They understood marketing, and the people beneath them were happy with what I was bringing to the table. So took a year and a half.

Glenn Plumby [00:47:26]:
After a year and a half, I could remember having a dinner, and, I had a great relationship with all of them. And, I can remember smoking cigars and drinking bourbon 1 night out by a camp a campfire, In one of the treats retreats that I had, and it we had the the most wonderful time, and it was it was good. But at the end of the day, you gotta be who you are. Right? I mean, you can’t be somebody else. Matter of fact, in the book, I call that person the imposter.

James Kademan [00:47:55]:
You

Glenn Plumby [00:47:55]:
try to be somebody who they aren’t, and that never works out. And those people were always flushed out, and that’s where I always I always really Call highly about you gotta be you. Right? And you and you you gotta understand the rules of the game, and, it it it it like I said, after after a year and a half, it was it was a good run. So the next 7 eight and a half years, it was good. I mean, we we had an outstanding team. The returns were excellent, and, 711 ended up buying us. So it was it was, it was a really good run.

James Kademan [00:48:31]:
Nice. That’s incredible.

Glenn Plumby [00:48:33]:
Yes.

James Kademan [00:48:33]:
So you tell me about was there any turnover underneath you in the office? I understand the stores, the frontline stuff, some of those people come and go. Yep. But as far as the I don’t know if you’d call it managerial level. Yep. Were those over the course of the 8, 9 years that you were in there? Did any of those change?

Glenn Plumby [00:48:54]:
We had we had turnover, but it was design turnover. So Okay. Within the operating organization, a lot of those the better the better performers would get promoted into HR. They would get promoted into marketing. They’d get promoted in these other disciplines once again trying to build their internal resume. So that way Glenn we had to sit down and do our performance succession planning for vice presidential jobs, that was who got on that list. Who had the who had the best internal resume and and who had the swagger and who had the On? So, you know, there was definite turnover there, but we were always keeping the bucket Call, you know, because we were we had we had a bench, at one point, you know, with Draw district managers, I had a bench of 50 district manager trainees on the bench.

James Kademan [00:49:47]:
Woah. Yeah.

Glenn Plumby [00:49:48]:
All college graduates Call college graduates, and we would bring them in. We would train them up, put them in temporary assignments, and then as we’re moving people on, we put them in in into good roles. So it was it it was it was really a lot of credit to our HR group and a lot of credit to our operations group because the c store business is all about hiring, disciplining, improving, and hopefully not firing, but but, there was some of that too.

James Kademan [00:50:20]:
Fair. Tell me let’s dig in a little bit into the discipline side because this is always interesting for me to hear when someone’s in a management position, they got people underneath them. They’ve trained them. They’ve given them all the tools to succeed, but still some people find a way to not do what they’re supposed to do or mess up it. How do you how do you incorporate discipline? Because we always hear about the reward, In more PTO, blah blah blah, all that stuff. But tell me about the discipline as far as what you guys ended up doing.

Glenn Plumby [00:50:51]:
You know, we we crafted a program called a PIP program, performance improvement program.

James Kademan [00:50:57]:
Okay.

Glenn Plumby [00:50:58]:
So when we identified a person that was struggling, we’d bring him in, we would talk to him, and we would put him on this performance improvement program, which was usually a 90 to a 120 day period. And we’re very KPI Draw, key performance indicators, And we made it very clear to them what success looked like. And over every 30 days, we would review them to see how they’re coming along with the performance improvement plan. In they are improving, it’s all good. If they’re not improving, then we had 2 options. 1 is to put them into a a role that was lesser than the one that they’re in, or we would show them the door. I would tell you that the predominance of the people that really couldn’t improve to the point where they kept their position, we would reassign people because we we certainly didn’t like putting people on the street. No.

Glenn Plumby [00:51:55]:
But the the best part or the most interesting part of doing that is people know when they’re over their heads. Right? In in that period where they’re over their head, they’re struggling, they’re grumpy, you know, and and they just aren’t happy because they know, but they’re never gonna come to you and tell you that.

James Kademan [00:52:16]:
So rare. Yeah.

Glenn Plumby [00:52:18]:
So I would tell you that I had over the course of my career, I had more people come to me after they’ve been reassigned to a lesser position and thank me for 30 or 60 days after.

James Kademan [00:52:31]:
Because Okay.

Glenn Plumby [00:52:32]:
Because because, you know, they knew it. It was just a matter of coming to work every day and failing and feeling bad about In. So we would put them in a role that we knew they were could be successful and wasn’t as big a title as what they may what they were doing, but they were still adding value. And I had to me, that’s probably one of the biggest surprises in business people don’t understand. And that is, first of all, you have to have the guts to call it. Right? And and secondly, when you when you handle it the right way, you put them on these performance improvement Glenn, you just give them a soft landing. People are gonna work for you harder when they go into that soft landing than when they did when they did, they In in the role they they they were strong on. So, you know, you gotta have a you gotta have a very defined way to handle that, but when you get to a point, you gotta make the call.

Glenn Plumby [00:53:29]:
I had a lot of people say, well, this guy needs another 30 days, and I’d say no. He had he had his time. Make the call. Because chances are, by giving somebody more time, it ain’t gonna help after a 120 days.

James Kademan [00:53:44]:
No. You’re talking 4 months? No.

Glenn Plumby [00:53:46]:
Yeah. It ain’t gonna it it it it it is what it is. And they may have been working their butt off during that time, so they felt skipping those 3. No. Make the call. You know? Make the call. And like I said, when we made the call, we had people that it’s rough for the 1st 30 days because there’s embarrassment and failure and all that kind of stuff. But we gave them a soft landing, and, it was amazing how many people thanked me for really making that tough call.

Glenn Plumby [00:54:17]:
So that’s that’s what I would tell you In if if you’re if you’re if you’re you have an employee that’s struggling, make it clear, make it accountable, give them a performance approved Glenn, but at the end of it, take care of them. Make the call.

James Kademan [00:54:30]:
Fair. Fair. Yeah. I get that. It’s interesting. People need to be led and even sometimes, not not often, but every once in a while, that’s gotta be led to the door. A lot of times, it’s just Glenn, like, this is what you need to improve. They have to be called out on it.

James Kademan [00:54:46]:
Right. So they’re shown that they need to be responsible responsible for themselves.

Glenn Plumby [00:54:51]:
Right. That’s exactly right. That’s exact and you when you were when you live in a world of accountability, which is what the way our operations group was designed, the numbers are there. You know? The the numbers are there. You know where you stand. You know how you stand. So So it was rare when we actually had to had to terminate somebody because people would get to a point where they said, I need to go somewhere else. And it and it and it was the right thing for them to do.

Glenn Plumby [00:55:20]:
And I I wrote a lot of, I wrote a lot of recommendations for those people. You know, they came and said, hey. Look. And I said, sure. You know, I applaud you for making a call. How can I help you? And, it it’s it’s it’s not a fun thing to do, but that’s that’s reality. That’s life.

James Kademan [00:55:38]:
That’s Glenn you’re in the business with people

Glenn Plumby [00:55:41]:
That’s it. That’s exactly right.

James Kademan [00:55:44]:
That’s it. We don’t have a ton of time left here, Glenn, but I did wanna ask you about the time pie chart.

Glenn Plumby [00:55:50]:
Yes. Yes.

James Kademan [00:55:52]:
Tell me a story about what the time pie chart is.

Glenn Plumby [00:55:55]:
Oh, man. You know, when you’re 20, you may not have a family yet. You got a bunch of friends, so you’re working. And you’re probably putting a lot of hours in because you’re trying to make, you know, a name for yourself. So you’re working way too much. Then when you’re not working, you’re partying with your friends, playing softball, you’re golfing. You may not have a family yet. So that time pie for that 20 year old is a predominance of your friends and work.

Glenn Plumby [00:56:26]:
Alright. Well, fast forward to when you’re 40. Right? That time pie, you you know, you have a family now, less time with your friends, really less time for work if you’re a family man. So that time pie is gonna change when you’re 40. The the part that the percent of your of your 24 hours in a day working is gonna be less than when you’re 20. Your friends In gonna be less than when you’re 20. Your family’s gonna be a lot more than when you’re 20. So my point with the time pie is you have to make decisions.

Glenn Plumby [00:56:59]:
You know, as you’re as you’re growing with a company, each year, your priorities are gonna change. Your work priorities are gonna change. Your family priorities are gonna change. Priorities are gonna change. So you have to be able to adapt the the number of hours that you have in a day to be able to be successful. And there’s one area that that I ignored for my career, and that’s exercise. Oh. I didn’t have time never had time to exercise.

Glenn Plumby [00:57:26]:
You know? Never had time to exercise.

James Kademan [00:57:28]:
So you’re eating In store food.

Glenn Plumby [00:57:31]:
That’s it.

James Kademan [00:57:31]:
Not exercising.

Glenn Plumby [00:57:32]:
Not exercising. Just buying bigger pants. That was my exercise, was buying bigger pants.

James Kademan [00:57:37]:
I walked to the store to get bigger pants. There you go.

Glenn Plumby [00:57:40]:
It. And it’s funny story. My my wife, I got married a second time, and my wife is she’s my soulmate. She’s wonderful. When we got married, I wore a size 36 pants, and she said, I’m never gonna let you buy size 38 pants. So we’ve married 20 years. A year before I retired, I go in to buy these pair of golf pants. I buy put the 30 sixes on.

Glenn Plumby [00:58:03]:
If I had those buttoned, I’d hurt somebody because it pop off and put an eye. So that at that moment, I said, it’s time. I gotta get after it. And now I walk 8 miles a day. I drink nothing but water and coffee, and and I watch what I eat. So so, you know, that from the time pie standpoint, you gotta you gotta prioritize that and sleep. You know? Sleep. You know? And I learned that from watching my dogs.

Glenn Plumby [00:58:31]:
Right? They sleep all day long. They sleep when they want. They’re never grumpy. You know? Sleep and exercise are things that that people ignore. It’s kinda like priorities. You think you can do everything, but you can’t. So and that’s what the book is meant to be from that standpoint, was to get people’s head wrapped around. There’s only so many hours in a day.

Glenn Plumby [00:58:54]:
What can I do versus what should I do, and what am I gonna do? So that that that was that was that was the essence around the time pie.

James Kademan [00:59:04]:
Got it. I love it. I love it. I wanna ask you. I wanna dig into relationships here just a tiny bit before we leave. You’re on wife number 2. First wife is 20 years. 2nd wife is 20 ish years.

James Kademan [00:59:17]:
Is that right?

Glenn Plumby [00:59:18]:
22. 22. That is Well, no. No. No. I’m sorry. I’ve been married to her 18 years, but I’ve known her for 22 years.

James Kademan [00:59:25]:
Call. That’s a while. That’s both of them, that’s a long time.

Glenn Plumby [00:59:29]:
Yep.

James Kademan [00:59:29]:
So first well, I you have to let me know or correct me, I guess. You’re traveling a lot or we’re traveling a lot for work. Yep. So did that take a toll on your relationship?

Glenn Plumby [00:59:42]:
No. No. It didn’t because I was always a dad first.

James Kademan [00:59:46]:
Okay.

Glenn Plumby [00:59:46]:
And I was always a husband first. So there was a lot of travel, a lot of a lot of that, but, you know, I made sure that I was talking to him every day and discussing things. And, you know, it comes back to with my first wife. My mom saw In me because she had some traits that I even when I was dating her, I wasn’t excited about and thought I could change. You know, you can always think you can change somebody, but it never works out. So, you know, we had 20 years together, which were 20 good years, and we decided to amicably part. And, a year later, I met, my second wife, and we dated for 4 years and then got married. And, she’s wonderful.

Glenn Plumby [01:00:27]:
Now she’s a lot younger than me, which is even better for me.

James Kademan [01:00:30]:
Yeah. Way to go.

Glenn Plumby [01:00:31]:
Know how that goes. Yeah. You know how that goes. But this it’s it’s you gotta prioritize your spouse.

James Kademan [01:00:38]:
So did that, you’re, I guess, going through a divorce In if it’s amicable. Did that affect your work at all, or how do you keep those separate?

Glenn Plumby [01:00:46]:
You know, no. And that’s because I always believe that you have work Call and home life. Something has to be good in one of those in order to get through life. And then your In work life and your home life are good at the same time. Rare. Rare. Right? So when I was going through the divorce In my personal life and struggling, I actually excelled at work because that had to be my savior. So I never really let that bother me.

Glenn Plumby [01:01:20]:
But Nice. You know, what I what I try to teach my 2 daughters is you it’s very rare when your when your work life and your home life are really good. And when that happens, you gotta enjoy it. You gotta be where your feet are.

James Kademan [01:01:33]:
Yeah. I mean, that’s the goal.

Glenn Plumby [01:01:35]:
Right. But yeah. Right.

James Kademan [01:01:37]:
Yeah. Challenge.

Glenn Plumby [01:01:39]:
Challenge. Oh, yeah. Challenge.

James Kademan [01:01:41]:
So does that mean when you got the good relationship that your work suffered just because yin and yang, that’s how it works? Or

Glenn Plumby [01:01:50]:
You you know, when I when I met my wife my second wife, she, saw me for who I was, and she understood what my passions were, and she understood how important work work was to me. So if anything, she was a cheerleader for me to to to be on the road, for me to because I talked to her about all these things, and so she was going through, you know, the work situations with me. So, I still travel, probably the last 10 years, a lot less than the 1st 20 years because I got in a role that was a higher level. So I had more board meetings. I had more budget meetings. I had a lot of that stuff. So the travel by definition was was less by the time I met her. So, but but she was more of a cheerleader for me because she knew what made me tick, and she wanted me to do what made what made myself happy, along with her.

James Kademan [01:02:55]:
Nice. Good question.

Glenn Plumby [01:02:56]:
That’s a good question.

James Kademan [01:02:57]:
You know, I’ve been married 20 I don’t know. Where are we at? 22 years?

Glenn Plumby [01:03:03]:
Come on. You gotta know that

James Kademan [01:03:04]:
number.

Glenn Plumby [01:03:07]:
Call always mix it up. 22 years.

James Kademan [01:03:10]:
And it’s interesting talking to people. And just even as an example, just, watching people at my my son’s baseball game, just watching the different couple of the parents of the kids. We’re approaching that age, I guess. I’m on the older side of the the families that are there. So we have 10 year old son. So we’re probably older by 5 to 10 years, a lot of parents there.

Glenn Plumby [01:03:35]:
Yep.

James Kademan [01:03:36]:
My wife is one of the coaches, so I’m sitting on the bleachers solo In some of these families. It’s very interesting, just to see how they sit, the body language. And I would dare say, I don’t know that there’s a lot of love. Well,

Glenn Plumby [01:03:59]:
you know, you’re you’re exactly right. I mean, you know, and that’s where my chapter on priorities. Right? My and I talk about your spouse. And my my comment is date night, turn the TV off, put away your phone, and laugh. And those are the those are the qualities that my wife and I live by to you know? You know, we don’t watch a lot of TV. We’re always laughing, remembering. We have a date big date night once once a month. You gotta have that connection because life is so hard.

Glenn Plumby [01:04:35]:
And like I said, that spouse it’s so easy for that spouse to be the lowest priority that you have just because they’re there. And Yeah. I I really Call about that in the book because I hate to I don’t want people to have to go through what I went through. But I think your observation is spot on. Right? I mean, like, a lot of these people may they get home and they get in a room and they’re watching TVs for 3 hours and never talking. Right? And all of a sudden, the kids go away and then they’re empty nesters, and it’s like, who are you? Right? Yeah. That’s what you gotta guard against.

James Kademan [01:05:08]:
So Yeah. My parents got divorced after 29 years, and I’m sure the last, 20 out of that 29, we’re probably not exactly, honeymoon.

Glenn Plumby [01:05:21]:
Yeah.

James Kademan [01:05:23]:
So it’s interesting you watch some of those relationships, that are close to me, and then you watch some of the people, just friends, and even people that I know, I don’t just superficially just because they have kids on sports teams or whatever. It’s very interesting to stand back and watch. I don’t just their position, their relationship with each other. No. It’s really the people say anything like, oh my gosh, I can’t stand you or anything or

Glenn Plumby [01:05:49]:
Right.

James Kademan [01:05:50]:
Anything of that nature, but it’s it’s definitely I don’t know. I guess you would say either people are taking their spouse for granted or, I mean, they’re just In apart or they’re together for the convenience of the kid. Right. Or they don’t even know how to navigate it or maybe it’s a financial thing. They’re like, I don’t wanna go down that road. Who knows? Right. Who knows? But it’s I love talking to people. I mean, this is On sound rude.

James Kademan [01:06:16]:
I don’t mean it sound rude, I guess, against my spouse. I love talking to people that have been divorced, that have found another spouse that they’re like, okay, I made some mistakes with that one or it didn’t work out. Maybe they weren’t even necessarily mistakes.

Glenn Plumby [01:06:29]:
Yep.

James Kademan [01:06:29]:
But they experience chalk it up to experience, move On. They find the second partner, and they’re way happier.

Glenn Plumby [01:06:38]:
Oh, I tell you that. And and I you know, I’ve been married to her 18 years, and every day In, like, the first day. And it’s just because, we spend time together. We prioritize each other. And, you know, a lot of what you said goes into one of the things I wrote in the book, and that is you either let life guide you or you try to guide life. Right? And there’s a difference there. If you just let life guide you, then you get what you get versus versus seeing what life’s giving you and saying, okay. I need to make a change here in what I’m doing.

Glenn Plumby [01:07:16]:
I need to do this different. I need to do that different. And the results often are better. But people are are so happy to complain about things versus do something about In.

James Kademan [01:07:27]:
That’s so true.

Glenn Plumby [01:07:29]:
You could sit on the couch and complain. Right? I mean, that’s easy. And, I’m so glad to hear you say that, that that you sit and you look at people because that I do the same thing. And it’s funny. You I go to those games now, and people think I’m the grand that my son is my grandson. Oh. I get so many questions. Is he your grandson? You know? Because he’s 17.

Glenn Plumby [01:07:52]:
I’m 65.

James Kademan [01:07:53]:
And I

Glenn Plumby [01:07:53]:
get you know? But, I mean, it’s it’s it’s more funny than anything. Yeah. But wonderful.

James Kademan [01:07:59]:
It’s interesting because you wonder I remember sitting in the bleachers, I’m talking with someone, and you realize that their spouse is sitting, I don’t know, 30 feet from them.

Glenn Plumby [01:08:09]:
Right. Right. Ain’t that funny?

James Kademan [01:08:12]:
And it’s a bizarre I don’t know. I mean, it’s just it is. Relationships are a fickle thing.

Glenn Plumby [01:08:18]:
Yes.

James Kademan [01:08:19]:
And they can be work. They are work. So I guess relationship of any kind, whether it’s spouse, employee, whatever.

Glenn Plumby [01:08:26]:
Right.

James Kademan [01:08:26]:
It’s very interesting. Very In. Glenn, I appreciate you being on the show. How can people find you?

Glenn Plumby [01:08:34]:
I have, my my email address is, authorglennplumby@gmail.com.

James Kademan [01:08:43]:
Alright.

Glenn Plumby [01:08:45]:
The book’s out there on Amazon, Charm Life, and, I’d love to if somebody feels as though I can add value to their organization, either In in new candidates or things like that, I’m certainly open to doing a lot of those things. Nice.

James Kademan [01:09:06]:
So you do a little bit of consulting?

Glenn Plumby [01:09:08]:
Yes. Yes. Yes. You know, Glenn I when I retired, I said I’m not gonna retire to get on it to take another job. So I played golf for 2 years, chased my wife and my son and my 2 daughters for 2 years in this book. You know, there’s starting to be some commitments again. I think that’s good. I don’t know.

Glenn Plumby [01:09:27]:
I kinda like being retired, but, I’m certainly open to do consulting and that In of stuff. I’ve turned down a lot of things In the convenience store business because I I just really wanted to be retired. But Here. But, you know, I really enjoy the business. No question.

James Kademan [01:09:43]:
No. That is so interesting you say that because I’ve never I guess I was just talking to another business owner 2 days ago about retirement and how we have this picture. You’re almost kind of fed the story that you work your ass off. You save a bunch of money so that one day you don’t have to work. And I have a very hard time even imagine imagining myself not working, not because I need to, but more because it’s pretty fun.

Glenn Plumby [01:10:12]:
Yeah.

James Kademan [01:10:12]:
I don’t But

Glenn Plumby [01:10:13]:
you know what?

James Kademan [01:10:13]:
I don’t like it.

Glenn Plumby [01:10:14]:
Tell you Glenn me tell you something. I don’t miss anything about work. I miss the people.

James Kademan [01:10:21]:
Alright.

Glenn Plumby [01:10:22]:
But what I do is I’m the guy that I have to have things to look forward to. So I’m the guy that’s setting up golf outings. I’m the guy that’s setting up dinners with friends. And as long as my calendar in the next 90 days looks good, I’m a happy camper.

James Kademan [01:10:39]:
Oh, I

Glenn Plumby [01:10:40]:
love it. People that retire and forget about their calendar, that would drive me crazy. But it’s really important that that you look forward and continue to talk to people, make friends. You know, I learned during the pandemic. I read every week you should text 5 people you haven’t heard from during the pandemic.

James Kademan [01:11:02]:
Oh.

Glenn Plumby [01:11:02]:
So I start so I started doing that, and I’ve continued to do that. And people are doing it back to me, and it’s just that notion of staying connected. Yeah. And when you’re retired, you have to stay connected. You have to.

James Kademan [01:11:15]:
Love it. Yeah. I love it. Glenn, that is awesome. I don’t know if I’ve had a show where I have had this much diversity of good advice. I’ve had shows. I’ve had great guests on the show. Great.

James Kademan [01:11:31]:
I mean, phenomenal guests on the show. So you’re in good company, and they’ve all had their focus that they’re very good at. Can share real estate investing. I mean, insert profession here. They do really well at, well, Glenn, you are very well rounded individual. I love it. That’s what I’m aiming for with my kid to try to get him diversity In in skills and experience and knowledge. So I love it.

Glenn Plumby [01:11:55]:
Well, there it In. A term life. So that’s actually the picture of, we have a house in Georgia. That’s actually the picture off my back porch. Well, that doesn’t matter. To you. But, you know, it’s a Draw pages. It’ll take you an hour and a half to read, and it’s very concise and to the point.

Glenn Plumby [01:12:17]:
So, I really appreciate your time and and having me on, and it’s been a lot of fun. I mean, it’s I’ve been looking forward to this, and and I’m gonna start listening to your show a lot more often.

James Kademan [01:12:29]:
Nice. I appreciate you saying that.

Glenn Plumby [01:12:31]:
I’ve told a lot of people about your show. So, hopefully, your ratings will go up when this is out there, but, it it’s been my pleasure. It’s been a lot

James Kademan [01:12:39]:
On fun. Yeah. We’re trying to Draw, trying to claw our way to the top. That’s the that’s the game. I’m not retired yet.

Glenn Plumby [01:12:46]:
Yep. Yep.

James Kademan [01:12:47]:
So Well,

Glenn Plumby [01:12:48]:
just know when you get to that point, it’ll be

James Kademan [01:12:51]:
wonderful. I’m looking forward to it. That’s the that’s the that’s I don’t wanna dare say goal. That’s the

Glenn Plumby [01:12:56]:
No. No. No. No goal.

James Kademan [01:12:59]:
Oh. That’s one of the things that we’re pushing for. How’s that?

Glenn Plumby [01:13:02]:
There you go. That’s that sounds right.

James Kademan [01:13:04]:
So, yeah, I can’t even imagine stopping doing this podcast In if there were no listeners. I Glenn more education In talking with great guests like you, just more knowledge, more insights, more things that I never even thought of. So I love love doing the show. Love it.

Glenn Plumby [01:13:23]:
Yep. Well, I could tell. And trust me, you’ll never have no one listening because I’ll be your biggest fan.

James Kademan [01:13:29]:
I love it. I appreciate it. Thank you, Glenn.

Glenn Plumby [01:13:33]:
Alright.

James Kademan [01:13:34]:
This has been Authentic Business Adventures. The business program brings you the struggle stories and triumphs and successes of business owners across the land. My name is James Kademan, and Authentic Business Adventures is brought to you by Calls On Call, offering call answering and reception services for service businesses across the country on the web at CallsOnCall.com. And, of course, the Bold Business Book, a book for the entrepreneur and all of us available wherever fine books are sold. We’d like to thank you, our wonderful listeners, as well as our guest, Glenn Plumby, operations and marketing expert. This is a crazy awesome list. I love this. Former executive VP and COO of a major convenience store chain as well as author of A Charmed Life.

James Kademan [01:14:16]:
Glenn, can you tell us your email address again one more time?

Glenn Plumby [01:14:21]:
Author, it’s, spell out the word author, glennplumby@gmail.com.

James Kademan [01:14:29]:
I love it. And then the book is available?

Glenn Plumby [01:14:32]:
Amazon. It’s out there on Amazon. You can get an e copy or you can get a

James Kademan [01:14:35]:
hard copy. Awesome. Love it. Past episodes give me phone, In, noon, and night. That’s linked On at drawincustomers.com. Thank you for listening. We will see you next week. I want you to stay awesome.

James Kademan [01:14:46]:
And if you do nothing else, enjoy your business.