Podcasts about so chad

It's summer, it's hot… and apparently so is the new Morgan Neville documentary Roadrunner: A Film About Anthony Bourdain. And like the weather: It's too hot for comfort. So Chad goes inside to cool off and take a knee with the team about it. Recorded LIVE at the Green Mill Lounge in Chicago for The Paper Machete. Back it at, babee! Brought to you by Jeppson's Mälort: Aiding in Social Distancing since the 1930's and Hero Power: Do you part to help keep the place clean by signing up today! Tell ‘em Chad the Bird sent ya and you'll get $25 off your next electricity bill! The Patreon is LIVE and we need money. Come be a part of my first-ever Saturday morning comedy variety show, delivered hot and fresh to you. Featuring “Promises” by the Barrerracudas, a touch of the ol “"Colonel Bogey March" by Lieutenant F. J. Ricketts and a snippy of “SOLO ACOUSTIC GUITAR” by Jason Shaw http://freemusicarchive.org/music/Jas... Creative Commons — Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported— CC BY-SA 3.0Come pay Fortnite with ChadthaBird on chicago4real's ‘H0T DR0P” every Wednesday 9pm on Twitch and get rekt! PLEASE RATE AND REVIEW, BLACK LIVES MATTER and WEAR A MASK!

It's the 4th of July again and since we didn't get to do it last year, we're gonna do it up twice as much this year… So Chad's a lil hungover today, take it easy, keep it down. We talk America's Birthday, mixed feelings and get into it about Sha'Carri Richardson. Opinions welcome but like, at a dull roar please. Brought to you by Jeppson's Mälort: Aiding in Social Distancing since the 1930's and Hero Power: Do you part to help keep the place clean by signing up today! Tell ‘em Chad the Bird sent ya and you'll get $25 off your next electricity bill! The Patreon is LIVE and we need money. Come be a part of my first-ever Saturday morning comedy variety show, delivered hot and fresh to you. Featuring “Promises” by the Barrerracudas, a touch of the ol “"Colonel Bogey March" by Lieutenant F. J. Ricketts and a snippy of “SOLO ACOUSTIC GUITAR” by Jason Shaw http://freemusicarchive.org/music/Jas... Creative Commons — Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported— CC BY-SA 3.0Come pay Fortnite with ChadthaBird on chicago4real's ‘H0T DR0P” every Wednesday 9pm on Twitch and get rekt! PLEASE RATE AND REVIEW, BLACK LIVES MATTER and WEAR A MASK!

Tonight Chad Brendel of The Bearcat Journal saves this episode of the Pod. Jeff was out this week and Aaron and I haven't had a pod just the two of us in a while! So Chad hoped on to talk some Reds, Bengals, and you guessed it Bearcats.  Check Chad out on Social Media. Twitter: @BearcatJournal, @ChadBrendel Website: The Bearcat Journal

Darshan Hey everyone, we have as you guys know, my podcast really deals with life sciences and pharmacy, and things that impact the engagement between the two, and things that impact just the care of patients. This specific podcast I thought was really interesting because I think groups like ascp come out and actually connect with a unique set of patients, patients who, whose needs are often not being met. So if you are in the pharmacy in this pharmacy, if you are a pharmacist or pharmacy, you want to be talking to someone like Chad, because you might want to find out Well, can I learn from lessons that that ascp has, if you're in the pharmaceutical industry, you may want to talk to Chad because these are pharmacists were frontline workers who are actually learning from patients and they need education. They need to know what your drugs are doing, what your devices are doing. So that's why I thought today's podcast makes sense. My name is Darshan Kulkarni, this is Darshan talks, and we have Chad Morris. So Chad, welcome. Chad Happy to be here. A little bit about yourself and escp. Sure. Well, first of all, thanks for having me on. Just from the audience perspective, I think the first time we met was a, a live stage podcasts. We were on stage in front of a group being recorded for a podcast and we had met I think, at lunch like 20 minutes before, and it's still one of the I had the best time. You know, obviously your personality lends to that. But just thanks for thanks for inviting me. Your show is fun. That's going to be a lot of fun today, you'll be good. Yeah. So um, yeah, to your point. asep is a is a unique organization. In pharmacy, we represent pharmacists, and pharmacies that take care of people in older adults setting. So traditionally, that's been skilled nursing facilities, assisted living facilities. Some states have intermediate care facilities, our pharmacists take care of a lot of individuals that live in group home setting, so developmentally disabled individual, so generally patients with complex medical needs. And it started, you know, 50 years ago, probably because a corner drugstore pharmacist said, How can I better serve these nursing homes that are popping up in the community? And ultimately, what what happened was the pharmacist figured out that there's a lot of things that those kinds of buildings need from efficiencies, like, how do you package medications and nurses can pass them better to how do you manage patients clinically when they start to accumulate medications. So the last 50 years has been this sort of growth and experience in how to take care of older adults that are complex from a medication standpoint. And now we sit at this intersection of sort of the Golden Age of pharmaceutical companies where we've got a lot of options to treat patients. So you've got a lot of demand for medications, and a lot of use of medications. Plus, you've got a population that over the age of 65 is growing faster than any other segment of our population. And even within that the over 85 population is growing the fastest within that over 65 population. So you've got older adults, they're living longer, they're healthier, primarily because of medications, but they're also dealing with the fact that they're they have to take a lot of those medications. So how do we do that safely? And how do we do that with an eye on the fact that they're a very different person than a younger, healthier population? So our pharmacists do that. You'll see them again, in nursing homes, assisted living facilities, and in the community. A lot of them are being embedded in in physicians, clinics and doctor's offices that take care of generally older adults. So let's start with the basics. Because when I talk to pharmacists, the big question I get asked is, how do I stop being a retail pharmacist? How do I stop licking, sticking, counting pouring? Generally speaking, if the big box retailers, I'm not knocking them.

Chris got mad that Chad didn't wanna watch Show Girls so he told him he had to watch a movie from before the 60's. So Chad chose the classic Invasion of the Body Snatchers! What did they think? Check it out! https://linktr.ee/Chrisandchadlikemovies --- This episode is sponsored by · Anchor: The easiest way to make a podcast. https://anchor.fm/app Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/fanboyandthesnob/support

In this episode we chat with Coach Chad Carson with coachcarson.com about his journey to financial freedom, real estate partnerships, common challenges for investors and Chad's thoughts of the future of real estate.    --- Transcript   Michael: Hey everybody. Welcome to another episode of The Remote Real Estate Investor. I'm Michael Albaum and today I'm joined by,   Tom: Tom Schneider.   Michael: And today we are going to be having a really, really, really fun episode with author, teacher Chad Carson with CoachCarson.com . So Chad is gonna be talking to us about all things real estate, his story, how he got started, and now he's been a full time investor since his college graduation. All right, let's jump into it.   Theme Song   Michael: Chad, thank you so much for taking the time today. Really appreciate you being here with us.   Chad: Yeah, thanks, Michael. Thanks, Tom. Really great to be here as well.   Michael: And so tell all of our listeners whereabouts in the country are you located.   Chad So I live in Clemson, South Carolina. And probably our claim to fame is the university right next door. It's a tiny little town. But Clemson University's here the football team. And so I went to school here and then stuck around afterwards and still live here. And it's really right next to the foothills of the Appalachian Mountains, lots of hiking, lots outdoors, lakes. So just a good good place to live and raise a family and invest in real estate as well.   Michael: Awesome. And we were just chatting before we started recording here that you got some rain from this last weather system. But everything is all good. Everything is sounded dry.   Chad: As far as I know. Yeah. No emergency text, you know, you guys are about long distance investing and passive investing. You know, most of the time, I don't hear anything from the property managers. They handle it. But now it's every once in a while you do get some emergency text.   Michael: So far, so good deal. Awesome. So I know you I think Tom knows you pipe in bigger pockets. It's kind of, you know, you're a big hero of mine for what you've done and what you've written. And we'll get into that in a little bit. But we'd love to get a little bit of your background and your story to start things off here.   Chad: Sure. Yeah. Well, I love bigger pockets as well. And what when I first started there, it was 2003. And I graduated from college. And I was a I was a biology major in college, I played football. So I kind of was just, you know, like anybody else when they're becoming an adult trying to figure out what's what's next, what am I going to do with my life. And I was fortunate enough that my dad had rental properties. And I used to like growing up, he would drop me off at a rental property and that he had bought at a foreclosure sale in the middle of the summer in Georgia.   And it'll be hot in the junk everywhere and an old refrigerator and he's alright, Chad, I'll be back in a few hours cleaning that frigerator out. They had old, you know, like deer meat or something. I'm sure it sounds like I hate this business. Who would want to do real estate. So low Behold, I graduated from college, I thought why don't I just give this real estate thing a shot for a year or two. And then I'll go back to the real world after that. And 20 years, 18 years later, I'm still still doing that little side hobby of real estate investing.   Michael: How great is it? It's so funny how the lens in which we learn about something or see something tends to overshadow you know, somebody of the other facts, right? Because we hear all the time Oh, I don't want to be a landlord. I don't wanna go fix toilets in the middle of the night. Or it is just you know, I don't want to go clean out refrigerators.   Chad: Yes, exactly. Yeah, my brother and I were ungrateful little little guys that were complaining about that. But it was really good. It was a good learning experience to I think you all come in a side lesson, but cleaning the floors of the store or cleaning out the frigerator of your landlord. I mean, you don't want to do that forever. But it's really a good learning experience to see the basics of the dirty work of what has to be done.   Michael: Absolutely. And so we're all your dad's rentals local to where you guys lit.   Chad: He was in Newnan, Georgia still is he has rental properties there and he and my mom have retired and live off a rental income now. And so yeah, that was all kind of local local rentals. And then he's actually now lives in another state. So you know, it's evolved into a long distance rental arrangement for him as well.   Michael: Right on and so after you graduated college and started to do your real estate side hustle, I mean, how did you get Into it full time was it was always part time or was it always full time?   Chad: It was actually full time for me Luckily, I didn't need a lot of money to live right after college you know, still in the the ramen noodle stage, living and spare bedrooms of friends houses and worst case living in my camera, a Toyota Camry or a 10 or something, you know, so I was I was in that stage of life where I was really low cost no family to support it. So I just jumped in. And rather than being an investor, I was really more accurately an entrepreneur, who is just trying to find good deals, we would flip them we would either typically when I my first year to have a business partner, we've worked together the whole time, we would find deals for other people and just kind of pass them on for a small fee is what's called a wholesaler.   So that was how we learned the business, cut our teeth. And then but as we learned to do that, we picked up that skill of finding good deals, it was kind of a natural step to start borrowing our own money from private investors from a couple local banks. And so we started flipping some houses where we fixed them up and flipping, flip them. And then after another A few years after we built up a little bit of capital, we started doing rental properties. And that's really split now that's that's our main thing. Now we very rarely do any flips. But we do rental properties. We loan some money to other people who are flipping houses so we're more of a kind of transition into a more passive investor long run   Michael: Right on you kind of covered the Whole real estate investing schema there, didn't you?   Chad: Yeah, I've been fortunate to be able to do a lot of it. Yeah, I've been on the money side now a little bit more the buy and hold the flipping, I've been the one who's out there making, you know, 5, 10 offers a week, you know, knocking on doors trying to buy properties that are, you know, in distress situations or landlord. So, it's been fun to be able to do all aspects of it. And I think it's kind like I talked about earlier, some point, if you want to outsource it other people, I don't think you need to know how to be an expert on everything. Like I'm not an expert, remodeler, contractor. But it certainly helped me be able to make decisions a little bit better with our money. Knowing all the details, what has to be done,   Michael: That makes sense.   Tom: It's almost more important to know where your gaps are at, you know, you know, versus coming in. And hubris and you know, saying that you're the best and every as that's a great point.   Chad: Yeah, yep.   Michael: And was all this local to where you were Chad?   Chad: It was at the time. Yeah, so I've always invested in Clemson, I was fortunate that, you know, not a lot of people in the country aren't as fortunate that the deals that we were flipping also transition nicely into rental properties. And actually, my very first rental property was a house that I bought from another investor, the investor owner financed it to me with a really small downpayment. And I moved in briefly for like six months, and I realized is like a 2324 year old kid, as I can't afford this house with like $750 payments, and it's the best it is sold to me. So I quickly moved out and rented it out, and was able to at least turn it into a rental property.   So that is my story. But I have over time, my wife and I part of our our story is that she's a Spanish teacher, we love traveling. And so we always knew kind of the back of our minds, the rental business is going at once we want to turn that into an income stream that we can use to travel and have a little bit more flexibility. And so several trips in our time together, 2009, 2017, we've gone abroad and kind of taken our backpacks before kids and just wandered around in South America. And then 2017, we had our two kids who were three and five at the time. And we moved to Ecuador for 17 months, and put them in school there. And they were able to study set learn Spanish with kids there and and so what started as a local business turned into a more of a long distance business and kind of forced us to think about systems and approaches and property managers. And how do we do this without me having to be there all the time?   Michael: Oh, this is so cool. I have so many follow up questions. But what a neat story. What a neat story. So with all the local stuff. Did you have property managers, were you utilizing property managers when you're doing the buy and hold type stuff?   Chad: Yeah, we started off doing everything ourselves. So not saying that's the right way to do it. But we were the property manager and say we as a business partner as well, early on, we actually divided up the business into like, the first step was acquisitions, and then financing, and then fixing up the property and then farming it out, which is either selling it or renting it out. And we basically divided it down the middle I was the acquisitions guy, I was the financing person who worked on getting bank or private money. And then he would manage the rehabs and then either get it rented out or sell it. And so we we did all that in house in terms of the early on property management.   And we over time, the the model we did was we grew kind of internal assistant who started off as a bookkeeper. And then she's really competent as a bookkeeper. And we saw the she had other skills, communication skills. And so we kind of groomed her into being more of a property manager, where she would do 90% of the tasks. So the you know, when we put signs out or put ads in the online or took calls from people or talk to people, former landlord, she would do almost all of that, I would still be the underwriter to decide, yes, we're going to rent to this person or not. And I would sign the lease agreements, still do some things like that. But we basically built our own internal property manager for a little property management company for a little while. But then over time, we'd grown a little bit bigger. And it outgrew her capacity to do as much. And she also decided to retire. So we just in the last year, we've moved more to third party property management with a couple different companies. So we've transitioned into just having being more of a pure investor, and having other people do do the property management stuff   Tom: In transitioning to that more of a buy and hold strategy versus wholesaling. I'd love to hear what were some of the early kind of like learning points that are no struggles of just getting in and being more that kind of buy and hold strategy is I would imagine doing self property management. There's some challenges there but kind of across the board. I'd love your thoughts on.   Chad: Yeah, I mean, yeah, the definitely the actually learning how to be a manager was was a big growing curve, you know, and I wish we had more time of dating myself a little bit, but 2007 and eight was when we were really started transitioning into more full time buying hold. And that also happened to be the time that the Great Recession happened and rate time and I   Tom: Think everyone was forced to do that. Anyway,   Chad: I was forced to do it. That's why we couldn't flip as many houses that we had just bought in 2007. So that was a big learning experience. I think the other thing we just a lot about we just had we had learning lessons where we may mistakes on how to how to analyze the numbers for a rental property. And this is a big takeaway that I know you guys probably talked about too, is that if you don't have a good estimate of what your maintenance and your capital expenses are, and you underestimate those, you know, when you buy and hold your, you're holding this thing for me, you're nobody else is going to bail you out of this, like with a flip, you could, you can make a few mistakes, even worst case scenario, you lost a little bit of money, you get rid of the property, and you move on to the next one, with a buy and hold. I mean, this is this is it, you better do your analysis right up front, because it's not going to get any better over time. I mean, the rents might go up in value out a little bit, but it's a long, slow process. And so we bought some properties and just got too aggressive and underestimated a lot of repairs, where we thought we're gonna make $200 a month in cash flow, we're really negative 50 or negative hundred bucks a month. Hopefully, I'm not the only one has ever done that. But   Michael: You're in very good company, man.   Chad: All right. Yeah, so we made that mistake. And but I guess that's the way I learned, you know, I could read in a book, I could listen to a podcast, and then you make the mistake. And now it's burned into my head, wait a minute, like you have to replace heating and air units, wait a minute, this is a 60 year old property and the sewer system or the, you know, the pipes underneath the house are going to start breaking after a long time. So I think some of those old house problems, Tom, were the are some of the lessons, I think we learned that you have to understand how houses put together again, you don't have to be the expert on doing all that stuff. But if you're gonna invest your money, and especially investing directly in properties, you do need to be the asset manager who thinks about the long term life of your systems, which types of properties are most efficient. So we found out that, you know, if you have a house that has all wooden siding, and you have to paint that every five or 10 years, that's a lot more costly than having a property, this brick siding, and has metal trim around the outside of the house, as you know, double pane vinyl windows, and all that low maintenance stuff that seems just kind of boring details. But those kind of things make the difference between a property that makes money over 10 to 20 year period, and a property that becomes an alligator and eats all your money instead.   Michael: It's such a good point to chat about knowing those type of nuances and intricacies of whatever the local effect on the property is going to have. Right. And in harsh weather climates, you want to have maybe a different exterior than in a hotter climate. So knowing all that stuff, I think is so critical. Chad, I'm curious to know about your partner, and how you guys whoever it is got linked up, because something I get questions about all the time is how do I find a partner? And something I've always said is find someone who has what you don't whether it's money time to experience go look to partner with someone, as opposed to whoever your best friend is just because it's easy. So how did you two meet?   Chad: I think your advice is right, I think we did bring different things to the party. But we were both beginners in real estate investing when we got into it. And I was when I played football in college at Clemson he had an online business, which at the time was a weird thing in 2000, you know, 02, 03 to have a internet business. And he had it was actually related to Clemson sports. And so I was he was doing interviews with some of the football players. And I just met him that way and kind of hit it off talked about finance and real estate something else. And so over time, we just went to some classes together and said, Hey, this is cool, we ought to do this together. And when I decided to move back up to Clemson, right after college was over, we just jumped in together, we actually started an LLC, each of us put 250 bucks into this LLC.   And so we had a $500 in capital in this thing. We actually read a book called The E-Myth at the time really awesome. business book, and book, it was the first book we read about business and it said, Hey, when you start a business, you ought to go and treat yourself like a big corporation and say, Alright, here's the CFO, here's the CEO. Here's the person who handles bookkeeping. And so we drew this like diagram of all the different roles in our little flipping business. And I said, Tommy, which one do you want to take? Alright, I'll take this one. You took it we just like like alternating back and forth. It's totally random. And, but but it was a really good exercise, because it did force us to divide our task and ask like, Alright, who's good at what he was better at just working with contractors and saying, Hey, this is what it is, can you do any better on that price, he was just kind of haggling and staying on focus, and a really good project manager.   And then I was more than a communicator, and going out negotiating with people and finding sellers and kind of the more the sales communication role. And we just divided that up. And we had some crossover here and there, but I think we were, what we both contributed was we didn't have to have a lot of overhead and hire anybody for a while because we contributed a bunch of time to it personally. And then eventually it became profitable to the sense that we could start hiring some people particularly on the rental side, but the thing that made it work was exactly your advice. Make sure you're each bringing something different to the party. The other thing was just aligning your long term goals and Is this a good person, you got to trust your partner with somebody This is all about trust is somebody who you believe in you can trust. If there's any inkling at all, there's just not even if it's not trust, it's not a good personality fit. Just don't do it. Like just move on. There's better there's better ways to spend Your time because it's kind of like a marriage, but without all the other benefits of marriage for a long time, and for better or worse, and, you know, a lot of partnerships get ugly, because there's not an alignment of a lot of those things we just talked about.   Tom: Yeah.   Michael: For anybody considering a partnership, please rewind the last four minutes and listen to that again.   Tom: Yeah. You know, I like about two is just thinking of like, what people bring to the table, you know, it's not all like one side, it could be experience, it could be they have a lot of extra time to work on it. It could be a lot of capital. I mean, just like, as Michael was alluding to earlier, and I mean, just to hammer on the point, like, yeah, trust, if that's not there, like just throw it all out, it really, really doesn't matter.   Chad: Yeah, I didn't want to hop on that one. We've done other partnerships since then. So we have a company. But we've partnered with other people, and exactly that role, where we brought the energy expertise, the ability to go find deals, somebody else was super busy at a job, but has some capital and credit. And we did partners like credit partnerships where they would buy, we'd bring a deal, they'd buy the property, and then we found a way to split up the deal. And they were a bit more passive. And we've used a lot of creative financing to get that done, like lease options and, and other kind of contracts. But real estate, so cool. In that way, there are a lot of different ways to split deals up. And it happens all the way up from the very tiny deals all the way up to, you know, hundreds of millions of dollars in commercial real estate, there's using options and leases and contracts, that sky's the limit on how creative you can get if you get the basic, you know, arrangement of what you're talking about that everybody brings some value, you agreed in writing how it's gonna work. And to me, that's one of the most fun parts of the business.   Tom: I got a question for each. I think a lot of people have can offer one of these things get money or skilled or whatnot. But I think a lot of people are concerned about getting taken advantage of like, what is their kind of BS detector on somebody they might want to do work with? Do you have any advice for people in vetting out a potential partner, either on the capital side or on the operation side on enter your method of kind of identifying like, is this a good actor?   Chad: I just like to move slowly. Yeah, I think some of this is like, even outside of the real estate sphere. Most of us have worked with people before most of us have been taken advantage before typically is moving too fast. It's trying to get it done. Now, I read a book early on in my career, as well called the Seven Habits of Highly Effective People.   Tom: Love your book list!     Michael: Killer list. Chad.   Tom: Keep them coming.   Chad: Yeah, I go back to that book all the time. Because there's so many life lessons, it's about knowing yourself, but also how you communicate with people, when his comments was when you're working with systems and business, you know, a lot of entrepreneurs want to go fast, they just want to make everything efficient, do the best thing. But when you're working with people, like slow is fast, like going slower, and slowing things down and getting to know somebody. And I've constantly been reminded this over time, whether it's working with money partners, where you know, I just got to know somebody for a year or two. And do I trust this person do I like them is my personality align. And so many times, we just want to jump into something really fast.   But when people go slowly, take your time, ask questions, get to know the person, then and only then do you start looking at some of the details of the real estate deal. Because all of that the foundation of all that other stuff is completely dependent on that relationship and that trust. So I think that's my tip, it's not really a hack or something you do fast. But if you're long distance, which I know a lot of listeners are, it's gonna be a little bit more challenging. But maybe one of the silver linings of COVID is that everybody's doing zoom anyway. So just getting used to having a zoom with a property manager having a if you are going to partner with somebody who's like a general partner, don't let them push you into something too fast. They're trying to push you really fast. That's probably the wrong person. I've heard somebody give a tip where they've said, I'd like to invest money with you. This is the limited partner talking.   But I want to watch a couple deals that you do before I do that. And they get all the documentation for that deal. They would follow the whole thing through as if they had invested with that person ask questions, they paid attention to details. And that takes a lot of patience takes a lot of time. But I think that's so worth it. You'll get to know somebody, you'll get to know how they do things. If you just study them for a little while, six months, nine months, maybe a year after that you've cemented that even though they're they're a good person to work with it or not. And then that that time you've invested in that downpayment, of relationship building you've invested can last for 20, 30 years after that,   Tom: Love it, there's this theme in poker called being tight and aggressive. And it's like, you know, having kind of taken that time to get to know someone doing all that right work. And then once it's like, oh, yeah, this is right, then it's being aggressive and moving quickly. I love that.   Chad: There you go.   Tom: Moving slow and fast.   Michael: It is such good advice. Because Yeah, I know, every single time I've been burned by someone is because I moved way too quickly. Because I felt cornered felt forced, it felt like I was my hand was forced. And yeah, it worked out horribly and to the opposite. Everyone that I spent time getting to know it's worked out beautifully or it just never worked out at all and that's okay too. But I spent the time to learn that   Chad: And I think about myself Why did I do that? Because I've done the same thing like I think it was because I was I had a scarcity mindset that absolutely another deal. There's not gonna be another partner, right? You know, there's always another deal. There's always another partner. So as a brand new investor, don't get pressured to think that you're going to miss out on something. There have been deals for 100 to thousands of years in real estate, there will be deals for hundreds and thousands of years. Again, don't worry about it, you're gonna be just fine.   Michael: The deal of a lifetime only comes around about once a week. So   Chad yeah, there you go.   Michael: Awesome. Well, Chad, I know that you're also in the real estate education space, you have coach Carson, calm, curious to know what you see some common hurdles, challenges are for new investors,   Chad: I think before knowledge is confidence. Like I think, you know, I deal with so many people who are competent professionals. And in some other space, you know, they're an engineer, they're a salesperson, they're a nurse, janitor, whatever, they're good at what they do. And then here, they come into real estate, and they're an adult trying to learn this thing. And they're also gonna invest a bunch of their money in it. That's just a recipe for like, lack of confidence. And just man I can't. And so that's one of the biggest hurdles that I see. My solution is kind of like, this is sports analogy, Coach Carson, kind of why bring that to the table, is that anything time you're trying to do something big, you just got to break it down into really little small pieces, like the Dave Ramsey baby steps.   Because when you do that, it becomes less intimidating. And you build confidence on that one little thing. And I'll give you an example. Like something out when people are first starting, I often recommend that they just focus on your What is your strategy? Like Don't worry about getting into analyzing your market, don't worry about the money yet. Don't worry about any of that. Let's just talk about like you and your finances and where you are. Are you a brand new beginner, are you you have a million bucks in the bank and you're trying to like diversify, or you have 50,000 bucks in the bank and you're trying to grow that nest egg, depending on where you are, that's gonna sort of dictate which strategy makes sense, whether that's house hacking, buy and hold rentals, long distance rentals, turnkey. You know, there's a lot of different viable strategies out there. Don't try to copy cookie cutters that you heard on a podcast because it worked for Chad or worked for somebody else, you know, have that self knowledge of saying, Alright, here's where I am. Here's where what I need in my life financially, and just be okay  with that strategy. be okay with doing one deal, even though people on bigger pockets are doing thousand deals in one year, you know, man, that's intimidating. Like, I can't I can't do that.   Michael: I could never do that.   Chad: Yeah, I could never do that. So therefore I must not be successful. I think that's the challenge is that you can if you compare yourself to other people, that's going to kill your confidence. If you try to take on too much at one time, that's gonna kill your confidence. So be okay with who you are. be okay with where you are. Break it down into the next step and say, what's the next thing I need to figure out? All right, I got my strategy. I'm going to do house hacking. Alright, good. What's next? All right, I need to figure out my target market. Where am I gonna invest? Alright, let's talk about that. How do you analyze the market. So you break it down in those steps, and it becomes much more manageable.   And it's kind of like, you know, you're going on a hike or a journey, you just kind of check one milestone off another milestone. And that's the cool thing about real estate to me is that you don't have to jump all in at one time. Um, there's a bunch of little steps, even down to the contract. If you get a property under contract, that seems really intimidating. But there's a due diligence clause where you can you ask your local attorney or local agent to if you made a big mistake, and you shouldn't pay that price, you have about 14 days maybe to evaluate that and get out of it. So I think there's so many little steps like that we can move forward with low risk or no risk and build your confidence to the point where you get some momentum eventually.   Michael: That's great advice. So you're also the author of retire early with real estate, a great book, I've read it, we're actually gonna be reading it for our roof stock Academy book club next month. We're very excited about it. Yeah, it's gonna be fun. It's gonna be a lot of fun. You're gonna come join us for our book club session next month. What motivated you to write that?   Chad: Yeah, it was actually right in the middle of when I was traveling to Ecuador when I wrote it. And I actually had a conversation with Brandon Turner BiggerPockets. We were at a conference about a year before that. And we were just chatting about his books he was doing, they were doing pretty well. I was just picking his brain. And he's like, Oh, you want to write a book, you know, go submit this. And it's kind of early stages of their book, book business. And I started I like the idea. I've been writing a blog and thousands and thousands of words, initially, I didn't think anybody would read that stuff. And then more people started reading it as Oh, that's cool. So I had a lot of words on paper, but I kind of condensed like, what is it all about that? What are some of the messages I'm trying to convey? And what are the things that are important to me and one of the I think the core messages that I try to get across in my blog, and my podcast is that real estate investing is a vehicle. It's a tool, but it's taking you to a place where you're doing more of what matters in your life.   So it's really about your life. It's about working backwards from what's important to you, what are your values? How would you spend your time on a day to day basis, if you had unlimited money, and money wasn't an issue anymore? I think those answers are why most of us are doing it. And very often it gets turned around where we're like, it's all about the thousand units. And it's about the doing really well which is which is cool. You know, I'm not discounting any of that stuff. But I wanted to write a book that not only validated like the small investor who's investing for lifestyle and who's trying to, you know, maybe have five properties, get them paid off and have three or 4000 bucks coming in and allowing them to work a part time job instead of working a full time job at 40 years old.   Like that kind of lifestyle business is what earlier retirement meant to me that was the idea of getting control of your money so that you can get to control your time and your life. And start asking yourself that question like, Alright, what does matter to me what I want to do, and I grew up, you know that same question we asked when we were 15 years old, 10 years old, like when I grew up, I'm going to be an astronaut. When I grew up, I'm going to start this big thing that's going to help the world and save the world. You know, when we get to be adults, we kind of get that creativity and that imagination ground out of us because we get into the practical stuff. And so I wanted to write a book that kind of inspired on the big picture of, hey, what could you do, if money were not an object, and then go from there and give like a blueprint. So it's kind of the big picture, here are the steps you can take to climb up the mountain, whether you're brand new beginner, whether you're intermediate, whether you're advanced, here are the steps you take and the things you need to think about if you actually want to live off of your rental income and have that flexibility.   Michael: That's so great. Yeah, so often I hear or the question asked, you know, what's your goal and people give $1 figure unit count figure that really needs to go a step further than that is to know what is that money your unit count gonna allow you to do? What's the life that you want to be living?   Tom: Yeah, yeah. The Why just because it's such a struggle, you know, in going through it, like, there's setbacks all the time. And it's like, you have a really flimsy why on, you know, not a clear kind of definition of like what done you know, where you want to go makes it that much more difficult to keep going without that more solid aspect?   Chad: Absolutely. Yeah, my real estate is fun. I love the business too. But I recognize there's, there's kind of a variation on the people who get into it, how passionate they are about it, like some people would be fine, getting a few properties, letting somebody else do all the work. And they want to go start a nonprofit to do something completely on their own related to real estate. You know, I'm a nerd, you guys are nerds. We're like doing podcasts about this all the time. But there's some people that are kind of partially nerds about it. And you know, that's okay, too. But if you have that passion in mind, and you have that in mind, it's more than just kind of fluffy feel good stuff.   I mean, it it dictates how you make decisions about the types of properties you buy, the scale of how you grow your business, the types of contracts and deals you get into. I mean, for example, my business partner and I have mainly stayed with small residential. And we've gotten into some like smaller multifamily like 12 plexes. And we bought some bigger properties as well. But we really like the small scale. And we've kind of kept our financing. And the way we do deals pretty simple, like we're not doing syndications and going out and starting, you know, big funds, although we could have had a lot of opportunities to do that. But working it backwards and saying, why am I doing this, I want to be able to turn the business on and off and go travel for 17 months, or I want to start a business like coach Carson, where I made zero money for several years, because it's just fun. And I like it's a passion to be able to do that you've got to build a business that not only makes money, but also has certain require, certain capabilities and systems that allow you to do whatever you want to do. So it's very practical, when you start from the end, kind of work it backwards.   Michael: I think that's such a good point. I know for me, I kind of personally fell victim to that mindset that, you know, the former mindset of, Oh, I got to get to 100 units, 100 units, hundred units. And then it just got to be to this kind of overwhelming point. And I said, Wait a minute, why am I doing like, why is that number important? What is that going to give me? What if I just rearranged some of the things that made my life simpler, could I get the same result or a better result. And so learning to do less with more, I think is really important too. So I love that point you made Chad. Okay, so you can do real estate full time since you're out of college. And I hear so many people, especially in the academy talked about wanting to retire early and looking to you know, make real estate then do real estate full time. Give us a day in the life of a full time real estate investor. When you're not in Ecuador.   Chad: Yeah, that's a good question. You know, I still like work. I think that's one of the secrets that people hear about retiring early.   Michael: Because we're nerds, man.   Chad: I enjoy it like I do like it. But I think the main differences is there's a lot less pressure. I know when we first started even up until 2014 and 15, even we had some of the properties, same number of properties. There's just always the pressure of like next month, I got to produce again next month, I got to do more and get into some of these plateaus where the cash flow continues to come in. Yes, there's some problems. Yes, the heat and air blows up here and there. Yes, there's some cash flow kind of rollercoasters here and there, but getting to the point where it's pretty consistent on the amount of money you can get coming in, that allows you to kind of change your schedule around as well. For example, I used to take all of our leasing calls, I used to take calls from people, you know, when you put a property for rent, you get dozens of calls, and you're on the phone all the time, like I do deep work, I do creative work, I do things that are not necessarily really urgent, and I paid other people to do the sales calls and taking care of maintenance issues.   And and so I think that's that's the thing that shifted, that doesn't mean I'm not aware of those like I still I think all of us no matter how, you know, quote passive, you get should still pay attention to the detail. So like I look at the property management reports every month, I'm paying attention very closely to the cash flow and the amount of rent that's being collected. And are there any kind of exception reporting Are there any weird things on the report this month that are different than normal? I equate that actually To the like, when you watch the matrix, I think it's so cool when he finally can start seeing everything and like digital numbers, you know, 01010. And so I've always compared the point where you're stepping back from your business to something like that, where you look at reports, and you look at, you know, your analysis of your business and numbers. And then when you see something weird or something unusual, you then jump into the matrix, you go in there, and you figure it out, and talk to the property manager and say, Hey, what's up with this thing? Let me get in the weeds too.   So I just I've had to be in the weeds in the last month or two, we had a fire, unfortunately, for the one of our rental properties, and no one was hurt. That was my first question. But we've had to deal with getting bids from contractors dealing with insurance, and how's this gonna work? And how did you tie those two things together. And so that was a new one. For me, I'm spending more than a normal amount of time on that kind of project that comes up every once in a while. But on a typical week, when it's just, Hey, I'm going to do a little bit of bookkeeping, I'm going to send a text message to the property manager. I mean, that could be an hour or two per week, probably max, you know, 110 properties. So it just ranges depending on how involved you want to be.   And also what's going on, I like to get in on the big side, the one we're selling a property when we have an insurance issue like that, when we every once in a while just meeting up with the property managers and talking strategy talking, Hey, how are we screening tenants? What's your best practice here? You know, there's some things like that that go on. But the kind of day to day week to week basis, it's looking at your bookkeeping, looking at those numbers, asking questions, sending a few texts here and there. And that's, that's kind of a normal routine for me.   Michael: Right on. So not to one up you by any means. But I actually had two fires in the same building on a property that I own, and I'm dealing with the insurance thing. So I don't know how it's going for you. I hope it's going well. But if you want to chat offline more about it, I'd be more than happy to public adjusters came and saved my bacon. That's a big, big, big plug for that profession. I was a big fan of that. So I hope it continues to go well. But yeah, let me know if you need some recommendations. happy to share.   Chad: I'm in the early stages. So yeah, I think we'll we'll connect on that. And I'm planning on doing a podcast at some point on my, you know, lessons, the good and bad of what I'm probably screwing some stuff up as well. But yeah, that's that's the that's my plan in the next couple of months to share what I've learned.   Michael: Okay, perfect. I look forward to hearing that.   Tom: I got a question for you sort of a crystal ball question. So changing world going through a pandemic, lots of technology advancements, how do you see this evolving real estate investing with your strategy or general kind of an open ended question of just the confluence of changes in the world and how you see it affecting real estate investment?   Chad: Yeah, I love that question. I think one of the trends and this has already been ongoing before COVID-19 came about, I read a book, it's another book recommendation. Big Shifts Ahead by…   Tom: I heard you drop Deep Work to another great, great book.   Chad: Yeah. Another another reference.   Tom: We love John Burns. Sorry, you're talking about Big Shifts Ahead.   Chad: Okay. So you know, John Burns, okay. I don't know him personally. But I like his work and his book, Big Shifts Ahead.   Tom: We had him on the podcast before he's yet he's a super entertaining guy. We had our back, I'm sorry for interrupting. Go ahead.   Michael: No, he's a legend.   Chad: He's really smart. his company's built is very good with analytics. And what my understanding is they advise a lot of hedge funds and builders and construction, who are looking at the whole country and trying to figure out the big trends. And so one of the to your question, though, one of the big trends that I think is most relevant for us, as investors trying to pick where we're going to invest, and you know, where we put our money is just the flow of people like where are the demographics of people moving and why. And one of the interesting things that john put out there was that, first of all, there's growth all around the country, I mean, country is doing pretty well, if you look at the big picture, let's be optimistic here. Like in the big picture, we're still have a rule of law, we still have contracts with our economy is really hard to replicate.   You're not when I travel around the world, it's kind of evident, you have good people everywhere, but to replicate the recipe of what we have going on with availability of credit, and Mark real estate markets and contracts. And it's just this recipe is pretty unique that we have. So United States is a great place to invest your money. That's my main takeaway. But then within the United States, john burns points out that a lot of the movement of people has been to the south of Southwest, southeast. They're just kind of outpacing growth in those areas. So I'm in South Carolina, Georgia, you know, Alabama's kind of seeing that North Carolina, Tennessee, Texas, you know, been a big way. A lot of people know that it's already on the map, but also Arizona, Southern California to an extent. But you know, there's a weather thing there. But also within that kind of movement to the south. There's a movement from city centers, to suburban areas. And he actually coined a term called surban. I don't know if you guys talked about it on the podcast yet.   Tom: We didn't talk about but I love it.   Chad: Yeah. So the suburban, it's like a hybrid. You have a lot of millennials, for example, lived in urban areas, pre forming their family, they love public transit. They love biking and walking paths and parks. So a lot of these urban things you think about good restaurants, good quality of life. Well, they're moving to the suburbs because they want to buy houses, the urban areas are out of their reach because of the prices. But when they go to the suburbs, what are they looking for? They're looking for urban like qualities. And so one of my favorite locations to invest in and help other people invest in are, you know, go to a city center, go to go to an Atlanta, go to a Charlotte, go to an Austin, Texas, but then go outside the city and find these, you know, little pockets, these little suburban places at 50,000 people 20,000 people, hundred thousand people, and they have their own little gravity, their own little town center and find the ones that have some quality of life factors.   So it could be a college town where I am, that's an example. You've got football games, you've got, you know, intellectual stimulation, you've got culture, there could be other areas that have natural beauty. I think a lot of places Colorado, for example, you know, people are moving there, because of the quality of life. And businesses are moving there, high tech businesses are moving there, because their employees want to live there, these millennials and some of these people who want that quality of life. So I've actually been trying to take my town and Clemson into that I'm kind of getting into local politics and have a nonprofit trying to build bike trails. And I've been trying to convey to them like that trend is happening. And if you're not investing in like quality amenities, and your little small town, to attract those people, you're missing the boat, it's not the traditional, bring in this huge manufacturer who's going to have all these big factories somewhere, a lot of its going to be small tech businesses and people who are working remotely.   And so as real estate investors, we can also pay attention to that and kind of follow some of those trends. And I think particularly for those who aren't big, huge hedge funds, trying to find our one or two little deals, I think we have to go to some of the smaller markets in order to find the opportunities where there's actually still some meat on the bone, you know, some opportunities to buy some properties that cash flow, and have some good growth potential.   Tom: That's awesome. there's a there's a fund out there that focuses very specifically on this kind of tier two cities. And you're right that a lot of those ones have been kind of picked off, you know, the larger private equity and hedge funds and funds are you know, made. It's so competitive. But that's a great point as far as kind of crystal ball on where to go and looking for these, you know, just outside of those major cities. The great john burns reference. Love it.   Michael: Tom, any final questions for Chad before them get out of here?   Tom: No, that was great. Yeah, that was great.   Michael: Well, Chad, thank you so much for taking the time to be here today. If folks have more questions for you want to learn more about you? where's the best place where they can do that? or reach out to you?   Chad: Sure. Yeah, everything online for me starts at coachcarson.com. I've been writing a blog there for years I've want to guides and articles and how to kind of in depth how to articles also have been a lot of fun with my podcast and YouTube channel too. So if you like podcasts have the real estate and Financial Independence Podcast focuses on some of the things we talked about today and more the nuts and bolts and practical side of using real estate to retire early to achieve financial independence.   I also interview some other people, mainly, you know, students, I do have some experts on there. But a lot of it's just real people who are getting it done, how they bought their property, how they, you know, grew to three or four properties. So trying to focus just on the nitty gritty nuts and bolts. And I do the same thing with my YouTube channel where I kind of just get behind the camera kind of coach whiteboard style, you know, drawing on a little whiteboard or something. And here's how you do a debt snowball. Here's how you do a house hack. And so if you like those kind of kind of nuts and bolts type approach to real estate. That's, that's what I try to do.   Michael: Fantastic.   Tom: Awesome. We'll add a link in the podcast description.   Michael: Perfect. Chad, thank you again for taking the time. So looking forward to having you on the academy book club next month. Appreciate that in advance. And we'll catch you later.   Chad: Yeah. Thanks, Tom. Thanks, Michael. It's been a pleasure.   Michael: Okay, everybody, that was our episode a big, big, big thank you to Chad Carson. That was a ton of fun. Thank you so much for joining us a lot of really great nuggets in there. So go back and give it a read, listen, rewind it, take notes, tons and tons of great content in there. So again, a big thank you to Chad. And we look forward to having Chad back on the Roofstock Academy book club session for the month of November. And so if you were thinking about joining the academy or not sure, check us out at RoofstockAcademy.com and feel free to take advantage of the book club session that we're going to be having for the month of November where we have Chad back on. Thanks everyone for listening. And if you'd like that episode, feel free to give us a rating and review wherever it is you listen your podcasts and we look forward to seeing you on the next one.   Tom: Happy investing

Chad Williams is our guest.  Chad is a former U.S. Navy SEAL. Now he’s a speaker and a best-selling author.  Days before Chad was to report to military duty, he turned on a television and was greeted with the horrifying images of his friend and mentor, US Navy SEAL Scott Helvenston, being brutally murdered in a premeditated ambush on the roads of Fallujah. This would have convinced most people to bail, but instead, it inspired him to double down on his dream of becoming a NAVY Seal too.  So Chad followed in Scott’s footsteps and completed the US military’s most difficult and grueling training to become a Navy SEAL. He was one of only 13 from a class of 173 to make it straight through to graduation.  After that…  Chad served his country on SEAL Teams One and Seven… completing tours of duty in the Philippines, Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, and Iraq.  We’ll learn how his NAVY Seal training now helps him as he leads others, how he lives his life, AND how he THRIVES even in a year like 2020!  Let’s get to this! RESOURCES: Chad’s Website: www.navysealchadwilliams.com Chad’s Signed Book: Click here. Chad’s Instagram: www.instagram.com/sealofgod   MORE ABOUT THE CHAD WILLIAMS EPISODE: After completing his 6 years of service as a NAVY Seal, Chad went on to author the best-selling book SEAL of God. Today, Chad has spoken at fortune 500 companies… as well as hundreds of faith-based events around the country.  He also contributes no holds barred… expert analysis related to military affairs and subjects of leadership and perseverance for major news networks… like FOX and CNN.   Chad has… and continues… to live a DREAM THINK DO life and I’m so excited and honored to get to have this conversation with him.  PLUS… I wanted your input on the questions I should ask… and you guys sent in suggestions like crazy… so I can’t wait to get to ask some of YOUR questions too.  So we’ll also go after the following questions submitted by YOU!  Questions like:  MENTAL TOUGHNESS: “What kind of techniques or mental thought patterns he learned to switch from being overwhelmed by circumstances to being able to focus on doing the things that he could control?†– Julie and Dan TEAMS AND DREAMS: “There’s a lot of focus on self-motivation and self-perseverance in striving to achieve our DREAM. We all know SEALS are a Team, and building a team is part of success, so how do we keep our team motivated when we’re so busy doing what we need to do?†  – Jeffrey Jorgenson  EVERYDAY LIFE: “What’s a take-away from your time as a Navy Seal that you apply to your life every day?†– Stephanie CHAD’S FAVORITE QUOTE (which he nails in the interview): “It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs, who comes short again and again, because there is no effort without error and shortcoming; but who does actually strive to do the deeds; who knows great enthusiasms, the great devotions; who spends himself in a worthy cause; who at the best knows, in the end, the triumph of high achievement, and who at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who neither know victory nor defeat.â€Â  –  Theodore Roosevelt   MINUTE BY MINUTE: 0:02 What to expect today 2:56 Meet Chad 6:07 Chad's journey to becoming a Navy Seal 18:50 Chad’s first day of Seal training 21:56 Your DNA does not determine your destiny 25:50 One of the most impactful sentences Chad has ever heard 30:32 How to switch from being overwhelmed to in control 34:25 How to keep your team motivated while still accomplishing tasks 38:23 Chad’s favorite Theodore Roosevelt quote 41:28 Mitch’s biggest takeaways   LET’S HEAR FROM YOU! Okay, so what did YOU think of what Chad Williams had to say?  Which stories resonated?  What phrases and mantras got you thinking?  What clicked for you?  What didn’t?  What’s going to be something you try/apply as a result?  Let me know.  Leave a comment below.  I can’t wait to hear from YOU!

So Chad hit a racoon with his car. First time he's had an animal run in front of him like that. Have Carter and Cook had similar experiences? What about Jason DeRusha? We took calls from listeners with some amazing stories. Take a listen... See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

The negotiation process isn’t always easy for a salesperson to navigate. But mastering the process is paramount to your success. The bottom line: if you can’t negotiate well you won’t fare well in anything you do in life. In this episode of Sales Reinvented, Chad Burmeister joins me to talk about some of the parts of the negotiation process that salespeople shy away from—and how to change it.  Chad Burmeister is the Founder and CEO of ScaleX.ai, which promises to deliver an “unfair competitive advantage” by helping your salespeople increase lead frequency and sales competency. He is the author of multiple books, including AI for Sales and Sales Hack. Don’t miss his stellar insight on the negotiation process.  Outline of This Episode [1:29] Our lives are built on negotiation  [1:59] Salespeople aren't comfortable discussing money [4:45] How to master the negotiation process [6:29] Salespeople need to understand the customers’ problem [7:58] Chad’s favorite negotiation closing technique [8:55] Chad’s FUN acronym [11:15] How one negotiation changed Chad’s life The importance of negotiation Chris Voss was the first to make the phrase “everything is a negotiation” popular—and for good reason. Chad points out that nearly everything we do involves negotiation. When you make a purchase, engage in a conversation, or play with your kids, some sort of negotiation is involved. Chad points out that it’s well worth any monetary investment to go from a ‘C’ level negotiator to an ‘A+’. Perhaps that change in status means more bookings, more revenue—maybe even fame and fortune. Whatever it is you’re trying to achieve in life can be benefitted from mastering negotiation.  Understand that the negotiation process means you’ll talk about Money The Objective Management Group has studied close to two million salespeople and found that only 54% are comfortable discussing money. A salesperson NEEDS to be able to comfortably discuss money in the negotiation process—yet most can’t stomach it. Chad sees that as one of the biggest roadblocks to a successful negotiation.  Chad notes that the discomfort associated with discussing money is often associated with the way you were raised. Did your family have money? Were they savers or spenders? Did they avoid discussing money at all? If you can understand your money mindset and buying pattern, you can learn how to master this part of the negotiation process.  Instead of letting a prospect walk away to “look at other vendors” you have to be comfortable pointing out what you discussed. “I thought we’ve discussed your priorities and requirements? You’ll save a million and increase sales by 5.4 million. Why do you need to look at the other vendors?” Chad shares another story about haggling in Mexico that drives the point home—so keep listening.  Roleplay the negotiation process When Chad completed his MBA, he took a class on power, politics, and negotiation. They spent a lot of time role-playing negotiations. Roleplaying in class with other students was the catalyst he needed to learn the negotiation process inside and out.  Aside from consistent practice, Chad recommends taking a class or reading a book—you can even play poker. Learning the art of poker is a great way to learn how to see people’s tells, when they’re exaggerating, etc.  Chad also believes you need to master closing techniques. Instead of “let’s schedule our next step meeting” at the end of a meeting, ask “If I could... would you…?” You’re essentially giving them an option to voice any objections they have to closing the deal in that meeting.  To hear more of Chad’s advice—including his thoughts on gap selling—keep listening! How Chad’s negotiation process changed his life Chad’s second job out of college was with Airborne Express. He had set up a meeting with Uhaul about some packages they had been shipping with USPS They were shipping packages of license plates for $4.50. The Uhaul would meet the USPS truck in whichever state the plates were to be delivered. They send 12,000 of these a month. 10% of the time, the USPS truck didn’t make it in time and the license plates got shipped back. So Chad took the time to dig and find out the impact of the 10% of trucks that were missed. Other than being fined, every once and a while a cop would sometimes pull over Uhaul trucks with expired plates and make them empty the contents from one truck into another. So with the fines, he calculated Uhaul was spending $5.87 to ship the new license plates. Airborne typically charged $6 to ship, but he offered to do it at $5 and demonstrated the total cost of ownership that would save Uhaul money.  Chad won the account—1,000 shipments a month. Then he won the Canadian account, which was 2,000 shipments a month. He went on to become the #1 salesperson at Airborne. Eventually, he got recruited away to a job in southern California where he met his wife and started his family—all because of the outcome of ONE negotiation.  Listen to the whole episode of Sales Reinvented for Chad’s insight on the negotiation process. If you’re looking to improve your skills—this is the place to start! Resources & People Mentioned ScaleX Chriss Voss on YouTube Robert Cialdini Gap Selling by Keenan Objective Management Group Airborne Express Episode 183 of Sales Reinvented Connect with Chad Burmeister Connect on LinkedIn Follow on Twitter Connect With Paul Watts  LinkedIn Twitter Subscribe to SALES REINVENTED Audio Production and Show notes by PODCAST FAST TRACK https://www.podcastfasttrack.com

UglyDolls (2019) and The Addams Family (2019) With Carona Virus, World War III, Australian wild fires and Carol Baskin murdering her husband, we can all agree that 2020 hasn't been a great year. So Chad and Simone are traveling back to a simpler time, a happier time. Join us in a yester-year of happy, ridiculously weird and misguided animated movies featuring underused singers, and a superb cast that was totally undervalued by the format. Social Media: Facebook and Instagram: @FreshTomatoesPodcast Twitter: @FreshTomatoesMP Email: FreshTomatoesPodcast@gmail.com --- This episode is sponsored by · Anchor: The easiest way to make a podcast. https://anchor.fm/app

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If you are going to attract and keep the best talent, what does your company actually stand for? There has been a growing shift in the importance of work culture. Pay, benefits, 401K, snacks in the break room have all become table stakes. Today’s guest on Little Left of Center is Chad Hickey, founder and CEO of Lucky Forks. Lucky Forks is an organization that helps companies implement a social responsibility strategy. We discussed the impact to companies’ bottom lines as well as what multiplying social good can do for a global impact. Also, Chad was super fun and smart!  Transcript below. Lucky Forks Instagram | LinkedIn | Facebook The New Voice of the Employee Podcast As for Little Left of Center, in addition to streaming on your favorite podcast app, these episodes are also broadcasting on DecaturFM and Salesforce Radio. If you haven’t hit subscribe yet, please make sure you do so you never miss an episode of these perspective shifting episodes. Leave a review. Share it with your friends and enemies. I’m also looking for sponsors for future episodes so feel free to follow me on the socials and hit me up. You can reach me by email, Instagram, or Facebook. Thank you so much for listening and I’ll see you next week! Allison Hare:                 00:05               Hey, I'm Alison Hare and welcome to little left of center, the podcast that interviews culture changers that are reshaping our world and breaking new ground. If you're going to attract and keep the best talent, what does your company actually stand for? You may have noticed a shift in the importance of work culture, pay benefits, 401k snacks in the break room. They've all become table stakes. And today's guest on little left of center is Chad a Hickey founder and CEO of lucky forks, lucky forks as an organization that helps companies implement a social responsibility strategy. We discussed the impact a company's bottom lines as well as what multiplying social good can do for a global impact. Also, Chad was super fun and smart. Please enjoy. So I am here today with Chad Hickey. He is the founder and the CEO. Is that right? Are you the CEO? Chad Hickey:                01:07               Yes, that's correct. Allison Hare:                 01:08               Of lucky forks. Lucky forks is a social responsibilities service. And I am so thankful not only to have you on the podcast, but it's so funny because I think that the social responsibility that corporations are now I'm starting to think about is kind of like when you are thinking about buying a Jeep or you buy a Jeep and then all of a sudden you see Jeeps everywhere. And and it's funny cause as I was preparing for this interview, I met this woman in Atlanta. So Chad is in New York city, but I met this woman in Atlanta who has a similar organization called social measures. And I thought, you know what, it is the thing, it is a thing. So I want to hear yeah. But I want to hear more from you to tell me more about, about you and how this came about. Chad Hickey:                01:59               Yeah. So you know, I've been in the advertising space for the past 17 years primarily in sales leadership. You know, started my career out in print that the Atlanta journal constitution. So I know you're in Atlanta, so shout out. Yeah. Allison Hare:                 02:13               The AJC. Yes. Chad Hickey:                02:15               Yeah. So I'm, I started my career there. You know, move to New York with a startup, work in various different, you know, technology companies. But you know what, what I was, I think they, you know, as you go through your 20s and your thirties talking about how you land kind of on what I'm doing today, you know, as you go through that, it's a scenario where you learn a lot of things of like what you want out of life and what you don't want out of life. And what I ended up doing was just realizing at one point when was I the most happiest in my career and I kept going back to different experiences that I had where I was doing something socially impactful. And I was lucky enough to work for a company who had, you know, a social responsibility strategy. Chad Hickey:                03:01               And I saw what that did for the organization. I saw what I did for employees, I saw what it did for the culture, those sorts of things. And so when I was saying, you know, what do I want, you know, as I go into my forties, because I'm not a spring chicken anymore, I go into my forties, you know, what do I really, what do I really want? You know, it wasn't necessarily about chasing the paycheck anymore. It was more about like doing something that made me happy. So that was where I landed when it came to social responsibility is it was really that was the catalyst and then it started to spiral into other things. To your point, like doing research on, you know, products that are socially responsible, but then also just the workforce change that's happening with gen Z because there is, I think such a fundamental shift happening that people aren't paying attention to where people want more. You have a generation coming into the workforce that will be 24% of the workforce next year and that's gen Z. You know, that's always grown up with school shootings and social media and they just think completely different. They, I actually get a panel had advertising week this week with a gen Z and I asked them to use words that describe themselves and one of the words that they used was entitled and abs first. Yeah, yeah. And so you probably have a, a reaction like Ooh, kind of a negative Allison Hare:                 04:27               Yes. Chad Hickey:                04:28               To describe yourself. But after thinking about that conversation, you know, what they were really saying is I'm worthy. You know what I mean? And they were saying, I am worthy to have a good clean environment. I am worthy to have a workplace that gives me in a work life balance, I am worthy to work at a company that shares my values and respects me as an individual. And I thought it was just so powerful that that was one the way they defined it and to just how they think so differently. But I mean it will be the largest transfer of wealth the next 10 years. In 10 years, gen Z will represent 75% of the workforce. And I just don't think that employ, like employers are paying attention to how fundamentally different they are. So that that's, you know, a long answer to how I landed on the company. Lucky forks. But you know, it kind of encompasses all of that of getting these companies ready. Allison Hare:                 05:22               And I thought what was interesting is I listen to your, your, I think it was the first episode of your podcast. What's the name of your podcast again? Chad Hickey:                05:30               It is the, the new voice of the employee, Allison Hare:                 05:33               The new voice of the employee. And I was kind of stopped dead in my tracks because I never thought of it this way, but you and a guest were talking about about kind of what the, the playing field is like when you're looking for a job. So whether it is gen Z, gen Y millennial, whether it's whoever is that you, what I remember about looking for a job is you want to make sure that there are good benefits. There's 401k, there's some security there, a ping pong tables, NYSE maybe that they have snacks in a kitchen, but I think that the point was those are table stakes now that when people are looking for a career, they want something that that the culture is going to fit them. And even when I, you know, like I've, I've worked for Salesforce, so Salesforce is real. Like we have social responsibility embedded in our culture and you know, even if I get hit up all the time by recruiters and I always, you know, think about, well, what if I were to go somewhere else? And the culture ; nothing beats the culture of Salesforce. And so I'm wondering from your perspective, why is social responsibility from a corporation so important to their bottom line? Chad Hickey:                06:52               Yeah, because it, it says that you care beyond profitability. I mean, if you look at what happened with the business round table in the 181 CEOs that, that came out and said, look, it's about the stake holder, not just the shareholder anymore. I mean, that was a very powerful statement, fundamentally different from anything that's ever been done in business. And I think that, you know, from that perspective, you know, these, these companies, it doesn't matter if you can play ping pong if you don't have a planet to live on in 30 years, you know what I mean? I don't care if you're like catering my lunch. Yes. To your point it is table stakes. And I'm not saying those things aren't noticed and they don't help, you know, gain an edge or get an employee, you know, in the walls of your organization. But it isn't the differentiator anymore. Chad Hickey:                07:40               And I don't even think having a social responsibility strategies should be used as a differentiation. It should be used as a responsibility. I mean, these companies have a responsibility because you know, there's a fundamental erosion of trust in the institutions that we could depend on in the past government, church, whatever. You know, people do not feel the same level of trust that they, that they have in the past. And so they are looking to their employer to say, listen, help me and build, build a future for me. You know what I mean? Or I'm not going to spend, you know, two thirds of my time at this job. And I think that's a very fair thing to, to expect. Allison Hare:                 08:22               Yeah, I think there's a cultural shift that has happened all across where people are looking at, where do I spend my dollars, where do I spend my time? Or is it going to be where my dollar is, my time, my resources, my intention is going to go to someplace that's going to be doing good. So whether it's things like Warby Parker and Toms and companies that are and even hanky panky, the panties company, you know, there, there are a lot of there are a lot of incredible stories that are going going along there and people have a lot more choices, which is some of the benefits of having a strong economy. And like I said, I work for Salesforce and a company that puts social responsibility in its forefront. But I find that, and again, I'm in the South, so I'm in sales, so I work with a lot of organizations that their companies tend to be stuck in a less socially responsible mindset. So how do you find companies that you work with? Are you looking at companies that are, you know, kind of moving in that space? Or how do you inspire companies that may not have thought that way? Tell me about your strategy for infiltration. Yeah, Chad Hickey:                09:36               No, it's a great, it's a great question. So we primarily focus on well there's two kind of answers to that question. One, we've, we primarily focus on companies within the advertising and tech space. And the reason why we do that is I believe the advertising and technology space can change the world for the better more than any other industry in business. And the reason why I believe that is because from a technology standpoint, we are changing the way people behave on a daily basis. Uber has changed the way we get from point a to point B. Amazon has changed the way we shop. Like we are fundamentally changing consumer behavior. And for you to think that that will not apply to the way that we volunteer or the way that we interact with nonprofits, you know, is just not realistic, you know? And so how do we make those companies realize that nonprofits out there cannot spend money on technology and they cannot stand, spend money on marketing, right? Chad Hickey:                10:40               Because they have to put as many dollars to the, the mission as they can. And so it's what we do every day, right? Like we are constantly focused on those two things. And so they need us as an industry to bring them along. And so I think getting into these organizations and talking to them about that and making sure that they understand that, listen, it's great that you went and planted a tree or it's great that you donated to, you know, this, this homeless shelter. And I'm not saying that you should not do that to be clear, but I do think that you need to authentically work, like lean into what you do on a daily basis as a company to see how you can amplify social good. So that's the first thing. The second thing that you know, when we're prospecting for companies is when I got into the location space in 2012, it really what I'm going through right now reminds me of that time because we were really building and evangelizing the importance of location. Chad Hickey:                11:41               The idea that, you know, where you went in the physical world, said something about you was still pretty new for most people. Right? And so we were out there kind of, you know, the company I was working at the time, which was ground truth. It was formerly known as X ad. You know, we were really changing the mindset and getting people to think a different way. And this past year of launching lucky forks and talking to people about social responsibility, it has reminded me so much of that experience because, and, and I'm thankful for that experience because it's made me realize that you have to meet people where they are. You cannot expect to walk into an organization that has no sort of strategy around social responsibility and say, you know what, you've got to have these policies and programs. You've got to have seven volunteer days, you've got to do all these different things. Chad Hickey:                12:31               It will overwhelm people. And so you've got to speak to them in a way that one I think doesn't feel overwhelming, but then two meets them where they are so that they see it and they feel it. And then they start to understand that. And time and time again, you know, when we work with companies now the first time they have an experience, one of the common comments we get is people will say, I get it now. Like I totally see how we can impact society. And so it's, it's understanding that process and respecting that process. And knowing that, you know, to your point, I'm probably 99% of the time walking into a company that probably doesn't understand its value, meaning the value of social good at the level that they can fully impacted. And so I've got to evangelize and educate that and bring that along the journey. Allison Hare:                 13:24               And I love what you said about it can be very overwhelming. Cause I, I thought about that too. There are so many causes to support. How do you help a corporation narrowed down how to help and what will make the most impact, as I imagine it's probably, you can go so many different ways. Like how do you, how do you narrow it down for them? How do you help them find what's, what works? Chad Hickey:                13:45               No, that's a, that's a really great question. I think it starts with their values. One and, and then two, it starts with who they are, like what they have to offer. And then three, it starts with, you know, what they are in the start, but you know, it is what their employees care about. You know, and I think that if you get those three things you know, at a basic level, you're gonna get, you know, to a strategy that can resonate. But you know, I think people try to boil the ocean a lot where they're like, Oh, you know what, it's so overwhelming. And, and in the company's defense the profits, you know, for lack of, you know, ill intention, you know, they, they are not the easiest to to work with because they're just trying to keep their head above water. Chad Hickey:                14:34               They are running with really lean staff. They don't have time to, you know, answer an email like in 30 minutes. And so, you know, I think a lot of companies kind of get frustrated, you know, with that process and that's understandable. But you know, when you start with the values, you've, you really from the values perspective, what nonprofit aligns with your values and then you dig into really what do they need? They may say, Hey, I need money. But you realize that they really have no sort of infrastructure or system to know when to reengage their donors. Then maybe you have the data and the technology to help them do that. You know what I mean? And so then there's a much more authentic connection between what your company does and then what that nonprofit needs from a corporate partnership perspective. But the, the thing that we say is, listen, social responsibility is not a volunteer day. Chad Hickey:                15:27               You do not go and you know what I love, I'm just going to make it up, habitat for humanity and I'm going to go and volunteer at habitat for humanity and now I am a socially responsible company. That's not how it works. That is, I am a company that has these values. I've found this nonprofit that I'm going to have a longterm partnership with and we are going to help each other and you know, help get to a common mission I think is the, the right way to do it. And then to understand that you've got to create smaller pads for your employees to plug in if they're not passionate about the one or two things that, or your corporation chooses, whether that be volunteer time off or some sort of matching program. So that they have their own personal outlets to then engage and connect. Allison Hare:                 16:15               So do you feel like companies typically do have their values established or is part of your service kind of flushing out what those might be? Chad Hickey:                16:24               Yeah. so that's a good question. I'm, I'm sometimes surprised, you know, when we have conversations, not necessarily that the companies don't know their values, but that Allison Hare:                 16:38               Are they clearly defined. Chad Hickey:                16:40               Yeah. Or there's too many of them or they just can't recite them, you know? I've worked in companies where the values were like drilled in our heads, you know what I mean? And so people would say, what's your values? And it was like, you rambled off. Right. And so I'm always a little surprised when I am, you know, meeting with a company and I say, you know, what are your values? And the people go, Oh, what was it again? What's the five words? Or, or you get into a company where maybe there's like 12 or 15 values and it's like so overwhelming that no one could really remember all of them, but you know what I mean? And so it is helping them kind of narrow that down and really engage the employees to say, what does the employees really care about and how do they describe the organization? And then how does that overall value definition get constructed? Allison Hare:                 17:32               So, and that makes sense to me. And he, you kind of touched on this a little bit, but this is kind of a burning question for me. Do you think that it is important for corporations to take a political stance because when it comes to valuers social, a lot of it so intertwined but so incredibly loaded, you know, when it emotionally loaded. So, you know, what are your thoughts on that? Is that important? Is that part of the strategic direction that you guys can offer? Chad Hickey:                18:02               Yeah, I think that the no longer is it as much of a faux pas to take a political stance where if you would've asked me this three years ago, you know, was recently that I probably would've been like, Oh, you know, like, stay away from certain issues. I think that if you authentically can connect the values of your company with a controversial topic that you want to get behindthat is when I feel like people are much more accommodating then, you just taking a stance to, to take a stance. And I think that you have to be, you know, if you're going to take a stance like that, you do have to be able to explain why. And we have a partner if you are listening to the podcast Teeds that partnered with planned Parenthood or put out, you know, with some other companies like full page ad in the New York times. And I asked that same question. I said, you know, what was there any sort of negative impact of that? And there wasn't because their organization really cares about the diversity and inclusion of all the people within their organizations. So it very much aligned with what their employees care about and they did not see any negative impact from it. Allison Hare:                 19:12               That's what I figured. That's what I figured. And Chad Hickey:                19:16               For a thing, it's a different way for people to wrap their heads around. It's fairly, it's, Allison Hare:                 19:20               This is so new too. Yeah. Chad Hickey:                19:23               Yeah. It's very understandable, you know, for companies to kind of go, Oh, you know, like what, where is the line and what am I going to step over it? Allison Hare:                 19:31               It's kind of like you can, it's not something that you dip your toe in. You kind of have to jump in, you know, if you're going to take a stance that like that. So whether it's political, whether it is a controversial social issue there's so much importance to that too. Yeah. And I'm, I'm curious about hiring practices. So from a cultural perspective, you've got organizations that are, are defining their values, they are defining social responsibility. What is your take, do you feel like companies that you hire to fit a culture or do you hire, do we expand what the culture could be? Chad Hickey:                20:11               Ooh, I love this question. You know what? I one time was interviewing a candidate at a, at a former company, and she said to me, she goes, I want to see not how you're a cultural fit, but how you're a cultural ad. And I love that, right? Like, if you were constantly trying to fit within an organization your organization doesn't evolve, you know, and I, I to to your point, I think that looks, there have to be fundamental values that you align. And one of the things that came out of the panel that one of the panelists said that I thought was super interesting because I said, at what point where do you draw the line that if your employer does something that you say, this is fundamentally against my values and I need to look for another job because you hear so many things around gen Z specifically, you know, really wanting to work for companies like that. And the answer was, you know, when it starts to impact who I am as an individual, you know, and so I think as an organization, as long as you can, you know, continue to you know, allow people to be individuals, you fundamentally stay within the bounds of who your organization is, but you continue to have that flexibility to evolve with different people. I think that's the strategy to take. Allison Hare:                 21:36               I love that. And it's funny cause I heard that question being posed or at least that concept being posed on masters of scale. And I wonder when so much talk is around culture. How do you find the right people? And I think it's interesting. So lucky forks, where did the name come from? And my second part is do good. Be ready. Is your tagline be ready for what? So tell me about your name. My mind is just going like, be ready for what? Speaker 4:                    22:07               Yeah, Chad Hickey:                22:09               I am not, look, while I'm serious about the value we bring to the industry, I am for people who know me also know I'm a pretty I, I liked to play practical jokes. I'm a, I'm a pretty you know, I'm not a super, super serious person. Allison Hare:                 22:25               I heard you do a great version of the Arkansas fight song. I might ask you to do it later. Speaker 4:                    22:31               Oh, Julie Stewart, Allison Hare:                 22:32               Julie Stewart. Speaker 4:                    22:35               But maybe, maybe that is true. But anyway Chad Hickey:                22:40               So you know, from now you've made me forget what the question was. Allison Hare:                 22:43               It was lucky for it, like the meaning of lucky forks and then do good, be ready. Chad Hickey:                22:48               Yeah. Yeah. I was like, Oh God, I started picturing myself in my head. But anyway, Speaker 4:                    22:52               So Chad Hickey:                22:54               You know, I wanted something playful. I didn't want something super serious. Walk is something that brings good fortune, but out of a lack of preparation. And I feel like a lot of the companies are not prepared for this fundamental shift. So that was the luck piece. And then a fork is about a fork in the road. I think it w it's, it was about a fork in the road for me personally to choose, you know, what I wanted to do rather than it just be about money. And then you know, also a fork in the road for these companies. And then a fork is a tool to, you know what I mean, that that feeds some sort of need. And so there were several different things that kind of kept bringing me to those, those two words. And I kind of liked the lightheartedness and ambiguousness of it because when we meet with people, a lot of people will ask that question. Chad Hickey:                23:42               So which is understandable. And then from do be ready, I mean obviously do good is pretty self explanatory, but be ready is, you know, speaking to our clients, like this is not a trend. It's not a fad. This is something that is what I tell people is think about it. Like when you used to go into offices and that they were all closed door offices and really high cubicle walls, you know, and it was just, you would, if you walked into an office in that way today, it would feel stiff or like an outdated culture. Right. That was probably the impression you would have, especially in advertising and tech. And what I, what I say to people is this next workforce shift is not as tangible as that. It's more of a feeling that it is something that visual and people are feeling it. Everyone's feeling it because I, I talked to people and they'll say, something just isn't connecting anymore. Or, you know, I'm not curing cancer with what I'm doing with my job. And it's more than just feeling this intangible workforce change evolution that's happening. And so that's the best way that I've been able to think about it in my mind of change. But the change is emotional. The changes you know, more spiritual or something that's not tangible, if that makes sense. Allison Hare:                 25:06               It does make sense. And I feel like that's happening all over the place where even how this my podcast little left of center has started is how can I do more and how can I be of service? How can I serve as kind of what I, I'm constantly asked myself, how can I serve? And so, and that kind of plays along with your concept of do good, be ready. Tell me about, give me five. Chad Hickey:                25:31               Yeah. So give me five. So, so here's what I'll say, kind of just piggybacking on what you, what you just said and then I'll get him to GiveMe5 is I completely agree and I think that where people overcomplicate it is they think that,uthat being of service has to the like I'm out there planting trees or building a house or whatever. And I, I just fundamentally don't believe that, you know, I think if you talk to any of my friends, I've never been a big like person out there volunteering or that sort of thing. You know what I mean? And so I don't claim to be, but I do think that as business people, you know, we have a responsibility to take those skillsets and see how we can amplify social good from that perspective. You know what I'm saying? I think that you've got to find where you're comfortable with giving back, whether that's just by making donations cause you're a busy person and that's okay. Chad Hickey:                26:27               And that was kind of where I always went, you know, in my direction was more just like in a monetary sense. But you know, kind of landing on one, giving herself that flexibility to really land on what your skill set is, but then to you know, really think about what makes you happy. So I just wanted to say that from a, from a GiveMe5 perspective kind of going into what do you know with, you know, by previous comment, what I knew was how to, how to run sales teams, right? Going into this, you know, I've been a part of the company who did the social responsibility program, but I was like, I know how much money is spent by entertaining clients. You know, there's, in our industry, there's a lot of fancy dinners, there is a lot of baseball games or concerts. Chad Hickey:                27:17               There's buying jeans and all kinds of stuff. Right? And what I'm sort of thinking about, you know, was how much money was wasted or, or not used in a fully beneficial way. And if there was a way to get a company to think about taking 5% of that budget, not necessarily finding new budget, but taking 5% of the budget they already have and utilizing that budget more for social impact and for ways that could actually be entertainment that gave back to community. So maybe instead of the really fancy dinner where you have three or four glasses of wine and forget what you talked about after the [inaudible] or that's what happened to me, Allison Hare:                 28:00               What it was, Chad Hickey:                28:01               Why not take that client out and do something in the community that and use that money that to actually give back. And so that's how GiveMe5 got started. And what I'll say is that the response from the advertising and tech community has been so strong that, you know, we launched that initiative April 1st Allison Hare:                 28:21               Because it's really a challenge to other organizations, isn't it? Chad Hickey:                28:24               You know, it is, it's, I say it's an awareness initiatives because it's really about the message, you know? Yes, it is this target of 5%. And it is a challenge because it's a challenge to think differently. But you know, it is, it's also to raise awareness. I had, you know, an agency CEO you know, say to me, look, we have had to put policies and programs in place because of the ways that we are perceived to be entertained. And he said, you are basically saying would give me five, you know, what we can entertain but do it in ways that actually give back to community so that it's more benefiting the public than it is about benefiting us through some sort of like, you know, more materialistic experience. And so so, so that, that was how it took shape. And you know, I'm happy to say that, you know, in seven months we've had, you know, 14 companies sign up and we have more coming on board. We already have people that are committed into 20, 20. And so, you know, and it's, it's, it's companies like Spotify and Hulu and you know, Outfront media that, you know, they have their own social responsibility arms, but they're saying, we believe in what this message is saying to our industry. Allison Hare:                 29:40               This like a utopian state. It sounds amazing to be able to do that. And even when you were talking before about the agencies or the companies that have the high cubicles and the closed doors, it really is like hierarchy versus collaborative level playing field, which I think is where companies are, are moving towards instead of just, you know, like the hierarchical ARCA goal. The little people don't matter. The big people do trivial. What is it, trivial many vital few where it seems like it's much more level playing field where everybody contributes in a way that's impactful, that's meaningful. So I can't see a loss in that, you know, why people would say no, which brings me to my next question is how do you, how do you measure success? What does success look like to you? Chad Hickey:                30:31               You know, success from, I feel success out of the response I see from people who have a volunteer day with us or you know, our Q3 giving five event. We funded a full year's worth of projects for a school in the lower East side and a silver, a school that is in the lower East side. And the principal and teachers came to our event and talked about for the first time they had iPads and computers and all of these things that they hadn't been able to, you know, afford previously. And we were able to partner with donors choose to at work, which is an amazing nonprofit. If people are not aware of it and fund those projects. And I think it's those, those moments that, you know you start to see your impact. And I think those companies felt their impact. But I will say, you know, being more high level from a lucky forks perspective is it is where the, the mission of the company is. His goal is to create social impact out of the budgets you already have and the time you already spend as an organization. Allison Hare:                 31:45               So it's just re-purposing. It's just repurposing. Chad Hickey:                31:49               It is, it's, it's saying guys, I'm not asking you to do different things. I'm asking, well, the only thing I'm asking to do differently is to think differently. You know what I mean? I'm not asking you to go find different money. I'm not asking you to change a behavior. I'm asking you to think differently about how you act currently and do it in a really easy way. You know what I mean? That actually when you take one company that then becomes five companies, that then becomes 14 companies that really starts to add up and can do some great social impact. And so so, so that's, that's kind of where I've measured success is watching that growth. Allison Hare:                 32:31               Oh, that's so cool. And I'm wondering, you focused on advertising and technology companies, are there plans go outside of that? Chad Hickey:                32:41               You know what? Yes. so we definitely have some plans to expand that with some different projects that I won't speak about right now cause Allison Hare:                 32:50               They're in the works. It's embark. Chad Hickey:                32:52               Yeah. Yeah, yeah. Well there's a definitely a focus from everyone, you know, within the team of how do we scale our social impact and how do we find those things that, that can scale very easily and make a really massive impact. And I know that's very ambiguous, but you know, at, at my core, I am a technology person. I have worked in companies where I like data and I like to think about how you impact as many people as possible. So that's always been a goal. So the events, the experiences, all that will remain very fundamental. But I think in 2020, what people will see is that we take it to the next level to say, okay, how do we really maximize impact in a, in a more technological way. Allison Hare:                 33:42               Oh, that's so cool. And I'm wondering, Chad Hickey:                33:45               It's cool. And you don't even know what it is. Allison Hare:                 33:47               I don't even know. Well, it sounds like you're, you're expanding. So that's, that's important too. And it takes a lot of work. It's hard work to launch and run a business like you're doing. What do you do for fun? I know that. So I don't know if I, I don't think I mentioned this before, but my good friend Dooley's steward had texted maintenance. Like, you've got to talk to Chad to Hickey. He is just so up your alley. You've got to talk to him. He's amazing. And so that's how that's how I came to find you. But Dooley told me that you're really great at karaoke. Speaker 4:                    34:22               What do you do outside of work? Did this just sit there? Probably if she, when she listens to this is, I can hear her cackling, but so I do love karaoke. Ain't no way, but I read the Franklin is my go to song. Allison Hare:                 34:38               These boots are made for walking. Speaker 4:                    34:40               Well, you know what, maybe we'll sing together sometime. Chad Hickey:                34:44               You know what, I really love to travel. And, and then outside of that, I mean I could be much better about having a personal life. I think that, look, when you find something that you feel really inspired by and you you know, like you, it doesn't feel like work, if that makes sense. I probably spend a little too much time doing that, but I like it, you know, and so I don't really see that as a negative. Allison Hare:                 35:13               Where do you like to travel? Where is your favorite place? Chad Hickey:                35:15               Oh, Lake Como, Italy by far. So Speaker 4:                    35:21               Hanging out with little league budget anymore when I'm building a company. But yes. Chad Hickey:                35:25               I've been there twice now and that was actually a fundamental spot that, that made me land on the idea of doing, you know, my own company as I was at a, at a hotel there, and I was relaxing and I was traveling alone for the first time ever. And I was reading the book, the subtle art of not giving a sock. If people haven't read it, you definitely should. Yeah, Allison Hare:                 35:47               I think it's hilarious. Yeah. Chad Hickey:                35:49               Yeah. When you listen to the guy, you're like, Whoa, okay. But, but, you know, there's a part of the book that says, what are you feeling to, or what are you willing to feel pain for? And like, I sat straight up when I'd never thought of it that way. You know what I mean? Because look, I, you know, for us in my thirties had had really good jobs that allowed me to be really comfortable financially and I really just wasted a lot of money, you know what I mean? And I didn't know a thing, meaning to media. I didn't do anything meaningful with it, you know, and so it really came down to, for me and my pain point was, you know, are you willing to go back to living on a budget and you know, cooking at home and all those things that I wasn't necessarily doing a lot of if you feel strongly enough that this company, you know, solves a need in the market. And so that's where I just kept going back to that one question. As I really land on, you know, taking the leap and forming the company Allison Hare:                 36:50               And I love that too. And I can relate to that. Like I think when you love what you do, when you're passionate, when you feel like you're serving a purpose, you love it. You know, like you can't wait to do more of it cause it you, you can see the ripple effect of your impact. And I don't know that there's anything more intoxicating than that then knowing what you're doing is making an impact Chad Hickey:                37:13               Well and taking on, you know, it taking a different form than what you've thought. You know, initially it was just to be consulting and going in and forming social responsibility programs for companies. And it's really taken on a much different meaning, you know, for me, one, you know, the first thing was really learning nonprofits and what they needed. But then too and it's been something recently, fairly recently that, you know, someone pointed out to me, I was having a conversation with someone who had listened to the first three episodes of the podcast and they said, it's really interesting to me how many people in advertising don't think they provide value. He goes, I've heard multiple times on your podcast. People say, well, I'm pushing ads or I am, I'm not, we're not curing cancer here. And I was like, I've heard that a million times by friends in the industry. Chad Hickey:                38:06               And what I think is interesting about that perspective that really like made the hairs on my arms stand up is when did we get to a point that we stopped understanding the power to influence culture in a positive way. I mean, people who are in advertising shape behaviors, that's what we do. You know what I'm saying? And so who are we to think that we provide no value? If we take that skillset and use it for purpose, that it can be so powerful. So yes, you may not be the doctor that's in the operating room curing the cancer, but you can at least raise awareness through messaging around nonprofits or causes that you can donate to that then will lead to curing the cancer. Do you know what I mean? We play a significant part in that. And so you know the, the, the piece that is like taking shape is making people understand how we can really impact community if we do it in the right way. The problem is, is that most companies aren't thinking about, Hey, it's what I do all the time. It doesn't have to be something else. Does that make sense? Allison Hare:                 39:15               Yes. I love that too. I hope more people, I hope a lot of people listen to those podcasts because I think it's, it's sparking so much for me and I could imagine it makes perfect sense, you know, for people that run businesses, what if they could do more? But with the resources they already have, just reallocating them, you know, and, and even being able to impact like that ripple effect. And I'm curious, what do you know that you wish people could learn Chad Hickey:                39:44               To decide how to think? Ain't no way Allison Hare:                 39:46               I want to hear it. Chad Hickey:                39:49               I think that it is like take what you know and don't overthink it and find a way to provide the impact that that plays on your skillset. You know what I mean? In that you don't have to do it the same way as everyone else. Like you don't have to be this person that has always been volunteer of the year or those sort of things that really hone in on those skill sets that can create the most impact in the way that feels the most comfortable to you. And you know, I think that just as valuable to me personally as like what the company is also doing. And so I think it's letting yourself go through that process and like stop fighting the current as Oprah would say, and go with the flow. I tell people all the time, I feel more in the float my life, as cheesy as that sounds in my eyes. Wanna roll back in my head. Allison Hare:                 40:43               Right. Chad Hickey:                40:44               I feel more in the flow of my life like then I probably ever have because I'm kind of just going with the flow, which anyone who knows me knows I'm not great at doing. I try to can be a control freak. So, but you know what I mean? It's like, and maybe that's what you know, I would say is do, do what you feel is the right thing and then everything else will hopefully work out. Allison Hare:                 41:09               Yeah. It sounds like it's something that is deep inside you is kind of emanating, you know, like you're kind of living your truth to get all Oprah on you. But yeah, like Chad Hickey:                41:21               I'm going to again, like I'm so not like, you know, a, again, have these conversations. I typically don't do it publicly. But you know, I'm sure it can sound cheesy to some people, but whatever that truth is or whatever that flow is, like find it and then don't put too much scrutiny on yourself to be a certain way. Do it in the best way that, you know, Allison Hare:                 41:40               I love that. I love that. So how can people contribute to your mission? What is the best way? So five listeners, maybe they're in New York, maybe they're in Atlanta, maybe there's somewhere else. How can people contribute? Chad Hickey:                41:51               Yeah, I think that, you know, if you're in the industries, you know, that we've talked about and you have a sales team and you understand the entertainment budgets that are used and they give me five initiative speaks to you, then we'd love to have companies be a part. If you're a company that you know, has done a couple of things but you haven't really formalized a full plan then we can help you. I think that if you have annual sales conferences or company conferences, we're going up to Canada and a couple of months to actually do an annual conference with an entire company. And we're bringing in 300 kids you know, with a different nonprofit, like we can help you from that perspective. And then if you're just interested in learning more about the company in general, then you know, I'm happy to take calls, you know, and, and to talk to people about a little bit more transparency on the, the longer term vision of the company. Allison Hare:                 42:43               Chad, you're doing such awesome things. I love this. How can people find you? What's the best way to read you? Chad Hickey:                42:49               Well, you know, by email, you know. Okay. We give them that out chat at [inaudible] dot com you can find us on LinkedIn, Instagram, Facebook, Twitter. And so, you know, we're pretty much on all the social channels, but you can email me directly. But those are the, those are the best ways. Allison Hare:                 43:06               So I'm wondering too, like how do you guys find the nonprofits or do they reach out to you too? Chad Hickey:                43:13               You know what? So we've spent a lot of time really vetting over 300 nonprofits ourselves. And we use different tools that are out there that we're, nonprofits are rated to see how much money actually goes to the mission and that sort of thing. But most of it is like that's doing our own research or word of mouth. We also have an office in the center for social innovation. And so that is almost like a social impact. We work for a lack of a better comparison and it is all companies and nonprofits and any sort of organization that has a social impact tie to it. And so we've been able to experience some, some really or, or meet some really great nonprofits also through just our office space too. So in fact, our Q4 event is a carnival for homeless children where we're partnering with a nonprofit called knock, knock, give a sock, which we met through our office and they were an amazing organization that does SOC drives for homeless people. And so we're going to be doing a holiday carnival with the companies that have taken the pledge and bring in 250 kids so that they get to experience something at the holiday. So Allison Hare:                 44:26               I love that and I love that employees get to be face to face with people that are facing challenge. I think based on my own experience, it's one thing to learn about it, but when you're kind of in the midst of it, it changes you in a way, in a good way, you know, in a more compassionate, empathetic way. So I love what you're doing. Chad. Thank you so much for, for your work and your impact for taking time with me. You are culture changers. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you Chad. I love tugging a chat. Hickey of lucky forks. I'm a little disappointed I wasn't able to get him to sing the Arkansas byte song during our chat, but I loved the impact. Lucky forks is ushering by helping companies define and execute their social strategy. I've linked to Zim foe in the show notes. As for a little left of center, in addition to streaming on your favorite podcast app, these podcasts are also broadcasting on Decatur rep them and sales force radio. If you haven't hit subscribe yet, please make sure you do so. You never miss an episode of these perspective shifting episodes, leave a review, share it with your friends and enemies. I'm also looking for sponsors for future episodes, so feel free to follow me on the socials and hit me up. Thank you so much for listening and I will see you next week.      

A conversation with Chad Sperry, organizer of the 5-Day Oregon Trail Gravel Grinder (June 19-23, 2019). Oregon Trail Gravel Grinder Website Oregon Trail Gravel Grinder Instagram Automagical transcription, please excuse all errors: Chad, welcome to the show. Thank you, Craig. Appreciate being here. Let's start off by learning a little bit about your background as a cyclist and how you started thinking about gravel. Yeah, you bet. Yes. I started cycling back in 91 92, um, came out of triathlon and uh, with triathlon my a strong fiscal, it was the bike and really love the, uh, kind of the strategy in the end, the game game and ship that happens in cycling compared to trapline is where I consider it the like the big grunt effort. You just kind of go from the start and, and peg your, uh, your lactic acid throughout the whole event. So it was really intriguing with me and I raced a competitively for 15 years on a, on the road traveling all over and, and doing a number of one day races as well as state races. Awesome. And then how, when, when did gravel come into your life where you riding your road, bike off road and then the equipment just caught up to your interests? Or is it something newer than that? No, gravel? That's a great question. Gravel Kinda was a, uh, an interesting thing, both from my professional life as a, as a race promoter, as well as my personal life. The area that I grew up in and a, and, and trained for those 15 years when I was competitively racing on the roads is a, a rural area that's east of the cascades, um, called the Dalles Oregon. And the, the area that we lived in there, the county that we lived in, Wasco County, uh, had the majority of the roads were actually gravel, like a 60 to 70% of the all roads in Wasco county. Our gravel, it's a high agricultural area with a, with wheat and a cherry orchards. And so what we, what we found, and this was back in the early nineties, is that if you, uh, if you wanted to do some really big cool loops and training rides, uh, the only way to do that would be to basically, uh, go, uh, from the pavement onto a, onto gravel for say, a five mile, 10 mile segment. And then it would connect you into another paved road. There's a lot of being in the gorge, there's a lot of uh, drainage's and, and basically, uh, paved roads that would go up some canyon or some, some, uh, some creek and it would get in and gravel. But if you continue to on it, you could, uh, you could take the gravel road up and over the ridge line and into another drainage or creek basin and then connecting to a pavement. So out of boredom and out of a interest in trying to find something new, we, uh, we started actually going out and, um, and using our little 25 millimeters skinny tire caliper road bikes and actually ride in the gravel. And it also really taught you how to, how to be a, a great, uh, you know, um, technician because you've got such skinny tires and it's almost like you're kind of like riding on marbles per se. Yeah, amazing. I think that's a common story with a lot of athletes who live in more rural areas where the, it just, it was a necessity that you started riding on gravel roads and it just became more and more fun. And, and obviously the terrain options became more varied once the bikes caught up with what you were doing already. Absolutely. And then then on the professional side of things, you know, we'd been, um, when I, uh, we've got to the point where I was kind of aging out of the racing feed and had a family and a mortgage to cover and what not. I started, I took, I was, I came from an operations background professionally and so started to apply that, uh, and put on a different bike races starting back in 2001 up in around the northwest. And we build our filter company breakaway promotions, uh, to a very large one of the artists in the country actually running events like the cascade siding, classic Mt. Hood side, Classic tour of Utah as well as, uh, we put on a 20 plus national championship events for a, for USA cycling. And so, you know, we, we developed that on the road side of things, but I still love doing events in that little home town that I grew up in. And so eight years ago we started thinking about, hey, what if the initial idea was to start it as a role based style race, meaning it wasn't like a full blown gravel race. It would be something where there's paved, uh, um, sections of paved as well as gravel sectors. Um, that we, uh, we have, um, but in between the different placements and so forth. Um, so we would pull that stuff together and it was more of a kind of a payroll bay. We actually call it the gorge Real Bay, and it was more of a, uh, uh, kind of, uh, uh, a play on Perry row bay kind of thing. So the gravel sections, we're generally, you know, anywhere from four to five to six miles, uh, per section. And then you'd have like 10 miles of pavement in between that and that, that, uh, that that took off. Like people were super excited about that format. And then within two years or about six years ago, um, we actually went to a full on gravel ride as people were asking for more and more of the gravel and less and less of the pavement. Yeah, it's funny that first race you were describing was the first one that caught my eye here down in northern California and it just looked really exciting. I had just gotten the proper equipment. I got my first closet, I gravel bike and I was like, that looks like a hell of a lot of fun. And as I mentioned to you, it took me a few years after that before I actually got up there and did one of your events. But it was very telling and interesting to me. I had done three events that year and the course we wrote at the high desert gravel grinder was more pavement than dirt. And then I did a few others that were more dirt with pain vent. And it really set me down this thought process of thinking about how as a course designer you can really influence the choice of equipment and how good or bad a particular tire is going to perform throughout the day. Can you talk about how you sort of have evolved your thinking about how the courses should be laid out and how modern equipment influenced that? Absolutely. And it has truly, uh, significantly changed, I would even say in the last three to four years, you know, that high desert, the course that you talked about, definitely a higher percentage of pavements and saved their gorge gravel grinder that we've been running up in the gorge for a number of years. And I'm, and I had a number of people come in and complained to me that there was too much, um, too much pavement on it. And I even had a few that questioned whether I knew what I was doing. And, and rightfully so, I, I, I took that, that information in that criticism. Um, and what I decided to do is basically just go full blown gravel, as much gravel as I could. At the same time, you know, three and four years ago is when we really saw that every bike manufacturer was now making it gravel specific bike. Um, you know, the whole a disc brake movement was basically on everything. Tires were getting the standing and performance. So we've, so, so the technology as well as, you know, kind of the feedback from the riders. We all have our stuff now. We have a three race series a, we have a one day, a three day, uh, so one day with the gorge gravel grinder, a three day ride omnium one of the first omnium if not the first omnium in the country. Um, it's a three day event in bend called the cascade gravel grinder, which used to be the high desert, then morphed into the cascade ground writer. And then we have our big five day, a point to point, which again is a first in the country for gravel. I'm coming up in June, but, but I went and I looked and I wanted to basically do every course we had had to have at least 80% gravel, if not 90% gravel. Um, that the, that the writers are doing because the bike technology and the speeds that they're at, which they're writing now, we are so much faster and so much, um, so much better. And there's, which helps reduce the fatigue rate as well. So, you know, used to throw in some asphalt just so the people could get a little bit of a break and a reprieve. But now, um, the bike technology has allowed for a much more efficient a ride on gravel. Yeah, I think you're right. That's a good point. I am super excited to talk to you about the Oregon trail and gravel grinder, the five day event because I think it is the first of its kind. Can you tell us a little bit about that? It's a big adventure. Absolutely. Absolutely. And I, I try to be a little bit cautious on, on how I described this because, um, our company break, wait promotions is actually been running the operations for Rebecca Russian and Rebecca's private Idaho. And she actually had an actual stage race, um, last year, a three day event there. So when I tell people it's going to be the first, uh, point to point overnight camping, uh, event of its kind on the gravel side. Mountain bike is, had it been going on with BC race and, and um, and Breck epic and a number of other super cool, uh, mountain bike stage racism. Then of course we got the road stage races. They typically don't have the camping element, um, but they're multi day. Um, and they can even be point to point, but, but nothing in the gravel sector has, uh, has come to fruition in this, uh, in this regard. Um, I am based out of bend, Oregon and we have just an almost limitless supply of gravel roads. So, so it was the hardest part in developing this five day, uh, gravel event was to literally find the best roads that we could use. Not because there were scarce, but because there was such an, a massive inventory of roads. And so we took, it took us weeks of, uh, of going deep deep into the Deschutes national forest and we'll amet national forests, um, driving roads, spending, I can't believe how many hours on 'em and ride with gps and Google maps. So our eyes were crossed looking at routes and so forth. Um, and we've, we feel like we've developed one of the most amazing five day, uh, events that, that anybody will ever see it. And, and the, the other beauty of this event is that because you're in central Oregon and western Oregon, the diversity and change that you'll see each and every day is just mind blowing. Like I can give you an example of day one. We started in what's considered, you know, the kind of the high desert area just north of bend out little community of sisters. And you start off and kind of more your sage brush in and um, and Ponderosa pine type of a seven Forrest. And then as you start to gain elevation, that turns into for, and then you go into an Alpine forest. And then when you cross over the, the true cascade mountain range at like 5,000, 6,000 feet of elevation, um, when you're doing it on day one, you're crossing, you're crossing the range on the old historic fan iam wagon trail road, that, that was an operation during the mid 18 hundreds to late 18 hundreds and that road been, connects you into the, over over the cascades into the western side and the Willamette national forest where you trade all the high desert elements into a moss covered trees. We, we have some areas we found that they missed somehow they missed in their early logging operations with old growth forest stands and beautiful creeks. And, and uh, and, and that time of year, there's a lot of the Alpine flowers and Rhododendrons and that are in bloom. So it just has this unbelievable feel even in, in a, in a single day. Um, you'll change through several different climates in several different environments and vegetation when you're going from point a to point B. And it just keeps going like that for the next four days until you get back to a, we do one big loop and it takes you back to sisters, Oregon. Amazing. You definitely have some incredible terrain. As you said, it's so diverse up there. I spent some time bike packing on the Oregon timber trail last year and it was just phenomenal. The changes that we went through when you went over a different ridge, how different the terrain felt, which is going to make it really exciting. Absolutely. Absolutely. I, I, I really think that there's something for everybody as they, as they do this and it, our staff, you know, we, like I said, we come from a very strong operations background, having run so many major national and professional cycling events. And, uh, and so we've got, I've, I'm, I'm fortunate in that I have just an outstanding crew that we can put towards this event. You know, my, my uh, people like Brad Ross, uh, that ran for National Championships in Oh, in the cross crusade a soccer crosses is my right, right hand person for setting camps up and, and helping with support there. I've got my, uh, uh, good friend Jeff Lorenzen. It was technical director two or Utah and cascade side class. They can always pro events for the last 15 years. And I could just, I could name a whole list of people that have a decade plus of experience operating at the, at the highest level. So, so what we look, we look to do is to provide all this amazing courses in scenery, but then make sure that everybody is completely taken care of every single day and maximize their experience along the way. Cause it's, it is truly going to be con. Absolutely. It's one of those, those events where you know, you have all those single day one day road races that you do and, and 10 years from now you forget it. This is one of those things that I truly believe for many will be a lifetime memory because of the diversity. And the challenge and, and the experience that they'll have. It said to nail the point home just because many of my listeners are regardless. He quite familiar with one day racism, what that experience looks like. So you're out on the trail for five days. What are you doing at night? What's happening during the day from a logistics perspective? Yeah, and that's a great uh, great question. So when a, you're just telling you a little snapshot of what riders can expect when they roll into camp and in each of the days that were camping, we've got beautiful, you know, forest one areas, you know, we're a mixture between city parks, community centers and um, and uh, um, and even some of the high schools, a little, little, little tiny high schools that are embedded out in the cascade mountain ranges in these remote areas. Um, they're just beautiful sceneries in quiet areas that were setting up camp. But as writers, Rollie, and the first thing they're going to do is we've got food for them to get snacks and food for them to kind of rehydrate, to kind of fuel up. Then we actually have a, we work with a caterer that we'll be doing the food service for the entire five days and it's not cheap, you know, um, you know, burgers and that kind of stuff if things like salmon and tri tip and, and a barbecue chicken and you know, we really want to make sure that this is a high level event. So this catering companies thing catering at a port Lily's been working with for a number of years, um, delivers unbelievable, uh, meals and, and has experience working with large events like cycle Oregon and, and some of the larger events out there running events. We, they do a lot of our running events with 2000 plus runners coming through and doing a full catered high, high level a meal for them. So they'll be on, on, on point. And then when they're done with their meal and they've had their hot shower and so forth, we will have a nightly different game, competitions and tournaments, things like corn hole, a horse, you, um, we're going to be doing a, a poker night. Uh, we've got live music on, on three of the, the nights that we have the event, we're going to have a, a western movies playing. So it's, it's not that you're going to go there and you're going to basically hold up in your tent and you're just going to sleep and wait until the next day. We've got entertainment planned throughout the entire course of the evening. And um, and then again, when the morning, uh, morning comes, we'll be there with our staff to load up your equipment and gear and a and get you guys supported and, and saddened and ready to go for the next day's events. So in the morning I grab some breakfast, I pack my bag up, get my bike ready, and then your team takes care of the logistics of moving all my gear from point to point. Absolutely. So what we do is we have, um, we have a system where everybody is, is checked out at a massive, a a plastic tub. It'll have their, their big number printed on the side of it and that's their tub there travel case to use throughout the, uh, the course of the week. We use a hard shell tub. I know there's a number of, of, uh, of races. Where are they? You just basically bring your own duffle bag and um, and you throw it in there. We want to make sure that everybody's equipment stays protected and stays organized over the course of the entire week. So the tubs we give them or are pretty sure are really strong so they won't, you won't get stuff. You can throw stuff in there and doesn't get damaged. It's easy to keep everything contained. Um, it's easy for us to transport it from point a to point B. So what we'll do is we'll, the writers will come, they'll grab their bikes though. They'll check their up, their tub and um, with all their equipment, each rider gets an extra set of wheels to take along with them and they'll check that in and then we'll actually take that and have it waiting for them when they arrive at the finish line at, uh, at that day stage. If, if a writer needs to abandoned for whatever reason, they're injured, they're sick. Um, they've got time constraints. They can only do three of the five days or four of the five days. We actually have a nightly shuttle setup, um, that will take them from the finish line on that days stage back to the start in sisters. And we were calling it effectually the shuttle of shame. And, um, and, and what, what, uh, as a little token or gesture, everybody that gets on the shuttle of shame and gets delivered back early, uh, gets a complimentary tee shirt, um, with, uh, with the old Oregon trail video game and the oxen and the, and the, the wagon cart is pulling on the front of the t shirt and then below it it says you've died of dysentery. And, um, and then they'll get a, a little, uh, um, uh, credit towards next year hoping they'll come back to finish what they started on this epic journey. Say a little benefit in your shame I guess. Really. Yeah. It's something worth noting to people who haven't done these type of stage races with camping before. There's something, there's something amazing about packing up that crate in the morning, passing it off and not having to do anything but ride your bike all day. And that's truly an art focus. I mean, that's a great point Craig. It's uh, we just, we want you to not have to worry about anything with logistics. We want you to literally focus on your ride and your in, you know, we're finding this is the first year of the event and were just blown away at how wide of a reach in it's very first year. We are seeing people signed up from all over the country that are coming and uh, and flying in and traveling to a, to experience this event. And our goal is, is that your focus is 100% on, on pushing those pedals as well as just enjoying the moment. I mean, you're going to be cycling through truly some of the most beautiful and on spiring terrain you will find anywhere in this country. And it's, uh, it's important for us that you're not thinking about anything but, um, that event and your time on the bike and your experience there. So, you know, we'll have incredibly stocked well-stocked aid stations. We have a very large medical team and mechanic team that we'll be rolling on motorbikes and a and four by four rigs along the course to make sure that anybody that has an issue is taken care of. And basically we just want you to focus on the ride, will take care of everything else, breakfast, lunch, dinner, uh, your, your, if you've got a bike issue we can fix it for you and, and just literally lets you experience in the moment this, uh, this tremendous, uh, adventure. Yeah. Now as you mentioned earlier, prior to recording, there's just something really special about finishing the day at a camp site. Having a communal meal with everybody, gives you a great opportunity to meet people from all over the country or all over the world and just share war stories from the day. It really is. And you know, it the thing that really fits well and I think that's why these of the, you know, the, the five day event is going to be something that I really think in a couple of years could, could take off and be very, very large is this is from my experience. Um, you know, years of experience working with gravel writers, they, they're a different mentality than what you would see on a mountain bike. Um, but especially what you'd see on a, on a road bike. You know, coming from a road background, it was all about the competition. You know, you didn't, you didn't lift your head, you didn't look around. You are watching your watch, you're watching your, your heart rate. You are, you are attacking you or you know, you, you, it was all about the race of travel. Writers are a fee for the most part are a very wide demographic. We have folks coming in that are truly just wanting to finish the day and have a great ride with their friends, have a beer and a barbecue afterwards. And then we have those, there are literally some of the top pros in the country that are there to race it in and, and have a great time. But even I've noticed that the folks that come from road backgrounds, they, it's almost like they just take a deep breath and they just like, we're just out here to have a great time and have fun. There's not the pressure that you see on the, on the roadside for placings and competition and sprinting and that kind of stuff. And so that's something that's been a huge joy for my crew and I in, in operating this is it just more of a, a fun and party type atmosphere? There's definitely some competition involved. Um, but, but it, it, it brings in such a wide demographic and wide range of people and, and, and they're all there to just have a wonderful time and experience. Yeah, I think you're right. I mean, obviously it plays out in the one day environment, but in the multiday environment when the pro athletes or camping just alongside everybody else even further enhances that opportunity to grab a beer or have a meal with a pro athlete that you were no where near during the day, but you all went through the same terrain. You did the river crossings, you hopped over down trees, whatever was in front of you, you did together and you had that shared experience. I think it's a, it's a huge opportunity on the multiday front. Absolutely. Absolutely. And you know, you see these, uh, these pro athletes, first off, the pro athletes we have coming are all just, they're just class a people. They're just great, wonderful personalities. They're great people. Um, and you know, you look on the, on the roadside or even to some extent the mountain bike side, when they're done with their thing and they're, they're, they're, they're finding their, their, uh, um, team manager and support staff and they're holed up in their team tent and then they all jump in their van and they go back to the hotel. We're here. There's all, there's going to be a tremendous access to these athletes who are going to be out there enjoying those games and fun with everybody else. It's going to be everybody together in this community type atmosphere for five days. And I, I think that's what I really enjoy, probably almost the most on this, on the side from the beautiful scenery that we get to work in. Is it just the fact that we're, we're one community moving through these five days together and tackling these challenges and meeting up every night in camp to swap those stories that you talked about and uh, and, and, or even strategize for the next day. Hey, we're kind of tires, are you using, what's your plan? You know, where do you think you're going to go hard? And the one thing I do need to make sure that everybody, anybody that's considering this a realizes number one, we are there to support you. So if for some reason you're just having an off day and it is not in the cards for you, um, we have the support shuttles and crew to transport you, pick you up, off course transports you to the finish. And yes, you can start the next day. It's not like a road stage race where you're disqualified. You can start the next day. Now granted you're not in the, in the results and you're not in the competition. But just being able to ride these courses is in my mind, the biggest benefit of doing this event. So we have the support in place. And, and so if you have a, you know, somebody who's like, oh, five days, I'm not sure I can do it. Well, you know what, if you can't make it one day, we'll get you shuttled to the finish or get you fed, we'll get you arrested and you can take a crack at the next day and, uh, and, and, and continue to finish your journey along the way. And so, so that's, that's the other element that I really am kind of enjoying on this is that there's, there's that pressure of I've got to, I got to finish, I got to finish in this time where I'll be cut is not there because it's a big investment for folks for time and money to come in and do this. But you know, we want to make sure that they go feeling that they got every dime was well worth it. Um, they spend it every minute and planning the logistics to get here was well worth it. Yeah. I think that's one of the interesting things about this format. And as you mentioned earlier, the mountain bike world has had a history of these events to kind of have set the stage. I do think it's this huge opportunity because many athletes, you know, whether regardless of where they are in the country, look at Oregon and say, hey, that would be a great place to ride. And the fact that you guys have so meticulously chosen the roots and handled the logistics, you sign up for this for being a week long vacation and whatever that adventure may lead lead you to. Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. And you know, it's one of the, we're fortunate where we're located in the courses that we were able to develop and I can't stress to people enough how deep into the forest and how remote these roads are. When we were scouting this, uh, these courses last year, we went out the exact same week. We're planning on running the event this year and drove him off. We wanted to see things like snow pack. Uh, we wanted to see what, uh, with the bug factor was what if, see what the road conditions work. Most importantly, we wanted to see what the traffic load was on these particular roads. We had no idea. And, um, and I know some people think, I probably exaggerate this, but this is, this is absolutely the truth in a, we, it took us two full days in the truck driving 12 hours per day. So 24 hours of driving to cover all 350 miles of the course because it might pickup truck. There's a lot of times where I'm not going a lot faster than what the cyclists would be as I'm going in negotiating these super windy gravel roads and whatnot. And when we did that entire scouting over the course of 24 hours in two days time, we literally passed a total of six vehicles on the roads out there. Of those six vehicles, three of them were forest service rigs. And it's just so it's one of those things, it's very, very unique. You know, you in a world that's so busy and so congested, there are very few areas where you can truly, uh, get lost or get out there where you're like, I mean it was to the point where you're out there driving and you're writing and you see another vehicle and you're almost excited cause you're like, wow, somebody else's actually out here. You know, I wonder what they're doing, wonder where they're going kind of thing. Cause it's such an anomaly and unique experience. But for the cyclist, it makes it so that they're not having to concentrate on anything but the scenery and the beautiful roads and they don't have to worry about just constant traffic coming yet coming their way. Yeah. So great from a writer's perspective to be able to go to a course that was designed by someone who was super passionate about their area and really just excited to expose the rider to something new and unexpected. Absolutely. Absolutely. And I really feel that, that confidence that this is this, this ride has something for everybody. And that's, I guess that's the other thing that I really enjoy about the gravel sector is, um, and I think, I think this is exactly what cycling needed is as we see a fairly hefty decline on, on the road side of things, especially the competitive road, um, in other areas of cycling. Um, I, I, I see, I see gravel for lack of a better term, um, almost kind of being the half marathon, 10 k of the cycling world. And what I mean by that and we, our company, half of our events are cycling events. We also own and operate a number of marathons, half marathons, running events as well. We try to be fairly diversified in our portfolio. But it's one of those things where again, you'll see everything from some of the fastest providers in the country down to people that are just literally wanting to finish their total weekend warriors. They've got a, they've got, you know, responsibilities and families and kids and, and things like that. And that's the beauty of it is, is that it's such a diverse, um, group of people that come out to enjoy this. And I honestly think that that's what the sport of cycling needs is that diversity and that experience from a wide demographic. Cause that's, that's where you get the numbers and that's where you get the most interest from. The general population is feeding it through that. And maybe gravel is the gateway to, you know, things like mountain biking or to road or something else as they venture out into some, some other disciplines and so forth. But we're just seeing such a cool movement in gravel right now. And I, I expect to see it continue to build and grow for years to come just because of the, the nature of being able to find quiet, um, venues where there's not just cars whizzing by you at 55, 60 miles an hour left and right all day or all through your rides. Yeah. One word in your comments that just jumped out at me. It was experience. And I think that's the hallmark of a great event, is that it's just this amazing experience from soup to nuts. And that may be something that's lacking in traditional road racing, right? If you get chucked off the back, it's just simply not fun. It's not all inspiring, but it doesn't typically matter where you are at the front end of the spear or the back and a gravel grinder because the experience is there for everybody. Absolutely. Absolutely. And that is, you can't lose on these things. I mean, typically, typically fine with the gravel that you're there with a friend or you end up joining up with some buddies and you're not trying to drop them. You're, you're literally, you know, if you're not competitive, you're, you're towards the back of the field of the pack. You're finding other folks the ride and you're experiencing this together. You're not, you're not, you know, writing and then trying to drop the guy next to you just as quickly as you can and, and so it makes it fun. It makes it fun no matter what's going on, whether you're in the points competition or, or results or you're just trying to finish that day. There's something for everybody. And that, uh, that community and camaraderie, you know, that extends, extends not just each night, but then all the way through the ride as well. Yeah. I feel like there's something, there's a phenomenon in mountain biking where you're riding with your friends and you'd do a section that's so much fun. You stop at the bottom and you just wait for everybody to give high fives and have a good laugh. And that may not be present in road athletes' lives. They may not have sort of really been familiar with something like that. And with gravel, I think there's a component of that as well. It's like, holy crap, I can't believe we just navigated that section and we all survived. You got a big smile on your face, you regroup and then you, you cruise along together as the terrain permits. Yeah, absolutely. And I even see, you know, I never, the folks that aren't really in it for the race components are in it more for the adventure. There are so many crazy beautiful, uh, pullouts in vistas along the way. I'm, I'm talking here, you'll be riding through the forest, like the Willamette national forest on the west side of the cascades. You'll come around some quarter and all, it'll be open. And all of a sudden, like, there's the three sisters mountains, like, Eh, they're so close. You literally think you can reach out and touch them. I mean, they're right there. And so there's, there's so many elements like that where you just, you're so much more aware of your, of your surroundings and, and, uh, and uh, and the beauty of the scenery that you, it's encompassing around you that, that people are just gonna be blown away. And I, again, it's just some of these roads. I, I just scratch my head that they, that, you know, back in the fifties and sixties, I guess that was kind of when lumber was king, even in the resources that they had to, to build these roads. I can remember on one particular scouting trip between two communities, um, Mckinsey and Oakridge, I've been driving for about three hours scouting and I'm thinking I've, I, I'd left Mckinsey that morning and uh, it was, was headed to Oak Ridge after about three hours of like, I've gotta be getting close to Oakridge. And I'd been on, I had not seen a soul out there for three hours, not a single car, none them are gravel roads that I come crest up over this ridge and come into a four way intersection. And it was one of the few times where there's actually a legitimate sign. They're showing, you know, directions and mileage to different points. And it said, uh, 35 miles back to Mckinsey, which I had just come and I still have 30 miles to go to get to Oak Ridge. And I'm like, where in the world am I? You know, I mean there's 30 plus miles to the nearest paved road or, or any kind of civilization is it just, it just boggles the mind that there are still areas out there that are that under undeveloped and just, uh, just wild and beautiful. Yeah. Well, I am really excited for this event. I'm really appreciative that you've put it together. I think it's going to be a great sort of landmark event for others to copy in different parts of the country. I encourage everybody to go to the website and check out the both the terrain, the video, the elevation gain and loss. This is going to be a massive adventure that is going to be something that you talk about for years to come. So Chad, thanks for telling us all about the event. I hope it's a great success and I can't wait to get up there again one of these days. Sounds good. Great. Thank you very much for the time this morning.

Chad Doty has 12 years of experience as a multifamily investor, but he wasn’t born with realestate in his blood. Originally, Chad was a management consultant for Arthur Andersen. Watching that company meltdown prior to him making partner made him realize that letting outside circumstances control his life wasn’t for him. So Chad then founded his own consulting company, only to realize he was simply trading time for money. Determined to control his own destiny, Chad decided to leverage commercial multifamily real estate to develop recurring, passive income. He formed 37th Parallel Properties, a private real estate acquisitions and asset management firm.   Podcast Highlights Who is Chad Doty? Chad was very driven as a kid, mainly due to his military father. He had aspirations to get into the Navy but because of a variety of reasons he wasn’t able to join. He decided to go into school and try to find something that he was really going to enjoy, he ended up becoming a network engineer and being very disappointed. He went back to school to get his MBA, found himself working for Anderson as a consultant and moving up through the ranks there. When you can answer the question of who you are a hero to, you will be playing an entirely different game from everyone else. Based on his DISC profile, Chad is a defined D and that heavily determines how he works and how he interacts with people on his team. What was it like to make such a drastic change? Chad didn’t really get the entrepreneurial bug until his mid 30’s. Most people can imagine what their perfect day looks like, but most people can’t imagine what a perfect month looks like. When Chad’s wife became pregnant that lit a fire underneath to make sure that when his child was born that he wouldn’t be an absent father. He was in the position to shift to his own client base and consultancy and in the following months made the move. When you go to do something different, a very powerful question you should ask yourself is “what is the worst that is going to happen?” You are 100% responsible for the results in your life, at least in how you respond to the events that occur. The Right Business Real estate wasn’t the first business that Chad attempted to get off the ground, he initially thought he didn’t like it. He started trading the market but felt that there were better ways to use the same engine and real estate fits the bill. People are always going to want a roof over their head so it passes the evergreen test. You can determine all things the affect you as an owner and if you focus on the fundamentals you can find success in real estate. Multifamily is going to be here for the foreseeable future, demographics basically ensure it’s a solid investment. What kind of market do you operate in? Chad uses a concept called your MAC profile, it stands for Market, Approach, and Capability. There are a million ways to make money in real estate but for Chad, he knew the approach they wanted to go with being long term holders of cash producing assets. They will hold the asset for as long as it performs at or above the market and the market hasn’t changed. When you get into real estate, you have to think about what kind of investor you want to be. The market has to match the approach and capability you bring to the table. People don’t pick properties to live at, they pick where the best part of town they can live based on job, school, and entertainment. There is no secret market for Chad, the markets they operate in just have the fundamentals that make them attractive. Syndication Chad hears two things that he refers to as real estate mythology. The first one is that a building can be a deal at som

If you're about to make, or have just made, any indie movie in the digital space, Chad Miller is the guy you want to know. He is currently the founder of Cinema Machine Management, which consults filmmakers on distribution and marketing. He's been doing this for 15 years. After coming out of UTA's (United Talent Management) famed story department, he jumped into the digital world before most of us (me included) knew what digital was or took it seriously. He was part of several companies from iN Demand to AT&T U-Verse TV to Gravitas Ventures, where he developed, curated, acquired, marketed, and distributed hundreds of digital movies (features and docs). So Chad had a foothold on where we are today over a decade before most of us realized it.  Chad is a thoughtful, precise, and articulate guy. This isn't the podcast to laugh your ass of, but it's the one to get more detailed info on the indie digital space and gain a connection to someone who could help you. He even tells you how to get ahold of him directly :) ***** PLEASE ENGAGE AND SUBSCRIBE Follow and like us on Facebook or Instagram You can also access all of the different apps and platforms this podcast plays on (9 in all) here: Official Podcast Page Terence Michael's book "PRODUCE YOURSELF: Apply Hollywood's Proven Formula To Become The Hero Of Your Life" is available everywhere. And PLEASE SUBSCRIBE on iTunes/Apple Podcasts so we know you like the show and want to hear more episodes. ***** SHOW DESCRIPTION: What began as a humorous analysis of just behind the scenes TV and film production (originally with co-host, director/producer and comedian Ian Gelfand), has now grown into an observation of The Hero’s Journey taken by professionals working in all aspects of Hollywood. The focus is on obstacles, side-hustles, approach, process, optimization and seeking peak performance both on set and off. This podcast is about learning to “Produce Yourself” in many areas of life, by hearing from people who have fought to get where they are in movies and television. ABOUT THE HOST: Emmy-nominated producer, Terence Michael, has produced over 20 movies and 30 TV shows (Duck Dynasty). He additionally hosts 2 podcasts about the entertainment industry. In his spare time, he invests in real estate, runs a mortgage business, and consults entrepreneurs on how to monetize their passions and be happy in the process. Terence has been developing, producing, and delivering story content, from film to television, over the course of ownership in three separate production companies covering most of the major studios, networks, and agencies in "Hollywood." He has now produced feature films distributed by studios such as Sony, Universal, MGM, Lionsgate, and HBO; and executive produced television shows airing on networks such as NBC, Fox, MTV, VH1, Showtime, Lifetime, TLC, Spike, Esquire, Syfy, Travel Channel, and A&E. Terence enjoys both developing and producing intellectual properties and formats for 100% Terry Cloth as well as show running other existing network or cable shows. Additionally, he has guest lectured and consulted on development, financing, story, packaging, and nuts-and-bolts producing panels for the Cannes Film Festival, the Los Angeles Film Festival, Independent Film Project West (IFP), Film ITConference, the SXSW Film Festival, AFI, and UCLA Film Extension; has been featured in magazines and publications, such as The Los Angeles Times, MovieMaker, Moving Pictures, Back Stage West, Independent Film and Video, Screenwriters Utopia, Writers Script Network, Venice Magazine, Newsweek, Details, The Christian Science Monitor, FitSmallBusiness.com, MyCorporation.com, Business.com, MagnifyMoney.com, and The PennyHoarder.com. He received an Emmy nomination in 2017 for Travel Channel's "Planet Primetime." Terence Michael has collaborated with many artists and brands in his films and TV shows, including: Actors: Scarlett Johansson, Ben Stiller, Sarah Jessica Parker, Vera Farmiga, Jeffrey Tambor, Tea Leoni, Tom Sizemore, Katherine Heigl, Peter Dinklage, Giovanni Ribisi, Cuba Gooding, Jr., Patrick Dempsey, Jaime Pressly, Mia Kirshner, Michael McKean, Britt Robertson, Oliver Hudson, Emmanuelle Chriqui, Jonathan Tucker, Nora Dunn, Skeet Ulrich, Cheryl Ladd, Alan King, Elizabeth Reaser, Megan Mullaly, Jennifer Morrison, Erin Bartlett, Jesse Bradford, Adam Goldberg, David Krumholtz, James Tupper, Jill Clayburgh, Eric Szmanda, Eric Mabius, Eric Schaeffer, and lates Alan King, Jill Clayburgh, John Heard Comedians: Adam Carolla, Tom Green, Chris Hardwick, Flula Borg, Ken Marino, Alonzo Bodden Athletes: Football’s Vince Papale, basketball’s Rick Barry, motocross’ James Stewart, Ryan Dungey, Todd Potter, and the Metal Mulisha team, skateboarding’s Tony Hawk, Buckey Lasek, Jason Ellis and snowboarding’s Shawn White, triathlete’s Wendy Ingraham and Chris Legh Musicians: Aimee, Mann, The Verve Pipe, Jill Sobule, Blink 182, Amanda Kravat, Foxy Brown, Usher, Vanessa Carlton Hosts/Authors: Amanda De Cadenet, Karla Cavalli, Allen Haff, Paul McKenna, Lisa Williams, Grant Imahara, Leeann Tweeden Brands: RedBull, Degree, Monster, Playboy, Jabbawockeez, The Golden Nugget, Joe’s Crab Shack, Oakley, the Duck Dynasty family        

Chad Doty has 12 years of experience as a multifamily investor, but he wasn’t born with real estate in his blood. Originally, Chad was a management consultant for Arthur Andersen. Watching that company meltdown prior to him making partner made him realize that letting outside circumstances control his life wasn’t for him.   So Chad then founded his own consulting company, only to realize he was simply trading time for money. Determined to control his own destiny, Chad decided to leverage commercial multifamily real estate to develop recurring, passive income. He formed 37th Parallel Properties, a private real estate acquisitions and asset management rm. As the CEO of 37th Parallel Properties, Chad specializes in syndicating multifamily investments. His offerings allow investors access and opportunities to generate stable streams of tax-advantaged passive income and equity growth without needing to manage the property themselves.   Through this approach, Chad helps investors get access to tax-advantaged apartment investments that can produce income and equity growth that have historically retained their value through economic downturns and nationally cycles. Chad is a proven multifamily veteran with over 12 years of investing experience, another 10 years of management consulting experience, and $325 million dollars in real estate transactions.   On today’s episode, we talk with Chad about his story of growing up with his family and how working with his father taught him the importance of work ethic at an early age. Chad’s father gave him the book Think & Grow Rich at the age of 18 and Chad started to listening to inspiring and motivational speakers including Les Brown. Chad knew he wasn’t an entrepreneur but he did have a desire to learn and improve his life for himself and his family.   Chad talks about how he had a burning desire for more freedom and control after working in corporate after college. You’ll learn what inspired Chad to get into real estate and the purpose behind choosing multifamily as a the primary asset class for his investing.   We also talk about advice for any professionals who are currently investing in their 401K and what might be a good mix for investing to achieve financial freedom for you and your family. Chad shares with us the number # 1 reason his primary focus is multifamily (earning twice the money with half the time).   We breakdown the the biggest difference between investing in residential vs. commercial real estate properties and how Chad’s biggest failure set up him up for success. Lastly, we wrap up the episode discussing the benefits of investing in multifamily apartment buildings and how to handle downturns in the real estate investment market.   Key Points From This Episode: The story about Chad’s wife telling him she was pregnant with their son switched his mindset to focus on gaining more time, freedom, money, control and be there for his son Chad shares he didn’t grow up in real estate but rather picked it as a business analyst. He found that it had the best features that he wanted to build a wealth and get scale from people and time. After doing further research on real estate investing, he decided that multifamily was best real estate asset class. Amazing advice for any professionals who are currently investing in their 401K and how they should go about investing How you can decide what is a good mix when starting out in investing or should you focus on what investments are given to you as a default Chad shares how his failures as an entrepreneur later set him up for success The differences between residential vs. commercial real estate investing (trends, markets, etc.) The # 2 life-changing things Chad implemented to improved his business (the theory of constraint and shifting your business to scale from how and what vs. why and who Breakdown of

Chad Oakley is the CEO of Charles Aris, an executive search firm based in North Carolina. One of the firm’s practice areas is Strategy & Corporate Development – and they’ve completed nearly 600 searches in that space. Charles Aris publishes an annual strategy consulting compensation study which is available free on their website. So Chad is one of the most knowledgeable people in the U.S. about the market demand for alums of McKinsey, Bain, BCG, and other top consulting firms. In this episode, Chad shares a perspective on how a stint of independent consulting on your resume can affect your job prospects if you plan to return to a full time role at some point. We also discuss, among other topics, resumes, LinkedIn profiles, and how to reach out to executive recruiters. You can learn more about Charles Aris by visiting the website, https://charlesaris.com/, and if you are open to new opportunities, you can send them your resume.

What's the deal with the Devil?  We touched on that a little this past Sunday, but we want to get a little bigger of a look. So Chad sits down with JR Forasteros, a pastor at Catalyst Rowlett in Dallas. He is the author of Empathy for the Devil, a fantastic look at the motivation behind antagonists in scripture.  So we dig into the Biblical identity for the Devil/Satan, what a timeline for his fall from grace, and how that changes the way we interact with Jesus.  LINKS - Chapters from Empathy outcuts on Matthew 4:1-11 part 1, and part 2.   

Hosts Chad Ryan, Mark Phillips, and guest third-wheel Robbie Duncan are your pilots today on another episode of the Redskins Capital Connection podcast! On today's show we're going to be starting our pre-training camp series of positional reviews, where we look at the current lineup of players across all the different positions, talk about who are stone-cold locks to make the roster, who has to fight for a spot, who is exciting us and intriguing us, and other bits and pieces of info. This week we're kicking the series off by looking at the Defensive Backs and Linebackers, which makes for a great and insightful chat. Also on this week's show, we learned last week that good friend of the show and just all around absolute champion Liz Clarke from the Washington Post is transitioning off of the Redskins beat and covering other sports for the Post now. So Chad took it upon himself to conduct her Redskins Beat Exit Interview. It's all a bit silly but we think it was a lot of fun and it really gave Liz a great chance to reflect upon her time on the beat in a unique way, and is a great lens upon which to look at this organisation through. Thanks as always for tuning in!

In this episode, two of us undertand the concept of group text messages and one of us couldn't be bothered to show up.  So Chad and I soldier on and give an in depth look at the upcoming movie season, building up to the latest Star Wars.  Plus, we talk far more baseball and football than would ever be allowed if Scott where here.  For two folks, we talked a long time.

It's the calm before the storm of DLC, games, Kickstarters, and E3 occupies our collective headspaces, preventing us from functioning as productive members of society. So Chad and Hyle do the most productive thing they can think of, and clear out the call log before digging into the latest from the Wii U's Virtual Console, and everything to expect from Nintendo, Team Dakota, Playtonic, and Rare in the next two months. It's a packed one, folks.

It's 2014 folks! So Chad and Mark take a break from current issue reviews and talk MOVIES! What are we looking forward to? What could we give "three pounds of monkey crap" about? All of this plus Doctor Who, classic rock and 80's cartoons! Listen in! Please visit our site at http://www.LanternCast.com

While Ben is on a dream trip on the east coast, there's still baseball going on here. So Chad and Willie discuss the first 22 games of the year and what some of the notable happenings have been so far. 12-10