How One Guy Keeps Oilfield Companies From Going Broke
0:00 All right, welcome back to Energy 101. Today we have Phil Reed all the way from Michigan. What's up? What's going on, man? If I switch to the wide shot here, you can see Julie missed a memo.
0:11 It is, you know, the attire. Oh, I did. And your mustache, you're missing a mustache. What are you doing? Well, good thing I got that taken care of. OK. OK. Very good. So today's episode,
0:26 I'm kind of hope goes in a different direction We had a lot of success with Chad Frazier. We talked a lot about just like culture and vibes. I don't know what a way to put it. We went into like
0:36 culture and not exactly like learning about one specific thing. And I think Phil can help us out with a little second taste of that, maybe talking about Michigan compared to Texas, talking about
0:48 kind of what you do in general and get into some - you said you have a lot of stories. So to get into it, I guess you have entrepreneurship uh. in the oil and gas field. You do like oil field
1:03 service. That's a word I hear a lot. It sounds like a broad term. Maybe break down what you do on a daily basis. Sure. Your LinkedIn tag is OFS Finance Guy. Yeah, OFS Finance Guy. I change it
1:14 like every week to OFS Lending Guy, OFS Finance Guy, Blue Collar Finance Guy. It's one of the other, you know. But no, so what I do specifically is I work with OFS companies and I help them with
1:24 their financing. So if they need like invoice factoring or something like that, I take the look of their package So I collect their P and L's, their AR aging, their AP aging, everything. And I
1:33 look at the overall view. Like I take a very bird's eye view, I see, okay, is this what you really need for one? Like, 'cause a lot of companies think they need factoring, maybe they actually
1:43 need collection work because their AR is just that old. So if it's that old, then I'll say, okay, you need to talk to how Wallace or something like that. Who's the go-to collection guy? But if
1:53 they're in that phase where they're really just having a ton of MSA work, they have guys out, and they just have a huge cash flow burden, like tons of equipment, tons of fuel, insurance, payroll,
2:05 everything, then what I can do is get a cash flow engine, such as invoice factoring. And I set them up with the right funding company 'cause there's like a thousand different invoice factoring
2:14 companies and funding companies out there. Most of them are predatorial. They say they're very good. Obviously they're gonna, they're looking out for themselves. And so my job for the OFS sector
2:24 is to make sure they're with the right funding company for their need And that goes from like 500, 000 a month up to, you know, five, 10 million a month. It just depends on who I'm working with.
2:34 So that's what my day to day looks like. Did you start this out of frustration? Like you experienced AR issues? No, well, it is out of frustration, but it wasn't out of my own frustration with
2:46 AR. So I started in the industry years ago when I basically just graduated with a biology and chemistry degree. And there's a company out of Corpus Christi that promised me a job doing sales for
2:58 chemical. for refiners. So I met with them several times. It was connected to one of my, one of my in-laws and he said, Hey, come down here, you have a job. I met with them, they said, Come
3:08 down here, you have a job. And right out of college, it was like 150 a year. And coming from a small town kid with parents that were very middle class, that's bougie. You know, that's a big
3:17 change. And so right after I graduated, I got married, I had like, I don't know, 100 bucks to my name. So I moved down to Corpus, I met up with them again, I said, all right, let's go,
3:28 let's get this job going. And they said, sorry, you don't have a job. So I was strung out, I had no money at all. And so what I had to do is just basically shoot my resume out to the sun and
3:39 hope that some guy saw this poor sap kid and gave me a shot. And sure enough, after like six months of jumping around, my first job was actually doing remediation work. So I worked hurricane
3:52 Harvey and I was cleaning out like nursing homes and Walmarts and gyms and stuff like that, sucking water out, things like that. a difficult company to work with. So I didn't end up there. And
4:02 then I did solar sales for like three months and they were lecherous and evil and have a lot of the customers. I'm like, can't do this. How did you do this? There's a lot of scam. Oh man. Me,
4:12 behavior and solar, unfortunately. Hugely, hugely. And I saw through that shit like immediately. So I was like, I can't do this. And then a company called Riviera Finance reached out to me.
4:21 They said, hey, we need somebody that's young and ambitious to manage this San Antonio area And we want to see if this works. It was a new push for them. And so I took the San Antonio area. They
4:33 really were a trucking invoice factoring company. So invoice factoring is leveraging receivables again to do cash flow, basically. And so my job was to find customers. And so I worked up a
4:43 customer base in San Antonio. I didn't like working with trucking companies 'cause it's just small and messy and it's only like 50 grand a month per customer. Like that's what their gross revenue
4:52 was. It made me like 20 bucks a month per customer So I'm like, yeah, this is not for me. And so I trucked over to Midland. And basically what I was doing was I was staying in Midland like two,
5:03 three weeks out every month for about two years. And I built a network and then got into oil and gas. But what I realized as I was building my network is that I couldn't help everybody. Cause
5:14 Riviera Finance had a tiny little niche. And if someone reached out to me said, hey, we need help. I couldn't help them. And so I started a brokerage to be able to find them the right help that
5:24 they needed. So that's how it started. Okay. Awesome Awesome. How was your experience in Midland? Wait. First of all, where are you from? Small town. So I'm from Eau Claire, Michigan. Okay.
5:35 So you are originally from Michigan. So here's Michigan. Yeah. Yeah. Do you have a camera at the glove? We're. Okay. There's one camera. Do you have a camera? Okay. So I think, all right.
5:44 So we're on the opposite side of the thumb right there. Okay. But my stepfather's family basically immigrated to Michigan in 1800.
5:57 So they settled the area. They were on the first families out there. And then they got 160 acres in the Homestead Act, and then collected a bunch of more acreage. They kept the original 160. They
6:08 sold some off and they kept 120. And so that's where I grew up. Like in the middle of nowhere, farming town, that's all everyone did either. You were a farmer or you worked for a farmer. So.
6:19 And then you, where did you go to college? Grace College in seminary So that's a little private college down in Indiana. Biology and chemistry. And then that company from Corpus kind of is what
6:30 brought you to Texas original. Correct. Okay. Yep. And then you were in Houston for a bit. Did you live in Houston or were you flying back and forth? Flying back and forth. So yeah, I was in
6:39 San Antonio. I went to Houston all the time. I went to Midland all the time in Dallas all the time. So I was just traveling a lot. Yeah. Yeah. How was traveling? How was Midland? How was your
6:49 Midland experience? You know, my favorite, phrase that I've heard about Midland is that the best view that you have is in the rear view mirror on your way out of it,
6:59 which, I don't know, I like Midland because the people out there are just great and every time I went out there I felt very welcome and everyone's very friendly and very nice and everyone's kind of
7:11 working together except the people that aren't and they don't tend to last very long. So I love Midland. I love it. I wouldn't want to live out there necessarily and I admire the people that do
7:22 I feel like that's what everyone says for sure. Yeah. Let's get back into like what you actually do today I guess. Yeah, yeah. Use a lot of acronyms and a lot of big words in the beginning there.
7:31 Sure. You got to remember this is 101. We got a lot of people know. No, let's dummy it down. But I mean basically you're helping people get the project started by financing them, right? I think
7:41 let's start with the problem. Sure. So that OFS companies face and it's usually getting paid by the operators and just start Yeah. Yeah. So I mean, as y'all know, operators take a very long time
7:54 to get paid. And it's just what is it usually? What is there like terms normally? I mean, I'm seeing average about 45 now extended out to 60 and 90. Some people are out to 120, which I think is
8:06 insane, which can be the death of a startup. Right. You can't do it. Like, unless you have a rich uncle or something like that with very deep pockets, you can't do it. And so in my opinion, a
8:17 lot of these mergers and extension of net terms is really to weed out small companies because they want their buddies and they want strong infrastructure working on these projects. And small
8:27 companies don't have strong infrastructure. So if they can weed out the small guys without the cash and the infrastructure they're going to. And of course, they're holding on to the cash as long as
8:34 they can because they're basically using the service companies as their piggy bank. And so that's where invoice factoring comes in. So the way it works, basically, is if let's say they have a100,
8:45 000 invoice, Right. So they did100, 000 worth of work. They're not going to get paid on it for 60 days. Right. And then they have, they have 60 grand of payroll. They have their fuel, they
8:55 have their insurance, everything to pay in that 60 days. So they have a huge cash flow crunch over that time. So what we do is we validate the invoice, like if it's an Exxon or a G or a
9:07 Diamondback or an Oxy, whatever, we're good. They're gonna pay their bills. They might pay late, they might take a long time, but they're gonna pay their bills. So that's our credit. So if
9:15 we're working with a startup that doesn't have any credit, they've been in business three months, maybe even just a month. There's no credit there. We can't give them money, but we can leverage
9:25 the receivables because they're going to get paid. And so we look at the100, 000, we say, they're going to get paid. And then we say, okay, we can give you 90 of it. So we give you90, 000.
9:35 You use that to pay your people, your insurance, your payables, basically. And then we will get paid at the end of your net terms. So we either set up a bank account with their name on it as a
9:45 DACA or something like that. And a DACA is basically, like I said, a bank account with their name on it doesn't tick off the operator because some operators don't like invoice factoring. We don't
9:54 want to screw with the MSAs because that's a big problem in the industry. So they have that 90 to work with. We get paid at the end of the term. We're released to 10 minus a fee, which is
10:04 generally at 60 days, call it 3, something like that. So that's a dumb-down process. Why don't operators like factoring? So this all started with the OG. I can't remember what year it was, but
10:17 I think it was like 2017 or something like that. But they had a service company, and I might be misquoting this. So someone from the OG sees this, and they're like, That's not how it happened. I
10:26 apologize. This clip is about to go viral, whatever it says. Our best clips are the overconfident statements. So I'm not going to be overconfident. I'm not really following statement is true,
10:36 inaccurate, and you can yell at us in a conference. Please don't.
10:41 So there's a factor in between EOG and a client, so our vendor rather. The vendor was doing work for them. I believe there is a dispute. So there's a dispute on the invoice, EOG refused to pay it,
10:54 or they paid late. I can't remember which one it was exactly. Then the factoring company, which legally owned the receivables and had a signed notice of assignment, meaning the invoice was
11:04 assigned to the factoring company, not to the vendor, right? So there's a sign in OA, they didn't pay. Factor said, You're gonna pay us the money. EOG
11:15 said kick rocks, factor suit 'em, and the factor one And they won in excess, too. And at that point, EOG said, No more of this crap. We're not gonna let you do this anymore, so no more
11:24 factoring. And then Oxy followed suit, Diamondback followed suit, and a few others did, too. I don't blame them, I get it. Right, yeah. Factoring companies can be real pain in the butt.
11:34 Especially if you're disputing after the fact that it's already been in their hands, and then I feel like it's messy. Oh, it's usually messy. Yeah. So you don't do that, or you do do that. I
11:44 don't do what? Factoring. What do you mean?
11:48 You said that it's not factoring. They have their own bank account or something. So we do the DACA accounts, the in-between accounts, with those debtors that don't allow it. So we're respectful
11:60 of that. We don't want to take anybody off. We stay in our turf. We'll play the rules. We'll play the game by the right rules, you know? Yeah yeah,. That makes sense. Yeah, absolutely. But
12:10 if someone allows an NOA, we'll do it. Like if they don't care about factoring and they're fine signing it, then we'll do it. It's more security for us. Okay Yeah, speaking of security, like
12:19 you said, working with the majors, like you expect them to pay. Yeah. So is your goal to work with these big boys, or you try to like to help out the mom and pops, the small operators, and what
12:31 is the risk, the trust, all that? Yeah, so I work with the service companies. So in that can range. So I can work with a mom and pop service company with like one water truck, something like
12:41 that. Maybe they're doing100, 000 a month.
12:44 I would say my bread and butter customer is doing between a million and five million a month. Like there's one gentleman I'm working on right now that has about 50 million in revenue. And he's just
12:56 in a pickle because he had his mid-stream work slow down. And he lost some bids, which is happening a lot right now. In mid-stream for some reason right now, there's just a lot of underbidders.
13:07 Like for example, he had an18 million bid, just get totally knocked out from under him by a10 million bidder, even though his hard costs were14 million. So someone is coming in and underbidding,
13:19 and then the mid-stream companies are accepting those bids, and then the more established companies are not getting those bids. Weird. Yeah, and so his payables got behind because he missed some
13:29 bids. I feel like there's a conspiracy theory there. I
13:34 mean, we could get into politics, and hiring undeserved labor at a very cheap cost, but I mean, it's all speculation. It could just be a really dumb, small company that's like, I want to win
13:45 the business, take a loss, and then hope I get the next one and get enough profit. Right. There's a lot of things that could be at play. Yeah, yeah. But no, I'm all over the place. So I like
13:54 working with the more established companies that are a million to five per month, like 50-ish million per year, but I'm happy helping out the mom and pops. Yeah.
14:04 Yeah. And are they mostly based, you said in Texas, so mostly based in the Permian, or are they kind of all over still in that San Antonio area? So I work with a lot of them out of the Permian.
14:15 I work with a lot of people out in Dallas, out of Houston as well, so I think it's really all over the place. A lot of the more established companies base their operations in Dallas or Houston,
14:24 and then they do a lot of work out in the Permian. Right. So it just depends. So are you still traveling to Texas a lot? Oh yeah. Yeah. Yeah, I love coming to Texas. I like living in the
14:33 boonies, but I like traveling to Texas. Yeah. Yeah So, if you're working virtually, basically. In a sense. So like you ever do, you ever visit the patch? You ever visit like any kind of sites
14:47 or you mostly in the AC? I'm mostly in the AC. Yeah. Like I would love to visit the patch more. I haven't done that. A video series that I would love to do is take my finance butt out in the
14:58 patch and have me do some work. Oh my gosh, I want to do that too. Right. Yes. Yeah, it'd be so much fun. Yeah. Absolutely, it'd be so much fun. And I would throw out my back every time
15:06 'cause I have a really bad back. People laugh at me 'cause they're like, Look at this pencil neck finance boy out in the patch. And all these big boy tattoos are like, Oh, you know. I always say,
15:15 I wouldn't have just be like, I wouldn't be a rough neck for a day, that's it. Like one day. Just one day. Yeah, that's fine, yeah. Yeah, those guys are tough, man. I know. They were so
15:23 tough. I could not do it, like. I think I can do it, that's why I wanna do it. Right. Someone make it happen. Yeah, yeah. So what are some things in the industry that are just, you know,
15:34 your biggest pain points, or your nightmares, any stories that you deal with,
15:40 big numbers, seven digit, eight digit numbers, like how ugly can it get? I mean, you'd be surprised at how many midsize companies like that are just terrible under the hood. They don't put it
15:54 out there. Like the entrepreneurs, they don't put it out there. They all posture and puff their chests out and pretend everything is okay, which I understand. You have to do that. You have to
16:02 pretend it's okay and keep pushing forward. But it's really tough right now A lot of people are very over-leveraged and a lot of people are getting receivables that are going very far out, which is
16:14 crushing their payables, and so they have vendor payments that are far past due. They have loans that they've taken to cover those vendor payments very quietly. Almost every company I talk to has
16:24 taken what's called an MCA, which is a merchant cash advance, which is basically a loan shark payday loan, and this New York-based industry preys upon oil and gas, because they see the high
16:36 margins and they think, Okay, we can make our money back Ultimately what it does is. just crushes companies, because the APR is legitimately like 50, like it's terrible. So I would say that's
16:47 the biggest thing is just, it's a financial mess right now. And most people don't see that from the small sector. They see the, they see what's going on. They think, okay, everything is okay,
16:57 but it's really not. So my role is to, is to really help under the hood and get them with better sets of capital, if that makes sense So like what are some red flags you have, like maybe when you
17:09 start a new project or get queried to start, you know, like with your, with your experience, we were talking before, like, you know, all the work you've done, like you got to be pretty, you
17:21 know, ready to go and bullshit meters got to be on, right? Oh, dude
17:27 So I have now encountered probably three or four. I'm certain of it mob backed or cartel backed fraud deals. Right. Yeah, it's crazy. You kind of come to realize when someone is hugely full of
17:46 shit after you've been doing this for a long time. And the constant posturing and basically saying, hey, I have these giant numbers, blah, blah, blah, like rapid fire praises to self
18:00 manipulation tactics like stonewalling or attacking you when you're trying to ask a question or flipping out for small things, which is basically just a way to manipulate you away from the actual
18:13 problem. You learn to spot these things because nine times out of 10, if someone's doing that in a company ownership position, there's fraud under the hood. Like there's either fraud or a giant
18:22 mess where there shouldn't be a mess. And I just don't touch it anymore. If there's if there's bullshit, I'm not going to touch it So there are red flags. A lot of them. It's good advice. Yeah.
18:34 Let's kind of get into the Michigan side of things. Yeah. Because You're an oil and gas, but you're all the way up there. Yeah. I mean, there's basins up there, I don't - Did you know anything
18:45 about oil and gas before you
18:49 kind of came - I put gas in my car.
18:52 I think I drank gas as a kid.
18:56 It probably explains a lot. You basically came in blind. Pretty much. Yeah, and like - I didn't even know what was going on. So going into that first job where you had to go to Midland. Yeah.
19:07 Like, what was a culture shock like? Was it crazy or was it kind of similar to where you're from? So I'm gonna send you a picture that maybe you can throw up on the screen. Oh yeah, throw it up
19:15 right now. Yeah, so there it is, right there. Everyone's looking at it. Everyone's looking at it. So my first meeting was with this guy named Michael Merritt down in Dilly. So I had somehow
19:27 attracted this guy. I think he called the office or something in the office and said, Hey, call this guy Michael. He has an oil and gas company. And he did gate guards, pumpers, and something
19:37 else. And so I hiked my, I hiked my ass down to Dilly and I was wearing like these black slacks, black shoes and a button up shirt in this, in the middle of nowhere in Dilly in this old little
19:51 restaurant. And this, this, this old boy Michael came in with these dirty jeans and boots. Dilly in Texas? Yeah, it's down in South Texas. Okay, okay. Yeah, it's down to the, he was doing
20:01 work in the Eagleford. Okay, okay. Yeah, he's, and so I was sitting there with him. He's like, what are you wearing?
20:09 I don't want to talk to you when you look like this. I'm not even kidding. He's like - Wait, he said that to you? He said that to me. What were you wearing? I was wearing the black, like the
20:17 black slacks. Oh. The black slacks and like - He's like a new chain. A white button there. He's like a finance guy. Yeah, I look like a finance guy. I'm like a narc. Right, exactly. Yeah,
20:27 and he flat out told me, he's like, you ain't gonna get business if you dress like this boy.
20:35 Oh my gosh. And so, yeah, he and I actually became pretty good friends over the years. He was adopted into the merit company or merit oil family. So that's his dad is like the heir of that,
20:48 whatever. And really cool guy, but he was my first oil and gas customer, became a very good friend of mine. He's about my age is like 30 or something like that. And he got me into the industry.
20:59 And he also steered me very quickly away from like the suit and tie stuff I hated that crap anyway. Like being from a small town, like rural community, blue collar, that's not who I was. But my
21:10 boss from Florida, he was always like, yeah, you gotta wear slacks. You always have to wear a jacket. And you always have to wear a white button down. And if you're not, they're not gonna take
21:19 you seriously. I'm like, yeah, screw you up. My dearest is, yeah, like 1954 or something like that, you know? Anyway, that's how I got into it. So then after that, I just really liked the
21:30 guy. Like he really reminded me of all my farmer friends up north, just very blue collar, very down to earth. No BS at all, telling you what it is. Like, hey, you can't wear that. No one's
21:40 gonna take you seriously. You can't wear that. And he wasn't being mean. He was actually being really nice to me. Yeah, 'cause he liked me. He's like, I wouldn't have done business with you if
21:49 I didn't like you. You looked like an idiot though. He got it in though. Right, you gotta change And so, yeah, God bless Michael. But yeah, no, then I just started going out to West Texas a
21:60 lot in South Texas and rest his history there. Yeah, I was gonna say it was it kind of hard to figure out like how to network, where to network, what town to go to, like all of that was kind of -
22:13 I mean, yes and no, I took the insane attitude of a relentless entrepreneur that was stuck in a sales role and I just knocked on every single door that I could. like legitimately, whenever I was
22:27 in any single city, I would knock on every single service company door and be like, hey, what's up? Here I am. And a lot of the times they'd be like, get out. Right. And then I add them on
22:39 LinkedIn and then I throw up content of like, hey, this is who I am. And eventually they're like, oh, this guy's kind of cool. Yeah. And then they call me, you know, so it took a long time.
22:48 Right. It took a long time. When did you start creating LinkedIn content? Immediately. What year was
22:53 this? That was seven years ago So whatever that was, 2017, 18, something like that, so. No one was really creating content then. No, and I'm a writer. Like I've always been a writer. I'm
23:05 very creative. I'm a musician. I play like seven or eight different instruments. I sing whatever, I create stuff. And I had never created like corporate content. And so all it really was was me
23:16 just taking my day and downloading it into my brain and saying, Okay, this is what my day was I'm going to put this on paper. in a way that's interesting to read that is actually meaningful to
23:28 people. This is real life. And so I just started doing that and posting, and posting, and posting, and posting, and adding as many people as I could. And I think I have like 20, 000 followers
23:39 now. You do, I just checked. Yeah, just, it's blown up, it's been incredible. That's like actual good content advice. And like, that's not even like LinkedIn, that's just like content
23:50 growing online in general. Yeah, you just gotta do it Yeah, absolutely. Didn't expect to turn down the shroud. Well, I kinda like this because I feel like a lot of people that listen to Energy
24:01 101 are people in, let's say, non-technical roles, when I say non-technical, I mean like they're not an engineer, they're more marketing, or then they're just getting into the industry and
24:14 they're like, I have no idea where to start. Like, or even where do I learn about the industry if I am interested in getting into it? So I think it's really interesting you came from Michigan and
24:23 you were able to like. find your way into these little like all the towns and South Texas or tiny little towns. Like getting the biggest one is like Victoria. Right, yeah. And then you have
24:34 Midland and it's just like it's hard to get in there
24:40 unless you're like really hungry like you're saying and treating it as an entrepreneur and that go getter like spirit. And you have to make friends. Like that's so deep to it 'cause if you don't
24:51 have friends and allies and people that like you, you're not gonna go anywhere. So I know a lot of people come into the industry they're just like, we wanna make money. But I mean, the money is
24:60 secondary to the relationship. And so if you're not out there building friendships, building relationships, showing people you're genuine and you care about them, you're not gonna go anywhere.
25:09 And that's the attitude I took from day one where I just wanted to build friendships. Yeah, yeah, it comes in layers. You absolutely have to build, you have to be willing to kind of sacrifice
25:18 yourself for a little bit in terms of monetary-wise Yeah.
25:24 and just kind of grind it out, figure out those friendships, those relationships, those connections, and then later down the road, it'll come to fruition. Right, and everything builds on top of
25:34 each other too. 'Cause you have these layers of friendships, maybe an auxiliary customer, like someone sends you business. Okay, well that's one, then there's a customer, then there's a big
25:44 referral source, then there's an investor, you know, they build on top of each other. And so you just have to keep stacking, stacking, stacking, stacking. Future business partner. Yeah,
25:52 absolutely. Yeah, yeah, things like that You gotta be strategic. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, so now are most of your clients coming from, like do you have a lot of inbound from LinkedIn? Oh yeah. Yeah,
26:00 but all the time. Not all of it. I'd say I have a lot of referral sources now 'cause people just know me. And so they say, hey, Phil's the guy, here's his number. So I get a ton of that and I
26:11 still get a ton just straight off of LinkedIn where they're like, hey, what's going on? This is what I have and can you help us? Do you have to send like any messages or anything on LinkedIn to
26:20 people like outbound? No, I don't do any up out sales, yeah. Awesome. Which is, he's not even trying. You know, it's a double-edged sword 'cause I hate cold calling other than just like - Said
26:33 door-to-door sales in. I did door-to-door, yeah. That's what you mentioned. Yeah, yeah.
26:38 So yeah, no, I started door-to-door. When I was in college, I sold Comcast door-to-door and this was like after my biology chemistry classes, I'm like, all right, I'm gonna make some money. So
26:49 I knocked on a bunch of doors in Warsaw, Indiana, like meth capital of the world. And I - Hey, that's Gary, Indiana, actually. Oh, sorry, this is the meth secondary capital world. Yeah,
26:59 this is the step-sister. But yeah, that was my sales start, I'd say, is that door-to-door. Do you feel like you got like a valuable experience from that, like you learned so much to people,
27:09 like you're a people person. Yeah, well, I think door-to-door taught me the foundational grit 'cause I wasn't building relationships with door-to-door.
27:20 Right, just hard core. Being hard, no, I know, I know. Yeah, and being able to immediately build rapport with someone and say, Hey, I can solve your problem, let's sit down and do it. And
27:31 having the finesse to be able to do that, that's a skill most people don't get taught. So I would say that's my real education. Biology and Chemistry taught me how to foundationally think, how to
27:43 solve problems and just not be an idiot. Basically, and then the door-to-door is what taught me how to do business. So with your degree being in Biology and Chemistry, do you use it? I have a
27:55 chemical company. Okay. Yeah, so I wouldn't say - Wait, so you have multiple companies? Yeah. Okay. Yeah, so yeah, so
28:04 I've had equity ownership in 14 different companies, most of which have not gone well. Which, you know, to your point, we were talking about your first venture, or one of your first ventures was
28:16 the clothing company That's not still in existence?
28:19 So same sort of thing. I've had a trucking company. We got 12 trucks on the road. We were doing a hot shot. I built that up to about 150 grand a month in revenue. And then we weren't tracking the
28:30 finances. And all of a sudden our factoring company started paying us double. We didn't realize that. We spent the money. They said, hey, you owe us50, 000. We said, oh, and then it folded.
28:42 Like we came up with the money. We paid them off, but it folded But no, so I've done so many different startups over the years. And maybe it's because I'm a little bit nuts, and I hate working
28:53 for people. I'm always innovating. There's always something to solve. But I've realized, too, you don't want to be spread too thin. You really don't. So all I do really now is the financing,
29:05 and then I help with the chemical company. I'm kind of the CFO of that company. And I manage the invoicing, the payables, and just make sure things are done right. So yeah
29:15 I've been listening to this podcast on Elon Musk. Yeah. It says the most successful people, and I mean, I know this to be true, but the most successful people have the most failures, but you
29:27 just don't hear that because they're right. Obviously. Successes over shadow. Yeah. Yeah. There's a lot of iterations. Yeah. Absolutely. Yeah. We kind of pivoted. No, actually, I want to
29:39 stay on the content, the networking, whatever, like what is your experience with trade shows and stuff like that? Because in this, in oil and gas, energy, just logistics, everything, they are
29:50 all known for having these huge conferences all around the world, around the country. Everyone gets together. Where's their suits and talks and yaps and networks? Like, are they valuable? Do you
30:00 take advantage of it with your approach? What is the value there? Man, I'm a huge introvert. Like, I hate those things. Right. Like, it's just a giant crowd of amorphous bodies, like,
30:14 bumping into each other smells a little weird, they're all yapping about stuff they don't care about. Yes, it's so like not human. Right, it's so shallow and I just, I hate shallow things like
30:27 that. It's just not my thing. I think there's value in it. Absolutely. I have gone to only a small handful of them. My first company I worked with Riviera forced me to set up a booth at them. It
30:39 yielded no fruit 'cause everybody had a booth. There were like four or five factoring companies and we're all saying the same thing. Hey buddy, come over here. Talk to me about nothing you care
30:48 about Let me sell it to you. Like no one gives it crap. Do you have free pens though? Yeah, we have free pens. Stickers, stickers were the one. And they didn't work. They suck. They were
30:55 terrible pens. I feel like trade shows are, okay, this is my hot take. They're main people that have a booth are OFS companies. So you're there with a whole bunch of other OFS salesmen. Yeah,
31:13 swingers. That's all it is. It's literally OFS. It's a sales fest. Yeah, yeah Yeah, and it's like they don't even have their. clients there. I mean, you'll maybe come across a couple people
31:23 from all computers. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. It's like a glaze fast. So I do, I feel like,
31:31 I feel like if you, if your client can be the OFS companies, it's so valuable for you because they're everywhere. Yeah. And that's, that's very true. So if you're strategic, and you collect a
31:43 ton of cards, and then you follow up with those cards in a genuine way, you'll do well. Yeah. I just, I just hate doing it. No, yeah. Like, I'm not saying there's no value in it. Just
31:51 personally, I don't like that style. It's not my thing. Yeah. So now we can go back to Michigan, which is I wanted to talk about. Sure. So like, what does your day look like virtually? And do
32:03 you, do you tell people your friends, your family, oil, fuel service, financial guy, or do you just say financial guy and avoid the conversation? Because you're all the way up there and they
32:14 might be a little confused like My family has no idea what to do with me. They really don't. Like I've always been the black sheep in like every single way. Everyone except for one other person are
32:25 teachers and generationally so. So my grandparents were teachers. Oh wow. Parents were teachers, aunts and uncle teachers. I actually started my education as a teaching major and realized like
32:36 after just an hour in the classroom like, no. No, that's a. No. Oh, you too? Mm-hmm. Yeah. Do you like those major teacher vibes? No, I sat in a class. I love kids. Yeah. But I sat in a
32:50 class and I was like, I don't want to do this. Yeah, no way. No, it's so hard and they don't get paid enough and no. What? Oh, yeah. So they have no idea what to do with me. So I kind of
33:02 allude to what I do, which is like, I'm in finance and then we just don't talk about it.
33:09 like, which is fine. Like, I don't, I don't got a flex. Like they don't, they don't need to know. It's fine. We're friends. You're like that meme. You're like the beam of the guy in the
33:18 corner. He's like, they don't even know I'm a multi founder. I've failed so many times. I've had
33:25 no idea what I've failed at.
33:30 Yeah. So day in the life, right? I'll wake up and I'll probably go sit outside and collect some sun I'll answer some calls and I'll get on my computer. And the beautiful weather. And the
33:42 beautiful weather. Is it getting cold? Yeah. I had trigger warning for all the people who don't wanna hear how good you have it right now. Yeah. No, I've had it
33:51 super. It's like 50s? No, in the summer, it's like 70s. Like perfect. It's perfect. So I would say spring, summer, fall, beautiful. Like spring is a little cold, but you know, you're in
34:01 the 50s for most of it into the 60s and in the summer, it's a solid like 70s for the entire summer. Mostly sunny, you have the lakes, which is basically a giant frickin' lake. It looks like an
34:11 ocean. Beautiful sands, like white sands. So people don't think about that, like Michigan being a lake town area. Like I live basically in a lake town. We're only 20 minutes away from the lake.
34:21 Everyone around us are on little lakes. And so a bunch of people from Chicago come and build these multi-million dollar houses around me. And while I am in the middle of nowhere, it's a weird mix
34:31 because you have a bunch of these multi-millionaires that are on giant houses right next to the farmers in their little dinky houses. So really great. Wait, we're at in Michigan? Oh, Claire. Oh,
34:41 Claire. The entire like Western side of Michigan, like the beaches are beautiful. Like I said, it's like, you think it's an, it would look like an ocean that you crop the photo, right? Like
34:51 you've been up there? Kind of. Okay. And I mean, there's a lot on the bucket list. Okay, sure. Okay, let's say you go up the hot, you go up all the way up there. Yeah, in upper Michigan,
35:04 the UP, it's a wilderness. Yeah, they got a whole second state. Right. The dog. You know, there's the glove and the dog? Yeah. That's what it's called. Oh, 'cause the lake, like, split
35:14 there? Yeah, and they call the UP. My parents are actually about to go there. Yeah. So I'll have to get some little advice from you guys. Why is it called the UP? Upper Peninsula. Oh. It's
35:23 about as rural as Canada in a lot of places. Like, sorry, not Canada, but Alaska. Very bizarre place. Like my brother went to M Tech up there, Michigan Tech And there was like maybe 5, 000
35:33 kids. And it was just one college, and that was the town. And he had so much fun. Like in the middle of nowhere, it's just a bunch of kids. Yeah. Awesome. Yeah, and like you can go see like
35:44 the Aurora Bariolis. I didn't say that, right? The lights, they got, you know, beautiful night sky stars, all these little towns, berries, like it's like, yeah, it sounds like a dream. And
35:57 I got a lot on my to-do list. Yeah, yeah, and as many ticks as there are stars too. Wow, beautiful. There's always a downside. Yeah. Always a downside to ticks, man. It's a ticks. Yeah.
36:08 All right, well, any, I don't know. Did you finish your day in the life? I think we cut you off. Was there any like, I just wanna, I don't know, like just some kind of like Michigan, Texas
36:17 comparison. I don't know, we kind of filled us in earlier with that. So the people are very similar. The people are very similar. So in Michigan, everyone's blue collar, kind of down to earth,
36:29 good old boy type of feel Same thing down here, at least in oil and gas. I wouldn't say that in general, Texan, but more in the oil and gas sector, people are very similar. They're a little
36:39 different 'cause in Michigan, everybody talks like a Canadian and down here and they get that slow thing. And I'd say people down here are very assertive, whereas up in Michigan, they're not as
36:51 assertive. They're more like polite Canadians where they're kind of a little stabby in the back, but they'll be very polite about it. But down here, if someone doesn't like you, they'll punch you
36:59 in the face, But yeah, I would say you don't have an accent. Like, I don't hear your accent too much. Well, yeah, I think I kind of adopted a mix 'cause I lived in Texas for so long. And so,
37:13 if I talk with a good old boy for like three hours or something like that, I'll start drawing. You're on it. Yeah. And if I talk with a Minnesota and, you know, I can't even do it on hand, but
37:24 now I'll start talking like a Minnesota. It's kind of ridiculous. Yeah, the same thing happens with me when I go to New Orleans Yeah, it gets a little sloppy, it gets a little slow, it gets a
37:34 little weird. So it comes out when you're in your homeland. I feel like, yeah, that happens to me in Midland, too, where it's just like a little more. Yeah, yeah, you get that draw. Yeah.
37:45 That was kind of everything I wanted to go around. Is there anything else you want to talk about? I had to collect 20, 000 in cash from one of those guys. And so I had to drive across the country.
37:55 So he owed me a bunch of cash. He was kind of sketchy And so I called my buddy.
38:02 Severn. So Severn, the very Nordic sounding, he is Nordic. This dude is like 300ish pounds, big old farmer dude, because a lot of Nord settled Michigan and farmed, right? So we have a bunch of
38:15 those big giant dudes out there, kind of like the oil field too, a lot of that same descent. So I called him, I said, buddy, you want to go drive out and pick up this cash, because I didn't
38:24 want to pick it up by myself. So I'm like, all right, we're going. So we drove across the entire country. He did Route 66 for a while, kind of did bro, bro stuff for a few days. And then we
38:34 drive up to this guy's house. We're like, Hey, you hear? He's like, Nope, money's on the porch. So I go out there. There's 20, 000 in cash just sitting on the porch and an envelope. He did
38:43 not come out of his house. He did not come out of his house. And then we picked it up. We left never heard from him again. Like crazy stuff. Yeah. That's scary. Yeah, that was a lot of cash.
38:54 Really like you go pick up the cash. Yeah, that was a lot of cash in my pocket. Yeah. No, I picked up the cash. Yeah? No, no, he and I, my buddy and I had a tiff the night before in the bar
39:02 'cause he was being dumb and I was being dumb. And so he didn't wanna go with me. So I was like, all right, fine, I'll go pick up the cash. So I went by myself, I picked up the cash and then I
39:11 went back to the Airbnb, he woke up, he's like, you ready to get the cash? Like, dude, here's the cash.
39:18 Yeah, that's so funny. It's crazy You hear 20, 000 and you like picture a big pile of money, it's like - Oh, it's just a little envelope. If it's all hundreds, it's like, it's so much. It's
39:27 just a little envelope, yeah, yeah. I got my money back, so I mean, in that venture, I didn't lose anything, which is great, and so I appreciate that about the guy that he did pay me back, so
39:36 at least he paid me back. There you go. No, well, well, yeah. Well, you came all the way down from Michigan, you're in Texas, how long are you here for? Saturday. Really, so to kind of
39:47 wrap things up, like, what are some of the things you look forward to being in Houston, you know, whether it's restaurants, seeing like a friend, like what's in use in that really interests you?
39:57 I mean, it's all clients and relationships. Like that's what I come to Houston for. And I always try to get good sushi places. So if you guys have any suggestions, like where are the good stuff?
40:06 I always hear Uchi. Uchi is
40:08 great. It's from Austin, and they have a second location here. Would you say it's the best one in town? It's the only have one Uchi. Yeah. Uchi is like world renowned. Like everyone knows about
40:19 it It's amazing. The chef is a Tyson Cole. He's an official, like actual American sushi chef. He's like the only American sushi chef, chef ever, something like that. Chuck knows more lore.
40:32 Like an official like sushi chef. Like it's like a thing. So there's some lineage here. Yeah. Like, you know, you like you need to like put in like over a decade of experience to like actually
40:40 get that title. Like anyone can like learn like you see guys all the time just like rolling sushi. That's not a sushi. Yeah. That's like a line cook sushi. I really don't know what I'm saying,
40:49 but it's kind of pretty much like that. You're right. I think it takes six years to be like entry level. Right. Sushi chef and like a master sushi chef, like you said, takes like a decade. Yeah.
40:59 It's pretty incredible. Yeah. Pretty funny that you said a sushi. You know, I was ready for like barbecue or Mexican. Yeah. Man, I'm a sushi guy, like I love sushi. Whenever I travel, I try
41:09 to find the best sushi place in whatever city I'm in. And I've tried dozens and dozens of places. And the best one to date is this little tiny shop in Chicago called Ari Sushi. It's like a hole in
41:20 the wall in a sketchy little strip center. Oh yeah. It's delicious. We got tons of those in Houston. And you look at any strip mall, there's gonna be like a sushi place or just like some kind of
41:29 like restaurant that's always busing and like looks scary on the outside, but it's good in there. Yeah, it's the most top notch sushi I've ever had. It was bizarre. Yeah. 'Cause my wife and I
41:39 were just like, Hey, let's get sushi. Like, okay, we'll find a top rated place. So we did and it was like in this really terrible part of town So we thought we were gonna die. Oh, we did not.
41:47 It adds to the experience. It adds to the experience. You're like having a last supper. Yeah. And then you get home and you're like, This is the first supper in first of many. Yeah. I think
41:55 we've been there like 10 times though.
41:59 All right, we're good to go. We're done. Cool. You're worth it. Well, thanks guys. Thanks for coming in. Thanks for coming in.
