This is Under Pressure, a podcast where we dive into the untold stories of entrepreneurs and business owners who have conquered adversity to achieve greatness. And now, here's your host, Nick Staton.

Welcome to another episode of the Under Pressure Show. I'm your host, Nick Staton. Today's guest is David Patry. David Patry, if you don't mind, explain to the guests a little bit about your background and where you come from and stuff. Oh, my gosh.

Nic Staton

So I grew up in South Florida and left South Florida at 17, went in the Army in 1997, served six years. Um, got out and, uh, people would ask me, what are you going to do? I said, well, people tell me to go to get business degree. I was a good soldier still then. I went and got a business degree. I got about two years into business school and I was in an accounting class. The professor was like, what are you going to do? I said, manage stuff. He's like, you need to be an accountant. I'm like, what do they do? He said, well, they make a lot of money. I said, well, sign me up. I got an accounting degree and I spent almost 15 years, I think, doing that. Uh, and it just wasn't for me. I'm not, I can't sit in the focused on something for hours and hours. I was really good at it, but I just didn't like it. And, uh, so, uh, the journeys and travels and, uh, COVID hit and I was in a position that was expendable. And from there, uh, or his restoration services was born.

David Patrie

Nice. So, uh, what exactly is restoration do like y'all go in and do like water restoration and stuff like that?

So, uh, I wanted to create a company that was, uh, focused on. putting the customer and the client first, right? So, I mean, I had heard stories from other guys and anybody can buy a pressure washer and blast something with water, right? Just, you know, it's dirty, I'm gonna hit it with the water and I will get out of here. And, and so, you know, we would see a lot of or hear a lot of even people in our neighborhood, just guys coming in and messing stuff up and, or, you know, not cleaning it properly and things like that. So I really wanted to focus on what processes that you could use right and actually learning like almost like the science behind the cleaning. Because I tell people with pressure washing, man, probably 10% of what we do is shoot water and the other 90% if you're doing it right is mad scientist stuff. What acids are you putting somewhere? What you know, are using a, are you using caustics or, you know, pH neutral and why do you use it? And how does that affect the substrate that you're cleaning? So I wanted to use those. I wanted, that's where that restoration comes in is to bring it back.

I hear restoration. I just think in my head, I'm like, is it water restoration or something like that?

Water damage stuff, you know, and, and looking back, uh, sometimes I'm like, dang, man, The, the name does throw some people off, but, uh, I also wanted to, to build a brand like you. Right. So, um, I wanted to get into it and have something that when somebody saw what we were doing or saw our logo or heard our name, they were like, yeah, those guys know what's up. Let's call those guys. Right. So, you know, um, so we've just lived by that.

Where are y'all? Where are y'all located? You said we're in San Antonio, Texas, San Antonio, Texas. Texas is a fucking huge place. I just go out to Dallas area and I'm like, fuck, this is like our whole state. I can't. I haven't even left Dallas. I couldn't even imagine visiting other places.

I'll tell you what, man, like, so right now school's out and it's summertime. So traffic is, it's still terrible, but it's like, well, it's way better. And it's the, uh, I mean, I tell people like you can get on the highway at 65 miles an hour and drive from one edge of the city limits, the other side of the city limits. And it's 45 minutes an hour North to South hour, an hour and a half. It's massive, massive city. So, uh, You know, we're the city's been good to us. We've been blessed with a lot of, you know, diversity in our clientele, whether it's commercial, industrial, things like that.

So that's what I was about to ask. Did you just focus on residential or would y'all focus on?

No. So. We don't, it's funny. You're the pre-show. You said, so you, you didn't know much about us. I have all my social videos out there. I I'm terrible at it. I'm terrible at it, but, uh, so we don't do a lot of advertising. So it's, it's been a lot of cold calling me and I might just, um, really just, just pushing that brand, right. Doing a good job and trust them. We're going to get rehired. So, uh, we started off with, um, cleaning a neighbor and having them do a review and, you know, the simple stuff everybody does. And so, but then it kind of just kept growing. You know, we drove through a coffee shop one day, and I looked at the window, I looked around and said, y'all need a window cleaner and a pressure washer? They're like, yeah, actually, we do. And I was like, no shit. Right. Like what's the chances. Right. And they're like, hold on, let me get you the guy. And they brought the manager right to the drive-through window. And, you know, so, and that bloomed into nine stores that were getting cleaned quarterly on a, on a, on a rotating basis. So, um, and that company helped build our company that gave me the confidence to go in and, and know, uh, and teach myself a lot of, of what you need to know in this business, you know?

So, uh, how, how'd you get started?

Well, we started in, uh, March of 2020. And this was when I've got my business license right at the beginning of COVID. So, uh, we really, um, we really struggled. Right. So you couldn't, there was lockdowns, there was, you know, a lot of things. So, um, man, we didn't get our first job until the end of September in 2020. And, uh, We're a veteran-owned, I'm a vet, and we're a veteran-owned company. So we had a call and it was out on the Air Force Base that's not too far from here. And it was a huge warehouse and some general had drove in the door or drove in the gate and was like, clean that building. It looks like hell. And so they called us and they're like, hey, can you come pressure wash the building? I'm like, sure. No problem. But I get out there, this thing's like 29 feet high, and one side of the building is like 300 feet, the other side of the building is like 500 feet. And there's windows and I'm just like, wow, okay. This is this is awesome start, right? Man. So yeah, and I only started wanting to be just a just a water shooter, man. I didn't want to do windows. I didn't want to do anything. And they were like, well, we want you to clean the glass to the windows need cleaning. So I got on the internet and did a Google search and window cleaning resource came up. And, and, you know, I got on window cleaning resource. They're like, call for, you know, call us for a business consultation. So I looked down at the bottom and I called the number and Jersey answered the phone. I don't know if you know who Jersey is over at window cleaning resource. And so anyway, window cleaner, he sells the, he's a sales rep for them now. And he's like, Oh, you want to clean windows? And I'm like, No, no, I don't. Like pretty sure I don't want to clean windows. And he's like, no, you want to clean windows. So we, he, we talked through and he's like, Hey, this is, you know, get a water fit pole system. It's super easy. It's a commercial job. All you gotta do is like, you know, you can teach yourself how to do it. Right. All right. So, Man, my son and I went out there because he helped me start my business before he went in the army. My son went out there and these people would stand at the window watching us work and they were like, oh, they come out. Oh, it looks so good. Man, we had no clue what we were doing, bro. We just made it look good, you know what I mean? It sold it. That's how we just went into everything. The crazy story about that is, trying to do everything by word of mouth and cold calling and really trying to build an organic base for our customers. Window cleaning turned out to be like 60 percent of my revenue for the next two years. It was a blessing. That's just kind of how we rolled it up and we've just kind of gone from there.

So why exactly did you start the pressure washing over anything else?

I had a friend of mine here, he had a pressure washing business and we started talking and he was like, yeah, I had to sell it. I was getting divorced and my ex-wife was going to take me for like, you know, all the equipment. And he's like, so I just sold the business and, and moved on from it. And I'm, like I said, I grew up in South Florida and it's kind of like, you know, that Southeast it's humid, it's hot, nothing stops growing really. And so we pressure wash all the time growing up. And I was like, you know, I kind of like that. It's that instant satisfaction, job well done. and it's not too, you know, it's not too bad. And so, just decided to do it.

That's what's up. What's been the hardest part so far?

Man, I'd have to, man, that's, I'd have to say keeping the faith, man. Keeping the faith in your show, you know? How many times you wake up when you're building a business or you're doing something and you're just like, man, I made a bad choice doing this. If you haven't hit the struggle yet, then it's coming. I mean, nobody in our service industry is... I mean, you get the guys that get the golden goose, but I mean, those trains usually run out and you really got to dig in your heels and grit your teeth. You know, when I say it's blood, sweat and tears, brother, like I can't believe I mean, one time I was sitting in the office here and my wife offices next to me and I just turned around one morning. It's about two years ago, I think. And I just had tears in my eyes. She's like, oh, my gosh, she thought something happened. I said, I made a mistake. I said, I got I got here's my calendar. Here's a flip through. It was not not not one. appointment on the books for the next, I mean, at all. And I said, I screwed up. And I said, I need to go. I'm gonna go take a nap. It was midday. I said, I'm gonna go take a nap, try to regroup. I went and laid down, got up, and just try to collect myself. And man, the next morning I woke up, 6.30, went for a run, came back, and my phone started ringing. My phone started ringing and ringing, and it rang, and it rang, and it rang. And I had six weeks of work on the books. And it was just, I mean, I could have, I just could have quit it all that day, turned off my phone and walked away. And, and man, less than 24 hours later, I had six weeks worth of work booked up just like that for like in three days. It was crazy. It was one of the wildest things that one of the wildest things I think I've experienced so far, you know, when you, when you just, I know that, uh, sometimes you I think in some of your your uh reels and stuff that you post, you talk about, uh, God and stuff. And, uh, man, I'm telling you, uh, I can't, like, I got a prayer jar, got a prayer jar and it's like an old cookie jar. And, and when, when I start praying for something that comes true, I write it down and I put it in that jar. Right. And when I have a bad day, I go over to that jar and I'll just dig through and pull something out. And I'd be like, Oh damn, I forgot about that. But that was one time that, you know, it, those are the things that keep me, keep me kind of going from the hard time to hard time. You know what I mean?

That was another thing that I was speaking about this morning. How we, you know, I'm sitting here in complete silence. Somebody had, uh, thought that they had booked it eight o'clock at night and they had booked at seven 30 this morning and I'm sitting there waiting on them. And then he messages me and he's like, Oh dude, I thought it was eight o'clock tonight. And I was like, Oh, you can change it till eight o'clock tonight. If you want. I was like, I ain't got nothing going on this evening. Just one other podcast. And, uh, I just sat here in complete silence. And I was like, you know, those two voices that just keep coming at you, one of them is telling you to keep on going and the other one's telling you that you ain't shit. And it's like, why are you doing this? You know, you should be doing something else. You're not making it nowhere. And that's kind of the voices that were fighting at me this morning. But, you know, the more that I feed into my positive bank and build my mind up to think more positive, more negative shit is always triggering me in some way or another. So we've got to learn how to always just keep fighting those battles. Because those battles are always going to show up. And the more that we get deeper into this and, I guess, get better at what we're doing, more shit's going to turn around and try and take us off course in diversity or whatever it's called.

Telling you, the good and evil fight, man, it's that when you get home and you know you should do something, but a good show catches your eye. That's what's trying to keep you complacent. And when you are making those strides and you are doing good things, when you get to the end of that big job and you're like, dang, man, that was crazy. That was like three weeks worth of work. Like we finally knocked it out. And you're like, you know what, I'm gonna take a couple of days, right? Like I just made stupid money, right? Like I got, you know, money in the mailbox. I got money coming in, like I'm gonna chill. And then the next thing you know, you're like, starting to feel like, man, I wish I could just do this all the time. And I'm just like, nope, time to go, you know? And then I'll just, And if I don't have some on the books, man, I just grab a stack of cars and I got these, some folders that my marketing firm put together that we drop at construction sites and stuff. And man, I'm just cold call. Just knock on a door. Hey, how y'all doing?

We just now picked up cold calling. I've actually got my VA cold calling, talking to people, seeing how that's going to actually go, uh, just to give her something else to do. Um, I pretty much just pick up all my stuff just by posting on like Facebook and stuff like that. And yeah, always talking to people every time I'm out somewhere, like the job that we just picked up at the hospital, that guy I talked to two years ago. I'm sitting there trying to figure out where the fuck did I find or talk to this guy at. And the way that the email came through is like that somebody had talked big about me at some meeting that they were at, um, discussing pressure washing and I get face to face with them. And he's like, oh yeah, you remember down there on saw mill and down there in Jefferson, uh, those two projects, he was like, I was head of all of that. He was like, you were down there doing the pressure washing for so-and-so. And I'm like. Uh, I was like, dude, I was wondering where the fuck I knew you from. It just wasn't clicking in my head. He was like two years ago, man. He was like, I told you I would have you out somewhere. And he's like the head of fucking property management, too. That's perfect, man. And those are eighteen hundred acres. Of fucking like sidewalks, curbs, all types of shit that just needs to be clean, get out there and you're like, I flew the drone up and I was just took an aerial view. And this is just one of the properties. They've got like five other ones. This is just one of them. I was like, dude, we could be here fucking all year just cleaning all this.

Yeah, that's, that's right. You know, people don't realize when they, they, you got like, when you're cold calling, or you're, you're just walking into a business, or you're walking onto a construction site. And, and you got to like, there was a right over here, like a couple miles from my house, they put up, they're putting up a Home Depot. And I was driving by there and I'm like, man, I wonder what they're building. I'm wondering what they're building. And I just, I was always on the way to a job and I never could have the time to like, you know, I'd have my trailer and they've got like concrete trucks coming in. And I'm like, man, there's no way that the superintendents can come out here and castrate me. Right. So one day, like, I'm like, Oh, you know what? It's like lunchtime and I'm gonna run over there. I'm gonna grab something to eat on the way back. And man, I'm driving over there and there's this big ass banner on the chain link fence that says Home Depot. And I'm like, I'm a day too late because, you know, everybody on this side of town, you know, like like 100 people would probably stop in this place. And that's how I opened up the conversation. I'm like, man, I've been trying to get over here for a week. I said, I've been busy. And I said, I know you've got a 20 of me come over here that want to clean this place or pressure wash the parking lot or, you know, strike the parking lot, do whatever I said. So, you know, I'm, I'm not going to waste your, you know, your time. So it turns out, uh, we started chatting back and forth and, and, uh, And it wound up that they had had like 25 people stop it in like two days. But it worked out, man. He's like, hey, we got to clean the parking lot. I like, you know, just the kind of way you approached everything and we'll give you a call.

It's pretty much what it is. If they don't like you and trust you, then they ain't doing business with you. And a lot of these people go into things thinking that they know everything and don't listen to those customers at all. And then the first time that you give that commercial customer like that on the construction site a problem, he's going to be looking for somebody else. But the moment that you go in there and he never has to see you, never speak to you, none of that, but you're getting your stuff done, he's going to call you again for another job. Yeah. That's kind of how I've built my stuff up is, you know, don't lie to them, just be straight up with them and bullshit with them. Talk to them. Yeah. Those guys love talking.

You know, and that's like, that's, you know, and I think one of the big things that we've also kind of learned, like if you are doing homes, right. And, and, uh, you know, Mrs. Johnson calls you out to the heights or the blush or wherever it is, you know, called where you're at, you know, And get on that property, introduce yourself, look professional. And the first thing that you should be thinking about is like, is, you know, what is this, like how the house is presented? I mean, like, wow, you have a beautiful home. If that that if that individual, whether no matter what they do, or who they are, like male or female, you know, if they're the home and the caretaker, I mean, you're complimenting their work, you know, in the same way, like, other pressure washers or whoever come onto your job site and compliment your work, it feels the same to them. So, man, it's doing that and putting them first and putting them at the center and the heart and getting back to what customer service really is, man. And Anybody can get on YouTube and think they're going to make $5,000 a day being a pressure washer.

Be your authentic self. Don't be nobody fake. Because they can read through that shit with a heartbeat.

Yeah. And that's all we've ever done. And it's hurt us sometimes where we don't do advertising. Like I see guys all the time and I get on my Facebook thing and we're talking right now. And so I'm sure my phone, we're talking about pressure washers. I'm sure I'm going to have 17 Facebook ads in my feed. And I'm just like, you know, and I'm like, what are these guys spending? You know, I don't even know what it costs anymore. I remember looking at it one time and I think it was like, These guys have got to be spending like a thousand to two hundred bucks a month.

Oh, they're spending anywhere from like a thousand dollars to three thousand dollars just on the agencies. And then they've got to spend money on their ad spins or whatever. So at the end of the day, it's like you've got to. fucking do like 10, 20 jobs just to pay for what you got going on. Whatever's extra is like, ah, I'm just going to keep doing what I'm doing. But I would say a local ad service thing or whatever to where basically you don't put any money into nothing besides when the phone calls come in, then you pay for like $32 or $40 a phone call. And I'd much rather do shit like that. And we actually just started doing that just so that we can start picking up some residential. Yeah, because otherwise all I'm built up off is commercial. That's all I go after. I'm not wasting my time going to that shit to houses and go where our trucks thrive. But we started doing that. And I really like that because honestly, you know, even if I as long as we don't sit on the phone for more like I think it's like a minute or two minutes. Then we can kind of dispute it and not get charged. But if we carry on and we kind of get some information from them and stuff like that, then go ahead and count that you're going to pay for that, that call. But more than likely you're going to close on that person or whatever. And even if you don't, I mean, it's only $32. Yeah. Yeah. So you would waste that if not more going out and going door knocking or whatever. Yeah.

Yeah, at least you get out for a walk, right? Like, so, yeah, we had man, we had this guy, like he had moved from California out here. And he had a window cleaning company in California. And he moved out here. And he, he had signed up with like, yo, and Angie's list and I mean, all this stuff. And he's like, I'm spending four or $500 a month on leads. And he's like, I'm not closing the job. And I'm like, are you under contract? And he's like, yeah, I'm under contract. I'm like, bro, like for how long? He was like, yeah, like, like, like 12 months. And I was like, oh man.

So he was working those Angie lists, things are fucking even bigger of a pain in the ass that I hear. They just take money from you.

Yeah, it's, it's crazy, you know, and I know guys that I've watched guys on other podcasts, or, you know, they have their own podcast. And, and it's like, Oh, man, that works for us. Now we build our whole business, we still do Angie's, it's all we do is Angie's. And I'm like, well, I mean, they built a model around that, and that works for them. What frustrates me is, is you see, like these newcomers, and they're getting on there, and they're, they're watching this, and They, you know, they're not teaching the model. They're just saying, Hey, go use these services. And it hurts a lot of guys, you know, so.

Oh yeah. It definitely hurts people. I tell people all the time, like if you're going to get in and just start at the bottom and just work your way up and figure out if it's something that you want to do, don't go dive off into something that you don't know nothing about. And then. Don't go into those group pages asking questions because you're bound to fuck yourself up. Somebody's giving you wrong information, you're going to go out to that roof. I've already seen it where I think that some people have gotten um galvanized and metal really mixed up and they go out there and clean galvanized roofs with sh and literally just annihilate them and you'll see them post that and they're like is there any way you can fix this it's like yeah buy a new roof that's it that's it we're so we're actually going out to clean a a a galvalume roof tomorrow um but i and i and i asked him i said how old is the roof

And they're like, Oh, you know, like 15 years, I'm like, it's never been clean. No. Okay, what's your goal? You want it to look new? No, we just want the dirt off of it, you know, because we want it to be energy efficient again. Okay, man, we're gonna throw a water fed pole on that sucker. They don't want it to be shiny. They just want the dirt off of it. So it's not absorbing that heat. No problem, you know. And I think that's, that's the thing is, on the other side of my business is like, I was telling you, we started the company in March. We didn't get our first job until September. So I would get, man, I would go down these rabbit holes in YouTube, man, and just, I mean, when I tell people I have hundreds of hours of research, whether it's like watching like pros on YouTube or picking up the phone and calling somebody, you know, one of the stories I always tell is I was looking for an environmentally friendly cleaner because we wanted to do things green. And then out here, we got a lot of creek beds and watersheds. So you got to kind of watch what you're putting on, putting on, uh, putting out. Right. And so, man, I, I, it was like lunchtime. I picked up the phone, call out the BBC and man, and Carlos answers the phone. He's awesome. And yeah, he picks up the phone. He's like, start asking some questions. I'm like, Hey, can you tell me a little bit about your cleaner? And like, all that was developed and man, he goes into this whole thing and I'm like, I was like, you sound really knowledgeable. He's like, oh yeah, well, I'm the president of the company. And so we started just talking, right? And he's like, well, here's my phone number, man. You ever need anything? Or can you hit me up on Messenger? And man, I don't know how. So I would just call people. And so I called several different places over the next few years. And I just so happened to call at a weird time of day. And man, the president, I mean, it's a small company. All us guys are small companies, right? They would pick up the phone, man, and I'd get the president on the phone, I'd get the COO on the phone, and I'd be like, tell me about your product and how it compares to this product because I'm looking at this product as well. And man, I would just talk to these guys and talk to them for 20, 30, 40 minutes and just gain, like, just soak all this in, right? And that's where I was saying earlier, like, hell, it's kind of like mad scientist stuff because, man, I was on one of those boards and this dude, he's like, oh, how do I get this, this, this staining off this brick? And it just looked like somebody had just aimed the sprinklers right at the brick for like 20 years. It was like, it was thick. And so this guy gets on there, he's like, Oh, it's after license. And I'm like, bro, that, that is, that is far more than after lessons. And I'm sure there's after lessons in there along with calcite and all this other stuff. And I said, I said, if you don't know what you're doing, man, like you'd probably need about three acids, at least to get that off. And then multiple treatments. And I said, you need to set it. You know, I was telling that dude, I was like, you need to set an expectation with that homeowner or that business owner that it's never going to look my best. We're going to take all this off so you can paint this so it looks better, you know what I'm saying? And then I was thinking about this earlier. I was going to say, so did you guys ever say it was probably like a month ago on one of the foreign boards, there was like this, this building and I called it Smurfpocalypse, dude. It was like they had put the spray dye in the sprinkler system and that sprayed everywhere. I mean, the sidewalks were blue.

Like the red stuff or whatever?

No, it's this, so it was posted and so we got called out on an emergency for it. And I got the call at like 10 o'clock in the morning and I was on site probably like just after lunch. But by the time that I had left, by the time that I had got the call and pulled my trailer from the shop and got across town, in an hour and a half, hour and 45 minutes. I already knew, I already knew the product. I had called the product manufacturer. I had like, you know, I had already done all this research. I was driving over there. So when I got on site, man, it was like, this is what, this is what you got. This is what it is. This is how we're going to treat it. And the big thing was, it was like a city owned property and there was a lake there. And in that lake was like this soft-shelled turtle. And it's the only place that that turtle is. So they were like, you can't use bleach. I'm like, OK. And it was organic dye. So we knew that the SH would just bleach it out. But we had to come up with some alternative methods to try to sell it to them. But it's approaching that situation like that, and then again, getting on there. And having the knowledge and the, and the, the basis to, to give that to them and make them to make the decision, you know? Yeah.

You got to let them make the decision at the end of the day. It's like, save the turtle or get rid of what you sure. But I'm here to get rid of this guy.

And then it's, you know, you know, it kills me too. Like, so we're supposed to, we're supposed to, we're supposed to do water recovery here on most jobs, man. Like nothing's supposed to go in the storm drains. I have a friend of mine in the business down here. He says, you know, you know, we don't reclaim, we storm drain. So, uh, like, you know, and they're like, so, you know, the SH, you know, is it going to hurt? I'm like, yeah, man. They're like, we would have to dump. this like directly into the water, you know, and so, you know, they're like, well, what is what is sh on like, what's the active ingredient, like your household bleach, right? It's, it's, anyway, but what the thing is, is once it dries, or once we dilute it enough, it's, it's nothing more than just salts, like it, once it dries up, it's pretty much inert, you know, and it took them a little bit to get past it. And So come to find out that the actual dye at the concentrations that they had released all over this property, if it was going to hit rain and get washed into this, into this pod, they would have killed the turtle anyway. Like, so the guys at the end were like, okay, yeah, let's just bleach it. Let's go forward with it. You know, so it was hilarious, man. I was just like, you know, here we are trying to save the turtle from the bleach and then the dye is going to wind up killing the turtle anyway. I'm telling you, man, like it's just, I mean, it wound up being, it wound up turning into a great, a great thing. Cause we came in and we saved the day. They were like selling this like multi, like brand new office building. I think it was like a 20 something million dollar building. And they're trying to sell it. This was on like a Friday, Thursday or Friday. They're trying to sell this thing like Monday. bro, like, we came in and like, we were the heroes, you know, man, we send them we send them the bill, right? And the guy's like, Oh, hey, bad at all. And I was like, I was thinking like, seven to 10k.

I'm like,

Like, that's a good down payment on a new truck. You know what I mean?

So I don't hear that often, but when I hear that fucking word come out of their mouth, I'm like, fuck.

Yeah. Fucking go up and you're like, damn.

Oh.

Most of the time it's like, is there any way we can do a little bit better? It's like, well, that's our, that's where we're standing at. You know, that's where we have to be in order for us to continue staying in business. And then once they hear that and they're like, okay.

So, and that's, man, we ate that too. Like, Oh, I just had a guy come by. He quoted me like, like half your price. I'm like, yeah, I asked to see as a certificate of insurance. I guarantee he ain't got none. Cause there's no way he's, he's running a business with the insurance that we carry.

Cause I'm sure that, you know, with these, I'm bonded and fucking got working as comp, all that shit and everything costs money, you know, fucking cheap. That's why, Well, when our minimum is 300 bucks and I might go down to like 230, 250, if it's just something where we're just basically pulling up and we're like, just cleaning the front porch real quick or something. But I mean, even then, you know, sometimes these people are like, all you're doing is coming and cleaning just a pad in the front. And I'm like, well, do you need something else more clean? Cause we do. Yeah. At the end of the day, like you're just calling me just to clean a porch and I have an F-150 that's going to come out and come clean that.

And your house wasn't downhill all the way there, you know what I'm saying? So like we had to use some gas.

Or they'll go, three years ago or four years ago, we got it cleaned and it was $120. It's like, man.

Yeah. And then you get the other half of the story when you're done cleaning, right? Like, oh man, these people are really nice. I'm already here, right? Like, I'll just clean it for 120 bucks. Yeah. And then he cleaned it. And then he, you know, my nephew, he went off to college and I'm like, oh, oh, it was a family member too, right?

Or the husband has a pressure washer in the garage and he used to do it, but he can't do it no more.

Oh my gosh, man.

They know what it costs.

You know, that's what kills me. And, you know, this last year, our insurance, just our base insurance, went up 30% on renewal. They're expecting another 30% on renewal. And we just picked up like a huge contractor. And they require $5 million of umbrella on top of the one plus one. And then plus a million and like, and it's like, okay, so my insurance bill a year just went. It's just commercial like warehouses.

It was like that. Yeah. I know that industrial does require stuff like that.

Like hospitals, they want like $10 million. Yeah. We got another, uh, a management company out here. They want $10 million in umbrella alone. That's $10 million. I'm like, and I told her flat out, man, just for why you're on that job site.

Uh, just so that it just goes active while you're on that job site.

Yeah.

You ain't got to carry it the whole year because there's no point in carrying that all year long. If you ain't going to be there all the time.

No, that's what I told him. I was like, what do you think I can do with a pressure washer? And that's going to cost $10 million worth of damage. That's my question. Cause I don't, I don't, I I'm adventurous. You know, I might be out there writing my name with a red tip or something, you know, I'm not sure yet, but yeah.

Kill all their stuff, kill everybody on the whole entire job site.

Yeah.

So how do you deal with pressure when you find yourself under pressure? How you deal with that type of stuff?

You know, I have I have the blessing and the curse of like ADHD. So when it gets to be like that, man, I can I have just an ability to just really just just hyper focus on it and knock it out. Um, one of the other things I think has been really, really awesome, uh, that I've really kind of developed something is being able to, and most guys that have been doing this, I've been doing this for four years and you've been doing a lot longer, but when you can walk a job site and look around and know what you're looking at and be like four hours, right, right. Four hours, we'll be in and out of here in four hours. And you get in there. pull up, hoses go flying, and you're knocking something out and you're pulling away three hours and 53 minutes later, that's awesome. And so combining that knowing now that I have that combination of being able to just put everything else out of my mind and focus on only that, but having that knowledge base to know that I can fit a job Not always, but I'm getting to be more and more comfortable with like walking something and just be like, yeah, four hours, we're good. Five hours, you know. And if it goes drastically wrong, you know, especially if it's on a construction site, if something's going wrong, man, we just stop. You know, if we get about four hours, four and a half, five hours, we just stop. We're like, okay, we were trying to do the right thing. But, you know, the landscapers, you know, they had tracks on this and all they did was like donuts across the parking lot. And, you know, the hotspots are good. The hot marks aren't coming up and stuff like that. So, you know, just having that knowledge base and just be able to push through.

There you go. What's been the best part?

Employing people.

Employing people? How many people? Yeah.

I got two, two, two guys. And then, uh, I got two other guys that are kind of contracting with me right now. I'm going to go through some larger jobs, um, doing some kind of specialty stuff like the, you know, we do striping like you guys too. And, uh, so you got the signage that comes with that. And then we had, uh, we just did this cigar shop out here and they put in this really, really nice, like cedar picket fence. And we were supposed to, uh, We were supposed to just slap some fire lane signs in there. And so, uh, you know, we got kind of creative with it and mounted the signs to the backside of the post and kind of custom took the sign brackets, but then kind of flipped them around and use those to mount the actual pole, you know, and just kind of, it's kind of tripped it out, man. I mean, it costs me like an extra 10 bucks and it looks like a million dollars. So, um, But yeah, so those guys kind of take care of that kind of like those niche things. If I've got to do some sign repair like that.

So that's kind of what I've done for right now. I wasn't going to get into it by myself and kind of go out and go line stripe. I bought the equipment and everything, but haven't done nothing with the equipment and got tired of turning down all the work. And then also not being able to land some work because of not having that. So found a crew that could go out behind us and they do a phenomenal job. They do seal coating, they do line striping. If the parking lot needs to be rised up in some way, they can turn around and dig it all out and pack it back down and make it all level. There's numerous things that those guys can do. So it's actually great to have them on the team and just know that, you know, I can go out here and go land this job and we're pressure washing. They're coming behind us. They're doing the final touches. And then the property just looks phenomenal. One of my biggest contracts that we have that I've worked for for the last four or five years. And they finally let us come up there to their main office and just basically redo the whole thing. I pressure washed all the curbs and sidewalks and some of the building. Then they came back behind and reseal coated the parking lot and then restriped it and that looks brand new.

Man, so that was one of the kind of one of the sayings that we have on our website and one of the sayings I you know I just sat around one night and started just thinking about stuff like how do you how do you how do you approach this? Or how do you do that with the restoration side? And one of the things is, is like, you know, we want to breathe, breathe life and beauty back into your space, right? So, you know, how many times we've gone into a house, they do live there for 15 years, they're about to sell it. And we're doing a make ready for a realtor. And so we go in and we clean the windows. And I had this lady call me like two days later, she's like, I hadn't opened up my blinds or pulled back my curtains in probably five years, six years, because I just got tired of looking at the windows. She's like, but I didn't realize that I was doing it. She's like, we're leaving in two days. But I don't want to close the blinds. She's like, I don't do it until it's dark out. Or you get somebody that's like, we went out to this one place. The guy had an outdoor kitchen, stonework, all this stuff. It was beautiful. He's like, man, we don't even come out here anymore. I'm like, well, why? He's like, I don't know. Just don't. And he called me about a week after we cleaned. He's like, man, we've been eating out there every night, man. It's nice out. It looks good. It don't smell moldy anymore. Thank you. And I think it's the same way for businesses. I'm part of a group. We'll have a meeting Tuesday and it'll be what, July 1st, 2nd. I'll stop at the end of the day and I'm like, hey, all you business owners, you've got a front door. I know you all come to work in the back door because it's convenient to park and everything. I said, walk around the front of your business. Look at what your customer sees. That is the first impression that somebody is going to pull up. If you're a dentist office and your sidewalks are black and your windows are dirty, man, why would you go to get your teeth cleaned if somebody don't clean your building? You know, and so I try to tell people like, you know, that that's, that's the, that's what you need to try to do. And like, you're saying like seal coat in that parking lot and doing all that, man, you gave him a whole facelift. That should give them a whole nother, a whole nother look at people driving by, you know, because a lot of times they don't even think about that stuff.

But then when you're out there, you, you, you are actually. Bring that up to them. And then they're like, damn, he actually cares about our property more than I do, or even just as much as I do, because he's actually bringing up things that would actually make our place look better. So, I mean, that's just more money. Like why, why leave money on the table and why not add more value to your customer?

Yeah. That's why I see like guys on forums or just like, you know, the pressure washing forums and they're like, oh man, yuck. I don't clean windows. And I'm like, bro, if you knew what you were leaving on the table, every job you're, you're doubling your ticket half the time.

You're going to lose that customer as soon as the next person comes along and says, I do window cleaning. That customer is like, oh, I want you because my other guy won't even touch my windows. I've got to do it after him. And I don't want to do that.

Yeah. And if you're going after those large commercial accounts and you know, man, like if you got a, a tool basket of guys, uh, build, build, build a network. Yeah. You know, I mean, I've got, I know I just did that, but like, I mean, build a network. These are guys that I trust and stuff. These are guys that I trust doing stuff, whether it's, you know, trailer sales or whatever else I got in here. But, I want to build a tool basket of guys that I am the solution for whatever problem you have. And if you go to the bottom of our website and go down to the bottom, there's a resources tab and it is businesses that I trust. And you can go on my website and You can find a glass guy to fix your broken window, you can find a roofer, you can find a guy to do your gutters, you know, all that stuff. Because, again, man, if you can provide or make yourself invaluable to that customer that they can't do without you, or they, they pick up and call your number to find a roofer, they pick up your number to find Do you know a painter? Do you know this? Yeah, I do. But if they're calling you first for everything, every time. then you're always on their mind. And that's exactly where you need to be. And I don't care how many Facebook ads you run or Google ads or whatever. You know, I think to me that that was more valuable to build that brand.

So, right. That's exactly it. Making yourself an authority in your area. That's how you stand out. That's pretty much how I've built myself up and make myself.

It's been fun watching you, man. Like I've been watching you for a couple of years. It's been fun, man. Sometimes I get foam. I'm like, oh, man, let's do something like three o'clock in the morning. I just got home like, I just got home like four hours ago from a job site, but man.

I'm pretty consistent with my stuff. If it's not, if I'm not working and I ain't got to stay up, then I'm in bed by nine o'clock and I'm up by four o'clock every morning.

That's right. I'm telling you like, uh, the consistency.

You treat that with everything in your life, not just with, you know, one thing.

I had a guy one time, and he was a friend of mine, and he was a Delta Force operator and super successful after. And I'm just like, how do you do it, man? I get that you guys are different human beings. Truly, they are. They're just different. They're super smart guys, super driven. And he's like, man, I'll just soldier the shit out of that. And I'm like, okay. He's like, man, I get up, I make my to-do list, I bullet point it, and I mark it off, and I give myself an agenda, and I get up. And he's like, maybe I don't do PT, but at 6.30, I'm already doing this or I'm doing that. And I break for lunch at 12, and I'm back to work at 1. And he's like, that's it. I just soldiered the shit out of it. And I'm like, man, that's crazy. That's too easy, right? Like give yourself an agenda, give yourself a, give yourself a calendar and follow it. Like it ain't hard. It's a road.

It's not, you just got to get into a routine or a system or whatever you want to call it. But as long as you get into something like that, whatever suits you best and staying with it and being consistent, you'll see results.

Yeah. That and having a cheerleader, man, you got to have cheerleaders, right? So those days that you're having a rough day, somebody that can, you know, I'm blessed to have, blessed to have my wife that, that, I mean, she's, she's my number one. She's my, my partner in crime and everything else. So, uh, it's always good to have somebody that when you're having a down day, they can be like, you know, man, like you're killing it. Just like, keep going. And, and like, for, I know for certain guys, like for you, like you have like this community that, that gives back, And, uh, so keep those people in your life, man. And if you got negative people and get them out, because if they see you, if they see you going like this, they're like, Oh, I'm not there. So they'll try to bring you back down at a heartbeat, you know, and you got to get rid of those guys or you got to get rid of those guys that you call them and you, you know, you're giving them a sub and they're happy to be there. And they're like, Oh man, like, you know, uh, this, that, and man, a phone ever, like, if that phone ain't ringing the other way, nope, I'm sorry, bro. Like, I'll, that's rough. You know, and it's something I learned when I first started. I met a guy and I would call people and I would say, hey, you know, I'm new to the business and, you know, what are you charging? What are your rates? And man, guys like, they get scared. Right. And so, uh, I found a guy in my area. He's real cool, dude, man. We call people or call each other all the time. Like, what are you charging for this man? Like, I don't want to delete the market. Right. That, that was my whole thing. I didn't want to come in and be the $99 guy. I didn't want to come in and be the $200 guy and not have any work, but I wanted to be like solid. middle of the road and, and doing it right. So if, if you got a contractor in your area that's willing to share that, I mean, you guys are going to be more successful together, bouncing off ideas or bouncing prices back and forth, because if you come in the middle of the road and outperform everybody, you got nothing to worry about. And so those other guys do, but it's, it was the weirdest thing. And, and, uh, and I got other guys that, I mean, pick up the phone and be like, this is what I'm charging. Am I stupid? And they're like, bro, solar panels, right? And I was charging like $5 a panel for the longest time. And man, I was getting every job and I'm like, damn, this is awesome. And so I call his, I call a friend of mine and he's, he's, he's in Texas, but he's like in east Texas, uh, north of Houston. And I'm like, what are you charging for solar panels? He's like 12 bucks. I'm like, he's like, what do you, what do you charge? I was like $5 because I was charging that like eight years ago, you know, but, when you don't know, right? So how many people were calling me saying, or, you know, how many people were getting a phone bill? Well, I got a guy that does $5 a solar panel. I don't want to be that guy, you know what I mean? For two reasons. I don't want to be the asshole that's like screwing everybody because my price is too low and then I ain't making no money anyway, so.

And you're landing every single damn job.

Every job. I'm a hell of a salesman, right? But it's hard when you first start because you don't know where to start. And then you try to get somebody to share that with you. So I gave this guy all my information. Oh, what do you charge for this? What do you charge for that? What do you charge for this? Oh, okay, yeah, I'll get back to you. Nah, bro. He just wanted to know what his competition was doing. Yeah. So I was very, very selective after that. That was probably the first couple of months that I was really working. And so I was really selective after that. And, you know, and I think I remember one of your reels or one of your posts that you had done, man, I tell people, you know, I have, we have clients that, that we charge certain rates for, right. We going out on those jobs, they get a rate, they're happy to pay it. we may not charge consistently across the board, but there's reasons for that, right? So you can go out and we got this one drive through that we do, no matter what we do, we got to wash it twice. And, but we don't charge the same rate as we do like for, you know, another drive through that we wash once, right? Like, so it's, you gotta, you gotta like, I don't know where you need to find what works best for you.

That's what it was on your post or whatever. Yeah. On your prices. You just need to find what works best for your company and, and kind of stick with those. And then at the same time, not nickel and dime your fucking customers to death. That's where a lot of people fuck up. I have people hit me up all the time and they're like, Well, shouldn't I just charge this or whatever? And this, and I'm like, you can give them that price if you want, but more than likely, you're not going to get that job. And if you're wanting consistent work out of that person, which that's what that type of person that is, then you don't need to be hitting them with that, you know, large ass ticket just because you think, because you saw on the internet that somebody is getting 26,000 for that fucking building cleaning somewhere else that you can get that, you know?

And so, you know, some of those guys that are close to us, I mean, like could have been, you know, there's several, there's what other factors went into that? Did the, did the client not know what the pricing should be and it needed to be done? And they were just the guy that was on the job, you know? Uh, was it that there was a whole bunch of other stuff that he wasn't showing you like rust, you know, a whole bunch of stain removals or, you know, things like that. And, and so, yeah, I agree with you. You gotta caution yourself with that for sure. You know, it's just, um,

the larger jobs that you're not going to win them all either like you're going out there and you're putting that bid in knowing that that's what your company is going to be able to profit is going to be able to thrive by doing that job but at the same time If you lose that job, you lose that job. But if you win that job, you know, you're making money, but don't go. Don't go into every single one of them thinking that you're going to win every single one of them, because you're not going to win every single one of them. That's why you've got to go out and put more bids out than just one bid out or talk to more than just one person, because you need to build a seed bank that you're constantly throwing out seeds and constantly watering those seeds. And then they blossom. Yeah, that's that's how I've built my shit up, but everybody's different on the way that they do their stuff.

So it's, you know, and we have guys that. Guys that I've worked with too, or even talked to, where they're like, man, I'm gonna get this parking lot, it's 100,000 square feet, and man, I'm gonna charge them like 15 cents a square foot. And I'm like, you ain't gonna get it. These guys, they don't realize that you gotta scale up, right? We clean a parking lot, we did a bid to wash down a parking lot post-construction, 365,000 square feet. And we bid, three and a half cents a square.

Right. So you got people out there that are doing three cents a square foot and shit like that. And people that are going to have to set up for it. You got to have 15.

It's like, no, no, they threw up all over that. So we, we first hit it like four and a half cents square and they threw up all over it. Oh my God. like 365,000 square feet, bro. You're talking about, you're talking about us with four machines dropping, you know, what was it like 35, 40 gallons a minute, right? You know, you got fire hydrants, you got four machines, you got five, six guys, you're out there six days, 10 hours a day. you know, rotating guys and on and off guns, you're, you're, you know, and then as the foreman or the owner, man, like, you're watching waterfall, right? Because, you know, that black, and it was blacktop too. So, you know, you're just flooding it, you know, and so, you know, as you got a, you're staging your, your, you know, your movement, because that waterfall and you mean, one of the first jobs we did, we probably did 50,000 square foot parking lot. And the waterfall should have been one what way and so one guy got a height of another guy and where they crossed, they got over this little hump in the middle, and the water started going the other man they wound up washing, you know, a whole nother 15,000 square foot again. But because, you know, I, you have faith that these guys are pouring a parking lot, right? Man, it's, it's dirt, it's dirt. And, you know, so it was, you know, it's a, it's a lot, a lot of fun. And I've had a lot of fun watching you with your new, your, your new hollow and everything. And I'm really intrigued about that because those, those massive jobs are so much fun. They're so much fun though, man. And I love them. And we've gotten, so we were watching with like three a gallon a minute and we were moving along one day and, but we can, with three, eight gallon a minute machines, we can turn out between 10 and 12,000 square foot an hour.

with my guys, but we've gotten to a point where... I can clean with 525 gallons of water, 34 gallons per minute, 15,000 square feet in 15 minutes.

Yeah, I bet you can for what it costs to get there. That's the other side of it, right?

I cleaned 300,000 square foot parking garage that was broken up into four buildings, some of it a couple of a couple of stories. We cleaned that in six days, all with that zero turn. Yeah, I mean, and washing pipes and walls. Yeah.

Yeah. You made a lot of people drool over those videos. That's for sure.

That's where that video went viral is when I first got that and put that in that parking garage and I was just fucking around on it. And that video actually went viral. I was like, what the hell is it?

So you're like, you'd like right at that.

And you're like running that zero turn. Oh, I love it, man. Yeah. My next step is to get one of my guys trained on it so that, you know, um, The more I can pull myself away from things, the better that I can actually grow this business and get out and pick up more jobs. Uh, nobody's really going to be able to sell this the way that I am, you know, and believe in it the way that I do. Um, but the guys love working and they love being around the environment and stuff like that. And, um, I just put more trust into them. I've got one guy that's out in one of my trucks. I trust him to do pretty much everything that has to do with residential, but my next step is to get him out of that residential truck over to my truck, get him more on the zero turn where I can get him out on that, get another person into the other truck, and just keep building like that because, I mean, The more I can pull myself away, it's not that I'm not going to completely quit washing. I'll keep on washing. But the more I can pull myself away, the more that this company is actually going to really take off.

You got to shake their hands and kiss the babies and you know, yeah, that's where all the political stuff.

I'm not working. I'm not able to really find any more jobs or even, you know, build those relationships to keep it coming. And it's not that they don't come, but they would just come faster if I would just, you know, take myself out and let that let that go. I've held that in my head for so long that I didn't want employees. I didn't want anybody. I could do this myself. But in the day, I just got a job. and I don't want a job, I want to own a company.

But that brand, that recognition that, you know, doing all that and then know that, knowing at the end of the day that you're in it for, to do it for the right reasons. Yeah. I mean, that's, that's all like, that's my favorite, my favorite reward of it all is going somewhere, taking care of somebody and having them say thank you and a smile. And man, that's, That's, to me, that's the best, best word you could ever have. You know, I walked away from the accounting world, I walked away from making over, over six, over, over, you know, over $100,000 a year. And I just hated, I couldn't do it anymore. Right. You know, I don't, I didn't like nerds in school. And I didn't like working with them. I didn't like working with them when I was an accountant. But, you know, it's just the personalities don't fit, you know, and being in the military for six years, and being very, very direct when you talk to somebody, very direct in your emails, man. I mean, I wind up in HR, like, you can't talk to them like that. Oh, what did I say? Oh, well, they said that you were leaning forward on the desk and you were asking questions. And I was like, you mean where I had my book where I was taking notes? And I was kind of like, you know, tell me about this. He's so mean and scary. Like, bro, I'm a teddy bear.

We're going to, we're going to end this right here. Cause I've actually got to get onto another one here in just a few. How can, uh, how can our audience find you and stuff like that on social media?

Oh man, so let me tell you about my social media presence. It's non-existent. They're out there, but I probably haven't posted. I probably haven't posted in over two years. It's terrible. Warriors Restoration Services, if you search that on Facebook, LinkedIn, and Instagram, you'll find us. Website's warriorsrestorationllc.com. And we're in San Antonio keeping it clean, man.

Nice. Well, thank you so much for coming on. We're going to end this. Guys, go subscribe to all the platforms. And we will be back with another episode of The Under Pressure Show. Peace.

Thanks so much for tuning into this episode. We sure do appreciate it. If you haven't done so already, make sure you're subscribed to the show wherever you consume podcasts. This way you'll get updates as new episodes become available. And if you feel so inclined, please leave us a review. And remember, pressure doesn't break you, it makes you. Until next time, friends.