Riding Tandem

00:00:00 - Speaker A
Welcome to Riding Tandem, a podcast about building businesses, leadership and creating positive impact for our communities. I'm your host, Vivian Kvam, and I invite you to ride Tandem Works with me as I have candid conversations with inspiring business owners, leaders, and experts who are building on their dreams and creating impact. Get ready to be encouraged and learn practical tactics, help us build successful businesses, become incredible leaders, and have positive ripple effects. Let's go. Welcome, everybody, back to this episode of Tandem Works Works. We have a fabulous topic today and a wonderful guest who's very knowledgeable. We're going to be talking a lot about money. Money, loans, how to obtain capital, all of those things which I know is of huge interest to so many of you out there. So be sure to grab your notebooks. If you're driving, take a mental note, come back to this. But if you have a chance, grab a notebook and a pen, because I think there's going to be things that you want to jot down. Little bits of gold nuggets here. But let me introduce real quick, I have with me today Jamel Hamilton, and he's the Deputy Director of Lending with NEF, which stands for Nebraska Enterprise Fund. And I know some of you are like, well, I don't live in Nebraska, so not going to listen. There's going to be tons here that applies to you, so keep your earbud in. But he's been with NEF for four years. He started as a loan officer and then was promoted back in 2020. And he has so much experience, previous experience with loan processing and collections and things like that. So all the money things that we want to talk about today just learned, too. So I want to point this out. Jamel is also just an active community member and very passionate about the community. And so he also serves as a board member with Nebraska Children's Home Society and Young Nonprofit Professionals Network of Greater Omaha. And so I think that community piece is really going to come through in our conversation today. And I can't leave out the family piece because I'm just excited the fact that he has some twins, because I just think that's I think twins are cool. It's such a neat thing.

00:02:05 - Speaker B
And my wife is a twin and.

00:02:06 - Speaker A
Your wife is a twin.

00:02:07 - Speaker B
And my wife is a twin.

00:02:08 - Speaker A
I had no idea.

00:02:09 - Speaker B
So it doesn't skip a generation.

00:02:10 - Speaker A
Oh, boy.

00:02:11 - Speaker B
So if anyone writes anything down, that should be something to write down, is that it does not skip a generation.

00:02:16 - Speaker A
All right. And you've been married six years?

00:02:18 - Speaker B
Seven.

00:02:19 - Speaker A
Seven years.

00:02:20 - Speaker B
Seven years.

00:02:20 - Speaker A
Congrats.

00:02:21 - Speaker B
Thank you.

00:02:21 - Speaker A
Now you have three kids, is that right? Three.

00:02:23 - Speaker B
I have three girls.

00:02:25 - Speaker A
Three girls.

00:02:26 - Speaker B
Three girls.

00:02:26 - Speaker A
Yeah. I'm from a family of three girls, too.

00:02:29 - Speaker B
It's awesome.

00:02:30 - Speaker A
It's the best.

00:02:30 - Speaker B
I have no competition.

00:02:31 - Speaker A
That's right. We used to include the dog as, like, the boy for my dad, and my dad was like, I special ordered all girls. I wanted girls. So I was like, that was sweet of him to say for sure.

00:02:44 - Speaker B
Now we messed up having the name so close together, but we had to since me and my wife's names are so close together.

00:02:50 - Speaker A
Okay.

00:02:50 - Speaker B
Everything starts with a J.

00:02:51 - Speaker A
Everyone's a J.

00:02:52 - Speaker B
Yes. So my name is Jamel. J-A-M-E-L. My wife is Janelle. Janel. And then it's Janessa, Jessenia and Jessalyn.

00:03:02 - Speaker A
Oh, my word.

00:03:02 - Speaker B
So we just keep it all together.

00:03:04 - Speaker A
Do you just go, hey, Jay.

00:03:06 - Speaker B
We have nicknames. So we have, like, Boo Boo and Chi Chi and Senny. We just have all types of different names. Or we just said, hey, come here. And if they all come here, they all come here.

00:03:16 - Speaker A
I love it. Would you do that again? Just for those out there are thinking about are they going to use the first letter? All the same? Would you do it again? Do you love it or are you like, wouldn't do it again? I mean, obviously you love your kids and their names.

00:03:27 - Speaker B
I would say I would do it again.

00:03:29 - Speaker A
Yeah.

00:03:29 - Speaker B
Just because I love their names. And we always had names for meanings of it, so there's always a meaning behind their names.

00:03:36 - Speaker A
I'm driving with that already. I ask people all the time, like, what does your name mean? Do you know what your name means?

00:03:41 - Speaker B
I found out when I worked at Walmart that it means, I think it's handsome in Arabic.

00:03:45 - Speaker A
Oh, there you go.

00:03:47 - Speaker B
I don't know if my mother and father did any research on it, but I'll take it.

00:03:51 - Speaker A
Yeah. What do your girl's names mean?

00:03:53 - Speaker B
Oh, I can't remember.

00:03:56 - Speaker A
Cut that part. No worries. One of my favorite things, though, is the meaning of names. By no means am I an expert, but I like to ask. So mine is vivacious and full of life.

00:04:08 - Speaker B
That makes perfect sense.

00:04:10 - Speaker A
Yeah, I think so.

00:04:11 - Speaker B
Awesome.

00:04:11 - Speaker A
And vivacious is kind of just a cool word to say.

00:04:13 - Speaker B
Yeah, that sounds like a cool business.

00:04:15 - Speaker A
But I think it's pretty neat that you're just I'm handsome, so yeah, I.

00:04:19 - Speaker B
Mean, I'll take it.

00:04:21 - Speaker A
All right, well, we're not going to talk about names the whole time, but I do love that. I want to talk a little bit about your role at NEF, nebraska Enterprise Fund.

00:04:30 - Speaker B
Definitely.

00:04:31 - Speaker A
What does that look like? What does that mean? What's your day to day look like? Just to kind of paint us a picture for everything we're going to be talking about.

00:04:37 - Speaker B
Yeah. So it can definitely help out in terms of what NEF is and then how it can relate to people in different places. So Nebraska Enterprise Fund is a community development financial institution. Don't quote me, but I do believe every state has one.

00:04:53 - Speaker A
Okay.

00:04:54 - Speaker B
It could be for different areas such as small business or housing. The main purpose is to serve underdeveloped underutilized communities, to be able to help them in our, quote, start, grow, and prosper. So my position as a Deputy Director of Lending is first and foremost looking at some of our loan policies. Just last year, I created a risk rating that is a tiered system based on the loan amount, what credit should look like, what type of underwriting, what type of collateral, working capital, things of that nature to be able to assist with some of those situations. One big example is with the credit. We don't look at the credit score per se. We look at the credit report. So one aspect I do love about my job is each and every loan has a story. So there's an art of storytelling to be able to tell that story for that business, maybe the start before they created that business, where they're at with this current situation. And then the last question to always answer is why are they not going to a bank? Or why are they not bankable? One of the main reasons is because of lack of working capital or credit. So as the Deputy Director of Lending, I oversee seven loan officers as well as a loan processor in the different communities within Nebraska and southwest Iowa. We do service the entire state and then six counties in Iowa. So being able to give them the information, give them the tools and resources and technology, of course, to be able to provide technical assistance, training and lending for their given areas.

00:06:27 - Speaker A
So just for clarity's sake for everybody, NEF is not a bank, correct? If you were to kind of put it in a sentence or two, how would you describe the general functions of NEF? Like, I can come to you for help with obtaining a loan. Is that how we would say it?

00:06:46 - Speaker B
I would say you would go to NEF when the bank says no.

00:06:49 - Speaker A
Okay, that's a good way to put it, for sure.

00:06:51 - Speaker B
That's a good thing to put on a T shirt.

00:06:53 - Speaker A
Yeah, I like it when the bank says no, come to me. Something like that. So you threw out the word bankable. Can you just define that a little bit?

00:07:02 - Speaker B
So anytime you go to a bank, they usually have their black and white criteria they have to abide by. Coming from wells Fargo and First National. I understand that you have to have a certain credit score to qualify for something, especially for housing. If you want to qualify for the first time home buyers for any type of loan product, you have to have a certain credit score. You might have to have a certain amount down. You might have to be in business for a certain amount of years. So there are certain qualifications in order to receive funding from a bank. And some portions they're not able to do that. One other aspect that we do is gap financing, where maybe they don't need 100% from us, where the bank is comfortable enough to do maybe 60 or 70% and they want the other 30 or 40 to come from somewhere else. In some cases, they did not save up the working capital. Maybe it's they're going through the day to day and they don't have that wiggle room to be able to do so. So we can step in and help and bridge that gap between that financing to bring in that additional 20 30% to get the deal done.

00:08:10 - Speaker A
Okay, that makes sense. So these tend to be smaller loan amounts, is that correct?

00:08:16 - Speaker B
For the majority, for direct lending, we do anywhere from 1000 because we have a credit builders loan as well, that's between 501,000 up to 150,000. We also partner with SBA doing Community Advantage Loans, which is similar to seven a program with banks and that can go up to 250,000. And then in Nebraska, we have what's called SSBCI, which is the state small business credit initiative. And that's through the Department of Economic Development. And we were awarded $10 million for that. And that is a loan matching program where we can go up to, I believe, 5 million in that case. So if a bank does 1 million, we can match them for 1 million. So we are able to offer a little bit more than we typically do, but our average loan size as of right now before the loans start kicking in is 50,000.

00:09:08 - Speaker A
Okay. When somebody is thinking about I need funds to do this new project or to launch this, what do you feel like are some of the steps that they need to go through to determine if they are going to a bank or if they should go somewhere like an NEF or if they should just save their pennies? How do they kind of work through that process to start with?

00:09:30 - Speaker B
So it always starts with the business plan so that's when you get to know more about the person individually and build that relationship, but also get to understand the business and where it's currently at. A lot of times when I tell clients when they're making their business plan to create a page that has milestones not only to know where they came from, but also to where they want to be. So maybe this year maybe they're grossing 100,000, but they're netting maybe 2000 or 1500. So then next we can look at some of those projections and also what their marketing plan is to see a is it more of maybe we need to look at some of the pricing you have. Maybe it's something internally where you can pay for something, or b is it a smaller amount that we can assist with and can they afford that loan? Or C is it something where it's a big project where you have to go to a bank and can you afford that as well? So affordability is huge. It's almost like balancing your checkbook at home. Just making sure if I can make this big purchase, can I do that? And if I can't, what avenues can I take in order to do that? Or another question can be should I even make that jump or do I need to extend that out three to six months and keep doing what I'm doing at this point?

00:10:51 - Speaker A
So a lot of what you're saying, you sound like yourself, but also just as an organization, pretty collaborative where you're looking for solutions and helping walk people through. Do you have people who come through your door and they're not ready but you have resources for them to help them get there? What if I don't really have a business plan or I have part of a business plan but not all of it? Are you just kind of like, well go figure that out or do you have resources for them?

00:11:18 - Speaker B
No, we definitely have resources for it. My motto is always see a need, fill a need. So even if the business comes in as just an idea, a lot of times we're just listening to the client. So they might be venting maybe some of their frustrations with trying to start a business or maybe it's even just things that are happening in their community or surroundings that they're frustrated with. So it's almost trying to take those ideas, taking that information and build it into what's the next step so client can come in with just that idea that hey, I want to start a business, I don't know what I want to start a business with. So we do have a program called Growth Wheel that we can send out to the client that has different focus areas that they can focus on. One aspect I do like about it is it does have smart goals of course. And then also a 30, 60, 90 plan. So that way in 30 days we can focus on this area 60 and 90 and it gives them monthly updates to say hey, this is what I need to do this month, this is what I need to do in 60 days. And then we can come back and take a look at that. And then we also have other different programs or other resource providers that we can refer them to in regards to business plans. We do QuickBooks training, we do training over financial projections. Our loan officers do technical assistance and one on ones with the clients just to be able to help them with that. So we try to do a lot of it in house because if we do that in house then it's more likely that we can help them along the way and then pass them to a community banker. So then now they are bankable because that's the end goal. But then also just building more relationships.

00:12:57 - Speaker A
So I'm just kind of thinking back through like you were talking about how you specifically were coming with like a rubric for whether or not somebody was going to be able to apply and if they met criteria, things like that. Are you taking on people or businesses? So the bank is saying you're not quite ready for us. You're saying, hey, we're willing to possibly work with you. Are you taking on like a higher risk than the bank is or what's kind of the difference there as far as that goes?

00:13:24 - Speaker B
A lot of times we are taking a higher risk. Some examples could be lack of collateral, it could be credit history isn't the standards of banking, could be low working capital. It could be a high risk industry such as the food industry. Or now I know with the trucking industry, it's kind of up and down lately. So a lot of different factors go into that. So I would say as a CDFI we are taking on riskier loans. So that shows that we have to focus a lot on the character of the person to know. Even with some of these issues or trials and tribulations that client may have, this is the character of that individual person. This is the amount of work they put into it. Maybe we're not able to do that certain amount or even in some cases we even say no. I like saying not yet, instead where it's more so, hey, we can't do it today. However, here's one, two and three steps that we need to take in order to get to a yes.

00:14:22 - Speaker A
That makes a lot of sense. It makes me think of people talk about like the old days, right, where I used to be able to go in and I could talk to my banker and just kind of they knew I was honest, they knew I was good for it, that kind of thing. It sounds like this isn't quite that right, where it's just like, yeah, sure, you look like a great person, you're good for it. But it does feel a little more in that vein of like, we can look at more than just my sheet of financials. You're going to actually talk to me.

00:14:50 - Speaker B
It's more than just a number. It's reading between the numbers, reading between the lines, for sure.

00:14:55 - Speaker A
What are you looking for?

00:14:57 - Speaker B
Looking for an individual. A lot of times I'm looking for passion, but then I'm also looking for education for that industry. When I first started, I knew nothing about small business. I did collections before this and then mortgage processing, some consumer processing, but I knew nothing about small business. What cost of goods sold know, I was kind of that person just learning as I go. Sure, I watched Shark Tank from Kingdom Come to learn verbiage, to learn what dejash means, what accounts receivable means in a small business sense, things of that sort. So the amount of research that I did in order to do my job well, I tend to look for clients that have done that research in terms of who is my target market going to be. And if you don't have that information, that's perfectly fine as long as you're open to the information I'm giving. Because to me, it's education before lending. So being able to educate the client on longevity not, here's my loan, what do I do next? I want the client to be prepared. Here's the loan. This is what you do for the next two to three years. Then here's the next step for possible lending. Or I want to see you back in here with maybe franchising or whatever the case may be.

00:16:19 - Speaker A
What I'm finding interesting about all of this is unlike going to a bank who, again, I've worked with very friendly folks in the bank that but it sounds like you really are there almost as like a business coach and mentor as well. You're really going beyond the financials here.

00:16:37 - Speaker B
Well, it's great that you said that because our loan officers, their title is Businessmentor Loan Officer. So they're a mentor first, loan officer second. A lot of times in the banking world, it comes down to time where a lot of the deals that they're working on, they have to spend certain amount of time with those deals. They work on thousands of dollars, millions of dollars in some cases, working on those files that take months at a time. So a lot of times, if the client isn't prepared, they don't have the capacity nor the time to be able to work with the client on a one on one basis.

00:17:12 - Speaker A
Sure.

00:17:12 - Speaker B
A lot of times I've built relationships with community bankers, commercial lenders, things of that nature, to say, hey, if there's any clients that you feel are great fits for the bank and they just need education, we're more than willing to be able to do that. Because I would say anytime I'm talking with my loan officers in terms of their KPIs or how well they're doing in the organization, the first thing I look at is how many one on ones they've done with a client each month. So how many people have you sat in front of and educated? How many people have you worked know, loans are great and I understand, you know, money's great. That's the main part of my job is I always say it's to spend NEF's money. But it's also, how wisely do you spend that money? As well as coming from a collection standpoint, I look at a loan in terms of can they pay for the next five years? Not can I get the deal closed? Because they might come back six months later and say, hey, I never opened or I don't have the funds. I need additional funding. Can we modify a loan? Which for some reason I love collections in that sense because it's also a storytelling aspect to be able to assist a client. Also look at possible modifications or deferrals or whatnot. But that's why I say it always comes back to communication. And it also starts with those one on one conversations.

00:18:32 - Speaker A
So piece I'm picking up here where I'm like, okay, notebooks ready. Write this one down right, is keep a very collaborative spirit with the person you're working with for a loan, wherever that's at, whether that's at a bank, it's with NEF because you can troubleshoot things before things happen.

00:18:48 - Speaker B
Oh, for sure. It's building those relationships, having kind of those resources with you. One thing that we do as well is a bail series. So being able to have a banker, accountant, insurance agent or lawyer that you're able to have those conversations with, to say, hey, I'm having issues with this, or I need understanding in these areas. If you're not well versed in those areas, having those built relationships, to be able to say, hey, I'm having an insurance issue. I need to contact someone, instead of, hey, I have this issue yesterday, I need help ASAP or something's going to happen, being able to kind of forecast that and be able to bounce ideas off of people.

00:19:27 - Speaker A
I was thinking too, I'm like bail, like bail you out, basically. Yeah, they bail you out before you need it, which is for sure. Okay, but this is a touchy subject for people. People don't tend to like to talk about their money, for sure, and they don't want to look like they can't handle it, right? Like you don't want to look incompetent. You don't want to look like you're failing. And so this is definitely an area where I see a lot with business owners, I've got to say, myself included, have overinflated numbers or set or left key pieces of information out or kind of looked at my report this way instead of this way.

00:20:06 - Speaker B
Sure.

00:20:07 - Speaker A
And what I'm hearing, though, is like, don't do that because you're only hurting.

00:20:11 - Speaker B
Yourself at the end of the day. And then also we have an underwriter on staff that loves to dive in and find information. So usually if you're telling a certain story and it's not that story, then they kind of give us that information to say, hey, maybe you need to ask them about this aspect, or why is there a certain charge every single month for this amount? Or whatever the case may be. But I think it all starts with kind of going back to that relationship piece. If you don't trust me as a loan officer, then you're going to give me that information, the wrong information, or you might say, hey, here's the information, but I'm going to leave this piece out of it. But if you're building that relationship and then you trust me as a loan officer, then you're going to say, hey, here's where I'm at now, can you assist me where I'm at today? So, I mean, it starts on our end as well. And I think that's kind of the notion that the bankers get as well is I'm going to give them the information as soon as they say no. Oh, they never got to hear me out or anything like that. So I think it's a part of vulnerability that's very hard to do. I know I'm actually reading a book because I started doing 75 hard. Do you know what that is?

00:21:25 - Speaker A
I've heard of it, but I have.

00:21:26 - Speaker B
Not dived and I'll jump back in. But it's two workouts, 45 minutes. One has to be outside. Then it's ten pages of a book that's nonfiction. Then it is sticking to a diet. And me and my wife are doing a high protein diet. And then there is pictures every day. So daily progress pictures. And then the fun gallon of water a day.

00:21:55 - Speaker A
I'd say there's a water intake right now. Yeah.

00:21:57 - Speaker B
So it's a gallon of water. And hopefully I don't where's your water bottle here? It's in the car. Okay. You get tired of drinking water sometimes, so I throw in a meal or anything like that. But the book that I'm reading is Entangling Emotions. And the chapter I read yesterday discusses with relationships on how to handle emotions. So one thing that I learned is the fastest emotion is anger. So you might be having a conversation with me about just the loan process in general on documentation that we need, or it's also feedback coming from the underwriter saying, this is the information we request, or can you verify this income? And anger is the first thing that comes to mind.

00:22:40 - Speaker A
Yeah. You don't trust me. I got to verify it.

00:22:42 - Speaker B
Exactly. So a lot of times, instead of the loan officer responding in a way of empathy, which I'm learning more on empathy as well as being in their shoes, but also thinking the same way that they are. So if I'm Vivian, what kind of responses would I give or how would I feel as Vivian? Not as Jamel, but as Vivian? So being able to go into their shoes and understand as a small business owner, you might have spoken to two, three, four other people that might have just told you the same thing.

00:23:17 - Speaker A
Right.

00:23:17 - Speaker B
So it's a trigger for them that you're asking for this information. Oh, so now I'm going to get the same result. So that's where the educational piece and vulnerability aspect comes in. Being able to explain, hey, we need this information not to hurt you, but also to help you. Because if we have the full picture on the table as a CDFI and being a storyteller, if you will, being able to tell, hey, this is the information they provided to us. This is what we see. This is how the money will help transform this business, help them grow this business. I understand if X, Y, and Z doesn't look good. However, this aspect does as well. And that's where kind of the shark tank aspect comes in, where if I'm able to answer those questions to our committee and being able to say, hey, I believe in this business because they were vulnerable with me. And I trust and believe that if there were any issues payment wise, then we can have those conversations about modifying it. Or we might set up a payment arrangement where maybe it's a business that's like a lawn care business where in the summer it might be higher months. Winter it might be lower months. Anyway, to get the deal done, to show hey. Because you were vulnerable with me, because you were transparent, here's what we were able to do and this is what we can do moving forward.

00:24:40 - Speaker A
I really like that. And I'm thinking back, I enjoy sharing my mistakes on this podcast because I think they're so important. But getting started, I remember feeling like I had to look like I had it together, which I know I've shared on here before, but the money area is definitely one of those. And so early on having conversations with people, I would not be vulnerable with basically anybody because I was like, well, I have to look like I'm put together whether I am or not. And I mean, that was anything from potential clients to friends to family to banks, the whole nine yards. What I've definitely learned to co sign what you're saying is now I might be maybe overly vulnerable right where we have talked about, okay, if we wanted to bring in funding, what would that look like? And I'm right away now going, let's go talk to somebody and say we don't know if we're ready yet, but what do we need to do to get ready?

00:25:34 - Speaker B
Exactly?

00:25:35 - Speaker A
And that has made me feel much more comfortable to say, I don't know, maybe I am ready and I don't know it, or maybe I'm not. But can you help me figure out if I am? And if I'm not, I'm open to what the steps are and I need to know now. Even if we're talking ten years down the road, it's nice to just kind of have a game plan. So being vulnerable feels much better now than not being vulnerable did all those years.

00:26:00 - Speaker B
Oh, for sure. There's an intentionality behind it, for sure. Because even being on a podcast or being on a panel or just talking amongst other people, the more vulnerable you are, it shows what your, I guess, testimony is and what your story is. And you might touch someone to say, hey, this is your testimony. It's very similar to mine. What did you do? Or oh, as a CDFI, okay, where did you go to get information? Or how did you get to the point where you are today?

00:26:31 - Speaker A
So I would love it if you're able to share any stories as examples. Obviously, I know you can't divulge specific information, but can you paint a picture of this type of business came in, they wanted to do things like this, and we were able to help in this way. Are there any stories like that just to help kind of paint some examples?

00:26:51 - Speaker B
For sure. So I would say as a client that I still work with till this day, she does it's almost like an event venue type space. But she also had different licenses and things of that nature. So when she came to me, she was very timid on her personal finances, on if she would even qualify for a loan based on what her personal finances looked like. So it was even a hurdle just to get her to apply in the first place. So a lot of it was building that relationship with that client. Also meeting her where she was, she worked an eight to five job. So a lot of conversations was either late at night or on the weekend or just random. I would get a random I would send her random emails at 03:00 a.m. In the morning. She would respond back. I had to learn to hit send later instead of send now. Yes, but it was just different conversations. When she finally applied, we're able to go through information and she was able to get a loan. But that was just the first step. Just because there were different aspects of the business in terms of build out, where it was more build out than she needed. So not only did she have to apply again, but she had to go through the similar process again and mentally get through that hurdle of should I even apply in the first place. She was able to get that loan to help with that business now full circle, that business is doing great. She's going to be opening up an event center here soon to see the culmination of where she was. And I mean, don't get me wrong, this person is an amazing person. She's even a mentor to me now based on the relationship that we have. She's helped me with a lot of things as well. But just seeing the growth as a small business owner now and being able to structure that in a way that helps the community as well, I think was an amazing testimony in itself.

00:28:54 - Speaker A
It is. It kind of gives you a little chills, right? Where I love that you keep saying this is about stories and the money is a piece of the story, right? Being able to have that capital that you need. But really what I heard in that was a build up of confidence that then can spill out into the community. And I think that's huge. Especially as I think about certain underserved communities, populations, areas in our city, but just across the nation and anywhere. I think a lot of times there is that I just don't feel the confidence. And how do you help build people's confidence to get there?

00:29:35 - Speaker B
I think a lot of it comes back to the educational piece. I think people feel more confident with the more information they know so it just starts with starting from the ground up. It's just if you're learning how to ride a bike, the more you ride the bike, the more confidence you have. So a lot of times the mindset has to go from being an employee to an owner, and that transition is huge and hard to actually do. So being able to make that transition also to trust different people with different aspects of the business, but then also just trust like, hey, I have my ducks in a row, here's my information. That's definitely the challenge is being able to educate clients, give that information, and then have the client find out that they have purpose. And their purpose is that business, that they are experts in that field and they should be proud of what they've done now and what they will do in the future. So my job is just being a catalyst to say, hey, I want to support your dreams, I want to support your aspirations. Here's how to show it on paper. So that way if the fund IRS comes by or if a bank comes by, if anyone comes by asking for this information that you're prepared and can give that information without having I like calling them fig leaves or having shadow casted on it where they feel uncomfortable showing that information. I want people to be proud of their tax returns, proud of their bank statements, proud of their PNLs, the whole nine.

00:31:08 - Speaker A
So I want to transition into some of the terminology just a little bit. We don't have to cover it all. But before we do that, I did just want to say we've known NEF and your whole team for a couple of years now, and we get to do some partnering on some social media things as well as some blogs. And so I just was going to point out, and we'll put in the show notes, if people are interested in reading some of those stories, I have found so many of them inspiring. And I know the owner of Heavy Hitters was on our podcast and that is somebody that NEF has worked with and they are inspiring stories for sure. And so we'll make sure there's a link there so people can go check out and just kind of see and go, okay, these are people like know, I think sometimes we go, oh, that's somebody else. But when you can see these folks and I know we've gone out and done photos with them and they're just really cool, inspiring people, but they're also everyday people. They're not celebrity status have it all together exactly. So we'll link to that for sure. But one of the areas that can be intimidating for sure is just understanding some of the terminology or feeling like you are truly have a financial literacy piece in your tool belt. Can you speak to that a little bit? Like when we talk about financial literacy, what are we talking about what are kind of the starting points? What are the basics? Is there some terminology we should know? Talk to me about that because I know that's an important thing to you.

00:32:39 - Speaker B
Yeah. So when I graduated from high school, I wanted to do accounting. So it was an easier transition for me because I had the information behind what's debits and credits and all that fun stuff. So when I'm working with clients, I usually work on projections, numbers first because those are easier to explain. So I first start off with your expenses. Your expenses is usually anything you spend on the business, whether that be insurance, advertising, if there's any leased equipment you have to have rent down to the cable. So being able to know what expenses you have or maybe some expenses that you don't have monthly, but you know, within the first year you're going to have those expenses. I know in some cases if you have, like, dues and subscriptions, maybe toll services, whatever the case may be, getting to know what expenses your business have, you don't have to know too much in terms of what the terminology is, but even just okay, what do I have to spend on a day to day basis to make this business go right?

00:33:50 - Speaker A
What's going out the door?

00:33:52 - Speaker B
And then next I would say is payroll. And I would say that's owners salary. So payroll is taking you out of it. If you're hiring employees, whether it be on a W two basis or it's a contracting basis, do you have money set aside to pay them? And then also the fund IRS is saying, okay, well, here's all the Social Security, all the payroll, enrollments and benefits and all that fun stuff. Are you setting aside the certain percentage depending on what state you're in, saving those funds up, depending on if you have a w two or a contractor or not? And then lastly, with the owner salary, how much money do you need to survive on a day to day basis? If this is a part time small business and you have a full time job, you don't have to worry too much about it. But if your livelihood depends on this business, you have to project 20 00 30 00 40 00 whatever the case may be. And then you also have cost of goods sold. I always like the hot dog business for some reason, but with hot dogs, what do you have to spend on the actual hot dog? The bread, the ketchup, mustard, relish, the whole nine. So that's cost of goods sold. So once you have all of that, you come up with a number, maybe it's 5000. Then, you know, from like a hustle mind standpoint, I have to make at least $5,000 each month just to break even, which is just to pay expenses. Pay yourself, pay employees and then buy cost of goods sold if need be. And that's your gross sale. So that's what you're going to make at the top. But I think a lot of people believe that if their top number is so high, oh, I'm making a million dollars, because that's what it says up top. But I encourage people, don't look at the top of the paper, look at the bottom, because that takes out the expenses. You might be negative, you might be positive. The goal, of course, is to be positive at the bottom, not the top.

00:35:54 - Speaker A
I love how you just broke it down. And the hot dog analogy is great because then you can always look at it, too. It took me a while early on to understand the cost of goods sold part. I'm like, isn't it all? Like, I have to do it all. And to use your hot dog analogy and correct me if I'm wrong, but I would say, like, the cart is not a cost of goods sold. I have to have it whether I'm selling hot dogs or not.

00:36:16 - Speaker B
Right.

00:36:16 - Speaker A
But I have to have a hot dog to sell a hot dog.

00:36:18 - Speaker B
And you're not selling the cart and.

00:36:20 - Speaker A
I'm not selling the cart.

00:36:21 - Speaker B
Right?

00:36:21 - Speaker A
Yeah, exactly right. That took me I remember early on being like sitting down with an accountant, and they were kind of going through because one of the first things they said was, I mean, people are throwing around PNL and balance sheet and all these things. I'm like, what are they talking about? And I love it. Now, I think it's super fun to look at all that because to your point, it does paint a story of our business.

00:36:43 - Speaker B
Oh, it does.

00:36:44 - Speaker A
And I know for so many, it can be like, oh, I don't want to look at that. It feels icky or I don't get it, or it's complicated. And as I've gotten further into it, not accounting status, but as I've gotten further into it, I'm like, I actually enjoy it. I can even say now I enjoy it even when the numbers are not good, because now I know what I need to do, and I know in my mind I could build it up to be like, oh, my gosh, I'm hundreds of thousands of dollars behind. Get in there and go, oh, ten grand. That's doable, right?

00:37:18 - Speaker B
For sure.

00:37:18 - Speaker A
I can figure that out.

00:37:19 - Speaker B
And that's what's good about projections, is depending on the type of business, you might already project that maybe February is a slow month because of the weather, or maybe august is a big month because it's back to school. So your mood doesn't change based on the numbers anymore because you've already solidified that your numbers are going to be this based on what you did with marketing. So, like you said, it's telling that story, but then you're not shocked when you look at your account and it says a certain amount.

00:37:53 - Speaker A
Shock is not my favorite thing. Like, surprise, that can be fun. But shock. And that is true. And I can't tell you how many times I've talked to business owners and friends and things like that, and they're like, oh, I've got it all in my head. And to me, I go, that's a nice first start, but you got to get it down and just validate that what is in your head is true. Because sometimes you're off, and sometimes what you're off is important.

00:38:19 - Speaker B
Correct. So that's why if people can't afford QuickBooks or anything like that I know growing up, I just used Excel and just plugged in because you have to think of it also, like, let's say your household expenses and how much you bring in. So it's like a personal budget kind of thing. It's almost the same way, but looking at it from a business standpoint.

00:38:38 - Speaker A
Yeah.

00:38:39 - Speaker B
So a lot of times I tell people, if you can't afford an accountant or can't afford QuickBooks, then just use an Excel sheet and just keep track of everything. And then you can start learning. Like, okay, when I took a break this time, it was a little bit lower. Maybe I need to make sure I'm working on this Thursday. Or maybe you're tracking it by the hour for a hot dog stand and saying, okay, well, anytime after 08:00, sales slow down, so there's no point in me staying past 08:00 because sales are starting to go down around that time.

00:39:09 - Speaker A
Yeah, we have found that super helpful as our business has been established for a couple of years now. We have the history because we tracked it, and early on, we weren't tracking all the right stuff.

00:39:21 - Speaker B
That happens, and that's fine. We were tracking the bittersweet part of being a business owner is that I would say the first three years, the first one, you're in full bliss that, hey, I started this business, someone wrote me a check. This is one of because everything is a first time for the most part. The second year is, I would say, the biggest roller coaster because you had that high the first year. Now there's expectations behind that where if you did well the first year, you expect to do great the second year. So, please, if January hits and it's way lower than last year, you're in full panic mode. And then the third year, you start leveling out and you start to feel like, okay, I'm a veteran now. I kind of get what I'm doing. So it's just being a sponge at the end of the day.

00:40:14 - Speaker A
Yeah. And I'm all for track it. I mean, start tracking anytime, for sure. Like, write that down, track this, start now. But if you're early on, start, even though you might be like, I don't really have much to track. Right. Like, I've been talking my husband's just gone out on his own with his own business.

00:40:30 - Speaker B
Awesome.

00:40:31 - Speaker A
We're talking a little bit, and there's sort of that conversation of like, but I'm not making anything. And I was like, exactly. So track that. Track what's going out, track what's coming in. It doesn't matter if it's $100 or whatever it is, because if you can build the muscle and the practice now, when it's hundreds of thousands of dollars, it's actually no different.

00:40:50 - Speaker B
You're just still oh, for sure. If you couldn't manage 30,000 before, then you probably couldn't manage 60,000.

00:40:57 - Speaker A
Yeah, that's a good tip.

00:40:58 - Speaker B
So one thing that I like doing is, like, DoorDash Uber eats and stuff like that. I like doing that just for the extra funds and stuff like that. But I use different apps to track mileage anytime I get oil changes, just tracking anything. And then also what areas I'm in. So I live in Bennington, which is a little outside of Omaha. So then my main road I stay on is Maple, because Maple has every single food known to. So as long as I stay on there, I know I can make a certain amount, and I also make goals for myself, which you can also for gross sales is, hey, I want to make a certain amount daily. I want to make a certain amount monthly. So it almost gives you a drive on. Okay, I didn't make $100 today. Do I need to make that up tomorrow, or do I need to work an additional day? It's almost like weight loss, where a lot of times people weigh themselves daily, weekly, monthly. It's all about the end result. But how you get there can be in many different ways.

00:41:58 - Speaker A
So a lot of people are maybe not as jazzed about this as you and I.

00:42:02 - Speaker B
Probably not. Yeah, numbers is definitely not exciting to some people, and that's okay. And you don't have to be an expert, because I'm for sure not the expert expert in it. But if you feel that you're not an expert in that realm, then that kind of goes back to building those relationships with different resources. Find an accountant, not just any old accountant, but also ask them questions about your business that they should be able to answer, because come tax time, they should understand the type of business that you're running. So make sure if you're I usually tell people to interview accountants, don't just pick one based on reviews, but also interview them because you're also building a relationship with them, because they're also looking over your finances, if that's the case. So if you don't love finances, I would say at least understand it to the point where you can run your business knowing if it's doing well or not. But with the back end things, I know some people just say, hey, I'll get my accountant to send this document over, or they'll just add them to the email. That's perfectly fine. But at least get some type of education to know what's coming in, what's coming out.

00:43:13 - Speaker A
Yeah, I think that's really good advice, because there are a lot of great accountants out there. And I know one of the things that we have done as a business is just finding an accountant who has the same financial philosophy that we want to use. And so we actually recently switched accountants. We still like and would recommend the accountant we had before. He was fabulous, like, no complaints. But we decided we really wanted to use this profit first model and in talking and looking and also we decided we are going to go with an accountant who that is their main thing.

00:43:49 - Speaker B
And it makes sense.

00:43:50 - Speaker A
Not because the other accountant couldn't or wouldn't or that, but we were like, we were looking for somebody who kind of specialized in that.

00:43:56 - Speaker B
Right.

00:43:56 - Speaker A
And so, yeah, finding the right person, we asked around a lot. We asked for referrals, we talked to people, but we wanted to find somebody who had a similar mindset, and there are various mindsets out there about finances, so that's an important one. Okay, well, as we're starting to wind down here a little bit, but now I'm starting to get really jazzed, I do like the numbers, and it kind of surprises me at times because when it came to math, terrible, just terrible in school. And so my parents were like, I was a home school kid, and they tore their hair out, and my dad would sit with me and try and try and try, because he's good at it and all that. And I went through the books and, I mean, I'm an overachiever. I want all the gold stars. It was a total mental wreck. Roller coaster for a couple of years, right? And my parents finally said, okay, look, we're going to stop trying to get you through. It was like algebra. Half I wasn't even like, all the way there, you know what I mean? And I'm like calculus. I'm like, that was the pie in the sky. Never going to happen in my mind. And so they finally said, okay, look, Vivian, you can either keep struggling for this and get it done, or you can take this full blown business math course. And I was like, Take the business math course. Let's try that. Loved it. Because all of a sudden it all applied.

00:45:13 - Speaker B
Exactly. That's the biggest thing. I was a big math guy.

00:45:18 - Speaker A
Were you?

00:45:19 - Speaker B
That was my thing. And that's why I decided to do accounting. That's why I love looking at numbers, because I think that numbers also tell a story.

00:45:28 - Speaker A
Do you like theoretical math and stuff, too, though?

00:45:31 - Speaker B
No. If it's a word problem, I don't.

00:45:34 - Speaker A
Yeah, like out, right?

00:45:35 - Speaker B
No. If it has words in it.

00:45:37 - Speaker A
No, yeah, I can't do that. Words in it has words in it or numbers that don't exist and stuff.

00:45:42 - Speaker B
I don't know because I'm in school right now for business administration, and I'm doing college algebra. So there's like the imaginary so there's like the three I or negative three.

00:45:52 - Speaker A
I. Yeah, you lost me.

00:45:56 - Speaker B
I can do it so that it makes sense. But then if you ask me in three months, I couldn't tell you how I got the answer.

00:46:01 - Speaker A
We won't have you on for that conversation. I'm not going to have that conversation on this podcast. But what's fun about it is when it's your math, it's your business for sure. I think that's where it can be more fun, even if it's not your.

00:46:16 - Speaker B
Thing, because it's telling that story.

00:46:18 - Speaker A
Telling the story.

00:46:19 - Speaker B
So it's telling you how well you're doing or how bad you're doing, or maybe the business needs something in a certain area so it's more relatability to it.

00:46:29 - Speaker A
Yeah, I know we won't be able to dive into all of this completely in time we have, but bring me back again.

00:46:34 - Speaker B
That's fine.

00:46:34 - Speaker A
Awesome. Good. I know that community is important to you, for sure. You've given us questionnaires back for social media posts and all these things and this community piece really plays in. Can you talk about that a little bit as far as why is that so important to you? How is it that you're integrating that into your role? Because I don't know that everyone thinks of people who work in loans and such as being community minded.

00:47:00 - Speaker B
Right. And I think that's the tough situation is when you're working in a lending standpoint, especially if you tell a person no. I understand if a person takes it personal because you're telling them no to their so called dreams and everything of.

00:47:18 - Speaker A
That, to their baby, almost in a sense.

00:47:20 - Speaker B
Oh, for sure. And it's definitely a fine line to let them know, hey, we're saying no. However, here's situations regarding that. Just personally for me, having three girls and seeing them grow right now they're five and then the twins are turning three, but wanting to see them in a place where they can thrive and just be themselves at the end of the day and not be afraid to voice their opinion over certain things. I think a lot of times in the community you're not able to voice certain aspects because when you might give a certain take on something or you might give a person a certain answer or give certain questions regarding something, people unfortunately have to take it as a personal attack. Sure, where I'm the type of person where we can have a conversation about it. But at the end of the day, what community means to me is also love. So being able to love on that person, but also understand where they're coming from, and they're coming from different sides of it. In Nebraska, we have Omaha, which is more urban than anything, which is underserved in itself, but then there's also western Nebraska, which is totally rural, and then there's a story behind that as well. So being able to go to different communities, learn what their needs are, but also what they're great at and what makes them that specific community. So going to Carney and Scottsbluff and Norfolk and Columbus and learning different things about them, not comparing them to Omaha, even Omaha versus Council Bluffs being one river over, there's two entirely different communities. So learning those communities, being able to get stories from each person, whether that be a client, economic developers, different bankers, things of that sort, being able to build community and kind of make the area that we serve into one big village, so to speak, where if there's a resource that a person needs, then we can give them that resource for it. A lot of times growing up, it was based on what zip code you were in terms of what you were going to do in life or absolutely. You have a certain percentage of doing this if you do this, or you can only do this that.

00:49:41 - Speaker A
And the third, well, I mean, even down to what school you went to or what your name is. Yeah.

00:49:47 - Speaker B
Oh, for sure. Being able to kind of break that mold and also be like the mentor piece not only to my children, but also for the younger generation or even older generation, in some cases not just in Omaha, but just around the entire community, or even with other CDFIs that I meet with in other conferences or wherever I go. Just being a beacon of light, so to speak. I just love to be able to do that, but then also attach numbers to it, and also attach the small business aspect of it, since the small business sector affects every aspect of life. Being able to just drive around the city and say, hey, I know this person. We assisted with a loan or technical assistance or mentorship, whatever the case may be. It's just building one big family at the end of the day.

00:50:36 - Speaker A
Yeah, it is really cool. And it's one of the things I love about being a small business owner or business owner is you get to create your opportunities and there's still challenges. And there are still challenges like you mentioned, based off of zip code, or if you're in a rural area, an urban area, there's so many of those. And yet when you are controlling it, you do get to control more of the variables. Not all of them, but then one of the things I really love is then you also get to help control the variables for the people you bring on and the people you affect. And so I know for some, I look at some things and I go, I don't know if I was in a traditional work environment if I would have the same access opportunities to certain things just based off of for example, I have an associate's degree, right? Doors are closed already to certain things. But as a business owner, I'm still getting access to that level of getting to exercise my brain or do things that I wouldn't have if not having that bachelor's degree, et cetera. So it's one of the things I love. And I love that you are helping equip business owners like me and others like us who are trying to build these dreams and reach for these goals that we might not have access to otherwise for any number of reasons.

00:51:53 - Speaker B
Exactly.

00:51:54 - Speaker A
Pretty cool stuff. All right, so I like to wrap up with some rapid fire questions.

00:52:00 - Speaker B
All right? You didn't want to tell me the topics?

00:52:03 - Speaker A
I didn't want to tell you topics, but if you've listened to other podcasts.

00:52:06 - Speaker B
Before, I should have did some training.

00:52:08 - Speaker A
You can pick them up.

00:52:09 - Speaker B
I wanted it to be fresh, honest answer.

00:52:13 - Speaker A
It's good. I'm going to start switching these up, I think, soon, so we'll see. All right, but in your opinion, what do you think is the biggest misconception about owning a business?

00:52:24 - Speaker B
That's definitely a tough one. I would say the misconception behind the business is that it's easy to do. I think a lot of people jump in thinking, oh, I'm just going to start this business and make millions of dollars for sure. And that's definitely not the case. Even the type of business that you start, it's not always the case. So a lot of times I always tell people to do research on the business. For example, personally, I almost wanted to start a shoe business, like a shoe reseller business.

00:52:57 - Speaker A
Okay.

00:52:58 - Speaker B
The amount of time and energy that goes into it, I didn't have the patience for. And I felt in the city that we're in, as opposed to Dallas or Houston or La. Or anything like that, I mean, even right now, there's not really a shoe reseller store in Omaha or in the area.

00:53:19 - Speaker A
Yeah, the Midwest might not have the best shoe taste.

00:53:24 - Speaker B
No. And also after doing research, a lot of people go to Raw Served Foot Locker and try getting it's just a lot that goes into it that I felt it wouldn't fit me with the amount of time, I don't think I would have made it something where I didn't have to work anymore. I can just focus on that.

00:53:42 - Speaker A
Right.

00:53:42 - Speaker B
So you have to identify, is the business a viable business based on the area that you're in, the market you're trying to do? One thing I'm doing with Unitech is a ten week Cohort that goes over the Business Model canvas, and this is basically pre business plan. So this is going over your customer segmentation, this is going over your market, your revenue. A lot of it is focused more on with the class that we're doing, more on the science and tech aspect of it. But with the business that you're starting, or in that Case, what invention you're creating, what effect does it have in your area, and does it make sense? So that's the first question I always tell clients is, does your business make sense in 2023 in the place that you're in.

00:54:35 - Speaker A
Yeah, that's good. Have you thought about affiliate marketing shoes or getting involved that way?

00:54:39 - Speaker B
I did, and then my kids were born.

00:54:43 - Speaker A
Fair enough. All right, well, with that in mind, then, what's an important piece of advice you have actually been given that you've actually applied in your life?

00:54:56 - Speaker B
I would say sometimes we get advice.

00:54:58 - Speaker A
And we don't apply it.

00:54:59 - Speaker B
I know one thing that I learned from being in a call center is anytime a client is irate or upset, don't ever take it personally that it's not you that they're upset with, that you have to find out what they're upset with. In the call center situation, it was easy. They were upset with I worked with toys arrests or babies arrests, so they're not upset with you. So when clients are venting or upset or maybe they're having a bottleneck behind doing the financials, or they had a slow month, or maybe there was a missed payment or anything along those lines, they're upset because of the situation that's happening. So don't look at it as Jamel did something wrong. It's, hey, there's an issue that needs to be resolved. How can we resolve it together?

00:55:55 - Speaker A
Yeah, that's good. Don't take it personally.

00:55:57 - Speaker B
Correct.

00:55:58 - Speaker A
That's good. What would you tell your 18 year old self, knowing what you know now?

00:56:04 - Speaker B
Oh, that is a great one. The first thing I would say is, continue dating the woman that you're with, because she's going to be your wife. Another thing I would say is college isn't always the main step to go to right out of high school. I went to college because I assume that's the only way that I can succeed. A lot of it can be military. My brother's in the military. It could be a trade school. It could be just finding some time to find yourself, because a lot of times at 18, you're not even fully developed mentally yet. So being able to make that huge decision at 1718 on should I go to college or should I go to the military? I would say focus on yourself in a sense of what can you do to better yourself for the next year, next five years, make that plan and be okay with making changes to that plan. At that age, I would say the 20s were my years of trying to maneuver and find myself during that time. I mean, I'm a fresh 30. I'm turning 31. But at least now I'm at a point where I feel solidified in what I want to do in life, and I don't feel like I knew that at 18 or even 2021.

00:57:21 - Speaker A
Yeah, I think that's fair.

00:57:22 - Speaker B
So just being open to change and being open to not following the norm in certain situations, yeah.

00:57:30 - Speaker A
Do you have a favorite kind of kickback and relax beverage?

00:57:34 - Speaker B
Beverage. Well, now it's just been water.

00:57:37 - Speaker A
Right. Gallon of water a day. Right.

00:57:38 - Speaker B
Gallon of water. So it's just been water. I'm not big on too many drinks, per se. I know. Before I started the challenge, my wife introduced me to High Noons, and I was drinking a lot of High Noons. We floated down the Elkhorn River a couple of weeks back when my cousin was in town and we had some High Noons. So nice. I would say that and then maybe I know when I was a kid, chocolate milk was fantastic.

00:58:04 - Speaker A
Oh, my husband loves chocolate milk. It's like, always in there and it's his, so he can drink it out of a jug if he wants.

00:58:12 - Speaker B
Oh, yeah, I can do that anymore now. Late at night. I know. Like when the kids finally go to sleep and me and my wife have time for ourselves. Pre 75 hard. It is definitely milk and cookies.

00:58:24 - Speaker A
Yeah. Nice. Love it. Is there a song, book or podcast that's inspiring you right now? I know you mentioned some books you.

00:58:31 - Speaker B
Were reading, so I don't want to touch on the book song. You know, I'm going to pull up my phone really fast.

00:58:37 - Speaker A
Yeah. We're going to have to start having people like we're going to insert I think when they bring up songs, we're going to start inserting like, a little clip of it so people can get a taste.

00:58:48 - Speaker B
You might as well. Yeah, that's a good thing.

00:58:51 - Speaker A
I definitely have, like a list, different lists I go to for the different moods and things like that.

00:58:59 - Speaker B
One thing that and maybe is this more of a plug or anything, but me and my wife went with her brother and his significant other to the Adele concert this year, and for some reason everyone in there cried somehow, some way during one of the songs.

00:59:20 - Speaker A
Right.

00:59:20 - Speaker B
So one of the songs that I think touched me the most was Easy On Me, and I was never a person that really listened to Adele like that.

00:59:27 - Speaker A
Okay.

00:59:28 - Speaker B
But after the concert, I usually listen to her probably a couple of times a day.

00:59:33 - Speaker A
Pretty soulful like on your heart, hits.

00:59:37 - Speaker B
You in a certain spot. So I would say easy on me is one.

00:59:42 - Speaker A
Yeah.

00:59:43 - Speaker B
And then if I had to name another, I would say any, because I'm big into Christian hip hop and then also gospel. It's almost like Christian R and B, I like to call it.

00:59:53 - Speaker A
Okay, so I got to ask you then, do you know KJ 52?

00:59:56 - Speaker B
Yeah.

00:59:57 - Speaker A
All right, there we go. Nobody ever does.

01:00:01 - Speaker B
I do. He hasn't done anything.

01:00:03 - Speaker A
Forever. Forever. That's what my sister and I look.

01:00:06 - Speaker B
If I remember the name of the song, I used to listen to a lot, but there was something that he made that I really enjoyed. I can't remember the name of it.

01:00:13 - Speaker A
We still get the whole coke fry and cheeseburger thing going. This is cheesy sister stuff we're talking about now.

01:00:19 - Speaker B
Nothing wrong with that, but no, I listened to like, 116 with, like, Lecrae and triple E. I know, NF was just in Lincoln not too long ago. So, yeah, I would say anything spiritual usually touches me and stuff like that.

01:00:34 - Speaker A
Yeah, that's cool. The first ever music I bought was on a cassette tape, and it was the News Boys.

01:00:42 - Speaker B
Oh, I went to their concert. It was maybe like, three or four years ago. I still have their T shirt.

01:00:47 - Speaker A
I remember thinking that was really, like, pretty wild out there music.

01:00:51 - Speaker B
Well, the first song I ever heard from them was God's Not Dead. Yeah, that was the first one. That's because I saw the movie and I'm like, oh, we should go to the concert because we saw the movie.

01:00:59 - Speaker A
Fair enough. I don't always find people who know these, so we got to talk about a little bit. Okay. What excites you the most about the future?

01:01:06 - Speaker B
The future? I would have to say the kids growing up. Yeah, definitely. They're at that age now where one is going to be starting pre K. Then the others will be there. Well, no, it's kindergarten now. Kindergarten. Then the other two eventually will as well. And just also growth within the company as well. Just because of different programs that we have now and different people we have on our team is a great team. So just seeing the trajectory of ways that we can help the community even more. And then also, like I said, just with the kids and seeing them grow.

01:01:41 - Speaker A
Yeah, that's cool. Okay, last two here what's something people often get wrong about you.

01:01:49 - Speaker B
Wrong about me, I think because how I walk and I have that resting face that I'm not approachable. And usually I'm pretty good at keeping conversations or another thing I get a lot is, did you play football in high school? And the answer is always, no, I played basketball, and then I played soccer a year.

01:02:13 - Speaker A
All right. Yeah. You have an athletic build.

01:02:16 - Speaker B
I would say kind of, maybe used to, but yeah, I'll get it back somehow.

01:02:21 - Speaker A
Well, you're working on it, right? Working on it right now.

01:02:23 - Speaker B
I'm working on it.

01:02:24 - Speaker A
All right, last one here, which I think you'll have some fun with, what do you feel business owners can do that makes the world a better place?

01:02:32 - Speaker B
Be authentically them? I think a lot of times people feel as if they have to conform themselves to what society wants a certain business to be. Or you have to market this way, you have to do your business this way. Kind of going back to hot dogs. You have to have relish on your hot dog, or it won't taste good at all. But you can be yourself, and you can make the craziest ideas, craziest inventions, and who's to say that they won't sell? There was a fitness business that I was assisting, and they moved from Texas to Omaha. And when they were in Texas, they had a business plan, and I believe it was a partner stole that business plan and thought that they could still do the business, but the business ended up folding. And the reason behind that, and they agree as well, and I think they were the ones that said it as well, is the owners of the business created that business plan. So that business plan wasn't tailored to just anyone. It was tailored to those specific owners. So a lot of times when people are creating their business plans and they ask, hey, is this too far fetched? I will say, no, it's not. Because the one thing that children have that we tend to lose over time is imagination. And I want people to keep that for as long as possible.

01:03:58 - Speaker A
People are going to get tired of me talking about this. I've brought it up and I don't know the last couple of episodes, but you just resparked for me. I'm like I have always had this dream where I want to have an ice cream and cat food delivery service because I think they go hand in hand because when I was collegeish age, I would find myself at the grocery store at 11:00 at night, always buying cat food and ice cream. So I think there's a market for it.

01:04:26 - Speaker B
Well, you can kind of do that now, you know, DoorDash delivers cat food.

01:04:29 - Speaker A
I know, but this is just for cat food and ice cream.

01:04:33 - Speaker B
Well, if it makes sense on paper, that's right.

01:04:36 - Speaker A
Get the numbers together, Vivian.

01:04:37 - Speaker B
We'll talk.

01:04:39 - Speaker A
This might go the way of your shoe business for where we're at. I don't know.

01:04:42 - Speaker B
Maybe not. I'm not going to shut it down. I got to see it on paper first.

01:04:46 - Speaker A
I appreciate it. I'm going to be really sad someday when I've mentioned it 18 times on the podcast. Everyone's so tired of hearing it. And then five years later but maybe.

01:04:57 - Speaker B
Because one thing also to think of it too, is even that's a perfect example, maybe it's not the business itself that it happens. Maybe you create a podcast called Ice.

01:05:06 - Speaker A
Cream and Cat Food.

01:05:08 - Speaker B
Then you have like, T shirts and marketing and the whole nine. So it might manifest in one way or another.

01:05:13 - Speaker A
You never know. And I do like that how things can spark the next thing. Well, thanks so much for coming on and talking with us about I think you helped make a topic that can be hard to understand or one that people just sort of avoid a little bit when it comes to business. Very easy and digestible and just fun. So I appreciate that so much.

01:05:33 - Speaker B
Thank you for having me. Absolutely.