2022 Rewind: The BEST of ‘The Tradie Show’

Ange
Yeah, I totally agree. Nothing more invigorating than giving your brain a chance to rest and instead pack in as much fun and laughter as possible, and I’m excited. Do you know why?

Andy
No. Why?

Ange
Because you and I and the kids are going to Japan, baby. We’re going snowboarding this Christmas and I’m super excited to hit the slopes. It’s been a very long time between snowboard trips.

Andy
Yeah, it definitely has, and I am so keen too, Ange, you know, we used to go snowboarding all the time, for those of you that don’t know, we even spent around 13 months over in Canada, which was awesome, Ange was working in ski school and, and I was doing a bit of our snowboarding instructing as well. But it was such good times and we just haven’t hit the slopes in a while, have we?

Ange
Yeah, look, absolutely. I’ve missed it. I’m definitely keen to get back out there, but you know what I’m mostly keen about is spending time with the family. Everyone is so busy with their schedules. I think it’s gonna be fabulous that all of us, you and me and the two kids actually just have time by ourselves in a beautiful, cool resort just hanging out.

Andy
Yeah, exactly. Japan is awesome. I’ve been going there for many years, snowboarding. I hadn’t taken the family over there because they were too young, and I just wanted to go with my mate. Snowboarding baby. But times have changed and as I got older and my kids are older, they are desperate. So we are all going to Hakuba Japan this Christmas. Can’t wait. We’ve even been out shopping over the last month, haven’t we? New board, new bindings, new boots. I am absolutely pumped.

Ange
Yep, absolutely. I am super keen to hit the slopes, but part of me is also really keen to get rid of all three of you so that I can just read a good book.

Andy
I can take the kids out and hit the hill and you can sit in the room.

Ange
Do whatever I like.

Andy
Do whatever you want, baby, because I’m in the snow.

Ange
Okay, awesome. So for those of you who are like me and do like to take a good book on holiday, I have a perfect one just for you. This one’s actually one of my favorites. A little bit more chill than what we might normally have recommended and perhaps a bit fluffier than your typical business book, but absolutely perfect for holidays.

Andy
Oh, thank God for that. I’d hate to have some type of hard-hitting book with business principles that you sort of just, you start talking to me about what you’ve read. I’m like, can you just leave it alone?

Ange
Okay. We definitely need to have a break and enjoy this one. All right, so this book is from one of our wonderful podcast guests, Lane Beachley. You probably all know her. It’s called Beneath the Wave.

Andy
Yeah, Layne is an absolute superstar and she was on one of our past podcasts, but we also had her at our Lifestyle Tradie 10 year anniversary member only event. And she’s just an absolute superstar, isn’t she?

Ange
Yeah, she is. This book is actually about her life story and how she became an icon in a male dominated surfing world and went on to win a record of seven Women’s World championships. I highly recommend this book for anyone who wants to take literally a leaf out of Lane’s book in terms of her mindset and her determination.

Andy
And you know why we’re speaking about Lane, because this is our last episode of the season and kind of the end of the year. We wanted to do a big recap of the podcast and bring you the best of The Tradie Show.

Ange
Yeah. Fantastic. So for this episode, we are going to be rewinding the tapes and flashing back to the best snippets from the best episodes of The Tradie Show. Basically what we wanna do is leave you with some really hot tips and tricks to mull over whilst you’re on break, including a little snippet from our episode with Lane.

Andy
So with that, we look forward to catching up and chatting with you again in 2023. Ange and I both hope you have an incredible holiday break with your family and your friends. Relax and come out firing for 2023.

Ange
Absolutely. Catch your next year, crew.

Andy
Drum roll please. Let’s go. Alright guys, first on the list, as we mentioned, is the wonderful Lane Beachley. We’ve already given her the intro she deserves, so let’s get stuck into it. So that’s why it’s awesome to have Lane Beachley joining us today. Nobody knows better than her about setting your eyes on a target and giving everything you’ve got to reach it.

Ange
Yeah, absolutely. So without further ado, Lane, welcome to the show.

Layne
Thank you very much. Lovely to see you guys.

Ange
Thank you.

Andy
Oh, it’s always so good to see you and we’re so lucky We had you with Lifestyle Tradie to celebrate our 10th business birthday down in sunny Manly a few years ago. I still remember when you spoke to our members and you accredited a lot of your athletic success to mastering the power of your subconscious mind. Can you explain to our listeners out there, why our subconscious would be holding us back and what we could do to change it?

Layne
So our subconscious mind, for those of you that think I’m probably on drugs and have just all of a sudden now we’ve got two mines. Yeah. But literally our brains are like icebergs and the conscious mind is the top of the iceberg, and the subconscious mind is what lies beneath the water. Yeah. And if you’ve ever seen a photo of an iceberg, usually what’s on top of the water is about a quarter of what is below. So that’s how our brains work. So our conscious mind is where all our thinking and problem solving and um, analytical considerations and distractions and all the white noise, you know, all the chatter. We all have between 50 to 70,000 thoughts a day. I’m a Gemini. I have about a hundred thousand thoughts a day, that’s going on all day, right? That’s all the conscious stuff, but the subconscious mind harbors our beliefs and governs our behaviors and holds onto stories and really that governs our lives. Like the, the subconscious mind is literally the captain of the ship and, and, and it’s dominating our lives. And if we don’t shine a light, Um, if we don’t even stop to take stock of what is and what’s not working, then we never really identify with either. We just continue to identify with our thoughts, and I believe I said this on stage, that what, how we think determines how we feel and how we feel determines how we behave. So we are constantly told what we think we become, but ultimately, What we believe we become. Yeah. So if our thoughts are not in alignment with our beliefs, then we will constantly sabotage our own happiness or our own success or our own lives. So what we can do to change aspects of our lives is first to actually take stock, what’s working and what’s not. I mean, that’s why retailers have stocktakes.

Ange
Right.

Layne
Just work out what products are moving, what products are not, and then they eliminate the ones that are and bring in more of what is. We can do the same thing with our brains. With our minds, we can start to focus on what’s serving me and what’s sabotaging me, what thoughts are supporting me, what thoughts are sabotaging me? What do I believe to be true? And because our lives are a direct reflection of what we believe, that gives us an opportunity to actually connect with our subconscious mind, because now I’m focusing on what I’m saying to myself versus what I really want. Does that make sense?

Andy
Definitely.

Ange
Absolutely.

Layne
Yeah. Okay. That’s good. I’m glad I’m making sense. What we can do is once we identify with the subconscious mind, which is literally one of the easiest ways to identify with it, is actually make a declaration. Make a declaration about what you want to achieve or where you’re going. Or how you want to feel and then listen to a thought that comes in after that. Because the thought that comes in after that will either be in support of that declaration or in sabotage of it. And that thought that follows the declaration is the fundamental belief system.

Andy
Next up we’re gonna hear from a guest who makes me hungry. It’s Tom Potter, the founder of Eagle Boys Pizza. He gives some really great tips on how to be more innovative in your business and his no nonsense approach and love for reinventing business is something that everyone can be inspired by. I just wanna touch on something that you were presenting to us and our Lifestyle Tradie members. You said something that really stuck with me and it was something in the words of, in small business you eat what you kill and, and you have to go hunting every day. You know? Do you do things differently to grow or can you explain the thinking around this sentence?

Tom
Yes. So we’ve just opened our new business up in Townsville, galactic Donuts, and we were doing 10,000 bucks a day when we opened. Right. So everybody came in to try it. If you asked me what would’ve been the perfect way to open, I would’ve said I would’ve liked to sell $5,000 worth of donuts and had outstanding customer service and, and been able to do everything perfectly right. And we had a couple of, um, Problems with some of the equipment, which basically it, it’s, it’s a big deal because when you go in and you buy a filled donor, let’s say it’s a nutella donut, you want about 30 grams of nutella. And our machines weren’t working properly, so some of our customers were getting hammer going, shit, there’s no nutella in this. Now we got customer complaints, we managed those. But I sat back after three weeks and said, You know, we really want to entice the customers back in the door. Anybody that might have been not so impressed with us, or somebody that might have been, um, put off with not getting exactly what they wanted. So instead of sitting back, and doing nothing, you know, I’ve said to my partner, let’s get out there this week and just off, but buy four donuts, get two free. Let’s just run the whole thing Monday to Friday. Let’s get the customers back in and impress the shit out of them. And then, you know, we’ll run that for two weeks, which is tactical, which gets people in and gets us trying us and gets them liking us. And then you’re getting up the following week and you go, now what are we gonna do next week? So I think the big one is to literally put a post-it note on the back of the toilet door. And it says, what are you doing for the customer next week? Yeah. You know, it’s, it’s constant. And when I spoke about that in the, um, at the conference, I took a leaf outta my father’s book who would constantly be looking for ways to maintain his customers, even though he sold his product at a much higher price than his competitor. He was competing with Coca-Cola, so that was a big job for him.

Ange
You can’t rest on your laurels, right? As a business owner, you’ve gotta constantly be creating and moving forward and think about your customers. All the time.

Andy
Yeah, exactly. And I know the, uh, a follow up on that I, your motto, and you mentioned it at the event as well, don’t be all things to all people and be a zebra amongst horses. You know, how can we do that in our trade business?

Tom
Well, I’ll just tell you one little story. I’m not sure if I mentioned it at the conference, but I went and spoke at a conference for Repco. Now I always thought Repco was a business that sold car parts. Now that was the first aha moment and I got there and realized, 400 businesses that were basically mechanical workshops. And they’re very good at mechanical workshops. They run off a good model. They’ve got, um, good scale in them, but each and every one of them’s individually owned. So I was playing golf with one of the young blokes, uh, the next day, and he got chatting to me. He asked me the same question. He said, you know, I’d pretty much do what everyone else does, servicing cars, changing oil, you know, all the stuff that boring is batched. And he said, What can I do? Um, and my question to him was, so when you’ve dealt with a customer, what do you do for? He goes, what do you mean? I said, well, what have you done for the customer after the sale? And his response was, oh, we put a card on the front seat saying thank you. And I said, you might as well put a card on the front seat saying F you, because no one cares. It’s just a piece of paper. So I said to him, what’s the average customer spend? And it, and it was a big number, like it was about $480 or something. And I said, when men come in to get their car service, put a six pack of, uh, brownies on the front seat and say, thanks. What’s that cost? Probably 10 bucks.

Andy
Make sure they’re cold.

Tom
Yeah. And I said to the women, put a pack of cadre roses on the front seat and just say thank you. Right. And, uh, he came back to me six months later and he said, we’ve had an increase mainly with women by as much as 60%. Because the woman was, they always feel intimidated when they take a car in to get it serviced. They don’t feel comfortable because the service guy stands there and gives them probably three minutes of gobbledy go. They don’t understand. Then they give ’em a bill and say, piss off. But then they get in the car and it says, thanks so much for coming in. We appreciate your business. Here’s a box of chocolates. They go to all their girlfriends cause they’re having morning tea and they tell ’em, you know, I usually feel screwed by the mechanic, but for some reason today I felt a little bit better cause they gave me something. And he said he’d had a huge upturn by just thinking about what he was doing after the transactions. You know, what are you doing for me after the transaction? And I always find that real estate agents who are the biggest assholes on earth, in most cases, missed the point because they’ve just made a 50 or $80,000 transaction. Yeah. Where is my case of, of champagne or my carton of beer that says, Hey mate, thanks for doing business and living on the front doorstep. You know, really a can of beer, 40 bucks. Because next time I go to sell a house, which would be another 50 or 60 grand in your pocket. I’ll come to you. Yeah. So they’re the kind of things I think we just need to think about after the transaction. What are we doing for the customer after the sale?

Ange
Especially when you start thinking about trade businesses, when coming back to use that service again, think plumbing, electrical, pest control, that kind of stuff is actually a given. So that trade will often come back into a house. So it is important that, I mean, I love this story about, you know, giving the females a box of chocolates cuz she will actually say, oh my God, these guys went over and above. They gave me a gift. And on the other side, even if it was like a trade company where you don’t come back as frequently, I as a female will still brag about your service if you left me with a lasting wow moment. And it sounds so little your sentence about just leaving this thing on the front of the chair, but yeah, it actually, it’s the lasting impression, right? We talk about repeat clients and loyalty and bragging to your mate.

Andy
I’m just, I’m just thinking back about five years ago with Dr. Drip, when we used to give them about a 5 cent bag of jelly beans. Like, you freaking tied asses that have spent a thousand bucks with you and you gave ’em some jelly beans, And I think the point

Ange
lasting impressions.

Andy
Yeah. The point is here, you know, in all business you’ve gotta be the zebra amongst the horses and make sure you stand out.

Ange
So next up, the amazing and relatable, Gus Worland. Gus Worland is the founder of Gotcha4Life and our chosen partner for Lifestyle Tradie and we are super proud of that. Gotcha4Life is a not-for-profit with a goal of zero suicides, taking action by delivering mental fitness programs that engage, educate, and empower local communities. Gus is so inspiring and amazing at creating a safe space to talk about mental fitness. We really hope you enjoy listening to this snippet. Gus, you talk about changing the term from mental health to mental fitness, kind of like exercise, and I’m curious to know what, ask perhaps some strategies that people can implement maybe on a daily or a weekly or monthly basis to exercise their mind and improve their mental fitness?

Gus
Yeah, I think if you look at it like your physical fitness rather than mental health, which has got a really bad rap, if you think about mental health, people think straight away, oh my god, you know, that’s not me. That’s someone else’s drama. Or I’m gonna have to get a lot worse before I’ve got a mental health issue. Yeah. Well that’s not necessarily true. So let’s park that for a moment. Mental health and talk about mental fitness. Just like your physical fitness. What’s your mark out of 10 for both of you right now? You don’t need to answer the question necessarily, but a number is probably already in your head. Your listeners, there’s already a number in your head right now of what your physical fitness out of 10 is.

Ange
Sure.

Gus
So what’s your mental fitness out of 10? That’s a much more difficult conversation. But you don’t, we don’t quite know what it means. And also how do you get your number up? Well, physical fitness, it’s easy. You eat cleaner, you move more. If you’re smoking, you stop. If you’re a drinker, then you drink less. There’s a lot of things there that are just there. You can just automatically know what to do to get your physical fitness right. But what are the activities in the exercises to get your mental fitness right? And that’s really what Gotcha4Life is all about. It’s like going to your mental gym, a gym for your head. Yeah. How can we build emotional muscle so we can actually feel strong enough to ask the questions that we need to ask or to put your hand up and say, Hey, I need some help. I sat with, um, a whole lot of lifeguards the other day at a big conference up in Queensland, and this 15 year old kid nailed it perfectly. He goes, why does someone in the water that needs our help stick their hand up? But they won’t do it on land? They won’t do it on sand. Yes. Because if you stick your hand up in the water it is a process. People go in, they’ll rescue you when you get saved. But for some reason we don’t have the emotional muscle to ask for that help on the land. So that’s what we’re really working out at the moment, because all the people that I talk to, these guys are worrying alone way too much, boys, girls, men, women, everyone in between. We worry alone in our own heads too much. So we need to be able to get those conversations out, and if you then share it, you’ll realize, ah, you’re not the only one with that problem. And secondly, there’s help there and support to get you through stuff. So that’s really trying to really take away the medicine and take away the white coats and the wellness and make this a human problem. Make you realize if everyone’s got this stuff going on and it’s normal, so just go out and get your help. If you had a problem with your knee or your calf, you’d go to a physio. Do the same thing with your melon.

Ange
I do find it interesting that pride just seems to get in the way for both men and women. We do know, you know, working with trade business owners, it’s a very blokey industry that the men specifically pride is, you know, this wall of pride really stands in their way, but you’re so right Gus, it’s quite interesting once you encourage them to talk about their life and what’s actually happening, not just about business, but just about life in general. They really aren’t on their own. Everyone’s got their demon. And I guess social media plays a really big part in that, that everyone is a bit of a highlight reel. But you know, truthfully, when I, even when we start talking to our friends, everyone has stuff going on.

Andy
I think that’s it. I mean, when you do and you hit it in the nail on the head, Gus, as you always do mate, when you mention the word mental health. Sometimes as blokes, we shy away from that and we go, that’s not us. But when you say mental fitness, I know right now that if we reached out to everyone listening to this podcast, they’d put their hand up and say, hell yeah. I have had mental fitness issues and I need to be better because every single one of us and it’s amazing even with a group like Lifestyle Tradie and what we do, I still have people in the group when things aren’t going as well. They still go, oh, I had a bad month last night. I said, mate, why don’t you actually pay me so you can talk to me and you’re still not doing it? He goes, oh yeah, I just didn’t wanna bother you.

Ange
Pride.

Andy
Yeah.

Gus
No, you’re right. It’s all about building a safe place to have this conversation. Yeah, and what we tend to do is we, we’re so busy, we’re running around, we’ve got so much going on. We don’t actually give ourselves the time to just sit in a bit of awkward, uncomfortable, vulnerable silence to start that conversation. We had 257 blokes at a local surf club the other day. They all walked in. They’re all looking around going, I thought I’d be the only one here. That was their first thing. Secondly, they looked around and went gee, there’s 80 year olds, there’s 16 year olds, there’s all of us there. And then you’re looking around going, okay, I wonder what this night’s gonna be about. And this young 16 year old boy stood up and went, blur, blur, blur, blur. I won’t tell you cuz it was in that room. It was special for all of us. And everyone went, wow, okay. If that kid can do it, if that’s got the guts. And he’s mentally fit enough to tell us that then I can get the mental fitness up to get through it as well. So many words got stuck here and there and did not quite come out. Sometimes you need the conversation with the snot running outta your nose. And the tears running outta your eyes. Just initially it’s like going to the gym for the first time. You’re gonna be sore the next day.

Ange
It hurts.

Gus
Trainer that you’re thinking. Oh my God, I can’t believe I spent 80 bucks on them. You’re gonna hate them, but a month later, three months later, exactly, six months later, all of a sudden everything becomes a lot easier. We need to practice, we need to get fitter. So it’s really all the stuff that we do and we’re all doing it together, is basically working at a mental fitness gym. And we’ve got all different styles there for all different people. Whether you wanna do it like this or information on a podcast or go and see people face to face. We just need to be doing more of that together.

Andy
This next one is something that a lot of us tradies have had to deal with in the past, and that’s other trade businesses ripping off our branding. In this snippet, we’ll take you through our steps to prevent copycats from stealing your branding. Most trade business owners wouldn’t even know if they had competitors out there. Um, we’re just lucky to come across this sky, so when you’re driving in traffic from now on, keep your eye out. And find out who is out and about. But I’m, because we deal with so many trade businesses, and I’m not gonna mention names, but there’s names that are the same in Sydney to Brisbane, to WA. Like in all these different states, there’s people that have the same names.

Ange
Well, I remember,

Andy
I’m assuming there’s no trademarks on these names.

Ange
Oh wow. This is the challenge, right?

Andy
Yeah.

Ange
And I remember this actually happening to one of our members. Yeah. An electrical company in a regional town. New South Wales who have a great logo and really strong brand presence. I won’t actually mention their business name, but say for example, it was three letters, let’s say ABC. And another member from Brisbane sent a picture of a vehicle with the exact same logo. I’m kid you not, same colors, same design, same font. The only difference was their logo was say ABD not ABC.

Andy
And guess what the logo was?

Ange
What?

Andy
It was a lightning bolt that was yellow. Yeah. Good on you electricians. So inventive. But I’ve seen this happen so many times with logos because a lot of people thought it was really smart to go to things like 99 designs where they have a hundred graphic designers globally all over the world, and you get in there and you say, I want an original logo and I want you to design something from scratch that no one else has. Ready, set, go. And then you look at say, five or six different logos. You pick one, you pay them the money in a way you go, but there’s no contracts signed, there’s no nothing. But what these designers are doing is just using that for the next person and the next person and the next person. And it’s amazed how many of the same logos are out there.

Ange
Yeah. The challenge of not owning the rights to the actual logo. Right.

Andy
And maybe it’s not, the logo is exactly the same, but they use a certain type of a man, like a comical image. Feature. An image, yes. Comical features. And I’m seeing that everywhere these days.

Ange
Yeah. So it was really lucky with these guys that I just mentioned who are operating in different states because imagine how hard it would be for a customer to tell those two businesses apart.

Andy
That’s right.

Ange
So, If Mrs. Jones doesn’t use you on a regular basis, she isn’t gonna remember your business name a hundred percent. So she’s simply gonna Google, say, plumber Sydney as an example, and on the first page of these two companies with identical colors and branding and the only difference is the name ABC Plumbing or ABD Plumbing. She is really gonna be able to tell which ones which, like probably not. And then you’ve potentially lost a customer. Your customer.

Andy
Nah, that’s exactly, and but, um, the lucky thing is, guys, there are strategies that you can use to protect yourself from being copied, like trademarking. So, yep. So, Ange, let’s get into it.

Ange
Yes, let’s do it. So this first one can be hard sometimes, but you just need to think differently. So, for example, you use this example of a, say, electrical company. So let’s say your company name was Zap Electrical, and your colors are currently yellow with a big yellow lightning bolt.

Andy
Ah, there you go.

Ange
But it’s not really original, right? So sorry to all use up electricians who are using yellow branding, but it can be really easily copied.

Andy
Yeah. A way that you can think differently, for instance, is considering changing the color. I know that everyone sees a lightning bolt as yellow, but say you had the lightning bolt as purple for an instance. It sounds silly, but that is definitely different, and it’s a way that you can stand out.

Ange
Yeah. And another way to protect yourself is to have your logo graphically designed by someone locally. So

Andy
I’d definitely advise this.

Ange
Yeah. It’ll probably cost you a bit more money than finding, say someone online who’s overseas or even finding something on Google images and duplicating it. But it will 99% guarantee that your logo and branding is original and that you own the rights.

Andy
And when you’ve got something that’s original, it is definitely worth trademarking. Too many of us out there go, I can’t be bothered. I’m not gonna do it. But believe me, every single one of you should be doing it because this is gonna cost you a little bit of money at the start. But if you find that someone is copying you accidentally, or they’re actually doing it on purpose, It’s almost impossible to stop them doing it, but if it’s trademarked, you’ve got something you can fight with.

Ange
Yeah. Like we said, trademarking Dr. Drip as a company name is inclusive of the logo that we had.

Andy
Yeah.

Ange
Saved us definitely on a number of occasions from copycats. And if you don’t trademark quick enough and someone else starts using similar branding and they trademark before, They can actually stop you from using the branding, so you might think it’s not worth it and that nothing is ever gonna happen to me, you say, but it’s never a problem until it is. Right? All right. This one proved to be super popular with you guys, so we thought we’d bring it back in case it’s that kick in the butt that you need to take action now. And that’s our episode, is your accountant a dud or are you the problem? It’s pretty self-explanatory, but basically it will help you understand where you are going wrong in your business accounting. Check it out. You need to see your accountant as an investment, not an expense.

Andy
Exactly.

Ange
But to ensure that they are great, in case of the question that we’ve been asked in reference, uh, is, are they a dud? Then I actually wanna circle back around and ask, have you the trade business owner told them what you want? Have you even told them?

Andy
Well that’s it, Ange. So what do you mean when you say what you want?

Ange
Well, most accountants will simply do what they always do with every client. Like cookie cutter services. You know, I don’t mean to be disrespectful when I say that, but if you don’t tell them what you want help with and how frequently then how do they know how to be classed great?

Andy
Well, I think everyone in life, if you’re gonna get paid a certain amount of money and you don’t have to do much for it, yeah. You’re not actually putting your hand up and saying, I need more work because I’m quiet. You’re actually just going, Ooh, they don’t want much attention. So I’m doing really well with this client. And if I was a listener right now, I’m probably saying, I’ve never got taught this staff. I don’t understand finance and I don’t even know where to start.

Ange
Right. So where do you start? Most trade business owners think it’s okay to simply show up at the end of a financial year, out of obligation, actually to the ATO because they signed a few pieces of paper from their accountant of which might I add. Make it, you are completely liable now for every single digit they have put into that form. So you’ve taken responsibility. They think finance is not their responsibility as a trade business owner. Like what’s with this?

Andy
I know. Keep going Ange I can hear a ramp coming on. Come on, keep going. I love this.

Ange
They don’t really listen to the accountant telling them about the financial data because either A, they don’t understand, or B, they actually just don’t care. And they’re lucky to help provide receipts when they’re even asked for it or any information throughout a financial year. And there’s no wonder the accountant shows up with little interest in helping them when they showed no interest in helping themselves with understanding the finance of their business. It’s the heartbeat. It’s important.

Andy
Oh yeah. A hundred percent right into so many people. And if you are out there right now driving in your car, keep your left hand on the steering wheel. And if you are one of these people that don’t look at your finances in your head, The sand right now, give yourself an uppercut, bang. But you’re not wrong as the business owner. You need to show more interest in this. You need to ask questions and definitely take ownership. This is your business, and you should know.

Ange
So I like to think of this like a date, because this, ooh.

Andy
Yes. Ooh. Like it, what a date. Yeah, but I’ve seen my account. I don’t wanna date my account. He’s a hairy little man.

Ange
So, so hear me out. The analogy of this just might work for you. Okay?

Andy
Okay.

Ange
So you turn up to this date,

Andy
don’t tell the accountant that I’m just a listener to this episode.

Ange
So you turn up to this date, right? And if you are interested in this person, you ask them questions, right?

Andy
Yep. You certainly do.

Ange
Well if they are also interested in you, they like to lean in and they happily respond to the questions and the conversation flows and you start to learn more about each other. Yes. Well this is just like your meetings with your accountant.

Andy
Definitely.

Ange
If you show up to an appointment and you show interest in the subject, they’re gonna show more interest in you and your business and therefore help you more. Make sense?

Andy
Yeah, definitely. And my accountant, or our accountant, he is like one of my best mates now, and we have banter and we pick on each other and we carry on, but we, there’s a love there. There really is. There’s a man love, not, not in a sexual way, but there’s a man, as I said, he’s a hairy accountant, but, um, he’s such a genuine, awesome guy and we catch up and we have dinners and he’s a legend. And I know he goes above and beyond for us. He certainly does. He goes above and beyond.

Ange
Because we’ve shown interest in him as a human. In addition, I should say, to understand the finances of our business. Yeah. We’ve actually taken an interest in a subject, (been accounting). That he loves. Yeah. That is not our forte, but we’re allowing him to teach us which increases our knowledge at the same time.

Andy
Plus, he loves Cadbury chocolates and I went to the supermarket and spent $500 on Cadbury chocolate. Do you know how much 500? That’s a trolley? Full of Cadbury chocolates. I put it in a box and delivered it to his home. You know, so, uh, that he does love us. He felt like he was a fat bastard for a while, but, uh, there you go. There you go.

Ange
So I’m just gonna circle back and say, If you are not telling the truth to your accountant, meaning that you’ve actually verbally said to them, you know what? I actually know very little about accounting and finance in general, and I’d really appreciate your help, then you actually have to start there and they will actually help.

Andy
Well, that’s it. Because even with our account, he knows I’m a typical tradie and he sometimes says some lingo, and I go, mate, you’re talking to Andy. Can you dumb it down a little bit, dude? He goes, oh yeah, sorry. I thought I was talking to an intelligent guy. You know? I’m like, ah, yeah, we’re playing that game, right. Anyway, it feels like we’re circuited back a little, but you need to ask more questions and tell them what you need to understand. Lastly, a topic that I absolutely love and that’s how to buy a business. These days with marketing costing so much money, it can sometimes be a cheaper exercise to buy a business the leads than throw more money at your marketing campaigns. Find out our hot tips to buying a business in this snippet. You know, I’ve started a lot of businesses from scratch myself, but I’d admit that buying an already established business does have its advantages. Some of the hard work has already been done for you, like maybe hiring staff. Some of the operations may already be set up, and they already may have set up a name for themselves in their geographic area that they live in, so they’re a bit established. You know, the grunt work has already been done for you, but now it’s time to put some smart strategies in place and kick it into another gear.

Ange
Yeah. Another advantage I can think of is most of us would need a bank loan, I imagine, or some type of financial backing to buy a business. So if that business is already profitable, a banker’s gonna be much more likely to loan you money if you need it, because it seems like a really safe investment for them.

Andy
Yeah, that’s a great point. You know, for the tradie that asked that question about a jewel business, and they already have a plumbing business, but they want to buy an electrical business, well, they’re in a pretty good situation. I would be assuming that their plumbing business is highly systemized. It’s set up the right way and it’s making good profit. So when you go to a bank, if you need to buy this next business, the bank’s gonna look very favorably at you and there’s a good chance they’re gonna lend you some money for that acquisition.

Ange
Exactly. So on paper it does sound like a worthwhile investment, but the important thing to remember is that you must take the necessary time and effort to research the business and the industry you’re looking to move into. You must do what we call due diligence. So to your point before Andy, about buying a lemon, whilst during covid, a lot of businesses did really well because we are classed as essentials now with a sharp rise in cost of living and material shortages. All the things we’ve banged on about last season. The profitability of some businesses is starting to waiver.

Andy
Profitability is not on an all time high for some people right now. And staff are becoming more demanding that wanting pay rises, aren’t they? And they’re looking for better benefits because they know there’s a bit of a staffing shortage out there and it’s really hard to get good tradies at the moment and a lot of people are capitalizing on it. So you really wanna make sure when you’re looking at a business that it’s consistently profitable, not just the last one or two years. Let’s go back three. Sometimes I even like to look back five years. I know five years is a long time, but you need to make sure it’s profitable. You need to make sure it’s got a good culture, good staff, and that businesses run reasonably well and out in the industry, people like the name of this business.

Ange
Right. So, Andy, if you were gonna buy a business, what’s the first thing you would do?

Andy
Well, the first thing you wanna do is make sure you are set up right from the start. You know, you need to personally be in a position to take on this responsibility because when you wanna buy another business, there’s a lot of information you gotta take in, and you need to be at your very best. I mean, I talk about, you know, it’s your grand final. You know, if you were going into a sporting match and it was your grand final, you need to be your best. Well, taking on another business isn’t just simple and I think a lot of people go, oh, I’ll just take on another business. No problems. Well, you know what? There can be a lot of problems, so you need to make sure you are definitely in the right headspace and you’re mentally prepared for what’s in front of you.

Ange
Yeah, I agree with that sentence, Andy. And I would also say you need to be sure that you’ve actually got the time When we are looking at this conversation or this question about having a dual business, what’s gonna be important is that you’ve actually system line and streamlined your current first business and truthfully removed yourself so that you know you have time.

Andy
Yeah, because I think the big thing there is you need to make sure that your business model is right in your first business. Yes. Before you take on anything else. Too many people take on these new businesses or try to grow when they haven’t even got the first structure of the business right.

Ange
That’s right. They’re trying to do too many things too quickly. So my advice there would be to slow down and make sure you have your first business perfect. That it’s truthfully profitable. Consistently profitable, and you have truthfully removed yourself from the business and it’s systemized. Because only then can you say, okay, I am ready from a time perspective to give every effort to this second business, to this dual business. Time is so important in a trade business owner’s life that we actually teach it with regards to what we call the time maximizer, and there’s some information in our show notes or at lifestyletradie.com.au/free-resources where we share with you how to get a better handle on your time. This will actually teach you how to get back four to six hours within one week. It’s that important.