Charly: I just want to bring up a couple of really critical points. I think you both know one of the hats that I wear is a certified high-performance coach. I’ve coached 7,000 sessions in the last 12 years. These are typically entrepreneurs and professional athletes, stuff like this, and Fortune 500 CEOs even. And one of the big things that we teach in high-performance coaching is that people support what they create. Everything’s a co-creation and a collaboration. And this ties back to what you shared about leadership and the difference between leaders and managers.

So for those listening, there’s a huge takeaway here in that it took time, energy, and effort in coaching for you to recognize and realize how are we co-creating and how are we inspiring? We don’t have supervisors. We have lead techs. And in that word, or those words, is the word “leader.” And it’s really critical that that’s part of a co-creation and collaboration, meaning that the lead tech is there not to direct and tell them what to do, but to be like, “Hey, got a problem? Let me show you how it’s done.” They’re stepping in front of it, showing them value in advance, so to speak, where they’re doing the work to get them on the right track to do the work properly and to make sure it’s done consistently and everything. And we really want to make sure that we pull that out. That’s critically important for the sustenance part and the culture. We think about the culture as a part of it, the values, but also it’s part of the overall feeling when you get to meet with you guys. It’s very obvious in this podcast. It’s like, I like these guys. And maybe there’s people that don’t like the way we’re approaching it. That’s not our people. And that’s fine too. So that’s a big part of this piece.

So one more thing. As you think about the history of Crystal Clean, were there any particular milestones you had to overcome? And one of the ones you just shared, and this may be a great starting spot, was we recognized at some point in our journey we needed to bring in a coach to take things to a new level. But were there any particular milestones in the growth of Crystal Clean that maybe coaching is one of them or anything else that were like, “Okay, this takes us to a brand new level”? Anything there?

Dave: Oh, my goodness. Well, the first thing I think of milestones is as the company grows, and you talked about growth, it actually gets easier because you have more resources, more people to draw from. You have more employees if something comes up to cover situations. So that’s a milestone, I would say, in that regard. When I started, we had 12 part-time employees when I bought the company. When we got up to about 30 or 40 full-time employees, that made a huge difference. Now I didn’t have to do every single aspect of the company, and I could work on the company and not in the company so much where I didn’t have to go out at night and clean a new account. I could focus more on getting new accounts and so forth.

Other milestones, I think, were moving out of the house. That was a biggie. I know it’s not exactly what you were referring to, but once we got our first office, that was a huge step forward. And then a very small office, but you had a location. People could come there to apply instead of meeting them at McDonald’s or something.

Moving to a much larger office—I think we had about just up the street here, we had 3,500 square foot office. That was a big step, and that was right in the middle of the Great Recession. So the rent was low, but it was scary because at that time, you don’t know if we’re pulling out of this. Is it going to get worse? Is it going to get better? And, of course, they had the bank bailouts, et cetera, et cetera. But it was a scary time. Our philosophy was, you know, you got to be courageous. You got to take chances in business. You have to. And it worked out well.

Another milestone while we’re on that thread was, I think it was just four or five years ago, our landlord said, “I need this space. You know, I’m not going to renew your lease.” And I was just—I was like deflated. Like, what do you mean? We’ve been here four or five years. Maybe longer. And he said, however, I’ve got this larger space twice as big down at the other end here. I’m like, what am I going to do with all that space? It was over 7,000 feet where we’re at now. And it was another milestone because he built it out exactly to our specifications. We drew where we wanted everything, how we wanted to design. He built it out. The rent was reasonable. It was far bigger than we needed. But within, I think, six, nine months, we filled it up. It’s like, wow. But the point I’m getting at is the morale shift when the managers and employees and lead techs all came to the new location. Like, wow, this is nice. And their motivation just doubled. It’s like, wow, I want to be a part of this. I want to, you know, it’s amazing.

I’ll mention that to prospective clients, too, that when they’re moving into a new building, here’s what you’re going to find out. The morale is going to double. You’ll see this. And they go, “I know. We’ve seen that.” That was a big milestone, too.

And you mentioned the coaching. Basically, we’re paying people to kick our butt. Every Thursday, they’d come in and kick our butt and tell us what we’re doing wrong. And it was painful, but we needed it and it helped. That was a big milestone there too.

But thinking back to growing the business, I think when we got our first big account, which was a large conglomeration of car dealerships, much bigger than any account we’d done before. And we just said, “Hey, let’s go for it. What’s the worst thing that can happen?” And Jeff and I joke about that all the time when we’re bidding large accounts. “Do you want to do this? What’s the worst that could happen? What could go wrong?” Of course, a lot could go wrong, but you have to take chances and just learn along the way. That attitude has helped us a lot. So once you get that first big account you realize this is really no difference, you know, same thing, just bigger numbers.

Charly: Yeah, but it reminded me of a friend I had in real estate and he started out, you know, I asked him how did you get so big and he says, “Well, you start out with, you know, flipping houses, doing this, doing that, and then we started bigger projects—shopping centers and an apartment complex.” And he said it was the same thing, just bigger numbers. And it really was. But to make that jump, that milestone, it’s scary. And sometimes things don’t go right. But, you know, again, our philosophy of life is short. Let’s go for it.

Charly: Boy, if that isn’t a testament. What was it? It was like something you could put on a bumper sticker. I think it was Mel Brooks that said, “Nobody gets out of here alive.” So what do you got to do? Let’s go for it.

Charly: Awesome. Jeff, was there anything you wanted to add about milestones you’ve seen in your time here at Crystal Clean?

Jeff: Well, I mean, I came in about four years ago, and I’ve never been afraid to sell big projects. And Dave is a visionary, so he’s never really been afraid to take them on. But it’s funny, we hover at the computers sometimes. I go, “I’m going to push send.” And Dave would say, “What’s the worst that could happen?” And we’d push send and we’ve won some nice accounts together. We’ve almost doubled. And it’ll be safe to say in five years, we’ll have doubled the company since I’ve been here. We’ll double it again in another five years because there’s still more work out there. And the sales balloon that we have even now, there’s just so much growth in Southwest Florida. But we never want to get away from the fact of what we bring to the table. Again, we are in that sweet spot where not everybody wants us. We don’t fit everyone’s needs, especially when it’s just budgetary. We don’t take on the large facility management role. But we find that a lot of people who have been using large facility management companies and janitorial companies really like to hear from a local family company that has the width and breadth that we do of 100 cleaners and an organizational structure to make sure that they get the service that they want. And that’s what we’ve kind of carved out together. And it’s a work in progress, but it’s gone well and it’s going to keep going well. And I think we’re both pretty excited for that. Dave’s not ready to throw in the towel.

Charly: A couple of things that come from this—this comes back to the values conversation. And this is a big thing that I really work with a lot of people I coach. And I’m just so fortunate to do that work. I just feel like it’s the best use of me on this planet is being here with you guys. It’s coaching these people who are all about growing, doing better. But there’s an inherent part to their belief system that they want to serve, be of service to others. The essence of it, it’s to assure that when you see me or you take our services or whatever that would look like, that you leave feeling uplifted, taken care of, cared for, all these kind of principles that we have.

The big question that we always ask is how do you scale and keep the values center. So what I mean by that is, as we grow and we continue to grow, it’s very common in industries, as you get to a certain tipping point of a certain number of employees, with certain organizations, that the exceptional part of the culture starts to—if you think of it like a fuel gauge—it starts to come down to moderate, not so exceptional. And then things can start to fall apart, the customer can feel it and so on. So do you have any guidance or thoughts on—Dave or Jeff, whoever wants to answer that—how you scale and keep the culture?

Dave: When we get a call or an email to a bid request and we go in, the most common complaint we get is all cleaning companies are the same. And the person I bought the company from even said these same words. He says, “I go in there, they tell me everybody starts out great and then they taper off. How are you guys going to be different?” So they’re already disgusted with the cleaning companies, and it does happen a lot in this industry where you go in with a bang and make the place look great, but then you just kind of taper off as the months and years go by.

So anyway, to counteract that, we have scheduled inspections that the lead techs do on regular frequencies. They fill out a report. We have our own app that they use on their phone where they can fill out a report for the inspection. It’s tracked. If there’s work to be done, you know that’s followed up on. And then we also have a secondary quality assurance where one of our managers will call or visit the client, not just inspect the work, but talk to the client. There’s a thing in this business that no news is good news, and that’s not true. If you’re not hearing from your clients, you should be worried. So it gets back to that complaint can be an opportunity. So the manager will call on a set frequency, could be every two weeks or every week with large clients, maybe every four weeks with smaller clients. Actually call the contact people, say, “Hey, are you happy with the service? Is there anything we can do?”

But the other aspect with both the lead techs and the managers who are calling or visiting is we have regular training programs. So like the lead techs, they’re in here every month for training. And for example, we have to keep reminding them you have to get to know the client. You have to get to know the cleaners, be their friends, you know, ask them about their lives, what’s going on. Don’t just, you know, do an inspection and leave, you know, make sure they see you, talk to you. And when you become friends with the clients, it sounds bad, but it’s very hard for them to fire you because you’re friends, you’re working together. They know you’re going to respond when there’s a problem, and there are going to be problems. You just have to accept that and fix them. So that’s worked for us.

Dave: If I could go back one second, I missed a big milestone, and that was Jeff. It’s only been four or five years, but when we hired Jeff, I left that out. It was a biggie. We never had a general manager before, and Jeff came in, and I don’t even remember, what did you do the first six months?

Jeff: I did what I know how to do. I come from a corporate marketing sales background, so I came in and said, well, I can sell. So I figured out the marketplace and just started selling on a daily basis, plus learning from Dave. And that’s where he doesn’t maybe even recognize what a good coach he is. But he allowed me to do that. So I can sell. I do that. I learn from Dave, and I still learn from Dave. I’m a general manager who has the advantage of an owner who’s really involved. So I just keep learning and absorbing and embracing. And if Dave ever does say, “No, I really am going to take a month and go to Europe,” we can cover it. I’m up to that point where I go, I’ve learned enough about the company and I want to do a good job for Dave, but definitely he’s given me the advantage of being able to do that. But it started on the sales side.

Dave: Yeah. Yeah, it’s part of my philosophy. Life is short, so I try to travel as much as I can, see the world. But anyway, when Jeff came on, he started out just working on sales. Prior to that, I was doing most of the sales. We did have some less than qualified salespeople before that. But the point is he really viewed this as his own, grew with the company very quickly so came in in sales and then eventually started managing and then became the general manager. It may have even caused a little friction with others who’d been here for years like why is this guy progressing so fast but we worked through that. And when he became the general manager that took a huge load off my shoulders and took over the sales and the marketing, works with you a lot on SEO and etc. And that was a big milestone. It’s very recent, four or five years in our 43 years of being here. But that’s a biggie that I left out.

Charly: I love that. I meant to say we have a great SEO guy as well. I just want to celebrate a couple things here. One is, Jeff, the fact that you have—let’s go back to the core principles and values of the company—you feel that you have a psychologically safe mentor in Dave who guided this and exchange of wisdom with you, knowledge, skill, and you’ve absorbed it and applied it. There’s so much to unpack and celebrate with that. So kudos to both of you for that. That’s—you think about especially people have been in business for decades—so often I hear of company owners, this is the kind of people sometimes I rescue through high-performance coaching, that they get caught up in their own ways, they become bitter—that’s one way of terming it—and then they wonder why their employees are talking behind their backs and all this kind of stuff. And it’s that big piece to this puzzle.

Me being on this journey, Dave, you and I met probably in 2010 or ’12, speaking and doing different things then, and the big journey of SEO as we’ve talked about as a side note for the listener is now becoming an AI journey, right? Because as of the recording of this, next week Apple will be releasing their new round of iPhones and they’re also going to be talking through their new iOS and iPadOS and has Apple Intelligence built in. So what we’re really aiming for with this podcast is to stay in front of technology because what we’re going to do is leverage the content of this to feed the AI beast, we’re calling it. So when people search instead of going traditionally to Google or something like that or going into their phone and saying “find me cleaning company that can help with X, Y, or Z,” they will simply talk to AI and AI will be like “here’s some options for you” and do you want me to go into detail about Crystal Clean? And AI won’t go to your website necessarily; they’ll have it in its hive mind and we’re feeding the beast through that with this very podcast.

Because it might say things like, just from this podcast, as it learns about us, that this is a culture-rich company who cares deeply, who believes in honesty, integrity, unconditional love for their team and for the family, friends that they’ve created along the way. And that’s a critical ingredient, and I just want to put an exclamation point on that for a minute, is that there’s been—and Jeff, you’ve talked about this with me too—there’s been a drive and a direction to assure that we’re staying in front of, or with, technology. Sometimes it’s stuff we do procedurally. Other times it’s bringing in people like me and others that are like, “Hey, here’s the things we need to be scouting out for the next 18 months to three years.” This AI thing is a big one. Is there any particular point that you want to make, Dave or Jeff, about the drive to leverage current technology or upcoming technology to assure that we’re playing in that realm? Part of the growth-minded, ambition-oriented. Anything you want to share? It’s big.

Jeff: Go ahead.

Dave: There’s no way around it. No matter what you do, learning to use technology in your favor is an absolute. And I think in the evolution of the company, again, within the time I’ve been here, we’ve made a focus of trying to take advantage of technology, even in the simple things, just sharing information as an example. We are now using an app, and now we have multiple versions of app for different applications in our field, just in our arena. It is the Crystal Clean app, and it services different parts of the company. And as we, of course, have you helping us with the search engine optimization and how Google thinks, that’s something I really—I’ve dabbled, but you know how Google thinks, and you’re helping us go, “Let’s take advantage of this and make sure that when someone is searching for post-construction cleaning or common area cleaning or any of the other things that we can facilitate for commercial cleaning, they’re finding us.” And that’s been working. And we want to make sure it continues to work. And that kind of technology will be your friend if you know how to use it. So we have what we know. And sometimes we get other people who know even more. But we know that using technology is a must. It’s an absolute.

Charly: One thing, the value of accountability, meaning that when systems are put into play, there’s an accountable plan. There’s an audit or an assessment. And the app, it sounds like to me, from what you’ve shared, there might be photos taken that assures the job is complete. So when a part of your team is out doing a job, they’re like, “Oh, top of mind, I have to assure that I clean this so I can take a photo of it.” And that story is shared inside the app for others to see and be inspired by. So there’s an inherent accountability with this, layered with the culture, that we’re doing what’s right, we’re ambition-oriented, we’re growth-minded. And that’s a big piece to this puzzle. I just wanted to make sure we brought that to a point. Dave, is there anything you wanted to add?

Dave: Yeah, like Jeff mentioned, the Crystal Clean app has really changed everything because there’s a cleaner version, there’s a lead tech version, and then the manager’s version—different access to information, but it’s all there. We can pull up any client and see all the information about that client, a history of when it was inspected, what were the results, when was the last time we talked to the client face-to-face. All that is documented and recorded. And we can see, “Oh, wow, we haven’t talked to this guy in two months. We better get on that.” Or “This one we’re calling too often. Let’s back off a little.”

So another thing with technology, though, is in the field of equipment. Most people know what a Roomba is. They have them in their home. And they’re pretty impressive now. But the commercial robot vacuums are amazing. You know, we’ve been out to the ISSA shows a couple years in a row now. And the technology there is just astounding. So you can take one of these large robots—looks like an R2-D2 type unit—put it in a building. It will learn the entire floor. It can be programmed. You can control it remotely. It will vacuum the entire, whatever, 20,000, 30,000 square feet of office space and not waste its effort like you see some Roombas going around randomly. Well, these follow an exact pattern, and they learn. Mentioning AI, it’s actually learning and improving each time. They are expensive, but in certain applications, it can save a huge amount of labor. And vacuuming is very physical, especially if you’re doing 20,000, 30,000 square feet. That’s hard work. So then the cleaners can focus on more detailed cleaning, perhaps.

Another advance is in battery technology. So, for example, we have floor scrubbers with newer lithium batteries that just weigh a couple pounds. You pop them in the scrubber and you can go for several hours. You take the next pair, put that in, you can just keep going instead of the big old golf-cart-type batteries. And they’re much lighter, they last like 10 years now, so it’s just advanced.

And what we’re just getting into now is backpack vacuums so they’re running on small batteries that you interchange and you can go for hours and they’re not so heavy like the old ones and you have no cord. So when you’re going around large office area again it’s much easier on the technician, it’s much faster. Again, it will pay for itself in a matter of months to a year. You just have to take care of it. So technology is huge, even in the cleaning industry. It’s changing. Chemicals are getting much better, much more effective. We have glass cleaners now that are also disinfectants. That never existed five years ago. It just didn’t happen. So you can use one product to clean the mirror and the sink. You know, disinfect, kill 99.9% of the germs and bacteria while you’re cleaning and not switch products. It’s never-ending. The more we learn, I use this expression, the more I learn, the more I realize I don’t know. The more I realize there is to learn, it’s just a never-ending loop. And AI is a biggie. It’s exciting.

We like technology. We try to employ as best we can. We don’t fear it. We’ve never feared change. It just doesn’t bother me. You just adapt.

Charly: Well, I just want to say thank you for that because here’s what we’re taking away from that. The ISSA show. That’s a show. Is it like in Vegas?

Dave: Usually in Vegas.

Charly: Okay. And that’s a place where they’re demonstrating the latest in tech. And you guys, like it’s so important for you to go to it, that you’re there and you’re really integrating with what that technology is. And the biggest part that I’m hearing from you is this: you learn new things, but the highest-performing businesses take action. And specifically, they take decisive action on what they learn. And so when we come back, typically when I go to my version of those shows, I come back and on the plane ride back, if it’s in California, four hours, I’m doing an action list. And I’m prioritizing the top three things we’ve got to move forward. And I’m putting it in my schedule. One of the things we teach in high performance is if it’s not in the schedule, it’s just a dream. So we put it in the schedule, we move forward with it, we take action on it. And I just want to make sure we heard that part of the Crystal Clean experience and culture, is that when we learn new things, we’re seeing where they can be applied, putting them in play, teaching our staff, moving that forward. And it comes right back to that consistency over time. I noticed you said you’ve been to a few shows, so there’s a consistency with that. Any thoughts that I’ve shared?

Dave: No, it’s amazing trade shows. The grand scale of it is just overwhelming. I think there are 400 or 500 vendors there. You can’t see it in a day. It’s too big. Several football fields of products and software. It’s just absolutely amazing. Not to get too far off track, but I do love to travel. Many other countries, especially in Europe, Scandinavia, they are so far ahead of us in technology. Three or four years ago, I went to a Chinese restaurant. The food is brought out by a robot. I don’t know of anybody here that’s even up to that point yet. I think it was 20 years ago, I was in Australia, and the person came out to our table to take our order on a little, like an iPad. And it takes the order. It’s sent right to the kitchen. So they’re adopting this technology way ahead of us. Now you’re just starting to see it in, you know, an Olive Garden or an Outback where they’re taking the order here. But they were doing this 15 years ago. So there’s a lot to catch up on, a lot to learn. And I would love to get to an ISSA show in—usually I think they’re in Amsterdam, I believe. I would like to get to one there just to see what they have. They’re very early adopters and they do not fear technology like some of us do here.

Charly: Yeah, so a couple points for that and this is the thing because I do a lot of international travel. I’m always the observer and seeing what people are doing in different businesses wherever I go. And saying, “What’s the lesson or the fundamental here that we may be able to bring back and apply?” Maybe for my business, or I might be able to talk to you about it or Jeff about it and say, “Hey, I learned this over there. Here’s a unique thing they’re doing or a unique piece of technology that they’re using,” something like that. Jeff, did you want to add anything with what Dave shared?

Jeff: No, I think it’s covered pretty well. I agree with all of it. I know we’ve said things like if you’re not learning and growing, you’re dying. And Dave’s not one to sit back and die. We want to learn. We want to grow. And ISSA has been a big part of that. I’ve enjoyed going for the learning that happens. People bring their new technology to a show like that. It’s a conglomerate cleaning show, actually, international. And so there’s not much you won’t see if you’re looking for it.

Charly: Oh, that’s so good. So the final part of our work today, and we’re probably going to divide this podcast up into a few parts because we’ve had such deep conversation in different areas, is I would just love to hear, like maybe go through the services you offer and then the ones that we’re really aiming to grow so we have a great understanding of what the different things Crystal Clean provides and then the particular ones that we see a lot of need with. And Jeff, you and I have talked a lot about the state labor idea and post-construction. This part of it is—Dave shared earlier, Southwest Florida has grown just a little bit since the ’90s. You saw, and the part that I want to make sure of, you saw a lot of abundance then, and it was a micro part of what it is today, and it’s just abundance everywhere. So if you want to go through the services, then we’ll kind of break down the top three that were—you know, you’d mentioned post-constructions, and we are seeing more of it and pursuing more of it. We want to grow that side of the business. We’re, frankly, getting really good at it. We have specific teams in place and a part of our warehouse is dedicated to having all the right tools in place just for post-construction cleaning. So as Southwest Florida is expanding, you go down around the airport and up and down, you know, from Fort Myers, Estero, Bonita to Naples, the growth, the apartments, the commercial side of it, warehouses we’ve cleaned, apartment complexes is another thing that it’s—so large in scale, again, it’s the scary side of things. You go, that’s a lot. And it is. But we’re ready for it. We’ve geared up for it. So we put ourselves in that market fully. But we’ll never get away from our common area cleaning. I mean, the associations and the condos, they always need people to come and go on a daily basis. Large office work has come into that as well. So for office cleaning on the commercial side where they need to have day porters and they need to have evening staff that’s very consistent in making sure that systematically we keep the facility clean. So many stories of places we’ve walked into that it’s been another growth part of the company because they’ve tried the mom and pops, they’ve tried the national facility managers, and they find that if we have a miss—and hopefully we correct it on the front end—oh, cleaner’s going to be off. Well, we have cleaners to replace them. We have a system to make sure that it gets hit. If we get a call, we make sure we send someone out to take care of it. And so we’ve been doing really well in that arena, the large office cleaning. And then you have all those ancillary services that come with it. So when they ask about floor cleaning, and we can do all the floor cleaning they need, the power washing that they need, take on the buildings, the roofs, soft wash, any given area. So in Southwest Florida, because of the salt, the sand, the humidity, there’s just surface buildup everywhere on everything. And they want a company who can do it all. And we want to be that company. In fact, we need to make sure we can provide all those services. So we’ve put together a system that if they ask, “Can you help us with this?” we absolutely can. And it’s true. Yes is the answer. So we pick up a lot of extra services as well.

Charly: Love that. Dave, did you want to add anything?

Dave: Yeah, in regards to construction cleaning, I had an aha moment about a year after Hurricane Ian. I really hadn’t been down to Fort Myers Beach much. A couple of our clients there, one in particular right next to the pier, we cleaned for 27 years, seven nights a week, completely washed away. It’s gone, not even there. The slab itself has broken up. But anyway, I went down there about a year afterwards and took a drive through Fort Myers Beach and saw how little was rebuilt already. And even today, there’s so much rebuilding that hasn’t been done, you know, due to money issues, insurance, what have you. But as I’m driving through, I had this aha moment and I’m like, who’s going to do all this construction cleaning? You know, we’re one of the larger construction cleaning companies here and we can’t handle a fraction of this. There’s just so much.

Most of the contractors there working on the beach are from out of state. They’re here temporarily building, building, building. And I came back and we had a meeting and said, we need to really gear up for construction cleaning because 6, 12, 18 months from now—this was in ’23, early ’23, I guess—this is going to take off. There’s more work than anybody can handle. So we need to gear up the staff, the know-how, the expertise, and we did. And like Jeff’s saying, now it’s become a huge part of the business.

But in addition to that, I was watching a YouTube video last night on growth in different areas of the U.S. And there’s two states in the U.S. that are growing even faster than China. And everybody hears how China is just booming for many, many years. And those two states are Texas and Florida that are growing far faster. And the reason is people are moving here as fast as they can because of the weather, the economy. There’s no state tax, etc. So in addition to the rebuilding here in Lee County from the hurricane and people moving here so fast, like Jeff said, the apartment buildings are just popping up like weeds. And in the past, we would have said, “Oh, that’s too big a project for us to go clean 200 apartments. How would we do it?” Well, we’re doing it. We found out how to do it, figured it out. That growth is incredible in this area. Like you say, I saw it 30-some years ago, and I always said as long as the sun keeps shining, people are going to keep moving here because they’re tired. Even if they’re only here six months, it doesn’t matter. They still have to build places to live and restaurants to serve them, et cetera. And the problem we used to have was labor. Couldn’t find enough labor, for example, to work on Sanibel, because obviously the workers can’t afford to live there. Or in certain areas of Naples, they can’t afford to live there. But we’ve solved the labor problem, how to get good people and how to retain them. So, you know, we use that expression, you know, the sky’s the limit. And our goal isn’t to become as big as we possibly can. You know, we want to grow, but we have had times in the past where we grew too fast. I remember one year, I want to say like 2007, somewhere in there, we grew 50% in one year, and it was too much. It was hard to handle and keep up with. So at any rate, there’s unlimited work out there. Nobody can handle it all. So it’s just a matter of doing it right, getting your target customer, not just every job you can get, because then you’re just running in circles and such.

That was a big milestone, too, what we were talking about earlier, is seeing what happened from Hurricane Ian, just devastating, and billions and billions of dollars being poured into reconstruction, remodeling, and new construction. I don’t see an end to it anytime soon.

Charly: A couple of really good points you made. One is this constant drive to scout opportunity, and then think about work with the team to kind of collaborate on how we can be best service. And I think you guys are like a tag team, Batman and Robin. It’s like, “Let’s get it. Let’s get it. How are we going to do it?” I like that. How are we going to rock this in such a way that people are going to feel the Crystal Clean impact, culture difference. And I would love to talk through this idea, Jeff. One thing that I’ve always thought about is the very first interaction somebody has with a company. I think about this even through a restaurant. When you walk in and that first host or hostess is incredibly caring, compassionate and so forth. It gives you a frame for how this works. So when people call in, when people call in and you get on the call with them, it sounds like from their perspective, there’s an urgency. There’s a thing that you want to assure. I hear you. Let’s take a look. Maybe you go out on site right away. I’ve heard you say within 24 hours, we’re going to be, you know, a couple of our video sessions. “Hey, I got something that came up. I got a handle. I’m like, you got it.” Because there’s a drive to assure, even from that first call, the customer is completely taken care of. Can you talk a little bit about that, Jeff or Dave? Jeff, you want to start?

Jeff: I will, because there is kind of a typical thing that happens. And we’ll start at the basics where they’re looking for some type of commercial cleaning. And we get so many calls and leads that come in online just because they found us on Google. Thank you, Charly. So they found us, okay, and I’m hearing more and more because of the work that you’re doing. And I went through the videos, and I went through your website, and you have great Google reviews. If it’s not that, it might be a referral. But we get so many leads in like that, so the first conversation is usually kind of working through the how did you find us, and oh, that’s great, and it’s very positive. Now, what’s the problem? Let’s talk about you have a pain point. That’s why you called us. And what is that and how can we help? And so the typical process would be we have some type of location. If it’s common area cleaning, if it’s a post-construction clean, a large office building, let’s take a look at it. And, of course, in touring with the client, now you really have time to talk with them. And we try to develop a process of drawing out from them what it is that’s causing them a problem. Pain points, things that they’ve maybe tried and failed to get fixed. All these things resonate to go, okay, we have the opportunity now. And then when we talk about if they want to work with a company like Crystal Clean, we do talk about the core values. We do talk about our process and our people. Because while Dave and I are very engaged with many of our clients, the fact is when we’re out of sight, out of mind, they love the cleaner. They love the lead tech. We rarely hear from so many of them because what we want to establish. And when people start to hear that and they’re like, yeah, I’ve tried all the other, like, let’s see what it’s going to take. Let’s put something together. Okay, we’ll build a proposal. And of course, we’re happy to come and present. We always offer to have them come visit us, which I think is unique. We’re a cleaning company. I don’t know what they would expect, but come visit us. You’ll meet some people and you’ll see what Dave has put together here. And that’s almost always a lock on being able to secure a new client. So we have a process that’s very typical for how it works start to finish on a good lead that turns into not just a good opportunity, but then a client. And of course, as you know, like I said, some people just aren’t a good fit. In that process, sometimes you weed out the ones who, “I’m just looking to get the lowest price that I can.” And when they say, you know, “I have six people coming in, I’m waiting on five more quotes or whatever it is.” Because usually we’re the first to call, usually, and often the first to give a proposal. Because we try to make sure we get those things done quickly. We know it’s important to the client, especially the right client. They see the proactive approach and they really like it. The others that put us off and say, “Well, I’m waiting for the five other quotes,” usually not a good fit.

Charly: Got it. Anything you want to add, Dave?

Dave: Yeah, I think we learn, too, again, from mistakes is to pre-qualify the client. We don’t want to work for everybody. There’s a lot of them out there that are not a good fit. We actually explain our core values. If they think that’s ridiculous or don’t like that idea, they’re probably not going to be a good fit. And that’s because we’re in the service business. We’re selling an ongoing recurring service in most cases. If we were selling, you know, a product or a commodity, sure, it doesn’t matter. You just want to sell as many as possible through the Internet, nationwide, what have you. It’s like that old Walmart joke. Well, we lose 50 cents per unit, but we’re going to make it up in volume. Obviously, that doesn’t work. You’re losing more and more and more. You have somewhat limited resources with your people and your organization, so you don’t want to waste them on the wrong clients. There’s nothing against them. Some of them are on super tight budgets, and they’re not going to pay the amount to do the job right, and you don’t want to get caught in that game because they’re never happy. You’re not able to deliver quality service. It’s just a lose-lose scenario. So, yeah, learning to qualify prospects in advance has saved a lot of time and a lot of headaches later down the road.

Charly: I just want to really reiterate this, is that there is a great qualification process for those that may be listening to podcasts that are newer to business. Sometimes when we start, we may have to accept clients that aren’t exactly a good fit to get us to a break-even, so to speak. But beyond that, there becomes a tipping point where you can be very clear about a qualification process that aligns you with the right. And when we think about the right customer, and it’s kind of what will work to end our beautiful—will be a multi-part podcast—is we think about the values they carry, the resonance when we meet with them. Do they feel like they’re a good fit for us? Do we feel like we’re a good fit for them? So often, a lot of the people that I coach courageously, in your position, Jeffrey, you want to meet with them, they’ll ask, “How do you feel? Are we a good fit for you?” And if we are, why? Why us? And they sell themselves on you. And it’s really powerful when you hear them talk and it can be a tell as to whether, “Wow, you’re a little more expensive and you’re not aligned with what our budget is. Okay. Thank you for sharing that.” Well, then in our mind, we know that may not be the right customer because we know the value we bring, not the commodity, so to speak, of the cleaning aspect of it.

The part that I love, and I think it’s so critical people hear this, is that there’s a vision, a strategy, a plan, and a set of action steps that Crystal Clean creates. And it’s not a singular creation on your end. When you’re out assessing a job, you’re co-creating that vision, that strategy, that plan. And I would imagine, Jeff and Dave, when you’re out meeting with customers, that you’re helping them see around corners they didn’t know exist. We talked earlier about the workers’ comp scene, the proper licenses and insurances, to help them understand that if you work with a company that might be a mom-and-pop shop that hasn’t been properly licensed, the liability is on you. And you’ve got to be careful about that, especially with workers’ comp and issues along that line. So it’s just really reassuring to understand that’s part of the value-packed price point that you guys provide. Is there anything you want to expand on with this idea of vision, strategy, plan, and action steps, Dave?

Dave: Well, the vision, of course, has gotten adjusted over the last 30-some years. I use the expression of like a sailboat going into the wind. You can’t go straight. You have to tack back and forth. But eventually you’re working your way there. But to back up a little bit with when I was first starting here and realized, “Wow, I need to get out and work more. I’m not on vacation here.” So I need to get motivated. There’s no way to motivate you when you’re an entrepreneur. You have to find motivation. You don’t have a boss to push you. You have to push yourself. Well, I was reading the newspaper. This is the thing we had back then in the ’80s. You know, you’d open it up and read it. And I saw an ad for Zig Ziglar and Brian Tracy were coming to Fort Myers. I never heard of them, but I knew they were motivational and sales speakers. So I went downtown, saw that. And since then, I’ve probably read everything Zig Ziglar’s written, watched all his videos. But one thing he mentions in almost every book and video and talk is this expression he uses: “You can get everything you want in life if you help enough other people get what they want first.” And it’s just like, “Wow, that makes so much sense.”

So when we go out and talk to prospective customers, you know, it’s “How can we help you? What can we do for you?” You know, like you say, “Are we a good fit?” And they can tell pretty quickly. They can tell if you’re genuine or not. But it’s almost, you know, I’m not the most altruistic person. I’m not saying that. But if you can take that attitude that I’m going to help people, you do. You get everything you want, basically. But you have to do that first, and you have to help them. So when we go and talk to prospects, we will give them suggestions and help, whether they hire us or not. “Maybe you should consider this or do that. You don’t need five-day-a-week cleaning here. This could be done in three days a week.” “Oh, really? Wow. Here’s what I suggest.” And they may still not hire us, but it doesn’t matter. They appreciate that you weren’t there just to make a buck. You want to actually solve a problem.

One thing our coaches would always tell us is you have to be the solution provider. They have problems. Like Jeff said, they have pain points. You need to find out what those are and solve them for them because they don’t know the cleaning business. They don’t know if they’re paying too much, too little. They don’t know why it’s important. But that aspect is critical in all areas of life, not just business. If you can adopt that attitude—“I want to help enough people, then I get what I want.” It’s kind of like your mom telling you, “You can go out and play, but you’ve got to do your homework first.” You’ve got to do the work first, and it pays off.

Charly: I want to celebrate the life of Zig. Great guy. I know a lot of young people never heard of him. Just get on YouTube, search for Zig, and watch him do his work. That accent of him, I could listen to that all day. Missouri, I think, is from Southern.

Dave: Yazoo City, Mississippi.

Charly: Yeah, so good. Jeff, is there anything you wanted to add as we talk through this?

Jeff: Maybe that’s part of why Dave and I get along so well. I saw Zig in a similar time frame up in Fort Wayne, Indiana when he came through, and I was just getting into business. And it did set a model in my mind, the type of thinking that goes along with succeeding. It’s really about helping others. And once you get a flow, everybody… that no zig remembers his pump as well and uh I came into a Dave already had a pump working so I didn’t have to start from scratch but we’re keeping it going and we’re keeping the flow with all the things we talked about in mind and and back to the core values you can never get away from from having good people yeah and dave has built really good key people around him both in the office to orchestrate but at the cleaner level And that education, training, lead tech, operational roles that we have, Dave’s done a nice job of surrounding himself with good people. And I’m not talking about me. I’m talking about other good people. But I’ve known that since I’ve met him. And I think it was in 2010 or ’11 or ’12, somewhere in there. And there was just a resonance between Dave and I. It was like, “Wow, this is amazing.” Because you’re on the hunt, especially if you’re—I think about it through the observer mind—that you have an idea of that ideal person you’d want to work with or the company you’d want to represent and that they’re doing good things for the world, really helping improve the quality of either people’s lives or business or something like that. And there’s always been that connection for me. So it’s an absolute honor being in this podcast, doing this work.

Charly: A couple of big points I want to bring up as we wrap up. One of them is this idea that you guys live into creating great visions, living into the strategy that comes from the execution of the vision, developing great plans, not only for Crystal Clean itself, but for customers. And then the hardest part for so many businesses—taking decisive, consistent action and being, and I love the words you shared, Dave, this idea, “I’ve never been afraid of change.” So if we have to evolve, we have to change, we’re going to bring it in and make it rock.

So as you think about our journey today, I would love to hear from each of you, maybe one, two or three points that really sum up some of the life lessons that have come out of this for you and it may be related to Zig’s quote or maybe something else but Dave we’ll start with you just what were some big things that came out of our journey today.

Dave: Well there’s a lot. I know it’s gonna take a minute to unpack. In a service business in particular, you know, we’re not an internet business so it’s a people business and that’s the key. We’ve made mistakes hiring the wrong people even managers, keep managers at times and in every case it didn’t work out and it was painful to remove them from the system and replace them with the right people and it took years and years to get the team we have now but it’s always evolving and we’re always trying to improve that and it can be exhausting but you have no choice. You know, you have to keep getting the right people. And that’s, again, why we say family first, referring to our family at work as well as home. So, for example, not to get too far off track, but if a manager, an employee has a serious problem at home, like, don’t worry about it, take the time off, we’ll cover it. You know, that’s what family does, so to speak. It comes back and pays dividends. So I would emphasize it always comes down to people and how many good people can you find.

Charly: Well I think that the point, what you just shared, if we want to give a takeaway here, is great businesses are composed of great people. Great businesses are about great relationships. And a big part of that relationship, as we unpack and define it, comes back to the values we’ve talked through, and I’ll say them one more time: care, compassion—I’m going to even say unconditional love because that’s where that comes from, where if you have a problem through thick and thin, we’re here for you and we’re going to work through this. But it also comes down to courage, trust, reliability, honesty, authenticity, openness. And a big part of what you’ve shared today is one of my big takeaways is that we want to be very open from the first call that you come in with to really understand your struggle while working to see if we’re a good fit for you, and then see if we can provide a proposal or a strategy that would be helpful for you, not only for the next month, but for life. And there’s this inherent part, customers for life. That’s another big takeaway for me and something that I’ve known about you, Dave, specifically since the early tens. With Jeff coming on in the last four years, it’s like, just take that, pour some gas on that fire, watch it go.

Jeff, is there anything that were big takeaways or thoughts that you want to share?

Jeff: You know, in Dave’s humility, he forgets how nice of a person he really is. And it does make the difference. When you talk about authenticity, to go out and spout how good you want to be and how you want to help others, it doesn’t do any good unless you back it up. And Dave has backed it up. That’s why I’m still here and not fearing change. You know, we came through COVID. I came in during COVID. And that was a huge change in my life. Like I said, I was at a corporate trade show marketing and here I am with Dave. And I’m still here with Dave because I love working with Dave and Crystal Clean. And the learning process and not fearing the change to come with it, go embrace it, absorb it. I’m like Dave in that regard. I can’t learn it fast enough. So I know that there’s a long ways to go there, but I feel like I’m becoming a cleaning professional and I can add some value. And it’s because of what’s been established already. And so Crystal Clean, looking into the future in the area, I hope that, like I said, in a few years, we’re just saying that Crystal Clean is the go-to family-owned and operated company that will provide the services that you need at a commercial cleaning level. And I think we’ve got a good, solid start, and we just want to maintain it.

Charly: Oh, that’s so good. So as we wrap up, two things. One, I want to tell you both what an honor and a privilege it is to be here with you. It’s the best use of me on this planet to work with you guys, to move these things forward, to take these values, put them in the world when a world that we see today especially needs these kind of values as examples, as mentors. Just having a quote, somebody calling in, you’re receiving good energy from Crystal Clean. That’s like, “Oh, there are good people in the world.” They don’t necessarily say that to us, but they feel it. And it’s to amplify that is everything I’m about. And that being said, I’d love to—if somebody wants to meet with you, get a quote, a proposal, tell us the course of action. Is it call, get on website? What’s the best way to move things forward with Crystal Clean?

Jeff: Currently, probably our website for most people. You may want to go to cleaningfortmyers.com, cleaningnaplesfl.com because we have two locations now. We didn’t even talk about our growth in that regard. We have Fort Myers and Naples. But our phone number is consistent, 239-936-7700, posted here. And either way you go about it, if you call, you’ll get a real human. I enjoy saying that because some companies it’s, yeah, the endless. Push one, two, or three. But our website will tell you a little more. And if you’re interested, of course, there’s a way to apply for a job. There’s a way to get our attention and say, “Hey, I need a quote.” And we will respond as quickly as we can.

Dave: No, that’s about it. You talked about milestones earlier. The internet has changed everything in business. It changed personal lives as well. It’s so easy to get information out, get a hold of people, find out who’s in the company, what they’re about. And you’re talking about calling. I think one thing that set us apart, too, is—and we’ve done this for many, many years—when a prospect calls and wants a bid, if possible, we even go the same day or the next day. “Yeah, I can come out and I’ll see you no matter how busy we are.” And they are just blown away. Like, you know, “I called five people. Four didn’t even show up. You know, three said they’d show up and didn’t come.” Whether, you know, it’s a good job or not, they’re just blown away that you actually respond right away. So, yeah, give us a call. We will talk to you absolutely as soon as possible. And that goes for clients, too. If a client has a concern, we don’t wait a day or two. We call them immediately to see, you know, what do we need to do? “Oh, I’ll fix it today.” They’re like, “Really? That’s awesome.” Yeah, that’s what we do. We’re a service business. There’s, of course, some cases you can’t, but, yeah, just service.

Charly: I think that’s such a tell, is that you want a cleaning company because it’s typically a lifelong—I mean, we aim for it to be a lifelong relationship. And if you’re not returning the call and showing up, like that’s a value tell. It’s so common. It’s unbelievable. And it’s something we talked about at the beginning was this Midwestern kind of vibe of like we do what we say we’re going to do and we get there and we try to do a great job and we try to grow from it. And we’re also there unconditionally. So that means if there’s a problem, call us. We’ll handle it. We’ll do our very best to solve it and move it forward. So I just really want to land that as we end this podcast. So to be clear, call, visit the website. And all the contact information will be with the episode, and you’ve already gone over it. And we just really wish all the listeners who are hearing this get inspired, have a great mentor, realize that having a—when you go to hire or go to be part of a company, thinking about the CEO, and I love this on your tag on your door it says “visionary” I believe.

Dave: Yeah.

Charly: Somebody who’s really establishing this is how we’re going to run this and it’s a co-creative psychologically safe environment which I believe Crystal Clean has. I just want to say thank you guys so much. Any final word, Jeff, before we wrap up?

Jeff: Dave’s a visionary but to keep him humble if you notice it also says chief cook and bottle washer. Oh I did so you know he’s willing to dig in and do the work. No final words.

Charly: Okay. Old school expression there. I love it. Dave, any final words?

Dave: No, it’s been great. I feel more inspired now.

Charly: Yeah, totally. Just discussing this to go out and try harder. I’m going to ask one bonus question, and that is, what’s one thing that you really loved about our time together, this podcast together? Just one thing. Jeff?

Jeff: The positive energy. I think that’s what, you know, I’m with Dave. I’m sitting here going, you know, we’re doing a lot of things right, I guess, in my own mind. And because we want to do them better, because we all know we fall short and things happen, it’s not a perfect world for any of us. But we feel inspired to try to keep doing a good job. And I feel that way more when we have these conversations.

Charly: Yeah, that’s so good. Thank you. Yeah, that’s true. There’s just always more to learn, always more improvement. I think it was Lexus years ago, their expression was “the relentless pursuit of perfection,” I think was their tagline. And you can never reach it, but you have to keep trying. You have to keep improving. So we don’t have all the answers. We’re certainly not perfect, but we’re going to keep trying to improve. That’s all you can do in life in general, but especially in business.

Charly: Well, the one thing that I loved is just the pure inspiring energy of both of you. And there’s three parts to what we call the teachable content pyramid. There’s this idea of principles and perspective at the top level. There’s the idea of a mindset, the sort of teachable mindset that we have. And then the bottom is where it all comes together is the tactics. So we’ve lived into all three parts of this. The thing that I really love about this is that we’re going to be able to take so many clips, so many inspirational pieces that will put in rotation almost for life, maybe on a monthly or quarterly basis that will continue to like a lighthouse, continue to shine the light on what it means to run an exceptional business in those three spectrums—bigger picture perspective. Here’s kind of how we’re doing it. And then here’s the tactical part as well. And this will be inspirational for everybody else. So you guys up for another podcast in the future? I want to hear you say the name of our podcast again. You did that really well.

All (laughing): Cleaning with Purpose.

Charly: Rocking it out here in beautiful Fort Myers, Florida on this beautiful day. Thank you guys so much.

All: All right. That’s a wrap.