Going from Route to Hail- One Man’s Journey
Learn what one tech did to pull roots in CA and head for the HAIL!
PODCAST TRANSCRIPT:
Keith: I’m Keith Cosentino. He’s Shane Jacks and this is the PDR College podcast. The only place in the entire universe where you can get the PDR skills that you need to run a business successfully. We’re not gonna teach you how to push dents on a podcast but we are gonna teach you to use those skills in your business to generate more and more money.
What’s so important about the money, Shane? I thought this was an art.
Shane: It is but I like money.
Keith: We need it. I need it to be able to buy my small-pall chonies.
Shane: My wife. Her shoe habit. It’s getting’ out of control.
Keith: One of these dudes –
Joel: Get you some air bags to get your damn Escalade over the speed bump.
Shane: Air bags to get your Chevrolet truck over the curb so you can pull your trailer.
Joel: Your dually.
Shane: Out of Union, South Carolina.
Keith: What does that even mean to anyone else?
Joel: Air bag it up.
Keith: Who knows?
Shane: Who knows?
Keith: But theoretically –
Joel: Zero.
Keith: But theoretically it could mean you got a huge trailer. You need a huge truck to pull it. That’s common sense. So you get the truck and you think, hey, this thing doesn’t look all that cool, because it’s kinds like what grandpa’s have. I’m gonna lower it down look like something super cool. Something a guy who’s 17 would wanna have and then you do all that stuff. Oh, now guess what? You can’t pull the trailer over anything larger than a dime so you get yourself actually stuck in parking lots. Or gravel lots, because you’ve taken a useless truck and turned it into something that looks neat but does absolutely nothing.
Shane: True story. Allegedly.
Keith: So as you can hear in the background we have another voice chiming in before he was supposed to. This is a guest on the PDR College podcast that – we don’t normally have guests. But it is fun once in awhile. Shane and I were talking about who could we have on. What is somebody– or who is somebody who is really interesting and has something to share?
So some of you may, and some of you may not know our man Joel Mathis. The reason we’ve got him on the show is because Joel has made the transition that a lot of guys think about making. Joel was running a successful route, retail business in sunny California and decided he was going to give that up and move into chasing hail full-time, full-speed ahead. And he actually didn’t just talk about it. He went and did it. And uprooted his whole family from one state to another and he’s living the dream now. So, we asked him to come on the show and share this experience. Tell us what he would do differently. What’s great about it. What sucks about it. And just kinda give you a little peek into that world.
Shane: Yeah, and Joel this just happened recently, right? It was last year? Was that the first year?
Joe: Last year was the first year. I contemplated it for many years and then I just got burned out with my route. Was just tired of the low-ball, low-ball, low-ball. $35.00 a car might be – yeah, but it’s a Rolls Royce. So what, I’m Mexican. I can do it for $35.00. Okay.
Keith: I was just gonna say, you had some high-end clientele there too, right? You were in Southern California?
Joel: Yes, I actually had quite a bit. It was just amazing how prices were going in the toilet, considering the stuff we were working on.
Keith: So, set a stage for us a little bit. Tell us, first of all, how did you get into the dent removal business? How’d you hear about it, how’d you get into it?
Joel: Country dance bar I used to go to. Bunch of guys that always go in there talk about all the money. Making it rain at the bar. Meeting the ladies with their dollar bills. And I was like what do you guys do? We’re local dent guys. My dad owns Dentmaster, this is who I am. This is my sidekick Tonto. This is how much money he makes.
So, I got tired of doing surveillance for comp investigation, so I was like, I wanna do that. They’re like, come on, you can make billions of dollars. So, I started learning.
Keith: You got hired on by that company locally?
Joel: Yeah, I knew the guys for a while and I was like, yeah, I’ll do it. And I rode around for a while with the guy that I said I would work with and did some training. Poked some Audi’s, made some circles, made some x’s. All that learning –
Keith: How many guys were at that company?
Joel: When he started his own business, there was just three of them after some stuff. I’m trying to be a little vague versus using names on some of these people.
Keith: Cool. So there was a few guys –
Shane: Interesting little – I completely forgot about this until Joel brought it up. The people he is talking about, Keith, I actually know them also.
Keith: No kidding.
Shane: Yes. They came out to the plant after I had been trained by Germans to do some training at the plant to train some other guys in the paint shop and the body shop. I was in assembly, and they came out and I met them. And they actually offered me a position in California. Asked me to come out there with them. I’d completely forgotten about that Joel, that you and I have a connection there with those guys.
Keith: It really kinda shows how small the dent world really, really is. We’re kinda at the genesis of the whole industry right now. Where everybody has like two degrees back to the original dent guys.
Shane: Yeah, mm-hmm.
Joel: Yes.
Keith: So, these guys hired you on, they trained you. How long was your training? Did you kinda take to it easily, or did you struggle with it?
Joel: No. I remember riding around with him, watching what he was doing. I still couldn’t figure out he was pushing the dents out and everything. He’s like, here, try this van and I start pushing. He’s like Dude, you’re fixing them like awesome. I had no idea. I don’t even know what I’m looking at. Can’t even – I’m looking at the side of the van going, ummmm. So, we go back to his house later on, he’s bragging to his girlfriend, the exotic dancer, and like, yeah, Joel was pushing dents today. And I’m like, yeah, I’m doing great. Whatever. I didn’t even know I was on the thing.
One thing led to another. Three weeks later the guy beats up his girlfriend, ends up in jail. The next thing you know; I’m thrown to the wolves with less than three weeks of experience to hold down twelve dealerships.
Keith: Seriously?
Joel: Honest to God.
Keith: Three weeks’ experience and you were out running the route?
Joel: I had spent – I was the type of guy that when I wanted to learn something – and remember I quit a $35.00 an hour job. And this was a long time ago. So, I was already making great money and so I trained every single night. I got hoods. I would sit on my back porch with a light, that old Dent Master light, with the black background with the bulb that you could either have it on or have it off, and try and master the Audi’s. Well, Audi’s are easy once you learn to pinch the bulb together. You make an Audi. But fixing a dent would suck.
So I had a vague idea. I could make a dent look really bad and then flatten it out a long time ago. But I still wanted to do it without using the sanding block, because many a clear coat was gone back then.
Keith: Yes. There’s a pretty steep learning curve with the sandpaper.
Joel: Yeah, clear coat’s not three inches thick.
Keith: So, you worked with those guys and then how long till you got your own gig going?
Joel: Oh, I only worked for a year –
Keith: And that was it? With those guys?
Joel: – with those guys. Oh yeah. Some things came to an end and I was Hasta Luigi. Moved to Seattle, got in the elevator trades, spent three years up there, came back. I started working with that guy that beat up his girlfriend. I ended up staying with him just to start again.
Then he was just as shady as shady could get ant I was like sleeping in the guy’s garage on the floor in the bathroom. Now this is what I went through in my life. And I was helping him run his route and he did everything shady. I was trying to do everything legit and I always told him, they’re gonna see what I’m doing and I’m doing the job because they’re gonna come back and look at my work because I’m doing it. And they’re gonna realize you’re not doing it and there’s gonna be a problem.
And sure enough all this stuff started happening. You’re not doing your job. They’re used to you being here. You’re just trying to run up bills just because they’re not gonna go back and look at your stuff and when you have me fill in, they’re gonna look at my work. Why? Because they don’t know me. So this went on and everything and people started getting all pissed off and I’m like, I’m not gonna go back and tell Beer, but you’re a sinking ship. I’m jumping off. And they’re like, well, we wanna use you, but if you’re gonna keep working for this guy then we’re not gonna use you. So literally as I’m living with the guy I started my own business and the day that he got my business license in his mail, he’s like you’re out. And I’m like okay.
Keith: And you took all the accounts?
Joel: A lot of them. He did it to himself.
Keith: I know. He lost them. You didn’t take them.
Joel: They wanted me, you know. It’s what I started. I started straight out the gate making $4000.00 month, so basically $50,000.00 a year with ready-made accounts that were just because I was doing my job.
Keith: So, that was the genesis of your company. Affordable is what you called it, right?
Joel: Right then and there off the floor, sleeping under a sink in some dude’s garage, working out of a milk crate with 16 tools, a Ford Ranger with everything I had in a 7×7 storage unit and literally sleeping out of my truck.
Keith: How many years ago was this?
Joel: 2001 was when I did that part of it, yeah.
Keith: That’s cool.
Shane: Wow. So Joel, when did you start with that company to begin with?
Joel: Right out of the Marine’s, 1998. I was helping them on the weekends as I was doing the P.I. thing. And I was doing the P.I. thing on the weekends when I was in the Marines.
Keith: From now on, I think you should refer to that as the Magnum P.I. thing.
Joel: Oh, yeah. The wife’s P.I. Thing. Yes.
Keith: So, then that was it. You hit the ground running and you were just figuring on running that route business indefinitely, yeah?
Joel: Yeah, yeah. I mean I did every sanding thing and everything just to make money. I just went hundreds of miles outside of my want just to get money. Because that’s what you had to do. It was like 200 bucks a day, 100 bucks a day, that’s what I needed to survive on. Let’s realize I was horrible. I mean compared to guys that had a lot of years of experience, I was horrible. But you know, they saw a guy that at least tried anything versus the guy that would go, no. And they wanted the try versus the no guy.
And they worked with me and I have accounts to this day that had been with me from day one.
Keith: So, your business obviously grew and you got to the point where you were doing well. At what point did you start to get to the point where you might want to leave it and do something different?
Joel: When I stopped caring. I stopped doing my job. Used every excuse in the world not to go to work.
Keith: Really?
Joel: Yeah, it went bad quick. Oh yeah, I went through a lot of – like when I talked about, you know when John talks about the economy sucked or how bad thing were, ask Joel. No, I was the demise of my business. We all are. If you destroy it, it’s because of you. Either you’re not trying hard enough or you’re not doing the right things. I destroyed my business.
Shane: Joel, man I can’t see that in you. Honestly. Keith have you spend any amount of time with Joel, whatsoever, honestly?
Keith: Yeah.
Shane: I spent several hours with Joel last summer. God, man I just can’t see that, honestly. Things must’ve gotten really bad, Joel. Because Joel is on the most personable –
Joel: I just go lazy. I lost sight of church. Just started partying too much. And then I lost confidence in myself.
Keith: So, how many years in were you running that business? The route retail business?
Joel: Before I did that?
Keith: Yeah, before you started to burn out.
Joel: About ten years. Because I had helpers that worked with me. I just got tired because I was paying a helper, and paying him well. I had three trucks. I had make seven grand a month just to pay bills because that’s how much stuff I had running. So I needed 12 to 15 a month just to pay him, pay bills, pay taxes and start making money.
Keith: And were you doing that consistently or was that a hit and miss program.
Joel: Oh, yeah. It was like 6:00 a.m. to 7:00 p.m. or 8:00 p.m. every night, every day. And that was a lot considering most the accounts were only paying $65.00 a car.
Keith: Yeah. So, it doesn’t sound like your burnout had anything to do with the revenues. So your revenue was high at your ten-year mark. I’m assuming it was as high as it’s ever been, right?
Joel: Oh, yeah. It was consistently around 140 to 150.
Keith: Revenue for the company or what you were able to pay yourself after all those expenses?
Joel: Believe me, I thought every dollar was mine. And then you wake up one day and the IRS takes $27,000.00 out of your account. Then you realize it’s not your dollars.
Keith: That’s a really important part of running a business.
Joel: I made it rain. I’m here to talk about everything I did right and everything I did wrong on this trip.
Keith: That’s really cool, man because a lot of people are private about that stuff and they don’t want to share it but that’s the stuff that can really help somebody. The stuff that you –
Joel: You’re gonna learn a lot about me. I was the guy –
Keith: Were the helpers pushing dents or were they just running cars for you?
Joel: I tried to teach a lot of people but it’s hard to find the right people with the right drive, that put the time in. So, basically they were taillight guys. They were pushing my cart around. Move the truck, move the car guys.
I tried teaching several people. One guy actually learned and then they gave him a hard dent and he quit. He showed up at my house, dropped my truck off with tools and I didn’t even know. I had bursitis. I was in bed for a week and didn’t even know he hadn’t even gone to work all week.
Keith: The bursitis, that’s your elbow, right or it can be an bursi sack?
Joel: Yes, yes. So mine had inflamed up really bad. I had that Joe Montana elbow thing going. It was all swollen up so I took a week off just to rest it. And then Lee, my roommate’s like, your truck’s in the driveway. I was like I ain’t even been out of bed in a week. I go out there and I’m like oh. At least I still had my phone. My phone’s dead. I turn I on. 36 messages.
So, you suck it up and you go back to work. That’s what I did.
Keith: Your story’s way more interesting than I even thought it was gonna be. You got a couple helpers. One of them quits and you know what you should done is ask one of these dudes if they would sleep in your garage bathroom under the sink. And if they would, that might be the guy that was gonna make it.
Joel: Yeah, and this kid was good too. I mean the stuff he could do with clay and stuff, he was a great artist and everything. He was phenomenal. I went to church with him. I knew his family and everything but he just lacked – anytime hardship or anything got tough, he was the kind of person that would quit versus push through it and I was trying to help him. So, at that point I was like yeah, I’m done. I’m out the door back out to it.
I just called the doctor. I said is this gonna kill me. Will I break my arm doing this? He was like nope. It’s gonna be a lot of pain. I Said okay, I can live with pain.
What actually helped me get through it was the fact that I was pushing through it. It hurt. Man did it hurt. But it helped get everything in and out real quick with the elbow.
Keith: So, you’re in Southern California. You got just one or two helpers now. Nobody pushing dents except you and the high point, your revenue, it sounds like averaged 12, 15k a month. Does that sound accurate?
Joel: Yes, yes. Which is probably pretty low considering. But I was doing strictly dealer work. And doing dealer work for the average prices of $50.00 to $65.00 a car, you gotta bang out a lot of cars.
Keith: How did you stay – you were stuck on the old guys pricing schedule when you took over. You never created your own pricing schedule.
Joel: And I did a big stuff, yeah. I was doing big stuff, small stuff, everything for that price.
Keith: Wow.
Shane: That’s insane. No wonder you got burned out.
Joel: I used some of the accounts that I was doing for $35.00 a car on Corona just because I was trying to get better at big dents, so I was like okay, I know it’s gonna kill me. I’m gonna do like seven cars a day, make 270 bucks or 370 bucks, that’s it. But he doesn’t care if chew them up a little bit. But he wants then better. I’m like okay. It’s a learning. It’s free. I get free training to hack up someone’s cars at a certain time to get better at the bigger dents.
So I was like cool. I’ll use this account to get better.
Keith: And then I’ll be able to go up the street and do $65.00.
Joel: Hundred-dollar holler. Come on. I was afraid to do retail.
Keith: I can see that after a few years.
Joel: Back then, yeah, I was afraid to do it.
Keith: But at some point you got confident. I’ve seen some of your work on a video. You can fix a dent. But, you were still – you couldn’t get out of that wholesale pricing mindset it sounds like.
Joel: Yeah, I had horrible techniques. I ultimately had to train myself and then I went to go buy some tools at Ultra Dent Tools. Steve Hopp was there and I said hey, I wanna see how good I am, I hear you’re really good. And he goes here. He knocks a dent in a hood and I’m like here comes Joel’s kryptonite. Flat panels
20 minutes later I’m still working on this dent. He takes a phone call. He knocks another one into it. 30 seconds the dent’s gone. I’m like, you are my god. Please train me.
Keith: So, did he put some time in with you.
Joel: I spent two weekends, $500.00 a day. He flew in a few different people. Robert Fisher from Dent Devil. Him and Ike, another guy and this guy was funny because him and I started working together this year and I had completely forgot about him.
But, yeah I want from using the pole I used to use. It’s called the Luminator Deluxe. I actually make like 3000 of those and sold those for dinging. And the ding boards. I used to make all their stuff. But I was using all that stuff. So I was trying to transition from the poles and ding boards and stuff to lights. I wasn’t familiar with lights.
So, I was horrible trying to learn this the first two days. The third day when he was like, okay, here’s your test day, it clicked overnight.
Keith: So, Steve ultimately got you on the right track.
Joel: And then you know, I was trying to learn the circle technique. He did. And a few months later I went back and took it again. And he was like stop coming back. I can’t teach you much.
Keith: Yeah, if I got this good once, I’m gonna do it twice.
Joel: Well, I wanted to get better. I wanted to be one of those good guys because I hear about Mark Magil, Jeff Magil, Ray Harmon, Tony Madison Brandon Madison. A bunch of these guys out there that are really good. And then Oster was like there’s one good guy that I would say that if you ever get a chance you have to work with him. And I was like who? And he was like come here, come here. Shane Jacks.
Shane: I know that’s a lie.
Joel: No.
Keith: So were marketing for retail at all?
Joel: Very, very – I tried dabbling in it but it was so hard to balance that and satisfy your accounts.
Keith: Yeah, it is really hard, especially when you’re by yourself.
Joel: You can kinds cheat.
Shane: You had the golden handcuffs on.
Joel: I was helping every Tom, Dick and Harry. I would have five different helpers a month at this point because I was trying to help anybody out. And my way of getting faster was to push my tool carts around, you take my taillights out. Anything that makes me faster so I can do the things that they pay me for. They don’t pay me to take taillights out. They don’t pay me to this that or the other. They pay me to push dents. And I figured I was losing money doing these things.
So, I’m like I’ll pay you 50 bucks a day, 60 bucks a day. I’ll pay you 10 bucks an hour, to get better. And I got better. I got faster, but I lost sight of all these other things.
Keith: So, at some point you had to figure I’m working on a Lamborghini or I’m working on a Bentley. This might be worth more than 65 bucks. That had to cross your mind.
Joel: It was at that time. It was like $125.00 a car 200 bucks a car max. So, I had some accounts that I started charging that and everything but then again, here comes Joe Davey, here comes Billy Bob, here comes Juan, here comes Achny. Everybody’s just knocking the prices down. Oh well, you weren’t here yesterday, so I had them do this dent and they did it for $125.00. And he’s pretty good.
So it’s just like, match it or leave.
Keith: So they were beating you up pretty good.
Joel: Yeah, but I’m Mr. Nice Guy. Remember I’m insecure. I’m trying to do anything to please people. I want everybody to like me. So, I don’t want to make anybody mad, nor do I wanna argue with you because I’m so insecure that I feel I need your money and I can’t make any more anywhere else, so, I’m gonna bend over and kiss your butt. That was that Joel.
Keith: Well, listen, that’s just about all of us that worked strictly wholesale. Your whole world is keeping those accounts and the thought of losing one is terrifying because you don’t have another one sitting on deck that you can go and work at. That was what happened to me with my big transition. That’s how I ended up doing so much retail.
Shane: I mentioned a few minutes ago the golden handcuffs. Joes while you were – and I can’t lie, I’m still in that boat in some ways with my wholesale accounts I make good money. There’s no $65.00 a car. I’m just not gonna do it. But Joel, you’re the same way as Keith and I. We can do larger damage and kind of have to showcase that to the dealers to keep them on board with our higher prices. But, going back to what I was originally saying, that plant that I was at that was a golden handcuff situation also. And that’s with the benefits and everything else that was there. Was scared to death to leave. And we do that with our car lots too because here’s the bottom line. Keith, how much do you make on an average retail customer dent. Just give me an average.
Keith: About $178.00.
Shane: Man that’s pretty precise. I actually do like $182.95. But $178.00 is average on our retail customer’s prices. And your wholesale accounts are – I don’t care how bad a wholesale account is, you’re gonna make way more than $178.00 a month or a year. And you may not see retail customer again for another five years. So, you’re sitting there, you’re going well here’s the guarantee. I’m going to chase not-guaranteed. So those handcuffs are hard to take off.
Keith: Yeah, but that’s the irony is that’s the perception but it’s actually the opposite. Because you don’t just have one retail customer, you have thousands of them. And the do come every five years, but in between that there’s a bunch of new people that are gonna come again in five years. So you think it’s just the one guy and he’s gonna come back maybe never, and you’re gonna be stuck doing nothing, but it’s really the dealers that are gonna screw you like Joel said. Hey Achned was here, and he’s pretty good and he did it for 50 bucks. We’re gonna use him unless you can match it.
Shane: I think you misinterpreted what I said. Basically what I’m saying is you have to earn those retail customers every single time that you get them, in some way. They have to find you or you have to find them. And with the guaranteed it’s there.
Keith: Yeah, you stumble onto the lot with your bursitis and make some money.
Shane: Guys think, and I’m the same way, where is my next retail customer gonna come from. – After all these years of doing it, word of mouth, advertising, etc. has yeah, it makes it almost a guaranteed. But guys that are transitioning as Joel would have had to do, just going from strictly wholesale to trying the retail side, dude he’s going in blind now knowing if there’s gonna be a retail customer next week because he doesn’t have those years of pushing the retail side like you do, Keith.
Keith: So let me ask you before we talk about your transition Joel, if you had to go back and forget about hail. You had to go back and start your route company over again, what would you have done differently? What would you do tomorrow differently than you did the first time?
Joel: Now I have confidence. I know what I can do. So being able to – the confidence. I can sell my skills. I’m no longer the fu guy. Believe me, I was. I would just – when I stopped caring I was just like fu, literally. What? Yeah, I’m serious. And just pack my stuff. Yeah, customers, I would sit there in their garages and if they would say something and if they would say something square, they would go inside and they’d come out and they’d come back and find they’re car torn apart and I would be loaded up and gone.
Keith: You kind of lost it.
Joel: But now I know how to communicate. I know how to work through these things. Oh, yeah, I was getting to the point where I’d just turn around and I’d be gone. Just pack up and gone. But now I know how to talk to people.
Keith: Take me back to before you lost it. When you would disassemble cars on purpose and then just leaving them,
Joel: Oh no, you’d get all sqauirrly, or start arguing price, I would just leave your car apart, pack my tools up when you turned your back, and be gone. You’d call me up and go where are you? I’m having coffee. I’m sorry I’m busy can I call you right back?
Shane: That’s awesome and not in a good way.
Joel: No, I mean I’ve gone through so many transitions to become who I am by looking back at all the mistakes. Now with the confidence I can talk to people, I can think on my feet, I have the skills; I’m constantly growing and looking to improve. I can sell those things where people are like I don’t know the guy but he’s saying the things I want to hear.
Keith: So, if you were starting back over, would you stick like you did with straight wholesale? Would you do some retail stuff? More retail stuff? What do you think you’d do different?
Joel: I would try and focus on retail. I would try and focus on the retail, the money customers. I’d focus on the high-end areas. But I’d still try and do some wholesale just keep the money flowing until that repeat business got a bit of a repeat business and a reputation was built and everything.
Keith: And you were fairly close to Tamecula weren’t you?
Joel: I actually did a lot of accounts in John’s area back in the day.
Keith: Wait a second. You fixed cars in Tamecula?
Joel: Almost all the dealerships were mine, believe me. I was a baller. Considering at the prices I did cars, doing 20, 25 a day that’s a lot of work. So I handled almost all the accounts when the auto center was build out there, they were all my accounts.
Keith: This is blowing my mind. They sell cars in Tamecula to people with money?
Shane: They do it for food.
Joel: They do. The Amish started a bunch of dealerships, yes.
Keith: You’re a whole other level of celebrity that I didn’t ever realize. Here’s a guy that went to a place that’s basically –
Joel: Oh, yeah. I never even knew that there was. If he owned Tamecula, I didn’t know about it. Because he wasn’t anywhere I was.
Keith: Who are talking about? If who owned?
Joel: Ain’t no money in Tamecula. Look at my multi-million dollar customers. I can’t make no dollars.
Keith: Oh, he’s talking about a mutual friend of ours who has had the misfortune of running a company in Tamecula for like 18 or 20 years where there’s no business.
Joel: I got all those Amway dollars. I focused on the Amway customers.
Keith: Did everything in barter.
Joel: There was tons of people out there who were running Amway so I started doing Amway and they all became my customers and I was like there you go. I was like I’ll find a way to do it. Here I can join this. I’ll never buy your products but I get to meet everybody that has money. What do you do? I fix dents. Hey I got a dent. No duh.
Shane: We’re gonna have to hang up on Joel. This is apparently all a lie. We all know that this cannot happen in Tamecula. Guys we are sorry for bringing Joel on.
Joel: I made money there. I don’t know about someone else but I was making it rain Amway dollars in my pocket. I mean I was – the gay guys loved me. I’ll make you breakfast. Come on over. I’m like shit, I’ll fix your car, I’ll eat too, but believe me that’s about it.
Keith: I got one of the best compliments I have ever gotten from a customer from a retail retired gay couple. Two guys. I fixed their car, they were so excited, they were jumping up and high-fiving each other, like high-ten, both hands with the feet off the ground and everything and one of them came out and called me a prince. He said you are just a prince. I’m liked you know what? I’m not gay at all but that’s cool man. I wouldn’t mind more people calling ne a prince.
Shane: You are a prince.
Joel: Back then I was in shape.
Shane: When you originally said it you said they called you Prince and I though the artist formerly known as.
Keith: No. Nope, nope.
Shane: Would you like some pancakes.
Keith: No, just a general prince. So at this point in our career your fed up, you’re done. Prices suck basically and you can’t see any way to get them out of the toilet because everyone is coming right over your head or under your feet with these other crappier prices and these guys are threatening to fire you and use these other guys. So you decide screw it. But how did you get wired into the hail community? In Cali we don’t have hail. We don’t ever see hail storms. How did you know that you needed to go do this? How did you hear about it?
Joel: Once again to those mutual people that Shane and I know. They did it a lot and after just hearing about it through the grapevine – they also did it part-time or whatever. /That mythological beast that’s called the hail guys. Really? What do those guys make? Oh man they make five, ten grand a day. You should see them. They all got Rolls Royces and cigar boats and everything? And I was like really? I can’t be that good.
So I was afraid of hail for a while because it was lie this mythological creature. The unicorn of dents was hail.
Keith: That’s how it seems out there to us.
Joel: And that’s when I originally went to Ultra to buy some tools, to talk to him because he didn’t get a lot of hail work and that’s what I wanted to see. Okay, well I hear hail is so different than route work, show me and that’s when he hit that dent in the hood. Twenty minutes I was still working on it. And I knew I needed some flat-panel work and then seeing him fix it so quickly, I was like teach me Obi Wan teach me.
Shane: It is a completely different beast for sure. Totally different.
Joel: Yes. Admittedly it is. It’s been a unique transition.
Keith: So, when you finally decided to go, did you, – you had made some connections with people I assume. You didn’t just drive out to another state and wait for hail to fall.
Joel: I started with Facebook, My Space, Twitter, talking to people, then I was like telling my wife, or girlfriend at the time I need to go to a tech expo. I need to meet these people because now people are recognizing my work because of either –the social media. I was horrible at it, but I knew I needed to do it. And I was just showing my work and more and more people saw it so it was like okay, if I’m gonna do hail, these people need to meet the man behind the Photoshop work. And so, I was like let me go on there, meet everybody and that way they can see if they wanna work with this guy.
Because it’s just like, you can see someone’s work, but then you meet the person and they’re horrible and you’re like you do great work but I would never work with you. So that was, I told my wife I need to go so people can meet me.
Keith: So, your first step was to network with some other guys.
Joel: That’s how I strated.
Keith: Which is super smart. And then you had the foresight enough to go and get impersoned at the MTE which we’ve talked about a few times on the show. Which if you haven’t been to it, and I think a lot of you Cali guys haven’t been because its’ a pretty long trip for us. It takes a whole day to get there. And you think what am I really gonna get. You know, I’m gonna see some tools and then a bunch of other dudes mulling around, but if you wanna grow in the business, there’s no better place to do it.
You’re on neutral ground. You’re not walking into some other dude’s account and trying to ask him about his favorite tools. You’re at some place in Florida. So everybody’s cool. Everybody’s talking about everything. The guys are surprisingly honest, or really good liars and you have a lot of cool conversations about the dent business and you made some buddies. Shane and I would not be on this Podcast if it wasn’t for the Mobile Tech Expo. We met online and we’re buddies but that’s where we got to meet in person and we got to see that we’re not too crazy.
Shane: Or both of us are and everybody else isn’t.
Keith: So if you haven’t gone you’ve gotta go.
Shane: We saw Joel down there by mobile tech and the one thing I remember when I first saw Joel, were the shirts that he wore. The button-up with Affordable on the back. I thought you know, that’s different. That stands out. That is a kind of a – oh what did it remind me of? The old gas station attendants or something. I was like that’s pretty cool. I like that. It makes him look different than everybody else standing here and so, I didn’t think any more about it and we went – I believe Keith, yes, it was when we went to Lee and Rick’s Oyster Bar the first time this year, and Joel walks in and starts dancing over against the door jamb is what he was getting his groove on with and that is ingrained in my memory and Joel will never be forgotten after that.
I know that guy now. It made huge impression. How many times has Shane called you to work on a hail sight?
Joel: Probably 17 times. In my mind.
Shane: I don’t call anybody.
Joel: In my mind.
Shane: I do it all myself.
Keith: So at this point Shane can neither endorse or discount the power of a freaky homo-erotic door jamb dance in an oyster bar for a means of networking.
Shane: Joel and I almost worked together in Minnesota last year.
Joel: No alcohol. We worked on walking a lot. Admiring the damage and laughing at the prices.
Shane: And we both walked away because of the pricing on that deal.
Joel: Yes, I spent three days there. Everybody left, I was the last man standing and I was like you guys can all suck it. I’m the last man standing and I was just the last idiot. Just all stuff I didn’t’ wanna get involved in and my wife was like if you’re gonna go this full-time you need to make a decision. I had already worked four months straight and she’s like I need you to come home and spend four months. So I was like okay.
Keith: So you got married pretty recently, right Joel?
Joel: I got married last year, yes.
Keith: So not only were you switching careers, because you got married at the same time and decided you were going to switch your career path. Pretty intense transition.
Joel: Sold my soul to the company store.
Keith: So you worked for a few months while you were living in California. What did you decide to do with your company? Did you think about selling it?
Joel: I did. It was making decent money. Okay, compare to a lot of people it was making like $80,000.00 to $90,000.00 a year which I thought was horrible for me at my skill level, so I was like hey, I’ll find someone I can trust to run it while I’m gone and it was slowing down. Truly the economy was slowing down but I wasn’t hitting it as hard as I should so it was making between $6.000.00 and $8,000.00 a month which isn’t horrible but it sure ain’t great compared to you guys. It’s not like Rolls-Royce money. I only know two guys who do dents out or Rolls-Royces. Ones out here and the other’s in California and I’m talking to both of them.
Keith: That is the truth or whatever,
Shane: Amen, brother.
Joel: I tried selling it. It wasn’t gonna happen. I let John run it because he could use the money to pay his helper and the things that happened. It didn’t work out business-wise. That sense of what happened to the business. I came back and there really wasn’t much to come back to. And really by then I was sold on leaving and getting moved. I had made my money and so I never went back to the route. I let it just, here you take it over. If you fail and destroy it, you fail and destroy it.
Keith: So that was that and you didn’t feel bad about it.
Joel: I did. I always – because I had such pride in my work and I kissed these people’s asses for so long that it’s almost like I betrayed them by giving them somebody that wasn’t me and I left when I thought about coming back and then I’m like no, I’m not gonna come back. I don’t care what the money is. I’m not coming back. It was killing me both physically and mentally just dealing with everything I was dealing with there that I was just sold on leaving. I was like let’s pack up. I mean, when I gottta start registering to buy ammo, I was like, I’m done. I’m outta this space.
Keith: You were great to them but did you have any accounts that weren’t trying to use Achmed when you weren’t there. Did you have some loyal guys?
Joel: Almost all of them were loyal to me. But I mean Ed abusing himself. I mean I’m the guy that would rather be at Irving Lake fishing than making money at this point. Many a day I just go there and put my rod in the water and turn my phone off. I literally ran my business into the ground. It was my fault. I would go a month and not show up to any of my accounts. Oh, I got a spider bite. Oh, I did this. Let’s be real. This is what I did. You wanna know me, that’s what I did. Oh, I got a migraine headache, oh my alternator went out. Oh, my wife’s grandma’s niece died. I just stupid stuff that took a great blossoming business and ran it into the ground.
Shane: If I were in the shoes of the dealerships or your accounts, let’s say that, just call them your accounts. If I was in the shoes of your accounts, I would swear you were on meth if you have me all of those excuses. That dude is on meth. Poor guy, he does great work but –
Joel: And here’s the kicker. I’m an alcoholic. I was. I was at the bars by noon. I spent many years at the bar by noon. I’d rather try to make a dollar shooting darts and playing Golden Tea then making an extra $400.00 a day. Functioning alcoholic.
Keith: Not the first, not the last.
Joel: We’re getting real people. We’re getting real.
Keith: Listen, this is what bad pricing will to you. It will drive you to drinking.
Joel: It’ll drive you to eat rotten avocados and drink alcohol.
Keith: I’m telling you just to cope, if you would’ve had the PDR College Podcast back then you would’ve been crushing it. You would’ve been doing dents out of the Rolls Royce.
Shane: All right, Joel, let’s get off of your –
Joel: If Iron Man would’ve been my idea I would’ve been Iron Man.
Shane: Let’s get off of your sketchy past.
Keith: So now we know where Joel is coming from, right? We know the transitions he’s ready to make and he decides to go chase hail full-time. So when you did that first four-month –
Joel: I haven’t drank in seven years basically.
Keith: All right. Thanks for clearing that up because for as long as I’ve known you, which has been a few years, I’ve never heard of anything even closely related to your drinking and doing anything crazy so I’m glad you cleared that up. But I never thought that was an issue.
Joel: Yeah, the transition. We decided we wanted to do it. I just walked away from the business. We had money. I’d made some good money selling my house so we moved everything to her parents and then we drove out to Nashville. We knew we wanted to be centrally located from what I as hearing from everybody following storms for many years from where they hit. So we just started shopping for houses around Nashville.
Keith: So those first trail months, like four months you said you were chasing hail while you still lived in Cali. What kind of money were you making doing that? J
Joel: My first week of ever doing hail, I made about $11,700.00. Working with Lou Freeman.
Keith: So you’re like this is nuts, dude. Like this is a regular decent month back home and I just did it in a week.
Joel: Yeah, Dent Wizard deal. Wholesale.
Shane: Yeah, that’s what I was about to say, it was a wholesale deal at that.
Joel: Lou was very proud of that. We went to meet with, there were a bunch of people and that’s all he bragged about is like how much did you make your first week. Joel made this.
Keith: Did the rest of your weeks keep that pace or did you fall off after that?
Joel: Oh no, that was wholesale. After that I went to retail body shops and all the fun began. Doing smacked cars in Georgian versus wholesale that are hit but not smacked.
Keith: So that was harder.
Joel: It came down to like four grand a week, five grand a week. I was overfixing cars, flat panels I was weak. Deep dents, stretch dents, combo dents, you’ve gotta bring you’re a game and I knew I was gonna need to do this in some areas and then the circumstances. The body shop owner didn’t wanna do anything, so you’re writing the cars, you’re supplementing the cars, you gotta tell them what needs to be painted, this side or whatever. You’re running the whole show, and trying to make money.
Shane: I see it constantly. The money is not always the money. The percentages are not always what tell – you know what I’m saying? They don’t tell the entire story of the amount of money you can make.
Joel: No, this was a bad hail year. I was blessed to be working and I was like okay, I’ll make between 15 and 17 a month. My bills are prepaid. I’d paid everything down and I was like okay. This is moving money and I’m gonna make money on my house when I sell since this was all prior to moving but it was tough to smack cars out there is Georgia. I was weak at flat-panel especially the sheer volume because we were trying to fix everything. The cars were estimated low so you’re doing a $3000.00 which is a $6000.00 car. The rip alone is taking you two days alone.
I got so used to my route doing everything perfect. I’m trying to do 1990 Honda Accords and Civics that a lick and promise they would’ve been happy with.
Keith: But you were putting yourself through the same program as before. You knew you were gonna eat it for a little while and do stuff cheap but you’re doing in consciously because you’re gonna try to home in on your game. You’re trying to glass everything out so that you can acquire those skills and hit the afterburners in a couple months and really make some money. That sounds like the plan, right?
Joel: Yeah, that’s what I was trying to do. I was just trying to meld my skills and work in areas that I was weak. You know flat-panel. I think a lot of route guys are super weak on their flat-panels because most of your route stuff is all side panels. And I truly was. I could do it but for that volume of dents do them fast and good was tough.
Keith: It’s a totally different animal. I’ve never even been to a full-steam storm. I’ve done hail cars before but to get through them quick the way these guys do car after car and clean, it’s not what we do working retail and route stuff. It’s totally different. The similarities are that we use a tool and we push the steel but that’s about it.
Shane: And that brings – Joel what was or is the because you probably still have some areas that you wanna – everybody has areas that they wanna work on, but you probably have an area that you really either struggles in last year your first year in hail or you’re still struggling with. What would that be? Would it be the flat panels? The big glue-pull, blending? What is it that you feel the guys trying to go from a route tech to a hail tech what is that one thing that you’re struggling with that you would suggest that other guys would either be warned about or hone their skills before they get out there?
Joel: What I probably still struggle with is the deeper damage. Learning some of the short-cuts to getting the bottoms out without munching them up. And then rails. Glue-pulling good smacks and rails and blending it versus spending 45 minutes to get the thickness of thumbnail out which I thought I needed to do in the beginning.
So I worked hard on that, which I’m still trying to work on that. You know blending it where it’s not like a flat wave, but make it flat, flat. And then some of the deeper stuff. I’m good at it but I’m not to where I wanna be and you better be – from what they say is the average hail year in damage, bring you’re A game or don’t come at all. Bring it but you’re gonna struggle no matter how good you think you are, I think. 90 percent of route guys are gonna struggle.
Keith: Oh, because the cars are hit harder than you think they are in your mind than they’re going to be.
Shane: Yeah.
Joel: Yeah, because I thought they’re going to be oh, I fixed that dent in that hood in that video I did and that’s just one dent. Try ten of those and that was a six-hour dent to get it that way without sanding or anything and now you’ve got six of them. What, are you gonna take four days to do a roof with six dents?
Shane: That’s the problem, storms like Atlanta, well in Georgia, there were some shots on those cars Joel that storm you were working last year. Jackson, Mississippi. I don’t think you went down there though, correct?
Joel: No I steered clear of it.
Shane: But everything out there. It doesn’t seem like the damage is getting any easier. There are very few gravy storms out there and I if you are you’re fragging lucky to get on them.
Keith: When I see some of that stuff that hail guys are fixing full-time it’s nasty, deep dents and 25 or 30 of them and each one is on the verge and I think no way do I wanna do that. No frigging way. That looks like a mess. It would be a nightmare. I’d rather do a smashed fender.
Joel: It stormed down there pretty good. This storm the dents are not hard but they’re deep. They’ll be five deep ones and that’s what I had to work on. Just identifying the bottom. And just one stupid little thing. Take a light, set it right next to the dent. You can see the bottom and there you go. I was struggling with one dent and then Lou said here, try this. Move your light right here since I had a little portable light and I just felt so stupid. I didn’t even think about doing that because I was trying to do everything with my big lights and just couldn’t see the bottom of it. He’s like, you got the light stick it four inches away, how’s that. That again I didn’t end up fixing. They had to paint the roof. Every subsequent roof I’ve done I’ve gotten faster and better. What happened the first one? I wasn’t thinking.
Keith: Shane, you’re one of the faster guys doing deep hail. Do you use a similar technique to what Joel is talking about or do you use something different to get to the bottom of those things?
Shane: No. I will pull my light close but I typically – for a lot of the guys that I’m around, even guys that have been doing this a long time, the last storm I was at up in Rock Hill I had a guy that’s been doing hail for 20 years and he comes over and he’s like man, your light sure is far away. At that point I said that’s why they’re flat when I’m done and I don’t have to struggle with it is because I’ve got my light far away when it’s really a deep, deep dent I will pull the light closer but in my opinion, the light as far away as you can get it.
On an SUV for example, I did a Yukon XL a couple weeks ago and this thing had 700 and some odd dents in the roof and I’m not exaggerating, well over 50 percent were oversized. I set my light up. I start at the back. I’m actually about to buy that ten-foot-long hail rod that they have out now and I’ll start at the back and I will put my light right at the front tires. I put it right at the tires of that Yukon. I put two fat heads up and I put one on the side and they didn’t move for the most part the entire time. That’s what I will do with hail. I want the light as far away as possible honestly and I can get it flatter that way. I can get it way flatter.
Keith: And you can start those deep dents with it that far away.
Shane: No. Some of the yes I can. If they’re extreme deep. Even if they’re oversized, if it’s a regular oversized dent up to about a hen egg and it doesn’t have extreme depth, yes I can start them that way. With the light pretty far away. But some of them I do have to pull the light really close but it’s goatta be extreme. It’s gottta be really extreme.
Keith: And your sharp tip start to finish on a deep down.
Shane: No, no no. I’m not sharp tip start to finish. On a deep hail dent it depends on the metal. You can’t say X works all the time. The Yukon I started with, I’d have the Dent Craft R4 with the rubber ball on it and then flip it over to a sharp tip. I would start with the rubber ball to for about four or five pushes. Get a little bit of depth out, flip it over four or five pushes with a sharp tip to make sure there’s not stretching and flip it back over soft tip flip it back over, sharp tip to finish.
Keith: Interesting. That technique you’ve gotta have that dual-tipped rod or two rods hanging in there.
Shane: Or waste a whole lot of time on two rods. It’s different with every – and Joel can tell you this. If you’ve got a Toyota Rav 4 roof, holy crap that thing is gonna munch like crazy. Using a sharp tip on that only at the end. You do it any other time than that, and you’re gonna make that metal look horrible to begin with.
Keith: So with a hail roof you’re living and dying by that R4 tip.
Shane: Yeah, for sure.
Keith: I didn’t know that.
Shane: How about you Joel?
Joel: I change a lot of tips. I change a lot of tips to fit the storm. One storm everything is gravy. One tip is not gonna work as well as I’m thinking another tip will, so, I’ll switch out like you said the rubber tips and then I’ll have that sharp spike on the other end just to fit how the overall hail is doing for this particular storm I’ve changed my tip recently to a bulb tip with a plastic cap on it to push the dents out of them because rubber one just wasn’t singling out the areas I wanted to single out and the rubber tip was just pushing too much metal and it would start to oil-can versus the cap was pushing them up and then somewhat shrinking them and then I would hard-tip them, steel tip them to finish them up. But that’s what that was. I made that one mistake with that one dent and then I was like I need to adjust this. I’m gonna go to this and move the light to here and then I’ll have my two big lights way back and I’ll have that one little one up close. I’ll start it with that till I get it close. I’ll move it out of the way and I’ll finish it with the other two lights.
Keith: So Shane, if you’re coaching Joel to get faster you’re gonna try to get him off that little mini-light program. Get him just with the big lights.
Shane: That is what I would do but if you can’t see the depth of the dent there’s no – I can’t tell Joel he’s doing it wrong. I would have to be around him. Some of those shots down in Georgia, that storm he was working it would be advantageous. I guess I would condition myself doing hail all this time where I don’t have to see the very bottom of the dent every time. It’s not necessary for me.
Keith: To get those couple soft pushes from the bottom out.
Shane: Right.
Joel: These are sharp, sharp heavy impacts in the bottom. Whatever hit the hail was sharp and it left a lot of lightning strikes where there’s different legs in it versus some hail that’s just rounded or only has one curve in it. You and push it up identify the curve versus when there’s six lines coming off of it.
Keith: That’s something not a lot of people understand. They’re not smooth little marbles. They’re jagged, nasty little snowflake-looking things.
Shane: Pretty much every storm I get is gonna be the bottom jagged bull crap for some reason.
Keith: That’s tough. I’ve just a couple.
Joel: Keep telling yourself that.
Keith: So, now Joel if you’re gonna start over your hail career again, even though it’s new, you’ve learned a lot in the year. Would you start it differently than you started it?
Joel: I’m kinda glad I did. Out of the hundred people said they were gonna call me, who called me was my was my number 100. And I’m kinda glad because I went through some hardships. I went through a lot while no one was babysitting me. I was left to make it or break it on my own merit. You find out what you’re made of and you find out if you’re cut to do this business. Like Tony Frazier said one time, Dude get off your butt, your Facebook buddy isn’t gonna come over there, hold your hand and find you work. You need to get out there and do it. So you’re gonna find out if you got what it takes to cut the mustard.
Keith: So there’s a lot more to it than just shaking hands at the Mobile Tech Expo, shaking hands and then going to work a couple months later.
Joel: These guys aren’t running daycares, they’re running businesses that they want to make a million dollars or there is the potential because of the volume they’re gonna run and the money they’re gonna make and if they’re gonna sit and hold your hand, go to the daycare or just go back home.
Keith: They’re on to the next guy. But you were saying that those relationships are still integral in your career. That was the 100th guy –
Joel: Huge, huge. A lot if it is huge because of the personality sometimes you can work with somebody because you see some potential. And some people doesn’t matter how good you are, you wouldn’t work with them because they’re personality is horrible. There’s too much drama in trying to work no matter how good they are.
Keith: It still amazes me how different the two business are. It really does. Very interesting.
Well, what a journey you’ve had going from the crazy wholesale business to running your hail gig. Do you think you’re going to stay as a hired gun doing hail or you gonna try to grow a hail company yourself? You got any ideas about that?
Joel: I don’t know. I’m just gonna see what the state of the industry is. I just want to start dabbling in my own retail but you fight with the other companies but no matter what they do, you still decide what you’re going to do and how you’re going to do it.
But there’s still chances to do it. I’m just networking out there. Whatever I gotta do to keep myself busy and take care of me. So as long as I’m continually building those relationships I may just be the hired gun for a while because it pays pretty good compared to nothing and I don’t have any of the headaches. I’m just the guy that’s there to work.
Keith: Yeah, it probably pays pretty good compared to running your own gig a lot of times too because you don’t have all of these expenses.
Joel: Just pay your hotel bill an move on.
Keith: You just show up, do the work, get the check. Like Shane said it’s not all about the percentages. The percentage can lie to you.
Shane: Yes, it can.
Joel: Oh yeah, 70 percent of 20 percent is still poop. That mythological 75 percent Yeah, but when you’re giving 80 and you’re taking 10 percent of that is squat so don’t feed me your 70 percent.
Keith: Tell me of you would, we knew about your first week. You did really well and then you kind of went down a little bit, what’s been your best week or month doing hail full-time?
Joel: My best week? Made like 12 grand in 3 days.
Keith: But then had no other work for the other two? Why was it a three-day week and not a five?
Joel: No other work. We were making too much money; some other guys weren’t making enough so we had to bring them in. They in turn, where they weren’t doing so good and we did really well so it was spread the wealth because everybody’s gotta be here. So we killed it and they were like these guys haven’t had anything this week, one car. You guys got some overflow, take some time off and help them out. It wasn’t an easy pill to swallow but it’s a team-player attitude. It’s the political answer so I get call back up.
Keith: So your first week was kind of –
Joel: Yeah, but I worked. But it was a wholesale deal and the damage was gravy. Rails killed me but I was splitting with Lout who made up for a lot of different things. It’s like splitting cars with Shane Jacks. Sometimes if you’re weak he’s got the attitude I’ll work with anybody. That’s how Lou was. I’ll work with anybody even if he’s slower. He gets it. I just want someone to help me out. And a lot of it was also due to the fact that Lou was there helping me out.
Keith: Thanks for sharing all that because some of it’s kind of private stuff, not everybody wants to talk about that but that is the big question we all try to answer for ourselves when we’re gonna decide what we’re gonna do with our profession so, thanks for putting that out there. It helps kill a lot of mysterious notions.
Tell me one thing I wanna ask you. I know how I do mu accounting and everything here at home. I use Recon Pro which I talk about on the show all the time about how much I like it, and how much it’s changed my business and for those of you that don’t know that’s a software system that’s based on the Apple IOS so it’s on the IPhones, IPads and you use that to keep track of the work you’re doing to invoice your customers and then it integrates with your Quick Books system for all of your accounting. That’s what I do with my fixed location and my technicians but when you’re out on the road, you need a system to keep track of what you’re doing and how you’re doing it. What to you use there doing hail. I know Recon Pro a lot of guys use that for hail and they love it or do you use something different?
Joel: It’s called My Wife 1000.
Keith: So you’re on paper.
Joel: Yeah, put it this way. I have the program I never installed it. It’s three years old. Hey I bought the program. How does it work? I don’t know. I haven’t pulled it out of the box yet.
For doing so many things right, you’d laugh going I can’t believe this guy is just a walking disaster sometimes. I keep track of it all. I send it to her. I just tell them I’m here to make the money. I don’t want to get caught up in the numbers. Here’s what I know I’m making, here it is and you put it how you put it.
Keith: And when you’re on someone else’s storm you need to write the cars or invoice the cars with whatever system they ask you to do it on right. You can’t just walk in with your own invoicing system and integrate it with somebody else’s. Is that right?
Joel: You’re using theirs. Usually someone’s around most the places so you just run the numbers, take your numbers off the sheet. Here’s how much you made. Then they bill the car out and in the end you jive what they say they’re gonna pay you versus what you thought you should’ve made on the car. A lot of its just paper. Tech sheets.
Keith: So you’ve gotta keep super tight paperwork to make sure you get paid right.
Joel: Yeah, a lot of it’s picking the right people to work with and that level of trust. Haven’t had a problem yet because I’ve worked with people that I hear are known for paying people and anybody I don’t know I don’t work for until they build the trust level with me.
Keith: By either burning you or not burning you the first time you work for them.
Joel: Yeah, I put the word out there that I’m not the person you don’t wanna pay. I have that dark side that I left but he’s still lingering.
Keith: He’s in there.
Joel: He likes to play but I like to keep him in the closet.
Keith: Well if you are curious about what I’m talking about with Recon Pro the website is Automobiletechnologies.com, You can check those guys out. They’ll set you up with a demo and kind or run you through the program and give you a little hands-on. Super cool stuff.
Joel: Sounds pretty awesome.
Keith: All right Joel thanks for coming on the show I appreciate it. I’m sure everyone else appreciates it.
Shane: Thank you Joel.
Joel: Their probably like that guys a disaster. I’m not calling him anymore. Just sometimes you wanna hear about people and everybody is so afraid of their personal image. Here’s the truth, here’s what happened if you want anymore. I’m not gonna sugar coat it.
Keith: You know, there’s so many people that are just gonna feed you what you wanna hear so it’s refreshing to hear when somebody can shoot straight with you so I appreciate that and I know everybody else is gonna appreciate it too. You see thorough when someone’s telling you all the high point of their life and how great they are. You see through it.
Shane: Joel’s a great guy for sure.
Keith: Super cool. You’re gonna have some laughs you didn’t know were coming hanging around this guy.
All right fellas check in with us next Monday and we’ll have another new episode on. Do not forget that if you enjoy the show, it’d be favor to Shane and I if you would pop yourself onto ITunes and give us a five-star review. It helps the show to be found by people who are looking and it makes us feel good which I know you guys are dying to do, give us a great compliment.
Stay wired in on our Facebook. We interact with a lot of people there and make sure you sign up for what we refer to as the Podcast alert. You’ll get a new alert each time we publish a new episode there’s an email opt-in form on our PDR College site but it’ not just for alerts. We’re gonna keep you in the loop with everything that’s going on with the PDR College Podcast through that email so if you wanna interact with us on another level you can do it through any of those things or on the discussion for on PDRcollege.com. We like talking to you. We like answering your questions. A lot of guys ask us questions on a private level and it’s fun to do.
So if you got something on your mind you wanna bounce it off us, send it on over man, this is what we like to do. We’d like to talk the dent business for you and for us. We can all kind of get better together. Stay wired in with us fellas. Thanks again Joel for joining us on the show and until next time.
Shane: Like Joel Mathis, get better.
[End of Audio]Duration: 74 minutes