EXPERIENCE 124 | Tim and Ami Lindgren of Lindgren Landscape - Building the Best Backyards in Northern Colorado - Together.

Tim and Amy Lindgren started Lindgren Landscape while they were engaged to be married and still in college at csu. They've been building the best backyards in northern Colorado ever since, and have developed a substantial commercial maintenance division. They employ more than 80 full-time employees at peak season. Lindgren Landscape was recently awarded a Torch award from the bbb, the acceptance speech for which prompted my outreach to be on the show. The Lindgren's are a great example of a spousal partnership in business. Amy is the CFO and self-described Chief Gopher and Tim, the president and ceo, and ultimately the leader of the design team and the greater team. In this episode, Tim and Amy share a business journey that overlays the entirety of their relationship and the growth and changes in course corrections that allowed the development of the Lindgren landscape of today. This conversation was the first I'd spent time with either Tim or Amy, and it was one of the more enjoyable conversations I've had on the show. Neither flinched at my question, pandemic Pandemic or Sham Demic and Amy shared the most near-Death Loco experience we've ever heard in the closing segment. Please tune in and enjoy as I did my conversation with Tim and Amy Lindgren. Welcome back to the Loco Experience Podcast. I'm pleased today to be joined by Tim and Amy Lindgren of Lindgren Landscape and perhaps other ventures I don't know yet, but, uh, welcome Tim and Amy and if you would, why don't you just, uh, share your title, uh, and what you do a little bit around the shop. Thanks, Kurt, in the office. Thanks for having us here. Um, first time podcaster here. Uh, Amy Lindgren. Uh, technically I am the on paper, the cfo. I like to also call myself the head gopher of the company. He's a good things done, girl. That's true. And how about you, Tim? I'm, uh, Tim Lindgren, president or CEO of Lindgren Landscape. Fair enough. And did you guys start Lindgren Landscape together? We did at the same time. Yep. We did. We were engaged and, uh, realized we had to start paying bills, paying bills on our own. Well, I'm gonna come back to that, but you guys really came to my attention because of your Torch award, uh, for the Better Business Bureau here. And, uh, sounds like, uh, my impression was really strong that you've been intentional about cultivating ethical practices within your business and what does that really mean in a practical setting and what's it mean for a landscaping company? Uh, talk to me about that just a bit, if you would. Well, the BBB award was just a real honor to receive and, um, Sometimes we joke, we still don't know how we got even nominated, but we don't, we don't technically know who nominated us and we need to find out, oh, I had one of my employees nominate me last year. So yeah, I cannot tell a lie. We don't know who nominated us. But, um, it was, um, it was really nice to be affirmed. Um, I do think in particular Tim has really led the path in making sure our business is, uh, run ethically. Yeah. And, um, just gives good direction and compass with that. That's, uh, a really been important to him. He's always, we've never wanna be looked at like landscapers. We wanna be looked at like professionals. Yeah. Yeah. How, how, Tim, how do you, what do you, how do you go about that? Like, what's that mean in practical terms? Is it staff meetings? Is it HR manuals? Is it, no, I think it, it starts, it started early by bringing the right people on and kinda holding, um, the people you hire. Cause cuz as when you're young business, you, you wear all hats and then you gotta start replacing yourself. Yeah. And looking at character first when you hire somebody to take a position that you used to have. And as you grow, that gets harder because you've gotta hire somebody to make those hires. And trying to get that person who's now the gatekeeper to your culture and. To be like-minded and understand what your values are as hard. And we've, we've failed several times, but, and we're not saying by any means that we've got, um, all the highest character people on the planet in our company, but we do a really good job of, um, finding good people to work for us. Yeah. And so that started 28 years ago, whoever we'd hire, you know, we'd interview'em, Amy and I would interview'em, make sure they're, um, the type of people that you wanna work with all day and that you want your clients to be around. And, and we've tried to continue that and it's as the bigger you get, the harder that is, I think to Yeah. Maintain. But I think also, um, you know, Tim worked in the field and in sales, so he was definitely, I mean, he's always been the face of the company, but I think, um, him being in the field and in sales also, he got to just lead by example. So it's not just talking about it. Yeah. Like we have some people that have been around a long time and have worked in the field with Tim. And so I think it just, um, it is that walk the talk. Yeah. Well, and those two places Right. You know, do, are you selling the thing that you can deliver? And then do you deliver what you sell? And, you know, you, you only, you know, a lot of times if you cut corners or, or don't do something as professionally mm-hmm. As you maybe should have or whatever. Or your team does. Yeah. Well, and I think we still take it really personally when jobs are failed. When, I mean, cuz some jobs just don't go well. Yeah. Like, cause all the best laid plans. It just happens. And we do take it personally still. Like it just is important to us. So tell us about, uh, tell me about Linn landscape. Is it landscape or landscaping? Landscape. Landscape. Uh, tell me about Linn today. Like how, how many people, how many, I mean, you don't have to tell me revenues or profits or things of course, but like what kind of an operation is it and how is it broken up into different divisions or whatever that might be? Yeah. We, we employ, during season we'll have 80, 85 Wow. Employees. Um, we have basically two divisions. We have a design build division, which focuses primarily on high end residential design and installation. Mm-hmm. And then we have a maintenance division, which is primarily commercial maintenance. Oh. And snow removal. So we have two different audiences for our two different divisions. We do have some overlap. We do some residential maintenance and we do some small commercial install, but it's mostly residential in the design built side and, and commercial. That's interesting. Isn't it common more that you maintain what you install instead of having that? It's, it is, it's, we just figured we couldn't do it. It's good that way. Well actually there's a more. Uh, there's a, a more fiscal reason why, like if you, if, if you put in a really good landscaping Yeah. Um, the things that it takes to maintain it, I mean Mm. When it's, it should be put in, well, you shouldn't need a lot of maintenance in the first few years. Yeah. Because the plants are small and if, if you did it right, um, you know, you just mow it. But like a full lawn and maintenance is, you know, a lot of plant care, weed management and usually early stage residential landscapes are not in need Yeah. Of a lot of maintenance. Yeah. If you put your weed barriers down Right. And all that kind of stuff. Stuff, if you do it right. So you would think it's a, a, a natural transition to install it and then maintain it, but it's, um, and so the service side really becomes more about when there aren't big projects to do and pull together and stuff like that, or slumps or whatever. You've got a, an engine that continues to run and, and keep the crews employed and whatever. Yep. Wintertime, snow maintenance too, or is that kind of thing. Yep. Yep. Snow has grown to be very big business for us and it's good, uh, revenue source in the winter. Yeah, yeah, yeah. From no revenue to from zero to something is really nice. To zero to something is good. Yeah. Uh, so and snow, the last year, last two years. Last two years, we've had so much snow. And then do some people float between the two teams or you really have dedicated teams for the install and service sides? They're, they're very separate. Okay. They're, they're, every once in a while there'll be some crossover. If, you know, we design builds waiting for a project to start and they don't have room, usually they'll shift within their own division, but every once in a while they'll cross over. But it's, it's, yeah. But snow, snow is snow. It's all, it's all hands on deck when there's a big storm. It's like, who wants to work? Yeah. Snow happens. It's, everyone's got a Gotta contribute. Yeah. So anyway, so, um, where I wanted to go next was like, take me through the customer journey. Like let's go, go for that high end residential. Uh, is it oftentimes a new construction or more often a, like a revamp or a freshen remodel? Sure. Pre, pre-recession, it was all new construction. We didn't take on any remodel work. And then, uh, once the recession hit that, and you're talking 2008 recession, that changed everything. Not the current one, not the I know. That's why I wanted to like, qualify. Yeah. Um, and so we do, I would say it's 50 50 new construction versus remodel. Found that to be a decent market for you after all. Kinda, yeah. Today. Today it is. Um, covid really changed a lot of, lot of dollars floating around looking for, well, people wanted to be in their homes more and create an outdoor Yeah. They, they were more interested in creating that outdoor living space. Sure. And they wanted their home office on the back patio. Yeah. I sit in my back patio all the time in the shade and work on emails or whatever. It's just mm-hmm. More nicer. I, I think, I think people spent years in the office and neglected their outdoor living space. Yeah. And then when they were stuck at home, they were like, man, we can do better. And this is gonna be, this is gonna be my office. They got the nights, the, the$240 target set with the sling chairs or whatever that blow away when the Wyoming wind comes. Right. Okay, so anyway, sorry to just detour there. So this, this customer contacts you, let's say it's a, a remodel for this case. Somebody that's neglected their, their backyard and now wants to pimp it out. So they'll, they'll contact us either phone or through the website or some, uh, social media. And, um, the vetting process on our end is probably just as important as the vetting process on their end. And we have a, a, uh, standard operating procedure for how we, uh mm-hmm. What projects we take, which ones we don't. And we, it needs to be a good fit for both parties and we are really busy. And so getting all the cards on the table early saves both parties. Yeah. A lot of times. So our design team, who typically vets the call to determine whether we're a good fit for what they want, um, talks'em through the process. And one of the unique things about what we do is we are truly design build, and we do not do design only. So, um, that, that, that's the contract. It's, it's unique. It's different if, if you just, if you're just looking for a, a landscape design, we are not your company. If you are looking for that design build process, then we are your company. And the reason that we are so, um, set on that is when we build the project, We, we want, when people see that it's something we've done. Yeah. It has to have our brand on, it has to have our style, our design team. And so you can, I can install anybody's design, but the install is only as good as the design. So if they, if they drive by a project that we didn't design, and it's an unattractive design, they think this is a Linn project and it's not. Hmm. So we want, we want control of the project from beginning to end so we can manage the design, the acre, the creativity part, the functionality part, all the way through the quality of the install, and then eventually the maintenance. But that's kind of our, our, uh, is that your special sauce, Tim? Is the design element, like that's what you become kind of a, a guru in? Yeah. Our, our, we, I think we do. You and your team, but initially starting with you, I presume the more complex the project is, the better we are at it. And it's, we don't like doing the same fire pit or the same fireplace or the same outdoor kitchen over and over again. We want to have a unique spin on it. We want every water feature to be different. So if you're looking for something that's creative that your neighbor is not gonna have Yeah. Um, not necessarily because of the price point, but because of the Yeah. Character and the style, the personality. Yeah. Yeah. I've had a goldfish pond in my backyard that I built myself with. I literally had an old water pump in a, in a 65 camper that I bought anyway, built a fish pond and it's carried fish through three winters. But I just had an algae bloom that just like took it out and just made a mess out of it. But, but I've also got a bunch of stones now that I, I'm doing some stuff in the backyard, so I kind of wanna make a waterfall mm-hmm. Out of my goldfish pond and, you know, figuring out how to get that, how to do that vertical drop and still have that pond effect and stuff. And I'm a hack. You, I'm not, I'm not an ideal customer for you guys. I'm, I'm guessing, like in today's dollars, we're talking like 50,000 to$250,000. Landscapings is a, or maybe even up upwards from there for some, for what our, what we do for your target clientele then. Yeah. Well, we, we will do, and we, we do have a small gardening department that does this, the projects that don't require the design process. Right, right. And, you know, we just want to replace a couple plants in this bed or, or build a garden box. Yeah. If, if we do that work. But that's kind of not our, what we're known for. Yeah. We're known for that higher end design. And we'll do any, we've done projects that. 20, 25,000 up to almost a million dollars. So it's, there's a huge range. Yeah. Yeah. And we don't, the dollar amount is not important to us. It's do you want something unique, something different? You're willing to spend the time and the money to do it. Right. I'm thinking it's like an integrated project too. It's like, don't just build me a fire pit. Build me a fire pit that flows into this patio segment in the outdoor kitchen over here or whatever. Right? Yeah. There was an era in our business where we would, um, people would come in and have the ability to, I mean, we didn't intentionally start, but you could get our designs. Mm. Um, and we found, cuz honestly we have such an amazing design team, uh, what was happening is people would come in and say, oh yes, you know, we wanna use you. And they would get the design and then they would go outsources. Try to get a budget. Yeah. They would go install. And so that's, there was definitely an intentional shift, um, because I think people would see the work. Yeah. And they would want that, but maybe not always at the price point or, so it's both ways. Yeah. So like, not only did you not want to build crappy designs, but you didn't want to have people poorly build or deal your design. Our good designs. Designs. Exactly. That's exactly, that's fair. And our design team very much considers their designs. They're like their babies. They put a lot of effort, they put a lot of time. So the financial gain is not in the design part. Sure. Yeah. It, that is a, it is a creative. Place. Yeah. Yeah. Um, gotta keep the design team busy and charge enough for it to cover them. But it's not a profit center for you guys. No, not at all. So, um, we've, I think we've gone through different phases of the designing, but we are very intentional now about if, if you want our design team, then yeah, yeah. They get to, you know, we get to install it too. Very good. So, um, I feel like it's a good time. We'll, we'll uncover a lot of the, the business decisions and strategies and different evolution. I think if we jump back in the time machine and, and go there. Um, are, are you guys, uh, uh, like third grade sweethearts or anything like that? No, she married a third grader, but, um, we do, no, we actually met at csu. Okay. We met in the library at csu. Tell me about it. So it's actually a really cute story. He's gonna get embarrassed here, but, um, that's okay. That's good. Yeah. He's wearing a pink shirt. It won't, it won't show very much. Is this pink? I don't know. Yeah. Well, yeah, it's like, for a man, it's like FIA or something. Fia like, there aren't that many, like fuchsia isn't really a color for a man. Yeah. It's red is close enough. Red. Red or pink. It's Fs. Um, so we both went to, he went to school in Minnesota for a year. Um, I didn't go to college. I guess they call it now a gap year. Yeah. I. I took a gap year, uh, it's called Get a Job Right, instead of a gap year. Yeah. Yeah. Um, so came to CSU and had been at CSU for a couple months and went to the library to study. And he was sitting, they used to have this room at CSU on the second floor. It used to be called the Anheuser Busch Room. Okay. And it was just like, um, a, like in the student center or whatever? Um, no, in the library. Oh, library. You said it in the library. And it was just rows and rows of study tables. Okay. She go up the stairs and it was just a room full of study tables. And so he was sitting at a table with, um, some buddies and some, some girlfriends as well. And I was sitting at another table and we kind of noticed each other across the room. And one of the girls from his table came over to my table and said, there's a guy at my table who would like to meet you. Um, would you come over and introduce yourself to him? And I said, no, if he wants to meet me, he can come introduce himself to me. Oh, okay. And, um, she went back to the table and he grabbed his books and then he left. Oh, no doubt. Yep. He left. Or magazines. I really didn't have books. You were the, you were the guy. I was worried it was gonna be a different guy at that table, but No, no. He grabbed his, he grabbed his books and, and he left. And I stayed and studied for a little bit longer. And there's, there probably was an elevator, but to get to the room was just stairs and then out. So I, I walked down the stairs and he was waiting at the bottom of the stairs. Oh, really? And he said, I'm, I'm so sorry. I'm so embarrassed. I never asked her to do that. Um, Would, do you wanna go out sometime? And I said, well, you can have my number. And so then we, um, chatted on the phone for a couple weeks and then finally went on a date. And, um, that was in Ing bad boom. Yeah, that was in 1992. Oh. The year I graduated from high school. Mm-hmm. So we've, we've technically known each other 30 years now. Yeah. Um, was, did you wander downstairs? Cause you just didn't want to engage in that, like with all your friends watching or? I, I don't remember the logic behind it. Uh, you were probably knowing you, you were probably just embarrassed. I probably was. We, we were, we were, I was obviously talking to my group of friends, like we all lived super cute over there. You see her that, that Yeah. Get you in trouble, I'm guessing. She was like, oh, go, go, go up and talk to her. And I didn't, didn't have the courage or the gumption to do it. And so she said, fine, I'll do it. And she, I think it's cool that you waited downstairs though. I, I think that's really sweet. And I hope you're, uh, I hope you, uh, quickly. Like forgave him for not having the courage and his, uh, going a different track. I never, never thought of anything about it. Part of it she was sitting with another guy. Oh. So there was a guy there. So I'm guessing had that not been the case, I probably would. Right. Well, yeah. If that guy's the boyfriend, you're like a jerk. And we had no idea. Obviously I didn't know her. Right. So, yeah. That's so, no, it was, it's a good, it's a good, it is a good story. It's a good, cute story. Yeah, it sure is. You know. Um, so we'll circle back and talk about more about family and the love story and stuff, but, uh, we like to kind of learn the whole story. So, Amy, why don't you start, where, where did you grow up? Uh, like elementary school. Uh, what was your family background? So, um, I tease and if my parents hear this, they'll be so embarrassed. They will hear it. They will hear it. Yes. They probably will cuz uh, I'll share it with them. Um, I, I tease at my parents are modern day nomads. Okay. Um, so when I was 16, we'd moved 16 times. Whoa. And some of that is just houses in, in the same town. Um, but I, um, my dad just had different job opportunities here and there and, um, And took that, was it like promotions and stuff or couldn't hold a job? Uh, promotions for sure. Okay. Um, and he, um, so yeah, we moved a lot and I didn't go to the same school for more than two years Wow. Until I was a freshman in high school. And so was that like an opportunity for you or was it a curse or how did you feel about that? I, you had to know, have known it was different than almost everybody's experience. Yeah. Being the new kid all the time. I think, um, especially for, um, a, a female my age, um, cuz that was just kind of the, yeah. There was a little bit of still sexism, quite a bit of sexism in the workplace. Yeah. In the early nineties. I think that just always being the, the new kid, um, I have no problem walking up and talking to anybody. Yeah. I think it made job interviews easier I think. Um, it gave me a lot of I'm okay being alone. Yeah. Yeah. You know, I think a lot of things, um, I think it gave me a lot of skills as a woman in the workplace and in life that if we had just stayed in one place and I'd always been comfortable and known cuz I was just not. Known a lot. So looking back, there was a lot of silver lining to it. I do think my, at the time were you in that space or were you didn't, you weren't a teenage kid. Like didn't I didn't, dad's moving us again. That jerk, um, was your style. I didn't, I didn't know any different. Okay. And, um, we always lived in agricultural areas. Okay. So like Yeah. Tell me, tell me about that. Like, what was the backdrop? So, um, my dad was a farm. Uh, we had a family farm in Iowa. Okay. And so, um, he was a farmer, uh, for a long time. So we, we moved there and then we've always had just, um, I, I grew up doing four H and showing livestock and riding horses and, um, I think maybe that's also why I, the friend thing was not as, um, maybe as deep for me as it is maybe for, you didn't feel a sense of loss. I didn't feel a huge sense of loss, cuz we always gotta take our horses with us. Yeah. You know, and so I had animals as companions, which sounds a little, a little weird saying it like this, but, um, so I think that was where the stability came from. Yeah. Yeah. Um, but yeah, I, and I loved, I still loved the agricultural world. I loved, I was a CSU livestock judge Oh, cool. Um, for a period of time. And I still. I still love, love all of that. We didn't raise our kids in that world, but I, it absolutely is still, um, something that I super passionate about. Yeah. Yeah. Um, so was it largely kind of in that, a certain region then and stuff that you were moving around? It wasn't like all over the country. You weren't going San Francisco to New York City, Miami, or, um, moved Iowa, Wyoming, and Colorado and in different areas within those, with, within those states. That's enough nory. Yeah. Yeah. So we moved to Colorado when I was an eighth grader. Okay. Uh, lived in Newcastle, Colorado, Newcastle. So if you go just past Glenwood Springs, there's like this little pin drop called Newcastle before you get to Rifle. Um, and then we moved to Carbondale. Okay. That was pretty nice. And so I went to, I finished at four years of high school in Carbondale. And, um, Carbondale was probably a lot different back then. Very different. Yes. Very different. Um, Woodstock moved there when I got done. Right. So like all my friends parents were riding skateboards and smoking weed and Awesome. Awesome. And also, again, it's a big, it used to be a big agricultural community. Sure. Yeah. A lot of, um, farms and the Carbon valley. Mm-hmm. That was their driver for a long, long time before it was like rich people buying stuff Exactly. Stuff. Yeah. The, the rich people in flux didn't happen until I was gone. Yeah. I graduated with 42 people. Yeah. Cool. So, Tim, uh, take me on the same small journey. Uh, where did you, where would you go? Elementary school? Um, I went to Henderson Elementary outside of Brighton. Okay. Yeah, yeah, east, east of Denver. Kind of a ways. Is there, or, or north east of Brighton, I guess more. Oh, north. Okay. So yeah, it's, you know, where Adams County Fairgrounds is, or the Riverdale Dunes course? Yeah, I've been through there, uh, over, over in that area. My, my travels don't take me that region very often. Um, I was born, I was born in Dallas and oh, um, my dad was going to Dallas Theological Seminary, so my older sister and I were born in Dallas. Then he got a job in, as a Bible professor in Denver. Oh. And so we moved to Arvada and then at kindergarten we moved to Brighton. And went to Anderson Elementary. Then Brighton High School is still a professor, your dad, and he just liked to be at the little quieter pace of life. What's that? Was your dad still professoring or whatever, or did he try Well, no. Yeah, he was, he, he, he taught, uh, old Testament at what is now Colorado Christian University. There were two, two colleges that merged. Oh. And he was the men's basketball coach. Oh, cool. And so he wanted, he's always wanted to get out of the outta town, so he bought, uh, 14 acres on the Platte River. And yeah. So he moved there when I was in kindergarten. That'd be a pretty deep way to grow up. Was that a, was it like a, a mini farm too? Did you have critters and stuff? It was a little hobby farm, and he grew a nursery and, and that's ultimately where I got my roots in landscape. Yeah. Cause he, he ended up having five children and being a Bible professor does not provide for five children. Right. So he started landscaping in the summer, so I grew up doing that for him. Interesting. Uh, nice deep background. My, uh, my nephew goes to Colorado Christian right now, and so we've been down for, he's a first chair flutist Oh, wow. In the band. So we went down for probably four or five, six. Jill's. My wife Jill has been down to a couple more than I have, but it's pretty neat. Uh, just the, the, the culture and the tone and just. The way they do stuff is, uh, pretty, we know several people whose kids have gone to, um, CCU and just really, really enjoyed it. Way better than getting lost in the shuffle like I did for a couple years mm-hmm. At ndsu and, and kind of see how it goes, you know, at roll the dice. Yeah. No, it's, um, I think they've done a really good job down there. Cool. So, um, so you had this kind of rural existence, right? Like Henderson's town of 20,000 or something? I have no idea. 10. It's tens. Yeah. Yeah. It's, we tease, it's, we, it's kinda ghetto. We were hobby farm, we, I did four h I showed steers and Okay. But we were not refined ranchers and farmers like my wife, family is. And so professionals. Yeah. We were, we were, we were the redneck version of It's true. He's a little before. He's right. Yeah. That's fair. So tell me about your studies. Were you a good student? Uh, horrible. Yeah. Just, just that way. I, I hated school since kindergarten. Um, I had no idea how or why I finished or why I went to college. I just think it was sheer determination, but I hated every minute of education. What, like, did you have a hard time reading? Were you dyslexic or anything? I don't, no, I don't, no, I don't know that. I just maybe attention span, maybe. Um, you were bored of the content. They've put you onri and no problem if Yeah, I probably would've back then. Me too. I just didn't, not, I was born 10 years later. I could have been a riddling attic my whole life. Sorry. Yeah. Probably shouldn't say that. No, I, I don't know. I don't, I don't like sitting in cl I don't like meetings today. I don't like sitting in meetings. I don't, I I really Is this a little squirmy even right here, kind of, or not too bad. Yeah. Yeah. I'll just drink more bourbon. We'll be fine. Yeah. Well, and you know, knowing him now, like he is, he is really good when he has something to focus on and tackle. Like, we brought in this, um, It's now considered a really progressive program, uh, in the landscape industry. And he's always been really good at like, making sure tech wise we're staying ahead. Mm-hmm. But like, he loves digging in and figuring that out and tackling it. So I think like school, having to touch multiple topics that don't allow somebody to just. When you can't see the progress and you can't see the progress and you're not focusing on one thing. Mm-hmm. Which I also feel like is why landscaping really suits his personality and a lot of people's personalities. Cuz there's an absolute beginning and an end. Yeah, totally. And so you start with nothing and like you're goldfish pond, right. You started with nothing and now you've got this goldfish pond and it makes you feel really good about yourself to, and then, and then you're done. Yeah. Like, it's not like laundry where then you gotta, like, everybody's gotta be naked for laundry to be done and it just never happens. So, um, I think that's how Jill, if you're listening back, we're gonna do a laundry done day once a month from now on. You guys could join us if you want. Yeah. She's she's saying that if you don't do your laundry, everyone goes around naked. Right? That's what you're hearing. No, I'm saying for to finish laundry, to have the whole house, everything clean in the laundry. Oh, you gotta undress so that that can be in the line. Yes. So laundry is never done when you had your clothes on. Yeah. But what I was thinking about as you were sharing that was like digging a field. I'm a farmer's kid actually. So you know, when you start digging a field, you know, you're just driving back and forth the tractor and you're digging the weeds up and whatever, and you're just driving back and forth and there's nothing spectacular. But when you're done, you're done. Yeah. You know? Right. No, even with a fish pond that you wanna build a waterfall. Well, am I done or could it be just a little bit better? You know, sometimes there's that, but at least you're done. Right. Yeah. Well and he, even when we were dating, he, we would drive around cuz we didn't have any money to really do anything else. Yeah. And you would drive around for pretty cheap back those, those days. Exactly. It was cheap. We would drive around and we'd drive by all his, of his old landscape projects. And I think there's just, and it stays, I mean, there's just a lot of pride in Yeah, that wall wasn't there and now it is. And it look, it's still there and it still looks good. And I think that's where, what captures people in our industry is there's a lot of satisfaction in driving by something beautiful that you built. Yeah, I like that. I appreciate that much. So, um, so Tim, you went first year of college, so Minnesota, is that what I just heard? Even though you were here from Henderson, you just wanted to Yeah. Get a little more exploratory. And, and what'd you go for? Uh, I, well I went to go play basketball. Oh. And um, do you still play. No, no. Me, me too. I, I played until about four years ago and I kind of got scared I would get too much. Well, and I said I'll play until I'm 40 or until I have a good injury. And I had a good injury, like 39 and a half, and then I was done. So, um, but yeah, I went there originally to play basketball and then I, at University of Minnesota, no, be, be Bethel College in St. Paul. Oh yeah. Actually I had a crush on a girl that went to Bethel. Oh, yeah. After, after Dsu. Anyway, yeah. So we weren't too far. Yeah. North Dakota State is where I went to college. Yeah. We fly into Fargo when we go to Minnesota. We're gonna be there on Friday. Awesome. We are, we'll be at the Fargo airport, say hey to the bison. Mm-hmm. Um, they didn't ask him back to Bethel. Yeah, they didn't, I, I, they invited him not to come back because of his grades. I found ice fishing and my, my roommate had a ice house on Lake Fanny and we spent most of our time, like days at a time in his house. One cool thing about ice fishing is you could actually do your homework while you're ice fish. I couldn't, I could not possible. You just sit there and eat deer sausage and drink beer while the little bobber thing you wait for it to happen. So yeah, I didn't take academics. I think I had one credit that transferred when I left, so, and then I ended up having, uh, multiple shoulder surgeries. And so I was down in Denver at. And went to Metro for a year, and then my third year I came up. So tell me about your basketball career just a bit before we passed that chapter. Oh, but that's not why the shoulder surgeries okay. So what he's failing to mention is when he was in Minnesota, this would've been 1990, right? 1 91. Oh yeah. You graduated in 90. So in 1991, most, one of the most popular shows of all, uh, in the time was American Gladiators. Sure. And they had a tryout in Minneapolis. I love it. Tim went to the tryout, got accepted to American Gladiators. So he went to the show. Did American, uh, he was, so he was a competitor on American Gladiators. Really? And in the kinda in the practice session. You remember the joust? Yeah, the, the with the Q-tips. Yeah, the massive Q-tips. Um, the guy dislocated, they were practicing right before the show and, um, dislocated his shoulder. Oh shit. Shucks. I mean, and so, um, yeah, that got, and it's funny, there's an American gladiator show right now on 30 For 30 On 30 for 30. Is that right? And so our kids are watching it like, wow, dad, we had no idea idea. This was that guy. This was like a legit show. We always thought your American gladiator was such a silly, but he has, like, we have the pictures with him, with Nitro and. All those. That's pretty cool. So were you, um, were you a fitness kind of guy or were you just kind of naturally strong and kind of athletic? No, I think I, I had good genes. My dad played basketball. Drake University. Yeah. And he was a basketball coach. He was my high school coach, and he has a super, super athletic family. Of the five of them, three of them went on to play college sports or begin college sports. So he, he has, his whole family's very, very naturally athletic. I'm almost jealous of that. Like, look at my arms, look at your, your biceps, fill out your whole shirt. You know, so yeah, he has, he has good genes, but they also, you guys are your whole family. They're a good, you guys are all good athletes. Yeah, we were sports families. Sport com being comp, compe comp competition mm-hmm. Was always, huh? Everything we were doing that seems like not necessarily in line with Old Testament scholar. Uh, was that yours, dad? Yeah. He was all about the Bible. Till you played basketball with him? Yeah. He was ultra competitive. Is that right? Yeah. Interesting. Yeah. I'm just joking. Ultra competitive kind. So you get accepted by csu, by some miracle. Oh, I should. Hard to get into I Well, you went to Metro. You went to go to Metro first? I went to Metro to clean it up. Okay, gotcha. It's not that hard to get into csu, I don't think. It wasn't at that time anyway. Well, at that time it wasn't. Now it's harder, I think. Yeah, I, yeah, I don't know. But yeah. And it was cheap at the time, like csu, right? Well, state colleges should be, was so, um, I was telling my daughter the other day, CS to go to csu. At the time it was like$1,800 a semester. Wow. And if you were a fulltime student, um, when at CSU in the early nineties, you got summer school for free. Really? Yeah. How cool is that? So you could go, yeah. So let you just jam your school. We had a similar I, cause I was at North Dakota State, I'm just like, it seems like one or two years behind you guys. Mm-hmm. Or whatever and yeah, I think it was 1600 a semester or 1400 a semester for a full load. Yeah, yeah, yeah. You could easily go And now it's only 16,000. Yeah, well, which is still cheap compared to, I suppose, yeah. A lot of places. Well, I don't think so. I mean, it's, yeah. Anyway, that's a whole other topic. Yeah. We'll get into there. So, um, so you guys are mean, we're basically there, right? Like we get to csu, you meet in the library. And Yeah. You, uh, so you, I find it interesting that you didn't, uh, agree to go on a date yet. Uh, but you did give him your number. And by the way, was that your boyfriend that you were sitting with? No, it was not. Okay. Uh, I didn't have a boyfriend. I was pretty, um, convicted coming to csu, cuz again, I had a gap year. Mm-hmm. Um, and I was paying for my college at the time and I was not gonna let a boy interrupt me getting an education. Right. And so I was very intentional about my studies and, um, I think also I had lived on my own for a little while at that point in time. Mm-hmm. And, um, this was way before the era of social media, but you don't say yes to go on a date with a stranger. Yeah. You don't, you, you just, you just know better. And so it wasn't him, it was just more a, i I don't know anything about you. Yeah. I'm not gonna meet you somewhere, um, before we talk. Uh, so it wasn't him. I would've said that. I would've said that to anybody. Yeah. Just, um, to me it seems like that responsible, one thing I've said recently in a conversation was for like, cuz there there are a lot of like, not high performing guys in the world, we'll say. And, uh, but, but for those high performing guys or whatever, the, one of the sexiest things about a woman is they, they don't need me. Like they want me. But they don't really need me. And my wife has that and I just, she's got, she has that. She'd be better off without me. No, but I mean, it is a, it's a it for, for some guys, they want a woman that needs them because that gives them some sense of like control or power or whatever, or valid or validation or just validation that they're needed, you know, and I, I, I prefer much to be wanted. Yeah. Well, yeah, it just, and I never had a negative experience. I just think as I just lived on my own long enough to know that you don't, you know, go out with stranger. Yeah. I think that's cool. Makes sense. So you had already been kind of landscaping with your pops and stuff like that and so really it was just a matter of transferring, you know, how did you find your first customers? Did you like, put an ad in a paper or something, Tim? Like what was that like? Yeah, with a first, so first my degree, first few revenues, my degree was in construction management. I had no intention of being a landscaper. Okay. I was done with that. Um, but I was doing, I had a little side hustle in college for professors. Like I'd go build a retaining wall form or build a sprinkler system or do something like that during Right. Stuff that was basically easy for you and for them it was like amazing. Yeah. So it, well it was, it was, you know, weekend money that Right. And, and it worked. And I had money to take her out on her first date cuz of it probably. But the. When, when we, when I was getting ready to graduate, we had a conversation like, what are we gonna do now that we're gonna get married? And I don't remember it was your idea or my idea, but like, let's go into business with my dad. Was that your idea or my idea? Did we start there thinking to go into, oh yeah. I feel like that came later. But you're right. Yeah. Let's, let's, let's, so I, I said, Hey dad, you wanna go into business together? And he said, absolutely not. Right. Why would you want me as a partner? I was so mad at him. Right. I thought that was so rude. So he, I I was a rebellious 20 or you were a normal, normal. You were just not a rigid Christian boy. Yeah. He had a very high standard. And so he and I are very different people in a lot of ways, but he, number one doesn't believe in partnerships. He doesn't think there always has to be a final say. There has to be, um, whether it's government or business, and didn't matter, you always have to have someone who can, who who calls the shots. I've had somebody say, uh, I'd rather be a 49% partner than a 50% partner. Yep, exactly. Yep. Yep. So someone, someone's gotta call the shots when, at the end of the day when push comes to shove. Yep. Um, but I also wasn't gonna, you know, multiple plays. He had had this business for 20 or 30 years or however long it was, and he, he didn't need some young punk to come into town. Right. And I thought I knew everything. So it was a great. It was a brilliant decision. I mean, it kinda stung at the time. I, I, yeah. We were, we were pissed. Were we? Yeah, we were. Okay. I, I don't, I don't recall You weren't pregnant yet or anything like that? Oh, no, no. We were still, yeah, we were, we were, we were, we were still engaged when we started, when we actually incorporated was May of 1995. And we were not married yet. We were engaged. So I, I was like, okay, so do I go, go. I wanted to build houses and through csu, the CM program is mostly commercial construction. Mm-hmm. So you go get a job with Hensel Phelps or Mortenson or something like that. And it's a journey. And I, I guess I'm impatient and Well, you weren't, neither of us were done with school yet. Yeah. I still had a semester left. Yeah. You still had a We both still had a semester yet, by the way. Amy, what were you gonna school for? Uh, I started out as an animal science. Um, major thinking. I would go to vet school. Sure. And then after I got into school, I was about 18 months in, I realized I do not want to go to college for 10 years. Like the, the, I didn't, it didn't occur to me two more if I can. Yeah. It didn't occur to me how long it took to become a vet. Yeah. When I thought, oh, I'll be a vet, I'm 19. Yeah. Um, and so I basically had all these science credits and I needed to transition to something science based. Um, so I got a degree in dietetics. Oh, interesting. Um, and, uh, realized when I was doing, um, in your senior year, they basically have you out working with dieticians, and I was like, this is terrible. So what, uh, was it partly that, or like, you sounded like you were very encouraging of like, doing this business. Like what gave you that comp? I guess it was your family background of kind of, I, I think independence and whatever. Yeah. I think my, um, a lot of college students today would be terrified to be like, okay, I'm engaged to be married and I'm gonna, and I have no money to speak of and I'm gonna start a business and I'm marrying a landscaper. Right. We didn't know that at the time. I think, uh, I don't know. I was probably oblivious as well, but I do think, um, my dad was a great resource and he was always, uh, a good resource when it comes to business. He's been very successful in, um, his jobs. Mm-hmm. Um, I don't know. It didn't, we were probably too dumb to be scared. At the time we had nothing to lose. Well, yeah, we didn't have anything. Sure. Like we just had some college debt and some credit card debt and like, there was no reason not to. And he was doing a good, he were already working, doing side jobs. Like we call him side jobs now. Sure. Um, I, I, I wish I could remember his name, but I feel like our very first big job was the guy who owns the McDonald's. Do you remember? Yeah. I don't remember. I can't remember. I know the house. I guess I used to know who that was too. Yeah, they did like three round. I planted all the perennials in front and that was one of our first big like real jobs. Like a professional style job. Yeah. Yeah. So we didn't know. We didn't know. And we had nothing to lose. And we actually, um, instead of renting, we bought a mobile home. Mm-hmm. A new mobile home and put it on a JJs. Oh. We live behind JJs. Oh, really? Over there in, in the trailer parked behind JJs Easy to the, uh, canyon Grill if you wanna go there. Yeah. I don't, was that there? She was like, she was like, we're not, we're not gonna buy a house and we're not gonna rent. I don't wanna rent, I don't wanna throw my rent away. Yeah. So we bought, we were just talking about this with our daughter last night. It was like a$30,000 mobile home. Yeah. We bought a$30,000 mobile home and, um, got a mortgage for 30 years on a$30,000 home. Like, our payment was like$130 a month. Right. And the, and the lot rent at that time was probably only 150 or something. Yeah. Our lot rent was like 150, 120. So we were out of pocket for our living for under 300. That's awesome. Or around 300 and. Yeah, we were, and our friends were renting apartments at the time, right? For 800? For, no, at the time it was 400. You get a two bedroom and Fort Collins for 400. Really? Okay. But we, yeah. So he was so embarrassed that we lived in a trailer park. Yeah. But it is what it is. Yeah. But, but, and, and you, it's a good decision in hindsight, right? No, honestly. Uh, Alma, the producer of the podcaster, she just got married at 20 years old. Uh, she's not here today, but she and her husband bought a mobile home and, and she's just like, you know, it's just, it's actually better than an apartment. I can't afford to buy a house now and we can save$500 a month toward buying a house in the future. And that's exactly how it worked for us. It really, we, we had a little bit of debt and Right. Allowed you to plow that down and Yeah. So we could really put our money towards paying that off. And we had three bedrooms. We had like 1100 square feet. Yeah. That was brand new. It was pretty, it was brand, it was pretty bougie for, yeah. We had two bathrooms, three bedrooms. It's a Biest mobile home in the park, baby. It really was like, and it does, it makes you feel good to just have something of your own. Yep. So it was, uh, um, it was, it was a good decision for us. Yeah, for sure. So tell me about those first few years. Like, was it just the two of you for quite a while, or was there, was there a crew coming on board soon because Tim was selling more designs than he could possibly labor up? Yeah. I, I, I think it was just me originally and she had to, she had to get a job at a restaurant at night and go to school. I, at Nate's during the day I worked, oh, Nate's seafood. Nate's seafood. Yeah. I was here when that was still going. Mm-hmm. Right at the corner of Horset Tooth and College. Yep. And so I, I basically, I don't, we didn't have any employees right away. Right. Well, you did. You had like, my brother came and worked and Jason worked for the worked, and Troy worked, you had buddies. He had college buddies. So he would grab a buddy here and there. Temp, temp folks here and there. Yeah. And we, we rented a storage unit somewhere to Right next to the Dodge dealer stuff. Yeah, it at the Foothills. So we ran, I ran our business out of a mobile home and a storage unit for, we interviewed at the storage unit. Like we, we had, I remember some of the kids, we'd ask them, they'd meet us at the storage unit and we would do our interviews and have'em fill out their, I mean, there was really no paperwork to speak of at the time. Right. We just had to get a signature that they were living. And so yeah, we did job interviews and you did all that stuff. You did all the payroll, all of this and that. Yeah. All the books from, from the start. Still today, you should probably not ask me a lot about landscaping. I mean, I'm probably like, I. You know what you like. I know what I like and I can tell you how things can go wrong, um, financially especially, and I think that's why we have been successful being married for 28 years and working together for 28 years. Yeah. Cause we each know her lane and we each Yeah. She doesn't try to come into my lane and I don't try and go her lane. So it, it, it works. And there's, there's not a lot of people that can work with their spouses, but we have done it very successfully for a long time's. Awesome. Well, it's, it's obvious to me from sitting here that you guys like each other quite a bit still, so that's nice. Um, I'm gonna call a short break. Yeah, sure. And then we'll come back and, uh, kind of do some more of the business conversation before the closing segments. Sure. Super. Okay. And we're back. So when we left off, we were kind of talking about, you know, hacking teams together with whoever had some time right now and stuff like that. Where did those first few real employees start to happen? And what was that like? Like, I remember one kid, his name was David, who's the blonde, tall kid interviewed in the store. Pool boy type. Yeah. I'm just kidding. Yeah, no, very much so. Um, but I was married to a pool boy at the time, right. So I didn't notice. Um, yeah, I, I, we must have just put an ad in the coloradoan. I would think I in, I don't remember hiring ever being hired other than the last 10 years. So I don't know where we got our employees. Well, I think a lot of referrals too. Like Jason worked for us. His brother came to work for us and it was mostly friends and people we knew that wanted a summer job. And I, I don't, I just, and that's so long ago. I don't remember how he got people. Yeah. It wasn't, I mean, so nobody like full-time permanent for quite a while. It was, her brother was probably our first real fir full-time employee. Yeah. Yeah. But he would go, like, for a while, even when our, our daughter was born, we were closed like three months outta the year. Right. Like in the winter, um, we were clo like once Christmas happened cuz we weren't doing snow removal. And my parents had a place in, um, Palm Desert. Okay. And so we would just take our kids and we'd go there for a couple weeks and, um, so we didn't have, so there was an era where, you know, you just made enough money to pay to get you to the next season. Yeah. And um, so we weren't How long does the design take though? Like, it feels like you should be working on the designs in the wintertime and installing them start March, April or whatever. That isn't really the way it goes. No, it is. It is now. It is now. Right. That's definitely how it happens now. But back then, I mean, we, I don't, we probably did. It was kind of designed as you build before. Yeah, we didn't have, we didn't, we were so small that Yeah. He would work all day. Uh, in the field and then come home, have dinner, and then we took, we had a third bedroom and we put a drafting table in it, um, that I'm sure I found on in the Colorado Right. For like 50 bucks or something. And he then he would do the designs at night and um, sometimes he'd come home in the day shower, go meet with a potential client. Right. But he was definitely doing all sales and all design. Right. And all installations. Yeah. You were there for all the installations. Sometimes you would have help. Yeah. And sometimes I would have help. Yeah. So obviously the target market is probably different or were you already kind of a, like a big dreamer guy, like he wanted a full backyard and the kind of experience Uh, no, I, that what my dad did was higher end stuff and that's all I wanted to do. I didn't want to do small projects or one-offs. And in the nineties it was booming in Fort Collins. Yes, it was, it was a great time. We would go and she would, we would. Create a, some cheesy flyer. It wasn't cheesy, it was like legit at the time. And we would put a rubber vander on it and we would every new house and every time we saw a house we would Oh, right over. Go put a door hanger on the Yeah. Cuz they got the house delivered with a, if they had sod, that was it. Well, at the time they really weren't even doing that. Yeah, that's what I was thinking. Yeah. You just got, you just got a dirt lock, here's your house. Yeah. And if you could do one house and you did a good job, then they'd tell your neighbor and then you could just kind of like, so greenstone, you know, we got in with one. Yeah. But also, I think one of the differences, um, that separated Tim's craftsmanship from other companies was his construction degree. Mm. Um, and there was a really big wall we did, um, kind of over by where goalie's is now a huge retaining wall. And it had to be like, um, stamped by an architect. What's the engineering engineered? There we go. And um, you know, so we, he sort of got known, I feel like, early on for really hard walls. Yeah, yeah. And retaining walls. That was where, and that seemed to just send us into the trajectory of more complex work. Yeah. So you had enough, you were, you were deep enough in that construction space and understanding of those things that you could design for actual buildability stuff. Yeah. We did a lot of retaining walls for my dad, but I also in the winter, Built restaurants for a, oh, for a company. Someone we knew from church and he'd just built restaurants. And so all winter long I would work for him as a assistant superintendent. Oh right. And do construction. So you got all the systems there kinda. So I, I really liked construction and that's kinda why I thought I wanted to be a home builder, cuz I really enjoyed doing construction. And so that was helpful when it come, designing it is one thing, but being able to design something that works and is functional is something else. And if you don't have the, the, uh, install background, it's hard to be a good designer in my opinion. Yeah, yeah. So having that, yeah, they should make architects, uh, work in the field. Work in the field. Yeah. Actually that's, uh, one of my earliest podcast guests was a guy named Lance Psycho, uh, F nine Productions down in Longmont. Anyway, he, uh, well he had me on his podcast first, and so it was kind of a return the favor, but like they do, like, they did architecture for a long time and they've kind of moved into that design build and they, and when as an architecture, they send all their young architects into the field to work in the construction part, like intentionally so that they're like, Hey, this is how things are really put together. Like things aren't really put together on paper. Yeah, yeah. Well, Tim has a really good relationship with, um, and I should know his name. Who's the guy at csu? Zach. Zach. Um, and that is what like, so his students come out. At least once a semester and get a chance to, um, you know, just talk to our, our staff. And they're in the, you know, the landscape architecture, landscape design program. And that is something that we just really, you can draw it, but it doesn't make it buildable. So I'm thinking about like the, like there's b a is probably a competitor, but also they go a long ways. Far a lot. Right? Or then there's like Ripley, they're not really, they're not comp, they're not in the residential world. Typical. Oh, really? They're mostly, um, hospitals, parks, gotcha. Municipalities, government work, that kinda thing. But, uh, so yeah, they, they are not So they're not in your space really. Who, who is your primary competition in your We don't have any. That's, that's what our sales team will tell you is we don't have any competitors. Yeah. Well, I don't really, I mean, like, in a way it's like a little bit like Nan was for a while. I'm not sure Neen still carries that mantle of the design build kind of guru or whatever. But maybe Neen is more construction. They're not landscapes Well, no, I think it's just, well, no, but just the design and build, like there were construction. Right. I don't know that there's anybody that does the, what we do. I mean, I, I think we're very different in that. And it's not for everybody, and we understand that, but, and Fort Collins has a lot of, because of the, the landscape, it's mean. CSU has such a good landscape design and architecture program, right. There are a lot of, um, landscapers in town and there's plenty of work and they can design and stuff and they can design and you know, you gotta, you gotta try. Um, but I don't, we don't spend a lot of time thinking about our competition. Um, yeah, we, we do. He, he talks to the salespeople more than I do, so they may have, they may they disagree. It just seems like a waste of time. It just focus on what you're doing. Like who's building the awesome backyards that are comparable to yours if you're not getting the bid because somebody's, well, it used to be Carver. Carver was, yeah, he's good. He was fantastic. And Richardson bought him up and took him to his ranch up and Oh, really? Yeah. Yeah. So he sort of, which was, which was awesome for us because he took him off the Thanks. But thanks. He, he's, he, he was phenomenal at what he did, and he's probably been working with Kurt exclusively for five or six or seven years. He's a good, he's a good, good guy. Good businessman. Um, I always said if I wasn't in the business, he would be the person I would hire to do my landscape. Yeah, sure. Mm-hmm. He was, he was very good. Maintenance is different. Maintenance has, sure. We have a lot of, like, bath, uh, has a pretty good operation mill, the commercial maintenance mill Mills, brothers Mill, Southern Mill, exposure Mills, mill Brothers. Mill Brothers. Mill Mill Brothers. Yeah. Yeah. Or Mills Mill. Alpine. Precis. Alpine. There's a bunch of them out there. Yeah. Main. Oh yeah. Maintenance is, there's, there's a ton out, there's pretty big industry really. When you think about how many properties there is, like those are all fairly large. Yeah. They're operations and they all have quite a few, few clients. There's just a lot of the grass always grows, the snow needs, plowing, all that. Right. Yeah. And especially in the commercial sector, um, you know, homeowners if, if their financial situation changes, you can mow your own yard. You can plant your own tree, you can, but in a, the commercial sector, they don't usually have a staff person Right. To mow the yard. If they did, it would cost'em way more than it cost to hire you guys for year. What do you, yeah. Then you gotta make sure you have stuff for them to do, you know, year round. So, um, the maintenance is, is highly outsourced. Yeah, for sure. Stable, stable kind of thing. Mm-hmm. Talk to me a little bit about some of the phases of growth. So you've, you've just started hiring employees and stuff. We're kind of approaching the late nineties, I suppose, or something like that when you're starting to really mm-hmm. You know, imagine you operated for a, for a while as a team of five or seven or whatever. You've got a few crews or a few people. Yeah. We, in the nineties when we, we started in 1995 and every year we grew and it, we started really, really small. And, uh, we thought we were, we were it, like we were, we were all that in a bag of peanuts and then the recession hit and it was a rude awakening for us. Oh. That 2008 recession. It really was. Oh, because you were so focused on new construction install That's, we were not a lean company company to, to, I was just up on Boyd Lake for a, uh, uh, chapter retreat. We had a boat day and a volleyball and spikeball and all kinds of fun stuff. And, uh, as a banker, one of the last seasons that we went through, we had like three specs on Boyd Lake and we had 400,000 in each of them, and we sold'em for two 70 or something like that. Hmm. Like that didn't count the a hundred grand that the borrower had in each of them too. You know, it was rough. Yeah. We learned, um, a lot in 2008 and 2009, we learned that, um, We learned how to, what being a lean company was, um, unintentionally, or, um, well, I think you, we gotta it figured out when you, you're like, only been, we cannot continue these kinda losses. Well, when growth has just basically been handed to you, which is kind of what the nineties was in Fort Collins, that Right. We had plenty of work. We never had to look for it. We didn't really have to, um, think as much about efficiencies and it just started in the nineties that oh, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, you know. Yeah. We literally landed when Fort Collins was just decided to be an amazing place to live. Right. Um, and it was, it was, and also as we were still fairly young business owners and that was really painful. Yeah. Uh, business owner time because you, um, you know, the time when you, the first time you have to say, we can't give you a raise. Right. Um, our team as a group, um, we decided to eliminate health insurance at the time. Wow. I mean, cuz it wasn't a mandated at the time. Yeah. Plus you were a bunch of young people. But it was, we had like nobody, nobody actually needed it. Here's the, here's the deal. Like I, some people might, we can all keep our jobs or some of you can keep your jobs and we can keep health insurance. Right. So the whole, and there's, did you talk to'em about it? Oh yeah. As a group before you made the decision, we're, we're pretty. Yeah, collaborative, especially younger. We're maybe less collaborative now that we've gotten a little bit bigger, but when it was just, there's two people on our team still Georgia and Matt Yes. That were Scott and Scott, um, that are with us today, that would, that remember, you know, having that meeting like Right. Um, nobody got wage increases. We eliminated health insurance. Like we sat down as a team and said, and everybody took my job. Yeah. What do we need to do to everybody? Keep getting a paycheck. Yeah. And, um, I wanted to ask Amy, did you supplement your dietetics or dietetics or whatever degree with any like, formal education for your C F O kind of gig or No. And any real C F O would laugh at me. Um, for sure. Like we have a great controller now. Um, I was definitely, you know, learn as you go. Um, QuickBooks, I had, we had a great accountant our first, um, 15, 18 years and he and I talked a lot and he just was super, yeah. Um, it isn't magic, like you can learn it just by listening and applying and learning. Yeah. But I, I will, I will say that. This is a segue, but the reason we got through the recession was because of her low debt mentality. And I, yeah. I am more of a spender and if we need it, let's go get it. And she really hated debt and a lot of that comes from her dad, who was a really good businessman, owned beer distributorships, and knows business. And he, Amy and her dad would, um, talk and he helped us through a lot of that, or helped her help me or help the business. Yeah. Help you see what she saw. Yeah. Yeah. The load debt was the, I mean, there was companies getting trucks, repoed left and right in our space. Right, right. We didn't have that. We didn't have to fire anybody. We didn't have to default on loans. We just didn't have a lot of debt. And it was because of her that, that we were able to get through this recession as well as we did. Well, I think that's one thing that's interesting. I remember that recession as well, and like there were three or four or five maybe businesses that I as the banker, like raised the alarm flag and said, Hey, this might not feel like it's pinching you yet because it accounts receivable and big inventory numbers and like, it just kind of can't really feel the impacts of changes in it economy. But you know, going from 8 million to three and a half million on your motorcycle dealership isn't gonna really not hurt. Yeah. Like you're gonna have to figure out how to cut. Some stuff here. Yeah, we were pretty fortunate at that time. And thanks Tim. My, I do think we still, I still would love to be a debt free company. Yeah. I think that's still, I, and I learned about leverage as I've gotten older and appreciate it and understand the value, but my core being is if we could just fund our own stuff always. And I think we tell our employees and it's, it's, um, you know, if, if you see it, for the most part we own it. Yeah. Like we are, we are still not, uh, a highly leveraged company, but we were able at that time to be able to then buy some, we were, we could pick up loaders and other people that were getting, everything was on sale that we're getting rid of things. We were able to pick up some stuff during that time. So you're poised to grow after. Yeah. And, and also our team just was really invested in, they, they cut, they cut things in their own world and, and we were all in it as a group. Where were you at that time? Were you like a 10 or 12 person company? Do you remember? We weren't really doing maintenance at the time. I really don't know how, how big we were. Maybe did a couple million dollars in revenue at, at most, maybe. Yeah. I don't know. Yeah. Probably somewhere in that range. 10, 10 ish people or something, you know. Yeah. I, I don't, I don't really know, but it, what, when we came out of that, I mean that really thinned the herd. I mean, there were so many companies that went out of business for during recession, and if you survived it, No, no. A sudden world lose your oyster. I mean there was so much work and such little competition. And during the recession, one of the things that we did, we really diversified what we do. And I started using my construction background in Georgia, who's been with us for 20 years and runs our sales team has a CM degree as well. She had a landscape design and contracting degree. Nice. And a minor in construction management. And so we was somebody from csu. Yeah, yeah, yeah. She's actually the great connection at csu. Cause I didn't go through the landscape department Atsu. Right. So she did. And she was a class pet and hi Georgia. She means that in a loving way. Yes. Very honoring. She is. She had, she's very academic connections with the professors and she was, she's, she's, she's got great connections through csu. But anyways, we started going back to the projects that we built, uh, you know, 10 years prior. And we're doing outdoor living spaces and started doing vertical construction. Whereas before it was all just tree shrubs, perennials, grass. Right. And then we got into the outdoor living space and I think we were the first company in Fort Collins to actually do that, to bring that trade in house. And so we were doing, that's when fire pits came in. Fire pits, fires were a big thing. Shade structure. Oh, I'm just remembering actually, I got acquainted with Andy Mill back in the day of my late banking years and he had that little shop down there, just a little ways away from surroundings. Surroundings. Yeah. And I never actually, I. Got involved, got acquainted and, and, uh, appreciated that he had a sense for Yep. Like the market evolution that was happening at the time. I don't, yeah. So we did that and that really, we came out of the recession known as kind of the outdoor living company and not just the landscape company. And so that, that kind of redefined who we were and we branded it and really, really got good at it. Talk to me about marketing, um, because I'm, uh, I've had a magazine ad for a while and let's get some action and stuff like that, but you guys have great, like magazine ads and the style magazine and the different things and like, I'm gonna take this one. Yeah, sounds good. Um, we spend a lot of money, good money on the pictures because what landscaping, what you wanna see is what your yard could be. Mm-hmm. And um, couple, we work with one primary local photographer, Steve Glass, and we have some new ones as well. Um, and. He and are very, we stage all of our projects as though when you look at the picture, someone just left their glass of wine and, and stepped in to use the kitchen. Right. You know, it, it needs to be like you lived there. And I, I worked briefly for Walt Disney Oh really? Um, before I came. And so movie sets and staging and kind of that I, I feel like I had a little bit of, from that background, I had a good understanding of what it takes to make a picture look like a moment and not a picture. Yeah. And, um, and this photographer and I just worked together and we've been working together for 15 years probably. Yeah. And so the, it's, we, the, the pictures make the difference. Um, we don't spend a lot of money on marketing, per se, like buying ads. I mean, we need a local presence. Um, and we are very pro Fort Collins and local, and we wanna be involved. But in general, our business comes from referrals. Yeah. It's, you know, we, the, the ads in, um, well, I guess it's not called Style anymore. Yeah. No clothes. No, no co no clothes style, no co style. Um, for example are just sort of a reminder and also just a place like people wanna see pretty things. Yeah. Um, but most of our work comes from if we do a good job and we. Leave that homeowner's house and they're happy with us, then they tell their friends they're gonna have people over. That's the point. Yeah. They're gonna have people over and they're gonna see it and they're gonna be like, how did, where did this come from? And then we have this design team that's amazing. Creates this stuff, uh, that people are amazed at and then we photograph it appropriately. Um, so we don't, I think we frustrate a lot of advertisers in the area because I'm pretty hardcore about, I'm pretty picky about where we go. Yeah. Cuz in general to me it's also if we don't need to spend the money on it, that's fair. We don't. So I have one question, like you introduce yourself as a cfo and I can appreciate that, but I, are you guys familiar with the book Traction and Thes model? Yes. Mm-hmm. It seems like it's just kind of visionary and integrator and like C O O or c f ffo or whatever would be almost too narrow. Well, it defaulted the CFO because she always did our books. Right. And that was, that was just kind of, we had to put a title down. Yeah, yeah. Yeah. And she, she did great until, and she would still do great today. And we had, we had a consulting firm that came in. We, our team, our team was at a place, and I can't remember, this was right after the recession. Well, it was about year 15 because that's 15 or 16 because that's, um, Ty was. Um, Ty and Reid were still in middle school. We just had all these great people and they were frustrated hard. Everybody exhausted hard. It's hard work. And, you know, we'd go to these trade shows and these consultants would get up and talk about systems and processes and things like that. And we were, every time we did something, we reinvented the wheel and we feel like we were trying to, to, to create these systems to cater to what we do. And they just wanted help. And so we reached out to a consulting firm and one of the first questions was, all right, what's your goal? How big do you wanna get? And we're like, we don't want to grow. That's not why we're doing this. We want, we want, we just want people less. Chaos is what we want. We every, we wanted to be less exhausted and we wanted our staff to be less. Like ultimately that was where we were at. Like, we know that we have a good product, we have a, we have great people. And, and, and when was this, this, this would've been, it was probably 12 years ago. Uh, yeah, like 2012, 2013, I think. Yeah. And, and, and this consultant firm came in and, and again, they were out of Atlanta and they interviewed our staff and, um, we basically hired somebody to come in and tell us all the things we did wrong. Right. Yeah. Well, it happens. And, and one of the well is, is narrow. One of the things that they said was, You guys are too big not to have a controller, like someone who knows numbers, that that's their life. Yeah. That's their, their training, their education. Someone that can give you amazing financials and, and yeah, do analyze report, tell you every, you know, every project between a hundred thousand, 150,000 has our profit margin, whatever. And we were like, how on earth can we afford a controller? And they said, how can you afford not to? And so we hired our first controller and he was amazing. And he came in and helped change how we do business. But along with this consulting firm, they just built all these systems with us to help us grow. So we had this platform that basically start clean, finish clean, and everyone had a lane and everyone had a job to do and knew exactly the steps to fulfill their job. And so it was easier for them. Everyone kind of got their life back. Yeah. And it wasn't one person wearing all these different things. Yeah. Spending time wondering what you should do next is a terrible way to be an employee. Yeah. Yes. So that is, and an owner as well, or an owner for sure. That's when we really started to grow because we had this platform and we had systems and. Yeah. You hire somebody, you can actually tell'em what their job really is like and whatever. Yeah. It was, it was huge. Cool. Getting a controller and getting, moving me out of that position. Yep. Um, super hard on the ego of course. But then after we had one for one year, I'm like, oh, this is so much better. He's so, I had no idea. Um, and again, he was, he was great. He also, we've been super fortunate cuz we've just had these people who have trained us Yeah. As well. He was, he was totally, he was, at least I've been trained by every employee I've ever had. Really, I've learned something from him. He was about 30 years older than us and had worked in multiple industries. Right. So he brought in thoughts and processes and systems that had never occurred to us before. And um, so we've just been between our accountant and our dad and Steve, like we just had some great people pour in into teaching us Yeah. What to do. So we got about 30 minutes left. Do you guys have a hard stop at five or? Not too hard. Okay. No, we're good. I have a couple more business questions I want ask before we get into. Sure. Um, Tim, you mentioned your email back to me that, that you've, you already involved in a peer advisory organization. Cause I was like, I like your style. You wanna learn more about local think tank. Tell me about that and when that originated and what kind of an impact that's been. That was the same consultants years ago. Oh, interesting. He said you need to get into a peer group. You wanna give him kudos. Yeah. Um, it's Ben, Ben Thomas who had an advisor out of Atlanta. Okay. And Ben. And Ken. He didn't really say what brand or anything. No, he wasn't like a Vistage guy or a tab guy or whatever he is like, it didn't a peer group, don't I It's Ken Thompson and Ben Gandy and they had bought and sold and started business. They're industry specific. Okay. And we interviewed a handful and chose them and they, they were just starting their consulting and so we got Ben and Ken directly like them. Yeah. Today, today. I don't think you get that, but they were fantastic. And he said You should get involved in a peer group and led me to Bruce Wilson and Well, we're, we're one of his, he probably has 10 different peer groups across the country and so Okay. There's six companies in our peer group and we meet twice a year. At somebody's facility or at a cap factory. Oh, landscaping. Yep. They're all landscape businesses that are not in our market. Yep. So what we'd call a, a 20 group mm-hmm. In like other lexicon. Yep. And you open your financials and you benchmark and you listen to their problems and you, it's just, yeah. It's really been good for us because I can reach out to somebody and say, Hey, we're working on our handbook. What do you doing that right? What did you do here? Could I copy it? Yeah. And yeah, exactly. Totally. You're not starting from scratch every time you find a new problem. Yep. And it's, it's, uh, you've got the sounding board with all these, these, uh, other business owners and it's, it's been very good for us to know how are we doing that? Was that good for you two as basically co-leaders along the whole way? It seems, I mean, obviously Tim, you've been the face and the sales. He was a revenue earner, so you get a little bit more hand just because you're the guy that creates a lot of the revenues. But you're a partnership. I can, I can tell that and you're on the same team, but what if you disagree? Was it nice to have that consultant or the peer group? I think over time, once we got the controller, my role really started changing in the company. Um, which I think is a good thing. Yeah. Um, I think the originally, and cuz I'm just tight, I never wanna spend money. Um, that's okay. You know, I was like, don't make apologies, we, no, I don't. Well, and you do need to invest to deliver more service. Right. More value class. But I was your, you don't need to this, you know, I don't know,$5,000 to go to a peer group and like, that seems silly to me. Yeah. Um, but once I went to the first couple peer groups and I think it was really hard for the group. To, especially because I have not been on the operation side, you were allowed to just like check in as part of the deal. Well, and like most of the other landscapers, they're in charge. They don't have this, they don't have a, like a Sure. Co-leaders and in general, um, Tim is the absolute leader of the company. Sure. I have said multiple times I'm invisible and I, and we've intentionally, you're not very invisible to me or to Tim for what it's worth. Yeah, for sure. We, um, but it's very intentional and per, uh, purposeful that Tim is in charge. Yeah. Um, cuz again, somebody's gotta be the decider. Well, back to Yeah. Tim's dad's philosophy. I still agree with today. You can't have two people making decisions. So ultimately the decision for all company things has been Tim's and it still is, and it will forever Bill be, will be. Um, and I think the, the leadership, the peer group didn't really know what to do with us. Um, a it's still an extremely male dominated environment. Sure. And a lot of the owners are, I'm sure you were the prettiest girl in the room. Um, I'm the only one. Um, and you know, so I think I didn't necessarily feel, um, and I don't take it personally. I mean these guys are great at what they do. I didn't feel disrespected. Sure. But, um, it just became pretty obvious to me that. It's easier to talk to one person mm-hmm. Than it is for two, for two people to talk and me know some information and Tim know other information. And it just, it just got kind of muddy. Mm-hmm. Um, and I think the older generation of men in con construction, um, some like women in the construction workspace and some don't, and I don't care. That's fine. It's, yeah. I'm not offended. I don't, you know, they're great guys. Um, so I don't wanna make it a sexist thing at all. Um, but I, I have bowed out of participating Okay. In the peer group. Um, and I, I think we're, and they, they would all love to have her back there, I think. I'm not surprised. They have No, no qualms with her being there. I just think she being the only woman, you know, what you would like, Amy, is our, uh, we have a next level catalyst chapter, and it's for the key leaders that aren't the final deciders of local small businesses. It's led by Alison Seabeck. She was, she became the 29 year old president of Prosci, which is like a people change management organization. She's a linguist by training. Uh, and, uh, I do love business. Absolutely. You're gonna love her. Absolutely. You're gonna love this group. I could tell. Not that I, I was wondering what Tim's story was, but honestly, You would love Allison's chapter in such a way because it's, it's such an interesting place to be kind of in that space where you're not the final decider, but you are so valued and respected and responsible, and you're not the final decider. So you're gonna manage up, manage down, and kind of like figure out what that looks like. There's a little, little world to be. Yeah. Anyway. But I, I think that where I find value now, um, after we have a controller and what the peer group, Tim was so operations focused and he did trust me so much that he was, um, he had to get a little more involved. He, he did not have the education or the depth of knowledge in the business finances Sure. That now he just blows me out totally. He blows me out of the water. And so I think, you know, it all kind of happens, um, for a reason. And he has just a, he's sort of shifted from, um, being sort of the operations guru to this financial guru and under That's awesome. Under understanding, um, just the depth of the business and, and running it from a financial perspective as opposed to the operations perspective. Yeah. We, we've gone from working and at the end of the year, do we have any money left to now we manage by the numbers. Yeah. And we're, we're running reports on a daily basis and. Not waiting until the job's done to see how we're doing. That's cool. Change course. Mid, mid project if we can to Yeah. Ride a ship or if you find a good consultant and you're willing to endure what they tell you well about your business and you gotta find a good one. You know, there's, there's, there's two. Yeah. It's worth every good one. It's worth every penny, but you do it right? It's, I, I have, I've referred a number of consultants over the years to some of my members and otherwise, and when it works good, it's like, so rewarding. Mm-hmm. Um, one other question I wanted to ask was like, what's next for Linn Landscape? Like, do you, like, in terms of your roles individually and the company overall, like, do you have like a five year, 10 year kind of a thing? Do you wanna be acquired by some big corporate, don't care about your people or your customers kind of thing? Or like, what's, what's the end game for you? You get, I mean, you're young yet, right? Like, you're not even, you're maybe 50 50. Yeah. 51. Yeah. Um, I, I am working less in the business and I think for a long time I was sort of the heavy. Yeah. Because I was the, and I'd get, you were making sure I had to say, say no a lot and if you got called into my office, people were like, oh. And cuz I was the HR too. And so, um, I, with, you know, I want to do more of fun and adding joy and. Um, because we have, I've been replaced. We have an office manager, we have an HR department. Right. We have a control. They don't actually need you anymore. They don't. Is it okay with you? I, I am not a good half in person. Yeah. I'm either all in and so it's a little bit of a, a covid definitely brought me in back in full-time. Yeah. Um, so I don't really know where I fit anymore. So at the moment I'm just trying to walk along our new hires Yeah. And help them. Cuz the culture is, that's a beautiful thing. Like to create something that doesn't really need you, though it needs him. For sure. So kind of, I, I think I get in the way more than anything and I'm not involved in the day-today. I haven't been in the field. You guys take long trips. Yeah. Yeah. We do not as good as we should. Amy says, I know we could get a long trip in this. We travel, we travel plenty. Oh yeah. We could travel more. Yeah. Um, so i's the business I don't think relies on me at all other than I like to be there to Yeah. You know, have a face ownership. I don't wanna be an absentee owner. Yeah. It's, I, I work, you know, four half days and then go home and work from home in the afternoon. Like you're officially there for a half day, but really you're kind of working all day. Right. Right. So it we're, we're in a good, good place. We have an amazing You don't plan to change anything significantly, sounds like. Yeah. No. And I, we don't have kids that want to take it. Um, Hm. Which is, are you like an employee-owned company option? Is that something you're entertaining or don't know Right now everything's on the table. Yeah. We really, we don't have an exit strategy. We're not planning on getting out immediately. We, you know, I'm not gonna do this forever. Yeah. But I don't know, we, we've built a company that's, I think is very valuable and it's, it could, it could be a great asset whenever we decide to do so. And we're, we're, we're just in a good spot right now. And we don't, don't need to sell, don't wanna sell right now. We don't. Yeah, we can. I would love if we had, I would love if we had employees who wanted, that would be, yeah. That would be awesome. That's your dream. Yes. Well, since my, my kids are not interested, um, which is not a big deal either way. Right. Like, that was, we didn't build it to make a legacy project anyway. Right. We built it to pay the bills, but, um, we do have some employees that have been really invested, and I think that that just, um, would allow the, the culture. Yeah. I mean, I think our culture, we, I think we work hard at our culture. Give a lot of grace. Yeah. I think, um, which is important to us. So Yeah. If you're working with humans Oh, geez. Otherwise, if you're working with robots, no Grace. Yeah. Anyway, so if we had employees who were interested, I think that would be really cool. Like what, um, was it odells did that? Sure. Yeah. Yeah. I thought I, I followed that pretty closely. I thought that was a really neat transition for them. Yeah. Very cool. Yeah. I, I don't have. Well, we just have such a good team. It makes going to work easier than it has been. That's awesome. We lost a ton of people during Covid and now we have rebuilt our team and have a phenomenal team and awesome. It makes my job easier. One last business question. How was c o for you aside from, sounds like there's some, like the labor market obviously was super challenging for a while, but it sounds like you've been able to address that. Yeah. Co covid was frustrat. So you had high demand and low labor availability. Right? Like that's always fun. Or, or low quality of labor, right? Yeah. Did you say that co covid was, uh, difficult and I wanted to get outta Weld County or Larimer County just because of their oppressive regulations during Covid and get into, um, I didn't want, you know Right. The county telling me that we had to shut down or that we had to have masks on or in this huge like pole barn. Well, and we, and we work outside. Yeah, we work outside. It was just crazy. I mean, to like ask our employees to wear, to ride in a, to just work outside a alone six feet apart. Six feet apart, right. When you're trying to move a boulder, only a three foot wide boulder, dammit. Right. But it was more, um, the hiring that just was brutal. And when your government is paying your employees more than you can pay them right. To sit at home, why, why go to work? And so, We were understaffed for, this is the first year in at least five years that we have been fully staffed. Really? It is. So it was already a challenge and then made worse? It was, it was definitely a challenge. Um, before, but it, there was just something Yeah. We were competing with unemployment. Yeah. Yeah. To come to work. And I think that's a shame of our, so society's like, like it used to be that kids on the football team or the lacrosse team, you know, they'd be like, I'm gonna work landscaping this summer because I want to do hard things. They get big muscles in the summer and at 10. Right. That would just like, they push weights or whatever and then they play video games and it's like, like, come on, did you watch walkie two? Yep. Come on. Like, do the real work, you know, get out there. Yeah. It is hard enough to find our industry is getting tougher and tougher to hire cuz people don't want to work hard. Yeah. And it's a generation after generation and we've been doing this for almost 30 years. Yeah. And you can just see every generation is. Finding it's harder and harder to find people who are willing to work. And so then you add all the unemployment incentives on top of that. And there's fun video games and people like, they see, um, younger people see people, you know, you make, you create an app Right. And you're a millionaire. Right. And you've, you know, so I think Mark Zuckerberg was 25 when he was billionaire. Right. Or something. So that, that is also like, Ooh, I could do that. And, um, or you could be miserable for most of your life cuz you don't even know how to freaking do anything. Well, and I also think not just even prior to Covid, we noticed, um, a a lot of home stuff also is outsourced, right. So people, like my dad mowed our yard and when we got old enough, we mowed our yard. Right. And we pulled the weeds and like, we were his like minions And you were as well. Yeah. Nobody's got kids these days either. Yeah. So, you know, your your staff. Your staff was your children, right? Um, but we've had multiple employees and I had, no one in in particular came, he was at the office and I set him up on a mower and I'm like, okay mow, you need to mow this and do this. And he was like, what? And he said, okay. And he said, can you show me how? And I was like, get on the mower and mow it. And he's like, my mom doesn't let me mow the yard. Right. And he's a 17 year old kid whose mom has never let him mow the yard. Right. And, and talk about handicapping an entire generation Oh yeah. Of skillsets. You don't have to know how to be a mechanic, but hopefully you make enough money that you can pay somebody and mow your yard your whole life if you can't do it yourself. Yeah. If you can't do it yourself. Right. And, and so I think a little bit as we live in a kind of an affluent area where people are not mowing their own yard, so they're not teaching their kids skills. I was just listening to a podcast where like, it almost became a mark of honor among late 20, early 30 something women to be like, I don't know how to cook. Mm-hmm. Because I'm so focused on my career and it's like, well you can't cook. Like I've, yeah. I've been cooking since I was 12 and my mom had a Saturday job at the post office and it, my siblings wanted food in the morning. Yeah. I just did it mostly. Um, both my kids cooked like we had a thing while you were 10. You had to be able to cook 10 things. Oh, I like it. So you cook, you know, you start with just a scrambled egg and then you go to a fried egg and then you go to, you know, you eventually move up to macaroni and cheese cuz that's boiling water. Right. But by the end of the summer they could, you know, you cook a pancake and um, yeah. They're just stuff that you, you gotta know how to do. Well we are animals. Like it would be good like, If a wilder beast didn't know how to eat grass, it'd be rough for it, you know? Exactly. I think we're, we're gonna see in the next 5, 6, 7 years where Amy's on board as well, that blue collar's gonna start to make more money than white collar. I, maybe. I think so. They're the trades. There's so few people I would celebrate that. And they're not going away. And if you're, if you know how to work hard, if you have a trade that you're good at, you will start. First year kids outta college, going to work for an accounting firm or Right. Whatever job. And unless it's a specialty job like a doctor or a lawyer or something like that, it, you're gonna make more money as a, I mean, a mechanic, a mechanic or a HVAC or a, or landscaper, a framer or a landscape architect, whatever, landscaper, what we, we offer career paths. Now people think of landscaping as a summer job and it's not that any anymore. Right. You can make really good money in the landscape business and we, we what you start at the bottom or if you have some work ethic, you can be a crew lead, you can be a project manager and work your way up and you can make a really good living. How many, uh, how many, I think you said that you have, yeah. I think you have 86 employees that's up today. But, but you've got a lot of core headquarters stuff. How many people make more than 50 grand out of that 80 do you think? Or 40 grand? All of'em. Other than the summer house. Yeah. Right. Absolutely. How many more? More than 80. There's some, I would at least 50. Yeah. Yeah. Really? Yeah. There's, there's quite a few people that make That's awesome. Over a hundred thousand dollars a year in our business. That's awesome. So that's a good Absolutely. Yeah. You're creating a lot of good jobs. Yeah. Yeah. There are very good jobs in the landscape industry and it is not just a summer job. Awesome. Um, need a potty break or anything? Good. Okay. Faith, family, politics. Where do you wanna start? He'll start, um, unapologetic Christian. Okay. Born and raised. I mean, I grew up in a Christian home and Yeah. Had a couple years, rebellious years, but, um, you guys get married. Get married so fast because you shared that faith and you, we had, we didn't get married quick. We dated for two years. Oh, you did? Okay. I, I thought that I misread that. Mm-hmm. Didn't we? Two years. Two years. Yes. Yes. Good job. No, we're became a Christian Sunday. I became a Christian later in life. Yep. So after him, no, I was about ni I was 18 at the time. Yeah. So tell, tell me about your background and that No, no. Faith early or was there Um, well, I would say, um, my parents definitely, uh, are, I mean they're consider themselves Christians are Christians. Sure. But we would go to church on Easter, Christmas. Right. So, as far as actively, uh, involved in the church, my parents are not, I think, um, they were younger and my dad, uh, I think identified some hypocrisy in the church. No. And, um, was a bit, a bit turned off. Yeah. Um, I think I. My perspective on that now is it's hypocrisy or it's just humans. Right. I would agree with that. You know, humans just fail. I've kind of craved towards smaller and smaller churches as I've gone along. Cause it's just without a big bureaucratic power structure, it's just less, it's same, same way as our government. Right. Like if you're farther from the people, the more crappy you get. Yeah. So we just didn't, um, I mean we went to a Christian Church but we didn't participate. Okay. Um, and, and, and then what was that like for you? Like actually investigating? Cause it sounds like you were right at that cusp, right? Um, yeah. I had, um, after your gap year? It was actually prior. It was my senior year in high school. And, um, the guy I was dating died. Oh. And on his way to visit me and, um, car accident or something in a car accident Wow. On his way to come see me. And, um, I think at 18, uh, senior in high school, um, no one had talked, uh, to me about more morale, mortality. What happens next? What happens next? It just had never come up. Wow. And I think when you are younger, or at least for me, having somebody, um, younger, um, who's important to you die, you want the opportunity to say, um, I'm sorry. Yeah. I, I didn't know, like, you know, you, you, you seek a very um, Almost physical forgiveness in wanting to have contact with that person again. Yeah, I bet. And um, so I can only imagine his mom. Um, basically, where were you? I was living in Carbondale at the time. Okay. I, a guy I dated in high school. I was, uh, playing at the state volleyball tournament. Okay. Uh, for Roaring Fork High School. And, um, very tall for a lady. I suppose you could spike it once in a while. And, uh, he was going to Western State Uhhuh and had just, I said, come to state volleyball. And he said, oh, I can't, I can't get my class. It's a attendance based grade. Don't, don't, I don't need to. I can't skip my class. I'm sorry. I'm not gonna be able to be there. And I was like, oh, this is the most important thing in my life cuz I'm a senior and it's state volleyball. And, uh, so he skipped his class and then, uh, died on the way coming to Denver. Wow. Did you blame yourself A little bit? Uh, well, yeah, absolutely. Um, and, but his mom was like the most gracious human ever and, uh, just had faith, uh, a lot like my husband's and was explained to me, um, that I could see him again. Yeah. And what that would mean really. And, uh, I was like, I'm in, I'll take it. Check. Just like that. Like that's all, that's all I needed. Yeah. Um, and then it took me a, a little while to sort of understand really more unfold the complexities, what that meant. And I had a acquaintance from high school that went to CSU and he really, I. Yeah. Um, helped kind of unfold that, uh, it's not just a one dimensional Yeah. Item. Yeah. Being a Christian. Yeah. And, um, I think honestly, if that event hadn't happened, I probably would've been on a very different trajectory and not have Yeah. Met my husband because probably, so that's why I ended up having a gap year and really, um, so, you know, I think absolutely, um, for me, God has a plan. Uh, we grew up obviously very different and I think we still approach our faith differently, um, sometimes, but the core value of our faith is, is there Yeah. Yeah. Um, we fundamentally agree on the core values of it. Um, just the execution. I, from my perspective, when you've grown up knowing it, it's, yeah, it's just different than, well, that's what acquiring it as you're older. One of the interesting things about faith and even the, the argument between Christians and stuff is like, is everything for ordained or does God provide based on your prayers and your givings and stuff? And this story you just told is kind of like either or mm-hmm. In some ways. Um, and you're probably right. Like you probably wouldn't have ever connected it. That time and that place otherwise, no. I, I, I would be surprised if our paths would've crossed. That's how I think is I had to be taken sort of down. Yeah. I had to be sort of dismantled as a person to then be reviewed. So you see that God had kind of met you where you were at as a responsibility? I think he let me follow really hard for a reason. As much for ordained maybe. And you're more of a pre determinist kind of element, Tim. Yeah. Like she had no choice but to fall in love with you basically. Exactly. Yeah. She had no choice. Um, yeah. I, I see both sides and it's a whole nother podcast, but fair. Yeah. It's good. It work, it, it works. It creates a little, little tension sometimes. Do you guys wanna plug it your, do you have a church that you both go to? Yeah, we've been, we've been actually going to Faith Evangelical Free, which is not my Faith church ever since we were dating. Yeah. Yeah. Just Shields and almost Fort Collins kind of, or just saw the for or whatever, just saw the harmony. Yeah. We've been, we've been there for a long time. We do, you know, with Covid, I love, I mean, I didn't love Covid at all, but one of the things I did love about C O I D is the, um, Church online. Yeah. And now I listen to a lot more pastors that are in the area. Yeah. Like that's really where, I mean, he listens to'em when he works out, but I just, there's these pastors everywhere. Yeah. There's such great, totally great information and things to say. And yeah. So I really am drawn more to that. There's a, uh, Greek Orthodox church in Loveland that I started listening to their podcast during the Covid, and there was one on March 16th where he is like, we might be the only church meeting, or maybe it was March 23rd or something. Oh yeah. Meeting in person right now. Maybe in northern Colorado. Yeah, absolutely. And like, you got me, I'm listening, you know? Mm-hmm. And it would, anyway, it's a whole nother conversation as well, but the, the Greek orthodoxy as far as it splits from Roman Orthodoxy and then kind of coming back more arguably toward its centers. Mm-hmm. Uh, in the Protestant movement, whatever. Anyway, I digress. Interesting though. It is interesting, the whole conversation's interesting. And that's, I don't talk about religion, I talk about faith because I try not to offend or well, sometimes, but I try not to like impose this structure that religion seems to imply for most people that. I do think, think about the topic. For me, religion seems to come with a lot of rules, so I think I've always been slightly opposed. And maybe that was a little bit of my dad's programming. Possibly. Probably. But I absolutely, um, am so grateful to have had, um, the opportunity to have faith and it just, I can't imagine not. Yeah, that's fair. Life is hard. Yes, it is. It's, it's easier with faith in some respects, for sure. Mm-hmm. Um, do you wanna talk about family or politics next? Well, I love talking about my kids. Okay. We always, I didn't even remind you about this, but, uh, we have a one word description. I ask you for a one word description of each of your children. Oh, this is easy. Really? You even know what I'm gonna say? Oh, you can, why don't you each do one word, one word, one word for how many kids do you have? I have two kids. Okay. So I want your two words and then your two words. See if they match up. So I have one word for both of them. For both of them. For both of them, but then it splits into two. Okay. I would say one of them is determined and the other one is stubborn. You're gonna get punched for that. It sounds like they're they're mother's children. Just kidding. Yes, they are. Oh. All right. Let's start again. So, um, my one word is Buffett. Okay. Jimmy Buffett and Warren Buffett. I like it. Yeah. Both extremely successful men went about at a very different routes. True Cheeseburgers in Paradise is a lot different than Coca-Cola. Mm-hmm. At$23. Yeah. Fair enough. Yeah. We have two fam, well our oldest is a daughter, she's 23 and she's played D one volleyball, had a full ride scholarship. Oh wow. Um, has just worked her butt off in everything that she does. I like it. And my son is 21 years old and he is the kindest. I Yeah. He's a sweet, sweet, thoughtful soul. Um, but he has to learn things the hard way. Right. You can't, you can't say, this is how we do things or this is how you should do it. He's gotta figure it out on his own. So that's why I said he's stubborn cuz he is very stubborn and he is just like his dad. Just like his mom. We were both extremely hard headed, stubborn people. And people have said for 20 years, you cannot believe that we're still married cuz we are so hardheaded. Um, but yeah. So he comes, he comes by it naturally. Yeah. She's stubborn too, in just a different way. Like the, did you ever read the book Grit? No, but I've recommended it lately. Uh, yeah. So she, and I think he does too. They're just, their grit is just a different way of having grit. Yeah. Um, but she is long haul grit. Like she will endure, endure, endure, endure. I call it perseverance. Yeah. Mm-hmm. Uh, perspiration plus perseverance. Mm-hmm. You do that long enough, you'll be successful in whatever you do. Yeah. So she's a grinder. He is, he has grit. And he's a grinder too. He's just a diff a different style as far as not me. If my motorcycle don't work after like two hours of me trying to figure it out, I'm like calling the mechanic. Yeah. Yeah. He just, he want, he wants to learn it. Like she's willing to, to take content and manipulate it and then go from there. His, his grit comes from, I will figure this out on my own. Yeah. So I feel like they both have very similar characteristics. They just apply them differently. Yeah. In life. But yeah, both our kids are, um, on really solid ground. He's, he is a great athlete as well. They're both very fortunate to, I feel like, have athletic in there. So, Skillset. Yeah. Yeah. I think it works well. That figure in, um, when you were sizing Miss Amy up from across the room, Timmy, you're like, oh, she's nice and tall. We could have some D one. I think he did. Cause all his sisters I'm shorter than all his sisters. It was like, yeah. Like I said, we were talking about third grade. I don't remember that. I remember very, my memory is so bad. I, I can't remember the details about that night in the library other than a couple. I just have a horrible memory. Is that right? Yeah. It's, it's embarrassing. Well, good thing you live in the present. Like there's no reason to have, you don't, if you're, if you're a liar, you have to have really good memory. But it, if you're not, then it doesn't really matter as much. No, exactly. Um, anything else that you would really like to share on the family front? You guys are like excited about grandkid land soon, I suppose. No, not super excited. No, they're still early. We got, we love Yeah. We need a little more time. Yeah. We need more time. No, they're, they're, uh, yeah, we love, they're both here locally, which, um, I think, you know, we push them both to go some other place for college Yeah. And, um, for a period of time. And so we're super fortunate that they're both back in the area. Um, I don't know that they'll end up staying, but I hope, I hope they do. Yeah. You know, we love Northern Colorado. We love living in Fort Collins. Um, it's just, it's been a great place to raise a family and, and we're, we are. Are both, we're both blessed to have come from good families. We have good relationship with our family. Family's important to us. And that's same with our business, right? We want them to have time with their families. We're not, we, we take that to work. And, you know, families first, business is second. Yeah. So that's part of, I think that's part of our success, is we're not slave drivers. We're not, uh, work before play, work before family. It's a very, very family oriented company. Yeah. I'm probably more, more of a slave driver than you would be. You are. Fair enough. Um, well, the, the murmon part about going, uh, faith and then family is that you have to finish with politics. I see a future Larimer County commissioner here, perhaps, and Tim, I, I can't speak in public like you can, so I'll never be in politics. So I, that's why she ran the Torch Awards Peach, and she does all of our company speeches. I just, I cannot, I can't do it. My dad was a great speaker and most, most of my, all my sisters are phenomenal public speakers. And I am. I didn't get that. So, oh, I think you do have it, honestly, like it was your speech at the BBB that actually wowed me. Even though it was short and sweet, it was concise and pretty amazing. It's, it's not, it's not my thing, but, um, politics, conservative, conservative, conservative, less government. Less government. It's So you're libertarian? No, not I'm on the conservative front because they're too open kind of to Yeah, there are, that there's some morality issues that they allow that I would never Do you think the Republican party got too, not libertarian for its own good? Like Yes. They kind of allowed for like big wars, big spending. Like it's easy to buy votes and that isn't really, like, that's why it's hard for libertarians to ever get it. Like if you can't influence politics with your money, what all is it good for? Right? Yeah. I, Amy is more libertarian. She leans conservative, but she would not call herself. Right. You wouldn't I am not a registered Republican. No. Yeah. But yeah, I'm, and I are, you feel it's, that's the right path. Yeah. Oh yeah. Yep. And like you would, like Doug Wilson, have you watched, uh, the blog ame blog podcast? No. No. Oh, you'll like that one. He's a, he's a, we'll call him a firebrand pastor from a church in Moscow, Idaho, which is like the one little blue spot in the middle of all of the red Idaho. Um, but he's a, yeah, he's an intriguing, uh, personality. What was his name again? Doug Wilson. Doug Wilson. Okay. I'll share it with you later. Yeah, that'd be good. Um, so from your perspective, like trying to get back to a more conservative union, a more, you're not a nationalist, you're not a populist, like, you're like a Reagan era kind of style. Yep. Call it real. Yeah. I, yeah, I would, I. I don't disagree with him too much. I just, I think in general it is. Um, I think if you allowed people to care for people in need, I think the thing that goes wrong with Republicans is, is it appears as though they don't care about people. Yeah. Which is not true. True. Um, and so the alternative is I think there's a fear involved that people won't take care of their own. But like at the BBB that one of the ladies, one of the other companies that won the award was the dementia program. Yeah, totally. Yeah. And she started that program, dementia Together. Yes. She started that program based off something on her own heart. Totally. And it has grown into, to now a full organization and they have, and I think honestly, if you left humans to do more of that, more of that, the underprivileged and the people that needed help would have it. Yeah. Instead of thinking there had to be government to manage it. And it doesn't really matter necessarily if it's who, where the money comes from. But there, there always has to be a check writer. The thing is, no pro nonprofit runs nothing free. Is free. Really? No. So no nonprofit runs without a check writer. So you need capitalists, you need people to make money, to be able to take care of the people who can't take care of themselves, and to think that the right place to take care. Because every community is different. Like this dementia program that she has in Windsor may not function in downtown la. Right. And so to because or in Atlanta. And so I think encouraging people to take care of their own and their own communities and giving them the support they need, I think that would function, be higher functioning than having the government take care of the people who are not in need Well, or that are in need, excuse me, 60% of the money, like taking care of the people that aren't actually need. Yeah. I just think it, there's too much waste. There's too much, too many layers. We have a uh, I have a quote personally actually, that I carried around for a couple years before I founded Loco, and then it became our first value. Now it's our motto and it's a ask of your needs and share of your abundance. I suspect that resonates with you. Yeah, totally makes sense to me. And I think that's where when you look at the parties, the fear gets involved. Well, the Democrats think the Republicans won't take care. Right. People are fearful of the need. Right. And I think honestly, they would, because Tim would give to organizations that he. Valued. Mm-hmm. And I think that they're, and probably you do. We do. And I think every business owner we know, but they're not all the same. And that's why it would work. Right. Right. We value different things. We all value different things. Like the respite ball is amazing. Exactly. Gorgeous. It's a beautiful cause and it's great. And like I don't really have people in my life that are in that space really. And so for me, the Matthews House Exactly. And I have a Habitat for Humanity and Focal cafe are more significant. Yeah, exactly. And that's no criticism against those who support the respite ball. Right. It's just like, we don't all have to love supporting everything, but if everybody really supported what they loved, I think it would probably, I think it would work. I think it would work. I think we would take care of each other. Yeah. So I think even the medical system would sort itself out. Like there would be a baseline, like free. Mm-hmm. And then, uh, you know, I want all the fancy shit. And, and it sounds terrible to have a bifurcated health system, but we do already only, it doesn't really fucking work. Right. Like, so we could actually have a bifurcated health system that would give strong, you know, basic level of care and occasional exceptional care. Yeah. And for the people that have like the Jews, we can still find new drugs. We can still, and I'm not even convinced that finding new drugs is actually beneficial for mankind anymore, but that's a whole nother topic. Yeah. I just, I think a lot of the, the two party system is based off fear. And that's why I, I've been, I've been an independent, I probably just signed up to be an independent because I like the word when I was 18, but, uh, pandemic, sham, demic or pandemic plan. Your wife is bold. It's between sham and plan. Wow. I've never asked that question before. That's a pretty big question. And that's, that's part of the thing that's so frustrating about politic, those that have something to gain if they can like create something that they can then sell you the antidote for it. That's just a terrible thing. Yeah. And I was like, I'd rather just die. Like, fuck off, I'm not gonna buy this thing from you. That prevents against me dying from the thing that you created. Yeah. Like just fuck off. Well, and my mom was a biologist and a chemist, and I just think science, science fails. Right. Science gets better because science fails. Sure. That's all. That's the only way it gets better. And uh, you know, I was just not a proponent of being a Guinea pig in the, in the first round of watching science succeed or fail. Right. Um, and that's kind of, was, was my take. And I know, I know that, you know, that that's not necessarily it. It had, it's not a popular opinion. It's not a popular opinion and I it will be. Um, I think people, you know, you needed to do What made you feel safe and comfortable? I just think science is not perfect and I just, I just could not pretending that one person is science is not perfect, government doesn't know what's right and is frustrating that they were forcing it on businesses and forcing it agreed down people's throat. And it's, and in my opinion, it's manage your own risk. If you want to do it, do it. If you don't want to do it, don't do it. If you wanna wear a mask, do it. Yeah. We can't ask people to, if you don't want to go over, give over that. Right. Don't, don't try and mandate all the way down to human sovereignty has gotta be like the level at which, which you can't go over. Yep. Sorry to take you there. No, that's okay. I am, I'm very, I'm glad you went there with me. Yeah. I'm very pro freedom on for, for, yeah. All, all the things. Mm-hmm. Yeah. Think you'd lose your freedom and you. Truth is hard to find. Yeah. And uh, you know, we're gonna have to keep working, especially with AI and all this jazz coming in. It's gonna be important that we talk to each other actually, instead of just like letting AI tell us what to think. We'll become that movie Wally. Right. We're all in the little chairs and we can't do anything for ourselves cuz it just tells us what to do every day. We've uh, we've taken you guys over a little bit already, but, uh, the Loco experience is the craziest experience of your lifetime, either solo or together or whatever that you're willing to share. What's a crazy story that you have that you're, will, you're willing to share? Tim, you wanna go first? Tim? Tim. Tim? Probably, I can't remember. Tim. Probably can't remember. I don't dunno. Um, gonna have a crazy story. Even from the pandemic season or anything like that, or any near death experiences. Hiking in Patagonia. Yeah. There I do have a near death. Yeah. Uh, let's see. Junior year of high school I, um, went hiking. Um, so Carbondale, you go up past, um, a little town called Redstone. Sure. And then you go past a little town called Marble right before you go over the pass. Yep. And um, I was hiking, uh, with my boyfriend at the time and I had this little, little puppy okay. With us. And we were, it had rained the day before and we were just gonna go hike up these falls and, um, He'd gone ahead and the puppy couldn't take the trail. Right. Cuz it was a little puppy. Too much jump. Yeah, it right too. Too big for the puppy. So I, I turned around, took the puppy back to um, the truck. Put it in the truck, and then, and I was unfamiliar with this trail, so I was trying to catch up. Okay. And, um, I don't, you know, it was kind of like a scramble. So it's not just a direct hike. So you kind of had to like Right. Jump over stuff to earn the waterfall. Yeah. Yeah, exactly. And I just happened to like step out on this edge and it broke. Oh. And I fell, um, I think they said about a hundred what? A hundred feet. And like tumbled a hundred feet tumbled. So you'd tumble, tumble. Like I remember breaking my thumb. Bounce, bounce, bounce. I, I, I cracked my jaw. I remember taking all the skin off, like I remember grabbing for things right. And bouncing down the hill. And then I did a straight drop. I think they'd said it was like 20 to 30 feet when I kind of got to the edge. Right. And just fell straight down. Yep. And landed in the, in the creek at the waterfall. Oh, well that's nice. At the bottom, I guess it's like the soft soil around the creek and stuff. Yeah. Not exactly water's like going underneath big rocks, whatever. Um, my Oh shit. Face down and nobody knows you're there. No. And so then my boyfriend, who obviously not together, he came back and looked for me and he saw me in the bottom. Oh shit. So he came down and then Oh. Cause you were just running the dog back to the car. Right. Right. Not right back. We were not together so he didn't see it. Right. Um, came down and, um, lucky, inspired you. Yeah. And uh, rolled me over and said, and I'm like, oh, can you, those rocks are poking me in the back. Can you please move those rocks under my back? And I felt his hands start like about my shoulder braids and go all the way down and there were no rocks. Right. I was not laying, so I just broken multiple vertebrae. Yeah. All those in my back. Yeah. And uh, oh shit. Yeah. Your vertebrae, not just your ribs and back. Mm-hmm. Vertebra. Yeah. So lot. You were incredibly capable. Lots of capable looking for a person that's had that, um, Like, there's probably some, some gravel in my forehead and in my thigh. So yeah. Lots of road rash and Wow. So then he had to go out to the road and go down to Redstone, like he had to hit, he hitchhiked down. We go to the Redstone Hotel every time we go there. Yeah. Redstone have lunch or whatever. Yeah, it's beautiful. Yeah, it's great. And, uh, we love the, uh, the hot springs over there. Mm-hmm. Uh, which is, uh, a avalanche, avalanche hot springs. Oh, see? Oh, you need to go there. Those were probably like just hot springs that were not official right. At the time we just sat at them. We just sat at'em because we could. It's right over by Carbondale. Uh, my wife and I have been there like four times already, so Yeah. The hot springs up there. Beautiful. Take your wife Tim. Okay. Um, anyway, finish the story please. I'm sorry to diverge. So anyway, yeah. He, um, he found you in found town. He found, he found, he, and he stopped a lady on the side of the road. They were from Texas. And um, so she came over and I just, this was such a huge moment in my life. She was leaning over me in this Texas woman big hair. And she had this cross that was like swinging above Yeah. My eyes like this. Yeah. She was so sweet and comforting. I have no idea who she is. And, um, yeah, she just sat there with me until they finally got an ambulance up there. Wow. And um, they put me in the, in the ambulance and uh, yeah, I got a neck brace and a back brace for, yeah. One of those one cool things there my junior year of high school and walked around all beat up. Wow. Okay. So, That is one of the craziest local experiences. Like we don't have anything nearly as near death as that so far. Yeah. It was a full, uh, year recovery pretty much. Really? Mm-hmm. So that was, was that your gap year too? No, I was, I was a junior in high school, so your senior year was basically a gap. So my senior year was pretty normal. Yeah. But yeah, my junior year was a body brace, full body brace and a neck thing and casts and uh, a lot of therapy and, uh, a lots of scars still. Yeah. Yeah. That's amazing. What happened to the dog? I didn't remember the dog in the story. Oh yeah. My dad didn't like that dog. He was, he made the fall. No, the dog was in the truck. Yeah, he was already in the truck. She went back. No, I can't remember. I put, no, I put the puppy back in the truck. But the, yeah, that dog didn't got Reh. Got rehomed. He was a blue healer and, uh, we lived he blue. His was a bitch man. Yeah. He, he just, anybody that came, they like to tell everybody who, and he, who was the boss. He bit a lot of people. That was before the postman could like tell on the dog. But my right, he did bite the postman. My grandma had a blue heeler too. Pepper and pepper bit. Every grandkid, everybody. I'm pretty sure every grandkid was bitten by pepper. Yes. So, sorry grandma, I know you're not listening cuz you're past, but, uh, pepper was a bitch. Yeah. He didn't, he got rehomed too. Whatever. Yeah. Dad was like, all right, Tim, let's see You compete with that. I can. Yeah, I know. I can't compete with that either. So, but let's hear a local experience, either, either you or maybe the two of you guys together. I mean, you jumped in the business together as not even married yet. You've been doing it for 30 years-ish. 28. 28 this year-ish. No. Anything that comes to mind when you hear that phrase? Yeah. I don't, I don't have, I'm pretty vanilla. Well, then you have to tell me a joke. That's your escape route from the local. You, he saved somebody's life doing the Heim Liquor in Hawaii. Oh, that's something I kind of did. I was No, you did. It was more, I had no idea how to do it. And my wife is yelling instructions and, because this old man, we were at one of those, um, a luau. Oh, right. And these Japanese people were yelling and, and Amy noticed that he was choking and they were all little people, except for this man was very large. Right. But couldn't even reach around the big guy. Bad. Short. And so Amy was like, all right, go pick him up and do this. And so I just start bouncing him and she's like, no, you gotta do this and get your hands underneath here. And so she was instructing me and. And, but it worked. You saved his life. Like we got the food. He was, he was turning purple and I don't even know that he was conscious when we were No shit. You like got it out of him after he, well his daughter started digging and eventually came up and she Right, because you gotta go in with the hook and tried to get whatever she Yeah. Cleared that. Wow. Yeah. Yeah. They gave you his business card and they wrote you a note after and Yeah. He owned the hotel chain or something and invited us to come to his hotels or It was, yeah, it was, you didn't get the hookup. We didn't, we didn't do anything with him. Well, you still could, I probably wouldn't spend the money on the airline tickets if you listened to this Mr. Hash mito or whatever. So, yeah, that and I'm sorry I've got nothing for you. Well, I mean, honestly, like you shouldn't have that many crazy experiences really. Uh, because live kind of within the rails and whatever, so I can't fault you on that. Um, this has been a fun conversation. Anything else that you would like the listeners to know? Do you wanna let'em just know how to find Linn Landscape or whatever? Www linn landscape.com. That was easy. Well, thank you for having us. Yeah, this was really fun. I think this was, we were both a little, um, nervous. Yeah. Coming in normal. Um, really grateful that you had some wine that was very helpful as well. Um, and that it's good wine. It is. Yeah. Blends winery. We should, uh, We do a little quick show here. Um, yeah, that was good stuff. Yeah, and we've, and we drank the bottle. It's right over there, right by Bingham. Well, mostly I drank the bottle. You had a couple Anyway, but anyway, it's been fun. Thank you for having us. This was great. Yeah. Thank you. Sound speed.