Meet the BLUE COLLAR Millionaire Who Started with Almost Nothing

 Summary

In this conversation, Don Wilson shares his journey from a Navy veteran to a successful entrepreneur who has acquired multiple businesses. He discusses his early career in the Navy and American Airlines, his transition to entrepreneurship through the acquisition of a candy store, and later, a barbecue franchise. Don elaborates on the challenges and successes he faced in the restaurant industry, including the importance of location, customer relationships, and effective management. He reflects on the lessons learned throughout his entrepreneurial journey, emphasizing the significance of understanding financials and adapting to market demands. In this conversation, Jon Stoddard shares his journey as a serial entrepreneur, detailing his experiences in various businesses, including convenience stores and a remodeling company. He discusses the importance of being hands-on in small-town businesses, the challenges faced during personal hardships, and the strategies he employed to grow his ventures. Jon emphasizes the significance of real estate in his business success and offers valuable lessons learned throughout his entrepreneurial journey, including the importance of maintaining a low profile and focusing on customer satisfaction.

Takeaways

Don transitioned from a military career to entrepreneurship.
His first business was a candy store purchased from a client.
He learned valuable sales skills while working at Primerica.
Acquiring the barbecue franchise was a strategic move based on relationships.
Location is crucial for retail success, especially in the food industry.
He faced significant challenges in the restaurant business, especially during economic downturns.
Effective management and understanding of financials are key to business success.
He scaled his business by opening multiple locations in a short time.
Cameras in stores helped monitor employee performance and reduce theft.
Evaluating profitability led to focusing on the most successful locations. Being an owner-operator is crucial for small-town business success.
Selling businesses can lead to new opportunities and personal growth.
Taking time off for family is important during challenging times.
Identifying profitable business opportunities is key to success.
Real estate can significantly enhance business profitability.
Building relationships with bankers can facilitate business purchases.
Investing in real estate can provide long-term financial benefits.
Maintaining a low profile can help in managing wealth effectively.
Customer satisfaction is essential for repeat business.
Learning from challenges is vital for future success.

 

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Transcript

Jon Stoddard (00:00.674)
Welcome to the top &A Entrepreneur today. My guest is Don Wilson. Don Wilson is out of Tulsa, Oklahoma. He's a Navy veteran and he's acquired 10 businesses. We're going to hear that story. Thanks for joining the show, Don. Thank you. Thanks for having me. So what did you do for the Navy for 10 years? looks like you were... Well, I started out in the Naval aviation.

side of the Navy and worked my way up over a 10 year career, you know, from one leadership position to the next. And ultimately at the end of 10 years, I realized that I did not want to spend, you know, another 10 years, you know, traveling around the world on the flat tops and with a family and, you know, be a father to my kids. Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah. My dad was in the air force 20 years. I served four years in the air force and he was gone a lot. He was gone. Yeah. well that's cool. Thank you for your service. So you went to go work for American airlines and you did that for four years and then you worked for prime America for a little bit. So what were you doing for prime America that you didn't like it so well that you decided I'm going to go buy my own business.

Well, obviously, you know, working in the airline industry, when I went to work for American Airlines, know, obviously I joined the Navy with the goal in mind of getting a license to work on aircraft. So that was my purpose of joining the Navy. So it took a lot longer than I anticipated to get that license because you have to have both airframe and power plant experience. And in the Navy, when you go into a rating, they typically you're in that rating.

and you really, you you kind of stay in that rating. So my rating in the Navy was a metalsmith, basically working on the structures and the hydraulic systems and stuff like that. So you really didn't get to work on engines. So in order to get my engine experience, I had to reenlist once or twice to get around the engines. And then I spent time away from my specialty. So I'd go to work normal hours.

Jon Stoddard (02:21.602)
But when I got off, instead of going home, I went over to the engine shop and learned engine. So that's how I got my engine experience. And then obviously once I got that, you know, that they required number of things that they were looking for, which is like 36 months of experience, I took the test and passed that for A &P licensing. All right. And then you went over to Primerica financial services. You worked there for 10 years.

Correct, yeah, I joined American Airlines, worked there for three and a half, almost four years, had a very good run there, learned a lot of valuable things. But the bottom line is, is I was a number and my number was 318-034 and that was my employee number. So when the day came that the airline, know, when they lay off people, they don't look at your experience, they look at your number. And so your number,

you know, your employee seniority date, they have a line and they draw that line, anything below that line, you're out the door. Does that make sense? Yeah, yeah, yeah. So, you know, so they treated me like a number. And I just, you know, I mean, I had enough of that in the military, you know, because you've got to play a lot of games in the military if you want to get promoted. So I left American Airlines for Primerica as a

sales rep learning how to sell financial products. And over that 10 year period, now that was not a job, that was an independent contractor position. So I had to learn that on 100 % commission. There was no income whatsoever, you had to go out and generate the income. So I learned sales, I learned managing, obviously I knew quite a bit about that in the military, but in Primarica,

When you hire people, you don't put them on a salary. They come in a hundred percent commission. So you have to train those people how to go out and make a living while they're learning the business. Yeah. Did you design that say, Hey, I need to get some sales experience under me if I'm going to go buy a business and your ultimate goal? Obviously with the primary opportunity.

Jon Stoddard (04:41.518)
when you join that company, you're an independent contract. You're 1099 right off the bat. So, you know, I just wanted to have, I wanted to be honest with you, I just want to replace the income that I had at American Airlines. That's making around $50,000 a year. And so I figured if I could go out and replace my $50,000 a year income, right, then I would be happy, right? So once I hit the $50,000 income, I said, you know, that's wonderful, but a hundred's better.

Yeah. So then I got to the hundred mark. Well, hundreds is good, but 200 is even better than that. And so you just kept working and working, building your team, building your organization. And over a period of time, it got pretty good. I I did real well. was in the top 2 % of all out of 100,000 reps in the company. I was in the top 2%. Yeah. So you were there for 10 years at Primarica. Correct. When did you start?

What was the first one, the Billy Sims Barbecue franchise acquisition or the candy, retail candy? It was a retail store. So during my primary experience, I developed a lot of relationships with customers, my clients, and I was managing their money. And I had about $10 million under management. And so, you know, I got to talk to guys and one of my clients said he had a candy store that he was trying to sell. And I said, well, you know, my son just went off to college.

My wife's home, she's got nothing to do. She loves kids. So why not just buy that? So, you know, I purchased my first retail business from a client. is that a, was he, when he, when you say he was trying to sell it, was he trying to sell it through a broker side, business by sell or was an off market? No, he had it listed with a broker. So when I, you know, when I, when he told me he had it, right.

I said I was interested and we got together and he had to bring the broker in because you know, he'd already started with a guy. So I had to go deal with the broker and all I wanted to see was the numbers. Show me the numbers. So I seen the numbers. I'm very good with numbers. I could do the math. I figured, okay, it makes about 50 grand a year, but he's had it for two years. And during those two years, he turned no profit, zero profit in two years. But I seen the profit. He didn't see it.

Jon Stoddard (07:03.71)
I seen it. I didn't saw the profit and something that you could do, or you saw the profit where he wasn't financially doing the books right. Well, I seen the profit where the guy he had run in the store for him was pocketing the money. OK. That's different. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So, you know, he wasn't physically running the store. He had other businesses. You know, he was running, but he he would this was just an idea for him to start this candy business. Right.

And so anyway, long story short, I purchased that business and I had about 30 grand in cash that I had in my account that I could use. So I took that 30 grand and I parlayed that with a SBA loan from a lender. And then I had him carry, I don't know, 20,000, something like that, small amount just to keep him on the hook. And then I got in the business, put my wife in there. We both worked it for a little while till I learned it.

Was that not fired? The guy fired that was first day. First thing, right? So what was the kind of multiple on a retail store, candy store in Tulsa, Oklahoma? Well, you got to look at the date. So this was back in 2004. you know, so he wanted to, he was non-negotiable. He wanted 112,000. was it. 112. And I said, okay, I'll give it to you. No problem.

And so how does does somebody ask for $112,000 from a business not making money?

Basically the way he arrived at that number, he added up all of his expenses to get that store open. okay. So he was just trying to clear his expenses. He just wanted to get his money back. That's all he wanted was get his money back. All right. So anyway, long story short, we purchased the store and within our first year, we cash flowed about 50,000 off of about 250,000. So we had 250,000 in revenue. We cash flowed about 50 grand.

Jon Stoddard (09:00.46)
Was that taking a salary? Were you guys taking a salary or was that? I took no salary. Wife got paid nothing. We just worked the business. We had 50 grand left in the bank app at the end of the year. So we made it up 50 grand. All right. And then what'd you do? Grew it to two locations, selling a ton of bull candy a week. was amazing. Yeah. So here's the deal. So obviously in that business,

In a candy store, it has to be in a mall. You can't put a candy store out in the track, you know, out in a strip center. It has to be in a mall. Right. So there's need traffic. You need built in traffic. You got to have kids and you got to have lots of them. You got to have traffic. OK, so my competitor in the bigger mall, I was in a smaller. There's two malls in Tulsa. So the bigger mall actually was three. One went under. So the bigger mall was the Simon Mall.

million square feet, big, you know, big place. His store, right, this is my competitor. I became friends with him and I said, Jim, now his store is twice as big as mine and he was doing twice as much sales as I was. Yeah. And he was getting older and he said, you know, I'm thinking about selling. said, Jim, if you ever want to sell, I'll buy it. Yeah. And he's he come, you know, and so between that time between when I bought that

And during that period of time, I had this wise idea of opening a restaurant. I should have had my head examined. So I opened a restaurant in the mall, So my space is here, Chick-fil-A right next to Chick-fil-A. Worst mistake anybody can ever do is open a restaurant next to Chick-fil-A. The highest margin business in the food business, Chick-fil-A.

So anyway, so I had this bright idea of opening a salad restaurant, right? So I called it Salad Days, the best days of your life. Yeah. It was a great, know, we had a great menu. you know, we did, we had, everything was great. The challenge was nobody wanted it. Yeah. Right? They wanted to eat Chick-fil-A. They wanted to eat Chinese and they wanted to eat a hamburger, right? They're not going to eat. Nobody wants to be healthy when they go to the mall. Right. It's the time.

Jon Stoddard (11:22.134)
Right. So, so I worked that business, opened a clothes for nine months, made zero dollars. Wow. Okay. So at the end of nine months, my next door neighbor, which is in the mall, he had a Greek restaurant, right? And I said, I'm fixing to close this sucker down. He said, no, I'll buy it. What do you want for it? And I said, what are you getting? He said, I'll give you 15 grand. I said, sold. Give me the 15 grand.

So he gave me the 15, I sold it. The next day I went over to the other mall and I said, Jim, I'm ready to buy your business. And he said, great, 140 grand, right? So I took- So Mike had seen his numbers or did you already see? I already knew his numbers. Remember, I already knew his numbers because his store was twice the size of mine. Yeah. Right. So I had 800 square feet. He had 1500 square feet.

He had 700 items. His store was busy from open to close seven days a week. So I purchased that. So my income went from 50 grand to 165 the next year. Yeah. you were judging, basing his numbers upon your numbers and say, Hey, he's got twice the size, twice the revenue, cetera. Did those numbers match out when you saw them? Perfectly.

Yeah, he did. He was doing 500 grand a year. I was doing 250. So combined, we were doing 750. So by by combining the stores, I was able to order bigger, bigger inventory, which got me a lower cost. Yeah, you increased your margin. Right. my margins were better. I mean, think about it. You buy a gumball, a gumball, you sell that gumball for a quarter. You pay two cents for it.

There's no better margin than gumball. How long does last? Gumballs last on the shelf? Probably six months. Six months in the store room and the shelf. Do they have to be cooled or? No, just room temperature, know, 78 degrees, something like that. But no, and so one of the things I did to grow that little business is I put, you know, had the retail store. So in the mall, had had spaces that you could rent, right, and put

Jon Stoddard (13:46.766)
gumball machine. So I had a guy build me carts, right? And so I put gumball carts about every 50 yards throughout the mall. Right? Does that cost you for that retail space? Say it again. Did that cost you for that space? Of course. ain't nothing free in a mall. Yeah, definitely. So the way it worked, let's say I brought in $1,200 a month from each cart, right? So my cost of goods was probably

a hundred bucks, maybe 150, but the rent is where they got you, right? They wanted 50 % of your revenue. Yikes. Yeah. 50 % of your revenue. So I netted about 600 bucks a month per cart and I had 10 or 12 of them, right? Throughout the malls. And so that was another way to increase revenue. So we just did all kinds. We learned a whole bunch of stuff about retail because of the candy store. A lot of people look down and said, dang, Don, how can you-

Yeah. Did you like being in retail and candy B2C? Did you like it? Well, yeah, we love kids, you know, my wife and I. So we love kids and, you know, we got to spend a lot of time around kids. You know, I got to hire kids. So all my employees were kids or teenagers. Right. And so I love teenagers. mean, you know, a lot of people can't get along with them, but I, you know, I was a teenager before too. So I know how to talk to them. And we had a, we had a great time. We did a lot of business.

And one thing led to another, my son worked with me. And so my son, around 2003, graduated high school, went to college. I paid his way through college, right? And when he graduated college in 2008, he said, Dad, said, Son, what do want to do? And he said, Dad, I want to be just like you. want to own a business. And so this was 2008.

2008, caught the same guy that I bought the candy store from, a client of mine, he started Billy Sims Barbecue. Billy Sims, you're talking about the running back? Yes. Billy Sims, 1978 Heisman Trophy winner for the University of Oklahoma. Yeah. Okay. So Jeff, my buddy, my client, him and Billy were good friends.

Jon Stoddard (16:09.486)
So Jeff started a barbecue business and he used Billy's name, Billy Sims Barbecue. Okay. It was unbelievable. He had a 1500 square foot space. He took the money that I sold the candy store. Remember the first one? I bought it for 112,000. He took that $112,000, opened up Billy Sims Barbecue, 1500 square foot, little hole in the wall joint, right?

first day of sales, 6,000 bucks. Yeah. Out of 1500 square feet. Yeah. And it exploded. I mean, it absolutely exploded. So from 2004 to 2008, Jeff built five locations. Okay. So I know all this because he's my client, right? So we'd have conversations. He was your client at Primarica.

Right. Correct. Correct. I had his business. I took care of his insurance and investment, stuff like that. So the bottom line, right, when he got ready to franchise, the first guy he called was me. Don, I'm ready to franchise. And he said, you want one? And I said, well, I know the numbers. Yeah, I'll take one. I'll be your first franchisee. So I was Billy Sims Barbecue first franchisee in 2008. Wow. Yeah. So my my son

graduated college, Home State University of Stillwater, and he had a degree in business, right? He wanted to own a business. So I said, son, you're now Billy Simmons Barbecue. You're the operator. So we trained him on how to run the business. went, you know, worked for the company for a little while. And then we got our, we bought an existing location of one of the five that he already had. So we bought that business.

And at that time, Jeff was cash flowing probably around 10 grand a month at that location, net in the pocket off of about 60,000 revenue. So about 60,000 revenue cash flow in about 10. Yeah. Okay. So we bought it and including that he took out eight for, for the franchise fee. So just remember we just lost 8 % for the franchise fee. Yep. Yep. You with me?

Jon Stoddard (18:29.166)
We cashflowed 17 grand our first month off of 70,000 in revenue. So far it looks like a good investment on capital. Very, very good, especially when I started with no money. A lot of people say, Don, you can't do a no money down business. Well, yes and no. Right. The way I structured that deal, he wanted 140,000 for that location. Right. So I said, Jeff, I'll tell you what, you carry 40.

I'll pay you back over 12 months, right? At market interest rate, whatever it was, five, 6%. I'll borrow the other 100 from my SBA lender, right? I already had a good reputation with her. So I borrowed another 100 grand from her, from the bank. So I had zero money in it. But remember, you've got to have operating capital. can't just start out with zero money But let me go back to the SBA part. She didn't have a requirement for...

You know, history of the business. mean, how old was that business? Yeah, yeah. She had a requirement and I, know, obviously I gave her the books. You know, we had five years worth of history. okay. Five years. it already, that's right. So we gave her the history and you know, but besides, you know, you got to understand when you use SBA at that level, at that small level, you're guaranteeing that personally, they got your house, they got your car, they got your first born child, they got everything.

You ain't gonna get out of that. That's scary. I mean, that to me, like a business running for 10 years and it's manufacturing, that is a little risk. But then you do an SBA on a restaurant. Man. Yeah, that's scary. I had a buddy that did bankruptcies from for bank business bankruptcies. And he said 99 % of people, my clients are restaurants. Right? Yeah, I agree. It's a very, very tough business. However, if you have a system

and you have a good product and you take care of your people, right? You know, a lot of people don't understand when you have a restaurant, you have to look at the people that's gonna be working in the restaurant, right? If you open the restaurant in an area and it's a high dollar restaurant, you open that restaurant in an area where there are no average folks, right? You're not gonna get any employees to come to work because they have to drive miles and miles and miles to get there, right?

Jon Stoddard (20:56.334)
So you want to make sure and that, you know, scope is to make sure that the people, there's places for the guys to live because you're, you know, your, your workers are going to be, you know, 1920, 21, 22. They're to be pretty young folks, right? Cause they're working in a barbeque. Like cops working down in downtown. They can't afford to live in New York city where it's $5,000 a rent for an apartment. Yeah. Right. So, you know, you gotta, you gotta keep that in mind.

Right? So I always, I always looked at the people cause man, I, I came from the bottom. mean, ain't nobody was lower than I was. So I came from the bottom and I remembered what it was like to wash dishes. I remembered what it was like to mop the damn floor. I mean, I, I, know, I understand what they go through. So we had a, you know, we had a very good team. And so the next opportunity, right. Was if you want more, you have to open another location.

Right. Because it caps out, right? mean, it's not like you got to let's put more dollars in and we'll get more revenue. There's a ceiling. There's a limit. mean, again, the location is location driven. You've got a certain number of customers that you're going to attract. Right. And, you know, you're going to get an average, you're going to hit an average. So our average is around seventy thousand dollars a month. You break that down per meal.

Most of it's lunch, so 60 % of your revenue is going to be at lunchtime. You're going to have about 100 people come through the line at lunch, right? And then the rest 40 % is going to come from the evening or catering, The other 40 % of your revenue. So you got to make sure that you do a damn good lunch and you take care of those people. We got to know the customers. The team got to know the customers. When they walked through the door, we already knew what they want.

you want the Heisman? you want the rib? you want the chicken? you want the pork? So we knew exactly what the customers want because these people kept coming back and coming back and coming back. You with me? Yeah. When did you... This was going into 2010, 12. When did you sell the candy business? Okay. I'm continuing to operate the candy business while I'm opening restaurants. Yeah.

Jon Stoddard (23:20.002)
You follow me? So the candy business is still operating. I got good managers in there, good employees that know what they're doing. The other thing I did was I went to cameras very quickly. I found out if you don't have cameras, your product will disappear off the shelf. Yeah. And the candy goes this, I bet, right? Yes, it will disappear. So you have to have cameras and you have to check on people and you have to call them up. Hey, what are you doing? And they're going, what? nothing.

Well, I see you on your phone. You're going to, didn't I tell you to put that phone in the back? You can't have the phone on the sales floor. Go put your phone in the back and wait on those customers and make sure you take care of them. So that's what the camera did for me. It allowed me to see what the employees were doing. Yeah. Makes sense. Yeah. So, and we did the same thing in the barbecue business, right? Cameras everywhere. I could see meat going out the door. If I seen stuff happen and it wasn't supposed to be happening.

They got the dreaded phone call from Dawn. And so the next opportunity was, right, I went to my son, said, son, you want another restaurant? And he goes, yeah, dad, I'm ready for another restaurant. So I went out, found me a location, negotiated the lease with the landlord. I like to do business with landlords that are small, mom and pop type guys. I don't like big corporations. I hate Simon malls.

I hate any mall operator. They're, mean, they'll rip your head off. They don't, they don't care if you make it or not. Yeah. They just want to that percentage of your revenue. Yeah. That's exactly. They want half of your business. They want you to work for them basically. Yeah. Okay. So anyway, I opened the second location six months to the day later. And then every six months I opened a new location and I did that four more times. Yeah. So from 2008,

to 2010, right? We started with one location with about, you know, 600,000 a year, 700,000 a year to five location and $3 million a year. Yeah. That's amazing. We did that in two and a half years working our asses off. Right. You're around the clock at that point, right? Almost. I was 24 seven, just like the Navy. Yeah.

Jon Stoddard (25:44.398)
So what happened after that? that got us to 2010. Okay. So eight to 10, you got to remember what was going on in 2008. We had a new crash. That was the crash. Yeah. Yes. Everything crashed. So everybody told me I was nuts to go open restaurants. said, yeah, I probably am, but I'm going to do it anyway. So I kept doing it, kept doing it, kept doing it. So in 2010,

We had two candy stores, five restaurants, right? So we had seven retail locations operating. Between all of us, we're doing probably 4 million. Cash flow in probably 750, somewhere in there, okay? So in 2010. Did you enjoy it? You like you're totaling up, like, well, hey man, we're great. We're doing great, 4 million bucks. But did you enjoy being on call?

drive into the restaurants or drive into the mall for the retail store. Did you enjoy it? Well, I mean, yes and no. mean, you on one side, could I be doing something else? Yeah, I probably could. You know, I could be working for American Airlines for 50 grand a year and dreading every damn day. I could do that. Right. But that's not an option. So, you know, so yeah, I enjoyed it. It was it was exciting because we were building stuff, man. We were

We were rocking and rolling, making lots of friends and making lots of money. so 2010, now check this out. So my Woodland Hills store, which is the big store with Simon Malls, it came up for renewal, lease renewal, right? So I started negotiating the lease. My rent at that time was 9,000 bucks a month. Okay, one store, nine grand. They said, we'll renew for you Don, 10 years.

but we're gonna renew at 12. So you're gonna be paying 12 grand a month and then we're gonna bump it by 4 % every year. and by the way, you gotta do a new build out. And I said, what do you mean? They said, you gotta tear everything out, all of your fixtures, the floor, the walls, the ceiling. I want a whole new look in your store, new signage on the wall outside. And so I did the math on that, that was 250 grand.

Jon Stoddard (28:09.996)
So I did the math and I said, it don't make any sense. Why would I renew for that? That's ridiculous. So I tried to sell it. So I had this guy on the hook that was ready to buy it for 150 grand, about what I paid for it. And I had two years left on the lease. And so he started dragging his feet because he knew that he did the math himself and realized, shit, there's no way I can make money on this.

Right. So he backed out of the deal. So what I did rather than sell it, said, well, you know what? I'll do the math. I can get 150,000 a year for two years. That's 300 or right. I'll just let the sucker go. In other words, I'll go to the end of the lease and hand the keys back to Simon. So that's what I did. I ran it two more years, handed the keys back to Simon. Right. And so in 2011, I left that

candy store, my other candy store that I started with, right? I sold it for 85 grand. Yeah. The reason I sold it for 85 grand when my lease was up there, I moved because they wanted to renew that lease. And I said, I'm not going to renew it. I said, can you give me a temp? Give me a temp space. They said, yeah, we can put you down the hall down there in a corner for about 1500 a month.

And I said, that people already know where I'm at. So yeah, I'll do it. So I moved everything down the mall, down the hall, you know, to the other end of the mall, just the dark side of the mall, right? lit that. where spirit Halloween goes. So, so we moved down there and the sales were about the same, but the cash flow was much better because I didn't have five grand a month in rent. There you go. Right. Yeah.

I sold that in 2011 for 85 grand. then we, let's see, we looked at the five restaurants, we took a hard look at the five restaurants. Out of the five, two of the five were doing more. In other words, they were carrying about 70 % of the profit. 70 % of the profit was coming from two restaurants.

Jon Stoddard (30:30.478)
The headaches were coming from the three restaurants that wasn't pulling their own weight. Yeah. Why were the headaches? What were the headaches caused by? Employee problems, lack of customers, just bad locations. We went out into suburbs and we went into the small towns, 20, 30,000 people. And so we tried to get out in those small towns and we found out

Unless you're there, unless you're an owner operator in the store, you're not going to build the sales that you need in those small towns, right? Yeah. So the two stores that were rocking were Tulsa, were Broken Arrow and Tulsa or in Owasso, which was two suburb towns, right? But they were very good towns, meaning that they had good people, lots, know, 100,000 or more people.

All the logistics was there that you needed to have. So what I did is I sold those three stores for 350 grand. I just got my money back. I basically got what I got in those stores. I got it back.

Okay. Who bought those? A new guy or did the franchisee? Well, when we started with the franchise, we only had, there was only five locations. I built an additional four that brought us to nine. He sold off quite a few. And I think today they've got about 50. So back then we were, we were all in just Tulsa, Oklahoma, and we had about 10 locations in Tulsa, Oklahoma. You with me? Yep.

And so I sold those three, which was, let's see, Claremore, Sepulpa and East Tulsa. I sold those to other operators, other operators that wanted to own and operate just one. Make sense? Yep. So I sold those and then I took that 350 and I semi-retired. I moved to Florida. you did? Yeah. Yeah. This was in 2012.

Jon Stoddard (32:45.538)
moved to Florida, walked on the beach every day, went boating, went fishing, know, done all the crap that you're supposed to do when you're retired. And after about three, four months of that, lived on the water, had a boat in the backyard. After about three, four months, I'm bored stiff. Yeah. So we go back to Tulsa. We moved back to Tulsa. We still had a home there. And the wife went in for her annual, you know, exam and she was diagnosed with cancer.

So I took the next year off. So the whole year of 2013 from 12 to 13, I took it off just to take care of my wife. So at the end of 2013 or close to the end, I think it was August, I found another business and it was a convenience store. So I had negotiated that deal and I got the numbers where I needed to get where they needed to be. Where did you find that? It was a broker site, listed site?

Yeah, it was on, you know, like biz buy sell something like that. So when I seen it, I seen the numbers and I, that's it. That's what I want. So I called immediately and said, I'll take it. No negotiation. No problem. What did you like about the, a gas station convenience store, the numbers, mean, it's such a small margin, isn't it? Yeah, but you got, don't understand. All right. This, this is a gas station convenience store in a town with 2000 people.

Okay. 2000 people. There's only two gas stations in town. That's Askel Oklahoma. So Oklahoma two gas stations in town. Yeah. So long story short, the numbers were he was doing 1.2 million inside sales inside the store. No way. Really? And 2000. And listen to this at a 28 % gross profit. 28 %

So he's given his shit away. He's given the stuff away. His gasoline, he was selling at a 20 cent profit per gallon. Yeah. Right. And when we bought the store, he was doing 700,000 gallons a year. So the store was cash flowing 300,000, which was more than my three restaurants. Yeah. You're like, my God, I just logged up here.

Jon Stoddard (35:12.302)
Yeah. Right. So we acquired that. I do acquire it. SBA, bank, what's the deal? Now what I did is the purchase price was $888,000. I had $350,000, right? I told him I'd take over his note. He had a note on the building itself. So I bought the real estate too. So I took over the note on the building, right? And then I gave him like $225,000. And then he carried the rest. Yeah.

So out of my 350, out of my 350, 225 went to him. The rest went in the bank to operate for operating capital. And obviously at that time I'm taking care of my wife. So I called my son and I said, son, you got to take this convenience store. Okay, dad, I'll take care. So he took it. So we had our manager, right? We already sold our candy stores. We sold three restaurants. So we only had two restaurants left, right?

And those are the cashflow positive store. Those are the cashflow Kings. They were the top two, one of the top, the top two stores in Tulsa. Okay. Besides the original location. So they were cash cows and I had a managed, had managers in both and I had a general manager that went from store to store to make sure everything was going. Yeah. So we acquired the gas station convenience store and we operated out for five years. So from 2000.

13 to 17. Okay. We bought it 888. We cash flowed about 300 grand a year. We kept building on that. We got our sales up to about a million and a half inside. We got our gallons up to about a million gallons a year at 20 cents a margin, know, 20 cents margin. So that store was making $300,000 in the pocket every year out of a town of 2000 people. Wow. Unbelievable.

Fantastic. And then we sold it for 1.5 million in 2017. Yeah. So 700,000 increase over five years. That's good. Correct. Correct. So we made a million five operating. We made another million or so selling. So, you know, that was a very good investment. Yeah. And then

Jon Stoddard (37:36.846)
2014, again, this is while, you know, while the, I still have two restaurants, we still have the, the, the convenience store, you know, being a serial entrepreneur, I couldn't stop looking at business. So I seen another one pop up, right? And it was a remodeling company. And it was out of Oklahoma city, which is about an hour and half away from Tulsa, right?

And it was making 400,000 a year off of the revenue was about a million, four million, five. And he's making 400 off of that. That's, that's great margins. And so I called on that and said, I'll take it. Right. was a broker side or another, another broker out of Dallas, Texas, another broker. So I said, I'll take it.

And you know, I tried to get the seller to carry some of it. He didn't want to carry nothing. He wanted his money. And but he only wanted 400 grand. That's it. 400 grand. was taking home 400,000, but he only wanted one X. And the reason is him and their wife were split. my God. Top 10 reason people are motivated to sell one of the top 10s.

Yes, so they couldn't get along. They were fighting, throwing chairs at each other all day. This is a bad situation. So, you know, so when I bought the business, I had to replace her immediately. So she was accounting. She did all the books. So I hired before before the business closed, myself and the guy that I bought it from. We both interviewed people, gals that was going to

be take that job and we hired a gal that worked for a window company that went bankrupt downtown and she'd been in the business forever. Yeah, I liked her. I hired her and one of the best things ever did. He was the designer and she was the accountant. No, he's a salesman. he was a salesman. Who was doing the design stuff? There's no design. This was a window. a window. thought I was like, sorry about that. A remodeler.

Jon Stoddard (39:53.27)
I thought it was right. It's a remodeling. It's considered a remodeling company. But the fact is, it's a marketing company. And so we market windows. There's not a lot of design. So the bottom line is, I'm good at sales. So I bought it because of my skill in sales. And we bought it August

16th, I think 2000 or 2014. Okay. So, August, September, October, November, December, by December, we had already made all of our money back. For the yard, he made your 400,000. So where did the money come from? That you burn? Huh? Selling windows? No, I mean, to pay the guy he

You know, here's the here's the if so people want to know how do you buy a business? No money down. Here's how you do it. Yeah. Number one, you probably have done some you probably have a history. Yeah. In other words, you've got a proven track record. You don't just walk in and buy it. You have a proven track record. So I had a banker. Right. I had a banker that I developed a relationship with and I borrowed some money from him from my barbecue restaurants. OK.

So when I seen this business, immediately sent the numbers to him. And I said, Hey Scott, did you get those numbers? Yep. What do you think? And he said, it looks good Don. I said, I want all 400. I want you to give me 400 cash. Okay, no problem. So he cut me a check for 400 cash. I handed that check over to seller. Who was this Don that gave you 400? Yeah. My banker. he was your banker. He just lent you the $400,000.

Yeah, of course with you know, you know how it is. They got it. You got to jump through the hoops and do appraisals. but it was it wasn't SBA line. It was just a regular long right? No, it wasn't. it wasn't SBA. SBA and they were having some kind of special at the time for veterans. So I got I got you know I got it in no fees or you know they didn't kill me. You know they didn't kill me on the fee part. Yeah, there's normally they're going to hit you 3 % you know of whatever you borrow right off to that. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Jon Stoddard (42:12.942)
So anyway, I got the 400 there, gave it to the seller and commenced learning the window business. took the 350, right? Remember the 350 I used to buy the convenience store, right? So I needed operating capital. So I took a hundred thousand out of the convenience store and I opened a bank account with that to operate the window business. Yeah. Did they make the operating capital out of the business?

Say it again. Did they, the, the windows remodeling, did they take the operating capital or the cash cash and account out of the business? Yeah, I got nothing. So when, when the deal closed, he was smart. He, when he closed, he took all of his, his work in progress and he, he ran that himself. All the AR. Yeah. Yes. I didn't get any of it. So I had to start from scratch. Yeah. But think about that. So I started from scratch.

And at the end of five months, had 400 in my bank. Yeah. 400,000 in the bank account. Well, that was a good, did you pay off the loan? No, here's what I did. So, I'm paying rent to him for the building. You follow me? Yeah. 50 grand a year. I'm paying rent to him. So I'm thinking 50 grand. I'm paying out every year. I got nothing to show for it. Right. Why don't I just go build me a new building?

Right. So I looked down the street, two blocks down the street, there's a nice hard corner and there's a, the, acre, about an acre of land for sale. You with me? Yep. 300 grand. So I went to, you know, I did a sketch for myself. You know, I just sketched out a little plan and I figured I could build the biggest building I could build on the smallest lot was 13,200 square feet.

I only needed 6,000 for my business. Yeah. You with me? Yep. So I took the plan, my little sketch on the napkin, took it to my, you know, found an engineer, gave it to him. He drew up the plans for the lab. You you got to have the lot, the parking area, you know, all the stuff the city requires. And so he did all that design for me. And so over the next year, I used my own cashflow and built the building cash.

Jon Stoddard (44:42.766)
Yeah. Okay. So within a year, I moved the business from the existing building that I was paying 50 grand a year for to the new building. And I had over 6,000 square feet to rent. no, it's just not a lost expense. It's an expense that's actually appreciating in value and a tax deduction. Well, think about it. I'm going to have to pay taxes on $400,000.

the first damn year. So 2014, was going to have a hell of a tax bill. So I took that money and I plowed it in to the real estate. You with me? And then I took the profits that I would have had to pay taxes on and I plowed all that back into the real estate. So at the end of the deal, 2016, I had a building that was appraised at 1.5 million and I moved into that building.

And then I leased it up. Right. So leased it up. The N.O.I. including my rent was one hundred and thirty one thousand dollars a year. Yeah. Now it's cash flow positive. Yeah. Right. So I had an asset that was paying me. Right. And I was being able to deduct my rent. So I paid myself my rent, which otherwise I would be paying some other landlord. So I got tired of being the landlord.

You with me? Yep. So I learned, I learned how to build a building. I learned how to deal with the city and that ain't no small feat. you know, I learned how to track tenants. learned how to do build outs and I've done lots of build outs with my barbecue restaurants. you know, it was just, it was a great experience. So, so the end game, and again, this wasn't planned. mean, I'm not no rocket scientist. I'm just, I'm just a wife through this though.

What's going on there? What do mean? from the cancer? Yeah, so I'm sorry. One year later, right? She was diagnosed free. He's gone. wow. OK, so she went through chemo. She went through radiation, lots of prayer. We believe the Lord healed her and to this day, 10 years later, she's cancer free. Fantastic, that's great news. So you know, like I said, when I started out all I wanted.

Jon Stoddard (47:09.006)
You know, I see all this all the time. I see these people and they go, yeah, I got, you know, I'm worth, you know, $50 million, $100 million. I'm sitting there, you know, I feel like such a dud. You know, I look at it, God dang, how do they do that? You know, and then I look back at myself and I'm going, well, you know, from a good old boy from Oklahoma that don't know is, you know, it's come here from Sikkim, you know, to go out and do what I did. That's not bad. You know, we did okay.

And, you know, so I look back at that and I think, you know, the end result here I am now retired, right? I retired in 2019. I sold my business. I sold the business. didn't tell you that I sold the business. I see in August, 2019. Yeah, correct. I sold it for $1 million. I sold the building for a million five. So about one investment that I spent.

no money out of pocket, none of my own money. Yeah. Turned out to be two and a half million dollars. And then you add in all the other. So the net worth is right where I needed it to be. I figured if I could just have an income of a couple hundred grand a year for the rest of my life, I think I'm going to be sitting pretty. Yeah. So right here we are in Florida. I live in a beautiful home and a beautiful neighborhood. I owe nobody nothing. Everything's paid for.

I have more income coming in than I can spend. I have all the free time I want. If I want to sell a business, can sell a business. If I don't want to sell a business, I just tell them, you know what? I can't help you. Yeah. So that's kind of my story. And where's your son? Where's your son working now? OK, so what happened when we sold the business in 2019? My son. Had a.

He built himself, by himself, he built him a ranch in Oklahoma. So he's got a big ranch, 30 acres, beautiful home, 3000 square foot home, he built it himself. He's got a 1200 square foot barn built in himself, a couple more outbuildings, horses, all of that. So when we sold the business, he's basically 30, I don't know, 30 some years old and a million.

Jon Stoddard (49:34.414)
million bucks in the bank, more than a million dollars in the bank. And so we relocated, we sold everything we had. We sold our home in Oklahoma. We sold our home in the Philippines. sold our home. Where did this home in the Philippines come from? Well, during that 2008, back in 2008, when I bought the restaurant, the Billy Simms Barbecue, and I put my son in there,

At the end of that six months, right, we needed a vacation, right? My wife's Filipina. So we went to the Philippines. And while we were in the Philippines, I bought a property. There you go. And that property was on the cliff overlooking the ocean. And so I had a cliff 140 foot straight down was the ocean, right?

So I built my house there and over the next 10 years, I developed that property and made it into a resort. Lovely. So we had a great time. Every year we'd go to the Philippines, spend about three months a year there. And because I had multiple businesses and I had a good son that was taking care of everything, I could take off.

Do you have any other kids or just that son? No, we have an older son, but he's not a business guy. He's, you know, did this business wasn't for him. Right, right, right, right. So it's not for everybody. Yeah. So what, what are you doing now? You're now you're kind of a business, investment banker realtor. Well, no, what I am is a business broker. So I created a company called blue collar way. And, basically it means that I started at the ground up.

So when I look at businesses, I like to work only with blue collar businesses. I'm not a white collar guy. I don't like offices, you know, even though I've done that, but I would much rather work with a blue collar guy and show them how to take their business and not only, basically do what I did. Instead of paying rent, get your own building, you know, get some tenants, build it up. When you sell your business, you can either keep the business and live off the cashflow.

Jon Stoddard (51:50.466)
from the real estate or you can sell the real estate, invest that money, you know, in the market, get, you know, dividends and stuff coming in from that. Yeah. So that's how am I. If you were to buy, if you were somebody who was to say, Hey, there's a business in one of your properties. would you tell the seller to keep the real estate or sell the real estate? Depends on the real estate. Yeah. Now see what I, what I, what you haven't heard.

And what most people don't hear is all the challenges.

Now, if you think I went through all of that with no challenges, need to know every part of this is a child. It's bigger than others. Yeah. The stories I could tell. And I'm to tell this one story just to illustrate. So the last deal that I sold, right. My American Qualities Exterior is that I sold in 2019. Yeah. Guess what happened in March of the next year? COVID.

Yeah, nobody's installing windows again. So I couldn't foresee that. had no idea that's going to happen. Right. So COVID happens. The guy that bought my business. And here's the other thing. If you are ever going to buy a business, to the wise, don't change nothing. You go into that business and you do exactly what that other owner had been doing.

unless of course it wasn't working. But if it was working, why would you change something that already works? Does that make sense? Yeah, I know, it totally makes sense. a lot of the SBA lenders will lend on that only like, you look, you need history with this business model. And this is like a perfect example, because I'm looking at this company that they were selling some equipment and they kind of changed their business model. They're making a lot more money and their higher price points.

Jon Stoddard (53:52.568)
but the SBA lender's not gonna lend on it because it's basically brand new business model. Yeah. Correct. So picture this, COVID comes around, they shut it down. Yeah. The government shuts it down. He can't go into homes, he can't make any presentations, he can't do nothing. So for two months, no income, no revenue whatsoever other than what he already had on the books. You follow me? Yep.

So two months, no revenue. So basically the people that were working for him, they got COVID, right? They got COVID. So one of them almost dies. So he's gone. The head of sales, he gets COVID, he's gone. So basically his business disintegrated when COVID come around. Now remember, you don't have that.

I'm carrying the paper on this business. So I'm carrying, you know, 700 grand. So I stand to lose all of that if that business is not successful. Yep. That makes sense? Stressful situation. So I was in contact with this buyer, right, counseling him on what to do. He wasn't listening. He was doing what he wanted to do.

I knew what his financial situation was. So what I did is I took that note for 700 grand and I went to the market and I found me a buyer that would buy that note. You with me? Yep. So he offered me a certain amount and it was discounted, of course, that's how they're going to make their money. And we got down to the close the day before the close on the note.

He calls the guy, the seller, he calls the guy that has the business that I sold the business to, right? The guy unloads on him, tells him he's not gonna make it. I don't think, I think I'm gonna go out of business. I think I'm gonna shut it down. So guess what? Well, I tell you, there's a lot of people that had that panic look in their eyes. I don't get the notes sold. So I'm stuck holding the paper.

Jon Stoddard (56:16.546)
So now the seller or the guy that bought the business from me, he knows that I'm selling the note. He don't know that the guy won't buy the note. He don't know that yet. So I call him up and I said, listen, I know, you know that we're selling your note. Yeah. I'm willing to offer it to you to the same terms as what I was offered. Guess what? He bought it.

I got my money. Yeah. So I got I got the money back. Right. I obviously took that and made useful, you know, made it useful. So I got out of that deal. I sold the building January of twenty twenty two months before Kobe that those tenants there were three tenants in the building. The company that I sold, another hair supply company and a gym, the gym went out of business.

Yeah. So the guy that bought my building, that money he was counting on didn't materialize. Right. And the guy that bought my business, he was having problems paying the rent. So he had to renegotiate the rent. So now the guy that bought the building, that NOI is not there. Right. So these are just some of the things that happen that you don't plan for, that nobody talks about. Yeah.

You with me? Yeah. And so these are things that you have to be aware of. And this is why I always said don't just because you start making a little bit of money. If you think a hundred thousands a lot, well, that's great. But don't go out and buy yourself a new car and a big house. Don't go out and show everybody how much money you're making because you know what? Something's going to happen. And when it does, if you're not liquid, you're not going to be able to survive.

and you're gonna be one of the casualties. So that's what I did. I never took my money and plowed it into stuff that would make me, you know, look good. I just kept putting it away, putting it away, doing the best thing that I could to make it grow. And now, you know, that I'm older, now I can pretty much do what I want because I'm liquid and I don't have to worry about, you know, making people, know, making myself look like I make a lot of money.

Jon Stoddard (58:44.35)
Matter of fact, I don't want to know anybody know anything about making money. None of their business. Yeah. Yeah. I'd rather keep a low profile. Good for you. So that's my advice to people that if you're going to go out and buy business, you know, have a reason for buying it and make sure you take care of your customers. You know, that's the reason you're in business is to take care of the people that are giving you their money. If they give you your money, you've got to give them what you said you were going to give them.

Yeah. You have to do that. If you're not going to do that, then you shouldn't be in business. So that's, you know, just a couple of little things that I think that I've had little success. What little I've had is because of that, because years ago when I was a mechanic for American Airlines, I took my truck in one day because I had a brake problem. I took it into the local mechanic, right? His name was Perry, Perry Jones. And I took it in and I said, I need the brake job. He's okay. We're going to take care of it.

So they did it, right? And so when I come to pick it up, I went out to the shop and I said, hey, did you turn the rotors on the front? yeah, we turned the rotors. No, didn't turn them, take the tire off. So they took the tire off. Sure enough, they didn't turn the rotor, right? So I told Perry, hey Perry, you didn't turn the rotors. And he said, what do want me to do? I said, well, make it right. Here you go. So he reached in his pocket, handed me 50 bucks. You know, back then it was $50. This is in nineties.

And that was it. I didn't have to pay for anything. Now got new pads for the deal, but my rotors wasn't turned. but he should have done it right the first time. No, I agree. What I realized at that point, and Perry was a good guy and I kept doing business with him for years because now I knew the guy was honest. Right. And so that business, that one little $50 gift back that he gave me back, right. I must have brought

because I love cars and I buy a lot of them. I probably bought 10, 15 cars over the next 10, 15 years and I brought them all to him. So that little $50 probably made him another $20,000. Yeah, repeat customers. You fixed him and you got repeat customers. Yeah. Right. So that's my advice to people. If you're going to be a business guy, make sure you do what you say you're going to do. Yeah.

Jon Stoddard (01:01:07.242)
I love it, Don. I really appreciate it. And we are up on the hour. thanks for your service. Thanks for sharing your story. This is awesome. The blue collar way. Look them up, everybody. Don Wilson on LinkedIn. Thanks, sir. Bye bye.