Intro/Outro00:02 - 00:17
Welcome to Fix Your Gym, a podcast about keeping your gear in shape. On this show, we have conversations with gym equipment gurus as we share stories on how they serve the fitness industry and community. And now, here's your host, Adam Niffen. 

Adam Niffen00:17 - 01:21
All right, here we go. Welcome to the show, man. Thank you, sir. Thank you, sir. Absolutely. I appreciate you coming on. We got Scott Jennings from ServiceRx. Scott, I appreciate you coming on, man. We've talked a little bit and don't know each other too well, but we do very similar things in terms of the industry that we're in and the businesses that we're building and things like that. So I'm excited to get into a conversation with you. So in this podcast so far, it's not just necessarily centered around guys in our industry as far as service techs and service companies and equipment companies. In order to expand and make sure that I have enough content, I've also brought in fitness people and different entrepreneurs and leaders and stuff like that in the fitness industry that I think can be valuable to all types of people. So it's always exciting to get somebody on who is though part of the service industry, who does what I do as well. And you're out of North Carolina, right? 

Scott Jennings01:22 - 01:28
Yeah, we're North Carolina, South Carolina, Northern Virginia, DC market, and Atlanta now. 

Adam Niffen01:28 - 02:10
Okay. So you guys are expanding. I know that you are one of the few franchises... I know years ago, man, when I first got into this industry, we thought about franchising. I was under a company called Metro Fitness Repair. And we thought about franchising. This was before FMT came about. There was no franchise. There was no service franchise. we thought about it, didn't work out. And then I got out of the industry for a little bit and got back in. And then there's FMT and there's a couple other guys. Um, you're one of them that, that is doing the franchise thing. So, um, how, how, how are things going, man, tell us a little bit about yourself and kind of what you got going on. 

Scott Jennings02:10 - 02:44
Yeah. Um, so just, we've been, we've been an organization since 2011. So, um, We've been around a little while, uh, you know, FMT, the original extra tech, you know, they've been around longer. Um, my head of operations, Matt used to actually work for FMT. Well, extra tech was in Pennsylvania with them, um, was actually offered one of the first franchises as he was moving away. This is at the very beginnings of those conversations. 

Adam Niffen02:44 - 02:46
Right. Um, is extra tech a franchise? 

Scott Jennings02:47 - 05:54
No, no, I think extra tech, if we I'd have to pull up their FDD or something, you have more locations. Yeah, they did. And then and so what they do is they turn them into FMT. Yeah. So extra tech became the parent company. And I'm not sure we'd have to go back and look at their FDD. And it would tell us who's who I actually used to keep Look, I mean, full disclosure, right? So the best thing I can do is watch what they do and see what I agree with and what I don't agree with, right? Because they're setting the precedence for the model of our industry. They're the beginnings, right? Thank God that they're here. Do I agree with everything that they do? No. Are they going to agree with everything I do? No. Am I going to agree with any other business owner? No, that's not the point of it all. It's that I need they're a guidepost to go, is this working or is it not? Again, as I talk to people in the industry, do they believe it's working or it's not? And then if they say that is not working, I go, oh, then I want to course correct to make sure I'm not going to do that thing. So yeah, we've been around since 2011. We were a different name. We used to be called FitTech and Assembly. You learn really hard that If your name is Fittek in any way, shape or form, you're going to pay a price for every other Fittek in the industry. There's a ton of us. Yeah. That name, some version of that name. The best thing that ever happened to us was sometime in 2018, 19 or so, somebody said to us, I think it was someone in core. Don't know who, cause they were talking to Matt, my right hand. Um, that the best thing we could ever do is change our name. So we did. Well, okay. So we took that under consideration. Plus, we kept getting hammered in ways that we didn't understand. It was like, why do we feel like we're a redheaded stepchild some days? We're not doing anything wrong. What's going on? And then we heard something really strange. And I don't know if it's true or not, because as you know, there's so many people in our industry that don't have websites. They fly under the radar. Yeah. And we don't know if it's true or not, but we heard that an organization somewhere down on the North Carolina, South Carolina line changed their name to some form of fit tech. We heard that through trying to, we got assigned a warranty work order to go see a customer and they refused us like we've never seen them before. What's going on? And all they heard was a version of fit tech. And that's how we were told that there was another. And that's what core was telling us at the time. was you're being held responsible for somebody else's name. Gotcha. So in May of 2020, I think it was May, we're in the chaos of the pandemic in the Carolinas, we were completely shut down. And I believe I looked at what came through the website and I don't know if it was a week or a month, I think it was a week and it was three people. And I was like, time to change the name now. 

Adam Niffen05:54 - 05:56
Yeah, perfect time. 

Scott Jennings05:56 - 07:34
Yeah. And so we really actually started having strong conversations for about two weeks about really what that could be. And so ServiceRx became the name because it's generic enough that if we choose to pick up other forms of work, we can, but it still says something that we do. That makes sense. And it's one of the best things that we ever did. Because now we are separated from being pigeonholed specifically in the industry and we're not so far out of the realm in our name that people are like, what the heck does that mean? And why did you choose that name? And then You know, so we're in a good sweet spot, which is great. And so we've been around and then we franchised. I started like you guys in the past, thinking about franchising. I don't know, let's just say it's 2015, 2016 or something like that. And just curious, right? Because I'm a, I'm a big thinker. I'm always aiming for Mars, which is sort of dangerous, right? As any entrepreneur is, especially if you're not, don't have the skillset to do it. Let's start looking around and start calling. And I didn't, it was just the pricing, right? I couldn't afford it. Um, and I'm glad I didn't cause I wouldn't have been mature enough to do it in the first place. Uh, and, um, through the pandemic, you know, I learned to be a better business owner. I, um, we had learned to be better money managers. We had learned to do a lot of other, just better the business of business. 

Adam Niffen07:34 - 07:38
Yeah. It was a great time to start building skills and kind of working on your, yourself. 

Scott Jennings07:38 - 08:01
And that was, yeah. And that was what it really was. It was just, it was the time that we could sit down and truly focus on what we knew were our weeks, weak points. And we did that and it started becoming self-evident. And so we did it. Now, I've also learned what franchising looks like. And I would tell you that the company I used, I would not use again. 

Adam Niffen08:01 - 08:07
Yeah. Did you use an attorney or something like that? 

Scott Jennings08:07 - 10:09
I used a company that develops a franchise for you. Gotcha. All right. So what they do is they play the middleman and they bring in the different components to make it happen. Now, here's why. Was it a completely bad experience? No. I love my lawyers. I don't like their fees, but I love my lawyers. They're great. They're awesome. They're knowledgeable. The lawyers who worked with me are the same ones who actually started and developed and created CycleBar. And And so they have an understanding of the industry. And they've worked for several, they've done several other lawyer services for other fitness. So they got what I was, even though I was on the service side. What I did not like in the development side of things was that a company that was not having project management meetings with me was not keeping me informed. And so, you know, I've never had a closeout meeting. we've essentially been done for over for about a year now. No one has called and checked. No one has, you know, it's just like they did something so right. And then something's absolutely so wrong. And I even said something to the president company. I was like, I'm not, no one's telling me what's happening. Yeah. I have to call and go, hey, what about this? What about this? I have this checklist here, but I still have it sitting here by my, I'm not going to show you the name, but this is their stuff about the company. And if I go through this and I start looking at it, I had to call and say, have we done this? Have we done this? Have we done this? In today's age, to put together a project management checklist, that's it. And make sure that in simple communication, the phone works 24 hours a day, text message works 24 hours a day. It's unacceptable. And that's where I was at the end. I was like, so that's why I said I would never use someone like that again. Because also, developing a franchise is probably 75% lawyers. 

Adam Niffen10:09 - 10:13
Yeah. How many franchises do you have? How many locations? 

Scott Jennings10:15 - 11:15
We have two. So we control the Carolinas, North Carolina, South Carolina. Franchise is Northern, so the Northern Virginia, D.C. is a franchise. It's operated by Jared and his crew up there. And then Atlanta is a franchise. And then we're in talks right now with someone in Texas and whatnot. And the goal is, and I'll probably start looking at buying out locations, if it's the right person, the person who says, because if you're mom and pop, you really don't have anything to sell. You don't, not in our industry. It would be, it'd be very hard to sell, but still I, because I am in the industry, I would be interested in potentially having conversations at some point with people who are just looking for their path out. They're not ready to leave. They're looking for the path out. Yeah. If you're leaving right now in frustration, I'm probably not interested. 

Adam Niffen11:15 - 11:40
Yeah. I feel like most entrepreneurs... Well, maybe not in our industry, but when you get into... A lot of entrepreneurs are generally looking for an exit at some point in time. So I thought about that myself as well. you know, um, come in and buy something that's already built. You know what I mean? And you have, you have employees and things like that. And, uh, and so forth. 

Scott Jennings11:40 - 12:25
Uh, it's just all going to be the right fit at the right time. I, my personal goal is I want service RX to be synonymous with the wellness industry, just like Roto-Rooter is the plumbing. It doesn't matter who we talk to in the U S if they are the age of, 30 and over, they tend to know that Roto-Rooter is equated to plumbing, even if they've never used Roto-Rooter. It is just, it's like Google is to searching, you know, like chat GPT is now becoming synonymous with AI. Does it matter that there's others? You know, it just is what it is, right? So that's my goal. And that just, and that just happens slowly over time. 

Adam Niffen12:26 - 13:47
Yeah. So to back up a little bit, I mean, it sounds like COVID threw a wrench in everybody's plans. But it also gave us a chance to sit down, reflect, like you said, and maybe re-strategize or come up with a new plan. Because we knew we were going to be coming out of that to a different world in certain ways. But to back up a little bit before that, It sounds like you have a similar story to me. You started from nothing. You started with a very small amount of money. And it's important for guys in our industry, whether it's service technicians that are listening, that are thinking about starting their own thing, or anybody that's listening that's not necessarily an entrepreneur yet, but considering it. This industry in particular is pretty easy to get started with a small amount of capital. Whether or not you can do it the right way is another story. But yeah, exactly. But I did the same. You said you started with under a thousand bucks. I did the same thing. It was me running around with some tools, fixing treadmills, learning the industry. I had no idea. I was like 22 years old. You know what I mean? But what's your story as far as that's concerned? 

Scott Jennings13:48 - 17:43
All right, it's super simple. I got a job working for assembly experts out of Tennessee. All they do is they contract people and they do, well, at the time it was Icon, but it's all iFit work. That is it, 100%. That's all they were doing. I got thrown in head first, no experience, no nothing. I was absolutely terrible for my first couple of years because I learned everything the absolute hard way. And again, this is 20, This is 2011, no, 2010 when I started. So there's no YouTube university. There's no nothing. I learned it all the hard way. I'm not the smartest tool in the shed. I'd worked for them for just about a year. It was coming up on a year and because it's residential and I'm in the Carolinas, residential is some very seasonal So we're coming back around to school, coming out and stuff. And I met my, I was dating the woman that's now my wife and we were relatively new and dating and she, I was starting to starve because the work had disappeared. One, I was being grossly underpaid for the work that I was doing because they only paid me a very small percentage of really what they were getting paid. And I was doing all the driving, all the gas, you know, I didn't know any better. And I was just trying to survive post 2008 apocalypse, you know, And because I've been in the office furniture industry for a long time, and that was still not happening. So I was trying to figure out something new. And I'd come out of landscaping, which was not my cup of tea. But she said, why don't you just start a business? Why don't you start doing it? And so my entrepreneurial spirit kicked in. And my first phone call was to the residential side, because I didn't know anything about the commercial side. And Johnson Health Tech gave me my first opportunity. I called them and I was very upfront. I said, I've been doing this for about a year. I'd like to start my own, but I don't really know what I'm doing right now. Please talk to me like I'm two. And if that's OK, I'd like to get signed up to do warranty repair work. They said yes. So that was my first customer. I still stayed on as a contractor for this company. Um, and then slowly adapt work. So I just tried and tried and tried. And at that time I was able to pick up smooth fitness when they were still around and they gave me a fair amount of work. And then yowza when they were around, they gave me a fair amount of work. So it was enough to start breaking away. Yeah. Um, and at residential pricing it, that at that time period, you know, which was on a 75 a pop, it was livable cause it was just me. It was just me and my son. So I was, was I rich? No. Could I barely squeak by? Yes. And trust me, I mean, I could, I can, I keep it on my desktop here. The trailer that I lived in, um, you know, but I started, ended up starting with the 86 Toyota pickup truck. So a brown, small Toyota pickup truck, no air, all that kind of vinyl seats, the whole nine yards, a bag of tools and 75 bucks and a lot of desperation. Right. So when I work for an organization called Inmates to Entrepreneurs, where we teach business 101 to those who have been judicially involved or in prison, and we talk to, you know, I've learned today that we can start a business just with our brains, you know, and sweat equity. What can I put into this, my muscle, you know, and do very well in the long haul. So that's where we started today, going back to what you're talking about, the pandemic and having time to stop and think, well, now we finally slowed down enough to where you can deep dive into your weaknesses and sharpen those skills and ask better questions because you have that moment to relax and actually think about the problems instead of just trying to solve a problem. It's super fast. 

Adam Niffen17:44 - 17:54
So what are the things now that you implemented in your life at that point in time in terms of personal development and growth and education and things like that? 

Scott Jennings17:54 - 19:57
Well, I think, I think at 20, When YouTube started to actually put more personal development on and really started getting a foothold to 2016 or so, I started listening to... First, it's the self-help stuff in the mornings, telling me I can be a better person, whether it's affirmations or business self-help kind of style that is very prominent. So that starts there. you start figuring out every time the whole list of things will wear you weak. Oh, I need to learn about marketing. Really, what is marketing? And then you're looking for the person that really resonates. Their style makes sense and resonates. At the same time, too, you listen to all kinds of stuff. And every time, I think what happens, and again, I'm a slow learner. Don't let anything I do ever fool you, because it took a long time to get to wherever I am. Over time, you go, oh, that makes sense. It takes a while for things to click. And so you learn about marketing, you're learning about sales, you're going back and you're watching videos that are getting better and better about how to work in your own industry. And then you go, well, how can I reteach this? Because if you're an owner at that point in time, you have staff, okay, well, how am I? So that's really what started happening is we started figuring out how can we really become a better, healthier organization as a whole, instead of feeling like we're always running around with our heads chopped off. And really get very intentional about how we are operating. You've been doing the same stuff, from what I can see. Yeah, absolutely. you're realizing that I need everybody to be on very close to the exact same page. Because if we're all growing in the exact same direction or the general same direction, we're much better together. It's all about teaching each other as we go. 

Adam Niffen19:57 - 20:03
It's all about developing people. And I can't develop people. I can only develop people as much as I develop myself. 

Scott Jennings20:04 - 20:40
Exactly. So the saying is what the organization is always as great as its leader. Yeah, absolutely. And that's also being vulnerable and showing your weaknesses. I like four letter words. I have a sense of humor that's very adult. I fully admit I'm struggling in today's age with our leaderships that I'm finding in clubs because they're very immature young adults and their humor is just like they have none. 

Adam Niffen20:43 - 21:57
Sorry to cut you off, but it just popped in my head. One of my texts went into... I'm just going to tell it how it is. This is what it is. I mean, they need to know. But they went into a genesis the other day to have a meeting with the club manager because... I got a call from a friend here locally and he's like, Hey man, this club has got 10 treadmills down. And they're like, their equipment is just falling apart and blah, blah, blah. And so my tech ended up going in there and setting up. I mean, he's my lead guy, so I kind of have him going out doing some sales stuff, you know, just getting his feet wet with it. And he goes in there and like this manager is like completely like he's I don't know for sure, but he's like falling up the stairs, just absolute. My buddies or my tech said he was coked out. I was like, I probably believe it in that environment, man. But like this and I, you know, I used to work at that same club, personal training, and it's just always been a mess. Exactly what you're saying, man. Clubs like that, the leadership there is It's definitely struggling. I mean, and of course we didn't, we didn't, you know, guys like, yeah, we'll come, we'll want you to do this, this and that and took him around the club and, and, and, and this and that never get anything from, they're not going to do anything, man. They can't, their management is just falling apart. You know what I mean? Yeah. 

Scott Jennings21:57 - 25:08
So. you know it just everything is everything has been dramatically changing but again so when the pandemic hit we we hired a business coach because in the carolinas like many other states we were solely shut down and so we hired a coach uh we put full brakes on things um some things were you know the coach taught us a couple things um But the best thing that ever came out of working with this coach is that they really recommended that we start doing a regular meeting with all of staff. One of the things that we've suffered from is because we are completely built in the cloud because of our footprint is so big is that we have staff that start feeling like they're an island and aren't connected. We haven't figured out how to get to that. And so I started a meeting under their suggestion and all that meeting did was and she said she gave me a general idea of what it should be about and so I turned it into people products and process and for the first year it was 90 people and by doing so in the middle of COVID when people are starting to tear each other's heads off when that staff came back when the PPP loans came through and we could get back to work Which, by the way, if you didn't cry, if you had to let off all your staff, you're heartless. I cried when I laid them all off because they needed to get unemployment because I couldn't pay them. And I didn't know if I was going to get paid with all the money I had sitting out. I didn't know if that would come. And then I cried when PPP loans came back and everybody came back onto staff. Luckily, we went only a handful of weeks. But regardless, and so we had this idea of, you know, to get through the people, products, and process, and we're focusing on people. I kept saying over and over, once you realize that in this conversation, what we're talking about humanity and people's characteristics and stuff, when you realize, oh, that's me, it's now your job to start working on it. And we thinned the herd pretty darn quick. Because people started pushing back because they got uncomfortable. They got very uncomfortable. And we went through a couple sets of people very fast. And then now, you know, service techs are always going to come and go. But as far as our core, We've had some people that have been here a while now, and that's a good thing. After about three years of those meetings, I've stopped, but it's time to pick them back up. I only stopped because I was the one running them, and I was out of ideas. The well was dry. Um, and so, but it's time to bring them back and by, we met with every place so that if you anybody on service, you were expected to be there, northern Virginia, Atlanta, everybody's expected to be there. And when I shut them down. The other owners were like, dude, we need this back. I'm like, well, could you run it? And they have not done so as of yet. 

Adam Niffen25:08 - 25:10
Because you're running their own team meetings, man. Yeah. 

Scott Jennings25:10 - 25:29
Yeah. Yeah. You know, I mean, I'm dry. Right. So I got to work. So but we do have tech meetings that happen. every Wednesday for 30 minutes. But it's time to bring it back because even inside of ServiceRx, I can feel the separation happening. Yep. And I don't like it. 

Adam Niffen25:29 - 25:52
I don't like it at all. Team meetings have absolutely transformed our business. I love it. And it's a non-negotiable. And when they're in the rare case, we don't have one, I hate it. It just keeps you guys close together and things like that and keeps you on the right path. I think it's super. 

Scott Jennings25:52 - 26:27
It was a place for everyone to get vulnerable. It's just surprisingly enough. I've cried. Other staff members have cried because we have, you know, in the process, my mother died. So that was rough. You know, we've had births, we've had all kinds of things happening. And so that was a place where people could feel vulnerable with their own team and no one judged them. And what happened is this person who's three hours away. would stop hearing that this is just my colleague on the phone and started seeing their colleague. Yeah. Superman. And saw them differently. And we just got 10 times better that way. 

Adam Niffen26:27 - 26:59
Very cool, man. Very cool. Well, we're getting close to the 30 minutes. I know you're busy, man. And just to kind of wrap up, one last question. What's your outlook on where our industry is today? I know we talked a little bit about where different club owners and things like that. But in terms of our industry, with manufacturers and other providers, where do you think we're at? Where do you think we're going? Any deep insights you have and experience? 

Scott Jennings27:02 - 34:19
It's a very long, that is a very short question for a super long answer. So I'll try to make it concise. Because me and you, we could literally talk for a couple hours on this alone. So one, it is time for our industry on the service side to grow up. Think about it, we're super young. Augie, whatever his name is, who just passed away from life fitness, built the first piece of equipment that could have used a third party service tech in 1973. That's when I was born, so it's only 50 years old. We probably started not getting third-party service techs outside of dealers to the 90s, is what I'm going to guess. Again, I've not been around long enough. I don't know enough history. We're super small and immature. It's time for us to get an association happening. So in this week alone, we've had conversations with the new head directly within the last two weeks. We've had conversations with the new head of global service at Freemotion. We've had conversations with the new head of global service at Core. We're taking tech support overseas, worst thing you could ever do. Why? Because they're never gonna get to our level. you want to clean up. I feel like our industry is more worried about the sale and less worried about the service after the sale. We, while we need an association, me, you, you know, FMT, Ace Fitness, which is Ruben's company, you know, The guys who do all the support for Afterburn, who owns about 60 orange juice, we need to come together and we need to start teaching each other better because it's not gonna get better by the manufacturer. And in fact, that's why manufacturers keep trying to hire their own techs so they have direct, but then their own techs, if you talk to them on the side, are not happy half the time with their experience. because they don't get to do a good job of taking care of the customer. They set a schedule and say, tell Ms. Smith over here, XYZ Gym, I'm coming to see you tomorrow. I know that you need this done. And their boss steps in and says, no, you need to go here. Whoa, wait a minute. That's not how this industry works. We need to have integrity. we need to do what we say and say what we do. That goes back to what I say all the time now is that, you know, we're a company that delivers on the promise that is constantly broken by others. You know, we need to start moving past the massive amounts of mom and pops that are there, that are under trained. We can't find them. If we look at our industry versus the other traits, The other trades have associations and training that they do outside of any manufacturer. We do not have that. All of us will pretty much have the same general statement of going to train with the manufacturer and that is we go to meet other techs and we go to get certified so that we can get discounted parts. If we can pick up a tip a trick, that's great, but otherwise when you sit us down in a room and you show a PDF interface, we don't learn that way. My best training ever came was during the pandemic. I happened to live just a couple miles away from the North Carolina pre-corps facility, which by the way just shut down. They're moving it. It was a training spot. I hate it. They've taken the pre-corps sign down and everything else. Whatever. Anyhow, this is when they are transitioning back from recutting pre-corps back out of Peloton. And so the trainer couldn't get in and get his documents. So the whole time was hands-on, the best training I've ever had. Because we didn't sit down and do PDFs. Screw your PDFs, let's do some real work, right? And I understood things about pre-court that I did not understand prior because we did hands-on. So I believe our industry has a lot of potential in today's world, but it's going to take me and you to change it, and then come as a group to the manufacturers and go, this isn't working. You keep trying to get to a point that you want to get to, but you're doing the wrong way. You're doing a corporate version of what has been a hamstring for every other corporation before. You're trying to save a penny to make a dollar, and it's not gonna get you what you want. It's a very complex thought, but I know in my eyes, taking tech supports overseas, my conversations have been aggravating. Yeah. Frustrating, you know, just to get the most basic of things done, mistraining, obviously talking to someone who does not know what a treadmill is. They know what the picture of it looks like, but that's as far as their knowledge gets. Things like that, an elliptical, whatever we're calling about. And, um, but I'll go back and say, I know that there's hope for our industry because, you know, Optane, even through their multiple selling of, of that happened, right. They've kept the same text and they're so knowledgeable. Yeah. You call Woodway and they're so knowledgeable. Um, you know, there are guys inside of pre-course tech support as long as you get the American guys and don't get their overseas now that are so knowledgeable. Yeah. And when you're running into something strange, you don't know what to do. The last thing I'll say is, you know, I know that like iFit has tried to do training classes, but they don't understand that When you're going to get in a situation like we are here currently on Zoom, because I also teach on Zoom too, you have to be entertaining as well as informative and interesting. And it's so dry, you're falling asleep. They tried to do what it was a year ago, an eight hour long training. Like what straight this last one was three hours and you're just you want to shoot Beat yourself in the head because one day they didn't bring in they didn't do camera work They couldn't spend the money on doing it right that your I fit Billions and billions of dollars the largest residential Manufacturer in the world and you can't spend real money on trying to make it a production that allows us to digest what you want us to digest Yeah Come on, man. Come on. That tells you everything you need to know about what is happening and why it's going to take me and you to come together. 

Adam Niffen34:19 - 36:20
I thought about this problem a lot. Yeah, I agree. And I so I try to look at it from another perspective, though, too, which is on our side of things. So if any time you have a problem. it's best practice to look at yourself first, right? And I think you were touching on this, right? And here's the thing from their perspective, as they're dealing with, there's so many service providers out there that are just, well, frankly, they're kind of like I was when I first started, right? How probably you were when you first started. So there is that where you just have guys that they just suck. But there's also guys out there who are getting into this industry and who are service techs that they just have no business being in it. I had somebody, a customer the other day, we picked up a new area from iFit. And I won't go too much into details. But A tech had gotten in trouble for trying to do something with this customer's daughter and stuff like that from another company. And stuff like that, the types of people that start service companies sometimes is kind of a rough type of person. You know what I'm saying? And so I think that if you look at it from the manufacturer's perspective, they're dealing with a lot of service providers. Because we get treated like this. They treat you like you don't know shit a lot of times. Like, you know, what are you doing calling type of thing. And I think that they're dealing with so many different service providers that just are not cut out for what they're doing or something along those lines. That's what I kind of think they're saying from their perspective. Would you agree with that? 

Scott Jennings36:20 - 44:09
I would think, yes, that is part of the equation. Here's the solution. Because you're right, when things are going consistently wrong, what's the common denominator? Who's the common denominator? Is it me? If I have someone who I put in charge of training a tech in an area and they've gone through multiple technicians and they're not working out, I stop looking at who we're hiring and I start looking at the person training and going, is this the problem? Perfect example. So if we go back to the manufacturer, you can't tell us that you want one outcome and then put very little effort into the outcome when it comes to the training. And then, if that's the training style that you're using in your in-house techs, and your in-house techs aren't getting the response that you want, you need to look at your training style. And that's why I'm saying, like, when I went to pre-core, and we didn't do PDS, every single one of us walked out of there going, that was the best. Because we didn't do PDFs because I don't know a single service tech who learns solely from a PDF and is going to remember that. No. We are a hands-on kind of personality. Now, we want me, I want the PDF and I want to be working on it because if I'm sort of confused a little bit about what I'm just saying, I can refer to the written language. If I'm hiring you, I'm going to ask you a question. Do you read the picture or do you read the words? And most techs will say, I read the picture. I look at what's going on because that's where my brain goes first. And then I go to the written language. And they don't get that because I think it's developed often by an engineer. And what's the one thing that most of us as service techs know? We walk into a home for residential. My husband tried to fix it. He's an engineer. My wife tried to fix it. She's an engineer. And it's 10 times worse than it should have been. It's just a different bird. And that's okay. We need them. But it is a portion of industry that you have to understand that good, good teaching is also good entertaining and has to keep it simple. Stupid. Let's break it down to the very beginnings. Yeah. All right. And that's where we start. So I'll go back and I'll leave it at this. You know, we did tech training and my son has come to work for us and he's doing really well, first and foremost, but he's never had a job where he's used his hands and worked with tools. So he does really well on the thinking part. He's learning to become a person who makes tools the extensions of his hands. Yeah. And, um, He wants to learn a lot more about electricity and I'm weak in electricity because they don't teach us enough. And what they do teach us is like ramming down your throat and it doesn't make a lot of sense because they don't break it up as simple. Our head of operations, he has somewhat of a logical background. He chose a video, which part of it was great. And the other part, this guy's going all over the place about things that did not matter to what we're trying to get to. And that's basic one on one. And that's where. And so I bring that up in the media. I was like, we need to go back and we need to put together a video series. that starts from A and truly only goes to B, C, D, E, F in a way that is so digestible that we keep just re-showing it and that people get a really good understanding. The reason being that is so important to me and we need to figure out how to understand the electricity that we are seeing and the way voltages are used and stuff inside of fitness equipment is because we can't build a better treadmill at this point in time. We can't really build a better elliptical. If we think about our bike, and if we think about elliptical bike, you know, they're all the same piece of equipment, just shaped slightly different. There's no difference in how they work. You know, same thing with the treadmill, what is changing, is consoles, entertainment. So we have to learn what these electrical pulses is. So if you want us to get better, you need to be creating as the manufacturer documentation and videos that help us understand exactly what you want. So then we flip back to that iFit training and you're dry, you're terrible, your cinematography is outside. That was ridiculously stupid. It's not thought out. It's ad hoc at best. And when we have to sit through it and try to learn from you fumbling through it all, I don't care how intelligent you are, you presented it in a horrible fashion, which had everyone just out or changing the channel, just letting it run so that we can say that we were there. Yeah. You know, and it's only the ones who can nerd out with you, who truly already had a really strong foundation, who got what you were saying. And that's a very long conversation. Like I said, we can talk about this for a long time, about the service side and how we can help it. Now, the nice thing is the new leader of service for CORE, he allowed us, me and Matt, to make some criticisms about where CORE has been and what they're doing. The one thing he did here is I said, we would like you guys to do focus groups with us as service providers. because we can help you guys steer into a better solution before you make the mistake. You guys don't talk to us. Rex Roundtables talks, Edmund Ursa, Nursa, everybody speaks to the end user and all they care about is sales and equipment. We do not teach service as the whole, and because we don't teach service as the whole, me and you are fighting to get people to take care of their equipment, i.e. 10 treadmills down in one club. So my analogy is this, and maybe we should then cut it off, because we will keep going. And my analogy is this. Your club is a race car. Your facility, wherever it is, it's a race car. The building is the shell. Yeah. Right. The equipment and the things that you use on the inside of the engine, your staff is the fuel and your leadership is the driver. So if you don't take care of the shell and the engine, it does not matter what kind of fuel you put in it or, or how good of a driver you are. Eventually it just, you know, runs into the ground. You don't win races when you don't kick, take care of the engine and in the shell. Right. and people get hurt. I was at a club where the manufacturer calls because someone fell off. Well, yeah, the belt was slipping. Well, they have their own techs. Club hired techs do not do preventative maintenance, they do reactive work. So they don't go in to do stomp tests and other stuff. And that's a shame because they are tasked with taking care of the building and broken stuff instead of being so they're reactive versus proactive. And that's why we stress preventative maintenance so that you're proactive. So hopefully we catch a loose belt before someone falls or a cable breaks or, you know, a handle falls off, things like that. 

Adam Niffen44:10 - 44:31
All right, man, we could definitely continue on and on and on about this, man, but, and we systematically break them down. We will, I'm sure we'll talk more and get to know each other more, man, but I really appreciate you coming on and, uh, I, I respect and admire what you got going on, man. And, uh, looking forward to, yeah, to getting to know you more and everything like that. So thanks again for coming on, man. 

Scott Jennings44:32 - 45:00
Man, Adam, thank you. And trust me, as much as we sort of sound like we're complaining, these are productive conversations to be having. And I'm so glad that you've started a podcast that sounds like it's going to be well-rounded, because that is what's lacking in our industry. It's one-sided. We need well-rounded conversations for us to be a healthier organization for those who use us. Absolutely. So thanks, man. 

Adam Niffen45:00 - 45:07
I hope you have a great day. Sounds good. You as well, Scott. I appreciate it, man. 

Intro/Outro45:07 - 45:20
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