Welcome to Fix Your Gym, a podcast dedicated to bringing you expert knowledge from fitness industry leaders, salespeople, gym owners, tech experts, and other fitness enthusiasts, where you'll learn about the latest industry trends, innovative technologies, new and current products on the market, and health and fitness news from experts across the nation. And now, here's your host, Adam Kniffin.

All right, welcome everyone to the Fix Your Gym podcast. Sorry it's been so long since I've put out an episode. Just been super busy and we've been trying to get some new guests on and it's been kind of a long time coming. We have a cool guest on today that we've been getting to know in the Fix Your Gym Facebook group. If you haven't joined that group, join that group. We're all kind of getting to know each other in there and it's become a pretty cool place to share information and just kind of bounce ideas off of each other. get to know other people in the industry. That's where we ran into our guests that we have on today. I think in LinkedIn first is where we first connected and then the group. Jim Young from Jim Maintenance. I love the name. It's great, dude. I love it.

Adam Niffen

I didn't come up with it. We can thank my girlfriend. She's clever.

Jim Young 

That's perfect, man. Jim Maintenance. G-Y-M maintenance, but J-I-M maintenance is the name of his company out of Jacksonville, Florida. you know, I, I, I see what, what you're doing and kind of the brand you're building. Um, I, I, I really like it. Um, you seem like a, like you're into fitness, you know, you're, you're into the lifestyle and you're really like involved on the groups and social media and stuff like that. Like, I like what you're doing. So super excited to, uh, to have you on and, and just shoot the shit with you and talk shop. And, um, so yeah, thank you for your time and for, for coming on, man.

Oh, thank you.

Yeah. So you're out of Jacksonville, Florida. Oh, actually first, let me, let me, let me stop. Let me give thanks to, um, our sponsors real quick who, who helped me make this show happen. Um, it's not cheap to produce this podcast and, you know, we don't make any money or anything like that, of course. Um, so it's, it's really nice to have some support. Um, our, our premier sponsor is, um, field tech fitness solutions in the field tech app. Ruben Hand is the owner out there, and he's developed a software for us that, you know, is really helpful and is basically a, you know, a CRM, work order management system, invoicing system. for fitness equipment service and install companies. So there's not another company out there like that. There's a few different like HVAC softwares and things like that, or some people might still be using paperwork orders, or whatever the case is, but his software is super valuable for companies like us. So if you're in need of that or wanna find out more about how that software can help your business, reach out to RubinHand. Field Tech Fitness Solutions in the Field Tech app. You can find him on the Facebook group, Fix Your Gym Community, and on LinkedIn. And yeah, he just got a plethora of knowledge in the industry, an industry veteran, 20 years and owns a service business as well. So definitely connect with him and see how FieldTech Fitness Solutions can help you in your business. And then we also have a little bit newer of a sponsor. We have AES Fitness Franchise and AES Fitness with Adam Schwab. He's up in the Northeast and he's developing a a fitness equipment maintenance and repair company that is a franchise. We've seen this a couple of times in our industry be successful and with like FMT and stuff like that. And it seems to be like a really, if I was to go back, When I started my business, and if I had my shit together a little bit more, if I actually had capital, and if I had good credit, and if I wasn't 21 and stupid and full of years of mistakes ahead of me, I would probably join a franchise like this. It's got all the businesses already set up for you. The relationships are already there. you know, the systems and processes are already, you know, in place where I've spent years and years building them in my business and still suck at them. You know, where you can join a franchise like AES and kind of have that jumpstart, you know what I mean? to get your business started. AES is up in the Northeast. It's an easily accessible initial investment. You'll be able to secure a home office, warehouse location, vehicles, all the necessary tools to be up and running in your fitness equipment service business. It's scalable and it makes a lot of sense. uh, to do it that way. So if you have any interest in that, um, reach out to Adam Schwab, the AES fitness, you can also find him in our group and on LinkedIn. Um, just another guy that everybody should be connected to anyways, uh, get to know these people. They're doing really cool stuff in our industry. Um, and, uh, and so on. So thank you guys for supporting the podcast. and sponsoring us and for providing valuable products and services to other business owners and industry. That's the type of sponsors that we want to have on. We don't want to have on just some random BS sponsor, but people who are really doing cool stuff. Thank you guys. But yeah, thank you, Jim, for coming on. Tell us a little bit about yourself, man, where, where you come from, how you got in the industry and, and so forth.

Oh, man. Uh, so I'll try to keep it sort of short. So I was basically born with a wrench in my hand. Um, my family come from a full line of racing, uh, drag racing, family building cars, cars, hot rods, off-road trucks, off-road, all sorts of stuff. Um, Spent my entire life going all the way up through my teenage years working on cars, got into a really famous restoration shop called Al Pruden Sons. They've been around for a very, very long time. And I was restoring some high-end antique cars at the time. And I ended up making a shift there because it was kind of crazy. There was a huge pay gap there. And actually, the one car I just posted on my Instagram a couple days ago, the most expensive car I ever worked on was a 1964 Ferrari GT40 Lusso. And it was like, I think it sold for 1.3 million right around in there. Yeah. And this guy, this guy had like 300 some cars that he, he didn't have a garage. He had a museum of cars. I ended up leaving that because of there's guys there for like 20 some years that were like making like $25 an hour. And it's like, all right, I guess that's good. And at the time, I had an opportunity to go work at a chemical plant. So I took my experience from turning wrenches into the chemical plant world, quickly shot up to the ranks and was running a chemical plant. And at the same time, I got into CrossFit. So my buddy had a CrossFit gym. He actually started his own gym. And at the time, he was he was buying a lot of used equipment and things were kind of breaking. And I was going behind him and fixing it. And I was just like, oh, OK. I'm like, there's kind of a need here. And it's solely organically grew in the York and Baltimore area. And So I started doing some research and I started reaching out to people. Basically, I was just doing cold DMs to people. Just like, Hey, this is what I do. Are you interested? And people didn't even realize that their stuff needed maintenance. And coming from the chemical plant world, the corporate world, I got to learn from some very, very intelligent people on asset management depreciation. And I basically was taking the things that these billion dollar companies were doing with their asset management programs on stuff that like cannot fail, or we have plan outages and all that kind of stuff. And I just kind of like spun it and tweaked it throughout the years into the gym space world. And, um, I ended up moving to Florida. I ran a chemical plant in Lake City. And I was chatting with my girlfriend and she was like, Why don't you start it down here? And I ended up starting it down here and it kind of blew up on me. So it was like all last year. Since I was a manager, I had a lot of PTO. So I had the chemical plant running to the point where I could show up three days a week and the leadership there was running itself. It wasn't really a challenge at all. And my boss did not like that at all. And it started... The company was very like a small kind of kind of like a small kind of company. And then it turned into a big giant corporate-y kind of business. And actually this year, January 31st, they gave me the boot. They just were sick of it. So I went, I was like, you know what, we'll go all in. So I went all in on this, and I saw another spike. And I've been not solely dedicated to the CrossFit world, but kind of where the core of the business was. It's kind of funny because there's a lot of... Everybody... It seems like I'm doing the opposite. A lot of people start in the commercial world and then they branch out. I started in the CrossFit world and now I'm getting into the commercial world. But it's funny. I used to chat with people in the comment section like, you know, how do you get these CrossFit gym owners to pay and all that. And the one thing I want to talk about, it's like you kind of got to teach your customer, because they kind of don't have a clue. And there's like this real old model of things. And they like CrossFit gym owners, they love to buy equipment upfront. do nothing with it and then slam it into the ground and then sell it to a gym member for like a hundred bucks and then buy new terrible model. Like there's like, you guys aren't doing any maintenance, like, you know, depreciation. So it's like, getting in front of these gym owners. And since I'm a CrossFitter myself, I speak their language. And I think they're comfortable with that, most of them. So it's... A lot of it, too, with social media is just like providing value for free. So just trying to educate the customer. And then it's slowly growing and scaling. We're still growing and scaling as we're going now. And building crews and getting into the commercial world, which has been fun.

Yeah, so do you sell equipment to these CrossFit gyms too?

No, I wanted to mainly focus on just the equipment side and maintenance and repair instead of getting into selling equipment. I just didn't really want to dabble in it.

So, you know, I don't really know much about CrossFit. I don't know, you know, when I think about CrossFit, I think like, Maybe some like rigs, like, like as far as like what equipment they have, like maybe some rigs and maybe some like, um, you know, like some rowers or something. I don't know. Like, do they, do they have, they don't have a ton of like, you know, we're going to cross the gym and they don't have 10 treadmills.

Right. non-motorized, but they'll have like air runners and stuff. Air runners.

OK, which need maintenance for sure. They need a lot of maintenance.

It's the amount of like the like, it seems like the number one destroyer of gym equipment that I see. It's hair. And man, these like those air runners, they have all them rollers in it. They just get. Yeah. And just destroys bearings. Yeah.

Sweat and the sweat will attract. Oh, my gosh. Yeah. Yeah, so no, that makes sense. And then I'm sure they're really hard on their equipment.

They are really hard on their equipment. It is. It's it's crazy. Like some of the gyms that we go into and it's just like, wow, like, I mean, chalk caked everywhere. Like we'll pull apart like I've pulled the flywheel out of a concept to rower and on the on the sprocket where the bearing sits, just caked in chalk. I mean, those things. Yeah. You know, and it's just crazy how the chalk gets in there and it just destroys everything. And like there's, you know, like when the grease gets like hardened and it gets all the dust and it has like little like dots everywhere. It's like turns into that. It's crazy. And you see hotspots everywhere. It's crazy.

Yeah, no, that's, that's interesting, man. That's like a nice little niche that, that a lot of people I don't think are really thinking about too much. Um, and I just had a talk the other day, my accountant actually came to me. He's like, Hey man, um, why don't we start a CrossFit sales company? I was like, what? Like, I just don't ever think about CrossFit, you know what I mean? But it's so popular, it's so popular. And I mean, there's CrossFit gyms everywhere, but he's in, you know, people who are in CrossFit, like, they're so like, they're a different type of people, man. They're like, CrossFit is my life and I will build a business based off of this life. He's in CrossFit too and like he's just like, you know, like you get in it and you see it and I'm guessing it's like one of those things where like you love it. Like, oh, you know, like running for me and you become like passionate about it and you're like, Yeah. So that's cool, man. I love that.

Yeah. And it is definitely an interesting kind of world. And it's yeah, there's so many people that like they call it they get bit by the bug and CrossFit and they want to start a gym. I never had that. I just was like, you know, like, oh, well, here's a service need that I can provide. And like, And a lot of it is too, like I see, it's like, there's not that skill asset of like doing it, but then there's also like the gym members can or gym owners can do it. It's not that difficult to put a shock cord in a rower. It really isn't, but it's the time of it. It's on the rower. Yeah. And then it's like, you know, people like, You can go out and mow your grass, but you want to save yourself an hour, two hours on a weekend, you know, and spend it with your family instead of sitting there. I've had this comment all the time, like sitting there, Jim and her sitting there trying to put a shock cord in the rower, watching YouTube, getting frustrated, got to pull the shock cord out, put it back in. I find a lot of stuff installed improperly. Yeah. The other thing is, is risk. A couple of weeks ago, one of the gyms I was servicing, they didn't want to touch their rowers and their rowers were old, man. And the shock cords were really old. Their drag factor on them was really bad. And a shock cord actually snapped on a girl. and while she was pulling back, and she fell off the back of the rower and banged her head on a barbell. Luckily, she was fine. It's just like, hey, this is the importance of it. You need to, part of your assets is your gym members, right? So it's like- Yeah, people will sue you over that shit, too. Yeah, yeah. And these waivers that they sign are, you know, like my one buddy was running his own gym. It's like, they can get around it. Lawyers can get around that stuff.

Yeah. It's definitely good to, uh, to cover your butt and, and dude, I mean, I'll do like maintenance and we've been talking about this a little bit in the group and I really want to, um, uh, I have a friend who owns a gym and we, she was our first commercial customer. She was been on the podcast. Monica is her name, but she was like, when I was out doing sales, like when I first started, she was the first gym that hired us. Right. So we've been friends forever. Um, And, uh, but she wants to come on and talk about the importance of maintenance because we, that was a, so for what, 15 years now, we've been doing quarterly preventative maintenance on her three gyms. And she's went through like a one equipment refresh in that time. And that equipment that she bought. has had so few repairs compared to when we started working for her when she didn't have maintenance and like the amount of money that she saved. So we want to get, I want to get into that too. Like what are the real benefits of preventative maintenance? Because there are some big ones and especially down the road, if you want to resell your equipment, you know, so anyways, yeah, it's, it's really important stuff that people

Yeah. It's that and the cleanliness of it too. Like a lot of people on across the gyms or they get kind of dirty. And I mean, there's, there's kind of a shift in it now. A lot of them are keeping their gyms a lot nicer, but it's like, you know, some it's like, Hey, what's, what's wiping, we'll clean and sanitize the equipment. It's going to look good. You know, it's, that's a big thing too. Cause people are sweating all over the place and it's disgusting.

Yeah, and PM contracts are nice because while it makes your business more scalable, it's easy to measure, it's consistent income, you know, and so forth.

Yeah, the consistency of self-business is nice. Yeah, for sure.

So you started in the CrossFit world. So when did you actually start? So you were working for another company, But started the business while you were working there.

Yeah. I think 20 was the first time I worked on a rower.

Got you. And then you went full-time 2024 in January.

Yep.

So what, what has it been like to go into detail a little bit more about like the last seven months, the struggles and the real shit and the first six months.

Yeah.

full of its highs and lows. One thing it's like, thank God for my girlfriend putting up with me at times, because I'll get stressed out. I'm a grinder. So I'll sit and grind or I'll get up at crazy times. Sometimes to get on the road, I'll get up at like 3am. I was like, I got to go to Miami. So 3am. We talk about it in the group, the Facebook group, it's like, you know, the road will wear you out. The company I worked for previously, I spent three and a half years as a regional manager, so I traveled the entire country week to week, and that was rough. But it's a lot different running your own business, that's for sure.

It makes it easier, I feel like, than working for somebody else and traveling. I don't know, man. I came from a similar background. I was in a warehouse job that I just didn't like. I was up for a promotion that I didn't get, that I should have got. And I was like, I'll make it. And that was like 21. And so I was making like $14, $13 an hour or something. But I started seeing that. I was like, dude, this is not what I want to do. You know what I mean? I don't want to be in a warehouse. I don't want to be working for a corporation, a big corporation. I want to work on my own. And yeah, it's difficult. And maybe you don't even make as much money or even close to the amount of money that you made in these other jobs for a while. But I feel like for me, there's just something about it that makes it a little bit easier to accept that because I'm working for myself.

Yeah, there's just a lot of things in the court. I liked my job a lot in the chemical plant world before it got very corporate-y. Just a lot of stuff wasn't making sense and it was frustrating. And the big thing that frustrated me probably the most was the treatment of people. And quite frankly, it pissed me off a lot of times how they would just, you know, like the chemical plant that I ran, we had, it was 24 seven, three 65 here in Florida. Um, we had, um, one product, sulfur that we were melting down. It's 280 degrees. We got a 3000 ton tank of molten sulfur that has to stay at 280 degrees. I got truck drivers running on the road, transferring this stuff. It's hot in Florida. You got to wear FR gear. And they were paying those guys like nothing and just running the ground. And these guys are in their fifties are getting worn out. They're getting tired. And it's just like, God, like, you know, pay these guys something. They care about them. And that's one. I kind of like got in like wanting to run my own business a long while ago when it was starting to get corporatey. And like I have these very like set things that I've written out that I don't want to do. And it's like I really want to take care of my team that I build. Yeah. It's it's just it's just crazy this corporate crap that's going on nowadays.

A lot of corruption and greed, man. Yeah, it really is. Yeah. And that's kind of my, I just was talking with one of my texts. last week about the core values that we have in our business and the culture. The whole reason why I have this business is it's not necessarily to provide value to the customers as much as it is provide value to my employees and my team, the people around me that spend the most time with me. Of course, we got to provide value to customers in order to make that happen, but the focus on our business is on them. Yeah, every it really is, is on their development. And they're, you know, and so I like that. I think you, you and I should kind of share that same like desire, because we come from a similar, you know, a similar place where, where the warehouse world, the industrial world is, it sucks, dude.

Oh man, the warehouse world is rough, man. My dad, he did that for a long time. And yeah, like the open docks, you know, the elements and like in up in Pennsylvania, you know, it gets cold. It's just like, man, how do you guys do this?

Yeah. So, so what, what, what, What has it been like over the last six months? Kind of like some of the details, man. What are you doing? What is your plans? What's your vision? What are you doing to grow your business on a daily basis?

So like, well, daily basis actions is I, um, there's a lot of stuff that I take from Alex Ramosi. Um, I'm kind of a fan boy of Alex Ramosi stuff. I mean, he lays it out really nice in his books. So I'm like, I do a lot of cold outreach. I mean a lot. Um, yep, there it is. But it's a lot of cold outreach. And then it's a lot of teaching the customers and trying to put out valuable information, not even to sell anything, just to like, look, like, look, this is stuff to look out for. Um, or if, Hey, if you got like one thing, like I've been teaching a lot lately and putting out a lot, it's like rogue echo bikes. If you start getting a loose pedal, stop pedaling the bike immediately because there's a bolt that goes into a welded and captured sprocket. If it snaps your rogue says your bike's junk, you're out of bike. So, um, a lot of that is the education process of it. Um, uh, the one thing I've been learning and getting. more into is like learning the CRM stuff and getting incorporated with that kind of stuff. And it's like all these, like everything about business is just learning about business period has been a big thing over the past six months. Um, how's my sales copy, you know, that kind of stuff, you know, testing, what software do you use?

Do you use Ruben's software?

No, I don't. I need to actually, I haven't on my action items list to look through his system and like get in touch.

Yeah. We're, we're considering switching over. Like we, I started with this company called RazorSync cause FMT uses it. And when we switched over to that and like, and it's like for HVAC and stuff, it's not for fitness. And then I heard about Ruben. I was like, damn, I don't want to switch software against him. He's been talking and like, gosh, but yeah. Um, But yeah, I did a demo and stuff on his, and I think, especially for somebody who hasn't committed already to something else, definitely worth taking a look at, for sure. It's got a lot of stuff that doesn't, that other softwares don't do, like tracking preventative maintenance. It's one thing that my software doesn't do. It's like, yeah, that stuff's important, man. Stuff's important. Especially, I spent so many years, man, not worrying about that shit, And then now, like years later, I'm like, dude, I should have done that stuff first. Why did why was there a bunch of balloons that just went across?

I don't know. That was funny. I was really weird. I don't know what I'm literally doing. I don't know what happened. I didn't press anything.

We're celebrating, I guess. That's funny. That's weird.

So, yeah. So. Yeah, that's interesting, man.

Yeah, it's a lot of learning. And I'm trying to also like learns. I like to read through that Facebook group a lot, just learning best practices from everybody else. I spent a lot some time on like when I have free time, just like looking at YouTube videos and stuff like that. Like what are what are some people working on with this and that learning more about the commercial world and how to get into the commercial world more and all that kind of stuff.

What are some things that you Google most?

Google most? Well, in the beginning, well, one of the ones that I looked at was like, I'm like, what in the world is with these, the Tanner, what are the Tannerman clip things on the, on a, was it Nordatrack treadmill? I was like, what? Everybody kept talking about it. I see it on I don't actually know what you're talking about. Everybody kept talking about like, if you replace a deck on this treadmill, you got to make sure you have these clips. I'm like, what? I was like, so that was like one thing that I dove into for a while. But like some of the electrical stuff too, um, yeah, virtual equipment is, I mean, I did a lot of that with the automotive side, but the site, it wasn't as technical as now. So that's probably like, It's probably like the top two I've really been looking into. Common problems, stuff like that. But there's like, you know, there's been a couple people that have been like great in the chat, like Scott, Scott Jennings, I mean, message back and forth. And thanks for Scott for letting me bounce questions off of you. And Dan, Dan has been great too in the chat. And Will Billy too out there in California have been great.

yeah there's there's a lot of um there's a lot of um There's a lot of experience in the group, man.

A lot of, there's a lot of, it was years and years of, yeah. When I got into this, I was just like, I thought like most of the commercial spaces, like just had their own like maintenance staff in place. And I never even gave it a thought. Like I, that's why I got really was in the CrossFit side. And then I kind of like, yeah. through research, finding a lot in the commercial space, which has been interesting, because just starting on the complete other side of it, it seems like.

Yeah. Do you get into any warranty stuff yet? Or have you done anything like that?

Not yet. I actually was going to I was going to go up to Life Fitness to get my cert from them a couple months ago. And then it took a while for them to get back to me. It was kind of a mess and would have been a last minute call. That was I'm kind of seeing that whole side of the industry is quite interesting. But I might go up in August for that certification.

I heard we're going to the August class. If you go, we'll be there.

Oh, you're going to be. Yeah.

Yeah. I think, I mean, that's the plan. I don't know. I'm not a, I'm just not a huge fan of live fitness, but, um, but we're going to go, um, I'm, uh, you know, part of the fixture gym community. And as you guys will, we'll see, as we develop the program within that community, um, as we want to build a training program, um, for technicians. Yeah. For, so like you could send, you can come to our training program and learn all the manufacturers. you know, it may be a two week long program, but you get like a one-on-one coach and stuff like that. Maybe you and one of your other technicians get one coach, you know, for two weeks with extended, you know, continued education and an advanced, you know, um, education on, you know, specialty products, stuff like that, or whatever new products coming out. But, um, so I like to go around to these other certification programs, um, you know, and kind of study what they're doing too. So that's why I'm going, but I'm also sending two of my techs,

Because I was an ASC tech, automotive tech. So a lot of my other family members were as well. So it's like, I see how that was built in. And I'm like, when you guys were mentioning that, I was like, Oh, that's a really smart idea. And it's just, it is interesting how this industry is like, it's very, it's highly needed. But it's so, like you guys say, it's such an infant stage. It seems like, but it still seems like it's been around a little while, but it's staying in an infant stage for like 25 years.

Yeah, it's a small industry, man. It's almost not big enough to have, you know, like the standard certifications and stuff like that's kind of why we're taking a little bit different of approach and kind of making a real specialized type of program. you know, kind of like, well, it's all it's, dude, it's all from this book. That's where it's all coming from, you know, and kind of what what Alex Ramos he teaches, and, you know, he kind of teaches like how to build schools, you know what I mean, basically, you know, and how to build, you Yeah. So that's, that's kind of a idea of what we're, what we're going with. It's in the beginning stages. I don't know exactly how it'll, it'll turn out, but the goal is, is like for you to be able to send technician to this training program and have a trained technician in, you know, four to six weeks rather than one year or whatever the case is, or, or, you know, um,

No, that'd be huge. I mean, especially if I'm not qualified technicians and everybody's got the same standard of it. Yeah.

And then if we could get manufacturers to get on board with it to where we do have a certification across the board. But if we did that, unfortunately, we would have to change up our program a lot. And we'd have to start doing, our classes would become very boring because you have to start incorporating in safety and all that shit. And I almost don't even want to mess with that, to be honest with you. Like I want it to be valuable for the technicians as much as possible. So whether or not we need their certifications or not, I don't know, it's debatable. But especially these days, there's a big debate on how much they're paying us and stuff like that. Some people will even say don't even do warranty work, which for us, we do a lot of warranty work, man. But I understand that sentiment, especially with a lot of the different manufacturers. hell, you can't even hardly make money. You know what I mean?

So why? Being in the chat was like, because I was like sitting there on my side of my man, do I even get into it? But I'm like, the training would still be good to have. And, you know, and I guess that it's just another thing. It's like another brick for the business.

You know, here's the thing with warranty work. This is I'll just give you an example. This is my my thought on it is that It gets my foot in the door a lot of places. So we got on with Technogym three years ago. And we picked up the Kansas City area, the Northwest Arkansas area. And, for example, we we started going out to this job in Kansas City. It's a pretty big health club doing warranty work. Well, they ended up doing a complete renovation of their whole gym, like millions of dollars. And so they brought us in on the install. And we were there working on the install with fitness machine technicians from Kansas City. And fitness machine technicians wasn't doing a very good job. And so Technogym, through that job, ended up giving us that entire territory and taking it from fitness machine technicians. Well, during that install, the club owner, we met the club owner, and he hired us for two other projects outside of the techno gym stuff, which were really big projects. One of them was putting together this children's fitness playroom area, and it was like, I think the bill on that was like $20,000 or something that we billed out on that. And then another one was this move strong, like modular staircase with like, it was huge. We had to rent lifts and stuff to lift this thing up. And it was monstrous. And that was another $20,000. So we had like $40,000 in a month off of this one customer that ultimately came from us taking on warranty work.

You know what I'm saying?

So it's like, yeah. And so, and then we developed a good relationship with that customer. They signed a, a PM contract with us on their stuff that's out of warranty as well. You know, they had some stuff that was still out of, that was out of warranty, some ellipticals and stuff. And so, so it's like, I don't know, man, it opens up, I'm all about relationships. And the truth is that warranty work, warranty work gets you in front of a lot of people, a lot of people in the industry, a lot of gyms, they're not calling anybody but the manufacturer to get service on their equipment.

You know what I mean? Yeah. Which makes sense. And there's been a, there's been a stressing need down here. I just got into a country club down here just because off of a lead and they were having a hard time with life fitness. And it's just, it's been a tough area in this, in this area lately. So that's why I'm like, well, I'm going to go and you know, build a relationship through the one I have, I'm close with the one life fitness rep here. So it's like, well, you know, let me, let me help you out. And that's one thing I learned a lot in the chemical plant world. Cause we were working with the major railroads all the time and big chemical companies like Dow chemical and all that. And it's just like, you know, if they like have a need or they're stressed or they like need something done, just get right on it. And then they're just like, you know, thank you build that relationship and that trust immediately. It's like, Oh, how'd you guys get this done? Or you just kind of like move mountains to get it done for them. Um, that's one reason why the previous company I worked for became as big as they did, because it was, it was started by like a small group of, it was like three guys, three brothers that ended up hiring an actual decent CEO. And like, he just was like massive action. And just like these guys that were just like, they were like grunts, man. They were like businessmen grunts. I learned so much from my senior vice president that he... The one day I was out transloading from a rail car to a truck, high fructose corn syrup. And he this guy I mean he's making monstrous amounts of money like he's busy guy but he comes out there and spends two hours with me he comes out he's in a uniform and he's like hey what are we doing today and it's like I'm like looking at him like what, what are you doing? And you know, a high vis FR gear, you know, clothes. And he's just like, I'm going to come out here and spend two hours with you and transload. And it's like, learn about what you're doing. And that's one thing that I learned. It's like, you know, be a technician first, even as the business grow, I still want to get out there with the guys. And I learned a lot from those guys and getting in the room with some, you know, board members of like CSX and stuff like that and seeing how they do business. So yeah, I definitely see where, you know, the warranty thing, you know, opens up the doors, opens up the ideas of conversation. You know, you're schooling, um, program that you guys are trying to put together, getting manufacturers involved. It's like, get them in the same room as you guys and chat, you know, it's, you know, it's start hammering things down and maybe somebody will be on board. Who knows?

Yeah, for sure. Um, I mean, I think ultimately something like that would be valuable for them as well. Yeah. You know, it could be, um, So, and I think it'll also be valuable for like gym owners who want to hire their own technicians. You know, like we had a YMCA recently reach out to us and was like, Hey, can you come train our maintenance technician to work on this fitness equipment? I was like, uh, sure. Uh, so you want me to train our replacement? Yeah, sure. That's fine. Whatever. I mean, I get it. We'll help you. Um, But we get there and he's like this young kid, and he's like, I just took a bunch of Xanax. I'm like, really? This is a guy that they're training? Like, good lord, that's rough. So yeah, it's a problem, man. These businesses are struggling to find good people, to find good technicians, you know. So yeah, we'll see how it turns out. And for me, it's like, at the same time, I'm trying to solve a problem in my own business. Um, you know what I mean? Where like, I need a good training program for my own business. You know what I'm saying? And for my, like, I'm good at training technicians and we, we have a lot of good technicians, but I don't have a real formal system and how to do that. So a lot of this stuff I'm doing is like, I'm in the same struggle as everybody else, you know what I'm saying? Like just trying to solve those problems and then hopefully solve them for other people, you know what I'm saying?

Yeah, you definitely need like a nice core training program and then, you know, putting them out in the field. It's just like, well, the chemical plant world again, like we translate, I mean, stuff that would kill you instantly. There's a couple of stuff that we did was, I mean, you were suited up to the nine, and you can't breathe it in or you're dead. And, uh, the training that's crazy with them. Oh yeah. The training programs for them were, I mean, I've worked with the SH and E staff and they were very, very detailed. Um, and I was on the training staff and it's just like, that's one thing like I like to see too. It's like, you know, building that out. Cause like now, like when I'm training my technicians, it's just like, field experience there with me, you know, and, and the car and the cross equipment isn't too complicated, but yet I want it done in a standardized way. So that's like one thing that I do been doing too over the past six months is building my SOP book, you know, pictorial and then going to video. Um, it's just, it's, it's a lot of work.

Yeah, it is. It's good. You're doing that now. So I'm, I'm just now doing that stuff. It's flying by the seat of my pants for, well, my first business, Metro Fitness Repair went out of business.

Yeah. I remember hearing you say that on the podcast.

Yeah. Because I was just so undisciplined and did not care.

Really? Yeah. I was young too, but, um, right.

But yeah. So, but yeah, no, that's good. You're getting that stuff done now. And, uh, what's your vision, man? What's your vision for your business for the future?

I'm trying to rapidly expand through the East Coast, especially with just the CrossFit gyms, keep growing the CrossFit gym model. Getting in the commercial world, I like to, especially just here in the Jacksonville area, kind of get into that and kind of take over that area. And then I have a potential gym maintenance startup in Salt Lake City. Nice.

Yeah, yeah. What's up?

That's across the way. That's the way. What's that? How are you going to do that?

Well, so I have my very close cousin that is an extremely gifted mechanical engineer that wanted to get into it. And then the one easy way to get into it is just to slowly get into it. And because you can kind of just kind of like you can self-regulate it, really. A lot of gym owners are looking for the need of it and then some aren't. So it's just something slowly to slowly start it up and then see where it goes from there. I don't have a lot of overhead, which is nice for my business. That really helps out. I don't have a bunch of trucks on the road. I don't have a massive payroll and all that stuff. So it makes it nice. It makes it little bit easier to, I think, scale a bit, control scale, I'll call it.

Yeah, for sure. Man, yeah, that's, uh, it's crazy. Like, yeah. Oh man, I kind of want to go back. Sometimes I think about like, it's really nice and it's just me, me, one other guy by myself.

That's a lot less stress, but I don't know.

Um, so yeah, man, um, what, how long have we been going here? Oh, we've been going about 30 minutes. Um, I don't want to keep you too long. I'm sure we could, we could go and go, go. Oh yeah. Um, what, um, where can people find you? Where can people connect with you? You got a website you, uh, are on. I know you're on social media, everything like that. Yeah.

I'm while in the group, I'm James young. Um, my social media, my Instagram is Jim maintenance nine Oh four. I put out a bunch of stuff in there. I'm in, I'm usually on Instagram a lot. I am not great with Facebook messenger. I've always, yeah, I always forget about checking it. And usually when I go in there, it's like 900 things from my dad that's just like a typical boomer, just like sending me stuff all the time. Sorry, guys. It's just like, gosh, dad, it's like, share this or you're going to die in the next 24 hours. I'm like, yeah, dude, I love that.

I love it. Uh, I don't, I don't do as much on Instagram. I probably should.

Uh, I think that's one big tip for everybody in our community is I can't remember the one guy who puts out amazing social media as a social media person. Um, you interviewed him. Where's he out of Oklahoma or Texas? He has an awesome one. He does.

Oh, Dylan. Yeah, he has a talent. Yeah, dude. He's got like a social media team that follows him around.

He's killing it.

Yeah. Yeah. That dude's great. Yeah. I like what he's doing a lot, man. Love to get to that.

Another Hermosi fan.

Oh, yeah. There's probably a lot of us out there.

Yeah, there is.

He's real, real big right now. And he's kind of in the gym space, too. Yeah. Cool, man. Well, I really appreciate you taking time on your weekend to hang out and talk. Yeah. And look forward to many more conversations and what you got going on and hopefully working together in some different ways. And yeah, just continue. I appreciate all your your input and participation in the group and stuff too. I mean, it just, it's really nice to, I wasn't, I didn't know how that would work, how that would take off. Like, and it really has taken off and there's people, a lot of people joining, a lot of people are like, wow. you know, that's cool. Uh, people are finding it and I'm not even really putting it out there anymore. And people are, it's kind of spreading. So that's, that's cool, man.

Um, yeah, I think you have a lot, there's a lot of collective knowledge. There's a lot of experience in that chat. And I think that's fine. I just want to like, like say like, there's a lot of like, us out there that are looking to learn from all of you guys, too. So it's like I like, I think recently, I don't know what it was. It was somebody's post that they were just like something that they found or know something that they were struggling with on a treadmill or something like that. And that kind of information is so useful in that chat. Yeah, it is, man. You know, it's just like it's like a bit of just like schooling right in that chat that you just click through and read through.

You can literally go in there and ask any question and I guarantee you'll get some good answers for. Oh, yeah. People are more than willing to help. A lot of people are more than willing to help. We're gonna keep the culture of that group. We'll make sure that it's not, that stuff doesn't get in. Cause I really wanted to keep it. Because man, when I started like, it sucks when you don't have anybody to get in. You don't have mentors or anything like that. You don't have anybody you can go to that, you know, like everybody wants to be secretive and the manufacturers are real territorial and they only want to let this person in or that person in. It's like, it's difficult, man. So, But yeah, so I wanna keep it going that way and help some of the new guys coming in, avoid all the BS mistakes that I've made, you know what I mean? And then there's everybody else who's got great businesses and are more than willing to share their struggles and their successes, you know what I mean? So, yeah.

No, it's definitely really helpful. And I appreciate everybody, appreciate you for putting that together.

Yeah. And don't be afraid to share, you know, the real shit you're going through, because a lot of, you know, there's other people that just started, you know, years ago or whatever, like, that's good stuff that people sometimes hard to share about, you know, stuff like that. Like, Oh, dang, man, I don't want people to know that I'm fucking up here. You know what I mean? So, but that's good. I mean, we need to see that stuff and then, um, you know, so, um, Yeah. Well, and it gives us the chance to see problems where they're at and then, and then try to solve those problems rather than you just being out there on your own or us, us being out there on our own, uh, trying to figure shit out that we have no idea how to figure out, you know? Yeah. Um, so good stuff, man. I appreciate it. Um, and I'll, um, let you get going. So, Yeah, we'll talk more, man. Thanks for coming on.

I appreciate you having me on and until next time.

Yeah, for sure, man.

Have a good Sunday. You too.

Thanks so much for tuning into this episode. We sure do appreciate it. If you haven't done so already, make sure you're subscribed to the show wherever you consume podcasts. This way you'll get updates as new episodes become available. And if you feel so inclined, please leave us a review until next time, friends.