Peach Perfect: Cultivating Success at the Roadside Stand with Shannon

Speaker 1: 0:04

Hello and welcome to Underdogs, bootstrapers and Game Changers. This is for those of you that are starting with nothing and using business to change their stars, motivating people who disrupted industry standards. This is the real side of business. This isn't Shark Tank. My aim with this podcast is to take away some of the imaginary roadblocks that are out there. I want to help more underdogs, because underdogs are truly who change the world. This is part of our Content for Good initiative. All the proceeds from the monetization of this podcast will go to charitable causes. It's for the person that wants it. Hello and welcome to another episode of Underdogs, bootstrapers and Game Changers. So excited I got another great guest for you. Usually, we have a theme or we have an amazing story that shows you how well you can make it with nothing the ultimate bootstrapper. We've got another Bootstrapper tale today and I'm going to talk to Shannon about her story because she can tell it better than I can. Welcome, shannon, glad to have you here.

Speaker 2: 1:11

Yeah, thanks for having me. Super excited to chat with y'all.

Speaker 1: 1:15

Yeah, absolutely. There's sometimes a theme to our podcast where we're trying to hit one certain topic, but then there's some stories where we just need to like, hey, you can get out of this, like, I don't need $100,000. I don't need a business plan, although I think you should write your idea down, we'll get to that on more episodes. You don't need the fancy VC firm to get started and do something amazing. And so, with that being said, tell me about Shannon, tell me about the way you got into peaches.

Speaker 2: 1:45

Yeah, absolutely so. I'm actually a trained librarian, believe it or not, awesome. I got my master's degree in the 90s, went on to work for newspapers. I was an in-depth investigative researcher for a daily newspaper. And from there I went into all kinds of fun, exciting stories. So I really got into the power of the press, you know, back when it still was power of the press and there were newspapers. But I just I got a real love for learning and investigating and getting out there and kind of just figuring things out for myself. From there I went on to do marketing and copywriting for a very long time, worked for lots of trade journals and went into business with my family. They had a software development company and from there I got the privilege to work with about 3,000 convenience stores All over the US and these were mom and pop convenience stores who were really trying to make it in the face of these ginormous, big branded, you know convenience stores, gas stations setting up on the corner. So I got a love for just the hyper-local business. And hyper-local that's like a three to five mile radius, and so you're drawing from the neighborhoods you know to come into your location. And from there I really started looking at what other hyper-local businesses would make great opportunities as startups. So if you're a family, if you're a college student, if you're a solopreneur, like what opportunities are out there? And from the convenience store business I started to really investigate cash-based businesses, and these are business models that typically have not, like, transcended or, you know, come over to the 21st century in their business practices. You know a lot of these folks are still doing spreadsheet accounting. They're totally cash-based. You know, it might just be one or two family members that are working the business, and what am I talking about? I'm talking about, like, vending machine, coin-out businesses. So vending machines, laundromats, car washes. You know all of these classic cash-based businesses. they're still in the last century and I had a friend of mine who was from South Carolina and he said you have got to come out and learn the peach business. He said this as a reseller at Peach Stands all across South Carolina. We are making an absolute killing and I thought isn't that business model dead? I mean Farm Stands, roadside Stands, that's so Route 66. You know, that's so 1960s, 1970s. People aren't doing that anymore. And he's like no, you're so wrong. So, all right. Finally, I was going through a personal transition in 2013 and had an opportunity take the summer, go to South Carolina and do an internship, if you will, you know an apprenticeship and I visited the orchards the peach orchards in that state that are predominantly still mom and pop owned. These orchards are going on third generation, so I got to meet with families. I got to spend time at the orchards. I got to learn the business from the ground up, like everything from planting a peach tree to the different varietals, to how they're sold, to how they taste. And then my friend said all right, now let's go set up these Peach Stands. So I got to work. He was running at the time, I think, five different, five different Peach Stands in South Carolina and these are semi permanent roadside stands. So basically it's a 10 by 20 tent. You set it up roughly Memorial Day, you take it down roughly Labor Day. So that's a peach season, memorial Day to Labor Day in the South. And what I learned is those daggum peach tents are ATM machines. You just have to decide how much money you want out of it. Plug that in and then it'll spit out the amount of labor, the amount of business, the number of peaches that you need to sell, and you will get that outcome. You will get that outcome at that cash. And it was the most amazing, eye-opening experience that I ever had out of something that most people thought was a dead business. And so that year, from doing that apprenticeship, I decided because I had a background in logistics in addition to marketing, that I wasn't going to do it small. I wasn't going to do no, five stands, I was going to do a hundred. And so I did. That summer I opened a hundred roadside stands and we were in three states Virginia, North Carolina and South Carolina and I learned everything to do wrong, which I did a ton of stuff wrong. But I also learned how to create a repeatable business blueprint and from there it took off. I had my blueprint and for the last 10 years that's all I've done and we now we do still teach families one-on-one, we teach college students, we teach side hustlers, we teach nonprofits, Anybody who wants to do a business that will make them relatively quick cash for big ticket items, and most of the time it's like college tuition. It may be a Disney family vacation now, because that's become a big ticket item, Could be a new car, it could be, you know, a down payment on a home. But families can make that kind of money just working together at one roadside stand over the course of a summer and it liberates people, it teaches them that you don't need, you know, 50 grand, 100 grand to go start a business. You can do this for $200. And at the end of the season be in such profit that you can pay, you know, an academic's year worth of college tuition.

Speaker 1: 8:05

What? What's the average that you make off one of these peach stands?

Speaker 2: 8:09

So an average peach stand if it is located in a really high traffic area, it should generate like a good peach stand should generate about $1,500 a week in profit. That's net profit. If it's really, if it's really kicking and doing good, it should generate between $2,500 and $3,000 a week in net profit.

Speaker 1: 8:35

Why did you start with $100 as opposed to starting with $1? Are you familiar with like the book the Lean Startup, where they talk about like really bringing the market fast? You know it's like why? Go 100 instead of starting with the one and seeing how that works. Could you tell me a little bit about that? I think.

Speaker 2: 8:51

I wanted to. I'm the type of person that I just jump out there and figure it out, and so, with the background I had from the convenience stores, understanding logistics and operations so that would be acquisition, delivery, right, fulfillment, breakage, you know, cleanup I understood how to deliver to several locations at once and I wanted to see if this was a scalable business, because I wanted I wanted to know personally if this was something that we could, just if you could only do one stand or five stands, or could you, as a big business, do 100, you know, and take this to where it's a new distribution model, right, because if you have a network of roadside stands all over the US, you have just created a distribution network from nothing. That didn't exist before. So that, really, that was my idea and it can be done At that level. It is a lot of labor and it's a lot of folks to make it happen and what's so cool. So you can scale up or scale down just depending on the labor that you have available to you. The startup revenue right, you can do one, stand for 200, or you can do 100, you know for 100 times that. So it just that's the beauty of it Scale up, scale down, do it seven days a week, do it only on the weekends. It truly is. You just decide at the beginning of the venture what you want out of it and you just work backwards, you plug all of that in and you'll come out with, you know, your business plan plus the revenue that you want to generate over whatever time frame you've allocated for your business.

Speaker 1: 10:39

So you start with 100. So you got a good chance to like. One thing I think that the audience can garner from this is you started with 100, most people would start with one right, especially somebody who doesn't have much money. And so tell me about that 100 and like if some of those had to have failed right. Like, oh, yes, stand, okay, yes, the percentage that failed out of that 100.

Speaker 2: 11:00

We found the attrition level was for every 10 locations, and this was true in the convenience store business as well. You know, sometimes you just don't know, it's a crapshoot. So for every 10 locations that we would set, six would be good. And out of that six, you know, three of them would be absolute winners, and then three would be good, and then four would be dogs and they would not meet the criteria that we set for profitability. So we would just pick them up, we would roll everything back into inventory and then we would just go find a new location to set. So we had, we had attrition that year. But that's a cool thing, right? It's a mobile, it's a mobile roadside stand. So basically you just fold that 10 up, tell the landlord, you know, thank you so much. And then just go on to the next location that you had negotiated for.

Speaker 1: 11:51

So audience out there that's called a pivot right. So she's like, and the nice thing is about the model that she's telling you about, you're going to start with one, probably right, but just know, like you hear the percentages, like there's a chance you could have that one, that's the dog you know. Now you got to adjust that dog and like in your expertise that's usually location right Is also the employee you have working at the stand. Is that another variable or is that like more of a fixable variable?

Speaker 2: 12:18

The employee, the people you have in the stand are very fixable. I would say your number one, your number one criteria is going to be where you're located, because the customer base for a roadside stand, I would say 80% of the traffic is impulse. They don't know you and so they're only stopping because they saw a big banner right that said fresh peaches or watermelon or, you know, tomatoes, whatever they saw, they're going to do a U turn and come right back. So you have to have a good high traffic area with massive visibility, because 80% of the customer base is impulse. Now I want to say, even 10 years later, I still get it wrong sometimes. I mean, you know, even last season we had some dogs and so we just packed up and moved on to the next location and it's. You know you don't want to take it personal, but sometimes we just can't anticipate. You know every outcome for a location. We think based on all of our criteria, we have a long list that we check off whenever we are vetting a location. You know we doesn't meet all this criteria and yes, it does and one of those criteria would be, like traffic counts. So we actually monitor Department of Transportation for car counts in a given intersection or roadway and so we have a threshold and we say okay yeah, this is going to be great, you know. But you know, then something happens, like last summer, the city decided to tear up the roadway and they blocked Ingress, egress from one of our locations, and so we were like, oh man, so we just had to pack up and move on to a different location, and we'll try to revisit this year. Construction is still going on, but we'll see. We'll see how it shakes out.

Speaker 1: 14:06

So the episodes always tell me what we're supposed to talk about and it's rather interesting and so, like and I'm keep coming back to this the person starting with one stand, you started with 100. So it gives us a really good data insight on like, because you could have gone out there only apported one, and what if you chose your dog and gave up, right? And so the point I want to break home into the audience is it's still a good business model, right, she's successful with it. If she could have had bad luck on her first location, said, oh man, this business doesn't work. Instead, we pivot and now there's ways that we can, like, assess this right. Where. Where are we going to go? Right, and one of the things in my mind is that, like genius on the data, right, it's like, where can we get some good data to judge the location? Because that's so imperative from the sound of it. And so, like traffic camps, right, or in any business you're thinking about starting, think about out of the box, right, how can I use a data set of some sort that might be available to now tweak that towards this little business that I'm starting, because still there's no way to know absolutely for certain if it's going to work or not, but with these data sets will help us a little bit. And then, like, recognizing the pivot quick, and I think that's what you've done. I really want to get back to like, I want to really lurk in the micro on some of these stands and I want you to tell me, like because the one stand person right, I wanted them to have a really good shot at the one standard, the one business or whatever. So tell me from from the data set of 100, 100 different employees, 100 different places, 100 different probably signs in the way they look. Tell me, like some key insights of like, oh man, when my one employee was amazing at selling peaches, they sold X. You know, because of the employee or the one employee or person that that business painted. The sign read wow, it blasted off. Can you give me like tiny little details like that on some of the absolutely like really made an impact?

Speaker 2: 15:49

Very quickly we discovered, totally by accident, that we had uniformity, a uniform look, a brand if you will. But we didn't have any signs out that said this is roadside republic or this is the peach stand. But we did have a very uniform look to our stands and so we always had white canvas tents. We always had red and white signs that said South Carolina peaches or Georgia peaches, you know what, whatever was in season or being harvested at that time. So we had number one, a very uniform look, without being officially branded. And so very quickly people began to recognize, oh, that white tent with those red signs, that's the peach people that we like. So, on accident, we had a uniform look and feel Now when a customer approaches. So all of the signs were uniform across all of our locations. And I tell that to people today who want to open their roadside stand is. You know, do a little bit of research, kind of reflect back to farm stands of old. So from the 60s and 70s, you know what were these farm stands, what was the look, what was the feel, what was the vibe, an attempt to recreate that for your own roadside stand. And so, once we kind of had the look down, then we moved to the experience. So what is the experience we want the consumer to have once they come up to the stand? And that was all about the people working there and how we trained them. And you know, secondarily of course it's about the product, which would be the peaches, but most importantly it's about the people there. So we developed I did as a writer, a marketer I developed something I call storytelling selling and we trained everybody who came to work with us. Because the value of the product is in the story that you tell. And that means if you can tell a great story about what you're selling, you can increase the perceived value of the product in the consumer's mind. So we never match the grocery store in terms of price for our products, because we don't want to be. We want to do a pattern interrupt and we want to break that association of the roadside stand with the grocery store. So we rarely have people anymore asking us well, why do you charge so much for your product? The grocery store is charging this. Well, no, it's a whole different ball game, it's a different experience. So with storytelling selling we would, because I had spent so much time at the orchards. I knew the families. I knew the varietals of peaches that were being harvested. I knew the flavor profile right. I knew the pick date. I knew the care and storage and processing and cooking. I mean everything you could possibly know about that product. I would teach. And because we had so many employees, we were doing videos right to send out to people. So this is how you talk about what we're selling today and I would pop into all of the staff would have to learn the history and the story behind that peach and in doing so they could really engage the consumer in a conversation the consumers never had before, because you don't get that at a grocery store. They would not know that this is a July Prince peach and that it's now a cling-free peach. They wouldn't know that it's from Titan Farms in South Carolina. They wouldn't know that the flavor profile is this buttery, mild, sweet peach. And so educating everybody who worked for us in that type of engagement, customer engagement, created raving fans, I mean overnight. And then what happened is because everybody who worked for us was so engaging. You know, people are. They're not like behind the, they're not behind the table in the back of the tent, people are out front to create an experience right from the get-go. So they're greeting people as they're getting out of their car and people consumers have this. They have this buy-in, this mindset already, because there's such a iconic memory around farm stands in the US. People are very sentimental about the experience and they approach it already happy. So all we have to do at that point is just talk to them about their experience. So most of the time a customer will come to one of our stands, they'll spend 20 minutes telling us about their childhood, about their experiences on the farm, about their experiences at a roadside stand, and basically all we have to do at that point is just sit back, take their money and tell them to have a wonderful day. It is the easiest sell you can imagine.

Speaker 1: 20:56

I mean, if they don't get that at home, she's not selling a peach, she's selling nostalgia right. Even me, who didn't really grow up in that, or, although I remember a little bit families, all from Michigan, I remember the sweet corn on the side of the road. Yes, a little bit of farm memory there, but even more so for the adult generation. And so, like, what she's really doing well here is telling you how to create an experience Like, can you create an experience with a peach? Yes, I mean the best one we could probably come up with, and maybe you can help me here. My best thing that I can think of is Walt Disney, right, and the Disneyland experience. Everything is. I mean, say what you want about the Disneyland parks and stuff. They put the trash underneath the road so you don't see any trash. Everybody has to smile, everybody goes through this like concept of training to provide the amazing customer experience. It's all with a thought process in mind that we're here to make the customer have a wonderful day, and when you put that in the people's soul that are working for you, just like you did, was telling the story of nostalgia. Now you have an experience, right, yes, and like, let's say, even your pricing was the same, more doesn't matter. It's like we will pay more for an experience, especially in this country. I mean you could use restaurants as a great example. If we go into a restaurant right now and it's boring, we'll pay a price for a good food or whatever. We go into a restaurant and it's an experience. The chef comes out and shakes your hand. You know like he's growing vegetables in the backyard, that, like are producing all these flavors and stories. And it's like you can create an experience in any business, even if it's a power washing business, even if it's a, you know, like landscaping business, a peach business is like understand experience creates huge value. And that's like a part that, like I love of what you're talking about. I want to talk about how do you you know, like your first person out there, like bootstrapping is going to be incredible at their job. Right, they're going to care. Right, we're going to care about the business more than anybody else. We're going to tell those stories. It's like you're like they're not people making a hundred thousand dollars a year that are working these stands. You know it's like how do you choose people, especially like at these? You know entry level, like jobs, like how do you choose people that are going to do a good job for you and represent your brand and your story and your experience accordingly?

Speaker 2: 23:13

I like you know we. Whenever I put out the call every season I put out on social media and where I live in Fort Worth people know us, they know me as the peach lady. So I put out a call. You know season's going to start in a month or so and if you're interested in a position or if you're interested in learning the business, you know let's get together. And then I have these meetings where people from the community will come in and sometimes it's like 20 people. You know where we sit down and I get to talk to them a little bit one-on-one, so I can gauge their you know their human connection. You know, are they extroverts? Are they introverts? What is the reason that they want to do this business? And it doesn't matter to me what any their experience has been prior. That's not really relevant. I just want to know what kind of human you know they are and are they truly excited to engage with other people? Because that's part of the Sorry are these employees or partners?

Speaker 1: 24:16

I just want to clarify for the audience. Are you hiring employees or are they partner with you on like basically their own business within the stand?

Speaker 2: 24:23

Both, both.

Speaker 1: 24:25

Okay.

Speaker 2: 24:25

We do both, and I have simultaneous business models going on today, that's, the business has evolved that way, but over the years it was strictly contractors, right, who are coming in to do, you know, a temporary, a seasonable job, and we pay really well. I mean, in our stands, these people get 20 bucks an hour to sell peaches, which is not bad. Plus, on top of that, they earn, you know, tips, and so it's perfect for teachers on summer break, college students, families. You know, a lot of times families will work together, so I may get moms with small kids who want a summer job. Bring those kids along to the stand. I mean, it's a true family environment and an opportunity to make income but also be with your kids at the same time. Because I've been there, I've been the mom, my son who's? now 21, is my business partner. He was with me since 11 years old in the stands learning how to do this and so. I totally, I totally get wanting to be with your kids all the time. So I gauge just the you know outward enthusiasm of folks. Can they tell a story? Because it comes down to, can you engage another human being in conversation? And if you can and if you're willing to learn, let's go. You know everybody deserves a chance and I will work with every person in the stand for like a day or my son will and we go through, you know, massive amounts of training and then from there they get to run their own stand for the summer.

Speaker 1: 26:03

Do you see a difference between the partners and the employees? You have two different business models, right, do you? Do you notice a difference in the two different? What do you want to say? Partnerships, employees. I'm curious like does one work harder than the other? Does one care about the other? The?

Speaker 2: 26:21

partners for sure. So what I find is we have so many college kids now and high school students who work the stands with us that some of the partners are going to be a little bit older. They may be moms and dads, right, who are opening their own stand, partnering with me to open their own business over the summer, and a lot of times they might be. I've had parents and their kids who will partner with me to open their own stand so that they can earn money for select volleyball, because you know all of these select sports opportunities. Clubs are so expensive. So the parents will have a summer stand to pay for these select sports, for example, or, like I said, a Disney vacation. So in those circumstances the parents are way more attentive. I mean, I love the college kids and all of our customers love engaging with college students because they have great conversations about where are you going to school? What are you going to study. Let me give you advice on, you know, when my kids went to school. But the college kids sometimes I'll show up to the stands and they will not be as tidy, you know, quite as neat in their stand etiquette as I would like them to be. So you know we have to go through, or they've got their guitars up there. Sometimes I come up to the stand and the kids have got their guitar which I love, you know and they're playing. Or there may be five other kids sitting in the stand, you know, and so they're having a great time and, you know, engaging with everybody that comes to the stand. But there is a little more training sometimes. That goes on in those circumstances where the partners are very neat, very attentive to breaking down boxes. And if you have waste you know, rotten peaches for example what do you do with that? You know we have to take care of all the waste and trash and disposal.

Speaker 1: 28:08

Have you just out of curiosity I want to get us to off topic on this but have you found a decent way to take care of the waste in a manner that's like good for the environment or good for animals or nice offset? Yeah, how do you?

Speaker 2: 28:18

Yes, yeah, so we have a tremendous amount of cardboard which we recycle, we recycle, we recycle everything. And now the waste. So say, we have rotten peaches. I say rotten. They're not necessarily rotten, but they're overwrite right. Yeah, we call them mash in the business. So I end up selling the mash to all of the canners, the jelly makers, the preserve folks, ice cream. Here in town we have a lot of retail stores that make ice cream and custard. Yeah, peach tea. So we sell all of that, so none of it goes in the garbage anymore. It's all recycled or upcycled to other processors who are going to use it to make goodies.

Speaker 1: 29:08

I love when the waste becomes a business in itself. And so my grandpa, who I didn't know very well apparently he used to do something with lumber. They chopped trees and stuff down, but then also something with ice. They'd cut ice. That was back in the day where you cut ice, so they used the lumber shavings to actually protect the ice and insulate it. And so then at the same time, I guess they had butcher shops, so they were using the butcher shop too, and it's like all these synergies between businesses. The found one in the peach business. So not everybody's going to get in their peach business, obviously. So let me have you help me with new bootstrapping entrepreneurs out there and how they can start any kind of business using some of the principles you learned from starting peach stands.

Speaker 2: 29:58

Yes, Today there is such a huge opportunity for all types of products and services. So there is this return to handmade goods, artisan goods, handmade jams and jellies and all locally sourced products.

Speaker 1: 30:18

So what I'm seeing.

Speaker 2: 30:19

What I'm seeing pop up all over the US are these. Of course, we still have farmers markets, which are becoming more and more and more prevalent, but we have these craft markets, artisan markets and shopping markets, and so these are organized pop-up events, particularly mostly on a weekend, where you might have anywhere from 20 to 100 different vendors. So people show up with their little 10 by 10 tents. They have secured their spot. They pay their booth fee, which sometimes can be as low as $25. Depending on the event and the promotion that's gone on in advance of the event, you know that fee could be as high as I've paid. You know $500, $1500 if it's a huge festival, for example, but most of the fees are super reasonable. We're talking less than $50. So you get set up and the organizer has done the hard work for you. They are pulling in. You know foot traffic to shop, and so it's everything from soap makers to. You know people pickling pickles and okra to. I see a lot of people who are doing potted plants and succulents and flowers. You have people who sell thrifted goods t-shirts. You know upcycled purses, cowboy boots, sunglasses I mean anything you can think of you will find now at one of these pop-up markets and on any given weekend here in DFW there must be 30 of these pop-ups going, going on. And so for somebody who, who wants to get started in a small incremental way you know you acquire your inventory. So say you want to do peaches and peaches go gangbusters. At any of these shopping markets you can buy $200 worth of peach product. You know you pay your fee $25, $40 To the organizers. You have a table and a stand or Maybe a banner, and that's all you need. Maybe a bag, you know, to put peaches in as you sell them, but that's it. You could, you can do it for as little as that. And and if you're open every day the week or if you're doing subsequent markets, you just keep snowballing or rolling that profit back into the next day's inventory. So if you start with $200 worth of product, you're going to sell through it. Now You've got five or $600 right, probably about $600. So you take, you take that part of it or all of it, you roll it into your next Load of inventory and you sell through that and by the end of a week, if you've done this seven days, you're going to not only be in profit, have your inventory startup. But now you'll have the capital you need to Go buy a fancy tent, go buy tables, buy all of your supplies and materials that you need to create the experience you want to have. So you can start out small and you don't have to worry about how you know snappy your tent looks or you know you have there. Yeah, you don't have to have the right banners you can have an umbrella and a chair.

Speaker 1: 33:37

Yes, Absolutely and you can you can.

Speaker 2: 33:40

You can hand write a sign. I've done it. And in fact, consumers Again, it's that sentimentality, you know they're like I'm doing. My part is Jane and Joe consumer, because I can see this little guy. He's out here hustling selling peaches under an umbrella and it's 105, I'm going to stop and buy $50 worth of peaches and watermelons and tomatoes and they go away feeling so Happy because not only do they have a really good product, but they've done their part as a consumer. They've helped Jane and Joe, who are the local business entrepreneur who were hustling for a dollar, and so it's a win for the farm who grew the products, it's a win for Jane and Joe and it's a win for the consumer. Everybody walks away happy.

Speaker 1: 34:28

You know and that I'm gonna I'm sorry underdogs we got to go there a little bit because, like this is where we get into like my waters and my life. You know, these days it's like one of the things that we do here. I have a small business tech company and we're basically the big brothers for small business and, as such, we pay attention to a lot of the regulations that are going on. We pay attention to a lot of like what's going on with small business in general and it is my personal hope and feeling that people are ready to buy small again. And you're actually giving me a lot of that, like you're backing me up here, because a lot of folks out there don't know, small business is a rated decline. It's in the worst status it's ever been in. I don't care what they're telling you, because the Percentage of the GDP in 1950 was 79 percent. Small business it's 45 percent in declining right now. And so I believe, like you're saying, that people want to buy small again. I think they want to hear the story. I think they want to have the experience. What are your thoughts? And I don't want to get too far off from helping the underdogs, but what are your thoughts being boots on the ground about how you feel that America is ready to help small business again.

Speaker 2: 35:32

Oh my gosh, people, consumers, are hungry. You can feel it. It's palpable when, in any of our locations that we have, people are desperate. They are. I get so much feedback when can I go to get local? Where can I go to purchase this? And these trade crafts are in decline. So we have all of these millennials, we have Gen Z and, and it is a a return to this grassroots Lifestyle. This you know consumption of let's go local rather than, yeah, ops or national, and, and I would say, pride, millennials and Gen Z are really pushing it, but what they're they know, you know you know, what they're hungry for is that it's a trade. It's a trade craft, it's an artisan craft that is in decline and not being taught to younger generations. And so I will have lines of young people, you know, that are that are at my booth to buy peaches or tomatoes or whatever, and they don't know how to grow anything and all they want to do is be part of that local you know transaction, that local cycle. They want to support as much local as they can. So that hunger, that desire, that consumer Investment, that disposable income is there and we haven't even I would say we haven't even tapped it yet. The hunger is so much there.

Speaker 1: 37:04

I guess that's why I wanted to go there too is like because somebody's at home right now thinking, well, I can't compete with the grocery store in my corn cobs or my peaches or whatever, and it's like I think they're ready. I actually think we're gonna have a resurgence back if, if people really pay attention to having the small butcher shops again when you can go in and talk to the butcher and get like good customer service, the experience you know, like right next door to the bread guy that has spent second generation bread, you know, just like we see in Europe Yesterday year, I think we're ready to brawl it out with the big Big box stores again, and not only that, but like look at what the big box spores are doing to us. You know they're getting all together now. They're increasing our prices across the board. It's gonna get to the point now where we're better off going in our backyard to grow vegetables because they're going so expensive, you know or supporting the little guy that's just trying to do it, you know, to feed his family. I actually want to mention one quick thing around this too, because I want to back you up on, like what's going on with your peaches, my cousins, we have an s ancestral family farm and, kind of an interesting story great great grandpa, or whatever, was running away from a war in Germany and he came over to the US and then the Civil War was going on. He got stuck into the Civil War conscripted and they couldn't pay him and so instead of paying him, in the end they gave him a plot of land in Michigan and I can't remember the exact details but it ended up going from like a thousand acres to now They've got thirty thousand. Cousin of mine, and one of the things they do they they're so good with their, their land they do they milk cows, you know, and one of the things they do on their land is they have they planted sunflowers and Kids actually mine the sunflower fields, they take care of them and people will come by just to take pictures or to have lunch in the sunflower field and that's actually put every single one of their kids through college. Yes, you know and so like it seemingly is small folks. But it's like amazing, like where something can go like to your, to your points, like one peach, right, get out there and go to the farmers market with your one peach, or one hat, your piece of jewelry. You know it's like, try it out. You know like, and then that's the lean startup approach too. You know it's like, you try it right. What are people liking firsthand? Don't just guess, you know. Don't go guessing in the marketplace and be like I'm gonna create this widget, I'm gonna go out and get a loan and create a million of them. Why? You know, I don't care how much money you have. Why wouldn't you start at the farmers market a little bit, if that's your intended audience, and try a couple out at a time Get exactly your feedback right. What's helping you sell that peach that day? I told the story this way one day and I'm not saying ever to lie, I'm just saying, like, what part of the story do people love? What part of the experience to people love and then use that daily right and like I, you know I, I love that because I think people want an experience in all their purchases. They want to know, and that's what I love about the younger generation too. To your point, it's like they want to know who they're buying from. Right. We don't want to buy from the corporate beer crowd anymore. That's no good for the world. We want to buy for something that means something. So make your business mean something too. You know it's like be on a mission, you know, and not only that, but it helps you not quit. You're on a mission like. I'm hearing your mission, whether you've defined it or not, you probably have your, your savvy lady. Your mission is to bring back that nostalgia of yesteryear. You know You're selling peaches, you're making money, but I think your enjoyment is in like that nostalgia, bringing back that good old, like feeling and that like American dream Small business, bringing people into that. That's probably around your why and you know it's like, no matter how hard your hundred shops might have been in the first, you know A couple years to figure out. It's like if you can stay strongly I know why you're doing this. You know it's like it's the no quit part and I say that a lot on this podcast you will absolutely succeed 1000%. You just can't quit right. If you had started one stand and you would land it on that one stand and happen to be that one bad area that you didn't know, you could have quit Right, but your mission was bigger. You made your mission bigger. You know it's like so find the pivot, it can work. You know. Find the better story. You know, help me add to this because I know you feel what I'm talking about.

Speaker 2: 41:05

Yeah, absolutely. And in addition to that, I would add that you know, as a small entrepreneur, you don't have to do everything at once. I did do everything at once, but I didn't do everything at once. I took one segment, one business model and started with that, which was the in-store right the roadside peach stand. Now, as I've evolved over 10 years, I have pivoted the business a little bit each year and you don't have to do it all at once. You can grow year after year after year. There is time to refine your business model, there is time to grow, there is time to try new things. So you know, giving an example, last year I started doing delivery here in DFW, so I added delivery services so people could go online. They would know what we had, for example, what was being harvested that week. We would put together what we call the Rody Farm Box for them. Customers would order, and these orders are not cheap. I mean people are spending, you know, anywhere from $65 to $100 on a farm box. I mean that's a pretty good cart value Plus they're paying a very small delivery fee. And then they're tipping the kids, because these are all college kids that are doing these services, so that a delivery service is something that I added last year. That was the very first time I'd ever done it and I had been thinking about it for two years, but I wasn't ready to expand because I just I didn't have all of the pieces in place yet. So I guess I want to say there are so many things you can add on to your business and grow your business and try different things, but you don't have to do it all at once. Perfect, perfect, the one thing first. So perfect that roadside stand. Whether you're selling peaches or sunglasses or cowboy boots doesn't matter. Perfect that. Know your product, know your story inside and out. Grow your customer base, because you will find it is so easy to get raving fans who will follow you anywhere. When you are that local and you are that engaging and you let people know my mission is to be here and serve the community, not just to serve my wallet, but to serve the community. It's very easy for people to fall in love with you and what you do.

Speaker 1: 43:31

You know, simplicity of product is another thing I want to stick on. It's like so good to great. The book talks about the hedgehog concept, right, really focusing in on what you want to be good at and like pigeonholing in on that. But another thing for bootstrapers let me bring that around to them is when you have one product, guess what, it's really easy to pay attention to that one product, what your costs are on that product, what you're making on that product, what your margin is on that product. It allows you as a new business person to actually be less of a business person. Now a lot of people want to go out there and they want to have 10 items, 15-hour items. You know I deal with this all the time actually. And then, like I don't want to get off on an accounting discussion too much, but when you bulk a bunch of different types of items into your sales sheet on your P&L and you bulk a different, a bunch of different items into your crossing goods which 90% of the population does they don't delineate GL accounts. Now you have no clarity. I guarantee you have a couple of product items in there that are making money, losing money. One's probably supporting the whole business for these loser ones that have no margin on them. But when you start with a simple product like a peach, you know the peach costs you a dollar, right. You know you're selling it for $2. You know your margin. Believe it or not? That's like half the battle Now. It's like you sit out there long enough. You're like well, my tent cost me this, my employee cost me that. You know now you put that together, but since you have simplicity of one product, is that margin enough to cover all the overhead too? You know you'll really get your numbers quickly. This is like starting business with like training wheels in a way, because you can really pigeonhole in that. So don't think you have to start with like going to a stand and having 18 different products. You're going to learn better business in that one product and those are the businesses that I see the most successful from the start. And it's not a, it's a lesson I learned the hard way because I had a bunch of products right and like. When I really got into where I learned accounting and everything else, I realized I had some products that did really well for me and I had some products that were losing me money, but I didn't know how to see those back then. One product you can see it right away. It'll teach you business, and then you know you could graduate on. I don't know, are you ever selling two products at a stand these days?

Speaker 2: 45:35

Yes, the business has evolved, so I want to confirm what you're saying. We call it choice overload. And when you have too many choices, consumers they kind of, you know, they they reel back a little bit and then they're, you know, they're indecisive about what they want, and that gives them more opportunity not to buy. So we, we keep our choices very small for that reason, thank you for staying there.

Speaker 1: 46:01

Yeah, yeah, I mean, six different brands of peach is not going to really sell anymore, or less. You know it's not gonna bring more peep sales.

Speaker 2: 46:08

Right. So what we've done. So choice overload is huge. And then choice architecture. So we architect the choices we have in the stand so that they're all complimentary and it makes sense. So we will do upsells and downsells in the stand, and this is something else that I teach all the kids and they're like. So it's like, you know, salesmanship and marketing. So for the products that we do have, they are complimentary. So we'll have, say, our big sellers, our peaches, of course, watermelons and cantaloupe, and the reason is they all grow in Texas and everybody here loves them, but they're complimentary. So in here in Texas and in Michigan, by the way, michigan corn Amazing, I get it every year yeah. I order it, you know, by the, by the bushel, and actually we do a lot of pre-orders. A lot of people here will just Order big old bushels of corn. So we sell a lot of, we sell a lot of that corn. But, so we architect the choices so that they make sense and the consumer doesn't just buy a basket of peaches Because you know, you know, jane, you need a watermelon for this weekend Because it's got to be in the fridge for a couple of days to get icy cold, and then, while you're waiting on that, you're probably gonna go ahead and eat this peco scanaloupe. So the choices make sense together and so that you know, okay, well, I'll take all three, and so what? That's something that I teach everybody who works for us. But to your point, yes, we keep the choices very, very simple, not just for accounting, but so that the consumer doesn't get, you know, overwhelmed.

Speaker 1: 47:43

I mean, and you're hitting so this is economics, folks. She's talking about contra complementary products, right? So they'll come in the store for one thing and they'll end up leaving with something else because they compliment each other. It's like you go in for popcorn, you need butter with that popcorn, right? So that is a thing you know. But, like we, we go for different guidelines as bootstrappers, especially originally, and I try to give you, like, the easiest way to do it, and starting with a product is the best way. And then you add on, like to her point and now like, of course, they've got a peach and a watermelon, right, you're gonna make more money. They go together, they compliment each other. You know it's like, if you're gonna make a fruit salad, you're gonna want a bunch of these different things. You know it's like, so why wouldn't you want to sell more? Well, don't start off that way. You know, like she started off with peaches. You know, got that model down, and then you add some complexity, comp. You know, like you find some items that have synergy. You know it's like, and then you put those things together, right, and then like that simplicity in the early business, like I don't know to you, you probably look at a lot of businesses too. I find if they start with one product because the biggest problem is small business owners don't know their margin hands down, they don't know how to start with that. So if they start with too much stuff, too much going on, we're not knowing how to value their time, especially when they get an employee or something like that. That's where they mess up. You start with one product. You know usually they can, they can figure it out pretty quickly.

Speaker 2: 49:00

Yes, yeah, the accounting when we at the peach stand is super simple and we can still just spreadsheet it. We have. We used to be just all cash-based and we would do spreadsheets, but now, you know, we've moved to cashless payment systems and then we also do accept credit cards now and that's increased our business. We've just started accepting credit cards in the last, or debit cards in the last three or four years and that's increased our business by 40% by allowing credit card transactions.

Speaker 1: 49:31

Yeah, we're in the world that it's cash is dying, unfortunately, you know, so you have to have those. I would love for small business people to have a better way than paying 3% on every Harder in dollar they're making, you know, for them to do that. It's something I aim to change in this lifetime because it frustrates me. Why should the credit cards just sit there and make 3% of our hard-earned money? You know, but at this point to your point, it's still worth the necessary evil because you can sell more. You know you don't want it. Yes, you don't want to have somebody just walk away because you can't take that form of payment. Right absolutely the credit card stuff. When she added that beyond the cash, or is it really been upside?

Speaker 2: 50:05

It. It has been all upside. You know, occasionally I will get some charge backs from customers. But here's what's interesting, because of the reputation we've created and the interaction, the engagement, the authenticity we have with consumers, if I get a charge back, I can look up exactly who it was. I call them and I say hey, jane, I see you're doing a charge back. Can you please let me know what happened? You know how can we make you happy? Because our goal that's it. There's no other reason for us to be here is to make sure the consumer is happy. And you know, a lot of times it will be like well, I didn't like that watermelon I got. I'm like, oh my gosh, jane, oh, you know, that's super simple. Come back tomorrow and we'll give you a couple more to try on us. So it's it's it's not lack of communication, but it's it's old mindset from the consumer. A lot of time you know why we might get a charge back and what I found is because of the relationship we have, I'm able to reach out with every person. It's really rare that this happens. I mean, I've probably had had it happen maybe five times in the last four years, so it's not real often, but we're able to resolve it. So it's there's been no, no downside, it's just been a huge boon to the business.

Speaker 1: 51:24

You know, and that's another good point. So most people know what a charge back is. But basically when you, when the consumer, takes something and then they go home and they decide something was wrong with it, so they call their credit card and they say, hey, I didn't pay for this or I didn't get what I want, and then what that does is the small business usually loses that money. You know there's ways that you can get around that, like there's paperwork you can have, like you have to make them sign something that they were delivered this and that sort of stuff. So you can't protect that and with you higher-end item people. You got to do that. Right, you can't have charge backs like that because people will use it as a form of robbery and extortion. But the other point I want to get to that you're making very, very well is that is an opportunity, right, because you went from a charge back client that would never come in again to you, called them personally. You said, hey, what went on? You know? And then, like, come back in, I will take care of you. Those clients, when you have those issues, if you'll allow them, will become your best clients in business Because you've now, you know, like any time there's an issue, you have an opportunity to lose that client and put them out there with a red flag hating you forever, or you have an opportunity to make it right and they will be your best client after that. Back me up with that, because I know you've. Oh my gosh.

Speaker 2: 52:34

Yeah, we call it taking what is a Valley experience. So you know they're down in the valley to a peak experience. So and and I empower every single person who works in the stands that if there's any complaint less than Static, you know satisfaction with what we're selling to just give them more of that. So I'm trying to break that Pattern in the consumer's mind that we don't care, like we're the seller, right, we're Walmart, we're the grocery store, we don't care that you got bad peaches, too bad for you, you know you just lost that income, absolutely not.

Speaker 1: 53:13

Nothing you could do. You'll be back.

Speaker 2: 53:19

Every consumer, so everyone in the stand, is empowered to take control of that experience and turn it into a peak experience. So they're like oh my gosh, jane. Well, gosh, I'm so sorry that that happened. Let's set you up with something else. What, what are you interested in today? First of all, let's replace those peaches. And then, oh my gosh, since you're trying that, you've definitely got to get a Pekos cantaloupe today. So try that on us, let us know what you think and and we'll see you next time. So just number one, seeing the customer where they're at. So you have to make them feel heard, seen and understood, and those are the three things that that I tell everybody who works for us. You've got to listen to them, you've got to Summarize what they're saying, repeat back to them, right, yes, I see you, I hear you, and let me see if I understand what the problem is and Then validate it and say, well, I'm sorry that happened. Here you go, try this. So in doing those three things, we increase the lifetime value of a customer. You know, tenfold easily.

Speaker 1: 54:26

Yeah, and you know that's kind of like a downside and upside to small business is like they won't go into Walmart expecting Walmart to do much, you know, because they usually won't. They're just like you'll be back, you know, but with if you allow it for small business, that's that's the thing. They never think we get a follow the same rules, you know, which I think is a little unfair, but at the same time, just look at it as like an opportunity. To your point, you know it's like. Look at it as an opportunity because that can become one of your biggest allies and I tell people all the time the sale that, yes, is only three percent of the business. The experience, you know, like taking care of the problem, like having a, a story you know, like all these things, that's the 97% of a sale, because if you do the 97% of the sale right, you'll never have to market. You know? I mean, I'm guessing you guys don't spend that much on marketing, right?

Speaker 2: 55:17

Um, we don't do. We really don't do any. I do some, you know, social media ads, but, and we do. We get local press, you know, from Newspapers and media outlets here. Yeah, so we do that, but, yeah, I don't do any print advertising. No, no door, you know, no mailers, no door hangers. We don't do any of that. And keep in mind, because 80% of our business is an impulse stop and so we don't have to spend that money on Advertising, which is another beautiful thing about this business, it's, yeah, 80% new customers every single day and then I would also Uh bad venture a guess at like your repeat clients are through the roof, like I would yes.

Speaker 1: 56:06

You make. You make that sale. You're gonna make another customer out of them.

Speaker 2: 56:10

Yes, yeah, they come back every season 50 grand for marketing.

Speaker 1: 56:14

I need a hundred grand to market my product. It's like you know what, go out there, work in the micro, make a couple allies and friends of your business that are tagging you in social Media that like yeah, I was telling one of my Uh business partners yesterday you treat people the right way, you put them through the right experience. They grab people by the hand and they bring them into your business. I've seen it over and over in my you know, in my years in business. It's like they will not allow somebody to go somewhere else. If you give them that amazing experience, like they'll literally drag people in by the hair, you know, and so like. So treat your customers Well. It's the best form of marketing. You know you have that opportunity. Um, unfortunately we're getting towards an hour already, which is crazy to me. I wanted to give you an opportunity to talk about anything in the world. Do you want to talk about, like, oh, you know what? Before we get to that, please tell me about how you're involving your business with the charity stuff. I think that's important.

Speaker 2: 57:08

Yes. So we um, we will partner with nonprofit organizations to do fundraisers. Um, one really popular fundraiser is pumpkin patches and we have partnered with nonprofits like churches in our area, the cities. We've done Kick uh Fall festivals For small cities, you know, within the dfw area, and so we set up we act as a broker in this case and we set up pumpkins, we acquire the inventory, we do the entire setup for the nonprofit and then we teach um, train the volunteers Of the organization on how to sell and, you know, run their little pumpkin patch business and then all of the you know, all of the income, all of the revenue goes back to the nonprofit and they have volunteers Right who are working for free and it's a win, win for everyone. You know they're only out the expense of the pumpkins that they sell. Um, and it's, it's a great. It's a great um destination for the community Because everybody wants a place to take their children and have again that sentimental experience. You know, to be connected and there's a ton of pumpkins that are growing in the state of texas. Most people don't know that. So to be connected with these pumpkin growers who are in texas, and you know the pumpkins come to the local church and so you can see these giant festivals set up and there'll be. You know, there's typically like pumpkin painting or face painting, apple bobbing, um, we set up vignettes for photo shoots for free so people can, you know, take their kids photos and the pumpkin patch and the scarecrows, but the church ends up making you know pretty decent or or the city or whatever the nonprofit may be. I'm a lot of um civic organizations will do this, fraternals, and I've worked with veterans organizations like the vfw or the am vets american legion, those types of things to to have these types of you know Um fundraising events and it's it turns out to be a great opportunity for them to get some revenue in the door but also Outreach to the community, because then they can tell the community about, um you know whatever scholarship programs that they're having or you know program, you know uh Programs that they may be doing, outreach wise within the community. So it's a win for everybody.

Speaker 1: 59:39

That's absolutely amazing and that's one of my favorite things in life is how, how for-profit businesses can actually be incredibly impactful for society, you know, and so, uh, I applaud your efforts there. Um, I want to give you a chance to uh talk about anything you got going on in your life that you'd like my audience to know, and I thank you so much for sharing the story today.

Speaker 2: 59:59

Yeah, yeah, absolutely. So you can find us at um wwwroadsiderepubliccom. In there on our website, you'll find more information about myself. And then my son, fin, who is my business partner. Like I said, he started selling peaches when he was 11 and now he's 21 and about to come home here soon for the the summer season and start selling peaches. But we um together, he and I, during co vid, we Took all of our knowledge and distilled it into video trainings, and so we have a ton of resources, both free and paid, for people who want to get into this type of business and um you can find it the information at roadsiderepubliccom? Um. And then we have a tick tock channel where we do a lot of behind the scenes content. We do a day in the life and you know, here are some of our strategies that we use. I just I give away you know tons of information there, so you can check us out on tick tock if you want roadside republic and follow our content there. Um, and we're also on facebook. I mean, we're on every social media channel. You just look for roadside republic and and we're there um sharing everything we know about the business.

Speaker 1: 1:01:13

That's absolutely amazing. Yeah, thanks so much for being here today. Thank you for the stories. Um bootstrapers. What can you gain out of this today? A lot, you know. There is a lot to be said about starting with a peach. It can all start with a peach, so I hope you got something out of this today. I just want to show you stories that show you where you can come and where you can go if you just get started. And so here's another great example. If you have questions for Shannon, I'm sure she's glad to answer them. I'll answer them. Stay tuned, come back for another episode of bootstrapers, game changers, underdogs next week. Thank you.