Digital Social Hour - Master Door-to-Door Sales: Lessons from $35M Success | Tony Wells DSH #1278

Episode Date: March 29, 2025

Ready to master the art of door-to-door sales? 🚪💼 In this powerful episode of the Digital Social Hour Podcast, Sean Kelly sits down with Tony Wells, an inspiring entrepreneur who turned his life around, going from humble beginnings and overcoming addiction to building a $35 million business! 🙌 Tony shares raw, real, and life-changing lessons about resilience, faith, and the grind of door-to-door sales—the ultimate cold calling challenge. Learn how he transformed rejection into opportunity, became a sales powerhouse, and helped others in recovery find purpose. From his first million at 40 to selling a company for millions, this episode is packed with valuable insights you can’t afford to miss. 🎯 💡 Whether you’re an entrepreneur, sales professional, or someone looking for inspiration, this conversation is for YOU! Discover how discipline, mindset, and gratitude can lead to unbelievable success. 📺 Watch now and subscribe for more insider secrets. 🚀 Hit that subscribe button to stay tuned for more eye-opening stories on the Digital Social Hour with Sean Kelly! 💬 Join the conversation in the comments and let us know your biggest takeaway from Tony’s journey. 🌟 CHAPTERS: 00:00 - Intro 01:12 - Growing Up in a Trailer Park 03:15 - Early Addiction Struggles 10:24 - How Shrooms Changed My Life 13:38 - Losing Everything: A Personal Journey 19:14 - Launching Your Business: The Beginning 22:20 - Mastering Sales Techniques 26:25 - Selling Weed in College: A Real Experience 30:22 - Education and Its Impact 34:00 - First Time as a Guest: Insights 34:34 - Discovering Your Passion 35:50 - Overcoming Victim Mentality 37:05 - Embracing God's Favor 38:25 - The Power of Gratitude 39:22 - Making an Impact on Others 42:00 - See You at the Game APPLY TO BE ON THE PODCAST: https://www.digitalsocialhour.com/application BUSINESS INQUIRIES/SPONSORS: [e-mail] GUEST: Tony Wells https://www.instagram.com/tonypwells/ SPONSORS: KINSTA:  https://kinsta.com/dsh LISTEN ON: Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/digital-social-hour/id1676846015 Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/5Jn7LXarRlI8Hc0GtTn759 Sean Kelly Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/seanmikekelly/ #lifecoaching #selfimprovement #d2d #solarsales #doortodoortraining

Growing up, I'm purposefully different in how I discipline my children because of that. But I still believe that, you know, like in the Bible, right, I spare the rod. I don't beat my kids, but I'm still firm with them. Yeah. But not as firm as maybe how children were raised, especially like back in the day. Oh, back in the day, you're getting fistfights with your parents. Oh, back in the day, you're getting fist fights with your parents. All right, guys, from Minneapolis today, Tony Wells, thanks for flying in, man.

Dude, it's an honor to be here. Yeah, it's going to be a fun one. I haven't had many guests from Minneapolis on, so I'm excited to learn more about the city. And you're at the Timberwolves games all the time, right? You're right. Yeah. So I'm glad to be here and represent represent the Midwest. Let's go. How long you been out there my whole life Yeah, born and raised, Minnesota boy. We live in California, Newport Beach for round five years

But ultimately we came back to came back to Minnesota about 2017. So yeah, you've seen a lot of growth in that city, right? You know, it's uh, I was saying the rural towns. So there used to be a lot of You know, it's uh, I was saying the rural towns so there used to be a lot of um, I Call it like the the farm the farm towns and now it's all suburbia. Nice. Yeah, that's cool Yeah, cuz you grew up in trailer park, right? You have some humble beginnings. Yes, sir How long were you there your whole life? No, so I was in a live in trailer park till the fourth grade Yeah, so my mom, you know, my mom and dad were they were divorced when I was three years old Mom was on welfare. My dad lived in a trailer park. And then in fourth grade,

I moved up to a city called Champlain with my mom, my stepdad and you know, got two sisters from them. But yeah, it's the life that I live today is a lot different than I was used to growing up as a kid for sure. Do you think you got that hustle mentality from back in the early days? Wanting to work really hard. I think so. You know, I grew up with no money. So, you know for me it was You know, I always wanted to you know fit in right so if the kids were wearing, you know

Polo designer clothes like you know, I wanted to wear that too. You know, back then it was wearing, wearing Jordans or it was wearing, you know, the Reebok pump shoes. But you know, my family couldn't afford it. You know, so I'm not proud of this. But you know, for me, in order to get that, you know, I was either stealing or at the age of 15, no, selling dope.

And that's how I was able to be able to get those kind of clothes. Yeah. I used to shoplift a little bit. You did. I got caught and I haven't done it since. Yeah. Yeah. I got caught as well. I got humbled. It took me in the... Do you know what Wegmans is? No. It's a grocery store on the East Coast. I grew up in Jersey. OK. But I got caught stealing and they took me in the security room.

My mom had to pick me up. Super embarrassing I've been stole since so what were you stealing? Dumb shit, dude. I was a kid like candy and like I don't know gift cards, whatever. Okay, it wasn't worth it Okay, they put me on the wall of shame. They did. Yeah, okay I've been stolen since yeah, so if I if I was to go there now, would you still be up on that wall? We not well, I'm all of shame? You can check. Bridgewater, New Jersey. But yeah, that was one of my worst habits when I was a kid. Yeah the shoplifting, you know, and then I was a drug addict by the time I was 14 years

old. Wow. That's young. Drug addict at 14. Damn. So just start with weed and kind of work its way up. Yep, start with weed. That's what they say It's not a gateway drug, but I think that's BS. You know for me it was

You know, we're I'm sorry. No, it didn't start we'd actually start with drinking So we used to get drunk, you know before school so we'd meet up at a friend's house about 630 in the morning She's we start to get drunk. That's so early and then what would happen those we get is we get into school and kids would start to pass out. And then the teachers would catch on. So then we had to figure out, well, how can we get high and still function or at least not get kicked out of class? And that's how we came into play.

And then back then, I'm 45 years old. How old are you? 28. Okay., I'm 45 years old. How old are you? 28. Okay, so I'm 45. So back then we had these little wooden dugouts. And so basically we would pack weed on one side and then you put a little oney on the other and then we'll just take little one hitters.

Like a one hitter? Yeah. Yeah, I think I caught the tail end of that. I saw some of those. We did gravity bongs where I grew up. That's a gravity bong. You never heard of that? Oh man. Maybe we didn't call it that. So it explains. So you put a hole at the bottom of a water bottle.

And then on the cap you put a hole in it. And you light the weed in a socket on the cap. And then you lift up with water. So it just fills with smoke. It was so high back then, but I don't remember doing that. Yeah, those were deadly, dude. I mean, with the bongs. It was pretty much a bong. Okay. Yeah.

So picture a whole water bottle full of weed vapor. You would inhale the whole thing. What about out of apples? We've done apples. Yeah. Apple bowls. Okay. Yeah. I've done that before. Yeah.

Hey guys, shout out to today's sponsor, Kinsta. Running an online business is already a challenge. Your website hosting shouldn't make it harder and I've been there dealing with slow load times, confusing dashboards and unreliable support. That's why I switched over to Kinsta and it's been a game changer for my brand. Since moving to Kinsta, my site loads faster, runs smoother

and I don't have to stress about downtime. Their intuitive dashboard makes managing everything simple and their 24 seven expert support means I always have real people whenever to help when I need it. Kinsta is built for performance with blazing fast speeds, enterprise level security and 37 global data centers to ensure your site reaches audiences quickly. They also handle free migrations.

So switching is effortless. And if you ever get a traffic spike, Kinsta automatically scales to keep your site online when it matters most. I'm not the only one who trusts Kinsta, TripAdvisor, NASA, Indeed and over 120,000 businesses rely on Kinsta for their WordPress hosting. So if you want hosting that works, just make the switch to Kinsta today, get your first month free, they'll even handle the migration for you. Just visit Kinsta.com slash D S H to get started.

That's K I N S T A dot com slash D S H. Used to be a huge donor, but then I got terrible anxiety when I got high. That's what happened to me. Yeah, terrible anxiety. And I'm an extrovert. I'm not. You're an introvert?

Yeah. Okay, so I'm an extrovert. So what it would do for me is that actually like, I call it stuck. Like you would shut down. I'd shut down down like I couldn't even like communicate with people. Mm-hmm. So I didn't like it so then what I do is I get into I got into like mushrooms and acid and stuff and And what that is?

You know, yeah, I'd see you like all the you know I'll be looking at like wood and it looks like it's like melting and see faces and things like that. But for me like all drugs, so I'm 18 years sober. I want to say that. All drugs for me, they always start out good and they all start and then they all go bad. Yeah. So for the the smoke in the pot, right? Like it was good because it got me through school, like through the school day. But then it started like mess with my mental where I wasn't able to communicate with people.

And being an extrovert, that was out of my like normal chemistry. Right. Then I got into, you know, drinking, but I'm an alcoholic. So when I drink, like I'm not just having, you know, like one drink. Like for me, it's give me the beer

and then give me the shot though. I want the shot of the tequila or the whiskey so I can hurry up and get to that level. And then I'm gonna have that beer and then we can just hang out. Maintain. But when you're ready to go home, I'm not. And that's the difference.

And so then with like mushroom and acid, like the first couple trips were cool, but then I always had bad trips. And like the worst trip I ever had is, and this was like the last one, I locked myself in, we were taking a ass in my buddy's basement at his parents' house. And I locked myself in his bathroom. And I just remember like laying on the floor, hugging the toilet and just praying like, God just like make this trip like end. And you know, so that was it.

But I was an addict, so I still then wanted to find a different high. And then I got into ecstasy. You ever done ecstasy? No, I haven't done my own one. Okay, so ecstasy, I into ecstasy. You ever done ecstasy? No, I haven't done that one. Okay, so ecstasy, I loved ecstasy because that would make me super loving. That's Molly, right?

Yeah, yeah. Okay. So I just wanna be hugging on you or hugging on whoever's around me and I be telling you that I love you. But what I didn't realize is that when you take ecstasy, it actually drains all the serotonin in your brain. Yep, I heard that.

And so then I get into depression, and then I got suicidal thoughts. Damn. So I stopped doing the ecstasy, or as the kids say, no, Molly, and then I got into cocaine. And when I got into cocaine, like that gave me the confidence,

you know, I'm in high school still, so that gave me the confidence to talk to girls, and it also allowed me to drink the way that I wanted to drink because I could like maintain like this level where if I got without cocaine, I would just go like this. You would black out, right? Yeah. And but when you do the cocaine, like you can drink all night.

But eventually I became like a violent cocaine user. Were you an angry drunk? Are you got fights a lot? Yeah. Yeah. I had a violent cocaine user. Were you an angry drunk? Or you got in fights a lot? Yeah. Yeah. I had a friend like that. I hated going out with him. Oh my god. You know, I was a little punk.

I mean, I was little. But I always had like the older friends or the bigger friends. And so, I would start the fights. But they would finish them for me. Got it. But I can only imagine being that friend, right? Like, it would finish them for me. Got it. But I can only imagine being that friend, right? Like, that would suck to have a friend like that. Especially these days with social media, because back then you got in fights, no one knew about it.

Yeah. It was low key. But now it's all over the internet as soon as you do it now. That's what I tell my kids. Like, I got two teenage daughters and two younger boys, and I tell them girls, like, whatever you do now, if it's on video like it's there forever it's gonna haunt you. Yeah getting in fights isn't worth it anymore now you'll just get sued. Yeah right yeah yeah. Especially someone like you you know

we'll dive into the business side of things soon but crazy story sounds like yeah wow yeah I got to like acid and shrooms and then I stopped there okay I didn't do anything crazy or not. But those two specifically shrooms changed my life for the better I'd say. Okay you still take shrooms? I microdose. You microdose? I don't do full trips anymore. I think I'd have a terrible trip if I did to be honest. But microdosing is a game changer. Okay so tell me tell me about how you said that shrooms like change your life actually for the good like why? Perspective. So like I went to Amsterdam in high school when I was my first business was e-commerce

So I was making decent money like six figures as a high schooler. Yeah, you know our college first year college. Heck. Yeah But yeah, I did shrooms and just walked eight miles straight smiled the whole time around Amsterdam Okay, just open my eyes to just all these new perspectives in life because I was so boxed in living in the town I grew up in in Jersey Yeah, okay, and just motivated me to get out there also and that's that's the difference between like you and me like You know even for my wife like she could have a glass of wine a night Half a glass of wine like she's good. I need the whole model And so for you like like, and I have friends

that could still smoke pot today, and they're functioning, they're successful, but it just affects my brain different. There's just this chemical imbalance. So you say it's like an addictive personality maybe? Yeah, 100%. Yeah, I think I have that too, but I can channel it if that makes sense.

Okay, all right. Tell me more about the microdosing. Well, it's like, I don't like pharmaceutical drugs. Okay. So like instead of taking an Adderall or a Vivand, I'd rather just micro dose a mushroom. Get the same effect if not better. No after effects, no burnout. So you're just locked in. So the micro dosing is it like drinking a tea?

Yeah, just like a stimulant gets your brain flowing. Like I don't know anything about that world anymore. Yeah, so you take stimulant gets your brain flowing like I don't know anything about I don't know anything about that world anymore Yes, tell me take one tenth of your dose. So say you eat an eighth of shrooms Yeah, a micro dose would be one tenth of that and is this still shrew is this still the same thing? Yeah, and they taste like garbage. I do it in the pill form. So I just swallow it. I don't taste it Yeah, but no shrooms tastes like shit dude. I've thrown up from eating shrooms before because they grow on cow shit Yeah, so yeah, I've had some bad trips with that. Okay But yeah, dude, it's interesting. Everyone's got their own thing. Some people it's coffee and people it's micro dosing

Yeah psychedelics. Some people are all natural Mine's caught definitely coffee and then and then I got these damn nicotine pouches. Mmm Dave Asprey takes those He brought one on the podcast and I got dizzy taking that shit. That's just strong. Yeah, five MGs. Yeah Yeah, put it right here. Right? Yeah. Yeah, those do help with focus. So they do this for me I've never done nicotine before so I didn't have a tolerance. Yeah, stay away from it. Yeah. Oh, yeah It's addictive anything to give me an edge man. All right, so For you like you're in Amsterdam What age are you in Amsterdam? I was 19. I believe yeah freshman year college. Okay

Yeah, you're 28 now 28 almost 10 years high school reunion is this year, which is crazy. You gonna go I might you might I'm Mike. Okay going back and forth might be a coin flip. Okay, did you go to yours? I think I went to the 10 year and now was it. That must have been interesting for you because people thought you were probably like, like you were drug addict back then, right? Well, let's see, so 10, so 10 I would have been what around 27. Yeah, I mean, 27 that's like the year I got sober.

Okay. Yeah. But you didn't start a business yet, really? No, no, no, I wasn't at 27. No, I'm newly married, newly sober, and actually I can't quite remember like exact timing of the high school reunion of where I was at in life, but I know in that first year of sobriety like I lost everything damn all your friends family More on the material side. Mm-hmm. So my first year sobriety we had we had our house that we were living in then we all said to investment properties and We lost all three to foreclosure. Oh cuz this was the away cross crash, right? This would have been, yeah, I guess, right

right around there. Yeah. The real estate market tanked. Yeah. Right around there. Yeah. And so we lost we lost everything to the point where like, you know, I had I've told the story a lot. Not to you, but to many where, you know, I've got a Land Rover in the driveway.

I've got a Rolex on my wrist and I've got, you a lot, not to you, but to many where, I've got a Land Rover in the driveway, I've got a Rolex on my wrist, and I've got money in the bank account, but my character was shit. And so God was like, listen son, and I was ungrateful. You know what I mean? I had our house that we're living in, I had the two investment properties,

newly married to my beautiful wife, who's still my wife today. But I'm just like, God, like, when I was homeless, I wanted to kill myself. And now that I have everything that I ever wanted, I still want to kill myself. So like, what's the whole point of like, this thing that's called life?

And I believe that it was then where God was like, son, I've given you everything you ever wanted and you're still ungrateful. So now it's time for me to work on your character. And so I'm gonna go ahead and strip everything away from you. And that's what he did. And he first started with the Rolex watch. I had to go to the pawn shop and sell the Rolex

just so I make one mortgage payment. Then I had to drive that fancy Land Rover that I'm so proud of to the food shelf and And they had to load the groceries in the back of that Land Rover and I was humiliated And and so what he was doing is to strip away my pride in my ego And when he stripped away my pride in my ego then I was ready to depend on him and not on my own abilities Because before that time I would tell you how great I am. Mm-hmm and look at all the stuff that I've accumulated because of how great I am but God wanted to be like son like

Every everything that you have including your abilities is is the gifts that I've blessed you with. And so when he took that stuff away, I had to quickly learn how to depend on him versus on my own abilities. And then he started to bless me. And it started with people. So he put first a sponsor in my life. And then also, you know, obviously I had my wife, you know, so I put a sponsor in my life and so I went into AA and my sponsor was like, listen, like, if you want to work with me, like, you've got to do exactly what I tell you. And so he said, we're going to meet once a week and we're going to go through the big book and I'm going to take you through the 12 steps of Alcoholics Anonymous. You're also going to go to a minimum of three meetings a week.

And you're also going to do service work. And so in that service work, I'd go to a local, not a food shelf, but a basically where there was hot meals and like the homeless youth would come through and we put, you know, hot meals on their plates. But what that taught me was I was in this like poor me, this victim mentality. And when they'd come through, I'd be like, thinking in my own head, like, wow, like my life isn't actually that bad. Like I actually still have a wife that loves me. I still have people in my life that

want to be around me. And I might be on the verge of losing my houses. But I still have a way to have shelter. Right. And so I started to get this attitude of gratitude. And so this is 18 years ago, but then my wife also encouraged me to go to church, right? So God's working through people. He's working through my sponsor to work my character. He's working through my wife. He's working through the pastor. And before, I grew up in a religious household,

but I didn't have a relationship with Jesus Christ. Mm-hmm So around the age of like 19 20 is when I wrote off God. I actually didn't want anything to do with it because I just I Religion and God to me were the same thing But she encouraged me to go to this church and at this church this pastor It's a big church like probably a thousand people in this church and the pastor is like hey like I don't care if you've ever Been a prison you're a prostitute. You're a drug addict like you're welcome here. Hmm And that was the first time I ever heard that from the pulpit So I was like, you know what like I'll continue to come back

Because I felt like he was talking right to me even though he's talking to a thousand people. So that's when my life really started to change. Wow. What a journey, man. And you're still on it now. Now you're crushing it. Yeah.

When did the business start from there? Was it shortly after that you started going to church? Yeah. after that you started going to church? Yeah, so the you know like becoming a you know even a millionaire then a multi-millionaire that that didn't happen until 40 years old. Wow. You know I'm 45 now so I made my first like I made my first million like million in my family's bank account when I was 40 40 years old and how that happened is in 2017, the gentleman that was my sponsor, now 18 years ago, he started a roofing company and he said,

he called me one day and he's like, hey, I was meditating and God told me to call you and ask you to be a partner in my company And at that same time my wife and I and our four kids we're living out in Newport Beach, California And I was on my knees And and I was praying and I said, you know Because my wife and my oldest daughter wanted to move back to minnesota I wanted to stay in Cali,

because I came from a trailer park. So I was living my dream. We were broke, but I was still living my dream. And that was to be out on the beach. And I'm praying like, God, if you want us to move back to Minnesota, like you're gonna have to open that door wide open. And if you don't want us to,

like just go ahead and slam that door shut in Courtney's face and let her know like we're supposed to be here in Cali and stay here and and all is gonna be well but if if it that is your will just let me know and that same day I got that call and the call was I was meditating God told me me to ask if you'd be a partner in my company. So I told Courtney that and then Courtney was like, all right, well, when do we move? Wow, I love that. So we moved back to Minnesota. And at the time the company is doing like 1.5 million in revenue. Had about eight sales reps including my partner. This is a roofing company? Yep.

Had about eight sales reps including my partner. This is a roofing company. Yep, and The deal was that I had a double day in the revenue of the company that very first year and so I had to go out and sell myself and In this business and in in that market we get a lot of hailstorms And in the sales is driven by door knocking Old school. Yeah, and so I'd never knocked the door in my life, but we moved back and we moved back with a purpose. And so I went out and started knocking on doors and I generated 1.2 million in revenue

by myself that first year. Wow. So, and then we had other sales reps and so we did $ million dollars. We did it. So then I made partner and then like the next year we did like six million then I think like nine million and like 14 million and like 20 million and then eventually we hit 35 million and then we sold that company to a private equity group a couple years ago. Well done, dude. $35 million going door to door?

Yeah. That's the grind right there. Yeah. Dude, that's incredible. So you had to get good at sales. I had to get good at door knocking sales. And that's a really cold lead. Dude, that is a cold lead.

Coldest probably you could get. I think so. I think so. Like, you know, I was telemarketing Did that kind of sales for years? You know you've got you've got three different phases or stages of sales right or Levels you got where they let's say you work at Best Buy right or a Verizon You know wireless cell phone store. You got customers coming into you. They're there for your product, right?

That's one sale then the next sale is telemarketing so you got a cold call with a cold call though if they tell you to f off like you can hang up and just dial the next number hmm but when you door knock the the homeowner could tell you to f off, slam the door in your face, and now you got to do the walk of shame. And to me, that's the biggest mental gymnastics, because then you have to physically walk to the next door, knowing that that person, the neighbor, just told you to F off, they slammed the door in your face, and you don't know if they just called their neighbor, right, to give them a heads up that this knucklehead is coming to knock on your door.

You just gotta stay positive. For me, I just looked at it as a numbers game, where I'd actually thank them. So I'd be like, you know what? In my head, I'd be like, hey, thank you. I'm just one more no, close for doing a yes. And that's what worked for me. What was the ratio out of like a hunter houses? What percent did you close? I would just said I would just say like 10% Okay, right So you're not gonna higher than I thought you're not gonna 100 door Well, I'll break it down like this if you knock on 100 doors now, everybody's gonna be home Now everybody's gonna answer so you're not gonna hurt doors

You're gonna get 10 people to answer and then out of those 10 for me. I'd get one Okay, so one out of one one out of all guys All right doors that you knock and But it was strictly just a numbers game so I didn't even care about like how good my pitch was I just looked at it as a numbers game. I'm gonna get I'm gonna get that one person who Probably just says yes to everybody when it comes to being sold. And if you just grind and get a strong work ethic, you're going to be successful. And

then successful in that business is making anywhere from a hundred, I mean, there's one guy that makes over a million dollars knocking doors. Is it commission based? Is it commission based? But I would say the majority is, you know, from anywhere from, you know, a hundred, uh, probably 250 grand. That's probably the normal. Um, and then, then you got your rock stars, right? You got you guys, it'll make 500,000, um, 600,000, but you know, you got your outlier that, you know,

100 to 250 solid for no college degree. And you know, you could start at a pretty young age. Dude, what was cool about our company is that 70% of our staff were in recovery. Wow. So that was a passion point for you. It was a passion point. You saw yourself in them, right? Yeah. And 30% of them were felons. Wow, so you didn't care about criminal record? I didn't so the I should say As long as there wasn't any kind of like, you know

Predatory right stuff, you know, yeah Where were our employees the the most of their criminal background, you know, maybe some of it was, you know salt charges But the majority of it was drug related. Yeah. Yeah, cuz back then you could get arrested for weed Yeah, yeah, which is now legal almost everywhere. Correct. Yeah, so we had guys that went to prison for you know Selling a lot of dope and yeah We're now now it's illegal lot of entrepreneurs started selling weed man. Yeah a lot I did that was money. I was selling a lot of dope and now it's illegal. A lot of entrepreneurs started selling weed, man. A lot, I did. That was mine, I was 15.

Yeah, I was 15 when I started selling dope. Yeah, high school or college. No, I did in college. Paid for my food. Okay, you're selling dope or? Weed, yeah, is that what weed is? I don't know the terms these days. And I'm 45.

It might be called something different, but. All right, so you're selling weed in college. I was selling weed when I was 45. It might be called something different. But all right, so you're selling weed in college. I was selling weed when I was 15. So would you buy it in the pounds or how did you start out? No, I never got to the pounds level. Okay. Yeah. I got to like a QP or HP is the most. Okay.

And then I would split that with someone just so I'd be able to smoke for free and then cover my liquor and eating expenses for the week or whatever. Okay. You know? Yeah. And I was in room 420 in my hall. So it was destiny. What?

It was destiny. So I had to come on. If you get room 420 and you're not doing weed, that's a crazy story. Yeah. Yeah. My mom was a little old school, you know, a little slap in the face sometimes. Yeah. I think tough love is good though. Yeah. It worked on me because you know, a little slap in the face sometimes. Yeah. I think tough love is good though.

Yeah. It worked on me because you still need a little bit of respect and fear. You know, you're going to listen. Well, it's, um, you know, I think that's one thing that's different about today, right? Where, where society says, um, how you can, um, correct your children. For me growing up, I wanna honor my step, my dad, he wasn't in the picture from the age of 14 to 24,

and then he ultimately died when he was 56. He was also an addict and alcoholic. So my stepdad, he really raised me, inattic and alcoholic. So my stepdad, he really raised me. But we didn't see eye to eye, you know, growing up and he definitely parented me differently than how I parent my children today. And the reason is because of how I was I was parented growing up, I'm purposefully different in how I discipline my children because of that. Um, but I still believe that, you know, like in the Bible, right. I have to spare the rod.

Um, I don't, I don't beat my kids. Um, but I'm still firm with them. Yeah. You know? Um, but, but not as firm as maybe how children were raised especially like back in the night. Oh back in the day You're getting fistfights with your parents. Oh Well, I don't even know if you're getting fistfights like your dad's pounding 50s right like you're not talking back. Oh my dad's grown

No, my dad grew up on a farm and they got works to death man. Yeah. Yeah, but that's how it was Yeah, these days you can't yeah you lay at hand you're death man. Yeah, but that's how it was. These days you can't, yeah, you lay at hand, you're getting canceled. You lay a hand on your kids. Yeah, times have changed. But like you said, the respect needs to be there. Now I see a lot of kids walking over their parents. They're just glued to their phones or whatever.

They don't even listen to their parents at the dinner table. Dude, the phones, the iPads, like it's a problem. It is. Yeah. I even see it with my kids, you know, today with, like my boys, they love Fortnite. I'm playing after this, man. Are you really?

Yeah. Are you? But I got a good relationship with it, you know. I'm not addicted. Yeah, you're also grown. Yeah. But I use it more to de-stress, you know. After working a long week week we'll play a little

bit on the weekends, me and my fiance. So for us it's a bonding activity. Your fiance will? Yeah. Really? She's gotten good. Shout out to Ariel, man. Yeah. She used to be, and I'll say this to her face, but yeah, she used to be trash at the game. Okay. But she's good now. Yeah, because she's school you? No. No. I used to be a big gamer nerd. You were a huge gamer nerd. Okay, were you like streaming and all that? No, this was before streaming. This was when parents said to never play video games You'll never make a living out of it and now they're streamers You know, yeah, but uh, I was like top thousand in the world in any game I played. Oh, yeah I was super nerdy with it. I would skip school to play video games

You know tell I want to know more about you. So when you went to school, like, what did you go to school for? I tried going for business at Rutgers in Jersey, but I couldn't get in because of my GPA. So I dropped out. OK, yeah, I dropped out after freshman year. After freshman year. Yeah. And then and then you went abroad? I just at the time I was running a business, so I went all in on the business. What was your business?

It was e-commerce, I was selling sports jerseys. Okay. Yeah. So I would message NBA players off my Instagram page, send them free jerseys, some of them would post it and tag me, and that's how I grew that business. We did $1.2 million in our peak year. Shut up. Yeah.

And I was like 20, 21. Congratulations. Yeah. So that was my start into entrepreneurship. That's huge, man. Inf up. Yeah. And I was like 20, 21. Congratulations. Yeah. So that was my start into entrepreneurship. That's huge, man. Influencer marketing. And you still had that today, don't you? No, I don't run it anymore. Kind of fizzled out. It did. Plus the margins are thin in e-commerce. Okay. But I learned a lot about marketing, influencers, how to build a social media profile, how to grow followers. Okay. That was a great first business for me. Take, take me from, take me from selling the jerseys to, um, to then starting the pod. Yeah.

A lot of fails made and lost my money twice, which is crazy. At my age, I've already made and lost it twice. Made a lot in crypto, lost a lot in crypto. During the pandemic, I was selling masks, PPE equipment to governments and hospitals Yeah, it's 15 million dollars in sales. Shut up. Yeah, so that business I learned how to cold email How to talk to older people because all those people in procurement are like 50s 60s 70s How to partner with the right people Yeah, each business. I learned a lot with different things. So now with the podcast

I just took everything I learned from every single business I've done. Yeah, and I think that's why it was pretty successful This is like one of my later businesses. Is this your main hustle? Yeah, I have events too Okay, but this is the main one right now. What kind of events do you throw networking events? Yeah, I think you got you. Did you just do one in Austin? Yeah Yeah, you get no one in Miami Miami during f1. Yeah, we have the got you. Did you just do one in Austin? Yeah, a few days ago. You got another one in Miami. Miami during F1. Yeah, we have the biggest F1 networking events in the country.

Wow. Yeah. No paid ads, all organic word of mouth. So the 15 million dollar company, did you just fizzle that out? Did you sell it? It was a seasonal. There's seasonal companies I've

done. That was one of them because it was just in the pandemic where people are just buying up PPE Then you take the the proceeds from that you dumped it into podcast into crypto in the crypto crypto Made a lot lost a lot and then started the pod shortly after that And how long ago just sort of pot two years two years ago. Yeah, holy first episode was in March two years ago How many followers did you have before you started the pod? Ah?

Good question. I'm not sure it was a lot though. I was already spending a lot on ads. Okay. Yeah What's a lot like a million five million? I spent on my Instagram page alone probably over a million dollars in one year Overall, okay. Yeah, okay million dollars in one year overall okay yeah okay and I'm sorry so that was that's the the amount of money that you're spending on advertising but how many how many followers like you said you had a lot a lot but what is a lot it was in the millions I don't know the exact if it was five or eight or whatever but okay but now with the pod we're just growing like crazy yeah I mean you're close to 12 million followers now dude but more impressively is the views.

150 million views a month. A month? Yeah, on Instagram alone. Dude, that's sick. Yeah, like the followers don't mean as much as the views to me, because you have a ton of followers, it doesn't really matter.

I care more about engagement. Yep. So. You know, I'm brand new to this world. Yeah, I noticed when I was doing research, when I do research on guests, the first thing I do is I go on YouTube and search what podcasts they've been on and I watch them. Okay. I can only find you interviewing someone else on your channel. Yeah.

So this is your first time as a guest. First time as a guest. Nice. I'm honored you chose this show. Dude, I'm honored to be here. Yeah. But I was like, damn, I got to find some self on this guy. So I watched that one and I went through your Instagram and found what I could. Okay. I'm an open book. You know, so whatever questions you got for me, I'm happy to answer them.

Yeah. My heart though, it's really for, you know, the still suffering addict and alcoholic who's out there. And that's my passion. My passion is to really inspire. Yeah. Truly. Because I came from nothing, dude.

I came from nothing and I'm a multimillionaire in all humility, all glory to God. But I know that my story is, is unique in that most people don't get to say what I just said when they came from where I came from. Yeah, American dream, baby. American dream. You're alive and proven it. Yeah.

And I think it's a cool story because it's kind of relatable. A lot of people suffer with addictions, whether it's drugs or whatever, and to see you come out on top of it. And as I tell, you know, guys that I sponsor, and then as I used to tell my employees, there's nothing special about Tony Wells in regards to like, I don't come from a pedigree family, I don't have a college education, I'm a recovering drug addict and alcoholic,

and yet here I sit. So if I did it, so can you. And that's the whole thing. Like, if I did it so can you? And that's the whole that's the whole thing like if I did it so can you yeah, but You have to be clear on what what do you want? yeah, and and You know to the haters they might say like oh money isn't everything no I agree with you money isn't everything But it definitely opens up doors and gives you opportunities great so I agree with you, money isn't everything, but it definitely opens up doors and gives you opportunities. Agreed.

So, whatever you want, if it's not the million dollars, then what do you want? What is your pursuit of happiness? And go after that. You're not a victim. Don't sit in victimhood. Don't sit in a pity pot like I used to. Kick all that mental garbage out of your head and realize that when your

will is aligned with God's will, you can have whatever you want. You can do whatever you want when there's that alignment because God's favor will be all over you. And what I realized is that when I got aligned with him, what that means for me is when I got my finances aligned with him meaning that I was Not just tithing, you know to the church But I was actually giving on top of the tithing to the church also giving to other organizations Then God was like listen son like now I can trust you so I'm gonna continue to fund you because I know that I can get that money through you and

fund you because I know that I can get that money through you. And all the silly stuff that you like, like Tony, like you, you like the cars and you like the watches and you like to sit courtside at the NBA games. Like you can have that son. Like, I don't care. Like that's nothing to me. It's, it's important to you. And so you can have it because you're being good and faithful. And that's the same message that I get to my kids. Like as long as they're grateful and as long as they keep a kind heart and that they love on others, like some would say then that they're spoiled,

but it's like, I have the means to do it. And God has an abundance of means. We as humans are the only ones who actually put a value on the price of a Lamborghini or a mansion on the ocean in Miami or something like that. We as humans are the only ones that do it. God's like, whether it's a hundred million dollar house or a 200,000 dollar house, it's all the same to me.

So for my child, if I can give him a thousand dollar bike, bicycle, or a hundred dollar bicycle, it doesn't matter to me. But their heart posture has to be correct. Yeah, I love that man. Gratitude, Super-Born to me. Add to me, but their heart posture has to be correct. Yeah. I love that man. Gratitude is super important to me. Add to gratitude, baby.

Yeah. So I still personally text every single person that comes to my events and I thank them for coming. Really? It takes me like so long now because now we're getting thousands of people. Yeah. But my first ever event had 20 people. Twenty people showed up and it was kind of embarrassing honestly, but out of those 20 people I still

talk to like five of them every single day. Wow. This was like six years ago. Yeah. And that community has grown into now 2000 plus people come to my events. 2000 people. And I personally text every single one and I thank them. I'm just grateful for them.

That's not normal. You know that right? No, I have to, I used to be able to do it in a day, but now I have to break it up into a week, two hours a day. Yeah. And everyone's like, why don't you outsource that to AI? But I'm like, dude, some things need to be personal. You know, when I'm thanking someone, I don't want it to be a copy paste thank message.

It's a real thank you. Yeah, and they feel it. They come up to me at the events and they're like, holy shit, no one's ever done that before. I get invited to so many conferences and no one's ever done that. What drives you? It's something to do with the podcast and the messaging

because I've done a lot of businesses before this like we talked about and money was the number one goal in the past, but that's no longer how I think and operate. How do you think and operate now? More about like getting messages across and impact people, inspiring people, helping people. This podcast, just the messages I get from the show. You wouldn't believe some of these messages. Like I'm really helping people. podcast, just the messages I get from the show. You wouldn't believe some of these messages.

Like, I'm really helping people. It's cool. Give me give me give me one that really touched your heart. We're like, man, I really am doing a good thing. Dude, I've stopped a couple of suicides. Really? Yeah, there's been a couple of those. There's been a couple just like. I like the veterans stuff a lot.

I have on a lot of veterans and just helping those guys get their message because those guys been through a lot. And just seeing the comments. It's like really inspiring. The suicide one that one touches me is, you know, when I was 17 is the first time I want to kill myself. Then when I was 23, I want to kill myself. And then when I was 27 and

You know People asked me like why did you start a podcast right like Basically, you're you're you're retired now Tony. So why why this or you know, what do you do? You could have done anything. Yeah, and I Believe that when I was social media, that if I would have had access to social media when I was 15, I think I could have gotten here a lot sooner because I would have been able to watch Sean Kelly, whether it's your story or one of your guests.

Yeah. And I would would have access to that. And I could have, I believe that God would have put a guest on your show, right? I'm just gonna use you as an example, would have put a guest on your show and it would have magically came into my feed and I would have watched it when I was 15 years old and I would have been inspired, right?

I would have seen maybe the I was 15 years old and I would have been inspired right I would have seen Maybe maybe the Tony Wells at 45 years old and he's sharing his story and be like man like I relate with that guy Like that's my story. I I came from the trailer park like I was selling dope and While he got through it right, yeah, or with your story or one of your other guests and and I mean you just said it you stopped a couple of suicides Those are just they watched it. I've messed it that a message so it could be even more but yeah It's deep with me too, man. Lost my grandfather to it and my father or so

Yeah, it's deep. Yeah, I want to end that cycle for sure man. Yeah Well, Tony, it's been a honor man. Can't wait to see you in Minnesota. Maybe Corside at one of the games. Dude, you gotta come. I know, I've never been to Corside before. What? Yeah, so that's a hard offer to turn down. I'll be there. Oh dude, come on.

Yeah. Let's do it. Yes. See some Ann Edwards in action. Oh dude. I love it. Yep. Alright man, we'll link your stuff below.

Thanks for hopping on. Hey, thank you bro. Yup. Check them out guys. Peace.