EntreLeadership - #102: Travis Boersma–How to Avoid the Hiring Grind

Episode Date: July 6, 2015

We’re talking hiring with Travis Boersma, co-founder of one of the fastest-growing companies in the U.S.—Dutch Bros. Coffee. Travis employs more than 4,500 team members, all who are crazy passionate about his company. Listen in for his top tips.  entreleadership.com/podcast Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Helping business leaders grow themselves, their team, and their profits. This is the Entree Leadership Podcast. Now, here is your host, Ken Coleman. Coming to you from the Music City, this is the podcast of leaders, by leaders, and for leaders. Thank you so much for tuning in with us. You're going to love this episode. I'm going to introduce you to probably the coolest coffee company that you have never heard of. Now, some of you in the Northwest and the Western United States may have heard.

heard of Dutch Bros. Coffey Company. Travis Borsma is their co-founder. You're going to love this guy. This is going to be a fun conversation. And we're focused this podcast on a theme that Entree leadership as a whole is focused on this month that is hiring and firing. You know this, that people are your most important asset. This is a very important topic.

I want you folks to do something for me. I want you to go back to a time, whether it was a while ago or if it was recent, or maybe you're in the middle of a bad hire. What I mean by that is that you hired somebody that you just know was a bad egg. They created havoc. Maybe you've got them on the team now. And I want you to, I know this is uncomfortable, but I want you to really take an assessment, honestly, right now. What did that bad hire cost you?

Not just in wages that basically have thrown out the window because they didn't do anything for you. productivity of your team because they're a cancer. They've infected your team and as a result affected productivity. Think about the anxiety that their leader has experienced and thus you've experienced. Fill in the gaps here. You know what I'm talking about. Would you do that again? I certainly hope the answer is no.

So that brings up another question. I know you're asking me. Okay, Ken, yeah, I'm there. I feel the thanks. Thanks for that. I appreciate that. I need some peps at AC right now. So what do I do? Here's the good news. All this month at entreleadership.com, we are focusing on hiring and firing.

And specifically, I want to tell you about our hiring process. Now, I've been here just over a year. I want to give you some context for this. I've known Dave over a decade, and do you know that it's easier to pass legislation in Congress than it is to get hired here? And I'm not complaining. That's a good thing. Over time, Dave has developed a process that works.

And I can tell you that we have eagles flying around this place all over the place. It's not rare to see an eagle here. It's because we've figured out how to identify turkeys and not let them in. So here's what we're doing. We're giving you the process free. Zero strings attached. What is Dave Ramsey's process for hiring eagles? Eagles. People who are like-minded, who are like-hearted, who want to be here, who see the mission

much bigger than their own personhood. That's the type of people you want to get. And by the way, you can do it in 2015. We're going to give it away to you our Entree Leaders Guide to Hiring. This is going to save you thousands upon thousands of dollars. Here's what we want you to do. I want you to text 33444, 33444, and keyword is EL Hire, as in Entre Leadership Hire. So you text 334444, and the keyword is EL Hire. And we will send you absolutely free the Entree Leaders Guide to Hiring. Why wouldn't you do this? It's free, and oh, by the way, it's proven. And if you are not engaged with All Access, you may need to think about it, Entreeleadership.com. Those of you who are All Access members, well, you know we're diving deep on this topic. So we wanted to really highlight the

importance of this conversation on acquiring top talent. And then, of course, getting rid of people that just aren't a fit. They don't need to be on the bus. So you're going to enjoy this conversation with Travis. This guy's doing it right. I'll tell you more about this company and why you need to be locked in on what he's telling you. But I wanted to do some research. I wanted to see what's happening out there in this conversation about hiring top talent. It's more important. than ever. And I ran across an article by Roberta Madison. She's a contributor to Forbes.com. She has an article entitled How to Hire Top Talent in the Membership Economy. Now, the headline jumped right off the page. I honestly, to this point, had never heard anybody say the membership economy. It's kind of a new phrase. Well, the article by Roberta is based on an interview she did with Robbie Kelman Baxter, the founder of Peninsula Strategies. This is a

Silicon Valley Consulting firm. And Baxter is the author of a new book called The Membership Economy. Now, I'm going to tell you something. I'm going to go get this book. I'm going to dive into it. And you might just see this conversation on a future podcast. I think it's so important. So I really want to focus on this article because I think there's something really good here.

A couple of real takeaways. So get ready to write. Let me tell you what the membership economy is about. Just give you a summary here that Roberta Madison does in this article on Forbes.com. and the summary of what this membership economy means is that the mindset has shifted among organizations and customers. It's not just ownership to access, but it's from transactional to relational. So think of this for a second. What do you think of when you think of membership organizations, right?

gyms, book of the month clubs, non-profits. But what has happened, and Baxter asserts this in the book, the membership economy, is that the changes in technology have extended the infrastructure of trust providing the opportunity for nearly any kind of business to join the membership economy. So in this article, Madison asked Baxter, if there's a difference in customer expectations in the membership economy versus the rest of the economy. Her answer is brilliant. Listen to this. She says, direct quote, the transaction becomes the starting line instead of the finish line.

Let me say that again. The transaction becomes the starting line instead of the finish line. And the member, that's the customer, expects a meaningful, ongoing relationship with the organization. That is a, you know, listen, that's a, that's, that's, that's, that's, that's, that's, that's, not like this crazy, innovative thought. It's just, if you think about it, anytime you're a member of an organization, a gym, a church, an ongoing club, well, you expect a whole lot more. This is really a fascinating idea. So, and again, I'll tell you the name of the article here, so you can go check it out, and we'll also provide the link at entreleadership.com on our podcast page.

But what's the takeaway as it relates to how we are. acquiring talent that will help us thrive in this membership economy. So Baxter lays it out in the book, and I'm going to give them to you really quick. You're ready to write? She says, when hiring people, you need to seek out these traits. First one, problem solvers. These are people who don't rely on company manuals to resolve a problem. They just solve it.

They get their customers back on track. Number two, strong communicators. We know this. Strong customer service is all about relationships, and relationships are predicated on great communication. So hire people who can communicate. By the way, it's important to point out here that that's not just somebody who can talk face-to-face. Somebody who knows how to write a good email.

You're communicating with customers online chats, emails, of course, phone call, and then face to face. Number three, conscientious. Obviously, people who take pride in their work. And not only take pride in their work, they take pride in working with you and for you and the brand. Number four, enthusiasm. Look for people who are just positive.

This is going to come up in our conversation. I think I mentioned this no less than two or three times with Travis, Boersma, who is the co-founder of Dutch Bros. Coffee. We have encountered their people. They have come to several entree leadership events in the last few months. And I'm telling you, I met them. They're bouncing off the walls, Eric, the producer. Their enthusiasm is infectious.

You met them at the summit. Phenomenal people. Just fun to be around. Why wouldn't you want to go buy coffee from those people? Finally, even killed. When you're serving people, you're going to deal with people who are hurting. We're having a rough day. Some people, let's just be honest, who are just downright jerks.

We've got to have to have people who have a little teflon in their skin. It just bounces right off of them. So let me review the five qualities you're looking for in people that will thrive in this membership economy. Number one problem solvers, two strong communicators, three conscientious people, four, enthusiastic people, and five even keeled people. Now, again, if you want to read the whole article, we're going to link to this article called How to Hire Top Talent in the Membership Economy on our podcast page at entreleadership.com. You can read the whole. It's really good stuff. And I'm telling you, I can't wait to get the membership economy.

In fact, Eric, the producer, can you get the old Amazon account out, the company Amazon account and get that for me? I want to fully dive into this because I think this is just a neat little shift on how we view how our customers are interacting. with our brands, our organizations, our services, our goods. And I think it's a wonderful little distinction. So I want to dive into the membership economy, and maybe we'll have Robbie Kelman Baxter, who is the author of that book on a future podcast. We'll see. But I think this is great.

I want to give credit again to Roberta Madison, who wrote this article, How to Hire Top Talent in the Membership Economy. It's on Forbes.com. We'll have the link for you on the page. So I wanted to kind of share that because when I read this article, and just kind of preparing for this entire month as we think about hiring and firing. And knowing that we were going to interview Travis, I just thought, this is perfect. Because this guy is hiring these people.

And you're going to hear how they actually recruit talent. And I love it. Not only do I love how they recruit talent. I love how they promote their talent. It's really good stuff. But let me paint the picture for you before we jump right into the conversation. In 2014, Dutch pros hit over 200 million in revenue.

They have now more than 4,500 employees as you look across their stores. They only, you'll hear this in the interview, they only award franchises to people who work on their team. I love that. You talk about preserving culture. this guy gets it. Now I've got to tell you this. He's from Oregon.

When I first talked to him, I thought, this dude sounds like he walked off the set of a surfing movie. He's such a cool cat. He is a listener to this podcast. And he gets it. He is Travis Borsma, co-founder of Dutch Bros Coffee.

Incidentally. Great story here. He co-founded it with his older brother who passed away. You'll hear a bit of that conversation and the history behind it and how they got into it. This is really good.

So I want you to just kind of remove distractions and listen to a real entree leader. He is one of you, and he gets it. Here's my conversation with Travis Borsman. Well, Travis is so neat to talk to a barista, a guy who has started from scratch. And I want you to just set the table for our listeners of the story of how you and your brother got started in the coffee business. Before we dive into the deeper conversation, how did it all start? Oh, my gosh, we're going way back to 1992. We were third-generation dairy farmers transitioning out of the dairy business that we valued the lifestyle so much.

And scratch on our heads, trying to figure out what to do. My brother being 17 years older, just in a place of trying to figure out what he was going to do to be the provider, that he was for his family, his three kids, his wife, and having that dairy background, being the guy who was in charge of operations and running the family farm for 15 years, pretty intense transition at the age of 38. I was 21 and ready to set the world on fire with all sorts of aspirations and dreams of doing something creative, innovative, and our two worlds collided at the right time with the right circumstances that seemed like devastation at the time.

It turned out to be a blessing in disguise by delving into the espresso world and purchasing our first push cart. Wow. Unbelievable. And so now, if I get this correct, you've got 240 locations in seven states and well beyond 4,000 employees. I have to ask if you had to narrow it down to one or a few things. what's the secret to how you have expanded so quickly and so successfully? Well, gosh, I had the great fortune of my brother that I referenced earlier being 17 years older. I called him the wise man.

And he exemplified, demonstrated life skills that were so important for me at the time that I didn't realize. But the secret for us, I believe, was a clear understanding from the beginning. that it's all about people. It's all about relationships and customer service focus, service being the element that we were naturally gifted with with relating to people. So my brother with his wisdom said with our business endeavor, man, let's keep it simple. And let's focus on what we're good at with people and build around that. And that's the core of it. And the thing that Dane brought to the table early on was this book. It was a Tony Robbins book, Unlimited Power. And he sat me down and he said, man, I've been reading this book. It's moving me. It's huge. I think it's going to serve us in our

professional life. It's going to serve us in our personal life. And it's got this little thing called the ultimate success formula that I want to go over with you, man. And it's know your outcome, specifically take massive action to get it. Ask yourself if the action you're taking is working and if it's not, change it until it does. And he says there's this goal-setting workshop in it. And I think we really ought to do these goals, man. And I'm like, well, you know, I don't know, man, goals. You know, I mean, I did goals in sports in high school and stuff, and that's cool.

But, you know, I'm really just ready to go hang out with my friends and socialize. And he's like, dude, I'm serious, man. Sit down. We sat down on the living room floor of his mobile home. And we set limitless goals, one, three, five, ten, fifteen, twenty-year goals without limitation, personal, professional, just capture. And 20 years later, we almost achieved every one of those goals. It was crazy. So take me back to the early days when you had your first drive-through, and it's you and Dane and you're training people, and it's not 4,000 plus people and hundreds of stores.

What were the characteristics, the engagement that you? you cast a vision for when someone drives up to the window what did you want it to look sound like feel like paint that picture for us well you know you never get a second chance to make a great first impression and so that was something that we knew was critically important we were trying to build our business and earn customers one at a time often through free product and and making sure that the experience was exceptional so you know music being a fundamental part of our fabric and having quality music that was appealing, that was upbeat, that, you know, was really something that people could relate to that maybe took them to a magical place in their life.

And, you know, when we started in the early 90s, Led Zeppelin, Jimmy Hendricks, the Beatles, a lot of those old school 70s, maybe even late 60s bands were played regularly and became the backbone for our business with rock and roll. Wow. So you're really connecting to a visceral emotion around a song, and that has a lot of to do with how they feel while you're making their coffee. Yeah, I think early on it was fascinating. We became students of human behavior in the inception of Dutch Bros.

And that is a very vibrant part of what we do today. I was just talking to our team about it. You know, I never realized when I was going to school and I was taking psychology that it would play such a critical role in our company. Or when I was in math, I didn't know the story problems. would enter into what we do every day in so many different ways. So, you know, those elements have really shown through, and it validates that we're in the relationship business and the experience business.

You mentioned at the start of our conversation that it's all about people and you're so right. I would love for you to share. You've had some tremendous success. And now you're in a very unique situation when you've got franchisees, multiple, you know, hundreds of locations, seven states, you know, that whole deal. That gets pretty big. And it's really important to keep that culture going.

So let's talk about how Dutch bros hires. So give me some examples, some things that you do that are unique to your culture but are so important. Well, I think something that is super unique that we do is we don't sell franchises to people. We have people grow up in our organization organically. They earn that opportunity to franchise. And we have a selection process for the ones who are, are absolutely passionate and have demonstrated the culture and know how to operate our shops with people and relationships being the driving force.

So we get to see those franchise owners early on as employees, and we get to see their behavioral characteristics and how they cultivate the culture, learn the way that we operate, and hiring is a critical component of that. So, you know, oftentimes our customer base is this giant army of people that we're looking at and they value the brand so much. They're in day and day out, sometimes multiple times a day. And we get to develop relationships and really learn about those people. And oftentimes they're the ones that end up applying for positions in the company.

So it's like this farm league of customers. And I look at our organization. I kind of flip it upside down from your traditional, conventional kind of corporate structure. And it starts with our customers. And then the brand new hires are second in command. And then we've got our large body of broistas. And those broistas are the ones that are, you know, they got some swag. They got some confidence.

They got charisma. They got their game and they're all polished. and they know how to communicate well and they're confident. They're the ones that these new hires get to emulate and they're the ones that are pouring into these new hires and helping them to grow into this creative, cool, fun world that we've got in our culture that's magnetic and contagious.

And then we've got, you know, these leadership platforms for people that run the shops and will oftentimes have the desire to, franchise their own shops with franchise owners and people at headquarters that are leaders. And then you got me in the very front of this pack leading the crusade with everybody assembled behind me with a giant army of customers to protect. You know, and we work for them because they write our checks. Oh, I love that. I must ask you, going back to what you just said, You said that your customers really become a farm team for the people that you effectively then recruit.

So I'm picturing this drive-through experience. Earlier, you mentioned speed, right, and great service. So what does the engagement look like when a person drives up to your drive-thru window that would allow you to get to know them so well that you might hire them? Because that's a pretty quick transaction. How do you do that? Well, you see these people day in and day out. And I think the thing that makes us unique is we're in the business of developing relationships because we see these people day in and day out.

We know the stuff that's going on in their lives. We engage them and actively engage in conversation. From the window. Am I understanding this right? From the window to window. Right out of the shoot. So learning names and knowing drinks and having them ready when you pull up is encouraged. You know, you've got four questions.

quadrants of customers. You have the customers who know what they want and they want it fast. And they're your regulars. Those are the easiest ones. And then you've got a second quadrant that is the customers who know what they want and they don't care if they have it fast. And then you've got the third one that is they don't know what they want and they want it fast. And the fourth most difficult one is the customer who doesn't know what they want and they don't care if they have it fast and they pull up and they're like, well, hey, man, how are you guys doing? And you're like, we're doing great. What can I get you? And they're like, man, I don't know. What do you guys recommend? You know, what do you think would be great today? And so, you know, those customers are a raving fan

champion customers oftentimes. And they're out there. And the word of mouth, and the word of mouth. And, you know, whatever that experience is, they're going to go tell their friends and family about. They love to talk and share and converse. And, you know, we, we predominantly deal with the ones that know what they want and they have it ready when they pull up, you know, their name and it's the same thing every day. And their consistency, kind of certainty individuals. And it's just, it's just fascinating. It's cool. You know, it's a lot of fun. But what happens is, is these relationships are formed and the product is love. Yes.

You know, and coffee is just the medium of spreading that Dutch love that we talk about. That's your story, Dutch love. Because Quadrant 4, Quadrant 4 are just people that honestly, they just want a couple of minutes of somebody smiling at them and make them feel good. Yeah, I mean, the bottom line is we have so many people that are looking for that Rea Sunshine, just that simple reward. They've got the opportunity to come in. They've got a few minutes.

got a few bucks, and they just want to be treated with kindness. And our people, it's reciprocal because it's all about this optimistic, positive lifestyle that is so, it's such a blessing for us to have. I got to tell you, folks, I have met several of the Dutch Bros team at our Entree leadership events. This is an aside, and I want to brag on them publicly so that you can hear about this, Travis. but they're the most enthusiastic people I've ever met. And I love life.

Anybody around here will tell you I'm high on life. But I love the enthusiasm. It is just contagious. It makes you smile. Well, definitely. And that's something that I think is so important in our culture is creative, innovative, freedom, it's family, it's fun, there's music, it's allowing for mistakes. to be made in a quality way, you know, and making up for it.

And empowering our people. We have a little slogan on the bottom of every one of the cups and it's guaranteed to satisfy. So we empower our people to make it right with the customer. The customer is always right. Even if they order it wrong and we build it and, you know, it's, we just make it right. If, you know, someone's having a bad day or somebody's going through a crisis in their family or whatnot, we'll hook them up. You know, and oftentimes I'll get these stories that are mind-blowing for me of how our crew went. This one just happened recently.

We had one of our customers come through, and their son was in the hospital. And they go through our Hillcrest location right here in Grants Pass daily. They went in to the hospital. The crew did, and they just went in to see Finn, and he's like three years old and read him books. and just put a smile on his face and he had a few laughs. And it was something that was just a good dude from the heart. And it's a testament to our people how much they care about, you know, just quality of life and being there for one another.

So now we've been kind of focusing on the hiring part. I want to talk about maybe this mid-range. You get somebody in because you're not a perfect company. You can't see everything. Maybe somebody fools you. Maybe somebody thinks it got potential. but somewhere along the way, Travis, it's not working out. What's the policy?

How do you handle that? Do you give them a little bit of a chance and keep working on them a little bit, or you identify quickly? This isn't going to work. We get them out quickly. Grace versus quick cut. What do you do? Well, it's always making sure that the expectation is clear.

And so, you know, that's part of it right from the gate goes. What's the expectation? It's got to be clear. And then if there's a gap between the result and the expectation, there's coaching opportunities that take place. After a few of the coaching opportunities, maybe it's two or three, maybe it's four, depending on the severity of the gap, then there's got to be a new chapter to begin and one to close. And it may be that we have to part ways and travel a different path. And that is critically important because something that I reference, Rick, regularly. And this is the thing that drives me in our company, the purpose of why I'm doing what I do is

really to provide a compelling future for our people. Most importantly, outside of the organization, rather than inside of the organization, because we've got so many people that step in and they become part-time baristas because it's fun and it's cool and it's magnetic and it's contagious and it's got this great culture and and you make fat tips and you know it's a flexible schedule and you can go to school part time or full time you could you know and and so it's so great but it really is an opportunity to go forward in a positive way try to find what it is that you're good at things that you're interested in develop skills in those areas while you work at db align it with your and then drive toward it outside of DB and make a difference in the world.

That's something that's critically important to me. And a lot of the individuals that we have in the organization certainly want to travel within the organization and have their own franchise. But what we ask of all of the people is, what is your life planned? Let's talk about life. How does it work if it doesn't work out? What is it going to look like? What is the time frame? How do you see it?

what are your interests? Where are you going? What's it about? You know, and stimulating those, those conversations and we have quarterly touches with our leadership teams to determine how our people are doing. And then we help them to, you know, try and get to where they want to go. You mentioned the quarterly touches. How often are you personally dealing with, talking with these 240 franchisees or however many franchisees make up the 240 locations, how often are you involved in drilling this culture, hiring the right people, training them, coaching them, letting them go if it doesn't work? Is this a regular drumbeat that you're hitting? Well, gosh, you know, we have an annual summit meeting that we get all franchise owners and

regional managers together. And we go to a radical resort. We've been to Maui. We've, We've been to San Diego. We intend to go to San Diego again down in Del Mar this summer. That's something that happens annually. Then the other time of the year that we do that is six months from that date. We get everybody together regionally. And it's more intimate. And it's really strategic to where they're located in a given region.

And then we have committees comprised of franchise owners that are in growth and development or operations or marketing and advertising. maybe it's culture. So those committees are comprised of 10 franchise owners that rotate annually, and we meet with them twice a year, if not more, and then have dialogue regularly throughout the year with all the technology that we've got at our fingertips today. So I'm making touches.

I'm engaged in every area as much as I humanly can be. And we've got this giant event that's happening Monday. It's called Coach Oplusa, and we'll run 2,600 people through, our headquarters right here in Grantsbass over the course of two weeks. And with that, there'll be a leadership breakout that is built on how to lead and what are the things we're looking for out of our leadership. And what's that expectation look like? And how can we help them to grow and learn and apply?

I must ask, what's your big vision for Dutch bros? What does it look like 15, 30 years from now? Gosh, you know, the big vision. vision that I've got for the company is this compelling future that I reference. And it's growing in a quality way. I believe we can have maybe a thousand stores in the next 10 years. And, you know, we sit at this hovering mark of about 250 today. But I'm not going to grow one of those stores unless the culture can be preserved and cultivated as we grow. So the quality of the growth is what I'm looking for and it really has to be built around this lifestyle that we so enjoy. The vision of the company

is not necessarily within the company as much as it is outside of the company with this compelling future piece and in developing people. We want to help our people to grow into what it is that they want to do and find what it is that they're passionate about and align it. And that's that's really the vision. That's at the end of the day the driving force. behind the company. Boy, that is so refreshing to hear. I mean, if I'm a parent, anywhere near your stores, I'm going, my kid needs to work there because you are really beginning to develop, it sounds like a platform for launching people who may not stay with you long term, but they look back and it would make you a very happy man. Would it not, Travis, to hear stories of

young people who 15 years ago worked for you and now they're doing this and they credit the culture and the training they got from you and your team as what propelled them. Is that not rewarding? That's ultimately the greatest reward for me is to see that take place. And our own in-house lawyer is one of those individuals. He started with a company when he was 16 years old, and he was working the night shift at one of our locations. And he's got the epic story.

I mean, he went to school, and by the time he was in law school, he had a family of five. and he was working at DB part-time to put his way through and make it all work. And then he went to work for the big corporate law firm in Portland in a metropolitan area. And he's up there kicking butt and putting in tons of time and all this effort. And, you know, the quality of life is then in question. And the opportunity came about where we had the opening and we contacted him and said, hey, Josh, you know, are you interested in coming home? And he's like, dude, I'm there.

I love that. And he's back. And, you know, it's awesome. And we have so many of those stories. But that one just is one that I share because it's so intimate and close to right here at home. And, you know, it's really cool. It's fascinating. It's something that I think is so critically important as we grow to have this methodology for developing people.

When you come get a job at DB, there's no question that your communication skills are going to be enhanced. You're going to work as a team. You're going to be looking at the glasses half full. And you're going to have some of the greatest experiences and the most fun of your entire life. And you'll be able to look back and remember those times. And hopefully they serve each and every one of those individuals with wherever they go and whatever they may do. Travis, I know you're a fan of Dave and Entree leadership. And if I've heard Dave say it once, I've heard him say it a billion times and he'll say it 10 billion more times.

If you live like no one else, later you can live and give like no one else. And Dave is this wonderful teacher. He can be tough love at times, but he's got an incredible heart. And many people don't realize what an extravagant giver he is. I was struck when doing research for this conversation. That matters to you as well. The love abounds foundation, how much money you give away. each year. I want you to just share about that, but more, if you could just turn it and encourage,

maybe challenge our audience, who's listening in here today, the importance of giving and how that has been such a huge part of what you all are about. Absolutely. You know, the givebacks in our community are so critically important. I, I, you know, it's paying it forward. I mean, if anybody's ever had the chance to watch the movie, pay it forward. Great movie. You know, you know, what I'm talking about. And if you haven't, man, pick it up, check it out. I mean, it's a fantastic movie. But that's it right there.

It's being present. It's doing what you can with what you have, where you are. And, you know, we have opportunities all around us regularly to do those things. And we allow for our franchisees to be creative in that space. And then we also come

together collectively. And we do, you know, fundraisers collectively together. One of them that that is huge, we call it buck for kids. And it happens annually. It happens in December. And each and every one of our franchise owners has the ability to choose the organization that they want to contribute to in their local area.

And it serves. It helps kids. And it's something that people rally behind. Our customers enjoy it. People in the community enjoy it. And then we have another one that we do, drink one for Dane Day and honor my brother. And just this last year, we raised over $500,000 just this year to help with research and cause, cure for ALS and provide services with families that are going through it because, you know, I mean, it's such a brutal, horrific disease. And then, you know, I mean, we've had all sorts of special carve-outs where, you know, police officer is shot and killed and their families in need.

and we do a fundraiser for that day, or, you know, Albany High School has this fire, and we do a proceeds day to help them with their cause. And, man, you know, I mean, we're all in this thing together. We had a big fire in 2004, and it was devastating, man. I mean, it was, we lost everything on the back end. But on the front end for the customers, we stayed alive and kicking. There's no way that I could ever explain how many people rallied together to help us out. in that time of misery that was just brutal.

I mean, it was like, you know, what are you going to do? Nobody has a computer. We don't have a desk. We don't have a home. We don't, what do we do? How do we keep this thing going? And all these people just pour out with, you know, office space, computers, you know, custom. We had Boyd's coffee who, you know, this coffee culture that we live in is incredible.

The community that we live in is so amazing because so many of the people in that sector, are there for each other. They've bent over backwards and they roasted the coffee for us while we were down with no roaster at cost, their cost and gave us the beans to be able to use in those stores with our franchise owners. And, you know, I can't say enough

about my own experience on being on the side of going through tragedy. And then, you know, I just believe in it immensely how important it is that, you know, we contribute to our communities and we're present and vibrant in our communities.

That's why we are locally owned and operated. I love those two words, present and vibrant. And folks, I said it earlier. I'm telling you, I've met multiple people from this team that came to our events. They are the most present, vibrant people I've ever met. That comes from the top. I mean, this is unbelievable when you talk about a great culture, enthusiasm, positivity. And Travis, it comes from the top, man.

It rises and falls with leadership. Everything does. And your influence has trickled down, and it's just a wonderful, wonderful story. And it's just a fun honor here to hang out with you today because you listen to this podcast regularly and then to kind of put you in the hot seat. I just, I know we're much better for this. So, dude, I got to tell you, love what you're doing and keep it up. And thanks for being a part of this podcast. Well, thank you, Ken.

I appreciate it, man. It's an honor. So you people know that InfusionSoft is a sponsor of this podcast. You're smart people, you get that. But what you also understand is that when you do business with somebody, you get to know them. At least you should. If you want to do good business with somebody, you need to get to know them. And so over the last few months, what it treated has been to really get to know the people behind the brand.

There's a reason why they wanted to be associated with us. So we wanted to learn more about why they wanted to. And so Phoenix, Arizona, headquarters of Infusion Software, went out there for an entree leadership one-day event. Daniel Tarty, Dave and I, we got to go out there, see their amazing facilities. And when you see where somebody lives, you see what they do every day, you really get them. Isn't that true? Do you ever remember when you would be dating somebody? You had an impression of them.

And then you go over to their house and it was a mess or there was something weird in the house. That's when everything got real. So we went to the house of InfusionSoft. And not only was it neat and clean in the bright lights and it smelled. nice, but the people, the people, the people. If you want to know if a brand is real, go to their house, hang out with their people. And what we figured out is that there's so much synergy

between InfusionSoft and Entree leadership. Different names, different business, different leaders, same values. So we wanted to do something different. Clayte wrote a book, you know that. if you didn't hear the feature interview with Clayte that I did several months ago, go listen to it. We talked about his book. His brother, Jeff, shares the same heart and passion as Clay does. So we had this idea.

I said, what if we just sit down and just unpack the what, the why, the how? He said, I'll do it. So we did it. And I actually love illustrating the power of one question, so much so that I wrote a book about it. And here's the point. you can ask somebody one specific question and get so much good stuff. So we decided to create one question with Jeff Mask from InfusionSoft. And we're going to play these series of conversations, small conversations,

bite-sized but full of value over the next several months. And you're really going to learn something. Not just why and how and what. But you're going to get great insight from people who started just like you, from absolute scratch. Dave Ramsey started on a card table. Infusionsoft started in a strip mall. You started somewhere in a humble beginning.

But here's the best part. We're all going somewhere that matters. Enjoy one question with Jeff Mask from Infusionsoft. Jeff, you know, the question I want to ask is why? Why did you and Clay kind of make this thing happen? What was the heart behind all of this? Simply put, there was a better way. way, we were born and raised entrepreneurs by entrepreneurial parents. We saw how our parents

lived their lives and thought, you know what, we like that style. We like being our own bosses. We like the freedom. We like the autonomy of running a business. The problem was there was a, there was a conflict in that. We saw running a business became so consuming that life was imbalanced, that time was just, there was never enough time. And in order to support a family and run a business simultaneously, it was next to impossible. So much so that there just wasn't enough emotion in the bank. There wasn't enough passion. It just wasn't there. And so we thought, you know, there's got to be a better way. And when we started the business as a custom software shop, we just wanted to have freedom. We didn't really know exactly what. We just wanted to figure that

out. But there's a story behind that in that the Martinot's father was a father of 10 who also ran a law firm. And on the side did all these little entrepreneurial ventures. One of these ventures, as bizarre as this may sound, was the little balloon tying company. You mean like the balloon animals? You heard me correctly. You go to a restaurant, you see the balloon animal twister? Yeah, imagine that. Always jealous of those. Yeah, very manly. It was a great one. So what happened was we started recruiting a whole bunch of these balloon twisters. And each of the twisters had to report in and schedule, and it started consuming more and more and more of Stan Martineau's time.

It was ludicrous. I mean, the number of hours at night he would spend just for this little side venture. And so Scott and Eric Martineau thought there's got to be a better way. So through technology, they automated his systems. They automated his scheduling. And they shortened down his time from 15 to 20 hours a week to two just through a system. And the light bulb went off. And we knew there are more entrepreneurs out there that are just going out of the old way, not leveraging technology to save time so they can do what they want to do, why they started their business in the first place.

And infusion soft was born. And we realize there is something powerful when you connect someone's passion with technology and the systems in place to enable them to serve the people that they're serving even better and to have a life while they do it. Because commonly an entrepreneur thinks, well, if I start my business and run it, things are going to just. be sacrificed, my family, my personal interest. It's either one or the other. And we're here to say you can have both. You can start and run your business successfully and have a successful personal life and have that balance. We are passionate about that balance. Hope you enjoy the conversation with Travis Borsma, co-founder of Dutch bros, and I want to brag on them some more. Clearly you heard the passion and heart behind the organization, but they do something really cool. Drink one for Dane.

This is a wonderful charity initiative by the company. They have raised $1.8 million, and it will keep counting, for the ALS division of MDA. And this goes to supporting research and services for families. So I love how they continue to honor their co-founder, Travis's older brother, that they really get behind a great effort to help so many people who need it. Also, they do a thing called Dutch Love Day. This is fun. And they've donated well over a million pounds of food to local food banks throughout the seven states that they are. in. They do this every February 14th, Valentine's Day. I love organizations that give as much

back as they get because they do such a good job of serving people. And, you know, Dave tells us this all the time. I love this. You know, he talks about Rabbi Daniel Lapin and his book, you know, Thou Shall Prosper, the idea that he leaves in that book that is so true that customers reward you with things called dollar bills. And you see Dutch Bros. winning and they are being rewarded, but they're also reinvesting those rewards back into their community. That's what it's all about.

Folks, I hope you enjoyed this podcast as much as Eric the producer and I did. As I always like to do, I want to thank you, the listener, for being a part of this conversation. Please spread the word. We'd love for you to connect with us. Of course, that's at Entree Leadership on Twitter. I want to hear from you via email as well. That's podcast at entreleadership.com.

On behalf of Eric the producer and our entire Entree leadership team, thank you for listening. We'll talk with you again very soon.