Good Life Project - Entrepreneurship and Autism: How One Family Is Breaking the Mold

Episode Date: July 28, 2015

By the time people living with autism hit their mid-20s, they often "age out" of all the services and support available to them. Many, in fact, 80-90% end up unemployed, often for life according to this week's guest, Tom D'Eri.Tom wasn't about to let that happen to his little brother, Andrew, who'd been diagnosed with autism at the age of three. Obsessed with entrepreneurship as a kid, and following in his dad's footsteps, Tom and his dad decided to create an entrepreneurial venture designed to both employ and provide community for those living with autism. They also wanted to show the local community and corporations that people living with autism can be wonderful contributors to a workforce.The perfect vehicle, amazingly enough, was a car wash that came to be called Rising Tide Car Wash. What happened with that business, it's astonishing success, how it changed not only his brother, but also the lives of so many others, including him and his family, that's the conversation in this week's episode of Good Life Project.Along the way, we also talk about Tom's dramatic change at age 11 from an overweight, non-athletic kid to the captain of nearly every major team and what triggered to metamorphosis. And we explore how autism affected the entire family, including Tom's dad's decision to stay true to his entrepreneurial calling, even in the face of six-figure therapy and medical bills. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

We have consumers and clients leaving us crying, you know, so excited that this exists and willing to tell all their friends, what car wash has that? Whether it's a change in the sensitivity to diagnosis or whether there's actually something happening in our culture, in our society, in our genetics. The rate of diagnosis of autism has absolutely skyrocketed in the last generation or two. It's alarming to a lot of people. Today's guest, Tom Dieri, had a little brother who was diagnosed with autism when he was three. Now, Tom and his brother are actually like grown adults right now out in the workforce.

And that's actually pretty unusual to say that they're both out in the workforce. Because what Tom shared with me is that once people with autism, you know, what he called age out of the system, whether it's education, all sorts of services at a certain age, generally, you know, early 20s, late teens, even all these resources and programs that support no longer become available and you're kind of left on your own. And something like 90% of people living with autism end up unemployed. So he wanted to change that and at the same time create some sort of vehicle to let the community know that autism is a condition, but the people living with autism, they're real people with real feelings and amazing abilities and to contribute to the world. So he and his dad actually tried to figure out an

interesting business to start to create these things. They ended up building both a venture that serves the community. And one of their first actual businesses is a car wash. And they realized that that actually fit extraordinarily well with the skills and abilities that somebody living with autism had. The car wash exploded and at the same time brought both local and national attention and really started a conversation around autism and introduced the local community to the fact that, hey, these people are not all that unlike you. They are different in some very meaningful ways, but at the same time, they're beautiful human beings.

Really excited to be able to share this conversation with you. I'm Jonathan Fields. This is Good Life Project. Whether you're in your running era, Pilates era, or yoga era, dive into Peloton workouts that work with you. From meditating at your kid's game to mastering a strength program, they've got everything you need to keep knocking down your goals. No pressure to be who you're not. Just workouts and classes to strengthen who you are.

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You know what the difference between me and you is? You're going to die. Don't shoot him, we need him. Y'all need a pilot. Flight risk. Really good to be hanging out with you, actually. Your story is really fascinating, so I'm psyched to sort of go into it and explore a little bit. Let's kind of take a step back, and then we'll take a big step forward to what you're up to. Tell me about Tom the Kid.

Tom the Kid? kid tom the kid um i was like chubby unathletic kid for like the first half of my childhood kind of really lived in my own imagination had some friends but wasn't like overly popular and then i got really sick actually when i was i guess 11th grade I think that's And I like ended up losing Like half my body weight Was out of school for like 6 months What happened? It ended up being actually bacteria in my lower intestine But they thought it was Crohn's disease

But it was misdiagnosis So that was the reason why it took so long to fix Because I was misdiagnosed So it was like C. diff in your intestine or something like that? I don't know, I just pretty much couldn't hold down food for months. The good news, I guess, was that it was bacterial. Yeah, I know. It wasn't lifelong.

It's a good news, bad news. Yeah, exactly. It ended up not being so bad, and it actually was a transformation in my childhood because I went from being overweight and not really athletic to having a second chance. I go, wait, well, I can kind of build my body up differently now and really taking that and you know you gain a lot of toughness as a kid when you go through something like that so from there i actually went from being like the unathletic

kid to being like one of the most athletic kids in my class okay how old were you i was i was 11 at that point and then um through middle school i was like captain of all the sports teams do you remember sort of like consciously making this sit and saying wait a minute like i'm 11 years old i have a fresh start like let me do this totally i do i remember my dad telling me saying to me he's like tom he's like you know this was awful experience but here you go now here's your chance to change you know and change it and he's like i know you i wasn't you know i didn't feel good about myself so here's a chance to feel good about myself and you know i loved baseball and i got really good at baseball i loved football i started getting really good at football and and that really kind of just changed the course of my life i

then went to catholic high school because of four sports made the best group of friends i possibly could have the guys who are now living down with me in Florida and building this business with me like my friends from high school and really that was you know I got to really experience something that most people don't get and I got to really the the best thing about it besides the fact that like I got to kind of read you know transfer my body at such a young age, the mental toughness of understanding how to get through a hard situation when you're so young. My parents had no idea what Crohn's disease was.

I had no idea what Crohn's disease was. I thought it was going to be this life-bound illness that was really affecting. I couldn't eat. I really couldn't consistently keep down with food for a couple months. And that was, you know, and getting through that and then getting to, you know, I felt like I could do stuff and I could conquer stuff. And that has helped me through my whole life. Yeah. And to learn that at 11 years old also, you know, it kind of makes you grow up a little bit faster also because you're struggling with stuff that your average 11-year-old kid doesn't struggle with. But, I mean, also just the fortitude and the insight to take that and then come out of it and say, okay, I'm physically a different kid than I was six months ago.

And, you know, I'm sure you were a lot weaker and a lot, but at the same time, you're like, huh, this is, this is a really interesting opportunity to actually, to be able to put on those glasses that says that this is an opportunity to change. It's really powerful. So it also kind of says something about your, just your approach to life from a very early age, which is basically like nothing's gonna stop me yeah it's it's funny because my dad is like the most like driven and big personality you'd ever meet he started from from nothing he built three successful businesses he's a real

like tried and true old school entrepreneur and getting to go to work with him when I was young and getting to see what he did and stuff like that, like that kind of wired me to just want to do stuff and get stuff done. And I don't know that the monetary success was ever something I was really interested in, but doing something that other people would say, wow, that's really, you know, like that's pretty cool that you were able to get. What did you do when you went to work with him? The business that really built him was litigation support.

So, like, working with large law firms doing initially copy shop, initially doing copying and filing for those companies, which moved into scanning and electronic data discovery. So seeing him kind of evolve through that. And he also actually owned a equestrian center in Manhattan for a while in Chelsea. So he does litigation support and equestrian. Yeah, that's what he was. Because they're just naturally tied together, right?

He loved, I mean, he loved horses. He saw an opportunity to do something in the city because there was really no great riding here. And he did it. It would have been super successful had he been able to really focus on it but since the other business was really paying the bills he ended up having to make a decision and yeah so wait where was the equestrian center like now that we're hanging out in new york i gotta yeah i need to know where it was uh pier 66 i think i was on one of the pier yeah yeah yeah i guess that's kind of because there's so few places in new york city yeah you could possibly do that. Exactly.

Yeah. So it was right under, I guess it's Basketball City. I don't know if it's still there. Yeah, I think it is, actually. It was right underneath that. So what was his interest in horses in the first place? He just loved riding. I mean, it was something he got into, I think, I guess he got into it in his 30s and loved it. And he rode in the city and he was like, you know, this sucks.

Let's do, you know, I could do better than this. It just sounds so weird to say he rode in the city. was like you know this sucks let's do you know i could do better than this it just sounds so weird to say he rode in the city i know exactly who does that so he was one of them really really exactly so he you know he saw that he was like all right let's do this and and going that was really cool because getting to do that like that was a consumer business where he had a lot of clients i got got to go to camp with his clients. And I got to make a lot of friends that way. The litigation support, it's a factory, essentially. Right.

So where were you actually living? Where'd you grow up? Long Island. Okay. Yeah. North Shore, Long Island. Whereabouts? Brookville, Muttontown.

Yeah. Right by Oyster Bay. Not too far from me. I was a Port Washington kid. There you go. Yeah. Right down 25A. So you're getting a taste for entrepreneurship and also seeing from your dad that you can start something from nothing multiple times.

Were you also getting a sense that it could be really hard? Yeah. I mean, my dad was always super stressed. I mean, running a business and especially the type of businesses that he was running, specifically the litigations. Oh, yeah. Because deadline driven. Yeah. 24-7, 365, dealing with, you know, the largest law firms in the country. Lawyers can be kind of tough bunch sometimes. I've heard that. So, I mean, you know, doing that for, geez, over 20 years, you know, really you saw and you know we started my dad was when I was born he was a CPA and he took that leap because one of his clients was in this business was in the

copying business and they were going to actually try to franchise it it didn't work out he ended up going on his own and seeing him really you know the only time I ever in my childhood up until I was probably in high school ever saw my dad cry was when he first started that first business. You know, I remember him like, oh, my God, this isn't going to work. What did I do? You know, I have a two-year-old kid and another, you know, newborn who ended up being diagnosed with autism. I don't think we knew that at that point. So this was you who were two?

Yeah. And you remember it. Yeah, it's like my only, one of my only memories memories from when we were living in Merrick at that point. So in that house, that's one of the very few things I remember. Yeah, it's so interesting because so many people look at the glory side of being an entrepreneur who's made it. So many people want to be an entrepreneur. So many people want to own restaurants especially, which having a lot of experience in that industry boggles my mind. It's so brutally hard.

I know. It's amazing that there isgles my mind. It's so brutally hard. I know. It's amazing that there is such great aspiration. And it's amazing. I mean, I'm an entrepreneur, and I love it. But it's also there are windows that are brutally, brutally hard. And it doesn't matter how successful you get. As long as you continue to grow, you will always move through those windows, which are just brutal.

It's just the nature of doing it. Every single business. One of the things that the guys at Unreasonable Institute talked about was kind of like this curve where it went, you start like really high, right? And like, oh, my God, this is going to be great. I'm going to change the world. And you get super low at some point. And then right as soon as you get to that point where, oh my God, this is all going to fail, if you're lucky, it turns around.

And you keep working through it and you build progress and you go forward. But there's, I think, I mean, in my experience, there's always a super low at some point. I totally agree. I mean, I've started a number of ventures and I've helped people start many ventures. And I don't think I've seen a single one that hasn't been through the wild highs and also the really wild lows.

And it's not about failing. It's just it's the nature of the ebb and flow of entrepreneurship. I mean, to a certain extent, I've actually seen people scale online through information in a way that can smooth that a bit, but it's still, you know, it's psychologically, it's grueling, but I mean, amazing upside, but still. Yeah, it's... And nobody talks about sort of like that part of it too, because it's funny, there's, I read a study a couple of years ago where they interviewed a whole bunch of entrepreneurs and they basically had really successful ones and they said had you known what it would take and what you would go

through to get here before you done it somebody sat down and said you you will succeed but this is what you're going to have to go through would you have done it and like the vast majority were like not a chance at hell exactly you know so it's almost good in a weird way. I'm like, oh, you should know the truth before you do it. But then based on that research, I'm kind of like, we should kind of know the truth, but not entirely because so many great things wouldn't get started. Exactly.

And it's funny that because I think that's something that every entrepreneur after they do one venture knows. But what I find super interesting is that a lot of entrepreneurs go and do a second venture and a third and a fourth knowing that, oh, this is going to be awful. Yeah. Well, it's funny because I had that in me and my wife would be like, you remember what it was like, right?

Exactly. You know. Like, you really want to go back there. Because, like, you know, we kind of just, like, we gloss over that because we just, the highs are the ones that, like, they're so good. Yeah. You just kind of, you're like, oh, dude, it won't be so bad i know then you get there and like oh it is that bad and there's this like eternal optimism where it's like you start saying oh i learned all these things it

won't be that bad this time i'll get through this i have all these partnerships that i can line up and it'll be easy and then you get through it's like oh god i knew it was gonna be easy i fooled myself again right because even when you have those like the reason now you have more resources more relationships but then you set your expectations that much higher because of it. And you're like, ah. Yeah. So you're pressing. Yeah, it's amazing. So anyway, you're growing up the kid of an entrepreneur learning all sorts of stuff.

And then, as you mentioned, you have a brother, little brother who's two years younger than you. And at some point, the family, I guess, starts to realize that something's a little different. Yeah. We knew that something was different with Andrew by the time he was probably two. I think he ended up getting the diagnosis of autism by the time he was three. So you say we knew. Did you know? Yeah. I mean, you could tell.

So, I mean, innately you saw that something was different, right? I mean, Andrew would cry a lot more. Andrew would be, you know, prone to like really sporadic behavior. And for me as a young child, and this is something that I've gone through a lot in like, like therapy and trying to understand is that I kind of took on this persona of, I can't make any trouble because Andrew, you know, my parents are dealing with my brother and he's, you know, this is really hard. And even before there before there was autism you know we knew what it was we knew andrew was a harder child he was struggling yeah so and i remember that for sure andrew always crying and me you know just standing there so

then you've got this thing in your mind saying i've got to be the easy kid exactly so it's got it's a lot of pressure at that age yeah yeah. Yeah, no, I know. And I think that, I mean, that's really, you know, I have worked a lot over the last year or so to be more cognizant of that, understanding that that is something that is part of who I am, and being willing to speak up when I'm having trouble. Yeah. You know, being willing to say, no, no, that's not okay. And I'm getting there. But like, that was a real epiphany for me to understand. It's like, hey, like, you know, the reason that you always like shy away from that type of situation, when you need help, not when others need help, but when you need help, you always

kind of just say, all right, well, I'll just eat it. You know, that's not good. And that's where it comes from. So, but yeah, Andrew. So that was when we were still living in America at that point. And Andrew was, you know, we hadn't gotten the diagnosis when, right as we were moving, my dad business is starting to pick up. So we moved to the North shore and we moved into this big old fixer upper in, uh, in Muttontown. And my brother was really lucky to find a teacher at that point she was going through her phd program and she was um her name is nicole wheaton bound and she runs a school now called nassau suffolk services for autism and comac but she was one of the first people that we had ever found that did aba therapy which now is like the leading behavioral modification therapy and there's so

much research around how the early intervention for children with autism is the most important thing you can do from that, like three to 10. If they're in intensive ABA therapy, the outcomes for their lives are so much better. So Andrew, you know, when he was diagnosed, autism was, I think, 1 in 10,000 diagnosis. It was a rare occurrence at that point. Was this like the 80s sometime? Yeah, he was born in 1990. So it was like early 90s. From like 85 to 95, it went from like 1 in 10,000 to like 1 in 1,000.

And now it's like 1 in 60 or something like that? It's 1 in 68. Wow. And for boys, it's like one in 60 or something like that? It's one in 68. Wow. And for boys, it's one in under 50. Wow. So there's a lot of reasons for that. Yeah. And we're not going to go there because that is a massive rabbit hole right now that's filled with conflict. Exactly. Yeah. I completely agree with that. So the real point I was just trying to make was that we got lucky with finding someone who was practicing the best style of behavioral modification early,

and that's really influenced Andrew's life and made him be able to be a productive individual. You know what's so interesting is that you keep saying we. We got the diagnosis. We got really lucky. Rather than Andrew got the diagnosis and Andrew got really lucky. What's that about? I mean, I don't know. I mean, our family's always been super close. I've always wanted to look out for my brother, though I didn't have a really close relationship with him when I was young.

Hard to have a relationship with someone who has that type of social communication disorder. But I mean, I always felt like I was helping raising Andrew and helping my parents cope with the situation my whole childhood. So I guess I feel, and now with our business too, like it's complete team effort. So I don't know, I took ownership over it, I guess. Yeah, it's so powerful. But on the one hand, it's really powerful.

On the other hand, again, especially as a younger kid, it's a lot. Yeah. Yeah, definitely. You know, and I guess, you know, you're in therapy now. Who isn't? Yeah, right, exactly. Well, if you grew up around the New York City area, you're like some sort of freak if you're not in therapy for some chunk of your life. You're like, what the hell is wrong with you?

You're definitely screwed up. You must be in denial. Exactly everybody's so he gets into this intensive therapy and probably using your language the whole family is in this intensive therapy and uh and i guess he's really he really responds to the therapy yeah yeah i mean 40 plus hours a week for 10 years, you're going to get some results. Yeah. So here's a curiosity also. Your dad's an entrepreneur, which means he's at 40 hours a week of private intensive therapy. It's got to cost a boatload of money.

Over $100,000 a year. So your dad's an entrepreneur, but he's also a CPA, meaning he could turn around, get a work-a-day paycheck, good six-figure job in the New York City area where he doesn't have to worry about anything. Yet he's kept being an entrepreneur knowing that he also had this huge chunk of money to spend. Have you heard any conversations about this? No, I haven't but it's interesting because um it always has boggled my mind how he because he he always told me because i i wanted to be an entrepreneur from time i was young watching him and he's like tom whatever you do do it before you have a family because you have no idea how hard that was yeah and i mean to one just take that leap when you have two little kids two normal

healthy little kids it's super I know. It's super. I did it when I had one and I was like, it's like brutally hard. Exactly. Way easier to do it when you have no strings attached. Right, yeah. And he did that and then to find Andrew was diagnosed. I mean, I think the fact that the business was doing really well, there was, it never was a huge thought to him.

But honestly, I don't know. It's a good conversation I should have with him. That's interesting. Yeah, I mean, because I'm so curious because I think the natural. It's a good conversation I should have. It's interesting. Yeah, because I'm so curious because I think the natural inclination for a lot of people who do have that fallback licensing and education would be, oh, let me get the job that's going to make sure that I'm making X dollars, which you're going to cover. So, yeah, if you have that conversation that he called me i'm really curious that's an interesting thought because i guarantee he had been thinking about it at some point there's no way that was on his mind in some way but yeah so andrew's going through therapy and he's and he's really responding powerfully to it and how's this sort of like

because at the same time so if you're talking like two to tennis or something like that, and then you also get really ill for six months, and then you go through this personal transformation, and into your teen years become really athletic and social. And so once you're sort of like moving up through high school and stuff like that, how does the relationship start to evolve between you and your brother? It really didn't, to be perfectly honest. It's funny because a lot of my friends have siblings similar age and they fought a lot but they also were really close you know

they played sports together or they talked about girls together and they had like good conversations but they were at each other's throats a lot. With me and Andrew, we never fought, but we never really had a deep connection either. So it was really hard. And it was, I think it, I was always cognizant of how that was affecting me, like, when I was growing up, like, because I did struggle making friends when I was younger. And I was like, well, I live in this, like, big house, isolated, don't really have any neighbors. And my brother, you know, I don't really have a relationship with. So this is, I got to go make some friends. But the cool thing about the business that we're doing now, it's changed that, which has been great.

It's really, you know, we work together side by side and we have a relationship. And though it's still different than a typical brother and younger brother would be. When we work together and I tell him to do something and he does it or he rolls his eyes at me and mutters under his breath, that's like a typical younger brother would if his older brother was telling him what to do. And that's good. And we'll go out and we'll have dinner sometimes and he's way more social. And it's great. You know, it's, I'd have no relationship with Andrew at all today if it were not for what we were doing.

So let's break it down. Let's actually share what you're, what you're up to and, and, you know, to a large extent why, why I want to hang out and have this conversation. So at some point, you go to college also, right? Yeah, I went to, yeah, I went to Bentley University in Boston, Massachusetts. And then you come out. So I guess let's just lay it out. What are you actually doing right now? So my family and I started a car wash to employ people with autism.

The name of our business is Rising Tide Car Wash. About 80% of our staff is on the autism spectrum, 35 employees with autism today. We're running one very successful car wash, and we're at the point where we're looking to do more locations and really help a lot more people with autism. All right, so now let's back into this. Why a car wash? Where does this idea come from? What are you trying to do both for your brother and for people who are on the spectrum?

Well, why a car wash? It started as kind of a novel idea. Say my dad saying, hey, Andrew could do this. And then we took a step back. I did a lot of research around, okay, what are people with autism good at, generically speaking? And what are some of the reasons why unemployment is about 80 to 90% among people with autism? Was Andrew working before this?

No, no. So what were the families sort of like looking at in terms of his prospects? So Andrew going to the school he was at, they did an amazing job working with him through his formative years. But as his school and as many schools that work with kids with autism, as they become adults, they don't really know what to do with them. And the way, since they're nonprofits, typical nonprofits, they get their funding through state grants and federal support. And there's actually a disincentive for them to find, at least for Andrew, to find employment. If they actually got him a real job and he was able to transition out of their program,

they'd have lost the funding and their budget would have been messed up. Oh, that's interesting. So that happens for all the kids and all the young men and women that go to the school. Not that they're not capable. Andrew was working as a volunteer bagger at Walbaum's and doing clerical work for a nursing home and that type of stuff so i mean he was doing work he was gaining work skills but he was not learning what work really was because he wasn't being paid it was like two hours and it didn't matter if he went

or not because the the business that he was working for was essentially looking at his well this is a charity thing that we do right we're just like we're doing something for him, not he's actually giving us value. Exactly. And that was essentially what we found as the primary reason why there's so much unemployment is that we look at autism fundamentally as a disability that requires sympathy instead of a potentially really valuable diversity. And in some cases, in in our case a competitive advantage so what we wanted to do was build a business that could employ andrew create a community for andrew and also tell the

story of how capable people with autism could be to the general public there are some great programs that wall greens best buy tia craft now pepsi that they do and they're they're employing people that Walgreens, Best Buy, TIA, Kraft, and now Pepsi, that they do and they're employing people with autism in their distribution centers and stuff with great success. Same type of stories we have from personal, from like the way the guys grow and the way that they become, you know, reach their potential. But their brands aren't built in a way that can tell that story, you know. Walgreens isn't going to be able to tell the story around how capable people with autism are

when most of their employees with autism are working in the distribution centers, so away from the communities. Right, they're not visible in any way. And also that's not their brand story. Right, their brand story is it's a very convenient product at a competitive price. So we wanted to build a brand that was built on, we're here because we're employing people with autism and we do a really, really good job

because we employ people with autism. Right. So it's not just your, and I guess very clear, this is not a charity. Like we're a competitive business. In fact, we're the best at what we do. Exactly. And it's because of this thing that most people would think would make it the worst.

One hundred percent. We're a for-profit business. We would not be nearly as good as we are if we were employing a typical staff. My general manager came from the restaurant industry, and he says that it's like a vacation working with this staff because they don't call out sick. They're never late for work.

They do as I say. They're not on their cell phones all day. They're not giving me you know oh my dog died for the second time in two weeks and you know i just broke up with my boyfriend i just broke up with my girlfriend i can't come to work that doesn't exist with these guys they are so passionate about working and having a place to call their own and proving that they can be good at something, they are the best possible employees that you could ever get. And people with autism follow processes better than neurotypical people do over a long period of time.

So is that the thing that really serves the business and creates the competitive advantage? Yeah. So we're really hyper-focused on process. That's what we consider our support system is that we employ a large percentage of our employees have autism and that everything that we do is super structured and that allows us to serve our employees and also produce the most consistent quality service out there because you know it's you're getting the same product and service every time you come in it's the same process and. And many of them have a great eye for detail.

So our more extensive packages, they do a really phenomenal job. And then we have the story that really does resonate for a lot of people. So many people are touched by autism that when we tell that story, we have consumers and clients leaving us crying you know so excited that this exists and you know willing to tell all their friends what car wash has that so you know there is really is a competitive advantage this watch that we took over so we we bought an existing car wash for this one and it was i mean it was losing money hand over fist. They were washing like 2,700 cars a month, which is very poor. And now we're washing over 10,000 cars. And that was,

we did make, you know, the best investments we could for, to make it the best quality service we could. But what's really bringing people back and what's caused people to talk about us is that we have a great social mission and that we do a hell of a job and that everybody's friendly. Everybody's happy to be there. You come and you'll get your hand shaken three times and say, you know, thank you so much for your business and you're having a great day. Okay. So this is really interesting though, because the common perception of somebody living with autism is that they're not going to look you in the eye. They're not going to shake your hand. They're not going to touch you, that there's no social skill whatsoever,

no ability to read or connect, but you're saying something very different. And that is true of all of our employees when they start. Every one of them is not comfortable in the situation. And we've had some of our best guys now, when they came to us, barely spoke, slouched over, just like you're saying, wouldn't look you in the eye. You know, we're really afraid to talk to customers, but the repetition and the structure that we put in place in the business. So

when you greet a customer, you say the same thing every time. Hi, welcome to Rise and Tight Car Wash. My name is Tom. The waiting area is over there. We'll come get you when the car is ready. And drilling that into them, and that gives them that confidence. Well, this is what I say. And then they're going to say it a few hundred times in the first week that they work there. And then they get confident. And then they want to talk to customers because they've had that positive interaction. And that gives them the confidence to have more of an ad-libbed conversation. And as they grow, some of our employees that have been with us since the beginning, so for like a year and a half now, they can have all the customer interactions. They can essentially deal with any situation that comes up.

And these are people that never wanted to talk, ever. We were physically afraid to speak to people when they got to us. And our theory, that this is much different than what you typically think about autism, and this is much different than what we find most of our guys when they come to us, is that the repetition in the structure gives them the confidence to keep moving forward inch by inch. And because they're producing a really high-quality service and because they're producing a really high quality service and because they're getting positive interactions, they want to go further and they want to put themselves

out there. And a lot of guys with autism are very much full throttle or no throttle at all. So once you get them moving, you can't shut them up. So now we're having the opposite problem. It's like, hey, Mel, calm down, man. You stick to the stick to the script just say that you don't have to talk you're not trying to have a whole conversation with the customer who's just trying to get the car washed and leave right you know so it's now

it's the other issue but that's something that's been really powerful for us yeah so how does it make you feel in knowing that you've created something where you're directly responsible for seeing this change happen in the life of so many people. I mean, it's awesome. My dad always says that running a car wash is a really tough business, right? There's mechanicals. There's lots of customers, so you inevitably have complaints and stuff. There's managing staff. There's all these different aspects of the business that can be really challenging. But as soon as you go out on that floor and you talk to Melvin, Tyler, my brother,

these guys, you know, you can't not be happy. It's like Disney World. You're like these, they bring out like this type of happiness that is just, it's indescribable how awesome it is to work with them and how, you know, how proud we are to have done this. I mean, my best friend is our general manager, a gentleman. His name is Kevin Walnick, and he was the one who came from the restaurant industry. And you'd never get talent like that if it weren't for the mission. And that's all of our typical employees are there because of the social mission. They really genuinely are aligned with what we're trying to do.

And I mean, every business hopes for that alignment and that purpose. And it's really hard for me to describe because you have to meet them to say, wow, it's 110 degrees out and these guys are smiling ear to ear working hard and you know pump they have to work an eight hour day tomorrow in the same heat you know and who's who does that you know nobody's like that you know it's great yeah i mean it's awesome also that you get to see that evolution and confidence because again i guess that's one of those assumptions that everybody makes who's not directly exposed to an autistic community that, you know, well, that's not something that in autism behavior. No, like this, this will work. What happens if one of them has an episode? They're all, what's the reason? I mean, was that

the reasoning? What happens if, yeah, exactly. What happens if they, if somebody has an episode there, it's going to be a chain reaction and everybody's going to have an episode. You know, they're not going to work good in teams together. This is not things that they're going to be good at. All right, so let me ask a question. Has anybody had a quote and episode? No, not a single one in over total time from the time that we started piloting with people with autism to opening our first door to now operations

has been a little over two years and worked with over 100 guys with autism, not a single episode. And would the PhDs have said that's possible? No, no. They also wouldn't have said that it's possible that when the guys work together in a car, so we have a person on the driver's side and a person on the passenger side, that they would actually work faster when they're together versus when one of them's just working on the car because they're mirroring each other. And that's something that a typical person you would assume, like there's a little competition there.

Yeah. But what the thesis is around people with autism is that they don't have that social capacity, but they do. I mean, you see consistently from somebody going from eight minutes when they're doing it when we're just practicing, it's just them working on a car, to as soon as they get with a partner on the other side, to six minutes, doing the same exact process, but having somebody where they're working with.

And people would have said that, or people said that, oh, well, they're not going to create relationships. They're not going to have friends. They're not going to really see it as a community. And while some of them don't, a lot of them do. I mean, we have employees that take three buses to work, to get to work, and still come on their off days because they want to hang out with their friends. Hang out in the break room and play on their Nintendo DS while their friends are working

just because this is their home. It's great, but it's stuff that you would never expect. Yeah. I mean, in an interesting way, it sounds like it's – I'm familiar with the broad idea of the ABA therapy you mentioned. It's actually a big article I just read about it. But certainly I'm not familiar with any of the details, but it almost sounds like in a way like this is –

like you were saying one of the big problems is, where do the kids go after these official educational programs? And it's interesting because it sounds like in a way that this is not only gainful confidence building, community building, skill building, employment. It's also, it's like, could you even, I mean, is there an argument to say that it's a continue,

it's the next level of that type of therapy? So, I mean, maybe. I've never really thought about it in those terms. Or maybe even not that type of therapy, but there's a continuing therapeutic effect. Yeah, there's absolutely a continuing therapeutic effect. And what we find in that there's a lot of research around, because they're such high unemployment, what does that do to a person with autism? So essentially, for the first 22 years in most states, the first that do to a person with autism? So essentially for the first 22 years in most states,

the first 22 years of a person with autism's life, they're funded by the government, they get all these great services, and they really show amazing growth. We put so much work into them. There are so many amazing special education professionals that really dedicate their lives to this. And then they get to 22, the services end, they go home, they sit at home and play video games.

And within months, much, much of it is undone because that isolation and that they're not stimulated, that regression happens very, very quickly. And we see that with people that were just, let's say, somebody who we wanted to take on but we just didn't have a spot for them. They come in an interview, and they're just graduating high school. And then they come back in the next year when we're hiring again, and they're not the same person anymore.

They've regressed. They have more behaviors. They're developing tics or more severe OCD. That sucks, and we see that over and over again. And with us, since they come and they have this structure, they're continuing to grow. And we, so we really want to get guys right as they're graduating high school, take them into the workforce. Many of our employees, people at my brother's level, that's in the middle of the spectrum. They have a home with us for a very long period of time. They can move up to the point where they can earn $12 an hour plus tips

and live independently. And then we have a lot of guys that are at the Asperger's or high-functioning autism level, where this is really, truly just the first job. Just like you or I worked at a supermarket. It was our first job, and we're teaching them, what does it mean to be a good employee? How do you navigate those social dynamics?

Giving them that self-confidence, and then hopefully they move on with that first reference to something that's more aligned with their skills or with the things that they want to do with their lives. So it's an important transitionary job for a lot of our guys, and it's also a career for a significant portion of our employees. And it's necessary for every person with autism, whether they have the capability to

work or not, you know, the family needs to get them into some sort of program to have them sit at home is, is really, really harmful. So knowing that you have so many of these kids who come to you and you just don't have space, knowing that you're an entrepreneur also, I'm sure you're looking at the future and what you want to do and how you want to not only grow the business but also serve more people before they sit home for a year. Totally. So we have a couple of different thoughts on that.

One, we want to grow the car wash business. We want to open up more locations. We're looking for, as we speak, real estate in the South Florida region to try to do a few more stores. And after we get that, hopefully we can do a larger expansion. But also a lot of what we're doing, since we are so focused on this process, the systems of how do you recruit, how do you assess, how do you train and ongoingly support an employee with autism, stuff that we're doing at a level that a lot of people

don't really know, aren't really doing. We're kind of at the front lines of that. And we want to share that information. So we're hoping to build some partnerships with either some advocacy organizations or some PhDs that can essentially take what we're doing, turn it into like a framework and share it. And that would be something that would be great that our thesis is that any business that can be structured, there's a subset of people with autism that will be your best employee. And also our thesis is that virtually every business can be structured, and it's better if that business is built in a step-by-step process, it's better for everybody. So with those two ideas together, people with autism are going to be, there's a group of people with autism that are going to be your best employee for a lot of jobs that you have in your business. And we want to essentially give small business people and even corporations the ability to

harness that. Not only have a great employee, but then also have a story to tell that will resonate with your customer base. Yeah. I mean, that's so powerful. What's funny is he said, you know, we hope to potentially partner with other organizations or PhDs, which immediately in my mind, I was like, wait a minute, isn't the PhD is a guy who like said, this is impossible. Well, you have to show them different. actually employs a ton of people with autism but you know you can build a consulting arm that basically says you know like let me just any like anyone who has a business who wants to function better let's we'll bring you in and show you how to systematize and process chunks of your business and then hire and and train and like create the environment for people with autism to come into your business and let your business flourish and then let them flourish in a really powerful way like there's is like you said there's probably

when you actually deconstructed almost no business that isn't yeah doesn't have some functionality in it which is capable of of process and systemization exactly yeah and and that's what we we'd love to be able to do that obviously we're you know we're a small team so we're focusing on on making sure we pay the bills and making sure we can grow the business in a way that's financially responsible also. But I mean, the consulting side of it is something we'd love to do. We've seen the great thing about being, the funny thing actually about a car wash is that it really is, without a lot of people recognizing it, kind of like a staple of a community everybody in the community goes to the same car wash right for the most part at least once a month or something right you're going there right it's very community centric and so we've had been able to like build relationships with with other local business people who see how great our

employees are and want to do it so like the local deli next door or the local gym or local um you know yogurt shop hey i'd love to employ people with autism how would i do that and at this point the best we can do is say hey just come and watch and i can kind of give you some pointers but it's not formalized right so it would be really great to be able to formalize that and let people yeah but but it's i mean the beautiful thing it's like it's this incredible proof of concept whereas like the biggest question everyone had like if you showed up and said hey listen you know the people with autism are great for this type of work here we're going to train you how to run the systems everything would be like yeah i don't know but but being able to actually look and say oh wait like this works yeah you know i guess one of the big questions

would still a lot of people would still be like well it works in their business but i'm still not sold on will it work in my business but at least it's it's a big you know like body of proof in the right direction yeah we have a living laboratory essentially and i think as we grow we'll look at not only growing in the car wash industry but also growing into other industries as well to prove that not only does it work here, but it probably works in the quick service restaurant industry also. It probably works in things like locksmithing. It probably works in stuff that can be really step by step and that's built out that way at a large scale.

And then at every business, like we said, there's parts of it that can be systematized. So there's... I mean, even in like massive business like massive business like amazon you know like warehousing picking and packing shipping stuff like that you know that's totally totally i mean it seems like those businesses would just be like tailor-made for yeah companies like sap or have made a commitment to employing a lot of people with autism uh there's a great company that's actually new york-based called ultra testing and they're working with high functioning individuals with autism. There's a great company that's actually New York based called Ultra Testing, and they're working with high functioning individuals with autism and software testing. And it's great. And they're working with big clients. And that because these are the best

people for that job. It's tedious work for a typical person, something that's not a desirable job function. But people with autism love it because there is that structure that repetitive nature that almost therapeutic in its kind of you know function it's really cool i think there's the way i liken this is essentially to the sustainability movement pre-1995 where the only thing we thought about when we thought about environmental responsibility was an ethical debate of should business should operate ethically right So we shouldn't dump in the Amazon rainforest. But there was no business case to it. So when companies like Seventh Generation, people like Paul Hawken, Emery, and Hunter Lovens came and proved that, hey, if you focus on

environmental sustainability, you'll have a more efficient process, you'll have better product innovation, and you'll have a stickier client base because people care about that stuff. When that light bulb turned on, well, now it's a huge deal for businesses to think about environmental sustainability. And it's the same thing with autism. Right now companies employ people with autism because it's an ethical thing. We think we should. It's a good thing to do, not because it's a competitive advantage. We think we should. It's a good thing to do.

Not because it's a competitive advantage, even though it is. So what we want to be able to do is be that company that really does something special and is a really competitive business because of this and hopefully impact other companies to do the same type of thing. Yeah, I mean, it's like the ultimate blend of doing well and doing good simultaneously. And we haven't talked about it a whole lot and it feels a little bit weird to talk about it, but we should throw it on the table, which is from a marketing standpoint. Also the same way that you're showing, you know, like when green was first sort of like a thing, all these huge corporations started piling on saying green, green, green. Now everybody's green. So it's not

a point of distinction anymore. Right. But especially with the data that you share, which, you know, one in 68 kids is diagnosed with autism, one in 50 boys. That means the number of families that are going to be touched by this on a very personal level in the United States alone is massive. And then from a marketing and just, you know, from that standpoint, you're going to have a huge demographic of people who really want to support businesses that are supporting kids like theirs. Exactly. And we see that all day, every day. People coming in with autism license plates being like, oh, I drove 10 miles to get here. Normally, somebody won't drive more than two or three miles to get to a car wash. And we haven't spent anything on advertising because it's all been generated through word of mouth and through our earned media and getting in, you know, news

and stuff. And that's something that I think that, I mean, that we can show at a small scale right now, but there's, we're just scratching the surface of how, how does that, how can that possibly work? How can you activate so many people that care and love for people with autism to vote with their wallets? And yeah, I mean, we're really excited. We got to, we're doing an engagement with Siegel and Gale. We won their CSR fellowship for 2014. So they're going to do a full-on engagement with us and hopefully help us mine that data and really figure out how to tell that story in a way where we can really activate customers around this is your your child's future and we need a really diverse ecosystem of opportunities to serve the entire autism population but you know by you demanding that companies look at this they'll do it. Yeah. So what's this whole experience done to you?

It's toughened me up, I could tell you that much. You know, running a business is not easy. Like we said, there are highs and lows in a car wash that I think most people think it's a relatively easy business. There's so many aspects of it that are really tough. So making sure all the equipment is running well making sure that you're staffed properly making sure that your your you know your menus and your services are the right services it's every bit of business kind of rolled into

one and and there are their highs and lows there so it's you know taught me how to do that right and it's taught me that and and this is something I never thought I'd be passionate about because it's not necessarily my personality, but it's something that I really care deeply about now. But that if you want to do something good, you have to do something well. And in order to do business well, you have to be organized. You have to have systems. You know, we have so many social entrepreneurs out there that want to scale, that have these brilliant ideas, but don't put the time into building systems with integrity that can actually do the type of scaling that they're talking about. And I mean, that is the

most important thing as you grow a business is making sure you have things. You're not just flying by the seat of your pants. You're building stuff that works and that's been tested and that can grow and can go from one to ten to a hundred. The business side of this is I've really taken the most from this family side and the social side. I mean, I can't even imagine what my family life was like before. I can't even put myself back into that place where I wasn't working with my brother every day. I wasn't seeing my mom and dad every day. It's funny for me to think about where I'd be if I'd probably be living in Manhattan, working in a consultancy or working on Wall Street, never seeing my family, not having any relationship with my brother. It's crazy to think about that inflection point where I went from,

I'm going to take a corporate job to, no, I'm going to do this with my dad. It's been wild. What was that inflection point, by the way? So I graduated college. I was and still am very passionate about environmental sustainability. I wanted to work at an impact investing firm or a sustainability-oriented consultancy. I got some good job offers, but what I did while I was doing that was I was talking to people in those fields.

And what I was finding was that nobody really felt fulfilled in those fields. Even though they're like, oh, well, we're changing the way business is done. At the end of the day, it's the entrepreneurs that actually change the way business is done because the consultant can only tell the CEO so much, but it's up to the CEO to say, okay, we're going to put this into action. And when then, you know, so I started to see that and then I started talking with social entrepreneurs and they felt super fulfilled. Definitely really challenging. But they felt like they were in control and they were able to make the difference that they set out to. And at that point, my dad and I were like, why are you going to go do this type of job?

Go work for a big company and get grinded out in Manhattan. Let's do this. Let's build this business together. And that was the fall of 2011. And then we started our research process, and the rest was kind of history from there. Well, I guess your relationship with your brother has changed in a pretty profound way. Yeah.

Yeah, I mean, like I said, we had very little of a relationship before, and now we have a much deeper relationship. We see each other virtually every day. We work side by side. He'll crack jokes, and we'll actually have real conversations, and we never had that before. So as any sibling who is affected by autism knows that it's really hard

to have any type of real relationship. And this is our opportunity to do that. So it's such a blessing. Yeah, I mean, knowing now the depth of relationship that's possible between you and your brother, imagining back, like had you at that point of inflection taken a different path and potentially never known that this was possible for life it's pretty powerful yeah i did an exercise a while ago about kind of that death

exercise well if i was going to die in a year where would i go what would i do and as i think everybody's initial reaction is i'm gonna get the hell out of here and i'm gonna go travel i'm gonna see all these things but then as i continue to do that exercise i i really you know i was like i couldn't see myself doing anything else even if i had six months left i'd still be on the floor at the car wash making it work because i need to be and it's really important it's important to my family it's to be. And it's really important. It's important to my family. It's important to my friends. It's important to the whole autism community.

And there's no place I'd rather be. That's awesome. So the name of this is Good Life Project. So I refer that term out to you, to live a good life. What does that mean to you? In my mind, it's when your actions align with your values. So for me, my values are being able to make a difference in the world, being able to do something of purpose,

and being able to really help a lot of people with autism live the lives that they want to live, and have meaning, and show that they're capable of a lot. And I get to do that every day. So that to me is, it's not easy, but it's a good life. That's awesome. Thank you. Thank you. Hey, I really enjoyed that conversation. If you found it valuable as well, would so appreciate if you just head on over to iTunes, take a couple of seconds, and let us know.

Share a review or rating. Always honest. And if you found this episode, the conversation, valuable and you think other people, maybe friends or family, would enjoy it and benefit from it, go ahead and share it with them as well. And as always, if you want to know what's going on with us at Good Life Project, then head over to goodlifeproject.com. Check it out. We're enrolling our annual camp GLP,

summer camp for world shakers, makers, and entrepreneurs right now. Really, really awesome stuff going on in August of this year. And that's it for this week. I'm Jonathan Fields, signing off for Good Life Project.