Living The Red Life - How a Trophy Maker Built a Legacy Beyond Awards

Starting point is 00:00:00 Certificate builder, crown jeweler, Jim Gano. Thanks for having me. When you talk about awards, you know, sometimes people will compliment me. And I almost get embarrassed, you know, by the compliment. And I sit there and I'm like, you know, all I should say is thank you. But even that seems, you know, I don't want to call it awkward, but, you know, just it doesn't seem like it's enough. And my thing is always been service to others, particularly those that don't have. have the same advantages that I do. That's why I bring in students into my business, who are

Starting point is 00:00:35 special needs, to teach them job and life skills. That's amazing. How does one get an award that makes the award? Like, what impresses you when it comes to celebrating you, my friend? I don't do what I do for awards. It's just more, you know, to leave that impression that somebody says, I made a difference in their life, and that's all I really need. My name's Rudy Moore, host of Living the Red Life podcast, and I'm here to change the way you see your life in your earpiece every single week. If you're ready to start living the red life, ditch the blue pill, take the red pill, join me in Wonderland and change your life. Welcome back to another amazing episode of the Legacy Makers podcast for Insight Success. I am Regiottieris. This is the

Starting point is 00:01:16 Red Life edition. Joining me today is quite the trophy maker, I would say, certificate builder, crown jeweler, uh, uh, uh, uh, Jim Gano. Jim, how are you? Bubba. Very good, Ray. Thanks for having me. Right on, man. I left very little to the imagination, but how are you, Mr. Crown himself, sir? Well, I am not Mr. Crown. I'm just one of the many Crown Trophy franchisees that are out there. And I opened my franchise about 16 years ago, never look back. It's funny because a lot of my friends are all at retirement age, and they're like, well, when are you going to retire? And I'm like, I'm having too much fun. Right on.

Starting point is 00:01:59 So the fun part comes from when customers come into the store, they're not in a bad mood. They're there because they're celebrating something, whether it's a t-ball team or, you know, corporate awards or something like that. So everybody's always in a good mood. And that's just infectious, you know, throughout the building. I was going to say, there's this old Simpsons joke where it's congrats, Bart, or there's rats, Bart. Do you ever sell trophies to celebrate something, quote, unquote, negative? Not so much negative, maybe a little risque. The big one lately is the fantasy football trophy.

Starting point is 00:02:35 And everybody's in a fantasy football league. And some are just like the old man's fantasy football. No big deal. Some of these team names, I'm like, I have a female engraver. I'm like, I'll engrave this one. There's no way I'm letting you read this page. They get a little out there sometimes with their team names. But, you know, it's still a lot of fun.

Starting point is 00:02:57 And, again, we're just celebrating success. Let's talk about the reward, rewarding hard work. We live in a different culture where you get a certificate for participating. And that's quite all right. But, you know, when it comes to red versus blue, you know, putting your full skill set versus someone else's skill set, you get something. Right. Talk about some of the things that you build and ascending clients' happiness. When they walk into your shop, what happens?

Starting point is 00:03:27 Sure. One of the best examples of this is a program I came up with when I was a recruiter. And I was challenged by one of the senior leaders in this pharmaceutical company to create some program. What he wanted to do was stop people from leaving his company after two and a half years, which was the average tenure. So I came up with a program called Recognized Reward and Retain. And what that meant was so often when I talked. to the candidates, they were telling me, I'm just a number. Nobody knows who I am. I do great work here, but nobody, I don't get rewarded for it. And so when I went back to that senior VP, I was

Starting point is 00:04:06 like, your own staff don't know who you are. So what we have to do is go out and recognize their efforts, whether it's like in pharma getting a drug from phase one to phase two, bringing it to market, creating a blockbuster drug, recognize them along the way. And that comes in many forms. be a t-shirt, it could be a certificate, could be a monetary award, could be a crystal award, could be a dinner with an award, just create some kind of program that shows them you appreciate what they do. And when we started doing that, all of a sudden we noticed that two and a half years was becoming three, four, and five. And the best part was if we could get them up to that four and a half five year, then they were getting close to being fully vested in their 401ks,

Starting point is 00:04:53 they wanted to stay. And now they've been promoted along the way. So now they're invested and they stay with the company. So it really became a very successful way at minimal expense of extending the tenure with the employee. It's quite clever how that works, building that company culture and how so small little nuggets can go a long way. Is there a hierarchy of trophy? Like the more seniority, do you get like a fancier trophy? It really, the way I start is we talk about budget. And then usually if it's going to be a recreation baseball team, it's a small budget. You know, give me the smallest trophy you got.

Starting point is 00:05:35 We only were able to collect $5 from the parents. And that's fine. There's a level for that. As we get into the corporate awards, when we start talking about budget, I'm not asking because I want to spend all of their money. I'm just trying to create a program that's going to be a good representation of what they're trying to recognize. And so we created a program called the good, better, and best.

Starting point is 00:05:58 And the good is going to be at one price level. The better is going to be at, you know, another one. And the best is, you know, some really beautiful pieces, but really expensive at the same time. And usually what we find is people will land on that better level, which is great. And sometimes they'll go to best. And sometimes they just don't have the budget. They're still getting a great award at the good level. So, you know, it's, again, we want to make, we want to create an awards program that they can be proud of.

Starting point is 00:06:29 I was just going to say that sounds very much like a, almost a front of house and back of house SOP. When someone selects essentially one of these categories, what goes into manufacturing? Is it the quality, is it the time you take now, just based on that category they chose? A lot of it is, some of it is pre-made. Like with crystal pieces, we get them blank and then we just have to engrave them. If we're building a trophy, it's going to come down to how crazy do they want to be. And if it's custom work, there's times when, you know, it's a combination of working in my shop at the store and I'm working at my shop at home because I'm trying to create something that is unique. So it may be some element of woodworking, metalworking or something to create this piece that's going to be stand out, you know, and that's going to be, again, that good representation.

Starting point is 00:07:21 But with the crystal pieces, the innovations that are coming out lately are just, they're mind-blowing. We have pieces that will sit on a crystal base, and yet it could be a globe that actually spins. And every time I look at, I'm like, how the heck does that work? We're in the future. Marty McFly was right. When it comes to, like, staying clever and creative with your manufacturing and your awards, do you take, you know, 3D printing into consideration? You know, there's a cat in New York that has.

Starting point is 00:07:51 selling $10 ice cubes. Like, are you looking at really clever ways to create your product? We are. And that's in partnership with the industry as well. So the several manufacturers will ask us, what do we need? We just had our annual meeting last week, had dinner with several of the manufacturers, and they're like, what's next? Where do we go?

Starting point is 00:08:12 What do we want to do? And I think one of the coolest products out there right now is what we call 3D subsurface. So in a crystal block, the image is... is etched inside in 3D. And these are very popular. You'll see them on cruise ships. And you'll, and what's nice is like if you take a picture of a couple

Starting point is 00:08:31 and then all of a sudden they're, you know, embedded into that glass, there's nothing that I have found that's, that's prettier right now. And that you can do so much with. We do firefighter awards with that technology. We do in pharma.

Starting point is 00:08:48 We do research awards, you know, As they get to that next level, you know, from phase one, phase two, phase three. And people just look at it and like, how did you do that? And it's like sometimes we didn't do it, but, you know, our manufacturers partnered with us to get it done and they have the equipment that can do it. How much of it, your processes are versus just filling up inventory like, oh, this item is hot. Everyone likes to be buying this one award. Let's buy 20 of those.

Starting point is 00:09:15 It's funny because people will walk into my warehouse and see all the shells and go, wow, you have so much stuff. I see are dollar signs. Oh, good for you. I don't want inventory like that, you know, because that just means that it's not moving. You're running a store, not a museum. Exactly. And, you know, so we keep on hand what we need. A lot of times we'll forecast, like with baseball, we'll say, well, we sold 6,000, you know, figures

Starting point is 00:09:39 last year. So we might minimize or reduce it down to 5,500, bring it in so we know we have it, and then order extra if we need it. But so it really comes down to logistics. but I really don't like having a lot of inventory because, like I said, it's just money sitting on the shelf. Right on. Well, let's talk about your background. Where does Jim come from?

Starting point is 00:10:02 I grew up in what was a small town called Bridgewater, New Jersey, which has over the past, you know, 65 years has really grown up into a bigger town in central New Jersey. Where I, my first house, three doors down for me, turned into a dirt road. Wow. There was no traffic lights in town. It'll take me a half an hour to go from one side of town to the other. It's just kind of exploded in growth. But I was born there, raised there, and live there now. Wow.

Starting point is 00:10:31 And it's really all I know. And it's just, it's an hour from New York City. It's an hour from Philadelphia. It has the best pizza anywhere in the world. Lucky. Is in New Jersey. I'm stuck in Miami with this noise. But it's, you know, it's one of those places where it was a great place to grow up.

Starting point is 00:10:50 And it was a great, it was a great. place to raise our children and now it's just a great place to live it's the only place I know and I really can't see you know going anywhere else have you always been this wholesome gym have you always has this energy always been inside you yep yeah I'm kind of a what you see is what you get guy I'm very humble um it it's when you talk about awards you know sometimes people will compliment me and I almost get embarrassed you know by the compliment and I'm and I sit there and I'm like you know all I should say is thank you but even that seems you know I don't want to call that awkward but you know just it doesn't seem like it's enough and my thing is always been service to others you know so when I was young I volunteered for Special Olympics because two two friends of ours from a family that we know and used to spend Christmases with were mentally handicapped so volunteering for Special Olympics and things like. that, eventually I became the chairman of that chapter of Special Olympics. And it was always

Starting point is 00:11:54 in service to others, particularly those that don't have the same advantages that I do. That's why I bring in students into my business, who are special needs, to teach them job and life skills. That's amazing. Good for you. I don't do it, you know, for the accolades or anything like that. I'm doing it just to get them, you know, a step closer. And we have some of these kids, you know, have never taken out the garbage. I've never fed the dog. So that's where the life skills come in. Very cool. And on the job skills, it's really about getting them what I call tools in the toolbox.

Starting point is 00:12:28 If I can teach you how to pull inventory, how to assemble a trophy, how to use your hands, at the next job, maybe some of those skills will transfer over. Absolutely. It's almost like running a chef in their kitchen. You can learn at least your knives and cutting. You can at least cut the vegetables and the potatoes and you can be part of the production line or your finger. Unless, if you're into that kind of appetite, So what are we going to learn about you and your Legacy Maker's episode?

Starting point is 00:12:54 Well, I hope that when people watch this, what they'll walk away with is that, you know, just be nice. You know, and you get so much more. I had an ad been years and years ago who used to use the phrase, you collect more bees with honey than you do with vinegar. And I've always kind of been that way, but we never really had a title for it. And it's just, you're going to learn about my business. You're going to learn about the workplace readiness program where I bring the special need students in. You're going to learn about my cancer journey, which happened about four years ago.

Starting point is 00:13:31 And it was not looking good at the time of diagnosis, but I fought like hell. And, you know, here I am today in remission, which is great. And thankful to the doctors and the nurses that brought me there. and to my to my family and you know so it's like you're just going to get a better picture of you know who I am and what I do and and how I do it and and that motivation to always I think I mentioned it in the interview you know my father used to have a saying never let it rest until your good is better and your better is best and I'm always in everything I do personal relationships professional relationships, the work we do, the products we create, I'm always trying to get to that

Starting point is 00:14:15 best level. Awesome, Jim. I got to ask. Do you got your book handy? I do. Oh, let's plug your book, Bubba. Okay. Oh, man, it's grabbing with your job.

Starting point is 00:14:23 I love using all the appendages here. Here's the reason. Here we go, my friend. Bam! Make sure you put it in that camera right there. With the cancer, the way it presented was I started out with two compression fractures in my spine. So two broken vertebrae. walking around with a broken back two became five and I went from six foot tall to five

Starting point is 00:14:46 foot nine so if you think of a building collapsing during demolition that was happening to my spine oh gosh so my flexibility suffered a lot so this is my book it's called I'm not done yet it's available on amazon.com and it recounts my story of and what I trying to do I was actually surprised because it recently won the international impact book award for inspirational biography. And when they called and said, you've won, I said, great. And they said, for inspirational biography, I go, it's not a biography. And I said, this is more kind of a roadmap for people on how to navigate your journey.

Starting point is 00:15:25 And they go, read it again. So I read, you know, all right, it's a little bit. But it was more, here's what happened to me. Here's how I handled it. Here's how I think you should handle it. And so many people have written me to say that they've read it. They've been inspired by it. It's offered them hope.

Starting point is 00:15:45 It's offered them motivation to continue. And, you know, as anybody will tell you, you know, cancer is not the easiest thing in the world to fight. And there are obviously different levels of it. But knowing that I'm out there and the book is out there giving people hope, inspiration, motivation, nothing more rewarding than that. Jim, I really appreciate your time and energy. You definitely deserve the crown you wear, my friend. Thank you very much. I got to ask, what award, how does one get an award that makes the award?

Starting point is 00:16:16 Like, what impresses you when it comes to celebrating you, my friend? Well, it really comes down to, is it a good representation of what you do? It doesn't have to be the most expensive. It doesn't have to be the tallest. But what about for you, sir? Oh, for me. How do we celebrate you, sir? Just say hello.

Starting point is 00:16:34 You know, I'm more, you know, if people will, I was the kid, you know, in high school, always bullied stuff like that. And I tell any kid who's going through that now, I always tell them at some point you're going to graduate high school and it's over. You know, it goes away. You're going to go to college. You're going to meet new people. And that all stops. And that's when I kind of came out of my shell. And that's why I think when we talk about, you know, how I interact.

Starting point is 00:17:04 with people. I think it's because of the lessons I learned early on. I would never want to be I didn't want to be treated like that and I certainly wouldn't want to be the guy treating somebody like that. And again, I don't do what I do for awards. It's just more, you know, to leave that impression that somebody says I made a difference in their life and that's all I really need. Jim, spoken like a true keen, where can people find you? What's your dot com, social media? Sure. My website is www.jimgano.com, J-I-M-G-A-N-O. They can reach me on Facebook, LinkedIn. All of the above. We're on all of them. And it's either going to be under my name or under Crown Trophy of Flemington and they're all linked together. And, you know, by all means, if they have any questions or want to talk further, reach out.

Starting point is 00:17:51 Right on, Jim. Thank you so much for your time and energy, my friend. Let the Crown speak for another episode of the Legacy Maker's podcast. Red Life Edition, Insight Success, I am Ray Gutierrez.

Living The Red Life - How a Trophy Maker Built a Legacy Beyond Awards

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