Noob School - The Pivot to Vintage: Lessons from Brandon Chapin’s Entrepreneurial Journey

Episode Date: December 6, 2024

This week on Noob School, we're joined by Brandon Chapin, an entrepreneur with a passion for building businesses that stand the test of time. Based in Greenville, SC, Brandon has cultivated a career centered around fitness and retail, founding two successful ventures: CrossFit Reaction, the first CrossFit gym in downtown Greenville, and GVL BZR, a thriving vintage clothing store that’s become a local favorite. Brandon's entrepreneurial journey spans over a decade, starting with his hands-on approach to running CrossFit Reaction—where he oversaw daily operations, fitness programming, and helped build a loyal community of athletes. After a successful run in the fitness industry, Brandon pivoted to retail, founding GVL BZR, a business focused on curating and selling high-quality vintage clothing. The shift from fitness to fashion was no small feat, but Brandon’s ability to adapt, his deep understanding of operations, and his relentless drive to succeed have made both businesses stand out. In this episode, we explore the challenges and triumphs of Brandon’s entrepreneurial journey, from scaling his first gym to launching and growing a unique retail business. If you're looking for inspiration or practical advice on sales, business growth, or transitioning between industries, this conversation is packed with insights that will help you level up your entrepreneurial game. Get your sales in rhythm with The Sterling Method: https://SterlingSales.co I'm going to be sharing my secrets on all my social channels, but if you want them all at your fingertips, start with my book, Sales for Noobs: https://amzn.to/3tiaxsL Subscribe to our newsletter today: https://bit.ly/3Ned5kL #SalesTraining #B2BSales #SalesExcellence #SalesStrategy #BusinessGrowth #SalesLeadership #SalesSuccess #SalesCoaching #SalesSkills #SalesInnovation #SalesTips #SalesPerformance #SalesTransformation #SalesTeamDevelopment #SalesMotivation #SalesEnablement #SalesGoals #SalesExpertise #SalesInsights #SalesTrends

All right, welcome back to Noob School. Today I've got a friend going back, I think, maybe, what do you think? 20 years? 15 years. 15 years. Brandon Chapin. Brandon is a good friend, and I met him. I was driving down the road in Greenville one day, and I saw a little sign on this old building, and it said, CrossFit.

Oh, yeah. I pulled in. I never forget. You were in there. And we started chatting and you just opened up a CrossFit Gym. Yeah. And I was like, oh, this is going to be easy. Right?

You came in. Credit card? Yeah, you'll be back. Yeah. It was, if you know we're familiar with Greenville, the giant, the condo they've built next to Publix. Yes. So the gym is still there, but it's hiding. Yes.

Yeah. That's right by the downtown Publix is where it was. And I brought my brother, my brother back. Yep. We signed up. And I remember. I got really lucky. The person that owned that building was a fellow entrepreneur.

And every other person thought I was crazy. And this guy, when I went to ask him about a building, he had for a lease, said, get in my car. And he took me there. Wow. A complete stranger. Wow. And he just kind of believed in me before I believed in myself, really. Yeah.

So one of the things, I mean, I like many things about you, but we obviously learned CrossFit from you and got in, reasonable shape. It's your wonderful gym. And CrossFit gyms are funny, I think, because they tend to attract, you know, something relative to the owner. Oh, for sure. You know, so you have your own little posse of people. In our case, they were all interesting, interesting people. Yeah. That were so much fun. But you, you had come down here from Maine to go to firm and then run track, right? Well, a kid I went to high school with, that I ran track with, went and ran track with, went and ran at Clemson. Okay.

And he was like, oh, you got to come down here. Yeah. So I came down and I ended up going to Furman. Mm-hmm. And I didn't run in college competitive. I just was into exercising. Yeah. And studied health and exercise science.

And it just was like, I was really into training and thought if I could get be where I'm not in the winter, that that would be like ideal. Yeah. It makes sense. I mean, and when you're young, I was like, totally. totally fixated on working in a gym, even in high school. Yeah. Yeah.

And it was always kind of like part of my life was going to evolve around that. Yeah. Well, one of the parts of the story today, the reason people might be interested, is, you know, a lot of times people will say something like, I want to have my own gym, but I don't have the money yet. Yeah. Or I can't afford it. Or blah, blah, blah. That has all these reasons. And that happens all the time.

People will say, I want this, but. And they tell themselves why they can't do it. What Brandon did, Brandon didn't have the money for a gym. I know for a fact. What he did was he kept his job at Furman. He worked in the physical training facility, the pet, I think it's called. The PAC. The PAC.

And he ran that gym for Furman while he was at Furman and then stayed on for a couple years afterwards, right? For a long time. That way you got a paycheck, and you had a paycheck, and you had your benefits. Yeah. And on the side, you were at the gym at 5 in the morning at your gym, right? Yeah. And then after the Furman thing was over.

Yeah, so I think it was like from 3 to 11 at Furman. Uh-huh. Uh-huh. Okay. So I could have like two full-time jobs. Yeah. So you would work early in the morning until 2 or whatever. Yeah.

And then for the afternoon session, I remember you had Michael. Yeah. Michael and his wife would do the afternoon. Yeah. I did that for years. Yeah. And I never really thought when I was doing CrossFit, it was kind of like proof of concept. It wasn't like now where you tell someone you're going to open a group exercise gym and they're like, oh, that's a great idea.

I mean, I was met with, I mean, people would just laugh at my face. Like when I worked at Furman, people felt obligated to tell me how I was going to kill me. And I, you know, like you mentioned the people and I was like kind of like really that wasn't my reality. It was I was like, well, all these other people seemed to be gravitating towards this. And it was hard to explain how like that positive peer pressure is what I call it. Yeah. How it just brings people kind of together. Yeah.

That togetherness that was really. revolutionary, I think. They were ambitious people. They wanted to do well in the gym and kind of what they were working on. But I just love the fact that you wanted to do something and you found a way to do it. Now, it required some extra work, right? Yes. I remember one time, this is a little embarrassing, but not embarrassing.

Maybe it's going to be proud of. But we were the first couple of customers. Oh, yeah. But you would get there at five. every day for the 530 class, whatever it was. And I said, I said, Brandon, how long you've been here? He goes since five. And I said, well, does anyone come this morning?

And you said, no. No way this morning. And I said, well, what's it like, you know, to be trying this hard and no one shows up? Because sometimes I'll just sit here and shed a tear, you know, because it's rough, right? Yeah. I mean, I guess I remember reading the E-myth. Like the first paragraph is about the baker. Yeah.

And how you get convinced to do this thing and it doesn't work or it's not working. Yeah. And I remember for sure sitting in the parking lot when no one showed up crying. Yeah. With like, I mean, it was like, I was like, what am I doing? Yeah, why? And then I just remember one of my friends that like kind of encouraged me to start the gym. told me that her parents immigrated to the U.S.,

not speaking English, and were successful business owners. Yeah. And I remember, like, thinking, like, well, dang, I mean, that's, like, I mean, I shouldn't quit yet. Right, right. And also, I think, like, I think I was a little naive, which was probably good.

I don't really know what I got myself into. Yeah. I was just so, I guess, fixated on like not working out alone, really. Yeah. It seemed like when you'd watch the videos on cross on their website. Yeah. It just seemed like everyone was having fun. Yeah.

And I always had fun doing high school sports and I really missed that. Yeah. I was like, man, if we can just get the, get it going. Yeah. It'll kind of be in that kind of let's get. Yeah. Get the snowball down the hill. Well, you know, a couple of things happened besides the fact that you were building a successful business.

You know, we all made a lot of new friends, including each other. Oh, yeah. And which, you know, today, you know, I haven't been to a CrossFit gym in a while, but some of those people are still, I still hang out with, which is so cool. Yeah, it's, it was really amazing. We met, we got to, people got married and they're still getting married. Yeah. your nephew got is getting married from someone there yeah and it's like I think CrossFit can be insular and you know to the outsiders it can be bad but it's like a lot of the times you think you got

to find people that prioritize the same things as you right and if you're around active healthy people. I think that's just like there's something really positive about that. Yeah, yeah, I agree. And so as time went on, you eventually moved to a much larger, nicer, easier to park place over by the baseball stadium. Yeah, I think I was really lucky that I had a lot of type A sales people and entrepreneurs, people that were mostly in control of their own output, right? A gram. Yeah. People that were just kind of, that's what they liked about CrossFit.

You could kind of see the dopamine, people that like kind of working towards a goal. And I would talk, you know, I was talking to my other friend that's a trainer and he said, you know, it is weird that people hire these business consultants and they pay all this money. and when you become a CrossFit coach, a lot of times those people come to you and they're paying you and they kind of just give you some tips. And I got a lot of great info

and I guess I just realized that we were going to... I saw real early on in Greenville that if we wanted to have a business, we had to probably own a physical space. Because at that time, I don't know if people remember, but people hated CrossFit. because it was loud and they were playing metal and it was just kind of different, right?

They thought a gym should be like an elliptical. So I was really worried that we were going to get kicked out of everywhere we moved. And I guess I just really was able to hyper fixate on that one thing. You were looking, looking, looking, right? For years. Yeah. Like, I would, I mean, I'm sure people that, they were really. realtors that I wasted their time for sure.

But they would let me look at these buildings and back then it was still cheap and I couldn't afford it. But I got lucky and kind of as CrossFit blew up, we started doing those events. And that really kind of accelerated kind of our savings and it allowed us to. Did you get paid for the events or just get more members? We would, they would be open to, as CrossFit kind of blew up. I realized like, oh, there's, I can get money from people at all, all these other gyms. Oh, I got you.

And I designed these events for the community around, for people from the outside CrossFit gyms. And that really was like a whole, was the, was definitely the most exciting thing. Right. It was like kind of organized chaos. Okay. Okay. So you found a way to get the other gyms to pay to come. be in your events.

Yeah. And I guess that was kind of my, I was always like looking at the, the angles, right? Like, I kind of saw the future. I'm always been really good at, like, seeing into the future. Yeah.

And, like, recognizing patterns, which is, I think, a real disadvantage in school. Because if you're, like, a lot of entrepreneurs are ADHD, dyslexic. Right. But for me, owning a business, it always was a real advantage. Right. Because I could kind of see what people liked a lot better.

I think it's interesting what you just said there because if you're like me and you're, let's just say, not so good at the details or maybe following the rules or whatever, not only is that good to be an entrepreneur, it's also a disqualifier to be a good employee. Yeah. You know, because that's not what they want. You know, and so it was, you know, I lasted for a while in a pretty good-sized business, but I was a part owner of the company. Yeah. And, you know, my job was to bring in sales, so I kind of got a lot of, like, latitude.

Yeah. But as a normal person, I wouldn't have lasted 10 minutes. I couldn't do an expense report. I didn't know how to dial, you know, a conference call number. I was just so lazy. Just, you know, no detail. I was not a great employee. I tried to be a pretty good employee because I couldn't get fired,

but I was really lucky that I worked at night. Yeah. So I could kind of fly under the radar. No manager. Yeah, no manager after 6 p.m. Yeah. So, yeah, I could, I wasn't, you know, didn't have to do all the details. But I definitely didn't see the importance of all of the details.

details either. Right, right. It is interesting. You know, one of the things, did you ever do any, like, personnel profiling or psychological profile testing? Yeah, I've done it. I can't remember a lot of it off my head. Yeah. I think it's important. We were talking about it yesterday, you know, particularly people would do it earlier. I didn't do it until, like, a company asked me to do it. Yeah. And, you know, you and I kind of knowing ourselves better now, but what if we really knew that when we were 20, that we're not good at the details. We're never going to be, so don't worry about it.

I think for me, I had this learning disability, but I was like pretty smart. And when people would challenge me and say, well, you can't go to college, I was like, well, let me show you, which was not, which I wish someone young would have pulled me aside and said like, well, you don't need to be.

prove anything to them. It's like they're not going to think about you ever again. Yeah. Well, you think about, I mean, just, I mean, obviously we're not the first person to think of this, but to say, you know, an education equals, you sit in a classroom quietly and listen to somebody talk and you take notes and then try to guess what the answers are. I mean, that's not really an education.

Yeah. That's not how I learn. Yeah. I think I'm like 20 years to. old, like with YouTube. Yeah. I mean, it's like can captivate me. Yeah.

And I feel like had I had that when I was younger, I think I could have figured out sooner a path to. How to find real estate, how to write a business plan, how to, you know. I mean, I remember in the early days of CrossFit, I printed out an article that someone wrote on how to start an LLC. Yeah, right. Because the internet kind of didn't, like, the state government didn't really use the internet. So you had to mail stuff in, which was very challenging for me.

Well, okay, so we know that you ended up buying a beautiful building. It was a nice parking lot. And you had room for events there. You had kind of a back room, weight room, I remember. remember you had an office? Yeah, we like moved up. Yeah. We had shower, like real showers.

Did you live there? No, I didn't have to live there. But I don't know, I've, I've said this. I've said this privately, but when I started the gym, that room upstairs, I was about a week away from living there. Yeah. And I didn't, like, again, the details, I wasn't really, like, that was not a concern of mine.

And then divine intervention. One of the teachers at Furman that I ran with at lunch was going on sabbatical. And he had a 15-year-old cat. And he was real worried about the cat moving with them to Atlanta. So I was entrusted their house and the cat for a year. Nice. For, I think it was like the utilities. Yeah.

And that was in my budget. Yeah. utilities. Yeah, so it was like $200 a month. Yeah. And then I got a roommate. Uh-huh. So it's a hundred now. So it's, yeah, a hundred. And he was a grad student for this, the professor, so it all worked out. But a lot of people, people wonder about CrossFit. A lot of people lived at their gym. Yeah. I mean, it was kind of a ride of passage. Right. I was thinking that because it was such, it was really a nice place, a nice neighborhood. Yeah. You could definitely live. there and I live next door for a long time. Right, right, right. But it's, that was kind of the way it was back in the day, which is kind of hard to imagine the momentum of, like, people were willing to do that. Right, right, interesting.

So at some point, I don't remember exactly why this happened, but at some point, I guess you had an offer or somebody wanted to buy you out and they bought the gym from you, You get up by the real estate too? No. So I was running the gym. Yeah. And the person I was running it with, we kind of had CrossFit was changing. And I kind of thought it should be simpler.

Mm-hmm. And they kind of didn't see it the way I did. Yeah. So we kind of, they were, the plan, right, they were going to run the gym. And I was going to take the event side and run with that. and I remember at the closing to do all the legal paperwork, the lawyer shook my hand and he goes, well, I don't think we're supposed to be doing that right now because of COVID.

And I said, what's that? And we signed the paperwork and then that was the lockdown. The Donald Trump got on the news. And I was like looking at flights to Costa Rica. And I was like, I don't think I should leave. Uh-huh. So that was like a total like 180, like kind of the direction I was headed couldn't, we didn't. So the event side of thing kind of fizzled out.

But the gym's still there. They just celebrated their 15th year anniversary like two weeks ago. Wow. And then that gave me the opportunity to kind of reinvent myself. And my nephew, Daniel, was he still work there? Oh, yeah. Okay. Sometimes I will drive by my mother-in-law now lives next door.

And I just see him in there. The lights, just the light, the little dim light, and he's on the treadmill. Just going. Since he's been 10. It reminds me of myself. Yeah. It was my, it's my favorite cathartic experience, right? Is that exercise.

Yeah, that's awesome. Okay, so now we're going to reinvent the Brandon. Yeah. You sold it. kept the real estate so they're paying you for that yep and what did you do next wanted to run trying to like professionalize CrossFit but it became impossible to buy gym equipment and have large groups of people and I no longer had a building yeah so that became kind of a crisis but I'd always played with eBay and I guess I would do it

it when I moved and do it, you know, when I needed money in college. Yeah. And I kind of just went and tried to do that a little bit and then just kind of got over, like, kind of just, it kind of blew up. Like, it was one of those things where I was like, oh, my God, this can't be this. It was too good to be true. And you're finding or buying equipment, gym equipment, and then settle. reselling on the other guy. I kind of weirdly got into this other sub-nitch by meeting people, right,

of old clothes or vintage clothes. And that kind of became an obsession, mainly to, as I have had different iterations of the eBay business, this is kind of, I've decided that clothes can fit into a much smaller space than most other things. So for my, the health. The health of my business and my relationship with my wife, we have to keep it smaller than bigger if I'm going to do it at my house. And that was

but I guess that was like one of those things where I, the way I viewed myself was like, I'm the CrossFit guy. And I was at this estate sale and this lady says, oh, I know you. And I was like, oh, from the gym?

And she goes, no. From your Instagram page about clothes. And I was like, oh, it was kind of this weird shift. And I guess that is like my new dopamine, like thrill-seeking, is finding these old things that are. So are you going to estate sales? Is that your main way to find it? Well, so it was. Yeah.

And now it's a whole subset of the culture where young people, this is their, they're seeking this out as their first, business. Okay. So I'm, I'm happy for them because they're willing to work much harder than I am at this point. They're like me 20 years ago, right? They'll sleep in their car and wait and wait. Whereas I'm a little older and can kind of move in different directions. But a lot of it now, since I'm older, is helping your friends when their parents move, move or die. Yeah. It's a lot of that.

And you can provide a service so that they know what to keep and what to sell. It's just something I help people do because you can't keep everything. Yeah. So yeah. So you're doing, I know you have a warehouse near here where you keep, I guess a lot of your stuff that you find it at very places, bring it in, sort it out. Yeah. And then put it on eBay and sell it. It's a logistics company is what I think about it.

So a lot of the time, like the old clothes, ship to New York and L.A. and Japan, weirdly. So you're shipping to the coat, like the kind of, you know, like there's more money there. There's hipper people. They love anything American. Yeah. Oh, yeah. In Japan, they love L.L. Bean and Patagonia. there's weirdly a lot of those stores there so it's taught me a way i guess i've always been really good

with people and understanding what motivates people it's kind of way you have to be if you're in any sales job but this has just helped me like truly shift that like that you can sell anything on the internet and the internet really i mean it's you can niche down as far as you want and you have old and limited reach. Yeah. And that's like with CrossFit, you're limited by who's in geological proximity. Yes, yes, yes.

And, you know, it was really easy for me to like, I'll be like, oh, I'm not doing as well as I could because all these people in the apartments aren't coming here. But with eBay and the Internet. It's unbelievable. And you get to some amazing stories. from people that tell you that this is, they've been looking this since they were a kid.

It was in their mom's kitchen. Yeah. And things like that. So that's kind of interesting. That's cool. That's cool. So people in Japan would see your listing because they're trying to find some certain thing, like a kiss t-shirt or something.

Yeah. And then they would say, what size is it? Or they would ask you questions and then you respond to that. Oh, yeah. I guess you must not have to ship everything to Japan. Yeah. So eBay makes it pretty easy. I mean, I guess it's easy for me.

Yeah. How does that work if you've got to ship something in Japan? First of all, how do you get paid? Through eBay? Through eBay? Yeah. Okay. And eBay is, what I tell people is,

eBay is searchable by words and pictures. So you've got to describe it really. So the details is the hard, that's why I hate the listing of it. It's a lot of data entry. Yeah. which for me is like the least my least favorite thing. Right, right.

And then, you know, you can, you just, for me it's like the human game of memory. When you're out looking, you can see things and weirdly you'll start to recognize like the way that things feel and the way they look and it's a lot of dopamine. You get paid to eBay and then to ship it, you put it in a bag. Yeah, poly bags. And then they give you a sticker. Yeah. And you just put that sticker on there.

And I have developed some rules because the post office can be a challenging experience. Yeah, yeah. So I have the post office is where the, you can fit a shoe box. I try to never go in and talk to people. Okay. Because I just found that it's better. A lot of people don't like their job. And I'm pretty happy.

And sometimes I think people get resentful of that. Right. So which ones do you go into? The big ones? Oh, no. They have them on Warren's Road and the main post office. You just have a little shoot. So you don't have to talk to people.

Just put it in there. I got you. Yeah. Well, that's a good lesson. This is not what we're talking about today, but you're smart because, you know, most people want to be happy. Right? I want to be happy. Why can't I be happy?

Well, that's one way you can be happy is avoid people that will bring you down. Yes. And try to hang around with people like our old posse at CrossFit. It will bring you up. And that's, you know, I think I like, everyone says my wife is like a golden retriever. And she is in sales, right? And they think, and to me, it's like the ying to the yang, right? I have a tendency to be a little more cynical.

But, like, at least I recognize that I need to be a, like. Yeah. And I think that's a lot of why people, as I've gotten older and I see people in their job, that when I was 25, they weren't really envious of me, right? Because I was sleeping in my car, you know, in between personal training clients. It wasn't that I was like, but I was like, you know, putting it in so that I could build up this capital of work. And now they're like, well, what do you do? And I was like, kind of like whatever I want.

And also, if you're self-employed, you also have to have a lot of self-discipline and structure. Right. Nobody's watching, but if you play Netflix, if you watch Netflix all day, it's going to catch up with you at some point, right? Yeah. And that's, I just have to do a little bit every day. Yeah. And you can't lose, it's like working out. You can't stop. Yeah. You have to do it. For me, I have to almost do it every day of the week. Right. I do. I mean, my trick, my trick for that with the same personality, my trick, and I've told many people this, is, you know, put your, your have-to's first. Yeah. Exercise, you know, do all the, all your listings done, all your shipping done, and just get it done as fast as possible. Maybe you're finished by 10.

Yeah. And then all of a sudden it's like, well, all the basics are taking care of. Now we'll see what happens today. And that's because people tell me, well, I was going to do it yesterday afternoon, but I ran out of it and I'm like, of course you did. Nobody's got time in the afternoon. We got stuff going on. That's a big shift.

one thing I've gained through not working in the gym is a lot of empathy for everyone that I probably said that they were full of excuses. Now that my life's more complicated and involves a lot more moving pieces, I'm like, oh, I was kind of a dick. I see. Right? Like it's easy, and that's wisdom, right? Right. But I remember when I was 30, even. My life was easy.

Like there was not, I worried about like the gym and that was really it and going to work. And now there's, you know, you got a lot of other people to consider every day. Well, you know, you think about, let's say a more complicated life, you know, if we have

things we want to do, like in your case, let's say we want to get all of our shipping done to Japan this afternoon. But like in my case, like if my dad called and said, hey, can you come over and help us with something. Be like,

of course, of course, that's going to take priority every time. But if I do those important things like between six and nine in the morning, no one's calling.

Yeah, that's my time. As I've not worked in gyms, I, that's basically, and getting a dog, if you get a dog that likes to walk in the morning,

it's no longer a choice. Yes, you've got to. It's a, they will let you know. So that's a life-haven. that I tell people can really just get you focused in the morning. Yeah, you've got to get up.

Yeah. You got to go outside. And, yeah, it's really helped me become a morning person. That's good. I mean, not that I wasn't, but I, like, choose to wake up now before the sun every day. Yeah, yeah. And, you know, also in terms of happiness, you know, it's certainly proven being outside is something you do to be happy. Getting some sun is a good thing.

And also seeing people. Oh, yeah. Charlie, you know, that kind of thing. That's inside. Yeah, in my neighborhood, it's, I'm with all the retired people. Right. They're getting the newspaper. Yeah.

And they're walking. Yeah. And I used to think it was silly, right? I was like, it needs to be harder. Uh-huh. And now it's just like, it needs to be more consistent. Yeah. As I've gotten older, the exercise.

It's just like. that business is going and I know you have a real nice warehouse with all that stuff in it. In fact, I've actually gotten something from you on it. I think it was a backpack maybe. Oh, yeah. The backpack. But you have something new you've done because I know your wife is in a real estate business and you've been doing some fixing up.

Yeah, so I guess it's hard when you become your parents, right? So Kendall and I have always been into being busy. So we bought, you know, we buy a house, fix it up, sell it. And then when she started doing more real estate, I started just during COVID, you know, it's going wild. And she's like, hey, I need someone to do this now. And I was like, okay, I can try like an entrepreneur. Yeah. Let's pretend.

Yeah. And it's kind of evolved into just like we help with real estate closing repairs and people that have holes in their drywall. Yeah. We do a lot of fence repairs. And that to me has been like a total shift in like what I do, but it's basically the same thing. You know, you talk about sales. It's like, well, following up. do what you say you're going to do.

Yeah. And, you know, I think a lot of people and they are not, they work in the trades. They're non-true, their school's not their thing. Yeah. They're not organized. And they, you know, they're like very much a hyperactive person. They need to be hands-on. So, which I'm aware of that, but I also know that for me, that's like the key.

Yeah. especially with real estate agents, they need it communication and to set schedules. So you're doing closing readiness. Yes. And this is for Kendall and also I assume some of her colleagues at the office. And I think what's maybe unique is I think that a lot of people don't, like the attention to the detail and what things look like and what's trash. that's like the coach in me right I'm like oh well like

you should move that chair just like six inches this way and that's kind of become my new like creative outlet because CrossFit for me was like I always viewed as like a human symphony like in a perfect world

you get all these people moving together and with houses it's like that feng shui I've kind of view it as like an art rather than a science. Like you see all these HGTV shows. And I'm like a believer that like, you know, the cool little thing could be the, you know, paints the picture of what the buyer wants. Right, right. And that's kind of the way, like the creative side of me that I never realized that I had.

Right. I just thought I was a meathead. I never thought that so you have had an interesting career once you made enough money really to leave Furman be on your own you've been fiercely committed to being on your own and not like having to work

somewhere yeah and that's a huge part of your lifestyle yeah and like I was saying before we started I heard someone say that their goal was to be self-employed yeah and you know as an entrepreneur for me it's sometimes you're you're like, you know, you're just killing it and you go, oh my God, I can't believe it. And then other times it's what you were doing.

Like, eBay used to be really easy. Yeah. Like, I mean, I felt like, like it was so easy that I like couldn't even believe it. And now it's like 80, 60% of what it was, right? So it's changed a lot. So that means that I have to kind of evolve. And that's okay. I don't think it's gone forever.

Yeah. And it's, I've been lucky that I've turned my hobbies into jobs. Yeah. Well, you've found opportunities, right? Yeah. And things that you can see yourself. I think that's like kind of the new American dream. Yeah, I agree.

I agree. And, you know, when they talk about the safety of a job and a big company, and people are obviously learning that that's maybe not so safe at all, because you've got multiple sources of income now. And if one of them starts to go away, you just work harder on the other one, right? Yeah. And it's funny, my stepmother,

who has retired with a pension from the government, is terrified about money. And she thinks, she, like, sees me and gets nervous. And I said, well, I just stop thinking about it. Like, I just always kind of have that abundance mindset that you can always help people. And everyone's a little lonely, right? So, you know, a lot of the times just that's, you can help. Everyone can help people.

And I think that they don't, they, like you said, that's that first step. I mean, when I was like super young and I had nothing to lose in my mind, I was like, well, if it doesn't work out, I guess I can go back to this job. Because you can always get a job. So I kind of was fortunate in that regard that I was able to, I had a bad job so it wasn't paying me a lot. So I kind of was forced if I wanted to make a little more money to kind of go for it. Yeah. Well, I'm glad you did.

Yeah. Let me ask you this. A couple of quick ones here. Yeah. I know you like to read. What's your favorite all-time book? I have favorite business book is Let My People Go Surf by Von Schenard, which is about the founder of Patagonia. And then non-favorite book, like just as a kid, it was Into Thin Air by John Crackauer.

Yeah. I was really into the outdoors growing up. That was. It's about Mount Everst. Everest when I think it was like 20 people died in 1996. Do you have any interest in doing Everest? Well, my wife's family are adventurers. That's their hobby.

So I've adopted that hobby as an adult. And they've talked about going to base camp. So that's on the list. How about a favorite band? Favorite band. I've been really into this internet rapper. His name is Mike, period. And he's kind of like this independent artist.

Okay. And I guess I admire him because I kind of like his music. And he's 100% his own everything. So he's not super popular, but he keeps 100% of what he makes. So he hadn't have all the whole posse and stuff supporting him. Yeah. What about a favorite word? A penultimate. Penultimate. All right. We use that a lot in coaching. The one before the last. The one before the last. That's like for reps.

Yeah. Like, or like if the set, the fourth set out of five is the hardest, right? Okay. Okay. Because, yeah. Fifth one you know you're finished. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. Okay. Penultimate. All right. All right. And then, what would you like to promote today? I just would tell people the, GVLBZR on Instagram. GVille. GVLBZR. So Greenville Bazaar. GVLBZR.

Yeah, that's our vintage clothes antiques page. And we sell on our eBay store. We go to local events. My friend actually from Furman started these clothing events. And they're like the new flea markets for secondhand clothes. Okay. The hyped experience markets I sell there a lot. Okay.

At near Home Team Barbecue. Okay. And then, yeah, if you have any home repairs, we love to help people. You know, fun. GV, LBZR. You can send me a message. Okay. I can send you the link to the, we have a little form you can fill out.

I'll be on the lookout. Okay. That'll be fun. Well, fascinating life you've led so far. Yeah. Maybe you come back in a year or so and give us. update you know because it's crazy all the crazy stuff you're doing oh yeah it's been awesome and thanks for all your support well it was nothing like an early customer oh yeah it's this is the best

yeah thank you man thanks so much appreciate it okay