The Code To Winning - THE BUSINESS OF STONE: A 15 YEAR JOURNEY IN CRAFTING SUCCESS || ERIK RAZO || EPISODE 016

Episode Date: February 4, 2025

THE BUSINESS OF STONE- Episode  016   Erik Razo, a seasoned stone surface professional with over 15 years of experience in the industry. Born in Los Angeles to a proud Mexican family and raised in Utah, Erik brings a unique blend of cultural heritage and local expertise to every project he touches. His journey in the world of stone surfaces has been marked by a passion for quality craftsmanship and an unwavering commitment to excellence.   As a key member of the sales and marketing team at Creative Granite, Erik leverages his extensive knowledge to drive innovative strategies that showcase the beauty and durability of stone. Alongside his wife, he also co-runs a successful family business specializing in stone walls, countertops, and comprehensive stone services. Their work is dedicated to enhancing the homes and lives of Utah residents through meticulous attention to detail and superior service.   Erik's deep-rooted experience and genuine passion for stone surfaces have made him a trusted expert in his field. Whether you're looking for stunning stone walls or custom countertops, his expertise ensures top-notch results every time. Subscribe for more insights, and join Erik on his journey as he transforms everyday spaces into works of art with the timeless beauty of stone

no idea what we're doing. He knew nothing about countertops. He just knew that it was stone and that it goes into homes and it was a good opportunity. I was with my dad a lot. I remember there's still stories my dad tells us where I was a little kid. It's hot in the California, you know, in California. And also when we came out here, it was, I mean, there was summers that are crazy hot. The car seat would get really warm. And one day he sat me on it and I just said that. I just started screaming hot, hot. And he just, you know, it's kind of a funny story. But I remember that. That's how young I was going out with my dad. I still had a car seat.

And since then, up till now, you know, I mean, I still periodically go with him. I'm very OCD, detail-oriented. I like to make sure things all are all in order. And I also am very, I feel like I'm very good at communicating things with customers and just people in general being vocal about things. Hey, this might happen. And just very detail-oriented, I guess it just sums it up. But that's what I do in my.

business go to a business a builder or a contractor and we tell them hey this is what we do can we give you an estimate that's what we used to do a lot and it was a lot harder because they always had someone and they still do but now that they actually see the stuff online and they see the beautiful work that we can that we can do they're more open to getting a bit from us allow us to show our customer without them ever having to come in what their kitchen could look like so we can make 3d rendering them exactly what the stone that they're choosing is going to look like, what every vein is going to look like when they match them up and then we cut it up and actually place it. So that's kind of cool.

Ladies and gentlemen, we have another amazing guest in the studio today. Welcome to the very another episode of the Code 2 winning insights you need today to seize the world tomorrow. Like I mentioned, he goes by the name of Eric Raso. He is a stone surface. He's been in the industry for about 15 years and right now. It's also in the sales and marketing team. So without further ado, our amazing guest, Eric Raso.

How you doing, boss? Good, good. How you doing? Great. Thank you very much. I appreciate your time for coming, considering a little short notice. But like I said, when you and I spoke earlier on, lately I've just been admiring just a lot of art, especially like the, you know, the countertops and like just interior design and like just stone walls, all these different factors.

But as much as I've been admiring it, I have zero knowledge to it. And so when I came across a professional like yourself considering the network and, you know, as we spoke earlier on with the Utah field, I just felt the need to like say I'm going to reach out to an expert and with you already got your 10,000 hours. And so can you just give us a brief introduction before we get into it about yourself, who you are and where this started all? for you. Yeah, well, my name's Eric Razo. I consider myself a family man. I've got a wife, two kids. Small, so one is one year old and the other one is three. And Hispanic background. So my family's from Mexico. I was born in L.A. I've been raised here in Utah. Been here all my life, so I can't

really say I know Los Angeles very well. I like to make that clear because a lot of people start asking, oh, this part of L.A., this part of that. I was like, dude, I don't know it that way. I was just born there. Yeah, so Utah's home. My dad was an entrepreneur who was little, and we've just always been inside of homes. He used to be a plumber. And then from there, he turned into the stone industry. There's actually a pretty cool story there that maybe we can probably talk about later. But my wife from Mexico, she's from a place called Veracruz, Mexico. And we met during a mission. She was serving as a missionary. I'm LDS. And she's LDS as well, her family and all that. So she was serving a mission in the same place I was serving a mission. After I got back from the mission, I decided to contact her. She was still single. And fast forward to now, we've got a little family and we're working on our business.

You know, I do work for sales and marketing at a company, but we also are building our own brand and our own business. In the same field? In the same exact field. Awesome. And have you guys started yet? Oh, it's a work in the progress. Say that again. Have you guys started that family business yet?

It's already, it's already started. Awesome, awesome stuff. And so what first drew you to this field and also like what has kept that passion going for you? Yeah, so I mean, that's a funny question because, or at least I find it kind of interesting, funny. We got into this because of a miracle is the way I would call it. My dad back in the day was a plumber and I used to go with him as a kid. to all the houses, you know, Monday through Sunday. There were no days off for us because we just, he really had the desire to do better, to give us something better. So I was always with him.

And I remember very consistently we would go to houses on Sundays and Saturdays, and we were going in through crawl spaces here in Utah and other, and in Provo, and the older homes where there's no basements. They have crawl space. And me as a kid, I remember those days, there was a bunch of like spiders and things like that down there just all dark you only had a flashlight and um that was consistent and up until maybe the age of like 14 15 i think it was roughly um my dad was knocking on a door selling a water purifier on a Saturday on one of his days off because he was working for a company but he was also doing his own thing trying to be an entrepreneur knocked on a specific door and the lady opened up. He sold to the lady. And then fast forward like a month

later, turns out that that lady's husband was our bishop because we're again, we're LDS. And they found out where we lived. They went to go visit us. And then my dad and us, we started going to church more. You know, we were already going to church, but we weren't consistent. Okay. Just every now and then and since he came out to visit us, we started to go more. They became friends. My dad became strong. His faith became stronger. I wasn't so, I didn't like it so much because we didn't go as a kid, but I saw the changes happening in my dad's, in my dad and in my mom. Shortly after, maybe a couple years after, that guy that came, the bishop that came, he told my dad that he was going to move to Mexico. He wanted to sell the company.

and he was thinking of my dad. And my dad can tell the story way better, but I'm just kind of, from what I remember as a kid, said that we want to sell it to you. So he went to Mexico, and my dad bought it, and I just remember from that moment, everything changed for us. We knew nothing about countertops.

No idea what we're doing. He knew nothing about countertops. He just knew that it was stone and that it goes into homes, and it was a good opportunity. I love that. I love that so much. And which year was that, if you don't mind me asking? You know, I don't remember the year. It's a good question, but I know I was around 14 and I'm 31 right now.

I'm born in 1993. Oh, 92? Yeah. 93. Sorry. It's crazy. No, that makes it, that's amazing. And so one of the things I've realized, there's one guest, I'm going to actually, I'm heading to Arizona tomorrow. One of the guests is his motto is born in Mexico, made in a America, but he also speaks a lot about his experience in terms of like just how hardworking like he had to be in order to, you know, to achieve what he had to achieve. And considering the fact that even though you're still born near, you got to see your dad's work ethic. And those things just naturally you inherit because you just end up like seeing that. And you've always been in the blue color field, right? Yeah, it all has been. You know, and you mentioned you naturally inherit that stuff. I don't know how true that is, you know. I think it has to do more with,

if you're exposed to it. For example, I've got family that they have hardworking dads, but they never went out with their dad. I was with my dad a lot. I remember there's still stories my dad tells us where I was a little kid. It's hot in the California, you know, in California. And also when we came out here, it was, I mean, there was summers that were crazy hot. The car seat would get really warm. And one day he sat me on it and I just said, that I just started screaming hot, hot, and he just, you know, it's kind of a funny story, but I remember that. That's how young I was, that's how young I was going out with my dad. I still had a car seat. And since then, up till now, you know, I mean, I still periodically go with him.

Awesome. No, I love that. And he still owns a business to the state. He owns a business. It's not the business that I'm in. It is the stone, it's a stone company, but creative, granted, the one I'm with right now is not his. Okay. And it's an interesting story because last year I actually decided to separate myself. Okay. For many reasons, it's hard working with family. I love my dad. I love my mom.

But my wife and I felt that there was just some tension building up. And so we had to separate ourselves. All right. But yeah. No, I get it sometimes. Sometimes I feel like you have to take a different path to yourself. And especially, like, you know, when you're with your wife and family, it takes that, it takes a lot of courage for soul because you're already accustomed to a certain culture.

you're always accustomed to work with family, but I get you have to make that one step for yourself for you and your family. Yeah, it was a hard choice, hard decision because when I was younger, well, I always was very rebellious. And so now, after having served a mission, it's like I understand things a lot better.

I understand the purpose of family now. And all I want is to be able to just show my parents, hey, I love you guys. I appreciate everything you did. Appreciate how patient you were with me. And so when, I started to feel impressions that, hey, it might be good for you to split up because it's building resentment.

You know, and it was like, man, but I don't think I should. You know, I wanted to help out my dad, help him either sell the business or take over or buy it from him and set him up. But it just wasn't working. And so after a lot of praying and a lot of meditating with my wife, it just came strong that we needed to make the change. So it's been a tough year, but it's been a good. one and that that's where I'm at right now okay and how did you come across like

creative granite like when you yeah before you join them how did you come across so small world again the guy that sold the company to my dad it's his brother so back back in the day when they started the company the guy that sold so the guy that sold my dad the company his brother owns creative granite and back in the day they started a business together didn't go well and then the brother owner of creative granite um kept doing it on his own, and the brother wanted to move to Mexico because he didn't want to compete with his own brother. That's what I understand of that story. And I've known him since then, because he was also always around at church, you know, with the young man and all that kind of stuff.

So he was always there. And even when we moved out from West Valley into South Jordan, he was in the same ward that we were in. So we've known each other for a long time. Okay. And then were you, did you just jump straight into the sales and marketing? Did you have a sales and, because I mean, Utah is like the mecca for door to door, you know what I'm saying? So did you end up getting it? Did you have a sales background before then you jumped in sales and marketing? My sales background was just selling with my dad, you know, selling the counters. Once I actually got, once I actually turned about maybe 16, 17, I was always selling. I was always taking care of the customers. Was it door to door? No, it was not. But I did see my dad doing door to door.

Okay. So I did that with him for counters, came back from the mission, decided to go do door-to-door for about three years with Vivint, and then from there I wanted to go back into Stone, because with everything I had learned with door-to-door, felt that I could apply it into our industry, because we don't really apply in our industry door-to-door cells. But a lot of the things you learn in door-to-door is very valuable, applicable in any industry, even in family relationships, it's kind of interesting, but that's where my background in sales comes from. I didn't study anything or anything like that.

I love that so much. I want to talk a lot. We'll keep bouncing between, obviously, creative granite and also your business. But I want to just talk just about like just the countertarts, the fabrication, everything that goes into it. I don't know much about it. Like what's the process like behind it? Like when, like, does somebody have to buy a house or do you show them designs?

How does that whole process like work as well? So it's different. And there's different ways. Either you buy a house from a builder that's building it, and they've already specked everything out. They've chosen everything, and you just have to come buy it and you live in it. If there's an issue with a chip or something, we come and repair it, so I don't really deal with that customer. Or the builder is building a custom home, and he allows the buyer to select materials. And then that's when I meet with the customer.

They select the materials. Once they select the materials, we take it to our shop. We cut it in a big machine. and then from there we polish it or we do whatever modification needs to happen to it. And from there, we take it to install. It's usually trucks or box trucks go straight to the house and then it's unloaded all by hand. And these are heavy, you know, heavy stones. The islands are pretty much a whole slab.

A slab can weigh up to 1,100 pounds, sometimes even more. If it's black and natural, because that's more dense, the dark stones that are natural, they have more density to them, so they're heavier. but we have to carry those into the houses and then we have to set them on the counters and then just do modifications because as most people know, no wall is perfectly straight

so we always have to modify that. Once that's all done, then it's just inspecting the counters, making sure the customer or the builder is satisfied with what happened and then on to the next project. So do you work with, you can also work with realtors

and it's just like a field because of the real estate market But there's just so, there's so many components that are involved in it. So there's realtor, there's like the buyer, there's the wholesaler. So you just work with different people, right? Yeah. Now, I don't typically work with realtors, but the people that are building the house, flipping the house, remodding the house, or whatever,

they obviously work with a realtor at some point. Okay. The only time I work with realtors is there's a lot of realtors from what I've noticed that are getting into flipping homes. And so they will hire me or hire another family. fabricator to work on that home that they're flipping. That's how I get involved with realtors. So since I've noticed that there's a lot of realtors doing this, I've started to network with more realtors. Okay. The reason, the other reason I've all started network with realtors is also because

I've noticed that whatever things the realtors are noticing in the market are going to affect me shortly after. So if a realtor is working for a builder, they're going to know before I'm going to know if the market is, you know, doing pretty well, if the houses are selling or not. Okay. And so I've noticed that. And so if I'm hanging out with realtors or networking with realtors, I'll know, hey, we can expect more work or, hey, we're going to see a decrease in work. So that's another reason why I've been doing that.

Okay. And so your guys' family business, is it the exact same as what you guys are currently doing over there? Yeah. But you separate both, though, because it's two different clients and, like, get your own clients, how do you balance the difference between both? Yeah, good question. So the stuff I focus on in my business with my wife is all custom, high-end stuff. So the bigger houses take a little more detail, take longer. Clients make a lot of changes. So that's what I take care of in my business.

I'm very OCD detail-oriented. I like to make sure things all are all in order. And I also I'm very, I feel like I'm very good at communicating things with customers and just people in general, being vocal about things like hey this might happen and just very detail oriented i guess it just sums it up but that's what i do in my business now at creative granite it's all production stuff builder work commercial multi-family apartments and stuff like that so two different completely different things it is counters but you treat them differently builder work you give them a set of colors here's 20 colors that your customers can choose from and their customers are happy with those colors

and then that's it. There's only a certain amount of options. With custom, you can go anywhere. You can get as wild as you want. If you wanted to go to Italy to choose your stone, you could do that if the budget allows it. If you wanted to go to multiple slab yards, you could do that as long as your time allows it.

Interesting. Interesting. And then what about those customers that have probably lived in a home Maybe they inherited like their grandmother's home and they're trying to like just like remodel it a bit personally for themselves. The process is they come and approach your business regarding that, right? Yeah, that's correct. So they would approach me, approach the business.

They'd call. They'd say, hey, we're remodeling or we're looking to do countertops. Typically what we ask is, hey, send us either pictures of the area, measurements, or we'll come out and measure to get you an idea of how much it's going to cost. Once we are able to give them an idea of how much it costs, it really tells us a lot on where and what we need to do with this customer. Do we need to show them these options or these options? That's how everything is initiated. That makes perfect sense.

And so now the reason I like sales so much, obviously I've done do-to-door, I did pest control for a while. I did solar for two, three years. And I'm right now in insurance where it's more like a remote thing. I have my team. Everything is pretty much remote, pick up the phone, give a food calls, leads. So it's just so much more convenient.

Now with your sales and marketing, your approach is obviously slightly a bit more different, considering your experience as well, because you have 15 years. You work with your dad and all these different stuff. How do you end up like approaching within like the sales and marketing today compared to like how you used to back then?

Yeah. It's a lot easier now, I feel, because now we've got access to social media, which really warms up the potential client. A lot of the people that are on social media, they see my stuff consistently or they see me. So often what will happen nowadays, and I've only been doing the marketing

on my social media for about three years now, but what will happen is I actually meet someone, and they say, oh, I've seen your stuff. So it makes the whole process a lot easier. They even mentioned, like, I feel like I almost know you to a certain degree. And so that's really warmed up the lead. or the, I don't even know how you would say that,

but it's just warmed up the market, I guess, for our business. And so before we used to have to knock or cold call. We still do that, but again, it's become easier because a lot of people see the stuff. Exactly. We would go to a business, a builder or a contractor, and we'd tell them, hey, this is what we do. Can we give you an estimate?

That's what we used to do a lot. And it was a lot harder because they always had someone. And they still do, but now that they actually see the stuff online and they see the beautiful work that we can do, they're more open to getting a bit from us. So it's, it's, yeah, it's a lot different now, but it's, yeah. And then obviously with innovation technology and the utilization AI, just so many things are just so different right now today. and way more accessible compared to back then as well. So the question I had, how do you balance the artistry of stone fabrication with the business side of things?

Yeah. With technology coming in, it's really changed a lot of things, as you know, in almost all industries. AI is not so much just yet in our industry. Other than maybe in the marketing side, you know, we can get a little more creative and use AI. but in the actual hard, heavy, heavy side of things, technology, there's a lot of tools now that allow us to show our customer without them ever having to come in what their kitchen could look like. So we can make 3D renderings showing them exactly what the stone that they're choosing is going to look like,

what every vein is going to look like when they match them up and then we cut it up and actually place it. So that's kind of cool. at creative we actually fortunately the owner Ricardo Opasos he's very into making things easier and faster and so whatever machine comes out that is going to help us in that process he he wants to buy it you check out our shop it's pretty big I mean we're top we're top three in the whole state wow a lot of the neighboring states were still number one in size so innovation is a big thing one of the machines that

we have right now that we're actually about to upgrade to. It's called the Pathfinder. And so what the Pathfinder does, it's just this big, big screen, green screen. You place the slab on it. You take a picture of it and then it puts it into the computer. And then from there, you can take the digital template and play around with it on the slabs. And it allows the customer and you, the fabricator, to see exactly where you need to cut it in order for everything to match up, in order for the tones to look for the tones to match up in the right area. So it's pretty cool. That helps our builders feel at ease because they're like, oh, these guys obviously

know what they're doing because they have this machine that most abraceters don't have. Okay. Either because they don't have the space or because they just don't know how to use the technology or they're not staying up to date. Also, with a lot of clients that work with designers, they like to see how that's going to, how things are going to line up. A lot of times in the bigger houses, you get multiple slabs, and they want to know exactly where everything's going to go.

Now, I love that so much. Matter of fact, I know today with the technology, when people end up buying cars and stuff, they can easily just, like, add different designs for, like, their seats, different colors and play around with that. I noticed as well when one of my friends are selling their homes, because it was already, like, online, they could end up using a different AI tool

where they could try and change up the kitchen have this thing. So my point, I'm going with this, with that, when you spoke about AI and technology, is there like an app or something that can allow customers to try and play around for you guys to kind of have an idea of exactly what they like? There is. There are different services.

I feel that they're still not easy enough to use, which is why we haven't really applied them to our website. Okay. There are some businesses, bigger businesses, that have a software attached to their website, where they choose the color of the stone and they choose the layout of their kitchen and they can see all those details. But it's just, it's not very user-friendly still, but I feel it's coming very soon.

Another option that there is out there, but again, this one isn't as easy to use yet is, how do I put it into words? You can use the Oculus and you can actually get into a room and you can also make those same selections. But the reason it's not easy to use is because not everyone has an Oculus yet. Not everyone has one of those VR headsets that they can just log into and change everything. So the technology is out there, but it's not very user-friendly because not enough people have these headsets to give feedback

and say, hey, this isn't working or this is working. But those are some of the answers to that. Oh, and I love that so much. Stone fabrication is obviously such a unique field and often misunderstood. What would you say, if you would kind of give a definition of what it is for people to kind of get an understanding as well? Yeah, so stone fabrication is an art. whether you're building production homes or high-end homes. Every guy that's in there, they have to look at it in an artistic way.

How am I going to make this match? How do I cut this and polish this in a way that it's going to look good once it's presented in the house? So again, in short, it's an art. You have to use a certain amount of water with certain stones. You have to use certain blades that have certain grits of dine. diamonds placed into them in order for it to cut it and not chip it. So every blade that we use has to have diamond bits in it.

And all those little things you have to take into consideration when you're going to fabricate something. So not every stone is the same. Now, you can technically cut every stone the same way with the same blade, but the end result isn't going to be the same. So again, that's why it's an art. If you're passionate about what you do, you're going to look into these different blades, the different glues, the different colors, the different tools that are going to make it

really beautiful in the end. And so that's a journey that just never ends. There's always a new blade. There's always something better. There's always something faster. And it's important for us to stay up to date with those things so that way our guys, the team, have the right tools to make it faster and keep making it look good. I love that so much. I also want to tell you the truth. the reason why I also approach you. I'm glad from the same faith, but another reason why I approach you, I've been studying a lot about the Salt Lake Temple.

I've been studying just about the members and the sacrifices that they made. I've been studying as well just about the designs, a lot of like a bit of stone fabrication, all the stuff that are cut up considering the lack of tools they have to have what it is today. And it's just so fascinating. And so that kind of stuff, it blew my...

mind because you know you often read these things when at a young age but you don't take in consideration just how attention to detail some things were in order to come and kind of have like a perfected like result obviously it took way longer because of like the structure what they were what the challenges they face lack of money but also because of like just internet and like just um so that's why i get fascinated with like topics like these because people often enter a home and just see something so beautiful. And it's only until you just sit there and you look at it, then you actually begin to really appreciate the art and just the beauty of it.

You know what I'm saying? Yeah. It's funny you mentioned the Salt Lake Temple. All of these temples, even the modern ones, they have a lot of stone in them. And yeah, machines cut them now, but there's still a lot of, there's still a lot of hand chiseling going on to some of the details. So we're at it's it's cool because as I've as I've come to before I came to decide what I was going to stick to for the rest of my life. I was thinking about the stone industry.

Why do I like it so much? Why do I want to stick to this? Most people, it's not it's not a career choice, you know? It's like no one thinks I'm going to be a fabricator for the rest of my life. But I did. And one of the reasons was because I feel that there's not enough people that try. truly love it that are in it. And so I do love it. I do enjoy it. It's kind of weird, I guess, you could say, because it's rocks technically, you know, but being able to mold something just

raw and make it into something beautiful, whether it is a counter or it's something else. It's amazing to me. On my mom's side, there's a lot of just, there's a lot of, um, they all like art or they like something artistic. One of my uncles, he's, um, he's a pretty big artist. in Mexico. And he has, he's just got a very creative eye. And I've always been inspired by him. And so my mom, she's also, she likes art. She likes to paint and draw and everything.

She never took it too serious, but she's good at it. And so I saw that from my mom's side. She studied architecture as well. So I, for some reason, I for that reason, you know, like art. I like to create things that are beautiful out of nothing. And so I decided, okay, well, since there aren't a lot of people that love this industry and I like to create beautiful things and I want to create something big and beautiful, then I'm going to stick to this industry because I have a feeling that this, you know, as I dedicate more time to it, I could really make an impact in the industry. And it's all around the world. It's not just in Utah and the United States.

Like if you go to any part of the world, it could be, it could even be Colombia, Mexico. it could be Italy, they all have stone fabricators. And they all have difficulties with finding passionate people in the industry. So that's why I feel like it have an impact in this industry with less competition, I guess you could say. But I don't know. That's why I decided to stick to this. One of the reasons. I'm not have an impact.

No, I'm glad you mentioned that. I'm glad you mentioned, you know, Mexico, Colombia as well. from my experience being in Brazil and maybe seeing like gone of South Africa, but like blue collar in America, it's a high paying industry. You know, because like it's, first of all, it's high in demand. So you get those that are passionate about it and those that default go to it as well. It's a balance of both. But it's still such a high, like, paying, like job.

And that's why companies that are. our contracting just seem to be more successful as well. In different countries, second, third world, sometimes it's pretty much a majority of the labor force, and so it's obviously sometimes more saturated because more people, they'll go for that skill set, you know, and so forth as well. From the difference with the stone fabrication, and from your experience when you're seen like Colombia, Mexico,

even though like the market isn't as saturated in that specific field, what are the differences between the two and like where do you see potential okay gotcha so like sorry it's a long question it's okay so difference in like mexico market compared to like the u.s market in the stone industry yes um in mexico it's there there there isn't as much there aren't as many companies that are very passionate about it that have invest that invest into a lot of machinery or invest into big enough spaces for their guys to be able to do it to do the work so most of the companies you go to out there, they're usually pretty small and they're still doing things in a very old school way. I go out to visit very often and I'm at a specific shop that I partner that I've

partnered up with. And they have innovative machines, they have new machines, but they also have certain areas where their guys are so used to doing it the old school way that they still do it. And one of those old school ways is they actually grab a full slab, they lay it on top of four used tires, and then they cut up the kitchen and then from there they go fabricate it. So that's very old school. Like you don't even see that in the United States ever. I highly doubt we've ever seen that happen here in the United States. But here the way we do that is we actually have a forklift that puts the slab onto a table and then the table then has a saw that is programmed and then the saw does all the cutting for us. And even if the company doesn't have a big saw, there's a miniature saw that

most of the companies use that will do all that cutting for them. So Mexico, hand cutting everything, putting it onto used tires on the floor versus a lot of most of every shop here is using a table. So what I'm trying to get out with that is that in Mexico, they're learning it the hard way, but that allows them to also be better at it because they have to do things from scratch. They don't have the machines that are helping them do all those. perfect cuts. Here in the United States, a lot of our guys are trained to use the machine and depend on that perfect 45 degree angle that's going to then allow everything to line up perfectly so that you

can't see the line that is usually in between the thick edge that you see inside of the home. Interesting. So we use the machine here to make that perfect cut in Mexico. The guys know how to make that perfect cut by hand. So what happens then? When people are moving in from a different country and they come over here and they know the stone industry, if we know that they're coming in from the other country and they're in the industry, we want them to work here with us because they're so good at it. And if they see that we have the machines, it's obviously going to make their life easier. They're going to be able to grow with us faster because they know what to look for and how to fix things. And so if they know how to fix things, if a machine does something wrong, then they

know what to do to take care of it. And so it's very valuable to find, you know, that kind of talent coming in from other countries. Now, I'm glad you mentioned that. And I think, so you actually answered two questions. The next question I was going to ask, what are the advantages of both? And you end up just saying that the fact that if people do come from that stone design or like that fabrication like field in Mexico, they're more high in demand to be idea because not only do you have the machines doing it, but you know somebody that can do it by hand as well. Is there a reason why Mexico is not heading towards that machinery side? They are. They are. It's just, it's more limited. But they are. I am looking more into it, more

constantly, especially since there's been a lot of companies that have been investing into Mexico. there's been a lot of Asian countries that have been investing money into Mexico to start a big factories to then supply the United States with certain things. It could be like Tesla just opened up and I don't know much about Tesla, but I just know that they opened up in a place that I'm going to go visit in the next month, the next couple of days, a gigafactory. It's called Monterey, Mexico. They opened up a huge gigafactory and that is specifically to help.

with the labor here in the United States. So they make them there and then they ship them over here. Interesting. Now, Asia, different parts of Asia, they're investing money into big factories in Mexico to make cabinets, flooring, or even just store the products. So that way when there's an order place, instead of having to ship it across an ocean, they're just shipping it across land. So that's happening currently in Mexico, and it's happening a lot.

So then that, in turn, is also making it so that people in the store, don't industry, you're thinking now, okay, well, if these guys are doing it, why don't I do it? They're just across the border. It's probably going to be easier for me, and it's probably going to be a little bit cheaper for me, or at least help us out somehow. I haven't shared a whole lot of information on this following topic. And it's not because it's a secret. It's just I haven't shared a lot about it. So I've been looking a lot into Mexico because project-wise? Project-wise, yeah. Because if these other countries that are known in manufacturing or going into Mexico to then supply to the U.S., then why don't we as, you know, as U.S. citizens, look into Mexico to do that ourselves?

So my goal, my plan is, and I'm working on this with Ricardo as well, the owner of Creative Granite, is to be able to manufacture stone in Mexico, the countertops, and then ship them to the U.S. Now, the benefit of that is that we wouldn't just focus on Utah. We would focus on multiple states. It could be California, it could be Texas, it could be New York. It doesn't matter. But we're in a central location just right next to the border. Okay. A project multifamily that has maybe 150 apartments or 300 or 400 apartments calls us to do the counters.

We make them, we ship them to that state, and we can either install them as well, or they can hire a local installer to do it. So at that point, we're manufacturing countertops. We're not just fabricating countertops. It's a little bit different. Interesting. My question, though, so obviously when I did solar, I was only in the sales part of things,

door-to-door, but I was also at a point of closer where people were still, like, do the setting and I'll close and so forth and not do my own. But where I'm getting with this is the fact that my entire purpose was sit with the client to communicate with them, get them to sign on a long term, 20-year contract, leave the house. But then we had installers that would come and install.

And then, like, as soon as that is done, it was, like, obviously, outsourced as well, which is going to where leading with my question with you. I know we mentioned earlier on, sometimes you do prefer people that have done, like, the actual fabrication by hand and so forth. Do you guys, like outsource or is everything in-house? My creative everything is in-house, fortunately. That is a fortunate thing. It's a fortunate thing.

Yeah. Sometimes it is good to outsource it if we really need the help. So it's good to have those partners lined up. Hey, this ex-company, they're really good at doing this and we want to build a relationship with them. So here's some work every now and then because we might need it as we grow. But we try and do everything in house because it allows us to better control the outcome, control the speed of the process, which also allows us to control the result that we give to our builders. So our focus at Creative is the slogan is we're the home builders number one choice.

And so in order for us to continue to be that number one choice, we need to control that whole process from beginning to end. We need to be able to supply our guys with the right tools in order for them to be able to succeed while they're installing, representing us on site. Okay, now I love that. That perfectly honest. Yeah, there's a lot of benefits to in-house. I completely agree. And I think they shifted towards that as well. I wanted to know personally what is like your most memorable project that you've worked with

and pretty much what does it showcase the possibility of like stone design like I want to know just memorable one um man there's just there's a lot there's a lot but I think the most memorable one for me is probably not going to be maybe the one you'd expect because it's not the most luxurious one or the biggest one or the coolest one for me the most memorable one One was a project I did about three, four years ago. We started about three, four years ago. It was a commercial project. And in that project, I took on the cabinets and the counters, and it was in an apartment complex.

It was small. It was old. It was in Brigham City. It was only 32 units. And the reason I remember it so much is because of the amount of things that I learned. And at the time that it happened allowed me, it forced me to learn other things that I wasn't expecting to learn. It was right before COVID.

And so we took on the cabinets, we took on the counters. It was supposed to be an easy job. It was supposed to be fast, but it was not easy and it was not fast in the end. And then what ended up happening is after COVID, the industry started to change. And the way that it changed is that there was a lot of fabricators that went out of business, unfortunately. And so what ended up happening is a lot of builders, contractors, and developers. they wanted to start putting scopes together, scopes of work, so that means cabinets and counters.

Put them together so that way they only have to call one person. And it's interesting. Some people may say that that's not when it happened, but I started to notice it happening most during that time. And so taking on that project when we did allowed me to learn cabinets and counters in a very, in a different way. And so now fast forward.

forward, we're able to now start providing cabinets and counters to a lot of these apartment complexes. And so right now that Utah is going through growth, a lot of growth, there's a lot of apartment complexes that are being built. So there's a lot of fabricators that aren't doing cabinets that aren't getting the jobs. And they're losing them because they just don't do the cabinets. So now that we actually are, we learned it three, four years ago, it's allowing us to be ahead of that. of that, I guess, problem or that challenge or that change in the market that's happening. Oh, my gosh. I love that so much.

And I think that goes in the importance of continuously innovating, continuously adding, because I think it was even Grand Cardone that spoke about, like, yes, it's good thing to sell one thing, but why not sell two to try and make sure you can try and cover for the customer from there selling three? And so, which, again, I don't know what you're doing. I'm asking one question, but you're answering three questions. that I already have planned out here as well, because that's one of the things I wanted to touch on, like how important is it continually,

how important is it to continually try and innovate the business that you in, how important it is it as well, for you to try and outsource and also try and find more ways to try and provide for the customer as well. So I'm glad you touched on that. So now personally for you and your wife, what does she do in your guys' business, if you don't mind me asking?

Right now, her main thing is raising the kids. That's the main thing, but she supports me. She used to actually be in accounting. She used to run the books and help us, at least with the books. But right now, since the kids take up a lot of energy, and my son has a whole job. Crazy amount of energy. Yeah. My wife says, I have a lot of energy.

He has like four times my energy. And then my daughter looks like she's right up around the same, you know, doing the same thing. Right now, what she does for the company is on pause. But I just want to be very, I guess, clear and vocal about that. Just because it's on pause, what she's physically doing for the company. What she's doing at home helps the company a lot. It helps what I do for creative as well because she's a great mom. She's staying at home.

She's doing her best to make sure the kids are learning and just learning good principles. That's then going to help the company in the future. I don't expect my kids to do what I do, but I do hope that they'll be inspired by what we're able to create with what I'm creating right now. And so her showing them all those things at home is going to pay off a lot in the future. Okay. Now, I love that so much. And I'm glad you also mentioned what you're going to be doing with creative or something you're going to be bringing up regarding entering the Mexico market, trying to bring it over inside here as well.

And I think I've been having that a lot of my guests where we've been talking about the nice thing about this capitalist environment of America is that this all is going to be a consumer for any market or any field that you're in. well. However, I don't want to play devil's advocate. I have been seeing a lot of, there's going to be a change in administration and it's going to be affecting a lot of like tariffs and stuff that could potentially harm and also do good because the entire purpose of tariffs and how it's been tackled is to try and like build America, make America get stronger, which makes sense in the way of like trying to grow the economy from within while still outsourcing in terms of outsport. Have you ever thought about the tariff impact that's going to be happening? Can you share about that? We think about it all the time. The tariff and also the mass deportation.

Okay. The reason the mass deportation comes in mind, it's not because we have a lot of, we have people that are undocumented working. It's not because of that. We don't. But it's because as a, as an immigrant, anyone can be mistaken as as just, as, just, you know, just illegal, you know, they can be treated in that same way. Or a lot of our, a lot of people that work for us, they do have family that didn't come in the right way, you know, but they are doing good things in the community. They are actually working and being responsible. And so that puts fear into our guys, you know, it puts fear into some of the guys and puts fear into their family. So then what does it do? It kind of makes them debate. It's like, okay, well, do I

just go back home or do I stay here? So that affects us in a way. And so that's why, we're thinking about it. Now our builders, they're also thinking about it because they know that a lot of the people that do the labor, whether it's framing tile or whatever it may be, a lot of them are Latino, they're Hispanic or they're from some other part of the world. And so the mass deportation is going to affect the housing industry if that does come to play out the way they're saying it's going to play out. But we'll see what actually happens. I don't know much about politics, but what I feel is that it's a strategy, it's a sales strategy, where you say, hey, we're going to be doing this mass deportation to kind of limit the amount of people that are actually coming in or what the other countries may be

doing or not doing to keep people from coming in. Again, I don't know anything about that. I don't know much about that stuff, but I just feel from a sales standpoint, from a marketing standpoint, if you say things like this, it may cause the other country, Mexico or Canada or whoever, whoever it may be, to think, okay, let's do something about it. So that way they don't, apply tariffs to the trade we're doing with the United States because that's one of the topics that are happening right now with Mexico and US, Mexico or US and Canada. Our president or our future president is saying that he's going to apply tariffs to Mexico. Mexico's not liking it, but I don't think he may apply some tariffs to certain things just

to show that he's serious is what I feel. But at the end of the day, I feel it's more just to say, hey Mexico, like just help us out. 100% do something. You know, it's so fascinating. You say that, and I don't want to just become like a political thing. So if you feel like it's getting too much, it's to stop me. But it's the same thing. I was talking to my friend, because I was telling you about, like, the BRICS.

And, you know, BRICS is Brazil, Russia, India, China, South Africa. Those are the main primary components of that before many other countries, close to like 80 that were trying to jump in BRICs. And obviously the tweet that came out saying that if you want to abandon the dollar or apply 100% tariffs. And like people are, you know, getting super nervous, but I'm like, you have to understand what you're dealing with. You're dealing with the president who was a businessman and a negotiator.

So trying to say like, listen, this is out there. Let's talk on how we can try and get that because not only is it sales, it's also negotiating because 100% tariff is not like a burden on the other country. It's also a burden in the United States because now you're preventing, you know, business from coming in here as well. And if you do that to everyone, eventually, about as much as this country is great, it's also reliant on Latino, Mexican, like, immigrants that are hardworking, that are very blue-collar that want to provide for their family,

that are also providing a lot of the immigrants in different fields as well. So I feel like never take things face value because there's just so many things happening behind the scenes. And it's also another power move. We try and say, this is what you elected me on. I'm going to stand on my word. You know what I'm saying? So I feel like, yes, there's going to be a few stuff that's going to be done. But everything all at once is not actually a benefit for America because this country has built off immigrants. You know what I'm saying? Yeah, no, and I agree with that.

Just while we're on this topic still about tariffs and all that and all this, back when President Trump became president for the first time, he applied tariffs to Asia, certain specific parts of Asia. And a lot of the courts that would come in was tariffed. And so what did that do? It made prices go up a lot. And it made us as fabricators have to then go talk to the builders and say, hey, we can't give you the same prices before. So that was a really big problem.

And there was tariffs on a lot of other things. But that's how it affected us directly back then. And so if tariffs happen again, regardless of where or what, it's going to have a similar effect. we're already seeing it, but the benefit of what happened then and now is when it happened back then, is it really made us get uncomfortable and go look for other options. So I remember when we weren't able to get a specific stone, that was our number one seller. It was a simple, speckled stone, very simple. Nowadays you don't see it as much, but we had a hard time finding that at the price that we were getting it at.

And so I had to scramble. I had to go look. I had to go call. I had to call a bunch of places, not just in Utah, to find someone that was providing it at the same price. So what did that teach me? It taught me that we can't always just be comfortable with one option. We have to be constantly thinking of multiple options in case this one that we're relying

on right now falls through. So pretty much don't get comfortable. You know, I don't think, yeah, so when I sent the email a while there, and that's why I love, like, it's like a blueprint, but I often like only ask like freaking 40% of the questions is because there's just so much of more insight that comes from our conversations like this. And I couldn't agree more than I think that the importance of an entrepreneur.

There's always not necessarily even an exit plan all the time, but you have to think outside the box from just like what you're seeing, obviously becoming comfortable and becoming uncomfortable. It's also a very important thing because the more you end up like branching out and trying new things, it's way easier for you to know that if a market ends up becoming obsolete, that you can branch off something else because you can look at many different fields. And I speak about that, you look at MySpace, you know what I'm saying? Because you and I are the same age, by the way.

So you look at MySpace and you end up looking at Blackberry, you know, obsolete. And there's just blockbuster, you know, how Netflix just completely destroy that. Toys are us. Toys are us. That's my last one. we grew up all that so my point is all these were i wouldn't say too big to fall but at one point it just seemed like it was going to just head that direction you know Nokia before blackberry all these different things and i think it's important to understand that as soon as the world keeps changing towards something it's also important for you to understand that you can't be comfortable in one thing so i'm grateful you share that can you want to add a bit more on that um no i

I think, I mean, you've summed it up well and just, yeah, don't get comfortable. And I guess if more fabricators are going to see this, remember that. Don't get comfortable because I unfortunately have seen some very close friends that were fabricators, our fabricators, and even cabinet companies, that got comfortable. They got comfortable doing what they're doing, and now they're either shutting down or they've shut down. So it's sad to see that. We have to adapt all the time.

We have to be like, you know, camillians. We have to just be able to mold to any situation. whether you're old or young, learn that. And if you can learn it when you're young, I think it's going to be better now. Now, if you learn it when you're young, remember it when you're old. If you're old, learn it then and apply it. I love that so much. Right now you're a leader in sales and marketing.

One of the things that are so important that I want to try and find out, what strategies do you currently use that you found to be most effective when building long-term relationships with clients. Yeah, so that's one I've been working on a lot lately, and that's one that really interests me because for the past four or five years, all I've been working on is just getting into the doors, knocking the door and being able to get in.

So now that I've gotten into a lot of beneficial partnerships, I call them partnerships, so they're not clients, they're partners, they're our friends, now that we're actually in the door with a lot of big builders, big commercial developers, it's maintaining them. So building a stronger bond, a stronger relationship. And so now at the stage of sales that I'm at

and the stage of the process of sales that I'm in, it's going out with them to lunch every other month, once a month, or however long it takes, but just build that, cultivate that relationship. How many kids do you have? How are your kids? How is your wife? I remember you were going through this.

How's that doing? When you go to lunch, don't talk about, work and all that stuff. Talk more about how they're doing, what they're going to be doing, what's motivating them. And then in the end, if there's time, talk about the business side of things. But that is something I've been learning in the last three years, cultivating and building up, compounding on the things that we've already built with our customers. Powerful, man. That's absolutely powerful. And then for someone, if you notice, I've been bouncing between both, but they're just so interconnected to both, both like the, you know,

know, creative and also what you've been doing, but I also want to focus on, on the entrepreneurial side of things. What advice would you give somebody right now that's perhaps watching this, wants to enter a field, even this one, or even a different field, but are just super skeptical and are afraid? What advice would you give that person? There's a lot of ways to be an entrepreneur. Some people would say, well, you're not really necessarily an entrepreneur because you don't have this, you don't have like a full-on business.

I don't think that's true. I have been trying enough things that I've learned what to do and what not to do. So now that I actually do have a business, whether it's small or big, you can create things from wherever you stand. So me just being at creative, yeah, I'm not the owner. But if I'm creative enough, I can bring ideas to the table that then will result in making more money for the company. innovative things that will then also impact the industry. So I feel that there's two ways to get started into the entrepreneurship world. It's either you go off and you do it on your own and you learn on your own dime

or you learn while working for someone that's already doing it. And so in a way, that's what I'm doing at creative. I'm learning from the best. I didn't want to go work at just any company, not that they're not that they're not good, but I wanted to go work at the best. The one company that everyone talks about in the builders, and like in the builder world is creative. And so I wanted to go see what they're doing, how they're doing it.

And I wanted to see how I can help them become better. And then when it's my turn to actually start up my own business, it's going to be easier for me because I've learned how to perform at that level. And you can't get that anywhere else. So both, you'll be able to. to become an entrepreneur doing both things, but just remember that. It's either you do it on your own, you learn on your own dime, or you work with someone, you partner with someone, and they teach you how to do it.

Oh, no, that's perfect. I think so there's so much learning. And often people sometimes want to start off too early without even gaining the experience. And it's not that it won't work, but the probability of it working long term without getting the experience can end up like just becoming a negative experience for both you and there as well. Yeah, well, to add on to that, I don't know if it's necessarily a negative ever experience ever. I don't think it's a negative experience ever. Precisely.

There's always something you learn. There's always something you're going to learn. So whether they take that route or you take this route, it's going to teach you something. I do feel that if you do it on your own dime, you're going to learn probably, you're going to learn lessons faster is what I feel. if you do it on your own dime. If you do it on someone else's dime, you're going to learn the lesson. But since it's not affecting your pocket

the same way it's affecting the owner, you may not learn it as fast as if you were doing it on your own. I agree more. Yeah, I should have rephrased it because it's failing forward. You know what I'm saying? Because even though you may fall short, there's a lesson that you learn from that

at the same time as well. Now, looking back at your entire journey from where you were and where you're at right now, what's the one piece of advice that you feel like you probably wish you had gotten when you first started off in the specific industry? The one piece of advice that maybe I wish I would have gotten when I started was decide what you want to do at an earlier age. I actually learned this reading one of Grand Cardone's books or listening to one of Grand Cardone's books.

I don't remember which one I was. I think it might have been seller be sold, which I absolutely love. He said there's a difference between rookie, amateur, and professional. Yeah, rookie amateur and professional. A professional is when you start to almost in a way see the future. You can tell the future. Why?

How? Is because you've done this so many times that you've been in this situation in the past, that you can see the probability of what good or bad things may happen, allowing you to then make decisions that will make either the bad probability minimized or the good probability maximized. And so I didn't learn that until I was about maybe 24, as I didn't read that book until I was about 24, 25. But I think if I would have listened to it when I was maybe 22 or 19 when I was doing

something else in entrepreneurship, which is completely different from Stone, I used to have a different company with two other friends. I would have probably experimented more with Stone, and I wouldn't be so far behind now. Even though I may not be very far behind, but I still feel I could be further ahead, if I would have learned that before. Experiment as early as you can, so that way you know what you want to stick to for a long time. Oh, man, that's absolute nuggets right there. Thank you very much for sharing them.

Now, every single entrepreneur, every single professional that I end up Yeah, often asked them this very important question because the entire purpose of my podcast is the coach winning. So somewhere or another, people are winning and everyone's got their own different definition of winning. You know, in your personal definition, what is winning? In a very easy way for me, winning or being successful is being able to be happy with what you're doing.

So yeah, if you're happy doing it, even if maybe you don't love it, but if you learn to be happy with it, you can make a lot of money doing it. But if you're happy, at the same time, you're also being able to keep your family happy. If my family's not happy, it's like, I'm not winning. It doesn't matter if I'm making a lot of money or if I'm, or what's going on. It's, I need my family to be happy. So in order for them to be happy, I need to be happy. My wife needs to be happy. So figure out what you want to do for the rest of your life.

life so that then you figure out what's going to make you happy. And if you're happy, then that happiness will trickle down into everyone else. And I think that is what true success is. As a leader, as a father, as an entrepreneur, finding what really makes you happy is going to trickle down to everyone else. And it's just going to radiate and they're going to feel that and it's going to be great. So, yeah. Perfect.

Well, if you could look into the camera, let our viewers know where they could get a hold of you if they want to try and get your business or and also forth where like social media email or whatever it may be you could just let our viewers know yeah so my instagram is razo underscore utah countertops and you can also look us up at creative granite dot com we're here in utah north salt lake you're welcome to come check out our facility anytime it's a big place and we'd love to show you guys around give you a tour awesome stuff ladies and gentlemen the code to winning insights you need today to seize the world tomorrow. Eric Razzo, thank you so much, brother. Thank you, man.