The Compound and Friends - Leadership Wins: American Entrepreneurs

Episode Date: July 3, 2023

On this special July 4th episode of The Compound and Friends, Michael Batnick and Downtown Josh Brown are joined by Scott Neil (Founder, Horse Soldier Bourbon) and Shirl Penney (CEO of Dynasty Financial Partners) to discuss the special forces sent to Afghanistan in the aftermath of 9/11 (now known as the horse soldiers), entrepreneurship, the importance of hiring the right people, and much more! This episode is presented by Jack Carr's new high-adrenaline thriller, Only the Dead. Pick up your copy at: https://www.simonandschuster.com/books/Only-the-Dead/Jack-Carr/Terminal-List/9781982181697?utm_source=the_compound&utm_medium=atria_display_ad&utm_content=&utm_campaign=only_the_dead_ad Check out the latest in financial blogger fashion at The Compound shop: https://www.idontshop.com Investing involves the risk of loss. This podcast is for informational purposes only and should not be or regarded as personalized investment advice or relied upon for investment decisions. Michael Batnick and Josh Brown are employees of Ritholtz Wealth Management and may maintain positions in the securities discussed in this video. All opinions expressed by them are solely their own opinion and do not reflect the opinion of Ritholtz Wealth Management. Wealthcast Media, an affiliate of Ritholtz Wealth Management, receives payment from various entities for advertisements in affiliated podcasts, blogs and emails. Inclusion of such advertisements does not constitute or imply endorsement, sponsorship or recommendation thereof, or any affiliation therewith, by the Content Creator or by Ritholtz Wealth Management or any of its employees. For additional advertisement disclaimers see here https://ritholtzwealth.com/advertising-disclaimers. Investments in securities involve the risk of loss. Any mention of a particular security and related performance data is not a recommendation to buy or sell that security. The information provided on this website (including any information that may be accessed through this website) is not directed at any investor or category of investors and is provided solely as general information. Obviously nothing on this channel should be considered as personalized financial advice or a solicitation to buy or sell any securities. See our disclosures here: https://ritholtzwealth.com/podcast-youtube-disclosures/ Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Welcome to The Compound and Friends. All opinions expressed by Josh Brown, Michael Batnick, and their castmates are solely their own opinions and do not reflect the opinion of Ritholtz Wealth Management. This podcast is for informational purposes only and should not be relied upon Hey, everyone. It's me, Downtown Josh Brown. I'm here with my friend Rob Passarella, and we want to tell you about probably the book that you should be reading this summer. This is Only the Dead by Jack Carr. You are fired up about this book. Tell us why. Josh, there's no reason not to be fired up, right? You have to really enjoy it.

Strong story. Okay. Yeah, could be. Could be. Jack Carr is one of those authors in the thriller space now. Unbelievably hot. This is his sixth book.

Okay. He's done this six times already. Okay. And every time it gets even more intense. What's his background? Jack was a Navy SEAL for 20 years. Okay, like serious. Like this is like real Navy shit.

This is a guy who was in the middle of Afghanistan, Iraq, the whole bit. Okay. So the story has also been turned into a Chris Pratt series on Amazon Prime called The Terminal List. Is that based on one of the first books in the series? That's right. The first book was basically a vengeance story, if you will, of getting even for the main character. He's a guy by the name of James Reese. In this case, his team gets wiped out.

And, of course, it's a secret conspiracy, government cabal and business and the whole bit. You love the book? Love the book. Love the author. So the book is called Only the Dead, written by Jack Carr, Rob Passarella's favorite author of the moment. And this is available where?

Everywhere? Everywhere, obviously. And there's a link in the show notes that's actually going to point that where you can get it from Scheinman & Schuster. Okay, I will be reading this this summer. Rob might even read it again. Is that true? I've read them all,

so I might have to read it again. All right. Thanks so much. Thanks so much. And please check out Only the Dead by Jack Carr. Hello, everyone, and welcome to a special Independence Day edition of The Compound and Friends. We are so fortunate and honored to be joined by our guest today.

I'm going to actually let you guys do your own introduction just to give people some sense of who you are and what you've built. And Scott, I want to start with you. We are in your urban still house here in St. Petersburg. This is a magnificent location. We thank you so much for allowing us to shoot here and record here. Thank you so much for allowing us to shoot here and record here. And there's just so much history in the room, even though it's really only, well, when did it actually open, the Urban Stillhouse itself? It opened the week COVID hit in March of 2020. Wow.

You know. Well, well done on the timing. Scott, tell us about Horse Soldier and tell us about the Urban Stillhouse. Yeah. So there's kind of two sides to our story. And like any good movie, I'm going to start right in the middle. We were a bunch of friends who served together. And as the wars were winding down, we were trying to find some reason to stay as friends. And we found out about whiskey and the pleasures and joys. And boy, if we just make it, we'd save a lot of money. And

then it turned into a good business. What we didn't drink, we'd sell. So the Urban Stillhouse here in St. Petersburg is actually in the Tampa Bay area. The headquarters of Special Operations is here. So that's why we ended up retiring out of our 20, 30 years in the military. And we wanted to build a home base, a place where Peter Pan's hideout, a little more upscale as you get older, and we built a beautiful restaurant. And it's a place really for us to bring our friends and family and now new acquaintances into this building. So that's where we're at. We're at the Urban Stillhouse in St. Pete. Okay. And we're going to talk more about special operations. And I know we started in the middle, but we're going to go backwards.

I'd also like to introduce friend of the show, Sheryl Penny. Sheryl is the founder and CEO of Dynasty Financial Partners. Sheryl, tell us a little bit about what Dynasty is. And then we're going to talk more about how you ended up in St. Petersburg as well. Yeah, no, I appreciate, Michael, you and Josh coming to our hometown here in St. Petersburg as well. Yeah, no, I appreciate Michael, you and Josh coming to our hometown here in St. Pete. And it's an honor to always, it's a lot of fun to spend time with my good friend, Scotty, but an honor to be here and to tape this show with an American hero like Scotty Neal. So appreciate the invite. Dynasty Financial Partners is the leading

integrated platform provider for RIAs in the country. Founded the business almost 13 years ago. We now have 50 RIAs on the platform all over the United States. 50 RIA firms that are on Dynasty's platform. Yeah, with a total of just under $80 billion of assets under advisement, about 330 advisors. We run all the integrated technology in support of those firms, help them manage the investments, provide capital, debt, and equity if they need it for succession or growth capital. We own an investment bank. It's the only full-service

investment bank, as you know, in the REA space. And we have a leads business where it's a newer business for us, but where we're able to introduce individuals who might be looking for a new financial advisor to one that is on the Dynasty Network. So the theme of the show is that the American dream is alive and well. And Scott, I know that's a message that's near and dear to your heart. And the very building that we're sitting in, I think, is the embodiment of that idea. And the very building that we're sitting in, I think, is the embodiment of that idea. You were not born into a third or fourth generation whiskey distillery empire or anything like that. So before we get into how you built this business and why the lessons are applicable to the audience, tell us a little bit about the unit that you served in and the renown that you guys have earned with your exploits? Yep. So I think we all have a deep memory of 9-11, the day of 9-11. It was very tragic. It

was a lot of uncertainty. How do you communicate it to a child who's watching you for the first time cry? So I was in the 5th Special Forces Group at Fort Campbell, Kentucky. Our area was the Middle East. We were getting ready to go on a normal rotation in October. World Trade Center's hit, and we were in a planning cell where you don't see a TV. And so we thought it was just a training exercise. They were just telling us the World Trade Center has been hit. And we're like, OK, let's figure this out. And it wasn't until about four hours later we saw it for real. But we instantly knew. And within a few days, a plan was put forward to the president. And one was getting the big army and big Marine Corps to come over land and a big invasion with airborne and tanks. And it would take six to seven months to orchestrate.

And President Bush said, that's not soon enough. We need America's response now. So the option was to send small teams of Green Berets and CIA personnel behind the lines to link up with old Mujahideen fighters we had worked with in the 80s against the Russians. And there was no information. There was no target packet. There was a national geographic. So there was a resistance to the Taliban

already in country, but there was no day-to-day contact between American forces. There was. And actually, it was a phone call from one of the Mujahideen leaders to a congressional member that had met him in Turkey. They said, you know that we've been resisting the Taliban.

And so little do we know, by 19 October, two small special forces teams were put behind the lines. One of those teams, ODA 595, linked up with General Dostum, who was on horseback. Because think about how do you hide from all the old Russian tanks the Taliban had. They were in the mountains on horseback. And that was literally how the—

Is that Rambo III? Rambo III? Right. Who knew how predictive that was? But that is how they have fought for centuries. The horses were really remnants of the Mongolians that left them there. So you're looking at basically the 19th century versus the 20th century enabled by American special forces with the most advanced technology. And Mark was able to raise a horse cavalry of over 3,500 cavalry and 1,000 infantry in three weeks.

And just imagine, these were only 30-year-old men. And so I had another special mission that complemented that as well. So we served our country in less than 90 days, 90 Green Berets, and our CIA partners had overthrown the government of the Taliban and got rid of al-Qaeda, and we thought it was done. So it's 90 Green Berets, American soldiers, and the rest of that 3,500 strong contingent is Afghans. Afghan on the horses with maybe two to three bullets attacking tanks. So the juxtaposition, I watched the movie, they made a movie, 12 Strong, I watched it on the airplane over here, of you and them. And there was a great line where one of the soldiers there says, I know you own the land, but we own the air.

Yep. And so the combination of the drones, the bombs own the land, but we own the air. And so the combination of the drones, the bombs with the on-ground horses was pretty wild. So within 90 days, you guys orchestrated America's first response to 9-11 by ousting the Taliban on horseback. Guerrilla Warfare 101. Were you a horseback rider? No. Actually, I think most of the guys had really good experience at Walmart with those quarter horses. But luckily, Mark, who Chris Hemsworth played, he had a rodeo scholarship. His ROTC, you know, the Reserve Officer. A rodeo scholarship.

Yeah, had a rodeo scholarship. Okay. As a young. To NYU? No, no, no, Kansas. Most Green Berets are more mountain men. We're not the glamour and the ritz that you see on TV. So we hunt, we fish, we camp. And when you send Green Berets, it's not for a day, it's not for a week, it's for till the job's done. And so all you do is encourage them how to fight. We give them the arms. We train

their medical people. So we are force enablers. So how does 12 Green Berets to 24 to 36 to 90 raise an army? That's what we're meant to do. And we're doing that in over 55 countries at any time across the globe. If I could just ask a question. Scott is a friend, so we spent some time talking about this. One of the things that you've always shared with me in this Fourth of July and Independence show, talk a little bit about the Afghan people and how brave they were and how they were so focused on protecting you guys there. They are very simple, uneducated people who probably never been more than a mile from their village. They don't know what America is,

let alone, but they understood that their enemy attacked us, so we should be friends. They fearlessly believed they were in the right with their God to charge a tank head on and they would be protected. So whenever you called a battle, it was the most awe-inspiring. Imagine thousands of horses going up and down valleys. It's not been seen since the 1800s. And the character to sit with them and break bread, to learn about their children. And we are friends still to this day. And some of them have come to America and started their life dream as well. Now, Cheryl, tell us about your horseback battles. I do actually own a horse racing stable. I know you own some horses.

You've seen all horses. You're probably not riding them into war, though. Yeah, no, no. I've seen your horses. I'm probably definitely not, actually. Okay, so you guys met. So Cheryl brings Dynasty Financial Partners down to St. Petersburg in 2021, comes here for lunch. The two of you meet and hit it off. And tell us a little bit about that relationship between, obviously, Horse Soldier and Dynasty. Entrepreneurs. Scott and Sheryl. It's two entrepreneurs, obviously, coming from different backgrounds, but with a shared sense of possibility.

Both seem like optimists to me, capable operators. You guys have a lot in common from the get-go. Yeah, you said it well at the onset. I'm very good at this. Yeah, yeah. You're not your first rodeo, right? We're both huge believers in the American dream. My story, as you know,

we're friends as well, but I grew up an orphan in the sticks of Maine. My step-grandfather raised me. I was homeless when I was 11, 12, 13, bought a suit for $13 at the Salvation Army, rode a bus 16 hours to New York. I'd actually never seen a revolving door, an escalator, or an elevator and fought through that. Ended up, they said, come back for a second round interview. First time I ever flew, they flew me back from Maine, Smith Barney at the time, and worked my way up at Citigroup and then started, as we talked about, Dynasty a number of years ago. But at Dynasty, one of the things we talk a lot about is we get to live our American dream by empowering others to live theirs, supporting the RAs who then in turn, as you guys do, support your end client. None of us would be able to do what we do without the brave men and women in uniform in our armed service. So just my wife and I have always been huge supporters of various charities around the military. And I'm just

always so inspired when I get a chance to spend time with someone like Scotty. So when I came here very early after they'd opened the facility, got to know the guys, certainly inspired by the story, was also inspired by their entrepreneurial tenacity. And, you know, as Steve Jobs had famously talked about, you know, it's usually the people who are the most irrational when you're starting a business that end up being the most successful. Because those of us who are entrepreneurs understand if we really sat back and thought about the odds, we'd never do it, right? Thank God nobody told me how hard this was going to be. So you're saying there's a chance. Okay.

So we sat down, talked about our backgrounds and the businesses, and instantly became clear that there's a partnership here. And that's one of the amazing things about America. You have Scotty's story and background and my story and background, and we can come together in beautiful St. Pete and build a great business partnership. And I was talking with some of Scotty's team members recently, and I was doing kind of back of the envelope. I think I might be your largest client here in terms of dollars spent. But in return, good return on that investment, we have closed in terms of new business, whether it's advisors bringing their clients,

we have closed, in terms of new business, whether it's advisors bringing their clients, or this is usually a stop when we bring a team down to do due diligence on Dynasty, we've closed over $15 billion. I mean, it's a seductive backdrop. In this facility, right? It's a great place to get to know people. Now I'm starting to think that Scotty might need a piece of Dynasty. Yeah.

I don't know. When you phrase it that way. It's just been an incredible partnership that works for both and our clients, our prospects. I've never brought anyone here that hasn't had a great time. Scott, I want to talk about the product.

And Cheryl had sent me a bottle, I guess, a year ago or two years ago. It went very quickly. It's not just because you're sitting right here. I am a bourbon drinker. It is without a doubt. One of my favorite spirits I've ever tried. I imagine you hear that from people all the time.

You're making it right here and S and several other places in the United States, but you had absolutely no background in, in craft distilling anything. So it sounds like it was yet another adventurous leap that you're after a whole lifetime of adventure. This was the next one and thank God it paid off. But tell us about that journey of deciding you wanted to start this to where you are today. So first, when is that point you discover that you have an entrepreneurial streak, right? I can't sit at a desk.

I'm smarter than the guy above me, below me, beside me. And special forces assessment selection is the American military's way of finding this country's expeditionary entrepreneur. We already had the seedsary entrepreneur. We already had the seeds within us. We just didn't know the language of business. So we thought we were inadequate. And so first step is I found a mentor and his name was John Coco. So John and Elizabeth and I kind of went on a soul searching for myself adventure in Yellowstone. We went to our first craft distillery and fell in love because it was a

husband and wife team. And when you see authentic, somebody just pouring their why they love it, how much they love it, and then the tears of joy of your business, whether it's good or bad or whatever. And so we started going to craft distillery and then we called another friend we served with and another and the roving band got bigger. Now, what we had was all of this wicked skill set, how to interview, how to question, what are the right questions to ask. Getting shit done. Getting shit done, right? My title was the doer of things.

You know what I mean? I get it done. Oh, we have one of those. Don't ask sometimes, but we got it done. No, not me. And we were fascinated that we already had the seeds of the skills of being an entrepreneur. And when you matched it with a good business mentor like Cheryl's been to us as well, you now are unstoppable. So we had no fear.

If you could do it, I could do it. If he could do it, I could do it. If he could do it, I could do it. But what we differentiated ourself was is people think vets, they want to pat you on the head and say, good job, and here's your car wash company. Thank you for your service. Yeah. No, no, no, no, no. I want to live the American dream we've been defending. So if it's real for those we're defending it for, I want a shot at the apple. And if you look throughout history of whiskey in America, it has been soldiers coming home, Pappy Van Winkle, their family served Jim Beam. Yeah. Oh, wow. There's not one history of American whiskey that wasn't a family that served, whether it's the Revolution,

War of 1812 with Colonel Taylor. You see what I mean? So our history. Jim Beam was a person? Yes. Okay. See what I mean? Yeah. So all of this is the history of America is the history of serving your country and then coming home and starting a business. So that's what we did. And would I do this again? Yeah. That's every question I have on saying, let me start here. So you started in 2015. So it has not been that long. Eight years. But you've made a lot of progress. We have punched above our weight class. We listened at every turn. We asked companies that failed and companies that were successful.

What made us different is we weren't pursuing the acquisition, the sale. We don't know what money is. We have accolades of movies and statues. It doesn't mean anything to us. We want to leave our kids a hundred year future. And long after we're dead, when our foot lockers locker full of war medals and everything mean nothing, we've built the truth of this American brand.

Something that endures. That endures. Yeah. I mean, look, you guys know this in building your business too. Adversity builds character. Yeah. I mean, look, you guys know this in building your business, too. Adversity builds character. Yeah. Right? And I think it ends up being, when you look back, a blessing.

When we started our business, we started with only $5 million in capital. That's all I raised from investors. And we had an incredible focus on capital stewardship, right? Trying to do more with less. And it builds incredible discipline in the business as you scale. And I know that's been the case for Scotty and the team here at Horse Soldier as well. You guys are mostly bootstrapped. We were.

In the beginning, it was John's money from his successes. And then money is inventory. What can it buy you? Can it buy you more ingredients? And that's how we did it. Luckily, we had a small retirement, gracious government retirement, but it was enough. And it seeded us. And what I've learned from my mentors and from Cheryl and everything is the business of business,

how to keep it at the next level, how to keep the culture, how to keep control, how to keep the vision because there to keep control, how to keep the vision because there are predators and how not to be vulnerable. So I want to ask you about that because we're living through that challenge now and I think we're meeting it. We started with a very small core of people with very specific shared ideas about taking care of clients and no compromise. And I think the hallmarks of our business in the early days were transparency. Everything we do internally, we write blog posts about and tell the whole world.

There's no secrets. Like these were some of the core. We've gone from four or five people to now 58 people. How do you keep, how do you preserve that with a larger population of people from different walks of life, from different regions of the country? You're scaling this business now. You must have answers to that question as you hire and try to reproduce yourselves and try to instill the things that built this place

to the next generation of workers so that they can carry on those traditions? Culture, number one. If you have to build and realize what your true culture is and then how to share that and make, because we have a problem that people will say, well, I wasn't a horse soldier, so I don't know if I belong with you. You have to embrace them as a teammate, right? You are now equal. You have to make them feel a part of that. Exactly. And they have to own problems like you own them.

So transparency becomes the issue. Actually, Jimmy Butler had a great quote the other night. He was asked about the role players on his team stepping up. And he said, I don't see them as role players. I see them as teammates. And everybody is our replacement, right? So in the military, if I go down, who's going to carry the flag and the banner and the mantle? And sometimes you don't see that in the business world.

And Cheryl and I talk about it when we talk about leadership and over-empowering those and let them demonstrate they're capable or do they need to be trained so your first investment is the people underneath you because I need to get to bigger problems. That's such a great thing. I wanted to ask you about this, but that was a great layup. So when you have a small business, you have small problems. And business is nothing but problems. And if you have big problems, you have a big business.

And it's a blessing. But that's all that business is, is putting out fires, dealing with problems. So sure, I'd love to get your take on how you deal with problems. And especially, I'm sure your problems are big ones. They're all there. Yeah. I mean, it's all relative, right? Certainly bigger ones that are out there, too.

But one of the things that I've heard, Josh, I've heard you say, which I think is similar with all three of our businesses, is oftentimes we create fans first that then become clients or business partners. And it's rare that we would engage with someone who isn't already familiar with what we do or they followed us on social media or whatever it might be. And I think similar is true with Scotty. I think, look, you talk about culture. That needs to be consistent over time. But one of the challenges, and I think to me, one of the hardest part of leadership is not everyone is right for every mission, right? And not everyone who got you here

is the right team member to get you there. And it's challenging. It's a harsh truth, but it's still a truth. And to me, the hardest part is to have conversations with people that were with you in the early days, right? That brought the grit and determination and were great to help you launch the business but may not have the same skill set to lead at scale, right, with a bigger business. And the really exceptional entrepreneurs, and I'm not suggesting that I'm one of those, but are the ones that can navigate through that. are the ones that can navigate through that. I think the biggest issues oftentimes you face really is personnel. In addition to, obviously, you know, clients and supply chain and making sure the product stands up to itself.

Capital. You know, I've studied entrepreneurship a lot. I'm a fellow at the Aspen Institute. And you can really narrow the success of a business down to four things. Quality of team. Quality of the plan, capital, do you have it when you need it, and timing, right? And you think about businesses like Uber, right? Uber, 25 years ago, timing wouldn't have been right. Or timing on a personal

level, if you have a sick child at home, right? It's not a good time to go launch a business. But I think it's important for entrepreneurs to take inventory on those four things, team, the plan, capital, which is not just how much you have, but what's the structure, how much control do you really have, and timing in the market around you and at home, and keep updating that because it will change in your business as you grow it over time. So I wanted to ask you in a similar vein to what Sheryl is saying. So we started, I think we corrected ourselves quickly, but in 21 and 22, so many of the people we hire are remote. And we meet them, we make it a point to meet them, but it doesn't make it easy. The benefit to that is you can hire the most talented people anywhere. You don't have to

rely on a local pool. The negative is, who is this person and do they really get what we're doing back home? One of the things that I think we started to make a mistake on and then quickly fixed it, we were overly fixated on the skills of the person. The correction was actually we can train people and give them skills. What we really need is somebody who says, Michael, Josh, Chris, Barry, I'll do anything you guys need. I just need to get into the building. Those are our best hires. We can give them the skills or help them obtain those skills.

We can't train attitude. And you mentioned to me, starting this business, you hired people that were not uh whiskey experts or not experts in how to run a restaurant they came in with the right attitude which you can't teach yeah how important has that been to the growth of horse soldier uh very important because uh yesterday i had five virtual interviews right now you're reading a document that says what they wrote down and you're trying to evaluate, but you don't know it until you see them, meet them, break bread. And

you're, you have to rely on the gut. All these intangible things as a leader and an entrepreneurial leader, this speaks to you too. And you have to place that, especially as we expand. Meeting your own gut feeling about a person. Yeah. Well, you could have the greatest gut in the world, but you're going to bat, if you're incredible, 70%. I mean, I'm making that number up. So what we did- 70 to 80 would be all-

All time. Yeah. So what we did was we're not hiring anyone without physically meeting them in person, going to dinner, having drinks, learning who they are. You can't do that over Zoom. No, because it's a facade and it's a digital facade. But it's a new world. So you've still got the old world of resume recommendation.

Then you have the virtual interview. Then you got to spend money, right? Because there's a finalist. Now, we don't have some made up assessment and selection for hires like we do for Green Berets. But to get past these gates we try to create metrics and matrices and all these things at the end it was still the gut call what do you think yeah what do you think it needs to be four people and and we've been very successful because we combine the reality of where we're at today but yet that that thing that survived us in the battlefield and that's instincts and guts that is uh an equation so i was we we have a small culture committee uh so we don't hire anyone in the organization

at least one person on the culture committee meeting with the person anyone who interviews with us would probably say it takes too long because it's expensive to to get it wrong same right on both sides right it's a mutual interview But we've talked about this. Our mantra is attitude over skills, not attitude. Is that true? Yeah, it is. At Dynasty has been since we started a business. So we kind of stumbled upon that on our own. I didn't realize that you had felt the same way. There's a lot of things that you stumbled on your own. That's true. We're on the same page.

And I got it from someone you know as well, from Mike Rapoli. Sure. And Mike was the co-namer of Dynasty. Mike and I came up with the name on my porch in Saratoga, where you've also been a few times as well. But attitude over skills, inconsistency in the culture, I think is critical. Our internal mantra has been, if it's not an obvious yes, it's a no. And I think nothing can bring down a great organization faster than the wrong hires. Oh, yeah. We've seen it in here as well.

So you think, you know, a bad hire is probably the biggest mistake you can make in a business because you can't unwind it fast enough. And then if you don't get at it, it becomes cancerous and it destroys. So, you know, you wish you had a lot of do-overs on hires. It just means, once again, your gut was telling you the whole time we all looked at each other like, yeah, that was, but we did it. But we're a growing company. Now I have to listen to you because I know how to grow a military organization from nothing,

a task force. I don't know how to grow a military organization from nothing, a task force. I don't know how to grow a business. I don't know these roadmines. And the mentor part of what Sheryl has brought and others that he's brought here, I get to now ask business mentors, hey, I'm about 25. We're going to 35. What should I look for? But there's not a big gap between what you were doing and what you're doing now. I mean, obviously, it's different.

But in terms of skills and leadership, a lot of the same traits. It's not life-threatening, but it's the rest of your life-threatening. You know what I mean? Now I fear for my legacy and are growing a great business. And I got families of families, right? And that can become nerve-wracking, just like a leader worried about his platoon getting killed. That's just war. Now, you know, a misstep in a

business i've got family of families to think about too right what's in common is that it's still people relying on your decision making and the decision making is never ending no and it's it's trees of decisions if i make this decision what are the next three decisions that are going to branch off from that? Anyway, I quit. Yeah, you don't go to work. You're always at work. So, Scott, a horse soldier, it's a bourbon. It's a restaurant.

What else are you guys doing? What's next? So think about a brand. Hey, Boozyland, right? Think about it. What we're building in Kentucky is our future. So we look at this like a military campaign of 100 years. In 100 years, we will be on every back bar across the world with a small story of those who served our country. But it's a functionally, vertically integrated Cooperage meets production facility meets marketing arm.

And we're only eight years into our first 10-year plan. Then our 10-year plan is a 25-year plan. And who is succession? Is it family? Is it board? So now when you say, I got bigger problems, it's because I want to be somewhere in 100 years from now. And I need a good team for six-month problems. I need a good team for one-year problems. And I need the freedom to think 25 years ahead. And as you guys know, as entrepreneurs too, one of the best things as your business matures is the next generation, and many of whom are coming in, they're more talented than us, and think about things certainly differently, where they want to take the brand,

where they want to take our respective businesses and grow it. To create that opportunity for them, that's more than just today's opportunity. In ways that you never thought of. And to me, that's incredibly inspiring. That's a great segue because this is where I wanted to go next. I want to talk more broadly about whether or not the American dream is still alive, why it feels sometimes lately that so few people believe it,

or maybe it's just the vocal minority who doesn't believe it. And people are out there pursuing their dream, regardless of how the media makes them feel about the state of our country. You guys must have a lot of thoughts on this idea. Scott, you want to take this first? Once again, the pursuit of the American dream, which was how I grew up, right? Parades, Mickey Mouse, all those core tenets of Americana meets patriotism. And now I was on the bush, the front edge of the world saying, don't you want to be like Americans? And they did, right? People hated us because we were Americans. Now I come home and I see this sense of misfortune and lethargy.

But then I look at immigrants coming in today. We had an Afghan family recently. We pulled out of Afghanistan after the events of a year or two years ago. But yet he's well-dressed. He has a job. His kids are enrolled in school. You know what I mean? Is the American dream for him?

Yes. He seized it because he had nothing. When I look at kids today, I worry about the pursuit of the American dream versus the handing of the dream. If you're going to sit by and wait for this American dream to be given to you, you already lost. When I talk to young people and they want to pursue and grab the dream, that's the right attitude. So how do we get those into the function of starting a business?

And it's okay if you start with $1 because you'll make $2. Well, how do we do that? Is it something about how they're coming out of school that might be different from your generation, my generation? Or is it something about the popular culture? What do you think it is that might be stopping people before they start? It started back when we had nothing as a family growing up, but we had everything as a family. And then if I wanted something extra, I had to have a paper route, right? And I got fired because I missed my thing two days in a row. You know what I mean? I got my first paycheck and I lost my mind. All those simple, subtle

teachings of life, you know, is because we weren't coddled in my generation. So I just wonder about the pursuit of teaching, you know, how to hustle, how to be thrifty, how to, you know what I mean? Handle failure. All of that. And be allowed to fail as a parent. I agree that it starts at home, right? So my step-granddad had a fifth grade education and he was handicapped, but he was present and he was always proximate with me.

He was there for every parent-teacher conference, every sports game. And I knew I had at least one person in the world who always, always had my back. So I'm a big believer in the fact that it takes a community to raise a child. And to me, that is part of the American dream. If you want to see it, Josh, live and well, this 4th of July, just like every 4th of July, I'll be in a little fishing village called Eastport, Maine. Eastport is the easternmost point in the United States, happens to be my hometown. There's about 1,500 people in the population. In the War of 1812, the British sailed 12 ships into the port. They had 23 cannons. We had one surrendered without a shot being fired. We lost their independence for two years. If you go there today, over 200 years later,

on the 4th of July, every single house, every house does not have a cannon, has a flag, has a flag. You don't know what people's politics are. Everyone's American, right? And they're showing up for the parade. And then the Navy ship that comes every year when they walk through, every person is cheering. It's old Americana. There's three-legged races down Main Street. That's where it's not the mainstream media, to your question. If you go and experience it, and there are places like that all across America where I think the American ideal, the American dream is absolutely live and well. That's such a good point. If you get off TV, get off the internet, you go outside, it's not that f***ing dour.

No. Yeah. Like it's just, it's not as bad as we think it is. And it's every generation saying the same thing about the next one. They're losing, whatever, whatever. Things aren't that bad once you step outside. I think, you know, for us as a brand now who has a little bit of an American story, the soldiers who served is one great story, but then started something with nothing. You know, there are simple celebrations and, you know, for us, believe it

or not, June 14th is National Flag Day. It's also the Army's birthday and National Bourbon Day. flag day. It's also the Army's birthday and National Bourbon Day. So we start our festive before the 4th of July quite early. But the simple ceremonies, we all kind of grew up, the parades, the flags, the newborn cousin, everything. I think, as you said, you turn off the technology, you'll actually come back to things that are grounded and more important. And I see a trend, too. I just read a report that kids are now buying flip phones to unplug from digital. They're oversaturated, and they think it's cool to be, you know. I have my StarTech in a drawer somewhere.

I should find it. Hey, it's a saver, yeah. Holy crap, who knew? So I wanted to ask about the future of both of your businesses. So, Cheryl, let's start with you. So at this point, you are the largest integrated platform for people seeking independence. And most of them are coming from the five largest banks, let's say. And the way that you built it 13 years ago, there's been a lot of

evolution along the way. Where are you going next? What will you be providing to those RIA firms that join your platform a year from now, three years from now, that didn't exist when you first started? Yeah. So specific to the advisors, we certainly want more. I'll come back to that. But the underlying why ties a lot to what we've been talking about here this afternoon, which is, for me, building Dynasty is to play a little part in helping to improve financial wellness in this country. If you look at things like the number one cause of divorce is financial stress. And we just talked about the importance of family. of divorce, right? It's financial stress, right? And we just talked about the importance of family.

And if you look at our industry, broadly speaking, it's a product sales business, as you well know, right? And the way you improve financial health in this country is not by selling people more shit they don't need, right? It's starting with financial literacy, education, empowerment around financial advice. And for us, we're trying to help more people who need a quality, independent financial advisor get connected to one of those advisors. And our hope over time is that Dynasty becomes the good housekeeper seal of approval for independent advice, right? So there's a lot of independent advisors that are starting to come out there. Some people candidly say they're independent. Maybe they're less independent. But if you look for one that's powered by Dynasty, right, then you know that they have great technology, clean compliance.

They're well-funded, well-capitalized, and could be a good fit for you. So our five-year brand arc is headed towards that. Along the way— So almost more consumer-facing, but not in place of the advisor's brand, but really as a complement to the advisor's brand. 100%. Consumer-facing, it's an ingredient marketing play. You could think of NutraSuite. You would think of Intel, I think, is even a better example. Pentium inside. Powered by. Powered by. Yeah. So it would be your brand powered by Dynasty is how a lot of our advisors are already pushing

it out there. So we're a platform brand. I believe it's the era of independence in this country tied to the American dream, financial independence, independence in wealth management. And for us, we're going to invest in everything that makes that easier for advisors to build better businesses and to take better care of their clients. And Scott, where are you guys going? I know there are plans to build facilities and expansion across states. Tell us a little bit about where Horse Soldier is headed.

Yeah. So number one is effective partnerships. If you want to go fast, go alone. If you want to go far, go together, right? So we built some great partnerships in Salesforce and Gallo family came in and gave us that sales strength. Next, we're coming up to really, which is going to be our distillery and is such a major capital project that we've had to fight through inflation and cost of materials, now access to those funds and small banks. These are just super problems. But really, this is about storytelling. If we just get in front of people and we meet them in communities and we tell them the American dream and great bourbon, we can go against publicly traded companies that have all the money and no story. You can and do. Yeah. Yeah. If you sit with a

group of people who love bourbon and you tell them what's gone into your bourbon and your backgrounds, they're going to be very interested in the brand. Yeah. So if we reach the people authentically, we'll succeed. Okay. And then from there, what's our next horizon is how do we teach other veterans about entrepreneurship through demonstrating that this is what success looks like. That is kind of that personal grit behind us that we want to bring this generation to be considered the next great generation that brought this economy back online. What are we drinking?

You have our private barrel pick right now. The image on the bottle, obviously, is the statue at Ground Zero, the American's response. I love the pewter emblem. Yes, it's the wives. Everything beautiful. Elizabeth was in the skincare perfume industry. 12 hidden meanings in the bottle. The molds that form this glass is World Trade Center steel.

And when you walked in, you didn't even know our history, did you? Nothing. I only knew of the movie, to be honest. Quiet professionals. So we are into discovery. So the more you know about us, you drink, the subtleness of us is where you're like, oh, my God. And that's the same thing in a restaurant.

We're going to build five more of the restaurants. And we'll just storytell our way into 100 years years. So there'll be, there'll be horse soldier, urban still, urban still houses. Okay. So urban still houses, the restaurant side are, uh, Meredith, the, the daughter runs it, right? There's some compliance issues. She, we have a real estate side. So I've learned all of this, you know, diversify. We have a real estate company. We have a bourbon making company. We have a real estate site. So I've learned all of this, you know, diversify. We have a real estate company. We have a bourbon-making company. We have a barrel-holding company. So it's been fascinating, you know, watching the complexity of the business grow. At the end of the day, this will tell our story in a remote bar in some Chilean, you know, place in Patagonia or somewhere.

And they're like, wow, that's ours. Scott, just a follow-on question. So Scott, if anyone comes here to St. Pete, obviously they can come to Urban Steelhouse if they can get a reservation. I know it's one of the hardest ones to get in town, but they should also come and view the Rise Monument. Could you tell us what that is?

So right next to us, we have the last piece of World Trade Center still recovered. It was under the statute of ground zero. Cheryl and other generous donors. Kathy Wood as well. Kathy Wood. We're not good at raising money. We're good at executing. But we had a vision of something that's a phoenix. What came out of 9-11 was something good, right? We all remember the tragedy the day of, and there's a thousand monuments memorial. When we were presented that gift from the Port Authority, we wanted to show what the phoenix coming out of the ashes, how do you rebuild the identity of America?

And so right next door, local artists, even children, everybody participated. President Bush donated the trees around it, right? So it is a very somber but yet very positive reflection of us coming out of the crisis of 9-11. Beautiful. Well, I want to thank you guys so much for joining us for this special edition. As I said from the beginning, we're so honored to have you here. And I think it's an important conversation.

So thank you to all the listeners, all the viewers, and, uh, please, by all means, number one, try, try the, I know we can't market alcohol per se, but if you happen to be in a liquor store or happen to be in St. Petersburg, how else could people find, I mean, you're, you're everywhere. Yeah. Yeah. Horse soldier, bourbon.com. We just opened, uh, you know, we're in 30 states. If you can't find us, horsesoldierbourbon.com. Okay, over 21 only, of course. Of course.

Guys, this has been amazing. Scott, thank you so much. Thank you very much. Cheryl, thank you so much. We really appreciate it. Awesome. Everyone out there listening, watching, make sure you hit the like button. Make sure you subscribe.

Please leave us ratings and reviews, and we will be back with you very soon. Happy 4th of July. Happy Independence Day. Go America. All right. I think we got it. What do you think, guys?