The I Love CVille Show With Jerry Miller! - Renata Miller Joined Alex Urpí & Xavier Urpí On "Today y Mañana" On The I Love CVille Network!

Episode Date: April 3, 2025

Renata Miller, Owner of Viva La Nosh, joined Alex Urpí & Xavier Urpí On “Today y Mañana!” “Today y Mañana” airs every Thursday at 10:15 am on The I Love CVille Network! “Today y Mañana” is presented by Emergent Financial Services, LLC, Charlottesville Opera and Matthias John Realty, with Forward Adelante.

Good morning everyone and welcome to Today Imanana. I'm Alex, this is Xavier. We're very excited to have you joining us on a little bit of a drizzly, cloudy morning here in Charlottesville, Virginia. It's spring, it will become 80 degrees, believe it or not. So hurry up, hurry up and get your ventilation out because it's going to get hot. Yeah, exactly. You know, exactly. Especially if you want an iced cafe de leche, get it now because by 2 p.m. it's going to be melted on you. It will be a lukewarm, semiwarm cafe de leche, which probably won't be the best. Semi-watery.

Yeah, neither hot nor cold, but you don't want. Pit one or the other. But we've got a great show lined up for everyone this morning. On today, mañana, we're going to be joined shortly in the show by Renata Miller from Viva La Nache here in Charlottesville. Later, Xavier and I will talk some finance. We'll talk some stock market.

We'll talk some economy. We'll talk numerous things. We'll see where the conversation goes. Where it all comes. Yeah, where the conversation goes, where the questions lead us, where the comments go. So we are open to anything. Already, Nidra Lusacerpi tuning in this morning.

He's fast. You got to hand it to Nick Lacerpi. By the way, Miller, is that related to Miller? We're not the Miller. We're not the Miller. We're related to the way nobody knows. We'll see. We'll see if any other Millers tune in and join us.

There aren't really that many millers in the country. Yeah. As we've learned. But yes, we've got a great show lined up for everyone. Merge of Financial Services, our presenter, thanks to our great partners, Mattias Yonreulti's show, it's about opera forward adelante. Of course, thanks to I Love Civil Network, we love being on the set here in studio. Drew behind the camera making us all look good.

He's always doing a great job. He is working his magic all the time. He makes it easy for us. That's the key, right? He really does. It's like we just come in and we don't have to do anything. Exactly. Other than make sure the microphone is closed to us. Yeah, make sure the microphone is on.

No, vaguely, who's coming on? No, I wake up in the morning and find out that Xavier's going to be my co-host. It's like, okay, yeah, that works. We jest, we jest. But yeah, it's a great show we've got lined up. Yeah, I don't know about you. Sure, I'm looking at this beautiful box here. We have some beautiful accoutrements on the table that we'll be able to share with everyone. So we're definitely excited for that. But so without further ado, we're excited to

welcome to the show this morning Renata Miller from Viva La Nache. Renata, thanks so much for joining us this morning. Thank you. Thank you. Good morning. Thank you for having me. It's great to have you on. Say good morning in Portuguese. Bom dia. Oh, very good. Bom dia. It's almost like buen dia.

Yeah, I mean, anytime you hear Portuguese, the beautiful part is that it's close enough to Spanish that I can get an idea what to say now. It just sounds like a very very smooth musical version of Spanish. She said it's so nice. Yeah, exactly. I thought you were Portuguese-speaking. It didn't sound that way. But yeah, no, we're excited to have you on, excited to have you on the show. So maybe for those who haven't met you yet, tell us a little bit about yourself and how

you first became interested in baking, tea parties, and everything that would eventually become Viva La Nage. So since I was a little girl, I loved baking. first became interested in baking, tea parties, and everything that would eventually become Viva La Niche? So since I was a little girl, I loved baking. I loved making things that looked beautiful and taste delicious. And once I started having children, I had four girls. And the first two, we did a lot of tea parties. And so I would bake and we'll set the tea set on the table She actually got a little tea set from her grandmother and was just so pretty and we will make real tea put it in there It was a porcelain too, and we still have it and she's 16 years old and

Four of them has played with them and so it's just something we four of them has played with them. And so it's just something we cherished to be together, eating delicious little treats, drinking the little tea. And it's just very sweet thing to do, you know, especially when you have girls and they want to dress up and everything. So and then we lived in California for almost 10 years and we moved to Nebraska and it was right before COVID. And I didn't have a lot of friends there. I did not, we didn't know much place to go and do. And they were homeschooled so I had a lot of time and I started baking more there. And the more I started making things, I'm like, I really enjoy doing this. the more I started making things, I'm like, I really enjoy doing this. Now that my house was quiet, calm, and it had time, and I really put the time to do it. And I'm like, I really

want to do this. Something with food somewhere at some point. And I just knew I wanted to move to a place where it was close to the ocean or close to mountains because where I grew up in Brazil was that kind of environment. And I really miss that. So we moved from Nebraska to Palmara. We didn't know anybody here. We didn't have a job here. We just had the hope that would work out because it was close enough to the ocean, close enough to the mountains and to a big city like the sea, and they had Trader Joe's in Costco. So like, yeah, that's the place. I know they do have the Trader Joe's and Costco and Whole Foods, but they don't have the mountains

and the ocean nearby. So you have to travel a long way. So I feel more at home. Wonderful. Where in California do you live? We lived in two places. We lived in Sunnyvale and in Mountain View, the Bay Area. Oh, very nice. We were neighbors to you down the road from the Bay Area. That's wonderful. So how did you, so you had this love of baking, you had your kids, you came here to Charlottesville. And then, when

did you decide to turn that into Viva La Nage? So when we came here, as I said, I didn't, we didn't have a job. My husband had a job. I didn't have a job. We just moved here. And so the farmer's market started in April in the Palmyra farmer's market. So I'm like, I'm going to go there. And I'm going to buy a tent on Amazon and get a table and we'll bring my things there and see how it goes. And so that's how it went. And I started there with a few baked goods. I had the biscotti, some macaroons and some things. And then I started coming up every weekend and people really enjoyed. And I thought, where do I go from here? And I didn't have a name for my business then. I had Miller

Treats. But I had saved that name, Vivala Nosh, back when we were in Omaha. I wanted save that name, Viva La Noche, back when we were in Omaha, I wanted something celebrating food, celebrating delicious food, and everything was taken online for a domain name. And I look at Google and say, what's another name for food? And they gave me a list, and Noche was something they use in Europe, in the UK, for something that indulge yourself, that it's really delicious. So I'm like, viva la nosh, that sounds good. So I bought that domain name when we were in Nebraska, and then when it came to the Flovena Farmers Market, somebody, so I'm like, I got to have some other name besides Miller Treats.

I'm like, oh, that name back there in Nebraska, I could use that name. So that's how I started. Oh, let's go with Villa Villanache. That sounds type of ring to it. And so I created Villa Villanache, creating sweet memories. Because the idea is that these sweet treats will turn out to be amazing moments that you had shared with your friends and families and it will forever be in your memory just like my tea parties with my children is still with me and with them.

And I think we need more of spending time together on the time that we live now. And so I'm baking so other people don't have, because it's a lot of work. The cleaning part. And then make sure it turned out well. Even when you have a recipe, when everything is there, so many things can go wrong. And to get it right every time, it's hard and can be frustrating. So I'm taking away all of that frustration and that time and you can focus only on spending time.

And it's true. And you know, there's something nice about little treats, right? And especially when you have family or friends around. Everybody can eat a little something. And you don't have to like be sitting there cutting cakes or whatever. It's just like, oh, let me try that.

Let me try this. And then you can sip a little tea also. Absolutely, absolutely. I've got some people tuning in. We've got Bill MacChesney tuning into the show this morning. We have the wonderful Monica Miller tuning into the show this morning. Thank you so much for watching. We love that we have one of our favorite viewers.

Absolutely. To be sure. That's why I asked if there was relations. Well, there we go, there we go. But yeah, that's fantastic. And so maybe you mentioned these little sweet treats and maybe tell us a little bit about, so what are the different things you make? So I create, so I bake these biscottis. They are actually, I say they're not authentic because they're made with olive oil. So they are soft enough that you can actually bite them. Yes. Oh, you don't have to like soak them in the...

You don't have to soak them and you won't break your teeth if you try. And they're still whole enough that you can dip on tea or coffee, prefer that way. But they're just delicious. I make two kinds. One is almond with chocolate and a little bit of orange zest. And the other one is actually I have here to show you a lemon one. And I use, so I lived in California for almost 10 years. And when you live in California, you get used to taste things. They're very fresh and it's very authentic. And so I have that because I love food.

So I rather have something very small that is made with attention and is fresh. With the best ingredients I can possibly find, then having a whole trail of things that are cheaper and doesn't taste as good. So I go for the small and the high quality and the best taste. So I want to eat that. And then I want to, I feel safe to feed my children and my friends and my family. So yeah, that's why everything kind of small. Let me show you before. So through the farmer's market,

I wanted to create a tea place. So because of the overhead of creating open space, renting, all that cost for somebody that have never done this would be a big leap. And I decided to create this little tea party gift box. And the tea party gift box. So I put it all together. So you open up.

Did you design that or you found a nice? I get the box and I have to cut and put the paper myself. That's so nice. And each box is different from one to another. And so when you open the box, so you're gonna have everything you need for a tea party. So you open in, I don't know if you can see. Let me open here.

Oh, Judah was like, yes, you can. Yeah, the way you were doing it, you can see. So look at that. So everything that you need is in there. And then so the inside, so I have the biscotti, the lemon one. And then I have the almond biscotti. And then it comes with the tea. So I use organic Fairtrade, one is peach, the other one is plain.

Also have a mango one. It's delicious and it's uncaffeinated and I only use composable package and unbleached paper for the tea. You don't have to feel guilty when you're done. You can't compost. You put everything on the side. It's all over compost. And you can't put a hole in the ground. And I have the little napkins. It comes with the napkins and then it comes with the cups and the little saucer. Let me show you. So the little cups has these little cup holders. Oh, I guess you put the cups in there so that you can put them.

And then you set up your little tea with the saucer and the little plate, the serving plate. And you have the little napkin. You have the little napkin, you have the tea, so also comes with this little reminder to spend time together. And then you set up, so the plates comes with, depends how many, which size box you buy, so you can put the biscotti, you open up the biscotti box and you can take the biscotti out of the box and you place it on the plates and the other biscotti also have little pound cakes. Then you can cut it up and place it in

front of you on the table and all you need to do and invite your neighbors, invite your mom, you know, or you can give it as a gift Is it here for your parents or somebody there's far away so they can spend time together? So that's how it goes. That's fantastic I bet you this is also great for like Picnics is one of the hardest things when you want to do like tea or things at a picnic is how do you? You know, are my tops gonna break is this how do I make this trap? All right, So you literally, you got the box, all you got to worry about is the hot water.

I was going to say, the only thing you have to remember is to bring the hot water in the thermos. Yeah, and you're set. But like, one of the hardest things about pigments is getting all the stuff there. And this, you're like, oh no, all I need is this one box. One box and a pot of hot water. Exactly, and the hot water. So that's just. Or you can even bring the tea already made on the thermos and then you can just pour it. That's fantastic. That's amazing. That's really. And all that comes together. What did you find in all this? I just put it all together.

My brain works in a mysterious way, I have to say. That's pretty neat, right? I wouldn't have even thought to look if they sold the thing that you put over the cup to make it look like a teatup. I wouldn't have even thought that you could sell it. Vanessa Parko watching the show this morning loves the idea too. She says, love the gift box, wonderful idea. So yeah, everyone is like, wow, that's a fantastic idea. And I just love that to send like for birthdays, to send, I have people that have bought it

from me to send to their families. They were having their birthdays or some kind of celebration. And when they received the box, because it's so beautiful put it together, everything is so detailed. When they open and have everything there, they just have this joy on their face. And when they eat everything everything it's so good everything's so delicious I just everybody that has tried my any of my treats they're like it's the best it's really is really I really put time and effort on everything I do and and sometimes a little too much but I just that's how I do things but that that's what makes it special, right?

Because you're getting the fresh quality ingredients, right? So each bite is really coming through. But then it's also that, sometimes it's that attention to detail that brings it to the next level. Like, it, yeah, because it's, it would separate just a random gift box that had things thrown in there. It's like, oh yeah, I opened the box, there's a bunch of stuff in there, right? Versus, oh, wow, I really,

to receive this in the mail is like, oh, someone really took the time to package it, make the wrapping paper look nice, have that beautiful linen paper on top of the box. It feels like, if you thought your family member did it, you'd be like, oh, that's so sweet. They put so much time into it, right? And that's what I think elevates it to the next level. Yeah. Like, when I baked the biscotti, I used unbleached organic flour. It has some orange zest and orange juice in it, so I buy fresh orange.

The lemon is fresh lemon. I squeeze everything. It's zest is there and and when I'm baking them So everything like you can taste that's very nice I mean the way you treat your family is the way you treat, you know All your or your clients But what I was gonna say is just that box alone and I guarantee you there's probably a lot of people that don't know That you go through the trouble of putting that on top. I know my wife is like she'd never throw that out.

She could put more like something in there. I know. I'm one of those box hoarders. I love boxes. And I think it's all coming together, my taste of food, my baking, you know, hobby, and the boxes. Because now I can't ‑‑ I can use the boxes because I have saved every single box. If they're cute, I'm like, I can use that for something. And now I really can use them for something. Absolutely. Now, do any of your daughters, have they picked up this tradition that you like of baking? Or are they not into it yet?

The oldest one, she did like, because they're homeschooled, so we were in Omaha, every Wednesday she would do a baking something. She actually picked up baking like macaroons, and then later I started baking macaroons, but it was first hers doing it. So this is like some of the macaroons that I make and I can find sometimes at farmer's market. They're very finicky. Everything can go wrong with the macaroons.

They will go wrong. You mix too much, didn't mix too much. If you bake too close to the thing, not too far, too long. Oh my gosh, if you don't wait too long, if you wait too long or didn't wait long enough, everything can go wrong. Well, that's what they say, right, about the difference between, you know, cooking food and baking. Baking truly is an exact science.

It's a science. Everything has to be exact. When you're just cooking, it's like, yeah, put a little more salt, a little this, and mix it up. But here, it's got to be right, otherwise, it didn't grow. It didn't, you know, it didn't whatever it is. It has to happen. It didn't happen right.

Right. And now that I have been baking so much for so long, I am spoiled because I will not pick a recipe if it's not has the grams on the recipe. What does that sound like? I can't bake if there is just like a cup or two cups. It has to be the exact grams because I know that person's serious. Because's so many you know the level when

you level and how much we put it totally changes everything so if you don't have the grams you're not serious. It really is amazing I have done some with grams and one time I was using I was it was the baking soda was in grams. And they had both the grams and the tablespoons, right? And I was doing grams on the recipe and said, well, just out of curiosity, I'm going to use the tablespoon to put the grams, to put it in and see if it's not even close. It isn't. 15 grams is not like one and a half tablespoons. It was a completely different...

Wow. I measured it out and I'm like, oh my goodness goodness if I had used tablespoons, this would have been a different recipe Yeah, exactly and even for like if I'm gonna buy a book Baking or any kind of book. I want to find a ward Because I know somebody went through that. The James Beard award or another. I'm getting to that point of like this is a bit much but you know it's like because you put so much time and effort in and after you spend like an hour putting this thing together and at the end when you finally finish the product that you had to wait for another hour to bake and then it's not what you expected.

It's disappointing. Exactly. And there's the ingredients and your time and the math, and then I'm like, you know, a lot of the time, the recipes is not even your fault. It's somewhere in the process didn't have like, hey, pay attention to this step. Like you have this step is very important. Absolutely. I would agree and

especially if you're doing something that is a business right. Because you know listen if you're doing it for the family it's like it's not perfect but it's edible you eat it right. But you can't sell that because somebody's gonna say this is garbage and the business that's it you're done right. And when you bake one time somebody tastes that and the next time they go is like but that's not the same thing I taste the last time exactly it's a have precise and the grams have to be there absolutely absolutely so I know you also do the little cheese oh yeah I have I make cheese bread which is a Brazilian treat that it's cheese bread cheese bread

They call cheese bread, but if you think of a cheese bread you think of a loaf that have cheese on top These are not that they are made with cassava flour, which is They actually grain free so people that has gluten intolerance, I wouldn't say the people that has Celiac disease but the ones that have celiac disease, but the ones that have gluten-tolerance can eat them because they're not made in a kitchen that's certified gluten-free, but they are grain-free. And so they are made with two kinds of cassava, one that is fermented, one that's not fermented, a sweet and a sour one. And because they're made with the sour one, I don't even need

to use any baking powder, any bacon soda, or any yeast. It pops up because it's fermented, the sour ones fermented, so it puffs up the little bread and it makes it really crispy on the outside, but it's kind of cheesy on the inside. So it's a great little treat to go. It goes with wine really well. And then also with coffee. And just a snack. My children sometimes just make it so they can have in the afternoon little cheese bread. And they're small so you can have, you know, you don't have to feel like you have to eat a ton of it, one gigantic big bread.

Exactly. Yeah, you pop as many as you feel like having. And those I know can be found somewhere in charge of Food of All Nations. Yeah, I have some at Food of All Nations. You'll find them in the freezer because they're actually baked and then they're frozen. And so all you need is reheat for like five, six minutes depending on how much you have in. And then you can enjoy them. Oh, wow. And you can also start selling them at some wineries.

They carry them, so when you are there, have you in your wine, you can ask for an order of cheese bread, and all they're gonna do is warm it up, bring it right fresh for you, so you can enjoy it with your wine. So when you go to Trader Joe's, it'll say, vive la nage? No, no, food of ovation.

Food of ovation. Food of ovation, yeah. And then right nowation. Food of Overnation. Food of Overnation. Yeah. And then right now actually I'm working on creating a package so I can sell like FoodLion and other places. So one day. One day. I'm working right now.

Yeah, we have one other. Hopefully soon. Next year it'll be a big show. And more. And more. And more. Absolutely. So, what's it like being an entrepreneur, and I know you went through the CIC class, so what was kind of that journey like to being like, okay, I'm not just making this, I now

have a small business that I'm running. Right. Having a small business, it's like, it is hard. And you need to have as many people helping you on that process as possible, because you don't have a lot of resources to pay this person to do this, this person to do this for you. You have to think, and like, who can help me? And so I have so many people that have helped me

along the way. I have, so people that have helped me along the way. I have, so CIC was an amazing class I took that gave me this foundation and so much knowledge in terms of my budget, my marketing, my, the cash flow. Yep, that's a key one. And if you are going to have a business, that cash flow, that understanding that number, it's so important because you can't move forward unless those numbers are right. And sometimes just having a wish or just make something that you like. It's not enough to be sustainable.

You need to have the numbers right, because otherwise you're just having a hobby. You don't have a small business. And it's nice to make things and just give it away. But if you wanted to grow your business, you need to be able to make, be able to pay somebody at some point that will help you grow your business. And if you able to make, be able to pay somebody at some point that

will help you grow your business and if you can't even pay yourself then how you gonna, and then I whole idea because I'm a stay-at-home mom sort of, I want to create this business that allow other moms to join me at some point, the ones that, you know, have a part-time job, they can come, help bake, and then we'll distribute the things and they can spend time with their family. And then we will totally understand if you're sick, your child's sick, I'm a mom, my children get sick. And this is a place where you can come to work

and we'll support each other through sick and health. So that's also my business is my intention is to create a place for moms to come and support one another to raise their family because everything I do, all the money I make, it goes to pay for my children's things. So if they want to do guitar, if they do gymnastics, if they do karate, those things they do, I help pay for it. And so, and I want to have that resources to help let them grow and force, nourish their dreams and their creativity. Their creativity, yeah. Very nice.

That's awesome. And now, did you, because I think what I love to tell people sometimes is that a lot of people might look at CIC workshop and say, all right, I need to be starting from scratch. But now, you already existed as a business before you took the class. I thought that was best, doing the CIC with already something already happening, because now it's like, oh, yes, I can use this for

this and I can use this for this. And they have other resources that they have a financial what do you call it? Management program, the FMP, financial management. Financial management. And so I have a person that sits with me and we go through my numbers and now she can see I'm doing this for a whole two years and she can see my numbers and she can help me to improve this or improve that changing this or that. And that is so helpful, especially for a small business that and I just like most of the small business people. They have a second job. They do something else. They can't, sometimes you can't just focus on one thing. Exactly.

One, so many hats, right? I mean, you could be an expert at what you make in the small business, right? You could be expert at baking. You could be an expert at, I don't know, you know, taking photography and so forth. But that doesn't also make you an expert in accounting exactly banking and loans, right? So it's just you need those resources because you can't possibly go No one's gonna go to get a degree in accounting so that they can then go back to their small business Yeah, so I do the baking and I get my husband he needs

me to do better on my my tracking Because he does our taxes so he has to do like on my tracking all those expenses because he does our taxes. So he has to do like, I need those numbers. I need those things. So he, thank God, helped me because I, again, I'm one person cannot do by all myself. And so like even my daughters, sometimes they come

and help me put the labels on my boxes. So I created every single label and every single thought about the box, the labels, and on Christmas time with different holidays I decorate the box in different colors and things. So you got expenses on the label, you got labor expenses, all these things. When you do your own business you don't think about that, right? At first you start, it's like I love to bake, I want to put all this together, you do it and somebody says, well how much does that cost? I don't know. Well that's that break even cash flow class.

Exactly. What did this actually cost you? And finding like all that overhead that you have, like the website that you didn't think about, the insurance that you think about, all the delivery time, the gas, all those things adds up. They're like, whoa, I have to have a thousand dollars just to start the business, like the LLC, all the other licenses that you have to edit there. So you're not thinking about that when you're creating a biscotti. Now how much of that is going to go inside of the box? And then some people are like, oh, but that's so expensive.

But yeah, it is and it isn't in a sense because I'm putting, you have to think of the labor that goes, the time and all these other things that you have to have, the insurance, and if you have a store, the rent, that's going to go in there, the insurance for that place, it just adds up. And so I teach small business for homeschoolers, teenagers, and I talk about that. And then I feel like everybody should start one business in their life at some point so then you can appreciate and understand what goes behind a business. And all that cost and all that effort and time.

A lot of the time sometimes you can't quantify, you know. And so you try as much as you can, but you're going to end up doing more. Just like you would do if you have a job. Sometimes you put more time there that you get paid for it. Exactly. Exactly. I know it's so to you. You work really hard, but you have that beauty of you're deciding what to provide and then

you have the flexibility to do it then you have the flexibility. Exactly. To do it as you want to do it. Yeah, yeah, you have the flexibility. Like yesterday, because my girls are in spring breaks, we went to Maymont in Richmond. Yes, beautiful park. It is so beautiful. They even have goats there.

You can feed the goats. Oh. And it's like, you're paying to feed these goats. You go like get quarters, put it in a little machine, and then they get a little handful of food, and they're just so happy to put their little hands there and have the goats eat from the hands. It's just something special about that.

Yeah. Exactly. So yeah, it's a beautiful, that's the beauty of small business, right? Of owning your own business. Exactly. That's what we always say. You can still have that time with your family, even though you know you don't have to work really hard. Yes.

All the rest of the time. And then you're there to, like, my daughters, they do karate. I get to take them there. I got to watch them, you know, and just have those little times to take them there. I got to watch them and just have those little times to take them to the park. They need to play. They need to have fresh air. And when you are gone all day, you barely see them. And then we can cook together.

We can eat better as well. Exactly. Exactly. That's what it's about. That's what it's about. Well, Renato, this has been an absolute pleasure. Absolutely, yes. It's been so much fun having you on.

Before we let you go, where can people find you? So you can find me at vivalanash.com, www.vivalanash.com. I'm also selling my biscotti. I sell at the food of our nations. And I just started selling them at the Virginia shop. Oh, very nice. And Mickey Tavern. I always want to say Mickey Tavern.

Okay. Mickey Tavern. Oh, I've said Mickey like too many times. Yep. So yeah, those are the, and also at Palmara at Art Emporio. Oh, yep. Next to the food line there, I sat there as well. And I'm probably going to be coming up to on Saturday for acts for the farmers market.

Wonderful. I'm trying to make that happen. Yeah, obviously. People can look forward, hopefully one day soon. See you there. Hopefully one day soon. I'll try. Because I teach yoga too. And so I teach at Lake Monticello and Fluvena Library now.

So I'm busy. Dave, we're glad in your business you came to visit us this morning. Thank you so much. I appreciate that. I appreciate both of you. Thank you for having me and let me show my goodies here. You're very welcome. Thanks so much for coming on.

Yeah, it's been great. Thank you. All right. So as we go ahead and swap here. Yeah. That was kind of pretty interesting, right? I mean, how that, you know, all that, that she puts together. Exactly. It's really, really really really very creative very creative very much so very much so that's

that's you know there I always I always talk about that there are some people just have that creative side of their brain work so well right and and that's why when we talk about small businesses that's why sometimes what you need is a situation where you have some, you need some help for the other side of the brain where it's all the numbers and all the calculations etc. because you have that creativity where you know what you're doing but you forget that if you run a small business the other side is also very important. You can't just let it go. So it's very good.

It's also a testament to how hard work you put in, but also you really appreciate those workshops that CIC puts up. I really encourage people to remind them that you can be an established business, that you can be a business that's already in business and go and they'll help you learn what are you doing right, what are you doing wrong, what could help you, are you sustainable, how can you become sustainable, how can you grow. So there's so many things you can learn and then when you graduate from the workshop, it's not like like, hey, you're done with 16 week workshop, it's over. See in 30 years, right? There's a financial management program.

There's all these other resources you can then connect to to help you keep growing. So that's fantastic. And it's a great way to network too, right? Because more and more people now learn about your business. And if I remember well, one of the nice things, because I guess they have like a roundtable, right? You learn from other people, it's like, well, here's what I did, I did this wrong. It's like, oh, okay, I was thinking about doing that.

So what should I do to make sure that I don't make that mistake, right? So that's good. Exactly. So key, so key. So it's just, yeah, fantastic to have all these wonderful small businesses in our community. It is. Well, listen, we've always said that's the bloodline of lifeblood. Lifeblood of the economy.

Lifeblood of the economy. And it's good to be reminded that, especially on days like today, where it's like, all right, yeah, stock market, 10% is there. OK, yeah, but those 500 companies are not the lifeblood of the economy. Absolutely not. Exactly. Absolutely right. Exactly. You know, are they important? Do you buy things from them?

Yeah. Right? But they're not what makes the economy function. On a day to day, in your small town, it's a lot of other things that come into play there. So you can't get too worked up about a day here, a day there, even a week, even a correction, corrections happen. Over time, who knows how many corrections we've had.

You want corrections. If you don't get corrections, you've got bubbles. So you don't want a lack of corrections. That's why it's called a correction instead of a disaster among other things. But you know, just important to keep in mind. But you know what's interesting is, you know, because it's the quarter end, right, and so we usually kind of look to see what the markets have done, you know, during the first quarter, the last 12 months, et cetera.

And you know, I find it amazing that, you know, so many people have panicked in this first three months of the year, especially the first, the last two months, and it's more because of market volatility, in my opinion, than just the markets going down. But you take a look at the 11 sectors of the S&P 500, as of yesterday, only two sectors are down. All the other sectors were up. So even though the S&P 500 is down over 3%, only two sectors have really precipitated that.

And I probably need to probably guess which two those are. And so you sit there and you go, so not everything is going wrong. So it's not like there is truly a market crash going on. There are just pieces of this economy where because of the uncertainties of whether you're worried about the tariffs, whether it's the fact going to lower interest rates or not, right? So these are the pieces to the puzzle that markets don't like. So those pieces that impact that specific markets are the ones that are really truly getting hurt. And you don't do one of them, I'm sure tech is one of them, right? You would sit there and say, well, how much are they affected by some of these tariffs?

And so you look at tech being down and then you have to think back to December, early January when we were sitting on this show talking about the fact that you have some of these companies at the top of the S&P 500 that have done really, really well and they're taking up so much that we haven't seen since 1963 and right? And that it's hard to sustain that growth. But as you would look at some of these and you look at something like NVIDIA and say, well, it's not like NVIDIA, you know, we put tariffs on Canada, and said, oh no, I can no longer function without Canada. No, it's because NVIDIA was a little high, probably a little overpriced, you get this tiny little

drip of bad news that everyone has now forgotten about three months later with the little Chinese AI company and Nvidia just starts going down, right? I said, did Nvidia go down because of news or did Nvidia go down because Nvidia was too high? Exactly, yeah. It was just slightly, it was overpriced. Exactly. Overpriced.

So you have to look at these different components because but as it's easy to get lost and say, oh, the whole thing's down. Well, as you said, no, no, no, the whole thing's not. It's like you said, there are healthy corrections and some of these companies say they needed that, right? They needed these corrections because they literally can't continue to grow at the pace that they've been growing over the last five years and therefore their markets aren't going to grow at the pace that they've been growing over the last five years, and therefore their markets aren't gonna go up in the same rate. We said this before 2022's down year, right? 2022 the market went down,

and we were talking that year, right? You had some of these large companies at 80 times price earnings ratios, right? And you sit there and say, price earnings ratio is, basically what price earnings ratio was telling you is the price of the stock relative to the share of the earnings of that company that you get. And you sit there and say, well, wait a second, if this stock is at 80 price earnings ratio, then that means that if I buy this one share and the price doesn't change, let's say the

price stays the same, it's going to take me 80 years of these current earnings to get my money back. Do you think about it? It's absurd on its face. And so what happens is they corrected in 2022, among other reasons, inflation and so forth. But sometimes a correction is necessary because you just look at the valuations

and say this doesn't make sense. This company doesn't make enough money to justify this hype. And then what happens is post-correction, then you find out was this company legitimate or was this company all hype? So they back to your MySpaces and guys out of the dot com bubble that once they corrected, they never came back. But you do that in Amazon, which corrected big time in this dot com bubble, but it's still around.

Because it actually did make money. So you need to weather these things, and what you don't want to be doing is saying, I don't want to be in the stock market at all because the world is ending. You know, you gotta think about, the stock market is like any other market, it's called supply and demand, right?

I mean, it's just like we always talk about the real estate market being supply and demand. In other words, you know, there's two houses and there's, you know, 15 people that are on by those two houses, guess what? That price is going to continue to go up until it hits that point. Well, it's the same thing. You know, a company has a certain amount of shares outstanding. It's not like all of a sudden that's like, you know, we got all these people want, let's just create more shares. No, I mean, not that a company can't, but the point is at any given day, those are the shares. So guess what? And the only way

you're going to buy those shares if somebody else is willing to sell it to you. And sooner or later, somebody says, yeah, I'm willing to sell it to you, but it's going to be 10 higher than what it was yesterday. And somebody says, yeah, I'll take it anyway. Boom. So that's how markets and therefore that's why they explode, that's why they grow so much. And as we all know, I mean, there was just an enormous amount of quote unquote, you know, free money or cheap money, let's call it that way, because interest rates got so low at some point in time, right, that money flew, money went where?

It just went right back into the stock market, right? And I think that was also a little bit of a bubble there. And I mean, the other, the sector that also didn't do well was consumer discretionary, right? So again, what does the consumer do when things get a little tight, right? They started going out, right? Exactly, well, and we kind of saw this, right?

Because you're talking about 2022 high inflation, 2023 high inflation, 2024 moderate to high inflation, right? At a certain point, right, we were sitting there saying, all right, consumer spending has, which is 70% of the economy, it's held up. But when we started to hit record credit card highs last year, you're like, okay, how much longer can it hold up? At what point does the consumer finally say, I can't buy this anymore? Or the credit company says that you no longer have any funds to borrow.

You have run out of places to obtain funds to buy. And the first thing you cut, you don't cut consumer staples because that's what's called. And the first thing you cut, you don't cut consumer staples, that's why it's called staples. Right. First thing you cut is anything that falls into that discretionary category, I'm not going to do it. Right. And you start to see that weakness come in.

Exactly. Exactly. Yeah. So you need to be prepared for those things to happen. And again, I mean, maybe you could speak to, because obviously, look, of all the tariffs we're talking about continue, that's a reshaping of the economy as we have seen it, right?

And talk, I mean, you were talking to some of our clients today about the lag effect. Like, okay, let's say you put a bunch of tariffs on car companies and they do want to move back to the U.S. That doesn't happen in five weeks. So you have to have that period where, okay, yeah, those other guys are now expensive. Those imported parts are expensive now. But the new factories haven't moved to you yet. So there's kind of that interim period that even if something may work out in the end,

there's going to be a rough period in between. And I guess there's two parts of the tariffs, right? And again, I think I would say that part of what this administration is doing is trying to level the playing field a little bit. I mean, it's also I think a negotiation But in either case, I think more than negotiation I think we've got to the point where it's like I don't just want to negotiate because if we're still exporting our If we're still exporting our jobs, that's not a long-term plan, right? And so we need to we need we need to insert a certain amount of pain where the companies say, it is no

longer worth it to us to build factories outside of the U.S. We might as well build them here, right, and employ people here. And that's the trajectory that you really want, right? And I think that requires a lot of pain both on those companies that are exporting our manufacturing. And of course it's going to hurt a little bit on our end because things are going to cost a little more. Because when you think about it, the reason you do trade is because the assumption is somebody has a resource that you don't have, and you have a resource that they don't have, and you're willing to exchange that, right?

The class of oil I like to use is olive oil, right? Yeah, you are. It makes more sense for us to buy olive oil from Italy than it does for us to attempt to grow olives in a climate that is not as suitable to growing olives as Italy. So Italy has a cheap resource, olives, right? We have other things, right?

You do the trade. You say, yeah, I will import your olives. Exactly. Because it makes more sense. You have a comparative advantage in olives that I do not have. You might even have an absolute advantage in olives that I don't have, right? But to your point, what the cheap good that we're talking about when you think of places like China where you think of sweatshops where you get your clothes in. Labor. The cheap good is labor.

Labor, yeah. And so you sit there and say, is that the cheap good that I want to be doing this deal with? Yeah. Yeah. And so I think from that perspective, you sit there and go, is that really the right thing to do? And at this point, you look at your own country and say, what is it that we create?

What is it that we manufacture in this country? And why can't we? And I think the advantage that we now have is, certainly robotics and AI will eventually take over some of the routine, some of the labor repetition that people do. I mean, just screw that in. And in your old day, you're doing the labor repetition that people do. I mean, just screw that in. And then all day you're doing the same repetition, right?

You go home at five o'clock, come back next day, well, a robot's gonna do that all day long, right? And so when you think about it, it's gonna take some time, as you mentioned, but I think the idea is to bring those manufacturing jobs here. And it doesn't mean that all of a sudden we're gonna have people screwing,

doing what the guys are doing. No, you're probably looking at skilled labor. Skilled labor, right? And that's the whole goal, right? So I think the tariffs are there, in my opinion, this time around, not so much for negotiation, but because- To actually change-

Because we need to change the trajectory of the economy in this country, whereby we begin to produce things that we import that's like there's no reason we can't produce that, right? I'll create that. So I think it's going to take time. It's going to be a little painful. So the point is, so you know it's like when do we want to do this? The point is, if you're going to do it, do it now, right, you're going to have a very difficult year, right, and then the next year it's going to get better, and before you know it, by the third year, you're booming, right, and that's the whole goal. If you keep waiting and waiting and waiting, you're going to get to a point where there's no return. You know, all of

a sudden, the rest of the world will be the greatest economy in the world and you're sitting here saying there's nothing we can do. Well, yeah, I mean I remember back to originally economics, right? You as the major, when you have that kind of trade imbalance, right, where you have the major import and the major export, right, and in this case labor is what the major export is exporting, right, especially in the case of Chinese goods. That, actually, that imbalance only goes on for so long. At some point, this economy gets larger than this one, and now you are the cheap labor to their import.

And you can see it in the way that they have been done to shift their economy. They would very much like to reach that position. and they're not wrong to want to do so. So you cannot do these things forever. So the question is when do you attempt to forestall this shift? Do you attempt to forestall it when you're still in a position where you are the major importer, or do you attempt to forestall it when it's too late and you are now the cheap labor? Even things that, at least for me, it's just common sense. But I remember reading an article where there's a certain amount of military equipment that is being created outside of the US.

And you sit there, why? I mean, if you're creating something that is really for the use for your protection, you're literally giving other countries the ability to say, oh, so that's what they're doing. It just doesn't make any sense to me. So it's like that should stay here, right? Well, there have been some standards. It was, oh, this might have been four or five years ago where they found that there was, you know, there was tracking and spyware in chips that

the Chinese, that a Chinese company had produced for the military. Yeah. I said, well, is that really shocking? Exactly. I said, oh my goodness, how do they do this to us? I said, well, why wouldn't they do that to you? You outsourced it to them. The chip industry, right?

It's like, why is that being created outside of this country at this point, right? I mean, we can create chips here, and we should, because you don't know what are they putting into these chips. You don't really know, right? Exactly. But I think there's an adjustment period. Yeah, there is.

There is. And again, we're going to see it. But it's interesting is that if you have, think about it, and this year has shown it more than in previous years, but if you have truly a blended portfolio and a diversified portfolio, like I said, I mean there are some funds. Those funds are up this year. I mean like some high dividend paying funds, they're positive as of yesterday. That's very good, right? I mean there's nothing wrong with that. Bonds? Bonds are a big, right?

That's your major difference, I think. I think people are a little worried that you don't have a repeat of 2022. 2022 there was nowhere to hide. I mean, are a little worried that you don't have a repeat of 2022. 2022 there was nowhere to hide. I mean, floating away bonds maybe, but there was essentially nowhere to hide. If you were in bonds, your bond portfolio was down. If you were in stocks, your stock portfolio was down. If you had a blended, diversified, beautifully diversified portfolio across all the asset classes, all of everything, you were down. Exactly, yes. That's not what we're looking at this year. What we're looking at is a stock market correction, but unless you're very, very, very young, right,

you should have a blended portfolio by this point. If you are at, what would you say, anything over 30, you should have some bond component. Exactly. Right? The closer you are to retirement, the more bonds you should have. So. The closer you are to retirement, the more bonds you should have. So if you are very close to retirement, your portfolio should be very protected right now.

Because yes, the stocks are dragging that little piece down, but you should be seeing certainly some income protection and some price protection on the bond side of your portfolio. And that's what I think is a little different. A blended portfolio can weather this in a way that 2022 you couldn't hide. Yeah. No, absolutely.

Absolutely. That's true. I was, again, going through some client portfolios, et cetera, because we get a lot of calls now, right? Because all they look at is they see the TV, S&P 500, growth stocks are down, everybody panics and they call and we look at their portfolios, yeah, your portfolio's up 3% so far this year.

Really? That has up, because it's the first, yeah. Exactly, not 100. In other words, we wouldn't be doing our job if we just put you in the S&P 500. Exactly. And so, and they're shocked, even though no matter how many times we explain them

about portfolio diversification, they're still shocked. So, but that's the whole point. The whole point is that even within the stock market, there are so many places that have done well this year, that the panic I think is overblown. And I'm sure the market's down today in certain areas and there'll be more panic. But I don't see this as a, you know, some people talk about

recession. I don't see this as a impetus to a recession whatsoever. Yeah. Doesn't mean it won't come, but there may be other reasons. Listen, the only reason you would have recession is if the consumer decides, I'm not going out anymore, I'm not spending anything anymore, and I'm not doing anything. Because the consumer, like you said, is 70% of your GDP. If they just completely buckle down and said, hey, I'm just paying off my credit card. I'm not doing anything. Yes, you're gonna have to slow down this economy. But again, a well-diversified portfolio can weather that.

Oh, easy. Yes. Exactly. That's easy. And I would say that's what an opportunity like this is. This isn't the opportunity to, oh my goodness, let me sell everything and get out. This is an opportunity to say, hey, was my portfolio well diversified? In other words, if I am 60 years old, am I down more than the S&P 500? So that's a problem. Exactly. My portfolio was not risk adjusted to my age.

If I'm, to be honest, but you look to the flip side, if you're 21 years old and you've, you know, let's say you're out of college, let's say you're 25, you've got a 401K, and your 401K is, the S&P 500 is down 3, 4%, and your 401K is down half a percent. To be honest, you might not be taking enough risk. You might be sitting there saying, oh, this is great. I'm not down as much. But over 40 years, your portfolio actually may be incorrect. Exactly. It's a time to look and say, where is my risk level? I see what the number is on the S&P 500. Where is my portfolio? Return, given that parameter. Do a little scenario analysis for yourself

and say am I appropriately, not just diversify, but is my risk level appropriate? And like I always say, do the work and if you've got 10 mutual funds, ETFs or whatever, look at each one of them, see what's in them. Just to make sure that yes, you're truly diversified. Exactly. These are always opportunities to learn more about your portfolio and to see see what's going on. Call your financial advisor and find out.

Talk to them. Yeah, it's true. It truly is and and and I appreciate it actually when people call because it gives us an opportunity once again to discuss what we're doing for them and where they are and why we're doing it. It's peace of mind. I mean it actually when people call because it gives us an opportunity once again to discuss What we're doing for them and where they are and why it's peace of mind I mean it's incredible buddy in the phone calls like wow this I feel so good exactly exactly Huh always good same here to have a little reminder Thanks to everyone watching a one sort of Miento watching the show this morning that you for tuning in the wonderful Keith Smith Tuning in this morning. You should always check him out one day after us. That's right. Not difficult. Same time, same place.

Today, mañana. Manana. You can watch Real Todd with Keith Smith. That's right. Always appreciate him tuning in. And definitely thanks to everyone who watched the show this morning. Be sure to check out viva lanash.com. Be sure to check out CICVILLE.org if you're interested in those. Yeah, if you're a small business, I mean, you really should just check them out. Is that it?

I'm pretty sure they're second. Obviously, the January cohort is well underway, but there's always another cohort. That's two. What, do I have two a year? I think there's two, I think it's up to two a year, maybe three, and there is a call-point orange one as well if you're out in that area. So be sure to check them out, you can learn about,

and they're doing things all year, even if you're not in time for the workshop, there's so many resources that you can still get connected, you can do a one-on-one consulting with the Small Business Development Center. So there's so many resources that you can still get connected, you can do a one-on-one consulting with the Small Business Development Center. So there's a lot of things you can do even if you're waiting for the next opening for the 16-week workshop.

So we encourage people to check that out. Got a great show lined up for two weeks from now. We're gonna have Christine Fairfield from the Oratorial Society of Virginia, Gabrielle Damond from Merriman Digital and Matias Young. So full house. I'm looking forward to it if I'm there. If not, I will be welcoming a little one.

Hopefully not for your sake. Hopefully for my sake I'm not. Then I'll be a little late. Should I say for Elizabeth's sake? For Elizabeth your sake. Hopefully for my sake I'm not yet. I should be a little late. Should I say for Elizabeth's sake? For Elizabeth's sake. For Elizabeth's sake hopefully we're all... You just get nervous. Elizabeth's got to do all the work.

That's my job as a pending father is to be anxious. So that's my job there. And always good to be on the show with you. Same here. Always good to have Judah behind the camera, do work in his magic, love being on the I Love Siva Network set. Thanks to our presenter Emergent Financial Service

and our great partners, Mattias Ionemilte, Sherwoodsville Opera, Forward Adelante. Thank to all of you who tuned in this today. Have a great, hopefully spring is here with some sun and everything, but enjoy the rest of your day. Have a wonderful weekend. We look forward to seeing you next time, but until then, as

we like to close it out, hasta mañana. Thanks for watching!