The Learning Leader Show With Ryan Hawk - 156: Greg Wittstock – The CEO Must Guide The Culture

Episode Date: September 4, 2016

Episode 156: Greg Wittstock – The CEO Must Guide The Culture Greg Wittstock has been dabbling in water gardens since the age of 12. He began with a concrete creation and evolved to the naturally balanced, #1 contractor-installed ecosystem ponds that Aquascape is well known for. After graduating from Ohio State University with a degree in Interpersonal Communications, Greg founded Aquascape Inc., which experienced incredible growth during its early years. The company appeared on Inc Magazine's coveted list of 500 Fastest-Growing, Privately-Held Companies in North America from 1999-2002. Greg later appeared on the cover of Inc Magazine, along with a feature article about his leadership and entrepreneurial spirit.   Episode 156: Greg Wittstock – The CEO Must Guide The Culture Subscribe on iTunes  or Stitcher Radio The Learning Leader Show "The first job of the CEO is to guide the culture" In This Episode, You Will Learn: Most excited about: The 25th anniversary of his company, Aquascape Growing a business from college hobby to 120 employees and over $60m in revenue at one point "Those who sweat together stay together" Values of Aquascape Character Team Winning Fun The importance of playing football and how they taught Greg about teamwork How The Chicago Tribune story launched his business to another level Why he didn't speak with his Dad for 9 years The average pond they build is $15,000 Overall philosophy to the profession of sales: Help those who have had a bad experience, sell the lifestyle, share statistics about how a pond can change your life Find someone who has done what you want to do and learn directly from them "The greatest satisfaction in life is helping other people succeed" "Find someone who does what you want to do and learn directly from them." Continue Learning: READ: Forbes Feature on Greg Follow Greg on Twitter:  @ThePondGuy To Follow Me on Twitter: @RyanHawk12 You may also like these episodes: Episode 078: Kat Cole – From Hooters Waitress To President of Cinnabon Episode 071: Nate Boyer - Green Beret, Texas Football, The NFL Episode 047: David Marquet - "Turn The Ship Around" Episode 107: Simon Sinek – Leadership: It Starts With Why Did you enjoy the podcast? If you enjoyed hearing Greg Wittstock on the show, please don't hesitate to send me a note on Twitter or email me. Episode edited by the great J Scott Donnell The Learning Leader Show is supported by Daor Design - Daor Design will help you build your brand like nobody's business. Most of their work falls into one of four categories: Logo Design, Print Design, Web Design or Digital Marketing. They pride themselves in being a trusted, valued resource for their growing family of clients. Bio From Aquascapeinc.com In 2004, Greg was nominated for Ernst & Young's Entrepreneur of the Year award. Greg also received the Best Boss' award from Fortune's Small Business Magazine and Winning Workplaces in 2005, and earned the University of Chicago's Entrepreneur Hall of Fame award in 2007. At the end of 2005, Wittstock's dream of a workplace utopia came true as the company moved to Aqualand, a 256,000 square foot office and warehouse facility that boasts the largest sloping green roof in North America. Aqualand received Silver Level recognition in the Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) Green Building Rating system. Greg has been interviewed and featured in numerous publications, including The New York Times in 2009, and has appeared on a variety of television shows over the years including Good Morning America, The Big Idea with Donny Deutsch, and cable home improvement shows.

If you want to be successful in life, find somebody doing what you want to do and do what they did. The greatest satisfaction in life comes from helping someone else reach their fullest potential. My business model is to help our customers succeed at building, selling, and retailing water features. I really get more juice out of seeing other people succeed than Aquascape succeeds. But guess what? When you help other people get what they want, you get what you want. Are leaders born or are they made? Our host, Ryan Hawk, believes that leaders can be made through,

determined, focused work on learning the art and science behind the makeup of other successful leaders. Now it's time to inhale knowledge and exhale success. You're listening to The Learning Leader Show with Ryan Hawk. Hey and welcome to the Learning Leader Show. I am Ryan Hawk. Thank you so much for being here. Talk about a guy with some energy. We got Greg Whitstock, CEO of Aquascape, known as the Pond Guy. His company appeared on Inc. Magazine's coveted list of 500, fastest growing companies. Also, he was nominated for Ernst & Young's Entrepreneur of the Year, been featured in the New York Times. Good Morning America, the big idea with Donnie Deutsch and many other places. A few of the topics we got into. Going from a $60 million

business to a $27 million company. Not typically the direction that we talk about on this show. And we discussed why that happened, how that happened, as well as how he and his company have responded that he describes the first and most important job of a CEO followed up by his overall philosophy on the profession of selling. Ladies and gentlemen, it's Greg Whitstock. Greg Whitstock, man. I've been pumped. Excited to have this conversation because I can say you absolutely have the coolest backyard

of anybody I've ever spoken to. We're going to get into that and get into why. But my first question is, what are you most? excited about right now. Okay, great, right? Well, thanks for having me on. Well, I get excited about a lot of things, so it depends on what day of the week. But actually, what I'm most excited about, this year is our 25th anniversary as a company,

which is, you know, a nice milestone. And I just didn't love, you know, more than ever with this industry. I feel that we have the longevity, the seniority, and we're kind of leading an entire industry for the world with kind of being the top expert. So it's a great honor to have turned my hobby into my career. And I guess at 25 years, I'm a bit nostalgic about basically leading into the future and all of the changes. And so I'm not an old dinosaur where I don't mind changing. And with social media platforms today and technology and all the stuff that we are embracing as an organization,

I think it's easier now more than ever to basically share with the world what my passion is with turtles, fish and frogs in backyard ecosystems. And so my excitement really comes from, you know, the technology that's allowed us to reach so many people. And just like you've seen my backyard, I'm sure you saw it on social media or whatnot. And that's, to me, nothing but, you know, for the next 25 years, excitement about letting more people be exposed to my passion that I turned into a career. Well, you might have forgot this, but you texted me a video of you swimming in your gigantic

pond slash lake that you've built for yourself. Oh, okay. Well, that one, that one was at Aqualand. So that was in my backyard. You talked about my backyard. That was my first big pond. That was in 99. I built that. I built the house in 2000. I built the pond at 99. That's kind of that order of things. And then the video that I texted you was our pond at Aqualand that we built in 2008 with the help of 350 certified aquascaped contractors from across the world. Jesus, this is incredible. For the people who don't know, can you describe what you do? Okay, of course. I'm Greg Wittstock, the pond guy. I'm the, I'm the, the founder of Aquascape. We're based in Chicagoland, and we are the largest manufacturer in North America of water gardening products, and probably the world, if you talk about specifically with ecosystem ponding.

And I'm just a kid that loved turtles and moved one day from New Jersey to the flat barren cornfields of Wheaton, Illinois, and was not too happy to leave my lakefront home where I caught turtles fish and frogs every day. And my parents promised me I can build a pond in the backyard for my turtles. and that began the beginning of my Odyssey with backyard ecosystem water gardening. So I was 12 years old back in 1982 when I did that and spent seven years ripping out and rebuilding my backyard classroom. And then in 1991, after my junior year at the Ohio State University, where I know your brother played,

I ended up launching aquascape to build ponds for people in Chicagoland. And it quickly took off from there. I ended up patenting the products that were made out of garbage cans and cattle troughs in my backyard and started selling those to other landscapers who referred to me as that pond guy. And that's when we really went national with our patented products and started teaching other landscapers what we ourselves did. To this day, we're still the only full-line aquatics manufacturer that builds ponds full-time. And we do that out of our R&D department in Chicago.

Man, it's incredible. And so talk to me about aqua land, why you built it and what it consists of. Well, I played football too. I didn't, I wasn't Division 1A material for Ohio State, but what I did was I learned more playing sports than I did from any classroom I ever took. And it was all about teamwork and camaraderie and fun. And so I built a workplace what I dubbed pleasantly a workplace utopia, Aqualand. It's a quarter million square foot lead, which is leaders in energy efficient design, silver certified building. So we have a green roof that's filled with the largest sloping prairie in North America or at least

one time it was. And we have a full weight room. We have a full indoor gym, you know, with a sport court and pitching machines and indoor soccer arena. And I even got a spa with a hot tub, sauna, steam room, and the piece to resistance, a cold plunge that is really good on my joints at 46. Wow. And what you're describing has just, well, really nothing to do with the business, but everything to do with the culture that you're trying to build. And that's what this show is what I really try to learn is finding really interesting and power. leaders who understand the importance of building, really are creating a place that people love to come to every day.

So how many people do you employ there? We have 120. There's about, I think, 95 maybe that are in Aqualand, and then I've got an office up in Toronto, Canada that handles my Canadian customers, and then I have some salespeople on the road. So just about 100 people or so come to Aqualand every day, and I believe those who sweat together, stick together. That's why we have all of the games. We just got done with eight days of Olympic competitions here from the office chairs to the hoverboard races to my favorite, which was the tug-of-war contest.

And I would have won. Our team would have won. But I was the lead. I wanted to intimidate the other side there with the boss being on the front. And then, of course, a couple of my managers came into pants to me. And so I had a choice, Ryan, I could either pull up my pants and let go of the rope or I could keep tugging. So I just pulled with my shorts around my ankles and we still got second place. but not a bad showing.

So it just, again, talks about you leading from the front and developing and building the culture that you felt was needed. And can you share with me your philosophy on leading a business, leading a company, and leading specifically people that make the company go? Amen. Well, I think the first job as a CEO is to guide and guard the company culture. I think that's a, the company culture is a direct reflection of the C.E. And so, you know, like I said, sports was a very powerful, you know, importance in my life.

And that's why we do a lot of sporting things here and have the whole building the way it's set up, the way it is. But for me, with leading people, first of all, they have to fit our four values as a company that we have defined. And then, you know, I'm not a manager. I don't manage people. I have a, I'm not operationally based. I'm always looking six months to a year down the line and making sure that the culture and the energy is fine. I mean, people come into Aqualand and not only is a lot. It's surrounded by beautiful water gardens and fish and turtles and frogs and all the fun stuff.

But there's an energy and a vibe. And I feel energy. It's one of my things. And when there's some things going on and the energy isn't high enough, I mean, I could literally kind of feel that in the air. And it means we're going to, you know, we need to adjust things a little bit. So to me, there's nothing more important than to guide and guard the company culture. That's my main job. The managers manage.

I get out of their way. Actually, they clean up my messes. And they make sure that things get implemented. I'm ready fire aim and I got managers who are ready aim aim aim fire so it's a constant you know refining of of my vision and you know I don't think that there's nothing I'm more proud about than the people that I you know the 120 or so people that work here some people have been here for over 20 years and they know me better than I know myself and and they they're in charge of their departments and all I want to do is support them and to do that they support me by taking all my quote unquote brilliant ideas and

actually making them work Where did you, or how do you develop the ability to approach it in that manner? I mean, I, you know, we talked in the phones prior to this. So I, and I got to know you, I think, pretty well. And I'm right in line. I love the way that you view the spectrum of leading a business and leading people, as I mentioned. Do you have regular, do you have coaching? Do you have regular self-study or how did you develop this approach?

Maybe it's through trial and air. I'm curious. Yeah, sure. Well, I'm telling you, it's team. I mean, that's one of our four company values. Team is character first, team, second. I don't want anybody that had to jeopardize their character to work on our team, winning, which is third. Obviously, we're in business to have success and then fun. And some people say, well, that's not fun. I go, yeah, but we got to win. We got to make money. Or, you know, we don't want to ever do something that would jeopardize someone's character. So I'm telling you, I learned this stuff playing football. I mean, I played football for four years for a great Marine. and I learned the power of work ethic and culture and winning attitude and a, you know,

a spree decor we're all for one, one for all. And so very early on I was building ponds. I was out in the field. You know, I could still say I eventually, every once in a while I'll get back out in the field. And that's always a fun day when I'm throwing rocks around and building a, you know, work of art, one of a kind of custom creation. But I realized really early on, Ryan, that I can only make so much money with my own two hands and I needed some people to work with me and not just hold me, Hammy rocks. And that's kind of when I kind of let the reins go a little bit and had my first

foreman and gave him the rope. And of course, I saw what he built and I was not very happy with it because he hadn't been doing it since he was 12 years old. And lo and behold, the customers loved it. And I was kind of shocked and, well, I gave him a little bit more rope and eventually he started selling ponds for me. And I went from building ponds to just selling ponds. I went from selling ponds to working on marketing. Someone else was selling ponds. And so the job of the CEO is I've worked my way out of every job here. I've started it and then turn it over to somebody else who's done it almost as good as me. And now today, they're obviously much better because that's what they focus on and it allows me to focus on working on the business and not in the business.

Part of your core values you mentioned was winning. And one of the ways to measure winning in your business is by how much money you guys make. If you could share, what is your both growth year over year as well as total revenues over the last. couple of years. Well, that's a loaded question, buddy. I think it's pretty straightforward. Yeah. Well, for me, it's loaded, and here's why.

I had the mightest touch. Everything I touched pretty much turned to gold from the time I, you know, I mean, I had a pickup, I didn't even have a pickup truck. My first summer building ponds in 1991, just as a kid, I said to my parents, all I used a strong back, a wheelbarrow on a shovel, and I'm ready to rock and roll. And that Christmas, I got a wheelbarrow on a shovel underneath the Christmas tree. and I used the family Buickla Saber with a free trailer from the side of the road. And I ended up building five ponds, $21,000 in sales and $11,000 profit.

So that was, I made more money than any of my friends in the fraternity at Ohio State. That's for sure. But my first Nissan hardbody pickup truck and the second year, I built 12 ponds. I'd done 17 total ponds. And then in August 2nd of 1992, my life changed forever because the Chicago Tribune put a front page story on me in the tempo section, out to 700,000 people. And my phones exploded. I had hundreds of calls for building water gardens and my fun summertime gig to build ponds

all of a sudden was my career. You know, I had an interpersonal communication degree. It took me six years to graduate because I was building ponds half the year and going to school half the year. My dad came into the business, big mistake. He was a great fellow hobbyist with me, but he was the polar opposite of me, which any business needs. But when you have a crazy guy like me who's a wild entrepreneur and you have a conservative 50-something-year-old

engineer, it's kind of. was like a gas pedal and a break, but we worked together for three years. My business kept growing, expanding and growing, and then he ended up leaving because we were budding heads too much and starting his own competitor. My dad became my first competitor. When I started my business, there was no manufacturers of professional water feature products in the world. It was all hobbyist-based, and we really targeted the professional side.

He became my first competitor. I spent the next nine years not talking to my dad while trying to prove to him that I could do it without him, and we did. You know, we were able to build this company into a four-time fastest-growing privately-hold company with just under $60 million in the annual revenue, all for my hobby of turtles. And everything was going great. I thought I had the Midas touch, and then 2008 happened. And 2008, our sales dropped $12 million. I did the exact same things I did in 2007.

And all of a sudden, in 2008, they dropped $12 million, and they dropped another $6 million. And my sales literally over a three-year, four-year period got cut. in half. And we ended up doing, you know, in 2011 was our low year. We ended up doing, you know, 29 and a half million. And the building that I had built as a workplace utopia, all of a sudden was a, was a burden and a hindrance to us. And then just to add to the piece of resistance, we had 24 inches of snow and my building collapsed under the roof on a Sunday, and we were out of it for the entire year of 2011. And I tell people all the time, you learn way more about yourself and your team in particular from the valleys

and you do from the mountain tops. And today we're rebuilding our sales. We're in the low to mid-30s. And we're profitable. We turn a profit, which I'm very proud of. I owe that not to me, but my incredible financial team, my CFO, my president. And we're a strong company.

Our growth has not been nearly like it was the first go-around, but the sustainability is there even more because we basically have a business model and a system that is run on a budget. was doing, you know, $60 million in sales and I wanted something, I would buy it. And now if I want to buy something, it has to get approved in the budget. If it's not in the budget, then Greg Whitstock, the Ponguey doesn't have a sandbox to play in. And so, you know, a lot of times people say that they don't want to invest in companies until they've been through a downturn. And we've been

to a downturn and we're ticking up slightly, not nearly the level that I would like to and as fast as I'd like to, but I'm sustainable. I haven't lost my team. I've still got my management team intact. And the future is bright because all my competitors, including my dad, who who we purchased in 2006 with that downturn, ended up coming back and shutting shop. So I've got probably 75% less competitors that I did in the peak right now, and no one's innovating that's left,

and we're the innovative market leader, and I'm loving life every day, which I could honestly say when we were doing $60 million, and I didn't have any quote-unquote problems. Life wasn't nearly as fun as is right now, rebuilding it the second time. Man, I really appreciate you sharing, especially how that was just, you can tell,

there's usually when people share it's at like the very peak of everything so you go from 60 million when the so the snow collapse I saw the the stories online and pictures and everything that that event you're still what five years later working to come back from well that was kind of the that we had we were actually our sales were just starting to grow from 2010 to 2011 we had you know, four or five months of year over year revenue growth. And then when that building collapsed, we really set us back because we had to operate out of three different cities and three different locations. We couldn't just go, you know, warehouse was one city. The office was in another. The retail store was in another. It took 11 months to rebuild Aqualand. I lost five teammates within

10 days of the building collapse, people that didn't sign up for the work that was required. But, man, did I gain a whole new respect for the people that stuck around? And I wouldn't say that the building collapse is what we're rebuilding from. I would just say that the collapse really came from home equity lines of credit going away. You know, I mean, the average pond that we're putting in is probably about $15,000. And it was just not a small amount. It's not a large amount. But, you know, when the economy was phenomenal, people would put $30, $40, $50,000 in their backyard. They'd have a pool. They'd have a hot tub. They'd have a pond. They'd have an outdoor kitchen. They still do those things, but they're usually doing one and not three or four of them. And so that's been a big impact. And what we've done is we've re-rereact.

We designed our business from the ground up. We've done things to improve the consumer experience, and we've gotten to a lot of do-it-yourself for products that we now carry and supply to, you know, for everything from fish food to small little pond kits that you can put in as a person or even aqua bowl. So I would have, you would have told me, Ryan, first of all, 10 years ago, what I would be dealing with as a business right now. I would have never believed it, but we've expanded and we've become, honestly, we're a stronger company in the $30 million, $35 million range than we were.

in a $60 million range when I had 185 people and I had never been through a crisis. What, again, thinking, thinking about from growth to then having to take a hit and now on your way back, have you seen more competition in the field or you say you had, there's only, you, you bought that through your dad's company. Because that was an interesting little, little, no, is that. So your dad was your competition and you ended up buying his company? Yeah, his company folded in. I bought the assets of the corporation. I mean, he is, you know, he was more of an engineer. He's a very brilliant man.

But he, actually, ironically, you know, a company needs those kinds of skill sets. But he was not an entrepreneur. So his business went out of business with the economy. We bought the assets, brought him back on. He was on the engineering side of our business. He's retired and playing golf now in Florida. But most of the competitors, I mean, a lot of my, I really created the marketplace for professional water features.

We were the first manufacturer, professional equipment. A lot of my competitors, after my father were distributors. that saw what we were doing. People that got in it because of the money. Well, when the money kind of went away, they went away. And the people that are remaining, there's a few people that are remaining, they're just kind of a shell of their former self, and no one's innovating. And I've redoubled down and we've been innovated.

All the money that I kind of, quote, unquote, stockpiled away at the bottom of the pond. You know, we reinvested back in the business. And we've, you know, we've reinvented ourselves to be a much more complete company today. And the sales will come, but we first got to make sure that all the eyes are dotted and the teaser cross. And Ryan, when you have double-digit growth for the first 17 years of your business, there's things that slip through the cracks. Well, there's nothing slipping through the cracks now because every penny's counted here

and every dollar is spent wise. If I were to put a $15,000 pond in my backyard, what would that look like? Very good question. There's options with obviously the type of stone you use and whatnot, but a very standard water garden and you would get it for 12, 15, you know, depending on your rocks, would be an 11 foot by 16 foot pond. It would have maybe a 10 foot long stream and waterfalls. It would be something that a crew we can teach because we're a wholesale manufacturer. We could teach a landscape crew to put it into 40 to 50 man hours. And it would be by far and away, there would be nothing

that anybody could put in their yard that would create the kind of impact, a decorative water feature will. It reestablishes nature and attracts birds and wildlife. And of course, if you got kids like I know you do. I want to get you one of these. It just is a magnet. It draws people outside. The thing that is maybe you ask me about where my passion comes from or what I'm most excited about is every day we're putting in ponds and I'm talking to people that just say it

changed their lives. I mean, what else can you put in someone's yard for $15,000 and have it changed their lives? It sucks them outside like a vacuum cleaner deposit. It's in their backyard and they'll spend hours on end feeding their fish and sitting with the glass of wine or a beer with their buddies or their wife and their kids playing in it. I mean, it's just basically water features turn a house into a home. And if you don't think I'm passionate about it, all you have to do is listen to me

because I honestly believe what it is that I'm selling will change people's lives. The one aspect of it, I talked to my wife about this prior to this conversation, Greg, is I'm not, I don't like to admit this, but I'm not a big guy on having to deal with upkeep of something like that, unless maybe I'm wrong, but having to go out there and work on little, I mean, like, I have certain, skills and I have certain areas where I'm not good and kind of like as bad as much as I hate admitting this getting out there like in working on it or fixing things is just not I want to say I can get better at and I think I can but right now I'm not good at that what for the people like me you're like dude I just don't want to deal with it I just want to enjoy it how does that work

well first of all we have a maintenance team that that does you know some people don't even live at their houses most of the time they just visit them you know some of people with second homes. So the maintenance crews just go out there and take care of the whole thing. Really, let me ask you this question. Have you ever had a fish tank before? Yes. When I was a kid, I haven't had one as an adult, but yes. Okay. So what's easier to maintain a 10 gallon fish tank or a 100 gallon fish tank? I mean, I assume the 10 gallon. Yeah, see, and it's harder. And the reason is because the smaller the body, the more it gets affected by, you know, fish load, the more it gets affected by weather. And the bigger the body, it's,

the easier it is to maintain. So that's why at 11 by 16 pond, we make an ecosystem-based pond. We start off every year you do need to do a clean-out and get it started. But once it's going, it's basically like having somebody empty the bag for you and you cut your lawn and you just have to empty the skimmer basket. We have an automatic dosing system. Our whole goal is to improve the consumer experience. There's not too many people that would say, yeah, I want to have more maintenance in my life. Everybody's time crunched and technology, you know, has really killed a lot of hobbies because everybody's on their iPads now instead of doing, you know, whatever hobbies. it is. So you can manage your pond from your iPad and we've got all that stuff available. So the whole goal of putting these in is that it's in a self-sustaining ecosystem and that basically you do a fall shutdown and a spring startup and then once it goes, all you really have to do is empty the skimmer bag of leaves, which is once a week in the spring or the fall, once a month in the summer. Wow. Okay. So I, you obviously have an incredible understanding of how this works. And to me, I naturally think of my first job out of college, Greg, was in the profession of selling. And I feel like I worked really hard after getting on playing football to understand the selling process and how to create a gap and then understand how my solution could help solve a problem or close the gap for the potential customer, the prospect that I was going to sell to.

As you view, and this is not just pawn related, this is, this is just in relation to the profession of selling. When you view the profession of sales, and I want this to be advice, hopefully, for anybody. Maybe somebody's driving in their car right now in between sales appointments. What's your overall philosophy when it comes to the profession of selling?

Well, that's a big question too. A lot of times when we're selling a pond to somebody, it's because they've had a bad experience with a water feature. So they call up and they say, I put this pond in, it doesn't work, or a landscaper built this, or my neighbor who does this kind of thing. And so we're fixing a lot of problems out there, which gives water features a bad name because they're not built properly.

And when you talk to somebody, what you really want to hear is them express their pain. Well, what does it frustrate you? Why are you not getting what you want? And then we could actually say to them, well, an ecosystem pond does the maintenance for you. You don't have to go out there every other week and clean out your pump because the pump is in a skimmer, which is why I created skimmers, invented skimmer, and it's out of a garbage. can in my backyard because my pump, Ryan, when I was a 12, 13, 14 year old kid would clog. So I used a garbage can and I used a net from the laundry basket to mcguiver up and Jimmy

rig up my own skimmer. So the whole goal of what we're trying to do is improve a consumer's experience. And then you talk to people about that don't have a pond and you say to them, don't you just wish you can have more time together with your spouse. Oh my gosh. And we're so busy. We're like ships passing in a night. Well, I tell you what, let's get you a beautiful water garden, put some underwater lights

out here and every day when you get home, instead of being on your iPad or being in front of the boob tube, sit outside with a beer or a glass of wine next year's and have that time together. And so we really sell it based off of the lifestyle that it creates. And, you know, I go to people's houses and I look at their furniture in their backyard and it's rusted to the concrete. Like it hasn't moved to long. You move it and all of a sudden it.

And then you go back a year or two later and visit that customer because they become your friends when they put upon and you have that connection. And you'll see an entire patio floor. You'll see a gazebo that was built. You'll see a fire pit. And all of a sudden, they're sucked outside and they're spending time. And that's what we sell.

We sell the lifestyle. So we have the negative where people have a bad experience that we want to turn it to positive. And then we also have the negative where they don't have time together, that we're creating that with that life. They're older kids. They're so sick of their kids playing video games. Put something in the yard that we want them to be out there.

And they're going to be with a net catching the frogs that come because build it and they will come. And you want to reestablish nature. You don't have to want to go to a park to do it, but get rid of the darn lawn that you have to cut, put in an ecosystem pond, and enjoy it with the whole family. Man, you're doing a good job of convincing me to actually think about this. The pictures that I saw in the video that you sent, I said that would be incredible. Don't you go scuba diving in that water? Yeah, well, my pond's 15, 14 feet deep, so I have an underwater cave and I have diving.

In fact, I'm going today to get the air tanks filled up because this week is pondemonium. It's our biggest event of the year for professional. contractors and retailers to come to Chicago to learn it. It's just a big party, and we learn and teach and play together. The best way to learn something is to teach it. But, you know, this is kind of a funny story, Ryan. I know you got kids a little younger than mine. And when my son was seven, he's now 16.

When he was seven, he went to someone's house and he said, Mommy, and she said, yeah, what's up, Ryan? His name's Ryan, too. And he said, Mommy, where's their pond? And it was the first time he'd ever been to a house that didn't have a pond in. And it's not because most houses have pond, only two or three percent of of them have ponds. It's because everybody that knows me, yourself hopefully included, gets a pond because they rub off on that passion. And so where does that passion come from?

Ryan, it starts at home. I've got a pond. I talk about my pond when I'm on a consultation. I talk about the birds and the wildlife. And I talk about how my family uses it and swims in it and scuba dives in it. And if you live with something, if you believe it, I mean, I don't know how people sell wire or toilet seats or whatever they sell. And they can be passionate about it. But obviously, they got to find a way to be passionate about it because when your Passion, passion, sells. It does in a big way. Because I was thinking, like, how to relate this to somebody who maybe sells,

and you kind of just touched on it. Sales in an industry where there's, let me think of, like, medical equipment sales guys, because they're driving. And their product is not all that different than the seven other companies that they have to sell against. And I'm like, I don't even know if there's any relation to that to what you do because you live your product. I mean, I never even thought about the potential impact it could have on a family in their life

by getting them outside in front of... Because I enjoy water. I really love it. I just got done actually doing a swimming in a triathlon. Oh, good for you. Yeah, and it was incredible. I tried to, because I was so tired and in so much pain, tried to be grateful.

This is kind of weird, I guess, but try to be grateful for the sun and the feeling of the water and the clouds just to try to get my mind off the pain. And so, like, I really have developed as I train for this race, a love for being in the water and being around the water. And so I'm like, a pond could potentially do that for people, especially what it's right in their backyard. I train.

I do triathlons too. Do you really? Yeah, I train in my front pond. And the thing that's hard for me, Ryan, about triathlons. is I always swim with a mask and a snorkel because I want to check out the fish. The turtles and the frogs that are in there. Then I go do a triathlon and I have to put little goggles on and I have to turn my head. That's the hardest thing.

But yeah, I train in my pond because, you know, and I got a pool at home. I would rather have, I'd rather have fish and wildlife in there because it makes it a lot more interesting than swim in the laps in a chlorinated pool. And that's another thing, too. People think chlorine is healthier for you? Like, oh, I don't want to swim with fish. It's like, what are you kidding me? The last 50 years we've had chlorine. You know, we grew up swimming in lakes and bodies of water.

This is national. In fact, the big problem with people in getting their kids sick is they're too sterile. Chlorine sterilized. Chlorine's not healthy for you. Biology, bacteria, that's the way our bodies were made to be. And so I'd rather, much rather pick swim in a body of water with fish than in a chlorinated swimming pool. You have guys that you call the top frogs. What does that mean to be a top frog?

It's so fun. That's pot pneumonia, baby. It's this week. The top frog is our top certified aquascape. contractors and retailers that are, you know, primarily North America. I had breakfast with a guy from England that's in this week for this. The people come from all over the world. But majority of my business is North America still.

There's a huge potential abroad. But top frogs is the people who sell the most of our stuff. And instead of being top dog or whatever else, we call them top frogs. We do awards. We do a crazy leg trophy for them. And they all come in for Ponemone. We got 400 and some people coming in this week. And we'll have four days of fun and leadership and swimming in the pond.

So top frogs are the top buyers. Top installers and top retailers. So what are, and I normally ask this question a different form, but I like to ask all people who have sustained levels of high levels of excellence and success. And that is when you look around, you study yourself and others who have sustained excellence for an extended period of time, what are some of the common characteristics you feel all those people? share. Amen. Well, I think the easiest way to be successful in life is find somebody doing what you want to do and do what they did. I'd love to be the model. This company be the model for people that want to succeed in selling, building, and retailing water features. For my business and for, I've always sought out people who are top in the field and I find out what I can learn and glean from them.

I'm sure you've heard of this. Your income is a denominator of your five closest friends. And the reason that is, Ryan, is how they think. So when I talk to a guy who's succeeding with water features, he pretty much thinks like the next guy, the next guy, and he's not focused on stuff that isn't important or the ridiculous drama or he's focused. He's got his, and, and character. And so I also seek out people that reflect my values, you know, so I hang out a lot with my pastor. He's a total, he's an incredible dude. And I want to learn from people who are better at me at whatever they're doing. And then I just want that, that to rub off on it. And so I'm all always, always getting advice from people that I respect, including my wife, because when it comes to, you know, to knowing me and knowing how I react.

And just yesterday, I just heard a great quote yesterday from from a top guy. And he said, one of my good consultants told me to wear a shirt, pretend I have a shirt on every time I am out in public. And it says, when you get mad, you lose. I'm like, I could totally wear that shirt because I'm a hair triggered blocking fullback that took out the middle linebacker. and I'm a very passionate guy, but man, when I raise my voice, when I get mad, it never turns out well, especially at home. I can see. I like that. How do you manage that when you feel a trigger happening or coming on at work and you're about to potentially go off?

How do you manage it? Well, I don't always manage it the best, but what I've learned is when I'm triggered, when I'm ever out of a loving joyous state, don't, if I'm ever reacting, at a hurt when I'm hurt or when I'm frustrated or angry, it's not going to turn out well for me. So I really don't interact with a teammate. I call them teammates, but our employees, when they've done something that's screwed up, I mean, sometimes there's an immediate thing that I just react to. But most of the time I go to their managers, their managers are much more politically correct, much more coddling or much more, you know, effective than I would be if I just, you know,

blew a gasket. So I've, after 25 years, I think I'm much better than I was for the first 10 or 15 years where I would, you know, I could lacerate someone's liver, you know, when it wasn't being done the way that I want to. And now I just literally turn it over to the managers and let the managers handle that situation. So it's obvious that you have a big, uh, high level of trust in your managers. What is your hiring process like for those people? Because they're, they're in very important positions if you give them this you empower them to have these difficult conversations what are you looking for in those people and how do you identify if they have it well first of all they keep me out of every job interview because I ask illegal questions just for the fun to see if I can get a

reaction like what so you married you have kids you know just like I would be talking to which I hate that that's illegal because like that's like me and you like we were that's something that you and I would ask if we're having a cup of coffee get to know each other you know so they hire without me being involved. I just got a new executive assistant. Of course, the running joke here was, you know, because I went through seven executive assistants maybe 10 years ago before I got one in the state for eight years. So, of course, they have money at bat the company and how long this person's going to stay. She came from, she was a CSI investigator 13 years for the local police department. And she's a tough, she's a tough cookie. So she has no problem hanging with me. She just started

in Memorial Day. But what happened was the HR department narrowed it down to two candidates. And then I went and met with both of those candidates. And, you know, I like to do social situations. So I like to go to lunch with somebody. I like to, you know, go ride a bike or do something outside to see how they interact with the waiter or, you know, the waitress or how they are in a, in a non-formal setting, not just in a, you know, a suit and tie sitting in an office. So when we hire a big position like that, I mean, the last big position we hired was a national sales manager. The guy played college football. I mean, we talked about college football for two hours and football and life. And, you know, what a cultural fit, especially for me. This is my culture.

But they narrow it down right before a big position. Obviously, my executive assistant and obviously a national sales manager. But most of the positions, I don't even interview. I just get to know after the team hires them. And, of course, the number one thing they hire them for is a cultural fit. Cultural fit. So can you remind me of what those key stones to your culture are? Sure. Character, team, winning, and fun are the four values.

And how we actually do that, Brian, is every month we celebrate those four values. So the team nominates a fellow teammate that represented fun, did something fun, maybe the Aquascape Olympics that we just had or character where they did something for a customer that, you know, showed their character. And so then we give them a bobble thumb, which I do a lot of thumbs. And they get, you know, so you see certain people displaying with probably their 10 or 15 or 20 bobble thumbs over the last 10 or 15 years that they've got it there. So we reinforce our company values all the time. And we don't always get it right. The HR department is not perfect. We'll get somebody.

but within a month or two, we know if that person's going to work out. People get blown away when they come to Aqualand. You have a full gym and a weight room. Don't you have people that abuse this? I'm like, listen, if somebody's up here on a treadmill two in the afternoon for 30 minutes needing to sweat, that's fantastic for me because that means that they're probably going to be more productive when they go sit back at their desk, as you very well would know as a triathlete and an athlete.

So we don't have people that abuse this. The reality is if people don't use this stuff, we have to really question, are they the right cultural fit more than if they're abusing it. I don't have people abusing it. And we know within a month or two if somebody's actually going to fit our kind of unique culture. And if they don't, then, you know, we cut our losses. We have a 90-day probationary period for everybody. And I would tell you that the HR department is way better at me when it's judging if someone's a cultural fit that I am because I just take everybody's softballs.

Oh, they said they love this. Well, they don't. They're just telling you that because you're the boss. I don't even get that. Man, that's a really interesting process. I like it. Greg, I know we both have things coming up. I just want to say thank you so much for being here.

Are there any specific topics that I might have missed or anything you want to me to ask you that you wanted to tell my audience or your fans before we take off? Hey, man. Well, listen, buddy, I appreciate being on here. If you want to be successful in life, find somebody doing what you want to do and do what they did. The greatest satisfaction in life comes from helping someone else reach their fullest potential. My business model is to help our customers succeed at building, selling, and retailing water. features. I really get more juice out of seeing other people succeed than Aquascape succeeds. But guess what? When you help other people get what they want, you get what you want. I talk a lot to kids.

I talk a lot to high school and college age kids. And they all say they want to make a lot of money. Well, listen, I've made a lot of money. I certainly don't do bad right now, but it's not about the money. It's about helping other people get what they want. And you know what? In return, you're going to get what you want. It could be a fulfillment. It could be monetary success. It could be both. But the bottom line here is I'm other focused. I don't want to focus on myself. This is not, even though I innovated this products and this is industry, I'm more proud about the people that I'm fighting alongside with and are my team and the success that they've had than anything that I've been able to accomplish. And guess what? Because I've given them the rope, I've climbed higher

too because they pulled me up with them. And that to me, and don't, don't run away from problems because there's a reason that we don't work in a toll booth. Not that there's anything wrong working in a toll booth for some people, but I tell you, I'd go crazy because I wouldn't fix problems. And all business is is fixing problems. Every single day I come to work and I'm faced with problems and I say, thank God for this because then I could see the people around me, like when the roof collapsed. And I have a reason for existing. There's managers that have been here before that don't want me to hear problems. And then they don't want me to be, I won't live without problems. I won't give me anything to do. I don't want to go play golf. I'm 46 years old. I want to be doing

this when I'm 76 years old because I enjoy the thrill of getting better. And every day, you're either getting better or you're getting worse. You're either part of the problem or you're part of the solution. And for me, the purpose of life is to have a purpose. God willing, my purpose is to be the pond guy and I'm going to do the best job that I can't add it, including doing little interviews like this with you that I really appreciate and congratulations yourself for being named a top five Inc magazine podcast. Whoa, this guy doing this research.

Okay. Thank you. Appreciate it, Greg. And, you know, it's interesting. I just want to make sure this goes on the record. We, you know, we had a long phone conversation, and I'm always appreciative when somebody is exactly the same when you're recording to when you're not recording, because some people turn it on and turn it off.

And that is not you, man. Like, I can say you are literally exactly the same guy. And that, I appreciate that, though. And I think people listening should should as well, because it's always kind of a, you know, I've done 150 plus. these, man. So I got a lot of experience with it now. And it's, um, it's, it's, it's cool to see people be exactly the same regardless of whether the, the, the, the, the, the microphone is turned on or and so I appreciate that. I live, I'm doing my passion, buddy. And, and, and I'd love to share that

passion with you and turn your house into a home. We might have to do it, man. We might have to do it. I'm, trust me, it's going to be a topic of conversation, uh, later tonight. Um, to see, uh, and so we'll be texting and, uh, I'll, I'm going to talk to a bit more about it. But, I really appreciate you being here. I definitely want to continue with this dialogue, obviously. Where would you send everybody to learn more about you online? Oh, Aquascape Inc. I'm also on Facebook, Greg Wittstock, W-I-T-T-S-T-O-C-K,

but just our website, you know, AquascapeInc.com. Awesome. Sounds good. Thanks so much, man. Again, look forward to continue us talking as we both progress. Amen, brother, and go bucks. All right. This episode of The Learning Leader Show is over,

but we have plenty more to keep you, Locked in until next time. Head over to learningleadershow.com for more information and to request your favorite entrepreneur, CEO, world class athlete, or anyone else that inspires you. You can also talk to Ryan directly by reaching out to him on Twitter at Ryan Hawk 12. Thanks again, and we'll see you next time

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