Wake up, Buy Here, Pay Here people. It's a beautiful day. Go grab yourself another cup of Joe and say hello to Jim and Michelle Rhodes on the Buy Here, Pay Here Morning Show. Take it away, you two. Hey, good morning, everybody. Oh, we got an intro somewhere. Is that on your speaker? We didn't catch that before we went live here. Give us one moment. Okay. We're good. All right. Excellent. So welcome, everyone. It's not like we haven't done this a couple thousand times, but you know what? That's what makes it fun and real is because we're messy humans. We're live. So we just, we get to, you get to see our mistakes. Well, and then, you know, like, oh, they make mistakes. It's okay if I make mistakes too. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. One of us has to. I know, right? Right. No, listen, I'm glad to have Michelle back in studio. Good to have you here. Feeling great and happy to be here. Yeah, good. So we got a lot to cover. There's a whole lot happening. You might have some updates that you want to share before I dive into kind of the business-related side of what's happening. Do you want to run into that now? Well, I mean, I'm going to share all the business stuff. I just thought if you had any other kind of announcements that you wish to share. Well, you know, there's a few things that are happening. And, you know, y'all know that I took a bit of a break from... all of the things uh health and all of that it's also been kind of like a reset in in a lot of ways and you know that kind of that started when we made the move to oklahoma and just you know all of the things and so we've um you know i've i've been like in this really weird head really weird headspace about Wanting to not wanting is this this internal desire to drive something that is kind of or that is that is mine to drive. And, you know, we've talked quite a bit about what that could be. And and it landed so clearly. in the last week. And so, you know, you watch the stinger Buy Here, Pay Here Nation television. And I was writing this last night. It was like, just my thoughts about our journey with Buy Here, Pay Here Nation television. And we first... We first conceptualized this whole thing in a twenty seven foot trailer as we were crossing the US and, you know, living the nomadic life for like right at the the end of the lockdown with covid. And for about two and a half years, we were we did so much work. conceptualizing and vision boarding and all of that so this the the vision for by your parent nation television was conceptualized like in twenty twenty so about six years ago twenty twenty one i mean it wasn't it wasn't launched but it was conceptualized that we do this thing and so um you know it was launched and i i need to go back and look but i mean it's it it has to have been four years ago And so, you know, Logo, Stinger, we have done on Nation Television. I call it Nation Television, even though it's by her name, Nation Television. We've done day-long events under that banner. We've done the morning show under that banner because you see the Stinger at the beginning and the end, and we've been doing that for quite a while. uh, webinars, dealer roundups, other podcasts that we have that, um, we've been banking, um, episodes around market watch and tech watch. And, um, you know, we have some things to note all of that dealer workshops that we're doing now, um, are under that banner. And, uh, And we have some other things that are coming from that. And so I was like, this is something that we really haven't gardened into a full blossom. And so that is what my thing is moving forward. And so you'll be watching a lot of things start to unfold relatively soon, but about programming, commercials, Sponsorship, schedules of events. And being on this, it's like a network. What it is showing me is it's going to be something like a Netflix, but for buy here, pay here. And so we've been ringing the bell for quite a while. um about virtual makes sense for a lot of people because um we love conferences we love the live conferences and there are some things that you cannot duplicate with virtual and We know that there are, I mean, it was like, twenty thousand, whatever, dealers across the US. We know that we're reaching them through our YouTube channel. um we can really help blossom that as well um but this is you know the conferences right now are really only able to capture a certain percentage of that and so we we just we're like we want to help advertise conferences um because there is a a very deep value in that and We are going to be driving, driving, driving virtual education to people that are or are not members of associations. And it's just in general. And there's some things that we are working on that are, which the topic today is around. It's not about necessarily buy here, pay here. it's about business. It's about working together as a couple. And that dynamic or that energy that happens when you're working with someone that you're building a business with and the challenges that come with that. And so there's a lot of things that we've been talking about that will be added to the the lineup and um yeah so it's it's really it's that was a i i i have he's seen it i mean in the last week my energy level has just like boom okay this is it this is this is the thing i've been looking for for a while so i'm really really excited i've seen her become very energized she's excited to get this uh yep BHBH Nation TV and kind of multimedia track. There is a ton of content. Oh my gosh. Some of it will be updated. Some will be replaced, whatever. Well, and part of it is what's in the Institute. That will become part of the programming for Buy Here, Pay Your Nation television. So those of you who are familiar with the bhphinstitute.com. There is a lot of stuff there. Some of those videos, I look different. Some of those videos, I was in a different setting from five years ago. Some of those videos, I'm like ten pounds lighter. The content is mostly still valid. It's as valid as the day we recorded it. It's all good. Thank you for your graciousness in letting me get excited about yeah you know what's happening but yeah i'll still be doing this yeah of course yeah i look forward to that yeah um so our conversation today is really around you know our topic was or the title was kitchen table conversations so this is us Talking about what we see as business coaches and, and as recently as my V eight meeting last night. Right. So we had a dealer show us on the screen, their brand new infant. I wish I had been there. I mean, I'm just, I'm so excited because we've, we've been with him for years. Yeah. Let's not say who it is. Two or three or something. For a while. We have quite a history. We know them. We've met their wife. So this stuff, it's really more than business is what we're talking about. And we also had, I think at the end of last month, we had a meeting where sometimes when we have poor attendance because dealers are off at conferences or whatever. It's time of the year or whatever. We have low attendance. And I had a meeting a while back where we just had three dealers in the meeting. and we were able to dig in a little deeper on some of this kind of stuff that we're going to talk about today and it really confirmed that dealers could use somebody to kind of guide them through any business owner most of what we're going to talk about here is we see it in our buy here payer segment but most everything we're going to talk about today it would be true for most any business owner is having somebody walk them through some of these pieces that are, you know, the conversation we had in that particular group that night was around, what do you want your business to create for you? Let's quit talking about sales and inventory and cash and deal and all the stuff that is the mathematics of being in business. But it's like this idea that What do we want the business to become? And it's back to that thing about, is the business serving you and your family? Or are we kind of slaves to, for lack of a better word, it's like, are we tethered to our business? And then as a result, we're feeling certain pressure. Yeah. Right. Yeah. And I'm going to bring up the first kind of thing that's about the myth of compartmentalized ownership. Yeah. This idea that you leave it at work and you get in your car and you go home and it all stays at the office. I mean, the reality is that's not generally true. That is not as common as we might think. It is a gift if you can do that. I mean, it's a special thing if you can leave your work outside of your home. So here's the way you and I talked about this the other day when this was coming up. Let me kind of give you some examples. These are not hypothetical situations. These are actual conversations that I've had with dealers in like the last week or business owners. There's some people in my personal life that I've had conversations with that are also entrepreneurs. May I just interject? We associate with a lot of business owners and ones that are in no way attached or connected to the automotive industry. None. Right. the challenges are a common thread. Yeah. They really are. Some of the stuff. And obviously when you have a smaller business and you have an entrepreneur that is very engaged in the business, it depends on the business owner a lot. Then when you have stresses, my main point was you're right very few can really compartmentalize it's like when you're feeling the stress of today i have a dealer that i spoke to who's feeling the stress of the the relationship with their lender they've got some pressures coming from their lender okay well do we think that that affects these kitchen table conversations do we think it that's on our minds as we're you know getting our kids off to school in the morning all the stuff that is everyday life it's like We know that this stuff comes home with us. And while we may not be talking about it, we may not vocalize it, we may keep it to ourselves as dealers, that the reality is it spills over into our family life. And I think this is the part that this is really my future in coaching. Michelle, you know that. Oh, I know that. This is where I'm going to be directing. And we're already kind of doing it, even inside our conversations. Occasionally, we get the opportunity to really take dealers to a place where they're They don't get to talk about this stuff enough. And so this is part of the direction that we'll be going with some of the kind of supplemental coaching that I'm stepping into. We've talked throughout our podcasting career. I mean, I think we're like seven hundred episodes, six hundred episodes or something like that in that we think and work and. two buckets straight lines and squiggly lines straight lines are you know those are things that are numerically um you know uh validated or you know that that that are written down and you need to follow the the the and every business is that is foundational yeah to every business you need to have policies and procedures you need to make sure you're compliant you need to make sure that your books are being kept you need to make sure and i'm he he hates it when i use the word need we strongly strongly strongly advise um i don't hate it i told you not to do it because i think i don't i don't like it but this but this is this is you know this is like business one-on-one it's like you you to you have to you there is a strong reason for you to have all of these things understood and like solid you know that they're solid then there's the squiggly lines and that is the heart piece that is the connection relationship with your consumer that's your relationship your connection with your team team culture and This is a relationship and connection with your partner, your life partner or business partner or whatever kind of with all of the things. And so this is the you know, what you're talking about is this is squiggly line stuff. yeah and you know we talk a lot about philosophy like philosophy informs so much of the way we do business even the straight lines and then even going beyond that to think about what does it look like for me to step away from my business a little bit and talk about these other elements like so you know if i'm if you're a dealer listening today the conversations that we're able to have with some of the folks that we work with is like just for a minute just quit being a dealer you don't even own a car lot for a minute that is one of the ways that you make a living i'm like closing my eyes and oming yeah yeah but it's like we have to ask them to think about just for a minute i know you you know me in the context of a bhph coach i've done it for almost thirty years that's the way you see me but for just a minute Imagine you're not in the buy here, pay here business. That is how you make your living currently. But I'm asking you to take a moment and consider that you're not in the buy here, pay here business. And just ask yourself, where do you want to go with your life? Where do you and your spouse want to be with your life in a year, in three years time? And so that's that's about forget that you're a dealer for just a moment. And and let's figure out what do you want to create and let's have the business serve you instead of the other way around. And so this is the part of what I'm trying to step into. And we're succeeding. We're having we're having those conversations with dealers. You know, when the opportunities present itself and then we'll be stepping forward with more formats that really facilitate those kind of conversations where we can talk about things that are beyond buy here, pay here. They're relevant to any kind of business. And it's really just about being able to walk folks through this process of how do I make sure that I end up where I want to be? And that is the common thread is, and you know, you said the buy here, pay here, that's just the hat you put on. Someone may be putting on a plumbing hat. Someone may be putting on a, I own a tech business. Someone may be putting on a whatever, whatever business. And that, you know, that what we see is that it's, it doesn't matter at every stage, every industry. It's like the, these, these are, important things for people to consider and and that there's not a lot of people talking about it yeah and um uh so that's yeah so in another conversation with somebody who reached out just learned about us from youtube and reached out and i had a fun conversation with a young business owner who's pretty new to financing cars and they're considering their their family member has made um home equity available for the sake of their business. And it's like, so just think about they're at a place where they're contemplating stepping into a place where they're drawing on real estate in order to build a business. And I think it's just, my mind immediately goes to How do you do that so that you keep the exit ramp so that in the event that it doesn't go as planned, you've got the ability to step off of the ramp and not have, you know, that end badly. So in this case, we're talking about a real estate mortgage, but any other parts of our business or however we might. capitalize that a friend family member bringing in money like you know that stuff happens right it happens with every business yeah especially when you're growing yeah businesses fail and so the reality is um or they struggle you know we've seen family conflict we've seen conflict certainly in the work that you and i've done we've seen situations where there are members of family inside a business and there's there's conflict that way so this stuff happens it's just uh the question becomes really i think the bigger part of this is Just being able to kind of catch your breath a little bit and step away from the rut that you're in day in and day out. That is everyday business life and entrepreneurship. And just ask yourself, is it where are we trying to go? What are we trying to create here? And so people can help you create that. But sometimes we have to sort of get out of our own way a little bit. We have to take a break from the day to day and be ready to pause. And we just see these poor dealers just struggling to get to a V-Eight meeting. Just, you know, they're just on the go and whatever else. And that's not new. That's been my whole career. I, for me, you know, I'm married into car business. I have a different skill set and have done the best I can to apply that to this. But my, just for me, what do I want out of life? I want to find delight everywhere I turn. And, you know, for just in the home. Mm-hmm. I, I, I was, as I was walking through the house on the way to the studio, I was like, just almost, I'm going to get emotional, almost teary about, I have created something that just delights. It just fills my soul whenever I, so I can have a bad day and And I can still be hits of delight, hits of things that just like, ah. So, you know, you think about like if you were to walk into your business, what are the things that the environment that would just make your heart sing? And, you know, I just I feel like I'm a living testament of that and how that works. That just makes it makes such a difference. It makes such a difference to to find pinpoint the ways because it's not just about like the aesthetic and all of that, but pinpoint the ways and the things. Yeah. that bring delight, that bring peace. And so there are things that you and I have as a couple that bring delight, that bring peace, that bring connection. And so those are the big, that's to me, like the big part that I am looking forward to contributing to. Good. Well, I think we covered the parts that I wanted to cover this morning. I think, you know, I know that, you know, when we think about just the buy here, pay here side of this business, which is primarily where this, you know, our broadcast channels currently go out across, you know, Facebook and LinkedIn, YouTube, whatever. And then primarily the audience has been buy here, pay here folks. And I would say that if if you're a business owner you're a buy here pay your dealer and you're listening today look we we can always talk about getting in a v-eight group and helping with marketing turning cars over we can always help with all the straight line stuff but what i'm asking you today is if you're if you're one of five dealers listening today that hears this message it says you know what jim and michelle i could use some help from somebody who would help me navigate this thing about how do i make sure that my business is is working for me and that i'm able to create for myself what it is that i'm looking to create and so this is this is where we're going to be spending our time and coaching and so if you're if you're in that group then by all means reach out you can find me at uh let me get my email loaded up here for you Get that on the screen. So you can always find me at jim at whitehatway.com. We're stepping into our AI thing. We actually started doing some LOIs on AI this week. And so our White Hat Way AI personas are going to be deployed and we're excited to get those to market. everybody's working are you ready to say what kind of like what okay not today we're kind of reaching out to a small group directly on this first round and so i think um you know when you get that call if you're in that small group super limited at the beginning yeah just because yeah so so i'll just tell those people that there's gonna be we've got twenty seats that we're offering and when you get that call you might get a second follow-up call and that's it you don't grab one of those twenty seats and we're gonna offer somebody else so far the reception has been Yeah. And rightfully so. We've made it affordable and we've made it kind of a collaborative sort of thing. And it's not what everyone's talking about in the industry. Everyone's like, AI, AI, AI. This is not collections. This is not sales. This is something that goes into the squiggly lines. Yeah, it solves a problem. It solves a problem that dealers have. And I think you'll be able to see that soon. Like I say, we're starting to enter into LOIs and we've got a development partner that can deploy this thing in a matter of weeks. So we're excited to get some dealers committed on this and get to work. So yeah. That's really, really exciting stuff. I don't think so either. I don't know if you all are aware, and we haven't really done a lot of podcasting. Buyer Payer United is just... It starts this week. It's coming week. It starts. Yeah. It's like it's soon. My mind's been other places than paying attention to the calendar, but I know that that is happening very soon. It's the ninth to the twenty. Yeah. And I'm I'm sure it's not too late to get a ticket and get a hotel room, hop on a plane. If you are looking to learn in a consolidated and where you can choose from a lot of different classes, live university type of thing. i'd look it up so it's buyer pair united i know you there's a lot of ads that are being run on buyer pair success do they still call it the summit bhph united summit i don't know i yeah but it's but it's a it's a good conference and then the next one coming up is uh the national conference for that one is on june twenty first through twenty fourth in denver Yeah, yeah. So that one is going to be independent. You're going to be able to they talk more about the legislative side, the compliance side and, you know, what your association is doing for you and a great forum for you to talk to those that represent you into what you would like to see happen. So all of the people on the board, everything will be there for that. So that's another one. And that happens in June. It's over Father's Day weekend, which is one bummer. We won't be there this year. We've got other irons in our fire that it's just not going to happen. But we, you know, big shout out for all of those things. So, hey, everybody, thanks for joining. We appreciate you taking your time. We know that you've got other things and, you know, things that are. But this is it. Just there's a lot of gratitude. Have yourselves a great day. We'll talk to you all later.
