← Unemployable with Jeff Dudan
Unemployable with Jeff Dudan
The NRA Tried to Shut Him Down. What Happened Next Made Him a Millionaire – Tim Schmidt #169
00:58:43
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- [00:00]
Jeff Duden
Welcome to the Homefront, everybody. I'm Jeff Duden. If you were a shy, quiet son of a frugal accountant, if you became a mechanical engineer, then was fired from a sales role for being too good, forcing you to start your own firm, working only from 6pm to 6am on borrowed software, if you started the magazine against all odds, against and the advice of many, which led to the founding of the US Concealed Carry Association. The dominant player is in firearm education, training, insurance and other benefits. With over 650 employees and 800,000 members while fighting off a hostile takeover by the NRA and the hostile press on 60 Minutes, your name can only be Tim Schmidt. Welcome, Tim.
- [00:50]
Tim Schmidt
Oh boy, Jeff, that was an awesome intro. I forgot about a lot of, it's.
- [00:54]
Jeff Duden
All, I read it, so it must be true.
- [01:01]
Tim Schmidt
I feel like there's one thing in my life I've been blessed with is the ability to kind of repress or forget about the crappy stuff in the past. And so that was, that was funny. That was interesting. So, hey, I'm happy to be here, Jeff. Really happy to be here. I've watched a bunch of your podcasts and you got some cool guests and, and for some reason you invited me.
- [01:19]
Jeff Duden
Hey, I appreciate it. We, we briefly met and in this group that we're in and I, I, I, I don't know, I, I, I, I'm like, I think we had, we shared a table of, with a meal together and I'm like this guy's real cool and I look it up and you know, you, you were very humble. I, I think if I, if I can just summarize it, very smart, very persistent, very humble take, took the, taking the high road over and over again, gotten screwed over a bunch of times, but it really never set you back. And you've built just an incredible legacy of a business here. And when I, when I saw that and real like we shot our shot and here you are.
- [02:03]
Tim Schmidt
Wow, Jeff, that's very kind. I appreciate that a lot and I do try to, I certainly teach the folks that I lead at my company and my customers that humility is one of the greatest qualities to have, especially if you have that quality in tandem with confidence, humility and confidence. I believe with those qualities you really can do anything. And I learned a lot of that from my late father. My dad, just such an awesome guy, unfortunately died just a horrible disease. He died of ALS when he was 72. That would have been back in 2017, but, but he was, that guy was my hero, man. He taught me Everything about business, everything about, you know, he had me reading how to Win Friends and Influence People when I was doing a paper route in like, you know, sixth grade. So, so he was such a great guy. And I, I do remember sitting in that table with you and, and that group that we're in and is one of the, one of the better mastermind groups I'm a part of. And, and I really like that. But, but yeah, yeah, I, I, I've had a lot of exciting things happen to me in the, in the world of business and, and it's, it's been quite a, quite a ride. Lot lots to, lots to reflect back on, and it's hard to believe. A lot of people ask me, Jeff, like, Tim, did you ever think that, that your business would turn into this? And I used to lie to people. I would say, oh, of course I did. I knew it would turn to this. But that's not true. Are you kidding me? You know, you know how it is when you, when you start a business from scratch. That's one of the toughest things there is to do. It's like, I often liken it to peeling like a giant onion that is seemingly never going to end. Every layer, just one after the other, there's just the next challenge. And, and I, I call it an onion because a lot of those layers make you cry, you know, because they can be challenging. And I reflect back on, you know, 22 years I started this business and man, I was just trying to get to the next corner, like, hey, let's make payroll. Hey, let's, let's make this advertisement work. Hey, let's figure out the next way we're going to get the next 500 customers. And, but I just never quit doing that for 22 years. And here's where we're at now. So it's been a fun ride.
- [04:12]
Jeff Duden
I like to say that many entrepreneurs are kind of screwed into existence, meaning there's a set of circumstances that form forces them to say, I've got to do something else. I've got to make ends meet. I've got too much month at the end of my money. And, you know, you were, but I mean, your, your father was a huge influence in your life. He would, he would. The name of your book is if It Is to Be, it's up to Me. And that was a phrase that your father used with you, starting when you played football and going into college. And, you know, you constantly had people telling you that you weren't good enough to get into Michigan Tech. You weren't good enough to, to do all these things. But then, you know, you had this mantra which was a value that, you know, your dad said just like, take responsibility for it.
- [05:00]
Tim Schmidt
Yeah, I'll never forget that. The first time that dad explained that to me, I was probably a sophomore in high school. And I went to a pretty small high school, but it was big enough so that they had a freshman and a junior varsity and a varsity football team. And as a sophomore, I played on the junior varsity team and, and, but I suited up for the varsity games and pretty much just, you know, rode the bench the whole time. And I was kind of complaining to my dad one time like, geez, dad, you know, why can't I get some playing time? Because there were some sophomores that were playing varsity and, and Dad's like, well, you know what, tell me, tell me what's going on. And I explained like, well, I think I, I could be on special teams because there's, you know, there's some guys that aren't that good and I want to do that. And dad's like, well, next time you're on kickoff at your JV game, as you're standing there waiting for that, your kicker to kick the ball, you need to act as if you're the only guy on that field that can make the tackle. If you don't make the tackle, they're going to score a touchdown and your coach is going to be pissed and, and all the bad stuff. And so that's what I did. I streaked down that field like a, like a bat out of hell. And, and I tackled the guy in like the 12 yard line and the coach just went crazy. He was so excited. And, and sure enough that next week, I, I, I was, I got to play varsity on, on kickoff. And, and that was, you know, dad used to say that phrase all the time. If it is to me, it's up to me. I'm like, gosh, dad, I've heard that so much, I just don't want to hear it anymore. This is, this is 16 and 17 year old Tim talking. But of course, you know, in hindsight that's, that's exactly what I needed to hear. And I'm super grateful that dad taught me that. So. Yeah, good.
- [06:40]
Jeff Duden
So, so you ended up going to Michigan Tech. You, you got through and got your mechanical engineering degree. And, and then you, you know, like most people do.
- [06:50]
Tim Schmidt
Barely. Yeah.
- [06:51]
Jeff Duden
And then, you know, then you moved into, you know, a nice little company, got yourself a cube, right? And working some cad or doing like that, but talk me through your early career and ultimately then how it ended up with you starting your own business. And, and I, I'd love to hear from you if you can think back to that time. Like, was that, was that a business of last resort or when did you start thinking about starting Schmidt Engineering?
- [07:20]
Tim Schmidt
Well, let's go back to my days at Michigan Tech. So, you know, I decided to go to study engineering because my high school, like, you know, senior year, biology teachers like, Tim, you should go and study to be an engineer because you like math, you like science, you're good at both of them and you're kind of awkward around people. And as an engineer you don't have to talk to people. So I thought, oh, I like that idea. Sounds great. And so that's why I studied engineering now, you know, I got to Michigan Tech and I tested, you know, they test your math skills to see if, you know, oh, you can take, you know, calculus too. Oh no, I had to take pre calculus because my math skills actually weren't that great. And so I did that and like this first two years, like every single calculus course I took, I got a two and a half GPA, C plus. And so that's like 25 credits of math. That's almost, you know, 25% of your entire, you know, college grade point. And I'm just, you know, two and a half on all of it. So my grade point just, I had to dig out the whole junior to senior year. Finally graduated with like a 3, 5. And, and you're right. Yeah, I went, moved to Boston with my ex wife at the time. Her name's Tani and she's actually my, still my business partner with Delta and uscca. But of course we were married back then and she, she was also an engineer and she got this job and the Big Dig in Boston, if you remember the Big Digs, they sunk an entire freeway underground. And it was one of the, like one of the largest public, you know, works boondoggles in the history of America. It was supposed to be like, I think 2 or 3 billion. It turned into 20. Anyway, so she worked on that project and, and, and I, and I went.
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Jeff Duden
To have any impact on how she ran the household budget or. No. Was she the problem? No, no.
- [09:26]
Tim Schmidt
Back then we were so broke. I mean, we were so broke we had no money and, but, but, but I was working at this, this engineering company, you know, again, making very, very little money. And I was designing centrifuges and cryostats and I kind of liked it. It Was fun. I was learning cool CAD software. And then this fella, his name was, what was his name? Sean. Sean comes in to the, to this, to the company and he's selling these super high end computer engineering workstations because that's what we needed to run the software that we ran. And Sean was this kind of weird little short guy. Nothing against short people, but that's just who he was. He kind of had Napoleon complex. But he convinced me. He's like, Tim, you can sell these engineering workstations and you can make twice as much money as you're making now. Well, that appealed to me and so I quit my engineering job, went to work for him. I was his second sale. He was the first salesperson in his company. I also owned the company, I was the second salesperson and my territory was the entire country outside of New England. And turns out I was pretty good at selling computers over the phone to other engineers because I knew the language and could talk to talk and it was, it was fun. Sean and I eventually kind of clashed a little bit because he, he, he, he didn't like how successful I was. I was literally selling millions of dollars of these computers and my commission was going through the roof and he thought I was going to go and compete with him and, and so he fired me.
- [11:02]
Jeff Duden
That makes a lot of sense at the time.
- [11:05]
Tim Schmidt
Yeah, at the time my ex wife Tawny worked for the same company. So we both lost our jobs the same day. And that was about that when we decided like, let's move back to Wisconsin and, and let's start over. And so that was when we moved, moved back and, and that's when I started Schmidt Engineering, which was to call that a company. Jeff is a stretch. I mean, Max. I mean, I think at one point we had four employees. And then I'd fire someone, go back to three and then back to four and then back to three. And I was not much of a leader and, but that's how we got started.
- [11:38]
Jeff Duden
Yeah, so my dad, he worked for actually a great little engineering firm outside of Chicago called rkr. And I mean, that's actually my first fishing trip was they did a company fishing trip. And that was. We didn't have a lot of vacations like outside of the, a couple of fishing trips. I mean my family, we went to Disney one time. And what I remember about that is my mom, you know, getting out of the car on i95 and walking along the meat side of the road. You know, that's, that was how, that was how. That's how good our family was. You know, that's how well we got along. That was the last vacation that we took as a family. And so, but yeah, so he, he, he ends up starting this engineering firm with a partner, and it just never got off the ground. I mean, it was him and the partner, and they had a couple of engineers working part time, but when they would have clients come in, and I know I was like 16 years old, he would have me put on a sport coat and sit in a cube, right. You know, like, you know, two or three of me and my friends would go in there, and it'd be like, I'm. I mean, surely they don't think we work here. I mean, like, what do they think we're doing? We're. They think we're the Doogie Howser of engineering. And we're, you know, we have. There's nothing on the desk. We're. We're eating the snacks out of the little snack thing. But, yeah, I mean, that's, you know, and, and ultimately. And what I remember about computer, like, there's so much synergy here. Like, what I remember about the computers is one of the things that got my dad in trouble was when the computers first came out, he bought, like, four computers for $100,000. And then three years later, you get those computers for, like, $10,000. So he was servicing a note on equipment that had just come down in price so much, and he really didn't have. They didn't have a lot of sales volume. I mean, I know now looking back on it, but he used to work seven days a week. I mean, he'd go in there and he'd be in there by himself, like, knocking out drawings and knocking out things for customers and stuff. And. But, yeah, you know, he, he, you know, similar. Probably a similar business, you know, doing all that stuff. And, and then, and then from there, you know. How'd you get the wild hair to do the magazine? Like, you. It. Well, now let's talk. Yeah, let's move to the gun. Like, so you, you fired your first gun when you were 11 with your father, and it made an impact on it?
- [14:00]
Tim Schmidt
Yep. Oh, it sure did. Yeah, it was, it was. I mean, so growing up in the Schmidt household, you know, dad and. Or dad, we knew guns were in the house, and they. And dad wasn't really a hunter. And so we knew the guns were for self defense, and we knew where they were and we knew the rules. And so it wasn't like this mysterious thing. It's like, yeah, we have guns for self defense. And then one time dad and I were camping together on our annual, my dad would take each of the kids on just a one on one annual trip which was, I always thought that was so cool. And I've done that with my children for the last whatever, 20 plus years as well. And so dad and I are on this trip in up north Wisconsin and we stop at this, at this shooting range and dad pulls out his prized possession, this.357 Magnum Smith and Wesson nickel plated revolver. And he lets me shoot it. And it was just amazing. Yeah, I'll never forget that. That was super cool. And so, okay, so back to the engineering company that's going on. I mean the main reason I started that was so that Tani, my ex wife could stay home and because we wanted to have children, but it was important to us and she was a stay at home mom and so she did that and we started having kids and the engineering company was, you know, it was either feast or famine. I was either working 80 hours a week, making a lot of money or there was no projects. And I'm like, oh, so this is how it's going to end. And, and so I'm like, I gotta come up with a business that's, that's scalable, you know, that has leverage. And so at the time we had just had our first kid, named him Tim Jr. I got to come up with that name.
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Jeff Duden
Schmidt Engineering Junior. Let me, let me guess, you outsource your branding.
- [15:47]
Tim Schmidt
I've never been the most creative person and, and so I was kind of personally going through what I call Jeff, my, my own self defense awakening. And I was realizing that man, just like my dad who had guns in the house for self defense, you know, I'm starting a family now, I got to do the same thing. And so I, you know, I, I, I started doing some research and I would go to gun shops and, and I would kind of get, you know, the run around from these guys who I'm just asking for help and they're asking, they're acting like, what do you even, what are you even doing here, nerd? You know, go, go away. And so that was when I did a little more recon and I decided to start a magazine, a print magazine now. Dude, this is the dumbest business to start ever. I mean especially in 2000, like 2 or 2003, the entire print publication industry is in the process of going in the toilet now that the Internet is this new thing, you know, back in it, back then and, but I don't know, I just did it anyway. And you know, luckily the engineering company was kind of was paying the bills. Kind of the sugar daddy for the magazine. First couple years magazine lost money and, and then I kind of shifted the, the business model a little bit and I called instead of it calling it a magazine, I called it an association and you joined the association and oh, the only one benefit you get a magazine.
- [17:15]
Jeff Duden
What was, what was membership fees when you started?
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Tim Schmidt
Well I think 70 bucks a year.
- [17:23]
Jeff Duden
But you got, and was that 12, you had 12 magazines for that or you get one a quarter? What was the man. I spent every little like if I got money for my birthday or I got money for Christmas, I bought Field and Stream. I mean I would love getting magazines when I was growing up. Especially you know, you know, topical. Something that you were interested in.
- [17:44]
Tim Schmidt
Sure. Something you're into? Heck yeah. Yeah. Field and Stream. Awesome, awesome publication. So, so yeah, so that's kind of how it started. And, and then finally after you know, four years of losing money, I'm like okay, this is not, I gotta, you know, so, so that, that's when we started adding new benefits. We added, we started creating firearms education and training curriculum for all the states and that helped us with traction. And then when we added the self defense liability insurance, that really helped a lot. And you know it's like, it's like a 2022 year overnight success. You know it's never an overnight success even though it seems like it. But, but now we, we have close to, you know, pushing a million customers, a million members and, and almost, almost 700 employees. That's a home dinger.
- [18:34]
Jeff Duden
That's, that's, that's really amazing. You know, I've so my, my career was in first of all the restoration remediation disaster industry and then, and then for the last 20 years in franchising and I was like this many years old when I realized as I started going around and expanding my circle and joining more masterminds this concept of education. You know, Grant Cardone is in the education business. He started in the real estate business, but he's in the education business. Ryan Pineda is in the real estate business, but he's in the education business. I mean you're in the education business. And I, I think and it, you know, I, I didn't understand the model and how powerful it was to get a bunch of people that needed something and then to be able to bring that to them. But you know how like, like, you know, you know talk through you know, kind of how the association has grown. Were there some, were there some pivots or some realizations? I know you had a big battle with the NRA at one time that you handled in a. With high integrity, and it probably played right back into your hands.
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Tim Schmidt
Yeah, I would, I would say the most, some of the most interesting stories. So, so the, the, the liability insurance didn't come onto the scene as it relates to being a membership benefit until 2011. So, you know, here I've been, you know, I started this thing in 2003, so eight whole years with just the education and training. And then it probably took me two years to find an insurance partner that would actually underwrite this benefit. Because most insurance companies are, you know, they're, they're risk averse and there's not a ton of, of actuarial data or there wasn't a ton. Now there is on sort of thing. And so it was hard to find that initial partner, but we finally did and put it together and launched it and it got good traction right away and our customers liked it. And so the business is really starting to take off. And not too many years later, the nra, especially after. So every year our booth at the NRA annual meeting would just get bigger and bigger and bigger. And pretty soon we're flying hundreds of employees down there and it's just a big deal. And the NRA didn't like that. And that was back when Ackerman McQueen was really kind of running the show there. And so they sent a few spies slash researchers and kind of tried to reverse engineer what we had done and they did that. And then in 2017, actually the same year my dad passed away, that this is when they, they like we, we had already signed up for a huge booth down in Atlanta at the annual meeting and all of a sudden, like two weeks before the show, so we're, you know, our trucks are already down there with all of, they send the, the check back that we sent them. And they said, by the way, don't bother showing up because we don't have room for you anymore.
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Jeff Duden
Wow.
- [21:44]
Tim Schmidt
Like, oh, no. And I can remember standing in front of the whole company now at the time, maybe we only had 100, maybe 50 employees. And I had created this deck. It was like David versus Goliath, you know, and we're David and we're going to survive. We're going to, don't worry everybody. We've got, you know, the Goliath of the firearms industry is coming after us, but we're going to do this. And so the messaging that we put out to the whole country was, hey, sorry, guys. For some reason, the NRA doesn't want us to be at the convention this year, but that's because we understand they're competing with us and competition is great. You know, we, we, we. At the end of the day, the consumer wins. And so, so yay. And, and that. That message landed really well and our members rallied and. And NRA got a little bit of a black eye. Now, unfortunately for them, they didn't really dot their I's and cross their T's as it relates to the way they sent up, set up all their insurance entities and their agencies. And so they were, you know, they were operating, doing all sorts of illegal stuff from an insurance perspective. And, and the state of New York shut them down. It took a couple years, but. But that's what happened.
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Jeff Duden
Training.
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Tim Schmidt
Crazy story.
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Jeff Duden
That's crazy. And I mean it. And a lot. Most times, when, if it's in the software industry, when things like that happen there, those are company killers. I mean, had they been successful. Right. But as they weren't and as you did it the way that you did it, and I don't know to the extent that they provide training and education like you do, but I'm interested to know how you do that. So you have, I think, over 4,000 contractors all across the country that provide training and education. I've got my concealed. My youngest son just took a class. He loved it. I don't know how he found who he went to. I just went to a local range here. But are these people potentially affiliated with you, and are they using your materials, your insurance, and your benefits to provide these courses to us?
- [23:51]
Tim Schmidt
Yep. So the way it works, Jeff, is we have, actually, we have over 8,000 certified instructors. Now, these aren't employees of Delta or uscca. They're simply people that have gone through the training and have been certified. And they essentially operate their own businesses. Some of them own ranges, some of them rent ranges. And, and, and they're. We consider them official certified partners. We also have about a. About 1500 brick and mortar type businesses now. Now this is gonna be more of your typical range. And, and they're also certified partners. And you'll see some of our logos and mats and whatnot. And, and. And most likely, they use our curriculum because it is the number one concealed carry curriculum in the entire country, more so than the NRA now and then as it relates to the business. The way the business works is we have about 150 full time outside sales representatives that we call account executives. And so they go and they create the relationship with the range. Say, hey, Mr. Johnson, you've got a great range here. Looks like you do concealed carry classes or home defense classes. If you allow me to come into your classes and talk about USCCA membership, you know, here's, here's a mutually beneficial business relationship that we can set up with you. And so these, these outside sales execs who are, you know, you, you know, guys like this, they eat what they kill and they're, and they're, they're just, they, they, they believe in the company, they believe in what they do and they do a really good job for, for the company as well as for all the folks who become members. So that's, that's probably the best way to explain how it works.
- [25:30]
Jeff Duden
Tim, there's a lot in your book and a lot in your material about why it's so important and that it's not only a right for us as American citizens, but also there is some social obligation for us to protect ourselves and protect others. Help me understand how you think about that.
- [25:54]
Tim Schmidt
Oh, boy. So in the very early days of uscca, there's a gentleman named Bob Boatman. He's since passed away, but I became friends with him. And he wrote this article called the Constitutional Right and Social Obligation to Carry a Gun. And in this article, Jeff, he literally goes to this extent of saying that if you're not willing to be properly trained and, and be able to defend yourself, then, then you're just a drag on society, which, like, whoa, that's pretty aggressive. But you know, the more you think about it, like I get that, right? I mean, as a, as a, as a, as a freedom loving American, I truly believe that, that, that, that to truly protect that freedom, you need to be able to defend yourself. You need to be able to be that first line of defense. Because you know, if your family is attacked, you know, the police aren't there to stop the attack. They're there to clean up the mess. They're there to hopefully deter things, but they can't be everywhere. And so I really feel strongly that the whole concept of developing your own personal protection plan and developing your own escalation of force profile so that, you know, obviously the last thing you want to do is the gun is the last resort. There's all sorts of other things you need to do before you use the firearm, but you got to have a plan. And, and that's what I teach my employees. That's What I teach my customers and that's quite frankly, that's how I'm trying to make America a better place.
- [27:29]
Jeff Duden
When I took my concealed class, so much of the information was counterintuitive about, but it was, there was just a handful of things that really stuck with me in and it was situational. So I mean you, you know, you, I mean just because you have a gun and let's say you open carry or you have it, you carry it legally, but you don't have a concealed permit, you haven't gone through training and you come up on an altercation, you could shoot the wrong person. You know, like you could, they could just be winning the fight at the moment, but it was self defense or they've disarmed somebody or been, you know, defending themselves against a robbery. There's, there's, you know, just, just like anything else. When, when forced with a, when, when faced with a situation, I think your heart rate goes up to around 200, your blood pressure goes up. Everything. You know, you, you're, you are incapacitated. Many people if you're are incapacitated and you have to have a default code upon which to fall back on, to go through a set of protocols to make sure that you navigate that situation properly. And it takes training and it takes practice. My son and I were at the range before I even knew you were coming. Like two weeks ago. He was home for spring break and we spent you know, half a day at the range just, just getting. Refamiliarizing ourselves with, you know, with our weapons and, and having to do that. So you know, it's, you know, it's, it's critically important. And also, I mean, you know, I know that social media and the news now, anytime anything happens, it's everywhere. So it feels like there's a lot more things going on. But, and it's, and you know, you probably go your, your entire life and never have to pull your weapon. Most people, 99 of people, 99.9% of people go their entire life and never have to pull their weapon. But if you need it and you don't have it, that's a bad situation to be in.
- [29:35]
Tim Schmidt
Yeah, yeah, for sure. For sure. And I mean that we all hope that we, and pray that we never have to use our firearm. However, I feel that the better prepared you are, the more you understand the importance of avoiding threats or de. Escalating threats or just being, being aware of your surroundings and, and living in condition Yellow, the more, the more that you live that lifestyle, the, the Chance of you ever having to use the gun almost goes to zero. The only people that, that find themselves in, in Condition Red, which means, like, you're in a fight, are people that live in Condition White. Because if you're living in Condition Yellow, when you see orange coming, you're gone. You're, you know, you are, you are, you're detecting a threat. You're get, you're getting the heck out of there because you don't want that. And, and so that, that. Another cool thing about this business, Jeff, is that we, you know, we get these customers, and then the more we teach them, the more we train them, the more we educate them, the less likely they are to ever use your gun. And that's ultimately what we want. So it's, it's a, it's a really good win, win, win scenario.
- [30:46]
Jeff Duden
What are some basic preventative things that your curriculum teaches? Maybe selecting tables in restaurants or understanding where egress is. Things, things like that. What are, what are some basic things that everybody can do to keep themselves safer?
- [31:03]
Tim Schmidt
Yeah, so I was just talking about the color codes and for, for your listeners who don't know what that is. So Colonel Jeff Cooper came up with this continuum. It's, it's the, it's Condition White, Condition Yellow, Condition Orange, Condition Red. Some people say this Condition Black as well, but we'll just keep it at Condition Red. And the whole idea is you need to live your life in Condition Yellow. Now, Condition Yellow means you're aware of your surroundings. You mentioned, you just mentioned you walk into a restaurant and you choose a table that allows you to see the exits. You, you, you've done some recon ahead of time, and you know where the primary and secondary entrance and exits are in case you have to, to flee. You know, you never sit with your back to where people are coming in because you're not going to see anything that's living in Condition Yellow, right? You're walking down the street and you're not staring at your phone. That's called Condition White. And I mean, we see people do this all the time. And, and ultimately, like when you practice or when you learn how to live in Condition Yellow, the bad guys, they can tell who's living in Condition Yellow. They sense this, and therefore they leave you alone, right? They're gonna go after the conditioned white people who are literally got their earbuds in. They're on their, they're looking at their phone, walking down the street. I mean, they might as well be holding up a sign. Hi, I'm a Target whatever you need. And so, so that's, that's probably one of the best lessons is, is just understand how to live your life in Condition Yellow. No, that doesn't mean that you're paranoid. It just means you're prepared and that just by doing that you'll avoid almost, almost all trouble.
- [32:43]
Jeff Duden
Is, is your training applicable for any, everybody, Even if they might not intend to pursue concealed.
- [32:54]
Tim Schmidt
You'd be surprised how many members that we have don't even, haven't even purchased guns yet. And so yep, a lot of people will join the USCCA just for the training and education and, and you know, who knows, maybe, maybe, maybe they'll decide that their weapons of choice. You know, your first weapon is your brain, right? That's, that's the most powerful weapon. Maybe the next weapon is a tactical flashlight. You can, you can control a person actually quite well with the tactical flashlight. And your voice, that's another weapon. Your voice is a powerful weapon. And maybe it's a taser or pepper spray or something like that. You know, you don't have to have the firearm. Now the firearm of course is the most efficient tool as it relates to equalizing force. Right. I mean the, probably the only tool that, that would be a fair fight for someone like you and a 90 or 80 year old grandma or even me. You know, I feel like you and I are both kind of big dudes. You know, the 80 year old grandma with a, with a gun, she can, she can take care of us. Yep. But yeah, there's lots of people. You don't have to go all the way to the gun. The gun is definitely the end of, the end of the line. Um, but if you're willing to, to, to study, if you're willing to educate and train yourself, I, I highly recommend it because you can save lives.
- [34:11]
Jeff Duden
Yeah, and there's, you can save lives. I think in your book you, the, you referenced the, the shooting in the church where the 71 year old was a concealed carry person. They were properly situated within the church. Somebody walked in, had a shotgun under the, under their trench coat and, and you know, six seconds they got two shots off. I'm not sure who was injured or how that shook out, but then the threat was neutralized within six seconds by a 71 year old churchgoer, but who just was in the practice of carrying it. And I do get a little lazy. We came back from the range and I had it in the case locked away and I did not put it back on my person or back in my car. So after I read your book last night, I now I have, you know, but that's a reminder. It's why, you know, and, and there was a situation, I think in a restaurant where, where they were not allowed, there was posted that you were not allowed to carry. And somebody came in and dispatched of, you know, many people in there, and there was several people that carried, but they didn't carry in the restaurant because it was legally, it was unlawful to do so. And they would have stopped that. I mean, there was more than one person that would have been able to stop that attack, you know, before it got worse. So, you know, it's, it's now traveling from state to state. Your, your curriculum, you've tailored it for all 50 states. I, I did continue education training for insurance adjusters. And every state has different requirements. Some it's in person, it's online, it's got to have this, it's got to be this many hours. So you've, you've got training for every state. But what, what do people need to be aware of? Let's just say I've got my North Carolina concealed and it's unclear. I'm going to be taking a long trip. What advice do you have for somebody like me with my weapon? Do I, do I change its proximity every state that I'm in based on the law or I just lock the thing away? What, what would you do?
- [36:21]
Tim Schmidt
Well, I'll go on the record saying that I highly recommend that everyone follows the law. We are a country of the rule of law. We do have a really cool tool on the website. It's free for everyone. You don't even have to be a member. You just go to resources and click on reciprocity map and state gun laws. And then you can just click on the state you're traveling and the tool will automatically show you all the different firearms laws in those states. Here's how you can and can't transport a weapon. Certainly there are some states that I would completely avoid. So I live in Tennessee now. Grew up in Wisconsin. I would never drive through Illinois with a gun.
- [37:05]
Jeff Duden
Oh, no.
- [37:06]
Tim Schmidt
Because they don't like guns there. Now, ironically, of all the places like Wisconsin, Tennessee, you know, the one place you're gonna need a gun is Illinois. So, so, yeah, I would avoid that. But yeah, we have a really cool tool. It's, it's very handy. And, and that's what I would. And, and you're right.
- [37:26]
Jeff Duden
There any correlation between certain places where guns are generally not allowed and they have a higher incidence of Shootings?
- [37:39]
Tim Schmidt
Yeah, malls, churches, schools. I mean, nightclubs. Wherever you, Wherever the mass shooting occurs, it's almost invariably a place where they have it posted. Hey, no guns allowed. Oh, that's great. That just means that the bad guys now know for sure that there will be no one shooting back at them. I mean, it's absolutely insane. And yeah, I struggle with that a lot.
- [38:06]
Jeff Duden
It's a lot of hard logic. Even for somebody who's slightly off the rails, that's easy logic. Easy logic for them. So what do you see going forward? Obviously, we're sitting here in 2025. You know, every four or eight years we go back and forth with political party. So right now we've got more conservative government. What, what types of things are you concerned about? What types of things are you lobbying for? And do you have a lobby within the organization?
- [38:42]
Tim Schmidt
Yep, we have a super PAC called U.S. concealed Carry Association. Fight for Life, for Freedom, something like that. I can't remember, but it's a, it's a DC super pack. And in general, what that super PAC does is we, we support local elections for state officials that, that, that are Pro2A, so we don't really get into national politics, but we, all across the country, we have our certain states that we're trying to protect and keep them Second Amendment friendly, and that's what we do for that.
- [39:13]
Jeff Duden
So you have a million members in the US CCA. What's the potential?
- [39:22]
Tim Schmidt
I think so. There's, there's 80 million households that own guns. I. So the vision of, of USCCA right now is, is to have 4 million members by the time we get to 2030.
- [39:36]
Jeff Duden
Okay.
- [39:37]
Tim Schmidt
And the, the company, that's the, the folks who are running the company now, that's the number they're shooting for. And, and we're excited about it. And, and yeah, so, so that's what we're going for. I, I think I'm really excited about, about, about the country as it relates. I feel what's going on in the, in the, in the White House. I know that not everybody likes Trump, but, but I do. And I also, I absolutely love what Elon's doing. And I think it just blows my mind. The, I guess the hypocrisy of, of so many people on the left who, who don't like this idea of, of uncovering fraud and waste. I mean, come on, everyone should be okay with that, right? Because fraud and waste are not good. But it's just, I think it's very telling of how that's going. But yeah, I'M very bullish on the United States of America. I'm very bullish on freedom. A lot of people will make, they'll complain about, oh, the younger generation, the 20 somethings. Man, I'll tell you what, I'm surrounded. So most of my employees are 20 somethings. And these people are, they're the most, you know, conservative, you know, religious, just good people who really believe in the country. And, and it's, it's awesome to work with, with young people like that. My children are that age and, and I raised them right. That's how they act too. So I don't know. I, I, I'm very optimistic about the future of America.
- [41:09]
Jeff Duden
Yeah, yeah, me as, me as well. While you're on it. And, and you talked about your membership goals. I mean is this a time where are you comfortable talking a little bit about price and benefits and what you get? Because I'm not, I don't, I going to be, I, and I know one of the, one of the benefits is insurance and maybe the numbers have changed but you know, $2 million or damages if you get involved in a situation and then I think $250,000 in legal defense, maybe the numbers have changed. But like that's a nice policy. That's an incredible benefit. Does everybody get that benefit with membership?
- [41:45]
Tim Schmidt
Yep, everyone gets the, that same benefit. And you're right, it's, it's the 2, 2 million. Up to $2 million in damages or to cover a judgment, let's say for example that, that you were in a self defense shooting and you were exonerated for the shooting. But then the family of the guy or the person you shot sued you, which literally just happened to one of our members in Chicago. And this guy got sued for $1.6 million. And if he would have lost that lawsuit, we would have paid that $1.6 million.
- [42:15]
Jeff Duden
Okay.
- [42:16]
Tim Schmidt
But the jury, the jury decided for him so he have to pay anything. So we, we were going to win or he was going to win either way.
- [42:23]
Jeff Duden
Yeah.
- [42:23]
Tim Schmidt
Um, but yeah, those are the, and then the different membership levels, there's Gold, Platinum, Elite, all have to do with the amount and quantity of access to education and training. Most, most people join at the platinum level, which is 49amonth. And then some people like, some people are just like, like I always buy that, the high end stuff. And that's elite, that's $59 a month. And then the gold membership is 39.
- [42:46]
Jeff Duden
Okay. Okay. And if I'm just a casual concealed person, I'm not involved in, in training or the industry or anything like that. Gold's going to get me some base level of benefits and protection.
- [42:59]
Tim Schmidt
Yep, yep. I highly recommend starting at Gold. And the nice thing is that you can upgrade whenever you want. All you gotta do is give us a call. We have, we have hundreds of, of. Again, I was talking about those young 20 somethings on the phones and, and they're, they're, they're always, you know, 24, 7, they're ready to take.
- [43:16]
Jeff Duden
So are they outbound doing development or are they inbound servicing CL clients?
- [43:22]
Tim Schmidt
Yep. So, so we have, we have like probably seven or eight different teams, but we, we just have inbound team, we have outbound teams, we have the, the, the account executives, we have people trying to help members remember to, to, to renew their membership. And here's something interesting, Jeff. So my, my, my, I only have one daughter, so I was about to say my youngest daughter, she's my only daughter. She, she's 24, she just got married and she, she works on the customer service team, so.
- [43:51]
Jeff Duden
Well, congratulations on, on the marriage. So what was that like when he came to you and you, you were, you were brandishing your father's six shooter, right?
- [44:01]
Tim Schmidt
Dude, I'll tell you what, I had so much fun with this and I, I mean I love this young man. He's such a, such a good young dude. You really want to hear the story?
- [44:11]
Jeff Duden
Absolutely. I've got one too.
- [44:12]
Tim Schmidt
Yeah, so, so my daughter had been seeing him for three and a half years and he already knew that I liked him, but I always kind of like, I mean, look buddy, you call me Mr. Schmidt unless you want to get punched. You know, so and so maybe like six months before he asked my permission, he and I had developed kind of this cadence of every other week. He would, he would reach out on a Saturday and say, hey, Mr. Schmidt, can we meet on Sunday and talk a little bit about. Because he's trying to develop real estate business. And so he would come over and we'd go in the basement, he would show me his computer and stuff and we, I'd help him, you know, make some offers on some properties and whatnot. Well, so then, you know, the day happened and of course I didn't know what was going on and my daughter hadn't said anything. And he's like, hey Mr. Schmidt, can I come over tomorrow about 2:00? Oh, sure. He shows up. Well, he, now he's at the front door and he's as white as a ghost. And I'm thinking, oh, Oh, I know what's going to happen. So, so we come inside. I'm like, hey, Tristan, I'll get my computer. He's like, no, no, you don't need that. Let's just go downstairs. And so that's. He asked me and you know, he's like, so you know how much I love your daughter. And I just stared at him.
- [45:28]
Jeff Duden
Yeah, the rottweiler look.
- [45:29]
Tim Schmidt
But now he's just, he's a great young man. I'm so happy for him. They're, they're great.
- [45:34]
Jeff Duden
And they just got married.
- [45:37]
Tim Schmidt
They got married. Yeah, this past October. Yeah. Thank you.
- [45:41]
Jeff Duden
My son's 26. They got married last May. My daughter's turning. Oh, wait, no, my son's 27. Sorry, Zach. And got married last May. And then my daughter is engaged for get married next February. He's very, he's a very proper young man. I mean, he called me when they were juniors in high school to ask me if he could date her steady. Oh, yeah, good move. Like that's, I mean that's, that's starting off on the right foot. Yeah, yeah, he's a good kid.
- [46:14]
Tim Schmidt
Good stuff, good stuff.
- [46:16]
Jeff Duden
Now I got a 20. I got a 20 year old, turns 21 next month that he's an engineering student. So they're. Yeah, well, I think, I think I'm three. I'm happy with all of them and they're just, you know, they're independent and they make good relationships. That's all we want, right? Independent contributing. Yeah, that's it.
- [46:37]
Tim Schmidt
Yeah, yeah, yeah. Our families are almost identical. My, my. I got a 26 year old son, 24 year old daughter and 21 year old son. And the boys are engineers and the, My daughter works for me.
- [46:49]
Jeff Duden
I got one, I got an engineer to be, I've got a finance and econ guy and then my daughter's in law school and she's. Yeah, well, she's going to sue us all, sir. She will sue us all. There's payback. There's payback coming, I'm quite sure of it. But. Well, I tell you what, you built an incredible organization. I think what I'd like to just spend the last little bit of the last couple minutes on is your leadership style. You're an accidental entrepreneur. I mean, I think you put one foot in front of the other. You kept moving forward. You, you know, you went the career route and then, you know, entrepreneurship. Your father had a, had a, had a business that didn't work out. Which by the way, you know, they're her his first employee. I'm not, I don't, I don't like to try to tell people stories, but just for the sake of, you know, I read the book, you know, he, he. He had a salesperson that ended up stealing all of his clients. Right. And it was very difficult, you know, and that's kind of a gut punch right there. But yet, you know, he, he did take an entrepreneurial step. And, and then you did it, and, and you pushed forward. But, like, by your own admission, you know, kind of shy young man, humble and all of that, how did you develop a leadership capability that allows you to lead a million association members, 700 employees? It's a, It's a huge business. I mean, it's a massive business. And, you know, I met you in person, you know, and the candidly, the room we were in, everybody has a big business in that room. Basically, just about everybody has a big, you know, so it's not. I wasn't surprised. But I mean, you know, you, you just came off as like a regular guy. A regular guy. You know, you weren't, you know, you know, that, that excited to tell everybody, but you built a massive business. So I'm interested to know, like, your leadership style, you know, how it's evolved. If there's anything that you would offer to other entrepreneurs who are maybe early in their career that you might have figured out. I just. Do you have any. Anything come to mind?
- [49:12]
Tim Schmidt
Sure. I guess I'll start by saying that something that I don't think my parents taught me this. I think I was just born that. God built me this way. But I just love to learn. I love to get better. I love to improve myself. And you're right, I used to be an extremely shy, introverted person. I still love my time alone and quietness. But I've really grown and learn how to learn how to be on tv. I learned how to do public speaking. I learned how to enjoy it. I learned how to inspire people and help people to see a bigger future that they can never see on their own. And so the number one thing is if you want to be a leader of people, you need to be constantly working on yourself. And quite frankly, you got to love it because it takes a lot to. To continually improve yourself. I just heard a quote recently that, that said something like, if you are not embarrassed about who you were a year ago, then you're not growing fast enough. And so. So that's number one.
- [50:21]
Jeff Duden
I will tell you a little anecdote there. My wife and I share that exact Same passion. Yeah, we're both constantly working on me.
- [50:32]
Tim Schmidt
Okay, that was good. Okay. Okay. Number two is if, if you, if you want to be a leader, you can never ask someone that you're leading to do something that you're not willing to do. You got to lead from the front. You gotta, you know, people need to see you, you know, doing the things that you're asking them to do. That's, that's, I'm not sure, there's probably a name for that, but leading from the front, that's what I call it. And so I think that's key. So yeah, those two things and just be patient, be patient. Understanding, which, I mean, those are two things that never came easy for me either. I've certainly developed patience. So. Yeah, that's, that's all I can think of for now.
- [51:29]
Jeff Duden
I'll tell you, it's. You know, when you look at all these high flying business people that are all over social media, like the one thing that seems to be missing is Grace. People aren't talking about that, they're talking about drive. They're talking about, you know, there's 14, 40 minutes in a day and you know, what are you going to do? And you know, you know, you got to win. You know, are you short term, greedy and long term, you know, all in and all of this? But like, I mean, over, like when I'm my businesses, every business goes through struggles and inflection points where it could go either way. I mean, I don't know a business that couldn't have gone, I don't care if you're Apple or you know, my business, it could have gone either way so many times. And I looked around the room and I said, am I willing to bet my house on this, these people, am I willing to bet my kids college education on these people? Because I'm going to have to go a little bit deeper and I'm probably going to be at risk and whatever I built is at risk right now. And I just looked around the room and like, have I earned the right for these people to jump in the foxhole with me and to see it through to the end? Because you can't do it yourself. Like when it, when it's easy and, and you're flying high and you're reading your own press clippings, you know, and you can pay, you know you can pay and you know, everybody's, I mean people are working hard but like every, we're winning. Okay, that's a little bit easier. But like when it gets hard it's like, okay, for the next 90 days, this is really going to suck. I mean, what, what keeps them from walking out the door to find something that's easier. And, you know, I, you know, I haven't, I haven't built the biggest businesses always, but I've always felt like at the end of the business, there was a bunch of people there that, you know, that it was, it was mutually worth it, and, and it was, it was worth doing. I don't know. You know, that's. For some reason that matters to me.
- [53:33]
Tim Schmidt
Yeah, I think that's great, man. I love that. I love the way you said that, Jeff.
- [53:37]
Jeff Duden
All right, you got time for a curveball and a fastball, all right? You bet. Right or left handed.
- [53:46]
Tim Schmidt
I'm actually cross dominant, so I golf and bat left handed, but I throw right handed and, and kick left footed. Okay. That's why I'm not very good at any of those.
- [53:56]
Jeff Duden
Okay, well, yeah, you might want to find some focus. That's what I'm saying. All right. Okay. Here's the curveball. Oh, well, this is, this is appropriate. Gun to your head. You have to start a business in the next 30 days that you're not currently in. Where's the opportunity that you see? Ooh, this is never an easy one, is it?
- [54:26]
Tim Schmidt
Is this advice for anyone or what would I do?
- [54:29]
Jeff Duden
Sitting where you are, you're resource like you are like. I, you know, the purpose is to say where are, where are. Where do people see opportunities? In the market.
- [54:39]
Tim Schmidt
Yeah.
- [54:39]
Jeff Duden
Or a market.
- [54:40]
Tim Schmidt
Well, I mean, so this is, this is really just based on my own personal experiences. I would, I would start a. And again, this doesn't have the most amount of leverage, but I would start a, an entrepreneur coaching business, which I'm already kind of doing. And I'm having so much fun. It is such a blast. And I can just. It's amazing how. How easy it is for me just to sprinkle little bits of glitter right there. Oh, no, don't do that. Yeah, and so that. I would definitely do that. I would not start a restaurant. I would not start a print magazine. Definitely not a bar. Oh, my gosh. Yeah. I don't know. How's that?
- [55:19]
Jeff Duden
The Tim Schmidt Mastermind is what it would be called.
- [55:22]
Tim Schmidt
Yeah, yeah, Mastermind. One on one coaching. Yeah.
- [55:26]
Jeff Duden
Yeah. Well, look, a few words can make a big impact and get delivered on time. All right, here's the fastball. This one come right down the middle. If you had one sentence to make an impact in somebody's life, what Would that be.
- [55:45]
Tim Schmidt
Oh, boy. It would be. You didn't come this far to only come this far.
- [55:53]
Jeff Duden
Oh, love it perfectly said.
- [55:58]
Tim Schmidt
I didn't, I didn't invent it, but it resonated with me.
- [56:01]
Jeff Duden
You didn't come this far to only come this far. Yeah, that's perfectly. I've never heard it perfectly said.
- [56:10]
Tim Schmidt
Yeah, I think it's a good one. It's a good one because it's like, look, I don't care how successful you are. I mean, man, there's so much more you can do. There's more people's lives you can touch. There's, there's. Yeah, don't, don't, don't stop now.
- [56:24]
Jeff Duden
It's not fatal, by the way, when I learned that, like trying, you know, if I die right now doing this podcast, it's not because I'm doing the podcast or because I'm building this business. It's other life choices, you know, it's not fatal. You might as well go for it. I mean, I, I just, I have lost all desire to be safe. I mean, so other than, you know, protecting me and my loved ones. Loved ones with my concealed carry. So, Tim, where can people, where can you direct people to either get in touch with you or with your business?
- [57:04]
Tim Schmidt
So if you're, if you want to learn more about the USCCA, just go to uscca.com and then if you want to learn about my business coaching or my music career, you can go to Tim Schmidt dot com. I moved to Nashville, Tennessee, man. I'm trying to become a rock star. It's a lot harder than I thought.
- [57:29]
Jeff Duden
You sing?
- [57:31]
Tim Schmidt
Yep, I sing, I play guitar and I write my own music and.
- [57:35]
Jeff Duden
Wow.
- [57:36]
Tim Schmidt
I've got, I've got, I've, I released an EP last summer and, and tens of people listen to it.
- [57:42]
Jeff Duden
Literally tens of people.
- [57:46]
Tim Schmidt
Tens of people.
- [57:47]
Jeff Duden
Let the royalties. You're living in a, in a dream world of residuals from it.
- [57:53]
Tim Schmidt
Yeah. Oh boy.
- [57:55]
Jeff Duden
Yeah.
- [57:56]
Tim Schmidt
But, but yeah, yeah. Uscca.com and then for a self proclaimed.
- [58:01]
Jeff Duden
Introvert, you've also been in the movie the Reliant with Kevin Sorbo. You've been on 60 Minutes. You're. You're singing. You got a music career going on. I don't know, man. I think that's inspirational for a lot of people. So, Tim, this has been great, man. Thank you.
- [58:20]
Tim Schmidt
You're welcome, man. It was, I, I really enjoyed it. You're. You're a really good dude.
- [58:24]
Jeff Duden
Like, back at you. I look forward to seeing or maybe next month or the next. Are you going to the next meeting out in Phoenix?
- [58:32]
Tim Schmidt
I'm going to be in. In May. Yeah, I think May 1st and 2nd.
- [58:35]
Jeff Duden
All right, I'll be there. All right. This has been Tim Schmidt. I am Jeff Duden. We have been on the home front. Thanks for listening.