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The Matt King Show
045: Robert Irving | Charging The Storm With Buffalo Growth Partners | The Matt King Show
00:53:18
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- [00:00]
Host
He's led billion dollar rollups, bought over 100 companies, and built from scratch what.
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Interviewer / Joe
Most only dream to inherit. But this isn't just about business acumen.
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Host
It's real world execution forged in the trenches.
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Robert Irving
It's the NFL business. I mean, it's some of the smartest people I've ever met. They can start to see the smoke and mirrors through the fog, and they see the fact that you've put lipstick on a pig and you've bought 15 companies. None of them communicate that they're not brand agnostic, they have no synergies. And if and when you go do all this work, right, and you brand agnostic and you roll out all these ERPs and you push all that data and actually streamline it and you do all these things, it's going to generate, you know, freaking $100 million in cash flow. Yeah, but imagine the culture shock. Imagine all the work. Who's going to go do the work?
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Host
And that's the difference. Most people talk about strategy. Robert lives inside the execution.
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Robert Irving
To be the Buffalo, you've just got to go grab that problem and be high agency and take it across the finish line and just solve the problem.
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Interviewer / Joe
And not only is he winning financially.
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Host
He'S building something that actually matters.
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Robert Irving
Starting Buffalo was saying, hey, we're going to build real sustainable businesses that actually generate cash that, you know, has a platform for people that want to build their careers, that want to get trained, that, you know, want to prosper and want opportunity. And we're going to have a lot of fun while doing it.
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Host
This is Robert Irving.
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Interviewer / Joe
So this is the first interview you. I've done outside of the studio. It's a little uncomfortable for me.
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Robert Irving
Yeah.
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Interviewer / Joe
But pulled up here to College Station today, watch you roll up in your truck. License plate says high agency.
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Robert Irving
Yeah.
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Interviewer / Joe
What the hell does that mean?
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Robert Irving
It was hard to get that license plate. Get that. That was not easy. I was trying to fit all the letters on there. I wanted some A and M stuff on there. But, you know, probably six or nine months ago, I read an article titled high agency.com by George Mack. Have you read it? I have, yeah. And so, I mean, the junior said.
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Interviewer / Joe
I haven't because I just asked you what it is, but you, you made me read it.
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Robert Irving
Yeah, I did.
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Interviewer / Joe
I. I haven't. Yeah, I haven't.
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Robert Irving
You know, the, the theory is, is that you happen to life instead of life's happening to you. And like, the question I like to ask, and it's just kind of funny when you get into, like, the depths of a problem. And, and people are constricted. And I've been in this world a lot where you, you are so focused on the problem. You've looked at it so many times, you can't see the forest through the trees. So building a custom house or solving a complex engineering tool and oil and gas. And like, you get in there and these guys, some of the smartest guys in the room, are just so focused, they can't see it. And it's like, that's kind of the, the principle of, of high agency is saying, is what I'm asking you to do, does it defy the laws of physics? The answer to that question is no. Well, then it can be done. You know, Elon is going to, you know, colonize Mars and land rockets on, on the ocean and do all these things. What's about how much time, energy and money do you want to spend to get this done right? How much effort do you want to put into it? Because the answer is it can be accomplished. Should it be accomplished? So, like, the theory of the question, that's easy to kind of get people to come around and you debunk this one on. But it's like, if you wake up tomorrow and you're in Venezuela in a third world country prison, and I hand you a cell phone and I say, who are you going to call? The answer to that question, the who you're going to call to get you out of there, that person has the most high agency, the characteristics of how to get you out of there. That's the mindset and the thought process you want to. True. Yeah. And so it's just kind of one of those things to embody and live by is, is to, to constantly remind yourself. And that's what that is. It's a reminder. Yeah.
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Interviewer / Joe
Well, going back to that question, who would I call? I mean, given the current events that are happening in the world, I think my, my phone calls to Trump, that's assuming I can get into him, because he clearly knows how to get people out of it.
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Robert Irving
He did a pretty good job of getting someone out of Venezuela, you know, unscathed.
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Interviewer / Joe
He did a very good job. So do you think that you're born with high agency, or do you think that it's a muscle that develops over time?
- [03:55]
Robert Irving
I think it's a muscle that develops over time. You know, I'll say that because one of the guys that's here, Kit, software engineer, his son is 22 years old, Carson, and, and kid. And I've sat down and talked about it quite a bit, and how we watched it flip a switch, you know, and I've been hunting with Carson, been running for a while, and, you know, good kid. And then all of a sudden, you just see this switch get flipped of, like, you know, you start to take control and you start to ask questions and you start to put yourself in that room. And then, you know, instead of being like, you know, we had a meeting with one of the big directors of A and M here, and instead of just kind of be like, oh, that was a cool meeting. It's like, no, how do. Hey, I need his email, I need his phone number. I'm going to go, you know, and then all of a sudden, they're off over here having these. These meetings, and you just take initiative to go do whatever it is you want to go do. And I think High Agency.com does a really good job of formulating all these different people, from the Wright brothers to people that stood up to Hitler to all these things to show you kind of what that thought process behind hit happening to life versus it happening to you. I think it 100 can be learned. Yeah.
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Interviewer / Joe
It almost sounds like resourcefulness in a way.
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Robert Irving
Exactly.
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Interviewer / Joe
And I mean, like, when I. When I think about, like, this whole nature nurture concept, I think a lot of it is. Is learned and can be a muscle, but it's also the way you're raised. Like, I'll never forget one day when I was probably 12 years old, I wanted to order pizza for dinner. My mom said, great. And this was the. The day and age of the phone book. And she just dropped the phone book on the table and said, figure it out. So I had to call Domino's and I had to order the pizza. And when they came to the door, I had to give them the money.
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Robert Irving
Yeah.
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Interviewer / Joe
And like, that little thing my mom did for me, I think is one of the things that's made me as resourceful as I am. And when people ask me, like, what's one of my superpowers, it's resourceful. I mean, literally, Christmas, my daughter's toy from Santa doesn't come. And so my wife is having a panic attack. We're gonna have to do something else. It's Christmas Eve. It's not in any of the stores around. I'm like, no, I'll figure it out. So I find a Walmart 45 minutes away, order it from there, hire a driver, have him pick it up, have him bring it to the house. And she's like, how did you do all that? Stuff. And I think, like, that's, that's high agency is like, look to your point, does this defy the laws of gravity? No. Like, okay, so then the question is just how much money, how much energy and how much time do I want to spend putting into this task?
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Robert Irving
It can be done.
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Interviewer / Joe
It can be done. And I think, you know, when you're in the world of business, high agency is one of the most important things. Like, you can't just be a victim of what's going on around you. And you've been a part of some really cool things. I mean, rolling up hundreds of companies for huge private equity firms. How did that high agency show up for you in those roles and how did it serve you?
- [06:27]
Robert Irving
Yeah, I think it's, it's clarity through the chaos. You know, when you're doing a roll up as fast as we did, you know, call it two to three companies a month for a period of five years, you know, it's. The pace that you're running at is daunting. And, you know, people could get worn out, they can get burnout. And a lot of times the systems and the processes that you're constrained by, you're breaking them every other month. And so it's like, okay, so what does this look like? I think it's just standing out among your peers of that of saying, being resourceful and just saying, hey, like this, this can be done. Anything, you know, whatever it is, it can be done. Don't let other people control your destiny. And I think that's one that I give people all the time, is say, hey, you know, if somebody tells you they're going to do something, you know, you follow up with them every single day. You know, it's like the rental guy says, I'm going to drop the lift off in the morning. It's like you followed up him seven times. I'll call your wife, I'll DM your mom on Facebook. I will figure it out and you will respond to me, you know, and we will get this done. But it goes back to like dialing that energy in. Right. And understanding that there's some things that don't necessarily need high agency. Right. And it's like some people take that as intimidation and intensity and it's just trying to figure out how you can work all of that resourcefulness in. But yeah, in a large scale rollup like that, it's, it's one of those things where, you know, you're doing something that's never been done. Right? And so a lot of Times you're, like I said, you're breaking the systems and you're trying to. To put square pegs around holes. And I'd say the biggest, hardest part of all of it was personalities. It's the people. Right? You're not. You're not buying companies. You're buying a group of people and individuals who have lives and trying to wrap your head around that picture of what do they want to do? Right person, right seat on the right bus. And I always tell people there's a converging path between two things. One is the employee, the person, and the other is the company. And people ask me all the time, what do you want me to do? Where do you want me to sit? How do you want me to act? Where do you want me to live? It's like, well, what do you want to do? Yeah. Because those two paths, where they converge is really the most important timeline. It's really the. The spot where it's like, this is where magic happens, is what do you want and what do we need? And then we'll color in the rest. I'll fill in the gaps. But if I tell you, hey, I'm going to have you grind and work 60 hours a week, or you're going to be my inspection sales guy, knocking on doors all day, that's not you. You know what I mean? Or, you know, so I think that's where the high agency thing is. You have to rein it in at times, but resourcefulness is probably the best way to look at it. But I think that's a. It's also like, kind of minimizes the concept.
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Interviewer / Joe
Yeah, well, and you have to be careful with it because if you have high agency or you're very resourceful and you say, for instance, I want to go buy a business, you can learn a lot about buying a business, but there's a lot you can't learn until you actually do the thing. And in the world we live in today, it's. It's kind of like everything is a cycle, right? So first it was single family residential. Real estate was the thing. Then it was self storage. Then it kind of became mobile homes. And now what's sort of on Main street is, hey, let's go buy a bunch of businesses and let's go operate businesses. But it's not that easy.
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Robert Irving
No.
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Interviewer / Joe
And people on the Internet, people on podcasts are saying, hey, just buy a business. Hey, just buy a business. Quit your W2 and buy a business. Where do you see people go wrong when they try to acquire a business?
- [09:38]
Robert Irving
Yeah. You know, it's funny. It, it's like, it's almost insulting sometimes where you see people, it's like this is what you're telling, this is what you're telling a business owner, right? You're going to walk into their world and, and I'm going to tell you that I'm better than you at something I know nothing about that you've been doing for the last 20 plus years of your life. All because it, you know, sounds great on the Internet. It's like what is your history, what is the past of what you've done and what do you know about plumbing or fire protection or whatever? Systems, processes, technology, growth, sales, marketing, SEO, like all these things and it's this, this mass repertoire business. Like I think a lot of people, when you look at it from a financial modeling perspective, if you just take that picture of it, it's much more advantageous than real estate, right? Real estate has like two or three levers. You know, interest rates, rents, maybe cap rates come down, right? There's a handful of things you can do, whereas in private equity or business there's a thousand levers, right. To pull. I think the number one thing people usually miss is the amount of active engagement it takes to run a business and understanding, especially in the service world, right? Like that's, that's the bulk of where everybody's kind of like oh plumbers, you know, blah blah, blah. And it, it's understanding, you know, like the quality of earnings, what is their customer base and how Repeat is it vs 1 time non recurring revenue, how much project based revenue are they doing? That's, you know, I always, it's tough for me to say like this is the number one thing that people mess up because there's a lot of number one things. But when you're doing projects and construction, it takes a real team. Like it takes, it takes a lot of guys to make the sausage. You need quality estimators, you need designers and engineers, you need project managers, you need superintendents, you need foreman and you've got to run a very well oiled machine to make gross margin on that. And in the service side it's tougher to grow because it's slower because you're talking about, you know, break fix, doing plumbing systems at hospitals and working on continuous duty motors and things like that. But now you're talking about a deep technical expertise. And so as like as an owner, right? And I remember having one of the guys called me and I took the call because you know, I'm a Proud patriot, and I want to support the troops. And he was a ex Navy seal, and he sent me a message and said, hey, I'd like to buy your business. And so I get on the phone with him, and we're talking through it. He raised a fund. And this has been. I mean, it's almost been eight, 10 years ago. I don't know who the guy is anymore. I wish I still had his contact. But, you know, I got on the phone with him for half an hour and talked to him about fire protection and how incredible the industry is and authorities have in jurisdiction and insurance agencies and the tailwinds and, you know, all the regulatory environment and all this stuff. Right. And I'm like, so, but tell me, man, like, what do you know about fire protection? And he's like, I don't know anything. So what about the licensing? He's like, what do you mean? I said, well, you got to have, you know, 10 licenses in the state of Texas or in any state, really, to run one of these companies. How do you plan on crossing that bridge? And he's just like, well, I don't know. And it's like, you know, it's those little things where it's like, hey, man, like, I get the energy, I get the hype, I get the excitement. It is very rewarding. But you have to make sure you can build your team around it. And we've got a ton of guys in gobundance that have bought electrical companies and have things go wrong. And I've taken a lot of those calls to help and say, hey, it's. It's humans. Yeah, that's the thing that people, I think, discount is this is a lot of work, and it's humans. It's people every day waking up, beating the drum to grow these businesses. They do not run on their own.
- [13:01]
Interviewer / Joe
Yeah, no, it's. I mean, it all comes back to the talent you have, right. And. And who you can recruit, who you can attract, but then who you can retain.
- [13:09]
Robert Irving
Yeah.
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Interviewer / Joe
I mean, talent only stays in your business so long as they can see a path to achieving their goals once they no longer see that they're gone, that they're out. But they have to believe in the mission, they have to believe in the cause, and then they have to be held extremely accountable. And that's one of the things that, you know, when I've studied what you're up to, that's one of the things that you're probably best at, is just, like, extreme accountability every single day. Like, this is the meeting Every single Monday, who's got the football, where is it going, who's on first, what's on second? And it's fascinating to me because a lot of people with business think they're just going to sell the private equity someday.
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Robert Irving
Yeah.
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Interviewer / Joe
But they don't even know what private equity really is. So from your perspective, what is private equity?
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Robert Irving
Yeah.
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Interviewer / Joe
But then further, what's flawed with private equity as it exists today?
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Robert Irving
Yeah, I mean, you go back to like the power of incentives and incentives drive everything to your point of understanding your people and what are their goals, Right. I say all the time, like you want to build a table big enough that everybody can eat, right? And so it's, it's, you have to understand your people. They, they have families and kids, they want to pay for their college and vehicles they want to buy and houses and all this stuff, right. And so it's like, how do we align, you know, those, those powers of incentive, if you will. And if you look at like, you know, call it the flaws of private equity, a lot of it comes back to the misalignment of incentives. And you know, so what is private equity? Right. And I think a lot of people, to your point, have a misconstrued vision of it, right? They think of New York City or, or whatever it is. And it's like the truth is, is it's a group of people come together, it could be come together and they develop a thesis, an idea. And in my opinion that idea should be, this is where I have an unfair advantage to win, right? And then we collect capital in some form, right? Whether it's from institutional family offices, whatever it is, and they go and deploy that capital on said thesis. And then you try to outproduce, you should outproduce what you would consider standard benchmark returns, which a standard benchmark return to most people is going to be S and P, Dow, nasdaq and you know, this is an ill equid locked up investment, right. If you're talking traditional private equity, there are no distributions. And you look at the returns of say like the S and P, and you average that stuff out, call it 15%. Well, you're going to have to outperform that because it's illiquid locked up. It's non tradable. Like, you know, you, you have to outperform that benchmark. And so that's kind of the holistic thing. It's like saying, hey, like you can form a private equity team with, you know, whoever you want, right? Traditional private equity, your Blackstones, Apollos and all that, you know, are the ones coming out of New York. And what I would say the flaw there is, is, and you hear this all the time, is probably the nuanced version of what is a value creation plan and how do we actually create value? And understanding like what you do matters more than how hard you work. And that's where they have got, they have gotten it right over the last 30 years, is getting the most juice out of the squeeze of the lemon, is understanding financial modeling. And there is a place for that. Like, it's beautiful when you see it. And it makes so much sense to say, okay, you know, what kind of leverage are you going to put on this? Are you going to do a sell leaseback on the assets? What is asset light and how does that run through the model? And if we tweak this gross margin or increase, you know, and I've sat in a million rooms and watched a billion guys work spreadsheets on, you know, if we just increase gross margin by 5% and we do this, we cut OPEX and we do that and we bud this and then all of a sudden, bam, we just made $400 million. And it's like, any idea how that's going to get done? Yeah, you know what I mean? It's like, come on. And, and it's, it's so funny. At first it used to irritate me, but then I kind of draw back and it's like, you know, I've been there where they just stare at you. It's like, hey man, you're, you're the operator, you're the guy that's supposed to go make the sausage. I need you to go figure this one out. And to me that's, that's where the misalignment is, is saying. And I've seen it inside big funds, right? Call it 500 million multi billion dollar funds where you know, you see guys that ultimately they've got these different OPCOs that are doing these large roll ups and if one of them blows up, it's not that big of a deal because the other one's going to cover it up. And, and all they have to do is match that benchmark and beat it a little bit. And the, the incentive is to collect fees a lot of times, right? Your, your 2 and 20s, your transaction fees and these things. And, and there's so much capital out there to be deployed that they begin to get numb to the thought of like, oh, we're, you know, we're deploying hundreds of millions of dollars. And, and then you begin to do a pro forma adjusted, you know, non GAAP compliant EBITDA with, you know, numerous add backs and all this fuzzy fancy math with synergies that'll never get recognized. And like, and the truth is, is like when you get in the depths of private equity is we all understand the game. Yeah, I know you're lying to me and you know I'm lying to you and we're all just going to lie together and then. But where does the music stop? You know, and to me, that's, that's what I wanted to do. Starting Buffalo was saying, hey, we're going to build real sustainable businesses that actually generate cash, that, you know, has a platform for people that want to build their careers, that want to get trained, that, you know, want to prosper and want opportunity. And we're going to have a lot of fun while doing it. And at the end of the day, these businesses make money, right? It's, this doesn't need to be a game of who's the greater fool's theory, who's left holding the bag at the end. It's, let's build a sustainable, durable business in these recurring trades, these B2B, you know, places that I feel like I have an unfair advantage and it's a lot of fun. But I would say that's the misaligned incentive of traditional private equity is collecting fees versus really relying on performance. Yeah.
- [18:43]
Interviewer / Joe
And when I think of private equity, like most of what comes to mind, at least for the last 10 or so years of my career, is sort of financial engineering, right? It's how can we reduce our cost of debt? How can we lever things a little bit more effectively? How can we collect money a little bit quicker, spread out our terms on payables, like, you know, how can we financial engineer this? And I'll never forget I was in a meeting one time and we were going through a Performa and a guy across the table was talking about how great this Performa was. And as we started digging into the Performa, all he was showing us was a PDF. He was just showing us the screen share. And one of the guys on my team said, hey, can we see the Excel file? And he's like, well, it's all right here. He's like, yeah, no, I just want to see the Excel file. I want to see how things are being calculated. And he's like, yeah, sure, sends us the Excel file and we dig into it. And the way he was generating the annual revenue was he was taking one quarter and multiplying it by 4.25. Well, there's only four quarters in a year. And so our CFO at the time said, well, hey, why does this multiply by 4.25? And he looks at us, he goes, oh, that's just to adjust for seasonality. And we're like, what do you mean? Adjust for seasonality is to add a quarter of a quarter to the year to the Performa. And a guy I was in the meeting with, the guy whose family office around looks at him and he goes, this is why I say performers are all like strippers. They look good from afar, but when you dig into the numbers, something always looks off. And what I hear you saying is, is what you set out to do with Buffalo is private equity, but it's private equity done differently.
- [20:09]
Robert Irving
Yeah.
- [20:10]
Interviewer / Joe
How are you doing it different?
- [20:12]
Robert Irving
Yeah, I think it's, it's operator led, right? That's kind of our tagline is operator led, technician powered and family focus. It's saying, hey, if things go awry, right, and let's, you know, play the worst case scenario. Everybody wants to play worst case scenario in acquisitions. And I always tell them, hey, if we're going to play worst case, let's play best too. If we're going to play the game, let's play it. But in the worst case scenario, right, Like, I've got a team of operators. I mean, we've built businesses from the ground up. I've started at zero. Hey, where does this trash can go? And you know, we scaled it up and we've done the roll ups of a hundred companies and we've built it all the way to a billion and done all these things. And it's like I have the confidence to say we know how to build businesses. I know how to implement technology like the actual software. I know how routing works. I know how scheduling dispatch and accounts receivables and, you know, accruing labor burden on your balance sheet and doing all these things. It's like I've been in there making that sausage for 10 plus years. And I think the businesses have evolved. I know they've evolved. And it's one of the biggest struggles that I've seen is you take somebody who ran a branch or a business in 2010 or 2015, you drop them in there. Today it's a completely different world with the data we have access to and the dashboards and the cost reports and the ability to track the trucks and the text messages that get sent out with a picture of Matt's face and he's on his way. And here's a digital sign. And it's like you turn around and at one point I told a bunch of guys I was going to change their title to dashboard managers. And, you know, it's like, hey, that's what you are. You're. You're looking at this living, breathing, you know, thing that's tracking in real time with costs and expenses and all this stuff. And like, you are a dashboard manager. You just happen to be educated on this subject, you know, and so I think for me, it's, it's looking at it and saying, hey, we're, we're operator led. We can connect with these owners and we can add real value. And so we have a set of value creation plans from like sales and marketing to technology to operations to tax and finance to exit readiness, and we can come in and add real strategic value beyond just capital. And we can build platforms that we can, you know, ultimately grow and either sell, recapitalize, distribute, whatever it is we want to do with them. And I think that's the uniqueness is, is being able to connect with the operators and tell that story of adding real value to their lives and their business. I think it's a unique approach to private equity.
- [22:29]
Interviewer / Joe
Well, and it sounds like traditional private equity is kind of. I think of it as the sweater neck, the Harvard MBA sitting in New York with their mouse unplugged, hammering away on Excel. And the unfair advantage that I hear you saying is, is you've been in the field. Yeah. You've done the job function. You fit the pipes, you've done the whole process.
- [22:47]
Robert Irving
Yeah.
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Interviewer / Joe
And so you can actually go in there and connect with the guy who's feeling down, who's feeling defeated.
- [22:53]
Robert Irving
Yeah.
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Interviewer / Joe
Who's turning to, to the bottle to numb the pain. As I said, like, you can find that person and you can connect with them in a deep and meaningful way because you've been there.
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Robert Irving
Yeah.
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Interviewer / Joe
You've seen every step of the process. And, and when I think about, like so many people say, oh, I want to be in private equity. I want to be in private equity.
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Robert Irving
Yeah.
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Interviewer / Joe
I think what I hear you saying is if you want to be in private equity, go get in the truck. That's it. Then, then go work in receivables, then go work in marketing, then go work in sales and go work in engineering, and then talk to me about getting into private equity. Because if you don't know how to run the business. Right. How can you optimize the Business from a keyboard.
- [23:27]
Robert Irving
Yeah. You know, there are lessons learned in these trenches that these books won't teach you and to give them their flowers, right? There's a place for the investment bankers, there's a place for the financial modelers. And it goes back to that bus and having the right guys and the seats and on the right bus. And I think private equities recognize that, I really do. And they begin to value the operator. And I saw it, you know, in all the stuff that I've done is like, hey, the operations guys really matter. And I've always said that. It's like, hey, you know, one of the questions I asked was, do you feel like operations has a big enough seat at this table when you're making decisions? And everybody looked at me and was like, yeah, maybe, maybe you're right, you know, but there's a place for the financial modelers and there's a place for the investment bankers and the capital raisers and, and all of that. It takes a ginormous team. What I would say over the last 30 years though is that operations has been discounted heavily because of the ability to financially engineer your success. And I also think that there's a lot of private equity, man, the most sophisticated. It's the NFL of business. I mean, it's some of the smartest people I've ever met. And they can start to see the smoke and mirrors through the fog and they see the fact that you've put lipstick on a pig and you've bought 15 companies and they're all on different ERPs, and they're all on different field service managements and different CRMs. None of them communicate. They're not brand agnostic, they have no synergies. They're all in different insurance plans. They're, you know, the cost is crazy. And then you pump out some proforma with oh, if, if and when you go do the hard work. Because me, I just bought 15 companies, I didn't do any real work, right? I just slapped a bunch of lipstick on a pig. $20 million of EBITDA. And oh, by the way, I have like a 15x for it, right? Like a couple hundred million bucks. And if and when you go do all this work, right, and you brand agnostic and you roll out all these ERPs and you push all that data and actually streamline it and you do all these things, it's going to generate, you know, freaking $100 million in cash flow. And so, yeah, but imagine like culture shock. Imagine all the work who's going to go do the work, you know, and I think private equity has seen that over time. And what you needed. And what has displayed is you needed a couple bombs to go off, you needed some businesses to blow up, and then you needed them to not be able to sell and for people to get haircuts. And I said that a long time ago. I said, look, there has to. Either one of these things has to be true. Either we have to get an extreme premium for doing all of this work, or they have to get a massive discount for not doing it. But both of these things can't be true. When you're integrating businesses and you're putting the right names on them and you're doing all that hard work, there's value there. Right? There's. And mainly the values in de risking. Right. Versus somebody who's just slapping lipstick on a pig and hoping that they can sell it. And that's the hard part of having trillions of dollars of dry powder is usually there's always a buyer. There's always someone that can step in and say, like, I think we can do it. You know, and they get themselves hyped up for it. And, and that opportunity. And that's what leads to some of these zombie companies that have been out there for, you know, I forget, I don't know if you're on the call guy told me today, the average new life term of a, of a fund is 17 years. And it's like 17 years is how long they're gonna hold. Something like that's just, you know, takes three to five years. They raise a billion dollars, takes three to five years to deploy. And then once you've hit your certain hurdles, well, then what matters is holding on to it, because the, the final exit is, you know, where they get all their outcome. And you look at the power of incentives and how do you realign those?
- [26:45]
Interviewer / Joe
Yeah, it's. It's fascinating too, because I think a lot of people are thinking through, like, oh, I got a business, I want to sell it to private equity. Oh, this thing, I want to sell it to private equity. Or, oh, I want to buy one of these businesses. And what's fascinating about your story is you've done the full cycle.
- [26:59]
Robert Irving
Yeah.
- [26:59]
Interviewer / Joe
You've worked for the company, you've built your own business. You've sold it. Got a bite of the apple, sold it again. Got a bite of the apple, sold it again, Got a bite at the apple. And so from, from your experience, from the seats you've sat in, a guy listening to this A gal listening to this is like, I've got a business I want to sell to private equity. Now I know there's a million things they need to do in order to prepare for a sale, but what would you say is the one most important thing they need to focus on if they truly want to transact with private equ Equity?
- [27:24]
Robert Irving
I think it's the plan. I think it's who you sell to. You know, I mean, at the end of the day, when you sell the private equity, nine times out of ten you're going to have to roll forward equity and you're going to have to stay on board and help them build that business. And so it's understanding, like what is it that they're going to do? What is their track record? Where are they at in their fun life, you know, what is the fund structure, how you know, and all of those things. Like, I tell people that private equity doesn't answer questions that you don't ask and you can tell. And I've had this conversation a bunch when guys that you're dealing with are using chat GPT to try and Swiss army knife their way to talk to you. And, and it's been a fun time. It's, it's been kind of comical because, you know, the, the concept would be the buffalo, right, is to charge it head on and, and have the difficult conversations. And, and I've had those with guys. I'm like, hey, I, I know you're using chat GPT and like the stuff that you're throwing back at me just doesn't make any sense, right? So go get yourself good representation. And I tell people that all the time. It's like, make sure you, you know, the, the most expensive thing you'll ever do is get a cheap lawyer, a cheap advisor that doesn't know. And, and again, look at their incentives, right? If it's being paid by the hour or if it's an investment banker or broker there, they only get paid if the deal transacts. It's like, okay, well don't you think they're going to push you to get the transaction done versus and so it's understanding the power of those incentives. But go get good advisors because when you're dealing with private equity, there's so much nuance of what is a profit interest unit, you know, and what is a distribution threshold and how do these documents align? And they are masters. That is the game they play is financial engineering and masters of documents. And so understanding that and then, okay, so what are you going to do what is the plan of how we're going to grow my business of. Of the bolt on acquisitions? We're going to do strategic acquisitions, geographical acquisitions. Are we going to diversify my revenue streams? Are we going to go get new customers? What customers do you bring to the table? Like, there's. There's a whole world of trying to understand that, because once you give up control, I mean, you know, 99 of them are going to buy 100% of your business, and then you're going to turn on and roll 30 or 40% of that back into the Holdco or however the structure is. And then, you know, the ultimate answer is, you don't have control anymore. They do. And so it's just understanding what their plan is. Yeah.
- [29:32]
Interviewer / Joe
And I want to go back to a second for this whole concept of the buffalo. I was talking to my wife about this interview and what I had on deck, and I'm like, oh, yeah, I'm interviewing Robert, you know, Buffalo growth partner. And she's like, I don't like the name. What. What does the name even mean? So, yeah, yeah. So take me back to, like, what is this concept of be the Buffalo, not just in business, but in life. Where did it come from?
- [29:51]
Robert Irving
You know, it goes back to, like, my concept on quotes. My license plate says high agency, and it's funny, man. I've had a couple guys, like, come up to me in hb and they're, hey, I know what that is. I'm like, oh, that's cool. But my concept of quotes is like, you know, I don't need to teach you things. I just need to consistently remind you. Because when you're in the depths of work and chaos and you're doing stuff in, like, a little. You look over here and you see it and it's like, oh, yeah, you know, and that's what the buffalo was. And. And the story was really cool, and it just kind of impacted me. It had to be 10 or 15 years ago. And when you think about the innate intrinsic instinct of an animal and. And what they do, right? And the big thing in Texas, you got a bunch of longhorns, you know, and. And I think this is actually a fallacy. I don't think it's true. But they say, you know, when it's going to rain, you. You can look at the cows in the pasture, and if they're laying down, it's about to rain. And. And that's. That's because of barometric pressure, right? And, you know, as a pilot, and you go, through all this stuff and all this training and, and you learn about barometric pressure in the weather. And so with the buffalo, it's. The theory is as the, the storms come over the Rocky Mountains, you had these two different animals and the way they converged was, is the cow would run from the storm and that storm would chase them, and they, they would endure the pain and the rain and the cold for, for longer because that they're running with the storm versus the buffaloes in neat. You know, their, their actual nature was to come together as a herd and to charge the storm and to run through it and to face their problems. And, and when you take that analogy and apply it to, to humans, it's in a team. It's like, hey, we're going to come together as a team and we're going to face the challenges head on and we're going to attack them. And for me, it's, it's just everything in life and I mean, on a weekly basis, it hits me where I'm like, you know, to be the buffalo, you've just got to go grab that problem and be high agency and take it across the finish line and just solve the problem, whatever it is. And yeah, it's just getting it done quicker and being, being ready.
- [31:41]
Interviewer / Joe
What's interesting is if you actually think about the concept be the buffalo, it means, you know, in addition to charging the problem, it also means leaning into hard conversation 100, which unfortunately, many people want to lean away from. It's like, oh, that's an uncomfortable conversation. I'll probably try to be passive aggressive. Maybe I'll just let resentment build until I explode and then I'll attack. But what I hear you saying is you almost can hide behind the quote and use the quote as the, the sword, if you will, and saying like, hey, look, I got to be the buffalo here. We've got to have a hard conversation. And now it's not, you're an asshole. It's like, this is our core value. This is our name. This is what I stand for. And like, you can lean into like, hey, this is violating the buffalo. That's a. We got to have a hard conversation. And I mean, I think when you think through life, so much of what we're seeking in life lies on the other side of what we're unwilling to do or where the discomfort is.
- [32:33]
Robert Irving
Right.
- [32:34]
Interviewer / Joe
And a lot of that is just a simple conversation. Yeah, but we build up all this emotion, all of this resentment in our head of like, oh, they're going to take it this way. I'm going to make them feel this way. I feel this way. That's better to just keep it internal. But what you're saying is, is charge the hard thing, even if it's uncertain.
- [32:49]
Robert Irving
Yeah. And it's the reps. You know, you go back to, like, I was counting the other night. People have asked me, like, how many of these dinners have you done with owners? And it's like, I think I'm nearing like 4 or 500 at this point. And you go in there and it's like, are you nervous? How with the questions? Are you going to bring some paper? What are you going to talk about? It's like, oh, man. That's like, at the end of the day, this is just. And I know you love my saying of crawl, walk, run. We. We are crawling. Right? And let's just. And I had a guy ask me this, and you know, Robert, he's one of the coolest dudes. And our first dinner, you know, he's like, are you going to ask me anything about the business? I'm like, no, probably not. You know, I don't really care. If I don't want to shoot pigs with you and hang out, then I don't really want to buy your company, because this isn't just about the money. It's about the people. And, you know, and I've said it a bunch, and you've heard it with. You've got three most important decisions in your life. One is your Lord and savior, the second is your spouse, and the third is who you're going to do business with. Because if we're doing business together, you're going to talk to me as much as you talk to your spouse. Yeah. You know, and to your point of being the buffalo, it's like, I have used it so many times to say that, and I think in my position and, you know, the. The conversations you have on a daily basis are some of the most important conversations people will have in their life. Life. You're talking 20, 25, 30 years of their life. They sponsored their kids t ball games. They, you know, sponsored their church. They're in the community. And. And this is a representation of them as a person. And I think that's the one piece of me in private equity where I seen a bunch of guys that are investment bankers or whatever you want to call them. This is just another day. This is just another rep. This is just another deal. Whereas it's like, no, I've walked through those shoes. I founded the company. I built it up with Some guys, and we sold it. And it's, this is their life. This is everything. And you should treat that with that kind of respect. And you should hold that conversation and understand that every word matters. Everything you do, they're going to go home and talk to their spouse about it. They're going to remember that. And I think it's just kind of having that, that knowledge and understanding of that and having the Buffalo be front and center. I think it's a, it's, it's an atypical thing, you know, for private equity to put that kind of energy out there, which makes us stand apart. Yeah, yeah.
- [34:53]
Interviewer / Joe
But it also represents who you are as a human.
- [34:55]
Robert Irving
Right.
- [34:55]
Interviewer / Joe
Like, that's how you live your life every single day. I mean, you bleed red, white and blue. You charge the storm. You're not afraid of the discomfort. You find the uncomfortable situation. You put yourself in it. And what I find most interesting is what people fail to recognize is that consistency is actually what breeds competence and confidence.
- [35:15]
Robert Irving
Yeah.
- [35:16]
Interviewer / Joe
Like when you actually do the thing, have the 500 dinners, number 400 is, is not just another dinner, but you're confident in it because you've done 399 of them.
- [35:25]
Robert Irving
Yeah.
- [35:26]
Interviewer / Joe
But most people sit at zero and go, like, I could never do that. I don't know how to do that. But at one point you were there, you were at your first dinner, and I'm sure there was some nerves, and I'm sure there was some butterflies. Then you go to two, you're like, all right, a little better. Three better by 50, you're like, I could do this with my eyes closed.
- [35:40]
Robert Irving
Yeah.
- [35:41]
Interviewer / Joe
Because I understand. It's just all about the human on the other side of the table. It's about seeing them, it's about hearing them. It's about understanding their perspective for. But then also sharing mine and being confident in sharing mine.
- [35:51]
Robert Irving
Yeah.
- [35:52]
Interviewer / Joe
And I think a lot of the world, unfortunately, leans away from consistency. They lean away from this concept of discipline. They lean into, like, what's easiest, what's the path of least resistance, and whether it's good or bad. Most of our world has been created for that. I mean, think about Amazon. You know, our parents, when they needed something from the store, they planned a shopping list, they drove to the store. Didn't matter if it was raining, snowing, sleeting, hailing. They picked up their things and they came home. Now, when I need something, I open Amazon. And I'm disappointed if it's coming tomorrow because it's before noon. It should be here Same day, right? And that's just kind of what the world is. But we've. We've lost that ability to do the work, right? To get in the trenches, to be disciplined. And a lot of times, my guess would be you do the work and the result doesn't show up immediately, but you got to stay disciplined. You got to stay consistent.
- [36:38]
Robert Irving
Now, what I tell them is, like, everybody's looking for the Golden Dagger, like, where are the pigeons that, you know, come out? And it's like, it's small, incremental changes implemented consistently over time, equal outsized results. And there's nothing that we're going to do today that's going to just drastically change the world. But to your point of, like, showing up for the level 10 meetings and staying disciplined and. And doing the work, you turn around in six months and look back and it's like, oh, wow, this is a completely different world. This is, you know, completely different than where we started. And you do need to recognize that along that path and the changes you've made and how you've evolved. But, yeah, it's the consistency of that discipline and just keep showing up and hitting the ball. It's like, over time, it just, you know, kind of. I think Alex Hormozi says it, you know, you have an undeniable proof of you are who you say you are, because you've done what you said you've done. And at that point, I don't need to be nervous just swinging that one more time.
- [37:32]
Interviewer / Joe
No big deal. So you launch this private equity firm, you go off on your own, you're doing the thing five years from now. What does success look like to you? What does success look like for Buffalo Growth Partners? And how can you look backward and say, damn, we did it?
- [37:47]
Robert Irving
Yeah, I mean, I think it's. It's to carve out your own little niche in the world. You know, I want to compete in an arena, I have an unfair advantage. And what I say is, if there's guys and trucks fixing broken stuff, I think I have an unfair advantage regardless of what they're fixing. And so I think success is, you know, I don't look at it like, oh, I want to buy 15 companies. I want to deploy this much capital. I want to, you know, because in my mind, it's like, in this game, if you have enough money, you can buy however many companies you want, you can, you know, build however many thesises, and you can do all these things because you can just throw money at the wall, right? It's. It's about building something sustainable. It's about building a legacy and building a table big enough where all my guys can eat, you know, and the guys that have helped me get to me to where I am, I think that's success in my mind is. Is having fun while doing it, building something of legacy, partnering with Texas A and M and getting, you know, young students coming out of the university that want to help build something and building something sustainable. Because that. That is one of the beauties of private equity is it can last for, you know, forever. How many industries can you roll up? How many businesses can you build? You know, the answer is as many as you want. And so it's a hard question to answer on defining success because there's no, like, tangible. I want a billion dollars. I want three platforms. I want, you know, it's. I want to do something that's sustainable and durable, and I want to have fun doing it. And at the end of the day, we're gonna make a lot of money while you're doing it.
- [39:10]
Interviewer / Joe
Yeah, but it's important to. To note that you said you want to make a lot of money doing it with a table big enough for all your guys to eat. That's like. It sounds to me like you're really focused on the people that are along on this journey with you.
- [39:21]
Robert Irving
Yeah.
- [39:21]
Interviewer / Joe
And making sure everybody's winning.
- [39:23]
Robert Irving
You have to, you know, at the end of the day, you know, you. You name off whoever you want. Bezos, jobs, Jensen, all these guys. And you look at it and I think. I think people have. One of the fallacies is they want to own too much or control too much of the watermelon of the pie or however you want to look at it. And that's the beauty of private equity is everybody can get their little sliver and everybody can. Can build alongside you, but you have to build a team. It's a monumental amount of work. And when you give people that opportunity to be on your team or to grow or to have their slice of the pie and build their family, like, you have the utmost highest expectation. Like, I'm not. This isn't a charity. You know what I mean? Like, we're going to win and we're going to work hard. But, yeah, it's, you know, they want to accomplish their goals. And I think there's room to do that, not only at the private equity level, but at the OPCO level. And I think that flavor and that different sauce. You know, one of the cool things about private equity being mainstream now is I've talked to a lot of business owners that. And it's kind of funny. You, you talk to them or however you do it, and they're like, yeah, I've talked to eight of you, so sure, you want to take me to lunch? Let's do this. And I go sit down with them. They're like, well, you're not like the last seven guys that walk through that door. It's like, yeah, no, I. And we, we heard it last night, right? It's like they. All they said was they were just, they had a billion dollars of capital they needed to deploy. It's like I kept asking, what are they going to do? And it's like, well, with me, here's what I'm going to do. Here's the plan, here's the technology, here's the systems, here's the, the processes and the growth and the marketing and all the things. And so I think that for me, it's, it's getting that message out there and being able to, you know, curtail that to the owners that we want to do business with because there's, you know, capacity is a real thing. But yeah, I look forward to it. It's fun. It's been, it's been a good journey. We've been at it for what, four months, five months now? And yeah, it's been a rocket ship.
- [41:12]
Host
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- [41:43]
Interviewer / Joe
Where does family, self, you know, personal growth, development, your health, where does that all fit into this? Because I. I know it's more than.
- [41:51]
Robert Irving
Just the business 100. Yeah. I mean, for me, it's one of my top priorities. I mean, I got up this morning, went for a run. I know if somebody went for a long bike ride, I didn't run as long as you rode a bike. But yeah, it's. It's one of the most important parts of it. You can't show up with your full self if you're not in a healthy cognitive mindset. Right. If you're stressed out or, you know, man, I just got all the blood work done at functional health and, and you're going through all these things, and, like, you have to make sure you're taking care of yourself and your family first, because you can't go home to chaos and then think you're going to come to business and be, you know, disciplined and rigid. It's just not how it works. And so. But again, all of that takes time and. And energy and planning and, like, you know, I live by my calendar, but I block out time with the wife and the workouts. I mean, every single workout I've done over the last decade is on that calendar, Every single one of them. And it's because it's like, look, I. Every Sunday, I go in there and I log like, okay, here's my week, and this is when I'm going to get the workouts in, because I'm just not going to miss them, whether it's wake up this morning and go for a run or whatever it is. And one of the concepts I have on. On working out specifically is like, the model of abc. Whereas A is like, you crushed it. You went in there, you're just feeling it. You're hitting PRs. You're just killing life. A B is like, all right, I'm gonna go through the motions. I'm probably gonna back the weight off 20 or 30% because I'm just. I'm not. I'm not here. I'm stressed out, whatever it is. And a C is. I'm just gonna go run a mile and a half, two miles when I get home because I'm just dying, or I'm just gonna go for a walk. Right? I'm just not there. I think it's really important for people to think of it that way. And that's one of the crux I've seen people. It's like, well, if I can't show up at 100 intensity, I'm just grow. It's like, well, that compounds over time. Yeah, right. And it compounds in the wrong way. And so make sure you. You understand the A, B, and C, and. And you've got to carve out time for the family and the wife and the kids and. And involve them in your life. I think it's. For me, a lot of guys I do business with, I want them to meet my family. And, you know, Lauren and Russ are coming to Breckenridge, and, you know, it's. You want to do good business with people that you want to build your life with and he around. And that's what excites me about. About building something like this is it's. You don't, you're not gonna sell it. You know, this is a 40 year run. It's, it's going to be a lot of fun. Yeah.
- [44:02]
Interviewer / Joe
And so family is important. The kids, you're going to go to the kids graduations, you're going to go to the prom dances, you're going to go to the weddings, you're going to see where they're going to college or what they're going to do with their life and like it. It really is clear to me that for you success is about the whole life, about watching people win together as that herd of buffaloes charging through whatever storm shows up and everybody coming out on the other side.
- [44:26]
Robert Irving
Yeah, yeah. No, I agree. I mean, I think for me, like one of the things, When I was 22 or 23, I went to FMI Leadership Institute in Colorado for a week and they had you sit down and like try and go through like a life's purpose. What are you doing? What are your goals? Right. And the one that I came up with, and I don't have any tattoos, but I've really contemplated this one for a long time. It's called Miota M I O T A and it's motivate inspire others through action. There's a lot of guys that get on a lot of stages and talk a lot about it, but for me it's like, look, you can just look at what I've done and my track record speaks for itself and health and fitness and powerlifting and you know, life with, with my wife and the kids and business and everything I've done, it's like that track record. I don't need to talk about it. And I'm not gonna, I'm not gonna be one of those guys that's all boastful about it. Oh, I'm better than you. It's like, no, I'm just gonna keep hitting the ball. Like I'm just gonna keep winning. And, and there's thousands of guys grind and get stuff done and they're fun and enjoyable and it's like, you know, there's a different world out there of people that are on social media and they have this weird, unique perspective and they think it's important to be boastful in a marketing machine. And then there's a whole nother world of people like John Morgan. I don't know if you've seen it, but man, that guy's incredible. That's my spirit animal. It's that guy. I love his interviews and, but there's a whole Ton of them out there that are just out there. It's like, hey, man, I just. This is what I do. Yeah.
- [45:48]
Interviewer / Joe
And it's all about do, don't tell, right?
- [45:50]
Robert Irving
Yeah.
- [45:50]
Interviewer / Joe
Just do it. And even if you think about parenting, I mean, you have young kids and another one on the way. I've got young kids, they learn so much more from our actions than our words. But so many people are afraid to take action for their life. And so you just got to keep taking action, keep hitting the baseball like you said.
- [46:06]
Robert Irving
Y.
- [46:06]
Interviewer / Joe
And keep doing what you said you were going to do. Even on the bad days, even in the bad moments. Just stay disciplined to the plan and do it with action, do it with purpose.
- [46:16]
Robert Irving
Yeah. And keep an intense curiosity of life. I think that's one of the things that, that, you know, I've developed over time. There was a switch that flipped in me at 21, 22 years old, where you, you have this innate curiosity to continue to learn. I think AI is something that's so, like, the, the range of that gap is getting so big of people that are, like, still stuck over here, and they don't understand this tsunami that's headed at you. And, and really it's just about getting in there in the arena and using it and, and understanding how it can change. And, and you know, it's like, like you only understand the experiences that you've had in life. Like, that is your worldview is the compile. Whether you like it or don't like it, it is the compilation of your experiences that formulates your worldview. And so to have an AI thought partner, a creative thought partner that you can bounce ideas off of to say, hey, this is what I think. Right. This is how I think I should structure this deal. This is how I think I should do this. But the reason you think that's because that's what you've experienced, what else is out there. And for it to be able to digest that contextually and give you feedback and expand your mind, it's mind blowing. And when people tell me they're not using it every day, or they don't know how to use it, or I've had guys, I've had CEOs of billion dollar companies tell me like, hey, this whole AI thing I keep hearing about at these conferences and, you know, whatever, and, you know, we might be able to get that someday implemented, I'm like, you don't know what's coming point. Yeah.
- [47:42]
Interviewer / Joe
I mean, if you're not using it now, you're already behind.
- [47:44]
Robert Irving
Yeah.
- [47:45]
Interviewer / Joe
And the thing about it is the rate at which it can be implemented and adopted. If you're not using it now, you're not just a day behind or a week behind or a year behind. You're years behind already. Because it's. It's the future. It's here, but it's allowing people and businesses to move exponentially faster through very complex problems.
- [48:04]
Robert Irving
Oh, yeah, yeah. And I think the easiest way is just to treat it like a.
- [48:08]
Interviewer / Joe
A.
- [48:08]
Robert Irving
A creative thought partner. Yeah. But then you have to understand, like, what is prompt engineering? What is context? How do I. You know? And all of that compounds on itself to, you know, kind of paint a picture of your life. And, yeah, it's. It's a unique tool. And it's just what I tell people all the time is like, the. The AI you use today is the worst AI you're ever going to use. And if you back up to two years ago, I mean, they. I think it was like, December 22, 2022 or something when they released Chat GBT. Somewhere around there, I saw a tweet from Sam. You know, they said, hey, can. Here's this new chat bot. Maybe y' all should give it a shot. It's like, that was the moment that changed the world, you know?
- [48:48]
Interviewer / Joe
But most people slept on it for a year and a half, two years. I mean, I know I was guilty of sleeping on it for a year and a half. I'm like, oh, AI, it's gonna make us dumb. Oh, I don't know. I don't like it.
- [48:57]
Robert Irving
Yeah.
- [48:58]
Interviewer / Joe
And now, like you said, it's a thinking partner. And it's. It's amazing because it's not just a thinking partner in the boardroom. It's not just a thinking partner through the P and L. It's a thinking partner for bedtime stories with my kids. Kids. I mean, I'm literally. I'm literally in there with my. My kids 6 and 4 right now. I'm like, all right, what do you guys want to do for the bedtime story? And Rylan will say she wants it to be a Barbie, and Bodhi will say it wants to be a Hot Wheel, and it's just prompt. Engineer it. And the next thing you know, I'm reading this beautiful bedtime story about Rylan with her Barbie and Bodhi with his Hot Wheels, and they woke up in the middle of the night, and they took him on this crazy adventure. It's like, I couldn't have never thought of that.
- [49:30]
Robert Irving
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
- [49:31]
Interviewer / Joe
But I had it in five Seconds. Right. But I'm also showing my kids how to think about using it, because it's going to be a real thing for them.
- [49:38]
Robert Irving
Oh, it's else.
- [49:38]
Interviewer / Joe
It's going to be everything for them.
- [49:40]
Robert Irving
Yeah. I mean, if you think of, like, even from a teacher perspective and a tutor and, you know, a lot of times if you think of just structured schooling, right. Our educational system and how you take a group of 20 students and put them in a room and one of them learns at this pace and the other one learns at that pace. Well, now you've got an infinite number of teachers that can teach you anything you need to know at any time. I mean, it's like the, the use cases for it are literally infinite. And talking to, like, data center developers, you know, a lot of what, what I've done in the past is just a lot of construction. We built a ton of data centers, hospitals, nursing homes, all kinds of things. And. And you talk to them like one of the most unique parts of when they're looking for land and they're building more of them. Like, hey, when is this going to stop? When are you going to stop building data centers? Like, explain to me why y' all just keep going. And it's like, well, if you think about the cost of compute, right, and the amount of tokens and things and energy that it takes to, to get to solve these problems as that cost comes down, which it is like, we've solved the problem with Nvidia and the chips, and we can do that as well. The amount of problems people are going to throw at it is infinite. How many problems do humans have? And so how much data do we want to put in it to process what type of cancer or whatever it is we want to solve? Like, what we see is as the cost goes down, demand goes up, and then we hit a supply constraint, which is the data centers. And then you look at Claude code and all these things that you can do and how fast you can implement and create and iterate. And it's like, yeah, the, the curve of needed supply is almost infinite. Yeah. And then the limitation is power, you know, like, you know, it comes back to. To land power. And it's like it's this weird circle that just keeps going around. And, yeah, I'm not sure we're going to solve it in our lifetime.
- [51:13]
Interviewer / Joe
I don't. Yeah, I don't think we're going to. And I don't know that we need to. And I think one of the beauties of life is problems exist because where There's a problem. Value can be created, which means people can make money. There's jobs, there's opportunity, there's suppliers, there's servicers. Like, no, there's beauty and problems. And I know one of the things that you've talked about is leaning more into creating more content, sharing more of your perspective, showing more of what you're up to. So for people listening to this that want to follow along on the journey, maybe learn more about how to sell their business, maybe sell you their business, maybe get your perspective on should they buy business, how can they plug into what you're up to, where you're going with Buffalo Growth Partners, and learn more?
- [51:51]
Robert Irving
Yeah, I think the. Probably the number One place is LinkedIn. I think it's a really underutilized tool. You know, it's all business content. And I make sure that we post out there pretty often. I think LinkedIn is the number one way. And then go into our website reaching out. I mean, I think at the end of the day, what I tell people, and I know you love this, is that those that can do do, those that cannot teach a course, they consult, they, you know, have their own podcast on buying businesses, and they've never bought one. And, and so we're busy, we're out here doing stuff and, and always willing to take a call and talk to people. But I think it's the content side of things, and allowing people know you better is something that's really important. And it's a flywheel. And I've seen that where it's like, they can go watch content, they go look up YouTube and they go look up past podcasts, and they begin to formulate this thought of like, okay, this isn't what I thought traditional private equity was. And then that allows your foot to get in the door to say, hey, let's have this conversation. Let's, you know, let's expand upon this. And that's really the beginning of it, is let's just go to lunch, let's go to dinner, let's go have a conversation and see where this can lead us.
- [52:55]
Interviewer / Joe
And more than anything, let's just be the Buffalo.
- [52:56]
Robert Irving
That's it.
- [52:57]
Interviewer / Joe
Charge the storm with high agents, with high agency.