Why Every Serious Business Owner Should Learn Golf ⎜Jason Haugen & Vince McCullam E489

Summary

Podcast Summary

Podcast: The Rich Somers Report
Episode: Why Every Serious Business Owner Should Learn Golf ⎜Jason Haugen & Vince McCollum E489
Host: Rich Somers
Guests: Jason Haugen & Vince McCollum
Date: April 16, 2026

---

Overview

This episode dives deep into why golf is not just a sport but a powerful networking tool for business owners and entrepreneurs. Host Rich Somers interviews Jason Haugen (former RV empire operator turned entrepreneur) and Vince McCollum (marketing/data expert) – co-founders of Black Jet Ventures/ Wedge Golf Company. The three explore career pivots, business pain points, brand building, the economics of private air travel, and—centrally—how the golf course is the new deal-making boardroom.

---

Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Jason’s Transition from RV Dealerships to Marketing/Golf

• Complexity and Stress of the RV Business
  • RV dealerships are operationally and financially challenging, often with complex inventory, hand-built products, warranty reimbursement issues, and massive financing risks.
  • "For me to order parts is literally taking a picture, uploading it, emailing someone across the country into Indiana...They have no idea what they put on these RVs. So it's just very, very complex." (Jason, 01:53)
• Financial Pressures and Market Shifts
  • Sold his nine-store RV operation after interest rates spiked, inventory issues worsened, and market dynamics became increasingly unfavorable.
  • "Interest I was paying on my inventory got up to almost 12%...just to hold." (Jason, 06:51)
  • Ultimately, Jason suffered major losses during the exit process ("lost $20 million in one year” due to market/inventory/plane losses, 08:54), forcing life adjustments.
• Lessons on Scale vs. Focus
  • Jason found he was more profitable, stable, and happier with three stores than nine.
  • "I made more money with three stores than I ever did with nine." (Jason, 55:58)

---

2. Founding Black Jet Ventures – From Failed Starts to Golf Arena Disruptors

• Initial Experiments & Failures
  • Jason and Vince met at a golf retreat, bonded over business culture and leadership, started (and quickly abandoned) an accounting business, recognizing lack of product/market fit.
  • “We didn’t have a good product market fit...it was kind of doomed to fail from the get go.” (Vince, 14:05)
• Finding the Growth Formula
  • They pivoted by acquiring businesses, particularly Wedge Golf Company—a leading golf content/marketing firm.
  • Pivoted Wedge from pure content to integrated data-driven, performance-oriented marketing ("stickiness" for brands/clients by merging Vince's agency experience, 17:00).
• Focus on Data and Performance Marketing
  • Deep investment in specialized marketing, digital fingerprinting, and data analytics has become their competitive edge.
  • "The smarter the data that you have, the smarter the marketing that you can perform." (Vince, 29:05)

---

3. Inside the Elite Professional and Celebrity Golf World

• Work with Golf’s Biggest Names & Brands
  • Clients include Sergio Garcia, Luke Donald, TaylorMade, Mizuno, and work with both PGA and LIV Tours.
• Lessons from Pro Athletes
  • Pro golfers are regular people with good/bad days; relationship management, consistency, and likability drive more opportunities and brand deals.
  • "The ones that are [likable] are usually the ones that have a sponsor for every tiny little thing. And there's a reason why." (Vince, 22:11)
• Culture, Leadership & Brand Longevity
  • The way athletes (and business people) conduct themselves off the field mediates career longevity and sponsorship.
  • “You have all the talent in the world, but you're just an ass. No one wants to be around you.” (Jason, 27:07)

---

4. Why Golf Is the Ultimate Networking & Business Platform

• Business is Relationships, Golf is the Venue
  • Golf provides 4-5 hours of uninterrupted, informal networking that's impossible to replicate in traditional business settings.
  • “There's really nothing else you can do for four or five hours…to get that one on one time.” (Jason, 37:13)
  • Many successful professionals (Ryan Smith, Dwayne Wade, tech and finance execs) are avid golfers for exactly this reason.
• Being Good at Golf is a "Cheat Code"
  • Being a competent golfer opens doors; high-level players (even CEOs, business magnates) often want to play (and do deals) with other good golfers.
  • “If you're good at golf, they automatically just want to do business with you and think that you're good at everything else. It's very, very strange.” (Jason, 35:30)
• Business Development on the Course
  • A significant portion ("probably half") of their new business and deal-closing takes place on the golf course (Vince, 41:14).
  • Golf has evolved into a “resume builder” for executives and entrepreneurs.

---

5. Advice on Golf—Getting Started and the Networking Mindset

• How to Level Up
  • To be a respectable player, aim for three golf sessions (1 round + 2 range/simulator) per week. Frequent play and focus, not just natural talent, is the pattern among scratch golfers in the business world (41:21-43:37).
• Golf Culture and Setting the Tone
  • Jason & Vince set expectations for fun, low-pressure vibes on the course to foster authentic relationships and productive networking (“We bust out…a cigar brand, some good drinks").
• Golf is Accessible
  • You don't need a pro's game to benefit from golf's business multiplier—just willingness, effort, and focus on building relationships.

---

6. Financial Insights: Private Jets, Big Losses, and Entrepreneurial Lessons

• Private Jet Ownership—Not Always Glamorous
  • Jason recaps his experience owning multiple jets (Gulfstream G200, Phenom 300, Pilatus PC-12) for personal and charter use.
  • Warns against the myth of jet ownership for profit—most at best "mitigate" costs, but don't cashflow (51:14-53:35).
  • "You don't buy a private jet unless you can afford to just have one and not have to charter it." (Rich, 51:37)
• Biggest Lessons from Losing $20 Million in One Year
  • Don’t over-extend or scale too rapidly; prioritize operational and financial discipline.
  • Focus on “depth” (doing fewer things better), not just “width.”
  • Get the right people in the right seats, especially financially skilled operators.
  • Stay in your lane, don’t chase shiny new opportunities simply because you can (55:01-58:36).

---

Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• On Growth and Discipline:
  • "I made more money with three stores than I ever did with nine." (Jason, 55:58)
• On the Power of Golf for Business:
  • "Being good at golf, they automatically just want to do business with you…and think that you're good at everything else. It's very, very strange." (Jason, 35:30)
• On Athlete Brand Longevity:
  • “You have all the talent in the world, but you're just an ass. No one wants to be around you.” (Jason, 27:07)
• On Focus and Saying No:
  • "Starting is about saying yes. Growing is about saying no." (Rich, 58:36)
  • "I've been around a lot of billionaires, and they're like, 'You're an idiot for doing so many things.' And I'm like, yeah, I'm learning the same thing as I grow." (Jason, 58:36)
• On Business via Golf:
  • “Half of our business has come or been sealed on the golf course. So, like, it’s 100% like a work thing too.” (Vince, 41:14)
• On Data-Driven Marketing:
  • "The smarter the data you have, the smarter the marketing that you can perform." (Vince, 29:05)

---

Essential Timestamps

• Jason’s Exit from RV Industry/Scale vs. Focus: 01:37–08:54, 55:01–57:45
• Meeting, Failed Businesses, Acquiring Wedge Golf Co: 12:03–18:15
• Golf for Business Relationships: 35:30–43:37, 37:02–41:21
• Golf as Networking Cheat Code: 35:30
• Private Jet Ownership Realities: 44:01–54:53
• The Power of Saying No/Entrepreneurial Clarity: 57:45–62:16
• Marketing, Data, and Ideal Clients: 29:02–34:36, 62:54–65:26

---

Conclusion

Jason and Vince’s journey illustrates how evolving your focus, trusting in your strengths, and leveraging powerful platforms like golf profoundly influence entrepreneurial success—sometimes in unexpected ways. The central theme: Golf is not just a sport, but the ultimate space for real business to get done—relationship, trust, and deals on the fairway. Their story is a blend of hard-won lessons and optimistic strategy for modern entrepreneurs.

---

Connect with the Guests

• Jason Haugen: Instagram, Culture Camp Podcast, Iconic Marketing Co, Black Jet Ventures
• Vince McCollum: LinkedIn, Iconic Marketing Co, Black Jet Ventures

Special Offer: Free Data Pixel—Mention you heard it on The Rich Somers Report for Wedge/Black Jet’s data pixel to try on your website. (65:04)

---

Transcript

[Jason Haugen]

I remember flying back on the plane. I was just actually by myself, flying from Oregon and like, you would think life is great, had fun, cars, the plane, and, you know, I'm doing all these things. I remember just looking outside, like thinking how miserable I was and how stressed out I was. And like, I. I kind of thought back to the most fun I ever had and like, the least stress I ever had it was when I had three stores. So I landed, literally was like, hey, we're selling all the stores out of, out of Utah. It's not fun anymore. I barely had to learn to just stay in my lane because I want to do everything else. I think I can do everything else. But staying in my lane has been so important because I've been around a lot of billionaires and they're like, you're an idiot for doing so many things. And I'm like, I know.

[Rich Summers]

Welcome to the Rich Summers Report where we talk real estate, business and wealth building, all while keeping it real. No fluff, no bs. I hope that you enjoy the show. All right, guys, today I got the founders of Black Jet Ventures doing big things and really disrupting the golf arena, which we're going to get into today. I got Jason Haugen and Vince McCollum in the building. What's up, gentlemen? How are we?

[Jason Haugen]

How's it going?

[Vince McCollum]

Great.

[Rich Summers]

It's going really good. It's going really good, man. Appreciate you guys coming in all the way from Salt Lake this morning, man, and a lot of game, a lot of stuff to cover today. But Jason, first things first, man. You had an eight figure exit with this RV dealership. You had nine RV dealerships, You had this eight figure exit, and now you guys are disrupting the golf arena with this marketing business. What is the transition like going from this, this, this nine RV dealerships and then you guys are going in the RV or the golf game.

[Jason Haugen]

It's been interesting, you know, like my, the dealerships are a very different world, Very different legion, very different operations, extremely complicated. In 2018, Harvard Business Review wrote an article that the RV dealership was the hardest business in America to run.

[Rich Summers]

I didn't know that.

[Jason Haugen]

Why is that so complex? And it is so 20 years ago, like, for me to order parts is literally taking a picture, uploading it, emailing someone across the country into Indiana and then saying, hey, I don't know what color this is because there's no VIN like there. Nothing means anything. They. They have no idea what they put on these RVs. And so it's just very, very complex.

[Vince McCollum]

Are.

[Rich Summers]

Are most the RVs manufactured in the

[Jason Haugen]

US most of them are. Most of them are in Elkhart County, Indiana. I would say 80% of them in the US are, are built, built there. And it's just, it's a tough world.

[Rich Summers]

And they're not, they're not like mass produced like a lot of these other car manufacturers.

[Jason Haugen]

They're definitely mass produced, but they're all hand built, hand put together and yeah, they are just built very interestingly is what I'll say.

[Rich Summers]

That's. That's how the boat game is.

[Jason Haugen]

Yeah.

[Rich Summers]

Everything's handmade and so shit's always breaking.

[Jason Haugen]

Oh yeah.

[Rich Summers]

People think, oh, like I made this mistake when I got my first boat. I thought you buy a brand new boat and nothing's gonna need to be repaired. But the new boats, everything's breaking the first six months because it's like you got to work out of the kinks.

[Jason Haugen]

Oh yeah, same thing. RVs, they have a year warranty for a reason. D. You're going to be back six to eight times, I bet in that year. And yeah, it's just, it's just super. I mean takes six to eight weeks, sometimes 12 weeks to order parts. And so it's just a very complex industry. There's like I had 5 p. Ls and so at one time I was having 40 p. Ls I was looking at or 5 p. Ls per location. So 40 p. Ls per month I was looking at.

[Rich Summers]

Is that because you had like different department service.

[Jason Haugen]

So every different department had their own P and L. And then they were all like allocated expenses. And so we would make sure that like the, like sales, service, finance, parts, like everything and have their own P and L. And to make sure that like they were all being profitable in themselves. And just in case, like I'm a very financial driven person. So just in case there was leaks. Right. My parts department was leaking. It didn't get cross contaminated with my sales department because sales always crushed it. Finance was always the number one driver in, you know, as far as profitability because the margins are 80% there versus something else. And so I just, I wanted to like departmentalize every single department so I could make sure that the financials and the leaks were, you know, they were exposed. And so yeah, I was looking at 40 different P Ls every single month. Balance, like it was insane.

[Rich Summers]

Did, did you guys do pretty well in the service department? Because I know, I know I have a couple buddies that have like used car dealerships here in San Diego. And they make a lot of money on the, the servicing on the back end.

[Jason Haugen]

Yeah. So RV is very different. You lose a lot of money in service. Really like my worst nightmare is doing service on RVs because it's so complicated. Right. And like in, in the automotive side, there's no such thing as warranty shortage. Which means like if I do, if you come in and it's a five thousand dollar warranty job. In the car business, they pay five thousand dollars. Right. It's just a very straightforward warranty process. In the RV business they're like, no, we don't think it should have taken you that long. We're gonna, then they beat us up on warranty and so we're losing usually 50 cents on every dollar. So if it's a five thousand dollar job, I'm losing 2500 bucks.

[Rich Summers]

Damn. Just keep the customer happy.

[Jason Haugen]

Yeah. So it's a very, I don't know, like I, I honestly, I just got sick of it. Like I got sick of battling the banks because the, the banking's like our rules and regulations banking when, because we get a flooring line and that's how we buy all of our inventory. It's called flooring. I had a 59 million dollar line and I mean I remember paying a $10,000 to my dad once and I put it under owner distributions. I don't know why or he, he had of ownership. So like here's $10,000 and I got, I got a $29 million line pulled from me and so I had to pay it off in 45 days. And just the battle with getting another, you know, someone to, you know, buy that off and like, it's just, it's, it's a tough industry. There's a lot of nuances around it. And because of all those lessons I learned doing that, like I feel like I can do anything. Like I, yeah. Tried the pressure of someone saying, hey, we're going to pull $29 million from you and pay it off in 45 days because it's all personal guaranteed. The whole line is personal guaranteed. So we're going to start seizing assets and it's like, okay, we're going to have to figure some stuff out.

[Rich Summers]

Yeah. I'm curious for you, man. You know, selling the RVs, what was that kind of tipping point for you there to where you're like, hey, I'm going to exit this industry and get into something completely different.

[Jason Haugen]

It was honestly just kind of really market driven. Our markets start like interest rates started going up. Like I was paying around 650 to 700,000amonth in interest.

[Rich Summers]

Okay. And to hold the new rv.

[Jason Haugen]

Yeah, just to hold and put in perspective, like that was like 100,000 the year prior. And then in just a very short months, like the, in the interest rates went through the roof. And I thought they would double. I didn't know they would triple, almost quadruple. And so I just got tired of battling that. I got tired of battling, you know, our market. Like the, the manufacturers were shoving us full of inventory and then we weren't selling. It was just a very bloody time. And I got, I got miserable.

[Rich Summers]

Yeah, I can imagine. I'm curious, um. Cause I know like, real estate rates were, you know, in the threes, even, even the high twos, mid to high twos, back in 2021. But in cars, like 2%. But boats, you know, it's a little bit higher. Like 4 or 5%. When the rates were good, what was the RV rates?

[Jason Haugen]

6. 7 was great.

[Rich Summers]

6 to 7 was considered.

[Jason Haugen]

I mean we. I mean my, the interest I was paying on my inventory got up to almost 12%.

[Rich Summers]

Damn.

[Jason Haugen]

As far as like consumer rates, I mean, those got up like, I mean 10, 12. I mean I saw some people were signing 20 if they had like 20. I mean it was crazy. Yeah, I remember like signing my first customer back in like 2018, 2019 with like a thousand dollar payment and on like these big hundred thousand dollar units, like all these crazy stuff. And I'm like a thousand bucks a month. Like, I don't know.

[Rich Summers]

Yeah.

[Jason Haugen]

Now that be. Oh, 20, 20 years with a balloon. Pretty much interest only for the first 10 years.

[Rich Summers]

Yeah.

[Jason Haugen]

Not very good. Right? It's, it's in the depreciator on 30 the first year and then about 10 a quarter after that. It's just, it's an interesting industry and it just got. Yeah, it's got a lot. Like I just kept thinking like, why am I doing this? Like, it just. That's so much stress. So much stuff is going on. The. The market is fluctuating so much. It's like a lot of stuff was out of my control and I didn't really love that. And I had a lot of exposure. You know, I have $59 million of inventory sitting there that I was. It's, you know, with our name. So started selling stores off slowly. We sold our Oregon and sold our St. Well, St. Louis first and then sold our Oregon stores and then sold the Utah stores.

[Rich Summers]

How many buyers across the nine stores,

[Jason Haugen]

how many buyers there was three Groups. We sold three groups.

[Rich Summers]

Yeah. And it's pretty regional.

[Jason Haugen]

Yeah. Like the, the Oregon got like that was a, a west coast group that really like to say West Coast. They were trying to get in the Oregon market because it's a good market. St. Louis was a still really good friends of them. One of my good friends, he owns 14 locations doing hundreds of millions of dollars a year in sales or 100 millions of dollars a year in sales. And he bought those stores and then the Utah stores we sold to a group that actually he had exited for a huge amount. And then his non compete was done and then he bought our stores.

[Rich Summers]

Damn. That's crazy. That's crazy. And so you mentioned before we started recording you told me that that this sale process dragged, dragged on a little bit and you ended up losing some money along the way up towards a $20 million. You lost in one year. How did you lose $20 million in one year?

[Jason Haugen]

The combination of the market, you know, squeezing us a little bit. Inventory finance where we were, we owed more on the units than they were worth technically at the time. And so we had to pay off a lot of the units when we sold the stores. They had a couple planes, lost a few 3 or 4 million on a gulf stream, a million on a phenom. And it just was a combination of just a bunch of crap that happened all at once in one year. But I mean it's, we recovered, we're okay. Like it's, we had the money and it wasn't necessarily the most like I'm not, I'm grateful in a way that I learned a lot of ex like a lot of things through that. But it sucked. I mean it like definitely had to adjust life a different way. Like we were building a gorgeous 7,000 square foot home. Told my wife, looked at her and was like we're not doing this. Like I, like I'm sorry. Like if we buy this house I can't guarantee our future but if we stay in the house rent, I can pretty much guarantee our future for you know, infinite time. So we ended up leaving that and it felt super bad. But we just had to adjust life and just things and just make sure that we were good stewards of the business and made sure that everything happened the right way and you know, had to like, had to kind of readjust some things.

[Rich Summers]

Was there retrading with these, these exits? I know you had three buyers amongst the nine stores. When the rates continue to go up. Were there retrades with the, the exits in terms of the proceeds we kind

[Jason Haugen]

of just ended up, like, slowly. I mean, we bought a couple things with the proceeds, and then we ended up just using a lot of those proceeds to pay, like as the dealerships winded down, to just use it to kind of COVID the expenses for what. What we needed to cover. Yeah. And it ended up not being the best exit for us, but we, we made a lot of money on the way there, so it's okay.

[Rich Summers]

Yeah, yeah. I always say, like, you know, certain businesses are quicker to trade and more liquid than others, especially real estate, too. You know, real estate really is a business too. But you think about a single family house, you know, in any markets close to a median, you know, bell curve in terms of median housing price that says really liquid, you know, you price it accordingly. You could, you could sell it quick, find a cash buyer in 14 days and you're out. So it's relatively liquid. But then, you know, you start getting into other assets, and that can take a lot longer to trade, you know. And so with the RV stuff, how long do those businesses take to trade? Once you identify a buyer?

[Jason Haugen]

Usually it's three months, four months. Because a lot of the, like, licensing, a lot of the state stuff, a lot of the dealer's license, all that's all those things we ended up. It's kind of funny, we always bought and sold the dealerships February 1st. I don't know why. It was just mostly because the season is in the summer and so everybody wants to wait. They don't. Because you lose money in the winter. It's so cyclical. Right. And so you just like, the problem is not losing money in the winter. That's a given. It's not making enough in the summer to be able to survive the winter. And so buying one in the spring, then you're automatically cash flowing because it's a great. You're having a great summer at the start of the year, and then you can save up for the winter. So no one wants to buy a

[Rich Summers]

store in the winter, going into the winter. Yeah, yeah, yeah. That makes a lot of sense. So a lot to dive in there. And I want to, I want to circle back on the, the, the jet stuff and some of these learning lessons along the way. But how did you link up with. With Vince and. And tell me what you guys are doing today?

[Jason Haugen]

Um, really it was winding down. Like I was selling the final stores and kind of exiting and I had kind of stepped down and left it to a group and kind of just stayed in the background because it was just like I. I felt like my time had passed and I was not making any headway with the manufacturers. And, like, I'm okay, I'm going to step down, bring someone else in. They're going to run everything, and I'm pretty much going to exit. And right at that time is me and Vince went to a golf retreat. So that's how we connected. And honestly, it was like I had no idea what I was expecting. Went to this golf retreat in St. George, Utah, some beautiful courses down there, and him and I just connected, honestly over culture and leadership. I had a podcast called Culture Camp, still do, where I interviewed a bunch of. Bunch of people, like, Dan Martell's on my podcast, talking about culture and, like, leadership. And I did culture consulting and speaking all over about culture. And him and I talked about it, and he was like, no, I don't believe you. I don't think you can, like, you know, because he's. Vince comes from a very, like, corporate, like, bloody world. And I was like, no, like, you can do. So me and him said, it's like, what, like three or four?

[Vince McCollum]

Yeah, I mean, we. We probably talked for, like, I mean,

[Jason Haugen]

the Attorney General Utah, too. We were all talking at this golf event. At this golf event.

[Rich Summers]

Yeah.

[Jason Haugen]

And, yeah, we had to wake up too early for the golf the next day, which I don't even think we really went to sleep. But, yeah, we just, like, vibed over it and then found out we live, like, 10 minutes from each other, which I live, like, northern Utah, which nobody lives in northern Utah, and then found out he lives, like, 10 minutes from me. And so he came in the podcast or came in my studio. We did a podcast together and just kept vibing over culture and leadership, and kind of one thing led to another, and it was like he was leaving some stuff that he was doing. I was obviously trying to figure out what I wanted to do. We really felt like we vibed together really well and, like, wanted to be partners. And we tried, like, what, three or four different businesses.

[Vince McCollum]

Oh, yeah.

[Jason Haugen]

We started with accounting and failed miserably at accounting. We were like, oh, everybody needs accounting. And we had a really great way to do it.

[Rich Summers]

Yeah.

[Jason Haugen]

It didn't work.

[Vince McCollum]

No.

[Jason Haugen]

What was.

[Rich Summers]

What went wrong with the accounting business?

[Jason Haugen]

All of it. We. We didn't know as much as we thought we needed to know. Yeah. And, like, just our. Our fulfillment on it wasn't what we thought it was.

[Vince McCollum]

Yeah. We. I mean, we didn't have a good product market fit. Our positioning was off. Our target audiences were off. So Then the messaging couldn't work. Like, I mean, it was just a domino effect that started from we think we have a good idea, but we didn't vet it probably as thoroughly as we, you know, should have. And so it was kind of doomed to fail from the get go. But because it was a commodity that we really strongly believed everyone needed, we still pushed forward, which was the learning mistake in that. But, you know, we learned and we pivoted and moved on.

[Rich Summers]

I feel like with accounting today, and I'm good friends with Carlos and Dennis, he invests with us too. But I think like the tax strategy part to where it's like, you know, you're working with business owners that are high income, high net worth, they have a tax problem, and then just advising them on what they should be doing, alternative asset classes and all that sort of stuff where it's not a ton of deliverables, but you're giving them huge value. I think there's a lot of money in that.

[Jason Haugen]

That aspect of that was nothing. We were doing more like, say, bookkeeping accounting.

[Rich Summers]

Okay, okay, yeah.

[Jason Haugen]

And like almost fractional cfo, but like, yeah, we just couldn't. And honestly, I don't really think it was either of our passions and our superpower. And so we're like, oh, we can do this. We see a needle. We talked. A lot of people, they're like, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. And they started asking us questions. They were like, bro, this is over our head. Like, I don't really know what to tell them. Like, I know what I would do, but like, I don't know what you're legally supposed to do. You know, all kinds of. So we ended up kind of squashing that and figured out we really just like, we're really, really, really good at like rev ops, like cgo, CRO, cmo. And so that's kind of like the start of like we hit when we bought a couple different businesses and we're like, hey, like, what we're doing for these businesses, we can do for other people in our internal businesses and everything. So that's kind of just. We really just started to focus internally and then help those businesses grow. And then it kind of just morphed into what we have now.

[Rich Summers]

Yeah. I'm curious, when you guys decided to shut down the accounting biz and pivot to something else, how long do you guys go, go down that, that rabbit hole before you realize, you know what we're going to, we're going to make a pivot and completely go a different direction?

[Vince McCollum]

I Mean, we. It didn't take us that long.

[Rich Summers]

Like.

[Vince McCollum]

Like, to be fair, like, maybe a couple months tops. Like, we. We identified it pretty early and kind of with what Jason's saying, like, we had made some other acquisitions. The Wedge Golf Company, you know, being our entrance in the.

[Rich Summers]

Around the same time where we wanted.

[Jason Haugen]

At the same time. Yeah, yeah.

[Vince McCollum]

We wanted to create and launch businesses at the time, so that's where the accounting came from. But we're operating the ones that we've acquired super well. And we thought, well, that's our bread and butter. He's a longtime operator. I'm a very long time cmo. Like, if we combine our superpowers, why can't we do that for the portfolio companies we have? And instead of trying to branch out, let's just dive down deeper.

[Rich Summers]

Yeah. Double down on whatever is already working. Yeah. Yeah. So, okay, so then now you guys got this. Blackjack Ventures as this golf, you know, marketing firm. What are you guys doing exactly for clients in the marketplace today?

[Jason Haugen]

I mean, anything and everything. Go. Like, the golf industry is so big, but it's so small. And so we acquired Wedge Golf company Which Wedge Golf Company is probably the number one golf content marketing. Like, so they were just content when we bought them. And then Vince is like, no, we, like, he. He's had this agency forever, and he's like, no, we gotta merge the stickiness of, like, performance marketing with content. Or else people, like, they had a hard time keeping clients. And so we identified that very early on, and they. And they did a great job before. Like, nothing against them. Like, the super awesome, like, everybody still works there that, you know, when we acquired them, but they're. They were very good at, like, handing over content. Very great stuff. Like, we've had stuff on, you know, espn, like commercials and Golf Golf, you know, the Golf Channel commercials. But they're like that. Then it ended there, and that's when Vince brought really. Performance marketing was like, no, we really got to make this sticky. And so then we started working and helping grow and scale golf brands. And so instead of just working with the big, big, huge guys, which we still do, like PGA Tour, live Tour, like, anybody and everybody in golf. Taylor made Mizuno, like, all these guys. Then we started really focusing on other brands that just helped them grow and scale and even with the other guys, like, help them grow and scale their. Their marketing and. And help them identify what they're doing.

[Rich Summers]

Yeah, yeah. You guys have worked with some pro golfers. Sergio Garcia, Luke Donald, to name a few.

[Jason Haugen]

What.

[Rich Summers]

What Are, like, some of the key things you guys have learned from. From working around some of these pros.

[Jason Haugen]

Oh, Vince was just in Austin with Sergio, so.

[Rich Summers]

Really?

[Jason Haugen]

Yeah. I don't know why I don't ever get invited to trips, but really, I don't ever go.

[Rich Summers]

Being the private jet background, I would imagine you'd be the first one to be like, my.

[Jason Haugen]

I have. I think I'm just so over traveling that I'm just like, you guys can go.

[Rich Summers]

Yeah, yeah, yeah. I feel you. Your wife probably appreciates that, too.

[Jason Haugen]

Yeah. And, like, my. Unfortunately, my wife got diagnosed with cancer shortly after I. I sold the stores.

[Rich Summers]

I'm sorry to hear that.

[Jason Haugen]

No, she's good now, but really, like, super blessing for Vince. Like, shout out to Vince. Like, he took reins on everything so I could go focus with her and, like, her treatments and the chemo was just insane. And it was like five days in a row every other week. So it was just very hard for her. And so. But, like, busting in disguise. Like, I exited everything got. Got in this with Vince, and then I could just kind of work from. I mean, like, when she's getting her infusions, work from there, but really just help, like, my focus with her, which is something. Honestly, like, I didn't really do a great job before then, but it really made me, like, realize, like, no, like, I actually love my wife, love being with her, and very grateful of, like, oh, my gosh, you have cancer.

[Rich Summers]

Like.

[Jason Haugen]

Like, time is valuable. So, yeah, shout out to Vince for kind of taking. For, like, for nine months of chemo. Because it sucked.

[Rich Summers]

Yeah, No, I can imagine.

[Jason Haugen]

Yeah.

[Rich Summers]

So, Vince, you were with Sergio Garcia not too long ago. What. What's. What's the number one thing that you learned being around him?

[Vince McCollum]

So. So the Wedge Golf Company. I mean, it's not. Not just me and Sergio. I mean, we're around a lot of athletes, celebrity athletes, too, and then professional golfers. Like, there's a big mix. It all kind of boils down. And I don't know why we're shocked every single time, but we're shocked every single time that they're just dudes. They just happen to be really mechanically sound at this golf swing. Right. Outside of that, like, they're joking with us. I mean, they still joke the same ways that other guys would joke in the locker room. Like, it's still kind of that. And if you just bring those kind of vibes, they start to loosen up and you start to really hit it off. Right. But on the flip side, too, like, they're just as vulnerable to emotion as everyone else. So, like, they woke up and just didn't have a great day. They'll show up to the shoot not in a great mood. And so it's not anything you can do. Try to bring down that barrier. Like, it's, it's kind of screwed, right? What's interesting about, like, just the, just the example with Sergio is I brought that up to him. Like, hey, we were just with another professional golfer last week. His vibes were terrible. He was not great to work with. And he was just like, you know what? I think it's all about your upbringing. He's like, you gotta be really installed in this as a kid. Like, you're gonna have to put in these four hours. You're contractually obligated. You're gonna do with a good attitude or a bad attitude. That's your choice. And, you know, he kind of understood how to play the game from a relationship management, from an emotional management kind of perspective, which was really, really cool for us because that's something that we appreciate. Like, you have to get in front of the camera, we have to do these things or to checklist. I, you know, all these items we had to get done and we had to do in a short amount of time. And I know it's not going to be what you wished you were doing, right? But, like, we need to get through this. And so that's what that was. Kind of like the biggest takeaway is like, hey, man, if you show me a good time, like, I'm yours and we're going to do really cool stuff together. So that's the kind of vibes that we try to bring because we want to bring that out of you. And so that we just have a great time. The next time we sync up, like, it's going to be even better.

[Rich Summers]

I always feel like if you're, if you're a professional athlete and a lot of these athletes do a good job of this, I think LeBron does a really good job of this. But it's like, dude, like, why, why would you not want to be the best? Like, put your best foot forward energy wise? Because it's going to get you way more brand deals.

[Jason Haugen]

Right?

[Rich Summers]

You know what I'm saying?

[Jason Haugen]

Right?

[Rich Summers]

Even the stuff behind the scenes, working with these different brands, the marketing companies, the videographers, like, if you're a likable person, you're going to make 100x what you are versus if you, if you were a dick.

[Vince McCollum]

You know, I mean, to be, to be Fair with what you're saying. The guys that we work with, they have a ton of deals. There are guys with lesser deals that we don't necessarily work with, and they have the same kind of, like, notoriety and story behind them that they're not the best to work with. The ones that are usually the ones that have a sponsor for every tiny little thing. And there's a reason why.

[Rich Summers]

Yeah. Yeah. I had the. We had the Yin Yang twins come out to perform at one of our holiday parties. And we. We did a podcast at the holiday party. And these guys are like, weird as hell. Like, weird as hell. I remember during the party, my buddy Sean Coughlin, who kind of set up the whole thing, he's like, hey, they're here. Come back in the room and. And meet them. And it's my buddy Andrew White's house and said they're like, in the master bedroom, and I wanted to meet him before the podcast. And these guys can. Can't even stand up. They can barely talk. They're like, on codeine. But they're just like dicks, dude. They're just like, full on dicks. They're good at just coming out, performing, but they're just dicks. They're terrible to talk to. And I'm talking to them on the podcast and they're like, yeah, we got zero brand deals during their. Their time doing music just because they're not likable people. You know, I'm like, it's free to be nice. Like, why would you not want to brand yourself, you know, and make money?

[Jason Haugen]

Yeah, no, it's so true. Like, I. I think that now, especially the course of, like, with social media and how important all that stuff is and like, how your image and, like, how you carry yourself is super important. I think more people are sort of realizing it, but it's kind of funny because a lot of people that we work with, it's like, why. Why do you like how you are? Because you could make so much money, dude.

[Rich Summers]

I know.

[Jason Haugen]

Like, there's. I mean, we know a ton of NBA players, NFL players, that it's. It's a short career.

[Rich Summers]

It is even shorter.

[Jason Haugen]

Yeah. And like, how you are and how you carry yourself on the field and off the field during your time is going to kind of set you up for success. And a lot of the guys we know, like, like, I. When we talk a lot of culture and leadership, like, I'm not going to argue, like, but like, Antonio Brown, probably one of the better, best, you know, receivers of his time. Right? Well, where's he at? Right. Like. Like, he had a lot of problems on and off the field. No one's doing brand deals with him. No one wants to. I mean, he had like, a league and he didn't even end up paying his guys. Right. It's. It's crazy. And so it's just, it kind of comes down to, like, that's where, like, I start first. Like, culture and leadership is who you are as a person. Like that. That's where it matters the most to me. And that's why I think I, like, I mean, I have a. We have a lot of mutual friends, even though we never met. Like, I. I think that's why I've done well. And same with Vince. Like, Vince knows freaking everybody. Like, worked in the Bay Area forever. Like, as far as, like a corporate, like, there's a lot of like, corporate people. And I'm like, yeah, I didn't really play in that world. A lot of mine are like, more maybe influencers or like leadership people. But it's interesting to be like, who you are as a person and how you are is like, what attracts me, especially because I was in the RV business. Like, I had nothing that you. What can I do for you? Buy an rv? I don't really know. Just be friends, right? Be cool. And so I think that's where, like, I vibe with people. And there's some people that I'm like, man, I wish I would have never met them, you know? Yeah. But it's all right. I mean, yeah, you know, whatever happens, happens.

[Rich Summers]

I agree with you, man. And yeah, it's funny. So at this, this holiday party, do the podcast with the Yin Yang twins and, and these guys are all like, on coding, they can barely talk. And I remember, Oscar, you were there. I'm like, I. I didn't. I didn't think they were going to be able to perform because they're about to go do a performance and sure enough, as soon as the music, the lights come on, these guys, like, didn't even miss a beat, man. Yeah. Yeah. Like, you can tell these guys are used to doing that.

[Vince McCollum]

That's a rough muscle memory.

[Jason Haugen]

That's a rough life for sure.

[Rich Summers]

But. But it's sad cuz, you know, these guys, this is like, it's 10 years after their. Their music career has kind of been over and they're just performing at like, you know, house parties and clubs and like, and that sort of thing. But I always just remember thinking, I think we paid him like 15k to come out and perform and you know, they bring a whole entourage. They got, like, eight or nine people with them. They got a couple hotel rooms, and, like, literally, the 15k is gone and that. That one night. But I'm just like, it. It's sad that that's what it's come to for some of these guys, you know?

[Jason Haugen]

Yeah, no, it's like, I got to hang out one time with Neo and Trey Songz in Salt Lake, and, dude, they were like, Neo, one of the nicest human beings I think I've ever met in my life. Like, he talked to my wife for probably, like, 45 minutes about. She was pregnant, really, really pregnant at the time with my daughter Lola. And, like, he went and did this private concert and invited us to it and was, like, singing to, like, baby Lola while he's up there. And, I mean, then we met Trey, and Trey was super nice. I'm actually still really good friends with his brother and the CEO of all of his stuff. And he was just like, look, man, like, he was like, you know, Ms. Independent or in whatever the song is. Like, you know, it's 15 years old. He's like, I'm a nobody. Like, I'm just really, really grateful to be here, and, like, I. I just want to be that good guy and a shining light in people's lives right now and, like, just have a good time and, like, just was super, super nice. But there are some people that you're just like, what? Like, it's like, he still gets deals. Like, he still markets himself real well. He still carries himself real well. He's still very involved in the music industry. But there are some people, like, man, like, you got all the talent in the world, but you're just an ass.

[Rich Summers]

Yeah.

[Jason Haugen]

No one wants to be around you

[Rich Summers]

100%, but, yeah, there's a lot of players. I mean, look at Shaquille o'. Neal, you know, Michael Jordan. A lot of these guys that were, like, a thing of the past, they're still getting brand deals and all that sort of thing, so.

[Jason Haugen]

Super relevant.

[Rich Summers]

Super relevant.

[Jason Haugen]

They did, like, intentionally made yourself relevant. Some guys, I'm like, you have all the talent in the world, sometimes better than some of these guys. They're just very, very good at carrying themselves and, you know, like, understanding that, like, as bad as it sounds, but, like, you are a business, and so you can carry yourself and you can become very, very wealthy outside of what you're doing. But a lot of guys just live and die by. Maybe there's their game paycheck, and that's all that matters. And they want to go look cool on social media, but there's really nothing else. Nothing else there.

[Rich Summers]

Yeah, and I think like today's age with the athletes, it's shifted with social media. And so it really makes you realize, like, I'm not an athlete, but, like, if I was an athlete, it's like, it makes you realize, like, you really gotta maximize your potential on social media while you have the attention. Because like you said, like an injury, the shelf life is, is so short. I've had on like three NFL pro bowlers now, and one of them, Golden Tate.

[Jason Haugen]

The dude.

[Rich Summers]

The dude retired in like young 30s, like 32, 33. And it's like, dude, that's so young. You know, especially even a wide receiver, running backs that's even shorter. But it's like, dude, you got to maximize your, your potential while you have that attention.

[Jason Haugen]

Absolutely.

[Rich Summers]

You know, hey, guys, real quick. If you are getting value from this show, it would mean the world to me if you take two seconds and drop a five star review on Apple podcasts or Spotify, that one small, simple action is the only way this podcast grows. And more importantly, it might help another entrepreneur or real estate investor find exactly what they need. I read them, I appreciate them. All right, now back to the show. So tell me with.

[Jason Haugen]

With the.

[Rich Summers]

You mentioned you guys implemented a sticky element to the marketing to this golf biz that you guys, you guys acquired.

[Jason Haugen]

What.

[Rich Summers]

What is that? That sticky element that you guys implemented, Vince?

[Vince McCollum]

Yeah, it's data. It's data.

[Rich Summers]

Okay, what do you mean when you say that?

[Vince McCollum]

I mean, I think everyone knows the marketing game. A lot of business owners understand marketing. I think the big difference is in two parts. One is people forget that marketing is an investment. They look at marketing as a savior, and by that time, it's too late. Like, marketing's not gonna come save you. It has to be done the right way. But in order to do it the right way, the second part is the data, right? So the smarter the data that you have, the smarter the marketing that you can perform. And it seems like it's common sense, like, yeah, okay, I get that, but how? It's like, it's like today, where I'm sure you've had a lot of conversations about AI. Everyone says the same thing, like, we gotta use AI. You get left behind. Yeah, but how do I use it? Like, give me the actual application, the process. So for us, our data, I mean, there's, there's a lot of concepts out there and how to do, like, lead generation. Grab contents and con contacts and records and things of that nature. But, like, no one's talking about digital fingerprinting. No one's talking about active shoppers. Everyone's talking about still old school. Scraping databases. Like, that doesn't work like today's world. You have a real live service or product that you need to get out there and you get out to the right people. How. So that's what we've done. We've done is. Is over time. Like now we grew the marketing agency so we have content address, we have performance marketing address. And the missing piece was data.

[Rich Summers]

Okay. Okay. Yeah, that's. That's pretty interesting. And then how are you guys acquiring new clients? Typically, like in the golf arena, is it doing a lot of these golf events, going to do the tours and all that sort of stuff?

[Jason Haugen]

A lot of it's colder outreach, but a lot of it is, I would say some. The smaller brands, gold outreach. The bigger brands call us. I mean, it's just like, when we very first acquired the company, I wanted to change the name because it's called Wedge Golf Company. Everybody thinks we make wedges.

[Rich Summers]

Yeah, we don't. I would have thought that too.

[Jason Haugen]

We do own part of a golf club manufacturer, but that's separate. But Wedge Golf company itself, like, we're golf content, right? And so I remember telling Vince, like, dude, we have to change the name. And so, right. Shortly after we bought the company, Vince went to the PGA show. Of course, I didn't go, but it's the largest conference, like over a million square feet of booths. Like, it's the largest golf conference in. In the world. Right? And he was like, dude, everybody and every executive and every brand new wedge golf company is like, oh, it's the wedge boys. Oh, it's the wedge boys. And he literally text me, he's like, we are not.

[Vince McCollum]

Yeah, we're walking up and down, like, these convention centers that, like, it feels like you're walking miles upon miles upon mile. It takes days to go through it. And you have executives at Callaway and guys at Trune just coming up and damping up the wedge boys. And I'm like, the wedge boys from Salt Lake? Like, the wedge boy. Like, you know, it was super, super validating because we wanted to make a bigger splash in golf. We want to be involved in golf. Just, just. But is this the right company? And then watching them get that kind of love in a global show was. That was like the true testament of, like, this is the right thing.

[Rich Summers]

What's the name of this global show and, and what do they do there?

[Jason Haugen]

So it's the PGA show, and pretty much every brand, it's a buy. Well, I mean, you would know more than me. I've never been there.

[Vince McCollum]

Yeah, I mean the PGA show, it's, it's the entire world of golf.

[Rich Summers]

Okay.

[Jason Haugen]

Just like literally European companies.

[Vince McCollum]

Yeah, Everyone, everyone goes to Orlando. So Orlando, Florida, every year they do it in two parts. There's the big Orange County Convention Center. That's everyone has their boost, whether you're golf direct or indirect into golf, like, you know, edibles or drinks hydration, like whatever.

[Jason Haugen]

Right.

[Vince McCollum]

Like that. And then the other half is what they call demo day. And so that's where your club manufacturer stuff. So they all set up this massive donut of like a driving range. And then you go hit clubs and you check out range finders and like, if you're a player in golf, you're there. If you're a player trying to be a player in golf, you're there like everything in between. So it doesn't matter if you're a Titleist or the brand new startup that's going to launch in three months and you're just there to prep and market research, you are there. So we get contracts from that and, and to be fair, like to answer your question from earlier, it's like we do some outbound, but if you just do business the right way and do it a high quality, people talk about it. So we have people knocking down our door to say, hey, can you do this? Yes, of course. Right. And it's because of our, our quality of work. Like it speaks for itself. And so a lot of that is just word of mouth.

[Rich Summers]

Yeah, absolutely. I know there's a lot of courses out there in the golf game. Some of them are very prestigious. You guys have been to a lot of them. What are the top golf courses that you guys have played at, been a part of?

[Jason Haugen]

I mean, for me personally, I think the best one I've. I mean, right down here in San Diego in Torrey Pines.

[Rich Summers]

Sick ocean view.

[Jason Haugen]

Yeah, we're, I think we're playing. We work our team. Again, not us, but our team's been everywhere you can imagine. And we were just at Pebble Beach a few weeks ago with TaylorMade and, and Trune. But I think we're going back there.

[Vince McCollum]

Yeah, I mean, they just came back two weeks ago from Pebbles, Spyglass and Spanish Hill.

[Jason Haugen]

Spanish? Yeah, Spanish something.

[Rich Summers]

What are considered like the top five, like golf courses in the States.

[Jason Haugen]

Oh, man, it's, it's very Subjective, obviously. Augusta is probably number one. Well, up there, Pinehurst would probably be.

[Vince McCollum]

Yeah, play Pine.

[Jason Haugen]

Yeah, you play Pinehurst. Pebble beach is a great one.

[Vince McCollum]

Beth Page in New York might be one.

[Jason Haugen]

I mean, it's, it's very, it's very, very subjective. It's kind of dramatic in the Gulf.

[Rich Summers]

Where would Torrey Pines fall in that, that list?

[Jason Haugen]

I think they're. Well, they're number two public course in this state or really number one or number one public course in the state.

[Rich Summers]

In California.

[Jason Haugen]

Yeah.

[Rich Summers]

Okay.

[Vince McCollum]

Yeah.

[Jason Haugen]

But nationally, it wouldn't be on their, their top five. Top ten.

[Rich Summers]

Really?

[Jason Haugen]

Yeah, because they're public course. Right. Most of the courses that are paid in the PGA Tour are private clubs,

[Rich Summers]

so you have to be a member to. Yeah. Or, or be invited by a member. Right, exactly. Got it.

[Jason Haugen]

Yeah. It's so interesting. Like Torrey Pines is so prestigious, but it's not that expensive and it's like very accessible, which is just odd because it's not a really a world that like most like. I think that's why it's played so much is because it's very easy to get to. Pebble beach isn't bad. Like it's a stay in play. A lot of these courses are staying play, but it's like Augusta is the one that like a lot of tour players can't even play. Like, if you don't get invited, you're not playing. If you're not a member, you're not playing. Like, it's very, very, very hard, difficult to get on. Like, I'm actually playing in a tournament supposedly soon that if I win top four, I get to go play Augustus so damn.

[Rich Summers]

Well, I didn't know. I didn't know you're a player, bro.

[Jason Haugen]

Yeah, no, I, I play a lot of golf.

[Rich Summers]

Okay.

[Jason Haugen]

Played since I was little. I Championship damn. Shout out to my school.

[Rich Summers]

But okay.

[Jason Haugen]

Yeah, I've been taking it super serious. Tony Finel's brother Gipper has been my coach and so been. Been golfing with him and just really trying to take it more serious because it's, it's, it's so weird. Like golf is such an interesting sport that like if you're good at golf and you go like, keep up with a very wealthy person, like a business owner or you beat him, they always want to play with you. Like they automatically like. And it sounds very weird, but like if you're good at golf, they automatically just want to do business with you and think that you're good at everything else. It's very, very Strange. So, like, that's where I've kind of made it my mission to. To be good at golf. Where you're golfing with people or people like, oh, like, I really want to golf with you more. We should go here, we should go there, get invited all around the place. Like, all over the place. Like, that's how we're going to pebble is we're getting invited to go down there. The guy that lives on the course. And so, yeah, I mean, it's just. It's. It's interesting how that plays a factor which you never think it would, but.

[Rich Summers]

What percentage of golfers do you think are business owners?

[Jason Haugen]

I would say a large percent. Yeah.

[Vince McCollum]

Almost all of them.

[Rich Summers]

Really?

[Vince McCollum]

Yeah.

[Rich Summers]

Why do you guys think that is?

[Vince McCollum]

They invest in it. I mean, they may not own it outright, but they heavily invest. I mean, they want to be involved and because they also want creative control. So we've seen that a lot. I mean, we were working on a deal with the number one golfer some months ago in the world, and he wanted a brand deal because all the other guys that were worse than him were getting brand deals in this one space and he felt left out. So he was like, I'll fork over whatever money just so I don't get left out. Like, it's just kind of. Even that mentality happens too. So, like, it's wild.

[Rich Summers]

Yeah. It's interesting. Maybe it's because it takes time to play golf, and if you have a 9 to 5, it's not really going to be the time.

[Jason Haugen]

I think it's great with sales. I think, honestly, like, you know, business is all about relationships.

[Rich Summers]

Yeah, 100%.

[Jason Haugen]

There's really nothing else you can do for four or five hours. Five hours nowadays, because courses are so packed, but that you can get that one on one time. You know, we were just out here golfing. One of the. With the CEO maybe like maybe two months ago, a month and a half ago. I think I told you. I was like, oh, yeah, I'm actually going to San Diego tomorrow. But we're with the. It's one of the top five biggest companies in golf. We're golfing the CEO as well as one of the largest music industry guys in the world. And we brought them together. And then it was. Me and Vince run a foursome and like, you don't generally get that, like, there's no other situation.

[Rich Summers]

One on one access for five hours, like just chatting.

[Jason Haugen]

It's almost kind of like a cheat code of the podcast. I'll be my podcast and Then I get to get to interview them and, like, learn from them for an hour. Right. That's what I love about my podcast. But, like, with golf, it's like, yeah, I'll golf with you. I'll do this. We'll go here. Like, oh, you can get on that course. Yeah, I'm with you. Like, it's. It. And they, like, we created some really cool, like, sounds weird. Like, magic from that, you know, from that day. Like, so good that, like, the CEO of the company was only supposed to golf nine holes. We had such a good time. He canceled everything, like, golf the rest of the day with us and took us to dinner that night and was like, I just want to keep hanging out with you guys. And it's like, we would have never. Like, he's one of the, like, an untouchable CEO of a company. Like, and we were with him for, like, eight hours of the day. It was just. It was super cool.

[Rich Summers]

Yeah. Yeah.

[Vince McCollum]

Believe it or not, we're a good time.

[Rich Summers]

Yeah, No, I can imagine. I can imagine. You guys are. You guys are getting me excited. I might want to get into the golf game a little bit.

[Jason Haugen]

Let us know, man.

[Vince McCollum]

You should.

[Rich Summers]

Yeah, I. For me, it's a time thing. Cause I'm like, if I do anything, I want to be good at it. There was a period where I was taking some lessons. This is, like, I want to say 20, 21 ish. And I was taking lessons once a week and just going to the range with. With my coach, and he was like, hey, like, in a little bit, we'll. We'll start going on the course. We'll do nine. I'll go with you. And I was starting to, like, see the results, and I was the improvement, and. And I was liking it. And then I took a trip, traveled to Europe for a little bit, and I just, like, fell off. And I just never rescheduled the lessons. I think I still have some that I paid for.

[Jason Haugen]

Really.

[Rich Summers]

And I just haven't played since. Dude, people invite me all the time.

[Jason Haugen]

Even LeBron, man. You see LeBron's just getting into it, right? Like. Like, Steph is so good that if he. If he left the NBA, he could get on tour.

[Rich Summers]

You think so?

[Jason Haugen]

Oh, he's unreal.

[Rich Summers]

Like, damn, he's legit. What does he shoot?

[Jason Haugen]

I mean, he's scratch golfer for sure, so he's around par.

[Rich Summers]

Yeah.

[Jason Haugen]

Yeah. Tony Romo actually has been trying to get on, like, some tour events, and, like, it's just. It's a game you can play forever. And it's kind of funny because, like, Kevin Hart's now getting super into it. Like, he now all of his social media, a lot of it is towards golf. LeBron same thing. A lot of it's towards golf. Like, LeBron actually just did one of the, like, they're bringing back the OG like Nike logo of the original Golf brand. And he just did a huge thing, a huge commercial like him golfing. And it's just like, LeBron Golf. Like what? And it's just, it's becoming so mainstream right now. And I think that a lot of, like, people are realizing what it really can, like, do for you as business. And like, the relationship. Like, I'm even seeing like, Ryan Pineda's doing his like, like the little club 19m nighttime. Like, he's like, a lot of people are going that way because it's just if it's something where it's not a boardroom sense, where it's like, oh, I'm like, it's just a bunch of guys or girl. Like, it's a bunch of people getting out there and having a great time, like, course and just, you know, getting relationships.

[Vince McCollum]

I'm not great at golf by any means. Like, I'm getting better 100% all the time, enough to where I can hold my own. Like, seven times out of ten, I'm doing business on the course. Like, it's the new resume builder piece. Like, it really, really is. Like, I mean, we're talking shop. We're intimately, you know, connected to each other. We're sitting, you know, leg to leg in a. In a cart for four hours. Like, and what else are you going to talk about? So you get to know them personally. You got to see if you want to do business with them versus need to do business with them. And then if starts to work out, then you can, you know, bring up how you're going to do it. Next steps when you. Before you leave that course. Like I would say just off the top of my head, without thinking too much about it, probably half of our business has come or been sealed on the golf course. So, like, it's 100% like a work thing too.

[Rich Summers]

Yeah. I'm curious if you wanted to be good, someone like myself. Right. And if you wanted to be decent, like respectable. How much should one be expected to play throughout a week? This is like practicing at the range and then going out and playing around. Or two. How much, how many times a week do you think that you need to do?

[Vince McCollum]

At least three.

[Jason Haugen]

Yeah, at least. At least three. Times like, I. I don't know. Like, I. Like, yeah. I mean, probably at least three, like,

[Rich Summers]

starting out, like, when you say three, what is that? Is that maybe. Is that two times?

[Vince McCollum]

I'd probably at least play around and. And one or two rain sessions.

[Jason Haugen]

Like golf sim. Like, golf. Like, yeah, we're big into the golf sim world. And so, like, that's. I mean, even Steph said that that's how he got so good, is he put a golf simulator in his house and got a coach and they just. He plays every day. Right. Just repetition. And so, I mean, that's like, we've actually thought about in our office, like, building a golf simulator. And one, because we could do shoots at it. And two, we just. We love golf, right? And it's just a good time. But. Yeah, I mean, it's something that, like, you know, if you want to be good, you put a lot of time towards it. But a lot of people, you know, can go out weekend warriors and go shoot a decent round and just have a good time. Like, and that's what we. Like we always said the. Like, I'm not bad, but like, we always said, the precedent, like, hey, this is for vibes. Like, we're just here to have a good time. If you're going to be an ass about this, like, that's not what this is about. Right. And most people are like, oh, thank you. Like, let's go have a good time.

[Rich Summers]

Yeah. You tell people that right when you get to the chorus.

[Vince McCollum]

Absolutely.

[Rich Summers]

Yeah.

[Jason Haugen]

Yeah. What.

[Rich Summers]

How do you frame it?

[Jason Haugen]

Just like, hey, like, you know, hey, we're out here. Just have a good time. Right? Like, hey, yeah, like.

[Vince McCollum]

But also, like, we bust out a speaker, too.

[Jason Haugen]

Yeah. We bust out like, we're having a good time. So we're.

[Vince McCollum]

We're about to play music and that's when we set that we're partners with

[Jason Haugen]

a cigar brand, so pop out cigars, you know, get some good drinks.

[Rich Summers]

Yeah. What do you guys like to drink on the course?

[Jason Haugen]

I have my swinging juice, man. Whiskey sours. I love whiskey sour.

[Rich Summers]

Okay.

[Jason Haugen]

My swinging juice.

[Rich Summers]

But why do you call it your.

[Jason Haugen]

Your swinging juice gets you feeling loose, man. The loser you are, the more you

[Rich Summers]

feel good, you play better when you're

[Jason Haugen]

loose A little bit. Yeah. Some. Sometimes, like, there comes a point where you just play worse because you're so buzzed you can't walk straight.

[Rich Summers]

But, you know, but a little. A little buzz takes the edge off.

[Jason Haugen]

Yeah, yeah, yeah, for sure. Because it's a lot of. It's kind of nerve Wracking, especially playing with like some of the CEOs and executives we play with is like, I don't want to suck, I don't want to suck, I don't suck. But then you just find out like, everybody's there to have a good time.

[Rich Summers]

So what, what percentage of these guys that, that you guys get on the course with that are business owners are. Are like good scratch golfers?

[Jason Haugen]

I would say a lot of them.

[Rich Summers]

Like really?

[Jason Haugen]

I would say the majority of them.

[Vince McCollum]

Really?

[Jason Haugen]

Yeah.

[Rich Summers]

Damn.

[Jason Haugen]

Yeah. Like, I mean, even like Ryan Smith owns the Utah Jazz and Utah Mammoth Smith Entertainment Group. He huge golfer. Yeah, huge, huge golfer. I mean, that's how him and Dwayne Wade met. And now Dwayne Wade's a part of the Utah or owner of the Utah Jazz is golf.

[Vince McCollum]

But like, don't get it wrong. Like they didn't start that way. Like over the course of 20 years doing this for business, they got, they became that.

[Rich Summers]

Yeah.

[Vince McCollum]

So like you just got to start.

[Rich Summers]

Yeah. So Jason, you owned three private jets, man. Which, which jets did you own?

[Jason Haugen]

So at a Gulfstream G200, a Phenom 300 and a lot of BC12.

[Rich Summers]

And what did you do with all three of them?

[Jason Haugen]

The Goldstream was designed for charter. We bought it for charter. We actually bought it from Antonio Banderas, the Zoro.

[Rich Summers]

Really?

[Jason Haugen]

Yeah. So everything in the whole plane said AB Everywhere, silverware, the. The tail of the plane said ab.

[Rich Summers]

And that was your personal one for personal use?

[Jason Haugen]

That one was. We bought it for charter.

[Rich Summers]

Okay. How many seats did it have?

[Jason Haugen]

That one only had eight seats. Cuz it was designed to fly back to his house in Spain.

[Rich Summers]

Okay.

[Jason Haugen]

And so it had basically four beds. So like the eight sat together and they would, they would like basically lock in the chairs and you could have four beds.

[Rich Summers]

Okay. And how many hours could that thing fly without refueling?

[Jason Haugen]

I mean, it could fly from Salt Lake to Hawaii non stop for a half hour, six hours. Yeah. So it was, it was certified to go across the, the pond, extended, arrange extended range and it had.

[Rich Summers]

You could go to Europe.

[Jason Haugen]

Yep, yep. And that. So that's why he had a design to go from his house in LA to his house.

[Rich Summers]

And that's why you got the beds.

[Jason Haugen]

Yeah.

[Rich Summers]

Okay, so.

[Jason Haugen]

And the phenom could go anywhere in the United States easily. It couldn't go to Hawaii, but you know, never really.

[Rich Summers]

Yeah. How many seats the phenom have?

[Jason Haugen]

The phenom had six seats. And then we bought a Devon, which is a little couch, and that actually never got installed because it took like three years for Phenom to or Embraer to get that. Yeah, it never got installed.

[Rich Summers]

Damn.

[Jason Haugen]

But it. Dude, those freaking. A two person couch, almost $400,000.

[Rich Summers]

Wow.

[Jason Haugen]

Really ridiculous.

[Rich Summers]

Yeah.

[Jason Haugen]

And then the Pilates was eight seats.

[Rich Summers]

Pilates was eight seats. Okay.

[Jason Haugen]

So I used it like for the Pac 12 championship. University of Utah. We're big fans. I took both planes with my family down to. I had a kid plane and the adult plane took everybody down there.

[Rich Summers]

That's pretty cool.

[Jason Haugen]

And then.

[Rich Summers]

So the kids flew on the Pilatus.

[Jason Haugen]

Yeah, kids flew on the PS and then all the adults flew on the. The Phenom. And then right after the game just flying back. So super unique experience. Went to all the Rose bowls on a plane there and back. We. We use them a lot.

[Rich Summers]

And so Pilatus, that's a single engine turbo, right?

[Jason Haugen]

Yep.

[Rich Summers]

How much did you buy the pilot for that one?

[Jason Haugen]

We actually ended up leasing in it. It was the best deal ever.

[Rich Summers]

Really.

[Jason Haugen]

We just. Yeah, it was not very expensive. I think it was like 20 grand for basically a year.

[Rich Summers]

Damn.

[Jason Haugen]

That one was super good deal.

[Rich Summers]

I didn't know. I didn't know that leasing a. A plane was a thing.

[Jason Haugen]

Yeah, you can drive. Oh dude, it's the great. Like it's a. If you don't want a charter, it's. It's a cheaper hack of chartering. Like way cheaper hack of chartering because you can just lease blocks of hours. I would lease about 50 hours at a time and ended up being way cheaper than chartering because I could fly from Salt Lake to LA and back for about $1,200 in fuel on the Pilates, which is nothing. So I mean you have to pay your hourly rate, but you already paid it. So that one I loved. Flew that plane. Freaking everywhere. The Phenom. We. We. It was a four and a half million I think was the Phenom.

[Rich Summers]

Okay. Phenom was four and a half.

[Jason Haugen]

Yeah. And I think that the. The Gulf stream was 6.

[Rich Summers]

And how old was the Phenom? What year?

[Jason Haugen]

Phenom was a 2009 but it only had low hours. 400 hours on. We bought it from the UN. UAE's police force. Really? Yeah. So everything was in Arabic and faa.

[Vince McCollum]

We were.

[Jason Haugen]

We were swear we were getting all transferred over but it was English and Arabic. It's kind of funny. But yeah, we bought it from the UAE police.

[Rich Summers]

Okay. In the Phenom and the Gulf Stream you would charter both?

[Jason Haugen]

Nope, just the. So they're Part 91s which means you can't charter them. I think it's 185 or the Part 1 call now. It's been so long since. But yeah, so the. The 90 ones were just for personal use. And then the Gulf Stream was for full charter. We had a charter certificate. We could. We could lease that out or we could charter it out.

[Rich Summers]

And so how much did you buy the G Stream for? And what would that charter for?

[Jason Haugen]

It was 6 million. It would charter for about 5,000 an hour. 6,000 an hour?

[Rich Summers]

That includes fuel and everything?

[Jason Haugen]

Yeah.

[Rich Summers]

Okay. And you would get what, a pilot and a flight attendant?

[Jason Haugen]

Yep. So we had five pilots. We. We employed full time, and they would just kind of rotate on, you know, different basis. And I know we had a manager company kind of taken care of. That's the. Why we lost a little bit of money on it was the management company actually ended up being kind of fraud and ended up being. Yeah. Like, a good friend. Steve Harward, he owns Prime Corporate Systems. He got me into this.

[Rich Summers]

I know Steve.

[Jason Haugen]

Yeah.

[Rich Summers]

With Prime Corporate Services.

[Jason Haugen]

Freaking Steve. But now we both kind of got scammed. The same people.

[Rich Summers]

You guys were partners on the.

[Jason Haugen]

No, we. He had his own planes with the same management company. Really?

[Rich Summers]

What was the management company doing?

[Jason Haugen]

Basically just frauding it. Like BS numbers saying it was chartering when it wasn't. We had paid like a couple hundred thousand dollars in a. In a repair bill is actually sitting at Van Nuys airport getting some stuff done. And we went to sell it. It didn't. Did its inspection, came back, and it's like, hey, you need to get these things fixed. And it's like, no, we already wired the money to this management company. They were supposed to get it fixed, took the money and ran.

[Rich Summers]

Yeah.

[Jason Haugen]

So it ended up being.

[Rich Summers]

So they. They were basically, like, identifying like. Like, false maintenance items and repairs that needed to be done. And then they're like, hey, pay us well. We'll take care of it. And then they were just pocketing the money, and they would say, like, hey,

[Jason Haugen]

I got this company that, you know, wants to block all these hours out. Like, we can't fly the plane. And then the plane would just sit there not chartering, and then they go, like, it canceled. And it's like. It just was very dramatic.

[Rich Summers]

And what was. What were they to gain by blocking the hours?

[Jason Haugen]

Great question. I think that they had no idea what they were doing, even though they talked to Big Game and said they had all these. All done these things. And, like, they, Like, I don't feel like, us and Steve are stupid. Steve's like one of the greatest guys in the world. I actually knew Steve before he kind of was anybody. I just knew him as an accountant and I always kind of wondered like, how does this accountant have all these planes? But found out he owned a big company and they just, yeah, they just kind of frauded us out a bunch of stuff and it sucked, dude.

[Rich Summers]

I randomly ran into Steve and he showed up to one of my meetups. This is like a few months back, I was getting a haircut. I get a haircut at this spot over here in downtown San Diego every, every Friday and I'm getting a haircut and Steve walks in like, what are you doing out here, man? I'm like, you live in Arizona, don't you? And he's like, he's like, hey, I'm randomly in town for some like speaking engagement that's happening tomorrow. And I was like, dude, I gotta meet up tonight. Come out. And so he came out to the meetup and, and hung out. This is, I want to say it's like November last year.

[Jason Haugen]

Nice.

[Rich Summers]

Yeah.

[Jason Haugen]

Like I've known him forever. He actually lives in.

[Rich Summers]

I send him a lot of business with, with the Prime Corporate Services affiliate. I send them anytime I have someone or new investor, whoever it is, like looking at form llc. I'm like, hey, these guys out there,

[Jason Haugen]

he does a great, great, like he's the number one guy at what he does in the country. So he's been doing awesome.

[Rich Summers]

Yeah, I love it. And by the way, prime corporate services.com/rich summers, if you guys are looking to foreign manage llc, then make it Hands off Trust, all that sort of stuff. Okay, so the jet game, that's interesting, man. So you ended up selling these, these planes. But I'm curious, like, can you buy and charter a jet if you do it right and actually like make money or at least break even?

[Jason Haugen]

I don't think you can make money or break even. You don't think after, like there's a lot of people that say you can. I mean, I know hundred people who've chartered and I don't think that you can break completely even. I think it just mitigates your costs. Right? Like if you're going to, I mean to own an airplane, some of the planes you're going to be out two or three million dollars a year if it never flies. And that's with management come like that's with your insurance, management, hangar pilots, all that stuff. I think it just mitigates it unless you are Just burning that plane to pieces. And, like, it's chartering every second of every day, and then they break. Like, I just. It's not going to.

[Rich Summers]

Do you think it's. So if it's only going to offset some of your cost, do you think it's worth it to put all the miles and the engine hours and all the wear and tear? Because that's depreciation.

[Jason Haugen]

Right.

[Rich Summers]

When you go to resell.

[Vince McCollum]

Yeah.

[Jason Haugen]

I mean, you can depreciate it. The good thing about, like, you know, in the tax, you can depreciate it, you know, an airplane, 100%. But so, like, there's that. But it's really just mitigating your monthly costs. Right. Where maybe the plane ends up costing you 20 grand a month instead of 50 or whatever that may be. But it does burn up the plant like it uses the living crap.

[Rich Summers]

Yeah. And do you think all the wear and tear, additional engine hours, because when you go to resell it, that's gonna. That's gonna hit you in the resale value. Do you think all the wear and tears were worth there? We used to say, like, hey, like, don't buy a private jet unless you can afford to just have one and not have to charge it.

[Jason Haugen]

I think that if you, like, a good management company will say, hey, like, how much do you want to mitigate? And especially, like, it's an interesting. Because it's like the Airbnb thing. Right? Like, you don't buy an Airbnb to go use it all the time, because the point of it is to rent it out all the time. Right. And so, like, that's where the manager companies got to be like, hey, how many hours a month are you going to use this versus, like, the rest of it? Do you want it 100% chartering when you're not using it? Do you want it a little bit chartering to just mitigate some costs? And there's a sweet spot of how many hours a month that you want to run the plane, and it's different for every plane. And again, a good management company will kind of explain that to you, but it does put a lot of wear and tear in my. Like, it's insane how much it puts on it. I mean it. You really. And if you're on the flip side, like, it's really bad to let them sit there. Like, the more you let a plane sit there, the more it's going to start breaking down. They're made to be ran all the time.

[Rich Summers]

Same thing with the boat game.

[Jason Haugen]

Yeah. And so like there's that sweet spot of like, that's why people say if you're not going to fly, you know, if you're flying under two hours, don't buy a plane. You're flying over two hours. 200 hours maybe, right? 300 hours. Yeah. By your plane, you're going to be running that, that's going to be a healthy time of year. But around that 200 hour mark, it's okay, maybe I can charter this out, you know, see what I can do. But it's just, it's, it's a very saturated game and there's only a couple companies I think that do it really. Right. And there's also a lot of other ways that you can own an airplane by not owning the airplane. With fractional. There's a great company out of Utah, they have FBO is kind of all over the place called CB or now it's called Skyshare. My buddy Corey owns it. In hindsight, I should have done that because the cool part about it is if you wanted to get out and sell, you get all your investment back, like and you are actually on the title of the airplane. If you want to get out, they just give you your money back, which is just, it's, it's super cool. Like there's just other ways to do it.

[Rich Summers]

And so the, with the fractional you'd be like one of like eight owners.

[Jason Haugen]

Yeah, you can pick like between like a, a 16th and 8th, a quarter or a half or a full if you really wanted to them, but they were.

[Rich Summers]

And then you're. And then you can book it for X amount of.

[Jason Haugen]

Yeah, it's like, I think that the 16th is like 20 days a year. One of them, I think it's like 20, 40, 80 and like 160 or something like that days a year. But that's way better to do than if you're like. With me, like, I don't travel a lot. I, I was traveling a lot like at the time, but like now I just don't really travel a lot. So it really doesn't make any sense.

[Rich Summers]

Do you think there's a big discount to the fractional ownership versus just renting? Like when you go, I mean 5,000 an hour is not bad.

[Jason Haugen]

Again, you got to see how much you're going to use it. Right. Because you still have to pay a monthly management fee of say 5 to $10,000 a month. So if you're not gonna use that, then it probably just chartered, so. Or, or dry lease hours, which is a Whole different ball game.

[Rich Summers]

Yeah. Yeah. Cause I mean, shoot, if you're. If you're only going to fly a few times a year, I mean, you know, talking $5,000 an hour, and some of these flights might be short. That's not really that bad.

[Jason Haugen]

No, I mean, I like you could charter a plane from Salt Lake to Vegas. It depends on the charter company because sometimes they bill you an automatically minimum of two hours. But if you're flying from like here to Sandy, I mean, for ten grand, three or four times a year.

[Rich Summers]

Yeah.

[Jason Haugen]

One month of managing fees, you might

[Rich Summers]

as well just charter.

[Jason Haugen]

Might as well charter.

[Rich Summers]

Yeah, yeah, I hear you. What's the number one thing or what's the number one lesson that you've learned? Losing $20 million in one year?

[Jason Haugen]

I think just be more one financially sound and operationally sound and really like getting the right people in the right seats. How to. How does. You know a person? And I won't call. Call the person out and what position they were in, but, you know, they were in the wrong position for how big we were. And we made some bad financial decisions and it lost us a lot of money, you know, thinking that we had more money than we did and, you know, getting the. Getting waste. Like smart people, especially in like, the. Even the CFO seat who really understand how to operate a business from the CFO seat and being more financially sound and more systems and processes. Like, I wouldn't have gone so wide nine stores, because in my mind that was growth, but that was not growth. I should have went deeper and more, you know, more sound in the stores that I already had. I made more money with three stores than I ever did with nine.

[Rich Summers]

Damn.

[Jason Haugen]

Yeah. Way more money, like, way more money, like millions of dollars more with three stores than I did with nine.

[Rich Summers]

And what was the main reason those three stores performed so much better than the other six?

[Jason Haugen]

Focus. I mean, they're right in my backyard in Utah. I didn't have to have 14 corporate people. I didn't have to have an office building, didn't have to have an airplane, didn't have to have all these things to operate the stores out of state. And in hindsight, I wish that, because I used to talk crap to these guys that were in the industry for 20 years saying, you know, you've been injury 20 years, you only got one store, you're an idiot. And the guy's like, I'm over here freaking cracking off net profit, like, really high margins.

[Rich Summers]

Yeah.

[Jason Haugen]

And I'm playing. And you know, I'm playing on My yachts or planes. And you're over here struggling, like, you know, just all over the place with nine stores. I mean, I had 250 employees. And I really wish that I just would have went deep instead of thinking that I had to grow. Like, we made all of our money back, which is great. Like, we, we would buy stores what they thought they were getting, maybe two and a half to three times net profit. We don't do EBITDA in the, in this industry, but, you know, net profit. And we would usually make our money back in 10 months just from our systems and processes we did implement. But then you have. I had to grow the team. Regional guys, regional sales manager, regional finance, regional parts. All these different things would spread out. And I thought I was kind of economies of scale in a way, but it was actually spreading us thinner and thinner and thinner. And I remember flying back on the plane, I was just actually by myself, flying from Oregon. And like, you would think life is great, had fun cars, the plane, and, you know, I'm doing all these things. I remember just looking outside, like, thinking how miserable I was and how stressed out I was. And like, I, I, I kind of thought back to the most fun I ever had. And like, the least stress I ever had. It was when I had three stores. So I landed, literally was like, hey, we're selling all the stores out of, out of Utah. It's not fun anymore. It's costing us millions of dollars to operate the stores that are not making millions of dollars. Like, it's, it doesn't make sense.

[Rich Summers]

Yeah, so. So pick one thing or two things, no more than that, and just go all in on those one.

[Jason Haugen]

That's kind of like what we're doing now is like when Vince and I started. Sorry, Vince, I'm talking a lot. That's probably my gift to gab sucks. But, like, we started, we were doing way too much because we, we had a lot of experience doing a lot of different things. And we kind of really focused now on our golf, but it goes vertically with our marketing, our growth firm and data. And so that's where we've kind of like had to peel stuff back and say, hey, we're just going to focus on these few things. And we have like, other, like, I have retail stores and real estate and other things, but like, our main thing right now is iconic marketing deos with our product for the data and then growing our golf brand. But, you know, just kind of staying in our, in our lane. I barely had to learn to just stay in My lane because I want to do everything else. We. I think I can do everything else. But staying in my lane has been so important because I've been around a lot of billionaires, and they're like, you're an idiot for doing so many things.

[Rich Summers]

And I'm like, yeah, I'm learning the same thing as I grow. I always say, you know, if you're listening to this right now and you feel stuck or maybe you don't know your direction, I always say, like. Like, figure out the life you really want. Like the end game. And then. And then this game's about saying no to everything that isn't that Starting is about saying yes. Growing is about saying no. Because as you continue to grow, more and more opportunities come to you. More people want to partner, more people want to do business with you. And the opportunities get better as you grow. And so you have to, like, learn to say no to, like, better and better opportunities. And now I say no to opportunities that, like, two, three years ago, I'd have been like, all.

[Jason Haugen]

All about that.

[Rich Summers]

Yeah, let's freaking do it. But, like, I gotta say no now. It's a time thing. You gotta protect your time.

[Jason Haugen]

We get presented stuff every day.

[Rich Summers]

Yeah.

[Vince McCollum]

At least.

[Jason Haugen]

It's so hard to say no.

[Rich Summers]

Yeah.

[Jason Haugen]

And then. And. And sometimes, like, the. The worst part about it is, like, seeing them succeed. And like, I mean, there's one deal where we said no to. Because we didn't feel great about the founders. And from the outside, I don't know, because we don't have any contact with them, it looks like they're crushing it. Buying watches, flying private jets, and all this stuff. When we were with them, they had nothing. And we. But we ended up just saying. And then it's like. And we get frustrated of, like, why are. Why do we feel like we do business such the right way? And maybe we're like, are we too nice? Are we doing things right way? When a lot of people that we know that don't do it the right way are succeeding? But we had to have this little talk within ourselves of, like, in our fields of like, bro, that could be us. Like, this should be us. Like, all those relationships are our relationships. But we can look ourselves in the mirror and be confident in ourselves. And, like, we're doing things for the right reasons and the right way. It's okay. Like, it's just not our time. Right. I mean, we're doing really well, but, like, at that time, it's not the right time. Right. So you got to say no to some things. And it sucks, but it's going to be okay.

[Rich Summers]

Yeah. So, Vince, what's. What's the vision over the next, you know, 12 months for wedge golf, for Blackjack Ventures?

[Vince McCollum]

I mean, it's a lot about what Jason just said. It's going deeper in marketing. The things that we have going on, our core business models are all intimately connected, right? So from the data to the marketing to the content to the culture and leadership, I mean, they all go. They work hand in hand. So it is just diving deeper within those. Those models and. And making sure that we're not too spread out too thin. I mean, kind of back to what Jason said. Like, I do think that there's. I don't know, it's. It's like, it's hard to not be super nice in business and want to create relationships with everyone where you want to help everyone out, especially if that's your upbringing and that's your nature. The hardest part about saying no is. Is it's understanding why you're saying no and being cool with it and not saying no because you can't or don't want to. It's that you shouldn't for what you're trying to protect and what you're trying to build. And I think that that's kind of like what every entrepreneur learns at some point, sometimes harder or. Or the hard way than they should have to. And I think that's probably a little bit for us. But. But going. Going into the future, I mean, we have doubled, tripled down on data and marketing, and that's exactly what people need. People have been really excited about it that when we have use cases come back. So we just had a awesome meeting yesterday where people came back like, hey, the culture and leadership that you guys installed with us and consulted with us, like, we've tripled our operational output, and everyone is super happy. And we're like, that is so cool to hear. And then we went to another meeting, and the guy was just like, hey, all the marketing that you gave us, the playbooks, it's working. I've now doubled my business. We're like, this. This is incredible, right? Like, and this was like, hours after we sat in a room looking at each other like, God, what the hell? This sucks.

[Jason Haugen]

Right?

[Vince McCollum]

We made some mistakes and, like, flipped the script within, like, three hours.

[Jason Haugen]

Yeah. Wednesday was a crazy roller coaster. Screw. Yeah. Last Wednesday was a bad day. But then, yeah, like, we just had to pick ourselves back up and hearing that feedback, and it's like, we literally had to have that conversation. It was like we're doing things the right way. Like we're. Our people are seeing success and that's huge wins for us. Especially if we can give them playbooks and like answers and things that we didn't have or we can help them like get five years ahead of the head of you know what, where they're at super fast where they don't have to maybe make those costly mistakes or those, those things, you know, doing things the wrong way. Like that's, that's wins for us. Yeah, for sure.

[Rich Summers]

Who's the ideal avatar or client to

[Jason Haugen]

work with you guys for data? Any like it's. It's hard to say. Like anybody but everybody use. Can use data. Whether you're lead gen, whether you're a home services and you're like outbound, inbound, you know for marketing we have so many vast. Like Vince has helped build some of the largest home service companies as far as a CMO in, in the mountain West, a part of massive, massive exits to private equity groups. And you know, we do a lot of E commerce stuff. We crush it with E commerce. Like our e commerce specialists, like what Vince and I did is we went and gathered like the best guys in the industry we know and one of our guys actually helped the brand and their. All their E commerce. They do about 150 billion a year in revenue and he's built their E comm and so we brought him on our team and so that's where we're really focused right now is E comm home services. I know dealerships really, really well. But as far as the data, like anybody and everybody, like there is not a brand we have not had a meeting with and we're like we can't help you. Like our data follows around over 300 million people every day. Over 65 billion buying intentions and over 28,000 audiences. And like there's 75 different categories in each record. Like there's so much, it's so vast that that's why we like call ourselves more of a growth firm is like we meet with you and like where are your needs at? And then we help you grow and scale like through that.

[Rich Summers]

That's really good. Jason, Vince, I appreciate you guys coming on dropping so much game. Where can the folks get in touch with you if they want to learn more, take advantage of your offer? All that good stuff.

[Jason Haugen]

I'll say for me, Jason Haugen it's J A S O N and the H A U G E N on, on Instagram, LinkedIn too. I'm not as much on LinkedIn, but Culture Camp podcast, Iconic Marketing Co or BlockchainVentures.com and Vince, you can, yeah, you

[Vince McCollum]

can find me at Prince. Vince, a long time name, since I was a kid, heavily. I'm probably more apt to communicate with you on LinkedIn though. That's just kind of my background professionally. And then, yeah, IconicMarketing co. That's where we have now recently launched Dattos, which is our data offering. As far as Iconic goes, that's kind of where we're housing all of our.

[Rich Summers]

And how about this free data pixel for the audience?

[Vince McCollum]

Oh, yeah. So anyone who wants it and wants to just kind of drop that they heard it from you, we want to give you our pixel for free to put in your website and get the data yourself. Like, I'm a big believer in don't trust my word. Like, see it for yourself. So with that pixel, I mean, like get the data yourself, check it out, like verify it and then let's have.

[Rich Summers]

I love it. They are Jason Haugen and Vince McCollum. I appreciate you guys coming on. You make me want to get in the golf game. So maybe next time we link up, I'm gonna be playing some golf. I'm Rich Summers, listeners. Thanks for tuning in. We'll see you guys on the next one. PE.