From Ashes to Impact: How Monkey Wrench’s Community Commitment Fueled $25M Growth

Summary

Podcast Summary: To The Point - Home Services Podcast Episode: From Ashes to Impact: How Monkey Wrench’s Community Commitment Fueled $25M Growth
Release Date: April 22, 2025
Host/Author: RYNO Strategic Solutions

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Introduction

In this compelling episode of To The Point - Home Services Podcast, host Chris converses with Yosi, the founder and president of Monkey Wrench Plumbing, Heating, Air, and Electric. The discussion delves into Yosi's remarkable journey of scaling his business to an impressive $25 million in revenue, emphasizing community commitment, effective marketing strategies, and resilient leadership during crises.

Navigating Growth in a Competitive Market

Timestamp: [00:00]

Chris opens the discussion by probing Yosi about the strategies that enabled Monkey Wrench to scale amidst fierce competition from larger players. Yosi attributes their success to a steadfast commitment to their mission statement: "to provide an elevated service experience to our members and their homes" ([00:06]). He highlights that 74% of their business stems from existing clientele, underscoring the importance of nurturing and marketing to their current customer base. This focus on existing clients has been pivotal, especially during challenging times, allowing Monkey Wrench to consistently deliver value and exceed expectations.

Building Community and Leadership During Crisis

Timestamp: [11:11]

The conversation shifts to the impact of the Palisades fire on Monkey Wrench's operations. Yosi shares how the catastrophic event echoed the challenges faced during the COVID-19 pandemic, compelling him to adopt empathetic leadership ([12:09]). He recounts sending heartfelt, handwritten letters to customers expressing empathy and offering assistance, which received overwhelming positive responses. This initiative not only strengthened community ties but also reinforced Monkey Wrench's reputation as a compassionate and reliable service provider.

Yosi further elaborates on his role as a chaplain, describing his efforts to support first responders and affected families by providing essentials like donuts and coffee during the fires ([16:20]). This act of kindness exemplifies Monkey Wrench's commitment to uplifting the community beyond business interests.

Effective Marketing to Existing Clients

Timestamp: [23:26]

Yosi delves into Monkey Wrench’s multifaceted marketing approach focused on existing clients. He explains their comprehensive email campaigns that are personalized and signed by him, making customers feel personally connected ([25:04]). Additionally, they employ direct mail strategies with targeted coupons and segregate their customer base to tailor their outreach effectively. This strategic segmentation ensures that each customer group receives relevant and timely offers, enhancing engagement and loyalty.

Yosi emphasizes, "providing value is the most important thing that we can do to differentiate ourselves" ([21:09]). This customer-centric approach has been instrumental in maintaining high retention rates and driving substantial revenue from their established clientele.

Personal Branding and Its Impact

Timestamp: [39:13]

A significant portion of the discussion centers around personal branding. Yosi shares his journey of building a personal brand through LinkedIn and thoughtful content creation ([43:32]). By regularly posting insights and stories, he bridges the gap created by business growth, ensuring that customers remain familiar with the face behind Monkey Wrench. This strategy not only humanizes the brand but also fosters trust and relatability among clients.

Chris adds that personal branding imbues the business with personality, making it more appealing to customers who prefer engaging with people they can relate to ([43:28]). Yosi concurs, noting that personal branding is crucial for transforming customers from mere clients to loyal members of the Monkey Wrench community.

Training and Development for Excellence

Timestamp: [32:20]

Yosi highlights the importance of continuous training and development within Monkey Wrench. He details their comprehensive service system training, which includes weekly field sessions and monthly focus on different aspects of their service process ([32:20]). Recognizing that installers may lack communication skills, they introduced a boot camp to equip them with scripts and customer interaction techniques. This investment in their workforce ensures consistent service quality and enhances overall customer satisfaction.

Quote:
"Guys literally have come over to our general manager, Kevin, and have said to him things like, I like, thank you. I never knew what to say around this situation. Thank you for that. Thank you for the role playing." ([35:15])

Adapting to Industry Standards and Customer Expectations

Timestamp: [28:45]

Yosi recounts a customer interaction that highlighted the need to adapt to evolving customer expectations. An angry caller struggled with their automated phone prompt, leading Yosi to recognize the necessity of simplifying customer interactions ([28:45]). This incident reinforced his belief that "today’s unreasonable request is tomorrow’s industry standard" ([28:45]). By addressing such feedback proactively, Monkey Wrench ensures they remain aligned with customer needs and industry advancements.

Conclusion and Key Takeaways

Timestamp: [48:49]

As the conversation wraps up, both Chris and Chad commend Yosi for his leadership, innovative marketing strategies, and unwavering commitment to community and customer satisfaction. Yosi reflects on the knowledge gained from constantly engaging with industry resources like Rhino X and emphasizes the importance of adapting and leaning into challenges to drive growth.

Final Quote:
"Zero days." ([51:07]) – Yosi concludes with a powerful mantra, encapsulating his proactive and relentless approach to business.

Notable Quotes with Timestamps

• Yosi: "To provide an elevated service experience to our members and their homes." ([00:06])
• Yosi: "Providing value is the most important thing that we can do to differentiate ourselves." ([21:09])
• Yosi: "Today’s unreasonable request becomes tomorrow’s industry standard." ([28:45])
• Yosi: "Zero days." ([51:07])

Key Insights

1. Focus on Existing Clients: Prioritizing and cultivating relationships with existing customers can drive significant revenue and foster loyalty.
2. Empathetic Leadership: Demonstrating genuine care and support during crises builds trust and strengthens community bonds.
3. Personal Branding: Actively engaging in personal branding through platforms like LinkedIn enhances brand visibility and customer connection.
4. Continuous Training: Investing in employee development ensures consistent service quality and positions the business for long-term success.
5. Adaptability: Responding to customer feedback and evolving industry standards is crucial for sustained growth and competitiveness.

Conclusion

Yosi's journey with Monkey Wrench Plumbing, Heating, Air, and Electric serves as a testament to the power of community commitment, strategic marketing, and resilient leadership. By focusing on delivering exceptional value to existing clients, building a strong personal brand, and fostering a culture of continuous improvement, Monkey Wrench has successfully navigated competitive and challenging markets to achieve remarkable growth. This episode offers valuable lessons for home service companies aiming to scale and thrive in today's dynamic landscape.

Transcript

[Chris]

Like, what was it that you did that helped you scale in, like, that really challenging time competing against all these big players with big money.

[Yosi]

One thing that we do that I hammer every single week is our mission statement, and that's to provide an elevated service experience to our members and their homes. Today, 74% of our. Of our. Of our business is existing clientele. So we spend a lot of money on existing. On marketing to our existing clients. But that has been. That has been exceptionally helpful for us in this. In, during these times is marketing to our existing clientele. We've got thousands of customers out there, and we need to market to them and we need to show them. We need to prove to them the value that we're able to offer them, and then we're able to just hit it out of the park. This is to the Point a Rhino Experience voted one of the top home services, marketing and operations podcasts.

[Chris]

Cutting through the and getting to the point. Hey, what's up to the Point, listeners. It's your boy Chris. Excited for another episode with a good friend of ours on today, which is great. And that friend's not Chad, because, you know, he's one of my good friends. Chad, how you doing today, buddy?

[Chad]

I'm doing good. Sun is shining. We're rolling along.

[Chris]

I see that right out the window. You got some sunshine in the Indian, which was a lot better than what I flew out of last week when we were there.

[Chad]

Yeah, trust me. Yeah, it's. We've got a little rain here just a touch, so hopefully it's starting to subside, which would be nice.

[Chris]

Let me share a quick story with our listeners. I was in Indianapolis last week. We had a redbird roofing powwow, and I was trying to beat a tornado that was coming. A tornado, like severe thunderstorms. Right. I was the last flight out of Indianapolis airport, and I've never driven so fast taxiing to take off than I did out of Indy, which concerned me. I mean, I have five fly. I mean, I don't even know how I fly so much that it takes a lot to, like, rattle me. Top two scariest flights I've ever had in my entire life was that flight out of Indianapolis. And let me tell you why. When you take off at Indy, I. We weren't off the ground maybe three seconds, and the plane, like, tilt sideways, so not up and down, tilt sideways so, like, you could feel the air catching the airplane and taking off. And it did this for 45 straight minutes. People are, like, yelling on the plane. The lady Next to me is, like, grabbing my arm. I'm telling you, it was sketchy. Like, 45 minutes. Because you figured, Chad, we just, you know, that thing rolled in, like, maybe an hour and a half or so later after I left or whatever.

[Chad]

Yeah, you're rolling right through. It.

[Chris]

Flew straight through. That son of a. Like, I was. I was nervous, like, and I never get nervous, but it wasn't just, like, up and down turbulence. It was like the plane was back and forth and up and down. And like, you know, when people yell on the plane, it makes it a little bit weird, but it takes a lot to make somebody want to yell on a plane in front of all those people. You know what I mean? That's how sketchy it was. So 45 minutes. It's done. And then I asked the. The flight attendant if I could have a double Woodford, please. I'll take a double Woodford to calm my nerves. And then I landed in Vegas and went right to work. So. But it was a good trip out there. I was excited. You know, it's always fun to talk about, you know, the new business and the market and all the things that we need and the change and fun stuff. Just same thing that we do on this podcast. So I'm excited because we have Yossi on the podcast today too, which is not his first episode, which I thought it was. Damn it. So. But I'm excited to have him on here because I've known him for a little bit. He's. He's worked with us at Rhino. We've become friends. He's been to Rhino X. Like, we have a lot of crossover. And I just want to talk a little bit about his journey. He is out in Southern California. And it's interesting because a big part of your. A big part of Yossi's service area is the whole Palisades area that, you know, caught on fire. So I was always interested into how he's handling, like, that. That market. So we'll talk a little bit about that, but just also about what he's experienced being in Southern California, competing in seller in Southern California, some of his growth, some of his beliefs, and then whatever questions Chad comes up with. But Yosi is the founder and president of Monkey Wrench Plumbing, Heating air and electric. And electric. Since. God, I'm gonna get this wrong. 2007. Did I get that right? Seven or eight? Is it 2007? 2007, yes. Okay, perfect. So 2000, which is when we started Rhino, which was brickyard marketing back in the day. But I Think what I love most is your tagline. But I'm curious to see if this thing's going to change because you are plumbing, heating, air, and electric. It says you're number one in a number two business. That's great for plumbing. Man, I thought, that's a great tablet, but are you going to shift that thing around? Because you do so much more than that now.

[Yosi]

When we started electric, I was on a mission. I was like, you know what? We got to come up with a new tagline. And I asked several people, I asked friends, I asked relatives, I asked even employees, like, what do you think we should do? And the feedback that I got actually was, is, let's leave it. People love it. It's catchy and big deal. So that's our tagline. Our tagline is our tagline. And we now offer other services all.

[Chris]

I'll tell you what, I love a good joke, and I don't want to let Chad down and I don't want to let our listeners down. So we're going to go ahead and. And just segue straight into a few dad jokes that. Yosi, I think you'll appreciate being a dad.

[Yosi]

Okay.

[Chris]

Even though your boys are older now, they're still going to appreciate these, right?

[Yosi]

I love a good dad joke.

[Chris]

Hang on one second. And then. And then we have something extra special for our listeners.

[Chad]

Oh, great.

[Chris]

Okay, so dad joke number one. What time do ducks wake up? And by the way, feel free to answer if you know this. Yesy. What time do ducks wake up?

[Yosi]

I don't know the answer, but I just. I had an epiphany at the quack of dawn.

[Chris]

Bam. Winner. No. That's a win. He got it. Jeez. Okay. Hey, well done, well done. Next one. What are a ninja's favorite kind of shoe? What are a ninja's favorite kind of shoe? Chad, you wear these often? Sneakers. Wow. Hey.

[Yosi]

Wow.

[Chris]

Like that. Okay, this next one actually comes in from a listener. We have listener participation in the dad jokes now. And I would encourage you other listeners, if you have a good dad joke, please give it to us and we'll read them on the air. This one was pretty good. And this one is from my dear friend Rusty Cochran from We Care out in Southern California. You know who Rusty is? Yossi.

[Yosi]

Absolutely. And I. I would definitely take him as a dad Joe guy. So.

[Chris]

Oh, he's a million percent a dad joke. And. And so I thought this was. This was funny. So he actually has a lot of great jokes. He actually sent me a few of them, but I think I actually used one of these before on a previous episode, so narrowed it down to the last one. He said that every morning. Every morning he says, I announced to my family that I'm going. That I'm going jogging. Then I don't. It's a running joke. Hey, that's a Rusty Cochran joke for. Yeah, hey, listeners, you're better off for knowing that joke. You're welcome. Okay, we're gonna get into this thing now, okay, because the jokes are over. Chad's had enough. I can tell by the look on his face he's displeased with the options that we had today. But you can only be mad at me for two of them because one's not on me. So, hey. Yes, you. You got to attend Rhino X, right? So you were not too far off from it, which is, you know, I, it's, it's. That's a great event on its own. You got to participate in it. You got to experience all the things, you know, you've been to a couple. You also had another great experience at this past Rhino X. That was a surprise experience, and it happened in the elevator of the hotel. What was that experience?

[Yosi]

Wow, that was, that was. That really threw me off my game because, you know, it's funny is that I, I feel like in the, in, in, in my little bubble, in my little world, I meet celebrities all the time. And those celebrities are perhaps people from our industry and people that I, that I follow. And so you get to meet them. You don't really get to be nervous or anything. And then.

[Chris]

Who was it?

[Yosi]

Hold on. And then.

[Chris]

Oh, you're. Oh, you're building.

[Yosi]

I'm building it up. And then. And even living in la, I feel like I see celebrities all the time, but I also don't get nervous. I don't get starstruck. But I'm, I'm running back to my hotel room because I meal prepped. Sorry. It wasn't that the food wasn't good at Rhino X. I just, I meal. I'm on a meal prep journey. I meal prepped and I ran back to the hotel to go get my food. And I'm like, literally out of breath. And as I'm walking into the elevator, I see Mark Cuban and I'm like, hi, Mark. Hi. I'm like, well, I'm like, trying to, trying to get it out. Trying to just actually have a conversation. I was so starstruck. It was a pretty, pretty cool moment and I felt like I butchered the heck out of it because people Would probably pay millions to be in an elevator ride up and down with Mark Cuban. Because I got out of my elevator, got to my floor, got the things that I needed to came back, and sure enough, he was in the elevator going down as well. So I got an up and down with him, and I butchered the entire conversation and then didn't really get much out.

[Chris]

Well, it happens because you got starstruck. Isn't that cute?

[Yosi]

Yeah.

[Chris]

Well, you would made this even. Even more interesting. Meaning Mark Cuban is if your meal prep was. Was a Cuban.

[Yosi]

Oh.

[Chris]

Huh. Huh.

[Yosi]

Okay, I see where you.

[Chris]

Now I think about it, you probably wouldn't have meal prepped a Cuban. Hey. Okay, so you got like to double dip into the experience. So well done. You made the most of it. I know there's a few people that caught Cuban in the. In the hotel, which was pretty cool. Let's talk. Let's talk real quick just about this Palisades fire stuff. And I know we're off from that a little bit, but because it impacted your business. I just want to talk about this for a minute because you don't do new construction. And I. I'm curious. I mean, I think if I remember hearing this correctly, you're doing millions of revenue in. In that Palisades area. I mean, it's an affluent area, and now there's a lot of opportunity for new construction. Are you letting this suck you into the new construction world? Are you staying strong to your service, service replacement service, repair, service, installations? Are you trying to stay in service space?

[Yosi]

Absolutely. I'm going to stay. Absolutely. There's. We will not be a general contractor anytime soon. We're not getting anything that is going to the next shiny object for sure.

[Chris]

Not.

[Yosi]

There's no way.

[Chris]

Good.

[Chad]

Yosi. I guess I would ask, obviously, with that being such a, you know, such a catastrophic event, you know, not to compare catastrophes, but I feel like this may have been an opportunity where you could potentially take some lessons from COVID where something hits, you know, obviously Covid hit the entire, you know, world. This had just hit your kind of community. Like, how did you kind of navigate that from a leadership perspective? When something crazy like that happens and you've got to kind of rally the troops and like, hey, we're going to. We're going to be all right. But you probably on one. On the other side of the coin didn't know, hey, maybe we're not like just a lot of uncertainty around that. How do you navigate that?

[Yosi]

Great question. And just for the record, in 2024. We did 3.4 million in the Palisade zip code alone. That's a lot of revenue.

[Chris]

That's a lot of revenue.

[Yosi]

And what's crazy is that we talk about what you said when I started this business. Those customers have been our customers since 2007 that we've slowly built up. So initially this hit really, really hard and it brought back real Covid of COVID vibes. And when it, when it came to leadership, we. I felt like I was able to quickly snap into that. We had a few employees actually, because there was another fire as well. Besides from the, from the Palisades. There were a few. We had a few. A few of our employees that were actually displaced. So we tried to offer as much assistance as we can to those employees. We sent out a handwritten, or I should say a letter that was written really nicely to every single one of these customers, as well as to the entire Monkey Wrench clientele base and just really offering as much empathy as we possibly can. And I wrote in this letter that if there is something that you need, whatever it may be, we are here for you. And I felt and the. We received a tremendous amount of responses from this. People calling in emails, messages on social media, just saying thank you to us for sending out this letter, that it meant so much to them because the community of LA was really affected by this. This is not just the community of Pacific Palisades. We are as a community, as an entire city is drastically affected by this, by. By this. And it's complete devastation.

[Chad]

Well, what is it? What's like kind of the. I guess, what's it kind of feel like there? And I assume just like rebuild, like probably a lot of excavators and different stuff. I mean, what, what does it, I guess maybe give people a feel for? I mean, you watched it on the news and you're like, oh my God, like, what. What is going on? Like, what. What does it look like? What. What's the feel around there right now?

[Yosi]

The feel around there right now is. I mean, you. If you drive through it, which you can today is you see lots of chimneys, just chimneys everywhere. And you're like, wow, that's where the house was. You'll. So you'll see an empty lot with a chimney and there'll be debris, there'll be a lot of burnt cars, a lot of burnt stuff. So it's very evident that there was a fire there. And you feel a sense of sadness. You feel you. You feel it inside of you. And I mean, it's it would be impossible not to because everywhere you go. And then the saddest part is when you see homes that are actually fully standing right next to a burnt home or right across the street and it's completely intact. But this guy, this family has to live in that home, looking across the street at his neighbors being with complete devastation. But on the other hand, you have people that are very optimistic saying, we're ready, we're ready to build. We're. We're ready to go forward and just move on with life. Because this was a setback and that's it.

[Chris]

Yeah, I think in those situations, like we have no choice as leaders but to step up and be supportive. I think what you did was great. You was, you were an empathetic leader. It sounded like you came in with a little bit of a, of a servant leadership type of role. And, and I think that goes along a long way, you know, especially if you're genuine about it. You know what's crazy is I was in Hawaii for spring break and you guys remember the Lahaina fire that happened in Hawaii? It burnt off like that whole area. I stayed like right next to it. And it was the same thing Yosi, where it was like you had all these empty lots and there's a lot of temporary housing that's there now, like just while they're building, while they're rebuilding. But it's gonna take forever to rebuild on the island. But same thing. But, but there was a church right in the middle that didn't burn like everything burnt around it, except this super duper old church. But then you would see like you maybe a few, you know, a block over. So house that also wasn't touched, like, but everything burnt around it is crazy. It's crazy.

[Yosi]

I can add one thing there. Chris is in, in my, in my side life, I'm actually a chaplain for, for an organization.

[Chris]

I didn't know that. You told me that before.

[Yosi]

And so the, the, like a couple days into the fires when the, the, the entire neighborhood was completely closed off to the public and even to the people that were living there. But as a chaplain, this is, this is our time to shine. This is our time to be able to go in there. And I went to Krispy Kreme and bought around 25 dozen donuts and boxes of coffee and just went there at nighttime. I actually had. I canceled all my meetings that next day because I knew this was going to be a long one. I left at around 10 o'clock at night and I just went out there and spent practically the entire night driving around first responders just, and watching this fresh in people's minds and seeing what was going on. And this was, it's, it's, it was beyond heartbreaking. But at the same time, being able to offer somebody just the ability to have a conversation, have a donut, have a coffee was, was pretty, pretty amazing.

[Rusty]

Sorry for the interruption to the point listeners, have you heard of Rilla? Are you using Rilla yet? If not, are you for reala? See what I did there? Rilla is the leading speech analytics software for the trades. It is on a mission to bring physical ride alongs to an end. You can coach your reps with virtual ride alongs now that are a hundred times better, faster and much more efficient than the physical ones. All you got to do is use the Killa Rilla.

[Chris]

That's R I L L A R the. Yeah. Nothing to do with what you actually offer at all. Just being a good human being. Good for you. Yeah, I love that. So, hey, real quick because I know we kind of blew past this maybe and you mentioned doing the three plus million 3.4, I think it was in Palisades. Why don't you let our listeners know in regards to revenue size of where Monkey Wrench is today just so they have some preference on those who have no clue who you are and why and who they're listening to.

[Yosi]

Absolutely. We're on track this year to do 25 million of our business today is plumbing. Hopefully though we are probably going to surpass that and eventually become an H Vac company that does plumbing. That was. I was warned by my business coach. And electric is just starting out as well. We currently only have two electricians, but we're slowly building, slowly building up both departments.

[Chris]

Got it. When did. So when did you. So you started in 2007. When did you add, when did you add the H Vac side of it?

[Yosi]

I added H Vac back two years ago. So this will actually be our third summer that we're doing H Vac and electric. We started last year actually at Rhino X, like, like a couple days before Rhino X. Last year is when we started electric.

[Chris]

Great timing. Did you get some, did you get some help when you're at Rhino X on this electrical stuff?

[Yosi]

I got not only help with the electrical side, I got help in all kinds of areas.

[Chris]

Okay, great. That's good news.

[Yosi]

That's the point.

[Chris]

Well, so you know what I'm always interested in when I talk to anybody who's working in the Southern California Market is like, it is an incredibly difficult market to compete in. Not that there's, you know, it's not difficult all over, but it's like, exceptionally difficult. I think, at least from my experience, your market is one of the most challenging. More specifically in H Vac, just because the weather habits, the patterns, the level of competition that's there, the volume of private equity money at play in your market. I mean, many factors, right? It's just expensive in general. And I always wonder, I mean, because you weren't, you know, two years ago and you're, you're push, you're pushing for 25 million now, but a couple years ago, like, weren't you like half of that size or something along those lines? Like. Yeah. So you, you progressed in a market where a lot of people suffered, you know, through a time period when a lot of people suffered. And so I'm always curious to know, you know, because you'll have somebody and I hear it quite, you know, I've heard it quite a bit, is, you know, it's like, oh, there's, you know, the, the weather's not helping because the weather was not. Well, everybody, there's a lot of you in the same market. Some advance, some don't, right? It's, it's not a market thing. I think there's, there's a, it's a human, it's a, you know, a mindset thing. I don't know, it's something. But like, what, what helped you or what made you. Was there something that you just like, put your foot in the ground, said, you know, I'm going to do X, Y, Z. If there's no leads, I'm going to create leads. Like, what was it that you did that you scale in like that really challenging time competing against all these big players with big money.

[Yosi]

There is no one thing that I would say that we did. Well, I should say one thing that we, we do that I, I hammer every single week is our mission statement. And that's to provide an elevated service experience to our members and their homes. And it's something that we, we talk about. I feel like if you ask any employee in our company, they will know what, that they will know what our mission statement is. We hammer it home hard. And for me, providing value is the most important thing that we can do to differentiate ourselves. Today. 74% of our, of our, of our business is existing clientele. Now, I'd love to get that even higher. I mean, as I'm talking to a marketing guy here, so if I Don't. If I don't, if I get that higher, I may not be using you. But, but at the same time, obviously always new business and still you need to market to the existing clients. And we spend a lot of money on existing, on marketing to our existing clients. But that has been, that has been exceptionally helpful for us in this, in, during these times is marketing to our existing clientele. We've got thousands of customers out there and we need to market to them and we need to show them, we need to prove to them the value that we're able to offer them and then we're able to just hit it out of the park.

[Chad]

Yes. One question I would have is, you know, obviously you started as a plumbing company, but in your mission statement you refer to your clients as members. Did you have a membership prior to hvac? I mean, obviously most people associate membership program with H Vac and maybe you offer the other services. Did you have one prior to that? I guess is the first part of the question. And regardless of if you did or you didn't, what kind of marketing do you do to your current clients? Because I think that that's something that's often missed by people. It's always like, you know, new, new, new, new. I need more leads, I need all of this stuff. But it sounds like you've been able to farm kind of your existing client base. So I guess two parter. One, did you have a membership program with plumbing? I assume you do now, but did you before? And then two, what kind of marketing ideas can you offer listeners as far as, you know, reaching out to their current clients?

[Yosi]

Sure. So we did not have a membership program. We've, we've tried to start it a bunch of times and it failed every single time. It's very challenging with a plumbing company to have an actual membership for people to believe in. Even though in my mind it's like it's, it's a no brainer, but for some reason it just never took on two things is number one is when we talk about members, our mission statement is actually our members are our internal members as well. So we believe very strongly in providing a elevated service experience to our members, which means our internal members as well as our external members, our customers and their homes. Once we started H Vac, we realized very, very quickly, especially in Los Angeles, that where the weather is today, it's April 8th and it's 83 degrees outside right now. And in the morning it will be chilly and tomorrow you never know what it's going to bring that if we do not have some sort of maintenance program and membership program where, where, where, where, where we have the ability to get into people's homes multiple times a year, we're toast. And we, we, we struggled that. That first season after summer was a disaster for us. I had no idea what I was getting into. And we learned very quickly that this is the only way to operate. And so we put such a strong emphasis on this that we are sell long to go ahead and to, to. To make sure that we're back in the customer's home. And then on the plumbing side and the electrical side, it's just like a perfect synergy there to be able to offer someone that membership.

[Rusty]

Now, what was it that you were.

[Chris]

Like, what were some of the. Like, give us some examples. Like, what are you marketing to these guys?

[Yosi]

That was the second part of the question. Sorry.

[Chris]

That's okay. That's why I gave you the little prompt there too. But you know what, I want to. Real quick before you go into it. So, so part of the, of that growth was you being able to cross sell your new, your new H vac service to your existing plumbing customer, even though they weren't.

[Yosi]

There's.

[Chris]

Yeah, gotcha. Okay. Yes.

[Yosi]

Okay.

[Chris]

So some examples were the.

[Yosi]

I would say a big piece of the growth as well was marketing to our existing clients. And what we do today is we have, we have a strong email campaign. This is not just an email that is sent out with, with, with some pictures of, oh, get a tune up, get a tune up. This is a real email that's coming from me. You follow me on LinkedIn, then I write the same way. And I write these emails to our customers with my signature on the bottom. For many years, I didn't know my customers. Many customers don't know who I am. But I'm putting a strong emphasis on our customers knowing who I am and building up a brand that way. In addition to that, we have direct mail with coupons. We have all types of postcards that go out. We have. And we segregate them. So we have lapsed customers, we have existing customers, we have member customers, and different customers get different pieces of mail. In addition to that, we outbound very heavily to those also segregated customers with different specials. That's just a few of those pieces that are very strong.

[Chris]

Question. I actually love the idea of the letter. I know that Chad did that. Jad does some of that stuff as well. Do you. Did you throw a. That's like a personalized letter, right? But did you have Any sort of call to action on the actual letter itself too.

[Yosi]

We did not.

[Chris]

Okay, so just a straight. Okay, got it. Okay. So I want to, I want to shift gears just a little bit. I think one thing that I appreciate about you is you're kind of, you're not willing to go after and try new things and when you recognize a time for, you know, that you might need to, to look at something that you, you've not historically looked at and make a change, you know, and you've done it. And I think a perfect example is, and we were just talking about this pre podcast is you had made a post on LinkedIn this morning that I read and I didn't plan on talking about it because I didn't, I wasn't even thinking about it until you. I read your post this morning and it was around an experience that you had at Monkey Wrench with a, with a client, a customer who was calling in. Well, who was calling in and they got to the voice prompt and you're so actually, you know what? I'm not going to tell a story. I'm gonna let you tell a story and then. But the point of it is I want the listeners to hear the lesson in it, you know, so maybe you can share the story in the lesson because this is definitely applicable to every single person that's listening to this. Because I guarantee you've come across at some point in time and sometimes you hear something that you have to chase down and see, like, oh, should I change a business process here or do I need to make an adjustment to something? Because right now every single opportunity matters. And being able to capture single opportunity matters, whether they're new or existing don't matter. You don't want to mess it up. You want to give them a reason to look someplace else. Like, because it's. Last I checked, things aren't getting cheaper, they're getting more expensive. Right? Everything. So maybe just share what you posted and you had a shitload of responses on there, man, up to that post of people saying different things. So interesting to read through it. So I thought, man, this is one that's worth sharing. So, so just share with our listeners the story and then we'll get to the, the you know what the resolution was towards the end.

[Yosi]

Absolutely. Story was a simple story. And I just, I like, I even, I overheard it in the call center. It wasn't like, it wasn't like someone called in specifically asking for me, but someone called in and she was angry. She was really upset because she was driving down the freeway and she sees our number on the side, on the back of a truck or on the side of the truck. And so she calls the number and we have a prompt that says, you've reached Monkey wrench. For service, push 1. And the reason for that is, is that we just to avoid the robo callers, but it goes straight to, straight to the call center. And she's driving like a good, safe driver. She didn't want to pick up her phone because it says push 1 for, for service. So she immediately says 1, 1 and she keeps on screaming into the phone 1, but it's not going anywhere. Now she was angry because in her mind, why would I have to push one today? Why can't I just say one? Because many times you call somebody and it gives you the option you could push or talk into the phone. Well, we didn't have that. That wasn't, that wasn't it. We didn't even think about that, that that should be something that, that we should do. We said thank you for the feedback, we're going to look into it. And sure enough we are resolving that and we're actually getting that fixed. I was blown away when I heard this story and I said to myself that this is just another level of value. But the crazy thing is that we live in this world today where Amazon is setting the bar so high with a one click purchase or everything else in our lives of just being able to get that information at our fingertips that how can we, how can we not even offer someone the ability to say one? We actually have to make them push one. And it's just, it's, it's, it's just fascinating. The, in, in the world of, in, I would say in the world of customer service, today's unreasonable request is, becomes tomorrow's industry standard and it's just growing. The bar is just going and going higher and higher and higher and higher. And this is the value that I've, that I've been speaking about and I'm trying to hammer in is that if you do not provide the value, the customer is going to find somebody else that does.

[Chris]

Yeah, everybody wants it to be simple.

[Chad]

Yosi, it sounds like you're really focused on this, which is phenomenal and obviously speaks to the success that you've had. What are, what are maybe some of the other things that you're doing or that you guys have discovered when it comes to providing that elevated value? I think we're all, you know, we've all heard the drumbeat of raise your prices and charge more and charge what you're worth and the trades are worth it and so on and so forth. But I think you bring up such a great point is that you have to be worth it. You know, I always talk to people about, you know, people complaining about, well, there's no people coming into the trades. And I always kind of flip the question of like, well, are you a company worth changing careers over? Are you a company worth, you know, putting my family's livelihood on, on the line for? So like, and I know that you spoke earlier about, you know, how important your people are as, you know, treating them as members and stuff like that. Like what, what are some of those things that I think listeners could take away and say oh crap, we, we missed on that one or we could definitely do this. Whether it's customer facing or, or internally facing.

[Yosi]

Great. So many, so many points to touch on. There is for me personal growth and development is huge. I, I, I got a taste of it when I joined Nextar 10 years ago and I've been on a journey of personal growth and development ever since. I've been trying to impress that upon my team as well. And we're offering all that throughout our, our service system trainings and so on and so forth. However, we've taken now our service system training to the next level and what I mean by that is, is that every Monday we do, we have a, we have a field training starting at 7:30 for an hour and we go every month we go through one step of the service system and for those that do not know is that nexstar has six steps of the service system which will take you ultimately through the job. And we spend one month talk, we spend one month training on each one of those steps. However we started a few weeks ago, this will be, I think we're three weeks in on Friday will be our fourth week where we're starting this now a boot camp specifically for installers because we have not that our service was bad but we realized that if we're going to be providing this value, it's not enough just to provide the value maybe over in the call center or in dispatch and the way we drive our trucks and sell the job but when we're actually executing the job and we're completing that entire job, we need the same level of excellence that has to go into that. So we've been spending a lot of time with installers and we created a boot camp around the concept of a service system but really giving these guys scripts that they can Use and starting out with like, hey, I'm out here because so and so sold this, or we're doing that, or we're installing XYZ and just takes them through that journey. A lot of times the installers are shyer people. A lot of times the installers maybe are not the best communicators because. And that's why they're installers and not. And not guys that are out there selling, maybe their personalities are not super yellow. And so we realized that if we put an emphasis over here, this just adds value to that entire sale. The feedback that we got has been phenomenal. Guys literally have come over to our general manager, Kevin, and have said to him things like, I like, like, thank you. I. I never knew what to say around this situation. Thank you for that. Thank you for the role playing. Like, putting these guys on the spot and really making them is just. It's been really wonderful. So I look forward to continuing that as well as. As well as just doing this throughout every department in our company. Role play after role play after role play.

[Chris]

You said super yellow. I'm a super yellow.

[Yosi]

What's your secondary?

[Chris]

Red.

[Yosi]

Okay.

[Chris]

It tracks, doesn't it?

[Yosi]

I can see that.

[Chris]

You know, I just want to mention one quick thing too. It's the. I want to take one step, step back. As you were talking about that experience with the lady that called in, we'll call her Karen. It was, it was. I had this. I think somebody who excels at that and training is the automobile industry, like auto dealers. And I'll tell you, because you think about. I'll give you the perfect example. I feel like from a technology perspective, from a training perspective, from a sales perspective, like, these people are on it and fast. And the point is you need to make a painful purchase, like an automobile, as simple as possible to get the deal right. And we kind of need to think that way a little bit. I think there's a lot of truth in that. And it's. How do we make it easy to do business with this perfect example? Like, you know, my daughter just moved to Texas and I'm trying to get her a vehicle, right? And I don't want to have to talk to somebody at all, like, you know, like physically on the phone until I have to. So I'm paying cash. Why do I need to talk to you? So I just reached out and said, here's what I'm willing to pay. And including tax, license and sales tax, you know, sales tax, tax, license, like, I want all that. And this is what I want to pay. If this works, then let me know. My phone's rang about 10 times since I've been on the podcast, so them trying to respond back to me. I'm getting text messages now, but they're so fast to get this. Get this stuff done that I could literally buy a car super fast. But the point being is I want it to be as simple as possible. Right. Like, I want this to be as easy as possible, whether I was financing or not. Irrelevant. I just want to be able to communicate with someone quickly the way I want to communicate with them. Right. So that requires a lot of training too.

[Rusty]

Right.

[Chris]

Because you gotta learn how to talk to somebody that way, you know, So I feel like they're just excellent, excellent leaders in that. And Chad, I remember you went and visited. I think it was like a. Oh, God. What was the company. Was it a moving company? Maybe you visited and looked at their sales process.

[Chad]

Yeah, all my. All my sons moving.

[Chris]

That's what it was in Texas or something like that, right?

[Chad]

Yeah. Unbelievable machine. Unbelievable.

[Chris]

So it's just interesting to look at some of these, you know, other industries and what they're doing and are we doing something similar that makes them, you know, you think about the volume, people reaching out to movers every day. It's got to be massive, right. A little bit easier of a purchase because it's not typically as big unless you're doing like, state to state moving. But I do think that it meant it makes sense. Like something as simple as you making a change to add a voice prompt is going to increase your business because you simplified the process to do business with you.

[Yosi]

Absolutely.

[Chris]

I think that's what we all have to do. Right? Like, we have to continue to think that way. You said today's unreasonable request is tomorrow's industry standard. I think that's a really good. That's a really good statement. Right. And the worst thing we can do is say that's how we've always done it. Right. I think, Chad, I think that's what's always been, you know, you and I've had this conversation many times is like, you, you are so willing to move fast and just build your own shit, like you know what you want and you see there's some options to do it. Then you just build your own thing that works within your model and that'll makes it easy for you to manage the business and makes it easier for people to do business with you. And then you guys have a fantastic training process, you know, that's always ongoing. And like all the things are, you know, all things are moving in tandem with one another to keep growing and scaling the business. And you'll see you're kind of following in those same footsteps where you're identifying changes and making them in an incredibly competitive market. So, so you gave, you have electrical now. Okay. We've got H Vac, you got plumbing, you got electrical as of last, I think you said last year you got a couple electricians, right. I'm guessing you're staying focused in the residential space, right?

[Yosi]

Absolutely. There will be no industrial. Those flashes come in my mind, but I just shoot them down.

[Chris]

But you're just, so you're cross marketing to them right now. That's how you're building it, right? You're kind of doing all the cross market stuff.

[Yosi]

Yeah, yeah.

[Chris]

So let me ask you this question because this has come up a few different times. I'm going to just shift gears a little bit again. How are you, I mean, because you're using for your own personal brand something you're paying more attention to, which is why you're using LinkedIn as kind of your platform. How, what is your view on, like, let's think about marketing as a whole. You're marketing really well to your existing customer base, right? You're, you have, you have digital marketing with your, with your Rhino, your partner with Rhino, you have, you're doing personal brand marketing, which. LinkedIn is social media, right? It is social media. So are you like, what's your thought process on? Like just this marketing bucket? Like, are you trying to do many things? Are you trying to focus on one piece? Is there something that stands out to you or are you just kind of like, hey, I'm trying to do all the things to just stay kind of wherever I can, wherever somebody's looking when they're looking to try and win the game today. Like, where's your mindset at on all things marketing?

[Rusty]

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[Yosi]

I think the answer is, is that it's. I learned this a long time ago that marketing is a funnel and you got to create this giant, giant funnel and allow it to pour in and we need to be relevant in every little piece. And I just had a conversation with my, with my son about this, who's 22 around how that, you know, TikTok or maybe things that are going to be catering to the, to a younger generation. He said to me, well, why do we need to be on TikTok? Our target audience today is 50, is, is 50 plus. You know, we live in, these are affluent neighborhoods. They don't have TikTok. And my response was, is that, well, in 10 years those people are going to now be the 50 year olds. And you know, you need to start, you need to start marketing to those people now that eventually you become a household name. I think that it's just becoming relevant all over the place. We're putting, where we have a certain area, we have a few like very targeted areas in L. A that we put focus on and we actually put a few billboards up over there and specifically in those areas and instead of just hammering all the freeways and things like that, we just, we're concentrating and we're trying to go after every opportunity to be front and center that when somebody needs a plumber or we should become a household name in the city.

[Chris]

Yeah, so you're doing a little brand building. You're kind of looking at it like it's, there's some brand building top of funnel, which I think is what you have to look at. And by the way, I would argue, I would argue that TikTok is definitely being used by your demographic because you're going through it and scrolling through it and looking for things like I think TikTok would tell you the exact same thing. So it is a thing definitely. Now are they, are they ready to buy right then? Probably not. Right. They're not going there to look for, you know, plumbers or hvac companies. But it's brand awareness. That's what you're doing right Creating some.

[Yosi]

Brand awareness, it takes time, a lot of time, though.

[Chad]

Yeah. And I think what you're talking about is something that I definitely subscribe to and I think a lot of people do is, you know, from a brand perspective, like to make H vac, plumbing and electrical real sexy is difficult, you know, and so just pumping out, you know, I used to think like content for us was like, well, here's four tips to get your AC ready for summer. Like, no one's reading that. That's what they call you for, to make sure that it's working. But I think that at least where I found, and maybe you can speak a little bit to this on the success that you've kind of found on LinkedIn, kind of from a personal brand is like, to me, that personal brand gives the, the actual business like a personality. Like, it gives people a glimpse into. Like, this is how we think, this is what we think about leadership. This is kind of like the flavor of person that you're going to get coming out into your home because this is how we speak within the business. And I think that that's really, really powerful and it comes at customers from a different perspective. Like, if you're talking about leadership or like an insight that you learn from the industry, like that doesn't have to do with anything about their H vac, plumbing or electrical system, but it's something that everybody can relate to. And to me, if someone with your most recent post, if you've got people responding and interacting with that and all of a sudden, all of a sudden they start to associate monkey wrench with. Oh, well, when I do need somebody, this sounds like a person that I'd like to do business with.

[Yosi]

Absolutely. I don't recall where I read this, but just the concept of a personal brand a few years ago, how important this was. And I decided, you know what, this is it. This is the only way to build this company up is to really put myself out there. Like I said earlier, as you grow, your customers don't know you anymore. And there was a time when I started out as a one truck guy. I knew every customer, they knew me. And you slowly, slowly start to disconnect. And then before you know it, you don't even know. You literally don't know the names. I remember answering the phone once in our call center and they said, hi, is so and so there? And I said, can I help you? No, no, no, no, no. I want to talk to so and so. And I'm thinking, why don't you want to talk to me, but that's what happens with growth. And, and so for me, going on to LinkedIn and posting became a next, it was the next piece of the, of the puzzle really, trying to, trying to show our customers who I am, who we are as a company. And so these are, these are thoughtful posts that go, that I, that I, that I work on to, as well as our emails to ensure that people get to know us, they get to know me, they get to know our team.

[Chris]

Yeah, I mean, I do. Listen, we've had the personal brand conversation before, Chad, you and I and Mike. I know we're all big believers. A lot of people in our, in our, you know, peer group, as you know, you'll see too, like all of our buddies are all big on personal brand. I do think it absolutely matters. I do, I really do. Especially to today. And you know, it, it gives you a, it kind of, it, like Chad said, it gives you your business a personality. Besides it just being an H VAC or plumbing, electrical, I think it's important, you know, you're giving something without any expectation from that perspective. I think that's valuable. And I think that, you know, people buy from people, right? So sometimes a little more relatable that way. So listen, I, I, I want to just say, you know, in a market that's incredibly difficult, you've figured out how to make it work, you know, and how to grow. And amongst all the obstacles that are actually against you, you know, as a smaller business, I say smaller, you know what I mean, in comparison to some behemoths you have that you're battling down there in Southern California, you know, and the market in general. So there's no excuse, right? Like, you could certainly figure out how to move forward and get, and get things done and keep growing your business. And you have all the tools in the world to do it. And thankfully, you take advantage of things you can, you got a coach, you know, you make time to come to Rhino X. You don't just come there and sit. You participate. You know, you take away things, you implement them. You leverage your relationships like you do all the things you got to do to move this thing forward when it's hard, right, because someone's going to win in these markets, it's probably the one who's going to put in the effort, the right effort, right? So, so congrats on, on your growth, man. And I appreciate, you know, the partnership, you know, and the friendship, you know, and I, and I, you know, you know that I've told you that Absolutely. And. And I just appreciate you, you know, giving our listeners the time. And Chad and I had time to share a little bit of your journey, a little bit of the success that you've had and, and, you know, the hope, you know, hopefully what we, what you, you know, the listeners get from this is, you know, you can be in a rural market and it's hard. You can also be in an LA market. It's hard and expensive, you know, but someone's going to win, and it's typically the one who's, who's willing to pivot, make the changes, use the resources, and do the lean in and do the hard work. And you've done that now, what, since 2007 to scale this thing, and now you're pushing 25 million bucks this year, which is not a bad gig for Southern California. So congrats to you, man. And it's fun to watch you. Fun to watch you grow and do your thing. Thing.

[Yosi]

Thank you. Thank you.

[Chris]

Yep. Chad, you got anything else, man? Because I think that we're ready to close this bad boy out.

[Chad]

I don't just really appreciate the time, most importantly, appreciate your thoughtfulness. I think the industry definitely benefits from. From people like yourself who are really going kind of that extra mile to not only make sure that their people are well taken care of, but their customers are well taken care of. And then also, you know, I see your stuff out there as well, you know, just making sure that the, you know, the communities that we live in are a better place. And so I just. Thank you for that. It's been. Been fun getting to know you and watching, Watching your business from afar.

[Yosi]

Thank you. I appreciate that. I. If I may say as well, I feel like it's an honor to be on this podcast. It's my second podcast that I've ever been as a guest on. But, you know, I've. I've been a fan of to the Point podcast for a number of years now, and so I gained a tremendous amount of knowledge from just listening and being. Being on here. And I will say that there was a time I used to run. I used to go running, or I would go to the gym listening to these podcasts and also listening to them on 1.5, thinking that I'm actually able to retain this information and that I changed that approach a while back, where if there's an episode that I want to hear or a person that I want to hear, I will carve out time, put it on my calendar, and literally sit there, even though I've got ADD and. But sit down with headphones or just go for a little walk. Slow. A slow walk. And be able to take notes because it's really, really real to be able to. The info that we can get from here is just incredible. So thank you. Thank you guys for doing what you do.

[Chris]

Yeah, man, it's our pleasure. And I can remember getting text messages from you when you'd be fired up, you know, back in the day, listening to a particular episode, and we probably even talked about. Yes, one day we're going to have you on and we're going to talk about your journey. And here we are. It's pretty cool. G gives me goosebumps when you said that, so I appreciate it. I'm glad we're here. So, to our listeners, hopefully you were able to take away something from this that you can implement into your business. If anything. Just remember he talked about members. Members not just being, you know, clients, but also members within the. The family of your business. So don't free either one of those. Both of them are extremely important. You don't got to do everything, but you got to do something. Yosi, you want to close this out? You know, the next statement.

[Yosi]

No. Zero days.

[Chris]

There we go.