79 - Nick May - How Almost Losing It All Made His Business Stronger
A painting business is not just about selecting a color or slapping some paint up on the wall; it is a large artistic canvas to some. Take the journey with us as we go from a dream of a college student to the life of a businessman with all of the in, out, ups and downs.
Nick shares with us how he conquered the fears of entrepreneurship and has flourished with his painting company. He can literally look back and say that he has been to hell and back and has the business today to thank for it. What's great is that he still has ability to say that he loves being an entrepreneur and being in business.
Painting was something that you thought you enjoyed at first and then you slowly thought you should work a corporate job and went back to painting. If you will tell us your story of how you got started painting. Nick took a summer job when he was in high school painting for a friend of his moms since he was getting ready to go off to college. The reality was he would help them paint their house but he was not actually painting their house by himself. Simply put it was his introduction to painting. Then when he was in college he saw a poster of a man in a suit sitting behind a desk and the headline said, “manage this summer”, that was really what he wanted to do for a summer job, he wanted to manage he didn’t want a job. So he answered the ad and it ended up being a college painting company, as they were very popular in the Midwest. However it was more like running a franchise like company. The problem was that between the royalty fees and paying off equipment it was very little profit. What he learned that summer was how to paint, hire, manage and run a business but what he got in return was some equipment and about $1,000.00 in his pocket. The biggest walk away was that the following summers he had a painting company that he ran on his own and it got him through college. Each summer his dad would say to him “remember you are going to school so you do not have to paint the rest of your life." He graduated with a marketing degree and got a job but just did not like any of the jobs that he had and was always looking forward to the end of the day. He kept asking himself what did he really want to do, all while he watch his father and father in-law working from themselves and being very successful in what they were doing. So on a New Years Eve night he found himself in Home Depot waiting to get paint for himself, all while helping people in the paint department as he waited to be helped by the man behind the counter. That was when he had his “ah ha” moment and realized that he need to go back to painting and has been for the last sixteen years.
Tell us what happened when you got into a partnership and things went sour. In about year four or five, he was getting so many requests from people who were asking about various kinds of flooring jobs and he would always refer his customers out to people. Meanwhile always doing the follow-up to see how the floor job turned out. Much to his surprise the reviews were never really great. He took it as an opportunity to add more services to his business and went out and hired a guy to do the sales side of the flooring business for him. Which ultimately he ended up asking this guy to come on as a business partner and run the flooring side of the business. However, that was the demise of the business, even though he was offering more services, with more services came more problems. Redoing a wall, although it can be a headache to do, it can be done and it does not take that much time. Redoing a floor can be a very expensive job and that is what started happening. When the roll changed from being an employee to an owner so did the work ethics of the gentleman that he had hired for the sales job to becoming an owner. From the beginning they had decided to take the same salary as what they were used to however, the painting business was making a profit but the flooring business was loosing money and things just started to go south. It got to the point that they were in about $80,000 worth of business debit because they still needed to take paychecks. At this point he decided that it was time to cut the losses and split the company. However, they had not done their due diligence and there was one document that was missing in order to protect the two parties. Bottom line was they settled on an amount that he would pay back for the investment into the company and went their separate ways. Meanwhile, there were still several jobs that had gone south and he found himself in a much greater amount of business debit as a result. After about a year he woke up and just realized that he had two options, he could file for bankruptcy or he could pay him off from the equity in his house and be done with it. He chose the payoff option and he then started feel that there was a little bit of hope, it was the turning point so to speak. It took about two years to finally get everything reorganized and really focus on the root of the business.
What would you have approached differently looking back on the partnership? Besides the paperwork problem and making sure that everything was handled legally, their needs to be a clear definition of responsibility and communication is the key. One other key point is to make sure that there is an accountability of income and not just allowing that need for salary because you are the owner stand in the way. Using the pay for performance model holds everyone accountable. You really have to find a person that complements you in business so that you can work together and get tasks done.
What have you done to make your business so successful and stand out from everyone else? He came into painting, but he wanted to have a business he did not want to be the painter. So he had employees from day one. But what make him successful are the little things that they do. Communication is key and he stands behind his work and what is said. He makes things happen, not waiting for things to come to him. And key to that is surrounding himself with a network of people who are like-minded and can make things happen. But most of all he really focused on what he likes to do and what he does best and that is the sales and marketing side of the business.
What are some other marketing things that you have done, you feel have been big wins for you? He has built somewhat of a co-op of businesses that were trying to attacked interior designers to buy from and created an event where they all come together and bring in high-end content to talk to interior designers about business. So he would have to say that the co-op/event marketing has been a big addition to the success of his business.
What is a tool or app that you cannot live without in business? His iPad is his best friend. It has allowed him to be able to leave a job with an estimate almost entirely completed. Where he used to take notes on a sheet of paper and then go back to the office and plug it in to the computer and have to remember what was what, his iPad allows him to complete most of what he needs to generate an estimate for the customer right at the site. The other company tool that they are using is a cloud system and it so flawless. Before they would have documents here and spreadsheets there now they are able to access all data for customer in one place.
You can find Nick at Walls By Design or Small Business Naked
More About Nick: is a small business owner in Denver, CO. He runs a successful interior painting business called Walls by Design where the painters are all artists, something that makes them stand apart from every other painting company in the area. Nick is also the host of Small Business Naked, one of the most popular businesses podcasts for offline business providing local services and products.