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what’s one of the toughest challenges that you faced the hardest part is that people don’t understand like it’s it’s it’s new and new means I’m either I’m going to listen to you and be really curious about it or I’m just going to tune you out like you must be selling me snake oil right the hardest part is explain to him welcome to the ride and style podcast your turbocharged pit stop for automotive restyling buckle up with Jesse and Josh [Music] welcome to another episode of the Ryden

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style podcast today episode 18 we have Brian Lounsbury of Midway plus Brian thank you so much for being with us today yeah thanks guys appreciate it thanks for inviting me B man Jesse now this is fun because this is hands down the funniest dude in the industry oh that’s so nice I was the funniest guy but then this guy walks in the room and and like he he’s kind of like that guy that just attracts all the tent he’s like Tiger Woods on the PGA golf course you all the other golfers are like H

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great Brian’s here so so kind my my wife thinks that I’m a mixer between Peter Griffin and Peter Griffin and and Rodney Dangerfield Rodney Dangerfield a little bit mostly Peter Griffin though little Rodney Dangerfield how did you guys uh how did you guys first meet do you remember either one of you I I know exactly how I first met I was in a room and I’ve been in the industry for a long time just like Josh and people it was year before we met somebody goes you there’s a guy that looks like you I said

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I don’t think so next year they go hey that guy that looks like you is here where they point I’m pretty sure I walked over I’m like hey I hear we look like each other funny is so Brian Brian uh comes up to me at that event and goes so is your name Brian Lounsbury and said no but then I look at his badge and his name was Ry I’m like well what is this guy tried to do he goes so I guess we look alike so what was your mom and Dad doing and then he named l so what were you doing in 19 what were they

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doing in 19 early 1976 or 75 I was like like no I I don’t think we’re brothers Brian I think we just have you some similar characteristics but yeah might you never know my dad traveled tiny bit your dad did travel a lot yeah but I don’t know you showed me a picture of your grandmother in that MooMoo and I was like no that’s not my grandma no no but I probably haven’t shown you the picture of my grandfather in the Momo that one’s the better one that’s oh yeah no doubt my grand my grandfather just

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started wearing moomo like in his older life he’s like I don’t care anymore so you will do you think you will be in a moomoo by what 60 yeah I I would say no but never say never he told me how comfortable he was and he would wear hunting you know like the yellow lens hunting glasses yeah he wore yellow bifocal hunting glasses and he wore a Mumu and you’d ask him he goes always looks nice out and I can pee anywhere I want in the field yeah because he’s not you know I mean he’s not wearing any under no no no no

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no no neither was your grandma no no it was not a lot of it was easy to do laundry at their house he just had one outfit it was the sad part was while the laundry was going on that was a scary two hours please put them in bed under the covers yeah yeah he was a a strange guy but those glasses how would you feel like all right so I mean obviously it didn’t get passed down to you so it’s probably with your dad right now but eventually your dad’s going to pass that mooo down to you and

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it’s going to be the same or would you just would you venture out and get your own MooMoo I’d probably get my own I mean he did have the sleeveless one which I always think is nice cuz when you’re showing off your old arms that are kind of flabby yeah you know they kind of shake when you’re when you’re yelling I think that’s a good look was it was it like my grandpa where he got like the Sailor tattoo when he was in the Army but now she’s just own that’s that oh that girl on the on his arm and

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now just nasty it’s just some ink blotch he uh he did have tattoos um he he they weren’t blotchy and he would show them to you but he had he had a couple he wasn’t a tattooed guy but he was from the service yeah but he had three tattoos he had one here one here and one in the spot nobody get a tattoo and it was three devils and each one had a different amount of horns and he would show you the one you didn’t want to see which was horrible oh my gosh can you imagine I don’t even want to think about the

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tattoo artist anyway we did we asked quite a bit we were like how did you get that and he goes my buddy and I went in there and uh we both got tattoos and I said okay and he goes now my buddy passed out so I had to hold his with a 2×4 and hold it over 2×4 so the guy could put in the tattoo and I go you held him he’s like yeah like so weird man you guys are weird listen they had to do what they had to do I guess when you’re in the military you don’t really care right yeah because I I told him I’m not holding yours I’m

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surprised your your grandfather didn’t have a hole in his MO just for ease ease of peeing he was kind of like an old dog that you know used to lift his leg and then stops you know because he gets arthritis I think he probably just squatted I would assume you know like to interview him one time but oh he was he was a very interesting man he was my step-grandfather and probably the most bizarre guy I’ve ever met yeah um his his he was the mistress’s child from the um Chicago mob boss he was like the illegitimate

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child wow and he was a prick because he was raised with like this backing right so his attitude he was just a little guy too he was he was five foot five maybe tops wow um but he felt like he had an army behind him the whole time he’s a brag he’s like you’ve never met a more perfect than me I mean he was so proud of how rude and obnoxious he was it it was amazing to watch it really was very interesting Guy taught me a lot actually yeah so all right so let’s talk we better talk a little cars otherwise you

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know these car people they they go crazy when we don’t talk about cars all the time like even though no none of us really like cars but that’s okay um so here’s I’ll tell you a funny story Jesse so we’re talking to Brian and I are talking at a I think we were at we were sitting next to each other at a a a board of directors meeting right and we weren’t really paying attention and so I started asking him I was like what so how did you start in this business and he starts telling me what he did which

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will ask him here and I said dude you are a restyler he’s like what so tell him tell him that story of what what you started doing and you realized you have an identity you almost felt like you you found your long lost last name or something family tree well you know when you did that job before it had a name to it you were basically nothing you you weren’t a mechanic you know and you weren’t um you know what I mean you’re like this weird in between place where you just made stuff look a little better

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and you made people happy yeah but yeah my my first job in the automotive side I was probably I was either 18 or 19 and I got a chop I got a job at a shop locally that did a lot of truck upfitting and really a lot of restyling stuff was really the main criteria that we did window tint Graphics this was 199 96 97 radios some people were still getting like that heartbeat thing on the side not many but it still happened and there was a lot of people that would get the venters and we’d tape them off and get

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them painted so you’d have like the white Hood cowl on the front and the white vent visors to match like all paint matched um yeah we we did all that stuff I did that for three or four years and Bedliners to tanel covers we did a lot of dealership work tons of it um so yeah I you know there was never a name to it before it was just basically anything anybody wanted that came in the garage and once in a while we’ do something performance related but it wasn’t that common it was it was mostly

00:08:43 – 00:09:31
I I’ve installed a lot of running boards in my day if there’s if there’s something that I have done an absolute ton of and now if you’re installing running boards in the great state of Michigan in the winter which everybody wants their running boards in a warm garage where the ice is the ice and snow are melting right on your face as it’s dripping and the dirt and the water going in your eyes just like this is this is a great job I love this you I think we are brothers because that was

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my first job installing running boards and I was in Ohio so it’s a little bit less spicy but it’s still the same it’s the same it’s the same so I mean now did you do the aluminum ones oh I did aluminum I did Wheel to wheel I did the owns oh yeah I did them remember the fiberglass you touch it and you get the fiberglass your hand you have that for the rest of the day cuz there was no uh they call PPP now you there was none of that there was none of that y you never wore glasses or gloves you had nothing

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you had nothing you you had electric your eye you’d take a piece of paper from the roll and you take electrical tape and put it over your finger because there’s no Band-Aids either yeah yeah we didn’t believe it well the shop couldn’t afford them the shop could not afford Band-Aids yeah so uh yeah I did I did truck caps all that stuff all right I I could put I could put a bed lighter in like that I would well yeah I mean come on that’s pretty easy well you’re right but so by yourself you

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could do it well sure you mean remember got it up in the middle you bend in the middle so Brian Brian how did you even get into that to begin with what were you doing before that what led into the automotive industry like what got you even into this to begin with so it my dream was always to be a mechanic I took all the auto shop classes in school my dad was you know the shade tree mechanic I was just obsessed with it and I was working Landscaping you know moving rocks digging holes you know using your your body but not

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your brain and I did that from when I was about 14 to 18 in the summer and then i’ every like spring break or anything I go work to make money so I I worked with the courage I saw an ad in the paper that the place was hiring so I walked in the door and I walked over the counter and I said I’m here to apply for a job and the guy goes well where’s your resume I’ve never heard of that before you know I I didn’t really pay attention a lot in school so I was like resume what’s that he’s like well it’s it’s a

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thing that outlines what you’re capable of and I go okay I go what you put on paper yeah so he hands me he had on his table like this and he goes well if you just you know a piece of paper writing down when you can do and I said can I have a pen and I went and sat in the corner of the garage and I wrote down I can weld I can uh I started naming off all the stuff I knew how to do you know like I I can change the ignition system and all stuff and I went and handed it back to the guy and the guy’s like I’ve

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never had anybody do that before I’ve never had anybody go sit back down and write out what they’re capable of and I got a job sweeping the floor and he looked down the entire list I can weld I can do this I can do that and they’re like listen this guy what he can’t do is write a resume so we’re gonna put him sweeping the floor first hey did and on my second day they gave me a Volkswagen curado that came in it was an out ofate car because there’s no Volkswagen in Brighton Michigan you know

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it’s a GM territory Ford territory so he handed me this car and they go hey put this alarm in this car and the alarm was in a box wasn’t brand new no instructions we don’t even sell that kind of car alarm and they go figure it out I worked on that that poor guy’s car oh I felt so bad for that guy it should have been done in like an hour and a half it took me like three days I I mean that poor guy I don’t know why they did that to me but it and he waited he probably waited in the showroom all

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three days you brought him like a pillow and blanket and food yeah yeah you guys I I was so nervous because I thought I don’t want to admit that I don’t know how to do this but I don’t know how to do this you know and you’re taking away a part on a volswagen that you know that’s that’s a rough car it was I broke the clips you know what I mean like everything that can go wrong went wrong yeah yeah that’s why we don’t like German cars working on them yeah they’re

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great cars but working on them is horrible it yes they’re definitely tough so yeah that was how I got into you also restyle in Hawaii I I did more of uh car audio in in Hawaii than I did anything I so so how did you get from Michigan to Hawaii it was 2000 I was working out in metro Detroit at a place where I was doing electrical repair for cars General Electric Repair like your fuel pump breaks you know your gas gauge doesn’t work and that’s where I learned all my electrical knowledge

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because I thought I knew my stuff doing car audio before that I didn’t know anything I got in this place these guys were like you’re an idiot like they they didn’t even talk to me for the first six months I had to go through like this hazing before they would they would I had to take the garbage out every day you know just clean the toilet it was just the worst job ever right but they taught me so much about electrical that it gave me a huge advancement every shop I went after that and I was working out

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there and I’m living in this little tiny house and I’m like you know there’s better places to live I’m moai so I had like $3,000 in the bank I sold everything I had and I bought a oneway plane ticket and I had I bought a mountain bike and I flew there and I went down to Wy key and got in a hotel and tried to find an apartment and got an apartment and got a job and lived there and how long little over a year yeah okay it was uh it was I think it was right around 20 some around there

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23 there’s definitely this this eye opening experience like I should probably get going with my life instead of goofing off which was really what I felt while I was there and the other big one was right before I left I meet this girl at a party that is from my hometown and we keep in contact she’s now my wife so I I I came back and I moved to Michigan State where she was going to college so like it was really her I was I had to blame her that I left Hawaii I tried to get her to come and stay though

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I was like come move here I mean like every day it’s 72 de it’s awesome out she would love that she uh she did love it she said but no no said in fact I think man I don’t know why I have this recollection so when I went to Hawaii I don’t know I was there 2020 I actually I was flying back actually weren’t we there for the board of directors meeting right yeah yeah that was M yeah when we were there we spent my wife and I spent some extra time there so I go over there you know I wanted to go to Pearl Harbor

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and everything like that and wasn’t your shop like right around there right on theet yeah it it was on Ward Street yeah like right right by went by it and there was a big I mean there was maybe a few of them but that one was audio and I just had this picture in my mind of you working on a car you had one in the bay and then one probably outside putting in an alarm real quick and radio or something it was it was a really strange experience because everybody that lives in Hawaii is pretty relaxed you know there’s not a

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lot to be upset about so people are pretty they’re actually really nice um it took me a little bit get over be being a Midwest prick you know it was like I had I always want to go real fast everything and they’re like hey slow down man just chill out yeah um but the garage I worked at you did most of your work outside like there was no garage the garage they’d pull in a car that was getting something done that you didn’t want to get dirt in yeah you know maybe some tent or something like that so

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everything else was done outside and the the other part that was awkward about it is the customer would stand right there and watch you I hated that right it makes you feel so awkward and then you get used to to it but they would bring me food like if you’re doing something they come they’d go across street get some food bring it back you know you ate all day long oh yeah and it’s super nice they invite you over to their house like people are really really kind but yeah it was a cool job um I learned a lot of

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lessons of that place like that the shops that I worked at before all did all custom work and this guy was like we don’t do custom work I’m like you’re losing so much money and he’s like custom work loses money yes he’s he’s like Turn and Burn laugh the radio in put four speakers and let him go Y and he taught me a valuable lesson he was right next place I went did a bunch of custom work and they struggled yeah so so you moved back to Michigan State Catherine’s is that when

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you married her because I mean listen I think I just I feel like you had a really small window to get a girl that good we we did she’s way she’s way out of his League Jesse he’ll be the first one to tell you she is but she hung around there for a long time I I think we dated for six or seven years or something like that what we’ve been together forever you know and I even moved like I moved from Lancing back to Metro Detroit to take a job at motivity because I Lancing Michigan is kind of

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like I I I was very curious because it’s one of the most depressing places the sun’s never out it’s always kind of raining and it’s an old uh factory town right so things are kind of run down in Gray coming from Hawaii to there was like oh this is terrible this is awful so after about a year and a half I went to her and said I can’t take anymore I’m leaving I’m going back I can’t do this this is this is torture and she’s like try one more time to get a job in

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Michigan and I called this guy and I was like hey I’m trying to get a job at this really famous shop and he’s like come give me your resume I’m like For What come work in this office I don’t want to work in an office that’s not I don’t have and that’s how I got in the office side was was that but I lived in we lived apart for I don’t know year and a half two years um but yeah I don’t know how I got her she stayed with me and is that where she went to school at

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Michigan State she did her undergrad and then she went to Wayne State in Detroit um for her and she got her Masters uh in science at Wayne State so she’s got like eight degrees I still have a couple bumps for I want to show her at some point oh she loves that kind of stuff take a picture of it I always every time I see her I’m like hey can you check this out for me real quick you know she’s like a doctor and everything and the older we get the older we get when we go somewhere now the more awkward

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people think show her or want to show her you know it’s like and they want everybody wants to tell everybody about the last time I went to the bathroom that’s the other one I’m like oh man I don’t want to know that but people are compelled to tell her this weird stuff is this blood sample is this Blood stool normal it is they’re like they they are they’re like I got this big thing on my back take a look at it you’re like don’t don’t touch it don’t touch it oh my

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gosh ask him about motivic Jesse because that’s where that’s where I think Brian you really got your name right and you got your root Doug I mean you that what’s that’s what well-rounded you yeah what’s that about that was uh a guy that I knew that I worked with in Brighton at that shop that was the guy that did the interview that had the yellow line piece of paper um uh me he he was working at this place and I called him up and I was trying to get a job somewhere else in a garage and

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because I like I really like working in the garage that to me is like the most fun you I I love the whole G garage atmosphere everything you know to me that’s Heaven um and he was like come interview and I did and I still didn’t want to do it and I got a job in the office and it was it was magical you know I my favorite thing to do is troubleshoot cars I really like problem solving I like when some else has broke everything in the vehicle in the garage and you’re the last one where they’re

00:20:32 – 00:21:37
like hey this customer’s goinging up tomorrow please fix it that was my favorite thing I was like give me some time you know and after I I did that stint at that garage where we troubleshot Electronics I was pretty damn good not great but pretty good and I got in the office and I learned that business is just one big troubleshooting MH it’s all it is is it’s constant problem solving on a much higher level instead of just fixing a car you’re trying to spin like 100 plates at the same time and figure

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out which one you should move to and it was way more mind consuming and it was it quickly became an obsession where I couldn’t get enough of it I couldn’t work enough I couldn’t learn enough I couldn’t I couldn’t stop and when I got there in 2005 I think there was eight employees we were at about a 10,000 ft facility with a 30 manufacturers we were distributor and we just started doubling business every year justo Boop it just was a wild ride man it was it was so much fun we there’s

00:21:41 – 00:22:39
I tried everything to make business grow we’ve given away cars I’ve I’ve had multiple race series that we we built and made we had a a car garage where we could take customers and take them on the racetrack everything what were all your roles there the only thing I didn’t do is the easier way to say it the only I do was I didn’t do accounting I I stay away from accounting math and I don’t get along very well I I understand it pretty well from the top but once you get down to

00:22:10 – 00:23:05
the weeds where you start thinking about like um like use tax and stuff like that you know that’s where I’m like I’m out so how how does a guy come in not really want to be in an office would rather be in a garage and work his way up to the president determination I think would be the easiest way like there was definitely thing that I learned from going from the garage to the office in the garage people are not patient and there’s no tolerance for you got to get the car out or you can’t go home right

00:22:39 – 00:23:42
like there’s this whole thing of like if you don’t finish the customer standing there looking at you like they see you and you got this this mentality of like all cars have to exit the building at the end of the day and if they don’t you stay so I would be at the garage till 3 o’clock in the morning working on people’s Vehicles often and and when I got in the office I that whole mindset really paid off and when you’re a restyler nobody teaches you how to do any of that stuff

00:23:11 – 00:24:17
they hand you the stuff and they go put this on that car for that guy and you’re like okay I remember the first sunroof I did oh boy they should have never gave me a saw what was it in tell us tell us it was in a 96 Ford Taurus the bubble one right oh yeah and I Cut’s tough it is and you caught the cross member out right and and I have to relocate the dome light yep so I had to do a new headliner yep which I’ve never done before I cut the hole too hole too small and it was a basto roof so what happened

00:23:44 – 00:24:33
is the metals like right on that plastic yeah so the customer leaves and every time he hits a bump it’s flexing and going making all this noise right so he comes back and and who is it it’s my high school guidance counselor that couldn’t stand me I walk up Freddy SE me and he’s like he thought I did it on purpose he really did he told the manager he’s like I don’t want that guy working on my car I had all kinds of problems with in school and I’m like I didn’t do it on purpose I don’t know

00:24:09 – 00:25:07
what I’m doing you should have never let me cut a hole in your roof that’s what you shouldn’t have so uh yeah I I that that whole mentality of figured out I think that’s what got me from A to B is don’t wait for somebody to teach you go figure it out yeah and I actually think that that mentality of the garage and just shut up and do the work was probably what helped me get further where I watched other people that were peers like you know somebody really need to send me to like a school to learn how

00:24:38 – 00:25:56
to do this I’m like nobody’s GNA send you anywhere if you want to go do it you would do so I think that’s probably it that’s probably how I did it Brian what would you tell your younger self if you’re just starting out in the industry don’t eat so much um watch your diet watch your diet um propose after two years propose after two um and yeah I well if I had to go back and tell myself something I would say be patient it’ll work don’t stress out constantly about thinking that the sky

00:25:17 – 00:26:18
is going to fall and it’s going to collapse just keep at it you know I I think that the anxiety you give yourself when you’re trying to succeed is so overwhelming sometimes where you just you’re you just beat yourself up constantly and you don’t even take time to see the wins I mean the situation where we started a company and at January I was just beating myself up and the investor calls me up and he’s telling me something like hey did you see your numbers and I’m like no because

00:25:47 – 00:26:49
I think he’s like giving me a hard time and he’s like no no you don’t understand you did more in the first month of January then you did onethird of what you did in 2023 and I’m like oh because you just get so hyperfocused on stuff you can’t see it I think that I’d probably tell myself to calm down chill out well that goes with your determination though yeah yeah a little little bit of balance there right yeah I think it be that that eat less so what’s great what I love about Brian Jesse is

00:26:18 – 00:27:12
so he so let’s see what I can’t remember what meeting we were at I think we’re in Vegas and we’re sitting there and we’re talking about software you know I’m starting off my software stuff and he has this idea and he goes because at that point you were unemployed right motivis he sells y he sold you know the company sells and he’s like he’s like a free agent I mean imagine having that you know you’re like okay I’m going to take my time and figure out what I want

00:26:43 – 00:27:51
to do and then he has this idea of how to start a software B to B and he as and he’s explaining it to me and I’m like I can’t believe nobody’s thought of that so explain to explain everybody what your new company does and or what you know maybe it’s maybe it’s changed a little bit since we’ve talked a lot but we help manufacturers with their channel strategy and how to do that we use software and business process to achieve that success so where the idea came from was

00:27:18 – 00:28:11
is while motivity was growing um thankfully the owners of the company never invested in it they only invested one time when it first started so what that meant is we had to do everything ourselves everything was find money because if there was money that was in the inside the bank they took it so you never had money so we had to make our own Erp we had to make all of our own websites we had to make all of our own stuff and while I was doing that listening to the manufacturers tell me how much they couldn’t stand what we did

00:27:46 – 00:28:34
and they should do it themselves I was like you’ll never achieve that as I’m doing it I’m like you know if these guys had some of this technology they could probably do more themselves but I never said anything to anybody because I’m like I don’t want to tell anybody my idea we watched manufacturers bring us business that they really should have kept to themselves like it was an important customer was a value ad customer and it was like you’re giving them to us because you can’t handle the

00:28:10 – 00:29:07
business process it’s you can’t satisfy the customer needs because you’re still operating like it’s 1985 not not an offensive way it’s like if you guys think about it can you tell me one place that you email somebody today to buy something and ask them if it’s in stock can you tell me that is there anywhere you do that it’s tough yeah it’s usually all online yeah right well all manufacturers are still operating that way and they think well we’re a manufacturer we don’t have to do

00:28:39 – 00:29:41
this yes you do that’s the progression of business so they’re all still like doing it this way what’s happening is the customer the more that the web takes off the customers are getting used to just ordering a certain way and if you’re not going to catch up on it you’re going to be left behind and what we do is help pull them into the digital age and get them in in kind of a satisfactory way of complying with customer the customer wants to know that the part’s in stock and they want to know when it Shi and

00:29:11 – 00:30:09
they want to know how much it is when they order it and they want to have their payment options even if it’s B2B doesn’t matter who it is you want to know those things you want to know where your return is you want to know what your cancellation status is so what we did is we made a businessto business marketpl place we said look all the manufacturers can use this and they can use it to work with their customers and we hook up to their Erp their enterprise resource planning software kind of like their ECU for

00:29:39 – 00:30:36
their company and what we do is we kind of a lot of the things that slow down a manufacturer we just bypass it that way it speeds it up for the customer so I’ll give you an example like when you send a a purchase order to a manufacturer or better yet even a lot of times if you order it through their portal if they have one it’s just an email that gets kicked out that email then goes and sits on somebody’s desk and let’s say that email that wasn’t ordered from their website it’s

00:30:08 – 00:31:09
just an email that email almost always has problems they don’t specify where they want it to be shipped what payment method uh they probably have the price wrong right like so there’s all these factors that make it go back to the Manu you got to email it back to the customer hey and nobody ever writes out all of them at the same time what’s the address what payment method what this it’s four voles back and forth so that order just got delayed by two to three days you know it just dragged

00:30:37 – 00:31:41
out that timing that the manufacturer is spending dragging these orders out is frustrating their customers and they’re either moving to another brand or stop buying we give them instantaneous tied to their Erp you order that order goes right under their Erp it’s it’s locked in like it’s sitting in their queue to go pick pack and ship or pull or build and you can see the status of it and then when it ships we tell the customer that it ship the payment method we process all the payment form and because

00:31:11 – 00:32:07
we’re a Marketplace we do all the state sales tax that all the manufacturers have to comply with now so what we’re doing is we’re helping the manufacturer uplift them themselves off of what it was before to what the future is and help teach them how to operate in the digital Aid what’s one of the toughest challenges that you faced I’m sure like you got to educate the manufacturers on this you’ve got to I mean because if they’re still living in what’ you say 1983 or

00:31:39 – 00:32:40
1985 I mean what what are the what are the challenges so what what Josh said earlier was nobody’s ever done this before the hardest part is that people don’t understand like it’s it’s it’s new and new means I’m either I’m going to listen to you and be really curious about it or I’m just going to tune you on like you must be selling me snake oil right the hardest part is explain to them this was completely engineered for manufacturers to sell to their customers we don’t take any transaction fee we’re

00:32:09 – 00:33:05
not marking the price up we don’t set the price we just give you the place the easiest way for me to explain it is we’re a virtual mall we built the mall we keep the lights on we keep the register the electricity everything running we shovel the snow in the driveway and we have General doors that people can come through every brand gets their own store inside the mall they control who goes inside and outside that door the other unique thing about it is we know that Brands only want to sell to

00:32:37 – 00:33:39
their value ad customers they don’t sell to everybody you know in business to Consumer how manufacturers do that is through price Rolex says this watch is $30,000 that excludes a lot of people Brands when they do it they pick their partners and say this is somebody that’s going to represent our company I want this person to be direct and they don’t do it through price they do it through picking so what our Marketplace does is one it’s exclusive Midway plus does not invite a single buyer into the space we don’t

00:33:08 – 00:33:59
even have a tool to do that the only way a buyer can get in is a brand that uses a Marketplace invites them into the system and then that buyer is only visible to that brand the buyer though can walk around the mall and go look and see all the other brands but they have to knock on the door and say Here’s who I am now we keep some stats for that person to help them apply and they can apply to purchase from the manufacturer and the manufacturer say yes or no and if they say yes we give that customer

00:33:33 – 00:34:31
all the product data they need the price file all the information they have to have and they can start purchasing the buyer only has to put one wallet together so if you’re buying from 50 manufacturers if you could imagine and they all have businessto business portals their own separate ones that buyer has to log into 50 different sites throughout the week yep ours are all a collection the buyer can put One credit card on file and the tax documents for their state they can buy 50 brands on one purchase order we’ll

00:34:02 – 00:35:04
split the whole entire thing up and parse it out and bring all the information back for the buyer so we’re collectively putting everybody together as a group no different than you know people say why I don’t be in the same space as another brand really do you would you want your booth next to that brand at SEMA I would why because eyeballs your businesso business site is never going to compete with a A company that registers more eyeballs your your site is it’s never going to be a place that people go you

00:34:33 – 00:35:32
got to have a collection and that’s for my past life of been a Wholesale Distributor you had all the eyeballs every eyeball is come in the distributor so to the manufacturer for them to have some kind of tool like this that people come in and buy from them got to have those eyeballs I was going to ask you what sets you apart but I think you just asked you just answered that the the most unique thing that our patent is about is that our Marketplace is in reverse the buyer is not technically we

00:35:03 – 00:35:54
don’t look at him as our customer from Midway plus as the marketplace facilitator the manufacturer is we take no money from the buyer on purpose because we don’t want to get in between that business we don’t want to jeopardize it we don’t interrupt it we don’t want to Mark anything up we want to be clean and pure just like if you were buying a direct right we charge a licensing fee just like a Shopify would to the manufacturer just like if they were getting a B2B store so they get the B2B store but

00:35:28 – 00:36:39
they’re in a combined group we don’t charge any other fees so the reverse of it is the buyer has no leverage over us yeah right when you go to anything else if you think about like Amazon as a Marketplace the buyer wants a better price so what Amazon does is they’re going to make that that first listing come up the best price it’s in stock and available well if you’re the manufacturer man a going to keep lowering my price to having people sell here the manufacturer in control they

00:36:03 – 00:37:10
set all the rules they set who’s allowed to buy and the price and the engagement they can have um sales rebates programs to help engage their customer but it’s their choice how they use them we don’t do any of that so the the really the uniqueness of it is the seller is the one that controls the marketplace we sit back and just help people conduct business business inside what so are you just in the automotive space right now we are right now so Automotive is obviously where I’ve spent my entire career um we knew

00:36:37 – 00:37:37
this new thing was going to be uh difficult to get up off the ground because it’s a New Concept you know and we thought the best place to start this is an automotive yeah based on what we know and I also knew this so many manufacturers if they could just if we could just tie into the Erp I can make them faster I I did purchasing at motivis for a long time yeah and so many frustrations of buying it I could just do a stock check so that’s like such a major thing or if I could get an order confirmation it would have saved

00:37:07 – 00:38:09
me so much time yeah so I knew there was a lot of help that was needed in this industry we are talking to other Industries about this um but we’re not going to take our off the ball when it comes to Automotive like that’s going to be our our Focus yeah it’s huge industry it so do you think this will afford you a more expensive moooo I think I could probably get like a Gucci one I think if I really want oh my gosh yeah could you imagine your grandpa your grandfather would be so proud he

00:37:38 – 00:38:44
would and he would be very proud of my Gucci Momo you’re right yeah so Brian go ahead Jesse I love it Jesse’s Jesse’s picturing it right now I’m I’m trying desperately not to but thanks I’ll send you a picture of my grandfather in have it it was a Christmas card for us one year which I still have somewhere make it your logo um how did you guys come up with the the name Midway plus where what’s where does all that come from and like how did you come up with those concepts for the

00:38:11 – 00:39:04
brand yeah so right now it’s a finished thought right what we do is a finished thought but when I first started thinking about this you know I might had this big of it and then I couldn’t get over certain hurdles like how the idea that you could split up 10 orders right that was that took me a bit split the taxes up was one of the bigger Milestones I had get over but way back in the day I had this idea and it just was ups every so often it would be a coming up session again I’d start writing down

00:38:38 – 00:39:34
notes I’d start thinking all these things I was in North Carolina NGK invited us to the zMAX four wide racetrack right and I’m sitting there and I walk down to the general area and I go over to this booth and I bought um a connecting rod John Force connecting rod and I’m standing there and I’m like that’s the Midway and I’m like well we bring Brands and buyers together we’re a Midway plus we help you do all these other things to make your business easier it was really this it was the

00:39:06 – 00:40:01
Midway from a racetrack that actually made the name was was how it came through and and the plus was just it’s not just a this we’re trying to actively help our customers make their business smoother and more profitable so really there was no original thought that went into it is what you’re saying no no I copied somebody else as I was standing there and I said Midway I like you’re like hm uh that I’m kind of lazy I don’t want to look around anymore this is I don’t I

00:39:33 – 00:40:27
don’t want to get anything else here so interfere with it so I’ll just go with that that was it yeah that was that was totally it and it would have been just Midway but somebody already owned that URL so I I made it mid plus plus that’s right plus.com that’s right and did you end up what did you have to do to get it off the ground did you have to go get partners what was that launch phase launching a software company is no small thing I’ve been a part of some of that stuff it’s it’s crazy we were very

00:40:00 – 00:40:53
fortunate that so there’s a gentleman to my right that’s worked with me for about eight years that wrote we we had a good team at motivis I would dry all the wireframes I don’t write any code but I do all the wireframes in the storyboards and then I I’ll say like when you touch this this happens to the Erp or this happens to shipping right so you do the whole hierarchy of operation and Steve who sits over here worked on so long I don’t have to do a lot of those things anymore he already

00:40:27 – 00:41:36
know know was like if I draw a pitch he’s like I know what you’re doing so we’re pretty fast like as a as a group um motivis was a rather you know it was a in the grand schema thing you know $100 million dollar WD is it’s not huge you know so we had to lean on technology to compete with the big guys with big wallets so we were pretty good about making an engineer in our own technology so I’d say for about 10 years when I was at Moto I was really heavy in all of the software that we had to build I

00:41:00 – 00:42:08
and we installed the new Erp in 2017 and that’s how I met our CIO he he was uh he put our Erp in at Moto in total I think six months start to finish did transactions on the first day no interruptions uh his passion is installing Erp systems that’s what he loves doing does anybody really have a passion for installing Erp system Greg Atkins is his name and his passion is installing Erp systems he loves it wow shout out to Greg um does he do anything on the weekends he he does do uh he does

00:41:35 – 00:42:26
contract work for people for advisement because here’s why he’s unque because because you can’t have a life a good great I mean I mean he’s is he single no he’s married man he’s married you package unicorn he’s there so he what I love about him is he studied economics because most it guys that you know when you think about like let’s build something they’re like let’s build this magical thing you’re like uh that’s not worth it like that’s to much money

00:42:00 – 00:42:59
yeah he did economics and then he goes when I was in college if you were in college at that time they basically told you get an it that was really they just shoved you into it goes so I got an it so what’s nice is he looks through stuff as everybody has to make money and you gotta have sales so that’s foolish don’t do that so his business operations through the Erp are like why do you want that and you know somebody else share and go okay but you’re not going to get your Roi on that good for him so he’s like a

00:42:29 – 00:43:31
so he’s an IT guy but he’s also got Common Sense he has business common sense so yes it’s it’s an interesting uh combination right so we when we sold the company the day that we sold and signed the paperwork I brought Greg and Steve into my office and I said I got this really wacky idea that I’ve been sitting on for about 10 years and I shared the idea and Greg Atkins goes that’s a blue ocean idea I’m like I don’t know what that is and he goes that means there’s no boats on the

00:43:00 – 00:44:20
ocean that’s never been done before I’m okay we all said we’re in we all shook hands I said I’m going to go spend the summer it was it was May I said I’m gonna go spend the summer sit on my boat and drink beer and take break and in the fall we’ll get back together and start working on it and 2020 I started putting wire frames together and I spent 20 the tail into 2020 beginning of 21 doing wire frames pretty much fulltime building out the entire site and then uh got a seed round in August of

00:43:40 – 00:44:37
21 and that’s when we got the office and we started putting code together and we released our product February of 2022 wow and um so we’re we’re just a little over two years old of having a finished product um we’ve got right now about 1.7 million lines of code it’s big product has to be to make it work for a manufacturer and it’s going well we’ve got a lot of great customers and what I love is I love hearing these old stories where’re like we don’t have errors

00:44:09 – 00:45:02
anymore that’s exactly that’s what you need or we now have the ability to scale like that’s exactly what’s meant to do have you ever thought of changing your name to no more errors no because people people would hold me to that oh and they’d be like hey you had an error today be like I know or just a few errors how about just a few errors coule fewer you have less than before fewer errors fewer errors that’s how you start how many errors did you have l oh you don’t even

00:44:36 – 00:45:29
know how many wow yeah we’re gonna be less or you don’t have to pay the bill um Brian uh I’m fascinated to hear okay you launched the business you guys built code you did all this but there’s something else you didn’t talk about which is sales so what did what happened how did you network how did you sell it how did you get get people to come on board were they was there their trepidation were they nervous at first like ah what is this thing how did you get over that because that’s only been

00:45:02 – 00:45:57
what a year from 2022 I mean like you’ve been moving fast well thank you I mean it feels like slow when you’re in the world of it right you feel like you’re going at a crawl a snail space I mean we we can’t put enough time in to try and keep going there is it there hasn’t been a time yet since we even started this that we’ve stopped production of code there’s there 250 projects right now sitting in the queue to go through so we have a complete road map we’re on version one

00:45:30 – 00:46:33
we’re about to switch to version two which just means more enhancements more than we normally have but we have all way to version six right now drafted honestly it was a lot of relationships you know myself talking to people I was fortunate enough to know a lot of the CEOs of companies where it was easy for me to go in and say look our product will cut your costs down I know it will and it’ll help you Traverse the next 10 years you’re you’re going to feel more safe and secure so that definitely helped um in

00:46:03 – 00:46:58
the beginning we sold it terribly we did a bad job you know we struggled to explain what it was um you know a lot of people think it does something that they they want to imagine it does something it doesn’t do they want to think that it grows your sales which is what a lot of people want I want my sales to go up 20% I’m like it doesn’t do that you could grow your business 20% but we don’t help you we’re not a rep agency right we’re we’re Marketplace so we’ve we’ve got much

00:46:31 – 00:47:44
better at understanding the right customer for us that is is ready for something like we’re doing because it’s a big project um Adel Brock was they signed and I think we started working on the project in November of last year um they use Oracle Alo plugging into that with their team they got a great team awesome and we got up and running about third week of January maybe and we’re they’re you know they it’s it’s a new way of doing business so they’re they’re now getting used to it

00:47:07 – 00:48:01
and and kind of operating but it’s about a six Monon commitment from start to finish for a larger company you know to install connect to Erp train configure and then inevitably after we go live we hear all these things like oh my God we do this and you know we didn’t know we’re like okay let’s see if we can work out a way to figure that out for you so in the sales process we just been fighting for every account it’s probably the best way to put it so are you uh you’re you were the

00:47:35 – 00:48:46
Visionary that got this thing off the ground and you’ve got a great team are is your role CEO or and are you the chief uh salesperson as well like what what are you doing now because you talked about you know the design work you do still but what else sounds like you do a lot we have a person that um one of the partners uh Albert Rea that does sales that’s his primary job do business sales um I also do sales I learned that I do it poorly but I’m working on it and why do you why do you say

00:48:10 – 00:49:17
that yeah I always thought I was pretty decent at sales I did and doing this it was a huge wakeup call selling a vision versus selling a product is completely different selling something that’s not tangible you can’t put in your hand and touch is completely different right so it was a big Learning lesson of how do you explain to people how do you get somebody to actually share with you the troubles they go through in their business to where they can recognize like well gosh yeah if you did that we wouldn’t have to do this

00:48:46 – 00:49:41
anymore and that cost us a lot of money to do that getting to that point is tough um I’ve got this thing where I tell people I I hate software people because I literally do I bought an Erp and we failed at in Moto it was horrible I bought a website we failed a website that’s what really taught me to go make our own um I learned why those people are terrible software sale people they tell you anything you want to hear because it gets a sale done if you’re honest at all with a customer you lose

00:49:14 – 00:50:12
the sale you know so it’s really tough to be a salesperson when you’re trying to be honest with people and say that isn’t going to do what you want where what they want you to do is lie to them and say oh yeah you got that no problem and then after you install it they’re like what about that thing you’re like oh yeah it doesn’t do that so yeah I do sales I do the the wireframes still that’s a big part of it and we usually write down four or five problems that our customers want us to

00:49:42 – 00:50:39
help solve um and myself and and Steve and and Greg will go through and try to figure out a business process that’ll help them fix that so who who’s funnier though you Steve or Greg me yeah no comparison Steve and Greg sound kind of boring a little a little bit tell them I said hi but there I would say I would agree with you yeah yeah I mean there’s a reason I’m not having them on the podcast well and and I one of my favorite things about Steve is is that when we were putting business cards together I go

00:50:12 – 00:51:02
what do you want on yours can I have nothing on it I don’t want anybody to ever call me and I go no problem no problem he doesn’t even have a last name his name’s not even really Steve I don’t know if he knew that that was my favorite part he’s like would it be okay if I never talked to a single person I said that’s that’s awesome that’s the best can you imagine hand somebody just a blank business card here here’s the best way to get hold of me never yeah yeah

00:50:39 – 00:51:27
what’s good though is now he’s he’s he’s warmed up to a lot of communications with the customers right because you know that’s awesome that’s it sounds like you got an awesome team there we do you know it probably the the the most fun I had with this is if you’re going to start your own company and you get to pick your own team right it’s not like it’s not you work somewhere and like HR brings you a person like yeah like that’s not what I wanted this is I got

00:51:03 – 00:52:04
to pick the people that I’ve worked with for a long time that I already knew what they were capable of right it wasn’t like I have to discover I to find out I already know and that was great because going through this you need to be tight and you need to be together on things because it’s hard it starting a business I people us always tell me I have an entrepreneurial spirit I learned something no you’re not an entrepreneur until you start your own damn business there’s no such thing you you

00:51:33 – 00:52:32
gota there’s it’s the most difficult thing I think you’ll ever do in your life it is hard absolutely if this fails will you go back to alarms maybe I think that I think that I now I’m actually living right right where I I originally had that job I’m right almost in the same town I’ve thought to myself gosh if this went under I could go back to do an alarms throughout the day remote starts and you know I can probably do that painted vent visors are coming back buddy are they

00:52:03 – 00:52:56
yeah they’re a little bit more expensive but they’re coming back so you already know that stick and peel STI yeah I I I can scuff them up with a scotchbrite or you know actually we learned use paint the other side that was when that genius came out remember that before he used to paint the outside then somebody figured out get them clear and then paint the inside smart yeah yeah well he listen you always have the restyling now that you know what it is now you can always tell people I used to be restyler now

00:52:28 – 00:53:23
I’m now I build virtual malls yeah which is a little bit more confusing than restyling but yeah it’s fine I often think i’ I’d like to get a car and and fix it up and my wife has to remind me that he’s like you have no patience for that stuff anymore every time you work on something you leave it alone like you used to stay and work on stuff for hours now you touch over 20 minutes like I’m going to go do something now I’m I’m bored what what are you what are you looking forward to

00:52:56 – 00:53:56
the most right now like what excites you about the business what what’s what’s next you know it it’s really hard to to put it to one thing you know it we’re at a place right now where things are coming together we’re getting success stories from our customers and I love hearing you know my favorite things is when they say we made more money like I love that you know a lot of times are hesitant to tell you because they think you’re going to charge them more I think I think that’s why but I

00:53:31 – 00:54:32
love it when they’re like hey we made more money yeah they’re like well yeah I we think it’s working for us thank you it it’s that’s my favorite part but I can see it it clicking and I can tell by the relationships that people are asking me to you know get involved with they’re like hey you should get to know this guy that it’s it’s starting to network and starting to grow um I’m looking forward to the next 20 customers I think you know I think the next 20 are really going to help refine our

00:54:01 – 00:54:58
process because you know we we almost do a little bit of like when somebody buys an Erp we have to go through a lot of things so it’s just it’s a pretty intricate thing we do and it we try to do it as fast as we can you know so having something like this done in three to six months is pretty quick I want to make it faster I want to make it to where it’s 90 days start to finish so I’m really looking forward the next 20 customers because every time we get one you find something you’re doing

00:54:30 – 00:55:38
wrong that you could do just a little bit better to make it a little bit faster well I’ll let Jesse ask his last question but before he does thank you Brian for being on you’re uh I’m so happy that your idea finally took off I mean I could tell you were gonna make it work you gonna make it there’s one thing I I don’t do very well is I don’t give up on things that I think are right and yeah I I I I commit I like to win very much I love the challenge it’s a lot of fun well and I’m just happy to look like

00:55:03 – 00:56:09
you so you should be you really should be and if somebody ever comes up to me and goes see we’re like did I see you in a Gucci MooMoo I’m like yes yes you did that was me I will and I will wear those Blaze or our hunter goggles too that the oh yeah yeah the B focals I’ll need them by then because this year was the first year I had to do this oh B focals me too me well of course we’re brothers so yeah I think our dad had the same problem about our age so it’s fine but you know I want to see

00:55:36 – 00:56:35
one day will you come to SEMA in a Gucci Mumu if you’ve made it to if i’ made it big scale if I’ve made it big hell yeah I would walk in there with that MooMoo on and would you bring me one so we can walk around together yes but yours would be a little tighter I’d make sure yours fit a little more Awkward you know I got to look better I got to look better yeah like me up you need to you need to lose weight yeah I’d be like look obviously he’s been eating too much he I have an eating

00:56:06 – 00:56:59
disorder literally I eat too much Brian um if people want to get a hold of you or learn more about your company where do they go what’s the website or or how would you like to field questions uh Midway plot.com you can go there you can go to linkon that’s probably what most people get holding me through linked it seems like um probably the easiest you probably have the high-end Linked In don’t you you pay for the I do you pay for the highend I do I do pay for that so you probably creep on

00:56:33 – 00:57:25
people no but you know you they changed the rules used to be a lot of fun you could tell who looked at your stuff before yeah and you can now but you have to get I think 700 views before that happens but before it used to be great you’d have like 10 views and you could see exactly who it was and you’re like oh I see you’re following me there they got rid of that it was it was way it was so cool and they deleted it I I’m mad at them yeah I’m too lazy write them an email I would never do it I’d like to

00:56:59 – 00:58:01
complain if they were in front of me but awesome well thanks again brother happy for you you guys are killing it so go out and see a Midway plus and if you’re a business why aren’t they using you right what’s their excuse should be they should they don’t have one manufacturers G there’s there’s 7,000 members of SEMA all you need is about a thousand of them to sign up tomorrow if they if a thousand sign up tomorrow I’ll be wearing thatu real soon yes let’s do it people let’s get let’s

00:57:29 – 00:58:32
see Lounsbury in a moomoo by 2024 SEMA let’s do this all right thanks again for being on our our show today I really appreciate it all right guys thank you and there you have it another high octane episode of the Ryden style podcast reved up and ready to go your hosts Jesse Stoddard and Josh pson shifted your Automotive game into overdrive if you’re hungry for more insights Trends and gamechanging interviews from the automotive restyling Universe don’t forget to hit subscribe and leave a

00:58:06 – 00:59:10
glowing review we’d also love for you to share this podcast with your Gearheads installers and autol lovers Network because remember knowledge is power but shared knowledge turbocharges the whole industry for more expert resources to supercharge your business cruise on over to autostyle marketing.com your One-Stop shop for Everything Automotive Market marketing until next time keep those Wheels spinning and your passion ignited thank you for riding in style with us see you on the next lap