Today Charlie talks to Devon boy Alan, a natural risk taker who enjoys being uncomfortable (both mentally and physically), and why this mindset enables him to go to places the mediocre majority can not.

Alan set up his own company after doing a job for a few months and thinking: “f*** it. I can do this. I’ll set up on my own”...

...Nearly 20 years later, he talks about the blazing rows with his brother and business partner, balancing kids and the business, and why hiring staff isn’t the quickest or easiest road to growth in this game.

Discover more about One Man Empire here:

https://www.theonemanempire.com/

Okay gentlemen.

Well, today I've got an absolute fucking belt, a foyer.

And they go out and Dylan.

Dan will be here inside of the bunker.

Now, Allen.

Well, he set up a promotional goods company, Strauss uni,

after being in a similar sort of job, I'm thinking, fuck this.

I can do this whole thing way better now, 20 years on he's operating what

some have called a national empire.

But here's what most people don't realize.

Actually, this whole thing is just run by him and his brother

rich, which is fucking amazing.

Now as someone that can't think of anything worse than working with my

brother, Al has got some awesome fucking insight on how to make that work.

We're going to get deep into how to build a business for scale.

We're going to talk about balancing all of that shit with family.

Now on top of all of that.

If like me, you get a hold of exercise and pushing your bodies to your limits.

I think Ellen's daily training routine is going to raise some fucking eyebrows.

So let's get to this.

Yesterday I just decided that I needed to whack up the weights, you

know, you'd been, I thought, fuck it.

I'm getting a bit bored of these weights.

I just whack 'em up.

So, smashed 'em up yesterday, um, was in quite a bit of agony

in the evening, which is good.

That's what that's, that's, you know, If you're not, then it's

a wasted session, isn't it.

What time were you weight training , was that first thing or

I usually go in the morning, um, but the miss is off to London, so she had

a million things she wanted to do.

So she's like, can you do this?

Can you do this

fucked with your routine is

Me?

She, I, she goes like, can you take the kids?

So I hope to get in in the morning, but I didn't, . I got a couple of hours in the

afternoon, before, I pick the kids up.

So, I squeezed it in, , it was a little bit quiet and then a million

emails started to come through and I thought, fuck, I'm now doing weights.

And in between the minute, wait, I'm doing email, get it back on the weights.

And then I get a big order come through from from Lloyd's bank.

Mate.

Doesn't doesn't that sum up what it is to be like a man at the help of a business.

Like you've got shit going on.

I'm at the fucking gym.

I'm closing sales, I'm sending emails and, in between, jacking up the weights

talk me through running a business with Richard brother,

which is really, really cool.

, cuz I can't even imagine like running a business with my brother.

It would be a fucking shit show.

We tried doing it when we were younger.

We had a skateboard company, , my brother was really into skateboarding,

, really successful at it.

And we were like, we, we give this a go.

But we are so polar apart in terms of how we, how we approach it we

would've ended up killing each other if we'd continued that adventure.

So talk me through

yeah.

Well, must have just finished uni.

I think I'd applied for a few jobs, got this one where I

was working at a promotional merchandise company up in Leeds.

A sales job, , the guy was paying me.

, I think it was eight K a year plus commission, which was, fuck

all, but it's, , it's a job offer

. I took it.

I like the sound of it.

Funnily enough, I'd been offered to go on.

The morsons, um, graduate management scheme.

But for some reason I, I jib that

I So I started there was doing really well with the sales . And,

um, I just, for,, you know, I'm not, I'm not getting paid enough.

I could do this for myself.

Um, spoke to my dad.

Cause my dad really ever since I've been young, he's always been drilled into me.

It's like, you gotta work for yourself.

He works for, he works for, you know, his work in a factory, um, his whole

life, but it's like, you gotta, work for yourself if you want to make it, . So

I always had that sort of instilled

So your dad, despite working in a factory, had already connected the dots

, he's still working in that factory.

Now he's been working since he's 21.

So 45 years there,

he had a tough upbringing where his dad wasn't about.

He was , the breadwinner, he had two sisters, he's got his mother, my

grand, who he still lives with.

He's got a support.

So he's very risk averse.

Some people are born to work.

Some people are born to the entrepreneurs, everyone everyone's different.

So I just went to my dad after Fremont said, listen, I can do this.

I can do this by myself.

My dad's like, all right, fine.

Let's get it started, and that was back in 2004.

So aside three months, experience nothing.

When you're young, you think you can do anything,

10 feet tall and fucking Bulletproof

You just everything and you can speak and you think I'm gonna start this company

and I'm gonna be doing the same sales.

I'm gonna be doing everything the same.

Without, , realizing everything else, which comes around the

package of running a business

but anyway, started, cause I'd just been to lead uni.

We got into their incubation space up there.

Was this still just you, Alan was rich involved at this stage or,

no, so it's just me at this stage, which was a recruitment consultant.

Um, maybe for, yeah, I know if I could maybe about no, maybe about six months.

He was hating it.

He was hating it.

. , and rich joined me after about six months.

, he jacked it in.

I think he just fucking quit.

And I think he just likes hear I I'm already.

And that was the beginning.

Really this was the days before.

Google,

we were sending out catalogs, you know, catalogs is how we're getting business.

We're sending out 50 catalogs out a day, . So it's completely different

That takes cash as well.

Doesn't it?

Yeah.

I think, I think

My dad gave me.

I think he gave us 20 grand to start

that's amazing.

and, and that's where it all began because

. you know, in The last , 20 years,

So that's how it all began.

We bounced around a few incubation spaces before we got our own premises,

our own offices up in leads , and just sort of grew out from then

we were, rocking and rolling, and then 2008 came into the crash

A hundred percent.

I was out in Canada in a construction business.

When that happened, it was like, fuck.

it was just like bang.

The world stopped, you know, the, the sale, everything,

just everything plummeted.

And it took so long maybe a year and a half after it ended to get back to

that same point again, cause the first thing, people stop buying promotional

goods, so it can be a tough game,

, what's in.

I mean, that, that 20 K investment from your dad there.

Must come with a huge amount of responsibility and all that.

So what's your emotions going into that conversation?

I remember, I think being at the train station and LEED, and I was gonna

getting the train home to speak to my

, did he know this conversation was coming

No.

So he didn't, so it's like, , I'm gonna ask for 20 K it's like a face to face,

you know, it's not, I mean, lead's not the one where you just pick up the phone,

. That's a lot of money, so you're right.

It is a lot of responsibility to take that off someone, my parents work hard.

They haven't got no high flying jobs.

They work, normal jobs where, it takes while to earn the money.

So, but I went back and he was more of an happy for me to, give it a go.

And I think to be honest, it's crazy, , looking back, I've in the

job three months and I wanted to start, I don't know what I'd say.

If my kids came up to me say, yeah, we do a job for a few months.

I wanna start my own company.

I'm like, hold on, hold the fuck up.

Yeah.

Have you

like company, you, you know, you thought this through, but my dad never,

no you're supportive the whole way.

You never, you never said a word like that.

And I think it's cuz he works in a factory, so he doesn't know what it's like

running a business or anything like that.

That is amazing.

I dunno.

I've always had that sort of risk taking, taking nature very sort of high.

You know, I, I can really push things to limit.

I remember at college, I had this like green dice, it had 20 sides

and I remember having people would come and I'd like, , do you wanna

bet on which number will come up?

And I'd say is a pound number , 20 people would enter at 10 quid for

the winner and I'd take another.

That's

And I was like running this.

I was running this like daily.

Nobody really battered an eyelid that I was making 10 pounds and

the winner was making 10 pounds.

I used to sell Parker pens at school, you know, shit like that, I'd sort

of buy them on the cheap, sell 'em to someone else, make a few kid quid off it

it could have been anything.

It's just, I saw something I thought I can, I can buy it.

I can sell it.

It's the same as what I'm doing now I can buy it.

I can sell it.

You know, it's like constant sort of think, can I make more money from it

But you know, . It's, it's exciting.

Isn't it?

I love it, mate.

I absolutely love it.

And it fascinates me the number of let's call it like self-made men that

have had that experience selling nose to nose, , whether that's in the fucking

playground or whether it's on the phone setting, like promotional stuff.

I sold gas and electric over the telephone.

Everyone told me I was gonna fucking hate it.

It was being the worst job ever.

And I loved it.

I was like, this is dead easy.

And I think it's that ability to hold a conversation or that ability to identify,

let's call it a, need a, want a problem, a desire or something that you can help

them with and then see that there is a value exchange that can happen there.

It's really, really cool.

Really cool.

What, , I'm, what I'm interested to, explore with you, Alan, , , is that crash

in 2008, , things are going, good.

Sales are going.

Super exciting.

You've not killed each other yet as brothers inside of the business and

then , this thing happens out the blue, which is completely out of your control

how do you approach that?

, how does that affect you?

I think whenever something like that happens the same

with COVID, whatever it was.

You never think it's gonna go on for as long as it does it first.

hits.

So it's always, I suppose, it's that positive attitude you're

thinking I'm gonna keep going.

I'm gonna keep persevering.

It's gonna come back.

Everything's gonna be good.

we just knuckled down.

I think, I don't know if we started around that time, a

business in which sold gadgets.

Okay.

So we had a business, which might have been helping us around that sort of time.

We are selling absolute shit loads on Amazon, ridiculous amounts,

something like, cuz we were one of the first people on there.

I think we were doing something like 50 or 60 of these a day.

Fucking hell Allen.

I think the gadgets sort of company helped us on that side or kept us

busy anyway and kept us focused.

I dunno how much money we ended up making out from it in the

end, but it kept us focused.

Um

So , where the fuck did that come in?

, where did you spot the opportunity, and make that happen.

We sell a lot of products and I started, we sell a lot of tech goods.

We're selling a lot of USB drives, . And then I I thought, actually we can.

Sell to the end user, get some stock in from the same suppliers.

And we started to look up the products that look looked popular.

Um,

and we just, we just sort of gravitated.

I also had , a company that sold, booster seats.

Oh yeah.

that, when that first came out, it's bought easy traveler, fucking,

all the memories,

I like the Brandon on that one.

yeah, we selling a load of those again.

But I think when you're an entrepreneur you got your fingers and so many pies.

So you wanna try, you see something, you see something exciting.

I remember watching the apprentice and they had some sort of gadget guitar came

on it, for one of the activities they're doing, and literally before the end of the

show, I was like getting a manufacturer, finding out where can I get these

from the next day I was selling them.

All of those sort of things are exciting.

So in your mind, how do you determine, or what's your thought

process to be like, fuck it.

I'm gonna take a punt on this.

Is it just punt?

If you got like an instinct with something or, how do you decide

what's worth trial and what not?

I, I think it, I think it is just like, I just have it instinct, whether it's gonna

be something that's gonna be popular.

So that gadget one with the guitars straight away.

I knew

but I mean, sometimes it works sometimes it doesn't.

But I don't mind being uncomfortable.

And I think what it comes down to is most people don't want that discomfort.

the mediocre majority are happy just to sort of coast along

in their protective bubble.

But the true growth comes from dis.

So I'm always, I'm always happy to, , push myself to, you know, it's like the same

with the running and stuff like that.

It's like a lot of people wouldn't go outside running when it's raining,

yeah, yeah.

It's like embraces the rain, go out into the rain, you know?

, everybody's become.

So comfortable.

Everybody's comfortable sitting in watching TV, watching Netflix in their

little bubbles but you know, the most fun comes when you're really pushing yourself,

Couldn't be a more true word said.

And I think if you you're constantly pushing constantly striving

it's, where real movement comes.

And do you think during like that 2008 crash during COVID, is, that one of the

characteristics that got you through that?

I mean, COVID was a bad one because it was a massive hit to our industry

promotional items, but I remember I was just annoying the misses.

I was like straight away within weeks.

I was like, what can I sell?

, but it's just, you know, it's giving up is never, it's not in me.

I'll have to break, and that's the same with my running and endurance

because I'd rather break the body.

At least I can say my body was broken, so I couldn't continue rather

than, I just gave up, I stopped.

That's not my vocabulary, you know,

. And you mentioned there annoying the misses with different ideas.

, when you, when you start, were you in you in sight together then,

So we, we didn't get together till 2009.

Um, yeah, so quite a few years later.

Um, and then

you've got, got two kids now as well, Haven.

that's right?

Yeah.

Two kids.

Five and three.

Yeah,

So talk me through cuz , I mean, as, as far as me and Emma goes, I fucked like a

load of shit up from a business standpoint when we had our bar but from you, going

from you're running the business for what would've been, , I guess five years.

And you've got that.

I say freedom, to basically work when you want , I can work 10,

12, 13, 14, 16, 21 hours a day.

And, then you end up, in a relationship with someone that starts taking time and

down the line through kids, into the mix, and it's a fucking hard thing to balance.

Isn't it?

So how did you manage that?

Yeah, definitely.

Pre relationship.

I was doing something I, you know, I, every night would

be working until midnight.

You just do it.

Don't you.

And that was fine.

I did that for ages.

Then you get married and suddenly you've got a bit less time.

To be honest with you, that transition from being single to being married

or together with someone is fine.

You've still got time.

The transition from being married to having kids.

That's, that's the one where it drops off a cliff where you're sort of like

now time has not gone down, maybe 10, 15% from being single to being married.

It's gone down 50%.

There's a massive, massive drop off there.

And, it's tough cuz , you've gotta really think about how

you're spending your time then.

And , what happens is you look back when you have kids, you look back and think,

fuck, I had a lot of time on my hands.

I had a lot of time on my hands.

I was probably wasting half of it.

And the same thing happens when you have a second child, you look back

on the first child, think, fuck.

I had a lot of time on my hands.

You've gotta really start prioritizing your time , which I do now.

And for me, the game changer has been really getting up early.

You know, where I can get up like five o'clock in the morning.

Where you can , do a bit of meditation, do a bit of work.

You know, two hours is gone before anybody's up . You're in a good place

you need to fulfill your own needs before you can fulfill somebody else's

and they're coming with their needs and you haven't even got out of bed yet.

So I've got into a good habit now of , kids go bed, I'll stay up for a bit.

Try not to watch too much TV.

Get to bed maybe about nine so I can get up at five.

And for me that works because then suddenly you've got that

balance you're just not irritated.

Your tolerance for getting irritated as much higher,

I, I do agree.

I So yesterday, I, I walk, I try to every day, get Barney to school

and, pick him up afterwards.

And, he's, he's on his bike, which is brilliant getting to school

cuz there's no one else around.

So, he's on his bike.

I'm on the one wheel and we fucking book it to school, , dead, dead easy.

I then come into the office and got finished up at, on

calls at like three o'clock

. Go and grab our bar , and score

It's mental.

You've got all, parents there on they've just got no ability to see what else is

going on and it's just, it's horrible.

We cross the road and our Barney then, because he wants to get on his bike.

He wanted to time how long it's gonna take him to get home.

So he's, Teter, toing, dicking around , with his watch, trying

to set like the stopwatch going.

And there's fucking kids everywhere.

There's a mom over here with a trolley that he can't pass.

And I.

Dude, what are you doing?

You've acting like an idiot.

And, you saw his face just drop and I'm like, fuck.

What I've done here is , I've taken that emotional, that stress level

that I'm experiencing right now.

And the tone should have been a hundred percent different.

And when, that tolerance isn't there or when mentally or not in the right

head space or whatever, that, that ability to snap, whether it's at your

kids, whether it's at your rather half, whether it's employees, it just raises.

And you're like, fuck,

Any interaction like that is always a reflection of yourself, isn't it?

a hundred percent.

I've done Exactly the same shit where I've been tired.

I haven't been looking after myself.

I'm more snappy you, what you do, you take it out on the

people that are closest to you.

If you're tired, which you know, which is really sleep is the

pillar everything's built on you.

You're fucked.

You really are fucked.

Cuz everything goes out the window.

You're not gonna eat properly.

You're not gonna exercise properly.

You know, everything around.

You's gonna seem worse.

I've been through that.

I've done that for years and it's not a nice place.

It's not a nice place to be.

But I think, you know what I think most people operate like that.

, they think they're relaxing cuz they've sat in front of Netflix for

three hours before they go sleep.

But they're not, they're just overly stimulated so they don't sleep properly.

They wake up tired.

And for me, when I broke it, when I was at last must have been

last year at some point during COVID, I just thought, fuck it.

I'm not gonna watch TV anymore.

That's it?

And I, I didn't watch TV for like three months

That's amazing.

and, and the change is just, it is incredible because suddenly you're

like, you get to the evenings, you're just sort of like, oh, I'll

read a book, I'll do something else.

You start to relax a bit more.

And , as soon as you're a bit more relaxed, you know what the people

around you are a bit more relaxed

, I'm the same from a news media standpoint, like ruthlessly ignore all of that shit

I think what a lot of people forget way that Netflix is designed,

the way that, TV is designed is designed to keep you fucking engaged.

And the way that they keep you engaged is to play on your emotions and to keep

you addicted , to watching the screen, which like you said, brings you down.

That's they show you, that's why it goes straight onto the next.

Yeah.

That's it straight into the next one fucking emotional hook and it

changes your mood, doesn't it?

And unless you realize that this shit is going on, or unless you are aware of

what you're watching in the evening and unless you start making choices around

that sort of thing, it's amazing how much it fucks with you , it's crazy.

Absolutely crazy.

you, You mentioned about the energy levels and fitness, , your

let's call it like fitness.

Journey's been nothing short of fucking phenomenal mate.

So you, you went from a place of.

I'm not gonna say standing still doing nothing, but, but arguably can't yeah.

I was gonna, I was gonna, I was gonna try and make feel not as bad as you were,

but you're at a point now where you're doing fucking iron mans ultra-marathons

So, so talk, talk me through where were you like, fuck,

I need to do something here.

It was COVID I suppose.

And first lockdown . Everybody was just like fucking ran, drinking, eating shit.

The weather was fantastic.

But barbecues going on,

but then it got to the second lockdown and I thought, I can't repeat that again.

I don't, our body can take that, eating all the shit and you're drinking

more because you're at home and I thought something's gotta change.

And I started listening to David Goggins . I got his book.

I remember within weeks I was out on my birthday.

I thought fuck it.

I'd run like 16, 16, K.

And my body was fucked after . I couldn't walk for days after that.

That was the trigger.

I just thought it's time to turn it around within a month.

My mate said to me, oh, do you wanna do a triathlon next year?

And I'm way, way off being fit enough to do this.

I haven't swam in like, 30 years.

Um, so I thought, fuck it I'll enter it.

That's always the best way.

Enter something which is far enough in advance that you've gotta commit to it.

And that, that was it.

I just started running around all through the winter.

I was cycling loads.

I started swimming in the sea.

Wow.

That's fucking hardcore.

Open water swimming.

I mean you're not messing around there.

Never done it before.

It's just me and this guy out there, he's on a paddle board, I'm in the fucking sea.

You feel very vulnerable.

I but I just thought, that's my weakness.

I'm just gonna, you know, push through,

as part of the training, you've been doing the vegan side of things . So

from your ,standpoint, Alan, what's the impact been from a performance

standpoint and, is it something you'd recommend and say is worthwhile doing.

Yeah, it's a big change, you know, I like my meat.

I didn't really go in for the ethical side of things.

I went for the sort of health, , I've got psoriasis,

which is in autoimmune condition.

Basically the body's attacking itself.

It thinks it needs to repair itself, but there's nothing wrong with it.

So I'd read that you could go to veganism, whatever.

I thought I'd give it a try.

And I tried it multiple times, but it's really fucking difficult to maintain.

And then it just came to be that it was COVID started run.

I dunno if I had more determination, I started then.

And for me, yeah, it's been a massive game changer.

, I exercise a lot.

The recovery's incredible.

, my mood was a lot better.

My body just felt a lot better.

Every now and again, still I slip into a bit of dairy.

, I'm like, ah, it's the kid's birthday.

I'll have a bit of cake and that will set me off where for the next

few weeks I might be eating dairy.

Cause I, I like cheese.

I like chocolate.

I like those sort of things, you know?

I'm not like a hundred percent vegan.

Yeah.

Good for you.

And I I'll dip into it and I won't give myself a hard time.

And it, funny enough, it all started when I went up to rich and Lee and I'd been,

I'd been for probably about three months.

I hadn't , any dairy, any meat and holiday and there's a place called I

think it's, uh Betty's um, and it's they do like these fondant fancies.

I thought, fuck it.

I'll go in there.

And yeah, got a couple of fondant fancies and that's all it took as it started.

Then I went out that night and we had Indian.

Then I had some, I had some, I think I had some cheese, some pane and for,

for the next few, probably for three or four weeks, I was eating more dairy.

But then you just don't beat yourself up, draw a line, start get on it.

Yeah.

That's , the dairy would be, I'm a fucking huge Ben and Jerry like

ice creams, like my cryp tonight.

There's ice cream in the house.

me.

It's it's brutal.

The imitation shit, imitation imitation with cheese is just shit.

The ice cream is not bad these days, what you can get, but it's still it's.

It's not, it's not the same

as soon as you realize, it's sort of like, cuz now I'm like intimate.

I do.

I've been doing intermittent fasting all year and it's just like fucking

don't eat till like, I don't know, lunch time, finish eating, miss breakfast,

finish eating, uh, dinner time.

I don't eat anything after six o'clock.

As soon as you get the thing is all these habits take time for the first few days

of cravings will pass until the point where you get to after a few weeks, it's

like, yeah, I'm not eating for after six o'clock I'm not gonna fucking snack.

I'm not gonna have those sugar.

And suddenly the benefits just start to, you know, explode

and you're just feeling better.

You're waking up.

You're in a better mood.

Everything seems to be going better.

So for me, definitely.

I would say that is, yeah, it has really, um, changed things for me for the better.

That's amazing.

I still need to give that shit a go.

I've gotta make it out.

And, and, and maybe as long as there's some vegan fucking Ben and

Jerry's will, will be aware the

There is mate.

There is

you, you mentioned about going to, to, to see rich or go, go and

see your brother you're obviously working with rich on a day to day.

I know you, you're both working in different offenses in terms of terms

of running the business, but then when you're together as family, do you, do you

like keep work separate or how, how the fuck do you balance that as, as brothers?

Do you just fucking talk about work when you're together

or what's your situation there?

yeah.

I mean off to be fair.

Often we like, when I come up to leads, it's like, work's happening because

I'm going, it's only the two of us.

I'm going to visit him.

He's got a laptop set up in the kitchen.

He's got calls coming in.

He's got inquiries coming in.

So it's just like, yeah.

You know, I'm working as well.

That's the thing, I'm, I'm not, I've got stuff coming through.

but we, you know, when we're going out, we we've got activities,

we've got things planned.

We won't be working during that period.

But in the morning when we wake up, we might be doing

emails, might be doing calls.

There's always things going in the evening when the kids have gone to

bed and the misses are maybe tired of sleep, whatever we'll get on the laptop.

So there's no, I suppose we just, we just get things done whenever we can.

And what we started to do actually is more, um, is just

turn the advertising off.

Something that we hadn't done in the past is just switch it off.

. And we, we did it in August.

We had it off for , like probably a third of the month.

You know, it was amazing.

It was a really profitable month and I to, and I just need to out what day of

the week, it's really shit advertising.

Maybe just turn off once a week where we just don't, we don't don't

get inquiries cuz you get there's certain times where shit inquires

like today we've turned it off

Have a bit more of a relaxing day.

It's it's not gonna make much difference.

And you know, in the long run it actually might actually make us more

money and we've got less work to do so.

What's really instruction from , my standpoint.

There you talk about core one line empire principles, what, what you rich have.

Have very very smartly being able to set up is an ability about

turning advertising on and off.

Be able to turn that tap , up, down, left right center.

That's such a critical thing that I think a lot of people talk about

feast and famine and, and I believe that's where the feast and famine

creeps into because the advertising only gets turned on when it's quiet.

And being able to make sure that there's, a base level, but I can adjust the dial

to make sure there's consistency in place.

It's fucking huge that isn't, it, it makes so much differe.

Yeah.

It's massive in the past.

I think we were just like, let's spend as much as we can.

We were busy, crazy.

We weren't making any money.

Um, and I think it's about that balance.

We know when it's working and we know when it's not working.

That's fucking powerful cause I, I think that's that sometimes can cause a lot

of overwhelm for people as well, in terms of being like, right, I'm going

away and what am I gonna come back to?

Or are they gonna be inquiries in while I come while I go away or when I come back

and I'm gonna have to get things back up.

So from your standpoint, to be able to go, actually we're going away

and we can turn things off yet.

The day I land, I can turn that back on and snap within an instant fucking inquiry

company that gives you so much confidence that gives you so much control that

when you are away, you go, I can fucking breathe because I know when I step back

in, I've got the confidence in the system, in the fucking process we turn it on and

boom, straight back to hundred miles an hour, , which is really, really cool.

We haven't dug into nearly enough here, a yours and Rich's relationship.

The arguments that you've had disagreements let's

get into the nitty gritty

me and rich have always been close.

We obviously went to the same uni together, but also have some blazing,

probably rounds about all kinds of shit.

We started the business we were in the office.

There's many, a bla argument in that office.

We're living together for a few years as well.

So living together, we're working together.

There's some blow up arguments.

Like I can't remember what it's about.

It's probably over, over fucking nothing.

We're just like burning on both end.

We wanna go out in the evenings going enjoy ourselves.

So we're just sort of maxing, maxing that out.

But yeah, by the time I left leads, it's probably getting to a tipping

point where we were arguing every day.

About some bullshit.

I think you get in a habit.

, funny thing is soon as I moved to Devon, he's up in leads, effing changed.

We're in our own offices now.

And we've just like getting on all the time.

We're a really good point now.

I think this point, All happened when we both started on the sort

of health exercising and veganism at the same time, now we're

That's really

In the past, be a lot of J in they'll be trying to annoy each other,

be trying to wind each other up.

That's sort of there, but not to the same level.

It's more like enjoyable, but you're trying to really piss someone off.

We were trying to really antagonize them like kids do , like my daughter

and son do, or every fucking day, they're trying to piss each other off,

you know, bring it to the next level.

But , I think because we're mentally a very good place.

That's reflected in our relationship.

I think if you go back 20 years to where we started, we weren't

mentally in a very good place.

We're burning the candle.

We're going out drinking.

We're eating shit constantly.

We're not exercising.

We're trying to work, but at the same time, we're trying to play.

Somebody's gonna get annoyed.

And when there's only two of you, who are you gonna get annoyed at?

You're gonna unload on them.

, so we've been through our journey ourselves, which has been up and down

and now is now is a brilliant point.

But, you know, um,

Cause that, must be really cool to be able to share that the ups,

the downs, and, be able to, to go through that . I imagine, your dad

on the back of , that 20 K loan , and from a family unit, he must be

super fucking proud of, uh, of the.

Yeah, , I think it's been good for everyone.

In the early days it probably wasn't so good, but we probably

didn't tell anybody about it.

. You just carry on.

But I think what happens is in those early days, a lot of times wasted

arguments take a lot of time and take a lot of effort emotionally.

I think when COVID happened, , it was like, I'm gonna turn at man for the better

and get on this health journey, get on doing this, or I'm gonna potentially, I'm

gonna start drinking every single night.

Yeah,

And if I know people are still doing night and I

Oh, a hundred

you know, and I'm gonna drink every night.

And I know I got a problem.

I know I chat to you about a problem.

I have like drinking.

I know it's not good for me, and I don't drink at all really now, only

every now and again, but I've got friends who are drinking a bottle of

wine a night, you know, but it's just

And that, that becomes the new fucking normal, doesn't it

yeah,

very quickly..

Really now is for me, it's about longevity.

you know, I'm 40, how long can I get this body to last?

How long can I maximize my health and feel good, be around for my kids, enjoy

myself, , rather than fuck myself over.

. And , you can change it around, but change.

Isn't easy.

That's the problem change.

Isn't easy.

Now we're gonna get onto one of my favorite topics right now.

Employees

I'm always a huge believer in minimum employees, maximum

systems and, and automations..

So what was your experience like with employees?

I know you had someone for a while.

They then took a swift bullet to the back of the head talk

me through that experience

yeah, it's a tough one.

You know, when you go from just being, it's two of you and then fuck it.

We're getting a lot of inquiries through.

We'll get some staff on board

and it's the whole process for me to go through like hundreds

and hundreds applications, interview process, you get them.

But the problem is, . You are having to deal with their emotional

shit , you are like their sounding, you become their sounding board.

And suddenly your time that you thought you'd get back, isn't as

free as you thought it would be.

And it takes a long time to train them and suddenly that, , extra time I wanted

to get back, I wasn't getting that back.

It was, it was tough.

We had a few staff, it didn't really sort.

Work out and it's quite in our sort of business it's quite

a, a steep learning curve.

. And our last employee, , he was a good member of staff and he left

to join the police after a year.

And then I just thought to myself, do I want to go through that again?

You know, I've got the staff overheads, the costs, emotional sort

of like the physical, actual time.

And I've just actually been thinking recently on my cuz you have a

lot of ideas on your holiday.

I just went on holiday recently missed as I was talking on the way back about.

staff actually.

And I'm thinking to myself rather than get staff, , how many

inquiries can we and rich deal with?

What's our sort of top end we can deal with how much money can we make.

And then I'm starting to think rather than try.

And up the advertising, you need staff because there's only a certain

amount of inquiries you can deal with.

I started to think, forget that, just keep the same amount

of people going to the site.

How can I utilize them better?

So that inquiry is gonna end up getting converted at a higher rate.

So I'm not doing any extra work, you know, getting more inquiries, more quotes.

That's the angle which we're going from now is how can we make

more money out of the customers?

We've got maximize that as much as we can and then have the plan over the next few

years to maximize it and basically sell off the business, and do something else.

, it's tough.

Staff take a lot of time.

I know from all other people, that's something which always comes up.

People have always got problems with people and that's inevitable.

, but nobody anticipates that , it's gonna be demanding on themselves.

Yeah, a lot of time managing effort, doesn't it.

And especially in a business where there's so many fucking variables

. But , the fucking golden shower of insight from yourself there, Alan,

is, is that concept of going actually how can we take the same effort that

we're doing now and make more money?

that's The thing that a lot of people forget is , in order to make more money,

I've got to sell more things to more people and it's going well, do you really?

Because if we can sell more things to the same people, the effort it takes

to sell to those existing customers, we fucking slash the time by like 75%

cause already no, like, and trust you,

So, whereas before it might.

The equivalent of doing, let's say 10 follow up course to take a call person to

a cell to do that to an existing customer.

We're like, well, fuck, I can do that in one quote with one

cell and they're over the line

All of a sudden same energy, same effort.

But the output that we get from a profitability standpoint goes through

the fucking roof, which is what we want when we're operating as one, maybe

two people at a helm of a business.

That's where the game really starts being played at another level.

Isn't it?

Oh, a hundred percent.

. The thing is you've gotta realize there's so much money left on the

table, with every interaction you're having, are you maximizing that?

Can you automate something to put in place where you're gonna maximize

that rather than like you say.

It's a lot of effort getting new business.

And , they're just coming to you cause they want a quote.

And if the quote's good, they can get it on time they buy.

Um, and it's so much easier to sell more to your existing customers and

make it more profitably than it is to constantly go after new people.

It's a tipping point.

At some point along the line, we're trying to, what we're trying to

do is maximize what we can to make it the most efficient business.

And end of the day, that's gonna make it much more profitable when we sell it.

Cuz we can say, you know, look, our efficient is look what we are

doing, what two people are doing.

So I think, that's the way to go.

, if you wanna minimize the work, but maximize the output at the end of day.

fucking amazing.

Alan I know that you've got an important date with your two kids.

Was it steam fair?

You going to

Yeah.

It is fair season.

Doesn't not come around your September, I suppose.

Every

had, we had it.

When was it?

Maybe, maybe two or three weeks ago.

, what amazes me and I dunno what your two are like, but our, Barney,

the shittest fucking ride you've ever seen in the whole world.

, , they're like magnets to kids, aren't they?

And a fairground ride now you're in for three, four quid just to ride this thing.

. And he's like, I wanna ride that.

And I'm like, really?

, you want to go and ride that thing, but they love it.

It's amazing.

You've just gotta suck it up and put your AAL adult thinking in a bin and

trying to see it through their eyes.

you do.

You do.

One thing they love now is like hooking your duck.

The one where , you just win.

You can stand there all fucking day, takes 10 seconds, hook a duck.

You get to pick a prize.

And what is this?

This is the most, this prizes prizes of shit.

It's like you guaranteed a win.

I have to give you.

5 6, 7 pounds, which are these like one pound presence on things.

So you know, it's going home, they're gonna fucking forget

about it's gonna go in the bin.

It's gonna fall apart like hour.

But yeah, , they love it.

And you know, I think that's part of it.

Anyway.

It's just the enjoyment, the enjoyment they get.

They've be looking forward to all week.

but you know, that's, that's why we go to work.

Isn't it

Holy fuck When absolutely golden sheriff inside of that from a main man.

Our and Dylan.

I think for me, the big takeaway.

Is making sure you avoid that trap of sticking body after body

inside of a business and actually thinking, fuck me with the right

systems and the right processes.

The world is you're always stoned.

You can do some absolutely amazing things, especially when it comes to building

this thing for sale, more important, I don't know if any of you will go into

the park this afternoon with your kids but if you are make sure you avoid hook

a duck like the fucking plague other than that, gentlemen i've been charlie Horton.

you've been listening to me with alan dylan and i will